Dr Muhammad Maroof Shah

If the beauty of Muhammad (SAW) known to select saints and sung by such poets as Jami and Iqbal is known by any human, it is impossible to oppose it or ignore it. If Islam is submission to Truth/Reality who is against it? If this Reality is known or manifest by what is the Praised One, the Embodiment of all perfections that human nature aspires for, who can dare to oppose the later? If the beauty of Muhammad (SAW) known to select saints and sung by such poets as Jami and Iqbal is known by any human, it is impossible to oppose it or ignore it. If we note the distinction between Muhammad (SAW) as known by Muslims in history and Muhammad (SAW) as known by Homo religiosus as its own aspiration for transcendence/ideality or the image of perfection one adores, as the Messenger sent not only to all humans but all creation, as the Mercy of the worlds known and unknown, as the Envoy of the Absolute as such and not a person so and so, it needs to be debated whether it is possible or feasible to

Is heaven like a modern nation state that has restricted entry on the basis of birth in particular region/religion? Who says God has no reward for other faith communities? None of the towering scholars holds historical Islam has monopoly on salvation. Islam that alone is acceptable to God according to the Holy Qur’an embraces, as metaphysic, all revealed traditions and can’t be identified with Sharia tagged historical Islam given Sharia has kept changing previously but salvific efficacy hasn’t from Adam/Noah to Muhammad. The logic of salvation couldn’t change on any arbitrary date and none has so far fixed that date either. Islam questions those who maintain Judaic or Christian monopoly on salvation and can’t contradict itself by asserting its own monopoly. Salvation is primarily a function of metaphysical/esoteric core that stays/stayed unchanged across scriptures. Even if salvation of believers in other religions is theoretically not conceded, in practice when it comes

First book of its kind from Kashmir on a difficult but vital topic by self-taught mystic scholar that any 8th grader can grasp.   A treat, already selling like sanitizer in the times of Corona, sanitizes the pathological environment created by puffed up ego holding consciousness in siege. The first book of its kind from Kashmir on a difficult but vital topic by self-taught mystic scholar that any 8th grader can grasp.      “In the beginning was consciousness.” Chit or Consciousness is, so to speak, the ultimate ground and end of all that is. The study or enquiry concerning consciousness is the first and the last enquiry concerning first and last ends of man. It is the science of consciousness that explains all the weird, mysterious, miraculous things that rationalism often dismisses without hearing. The sum and substance or objective of great art and poetry is development/universalization of consciousness. Man is, so to speak, consciousness. And God is the universal consci

Nothing in Islamic culture makes sense except in the light of Tasawwuf . It was not till the 19th Century, under the influence of Orientalists, that Sufism began to be considered non-indigenous to Islam. Let us unfold these observations. Sufism understood as inner/spiritual dimension of Islam/ Ihsan and defined in terms of key aspects by various Masters – “attention without distraction,” awareness of the present moment, doing everything in style or with an eye on beauty, sincerity of purpose, guarding against nafs and all its guises, exclusive attachment to the Real, cultivating love/gnosis, science of stations/virtues, science of realization of freedom, adab , giving everything its due, seeing everything in terms of beauty, journey within from the self/ego/psyche to the non-self/Self/Spirit, to be truly oneself or just to be and share the treasure of one’s being or presence – has been of vital importance for understanding Islamic culture and much of intellectual-religious-spiritual

  It is time to weep for Hussain(AS). If we can’t, we need to ask God for helping us. “Tears are a gift. When we don’t know or don’t remember how to shed them, we can pray for the gift of tears. We don’t know the script. We know the Giver.” It is time to know Hussain(A.S) suffered for each one of us, for all those who are denied justice. It is time to see how suffering is a gift and thank God for it. Let us unfold all these points on the day when the noblest family on earth was massacred for the noblest ideals that ennoble and redeem life.      To be human is to suffer, to grieve and to weep. It is to suffer for the sake of that which is dearer than life, to grieve for that which ideal which humans, our predecessors or we have failed to be loyal to. It is to weep for what overcomes us and undo all resistance on our part to the decimating embrace of God/Spirit.       God made us humans and not angels. Not to weep in the name of some spiritual or mystical principle would contradict our h

“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