MUHAMMAD IQBAL (1877-1938)
was undoubtedly amongst the profoundest thinkers of the
previous century. He was not an ordinary poet, but a man
of Vision. His verse is not a romantic lullaby. Instead
it is a slogan of Valour, incessant action and Self-realization.
His poetry is not for one nationality alone. His message
is far-reaching, and transcends any geography.
He is not a confused
philosopher. However, many a
time, he is seen posing questions, one after the other,
inducing elegant dialogue between his personified
conversants. He commits to such exercises of inquiry, not
only to reach at answers himself, but also to put his
message across. Many of his poems are representative of
this dramatic plot. In short, he was not the kind of
philosopher who would say, “I am a philosopher, for
I have a problem to every solution!”
Iqbal’s
standards are unconventional. He is difficult to
understand – not because of the choice of his words,
but because they carry a characteristic meaning. Iqbal,
therefore, like all worthwhile discourses, needs to be
learnt from someone, and cannot be learnt on its own
– for one needs the Blessing of the Eye – an
inspired teacher, just like the teachers of Iqbal himself.
His poetic terminology is not new, but its meaning is
indeed unique to him. The moth and the candle, the
nightingale and the glow-worm, the Tulip and the Rose
– are all well-retained traditions in Persian and
then Urdu poetry, but they assume an altogether new
appeal in his cavalcade of ideas. Even the roles of
Prophets like Abraham and Moses find unique meanings in
his thought cycles. The parables of Mahmud and Ghaznavi,
Farhad and Shirin, Laila and Majnun are all there, in
full show, but viewed from a totally different angle
– cast in an altogether new die. Mu’min,
Darwesh and Qalandar and Kafir, Barhaman and Zandeeq are
all new symbols. It could be said that he took all the
stock of gold from his predecessors in literary tradition
and then remoulded it to his ambition’s desire. Very
rightly, Omar Khayyam says:
Ah Love, could Thou
and I with Fate conspire?
And grasp this sorry scheme of things entire?
Would not we shatter it to bits and then?
Remould it nearer to the Heart’s Desire?
Iqbal’s works are not an emblem of contradiction,
rather they are an amalgam. Being a devoted lover of the
Prophet (PBUH) and his companions, he derives inspiration
from the fountain-head of the Qur’an. Seeking Qur’anic
instruction from his exemplary teacher Maulvi Mir Hasan
at Sialkot, he was advised by his father, “My
Son! You should always read the Qur’an as if it were
revealed upon you.” He
often reminded himself of this adage in his later life as
well. In my view, this one advice could have had an
enormous impact on his thought-process and his expressive
faculties. Nevertheless, in his quest to intellectually
steer his nation he seeks refuge and guidance, from the
Prophet (PBUH). Like a submitting Muslim, he supplicates
to the Prophet (PBUH) and shares his complaints with his
Ultimate Master. Sometimes, he goes a step ahead and
establishes a direct communion with God. Sometimes, he
assumes the role of a stray observer, eavesdropping
dialogues between Sa’di and Hali, Lenin with God and
sometimes Satan with God. So much so, at times, he goes
to the blasphemous extent of praising Satan.
All these seemingly paradoxical ideas fit in well, with
his consistent themes that I shall outline below. They
are pieces of the jigsaw puzzle that may seem very
inchoate at first glance, but once pulled together, form
a glorious portrait of Vision and Warmth both together.
The savant Iqbal addresses the quintessential questions
of Life and death. He
preserves the sanctity of Life and death appears as a
meager mirage in the Grand Scheme of this world – a
temporary interlude in the journey. His life is a life
beyond calculative measures of the yester and the morrow.
The ideal life always moves, never comes to a stop. It
subsumes worldly pleasures and is not surmounted by them.
It begets, but is not begotten. For example, at many
instances he assures that the difference between a Mu’min
and a Kafir would be one of Ishq, one of Khudi, one of
being a subjugate to the Commands of Allah and the other
being a victim of the Writ of Fate. Building upon Qur’anic
concepts, he talks about the actions of the capable man,
becoming consummate with the desires of God.
Ishq is
the main ingredient of Life and is also its driving force
– the prime mover behind all universal occurences.
This Iqbalic Love would make man into a creator of and
victor over his own ideals, setting him into never-ending
motion. Outreaching from one conquest to another, he is
never subject to surcease. History is fraught with
examples of Ishq making a difference between the right
and the wrong. This Ishq, is distinct from Ilm or Aql.
There are many junctures in one’s Life, when one
reaches a divergence of passages. Reason alone cannot be
the sole guide in such cases. Reason will always give one
a sense of fear and deprivation; it safeguards interests
in life, but Ishq creates life, procreates life and makes
it grow beyond bounds and shine beyond glitters. A life
of pure reason would drear death, a life of Ishq will
welcome it.
Iqbal is a believer
in the anthropic principle. His bold dialogues
with God represent his belief that Ishq could make man
work miracles. But to the basic question as to how one
could acquire this quality of zest, Iqbal provides a
solution too. It is the concept he introduced of Khudi, of
Self-Realization: seeking purpose in one’s life;
awakening to the idea that this world is for you; grasp
upon the personal gifts bestowed upon you by God and in
return “seize the day”.
Khudi in turn leads to the qualities of Faqr
– pride that
never crosses the borders of conceit. Faqr represents
Dignity and mutual respect, a state of being straight
forth in the face of the vain pursuits of this little
world. It is this attribute, that makes a man who is but
the king of his heart’s world, to turn away from
princely grandeur. Moreover, Iqbal says that a man could
only be dignified, if he is a free man. Freedom from all
masters but one, is essential. The false hopes, fragile
aspirations and misplaced desires that dwell in a slave’s
heart, could never grant him the virtues of Khudi and
hence most of his value in life would simply be lost.
Worshipping deities other than the Lord, either
inhabiting within one’s heart or without, should
shatter away any hope of progress. To the Muslims of the
day, these figurines are the idols of sect, territory,
rites and vain customs and above all false nationhoods.
A man of Faqr would never sell away his fortune in search
of temporary goals. He is firm and strong in action. He
can never be bent in the face of peril. He does not droop
low to seek sustenance. Such a man is likened to a
Shaheen, an Eagle, whose niche is the echelons of honour
and not the abysses of ignominy, like the habitat of a
vulture. A nation, whose youth are armed with the double-edged
sword of Khudi, would no longer need any weapons of mass
destruction – it would be crowned with majesty.
Muhammad Iqbal pinned his hopes in the youth.
Youth and Hope were again some of the themes resonating
throughout his work. Hope, as Iqbal believed was a
natural outcome of Faqr and Yaqeen. The youth were Iqbal’s
foremost addressees. Inculcating his Vision into the
individuals of the day, as professed in the verse I have
selected to be the masthead of this essay, was his prime
desire.
Iqbal, being wary of the vices of modern
western education, conflicted with an
education that was void of Ishq or a recognition of Self.
Wetern education, especially, remained a main target of
his criticism.
The west never became the ideal world for Iqbal. His
Inner Eye could go beyond the veils and penetrate into
the flaws of the modern society. He attacked western
imperialism, their portrayals of democracy, their
concepts of colour and race, and their emptiness of
warmth or Soz, as Iqbal coins it. He had a sip of wine
from the cups of disparate civilizations – both the
east, being shuddered into the wormholes of ignorance and
bigotry, as well as the west, with all its signs of
teeming progress. To him, the west was all glitter, with
false standards, and soul-less ideals. Their lives were
mere lives of humanoids, mechanically adjusting to daily
needs. Iqbal’s whole philosophy, on the other hand,
had grown out of Purpose. Without Purpose, it would have
taken to the ground in no time. Could the west contribute
any purpose to life or any direction, at the least? The
poet speaks of their scientific marvels –
Copernicianism, Newtonianism, and Einsteinism, one after
the other, and then raises the question if
the self-same scientifically abler man, traversing the
zodiac of galaxies, could ever resolve the complex
trajectories of the ideas drifting in his own personal
cosmos. Whilst capturing beams of sunlight, could he ever
illuminate the dark alleys of his terrestrial barren life?
Without being a rejectionist, Iqbal also looked beyond
mere romanticism with the past glory of Muslims. His
vision flew him over and above the cities of Kufa and
Baghdad, always waiting for new camps to be drawn, new
roads to be taken and new thoughts to be aspired. He
fascinates with the past to an overwhelming extent, but
he does not blindly reject all that comes from the west
or exhort all that is eastern.
He vehemently rejects asceticism. He arouses a constant
clash between the madrassah and the khanqah – the
abodes of the mullah and the sufi respectively. He does
not respect the philosopher or the narrow mullah –
one, he says, summons the death of the heart, and the
other blindfolds the eye that looks boldly into the world.
He only craves the Vastness of his heart and fails to
find this opportunity in contemporary Modern Education or
Sufism or even the Faqih, or further still, the
ritualistic leader of our uninspired prayers.
How would they all
know, after all, the means to guide a nation?
Iqbal lived before his age. His envisioned state was born
after he lived long enough to witness it. Still we owe a
heavy debt upon our shoulders, to this man, who takes us,
at the one hand for a ramble betwixt the stars, and at
the other, pierces within the hearts of our hearts.
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