John 2:1-11 states that while Jesus was attending a wedding in Cana with his disciples the party ran out of wine. Jesus’ mother told Jesus, “They have no wine,” and Jesus replied, “O Woman, what have I to do with you? My hour has not yet come.” His mother then said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you”. Jesus ordered the servants to fill containers with water and to draw out some and take it to the chief steward waiter. After tasting it, without knowing where it came from, the steward remarked to the bridegroom that he had departed from the custom of serving the best wine first by serving it last. John adds that: “Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee and it revealed his glory and his disciples believed in him “.
This is how the Christians glorify their savior by projecting him as the producer of wine miraculously which allows them to enjoy even If it was prohibited in the Old Testament. Whereas the holy Qur’an describes his first miracle as a savior of his mother’s chastity which was under trial before her own people. As Qur’an states “
“Then she brought him to her own folk, carrying him. They said: O Mary! Thou hast come with an amazing thing.
O sister of Aaron! Thy father was not a wicked man nor was thy mother a harlot.
Then she pointed to him. They said: How can we talk to one who is in the cradle, a young boy?
He spake: Lo! I am the slave of Allah. He hath given me the Scripture and hath appointed me a Prophet,
And hath made me blessed where so ever I may be, and hath enjoined upon me prayer and almsgiving so long as I remain alive,
And (hath made me) dutiful toward her who bore me, and hath not made me arrogant, unblest.
Peace on me the day I was born, and the day I die, and the day I shall be raised alive!
Such was Jesus, son of Mary: (this is) a statement of the truth concerning which they doubt.
It befitteth not (the Majesty of) Allah that He should take unto Himself a son. Glory be to Him! When He decreeth a thing, He saith unto it only: Be! And it is. (The holy Qur’an 19:27-35)
Here, it becomes clear that how Islam goes with the preservation and defense of the purity and chastity in human nature. It is common fallacy that Islam prohibits its followers a lot and allows a bit to live their lives without flavor of enjoyment. The misconception continues with a thought of Islam creating desert in human lives by prohibiting actions of extravaganza, chilling and thrilling, dining and wining or rather it should be called negative attitudes and by avoiding cultural malpractices of the society in the name of art. The wisdom behind prohibition is crystal clear and it is to beautify the lives of people as an individual unit of the society and mankind as a whole with the colors and odors of nature in its original freshness. And thus it saves man from wandering into the desert full of mirages in which one rushes to quench one’s thirst but only returns with more thirst.
At many instances prohibition opened the doors for more exploration and use of human endeavor as we see when wine was declared Haram in Islam Muslims came with something which was pure, more comforting and giving more enjoyment. They replaced “Sharab”(wine) with “Sharbat” (drinks in different natural flavors).
Field of literature also witnessed that purity. When Prophet (PBUH) came in the Desert of Arabia, Arabic poetry was on its maxima but it was all the filth of obscenity prevalent in the poetries of Arabs. And it was not just poetry but even the most religious scriptures were full of foul stories of heroic characters in the name of giving joy. We see in the mythologies of great civilizations of Greece, Rome, Persia, China and India where we find the stories of glorification of illegal relations between gods and goddesses and their illegitimate children whereas the holy Qur’an narrates the story of Joseph (Yusuf A.S.), the Ahsanul Qasas, which glorifies chastity of hero and defines the characters of heroism. In India, a women whose chastity was confirmed on a test-fire (Agni Pariksha) was sent on exile (Vanvas) whereas The Holy Qura’n testifies the chastity of the mother of Muslims Hazrat Aisha (R.A.) and justice is established. This is how Islam constructed societies based on piety, chastity, and beauty of character as a gift of principles and laws of prohibition and appreciation which were inspired by Almighty God (swt).
Like other fields of creativity and human endeavor, fine arts has great impact on the lives of people. Every individual has been granted with the skills to draw lines and express untouched emotions, dreams and ideas, which always carry a danger of being narcissistic in approach and hurting sentiments of others. At many moment in history it has lowered the standard of morality and created an unrest in the society.
Narcissism for one’s work is the extreme love towards own creation that lets man even forget his own status and forces to bow down in front of it. Man’s imagination regarding God, an engraved concept of the origin and source of creation, has led many to the truth of finding true One and many to commit the gravest of the sin i.e. shirk (worshipping other than one true God), in the eyes of the Almighty. Pictures, images and statues have become manifestations of that theism. The conception and its manifestation has produced a large variety of imaginations that varies with geography and time.
A Greece or Roman god will have long hair, blue eyes, muscular body and of course white skin whereas Indians will find the beauty in the black (shyam) and a Chinese will have imagination of god with flat nose. Many times they come with the worst kind of pictures we can imagine for a God Who is most beautiful and all beautiful things owe to Him. And of course with all its negativities it has a positivity that it testifies the un-universality of polytheistic belief as God must be universal without having contextual identity.
Through the narcissistic experiences worship of the created becomes addictive behavior as a companion of prophet (PBUH) was once mentioning his story of Jahilliyah (days of ignorance), that during the journeys when they did not find carved stones (idols) to worship they used to make an idol from their food materials (like grain floors) and worship it when their worship is completed they used to have it.
The other very harmful effect of such an art is the heavy show of obscenity. Many of the artists have come with disastrous kind of paintings which received great applaud from people of their own mentality but at the same time caused huge damage to the edifice of human society.
In the name of art, obscenity was served by the artists who lead the field of art one of them is Michelangelo Buonarroti, an artist, architect and a sculptor of high renaissance who exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Western art has vilified many pious concepts of religion with his paintings. His work on Sistine chapel ceiling may be called visual representation of biblical descriptions but a dangerous effort to visualize pornography, nudity and depiction of acts of adultery and incest which in words of George Bernard Shaw “the most dangerous book on earth (the Bible), keep it under lock and key. Keep the Bible out of your children’s reach.”
Likewise “Picasso of India” M. F. Hussain, a cubist, deviating from Islamic principles, painted Hindu Goddess Lakshimi Naked on Shri Gangesh’s Head
Which hurt the sentiments of Hindu community at large and it also featured nude females in different erotic positions only disturbing the moral structure of social fabric. This exhibition received eight criminal complaints against the painter which may seem was mostly influenced by political reasons.
These are just few to name but the list has unending length of such artists and painter who have offered disservice to the humanity without bound of time.
Leaving behind these champions of obscene art, artists of the ancient India have carved the rocks of Ajanta and Ellora caves which seems very ahead of their time giving nudity a 3-D form with the blend of religiosity. They have been so bold that an M. F. Hussain will be put to shame after watching it or rather we may say that obscenity in modern art is borrowed from there.
The art has also been used as a weapon to hurt the sentiments of the people whom the artist may not like and it all happens in the name of freedom of expression. The infamous creation of the Danish cartoonist was not just an effort to malign the image of the prophet (PBUH), a mercy to the mankind, but was also intended to disturb the harmony among the people. It faced agitations and protests worldwide few of them turning violent unfortunately but the matter of fact was that it never seemed an honest effort of journalism.
Here again Islam comes with a solution applying the law of prohibition of making images of God, His prophets or any sentient thing “Aniconism” which ends the possibility of idol worship, obscenity and making mockery of the ideals to a great extent. As it has been mention in several Ahadith including the hadith in Bukhari Narrated by Aisha:
I bought a cushion having on it pictures (of animals). When Allah’s Apostle saw it, he stood at the door and did not enter. I noticed the sign of disapproval on his face and said, “O Allah’s Apostle! I repent to Allah and His Apostle. What sin have I committed?’ Allah’s Apostle said. “What is this cushion?” I said, “I have bought it for you so that you may sit on it and recline on it.” Allah’s Apostle said, “The makers of these pictures will be punished on the Day of Resurrection, and it will be said to them, ‘Give life to what you have created (i.e., these pictures).’ “The Prophet added, “The Angels of (Mercy) do not enter a house in which there are pictures (of animals).”
But with the prohibition possibilities of creativity do not die as Muslim artists and calligraphers practiced an art that was based on Islamic geometric patterns, calligraphy and the barely representational foliage patterns of the arabesque. They decorated the buildings with these elements right from Al-Hambra in spain to the dome of rock in Jerusalem, from Taj Mahal in India to Jama Masjid of Herat in Afghanistan. The art included the Mosaics, three dimensional reliefs and pietra dura decorations. Calligraphies were mainly glorification of God as in Al-Hambra the walls have engraving of Arabic sentence “La Ghalib Illa Allah” which means “there is no victorious other than Allah”.
Things we see in the world are commodities that God has given to use or abuse as he is testing us with it. So, the best way is to use it according to the principles that avoids the chaos in universe that has been charted by God Himself. Only place we observe unrest anywhere in the creation of God is tiny ball of earth which has been given to the mankind with two clear ways to follow. One goes with piety, righteousness, truth and harmony with the universal laws other goes against it. It’s up to us how we live and what we admire…..!
arts vs obscenity
