Of late my peaceful coexistence in/with cyberspace has been periodically disturbed by "provocative articles" forwarded from individuals/groups that are seemingly attempting to push the agenda of the Malaysian "Anti- Hadis" group to the point of irritation.
Muslims believe in the Quraan and the Sunnah of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/fundamentals/hadithsunnah/ that guides their lives.
I do not mind reading alternative viewpoints on issues of the day but not ones that are provocative and damaging to any religious faith. In this case of which war is declared in cyberspace, Islam becomes the target for zealots of the Anti-Hadis cult.
Let me analyze an interesting and funny one.
Interesting email I received
Consider the following unsolicited emails I receive:
"I'm sure you know there are thousands of forums, email groups of Muslim's cyber community on the net worldwide. In time, some of these usually turned into battlegrounds for Sunnis and Antihadis. Prior to joining such groups, 'antihadis' will usually do some intelligence gathering. They will look up for groups that are un-moderated with high number of membership. The more the merrier. These 'antihadis' are Special Forces commandoes. They slip-in in small numbers or some would prefer to be lone rangers. They will survey the area and do target analysis. Upon the first strike of the clashes, u could see the formation of the Sunni Brigade. Sunni brigade in general can be classified into four groups. I classify them as: 1. Sideliners 2. True followers 3. Replacement killers and 4. Crusaders."
The one below looks like an email describing what the Anti-Hadis cult is about:
'Ambush. � As I had mentioned in the profiling I did on Sunni Brigade, antihadis favorite ambush are on 'rubbish convoys'. But don't be surprised that sometimes, antihadis themselves are the ones who pose as the 'rubbish forwarder'. They intentionally collect religious rubbish on the net for the purpose of using it against the Sunni. Sometimes they would pose as a pious, uncorrupted sunni with intention to get 'ilmu'. They would then ask leading questions and set a trap for the sunni.
Lure. � Antihadis would post controversial articles or writing with the hope to get responses from the Sunnis. They set these to lure the Sunnis. The war will rage on as soon as the first response comes.
Assassination. � This type of warfare is done by hunters. They are the anti hadis elite and they are after specific target, especially the sunni Crusaders or any well known figure. They never get into any ongoing clashes but they do monitor the Crusaders/target closely. Once a Crusader goes out of line, they will move in for a kill.
They are also known as 'Israel' because when they make a move it will be short, precise and decisive. Their mission � to demoralize the Sunni Brigades. But to some sunni brigade they are known as 'The Devil'. From the segments above, I hope to furnish you with the understanding of antihadis in a general sense. Hopefully you will be able to see that debating/confrontation as one of the learning methods where you put your own understanding to a test, which in turn will further strengthen your own belief and gain understanding and tolerance.
If you wish to engage in one, I suggest that don't get emotional if you were to find yourself on the losing end. Make some adjustments, re adjust and re-invent yourself and get on with it again. Perhaps u might opt for a more challenging battle � climb to the peak and confront those atheist and those agnostics, where the Quran is no longer a relevant book of reference."
The contents are actually quite hilarious. They might have been written by one who has been plating too much of the video game "Mortal Combat II". There is some sense of seriousness in those passages, though.
The problem with this Cult
These arguments in support of Anti-Hadis groups merely reflect the weakness of the mind of those who refuse to read more than just the Quraan. If reading the Quraan itself is too burdensome and too mentally-taxing for the docile mind, how might one expect these lazy thinkers to read the Hadis?
How might one expect them to venture beyond Hadis and move on to philosophy and next onto praxis (marriage of theory and practice)? How might we expect them to venture into the study of the scriptures of other faiths?
The lame excuse of not being able to understand even the 4O Hadis (Hadis Qudsi) http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/fundamentals/hadithsunnah/hadithqudsi.html
make them decide to form the Anti-Hadis groups and next form a "brigade" that will then disturb the peace of others, especially in cyberspace.
I suspect the failure of this cult to propagate their ideas have made them resort to the Internet to deconstruct the belief system of Muslims.
These Anti-Hadis groups think that it is imperative for the majority of Muslims to think outside of the box and to produce treatises and pronouncements that are actually making them retreat into the box and stay there as a clan to inbreed amongst each other guided by their Anti- Hadis philosophy.
The Anti-Hadis followers in due time, breed their own zealots that thrive on aggravating the general Muslim population who hold a better truth that the one who hold the "ill-conceived, ill-defined, ideologically-bankrupted" Anti- Hadis group.
The lack of understanding of the philosophy of history, of dialectical materialism, of Marxist theory of knowledge, of eschatological dimension of historical progress, ecclesiastical dimension of the life of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and a range of other bases of knowledge in Islam, pragmatism, and Continental philosophy contribute to the emergence of this cultist group of Anti-Hadis true believers.
While the majority of the Muslims are keen in progressing with their rigorous study of the Quraan and Hadis, the Anti-Hadis are moving intellectually backwards, holding on to their notion of poorly understood syntagmatic patterns of history, designing their poorly-conceived paradigm based on their revisionist theory of progress whose axioms are historical-materialistically weak.
I suspect the gung-ho anti-Hadis deconstructionists are feeling a sense of power going into Malay Muslim newsgroups engaging others in arguments that they hope will "make Islam more liberal". This might also be essentially a contributing factor to the growing case of apostasy. This is also a classic example of the abuse of power to spread ignorance.
Perhaps the younger followers of the Anti-Hadis groups consist of reformed Black and Death Metallists, pseudo-intellectuals, wayward artists and poets, extremely radical Malay Muslim feminists, and Malaysian gangsta rappers and hip hoppers who need the shortest way possible to understand Islam by skipping the Hadis and reading only selected passages of the Quraan.
Such is the cult created by this new breed of revisionists of the already well-foundationed and finely preserved Islam. The purpose of this group is to question the authority the Imams by first questioning the legitimacy of the Hadis and the Sunnah of the Prophet (PBUH). The next target might be the Quraan itself.
Language games to destroy Islam
Creeping into public discourse, over this decade or so are terms to subdivide and destroy Islam as a religion of peace.
I find the words such as "Islamofascists", "Political Islam", "Islamic terrorists", and "Islamic Fundamentalists" as very good inventions of the Western-corporate-hegemonizing-fascistic-profiteering Western media with the intention of weakening people of the Islamic faith.
It is also a good way to crate dichotomies such as "Moderate Islam". "Liberal Islam", or even "Muslim feminists". Christianity and Judaism suffered form these forms of subdivisions.
Once the "enemy is named" it easier to deal with it � or to even sell weapons to nations fighting over confusing issues.
We must provide the anti-thesis, even to the cult of the Anti-Hadis.
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