Brief Autobiography

{bit.ly/IEML221216} This is the first message to our newly launched Islamic Economics mailing list (JOIN via: http://bit.ly/AZIEML ), created in connection with my newly launched book “Islamic Economics: The Polar Opposite of Capitalist Economics”. I decided that the best way to start would be by introducing myself, and explaining my reasons for writing the book, and creating this mailing list.

Like all of us, my personality has been strongly shaped by my childhood experiences – in my case, my Parents. For more details, see: Remembering My Father  http://bit.ly/AZfather. Critical Lessons from my Father were:

1. Trust people daringly – he had immense faith and confidence in us, and asked us to do advanced tasks, far beyond our age-level capabilities.
2. He had immense love for us, and always encouraged us to aspire to the highest visions.

Our mother also had an extraordinary personality, shaped by the tragic experience of losing her father as a teenager, and suddenly becoming responsible for managing the entire household. She taught us:

1. Grit and Determination.
2. No Whining. Face the greatest problems with equanimity. Just do what is needed, for however long it is needed.
3. Patience and Fortitude.

Some of the key takeaways from this childhood training were:

1. Non-conformity: think for yourself, independently, without concern for what everybody else thinks
2. Formal education is a (necessary) paper chase. Life begins AFTER education.
3. Real education comes from life-experiences. But not from ALL kinds of life-experiences.
4. Learning is the result of struggling to change the world.

Before proceeding, I would like to pass on a critical insight from my father, which has served me well in my life: the dramatic difference between the Urgent and the Important.

The Urgent is the pressing need of the time. It is what the environment demands of you. (Fire Fighting)

The Important is the impact that you can make on changing the world – since this is always a long-term project, it is NEVER urgent. So there is no overlap between the two.

The URGENT is the pressure put by the world on you to act in certain ways. The IMPORTANT is the pressure you put on the world to change it in desirable directions.

Most people spend their lives fighting fires. They let the world happen to them, but they never happen to the world.

Youth

I was brought up in a typical modern Islamic background; a shallow cultural Islam without any deeper understanding of the fundamentals of the faith.         About the time, I was leaving for the USA for my education, my father was undergoing major transition in life-style and thinking. He resigned from high government office – Chief Commissioner Azad Kashmir – to join Tableegh full-time. Unfortunately, this had no DIRECT impact on me. INDIRECTLY, I understood, for the first time, the seriousness of Islam – it could lead to major life decisions, and radical changes in life-styles.

Education

In accordance with guidance from my father, I rushed through my education. I spent 3 Years at MIT, getting a BS Math  (1971-74) between ages 16 – 19. I spent another 3 Years at Stanford, getting a MS Statistics, and Ph.D. Economics, between ages 19-22. To top off my education, I spent a Post-Doctoral Year at CORE, University Catholique de Louvain in Belgium. I learned to speak French fluently – but to my surprise, this knowledge did not bring me any benefits in later life. The first link below is to a long talk about my educational experiences at MIT. The second link is a brief post about how my economics education at Stanford was purely theoretical, and did not teach me anything about the real world.

1. Lessons MIT did not teach me     http://bit.ly/mit4az
2. The Education of an Economist   http://bit.ly/AZeduc

Career

With my credentials, I was able get appointments at top-ranked economics departments in the USA, and taught at major universities for fifteen years. I had planned to spend my life in the USA, but God had different plans for me.

• First Appointment: Assistant Professor, University of Pennsylvania Economics Dept.
• Later: California Institute of Technology, Columbia University, Johns Hopkins University
• Teaching Career from 1978 to 1993 in the USA.

For more details about my academic career, see https://asadzaman.net/about-me 

The Conversion Experience

When I entered MIT at 16, I was young, very impressed with the West, and only lightly attached to my culture and religion. I was swept away by the powerful currents of university life; see “Social Revolutions” for a brief account of the details (bit.ly/iwv4sr). It took a few years to realize that the secular modern lifestyle was meaningless and empty, and had made me desperately unhappy, contrary to its promise. I started to search for a more satisfactory philosophy of life. Reading “Deliverance from Error” by Imam Ghazali struck many chords, as it was about his search for the truth. In the Quran, I came across Ibraheem AS dua:  لَئِن لَّمْ يَهْدِنِي رَبِّي لأكُونَنَّ مِنَ الْقَوْمِ الضَّالِّينَ . Unless you guide me my Lord, I will surely be among those who go astray.            To me, this seems perfectly matched with my own state. Without certainty about the existence of God, I could still ask for guidance. God did respond to my prayers, and put me through some experiences which brought me closer to Him. One of these was the near death experience of younger brother Amjad. This led me to make dua to save his life, in return for my turning towards Allah. But the critical turning point came when I spent 40 days in Tableegh; this was a life-changing experience for me. A brief autobiography describing these experiences in greater detail: http://bit.ly/AZbiog 

EEMAN => HUGE contradiction

The growth of faith in my heart led me to an enormous contradiction between the teachings of Islam, and what I had learnt in my Western education:

Western Education: The West is the most advanced civilization the planet has ever seen. This is due to the amazing knowledge they have created – in all fields – over the past few centuries.

Islamic Teachings. God give mankind a complete and perfect message, sufficient for our guidance for all times to come.  

All the empirical evidence and logic showed me that Western Knowledge is superior to the final revelation of God – the whole word runs on technology created by the West. But how could any human knowledge be superior to the final message of God to mankind? In fact this is the biggest challenge facing the Ummah today; see: The Modern Mu’tazila  http://bit.do/aztmm   

The training of Tableegh told me that the word of God is the certain truth, even if it contradicts what appears to be reality. I kept making dua to Allah to show me the truth. It took many decades, but God guided me to the understanding that the Wisdom of the West is an Illusion!

The central questions we all face concern the meaning of life. What is the best use I can make of my brief and precious time on this planet? Studying physics, chemistry, and biology, furnishes no answers. In fact, a Western education is built on the premise of denial of God. For more details about this, see Reuben: The Making of the Modern University: Intellectual Transformation and the Marginalization of Morality (http://bit.ly/AZmme)

Step by step, piece by piece, in a very slow process, I learned that nearly everything that I had learnt in my Western education was deeply flawed. This journey of three decades cannot be summarized in three hours, let alone three minutes.

Mailing List for Islamic Economics: Join via: http://bit.ly/AZIEML

This weekly mailing list will provide information about ongoing work for Islamic revival, which involves building a society based on the moral framework of generosity, cooperation, social responsibility, and the pursuit of the pleasure of Allah SwT.

This is the first of a weekly sequence of lectures.  Members of mailing list will receive weekly updates

My new book explains how the apparently complex, deep, and sophisticated structure of modern economics is fundamentally flawed: “Islamic Economics: The Polar Opposite of Capitalist Economics” Homepage: bit.ly/ietpoce –

FREE OFFER:

The free book offer on my new book “Islamic Economics: The Polar Opposite of Capitalist Economics” is now available on Amazon Kindle Store. This free offer will be open until 1300 Dec 20th, 2022, Pakistan Standard time. However, many people have reported problems downloading the book. This will explain how to resolve these problems.

 In all cases, to read on Kindle, you must have a Kindle — This can be an app on your mobile or PC, or online via Kindle Cloud Reader, which does not require apps and works via your internet browser. But you need an Amazon account to set one up. Apparently, for some addresses, including Pakistan, KINDLE is not available. For those people, you must use a VPN to access Amazon, and set up your Amazon account address for a country which does not restrict access to Kindle. To use a VPN (which sets the location for your browser to be whatever you want), you can install a free extension for most browsers, including Chrome, from the following link:

https://browsec.com/en/

Then You can open up an Amazon account, BUT you will need a CREDIT card for this purpose (Pakistan credit card will work, but DEBIT cards will not work). Then setup your kindle cloud reader at http://read.amazon.com  and link it to your amazon account. THEN, you will be able to download the ebook for free. .

 If all this is too difficult, or not possible, or you simply do not want to have so much hassle, there is a simple alternative. On this email list (http://bit.ly/AZIEML ) I am planning to create an Islamic Economics textbook. As a part of this effort, I will be covering this book chapter by chapter on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. Thus ALL chapters of the book will be covered, and will be provided to members of the mailing list. 

 There is a THIRD way to get this book, chapter by chapter. Simply FOLLOW my Islamic Worldview Blog — The chapters will be posted on the blog one-by-one. Everyone on the email list is also requested to subscribe to the blog – this way, they can comment on the chapters as they are posted, provide feedback and have discussion on the contents. To follow the blog, go to https://azprojects.wordpress.com and look for a blue button on the right hand side which says “Follow An Islamic Worldview” CLICK on this button, and enter your email to become a subscriber. Then, whenever new blogs are posted (which will include all chapters of this book) you will be notified via email.

Some Key References:

Lessons MIT Did Not Teach Me  https://bit.ly/mit4az

Social Revolutions                         https://bit.ly/iwv4sr 

Learning Who You Are                  https://bit.do/azwya

The Ghazali Project                       https://bit.ly/Ghazali1

•             Let us conclude with a masnoon dua.

سُبْحـانَكَ اللّهُـمَّ وَبِحَمدِك، أَشْهَـدُ أَنْ لا إِلهَ إِلاّ أَنْتَ أَسْتَغْفِرُكَ وَأَتوبُ إِلَـيْك

Subhaanaka Allaahumma wa bihamdika, ‘ash-hadu ‘an laa ‘ilaaha ‘illaa ‘Anta, ‘astaghfiruka wa ‘atoobu ‘ilayka

Glory is to You, O Allah, and praise is to You. I bear witness that there is none worthy of worship but You. I seek Your forgiveness and repent to You.

Abu Dawud: 4859

https://www.islamicfinder.org/duas/masnoon/at-the-end-of-a-gathering-majlis/#1