Fatwas Are Used By the Ulema as a Tool of Authority over the Muslim Community
Ulema
Have Resisted Any Air of Reform within the Community And the Fatwas Have Come
For Them as a Handy Tool of Resistance
Main
Points:
1. Ulema have
resisted any attempt at reform.
2. They have
posited themselves as the guardian of the faith.
3. They have
demonstrated aversion to translation.
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By
New Age Islam Staff Writer
17 August
2022
Representational image. AFP
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Siddhartha
Rai discusses the power of fatwas and its effects on the thought process of the
Muslim community. The fatwas have been a powerful tool in the hands of the
Ulema through which they justify their presence in the community. The author
points out that Sir Syed's movement had pushed the Ulema to the back stage but
the launch of the Khilafat movement revived this section because Gandhi ji and
Ali Brothers needed the fatwas of Ulema to justify it from the point of view of
Islam.
The Barelvi
sect had opposed this movement on the basis that Hindus could not be a part of
a purely Islamic movement. Maulana Abul Kalam Azad had to face criticism for
joining the movement by the Barelvi Ulema.
The Ulema
have also expressed their reservations on translations because they think that
any translation done by a non-madrasa scholar is bound to be faulty. In fact,
they fear that a just and honest translation will refute their sectarian
beliefs. For example, the last verse of Surah Al Kahf and verse 93 of Bani
Israil clearly say that the prophet is a Bashar (human being) but a sect of
Muslims insists that the prophet was light (Nur).
Therefore,
the translation of these verses makes them uncomfortable and so they translate
them in a very complicated way to confuse the reader. Even an Islamic scholar
of the stature of Shah Waliullah was not spared when he translated the Quran
into Persian. He was criticised and a fatwas was issued against him.
Maulana
Azad was also criticised for his 'wrong' translation of the Quran. And Dr Zakir
Hussain had to apologise when during his tenure as the VC of Jamia Millia
Islamia, a translation by an Islamic scholar was published by Jamia. The Ulema
had strongly objected to the translation and Dr Zakir Hussain had to announce
that in future all the translations published by Jamia would only be done by
Ulema.
The author
rightly says that Ulema have resisted any air of reform within the community
and the fatwas have come for them as a handy tool of resistance.
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Fatwas: All That Is Wrong With Islam
and the Problem with Muslim Liberals
By
Siddhartha Rai
August 16,
2022
Fatwas, as
Arun Shourie writes in his The World of Fatwas or Shariat in action, are the
main instrument employed by the unscrupulous Ulema as a class. They also
reflect, more or less accurately, what has been written in the Quran and
Hadees, and from this emanates the authority of the Ulema.
The recent
attack on the acclaimed author, Salman Rushdie has once more catapulted the
power of fatwas in the Muslim mind to the forefront of public debate. In fact,
Rushdie’s predicament highlights the fundamental dilemma of Muslim ‘progressives’
and reformists among the Ummah: to carry the badge of being a liberal and to
make a flourishing career in lieu of that badge, one must not bring into
question, and just condone, all the wrong in Islam as is reflected in the
fatwas. But, as one remains silent at the abhorrence of inversion of
fundamental laws of humanity by the ulema and fatwas, that very badge of
liberalism comes under scanner.
The
liberals have, since long — from before India’s Independence — used the ploy to
give in to the fatwas, concessions as it were, to circumnavigate falling foul
of the Ulema, but instead of being a stratagem, the strategy has almost always
backfired. The Ulema, at the first sight of such concessions, first declare
victory — both theirs as well as the indefensible positions of Islam — and then
push forward for more, and more, so much so, that they keep on reclaiming the
minds of Muslims to extremism, orthodoxy, conservatism and fundamentalism.
But, it is
not the first time that a liberal intellectual has found himself on the wrong
side of fatwas and the Ulema. Throughout the recent history of India, starting
before Independence, the Ulema have gradually gathered authority, existing in
the interstices of political processes to begin with and then coming of age to
claim the constituency of the Muslim mind.
Muslim
intellectuals such as Iqbal have noted that while the movement of Sir Syed
Ahmad Khan had pushed the Ulema back into the bunkers of their madarsas and
maktabs, the Khilafat movement spearheaded by Mahatma Gandhi, along with Ali
Brothers, had brought them back into relevance as the Khilafat committee needed
fatwas on a regular basis to bolster their hold on the Muslim community. Not
that Sir Syed Ahmad Khan was a true liberal — he propounded the two-nation
theory, followed later by Mohammed Ali Jinnah in letter to the last ‘t’ to
carve out Pakistan — he too had to face a fatwa issued by the Imam of Mecca for
his zeal to reform Islam.
Maulana
Mohammad Ali, one of the leaders of the Khilafat movement that was woven around
the vision of re-establishing the Caliphate, was once an ardent fan of Gandhi.
So much so, that he had likened Gandhi to Jesus on more than one occasion.
While Gandhi extended his support to the Khilafat movement, Jawaharlal Nehru
had argued that Mohammad Ali was just trying to ‘use’ Hindus as ‘pawns’. And,
that came to be true not long after!
While the
Khilafat movement fizzled out towards 1924, Mohammad Ali changed his tone, took
an about turn: he declared that when it came to creed, even an “adulterous and
fallen Musalman” was better than Gandhi!
In a letter
to Swami Shraddhananda, cited by Shourie and drawn from Gandhi’s Collected
Works, Mohammad Ali wrote that some Muslims “…are flinging at me the charge of
being a worshipper of Hindus and a Gandhi-worshipper”.
The
pressure of the Ulema was catching up.
“As a
follower of Islam, I am bound to regard the creed of Islam as superior to that
professed by the followers of any non-Islamic religion.” And there ended the
ecumenism of a joint Hindu-Muslim Khilafat movement, as envisioned by Gandhi.
On another
occasion, Mohammad Ali toed the classic orthodox Ulema line, to declare that to
it was the duty of every Muslim to consider Islam as superior to all other
religions.
The ulema
have actually fashioned a cleverly-crafted strategy, in close association with
the Urdu press in India, to push their agenda and clog all and any light of
re-interpretation of the Quran from shining inside the Muslim community, to gag
all liberal voices, who at the end have had to relent and kowtow.
Even the
likes of Zakir Husain and Maulana Azad bottomed out when confronted with the
power of the Ulema and their fatwas.
Zakir
Husain became the target of the Ulema when a book authored by a German
orientalist was translated in Urdu at the Jamia Millia Islamia, when Hussain
was the vice-chancellor of the varsity in 1927. The book had made claims
contrary to popular Islamic beliefs as read in the Quran. The very fact that
the book was translated at Jamia was made into a question of faith and loyalty
to Islam, and Zakir Husain castigated for it. The pressure brought about by the
Ulema, the Urdu press and conservative experts of Islam — including Hakim
Mohammed Jamil Khan, the son of Hakim Ajmal, one of the founders of the university
— was such that Zakir Husain had to pen an almost abject apology.
The ulema,
declaring a war on the book, were very clear in their charges: why, at all, the
book was translated into Urdu, lest it pollute the minds of the common Muslim
reading it; moreover, why and how, such an endeavour was undertaken at Jamia,
Muslim university. By extension, the leadership — Zakir Husain — was complicit
in this ‘misdemeanour’, committing a ‘crime’ against Islam and the faithful.
Zakir
Husain, in his explanation, had given in so much so that he announced that any
such endeavour (of translating texts from other languages) in future would be
run by the Ulema and committed to translation only when the latter cleared it
worthy to be published.
Though
Maulana Azad too had joined issue with the Ulema, though quite subtly and
almost in defence of Zakir Husain, he too suffered the same fate for his book,
Tarjuman al-Quran, wherein he argued that form and spirit of religions,
including Islam were different things. What mattered was the form that taught,
including in the Quran, the unity of almighty, though forms of worship and
ritual differed from religion to religion, from country to country, from clime
to clime.
The Ulema
questioned him: how those who did not believe in Islam and Allah get delivered
and attain salvation? They alleged that Maulana Azad was trying to start a sect
like Raja Ram Mohan Roy’s Brahmo Samaj within Islam. What was the harm? The
Ulema was of the view that Hinduism was a fallen religion which needed to be
reformed. But, Islam with Quran having been revealed by the Prophet was in no
need for any reform!
Maulana
Azad capitulated. He clarified that what he ‘meant’ to say in the book was that
only believers in Allah could attain salvation; that good deeds were only as
prescribed by the Quran. All pretence of liberalism just vanished in thin air.
What the
Muslim liberals have not been able to find a way through is the fact that Islam
posits the Ulema as the only intermediary between the Prophet and the Muslim community;
the problem is compounded by another fact — that Quran not just governs the
spiritual life of a Muslim, it also regulates all facets of life, from as banal
aspects as clothing, and appearance to law to death. And this power has been
wielded via fatwas!
Source: Fatwas: All That Is Wrong With Islam
and the Problem with Muslim Liberals
URL: https://newageislam.com/radical-islamism-jihad/fatwas-ulema-authority-muslim-barelvis/d/127731
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