By  Mowahid Hussain Shah

July 26, 2013

At a Standstill

The other day, Shahid Mahmood, former Pakistan test cricketer and a pioneer in community activism in the tri-state region of the northeast corridor of United States, sent an email vividly illustrated with graphics depicting the Muslim world at a standstill, mired in sloganeering, while the rest of the world during the last 100 years has marched on through motor cars, airplanes, space flights and space satellites. Shahid, today, spends most of his waking hours in prayerful meditation. It is a clarion wake-up call to fill the moral, spiritual and intellectual void in the Muslim world.
It is in stark contradiction to the mighty legacy of path-breaking learning in the Muslim world. Right in the European heartland of Budapest, Hungary, is a shrine of the Sufi saint Gul Baba. It takes a steep climb to get there but is worth it to see the rose-covered tomb of the holy man who was declared patron saint of Budapest during the 16th century. In Andalucía, Spain, is the great 12th century Al-Mowahid mosque at Seville. In the mid-thirteenth century, the city was captured and the mosque was Christianized as a cathedral. In it lies buried Christopher Columbus, the discoverer of America. The scientific achievements of medieval Muslims are too numerous and staggering to be enumerated here. But when coffee is drunk in the West, it is not often realized that it made its way first via Vienna when the Ottoman Turks made their final bid in 1683 to capture Vienna.
Current ‘leadership’ is devoid of inspiration and direction, steeped as it is in passive victimhood, defeatism, grabbing of wealth and preservation of perks and power. To expect leadership then from those who have none is absurd. They are incapable of raising the bar. Tariq and Babar accomplished great conquests with a small band of intently committed and motivated fighters. Baba Farid Ganjshakar and Baba Bulleh Shah conquered the hearts of huge swaths of the populace with sheer piety and simplicity. They did so without materiel resource. Today, the resources are overflowing and so is the size of the Ummah. But all this has not put a dent in the occupation of Palestine and Kashmir nor curbed Islamophobia. In a memorable scene from the Punjabi blockbuster ‘Maula Jutt’ impeccably written by Nasir Adeeb, a shackled jail inmate, Noori Nutt, peerlessly portrayed by Mustafa Qureshi, accosts the burly jail superintendent with the putdown taunt that ‘despite your huge size, your voice is quite tiny and squeaky’. This can be said with equal relevance to the 1.5 billion Muslim community.
Yet, despite pitiful results, the ruling oligarchy considers itself over-smart when the evidence suggests crushing ineptness. When grit, endurance and foresight are needed, they, instead, have squandered the national energies into the futile quagmire of venality and vendetta. Even the finest formal education has not removed the anxieties and complexes of a defeatist mindset nor has it instilled an abiding sense of integrity. Often one encounters the rationale of surrender in that ‘there is no choice.’ As the Arab upsurge demonstrates, for too long, the oligarchy has enjoyed a free ride; now some of them have paid and are paying the price.
To make its mark now in the international arena, Muslims have to show that they are twice as good as their contemporaries. Muhammad Ali showed it in America during the 60s and the 70s. Now, the bearded Hashim Amla of South Africa has stamped his class on and off the cricket field without compromising his Islamic convictions. There has been an accelerating slippage of standards. Ashraf Mumtaz, a respected journalist narrated in The Nation a horror story of his Umra journey on PIA from Lahore to Medina. In it, he cited foul smelling toilets, intolerably hot temperature inside the plane, and shoddy service. Similar, too, is the case of Pakistani cricket, which recently has disgraced itself in South Africa and in England, breaking the hearts of millions of their country folks. Both PIA and Pakistan cricket were once a source of joy and pride.
The status quo suits the oligarchy who, through sheer weight of wealth, control the keys to the kingdom and, thereby, act as pliable proxies for vested interests by fanning fissiparous flames. They have kept the gates of intellectual inquiry and of moral audit closed. They may appear strong, but they are inherently vulnerable because they are wrong.
Can the Muslim world stand up and be counted to face its real foes while they are themselves being kept busy and entrapped in suicidal squabbling? Hate, paranoia and falsehood have a cannibalizing impact. The focus remains on ceremonial aspects of faith and not on its vibrant moral core. By wrangling over non-issues, the influentials are doing exactly what the foes want them to do. And in doing so they are keeping the Muslim world at a standstill.

 

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PREVIOUSLY


Election 2004: Decisive but Divisive

Muslim Youth & Kashmir in America

The Big Picture: Wealth without Vision

Oxygen to Global Unrest

Punishing the Punctual

Change without Change

Don’t Be Weak

Passionate Attachment

The Confidence of Youth

The Other Side of Democracy

Campaign of Defamation

Pakistani Women & the Legal Profession

A Pakistani Journey

Farewell to Fazal

Mukhtaran and Beyond

Revamping the OIC

7/7 & After

Nuclear Double-Standard

Return to Racism

Hollywood – The Unofficial Media

The Sole Superpower

The UN at 60

A Slow Motion World War?

Elite vs. Street

Iqbal Today

Macedonia to Multan

Defending our Own

2006 & Maulana Zafar Ali Khan

Error against Terror

The Limits of Power

Cultural Weaknesses

Aggressive at Home, Submissive Abroad

Global Storm

The Farce of Free Expression

The Changing Mood

Condi & India

Xenophobia

Looking inward

Re-Thinking

A Tale of Two Presidents

Close to Home

Flashpoint Kashmir

The Spreading Rage

Confronting Adversity

The Illusion of International Law

Other Side of Extremism

Five Years after 9/11

The Educated Ignorant

The Decline of Humor

Icons

Six Years of Insanity

The War Not Being Fought

Munir Niazi

Compliance & Defiance

Counter-Message

Miscast

The Goddess of Wealth

The Meaning of Moderation

The Tora Bora of Fear

Clash of Civility

The Early Race

Challenge & Response

Will & Skill

Zealotry

Movie-Media and Pakistan

Hug with a Thug

Quest for Integrity

Unconquered

Vanity

Bringing Back the Past

Stuck in Iraq

Islam, Science and the West

Turmoil over Turkey

Leaders versus Leadership

Might Does Not Make Right

Kursi First

Vision & Will

Battle of the Billionaires

Assassination Alley

Extremism and Change

Rosy Expectations

Short-Term Gain, Long-Term Pain

Not Winning

Beyond Baghdad: Five Years after

The Hijab of Democracy

Hate, Fear & Hope

Weapon of Words

Hide N’ Seek

Yanking in the UN

Obama’s Breakthrough

Let Lahore Be Lahore

National Mood & Sports

Flirting with Fire

Trips Abroad

Georgia on the Mind

Duel for the White House

Zia to Zardari

Palestine: Avoiding the Unavoidable 

Not Working 

In the Ring 

Obama’s America

Smiles & Dreams

Quiet Deeds of Good

Crime and Indifference

Journey of Understanding

VIP-hunting

Terror via Counter-Terrorism

Umpires or Vampires?

The Long Road

Yesterday’s Reminder

Appeasement and the Real Threat

Israel’s Washington Agenda

New Challenges

Cairo and Beyond

Re-fighting Old Battles

America ’s Super Villains

Activism in America

Style without Substance

Overcoming Barriers

Ashes to Afghanistan

The Looming Change

Fear and Possibilities

What Is Not Debated 

Hired Guns

Rampage at Fort Hood

Manmohan in Washington

The Long Duel

Green Nukes

Vision and Division

Avoiding Why

Striving to Matter

Shame-proof

Anxiety and Opportunity

Putting Iraq in America

The Right Strategy

Looking Beyond

Rot at the Top

Strategic Folly

Daring & Caring

Over-Stepping on Turkey

Sudan : Perils of Provincialism

Old Fears, New Target

Europe ’s Stain

The US-Pakistan Enigma

The Status Quo Is Unacceptable

9 Years after 9/11

License to Steal

US Muslims at the Crossroads

Tumor of Terror

An Arab Voice

Disastrous Decisions

Double Game

Sticky Wiki

What Quaid Was Not

Money Conspiracy

Pharaohs & Pirates

Greed and Cricket

Change & Challenge  

Forty Years after 1971

Abandoning Our Own

Rewarding Failure

Osama and Obama

Tsunami of Tolerance

Representation and Presentation

Meek and Weak

Change or the Same?

No Easy Exit

Nation to Non-Nation

10 Years after 9/11

Shining India?

Big Power, Small Politics

Rule of the Gun

Proxy of the Powerful

Fight for Fairness

Republican Race

Actors or Directors

Speaking out

Professional Sycophants

More Provinces?

Too Much Information

Soft Separation

Soft Poison

Unemployment & Over-Population

Seize the Day

The Arab Awakening

Ben Bella

At University of Gujrat

Good People Behaving Badly

Playing Over-Smart

Do Less

Resisting the Resistible

Performance, Not PR

Home-grown Havoc

Salutation to the 65 th Year

Plague of Provincialism

USA Elections 2012

Rage

Fight or Flight

Rift and Drift

Obama II

Me and We

Small Role or Small Actors?

On Losing

Who Will Guard the Guards?

Loyal to Their Loot

Prevail or Fail

Perceptions and Reality

Toll of Occupation

Re-think, Re-examine, and Self-correct 

The Washington Tribe

Voice and Vision

Moral Slump

Wall of Illusion

Under One Banner

Bitter Harvest

Gallows and the Throne

Scent of Power


2001

 

Editor: Akhtar M. Faruqui
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