Whither Civilization?

Mohammad Yaqub Khan
Editor – The Light

“The greater part of Europe sees no law prevail but the law of the jungle where the prey falls to the swiftest and the most reckless stroke.”

Mr. A. Eden, ex-Foreign Secretary, Britain.

“If there is no sufficient space for us, someone must give it to us…Neither printed paper nor ink will stop us because above them are our will and our blood.”

Signor Mussolini.

“Britain has been acting unvirtuously for the last three hundred years. Now in her old age she has started preaching virtue.”

Herr Hitler.

The above are no extracts from the utterances of potentates in the Dark Middle Ages. They are the well-considered statements of those who hold the destinies of millions of human beings in their hands in this 20th century of enlightenment and civilization!

Have they no lesson for those who have eyes to see? They have one lesson which a man who runs may see – viz., this is where a Godless civilization has landed humanity, back into the life of the jungle where no law but the law of brute force prevails.

What a commentary on the Quranic verse – “We have created man in the goodliest of moulds; then We have made him the lowest of the low!” Man has on the one hand the potentiality to rise higher than the angels but at the same time he may sink lower than the brutes of the jungle. And this is what happened to the civilized man of Europe. Notwithstanding all his advances in the domain of science and culture, for all practical purposes, he is a mere brute, swayed by no higher considerations than self-gratification.

A civilization which has banished God outright and which is based on the gratification of the self could not but reduce the surface of the earth to a vast jungle, with well-dressed, clean-shaven, highly civilized brutes pouncing upon one another with the ferocity of the beasts of the jungle.

Here is food for thought – for very serious thought indeed – for those who decry religion. Religion, even when deteriorated into superstition, has never carried man to such low depths as to reduce him to a brute recognising no higher law than that of brute force. Even the Inquisition with all its horrors pales into insignificance before the present-day organized and whole-sale suppression of humanity.

The Englishman accuses the German of having become a brute but the German rightly retorts –“you have been acting as a brute for the last 300 years. Why this pose of virtue now? Why this bloodshed in Palestine? Why exploitation of the teeming masses of India?” And the retort goes home. The German may be behaving as the denizen of the jungle, but the Englishman has not the face to turn round and putting on self-righteous airs read him a sermon on morality. This would naturally sound like the Devil quoting scripture. The fact is they are all chips of the same bloc, the only difference being that some, such as the Italian type, are more brazen in flouting the law of morality than the others.

Here in India, the cry has been repeated ad nauseam that religion is standing in the way of Indian’s onward march towards freedom, that religion must be banished from politics. It will be an evil day for India indeed, should such a catastrophe befall her. If a Godless nationalism has reduced Europe to a huge jungle, as Mr. Anthoney Eden has put it, it is bound to plunge India into the chaos of a Civil War, if it ever gains as much grip over this land. In fact, India owes much of her present political status to the instrumentality of religion. For Mahatma Gandhi, the moving spirit behind the freedom struggle is intensely religious.

The sooner our rising generations, whether Hindus or Muslims, throw the scales of Godless nationalism off their eyes, the better. Remove God-idea from life and you start on a downward course till, as in the case of Europe, you reach the verge of undiluted brutality. God-idea is the only brake that can keep humanity from sliding down that dangerous precipice. In Russia where the anti-God movement was in full swing, the sanctity of matrimony and of home, respect for age – everything that goes to make the foundations of society strong and stable was undermined. Experience has made them wiser, and a halt has already been called even in that citadel of Godlessness to that mad drive. The rest of Europe is standing thanks to the elimination of the higher values of life as implied in God-idea – on the brink of a catastrophe which threatens to engulf the entire fabric of that civilization. Shall India follow that mad course – the course of a Godless nationalism which is the surest way to the jungle or shall she build her destiny on surer foundations? The East has been the cradle of the Higher Light of Religion and let her footsteps be guided by that light. Let Hinduism and Islam assert the highest that is in them and save this ancient country from falling a prey to the demon, which has reduced Europe to a jungle. Just now these two great faiths, being in unworthy hands, are destroying each other. Why can’t they stand shoulder to shoulder and present a united front to the wave of a Godless nationalism and the ravages consequent upon it. Europe has been sowing the wind for centuries past. She is now reaping a whirlwind which may any day blow off the entire fabric of her civilization. Shall that lesson be lost on us here in India?

A special responsibility devolves on Islam which is pre-eminently a religion of human and inter-religious fellowship. If there is one religion particularly fitted to act as a peacemaker between the various religions, it is Islam which alone proclaims the Divine origin and essential unity of all religions. At this most critical juncture in the history of the human race when humanity stands at the parting of ways – one way leading straight to the jungle – it should be the one paramount all-absorbing mission of Islam to block that way and turn the tide of humanity from the jungle back to fellowship.

Here in India, it must be conceded, no serious effort has been made in this direction. Hinduism and Islam have known each other more as enemies than friends. The broad humanitarian teachings of Islam have never been seriously presented to the Hindus. All the emphasis is placed on the hostility between the two whereas the crying need of the times is a rapprochement between the two. Islam alone can and must take the initiative. And if Hinduism responds, India may yet be saved from the path of the jungle.

Musalmans owe it not only to God to take the humanitarian unifying message of Islam to every Hindu home but also to themselves. Islam alone can obstruct the jungle-ward path – the path of a Godless society which has landed Europe back into medievalism. Islam alone can point the path to human fellowship. If Islam fails, the jungle gains and God help humanity.

Just at this juncture, however, when the very Destiny of humanity is bound up with Islam, Shias and Sunnis in Lucknow are busy breaking one another’s heads. And what is the issue involved? The Sunnis insist that they must publicly recite praises of the first three Caliphs. The Shias cannot bear this. They say they must have the right to publicly curse Abu Bakr and Umar. Is this Islam? This is an insult to Islam. It is up to the enlightened sections of Musalmans to rise to the full height of the call, listen to the challenge of the times, and listening to it, take it up in the only way that it can be taken up – viz, with the broad humanitarian message of Islam. Islam alone is the antidote to the individualism and exclusiveness which have landed Europe in the life of the jungle. If Islam does not take up the challenge, no other faith can. Islam alone can stem the jungle-ward drift of man.

M.Y.K.

(The Light – April 8. 1939)