Dr Muhammad Maroof Shah

“Man can live without science, he can live without bread, but without beauty, he could no longer live because there would no longer be anything to do to the world. The whole secret is here, the whole of history is here.” (Dostoevsky)  Laotze’s and Kant’s respective remarks about beauty as “the usefulness of the useless,” and “purposiveness without purpose” are recalled in Martha Nasubaum’s choice of the title of her work “ Nor for Profit: Why Democracy Needs Humanities .”       Given the modern penchant for utility and commodification that reserves only a small corner for arts in museums and seeks profit by organising art exhibitions, and impoverished modern souls not ready to live and die for beauty, the twentieth century has been the ugliest as Ananda Coomaraswamy noted. Our standard references to immortal works of art and architecture usually go to ancient or medieval times against traditional cultures that glorified God by cultivating beauty within and without,       It is im

If you want to immortalize a community oppress it brutally as its memory would later unite it. When God was distributing  special gifts to communities few could match Kashmiris in felicity of choice and fastidious taste. Kashmiris demanded and were granted the best of lands where heaven found its own reflection, the best of minds and hands and the hearts that have delighted, influenced and enriched the whole world. It was especially fastidious about the cuisine and developing a refinement of stomach for the same. Kashmir settled for nothing less than its own scriptures and wrote its own versions of great epics including the celestial song Gita as well. A whole new school of philosophy that is brand Kashmir it cultivated and gifted to the world. It invented new science of art/drama and its appreciation as well. It couldn’t accept any rule from outsiders on intellectual, artistic or spiritual planes. All these gifts, however, meant that it  had to excel in the virtue of patience and

Do we ever ask about the contemporary relevance of the use of intellect, sunlight, air and water? Similarly, we shouldn’t ask about the relevance of Tasawwuf today. Let me explain why. Anyone who reflects on what is Tasawwuf or what are its key definitions/characterisations would understand that Tasawwuf or what is said to be its true signified is to be treasured by everyone, every sane human and every Muslim. Just reflect on the standard definitions and characterisations of Tasawwuf here italicised followed by brief comments on our part.       It is the inward/deeper dimension of Islam. A Muslim can never ask about the relevance of the core of Islam. It is worshipping God as if one sees Him or imagining that God is seeing one. Isn’t it perennially the requirement of all true prayer or worship? Isn’t ihsan the perfection of Islam, the ideal end to which faith is oriented? Ihsan has also been linked to husn paida kerden (creating beauty/doing everything in a style or as it

Unlike Holderlin and Rilke, Iqbal is still awaiting his Heidegger, who could appropriate and present him for the post-Nietzschean world audience. Unlike Heidegger, he has received little attention from great philosophers and theologians of the world. Even the Muslim world has been largely ignoring him or just packaging his complex and enormously fecund and subtle mystical and metaphysical insights into some neat and clear formulations. Due attention to his existential and metaphysical thought has been overshadowed by overemphasis on his political thought. He has so far been written off by major histories of philosophy into margins of modern Muslim thought through his vast output was addressed to modern man as such and not to the Muslims only.       Under his unique literary genius and combining all traditionally-recognized approaches to the Ultimate – poetry, philosophy, religion and mysticism – has immense power to speak to an age marred by various crises that fundamentally spring