The Abode of Peace: Islam and a Globalized
World
by Dr Abdu Razzaq
Blackhirst
With the collapse of the Ottoman Caliphate in 1924 the
classical era of Islam came to an end. Since then Muslims
have been engaged in a struggle to define and develop a
post-Caliphate Islam that addresses the realities of
modernity, including that universalising economic and
cultural reality known as globalisation. When the Caliphate
was disbanded it was already a corrupt, moth-eaten relic of
former times and an embarassment to the Islamic faith; its
demise was inevitable and the arrival of modernity just as
unavoidable. In many ways the post-Caliphate era is no doubt
a decline, a forgetting, a fading of the mystical perfume of
classical Islam, but at the same time it is also no doubt a
Divine decree. Steps of decline and forgetting are
providential and inescapable. The teaching of the Koran and
all of God's Books is that the fragrance of sanctity will
fade from the life of man as time goes by and as the Day of
Reckoning looms ever nearer. The challenge for Muslims is to
adapt to the new conditions and to find an authentic Islamic
response to the new reality. This entails, above all,
preserving Islam as a viable, living path to human
salvation. As the modernist poet T.S. Eliot said, the whole
purpose of either a religion or a civilization is to offer
the possibility of sainthood for those capable of sainthood
and for those who are not the possibility of at least a
moral life. Modernity and globalisation does nothing to
change this fact, although it changes (and complicates) the
framework in which this unchanging duty must be
accomplished.
So far, it must be admitted, the Muslim world has had
great difficulties coming to terms with post-Caliphate
conditions. To a large extent the struggle has been thwarted
by the dominance of regressive, externalist, so-called
"fundamentalist" forms of Islam. Just as the Caliphate was
being abolished the backward-looking Wahabis came to power
in the Arabian peninsula, the heartland of Islam, and began
promoting and funding their brand of the religion far and
wide with their new-found oil wealth. Consequently, Islam
has been retarded, has failed to mature and to find a
legitimate response to the tides of change that have swept
and are still sweeping the planet. The extremists from among
the fundamentalists (Islamists, jihadists, call them what
you will) seek a return to the past and are united in their
desire to reconstitute the Caliphate as a trans-Islamic
political entity. They are part of a wider phenomenon also
found in other religions whereby the weak-minded, seeking
simple solutions to the modern impasse, clamour to defy
providence and to restore the past. But restorationism is
always an evil. Restoring the past is always a vain conceit.
It is is like Dr Frankenstein's efforts to reanimate the
dead. It is an evil in Islam, where jihadists seek to
restore the Caliphate, just as it is an evil in Judaism,
where Zionists seek to restore the ancient Israelite
kingdom, and in Christianity where fundamentalists support
the restoration of the ancient Temple as a prelude to the
Second Coming of Christ. Restorationism is a hallmark of
reactionary fanatics and is a fatally inadequate response to
the pressing problems of our age.
The tragedy of this is greatest in Islam which, as the
last of God's revelations, has a particular mission to our
times and to modern, globalised man and that, of all faiths,
has a potential that is still unrealised. We need only think
of the institution of the Hajj to see a concrete example of
the Islamic promise. From the outset Islam contained an
extraordinary global vision of a single human brotherhood
united in peace and equality in a common submission to a
transcendent authority. The Hajj is an expression of an
inner geometric framework in Islam that adapts it to global
expansion. The pivotal theme of Islam - Unity in
multiplicity - is inherently globalising. There is a
geometry of proportion in the very internal structures of
the Islamic revelation by which the revelation "unfolds" to
embrace the whole of humanity. It can be expanded by these
proportions or it can be condensed by the same proportions
according to the times. The Muslim ummah - the worshipful
community of Muslims - unfolds in this way. At its centre is
the heart of the individual Muslim in remembrance of God
(dhikr). This then unfolds in the individual's (voluntary)
salat. This is followed by the obligatory salat where
Muslims are gathered in congregation. Then the family unit.
Then the wider local community at Friday prayers. Then the
gathering of broader communities at the Eid. Then, finally,
the gathering of the whole Ummah, the whole human family, in
the pilgrimage. Islam expands outwards from the human heart
to embrace the whole world, like boxes in boxes. This is its
inherent structure. It is a structure made for a globalised
world. Modernity needs Islam - this too is providential -
but so far Islam has failed to rise to the occassion and
expand into its fullness.
The plan to restore the Caliphate is part of a larger
plan to rebuild the House of Islam, the Abode of Peace, as a
geographical entity after the medieval pattern but now
nuclear-armed. The most important consequence of
globalisation for Muslims has been the rupturing of a
distinct "Islamic world" and of the old distinctions of
'Abode of Peace' and 'Abode of War'. In the Middle Ages
these terms were not problematic. They indicated
geographical realities. The Abode of Peace was those lands
under Muslim control and the Abode of War was those lands
not under Muslim control. The projected passage of history
embedded in Muslim consciousness and part of Muslim
triumphalism - a triumphalism that deteriorated into
complacency - was that the Abode of Peace would gradually
subdue the Abode of War. History has turned out otherwise
and, indeed, there are no longer any such certainties or any
such neat distinctions. The West initiated modernity after
shedding the limiting medieval idea of a geographical,
monocultural Christendom. This enabled the Western mind to
acquire global scope, a world consciousness that is now
being translated into the globalisation of a post-Christian
Western culture. Today, all parts of the globe, including
the old "Abode of Peace" are being colonized by Western
music, art, food, advertising, technology, tourists,
institutions, finance and values, if not by Western armies.
This extends beyond the idea of mere "imperialism". It is
now an open-ended global embrace, driven by technological
revolution, and with a momentum of its own. All parts of the
globe are being "Westernized" and "globalised" in this way.
Where the 'Abode of Peace' was once a self-contained
cultural bubble it is now porous and Western influences are
filtering in at an increasing rate every day. The old hard
and fast boundaries between the East and the West no longer
hold.
At the same time, however, and against this, there has
been a great epoch-making transformation in the late
twentieth century as a consequence of the West's global
reach, namely the establishment of large Muslim communities
in the West and, along with it, a growing number of Western
converts to Islam. These Western Muslims have crossed an
important historical threshold. In the Middle Ages, and in
fact until recently, the notion of large communities of
Muslims living and worshipping as free citizens in Europe or
North America - ostensibly the "Abode of War" - was utterly
inconceivable. Now there are nearly twenty million Muslims
in northern Europe alone. There are mosques in all the major
cities as well as extensive Muslim school systems and second
and third generations of Muslim citizens - with healthy
birth rates - steadily weaving Islam into Western life. It
is among these Western Muslim communities that a new
expression of the timeless principles of Islam is taking
shape.
Extremists regard Muslims who migrate to the West as
sinners because, by their interpretation, only lands ruled
by Muslims count as 'Abode of Peace'. Such a viewpoint is a
failure to come to terms with the demise of the temporal
Caliphate and the end of a territorial "Islamic world". More
importantly, it fails to see the opportunity at hand. The
West had to undermine the spiritual foundations of its own
civilization in order to accomplish its global ambitions.
Like the Romans who proverbially "created a desert and
called it peace" the West has created a shallow hedonist
wasteland and called it the Land of the Free. It replaced
Church with State and confused patriotism with piety. As an
intellectual culture it abandoned its sense of the sacred
and succumbed to the shameful underestimation of the human
condition that is atheism. There is now a mentality and
temperament bred in the West that is completely incapable of
religious sensitivity. The idea that "progress" is at the
expense of religion is an indelible and deforming stain on
occidental thought. Muslims at large, but especially Muslims
in the West - outside of the inhibiting atmosphere of the
traditional Muslim world - are engaged in an endeavour to
demonstrate that a modern, technological life is not
necessarily at odds with profound belief and the fullness of
religion, sainthood for saints and for the rest the
salvation of a moral life.
In the post-Caliphate period there have been various
attempts to grapple with the demise of old distinctions and
to reclassify modern secular Western states as 'Abode of
Safety' or 'Abode of Truce'. Such innovations are
unnecessary. Instead, we merely need to understand 'Abode of
Peace' as any jurisdiction in which Muslims are free and
safe to live as Muslims and to practise Islam. This includes
both Muslim majority jurisdictions but also secular Western
democracies insofar as they are tolerant and pluralist and
do not obstruct or hinder the essentials of the faith. The
'Abode of War' on the other hand is any jurisdiction in
which Muslims are not safe to live as Muslims and to
practise the essentials of their religion. Muslims have a
religious duty to seek to live where they can be Muslims.
What exactly this entails may be open to debate. Are Muslims
free to be Muslims if their girls are forbidden from wearing
hijab in public schools, for example? At what point does an
'Abode of Peace' become an 'Abode of War'? This is a
question that remains to be settled but it is a fact of the
contemporary world that the categories "Abode of Peace' and
'Abode of War' do not necessarily correspond to so-called
Islamic and non-Islamic states anymore and that the forces
of globalisation have and will distribute the Ummah across
the face of the globe.
Against the inclination to fall back into a narrow
territorialism, whether it is belligerant nationalism or
archaic tribalism, a new cosmopolitan spirit must awaken in
the Muslim collectivity. In particular, the legitimacy of an
Islam that is settled and at home in the West depends upon a
reinterpretation of the old categories and is a vital step
towards acknowleding the global realities of our times. For
the first time a Western Islam is essential to the future
vitality of the faith. The real tests of the post-industrial
age are concerned with the pitfalls and distractions of an
unprecedented affluence, hi-tech decadence and the
totalitarianism of science. Muslims in the West are at the
forefront of coming to terms with exactly these issues.
Even more important than shedding old territorial
definitions, though, is an unfolding of the inner dimensions
of tauhid, the core doctrine of Unity. If old territorial
boundaries can no longer be sustained, neither can old
exclusivist mentalities that were formed in the comfort of
the secure Islamic citadels of the past. Just as the Hajj
implies a single brotherhood of man so the metaphysical
doctrine of Unity implies a spiritual perspective with
universal scope as befits a global era. Islam asserts that
no people have been left without a prophet and that the
teachings of the prophets are one and unanimous. The whole
prophetology of Islam is universalising. The challenge for
modern Islam is to rise above the medieval
particularisations of religion - a combative mentality of
"us and them" - and to realise a universal ideal. In its
fullest potential Islam is not just one religion among many
but is a meta-religion, the religion of religions. No other
faith offers this possibility. Hinduism is too rooted in the
soil of India. Buddhism is too abstract. Judaism is
fossilized in ethnic identity. Christianity is limited by
the dogma that none comes to the Father but through the Son.
But Islam has a genuinely universal perspective by which it
is able to bring all other faiths under its wing. The
challenge is for Islam to mature and realise this potential.
As we globalise, so must we also transcend. Ours is an age
in which Muslims are being called to the spiritual
leadership of mankind but so far too many have shown only a
woefully inadequate appreciation of the dimensions and
gravity of the situation.
As regards forms, the genius of Islam is in the realm of
Law. On the face of it, the Sharia is an impediment to a
legitimate Muslim response to a globalised modernity, but
this again is because of reactionary failures to seize the
moment, a failure of vision. The end of the classical era of
Islam also brought the end of the classical maddhabs. The
post-Caliphate era is a new era of ijtihad but thus far
Islamic jurisprudence has not awoken from its medieval
ossifications. Nor has the Muslim Ummah at large -
fragmented and caught up in the quest for national
identities in the post-colonial chaos - appreciated the
universal value of the Islamic notion of Law. Islam
preserves and offers a nomocratic view of government and
society. Islam represents the view that there is an
immutable bedrock of Law and that sovereignty lies with God.
Islam - let it be stated against all manner of modern
theories - is not a system of government, it is a system of
Law. The Islamic ideal is communal submission to a
transcendent authority in which a broad layer of Law
insulates most of the people from most of the governments
most of the time, and wherever there is a breakdown of
government a bedrock of Law, internalized by the intimacies
of religion, still prevails.
The nation state is especially problematic in a
globalised context. For a start, globalism places unbearable
pressures upon the great array of fragile and often
half-baked so-called "nation states" in the African and
South American continents, in Central Asia, in the Pacific
and elsewhere. The nation state model has bound diverse
elements together into meaningful entities in some cases in
European experience but outside of the West few states are
truly robust. And, secondly, in those states that are viable
the intrusions of globalism are prompting the state into
tightening the reins of its tyranny over the lives of its
citizens. As tariff barriers come down between national
markets the barriers of citizenship go up along borders. As
the internet penetrates new populations governments grow
more suspicious of what their own citizens might be thinking
and saying and doing in their own homes. The modern,
intrusive, technological state (its murderous weaponry,
security paranoias and pseudo-religious ideologies) is a
monster. Countless examples from the grim history of the
twentieth century and our present times could be cited to
illustrate this point. Life in even a benign modern state is
institutionalized, licensed and controlled from birth to
grave as never before.
By any realistic prognosis globalism will bring a world
polarised between areas under pervasive, intrusive
government and areas under stateless anarchy. Only Islam has
the potential to form a viable alternative to these extremes
and the historical momentum to see it realised. The
nomocratic ideal has, in fact, been the norm in history.
Statedom is just a passing phase, as globalism now
underlines for us. While the history books are full of
empires and kingdoms, the reality is that for most of human
history most people have proven perfectly able to go about
their own affairs with little or no institutional government
- they were governed instead by Law in the broader sense, a
cohesive atmosphere of common encoded symbols, a body of
authoritative rules and social norms to which all, including
governments, are subject.
Islam preserves a vision of a comprehensive and steadfast
bedrock layer of Law beyond the reach of corporate
manipulators, self-interested oligarchs, social
experimenters, dangerous idealists, misguided do-gooders,
tyrants and demigods, a Law that is humanising in its intent
and universal in its application, a Law that is implicit in
the very notion of humanity. This is the way of the future,
because our own destructive capacities will eventually force
us to locate sovereignty beyond ourselves - either that or
we are destroyed by our own creations. We are rapidly
approaching that moment in history where it is brotherhood
under Law, or nothing. The great challenge of this new,
Post-Caliphate era of ijtihad is to find reckonings of
jurisprudence calculated from the modern ferment that serve
a global Ummah and offer globalised man a code of life more
deeply humane and civilizing than any declaration of human
rights. This is an essential part of the task of globalizing
the 'Abode of Peace'.
© Copyright Dr Abdu
Razzaq Blackhirst 2007
This article was written
for and first appeared in 'Folio' the journal of Forman
Christian College, Lahore, Pakistan.