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| Dear brother
Assalaamu Alaykum In my conversation with a senior politician in the country recently, I got the impression that the majority of the non-Muslims in the country is still very apprehensive about Islam and the Islamic State. We have to blame ourselves for this failure on our part to explain Islam to the non- Muslims and also to the Muslims. We are in fact living in an exclusive world of our own and are very naive to think that with few articles, the Muslims as well the non-Muslims will see the beautiful side of Islam and will drop their Islam-phobia overnight. Nobody has any quarrel with Islam as a religion as long as it is kept personal. But for Islam to play any part in politics, economics and society in general is anathema. Even if the Malaysian constitution provides that the religion of the state is Islam, the constitution makers, they argue, did not mean to make Malaysia an Islamic State. But didn't the constitution makers intend to retain the Islamic character of this country, that is a ‘Muslim’ State? As an individual, a Muslim is expected to behave like a Muslim -- that is he believes in One God and believes that he is answerable to God and he is guided by a moral consciousness -- isn't it logical to expect a Muslim state to behave and project itself as Muslim. If the constitution provides that the head of the government must be a Muslim, does it mean that non-Muslims will accept only a person who is Muslim by name only, whose first loyalty should be to big business and not to Islam. A state without an ideology is nothing more than a business enterprise which exists for profits. Probably this is true of UMNO's idea of a state, for the prime minister is now known as CEO or Chief Executive Officer. The western media has succeeded in brainwashing the people that religion should not mix with politics and they consider everyone should take this as an inviolable axiom. Those who question this premise are considered fanatics or fundamentalists. Politics is big business and politicians have to behave like businessmen. Idealism is dead. The secular politician has no convictions of his own. He, like the businessman, sells what is in demand by the people and feeds on the prejudices and ignorance of the people. In other words, his political philosophy is like that of a clever businessman ‘selling what is in demand’. Even if he is convinced that Islam is greatly misunderstood by the people, he can't afford to correct the image the media has created about Islam, for that will be interpreted as a sell out to PAS. The truth is that secularism is no less than another religion, indeed it is held as fanatically as any other traditional religion. While PAS derives its ideas from a revealed paradigm, the secular parties claim to believe in universal values. This they call by the alluring name of Humanism. While an Islamic party is subject to an objective controlling mechanism, Humanism, or the universal values they claim to believe in, is a free-for-all jungle. Universal values in the absence of a belief in God and man's accountability to God are subject to their own changing whims, desires, emotions, cultures, interests, policies, strategies and theories. An Islamic politician has to be constrained by moral consideration and his faith in God's justice, while a secular one is both amoral and largely immoral. The main task of PAS, as the party which takes Islam as its ideology, is to demolish this myth that Islam is a bundle of rituals. PAS should be able to project Islam as a movement for reform; for the reform of the World Order which is hiding its ugly face behind all kinds of alluring names such as Humanism, universal values, etc., in opposition to Religion with a capital R. The man who has no religion is considered a man of tolerance. This perverted logic is the root of all evils we now experience. People to people dialogue at all levels is the only solution. As the businessmen politicians do not have the moral courage or will to tell the people the truth lest they lose elections, PAS should not waste its time on these leaders who feed on the ignorance of the people. In the final analysis, PAS is a party of Islamic Da`wah. PAS as an Islamic movement is an open movement and it has no hidden agenda. Special meetings and dialogue sessions should be organized not only to clarify some of the misconceptions about Islam, but also to know others and to learn from others. PAS Da'wah Unit should multiply books, booklets, pamphlets etc. on Islam in all languages and should be able to organize sale and distribution of these books at all gatherings, whether PAS takes part or not in such gatherings. It should also make full use of the IT and internet. Insha# Alla#h, the day will come when the truth will triumph; then the idols of UMNO will be demolished, just as the Prophet (sws) destroyed the 365 idols in the Ka'bah reciting: ‘Truth has now arrived, and Falsehood perished: For Falsehood is bound to perish’. (17:81). Regards Muhammad Assaif |