Introduction | 5 | Mawlana Mawdudi and Political Islam

ABSTRACT

Sayyid Abul A’la Mawdudi (1903-79) needs no introduction for anyone from South Asia. In fact, in the Muslim intellectual world as a whole, his name is frequently mentioned in debates, conferences and Internet listservs on topics such as Islamic revivalism, democracy, sharia, gender, non-Muslims and jihad. What is often surprising is that, despite his notoriety, he is often misquoted and misunderstood, with views and quotes wrongly or misleadingly attributed to him. The result is that Mawdudi is sometimes presented as one of two extremes: either as more ‘liberal’ than he actually was, or more traditionalist than, at least, he intended or wished to be. The life and character of Mawdudi is a complex one, tied up as it is with the immense political upheavals that surrounded him at that time, together with the accompanying concerns and debates over Islamic identity, if not the very survival of Islam in the region. To this extent, Mawdudi’s life and thought can be seen as something of a template that has been repeated across the Islamic world to the present day, hence his name continues to echo loudly. Mawdudi was many things to many people and, as someone who seems

to have rarely taken a moment out to simply reﬂect and relax, he would approach the world with a kind of vigour and intensity (not always wisely directed, it has to be admitted) that puts most of us to shame. Born in Aurangabad in India, he was a journalist, an Islamic scholar, a Muslim revivalist and a political philosopher. Along with the poet and activist Muhammad Iqbal and the statesman Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Mawdudi is considered at the forefront of the establishment of Pakistan. He is probably most renowned as the founder of Jamaat-e-Islami (the ‘Islamic Party’) which continues to be active in Pakistan to this day, as well as its sister organizations in India, Bangladesh, Kashmir and Sri Lanka. Founded in 1941, it is much more than simply a religious or political party; rather it is an Islamic movement, a complete way of life, with an ultimate vision of an Islamic statement founded upon the principles elicited by Mawdudi in his writings and speeches. In its methods, ideology and organization, the Jamaat has proven to be an inspiration and model for many other Islamic groups across the world. The appeal of Mawdudi resides not only in the Islamic world, however,

for here is a man who – though perhaps he was reluctant to admit it – was

inﬂuenced by non-Muslim, western thought (as much as he was Islamic thinkers) including Plato, Hegel, Bergson and Marx. This resulted in an interest that is prevalent in much of his writings: placing modern western thought within an Islamic world-view. The importance of Mawdudi’s thoughts here, particularly his concept of ‘theo-democracy’, are crucial in understanding such modern ‘clash of civilizations’ debates. Mawdudi’s personality in many ways represents this identity struggle between the values of the west and those of Islam and, ultimately, whether such values are as diverse as people might suppose. Because of the continued importance of Mawdudi, it is extremely diﬃcult

to outline his inﬂuence without being painfully aware of what is being left out. Certainly, the Egyptian ‘salaﬁs’ (revivalists) Hassan al-Banna (founder of the Muslim Brotherhood) and Sayyid Qutb read and were inﬂuenced by him. Qutb, the intellectual driving force behind the Muslim Brotherhood and arguably the most signiﬁcant inﬂuence on the more militant Islamic groups that have sprouted, was inspired by Mawdudi’s writings on the need for an Islamic ‘vanguard’. The Palestinian scholar Abdullah Yusuf Azzam was also inﬂuenced by Mawdudi and, in turn, Azzam taught a young student named Osama bin Laden. Mawdudi’s inﬂuence can also be found within Shi’a Islam, notably Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini who translated some of his works into Farsi and found the concept of theo-democracy (which, in practical terms, is really a theocracy), ﬁtting for Shi’a political thought. This book intends to present Mawdudi ‘warts and all’ and to redress the

seeming imbalance in terms of literature that seeks to glorify rather than, as much as any book is able to do, objectify. It is not only a biography, however, but it is also an attempt to place Mawdudi within the wider context of political philosophy. No knowledge or understanding of Islam is assumed; rather, the aim is to address an audience – Muslim or not – who are simply interested in such questions as, for example, is it possible to live in a state that requires obedience to God and yet still possess free will? In a state governed by morally impeccable individuals, what scope is there for autonomy? In an ideological state, what is the status of those who do not subscribe to that ideology? What issues are raised in the debate between modernity and religion? These were all of some concern to Mawdudi, but they also continue to have a resonance for our world today. It is, therefore, divided into two parts: the ﬁrst part is chronological, focusing primarily on Mawdudi’s life and times, while the second part considers his views within the wider context of political philosophy. Chapter 1 covers the period of his birth in 1903, until the start of the

Khalifat movement in 1919. What were the inﬂuences on Mawdudi’s early life? Mawdudi’s grandfather was a Suﬁ pir and they were also related to the modernist thinker Sayyid Ahmad Khan. Consequently Mawdudi’s father, Ahmad Hasan, attended a modernist Anglo-Oriental College at Aligarh for a short while. This chapter looks at his father’s modernist upbringing and surroundings, combined with his later abandonment of the ‘British ways’

and becoming a Suﬁ. The life of his father, Ahmad Hasan, should be seen as an important paradigm and represents a not-untypical identity crisis between Islam and western modernism. Another important inﬂuence was his literary heritage of poets and writers which encouraged Mawdudi in his own writing. His noble heritage and the witness of their decline ﬁnancially, politically and spiritually, all reﬂect upon Mawdudi’s concerns in his writings. Mawdudi’s father was particularly important in his education as he wanted him to become a theologian and religious scholar: Ahmad Hasan avoided teaching English and western science, and instead gave Mawdudi a solid Islamic education as well as telling Mawdudi stories of Islamic history and great ﬁgures in that history. When, from the age of 11, Mawdudi was enrolled in at the Madrasah-i Fauqaniyah of Aurangabad he, for the ﬁrst time, encountered the natural sciences and remained keenly interested in modern scientiﬁc thought throughout his life. Mawdudi was particularly expert in language; that of Urdu and Arabic, and he decided, in 1918, to pursue a writing career. With Chapter 2, the period up to 1930 and the publication of his Jihad in

Islam is explored. With the increase in violence between Muslims and Hindus in India in the 1920s, Mawdudi wrote on the understanding of jihad. His published writings on the legitimacy of jihad proved to be hugely inﬂuential. Importantly, Mawdudi translated the philosophy of Mulla Sudra and as a result was inﬂuenced by the views of the Asfar, particularly the importance of sharia for humankind’s spiritual being. He became increasingly interested in the politics of Delhi, particularly the independence movement. Mawdudi continued his study of the Islamic sciences as well as his journalism and he was inﬂuenced by the Deobandi order, especially its concern over the intrusion of western culture. From this, Mawdudi became heavily involved in the Khilafat movement. Mawdudi became increasingly political and concerned over the future for Islam due to various events occurring at the time that caused this anxiety, notably the Shuddhi campaign, the increase in Ahmadi missionary activity and the growth in the Wahhabi movement in Saudi Arabia. At this time he talks of a ‘conversation’; he is a ‘new Muslim’ and looks for an organization to pursue his new cause of reviving Islam. Chapter 3 takes us up to 1939. In 1932 Mawdudi wrote Towards Under-

standing Islam, which outlines the basic beliefs and tenets of Islam and established his name among students at colleges across India. Muhammad Iqbal had advocated a Muslim homeland in northern India since 1930 and was looking for a suitable candidate to make this vision a reality through religious and educational means. This led to the creation of Darul-Islam (Land of Islam) with Mawdudi at its head. Here Mawdudi demonstrated his organizational skills, but his desire for the project to be more political conﬂicted with its original apolitical remit. This is also a time when Mawdudi confronted his own demons and questioned his religious and spiritual integrity. It is a period of self-doubt and questioning which is reﬂected in his poetry. With Chapter 4 taking us up to 1947, the most signiﬁcant event was the

birth of the Jamaat-e-Islami in 1941. Why the need for a new party? What

distinguished it from other parties that existed at the time? How was this new party going to respond to the increasing call for a separate Islamic state? The gestation period of the Jamaat is explored here, together with Mawdudi’s own struggle between his ideological principles and the practicalities of politics. The ﬁnal chapter of Part I considers the Pakistan years up until Mawdudi’s death in 1979, with the continual conﬂict between trying to maintain the Jamaat as a principled way of life when confronted with the harsh pragmatism of the political arena and the necessary compromises this entails. Having looked at Mawdudi’s life, Part II, beginning with Chapter 6, will

examine his writings in more detail, in particular his concern for ‘intellectual independence’ as he called it, or cultural authenticity. Despite the fact that Mawdudi was inﬂuenced by western thought, he strives to demonstrate that Islam possesses its own ‘-ism’, unsullied by external ideology. Here he looks to the life of the writings of Muhammad Iqbal, although Iqbal himself was inﬂuenced by such western philosophers as Nietzsche and Bergson. Chapter 7 puts Mawdudi into the context of the Islamic revivalism and the

movement known as salaﬁ, for Mawdudi shares many features of the salaﬁs, while also being distinguished from them, particularly in his reluctance to engage in independent reasoning. What would Mawdudi’s vision of an Islamic state actually be like in practice? This is the question that is addressed in Chapter 8 by examining Mawdudi’s four paradigms of the Qur’an, the Prophet Muhammad, the Rightly Guided Caliphs and the great jurists. Mawdudi presents a romantic view of early Islam, and then applies these paradigms to modern times. Islam is thus idealized with a central obligation of absolute obedience to God (his exposition of the concept of din). To what extent would Mawdudi’s state be a ‘democracy’ as opposed to a

‘theocracy’? Isn’t his concept of theo-democracy a contradiction in terms? Mawdudi’s understanding of the term ‘Caliph’ suggests that all Muslims are Caliphs and we are therefore talking of a democracy in the sense at least that all Muslims have equal representation in the aﬀairs of state. Yet, at the same time, one is bound by the laws of God, which implies a theocracy. When we dig a little deeper, as is done in Chapter 9, we see that Mawdudi had a very strict understanding of what constitutes a Muslim. It has been said that Mawdudi’s views on revolution are essentially Marxist

and are tied in with his views on jihad. Mawdudi was clear that an Islamic state could not occur until the existing political order was removed and this inevitably would result in some direct action. However, Mawdudi is ambiguous in his writings and seemed to not be in support of violent revolution and, instead, saw revolution as a piecemeal thing that is evolutionary in character. Therefore it would be an orderly transfer of power rather than a spontaneous overthrowing of the existing order. He looks back to the prophetic era as his paradigm, with the Prophet extolling ‘patience and paciﬁsm’. Yet, as shall be shown in Chapter 10, once again Mawdudi’s views seem often conﬂicting and ambiguous and need to be seen within the context of his writings on jihad.