West and Islam

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West and Islam >Wed, 10 Jul 2002 01:08:27 -0700 > >Title: West and Islam

>Author: Francois Gautier >Publication: Pioneer: >July 10, 2002 >

>Boston, Massachusetts - American newspapers publish daily commentaries by

eminent Muslims, who all want to prove that Islam is a tolerant creed, that the

Taliban were an isolated aberration, and that Osama bin Laden is desecrating the

scared non-violent tenets of Islam with his terrible deeds. > >It is in such

times that it is useful to remind the world, particularly the United States -

which has chosen as a frontline state for its war on terrorism, a nation which

breeds terrorism - that while Pakistan is an aberration of what Islam has stood

for since its inception in the 7th century, India is a living example of a peace

loving nation, tolerant of other creeds, ethnic groups and religions. Most

Western history books, for instance, eulogise the Mughal period in India as a

time of refinement and enlightenment, and many of them say that Aurangzeb was a

strict but just emperor. What is the truth? > >Aurangzeb (1658-1707) did not

just build an isolated mosque on a destroyed temple, he ordered all temples to

be destroyed and had mosques built on a number of cleared temples sites. All

other Hindu sacred places within his reach equally suffered destruction. A few

examples: Krishna's birth place temple in Mathura, the rebuilt Somnath temple

on the coast of Gujarat, the Vishnu temple replaced with the Alamgir mosque now

overlooking Varanasi and the Treta-ka-Thakur temple in Ayodhya. The number of

temples destroyed by Aurangzeb is counted in 4, if not 5 figures. According to

his own official court chronicles: "Aurangzeb ordered all provincial governors

to destroy all schools and temples of the pagans and to make a complete end to

all pagan teachings and practices." Aurangzeb did not stop at destroying

temples, their users were also wiped-out; even his own brother, Dara Shikoh,

was executed for taking an interest in Hindu religion and the Sikh Guru Tegh

Bahadur was beheaded bec! >ause he objected to Aurangzeb's forced conversions.

> >We can see, Romila Thapar and Percival Spear's statement of a benevolent

Aurangzeb is a flagrant attempt at negationism. Even the respectable

Encyclopedia Britannica, in its entry on India, does not mention in its chapter

on the Sultanate period any persecutions of Hindus by Muslims, except "that

Firuz Shah Tughlaq made largely unsuccessful attempts at converting his Hindu

subjects and sometime persecuted them". > >Many orthodox Indian Muslims still

cling to the Deoband school, which says that India was once "Dar-ul-Islam", the

house of Islam, and should return to that status. The Aligarh school, on the

contrary, led by Mohammed Iqbal, propounded the creation of Pakistan. What

particularly interests us in the Aligarh school is the attempt by Muslim

historians, such as Mohammed Habib, to rewrite the chapter of Muslim invasions

in India. In 1920, Habib started writing his magnum opus, which he based on

four theories: One, that the records (written by the Muslims themselves) of

slaughters of Hindus, the enslaving of their women and children and razing of

temples were "mere exaggerations by court poets and zealous chroniclers to

please their rulers". Two, that they were indeed atrocities, but mainly

committed by Turks, the savage riders from the Steppes. Three, the destruction

of the temples took place because Hindus stored their gold and jewels inside

them and therefore Muslim armies plun! >dered these. Four, the conversion of

millions of Hindus to Islam was not forced "but what happened was there was a

shift of opinion in the population, who on its own free will chose the Shariat

against the Hindu law (Smriti), as they were all oppressed by the bad

Brahmins..." > >Unfortunately for Habib and his school, the Muslims invaders

did record with glee their genocide on Hindus, because they felt all along that

they were doing their duty; that plundering, enslaving and razing temples was

sanctioned by their religion. Indeed, whether it was Mahmud of Ghazni

(997-1030) - no barbarian; although a Turk, he patronised art and literature

and would recite a verse of the Quran every night after having razed temples

and killed his quota of unbelievers - or Firuz Shah Tughlak (1351-1388) who

personally confirms that the destruction of Pagan temples was done out of piety

and writes: "On the day of a Hindu festival, I went there myself, ordered the

executions of all the leaders and practitioners of his abomination; I destroyed

their idols, temples and built mosques in their places." Finally, as Belgian

historian Konraad Elst points out, "Muslim fanatics were merely faithful

executors of Quranic injunctions. It is not the Muslims who are guilty but

Islam." > >It is not only Indian historians who are negationists, but also

Western historians and India-specialists. We know that the first historians of

India, the British, twisted India's history to suit their theory that they had

come to civilise a race which was not only inferior to them, but was also

supposed to have been heavily influenced in its philosophies or arts by

European invaders (read the Aryans or Alexander the Great). > >However, but

what is less known is that today many Western historians not only still cling

to these outdated theories, but also actually, more or less willfully, mislead

their public, which is generally totally ignorant and takes these

"knowledgeable" comments about India as the absolute truth. Many of these

India-specialists are not only Left-leaning, but they are also specialists of

the Mughal period of Indian history, which is to say that they are sympathetic

to Islam's point of view on India, while they often consider Hindus fanatics. >

>It is time Indian historians looked again at their own history and wrote it

based on the latest archaeological and linguistic discoveries, so that the West

is better able to understand India. >

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