An irony!

Once there was a village. In that village people lived as long as their memories permitted. They were happy living their traditional life. Children played in the day and learned tradition at the footsteps of their elders from THE book. Men went into the fields and worked all day. The women assisted in teaching the children, doing chores at home and sometimes went to fields to share men’s burden. The men also respected their wives and didn’t burden them with worries. Women also never bothered men with lavish desires. Everybody lived happily.
One day all things turned into a nightmare for these people. Some strange people came from nowhere and looted all their homes. They came with strange devices and things the people of the village had never seen. They used these gadgets and destroyed their homes. They killed their young, raped their women, took away their children and took them into bondage.
These people were then blamed by the invaders that they were not good in defending themselves, that they were backwards and had nothing in comparison of what they had. That was the day when people from the village were robbed of their freedom. They didn’t bother anyone, they didn’t know if there was a world outside their village. They were busy in taking their tradition from one generation to the other. In doing that they had discovered great many things. But the invaders never cared for what they had and branded them slavery forever.

Detachment!

I have been feeling very down from past few months. It is like the world has become a very difficult place to live in and to stand by its injustices. It is like people have denounced known morals and I can feel nothing to inspire me to indulge myself in goodness and objectivity. I am at loss of vibe that could get me out of this detachment. I am writing this post after a very long time on my blog and in this time period, there were many things that came into mind to write about but I couldn't muster up enough enthusiasm to write.
This detachment is foremost because of two faced people that I see. While in my sins and my procrastination I cannot just bring the courage in me to face the bare reality of this very short rugged life. I have prayed to Allah and await His response. Wind blows my soul dry and i feel like stranded in my own negativity. It is difficult when you don't have beacon of light to find path. (Beacon being my mother, she always knew what I had to do). The miracle (Quran) lays in my hand and I even can not extract objectivity from it. If you have any solutions please share.

Iqbal's very inspiring words!

As in the beginning of April 660 A.D. 23 years after the Battle of Siffin, in the town of Mecca, a Muslim had stood up to tell the pilgrims of that sacred soil how the unity of Islam had been split up into various factions, so in the beginning of April in the town of Lahore, the soil of which claims the bones of some of the greatest personalities of Islam, I, an insignificant member of the community, venture to stand up and place my finger on this dreadful wound in the body-social. In this great assembly of educated Mussalmans, I condemn this accursed religious and social sectarianism; I condemn it in the name of God, in the name of humanity, in the name of Moses, in the name of Jesus Christ, and in the name of him—a thrill of emotion passes through the very fibre of my soul when I think of that exalted name—yes, in the name of him who brought the final message of freedom and equality to mankind. Islam is one and indivisible; it brooks no distinctions in it. There are no Wahabies, Sh’ias, Mirzais or Sunnies in Islam. Fight not for the interpretations of the truth, when the truth itself is in danger. It is foolish to complain of stumbling when you walk in the darkness of night. Let all come forward and contribute their respective shares in the great toll of the nation. Let the idols of class distinctions and sectarianism be smashed for ever; let the Mussalmans of the country be once more united into a great vital whole. How can we, in the presence of violent internal dispute, expect to succeed in persuading others to our way of thinking? The work of freeing humanity from superstition—the ultimate ideal of Islam as a community, for the realization of which we have done so little in this great land of myth and superstition—will ever remain undone if the emancipators themselves are becoming gradually enchained in the very fetters from which it is their mission to set others free.
(Islam as moral and political ideal, Dr. Allama Iqbal)

Virtue is power!

This idea of man as an individuality of infinite power determines, according to the teachings of Islam, the worth of all human action. That which intensifies the sense of individuality in man is good, that which enfeebles it is bad. Virtue is power, force, strength; evil is weakness. Give man a keen sense of respect for his own personality, let him move fearless and free in the immensity of God’s earth, and he will respect the personalities of others and become perfectly virtuous.
(Islam as Moral & Political Ideal by Allama Iqbal)

Foundations of Secular Educational System!

Know thy enemy.

"Allah is the Protecting Friend of those who believe. He bringeth them out of darkness into light. As for those who disbelieve, their patrons are false deities. They bring them out of light into darkness. Such are rightful owners of the Fire. They will abide therein."
2:257

Are we conscious of what we take from the modern-secular thought and its educational system, and what we reject? In fact, are we rejecting anything harmful? Are we deciding hard what is useful for us and what is unacceptable from Islamic point of view? Do we fully know what we’re up against? Not so much.
Our universities and intelligentsia model itself on the contents of western educational system, and are heavily influenced by it. What then are the major components of western, modern educational system which contrast with Islamic worldview? What are its philosophical and practical bases? This is the first article which encompasses the influences on modern education and its origins. In further articles, we’ll try to come up with some rationale on which to build the structure of modern education which keeps human nature intact with its ethics and preserves the teachings and injunctions of Allah Almighty. We invite you to participate in that and broaden our mutual understanding from Islamic point of view.
Setting the Context: Roots of Modern Education

The loss of God is death, is desolation, hunger, separation. All the tragedy of man is in one word, ‘godlessness’– (Metropolitan Anthony of Sourzah)

Contemporary education, or modern literacy, has harmed, as well as benefited human race. To understand the long lasting effects of modern education we have to go back in history towards its inception. From there we believe we can conceive the idea of what contemporary endeavor of modern education is. For now it is enough to say that it has given us war, bloodshed, imperialism, disbelief in unseen higher order realities, exploitation, slavery to created things, nationalism and list goes on. It has divested the superior human values from us and has turned human society into an individualistic and hedonistic one; where men are involved in performing feats of personal gratification in which there is no room for love and care due to their shear selflessness. Selfishness is at the heart of economics, for instance. It has so far given two major wars or world wars in the human history. This cannot be said the age of enlightenment, rather a dark age to many. It is a delusion of evolution without any direction. No doubt that science and education of people have given us some wondrous inventions and have laid the foundations of various subjects, but these were supposed to make human life easier and were to make them civilized. Ironically, repercussions have been disastrous.
Understanding the context (or the times) is imperative here. We have our differences with Hinduism, but we ought to call to ‘a common word’. Similarities can be startling, like the following predictions of The Vishnu Purana, “a Hindu text dating back nearly two millennia,” which describe the Dark Age or Kali Yuga:

“Riches and piety will diminish daily, until the world will be completely corrupted. In those days it will be wealth that confers distinction, passion will be the sole reason for union between the sexes, lies will be the only method of success in business, and women will be the objects merely of sensual gratification. The earth will be valued only for its mineral treasures, dishonesty will be the universal means of subsistence, a simple ablution will be regarded as sufficient purification…The observances of castes, laws, and institutions will no longer be in force in the Dark Age, and the ceremonies prescribed by the Vedas will be neglected. Women will obey only their whims and will be infatuated with pleasure…men of all kinds will presumptuously regard themselves as equals of Brahmins…The Vaishyas will abandon agriculture and commerce and will earn their living by servitude or by the exercise of mechanical professions…The dominant caste will be that of the Shudras…”

(The last point may raise eyebrows. Interestingly, Prophet also indicated that lowly people will be happy people in final days, like these modern singers and movie stars, as per Hamza Yusuf.)

Let us delve into the influences and foundations that modern curricula’s globally have in common, in East and West.
Industrialization & Progressivism

The modern age of industrialization initiated by the Great Britain was founded on the sentiments of increasing productivity. On these grounds it can be said that it was related to greed present in human nature. It cannot also be simply linked to increase in population, but more or less it can be related to greed or avarice, and subjugation of extremely poor people who were used as ‘grist in the mill’ of industrialism. (Also because at that time Malthus’ theory argued that “poverty is caused by excessive breeding of the poor,” a factually wrong and disproven dogma still held by anti-poor elites. Hence poor had to be left at the mercy of wolves or corporate elites.) With this radical change there came a rush of inventions and products that changed the face of human society forever.
Previously wars were fought between groups for land, ownership and money. This has not changed yet, only the form has changed (in these supposedly extremely ‘civilized’ times). Groups now are nations & corporations led by war mongering political establishments and Opera going executives. They wage wars on other groups (weaker the better) for their own sake of safety, protection and survival. Their excuse: “we’re here to civilize savages and bring the Light of Democracy.” (Ironically, Donald Rumsfeld categorically said that ‘an Islamic state is not an option for Iraq’ even if people want it!)
Today, the businesses are running on Machiavellian thought, Adam Smith’s principle of pursuit of self-interest and totalitarianism without any bounds and without any absolute set of ethics. Very recently around 20 banks in UK and Europe joined hands to loot and fool the world by fixing certain trading rates (or Libor) that affect all financial transactions, for instance.
All that boils down into the domination of a system based on money and power. Globally, this is translating into the rise of the American Corporate Imperialism, as exposed in Confessions of an Economic Hitman. Capitalism whose decline has just been started in Wall Street outlines a system in which the whole of economy stands on the greed of humans for power and outward beauty. Economics, when stripped off from ethics, results in the bigotry of unequal distribution of wealth and immorality. One of us vividly remembers his economics professor forbidding use of any moral arguments against narcotic drugs; so he had to argue “rationally” in favor of legalizing drugs according to economic analysis!
Industrialism and capitalism is the soul for today’s educational system. (Remember what’s the bottom-line? Dollars & prestige.) The degrees which are now offered are only to sustain this system and to make it robust. The curricula have failed to give people any higher aim of living. Those who aspire for greater good are themselves restrained to a small local level, and have up till now failed to achieve any milestone in bringing a halt to the devastation borne by a vast majority of people around the globe. But quality will prevail over quantity, Allah willing.
Capitalistic ideas must be taken critically and attacked from various angles. We tend to naively believe that this is the end-result of human effort in economic sphere. Surely anyone familiar with economic research at the forefront knows that dogmas of neo-classical economics or capitalism are being challenged bottom-up.
Philosophical Purge

While nineteenth century materialism closed the mind of man to what is above him, twentieth century psychology opened it to what is below him
(René Guénon)

The ‘eclipse of human soul and intellect’ by secular thought has brought disastrous consequences not just at pure intellectual level, but at societal and practical level as well. The change agents have been ‘false prophets of modernity’ (i.e., modern philosophers and theorists). At intellectual level, they’ve lost the traditional, religious view of nature and knowledge, and created false alternatives – the cause of mass misguidance. Not only that, these handful of men have produced this ‘Dark Age’, a material civilization, in which both human actions and intellectual efforts are profane and cut off from Divine guidance. At practical level, though they have discovered in their way great deal of facts about human mind and body, but still paved way to moral degradation, materialism and suffocation of public morality. (We hope to give historical and evidential bases to these ‘bold claims’ of major religious thinkers in future, Allah willing.)
At political level, we have seen destruction by and self-abdication of great many political minds and men: thanks to Machiavelli’s work, The Prince. In his over-rated book, he suggests that for rulers, ethical norms do not matter. In fact, being truthful and honest is inefficient. His dajjalic policies are just another case of modern man’s declaration of independence from heaven. Similar strains on ideologies and humans actions are attributed to Sigmund Freud. These mistaken ideas have in fact formed the basis of human nature, society, economy and government, with harmful consequences for societies and even for individuals who practice it.
Ideas of Darwin and Karl Marx are the nails in the coffin of education. Karl Marx perpetuating Darwin’s theory of evolution into historical materialism (as he was took Darwin’s book as building block for his own theory) suggests in Marx’s Critique of Political Economy that:

“… in every historical epoch the prevailing economic system by which the necessities of life are produced determines the form of societal organization and the political and intellectual history of the epoch; and that the history of society is a history of struggles between exploiting and exploited, that is, between ruling and oppressed, social classes.”

On his funeral, F. Engel summed up Marx’s grand theory about human life on earth:

“Just as Darwin discovered the law of development of organic nature, so Marx discovered the law of development of human history: the simple fact, hitherto concealed by an overgrowth of ideology, that mankind must first of all eat, drink, have shelter and clothing, before it can pursue politics, science, art, religion, etc; that therefore the production of the immediate material means, and consequently the degree of economic development attained by a given people or during a given epoch, form the foundation upon which the state institutions, the legal conceptions, art, and even the ideas on religion, of the people concerned have been evolved, and in the light of which they must, therefore be explained, instead of vice versa, as had hitherto been the case.”

According to him, the structure of society including politics, religion, arts, and philosophy is founded on the basis of economic conditions of prevailing era alone. Economics explains everything in Marxian worldview. Religion and ethical systems are either products of economic realities, or merely tools used to justify a given economic system. Moreover, if a system is exploitative, religion will be used as opium to cancel out resentments of the masses. (Actually, “opium is the religion of masses.”) People often read and are influenced with these writings without being critical, just as Ilich Lenin was influenced and brought up the revolution in Russia.
The curriculum of today take these adulterations as credible and as “scientific facts,” mal-nourishing young minds philosophically. In reality these ideas have exploited the darker sides of human conscience & mind, bringing forth those attitudes which were once considered taboo. “With the sword of furqan,” says one Islamic thinker, “Muslim minds should destroy the idols of western ideologies.”
Revolutions and Wars

“Wars and revolutions and battles are due simply and solely to the body and its desires. All wars are undertaken for the acquisition of wealth; and the reason why we have to acquire wealth is the body, because we are slaves in its service” – Socrate

The unrests and revolutions that came in past few centuries have also framed the worldview of education and its outcomes. The French revolution attributes a significant place for wiping out feudalism and is credited with giving birth to liberalism. People overthrow the government of King, the oppressor, to free themselves. This idea found in this revolution gained strength later on and reached in its purest form in the Human Rights Charter.
A sceptic might object: how can this be freedom that a mob can overthrow a king and then take control of everything for themselves? Instead of one king, a state is created for few to rule. They maintain the cycle though: they print the currency, impose taxes, compel everybody to work for material gain, start a competition in the society, bring women out just to boost economy, make children learn things that are not going to matter to them except for increasing taxes and wealth of only a bunch of people. All it does is to make the suffering swallowable for sensitive minds.
This revolution preceded by the American Revolution instills a spirit of absolutist liberty in the approach of institutions of teaching and learning. It also contributes the idea of democracy in the western world and it was through this revolution that basis of modern political thought is inspired. Political theorists and students now advance their thought after considering the universality of the ideas of democracy and capitalism, without analyzing critical the implications of these systems and without challenging its naive assertions.
Similarly, the Russian Revolution and Marxism have brought with it a completely different mindset and values. When these values were first implemented after the revolution, ferocious was the attempt to impose these ideas to the whole world. Nazi Nationalism was another despicable event that took place and failed. Now the world is left with a single dominion of Capitalism awaited to be replaced with something more ideal.
These revolutions have then helped fringe these (and other) concepts of liberalism.
20th century World Wars can safely be attributed to Nationalism (and other psychological diseases and delusions). Education served the warfare. Many of the subjects and fields of study were developed owing to the demands of warfare like Operations Management, Supply Chain Management, and Resource Planning etc. Even the invention of internet is accredited to the needs of military communication after World War II (and to some pure mathematical pursuits too, we must mention).
The overall focus of the education in previous two centuries hasn’t been on the moral grounds, because if it was so people would be enjoying a more safer, indiscriminate and peaceful planet. These so-called “management” and “engineering” fields are nothing but the tools to keep the “system” running and to spread the void between rich and the poor, powerful and the oppressed, from one perspective.
A conscious citizen knows that industrial-military-complex is at the heart of American economy. Those who set up wars, sell weapons and then blame others for mischief are equally responsible and real barbarians.
Anti-Principalism

A brief survey of modern thought and its educational system will show that it’s based on overturning principles, notes Hamza Yusuf, an American convert and preacher. Whereas, he further said, in Islamic educational system, you cannot question those principles. Prof. S. H. Nasr notes that in old days, when Islamic Tradition was fully intact, the intellectual environment was like a sea in which all kinds of fish would swim, with all kinds of colors and shades; but none would question existence of water. No one would doubt unity of God, for instance, but have very sharp differences at the same time. Secular, positivist, modern education attempts murdering this holistic and sacred understanding of knowledge and instruction.
Today, ulema are anathematized for having deep theological differences (when in fact those differences lead to greater synthesis, as per M Iqbal); whereas, the very modernists would dare disagreeing with Quran, and whole of the Orthodoxy developed and perfected by the best generations of Muslims – progressive-academics like Amina Wadud for instance.
Logical Positivism in Social Sciences: Rejection of the Unseen

No understanding of western social sciences (hence its educational system) is complete without delving deep into logical positivism. Western social sciences are based on logical positivism, which rejects belief in and study of the Unseen. An implication of rejection or indifference to the existence of God.
It only studies what can be seen and observed, while rejecting underlying realities like courage, love, goodness, etc. For instance, we cannot see gravity. Hence, we won’t talk about gravity, but we’ll only study its effects. Equations describing its effects will be studied only. (However, physicists don’t bow to positivism much and always talk about such unobservable things as gravity, strings, etc.) Similarly, in psychology, many things are unobservable, unconscious for example. Behaviorists reacted to this invocation of unseen concepts and called for rejecting the study of such areas in psychology. Not many heeds their call anymore.
Unfortunately, despite having failed, logical positivism continues to stick (like a sticky tape) and be taught in many areas. This is evident from its two basic dogmas, which have also taken disbelievers away from light and into darkness:
“S1: Unobservable entities cannot be invoked as explanatory factors. Social science, like the physical sciences, must be built around quantifiable and measurable concepts.
S2. Morals, values, ideals are unobservable and hence unscientific. Activism, or efforts to create a better society are not part of scientific activity. Social scientists must act as neutral, detached observers seeking to describe laws of motion for human and social activities.” (Source, please read the paper for a detailed description, history and criticism of logical positivism.)
One can appreciate that these misunderstandings are opposite to Islamic understanding of knowledge and method of inquiry. Islam on the contrary is for those who believe in the Unseen, and that invoking unobservables is necessary and only rational to be objective in social sciences.
Media: The Mind Control Machinery

Brainwashing and conditioning doesn’t end with classroom sessions in the afternoon. The very potent one begins afterwards. It can be said that today many are reading, writing, learning, understanding, persevering, and moving forward only for the sake of money and lifestyle. Not for the sake of Allah, which has severe consequences, as evident from pupils’ boredom with the education. Media, advertising and our education reinforces these “ideals.” But the fall is much grave and deeper. The subtleties of men now rest in the hands of some ignorant celebrities and movie stars, or a bunch of business giants who’re controlling and influencing a major portion of the population. These corporations are centralized and concentrated. A few many firms own large, diverse businesses like magazines, gaming, newspapers, etc. They won’t let research published against them spread so easy.
With its unprecedented influence, media is termed as the fourth pillar of the state and is the most influential tool rampant in the circles of life of contemporary global culture. The “culture” is nothing but the monoculture imported from America (like McDonalds, etc.). It frowns upon facial hairs, turbans, sandy terrains, and everything more natural. At deeper levels, it’s contemptuous towards various manifestations of traditional civilization, especially the latter’s anti-absolute-freedom-to-do stance.
It’s a mind control machine that ‘manufactures consent’, to put it mildly. But it is much more than that, and impacts deeply spiritual state of those who’re exposed to it without caution. Our national identity, and moral growth of individuals is at stake due to this media because it has torn apart the garment of modesty from people’s eyes and it has once again took humanity to those primitive times when there was degradation of feminine gender and immodesty it faced. In Islam, bashfulness is the essence. In modernity, it is a meaningless commodity that doesn’t help.

Conclusion

An education that only makes us honest, efficient, hardworking and loyal to the system can be very deluding. If the system negates the many clear-cut commands of Allah, honesty, efficiency and hard work won’t do any good to the individual and society. This, to us, is the case with education in Pakistan.
Many things must have been left while writing this as this is no short topic it requires deliberate working and understanding of human conscience and zeitgeist of time in order to identify its fallacies. This article is just an effort to compile the thoughts into an organized form to better understand the problem at hand and to convey it to others. We welcome you to amend, add and expand the scope, contents and depth.
The Islamic concept of educational system is based on the spiritual and moral grounds and implies a set of principles which are completely different and in fact in conflict with the contemporary world view of education. The modern education has moved on after renouncing the existence of any other world other than what they perceive and feel, this attitude has casted a curse on society which has sabotaged its moral values. Dignity, courage, austerity, justice, freedom, wisdom, virtuousness, integrity, and absolute sincerity are absent from today’s learned and literate man. Because if it were a part of the education or if education would have taught these moralities; there must have been less suffering by human race.

“To learn is to understand and to understand we need free thought and for free thought we need not to be slaves”

خرد کو غلامی سے آ زاد کر

As Published on MyBitForChange.org by me and Umer Toor (Expressing him profound gratitude for his very valuable additions.)

Visible signs of delusion!

Once in a market i heard a woman say "Baby cumble hay koi changa jiya?" (Do you have any good baby blanket?) In this little sentence our story of delusion echoed inside me. The sentence consists of words from three languages; English, Urdu, Punjabi. We are Muslims, out National language is Urdu, but our mother tongue is Punjabi, while we look up to West and English language. And what we have is the mixed effect of everything from Islam, tradition, Western materialism and National selfishness. We don't know who we are? Where we want to go?
Let me try to come with names that we associate ourselves while we are actually no one:
First on the basis of language/area:
Punjabi
Sindhi
Balochi
pathan
Uzbek
Mahajar
Saraiki
Pashton
pakhtun
Lower Punjab
Upper Punjab
Gilgi Baltistan
FATA
Waziristan
And many others that i don't know of. You can add.
Second on basis of religion:
Sunni (Hanfi, Zikri . . . )
Shiite (Naqvi, Kazmi, Jaafry. . .)
Beralwi
Deobandi
Wahbi
Ahl e Hadees
Tableegh e Islami
Jamat ud Dawaa
Jamat e Islami
Naqshbandi
Chishtie
Qadyani
Green paghri walay (With Green Turbans)
Orange pagrhi walay (With Orange Turbans)
Black paghri wwalay (With Black Turbans)
White paghri walay (With White Turbans)
And still many others

This list can go on and on and on if we add political parties and castes that reside in Pakistan. How can we be united then. People from every association of the above list will always try to relate themselves with specific group, clan, area or party. Our identities are no more just Muslims and followers of one religion Islam. So, how can we be united? This is the condition of one country of Muslim Ummat while there are forty nine Muslim countries all over the world.
Please let me know about your reflections that how can these unite into one.


Image provided by "africa" at freedigitalphotos.net

Stimuli of Muslim curricula!

This article was written by me earlier in 2012. I wrote it and just forgot about it. After seeing some articles on education by Umer Toor I came to remember it. So, it goes like this:

This article is written as a critique on modern education, its implications and to understand where it has lacked and how we Muslims have to transform education in order to preserve the human moralities and Islamic ideology. This is the first article which encompasses the influences on modern education and its origins. In further articles, it will be tried to come up with some rationale on which to build the structure of modern education which keeps human nature intact with its ethics and preserves the teachings and injunctions of Allah Almighty. There has to be a balance between what we take from the prevailing system in which we Muslims are dominated by another civilization and have to decide what is useful for us and what is it that divides and rules us. Just two hundred years back we were united but now grand walls of utilitarianism stands between us which has in fact nothing to do with us or our civilization.
Contemporary education or modern literacy I believe has harmed, as well as benefited human race. To understand the long lasting effects of modern education we have to go back in history towards its inception. From there I believe we can conceive the idea of what contemporary endeavor of modern education is. For now it is enough to say that it has given us war, bloodshed, imperialism, and nationalism. It has divested the superior human values from us and has evolved human society which is individualistic in nature, which compels men to be involved in performing feats of personal gratification having no room for love and care with shear selflessness. It has so far given two major wars or world wars in the human history. This cannot be said the age of enlightenment nor is it the Dark Age. It is a delusion of evolution without any direction. No doubt that science and education of people has given us some wondrous inventions and has laid the foundations of various subjects but these were supposed to make human life easier and were to make them civilized. But repercussions suggests that it has been disastrous. As humans we are on the brink of making some decisions which will in fact be the architecture of our future.
Now let us delve into the influences that modern curricula’s have in common.
Industrialization:
The modern age of industrialization initiated by the Great Britain was founded on the sentiments of increasing productivity, On these grounds it can be said that it was related to greed present in human nature. It can also be linked to increase in population but more or less it can be related to greed or avarice. With this radical change there came a rush of inventions and products that changed the face of human society for ever. Previously wars were fought for land, ownership and money; this is not changed even now, groups or clans for their own sake of safety, protection and survival wage wars on other similar groups(by groups today, I mean Nations and corporations). Today, the businesses are running on the Machiavellian thought and totalitarianism without any bounds and without any ethics. This has created the domination of a system based on money and power. Capitalism whose decline has just been started in Wall Street outlines a system in which the whole of economy stands on the greed of humans for power and beauty, which when stripped off from ethics, results in the bigotry of unequal distribution of wealth.
This system is the sentiment of today’s educational system. The degrees which are now offered are only to sustain this system, to make it robust, and are only for its embellishment. The curricula have failed to give people any higher aim of living. Those who aspire for greater good are themselves restrained to a small local level and have up till now failed to achieve any milestone in bringing a halt to the devastation borne by a vast majority of people around the globe. (We are aware of bombings in Japan, massacre of Hitler, Bloodshed by Communists, Economic Depressions).
Capitalistic ideas must be taken critically and should be renounced as the final word for the economic system of humans. This indicates the revitalization of the sentiments on which the subjects are taught in schools and colleges.
Philosophical Purge:
The subconscious ruling of human nature and the deterrence it brought with it can be attributed to some of the Western philosophers. Though they have discovered in their way great deal of understanding of the human nature but still they have formed the basis of which modern obscenity, immorality, and materialism find their justification. These ideas must be subverted by pure Islamic intellect and ideology. Because in reality these ideas have explored the darkest sides of human conscience and brought to light those attitudes which were once considered taboo.
Machiavelli’s The Prince is one such example. In his book he suggests that for authority, ethical norms for rulers do not matter2. Similar strains on ideologies and actions are attributed to Sigmund Freud3. These dreadful ideas have in fact formed the basis of modern society, economies and governments.
Nail in the coffin for modern education are majorly the ideas of Darwin and Karl Marx4. Karl Marx perpetuating Darwin’s theory of evolution into historical materialism suggests in Marx’s critique of political economy that:

“… in every historical epoch the prevailing economic system by which the necessities of life are produced determines the form of societal organization and the political and intellectual history of the epoch; and that the history of society is a history of struggles between exploiting and exploited, that is, between ruling and oppressed, social classes.”

According to him the structure of society including politics, religion, arts, and philosophy are founded on the basis of economic conditions of prevailing era. People do read and are influenced with these writings just as Ilich Lenin was influenced and brought up the revolution in Russia.
The curriculum of Muslims today does not at any plane, deals with these adulterations and is harming the way our students are nourished ideologically. It spoils the higher obligation and rank that Allah Almighty has awarded to humans. So, to revive the educational system this philosophical purge is inevitable.
Revolutions and wars:
The unrests and revolutions that came in past few centuries have also framed the world view of education and its outcomes. The French revolution attributes a significant place for wiping out feudalism and is credited with evoking liberalism. This revolution preceded by the American Revolution instills a spirit of liberty in the educationist approach of institutions, teaching and learning. It also contributes the idea of democracy in the western world and it was through this revolution that basis of modern political thought is inspired. Political theorists and students now advance their thought after considering the universality of the ideas of democracy and capitalism without analyzing critical the implications of these systems.
Similarly, the Russian Revolution and Marxism has brought with it a completely different mindset and values and when they were first practiced in the revolution they were ferocious in prevailing these ideas to the whole world. The Nazi’s Nationalism was another despicable event that took place and failed. Now the world is left with a single dominion of Capitalism awaited to be replaced with something more ideal.
World wars can simply be attributed to Nationalism. Many of the subjects and fields of study were developed owing to the demands of warfare like Operations Management, Supply Chain Management, and Resource Planning etc. Even the invention of internet is accredited to the needs of military communication after World War II. The overall focus of the education in previous two centuries have not been on the moral grounds because if it were, people would have enjoyed a more safer, indiscriminate and peaceful planet. This so called “Management” and “Engineering” are nothing but the tools to keep the “system” running and to spread the void between rich and the poor, powerful and the oppressed, while their better purposes are still left unexplored.
These ideas have deep impact on the overall structure of educational system of Pakistan as well as other Muslim countries. The need is to understand the fragility of the grim situation that we are in and to find the ways out of it.
The fourth pillar of the state:
It can be said that today everyone is reading, writing, learning, understanding, persevering, and moving forward only for the sake of money and life style. The subtleties of men now rest in the hands of some ignorant celebrities and movie stars or a bunch of business giants and global corporate culture which are controlling and influencing a major portion of the population.
With its importance it’s termed to be the fourth pillar of the state and is the most influential idea rampant in the circles of life of contemporary global culture. It starts influences children from their childhood and matures as the child matures, develops like the child develops and does not die with that person but finds another prey. This fourth pillar of the state and its adversaries are now the most revered in society and people’s ideals are those who come on ‘TV”. This gives an unfathomable, surmounting and alarming situation for the decency and civilization of mankind. Our evolution is at stake due to this media because it has torn apart the garment of modesty from people’s eyes and it has once again took humanity to those primitive times when there was degradation of feminine gender and immodesty it faced.
The media has now become the tool and playground for a few to play and ridicule the many. This influence is also upon the educational system and it influences it indirectly. This has made people weary of studying printed books and has inflicted upon them procrastination and sloth. Which not only affects their learning and mental capabilities but drives them away from abstinence.
The memory of the child and his true freedom must be preserved in order to flourish true wisdom in the students and to conspire in them the motivation of learning.
Conclusions:
Many things must have been left while writing this as this is no short topic it requires deliberate working and understanding of human conscience and zeitgeist of time in order to identify its fallacies. This article is just an effort to compile the thoughts into an organized form to better understand the problem at hand and to convey it to others.
The Islamic concept of educational system is based on the spiritual and moral grounds and implies a set of principles which are completely different and in fact in conflict with the contemporary world view of education. The modern education has moved on after renouncing the existence of any other world other than what they perceive and feel, this attitude has casted a curse on society which has sabotaged its moral values. Dignity, courage, austerity, justice, freedom, wisdom, virtuousness, integrity, and absolute sincerity are absent from today’s learned and literate man. Because if it were a part of the education or if education would have taught these moralities; there must have been less suffering by human race.
“To learn is to understand and to understand we need free thought and for free thought we need not to be slaves”

خرد کو غلامی سے آ زاد کر