This attitude usually adds to the tyrant’s courage, makes the slanderer even more impudent and the assailant more outrageous. Still, I say to myself, “They are human too, and one day they will realize it and they will give up such impertinence.” This is perhaps wishful thinking or a misapprehension, but I prefer waiting for a blissful hour when everyone will come to reason and mercy. Filled with some bizarre supernatural expectations, I endeavor to soothe my exasperation and stand firm against the storms that challenge my lenience. I sometimes dive into a deep, silent introspection to escape my own realm of feelings. There are times when I feel sorry for myself in the face of some agonizing events, and I am troubled with a passing sensation that I am perhaps disrespecting myself while trying to be respectful to everyone else. But still, in spite of so many lies, fabrications, and devilish schemes, I turn to myself and say, “You have assumed trouble as your healing from the beginning; then what is this protest for? The one with teeth will certainly bite, and the one with claws will rip through; no one can change this as long as those who consider the truth to be with the powerful continue to exist. Be tolerant to everyone.” I bury my cries inside and pronounce my feelings with silent woes.

Indeed, it is impossible for people in my circumstances who share this way of thinking with me to act otherwise. First of all, we do not submit to the wicked ones, but “to the decree of fate we wholeheartedly submit our souls” (Bâkî). Secondly, we live in a time in which people in great numbers are locked onto hostility; today’s revenge-thirsty figures overshadow in ruthlessness the abominable tyrants of the past-so, tempering the atrocities in my heart does not change the reality. Many billow with the rage of pharaohs when they speak; their hatred and violence never abate and their hunger for blaze, destruction, slaughter, and extrajudicial execution is never satisfied. They raise their swords to the heavens like He-Man and scream, “I have the power!” The world all over echoes with the chorus of “Justice, freedom, democracy, civil rights,” but justice is desperate in the hands of crude power, freedom is leashed with the straps of slavery one over another, democracy is a freak in the hands of enforcers who interpret it capriciously. There is no one left who does not understand this, but those who have conducted decades-long abuses continue singing the same tune, as if they are unaware, with no sense of self-respect, and debasing their own social status. With no other occupation, sitting in sloth, they speak on behalf of rights, freedom, and democracy, while others who violate these values in broad day light utter the same words. These are words of magic invoked to earn status and esteem, and then circumvented to legitimize corruption and fraud. Oppressors rely on them when they oppress some people while favoring whoever they favor. These are the words offered as legitimate governments around the world are interfered with and countries are invaded. “Bringing prosperity” is a pretext for shedding blood and dishonoring others. With the same excuse, murders are committed, killings are left unsolved, people are tyrannized, free speech is censored, privacy is violated, religious persuasions are harassed, unthinkable profanity and what is forbidden are replete and promoted; civil rights and justice are frequently pointed to, but are trodden down at the same time.

Nowadays, I am observing all these horrors and calamities through my narrow vision, and I mumble, “O Lord, how forbearing you are! You continue to grant respite to the perpetrators who are responsible for all this violence, oppression, and degradation of rights, freedom, and democracy. Absolute might and power belong to God.” And then I bury myself in a silence of astonishment and amazement (dahsha and hayra) , which I feel has become part of my nature. Absolute silence in the face of injustice, tyranny, and violation of rights is no different than glorifying Satan and is condemned in a Prophetic tradition. Indeed, believers never remain in absolute silence; if their hands are tied, they speak out; if they are gagged, they reveal their fervor with overflowing gestures; if they are ostracized completely from society, they expand with palpitations as if they had a volcano heaving inside. If their internal explosions could be unveiled, we would witness bolts of lightning issuing from their hearts and chill from their claps of thunder.

Their quiet stance arises from their subtle refinement and vast compassion which would not disdain even an ant, from their philosophy of security and trust, respect for human values, mercy toward everyone, and from relying on God in all matters. First and foremost, they are people of fine balance. Even when the most horrific waves of unrest beat the shores of their hearts, they behave with the utmost moderation and prudence. They never act unwisely like a child whose imagination outweighs his reason and comprehension, who blabs everything that crosses his mind without a moment’s thought, who is concerned with accountability only after destroying everything with his words and actions and seeks excuses for the destruction he has caused. They are always aware of their position, of what they do and say, and act with discretion in the balance between their hearts and minds. When they are granted the opportunity, they pronounce universal human values; when they have to remain silent, they act out these values with fervor, keep up their prayers and invocations, observe with compassion, and smile on everyone. They are never upset by their fate, nor do they complain to others as if dissatisfied with God Almighty. On the contrary, they question their own selves and seek their own faults. They bury their sorrows in their chests and do not mention them to those who are unable to comprehend; not a word of discomfort can be released from their mouths even though they may burn like an oven on the inside. They die and come back to life, but never do they disclose this to anyone.

No one can know completely what a burning mass of white-hot embers they actually are; others consider these special people no different than themselves. Yet, if their belief, demeanor, and selfless spirits that are devoted to making others live were to allow them to roar out their internal fervor, all the crows would immediately hush and look for a hidden corner to take refuge in, while all the bats would retreat back into their dark caves and descend into silent introspection. True believers are men and women of trust and security who show the utmost care in performing what their true character necessitates. They never hurt others, even though they may be hurt; nor do they cause pain, even if they are tortured.

In fact, their spiritual realm is replete with portraits of sorrow, each more horrifying than the last, that exist side by side with their feverish passion to relieve society of its ailments. Their palpitations and pains last forever with constant brainstorming and attempts at revival. The eternal verses of their hearts or, more truly, their silent cries, are a call to the light with a commitment to illumination as opposed to darkness. One line of the poem drops from their lips in grief, while the next inspires revivification. Their indignation and enthusiasm reveal signs of all this incessant internal turmoil.

Indeed, this has been the kind of life we have always sought, or perhaps we have been forced to live in this way. Fervor and sorrow have been our fate and in fact what we have also demanded. We have considered living for our own sake as selfishness, an attitude we have always abhorred. The motto “So others may live” and wishing eternal happiness for all have been our passion. This passion is so intense that if it were at all possible to come back to this life after death and we were given the right to choose, we would still prefer others’ lives to our own. The true horizons of humanity we would fix our direction towards; thoughts of revival we would breathe with; degradations we would close our eyes to; fuss about fundamentalism we would not be deceived by; those who come forward with slanders, calumnies, and accusations we would not be upset by or despair at; unrelenting violations and attacks of the severest kind we would bury in our chests; when it hurts inside, we would still manage to smile; when the magma inside erupts, we would suppress our exasperation so that no one is hurt or disturbed; and we would always display the privilege of being human.

I feel that those who think we remain in total passive silence and those who think we are involved in some kind of “activism” are all wrong. We are never absolutely still-anguish and hope, enduring everything, and striving for survival, all coexist in the depths of our souls. We may sometimes lose spirit, but never to a level of termination for good. Even if only with half of a voice or a breath, a quarter of a pain or palpitation, our hearts are like a brazier with embers always burning inside. Our faith constantly whispers new sentiments to us, and our conscience plays tunes of all kinds. Nevertheless, those who are of not the same persuasion or ideals as us cannot hear any of these melodies nor can they comprehend any of these sentiments.

Personally, every time I think of this agitation and fervor, I tremble as I visualize innocent people who have been victims of deadly imprisonment, maddening persecution, and merciless hounding, and whose words were stuck in their throats, words they wanted to utter but could not, so they were choked almost to the point of death. Who knows what beautiful things they would have said. The ignorant who did not know, even worse, those who did not know that they did not know, and the worst of all, who thought they knew even though they did not, used all available means to prevent those innocent people from expressing themselves; they would never allow them to do so, for if they did, people would understand how bereft of ideas and knowledge are those persecutors. In the words of Akif, the miserable oppressors “do not look to the East, nor are aware of the West, nor have any share of good conduct / All they have as capital is a face that cannot blush and eyes that cannot water!” If they did allow the innocent to speak up, those who can reason would comprehend all these matters and discover the true identities of some of these ignorant ones who tie justice to power and resort to despotism, whose assets are no more than yelling, and who try to catch fish in muddy water. Then, all the wretched souls who fight against common sense with dialectic and demagogy would topple one by one, their false candles would blow out, and those who have been deceived would not be tricked any more. All this would end in the collapse of those who want to rule the world with crude power, and I do not think they would ever acquiesce to that. In any case, we end up with the fact that today some people are gagged, while many others remain indifferent.

Those who cannot express themselves today in one way or another, will certainly voice their internal vibrations and pain, be it merely in their comportment; in return for their gulping down their words with palpitations today, they will recite the best poems of silence when the day comes. Who knows, perhaps then many rude and cruel characters who have forgotten true humane values like compassion, mercy, and justice for several centuries now, will unexpectedly melt down and turn into whatever being truly human demands.

So, let tyranny enjoy itself for a bit longer; let civil rights and justice be trodden on; let the innocent moan with pain; let the wronged strive to voice their grievance; and let hearts breathe with grief and fervor, hoping for a blissful hour in which the All-Powerful will speak. For us, if it is a matter of time serving our time of trial and lamentation, then, as in the words of Faik Ali, “There are songs yet unfinished / Anticipation moans in their silence,” there is still need for more quiet lament, after which perhaps the spring will rise.

We express and communicate our feelings, ideas and wishes through language. Cultural transmission and education from generation to generation is through language.

Linguists do not know how many languages there are. There is not even agreement about the number of languages in India. They do not agree on how to define a language and how to differentiate it from other linguistic codes such as dialects or sociolects. We know that languages change according to social context and that each individual has his or her own ideolect, or repertoire of linguistic codes. We also know that the dominance of some linguistic codes over others is related to political and economic power. It has been said that the difference between a language and a dialect is that a language is spoken by a people with an army and a navy. Philosophers and linguists have for centuries debated (and differed) about the origin and development of language.

Secular linguists have proposed four theories, all related in some way to an evolutionist account of human development for the origin of language. Linguists who draw on religious sources have a fifth alternative, namely the idea that language is a Divine gift to human beings -an idea shared by the three major monotheistic religions.

The secular theories of language

Secular linguists at least agree that the question of the origin of human language is still unsolved. After much discussion, they have concluded that the data available on the subject yield little or no evidence about the origin of human language. By means of comparative and reconstructive techniques, they have presented some information about early stages of the development of particular languages.

However, these techniques are applicable only for a period of up to about four to six thousand years. This is far less than the million years that they themselves believe human language to have existed.

Unlike other so-called sciences, linguistics and philosophy of language cannot pretend to have access to data related to the origin of their subject of study. There are no tape recordings which can be served up as ‘the missing link’ between men and monkeys. Therefore, their theories are based on what is observable around them-animal cries, the languages of what they consider ‘primitive’ groups and the speech of infants.

Animal cries

The gap between the meaningful behaviour of animals and human speech is so wide that available evidence does not furnish a bridge. Animal cries are characterized by invariability and monotony. Human language, by contrast, displays infinite variability. If we take animal cries as our starting point and suppose that language developed out of something similar, we face a number of problems. How could an ordered phonemic system grow out of the disorderly monotony of animal cries? How did the meanings of most speech forms come to be arbitrary? How did linguistic structure develop out of the undifferentiated cry? In short, animal cries are so vastly different from human language, it is inconceivable that speech could have evolved from them. Animals, according to Professor James (1938), have all the necessary speech organs but do not have language. Human, speech is obviously and only human.

‘Primitive’ groups

It was once thought that the speech of ‘primitive’ societies was something halfway between animal cries and human language, and that by studying them we could learn how language evolved. But the very notion of ‘primitive’ peoples has long been thought questionable. In any case, their languages are, as a rule, only ‘primitive’ with reference to the vocabulary of modern civilizations; their structures (grammar and syntax) show at least as much (often more) complexity and sophistication than ‘non-primitive’ languages.

The speech of infants

Study of the speech of infants has not yielded any clear results either. From birth, children are under the influence of adult speech, which they proceed to imitate. If all that is needed for language is a process of imitation, why are apes, who imitate humans so well in other respects, linguistically ‘inferior’ to birds, who can imitate us in respect to linguistic sounds? Why do cats and dogs, who have been living with us and observing us for many centuries, fail to imitate the sounds we make when we imitate theirs so well?

Despite these manifest errors in the assumptions on which the theories were based, some linguists still promote four onomatopoeic theories.

The bow-wow theory

This theory suggests speech was invented by attempting to imitate the characteristic sound of the thing referred to. The characteristic that differentiates a dog from other creatures is its bark. That is why, it is said some children call dogs ‘bow-wow’. Another example: the ‘first man’ heard the whistling of the wind and the hissing of the snake and named them ‘wind’ and ‘snake.’

The ding-dong theory

This theory, associated with the German philologist, Max Muller, holds that the origin of language is connected to rhythm. Like bow-wow, it relies on the idea that humans imitate what is around them. It suggests we imitate the rhythms around us developing first a simple hum and later words. The only evidence proposed is the ‘war dances’ and ‘ballads’ which, it is claimed, are common to all ‘primitive’ people.

The pooh-pooh theory

This theory traces language back to the emotional interjections evoked by pain, pleasure, disgust, etc.

Even secular theorists who believe in evolution like Wilbur Urban (1939) dismiss the above theories for being their assumptions and insufficient evidence.

The gesture theory

The idea that the earliest method of communication was through gesture which later developed into language was first proposed by Wilheim Wundt and elaborated by Paget (1935). They suggest that as most of our hand gestures are accompanied by movements of the jaw and many of our verbal expressions are supported by bodily actions, sign and spoken language are intrinsically connected. Among the bits of evidence offered for this hypothesis is the fact that, in English, I and me both involve drawing air inwards whereas you and thou involve the opposite.

This theory has the same weaknesses as the others. The few samples of so-called data are not enough to justify the assumptions that are built on them. All these theories are attempts to contrive ‘evidence’ for what is essentially a belief-a belief that humans evolved from monkeys. Those who do not believe in evolution, but believe that humans were created by an Almighty God do not subscribe to the above theories. They look to revelation.

Language as a divine gift

Language is one of the greatest gifts of the Creator. The Merciful Creator gave his Prophets miracles as evidence for their holy mission. The greatest miracle of prophet Adam was use of language. The event is alluded in the verses of the Qur’an, itself a linguistic miracle:

He taught Adam the names of all things and then set them before the angels, saying: ‘Tell Me the names of these, if what you say be true.’ Then said He: ‘Adam, tell their names.’ And when Adam had named them, He said: ‘Did I not tell you that I know the secrets of the heavens and the earth, and all that you reveal and all that you conceal? (al-Baqara, 2.31-33)

It maybe understood from these verses that man did not invent language, as some scientists claim, but that he received it as a direct gift from God. There was no time that people were without language. We had the potential for speech from the beginning of our existence. On this point, Quintilian said: ‘God, that All-Powerful Creator of nature and architect of the world, has impressed man with no greater characteristic to distinguish him from other creatures, than the faculty of speech.’

This view of language is common to all the monotheistic peoples. The Bible says about language and its origin too:

Whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof (Genesis, 2.19).

Because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth (Genesis, 11.19).

Human speech makes humans human. God created them and honoured them with the ability to speak, thereby distinguishing them from animals. He distinguished them from the angels by teaching the first man, Adam, the names of all things. In doing so, He gave him the key to understanding the world over which he and his offspring were to be made vice-gerents.

REFERENCES

• JAMES L. (1938) Our Spoken Language
• PAGET R. (1935) Human Speech
• URBAN W. (1939) Language and Reality