While still in school as I was just beginning to realize that there was a world outside the 'self' and everything was not an extension of my being and that the world did not really revolve around me when all of a sudden I was struck by questions all the time. They came like shooting stars, out of the blue and with flashing brilliance. I was not alone of course, everyone my age, around me had similar queries. The hows and whys of life and beyond. But whereas I was encouraged to ask I felt some of my friends snubbed these thoughts because ''Islam' did not allow them to question'! And I would ask them why and was told that there are some questions to which there are no answers and if we persist our faith may be tested...hmmm..but isn't it that every question has an answer and 'dhoondney sei tou Khuda bhi mil jaata hai' (One can even find God, if one goes out searching for Him), and how can we have answers when the search has stopped?
Isn't the current situation in Pakistan a result of this kind of dogmatic thinking? Since we stopped asking question, people less educated, less intelligent and lets face it having a lesser faith then us have taken it upon themselves to speak for God. As if God needs anyone to speak for Him. He has spoken to us through countless prophets, recorded the last one in a book and informed us that he lives in our hearts and speaks to us on a daily basis through our conscience and yet....and yet we need...abstracts? Why? The only shariah these people, whom we have allowed to do the asking and answering, adhere to is of their own making, a devised shariah. A shariah where there is only destruction, confusion, confinement and restriction. Only women suffer. Was the sole purpose of Islam to deprive women of breathing the same air as men? To be reduced to an object of physical desire for husbands? Why are human beings 'Ashraf ul makhloqat' (greatest of all living beings)? And mind you human beings are not just men, so if there are no schools, no learning centres, intellect wont be developed and we would be no better then the stone that we kick for our pleasure.
Its a cruel Islam if its the Islam of the mullah in Swat and if that's what it teaches you. So please ask these questions and I guarantee you you will not lose your faith. But maybe you will learn an argument or two to defend your Islam from being hijacked!
Isn't the current situation in Pakistan a result of this kind of dogmatic thinking? Since we stopped asking question, people less educated, less intelligent and lets face it having a lesser faith then us have taken it upon themselves to speak for God. As if God needs anyone to speak for Him. He has spoken to us through countless prophets, recorded the last one in a book and informed us that he lives in our hearts and speaks to us on a daily basis through our conscience and yet....and yet we need...abstracts? Why? The only shariah these people, whom we have allowed to do the asking and answering, adhere to is of their own making, a devised shariah. A shariah where there is only destruction, confusion, confinement and restriction. Only women suffer. Was the sole purpose of Islam to deprive women of breathing the same air as men? To be reduced to an object of physical desire for husbands? Why are human beings 'Ashraf ul makhloqat' (greatest of all living beings)? And mind you human beings are not just men, so if there are no schools, no learning centres, intellect wont be developed and we would be no better then the stone that we kick for our pleasure.
Its a cruel Islam if its the Islam of the mullah in Swat and if that's what it teaches you. So please ask these questions and I guarantee you you will not lose your faith. But maybe you will learn an argument or two to defend your Islam from being hijacked!
Comments