|
Dear Rashid
Now I understand you
better, but I still regard the view as odd, and unnecessarily bleak. You
seem to regard the “action and reaction” as always a negative thing, which
it surely isn’t; it’s just part of the human condition. It is the language
of love and comedy, as well as hatred and tragedy. As you yourself concede,
you’re doing it too, in your reaction to what I wrote. And given that
humans do that, isn’t it better that it be in words (when the concepts are
in conflict) than in hostile action?
Yes, to some extent we
humans are conditioned creatures. But we can also be independent-minded
enough to escape that conditioning. The very fact that you and I
acknowledge our conditioning is evidence of that. You say our conditioning
has fragmented us into religions and tribes. That is historically true, but
less so than before. In our increasingly globalised world, old barriers and
unsupportable traditions are breaking down. Our fathers had prejudices that
we lack. A black man has just become the most powerful man in the world.
One of my complaints
about the Muslim world is that it has, in general, been slower to abandon
the kinds of dualities you complain about. I see this in the refusal of
many Muslims to acknowledge the morality of people who are not Muslim. I
see it in the concept of the umma; why should
co-religionists matter more than other people?
You say that none of
you are enlightened by what I have written. Yet I am unsure why that should
be. I certainly did not expect people with long-established views simply to
change them on my say-so. However, enlightenment mainly involves
understanding, and, agree with them or not, my views are fairly clear. For
example, take what I have written in this message. Is it “blabber’ or
“psychobabble”? If you would call it that, Rashid, then I can only assume
that you want to reduce all human communication to purely functional
utterances, such as “Pass the salt” or “I’ll take the red car with the
manual transmission”.
Regards
Peter
|