The Quran, as some other previous scriptures, tells us there is to be a transformation of the world, after a major psychological, social and geophysical upheaval. The present system of life is to be replaced with a new earth and a new heaven as has happened before(Quran 14:48, 6:6, 17:17, 27:51, 28:43,78, 50:36 etc.). This may be interpreted as meaning the creation of new physical and social conditions and to new psychological, ideological and cultural conditions. The righteous will inherit the earth (Quran 21:105, 14:19, 15:23, 19:40, and 70:40-41). This, in the language of the Quran, implies that Islam will triumph. That is, those who surrender to God, to objective principles and to their own inherent nature as made by God, will prevail. There is no justification for narrowing down the meaning of this to a particular sect. (2:62, 5:69)

There is little doubt that we are living in an age where the conditions of life are undergoing revolutionary changes owing to the rapid progress of science and technology, particularly because of the means of transport and communication, computers and the Internet. But this also brings about political, economic and environmental problems because of the raised expectations of people and the pressure on resources, the pollution and ecological disruption and massive geophysical effects of industry and commerce.

(1) The present dominant system of life has created a great amount of injustice, oppression, inequality and physical, mental and spiritual enslavement in the world. From a religious, spiritual or objective point of view, much of the business, political and cultural practices of the world are immoral, evil and depraved and ought to be regarded as criminal.

(2) These produces poverty in a great part of the world, which brings extreme deprivation, disease, ignorance owing to lack of education, weakness and disability, social disintegration and disorder, desperation. And even in countries that have become very prosperous at the expense of others, it brings increasing psychological, social, physical and environmental problems, moral and cultural degeneration and depravity. The forces causing these degenerative effects can be called Subjective or Satanic, Forces S.

(3) Most of these problems are due to the greed and selfishness, particularly of those who are obsessed with ambitions, who accumulate wealth and power at the expense of others and much beyond their own needs and welfare. They tend to be psychopathic to various degrees in that they lack conscience and are willing to sacrifice the welfare and lives of great numbers of human beings for the satisfaction of their own appetites.

(4) This wealth and power is the result of a hierarchical organization which concentrates this power in fewer and fewer hands the higher up the pyramid one goes and disempowers those below. It dehumanizes, depersonalizes and creates anonymity and makes the society into a remote controlled machine. Those in power and authority take increasing control of the bodies, minds and conscience of people, and increasingly greater amounts and aspects of their lives.

(5) An increasing number of people are discovering these things, becoming discontent, opting out, protesting and forming an opposition. In particular they feel the psychological vacuum and are turning in increasing numbers to spiritual matters.

(6) However, owing to increasing knowledge and education the naïve and superstitious understanding of religion as in the past is no longer tenable and is increasingly giving way to a more sophisticated understanding. One of the consequences of this is that though the ideas progressively approximate to objective principles and are likely to converge to more or less comprehensive uniformity, the practices become more diverse. This is similar to the case in Medicine. which has a diversity of remedies for the diversity of maladies and persons, though the science behind it is one. The forces causing these regenerative effects can be called Objective or Divine, Forces D.

(7) The result of these developments is likely to be a popular unorganized but co-operative movement, which gains momentum over time. A power struggle must inevitably ensue between the Forces S and D. People will increasingly take sides and the opinions, proposals and actions taken will vary over a wide range sometimes taking an extreme and desperate form. As the organized power is greater this movement will continue to seemingly fail until such time when the general level of intelligence, knowledge and awareness has reached a level where it balances this power. Though it seems to fail, the fact is that it has subtle effects, causing gradual unobtrusive changes. This movement, as in the past, may be taken over periodically by a different set of ambitious people and discredited.

(8) After an unpredictable period of struggles, this movement will topple the existing power structure and replaces it with a system of life that approximates an Objective Ideal. This will probably be precipitated by the intervention of some Cosmic, geophysical, climatic or natural event, which changes the conditions of existence thereby making one set of characteristics (ideas, values, practices and talents) more useful than the previous set. It may even result from a biological, social, or psychological crisis that is even now in the making. Or it may come from an interaction and combination of these inner and outer factors.

Here, a system will be described which can be regarded as ideal from an Islamic point of view.

It has been indicated in previous articles that Islam can be regarded as having 7 aspects as follows:- Justice, Love, Truth, Surrender, Universality, A system of Spiritual Development and The Ideal Society. In order to describe various aspects of the last, many other articles were also written. Here, these will be summarized to give a unified picture. However, it may not be fully comprehensive and is only one view. Many other views are possible.

Ideal Societies have been described by many Philosophers and Novelist such as Plato, Thomas More, H.G. Wells and Aldous Huxley in works such as The Republic Utopia, Shangri-La, and Island. Some of these base their Ideal Society on Reason, and others on Science and Technology. But, they appear to have a shallow view of the nature of man and do not recognize what the real problems are. Communism was an attempt at actually establishing an Ideal society. But it failed and turned into a tyranny because it was based on false premises. It based itself on economic considerations and ignored the moral and ideological. Yet it was itself an ideology and the economic conditions were also a matter of human laws about property and movement of raw materials, goods and populations. It supposed that human nature was alterable merely by creating social changes and ignored the inherent genetic factor and denied the spiritual dimension. It did not seem to have occurred to those who proposed and implemented the movement that it was human being who made the environmental and social conditions according to their own psychological or spiritual natures, and that their own actions modified them.

The successions of religions have attempted to establish what has been called the Kingdom of God on Earth. But though they grew at first, they have lasted only for short periods or have disintegrated into small units scattered here and there in a more or less hidden form outside the main stream of life. Worldly forces, those coming from the desire for material wealth, power, prestige and egotism have succeeded in undermining and corrupting them. But this was foreseen, and new spiritual influences were introduced from time to time into the world so that a gradual development by cumulative effects could take place. Indeed, each dispensation of religion forecast this degeneration and the coming of the next Messenger from the Real. Jesus predicted the coming of the Spirit of Truth, Muhammad, and the establishment of the Kingdom of God. Obviously, the Ideal Society cannot be established until human beings reach a certain stage of development.

But Ideals may be real, illusory or negative. They are real if they conform to inherent human strivings, negative if they lead to destruction and illusory if they are not within human potentialities. Ideals must actualize potentialities. An Ideal Society must be one in which there is harmony and balance between three factors:- Human Psychological or Spiritual Potentialities, Social interactions and the Environment. Ideas, Motives and Actions must be coordinated. There is, of course, an opposition, a kind of contradiction between Ideals and Actualities. In so far as Actualities are not taken into consideration the Ideal always fails and is bound to fail. On the other hand, human actions, in so far as they are not impulsive or automatic (bound by habit and conditioning), but are purposive then they are certainly based on hope that something not yet actual will be realized. But all the factors that affect the actual present are not known to us. They are known only to God. The results of our actions, therefore, cannot entirely depend on us, but depend on God. Our actions do produce the future, but that future is a resultant of the present Ideal and the present Actuality. It will, therefore, depend partly on the nature of the Ideal, which is itself embedded in our nature and history.

Islam may be described as a consciously constructed objective, comprehensive, unified, self-consistent Way of Life that has 7 interconnected aspects. (1) It has a system of spiritual or psychological development. (2) It has an Ideology or System of Ideas (3) It has a Cultural Aspect, which will be understood here as referring to customs, attitudes and the modes of thinking, motivation and action. This includes the arts, ethics, morality, and etiquette. (4) It has a Social System, which refers to the relationship between people, between the sexes and between the generations (5) It has a Political Aspect (6) It has an Economic Aspect (7) It has a Legal Aspect and is a system of Laws.

The following verses of the Quran should be studied and understood, and may be regarded as its foundation:-

An Ideal Social System, from an Islamic point of view, can be best understood when these interconnected fundamental principles of Islam are first understood:-

(1) God, Allah, is the fundamental Absolute Unitary Reality and source of all things, including facts, meanings and values. He is, therefore, the supreme Authority. The belief in this gives rise to, and is itself a result of what can be called the Principle of Transcendence. This recognizes that man is a dependent part of a much greater reality; there is much more to reality than exists in our knowledge and experience; and that there is a much greater range of possibilities than have been actualized. This principle lies behind exploration, the pursuit of sciences and technologies, the belief in progress and the desire for self-extension. It is also the source of Ideals. As Reality is greater than our knowledge of it and of our powers, another consequence of this principle is that it is not possible to be certain of anything. Anything from the unknown area may enter into the known area to cause unpredictable changes. This is the Principle of Uncertainty. It leads to striving for certainty, which can only be achieved by identification with Allah.

(2) As Allah is the fundamental Reality, His attributes manifest in creation and ought to manifest in human activities also. He is the source of Truth. The implication is that Objective factors - facts, meanings and values - should govern the conduct of life. The Ideal Society is, therefore, based on the Principle of Objectivity in thought, motives and actions. One of consequences of this principle is that people seek truth and virtue, honour those who acquire them and seek their guidance. The affairs of the Society should be run by the Enlightened, those who are called the Foremost (35:32, 56:10), and others in proportion to the degree of their enlightenment. They do not do this by compulsion but by their abilities and sense of responsibility, by earning trust and respect, and by guidance, teaching and otherwise facilitating the development of this objectivity in others.

(3) Allah is Benevolent, Compassionate and Merciful. This may be called the Principle of Beneficence - We exist because the conditions that are conducive to our arising exist. They do not exist because we deserve them or have created them, but they put us under a debt, an obligation to fulfill the function for which we have arisen and at least to maintain the conditions that formed us. The world should, therefore be regarded as benign which can supply all needs and tolerant in that most mistakes are not fatal and are irreversible. This principle creates hope, optimism and a positive attitude. Lest the Ideal and failure to live up to it, should create inner conflicts and disabling guilt, God is also the Merciful and Forgiving to those who repent and strive. Failure should not, therefore, lead to despair and paralysis. On the other hand success should not lead to arrogance because the powers and circumstances by which we obtain it have not been created by us but by God. Forgiveness means the removal of inner contradictions and conflicts and the restoration of harmony and unity. This is the Principle of Tolerance.

(4) Allah is Just. This implies that there are Rules and Laws governing the Universe and human affairs should also be so governed. This is the Principle of Justice. Every action has consequences that are appropriate and proportional to the action. All things should be judged in proportion to their similarities and dissimilarities and in context. However, these Laws are not completely rigid. They refer to probabilities. Though the Law of Gravity requires that all things should fall to the ground, other laws allow airplanes and birds to fly. This is possible because there is a payment in energy for overcoming gravity. When this payment ceases the airplane crashes. Human beings must pay physically, mentally or spiritually for what benefit they get.

(5) There is an ultimate Unity such that all things belong as parts of a greater whole to several levels, with respect to which they have a function. Nothing is independent. Human beings depend for their existence on the resources of the world and the rest of the Cosmos and also on other human beings. They also affect their environment, including other human beings. As this modifies the environment that affects them, they are affected indirectly by their own actions. Conversely, the environment by affecting and modifying them, affects itself. And every action people do modifies them and this affects the surroundings. This may be called the Principle of Unity beyond duality or plurality, into which all other things are incorporated in a self-consistent manner, because they are regarded as parts or aspects of the Unity.

(6) The Universe and all things in it including man, have a purpose and a goal. There is a direction of development. Human beings are made as vicegerents. They are required to grow and develop spiritually and this is to be achieved by fulfilling their responsibilities with respect to the world they live in. The recognition and awareness of this can be called the Principle of Purposiveness. This creates striving and development.

(7) Human beings have the Spirit of God in them (32:9, 15:29). This implies that their main characteristic is that they possess a more highly developed soul than other creatures - that is, they possess the Spiritual faculties for consciousness, conscience and will (the ability to control themselves, for intelligent voluntary action as opposed to instinctive actions or conditioned reflexes). Nothing can be said to exist or have any meaning or purpose, for someone who is not conscious, not even himself. This can be called the Principle of Spirituality. The emphasis is on Awareness. They have inbuilt drives, motives and goals and the capacity for fellow feeling, sympathy and empathy which gives them the power for cooperation, mutual aid and unification. These faculties give them not only perception but also imagination and the ability to create symbols and to manipulate both. They are able to see facts and their relationships both in the external world and within themselves. They can analyze, extrapolate from these, relate, interpret, evaluate, systematize and synthesize, and this gives them the power to predict what has not yet happened, invent and also to form Ideals. Development and progress for man involves the enhancement of these human faculties. This principle causes the society to be organized for the psychological or spiritual development of people. It is, therefore, a Comprehensive Development System (CDS) rather than an educational system in the ordinary sense, and produces or should produce, enlightened people. Techniques of Spiritual Development are, therefore, integrated into the Social System. These structure Time - the day, week, year and life span.

(8) Humanity is One, not only because of the effect people have on each other, but also because they are genetically derived from a single source and have fundamentally the same nature. They can be thought of as cells within a single organism. The nature of the whole can be regarded as a resultant of the nature of all individuals in it, and each individual has the potentialities contained in all others. This allows indirect and direct communication, sympathy, empathy and a type of resonance and unison. This can be called the Principle of Identity. The welfare and development of the whole will depend on how the parts, organs or individuals co-operate and how the whole deals with the parts and the parts with the whole. The Spirit of Allah within them makes human beings, or ought to make them, into Agents through whom Allah works, not unconsciously as all other things are, but consciously. This condition is called Surrender, (Islam). The idea may be called the Principle of Responsibility. Their welfare and fate depends on how they perform this function. It is, therefore, necessary to determine what the function is and abide by this knowledge. The responsibility is towards (a) the environment, (b) other people and (c) themselves. These are inter-dependent. What a person does to himself modifies him and this will affect others and environment directly or indirectly. And vice versa.. This principle creates, or ought to create, a purposive, self-motivated, self-determined and self-controlled people, free from slavery, physically, mentally and spiritually, to things, to other people and to their own irrational impulses, prejudice, habits, obsession, addictions, fixations and conditioning.

(9) Islam requires the direct connection between a person and God without mediation of priest or organized Church. This is because the Spirit of God is in him. This also brings him, or ought to bring him in more intimate contact with other people who also contain His spirit and with the rest of the Cosmos which is a creation like him. We can call this the Principle of Connectedness. A person is, therefore, responsible for his own soul and to a degree for the welfare and development of everything within his sphere of influence. This responsibility includes his own spiritual development, seeking knowledge and accepting the guidance of those who are higher up the ladder and guiding and helping those who are lower. Personal responsibility implies a degree of autonomy and self-determination and freedom from the control of others both physically and mentally. It also implies that though diverse with diverse functions, people are equal, not in the sense that they have similar or equal amounts of intelligence, talents, virtue, wealth, and privileges but in Justice - that they are measured by the same scale.

(10) Though it is possible to distinguish between the spiritual and the mental and physical, and between the outer and inner, and the higher and lower, they may be regarded as aspects of thing and are not completely separate. They interact and are inter-dependent. We can call this the Principle of Correspondence.

Notes:-

It is necessary to clarify some sources of misconception and controversy:-

(1) From the Islamic point of view all things created by Allah are True and Good. Truth and Goodness are attribute of Allah. Therefore, Falsehood and Evil from the objective point of view do not exist - they are the absence of Truth and Good, as darkness is the absence of light. But from the human or subject point of view there is both good and evil - we judge things according to how things affect us. Allah is the creator of both these and He transcends this pair. Pain and pleasure do exist and lead to the same thing because one attracts and the other repels from the opposite. Both are good in the transcendental sense. But even objectively, some things are beneficial to man and others are harmful for him. There is good and evil which refers to particular objects and not others. This kind of good and evil is relative and concerns the way things are related and organized. The Created World is also formed from a pair of opposite but complementary forces, Active and Passive, Positive and Negative, Male and Female. The Creator is a Unity beyond this and we are required to "flee to Allah". We can, therefore, speak about the Principle of Discrimination which refers to different levels and areas and the distinctions between Absolute and Relative, and Objective and Subjective judgments.

(2) Purpose refers to the function of a thing with respect to a higher system, as organs have within an organism. Things arise because they are useful and degenerate when not useful owing to change of circumstances or malfunctions. Purpose and Cause are, therefore, related. Hunger for instance has causes and purposes. The purpose is to obtain the nutrition and energy required for the maintenance and activity of the organism, and the cause is the depletion of these. The awareness of purpose is also called purpose, but is another degree of it. Conscious beings require an understanding of both causes and purposes.

(3) Human responsibility may be regarded as having three aspects:- (a) not to disrupt the order of things. (b) to administer and maintain (c) to enhance, develop and aid in the evolution of the environment, things and human beings themselves. This may be called the Principle of Evolution, but not in the Darwinian sense. Physical evolution is a side effect of Spiritual evolution.

All this requires consciousness and the enhancement of consciousness - the introduction of the Light of Allah. Many people, however, confuse consciousness with thought. In fact, consciousness requires receptivity while thought is an action. In order to be conscious thought must be suspended. When thinking begins consciousness is suspended. Each has its own function. The mind, especially in modern days, has the following characteristics:- (a) It is full of ideas and images which provide rigid forms. Flexibility is sacrificed and perception is superficial. (b) The mind is fixated on these forms and narrowed down. (c) Because these forms are distinct from one another they also tend cause disintegration. The Unity of the mind is lost. (d) There is no framework or centre with respect to which all things can be seen in context or compared. (e) The mind is constantly active, (f) It flits from one thing to another. This has been called "The inner Chattering Monkey". It makes the mind uncontrolled, variable and unstable.

Surrender to Allah (Islam), of course, ultimately means to be at one with Allah, to realize Unity (to make it real). To "Surrender to Allah" is also to surrender to the Spirit of Allah which is within us:-

The purpose of life is, therefore, Self-realization and the purpose of religion is to provide the techniques for doing this.. This means:- (a) We are spiritually at-one with the Spirit of Allah; (b) as all human beings contain this spirit, we are also spiritually at-one with all human beings. But particular, those who realize this or acknowledge that it is so are at-one with one another. (c) As it is this Spirit which also carries all the attributes, virtues and powers of Allah, then self-realization bestows these on us. (d) Self-realization is return to Allah and brings harmony, peace and joy.

But there are those who devote themselves to the experience of Unity and get "drunk" or fixated with this experience and become unable to deal with the particularities of life. This, however, appears to contradict the purpose of man, his vicegerency. Unity includes Truth as well as Compassion and Justice. Here Truth refers to the fact that all things do belong to a system and have existence, function and meaning only because of this; Compassion implies recognition and concern for the creatures and all particularities; and Justice means that there are laws according to which things and their relationships function. Consciousness includes all this.

The members of the Ideal Society should learn from the earliest to cultivate Awareness, particularly self-awareness. They should also learn from experience that there is distinction between the Spirit within them and the Ego, between "I" and "Me". The Spirit refers to what is real, essential and unitary and in harmony. It is the same in all and makes human beings one with each other and with Allah whose spirit it is. The Ego is the source of the superficial, illusion, division and conflict. The Good can be defined as that which brings unity and harmony and evil can be defined as that which brings division and conflict. Consciousness (con = together, sciousness = cognition) means awareness of unity. It follows that evil can be recognized and often eradicated simply by the cultivation of self-awareness. But most people do not wish to look inwards because the view is too painful owing to the inner contradictions which they find there and the addiction to things which cause them. They, therefore, create and use all kinds of distractions and Escape Mechanisms designed to suppress, divert of dull consciousness. These may consist of the use of drugs, alcohol, sport, fashions, seeking excitement and sensual pleasures, adherence to causes, prejudices and fantasies, fanatical interest in politics, philosophies, sciences and even religion as long as they are only ideas and thought. This not only makes them unable to perceive the real and the source of their problems (which is also definable as a contradiction) and, therefore, their solution, but creates even more problems. Indeed, pain and suffering are themselves results of conflict, contradiction and disharmony. They are both punishment and deterrent. Joy and happiness come from harmony and are the reward and incentive. The whole of the Spiritual discipline is concerned with approaching and cultivating awareness and identification with the Spirit and removing or distancing oneself from the Ego. This is the Principle of Surrender.

(4) Each individual has his or her own potentialities, abilities, experiences, opportunities, professions, circumstances and sphere of influence. They are like different cells within a human body. However, underlying the differences there is something similar about all human beings. It is this similarity which also binds them together. This is the Principle of Equality, which should be understood in relation to the Principle of Diversity and the Principle of Similarity. People cannot be judged by other people or against other people but according to their function within their own contexts or according to an impartial law on which the society is constructed. Everyone is responsible for their own development and everyone is, and is to be held, responsible for what he does and cannot plead that someone else ordered him to do something. The person who orders, the person who transmits the order, and the one who carries it out are all responsible. This requires that the educational system must place as much or more emphasis on moral values as on factual knowledge and skills and that the organization is not secretive and authoritarian but provides all information to the members on which intelligent they can base intelligent action.