Deconstructing Zaid Hamid part 3

(An Abridged version was published here)

Deconstructing Zaid hamid

The past has to be bared to settle all accounts, so that one could proceed further.

Barthold Brecht.

Before the start of 3^rd part, I want to share some words of Dr. Eqbal Ahmad, regarding the concept of separation of Church and State. Writing in his essay “Islam and Politics”, he wrote, “It is commonly asserted that in Islam, unlike in Christianity and other religions, there is no separation of religion and politics. In strict textual and formal legal terms, this may be true. But this standard generalization is not helpful in comprehending Muslim political praxis either historically or contemporaneously. In its most fundamental sense, politics involves a set of active links, both positive and negative, between civil society and institutions of power. In this sense, there has been little separation, certainly none in our time, between religion and politics anywhere” and  “ In this sense, separation between state and religion has existed in the Muslim world for at least eleven of Islam's fourteen centuries. The organic links between religion and state power ended in A.D. 945 when a Buwayhid Prince, Muiz al-Dawla Ahmad, marched into the capita[ city of Baghdad and terminated the Abbasid Caliph's dual role as the temporal and spiritual leader of the Islamic nation. For a time, the Caliph served in various parts of the Muslim world as a legitimizing symbol through the investiture of temporal rulers-Sultans, Amirs, and Khans-among them, successful rebels and usurpers. The Buwayhids, who ruled over Iraq and Fars as Amirs, kept the Caliphate in subjection for 110 years until they were displaced in A.D. 1055 by Tughril, the SeIjuk Warrior. In 1258, the Mongols sacked Baghdad, killed the Caliph and his kin, and terminated the Abbasid Caliphate, which had been for two centuries a Merovingian cipher. Although the Caliphate was revived and claimed-at different times in various places, by a variety of rulers-it never quite mustered the allegiance of a majority of Muslims. Power, in effect, remained secularized in Muslim practice.'”.

Episode 5

Ali Azmat kick-started the show by telling us that Iqbal studied at Oxford, when in fact, Iqbal was a student at Cambridge University, located 84 miles away from Oxford.

ZH: Un main Indian nationalism k germs thay, and he ‘radicalized’ into a pan Islamist. (Translation:-He had germs of Nationalism)

Comment: Yeah, Indian nationalism is a disease in your twisted logical framework. The use of the phrase radicalized (and those were his exact words) is a window to the mind-set of Mr Zaid Hamid.

ZH: Sicily kai so sal tak musalmano ka garh raha hai.(Sicily was a Muslim stronghold for centuries.)

Comment: - Muslim rule in Sicily was from 965 A.D till 1072 A.D. That makes a total of 100 and 2 years. Like I said before, you do the math.

ZH: Topkapi museum main 1400 sal ki khlafat k nawadir pare huay hain.

Comment: - There was no “centralized” Khilafat for 14 long centuries. After the first 4 Khulafa-e-Rashideen and initial period of Umayyad Rule, there were splits and factions and so on. (Reference:- Hamari tarikh fehmi, paper by Hasan Jaafar Zaidi)

ZH: Allama lqbal was 'elected' as one of the founding members of London Muslim league.

Comment: - Iqbal was a member of the London Muslim League which was founded by Syed Amir Ali (a Bengali philosopher and writer who was a contemporary of Sir Syed and who very few students of Pakistan history know because his efforts have been criminally neglected by our textbook writers.) How can a person be ELECTED as a founding member is beyond logic.

ZH:-Federal Reserve was created in 1913 and it financed the global turmoil.

Comment: - Federal Reserve was in fact created in 1913 A.D but US didn't take part in the world war until 1917 A.D.

Also, there wasn’t any wire transfer or PayPal through which an America-based bank could finance events unfolding across the Atlantic.

ZH:-Iqbal had predicted that after a world war, ideologies like democracy, liberalism, feminism, modern education will be implemented.

Comment:-This is another demonstration of the lack of knowledge by Zaid Hamid. Democracy was working in US, France and UK even before Iqbal was born.

Similarly, the first wave of Feminist movement started in late 19th century.

Regarding Iqbal’s views on Democracy, lets see for ourselves what he said on record. In his letter to the Civil and Military Gazette published on May 28, 1937 he says: “For Islam the acceptance of social democracy in some suitable form and consistent with the legal principles of Islam, is not a revolution but a return to the original purity of Islam.”

In another letter in the Civil and Military Gazette published on July 30, 1930, he said: “If anybody thinks that approach to democracy means sailing into a kind of lotus-land, he cannot have read a word of history. The truth is exactly the opposite. Democracy lets loose all hues of aspirations and grievances which are suppressed or unrealized under autocracy. It arouses hopes and ambitions, often quite unpractical, and it relies not on authority but on argument, on controversy from the platform, in the press, in the parliament, gradually to educate people to the acceptance of a solution which may not be ideal but which is the only practical one under the circumstances of the time. Democratic governments have attendant difficulties but these are difficulties which human experience elsewhere shows to be surmountable.

Reference: Iqbal, the Destruction of False gods and Islamic Revolution by Prof. Khawaja Masud, from his soon-to-be-published book Lessons of My Life.

Episode 6

ZH:-Un ko talash kia, build kia aur ultimately tayar kar k deliver karwya dia,qaum bhe un ko bna k di.(Translation:- He(Iqbal) found him(Quaid-i-Azam), built him and later delivered, manufactured a nation for him as well).

Comment:-  This is absurd. Allama Iqbal did have an influence on Quaid-i-Azam but it didn’t happen the way Zaid hamid thinks it did. They met in London in 1931-2 when Allama Iqbal was there for one of the Roundtable Conferences. Later, there was correspondence between the two via letters which can be read here. It can be seen from these letters that Zaid Hamid is concocting stories just for the sake of his convenience. Plus, no-one can singlehandedly MANUFACTURE a nation.!!! Another important point to note is that Quaid-i-Azam himself was a famous politician and barrister. He didn’t need to be “found”. 

ZH:-Un k munh se jo baten niklin,unko itefaq se kahi jane wali baten nhe kaha ja skta.(Translation: Whatever he(Iqbal) said could not have been a co-incident)

Comment:- Giving divine notions to otherwise not-divine matters is a specialty of Conspiracy merchants like Mister Zaid Zaman Hamid. He is trying to elevate Iqbal to the level of at least a Prophet. Iqbal never made such grandiose claims as he was a much wiser person than ZH.

ZH:-Our youth can’t speak Urdu.

Comment: - This is an exact quote from Mr. Zaid Hamid. At the very least, he should have used the medium of Urdu to say this, which he didn’t. Most of the conversation that took place during the course of the programs was a mixture of English and Urdu. As Nadeem Farooq Paracha wrote in his article for Dawn, “The GMG (Groovy Media Guys) has a lighter and a tad more liberal side to it as well. It has a cultural wing consisting of sirens in the shape of trendy looking androids that are fed burgers and French fries to further fatten their complete ignorance of reality. They talk in strange tongues also called “Minglish” and “Hinglish”.
One of the biggest successes in this respect has been conversion of Zion Hamid who was once an uncaring, burger-hopping DJ at a Tora Bora Disco. Today he is the hero of GMG”.

ZH:-He explains(ilm,tadabbur,hakumat) as democracy, equality, liberty, women's rights and that Iqbal warned against them.

Comment: - Literally, it should be translated as knowledge, equanimity and government. Zaid Hamid gave his own description and a different twist to what Iqbal was saying. This is not only unethical, it is also deplorable. Iqbal was a wise man and he would not have warned people against enlightenment.

ZH:-The root cause of all injustices in this world is Riba, Usury, and Sood.

Comment:- FYI, Usury is simply a translation of the urdu word “Sood”. Another grand claim made by Zaid Hamid here. The issue of Riba and its role in the modern economy is discussed in detail by Bilal Ahmad, an Economics Professor in his book “Pakistan main Iqtisadi Pasmandagi”. His complete essay can be read here. There are many deficiencies and pitfalls in the current economic systems and criticizing them is not a new phenomen. What Zaid Hamid and people who blame ALL ills on Usury and Riba don’t actually know how the system works. Also, the system that they propose is not viable. Details can be found in Bilal Ahmad’s essay.

ZH:-They started the 1st world war so that they can destroy the world and then give Marshal Plan to get them on their roll.

Comment: - This is another juxtaposition of historical facts. Marshall Plan or European Recovery Program started in 1948.!!! First World War ended in 1918. Second World War ended in 1945. According to Encyclopedia of American Foreign Policy, volume 2; page 95; published in 2002, Marshall Plan was the large-scale American program to aid Europe where the United States gave monetary support to help rebuild European economies after the end of World War II in order to combat the spread of Soviet Communism. It was actually named after US Secretary of State, George Marshall.

ZH:-Muslims were spreading in Eastern Europe with the Ottoman Empire and were already present in the east, courtesy Spain.

Comment: - Zaid Hamid got his history wrong again. The Turkey-based Ottoman Empire expanded in Europe in the 16^th and 17^th centuries (After conquest of Constantinople in 1453, there was no further expansion of the Empire for many years). Meanwhile in Spain, the last Muslim ruler left for Morocco in 1492 and thereafter the infamous Spanish inquisition happened which eradicated all traces of Islam from Spain.