A General Look At Rites

The Link Between the Absolute Is a Two-edged Problem

The observer, scrutinizing the different acts of the stage-story of man in history, may find out that the problems 'are different and the worries diversified in their given daily formulas.

But if we went beyond these formulas, infiltrat- ing into the depth and essence of the problem, we would find, through many of such different daily formulas, one mainly essential and fixed problem with two edges or contrasting poles wherefrom mankind suffers during his civilized advancement along history.

It is from one angle expressing this problem: the problem of loss and non-entity, thus expressing the negative side of the problem. And from another angle, it expresses the problem of extreme in entity and belonging by c:olinecting the relative facts to which man belongs to an Absolute; thus express- i ng the positive side of the same problem. The Concluding Jurisprudence (of Islam) has given the name "atheism' to the first problem, which it expresses very obviously, and the name "idolatory" and shirk (believing in one or many partners with God), as also an obvious expres- sion of it. The continuous struggle of Islam against atheism and shirk is, in its civilized reality, a struggle against both problems in their historical dimensions.

Both problems meet into one essential point, and that is: deterring man's movement to advance from a continuously good imaginative creativity, for the problem of loss means to man that he is a being in continuous loss, not belong- ing to an Absolute, to Whom he can support himself in his hard march of a long range, deriving from His Absolutism and Encompass- ment help, sustenance and clear vision of the goal, joining through that Absolute his own movement to the universe, to the whole exist- ence, to eternity and perpetuity,

defining his own relationship to Him and his position in the inclusive cosmic framework, for the movement at loss without the aid of an Absolute is but a random movement like that of a feather in the wind, the phenomena around it affect it without being able to affect them. There is no accom- plishment or productivity in the great march of man along history without a connection to and promulgation with an Absolute in an objective march.

But this same connection, on the other hand, directs the other side of the problem, that of extreme entity, by changing the "rela tive" to "absolute", a problem which faces man continuously. For man weaves his loyalty to a case so that such loyalty provides him with the ability to move and continue marching.

But such loyalty freezes gradually and gets stripped off its relative circumstances within which he was accurate, and the human mind will derive out of it an "absolute" without an end, without a limit to responding to its demands. In religious terminology, such an "absolute" eventually changes to a god worship- ped instead of a need that requires fulfillment.

When the "relative" changes to an "absolute," to a "god" of this sort, it becomes a factor in encircling man's movement, freezing its capa- cities to develop and create, paralysing man from performing his naturally open role in the march:

Associate not with Allah any other god, lest you sit despised, neglected. (Qur'an, 17:22)

This is a true fact applicable to all "gods" mankind made along history, albeit if they were made during the idolatory stage of worship or its succeeding stage. From the stage of tribe to that of science, we find a series of gods which deterred mankind who worshipped them, treat- ing them as an "absolute," from making any accurate progress . . .

Indeed, from the tribe to which man sub- mitted his alliance, considering it as an actual need dictated by his particular living circum- stances, he went to the extreme, changing it to an "absolute," without being able to see any- thing except through them. Hence, they became an obstacle in his way to progress.

To science, to which modern man deserv- edly granted alliance, for it paved for him the way to control nature . . ., but he sometimes exaggerated such an alliance, turning it to an absolute alliance, trespassing his limits while being infatuated by it. Thus, man derived out of science, with which he was infatuated, an "absolute" to worship, offering it the rites of obeisance and loyalty, refusing for its own sake all ideals and facts which can never be measured by metres or seen by microscopes.

Accordingly, every limited and relative thing, if man wove out of it, at a certain stage, an absolute to which he thus relates himself, becomes at a stage of intellectual maturity a shackle on the mind that made it, because of its being limited and relative! Hence, man's march has to have an Abso- lute . . . !!!

And He has to be a real Absolute capable of absorbing the -human march, directing it to the right path no matter how much advance ment it achieves or how far it extends on its lengthy line, wiping out all gods that encircle the march and deter it . . . ! Thus can the problem be solved in both of its poles ... !

Belief in God is the Remedy

Such a remedy is shown by what Divine Jurisprudence has presented man on earth: The Belief in God as the Absolute to Whom limited man can tie his own march without causing him any contradiction along his long path.

Belief in God, then, treats the negative aspect of the problem, refusing loss, atheism and non-entity, for it places man in a position of responsibility: to whose movement and manage- ment is the whole cosmos related, becoming the vicegerent of God on earth. Vicegerency implies responsibility, and the latter puts man between two poles: one Deputy before Whom man bears responsibility, and a reward he receives accord- ing to his conduct, between God and resurrec- tion, infinitude and eternity, while he moves within such a sphere a responsible and purpose- ful movement.

Belief in God treats the positive aspect of the problem - that of the extreme in entity, forcing restrictions on man and curbing his

swift march - according to this manner:

First: This aspect of the problem is created by changing the limited and relative to an "absolute" through intellectual exertion and by stripping the relative off its circumstances and limitations. As for the Absolute provided by the belief in God, this has never been the fabrication of a stage of the human intellect, so that it may become, during the new stage of intellectual maturity, limited to the mind that made it . . . !

Nor has it ever been the off- spring of a limited need of an individual or a group, so that its becoming absolute may place it as a weapon in the hand of the individual or group in order to guarantee its illegal inter- ests . . . ! For God, the Praised, the High, is an Absolute without limits, one whose fixed Attributes absorb all the supreme ideals of man, His vicegerent on earth, of comprehension and knowledge, ability and strength, justice and wealth. This means that the path leading to Him is without a limit; hence, moving towards Him requires the continuity and relative movement and a relative acceleration of the limited (man) towards the Absolute (God) without a stop:

O' thou man! Verily thou art ever toiling on towards thy Lord - painfully toiling, - but thou shalt meet Him! (Qur'an, 84:6) He grants this movement His own supreme ideals derived from comprehension, knowledge, ability and justice, as well as other qualities of that Absolute, towards Whom the march is directed . . . ! The march towards the Absolute is all knowledge, all potential, all justice and all wealth. In other words, the human march is a continuously successive struggle against all sorts of ignorance, incapacity, oppression and pov- erty.

As long as these are the very goals of the march related to this Absolute, they are, then, not merely a dedication to God, but also a continuous struggle for the sake of man, for his dignity, for achieving such supreme ideals for him And if any strive (with might and main), they do so for their own souls: for Allah is free of all needs from all creation. (Qur'an, 29:6) . . . He, then, that receives guidance bene- fits his own soul: but he that strays injures his own soul ... (Qur'an, 39:41)

Contrariwise, whimsical absolutes and false gods cannot absorb the march with all its aspir- ations, for these manufactured absolutes are the children of an incapable man's brain, or the need of the poor man, or the oppression of the oppressor; therefore, they jointly are linked to ignorance, incapacity and oppression; they can never bless man's continuous struggle against them... !

Second: Being linked to God Almighty as the Absolute Who absorbs all of the aspirations of the human march means at the same time rejecting all of those whimsical absolutes which used to cause excessive entity and waging a continuous war and endless struggle against all sorts of idolatory and artificial worship. Thus, man will be emancipated from the mirage of these false absolutes which stood as an obstacle in his way towards God, falsifying his goal and encircling his march:

But the Unbelievers, their deeds are like a mirage in sandy deserts, which the man parched with thirst mistakes for water; until when he comes up to it, he finds it to be nothing: but he finds Allah (ever) with him ... (Qur'an, 24:39)

. . . Are many lords differing among them- selves better, or Allah the One, Supreme and Irresistible? If not Him, ye worship nothing but names which ye have named, ye and your fathers, for which Allah hath sent down no authority: . . . (Qur'an, 12:39-40)

. . . Such is Allah your Lord: to Him be- longs all Dominion. And those whom ye invoke besides Him have not the least power. (Qur'an, 35:13)

If we consider the main slogan heaven put forward in this respect: "There is no god but Allah," we will find out that it joined in it the linking of the human march to the True Absolute with the rejection of every artificial absolute . . .

The history of the march, in its living actuality, came across ages to emphasize the organic link between this rejection and that strong and aware tie to God Almighty. For as far as he goes away from the True God, man sinks in the labyrinth of different gods and lords. Both rejection and positive link to "There is no god but Allah" are but two faces for one fact, the fact which is indispensable to the human march along its lengthy path. It is but the Truth which is worthy of saving the march from loss, helping it explode all its creative energies, emancipating it from each and every false and obstructing "absolute" . . .