Iqbal on Man's Metaphorical Death

Muhammad Munawwar

One of the most renowned poets of Egypt late Ahmad Shauqi (احمد شوق) had said:

"Human beings are of two kinds, those who are dead in life, and others who are alive in their graves."

By metaphorical death, here, is meant the first kind of death. Dead, metaphorically, are persons who exist but are not counted among the living. They are rather counted out. They are "breathing-dead" bodies on foot, sorry creatures, rejected by their graves and always in search of graves. They do not walk on God's earth; they only drag their corpses. Their breathing is only a process of evaporation. If someone insists on calling them alive, then they are so only figuratively. They are far removed away from the reality of life. Their souls are as good as dead wood. Their perception is petrified. No aim, no determination. For them nothing is good, nothing bad. They cannot discriminate good from evil. Their vision is sightless. They are for ever astray and know not. How can such persons be called human beings? They are not unlike the dancers depicted in Oscar wilder' poem "The Harlot's House".

"Sometimes a clock-work puppet pressed. A phantom lover to his breast. Sometimes they seemed to try to sing.

Then turning to my love I said, "The dead are dancing with the dead, The dust is whirling with the dust".

Such persons whose actions are not of their determined choice have aptly and justly been called puppets by Oscar Wilde. They hug each other but they do so as robots. They do not qualify even for Hawthorne's description, "Sensuous sympathy of dust for dust". They seem to be human beings but are infact, nothing more than solidified dust.

A society is alive if the individuals belonging to that society are exceptionally animated and have definite goals to win and ideals to achieve. But a society clogged with puppets, shadows and phantoms, is a dying society, if not already dead. Whirling phenomena of dust, breathing existences with no soulful activity, put together do not make a living and energetic community. A multitude of zeroes put together, do not come to more than zero.

To live means living in a responsible manner, to be account-able for deeds done. Puppets move but their movements are not actions. A senseless deed is not a role. Only a conscious act of one's own choice is a responsible performance. And how rarely do persons perform acts of their own. To be responsible entails self-knowledge. Without self-knowledge, a person cannot attain cognizance of his station in the process of creation and as such cannot realize himself fully. Without self-knowledge there can be no notion of duties and rights. Self-knowledge is, in other words, the perception of man's ultimate function and final stage of his achievement. But to grow from a homo sapien to a man is a long and arduous journey. He is born as a lump of matter. Innumerable material elements build his physique. But in his material frame or form is deposited a soul-particle as well.

That soul-particle grows into what is called man's spiritual aspect. Man hungers for good and other sensual materials. That is his material aspect. Then comes a stage when a faculty of discrimination begins to operate and the question of what, how much, through which means, raises its head. It means a person begins to distinguish what is good, just and suitable to aspire for and what is evil, unjust and hence not suitable to aspire for. This discriminating faculty when it comes to operate in a person's conscious behaviour entitles him to be called the captain of his fate and the master of his soul.

Man's material aspect is always after dragging him down to dust by conquering- the spiritual. The spiritual aspect, on the contrary, is always after subjugating the material and soaring to higher spheres. This tussle goes on. When there is spiritual dominance, there is life because values are upheld. Where there is material in command, there is death because values are not operative. Says Allama Iqbal

"A spirit which accepts clay as an associate, begins to take pleasure in sleep, without delay.

It wakes up whenever it creates "self." But when `self" becomes a slave to the body, the spirit dies out."

As is clear, it is not actual death. It is rather death in life or say death operative in life — death dominating life. God Almighty defining the Quran declares:

"This is no less than a Message and a Quran, making 'things clear that it may give admonition to any one who is alive and the charge may be proved against those who reject".

Explaining the world "alive" Abdullah Yusuf Ali states:

"Alive, both in English and Arabic, means not only 'having' physical life but having all the active qualities which we associate with life. In religious language, those who are not responsive to the realities of the spiritual world are not better than those who are dead. The Message of God penetrates the hearts of those who are alive in the spiritual sense."[3]

Those who are spiritually alive are impressed by the Quran and hence take to the right path. Those who are not alive in the Quranic sense do not pay heed to what the Book of God enjoins. They remain astray and take pride in it. But the Quran admoni­shes and also warns in clear words and thus stands as a proof against those who are rebellious willfully. They, on the Day of Judgement, will not be able to say that they had not received guidance or that they were not warned.

Similarly the Quran while addressing the Prophet explains:

و ما یستوی الاحیاء و لا الاموت ان اللہ یسمع من یشاء و ما انت مسمع من فی القبور ان انت الا نذیر![4]

"Those that are living and those that are dead are not alike. God can make any that He will, to hear. But you cannot make hear those who are buried in graves."

Here it has been made clear that persons who are spiritually dead cannot be expected to accept guidance. In this regard they are like those buried in graves. Thus it is obvious that the Prophet of God had only to inform, teach, direct, admonish and warn. He was not to compel them to comply with his directions or act according to what he imparted to them. Those who were not alive were to be left alone. Those who were spiritually alive would listen. An Arab poet says in a similar vein, addressing, perhaps, himself:

لقد اسمعت لونادیت حیا                 ولکن لا حیاۃ لمن تنادی

"Had you addressed someone alive, you would have been lighted to. But he whom you address, is lifeless."

The Quran explaining the inner condition of unbelievers sets forth:

لھم قلوب لا یفقھون بھا ولھم اعین لا یبصرون بھا ولھم آذان لا یسمعون بھا اولئک کالا نعام بل ھم اضل اولئک ھم الغافلون![5]

"They have hearts wherewith they do not understand. They have eyes wherewith they do not see. They have ears wherewith they do not hear. They are like cattle. Nay, they are more astray than cattle." It is they who heed not."

Such persons who eat, drink, and loiter hither and thither, are merely like animals. As human beings they are lifeless. They do not perceive though they look. They do not listen though they hear. They do not understand though they observe. Alive they are, but as animals even worse than animals. They are left alone. God has nothing to do with them. Says Iqbal.

"Your body has no soul. No wonder if your sighs are not answered The Creator is disgusted with a soulless frame. God is all life and He is God of those who are alive."

Allama Iqbal has repeated the same theme in the following verse;

"The living God is in search of a living soul. A dead prey does not deserve an eagle's assault."

It is obvious that a society is not something suspended in the air. It is a concrete collection of wide awake and soulful individuals. It merits being called a living society if harmony between the spiritual and material, physical and mental and above all the individual and collective aspirations is maintained. No doubt different individuals possess different qualities. Standards are also different. All cannot be equal in every respect. Yet it is incumbent upon every individual that whatever one attains is aimed at the collective good of the society or the nation to which he or she belongs. No individual should, on account of his higher faculties of attainment pounce upon and appropriate the rights and fortunes of others. If some person or a group of persons does so it is done to the detriment of the society or the nation. This creates imbalance which in sociological terms is a kind of disease. Hence Iqbal's message to every person is to always keep in mind that;

"The destiny of nations is vested with the individuals. Similarly every person belonging to the Muslim Ummab is its destiny's star."

Every star should be an ascending star of collective well-being. Charles W. Morris explains:

"The individual must know what he is about; he himself and not merely those who respond to him, must be able to interpret the meaning of his own gesture. Behaviouristically, this is to say that the biological individual must be able to call out in himself the response his gesture calls out in the other and then utilize this response of the other for the control of his further conduct. Such gestures are significant symbols. Through their use the individual is taking the role of the other in the regulation of his own conduct. Man is essentially a role-taking animal. The calling out of the same response in both the self and the other, gives the common content necessary for community of meaning."[9]

Man is not only a social animal, it is in the opinion of Charles Morris a role-taking animal. When this role-taking process slackens or comes to a stop it indicates bad omen.

Gestures are then not exchanged. Individuals become egotists.

They eat one another. The society is consumed by the mutual egotistic exchange of individual's wrath. A lustful over, ambitious person or a group of persons is like dead limbs of a body they are as dangerous as the lazy and idle hippies or their coteric of cocain high persons. Individual physical health rests on the harmony amongst all constituting elements. Loss of harmony is illness. If not cured properly and in time it results in death. Similarly societies where balance is lost, cannot last. This is leprosy of covetousness. This is anarchy of emotions. This is paralysis of foresight this is no self which is strengthened. This is short sightedness that finds an opportunity for free play rather a free for all to shrink towards self-seeking gradually leads to death. Allama Iqbal explains thus:

"To shrink within oneself is tantamount to death. Leaving the world and receding towards self is to accept extinction.

These words are beyond your ken because your soul is over-powered by your body. (Within you it is material aspect that rules)."

Albert Schweitzer, in the following lines discusses almost the same subject i.e. what it is that promotes life and what it is that diminishes it;

"My life carries its own meaning in itself. This meaning lies in my living out the highest idea which shows itself in my will-to live, the idea of reverence for life. With that for a starting point —I give value to my own life and to all the will-to-live which surrounds me. I preserve in activity, and I produce values. Ethics grow out of the same root as world and life affirmation for ethics, too, are nothing but reverence ,for life. That is what gives me the fundamental principle of morality, namely that good consists in maintaining, promoting, and enhancing life, and that destroying, injuring, and limiting life are evil."[11]

Egotists and self-seekers look as if they were alive though in actual fact they are worthless and as dead as a dodo. All sorts of advice fall flat on them. Even if they join colleges and universities and obtain enviable certificates and Degrees, testifying to their acumen and scholarship, in this field of knowledge or that, yet if they are lust-ridden, they cannot be counted amongst the living ones. To be a scholar is one thing. To be human is something else. Scholarship is not a surety of a scholar's integ­rity, sincerity, truthfulness, good neighborliness, kindness and magnanimity. A person may possess a character in inverse pro-portion to the height of his educational qualifications. Purity of heart cannot be had through instructional institutions where knowledge is imparted but morals are neither taught nor-practiced. And according to those who have been leading moral lives, it is only through purity of heart that moral teaching leaves lasting impact. Without the diligent receptivity of a pure heart all pieces of advice and ethical demonstrations run out leaving almost no effect as if all teachings in that regard, were like water poured on duck's back. Ab-dal-Qahir. (jiU)IAT.a) b. Abdullah al-Suhrawardi explains the above subject in examples as follows:

"A grain-sower went with grain. He picked up a handful of it. Some of the seeds fell on the path. In no time birds descended and picked them up. Some of the grains fell on a slab of stone covered with a thin layer of earth and a bit wet on account of dew drops. The grain sprouted and grew a little. Then the roots touched the stone. They could not penetrate it hence dried up. Some grains of seed fell on a good earth where there was a thorny growth. When seeds sprouted and the seedlings gained some height, they were strangulated by the thorny growth. Thus they became useless and got intermingled with thorns. And some of the seeds fell on a good earth which was neither a path, nor a layer on a stone, nor replete with thorny growth. Here the seeds grew into what they should"[12]

Abd-al-Qahir, proceeding further elucidated these examples and told the readers that the heart which is like a path cannot retain good lesson. The devil descends and takes it away in no time. The listener forgetting all of it. When the other who listens but has been likened with a slab of stone, is a person who listens diligently but his heart has absolutely no intention to act accordingly. Therefore, the lesson does not take root in his heart and vanishes. He likened the grain that fell on a good earth but with thorny growth, to a person who listens and intends to act accordingly, but his lusty ambitions prevent him from translating his good intentions into actions, therefore, he turns away from the desire to do good. His desire becomes ineffective like the seedling strangulated by the thorns. Abd-al-Qahir likens the seed falling on good- earth without thorns, to the listener who understands and acts according to the advice he listens to and keeps aloof from lusts. He likes and keeps to the right path—Such a person is a Sufi. Sufis, define Sufism, as purity of heart and shunning all sorts of pollution. In short all these examples are degrees of being alive—to what extent and how much.

People are alive in proportion to good deeds done by them and they are dead according to the quantum of their misdeeds. And those who do nothing, neither good nor evil, are worst among the dead in the particular sense, operative in this article. There are people who cannot discriminate between good and evil. There are others who can, but still do evil, and cannot overcome evil temptations. Socrates is often quoted as saying that people do not know evil otherwise they would not have indulged in it. Our observation and experience proves quite the contrary. To know and to understand evil is something else but to over-come the unbridled desire to do evil is quite a different matter. People know the dangers of over-smoking. They know the dangers of cocaine and marijuana. Everybody understands to what gambling leads. Every addict to strong drinks knows what the addiction results in. All such helpless people are slaves to their material selves. They cannot exert their will. They cannot implement their determinations. Such persons are not alive in reality. They say, if not all of them, millions, of them certainly, that it was their luck. They were made to remain earth-rooted. Palmists had told them like that. Astrology had indicated that they could not rise above a certain level of will power. But Iqbal declares:

"You should write your destiny with your own pen. God's pen has left your brow blank."

`This azure atmosphere which we call sky is in reality nothing provided we muster courage to fly."

At an other place Allama Iqbal again lays stress on the same point:

"Your age (Time) must have your impact you are ignorant of the fact that it is not under the influence of stars".

"I have seen such madness as well (determination that looked like madness) which has sewn what the destiny had torn up."

Apparently things do look impossible. There are hurdles which people find insurmountable. Yet there are individuals deter-mined, unswerving and sure who take upon themselves to prove they can defy any opposition to their will And History stands witness to the fact that such intents as were termed a definite mark of madness, turned the impossible into possible. Perhaps it was G B. Shaw who stated that all progress of the world was due the unreasonable persons. When self-confident persons resolve to-do something then cowardly calculations of reason do not stand in their way. Life is will. Where there is no will there is death.

And there are persons and groups who become mentally lethargic. They do what others especially the well-to-do, usually do. They do not apply their mind whether what they do or desire to do is correct or plausible in itself. And the majority of people are blind followers of others, individuals as well as societies, Sometimes people do something and the reason for their doing so is that many others were doing the same. Care should always be taken in copying others. Sometimes, the great majority of the members of a society may choose a wrong path and thus bring about destruction. Mirza Ghalib, one of the most celebrated poets of Urdu and Persian, very rightly had said:

"As following others can result in putting ourselves to a wrong path-hence we are not going to choose the path for us only because the whole caravan had taken to it (the whole caravan could go wrong),"

Allama Iqbal States:

"If to copy others, (without critical analysis) were a good habit and profitable mode of life then the Prophet (SA.S) would have gone the way his forebears had gone."

Therefore, according to Islam the leaders, dignitaries and celebrities in all walks of life are advised to act with utmost responsibility. People follow the big ones whether they be big as academicians as religious scholars, politicians or rulers. If they adopt an evil mode of life and uppish manners; they misguide thousands, rather millions of people belonging to the lower strata who take pride in looking and behaving like those who are at the higher pedestal. All those who are looked upto for standards should set beautiful standard. They should uphold positive and life-enhancing values. If they set bad examples they will have to account for those who followed them out of awe or respect.

Anyway to follow others blindly is a sort of mental slavishness. A person who has a self i.e. confidence in himself, acts responsibly. He follows where he should. He goes his own way where he should. He does not go against others on account of sheer malice or conceit, even if others do the right. A conceited person is also a slave---a slave to his own animal self. In short, it is not easy to act independently in the real sense of the word. The majority of the individuals and groups act as slaves. And hence they are not fully alive.

In the field of literature too it is observed that a person who becomes a "celebrity" assums the status of a reference. His ideas, words, terms and sentences are quoted uncritically. If he gains much in fame, then his pet sentences and phrases become quotes. To follow him and to quote him becomes rather a literary fashion. Gradually, there emerges a circle of like minded people who give airs to themselves for belonging to each other, the integrating element being the reverence for that particular "celebrity", For some years they treat themselves as high-brows and those who lack confidence crouch before them. But Allama Iqbal would like to ask them whether they were sure that they had not fallen in the traps of something flashy and flaunting. This is why he admonishes;

"Foreswear, following the nightingale and the peacock. The night­ingale is nothing more than voice and the peacock is nothing more than colour."

The "literary high-brows" and "bullies" are selling their aphorisms, symbols and pet idioms. There is nothing in them. It is all flashy, beautiful crust and no kernel. An Arab poet, addressing a friend of his, who was following a group of cultural high-brows rightly castigated this kind of complex

"O Aba Ja'fer b. saeed, you show off a religion which is not your real creed.

You are not an atheist but you crave for renown as a liberal person."

Such slavish attitude diminishes self. One should be independent and not slavishly "liberal". One should look at things with one's own eyes and should obtain lesson, pleasure and vision of his own. Lacking independent vision is a mark of diminished self-confidence and denotes diminished life.

Societies and nations who become politically -enslaved and subjugated by other societies and nations present the worst kind of death in life. They are the most wretched form of breathing dead bodies. Politically enslaved people lose all confidence in themselves. They look with utmost reverence upon whatever belongs to their masters, howsoever, inferior or abominable, in actual fact, that might be. They look down upon whatever is their own howsoever valuable and worth-while that might be. The potentialities of the enslaved societies remain unrealized

"In slavery, a believer in one God, adopts the manners of idol worshippers. In slavery, a bolivers' potentialities remain dormant" "His taste dies out hence he takes poison for honey. He is a corpse without death carrying his dead body on his shoulders."

"He has gambled away the respect for life and has reconciled filling his belly with trash like donkeys."

According to Allama Iqbal slavery, of all deaths is the worst death. Slaves are the most miserable breathing dead bodies;

"There is much brutal kind of death. Name of that death is slavery. Would that the slave could understand the trickery and artifice of the masters."

Allama Iqbal doubts the capacity of a slave to experience resurrection;

"Israfil's trumpet cannot resurrect those whose body remained soul-less even when they were alive".

"All who possess life have to go to the lap of the grave but it is only the free and emancipated who will regain life after experiencing death".

And, then there is a dialogue between the dead body of a slave and the grave. Several times Allama Iqbal has used the technique of making others express his opinions. It has a dramatic tinge and is meant to add strength to his exposition. He succeeds, invariably;

"Grave (addressing the corpse it contained) O you gloomy impact of opression— were you a slave person in the world? I could not under-stand why my frame had kept burning your corpse has turned the darkness that surrounds me, still darker. On account of your corpse earth has suffered utter disgrace."

"I shun the grave of a slave vehemently. I declare it a hundred time to you O Israfil! O the Creator of the universe! and O the Sacred spirit!".

In the same vein Allama Iqbal alludes to the youngmen who were being educated in the institutions where instruction was imparted and subjects were taught with a view to kill the spirit of the students so that they would begin to think as their Masters thought and start looking at things as their masters did. They would even adopt the morals, tongue and the costume of those who ruled them. They do uncritically just to copy their rulers. Emerson was right whom he said; "Slavery is an institution for converting men into monkes." And they did so without being conscious of the loss they incurred. They got transformed in such a tricky way that instead of feeling ashamed of their trans-formation they took pride in looking like their western chiefs. Allama says and the rub of these words cannot be fully tasted by us now as we are no longer slaves. Yet the reflection of an injured sense or self respect experienced by an enslaved society is, vividly expressive;

"This college—going young man looks alive. In fact he is a dead body who has borrowed breath from the West."

The over all policy of the conquerors in respect of subjugated peoples is always meant to weaken the spirit of slaves so that, by and by they reconcile to their slavish plight, rather they start looking with pride at things which are in fact the token of their enslavement. This is how Allama Iqbal shows his utter disgust with the educational policies of the colonialists:

`You are looking at how the plunderer has destroyed the whole caravan. Then why should you ask me of the way in which he did so. Do not feel yourself immune from the effects of the knowledge you are obtaining. With this kind of knowledge the spirit of a whole nation can be killed.”

There are poisonous foods or at least foods that do not suit the requirements of a physique. If no change in the menu takes place in time, the body dies. Similarly there are philosophies, thoughts, principles and theories that diminish mental and spiritual vitality and inch by inch lead to a mental and spiritual demise. It is the positive and invigorating bringing up which changes the outlook for the better and the negative and attenuating indoctrination which brings about a change for the worse. Through one mode societies gain courage and vitality and through the other they attain despair, languor and cowardice.

We have seen that improper food results in disease and death of the body. We have perceived that incongruous education kills the spirit of individuals and societies. Foreign rulers impose particular syllabi on the subject peoples to mould their outlook in a mode that would suit colonial interests. A slave society cannot run away from this calamity easily. This is why, according to Allama Iqbal slavery is the worst kind of death.

But Allama Iqbal saw that sermons emanating from the mosques and monasteries were also not life-giving. They were life killing. This is why Allama Iqbal castigated the religious leaders, with not less biting phrases than those used against the foreign rule. If the religious leaders and scholars begin to inject into the soul of their society, the feeling of despondency and an inclination towards relinquishing the battle-field of life to seek comfort in seclusion, it is clearly a bad omen and it suits the purpose of the alien authority. Speakers and writers who teach and propagate defeatism, are in a way allies of foreign masters. All such teachers, preachers, writers and speakers are according to Allama Iqbal, accursed persons;

"Causes of ailments of nations are extremely subtle. Words fail us if we try to state it openly. Preachers and saints of enslaved peoples discern only fox-philosophy in the life-style of lions.

If Mosaic revelation be inwardly devoted to pharoah's power and authority, it surely is a curse for the nation (of Moses)."

At another place Allama chastises the defeatist attitude of both the religious leaders who preach in mosques and saints who teach in monastries, in the following quatrain

"The Europeans bagged their game from the Sanctuary of Kaaba and other places of worship, but the voice that was raised in the monastries spoke. None else (God Himself ordains all things)

I related this story to the Mullah who prayed, O, Lord make end (life hereafter) pleasant."

Similarly Allama Iqbal addressing the Mullah says ironically:

"You have delivered prolonged lectures on the book (of man's deeds) and the balance (of God's Justice)

I am amazed you do not look at the Doomsday which is already upon us."

The turmoil life in our society and injustice prevalent here and now, was not being discussed by our preachers and scholars. How the nation could fight its battles of day to day life, was not their concern. They only talked of what could happen on Doomsday when human beings would be called upon to account for their deeds 'performed in this world. They dwelt much more upon the description of God's balance and record of men's deeds than upon the inculcation in the minds and souls of their listeners as to how to be brave, how to be just, how to live a life free of the shackles of slavery, how to mould the lives of their pupils and devotees according to the ego-strengthening principles of Islam.

Teachers, preachers and mentors told their devotees to adopt the mode of seclusion which meant monasticism, inertia langour and a reluctance to face realities. Such guides according to Allama Iqbal, were preachers of death;

"If mosques be unstaring then the religion of a believer can be nothing more than a dream or death Listen!

O, the Valley of Laulab."

"Your way of life and your literature smack of monasticism. This verily marks the decay of dying nations,"

Allama Iqbal has an idea of his own regarding abondonment. In his view ebondoning the world does not mean seclusion from day to day problems of life, it is rather abondonment of greed, lust, covetousness, unbridled and sinful ambitions to pose as a bully to society. For Allama Iqbal Islam is the only means of enabling human beings to become truly human. And this he cannot be unless he is the master of his own self. A man who stands emancipated from all wantonness and carnality, is in fact the conqueror of the lower world. To forsake is one thing and to free of worldly avidity is another says Allama Iqbal:

"Height of abondonmeant lies not in forsaking the world. Height of abondonment lies in sujugating the terrestrial as well as the celestial."

In Allama Iqbal's opinion, the alive and truly so, are persons who willingly accept the challenge of life and fight against various types of evil. They do not mind whether they succeed in their mission or fail. A believer knows that there is yet a life after death which is everlasting. Such a person lays down his life trying to strengthen the forces of good. A man of conviction never surrenders before untruth and injustice. Terefore, according to the Quran such a person lives on. To live, for dying on the path of righteousness is living genuinely. Lite is a constant toil for the preservation and Implementation of good. And a life sacrificed for the preservation and implementation of good is not cut short. It attains constancy, martyrdom makes life ripe for eternity. In the words of Allama Iqbal:

"Never consider a man as dead who stood the test, He does not in reality expire although he passes away under the sun.

Such is the death as you should deserve, otherwise you can die in whatever manner you like."

A believer strives in the path of Allah. When he succeeds he says: "Allah be praished". When he fails he says:

"Allah be praised" This behaviour is the hall-mark of a believer. He neither feels elated nor frustrated. His conviction is that everything belongs to Allah, including life. From Allah to Allah Elation and frustration indicate a feeling of personal gain and personal loss, whereas a believer is a trustee of Allah regarding whatever apparently is his. A trustee, a real trustee, is one who is always ready to return what is entrusted to him to the owner. Life also is a trust and can be claimed back by the Master.

Then why should a believer be afraid of death. But Allama Iqbal says:

"I have not been able to find out a single Muslim of whom death be afraid, although I have travelled far and wide in the world."

Life can never flourish under constant fear of death. That is not a full life. It is always the good practical examples which inspire hearts to do good. It is the example of bravery that inspires bravery. But in a society where inspiring examples be not available life begins to shrink. High hopes lie scuttled and sink into the minds, unconscious layer. Under such despondent circumstances a voice of hope sounds odd. Allama Iqbal had to shake his despairing society into becoming awake to their appalling condition. They were to be made aware of the fact that they were not alive. They were dead and they did not know it. Says Allama Iqbal:

"Woe be to a nation which stands far removed from Truth (God) and hence has died but is not ware of her death."

Such persons are fugitives from life. They enjoy the society of only those who do not talk of life. Like-minded people are a fraternity. Lovers of escape from the challenges of reality are also a closely-nit brotherhood. Tavern tots have their own circles. Hunters like hunters. Lovers are fond of lovers. "Birds of a feather flock together" Hazrat Sheikh Abd-al-Qadir al-Jilani states:

"You are spiritually dead hence you keep company of those who are spiritually dead. You should adopt the company of the alive, the noblemen and the sons of noblemen. But you are a grave hence you come to a grave like you. You are a corpse. you come to a corpse like you. You are a cripple and a cripple like you is your leader. You are blind and a blind man like you is your guide."

Allama Iqbal had admonished the Muslim Ummah the enslaved people, for their death-like lethargy. He exhorted them to be up and doing and urged them to check the account of their deeds everyday to know whether they found them selves better than what they were the day before.

"If your today is a true copy of your yesterday then your body of clay contains no spark of life."

Breathing-dead bodies can be reenlivened and Allama Iqbal tells us how. But it is a different subject and demands separate treatment.

NOTES