SWAMI VIVEKANANDA AND ISLAM

Dr. Hussain Randathani

Lord Vivekananda was a man of universal love and universal religion. He glorified the spiritual values of Hinduism against its ritual and ceremonial aspects and insisted the importance of Vedas and Upanishads in explaining the universality of Hinduism and Godhood. His comments on Islam was basically considering this aspect and he praised the Islamic concept of Godhood and brother hood and exhorted his people to study Vedanta through Islam. He also believed that ideals of every religion are one and same.[1] By undermining this fact the communal writers represents him as a man of hindutva, spreading hatred against Muslims. They, in order to suit their needs, included Vivekananda among their ranks of leaders by forgetting the fact that he stood for love and brother hood among all the religions and creeds. Swami explicitly said: In whatever community, in whatever country, in whatever belief one is born and brought up, we pay our homage to all the spiritual men who had traditionally given us advices and the straight path. Whatever may be their race , birth and colour , we bow before all those divine oriented souls who came forth to integrate the human race.”[2] We had his immortal address to the world parliament of religions in Chicago on 11^th September 1893 in which he clearly remarked: “I am proud to belong to a religion which has taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal toleration, but we accept all religions are true”[3]. Regarding religious differences he said: You may have different ways to reach God. Yours may be different of mine. The idea that everyone should follow a single religion is dangerous. When everybody maintains same opinion on religion and everybody seeks a single path to reach God, it is meaningless. Then all the religions and thoughts will perish. It is in vain and should be avoided…It is also absurd of talking on love by those who try to destroy his brother who seek a different way to reach God. There is no value for his love. ….Let the religions teach to worship either the Christ or Budda or the prophet. We have no quarrel with them.[4]

In November 1993 the London School of Oriental Studies organised a workshop that coincided with the centenary celebrations of Vivekananda's address in 1893 to the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago. The workshop came to the unanimous conclusion that any attempt to project Vivekananda as a Hindu fundamentalist grossly contradicted evidence. Tapan Rai Choudry of Oxford University made his statement that the Swami was among the earliest thinkers to claim the Indo-Islamic period as part of Indian heritage. Sister Nivedita, his earliest and closest disciple, has recorded Vivekananda's intense pride in the artistic inheritance of the Mughal era and his admiration for the Mughal policy of taking Hindu brides so that rulers of India had Muslim fathers and Hindu mothers. [5] In his article “On the future of Bharata” Vivkananda wrote: ‘The Muhammadan rule was experienced as a liberation to the poor and down trodden. That is how one fifth of our people became Muhammadans. To think that all these were brought by sword and fire is sheer madness. …… Is there any were in the world, such a folly which I have witnessed in Malabar. The poor Paraya cannot walk through the streets where upper caste people are walking. … All these Malabaris are mad people and their houses are mad houses. [6]

Vedanta, according to him, applauded a variety of religions and faiths: "Whether you are a Christian or a Buddhist, or a Jew or a Hindu, whatever mythology you believe in, whether you owe allegiance to the prophet of Nazareth, or of Mecca, or of India, or of anywhere else, whether you yourself are a prophet...it (Vedanta) preaches the principle which is the background of every religion and of which all prophets and saints and seers are but illustrations and manifestations".[7] He considered toleration as the basis of religion. “We cannot develop reform without stopping arrogance, bloodshed and barbarism. No reform can raise its head without bringing generous consideration mutually. The first step to this inevitable generosity is to view the religion of others with love and generosity….. Not only that, even if our ideals and cares are differed from others , we should help the people of other faiths. This is what we are doing in India. In India it was the Hindus who built mosques and churches for Muslims and Christians respectively. This is what we have to do.”[8]

Sri Rama Krishna Paramahamsa(1836-1886), the teacher of Vivekananda had preached earlier, the universality of all religions by saying that, ‘ all religions are only different paths to the same God’ (Jat mat tata path). Sri Rama Krishna told that idol worship and shapeless concept of God or monotheism and polytheism all had their values and were different paths to God.[9] As his disciple Vivekananda had roamed across India and had lengthy discussions with several Muslim maulvis on both Islamic and Hindu philosophy. He concluded that the differences between the Hindu and Muslim worlds were more apparent than real. The national ideal, for Swami Vivekananda, was drawn from the teachings of the ancient sages and thus essentially Hindu. But he saw no inherent conflict between this and the distinct stream of Indian Islam. "Shah Jehan would have turned in his grave to hear himself called a `foreigner'," the Swami once told a disciple who had erred in so describing the Mogul emperor.[10]

Christopher Isharwood, a British writer records the statement of Vivekananda given in a speech at America: “Mohammed – the Messenger of equality. You ask, ‘What good can there be in his religion?’ If there was no good, how could it live? The good alone lives, that alone survives… How could Mohammedanism have lived? Had there been nothing good in its teachings? There is much good.

“Mohammed by his life showed that amongst the Mohammedans there should be perfect equality and brotherhood. There was no question of race, caste, colour or sex. The Sultan of Turkey may buy a Negro from the mart of Africa, and bring him in chains to Turkey; but should he become a Mohammedan, and have sufficient merit and abilities, he might even marry the daughter of the Sultan. Compare this with the way in which Negroes and the American Indians are treated in this country (the United States of America)! And what do Hindus do? If one of your missionaries chances to touch the food of an orthodox person, he would throw it away…..

“As soon as a man becomes a Mohammedan, the whole of Islam receives him as a brother with open arms, without making any distinction, which no other religion does. If one of your American Indians becomes a Mohammedan, the Sultan of Turkey would have no objection to dine with him. If he has brains, no position is barred to him. In this country, I have never yet seen a church where the white man and the Negro can kneel side by side to pray…..

“It is a mistaken statement that has been made to us that the Mohammedans do not believe that women have souls…I am not a Mohammedan, but yet I have had opportunities for studying them, and there is not one word in the Koran which says that women have no souls, but in fact it says they have…..

“Vedantic spirit of religious liberality has very much affected Mohammedanism. Mohammedanism in India is quite a different thing from that in any other country. It is only when Mohammedans come from other countries and preach to their co-religionists in India about living with men who are not of their faith……..Practical Advaitism … is yet to be developed among the Hindus universally… Therefore we are firmly persuaded that without the help of practical Islam, theories of Vedantism, however fine and wonderful they may be, are entirely valueless to the vast mass of mankind…For our own motherland a junction of the two great systems, Hinduism and Islam – Vedanta brain and Islam body – is the only hope… I see in my mind’s eye, the future perfect India rising out of this chaos and strife, glorious and invincible, with Vedanta brain and Islam body.”[11]

Swami credited Mohammedanism with a complete destruction of priesthood and remarked that Protestantism borrowed it from that Muhammedans probably under Moorish influence.[12] Vivekananda had a deep contempt for all those who used force to spread their religion. He vehemently denounced the violence of Islam and Christianity in certain phases of their history. But he also knew that coercion alone, could not keep people converted. Islam won adherents with its message of equality and Christianity with its message of love. His concluding words in the famous Chicago speech clearly envisage his whole concept of the religions: “Similar is the case with religion. The Christian is not to become a Hindu or a Buddhist,nor a Hindu or a Buddhist to become a Christian. But each must assimilate the spirit of the others and yet preserve his individuality and grow according to his own law of growth. If the Parliament of Religions has shown anything to the world it is this. It has proved to the world that holiness, purity and charity are not the exclusive possessions of any church in the world, and that every system has produced men and women of the most exalted character. In the face of this evidence, if anybody dreams of the exclusive survival of his own religion and the destruction of the others, I pity him from the bottom of my heart, and point out to him that upon the banner of every religion will soon be written, in spite of resistance: "Help and not Fight," "Assimilation and not Destruction," "Harmony and Peace and not Dissension."[13]

His idea is again recalled in his speeches: My idea, therefore, is that all these religions are different forces in the economy of God, working for the good of mankind; and that not one can become dead, not one can be killed. Just as you cannot kill any force in nature, so you cannot kill any one of these spiritual forces. You have seen that each religion is living. From time to time it may retrograde or go forward. At one time, it may be shorn of a good many of its trappings; at another time it may be covered with all sorts of trappings; but all the same, the soul is ever there, it can never be lost. The ideal which every religion represents is never lost, and so every religion is intelligently on the march.[14] In the same speech he touched Mohammedanism: “Take Mohammedanism, for instance. Christian people hate no religion in the world so much as Mohammedanism. They think it is the very worst form of religion that ever existed. As soon as a man becomes a Mohammedan, the whole of Islam receives him as a brother with open arms, without making any distinction, which no other religion does. …….Just think of that: Islam makes its followers all equal — so, that, you see, is the peculiar excellence of Mohammedanism. In many places in the Koran you find very sensual ideas of life. Never mind. What Mohammedanism comes to preach to the world is this practical brotherhood of all belonging to their faith. That is the essential part of the Mohammedan religion; and all the other ideas about heaven and of life etc.. are not Mohammedanism. They are accretions.[15]

Here again Swami, while describing Vedanta praised the view of Islam on the subject. In 1898 he wrote to Muhammed Sarfaraj Husain, "Whether we call it Vedantism or any ism, the truth is that Advaitism is the last word of religion and thought and the only position from which one can look upon all religions and sects with love. I believe it is the religion of the future enlightened humanity. The Hindus may get the credit of arriving at it earlier than other races, they being an older race than either the Hebrew or the Arab; yet practical Advaitism, which looks upon and behaves all mankind as part of one's own soul, was never developed among the Hindus universally. On the other hand, my experience is that if any religion approached to this equality in an appreciable manner, it is Islam and Islam alone."[16] Therefore, without the help of practical Islam, the Vedanta theories, to whatever extent it is keen and amazing, for the majority of human beings it is worth less.”[17]

He knew very well the religious background of India and found that Hindu Muslim Unity is most essential for the sake of national freedom movement. Hence he fervently strove to bridge the gulf between the followers of the two major religions of the country, Hinduism and Islam. “Thus highlighting the genuine merit of Islamic faith he wanted to draw the attention of the people of either sect and sought to eliminate the deep- seated distrust between Hindus and Muslims in India”[18] Swami further said in the same letter, “ We want to lead man kind to the place where there is neither the Vedas nor the Bible nor the Koran, yet this has been done by harmonizing the Vedas , the Bible and the Quran. Mankind ought to be taught that religious but the varied expressions of the religion, which is Oneness , so that each may choose the path suits him best”[19]

Equality of all, irrespective of caste or creed, was an important feature of Vivekananda's vision of an ideal society. But this by no means implied the equalization of all human beings. He explained that human beings were not and could not be equal. Indeed, to entirely do away with the differences would bring about death and annihilation. And yet, Vivekananda struggled for abolition of privileges of any one nation, community, and sect and individual over another. "The idea that one man is born superior to another has no meaning in Vedanta", he wrote. He also told his followers: "Never judge the customs of other people by your own standards". Nor was he particularly enamored of his own customs or rituals. He did not accept, for instance, that bathing in the Ganga would negate sins; if this was so, he said, fish would be the purest of all beings. He wanted to demoralize the British people so that the freedom movements gains strength in India. Comparing the Muhammedans with the British he said: “You look to India. What has Hindu left? Wonderful temples everywhere. What has the Muhammadans left? Beautiful palaces. What has the English men left? Nothing but mounds of Broken brandy bottles”[20]

Vivekananda praises the role of Arabs and Islam in creating renaissance in Europe. With the down fall of Roman Empire the lamp of Europe was put off. It was Islam which brought back the Europeans into the light. “The Muslim wave struck the Europe from the east and the west. It cleared the darkness and ignorance of Europe and lighted the lamp of knowledge.”[21]. He declared that it is monism-advaitha- the last word of dharma and thought and the only place where all the religions and sects can be viewed with love. That is the dharma of the enligh tened race of the future. Since the Hindus are older than the Arabs and Hebrews they have got the quality of reaching it a bit earlier.

Despite all the above views and statements the communalists continuously project Vivekananda as their leader by saying that he stood for a Hindu nation as described in the Hindutwa texts. He has been depicted as an anti Muslim saint and for the purpose some statements have been put in to his mouth. His so called statement goes like this: : “Now, the Muslims are the crudest in this respect, and the most sectarian. Their watch-word is: there is one God (Allah), and Mohammed is His Prophet. Everything beyond that not only is bad, but must be destroyed forthwith, at a moment’s notice, every man or woman who does not exactly believe in that must be killed; everything that does not belong to this worship must be immediately broken; every book that teaches anything else must be burnt. From the Pacific to the Atlantic, for five hundred years blood ran all over the world. That is Mohammedanism (Islam)!”[22] “The more selfish a man, the more immoral he is. And also with that race which is bound down to itself has been the most cruel and the most wicked in the whole world. There has not been a religion that has clung to this dualism more than that founded by the Prophet of Arabia (Mohammed), and there has not been a religion (Islam) which has shed so much blood and been so cruel to other men. In the Koran there is the doctrine that a man, who does not believe these teachings, should be killed; it is mercy to kill him.”[23] These and similar statements are taken from his so called speeches which are said to be delivered in London and California in 1890 and 1896 respectively.[24] Since these statements are found paradoxical to what he had always said and written, their authenticity has to be tested and proved. It is unbelievable that a sage like Vivekananda who had his education at the feet of his master Sri Rama Krishna Paramahamsa, will make such inimical statement when he had been an admirer of Islam and its stand on advaita. It is pity that a man with human ideals and univesrsal out look is maligned for justifying the vandalism of the communalists. Ironically, those who are at the forefront of spreading communal ill-will in Gujarat today are quoting Swami Vivekananda as their inspiration. My study of the teachings of the great Swami show him as a champion of Hindu-Muslim unity. He was more a unifier than a divider. Mahatma Gandhi, after going through Vivekananda's works, said: "The love I had for my country became a thousand fold." Indeed, Vivekananda was a proponent of a broad humanism that both he and Gandhi believed to be the basis of Hinduism.