“In a Secular country, minorities are free in their religious matters. Saving Secularism in India is the most important task and responsibility of every Muslim voter” (Mualana Arshad Madni, head of Darul Uloom Deoband )’. It is an insightful statement and I hope the other Ulmas, especially in Pakistan will follow the advice. The article is in urdu and shared by Zafra Khizer.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=696159043759968&set=a.595360673839806.1073741828.515901875119020&type=1&theater
First of all it is important to understand what is Secularism: “Secular” does not mean “godless.” In politics, it demands the privatization of religion. It binds the ruler or the ruling class to an objectively “neutral” moral and ethical order, which does not violate an individual’s subjective beliefs. Its neutral meaning, unfortunately, has always fought with the more negative one.
It is worth noticing that the foundation of Political Islam was laid on a secular charter that though invoked the name of Allah and Muhammad as his messenger. It was neither a religious canon nor an invention of a political theorist, but a secular contract—not overtly or specifically religious, not ecclesiastical or clerical. For the first time in the history of the Arabian Peninsula, it marked a political unity of diverse factions under the leadership of Prophet Muhammad. The Prophet would settle all matters in the light of natural moral and ethical order. This charter successfully helped maintain law and order in Medina, between religious believers of different faiths as well as the non-believers or the polytheists.
Muslim period of the Sub-Continent India reveals that during the secular period of the Muslim Turkish rulers; more specifically under the secular rule of Emperor Akbar, majority of people converted to Islam. On the other hand the forced conversion by Aurangzeb’s fundamentalist rule, not only stopped the wave of conversion, but also brought the fall of Muslim rule in India.
Mirza Ashraf
Secular is derived from latin secularis which means worldly or temporal. In the modern political context it means either separate from religion or not exclusively associated with or against a particular religion or sect. Such ideas seek to promote pluralism and tolerance to prevent the tyranny of a dominant group against minorities. Regretably, Muslims do not have a particularly secular history. The distinction to be made among the various Moghul rulers is more of practical tolerance. Akbar is different in that he engaged in social experimentation that sought to fuse concepts of Muslim and Hindu theologies. It did not succeed and his grandson reverted to a religious course that sharpened the religious divide that hastened the demise of the empire.
Secularism for the Muslim world should also be examined in the Sunni-Shia context. The two main arms of Islam are engaged in a fierce struggle to decimate rather than accomodate. It is a cancer that afflicts the Muslim soul from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Chechnya, Syria, Lebanon and into Africa. It is destroying the history, social fabric and the very structural integrity of the various countries and turning Islam into a one-dimensional mockery of murderous intolerance.