This Beloved Arab Colony

#15 by Honorable_Syed on June 18, 2003 9:04pm PT

``why do you keep forgetting that our identity starts with our deen ``Islam``, and not by where we are geographically situated.``

Pakistan lost its Islamic identity when the majority of the muslim population of Pakistan sought independance from the minority and created Bangladesh. Thre are two states that were created in the name of religion and both are failures.


``As to your comments of the arabic alphabets not being used for our language Urdu, that`s absolutely outrageous, as our language was derived from Arabic, persian, and sanskirt, hence if certain sanskirt words are not compatible with our arabic script, we would rather discard them (throw them in the dumpster) than change our script. We are extremely proud of our deen, don`t ypu ever forget that.``

First of all language has nothing to do with religion. This was part of Zial-ul-Haq`s popaganda that Islam, Pakistan and Urdu went hand in hand. Remember the slogan ``Islam khatrey mai hai``.

Secondly Urdu is not a Pakistani language but is an Indian language. The word Urdu comes from the word Urd or Lashkar. It was the language of the soldiers in the Indian army who came from different backgrounds and spoke different languages. It is correct to say the the foundation of the Urdu language come from Persian, Turkish, Arabic and Sanskrit. Hindi in fact is also a derivative of Urdu, whereby Arabic words were replaced with Sanskrit ones.

imagine for a minute that you are a part of a middle class family living in gulshan iqbal, karachi or samnabad, lahore. imagine one evening, while sitting in the sehan with abba, ammi, dadi, dada, behen and bhai, there is knock on the door. imagine that standing in the doorway are canvassers for a new political party. imagine that these people talk to you and your family about creating a society modeled on america. these people tell you that islam will be irrelevant in this new society and that sharab will be available at the corner store. these people ask you to vote for them.

imagine next evenings there is knock on the door again. at the door this time are people from another political party. these people talk to you and your family about creating a society based on the fundamentals of islam, a society with an emphasis on simplicity, tolerance and justice and a society where everyone (including minorities, generals, mullahs and fuedals) are equal in the eyes of the law. the canvassers specifically tell you that their party does not believe in mma/taliban islam.

so my dear countryfolks, which party will get more votes?

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hamidm writes: ``and come to think of it, that is exactly how muslims divide the world – dar ul salaam vs. dar ul harb, but they have the labels switched ……… ``

Yep, the labels are definitely switched. Let`s see by whom: A picture is worth thousand words

sammeerJB:
``rubb milai joRi - ik annha teh ik kohRi....``
Here is one better for you, from an old Pindi-hand:
Maan vee anee, dhee vee anee
anaa ee autree naan jawaai
rab nay murh kay bhaag laaya
tay noon vee anee aayee!
Does it fit into the theme of this article?

`` But does that not show that Islam strengthens and advances a culture? Consider that ``That is to say, Islam’s forces of diffusion share their own cultures, producing in Pakistan what I consider to be a deeply attractive mix of indigenous, Turkic, Iranian and Arab influences.``
....Typical Pakistani complex at work. Turkic, Iranian and Arab influences are mentioned with pride but Indian/influences have to be covered with the hijab of ``indigenous``.

LETUS SEE WHAT HAPPENS IN THE CONFRONTATION BETWEEN MUSHRRAF AND MMA.

In resp to pakfin:
``Secondly Urdu is not a Pakistani language but is an Indian language. The word Urdu comes from the word Urd or Lashkar. It was the language of the soldiers in the Indian army who came from different backgrounds and spoke different languages. ``
This is an incorrect assessment, urdu was not the language of the Indian army. it was the language of the foreign muslim army, the invaders. And i have never said urdu is a pakistani language.

urstruly,

......... where are the pictures of the taliban or their counterparts in iran and saudi arabia beating women on the street for not being dressed properly, bengali intellectuals being massacred in chittagong, suicide bombers blowing up jews in haifa, rebels in the phillipines kidnapping and torturing tourists, people being publically beheaded in mecca, christians bring driven from their homes in sudan, shias being killed in karachi, muslims flying planes into the wtc, chechens killing russians civilians and bearded fools crying for implementing inhuman sharia laws from morocco to indonesia ............

........... the civilized world has a right to protect its way of life from barbarians bent on destroying what they can`t have ............. muslims have to stop acting like rodney king and take responsibility for their actions ..........

re: veeresh # 17

The problem in Pakistan is simple. We Pakistanis think that we are the only Muslims in the world and Pakistan is the only Muslim state in the world. This situation is made even worse by that fact that Pakistanis think they are only true defenders of Islam in the world and they have an interpretative monopoly on Islam and that we are the only ``true`` Muslims in the world; the rest all infidels.

We, Pakistanis, thanks to MMA, decided that shawalar-kameez is a Islamic dress and ispo fact, by that fiat we have made all the garb worn in other Muslim nations as un-Islamic and turned all the Muslims, who do not wear shalawar-kameez in the world, into non-believers!

This is insanity and this insanity has to be erdicated; not defeated, for Pakistan to progress. It is our unique version of Islam, which we seek to impose on the world. Our version is not Islamic, as much it is confluence of tribal ethos, local customs, political ambitions, cultural exploitations, and ideological insecurities. The interpretative roots of our Islamic version are grounded in Hinduism and Hindu mythology. The Islam we practice has no cognitive association with the Islam, which originated in Arabia. Islam may have arrived here in 711 AD, but since it was exposed to Hinduism, it has evolved in the last 1300 plus years. It can no longer be considered as the Islam that came to the region with Muhammad Bin Qasim, because its evolution in India has been influenced all the major religions of India; Sikhism, Buddism and Jainism and Hinduism et al. It is our, as a nation`s, refusal to accept this statement, and our endeavors to extract a purified essesnce of Islam by ignoring the influence and the contribution, which India`s various religions have had on Islam, that consitute our failure to articulate an ideological identity.

Pakistan may espouse any ideological set of beliefs, but it will remain incomplete. It will remain logically flawed as long as we seek to identify in a geographic sense by denying our historic roots. Pakistan`s ideology maybe Islamic, but its historic roots are in the Indian tradtions and not in the past experience of the Arab/Middle Eastern world. Pakistan`s identity lies in South Asia and not in Arabia. Our problem is that we try to reconcile the irreconiable.

Ciao

In response to Honorable_Syed:

Urdu is a derivation of Turkic word ``ordu`` and translates into ``lashkar`` or ``army`` or ``military``. The Turkic word ``ordu`` is itself a derivation of the latin word ``ordo`` which means `arrangement`, or `group` etc. The english word ``order`` comes from these roots as well.

Furthermore, Urdu is not an Indian language. It has its roots in the conglomeration of turkic and north indian armies during the 13th through 17th centuries.

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#42 by ferozk on June 19, 2003 11:25am PT
Very well put.

In fact it is also strange that all the decendants of Ali (Syeds) ended up living in India and Pakistan.

#34 by faisaluno on June 19, 2003 8:46am PT
so my dear countryfolks, which party will get more votes?


Are you trying to say that the party that talks of ``creating a society modeled on america. these people tell you that islam will be irrelevant in this new society and that sharab will be available at the corner store`` will get more votes?

I am surprised with the amount of hand wringing and introspection Pakistanis do. Maybe it is becuase they are so confused about their identity. Mr. Moghul is trying to arugue that for Pakistan to go forward, it has to go back in history. And not only in its past but the past of Arabia. I am sure this attitude will be diagnosed as Inferiority Complex by a good psychiatrist.

The only way to go is to look into future. Figure out why the Islamic World is in such a bad shape. The future belongs to the Educated and Education cannot spread until there is freedom of thought and speech. If you cannot question you cannot educate. Until people are free to question everything including religion and beliefs, there will be no progress. I am sure this will not happen in the near future in Pakistan of any other islamic country. Even after generations there will be articles like this one.

Japan, USA and ECU are biggest trade partners of Pakistan. Pakistani exports rice and labor to Muslims countries and imports oil. That is the extent of Ummah from Pakistani perspective. The Arabic or Persian language has no use for Pakistan and in open media market, these languages programs will not get private sponsors. Go to any Market in Islamabad, less than 150 miles from Afghanistan and only visible trade is few dry food stalls. There is just nothing for Pakistan to be politically Islamic and on the bandwagon of Ummah. Besides three mentioned above, India, China and southeast Asia should be preferred trading partners for Pakistan.

dost-mittar:
It does fit with the theme of this article from my point of view.

faisaluno:
I agree that Pakistanis will choose the religious one over overtly western/ liberal but you excluded third, fourth and other possibilities. Two points. 1) State supported systematic promotioin of ideology and identity and last 25 years since Bhutto`s murder has produced an environment conducive to pro-religious mindset. However, instead of the two assumed political parties you mentioned, I add one more who ignore both and support local cultural identity, official backing of local language, pride in local culture, standing up for local people and standing up against unfair treatment of local cultural identity, is likely to beat out both just as MQM did in Karachi.

That is the main point to understand the mind of pan-Islamist and Ummah person. Their strongest opposition is native identities and cultures and, boy, they detest challenge to pan-Islamism from native cultures. They can`t accept that Islam is religion and culture is composite Pakistani - varying from ethnicity to ethnicity. They wish to have whole enchilada but grudgingly project a view of composite Islamic, Arabic, Persian, Afghan, Turkic and ``indigenous`` in the last. This is nonsense. We belong to our ethnicities in cultural terms - 100 percent. The cultural component of the Islamic civilization of glory days did not make a significant impact until last 25-30 years and that too mostly in urban environment. The reason was not any weakness of Islamic but the self-contained randomly distributed villages and cultures did not offer proper means of communication in addition to ruling style from the top only. How can Panjab be Islamic culture when practically no road and only two major cities, Lahore and Multan existed that mattered to Islamic rulers and the population of Lahore, the biggest city was 200,000 when British took it over. Much less than 10 percent men knew reading or writing with almost zero percent women. What the heck author is talking about the past of our people and Pakistan belonging in the past? In Mexico, despite extensive urbanization, westernization, Spanish language and 95 percent catholics, the cultures of the society is still native American.

The past of Pakistani people is much less Islamic - mostly nominal Islamic - than current hoopla about it. In the past, Pakistani peope never took part in any jihad or pan-Islamism. They casually followed local sufis at the most.