A symbolic garment was rejected in the first clause. Thus, when this matter made its first declaration of existence through a consensus of thought, it adopted the principle of not foregrounding its formal existence. There was something here that could be found strange: It was odd that at the very moment an entity expressed its existence, it presented its societal existence as a secondary issue. Perhaps a sensible community would not start its first words with “The essence is not this community.” Another thing that could be found strange in these words: Why was a vest something worth rejecting? Again, perhaps, it wanted to say — or avoid saying — something through its view of its own formal existence as secondary and projecting this view through a symbolic depiction. And the things it wanted to avoid were not only from the French Revolution but even before that. Because neither the concept of the nation was invented in it, nor were people only nationalist regarding their nations.
A community, a way of expression, a style, a shell. There is no formless way of expression. But a form, that is, the inevitable, becomes noteworthy when it can best accumulate the power of meaning and thus a casing — just like a very beautiful name — can be added to and integrated with meaning to an extent that it will never be detached from it. On the other hand, every form is prone to become a meaningless repetition, as happened to all other ways of expression later, and when meaning is lost, the perpetual need for a sense of meaning leads one to choose forms, the last and easiest thing that can distinguish meaning, as an object for oneself. In this case, one begins to love oneself as if defending oneself. Indeed, loving one’s nation is a convenient and insidious way of loving oneself because it appears innocent. Just like at times when one tries to criticize another, to avoid getting stuck on the other’s sentimentality with the aim of transferring the known critique to its subject, one says “We are actually doing something bad.” instead of saying “You are doing something bad.”, including oneself in the critique.
Within the inevitabilities of being a unity, the place that needs to be a shell for the more essential potential essence that the community can bring forth by foregrounding this unity, in this respect, our way of expression, which can announce our own voice through itself, just like the timbre of our voice, from which no one can take its originality, may fall into the trait of falling in love with our own voice and then putting itself in the foreground on its own. This can still remain innocent. But if it draws a fence between us and other Muslims, on the other side of which we believe we remain in a more pleasant place, then we believe we are different from everyone else, and because we believe we are different from everyone else, we become like everyone else. Therefore, a balance of “us” that can be held onto because it keeps us together against enemies and strengthens the bonds among us, and can be loosened to the extent that it separates us from other potential friends, needed to be observed.
Now, all this should be projected. The first small community is the family. The extremity of one’s allegiance to it — supported by blood — becomes an expression of collective — therefore less guilt-inducing — selfishness. Then, as the scale grows, this manifestation turns into foregrounding a new and different “us” — actually with the same egocentric feelings finding a new object for themselves. But as Ghazali said, “If there were no anger and desire, a person could not defend themselves against dangers and would perish.”, like the contrasts expressed, this first clause, while stating that collective feelings could lead to a non-sectarian sense of pride for whatever reasons, was also acknowledging collective feelings that express a teleology. If the vest is symbolic, the choice of the vest’s name was also targeting the source of these references through a symbolic example. Whether the signs are visible or not, as all these references become apparently dominant with a frequency conducive to losing the measure in a “us” feeling, the individuals within this “us” implicitly put themselves at the service of the dreamy reference referring to themselves. If our community — a way of expression — that we put forward for a purpose turns into a community that makes itself the purpose, then we become like the Pharisees whom Jesus said, “The rules are for us, not we for them.” Then, this garment, this name, would not have existed for us, but we would have existed for it.
Beyond all names, our creator chose the name Muslim for us. Perhaps only the sense of pride regarding the realization of this one name must be extreme to reach its own reality. To attain this essential name, all other names must be able to be found strange.
