During the past few months, the Punjab has been projected as another region of religious militancy in Pakistan by the Western governments and their mainstream media. A number of terror attacks including the one on the shrine of Hazrat Ali Hajveri, commonly known as Data Ganj Baksh the most influential eleventh century sufi is quoted as an example of this disturbing trend in the province. Moreover, the attacks on the shia religious procession in Lahore are also cited to reinforce the assertion that sectarian differences are brewing into an acute form of religious hatred and intolerance among the Punjabis.
This assertion is untrue. The terror incidents are a fact but to aver that these happenings reflect a radicalization of the Punjabis will be a hasty induction. On the contrary, Punjab has been a pluralistic society where people of different religious faiths, sectarian denominations and ethnicities have co-existed harmoniously for several centuries. The masterminds behind these acts probably wished to communicate that the mystical traditions that bounded the social fabric of this province were losing their vigour and vitality. Such incidents may threaten the physical structures (mausoleums) that contain the remains of these mystics but they cannot kill their philosophy as it is deeply ingrained in the psyche of Punjab.
Even today, these mystics and their teachings are more popular in Punjab than the sayings and doings of any religious leader whether inside or outside Pakistan. What is in their message that hasnt lost its appeal among the Punjabis? Qazi Javed in Hindi-Muslim Tehzib states several factors in this regard, the more profound being these mystics love for humanity, sense of tolerance and accommodation towards followers of other faiths as well as emphasis on social justice and equality. Hinduism and Islam were two predominant religions in the subcontinent and Ikram Ali Malik in Volume 1 of Tarikh-i-Punjab writes that Data Ganj Baksh and sufis after him transformed Hindu-Muslim animosity into love and toleration.
Incidentally the minorities in Pakistan, being too small in number, do not pose any threat to the followers of Islamic faith yet there are certain Muslims who think they are the chosen ones and do not shirk from resorting to violence against those whom they do not consider to be good Muslims. About such self-proclaimed righteous preachers, the mystical Sultan Bahu poetically said:
(Having read a thousand books they feel they know.
But as they have not read the one essential word love,
they wander astray, and poor ones are lost.)
It was not only Sultan Bahu, who emphasized the importance of love, other Punjabi mystics such as Waris Shah and Baba Bulleh Shah also urged their disciples to establish a bond of love with their Creator and fellow human beings, and shun theological rigidity. The universality and timelessness in the poetic message of these two sufis can be appreciated from a set of verses quoted in The Indus saga and the making of Pakistan authored by Barrister Aitzaz Ahsan, who was declared as one of the top 100 intellectuals of the world by a leading American magazine, a few years ago. On page 146, he has cited a couplet from the kafi of Baba Bulleh Shah:
(Reading the Vedas and the Quran (they) are tired.
By bowing to the ground, the foreheads are worn out.
God is neither in the temple nor in Mecca.
One who has found love, his light is powerful)
On page 147, he has reproduced a quartet of Waris Shah:
(Believing they are well read, muftis feel they can give judgement.
But without love they have remained ignorant
More studying gives no knowledge of God
For that there is only one apt word: love)
In addition to this message of love, the saints directed their adherents to stay clean of sectarian hatred. That is why except some isolated engineered incidents of sectarian strife, by and large, sectarian harmony and tolerance have prevailed in Punjab. Thanks to Sultan Bahus advice:
(I am neither a sunni nor a shia;
Both cause me heart burn
The arid part of my journey ended
When I turned away from both
And plunged into the ocean of oneness)
A somewhat similar message was preached by Baba Fareed, who is acknowledged as one of the most influential sufis of the Chishtia Order. Once, when a disciple presented him a pair of scissors, he, instead asked for a needle stating, Give me a needle because I want to unite not to separate (people). Such high thoughts have been well-rooted in the minds of the people, who, irrespective of class and creed have been listening to the sufi poetry sung in the evenings to the accompaniment of music for centuries. The practice of Peeri-muridi and the Khanqahi Nizam have enabled the sufi thought to spread and endure, for over a millennium, now. The Khanqahs of the Peers are generally adjacent to a mosque or a madrasah, where all those, who come to seek solace from sufferance are offered free food and accommodation while the murids act as the transmitters of the message of their peers. This message of love, tolerance and universal brotherhood of humanity is quite alive in Punjab and those who intend to sow the seeds of discord do not stand a chance.
The writer is an academic and journalist. He can be reached at [email protected]
