The Convert: A Tale of Exile and Extremism (27 page)

118   
“All that was good, true… sufficient to convince me.”
Maryam Jameelah,
Why I Embraced Islam
(Delhi: New Crescent Publishing Co., 1997 reprint), 12.

118   
“with a complete, comprehensive way of life… into a perfect harmony.”
Jameelah,
Islam versus the West,
7.

118   
“My quest was always for absolutes.”
Jameelah,
Why I Embraced Islam,
11.

118   
The list of schizophrenic behaviors… they manifested.
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders:
1952 edition. “Schizophrenic reaction, catatonic type. These reactions are characterized by conspicuous motor behavior, exhibiting either marked generalized inhibition (stupor, mutism, negativism and waxy flexibility) or excessive motor activity and excitement. The individual may regress to a state of vegetation.”

119   
Psychiatrists who once had described… began behaving like one.
S. P. Fullinwider,
Technicians of the Finite: The Rise and Decline of the Schizophrenic in American Thought
(Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1982), 150.

119–120   
Muhammad Asad… gives life to dead hearts.
Muhammad Asad,
The Message of the Qur’an
(Gibraltar: Al-Andalus, 1980), 393.

126–127   
Freud’s theories held sway… serious questions.
Jameelah,
Why I Embraced Islam,
11.

130   
“left to die, herded naked and incontinent like cattle.”
Jameelah, “A Manifesto of the Islamic Movement,” 32.

130   
“Schizophrenia is no longer limited… are taking place.
” Jameelah,
Westernization and Human Welfare,
67–68.

130–131   
Qutb had made a similar observation… of the colonized.
Paul Berman, “The Philosopher of Islamic Terror,”
New York Times Magazine,
March 23, 2003.

131   
“all embracing system… salvation of the individual personality.”
Jameelah, “A Manifesto of the Islamic Movement,” 32.

132   
“made mistakes in my life” and “done some foolish things.”
Maryam Jameelah to Abul Ala Mawdudi, April 7, 1962, NYPL.

Chapter 6: The Convert

135   Epigraph from
The Secret Rose Garden of Sa’d ud din Mahmüd Shabistarí,
trans. Florence Lederer (London: John Murray, 1920), 72.

137   
Maryam would also ascribe… a cost-benefit analysis.
Jameelah,
Islam Face to Face with the Current Crisis,
5, 7–10.

141   
“After declining your kind invitation for so long… too late to accept it now?”
Maryam Jameelah to Abul Ala Mawdudi, March 22, 1962, NYPL.

149   
“I hope they learn a lesson from your example.”
Abul Ala Mawdudi to Maryam Jameelah, June 20, 1961, NYPL.

149   
It never ceased to amaze him… fight against the godless communists.
Abul Ala Mawdudi to Maryam Jameelah, April 1, 1961, and May 19, 1961, NYPL.

149–150   
Maryam began the letter by… Allah was forgiving and merciful.
Maryam Jameelah to Abul Ala Mawdudi, April 7, 1962, NYPL.

150   
He had already made it clear… similar incongruities, he insisted.
Abul Ala Mawdudi to Maryam Jameelah, February 25, 1961, NYPL.

153   
If Maryam accepted… “Please let me know if you accept these arrangements or not.”
Abul Ala Mawdudi to Maryam Jameelah, July 2, 1963, NYPL.

155–156   
Over 7 million traveled… Muslims and non-Muslims.
Jacques Semelin, ed., “The Partition Massacres, 1946–1947,”
Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence.
http://www.massviolence.org/.

156   
Once Pakistan became a reality… upheaval of Partition.
Adams, “Ideology of Mawlana Mawdudi,” 376.

PART III: THE CONCRETE LIBRARY

Mas’ud-e-Bakk poem from http://www.chishti.ru/shisti_poetry.html

Chapter 7: The Renegade

164   
This comprised the city’s sum total… referred to as “civil society.”
Conversation with Najum Sethi, December 2007.

167   
“We should in Palestine form a portion… an outpost of civilization as opposed to barbarism.”
Jameelah,
Western Imperialism Menaces Muslims,
26.

167   
Within days of signing… Arab residents from the land.
Benny Morris,
The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 521–25.

168   
“Every minute of our lives… part of the testing.”
Jameelah,
Islam versus the West,
116.

171   
The compound at Mansoorah… passed along to the family.
“An Interview with Haider Farooq Mawdudi,” J&K Insights, translated from “Diwar-e-Shahar,” August–September 1998, http://www.jammu-kashmir.com.

171   
Her family had made its fortune… eyes of Islam.
Nasr,
Mawdudi and the Making of Islamic Revival,
33–34, 152.

171   
When Maryam asked her… husband’s great patience.
Interview with Maryam Jameelah, December 2007.

172   
“Qutb is a great admirer of you and specially recommended your books to me.”
Margaret Marcus to Abul Ala Mawdudi, May 29, 1961, NYPL.

173   
To Mawdudi’s dismay… noncooperation movement
. Adams, “Ideology of Mawlana Mawdudi,” 373.

173   
During these years… economics, and political theory.
See translation of Mawdudi’s autobiographical notes,
Khud Nawisht,
in Masudul Hasan,
Sayyid Abul A’ala Mawdudi and His Thought
(Lahore: Islamic Publications, 1984), 2 vols., 24.

174   
“I studied your life-sketch… unexpected for me.”
Mawlana Mawdudi to Maryam Jameelah, February 25, 1961, NYPL.

174   
“I affirmed my faith… soul to the question.”
Gilani,
‘Maududi’: Thought and Movement,
50–51.

175   
He appropriated concepts… his left was doing
. “Now if these books are merely translated they cannot be of much use to us. It is, therefore, imperative that persons having knowledge of modern legal systems should work on all such materials and rearrange them to fulfill the modern requirements.” Mawdudi,
Islamic Law and Constitution,
104.

175   
The ulema were often dismayed… doubted his grasp of Islamic history.
Ahmad,
Murder in the Name of Allah,
28. In chapter 2 of this book the author shows the continuities between the Orientalist representation of Islamic history and Mawdudi’s own grasp of it.

175   
Equally often he let… question his authority.
Mawdudi,
A Short History of the Revivalist Movement in Islam,
preface to the 4th edition, 4.

176   
“Sir, what do we know… pens is our pleasure.”
Mawdudi, “Jihad in Islam,” 2.

177   
A sympathetic account… before it could be published.
This is speculation based on the period in which the book was written. It seems to me too that had it been a critical book, the British would not have censored it.

177   
More than any other thinker… traditional village life.
In developing this point I am indebted to Akeel Bilgrami’s insightful essay “On Enlightenment and Enchantment,”
Critical Inquiry,
Spring 2006.

178–179   
But Sharia also dictated… preserve national honor.
Mawdudi, “Jihad in Islam,” 8–9.

179   
Similarly, divine law… only enslaved.
Hasan,
Sayyid Abul A’ala Maududi and His Thought,
51–62.

179   
Following Sharia… obligation, he insisted.
Dr. Sayez Riaz Ahmad,
Mawlana Mawdudi and the Islamic State
(Lahore: People’s Publishing House, 1976), 122.

179   
Yet the more deeply… how Islam might be renewed.
Ibid. See discussion of the writing of
Al-Jihad fi’l-Islam
in notes, 64.

179   
“are preventing the truth of God from prevailing.”
Ahmad,
Maulana Maududi and the Islamic State,
123–24, citing
Al-Jihad fi’l-Islam
(Lahore: Islamic Publications, 1962), 48–50.

179   
To define jihad as primarily… Qutb soon wrote.
Rahnema,
Pioneers of Islamic Revival,
84.

179–180   
“After years of study and thinking… lawful and constitutional means.”
Nawa-i-Waqt,
November 10, 1962, as quoted in Jameelah,
Islam in Theory and Practice,
256.

180   
In “Jihad in Islam”. “communities on the wrong path.”
Abul A’la Maududi,
System of Government Under the Holy Prophet
(Lahore: Islamic Publications, 1978), 19-20.

180   
Similarly, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan should seek   .   .   . to whatever extent possible.
“Hence it is imperative for the Muslim Party for reasons of both general welfare of humanity and self-defense that it should not be content with establishing the Islamic System of Government in one territory alone, but to extend the sway of the Islamic System all around as far as its resources can carry it.” Mawdudi, “Jihad in Islam,” 21.

180   
To achieve this, it was imperative… tanks, airplanes, and so on.
Mawdudi,
A Short History of the Revivalist Movement in Islam,
146   47. Mawdudi seems to equate science with military technology. He never mentions its other contributions to human welfare, for example, medicine, electricity, the internal combustion engine. Instead he defends Islam’s appropriation of Western military technology by citing the Prophet’s use of the battering ram.

181   
“But after the failure of admonishing… under my feet today.”
Al-Ghashiya 88:23   26; quoted in
Al-Jihad f’il-Islam,
3rd edition, 1962, 141–42.

181   
“I tremble after reading this writing… not words but merciless stones.”
See “A Review of the Pakistani Government’s ‘White Paper’;
Qadiyaniyyat
—A Grave Threat to Islam: Replies to Some Allegations,” a sermon delivered by Hadrat Mirza Tahir Ahmad, on February 15, 1985, at the Fadl Mosque, London, 30–34. http://www.alislam.org.

181   
“Islam requires the earth… the whole planet.”
Mawdudi, “Jihad in Islam,” 6.

183   
The world, he said… wrest control of the train.
This speech, given in April 1945, has been translated twice. I have paraphrased drawing on both versions. Sayyid Abul A’la Mawdudi,
The Islamic Movement: Dynamics of Values, Power, and Change,
ed. Khurram Murad (Leicester, UK: Islamic Foundation, 1984), 72, 77. See also Abul A’la Maududi,
The Moral Foundations of the Islamic Movement
(Lahore: Islamic Publications Ltd., 1976), 8. “The duty of a person who puts faith in the creed of Islam is not confined to ordering his life so far as is possible according to the tenets of Islam, but his faith demands that he should direct all his efforts to the attainment of one purpose only, i.e. that power and authority should be wrested from the hands of the infidels and the wicked and that the Divine code of life be established in the world.”

Chapter 8: A War Between and Within

188   
“No law can be made… germs of indecency and obscenity.”
Mawdudi,
Purdah and the Status of Woman in Islam,
167–68, 171.

197   
In 1987 Maryam wrote an article reappraising Mawdudi’s work.
Maryam Jameelah, “An Appraisal of Some Aspects of Maulana Sayyid Ala Maudoodi’s Life and Thought,”
Islamic Quarterly
31, no. 2 (1987).

198   
During the government’s siege… make political hay.
Joshua T. White, “Vigilante Islamism in Pakistan: Religious Party Responses to the Lal Masjid Crisis,” (Washington D.C.: Hudson Institute, November   11, 2008). http://www.currenttrends.org.

199   
“I thought of the amoeba… going inside her.”
As quoted in Fullinwider,
Technicians of the Finite,
149.

199   
Not long before his death… nothing further I can do.
Interview with Haider Farooq Mawdudi, December 2007.

200   
Once he fell ill… submission to Allah
. Interview with Ahmad Farooq Mawdudi, September 2008. See also Nasr,
Mawdudi and the Making of the Islamic Revivalism,
45, for an account of Mawdudi’s disillusion with the direction of his party’s political struggle.

200   
With Zia’s coup… in the army curriculum.
Nasr,
Vanguard of the Islamic Revolution,
172.

200   
In February, to Mawdudi’s great pleasure… Islamic penal code.
A. Rashid Moten,
Islam and Revolution: Contributions of Sayyid Mawdudi
(Kano, Nigeria: Bureau for Islamic Propagation, 1988), 29–30.

200   
Six months later… trumped-up murder charge.
Nasr,
Vanguard of the Islamic Revolution,
181, 190.

200   
At best, Mawdudi concluded… worry about it.
Interview with Haider Farooq Mawdudi, December 2007.

201   
His godly voice… citizens of Muslim countries.
Misbahul Islam Faruqi,
Introducing Mawdudi
(Karachi: Student Publications Bureau, 1969), 7. As quoted in Sheila McDonough,
Muslim Ethics and Modernity: A Comparative Study of the Ethical Thought of Sayyid Ahmad Khan and Mawlana Mawdudi
(Waterloo, Ontario: Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion, 1984), 62.

201   
Faisal Shahzad… e-mails to friends.
“For Times Square Suspect, Long Roots of Discontent,”
New York Times,
May 15, 2010.