AbuDahr [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

And Once Again Abu-Dhar

Introduction

From that day when Muhammad (PBUH) left Mecca after thirteen years of
anguish and continuous struggle and went to Medina, he knew that the period
of weakness and concealment of Islam had ended and that he must, with the
help of his loyal and valiant followers, lay the foundation of a civilisation
with the glory of an Islamic organization, and construct the basis of his
political regime in the way which God desired.

At this time, to the east of the peninsula, the King of Iran had a splendid
palace and sumptuous court in which thousands of female slaves, and thousands
of enslaved people and servants, had been appointed to perform the ceremonial
duties there, and the product of the labor of the miserable and hard-working
people was spent in order to maintain that system.

To the north of Arabia, also, Heraclitus was rising to prominence with
his frightening regime and sumptuous empire. It could be said that the
things which were the most striking in these two large countries were these
palaces which reached towards the sky, for the exclusive enjoyment of the
rulers, and that art, literature, war, the collection of taxes, design
and invention, were all undertaken so that the royal and imperial ceremonies
could be held in the greatest splendor possible.

But as to the Prophet of Islam, as soon as he entered Medina, he built
a mosque and his humble house beside it. The door to his house opened from
inside the mosque. Until the end of his life, when Islamic rule was established
throughout Arabia, he did not change his lifestyle.

He was the absolute ruler of a country and he ate barley bread . He
would sit with the poor upon the ground at their meal just like a humble
slave. He would ride a donkey bareback and, most of the time, he would
sit another person behind him.

This method of ruling by the ruler was to show the difference between
his regime and the monarchic regimes of Iran and the Roman Empire. The
people could see with their own eyes that a new regime and a young organization
had come into being, between two aristocratic bases, in which there was
no difference between ruler and ruled, commander and commanded, master
and slave, and that all stood in one rank upon the threshold of God and
justice.

The founder of this regime passed away and, with the dispossession of
'Ali and political manoeuvres, the first brick in the wall of the Caliphate
was laid crooked. Abu Bakr then designated 'Umar as his successor, and
the second blow was dealt to the Islamic regime.

Even though 'Umar and Abu Bakr were themselves the cause of this deviation,
the political organization of Islam was established upon the basic principles
which the Prophet laid down: simplicity, equality, and the fair distribution
of wealth and prevention of its concentration, just as it had been previously.

'Umar also left and 'Uthman, this incompetant, pseudo-religious old
man, took over the reins of rulership, and the instability which had come
into being in the foundation of Islamic rule became so strong that the
infrastructure of Muhammad (PBUH) was immediately destroyed. During 'Uthman's
rule, the Caliphate was changed into a monarchy and the mud homes of the
Islamic rulers were changed into king's palaces; simplicity changed into
the splendid ceremony of the court of Mu'awiyah and the extravagant organization
of 'Uthman.

Abu Dharr, who was the fourth or fifth person who joined Islam, and
whose sword had been most effective in assisting the progress of the Islamic
movement, saw this deviation. 'Ali, the image of piety and truth, became
isolated and the enemies of Islam had found their way into the Caliphate
organization and, like termites, they were eating away at Islam.

Each of the liberated truth-seekers was driven into a corner and silenced.
The day when Abu Bakr pushed Ali aside from the political scene, and he
himself sat upon the throne of the Caliphate, Abu Dharr became anxious
and terrified. The future of Islam was black, to his mind, and appeared
to be frightful, but he still saw that, at any rate, the caravan of Islam
still progressed on its main course and even though an important rightful
claim was being disregarded, the Islamic system had not been torn apart.
Even though he was incensed and boiling with indignation, he put the seal
of silence on his lips. When the regime of 'Uthman dominated Islam, the
humiliated working masses and the helpless were suppressed under the heels
of usurers, slave merchants, the wealthy, and aristocrats who were coming
and going in the courts of 'Uthman and Mu'awiyah. Class differences and
the concentration of wealth were revived; Islam, threatened with a great
danger, was changed from the situation of the Prophet and the simplicity
and unpretentiousness of Abu Bakr and 'Umar, who were living like average
people or even like the poor and needy. Thousands of dinars were spent
to build a Green Palace for the Islamic governor Mu'awiyah and a regime
was established which was like a king's court.

Abu Bakr, in order to earn his living, had milked the goats of a Jewish
woman, yet now a necklace belonging to the wife of 'Uthman, the Prophet's
caliph, was worth a third of the taxes from Africa! 'Umar, because of one
horse, took to court a boy who misused his father's position, and his father
(who was one of his leading commanders), because they tried to steal a
horse by force, whereas 'Uthman had made Marwan Hakam, (that is, a person
who the Prophet had exiled), his consultant and had given the district
of Khaybar and the taxes from the north of Africa, part and parcel, to
him!

Abu Dharr was watching these shameful scenes and because he could no
longer bear it, could no longer remain silent, he rebelled, a manly and
wonderful rebellion; an uprising which caused rebellion in all the Islamic
lands against 'Uthman; an uprising from which the waves of enthusiasm can
still be felt until the present day in the situations of human societies.
Abu Dharr was trying to develop the economic and political unity of Islam
and the regime of 'Uthman was reviving aristocracy. Abu Dharr believed
Islam to be the refuge of the helpless, the oppressed and the humiliated
people and 'Uthman, the tool of capitalism, was the bastion to preserve
the interests of the usurers, the wealthy and the aristocrats.

This struggle between Abu Dharr and 'Uthman began, and Abu Dharr, in
the end, lost his life upon this path. Abu Dharr would cry out, "This capital,
wealth, gold and silver which you have hoarded must be equally divided
among all Muslims. Everyone must share in the others' benefits in the economic
and ethical system of Islam, in all blessings of life." But 'Uthman saw
Islam in ceremonies, external show and the pretence of piety and sanctity.
He did not believe that religion should interfere with the poverty of the
majority and the opulence of the minority. Abu Dharr, who had begun the
struggle for the development of Islamic equality, would not be pacified
and would not let the enemy be pacified, either...

Whenever I think about the wonderful life of Abu Dharr and I see his
worship of God, I recall Pascal. Pascal says, "The heart has reasoning
powers which the intellect does not attain. The heart bears witness to
God's existence, not the intellect; faith comes in this way." Abu Dharr
says, "In this unbounded existence, I have found signs by which I have
been guided to God. There is no hope that the intellect will reach His
Essence through discussion and analysis because He is greater than any
of that, and there is no possibility of encompassing Him." Abu Dharr, just
like Pascal, believed in God, knew God through the heart, and he had worshipped
God for three years before he met the Prophet.

When he was speaking of capitalism and the hoarding of wealth and he
was strongly defending the wretched, and when he was turning against the
aristocrats and the palace-dwellers of Damascus and Medina, he resembles
an extreme socialist like Proudhon, but the truth is that Abu Dharr is
one thing and Pascal and Proudhon are different. Abu Dharr knew God; from
that day on, he never stopped upon God's Way; not for a moment did he weaken
in thought or action. Neither does Proudhon have the purity, devotion and
worship of Abu Dharr, nor does Pascal have his activity and enthusiasm.
Abu Dharr had become a complete human being in the School of Islam, and
this commentary alone is sufficient to demonstrate his greatness.

It is possible for the following question to arise for many people who
are studying Islamic history:- What was the glorious result of this movement,
other than a few movements of armies, some military victories and the creation
of a great empire which dispersed after a few centuries? What is the difference
between the Islamic movement and other political and military movements
in history which achieved similar victories and even greater triumphs,
particularly when we see that the Islamic movement, from the very first
phase, was faced with political differences, and was made to deviate from
its main purpose, and that the real leaders of Islam were also aware of
this? Then what did Islam do? What results were attained from all those
sacrifices and struggles of the Prophet and his God-worshipping, brave
followers? If it had military victories, they do not deserve to be considered
important in the way we look at religion, in particular since these victories
were gained through the Bani Umayyid and Bani 'Abbas sultans and people
like them, and did not have a real and direct relationship with the truths
of Islam.

This opinion on this point is at least correct in some degree, and we
must not conceive this expansionism, these military victories and the Islamic
empire's power, to be the goal of Islam, nor believe them to be among the
great results of this movement. If we look at Islam in the way in which
we must look at religion, this problem will not only be solved, but also
we will marvel at the glorious results, progress and victories of Islam.

Religion is the only factor which has a duty towards the universal elevation
of creation, obliging humanity to progress and ascend, and just as there
was some stimulant that transformed the inanimate into a plant and the
plant into an animal and an animal into a human being, so to find completion,
religion is also a reason for the continuation of this amazing story of
creation, and it also carries the human being to the final stage which
he or she must reach, allows the human spirit to fly to the highest summits
of the loftiness of gnosis and humanness, and even elevates one beyond
that desert and puts one above time and place. Thus one can use this commentary
to show that religion is the instigator, stimulant and impetus for the
human being to move up the ladder of transformation. In other words, religion
is a factory in which the real human being is built and we should expect
nothing other than this from religion.

Now we must consider whether or not Islam has been able to attain success
in this direction, and offer examples or models of its product to the market
of humanity. To study this perplexing issue, one must seek out, on the
margins of history, some of the men and women who arose from among the
nameless masses, oppressed slaves and the exhausted people. That is, one
must search out the names of those very people who History has always been
too ashamed to record. History has most often been kneeling before the
splendid palaces of the sultans, in the battlefields and on the threshold
of the gods of gold and of coercion. But this time we see that this very
aristocracy-worshipper History is going to the worn tents, to the destroyed
mud houses of the African slaves, to the nameless, bare-footed people of
the Arabian desert, to unknown and unimportant people like Abu Dharr, a
man from the Ghifar tribe, Salman, a homeless man from Iran, and Bilal,
a cheap slave. History records their lives, one by one, with great greed
and envy. With the highest of honors, it offers them to future generations
of humanity. And it must also be asked why, and as of when, this pharaoh-seeker,
royal court-dweller, History became so humble.

Thus, in order to assess the results which the Islamic movement has
achieved, one must not look at the victories in Asia and Africa and in
the lands in southern Europe. Rather, one must become aware of the progress
that this movement made in the depths of the thoughts, brains, hearts and
souls of a limited group of its followers. The victories which Islam had
in causing the changes and new directions in the souls of these people
appear more splendid, more extensive and more wonderful to those people
who place greater value on truth and humanness than on power and extraterrestrial
military domination. The Islamic victories in the history of places like
Rome and Iran and in the fate of expansionists like Ghengis Khan, Dara,
Napoleon, and others like these 'famous brainless', are not exceptional,
but restructuring an unknown desert-dweller and half-savage like Jundab
ibn Junadah into an Abu Dharr Ghifari is unique in any ideology or movement.
If the result of Islam was no more than educating these four or five human
beings like Abu Dharr, Salman, Ammar Yasir and Bilal, it would suffice
for the intellect to be amazed at the victories of Islam.

But unfortunately the legacies of great men who are considered to be
an honor to the history of Islam have been wasted, because the followers
of that very religion, who were nurtured by the power of the thoughts and
the swords of these people in the world, do not know them, have not understood
the highest levels which these models of humanness attained in the chain
of transformation, and do not know even brief details of their life stories.
With this indifference and apathy to the destruction of the reputations
of these rightful pioneers and images of piety and courage, we have struck
blows against truth and humanity for which it is difficult to compensate,
and all Muslims share in this fault.

More amazing than this is that, in general, people who were considered
to be leaders of the Islamic Revolution continued to support truth and
even sacrifice themselves for it, during the time of the rule of Abu Bakr
and his successor, when Ali, the leader of the Shi'ites, was humiliated
and his rightful claim was disregarded. It can be said with certainty that
because of their struggles with the regime and because of their efforts,
pure Islam was delivered into the hands of History. They helped humanity
attain the source of truths and wisdom, in spite of the desires of the
hypocrites and the ambitious, because of their struggles and brave resistance
to the changes in the Islamic regime.

Abu Dharr is one of these exceptional people, one of those leaders and
liberated saviours longed for by mankind today. From the time when the
system created a severe crisis in the world of economics, making economics
the most sensitive issue of life and the basis of everything, his opinions
have found greater importance and today, once again, they recreate those
scenes in Damascus and Medina. He who gathered the humiliated and the needy
around him, rallying them against usury, money-worshippers, gold gatherers
and aristocrats, has now caused the Muslims of the world to listen to his
heart-warming words and opinions; his fiery rhetoric. It is as if they
see him in distant history with their own eyes; he who gathered the oppressed
and wretched in the mosque, rightfully inciting them against the inhabitants
of the Green Palace and against the regime of 'Uthman, cries out, "And
there are those who hoard up gold and silver and spend it not in the Way
of God... " (9:34).

"O Mu'awiyyah! If you are building this palace with your own money,
it is extravagance, and if with the money of the people, it is treason."
"O 'Uthman! You have made the poor, poor and the wealthy, wealthy."
Mashhad, 1334 AH (1955)
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Revision by: Dr. Bartlett M.D.