The search for paradise

Book Review: Desperately Seeking Paradise: Journeys of a Sceptical Muslim by Ziauddin Sardar (Granta Books)

The 20th-century was meant to be the century when the ills which have blighted the human race had finally been overcome. Science and technology, it was felt, would allow man to be free from from all physical sufferings, such as disease, and irrational conditions, such as religious beliefs. Paradise -- in all its heavenly perfection -- could, at last, be realised on earth.

Yet, the thing the 20th-century gave us, above all else, was the death of such grandiose schemes and earthly utopias. Science and technology, like religion and philosophy before them, have not offered man any sort of salvation on this earth; for it was discovered that science and technology were complicit in as many, if not more, crimes against humanity than any religious doctrine. It is with this in mind that we turn to Ziauddin Sardar's (Islamic Futures, Explorations in Islamic Science, Postmodernism and the Other), semi-autobiographical account of three decades of his own attempts to find just such a earthly paradise.

Sardar's writing has always had two primary objectives. First, to 'critique' contemporary Muslim ideas, trying to expose their flaws, and to try and find solutions, mainly through the creation of a genuinley 'Islamic science'; and second, to put 'Western thought' in its place and show the real impact of the colonial encounter on the "Third World" (from where he gets his label as a 'Leftist'). Lace these views with some humour, often self-deprecating, add a hint of disrespect for self-proclaimed leaders of 20th-century Islam, and you have a man whose writings are a pleasure to read, even if you find his views annoying at times. His existence outside of established academic cliques -- Western or Muslim -- only adds to his image of an iconoclast.

His journey starts from the humble settings of Hackney in east London, and weaves its way across Britain, Morroco, Turkey, Iran, Syria, Saudi, Iraq, Pakistan, China and finally Malaysia. Along the way he learns somethings about the Muslims who makeup 20th-century Islam that disturbs him. The Tablighi Jammat, an enounter with whom the narrative starts, fail to provide him with answers that can satisfy his underlying scepticism. But Islamic politics simply scares him, with its demands for 'perfect people having perfect faith' (p. 38). This utopia seems out of place in a world which is far from perfect. A second visit to Iran under the Revolution -- something which he, like most Muslim intellectuals of the time, supported -- seals his parting with the demands of political Islam: that it entertains neither criticism nor allows for dissent simply proved his earlier concerns right.

Natutrally, he wades into the lands of Sufism. Yet, even here he finds a mish-mash of personality cults, irrational dispositions and nothing which seems to provide him with a route to finding Paradise; indeed it seems to obscure the search for that very knowledge. "There was something at the core of mysticism -- all mysticism -- that was deeply flawed" (p. 69). Or maybe there was something wrong with 20th-century Muslim mystics? Yet an encounter with a Turkish Sufi leaves him both baffled and in awe, when the shaykh tells him "Islam is wearing a beard, a trench coat and a turban" (p. 79), and that if he cannot accept these as 'symbols' of his faith, he must find (or make?) his own.

He finds that his work to save Makkah from the modernising devestation of the Saudi ruling clan visited upon Madinah to be a failure. So much so that while on hajj he finds himself sitting "in the Sacred Mosque, reconstructed to look like an underground station complete with escalators" (p. 134). (Calling all Americans: 'the underground' is our subway.) The devastation, though, was not just physical, but an "ideological onslaught on its spritual and philosophical richness .. [the] subtle complextity disappearing from the mental enviroment" (p.134).

Even Sardar's own life highlights the contradictory and confused (or complex?) nature of the Muslim world when he uses Saudi and Iranian money to fund his modernising agenda. After a failed attempt to write a biography of the Prophet (p), during which time he falls out with Kalim Siddiqui (more on him later), he is invited to work on a 'progressivist' magazine, which he calls Inquiry. This is meant to serve as a platform for his criticisms and ideas of the Muslim world. Along the way he collects friends -- who refer to themselves as 'Ijmalis' -- to help him work on the magazine, many beardless (including Parvez Manzoor); one was even a Welsh female convert (Merryl Wyn Davies, with who has co-authored several books, including his latest American Dream, Global Nightmare) who, when asked why she became a Muslim, responds with an answer that any Muslim with years of learning would struggle to come up with: "Islam offers a coherent and intellectually satisfying framework in which to seek answers for all the pertinent questions about the purpose of life" (p. 207).

His critical views lands him in trouble on several occassions. On a visit to Pakistan he meets the then President-General (some things never change do they?), one Zia-ul-Haq, who he had called a "deranged dictator". He also find mind-numbing sectarianism breeding and thriving in the madrassahs across the border provinces (though this does a disservice to all madrassahs). In China he disappoints a Muslimah when he says he is not looking for a second or third wife, but finds a Muslim community slowly emerging from its isolation. And in Malaysia he finds his biggest disappointment since his self-realisation in Makkah. The fall of Anwar Ibrahim, a man who was credited with trying to create a multicutural Islamic environment in Malayasia, leaves Sardar and his fellow Ijmalis at a loss. If not here, where?

The portraits of the Malay philosopher Naqib al-Attas, and the Turkish historian of science Ekmalettin Ihsanoglu, are very favourable (and with good reason). But he is scathing of Kalim Siddiqui, fervent supporter or the Iranian Revolution, and Ismail Raji al-Faruqi, father of the 'Islamisation of Knowledge' project. After criticising the Revolution, Siddiqui threatens to break Sardar's legs, and the two depart; Siddiqui, who Sardar describes as having 'authoritarian tendencacies' and a 'full-blown Trotsky', later helps end the Iranian funding of Inquiry by exposing Sardar as its 'real' editor. For Sardar, al-Faruqi's 'Islamisation' is naivity, a "still-born" (p. 198) idea which would struggle to stand on its own two feet if it were not for the funding given by many governments. Not surprisingly, the invites to many Islamic conferences who had been supporters of the 'Islamisation' thesis dried up.

Converts (or 'reverts') come in for sharp criticism ("Most of the converts I knew tended to be more Muslim than Muslims themselves; each one seemed to have a strong puritanical and decidely unsavoury trait" (p. 206)). But he would be confusing his own, limited, experiences with the experiences of the ummah as a whole which has been favourable. Think of all the 'converts' who have enriched our faith in the last 100 years (not forgetting that the early Companions of the Prophet (p) were themselves 'converts'): Marmaduke Pickthall, Yusuf Islam, Muhammad Ali, Martin Lings, Yassin Dutton, Charles Le Gai Eaton, Abdul-Hakim Murad, to name but a few.

No book by a British Muslim would be complete without revisiting the 'Rushdie Affair', considered a turning point in British-Islamic understandings, usually for the worst. Sardar, who sits comformtabley with his liberal tag, finds himself outflanked not only by the likes of Khomeyni and his fatwa, but also by the very liberal cabal in British public life who he used to see as his friends. Fay Weldon, among others in the literary establishment, attacked Islam as a 'wicked and nasty religion', compared to 'compassion and grace' of the Christian Bible: where did their beloved secularism (supposedly a "religion-neutral" concept) go now? Though the whole episode is remembered for that fatwa, what many forget was the outright racist views which were openly expressed by so-called 'liberals'; indeed anyone asking for understanding of the Other (I'd have thought a classical liberal position) was shot down as a 'hypocrite' to 'Western values'. That liberalism in Europe has long been opposed to any religious traditions which seek public recognition should have come as no surprise to Sardar. His dismay and real sense of hurt (betrayal?) is only compounded when his rebuttals to Rushdie, including his book (Distorted Imagination: Lessons from the Rushdie Affair), are given a wide berth by the liberal establishment, newspapers and publishing houses.

Sardar struggles at times to get to grips with certain aspects of Islamic history. My biggest criticism would be that he has a tendency to reduce a varying and complex history into simplistic narratives to service his own views on how things ought to be -- something he criticises other Muslims for doing. Certainly, he has to reduce some aspects in order to fit them into his overall narrative on how he views ideas and concepts in Muslim history. But at least he should acknowledge other views, and let the reader know that he has given them their due consideration, rather than simply ignoring or dismissing them. That he failed to realise the criticisims within 'orthodox' Shi'ism regarding Khomeyni's "rule by clergy", and the varied nature of how the Shi'i Imamate is understood, makes him as guilty of the very people he criticises.

Though he could be forgiven forgiven for his misunderstanding of Shi'ism (given his Sunni background), the problems he creates for himself when tackling other, sensitive, areas of Muslim history are not so easily overlooked. Three areas where I believe he struggles on are in his discussion of the shari'ah, his survey of 'secularism' in Islamic history, and on his discussion of Mu'tazilism and its legacy.

On the first he asserts that the shari'ah is defined as "nothing more than a set of principles, a framework of values that provides Muslim societies with guidance" (p. 248), and gives the impression there has been little activity in legal literature since the 9th- and 10th-centuries. The problem here is several-fold. He is simply repeating the classical Orientalist view of Islamic legal history, popularised by Watt (among others): that upon 'closing the gates of ijtihad', Muslim jurists simply ceased to think. Much modern scholarship has shown this to be patently false. For the Muslim, to who Islam is a living, breathing, reality, constant references to the shari'ah is a very real experience; that new questions are posed daily and new answers drawn up, itself shows that Islamic legal activity is very much alive, whatever the scope of these answers. Sardar also fails to comes to grips with the relationship between 'thinking anew' ('ijtihad') and authority in Islamic law: many modernisers and reformists of law were not rejected because their ideas were "un-Islamic" or were not derived from the "texts" of Islamic law (indeed some of their ideas were thorougly "Islamic"). But they were perceived as lacking the authority to make these judgements.

Second, he fails to define shari'ah (and distinguish what "it" is from, say, fiqh) with all its subtleties: it is not simply a "framework". Granted this is one possible, and very valid, explanation. But he needs to appreciate that it could easily refer to the entire legal and political history of Muslims; or it could refer to some normative ideals within Islamic "texts" (a slightly more abstract concept); or it might refer to some core "texts" (such as the Qur'an and the sunnah of the Prophet (p)); or any combination of these, or even something else. Maybe he should have been clearer in telling the reader that this is his own interpretation of Islamic legal history, one which he would need to reason and defend against other arguments.

Thirdly, and this is a criticism from a more 'religious' perspective, Sardar -- like many modernisers -- does not show that he appreciates that questions relating to ibadaah (that is 'how to worship God') are also an integral part of the shari'ah. Merely calling shari'ah a 'medieval body of law' does violence to these, very important, religious tenants. Indeed most modern reformists overlook the importance of prayer.

Before discussing Mu'tazilism, Sardar claims that, "secularism has a strong presence in Islamic history even though it was not articulated as a clear and distinct separation of religion and political power" (p. 251). The main fault here is taking an idea we have, secularism, and projecting it backwards onto some other period in history. 'Secularism' was coined as late as the 19th-century by George Holyoake, and has its own philosophical concerns and problems. It is more complex than the simple pious statement "separation of church and state" (which he acknowledges later) would allow us to believe. Must we make things even more difficult to understand by making unneccassary assumptions like the 'unarticulated secularism of Islamic history'? He would have been better of critiquing the classical Muslim state in the same way as somone like Fazlur Rahman, who suggested that there was a de facto secularity in Muslim political culture, where the state had been divorced from the 'moral values of Islam'.

It is when we get to Mu'tazilism itself that I believe he makes the biggest mistakes. First, he writes that the Mu'tazlites "denounced strict, Shariah-based faith and worked to transform Islam into a more humanistic religion" (p. 252). He then goes on to cite al-Farabi, Ibn Sina and, most bizarrely, Ibn Rushd, as examples of Mu'tazilites. He ends his views on them by suggesting that the "clear-cut victory for the Asharites ... sealed the fate of secular humanism in Islam; and hurled Muslim civilisation into its present trajectory" (p. 254).

I am not sure these three men were Mu'tazilities. Ibn Rushd certainly would not have gained acceptance as an expert in Islamic law (despite criticisms of his philosophical arguments) if he was a Mu'tazilite. The Muslim philopshers had their own views, largely independent of Mu'tazilite concerns. It seems the word here is being used to define anyone with a penchant for rational argumentation. But then the historical opponents of the Mu'tazilites, the Ash'arites, where no less given to the use of rational arguments in defending their own views while attacking others (e.g. Fakr ad-Din ar-Razi was a chief exponent of logic, and the real gem in Ash'arite theology). It is a mistake, perpetueted by classical acounts of certain Oritentalists and Muslims themselves, that the Ash'arites, especially al-Ghazali, rejected 'reason'. What they found were flaws in 'reason'; on the moral front, al-Ghazali expressed scepticism in the 'realist' arguments of Mu'tazlities and their like.

Second, the Mu'tazilites, despite their status as heretics in Muslim orthodoxy, were a pietist-rationalist movement (if we can call them a 'movement') concerned with the questions relating to 'good' and 'evil', 'paradise' and 'hell', 'belief' and 'disbelief', 'God' and 'scripture'. It seems absurd to equate them with secular humanists. That Muslim civlisation was hurled into its "present trajectory" by this theological debate is to assume far too much. It assumes that had Mu'tazlite views made a greater impact on Muslim theologians and jurists (and who said they didn't?), the Taliban would have been proto-Progressive Muslims (i.e. liberalism as understood today would have neccessarily emerged from Islamic societies).

It is also false to say that they were not concerned with 'statecraft' (p. 252), for it was under the Mu'tazilite-influenced Caliph al-Ma'mun that the infamous inquisition of 'traditionalists' occured (most infamously the jailing of Ahmad Ibn Hanbal). This they did under the famous verse in the Qur'an asking Muslims to 'command that which is good and forbid that which is evil'. Yet this episode is totally overlooked by Sardar (as it is in most modern histories of Mu'tazlism).

There was also, I believe, a mistake by Sardar. On p. 61, he describes `Abd al-Qadir al-Jilani, the famous Sufi, as an "Indian". I'm open to correction here, but from what I've read he was born in Jilan (hence his name), an area which is just south of the Caspian.

In the end, Sardar shows secular reason that there is a world beyond the fashionable reductionist materialism of our times, and that the Muslim world itself is trapped in this secularist world. Paradise, as Sardar discovers, is not any place on earth. But an earthly paradise is itself a journey; "the Muslim paradise is not a place of arrival, but a way of travelling. Just as we cannot stop living, we cannot stop searching for our paradise. But the search is a continual kind of becoming. All the failed paradises I have discovered are based on the misguided notion belief of arrival." (p. 339) To the Muslim the means and methods must as "Islamic" as the ends. The books ends as it began, with Sardar, nursing his bruised mind and body at his North London home, inviting a new group of younger, fresher, Muslim Britons keen to help their co-religionists. The path to paradise opens up once more.

In general, this is a an enjoyable read. It's classic Sardar, and anyone -- friend or foe -- ought to take the time to read the views of a man who is an important in British public life as modern Islam struggles to find its place in Britain. As one other reviewer points out: this is "an Islamic journey", and not that of Naipual.

Comments

[Yusuf Smith]

As-Salaamu 'alaikum, Zia Sardar wrote one of the first books I read on Islam which was instrumental in persuading me to accept Islam, and so I find it disappointing to hear a lot of what he says given that he did so much for me (even without knowing me). Yes, you're right about Abdul-Qadir al-Jilani. He was Persian (Gilani) and did most of his work in Baghdad.

I actually saw him speak at Borders in Charing Cross Road, London, next to Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, and he was commenting on Muslim attitudes to Qadianis. Then he said that they are beginning to call "your lot", the Isma'ilis, non-Muslims as well. Which Muslims always have, in fact. They have not always made a big thing about it with the Isma'ilis, because the Ismailis don't go round loudly proclaiming themselves to be the True Muslims, which the Qadianis do.

At this event I took him up on his claim that Wahhabism was tribalism with Islam as the tribe, when in fact it has the characteristics of straightforward tribalism - it comes from the same part of the Arabian peninsula which resented having a Quraishi prophet (sall' Allahu 'alaihi wa sallam), and many of its outlying communities are found in so-called "marginalised" populations, particularly in ghettoes, and among refugees (eg Somalis). It may be true in the case of the violent, bin-Laden type of Wahhabi, however.

[Yusuf Smith]

Sorry, just to clarify, when I said "your lot", I was referring to what Zia said to Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, who is an Isma'ili herself.

[Haroon]

Salam

Beautiful post, Thebit. It's always excellent to read.

Here in West Philadelphia, there is an enormous African-American Muslim community and it's widely recognized that it's growing fast. Converts keep coming in. Many of these converts are attached to very "harsh" interpretations of Wahhabism, one might say, but I do not begrudge that (even though I do not agree with that.)

Islam was begun by converts and the ferocity of their commitment. For many who convert, Islam is the way to God. For someone like myself, Islam is this thing I have inherited and have to figure out, on top of it also being a spiritual and social path... So I don't agree with Sardar's analysis of the fidelity of converts. I mean, I agree that it's there, but I can't see it as a bad thing in many cases...

Yusuf, if you could expound on your comment on tribalism and Wahhabism, I'd be most grateful...

[thabet]

wa alaykum as-salaam

Yusuf: To me, Wahhabism is long dead. It passed away when the modern Saudi state was formed, and the Saudi state is a Salafi sate. The two might be lumped together by their critics, but they are very different. One (Wahhabism) was pre-modern, their worldview rooted in their Bedouin culture. The latter, Salafism/s (for there is more than one), are very 'modern' -- it has managed to form a coherent political ideology (a good sign of the impact of modernity), and has found itself fighting colonialism. Some see Saudi as the ideal "Islamic state"; others as a hypocritical ruling family. The same is said for bin Laden. For example most Salafis, as you might know, are religiouslly opposed to the use of suicide bombings.

I am saying these things not to defend Salafisms or the Saudi state (they pay enough people to do this, so why should I do it for free ;-) But to put across the "other" side, if only to facilitate understanding.

As for Sardar himself, I think his most useful work is on critiquing modern Islamic science. I am afraid I agree with his overall assessment that it is of poor quality, unable to think outside of the box, stuck in merely mimicking "western" science or miracle-mongering. When I see people who are schooled in the classical Islamic disciplines promoting the Qur'an or the hadith as a source of "the latest scientific discovery" I have to cringe with embarrassment.

As for Sardar's views on Islam in general, especially law: I think he is sloppy in the use of words. His arguments might have more merit if he payed attention to them and what they meant, rather than ignoring the same history he likes to promote. (I left the same comments on your blog.) The irony is that as he defends Islamic history from the Outsider, he is rejected by his own.

Haroon: Thanks, you're too kind.

We -- you and I -- were Muslims, first and foremost, in the social and cultural sense (note: I am not talking of that famous hadith), born ito an era where we are a "minority". Some of us found it hard to keep this 'normative' faith, especially as out societies viewed our skin colour and funny names with suspicion, even contempt. Later, some of us discovered that element of our culture which makes them "Islamic" in the first place -- the Transcendent.

The convert, however, comes from the Outside. He often sees something we do not. He (or she) must see that which transcends "culture". The sad thing is that, as much as we like celebrate converts, especially white ones (it massages the ego), they are often shunned and neglected; treated like an unwanted pet among certain communities. And here I mean Pakistani communities, especially the ones who practice some sort of traditional Pakistani Islam (some form of Hanafism, Barelvism, Deobandism etc). When was the last you saw a traditional Pakistani family -- one long settled in the UK (or US?) -- marry their daughter to an upright Muslim outside their own birth village, or clan, let alone racial or ethnic group? Among my own relations recently there was much "uproar" that X cast married Y cast. Or earlier when there was disgust that a Punjabi family of "our cast" allowed their daughter to marry an Indian Gujrati. I've heard derision and contempt for black Muslims, where they would not even think the same of a black non-Muslim (indeed they can be close friends, and elements of "black (popular) culture" in Britain has made inroads into British-Pakistani youngsters). And these people are not your simple, "backward", villager.

I can honestly say had I not been witness to such scenes, I would not be repeating them here now.

In this respect, at least, "Wahhabis" (that is all groups identified as such by their critics) are better -- they seek (if unsuccessfully) to transcend their own provincialisms.

This is not to belittle Muslim ("Islamic") cultures (emphasis on plural). I believe "The One Islamic Culture Of All Times" as promoted by some is empty, vapid, meaningless and really means a replacement of their own opinions for "Islam". But it is to seek that which makes them "Islamic" in the first place. This is what Ramadan, for example, is asking Muslims in Europe to do; to make their own "European" culture but one which remains "Islamic". If Pakistani or Indian Muslims can have their own culture, why not European Muslims?

An Ibn Fadlan or an Ibn Battuta told Muslims there were "truths" other than their own local ones -- a Sardar of our own time is seeking to do the same, I believe. This ought to enrich us.

(Just to clarify: this doesn't mean the attempts by Ramadan, Sardar, or anyone else is free critcism.)

[Yusuf Smith]

As-Salaamu 'alaikum, just one point in reply to Thabet about intermarriage and provincialism: in my experience, a lot of the urban ghetto Wahhabis don't attempt to transcend their provincialism, much as they like to think they're the universal Muslims and those Pakistanis down the road who are stuck in their "grave-worship" etc are just following culture. One of them (a quite recent convert) told me in response to my attempts to persuade him towards Ahlus-Sunnah that he had consulted his "good friends" in Brixton, and that he was following what they said to him.

I have personally heard a Carribean convert's hard-luck story about a Somali who refused him his daughter because he wasn't Somali, and a Libyan who demanded a five-figure mahr in gold, but the truth is this man had detestable adab and I would not marry any daughter of mine to him if he was the last man on earth. I speak as someone who has had three explicitly racist rejections for marriage from immigrants of two different backgrounds, but if we are talking about seriously religious Muslims, I still think we converts have a lot more to learn about Islam and being Muslim than they do.

[Hassan]

pls anybody tell me abt AZAAN who was tour of pak, india bang pls contact me here
hassanjng@yahoo.com
thanks