2014-‐03-‐15
A Day in the Life of a Jamati Leader: Understanding Value Systems and Living Our Values Bashir Jiwani, PhD
Ethicist & Director, Fraser Health Ethics Services & Diversity Services www.incorporaCngethics.ca
The path this evening
1. Aahil and Khatija 2. Some framing thoughts 3. The idea of a value system 4. Values in alignment 5. Elements of the Shia Ismaili Value System 6. Sources of tension
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Aahil and KhaCja’s Saturday
• Aahil and KhaCja have been appointed as Mukhisaheb and Mukhianisaheba for Chandraat majlis
Aahil and KhaCja
• At bait-‐ul-‐khayal this morning, an elderly member of the Jamat approaches Aahil and requests a waro to recite ginan during the next khushiali majlis. The member is known to have a poor voice and also to sing more verses than assigned • The member is also related to their Kamadiasaheb, Nashir • Aahil is wondering how to respond
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Khatija’s family practice • Khatija is tired this morning as yesterday was a hard day for her • She is a family physician • She works two days a week so she can spend more time with her two young children • She is growing increasingly frustrated with her practice as there are more and more seniors coming for care • Their problems are complex, it takes a lot of time to look after them so she doesn’t earn as much, and she doesn’t find the medicine intellectually challenging • She is considering a policy not to accept any new patients (seniors, anyway)
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Khatija’s BUI class • As part of her effort to spend time with her children, Khatija also teaches BUI • At BUI today, she found a boy, Rahim, crying quietly in a hallway • With a little prodding, Rahim told her that another student was bullying him. • He said “I don’t know why this boy doesn’t like me” • Rahim said the boy would push him around outside BUI and at Jamatkhana, but mostly he would spread bad stories about Rahim • Rahim says he is having trouble sleeping, is feeling scared and worried • Khatija is trying to determine how to respond 6
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Aahil and the coach • After BUI, Aahil took Shakeel to his son’s soccer game • During the game, Aahil’s son Shakeel got hurt and had to stop playing • Afterwards, Shakeel was very upset – not because he got hurt but because a coach from the other team was yelling at him that he should stop pretending to be hurt • Shakeel looked up at Aahil and Aahil was wondering how to react
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Aahil’s care home • At soccer, Aahil saw his cousin Tariq, whose son also plays there, this reminded Aahil of his work • Aahil runs a small private seniors care facility • Most of the care providers are unregulated workers • Sometimes these caregivers feel unprepared and insufficiently trained to provide the care asked of them • For example, sometimes residents want help with risky behaviours, like eating when they are at risk of choking • They have asked Aahil for support and he is not sure how to respond 8
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Aahil’s care home • Aahil is also having trouble with his partner, his cousin Tariq • Tariq made a lot of money in the stock market about 10 years back and agreed to provide financing for Aahil to buy the care home • For the first year or so, the relationship went well • But lately, Aahil has noticed that Tariq has been having meetings with the accountants and bank managers without involving Aahil • Aahil has also been suspecting that some of Tariq’s other investments have been having trouble lately • He’s not sure what to do 9
Safai CommiUee • That evening, Aahil and KhaCja are having dinner with their Kamadiasaheb and Kamadianisaheba • At dinner, as usual, Nashir raises the topic of the Jamatkhana safai commiUee • The commiUee has been in place for 20 years and does a terrific job • However the team, especially the leader, is not open to new members • Two new JamaC members would really like to parCcipate but have been rebuffed by the leader • The JamaC MKs have raised this issue with their team and asked for their advice • Nashir asks Aahil and KhaCja what they think should happen 10
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Framing thoughts
Tutzing Evangelical Academy 2006
The spiritual roots of tolerance include, it seems to me, a respect for individual conscience -‐-‐ seen as a Gi[ of God -‐-‐ as well as a posture of religious humility before the Divine. It is by accepCng our human limits that we can come to see The Other as a fellow seeker of truth -‐-‐ and to find common ground in our common quest.
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As fellow seekers of truth, we both have an acCve role to play this a[ernoon
As leaders we want to be ethically literate people who can…
• reason morally whenever they analyse and resolve problems,
• Who can see the world through the lens of ethics, • who can ar0culate their moral reasoning clearly -‐ even in a world of cultural and religious diversity – • and have the courage to make tough choices.
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InvitaCon to culCvate skills of arCculaCon
At this Cme…
1. Please get the handout and a pen 2. Please find a partner – dispute prevenCon model
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What is a Value System?
What is a value system?
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Value System
• The collecCon of beliefs and values that define what is important and what is true about the world for an individual or a community
One of the areas of alignment between value systems
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Pluralism
Diversity: The fact of difference Pluralism: The way we should respond to diversity
Differences in • interests, • principles, • conceptual frameworks, • culture
• language, • naConality • modes and styles of communicaCon
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Pluralism in acCon In Canada (Globe and Mail) 1.
2.
3.
4.
Universal health care that innovates – No. 1 determinant of economic success and social mobility – Healthcare is universal – AUracts record numbers of skilled immigrants Educa0on that integrates – Oxford University study of immigraCon and diversity among Western countries found Canada to have excelled in intercultural educaCon A labour market that mobilizes – 2011, more than half the employment growth among landed immigrants was accounted for by newcomers living in the Prairies and BC Ci0zenship that both inspires change and withstands it – Canada gives ciCzenship, even dual ciCzenship, more than any other country – reduces social tensions, gives immigrants beUer access to schools, courts, hospitals and the ballot box
In Islam (Hazar Imam’s address to parliament) •
•
The complexity of the Ummah has a long history. Some of the most glorious chapters in Islamic history were purposefully built on the principle of inclusiveness — it was a maUer of state policy to pursue excellence through pluralism. This was true from the Cme of the Abbasids in Baghdad and the FaCmids in Cairo over 1,000 years ago. It was true in Afghanistan and Timbuktu in Mali, and later with the Safavids in Iran, the Mughals in India, the Uzbeks in Bukhara, and OUomans in Turkey. From the 8th to the 16th century, al-‐Andalus thrived on the Iberian Peninsula — under Muslim aegis — but also deeply welcoming to ChrisCan and Jewish peoples.
Pluralism defined 1. We should believe that diversity is good
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Pluralism defined 2. We should treat all people with respect: A. treaCng them with kindness B. listening to their perspecCves to understand -‐ without judgment C. then sharing our own perspecCves
Pluralism defined 3. Individuals and communiCes living and working together should seek common values-‐based soluCons to common problems without compromising their deepest values • We believe that understanding each other’s values and beliefs will enhance our understanding of the issues • We believe that achieving such soluCons will actually allow us to live with greater integrity
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Pluralism defined 4. Subgroups should be able to maintain their own idenCCes (meaningfully held values, beliefs, pracCces) within the laws of the broader community 5. We shouldn't want to change each other; we should try to build common foundaCons on which to move forward
NoCce that this approach to difference enables prevenCon of dispute in addiCon to creaCng a framework for successful dispute resoluCon
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Pluralism defined 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Believe diversity is good Treat others with respect Seek values-‐based soluCons Allow others to maintain idenCty Build common foundaCons (cosmopolitan ethic)
Key value system elements Mawlana Hazar Imam spoke to in his parliamentary address
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Core Element:
Belief in a living Imam
• What does this mean? • How do they impact your own personal daily life?
Imam as guide
“The understanding of the term imam therefore differs greatly in Sunnism and Shi’ism. In Sunni Islam the term has many uses, but it is never used in the mysCcal and esoteric sense given to it in Shi’ism. In Shi’ism, the Imam, like the prophets, is inerrant (ma’sum) and protected from sin by God. He possesses perfect knowledge of both the Law and the Way, both the outer and inner meaning of the Quran. Seyyed Hossein Nasr The Heart of Islam, p. 66-‐67
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One value system or many? Examining our values and trying to recalibrate our lives to live these in a new reality
Hiding from our values and trivializing the incoherence between our values and our actions
One value system or many? Examining our values and trying to recalibrate our lives to live these in a new reality
Hiding from our values and trivializing the incoherence between our values and our actions
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Core Element:
Fusion of Faith and World
• What does this mean? • How do they impact your own personal daily life?
Imam Sultan Muhammad Shah’s Memoirs Life in the ultimate analysis has taught me one enduring lesson. The subject should always disappear in the object. In our ordinary affections one for another, in our daily work with hand or brain, most of us discover soon enough that any lasting satisfaction, any contentment that we can achieve, is the result of forgetting self, of merging subject with object in a harmony that is of body, mind and spirit. And in the highest realms of consciousness all who believe in a Higher Being are liberated from all the clogging and hampering bonds of the subjective self in prayer, in rapt meditation upon and in the face of the glorious radiance of eternity, in which all temporal and earthly consciousness is swallowed up and itself becomes the eternal.
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London, October 19th 2003 In this context, would it not also be relevant to consider how, above all, it has been the Qur’anic notion of the universe as an expression of Allah’s will and creation that has inspired, in diverse Muslim communities, generations of artists, scientists and philosophers? Scientific pursuits, philosophic inquiry and artistic endeavour are all seen as the response of the faithful to the recurring call of the Qur’an to ponder the creation as a way to understand Allah's benevolent majesty. As Sura al-Baqara proclaims: ‘Wherever you turn, there is the face of Allah’.
Din & Dunya
AKDN Ethical Framework
• “A person's ulCmate worth depends on how he or she responds to these Divine favours. Din is the spiritual relaConship of willing submission of a reasoning creature to his Lord who creates, sustains and guides. For the truly discerning, the earthly life, dunya, is a gi[ to cherish inasmuch as it is a bridge to, and preparaCon for, the life to come. Otherwise it is an enCcement, distracCng man from service of God which is the true purpose of life.
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Din & Dunya
AKDN Ethical Framework
• “Service of God is not only worship, but also service to humanity, and abiding by the duty of trust towards the rest of creaCon. Righteousness, says the Qur’an, is not only fulfilling one's religious obligaCons. Without social responsibility, religiosity is a show of conceit. Islam is, therefore, both din and dunya, spirit and maUer, disCnct but linked, neither to be forsaken.”
The Muslim worldview:
God, humanity, pre-‐existenCal agreement...
God
abd/ servant
khalifa/ trustee
Creation
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Core Element:
The connec0on between human beings
• What does this mean? • How do they impact your own personal daily life?
Mawlana Hazar Imam, Annual MeeCng of the InternaConal Baccalaureate April, 2008 •
•
•
•
• •
As a point of departure in addressing these quesCons, I would turn to those words from my Grandfather which were quoted in two earlier Peterson Lectures. He included them in a speech he gave as President of the League of NaCons in Geneva some 70 years ago. They come originally from the Persian poet, Sadi, who wrote: “The children of Adam, created of the self-‐same clay, are members of one body. When one member suffers, all members suffer, likewise. O Thou, who art indifferent to the suffering of the fellow, thou art unworthy to be called a man.” You will readily understand why such words seem appropriate for a Peterson Lecture. They speak to the fundamental value of a universal human bond-‐ a gi[ of the Creator -‐ which both requires and validates our efforts to educate for global ciCzenship. I would also like to quote an infinitely more powerful statement about the unity of mankind, because it comes directly from the Holy Quran, and which I would ask you to think about. The Holy Quran addresses itself not only to Muslims, but to the enCrety of the human race, when it says: “O mankind! Be careful of your duty to your Lord Who created you from one single soul and from it created its mate and from them twain hath spread abroad a mulCtude of men and women.” These words reflect a deeply spiritual insight -‐ A Divine imperaCve if you will -‐ which, in my view, should under gird our educaConal commitments. It is because we see humankind, despite our differences, as children of God and born from one soul, that we insist on reaching beyond tradiConal boundaries as we deliberate, communicate, and educate internaConally.
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THE VALUES OF THE SHIA ISMAILI VALUE SYSTEM ARE ROOTED IN METAPHYSICAL, SPIRITUAL BELIEFS
Core Element:
Voluntary Service to improve the lives of others
• What does this mean? • How do they impact your own personal daily life?
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Understanding history through art
Is not a great work of art, like the ecstasy of the mystic, a gesture of the spirit, a stirring of the soul that comes from the attempt to experience a glimpse of, and an intimacy with, that which is ineffable and beyond being?
Mawlana Hazar Imam at the Ismaili Centre London, 19 October 2003"
QuesCons to ask 1. What is the subject maUer? 2. What does it say is important in life? 3. What does this artwork say about “that which is ineffable and beyond being”? 46"
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Madonna and Child in Majesty Surrounded by Angels, Cimabue, 1270, Musée du Louvre, Paris, France
End of Medieval period (15th 16th C)" Religion"
ChrisCanity"
Culture"
Dominated by the church"
Economy"
Feudalism Direct producCon"
Social Arrangements"
informal"
IdenCty"
Social Hierarchy"
PoliCcs"
Monarchy with church influence"
Purpose of life"
SalvaCon in the a[erlife" 48"
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"Madonna and Child with Two Angels" - Fra Filippo Lippi - 1465, Galleria Uffizi - Florence"
15th-‐16th C ReformaCon
• Luther breaks hegemony of Catholic Church – Luther (famous 95 theses) breaks with Catholic Church – Prince’s of Northern Europe side with Luther for poliCcal reasons – Begins 100 years of ChrisCan struggle • 30 years war (1518-‐1548) • 100 years war (to 1648)
– Ends with treaty of Westphalia • Religion of the Prince will determine religion of the people
50"
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Protestant Reformation
End of Medieval period (15th 16th C)" Religion"
ChrisCanity"
Culture"
Dominated by the church"
Economy"
Feudalism Direct producCon"
Social informal" Arrangements" IdenCty"
Social Hierarchy"
PoliCcs"
Monarchy with church influence"
Purpose of life"
SalvaCon in the a[erlife"
Renaissance (14th 17th C)" Catholic and Protestant ChrisCanity" Church losing grip, laity gaining influence"
Several legiCmate perspecCves" 51"
Enlightenment
• Need to “purify” our understanding of truth – to show religious ideas as prejudices without foundaCons • SCll religious society, but public life to be governed based solely on reason by pure thinking, enlightened leaders – not priests
52"
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ScienCfic RevoluCon
• From 15th to 18th C • 1543 Copernicus demonstrates earth goes round the sun • 1687 Newton publishes laws of moCon & gravity • “…outshines everything since the rise of chrisCanity and reduces the reformaCon and renaissance to the rank of mere episodes…” (BuUerfield)
53"
Sociological Shi[s •
•
CentralizaCon of the populaCon
– – – – –
Technology, industrializaCon, people move to ciCes CiCes become cultural powerhouses 200 years ago -‐ 97% in rural Today less than half In next 50 years 20% in rural populaCon
Social control becomes formal – People less concerned about belonging to a given community -‐ communiCes are porous – Shaming and shunning don’t work – Move to bureaucracy -‐ administraCve agencies, professional police, courts etc. administer jusCce formally in the name of the state
•
Economic producCon becomes indirect – Market economy – People become specialized, & produce goods that we don’t need, but that we can produce for cash that we use to meet my needs – Not focused on own needs -‐ rely on others for producing our own needs – Based on trust that with capital will be able to meet needs – Disconnected from purpose for which working
54"
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"Gold Marilyn Monroe" - Andy Warhol- 1962, Museum of Modern Art, New York"
Renaissance (14th 17th C)"
Enlightenment & Scientific Revolution
Protestant Reformation
End of Medieval period (15th 16th C)"
Modernity (17th 20th C)"
Catholic and Protestant ChrisCanity"
Religious pluralism"
Church losing grip, laity gaining influence"
secularist"
Begin manufacturing -‐ industrial"
Capitalism, rise of knowledge economy"
Religion"
ChrisCanity"
Culture"
Dominated by the church"
Economy"
Feudalism Direct producCon"
Social Arrangements"
TradiConal society Informal control"
IdenCty"
Social Hierarchy"
PoliCcs"
Monarchy with church influence"
republicanism"
Purpose of life"
SalvaCon in the a[erlife"
Several legiCmate perspecCves"
From serfs to workers"
Global society Formal control" Individual" Liberal democracy" Up for grabs"
56"
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All that matters is God and the afterlife"
This life matters too"
Mary is replaced by Marilyn
commercial beauty intrigues"
Four “isms” implicit in the Western ethos
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Materialism • All there is, is maUer – God and souls are figments of our imaginaCon • Science has the answer to everything – Religion is only a way to inappropriately grab power • You want to understand the world? Turn to science – don’t need revelaCon • You want to control the world? Turn to technology – don’t need prayer • You want to be happy? Go to the mall – don’t need salvaCon
Individualism • You come before the community • We are separate, isolated creatures, independent of one another • We just bump into each other in this world • You want to distribute power? Turn to democracy – don’t need religious authority • You want to exchange goods? Turn to the market economy – don’t need government
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RelaCvism
• Your ideas about that which we can’t prove scienCfically are just as good as mine • Let’s just go with the flow • I won’t criCcize you and you don’t criCcize me
Secularism
• • • •
Faith and life are separate Keep religion private and out of public life Focus on neutrality Single principle of separaCon of church and state – Ill-‐equipped to handle diversity – Arose in Cme with less diversity
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“And say, ‘Lord grant me a good entrance and a goodly exit, and sustain me with Your power.’”
Surat al-Isra’ (The Night Journey, 17:80)
“The calligrapher has made masterful use of his elegant thuluth murakkab script to create a calligraphic composition resembling a boat filled with a crew, their
long oars dipping into the water that is the skeleton of the leaf.”
chestnut leaf. Ottoman Empire (Turkey), 19th century. Aga Khan Museum"
Thank you!
www.incorporaCngethics.ca
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