From: www.harunyahya.com
By: Harun Yahya
The wise are defined in the Qur'an as: "Those who listen well to My precepts and follow the best in them are the ones whom Allah has guided. They are the people of understanding". (Surat az-Zumar: 18) Allah had rewarded these people with wisdom because, they unfailingly follow the path Allah has shown them, they carry out the advice of the Qur'an meticulously, and they clearly abide by their conscience.
Wisdom is a very important factor that opens the doors to many other beneficial qualities. A wise person displays his uniqueness in every situation, by his actions, and the things he says, and he elicits great respect and admiration from those around him. Wisdom is such an important quality, that it goes on making one more and more superior right to the end of one's life.
The pages to follow will be a reminder of what a blessing wisdom is by touching on some examples of the superiority conferred by wisdom.
GOOD MANNERS
Foremost among the qualities people of wisdom acquire is the morality of the Qur'an, which opens the paths to many beauties in this world and the Hereafter. The wise man is one who meticulously practices the morals Allah lays down in the Qur'an. The Qur'an recommends such moral qualities as honesty, genuineness, sincerity, modesty, peacefulness, compassion, justness, tolerance, and forgiveness among many other virtues. And a wise person is successful in displaying all of these qualities in the best possible way, in every situation he or she faces. He knows that the more care he takes in evincing these qualities, the better Allah will recompense him in the Hereafter.
For this reason, a wise person acts according to his conscience in situations he faces every day. For example, he helps someone in need without leaving the responsibility to others. He carries out all the good things he knows that Allah will approve of, without missing any of them. Or he helps someone who is trying to carry a heavy object instead of sitting and watching him. Whenever he sees someone who is elderly or sick on a bus, he prefers to stand and give his seat to that person. Otherwise he knows that he will be uncaring and this is something Allah will not approve of. Even when he faces a situation that angers him, he knows that Allah will prefer him to act with kindness, so he overcomes his anger and responds to the person concerned with kind words. He is always honest, even when he knows that it will be of disadvantage to him.
One, who displays all the above qualities in the best possible way till the end of his life using the full power of his mind, lives a good life in this world. Moreover, because he was aiming to please Allah with his behaviour, he will be rewarded with Heaven are elaborated upon in the following verses:
But as for those who believe and do right actions, We will not let the wage of good-doers go to waste. They will have Gardens of Eden with rivers flowing under them. They will be adorned in them with bracelets made of gold and wear green garments made of the finest silk and rich brocade, reclining there on couches under canopies. What an excellent reward! What a wonderful repose! (Surat al-Kahf: 30-31)
SAGACITY - DISCERNMENT
Sagacity is the human ability to understand and comprehend things quickly. Discernment is the ability to recognize the essence of things, to be foresighted and to have an insight on the truth in its every detail. The source that provides both these qualities to human beings is their wisdom.
In one of His verses, Allah draws attention to the importance of discernment and defines people who lack this quality as blind; "The blind and the seeing are not the same. Nor are those who believe and do right actions the same as evildoers. What little heed they pay!" (Surah Ghafir: 58)
In another verse in the Quran, the difference between those who possess this quality through wisdom and those whose sight and comprehension are blocked is compared as:
Is he who knows that the truth has been sent down to you from your Lord like him who is blind? It is only people of understanding who pay heed. (Surat ar-Ra'd: 19)
One who possesses sagacity and discernment has the capability to analyse an event, a behaviour, or a word in the best possible way. He can draw the best conclusions from his past experiences and use these in the most appropriate way for future events. He can cleverly analyse his situation, means, and the condition he is in and can make the most out of these and use whatever means he has at hand to the best advantage. Before he undertakes any task, he takes every possible precaution, foreseeing any future problems, and acts accordingly. Everything he says is appropriate, his manner entirely composed, and his thoughts are the product of a clear mind and understanding.
If people of wisdom possess these qualities, it is because they live out their lives trying to earn Allah's approval and sincerely aiming for the Hereafter. The Qur'an reminds us that the Prophets sincerely turned towards the Hereafter and in accordance with the high morals they displayed they were people of strength and discernment.
And remember Our servants Ibrahim, Ishaq and Ya'qub, men of true strength and vision. We purified their sincerity through sincere remembrance of the Hereafter. They shall dwell with Us among the righteous whom we have chosen. (Surah Sad: 45-47)
WISDOM, DECISIVE SPEECH,AND THE ART OF PUBLIC SPEAKING
Another aspect of wisdom which most people fail to recognize is its ability to add purpose to one's mannerisms and speech. Most people miss the point that the actual source of such mannerisms and speech is wisdom. On the contrary, they think that wisdom is a quality that can be acquired through education and experience. That is why it is generally thought that the only way to speak well and persuasively is to memorize rules of influential speech by taking classes or reading books on how to speak effectively. These books outline when people should start and stop speaking, when they should laugh, and details such as these which are supposed to produce effective oratory. They believe that people can be successful speakers in relation to how well they follow these rules.
However, it is definitely not possible to bind effective speaking to any rules. On the contrary, truly effective speaking is not linked to any rules and is not memorized, rather it is a "sincere speech", which comes from the heart, without any difficulties, and without artificiality. And only people of wisdom possess this type of perfection in speech. The one who speaks with wisdom leaves a deep impression on the hearts of his listeners with the sincerity of his words.
One who is far from religion can make a good speech on a topic within his area of expertise with proper emphasis and by following the rules of speech. However, we shouldn't forget that the qualities mentioned do not reflect any wisdom in this speech. For a speech have wisdom, it has to be sincere and leave a deep impression on the hearts of the listeners. A wise person is someone who can explain what he wants in the most genuine and sincere way, with the most striking examples. In one verse, Allah points out the importance of wisdom by stating that He has given this quality to the Prophet Dawud (as):
We made his kingdom strong and gave him wisdom and decisive speech. (Surah Sad: 20)
As is seen in the verse, along with giving wisdom as a virtue, "decisive speech" is also mentioned. To attain such a blessing one doesn't need to have any special talent or expend any extraordinary effort. It is given by Allah to those who have faith and are sincere.
However, wisdom is not something that manifests itself only in speech. It is evinced also in a wise person's mannerisms and decisions, and in the analyses he makes. It is declared in the Qur'an that this important superior quality is given to many of the Prophets:
They are the ones to whom We gave the Book, Judgement and Prophethood... (Surat al-An'am: 89)
And with Allah's permission they routed them. Dawud killed Talut and Allah gave him kingship and wisdom and taught him whatever He willed... (Surat al-Baqara: 251)
"Yahya, take hold of the Book with vigour." We gave him judgement while still a child. (Surah Maryam: 12)
In other verses of the Quran, it is stated that Allah can give wisdom and insight to whomever He wills:
He gives wisdom to whomever He wills and he who has been given wisdom has been given great good. But no one pays heed but people of understanding. (Surat al-Baqara: 269)
From all these verses we can understand that this great blessing, given to a responsive person, brings about "strength of expression" and with it the "ability to persuade". A believer takes the opportunity to explain the true religion and morals of the Qur'an in the best possible way, with the qualities of wisdom, decisive speech, and apt expression, as Allah advises: "Call to the way of your Lord with wisdom and fair admonition, and argue with them in the kindest way..." (Surat an-Nahl: 125)
A SUPERIOR ANALYSIS ABILITY
Another important quality wisdom brings with it is the ability to "analyse things". Anyone can recognize and make comments on any given thing. However, of where people of wisdom excel is in their recognition always being appropriate and their ability to see details which others cannot. The secret of this appropriateness and fine recognition ability is that believers use the Qur'an as their guide and use their wisdom toward its ends. The Qur'an is Allah's just book. As a consequence, people who obey the Qur'an will definitely tread the most righteous path.
This ability of wise people makes for superiority and ease in every part of their lives. Above all else, they can analyse in detail the character of the people they meet. As a result they can easily determine their friends and enemies. By taking the characters Allah introduces in the Qur'an as their guide, they can understand others' characters in a very short period. Moreover, their ability to realize at the outset which events are in their favour and take precautions accordingly is a great advantage to them. Also, it is those with wisdom who can appreciate the beauties of the people around them, the details of which generally go unappreciated and the signs of wisdom they demonstrate.
Another important quality of wise people that merit attention, is that they do not need to make lengthy observations or gather detailed information before making correct assumptions. A wise person's chief quality is his ability to arrive at correct conclusions with as little evidence as is needed and in the briefest possible time.
A wise person can determine whether a person is lying by his mannerisms at that time, by inconsistencies in his speech, by his efforts to explain the situation in detail, by his restless behaviour, and many other factors depending on the situation. A person lacking wisdom will fully trust a person who is lying and even talk about his honesty. Because of this, he can go into a partnership with the dishonest person and suffer materially and spiritually as a consequence.
The reason why people lacking wisdom draw wrong conclusions and make wrong decisions under the same circumstances is that they don't follow the Qur'an's teachings. Allah therefore draws attention to the fact that only the wise can see and comprehend the examples given in the Qur'an and reminds us that people who know and who don't know are not the same:
Such metaphors-We devise them for mankind; but only those with knowledge understand them. (Surat al-'Ankabut: 43)
What of him who spends the night hours in prayer, prostrating himself and standing up, mindful of the Hereafter, hoping for the mercy of his Lord? Say: "Are they the same-those who know and those who do not know?" It is only people of understanding who pay heed. (Surat az-Zumar: 9)
ATTENTION AND CLEAR CONSCIENCE
In the Qur'an, Allah reminds people to heed Him and draws their attention to various topics:
Everything in the heavens and on the earth belongs to Allah. He knows what you are engaged upon. On the Day when they are returned to Him, He will inform them of what they did. Allah has knowledge of all things. (Surat an-Nur: 64)
What! Are they in doubt about the meeting with their Lord? What! Does He not encompass all things? (Surah Fussilat: 54)
Have they looked at the sky above them:how We structured it and made it beautiful and how there are no fissures in it? And the earth:how We stretched it out and cast firmly embedded mountains onto it and caused luxuriant plants of every kind to grow in it, thus offering an insight and a reminder unto every human being who turns to Allah. (Surah Qaf: 6-8)
As the above verses recall, Allah advises people to apply their minds to thinking clearly, analyzing situations rightly, and thus seeing realities. However, it shouldn't be forgotten that the ability to focus our attention as mentioned in the Qur'an is a quality evinced only by people of wisdom. We are told in the Qur'an that only the wise reflect on and take the advice of the teachings of the Qur'an:
… But only people of understanding pay heed. (Surah Al 'Imran: 7)
It is a Book We have sent down to you, full of blessing, so let people of understanding ponder upon its Signs and take heed. (Surah Sad: 29)
So, people of wisdom who focus their attention as the Qur'an instructs can see the whole of reality. They grasp primarily that there is no god other than Allah, that He is the owner of the whole universe, and that the Hereafter is a definite reality.
As we dwelt upon previously, a clear conscience and close attention manifest themselves at all times in a wise person's life. Knowing that Allah created everything for a reason, that everything they experience and every utterance they hear are parts of the test created for them, and that they're responsible for all the things they're faced with, sharpens their attention. As a result, they can sense a developing threat in their environment and take the appropriate measures before anyone else. In the same way, they can instantly determine a positive development by paying close attention.
It is true that intelligence also provides people with a certain superior awareness. But the difference made by wisdom in this case is that it notices details that intelligence can't distinguish and this gives the opportunity to analyse, take precautions, and make timely decisions. For example, an intelligent and alert person will realize that there is a burglar in his house by paying attention to the sounds coming from the basement. A wise person, on the other hand, is one who will take definite precautions and bring lasting solutions to the possibility of a burglary before the situation develops to this extent. He will have thought about all the alternatives to the possibility of a burglar entering and worked extensively on this issue. For example, he will set up a sophisticated security system that will definitely prevent a stranger from entering the house.
So, this is the ideal type of attention one should be capable of. A wise person does not just cope with a dangerous situation as it's happening. He takes precautions before the danger begins to develop, before he faces such a situation, even where many of the relevant factors are not immediately obvious. After he has determined these actual dangers, he takes definite precautions in order not to be subjected to them.
A STRONG PERSONALITY
A wise person knows that all creatures alive or not, submit to Allah and nothing ever happens in this universe without His permission. His submission to and the trust he reposes in Allah enable him to be fearless of anyone or anything except Allah and thus enables him to develop a strong personality. Because he knows that Allah controls everything, his behaviour towards others or in different situations does not change. As he strives to earn Allah's approval and not that of other people, he doesn't ever make a concession in his personality, behaviour, and morals for any personal benefit.
However, we should remember that the true meaning of a "strong personality" is actually different from the way it is used in ignorant circles. People far from religion, believe that the only way to build up the personality is through arrogance, formality, and gravity. They think that the more a person makes his difference from and superiority over others felt by those around him, the greater the personality he has. However, this kind of conduct does not denote a strong inner personality but is rather aimed at hoodwinking others and projecting "an image" of an individual with a great personality to those around him.
Real personality has nothing to do with pride, gravity, formality, or outward appearances. According to the Qur'an, a strong personality indicates one's fear of Allah and as a result of this, shows determination in living by the morals of the Qur'an. One with strength of personality never compromises upon the truths told to him by Allah for any reason or for any worldly gain, and never condescends to crude or unpleasant behaviour. So, these are the qualities that give a person a real personality and people who are steadfast in maintaining these qualities are people of wisdom. People of wisdom who never stray from the right path are given this good news in the Qur'an:
The angels descend on those who say, "Our Lord is Allah", and then take the right path to Him. They say: "Do not fear and do not grieve but rejoice in the Garden [i.e., Paradise] you have been promised." (Surah Fussilat: 30)
ALLAH'S HELP AND SUPPORT
You who believe! You are only responsible for yourselves. The misguided cannot harm you as long as you are guided. All of you will return to Allah and He will inform you about what you were doing. (Surat al-Ma'ida: 105)
In this verse Allah informs the believers of a very important reality: unbelievers cannot misguide believers.
The right path can be reached only by those who have faith and who follow the teachings of the Qur'an. Because such people always take the teachings of the Qur'an as their guide and live their lives accordingly, they always receive Allah's help and support in return. Allah helps believers and has promised to help those who help his religion:
… Allah will certainly help those who help Him-Allah is Powerful, Almighty. (Surat al-Hajj: 40)
Allah explains in another verse, that He helps and supports those that believe in Him sincerely and that He makes things easier for them:
As for him who gives [generously], performs his duty and acts charitably in the finest manner, We shall facilitate an easy way for him. (Surat al-Layl:5-7)
... Whoever heeds Allah-He will make matters easy for him. (Surat al-Talaq:4)
Those who seek the protection of Allah, His Messenger and the faithful must know that it is Allah's followers who are victorious! (Surat al-Ma'ida: 56)
In Surat al-Anbiya', Allah points out that the truth and justness always wins over falsehood. This is why, people of wisdom who follow the right path always win against those who hide behind falsehood. Allah tells us this truth:
We hurl the truth against falsehood and it cuts right through it and it vanishes clean away!... (Surat al-Anbiya': 18)
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Glenn Beck: My untimely demise
From: www.cnn.com
By Glenn Beck
Below is a commentary from Glenn Beck, who anchors "Glenn Beck" on Headline News nightly at 7 and 9 ET.
NEW YORK (CNN) -- The rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.
" .. Nothing ... will drive more listeners to conservative talk radio than a liberal back in the White House," says Beck.
Well, actually, it's not just the rumors of my demise; it's me, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and every other conservative talk radio host.
Here's how the theory goes:
1. Rush Limbaugh is the most powerful and influential conservative talk radio host around.
2. Rush Limbaugh spoke out on the air against John McCain.
3. John McCain still did well in the primaries.
4. Rush Limbaugh must have no power or influence.
5. Conservative talk radio is dead.
But that cute little theory leaves out a few important facts. First, no one -- from Rush, to Schwarzenegger, to Ted Kennedy, to Oprah -- has enough power to dictate an election. Nor should they. The founding fathers thought that might be a bad idea -- remember, they had already gotten their fill of the whole monarchy thing.
Secondly, I don't wake up every morning hoping to influence anyone to do anything. Unlike Air America (the liberal radio network that has consistently failed) I don't consider it my job to win elections for any one candidate, let alone an entire political party. My job is to entertain. Period. If people relate to what I say, and maybe find a little piece of themselves in the process, then great, I get to keep my job for another day.
Don't Miss
Glenn Beck on Headline News
Glenn's new book: "An Inconvenient Book"
But let's put that aside for a second and assume hypothetically that talk radio's mission is to directly influence behavior. Let's even assume that all the hosts get a morning talking-points email directly from the White House and/or Halliburton with our "original thoughts" of the day outlined. What influence would any of that really even have on an election? Sure, conservative talk radio has an enormous audience -- tens of millions of listeners -- but over 215 million Americans were eligible to vote in 2004. So even if talk radio hosts could completely manipulate every single voter in their audiences, it would still be just a fraction of the voting public. In a close general election, with two vastly different candidates, that fraction could very well make a difference. But in a wide-open primary with a half-dozen candidates all claiming to be conservative? Not a chance.
Even when people point to instances where talk radio has had influence, they're missing the point: it's not the hosts who had the power, it's our listeners. For example, when the McCain-Kennedy immigration bill was being rubber stamped through Congress last year, it was conservative talk radio that ignited the fire that eventually stopped the bill in its tracks. But that fire didn't start because we brainwashed people; it started because we focused them. We didn't change anyone's opinion, we just helped open their eyes to the one they already had. And that is the real power of talk radio -- we can take an issue or a problem and shine a national spotlight on it. Sometimes enough people look and decide that it warrants action. Sometimes they don't. But that's not our decision to make; and it's certainly not our job to make it.
Part of the reason why this is even a story is that the media doesn't understand talk radio at all. They like to pretend that our listeners are one big, dumb voting block that's ordered around by us hosts. But while that would make our advertisers extraordinarily happy (and wealthy) people, the reality is that our listeners are exceptionally smart, independent people.
Years of open, honest conversations on the air have resulted in an implicit trust between talk radio listeners and some hosts. But just because you trust someone doesn't mean you always agree with them let alone blindly follow them. For example, you might trust your real estate agent, but you're not going to buy a house just because they describe it to you. Talk radio is the same way: we bring our listeners to the issues we think they might like, but they ultimately do their own homework and make their own decisions.
Our listeners are the people who actually know what McCain-Feingold is. They are the people who have done a full cost-benefit study of McCain-Lieberman. They are the people who have listened to hours of analysis on the Z-Visa buried in McCain-Kennedy. They are the people who care enough to know what they're actually voting for.
As a result, some of them have considered all of the information and decided that John McCain is worth their vote because he is brilliantly ahead of the curve. Others have decided that he's simply the best bet to keep Clinton or Obama out of the White House. But the vast majority of them have spread their votes out among candidates named Huckabee, Romney, and Paul (and, in some cases, Giuliani, Thompson, Hunter and Tancredo as well).
No matter the reason, the point is that our listeners have their own brains. They make up their own minds. Talk radio may be one source of information, but it's certainly not their only one.
The biggest irony in all of this is that most of the people who are claiming (or is it hoping?) that talk radio has no influence are the same people who are hoping for a Hillary/McCain match-up this November.
Why is that ironic? Because nothing -- absolutely nothing -- will drive more listeners to conservative talk radio than a liberal back in the White House.
Blogger Comment:
1- Glenn Beck is a good man with strong criticism but a kind good heart, easy to read.
2- We have to move forward in the next election. My dream is not to see conservatives and liberals fighting but both are uniting to dirct us to change the country to a new path.
3- I can see them finding middle ground and bringing again a working democracy.
4- We all have to stand with the next president and he has to listen to us. The American dream will be an illusion as we waste our money in terror wars chasing an illusive enmey and outsouring American money and jobs to big corporations.
5- We have not to wait for an American president to fall since if the ship falls we all will be drawning.
By Glenn Beck
Below is a commentary from Glenn Beck, who anchors "Glenn Beck" on Headline News nightly at 7 and 9 ET.
NEW YORK (CNN) -- The rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.
" .. Nothing ... will drive more listeners to conservative talk radio than a liberal back in the White House," says Beck.
Well, actually, it's not just the rumors of my demise; it's me, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and every other conservative talk radio host.
Here's how the theory goes:
1. Rush Limbaugh is the most powerful and influential conservative talk radio host around.
2. Rush Limbaugh spoke out on the air against John McCain.
3. John McCain still did well in the primaries.
4. Rush Limbaugh must have no power or influence.
5. Conservative talk radio is dead.
But that cute little theory leaves out a few important facts. First, no one -- from Rush, to Schwarzenegger, to Ted Kennedy, to Oprah -- has enough power to dictate an election. Nor should they. The founding fathers thought that might be a bad idea -- remember, they had already gotten their fill of the whole monarchy thing.
Secondly, I don't wake up every morning hoping to influence anyone to do anything. Unlike Air America (the liberal radio network that has consistently failed) I don't consider it my job to win elections for any one candidate, let alone an entire political party. My job is to entertain. Period. If people relate to what I say, and maybe find a little piece of themselves in the process, then great, I get to keep my job for another day.
Don't Miss
Glenn Beck on Headline News
Glenn's new book: "An Inconvenient Book"
But let's put that aside for a second and assume hypothetically that talk radio's mission is to directly influence behavior. Let's even assume that all the hosts get a morning talking-points email directly from the White House and/or Halliburton with our "original thoughts" of the day outlined. What influence would any of that really even have on an election? Sure, conservative talk radio has an enormous audience -- tens of millions of listeners -- but over 215 million Americans were eligible to vote in 2004. So even if talk radio hosts could completely manipulate every single voter in their audiences, it would still be just a fraction of the voting public. In a close general election, with two vastly different candidates, that fraction could very well make a difference. But in a wide-open primary with a half-dozen candidates all claiming to be conservative? Not a chance.
Even when people point to instances where talk radio has had influence, they're missing the point: it's not the hosts who had the power, it's our listeners. For example, when the McCain-Kennedy immigration bill was being rubber stamped through Congress last year, it was conservative talk radio that ignited the fire that eventually stopped the bill in its tracks. But that fire didn't start because we brainwashed people; it started because we focused them. We didn't change anyone's opinion, we just helped open their eyes to the one they already had. And that is the real power of talk radio -- we can take an issue or a problem and shine a national spotlight on it. Sometimes enough people look and decide that it warrants action. Sometimes they don't. But that's not our decision to make; and it's certainly not our job to make it.
Part of the reason why this is even a story is that the media doesn't understand talk radio at all. They like to pretend that our listeners are one big, dumb voting block that's ordered around by us hosts. But while that would make our advertisers extraordinarily happy (and wealthy) people, the reality is that our listeners are exceptionally smart, independent people.
Years of open, honest conversations on the air have resulted in an implicit trust between talk radio listeners and some hosts. But just because you trust someone doesn't mean you always agree with them let alone blindly follow them. For example, you might trust your real estate agent, but you're not going to buy a house just because they describe it to you. Talk radio is the same way: we bring our listeners to the issues we think they might like, but they ultimately do their own homework and make their own decisions.
Our listeners are the people who actually know what McCain-Feingold is. They are the people who have done a full cost-benefit study of McCain-Lieberman. They are the people who have listened to hours of analysis on the Z-Visa buried in McCain-Kennedy. They are the people who care enough to know what they're actually voting for.
As a result, some of them have considered all of the information and decided that John McCain is worth their vote because he is brilliantly ahead of the curve. Others have decided that he's simply the best bet to keep Clinton or Obama out of the White House. But the vast majority of them have spread their votes out among candidates named Huckabee, Romney, and Paul (and, in some cases, Giuliani, Thompson, Hunter and Tancredo as well).
No matter the reason, the point is that our listeners have their own brains. They make up their own minds. Talk radio may be one source of information, but it's certainly not their only one.
The biggest irony in all of this is that most of the people who are claiming (or is it hoping?) that talk radio has no influence are the same people who are hoping for a Hillary/McCain match-up this November.
Why is that ironic? Because nothing -- absolutely nothing -- will drive more listeners to conservative talk radio than a liberal back in the White House.
Blogger Comment:
1- Glenn Beck is a good man with strong criticism but a kind good heart, easy to read.
2- We have to move forward in the next election. My dream is not to see conservatives and liberals fighting but both are uniting to dirct us to change the country to a new path.
3- I can see them finding middle ground and bringing again a working democracy.
4- We all have to stand with the next president and he has to listen to us. The American dream will be an illusion as we waste our money in terror wars chasing an illusive enmey and outsouring American money and jobs to big corporations.
5- We have not to wait for an American president to fall since if the ship falls we all will be drawning.
Understanding Obama’s Appeal
From: Newsweek
By: Ellis Cose
Biography
More by the Author
In the wake of Super Tuesday, both camps have claimed victory: Obama because he won more states; Clinton because she got more votes and won the largest states. Both campaigns can credibly claim to have the wind to their back as they enter the next stage. Yet because of the nature of his candidacy, a draw or even a close Clinton victory at this stage renders Obama more attractive to those who like him but are reluctant to gamble on an unknown.
Obama is appealing because he offers an immense, if unproved, potential for greatness. Hillary Clinton's appeal lies, in large measure, in her familiarity—in the sense that with her we know pretty much what we will get. She is a bit like the comfortable neighborhood swimming pool, while Obama is more like the ocean—full of wonder, mystery, and beauty, but also peril. The problem for Clinton is that, as more and more people dive into that ocean, it becomes less and less scary, and even more people are tempted to join them.
Obama's advisers are fond of arguing that the more people get to know about Obama, the more they like him, that the longer he campaigns, the more viable his candidacy becomes. The truth is more complicated. People seem to like him well enough even at first glance. Many are not convinced, however, that he is quite real, that the soaring rhetoric of hope, unity and change is compatible with a practical plan for governing.
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Obama's rallies, which tend to attract larger and more delirious crowds than Clinton's, are full of people who swoon over the man but cannot tell you precisely why they support him. They talk of his power to inspire, his ability to unite, his promise of fulfilling so many dreams, but little of it is about anything tangible. Yet the higher he soars, the longer he stays airborne, the more realizable his quest for the presidency seems. That can be seen most clearly in the way support has grown for his candidacy among black voters. Initially most blacks did not back him—in part because he was so unfamiliar, but also because he seemed like such a long shot. He now enjoys overwhelming black support, because after a big win in Iowa and impressive showings elsewhere his candidacy seems much more real.
Much the same seems to be happening—albeit not quite as dramatically—with other groups. In several of the contests on Tuesday, Obama beat Clinton among white males; he consistently beats her among young people. And he even appeals to people who don't normally consider themselves Democrats.
"I can't tell you how many Republicans I know who have never supported a Democrat before [who are supporting Obama]," his adviser Valerie Jarrett told me. At Obama's rally at Chicago's Hyatt Regency Hotel, Rosalind Van Tuyl, a 35-year-old entrepreneur, sported a T-shirt identifying herself as an "Obamacan." Van Tuyl explained that she was a registered Republican who had never before worked for a Democrat, but "I felt called to this in a way I haven't felt called to anything." Why? Because Obama "transcended the divide, the labels, and the dogma."
It's impossible to say how well Obama would actually do if he found himself in the White House. It's far from clear how he would go about reforming a town where lobbyists grease the wheels of government and big money buys political support. Compelling though his oratory may be, it is unlikely to change people's fundamental perception of their self-interest—particularly if they are already comfortably in power.
But Obama is not so much selling a prescription for governance as he is selling a movement; he is selling faith in an idea and in the power of the people to achieve it. And therefore people seem not to care so much about the specifics: the dream itself is enough, for now.
"Tonight I want to speak directly to all those Americans who have yet to join this movement but still hunger for change … They know we can do better than we're doing. They know we can take our politics to a higher level … but they are afraid," he declared Tuesday evening. He then invited undecided voters to set aside their fear, challenging them to accept the call of destiny: "Change will not come if we wait for some other person, or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek. We are the hope," he roared.
Hard to argue with hope, as the Clinton campaign has discovered. It's also hard to argue against an appeal to people to set aside fear. That argument only becomes harder as more and more people dive into the water. The big question both campaigns face has less to do with who won what on Super Tuesday than with whether it helped Obama's movement achieve a kind of critical mass—whether it helped him garner enough support to convince leery voters to set aside their fears and leap into the great unknown.
Blogger Comment:
1- Great article.
2- Mr. Cose writes like he is paintaing a beautiful landscape scene.
3- Can we have the mix of Obama dream, the good days of the Clintons to the American people, the stand up personality of McCain or the comforting peronality of Huckabee.
By: Ellis Cose
Biography
More by the Author
In the wake of Super Tuesday, both camps have claimed victory: Obama because he won more states; Clinton because she got more votes and won the largest states. Both campaigns can credibly claim to have the wind to their back as they enter the next stage. Yet because of the nature of his candidacy, a draw or even a close Clinton victory at this stage renders Obama more attractive to those who like him but are reluctant to gamble on an unknown.
Obama is appealing because he offers an immense, if unproved, potential for greatness. Hillary Clinton's appeal lies, in large measure, in her familiarity—in the sense that with her we know pretty much what we will get. She is a bit like the comfortable neighborhood swimming pool, while Obama is more like the ocean—full of wonder, mystery, and beauty, but also peril. The problem for Clinton is that, as more and more people dive into that ocean, it becomes less and less scary, and even more people are tempted to join them.
Obama's advisers are fond of arguing that the more people get to know about Obama, the more they like him, that the longer he campaigns, the more viable his candidacy becomes. The truth is more complicated. People seem to like him well enough even at first glance. Many are not convinced, however, that he is quite real, that the soaring rhetoric of hope, unity and change is compatible with a practical plan for governing.
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Obama's rallies, which tend to attract larger and more delirious crowds than Clinton's, are full of people who swoon over the man but cannot tell you precisely why they support him. They talk of his power to inspire, his ability to unite, his promise of fulfilling so many dreams, but little of it is about anything tangible. Yet the higher he soars, the longer he stays airborne, the more realizable his quest for the presidency seems. That can be seen most clearly in the way support has grown for his candidacy among black voters. Initially most blacks did not back him—in part because he was so unfamiliar, but also because he seemed like such a long shot. He now enjoys overwhelming black support, because after a big win in Iowa and impressive showings elsewhere his candidacy seems much more real.
Much the same seems to be happening—albeit not quite as dramatically—with other groups. In several of the contests on Tuesday, Obama beat Clinton among white males; he consistently beats her among young people. And he even appeals to people who don't normally consider themselves Democrats.
"I can't tell you how many Republicans I know who have never supported a Democrat before [who are supporting Obama]," his adviser Valerie Jarrett told me. At Obama's rally at Chicago's Hyatt Regency Hotel, Rosalind Van Tuyl, a 35-year-old entrepreneur, sported a T-shirt identifying herself as an "Obamacan." Van Tuyl explained that she was a registered Republican who had never before worked for a Democrat, but "I felt called to this in a way I haven't felt called to anything." Why? Because Obama "transcended the divide, the labels, and the dogma."
It's impossible to say how well Obama would actually do if he found himself in the White House. It's far from clear how he would go about reforming a town where lobbyists grease the wheels of government and big money buys political support. Compelling though his oratory may be, it is unlikely to change people's fundamental perception of their self-interest—particularly if they are already comfortably in power.
But Obama is not so much selling a prescription for governance as he is selling a movement; he is selling faith in an idea and in the power of the people to achieve it. And therefore people seem not to care so much about the specifics: the dream itself is enough, for now.
"Tonight I want to speak directly to all those Americans who have yet to join this movement but still hunger for change … They know we can do better than we're doing. They know we can take our politics to a higher level … but they are afraid," he declared Tuesday evening. He then invited undecided voters to set aside their fear, challenging them to accept the call of destiny: "Change will not come if we wait for some other person, or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek. We are the hope," he roared.
Hard to argue with hope, as the Clinton campaign has discovered. It's also hard to argue against an appeal to people to set aside fear. That argument only becomes harder as more and more people dive into the water. The big question both campaigns face has less to do with who won what on Super Tuesday than with whether it helped Obama's movement achieve a kind of critical mass—whether it helped him garner enough support to convince leery voters to set aside their fears and leap into the great unknown.
Blogger Comment:
1- Great article.
2- Mr. Cose writes like he is paintaing a beautiful landscape scene.
3- Can we have the mix of Obama dream, the good days of the Clintons to the American people, the stand up personality of McCain or the comforting peronality of Huckabee.
The 2008 President of USA: How To Change Washington.
By: Maged Taman
The 2008 presidential elecation will declare a new president of USA in 11/08. It is amazing how years go by. We are really at the end of time. The new president have to conquer Washington to the American people. It will be a peaceful revloution to change the direction of the country. It does not mean that the people before him were bad but the time and overwhelming issues facing us are too serious that we need a new approach, style and ideas. These are my advices to the new president:
1- He has to take the American People with him to Washington.
2- He has to let them engage with him with all the changes he will make.
3- People in Washington will see him as a giant with broad shoulders and will feel if not see that millions of people walking behind his back. Even when he turns his head to the side they will see millions of people turning their heads to the side. They will feel he is the shadow of the millions of people in the homes and the streets.
4- He is not going to fight Washington but to change Washington.
5- He is not going to make wars with bad people but change the system that is not working (like the medicaolegal system that is a fight between doctors and lawyers either or both are not bad the system is just wrong that we ended by a huge medicolegal fiasco).
6- He will not dictate to people what to do but he will ask them what we do. He will lay his ideas and with a lot of smart people's ideas the decision making will be fromulated.
7- Washington will feel that he is not conquring them but winning them over. The media will be in his side they will enjoy documanting his moral revolution to the upcoming generations.
8- With his ideas and enjoyable intellect he will incite people and with his inspirations and good intentions people will get excited to a new change.
9- Washington will feel that the American people in the White house, congress and all the governmental places. They will feel that People are in the halls, flying in the air or behind all the doors. People are everywhere they are invisible but they are felt everywhere.
10- Washington will feel that he is a man of People. They will label him as a dreamer, they will feel that they are in the middle of a dream. He will convert our dreams into reality and his reality will look like a dream.
We will feel we are in a dream, in a movie or in Disneyland all the day. We will not complain we will enjoy every minute and we will wish no one wake us up from the middle of our dream.
The 2008 presidential elecation will declare a new president of USA in 11/08. It is amazing how years go by. We are really at the end of time. The new president have to conquer Washington to the American people. It will be a peaceful revloution to change the direction of the country. It does not mean that the people before him were bad but the time and overwhelming issues facing us are too serious that we need a new approach, style and ideas. These are my advices to the new president:
1- He has to take the American People with him to Washington.
2- He has to let them engage with him with all the changes he will make.
3- People in Washington will see him as a giant with broad shoulders and will feel if not see that millions of people walking behind his back. Even when he turns his head to the side they will see millions of people turning their heads to the side. They will feel he is the shadow of the millions of people in the homes and the streets.
4- He is not going to fight Washington but to change Washington.
5- He is not going to make wars with bad people but change the system that is not working (like the medicaolegal system that is a fight between doctors and lawyers either or both are not bad the system is just wrong that we ended by a huge medicolegal fiasco).
6- He will not dictate to people what to do but he will ask them what we do. He will lay his ideas and with a lot of smart people's ideas the decision making will be fromulated.
7- Washington will feel that he is not conquring them but winning them over. The media will be in his side they will enjoy documanting his moral revolution to the upcoming generations.
8- With his ideas and enjoyable intellect he will incite people and with his inspirations and good intentions people will get excited to a new change.
9- Washington will feel that the American people in the White house, congress and all the governmental places. They will feel that People are in the halls, flying in the air or behind all the doors. People are everywhere they are invisible but they are felt everywhere.
10- Washington will feel that he is a man of People. They will label him as a dreamer, they will feel that they are in the middle of a dream. He will convert our dreams into reality and his reality will look like a dream.
We will feel we are in a dream, in a movie or in Disneyland all the day. We will not complain we will enjoy every minute and we will wish no one wake us up from the middle of our dream.
Tolerance and Diversity in Islam
From: www.islamicity.com
By: Asma Afsaruddin
In the thirteenth century, when the non-Muslim Mongols had taken possession of Baghdad, their ruler Hulegu Khan is said to have assembled the religious scholars in the city and posed a loaded question to them: according to their law, which alternative is preferable, the disbelieving ruler who is just or the Muslim ruler who is unjust? After moments of anguished reflection, one well known scholar took the lead by signing his name to the response, "the disbelieving ruler who is just." Others are said to have followed suit in endorsing this answer.Just and accountable government has long been considered essential in Islamic political and religious thought. The Qur'an states that the righteous "inherit the earth," righteous in this case referring to the morally upright rather than the members of any privileged confessional community. A righteous and just leader ruling by at least the tacit consent of the people and liable to being deposed for unrighteous conduct remained the ideal for most Muslims through much of the Middle Ages, even though dynastic rule replaced limited elective rule only about thirty years after the Prophet Muhammad's death in 632 CE. That thirty year period of non-dynastic rule became hallowed, however, in the collective Muslim memory as the golden era of just and legitimate leadership.The consequences of this memory could have potentially far-reaching repercussions for the reshaping of the Islamic world today. The Qur'anic concept of shura refers to "consultation" among people in public affairs, including political governance, and was practiced in particular by the second caliph Umar during the critical thirty year period. It is a term that resonates positively with many contemporary Muslims who wistfully recognize the intrinsic value of this sacred concept but find it rarely applied in the polities they inhabit today. Contrary to certain popular caricatures, Muslims are not somehow genetically predisposed to accept tyranny and religious absolutism. There is a healthy respect for honest, reasoned dissensus within the Islamic tradition; this attitude finds reflection in the saying attributed to the Prophet, "There is mercy in the differences of my community."With the historical insight and interpretive rigor, one can discover common ground between the modern Western ideal of democratic pluralism and the praxis of various pre-modern Muslim societies. Long before the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution were formulated, medieval Muslim jurists developed what may be called an Islamic bill of rights meant to ensure state protection of individual life, religion, intellect, property, and personal dignity. Non-Muslims such as Jews and Christians (later Zoroastrians and others as well) also had specific rights in the Muslim community. Above all, they had the right to practice their religion upon payment of a poll-tax to the Islamic state (from which priests, other clerics, and the poor were exempt) and were consequently freed from serving in the military. The Qu'ran after all counsels, "There is no compulsion in religion." Within roughly twenty years after the Prophet's death, Islam lay claim to the former domains of Byzantine and Persian empires in Persia, Syria-Palestine, Iraq, and Egypt.It is important to point out that territorial expansion did not mean forcible conversion of the conquered peoples. The populations of Egypt and the Fertile Crescent, for example, remained largely Christian for about two centuries after the early Islamic conquests. Individual Christians and Jews sometimes obtained high positions in Muslim administrations throughout the medieval period. Syriac speaking Christians were employed by their Muslim patrons in eighth and ninth century Baghdad to translate Greek manuscripts into Arabic; their inclusion in the intellectual life of medieval Islam helped preserve the wisdom of the ancient world. Centuries later, Jews fleeing from the "excesses" of the Spanish Reconquista would find refuge in Muslim Ottoman lands and establish thriving communities there. Clearly, the Qur'an's injunction to show tolerance towards people of other, particularly Abrahamic, faiths was frequently heeded by those who revered it as sacred scripture. To deny these lived realities of the Islamic past, which point to what we would term in today's jargon a respect for pluralism and religious diversity, is to practice a kind of intellectual violence against Islam. Muslim extremists who insist that the Qur'an calls for relentless warfare against non-Muslims without just cause or provocation merely to propagate Islam and certain Western opinion makers who unthinkingly accept and report their rhetoric as authentically Islamic are both doing history a great disservice. Muslim extremist fringe groups with their desperate cult of martyrdom are overreacting to current political contingencies and disregarding any scriptural imperative. It is worthy of note that the Qur'an does not even have a word for martyr; the word "shahid," now commonly understood to mean "a martyr," refers only to an eyewitness or a legal witness in Qur'anic usage. Only in later extra Qur'anic tradition, as a result of extraneous influence, did the term "shahid" come to mean bearing witness for the faith, particularly by laying down one's life, much like the Greek derived English word "martyr." The question thus remains: if there is much in the history of Muslims that may be understood to be consonant with the objectives of civil society, how and why did it go awry? Zeal for political power and corruption on the part of many ruling elites throughout history, and debilitating encounters with Western colonialism and secular modernity in recent times are prominent among the constellation of reasons advanced to explain this current state of affairs.There has in fact never been a better time for collective introspection and moral housecleaning. A contrite Christian Europe after the debacle of the Holocaust was forced to question some of its interpretive traditions and their moral and social consequences. After the atrocities of September 11, the virulently militant underbelly of political Islam can and should be eviscerated by debunking the interpretive strand that is in clear violation of the most basic precepts of Islam, fosters the glorification of violence and self-immolation. In its stead, reflective Muslims must engage in a process of recovery and revalorization of genuine Islamic core values, such as consultative government, religious tolerance, respect for pluralism and peaceful coexistence with diverse peoples. The compatibility of these core values with those of civil society imparts both urgency and legitimacy to this process.
Asma Afsaruddin is Assistant Professor of Classics at Notre Dame and a Fellow of the Kroc Institute. Her scholarly research focuses on the early religious and political history of Islam, Qur'an and hadith studies, and classical and modern Arabic literature. She recently published Excellence and Precedence: Medieval Islamic Discourse on Legitimate Leadership (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2002). This article is adapted from "Recovering the Core Values of Islam," published in Muslim Democrat, vol.4, no. 1, January 2002.
By: Asma Afsaruddin
In the thirteenth century, when the non-Muslim Mongols had taken possession of Baghdad, their ruler Hulegu Khan is said to have assembled the religious scholars in the city and posed a loaded question to them: according to their law, which alternative is preferable, the disbelieving ruler who is just or the Muslim ruler who is unjust? After moments of anguished reflection, one well known scholar took the lead by signing his name to the response, "the disbelieving ruler who is just." Others are said to have followed suit in endorsing this answer.Just and accountable government has long been considered essential in Islamic political and religious thought. The Qur'an states that the righteous "inherit the earth," righteous in this case referring to the morally upright rather than the members of any privileged confessional community. A righteous and just leader ruling by at least the tacit consent of the people and liable to being deposed for unrighteous conduct remained the ideal for most Muslims through much of the Middle Ages, even though dynastic rule replaced limited elective rule only about thirty years after the Prophet Muhammad's death in 632 CE. That thirty year period of non-dynastic rule became hallowed, however, in the collective Muslim memory as the golden era of just and legitimate leadership.The consequences of this memory could have potentially far-reaching repercussions for the reshaping of the Islamic world today. The Qur'anic concept of shura refers to "consultation" among people in public affairs, including political governance, and was practiced in particular by the second caliph Umar during the critical thirty year period. It is a term that resonates positively with many contemporary Muslims who wistfully recognize the intrinsic value of this sacred concept but find it rarely applied in the polities they inhabit today. Contrary to certain popular caricatures, Muslims are not somehow genetically predisposed to accept tyranny and religious absolutism. There is a healthy respect for honest, reasoned dissensus within the Islamic tradition; this attitude finds reflection in the saying attributed to the Prophet, "There is mercy in the differences of my community."With the historical insight and interpretive rigor, one can discover common ground between the modern Western ideal of democratic pluralism and the praxis of various pre-modern Muslim societies. Long before the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution were formulated, medieval Muslim jurists developed what may be called an Islamic bill of rights meant to ensure state protection of individual life, religion, intellect, property, and personal dignity. Non-Muslims such as Jews and Christians (later Zoroastrians and others as well) also had specific rights in the Muslim community. Above all, they had the right to practice their religion upon payment of a poll-tax to the Islamic state (from which priests, other clerics, and the poor were exempt) and were consequently freed from serving in the military. The Qu'ran after all counsels, "There is no compulsion in religion." Within roughly twenty years after the Prophet's death, Islam lay claim to the former domains of Byzantine and Persian empires in Persia, Syria-Palestine, Iraq, and Egypt.It is important to point out that territorial expansion did not mean forcible conversion of the conquered peoples. The populations of Egypt and the Fertile Crescent, for example, remained largely Christian for about two centuries after the early Islamic conquests. Individual Christians and Jews sometimes obtained high positions in Muslim administrations throughout the medieval period. Syriac speaking Christians were employed by their Muslim patrons in eighth and ninth century Baghdad to translate Greek manuscripts into Arabic; their inclusion in the intellectual life of medieval Islam helped preserve the wisdom of the ancient world. Centuries later, Jews fleeing from the "excesses" of the Spanish Reconquista would find refuge in Muslim Ottoman lands and establish thriving communities there. Clearly, the Qur'an's injunction to show tolerance towards people of other, particularly Abrahamic, faiths was frequently heeded by those who revered it as sacred scripture. To deny these lived realities of the Islamic past, which point to what we would term in today's jargon a respect for pluralism and religious diversity, is to practice a kind of intellectual violence against Islam. Muslim extremists who insist that the Qur'an calls for relentless warfare against non-Muslims without just cause or provocation merely to propagate Islam and certain Western opinion makers who unthinkingly accept and report their rhetoric as authentically Islamic are both doing history a great disservice. Muslim extremist fringe groups with their desperate cult of martyrdom are overreacting to current political contingencies and disregarding any scriptural imperative. It is worthy of note that the Qur'an does not even have a word for martyr; the word "shahid," now commonly understood to mean "a martyr," refers only to an eyewitness or a legal witness in Qur'anic usage. Only in later extra Qur'anic tradition, as a result of extraneous influence, did the term "shahid" come to mean bearing witness for the faith, particularly by laying down one's life, much like the Greek derived English word "martyr." The question thus remains: if there is much in the history of Muslims that may be understood to be consonant with the objectives of civil society, how and why did it go awry? Zeal for political power and corruption on the part of many ruling elites throughout history, and debilitating encounters with Western colonialism and secular modernity in recent times are prominent among the constellation of reasons advanced to explain this current state of affairs.There has in fact never been a better time for collective introspection and moral housecleaning. A contrite Christian Europe after the debacle of the Holocaust was forced to question some of its interpretive traditions and their moral and social consequences. After the atrocities of September 11, the virulently militant underbelly of political Islam can and should be eviscerated by debunking the interpretive strand that is in clear violation of the most basic precepts of Islam, fosters the glorification of violence and self-immolation. In its stead, reflective Muslims must engage in a process of recovery and revalorization of genuine Islamic core values, such as consultative government, religious tolerance, respect for pluralism and peaceful coexistence with diverse peoples. The compatibility of these core values with those of civil society imparts both urgency and legitimacy to this process.
Asma Afsaruddin is Assistant Professor of Classics at Notre Dame and a Fellow of the Kroc Institute. Her scholarly research focuses on the early religious and political history of Islam, Qur'an and hadith studies, and classical and modern Arabic literature. She recently published Excellence and Precedence: Medieval Islamic Discourse on Legitimate Leadership (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2002). This article is adapted from "Recovering the Core Values of Islam," published in Muslim Democrat, vol.4, no. 1, January 2002.
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Glorifies Jesus (pbuh)
"Beloved, believe not every spirit (prophet), but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that [spirit] of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world."
1 John 4:1-3
This one is very easy to understand: Every prophet who does not confess that Jesus (pbuh) came in the flesh was not sent by God. He is a false prophet. But any prophet that confesses that Jesus (pbuh) came in the flesh was sent by God. What does the Qur'an and Muhammad (pbuh) say about Jesus (pbuh)? They say that a Muslim is not a Muslim if he does not believe in Jesus (pbuh), in his miraculous birth, in his giving life to the dead by God's permission, in his healing of the lepers and the blind by God's permission, in his piety and chastity, in his truthfulness, and in the fact that he was the Messiah (the Christ). The Qur'an contains many verses to this effect. For example, in A'al-Umran(3):40 we read:
"And the angles said 'O Mary, Allah gives you glad tidings of a Word from Him, his name is Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, High honored in this world and the next, of those near stationed to Allah."
So now we must ask: Has Muhammad (pbuh) fulfilled this criteria or not? This is all the more remarkable when it is contrasted with the popular opinion of the time such as the claims of the Jews regarding Jesus (pbuh) and his mother Mary (pbuh) as seen in part nine of section 6.3. As a matter of fact, Jesus is referred to by name in the Qur'an fully sixteen times, as compared to only four places in the whole Qur'an where Muhammad (pbuh) is mentioned by name.
No other religion in the whole world outside Christianity makes it an article of faith for its adherents to believe in, love and honor Jesus except Islam. Reading the Qur'an bears testimony to that (see for example (19):16-36, A'al-Umran(3):33-68, Al-Nissa(5): 72-77). Here we have the testimony of Jesus himself in the Bible that Muhammad was a prophet of God. If Jesus' words carry any weight at all with us then we must concede that Muhammad was a prophet of God and therefore spoke in the name of God.
Further, Jesus gives a second criteria to judge the truthfulness of a prophet. He says:
"Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither [can] a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them."
Matthew 7:15-20
So, according to the testimony of Jesus, if we wish to know whether prophet Muhammad (pbuh) was a true prophet or not we need to see what sort of "fruit" his message produced. A moderately detailed description of these fruits can be found in chapters 9 and 10, however, let us listen to the words of the Hindu Professor K. S. Ramakrishna Rao. He says:
"Historical records show that all contemporaries of Muhammad, both friend and foes, acknowledged the sterling qualities, the spotless honesty, the noble virtues, the absolute sincerity, and the absolute trustworthiness of the apostle of Islam in all walks of life and in every sphere of human activity. Even the Jews and those who did not believe in his message accepted him as arbitrator in their personal disputes on account of his scrupulous impartiality"
Muhammad the Prophet of Islam, K. S. Ramakrishna Rao, p. 13
(Please read chapter nine for more on the fruit of the message of Muhammad, pbuh)
Table of Contents Next Page
Muslim-SA@acsu.buffalo.edu
1 John 4:1-3
This one is very easy to understand: Every prophet who does not confess that Jesus (pbuh) came in the flesh was not sent by God. He is a false prophet. But any prophet that confesses that Jesus (pbuh) came in the flesh was sent by God. What does the Qur'an and Muhammad (pbuh) say about Jesus (pbuh)? They say that a Muslim is not a Muslim if he does not believe in Jesus (pbuh), in his miraculous birth, in his giving life to the dead by God's permission, in his healing of the lepers and the blind by God's permission, in his piety and chastity, in his truthfulness, and in the fact that he was the Messiah (the Christ). The Qur'an contains many verses to this effect. For example, in A'al-Umran(3):40 we read:
"And the angles said 'O Mary, Allah gives you glad tidings of a Word from Him, his name is Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, High honored in this world and the next, of those near stationed to Allah."
So now we must ask: Has Muhammad (pbuh) fulfilled this criteria or not? This is all the more remarkable when it is contrasted with the popular opinion of the time such as the claims of the Jews regarding Jesus (pbuh) and his mother Mary (pbuh) as seen in part nine of section 6.3. As a matter of fact, Jesus is referred to by name in the Qur'an fully sixteen times, as compared to only four places in the whole Qur'an where Muhammad (pbuh) is mentioned by name.
No other religion in the whole world outside Christianity makes it an article of faith for its adherents to believe in, love and honor Jesus except Islam. Reading the Qur'an bears testimony to that (see for example (19):16-36, A'al-Umran(3):33-68, Al-Nissa(5): 72-77). Here we have the testimony of Jesus himself in the Bible that Muhammad was a prophet of God. If Jesus' words carry any weight at all with us then we must concede that Muhammad was a prophet of God and therefore spoke in the name of God.
Further, Jesus gives a second criteria to judge the truthfulness of a prophet. He says:
"Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither [can] a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them."
Matthew 7:15-20
So, according to the testimony of Jesus, if we wish to know whether prophet Muhammad (pbuh) was a true prophet or not we need to see what sort of "fruit" his message produced. A moderately detailed description of these fruits can be found in chapters 9 and 10, however, let us listen to the words of the Hindu Professor K. S. Ramakrishna Rao. He says:
"Historical records show that all contemporaries of Muhammad, both friend and foes, acknowledged the sterling qualities, the spotless honesty, the noble virtues, the absolute sincerity, and the absolute trustworthiness of the apostle of Islam in all walks of life and in every sphere of human activity. Even the Jews and those who did not believe in his message accepted him as arbitrator in their personal disputes on account of his scrupulous impartiality"
Muhammad the Prophet of Islam, K. S. Ramakrishna Rao, p. 13
(Please read chapter nine for more on the fruit of the message of Muhammad, pbuh)
Table of Contents Next Page
Muslim-SA@acsu.buffalo.edu
Because he was the "Messiah/Christ" and the "Word"?
Many people believe "Messiah" to be a mystical Biblical term which had been reserved by God from the beginning of time as a direct equivalent of "only begotten Son." For this reason, when they see that Jesus is referred to in the Bible as "The Messiah" they immediately translate this to mean "The Son of God." In order to clear up this misconception, let us first define the true meaning of the word Messiah and then show it's exact usage in the Bible.
The word "Messiah" is the English version of the Hebrew word mashiyach {maw-shee'-akh}. The literal meaning of this word in the Hebrew language is "to anoint." In our present day, it is customary for those who are appointed to high office (ie. the President of the US, Supreme Court justices, etc.) to attend a solemn ritual wherein that person is consecrated into office. During this ritual, certain rights of passage or ascension must be performed, such as repeating a solemn oath and so forth. Once such rituals have been successfully completed, only then is that person considered to have officially received the rights and obligations of this office.
In a similar fashion, in ancient times it was a common practice among the Jews to "anoint" those who were appointed positions of high authority. If we were to read the Bible we would find that every priest and king of ancient Israel was "anointed" by their people as a sign of official consecration to office. Further, we find that it was not at all uncommon for inanimate objects and even pagans to be "anointed." For example:
Solomon:
1 Kings 1:39 "And Zadok the priest took an horn of oil out of the tabernacle, and anointed Solomon. And they blew the trumpet; and all the people said, God save king Solomon."
David:
1 Samuel 16:13 "Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him in the midst of his brethren: and the Spirit of the LORD came upon David from that day forward. So Samuel rose up, and went to Ramah."
Jewish priests:
Leviticus 4:3 "If the priest that is anointed do sin according to the sin of the people; then let him bring for his sin, which he hath sinned, a young bullock without blemish unto the LORD for a sin offering."
Cyrus the pagan:
Isaiah 45:1 "Thus saith the LORD to his Messiah, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut;"
A pillar:
Genesis 31:13 "I [am] the God of Bethel, where thou anointedst the pillar, [and] where thou vowedst a vow unto me: now arise, get thee out from this land, and return unto the land of thy kindred."
The tabernacle:
Leviticus 8:10 "And Moses took the anointing oil, and anointed the tabernacle and all that [was] therein, and sanctified them."
A cherub:
Ezekiel 28:14 "Thou [art] the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee [so]: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire."
Sick people:
Mark 6:13 "And they cast out many devils, and anointed with oil many that were sick, and healed [them]."
Jesus anoints a blind man
John 9:6 "When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay,"
When this word was translated into ancient Greek, the words used were "Messias" {mes-see'-as} and "Christos" {khris-tos'} (see John 1:41, 4:25). This is where we get the word "Christ" from, it was originally derived from the Greek word for "anoint." Jesus was indeed "christened," or "anointed," or "baptized," by John the Baptist before the beginning of his ministry as seen for example in Matthew 3:16 among many other verses.
This is not to say that just because the word "Messiah" was applied to others that it was not a specific designation for Jesus. It only goes to show that this title does not imply a position as "Son of God."
For example, all of the prophets of God are "friends of God," however, only prophet Abraham received this title as an official designation for himself (James 2:23). In a similar manner, all of the prophets of God in ancient Israel were all "anointed" prophets, however, as an official designation, this title was reserved exclusively for Jesus. This is indeed confirmed in the noble Qur'an:
"And the angles said 'O Mary, Allah gives you glad tidings of a Word from Him, his name is Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, High honored in this world and the next, of those near stationed to Allah."
The noble Qur'an, Aal-Umran(3):40
In fact, prophet Abraham is also fondly referred to by Muslims as the "Khaleel-ullah" ("Friend of God"), and prophet Moses is referred to as "Kaleem-ullah" ("The one spoken to by God"). However, just because prophet Abraham is the "friend of God," this does not imply that all other prophets (Noah, Moses, etc.) are all "enemies of God."
Similarly, just because Jesus (pbuh) is a "word" from God and a "spirit" from Him does not imply that that he is "part of" God, or that this designation is exclusive to him. For example, in the Qur'an we read:
"So when I (God) have fashioned him (Adam) and breathed into him of My spirit, fall you (Angels, and those in attendance) down in prostration before him."
The noble Qur'an, Al-Hijr(15):29
"Verily! Our (Allah's) Word unto a thing when We intend it, is only that We say unto it "Be!" - and it is"
The noble Qur'an, Al-Nahil(16):40 (please also read chapter 14)
To make such terminology clearer, let us take the example of the term "house of God," or "My house" as seen in the Bible and the Qur'an in 1 Chronicles 9:11, and Al-Bakarah(2):125. If God is not confined to a specific house or location (both Muslims and Christians agree to this), then what is meant by the words "house of God"? Every house on earth belongs to God, however, we do not call bars or brothels "houses of God" but we do call houses of worship "houses of God." The true meaning is that God is showing favor upon this house by associating it with His name. God bestows such titles upon those whom He wishes to bestow His favor upon from among His creation by virtue of the piety and worship which is displayed to God in association with this creation. It was the selfless dedication and piety of Jesus (pbuh) towards his Creator which was rewarded by God by associating Jesus' spirit with His name.
In a similar manner, the reference to Jesus being a "word" from God does not mean that Jesus is "part of" God. For example, in many places in the Bible God refers tp His "word." We can see this for example:
"Aaron shall be gathered unto his people: for he shall not enter into the land which I have given unto the children of Israel, because ye rebelled against my word at the water of Meribah."
Numbers 20:24
Does "my word" here mean "Jesus"? There are numerous other examples.
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Muslim-SA@acsu.buffalo.edu
The word "Messiah" is the English version of the Hebrew word mashiyach {maw-shee'-akh}. The literal meaning of this word in the Hebrew language is "to anoint." In our present day, it is customary for those who are appointed to high office (ie. the President of the US, Supreme Court justices, etc.) to attend a solemn ritual wherein that person is consecrated into office. During this ritual, certain rights of passage or ascension must be performed, such as repeating a solemn oath and so forth. Once such rituals have been successfully completed, only then is that person considered to have officially received the rights and obligations of this office.
In a similar fashion, in ancient times it was a common practice among the Jews to "anoint" those who were appointed positions of high authority. If we were to read the Bible we would find that every priest and king of ancient Israel was "anointed" by their people as a sign of official consecration to office. Further, we find that it was not at all uncommon for inanimate objects and even pagans to be "anointed." For example:
Solomon:
1 Kings 1:39 "And Zadok the priest took an horn of oil out of the tabernacle, and anointed Solomon. And they blew the trumpet; and all the people said, God save king Solomon."
David:
1 Samuel 16:13 "Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him in the midst of his brethren: and the Spirit of the LORD came upon David from that day forward. So Samuel rose up, and went to Ramah."
Jewish priests:
Leviticus 4:3 "If the priest that is anointed do sin according to the sin of the people; then let him bring for his sin, which he hath sinned, a young bullock without blemish unto the LORD for a sin offering."
Cyrus the pagan:
Isaiah 45:1 "Thus saith the LORD to his Messiah, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut;"
A pillar:
Genesis 31:13 "I [am] the God of Bethel, where thou anointedst the pillar, [and] where thou vowedst a vow unto me: now arise, get thee out from this land, and return unto the land of thy kindred."
The tabernacle:
Leviticus 8:10 "And Moses took the anointing oil, and anointed the tabernacle and all that [was] therein, and sanctified them."
A cherub:
Ezekiel 28:14 "Thou [art] the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee [so]: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire."
Sick people:
Mark 6:13 "And they cast out many devils, and anointed with oil many that were sick, and healed [them]."
Jesus anoints a blind man
John 9:6 "When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay,"
When this word was translated into ancient Greek, the words used were "Messias" {mes-see'-as} and "Christos" {khris-tos'} (see John 1:41, 4:25). This is where we get the word "Christ" from, it was originally derived from the Greek word for "anoint." Jesus was indeed "christened," or "anointed," or "baptized," by John the Baptist before the beginning of his ministry as seen for example in Matthew 3:16 among many other verses.
This is not to say that just because the word "Messiah" was applied to others that it was not a specific designation for Jesus. It only goes to show that this title does not imply a position as "Son of God."
For example, all of the prophets of God are "friends of God," however, only prophet Abraham received this title as an official designation for himself (James 2:23). In a similar manner, all of the prophets of God in ancient Israel were all "anointed" prophets, however, as an official designation, this title was reserved exclusively for Jesus. This is indeed confirmed in the noble Qur'an:
"And the angles said 'O Mary, Allah gives you glad tidings of a Word from Him, his name is Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, High honored in this world and the next, of those near stationed to Allah."
The noble Qur'an, Aal-Umran(3):40
In fact, prophet Abraham is also fondly referred to by Muslims as the "Khaleel-ullah" ("Friend of God"), and prophet Moses is referred to as "Kaleem-ullah" ("The one spoken to by God"). However, just because prophet Abraham is the "friend of God," this does not imply that all other prophets (Noah, Moses, etc.) are all "enemies of God."
Similarly, just because Jesus (pbuh) is a "word" from God and a "spirit" from Him does not imply that that he is "part of" God, or that this designation is exclusive to him. For example, in the Qur'an we read:
"So when I (God) have fashioned him (Adam) and breathed into him of My spirit, fall you (Angels, and those in attendance) down in prostration before him."
The noble Qur'an, Al-Hijr(15):29
"Verily! Our (Allah's) Word unto a thing when We intend it, is only that We say unto it "Be!" - and it is"
The noble Qur'an, Al-Nahil(16):40 (please also read chapter 14)
To make such terminology clearer, let us take the example of the term "house of God," or "My house" as seen in the Bible and the Qur'an in 1 Chronicles 9:11, and Al-Bakarah(2):125. If God is not confined to a specific house or location (both Muslims and Christians agree to this), then what is meant by the words "house of God"? Every house on earth belongs to God, however, we do not call bars or brothels "houses of God" but we do call houses of worship "houses of God." The true meaning is that God is showing favor upon this house by associating it with His name. God bestows such titles upon those whom He wishes to bestow His favor upon from among His creation by virtue of the piety and worship which is displayed to God in association with this creation. It was the selfless dedication and piety of Jesus (pbuh) towards his Creator which was rewarded by God by associating Jesus' spirit with His name.
In a similar manner, the reference to Jesus being a "word" from God does not mean that Jesus is "part of" God. For example, in many places in the Bible God refers tp His "word." We can see this for example:
"Aaron shall be gathered unto his people: for he shall not enter into the land which I have given unto the children of Israel, because ye rebelled against my word at the water of Meribah."
Numbers 20:24
Does "my word" here mean "Jesus"? There are numerous other examples.
Table of Contents Next Page
Muslim-SA@acsu.buffalo.edu
6.11: God did not kill Muhammad (pbuh) for speaking in His name
In Deuteronomy 18:20 we read
"But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die."
Muhammad (pbuh) spoke not just a single word, but dictated a whole book in God's name. For twenty three years he spoke exclusively in the name of God Almighty. He was given one hundred and fourteen chapters, all of which were, and are to this day, recited day after day in God's name. Chapters in the Qur'an begin with the words "In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful." Yet he did not die, but lived to fulfill his message completely. He himself even narrated in the name of God a similar verse in the Qur'an:
"And if he (Muhammad) had invented false sayings in Our (God's) name, We would have taken him by the right, then We would have severed from him his aorta, and there is none among you who could have held Us off from him"
The noble Qur'an, al-Haaqah(69):46
(Remember that the plural form of this verse is the Arabic plural of respect, not the Christian plural of "Trinity," as seen in chapter 14). If the claims of some are true: That Muhammad (pbuh) was an impostor, then did God go to sleep for twenty three years? Of course not! He knew full well what Muhammad (pbuh) was claiming. If he was not telling the truth, why did God not kill him? Why did he allow him to perpetrate a lie that would span fourteen centuries, and eventually come to cover the globe?
Table of Contents Next Page
Muslim-SA@acsu.buffalo.edu
"But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die."
Muhammad (pbuh) spoke not just a single word, but dictated a whole book in God's name. For twenty three years he spoke exclusively in the name of God Almighty. He was given one hundred and fourteen chapters, all of which were, and are to this day, recited day after day in God's name. Chapters in the Qur'an begin with the words "In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful." Yet he did not die, but lived to fulfill his message completely. He himself even narrated in the name of God a similar verse in the Qur'an:
"And if he (Muhammad) had invented false sayings in Our (God's) name, We would have taken him by the right, then We would have severed from him his aorta, and there is none among you who could have held Us off from him"
The noble Qur'an, al-Haaqah(69):46
(Remember that the plural form of this verse is the Arabic plural of respect, not the Christian plural of "Trinity," as seen in chapter 14). If the claims of some are true: That Muhammad (pbuh) was an impostor, then did God go to sleep for twenty three years? Of course not! He knew full well what Muhammad (pbuh) was claiming. If he was not telling the truth, why did God not kill him? Why did he allow him to perpetrate a lie that would span fourteen centuries, and eventually come to cover the globe?
Table of Contents Next Page
Muslim-SA@acsu.buffalo.edu
Islamic history answers many contemporary problems: Armstrong
From: Daily Times.
By Nayel Noorani
KARACHI: The word of God is as transcendent as God Himself and is infinite: It can never be limited to the interpretation of any single individual, cautioned comparative religions expert and author Karen Armstrong at a talk Monday held at the Aga Khan University. The lecture, the final of a five part series, was part of the on-going celebrations of the golden jubilee of the ascent of the Aga Khan to the Imamat, the spiritual leadership of the Ismaili community. Armstrong, who spoke in Karachi last year as well at the AKUH to nearly five packed auditoriums, began by talking about how despite being so united by the presence of technology and the inter-linking of economic fortunes, we live in world that is divided dangerously as never before. Emphasizing how there was no difference between Islam and so-called ‘modernism’, Armstrong referred to Abdi, an Egyptian Sunni fundamentalist, who fought for independence for his country from the British. He had lived in France and said, “In France, I saw Islam but no Muslims. Here, I see Muslims but no Islam.” Abdi meant that he had seen the values of Islam applied in the democratic constitution in France and felt that these ideals were missing from Muslim communities. In Iran, the mullahs had campaigned for democracy side by side with secularists and when the Shah was overthrown, Ayatollah Khomeini said that achieving a democratic constitution was the next best thing to the coming of the hidden Imam. She talked about the need for all religions to grow and change. “The scriptures give people the grounding with which to branch out,” she said. Religion can never be about following written edicts without reasoning. Instead, Ijtihad, the process of understanding the fundamental principles and applying them to current situations, is the ‘skilled religion’ that the Buddhists talk about. Change is difficult but necessary. She quoted examples from the Holy Prophet’s (PBUH) life where despite resistance from his own companions, he did what he felt was right. The Hijra was an unthinkable step in those times, as was the equitable treatment of women. The Treaty of Hudaibiyah greatly disturbed all the Companions (RA), yet the Prophet (PBUH) went ahead and signed it. This decision was ratified by the revelation of the victory surah immediately afterward. In today’s world where we clash only because we do not understand each other’s cultures and traditions, dialogue is more important than it ever was before. “Dialogue does not mean only talking, but also means listening, not only to the words being spoken, but to the undercurrent of rage, anger, fear and frustration underneath. It means being willing to change rather than just bludgeoning your opponent,” she added. This was the final of five lectures in Pakistan on the pluralistic and intellectual traditions of Islam.
Blogger Comment:
1- There are pillars in Islam we have to follow like the ten commandmants, five prayers a day, the fasting month is Ramdan and so forth.
2- There are other things in our lives like the shape of government and how to govern that God left to us to work it out.
3- The simple role in Quran is governing by consultaion. How to shape it and if we to include non-Muslims is our process.
4- We know God by reason and most of the religion of Islam is built on reason. You will find the reasoning of prayers, fasting, pilgrim, Zaka ... in many articles ove the internet and my blog.
5- It is the underlying thinking process that has to follow the roles of God as wisdom, justice, kindness .....
6- I do not see a clash of civilization but departure from following the roles of God.
By Nayel Noorani
KARACHI: The word of God is as transcendent as God Himself and is infinite: It can never be limited to the interpretation of any single individual, cautioned comparative religions expert and author Karen Armstrong at a talk Monday held at the Aga Khan University. The lecture, the final of a five part series, was part of the on-going celebrations of the golden jubilee of the ascent of the Aga Khan to the Imamat, the spiritual leadership of the Ismaili community. Armstrong, who spoke in Karachi last year as well at the AKUH to nearly five packed auditoriums, began by talking about how despite being so united by the presence of technology and the inter-linking of economic fortunes, we live in world that is divided dangerously as never before. Emphasizing how there was no difference between Islam and so-called ‘modernism’, Armstrong referred to Abdi, an Egyptian Sunni fundamentalist, who fought for independence for his country from the British. He had lived in France and said, “In France, I saw Islam but no Muslims. Here, I see Muslims but no Islam.” Abdi meant that he had seen the values of Islam applied in the democratic constitution in France and felt that these ideals were missing from Muslim communities. In Iran, the mullahs had campaigned for democracy side by side with secularists and when the Shah was overthrown, Ayatollah Khomeini said that achieving a democratic constitution was the next best thing to the coming of the hidden Imam. She talked about the need for all religions to grow and change. “The scriptures give people the grounding with which to branch out,” she said. Religion can never be about following written edicts without reasoning. Instead, Ijtihad, the process of understanding the fundamental principles and applying them to current situations, is the ‘skilled religion’ that the Buddhists talk about. Change is difficult but necessary. She quoted examples from the Holy Prophet’s (PBUH) life where despite resistance from his own companions, he did what he felt was right. The Hijra was an unthinkable step in those times, as was the equitable treatment of women. The Treaty of Hudaibiyah greatly disturbed all the Companions (RA), yet the Prophet (PBUH) went ahead and signed it. This decision was ratified by the revelation of the victory surah immediately afterward. In today’s world where we clash only because we do not understand each other’s cultures and traditions, dialogue is more important than it ever was before. “Dialogue does not mean only talking, but also means listening, not only to the words being spoken, but to the undercurrent of rage, anger, fear and frustration underneath. It means being willing to change rather than just bludgeoning your opponent,” she added. This was the final of five lectures in Pakistan on the pluralistic and intellectual traditions of Islam.
Blogger Comment:
1- There are pillars in Islam we have to follow like the ten commandmants, five prayers a day, the fasting month is Ramdan and so forth.
2- There are other things in our lives like the shape of government and how to govern that God left to us to work it out.
3- The simple role in Quran is governing by consultaion. How to shape it and if we to include non-Muslims is our process.
4- We know God by reason and most of the religion of Islam is built on reason. You will find the reasoning of prayers, fasting, pilgrim, Zaka ... in many articles ove the internet and my blog.
5- It is the underlying thinking process that has to follow the roles of God as wisdom, justice, kindness .....
6- I do not see a clash of civilization but departure from following the roles of God.
Imam Zaid Shakir: A Spiritual and Intellectual Journey to Islam
From: http://www.islamicity.com/
By: ASMA NEMATI InFocus news* -
Imam Zaid Shakir was born in Berkeley, California to a family descended from African, Irish and Native American roots. As a young man, many of his experiences, as well as his unrelenting desire for social change and economic justice, led him to accept Islam in 1977. Imam Zaid actively participated in his New Haven, Connecticut Muslim community, followed by several years of studying abroad to expand on his understanding of Islam. Soon after his return, Imam Zaid joined Shaykh Hamza Yusuf at the Zaytuna Institute in Hayward, California, where he has been an integral part of the post-911 Muslim community. Apart from teaching full-time at the Zaytuna Institute, actively engaging as a Panelist on The Washington Post's On Faith weblog, Imam Zaid has also authored several books, and ardently participates in the Muslim and Interfaith community of the Bay Area.
InFocus: What was a major turning point in your life that caused you to look into Islam?
Imam Zaid: There were several. One was dislocating my shoulder my senior year in a football game. That injury - which became a nagging injury - really ended my football career. My goal in life was to play football, so when that [the injury] happened, it started me on a path to begin looking beyond athletics and to begin looking at the more serious aspects of life.
Shortly thereafter, there was a party that I went to in a housing project (Mt. Pleasant in Britain, Connecticut). After the partyÉ I was walking home through this project and this little Puerto Rican girl came out and ran out on that frigid night - and she was yelling, "Why doesn't anyone love me? Why doesn't anyone love me?" That really echoed in my mind and I was thinking, "Why should a little girl (9 or 10 years old) reach a point in her life so young that she perceives no one loves her, that no one cares about her?" So when that happened, it really deepened my examination of life. I think that was one of the real turning points that placed me on a path that eventually culminated in my examining Islam.The more immediate circumstances were the fact that I had rejected Christianity and I started studying various philosophies, ideologies and religions. I wanted to know the truth. I read about various Eastern religions: Zen Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, this-ism, that-ism. During this process I eventually got involved into transcendental meditation, which was somewhat popular at that time. Stevie Wonder - someone I enjoyed listening to at that time - mentioned transcendental meditation. I think in his album "Inner Visions," he says something like: "transcendental meditation speaks of inner preservation; transcendental meditation gives you peace of mind." So, I said [to myself] "I'm gonna check out this transcendental meditation thing." So I got into that and it was really good and spiritually soothing, but I was looking for a way to address the issues that had led that little girl to such desperation - social issues - and try and find a way in the path to make changes in that regard.I then found the Eastern religions and Eastern spiritualities somewhat selfish - in the sense that I was benefiting. I was feeling good; and I was meditating. But I wasn't doing anything for anyone else. At that time when I really began to question things, I was still into meditation: the efficacy of the Eastern religion phenomenon, in terms of its ability to help effect change at a communal level. At that point, in the spring of 1977, I got a book on Islam called "Islam in Focus." When I read that book, all of my questions were answered. I eventually became a Muslim after a few months of examining Islamic teachings, and Alhamdulillah (all thanks to Allah), I never looked back or examined anything else. I had found the water so I took a nice, hardy drink. I also found there was meditation in Islam - dhikr - so I was able to maintain that aspect of spiritual growth.
IF: Please tell me about your experience studying in Syria. What motivated you to go abroad?
IZ: Alhamdulillah, I was motivated to go to Syria and teach because in the winter of 1987/88 I had finished my graduate studies and got a job in the Hamden, Connecticut Welfare Department. We [the Muslim community] started a little mosque, Masjid al-Islam, and we were very active in the community. We were active in the anti-drug work; community organization; local after-school programs; and we had a food program operating out of the masjid, which distributed surplus food to members of the community.Alhamdulillah, we were helping a lot of people and we had a whole lot of people constantly accepting Islam. However, I gradually realized that my life was headed to working, in the full capacity, for the Islamic community. I realized that if that was going to be the case, I had to improve my knowledge of the religion because the matter is very serious. I'm making decisions that essentially, indirectly or directly, are determining people to go to heaven or hell. That's a very weighty matter, so it would be incumbent on me to deepen my knowledge of religion. That culminated in my going to Syria. The reason [for choosing] Syria was that when I was teaching, one of my students was from Syria and after realizing my wish to study abroad, he actually arranged for me to go to Syria. He was going to set me up with various shuyookh and get me into one of the schools so I could get a residency permit. I also realized the cost of living in Syria, as compared to other cities, was very low. So, Allah had decreed that that was the place I would go.
IF: You met and studied with many great scholars, who were they and what did they teach?
IZ: When I arrived there, I immediately started lessons with one of the great scholars, Shaykh Mustafa Turkmani. He was a student in fiqh and Islamic Sciences of the great Damascene scholar, Shaykh Hassan Habannaka. Anyone from Syria familiar with the Islamic scene there knows that Shaykh Habannaka was considered one of the greatest scholars of Syria during his lifetime. Shaykh Habannaka was a student of Shaykh Muhammad al-Hashimi in tasawwuf, and also the great Rifa'i Shaykh, Abdul Basit.I was also able to study with one of the sons of the great Syrian scholar Saleem Hammami, who was the khateeb of Jami' al-Manjaq for almost 30 years. Very briefly, I was also able to attend the lessons of Shaykh Abdul-Rahman ash-Shaghouri before he fell ill - the lessons of whom I was able to benefit from tremendously. [I was also able to attend] the public lessons of Shaykh Ramadan al-Bouti. At the Abu Nour Islamic College I was able to study with various other prominent scholars. However, most of my student days were spent studying with Shaykh Mustafa Turkmani. We read a very wide variety of books throughout a number of lessons. Alhamdulillah, it was an enriching time and there were obstacles to be covered, but Allah is most Merciful.
IF: How did you meet Shaykh Hamza Yusuf? Please share with us your experience with regards to teaching at Zaytuna Institute and being a part of the Bay area community.
IZ: I first met Shaykh Hamza in 1993 at one of the Muslim pow-wows he and a few other people had orchestrated in New Mexico to bring Muslims of various approaches together for a week-long camp. I didn't have a deep acquaintance with him, but I met him again at a MAYA (Muslim Arab Youth Association) conference in Detroit, where we were both speaking. We shared a panel in an English speaking session (the program being primarily in Arabic) and I got to chat with him briefly. When I was studying in Syria, I was invited to a couple of the Zaytuna conferences. I would come back and forth from Syria and would meet him. Then I started teaching at some of the Deen Intensives, primarily the ones that were held in New Mexico, and then one that was held in Calgary, where I got to spend more time with Shaykh Hamza.Most of this time I was still in Syria, going back and forth. However, during the Calgary Deen Intensive, I was in New Haven, Connecticut. I returned to Masjid al-Islam, but a lot of changes had taken place over the years of my absence. It was becoming very hard to readjust to certain things. The community had essentially split up. We had a beautiful community, characterized by a lot of unity. But that had really declined during my absence and there were a lot of factors that lead to me searching for another venue to assist Islam. That's actually what started me to consider coming to Zaytuna, and at the time I understood the post-911 demands had pulled Shaykh Hamza away and there was IZ: Hopefully, inshaAllah, we plan to be working more closely to UC Berkeley, and to offer a program that integrates traditional Islam with the contemporary Western paradigms of study and methodology to try and bring about a dynamic fusion and synthesis between the two. That's our objective and we have started a curriculum that is based on those objectives. We're also excited to be offering a summer intensive Arabic program on the UC Berkeley Campus. We pray that Allah ta'ala gives us tawfeeq in that regard.
IF: What are your thoughts on indigenous and immigrant Muslims living in America?
IZ: There's definitely a stark divide between the indigenous and immigrant Muslims in the United States. An illustration of that is Islamic conferences: if you look at the ISNA, ICNA or MAS conferences, you will notice that the number of African-American participants varies from 1 to 2 percent. That's it. For example, you look at a CAIR fundraiser where you're getting about 1 to 2 percent of African-Americans show up. [Yet, they] make up about 35% of the Muslim community. The reason for that is that the issues that are being dealt with, talked about and advocated, are not relevant to the lives of the average, indigenous Muslim, primarily African-Americans, but increasingly Latino, and even white converts.On the other hand, if you look at the major African-American conferences, such as MANA (Muslim Alliance of North America), or if you even stretch the definition (of Islam in America) a little and you look at the Louis Farrakhan conferences, you see that 99 to 100 perecent of the participants are African-American, with some Latino Muslims, and virtually no immigrants, Again, because there's very little relevance in those particular conferences, in terms of the agendas being pursued, for immigrant Muslims. Then you have a few joint efforts between the two groups, such as IMAN (Inner-city Muslim Action Network) led by Rami Nashashibi in Chicago, where immigrant and indigenous Muslims are working together to try and bring resources - both human and material - of the collective community to bear on addressing problems and issues of concern for the wider community.I think that it's really important for both communities to realize that in numbers, there's strength. But unity has to be more than a slogan. There has to be relevance in the lives of the constituents of the various Muslim groups, or population. It's really important for us to sit down and look at the areas of common concern and how we can best share the available resources to impact the lives of the wider Muslim community - regardless of their background - and to begin to address common concerns that are of interest to all of us. That's going to take the creation of a relevant agenda and visionary leadership. And, at a certain point, we have to recognize that there will always be differences that are going to lead to different emphasis. Therefore, naturally different degrees of relevance for various constituencies [will ensue] within the wider Muslim community.
IF: As a prominent scholar of the Muslim and Interfaith community, what are some of the obstacles, from your perspective, Muslims face in the U.S. as regards to assimilation?
IZ: I think the greatest obstacle Muslims face, in regards to assimilation, is attitude. Most (older) immigrants are coming from a perspective of being colonized by various European powers, or a neo-colonialism perspective of being colonized in the sense of the new globalization, primarily by the U.S. On the one hand, the latter creates a very deep psychological barrier that works against integration. On the other hand, the approaches to Islam that have been very ideological create very stark, analytical and movement-oriented categories that view America as the embodiment of kufr in some instances, and presents a view of Islam that's very culturally predatory, as opposed to being culturally assimilative, as it was historically. The latter attitude works against assimilation, both in the case of immigrants, who historically have been very insular and have been inclined towards looking back across the seas, to ultimately moving back there on the event of a crisis, such as September 11. However, that's starting to change with a lot of the younger generation..In the case of converts, again, you have an oppressed people, generally-speaking, coming into a religion that has, in its recent history, experienced a tremendous degree of oppression. I think a lot of the converts are led to adopt attitudes of hostility towards the United States, in general, [such as taking] a very negative view of the society. As a result, in many instances, rejecting the fact that we're already assimilated and then rejecting the reality of assimilation; breaking ties with relatives, and even parents; looking at one's former community as kuffar, or antagonistic non-believers. Those attitudes work against the reality of assimilation.If you're a convert, you're already assimilated; you're part of a wider American family of non-Muslims; you have relatives that are non-Muslims; you have neighbors and friends that are non-Muslims; the people who you grew up with, before converting, and who have been an integral part of your life, are non-Muslim. So, you're already assimilated. But, for a lot of us - and I include myself - that reality of assimilation is sometimes rejected and one adopts the integrities and the priorities of the immigrant community, and in many instances, of the most anti-assimilative elements in the immigrant community. I think that's a huge mistake that we have to begin to address and then correct if we're going to take advantage of the many opportunities that Allah (SWT) has given us in this society. In my opinion, that's the greatest barrier to assimilation. Once we can overcome that, we have enough creativity to figure out creative ways of how we can maintain our integrity as a Muslim community, while contributing to maybe even the salvation of the greater American project, not the more narrow American project to what was characterized, as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. referred to it, the triplets of racism, militarism and materialism. Certainly that's one of the great aspects of the greater American project, especially in these days and times, but there's also another project that argues for equality: respecting people; people advancing based on their merits and not advancing based on their religion, race, ethnicity, or other accidents of birth. That's why I think it's very important for us to take advantage of the opportunities we have because those opportunities might not be permanent.IF: Islam is being actively exploited in the presidential race. What are your views and hopes about the race in general? Do you have anything specific to share with the Muslim community about the presidential candidates? really a need for someone to be on the ground there.I had actually made a commitment to the Islamic Association of North Texas and at the last minute I changed my mind, and instead came to Zaytuna. I moved here in the summer of 2003. Alhamdulillah, it is a wonderful community here in the Bay area; a lot of very wonderful, dynamic and talented brothers and sisters: May Allah bless everyone.
IF: The Zaytuna Institute has moved its academic office to Berkeley. What are its new goals and what do you hope to be teaching in the future?
By: ASMA NEMATI InFocus news* -
Imam Zaid Shakir was born in Berkeley, California to a family descended from African, Irish and Native American roots. As a young man, many of his experiences, as well as his unrelenting desire for social change and economic justice, led him to accept Islam in 1977. Imam Zaid actively participated in his New Haven, Connecticut Muslim community, followed by several years of studying abroad to expand on his understanding of Islam. Soon after his return, Imam Zaid joined Shaykh Hamza Yusuf at the Zaytuna Institute in Hayward, California, where he has been an integral part of the post-911 Muslim community. Apart from teaching full-time at the Zaytuna Institute, actively engaging as a Panelist on The Washington Post's On Faith weblog, Imam Zaid has also authored several books, and ardently participates in the Muslim and Interfaith community of the Bay Area.
InFocus: What was a major turning point in your life that caused you to look into Islam?
Imam Zaid: There were several. One was dislocating my shoulder my senior year in a football game. That injury - which became a nagging injury - really ended my football career. My goal in life was to play football, so when that [the injury] happened, it started me on a path to begin looking beyond athletics and to begin looking at the more serious aspects of life.
Shortly thereafter, there was a party that I went to in a housing project (Mt. Pleasant in Britain, Connecticut). After the partyÉ I was walking home through this project and this little Puerto Rican girl came out and ran out on that frigid night - and she was yelling, "Why doesn't anyone love me? Why doesn't anyone love me?" That really echoed in my mind and I was thinking, "Why should a little girl (9 or 10 years old) reach a point in her life so young that she perceives no one loves her, that no one cares about her?" So when that happened, it really deepened my examination of life. I think that was one of the real turning points that placed me on a path that eventually culminated in my examining Islam.The more immediate circumstances were the fact that I had rejected Christianity and I started studying various philosophies, ideologies and religions. I wanted to know the truth. I read about various Eastern religions: Zen Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, this-ism, that-ism. During this process I eventually got involved into transcendental meditation, which was somewhat popular at that time. Stevie Wonder - someone I enjoyed listening to at that time - mentioned transcendental meditation. I think in his album "Inner Visions," he says something like: "transcendental meditation speaks of inner preservation; transcendental meditation gives you peace of mind." So, I said [to myself] "I'm gonna check out this transcendental meditation thing." So I got into that and it was really good and spiritually soothing, but I was looking for a way to address the issues that had led that little girl to such desperation - social issues - and try and find a way in the path to make changes in that regard.I then found the Eastern religions and Eastern spiritualities somewhat selfish - in the sense that I was benefiting. I was feeling good; and I was meditating. But I wasn't doing anything for anyone else. At that time when I really began to question things, I was still into meditation: the efficacy of the Eastern religion phenomenon, in terms of its ability to help effect change at a communal level. At that point, in the spring of 1977, I got a book on Islam called "Islam in Focus." When I read that book, all of my questions were answered. I eventually became a Muslim after a few months of examining Islamic teachings, and Alhamdulillah (all thanks to Allah), I never looked back or examined anything else. I had found the water so I took a nice, hardy drink. I also found there was meditation in Islam - dhikr - so I was able to maintain that aspect of spiritual growth.
IF: Please tell me about your experience studying in Syria. What motivated you to go abroad?
IZ: Alhamdulillah, I was motivated to go to Syria and teach because in the winter of 1987/88 I had finished my graduate studies and got a job in the Hamden, Connecticut Welfare Department. We [the Muslim community] started a little mosque, Masjid al-Islam, and we were very active in the community. We were active in the anti-drug work; community organization; local after-school programs; and we had a food program operating out of the masjid, which distributed surplus food to members of the community.Alhamdulillah, we were helping a lot of people and we had a whole lot of people constantly accepting Islam. However, I gradually realized that my life was headed to working, in the full capacity, for the Islamic community. I realized that if that was going to be the case, I had to improve my knowledge of the religion because the matter is very serious. I'm making decisions that essentially, indirectly or directly, are determining people to go to heaven or hell. That's a very weighty matter, so it would be incumbent on me to deepen my knowledge of religion. That culminated in my going to Syria. The reason [for choosing] Syria was that when I was teaching, one of my students was from Syria and after realizing my wish to study abroad, he actually arranged for me to go to Syria. He was going to set me up with various shuyookh and get me into one of the schools so I could get a residency permit. I also realized the cost of living in Syria, as compared to other cities, was very low. So, Allah had decreed that that was the place I would go.
IF: You met and studied with many great scholars, who were they and what did they teach?
IZ: When I arrived there, I immediately started lessons with one of the great scholars, Shaykh Mustafa Turkmani. He was a student in fiqh and Islamic Sciences of the great Damascene scholar, Shaykh Hassan Habannaka. Anyone from Syria familiar with the Islamic scene there knows that Shaykh Habannaka was considered one of the greatest scholars of Syria during his lifetime. Shaykh Habannaka was a student of Shaykh Muhammad al-Hashimi in tasawwuf, and also the great Rifa'i Shaykh, Abdul Basit.I was also able to study with one of the sons of the great Syrian scholar Saleem Hammami, who was the khateeb of Jami' al-Manjaq for almost 30 years. Very briefly, I was also able to attend the lessons of Shaykh Abdul-Rahman ash-Shaghouri before he fell ill - the lessons of whom I was able to benefit from tremendously. [I was also able to attend] the public lessons of Shaykh Ramadan al-Bouti. At the Abu Nour Islamic College I was able to study with various other prominent scholars. However, most of my student days were spent studying with Shaykh Mustafa Turkmani. We read a very wide variety of books throughout a number of lessons. Alhamdulillah, it was an enriching time and there were obstacles to be covered, but Allah is most Merciful.
IF: How did you meet Shaykh Hamza Yusuf? Please share with us your experience with regards to teaching at Zaytuna Institute and being a part of the Bay area community.
IZ: I first met Shaykh Hamza in 1993 at one of the Muslim pow-wows he and a few other people had orchestrated in New Mexico to bring Muslims of various approaches together for a week-long camp. I didn't have a deep acquaintance with him, but I met him again at a MAYA (Muslim Arab Youth Association) conference in Detroit, where we were both speaking. We shared a panel in an English speaking session (the program being primarily in Arabic) and I got to chat with him briefly. When I was studying in Syria, I was invited to a couple of the Zaytuna conferences. I would come back and forth from Syria and would meet him. Then I started teaching at some of the Deen Intensives, primarily the ones that were held in New Mexico, and then one that was held in Calgary, where I got to spend more time with Shaykh Hamza.Most of this time I was still in Syria, going back and forth. However, during the Calgary Deen Intensive, I was in New Haven, Connecticut. I returned to Masjid al-Islam, but a lot of changes had taken place over the years of my absence. It was becoming very hard to readjust to certain things. The community had essentially split up. We had a beautiful community, characterized by a lot of unity. But that had really declined during my absence and there were a lot of factors that lead to me searching for another venue to assist Islam. That's actually what started me to consider coming to Zaytuna, and at the time I understood the post-911 demands had pulled Shaykh Hamza away and there was IZ: Hopefully, inshaAllah, we plan to be working more closely to UC Berkeley, and to offer a program that integrates traditional Islam with the contemporary Western paradigms of study and methodology to try and bring about a dynamic fusion and synthesis between the two. That's our objective and we have started a curriculum that is based on those objectives. We're also excited to be offering a summer intensive Arabic program on the UC Berkeley Campus. We pray that Allah ta'ala gives us tawfeeq in that regard.
IF: What are your thoughts on indigenous and immigrant Muslims living in America?
IZ: There's definitely a stark divide between the indigenous and immigrant Muslims in the United States. An illustration of that is Islamic conferences: if you look at the ISNA, ICNA or MAS conferences, you will notice that the number of African-American participants varies from 1 to 2 percent. That's it. For example, you look at a CAIR fundraiser where you're getting about 1 to 2 percent of African-Americans show up. [Yet, they] make up about 35% of the Muslim community. The reason for that is that the issues that are being dealt with, talked about and advocated, are not relevant to the lives of the average, indigenous Muslim, primarily African-Americans, but increasingly Latino, and even white converts.On the other hand, if you look at the major African-American conferences, such as MANA (Muslim Alliance of North America), or if you even stretch the definition (of Islam in America) a little and you look at the Louis Farrakhan conferences, you see that 99 to 100 perecent of the participants are African-American, with some Latino Muslims, and virtually no immigrants, Again, because there's very little relevance in those particular conferences, in terms of the agendas being pursued, for immigrant Muslims. Then you have a few joint efforts between the two groups, such as IMAN (Inner-city Muslim Action Network) led by Rami Nashashibi in Chicago, where immigrant and indigenous Muslims are working together to try and bring resources - both human and material - of the collective community to bear on addressing problems and issues of concern for the wider community.I think that it's really important for both communities to realize that in numbers, there's strength. But unity has to be more than a slogan. There has to be relevance in the lives of the constituents of the various Muslim groups, or population. It's really important for us to sit down and look at the areas of common concern and how we can best share the available resources to impact the lives of the wider Muslim community - regardless of their background - and to begin to address common concerns that are of interest to all of us. That's going to take the creation of a relevant agenda and visionary leadership. And, at a certain point, we have to recognize that there will always be differences that are going to lead to different emphasis. Therefore, naturally different degrees of relevance for various constituencies [will ensue] within the wider Muslim community.
IF: As a prominent scholar of the Muslim and Interfaith community, what are some of the obstacles, from your perspective, Muslims face in the U.S. as regards to assimilation?
IZ: I think the greatest obstacle Muslims face, in regards to assimilation, is attitude. Most (older) immigrants are coming from a perspective of being colonized by various European powers, or a neo-colonialism perspective of being colonized in the sense of the new globalization, primarily by the U.S. On the one hand, the latter creates a very deep psychological barrier that works against integration. On the other hand, the approaches to Islam that have been very ideological create very stark, analytical and movement-oriented categories that view America as the embodiment of kufr in some instances, and presents a view of Islam that's very culturally predatory, as opposed to being culturally assimilative, as it was historically. The latter attitude works against assimilation, both in the case of immigrants, who historically have been very insular and have been inclined towards looking back across the seas, to ultimately moving back there on the event of a crisis, such as September 11. However, that's starting to change with a lot of the younger generation..In the case of converts, again, you have an oppressed people, generally-speaking, coming into a religion that has, in its recent history, experienced a tremendous degree of oppression. I think a lot of the converts are led to adopt attitudes of hostility towards the United States, in general, [such as taking] a very negative view of the society. As a result, in many instances, rejecting the fact that we're already assimilated and then rejecting the reality of assimilation; breaking ties with relatives, and even parents; looking at one's former community as kuffar, or antagonistic non-believers. Those attitudes work against the reality of assimilation.If you're a convert, you're already assimilated; you're part of a wider American family of non-Muslims; you have relatives that are non-Muslims; you have neighbors and friends that are non-Muslims; the people who you grew up with, before converting, and who have been an integral part of your life, are non-Muslim. So, you're already assimilated. But, for a lot of us - and I include myself - that reality of assimilation is sometimes rejected and one adopts the integrities and the priorities of the immigrant community, and in many instances, of the most anti-assimilative elements in the immigrant community. I think that's a huge mistake that we have to begin to address and then correct if we're going to take advantage of the many opportunities that Allah (SWT) has given us in this society. In my opinion, that's the greatest barrier to assimilation. Once we can overcome that, we have enough creativity to figure out creative ways of how we can maintain our integrity as a Muslim community, while contributing to maybe even the salvation of the greater American project, not the more narrow American project to what was characterized, as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. referred to it, the triplets of racism, militarism and materialism. Certainly that's one of the great aspects of the greater American project, especially in these days and times, but there's also another project that argues for equality: respecting people; people advancing based on their merits and not advancing based on their religion, race, ethnicity, or other accidents of birth. That's why I think it's very important for us to take advantage of the opportunities we have because those opportunities might not be permanent.IF: Islam is being actively exploited in the presidential race. What are your views and hopes about the race in general? Do you have anything specific to share with the Muslim community about the presidential candidates? really a need for someone to be on the ground there.I had actually made a commitment to the Islamic Association of North Texas and at the last minute I changed my mind, and instead came to Zaytuna. I moved here in the summer of 2003. Alhamdulillah, it is a wonderful community here in the Bay area; a lot of very wonderful, dynamic and talented brothers and sisters: May Allah bless everyone.
IF: The Zaytuna Institute has moved its academic office to Berkeley. What are its new goals and what do you hope to be teaching in the future?
IZ: I think it's very important for Muslims to form a political agenda that looks at the interests of the wider Muslim community. Human Rights issues in general, the interest of the poor, oppressed and the downtrodden because those are the people that our religion urges us to be an advocate group for. If we ourselves are rich, wealthy and well-off, it shouldn't automatically make us people who tend to vote Republican as a lot of immigrant Muslims in this country have done historically, because "we see that as protecting our (narrow) interest:" We see where that got everyone in the 2000 election and the aftermath of that election. It is very important for us to look at the historical values that Islam encourages; and to create a political agenda that reflects those values. Then support the candidate who (mostly) commits himself or herself to advancing that agenda, or punish the candidate who does not by working to make sure that they have a very short political career.In terms of candidates actually running, I think they all leave a lot to be desired, especially those who are described as being more viable such as Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton. Even Ron Paul or John McCain; they all leave something to be desired but we have to look deeply at the issue. A lot of people are attracted to Obama based on what he represents and the message he would send to the world. But the fact is that Obama is only viable as an African-American candidate, because he does not - and realizes he cannot - be an advocate for the poor and downtrodden masses of African-American people because he realized he will be just another Al Sharpton or Jessie Jackson; therefore, unelectable because he's advocating for the poor, or the downtrodden, or the increasingly disenfranchised masses of poor, urban African-Americans. This is an indictment of the general public here; that the candidate can only be viable as an African-American if he is seen as being acceptable to the white majority - essentially meaning that he champions issues of relevance to them, and neglects his own people. I think that's a big problem as regards to Obama, in addition to the fact that with such large contributions of corporate interest, it will be difficult for him to return to his activist groups, even if he desired to.In terms of someone like Ron Paul, a lot of Muslims see his advocacy, for example, for eliminating the income tax as being something that appeals to them. But, that doesn't help the poor people. They don't pay the income tax, anyway. When you take away the income tax and you introduce other liberal policies that don't raise the tax in a significant way, then you just end up with a kind of crisis you have here in California, with massive budget deficits without any sources of new revenue. Some propose national gasoline taxes, or similar taxes. That will affect everyone, including the poor people who don't pay the income tax now, but then they would. The wealthy people's taxes will be substantially reduced, so it puts a disproportional burden on the poor. Without new sources of revenue through taxation or other forms of income generation for the state, you have budget crisis that leads to budget cuts. That [at the end] affects the poor again, such as [the current situation] in California, with the cutting of various welfare programs and cutting education, which primarily affects the poor, who have been benefiting from the grants that are made available.We have to really form our own agenda and possibly look at fielding our own candidates. And, initially, that might just be to educate the general public about the issues. Dennis Kucinich does that through his candidacy, or Ralph Nader in the Green party, where there's no chance they're going to win in this winner-take-all political system. However, at least some issues are put out there for the public to discuss, and inshaAllah, with time the public will become keen on resolving some of those issues.
IF: What do you think about the prospects of traditional Islam in the future?
IZ: It's very important for traditional Islam to be rooted in real tradition, and not in the superficial veneer of traditionalism. For example, we have proliferation of Sufi tariqas, but the deeper lessons of tasawwuf are escaping people as they become arrogant. "My tariqa is better than your tariqa. My Shaykh is better than your Shaykh. I'm better than you because my Shaykh is better than your Shaykh." Tasawwuf is about humility; and it's about addressing defective character; it's about remembering Allah so one can get closer to Allah, not so one can lord himself or herself over other Muslims who aren't remembering Allah. All of that has nothing to do with traditionalism. It is just using some of the institutions associated with traditionalism to stay on the same ego trip that you were on before you ever got involved with [anything].I think it's very important for us to really understand the essence of traditionalism; acknowledging the collective efforts of Muslims as human beings, to apply Islam in a real human context, and not looking at some mythical, ahistorical Islam that's not affected by history and that's not defined by the efforts of Muslims in history. That effort is an ongoing project. I think it's very important, in terms of traditionalism - be that respecting the madhahib, respecting tasawwuf, and other human institutions that human beings understood to be an articulation of the fundamental and foundational teachings of the religion - tjhat these things are means that can constantly be improved on. [They] are amenable to change and alterations that keep us in touch with unchangeable ends to Islam. The latter is what traditionalism is and, I think, if we can concentrate on the ends and not see the means as ends in and of themselves, we'll be able to benefit from traditionalism. Traditionalism is about benefiting from the wisdom of those who preceded us, and then continuing, as Dr. Umar Farooq Abdullah likes to say, from where they stopped, and not becoming stuck and mired in some of the negative aspects of their work, which is one of the dangers.The institutions that were prevalent at the time of the four imams--Imam ash-Shafi', Ahmad, Abu Hanifa, Malik--were not the institutions that were prevalent at the time of Imam Ghazali. And the institutions in the form of their engagement with the world and with reality during the time of, for example, Imam Suyuti, were not the same as those that were prevalent during the times of Imam Ghazali. There was growth, there was change, there was evolution. We have to continue that process.
IF: Do you have any specific advice to American Muslim and Muslims around the world?
IZ: My advice to American Muslims would be to really think deeply on the opportunities that we have here and to take advantage of them, not to squander them with ignorance or short-sighted thinking; to really realize that we have tremendous opportunities in that our community is very wealthy, talented and highly educated. We should take advantage of those realities to try to organize ourselves and galvanize our energy and the potential we have to do something significant for the Muslim and non-Muslim people of the world.In terms of advice for Muslims of the world, I would just say to look at the fullness of the religion and never lose touch with the heart of the religion, which is purification of the heart. If we have a deep relationship with Allah, it becomes very easy to keep all of the trials and tribulations of the world in perspective, and not to be overwhelmed by them.
Monday, February 04, 2008
The Simple Adam and Eve Story in Quran
By: Maged Taman
And indeed We made a covenant with Adam before, but he forgot, and We found on his part no firm will-power.
And (remember) when We said to the angels: "Prostrate yourselves to Adam." They prostrated (all) except Iblis (Satan), who refused.
Then We said: "O Adam! Verily, this is an enemy to you and to your wife. So let him not get you both out of Paradise, so that you be distressed in misery.
Verily, you have (a promise from Us) that you will never be hungry therein nor naked.
And you (will) suffer not from thirst therein nor from the sun's heat.
Then Shaitan (Satan) whispered to him, saying : "O Adam! Shall I lead you to the Tree of Eternity and to a kingdom that will never waste away?"
Then they both ate of the tree, and so their private parts appeared to them, and they began to stick on themselves the leaves from Paradise for their covering. Thus did Adam disobey his Lord, so he went astray.
Then his Lord chose him, and turned to him with forgiveness, and gave him guidance.
(Allah) said: "Get you down (from the Paradise to the earth), both of you, together, some of you are an enemy to some others. Then if there comes to you guidance from Me, then whoever follows My Guidance shall neither go astray, nor fall into distress and misery.
Surah (Chapter) Ta-Ha (Ta Ha) Qur-an 20:115-123
And indeed We made a covenant with Adam before, but he forgot, and We found on his part no firm will-power.
And (remember) when We said to the angels: "Prostrate yourselves to Adam." They prostrated (all) except Iblis (Satan), who refused.
Then We said: "O Adam! Verily, this is an enemy to you and to your wife. So let him not get you both out of Paradise, so that you be distressed in misery.
Verily, you have (a promise from Us) that you will never be hungry therein nor naked.
And you (will) suffer not from thirst therein nor from the sun's heat.
Then Shaitan (Satan) whispered to him, saying : "O Adam! Shall I lead you to the Tree of Eternity and to a kingdom that will never waste away?"
Then they both ate of the tree, and so their private parts appeared to them, and they began to stick on themselves the leaves from Paradise for their covering. Thus did Adam disobey his Lord, so he went astray.
Then his Lord chose him, and turned to him with forgiveness, and gave him guidance.
(Allah) said: "Get you down (from the Paradise to the earth), both of you, together, some of you are an enemy to some others. Then if there comes to you guidance from Me, then whoever follows My Guidance shall neither go astray, nor fall into distress and misery.
Surah (Chapter) Ta-Ha (Ta Ha) Qur-an 20:115-123
Real history of Islam and the West
From: http://www.islamicity.com/
By: Karen Armstrong
On the eve of the second Christian millennium, the Crusaders massacred some thirty thousand Jews and Muslims in Jerusalem, turning the thriving Islamic holy city into a stinking charnel house. For at least five months the valleys and ditches around the city were filled with putrefying corpses, which were too numerous for the small number of Crusaders who remained behind after the expedition to clear away, and a stench hung over Jerusalem, where the three religions of Abraham had been able to coexist in relative harmony under Islamic rule for nearly five hundred years. This was the Muslims' first experience of the Christian West, as it pulled itself out of the dark age that had descended after the collapse of the Roman Empire in the fifth century, and fought its way back on the international scene. The Muslims suffered from the Crusaders, but were not long incommoded by their presence. In 1187 Saladin was able to recapture Jerusalem for Islam and though the Crusaders hung on in the Near East for another century, they seemed an unimportant passing episode in the long Islamic history of the region. Most of the inhabitants of Islamdon were entirely unaffected by the Crusades and remained uninterested in western Europe, which, despite its dramatic cultural advance during the crusading period, still lagged behind the Muslim world.Europeans did not forget the Crusades, however, nor could they ignore the Dar al -Islam, which, as the years went by, seemed to rule the entire globe. Ever since the Crusades, the people of Western Christendom developed a stereotypical and distorted image of Islam, which, they regarded as the enemy of decent civilization. The prejudice became entwined with European fantasies about Jews, the other victims of the Crusaders, and often reflected buried worry about the conduct of Christians. It was, for example, during the Crusades, when it was Christians who had instigated a series of brutal holy wars against the Muslim world, that Islam was described by the learned scholar-monks of Europe as an inherently violent and intolerant faith, which had only been able to establish itself by the sword. The myth of the supposed fanatical intolerance of Islam has become one of the received ideas of the West.As the millennium drew to a close, however, some Muslims seemed to live up to this Western perception, and, for the first time, have made sacred violence a cardinal Islamic duty. These fundamentalists often call Western colonialism and post-colonial Western imperialism al-Salibiyyab: the Crusade. The colonial crusade has been less violent but its impact has been more devastating than the medieval holy wars. The powerful Muslim world has been reduced to a dependent bloc, and Muslim society has been gravely dislocated in the course of an accelerated modernization programme. All over the world, as we have seen, people in all the major faiths have reeled under the impact of Western modernity, and have produced the embattled and frequently intolerant religiosity that we call fundamentalism. As they struggle to rectify what they see as the damaging effects of modern secular culture, fundamentalists fight back and, in the process, they depart from the core values of compassion, justice and benevolence that characterize all the world faiths, including Islam. Religion, like any other human activity, is often abused, but at its best it helps human beings to cultivate a sense of the sacred inviolability of each individual, and thus to mitigate the murderous violence to which our species is tragically prone. Religion has committed atrocities in the past, but in its brief history secularism has proved that it can be just as violent. As we have seen, secular aggression and persecution have often led to a heightening of religious intolerance and hatred.This became tragically clear in Algeria in 1992. During the religious revival of the 1970s, the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) challenged the hegemony of the secular nationalist party, the National Liberation Front (FLN), which had led the revolution against French colonial rule in 1954, and had established a socialist government in the country in 1962. The Algerian revolution against France had been an inspiration to Arabs and Muslims who were also struggling to gain independence from Europe. The FLN was similar to the other secular and socialist governments in the Middle East at this time, which had relegated Islam to the private sphere, on the Western pattern. By the 1970s, however, people all over the Muslim world were becoming dissatisfied with these secularist ideologies which had not delivered what they had promised. Abbas Madani, one of the founding members of FIS, wanted to create an Islamic political ideology for the modern world; Ali ibn Hajj, the imam of a mosque in a poor neighborhood in Algiers, led a more radical wing of FIS. Slowly, FIS began to build its own mosques, without getting permission from the government; it took root in the Muslim community in France, where workers demanded places of prayer in the factories and offices, incurring the wrath of the right-wing party led by Jean-Marie Le Pen.By the 1980s, Algeria was in the grip of an economic crisis. FLN had set the country on the path to democracy and statehood, but over the years it had become corrupt. The old garde were reluctant to attempt more democratic reforms. There had been a population explosion in Algeria; most of its thirty million inhabitants were under thirty, many were unemployed, and there was an acute housing shortage. There were riots. Frustrated with the stagnation and ineptitude of the FLN, the young wanted something new and turned to the Islamic parties. In June 1990 the FIS scored major victories in the local elections, especially in the urban areas. FIS activists were mostly young, idealistic and well educated; they were known to be honest and efficient in government, though they were dogmatic and conservative in some areas, such as their insistence upon traditional Islamic dress for women. But the FIS was not anti-Western. Leaders spoke of encouraging links with the European Union and fresh Western investment. After the electoral victories at the local level, they seemed certain to succeed in the legislative elections that were scheduled for 1992.There was to be no Islamic government in Algeria, however. The military staged a coup, ousted the liberal FLN President Benjedid (who had promised democratic reforms), suppressed FIS, and threw its leaders into prison. Had elections been prevented in such a violent and unconstitutional manner in Iran and Pakistan, there would have been an outcry in the West Such a coup would have been seen as an example of Islam's supposedly endemic aversion to democracy and its basic incompatibility with the modern world. But because it was an Islamic government that had been thwarted by the coup, there was jubilation in the Western press. Algeria had been saved from the Islamic menace; the bars, casinos an discotheques of Algiers had been spared; and in some mysterious way, this undemocratic action had made Algeria safe forThe result was tragically predictable. Pushed outside the due processes of law, outraged, and despairing of justice, the more radical members of FIS broke away to form a guerrilla organization, the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), and began terror campaign in the mountainous regions south of Algiers. There were massacres, in which the population of entire villages was killed. Journalists and intellectuals, secular and religious, were also targeted. It was generally assumed that the Islamists were wholly responsible for these atrocities, but gradually questions were asked which pointed to the fact that some elements in the Algerian military forces not only acquiesced but also participated in the killing to discredit the GIA. There was now a ghastly stalemate. Both FLN and FIS were torn apart by an internal feud between the pragmatists, who wanted a solution, and the hardliners, who refused to negotiate. The violence of the initial coup to stop the elections had led to an outright war between the religious and secularists. In January 1995 the Roman Catholic Church helped to organize a meeting in Rome to bring the two sides together, but Zeroual's government refused to participate. A golden opportunity had been lost. There was more Islamic terror, and a constitutional referendum banned all religious political parties.The tragic case of Algeria must not become a paradigm for the future. Suppression and coercion had helped to push a disgruntled Muslim minority into a violence that offends every central tenet of Islam. An aggressive secularism had resulted in a religiosity that was a travesty of true faith. The incident further tarnished the notion of democracy, which the West is so anxious to promote, but which, it appeared, had limits, if the democratic process might lead to the establishment of an elected Islamic government. The people of Europe and the United States were shown to be ignorant about the various parties and groups within the Islamic world. The moderate FIS was equated with the most violent fundamentalist groups and was associated in the Western mind with the violence, illegality and anti-democratic behavior that had this time been displayed by the secularists in the FLN.But whether the West likes it or not, the initial success of he FIS in the local elections showed that the people wanted some form of Islamic government. It passed a clear message to Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia, where secularist governments ad long been aware of the growing religiosity of their countries. In the middle of the twentieth century, secularism had been dominant, and Islam was thought to be irredeemably passe. Now any secularist government in the Middle East was uncomfortably aware that if there were truly democratic elections, an Islamic government might well come to power. In Egypt, for example, Islam is as popular as Nasserism was in 1950s. Islamic dress is ubiquitous and, since Mubarak's government is secularist, is clearly voluntarily assumed. Even secularist Turkey, recent polls showed that some 70 percent the population claimed to be devout, and that 20 percent prayed five times a day. People are turning to the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan, and Palestinians are looking to Mujamah, while the PLO, which in the 1960s carried all before it, is now looking cumbersome, corrupt and out of date. In the republics of Central Asia, Muslims are rediscovering their religion after decades of Soviet oppression. People have tried the secularist ideologies, which have worked so successfully in Western countries where they are on home ground. Increasingly, Muslims want their governments to conform more closely to the Islamic norm.The precise form that this will take is not yet clear. In Egypt it seems that a majority of Muslims would like to see the Shariah as the law of the land, whereas in Turkey only 3 percent want this. Even in Egypt, however, some of the ulama are aware that the problems of transforming the Shariah, an agrarian law code, to the very different conditions of modernity will be extreme. Rashid Rida had been aware of this as early as the 1930s. But that is not to say that it cannot be done.It is not true that Muslims are now uniformly filled with hatred of the West. In the early stages of modernization, many leading thinkers were infatuated with European culture, and by the end of the twentieth century some of the most eminent and influential Muslim thinkers were now, reaching out to the West again. President Khatami of Iran is only one example of this trend. So is the Iranian intellectual Abdolkarim Sorush, who held important posts in Khomeini's government, and though he is often harried by the more conservative mujtahids, he strongly influences those in power. Sorush admires Khomeini, but has moved beyond him. He maintains that Iranians now have three identities: preIslamic, Islamic and Western, which they must try to reconcile. Sorush rejects the secularism of the West and believes that human beings will always need spirituality, but advises Iranians to study the modern sciences, while holding on to Shii tradition. Islam must develop its fiqh, so as to accommodate the modern industrial world, and evolve a philosophy of civil rights and an economic theory capable of holding its own in the twenty-first century.Sunni thinkers have come to similar conclusions. Western hostility towards Islam springs from ignorance, Rashid al' Ghannouchi, the leader of the exiled Renaissance Party in Tunisia, believes. It also springs from a bad experience of Christianity, which did stifle thought and creativity. He describes himself as a "democratic Islamist" and sees no incompatibility between Islam and democracy, but he rejects the secularism of the West, because the human being cannot be so divided and fragmented. The Muslim ideal of tawhid rejects the duality of body and spirit, intellect and spirituality, men and women, morality and the economy, East and West. Muslims want modernity, but not one that has been imposed upon them by America, Britain or France. Muslims admire the efficiency and beautiful technology of the West; they are fascinated by the way a regime can be changed in the West without bloodshed. But when Muslims look at Western society, they see no light, no heart and no spirituality. They want to hold on to their own religious and moral traditions and, at the same time, to try to incorporate some of the best aspects of Western civilization. Yusuf Abdallah al-Qaradawi, a gradate of al-Azhar, and a Muslim Brother, who is currently the director of the Centre for Sunnah and Sirah at the University of Qatar, takes a similar line. He believes in moderation, and is convinced that the bigotry that has recently appeared in the Muslim world will impoverish people by depriving them of the insights and visions of other human beings. The Prophet Muhammad said that he had come to bring a "Middle Way" of religious life that shunned extremes, and Qaradawi thinks that the current extremism in some quarters of the Islamic world is alien to the Muslim spirit and will not last. Islam is a religion of peace, as the Prophet had shown when he made an unpopular treaty with the Quraysh at Hudaybiyyah, a feat which the Quran calls "a great victory." The West, he insists, must learn to recognize the Muslims' right to live their religion and, if they choose, to incorporate the Islamic ideal in their polity. They have to appreciate that there is more than one way of life. Variety benefits the whole world. God gave human beings the right and ability to choose, and some may, opt for a religious way of life - including an Islamic state - while others prefer the secular ideal."It is better for the West that Muslims should be religious," Qaradawi argues, "hold to their religion, and try to be moral."' He raises an important point. Many Western people are also becoming uncomfortable about the absence of spirituality in their lives. They do not necessarily want to return to pre-modern religious lifestyles or to conventionally institutional faith. But there is a growing appreciation that, at its best, religion has helped human beings to cultivate deceit values. Islam kept the notions of social justice, equality, tolerance and practical compassion in the forefront of the Muslim conscience for centuries. Muslims did not always live up to these ideals and frequently found difficulty in incarnating them in their social and political institutions. But the struggle to achieve this was for centuries the mainspring of Islamic spirituality. Western people must become aware that it is in their interests too that Islam remains healthy and strong.The West has not been wholly responsible for the extreme forms of Islam, which have cultivated a violence that violates the most sacred canons of religion. But the West has certainly contributed to this development and, to assuage the fear and despair that lies at the root of all fundamentalist vision, should cultivate a more accurate appreciation of Islam in the third Christian millennium.
Excerpted from the book "Islam - A Short History" by Karen Armstrong. democracy. The French government threw its support behind the new hardline FLN of President Liamine Zeroual and strengthened his resolve to hold no further dialogue with FIS. Not surprisingly, the Muslim world was shocked by this fresh instance of Western double standards.
By: Karen Armstrong
On the eve of the second Christian millennium, the Crusaders massacred some thirty thousand Jews and Muslims in Jerusalem, turning the thriving Islamic holy city into a stinking charnel house. For at least five months the valleys and ditches around the city were filled with putrefying corpses, which were too numerous for the small number of Crusaders who remained behind after the expedition to clear away, and a stench hung over Jerusalem, where the three religions of Abraham had been able to coexist in relative harmony under Islamic rule for nearly five hundred years. This was the Muslims' first experience of the Christian West, as it pulled itself out of the dark age that had descended after the collapse of the Roman Empire in the fifth century, and fought its way back on the international scene. The Muslims suffered from the Crusaders, but were not long incommoded by their presence. In 1187 Saladin was able to recapture Jerusalem for Islam and though the Crusaders hung on in the Near East for another century, they seemed an unimportant passing episode in the long Islamic history of the region. Most of the inhabitants of Islamdon were entirely unaffected by the Crusades and remained uninterested in western Europe, which, despite its dramatic cultural advance during the crusading period, still lagged behind the Muslim world.Europeans did not forget the Crusades, however, nor could they ignore the Dar al -Islam, which, as the years went by, seemed to rule the entire globe. Ever since the Crusades, the people of Western Christendom developed a stereotypical and distorted image of Islam, which, they regarded as the enemy of decent civilization. The prejudice became entwined with European fantasies about Jews, the other victims of the Crusaders, and often reflected buried worry about the conduct of Christians. It was, for example, during the Crusades, when it was Christians who had instigated a series of brutal holy wars against the Muslim world, that Islam was described by the learned scholar-monks of Europe as an inherently violent and intolerant faith, which had only been able to establish itself by the sword. The myth of the supposed fanatical intolerance of Islam has become one of the received ideas of the West.As the millennium drew to a close, however, some Muslims seemed to live up to this Western perception, and, for the first time, have made sacred violence a cardinal Islamic duty. These fundamentalists often call Western colonialism and post-colonial Western imperialism al-Salibiyyab: the Crusade. The colonial crusade has been less violent but its impact has been more devastating than the medieval holy wars. The powerful Muslim world has been reduced to a dependent bloc, and Muslim society has been gravely dislocated in the course of an accelerated modernization programme. All over the world, as we have seen, people in all the major faiths have reeled under the impact of Western modernity, and have produced the embattled and frequently intolerant religiosity that we call fundamentalism. As they struggle to rectify what they see as the damaging effects of modern secular culture, fundamentalists fight back and, in the process, they depart from the core values of compassion, justice and benevolence that characterize all the world faiths, including Islam. Religion, like any other human activity, is often abused, but at its best it helps human beings to cultivate a sense of the sacred inviolability of each individual, and thus to mitigate the murderous violence to which our species is tragically prone. Religion has committed atrocities in the past, but in its brief history secularism has proved that it can be just as violent. As we have seen, secular aggression and persecution have often led to a heightening of religious intolerance and hatred.This became tragically clear in Algeria in 1992. During the religious revival of the 1970s, the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) challenged the hegemony of the secular nationalist party, the National Liberation Front (FLN), which had led the revolution against French colonial rule in 1954, and had established a socialist government in the country in 1962. The Algerian revolution against France had been an inspiration to Arabs and Muslims who were also struggling to gain independence from Europe. The FLN was similar to the other secular and socialist governments in the Middle East at this time, which had relegated Islam to the private sphere, on the Western pattern. By the 1970s, however, people all over the Muslim world were becoming dissatisfied with these secularist ideologies which had not delivered what they had promised. Abbas Madani, one of the founding members of FIS, wanted to create an Islamic political ideology for the modern world; Ali ibn Hajj, the imam of a mosque in a poor neighborhood in Algiers, led a more radical wing of FIS. Slowly, FIS began to build its own mosques, without getting permission from the government; it took root in the Muslim community in France, where workers demanded places of prayer in the factories and offices, incurring the wrath of the right-wing party led by Jean-Marie Le Pen.By the 1980s, Algeria was in the grip of an economic crisis. FLN had set the country on the path to democracy and statehood, but over the years it had become corrupt. The old garde were reluctant to attempt more democratic reforms. There had been a population explosion in Algeria; most of its thirty million inhabitants were under thirty, many were unemployed, and there was an acute housing shortage. There were riots. Frustrated with the stagnation and ineptitude of the FLN, the young wanted something new and turned to the Islamic parties. In June 1990 the FIS scored major victories in the local elections, especially in the urban areas. FIS activists were mostly young, idealistic and well educated; they were known to be honest and efficient in government, though they were dogmatic and conservative in some areas, such as their insistence upon traditional Islamic dress for women. But the FIS was not anti-Western. Leaders spoke of encouraging links with the European Union and fresh Western investment. After the electoral victories at the local level, they seemed certain to succeed in the legislative elections that were scheduled for 1992.There was to be no Islamic government in Algeria, however. The military staged a coup, ousted the liberal FLN President Benjedid (who had promised democratic reforms), suppressed FIS, and threw its leaders into prison. Had elections been prevented in such a violent and unconstitutional manner in Iran and Pakistan, there would have been an outcry in the West Such a coup would have been seen as an example of Islam's supposedly endemic aversion to democracy and its basic incompatibility with the modern world. But because it was an Islamic government that had been thwarted by the coup, there was jubilation in the Western press. Algeria had been saved from the Islamic menace; the bars, casinos an discotheques of Algiers had been spared; and in some mysterious way, this undemocratic action had made Algeria safe forThe result was tragically predictable. Pushed outside the due processes of law, outraged, and despairing of justice, the more radical members of FIS broke away to form a guerrilla organization, the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), and began terror campaign in the mountainous regions south of Algiers. There were massacres, in which the population of entire villages was killed. Journalists and intellectuals, secular and religious, were also targeted. It was generally assumed that the Islamists were wholly responsible for these atrocities, but gradually questions were asked which pointed to the fact that some elements in the Algerian military forces not only acquiesced but also participated in the killing to discredit the GIA. There was now a ghastly stalemate. Both FLN and FIS were torn apart by an internal feud between the pragmatists, who wanted a solution, and the hardliners, who refused to negotiate. The violence of the initial coup to stop the elections had led to an outright war between the religious and secularists. In January 1995 the Roman Catholic Church helped to organize a meeting in Rome to bring the two sides together, but Zeroual's government refused to participate. A golden opportunity had been lost. There was more Islamic terror, and a constitutional referendum banned all religious political parties.The tragic case of Algeria must not become a paradigm for the future. Suppression and coercion had helped to push a disgruntled Muslim minority into a violence that offends every central tenet of Islam. An aggressive secularism had resulted in a religiosity that was a travesty of true faith. The incident further tarnished the notion of democracy, which the West is so anxious to promote, but which, it appeared, had limits, if the democratic process might lead to the establishment of an elected Islamic government. The people of Europe and the United States were shown to be ignorant about the various parties and groups within the Islamic world. The moderate FIS was equated with the most violent fundamentalist groups and was associated in the Western mind with the violence, illegality and anti-democratic behavior that had this time been displayed by the secularists in the FLN.But whether the West likes it or not, the initial success of he FIS in the local elections showed that the people wanted some form of Islamic government. It passed a clear message to Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia, where secularist governments ad long been aware of the growing religiosity of their countries. In the middle of the twentieth century, secularism had been dominant, and Islam was thought to be irredeemably passe. Now any secularist government in the Middle East was uncomfortably aware that if there were truly democratic elections, an Islamic government might well come to power. In Egypt, for example, Islam is as popular as Nasserism was in 1950s. Islamic dress is ubiquitous and, since Mubarak's government is secularist, is clearly voluntarily assumed. Even secularist Turkey, recent polls showed that some 70 percent the population claimed to be devout, and that 20 percent prayed five times a day. People are turning to the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan, and Palestinians are looking to Mujamah, while the PLO, which in the 1960s carried all before it, is now looking cumbersome, corrupt and out of date. In the republics of Central Asia, Muslims are rediscovering their religion after decades of Soviet oppression. People have tried the secularist ideologies, which have worked so successfully in Western countries where they are on home ground. Increasingly, Muslims want their governments to conform more closely to the Islamic norm.The precise form that this will take is not yet clear. In Egypt it seems that a majority of Muslims would like to see the Shariah as the law of the land, whereas in Turkey only 3 percent want this. Even in Egypt, however, some of the ulama are aware that the problems of transforming the Shariah, an agrarian law code, to the very different conditions of modernity will be extreme. Rashid Rida had been aware of this as early as the 1930s. But that is not to say that it cannot be done.It is not true that Muslims are now uniformly filled with hatred of the West. In the early stages of modernization, many leading thinkers were infatuated with European culture, and by the end of the twentieth century some of the most eminent and influential Muslim thinkers were now, reaching out to the West again. President Khatami of Iran is only one example of this trend. So is the Iranian intellectual Abdolkarim Sorush, who held important posts in Khomeini's government, and though he is often harried by the more conservative mujtahids, he strongly influences those in power. Sorush admires Khomeini, but has moved beyond him. He maintains that Iranians now have three identities: preIslamic, Islamic and Western, which they must try to reconcile. Sorush rejects the secularism of the West and believes that human beings will always need spirituality, but advises Iranians to study the modern sciences, while holding on to Shii tradition. Islam must develop its fiqh, so as to accommodate the modern industrial world, and evolve a philosophy of civil rights and an economic theory capable of holding its own in the twenty-first century.Sunni thinkers have come to similar conclusions. Western hostility towards Islam springs from ignorance, Rashid al' Ghannouchi, the leader of the exiled Renaissance Party in Tunisia, believes. It also springs from a bad experience of Christianity, which did stifle thought and creativity. He describes himself as a "democratic Islamist" and sees no incompatibility between Islam and democracy, but he rejects the secularism of the West, because the human being cannot be so divided and fragmented. The Muslim ideal of tawhid rejects the duality of body and spirit, intellect and spirituality, men and women, morality and the economy, East and West. Muslims want modernity, but not one that has been imposed upon them by America, Britain or France. Muslims admire the efficiency and beautiful technology of the West; they are fascinated by the way a regime can be changed in the West without bloodshed. But when Muslims look at Western society, they see no light, no heart and no spirituality. They want to hold on to their own religious and moral traditions and, at the same time, to try to incorporate some of the best aspects of Western civilization. Yusuf Abdallah al-Qaradawi, a gradate of al-Azhar, and a Muslim Brother, who is currently the director of the Centre for Sunnah and Sirah at the University of Qatar, takes a similar line. He believes in moderation, and is convinced that the bigotry that has recently appeared in the Muslim world will impoverish people by depriving them of the insights and visions of other human beings. The Prophet Muhammad said that he had come to bring a "Middle Way" of religious life that shunned extremes, and Qaradawi thinks that the current extremism in some quarters of the Islamic world is alien to the Muslim spirit and will not last. Islam is a religion of peace, as the Prophet had shown when he made an unpopular treaty with the Quraysh at Hudaybiyyah, a feat which the Quran calls "a great victory." The West, he insists, must learn to recognize the Muslims' right to live their religion and, if they choose, to incorporate the Islamic ideal in their polity. They have to appreciate that there is more than one way of life. Variety benefits the whole world. God gave human beings the right and ability to choose, and some may, opt for a religious way of life - including an Islamic state - while others prefer the secular ideal."It is better for the West that Muslims should be religious," Qaradawi argues, "hold to their religion, and try to be moral."' He raises an important point. Many Western people are also becoming uncomfortable about the absence of spirituality in their lives. They do not necessarily want to return to pre-modern religious lifestyles or to conventionally institutional faith. But there is a growing appreciation that, at its best, religion has helped human beings to cultivate deceit values. Islam kept the notions of social justice, equality, tolerance and practical compassion in the forefront of the Muslim conscience for centuries. Muslims did not always live up to these ideals and frequently found difficulty in incarnating them in their social and political institutions. But the struggle to achieve this was for centuries the mainspring of Islamic spirituality. Western people must become aware that it is in their interests too that Islam remains healthy and strong.The West has not been wholly responsible for the extreme forms of Islam, which have cultivated a violence that violates the most sacred canons of religion. But the West has certainly contributed to this development and, to assuage the fear and despair that lies at the root of all fundamentalist vision, should cultivate a more accurate appreciation of Islam in the third Christian millennium.
Excerpted from the book "Islam - A Short History" by Karen Armstrong. democracy. The French government threw its support behind the new hardline FLN of President Liamine Zeroual and strengthened his resolve to hold no further dialogue with FIS. Not surprisingly, the Muslim world was shocked by this fresh instance of Western double standards.
About Quran
From: http://happy-muslim.tripod.com/id17.htm
WHAT IS "THE QUR'AN"?The Holy Book of Islam, the Qur'an, is not the work of a man, nor it is the collected thoughts or opinions of wise men through the ages. It is the "Word of the Almighty God(ALLAH)", the Creator, The Lord of the universe. It is the perfect revelation to mankind.Though called and treated as a book, the Qur'an is not a book in the ordinary sense of the word. It is neither a treatise nor a dissertation on a particular theme;nor it is a book on religion.
Its overall style and organisation of the matter basically differ from the other religious scriptures. It is unique, the only one of its kind in the whole world. WHAT DOES IT DEAL WITH?The subject matter of the Qur'an is "man" (human beings) and it discusses those aspects of his life which lead to his REAL success or failure. The central theme that runs through the Qur'an is the exposition of "Reality" with the aim of inviting human beings to the Right Path. Its purpose is not simply to inform or to convince but to mould and transform. As such, it tries simultaneously to inform, to persuade, to convince and to motivate and mobilize men and woman to fulfil their mission in life.
A GREAT HUMAN NEEDGod, after creating the human race, has not just left them without any direction. If the loving Creator has provided air, water and food for physical existence and growth, He has also provided guidance for the moral, social and spiritual existence and development. The Qur'an is but Divine Guidance to mankind - guidance in the widest sense of the world.O! Mankind surely to you has come the sermon (message/rememberance), which is healing for the diseases of the Heart, and is the guidance and blessing for the Believers (10:57)How can anyone know for sure what is the "Reality"? How can anyone have the unquestionable knowledge of the ultimate values to which human behaviour should confirm? Certainly not through the instinct, habit, intuition, reason or experience and not through the resources of guidance developed by man himself through the ages (mythology, philosophy, science, history, law etc.) which are too subjective and too limited, and are misleading. Divine Guidance is the greatest human need. Surely the judgement (deen) in Allah's sight is Islam (Allah's Islam), But those who were given the book strayed away and repelled after the knowledge had come to them out of enimity, and whoever doesn't believe in His Ayyats ...then Allah is the strickest judge (3:19)
IT IS THE ONLY SCRIPTURE WHICH ...
•
is totally and purely the "Word of God". It does not contain anything other than the "Word of God", not even a word of the Prophet. (The sayings of the Prophet, called Hadith, are compiled as separate books). The Scripture itself claims that it is undoubtedly from God Almighty.
•
has the language and style that cannot be imitated by human beings. It has stood as a challenge to the literary ability of mere mortals. It is a living miracle revealed to the unlettered Prophet.
•
is present today in a living language and is independet of translations. Its language, Arabic, is still widely spoken and understood today. In fact, the Qur'an has kept the language alive and remains its source of inspiration. The original clear Arabic text can always be referred to for any controversy.
•
has been preserved in its exact original form as it was revealed to the Prophet about fourteen hundred years ago, not a word added or removed. This is a historical fact beyond any doubt. Millions of Muslims, the world over, know its text by heart. So there has been only one version of the Qur'an all over the world, all through the ages, right from the time of the Prophet.
•
has always been in the hands of the people and was never a property of clergy or a section of the society.
APPROACH TO THE QUR'ANEvery discipline has its own demands. So has the Qur'an. Anyone who wants to really understand the message of the Qur'an, whether he actually belives in the Book or not, will be able to get the best results if he approaches it: with an open mind, putting aside all the pre-conceived notions,bearing in mind the nature of this Book and its uniqueness, and in a spirit of reverence, and not with casual treatment given to any ordinary book. This is Holy Book and it is to be handled with respect. The reader should be clean in his person and place of sitting and he sould never put it in a unclean place.
This is the Book; In it is guidance sure, without doubt, to those who are God-conscious. (2:2)
This Qur'an will guide to that which is most upright, and promises the belivers who do good works, a rich reward; And threatens those who belive not in the Herafter, with a grievous penalty. (17:9,10)
So, Don't the people Ponder in the Qur'an, Or do they have locks on their Hearts. (47:24)
Don't hasten (in reading) with your tongue, with this (the Book)
Surely to compile (in our hearts) and to teach is our responsibility (Allah's)
So, whenever we read it, follow what is being read
Then surely it's our responsibility to make it clear to you (75:16-19)
WHAT IS "THE QUR'AN"?The Holy Book of Islam, the Qur'an, is not the work of a man, nor it is the collected thoughts or opinions of wise men through the ages. It is the "Word of the Almighty God(ALLAH)", the Creator, The Lord of the universe. It is the perfect revelation to mankind.Though called and treated as a book, the Qur'an is not a book in the ordinary sense of the word. It is neither a treatise nor a dissertation on a particular theme;nor it is a book on religion.
Its overall style and organisation of the matter basically differ from the other religious scriptures. It is unique, the only one of its kind in the whole world. WHAT DOES IT DEAL WITH?The subject matter of the Qur'an is "man" (human beings) and it discusses those aspects of his life which lead to his REAL success or failure. The central theme that runs through the Qur'an is the exposition of "Reality" with the aim of inviting human beings to the Right Path. Its purpose is not simply to inform or to convince but to mould and transform. As such, it tries simultaneously to inform, to persuade, to convince and to motivate and mobilize men and woman to fulfil their mission in life.
A GREAT HUMAN NEEDGod, after creating the human race, has not just left them without any direction. If the loving Creator has provided air, water and food for physical existence and growth, He has also provided guidance for the moral, social and spiritual existence and development. The Qur'an is but Divine Guidance to mankind - guidance in the widest sense of the world.O! Mankind surely to you has come the sermon (message/rememberance), which is healing for the diseases of the Heart, and is the guidance and blessing for the Believers (10:57)How can anyone know for sure what is the "Reality"? How can anyone have the unquestionable knowledge of the ultimate values to which human behaviour should confirm? Certainly not through the instinct, habit, intuition, reason or experience and not through the resources of guidance developed by man himself through the ages (mythology, philosophy, science, history, law etc.) which are too subjective and too limited, and are misleading. Divine Guidance is the greatest human need. Surely the judgement (deen) in Allah's sight is Islam (Allah's Islam), But those who were given the book strayed away and repelled after the knowledge had come to them out of enimity, and whoever doesn't believe in His Ayyats ...then Allah is the strickest judge (3:19)
IT IS THE ONLY SCRIPTURE WHICH ...
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is totally and purely the "Word of God". It does not contain anything other than the "Word of God", not even a word of the Prophet. (The sayings of the Prophet, called Hadith, are compiled as separate books). The Scripture itself claims that it is undoubtedly from God Almighty.
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has the language and style that cannot be imitated by human beings. It has stood as a challenge to the literary ability of mere mortals. It is a living miracle revealed to the unlettered Prophet.
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is present today in a living language and is independet of translations. Its language, Arabic, is still widely spoken and understood today. In fact, the Qur'an has kept the language alive and remains its source of inspiration. The original clear Arabic text can always be referred to for any controversy.
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has been preserved in its exact original form as it was revealed to the Prophet about fourteen hundred years ago, not a word added or removed. This is a historical fact beyond any doubt. Millions of Muslims, the world over, know its text by heart. So there has been only one version of the Qur'an all over the world, all through the ages, right from the time of the Prophet.
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has always been in the hands of the people and was never a property of clergy or a section of the society.
APPROACH TO THE QUR'ANEvery discipline has its own demands. So has the Qur'an. Anyone who wants to really understand the message of the Qur'an, whether he actually belives in the Book or not, will be able to get the best results if he approaches it: with an open mind, putting aside all the pre-conceived notions,bearing in mind the nature of this Book and its uniqueness, and in a spirit of reverence, and not with casual treatment given to any ordinary book. This is Holy Book and it is to be handled with respect. The reader should be clean in his person and place of sitting and he sould never put it in a unclean place.
This is the Book; In it is guidance sure, without doubt, to those who are God-conscious. (2:2)
This Qur'an will guide to that which is most upright, and promises the belivers who do good works, a rich reward; And threatens those who belive not in the Herafter, with a grievous penalty. (17:9,10)
So, Don't the people Ponder in the Qur'an, Or do they have locks on their Hearts. (47:24)
Don't hasten (in reading) with your tongue, with this (the Book)
Surely to compile (in our hearts) and to teach is our responsibility (Allah's)
So, whenever we read it, follow what is being read
Then surely it's our responsibility to make it clear to you (75:16-19)
Sunday, February 03, 2008
Muslims need to revive their intellectual traditions’
From: The Daily News.
* Karen Armstrong urges today’s Muslims to follow the example of reasoning undertaken by the companions of the Holy Prophet (PBUH)LAHORE: Dr Karen Armstrong asserted on Saturday that Muslims today needed to follow the example of the companions of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), who, in the time immediately after his death, had re-explored the verses of the Holy Quran within the framework of ‘reasoning’ in order to establish a pluralistic society. The internationally renowned religious historian and scholar said this while delivering a seminar entitled “Intellectual Traditions in Islam” – part of a series of lectures to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of the Imamate of His Highness the Aga Khan. The lectures, organised by the Ismaili Council of Pakistan, were aimed at developing a comprehensive understanding of the need for pluralism and tolerance within society. Dr Armstrong stressed that the world often passed through periods of great turbulence and upheaval. Indeed, she noted, Muslims had faced such crises directly after the death of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). Fitna (chaos or mischief), she said, ensued after his death. For many at that time, his death represented a religious and political vacuum. Others saw the crisis as having the potential to give space to non-Arab influences that directly challenged the prevailing Arab-Islamic culture. Thus, she noted, the companions of the Prophet (PBUH) began addressing these problems within the framework of Quranic injunctions and the teachings of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) in the form of the books of the Hadith, which were compiled in order to offer additional guidance to Muslims. Dr Armstrong stressed that great Islamic scholars such as Abne Rushad (Averros) and Ibne Seena (Avicena) were also at the forefront of those who pondered and followed the teachings of their religion within the framework of reasoning in order to form a just and ideal society. Thus, she said, Muslims today should not shy away from adopting the same approach towards Islam. This was especially true given that the Holy Quran represents a code of conduct, which promotes the idea of pluralism and, as such, is open to new ideas. “We need to assume confidence which we do not have at the moment and then we need to recover spiritualism.”Given that Muslim tradition had demonstrated an introspective approach to the crises of a particular era, she urged Muslims today to adopt a similar approach. This would help them fulfil the visions of Muslim saints, including the Sufi leaders, who had practised Islam in its true form to promote humanity, equality and respect for all. Indeed, Dr Armstrong said that since the Holy Quran itself urged believers against blind faith, Muslims should engage in exploring the true meaning of its injunctions in order to advance further the cause of humanity. Earlier, President Ismaili Council for Pakistan Iqbal Walji addressed the gathering saying that it was essential for Muslims to promote a pluralistic society in order to foster peace and harmony. In addition, he said that communities needed to be provided with a greater range of choices and understanding in order to promote mutual respect and tolerance. Towards this end, he said that it was imperative to promote good governance in the bid to eradicate poverty. Stressing that the world should strive to become an alliance of civilisations, Mr Walji appreciated the role played by Dr Armstrong in building bridges between the West and the Islamic world. After the end of the lecture, the audience was invited to participate in a brief questions and answers session, where Dr Armstrong again stressed that the Holy Quran outlined the need for understanding of Islam’s true meaning and that this could not be developed until its injunctions had been fully explored. Such an approach, she said, should extend to madrassa education. Dr Armstrong is the author of many books on religion, many of which have been translated into forty languages worldwide. In 1999, she was honoured by the Muslim Council for Public Affairs (USA) and in 2004 by the Muslim Association of Social Sciences in recognition of her contributions for building bridges between the West and Islamic world. staff report
* Karen Armstrong urges today’s Muslims to follow the example of reasoning undertaken by the companions of the Holy Prophet (PBUH)LAHORE: Dr Karen Armstrong asserted on Saturday that Muslims today needed to follow the example of the companions of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), who, in the time immediately after his death, had re-explored the verses of the Holy Quran within the framework of ‘reasoning’ in order to establish a pluralistic society. The internationally renowned religious historian and scholar said this while delivering a seminar entitled “Intellectual Traditions in Islam” – part of a series of lectures to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of the Imamate of His Highness the Aga Khan. The lectures, organised by the Ismaili Council of Pakistan, were aimed at developing a comprehensive understanding of the need for pluralism and tolerance within society. Dr Armstrong stressed that the world often passed through periods of great turbulence and upheaval. Indeed, she noted, Muslims had faced such crises directly after the death of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). Fitna (chaos or mischief), she said, ensued after his death. For many at that time, his death represented a religious and political vacuum. Others saw the crisis as having the potential to give space to non-Arab influences that directly challenged the prevailing Arab-Islamic culture. Thus, she noted, the companions of the Prophet (PBUH) began addressing these problems within the framework of Quranic injunctions and the teachings of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) in the form of the books of the Hadith, which were compiled in order to offer additional guidance to Muslims. Dr Armstrong stressed that great Islamic scholars such as Abne Rushad (Averros) and Ibne Seena (Avicena) were also at the forefront of those who pondered and followed the teachings of their religion within the framework of reasoning in order to form a just and ideal society. Thus, she said, Muslims today should not shy away from adopting the same approach towards Islam. This was especially true given that the Holy Quran represents a code of conduct, which promotes the idea of pluralism and, as such, is open to new ideas. “We need to assume confidence which we do not have at the moment and then we need to recover spiritualism.”Given that Muslim tradition had demonstrated an introspective approach to the crises of a particular era, she urged Muslims today to adopt a similar approach. This would help them fulfil the visions of Muslim saints, including the Sufi leaders, who had practised Islam in its true form to promote humanity, equality and respect for all. Indeed, Dr Armstrong said that since the Holy Quran itself urged believers against blind faith, Muslims should engage in exploring the true meaning of its injunctions in order to advance further the cause of humanity. Earlier, President Ismaili Council for Pakistan Iqbal Walji addressed the gathering saying that it was essential for Muslims to promote a pluralistic society in order to foster peace and harmony. In addition, he said that communities needed to be provided with a greater range of choices and understanding in order to promote mutual respect and tolerance. Towards this end, he said that it was imperative to promote good governance in the bid to eradicate poverty. Stressing that the world should strive to become an alliance of civilisations, Mr Walji appreciated the role played by Dr Armstrong in building bridges between the West and the Islamic world. After the end of the lecture, the audience was invited to participate in a brief questions and answers session, where Dr Armstrong again stressed that the Holy Quran outlined the need for understanding of Islam’s true meaning and that this could not be developed until its injunctions had been fully explored. Such an approach, she said, should extend to madrassa education. Dr Armstrong is the author of many books on religion, many of which have been translated into forty languages worldwide. In 1999, she was honoured by the Muslim Council for Public Affairs (USA) and in 2004 by the Muslim Association of Social Sciences in recognition of her contributions for building bridges between the West and Islamic world. staff report
Saturday, February 02, 2008
Deep Thinking
From: www.islamicity.com
By: Harun Yahya www.HarunYahya.com*
Have you ever thought about the fact that you did not exist before you were conceived and then born into the world and that you have come into existence from mere nothingness?
Have you ever thought about how the flowers you see in your living room everyday come out of pitch black, muddy soil with fragrant smells and are as colorful as they are?
Have you ever thought about how mosquitoes, which irritatingly fly around you, move their wings so fast that we are unable to see them?
Have you ever thought about how the peels of fruits such as bananas, watermelons, melons and oranges serve as wrappings of high quality, and how the fruits are packed in these wrappings so that they maintain their taste and fragrance?
Have you ever thought about the possibility that while you are asleep a sudden earthquake could raze your home, your office, and your city to the ground and that in a few seconds you could lose everything of the world you possess?
Have you ever thought of how your life passes away very quickly, and that you will grow old and become weak, and slowly lose your beauty, health and strength?
Have you ever thought about how one day you will find the angels of death appointed by God before you and that you will then leave this world?
Well, have you ever thought about why people are so attached to a world from which they will soon depart when what they basically need is to strive for the hereafter?
Man is a being whom God furnishes with the faculty of thought. Yet, most people do not use this very important faculty as they should. In fact, some people almost never think.
In truth, each person possesses a capacity for thought of which even he himself is unaware. Once man begins to use this capacity, facts he has not been able to realise until that very moment begin to be uncovered for him. The deeper he goes in reflection, the more his capacity to think improves, and this is possible for everyone. One just has to realise that one needs to reflect and then to strive hard.
Someone who does not think will remain totally distant from truths and lead his life in self-deception and error. As a result, he will not grasp the purpose of the creation of the world, and the reason for his existence on the earth. Yet, God has created everything with a purpose. This fact is stated in the Qur'an as follows:
We did not create the heavens and the earth and everything between them as a game. We did not create them except with truth but most of them do not know it. (Surat ad-Dukhan: 38-39)
Did you suppose that We created you for amusement and that you would not return to Us? (Surat al-Muminun: 115)
Therefore, each person needs to ponder the purpose of creation, first as it concerns him himself, and then as it pertains to everything he sees in the universe and every event he experiences throughout his life. Someone who does not think, will understand the facts only after he dies, when he gives account before God, but then it will be too late. God says in the Qur'an that on the day of account, everybody will think and see the truth:
That day Hell is produced, that day man will remember; but how will the remembrance help him? He will say, "Oh! If only I had prepared in advance for this life of mine!" (Surat al-Fajr: 23-24)
The truth can be told to a person in many different ways; it can be shown by the use of details, pieces of evidence and by every means. Yet, if this person does not think over this truth on his own, sincerely and honestly with the purpose of comprehending the truth, all these efforts are useless. For this reason, when the messengers of God communicated the message to their people, they told them the truth clearly and then summoned them to think.
While God has given us a chance in the life of this world to reflect and derive conclusions from our reflections, to see the truth will bring us great gain in our life in the hereafter. For this reason, God has summoned all people, through His prophets and books, to reflect on their creation and on the creation of the universe:
Have they not reflected within themselves? God did not create the heavens and the earth and everything between them except with truth and for a fixed term. Yet many people reject the meeting with their Lord. (Surat ar-Rum: 8)
A man who reflects grasps the secrets of God's creation, the truth of the life of this world, the existence of hell and paradise, and the inner truth of matters. He gets a deeper understanding of the importance of being a person with whom God is pleased, and so he lives religion as is its due, recognizes God's attributes in everything he sees, and begins to think not according to what the majority of people demand but as God commands. As a result, he takes pleasure from beauty much more than others do, and does not suffer distress from baseless misapprehensions and worldly greed.
These are only a few of the beautiful things a person who thinks will gain in the world. The gain in the hereafter of someone who always finds the truth by thinking, is the love, approval, mercy and the paradise of our Lord, which are above everything else. Harun Yahya is a pen name used by Mr. Adnan Oktar. Born in Ankara in 1956, Adnan Oktar is a prominent Turkish intellectual. Completely devoted to moral values and dedicated to communicating the sacred values he cherishes to other people, Oktar started his intellectual struggle in 1979 during his education at Mimar Sinan University's Academy of Fine Arts.
By: Harun Yahya www.HarunYahya.com*
Have you ever thought about the fact that you did not exist before you were conceived and then born into the world and that you have come into existence from mere nothingness?
Have you ever thought about how the flowers you see in your living room everyday come out of pitch black, muddy soil with fragrant smells and are as colorful as they are?
Have you ever thought about how mosquitoes, which irritatingly fly around you, move their wings so fast that we are unable to see them?
Have you ever thought about how the peels of fruits such as bananas, watermelons, melons and oranges serve as wrappings of high quality, and how the fruits are packed in these wrappings so that they maintain their taste and fragrance?
Have you ever thought about the possibility that while you are asleep a sudden earthquake could raze your home, your office, and your city to the ground and that in a few seconds you could lose everything of the world you possess?
Have you ever thought of how your life passes away very quickly, and that you will grow old and become weak, and slowly lose your beauty, health and strength?
Have you ever thought about how one day you will find the angels of death appointed by God before you and that you will then leave this world?
Well, have you ever thought about why people are so attached to a world from which they will soon depart when what they basically need is to strive for the hereafter?
Man is a being whom God furnishes with the faculty of thought. Yet, most people do not use this very important faculty as they should. In fact, some people almost never think.
In truth, each person possesses a capacity for thought of which even he himself is unaware. Once man begins to use this capacity, facts he has not been able to realise until that very moment begin to be uncovered for him. The deeper he goes in reflection, the more his capacity to think improves, and this is possible for everyone. One just has to realise that one needs to reflect and then to strive hard.
Someone who does not think will remain totally distant from truths and lead his life in self-deception and error. As a result, he will not grasp the purpose of the creation of the world, and the reason for his existence on the earth. Yet, God has created everything with a purpose. This fact is stated in the Qur'an as follows:
We did not create the heavens and the earth and everything between them as a game. We did not create them except with truth but most of them do not know it. (Surat ad-Dukhan: 38-39)
Did you suppose that We created you for amusement and that you would not return to Us? (Surat al-Muminun: 115)
Therefore, each person needs to ponder the purpose of creation, first as it concerns him himself, and then as it pertains to everything he sees in the universe and every event he experiences throughout his life. Someone who does not think, will understand the facts only after he dies, when he gives account before God, but then it will be too late. God says in the Qur'an that on the day of account, everybody will think and see the truth:
That day Hell is produced, that day man will remember; but how will the remembrance help him? He will say, "Oh! If only I had prepared in advance for this life of mine!" (Surat al-Fajr: 23-24)
The truth can be told to a person in many different ways; it can be shown by the use of details, pieces of evidence and by every means. Yet, if this person does not think over this truth on his own, sincerely and honestly with the purpose of comprehending the truth, all these efforts are useless. For this reason, when the messengers of God communicated the message to their people, they told them the truth clearly and then summoned them to think.
While God has given us a chance in the life of this world to reflect and derive conclusions from our reflections, to see the truth will bring us great gain in our life in the hereafter. For this reason, God has summoned all people, through His prophets and books, to reflect on their creation and on the creation of the universe:
Have they not reflected within themselves? God did not create the heavens and the earth and everything between them except with truth and for a fixed term. Yet many people reject the meeting with their Lord. (Surat ar-Rum: 8)
A man who reflects grasps the secrets of God's creation, the truth of the life of this world, the existence of hell and paradise, and the inner truth of matters. He gets a deeper understanding of the importance of being a person with whom God is pleased, and so he lives religion as is its due, recognizes God's attributes in everything he sees, and begins to think not according to what the majority of people demand but as God commands. As a result, he takes pleasure from beauty much more than others do, and does not suffer distress from baseless misapprehensions and worldly greed.
These are only a few of the beautiful things a person who thinks will gain in the world. The gain in the hereafter of someone who always finds the truth by thinking, is the love, approval, mercy and the paradise of our Lord, which are above everything else. Harun Yahya is a pen name used by Mr. Adnan Oktar. Born in Ankara in 1956, Adnan Oktar is a prominent Turkish intellectual. Completely devoted to moral values and dedicated to communicating the sacred values he cherishes to other people, Oktar started his intellectual struggle in 1979 during his education at Mimar Sinan University's Academy of Fine Arts.
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