Desperately Seeking Paradise: Journeys of a Sceptical Muslim
by Ziauddin Sardar
(Granta Books)
Born in 1951 in Pakistan and raised in London, Ziauddin Sardar is a prolific, 21st-century, universal man. His Google hits amount to thousands, referring the googler not only to Sardar’s own writing, but to writing about him. His own topics range from information technology to scientific futures, from literary reviews to Islam.
As a columnist, he is an interpreter and critic of Islam to the West, while understanding the role of colonialism in the decline of Islamic culture. In short, his project is to show and emphasise a strain of scepticism in Islam.
This provokes the ire of both American patriots and less sceptical Muslims. To the former, he is an apologist for Islam; to the latter, a traitor (there are some scary blogs out there).
Desperately Seeking Paradise continues this project, tracing the writer’s journey from his youth as a Muslim student activist in the 1970s to his role in various Muslim think-tanks; from his hurtful breaks with dogmatic former comrades to reconciliation with them post-9/11.
Throughout, Sardar traces the history of humanism and scepticism in Islam, using it as an antidote to the various forms of bigotry he encounters as he searches for some Islamic movement or think-tank in which he can play a role.
The book is a hoot, cultural criticism as comedy. Frequently, Sardar is approached by a pair of characters who either want to “help” him find “true” Islam, or who seek his help in matters religious or political. Having identified himself as a seeker — “Seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave” is an oft-quoted saying of the Prophet Muhammad — Sardar readily falls in tow with whoever knocks on his door.
Sooner or later, though, he discovers his companions to be absolutist and unforgiving in religion. The comedy is created by the way in which Sardar caricatures these characters and his conversations with them, throwing the naive simplicity of their belief into sharp relief.
Sometimes this verges on uncomfortable stereotype, and one wonders about Sardar’s less explicit motives. But he redeems himself with witty self-effacements.
Desperately Seeking Paradise is a must-read for the way in which its extended argument against absolutism is interwoven with a history of scepticism in Islam.
It also contains a wealth of information on the history of the interpretation of the Qu’ran, early Islamic jurisprudence, literature and culture. For instance, the book explains how Shariah (Islamic law) started out as jurisprudence in action, as a method of interpretation after the prophet’s death. But it is the interpretations of “eighth century, classical jurists” themselves that became codified as Shariah, making their historical interpretations an unchanging law.
Underneath the comedy, scepticism and frustration at absolutism, the book is also a paean to the history of Islam. This is evident in the chapter on Sardar’s time in Mecca, establishing the Hajj Research Centre.
The aim was to study human movement during the pilgrimage and to use such analysis in town planning so that Mecca could be developed without losing its history. At some point, Sardar reenacts the pilgrimage on foot, and the reader encounters the voice of a sceptic filled with the passion of a believer. This is the voice of someone who understands the importance of history, culture and ritual, who understands the spirit of Islam and believes in it far more passionately than any of his dogmatic opponents.
Rustum Kozain is a writer who lives in Cape Town. His debut collection of poetry, This Carting Life, was published in August this year