KARACHI: The real message that one can glean from Allama Iqbal’s poetry is that he talks about humanity, and the issue that the contemporary world is confronted with is the lack of respect for mankind which can be solved if the great poet’s message is properly relayed.

This was the crux of the thesis presented by Dr Syed Taqi Abidi at Urdu Bagh on Monday afternoon.

Dr Abidi, who lives in Canada and is on a personal visit to Pakistan, talked about Iqbal’s ideas by reading the following lines:

Ragon mein woh lahu baqi nahin hai

Woh dil, woh aarzu baqi nahin hai

Namaz-o-roza-o-qurbani-o-Haj

Yeh sub baqi hain, tu baqi nahin hai

[There’s no blood of yesteryear valour

Nor your heart or its desire is the same

Prayers, fasting, the spirit of sacrifice and Haj

All remain, but you, in essence, don’t exist]

‘Javednama is counted among five greatest books in the Persian language’

‘Maulana Iqbal Lahori’

He said today Iqbal’s message, if understood correctly, could show us the way forward. In the last 700 years, after Rumi, Iranian culture had bestowed upon the title of Maulana on only one person, and that was Iqbal — Maulana Iqbal Lahori. There’s a reason for it: Iqbal’s book Javednama was counted among five of the greatest books in the Persian language.

Dr Abidi said we were lucky that we had among us a poet who focused his creative pursuits on humanity or the human race (aadmiat). The biggest issue that the 21st century was faced with was that it didn’t respect human beings and their fundamental rights. Iqbal once said that he called upon Muslims like Rumi because the two poets had something in common. In Rumi’s time, 700 years ago, Khilafat-i-Baghdad was dismantled; and in Iqbal’s time the Ottoman Empire came to an end.

Allama Iqbal believed that we didn’t have to be impressed with the West or get lost in the East’s afsaney, but needed to look for a modern social system (jadeed muasharti nizaam). In that context the poet laid emphasis on respecting the human race. It was the gist of culture and civilisation. Today [some] countries in the West couldn’t claim to be civilised since they didn’t respect their minorities. So Iqbal did not just pose question, but also provided answers to them, he added.

Dr Nomanul Haq presided over the event. Speaking after Dr Abidi’s speech he said while he appreciated the way Iqbal was being remembered, he felt that the poet’s craft, his diction, and his use of metaphors hadn’t been discussed the way they merited. He mentioned Iqbal’s brilliant metrical composition used in his masterpiece Masjid-i-Qurtaba. And in the book Baal-i-Jibreel he argued Iqbal blurred the line between nazm and ghazal. This particular quality of the poet to use words and metres in a certain manner needed to be pointed out. But he (Dr Haq) feared that Iqbal’s poetics might disappear into oblivion if we didn’t highlight it.

Dr Haq said he was once discussing Iqbal with the late Mushtaq Yousufi. Yousufi sahib remarked that Iqbal was a freak (in a positive sense for the poet was prodigiously talented). To which Dr Haq replied that Iqbal was a miracle.

Earlier, two books — Iqbal Aur Pakistan and Mutala-i-Iqbal Ki Jahtein –– were launched. Introducing the books to the audience, Prof Sahar Ansari said they were being launched in connection with Iqbal’s birthday (Nov 9). The essays included in Mutala-i-Iqbal Ki Jahtein had already been published in Urdu quarterly.

Expanding on the subject, Prof Ansari said the essays had to do with the different phases in Iqbal’s life. First, when the global scenario was swiftly changing. Two, when Iqbal visited Europe (1905-1908). Third was to do with Iqbal’s thoughts and ideas that were shaping up because of the preceding two factors. And fourth was related to his khutba-i-Allahabad.

In the end, Dr Fatema Hassan thanked the guests. After the event, a naatia mushaira was held.

Published in Dawn, November 20th, 2018