Ideas Inspired by the Qur'an

The Spirit of Government

Public spirit, public service — this, to Gibbon, was the human motive force of progress, and it was nourished, in his view, by the kind of society which, in turn, it created and preserved: a plural, mobile society. It had created the city-states of Greece, the republic of Rome; and from those city-states and that Republic — not from the Roman Empire — the ideas had been born which were the intellectual means of its preservation. The centralization, the immobility, the monopoly of the Roman Empire had gradually destroyed that pluralism, stifled those ideas, and so progress had been retarded, public virtue had declined, and in the end an inert, top-heavy political structure had fallen to external blows which a healthier organism could have survived. [Trevor-Roper, Edward Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire]

When I say that the aims of an Islamic government are spiritual, people might misinterpret that to mean I am calling for a theocratic state. For most of us, spirituality is an internal, personal matter, while government is the power we delegate to bodies that look over our bodies.

But even our physical bodies are spiritual; they respond to spiritual practices such as ritual worship and fasting; they are invigorated by kindness, and dwindle and die when neglected and shunned.

What kind of government, then, is most likely to promote the spiritual interests of its population?

1. A government that understands spirituality, i.e., the moral, religious, social, intellectual, and emotional needs of its citizens
2. A government whose officials comprise the best elements of the population, rather than the pathocrats we so often see — obsessed with wealth and power, ambitious, voracious, swayed by popularity rather than reality, dishonest, hypocritical, and indifferent to suffering
3. A government that prioritizes competence and care over cunning and control
4. A government that encourages communities to think and act for themselves when such autonomy is neither detrimental nor unfair to the nation as a whole
5. A government that is proactive but not intrusive
6. A government that cannot be swayed or corrupted by special interests or the opaque influence of the rich and powerful
7. A government that can mobilize the population for self-defence but then relinquishes that power when the danger has passed

Is there any system that can ensure such a government?

No, there is not. Monarchy and autocracy can produce amazing results when obeyed, but constant discipline without growth from below results in a passive, apathetic, and slovenly population that remains stunted and ignorant. Republicanism and democracy also look good at first, but they eventually generate self-interested factions that make political power their sole goal, and thus become corrupted by money and demagoguery. Aristocracy might appear to be a happy medium between the merits of quality and quantity, between the clear decisiveness of a king and the participatory fervor of the people, but aristocrats generally start to treasure their privileges and split into rival parties while coining bons mots about the rabble.

Every system is but a means, a technology, and no technology can guarantee that it will be used fairly or benignly. Rather it is the spirit of the tool-user that determines what the end or purpose will be. Spiritual diseases have never been cured with material bandages, and for every rule there is a loophole or workaround when the original reason for that rule is no longer respected.

If we hope to achieve the kind of government I described above, there is no substitute for practising it; practice makes perfect or, if not perfect, at least competent. And competence is what we lack.

So all I can suggest is that our mosques and local community groups begin to practise the virtues of good government. And since our mosques are only as good as the people who comprise them, we first need a spiritual revolution in our priorities as Muslims. How do we refrain from taking power in favour of taking care? How do we learn to honour honest poverty as much as or more than the flaunted wealth and subtle pride that goes with worldly success?

In other words, before we talk about national or regional government, how do we govern ourselves and our families spiritually?

Download the PDF version for free at Ideas Inspired by the Qur’ān – Mont Redmond complete version, or purchase a hard copy at Ideas Inspired by the Qur’an: Redmond, Mont: 9781738842506: Books – Amazon.ca.

Photo by Sam Kolder