The Religion of Nostalgia

[AceOfHearts]

The Religion of Nostalgia

Among people are those who believe themselves to be on the right path. These people lead their lives thinking they are the types of people who have Allah's approval. However, a quick glance reveals that their idea of fulfilling Allah's commands consists of nothing more than conforming to a set of traditions. These traditions include such things as dressing up and taking a certain appearance, sitting down in some manner, or saying certain arabic jargon words to their peers. It usually includes a special effort to keep away from the opposite gender as much as possible. In general, the aim is to create an atmosphere that feels religious and fulfills their nostaligic idea of religion, and not the absolute aim to earn the pleasure of Allah. For this reason, they are also incapable of being forward-thinking and keeping up with positive modern changes.

People who fall into this form of religion loose the capability of looking at all events with an open-mind and ablity to decide on actions, mannerisms, and ways of conduct that is most appropriate to the environment that they are in. Such people by their own acknowledgement, can function properly only in that environment which they create. Their time is almost always spent on reading or exchanging stories about certain incidents and doings of this and that person of the past, and feeling great emotional excitement from reading and hearing these. They think they found religious sincerity. Discussion about Allah's blessings, mercy and signs hardly happen. Religious devotion is simply an emotional devotion and excitement of these human charecters and past events and a desire to emulate their behaviour - to keep up the nostalgia of that time. They are unable to grasp the importance of having inner faith in Allah as stressed in the Qur'an, and thus never engage in discussion that are truly beneficial to the human soul.

[Zainab_M]

This is so, so correct brother. 

Also, I clearly sense that creating such an atmosphere makes them nostalgic not of the true message of Islam, but it's basically reminiscent  of the pre-Islamic days which many of them inadvertently still appreciate.

Humankind is inherently a much greater lover of human laws than the Divine Message.  History has been witness to that.

I've observed, even those Muslims who are well educated academically and updated with modern technology refuse to focus on the Quraan when it comes to Faith, and instead, prefer the fatwas / hadiths, despite all its descrepancies.  In fact, I've also observed that those Muslims who are in the fold of a busy schedule and lifestyle of the modern world are still more closed-minded when it comes to interpreting Faith.  These ones are most distant from the Quraan because they don't consider it necessary to spare any time from their daily schedules to study the Quraan and reflect upon it.  They do not consider that to be necessary because they feel they already have a short-cut, which is, to listen to the khutba of their local imam for a few minutes every Friday.  This is precisely the reason why they've lost their capability of making their own decisions as you so correctly stated.  The sort of questions that both men and women ask of the 'ulemas' is shocking.  I've heard of women asking for guidelines from their local imams on how to wash their clothes at the end of their menstrual cycle.  There are men who seriously ask their imam that while stepping into the masjid, should they first put in their right foot or left.  Ridiculous as it sounds, this mindset is true.  This is the extent to which many people have become incapable of using their own rationale.  It also explains why they experience such great emotional excitement from rhetorical stories narrated by the imams, yet being quite unmoved by the words of the Noble Quraan.  The imams of course enjoy & encourage this mindset of their audience of total dependency upon them.  Briefly, this can be described as a set of shallow ideologies and ignorance  trapped inside a net and proliferating within it.

This is also very similar to the Christian approach to spirituality where they visit the church once a week to listen to the sermon.  Their parish priest is their mentor, never to be disobeyed.  Their present Bible that draws their attention has been completely altered and is man-written.  They have no idea of the contents of their original Divine Bible.  Similarly, the man-written Hadith is at par with the present Bible, drawing the attention of Muslims.  Though the Noble Quraan is present and is totally original, no Muslim bothers to read it.

The only time they read the Quraan for practical application is with the hidden intent of misinterpreting an ayat to support a fatwa or hadith.  E.g. I've come across quite a few Muslim men who try to condone extra-marital sex by using the term of the Quraan "right hand possess."  I've explained so often that this term is applicable only within the historical context of that era when slavery was rampant.  It refers directly to slaves.  And the Noble Quraan is totally against slavery .. to the extent that freeing a slave is looked upon by the Quraan as an atonement for a sinful act.  The aim of the Quraan was to end the culture of slavery gradually without a social revolution which would certainly cause bloodshed, and also, those living the life of slaves for generations would very likely be prone to misusing their sudden, newly found freedom.  Thus, as per the values of the Quraan, it took the Prophet (pbuh) two decades to eradicate the culture of slavery from the Arabian peninsula so that every man and woman could live as free individuals, answerable only to Allah.  And now, since slavery has been abolished, we are not to bring it back.  As slavery doesn't exist any longer, we can only be employers, employees, colleagues or supervisors/bosses of one another .. but not slaves.   Yet, unfortunately, there are any number of Muslim males who intentionally conceal this analysis solely for the purpose of misinterpreting a very simple and clear expression of the Noble Quraan.

The entire scenario involving the present mainstream mentality is like a tunnel without any light at the end of it.  While the Noble Quraan being in midst of us (Alhamdulilah), if we had held on to it with rational and unmotivated minds, we could have risen to such heights.  Instead, we chose a very different path.  Alas!  truly depressing

Thanks for putting up this wonderful piece, my brother.  Walaikum salaam and Allah bless.