It’s Okay to Proselytize Islam
This posting will share some beautiful experiences. It will also contrast how it is okay and encouraged to proselytize Islam around the world but against the law with harsh repercussions in the Kingdom to proselytize any other faith than Islam in the Kingdom.
The other day a well-known and respected Sheik gave a presentation at an organization. The presentation was in Arabic but translated to English as well. The sheik, Abdulrahman Al Sumait, shared his experiences in working with a Saudi charity of which he spent 29 years working in Africa: Direct Aid, African Muslims Agency. (www.africanmuslimsagency.co.za) His mission was to assist the needy as well as preach and convert others to Islam.
He shared tragic experiences of seeing too many people on the verge of death due to starvation and illnesses knowing that he would be unable to assist them. He also had to perform triage when helping some of the people knowing he must assist the ones who would likely have a chance to survive with his help. His discussion of experiences was supplemented with photos showing people (adults and children) who literally looked the walking dead when he found them but whom he saved and nursed back to good health. His photos were before and after shots which really made his points and the efforts he made hit home.
He was dedicated to his work and his mission. He typically spent 11 months of each year working in Africa taking only 30 days leave to return to Saudi Arabia and visit with his family. One year he had his children join him in Africa. He described the shocks they received on seeing the realities he had spoken about and dealth with on a daily basis there. While some may have thought his decision to bring his children to Africa among the desolation, death and destruction was too harsh, he believed it was important for his children to see with their own eyes the conditions in which these people lived and bring them closer to further understand his work. He openly shared how his children were disturbed by seeing people they could not help and how at one time they tried to save a child whom he had told them was beyond saving. The child died in a vehicle with the children while they were taking the child to a medical facility (against the father’s advise who had told them it was probably too late).
According to the sheik, the experiences his children had while assisting him in Africa taught them the realities of life as well as deeper compassion and understanding. Anytime they hear of people complaining because they do not have this new mobile or do not like a particular dish, they will remind the complainant of how life can be much much worse.
As I mentioned, in addition to helping the sick and needy, the sheik also attempted to convert the African tribes people to Islam. Many of them had never heard of any religion let alone Islam. If they worshipped at all, it was usually some kind of idol they viewed as a God. He patiently told stories about Islam and how Islam is a good and pure religion. He had to use simple terms since the people were uneducated. He was very pleased when a tribal leader chose to convert to Islam. The sheik decided it would be appropriate to send the tribal leader to Hajj. Not only would this likely be viewed as building up the stature of the tribal leader within the tribe but likely facilitate towards converting more of the African tribe people to Islam – in the mind of the sheik.
When he told the tribal leader he was going to be sent on Hajj the initial reaction of the tribal leader was not what the sheik expected. The tribal leader was shaken and reluctant. It turned out that his understanding of Hajj was that he would be sent to paradise. However after thinking it all through the tribal leader decided if that is what the sheik wanted of him, he would go. In preparing for his trip, he began to give away his lands, his possessions and settle his affairs and start preparing himself for entry to paradise.
When he boarded the plane and it descended above the clouds he was more convinced than ever he was now on his way to Paradise. On landing at Jeddah airport the tribal leader was so happy to be off of the aircraft and entering Paradise the first thing he did was bend down and kiss the ground. On standing he was surprised by what he saw. There were no rivers running full of honey or beautiful virgins waiting to greet him. All he saw were many men around dressed all in white like himself. Obviously they were on their way to Paradise too. So he chose to follow them. Of course he ended up in Mecca where he learned the true meaning and beauty of Hajj which was of another Paradise unto itself. Yes, he did return to Africa and his tribe and as the wise sheik had hoped, the tribal leader shared his experiences and in turn many more of the tribe continued to convert to Islam on the words and experience of their leader.
The sheik concluded his lecture at the organization encouraging the attendees to be kind to one another and never forget the true spirit and meaning of Islam. It was certainly a “feel good” lecture and the sheik was a charismatic speaker. He discussed the virtues of Islam but at no point did he criticize or discuss other religions.
I enjoyed the presentation and hearing of the experiences. However at the same time, the thought did run through my mind how it is okay for individuals such as the sheik to go out and administer to the people and teach them of Islam but if one attempts to speak out about a faith other than Islam in the Kingdom it is a punishable offense.
Filed under: culture, islam, politics, relationships, religion, Saudi Arabia, Saudi culture, Saudi customs, travel, Uncategorized
“how it is okay for individuals such as the sheik to go out and administer to the people and teach them of Islam but if one attempts to speak out about a faith other than Islam in the Kingdom it is a punishable offense.”
Sadly, this reaches beyond the local scene, and causes students when abroad to feel sensitive towards other faith’s similar attempts at preaching and persuading others to join a religion other than Islam (be it Christianity, Judaism, etc.) Being intolerant of other faiths locally, helps engrave in the collective mind that it is okey for Muslims to preach, because they are good, but it is bad for others to do just the same because they necessarily work according to “evil” agendas.
http://ayshak.blogspot.com/2007/11/takes-on-to-know-one.html
The problem with initiating laws to support and discourage certain faiths, is that faiths eventually get mixed up with politics. In my opinion, that is what harmed faiths the most througout history.
*Al-Sumait has my respect.
“…if one attempts to speak out about a faith other than Islam in the Kingdom it is a punishable offense.”
It is a punishable offence because of what the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam) and the sahaba said. It is well-known that Umar (ra) forbade Christians from expanding churches or building new ones, and that under his premiership all non-Muslims inhabitants were expelled from the peninsula (but not from other Muslim lands), in accordance with the wishes of Muhammad (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam).
But I don’t understand why you don’t just ask a shaykh to tell you about this (if you are in KSA), he can give it to you in as much detail as you would want etc.
The link above for African Muslims does not work for me for some reason.
Dr. Abdul-Rahman Al-Sumait is a Kuwaiti medical doctor and preacher who established Direct Aid in 1981 in Kuwait, a charitable philanthropic organization with the aims of providing assistance to needy people in Africa.
Interview with Al-Sumait in English
I think when one sees the selfless work that this man has dedicated his life to in helping the destitute in Africa, the comparison to the situation in Saudi is negligible.
There have been Christian missionaries living amongst us in Kuwait’s history who have grown close to the Kuwaiti people through their medical knowledge; they are remembered fondly.
“There have been Christian missionaries living amongst us in Kuwait’s history who have grown close to the Kuwaiti people through their medical knowledge; they are remembered fondly”
*bangs head repeatedly against wall*
This invasion of Muslim lands was brought to you by Kuwait and the number 7. Educational stuff.
I disagree WM.
Why should you call Christians here and “invasion”? Do you also call Muslims in the West an “invasion”?
I understand what you are saying about the Prophet (saw) but I also know that Allah revealed to our Prophet (saw) that there is no compulsion in religion. And it seems in this regard — Muslims proselytizing everywhere while making it illegal in certain “Muslim countrues” — that it just goes against the spirit of Islam in my opinion.
We recently opened our first purpose-built church in Qatar for the Christian ex-pats. I think it is a welcome addition.
Salaam Alaikum,
PM
All religions are man-made!!
Religious leaders and politicians use various tools — race, colour and of course religion — to divide people and play them off against each other (read: war)
The do that to rule and control people for their own financial reasons etc.
Religion in its PUREST FORM points to GOD — it is like a road sign — telling you where to go — so religion shows direction.
But you got to travel in that direction — it IS rather stupid to sit in front of a road sign and think that your sitting (read:devotion) will take you to the city.
After a while of travelling you even forget the road sign, or encounter new ones. But once you get to the city (or maybe during your travel), you realise that the road sign is not God — and there is actually NO CONNECTION between the city and the road sign!!! The city dont even know about all the road signs!!
[email protected]
You’ve gotta love such blatant double standards. It’s quite like a child during a tantrum, “My way or no way.”
Lovely.
Immaturity and immorality are sadly, two things that people (who support such laws), possess.
While I acknowledge the generosity and kindness of religious missions in Africa and around the world, why can’t it just be about charity and good will rather than charity, good will, AND conversion?
If one believes wholeheartedly that his/her religion is truest, and other systems are only paritally true or false, then conversion efforts make sense. All religions have a tenet similar to the Islamic injunction to want for your brother what you want for yourself. The Christian version is the Golden Rule. There are others. Conversion efforts make sense if you want people to share your conviction in your own religion. Jehovah’s Witnesses actually require evangelistic activities as a requisite for membership!
So why do some of us dislike efforts at conversion?
Yes, people get inflamed about the subject, especially when two true believers butt heads. Yes, religion gets mixed up in politics for the profit of one over the other. Yes, believers claim that their religion was revealed by God, so why so many religions?
Personally, I think Botha’s got it right. Perhaps the wisdom of his words underlies the objection to evangelism.
PM, that’s not what I meant. I was thinking of Gulf War part one (Kuwait not being the only guilty party, obviously)- I guess I am morally against Muslim countries having anything to do with invasions of Muslim countries, by the US or anyone else. Not really relevant, but what the hey? 🙂
“And it seems in this regard — Muslims proselytizing everywhere while making it illegal in certain “Muslim countries” — that it just goes against the spirit of Islam in my opinion.”
I love this, PM 😀 when people invent the ‘spirit of the law’ and invoke it against its own letter. Brilliant. It’s like saying it is haram to punish adulterers (etc) because Islam orders kindness; in the Qur’an it even says not to be moved by the protests of people about to be punished for such it. They take a general commandment and abuse it to undo a specific order from the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam): which gives them an ‘F’ in Usul al-Fiqh 101 😉 W’Allahi there isn’t a single part of the religion you couldn’t destroy with this methodology (of course, I’m really not saying you are). Furthermore, there is no real attempt to find out what these general commandments entail, let alone to contextualise them or find out when they are restricted. And the anachronisms are so bad I want to pull my ears off- not to mention the implication that the sahaba and their followers (etc) got it 100% wrong. I can’t influence people or change their opinion, I’ve found; there is something wrong with my approach, obviously.
The only reason I believe in the things I mentioned in the above comment is because it is what the sahaba did, what the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam) ordered and what the Muslims followed them in doing until the year xyz. If you want to change my opinion on this issue, you will have to convince me that this is not what the sahaba did, nor what the Muslims followed them in doing. I won’t say that this is impossible, just that you will have to turn history on its head to convince me I am wrong 😉
And there is no point in telling me what UN Charters say on the matter: frankly, I don’t care.
“You’ve gotta love such blatant double standards. It’s quite like a child during a tantrum, “My way or no way.”
Maya, what an interesting indictment of the conduct of the best of Muslims on this issue. People only hold to this opinion nowadays because the sahaba did. The only way to change their minds would be a. to convince them the sahaba didn’t do this, or b. to say ‘to hell with the example of the early Muslims’.
a. takes as much intellectual effort as dishonesty, and b. fortunately doesn’t quite cut it.
Unfortunately for the detractors of KSA on this issue, you are all incapable of ‘a’ and hopefully not stupid enough for ‘b’.
I guess it’s just that charity towards those less fortuante is the tenet of pretty much every world religion. Why can we not give to those who so desperately need w/o trying to alter their belief system?
PM, I’ll send you something insha Allah.
WM, may Allah reward you for your gheerah.
Thanks Dalioness. You too.
To everyone: whatever people think my intention is, whatever it is, in fact, is not your business; deal with my arguments please.
“However at the same time, the thought did run through my mind how it is okay for individuals such as the sheik to go out and administer to the people and teach them of Islam but if one attempts to speak out about a faith other than Islam in the Kingdom it is a punishable offense”
Is this a simple thought, a genuine question or a very diplomatically-stated opinion? 🙂
Hi WM,
What prompted me to write that bit of speculation was when the Sheik discussed part of the strategy in sending the tribal leader to Hajj in that he (the tribal leader) would return and likely convince more to convert to Islam. So I guess it comes under a simple thought and geniune question.
Hi WM,
I understand what you are saying, there are just some things that I have a hard time accepting and one of them is the inherent inequality in the way Islam is intrepretted and practiced by many. I may be wrong and if so, will have to stand before Allah on yom il-qiyamah, but these are feelings in my heart and mind I cannot suppress.
Thanks for the clarification about the GWI and GWII. I was against the US getting involved in GWI — and in fact my children and I were very active in demonstrations against it (including me spending a month in NYC working in Ramsey Clark’s office). Once I met (and unfortunately married) a Kuwaiti who had been inprisoned by the Iraqis (he was high up in management of one of the refineries), I got an idea of how complex the situation was. There was a lot that was done wrong on all sides in that conflist.
Regarding GWII — there is NO excuse for the American invasion into Iraq.
Anyway, sorry for the hijack Carol 😉
Salaam Alaikum,
PM
PM,
I understand. I’ll leave off talking, I think I’ve made my point.
فَلاَ وَرَبِّكَ لاَ يُؤْمِنُونَ حَتَّىَ يُحَكِّمُوكَ فِيمَا شَجَرَ بَيْنَهُمْ ثُمَّ لاَ يَجِدُواْ فِي أَنفُسِهِمْ حَرَجًا مِّمَّا قَضَيْتَ وَيُسَلِّمُواْ تَسْلِيمًا
Translation of the meaning (Hilali/Khan):
“But no by your Lord, they can have no faith, until they make you (O Muhammad) judge in all disputes between them, and find in themselves no resistance against your decisions, and accept (them) with full submission”. Al Nisa:65.
WM-
The issue here isn’t religion, it’s simply the decision to not dehumanize a person or devalue their rights if they are not one of “yours.”
If you view another human being as having as much worth as yourself (in all aspects, their religious beliefs or lack of, included), then you will never seek to strip them of their freedom, nor would you discriminate against them in any way, shape, or form.
It’s really that simple.
So please, stop using religion as an excuse for inhumanity and immorality. It’s very tiresome.
“The issue here isn’t religion”
I disagree. The issue here IS religion, if for no other reason than it is the principal reason people subscribe to this view that you find so repellent.
I wonder if you are a Muslim (I genuinely don’t know, I am not trying to imply anything btw)- if you are, the argument should have ended as soon as you found an answer to the question, ‘What did the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam) tell us to do?’, unless you found some reason to disbelieve that this is what he actually did/said, what the sahaba followed him in doing etc. If you aren’t a Muslim, then obviously I am not going to be able to convince you that non-Muslims have no right to openly preach in Muslim lands, since you adhere to a different set of values, you have a different understanding of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’.
It’s really that simple 🙂
Oh, and if I ever want to read un-critical, unthinking and un-Islamic tripe I need only visit Saudi Jeans 😉
Maya,
How is the issue here NOT religion? And who said that anyone is being “dehumanized”? We as Muslims give everyone their rights, YET we give Allah and His Messenger sallallahu alayhi wa sallam their rights first and foremost, those that Allah orders us with. Our opinions do not hold any weight if they are not in line with Islam.
By the way Muslims do not “convert” people, they give da’wah and those who wish to accept it they do. And no, “religiously” non-Muslims are not equal to Muslims. Why? Because that is what Allah says.That does not mean that we treat them as if they were less than humans, on the contrary. Believers and non-believers are not equal, which by the way is the same principle in any religion.(Christianity: a believer and a non-believer should not be equally yoked, something like that). So if calling to the truth is “dehumanization” to you, then you have a serious problem if you are a Muslim.
If the prohibition of preaching other religions in the land of the Muslims is “dehumanization” to you, again, you have a serious problem and you only need to refer to the above mentioned ayah and do a bit of research of Qur’an and Sunnah.
It’s really that simple.
dalioness,
You are either naive or trying to sweep some things under the carpet. Muslims DO indeed try to convert people. It is the same thing that Christians do. It may be well-meaning but giving it the name “dawah” and saying it is “calling” people to Islam is no different than what Christians are doing.
Now I am curious again and ask you are you a Salafi? Because you seem to expressing the Salafi party line. I am also curious if you practice your dawah in the West (or non-Muslim lands)?
Salaam Alaikum,
PM
Carol,
Making Hajj does not qualify anyone to make da’wah, especially if the person is a new Muslim with little or no knowledge. In other words, Hajj does not qualify anyone to make da’wah, rather it is knowledge and wisdom that is required before doing so.Actually, if the knowledge and wisdom is not there, than it becomes prohibited to call people to Islam, as it may cause more harm then good. Anyone who uses this as a strategy is making a grave mistake, and is not necessarily following the way of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam in calling people to Islam. Yet this does not mean that I am judging the shaykh and his call as there may be more details to the story than what was provided in the article.
Not every Tom, Dick and Harry is qualified to call people to Islam, and Islam is not concerned with quantity, it is quality that matters.
I hope that shed some light to your question.
And btw, I do agree that the issue IS religion. It is the interpretation of religious dictates that leads some to believe that there can be no Christian proselytizing in Muslim lands, while Muslim proselytizing in non-Muslim lands is alright and even expected. So whether we like it or not — it IS a religious issue.
PM said:
“dalioness,
You are either naive or trying to sweep some things under the carpet. Muslims DO indeed try to convert people. It is the same thing that Christians do. It may be well-meaning but giving it the name “dawah” and saying it is “calling” people to Islam is no different than what Christians are doing.
Now I am curious again and ask you are you a Salafi? Because you seem to expressing the Salafi party line. I am also curious if you practice your dawah in the West (or non-Muslim lands)?
Salaam Alaikum,
PM”
Both of your assumptions about me are wrong.Neither am I naive nor am I trying to sweep anything under the rug, it is not necessary as I am not ashamed of my religion, on the contrary.
I guess you will just have to disagree with me about conversion versus da’wah. The word da’wah has its’ basis in the Qur’an and Sunnah, whereas “conversion” does not. I would however not expect you to know the difference as you can not even accept some basic principles of Islam so I won’t even go into explaining the details.
Am I salafi? The answer is simple: I am a Muslimah who strives to follow the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Messenger sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and the Sunnah of the rightly guided Companions may Allah be pleased with them. It is up to you which name you want to label me with. I am not familiar with “a salafi party line”. I am familiar with the reputation of some “salafis”, but remember, just because you call yourself something does not mean that it is what you are.
West or East, I do strive to speak the truth as all of it is the land of Allah. Do I “practice my da’wah”? My answer depends on your definition of “practicing the da’wah”.
I am also curious, do you take time to learn your religion? And do you take the Qur’an and Sunnah to be your guideline in all walks of life or is it your opinions and desires? No offence, just a question (no need to answer me, that is between you and Allah).
Wa alayki assalam wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh
Dalioness
*cringe*
Um, sis, I understand what you’re trying to do, but…
Salaam Alaikum,
Sorry for asking but now have visited your blog and understand you better, insha’Allah. I have had a lot of contact with the Salafis both in the West and in the Gulf, so I am usually pretty good at recognizing them. That’s how I picked it out in your responses here and had it confirmed in reading your blog. Not that there’s anything wrong with you following whatever path you think is best; I just know that the Salafi path is very narrow and judgmental so there is nothing I could ever say that would measure up in your mind. Nor would I care to.
Yes, I take time to learn my religion but I am burdened with a good mind, alhamdulillah, that is capable of thinking critically. It must be nice not to be so flawed but what can I do? This is the way Allah made me 😉
PM
WM, you’re right,pray for me!
Wa alaykum assalam PM,
I’m not sure what my blog could have possibly confirmed to you, but khayr insha’Allah. I did not know you were such an expert on salafiyyah, more power to you.
If anyone is being judgemental here it is people like you (don’t worry you are not the only one) who call to “moderate” Islam while at the same time, when someone voices an opinion opposite to theirs, all hell breaks loose and the tempers get high and the labeling begins. My personal observation(does not mean I am right).
Alhamdulillah,I am also capable of thinking, however I direct my critical thinking at myself (improvement is always needed) not Islam. If I lack intelligence and a sound mind because I wish to obey Allah while abstaining from putting my opinions before His words, then I do not mind being the “dumbest” person on Earth, smile. We do have something in common, I as well am nowhere near flawless (creature of Allah),however I believe in self-improvement (primary religious, secondary wordly). As such,if you have any evidence from the Qur’an and Sunnah for your opinions sister,do enlighten me insha’Allah, I have no problem with that.
Also note: just because I speak with gheerah for Allah does not mean that I am imposing my views on you.
“fadhakkir inna fa’ati dhikra…”
Let us just refer all matters to Allah insha’Allah.
Would any of you good Muslims care to experience the peace and salvation that only comes from accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior?
No? Really? Why, not? —Think about it.
Unlike Dalioness, I am naive. But, nevertheless, it seems to me that restrictions on the promotion or proselytizing of other faiths has its source in weakness and fear. Not, mind you, fear for yourselves or of your own weakness; rather, fear that members of your society will be persuaded that a religion other than what you regard as the true religion is to be their religion. And, we can’t have that, can we?
Funny thing is; one, perhaps two of you, would be right at home in certain wings of my family and my wife’s family where the path followed is pure, narrow and judgmental, so much so, that even Christians of other denominations are unwelcome and, in any event, destined for Hell. So it is written, so it shall be. You may fool yourself, but you can’t fool god — so they say.
The “Muslim lands” concept would be well understood, but unfortunately, it would have to change. You see, there are god given lands; they call them the “promised land.”
The issue, at least in my mind, is not religion. The issue is people, what they fear, what they find comfort in, and what they feel (as a matter of public or private policy) comfortable leaving to the individual to decide for themselves. “We” can’t be the “we” we want to be unless we all believe such and such in common. That is the issue here, whether you can recognize it or not. What differences in belief are you able to accommodate, and what difference in belief are you not able to accommodate. The issue is the “organization” of religion, or if you prefer, “organized religion” or organized religious State.
I find it ironic (and I hope that I am offending no one) that one of the very reasons that I, a Christian, believe that Mohammad was indeed a prophet, is the “there is no compulsion in religion” verse. To hear its import https://americanbedu.com/files/2008/03/21/downplayed, just reinforces my sense that maya is correct; it aint about religion. Its about us humans, our manmade rules, and the battle for the collective mind.
AGA asked:
“Would any of you good Muslims care to experience the peace and salvation that only comes from accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior?”
Can only answer for myself: No.
“No?”
No.
” Really?”
Really.
“Why, not?”
Because Jesus peace be upon him is only a Messenger of God and as such is not to be worshipped.
” —Think about it.”
Already did.
AGA said:
“one of the very reasons that I, a Christian, believe that Mohammad was indeed a prophet, is the “there is no compulsion in religion” verse.”
Really? Then you must accept the message he was sent with and as such you must stop worshipping Jesus peace be upon him.
Speaking as just a normal person to whom religion is a very personal thing, nothing turns me off more than the unwelcome intrusion of someone trying to convert me to their beliefs, whether it be Islam, Christianity, or any other religion. I think it’s great that many of you are so steadfast in your beliefs, but unless I invite your input, please leave me alone. I have no doubt that many other people in the world feel the same way I do.
I was just told something I was not aware of and thought interesting…this post resulted in a discussion at my office and we were talking about the way groups of differing faiths will try to share their beliefs or convert others. However if one thinks about it, unlike Muslims, Christians, Mormoms, etc., you will not see those of the Jewish faith going around and trying to convert others. I was advised that this is because they consider themselves the “true believers” and thereby do not seek converts.
This comment is not intented to add more fuel to any fires but being presented solely as FYI.
WM: every comment you make gives me the feeling that you value muslims higher than other faiths. At least christians and jews are also followers of the book and it is not for you to devalue their notions of right and wrong simply because they have a different religion, especially as they are, in fact, the same.
And if I got it wrong (again) than you should (again) reconsider your choice of words.
And no crap against Saudi Jeans please:
I don’t see your Blog on line, with your honest and candid thoughts, at a time and in a country where some bigotted creeps have just issued a death fatwa against people who ”Don’t tow their line”
You are to chicken even to give us your real name.
And there are enough bigotted Muttawa loving chauvinists commenting on his blog to please any mindless superficial heartless selfcentered dissembler.
Woehaha, I just misread your comment Bedu, I read: ”This comment is intended to add more fuel to any fires” ROTFL
I have had some proselysing christians at my door yesterday, but only to invite me to an easter-do.
I really dislike the Jehova’s witnesses, who are real creeps. They have little pre-printed notebooks in which they mark down comments on you after they’ve been at your door, and plans on how to approach you next time. I know somebody who was with them, and they rip even families apart: proselysing is more important than family. They read the death announcements and follow up on the berieved.
Last time they were here I told them I was a satanist, and invited them to the black mass that evening where I was going to be the altar, naked, covered in blood! That was a couple of years ago, two ladies, never seen the Jehova’s witnesses again! Wonder what they wrote down in their little notebook. 🙂
Very satisfying. 😀
Carol,
That is somewhat true, i.e. considering themselves the true believers, however the other side of the story is that (from my conversations with a few Jews), they believe that unless you are born Jew, you can not convert to their religion. I am not sure how authentic this is, but it came from “religious” Jews.
Dalioness, that depends on the persons, and their interpritations of their religion. Some say you can convert, some say you can’t. Some say, your mother has to be jewish, otherwise you can never be jewish, some say if your mother is jewish you are jewish no matter what. There are a great many different views amongst jewish people. As with everybody, and every other religion as well.
Again, this is not about religion. Religion is merely the tool used to dehumanize. And yes, giving people less rights simply because they disagree with your religious beliefs IS dehumanization. You cannot strip people of their freedom because they do not share your faith in God.
If it were not religion, then one would find another excuse, whether it be race, culture, nationality, etc. All those things that people CANNOT control.
Of course we can see where these attitudes bring us. It brings war, violence,and death (people revolt when treated as second class citizens). When you refuse to compromise and value the rights of ALL people, you become the victimizer.
This is the attitude taken by those who use torture and commit genocide (might equals right?). Just because something is dictated by your religion, doesn’t make it right.
To assert that no one has equal rights in your land unless they are part of the majority, yet you should retain your rights as a minority in another land makes you nothing but a hypocrite, and religion does not wipe the shame from such intolerance and hypocrisy.
That being said, it’s no wonder people fear Islam and Muslims, such talk only justifies their fears. I’ve made my peace on this topic.
Has anyone ever seen that Far Side cartoon with the dog and the dog-owner? I was reminded of it by the responses to my comments. Obviously, they can’t address any of my arguments, to the extent that the best they can come up with is visceral ad hominem stuff- which didn’t even make me laugh.
“I don’t see your Blog on line, with your honest and candid thoughts”
Too lazy for it, but I hope I have shared my candid thoughts enough on this blog to make you a bit more conscious of the untenability of your position. But you are stubborn, of course, because you’ve seen the prejudices and fairy-tales of your childhood attacked. You’d always assumed they had some sort of intrinsic validity, that the Charters of the UN were some sort of sacred tablets on which morally binding prohibitions were written with golden ink by a divine hand. Excuse the sarcasm; this may not be what you believe, but the vigour and fanaticism with which you defend your inanities, and the hostility with which you react to those who challenge them, make me think of you as some kind of quasi-religious fanatic. In fact, why do you think we see humanists (of the secular kind) have appropriated exactly the kind of tropes as those of religion? The so-called obscurantist clerics are ‘demons’ (Saudi Jeans actually used this kind of language once) fighting some sort of evil battle against the forces of goodness and light. Puh-lease! If you are going to employ this kind of language, at least be on the side it belongs to! If your arguments wither away in religious terms, then accept that you are an idiot in those terms and move on. Instead of being so confused about where wrong and right come from, and making some half-assed attempt to defend your false ideas Islamically, just ‘fess up! Tell us where right and wrong come from, and then we can decide whether there is any point in this argument.
“at a time and in a country where some bigotted creeps have just issued a death fatwa against people who ”Don’t tow their line”
What you’re describing is the fatwa of Shaykh Barrak on two journalists who wrote an article in which they claimed (apparently) that Christianity constitutes iman i.e. that it is acceptable to Allah, that it isn’t kufr. So I don’t see how this fatwa toes any ‘line’ but the rope of Allah (in some interpretations: tawhid), which by consensus of the Muslims, even the most stupid and depraved of them, agrees that Christianity is kufr and that whoever rejects this idea is a kafir. What he asked was that these journalists be brought before a judge and explain what they were saying- if what they wrote was kufr, they should be asked to repent. If they persist on kufr, of course, they should be executed. If this is prejudice, it is the prejudice of the sahaba, of the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam), of the Muslims that followed them, of the learned among them etc etc. But, of course you won’t say anything about my arguments because it was long ago established that you and your ilk are intellectually-bankrupt and very, very confused about morality.
“You are to chicken even to give us your real name.”
It’s Omar. My dad is called Walid. I wear (UK) size 12-13 trainers (what Americans call sneakers). I chew my fingernails a lot. I could lose a few kilos, to be honest. I’m a university student. I like Belgians waffles and eat too much fast-food. My favourite author is Rousseau. I cried when I read ‘Charlotte’s Web’ as a kid. My parents wanted me to go to Med school. I prefer red to white meat. I used to respect Marx (intellectually) until I found out how un-original he was. I passed my driving test a month or so ago. I am twenty years old. I live in London. Would you like my pin number? I think I’ve told you more here than you’ve a right to ask for. My point is, you obviously can’t touch my arguments, so rather than withdrawing with your tail between your legs, you’ve decided to spout crap on how ‘I am a coward’ and how Saudi Jeans is the best thing since sliced bread. Sorry, but I don’t see how anything I’ve told you (about myself) has made my arguments any more or less valid.
“…mindless superficial heartless selfcentered dissembler.”
You are a dissembler, since you try to confuse people about the truth, not that you have any conception of it since you’re so confused by the fantasies of your childhood.
You are superficial, because you never addressed my arguments, but only insulted me. And your insults stank too.
You are mindless (within the context of this discussion), and that is self-evident.
I apologise, Carol, for having to defile your blog, but I’ve put up with Aafke & co for a whole two days (!) and the stupidity hasn’t stopped.
Aafke, take my advice: consider a career in tabloid journalism.
“Just because something is dictated by your religion, doesn’t make it right.”
Actually, that is precisely what it DOES do, not only for Muslims, but for believers in any faith.
WM, Thank you for taking the trouble telling us about yourself.
dalioness: I was being facetious. I knew your answer was no, and I am trying to point out that the rules aren’t advanced by you to protect you, but others whom you fear would choose otherwise. The “think about it” comment was, albeit ambiguous, directed at having you reflect on how rock solid your faith is, how the “rules” aren’t directed at you or persons like you. So then, it seems to me, one has to reflect on what purpose the rules serve and to whom are they directed.
The alternative, of course, is not to reflect, not to think or even to feel anything more than that sense of satisfaction that comes from knowing your’re right.
Aga: My response to you was sarcastic, I guess you did not catch that.
Hm, who said I “fear” those who “choose otherwise”? Alhamdulillah, my faith/religion is very solid, there is no need for me to doubt it whatosoever.
As for the alternative you mentioned, I believe you are already doing a great job at it.
WM: Thanks for making me laugh today. You are something else!
Aafke, thank you for the lesson on jewish people.
AA-
I’d like to see a well-thought out response to Maya’s last comment. She makes a strong argument that can’t be easily dismissed with a simple ‘Islam says so’.
How do we reconcile our desires, nay our demands, to be treated justly as minorities in the West, but are not willing to reciprocate in our Muslim countries?
Brnaeem,
I can never be a US president because I was not born in this country. Aww, I feel so dehumanized. I can not vote because I am not a citizen yet, I feel so dehumanized.
AA- Dalioness,
Really? Is that the best you/we can come up with? Surely, we must have something better to offer…
Brother, the simple question was, ‘why is this allowed here and this not allowed of someone else?’. The only answer you can give to that question has been given, because Allah makes the halal halal and the haram, haram.
What does being ‘treated justly’ mean anyway? It means, giving each person the rights that Allah gave them, and nothing else. We are not talking about the persecution of Copts, brother, but the fact that non-Muslims are prohibited from preaching in our lands, which is a prohibition enshrined in the shari’a.
btw I can’t say any more until April 4…so much work to catch up with.
Salams to everyone
Omar
No, those are just random examples. No use anyway, you are not seeking to understand but to debate. Waste of time.
WM,
What do you think about living in a society and culture dominated by “the kuffar”? As a Muslim, do you think it is then okay to live in a country where you are ruled by “the kuffar” and your head of state is the head of a branch of religion that is not Muslim?
What would the Prophet and companions say about a Muslim who made reverse hijrah to live in the land of the kuffar? What about those Muslims who fled Muslim lands to enhance their own pocket books?
I love extremists who live in the “Land of the Kuffar” and bang on about Islam, but dont mind taking their money and living in their societies.
AA- Dalioness,
My comments have been made out of sincerity. I’m sorry that you took them any other way.
If any one believes my inquiry is not a waste of time, I’m more than willing to engage.
AA- Omar,
“What does being ‘treated justly’ mean anyway?”
Let’s start with the rights afforded to us Muslims in the West – the right to worship and dress as wish. We, rightly so, demand these rights, but when non-Muslims ask of these rights in our countries, we deny them.
Brnaeem,
The only way this discussion can continue (which I no longer will be a part of) is not by adding more confusion and personal opinions and observations to it, but by reffering the matter to the Book and the Sunnah. That would be sincere enough. By that I mean, not picking and choosing which ahadeeth we want to follow, but by accepting all of them provided they are sahih. The problem here seems to stem from people who, while they are willing to accept a hadeeth, for example about the prohibition of gold and silk for men, they are not willing to accept a hadeeth that does not conform to their opinions on rights and wrongs,morals and humanity, although both ahadeeth can be found in the same sahih collection. I have seen this not by other people but by the very commenters here on this very blog and elsewhere. I do have a hard time understanding this in any other way but that there is some picking and choosing going on.
If you notice, earlier I have posted an ayah in hopes that it would motivate us (including myself) to stop and ask ourselves what is and what isn’t a part of this deen, by way of asking ourselves, what DOES Allah say about this? What DOES Rasulullah saws say about this? Is it our opinion that is set in stone or is it the word of Allah? Perhaps we have some misconceptions about this,etc.
YET noone seemed to care about the ayah posted at all. The Book and the Sunnah should be the judge, not parts of it, but all of it. And certainly not our opinions. And in the end, those who call for Qur’an and Sunah to be the judge, are labeled extremists, salafis (which is not negative provided it is understood correctly), etc. Who dictates morality, right and wrong, opression, injustice, etc?
I think what the intelectuals need to do is not offer their opinions, but offer evidences from the two sources I repeatedly mention, so that “extremists” can be guided.
This really is a waste of time otherwise, as I can not see any benefit for myself and others here, actually, all I wanted to do is come back and apologize to you for my assumptions, it was wrong of me.
Ugh. I am lazy, partly because you lot are so insufferable. Firstly, if you want to discuss something, please stick to the topic. The point I have made, again and again, is that non-Muslims have NO right to build churches or propagate their religion in the peninsula. I’ve established this, apparently, so well with reference to our religion, that no-one has even tried to refute my argument in these terms. It’s so interesting that none of the Muslims managed to disagree on this point until God sent Abu Sinan and Naeem into the world to enlighten them, since the past few hundred years of Muslim opinion had been so utterly misguided. Excuse the sarcasm. The extremists are clearly those who refuse to defer to the Islamic opinion on whatever issue, instead following their nafs or the non-Muslims, or both.
Abu Sinan, Herr Sturm und Drang, please stick to the topic. I’m sure you’d love to hear all about my life story, but it simply isn’t relevant. And, as usual, I have to suffer your 101 false assumptions made about me. But since you love raking muck all over those who you neither understand nor are capable of refuting, perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised.
“…a Muslim who made reverse hijrah to live in the land of the kuffar? What about those Muslims who fled Muslim lands to enhance their own pocket books?”
None of which applies to me, alhamdulillah. Nor did you take the time to ask me my views on hijra, since you are as slanderous as ever. See? We can’t expect reasoned dialogue with these people, because they long ago committed themselves to non-Muslim values, which they lacked the faith to overthrow. Can someone at least have some shame (ironically) and lie, and say that my opinion wasn’t shared by the Muslim community of the time of the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam) and long afterwards. Is this even a discussion about what Islam dictates any more? If this is no longer the case, there is something seriously wrong with you and your ilk.
“I love extremists who live in the “Land of the Kuffar” and bang on about Islam, but dont mind taking their money and living in their societies.”
Sorry, what is an extremist? Is it not someone who rejects Muslim opinion and follows his ahwa? Because, according to that flawless criterion you are an extremist, brother. And, since you are arrogant and class snobbery has to manifest itself in everything you say- no, I don’t ‘take money’ from non-Muslims, you dingbat, and I think that any Muslim who lives off government support because of unemployment etc is a parasite. Did you even bother to ask who/what I was? And even if I did accept support, which would be despicable hypocrisy, would that change what the sahaba did? No. But what the sahaba did seems irrelevant to you and your coterie of idiots.
Can I ask for a very simple clarification?
Br Naeem, Abu Sinan etc: who thinks the non-Muslims should be allowed to build churches, synagogues, temples etc in the peninsula?
Brother Naeem.
No-one mentioned dressing etc.
Should churches be built in the peninsula?
Say ‘yes’ and you are at the very least an idiot.
WM,
Do you think it is possible to live life properly as a Muslim in the West? Do you think it is okay to work and be educated in mixed classrooms?
If you do think it is okay, care to provide proofs? Your tax money in the UK goes to support a “war against Muslims”. Do you think it is okay to provide tax monies for such a cause, if so what are your proofs?
Interesting that you are sitting here calling names. It seems rather clear that you think your version of Islam, and the way you practice it, is better than others.
Where does calling names come into the picture? Is that an appropriate way to deal with people? Care to provide proofs for that one or will you just rather continue to give me your hasanat? Thats fine………I can always use more, but I fail to see how calling people “dingbats” advances your point.
It is clear you have a disdain for people who are not Muslims, the “kuffar” so why do you CHOOSE to live amoungst them?
Abu Sinan, we can continue this conversation by e-mail, but can you please tell me: should churches be built in the peninsula?
“Do you think it is possible to live life properly as a Muslim in the West?”
– Yes, I think it is, and I think there are plenty of Muslims who do.
“It seems rather clear that you think your version of Islam, and the way you practice it, is better than others.”
– Never made any claims about practicing better…but every Muslim necessarily believes his beliefs are the best, that includes YOU. In fact, my odious friend, you even wrote once of wanting to fight against Muslims who didn’t share your opinions, as I distinctly remember.
Insults- I am impatient with you, and the way you look down on every Muslim who isn’t somehow ‘enlightened’ like yourself.
Can we keep the discussion focussed? Can you actually deal with my argument? That is sort of the point, brother. Remember, the whole subject of the discussion?
Expect an e-mail insha Allah.
Some hadith for WM, our resident scholar. I wonder how his manners (aadab) on this board look when compared to these hadith?
No matter what we are talking about, no one here is lobbing around the insults that you are WM. If you cannot debate in a rational, reasonable manner without having to resort to calling people idiots and the like, I suggest you refain from debating period.
That is my naseeha to you as one Muslim to another.
Abud-Darda’ (May Allah be pleased with him) said: The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) said, “When a person curses somebody or something, the curse goes up to heaven and the gates of heaven get closed. Then it comes down to the earth and its gates get closed. Then it turns right and left, and if it does not find an entrance to go anywhere, it returns to the person or thing that was cursed; if he or it deserves to be cursed; otherwise it returns to the person who uttered it.”
[Abu Dawud].
Abu Hurairah (May Allah be pleased with him) said: The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) said: “It does not befit a Siddiq (righteous Muslim) to frequently curse others.”
[Muslim]
Abud-Darda’ (May Allah be pleased with him) said: The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) said, “Those who frequently resort to cursing (people) would neither be accepted as witnesses nor as intercessors on the Day of Resurrection.”
[Muslim].
Ibn Mas`ud (May Allah be pleased with him) reported: The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) said, “A true believer is not involved in taunting, or frequently cursing (others) or in indecency or abusing.”
[At-Tirmidhi].
“I guarantee a house in Jannah for one who gives up arguing, even if he is in the right; and I guarantee a home in the middle of Jannah for one who abandons lying even for the sake of fun; and I guarantee a house in the highest part of Jannahfor one who has good manners.”
[Abu Dawud]
“A person may say a word that is pleasing to Allah (S.W.T.) and he may not think much of it, but Allah (S.W.T.) will, (because of that word), bestow his pleasure upon him on the Day of Judgment, and a person may say a word that is displeasing to Allah (S.W.T.), and he may not think much of it, but Allah will have, (because of that word) his wrath and anger on him on the Day of Judgment.”
Imam At-tirmithi and Ibn-Majah
“Let whosoever believes in Allah and in the Last Day either speak good or be silent. Let whosoever believes in Allah and in the Last Day honour his neighbour. Let whosoever believes in Allah and in the Last Day honour his guest.”
[Al-Bukhari & Muslim]
Oh- this Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam), this man you claim to follow- how come you accept, with belief, one part of his shari’a, and reject, with belief, other parts? At least my beliefs are consistent, even when my actions aren’t.
You still haven’t answered my question about churches.
And you are such a hypocrite, since you made it clear you have problems accepting the sunnah and the hadith. I haven’t added any salt and pepper to this claim, since you have said it yourself in various forms. So do you accept the same sunnah that tells you all about non-Muslims and the Hijaz?
AA- Omar,
“Say ‘yes’ and you are at the very least an idiot.”
Please mind your manners bro. I’m sure Uncle Walid taught you that much. Let us try to keep this discussion from descending to name calling and the such (maybe its too late for that). I will do my best to keep the respect…I would hope that you can reciprocate.
You get upset when assumptions are made of you. Please don’t be guilty of that sin yourself. I never stated my feelings on this matter. Kindly reread my comments. I have merely brought up contradictions that I am personally struggling to reconcile.
I understand the original premise of the post and I felt that it was worthwhile to visit a wider topic, as introduced by Maya in her comment. I am trying to better understand the stand that we Muslims take on this issue of civil rights, as practiced in the both the East and West.
Don’t you find a double-standard, maybe even a tinge of hypocrisy, when Muslims are calling for fairness and justice and equal rights in the West, but are not willing to give it back in the East?
Regardless of whether I agree/disagree with you on the specifics of churches in the gulf (which I admit not having researched), that fails to address the larger issue, which is what I’m more interested in.
WM,
I will not communicate with you as long as you insist on insulting people. I dont think it takes much more than basic aadab (manners) to realise that you should not insult people.
Amazing, 20 years old, wanting to lecture other people about the deen, yet he hasnt learned one of the most basic things, dont call other people around you names.
WM,
I will not deal with you or answer any of your questions until you learn to act civilised. Calling people names, insulting and cursing them is not the way to go.
Sorry mate, until you grow up I am not going to e-mail you or answer any of your questions.
Abu Sinan:
I’m sorry for insulting you.
Now, am I an extremist for wanting to keep churches from being built, for example, in KSA?
“Don’t you find a double-standard, maybe even a tinge of hypocrisy, when Muslims are calling for fairness and justice and equal rights in the West, but are not willing to give it back in the East?”
So, effectively what you are saying is that someone who doesn’t want churches built in KSA, while wanting mosques built in the UK, is a hypocrite? So that makes me a hypocrite and an extremist, and all for espousing an opinion that no-one has bothered to refute.
Abu Sinan, I called you odious, an extremist, a muck-raker, a class-snob, a slanderer and a dinbat. I apologise for that.
Now, can we have some admissions from our brothers, so the discussion can move forward?
Glad you decided to grow up. Insha’Allah, your manners continue. As long as they do I will talk with you.
You have made a claim here, several times, that you have hadith that prove that the Prophet banned houses of worship in Arabia, even for people of the book, yet you have never provided them.
I havent studied the issue, so I dont really know. You have made the claim it is up to you to provide the daleel for it.
Feel free to do so.
To this point you have done little more than curese and insult people and then sit back and wonder why no one takes you seriously.
You have made a claim, provide proofs.
I dont have much a problem with the idea on principle, even Jews used to put to death non Jews who’d venture past a certain area in their temple.
AA- Omar,
Not calling you an extremist nor a hypocrite. Your words, my mouth, kindly keep them out.
Wanting something and expecting it as a right are two different things. We don’t only want to build mosques in the West, we realize that its our legal right, granted to us by the host nation, and are willing to call upon that right in order to build that mosque.
Equally, I don’t want churches built in Muslim lands, but should not that right be given to the non-Muslims living there?
Lets not confuse what we want/don’t want with legal rights.
WM “all for espousing an opinion that no-one has bothered to refute.”
You have yet to provide any proofs, just offered up an opinion. Sorry, but I doubt anyone is going to believe anything you say based on your opinion alone, especially after your track record here.
Daleel.
“Don’t you find a double-standard, maybe even a tinge of hypocrisy, when Muslims are calling for fairness and justice and equal rights in the West, but are not willing to give it back in the East?”
Br Naeem, we are asking people to stick to the principles they adhere to by asking for our civil rights in these countries. And we are adhering to our own principles by e.g. preventing non-Muslims from building churches in our own lands (which is NOT a license to beat them, confiscate their property etc). What we are expecting is that people remain consistent in terms of the rights they grant others.
“I don’t want churches built in Muslim lands, but should not that right be given to the non-Muslims living there?”
I didn’t at all conflate the two- non-Muslims have no legal right to build e.g. churches in the peninsula. I also don’t want them to.
Sure, we have a legal right here in the West to build mosques. Would you be okay with it if that right was removed?
Heck, might not be a bad thing. Maybe it would stop the brain drain from Muslim countries. I work with a ton of Muslim Engineers from all over the Muslim world who came here for nothing more than the $150,000 they make a year.
Sad thing is, even if mosques were banned here in the USA, most would stay on anyway. They didnt come here for the deen, they came for the GREEN!
WM,
Interesting that you have yet to provide proofs for your claim.
As to wanting them to build churches, I dont really care outside of the Hijaz/Mecca/Medina. If there is nothing prohibiting it then I am very firm in the ability of Islam to flourish, even thrive, under such conditions.
Unlike some people, I do not fear for Islam. Islam will grow no matter what happens. Islam does not need to be “saved”.
For example:
(All of these statements came near the end of the life of the Prophet- sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam- and were implemented by my namesake 😉 )
“I will expel the Jews and the Christians from the peninsula, and will not leave any there but Muslims”- Tirmithi
“Two religions can not coexist in the peninsula”- Abu Dawud
Rasul Allah (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam) left behind three instructions (said ibn `Abbas): “Expel the mushrikin from the peninsula…” Abu Dawud.
To be honest, the main reason anyone follows this opinion is that it’s what the ulema always called to, besides the fact that it is explicit in the sunnah.
“I do not fear for Islam.”
Me neither, but I fear for the Muslims.
“Would you be okay with it if that right was removed?”
– Nope.
If you’ve ever seen that treaty which people say was signed between my namesake ( 😉 ) and the Christians of Syria, you’ll see it forbids them from building new churches, allowing them to keep their old ones (since this is outside the peninsula) etc. There are many other interesting stipulations there too.
…? I take it I’m still an extremist?
And for my next trick, ladies and gentlemen, I’ll get Saudi Jeans to put a sock in it 😀 😀 😀
Sahih Al Bukhari, vol.9 #7319:
Narrated Abu Hurairah ra: The Prophet saws said: “The Hour will not be established till my followers copy the deeds of the previous nations and follow them very closely, span by span, and cubit by cubit”. It was said: “O Allah’s Messenger! Do you mean by those (nations) the Persians and the Byzantines?” The Prophet saws said, “Who can it be other then they?”
Sahih Al Bukhari, vol.9#7320:
Narrated Abu Sa’id Al Khudri ra: “The Prophet saws said: “You will follow the ways of those nations who were before you, span by span and cubit by cubit so much so that even if they entered a hole of a mastigure, you would follow them”. We said: “O Allah’s Messenger! (Do you mean) the Jews and the Christians?” He said, “Whom else?”
Sahih Al Bukhari, vol.4#3167:
Narrated Abu Hurairah ra: “While we were in the mosque, the Prophet saws came out and said: “Let us go to the Jews”. We went out till we reached Bait Al Midras. He said to them, “If you embrace Islam, you will be safe. You should know that the earth belongs to Allah and His Messenger, and I want to expel you from this land. So, if anyone amongst you owns some property, he is permitted to sell it, otherwise you should know that the earth belongs to Allah and His Messenger”.
(NOTE: Please read the entire Kitab Al Jizya in Sahih Al Bukhari).
Sahih Al Bukhari, vol.4#3168:
(refer to the entire hadith in the collection):
“…….then the Prophet saws ordered them to do three things saying, “Turn out all Al Mushrikun from the Arabian Peninsula, show respect to all foreign delegates by giving them gifts as I used to do”……”
General naseeha:
One should try to study ‘Ilm Mustalah Al Hadeeth as much as possible. Of course not everyone can be a scholar nor is expected to be, but there are many benefits in at least knowing the basics. And of course Fiqh, that is a given. General history is also good to know about, as well as tafsir and the lives of the Companions.
Also, we need to keep in mind that the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam ordered us with sticking not only with his Sunnah, but the Sunnah of the rightly guided Companions, which is also a sahih hadith, I believe it is to be found in Sahih Al Bukhari and Muslim.
Also, keep in mind that the Prophet saws disliked questions that do not concern us (besides that they only create unresolved issues and confusion in any discussion).
If we follow his guidance all will be khayr insha’Allah.
Ye may now continue in peace, hehe.
I can’t believe this post has so many comments doing nothing but bickering. The only thing Muslims can say is what Muhammad (SAW) said in Sunnah and the Qur’an.
Your opinions of this don’t matter and I believe the author of this post has wisely stayed out of the discussion. As should we all.
All other faiths can say is that they don’t agree because they don’t follow our texts so arguing is moot.
This really isn’t going to go anywhere because after 1400+ years you singlehandedly arent’ going to change the laws of KSA or the religion of Islam so I suggest we applaud the brother for helping people in Africa (which is the point of the topic) and move on to Bedu’s other interesting posts because no one is changing any laws by venting all around and insulting all around. Brava Bedu for about 90 comments ina post! (thanks to about 5 very stubborn people.who couldn’t take their fight to e-mail)
🙂
WM,
You say you’d not be alright if freedom of religion was removed from the countries of the West. Why is that? Don’t the people of the countries here have a right to enact the laws that they choose?
If you say that the entire Arab Peninsula should be completely free of Jews and Christians and their houses of worship, why would the Christian West then be under any obligation to allow Muslims in their lands or their houses of worship?
I have a hard time with people who feel so strongly against the “kuffar” yet have no problem studying in their institutions, working in their companies and living in their countries.
There are still Jews and Christians in the Arabian Peninsula. Do you think that they should be ethnically cleansed from the land? There are Churches in the Arabian Peninsula. Do you advocate a holy war to remove Christians and their Churches from places in Jordan, Oman, and Yemen?
Places like Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait would fail to be able to operate without their foreign, non Muslim population. Look at UAE where only 1 in 10 people is actually an Emirati.
As a matter of fact, there has never been a time in Muslim history where the Arab Peninsula was free from Christians and Jews, never.
What is your plan then to rid the Arabian Peninsula of the Kuffar? How would you do it?
There were a number of different articles in various journals and papers today about King Abdullah supporting Interfaith dialogues. Here is one such link: http://www.christianpost.com/article/20080325/31665_Saudi_Arabia_Leader_Calls_for_Interfaith_Dialogue.htm
In light of all the discussion that continues with this post, I thought it was worth pointing out.
Abu Sinan- still no admissions from you. I should have expected as much.
“…the entire Arab Peninsula…”
I didn’t mention this at the time, but ulema differ over what was meant by ‘peninsula’ e.g. some say it means; all of the lands of the Arabs, some say the extent of territory intended is much less broad in extent than that etc. Part of the problem is that we are dealing with an age before nation-states and internationally-recognised borders (and so on), so defining the parameters of any ‘state’ is going to be difficult.
“I have a hard time with people who feel so strongly against the “kuffar” yet have no problem studying in their institutions, working in their companies and living in their countries.”
Sorry, I don’t see where ‘feeling strongly’ against anyone necessarily comes into it- again, you are making unwarranted assumptions about me. All I am saying is this; x is the shari`a, and we are obliged to obey the shari`a, ergo we should implement x. If you want to fault my argument, please disprove the first assumption- otherwise, there is no point in this discussion. If we can’t agree that the shari`a should be adhered to then we sure as heck won’t agree on its particulars.
“There are still Jews and Christians in the Arabian Peninsula. Do you think that they should be ethnically cleansed from the land?”
No. But who ever said anything about violence, killing etc, especially the ‘vigilante’ kind? Again, more assumptions. And coercive power basically belongs to the state, not to individual subjects, and certainly not to people like me sitting behind keyboards. What I do have the ‘authority’ to do, however, is to take issue with what you write, as I have done.
“There are Churches in the Arabian Peninsula. Do you advocate a holy war to remove Christians and their Churches from places in Jordan, Oman, and Yemen?”
See point above about the extent of the peninsula.
“Places like Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait would fail to be able to operate without their foreign, non Muslim population. Look at UAE where only 1 in 10 people is actually an Emirati.”
How many of them are Muslims, these expats? Most of them. And what we mean by ‘no mushrikin’ is, ‘no permanent residence of the’ etc etc.
“As a matter of fact, there has never been a time in Muslim history where the Arab Peninsula was free from Christians and Jews, never.”
A nice fairy-tale, brother. Did you miss everything I said about Amir ul-Mu’minin Umar (ra)? Did you forget the fact that he did expel non-Muslims from living permanently in certain territories? Not to say that he forbade them from trading in Muslim lands, which shouldn’t entail their living there on a permanent basis. Besides, there are other things I could go into, such as the issue that enacting the law is not the same as enforcing it, that there are logistical difficulties in implementing such a law etc. “…there has never been a time in Muslim history where the Arab Peninsula was free from Christians and Jews” is no different from saying “there has never been a time when every Muslim home was free of alcohol”. Does that make alcohol permissible? Not only that, but you have ignored the fact that my namesake did in fact kick them out, so to speak.
All I want from you, Abu Sinan, is the admission that this is the shari`a; I don’t want more irrelevant questions, or discussions of the im/practicality of these things. I just want that simple admission.
And you never gave me any proof of your argument, and was silent when I gave you mine. There is a problem there, brother.
Shall I give you a practical example? Apparently, the Vatican wants to see a church built in Riyadh. What do you think? I think it has no place there, and perhaps people should even tear it down if it is built (hisba 😉 ). Why don’t we ask the scholars? 😀
All I want from you, Abu Sinan, is the admission OR the denial that this is the shari`a. Then I will stop.
I am really inspired by this quote Aby Sinan posted:
“I guarantee a house in Jannah for one who gives up arguing, even if he is in the right; and I guarantee a home in the middle of Jannah for one who abandons lying even for the sake of fun; and I guarantee a house in the highest part of Jannahfor one who has good manners.”
[Abu Dawud]
Not that I’d do it just for the selfish reason of getting a house in Jannah, but it makes sense and I have been guilty too of placing a few unpolite names. They were meant only as a little pinprick, and not at all to hurt anybody. I’m sorry if they did.
So I’m giving up arguing.
(even if American Bedu just put a log on the fire! (probably to keep on top of the WordPress list))
“I guarantee a house in Jannah for one who gives up arguing, even if he is in the right…”
‘Arguing’ here means what? Does it mean da’wah, or trying to guide someone? Obviously, it does not.
But I give this up, whatever it is, anyway. I’ve long since proven my point.
WM,
You are wrong to claim that there has ever been a time, after the time of the Prophet, when the entire geographic area known as the Arab Peninsula, where there was no Jewish or Christian community.
“Arabian Peninsula” is not a formulation of modern nation states, it is a geographic description. If, as you say, Hadith says Muslims are required to expell all Christians and Jews from the “Arabian Peninsula” then that in today’s terms means Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.
Even the quickest look at the history of these modern countries that are contianed in the geogrpahical designation of the Arabian Peninsula will show you that areas of the Peninsula have had Jewish and Christian communities before Islam and continuing non stop until this very day, although in many places the numbers dropped in the 1900s, especially in Yemen.
You talk about permanent citizens, but I hate to inform you that there are Jewish and Christian citizens of the countries of the Arabian Peninsula as we speak.
Unwarranted assumptions about you? You are a Muslim right? You live in the UK right? It seems pretty clear to me that you have an issue with “the kuffar”. Your own words make it clear. Yet you have chose to live amoungst “the kuffar”. Seems to me if it is that much of an issue then you have made an active choice to live amoungst the kuffar and seem to have rejected the obligation to live in a Muslim land.
I have met and seen many people like you. They moan and groan about “the kuffar” and the “war against Islam” yet they have no issues living in the same countries they are making allegations about.
Many of those residing and working in the Gulf are not Muslims, as a matter of fact many of them are not even “People of the Book” and many of them live there for decades and decades.
In the later part of your screed basically you say it is okay to enact a law, but not to enforce it. Kind of looks a lot like window dressing to me.
Umar did NOT kick out all non Muslims from the Arabian Peninsula. No one reading history would make such a claim. The hadith in question most certainly talks about the “Arabian Peninsula” in geographic terms because that is all that existed at that time so no other reference would have made any sense.
If you look at the history of a place like Jordan, or Yemen, they both have had significant Jewish and Christian populations since BEFORE Islam and have continued to this day, although the Jewish population has fell to next to nothing after 1948. Sorry, they have been there all along.
You can try to claim that Umar made them only communities there “allowed to trade”, but they have been there for some 2,000 years or more, so it hardly makes them temporary trading communities. A community that was there before Islam, and is still there, is in no way temporary.
Honestly, WM, I dont care what you want me from. Your words, insults and mannerism are those of a spoiled young kid who has a lot to learn.
Certainly your adab is way out of bounds for someone who claims to be a Muslim.
Maybe time will teach you how to present an argument without leading those with whom you are presenting it to without an ill felling about you, but that time seems to be long in the future.
You should heed the words of the Prophet when he made it clear that if you cannot argue in the better way it is best to remain silent.
As to the scholars, I think it would be a hard pressing issue to find an over all group of people who have done a greater disservice to Islam and Muslims than the vast majority of “the scholars”.
As a convert to Islam I must tell you it is people like YOU that make it hard for me to hold onto my deen every day. Alhamdullilah, Islam is the greatest religion, but it certainly has the worst followers.
I am just letting you know that it is not even your ideas that are a turn off really, just the rude and childish way you present them.
A complete turn off.
People who act like you do make others run from Islam when their real job should be to call people to the deen.
You really need to take a look in the mirror and reevaluate the way you behave and your manners.
No, no, Omar, I was solely speaking about myself.
I posted that comment without having seen your latest anyway. I took a long time and was eating dinner.
I really admire the zeal and effort you put into your discourses.
And I think it really sweet that you cried over ”Charlotte’s Web” I cried over that too. So we have that in common.
WM “All I want from you, Abu Sinan, is the admission OR the denial that this is the shari`a. Then I will stop.”
I dont care if you stop or not. You have the manners of a homar WM, no respect and whlst you might think you are doing something in the service of Islam, it couldnt be farther from the truth.
You, WM, and people like you, is a major part of WHY the Islamic world is a backward cesspool of corruption, injustice and murder.
The only thing you’ve “proven” here WM is that Shaw was right when he said “Islam is the great religion, but it has the worst followers”.
Some day, Insha’Allah, you get some manners and become a half way decent representitive of Islam.
Our brother said:
“As to the scholars, I think it would be a hard pressing issue to find an over all group of people who have done a greater disservice to Islam and Muslims than the vast majority of “the scholars”.”
As opposed to his illustrious self, of course.
What do you mean Omar? Which brother?
I thought you liked scholars?
Which illustrious self?
The expression used in the hadith is ‘Jazirat al-`Arab’- it is the definition of this scholars aren’t 100% on. That is why some of them say it includes larger areas than others. There is an inherent problem in pointing out where exactly a peninsula ends and begins. The scholars also have to discuss in what sense ‘Jazirat al’Arab was used by the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam), since some people make the mistake of assuming that the modern signification of ‘Arabian peninsula’ is the same as the old one. And like I repeatedly said, the duty of enacting whatever law falls on the state, not on Joe Schmoe.
Aafke:
Scroll up and read.
I do.
Abu Sinan.
Abu Sinan: the problem is with me. Don’t let me make it hard for you as a convert. I have bad manners; that is bad. Most people here don’t agree with me, so that is proof that definitely not all Muslims are like me.
WM,
For whatever it is worth, I do not dislike you one bit. I believe from what I read of your comments I understand everything you are saying, and what you want to focus on topic wise. Sure sometimes you are out of line, may Allah forgive you for that, but I admire your zeal and gheerah for the words of Allah and His Messenger saws. Do not get discouraged because of your faults, just try your best to correct them insha’Allah.
Abu Sinan,
Please do not take offence to what I am saying, as regardless of how much you and I differ on many subjects (it is obvious from the past as well if you remember) you are still my brother in Islam, and what I am saying to you now is sincere and it is meant as a reminder (reminder benefits the believer):
Abu Sinan, I do not think you are fair nor are you in the position to criticize WM’s manners, since you yourself are lacking in them and you are not following your own advice brother. I am saying this because of the comments I read in this post, as well as some comments you and I exchanged here on Carol’s blog a while ago. You for some reason do not understand that brother WM is only trying to uphold the word of Allah and His Messenger saws over words of you, me, Tom, Dick and Harry. Brother, do you agree that as Muslims, we have to refer to the words of Allah and His Messenger saws to establish the truth, especially when there is a dispute? This is obligatory upon us akhi because of the ayah I provided above. Our feelings (yours, mine and WM’s) do not matter. It does not matter what we “think” or “feel” is right akhi. There are in this religion many things that are clear and we understand them, and they are logical and make sense. However, there are many things that we simply do not understand and never will understand until the Day of Judgement is established, yet we still believe they are the truth, and we act accordingly.
Brother, good manners is not only by way of politeness and gentleness, good manners are also about sticking to the issue that is being discussed without going into details and questions that have nothing to do with the topic at hand. The Prophet saws used to dislike that people ask many questions especially if they do not concern them, refer to Sahih Al Bukhari. and you are undeniably doing a lot of that. You want us to somehow change the way you think and adopt your way of thinking, yet you fail over and over again to show us, what is the (islamic) basis and evidence for your various opinions? Also brother, I assume that you are a bit older then our brother WM, and as such I would expect a bit more wisdom from you, and I would expect you to take more control of this discussion in a mll bring manner that will bring results. I believe that brother WM mentioned in one of these comments that he will gladly change his opinion if the opposite has evidence in the deen. Therefore, if your intention (and it should be your only intention) is to guide him to the truth, you are obligated, by Allah you as his muslim brother are obligated to provide that evidence. I believe you are insha’Allah a God fearing brother who is mainly concerned with the truth, just as WM and myself are.
Brother Abu Sinan, please do not think for one second that I feel that I am somehow better than you, that is not a trait of a believer. I have my own faults to deal with and my own character to perfect. Human nature is such that we do not like to be reminded of our faults, but it may be that there is some benefit in your brother or your sister coming to you and saying “hey Abu Sinan, be careful of such and such”. The very least that a person I personally know, and masha’Allah this is truly one of the rare Muslims today, the very least they do when something is pointed out to them, this person humbles himself even if he is free of what he is accused of.
I think if you want to advise someone with good character and manners, it is far better to do it by way of personal example.
Also, and this is for all of us here not just you Abu Sinan, we really need to seek refuge with Allah from shaytan, and we really need to pay attention to our intentions, as our actions will be judged accordingly.
American Muslim writer was very right masha’Allah, may Allah reward her for that. However, the issue here is getting to the bottom of the truth from the perspective of Islam, not our opinions on how things “should” be and what makes or does not make sense.
Also, brother Abu Sinan, know that extremism is of two different forms: negligence and exegerration in the deen. There is a balanced way which we are ordered to follow, but we first need to get to know it by way of “ALLAH SAID AND HIS MESSENGER SAWS SAID”. It is well known that the sahaba would stop at the words of Allah and His Messenger, and their example is to be followed. Abu Sinan, also, know that every man sins, but the sin of wrong belief when clear evidence has been presented is far worse, because it constitutes putting ones’ word over that of Allah and His Messenger, it implicates that somehow the religion is not perfected and that there is something that the Messenger saws failed to convey, and all of this “can” lead to kufr depending on a few factors. So I just want to caution you against continuing to follow your opinion after clear evidence has been presented. Ours is not to discuss how “bad” some Muslims are, and certainly not to generalize, which is exactly what you are doing akhi (re-read your comments, esp your second-last), and this gets you to sin (slander).
I have a feeling you will come back and lash out at me without even considering that I may be right with what I am advising you with(yet I hope Allah will guide you accept it from me insha’Allah) since I am an extremist in your eyes obviously, but if we can learn a thing or two from non-believers, we should certainly do so with the Muslims, provided they are telling the truth.
On the personal note, akhi, you have offended “me” and injusted “me” by your generalization of the reason why Muslims come to this country. I must say you have a very wrong understanding of what we, as Muslims, may or may not do, may or may not complain about. You can not judge millions of people by an x number of people you have met, heard of, etc. Even those you have no right to judge brother. I certainly did not come to this country because “of the green”, in fact, I did NOT have another choice. This was my last choice regardless whether or not I liked it. Just because I live in this country does not mean I have to like it, first of all. That however does not mean I can go around publicly expressing dissatisfaction about anything and everything, although if I did so it is NOT haram. It is however HARAM to do so in a Muslim country (i.e. secretly advising the rulers if one is able to do so, if not, having patience and trust in Allah). However, the scholars that I am sure you would not take knowledge from, advise us (and it is common sense anyway) that it is dislikeable that we do anything illegal (such as cheating the government by way of abusing the welfare system, stealing, rebeling, etc) and that we must show appreciation to these governments (by way of obeying the law) for allowing us to come to their countries. IF they frobade us to practise our religion here in any way, then it becomes obligatory for us to leave the country, it does not give us permission to rebel in any way, especially if the there is a treaty between the Muslims and the particular country.
Brother, I really believe that much of the bickering, bad manners, frankly, discussion which has no benefit and leads nowhere, could be prevented if you just for once stop and think. Think about what is the issue at hand, and what is the daleel for either opinions. I actually do not understand what your opinion is, since you are not giving any, you are only asking questions on top of questions, and it does not seem to me that any answer will satisfy you. I do not understand your intention beyond all this wallah. What truly makes me sad though is that, although ahadeeth were provided, and they are not the only daleel in support of WM’s and my opinion (on the issue of building churches in Saudi and publicly preaching religions other then Islam), you have not provided a comment on the daleel presented. You seem not to accept it, but you do not attempt to refute it either with sound daleel. So I do not understand what it is that you want.
I know this comment is to long, and I apologize for that, but please blame it on my lack of eloquence and english vocabulary. I also want you to know that it would have been better if I advised you with this in secret by way of email, yet (and I did not look if your email adress is available on your blog) I dislike exchanging emails with non-mahram men. Only Allah knows our hearts, so I do not expect you to believe that all my words towards you are out of sincerity, even if they may lack in manners at times, so I do expect you to at least, as one Muslim to another, give me the benefit of the doubt.
Assalamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh
Before my words gve of the wrong impression, I wanted to add that it is haram to cheat any government (taxes, welfare etc) regardless if muslim or not. I said dislikeable in terms of generality, since some Muslims do things that are not necessary haram, rather dislikeable, so i should have more careful with my words.
Another thing I wanted to add is that, I have worked since day one I came to the US, and a while ago lost a job due to discrimination (hijab). I have received unemployment benefits that were due to me, and for over a year struggled to find a job, yet I am not on welfare. I know many muslims alhamdulillah who are very honest and God fearing, who came to this country because they struggled in their own countries (not all of them are Muslim countries by the way). As a person who has the right to speak on this particular matter, I see that you fail to realize the actual reason why you may hear some Muslims complain about this country. Mostly it is exeggerated at times because, as bad as they had it in their own countries, it is their homeland and they miss it, and there is a thing called culture schock. For this reason, you may find that some Muslims complain about things they would not normally complain about. I myself do it and many people I know do it, but we know where it comes from, and mostly it is due to missing our homes, so sometimes we exegerate a bit. Heck, I have had to listen to Americans left and right complain about this country to the point of exegerration, and I even had to correct them on a few things and let them know they are complaining to much. For instance, while I am not at all fond of the current president, I defended him on a few occasions, because as Muslims we are to be just, Muslim or not. I am not saying this by way of bragging or anything of the sort, just telling you that you cannot generalize due to what you see, because it amount to slander of the innocent.
Assalamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh
I think in future, insha Allah, I won’t ever discuss this subject with anyone, because of what seems to result. I am sorry for hurting you (Abu Sinan), and for insulting anyone (a bunch of people). My position on the issue remains unchanged.
Insha Allah, insha Allah I will refrain from discussing anything controversial with anyone ever- in my life, online, and so on. I’d hate to think I make things difficult for other Muslims.
WM, don’t be to hard on yourself, you were trying to do what is right and the outcome in any conversation does not depend on one person alone, that is why it is called a conversation. That said, I will follow your example and stay away as well insha’Allah, barak Allah feek.
Why doesnt it surprise me that WM and “Dalioness” would find common cause?
Oh brother. Sometimes I have got to learn when it is nothing more than a waste of time.
Your continuing arrogance does not surprise me.
You are a hoot Lioness. Between you and WM, you have the corner on arrogance, maybe I should take lessons from you?
As for WM, I’ll leave him alone, he has e-mailed me and apologised.
I wasn’t guilty of anything you were innocent of…except being right.
😉
Thanks for accepting my apology btw, much appreciated.
“Why doesnt it surprise me that WM and “Dalioness” would find common cause?”
Because great minds think alike? 😀
OK, I’ll stop with the cheesy humour now.
Abu Sinan: leave WM alone: he has been very nice in his late posts, so you have no cause
Oh, here we go again; writing at crossed comments.
WM, Omar, I don’t agree with you, but I would like to discuss stuff with you in a more friendly atmosphere in the future.
Because something tells me that you will nót be able too keep away from a nice juicy controversial subject when it pops up. 😀
And shouldn’t you be hard at work for something? At least until the 4th of April? Shut down the internet and get to work!
And I haven’t seen anything of American Bedu today, so she is either cut off from the internet, or she is on a roadtrip again! Anyway, that leaves the field free for us to do some bashing!!!!
“And shouldn’t you be hard at work for something? At least until the 4th of April?”
:/ It’s not too bad. At worst they’ll leave me with one leg.
No more controversy please!
If arrogance were a science, Abu Sinan, you perfected it. But I have no interest in learning it. I am sure you haven’t even thought about anything I wrote to you, because in your mind, there is absolutely no possibility that you could be wrong on anything. I continuously tried to establish, what is the position of the DEEN on the subject at hand, you on the other hand, continued to bash Muslims. Advice: worry about yourself, leave people alone. YOU, my dear, are a waste of time. Now write all your arrogant comments all you want, it is useless talking to you.
And if you were able to find one insult that I directed toward you for which I haven’t apologized, then it is upon you to make clear what it is. All I see is listing ahadeeth and telling you it is not okay to generalize, and that is the truth, if you can’t accept it, I have nothing to apologize for.
WM: *At worst they’ll leave me with one leg.* not really? ???
Everybody:
Peace and blessings!
Of course ‘not really’! Anyway, they start with fingers 😉
‘They’= the people who grade my essays.
LOL!
Dalioness and WM, a match made in heaven! Are either of you married? If not, maybe it is naseeb? God works in mysterious ways! Alhamdulillah.
Dalioness, I didnt think about what you wrote me because honestly, I didnt read beyond the first sentence or two; it was much too long winded.
You need to learn how to say more with less words. More is NOT better. Do me a favour and offer me a set of Cliff Notes next time if you are going to give a lecture.
I was an engineer major, not a English major, so keep it short, or at least throw some maths in it.
Bullet points might be a good suggestion for you, it makes it less work to scroll past your posts.
Anyway, it’s spring, the birds are singing, so be happy! }:>)
Abu Sinan:
Since my faith in your ability to make a coherent case for anything died some time ago, I’m not sure I can trust your match-making abilities to lead me into marital bliss.
Thanks for the cheap shot.
Abu Sinan, HAD you read what I said (surely it is not that difficult), I have explained why I wrote that much. Plus, in light of your comments, you asked a lot and accused a lot so you should expect a longer reply from some of us. To bad that your highness is bothered to read and rather wishes to assume.
Thank you for advising me to be happy, I could not be happier than I already am, LOL! By the way, it is still cold where I live, so I am a bit grumpier than usual. Hopefully exchanging of comments with you wont be necessary in future, so I won’t bother worrying about the writing style.
LOL! Me and WM? Well that’s a lovely suggestion. Hey, never know right? But I think I am to hot-headed even for him, LOL!
Aafke, peace and blessings unto you as well!
WM, you crack me up!
Abu Sinan:
The weather here is miserable. Last year there was no summer, and we’re still waiting for it to arrive.
Woehaha! I liked the summer: not too hot and lots of rain! 😀
WM,
That’s what you get for living in “Blighty Old England”. Having spent several years there I know what it’s like.
Personally, the colder the better for me. Anything above 32 degrees/0 centigrade is t-shirt weather for me.
Wow…my internet goes down for 2 days and I return to find this post and the comments still going strong.
I think it is safe and fair to say that there will always be those who agree to disagree and continuing to repost on same issues is not going to change anyones views. However it has indeed been informative and educational on a variety of aspects. Not only by the information shared but we all certainly received insights on a number of personalities, convictions and beliefs. Thank you all!
I hope that other posts will have such stimulating dialogue!!
Thanks carol for stirring us all up, you’re so naughty. LOL!
*we all certainly received insights on a number of personalities, convictions and beliefs.*
This is really scary!!!!!
I’ll shut up. :+
“we all certainly received insights on a number of personalities…”
Even WM? I’ve been told (in life) that I have no personality. Only online does my sequestered alternate self emerge 😀 *evil laugh*
Well, dalioness,
Aren’t you so lucky that you are even getting to live in the US and are (it would appear) on a path to citizenship. Do you think you could immigrate to Saudi or another Muslim country where you were not born and immigrate — much less be treated equally???
Ah, but you do have the freedom to worship as you please in the US. I guess you just don’t want for others what you want for yourself ;-)))
Peaceful Muslimah,
It has already been said here that people who think like this would NOT want to have their religious practices banned, but they see no issue with banning others.
You know how it goes “Down, Down with the Great Shaytan!”…….”Now where is my Green Card?”!
American is awful, we are terrible here, but if everyone in the Muslim world who wanted to come to the US could, places like Amman, Beirut, Cairo, Riyadh and many others would be more than half empty.
I have a suggestion, instead of these people fleeing their own Muslim societies and then coming here to the US to complain about how bad America is, why dont they stay in their “Islamic” countries and do their bit to sort out their own mess?
But see, the standard of living here, six digit salaries trump even the “disgrace” of having to live amounst the “kuffar”.
If you ask me if one is looking for a society that, at it’s very roots, is the most Islamic, the USA is just the very place! Places like Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the like wouldnt know Islam from Hari Krishnas.
LOL, I guess it is obvious this subject bugs me.
If you dont like America…………….feel more than free to leave.
PM and Abu Sinan,
very nice “islamic” manners, I must say. Besides the fact that obviously you continue to make assumptions about me despite some of the things I said in reference to my living in this country.
The topic was “proselytizing” not stripping people of the existing rights. The conflict here seems to be between you and the shari’ah, not you and me. To bad.
I would expect this type of arrogance, ignorance and hatred coming from the “kuffar” (yes I said it) rather than my “fellow” Muslims.
SO: Think, assume and dwell on it all you want.
In closing: to you are your beliefs, to me are mine.
Good luck!
You are great with false assumptions, Abu Sinan. Has it ever occured to you to ask us what we think of hijra, let alone to ask exactly why we are in the situation we are in?
I was born here. This is where I’ve lived my whole life. I don’t know anything else. When I go abroad, I get stared at- because I don’t look like an Arab (not that I wear a Hawaiian shirt and have a camera slung around my neck). Did you ever even bother to ask what I think of friends, colleagues etc I have in this place? How I’ve established a good relationship with them, how I am friends with some of them? How the next few years of my life (insha Allah) will basically be dedicated to reading their books, studying and teaching about their ideas, their traditions, of which I have a more profound knowledge than of our own? I can tell you all about the French Revolution, about Godwin, Burke, Paine etc, but I know nothing of the Abassid revolution. I have read hundreds upon hundreds of pages of Rousseau, and probably less than a dozen of ibn Taymiyya. I can tell you about the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and Marx’s analysis of the Ten Hours Act (in Capital, vol I.), but beyond some very simple things about my own religion I know nothing.
What is my point? That I am a little less simple than you think, that I am not just some horny young hot-head who, for want of women, turns to fanaticism.
What about hijra? The opinion that I have come to agree with, that I understand best, that the scholars I trust stick to: as long as one can properly practice his deen in a country, hijra isn’t wajib on him, especially if he was born there. I don’t even have the means of leaving, and that is if I wanted to! btw on the issue of tax pounds funding foreign misadventures- as a full-time student who has never earned more than the government ‘nisab’ of £5,000, I have never paid tax. And, no matter where I move in the world, as an expat, I would still surrender my 40% or whatever it is to HM’s Treasury. This issue is interesting, I can see why it is such a dilemma. And it isn’t one I can offer any solutions to, to be honest with you.
So my position on non-Muslims proselytising in our lands is the simple result of a little reflection on my own part with my limited knowledge of things. All I offered you was my sincere conclusion based on what I know, and the only thing I can apologise for was the way I treated you (insulting etc), which I think I have done already.
WM, I feel these comments are directed at “people like me”, you seem to have been accepted in the “gang”. LOL. You are the “moderate” one now, I am still an USA hating extremist who needs to bend and apologize for “my life” as it seems, to people who think they know everything about it. Perhaps I will publish an autobiography soon for the critics (if I ever improve my english skills), but wait, perhaps I won’t be “allowed” to use the english language either.
Well, since my position on the issue never shifted in the least, I can’t see why/how the attitudes of others can/have shifted towards me. If a church was built in Makkah or Riyadh, I STILL think it should be razed to the ground (without people inside, obviously)…or maybe it should be converted into something else. You get the point.
…a cryptic invitation to every commentator…tell me you love me! 😀
“People who think like this” was in reference to me, obviously, in response to PM’s comment.
I am scratching my head, how does my opinion about ‘proselytizing” in Saudi have anything to do with “Down down the great shaytan” mess.
It is mind boggling, how is one basically saying that I am a hypocrite and does not know a lick about me and my life in the US? I thought I was dealing with intellectuals and “moderate” Muslims here, I was wrong.
This no longer serves a decent purpose.
Interesting that you both took this as a direct slam at you both. My comments were about the general situation, not directed personally at either one of you.
Trust me, I have known more than few Arabs and Muslims who come to this country and do nothing but complain. I know a few who were actually DRIVEN from their own country, by their own countrymen, but have little or nothing to say about the US besides scorn.
Dont you think it would be nice if people kindly taken in by a foreign country, that didnt have to take them in, showed a bit of consideration and respect for that country? I dont think that is too much to ask.
As for doing reverse hijrah, I am married to an Arab lady whose parents did exactly that. Her father worked abroad at various locations, both in the Islamic world and outside of it, and made a choice to stay here in the USA. My wife, although she has lived in Saudi Arabia and is a Saudi citizen, made a choice to stay here as well. I have one step-son whom aged 17 whom we recently sent back to Saudi for awhile who will soon be coming back, Insha’Allah.
So to try and say that I might not understand the complexity of it all is more than a bit far from the truth. I most certainly do. I also understand that people who are taken in by my country, when we do not have to, owe a debt of gratitude to this country that I think more often than not, is ignored.
WM, you say your parents are Arab and made reverse hijrah to the UK, do you not then have the right to the citizenship of your father? In most countries in the Middle East that I am aware of birth to a man who is a citizen automatically confers citizenship rights on the children.
I have known such children who have later refused to go back to their parent’s country for fear of being drafted to serve their time in the military, Syria is a good example of that. Unless there is some legal impediment keeping you from doing so, all children of immigrants have the ability, if they choose, of going back to live in their parent’s native country. I have known a couple of young men who have done so, and despite issues with language, have done rather well for themselves.
As a citizen of a country in the West, you must see the duality of demanding the rights to raze any Church built in the Arabian Peninsula, then not wanting the same thing to happen here in the West. It is a democracy. If the elected officials in the UK, or even the US, decided that Islam was not compatable with democracy and freedom, wouldnt they have a right to ban Islam, even Muslims? Germany has taken a hard line on Scientology, what if they were to do the same thing with Islam?
Those who would destroy churches in the Middle East yet demand religious freedom in the West make it impossible to be able to defend the rights of Muslims already here in the West with a straight face. Take a look at any Islamophobic web site and this duality is pointed out on a regular basis.
I dont know your situation “Dalioness” so it is a bit unfair to accuse me of making statements about it. Like I said before, my statements here were not really directed at you, but at a mindset in general.
I am fully aware of what it can be like to be at the mercy of governments in the Middle East. My wife and I cannot even travel to her own country because of reasons like this, we cannot go on Hajj together, Umrah together, nor visit friends and family. All because one government that man think is the only country that is run according to Islamic principles has decided to trump God’s laws and make us conform to their laws.
Anyway, I will say it again, I think it is much easier to be a good Muslim in the USA, and the West in general, than it is in any “Muslim” country. There isnt anything going on here in the West that doesnt happen in the Middle East. There are heroine addicts and prostitutes yards from the Grand Mosque in Saudi and in every decent sized town in the Middle East. They used to brew alcohol under the Grand Mosque in Mecca.
Having mosques on every corner does not a Muslim country make, when your society is dominated by inequity, injustice, wasta, corruption, reschwa/bribery and greed.
When it comes to cultures that are “Islamic” one would be hard pressed to say that any country in the Muslim world has anything close to an Islamic one. As time it only gets worse.
There is a hadith that states that there will come a time when the Ummah, and I am paraphrasing now, will be less Islamic than other communities out there. Another that states that in the end days for most people the deen will not extend any further than their throat. Clearly meaning that there will be those in large numbers who claim knowledge and to be religious, but are not.
If we are not there already we certainly are close.
Abu Sinan:
“I dont know your situation “Dalioness” so it is a bit unfair to accuse me of making statements about it. Like I said before, my statements here were not really directed at you, but at a mindset in general.”
A bit unfair? Wolf or sheep? Choose one and stick with it.
PM:
“Well, dalioness,
Aren’t you so lucky that you are even getting to live in the US and are (it would appear) on a path to citizenship. Do you think you could immigrate to Saudi or another Muslim country where you were not born and immigrate — much less be treated equally???
Ah, but you do have the freedom to worship as you please in the US. I guess you just don’t want for others what you want for yourself ;-)))”
Abu Sinan (after a period of silence):
“It has already been said here that people who think like this would NOT want to have their religious practices banned, but they see no issue with banning others.
You know how it goes “Down, Down with the Great Shaytan!”…….”Now where is my Green Card?”!”
Keywords: “people who think like this”.
I believe your hatred and lack of understanding and tolerance, your extreme generalization were made known long ago. No need to keep repeating.
Arrogance is a trait of Iblis. Get rid of it.
“Places like Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the like wouldnt know Islam from Hari Krishnas.”
Are you calling them “kuffar”?
Be mindful of Allah. Abu Sinan, really, be mindful of Allah. That is the best and the last I can say to you.
In general, according to the theory of Abu Sinan, all expats who have any complaints about Saudi should leave Saudi.
Nice Dalioness, but you failed to address anything I said.
Is it not rude and insulting for those who are taken in by America to have nothing positive to say about the country?
If someone moves here and does not like it they should leave, full stop. No one is forcing anyone to stay! This is a free country.
I find it more than a bit rude that people who come from countries where corruption, torture and murder are the order of the day, then get here and complain.
I know this guy, a Jordanian originally from Palestine. He complains and complains about the US. Then he told me how he was once traveling to Jordan and was arrested. When they found out he had a US passport they demanded a 10,000 JD bribe to get him out of jail otherwise he’d get a sentence of several years in prison, all on trumped up charges of course. It was his engineering job here in the USA that allowed him to come up with the 10,000 JD bribe.
After this he came back to the US and went back to complaining about the USA. This is all too common and it almost borders on insanity, really. If it was just this guy it would be one thing, but this attitude is very common amoungst Muslims in the West.
Now, what would happen if I traveled to Jordan and complain about the King? Think I’d be welcomed to continue my stay? Would others defend my freedom of speech? How about I headed to Kuwait and talked about the unIslamic and corrupt nature of the Kuwaiti royal family. What do you think would happen?
I love freedom of speech, but people like this need to have some respect for themselves. If the US is so bad………..leave. If it is good enough to stay, then respect the country and if you something wrong do something about it and NEVER forget why you left where you came from in the first place.
I am very understanding “Dalioness”. My own family is a very good example of the right way in which people can come to this country and make a positive impact on the community and the people around them. You wont catch the members of my wife’s family sitting around complaining about the USA all day.
They know full well that this county is better than the one they came from and they are not about to be rude and disrespectful to a country that took them in when it didnt have to.
Are you really trying to compare Saudi to the USA? Are you for real? Here in the USA when you are here legally for five years you can apply to be a citizen. Care to tell me under what circumstances, say someone from Pakistan, can become a Saudi citizen?
It is very clear that Saudi Arabia is very unfair on a whole host of fronts, and it’s treatment of ex-pats, especially non white ex pats, is one of the worst of them. Having said that, if ex-pats do not like Saudi to the point where they cannot stop talking about it, yeah, they should leave. Hoepfully before they get locked up for a couple of years.
As to the societies in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the Middle East, I would have no issue saying that most of their culture is no more based on Islam than ours is here in the USA. Like I said, having mosques on every corner does not make one a Muslim country, it’s culture and the way it acts and treats it’s citizens makes it a Muslim country.
Based on that alone I would so there is no such thing as a “Muslim” country in today’s age, only countries with Muslim majorities.
If you think the cultures of the Middle East are Islamic then you must then have to formulate why, exactly, are honour killings done, why bribes and corruption are a way of life, and why 99% of the immorality that happens in the West also happens there.
So yes, it is clear the culture is “kuffar” even if the people are not. I am not making takfir upon them, simply recognising that the culture in the Middle East is a VERY long way away from Islam and the example our Prophet set.
If you can make an argument of why you think the culture in the Middle East is Islamic, feel free. Good luck.
Hm, who are “you” so that I need to adress anything you said???
You haven’t even adressed the ahadeeth that were provided, let alone anything anyone said that does not conform to your opinion!!!
Do you want me to engage in all the backbiting and slander you continuously repeat? No, thank you. How did you even get the idea that I condone the behaviour of various Muslims you are describing???
The issue was: WHAT DOES SHARI’AH SAY ABOUT PROSELYTIZING OTHER RELIGIONS IN SAUDI. Even I, the foreign Muslim extremist know the definition.
That is all that should have been adressed, and to be honest, I made a mistake by engaging in all other points. I would have to write a book to adress all you said, and frankly, I do not care to nor do I have the time, nor does it bring any benefit.
“If you can make an argument of why you think the culture in the Middle East is Islamic, feel free. Good luck.”
I can. But you would not know the difference, nor would you care. So, I don’t care to waste my time. Besides, Muslim countries and Muslims was not the topic. You want to make it one, so I can not help you with that. I have waisted to much time already. Maybe if you followed the same advice you once gave WM, maybe then the exchange of comments would be meaningful.
Last note:
“You are a hoot Lioness. Between you and WM, you have the corner on arrogance, maybe I should take lessons from you?
As for WM, I’ll leave him alone, he has e-mailed me and apologised.”
Does that mean you won’t leave me alone, because I haven’t? Where did I insult you? I believe one time I did apologize for my behaviour, but I believe I did not call you any names. When will the time come when you will apologize to all those Muslims whom you continue to backbite, and along with them slander the innocent? Tell it to their face, that they need to leave if they don’t like it. Don’t come here and whine about them as if though “your” life has anything to do with them and vice versa. “Each soul will carry its’ own burden”, you know that right?
“WM, you say your parents are Arab and made reverse hijrah to the UK, do you not then have the right to the citizenship of your father? In most countries in the Middle East that I am aware of birth to a man who is a citizen automatically confers citizenship rights on the children.”
😀
You are too funny, Abu S. You know what my dad is? Give you a clue, so you don’t overheat the ol’ noodle. Before getting a UK passport he, um, how do I put it? Didn’t have one. Yup. Just a stack of papers with the word ‘stateless’ printed on them. He was a Palestinian- only, his Palestine (Yafa) is now sort of…occupied. Some new neighbours moved in, so we sort of got kicked out, my dad (along with his family) never returned home. They got treated like guests by other arabs too, Lebanon, where he was raised (well, minus the first few years in the mother country). I’ll leave the details to your imagination.
Oh yeah- what DID happen to that old right of return thingy? Do you think it exists? Frankly, even with my UK passport I’d rather not live in the Jewish state. I think then I’d really have something to complain about.
Abu Sinan, you really do make it impossible for people to like you.
“If the elected officials in the UK, or even the US, decided that Islam was not compatable with democracy and freedom, wouldnt they have a right to ban Islam, even Muslims? Germany has taken a hard line on Scientology, what if they were to do the same thing with Islam?”
Then hijra would become wajib. Duh.
“Those who would destroy churches in the Middle East yet demand religious freedom in the West make it impossible to be able to defend the rights of Muslims already here in the West with a straight face.”
Clue: freedom of worship already denied to non-Muslims in KSA. Non-Muslim governments haven’t done anything about it, with regards to the rights they grant Muslims. No-one mentioned ‘destroying churches in the Middle East’- the ME is a broad term covering countries like Egypt, Lebanon etc. Old churches shouldn’t be destroyed in those areas- just read the covenant of Umar, will you?
“Anyway, I will say it again, I think it is much easier to be a good Muslim in the USA, and the West in general, than it is in any “Muslim” country.”
What, so you pray five salawat in jama’ah in the masjid every day? You pray in the haram, where every prayer is worth a zillion times more than it is in the US? Masha Allah, you can defy space and time. You must be a wali or something.
“Having mosques on every corner does not a Muslim country make, when your society is dominated by inequity, injustice, wasta, corruption, reschwa/bribery and greed.”
The worst believing Muslim is better than the most upright kafir. Have some wala’a for your brothers, for God’s sake!
“There is a hadith that states that there will come a time when the Ummah, and I am paraphrasing now, will be less Islamic than other communities out there.”
Rubbish. Don’t lie on the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam) by attributing something to him accidentally. I know you don’t do this intentionally, but be careful.
“Another that states that in the end days for most people the deen will not extend any further than their throat.”
Nowhere does the hadith state, ‘most people’. It states, ‘a group of people will come out…’, and the ulema agreed that this group was the Khawarij.
You know what? You are probably the worst fanatic I have ever met. The whole ummah is damned, except for you. Every Muslim who doesn’t follow secular humanistic values in their 21st century formulation is damned. Most of the historical ummah is horribly misguided. The scholarly legacy is a lie. You are the worst fanatic I’ve ever met. The ummah was misguided before Allah sent you, a man unknown for his knowledge, his piety, a schmoe, a schmuck, just like the rest of us.
You obviously didn’t even bother to read the note I wrote on hijra, did you?
Wow, Carol, this has become a real hornets nest! I see what you mean.
My Great Uncle was a Christian Missionary for the past 65 years who helped feed and educate the poor in some far off land through his church that he founded. People like him who tend to the poor, the sick and the needy, do it because of their strong faith in God and their unselfish belief in helping their neighbor. Even though I’m Muslim, I find what he did a wonderful way of worship. There are so many who need help….does it really matter why they help them? I mean, if you were drowning and someone rescued you….but also wanted to convert you…..would you really care?
WM,do you believe this:
“The worst believing Muslim is better than the most upright kafir. Have some wala’a for your brothers, for God’s sake!”
I cannot believe this. Maybe before I became a Muslim and met so many horrible people who call themselves Muslim. But having lived in the heart of the Muslim world for 9 years now and living among the “kuffar” for the previous 40 years — well, it just doesn’t pan out if you really are honest and aboe to think critically. Perhaps it’s all semantics and what you are referring to as Muslim and Kaffir are not the labels people apply to themselves.
Anyway, it is this inability to blindly follow what is essentially the Islamic “party line” that has made me begin to question my decision to convert to Islam and whether it is a path I will continue on. It would be harder for me to feel more alienated than I do when I read what some have written here.
Salaam,
PM
Wow WM, it would seem that your version of Dawa seems to leave people questioning Islam and their decision to embrace it.
Although I do not regret converting to Islam, I COMPLETELY understand what PM is saying.
Here I have been trying to do nothing more than get my marriage recognised by the Saudi government so we can travel there, I can act as her mehram for government matters, even be able to travel to Saudi with my very ill mother in law, but I have gotten next to no help from anyone.
I have contacted clergy here in the US and in the Middle East, I have contacted the Saudi government, written members of the press, media, you name it. I have probably contacted hundreds of “Muslims” in this quest.
You know what? The only people that have actually done ANYTHING are not Muslims, they arent Arabs, they were both my Senators who wrote letters to the Saudi Embassy.
That’s right, all I want is for the Saudi government to accept what God already does so I can travel with my wife and her family, take care of her needs. Muslims from accross the world have IGNORED me, 99% of them dont even both to respond or get back to me.
Heck, even the Saudi Ambassador, Prince Bandr, for whom my father worked for 25 years, refused to help.
Yeah, that is EXACTLY what I can expect from the Muslim community. Wallahi when Shaw said that Islam is the best religion and it’s followers were the worst I do not know if a more true thing has ever been said on this earth.
Some of the worst people I have ever met in my life are Muslim. My wife and I have gotten to the point where we’d rather make non Muslim friends just because we know they are probably going to have a higher character than most of the Muslims we have met.
That might be a slap in the face for me as a convert to say, but when someone who was born a Muslim and has lived in the heart of the “Islamic” world to say it is a WAKE UP call for the Ummah and all Muslims who give a crap.
I am sure this is where the self righteous will want to give an unreadable lecture and proclaim about how little faith we have, ect…………..ad naseum/boring.
Muslims need to take a look at how many converts to Islam actually STAY Muslim when they have to put up with the trash that one encounters in most “Islamic” communities. We can sit here and brag about how Islam is the fastest growing religion, but why cannot we address the reasons why so many people who convert to Islam actually leave the religion?
I think a lot of “born” Muslims do not want to face the fact that their actions and the communities and societies that have built are driving people from Islam.
WM,
I have many people who like me, and fortunately, do not need to troll the internet for friends or for validation of myself or my ideas.
It is very hard to do, but I try to surround myself with those Muslims out there, and it is getting harder to find them, that actually draw people to the religion and to Islam. As PM has stated, some of the opinions stated here, and how they have been stated, are enough to drive people from the deen.
You and “Dalioness” need to really take a look at yourselves because not one, but TWO converts to Islam have publically said that your statements, and how you make them, are damaging. If two have publically said it, many more are privately thinking it.
Again, I am sure both of you will write lengthy replies telling me how full of it me and PM are and provide lots of daleel how you have everything right. That is fine, think what you may.
But, as you write your reply, keep in mind that two people who have converted to Islam, by the grace of God himself, are telling you that your ways are harmful.
Take that for what it’s worth. And before you claim PM and I are in league on this, that boat wont float. We have had many arguments on her blog and she actually asked to me to stop posting there. I think that was based on part because she misunderstood what I was trying to say, but there you have it.
Ha! Abu Sinan, I thought you have no time to read “long comments”, so why write them and expect others to do so?
I am a Muslimah for the pleasure of Allah and my faith in Him, so peoples’ attitudes, actions, thoughts, opinions etc do not make me question it and want to leave it. So please, save me the drama and do not pin the burden on me for anyone elses doubts and obvious lack of faith. I won’t carry it for ya, sorry.That is very cowardly. Besides, if I understand correctly, we are all Muslims here, I did not think that da’wah was needed. But now I see that it is, unfortunately, I am not the one to do the job. See previously, I thought as Muslims we are only discussing what is the shar’i on PROSELYTIZING other than Islam in Saudi. What should I apologize for? the ayah? The ahadeeth? My own words which, just as you, I should feel free to say? Abu Sinan, you have to many issues which I do not even want to begin adressing. it is between you and Allah, after all. Besides, why belittle the “daleel” when you were the one who asked for it. It was presented to you, yet you disregard it as if though I made it up somehow. Well since you, and the likes of you have no respect for the words of Allah and his Messenger, nor are their words enough, I do not expect that anything I say holds any weight.
So Abu Sinan, for me this discussion is done, and you no longer need to adress me. So, since I won’t participate any longer, I do not give you permission to mention my “name” any longer, and if you do, then you have backbitten me. Although, that seems to be one of your talents so I hardly believe you will give it up.
Again, I leave you with this, hoping it will serve as a starting point for you and the crew:
فَلاَ وَرَبِّكَ لاَ يُؤْمِنُونَ حَتَّىَ يُحَكِّمُوكَ فِيمَا شَجَرَ بَيْنَهُمْ ثُمَّ لاَ يَجِدُواْ فِي أَنفُسِهِمْ حَرَجًا مِّمَّا قَضَيْتَ وَيُسَلِّمُواْ تَسْلِيمًا
“But no by your Lord, they can have no faith, until they make you (O Muhammad) judge in all disputes between them, and find in themselves no resistance against your decisions, and accept (them) with full submission”. Al Nisa:65.”
Just what I thought. Leave it to you to prove my point.
Game, set, match, too bad it isnt a game.
You are a shining example of what is wrong with the Muslim community today and sadly enough, why so many people are leaving it. You might not like it, but it is fact.
You dont give me permission to mention your name? Wow, that is rich!
I am just left here shaking my head. You didnt get it at all.
Thank GOD I am able to hold onto my religion DESPITE Muslims, not because of them. It is sad to say but Muslims are the worst selling point Islam has.
If one avoids talking about the Muslim community there is no issue. As soon as you start talking about the mess the Muslim community is in and the way you are likely to be treated as a convert in the Muslim community you are in trouble.
I ought to avoid talking to people like you, it certainly gets the best of me.
My naseeha to you. If you wish to help Islam, please do not talk about it in public until you change your manners and your methods. Unless, of course, you are seeking to drive people from Islam. As a convert I can assure you your methods and your manners do that.
Allah Ma3aki!
Abu Sinan,
I am sympathetic of your situation but do take a little bit of umbrage when your comment implies at least that because a group of Muslims (ie, Saudi officials) were not sympathetic and helpful that you feel frustration and perhaps resentment against Muslims. I don’t think it is fair for anyone to generalize about Muslims or any other respective faith. That’s a big disservice.
For PM,
Like with any religion, I can understand that sometimes ones faith can be shaken and tried because of actions of a few. Sad but so true. Quite frankly, sometimes my own faith is shaken since living here in the Kingdom because I guess I innocently figured that being in the heart of Islam all people would be naturally kind, patient, helpful, etc., but instead see too much of impatient, rude, arrogant….and those are times when I have to give myself a good pep talk and remind myself to ignore those and continue to set my own example illustrating my beliefs and faith.
“The worst believing Muslim is better than the most upright kafir.”
Woah! Do you know what I meant by this? I don’t think you read it in the same way I wrote it!
The best of non-Muslims, Abu Talib, died a non-Muslim and despite his support for the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam), we were informed that he burns, this is what I meant! Whereas the ‘worst’ of the sahaba, because of his Islam, there is always the hope that etc- does that make sense? Please let me know that you all understand me! I want to hear everyone tell me that they understand this point, and don’t misunderstand it.
When I started practicing, I had a hard time, a very hard time. I didn’t talk to Muslims very often, I didn’t know that many. Everything I did, I had to struggle and accomplish on my own, and I always felt let down by my brothers. I had to accept ideas and doctrines that were ANATHEMA to everything I had been taught, everything I had known for my whole life. Some things I read tested my faith severely, in those early days- and believe me, it hurt.
Will return later insha Allah, need a haircut.
All muslims have their own personal struggle…I believe that is part of our test of faith from God. If muslims could unite and stop being so difficult with each other, imagine the strength we’d have! Imagine if we all supported each other in business like some ‘other’ faiths are known to do. But Islam starts with each of us and with the people we come in contact with each day. If we can start there, and try to make a difference, then things WILL get better for all of us….and it will make an impact. We can’t give up so easily because of a few bad examples.
“I can understand that sometimes ones faith can be shaken and tried because of actions of a few.”
Is it the actions of a few? If it is, then alhamdulillah, the blame is on those few. What if it is on the beliefs of the many, the historical many? Then there is a problem beyond that of the likes of me.
Let me say something to illustrate my point: when I was becoming a Muslim, I mean, truly trying to practice my faith, I encountered these problems too. For someone whose father was something of a rationalist, do you think it is easy to accept a belief in sihr [sorcery]- that it exists? Or what about jinn? Or that jinn can possess human bodies? In the beginning, simply put, NO, it was not. But all of these beliefs are bona fide Islamic doctrines, they are in the Qur’an, some more than others. I slowly began to realise that if I have a problem submitting to said creed, there is a problem with ME, something I have to fix within MYSELF. Anything else is solipsistic; to assume that there is never anything wrong with ourselves, but with what is external to us, makes us like the man who stood on his head and accused the entire world of being upside-down.
Some people are repulsed by the idea that, even in principle, a thief might have his hand amputated, or that an adulterer might be stoned, or that a man might be crucified for a cetain crime. I say, in principle, because the mere possibility of these things occuring, whatever the context, is repellent to some people. To those people, beyond asking them to confront their prejudices, and the hobgoblin of ‘freedom from unusual punishment’, I have no idea what to do. They are free to dispute that these things are from Islam, or were ever taught by the scholars, or implemented by the sahaba. Tell me what I should do. Do I blame myself, if there are certain beliefs they just can’t accept? These are w’Allahi genuine questions. Abu Sinan, beyond my jerkery in insulting you, which I did apologise for, can you please tell me what you just can’t accept from what I am saying?
I really do hope the problem is with the WAY I am saying things, and nothing else.
Now please tell me that there is something wrong with ME, with the way I am presenting things, with the way I get angry etc etc RATHER than saying that I have told some hard truths that simply can’t be swallowed.
Sooner or later you will have to confront the questions I made you ask; you might put them off, live in a state of suspended judgement or, like Abu Sinan, live self-consciously on the intellecutal margins of the Islamic tradition, by rejecting scholarship as bunk, and yourself as the most rightly-guided believer there ever was. For the rest of us, which includes me, there is safety in numbers, and the ummah of the past was never unanimous on error. Islam is submission, istislam, and I can’t apologise for what those before me upheld. I WANT to hear that your problems are with me, that I was rude, arrogant and self-righteous, that my thinking wasn’t joined-up properly, that I forgot to carry the two etc. W’Allahi, I want the best for you, especially for PM who I know better than I know the rest of you, and who (I would like to think) is a close friend.
Beyond that, beyond apologising for the method of presentation, my brothers and sisters, I can do no other. I can only submit to that which I believe the scholars wrote, what the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam) said, what the sahaba transmitted to us and so on, and so long as I have done this to the best of my ability, I don’t believe I can be blamed for anything, before Allah azza wa jal.
Carol, Abu Sinan, PM and others: can you pelase tell me what is wrong with saying: non-Muslims are prohibited from proselytising among Muslims in our countries? Since you obviously think I am a jerk, that is.
WM,
My only comment is that I do not like anyone putting words in my mouth. If I wished to think or call you a jerk, I can do so on my own. I have not done so please do not infer or state that I have.
Regards,
Carol
Can you tell me, beyond that, what is wrong?
I am in something of a quandary: TELL ME WHAT TO DO
I am in something of a quandary: TELL ME WHAT TO DO. Do I apologise for the opinion and actions of Umar (ra)? Do I apologise for the opinions of the ulema? What do I do? Beyond asking for forgiveness and guidance for myself, I don’t know what to do. Beyond asking for what is wrong with me, not the sahaba or the ulema, I have no idea what to do. Is there anything I can do, or have we reached an impasse? I am in earnest. Has it reached the point where the fault is not with me, not just with me, but with something much greater and more venerable? I am afraid I could never live on the religious margins of Islam, by rejecting the whole of history and scholarly opinion.
Tell me the problem is with ME, not with the sahaba and the ulema. Tell me I’ve tragically mis-represented them, somehow.
If the problem is with me, not with the sahaba, then I say: alhamdulillah. On the other hand, if the problem is with me then…
“If you wish to help Islam, please do not talk about it in public until you change your manners and your methods.”
I genuinely believe, brother, you have a problem with WHAT I am saying, as well as the manner of my saying it.
Wow… I’ve spent the last hour reading the comments here, and am deeply saddened. I am a Christian. I am also human, which makes me a sinner – no matter what else I may be, I am that. I abandoned “organized religious denominations” some time ago, ironically enough, for some of the same things that I’ve seen here. You see, the Baptists thought they were superior to the Methodists, who felt they were superior to the Catholics, who believed they were superior to the ________ (fill in the blank), and so on and so on. They all claimed to share a common faith, but each believed themselves to be better – more correct, more intelligent, more learned – than the other. What I saw in those places were too many people who spent too much time trying to tell others how wrong they are – all this from a religion that teaches us to love our neighbors as ourselves. What a contradiction.
Not being Muslim, I cannot speak on the tenets of the belief, and won’t try to… but it seems there are divisions within that cut as deeply as those in Christianity. Perhaps I’m just reading it wrong.
The original post that spurned all of this “discussion” was a story about a man who traveled to a foreign land to help those who needed help. Did he convert some? Apparently so – but is that the important lesson of the story? I don’t believe he spent 11 months out of the year proselytizing… do you? I believe that his mission was to offer himself in service to those who were less fortunate than he… to love others as he loved himself, even giving those in need far more of his time than he gave to his own family.
I am sad because, no matter what label we choose to affix to our faiths, no matter what book(s) we decide to call ‘holy’, no matter what ethnicity we call our own, or what land our ancestors were born into, we – as human beings, individuals, not governments – will continue to thrown stones and call names and murder each other… and we’ll do it because we think we are right, and our neighbor is wrong. And we’ll feel justified that our actions are acceptable and just, because it’s what our beliefs teach us. And we’ll continue to mourn for our dead, and burn for revenge, and sacrifice the futures of our children. I’m sorry… but to this old, fat man, there is something seriously wrong with this picture.
God help us all.
If my comment is offensive (I am new to this blog), then please accept my apologies, as it was not my intent to offend. Thank you, Carol, for your kind comments on my blog. I hope I have not overstepped my welcome to yours.
Pax, amor et veritas.
Dear Omar, I am sorry you are having trouble. It seems from what you write you are very much alone with your current thoughts. Also you think too low of yourself, nobody thinks you are a jerk (well, perhaps one or two), just somewhat unlucky with some of your expressions.
Writing on the internet is só difficult; what seems clear to yourself is taken completely different by others. I have had big problems with that myself, and have been very upset at times. I have to think every sentence over three times.
We are all in a state of developement. I have no answers to your questions, but I am sure that with an honest evaluation of what you know, and you will be learning more too, you will answer your own questions eventually.
So how did your haircut turn out? On a sunday???
(I hope you appreciate the time I spent here: this difficult comment took me 40 minutes!)
Lofter,
Thanks very much for your astute summary of the original post and the various comments. I’m still amazed myself that my simple post spurred so many comments and dialogue.
Haircut was fine alhamdulillah.
Abu Sinan, PM etc:
Please read through ALL of the below, I have gone through great trouble to type it at 4.15am with work due in tomorrow, and w’Allahi for no other reason than to guide us all insha Allah. I learned a lot alhamdulillah from what I read, Abu Sinan look for mention of Yemen, PM look for the hanafi opinion on things. I am sorry if I gave you the impression that they should be kicked out of Yemen, seems the majority disagree strongly; I am a dunce, but insha Allah when shown evidence like this I do correct myself, I am not a complete reprobate 😉 Apparently Abi Hanifah allowed them in the Jazeera for need, possibly to live permanently but I it wasn’t clear from what I read (‘necessity’ in the shari’ah does not equal convenience btw); different reports come from him, some stricter than others. Pretty much everyone from what I read agree on Makkah, Madinah and surrounding areas.
There are LOADS of different opinions on the issue of what constitutes Jazeerat al-‘Arab: some go as far as saying it means ‘all the lands of the Arabs’, some limit it much, much more than this and say; the two Holy Cities and surrounding townships. When they mention a specific city e.g. Madinah, they intend, Madinah and surrounding townships.
I want to summarise from something I read:
ibn Hajar (‘Asqalani) said: Makkah, Madinah, Yamamah and neighbouring areas, but NOT Yemen according to the majority (i.e. they are allowed in Yemen), he also says (drum-roll please): Hanafis allow them residence in all the Jazeera minus the haram (Makkah-area)
Ibn Wahb said Imam Malik said: Makkah, Madinah, Yemen
al-Asma’i: in length, Aden to the Iraqi highlands; in width, Jeddah and neighbouring areas all the way to Shaam
Malik b. Anas: Makkah, Madinah, Yamamah, Yemen
Mughirah b. Shu`ba: Makkah, Madinah, Yemen and neighbouring regions
Ibn Qudamah said: non-Muslims aren’t allowed residence in Hijaz according to Shaf’i, Ahmad said, no residence in Madinah, Makkah, Yanbu’, Khaybar etc and surrounding regions; Shaf’i said NOT to expel them from Tayma’ or Yemen ( 😉 Abu Sinan); Abi Ubaydah b. al-Jarrah said: not to expel them from areas outisde the Hijaz
al-Qurtubi said: Makkah, Madinah, Yemen, Yamamah, Shaf’i allows them in Yemen ( 😉 Abu Sinan)
ibn Muflih: from what is between Yemen and Najd and Yamamah and ‘Urud
ibn al-Qayyim: Malik said, kick them out of ALL Arab lands, he adds Yemen cannot be a part (which they are expelled from) because Jizya was accepted from them
anNawawi: ‘expel them from the Arabian peninsula’, meaning, the Hijaz in particular and not necessarily what is extraneous to those
WM: I love you, brothers and sisters, and care for you (not in a condescending paternalistic way 😉 ), and want all of us insha Allah to be guided to what is right in things. Yes, I was wrong in many of the impressions I gave, and I left people to infer too much whereas the ulema were more specific. W’Allahi I was never dishonest or insincere in anything, and I like it when my brothers and sisters advise me, when they point out errors in my arguments, when they advise me not to be rude, especially more than anything I cannot resist it when they are kind to me. I always got the impression that people look down on me for being young, maybe they are right to do so. I feel warm and fuzzy now, it may just be physical exhuastion but I genuinely care for my brothers and sisters. I hate to hurt them…well, the ones I like and are kind to me really, I find it is such a struggle to tread the path of pleasing Allah without paying heed to the people, I always fail in it but I hope I succeeded guys, in pleasing both Allah and you, since that is the best result of all.
But I re-emphasise, we must make the Prophet (sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam) our judge in everything, we must love him more than our family and even ourselves, I know this takes so much effort, Allah make us of those who love Him and His anbiya, ameen.
“I’m still amazed myself that my simple post spurred so many comments and dialogue.”
For good or for evil, ’twas my itch to write.
Aafke,
You raise excellent points on how easy it is for one to be misunderstood when writing on the internet….we must also take into account that for some who comment, English is not their first language either and therefore can make interpretation more challenging too.
Someone I respect greatly told me: instead of wasting all that time you could have read Qur’an. What a good person, insha Allah I will follow their advice as much as I can.
Carol,
I understand where you are coming from, so I hope you know where I am coming from, and I think you do.
I am really mad, I am VERY frustrated and really feel that my wife and I, as well as many in our situation, are being very unfairly treated.
I try not to generalise with our situation, but when you become aware of the scope and the amounts of people I have contacted then even if you do not share my feelings, you can at least start to understand.
It isnt that the hundreds of people I have contacted have returned my e-mails, phone calls or inquiries and let me know they couldnt help, or even acknowledge that we exist, 99.99% of them didnt even have the decency to even contact us back.
After a few years of this it becomes a bit too much. I just want to scream at the top of my lungs “no, we dont have money to pay you a massive bribe, no we dont know anyone that can do anything for you, how about just being a decent person and helping us out”?
Carol, you have done more for us that anyone out there to date and I appreciate that. It just gets frustrating sometimes and it can become too much. All of this work just because we want to be able to visit the country where my wife is a citizen? It is really amazing.
You said this is about Saudi officials, and if that was the extent of it, I might be okay with it. The fact is, is that I have contacted a wide array of Muslims from all over the Middle East, from all backgrounds, all countries, from a diversity of groups, again 99% of them failed to even recognise our existence, let alone offer any sort of help or a guiding hand.
I have contacted respected Muslim officials here in the US who refuse to get involved. For me, one of the great things that drew me to Islam what the idea that Mohammed (PBUH) fought and strove for justice against all odds. Islam, as much as it is a religion, was founded as a social justice movement.
I see none of this today and when I do, it is the exception and not the rule. My experiences, as a whole, in the Muslim community in the Middle East, Europe and the USA, has been a consistent downer.
I have met some great people, some incredible people and I wish I could say that is the norm, but in my experience it is not.
I can only put forth my experience, the sum of what I have seen and experienced. I am sure it is different from what other people experience, but that is their story to tell.
I am sure if my father in law was alive today and could walk in and have the Prince sign a piece of paper and make all of the issues disappear I would have a different viewpoint. If I had 100,000 Saudi riyals to pass to the right person, I am sure I wouldnt be as frustrated.
Here I sit knowing that my mother in law might die any day and I will not be able to take her back to Saudi where she wants to be buried in her hometown of Mecca. I sit here knowing that she’d probably move back to Saudi if she knew I’d be there to accompany on her trip and help her set up things when she got there.
I realise, that as things stand, my wife and I will never be able to go to Hajj or Umrah together. My sister in law in Jeddah has three daughters that my wife has never seen, and will never see, as long as our marriage is not recognised. My boys havent met their aunt, nor have they seen their cousins, and other members of their family.
My wife, because of our marriage not being recognised, is not able to apply for the scholarship that she would otherwise get, because of our marriage issue. That leaves me working an extra 16 hours a week to pay for her classes, meanwhile I spend weekends and evenings away from my two boys who are growing quicker than I can keep up with.
Why? Because the Saudi government wont give us a little piece of paper saying that we have their permission to be married even though we already have permission from the government here in the USA, from our mosque, my wife’s family, and most importantly, from God Himself.
Anyway, enough venting.
Sorry if this all gets to me at times, but the whole thing would be a bit stupid if it didnt affect our lives at so many different levels.
Abu Sinan, can you tell me you read it before I go to bed?
Man…over the next 48 hours I will get about 5 hours sleep. Please, anyone who reads this make du’a for me…
Abu Sinan,
This is short and sweet before I dash off to work, but have you tried contacting Karamah? http://www.karamah.org (they are in the WDC area)
Can someone wish me goodnight 🙁
I feel lonely
Good night, may Allah make things easy for you, ameen.
Carol,
I have not tried Karamah. We might try. I am reluctant because a Saudi friend of my wife, who has a child with Autism contacted them. The child’s father was Palestinian and was killed in Palestine when the girl was little.
She contacted them to see if they could help in getting the girl a Saudi passport. Of course, in Saudi law, if the father is not a citizen the children of a marriage to a Saudi woman do not normally get Saudi citizenship. Of course, like anything in Saudi, if you know the right people this can be fixed.
Anyway, as so often happened to me, the people from the organisation didnt get back to her and it has been many months now. I guess that is what bugs me, if you cannot help someone, just tell them. Dont make them sit there and wait, wonder and then give up hope.
I will have my wife draft up a letter to them, but as we have contacted so many different groups before, we wont put any hope on it. Once we went through a list of like 5 dozen different Saudi charitible groups, many of them professing to work to help women and children. Not one responded with anything. Not a yes, a no, sorry we cannot help you, but with nothing at all.
This is where my attitude about this issue comes from.
Abu Sinan,
I’m happy to offer suggestions such as above but as I’m sure you have also realized…rightly or wrongly, the Saudi government does not take to what could be characterized as “publicly airing of dirty laundry.” And it is not only for anything that could be construed as a negative but even the most positive and beautiful actions on the part of the Saudi government are down-played too. Therefore when one has perhaps publicized too much, it may in fact have the opposite actions of what one has wished. I realize this is contradictory to the Western way which is to appeal publicly and to various organizations as well as to “toot our own horn” when doing something viewed as worthy and charitable.
I see what you are saying Carol. I guess if I had gotten any help early on I might not have said anything, whether online or elsewhere, but if you have zero power, little resources and no one seems willing to help, there isnt much else one can do.
This isnt about what the Saudi government wants to do really, public or not, to me this is about granting to us what GOD has already given us. If Saudi is indeed to be seen as any sort of an example of the way things should be done they should take this into account.
What is there to gain from keeping a husband and his wife from going on religious pilgrimage together? Is pride to blame for maybe keeping a son in law from being able to take his ill mother back to Saudi and set herself up so she can die in the country of her birth? A county her husband worked for 40 years to promote, and for which she herself has given so much?
From day one I was told I would need something more than my application, references and the word of God. I was told by the Embassy themselves that God’s way was not enough, I’d need wasta in Saudi.
Sad day when wasta trumps God in the Land of the Two Holy Shrines. This is NOT the way things are supposed to work.
My wife has basically given up on the whole process herself. Having dealt with the Saudi Embassy and official for years she just thinks it is a waste of time.
Me? I guess maybe I am stupid or do not know things like she does, but I will still go on looking for that one person who is willing to do the right thing. It is called hope (amal in Arabic) and I have not given up on it yet. Sometimes one person can do the right thing and make everything okay.
I started this whole thing pretty firm in the belief that we’d not be ignored by those in a position to help. No matter what I heard from my wife, her family, and our Saudi friends, I thought there is no way in today’s world they’d make such a big deal out of it.
I was SO wrong. To be honest this whole thing is the center piece of my growing ill feelings towards many things. It is sad how someone can start a process so full of hope and have that hope dashed by so many people in so many places.
Insha’Allah, someone steps up and does the right thing. I have heard cases of people staying silent for years and years and at the end of the day getting rejected, so it is clear that the process isnt always fair either.
I am just so sick of “kalam fadi” and “jamyle kadaba” I want to cry.
This is very simple to understand!
The Saudi State being an Islamic country by constitution, recognizes only Islam as the true religion and considers every other religion to be false. Therefore the preaching of falsehood is banned in Saudia and only the preaching of Islam is allowed.
The western countries mostly do not ascribe to any religion (or ascribe in name only), therefore they allow the preaching of other religions.
[…] dialogues are not intended for conversion or proselytize. Yet in today’s changing world, people cannot remain with their head buried in the sand. They […]
@WM:
Salaam Alaykum.
Some historians today believe that Umar ibn al Khattab(r.a.) although he was a virtuous man, may have fabricated such a hadith in order to expel Christians and Jews from the Arabian Peninsula (or someone else could have fabricated it and attributed it to Umar). Islamic scholar Reza Aslan supports this view. However, Umar was kind towards Christians in other parts of the Middle East, e.g. the “Mosque of Umar Incident”. It makes no sense that Muhammad (s.a.w.s.) would say such a thing, seeing as how other ahadith state that he was tolerant towards Christians (even allowing them to pray in his mosque in Medina!) and how the Qur’an commands Muslims to respect the Ahl al Kitab and come to terms of agreement with them. I believe that Christians and Jews should be allowed to publicly practice their religion in KSA.
However, I’m still all for banning non-Muslims from Makkah. Shoo! 😀