By: Sayyid Sa'eed Akhtar Rizvi
“Chaos has appeared on land and sea because of what the hands of men have earned; that God may give them a taste of some of their deeds: in order that they may turn back (from evil): (Qur’an: Chapter 30, verse 41).
Chaos in social system, chaos in political life, chaos in law and order, chaos in the moral and ethical values – in short, there is chaos everywhere; and God says that it has appeared as a result of man’s own misbehavior.
This world of ours is full of contradictions. Our actions contradict our words; our aims are believed by our ways and means; our language says we are Muslims, our deed shows us to be pagan. We spend countless months and years in disarmament conferences; and spend countless millions and billions on armament race. We invent more effective medicines to prolong the life of man; and then invent more effective bombs to end his life immediately. We could not make this earth place worth living in, but we want to reach to moon to make it inhabitable. We send good-will missions to other countries, for the purpose of spying on hem.
We declare that liquor is the cause of a large proportion of the motor accidents, yet we have done nothing to confiscate the licenses of the drinking people. We say that drunkenness is the-enemy of nation, it is a cause of the wastage of so much money and so much man -power, that it ruins the health and family life of so many people; therefore, we appeal to them to refrain from this bad habit; then we allow beverage companies to function in our land and propagate the so-called ‘virtues” of their wine among the ignorant people.
Our hypocrisy has brought chaos on this earth; we have been left by God to taste the fruit of some of our deeds. This chaos is not going to be removed unless we change our behavior, unless we abide fully with the code of conduct sent by God for us through his Prophet.
Decaying Society
“(The hypocrites) enjoin evil and forbid what is good;… They have forgotten God; so God is punishing them of This forgetfulness”. (Qur’an, 9:67).
Today, at the risk of being branded as ‘out-of-date’, I want to comment upon this materially developed and spiritually decayed civilization of our time. A civilization in course of time reaches its highest peak; and then its glory turns into vain glory; it becomes drunk of its power and achievements. And then it goes down the path of decay; and, finally, to death.
The modern civilization which is continuously ‘enjoining evil’ has, according to my thinking, long served its usefulness and now it is heading towards self-destruction – with rocket-speed.
Today the scientists are steadily pushing mankind towards its extinction. Their energies are enslaved by their bosses to invent more and more lethal weapons. They are trying to preserve wild-life – and kill human-beings.
And there is tendency on the part of the ignorant minds to accept every trash as a God-sent revelation – provided it comes from a man who has a string of letters after his name.
Result? Every kind of vice has been glorified and accepted into that society. Adultery is preached to be a healthy thing for a marriage; persons of same sex enter into ‘matrimony’ with an encouraging nod from the ‘priest’; pre-marital sexual relation have been accepted as the norm of the day; gambling is practiced in places of worship: people are led to believed that drinking liquor is a pre-requisite of ‘being civilized’. And religion has ceased to lead the people; it is being led by the masses. All these symptoms point to the advanced stage of deterioration of our civilization.
Modesty is a virtue for men and women
“Islam is naked; modesty is its garment”. (Holy Prophet S.A.)
Modesty is a virtue for men and women both, though it is more commendable in women. But in our days, thanks to the modern civilization, man appears to be more modest than the woman.
This industrial age has turned woman into a piece of merchandise. No advertisement is eye-catching unless it has a woman’s body in it exposed to me various degrees of nudity. Films and television are a flop unless they have sex-appeal, and plenty of it. Magazine and books flourish on the lustful desire of man, by providing a lot of erotic material in written words and painted photos. Hotels and restaurants, gone-by days, used to boast of their excellent food and superb service. Now they arrange dances and strip-tease performances to satisfy the customers. Commercial firms expressly say that their receptionists must have a “presentable appearance”. Even in political life a modest wife is considered a liability!
Woman has been selling her body since time immemorial. But never before was shamelessness given the glittering table of “art”. Never before was immodesty the accepted norm of life. It is in this age that woman has lost her sense of self -respect. There was a time when she was a coveted prize, to be pursued by man. Now she has put herself in show window. No more is she a hidden treasure to be discovered by her rightful husband. She is now a piece of beauty to be seen, selected and admired at every shop.
And this hoax has been given a blinding name: “Freedom of woman”. But, as I see, it is man, not woman, who has made himself free to exploit the woman in every conceivable manner. Now in the name of freedom, she has been persuaded to discard all “Superfluous cloth” and appear in public in bikini only, thus providing the man a chance to feast his eyes.
In the last century, when the Westerners penetrated in the heart of Africa they found some tribes who were roaming naked. Those pioneers of “civilization” forced the tribes to wear clothes. Now those advocates of “civilization” are themselves discarding the clothes. One often wonders if the “primitive tribes” of last century were not more civilized than the rest of the world. After all, it is rest of the world which is now imitating the ways of that “so-called primitive society”.
