What_Was_the_Secret_of_Sir_Syed's_Success

SOCIAL, RELIGIOUS & POLITICAL CONDITIONS OF ARABS BEFORE HOLY PROPHET PBUH SOCIAL: Arabian Social life presented no better a picture. The Arabs were ignorant of the very essentials of social virtues. Their manner of life made the progress of any social virtue impossible. Tribal feuds engaged their whole attention. A settled and peaceful mode of life, indispensable to the cultivation of social qualities, was unknown to them. The prospect of hostilities with another clan that might break out at any time was ever present before their minds. They led a nomadic life, wandering with their cattle from place to place. They would set up their tents of camel-skins wherever they found water to drink and forage for their cattle. Only a small minority of them had settled in villages and still fewer in towns. There were certain noble traits like Hospitality, love of freedom, daring, manliness, tribal fidelity and generosity in which the Arab had no equal. RELIGIOUS: No doubt, the Arabs professed faith in the unity of God, but their belief was shallow. Their practical life belied their profession. They thought that the Almighty had entrusted the discharge of the various functions of the universe to different gods, goddesses and idols. They therefore turned to these, invoking their blessings in all their undertakings. Thus their belief in the Unity of God was an empty belief, finding no place in the system of their practical life. Besides, idols, they looked upon the air, the sun, the moon and the stars as the controllers of their destinies, and worshipped them as such. They had fallen as low as to worship pieces of stone, trees and sand-heaps. They prostrated before any fine piece of stone they might come across. Should they fail to find a piece of stone, they would worship a sand hill. They looked upon angels as the daughters of God! Even men of fame were worshipped, images being carved out in their names. It was not necessary to have the stones properly carved or shaped; even rough, uneven ones served the purpose. Besides the three hundred and sixty idols set up in the Ka'bah, every tribe had an idol of its own. The central idea of their faith was that God had made over the control and administration of the universe to others in whom He had vested all powers, such as healing the sick, granting children and removing famine and epidemic. In addition to idol-worship, which was the order of the day, star-worship had taken as firm a root in the soil of Arabia. Human destiny was associated with the movements of various stars and the phenomena of nature affecting the fortunes of man for good or evil were attributed to their influence. Whereas on the one hand, the worst form of idolatry had its hold on the Arab mind in general, there were also some who had no faith in the existence of God, the immortality of the human soul and the day of retribution. To them all religion was mockery. POLITICAL: There was no central government to enforce law and order in the country, which was rent into innumerable petty states, each clan forming a separate and independent political unit. They were too weak to enforce justice; to wrench one's rights from another, one had to depend upon one's strength of arm. Each tribe had a chief of its own, its leader in battle, but there was no law whatsoever binding the tribe to the nation. Each was independent, owing no allegiance to any central authority until Islam came with its unifying force. Hostilities once breaking out continued for generations. Trifles, such as a word of contempt, or a slight mischief in a horse race, led to the slaughter of thousands and the eternal bondage of the vanquished. A mighty transformation! A miracle, as a modern writer calls it in his Ins and Outs of Mesopotamia: "A more disunited people it would be hard to find, till, suddenly, the miracle took place. A man arose who by his personality and by his claims to direct Divine guidance, actually brought about the impossible, namely the union of all these warring factions."