May 9, 2008
Author Nails Mirage of the Ages
as Root Cause of Religious Strife
as Root Cause of Religious Strife
By Rashid Mughal
The Weekly Voice, Toronto
The Weekly Voice, Toronto
At this moment in history it appears that the one God of Judaism, Christianity and Islam has begun once again to insist on a central role in public life around the planet. Thanks to all the doctrinal variations of monotheism, relationships between politics and religions are precariously and dangerously entangled, with Muslims taking much of the zealous heat of the free world.
In his no-nonsense opus Chasing A Mirage, Tarek Fatah blows the lid right off the many obvious inconsistencies of fundamentalist thinking and Islamist worldview. A self-conscious man of many parts - journalist, political activist, TV host and, finally, author - Toronto-based Fatah challenges the notion that the establishment of an Islamic State is a prerequisite to entering the state of Islam.
The very idea of an Islamic State, he writes, is an illusion that Muslims have been chasing for well over a thousand years.
Does it matter, really, that Muslimdom, caught up as it is in a tragic illusion, is forever chasing a mirage?
Of course it does, and Fatah paints a broad canvas replete with some telling observations about the Muslim diaspora around the globe vis-a-vis the Arab mindset and the Wahhabi agenda. He falls back time and again on the history of Islam in an effort to demonstrate a remarkably backward genetic tendency among Muslim nations in dealing with international relations, matters of spirituality, the hurtling advance of technology, and the relentless onslaught of modernization.
If faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen, then who can blame the ignorant men and women who are blinded - each in his or her own way - by the fabulous brass ring shining in the heavens since the dawn of history?
Because the title is rather loaded, some fundamentally close-minded readers of Mirage may not get to see the wood for the trees. They may clam up, because to them 'mirage' is a negative term and 'tragic illusion' even more so. They may see the book as a secular Muslim's highly selective truth masquerading as objective reality.
Fatah, a believing Muslim, however, knows his subject well. He's peppered his book with authoritative tidbits of contemporary political history along with snippets of religious tradition that support his key points concerning the elusive mirage of bliss that he calls the Islamic State.
Fatah, a believing Muslim, however, knows his subject well. He's peppered his book with authoritative tidbits of contemporary political history along with snippets of religious tradition that support his key points concerning the elusive mirage of bliss that he calls the Islamic State.
There are countless Muslims in the West who are citizens of the world without any attachment to their natal umbilical code (excuse the pun!) or their native countries, people who are truly progressive (or, for want of a better word, secular) in their outlook regarding the follies both of the East and the West.
These people, and Fatah is certainly one of them, wish to lead quiet lives which have been so unreasonably rattled since 9/11. If one were to follow Fatah's logic, it appears he loves what the West has done to clean up the five-pillared House of Islam and to help hapless nations like Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, et al, to come to grips with the realities of living, loving and laughing in the 21st century.
Fatah is clearly at odds with those literalist diehards and Islamists in our midst who harbour in their souls so much neurotic anger and resentment against the West that they resort to suicide bombings at the drop of a hat. That's the tragic reality, this resorting to mindless violence instead of striving for peace by fulfilling the covenant of Islam: to live and let live.
Ironically, Fatah's mirage is possibly the safe haven offered by the West to Muslims following the political ruin of their native lands whether through white mischief or through the captious designs and ambitions of Western imperialism and the military industrial complex - and as if the ignorance of Muslim countries had nothing to do with such exploitation and ruination by George Bush and company in the first place.
It is imperative that readers of Mirage understand the universal human quest for what has been lost - the idea of literal belief in the claims of religion by Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad, because all these three major prophets of Islam derive their inspiration from a common fountain of theology.
Fatah nails racism as one of the core problems in Islamic ideology. He has witnessed Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi Muslims live like slaves in some Arab countries.
Also, he lashes out at the assumed superiority of the Quraysh Meccan Arabs over other Arabs, and that of Arab Muslims over Persian, Indian and African Muslims. It is no wonder, he writes, that Ibn Khaldun refers to Africans as "dumb animals."
Fatah has never been afraid to be controversial despite several death threats. A daring man like Fatah doesn't need anyone's approval in order to question the core and substance of his own religious beliefs. He knows well that the unexamined life is not worth living, and Mirage, believe it or not, deserves unequivocal praise.
Also, he lashes out at the assumed superiority of the Quraysh Meccan Arabs over other Arabs, and that of Arab Muslims over Persian, Indian and African Muslims. It is no wonder, he writes, that Ibn Khaldun refers to Africans as "dumb animals."
Fatah has never been afraid to be controversial despite several death threats. A daring man like Fatah doesn't need anyone's approval in order to question the core and substance of his own religious beliefs. He knows well that the unexamined life is not worth living, and Mirage, believe it or not, deserves unequivocal praise.
No one with the slightest advantage of literacy who receives his message with an open mind will ever stop to think of shooting the messenger. Of course there may be some hate mail, but there will be lots of hurrahs.
This book has guts and juice, two things that many Muslim and non-Muslim readers alike will prize for a long time to come.
This book has guts and juice, two things that many Muslim and non-Muslim readers alike will prize for a long time to come.
Chasing A Mirage:
The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State
by Tarek Fatah
John Wiley & Sons, Toronto, 2008
410pp; $31.95
Rashid Mughal is a freelance journalist, editor and writer with a special interest in esoteric philosophy, comparative religion and New Age spirituality. He is presently working on his book, The Moving Finger. Email rashid@mughal.com.
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