<<< Chapter 5

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Anwar Shaikh was a Jihadist turned apostate of Islam and became one of first and prominent critics of Islam of modern times. This is a part of his famous book, 'Islam, The Arab Imperialism'.

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Chapter 6: Prophet And Nationalism

Nationalism is the natural and most effective weapon of a Prophet, who wants to be loved and worshipped as the only God because of his immense dominance-urge, which tolerates no equal or rival. This is the reason that Muhammad made the following principle as the cornerstone of his prophethood:

"There is no God but Allah."

Allah is the Arabic name of God. Apparently, it signifies monotheism (existence of One God) but as Allah, along with His angels, worships the Prophet, it is Muhammad, who is the only God. Muhammad maintained his uniqueness by a further claim that he was not only the greatest but also the Last Prophet.

Seeking mass acknowledgement as the only God through proclamation of prophethood is a very difficult task, indeed, because the claimant wants this honour eternally, and not for a limited period. Nationalism is the most suitable vehicle for achieving this end: the Prophet raises a devoted band of his own nationals, who speak the same language, share the same cultural traditions, and love the same motherland. It makes unity easy for achieving the goal. The Prophet's wisdom lies in assuring his followers that their dignity or degradation is proportionate to their sincerity of belief in him, and acting upon the Law that he has given them; the master stroke is that the Law such as the Koran is projected as divine and eternal. Since Prophet is the fountain of the Divine Law, devotion to it, in fact, becomes an act of adoring the Prophet, who is depicted its ultimate goal because it is he who gets his followers into paradise.

However, it should be understood clearly that a Prophet is the most sincere leader of his nation in terms of wishing them glory, greatness and grandeur. It is because the loftier his nation, the greater his chances to be established as the Divine through its efforts: surely, a cat is more capable of performing higher deeds than a mouse. Unless, a Prophet has strong national leanings, he cannot arouse the national pride of his people. There is a stack of evidence available to demonstrate that Muhammad was a great national leader because he believed in the racial superiority of the Arabs, and he used the device of Prophethood to achieve this goal. Yet the Muslims insist that Muhammad had nothing to do with nationalism, and his message is based on human love and international brotherhood.

Instead, they claim that being a Prophet, Muhammad came to eliminate the last traces of shirk i.e. idolatry, which holds that there are other gods besides Allah; so enthusiastic was he in this respect that he declared all sorts of images including portraits and pictures as un-Islamic. This truth is fully attested by the following hadiths reported in Volume 7 of Bokhari: 840, 841, 842, 843 and 844.

How desperate Allah is for making people believe in Himself to the exclusion of all others! Yet, He claims to be the All-mighty, and the Creator. If it were true, He could have arranged creation in such a way that man would not have believed in any god but Allah, who could have thus saved a lot of nagging chagrin to Himself and also spared the most horrendous torture that anti-idolatry forces have caused to human-kind by way of religious hatred, leading to mutual destruction and carnage. If Allah really sent Muhammad for this purpose, then it proved to be an abortive exercise because there are infinitely more images in the world today than when Muhammad came to destroy them. Even the Muslims themselves have become the worst kind of idolaters; they all want to stuff their pockets with currency notes that carry the figure of some national hero; they possess cameras to photograph their loved ones, own television sets to watch pictures and have film industries in their countries.

Surely idol-bashing could not have been the apostolic purpose of Muhammad. If it was, then both Allah and Muhammad failed completely because, instead of disappearing, idolatry has multiplied itself. It does not prove that Allah is All-wise or All-Mighty. Does it?

However, when we assess the greatness of Muhammad in national terms, he tops the list of national heroes. The evidence to this effect is so overwhelming that only the naive will fail to see it:

The people of Muhammad i.e. Arabs, were divided into small tribes, perpetually at war with one another; poverty and ignorance had reduced them to extreme insignificance. On the contrary, the Jews, who settled in various parts of Arabia i.e. Mecca, Medina and Taif, enjoyed a high status owing to their grip on national trade and commerce. The Jewish superiority sprang from their religion, which states:

1. The Jews are the chosen people of God, and hence the superior race. (God could not choose second-class people to call them as his own. Could He?)

2. Yahwe, the Jewish God, had laid it down as the basic principle for the Jews that they should pursue the course of riches. In fact, they should be so wealthy that they ought to lend and not borrow.

3. The Bible had bestowed supernatural reverence on Jerusalem, the chief city of the Jews.

4. It was a Prophet, called Moses, who had welded his people into a nation and enthused them with the zeal of racial ideal demanding power, pomp and prestige.

As the Arabs practised idolatry, closely resembling the *Indian model, they did not have direct consciousness of a Prophet or Messiah. Since it is the Jews who popularised these concepts, which had contributed to their national unity and uniqueness, adopting their doctrines to create a similar Arab nationhood, would be a great model to follow. Not only the national appeal of the Jewish principles was tempting to Muhammad, but the fact that Abraham was a common ancestor to both the Jews and the Arabs also proved to be an irresistible factor. However, there was one major drawback: the Torah declared the Arabs inferior to the Jews because they are held as descendants of Ishmael, fathered by Abraham but borne by Hagar, who was Sarah's bondwoman of Egyptian origin, whereas Isaac, was borne by Sarah, Abraham's wife. Therefore to vouch for the superior birth of Isaac, the Jewish ancestor, the Bible declares: "But my (God) covenant will I establish with Isaac .." (Genesis 17: 21).

Though God gives Isaac priority, He does not neglect Ishmael: "And also of the son of the bondwoman (Ishmael) will I make a nation, because he is thy (Abraham's) seed" ( Genesis 21: 13 ) .

In chapter 17: 20, this Divine undertaking is more pronounced: "And as for Ishmael .... I have blessed him, and will make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly; twelve princes shall he beget, I will make him a great nation."

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* For details, see my article: "India And Democracy."
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However, a deeper study of the Old Testament shows that Ishmael is not being shown these favours in his own right but because he is someone from Abraham's seed. It is the divine Covenant that makes a person God's Lieutenant or Vicar on earth with godly powers, properties and priorities. And this covenant is with Isaac. This is the reason that God declares:

"For thou (the Jews) art an holy people unto the Lord
thy God: the Lord thy God, hath chosen thee to be a
special people unto Himself, above all people that are
upon the face of the earth" (Deuteronomy 7: 6).

To maintain the Jewish superiority, God emphasises:

"The Lord shall open unto thee (Jews) His good
treasures .... and bless all the work of thine hand:
and thou shall lend unto many nations, and thou shall
not borrow." (Deut. 28: 12).

Again, the Bible (Genesis 22: 9-12) states that the honour of being sacrificed to God was bestowed on Isaac, to make him the worthy father of the Chosen race.

These verses, not only announce superiority of the Jewish race, but also hold the Arabs in gross contempt compared with the Jews. A nationalist of the stature of Muhammad could not digest such an insult. His national pride prompted him to devise an alternative to degrade the Jews and elevate the Arabs. The following hadith explains this truth:

"Of the two tribes that God chose as the best were
the descendants of Ishmael and Isaac. God preferred
the children of Ishmael (Arabs, to the children of
Isaac - the Jews). Then God created Muhammad in
the chosen tribe of the Quresh (the descendants of
Ishmael ) and then he chose his family as the best
among the Quresh families and created Muhammad
as the best of all men." (Jame Tirmze, Vol. 2)

One can see here the racial pride of the Prophet; he not only exalts the Arabs over the Jews but also prefers his own family (Hashemites) to the rest of the Arab clans. Finally, he asserts his own superiority over each and every member of mankind to rank as Khair-ul-Bashar (the best of men). It is strange that the non-Arab Muslims eagerly quote the Prophet's Address of the Last Hajj to prove that there is no colour distinction or nationalism in Islam. This address is, obviously, a forgery because it contradicts the principles and practices of the Prophet. Again, one should remember that members of the Prophet's audience at that occasion, were all Arabs except a few slaves of the African origin. As the Arabs have different colours, the Prophet's remarks regarding colour apply to the Arabs and not the Africans, who were never given high posts in the Prophet's administration. One must also remember the famous hadith:

"Love of one's motherland is an integral part of faith."

The above quoted hadith clearly testifies to the Prophet's national zeal and demonstrates his effort to convince his fellow-Arabs that they are superior to the Jews, whose racial ties were forged into a distinct nationhood with the force of religious manipulation. Obviously, this is the reason that Muhammad, following the Mosaic model, invented Islam to glorify Arabia.

Muhammad was a wise man. He knew that the Jews of Arabia had tremendous economic resources and social expertise. If they could be persuaded to become a part of the Arab nationalism, Arabia would stand to gain a great deal from this amalgam. Therefore, as a first step, he held out an olive branch to them. It was a psychological approach, which sought national union by exploiting the common ancestry starting with Abraham. It was a serious attempt to raise a Super Semitic Nation. Consider the following facts:

1. The Prophet commences his national campaign by acknowledging the Jewish claim of racial superiority. The Koran says:

"Children of Israel, remember My (God's) blessings
wherewith I blessed you, and that I
have exalted you above all beings."
(The Cow, 11-115)

2. It is difficult to change one's relgion, but the Prophet Muhammad's genius made it easy to swallow the pill of conversion. He declared Islam was not a new religion but a continuation of the faith that Allah had handed down from Prophet to Prophet:

"He (Allah) has laid down for you as religion that He
charged Noah with, and that We (Allah) have
revealed to thee ( Muhammad ) and that we charged
Abraham with, Moses and Jesus ...."
(Counsel, XLII: 11 )

3. With a view to alleviating the Jewish fear that accepting Islam might destroy their national identity, the Prophet Muhammad even accepted diminution in his own status; he declared that Islam is the religion of Abraham, the Jewish patriarch:

" ... your religion (Islam) being the creed of your
father Abraham: He named you ( the followers of
Muhammad) Muslim." (The Pilgrimage, XXII: 75)

4. To drill home the message of Jewish-Arab unity, the Prophet bestows lavish praises on Abraham:

"Follow you the creed of Abraham (Islam), a man
of pure faith, and no idolater."(The Bee, XVI: 120)

5. "No, Abraham in truth was not a Jew: neither a
Christian, but he was a Muslim."
(The House of Imran, III: 60)

6. "We (Allah) chose him (Abraham) in the present
world, and in the world to come, he shall be among
the righteous." (The Cow, II: 120)

7. Adoption of Jerusalem as the Kibla or direction of worship by Muhammad, is the master stroke of his political acumen, which also proves that for raising a Super Semitic Nation, he was fraternal, flexible and far-sighted. As I shall explain in another chapter, it was a political act of high courage, which could not be taken without stupendous good will. In fact, it was a supreme example of sacrifice, which only a man of Muhammad's stature could envisage. Had the Jews listened to the Prophet, the unrivaled glory that Kaaba has enjoyed for the last fourteen centuries, would have belonged to Jerusalem, bestowing divine reverence on the Jews, instead of the unspeakable condemnation that they have suffered in the world of Islam since its inception.

The Jewish refusal to embrace Islam, turned the Prophet against them, and he decided to raise a purely Arab nation instead of a Super Semitic Nation. Considering the ferocity of the Prophet's anti-Jewish action, it is obvious that he t hought of Judaism as a permanent threat to the Arabs and his creed. Therefore, he prepared a master plan:

1. To raise a pure Arab nation by eliminating the Jews from Arabia.

2. To make Islam the tool of self-perpetuating Arab Imperialism in such a way that, although it is sharp, shocking and shattering in purpose, its appeal must be hilarious, hooking and hypnotising. In fact, it must create similar mental conditions in the non-Arab Muslims as a flame does in moths and they become eager to cremate themselves on it.

3. Realising the world-wide spread of the Jews and their influence stemming from their commerical expertise, he made Jew-hating a doctrine of the Islamic faith so that the Muslims all over the world must join the Arabs in condemning the Jews in the international arena.

I may discuss part one of this Prophetic Plan in this chapter, but shall deal with section two, i.e. Islam, the tool of self-perpetuating Arab Imperialism in chapter seven, and section three in chapter eight headed as "The Clash of Prophets."

1. Elimination of Jews

Hadith no. 4363 (Muslim) states that the prophet said: "O ye assembly of Jews, accept Islam and you will be safe ... you should know that the earth belongs to Allah and His apostle, and I wish that I should expel you from this land."

Here is the story of Banu Kainuka:

a. The Banu Kainuka, a Jewish tribe, were beseiged in A.D. 624. After a fortnight, they surrendered. The Prophet wanted to execute the lot of them. Abdullah bin Ubayy, who had been their ally, begged mercy for them. The prophet turned his face away to ignore the plea but Abdullah persisted in his pleading and caught hold of the Prophet's arm. The Prophet cursed him loudly and commanded him to release his grip but he would not do so until he had compassion on the captives. In support of his action, Abdullah enumerated the virtues of his Jewish associates and * said, "I will not let thee go until thou hast compassion on my friends; 300 soldiers armed in mail, and 400 unequipped - they defended me on the fields of Hadaik and Boath. Wilt thou cut them down in one day O Muhammad?"

Though fallen from the pulpit of power, Abdullah was still too powerful to be ignored. "Let them go!" the Prophet said reluclantly; "the Lord curse them, and him (Abdullah) too."

Though the Prophet spared their lives, he banished the whole tribe of Banu Kainuka from Arabia.

Here, the stance taken by Abdullah bin Ubayy clearly demonstrates that the Arabian Jews were not faithless and treacherous people as depicted by the Muslim historians. They honoured their alliances and fought for their principles. It is unfair to denegrate a people for struggling to hold its traditions and liberties.

b. Invasion of Khaiber
 

"What do they seek to hasten Our (Allah's)
chastisement? When it lights in their courtyard, how
evil will be the (morning) of them that are warned!
So turn thou (Muhammad) from them for a while,
and see; soon they shall see!
Glory be to thy Lord, the Lord of Glory .."
(The Rangers, XXXVII: 175-80)

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* The Life of Mahomet, P. 242
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What do these Koranic verses imply? They state that the Prophet had extended an invitation of embracing Islam to the Jews of Khaiber but they ignored the call. For inducing a false lull, the prophet allowed them sufficient time to feel smug about the warning (i.e. embrace Islam or else). Then all of a sudden, without giving them a notice of battle, as had been the custom of the invaders for centuries, the Prophet attacked the Jews of Khaiber. The hadith no. 4437 (Muslim) describes the event:

"When we entered the town, he (the Prophet) said:
'God is Great. Khaiber shall face destruction .... it
is a bad day for them who have been warned (and
have not taken heed).'" The people of the town had
just come out (from their houses) to go about their
jobs. They said (in surprise): "Muhammad has come.
We captured by force."

It is really astonishing that the Prophet attacks a people without any ultimatum, ignoring the established customs of warfare, especially when their only crime is that they refuse to accept him as the Apostle of God. Even a more stunning attitude is that of Allah, who feels so proud of the situation that He exclaims: "Glory be to thy Lord, the Lord of Glory!"

The situation that arose from this raid has been described in hadith no. 3325 (Muslim) and explained in the footnote by the annotator (in note no. 1870). As a result of the successful invasion, whatever the vanquished possessed, became property of the victor by grace of Allah. In the huge holy booty, was included a dazzling Jewish beauty of seventeen called Safiyya, the daughter of Huyayy bin Akhtab, the Chief of Quraiza and al-Nadir. She was the wife of Kinana, the keeper of the great treasure, reluctant to disclose its secrets. The Prophet ordered al-Zubayr bin al-Awwam to "torture him until you extract what he has." As a result, there was "kindled a fire with flint and steel on his chest until he was nearly dead." Once the treasure was discovered, he lost his significance, and was put to death at the Prophet's behest.

The pious victory turned the profane prisoners of war into possessions for the holy crusaders; one of them called "Dihya" came forward and said, "Messenger of Allah, bestow upon me a girl out of the prisoners." He said: "Go and get any girl." He made a choice for Safiyya bin Huyayy.

Dihya's fellow-crusaders, realising what had happened, reported to the prophet: "She is worthy of you only .....we have not seen the like of her among the captives of war." It is easy to see that it was not a reference to her social status but the bewitching beauty. The Prophet summoned them, and said to Dihya: "Take any other woman from among the prisoners."

Hadith no. 3329 (Muslim) describes the rest of the episode, which took place the day when her entire family had suffered decimation along with her husband. The Prophet freed Safiyya on the condition of marrying him. Anas, the narrator of this hadith adds that the prophet "then sent for my mother and asked her to embellish her (Safiyya). Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) then got out of Khaiber (and kept moving) until when he was on the other side of it (Khaiber); he halted and a tent was pitched for him (to pass the night.)"

Next morning a simple nuptial feast was held. Thereafter the journey to Medina started, Safiyya being seated behind him. Reaching close to the destination, their camel stumbled, and they both fell down. As people rushed to them, the Prophet said: "We have received no injury. We entered Medina and there came out the young ladies of the Household ( i .e. Prophet's other wives ) . They saw her (Safiyya) and blamed her for falling down."

The faithful have advanced some incredible arguments for Muhammad's marriage to Safiyya, but the fact is her alluring beauty. The Prophet stopped his journey while he was just on the other side of Khaiber and still within the tactical reach of the enemy if he could take revenge. Some sceptics have pointed out that the prophet should not have consummated his marriage with Safiyya immediately, as he did, because she was a young widow. According to his own law, he must have allowed sufficient time to establish that she was not pregnant.

c. Treatment of Banu Quraiza

Having expelled Banu Nadir from Arabia, the Prophet Muhammad decided to exterminate Banu Quraiza, another Jewish tribe.

Since it is the habit of the Muslim expositors to turn, twist and treat every event to suit their own palate, I shall ignore their explanations of this highly doleful episode of history to dwell on the actual handling of the Jews by the Prophet. For the sake of consistency, I may quote it from my own book: "Faith And Deception."

According to Aisha, the Prophet had just returned from the Battle of Ditch, and had hardly taken off his armour when the angel Gabriel appeared and told him to destroy Banu Quraiza (hadith no. 4364 - Muslim). Just see, how proudly Allah narrates this event in the Koran:

"And He (Allah) brought down those of the People of
the Book, who supported them from their fortresses
and cast terror in their hearts; some you
(Muhammad) slew, some you made captive.
And He (Allah) bequeathed upon you their lands,
their habitations, and their possessions,
and a land you never trod. God is powerful
over everything." (The Confederates, XXXIII: 25)

The besieged Jews, having suffered for twenty-five days, surrendered on the condition that their fate would be judged by Saad bin Muaadh, a chieftain of the Ansar. The hadith no. 4369 of the Sahih Muslim contains his judgement, which states " ... kill their fighters and capture their women and children."

The Jews were taken out from their fort, and like animals, were penned up in separate yards. They prayed all night to their Lord God for mercy while a long deep trench was being dug up by the zealous Muslims at the command of the Prophet. It was a mass grave for the Jews, who had defied Muhammad to protect their faith, possessions, wives and children. As the sunrays were about to break through the curtain of darkness, the grave was ready to provide a last refuge to the victims of helplessness. Having said prayers to the Most Compassionate Allah, the Prophet, who claimed to be Mercy for all beings, took a seat by the dreadful pit to supervise the operation personally. The Jewish men were brought in bands of five or six, without knowing their destination. Each man, with his hands tied at the back, was commanded to lie down and stretch his neck over the bank of the ditch, where stood Ali and Zubair, who removed heads from their bodies with massive swords. By dusk, the job was completed. The pleasure of Allah and Muhammad led to the cold-blooded killing of 800 Jewish men, which in terms of today's inflated population, would equal 80,000 men. Their children were enslaved and women turned into concubines with a view to providing the faithful with the foretaste of paradisiac delights.

Saad bin Muaadh's decision was a demonstration of extreme cruelty, especially when the Prophet Muhammad claimed to be "Mercy for all beings," and not just for the Muslims. The Muslim scholars justify this verdict on the pretext that Saad was not in a good mood owing to ill health. This in fact, is an anti-Islamic attitude because another hadith states as a principle that a Qazi (judge) must not give judgement when in a bad state of mind. The attitude of the Muslim scholars is false because the hadith no. 4371 (Muslim) clearly states that the prophet fully approved of the judgement by saying: "you have judged their case with the judgement of God, the Exalted and Glorified."

Among the Jewish women that fell to the Muslim faithfuls as spoils of the war, was an enchanting young beauty of twenty-two, called Rihana, whose husband, parents and closest relations had just been massacred and buried at the Prophet's command. He wasted no time in inviting her to accept his Prophethood and become one of the wives, but she failed to understand how the "Mercy for all beings" could make such a proposal when she was being choked by grief, pain and sorrow. When she refused to embrace Islam, the prophet took her for a concubine, which is an unmarried slave woman. The Islamic law allows the master to use her sexually, but treats her children as legitimate! The Prophet owned another concubine presented to him by the Governor of Egypt as a personal gift. Her name was Mary (Mariya); she bore him a son called "Ibrahim."

From the above episode, one can clearly see that the treatment of Banu Quraiza and other Jewish tribes, is a pathetic model of ethnic cleansing. The Jews suffered this fate when they refused to become Arabs. We cannot find an example of such extreme nationalism so early in history. Yet the Muslims believe that Islam does not recognise nationalism. They insist that it is a message of international brotherhood!

It is a gross misconception. Here is the truth that exposes the true nationalistic nature of Islam:

1. In fact, Islam is based on the racial pride of the Prophet Muhammad, who wanted to exalt the Arabs over the Jews. For sake of convenience, I re-quote the hadith:

"Of the two tribes that God chose as the best were
the descendants of Ishmael and Isaac. God preferred
the children of Ishmael (Arabs) to the children of
Isaac (the Jews). Then, God created Muhammad in
the chosen tribe of Quresh (the descendants of
Ishmael) and then He chose the best family among
the Quresh and created Muhammad as the best of
men." (Jame Tirmze, Vol. 2)

Since every word of this hadith emits the national pride of Muhammad, it is difficult to imagine that Islam can have any purpose other than serving the cause of Arabia. When we look into it more carefully, it transpires that Islam represents a narrow concept of nationalism, which restricts the right of governing to the Quresh, that is, the Prophet's clan only:

2. "May Allah destroy those who intend to humiliate the Quresh." (Jame Tirmze, Vol. 2)

3. " ...the prerogative to rule shall remain vested in the Quresh, and whosoever is hostile to them, Allah shall destroy him.." (Sahih Bokhari, Vol. 4)

4. "The right to rule shall belong to the Quresh even if two men existed." (Bokhari, Vol. 4)

One must remember that Volume 9 of the Sahih Bokhari clearly states that Abu Bakr was chosen as the First Caliph on the authority of these hadiths because he belonged to the Quresh tribe, and the other Arab clans had to withdraw their claims. This fact became entrenched as the political doctrine of Islam. This is why all the caliphs, both in Baghdad and Spain, came from the Quresh family over a period of many centuries.

5. That the Prophet was a staunch believer of Arab nationalism, is confirmed by his extreme love for Mecca i.e. Arabia, his homeland:

The Prophet said, "O Mecca, by Allah you are better than any part of the earth, and dearer to me than the rest of the world." (Jame Tirmze, Vol. 2)

6. "He who aggresses against Arabia, shall not win my love, nor will I intercede for him." (Jame Tirmze, Vol. 2)

7. For bestowing Divine reverence on Mecca (the home town of the Prophet), he claimed that when Allah expelled Adam from the Garden of Eden, He ordered him to go to Mecca and build there the House of God. And so, he did.

Nobody wants to have his house built in a desert if he can have it in a green valley. Why did God prefer the Arabian desert? Again, as Adam was the first person, who ever lived, there could not have been such a thing as Mecca or Arabia. No faithful has ever considered this point. It is a proof of their total brainwashing.

8. The Kaaba, i.e. Mecca was projected as more sacred than Jerusalem because it was claimed by the Prophet that it had been rebuilt by Abraham.

There is no historical proof that Abraham ever visited Mecca. He was an inhabitant of Ur in Mesopotamia, hundreds of miles away from it. If it was a fact, the Old Testament would have certainly mentioned it. It was an attempt of the Prophet to make Arabia the centre of international adoration so that foreign nations must accept the Arab cultural hegemony.

9. To make sure that Mecca becomes the hub of international reverence, the prophet declared that even God was worthy of worship owing to His association with Mecca.

"I have only been commanded
to serve the Lord of this territory (Mecca)
which He has made sacred." (The Ant, 27: 91)

10. One should remember that Moses had associated God with Israel only to make the Jews a special people. The Prophet Muhammad followed this model to create a Divine Arab nation, which should be culturally obeyed and loved by all other people. See the following:

"YOU (the Arabs) are the best nation ever brought
forth ... bidding honour, and forbidding dishonour..."
(The House of Imran, III: 105)

Here the non-Arab Muslims, especially the Indians, the Pakistanis, the Bangladeshis, who have lost all sense of national honour owing to a long period of political humiliation, buttress their psychological degradation by pretending that in this verse "you" means the Umma i.e. the international community of Muslims. The stark truth is that when this verse was "revealed," there was no Umma but the Arab Muslims. Examine the following verse to understand its true meaning:

11. By the Clear Book,
behold, We have made it an Arabic Koran;
haply you will understand ..."
(Ornaments XLIII, 1-4)

There is no room for any ambiguity here: The Koran has been delivered in Arabic so that "you" - the Arabs must understand it. Therefore, Islam is meant for the Arabs only because it is their language.

This discussion clearly demonstrates that the Prophet Muhammad was a great nationalist. To raise a pure Arab nation, he carried out a systematic programme of ethnic cleansing, and to motivate his people with a supernatural zeal, he assured them that they were appointed by Allah as the Best Nation, charged with the international duty to bid honour and forbid dishonour. (III-105)

This divine duty of the Arabs "to bid honour and forbid dishonour" is what makes them Warden of humanity, and thus, entitles them to declare Jehad i.e., holy war against infidels to achieve their secular aims.

A Prophet, as stated earlier, is a man of super ego; he wants to be treated as God's Superior without discarding his mantle of humanity because this indirect approach makes his actions look unselfish and a part of divine duty. For raising himself to such unique status, he needs a strong and well-disciplined nation, thoroughly devoted to his cause. This type of ambition requires followers, who are so drunk with the wine of faith that they make fun of reason, the foundation of humanity. This is why a Prophet uses revelation as the tool for realising his dreams: without doubt this is the most effective means of brainwashing, which reduces a man to the level of a monkey, and he cannot see the difference between honour and dishonour: honourable is what serves his purpose: the rest is dishonourable.

The prophet Muhammad being a great visionary, knew that the history of nations is subject to rise and fall. Therefore, a fallen nation cannot keep a Prophet on the pulpit of divinity. With the force of sagacity, he made Islam, the self-perpetuating Arab Imperialism in such a way that it is very hard, indeed, to penetrate this truth that lies concealed under its most alluring cover of piety, purity and probity.

In the next chapter, we may have a glimpse of this mystery.

>>> Chapter 7