Muhammad Iqbal Quotes
Sir Muhammad Iqbal was an Indian-Pakistani Islamic philosopher, poet, and political thinker of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, widely regarded as the spiritual father of the modern state of Pakistan and as the most influential Muslim poet of the South Asian subcontinent. The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam, his 1930 Madras Lectures, set out a sweeping renewal of Islamic philosophical theology in conversation with Bergson, Whitehead, and the new physics, in which the human ego, in its dynamic engagement with God and the world, is held to be the proper category through which Islamic philosophy may be renewed. The quotes below are attributed to Muhammad Iqbal, organized by topic.
Muhammad Iqbal on God
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Attributed to Muhammad Iqbal:
“Islam is not a finished system; it is a continuous engagement of the believing self with the world.”
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Attributed to Muhammad Iqbal:
“The reconstruction of religious thought is the proper labor of every generation of Muslims.”
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“The immediacy of mystic experience simply means that we know God just as we know other objects. God is not a mathematical entity or a system of concepts mutually related to one another and having no reference to experience .”
The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930), p. 14
Muhammad Iqbal on Knowledge
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“Ends and purposes, whether they exist as conscious or subconscious tendencies, form the warp and woof of our conscious experience.”
The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930), p. 42 -
“Sir Muhammad Iqbal’s 1930 Presidential Address to the 25th Session of the All-India Muslim League, Allahabad, 29 December 1930 (from University of Columbia website )”
It cannot be denied that Islam , regarded as an ethical ideal plus a certain kind of polity – by which expression I mean a social structure regulated by a legal system and animated by a specific ethical ideal – has been the chief formative factor in the life-history of the Muslims of India . It has furnished those basic emotions and loyalties which gradually unify scattered individuals and groups,
Muhammad Iqbal on Life
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“It cannot be denied that Islam , regarded as an ethical ideal plus a certain kind of polity – by which expression I mean a social structure regulated by a legal system and animated by a specific ethical ideal – has been the chief formative factor in the life-history of the Muslims of India . It has furnished those basic emotions and loyalties which gradually unify scattered individuals and groups, and finally transform them into a well-defined people, possessing a moral consciousness of their own.”
Sir Muhammad Iqbal’s 1930 Presidential Address to the 25th Session of the All-India Muslim League, Allahabad, 29 December 1930 (from University of Columbia website ) -
“Sir Muhammad Iqbal’s 1930 Presidential Address to the 25th Session of the All-India Muslim League, Allahabad, 29 December 1930 (from University of Columbia website ). Quoted by Zafar Anjum in Iqbal: The Life of a Poet, Philosopher and Politician (2014).”
The principle that each group is entitled to its free development on its own lines is not inspired by any feeling of narrow communalism . There are communalisms and communalisms. A community which is inspired by feelings of ill-will towards other communities is low and ignoble. I entertain the highest respect for the customs, laws, religious and social institutions of other communities. Nay, it is
Muhammad Iqbal on Mind
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Attributed to Muhammad Iqbal:
“Khudi, the self, is the proper category through which Islamic philosophy must be renewed.”
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Attributed to Muhammad Iqbal:
“The mind that is most alive is the mind most in contact with God.”
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“The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930), p. 14”
The immediacy of mystic experience simply means that we know God just as we know other objects. God is not a mathematical entity or a system of concepts mutually related to one another and having no reference to experience . -
“The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930), p. 42”
Ends and purposes, whether they exist as conscious or subconscious tendencies, form the warp and woof of our conscious experience. -
“The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930), p. 99”
Muhammad of Arabia ascended the highest Heaven and returned. I swear by God that if I had reached that point, I should never have returned.” These are the words of a great Muslim saint, ‘ Abd al-Quddūs of Gangoh . In the whole range of Sufi literature it will be probably difficult to find words which, in a single sentence, disclose such an acute perception of the psychological difference between t
Muhammad Iqbal on Politics
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Attributed to Muhammad Iqbal:
“A people without a vital self is a people without a future.”
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“To this convention you must re-state as clearly and as strongly as possible, the political objective of Indian Muslims as a distinct political unit in the country. It is absolutely necessary to tell the world both inside and outside India that the economic problem is not the only problem in the country. From the Muslim point of view the cultural problem is of much greater consequence to most Indian Muslims. At any rate it is not less important than the economic problem.”
letter by Sir Muhammad Iqbal to Jinnah pleading with him to summon an all India Muslim convention to take on Nehru’s challenge. quoted in Venkat Dhulipala - Creating a New Medina_ State Power, Islam, and the Quest for Pakistan in Late Colonial North India-Cambridge University Press (2015) 67 -
“letter by Sir Muhammad Iqbal to Jinnah pleading with him to summon an all India Muslim convention to take on Nehru’s challenge. quoted in Venkat Dhulipala - Creating a New Medina_ State Power, Islam, and the Quest for Pakistan in Late Colonial North India-Cambridge University Press (2015) 67”
To this convention you must re-state as clearly and as strongly as possible, the political objective of Indian Muslims as a distinct political unit in the country. It is absolutely necessary to tell the world both inside and outside India that the economic problem is not the only problem in the country. From the Muslim point of view the cultural problem is of much greater consequence to most India