East-West Understanding

Dear Sir,

When it first came to my notice that you had published in your paper ’The Light’ a private letter I had written to a friend, Maryam Jameelah, I was rather annoyed. The principal reason for this was that my consent had not been obtained prior to publication. You will I am sure appreciate my feelings in this respect.

While the original offence cannot be excused, I would like to record that when a copy of the relevant issue came into my hand a short while ago, I felt that your covering editorial could not have been bettered, for it illustrated a commendable tolerance in your own attitude towards East-West relationships and a genuine desire to gulf the gap which has so far existed between our two environments and philosophies.

While I have certain conceptions regarding the life of the Holy Prophet and of prayer in Islam which cause me to hesitate in regarding myself as being truly Muslim, I would like to stress that much of the understanding which I have acquired on the wider issues of life are due to the influences of Islam and the Holy Quran.

Where East-West understanding is concerned its basis must, to some extent, first centre upon an understanding of historical social changes and the material influences which surround these. Spiritual progress or decay intertwines around these so that while in some way it influences the former, so also does the former influence the latter. They cannot in fact be judged as entirely separate entities.

It therefore must be that in following this thesis the East should try to understand the social changes which have been wrought in many Western countries before judging too harshly the generally reported behaviour of Western people. And in observing the conditions which have been brought about, it should also realise that having not undergone them itself, it cannot with full justification rest entirely on its laurels where its own expressed endurance upon spiritual and social values is concerned.

As those in the East perhaps realise even more than we in the West have tended to do, the progress and quality of a society rests to a large extent upon the position of women in it and following this school of thought I would like to discuss the evolution of the woman in the West, and in England in particular.

As far as English women are concerned, the one thing which influenced their position more than anything else was the advent of World War II. During the period of the War most of the able-bodied men were summoned to join the armed forces (my own father was amongst them). This left the women at home, not only to bring up their families single handed, but also in many instances to man the jobs which had previously been the men’s prerogative.

The long years of the war not only saw the women learn to do their new jobs efficiently, but at its end many found that they liked working outside the home, and in many more cases many had to continue working in order to support their families – their menfolk having been killed or maimed during the fighting.

These war years were not only to affect the psychology of the wives and mothers, but it also effected, perhaps in a way more indelible, the children. They not only grew up in an environment in which it was regarded as natural that the mother should leave the home to work, but they were also devoid of the background which can only exist when the mother remains in the home – and so began the great change. I would here like to stress that not all the wives and mothers were subject to these changes directly, but it did mean that what had originally been regarded as an unusual and undesirable state of affairs had become more usual because of wartime conditions, and therefore automatically less undesirable.

It must be further noted that these same children, and I am one of them myself, are the young parents and adolescents of today, and it is upon their behaviour that a lot of the judgment of the East rests.

On a general plane, the standard of living in the Western world has progressed enormously since the war years. With scientific progress and the development of more equipment to make life more comfortable, it has made available to women more jobs than would have been open to them in pre-war years. With women working and increasing the income into the home, families have been able to afford the luxuries offered on the market. The irony here is that they are consequently seldom at home to enjoy the new comforts they have to go out to work for!

Parallel with this trend the larger market open to manufacturers for their tangible products has led to increased competition between them. Increased competition has automatically meant an increase in advertising, as the manufacturer tries to convince the buyer that his goods are superior to those of any other, and so it is that through a progression of advertising techniques the phase is now reached where people are being convinced that life cannot be perfect without so-and-so’s refrigerator, or so-and-so’s television set – and so it goes on through all the marketable goods.

The result now arrived at is for one thing to chase another so that even the participants are incapable of separating them from each other in their analysis of why this situation has developed.

Where religion is concerned, the older members of our society were subjected in their youth to the influences of the Church. The      generally adverse conditions of wartime however upset the delicate balance so that the parents during those years received even less of Christian influences, and their own children have consequently received even less or nothing at all. And so it is that the Churches in England have been caused to stop and wonder and realise that they must change their own outlook to the community and its problems and adapt their teachings to suit the new mentality which today exists. The social evolution which has seen a greater value placed on material things solely because those things arc now attainable has seen also a decline in any desire there might have been to attain a spiritual being or development.

As yet the East has not been subjected to the same experiences as these. It has also not been subjected to the same materialist progress and matching increase in the standard of living. It has not therefore been subjected to the same temptations in quite the same way, and because of this should not hasten to judge us quite so harshly.

The one thing which you can all do is to learn from observing what has happened to us. In that way you will be able to prepare for what we were not warned would happen. Islam of course has a different kind of theology than that of Christianity, but it is I believe, one which may perhaps be better able to cope with material progress. The historians of the future can be the only judges of this, however.

My plea from the West therefore is that you should endeavour to understand why things are as they are here. From understanding springs eternal Hope that eventually we can be united in a common cause for humanity and so destroy for ever the distinctions of today which can add only to world chaos and possible future destruction.

Sincerely,

JEANNETTE D. WYATT.

Reply:

The East certainly has to learn a great deal from the process of social evolution in the West, especially as it emerged at the impact of the industrial revolution. Indeed, it is the express teaching of Islam to adopt whatever good one may find in any quarter. It is a wrong attitude to decay everything that comes from the West. There is good and there is bad in all peoples.Impact with the Western thought and institutions should be conducive to the enrichment and stimulation of life urges in the East. Any tendency towards isolationism is against the spirit of the Quranic proclamation that ”to God belongs the East and the West”. No Westerner, however, would deny that the very material prosperity which the West has achieved has given birth to evils which tend to cancel that prosperity in terms of peace and content of the mind. In the field of religion itself, the West has completely missed the significance of Jesus Christ and his mission to mankind, who, after all, was a man from the East, and reflected the soul of the East. The new age which has brought the East and the West physically closer calls for a closer understanding between the two. Both must pool their resources, material and spiritual, to build a better social order, based on universal human fellowship and the blending of the material with the truly spiritual.

Editor: The Light

M.Y.Khan