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Be not as those who scattered and fell into variance after the clear signs came to them; .... (3: 105)
And with those who say `We are Christians' We took compact; and they have forgotten a portion of that they were reminded of. So We have stirred up among them enmity and hatred, till the Day of Resurrection; and God will assuredly tell them of the things they wrought. (5:14)
So for their breaking their compact We cursed them (the children of Israel) and made their hearts hard, they pervert words from their meanings; and they have forgotten a portion of that they were reminded of ...; (5:13)
In the above verses of the Quran, one can discern the emphasis on this point: the proneness of a people to distort their sacral perspective of history due to collective sinfulness, negligence, ambition, prejudice, and malice. The Quran partially affirms the biblical sacral history, but it rejects the Jewish and Christian sacral perspectives of the future as mass hallucinations.
The development of secular history, from an Islamic viewpoint, is a result of blindness to the sacral pattern of life which envelops all aspects of life, ethical, social, political, economic, etc. Man's view of the past sacral history is internally distorted and clouded by the accumulated prejudices of past generations. Divine revelation plays a role of an objective corrector of sacral perspective, as the Quran does in regard to history, the past and the future, for all nations of mankind. The Quran encourages human beings to view history in a sacral perspective with the help of the revealed truth, without which they can neither understand the past, the present or the future. There is no place in it for the secular history which is an unrealistic, partial, and schizoÂphrenic picture of the past based on ignorance or neglect of the essentially sacral pattern of all reality. Secular history, therefore, may be compared to an attempt to explain psychological and biological phenomena in exclusive terms of chemical reactions.
Moreover, the Quran offers certain general guide‑lines for putting events in a correct sacral historical perspective, as can be seen from the following verses:
That is because God would never change His favour that He conferred on a people until they changed what was in themselves .... (8:53)
.... God changes not what is in a people, until they change what is in themÂselves .... (13: I1)
Frequently the Quran asks believers to undertake a study of the past peoples and civilizations and find out why some nations perished without a trace (3:137, 16:36, 37:69, 30:42). There are also frequent references to the unchangeable Sunnah of God governing the character and historical fate of nations (33:62, 35:43, 40:85, 48:23, 17:77). In all these verses, the Quran asks Muslims to develop a sacral view of the entire history of mankind, and reminds them that they are no excepÂtion to the Sunnah or the sacral laws which control the destiny of nations, and whose neglect caused many a nation to perish without leaving any trace. In this fashion, the Quran lays the foundations of a sacral historiography of mankind, a subject which was paid some attenÂtion by Muslim historians,' who laid the foundation of a philosophical and sociological study of history, but unfortunately they could not make much advance in the direction of developing a specifically Quranic view of historiography in the strict sense of the term `sacral'. They actually contributed to the development of modern secular outlook of history.
Modern historiography owes much to Muslims but not ‑from the sacral viewpoint. Modern historians and archeologists who study the relics of past cultures approach the subject with a secular outlook, and, therefore, their research, though not entirely unproductive, fails to obtain desirable results. Also it suggests the role of revelation as a corrector of sacral perspectives, as in the case of the Jewish and Christian sacral histories.
From an Islamic viewpoint, the Christendom, lacking the proper sacral criteria necessary for viewing post‑scriptural history in a proper perspective, and as it flourished in the cradle of Rome's pagan environÂment, had to accommodate considerably the secular or sacral view of social reality and history. The post scriptural Christianity gradually lost its sacral thread of history and could no longer see a sacral pattern in the events. It seemed to ordinary Western Christian as if God no longer controlled the course of history and that it has lost sacral meaning for contemporary life. Didn't Nietzsche proclaim at the turn of the last century that "God is dead"? The Christian malaise also spread to the Muslim world and increasingly greater number of educated Muslims came to see the world and their own destiny through the Western‑made glasses of a secular socio‑historical perspective.
Perhaps among the Muslims the Shi'ah, more than other Muslims, have tended to see sacral patterns in historical events. The Shi'ah view the history of the post‑Prophetic period in a different perspective. In this perspective there are some events which have great significance for the Shi'ah, which have lesser or no sacral significance for most Sunni Muslims. One of those events is the martyrdom of al‑Imam al‑Husayn (A) and his relatives and companions in Karbala' in the year 61 A. H. The same event is seen in an altogether different light by some Sunnis and most Western scholars of Islam, who, viewing it through the secular glasses, see in it no more than a ruler's response to a challenging rival.
Of the contemporary events of significance in the Islamic sacral perspective are the revolution in Iran, the war imposed on the Islamic Republic by Iraq, and the Islamic resistance in Lebanon against the Zionist forces and their Western allies, especially the U.S. The occupaÂtion of the U.S. embassy at Tehran by the Muslim Students was another event, whose `sacral' significance for the Iranian Muslims perhaps went unnoticed except by R.W. Carlsen in his books on that crisis."
That the distortion of the sacral perspective may entail dangerous political results causing much conflict, turmoil and bloodshed is confirmed by the contemporary example of the formation of Israel. It would be interesting to apply the criteria of `satisfactory' results and `positive achievements' to the Zionist interpretation of the Jewish sacral history in the light of the decades of conflict and turmoil in the area and the exile, homelessness, oppression and bloodshed of Palestinian and Lebanese Muslims at the hands of the Zionists.
There are many other views expressed by Watt in this chapter, which, if critically examined, will require an entire book. For reasons of brevity we will refer only to one or two of these."
Watt briefly refers to what he calls `axes of anthropogenesis,' by which is understood "the process by which people become thoroughly human." He confronts the stupendous claim of Teilhard de Chardin that "during historic time the principal axis of anthropogenesis has passed through the West" with the suggestion that there may have been "other axes of anthropogenesis, at least in India and China, parallel to the Western or Christian axis." However, with a mixture of Western pride and Christian generosity he adds that "there are some grounds for thinking that from about AD 900 to AD 1300 this axis swung away from the Christian West to the Islamic Middle East."
From a purely Islamic viewpoint, anthropogenesis cannot be described on a regional or racial basis. From a spiritual viewpoint, according to Islam, God is the source of anthropogenesis, and revelation is its means:
O believers, respond to God and the Messenger when he calls you unto that which will give you life; and know that God stands between man and his heart, and that to Him you shall be mustered. (8:24)
However, if one were forced to identify a historical landmark in human history, there is the unique figure of Abraham, who through his whole‑hearted devotion to God changed the course of human history. The Quran refers to Abraham as hanif (3:67, 3:95. 4:125, 16:123), khalill (4:125), ummah (16:120), imam (2:124), and His chosen one (3:33), in whose descent God promised to bless all nations of mankind according to the Bible. If we may talk of an axis of anthropogenesis, here we may locate it, in the light of both the Bible and the Quran.
Humanity in Relation To God
In the book's seventh chapter "Humanity in Relation to God," Watt at length deliberates over the Muslim and Christian terms used for description of the relationship of human being with God. Earlier we have referred to such terms as `abd (servant, slave, worshipper), and `ibadah (service, servitude, worship) used by the Quran, and saw that the two terms were interrelated. With reference to the issue of secular and sacral history we have quoted the Quranic verse 51:56, according to which `ibadah of God is the primary objective of the creation of human beings. Not only human beings, but all the beings in the universe are `ibad or servants of God:
None is there in the heavens and earth but he comes to the All‑merciful as a servant. (19:93)
Thus, `ibadah or service being the goal of all creation, it is quite fitting that human beings should be generally described as `ibad Allah, the `servants of God.' Let us see what Watt has to say on this point. At first he mentions the modern Western Christian's allergy towards the term `slave' "because of the connotations of the word in Western society since the sixteenth century." Here Watt may be referring to the Western experience of slavery which has left behind a deep sense of guilt embedded in the European and American White man's conscience, and which makes the term `slave' highly detestable. He points out that although the Islamic depiction of man's relationship with God by the term 'abd may "seem strange to the Western Christian, there is much in the Bible which is parallel to it. When Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David and the prophets are referred to as `servants of the Lord,' the word for `servant' is `ebed, which is the Hebrew equivalent of the Arabic `abd and is often represented in the Septuagint by the Greek doulos, `slave'."
Watt, too, is not free of the Westerner's allergy to the word, for he considers the status of the `abd of God as something below human dignity, or at least improper to the contemporary man's sense of dignity. He remarks:
"The chief way in which the modern Muslim rises above the status of slave is when he becomes God's agent or steward in this world. In the Quran (2:30‑33) there is an account of how God informed the angels that He was about to establish Adam as His khalifah (successor, deputy) in the earth .... In recent centuries, however, Muslims in general have come to interpret the passage about Adam as implying that God has given humanity a position of stewardship in His world. In some respect this would seem to be an advance on the status of slave. (p. 127)
This `recent' 12 improvement in the status of the Muslim from being `a slave of God' to His `deputy', as envisioned by Watt, does not help him in catching up with the Christian (Watt is not bothered with the Jew), who has been already the `son of God' for nearly two thousand years; for Watt further remarks that,
In the New Testament the possibility is also presented of man rising above the status of slave to God [which he was throughout the era of the Old TestaÂments, neglecting of course the presumptuous self‑promotion of the Jew to the status of `sonship', whom Watt quotes from John 8:41 as saying to Christ, "God Himself is the only father we have, and we are His true sons."], since it is repeatedly affirmed that the Christian believer has been raised to the status of `son'. The essential distinction seems to be that the slave or servant does not know what the master is about, whereas the son does. (p. 129)
Watt agrees, therefore, that the modern Muslim's promotion (a rise of which the Muslim has become conscious, according to him, only lately, after nearly fourteen centuries after the Quran was revealed) to the place of God's deputy "at least slightly" raises him "above servile status, since one who acts for God as His `agent', or `steward' is more than a mere slave."
Watt goes on to imply that the Quran's rejection of God's having sons or daughters was perhaps due to the lack of training on the part of the Prophet's contemporaries in the symbolic uses of language, `sophisticated naivety' being, of course, a later invention. In another remark which is obliquely aimed to insinuate `the presence of human element' in the Quran, he speculates:
As is well‑known, the Quran denies the possibility of God having sons and daughters (6:100, etc.), and this applies both to pagan beliefs and to Christian belief about Jesus. Presumably the Quran made these assertions because many of Muhammad's contemporaries understood these terms literally.
The Quran, contrary to what Watt imagines, perfectly knows what it is talking about and what the Christians and the Jews believed. It rebukes all attempts to claim any special proximity and relationship with Him, which in reality boils down to a claim of inherent superiority over other human beings. The `sonship' complex like the `chosen people' theory, according to the Quran, is rooted not in spirituality but in communal and national pride. The Quran carefully avoids any vocabulary which may become the cause of such collective afflictions as pride and prejudice, such as afflicted the Jews in Christ's time, to whose claim that "we are God's true sons," Jesus replies, "If God really were your father, you would love me, because I came from God and now I am here.‑You are the children of your father, the Devil, and you want to follow your father's desires." (John 8:42‑44) It is not logical to assume that Jesus would sanction for his followers a vocabulary which he condemns the Jews for using, because to permit the Christians to consider themselves the `sons of God' would be equivalent to exposing them to the same kind of dangers of spiritual prejudice and blindness which afflicted the Jews who opposed Jesus.
In any case, even if the `son‑father' terminology were considered to be a permissible substitute for the `abd‑Rabb terminology used by the Quran for true believers, it cannot be applicable indiscriminately to any group of a religious community, whether Jew, Christian, or Muslim, which includes all kinds of good and bad people, from the time of Moses to the present. The Quran rejects such supercilious claims made by the Jews and Christians in these words:
The Jews and Christians say, `We are the sons of God, and His beloved ones.' Say: `Why then does He chastise you for your sins? No; you are men of His creation [like other human beings]; He forgives whom He will, and He chastises whom He will.' (5:18)
The Quran refrains from using anthropomorphic terms in relation to God‑man relationship, which may be adversely misinterpreted, especially when they have connotations related with biological relationÂships among members of a species. The `Father‑Son' relation when applied to God with regard to Jesus, one of His eminent prophets according to Islam, perhaps led the early Christians to interpret God and Jesus as members of one species, sharing the same specific characteristic, namely, divinity. Probably the early Christian usage of the Father‑Son allegory was derived from the Jewish people's earlier eschatological hopes of a king in David's lineage "who would break the nations of the whole earth with an iron rod; and shatter them in pieces like a clay pot," (Psalms 2:8‑9) which either represented the impotent agony of a people in political slavery or exile or the imperialist fantasies of a nation clothed in a sacral and religious form. When Jesus appeared, he became the focus of all the high hopes of the Jews. They saw in him, "the Lord" of Psalms 110, "who sat at the right hand of God," under whose feet God would put his enemies, the "greatest king" and the `first‑son' of Psalms 89 who says to God, "You are my father and my God," and the "son of David" of 2 Samuel 7, where God i: alleged to have told David, "When you die and are buried with you ancestors, I will make one of your sons king and keep his kingdom strong. He will be one to build a temple for me, and I will make sure that his dynasty continues for ever. I will be his father, and he will he my son."
Watt presumes that the Quran rejects the `Sonship' of Christ because many of the Prophet's contemporaries understood these terms literally. This is a usual plea put forth by Christian writers. First of all there is little in the Gospels which precludes the notion that Christ was not regarded as the `Son of God' in the literal sense at least by a large group of early Christians of the era in which the Gospels were written. In the letter of Paul to, the Galatians (4:4), Paul refers to Jesus as "God's own son:" There is no indication that the word is used in a metaphorical sense, at least for Christ, who is also referred to elsewhere as God's first‑born. The idea of sonship by procreation is not refuted explicitly by the New Testaments. Secondly, it is sonship in the non‑literal sense, also, that the Quran refutes at several places (2:116, 10:68, 18:4; 19:88, 23:91, 72:3). The verb used to state that God has not taken (or adopted) anyone as a `son' is ittakhadha, which expressly implies that God does not adopt any sons, either in the literal or symbolic or metaphorical sense. Thirdly, there are strong reasons for assuming that the `Sonship' of Christ is something more than symbolic for Christians, for it carries the idea, if not of procreation, at least of belonging to the same genera or species, as is true of all fathers and sons, and in this case that species is represented by `divinity.' The latent Christian thinking can be put in a syllogistic form: (1) All fathers and sons belong to the same species; (2) Christ is the `Son' of a/the Deity; (3) Christ is also divine. Both the minor premise and conclusion of the implicitly polytheistic syllogism are refuted by the Quran:
God has not taken to Himself any son, nor is there any god with Him; .... (23:91)
Though at certain places in the New Testament it is stated that the `Son' is the same as God (John 1:1, 10:30), at other places it is also made obvious that the `Son' may die (something impossible to assert or even imagine about the Father), and once dead is powerless to rise again, as Paul states in his letter to the Romans (6:4): "Christ was raised from death by the glorious power of the Father ...." From the viewpoint of a Muslim, the Christian doctrine probably became a prey to the political fantasies of Jewish scribes who wrote them back into their books. Such fantasies formed the groundwork for the political hopes of the Jewish community throughout the five to seven hundred years that elapsed between the fall of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah and the appearance of Jesus. They find obvious reflection in this stateÂment from Luke (1:32‑33) where it is said of Jesus that "he will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High God. The Lord will make him a king, as his ancestor David was and he will be the king of the descendants of Jacob for ever; his kingdom will never end." Obviously Jesus never became a king "as his ancestor David was." However, despite it, for those who believed him as a prophet, he continued to remain the "Son of the Most High God" ‑a belief which found further encouragement in the many miracles of Jesus and the later belief in his resurrection. The terms `king' and `son of God' had, before Christ, come to be inextricably coupled together in the Jewish imagination, as can be seen in the exclamatory statement of Nathanael who, before meeting Jesus, had been told by Philip, Jesus' disciple, "We have found the one whom Moses wrote about in the book of the Law and whom the prophets also wrote about " (John 1:45). On meeting Jesus, Nathanael is reported to have said to Christ: "Teacher, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Isreal!" Evidently Nathanael's remark was a product of his Jewish religious :background, for about him Jesus says : "Here is a real Israelite" [i.e.:a real Jew] (John 1:47). Obviously, to Nathanael, one brought up ini the Jewish monotheistic tradition, the term `son of God' could not have signified the divinity of Christ, as it did for many Christians later. `Son of God' most probably meant to him the privileged station of the Israeli king puffed up by Jewish nationalistic hopes. However, the Jewish political hopes were not realized in Jesus. Though it became difficult to call him the `King of the Jews,' he remained for some Jews who embraced Christianity the `son who sat at the Father's right hand'. Still some others clung to a hope in the `Kingdom of God,' which in the Islamic terms could have meant the `Hereafter,' though for many of the Christians it continued to signify a terrestrial kingdom.
The Christian conception of `sonship' as a higher status seems to be derived from the arguments used by Paul to overthrow the `burden' of Mosaic Law. Paul, on his own authority, argues that Mosaic Law was for `slaves,' then "God sent his own Son ... to redeem those who were under the Law, so that we might become God's sons" (Galatians 4:3‑5). Elsewhere, he warns the converted Jews who entertained scruples about the retention of the Mosaic Law in these words: "Freedom is what we have‑Christ has set us free! Stand, then, as free people, and do not allow yourselves to become slaves again" (Galatians 5:1). From the
Islamic viewpoint Paul had no authority to abrogate the Mosaic Law. For such an important step he should have had‑besides his own ingenuous arguments‑ some textual authority from Jesus himself. This he never cites, nor claims that Jesus had recommended such a step. All that motivates him in this respect is a proselytizer's zeal. Discussing the problem of retention or rejection of the Mosaic Law with Christ's apostles; who were all of Jewish background, he tells them, "My brothers, you know that a long time ago God chose me from among you to preach the Good News to the Gentiles, so that they could hear ar,d believe .... Why do you want to put God to test by laying a load on the backs of the [new] believers which neither our ancestors nor we ourselves were able to carry [being born‑Jews]?" (Acts 15:7‑10)
Thus we see that the idea of `sonship' in Christianity is connected on the one hand with the religio‑political fantasies of the Jews and on the other with the need felt by early Christian leaders to liberalize the faith by downplaying the significance of the Mosaic Law (Acts 15:19). What we have stated here is irrefutably supported by the Christian scriptures.
In Islam (i.e. in the Islamic doctrine, not the Muslim history), on the other hand, the racial or communal prejudices and ambitions of the Arabs did not play any part whatsoever. The Quran declares that no individual, nation or community has any special relationship with God. All are His servants and creatures. Jesus though a great prophet is still a creature, a servant, and a slave of God; he will not disdain to be God's servant:
O mankind! We have created you male and female, and have made you nations and tribes, that you may know one another. Certainly, the noblest of you, in the sight of Allah is the most pious among you .... (49:13)
This verse does not address itself only to the Muslims but to all mankind in general .
The Messiah (Christ) will not disdain to be a servant (`abd) of God, neither the angels who are near‑stationed to Him.‑(4:172)
The term abd is used in the Quran in two meanings, such as our use of the word `human' for all human beings and for good people in particular. Although potentially every man is an `abd or slave of God, only those who have served God as He should be served, becoming selfless instruments of the Divine Will, really deserve to be called `ibad. Though all are potentially `ibad, only those who are servants par excellence really deserved to be called `ibad. That is, a potential `abd becomes a real `abd through `ibadah, the worship and service of God. Only then he is fit to join the heavenly community of God's servants ‑what Watt erroneously calls the `theiosphere.'
O soul at peace, return unto thy Lord, well pleased, well pleasing! Enter thou among My servants! Enter thou My Paradise! (89:27‑30)
Of course, Watt may not accept that `sonship' exempts the `sons' from `ibadah. Even Paul, whatever his ideas about the Mosaic Law and the necessity of circumcision, will not grant such an exemption. Whoever does the `ibadah of God, recognizes that he is an `abd.
There is a reference in this chapter to Jesus' speech to his disciples, from which a Muslim‑or anyone else‑would draw conclusions entirely different from those deduced by Watt. In John 15:15, Jesus is reported as saying to his disciples:
I do not call you servants any longer, because a servant does not know what his master is doing. Instead I call you friends, because I have told you everyÂthing I have heard from my Father.
Apparently Jesus' disciples differentially called him `master' or `lord', which implied that they considered themselves as his servants or slaves. So Jesus tells them that he will treat them as his friends and equals now that he has taught them all that he had been taught by God, and now that their spiritual instruction has been completed. This is a common practice in any institution of higher learning. Senior pupils, when after undergoing long years of training attain approximately the same degree of knowledge as their teachers, are treated by their teachers as equals and friends. Watt, however, with the purpose of detracting the Islamic usage of the term `abd at the back of his mind, draws another kind of conclusion; he says: "This implies that the slave or servant does not know what the plans and purposes of his master are whereas the son [ i.e. Christ ] does, and shares his knowledge with his friends [the Christian believers] ." The inference: `son of God'= divinity of the son, whose literal correlation seems inevitable, also surreptitiously creeps into the `sonship' of the believer. This is obvious from the following statement of Watt, which is made easier for him by the vocabulary of the lines in Psalms 82:6, but which reduces monotheism to a mere verbal game:
Jesus was a pioneer in this field [i.e. sonship] , and his followers became more fully sons and daughters of God as, following him, they understand God's purposes more fully and seek to realize them. It might even be suggested that in so far as one comes to understand God's purposes and is committed to realizing them one enters into a sphere above the nousphere, perhaps to be called the theiosphere [the sphere of divinity], and Jesus would then be the one who first found the way into this. (p. 137)
Watt makes the reader aware of the fluidity of symbolic language. At one place dealing with the problem as to how the `sonship' of Jesus differs from that of his followers, he suggests two explanations which do not harmonize with each other; then adds, "These suggestions do not harmonize with one another, though this does not matter when we are dealing with symbolic language." (p. 136) One would expect that he would dismiss the difference between the Islamic `servant‑Lord' vocabulary and the Christian `Son‑Father' vocabulary in the same spirit, especially since he recommends that we should view religious differences in an eirenic spirit and adopt a conciliatory approach to apparent divergence in religious symbolism. One may say that with substitution of the words `servant' or `prophet' in place of the word `Son' in the New Testament (whenever used for Christ) and the word `Lord' throughout for the word `Father', nearly ninety‑nine per cent of doctrinal differences between Islam and Christianity will evaporate like mist. But despite his frequent harping on the theme of symbolism in religious language, he turns out to be a staunch literalist at the end, where he, perhaps unknowingly, gives vent to a self‑contradictory idea:
In the light of what was said earlier about symbolic language, the conception of `son of God' is to be regarded as expressing, in the best way possible for us, something real about God. The symbol of Divine sonship implies that a human being may have insight into His purposes and into His relationship with humanity, and may be able to do something towards realizing the purposes. (p. 137)
According to Islam, God imparted the knowledge of His aims and purposes to man not just two thousand years ago, but at the time of the creation of Adam, who was designated to fulfil the role of God's deputy and vicegerent (khalifah) on the earth. Whereas according to the Bible, God forbade Adam and Eve from eating the fruit of the `tree of knowledge of what is good and what is bad' (Genesis 2:17) and expelled them from paradise, saying "Now the man has become like one of us and has knowledge of what is good and what is bad" (Genesis 3:22), according to the Quran God gave all knowledge to Adam before everything‑even before he was given a spouse to live with (2:31)‑and made all angels prostrate themselves before Adam in respect for his superior knowledge (2:31‑34). At least twenty times the Quran speaks of God as the teacher of men (2:32, 96:4,5, 5:110, 12:101, 4:113, 2:239, 18:65, etc.). The Holy Prophet (S) is asked to constantly pray to God for the increase in his knowledge (20:114). The abstract noun `ilm (knowledge) occurs about a hundred times in the Quran. The various derivatives of the root `alima (he knew) occur more than seven hundred times in the Quran. In fact it may be stated that no religious scripture talks of knowledge so often and profusely as the Holy Quran. It indeed requires a lot of naivety to hold on the one hand that God expelled Adam jealously ‑na'udhu billah‑for attempting to share His knowledge, and on the other hand to profess that He later became so indulgent as to adopt human beings as sons and offer them "insight into His purposes and into His relationship with humanity," which ultimately turns out to be no more than `insight' into the `sonship' and `divinity' of Christ; because `sonship' and `divinity' may signify power, but do not add to Christ's character reflected in his words and deeds.
The phrases "King of Israel, Son of God," or the idea contained in them, which recurs in several places in the Old and the New Testaments with different wordings and, as we said, expresses the nationalist and political hopes of the Jews embodied in the fantasies of an Israeli super‑king. What these phrases meant to the common Jew of Christ's times may be said to be something like this: "God will send a king of David's descent who will reestablish the Jewish self‑rule. He will regain not only the independence of the Jews now lost for almost five hundred years, but also will defeat and subjugate all other nations to the Israelites. That super‑king of the future will be an undefeatable and irresistible‑‑potentate backed by the power of the Almighty. He will be a man `well‑connected' and one who enjoys much influence at the `top' (connections with the most powerful had an irresistible charm and prestige for the Jews, who were for generations used to slavery and second‑class citizenship, as is apparent from many passages of the different books of the Old Testaments). He will have great temporal power, and his dynasty will rule for ever. This will be on account of the great favour and protection of the Superpower that he will enjoy (the mightiest `superpower' was God in the Jewish religious imagination, who, unlike other terrestrial powers, who were enemies of the Jewish self‑rule, was sympathetic to the Jews and considered them His own people). The idea contained in "King of Israel, Son of God" neatly sums up the passionate political hopes conceivable for the Jewish religious imagination. It recurringly echoes through the Bible and had acquired great importance for the Jews during the days of political turmoil that preceded and followed the times of Jesus Christ. Moreover, the office of prophethood had lost all charm for them, and the prophets were considered to be obstructive holy men who had nothing to offer except moral admonition and threatening prophecies of greater evils and sufferings. Jesus, in the Gospels, is reported as accusing the Jewish priesthood of killing many prophets. At another place, after the cold reception he had by the people in his own hometown of Nazareth, Jesus remarks that a prophet is not well received in his own town. Familiarity breeds contempt, it is said, and perhaps the Jews were so much used to ignore the reproaches of the prophets that many followers of Christ thought it necessary to propagate his message by dubbing him something else than as a "prophet", a term which had lost its prestige with the Jews. On the contrary, such terms as "King of the Jews" and "Son of God ", because of their political significance and connotations of power, were more welcome to the prevailing Jewish taste and, certainly, to the Hellenic mind of the Gentiles, who were more familiar with such ideas as they were common in Greek and Roman mythologies.
In our own times, the religious belief in God having become almost an anachronism and the modern Jews being more at home in modern terminology, new terms are substituted for ancient fantasies and ambitions. One may say that the same idea contained in "King of Israel, Son of God" is reflected in the contemporary phrases: "the Greater Israel, the special friend of the U.S." These contemporary phrases represent the ancient Jewish ambitions and fantasies, which have been realized through the efforts of the Western powers through the formation of the Zionist state in Palestine. The state of Israel now takes the place of the ancient fantasies about the "promised king of the Jews", who failed to keep his appointment. Moreover, adoption of the Western secular view of reality and history has led the Zionists to look forward to the more tangible "sonship" and "fatherhood" of a terrestrial superpower, the U.S. in this case. However, ancient fantasies linger with obdurate tenacity and the ancient relationship of "sonship" is considered fulfilled in the "special relationship" between the U.S. and Israel. In fact several U.S. officials, including presidents, on innumerable occasions, have referred to "the special relationship" of the U.S. with Israel. The `special relationship' idea is also reflected in the writings of anti‑Zionist Muslims when they call Israel "an illegitimate child of the U.S. imperialism."
Therefore, from the Muslim viewpoint, Christian religious terminology, on which the characteristic Christian doctrines are based, is a continuation of the religio‑political vocabulary of the pre‑Christian Judaism, and a transference of the political vocabulary which was given a spiritual and theological import by the majority of Jewish followers of Christ who, having separated from traditional Judaism and the practice of the Mosaic Law, continued to hold on to the ancient fantasies in the coming of the "kingdom of God" and the rule of the Son. Those fantasies were also not abandoned by the traditional Jews and have survived until the modern times.
In the final analysis, therefore, the doctrine of incarnation or `Sonship' is a doctrine of power under the cloak of spirituality. In this sense Neitzsche, who extolled power, was a Christian despite his condemnation of the Christian morality, which he called `slave morality.' In Islam, on the other hand, even though God is Omnipotent, even the worship of God is the worship of the Divine Character signified by the oft‑repeated Names such as Rahman and Rahim. Its Prophet, in the first place, is an `abd before he is a rasul (Messenger): ; he represents rahmah (mercy), although he enjoyed temporal power. The Prophet (S) was a ruler, but his temporal `power is overshadowed in the Muslim's mind by his spiritual station. He preferred the humility of a slave and despised the power and pomp of kings.
Last Chapter
Finally, in the book's last chapter, Watt, very briefly, comes to deal with the contemporary issues and problems indicated in the title of the book. His viewpoint is not different from that of the Western media regarding the contemporary resurgence in the world of Islam. About the motives underlying the Islamic revival, he says:
The old religious intellectual class of the `ulama' or jurists has tended to resist ‑change and as a result its power and influence has greatly declined. Since about 1950 the speed of change has greatly accelerated, and this has left the masses of ordinary people utterly bewildered and feeling anxious and insecure, as they saw the disappearance of familiar objects and ways of acting and their replacement by things strange and new .... It is chiefly out of this feeling of insecurity that the Islamic resurgence or revival has developed .... People looking for security think of `the good old days' when the old religion was properly observed. One aspect of this insecurity is the fear of being, as it were, drowned in Western culture and losing one's traditional identity. Consequently in turning to the old religion they tend to emphasize those features which make it culturally distinct from the West, such as prohibition of alcohol and usury and the use of the veil and similar coverings by women..., This type of response can indeed be traced back for centuries. A not so distant example comes from the India of about one hundred and fifty years ago, where the Hindus were eagerly getting Western education for their children, while the Muslims remained aloof; and the not surprising result was that the best government posts open to Indians nearly all went to Hindus, while the Hindus also benefited in other ways. (p. 142)
As is obvious from these remarks, Watt is disposed to view the Islamic revival in a negative light and elsewhere refers to it as being a manifestation of "extreme conservatism." This shows that Watt is entirely out of touch with the contemporary world reality. He fails to notice many aspects which are very significant in the present Islamic movement. His reference to "the good old days" of the British rule in India and the attitude of Muslims towards the alien rulers is totally irrelevant in the context of the present world‑wide Islamic revival. He does not say anything about the prominent aims and objectives of the present Islamic resurgence.
The goals of the present Islamic resurgence are multifarious and embrace a wide range of activities from politics to education. In the political domain, which represents a very important facet of the Islamic resurgence, the aims might be stated to be: (1) replacement of the present so‑called secular regimes, most of which are oppressive dictatorships controlled by pro Western military juntas, by purely Islamic states in which the participation of the people in their country's destiny is ensured; (2) ending foreign political, military, and economic interference in the affairs of Muslim countries; (3) political and economic justice, independence, and self‑sufficiency; (4) harmonization of all political, economic, social and educational policies with the Islamic Shari'ah. The social and educational objectives must be stated as: (1) revival of the true social and ethical values of Islam; (2) emphasis on the unity of the world‑wide Muslim community; (3) the need to reorient the educational infrastructure in the Muslim countries in accordance with the Islamic goals and values; (4) the need to raise the level of scientific and technological education and research in the Muslim countries; (5) the need to dissociate modern technology and industrial practice from the undesirable cultural accretions of the West, and to give a human and Islamic direction to the application and use of science and technology; (6) the need to subordinate the entire legal structure in the Muslim countries to Islamic Shari'ah. In the sphere of economics, the objective may be stated as: (1) the need for developÂment of economic, fiscal and commercial policies which are in agreeÂment with the Islamic teachings; (2) the need to promote trade and mutual co-operation between Muslim countries in the fields of industrial production and scientific research; (3) the need to make the Muslim world economically self‑reliant and self‑sufficient. Apart from these, many more objectives can be mentioned which are stressed by the so‑called Muslim fundamentalists. More than anything else, the Islamic revival is not motivated by a desire to recreate a past or to bring back `the good old days' as Watt remarks. There is indeed a sense of anxiety among the Muslims, for they feel that the Islamic values are threatened and challenged, but not an anxiety caused by `disappearance of familiar objects and ways of acting.' Indeed, there is a strong desire to obliterate the hitherto familiar and hated idols in the field of politics and their dictatorial ways of administering affairs and to substitute them with hitherto forgotten and forsaken ideals and `ways of acting' at the level of political and communal life, ideals which are deeply ingrained in the Muslim consciousness in the form of the Sunnah of the Prophet (S). There is no resistance to change in the Muslim world, in the sense familiar to Western sociologists, for such resistance would have come from the elderly and the aged. The contemporary Islamic revival, on the contrary, is centered around the revolt of the Muslim youth against the social conditions to which the members of the senior generation have already adapted, but which are not acceptable to the young. Therefore, it is ignorance to say that the Islamic resurgence represents resistance to change. In fact it is a call for a drastic change and a socio‑political, ethico‑legal, economic and cultural revolution.
Furthermore, it is the secular West which feels insecure and threatened by the kind of fundamental changes demanded by the Muslim revivalists. It is the West which is bewildered and feels anxious and insecure when confronted with such a phenomenon as the Islamic Revolution in Iran, and strives to maintain the status quo. It is the Western powers which are plunged into depths of insecurity and anxiety at the spectacle of disappearance of the familiar pawns who have assisted them in keeping the Muslim world under Western control since a long time. In the present world situation, it is the capitalist West and the socialist East which represent the forces of reaction and conservatism, and strive to keep intact their respective domains of hegemony which fell into their hands during and after the Second World War.
The Islamic resurgence is not a negation of the positive changes brought about by the technological and industrial advancements, but a negation of the political and cultural appendages which have accompanied the indiscriminate introduction of technology and industry into the Third World by unthinking governments and negligent vested interests. `Modernization,' which in the Western terminology means introduction of Western secular patterns of life into Muslim countries, in this special sense has been considered to be an attendant of the Western technological and highly sophisticated industrial methods. The Islamic revival negates the assumption of necessary correlation between technology and the so‑called modernization, which has proved to be an attending evil.
Watt, like a bad physician, makes a wrong diagnosis of the contemporary problems of the Muslim world, and prescribes a worse remedy. He cites the example of al‑Ghazali as a model of "creative response" to the crucial contemporary problems. He describes a "creative response" as the response of a person "who tries to effect a degree of harmony between these [the central religious doctrines] and the current scientific and philosophical outlook, and in so doing to provide a basis for dealing with social and political problems." This definition is quite convincing, but it is inappropriate to cite al‑Ghazali as an example of it. Al‑Ghazali, despite his greatness as a thinker, represents a great reactionary force in the history of Muslim thought. His was a reactionary response to the challenge of his age. By discouraging the pursuit of philosophy and natural sciences, he provided a negative or rather destructive solution to the challenge that was invading the Muslim society, and caused much damage to the progress of Muslim science and philosophy. To project and recommend him as an archetype of "creative response" is equal to prescribe poison as a life‑saving drug.
Watt is deeply infatuated with the desire to defend the Christian doctrines by diluting Islamic disapproval of them. In this chapter also, where one would expect him to deal with the contemporary issues of Islam and Christianity, he relapses into a discussion of the Christian belief in Christ's crucifixion. He regrets that,
... because Muslims have not accepted the historical fact of the crucifixion of Jesus, they have failed to understand most of the Christian teaching about the meaning of his death and resurrection and the nature of his work of `salvation'.
By the standards of modern historiography the crucifixion of Jesus is one of the most certain events in past history, as certain‑dare one say it?‑as the fact that Muhammad proclaimed the religion of Islam in Mecca about the year 610. (p. 144)
Then he goes on to argue that the Quranic verses which (apparently, according to Watt) deny that Jesus underwent crucifixion do not necessarily refute crucifixion "when looked in an eirenic spirit." But as we said, the Quranic denial of Jesus' crucifixion was firmly corroborated by reliable hadith. According to Islamic hadith, it was Judas Iscariot, the traitor, who was crucified, his appearance having been changed to resemble that of Christ. The fact of crucifixion of Judas, whom all Jews, including the disciples and Christ's own mother, took for Christ, is accepted by the Quran and the hadith. Islam denies Jesus' crucifixion and all the other Christian doctrines and beliefs which are based on the belief in his death on the cross, such as the doctrine of atonement, the doctrine that the Mosaic Law became inoperative with him and that the believer in the resurrected Christ need not‑in fact should not‑follow the Mosaic Law, and other related beliefs. MoreÂover, the Islamic belief that Jesus did not die upon the cross and that the Mosaic Law with small modifications was made obligatory for Christians to follow, and that Jesus was just a man and a prophet, not the `Son' of God or God‑all are confirmed expressly by one of the Christian gospels, the Gospel of Barnabas, which is, however, included by official Christianity among the writings conveniently dubbed as `apocrypha'. There have been Christian sects who held identical beliefs, but who are also, as conveniently, branded `heretic' or `unorthodox' by the majority, the `orthodox' Christians. Watt, as we pointed out earlier adopts a statistical criterion of truth, a criterion which has been considered by the statistical majority, in the history of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, as the criterion of orthodoxy.
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