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ISLAM AND
HINDUISM
Part 1: Spiritual symbiosis
By Sultan Shahin
TIRUPATI,
South India - It is impossible to spend several days
visiting ancient temples in and around Tirupati, one of
the four "Meccas" for Hindus, as the only Muslim in the
company of about 50 Hindu journalists, having a
darshan (close encounter) of Balaji, as Lord
Venkateshwar is popularly called, detect not the
slightest hint of unease on the part of any of my Hindu
colleagues on account of my being a Muslim, get a rare
opportunity to spend a couple of hours meditating in a
temple room next to where Balaji is installed, and not
reflect on the growing hostility between Islam and
Hinduism that is threatening to keep India from
realizing its destiny in the 21st century.
Does
the fault lie with the two faiths or with their
practitioners? Are the two faiths irreconcilable in
their belief-systems? Do they have any points of
convergence? Is it right to say that Islam is
monotheistic and Hindu polytheistic and so the twain can
never meet? Can Hinduism be simply dismissed as a
polytheistic faith, with idol worship as its chief form
of worship, as the Muslim fundamentalists tend to do?
If the two faiths are so irreconcilable, how can
thousands of Hindus visit and pay obeisance at Muslim
shrines in all parts of the country every day and a
Muslim visit and have darshan of Hindu deities
without provoking the slightest discomfort? How can
Hindu mahants (priests) invite Muslims for
Iftar (ritual breaking of fast during the month
of Ramadan) in the temple town of Ayodhya, which has now
become a by-word for Hindu-Muslim hostility since the
medieval Babri mosque was demolished there in 1992? And
how can the Muslims then reciprocate by inviting Hindus
in the same hotbed of hostility to share the ritual
festivities of Eid?
Hinduism and Islam have
lived in India together for almost 14 centuries. The
first 13 as excellent neighbors. "Love thy neighbor, for
he is yourself." said the Vedas. The Koran agreed: "Do
good - to parents, kinsfolk, orphans, those in need,
neighbors who are near, neighbors who are strangers, the
companion by your side, the wayfarer." (An-Nisa 4.36).
But the 20th century changed all that. As a
result of the British colonial divide-and-rule policy,
coupled with the short-sightedness of Hindu and Muslim
politicians, the country witnessed growing disaffection,
culminating in partition at the time of independence
from colonial rule in 1947, and periodic outbursts of
unimaginable savagery on the part of both communities.
This disastrous trend is continuing, infecting
hitherto unaffected sections in rural areas and the
south of India, apart from the previously affected east,
west and north of India. We may lose the 21st century,
too, to the forces of disintegration and chaos unless we
rediscover the spiritual symbiosis that kept the two
communities in near-perfect harmony for such a long
time.
Hinduism is known for the catholicity of
spirit, broadmindedness and a holistic approach, but
many Muslims merely dismiss it now as a byword for
superstition. Part of the blame lies with the rise of
obscurantist fundamentalists and their exclusivist
approach in recent years, though Islam was spread in
India largely by Sufi saints who considered all
religions to be merely different paths to God.
But also responsible for the present image of
Hinduism is Christian missionary propaganda under
British colonial supervision and support that has
affected not only Muslims and Christians, but also
Westernized Hindus educated through missionary schools.
Hinduism has been accused, for instance, of permitting
"the most grotesque forms of idolatry, and the most
degrading varieties of superstition".
It seems
to me, however, that a symbiotic spiritual relationship
exists between the two great religions. It is a
realization of this spiritual symbiosis, though largely
unconscious, that I believe helped sustain this
harmonious relationship despite the invading Central
Asian hordes led by Ghaznis and Ghoris, who called
themselves Muslim, and the British colonialists with
their massive effort at divide and rule using all
possible propaganda tools.
Islam's encounter
with other religions was quite violent. The history of
Crusades launched by Christian powers is well known. It
was Hinduism alone that provided Islam with a fertile
ground for growth, something it had denied for long
centuries even to indigenous Buddhism. Muslims'
treatment of Hindus, too, was quite considerate and in
keeping with the Islamic spirit of Lakum Deenakum
Waleya Deen (For you your religion, for me mine, the
Koran -109:5). As Hindus had the reputation of being
polytheists and idolaters, Muslims could have treated
them as Kauffar and Mushrekeen (religious
deviants). Instead, the very first Muslim to conquer
parts of India - Sind and Multan in 711 AD - Mohammad
bin Qasim, accorded them the special status of
Ahl-e-Kitab (people who follow divine books brought by
messengers of God before the Prophet Mohammed) that was
at first thought to be meant for Christians and Jews
alone. (Muslims are permitted to have the best of
social, including marital relations, with the
Ahl-e-Kitab). Even the Central Asian bandits who invaded
and looted India could not disturb the growing and
deepening spiritual ties. A number of Sufi saints spent
their lifetime in India, spreading the message of Islam,
that literally means peace, that comes with total
surrender to God. The Prophet Mohammed, too, is believed
to have felt an attraction for India.
The Indian
sub-continent's pre-eminent poet-philosopher Allama
Iqbal wrote:
Meer-e-Arab ko aaee thandi hawa jahan
se,
Mera watan wohi hai, mera watan wohi hai.
(From where the Prophet Mohammed received a cool
breeze,
That is my motherland, that is my
motherland.)
Hindus as
Ahl-e-Kitab
Some primordial spiritual connection
must have been at work. For only recently have Muslim
scholars learnt that Hindus indeed constitute the fourth
major group of Ahl-e-Kitab mentioned in the Holy Koran
repeatedly. For some mysterious reason, the Holy Koran
had left this question vague. It mentioned a major
religious group as "Sabe-een" as the ummah
(community) of a prophet who had brought a divine book
bearing God's revelation to the world. It also mentioned
Hazrat Nooh (Prophet Noah of the Bible) as a major
prophet ranking with prophets like Abraham, Moses, Jesus
and Mohammed. But who the followers of Hazrat Nooh are
was left a mystery.
Painstaking research has
been going on seeking the fourth major Ahl-e-Kitab. From
Hazrat Shah Waliullah, Maulana Sulaiman Nadvi and
Maulana Obaidullah Sindhi to a contemporary scholar from
Uttar Pradesh, Maulana Shams Navaid Usmani, a number of
scholars from the sub-continent, too, contributed to
this effort. It is now clear that Hindus are indeed the
lost ummah of the Prophet Nooh, whom they know as
Maha Nuwo. Evidence from Markandaya Puran and several
Vedas, and their description of "Jal Pralaya"
(devastation caused by the Flood, as in the biblical and
Koranic stories of Noah's flood) has been most helpful
in this search.
The authenticity and finality of
the above-mentioned research has not to be accepted by
any one, however, to be able to know that the
Hindus do indeed constitute a major Ahl-e-Kitab
ummah (religious community). According to the
Holy Koran, there is not one nation in the world in
which a prophet has not been raised up: "There are not a
people but a prophet has gone among them" (35:24). And
again: "Every nation has had a prophet" (10:47). And
again: "And we did not send before thee any but men to
whom we sent revelation [Divine Book]" (21:7).
We are further told that there have been
prophets besides those mentioned in the Holy Koran: "And
we sent prophets we have mentioned to thee before [in
the Koran], and prophets we have not mentioned to thee
[in the Koran]" (4:164).
It is, in fact stated
in a famous Hadees (also written as Hadith, meaning
sayings of the Prophet, as distinct from the Holy Koran,
which is believed by Muslims to be the word of God
revealed to the Prophet) that there have been 124,000
prophets, while the Holy Koran contains only about 25
names, among them being several non-Biblical prophets.
Prophets Hud and Salih came in Arabia, Luqman in
Ethiopia, a contemporary of Moses (generally known as
Khidzr) in Sudan, and Dhu-i-Qarnain (Darius I, who was
also a king) in Persia; all of which is quite in
accordance with the theory of universality of
prophethood, as enunciated above. And as the Holy Koran
has plainly said the prophets have appeared in all
nations and that it has not named all of them, which in
fact was unnecessary and not even feasible. Thus a
Muslim must accept the great luminaries who are
recognized by other religions as having brought light to
them, regardless of the terminology used to describe
them, as the prophets that were sent to those nations.
The Koran, however, not only establishes a
theory that prophets have appeared in all nations; it
goes further and renders it necessary that a Muslim
should believe in all those prophets. In the very
beginning we are told that a Muslim must "believe in
that which has been revealed to Abraham and Ishmael and
Issac and Jacob and the tribes, and in that which was
given to Moses and Jesus, and in that which was given to
the prophets from their Lord, we do not make distinction
between any of them" (2:136). The word "prophets" in
this verse from the Koran clearly refers to the prophets
of other nations.
Again and again, and in
different contexts, the Holy Koran speaks of Muslims as
believing in all the prophets of God and not in the Holy
Prophet Mohammad alone: "Righteousness is this that one
should believe in Allah and the last day and the angels
and the books and the prophets" (2:177). And again in
the same surah (chapter): "The Prophet believes
in what has been revealed to him from His Lord and so do
the believers; they all believe in Allah and His angels
and His books and His prophets: And they say 'We make no
distinction between any of His prophets' " (2:28).
Part 2: Are Hindus Kafir?
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