The Holy Quran with Five Volume Commentary (Vol 1) — Page xlv
GENERAL INTRODUCTION own time. Similarly, times during which a materialistic outlook on life has produced a true civilization seem to have been very similar to our own. But two differences seem to be outstanding. Civilizations and cultures which arose before the advent of Islam were not universal in their appeal or conception. They were not derived from a universal principle. Religion and civilization were not like branches shooting out of the same root. If they ever seemed to be so, they lacked true unity. In the Jewish religion, no doubt, an effort has been made to combine civilization and culture. In the Old Testament, to a very large extent, social ideas and ideals have been combined with material conceptions, and both centre around religion. But this attempt of the Old Testament can be described as a first attempt only and not a final successful attempt. The same is true of the Hindu and the Zoroastrian religion. The thousand and one needs of human life seem to require an ideology and a system of thought which is elastic enough to serve as a guide for all occasions and all needs. Such an ideology the older religions do not provide. A wooden, inelastic teaching bearing on the needs of civilized society is also offered by them. But the innumerable needs of a wide human society cannot be met by an inelastic system of teaching. What distinguishes man from other animals is the very important fact that human beings, while they are so much alike, are at the same time so very different from one another. The animal world is distinguished by a dead uniformity. Buffalos, cows, lions, tigers, hawks and fishes, in short, animals and birds whether they live on land, in water or in the air, are all alike in their external appearance as well as in the structure of their brain. They seem to obey one uniform law. But man is different. Human individuals come into the world with the same kind of body. They have the same kind of appearance, and their limbs and sense organs also seem to be very similar. But in respect of their mind and in respect of what they think and feel, they are very different from one another. If we must have guidance for all these differently situated and differently constituted human individuals, it must be one, the rigidity of which is tempered by a due degree of flexibility. Jewish and Christian Cultures As the world has advanced, it has made effort after effort to approach this ideal. Moses gave to Israel both a religion and a civilization. But his teaching proved too rigid to answer to that variety of urges of which human nature is capable. As soon as the people of Israel began to think along new channels and to entertain new ideals and objectives and to break new ground, the teaching which Moses had left for them began to fail. Moses did not succeed in making good citizens out of the new generations of Israel. True, they continued to attach themselves to this teaching but they became either rebels or hypocrites. Christianity, therefore, could not but proclaim that the Law was xix