Common Sense
By: Hassan Al-Haifi

In the previous two issues, we delved into the pre-Islamic period in Mohammed's (Peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) life to shed light on the spiritual evolution of the Messenger of Allah. The early revelations of the Koran were generally very powerful short verses that impress upon the reader the mighty powers of the Divine that are consolidated in Allah, the Al-Mighty, with brief introductions to the spiritual development of man and the series of prophets and messengers that came, from time to time, to correct the misconceptions that have evolved over the passage of time. The essence of these early revelations is to ascertain the fallacy of all the prevailing religious misconceptions, noting that most of these are the work of men, who saw in religion an opportunity for wealth and power and who, accordingly, corrupted the instinctive inclinations of mankind to seek spiritual salvation, with a view towards satisfying the mundane aspirations of these men. In other words, mankind is relieved from having to resort to priests, "holy men", medicine men and any other human beings, who profess to have quasi supernatural powers or direct connections to the Divine. On the other hand, the essence of faith is manifested to the point of outlining simple worshipping rites that rely on the believer's intentions and strong motivations of faith. The simplicity of these worshipping rites is sufficient enough so as not to have a need for clerics and priests to "carry the burden" for the believer, while at the same time their regularity ensures one Ð to Ð One contact with the Lord on a daily basis. Their communal nature, while not mandatory, in most cases, is strongly encouraged to promote a fraternal bond among the believers and to instill the principle of the equality of men, notwithstanding their national, ethnic and social affiliation. While the worshipping rites of Islam are significant in providing the Moslems with a high degree of homogeneity and discipline, they also help to create a sense of order in the believer's life. Moreover, they provide the Moslem with a chance to take care of personal hygienic needs and to clear the mind of some of the pressures of daily life.

In summary, the five principle rites of worship in Islam are: 1) to attest openly that "There is no God, but Allah, and that Mohammed is the Messenger of Allah"; 2) to carry out the five prayers of the day, at their fixed time intervals, preferably collectively in the mosques; 3) To fast during the Holy Month of Ramadhan (from dawn to sundown); 4) to pay the Zakat duty (for those who have acquired the resources that exceed their subsistence needs and managed to keep this position for over a year); and 5) to make the pilgrimage to Mecca (only if able to afford the journey, without causing any hardships on the dependents for sustenance).

Yet, Islam does not end there! In fact, Islam came as a special phenomenon of a far greater global significance, the influences of which cannot be overestimated. Islam insists that oppression and authoritarian rule are anathema to Islam and the political power rests with the masses of the faithful. The Prophet Mohammed (P) and his early disciples had a clear comprehension of the political and social ramifications of Islam and set fine examples of how the responsible officials of the state should act in their official duty, as well as in their personal lives and interactions with people. The respect for human and civil rights was a matter of religious duty rather than merely being a civic responsibility, to these early adherents of Islam and their application of sentience was so in-depth that their piety and love of God could never be questioned, even though some of them have already been pledged with the Lord's blessings and bliss in the hereafter, for their contributions and struggle for Islam in its primary stages.

Much of what has become universally recognized as human rights have their origins in the teachings and practices of the Prophet Mohammed and his early followers, and this is attested to by many historians and statesmen over the ages. Unfortunately, Moslems, soon after that, became the last to see this important aspect of Islam, as the model Moslem state, set up by Mohammed and followed through, more or less, by the Moslem leaders that followed him for about half a century after that, became the victim of greed and lust for power among the Moslems themselves, whose affinity to earthly things became far closer than it was to the spiritual.

Eventually, the Model State was overthrown, only to be replaced by autocratic regimes. These autocratic regimes, while proclaiming themselves to be the guardians of the faith, on the contrary worked diligently to erase the real fundamental political and social message of Islam. They even had "religious" scholars express and teach that submission to such regimes was a part of religious doctrine, keeping the emphasis on religious worship rites, as the essential elements of Islam! Many Moslem states today have their legitimacy based on this fallacy, and thus regard political awareness as anathema to Islam.
At the present time, many problems and challenges beset the Moslem World. The most serious of these challenges, is to overcome the general lack of grasp of the fundamental political and social principles that Mohammed (P) sought to instill on his followers. Even those current "fundamentalists', who claim to be struggling for the "revival" of the "true Islamic state," appear to be no more than disheartening organized efforts to misrepresent Islam and to project a narrow-minded and often distorted image of the real principles of Islam. These "fundamentalists", by the nature of their organizations and tactics Ð autocratic and non-transparent Ð cannot and should not ever be viewed as the competent manifestation of the message that Mohammed conveyed to mankind. In fact, they often project the image of Islam and Moslems that the Prophet Mohammed (P) or his followers taught or acted directly against. Even the political orientations of such organized fanatics arouses the suspicions of many conscientious Moslems as to their real objectives and origin of support. On the other hand, these extremists tend to project an extremely exaggerated view of some very minor issues that are not of such great significance, such as clothing, appearance, etc., and they overlook the overriding issues of the oppressive regimes that rule in those countries, where they have been allowed to operate with a high degree of freedom and the corruption that surrounds them (and one wonders how the leaders of these "missionaries" are living in lavish wealth and splendor, that would have outraged the Prophet and his early disciples, had they seen it). On the other hand, they reject the concepts of human rights and political freedom as "Zionist and imperialist designs" that are anathema to Islam! Moreover, they insist that their conceptions of Islam are the only legitimate ones, damning the majority of Moslems throughout the world as "heathens" and rejecting the theological and philosophical work of generations of highly regarded Moslem scholars, whose volumes of scholarly works have more to offer for Moslems, in eloquence and content, than what the masterminds of these "fundamentalist" movements have to offer as guidelines for Moslems to pursue. Another characteristic that is disheartening is that the leaders of these movements tend to take on the place of clerics of supreme authority, whose wisdom can never be contested by the followers, or whose orders and judgements can never be questioned or appealed. One would expect that if the ample resources that seem to be available to these suspicious movements is depleted and the general Moslem population becomes more aware of the suspicions that these movements give rise to, they will fade in the strength of the tolerance, which the religious of Islam introduced to the social order of the universe.

Tolerance is one of the principle contributions of Islam to the social and political development of human civilization. It was the tolerance that early Moslems displayed, wherever they went, that lead to its rapid spread (and not the sword as many prejudiced Western historians would like us to believe). It was also tolerance that lead to the cultural advances of Moslems during the Middle Ages, when Europe was in the heyday of its darkness, that eventually lead the foundations for all the scientific, social and cultural advances that the modern world enjoys today. It is in this that one can rest assured that the eternal Message of the Prophet Mohammed that started in the Month of Ramadhan over 15 centuries ago will surely carry on as a positive factor in the development of man, towards the next millennium and in the millenniums to come.

Dr. Mohamed A. Qubaty
Professor of Surgery, 
Sana'a University, 
Advisor for the Presidium of the Yemeni Parliament

Funding education is a problem faced by all societies, but Yemen is not only a poor country, it is also the first in the world as regards the rate of increase in population. It is a fact that the population explosion in Yemen is the main cause of the problem of funding education in our country. If the situation remains as it is, education, health and housing will not be the only victims but the whole Yemeni people will suffer from more poverty year after year.

The work for reforming and developing education in all its aspects, branches and dimensions must be the first item on the agenda of decision-makers in Yemen. Future education systems in Yemen must include the following:
¥ Getting rid of the existing means of education, which are based on rote learning, and replacing them with methods aiming at developing analytical, creative and research capabilities among students.
¥ Paying special attention to teaching students how to exercise self-education and using the basic resources available to obtain knowledge, including the multi-dimensional media of information and the internet.
¥ There must be an emphasis on the concept of comprehensive education as it includes intermarriage of specialties and reorganization of universities and research centers in a manner allowing such intermarriage in a short time.
¥ Benefiting from modern technology in education process and interacting with the intellectual outcomes which they yield.
¥ Re-consideration of the relationship between the institutions of public education (universities and schools) and other education institutions, because in the technological revolution, information and the multi-media technology have become a parallel school with an ever-increasing role in the education process.
¥ Reconsideration of the concept of illiteracy eradication so that it would not be confined to reading and writing but also to cover the idea of eradicating computer illiteracy and teaching the basics of information literacy.
¥ Establishing Centers of Excellence, i.e. research units of a high level capable of following up the technological developments and comprehending their results.
¥ Adoption of a policy of continuous education which necessitates flexibility in all institutions of public education.
¥ Helping students to form their own viewpoints concerning various issues and problems and to develop the skills of criticizing thinking.
¥ Giving particular attention to the resources of education, especially regarding quality, modernization and variety and facilitating their acquisition.
¥ Giving broad opportunity for optional studies and diversification of educational activities, taking them as a basis for developing students' tendencies.
¥ Re-training and rehabilitation of teachers and maintaining training during service to update their knowledge and abilities.
¥ More linkage between education and the local community and encouragement of education decentralization.
¥ Rendering due care to Yemenis living abroad and those coming back home, and benefitting from them and effecting essential changes in teaching live foreign languages, in addition to increasing scholarships for studying abroad in fields of applied sciences.
¥ Revising some existing educational concepts in the light of scientific and technological developments.
Coming out with a comprehensive strategy aimed at reforming and developing education could not be achieved except by assigning a higher supervising commission to set up a committee of experts to undertake preparation of studies and researches required for rescuing education from its present dilemma. It would also have to explore the real dimensions of the tasks that must be fulfilled in order to find a remedy to all the defects that are threatening the educational system in Yemen, in order to keep in pace with developmental requirements and the rapid changes of the world of the 21st century.
Some of the proposed outlines may be:
¥ Regarding objectives: Education in Yemen must work for upgrading the level of capabilities (i.e. developing human intelligence abilities)
¥ Regarding curriculum: Concepts of dialogue education should be adopted and the student participation in acquiring knowledge.
¥ Regarding content: The education process should be characterized by flexibility, renewal and ability to comprehend new knowledge.
¥ Regarding scope: education should be spacious enough to include adult education in a direct and intensified form, and to stress the importance of tackling the problem of girls' leakage from the education system, a matter having a considerable negative impact on the aspects and potentials of sustainable development in Yemen in general.

Mohammed Hatem Al-Qadhi,
Managing Editor

Four days and 94 hours are left before the world moves into the third millennium. However, there are some people who still argue that the 20th century will not finish at the end of December. They say that there is one year left in this century.
Whichever it is, some nations will be moving into the next century very quickly, developing and changing as time goes on. Still, there are some nations which will hardly be able to even crawl into the 21st century.

It is a good chance to go back for a while and think of the great scientific and technological achievements which the world has made in the 20th century. The world has been able to make laudable strides in different fields of life, doing many things which had never been done before, and some things which were only dreamed of. In fact, this century is associated with miraculous achievements, which the world should be very proud of.
A lot of discoveries in different arenas of life have been made. It is also in this century that great theories like those of Freud, Darwin, Marx, Einstein and others emerged. It is in this century that man landed on the moon for the first time. Marvelous and radical changes in the life of mankind have taken place. They are, of course, uncountable.

The most important revolution in the history of man in the 20th century is that in communication technology. This revolution has broken all the barriers between the world communities, and made the world, so to speak, a global village. This information revolution has also helped in the emergence of globalization, not only of economics but also of politics and culture. I mean it is in this century the communication between nations has become very close, particularly with the advent of the internet and the telephone.
Again, it was in this century that great catastrophic events took place, such as the First and Second World Wars. Still, the achievements remain greater than the catastrophes.

It is a good time for nations to go back for a while and examine their contributions to the welfare of humanity. It is those nations who have helped humanity most that should be remembered well. There are, however, nations which did nothing. They were and are still just consumers of the products of the hardworking communities. What is more unfortunate is that these countries are not aware of their future at all. The advanced world has made up its full-fledged plans and resolutions for the new century or at least for the new year. But other nations are not conscious of what is happening and what the next millennium means to them. I believe that everybody in the Western world has made up his own decision and plan for the new year. Their governments and nations usually make decisions and plans for several years to come. I wish that the third world countries did just like the western people and made plans, even for at least for one year in advance.

Yemen is one of those countries which will move to the next millennium only in terms of time. I feel really worried about our society when I find that there are some people in our country who still live in the past.
Yemen is truly troubled by many ordeals that are still to come. Education, the main ingredient that is supposed to help us move to the next century hale and sound, is perverted and useless. The health sector in our country is very deteriorating and having hard times. Sheiks and tribes are still more powerful than law and order. The whole infrastructure of the society is shaky and undependable; a brighter tomorrow is uncertain. The social structure needs considerable restructuring. Corruption seems to have devoured everything in this country and is out of control. Therefore, are the people in authority aware of the challenges of the next century? If they are, they do not seem to have made plans to find solutions for the many pitfalls which lie in the road.

Merry Christmas and happy new year to you all.