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Sufi Islam has recently been coming under attack across the country. A number of shrine caretakers in Sindh have been mysteriously murdered. Last week, in Buner, Taliban militants locked down Pir Baba’s shrine and continue to guard its entrance. Last month, Sufi mystic Rehman Baba’s shrine in the outskirts of Peshawar was bombed by militants.
What explains these assaults on the symbols and practitioners of Sufi Islam? Do the militants view Sufism’s continued popularity as a threat? And do you think that it can be effectively used to counter the increasing popularity of hardline Salafi Islam?
The attack on Sufi Islam is in line with the Wahabbi/Salafi doctrine practiced by the taliban. The idea is to purge the land of all non-Wahabbi practices and way of thinking. All sects including sunnis, shias and barelvis will be targeted if the taliban take control of the country. There will be religio-ethnic cleansing that will make the genocides in the Balkans and Rwanda look like a walk in the park.
Sufism is liberal .Sufism believe spiritual power. Sufism taught humanity, tolerance and softness in Islam .Suffi can not hurt other human-being even by his/ her talks. On the other hand Mullaism or Theocracy is strict. They can not show tolerance or harmony for other. Sufism believes Islam can be spread by preaching and love and softness tolerance, harmony and by wining heart of others. On the other hand Mullaism wants to spread its own type of religion by sword and gun
The answer is not sufism or wahabism, but simply finding Islam. Studying the AlQuran and understanding it is the only way to overcome our problems.
as a matter of fact the Quran tells us to be peaceful, loving &tolrant i wonder all these people making comments have bother to study and unerstand the Quran, we must all of follow what Allaha and His messenger(p.b.h)has comanded and be not divided.
sufism teaches islam with love and peace to all .The result is that islam spreaded in india.Even today non muslims respects islam and visits shirines regularly.
whereas taliban tried to impose thier own choice of islam by force,developed hared everywhere and defaced islam
We should look at who gains from these acts. If we find that out we know who is behind all this. Find out where the money comes from and you know who gains. Wars cost a lot of money to fight.
Excellent comments all, especially Punjab Singh Punjabi and Nasir Khan.
Sufiism is the only branch of Islam through which man can unite with the Almighty and becomes true human being. Rasulullah had practiced meditation in the Jabale Noor for 15 years.
Talibans are ignorant about the true message of Islam. Or they are being misguided by the anti Islamic thoughts or agents.
By destroying the shrines of the sufis, they are axeing their own feet of existence.
May Allah give them right understandings.
No doubt, desecration of a grave or shrine is not justifiable, but I believe we must look at the degraded practices that have spread around shrines; practices that are given cover and actively followed by the caretakers of those shrines; which might cause some to react harshly.
Taliban have a distorted view of Islam,although the way of Islam which they are trying to follow is fine but because of not being well educated or not educated at all they take different views out of it and distort it and become extremists.
But at the same time what Sufism says in my opinion is not right, because it brings innovation in islam. I believe sufism is not what prophet Muhammed (PBUH) preached.
But at the same time it doesn’t mean that in order to change the perspective of sufis, you start blowing up the shrines or start killing them.
Taliban barbarians kill everyone in their game to wrest political control. They are bleeding civil society to death as we speak. If they win, then I will renounce Islam and become atheist or christian. I assure you, I will only be one of millions who will do the same – even though they may do so quietly.
Actually the form of Sufism that we have nowadays is not that we had in Asia some years back at the time of Awlian.
Nowadays there are many issues, some claim that the Drug Mafia is running their business through Malangs (people who serve these shrines).
I am not trying to rationalize the attacks on these shrines but to mention that we also need to understand the spirit of Sufism.
I agree with many of the posts/comments.
This Taliban act appears to be barbaric; Cold blooded, brutal murders, destroying holy places, killing people, bombing girls schools etc., are completely non-religious;
No religion would teach such things to anyone; These Taliban acts are using the name of “God” and living a free life. It is high time the government wakes up & creates awareness; Else it’s going to consume Pakistan itself. We want our neighborhood country citizens to live a peaceful & safe life.
As Salam Alekum,
Sufism is the path towards Allah on the pattern of Rasul Allah S.A.W.
Sufism creates love of Allah and Rasool Allah SAW in people’s heart.
A true sufi’is a friend of Allah and as Hazrat Khwaja Moin Uddin Chishti RA said.
” A friend of Allah must have affection like the SUN.When the sun rises it is beneficial to all irrespective of whether they are Muslim,Christian or Hindus”
It seems much better than blowing up people.
This suicide bombing & violence is crazy. It should end. I think, the Pakistan government should take measures to avoid further blood shed, even if they have enter a deal these people. They are dangerous & unpredictable.
Perhaps the Taliban, should be reminded that Islam was introduced to the sub-continent through the beautiful and peaceful message of sufism. Sufism teaches the true spirit of Islam, Love (for all humanity, Broterhood, Peace, Charity, Kindness.)
if islam was spread mainly thru sufism, then sufi islam would naturally be the dominant sect in the subcontinent. However it is still a minority. Therefore, get the notion out that islam was spread by love and peaceful means. Read the texts written by unbiased authors…nay, read the texts written by the muslim conquerors themselves, and see for yourself how islam was spread by the sword and economic strangulation of the dhimmis.
The Taliban believe they can destroy everything that opposes them in order to win.
They will leave nothing standing in the end.
But I see that even some on this forum are fooling themselves – so long as we continue to find excuses like ‘internal agents/agencies’ we will not defeat this intolerant ideology.
Blaming the ‘agencies’ (ISI) is just as big a canard as blaming RAW, the objective of both is to deflect blame from where it should be, and to continue to believe that ‘we Muslims could never do such atrocities – it must be the agencies and/or RAW’.
Wake up – there is no all powerful bogeyman pulling the strings of these people. They thrive because we Pakistanis refuse to accept that our ‘Muslim brothers’ are killing us, destroying everything good and beautiful in our nation. We condemn our military when it acts, accusing it of all sorts of vile things (remember the criticism over Lal Masjid) and then we criticize it for negotiating ‘peace deals’.
We as a nation are hypocrites, we only know how to blame the other, someone else, anyone else. Rise up against this menace – tell the government that we support it and the military if it uses force, and we will work to rehabilitate those affected.
We need to show some determination as a nation.
This experience of internal religious bickering is inherent in every state that has an official religion, whether it be Christian Britain or Communist Russia. When you elevate and make something the official religion (and yes communism is a codified system of beliefs, so it really is a religion in many ways, with sacred texts and messiahs), you need a certifying group that says “Yes, this person belongs to the religion.” Basically, you empower a powerful priesthood. It is extremely rare to create a stable system with an official religion. They all have endless purges. You see this in India too in how the Bajrang Dal now says that many BJP leaders are not good Hindus. Or in America, where the Christian right thinks that the Democrats are “Godless.” This is precisely why the founding fathers of America (who were almost all Christian) established a division between church and state.
All nations need this division, i.e. all nations need to be de-facto secular if they want internal stability and freedom. This isn’t specific to any specific people or race. This is how all humans are. It is not an accident that most nations that democratize and develop, also systematically become more secular in their institutions. This is a tough pill to swallow for most people from the subcontinent – Indians or Pakistanis – because our identities are so rooted in our religious affiliations.
when will we stand up against these mullahs that use religion to kill and destroy. The only thing the Talibans want is power- political and personal. I am absolutely sure more than 90% of them do not know the meaning of a single verse in the Holy Quran. Pakistan and Pakistanis are paying the price for their blind faith in the violent Saudi version of Islam that we allowed to creep into our country over the past few decades. Why doesn’t Osama plant bombs and kill Saudis or even Arabs in the gulf? The reason is that we are fools to have extended our Islamic brotherhood to killers and are reaping the rewards of being part of the “umma” . Wake up and be Pakistani muslims and let the Arabs take care of themselves!
According to my humble opinion, it is not sufism under attack but our religion i.e. Islam in under attack. You all will agree that it was because of peaceful preachings of our great sufis that Islam spread to nook and corner of entire South Asia. The sufis give message of love, peace, tolerance, equality, justice and fairplay which is in direct clash with these talibans who wants to impose their religion on the people of Pakistan. At this critical juncture when the world community is equating our religion of peace and love with terrorism, the people of Pakistan desperately need a school of thought which can teach peace, love and tolerance. And I think this can only be achieved through peaceful preaching of sufism.
Sufism and Punjabiyat are synonyms. Sufism will always survive in Punjab irrespective of whatever is done to it in other provinces.
Quoting parts from other comments:
‘Talibans are Wahabis, and their problem is that they are intolerant and believe that their version of Islam is the best.’
‘It’s always hard to fight an internal enemy that looks like you, belongs to the same religion and lives next door.’
And for my bit, I don’t think Sufi Islam has much to do with shrines and shrine worship and doubtful/questionable ‘acts’ carried out in the shrines. As pointed out, Sufi Islam has much higher purpose – yes you can call it ‘love’, but its all about the perfect-most connection with the creator.
And yes, Sufi Islam has solid basis for education and development too, unlike the Wahabi school.
So though I dont support or oppose the shrine bombings – Sufi Islam still should not be targeted.
Extremist ideology is the reason Pakistan will stay in the turmoil it has been for the last decade!
These ignorants should be bought to justice in public to be made into examples instead of the government making deals with them! Turkey did it years ago and cleaned up extremism…why can’t us Pakistanis do it?? Are we too corrupt or simply being ignorant of facts??
Cleaning up the society from these people will make my home Pakistan home again instead of the political, religious and sociopathic mess it is right now!!!
La Aekraha Fid-deen – there is no forcing in the religion. The Taliban are ignorant and do not know the teaching of Quran because they continue to attack people trying to find God.
We must provide secular or sufi education to the poor and under-privileged and provide basic necessities to them and their families like the Taliban and Wahabis or we will never change the situation. Young men are willing to be suicide bombers because they have been brain-washed into thinking that is condoned by Islam. They and their families are provided for by these groups and therefore agree to their beliefs. The ruling class in Pakistan has not provided schools, hospitals and still continue to pay their domestic help almost nothing while they live in luxury. They are interested in having property in Dubai, England and sending their children to universities abroad, while the masses continue to struggle for basic necessities. I am so incensed by what is happening to Pakistan. So much has to do with the neglect of the masses. No poor Pakistani would have been State should have given them, an education.
I didn’t Speak out!
“First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists, but I was neither, so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew so I did not speak out. And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me.”
Wake up before it’s too late and the only one left is you.