On the 'Purposelessness of Gold' and the 'Will of Allah!''

Balatarin
Share/Save/Bookmark

On the 'Purposelessness of Gold' and the 'Will of Allah!''
by Iqbal Latif
09-Sep-2011
 

'Predestination' has been the bane of the Islamic societies since inception!

The fall of Baghdad to Mongols invaders led by Hulagu Khan! Hulagu Khan (ca. 1216-1265) was a Mongol conqueror and the founder of the dynasty of the Il-Khans of Iran.

He also suppressed the Ismaili sect (hashshishayooon or the word Assassins originated from this sect) and defeated the last Abbasid caliph. ''Caliph was locked in his treasury and was brought gold rather than food. When the Caliph protested that he could not eat gold, Hulagu asked why he hadn't spent his treasury on providing for his army and defense to which the Caliph cried "That was the will of Allah". In response Hulagu replied, "What will happen to you is the will of Allah, also," leaving him among the treasure to starve. ''

Though some historians differ and think that the story, familiar from the pages of Marco Polo and Longfellow's Kambalu, of the Caliph's being left to starve in a tower full of gold and silver is apocryphal; he was probably rolled in a carpet and beaten or trampled to death in order not to shed royal blood, such being the Mongols' custom in the execution of their own princes.

The last history states that Hulagu, fearful of spilling the sacred blood, wrapped the Caliph in carpets and had horses gallop on him. Unlike Karbala where Yazid sprinkled the bluest of the blood that of grandson of the prophet mercilessly on the desert plains at least Mongol were polite enough not to let the pedigreed blood from the lineage of Banu Abbas to be spilled. They made sure to avoid the possible wrath of God as their counsels advised that holiest of the blood be soaked in the thick silk forms of the Caliphs flamboyant carpets.

The traumatic scar of the deeds perpetuated toward the capital and the sovereign of Islam persist to such an extent that in a book on Arab cultural identity, published in the nineteen fifties, a Syrian government official is quoted as saying that had the Mongols not destroyed the libraries of Baghdad, Arab science would have produced the atom bomb long before the West.

The lessons from history: Why one should not leave everything on the 'Will of Allah?'

With the will of Allah sufficing to explain everything risk no longer mattered and Muslim commerce began to dramatically suffer. Thus the civilization of Islam began to falter as 'Destiny' persevered over 'reason and logic'-and lenient ecclesiastical and priestly control once again tightened over the 'free will' of Muslim people.

The banking and finance capitals that could have emerged in the coastal cities and regions of Alexandria, the Yemen and Sumatra, as rivals to Europe were stemmed in their infancy.

Muslims who could not take out insurance because of 'destiny and fate,' Mashiat -e-ezdi or 'iradutul-allah' ruined incentive and enterprenership; it was considered 'Haram!' Risk management was believed to be intrusion in the ‘Will of God, ‘until today Insurance remain haram. This led ot the decline of trade and commerce. Where lack of risk management aborted an infant financial industry that could have provided commercial support to trade and sea-faring voyages were instead confined to the Mediterranean, a Muslim lake, instead of venturing out like Christopher Columbus. In Salamanca universities and insurance supported the voyages into unknown dark of the Oceans. In Islam disasters were considered as ‘Will of Allah.’

Any belief that employs "guardians of truth'' on shaping of landscape of intellect will implode. It is said that 'Crutches of faith are introduced when reason sink exhausted.' It is an paradox that when curtain of dogma was descending within the Islamic lands killing free thinking it was slowly and steadily rising in Italy and northern Europe. The Islamic world was being eclipsed because of the internal philosophical challenges of orthodoxy and dogma was gaining.

( Hulagu left Mongolia in the autumn of 1253 at the head of a large army. Traveling slowly along a carefully prepared route, from which all natural obstacles had been removed, he did not cross the Oxus, then the frontier between the Chaghatai Khanate and Persia, until the beginning of 1256.

By the end of that year the greater part of the Ismaili castles had been captured, and the Grand Master himself was a prisoner in Mongol hands. He was sent to Mongolia, where he was executed by the order of the Great Khan, and with the wholesale massacre of the Ismailis that followed, the sect was all but wiped out. The summer of 1257 was spent in diplomatic exchanges with the caliph al-Mustasim from Hulagu's headquarters in the Hamadan area. The Caliph refused to accede to Mongol demands for submission, and in the autumn Hulagu's forces began to converge on Baghdad. On Jan. 17, 1258, the Caliph's army was defeated in battle; on the 22nd Hulagu appeared in person before the walls of Baghdad; the city surrendered on February 10, and 10 days later al-Mustasim was put to death.

With his death the Islamic institution of the caliphate came to an end, although it was artificially preserved by the Mamluk rulers of Egypt and the title was afterward assumed by the Ottoman sultans. After Baghdad, in 1260, Mongol forces combined with those of their Christian vassals in the region, such as the army of Cilician Armenia under Hetoum I, and the Franks of Bohemond VI of Antioch. This force then conquered Muslim Syria, domain of the Ayyubid dynasty.

They took together the city of Aleppo, and on March 1, 1260, under the Christian general Kitbuqa, they also took Damascus. After Baghdad, in 1260, Mongol forces combined with those of their Christian vassals in the region, such as the army of Cilician Armenia under Hetoum I, and the Franks of Bohemond VI of Antioch. This force then conquered Muslim Syria, domain of the Ayyubid dynasty. They took together the city of Aleppo, and on March 1, 1260, under the Christian general Kitbuqa, they also took Damascus. The Mamluks took advantage of the weakened state of Kitbuqa's forces.

The Crusaders, though traditional enemies of the Mamluks, also regarded the Mongols as the greater threat. Discussions took place between the Muslims and the Christians, with debate about whether or not to join forces against the Mongols, but the Muslims were not in agreement with this action. So instead, the Crusaders allowed the Egyptian forces to come north through Crusader territory, and resupply near the Crusaders' powerbase of Acre.

The Mamluks then engaged the remnants of the Mongol army in Galilee, at the Battle of Ayn Jalut. The Mamluks achieved a decisive victory, Kitbuqa was executed, and the location established a highwater mark for the Mongol conquest. In previous defeats, the Mongols had always returned later to re-take the territory, but they were never able to avenge the loss at Ayn Jalut. For the rest of the century, the Mongols would attempt other invasions of Syria, but never be able to hold territory for more than a few months. The border of the Mongol Ilkhanate remained at the Tigris River for the duration of Hulagu's dynasty.) Source Wikipedia

Balatarin
Share/Save/Bookmark

Recently by Iqbal LatifCommentsDate
Ashraful Makhlookaat!!! Gods imperfect 'Prime Creation.'
3
Dec 04, 2012
Defining 'infinity' with our 'finite minds.' We live in-between two infinities!
14
Dec 03, 2012
Stop this strange 'scriptural Puritanism' of democratic Israel.
8
Dec 01, 2012
more from Iqbal Latif
 
Iqbal Latif

Hush - Don't Say Anything To God 3

by Iqbal Latif on Sat Sep 10, 2011 05:03 AM PDT

Renaissance can only be possible if minds are free; renaissance is about freedom of expression in literature, architecture, arts, deconstruction of myths and chiselling of the marble to exquisite forms. Michelangelo was icon of such freedom.

Sistine Chapel 'Creation' or 'David ' could only be created through the 'freedom of mind' ; an enslaved mind cannot be an artist or a creator. Enslaved man can be a revolutionary and many a enslave people have helped changed the world but their minds were free they accepted death instead of compromise with totalitarian or dogmatic despotism of clergy.

Michelangelo was icon of such freedom. Sistine Chapel 'Creation' or 'David ' could only be created through the 'freedom of mind' ; an enslaved mind cannot be an artist or a creator. Enslaved man can be a revolutionary and many a enslave people have helped changed the world but their minds were free they accepted death instead of compromise with totalitarian or dogmatic despotism of clergy.

@Science backs god with numbers.

@Scientific procedures may have been involved in the making of the computer, but human hands were required to assemble it. Ditto, god.

In ''Just Six Numbers: The Deep Forces That Shape the Universe,'' Rees states that he does not interpret the fine tuning of universal constants to an intelligent designer but rather supports the notion of a "multiuniverse". Just Six Numbers is a well-written introduction into the forces that shape our existence. The book focuses on 6 fundamental constants in the universe and how key the values of these numbers are towards the universe and life ever coming into being.

Our whole Universe is governed by just six numbers, set at the time of the Big Bang. Alter any one of them at your peril, for stars, planets and humans would then not exist. These six numbers constitute a 'recipe' for a universe. Moreover, the outcome is sensitive to their values: if any one of them were to be 'untuned', there would be no stars and no life. Is this tuning just a brute fact, a coincidence? Or is it the providence of a benign Creator? I take the view that it is neither. An infinity of other universes may well exist where the numbers are different. Most would be stillborn or sterile.

Our religious convictions are the product of our birth. Born to a Hindu family we would probably be a Hindu or in a Muslim family mostly a Muslim. In science, one is not born in a region to adhere to a certain definite belief set. There is no region of the world where you can see mindless predominant following of Aristotle, Newton, or Einstein. Yet, those regions where science helped to develop tools of progress are regions where theories of sciences and philosophy are well treasured. Where Newton is respected, logic and rationalism has survived and progressed by leaps and bounds, toleration in those regions is admirably better. Regions, where pre-dominant thinking and learning of scriptures is considered as divine progress, stand still, and with poverty of mind that dominates the landscape material hazards make the life of inhabitants miserable.

With the Beloved's water of life, no illness remains
In the Beloved's rose garden of union, no thorn remains.
They say there is a window from one heart to another
How can there be a window where no wall remains?


  •  
Iqbal Latif

I looked into my heart and there I saw Him; He was nowhere else!

by Iqbal Latif on Sat Sep 10, 2011 03:49 AM PDT

I searched for God among the Christians and on the Cross and therein I found Him not.

I went into the ancient temples of idolatry; no trace of Him was there.

I entered the mountain cave of Hira and then went as far as Qandhar but God I found not.

With set purpose I fared to the summit of Mount Caucasus and found there only 'anqa's habitation.

Then I directed my search to the Kaaba, the resort of old and young; God was not there even.

Turning to philosophy I inquired about him from ibn Sina but found Him not within his range.

I fared then to the scene of the Prophet's experience of a great divine manifestation only a "two bow-lengths' distance from him" but God was not there even in that exalted court.

Finally, I looked into my own heart and there I saw Him; He was nowhere else."

Rumi


  •  
Iqbal Latif

Hush - Don't Say Anything To God 2

by Iqbal Latif on Sat Sep 10, 2011 03:10 AM PDT

Don't be satisfied with the stories that come before you. Unfold your own myths.

Don't let them think that we've broken down;
That we've cracked up.
We merely dropped leaves,
For a further spring.

Not only the thirsty seek the water,
the water as well seeks the thirsty.

Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu
Buddhist, sufi, or zen. Not any religion

or cultural system. I am not from the East
or the West, not out of the ocean or up

from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not
composed of elements at all. I do not exist,

am not an entity in this world or in the next,
did not descend from Adam and Eve or any

origin story. My place is placeless, a trace
of the traceless. Neither body or soul.

I belong to the beloved, have seen the two
worlds as one and that one call to and know,

first, last, outer, inner, only that
breath breathing human being.

From Essential Rumi


  •  
Iqbal Latif

Hush - Don't Say Anything To God

by Iqbal Latif on Sat Sep 10, 2011 03:04 AM PDT

Oh Beloved,take me.
Liberate my soul.
Fill me with your love and
release me from the two worlds.
If I set my heart on anything but you
let fire burn me from inside.
Oh Beloved,
take away what I want.
Take away what I do.
Take away what I need.
Take away everything
that takes me from you.

On the way of quest, the sane and insane are one.
On the way of love, relatives and strangers are one.
Whom the wine of the beloved's union was given,
In his religion, the Ka'ba and the idol-temple are one.

Moulvi


  •  
Maryam Hojjat

Great Article, Thanks

by Maryam Hojjat on Sat Sep 10, 2011 02:21 AM PDT

I enjoyed it & Agree with All points you made.


  •  
Iqbal Latif

On pre-destination and Fatalism

by Iqbal Latif on Fri Sep 09, 2011 04:38 AM PDT

Pre-destination: The onus lies on us to train our children to be great human beings, eradicate caste or creed; no religion is big enough or creative enough to encompass the demands of 6 billion people.

I believe I have transcended into a new creed. I think we all should follow one thought: that of unique ‘humankind’, we have the same inherited coding, the same love, the same hatreds. We got to go beyond parochial ideological fixations and reach a universal solution where we identify ourselves as citizens of this big blue planet that we should all call “Mother Earth.”

Plain and simple, it helps me eradicate the ‘middleman’ (Prophet) who tells me through his “agents provocateurs’ (clergy) who to love and how to love others. Love is born within us; we don’t need an agent provocateur to tell me. Everyone’s way is so different and complex. But we humans can have only one way “the human way” and love should be our main objective. We need to go beyond our self-made delusions and avatars.

Mankind today is at another cusp of evolution where we have come a long long way from Stone Age to the Age of Connectivity, where the world has become one giant neighbourhood; a new melting pot has emerged where 4 to 5 generations from now will have a new civil and human order without boundaries where caste and creed will be a thing of the past. We are the last remnants of the “Old World”.


  •  
Iqbal Latif

We are living in the most

by Iqbal Latif on Fri Sep 09, 2011 04:32 AM PDT

We are living in the most peaceful era of human history. The previous centuries was fraught with wars and went through its own evolutionary period and we realized that nothing is better than peace.

But what history has taught me is that progress in life is about construction, creative productive ideas, and love of mankind, and not about religious ideologies or medieval practices, wars and disasters. Modern world has no room for disagreements and hatred.

Our genetic model is based on that. Mankind is a great big orchestra where each man is a conductor playing the symphony of love. It is scripted within all of us.
Those who seek destruction are merely peripheral and become footnotes in the annals.

It is also not just the survival of the fittest, but of the fastest who have a constructive attitude and are most responsive to changing times. Medieval cultures and nations fighting for supremacy through swords and reigns of terror are failures.


  •