Last week I was invited to speak at a World Religion Day Forum on the topic \’Science, Religion and Development\’. I started the presentation by defining the three terms, their underlying concepts and implicit world-views that we take for granted uncritically and without question or query.

One of these underlying world-view ideas and ideals we take unquestionably is the ‘modern capital I’.

I made the rather stark and surprising point, to most in the audience, that it is only the English language that capitalises the personal pronoun ‘I’.

I then went on to explain my perspective on the etymological origins of the personal, capitalised and bold person claim of an ‘I’ in our everyday use of the word. I traced it directly to Rene Descartes’ ‘Cogito Ergo Sum or his I think therefore I am’ thesis. This coupled with Martin Luther’s protest to the then Catholic Church that “he can do no other!” make up for the capitalised I, which now appears to be used only in the English language as the capital I. No other language seems to capitalise the personal pronoun I.

Last week also in Parliament, we saw this ‘Ughly I’ (spelt phonetically and used such to sound as a disgusting action). This time it was the so-called members of the Umno Youth who came to protest their apparent verbal abuse in the House by none other than the now Lion of Bukit Gelugor While what Karpal Singh did, much like the decision of the Perak speaker, they both did under the legal immunity provided by the House they sit in. The members representing Umno Youth abused the law and insulted our August House of Parliament. They behaved in an uncivilised way in our Parliament. How can a rowdy crowd such as this even get into Parliament unless the police who guard the Parliament House are “as usual closing one eye to the parties from within the federal government?”

What is becoming of Malaysia?

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Allow me therefore to share what and how I think this ‘Ughly I’ is becoming even more visible in all aspects of Malaysian life; although there was probably a time when the ordinary Malaysian would not even dare to look a police officer straight into the eye. Today, it would appear that ordinary Malaysians can not only look them in the eyes, but can say straight to their faces that they are closing one eye to many matters and are mostly indignant about the issue. What has become of Malaysia, the once gentle and simple beautiful country of the most hospitable people, probably in the world?

Today, the so-called leaders and titled people break laws, cheat and steal, and rationalise their every wrong action without shame or even any sense of awareness that there is a God up there who sees and judges all these. Why else would the ordinary people of Perak, under a Pakatan Rakyat banner surround and abuse the Regent of Perak who now says, in the NST that “a lawless system breeds a lawless culture.” I cannot agree more. But, he should also look within the royal institution, before only looking outwards.

I believe that this lawlessness starts with the very modern idea of the “I” as the center of one’s universe of thought and life. Descartes gave birth to this modern self-centered and personalised capital I. Such a universe of thought and life is now fully man-centered. Man is the center of this world-view and that personal perspective thereby defines all truth and reality within that world-view.

Such is also the world-view that defines and takes an exclusive position on the Arabic word for God as Allah; but claims that it is the reserved word for the absolute and only use of the Malay language in the Muslim context. That same world-view gazettes one day and de-gazzetes yet another day, the same word without impunity; as if the same God of the Universe is not watching at all.

Only a man-centered worldview of ‘I-Me-Myself’ can think and act like this; with such absolute certainty in defining an invisible, unlimited, all powerful God of the Universe vide simply by a human gazette. Absolute Truth can now be simply decreed by human edict; forget God, whatever his name. In the Christian faith, we call this the world-view of sin based on the fallen state of man; a world-view that chooses to ignore the sinful nature of man but also seeks to make man the center of this same universe of God. Christians refer to the Holy Trinity in their God-ordained world-view; but this man-centered world-view makes man the center of this world-view; that of I-Me-Myself.

Such a world-view can operate at the level of the individual or even at the level of a group. Therefore the Umno Youth world-view of barging like thugs into the Parliament to try and physically stop a man on a wheelchair is no better or no worse than their accusation that the Lion was abusive; even if under the legal protection of the Parliament. Neither the end nor the means can justify the ends nor means in either case; except Karpal was within the law. In all such morality and ethics, the journey is also the destination.

Immorality as now defined by these Umno Youth members by their action in Parliament establishes exactly what the member of Parliament from Bukit Gelugor is trying to prove.

The ‘Ughly I’ reveals itself both in the language of the member of Parliament but also in the actions of the disrespectful non-members of the August House of the people. The real losers are the ordinary people who hold a simple but profound world-view that the Parliament, like the kings or sultans, and the other governance institutions under our federal constitution are just that; subservient to the federal constitution which gives life to each of them.

Like the Great Thou of the Universe, the constitution exists above all of us and therefore it is incumbent upon all of us to respect, protect and preserve this Document of Destiny, as Prof Shad Saleem Farouqi labels it.

What is the way forward?

What then is the way forward, for all and sundry? The capital I in all of us needs to become the smaller non-capitalized ‘i’ without exclusivity; in all matters over which there is no absolute certainty at the human level. In common parlance this calls for humility in both conduct and communication. On absolute matters, we do not need emotions but legal certainty.

Karpal is only stating a legal and constitutional case; he is therefore not challenging the status of the royalty in Perak, or Malay rulers or rights. He is only questioning the judgment over the related decisions. Since the Perak Royal is a constitutional head of the state government; it should now be left to the Federal Court to resolve this constitutional issue. Emotions alone cannot.

My prayer for the whole nation and peoples is that we will recognise that the federal constitution is above all of us, and therefore, if we have issues of major disagreement, we must turn to the courts to settle them.

Doing things on our own, based on our own emotions or based on brute strength will never resolve issues. What is right and truth of any matter can only be resolved vide sober face-to-face meetings and rational arguments based on our accepted laws of the nation. In real life, neither the roar of the lion nor brute force will prove anything. May God bless our beloved country and leadership with wisdom out of this constitutional quagmire.