Culture Bashing Cannot go Unabated

The eyes can’t see when they move, only when they stop that they see. Ever wondered why birds move their heads the way they do, Start-Stop movement? They cannot move their eyes, they have to move their head to bring a particular range in focus and then to see something, they have to stop moving it once placed at the right place. To be able to see things clearly we have to stop moving for a moment! Culture bashing cannot go unabated! Stop right there! Stop and pause and rethink what we have been thinking all along!

Every coming day an op-ed appears criticizing one or the other aspect of our culture. Marriages are getting delayed because marriages are getting costly, marriages are costly because – “culture”. Rubbish! There is casteism in Kashmir. Rubbish! We are people with backward mentality. Rubbish! Women are oppressed in Kashmir. Rubbish! All of our problems are because we failed to modernize. Rubbish! Mental health is the biggest issue in Kashmir. Rubbish! This is not Islam, this is part of culture. Rubbish! My Islam doesn’t tell me to serve my in-laws, but only my husband. Rubbish! Traditionalists are holding us and the society back! Rubbish!

It is difficult for me to address the entire discourse in one write-up and it is impossible to make a point by point refutation of each one of the claims that are made in newspaper op-eds, Tweets, Status Updates, Pyend talks etc., by almost all of us including Molvis, Teachers, Students, the walael/masala woal but most of the times by “journalists” and “activists”, masquerading as scholars of sometimes religion, other times economics and certain other times sociology and what not, and often times by lab rats masquerading as “academicians”. Barbaad gulistan karne ko bas ek hi ullu kaafi hai, har shaakh pe ullu baitha ho anjaam-e-gulistan kya hoga.

The infamous Mushtaq Ahmad Veeri sahab who informed us of “salafiyun ka kamaal” when ISIS first rose, in a public talk went on to say, “akh folla, ze faell, trye faell ti hekihya insaan khyeth, thakan chu insaan ath khaandras pyeth…………hurraihuss, ath manz gayi asi saeri kuniy, aelhadees, hanafi, jamaet, tableegi…….. rafulyadaen aur ameen bil jahar se hi kaam chalne waali (nahi hai), udkhulu fis silmi kaafa, poore poore gasiv Islamas andhar daekhl, haeyith diyiv be chus amli ummatee.” (we could have had our fill with a piece or two or even three, marriage (read wazwaan) tires us….. increase the servings, we all agree on this – the Ahlul Hadith, the Hanafi, the Jamat-e-Islami, the Tableeghi Jamat…… raising hands during prayer (rafa ul yadain) and saying “ameen” loudly (ameen bil jahar) is not enough, udhkhulu fis silmi kaafa, enter into Islam completely (Quran says), show everyone that you are the follower of the Prophet (saw) in practice…..)

Wazwan is the prime suspect in the moral degradation our society is going through. Truth be told, we all know the reasons why our society is falling, but we can’t speak for we are afraid to offend anyone. The instinct to place blame on something and to find something to get our frustration out upon, we have to criticize culture or cultural references or its institutions, for culture has no one defending it and the “masculine-unafraid-you” have no one to offend. Comment on women in jeans or men without shirts, and Lo and Behold, a brigade would follow you, hound you and ultimately cancel you. Comment on Liquor Shops, Cinema halls and [this portion has been edited out]. Comment on religion and the Maulana is all guns blazing. Culture! There it is! No one speaks for rista! Everyone eats it, everyone enjoys it, everyone wants to have a piece more, but rista is the enemy! And when you add udhkhulu fis silmi kaafa to the discourse, it invariably means that you have rista because you have not yet entered into Islam completely. Islam enters, out goes the rista!

“Custom has the weight of law” (al-‘ada muhakkama) is a relevant maxim of Islamic Law (out of the five in total – al qawaid al kulliyat al khamsat). Yes, you read that right! The principle of custom/precedent, qa’idat al ‘aadat, states that custom is a legal ruling unless contradicted specifically by text. Period! For scholars the five maxims of Islamic law are a summation of all that Islam represents. One of the words for custom in Arabic is urf (عُرْف), the word is often used in Islamic law to refer to common practices as a source of law in absence of a clear cut textual injunction and/or inference or consensus. The word appears in many varied forms in Quran among which one is in Surah 7 verse 9 which Dr. Umar Faruq Abd-Allah, to bring the necessary meaning out, translates as, “accept from people what comes naturally. Command what is good by custom.” Urf is also the root for knowledge irfan/maarifah and the one who has it aarif. Urf appears as the root of another common word maroof (that which is right) used famously in Quran as against munkar (that which is wrong). That it is through custom (urf) that we recognize right (maroof) from wrong (munkar) should be clear by now. When we meet a new person and we seek his identity we seek ta’ruf. The same word is the root for raising in status, like elevating or the word for height like the name of chapter aaraaf in the Quran.

Dr. Abd-Allah writes in his “Islam and the Cultural Imperative”, “The Prophet’s attitude towards the cultural norms of the Arab tribes and other ethnic groups constitutes a major precedent and a basic standard in Islamic law. Because the Prophet gave broad endorsement to diverse cultural conventions and did not alter them except when necessary, Abu Yusuf, the principle student of Imam Abu Hanifa, regarded Islam’s openneess towards other cultures as the Prophet’s Sunna.” Interpreting Abu Yusuf’s position Dr Abd-Allah says that it is in contrast to the ideas where sunnah, narrowly defined details of dress and personal behavior, is regarded as a substitute for culture. He quotes Al Tusuli, a prominent Maliki jurist, who called handing down rulings against peoples’ customs, usages and general aspiration as gross deviation and tyranny.

In the absence of any certain knowledge of Islam, that we recognize that custom is second nature (al ada tabia thaniya), the first to suffer is culture. In the absence of knowledge presented above, it seems to the defiant that it is not a religious maxim, a Quranic aayah or a Hadith that he is criticizing, it is a nothing, culture, culture invariably ends up the first to suffer destruction. What goes next? Religion! Removal of unhealthy cultural practices is to be done with utmost care, proper thought, in the guidance of the learned, the buzurg, the ones who have thorough understanding of law, sociology and culture. The particular practice is to be understood under the universal maxims of religion and only when found in categorical conflict with the universal principles needs to be tampered with. Casual statements from the pulpits of the Prophet (saw), Twitter, Newspaper op-eds need to be discouraged and stopped once and for all.

With the protection of culture taken off it, with the clothing of culture torn off its virgin body, religion lies naked and out in the open to be devoured by the glutton – the modern man deprived of his “natural and legitimate” needs! Now, religion dances to the tunes of the unsatisfied modern man. He bends it to his whims and fancies and where he can’t bend it, he escapes it. The daily escape from parts of it, one day at a time, ends up in complete freedom from it one day. This newfound “freedom” instills fear, the fear of old chains and shackles of religion. Fear of reverting back to the old life of conformity under social pressure raises the need and urge, in the “freed” soul, to propagate the newfound love – calling it reform! The reform follows the same path which the individual had followed, first the removal of culture as a determining factor of any social act, marriage and divorce for example, and then religion itself.

“Marriages are getting delayed because they are getting costly”. With such impunity is this sentence uttered that Kashmiris have forgotten that there is something called “evidence”. How do you turn a lie into truth? Keep it simple, say it loudly, repeat it often! There isn’t any research backing the statement, neither any data! Period! The only “research” (research for the lack of better word) puts education to be the prime reason why marriage is being delayed. Bashir Ahmad Dabla, a professor in University of Kashmir, is often quoted in this matter. He says that the common reasons for the delay in marriages is modernization, better education and more employment opportunities. He argues that the more educated people are, the more conscious they become about money and status or getting employment or better employment, a fact that he says is true of not only Kashmir but any modern society. Taking these studies into account, we can conclude that marriages are delayed because of the need to complete studies and/or finding a nicely earning “permanent” job.

Dowry is often mentioned, though not as a prime suspect. Dabla sahab also makes a reference to it, I doubt he took the pains to understand what his sample was calling dowry, like any casual usage of terms it might just be another such case of casual usage of terms. How is causality established, if at all it can be? To argue that A caused or led to B, three broader principles must be considered, a) A must come before B in time, b) It has to be seen that the correlation between A and B isn’t just a chance happening, c) Alternated causes need to be eliminated, it has to be seen that there are no other factors that could be responsible for the relationship between A and B. A World Bank study titled “The evolution of dowry in rural India” shows that dowry payments have remained “remarkably stable” over time. In view of the increasing family incomes we can say that effective payments of dowry have fallen. The findings are corroborated by the fact that dowry deaths are also falling as reported by National Crime Records Bureau. If dowry payments are stable, if dowry deaths are falling and if effective payment of dowry is decreasing, and marriage age is showing an increasing trend consistently, where then is the correlation between dowry and delay in marriages? Dowry has existed for long now and the ability to pay dowry has only increased with time and the negative perception of dowry has only increased with time, while marriage ages show a continuous increasing trend. In the absence of a credible study, there is no reason to believe it is dowry that is leading to the delay in marriages.

But how can you deny the pandalas, the lavish wazwan, the increasing number of “formalities”? What about lavish wazwan? Can that be the reason? The question that one needs to ask is whether wazwan and pandalas are the only thing that have increased in their “lavishness”. With rising incomes the effect is going to be visible on every aspect of living. Have not we gone from a couple of shoes to ten pairs, a couple of shalwaar-kameez to ten pairs of jeans and Ts? As incomes increase so do living standards, so does find aesthetic sense within us expression. The elders would say aasun chu heshnawan, na aasun chu manchawan. Marriages have increased in their lavishness in sync with rising incomes. There is no reason whatsoever to believe that the costs incurred in marriage are burning a bigger hole in the pockets as compared to what they were earlier. The costs incurred were less, so were the incomes.

I would rather argue that percentage of money spent on marriage, out of the total family income must have fallen with time, for incomes have increased at a larger pace as compared to the “lavishness” of wazwan and pandala. Not much has been added to wazwan with time, the costs that have gone up are with respect to the bride’s and groom’s personal belongings. Shopping from Delhi and Chandigarh, Hair Transplants, Teeth straightening, mehnga lehnga, all the accessories including the things used for grooming are a cost that has been added the most and these costs are a reflection of a family’s income status. Though I don’t encourage consumerism, purely from a religious point of view, but like shifting to protein rich food is an indication of economic upliftment of masses, so is consumerism and lavishness. In the absence of any empirical data, it is wrong, nay criminal, to create a correlation between increase in the cost of marriages and age of marriages. Also, the fact of magnification that happens due to social where a particular marriage in Sanat Nagar or Raj Bagh or Nishat becomes the representative of entire Kashmir, it is not! Period!

A certain story by a certain journalist appeared in the Kashmir Observer website by the title, “‘We Take It Lightly’—But Caste Discrimination Ruins Lives In Kashmir”. The tragedy of our times is not “caste discrimination” but that our journalists have turned into our scholars. With the amount of media exposure a journalist receives, this trend of journalists turning into scholars becomes a dangerous phenomenon. It is the same phenomenon that fanned the fire of “war on terror” in the 2000s ultimately ending in rampant Islamophobia around the globe. Locally this translates into an onslaught on culture, self-flagellation and ending up in culture-phobia. It paints such grim picture of the reality that the reader and more so the outsider feels that even breathing in Kashmiri culture would be difficult.

“Ruining Lives” – Plural! It presents a picture as if we continue to live under a feudal setup with Syeds occupying the positions and rest of the population languishing in indentured labor. It is the same phenomenon where a majority is made to feel that its failures are because of a particular minority. It carries with it the undertones that there is an “other” that is in control of the system and of our destinies. This explanation finds ready acceptance where the reality of life that it many at times get tough, is forgotten, and the state of one’s own affairs is presumed to be caused by an external agency. It is same as the Biblical story where Eve says “The serpent deceived me, so I ate”, and then Adam says “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, so I ate”. Though we don’t accept the story as narrated here, in our tradition blaming others for one’s own failure, and dare I say incompetency, is an ibleesi character, “you led me astray”, Iblees had said.

These thoughts, though innocent most of the times, are a stepping stone towards Nazism. In an alternate universe a Kashmiri Hitler would be telling his non-Syed-majority-following that all of your failures are because of a tiny minority of Syeds that are occupying all the important positions (which they actually are not), where they conspire within their “Syed organization” about how not to let this hegemony get diluted. This Kashmiri Hitler of the alternate universe would not begin his career with “final solutions” or “concentration camps”, it has to be much more subtle, it would begin with a statement like “we take it lightly, but caste discrimination ruins lives in Kashmir”.

It is no secret that journalistic ethics have been in a nose-diving situation for long and it shows. Journalists were expected to report facts as objectively as possible, refraining from passing judgements as long as possible. If the views of a particular people are taken, journalistic neutrality would require that the other side is also considered. Least we expect is fairness in reporting where journalists maintain neutrality to the best of their capabilities. Usage of loaded words like “stares into the nothingness”, “impasse”, “how brutally his hopes”, “laments”, “agony”, “more brutality in store”, “the so-called world”, “a monster lurking”, “ugly monster”, is to prevent the reader from making any objective opinion about the statements of facts inside the story. This packaging of opinion masquerading as journalism is done so effectively that the reader does not make up his own mind at all, instead he inserts a packaged opinion into his mind, somewhat like inserting a cassette into a cassette player. He then pushes a button and “plays back” the opinion whenever it seems appropriate to do so. The Journalist too is just a cassette player!

“Caste” itself is a loaded term in the Indian context. It doesn’t even refer to varna system proper, its modern day connotation includes all the inhuman disabilities that were inflicted upon a particular varna and the outcasts, ultimately culminating in the heinous practice of Untouchability. The Kashmiri phenomenon of zaat isn’t comparable to “casteism” as we understand it in the Indian context. Though zaat in itself would refer to a lot many things including lineage, origin, tribe or self, in the Kashmiri context it is used more for identity than anything else and identities are a must. Identities help us in identifying one another and human society can’t have it any other way. Even if lineage based identification ends, its place is taken by something else – an artificial classification. Whenever a grouping takes places it is associated with some sort of attitude towards all the aspects of life which are part of the identity of the group. Among these aspects is the institution of marriage about which groups may be endogamous or exogamous or sometimes partially both or none. Kashmiris as a social group are highly endogamous with few or no marriages taking place with non-Kashmiris, this obviously is not casteist but is driven by the very conception of identity which is built into humans as a whole. Within Kashmir districts, towns, cities, regions form semi-endogamous groups wherein marriages are preferred within the regions, in fact the rural-urban divide is far more a bigger consideration than any other, followed in most cases by economic consideration and rightly so.

Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, who is the champion of the caste question in India, mentions it unequivocally that “caste” in other communities (including Muslims) is not the same as caste in Hindus. That, however, is not the point I wish to make, Dr. Ambedkar tells us grouping, within a social system, is universal or in other words inevitable. He writes in his Annihilation of Caste, “you must at the outset bear in mind that nowhere is human society one single whole. It is always plural. In the world of action, the individual is one limit and society the other. Between them lie all sorts of associative arrangements of lesser and larger scope—families, friendships, co-operative associations, business combines, political parties, bands of thieves and robbers. These small groups are usually firmly welded together, and are often as exclusive as castes. They have a narrow and intensive code, which is often anti-social. This is true of every society, in Europe as well as in Asia. The question to be asked in determining whether a given society is an ideal society is not whether there are groups in it, because groups exist in all societies”.

How then are we to judge a particular system of grouping or how do we compare two such systems? Dr. Ambedkar answers that the determinants are, “How numerous and varied are the interests which are consciously shared by the groups? How full and free is the interplay with other forms of associations? Are the forces that separate groups and classes more numerous than the forces that unite them? What social significance is attached to this group life? Is its exclusiveness a matter of custom and convenience, or is it a matter of religion?” Once we answer the question for our own selves we realize that it isn’t “caste system” that exists in Kashmir. The primary reason for the onslaught against Syeds seems to be the loss of culture, lack of respect for cultural institutions, loss of religiosity and the loss of love for the Prophet (saw) and his family and then above everything else, bugz. Dr. Ambedkar writes, “If we apply these considerations to castes among Mohammedans, Sikhs, and Christians on the one hand, and to castes among Hindus on the other, you will find that caste among Non-Hindus is fundamentally different from caste among Hindus.”

A caste ridden society has minimum interface between its groups, the points of contact are minimum, possibilities of interaction negligible. When these are present, the society appears fragmented on the very surface. In a caste plagued society the centrifugal forces of separation far outnumber the centripetal forces of integration. Dr. Ambedkar writes, “among the non-Hindus there are plenty of these organic filaments which bind them together………….There may be castes among……Mohammedans, but…..the Mohammedans will not outcast………a Mohammedan if he broke his caste.” Calling the system in Kashmir casteist is inappropriate usage of terms and a grave injustice and an insult to the millions who have suffered under caste proper. Arthur F. Buehler in his “Trends of ashrāfization in India” makes a similar point and says, “It is a conceptual error to equate Muslim social stratification with caste just because the outer form looks similar”, he concludes elsewhere, “the larger historical and religious context points to “caste” as an inappropriate term to use for South Asian Muslim social stratification outside of extremely limited local contexts”.

What about liberty in marriage – marriage with one’s choice? Absolute liberty in marriage can only exist in societies where promiscuous marriages are allowed. In a scheme of life based on self-restraint, as Mahatma Gandhi would say, restrictions against promiscuous marriages is necessary. A casual approach to marriage is only encouraged to demystify marriage, dropping it to just another form of a live-in relationship. What is the objective of law? In Islam the most important objectives of law are five, called al-maqāṣid al-khamsa al-kubrā, one of which is protection of nasl/nasb which is colloquially understood to mean lineage and is often translated as lineage. However in the maqasid al khamsa it can be said to be including within it a broader meaning than the narrower meaning of lineage, it would mean the protection of family or the protection of the family system or even the protection of children. For fulfilling the purpose of a law there are certain things that are necessary, there are certain others that are complimentary and there are certain others which are minor additional ornamentation. Cultures work in such a way that these three exist in tandem so that the purpose of law is fulfilled. Even when knowledge of law doesn’t exist with people, urf or custom of the land has in-built mechanisms to reflect the three.

Marriage is one of the most important institutions in Islam, its protection takes central stage. Marriages can’t work with whims and fancies, that is how promiscuity works. Marriage is a vow, of staying together forever, bringing up children in the best possible way in an environment where they feel safe and secure, which is only possible in a healthy marriage. Love is a very important aspect of marriage, but it is not the only one and certainly not the most important. Values are the most important aspect of a healthy marriage. Every other aspect like sharing/not sharing time together, listening/not listening to one another, abuse or affection and everything else finally zeroes down to values. For marriages to be successful the core values must match, probably why the stress on compatibility (kaf’ah) in Islam. But why listen to Islam? The modern mind is only satisfied when the psychologist says it, alas they say the same! The psychologists often cite incompatibility as one of the most common reasons for divorce and breaking of families. How are we to know whether core values are matching or not? Cultures that allow free mingling of sexes would say “don’t rush, take it slow, know each other first”, this has its benefits and its associated cons. Turns out, marriage limits itself to “knowing” and once you know – divorce! Everyone time you “know” someone – incompatible! It also encourages promiscuous behavior and leaves no incentive for the couple inside marriage to try working on the marriage instead of breaking it, because “it did not work out”.

Islamic societies place a lot of importance on children and family and by extension marriage itself. How would such a society ensure values match before a match is made? The Shari’ah has considered Kafaa’at (suitability and compatibility) between spouses necessary. The scholars disagree on the details of what constitute Kafaa’at. Even though there is no general prohibition in marriage to a non-Kufu, however it forms an integral part of selecting a spouse. Cultures developing around Islamic law would invariably end up creating institutions through which “compatibility” can be checked. We in Kashmir use for example place of residence as a means, southik, northik, shahrik, gaamik, homi mohlik, downtownik, we use educational backgrouds, doshwai chi doctor, we use religious beliefs, hanafi gasen aasin, age, na sa su hasa chu temis waarah bodh, lineage, panni zaencz hind chikh, the list can go on. The Prophet (saw) said (among many many many many narrations on this), “Takhayyaroo li nutafikum fankihoo al-akfaa’u wa ankihoo ilaihim” which means, “Choose carefully for your seed.  Marry those who are equivalent and marry off to them.”

I am aware about the difference of the opinion surrounding what all constitutes kafa’at but that shouldn’t make us doubt the validity of the concept itself, which is agreed upon. Islam within its breast contains huge length and breadth to accommodate diverse views, but not views that are fundamentally opposed to the principle itself. Commenting on the diversity of views after discussing opinions of various scholars on what all can be considered under kafa’at,Louise Marlow, in “Hierarchy and Egalitarianism in Islam Thought” says, “the various hadith generated by the issue of marriage equality suggest the prevalence in most legal circles of a strong sense of social differences. The range of criteria for marriage equality, and the difference of opinion even among scholars of the same school regarding their relative importance, suggest a diversity and perhaps a degree of informality in actual social practice, but this lack of uniformity does not negate the impression given by the sources of a profound consciousness of social rank among scholars in many environments. The attention given to descent, wealth and profession among the criteria for marriage equality in a legal tradition that largely emphasises the equality of free Muslim males should not necessarily surprise us; even the most convinced egalitarian might baulk at the prospect of his womenfolk marrying in a socially random fashion.”

Because of lack of knowledge of Islam many people think that all of what is Culture is independent of Islam with no roots inside it. This disease has become much more prominent with the advent of social media, infiltrated by lab rats and journalists who have to have an opinion on every matter under the sky, even when the Prophet (saw) said that it is enough lying to speak about everything you come across. Umdat as-Salik wa Uddat an-Nasik (Reliance of the Traveller and Tools of the Worshipper) is a well known classic produced by the great Shaf’i jurist Abu al-‘Abbas Ahmad ibn an-Naqib al-Misri (1302–1367) in which he says that kafaa’at or compatibility concerns lineage, religiousness, profession, and being free of defects that permit annulling the marriage contract. Lineage (sharaf) and honor (hasab) are accepted as forming part of compatibility discussion inside Hanafi fiqh practiced predominantly in Kashmir. Scholars consider one or some of all of the following to be a matter of compatibility: Lineage, length of ones arrival into the fold of Islam, freedom, din or piety, honor, means of livelihood, wealth etc.

The Prophet (saw) said, “A woman is married for four things, i.e., her wealth, her family status, her beauty and her religion. You should marry the religious woman.” This forms the general rule in all marital transactions in Islam and trumps everything else. It is under this rule than many instances from the Sahaba can be quoted which seem to be contradictory to the rule of compatibility. It is a shame that kafa’at are limited these days to mundane things, but it is what it is, Ibn Abidin, a 19th century jurist, lamented that during the previous jurists’ era piety was source of checking one’s merit while in his time it was mundane things. The anti-Syed brigade wouldn’t encourage marriage for piety. It wouldn’t for example ask men and women to get married to poor but religious people, instead they would try to find caste system where there is none. It is their frustration and the infiltration of alien ideas into their hearts and minds that speak through them.

The point here is not about taking one or the other positions on these social issues but calling out the callousness and utter disregard to scholarly propriety. It is to tell ourselves that there is more to the story than catches our eyes. Culture though seemingly distinct from religion, may not always be so on a deeper analysis. It is the rising influence of the Western ways arriving at our doors through minuscule injections in our society of foreign conceptions like materialism, skepticism, modernism, feminism, agnosticism, invariably ending in such behavior of choosing for one’s own self, making one’s way as one goes alone for which incidentally the word in English dictionary is “heresy”. Most of the views expressed, though expressed in good faith, are tainted by ideological inputs that creep in our narrative from ideologies inimical to our worldviews. The idea here is not to present an alternate narrative but to bring to the reader’s notice that a view untainted by University Miseducation, Islamist indoctrination, Twitter Woke Trends, Journalistic Propaganda, Feminist/Modernist Perversion, Communist/Capitalist Misinformation, Waan Pyend pseudo-Information, Uptown Culture Appropriation may exist and might to unnoticed. A lot enters into the pristine Kashmiri narrative through millions of minuscule injections of ideologies alien to it through TVs, Phones, Social Media, Advertisements, Schools, Universities, Madrassas, Masajid, Books, Songs, Movies etc, in front of which an untrained mind is helpless but to capitulate.

The reasons for such a state of affairs are many but we may state a couple here. Material view of universe has overtaken us all, even the people of faith have material explanations of purely spiritual phenomenon and sometimes the presence of material in our explanations is so subtle that one may not even notice. The overwhelming discourse driven by news channels and newspapers – driven by the overwhelming majority of movies and art industry, driven by countless public figures and more so the journalists and celebrities masquerading as academicians, driven by various schools in our colleges and universities teaching us Engineering, Medicine, Economics, Sociology, Biology, Psychology and all the other sciences and social sciences – is that of the betterment of material life calling it with the beautiful name of “development”; insinuating development, material development, to be the Purpose of Life.

Not even the spiritual religion escapes the material teeth of this modern industry called education, in whose auspices religion is studied, examined to be understood, to be experimented with, there lies its naked virgin body as an exhibit on the table, to be dissected, in the labs of sociology and anthropology. And any explanation that nullifies the need for a supernatural explanation is to be hailed as a discovery for having raised us above the medieval vulgarity of submission to the supernatural. It is to be hailed for it liberates us from immaterial. Drunken with this material conception of life, fed to him goblet after goblet, from kindergarten to his doctorate, in a life span of more than two decades, he arrives home via Twitter, Facebook, NGOs, and what not to protect his newfound love. The Purpose of Life becomes the assertion of material truths, material well-being, comfort, exerting his Will to Power.

A few days back an otherwise learned man had the following comments for a particular scene of the 90s classic Dilwale Dhulhania le Jayenge,

“Yeh kabootar meray apnnay hain, wahan ke kabootar parayay hain” Amresh Puri tells Raj (Shahrukh) in a very serious one on one talk. And Raj replies back, “Kya pata koi kabootar udh kar yahan se wahan gaya ho”.

I mean, bro, what the non sense. You are giving a weird analogy and the audience/public receives that extremely well, as usual. Sub continental masses live imaginary & delusional lives. One who tells beautifully worded emotional lies becomes the hero.

Living real has not touched the ground yet. We might have had civilization in the past but our present is still undefined. We are stuck. Stoic and unmoved. We still live in our past resisting every change to move ahead in the present.

On the face of it, the statement appears to be simple but is the reflection of everything that is wrong with our society, for the person who says it seems to be a well intentioned one. The point made in the outpouring obviously is not DDLJ but the broader point of us living “imaginary & delusional lives” “stuck” “in our past”, “resisting every change to move ahead”. It is a commentary on society, culture, our collective being. It is not a trivial trespass, it is a bold statement which could only have come from a serious inquiry into the subject. Does it appear that the statement is coming from a thorough inquiry? Of course No! But I say both yes and no. No, because it is a reactionary statement, an outpouring of a moment, a kind of reflex action against a stimulus. Yes, because all of reactions are a product of decades of what we have become. Did we not say, “Drunken with a material conception of life, fed to him goblet after goblet, from kindergarten to his doctorate, in a life span of more than two decades, he arrives home via Twitter, Facebook, NGOs, and what not to protect his newfound love”. It is an outpouring of what has been internalized over decades.

Such outpourings, Tweets, status updates and the skeptic’s questions are always short, the answers are lengthy. A person comes and questions or makes a trivial comment and then the long explanation has to follow. For example, it is very easy to label “us” as “delusional”, it is very difficult to put up an explanation of why we are so and how to get out of it, or if we need to come out of the “delusion” at all. Can it be argued that the modern man is delusional instead, having lost touch with reality, passing every cultural reference through the axe of “aql” while at the same time reducing “aql” to ruthless, cold logic? Humans do have a cognitive aspect, but it is not the whole of us, it is only one of the three aspects we have, and there lies the modern man’s delusion! Does our “will” come from our cognition too? Of course not! From an “is” an “ought” cannot be derived. The analogy in DDLJ could be poor (an “is” statement), and we ought not have received it well (an “ought” statement) is what was said and it appears as if aql and “logic” have been used. What if one says that the analogy is poor and therefore we ought to receive it well, or the analogy is good and therefore we ought not receive it well? On this mild scrutiny turns out in either case we are not appealing to cognition, but something else. We are all equally delusional!

We have a separate “willing” element and the will doesn’t work only on what the cognition supplies. We have an affective aspect too. Blaise Pascal in the Pensees writes, “The heart has its reasons, which reason does not know. We feel it in a thousand things. I say that the heart naturally loves the Universal Being, and also itself naturally, according as it gives itself to them; and it hardens itself against one or the other at its will. You have rejected the one and kept the other. Is it by reason that you love yourself?” That instinctive recognition of truth, goodness and beauty! We know truth, not only by the reason, but also by the heart. And that is how all of us, and the skeptic too, work. And that makes all of us human and that makes the analogy an acceptable one. “The sceptics, who have only this for their object, labour to no purpose. We know that we do not dream, and, however impossible it is for us to prove it by reason, this inability demonstrates only the weakness of our reason, but not, as they affirm, the uncertainty of all our knowledge………And reason must trust these intuitions of the heart…….And it is as useless and absurd for reason to demand from the heart proofs of her first principles”.

It is the delusional “mind knows all” modern man who considers the analogy bad, because a pigeon cannot fly that long! Missing the point which the people living “real lives”, called delusional in this outpouring, don’t miss at all. May be the modern man has lost touch with the reality, because reality can only be touched by the affective element in us, like Hellen Keller said, “the best and the most beautiful things cannot be seen, they must be felt with the heart”. But the modern man’s heart is dead, he sees no beauty in tradition, he sees no love for Prophet (saw) in the love for the Syeds. May be it is the modern man that has lost touch with the reality, the stoic is in touch, hence rooted! Is the good old grass in touch with the earth or the modern polythene bag that flies on the slightest movement of air? The eyes can’t see when they are moving, only when they stop do we see anything at all!

The scene in DDLJ itself isn’t a perfect one, but is in complete sync with the 90s sensibilities and also with the in-movie dynamics. The scene is a continuation of the three earlier scenes, one in the very beginning where Puri sahab is doing the same act in a foreign country, and remembering how he used to do it in India, two scenes where Shahrukh is trying to set him up for this exact conversation. All of us understood, what the modern man missed, that the reference is to Raj being a foreigner in his outlook could still be an Indian at heart, a point well made in the larger context of what the society was witnessing in the post-liberalization era in 1995 and in the context of the movie. I am certain the 90s liberalization and the diaspora connect would have been missed by many.

There is the following analogy in the Bible, “The gatekeeper opens the gate for the shepherd, and the sheep recognize his voice and come to him. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. After he has gathered his own flock, he walks ahead of them, and they follow him because they know his voice. They won’t follow a stranger; they will run from him because they don’t know his voice……I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me. There are other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them over.” The modern man would say, the sheep are dumb!

The reason why modern Muslim man behaves in this way is summed up by Muhammad Naquib al Attas in the following words, “….the dilemma in which we find ourselves, the basic problems can….be reduced to a single evident crisis which I would simply call the loss of adab……the loss of discipline – the discipline of body, mind, and soul; the discipline that assures the recognition and acknowledgement of one’s proper place in relation to ones self, society and Community; the recognition and acknowledgement of one’s proper place in relation to one’s physical, intellectual, and spiritual capacities and potentials; the recognition and acknowledgement of the fact that knowledge and being are ordered hierarchically. Since adab refers to recognition and acknowledgement of the right and proper place, station and condition in life and to self discipline in positive and willing participation in enacting one’s role in accordance with that recognition and acknowledgement, its occurrence in one and in society as a whole reflects the condition of justice. Loss of adab implies loss of justice, which in turns betrays confusion in knowledge…………………………. Knowledge must be approached reverently and in humility, and it cannot be possessed simply as if it were they available to everyone irrespective of intention and capacity. Where knowledge of Islam and the Islamic world view is concerned, it is based on authority……..and legitimate authority recognizes and acknowledges a hierarchy of authorities culminating in the Holy Prophet, upon whom be Peace! It is incumbent upon us to have a proper attitude towards legitimate authority, and that is reverence, love, respect, humility and intelligent trust in the veracity of knowledge interpreted and clarified by such authority. Reverence, love, respect, humility and intelligent trust can only be realized in one when one recognizes and acknowledges the fact that there is a hierarchy in the human order and in authority within that hierarchy in point of intelligence, spiritual knowledge and virtue”.

“Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent”, said Wittgenstein in his Tractus. It is a reminder of the Prophetic (saw) statement that in silence is one’s salvation. Culture is how religion is practiced. The religion provides principles, culture provides the rules. It is a shame that the principles are forgotten, but in the absence of that knowledge the rules incorporated by culture are the next best thing. Kashmiri traditions are a protection over Kashmiri religion, we may not know all the Quran and all the Sunnah, but the cultural norms make it possible for us to live lives closer to the principles of which we have lost all knowledge of. Kashmiri traditions are widely practiced but have no defense of their own with the “intellectuals” completely having given up on them, having deserted them. We, you and me, don’t claim to be experts either, but then can we not even try to put up a perspective that is the view of all of us? The perspective that is of all of us, yet lives as if in a minority of one. Only when it is spoken can our lie be exposed, if it is not spoken, we cannot know its truth value. Stop right there! Stop and pause and rethink what we have been thinking all along!