BOKO HARAM

 

                                                                                                                                                                                 PART 2

 

                                                                                                                                                           THE RELIGIOUS IMPERATIVE

 

                                                                                                                                                             Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju

 

One of the best pieces of news to have emerged in the closing days of 2011 and the early days of 2012 is the denunciation by religious and political leaders of Northern Nigeria of the terrorism associated with the violent Islamic sect Boko Haram and of any terrorism associated with Islam in the wake of the particularly horrific Christmas day bombings in Madalla, Jos and Gadaka.

 

The fact that these leaders have at last summoned the courage to emerge with this solidly united denunciation means that the Boko Haram scourge is at last coming to a close. The closing of this chapter of Nigeria’s ongoing battle with violent Islam emerges at this point beceause it now becomes clear to all that  Boko Haram is a menace to society. It might have enjoyed some sympathy among those who do not identify with what they might  understand as the infidel social system that runs Nigeria, a system expressed in politics, education, commerce and all aspects of national life, preferring instead to live within a system that is  in harmony with Islam as dictated by Sharia, the Islamic system of government that embraces all aspects of life, but, which, even in those states in Nigeria that run Sharia legal systems, is manifest only in legal issues and not in the system of government.

 

The reports about the stated goals of Boko  Haram, sketchy as they are, suggest a determination for a sweeping implementation of Sharia within the Sharia states of Northern Nigeria and within Nigeria as a  whole. The idea of making Nigeria an Islamic state and pushing for more rigorous Sharia within the Sharia states suggest to me that what Boko Haram is being described as aspiring to is total Islamic government at all levels of social life.

 

An Attempt to See With the Eyes of Boko Haram

 

             Sharia and the Divine Imperative of Revealed Religion

 

                      The Transcendental Character Ascribed to  Revealed  Knowledge

 

This ambition can be understood in terms of what can describe as the divine imperative of Islam and, of many, if not most religions. Religion is often based on what is understood by its devotees as revelation, an opening of the human mind to a form of knowledge not available by any other source and not accessible purely through human initiative. This is described as a radically transcendental form of knowledge. Gaining access to this knowledge enables  participation in a state of being that is as above  human  knowledge as the heavens are above the earth, to quote the Biblical book of Isaiah,  or as removed from human awareness as the light of a lamp hidden in the deepest rock far from human consciousness, but illuminating the cosmos, to adapt a metaphor from Sura al Nur of the Koran.

 

The transcendental character of this knowledge is demonstrated in the understanding that it is  revealed  by divine agency, by the sole initiative  of the creator and sustainer of the universe, and not reached by human  effort.

 

The human being  may prepare themselves  in ways that will dispose divine grace to pour into the aspirant this fantastic knowledge utterly beyond unaided human abilities, as Muhammed is described  as spending a good part of his time  before his revelation within a cave in regular prayer and meditation before the revelation of the Koran through the angel Gabriel and the now iconic command “Read!” from the divine messenger  presented before an awed and terrified  man.   

 

This was a demand to do what the man  could not ordinarily do,  being illiterate,  eventually unlocking from within that man  the ability to read and write, leading to the composition of one of the most influential books in history, a book at the centre of a movement  that transformed Arabic civilisation at all levels and which swept all over  the world, at one time   leading to the creation  of one the world’s most accomplished civilisations, the positive fruits of which have been assimilated and carried on by other civilisations that rose after Islamic civilisation had emerged.

 

In the presence of knowledge revealed by the creator of the cosmos, who is the human  being, that creature who knows not where he or she comes from, who has no knowledge of when they will leave this  earth, of where they will go on leaving this earth,  to claim  any superior knowledge?

 

“The life of this world, begetting and being begotten, is but a sport and a play! If they did but know!” declares the Koran.

 

                     

                                        Divine Revelation and the Question of Social Justice in Ultra-  Conservative   Islamic Thought      

                     

 

What more effective manner to ensure justice, so difficult to arrive at, than to follow divine commands? How may all those evils that plague human society be eradicated if not through the guidance of the One Beyond Being who created  human  beings and all forms of being?

 

What more effective manner to learn from this ultimate authority than through the words received from  that divine authority through a privileged text, a revelation unique in history, superseding all other revelations, and interpreted by he, the Seal of the Prophets, the culmination of the long line of prophets from Abraham to Muhammed, of the line of those who revealed the One God, supreme above all, who revealed  himself to Abraham but the  unsurpassed  light of whose revelation has been dimmed by those who mixed that glory with their own imaginings, such as idea of the Ultimate One, without father or mother, as having a child, leading to a religion based on that strange  interpretation  of an Existent that is beyond all material forms of existence, talk less ideas of sexuality, no matter how modified to suit their imaginations?

 

As for all other religions, they are at best grievous mistakes, at worst abominations.

 

Islamic monotheism is so radical that no images of the divine are allowed, and pure abstraction is emphasised in religious art,  leading to the creation of one of the world’s greatest forms of abstract art, art embodying sublime ideas about ultimate reality as well as related to mathematical insights derived from the presence of this art in Islamic architecture. [1]

 

Within the context of the divine imperative of revealed religion, of the idea that the human being is  best governed by a divinely revealed system of government, the claims about the demands of Boko Haram can be understood as a determination to align humanity  with its creator.

 

                  Boko Haram and the Use of Terrorism in Pursuing a Divine Imperative

 

In the light of the sheer stubbornness of those humans  who will not agree to walk along the divinely ordained path, what is the value of the lives of such people? Are their lives not already forfeit on account of their disobedience of divine commandments? The creator holds all life in his hands and life is valuable only in relation to the creator. The lives of those who do not recognize that creator are therefore of little value.

 

Even the life of I, a servant of the Most High One, is of little value in relation to His transcendental majesty. That life needs to be sacrificed to the ultimate goal of ensuring the fulfillment of the divine will on earth, even if that sacrifice is the immolation of this transitory  body, the covering of my soul, within the flames with which I incinerate the infidels.

 

To be continued in

 

Part 3: The Political Dimension of Boko Haram

Part 4: The Educational Imperative and the Challenge of Boko Haram

 

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