Prophetic way to establish peace and justice in the world

To achieve peace in personal and societal life through obedience to the Creator is the principle proposed by Islam. Upholding moral values, ethics and maintaining discipline in personal life and thus in the society is very much essential in order to establish peace and justice in the world. While a group of people work towards this aim, it is quite natural that those rulers and intermediaries who live upon exploiting the people through injustice and immoral means will deadly oppose their movement. They will instigate the ignorant masses and turn them against those good souls by false propaganda. They will use all possible means to oppress the missionaries of peace to eliminate them to protect their selfish interests. How to overcome such hurdles and establish peace and justice in the world? The aim of this brief article is to  draw lessons from the methodology of the messengers of God in this regard.

Reformation and opposition:

The messengers of God were sent to different parts of the world at different periods of time. They found their respective nations living in turmoil amidst superstitions in the name of religions, idol worship, tribal wars, treachery, injustice, enmity, exploitation, immorality etc. under the influence of Satan.

The messengers reformed the people gradually by reminding them about the oneness of mankind and oneness of God and their answerability to Him. They guided their respective people to worship directly the Creator without intermediaries and formalities and thus freed them from superstitions and exploitations. Reminding about paradise and hell in the life hereafter, they enjoined people to do good and forbid evil in the world. As a result of this they started ignoring the intermediaries and ruling class who were exploiting them in the name of religion. Realizing the harm done to their selfish interests, the exploiters extensively oppressed the messengers and their followers to force them to stop their movement. They also instigated the ignorant masses against those good souls. They faced killings, social boycott, tortures and other oppressions.

Lessons to be drawn:

While we study the Prophets in general and Prophet Muhammad in particular (peace be upon them all) we can observe that God almighty guides them to success with the following means: Patience, amnesty, perseverance and application of proper wisdom. During the 13 years of preaching at Mecca, Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) or his followers patiently underwent the oppressive measures inflicted by the enemies. Those who could not withstand the oppressions were advised by Prophet to immigrate to safer places. The oppressed were never allowed to revenge their oppressors as this will adversely affect the process of reformation of people. After prophet’s immigration to Medina, when the enemies waged a war on to stop the growth of Islam, only then the prophet and their followers fought a defensive war to save the movement.

In the incidents of war, treatment of prisoners of war, his rule at Medina, conquest of Mecca etc. we can observe that the Prophet was giving utmost respect to each and every human soul which he encountered and he gave every chance reform. His intention was not elimination of any human being but its reformation. Even after gaining supreme leadership of state as well as religion he did not avenge any one for the wrongs done to his self. But he never failed to avenge when interests of Islam or public were violated.  Besides sticking on to the methodology of the Prophet, seeking closeness to God through prayers and remembrance of Him and maintaining clear and unselfish intention the workers of the mission to establish peace should never ignore the following facts:

§  Islam means adopting a life of obedience to the Creator and any human being is having the right to adopt it at any point of time. Hence those who have adopted it already either by choice or by hereditary should never alienate themselves as a separate sect and treat others as their enemies.

§  All human beings irrespective of their color, creed, country, religion, language etc, belong to our family and thus they are our brothers and sisters. Hence we cannot treat any of them as our enemies. The real enemy is Satan who is misguiding them. Our prime duty is to release them from the clutches of Satan by reminding them about our Creator and our answerability to Him.

§  This is the highest humanitarian service on earth by we which are liberating the mankind from the clutches of miseries enshrouding them today and the misery of life to come hereafter. We are taking them to Paradise instead of Hell.

§  Our ultimate aim is to please our Creator who will reward us for each and every minutest effort of us. Hence the failures, oppositions and oppressions should not deter us from our aim.