THE POET OF THE EAST

Nietzsche abhors the democratic rule by the herd of hopeless plebeians and bases all higher culture on the cultivation of an aristocracy of supermen. But is the plebeian so absolutely hopeless?

The democracy of Islam did not grow out of the extension of economic opportunity; it is a spiritual principle based on the assumption that in every human being is a centre of potential power for good, the possibilities of which can be developed by cultivating a certain type of character. From the poorest, simplest common people Islam has shaped individuals leading the noblest kind of life. Is not then the democracy of Islam a tangible refutation of Nietzsche’s ideas?

The degree of misinformation about Allama Iqbal can be ascertained from J. S. Badeau’s (Professor at the American University of Cairo) claim in his recent book, The Lands Between ¹ (Friendship Press, New York, 1958) that Allama Iqbal preached that the Quran was given as a guide only to the period when modern science was unknown. After the discovery of modern Western science, the task of research must be undertaken by scientific methods without reference to the authority of the Quran.

According to Professor Badeau, Iqbal taught that the Quran has already fulfilled its function by leading men to the threshold of the modern Western world so that science could take up its task from there. Iqbal expresses his true attitude towards modern Western science in clear, unambiguous language when he wrote:

Do not seek the glow of love from the knowledge of today Do not seek the nature of truth from this infidel’s cup. Long have I been running to and fro Learning the secrets of the New Knowledge. Its gardeners have put me to the trial And have made me intimate with their roses. Roses, tulips that warn one not to smell them, Like paper roses, a mirage of perfume. Since this garden ceased to enthral me, I have nested on the Paradisal tree.

Modern knowledge is the greatest blind, Idol worshipping, idol selling, idol making. Shackled in the prison of phenomena It is ever engaged in joyless search. It has not overleaped the limits of the sensible. It has fallen down in crossing the bridge of life. It has laid the knife to its own throat…

Nothing could be further from the truth than to characterize Allama Iqbal as a Westernizer like Professor John S. Badeau has done.

Iqbal’s deep knowledge of Western materialistic philosophy only served to alert him to the magnitude of its evils.

His poetry leaves one without the slightest doubt as to his attitude towards the adoption of Western civilization.

Music of strange lands with Islam’s fire blends On which the nation’s harmony depends. Empty of concord is the soul of Europe Whose civilization to no Mecca bends. Denied celestial grace a nation goes No farther than electricity or steam, 95 Death to the heart machines stand sovereign, Engines that crush all sense of human kindness… Reality grows blurred to eyes whose vision Servility and parrot ways abridge. Can Persia or Arabia such new life From Europe’s culture draw, Itself at the grave’s edge?

In the entire contemporary world of Islam, Allama Iqbal is one of the very few who has been able to express in poetry of enduring artistic value what it truly means to be a Muslim.