Dinosaurs were known to become extremely aggressive when attacked or when they sensed danger. They were even more ferocious when they felt their end was near. At that stage they resorted to using their full powers to fight back rather than giving up. The gigantic reptiles faced extinction when they lost touch with their natural habitat which provided them with everything they needed and ensured their survival. There came a time when they found themselves facing a rapidly changing world all around them, but what they failed to notice was that they were facing this new world with the same physical and mental characteristics — a large body and a tiny brain.
God has decreed that the mode of life keeps changing, that everything in this world is subject to evolution and that those who fail to adapt are doomed. This is exactly what happened to the dinosaurs; they failed to adapt and so they no longer exist.
This is almost the same path chosen by extremist movements which try to manipulate religion to achieve their objectives. For them, religion is an end in itself and not a means of regulating people’s affairs and making them live as God ordered.
Some may think the war against extremism will be short and that sooner or later the conflict will come to a decisive end. Such people seem to have forgotten the lessons of history. For the last two decades now, religious consciousness has been trapped in a dark tunnel. It will take hundreds of torches to brighten the darkness and expel the snakes and insects. All that comes out of the tunnel is clouds of hatred, sullen looks, distortion and rejection.
Tolerant Islamic teachings have been turned into rigid theological practices confined to a small group of individuals who practice their own version of Islam. Living in a dark tunnel all this time has rendered this exclusive group inactive, unable to move forward. Its members can’t apply reason or logic or use their brains because these have been kept in the dark and rendered ineffective. The desperate actions committed by members of this group in the past are like someone uttering a death rattle, the unusual sound in the throat of a dying person. It is the same rattling sound of the dinosaur at its end after failing to cope with change. What we must do is light more torches and illuminate the tunnel with bright light. It may be pitch dark inside but enough light will dissipate the darkness.
Arab News From the Local Press 24 June 2003
