The Spiritual Remedy for our Consumerist Materialism and Capitalist Global Culture: An Islamic-Sufi Perspective

By Prof. Henry Francis B. Espiritu 12 October 2022 For Islamic Mystics Or Sufis, Only Love—Loving God With Our Pure Unbounded Love, Loving All Creatures, Our Ecosystem And This Universe On Account Of Our Love For God—Is The Sole Pathway Towards Restoring Our Dignity As Altruistic Human Beings Who Are Created Essentially To Love And Be Loved By God, The Best Beloved ----- We live today in an extremely consumeristic and capitalistic global culture which is materialistic, alienating, objectifying and commodifying to our fellow humans, extremely individualistic, idiotically narcissistic, exclusively egotistic; and constantly beset with anxiety, shame, guilt, neurosis, mental turbidity as well as emotional chaos. From the perspective of Islamic spirituality called Sufism, our present human civilization is under the greatest despotism that it self-destructively creates upon itself: the dictatorship of egotism—the worship of one’s greed, vanity and self-importance. This contemporary world prides itself in being secular and yet our present day-and-age worships the most stubborn infantile idolatry of self-deity—worship of our vain and prideful ego. Our world today is so much enamored with “my” own name, "my" own welfare, “my” own benefit, “my” own fame, “my" own power—to the exclusion of others: to the exclusion of our fellow humans, to the exclusion of our fellow sentient beings, and to the exclusion of God in our lives! Like Narcissus of old, we have fallen into the fetid and murky spring of self-praise and have fallen in-love with our own hazy reflection—we now worship ourselves and on account of this, we have effectively separated ourselves from others due to our obsession with our egos and our selfish agendas. What is the solution to this our contemporary human debacle that besets our consumeristic propensity and capitalistic mentality? The central and crucial message of Islamic Sufism is salvation by Love, through Love and in Love—pure and unbounded love for the Beloved, God Himself. Only our remembrance of and love for the Beloved can effectively free us from our love of the world and love of our ego. And only Love is the answer to our longings of connectedness, because when we are truly and really connected with the Best Beloved, then we are truly enabled to love our fellow humans, love all beings in the cosmos, and love the ongoing universe itself. Sufism is a faith-ideology and praxis of pure unbounded love for-one-and-all for the sake of the love of God, the Beloved. A real lover of God is someone who constantly endeavors to purify one's self from one's selfish ego, someone who strives to liberate oneself from loving one's own self, so that only the remembrance of the Beloved’s Beauteous Face is imprinted in one's heart, mind, soul and spirit. A true Sufi does not attribute goodness to one's own self and sees himself as being devoid of any merit, and is not held in bondage by any forms of self-worship because he sees that everything that he is and everything he does and possesses are all due to enabling grace and mercy of the Beloved. Only the Beloved’s Beautiful Face is worthy of being beheld and adored by the true lover since all beings in the universe are simply finite mirrors minutely reflecting the Infinite Beauty of the Beloved. In the words of Hazrat Maulana Jalaluddin Rumi (may Allah's mercy be upon him): “The real lover (Sufi) sees nothing except Allah. He is absent from himself but present with Allah.” (See "Advice of Hazrat Maulana Rumi". Rabat, Morocco: Dar-ul-Arquam, 1987; p.76.) Loving the Beloved and loving the Beloved’s creation, whether animate or inanimate, sentient or non-sentient, may be the most basic remedy for the prevailing hedonistic materialism, consumeristic capitalism, extreme selfishness, and narcissistic consciousness of our present day and age. In our obsession with our false selves, in turning our backs on God, the Best Beloved, we have also lost our essential self, our own divine origin—our very own fundamental connectedness to the Best Beloved. In forgetting God and in being enamored with our individualistic egos, we have forgotten our true self as God’s lover and God's beloved. For Islamic mystics or Sufis, only Love—loving God with our pure unbounded love, loving all creatures, our ecosystem and this universe on account of our love for God—is the sole pathway towards restoring our dignity as altruistic human beings who are created essentially to love and be loved by God, the Best Beloved. This for me is the relevant answer of Sufism or Islamic spirituality to the crisis of global unconcern and negligence to our fellow humans, to other creatures, and to our cosmos. Love is the answer! Love is still the answer: the redemption of the world and of ourselves is still by Love, through Love, and in Love! Amen, a thousand times Amen! ---- Prof. Henry Francis B. Espiritu is Associate Professor-7 of Philosophy and Asian Studies at the University of the Philippines (UP), Cebu City, Philippines. He was Academic Coordinator of the Political Science Program at UP Cebu from 2011-2014, and Coordinator of Gender and Development (GAD) Office at UP Cebu from 2015-2016 and from 2018-2019. His research interests include Theoretical and Applied Ethics, Islamic Studies particularly Sunni jurisprudence (Sunni Fiqh), Islamic feminist discourses, Islam in interfaith dialogue initiatives, Islamic environmentalism, Classical Sunni Islamic pedagogy, the writings of Imam Al-Ghazali on pluralism and tolerance, Islam in the Indian Subcontinent, Turkish Sufism, Ataturk Studies, Ottoman Studies, Genghis Khan Studies, Muslim-Christian Dialogue, Middle Eastern Affairs, Peace Studies and Public Theology. URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-society/spiritual-consumerist-capitalist-islamic-sufi-/d/128161 New Age Islam, Islam Online, Islamic Website, African Muslim News, Arab World News, South Asia News, Indian Muslim News, World Muslim News, Women in Islam, Islamic Feminism, Arab Women, Women In Arab, Islamophobia in America, Muslim Women in West, Islam Women and Feminism