Will Moderate Islam In Kerala Be Radicalised?
By
Grace Mubashir, New Age Islam
20 February
2024
How An
Extreme Trend That Has Gradually Been Introduced Into The Social Life Of The Muslims
In Kerala By Advocating Piety And True Islam Has Become A Challenge To Their
Social Life
Main Points:
1.
Islam came to Kerala with a loose structure and
character
2.
A distinctive local Islam was formed on the
Kerala coast, retaining an indigenization even in the manner of construction of
places of worship, including customs and rituals.
3.
Puritanism has transformed many societies like
Kerala, which have come to have their own cultural characteristics.
4.
The history of the last half-century is that
the entire cultural characteristics of a Muslim society, which even Malayalised
the Arabic language and script, were destroyed. Muslims today live in a
religious-societal structure dominated by extreme narratives, with no religious
recognition of the religious and social lives Muslims lived unchallenged half a
century ago.
-------
Historians
do not have a uniform opinion as to when Islam came to the coast of Kerala.
There are different opinions as to whether it is in the 7th century or the 8th
century. Whatever the time, one thing is certain. Islam came here with a loose
structure and character. It was not an Islam of extreme creeds or purity. If
that were the case, Islam would not have received any acceptance here. It is
because it is not too stubborn that people are ready to join it and it has been
given the conditions to grow. These are some of the facts that we can
understand from the available evidence about the social discourses of early
Islam in keeping with the local culture.
Chronologically,
Islam came to Kerala at a time when there were strong Arab and Chinese
relations. Like Arab traders, Chinese traders also played a major role in
spreading Islam along the Kerala coast. But when it comes to telling the Kerala
history of Islam, religious organizations do not show much interest in
revealing its Chinese connections. It must be because they only believe in the
Arabic tradition of religion. Whether Arabs or Chinese, the business community
is generally undemanding and prefers friendly conditions. An Islam that grew
through trade would have a very different cultural environment from an Islam
that grew through preachers and theoretical scholars or through political
conditions formed after wars and conquests. The main reason why the Muslim
community formed in Kerala has its historical and cultural characteristics is
because it was one that came through the commercial stream. This characteristic
can be seen in all the different Islamic streams of the world, which were
cultivated by the mercantile people.
Muslim
foreign traders used to marry from Kerala in the early days. Many of them were
staying here for a long period of time. How could the Arab Muslims at that time
have married natives of other religions who did not know the Arabic language or
the doctrines of Islam and fully obeyed the religious principles?
If it is
argued that they were taught religious doctrines, converted to Islam and
married, there will be a question as to how and in what language the
communication took place. According to religious doctrines, if one is simply
captured and converted, can one marry? Muslim traders married women of other
religions from here not following strict religious rules as seen today.
This was
also the case when Mughal kings married Rajput women. The reason for that is
simply that they held a much looser, less demanding, more inclusive religious
outlook. Islam started as a loose structure and remained so for ages in the
Kerala backwaters.
One thing
becomes clear when we examine the Islamic tradition of Kerala. By spreading the
religion, the Arabs did not convert indigenous new believers to their culture.
Instead, they changed the religious beliefs they brought to the culture here.
This cultural feature is formed not only in human life. A distinctive local
Islam emerged on the Kerala coast, retaining an indigenization even in the
manner of construction of places of worship, including customs and rituals.
A
distinctive local Islam was formed on the Kerala coast, retaining an
indigenization even in the manner of construction of places of worship,
including customs and rituals.
Until
recently, two or three decades ago to be precise, the costumes of Muslim men
and women in Kerala were not as seen today. It is not about the change in the
general costumes of the Malayalees. Especially the role of Muslim women. The
unprecedented change in Muslim dress today is a product of the introduction of
Puritanism into a people who, while religiously sanctioned, lived a life of
self-denial. Puritanism has transformed many societies like Kerala, which have
come to have their own cultural characteristics. The new generation may be
surprised to learn that there was a past here when even the wives of religious
scholars and imams of mosques lived in public life wearing mundus and
half-sleeved shirts, later sarees and blouses. This liberal structure was the
speciality of Islam that existed in Kerala. It was this liberal structure that
made Muslim social life co-operative. Even Muslim names were Malayalised.
Examples include hundreds of names like Maiteen, Aidrus, Vavakkunju, Utuman,
Mammad, Pathumma, Asia, Anumma, and Biyathu. The history of the last
half-century is that the entire cultural characteristics of a Muslim society,
which even Malayalized the Arabic language and script, were destroyed. Muslims
today live in a religious-societal structure dominated by extreme narratives,
with no religious recognition of the religious and social lives Muslims lived
unchallenged half a century ago. There needs to be further examination of how
these extreme narratives were formed here.
There are
many people who have left a unique mark on the social life of Kerala Muslims in
the past. From historical men like Kunjali Marakare to Premnaseer, there is a
huge list. We also need to examine what the religious life of such people, whom
Muslims remember with pride even today, was like. None of them accepted the
extreme narratives of religion. They all lived within the liberal framework of
religion. Even the contents of the early religious reform efforts in Kerala
contained liberal views. None of them were strict and rigorous in their views
and practices. Efforts have been made to reinterpret religion to the extent that
it can be socially and liberally interpreted to keep the religious stream close
to the social mainstream of Kerala. Reform initiatives like the Kerala Muslim
United Union have advanced by upholding the concepts of gender equality,
modernity, democratic values, rationality, scientific consciousness, individual
freedom and civic consciousness. The early religious reformers were the early
religious reformers who interpreted bank interest, which is still considered
taboo by the general Muslim community, with the support of modern economics and
decided that it was not irreligious.
The
reformer Sanaulla Makti Thangal fought against the society of that time and
engaged in efforts to educate girls and boys in a class. Decades have passed
since Makti Thangal. The contemporary Malayalee Muslim is characterized by
anti-social interpretations of 'Scriptural Islam' by placing boys and girls in
separate classes again with increased vigour, insisting that a Muslim woman's
dress is religious only if she covers her face, making the subsequent
traditional Muslim social life anti-religious, and issuing many Fatwas that
separate the ordinary Muslim life from the mainstream. Modern narratives to
anti-Islamize the past, which tried to maintain the common culture in social
life while incorporating religion, are not at all harmless. An extreme trend
that has gradually introduced into the social life of Muslims in Kerala by
advocating piety and true Islam has now become a challenge to their social life
itself.
Every
religious and ideological school in the world has extreme interpretations. When
an ideology is formed, many other points of view that it does not have will
later find their way into it. Radical religious schools are formed by the
development of original ideas contributed to them by radical philosophers
living in different eras. As sociology develops, religious theories that do not
develop accordingly will later lead to rigid attitudes. This was the crisis
that befell Arabian Islam after the world conditions of the nineteenth century.
The religious narratives that came to be known as 'scriptural Islam' rejected
the pluralistic traditions of Islam and the cultural combinations that formed
them. Through a narrative that Muslim lives should change according to what the
book says, radical interpretations full of socially undeveloped and unmodern
views have entered various Muslim communities. It was the delay in
distinguishing and understanding this line of interpretation that completely
rejected Kerala's unique Muslim tradition that gave them the opportunity to
influence this society so much.
Fifteen
centuries old, Islam has a variety of religious views and perspectives. There
are many internal currents within it that are diametrically opposed to each
other. But none of the currents with extreme arguments and views could survive.
Textual Islam that create conflict with the external society and reject
cultural pluralism will either become unstable or they will be gradually
converted to liberal positions. If extreme ideas gain the upper hand somewhere,
it is only a temporary phenomenon. The extreme ideas of religion are not strong
enough to overcome the growth of time and the social development of man. Only
liberal interpretations advance with time. Time and history are proof of that.
-----
A regular columnist for NewAgeIslam.com, Mubashir
V.P is a PhD scholar in Islamic Studies at Jamia Millia Islamia and freelance
journalist.
URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-q-a/moderate-kerala-radicalised/d/131761
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