| Men In Black Dresses: Ancient
Faith & Modern Mercy A conversation with Islam's most respected visionary by Yvonne Seng The following is an excerpt from Men In Black Dresses: A Quest for the Future Among Wisdom Makers of the Middle East (Simon & Schuster/Paraview Pocket Books, 2003). Six-thirty in the morning is an ungodly hour for a conversation, let alone a conversation with the planet's foremost Muslim cleric about the state of the human soul. As the taxi drags my carcass across the Nile, the cheerful taxi driver attempts small talk about American music and plugs in a cassette of Arab hip-hop to make me feel at home. I'm trying bloody hard to be a morning person. I pull the Prussian pink scarf from my camera bag and adjust it in the rearview mirror. The driver does a double take at my covered head, my Disappearing-Blonde Trick. He glows with pride as we approach our destination. "You are Muslim?" he says, uncertain. "I am Christian," I reply. These words form awkwardly on my tongue. "Aaaah," he says and adjusts the mirror again. After a pause, "We are all God's children." "Thank you," I say. "But you are visiting our mosque," he says, indicating Al-Azhar. "No," I reply, nodding towards the building opposite. "I am meeting with your Sheikh." His face changes from confusion, to disbelief, and back to confusion. This is not a joking matter. Egyptians hold the Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar in high regard. When the cabbie sees I'm serious, he bows slightly. I bow in return. I also find it difficult to believe. The security guard at the street entrance to the Office of the Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar checks me through with a smile of encouragement. Or is it congratulations? The Grand Sheikh rarely gives private interviews. Al-Azhar is our planet's oldest living university. Today, I join the Grand Sheikh of Islam, Sheikh Mohammed Tantawi, scholar, mystic and spiritual leader of the planet's billion Sunni Muslims. His decisions and pronouncements guide the lives of the planet's fastest growing religion. I shake myself: How did I get here? A uniformed guard escorts me through elaborate security into the Sheikh's library. Sheikh Tantawi looks up from his seat, trying to place me. One of his dark-robed assistants taps his wristwatch to indicate that there are more important things to attend to than this foreign chick with lots of questions. The Sheikh signals over his conversation for me to sit. Beside me is the Sheikh's affable and articulate translator, Abdel-Khalik -- he's nervous -- and between us is our digital scribe, the tape recorder. I'm now also nervous. "Let's begin," the Sheikh says and cuts into my set-up. I'm fumbling with loose wires. Damn, I want to swear. But damn if I'm giving up now. "Your Holiness, may I ask you your honest opinion of technology?" I ask, leaving out the expletives. The Grand Sheikh, smiles. "From your perspective," I continue after a nod from the Sheikh, which doubles as both encouragement and a call for order, "what is our relationship with technology -- its effect on our lives?" He pauses before answering, as after each question I will ask, and considers his words. This is a man of history. His words bear weight. "Islam is on the side of progress and development," he says. "We welcome all machines invented in this age if they are for the progress and service of humanity. We should make it clear, however, that technology is to be used for the sake of humanity, not against it." Technology is a subject surprisingly dear to his heart. Literally. He recently announced that his heart, as well as other organs, be donated upon accidental death. Just before my visit, the Grand Sheikh took on other religious scholars in a very public debate on television and the newspapers. At issue were cloning, organ transplants and technology transfer; subjects that have met with caution from America's religious and science communities. According to their argument, there is no difference in diddling with a palm tree, sheep or human. They are all God's creation, with the special footnote that man is created in the image of God. Some Muslims believe that God has written the Fate of each person on his or her forehead. For example, it may be someone's Fate that God gives her a particular disease. Because the genetic diseases of one person can be passed to another through donated organs, the argument goes, man is changing destiny by inserting one person's organs into another. Physical determinism. For Tantawi, the "Fate" argument reeks of superstition, which preys upon ignorance. Thus came Tantawi's stunning move: the holy man donated his heart. I turn to another of the Sheikh's concerns: the intricate balance of the planet's resources and population, which continues to warp under stress. "In the Qur'an," I say to the Grand Sheikh, "Adam is referred to in Arabic as the khalfa -- the caretaker, or God's vice-regent, of the planet." "Khalfa," he repeats and nods. "Yes, we are caretakers." "How are we doing then as caretakers of our planet?" I ask. "How are we faring in our relationship with the environment and each other?" "Almighty God has created us from the earth of this planet," the Sheikh begins. "And we shall return to it after death. Therefore we should do every good thing possible for the sake of the earth and to benefit future generations." We are all settling into our chairs and into the heart of the discussion. The assistants are now engaged. I exhale. "Our investment in the planet is not purely physical," the Sheikh continues, "It is also spiritual." He quotes a verse in the Qur'an -- "From the earth We have created you and We shall receive you back again in the Last Day" -- and pauses to see if I understand what he is saying. The Qur'an can be understood on many different levels, and an understanding suggests itself to me, then floats away. Spiritual men and women also speak in revealed meanings, what the Sufi mystic Inayet Khan refers to as "the meaning of that which exists behind that which is revealed." The Sheikh says that this earth we are polluting and destroying comprises the spiritual and physical raw ingredients for the creation of future generations. To build stronger generations, we must therefore strengthen and replenish the earth. Quite simply, by our abuse or misuse of the planet, we poison the spiritual and physical life-stock, the basic building material, from which our children and future generations are formed. And since we return to the earth upon death, our lives, our selves, enrich or weaken that stock. This is not an ashes-to-ashes, dust-to-dust homily. He is saying that our responsibility does not end with death. When it comes down to it, we are spiritual compost. If we return to the earth as corrupted beings, we corrupt the future. However, if we fill the earth with goodness, both through treatment of it and betterment of our selves, we contribute to a better future. "On a practical level...." I begin to ask. The Sheikh holds his hand in a simple gesture, fingertips together, palm cupped towards heaven as if catching rain drops, that says have patience. He's already going in that direction. Tantawi moves easily between the spiritual and the pragmatic. He may speak softly of spiritual legacy, but his immediate advice is down-to-earth. Saving lives is as important as saving souls. Clean water is as important as the spirit. "Yes, we should plant beneficial plants and trees," he says as he begins a list in which he refers to the Universal-We of the much hyped Global Village. "We should see there is water in the wells by preserving the rivers. We should try to preserve every good thing for the sake of the future generations and for the people living now. We should construct houses for the poor and build factories to give a hand in the progress and prosperity of humanity." These are equally global and local responsibilities. The Sheikh encourages international collaboration, the exchange of commerce and ideas that benefit and advance humanity. I begin to wonder what Egypt has to exchange when it becomes clear that the Sheikh does not condone charity as a lifestyle. Sheikh Tantawi is adamant about personal responsibility. Along with charity, which as one of the Five Pillars is part of the moral core of the religion, Islam also believes in the Day of Judgment when God will ascertain the actions and works of each person. Humanity must therefore do the best possible, collectively and individually. Each man must be productive by his own hands and mind, not sit and wait for the rain to make his fields grow for him. The rest is in the hands of God. He clearly gives short shrift to laziness or self-indulgence and refers to a verse in the Qur'an: "God Almighty has created the earth for you and it is in your hands to do whatever you will. You should do whatever you can to have prosperity and good things for yourself." The mind-set of Inshallah -- God Willing -- a common Arabic expression often used to circumvent responsibility or commitment, is not acceptable to this leader of Islam. Fatalism, like favoritism, just doesn't cut it. "Where does religion fit into our lives today?" I ask him. "The role of the religion is to correct what people have spoiled in this world," he replies, "and to advise them, to lead them, towards what will make them live in safety and peace." He returns to our theme of Earth as a garden. The Paradise given by God to be enriched by man has become a jungle, overgrown from neglect and man's injustice to man. "We cannot deny," he says, "that all nations in this age, at the end of this century, are living in a type of a jungle. The strong try to eat the weak who live with them. In this jungle there is no mercy and no justice." In addition to knowledge, responsibility, commitment and hard work, the Sheikh also believes in the moral imperative of the strong to practice justice and protect the weak. Planting trees and providing clean water is not enough. "In building a global community," I ask him, "are there lessons we can learn from history?" According to Tantawi, oppression is one of the negative lessons of history. "To build a good nation, a good society," he says, "one must spread good morals and justice and mercy in all aspects of society. You should respect the freedom of others and do your best to spread the prospect of peace and safety to all who live with you. This is what history has told us in all the past ages and will continue to say for the future." "From your perspective," I ask, referring back to our earlier discussion of spiritual compost, "the planet both benefits and suffers from the generations that go before. How, then, would you describe the present state of the human spirit?" "Spiritual life in today's world -- East or West, North or South -- has become distracted," he says, and the translator searches for another word. "Illegitimate." How can the spiritual life be bound or legitimated through laws, I wonder, but as he continues I begin to understand that he is talking about a core characteristic of humanity: the state of virtue -- or the belief in it. The Grand Sheikh characterizes virtue as "mercy, kindness, the sincere love and respect for one another." He calls for a return to virtue, but believes that this will only come with a return to the spiritual side of life. One of the keys, he says, is that we must rid ourselves of selfishness. "In this way," he says, "we will prevent man from being reduced to an animal." The images he is offering are sobering. The garden as an overgrown jungle. Man, God's vice-regent, reduced to an animal. "If the world remains as it is today," he continues, "it will weaken in the next century. But if we increase the number of reasonable people -- people who think and are educated, people who are involved in their culture, good moral people -- virtue will increase." Then, he says, the world will be characterized by peace and fulfillment. The Sheikh also argues for quality, not quantity. He argues for balance and tolerance. "We can learn from each other," the Sheikh says, quietly, "from our differences, as well as what we have in common." We have gone way over schedule, but neither the Sheikh nor I move. He signals one last time to his assistants to be patient. I smile at the use of this simple Egyptian hand signal for patience by one of the most important men in the region. Cairo has to be the only place in the world that has a hand sign urging patience and they use it as often as New Yorkers give the finger in insult. This may be the secret of their long existence. That Egyptians are conservative and moderate is a recurrent theme told by many different people during my stay. Extremes and conflict are alien to their nature, I am told. It is not anarchy, but an elaborate process of negotiation and compromise. I try not to test the Sheikh's patience with one last question, but he motions me to go ahead. "As teacher and spiritual leader," I ask, "what advice would you give to children? And to the next generations?" He knows I am a cultural historian, and I am suspicious at first that he has pulled out a stock answer tailored to my interests. "I say to the following generations," he begins, "that you have to be careful to understand those the lessons history gave to us." These he has already spoken about, especially oppression. Then he continues to lay out practicalities, which reinforce the restraints of society and the role of religion within it. "You should respect religious realities and virtues," he says, "and keep those morals and virtues." But then he leaves the official path and begins to add his personal advice. He is speaking not only to children of Egypt, or to Muslims throughout the world. He speaks almost wistfully to all children, perhaps the Universal Child, and from experience. His voice is soft. "I advise children to keep sight of those who set a good example and benefit humanity; to always seek to build good relations between individuals and others. I urge the young not to destroy or spoil the earth nor to commit any act that could harm humanity. Look after other people, so that they may live in safety. Do not discriminate among them." He pauses for a moment and looks down at his hands. We, too, look down at his hands. "If you do these things," he says, "I assure you that you will live in goodness. You will live in prosperity, and peace. And you will live a better future than previous generations." We sit in thick silence, digesting his advice. The Grand Sheikh of Islam stands and shakes my hand. With that, he shakes us out of the warm state into which he has led us. The vision of a perfect world. He breaks his circle and begins to walk away, accompanied by his head assistant who is going over the day's schedule. My eyes follow, unwilling to let him go. The Sheikh stops, mid-step, places his hand on his assistant's arm and turns back towards me. His face is now stern and he looks me straight in the eye. I am uncomfortable and swallow hard. "The message which I send to all people in the world," he says, "is the saying of Almighty God in the Holy Qur'an: You should do your best to work together for the sake of piety and for the sake of good, and for the sake of peace. Not for the sake of aggression and oppression." A small, tired man turns and leaves for another endless day of meetings. Yvonne Seng, Ph.D., is a cultural historian who specializes in the Middle East and Turkey. Based in Washington, D.C., she has taught courses on conflict resolution at American University's Center for Global Peace, and on religion, history and Islamic culture at Georgetown University, Princeton University and Wesley Theological Seminary. For more information on Men in Black Dresses, go to www.reachthenextlevel.com/seng Copyright © 2004 Yvonne Seng, Ph.D. |
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JUNE 2004 |
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