Introduction
I have this documentary fetish. I joined a group on Facebook called; I watch the history channel like its porn. True statement. So, one of the recent documentaries that I watched, and felt that it was worth mentioning in a review is “The Man Who Walked Across the World- Magicians and Mystics”. The documentary follows an Arabist, Tim Mackintosh-Smith, who retraces the steps of the 14th Century Muslim traveler, Ibn Batuta. I am not a huge fan of Ibn Batuta, nonetheless, his travels always intrigued me.
A Disclaimer: This is my first post of the like, so bare with me…
Biography of Ibn Batuta
His name was Abu Abdullah Muhammad Ibn ِAbdullah Al Lawati Al Tanji Ibn Battuta. He was born in February of 1304 and died about 60 to 70 years later. Ibn Batuta was a Moroccan Berber and a jurisprudent in the Madhab of Imam Malik (RH). Although he was a scholar in his own, he is primarily known in the Muslim world and the Western world for his travels. He traveled across much of the Muslim world as well as outside of it. Ibn Batuta visited North Africa, West Africa, Southern Europe and Eastern Europe in the West, to the Middle East, Indian subcontinent, Central Asia, Southeast Asia and China. And for the intents and purposes of this blog entry, that is all we will have to know about our sometimes-friend, Ibn Batuta.
Brief Synopsis of the Documentary
The narrator of this documentary is Tim Mackintosh-Smith. He is an Arabist and has lived in the Muslim world for half of his life. The documentary begins in Turkey, the homeland of Rumi. This is where, according to Mackintosh-Smith, Ibn Batuta’s journey began. The documentary continues with the narrator spending an evening with Sufis of the Mevlevi order. The gathering, technically illegal in Turkey now, consisted of dancing, music, food and statements of Rumi’s history and philosophy. Mackintosh-Smith then leaves the busy city to interview descendents of the nomadic Sultans in the outskirts of Turkey. The documentary continues to the Crimea, or modern-day Ukraine and a visit to an Orthodox church, whereto it is said that Ibn Batuta also traveled. The overwhelming remainder of the video consists of Ibn Batuta’s stay in Indian and the Sultan, Mohammad Shah.
Reflections/Conclusions
So pretty much everything that preceding this section was boring and dry because there was very little personality within the text. Believe me I know this. I just wanted to offer a brief historical background of the focus of this documentary and a synopsis of the documentary; you should watch it yourself (I offer the link at the bottom of this entry). So, I don’t consider myself too accepting of a person. However, as of late, I have been trying to broaden my horizons and exposure to other cultures and beliefs. Aristotle is quoted to have said, “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it”. I feel as though I have reached a status in my intellectual endeavors whereby I can now seek out new ideas and thoughts without feeling tremendous influence by them. With this quote in mind, I watched this documentary with a surprising amount of tolerance and wonder.
The narrator of the documentary set out to show a picture of the Muslim world that is not always seen in the West. It sought to bring down the monolithic image of the Muslim world that has been created in today’s media and political discourse. The Arabist does a wonderful job of showcasing the rich diversity that is found within the Muslim world. I am of a particular persuasion, school of thought, and ideology. However, I could not help but revel in the beauty of all the different peoples and cultures studied in this short documentary. This is a theme or understanding that you will see in a lot of my writings from now on. The Mevlevis in Turkey, the Tatars in Ukraine and the Muslim Magicians in India showcased in this documentary each offered a very human, yet very distinct face to Muslims and the Muslim world.
I found myself, not necessarily re-evaluating my social or religious beliefs, rather finding a certain beauty in the difference that exists in our Muslim societies. It peaked my curiosity in cultures that I might have previously found offensive or heretical. I hope this is only a beginning to a thorough study of the Muslim world and the plethora of peoples and cultures it has to offer.
The documentary can be searched and streamed on the following website:
http://bestdocumentaries.blogspot.com/
- The Bengali
The reasons for people rejecting God
June 14, 2008
Salaam,
it only makes sense that you present both sides of an issue. I am learning this well with the philosophy class on biomedical ethics i am taking. It seems that the reason for people rejecting God are greater than the reasons for acceptance. The top reason, of course, is due to the technological advances that have occurred in our country and around the world over the last 4 decades, in particular. It has made man feel proud of himself and his accomplishments and so he begins to get a feeling that he does not need anyone else to regulate his life. He should live as a humanist, atheist or agnostic as all these give him a sense of control over his life.
Also, the loss of nature has contributed heavily as well to the rejection of God. The people go outside everyday to see more lands cleared of trees and more industry taking over. Pollution is wide-spread and more and more animals lose their homes. There is no connection with nature except for maybe a watch of the sunrise or a trip to the beach.
There has also been a negative media influence on the people’s rejection of God. Everyday more and more stories are coming out that attack people with religious views as extremist, left-wing and backwards. On the other hand, the media has no problem with people cursing God and portraying him as they please with the slogan of “free speech.” This is not to generalize but stations like Fox news are almost becoming impermissible for Muslims to watch, for example, because they only show the extremist aspect of Islam.
The loss of morals in society and the negative attitude towards fate has added to the rejection of God as well. With more and more people stealing, lacking modesty, treating family members without respect, you naturally start to get used to the non-religious atmosphere around you.
Next to last, science, philosophy and psychology are three academic areas that have attacked religion and thus aided people in rejecting God. They are part of the “free-thinkers and research” arena. They enforce their views on others through schools, colleges and daily control of all of our marketing networks but claim only religion enforces its ideology on others. A perfect example of this is how my own professor deleted my entire post on his criticism of religion and its lack of merit because i was displeased with his intro on religion. He wrote that a religious person with morals is not as superior to someone who believes in morals without religion. I wrote that the fact you spent only one paragraph on religion in a 10 chapter book is clearly showing bias and an unopen mind from someone who teaches philosophy. I also said philosophers are all talk and live depressing lives while those who believe in God act upon what they teach and have changed communities for the better. But lets leave that.
The last and most important reason for people rejecting God is something most people don’t talk about and that is related to the secret societies and gangs that have infiltrated the power structure in our country. This ranges from fraternities to sororities to gangs. I will only dwell on their generalities as i don’t want to commit intellectual dishonesty with any of them. Basically, they seek your loyalty and life to their certain organization and work in absolute secrecy. Now secrecy can be good or bad but just from knowing about their basics, it seems that you pledge loyalty to Satan or to another man above God. It doesn’t even matter about family or your own when it goes against the “gang” or “brotherhood”. So these above are all factors that go against people who try to search or find God.
To be frank, one more point must be addressed which is the issue of what do most humans think about god? Religion definitely prevails over philosophy or atheism as a mindset of a lot of people. This is evident from the fact that any way of thinking other than religion has to be preached and built in to people while the belief in God is something that most people seem to believe naturally. But what do people mean by belief in God? It is a belief, for most humans, that is full of heedlessness and requires no service or actions in the way of god. To believe in God means that you believe in your heart and don’t really follow him in your everyday actions. One must conclude that the majority of humans are thus in partial rejection of god because they believe in him but do not follow him. This is still a rejection that is of a lesser level in comparison to those who believe in no god or believe they are their own Gods. So rejection is widespread and can be partial or complete.
A.R. Absolutist
