Imam Ali (A.S) Is a Reliable Reference for the Protection of Human Rights: New Age Islam Columnist Ghulam Rasool Dehlvi at Khanqah-e-Arifia, Allahabad
By
Ghulam Rasool Dehlvi, New Age Islam
19 January
2023
"Our
Words Can Be Understood Only By the Honest Hearts and the Far-Sighted
Intellects"
(Imam
Ali)
Main
Point:
The 7th
Century Letter Of Imam Ali (A.S) To Malik Al-Ashtar, His Governor In Egypt,
Which He Wrote To Advise Him As To How Justly He Should Treat The People Of Egypt
Has Come To Be Seen As A Model Or Manifesto Of Human Rights.
------
This essay draws on an address by a regular columnist of
NewAgeIslam.com, Ghulam Rasool Dehlvi, which he delivered at Jamia Arifia
founded by Sheikh Abu Saeed Shah Ehsanullah Mohammadi Safawi, Sufi master and
rector of Khanqah-e-Arifia, Saiyid Sarawan, Allahabad (Prayagraj). Mr. Dehlvi
was invited to address the students on the occasion of the 21th night of Jumada
al-Akhir—the sixth month of the Hijri calendar—which is marked as Mehfil-e-
Maula-e-Kainat at Khanqah-e-Arifia.
-----
The topic
of 'Human Rights' has become commonplace today. Nearly every institution of the
world, every welfare organization, and every NGO in India and abroad has given
it paramount importance for decades. But ironically, people who do not respect
the human rights of others, and themselves deprive other people of their basic
rights and continue to usurp them, also keep harping on this topic. While they
themselves violate the rights of their own people, depriving them of the equal
opportunities, freedom, and other benefits, they repeatedly talk of ‘human
rights’ of the oppressed people of the world such as the religious and ethnic minorities,
indigenous peoples, African-Americans, Native Americans, Red Indians, women,
LGBTQs, and other minority groups who have all been oppressed by prejudice and
unfair laws. But in their own communities and countries, they do not get tired
of giving away the rights of similar oppressed sections of the society.
Hence, on
this auspicious occasion of Mehfil-e- Maula-e-Kainat Imam Ali (A.S), we will
try to understand how Hazrat Ali (May Allah bless him and grant him peace)
conceptualised the ‘human rights’? And how helpful are his teachings today as
contrasted to the current Human Rights Narratives? How have we Muslims
demonstrated them ourselves? And how should we follow them in letter and spirit
today?
Emergence
of the ‘Human Rights’ Narrative
The term ‘Human
Rights’ originally came from the West. It has been around for about five
hundred years, but has gained momentum in the last hundred years. It has a
historical background. In the Middle Ages, there was no concept of ‘citizenship
rights’; the citizens were deprived of all human rights. Whoever had the power
in his hands, used to do all kinds of arbitrariness, giving whatever rights he
wanted to his people. They did whatever they wanted. No one was going to stop
them.
In the
seventeenth century, the concept of ‘citizenship rights’ emerged with the
notion that the state does not have the right to arbitrariness, and that the
parliament should come into existence; the people should have a government, and
the people should participate in its formation and administration. Thus, in the
last three hundred years, peoples of different nations began to get their
rights one by one. It is not that we got all the human rights mentioned in the
United Nations Charter at once. From a historical point of view, in 1679 Britain
was the first to pass the law of 'arbitrary imprisonment', meaning that no
person can be arrested without any evidence or without a conviction.
Then in
1689, the 'Bill of Rights' was approved in Great Britain. That is, it was
clarified that the King does not have absolute rights, but his rights are
limited and will have to be approved by Parliament. In 1776, the American state
of Virginia guaranteed some rights to its citizens including the Freedom of
Press, Freedom of Religion and Belief, and the right to judicial appeal. In the
same year, the Declaration of Independence of the United States was approved in
which citizens were granted the right to equality, protection of life and
liberty. Similarly, in 1868, when the 14th amendment was made to the US Constitution,
many civil rights were added to it. In the 20th century, in France and Japan in
1946 and in Italy in 1947, some rights were included in the constitution under
the name of 'Fundamental Rights'.
Finally, in
1946, the Charter of Human Rights was approved by the United Nations, which is
called the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) in the modern UN
terminology as per the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
(OHCHR). It mainly includes 30 provisions in which the right to freedom,
fundamental rights of citizens, right to private life and other social rights
have been approved. According to the OHCHR, the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights (UDHR) is a milestone document in the history of human rights. Drafted
by representatives with different legal and cultural backgrounds from all
regions of the world, it set out, for the first time, fundamental human rights
to be universally protected.
In summary,
the concept of 'Human Rights' has emerged in the West after a long period of
public struggle and as a result of various protests and demonstrations which
were held in innumerable movements across the world. But behind all this, it
was not the hard work of a single individual or group, but rather member states
of the United Nations which have greatly contributed to the UDHR and ratified
it after great scrutiny.
Two crucial
points emerge from all this: First, the human rights were basically not granted
willingly. The states did not approve these rights for the welfare of their
people, but as the people became stronger, they protested, held demonstrations,
expressed their power, thus they got each fundamental right in a gradual way.
The Human Rights guaranteed by the United Nations, are not rights that the
various governments which comply with the UDHR today, willingly gave to their
people.
Secondly,
these rights are still not enjoyed by all the people of the world, because they
were initially based on the concept of nationalism. The West clearly declared
that these rights were only for them, not for others. Those who are not within
the scope of their nationality were deprived of these rights. When the
fundamental rights were included in the French constitution, their privileges
was given only to the citizens of France. Likewise, the British constitution
specified the rights that were denied to the people living in the British
colonies at that time.
Imam
Ali's Letter to Malik al-Ashtar: A Manifesto of Human Rights
The 7th
century letter of Imam Ali (A.S) to Malik al-Ashtar, his governor in Egypt,
which he wrote to advise him as to how justly he should treat the people of
Egypt has come to be seen as a model or manifesto of Human Rights. The
Universal Declaration of Human Rights was written in 1946 AD. When the United
Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) was created, the rights experts of the
world were united for the purpose of creating universal human rights, and these
people sat for days and weeks and then came up with their version of human
rights manifesto.
But Imam
Ali (A.S), alone and in a very short period of time, wrote the most
comprehensive manifesto of human rights in the form of a letter addressed to
Malik al-Ashtar. This is the manifesto that has the ability to govern and guide
the whole world in the real sense. This is precisely why UN Secretariat, the
Committee of Human Rights in New York under the chairmanship of the Secretary
General Kofi Annan issued this historic resolution in 2002:
"The Caliph Ali Bin Abi Talib is considered the fairest governor
who appeared during human history (After the Prophet Muhammed)".
Furthermore,
the United Nations advised Arab countries to emulate Imam Ali (A.S) as an
example in reforming their regimes based on justice and democracy. The United
Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in its 2002 Arab Human Development Report,
distributed around the world, listed six significant sayings of Imam Ali (A.S).
"Most regional countries are still far behind other nations in democracy,
wide political representation, women's participation, development and
knowledge", the UNDP stated in its report which exhorted the Arab
countries to comply with Imam Ali’s teachings on treating the citizens with
fairness and protecting their human rights. It emphasised the letter to Malik
al-Ashtar with a special reference to ‘consultation between the ruler and the
ruled’, ‘ensuring justice to all’, ‘eradicating corruption’ and achieving
domestic development.
In the Arab
Human Development Report 2002, the UNDP quoted the following as referenced in ‘Good
Governance Early Muslim Style’ by Patricia Lee Sharpe:
1. "He who
has appointed himself an Imam (ruler) of the people must begin by teaching
himself before teaching others. His teaching of others must be first by setting
an example rather than with his words, for he who begins by teaching and
educating himself is more worthy of respect than he who teaches and educates
others."
2. "Your
concern with developing the land should be greater than your concern for
collecting taxes, for the latter can only be obtained by developing; whereas he
who seeks revenue without development destroys the country and the
people."
3. "Seek the
company of the learned and the wise in search of solving the problems of your
country and the righteousness of your people."
4. "No good
can come out in keeping silent to the government or in speaking out of
ignorance."
5. "The
righteous are men of virtue, whose logic is straightforward, whose dress is
un-ostentatious, whose path is modest, whose actions are many and who are
undeterred by difficulties."
6. "Choose
the best among your people to administer justice among them. Choose someone who
does not easily give up, who is unruffled by enmities, someone who will not
persist in wrong doings, who will not hesitate to pursue right once he knows
it, someone whose heart knows no greed, who will not be satisfied with a
minimum of explanation without seeking the maximum of understanding, who will
be the most steadfast when doubt is cast, who will be the least impatient in
correcting the opponent, the most patient in pursuing the truth, the most stern
in meting out judgment, someone who is unaffected by flattery and not swayed by
temptation and these are but few."
Regrettably,
the Muslim countries which were particularly called upon to follow the model of
just governance as envisaged by Imam Ali (A.S) are known today for the
violation of human rights, particularly pertaining to the religious minorities.
Some of them are still inflaming the fire of sectarian war to widen the
Sunni-Shia divide. More deplorably, many member states of the UNHRC and the
numerous nations of the world which gathered hundreds of international law
experts and wrote the UDHR, have never followed it in letter and spirit. Though
it was reinforced by the 1993 Vienna Declaration and Program of Action,
International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the 1979
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
(CEDAW), and the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC), the full
implementation of these human rights conventions is still a mirage. The only
reason is that the claimants of human rights themselves are busy fanning the
flames of war in the world, as it is patently clear from the current
Russian-Ukraine crisis. One of my mentors and a renowned critical-traditionalist
Islamic scholar, Ebrahim Moosa has weighed in on this phenomenon from a
historical point of view in his erudite and scholarly paper titled as
‘Colonialism and Islamic Law’ (Islam and Modernity: Key Issues and Debates
edited by Muhammad Khalid Masud, Armando Salvatore and Martin van Bruinessen).
It is indeed important to understand how imperialist countries have been
violating the human rights of citizens in their occupied territories. "Law
is not only part of the ideological apparatus of states; it is also part of a
cultural matrix. Apart from mobilising multiple forms of power—military,
political and economic—colonial rule also relied on a complex apparatus of
cultural technologies to assert itself……", writes Ebrahim Moosa.
Thousands of
books have been written about the laws that Hazrat Ali has formulated as the
fourth rightly guided Caliph of Islam and Amir ul Momineen (chief of the
believers). As time goes by, the greatness of this unique governance system is
being revealed. Whoever studies his life and virtues, realizes that something
new has become available to us through his just and humane system of
governance, particularly in the protection of civil rights. Therefore, his
principles of governance and legal theories as contained in Nahj al-Balagha
serve as a source of inspiration for humanity at large.
It was the
famous Shia scholar of Baghdad, Adib Sayyid Razi (d: 406 AH) compiled the
sermons, letters and sayings of Imam Ali (AS) into a book entitled "Nahj
al-Balagha" in the 5th century AH. Notably, the first and the best known
commentary on Nahj al-Balagha titled as ‘Sharh Nahj al-Balagha’ was written by
a Mu’tazilites scholar and a middle-ages writer in the 7th century Hijri. ‘Izz
al-Dīn Abdul Hameed ibn Abi al-Hadīd al Mutazilī al-Mada'ini, popularly known
as Ibn Abi al-Hadid Mu'tazili belonged to Mada'in, Iraq and was a famous
historian and chronicler of the last period of the Abbasid Caliphate. The
Abbasid government until the fall of Baghdad and the Abbasid Caliph Mustansar Ballah
(d: 624 AH) held him in high esteem.
This
commentary namely Sharh Ibn Abi Al-Hadid is available in Arabic language in 20
volumes. It is the major reason of fame for Ibn Abi al-Hadid. However, Sunnis
generally label Ibn Abi al-Hadid as a "Shia" Mu'tazili. Of
late, Nahj al-Balagha was researched by prominent intellectuals and was
consulted by great rulers and officials in different countries. In the Arab
world as well as in the West, many modern commentaries (Sharhs) have been
written on it. Two most striking commentaries that I have recently studied
include:
(1)
"Al-Ra'i wa Al-Ra'i" by Tawfiq al-Fikiki which is a commentary on the
instructions given by Imam Ali to Malik al-Ashtar. It offers a focused and
special study of his ideal of government. (2) Another important book is:
"Al-Imam Ali, Saut al-Adalah wal-Insaniyyah" (The Voice of Human
Justice). Originally written in Arabic (صوت العدالة
الإنسانية)
by George Jordac—a Christian author from Lebanon—the book is basically a
biography of Hazrat Ali with the contents largely drawn from the Nahj
al-Balagha.
An
important document that is a source of pride for not only the world of Islam
but the mankind, is the Ahad Nama of Amir ul Momineen Imam Ali which he
gave to his governor, Mr. Malik Ashtar, which is the most reliable declaration
of human rights for almost fourteen hundred years. The sentences and texts of
this pledge address different bodies and various sectors of the government,
taking care of each section of the society and highlighting various important
angles of governance system in order to ensure the rule of law and human
dignity. Today, it serves as an ideal manifesto of human rights from the UNO to
the representatives of all the human rights organizations of the world. It is
nothing short of a miracle, George Jordan avers.
Jordan
writes at the very outset of his book:
I have
studied the life of Imam Ali (a.s.) a lot and found the fact that in today's
developed world, the principles that are acceptable, agreed upon by nations and
states, and are seen as the guarantors of human life and inclusive development,
were put forward by Imam Ali alone. But the scholars of Islam have neither paid
attention to it nor interpreted it properly.
He
further writes:
By God! I
admit the truth myself before any evidence is given against me. Ali formulated
such firm rules and presented such solid views for the rights of the human
beings and the welfare of the human society, that their roots penetrate into
the depths of the earth and their branches extend upto the heavens. All the
social sciences which are prevalent at present mostly confirm these views and
principles. Although these modern social sciences may be given many names, and
may be presented in various forms, their object is one and one only that the
human being should be protected from oppression and there should be formed a
society which should protect human rights in a better way - a society in which
human dignity should be respected and the freedom of word and action should be
safe to such an extent that none should be hurt.
George
Jordac continues:
The second
feature of Imam Ali's concept of rights is the 'reciprocal rights'; the rights of the ruler and that the
ruler respects the rights of the ruled, the truth gets powerful between them, …
life becomes enjoyable, the stability of the state is guaranteed, and the
enemies become hopeless'.
Ali enjoys
a very high position in the history of human rights. His views were linked with
the thinking of Islam. The central point of his views was that despotism should
come to an end, and class discrimination should be eliminated from amongst the
people. Whoever has recognized Ali and heard his remarks and understood his
beliefs and views about human brotherhood knows that he was a sword drawn on
the necks of the tyrants. His entire attention was directed towards the
enforcement of the rules of equity and justice.
George
concludes:
His
thoughts and manners and his government and polities were all dedicated to the
achievement of this purpose. Whenever any oppressor encroached upon the rights
of the people or treated the weak in a humiliating manner or ignored their
welfare and threw his own burden on their weak shoulders, Ali gave him a tough
fight. Ali elevated man and always remained ready to protect him. His
government was the best specimen of administration during that period. It was a
government which was just and the protector of human rights, and one, which
achieved its end by all possible means.
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A regular NewAgeIslam.com columnist, Ghulam
Rasool Dehlvi is an Indo-Islamic scholar and a Delhi-based writer on Sufism and
Islamic affairs.
URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-personalities/imam-hazrat-ali-human-rights-khanqah-arifia/d/128908
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