Allama Muhammad Iqbal

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Allama Iqbal
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Brief Life Sketch

• Muhammad Iqbal (1877-1938) is one of the
  preeminent writers of the Indo-Pakistan
  subcontinent. Indeed, the attention he has
  received from numerous writers, translators, and
  critics from Western as well as Islamic countries
  testifies to his stature as a world literary
  figure. While his primary reputation is that of a
  poet, Iqbal has not lacked admirers for his
  philosophical thought. He has in fact been called
  the most serious Muslim philosophical thinker of
  modem times.

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• The frequently used appellation of
  poet-philosopher is thus well deserved. The
  hyphen in the phrase is all-important Iqbals
  poetry and philosophy do not exist in isolation
  from each other they are integrally related, his
  poetry serving as a vehicle for his thought.
  Iqbal wrote poetry in Urdu and Persian, and
  several collections in each language exist. In
  the following page a life-sketch of Iqbal is
  followed by a brief treatment of some of the
  major themes and literary features of his poetry.

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• Iqbal was born in Sialkot, in the present-day
  province of the Punjab in Pakistan, in 1877. He
  received his early education in that city, where
  one of his teachers was Mir Hasan, an
  accomplished scholar who commanded a knowledge of
  several Islamic languages. Mir Hasan gave Iqbal a
  thorough training in the rich Islamic literary
  tradition. His influence on Iqbal was formative.
  Many years later (1922), when the English
  governor of the Punjab proposed to the British
  Crown that Iqbal be knighted in acknowledgment of
  his literary accomplishments, Iqbal asked that
  Mir Hasan also be awarded a title. To the
  governors remark that Mir Hasan had not authored
  any books, Iqbal responded that he, Iqbal, was
  the book Mir Hasan had produced. Mir Hasan
  received the title of Shams al-Ulama (Sun of
  Scholars).

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• For higher education Iqbal went to Lahore (1895),
  where he enrolled in Government College, getting,
  in 1899, an MA in philosophy he had already
  obtained a degree in law (1898). In Lahore, a
  major center of academic and literary activity,
  Iqbal soon made a name for himself as a poet. One
  of the teachers of Government College Iqbal
  admired most was Sir Thomas Arnold. Arnold, too,
  had great affection for Iqbal, he helped Iqbal in
  his career as a teacher and also encouraged him
  to undertake several research projects. When
  Arnold returned to England in 1904, Iqbal wrote a
  touching poem in which he expressed his resolve
  to follow Arnold to England. The very next year,
  in fact, Iqbal left for study at Cambridge. His
  choice of Cambridge was probably dictated by the
  fact that Cambridge was reputed for the study not
  only of European philosophy but also of Arabic
  and Persian. In his three years of stay abroad,
  Iqbal obtained a BA from Cambridge (1906),
  qualified as a barrister at Londons Middle
  Temple (1906), and earned a PhD from Munich
  University (1908).

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• After returning to Lahore in 1908, Iqbal taught
  philosophy at Government College for a few years.
  In 1911 he resigned from government service and
  set up legal practice. Meanwhile he continued to
  write poetry in Urdu and Persian, Asrar-i Khudi
  (Persian) was published in 1915. Translated into
  English as The Secrets of the Self (1920) by
  Professor Reynold Nicholson of Cambridge, the
  book introduced Iqbal to the West. Asrar-i Khudi
  was followed by several other volumes Rumuz-i
  Bikhudi (1918), Payam-i Mashriq (1923), Bang-i
  Dara (1924), Zabur-i Ajam (1927), Javid Namah
  (1932), Musafir (1936), Zarb-i Kalim (1937), and
  Armaghan-i Hijaz (1938, posthumously). Iqbal
  wrote prose also. His doctoral thesis, The
  Development of Metaphysics in Persia, was
  published in 1908, and his Reconstruction of
  Religious Thought in Islam (with a 7th chapter
  added to the original set of six lectures, first
  published in 1930), in 1934. Many of Iqbals
  poetical works have been rendered into foreign
  languages, including English, German, Italian,
  Russian, Czechoslovakian, Arabic, and Turkish.
  His works have also spawned a vast amount of
  critical literature in many languages.

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• Iqbal often uses a series of images to convey a
  thought, producing a cumulative effect. In
  Fatimah bint -Abdullah, for example, he uses no
  fewer than four images to express the idea that,
  even in its present age of decadence, the Muslim
  Community can produce individuals of exceptional
  caliber
• O that our autumn-stricken garden had
• A flower-bud like this!
• O that in our ashes would be found, O Lord,
• A spark like this!
• In our desert is hidden many a deer still.
• In the spent clouds lies dormant still
• Many a flash of lightning.
• Iqbal is capable of writing biting satire. Two
  examples are Give Me Another Adversary, in
  which Satan argues that he deserves a better
  rival than Adam, and Scorpion Land, which
  criticizes slave mentality.

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IQBAL AND PAKISTAN MOVEMENT

• Although his main interests were scholarly, Iqbal
  was not unconcerned with the political situation
  of the, country and the political fortunes of the
  Muslim community of India. Already in 1908, while
  in England, he had been chosen as a member of the
  executive council of the newly-established
  British branch of the Indian Muslim League. In
  1931 and 1932 he represented the Muslims of India
  in the Round Table Conferences held in England to
  discuss the issue of the political future of
  India. And in a 1930 lecture Iqbal suggested the
  creation of a separate homeland for the Muslims
  of India. Iqbal died (1938) before the creation
  of Pakistan (1947), but it was his teaching that
  "spiritually ... has been the chief force behind
  the creation of Pakistan."

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• Iqbal joined the London branch of the All India
  Muslim League while he was studying Law and
  Philosophy in England. It was in London when he
  had a mystical experience. The ghazal containing
  those divinations is the only one whose year and
  month of composition is expressly mentioned. It
  is March 1907. No other ghazal, before or after
  it has been given such importance. Some verses of
  that ghazal are
• Your civilization will commit suicide with
  its
• own daggers.
• A nest built on a frail bough cannot be
• durable.
• The caravan of feeble ants will take the rose
• petal for a boat
• And inspite of all blasts of waves, it shall
  cross
• the river.
• I will take out may worn-out caravan in the
• pitch darkness of night.
• My sighs will emit sparks and my breath will
• produce flames.

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• For Iqbal it was a divinely inspired insight. He
  disclosed this to his listeners in December 1931,
  when he was invited to Cambridge to address the
  students. Iqbal was in London, participating in
  the Second Round Table Conference in 1931. At
  Cambridge, he referred to what he had proclaimed
  in 1906
• I would like to offer a few pieces of advice to
  the young men who are at present studying at
  Cambridge ...... I advise you to guard against
  atheism and materialism. The biggest blunder made
  by Europe was the separation of Church and State.
  This deprived their culture of moral soul and
  diverted it to the atheistic materialism. I had
  twenty-five years ago seen through the drawbacks
  of this civilization and therefore had made some
  prophecies. They had been delivered by my tongue
  although I did not quite understand them. This
  happened in 1907..... After six or seven years,
  my prophecies came true, word by word. The
  European war of 1914 was an outcome of the
  aforesaid mistakes made by the European nations
  in the separation of the Church and the State.

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• Building upon Sir Sayyid Ahmed's two-nation
  theory, absorbing the teaching of Shibli, Ameer
  Ali, Hasrat Mohani and other great Indian Muslim
  thinkers and politicians, listening to Hindu and
  British voices, and watching the fermenting
  Indian scene closely for approximately 60 years,
  he knew and ultimately convinced his people and
  their leaders, particularly Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad
  Ali Jinnah that
• "We both are exiles in this land. Both longing
  for
• our dear home's sight!"
• "That dear home is Pakistan, on which he harpened
  like a flute-player, but whose birth he did not
  witness."

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• Allama Iqbal in his letter of March 29, 1937 to
  the Quaid-i Azam had said
• While we are ready to cooperate with other
  progressive parties in the country, we must not
  ignore the fact that the whole future of Islam as
  a moral and political force in Asia rests very
  largely on a complete organization of Indian
  Muslims.
• According to Allama Iqbal the future of Islam as
  a moral and political force not only in India but
  in the whole of Asia rested on the organization
  of the Muslims of India led by the Quaid-i Azam.

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• The "Guide of the Era" Iqbal had envisaged in
  1926, was found in the person of Muhammad Ali
  Jinnah. The "Guide" organized the Muslims of
  India under the banner of the Muslim League and
  offered determined resistance to both the Hindu
  and the English designs for a united
  Hindu-dominated India. Through their united
  efforts under the able guidance of Quaid-I Azam
  Muslims succeeded in dividing India into Pakistan
  and Bharat and achieving their independent
  homeland. As observed above, in Allama Iqbal's
  view, the organization of Indian Muslims which
  achieved Pakistan would also have to defend other
  Muslim societies in Asia. The carvan of the
  resurgence of Islam has to start and come out of
  this Valley, far off from the centre of the
  ummah. Let us see how and when, Pakistan prepares
  itself to shoulder this august responsibility. It
  is Allama Iqbal's prevision.

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• Allama Iqbal died in 1938 was buried outside
  Badshahi Masjid in Lahore. His tomb is now
  visited by hundreds of devotees everyday. He did
  not live to see his separate nation come into
  being, but he was a great influence on other
  Muslim and Non-Muslim leaders and after his
  Jinnah talked of how Iqbals poetry immortal as
  it is, is always there to guide us and inspire
  us.

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Allama Iqbals Pictures
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Thank You !

• Ibrahim Muhammad
• Nouman Khawar
• Arsalan Ahmed
• Muhammad Salman