Rereading Iqbal: Don’t trust on heresy & Read Yourself

Click & Read YourselfDon’t trust on heresy

Still after 84 Years  the address is

 relevant, pertinent and significant

 not only for Pakistanis but

 for South Asians in general.  

Don’t trust on South Asian textbooks and media who often miss the punch line while praising or opposing Iqbal.  Born at November 9, 1877 in the historical trader city of the Punjab, Sialkot (which linked huge trade of Shawa-lak reigns started from today’s Arunachal Pradesh at the border of China {Tibet} till Jammu.) Iqbal was 53 years old when he penned this historic address. There was a politics even before the address and and people like Mr Shamsul Hassan of Luknow played a bad role but as Iqbal had relations with many people so a person from Allahabad came forward and then Iqbal travelled from Lhore to Allahabad and delivered his address. But this is not the time to discuss that politics yet I will write about it too. My search started in 2009 when I was working on the content analysis of Textbooks published by Punjab Textbook Board (It was published under the title Hum Apnay bachoon ko kya parha rahyeen hain or What We Are Teaching Our children.) I have to check authenticity of quotations published in books of Pakistan Study, English, Urdu, Islamiat and Ethics. During this search I found that textbook writers even played with the writings of Allama Iqbal. It was a shock but soon I understood why they did so? Even some critics of Iqbal depended on that twisted text which moved me to deconstruct such mentality. So I am sharing original text of Allama Iqbal’s 1930 address. I have its less than half dozen translations but there are issues in all but I will also share those translations with you soon. But twisted text of 1930 address was not found even in those translations. One tiny but important twist is use of the term “Organized Islamic State” but it was neither used in the original text nor in any translation.  Iqbal wrote that address in English and it was first published in 1944. Iqbal Academy has published revised edition of that book “Statements and writings of Allama Iqbal” many times and it is still available. Columbia University has reproduced it in its website and here is its link. You can read and download it easily. 

http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00islamlinks/txt_iqbal_1930.html

Source: Speeches, Writings, and Statements of Iqbal, compiled and edited by Latif Ahmed Sherwani (Lahore: Iqbal Academy, 1977 [1944], 2nd ed., revised and enlarged), pp. 3-26.

I will share some important features with commentary soon at this page. Thanks

aamir riaz (aamirriaz1966@gmail.com)