by: Ruhullah Kazemi, Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) Islamic Studies
A rope is hanging on the neck of our history (Afghanistan) and the secret to breaking it and crossing it lies in returning to the school of Balkh and its tradition of thought. Balkh had a bitter and contradicting fate and now this contradiction is standing in front of us in the form of a tragedy; it looks as if it demands something. Talking about Balkh is as difficult as a person’s self-discovery, and more painful and mournful than the memory of any collective and individual pain. First, Balkh is the cradle and home of a civilization and rationality. The background of Balkh civil and traditional rationality as one of the most important centers of civilization goes back to more than six thousand years ago. However, written history of Balkh goes back to Avesta period, about 2600 years ago. Cultural territory of Balkh, both before and after Islamic culture, is of unique cultural and intellectual importance and validity. Post-Islamic Balkh although is hurt and injured of it; but it nurtures Islam in its lap changes it to a rich cultural process and it becomes “Mother of the Cities” of the Islamic era. Balkh enjoys equal status in the Eastern civilization, specially the Islamic culture and civilization, as Athens Enjoyed in the European civilization. Balkh shall be considered as the intellectual and cultural intellectual agora of the Islamic culture. Balkh as the strongest and sustainable spiritual geography in not inferior than Athens rather, it was equal to it. Plurality and tolerance are considered the most essential characteristics of this cultural and intellectual realm; In such a way that during twenty-two times of invasion and destruction, it resurrects itself like a phoenix from the fire of destruction and darkness. The fact that an intellectual realm can revive itself after the harshest hardships and coldness of the times and think about its renewal indicates its intellectual power and spiritual richness.
We see the first emergence of the idea of ”Eternal Wisdom” in Balkh in the work of Hoshang Pishdadi of the same name, an idea that was later paid attention to by people like ibn Miskawayh at the height of the flourishing of Islamic culture, and Sheikh Ishraq, Yahya ibn Habash Suhrawardi(among others, made intellectual profit from it. Ironically, the wisdom section of Nahj al-Balagheh, which was collected by Sayyed Radhi, has a close similarity in form and content with the Eternal Wisdom. Anyway, the root of eternal wisdom or tainted wisdom, which gave the famous contemporary traditionalists an intellectual and spiritual essence and identity, also goes back to the cultural sphere of Balkh.
The role and status of Balkh in Islamic civilization is also fundamental. Balkh, or the geography that was called Khorasan after Islam, and Balkh is considered its main focus, has nurtured about three thousand scientists and writers from various fields. As a result, we are faced with a series of philosophers, mystics, poets, theologians, commentators, jurists, etc. in recent centuries. We should consider that Islamic victories happened less with spiritual and moral spirit; Rather, it showed more dominance, violence, and brutality. We want to say that the prosperity that occurred in the Islamic period in the Islamic world was mostly the product of the spirit of the people who, although they had just become Muslims, but before that they had a cultural, spiritual and moral spirit, and the intellectual, spiritual and moral creativity was the product of this spirit. Therefore, Balkh is one of those centers that before Islam had a unique and outstanding ethical, moral and intellectual spirit and thus it gave an identity to Islam in its epistemological and interpretive lap. As a result, Farabi and Ibn Sina, founded Islamic philosophy, the teachers who grew up in the cradle and mother city of Balkh. If not to say that the cultural spirit of Balkh prevails in the spirit of the translation movement as an Islamic renaissance; but, indeed it is one of its main pillars. In the field of theology of many Mu’tazili (sect of schismatics) and rationalist theologians have emerged Balkh, and the stream of rationalism generally originates from the spiritual realm of Balkh as thus one of the most rational jurist, theologian and philosopher has emerged form Balkh. If we consider the geography of the Persian language, Balkh is considered the most fundamental cradle and flourishing of the Persian language. Before and after Islam, Aryan/Dari language has been its main and academic language.
It is in Balkh and through the literary creations of this area that the Persian language shows its powerful richness. The cultural field of Persian language has no identity, both historically and scientifically, without the cultural fruits of Balkh.
Anyhow, the spiritual and practical sphere of ancient Balkh is now burning in the fire of The fire of disaster and destruction. The destruction, confusion, indecision and brutality that dominates Balkh, is originally rooted in the absence of the rational tradition of it. The Misery and destruction that drive us back each day and the mean requests for favors that are sent from around and around our wounded soul, indeed is rooted in forgetting the school and intellectual tradition of Balkh; That is, it originates from the self-estrangement of our soul.
The fact that destruction as our fate now makes others laugh drunkenly and they seek happiness from the helplessness and desperation of our historical existence and not on the grave where they trample on our bloodied corpses in any way, naturally returns to a childish and vindictive spirit. But returning to our homeland and our cultural spirit cannot be done in response to these dusty winds. On one hand it does mean returning to the past, but renewal of vows with the spirit standing beyond the time and thus one can ask for help and move towards the future.
Let’s see the current theoretical and practical crisis in the mirror of the absence and forgetting of the rational tradition of Balkh. Getting caught up in the monster of corruption, war and looting was basically the product of turning our backs on the said territory. We find renewal and modernization in questioning and not being satisfied with the existing matter, and until something has not sat and experienced in our soul and spirit, going beyond it, is also meaningless. In any case, the cultural and spiritual territory of Balkh today has been invaded by the most irrational group and the most brutal racial-religious ideology. Currently killing, injustice, forced displacement, Land-grabbing feudalism and Predatory racial hegemony have been replaced with Balkh and its culture. Today, Balkh has forgotten itself and only with bloodshot eyes, it is watching the genocide and displacement on its torn and trampled body. Bamik’s Balkh wears the cloak of oblivion, silence and astonishment and has plunged into absolute darkness. The name of Balkh is now not tied to the culture of the past and its creations, but to massacres, destruction and displacement. In a sense, now Balkh is executed. We only want to remind you to study the report of killings and terror and forced migration these days in the territory of Balkh with attention to its background. After the advent of Islam, Balkh not only suffered spiritual and intellectual decline, but gradually its spiritual and artistic body was also accused, excommunicated, and from the end of the 19th century onwards, it was either destroyed or looted or like another part of its body (Bamiyan) collapsed from shame and became ashes. Now Balkh women fight with the deadliest terrorist regime for their basic human rights, but they are brutally abused and face serial murder. The most defenseless people in Balkhab are being massacred for no reason and many others are forcibly moved from their homes in Mazar e Sahrif and thrown into the heart of the darkest fate.
What happens to Balkh in the contemporary history, whether from the most extravagant leaders and People’s political traders or now from the most terrorist ruling ideology, consciously or unknowingly, it marks the historical identity of Balkh. That’s why Balkh, which was once the cradle of civilization in the east, has now turned into a pasture for desert wanderers and has changed its nature from city to wilderness. Not only the human crimes of the Taliban in Balkh, which are dismissed with silence and fear in all parts of Afghanistan, and not only in Afghanistan but in all countries, societies are held hostage and people are enslaved. But the answer to all this silence and squatting, fear and intimidation, irrationality and deception with all its connections will be nothing but collective disaster. In contemporary history, man has brought himself closer to disaster with every step; but the powerful states and the owners high interests, leaders of the communities, submissive elites and Racist intellectuals are the main people who are blamed for such catastrophes.
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