Muslims for Human Dignity: A Global Call

The dignity of all individuals is a core Islamic principle

BY MOHAMMAD OMAR FAROOQ

Taking a glance at the Muslim world, it’s quite a stretch to talk about a “global call” let alone presenting a model for others to emulate. After all, for several centuries it has appeared dizzyingly fragmented, disoriented, disunited and dysfunctional.

While the problems and issues for the rest of the world might be somewhat different in nature and scale, most countries are contending with deeper issues. For example, in the U.S., part of humanity “can’t breathe” and needs to be reminded of this truth by the Black Lives Matter movement. In parts of Europe, racial discrimination and ghettoization are widespread and not all Muslims have the basic freedom to wear the dignified attire of their choice.

In China, people lack basic liberty. The country is steadily gaining economic and military power and asserting itself forcefully, as in the formerly British-occupied Hong Kong, or repressively, as in what used to be the Uyghur Muslim-majority province of Xinjiang. From the continuing conflicts in Indian-occupied Kashmir and Israelioccupied Palestine, everywhere one looks human dignity — the dignity associated with just being human — is at stake.

Comparatively, the Muslim world’s condition is, in general, worse. The post-colonial dismembered Muslim world of nation states had hardly any truly independent entities, for almost all of them gradually became appendages of the colonial legacy and essentially served the interests of the former colonial masters or of the privileged domestic group that had its grip on the political and economic power in most of them. As history shows, their role was to serve themselves or their colonial patrons, not their people. Parallel to the rampant concentration of wealth and resources, poverty and corruption, there isn’t a lot of positive things to say about most Muslim-majority countries.

Conflicts based on and shaped by internal and external dynamics are raging in the Muslim world. Wars are imposed on them, and being played by external powers and interests engenders many fratricidal conflicts. Extremists play their own tunes, and God only knows what their moral boundary is, as they attack people indiscriminately, especially on a sectarian basis.

Various Muslim-majority countries are adding fuel to the fires of hunger and devastation in Syria , Libya and Yemen, instead of trying to establish justice and bring peace. Palestine keeps bleeding, Israel shrewdly and masterfully pursues its monstrous dream of the Greater Israel and some key Muslim-majority countries are prostrating themselves at its feet.

Given all of this, is it at all relevant for the world’s Muslims to take a stance? This indeed is a pertinent issue, for Muslims have something that others do not and thus have a pivotal role to play in this regard.

Throughout history, self-centeredness has been an inalienable aspect of human traits. It has manifested itself at the individual, tribal and racial levels, and today through nationalism as nation-states. Decadent for a long time due to many internal factors, even the Muslim world has been sucked into this ruinous path. The worst manifestation of such nationalism has occurred in Europe, the cradle of Western civilization, in the form

of two continental wars that eventually became world wars. The long-fragmented Muslim world was easily placed on the chessboard as the colonizers’ pawns. As an appendage to this legacy, it continues to manifest a disorientation and delinkage from its original transcendent civilizational and religious root, because nothing Islamic can be self-centered. The Muslims’ aspiration is distinctively special, with a common thread binding us all at the level of humanity. At that level, irrespective of race, religion, language, nationality, gender or culture, we are one — one common humanity, of which human dignity is the foremost concern. This is where all modern societies have failed dismally. If we want to pick up the pieces and move toward a better future for everyone, then we need to transcend our parochial, self-centered mentality and perspective and embrace a sense of global belonging or, more aptly, a humanity-centered orientation. That means that even Muslims cannot be Muslim-centered. Seriously? Yes, seriously.

In my “Toward Our Reformation: From Legalism to Value-oriented Islamic Law and Jurisprudence”(International Institute of Islamic Thought, 2011), several specific Quran-based values were mentioned as part of the value-orientation, among them humanity orientation and global belonging, on the basis of: “You are indeed the best community that has ever been brought forth for [the good of] humanity: you enjoin the doing of what is right and forbid the doing of what is wrong, and you believe in God ...” (3:110). The Quran unambiguously states that God meant for Muslims to be a community that serves everyone.

“O humanity! Revere your GuardianLord, the One who created you from one being, and created from it its mate, then spread from the two many men and women; Revere God, through whom you demand your mutual (rights), and (revere) the wombs (that bore you): for Allah ever watches over you” (4:1).

Here the Quran addresses all humans so and modern nationalism, which virtually that there is no self-centeredness, as shown let people worship and glorify their tribes by many Muslims. Rather they are to be a or nations, are incompatible with Islam as witness and model: “And thus we have made a deen and its values and principles. you a just and balanced community that you In addition, Muslims need to nurture, will be witnesses over the people and the develop and feel a special bond for the Messenger will be a witness over you” (2:143). umma. Because Islamic identity is one of

Like the rest of humanity, in genchoice, not lineage, this sense and level of eral Muslims have also forgotten their belonging is of great importance. However, h umanity-orientation and severed their even this attachment must not be allowed bond with humanity. At the level of faith, to conflict with Islam’s humanity-orienta

HUMANITY’S ACHIEVEMENTS AND JOYS ARE NOT

ISOLATED FROM THE UMMA AND MUSLIMS MUST HAVE

A SHARE IN THESE AND NOT ONLY REJOICE WHEN GOOD

THINGS HAPPEN TO THEM. SUCCUMBING TO A SENSE

OF ESTRANGEMENT THAT LEADS TO THE DEFAULT VIEW

THAT THE REST OF THE WORLD CONSTITUTES “THE

OTHER” MUST BE RESISTED. MUSLIMS CANNOT JUST

FEEL THE PAIN AND AGONY OF THEIR OWN SUFFERING,

BUT MUST BE IN TUNE WITH THE TRIBULATIONS OF

HUMANITY AT LARGE.

Muslims are expected to uphold the truth and seek and strengthen their bond at the level of the umma. At another level, they are to connect with humanity via a clear humanity-orientation.

Why is this sense of humanity-orientation and global belonging important? Because only with this orientation can the role of “khayr umma (the best of nations) produced to serve humanity” (3:110]) be fulfilled. As human beings, we have multiple levels of belonging: family, nation, country and umma. At yet another level, we all belong to one humanity. None of these levels needs to be conflicting. Our biological and other bonds connect us with our family and relatives. With the greater mobility of modern times, national belonging is more fluid. All of these belongings can be important and indispensable, but we can also reconcile them.

Unfortunately, human beings’ sense of belonging is rather messed up. Any society or nation that embraces the nation-state concept and nationalism to such an extent that its members glory in it and even give their life for it risks abandoning its moral principle or norms, because such patriotism usually means “my country, right or wrong, ethical or unethical, just or unjust.” However, such an attitude is un-Islamic and therefore unacceptable.

Of course communities, administrative structures and their components give rise to nations, but the concepts of ancient tribalism tion, for this spirit of affinity enables the realization of the Quranic phrase “evolved for humanity.”

Humanity’s achievements and joys are not isolated from the umma, and Muslims must have a share in these and not only rejoice when good things happen to them. Succumbing to a sense of estrangement that leads to the default view that the rest of the world constitutes “the other” must be resisted. Muslims cannot just feel the pain and agony of their own suffering, but must be in tune with the tribulations of humanity at large. Here, what the others do or believe is irrelevant, for Muslims are guided by Islam’s principles, values and vision, the Quran and the Prophet’s (salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) legacy.

Imbued with the spirit of global belonging, Muslims must seek common ground for worthy causes and should be at the forefront of fostering the spirit of global belonging. One of the most salient aspects of the Prophet’s Farewell Message is his explicit statement that Arabs are not superior to non-Arabs and Whites are not superior to Blacks, except in taqwa (God consciousness). This resonates with: “O humanity, indeed We have created you from male and female and made you peoples and tribes that you may know one another. Indeed, the most noble of you in the sight of God is the most righteous (God-conscious) of you. Indeed, God is Knowing and Acquainted” (49:13).

Regrettably, and despite these above reminders, Muslims still practice ethnic and skin color discrimination. Consider the ramifications of humanity-orientation. If we treated the conflicts in Afghanistan, Yemen and Syria as a family issue devoid of all other parochial factors, these conflicts would have been handled in a far different manner. Maybe they would not even have started. If the Palestinians and Israelis could embrace humanity-orientation and affirm their mutual human dignity, a fair and lasting peace to that longstanding conflict would not have become so impossible.

If we uphold universal human dignity, we would feel ashamed that so much abundance, luxury and military extravagance exists beside at least the one billion people living in poverty, even abject poverty, and that hunger and famine kill millions of people each year. If people had universally upheld fundamental human dignity, slavery would have ended long before it actually did, and any lingering trace of racism would have been confronted and extinguished. Embracing human dignity would have made businesses, industries and policymakers prioritize people’s broader welfare instead of sacrificing it to the pursuit of profit and damaging the environment.

Humanity-orientation means recognizing each person’s fundamental sanctity and dignity and treating them fairly and caringly, as if we actually were members of one family. This doesn’t mean that families are perfect or that people are simply going to become angels. However, when a society embraces human dignity, challenges and issues can be addressed or minimized in a constructive and effective way.

In today’s world, the message of Islam, especially that of upholding fundamental human dignity, is as fresh and relevant as ever. Thus Muslims should be the first ones to step forward by transcending their parochial mindset, embracing humanity-orientation and setting a good example. Nothing is better and more effective than leading by example. Today, given our world’s infestation with ideas, philosophies, ideologies and systems that thrive on division, domination and claims of supremacy, Islam’s liberating and enduring message of human dignity for all remains intact. God will hold us accountable for what we did to bring it from theory into reality. ih

Dr. Mohammad Omar Farooq is an associate professor with the Department of Economics and Finance at the University of Bahrain (farooqm59@yahoo.com).