Why do Muslims fail and why an Islamic state so crucial?

 Dr. Firoz Mahboob Kamal

Why Muslims so powerless?

The current state of powerlessness of Muslims mostly owes to absence of an Islamic state in the Muslim World. It is very easy to understand  that the full practice of Islam is impossible without an Islamic state. Then a Muslim remains only a partial or imperfect Muslim. Most of the Islamic obligations are social, political, ideological, cultural, judicial, and warfare related. Only a few Qur’anic revelations deal with the religious rituals. It is a Qur’anic obligation that Islam must be practiced by all Muslims in all social and political arenas. There must not be any compromise or imposed restriction on that. For practice of all Divine obligations, an Islamic state is not only indispensable but also obligatory. Because, the implementation of all those social, political, educational and judicial policies are exclusively the functions of a state. This is why on the first day of migration to Medina, the Prophet (peace be upon him) didn’t lay the foundation of his own home, rather an Islamic state was formed first.

An Islamic state empowers its citizens and gives the necessary strength, skills and space to stand against the enemies. Hence, if there is no Islamic state, there exists no defence for Islam and Muslims. Exactly, that has become the current situation of Muslims now. A state that stands for national, tribal, monarchical and secular causes can’t stand for defending Islam and Muslims. That doesn’t constitute their political agenda. This is why the minority Muslims in Myanmar, India, China (Uighur), Kashmir, Palestine, Thailand, Philippines, and the Republic of Central Africa hardly have any friends on the world stage. Islam is not only about building relation with Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala, it is also about building individuals, families, societies, states, and civilisation with an an Islamic identity. It is a Qur’anic obligation that Islam must be practiced in all those areanas and not only in personal life. For such Islamisation, it needs Islamic policies in the field of education, societies, judiciary, culture, economics and governance of state. For that, an Islamic state and its infrastructures must play the most crucial role. In fact, that happened excellently in the time of the Prophet (peace be upon him) and the khulafa-e Rashida. The past glory of the Muslims indeed owes to that. These are indeed the most important legacies of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) for all Muslims in all ages.

But now the Muslims are far away from those most successful and guiding legacies of the Prophet (peace be upon him) and his great companions. Now they have created their own traditions (bid’yat). It is a pity that instead of Islamisation, they have taken paths of de-Islamisation. The situation has deteriorated so low that the Muslims now live without the full practice of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him)’s Islam. This is why understanding of the Holy Qur’an and the practice of sharia, hudud, shura, pan-Islamic unity, jihad, and other basics do not exist in their life. Such a limited and restricted practice of Islam is considered by the enemies as the best way of containment of Islam. Any attempt to come out of the control is labelled as a threat to the so-called global peace and security; hence becomes the target of instant annihilation. The so-called issue of peace and security means the peace and security of the global imperialist terrorists and not for the Muslims. So the Muslim villages are bombed and the Muslim men, women, and children are mutilated in many Asian and African countries by the US, the French, and the Russian bomber planes. Even the wedding ceremonies and the burial gatherings are not spared.

The core Islamic obligation like “a’amaru bil maruf (enjoining the right)” and “nehi anil munkar (eradication of the wrong)” is not allowed even in so-called Muslim states. For execution of such Qur’anic missions, it needs an Islamic state and strict implementation of sharia. But any attempt for establishing an Islamic state and implementation of sharia is labelled as a marker of religious extremism. And any glorification of efforts for establishing an Islamic state is blamed as terrorism. Even helping the innocent victims of Israeli atrocities in Palestine faces strict restriction and scrutiny by the imperialists and their cronies. Thus, a believer is compelled to live without Islam’s key mission, vision, and objective. Whereas, submission to such restricted and distorted practice of Islam is only possible after a gross deviation from the Qur’anic roadmap. Such deviations can only lead to hellfire. To avoid such a hell-bound route, migration to an Islamic state becomes part of the Qur’anic roadmap –as practiced by the early Muslims.

An Islamic state: the most beneficial institution

The livelihood for physical sustenance comes only from Almighty Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala. Such a staff of sustenance is given to all creatures. But the comprehensive success in life depends on the spiritual and the ideological rightness. Only such rightness takes one to paradise, and failure takes to hellfire. Achieving that spiritual rightness is the obligation of every individual; his or her fitness for paradise is tested here. For that, the conceptual premise must stay uncorrupted. And to stay uncorrupted, it needs full immunity against toxic ideas, false beliefs, and fake religions. And to generate such immunity, it needs Divine knowledge. Because of such a knowledge-induced immunity, the Muslims who stayed in Makkah prior to their migration to Medina could survive the conceptual corruption amidst the highly corrosive kuffar beliefs. One can produce food and drinks, but can’t grow Divine knowledge or guidance. To address such a crucial need, Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala has sent down holy books and thousands of messengers.

For spiritual and conceptual rightness, one needs an ideological environment free from toxic ideas and beliefs and also needs regular nourishment from the Divine treasure of knowledge like the Holy Qur’an. Only this way one gets rightly benefited from the greatest blessing of Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala and can stay aligned with siratul mustaqeem. Otherwise, he or she meets a spiritual death and gets deviated from the hellfire. In this regard, the role of an Islamic state is crucial. Such a state does the job on behalf of Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala to keep people safe from political, ideological, and cultural corruption and prepare them for paradise. When a state does its job –as done in the early days of Islam, even an average man achieves spiritual good health and attain the necessary fitness for paradise. This is why nothing is more beneficial on the earth than an Islamic state. This is the best project to save people from hellfire. It is also the most costly project; more than 60 percent of the Prophet (peace be upon him)’s companions had to sacrifice their life to build an Islamic state.  Those who invest their wealth, talent, and blood for building an Islamic state are indeed the best people in the sight of All-Wise Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala. In the absence of an Islamic state even a Nobel laureate gets lost in a corruptive conceptual quagmire. Through the corruptive education, culture, and politics, the people living in an un-Islamic state get groomed for the hellfire.

Since Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) and his companions didn’t have any ready-made Islamic state anywhere, they needed to build one anew. It is indeed the most important as well as the most beneficial task that the Prophet (peace be upon him) did for mankind. Because of that, the Muslims could build the finest civilization in human history. Such a state works as the true gateway of paradise. But Shaitan has his own agenda; he wants to take people to the hellfire. He made his plan known in front of Allah Sub’hana Ta’ala on the first day of his rebellion. In the Holy Qur’an, Shaitan’s has been repeatedly described as a real threat for humans. This is why the Shaitanic forces all over the world stand against the creation of an Islamic state even in a Muslim land. They wish that the Muslims should live without full Islam. For that, they want to de-link people from the Qur’anic teachings. This is why the USA and other anti-Islamic forces put pressure on the client Muslim states to curb Qur’anic lessons in schools, madrasas, mosques, media, and in public gatherings. So, in Saudi Arabia, Bangladesh, India, Egypt, and in many Muslim countries, not only the Qur’anic classes and the Islamic TV channels are closed down but also many of the Qur’an teachers are put behind bars.

Dangers of an institutional void      

The most important event in the Islamic calendar is not the birth of the Prophet (peace be upon him) or the victory of Makkah, but his migration from Makkah to Medina. It is the most important milestone in Islam’s civilizational growth and in the emergence of the Muslim Ummah as the most dominant World Power. The decision of the early Muslims to begin the Islamic calendar from the year of migration indeed gives recognition to the significance of the event. Only after the establishment of an Islamic caliphate, the Muslims could enjoy a safe and conducive premise to practice full Islam. Only a powerful Islamic state could provide the infrastructural support and security in fulfilling the Islamic obligation of the Muslims to make the Qur’anic Truth prevail over the falsehood. Only such an Islamic state based on pan-Islamic brotherhood could help dismantle the divisive walls raised in the name of land, language, race, and ethnicity and could provide the needed space for civilizational growth. The absence of such a core Islamic state could easily precipitate the worst catastrophic consequences -as the Muslims experience today. The Muslims are now forced to live a life without full Islam. They are forced to embrace even the enemy occupation, deaths, destruction, eviction, and ideological cum cultural corruptions.

For moral development, constant nurture in a value-adding institutional environment is crucial. Family, mosque, madrasa, school, and the cultural cum educational milieu of an Islamic state constitute the essential parts of such a value-adding infrastructure. In absence of such institutions, the risk of moral, cultural, and spiritual deprivation is quite real. In fact, in such an institutional void, men and women even with full physical fitness turn inferior to the animals –as has been stated in the Holy Qur’an. The Holy Quranic thus reveals, “ula’ika k’al an’am, bal hum adal (they are like animals, rather worse than that)”. The naked men and women who live like animals in the jungles of Nicobar Island are indeed the products of such an institutional void. Physically and genetically they fully resemble a man or woman, but they can’t fit in human society. Instead, they show more compatibility with their fellow animals living in the jungle. When they see men or women in their near vicinity, these fellow members of the same species quickly disappear into the forest –as shown in documentaries on their life. It reinforces the fact that meeting mere bodily needs doesn’t make people true humane. The moral, educational, cultural, and spiritual needs to be adequately addressed, too. For that, a value-adding vast infrastructure must be in place; otherwise, moral death is unavoidable. Indeed, an Islamic state provides such a humanizing mega infrastructure; hence it is the most important institution on earth. Because of such a value-adding infrastructure, the best people of the whole human history -like the companions of the Prophet (peace be upon him) could be produced. Because of such a supportive state, the Muslims could build the finest civilization on earth and could emerge as the number one World Power.    

The state power and its immense importance

Families, communities, mosques, schools, and colleges have their invaluable importance as value-adding institutions. But none of these is equal or superior to the state and its powerful infrastructure. The state is the most powerful institution on earth that can add ultimate humanizing or dehumanizing factors to humans. A state must empower its people and the people must strengthen the state. Such a model works in an Islamic state and gives birth to a powerful civilizational force. But such a model does not work under enemy occupation. Then, a state and its institutions are run by the enemy and work for the enemy. The people are then treated only as subjects. And the state institutions then become the tool of exploitation, subjugation, de-Islamisation, and de-empowerment –as occurred under the colonial occupation in the past and is happening now under the occupation of anti-Islamic forces.

The occupying force of a state can easily undo the good works of the social and religious institutions. They can easily manipulate the media and the civic institutions to serve their own agenda. Millions of mosques and thousands of madrasas then stand powerless to encounter the influence of the brutal state power. Mosques and madrasas can be turned into pubs, clubs, stables, or fodder stores –as happened in Soviet Russia and China during the communist era. Thus, if state power falls in the hand of any evil forces, it can cause unimaginable havoc on the earth. Not only can they drop nuclear bombs, occupy countries and turn cities into rubles, but also can endorse the worst criminals as gods in public life –as happened at the hand of Pharaoh and Nimrod. The magic spell of state power doesn’t end there, it can even approve the most scandalous crimes in the name of religion –as was done in the case of mass slaughtering wars of the European crusaders in the Muslim lands. It can indoctrinate people even in believing the most unbelievable lies. Cow, snake, sun or idol-worshipping paganism is indeed the product of such state-sponsored indoctrination -that too in the name of religion.

Such manipulative state power can turn the societal space morally and spiritually more dangerous than jungles. A jungle is morally or spiritually neutral. The animals never persuade people in worshiping snakes, cows, stones or idols: therefore do not guide people to hellfire. Nor do they endorse a tyrant killer like Pharaoh as a god or Hitler as a leader. In fact, the most harmful evil creatures on earth were not born in jungles, rather in states –as is the case of Pharaoh, Hitler, Stalin, Bush, or Putin. Then the state institutions work as the largest evil industry to produce the most murderous people on an industrial scale. Occupying states, colonizing countries, running gas chambers and dropping nuclear bombs, cluster bombs, barrel bombs or chemical bombs then become the acceptable norms in politics and warfare. Such states under the occupation of the evil forces become the powerful tools for making wars, World Wars, genocidal massacres, ethnic cleansing, and mindless exploitation. The state apparatus like media, educational and cultural institutions then works as massive machines to mold people’s minds, behavior, and character to the extent that they grow as the most obedient worshipers, voters, and warriors even for the worst killers on the earth.

The task of promoting and protecting people’s moral and spiritual health is so massive and difficult that it can’t be accomplished by mere religious scholars, leaders, or parties. Nor could be done merely at homes, mosques, or madrasas. The full Islamisation of people is unattainable without full Islamisation of the state and its institutions; both must run together. Otherwise, the people and those who run the state deviate from Islam’s hands in hands –as is the norm today in the Muslim World. Hence, for the sake of Islam and Muslims, nothing is more important than the full Islamisation of the state. Such an extreme spiritual cum political necessity has also been emphasized in the Holy Qur’an. If the state stays out of Islamisation, the most important Qur’anic obligations like justice by sharia, rule by shura, jihad for eradication of wrongs, and enjoining the right and borderless pan-Islamic Muslim unity remain only in the pages of the Holy Qur’an. By establishing an Islamic state, the Prophet (peace be upon him) showed the priority to the ummah. Now it becomes an obligation on every Muslim to follow his legacy. It is also an inseparable part of sunnah. In fact, building an Islamic state is the greatest and the most revolutionary legacy of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) that makes him the greatest man in human history. The huge success of the early Muslims owes greatly to the contribution of such a powerful Islamic state. Because of such a state, the Muslims could emerge as the most powerful civilizational force on the world stage and could better serve Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala’s agenda. The Islamic khilafa appeared as the core Muslim state to protect Muslim interests both at home and abroad. No other faith or religion, nor even the great prophets like Musa (peace be upon him) or Isa (peace be upon him) could build such a state. As a result, they couldn’t build any civilization either. 

The task of the highest piety

For building a higher civilization, it needs an inclusive involvement of all the state and non-state actors and institutions. To accomplish such a highest act of piety, it also needs inputs from All-knowing Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala. Such Divine inputs are made available through the Holy Qur’an. In such an endeavor of state-building, all the believing men and women need to be fully mobilized and engaged –as happened in the days of the Prophet (peace be upon him). Islam makes it a binding obligation on every believer. Therefore, for a Muslim, remaining inactive or disengaged from state-building is not an option. In fact, the success or failure of the ummah in raising such an Islamic state and civilization depends on the level of people’s involvement. In such an Islamising endeavor, the entire state establishment with all of its leaders, actors, institutions, and manpower must play the coordinating, mobilizing, and leadership role. Otherwise, all efforts meet failure. In Prophet (peace be upon him)’s days, not a single physically fit Muslim remained inactive or disengaged from it. Any form of disengagement was known as a marker of disbelief (kufr) or hypocrisy (munafiqat). No other sector demanded such a massive investment of time, energy, wealth, and human lives than building the Islamic state; most of the companions needed to be on the front line of jihad and to be ever ready to sacrifice their life. In absence of an Islamic state, the Muslim Ummah misses the rallying point. In such a void, the Muslims engage in doing the opposites: they fight for disunity and mutual destruction -as is happening now in the Muslim World.

Building hospitals, schools, colleges, universities, highways, farms, fisheries, or industries are definitely good deeds. These give knowledge, medical cure, professional skills, economic yields, and comforts. But such social care, economic benefit, and welfare works do not add any meaningful moral highness to the people. Nor does it give any guidance to get saved from hellfire. The fate of mankind is decided elsewhere. It is through jihad for enjoining the right and eradicating the wrong. And the best way of doing it is the Islamic state building jihad. Then, the whole state and its institutions become the parts of the Divine mission for enjoining the right and eradicating the wrong. The Muslim countries now have thousands of hospitals, universities, highways, farms, fisheries, and industries. They have nuclear bombs, too. But that didn’t help them emerge as a civilizational force on earth. Neither did that add an iota of glory to the Muslims on the world stage. The Muslims built 57 national, subnational or tribal states, each state with a different map, flag, and leader. But none of these states has any Islamising role. The Islamising objective of Islam can never be achieved by such a national, tribal, or secular state. Such states are fully incompatible with Islam’s core agenda. These secular states don’t match the Vision of Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala and work as fast-moving trains on Shaitanic tracks to take people to the hellfire. To encounter such a Shaitanic scheme, Muslims must set their state-craft on siratul mustaqeem. It is an obligation. Only then, a state and its institutions help people reach paradise. This way an Islamic state does the greatest benefit to its citizens. It is indeed the real blessing of an Islamic state. Can any worldly benefit match such an eternal benefit in the hereafter? Therefore, what else can be the act of highest piety than building an Islamic state? It is awful that such an enormous benefit of an Islamic state gets ignored. Shockingly, such a distinctive difference between an Islamic and a non-Islamic state goes mostly unnoticed even by the Muslims. Such indifference owes to huge hostile propaganda by the evil forces!

Khilafa (caliphate): why indispensable?

Enjoining the right (amaru bil maruf) and forbidding the wrong (nahi anil munkar) is a key mission of Muslims’ survival. It is purely a law enforcement issue -hence a function of the state. Therefore, it can’t be done through salah, fasting, hajj, charity, and other rituals. These rituals are only the means to prepare people for the end -not an end in themselves. And enforcement of law can’t be done privately by a man or a woman. It needs law enforcement executive authority possessed only by a state. It also needs a huge state infrastructure of policing and judiciary to find out the wrong-doing criminals and to bring them to justice. Therefore, how can believers discharge the Qur’anic mission of “enjoining the right and forbidding the wrong” in absence of a sharia enforcing state authority? Hence, in absence of such a state, a great part of Islam remains unpractised –as has been the norm in most Muslim countries. More importantly, without engaging in this obligatory mission, how a Muslim can please his Supreme Lord and can save his soul from the hellfire? It is unique that instead of surrendering all power to autocratic rulers, Muslims built up khilafah (caliphate)–the viceroyship of the Prophet (peace be upon him). The khalifa is elected by the people and mandated to carry out the same mission as the Prophet (peace be upon him) used to do in his ten years of rule.

In absence of such a state, sharia survives only in books –as happened in the case of sharia that was revealed to the prophet Musa (peace be upon him). The people of Bani Israel were heavily punished for such a criminal disobedience. Awfully, today’s Muslims have taken the same route of the deviant Jews. In the context of such a betrayal, what else could be the highest act of piety than engaging in Islamic state-building jihad? Whoever gets killed in making and defending such a state is called a shaheed. A shaheed has a special place in Islam. No one can be a prophet anymore; the door of prophethood is closed. But the door to be a shaheed stays open all the time. In the hereafter, shaheeds will enjoy the highly valued privilege of sitting with the prophets. They are given an instant entry to paradise without accountability. The Almighty Lord gets so much pleased with such self-sacrificing deeds of shaheeds that He made it forbidden to call them dead. They stay alive and are given food and drinks even after getting killed –as promised in the Holy Qur’an.

The greatest wisdom of the early Muslims

The greatest wisdom of the early Muslims lies in the fact that they could fully realize how indispensable an Islamic state is. It reflects not only their true understanding of the Holy Qur’an but also the understanding of the socio-political urgency of an Islamic state for the practice of full Islam. Because of such understanding, they didn’t confine the practice of Islam within the boundary of their personal or family life. Nor did they restrict it within the premises of mosques. Their vision was so insightful and their commitment to the cause of Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’ala was so profound that even in the tiny Muslim population of Arabia, there was no shortage of people who sacrificed their wealth and lives to make the Islamic state a great success. Except some physically disabled ones, none of them stayed behind the frontline or remained aloof from jihad. In fact, most of the companions of the prophet (peace be upon him) became shaheed. Islam’s successive victories, rapid expansion, and the whole glory indeed belong to them. Because of such a self-sacrificing spirit, the companions of the prophet Muhammad (be upon him) are labelled as the best people in the whole human history. Today’s 1.5 billion Muslims failed to make a contribution of the same size. On the contrary, they made the ugliest part of the Muslim history by working side by side with the imperialists as their most subservient mercenaries –as evidenced in Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. The mercenaries look for money, not for Islamic principles, obligations, or higher values. If they get money, they even turn their guns towards Muslim men, women, and children to please their masters.

Working as a mercenary for a foreign power has become the dominant culture among the civil and military elites of the Muslim countries. They join the government and non-government organizations (GO’s and NGOs) to fight for the imperialists’ causes both at home and abroad. They have already shown their readiness to fight any nasty war for the imperialists. So they could drop bombs even on religious schools to kill innocent girls –as the Pakistan Army carried out on Islamabad’s Hafsa madrassa during President Musharraf’s era. They can also launch a barrage of artillery shells even on a peaceful gathering of unarmed Islamists –as the Bangladesh Army did in Dhaka’s Shapla roundabout on 5 May 2013. They killed hundreds of innocent people and concealed their dead bodies. The Egyptian Army committed the most heinous massacre against the innocent unarmed men and women in Rabaa al Adawiya square in August 2013. These are only the terrible symptoms of a sinister disease, and the disease itself is the absence of a core Islamic civilizational state and its institutions. In absence of such a state, no one can punish these criminal mercenaries. These hardcore enemies of Islam have taken the full benefit of such a void -as they successfully occupied most of the Muslim countries. Millions of mosques, hundreds of thousands of madrasas, and more than 1.5 billion Muslims couldn’t end the occupation of these homegrown enemies. Prayer and supplication couldn’t help either. It needs some crucially important things to be done –as the early Muslims did by establishing an Islamic state.

The first thing must be done first. monarchical states, national states, and secular states can’t solve Muslims’ problems. Muslims need to return back to the Prophet (peace be upon him)’s legacy. The first political step must be the restoration of Islamic khilafa –the only prophetic political institution of Islam on the earth. Only an Islamic state can dismantle the anti-Islamic states and their institutions from the Muslim lands. A devil never fails to understand his enemies. Hence, nothing invites more wrath, more hostile propaganda, and more bombardment from the anti-Islamic global coalition of the imperialists than an Islamic state-building initiative –as it is currently visible all over the Muslim World. Such enmity of the established enemies of Islam indeed establishes the importance and correctness of the project. 05/11/2016