Читать книгу Islam, the West and the Challenges of Modernity - Tariq Ramadan - Страница 6

Foreword

A man, a womanat the heart of modernity

To observe and understand it, our world seems inaccessible. The days pass and confirm the folly of men. Carried, here, by technique and noise, they live on speed, computer science, music and cinema. Burdened, over there, by hunger and weariness, they survive on expectation, hope and in silence. Modern times have, for our memories, a concern for image, and also the infinite neglect of reality and meaning.

In the East as in the West, our epoch gives rise to the greatest famine ever noticed on earth. Tortured bodies echo the suffering of minds. Bodies and hearts are thirsty for humanity. Poverty, straying, dictatorships and wars stifle and stammer the dignity of several billions of men and women every day. Solitude, individualism, moral misery, and lack of love eats into the being of all those whom comfort should have made content. Where is the way? Where are we going? How to be a woman, how to be a man today?

So how, at the heart of this agony, do we respond to our hearts and protect the spirituality which makes us be? How, on the precipice of so much imbalances, do we bring forth the balance and harmony that will appease our hearts? How do we remain faithful to the pact of origin when modernity renders us so unfaithful to our humanity?

Memory of the first morning:

And when thy Lord took from the Children of Adam, from their loins, their seed, and made them testify touching themselves, ‘Am I not your Lord?’They said, ‘Yes, we testify…’ (Qur’ān, 7:172)

This testimony lives in the depths of hearts; it speaks and calls to us. Our heart is our hope; spirituality is our way:

It is not the eyes that are blind, but blind are the hearts within the breast. (Qur’ān, 22:46)

This is looking, in one’s depth, for strength of sight, real sight. It is being with God in order to read the signs, live with His remembrance in order to fill oneself with humility, to give the night its light and pray loudly in infinite silence:

Behold We shall cast upon thee a weighty word; surely the first part of the night is heavier in tread, more upright in speech, surely in the day thou hast long business. And remember the Name of thy Lord, and devote thyself unto Him very devoutly. Lord of the East and the West; there is no God but He… (Qur’ān, 73:5–9)

To give life to one’s heart is so difficult. The daily running of the world steals us from ourselves, to the point, sometimes, of rendering our personality double and tearing us apart. I have this memory, so present in my eyes; an image in Tunisia, Egypt, India, the USA, Europe, in the East as in the West. Friday and all days of the week: the tearing apart of the Muslim world is there.

The crowd, the community, the fervour, the hope and the best of intentions. The most beautiful day of the week, the day of all symbols. The sermon, the reminder to meaning, the wet eyes, the tears of the heart. The world of Islam is vibrating in this end of the twentieth century as it was vibrating at the beginning of the seventh; God is witness of this strength of faith. The mosques open up, the roads are mosques, and the earth is a mosque. The Umma is here; the rich and the poor, the computer scientist and the unlettered, witnesses of the same testimony looking to quench the same thirst.

Saturday, Sunday, Monday and the rest. Five hours of the morning, noon, or even four hours. Sleep is so heavy, the jobs so preoccupying. So many silences on Fridays and so many words on other days. So much truth and then so many lies; so many hopes and then so much groaning; so much will and then so much laziness. There was here a memory, what remains is forgetfulness. There was so much, but what remains is so little. During the days of the week, daily life has its excuses that have reason for our faithfulness. Our epoch is one of torture. Spirituality is a trial.

On Friday as on other days of the week, our wounds are deep. There are some who, observing the vanities of this world, will adopt the ways of mysticism. Far from the world, ambitions and conflicts; and nourished by the light of the only Light. In the West, it was even considered that such was “real Islam”, “the other Islam”; the one that forces respect, when it is an Islam that attacks minds. One must live far in order to live better; abandoning men in order to come closer to God. Our epoch seems to give reason to the meaning of this exile.

The Sufis, through their contemplation, their inward exile and their shunning of the world have followed and are still following the example of the Prophet (peace be upon him) who used to spend entire nights in prayer, meditation, in beautifying his memory, deepening his gratefulness and perfecting his worship of Him. The tears, born out of meditation, make the signs in the universe appear. The presence of the sacred is revealed:

Surely in the creation of the heavens and of the earth and in the alternation of night and day there are signs for men possessed of minds who remember God, standing and sitting and on their sides, and reflect upon the creation of the heavens and earth… (Qur’ān, 3:190–1)

At the heart of our daily existence, which is agitated and drowned in the most overwhelming occupations, this is tantamount to taking a step backwards, exiling oneself to one’s centre, looking for the strength of one’s memory, loving and acknowledging, thanking and praying in the noise, looking for silence and living with strength the meaning of the words “Be on this earth like a stranger or a passer by.” ¹

This spirituality, and its requirements, is at the heart of our daily existence. It is a question of denying nothing of our being, neither our body, nor our spirit, nor this life nor the Next. The trial of spirituality is a trial of balance; it is the way of the “just middle” as it is the way of all difficulties. Some want but the life of this world, and thus they lose themselves:

Now some men there are who say, ‘Our Lord, give to us in this world’; such men shall have no part in the world to come… (Qur’ān, 2:200)

Others, as much as their humanity allows, want to be here in order to be better over There:

And others there are who say, ‘Our Lord, give to us in this world good, and good in the world to come’ (Qur’ān, 2:201)

It is living one’s daily existence, working and committing oneself; putting one’s faith in order to test one’s own actions, angers, and deceptions. It is being with God amidst men and giving to what one has the meaning of what one is:

… but seek, amidst that which God has given thee, the Last Abode, and forget not thy portion of the present world; and do good, as God has been good to thee. And seek not to work corruption in the earth; surely God loves not the workers of corruption. (Qur’ān, 28:77)

It is to be with one’s whole being in this life, carrying the witness of one’s faith through actions of justice and goodness. It is tantamount to rejecting nothing of what one “is” in order to be with one’s whole being. This before God and men:

The best of men is the one who is most useful to his fellow men. ²

Yet, our epoch challenges us. The society of entertainment, excessive consumption and generalised individualism coexists with the most extreme destitution and the most total misery. In front of these fatalities, where is the meaning? Filled with the remembrance of God, at which source, in all this modernity, can we quench our thirst?

Each person knows the re-routing of this life which kills something in us: sitting in front of the television, battered by a torrent of information, and paralysed by the scope of fractures. This is tantamount to acknowledging God, but living without a life. It is losing one’s mind because one has lost one’s heart, and this day in and day out.

One would love nonetheless to know how to be a man, how to be a woman before God, in the mirror of one’s own conscience, in the looks of those who surround us. One would so wish to find the strength to beautify one’s thoughts and to purify one’s heart. It is everyone’s hope and expectation to live in serenity and to plod along in transparency: the palms of the hands patiently directed towards heaven, at the heart of all this modernity.

A man, a woman, it is simply a question of being. To be good and do good. Which man has not wished to be for his companion the horizon of his expectations; to walk on the same shore and, out of tenderness and pardon, make of their union a sign. A couple that is for humanity what the sun is for nature, the warmth and sign of creation. Which woman has not wanted, with this same will, to be for her husband the energy of the way, at the heart of this modernity?

Which mother, which father or which parent has not hoped for their children the most harmonious space, the most united family, and the most liberating interior force? Who has never wished to see in the eyes of his son or daughter, in the depths of their heart, the sparkle of thankfulness and conviction that make faith? Which son or daughter has not desired living between two beings, carried by their love, nourished by their values and strong in their coherence, at the heart of this modernity?

Such simple things in so troubled an epoch. To be good and do good, before God, is the meaning of this call, chanted more than 17 times a day, yesterday as it is today, at the heart of this modernity:

Guide us in the straight path… (Qur’ān, 1:6)

Walking along the right path, the path of the just middle, to remember God and keep in one’s heart the sense of values and finalities. Always walking along despite the dangers and adversities, despite the injustices and horrors, trusting in God so as not to despair of men and events. Walking along, and walking again, simply trying to be a man and trying to be a woman. In transparency and clarity accepting one’s weaknesses and humanity, finding at the heart of forgiveness the strength of one’s own humility. To be humble, in order to be at the heart of modernity. As also the remembrance and the reminder:

Remember thy Lord in thy soul, humbly and fearfully, not loud of voice, at morn and eventide. Be not thou among the heedless. Surely those who are with thy Lord wax not too proud to serve Him; they chant His praise, and to Him they prostrate (Qur’ān, 7:205–6)

This by facing up to all inhuman individualism, all reflexes of consumption, all televisual or cinematographical illusions and all neglects. By rejecting all injustices, by opposition to all exploitation, by fighting against all miseries. By saying and maintaining with determination the strength of this humility and trust in God, in an infinite manner. By finding the road in action; arming oneself with light through patience. In the fraternity of men against the society of individuals, in the union of liberties against the egoism of independence. The right path, at the heart of modernity: our spirituality, in our heart, is at the heart of life.

By rejecting neglect and listening, deeply listening from the deepest recesses of ages, listening and hearing, the voice of the ancient slave Bilāl calling the faithful to his faithfulness, five times a day, and for eternity. Looking, in the echo of this voice and in the rhythm of prayers, looking and finding the direction and the way, at the heart of all this modernity.

Notes

1. Aḥadīth reported by Bukhārī.

2. A ḥasan Ḥadīth reported by al-Dāraqutnī.