Dr Muhammad Maroof Shah

Reorienting certain debates on the meaning and constructions of Islam today. Sectarianism in Muslims is mostly a product of ignorance and vested interests. How far it is a product of ignorance is documented by Shahab Ahmed in his What is Islam , one of  the really great works on Islam that is destined to be influential and help reorient certain debates on the meaning and constructions of Islam today. First a few remarks on the author and the book.       Shahab Ahmad knew 15 languages including the most important classical languages in which Islamic tradition is expressed. He is extremely careful with regard to sources he quotes and usually deals with original sources and classical authorities to build his arguments. There is little by way of his own interpretation and much by way of letting authorities and little noticed scholars speak in their own words. He asks questions after piling huge mass of facts and marginalized scholars. Let us read him, as he reads others, respectfully and

Man has been made a slave instead of true worshipper and he has lost self confidence. There is something terribly wrong with religions as ordinarily understood and practiced, and appropriated for political ends. There is a truckload of guilt associated with non-issues, a fear psychosis promoted in the name of God understood as cosmic policeman, exploitation and oppression against women, minorities and religious other in their name. Many an unfounded superstition and distrust of reason and science has also been associated with religions. Man has been made a slave instead of true worshipper and he has lost self confidence. People have been divided, hated, killed is its name. It is no wonder that modern man who is deeply religious has found it difficult to concede what has been sold in the name of religion. Failing to find deeply fulfilling rational, moral and spiritual theory and practice of religion, he seems to have chosen agnosticism or atheism or some sort of heresy. The choice now

An open letter to the Chief Minister of J & K on Wild Management Plan for Vandalization of Historical Heritage Farm at Dachigam. Dedicated to the dumb sheep and their reportedly deaf shepherds, and the oppressed Hangul. Hon’ble Madam, “As they have dared, so shall I dare. Dare to tell the truth, as I have pledged to tell it, in full, since the normal channels of justice have failed to do so. My duty is to speak out; I do not wish to be an accomplice in this travesty. My nights would otherwise be haunted by the spectre of the innocent” sheep farm suffering for a crime it did not commit.  “I defy decent men to read it without a stir of indignation in their hearts and a cry of revulsion, at the thought of the undeserved punishment being meted out.” Compelled by my professional obligations wedded to Hippocratic oath and thanks to my long standing interest in environmental movements and thinking, I, based on close reading of much of communication between sheep husbandry and wildlife

Reading Nayeema Mehjoor’s Lost in Terror It is undeniable that Kashmiri resistance movement has been weakened by its (mis)association with puritanical Islamist ideology, unbearable – and some inadequately documented – human costs, violence against minorities, women and imagined/projected other. It needs rare courage to report from ground zero, to direct gaze to the problematic within, to avoid mincing words and call spade a spade. To attempt to write without imposed or imagined blinkers and threats, to write back to the Empire of oppression and violence, to speak on taboo issues and take strong positions outside the comfort  zone of hypocrisy or neutrality is what a writer-journalist can aim at and to succeed to a significant extent in this endeavour is indeed an achievement.This success story deserves our attention this week.       A Kashmiri woman stranding between tradition and modernity, Kashmir and London, and caught up in transition that requires dealing with

We need to read these thinkers first in historical context and proper perspective, and then judge. The question of our attitude to Sufism has divided modern Muslims. ISIS, and even some revivalists who don't share ISIS politics, share significant part of their theology, premised on certain negative reading of Sufism. Should we side with Ibn Taymiyyah perceived as staunch opponent of Unitarian Sufism or Ibn Arabi who is perceived to be its greatest exponent? For some analysts Salafis are playing into hands of Imperialists and dividing Ummah.       So how do we tackle these accusations and counter-accusations? I propose to say a few words on Ibn Arabi to clarify the issue and ask if Ibn Taymiyyah can be considered his real opponent notwithstanding his takfeer of him. (Against Ibn Taymiyyah, some great Ahle-Hadees scholars, from the Indian subcontinent especially,  have been highly praising Ibn Arabi.) I don’t claim to understand Ibn Arabi better than his seeming opponent but onl

Life as experienced in all its hues is what books seek to discuss. Life with all its weal and woe is the book which we need to learn to correctly read. Nature, the Quran-i-takweeni , is the book of books. Life as experienced in all its hues is what books seek to discuss. Now some lessons are so crucial for us mortals that God bypasses the need of earthly teachers or ink and pen to teach us. God sometimes needs to directly speak to each one of us and he does speak in many ways including suffering. We have suffered; all of us may have stories to tell that can rip apart hearts and minds. But do we know how to read the symbolic message of all kinds of sufferings that are inflicted on us or invited by us. (In one sense all suffering is invited, invited by our own souls for their progress. Even our time of birth and death are chosen by that higher principle in us). Experiences of suffering are like events of a dream which need to be interpreted. Suffering is not only to be endured bu

Reading Iqbal on the Beloved Prophet (SAW) Who was Iqbal? The best description is by his son that he is a lover of the Prophet (SAW). The rest is a corollary or an exemplification. And who is the Prophet he loved? Ideal pole of man, the Meaning of everything, the Alpha and the Omega of all human endeavours. “Since Muslims love you, you should let beard grow” a Molvi advised Iqbal. He replied, somewhat humorously, “You have shaved it from inside and displayed from outside and I have shaved it from outside but let it grow inside.”  One reason for his failure to go to Hajj, opines Mr Ghulam Beigh Neerang – and one feels agreeing – could be providential as he couldn’t afford to see the Prophet’s place and still live. Iqbal was seen to be occupying splendid place in the hierarchy of Prophet’s beloved by a Kashmiri who didn’t know him and he rushed to Lahore to inform him. He refused a job that required his wife to be part of the parties he had to attend. Asked if you have had deedar

Revisiting Plato and Al-Farabi today Witnessing calls for violence, God’s Rule, juxtaposition/confounding of political and religious slogans, use of Islam for and against particular ideological thought current, one wonders how to understand and differentiate what is truly divine and what is sold as divine. So much counterfeit currency might be in the market that we need a touchstone to judge. Let us explore if we have this touchstone with the help of Plato, “second Master” Al-Farabi and “modern Plato” Voegelin.       Plato argued for orienting man and his communal institutions toward God/the Good and need for true constitution we can call divine or revealed constitution and dangers of those constitutions in which one part dominates against others and society is no longer an integrated whole governed by Justice that is God, although one can always see its ideal character in the sense that it will only be approximated and never fully the case. as Derrida would note justice is yet to