Auron ka hai Payaam aur, mera Payaam aur hai, / Ishq key dardmand ka tarz-e-kalaam aur hai! (Iqbal)
The Ummat is the body of Muslims who, generation after generation, personify the Qur’ān and Hadith in their individual and collective lives – in their families; in their society; and in their state and its institutions.
The Ummat is thus the human side of Islam and it acts and behaves very much like human beings on earth generally do.
As a result, the Muslim society and the Islamic state that Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam, founded right here on earth have, on the one hand, scaled great and unimaginable heights of success, achievement and glory. On the other hand, they have also gone through all the inevitable vicissitudes, decay and degeneration that human society is heir to over a period of time.
Rendered fragile by internal weaknesses and subjected to never-ending assault and aggression by external forces, the Islamic society and state that Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam, created, nurtured and bequeathed, fell prey to physical fragmentation, moral decay and intellectual shallowness and rigidity.
Today, even though the Ummat continues and the world is full of Muslim communities and societies, they are at best a pale and, in many instances, formless shadow of their original self.
They all live what they perceive or claim to be a Muslim or Islamic life, of one kind or another, to one degree or another. They are all happy and proud of who they are and what they do. Each of them represents a shade of Islam they say they are and of the fragment of Islam they claim they own.
But these are at best partial and anemic imitations of the original model left behind by Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam. And they are removed, by different degrees, from the true and comprehensive teachings of the Qur’ān and Hadith.
ISLAM LIVES ON
And yet, in and through these fragments of the Muslim Ummat, as individuals and societies, such as they are, that Islam lives on. For, in spite of all their imperfections and ineptitude, they all aspire and work to implement the teachings of Islam in their lives.
At the same time, Islam also lives on through the Qur’ān and the Hadith of Prophet Muhammad, Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam, in our midst, free from all imperfections as they are. They continue to shed their blessings on the world.
And they continue to flash a steady and unblinking divine light along and at the end of the tunnel of misery and despair in which humanity finds itself.
Islam is thus alive and well.
And it continues to be vibrant and thriving, even as it awaits a better day for humanity to dawn – a day when Islam will be embraced not just by some but by all, and not just in shards and shreds but in its glorious totality and fullness.
The world awaits a day when Islam will be implemented not just in some selected parts of the world but all over the globe. A day when Islam – and God of Islam – will make life on earth better for all human beings regardless of race or religion, gender or nationality.
So, Islam lives because the Qur’ān lives. And Islam lives because the Hadith lives. And Islam lives because the Muslim Ummat is around.
And the world of God is continually blessed by their existence, whether anyone knows this or not and whether anyone acknowledges it or not.
[Write to the author at Drsyedpasha@aol.com. Also visit www.IslamicSolutions.Com and Listen to Pasha Hour International.]