SOME STRIKING PARALLELS

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/26/some-striking-parallels-2/

• Covid-19 is making us face some uncomfortable questions

Women have often dreamed of an opportunity to put men in their shoes, to see how far they can walk in them. That opportunity it seems is here.

Both men and women have been heard complaining about how uncomfortable it is to wear a mask. “Its hard to breathe,” “It makes me feel hot, suffocated,” and “I can’t wait to take this ruddy thing off my face,” are some of the things being heard.

Well, it is most understandable, so perhaps one could stop for a moment to perceive the parallel between ‘this ruddy thing’ and the face covering that many women are expected to embrace, the covering that Islam does not require but is said to expect women to don. One moreover that does not end with the discovery of a vaccine but carries on till the woman’s last breath.

Yes it is very hard to cover one’s face, particularly when the temperatures go up. It is impossible to believe that Allah, the One we call Rehman and Raheem, would put woman through this torture.

But there is more. Putting a covering over the face reduces peripheral vision which makes it hazardous for a woman in a tent to drive a car and cross the road. And then there is also the fabric wound around the head, no different to wearing a scarf in searing temperatures. A trailing abaya often accompanies all this other gear; it is both unsanitary and once again a torture, particularly in the heat. Both the trailing abaya and scarf are prone to getting snagged in the wheels of a motorbike, making it extremely dangerous and even life threatening for a woman precariously seated on the bike and for the child or children very often in her arms. In fact it should be illegal in this case. But when have the authorities ever been known to stand up to the religious mafia?

In fact, there are many facets to this coronavirus business. This episode will hopefully encourage people to take a closer look at some of the practices so deeply ingrained in our society in the name of religion.

There is of course the fact that the clergy seems to disregard all evidence to the contrary and is insisting on resuming congregational prayers in mosques, expecting worshippers to be somehow protected from infection.

This is nothing but an example of self-interest dictating policy, as for example is happening in the USA with the President suggesting medications in the making of which he holds a financial interest. Where would our poor uneducated mullah get the high that comes with authority without the congregations they head?

It is perhaps natural for a group of persons whose only claim to elevated position is their supposed knowledge of religion to be reluctant to relinquish it. Clerics have long fought against science, because they feel threatened by it, although Islam does not claim any conflict between the two. The Quran in fact repeatedly asks us to observe nature and learn from it.

In the Quran it says: “Have those who disbelieved not considered that the heavens and the Earth were a joined entity, and we separated them and made from water every living thing? Then will they not believe?”

And again: “It is He Who created the night and the day, and the sun and the moon. All (the celestial bodies) swim along, each in its rounded course” (21:33).

“It is not permitted for the sun to catch up to the moon, nor can the night outstrip the day. Each just swims along in its own orbit.”

There are numerous other such examples. So where does the conflict arise?

Why, for example can we not fix our lunar calendar instead of going through the moon-sighting ritual? Perhaps alone among the Muslim world, the people of Pakistan never know when they are expected to start fasting and when they must stop.

This is a democracy. It was a certain set of people that was elected to govern the country. It seems though that that set of people have little say in policy. If they say that congregational prayers will not be held until the threat to the health of the nation is over, congregational prayers should not be held. But that is not the case.

Why?