I recently received an email from Taherali on a discussion of what religion is about and he included this beautiful, simple poem which is so clear and refreshing.
My response:
Nice lines
from Tagore. I learned my Islam in a Christian school and may well have
learned it in Tagore's Ashram and been better equipped to address the
problems surrounding me today.
My problems today are nothing to do with Islam. Mostly they are to
do with inhumanity and inhumanity caused by the brainwashing by the
media.
Most if not all of my problems are political. If I look
in Kenya, I find that my progress is stymied by tribalism, corruption
and deception by the ruling classes who have given a new definition to
the word, 'class'.
What has Islam got to do with the root of the problem, the cause of
the Westgate debacle? Any terrorist from any persuasion might have
achieved a similar effect, the way the Israelis can do it to the
Palestinians, or Modi's followers did to Muslims in India or, indeed,
what the Shabab did to us here without discrimination. Yes, without
discrimination. They also killed Muslims after which the KDF is now
being accused of having razed the place like safari ants. If this
report turns out to be true as it probably will, if it is not covered
up, I would ask, what has the sequence of events to do with Islam?
If
you look in your own country you will find that these are the real
problems: Class definition by those who occupy the highest classes,
rule by an establishment that keeps a government in place as an agency,
corruption in high places that is not easy to stop (see what is
happening in India), deception by the rulers who have their own culture
and way of life, anger in sectors of the population who have reached a
point of exasperation and about to go over the brink and take the law
into their own hands (anarchy), the definition of one's own set of
beliefs hijacked and broadcasted by ignorants in the media, (the way Fox
News will broadcast, "Islam is a terrorist religion.", which is,
if you ask opinion leaders of an Islam that is being practiced to the
benefit of all communities around, like Yusuf Islam, Aga Khan, scholars
like Reza Shah Kazemi and hundreds of others, just not true.)
The moment you turn to means that are beyond intellectual and peaceful
to solve problems, you are crossing the bounds of what Islam is, and now
working from outside its ethic. Period. It is true of any faith.
No, Islam is not about going to the mosques and doing namaaz. That
is a personal routine that affects individuals and, in some respects,
congregations, in a manner that no one else can judge. It might be just
knee-bends to some and to others a deep expression of adoration and
worship and submission to a recognisable power that is conceivable.
I would say that media is a diabolical instrument of brainwashing
populations and providing definitions that are tempting to swallow, for
the express purpose of the furtherance of war and diversion of resources
into the hands of the banksters and their agents, like politicians and
country leaders. There is very little that is nationalistic or
patriotic about the rulers today.
Peace
Mohamed Jiwa
In parentheses...
The question that Taherali brought up was whether we should be worried about how the world looks today. Pictures are shown under the introduction, "Makes you think!" of people living in Iran, Afghanistan, Egypt and Netherlands in the 1960's and 80s, juxtaposed against the way people are dressed there today, focusing on women being covered from head to toe, in 2012. In the early days everyone simply looked relaxed and open, dressed in western clothes. The pictures of today show everyone (women, mostly) in burkha, and all covered up. This was followed by the question, "...and some people still do not see reason to worry?"
Here are the pictures:
8 Pictures = 1000 Words
Iran 1970
Imitation westerners?
Iran 2012
(Not a very fair example of Iranians as it shows them not having fun, which they do)
Afghanistan - Is this a fair picture, then?
Egypt: Cairo University 1959
Cairo University 2012
Amsterdam 1980
Amsterdam 2012
The pictures say a lot, yes, when put together in this way: They suggest that the world was once a beautiful, relaxed place when not many people were concerned about whether there was a killing to be made in oil, or not. This is, of course, entirely untrue. The only people who were happy with the world the way they found it were the affluent and the middle class.
While there may not have been much in the back of the mind of the children of affluent families in these countries there is no image of what the poor and the village people were doing at the time. What was their lifestyle? Were people being oppressed in the background? Was Israel not being established as the ruler of the Middle East? Who was making most of the money from the oil in Iran? What were the reasons that the Taliban erupted? Who was ruling Egypt before Nasser and what was he doing? How did the world emerge as a playground for puppet royalty into an environment that has been destroyed? What have we left for our children? Are these people in the burkhas to blame then?
Was not the SAVAK all over the place when Iran was like this? Where is their picture?
The argument is worth taking on in full. I hope I get the time to do it.
