Sindh’s greatest Sufi poet and mystic, Hazrat Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai was born in 1689 to a well-respected family of the province. Bhittai was never attracted to comfort and rejected the luxuries of life to search for true spirituality.
Spending most of his life in deep solitary meditation, the questions that burned through his mind revolved around man’s purpose for being on earth and his relationship with his creator.
It was through his poetry that Bhittai preached the beliefs of tolerance, love and conquering tyranny and oppression.
Tolerance is what makes a man human. Man, who has many desires, moods and ambitions, is constantly struggling to get ahead of the rest or to achieve his desired objectives.
It seems that everyone is in some kind of a race and we are competing against one another and many a times, this competition gets severe because we tend to overlook others’ feelings or even attempt to hurt others.
Islam, being a way of life, shows us how to lead our lives on a day to day basis… how to behave with different relations, how to perform good deeds, how to talk, how to discipline ourselves and so much more.
It is a known fact that God loves those who love his beings. Indeed, why not? Don’t we love those who show love towards our children? But sadly, everything falls apart when it comes to that race! People are losing faith in one another, trust being broken more regularly than ever! A brother doesn’t trust his brother! Husband doesn’t have faith in his wife! One relation betraying another is becoming a common practice. Back-biting, which is strictly prohibited in Islam, is no big deal for anyone anymore.
One looks for an opportunity at all times to malign the other. Rules are broken with pride, there is no patience to stand at a traffic signal just for a few seconds and throwing garbage and spitting paan on roads and streets is common now! Look at what we have done to our historical buildings and heritage sites!
You must be wondering why did I shift from the topic of Bhittai and ended up here. Well you see this is what we need to understand and value because love and tolerance, as propagated by Bhittai, is what we need today to fix our society.
We need tolerance to co-exist and we need love to care for all beings created by God, thus making the Almighty happy.
Bhittai wrote poetry on the women of Sindh, admiring their courage and loyalty. Women, who give birth to life, need to be respected and appreciated for the struggle they go through in a world where fathers, brothers and sons dominate the society.
Wise women suffer because their wisdom becomes a nuisance for them. Bhittai’s mesmerising poetry pays tribute to women and their various abilities.
Bhittai’s message was not limited to one region. His philosophy of love and tolerance had no boundaries and he preached about greater harmony.
Today, when countries are aggressively confronting one another, conspiracy theories are popping up every single second, terrorists are working on their evil plans, territories are becoming more precious than human life and blood of innocent people and children is being shed in different wars, we need the message of Bhittai to spread! We need to end these wars, stop the conspiracy game, stop the shedding of precious blood and this is what Bhittai’s philosophy of greater harmony is all about. It is the best resolution of all conflicts. Bhittai undoubtedly thought much ahead of his time and that is why he devoted his life to the greatest cause of spreading love and tolerance amongst all.
Bhittai’s poems, collected and compiled, have survived generations and inspired million across borders and faiths. His teachings of humanity, piety, respect and emancipation of women, tolerance between faiths and moral courage continue to be our guiding light.
Sindh is known for its great Sufi saints and we take pride in their message of love and peace. Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto, who often visited the shrines of the Sufi saints in Sindh, understood how important it was to spread this message of peace and so she initiated the process of reconciliation.
Her vision of reconciling for greater peace in the country and region is a mission for us today and we continue to move in that direction under the leadership of President Asif Ali Zardari, who too forgave those who never forgave him.
They punished him for being on the right path, they tortured him to break his silence but he struggled with dignity. The Pakistan People’s Party continues to promote peace through reconciliation.
Today we need to remind ourselves of Bhittai’s message of love and tolerance and peaceful co-existence. We need to forget our differences and learn to respect each other’s point of view. We need to end disputes and conflicts and value the little things in life. We need to make peace within and outside, reconcile and work together for greater peace and harmony. We need to really work hard to make our world the better place to live in! Long live Bhittai…
The writer is Sindh information and electric power minister.