CPS Peace Efforts are at the top of the agenda of our activities. CPS and its global partners are undertaking peace efforts to spread the ideology of peace and train people based on its principles. It is the endeavour of CPS to regularly participate in peace efforts wherever opportunities present themselves. With this objective Maulana Wahiduddin Khan and the Ambassadors of Peace and Spirituality are regularly participants in the peace efforts of Indian and world organizations such as the Community de St. Edigio, Jain Council, Parliament of Religions, UPF Global Peace Council and many other organizations in India and globally. They are further participating in peace conferences, lectures, seminars; one-on-one interactions with spiritual and world leaders; making and distributing positive print, audio-visual and online material; and production and broadcasting of programs through television and radio.

Maulana Wahiduddin Khan involved in Peace Efforts 

The Ambassadors of Peace and Spirituality, under the patronage of Maulana are further undertaking meaningful inter-faith efforts to reveal the true face of Islam  and removes its misconceptions as to re-engineer the minds of fundamentalists and replace the mentality of violence with a culture of peace by helping them to rediscover Islam. During the peace efforts, Maulana makes people understand the power of peace in Islam as exemplified by Prophet Muhammad and understand how to face the challenge of Islamic fundamentalism. He explains, as exemplified by Prophet Muhammad, people have to maintain peace unilaterally, for nothing that we desire can be achieved without it. This is because human thinking is at the root of both the state of peace and violent action — though at opposite poles. Therefore, if one were to apply one’s mind in all sincerity to the end result, one would never indulge in violence, only in peaceful activities. Everyone would realize that peace is actually in consonance with humanity, whereas violence means a descent to the animal level. It is only peaceful minds that make for a peaceful world.

Maulana Wahiduddin Khan receiving the Demiurgus Peace Award 2002

According to Maulana, peace and spirituality are in fact two aspects of the same truth. Positive thinking in the individual is called spirituality; when this positive thinking spreads from one individual to another till it permeates every strata of society, it results in what is known as peace. He explains that a peaceful society is necessary for any major progress to take place. He further explains that to have a peaceful society, you have to begin by constructing a positive and spiritual personality in the individual. The formula that Maulana teaches to bring in the revolution in one’s personality is very simple:

“Change yourself by living a God-oriented life and you will be able to change the whole world."

Maulana explains that, in this world, it is impossible to change others; but one can change oneself. Once we stop complaining and protesting about other people or our situation, we are able to analyze the situation objectively and make positive changes in ourselves. This is the beginning of the development of our personalities on positive and spiritual lines – of bringing a spiritual revolution in our personalities. This is what makes positive and peaceful people in society. Then, when such individuals are created in large numbers, they may be regarded, collectively, as a peaceful society.

Tolerance is the Basis of Peace

He then explains that everything in this world has its price and this is particularly true of peace. If we want peace, we should be ready to pay for it or stand deprived of it. So what is the price of peace? It is simply tolerance. We live in a world of differences, and these differences cannot be eliminated. There are only two options before us: to adopt the policy either of tolerance or intolerance. While the latter leads to violence, the former ensures peace. Where there is tolerance there is peace, and where there is intolerance, there is war and violence. Tolerance is the only universal base for peace, and this same formula may be successfully applied to one’s family life, social life, as well as at the national and international levels. Peace requires us to foster a culture of tolerance, for intolerance can lead only to war. The United Nations itself subscribed to this philosophy, while proclaiming 1995 the ‘Year of Tolerance’.

The Ideology of Peace

Another aspect that comes out in the peace efforts is that people link peace with justice, saying, ‘give us justice and peace will ensue’. According to Maulana, this is an impractical way of achieving peace. CPS and its global partners are making people understand that when people indulge in acts of violence in the name of justice, peace can never prevail. This is because nothing productive can take place in an environment of violence. Peace is always desirable for its own sake. But, everything else comes after, not along with peace. When people become tolerant and keep the peace for the sake of peace, what that actually does is open up opportunities – it creates favourable conditions, which enable people to strive towards and attain their objectives. When people avail of the opportunities thus created, they eventually obtain justice and bring to fruition many other constructive initiatives. The case of Japan is a concrete example of the success of this formula.

Giving the practical model to obtain peace, Maulana advocates the following formula for peace, “Ignore the problems, and avail the opportunities.” He has developed such an Ideology of Peace with this very purpose in mind. Presenting the ideology of peace, based on Islam’s original sources (The Quran and Teachings of the Prophet Muhammad), he has published many books in English based on this Ideology: The Prophet Muhammad: A Simple guide to his life, Manifesto of Peace, Islam and Peace, The True Jihad and his latest book The Ideology of Peace. The ideology aims at persuading Muslim Extremists to accept more peaceful solutions. These books present such an Ideology of Peace, which aims at banishing the notion that there can be anything acceptable about terrorism.

Re-engineering of Mind Towards Peace

According to Maulana Sahab, violence always begins in the mind, so we have to uproot it from the mind itself. This would call for a total mental re-conditioning of the terrorists. That is, we have to rid the minds of the militants of the ideology, which is activating them. The ideology of peace presented in these books targets the minds of militants to eventually re-condition them and rid their thinking of the ideology of violence that is spurring them on to commit acts of terrorism in the name of Islam. These books have successfully re-oriented people’s minds, especially in Kashmir, India. People here have abandoned violent ways in favour of a peaceful course of action and engaged themselves in constructive activities. Having achieved success in the region, this ideology simply needs to be spread globally to re-orient the minds of people worldwide.

Need to Present the True Face of Islam

Maulana explains that we are living in an age of information. This is the age of the knowledge explosion. Today, everyone wants to know more and more about everything, including religion. The result is that, today, on the subject of religion, people are far better informed than ever before. But there is a difference. About other religions, people generally know what is enshrined in their religious books. Whereas the case of Islam is the opposite. Their information about Islam is derived from unauthentic sources. The reason for this lies with the Muslims and not with anyone else as the violence engaged in by the Muslims is being done in the name of Islam and Muslims are neither condemning these activities, nor disowning them outright. It is, therefore, but natural for people to attribute their violent propensities to their religion.
Another aspect of this phenomenon that must be questioned is the Ideology of Violence. Calling it ‘Islamic jihad’ is clearly a misnomer. The name of Islam is falsely linked to the Ideology of Violence. Repeated acts of terrorism led the Daily Times, London, to study Islam with reference to violence, and then, laying the emphasis on sensationalism rather than on objectivity, produced an article entitled, “A Religion that Sanctions Violence.”

Ideology of Peace to Replace the Ideology of Violence

According to Maulana, Muslim Extremists have concocted a wrong interpretation of the Quran, according to which smiting Kafirs is an act of worship and killing them is a certain certificate of entry into paradise. This Ideology is therefore an anti-humanity movement. But to put an end to this movement, what is really required is to bring about the de-conditioning of its adherents. This can be done only by meeting them on an intellectual level and impressing upon them the true and positive picture of Islam based on the Ideology of peace rather than on their wrongfully presented Ideology of violence.

Maulana explains that the terrorism of the present day is not a case of the gun-vs. -gun policy; it is rather a case of an ideology-vs. -an ideology. Muslim Extremists are committing these acts of violence due to the ideology of violence presented to them, based on the Islamic Scriptures. We have to make them understand that the ideology of violence is a wrong interpretation of Islamic Scriptures and the true interpretation as per Islam is the ideology of peace. Once they understand the ideology of peace, they are willing to abandon their violent mentality for the culture of peace.

During the peace efforts, Maulana and the Ambassadors of Peace and Spirituality explain to people that to be rid of Violent Jihad, the underpinning ideology has to be proved wrong by the kind of literature which will give forceful arguments against it, making it clear to the public that the Violent Ideology is the problem, not the solution to the problem and that the path to violence is not the path to heaven but the path of the Ideology of Peace is the path to heaven. Once people understand that the Ideology that they have been taught itself is wrong and does not have any basis in Islamic Scriptures, they will be motivated to rediscover Islam based on its Scriptures – The Quran and Hadith with the basis of the Ideology of Peace.

The Terrorist groups exemplify the ideology of violence at the global level. This ideology is prevalent all over the world and is so deep-rooted in the minds of not only the extremists but of many common Muslims that it is important to shed light on this Ideology of violence and show in detail how it is contradictory to Quranic teachings. This can be done by presenting the ideology of peace presented in the books that will show the stark difference between the two.

We are convinced that once people understand the ideology of peace, it will usher in an era of world peace.

Join CPS Peace Efforts to make world peace a reality!