‘Myths of Composite Culture and Equality of Religions’ by Harsh Narain : A Book Analysis [Part – 1]

“….Süfi, Jalal ad-Din Bukhārī Suhrawardi, nicknamed Makhdūm-i Jahaniyäń Jahāngasht, fell ill and the Hindu Daroghah (a revenue official) of Uchh, named Nawāhūn or Nahāwan visited him to ask after his illness and, full of reverence for the saint, remarked: ‘May God restore His Holiness the Makhdüm to health. The blessed soul of the Makhdüm is the last/seal of the saints, even as Muhammad (God bless and keep him!) was the last/seal of the prophets.” Upon this, the saint observed, ‘You have recited half of the Kalimah (Islam-confessing formula), recite the other half and become a full-fledged Muslim, failing which you will have to die.’ On his refusal, the Hindu was produced before Firoz Tughluq and got beheaded”.

This excerpt is from the book ‘Myth of Composite Culture and Equality of Religions’ authored by Harsh Narain. The terrorist attack at Bondi beach in Sydney last year, which killed 12 people and injured dozens during jewish holiday, has left the world terrified. One of the attackers was named as Naveed Akram. The Red Fort Delhi blast of last year once again disillusioned every ‘secular – centralist’ and the advocate of ‘education can cure terrorism or radicalization’ standpoint. Every terrorist was a doctor and  essentially a ‘believer’.

Harsh Narain made an effort to remove the intentional/unintentional blindfold of composite culture being pushed in our minds and souls from the last seven and half decades. This book becomes veritable in present times, where the attacks perpetrated by Islamic nation with the assistance of muslims residing in India, who sees Bharat as Mecca to establish Islamic rule, as told by Utpal Kumar in his book ‘Bharat Rising’ ; is constantly causing greater extent of menace from demographical and civilizational contexts.

This book has three chapters :

1. The Myth of Composite Indian Culture
2. India: Dar Al-Harb or Dar Al-Islām?
3. The Myth of Unity and Equality of Religions.

Here, we’ll deep delve in the first one only, the other two will be covered in the next part as this chapter encompasses vital theoretical concepts.

Addressing the narrative of Hindu – Muslim Composite Culture

The author ‘hit the nail on the head’ by encompassing and addressing those issues served in front of us which are of faulty and foul play in their disposition. These are certain issues :

1. Formulating a distinction between radical and moderate Islam.
2. Education can cure terrorism or radicalization.
3. Sufis propagated devotion through dance and music.
4. The issue of Hindu – Muslim or Islamic fanaticism has been politicized recently and before this, there was peace and co – existence between these two communities from many centuries.

While reading the excerpt in the beginning of this book review, the reader can understand that the problem of non – cooperation towards non – muslims by muslims and proselytising them by the force of sword is not a political party – sponsored project, but a persistent theological problem. Rest of three issues mentioned above will be discussed further.

Narain begins the book by categorising the pervading social psyche of Indian or Hindu masses in our country. In early phases of modern Indian renaissance, according to the author, the Vedic – Upanishadic phase of Indian culture gets all the praise and pride, which it deserves. Later, the agnostic, materialists, rationalists, humanists and modernists took over the social psyche and then after the inception of British rule in India, the communalization of Indian politics was disguised as ‘secularism’ which led to exaggerated imaginations and presumptions on the secularists’ part, ultimately known as Hindu – Muslim composite culture. He further explains the stated or unstated reasons behind this secularism :

 

1. That Indian culture is a composite culture.
2. That the composite culture is pre-eminently the culture supervenient upon the mingling of the Hindu and Muslim cultural streams.
3. That the Hindus should be thankful to the Muslims for the latter’s contribution to the composite culture.
4. That it is this phase of Indian culture which is of paramount importance as conducive to communal harmony and national integration.
5. That such a composition of cultures is always desirable.

Narain sharply puts – “The protagonists of this concept of composite Indian culture feel committed to paint the Hindu-Muslim relations during the pre-British times in the brightest possible colours. To them, all was well before the inception of British rule in this country. Indeed, they sometimes wax so enthusiastic in flaunting their whim of perennially persisting ‘ideal’ Hindu-Muslim relations and pay such glowing tributes not only to the Indian Muslim community but even to the most universally despised persecutors of the Hindus and destroyers of all that is Hindu that the unwary are led to forget that India was ever partitioned on account of just the non-coexistential disposition of the Muslim mind.”

Further eulogy of this phase in Indian socio – political contexts, the author describes, created a ‘self – oblivion’ and ‘self – alienation’ mentality among Hindus, this even sometimes goes to the extent of ‘self – cancellation’. The author puts, cultural purists disbelieves in the concept of composite culture and rather believe in the fact that it is the civilization which is of composite disposition. He further explains, neither the civilization is culture – proof or culture is civilization – proof.

It can be explicitly understood, the author is not against the concept of composite culture in itself or the Hindu society being of composite culture, but he is firmly an antagonist of the distorted idea of hindu – muslim composite culture and therefore naming this concept as myth in the book title itself.

Defining Culture, its stratas and its categories

Harsh Narain defines ‘culture’ accurately in these words – “culture has two strata: culture of the aristos and culture of the demos. It is the former which represents and defines society, imparts its own identity to it, and determines the course of events in it. There is little notable difference among the different cultures of the demos. The culture of the demos has no appreciable form of its own, therefore it is comparatively easy for it to intermingle with other such cultures. In what follows, therefore, we always mean aristocratic culture by ‘culture”.

Further, the author puts, what protagonists of Composite Indian culture mean by it? Narain takes three different kinds of culture and places the Indian culture on that particular kind to inquire which of the Indian culture is referred to by protagonists of composite Indian Culture. He categories culture in three kinds :

1. Cultural Congeries : A collection of cultural phenomena that are not internally related but are grouped together merely because they exist in the same space or time.

• Example: Think of a food court in a mall— Chinese, Italian, Indian, and Mexican cuisines all present, but not influencing or blending with each other.
• Implication for Indian culture: If Indian culture were a congeries, its diverse elements (Hindu, Muslim, Christian, tribal, etc.) would coexist without meaningful interaction or integration, merely sharing geography or historical periods.

Narain implicitly defines Indian culture as not being congeries of culture, because different cultures under the grand Indian culture are related — Buddhism, Jainaism, Sikhaism etc in general and have been incepted from Hindu culture, in specific. All have served in the larger interest of societies and nation and never fought internally or with each – other, except from the last few decades.

2. Eclectic Culture : A culture that selectively borrows elements from various traditions, philosophies, or practices without necessarily integrating them into a unified whole.

• Example: A person who practices yoga (from Hindu tradition), celebrates Christmas (Christian), and follows Zen meditation (Bauddha) without merging these into a coherent worldview.
• Implication for Indian culture: Indian culture may be seen as eclectic if it picks and chooses from different traditions based on utility or appeal, but does not synthesize them into a deeper unity.

The author puts forth the fact that Indian culture should not be an eclectic culture. Giving example of Yamunācārya the great pre-Ramānuja Vaişņava philosopher, who warns against intermixture or eclecticism (sankara) of different Tantric traditions, says : ‘The Saiva, the Pāśupata, the Saumya, and the fourfold Läguda Tantra-s [have their own identities and] are meant to be different. They must not be intermixed.”

It is that culture, which is being followed by most of the Hindus today, where certain aspects and elements of western or woke culture have been adapted to live a western oriented lavish life. Clearly, Indian culture should not be an eclectic culture. The author describes – “Thanks to the loss of vitality of culture, for example, its bearers tend to become mimics of the good, bad, or indifferent traits of other cultures, which results in a hotchpotch of cultural patterns, tending often to do more harm than good.”

3. Synthetic Culture :

The third and last alternative meaning of Indian culture is a synthetic/synthesized/integrated culture, a culture born of a happy blending of different cultures. If the upholders of the composite view of Indian culture, Narain says, mean such a culture by composite Indian culture, they are living in a fool’s paradise. The partition of India is the best example of this.

It can be observed from the above trial and error method of Narain, that Indian culture does not fit in any of the categories for projecting it as a composite culture.

The author defines Bauddha, Jainaa and Sikha culture as the sub – cultures of Indian origin or the semi – hindu cultures and cultures of non – Indian origins  (also known as semitic origins) as counter – culture or inculture. The activities of christian missionaries have led to unprecedented acculturation of the neglected masses of India.

Further he pointed out, the protagonists of composite hindu  – muslim culture, who projects Islam as a progressive cultural force and a boon to India, never talks about the pre – muslim culture of greater India, except in the case of secularists who sees the pre – muslim phase of India as oppressive and orthodox in order to defame and malign it.

This is reflected, Narain puts, in their choice of representatives of composite culture. The author gives example of Rasheedudin Khan’s list of ‘the most illustrious representatives of the composite culture of India spanning eight centuries’ which consists of :

1) Amir Khusaru,

2) Kabir,

3) Nanak,

4) Dārā Shukoh,

5) Rammohun Roy and

6) Jawaharlal Nehru.

Surely, the list is entirely problematic. Further, Rasheedudin Khan encompasses the certain streams of influence in the composite culture of India :

(1) Vedāntic vision,

(2) Bhakti mārga,

(3) humanistic concepts of Islam,

(4) the message of sulh-i kull (peace for all and complete peace) of Süfism,

(5) syncretic Indo-Muslim cultural values,

(6)cosmopolitanism of modern urban development

(7) heritage of Indian national movement

8) the essence of the philosophy of the Bhagavad-Gita.

The above names and streams of influence list are conceptually wrong, there is nothing like humanistic concepts in Islam, as the sole aim is to serve the almighty or allah by any means — prominently Jihad. Neither the Indian philosopher tried to deeply understand Islam from its dawn to inception of British rule in India and just elaborated it on the surfacial level, the author underlines, nor any Muslim thinker, except a few names, had tried to understand Indian culture deeply.

Composite Hindu – Muslim Culture : Sowing seeds of distorted and conceptually faulty idea

Even during the British rule, the author delineates, people considered Indian philosophy, Indian religion and Indian culture stood for the philosophy, religion and culture of India and not an intermixture or composite nature of hindu – muslim culture and it was extremely clear in the consensus of common masses that even if muslims are permanently settled in India, their religion, philosophy and culture are entirely alien in their disposition and their devotion belongs to elsewhere rather than this country. But Lālā Lājpat Rai was the first to moot the idea that ‘the Hindus and Muslims have coalesced into an Indian people’, author says, and that ‘the Muslim rule in India was not a foreign rule’. The ‘non-communal’, ‘secular’ historians began to follow this. The protagonists of this view holds, that, ‘despite Islam’s being a religion of foreign origin and the Muslims’ establishing their rule here as foreign invaders, they settled here for all time to come and became Indians, forgetting all about their native lands. They ruled India from within India, unlike the British who exercised their sway over India from afar.’ Well, this can be considered as the highest point of irrationality. As Narain perfectly says – “Mere permanent settlement in a country does not entitle a plunderer to be looked upon as indigenous. It must first be seen whose interests he is out to serve.”

Along with using Latin phrases beautifully throughout the book, the author quoted several instances of how muslims did every and all gruesome actions to de – hinduize and de – nationalising the Hindus. Narain puts instances of sufis to sultans and their inhuman ways to destroy India and Hindus. He specifically mentioned the innate nature of Islamic rule of ruining civilizations to disaster – whether its Turkey, Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Iran, Afghanistan.

Further expounding the reason of why the native languages of the countries did not survive under the Mughal rule, he additionally described that it is India alone, Narain says, where, those out to uproot the whole gamut of the mainstream of our religio-cultural tradition are hailed as national heroes.

However, Narain made a factual mistake by considering Akbar and two other Muslim invaders as generous, kind and advocative of Indian culture. Factually, Akbar has murdered hundreds of Hindus. Few exceptions can’t be considered equivalent to innumerable atrocities perpetuated by Islamic rulers.

Hindu Inclusivism : A Fundamental trait of Hindu culture

The author goes on to tell the open – heartedness of Hindus who just not welcomed Muslims for trade purposes but gave hundreds of grants to build the mosques, this open heartedness was based on Dharma – inspired humanity. Although this was somehow tuned as ‘Sadguṇa Vikṛti’ in later periods for Hindus itself, for obvious reasons.

Even pre – islamic rule, other foreigners too, were open heartedly welcomed in India, as the author throws light on the fact that all this assimilation was non – violent and peaceful. He adds – “This process consisted usually in assignment of the aliens to different castes or in creation of new castes for them under the umbrella of the relevant Varna-s. This is the secret of the multiplicity of the much-maligned castes.”

Although, the author holds the view that how a vast country like Bharat does not go through an easy islamisation because of its vast population but simultaneously expressed concerns over how certain vital sections of Indian culture and society are gradually slipping away due to persistent breaking agendas.

Muslims Of India : A mere businessmen, a settler or a Mujahid?

The author firmly made it clear by breaking all the narratives of leftists academicians, of  muslims being mere settler or trader and not an invader, by explicitly saying that muslim rule in India was wedded to the cause of islam and dismantling Hinduism entirely, in Islamic terminology, Kufra. Additionally, Narain describes how to the Muslims, the Hindu was saleable, enslaveable, and slayable. Further, Narain quotes KS Lal — “In the medieval Indian chronicles, the sovereign is always mentioned as “the king of Islam”, the territories of his empire are referred to as the “land of Islam”, its armies as “soldiers of Islam”, and its religious and judicial head as “Shaikh-ul-Islam”. The monarch was committed to make Islam the true basis of private and public life through the enforcement of the Shariat and to convert the people to the “true faith”.”

Further delineating on this point, Naraian quotes another author Nirad C. Chaudhary — “The dominant culture in the Gangetic plain, became Islamic, and the Hindus became a cultural proletariat. ….Thus the course of political history in northern India reduced both Hindu culture and religion to the level of a folk culture and folk religion by depriving it of its elite. Both lost their sophistication and pride. Sanskrit learning virtually disappeared from the region.”

Islam knows no cooperation, says author, not any peaceful coexistence with the Kafirs, to them Islam offers only four alternatives :

• Islam
• The sword
• Slavery
• Jijyah

Narain put it correctly when he said — “Geographical participation can have meaning only by subservience to cultural participation. The nationhood of a nation consists in its self-identity, and an alien culture grafted upon a country subjugated by it and preoccupied in destroying its self-identity does not deserve the appellation of an indigenous culture……Indigenousness is not purely a geographical concept; it has cultural overtones….”    and imposing these taxes ensures geographical participation solely where native culture dies every second.

Narain also talked about other sufis taking part in offensive wars where they are titled as Qattal ‘the great slayers’. He gives the example of a sufi Sayyid Ali Hamadani who converted 37,000 Hindus to Islam.

Christian culture, author puts, has had its impact too. Its direct impact is discernible in the ideology of the Brahma Samaj. He additionally describes how Christianization as also Islamization resulted in denationalization. He describes the prominent characteristics of a converted person, whether in Islam or Christianity :

1. The moment one converts to Christianity or Islam one’s love for and self-identification with India undergoes abatement. The convert’s adherence and allegiance to the mainstream of Indian culture gets diluted and dissipated often beyond recognition, if not totally wiped out.
2. The great traditions of the rși-s and muni-s, ascetics and saints, Tirthankara-s and Buddha-s, Siddha-s and Yogin-s, Vālmīki-s and Vyāsa-s, Rāma-s and Krsna-s, and so forth cannot catch the fancy of the Christian and Muslim hearts, which have an innate and self-existent predilection for the Biblical and Qur’anic prophets and personages.
3. All Indian history prior to the advent of Islam or Christianity becomes an age of darkness for the convert. Indian heroes become irrelevant, if not villains outright.

Narain, blames the western culture, for acculturation of Indian culture whose chief traits are modernity and scientific temper. Further, Narain arrived at certain conclusions through academic scientific deduction method that :

• Thus Indian culture is Hindu culture: even if predominantly, it is predominance that gives the name.
• Muslim and Christian cultures are counter-cultures.
• Lokāyata culture is a non-culture or subculture.
• Śramaņa culture is a subculture.
• Hindu culture alone deserves the credit of recognition as the national culture (abhimanin) of this country, as the culture owning and possessing this great nation, along with other Indian-born cultures like Buddhist and Jaina cultures as its subcultures, Muslim and Christian cultures being in the nature of tenant-cultures, parasitic (anuśayin) cultures, or out-and-out counter-cultures.

Narain repeatedly makes the blunder by advocating the idea of humanizing or indigenizing the counter cultures like Islam and Christianity. Those who have entirely understood the theology of these religions, can never engage in fantasy like this. The author himself describes that how the Muslim system of education current in thousands of Madrasah-s scattered all over the country acts as a bulwark for what S. Maqbül Ahmad calls ‘political  fanaticism’ and turns out still more thousands of Hindu-haters every year.

Harsh Narain encompassed other issues pertaining to the myth of composite culture and further expounded upon the equality of religions and also on Darul Islam and Darul harb. We will cover those issues in the next part.