The Trial of Socrates; The Society that we aspire to.

When Socrates was brought before the Athenian assembly and charged with the crime of corrupting the youth, the charge that he was really convicted of was that of not doing “politics”. 

Contrarily he had given his life in service to the community; in his own words he had advised them, each and all, and on more than one occasion to pay heed to their moral and ethical wellbeing over their gaining an unfair advantage- one over another. 

He had taken this course contrary to his own apparent wellbeing, because he perceived a greater good in it and stayed that course beyond the judgment of death that was enforced on him. 

Solon said that a fortunate man is one who dies happy. Socrates died happy. 

Society often persecutes the one who seeks the good of the community whilst avoiding a political mindset; one who does not massage egos, and doesn’t work through cliques of people; being open instead to all, and one, and gives himself in the service of all, and not just the few. 

This is what we witnessed when Corbyn failed in the election. It was not a failure of vision, rather it was too much vision for too many people. 

It was a failure in “politics”, that he was not politic enough or rather more telling, that politics had not grown past the days of Socrates.

But it had, and it can again. 

Because that is not the society that we, as Muslims, aspire to. The society that we aspire to, was one that the Messenger (saw) moulded. 

Imagine if you will a society that safeguarded even the Munafiq- those that professed belief only to gain an advantage (the hypocrites who we know will be assigned the the lowest part of hell). Where their names were recorded and yet kept safe from common knowledge, to the extent that when they died the believers gathered to pray over them. 

Read the expedition of Tabuk. 

Where Kab bin Malik (ra) remained behind, and was of those who back slide. 

How the Messenger (saw) and the believers imposed a boycott on him. Not so much as a punishment, but more so that revelation might come down concerning him. *1

And the delight that they had, and the wish that he might be exonerated by Divine writ, when it happened and that heartfelt openness of a community as one. 

For whilst the hypocrites came and made their usual excuses, and were not hindered from doing so.. it was for the believers both a trial and an exposition of what should and could be. 

That even Wahshi who slew Hamza (ra), the beloved uncle of the Messenger (saw) was accepted into the fold and granted forgiveness.  *2

That is the openness that Islam ushered in to the human experience. *3

And that example will stand the test of time. 

  

What I have said here is my considered opinion. If it is wrong then that wrong belongs to me. 

Knowledge is sought through study and contemplation, not via lectures, nor speeches, nor this above. 

*1 the Messenger (saw) said of him that if he had asked me, then I would have prayed for forgiveness for him. 

However the community of believers, there, ever sought connection to God’s Grace, and Kab wished to be exonerated by God Himself. 

And it’s also clear that the Messenger also so wished it, and fervently prayed that revelation might descend exonerating him. 

Read the verses revealed concerning him. 

*2 Wahshi took the Shahadah with the

Messenger (saw), and was asked that he not present himself before him again as the pain of recollection was too great for him (the Messenger (saw)) to bear. 

*3 A benchmark of Sunni Muslim Civilisation is and was the extent to which we would go to to preserve that openness. 

The Seljuk Turk princes would ride out to open plains and remain there until the sun set, free from their cumbersome courtiers, in order to allow complainants full access to them - and none would be hindered from approach. 

the BasmaAllah

As Abu Bakr (ra) walked beside the mounted young captain, Usama bin Zayd (ra), leading his army to meet the Roman battalions that threatened from the North, he offered him advice. 

He did not tell him how to meet the Romans, neither the configuration nor the tactics that he should employ. 

He did not, at least not at first, remind him of the rules of engagement neither to chop the tree, nor to harm the peasant farmers, nor the old, infirm or young. 

His first advice was the most telling. 

For the battle worn companions in the train behind them marvelled at such a sight. 

The older, wiser veteran of many campaigns, Abu Bakr (ra), wanted to impress on the men that followed the necessity of discipline, and so he refused Usamah’s offer of his mount. 

And then the first rightly guided Caliph, the then leader of the Muslims, advised the young captain to remember the BasmaAllah. 

“Remember when you eat to say the BasmaAllah “- in the name of Allah, the true name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. 

At one and the same time a dedication, a means and a way of partaking by His leave and through His grace, and then a remembrance of that grace. 

Indeed it is Islam that advocates a systems approach to living life to its fullest. 

And whilst it is vogue in today’s modern world to recognise the utility that a systems approach brings to work, it is less so for the things that are the more important. 

For the modern world advocates a lasse faire- everything and anything goes- approach to our personal and interpersonal lives and to our spiritual side. 

That your children should be the concern of the state, that your marriage doesn’t need time, nor work, that your faith is inconsequential. 

And that you are free in your social life to do as you please. 

And yet it is our Islam that advocates a systematic approach to all those things, as being in fact just as important, if not more so. 

That there is a right way to do those things. And therefore that there are better and also worse ways to do them. 

That your children will need your continual guidance, even that is when they are all grown up. 

That your parents have a right over your company, and friendship. 

That some times it is enough just to be there for your loved ones. 

And that in our social conversations we need to be aware of the hurt we can cause, or the alienation that can surface when we are not fully open to others. 

And it is the BasmaAllah that should remind us of all those things, precisely because it is the right way to start any, and all things. 

Remembering God, that He blessed us with the ability to try and achieve, to do and to fail, to learn and then go on. 

That the right way to start to eat, is to do so recognising that it is by God’s leave and grace that you partake of it’s nourishment.

And the right things to eat are wholesome foods, and these are those that are halal. 

And the right way to finish eating is by Thanking God for His provision and care. 

Alhamdolillah, Allah and his Messenger (saw) have taught us gratitude, even for the simple things in life. 

Like the clean and pure water that we sip, fully savouring it’s taste and eschew the thirsty gulp of an ingrate - even that is when we are thirsty. 

And it is this ever present gratitude, even when we have little, that makes us both happy, and contented, and is our strength in adversity. 

What I have said here is my considered opinion. If it is wrong then that wrong belongs to me. 

Knowledge is sought through study and contemplation, not via lectures, nor speeches, nor this above.  Knowledge is sought through study and contemplation, not via lectures, nor speeches, nor this above.