Be a Better Muslim

One idle day in Barcelona, John D Martin iii made a comment in casual conversation that changed my perspective on life (a little). I like to keep myself surrounded by people who can do that - it keeps life stimulating, and it broadens my horizons. In fact, that's probably a big part of why I'm married to 'poema de vida'.

We were talking about Egyptian madness and the confused double standards that seem to be wide-spread around the Muslim world, particularly where religion is concerned, when I said to John, "Well, at the end of the day, all these people who take various 'Islamic studies', and display acts of religiosity are just trying to be Better Muslims".
John stopped, looked at me and said "...than everyone else".

Those three words shook up my map of the world. He was right. Many of the people we knew who were pursuing some form of 'Islamic' education, were apparently doing so not only to improve their faith, but were probably also doing so to be better Muslims than everyone else. But why did that startle me? Well, it occured to me... maybe I'm just doing it to be better than everyone else too. This is a little worrying. It reminds me of satan's reply to God, when commanded to bow to Adam. "I'm better than him!"

This made me re-assess why I am really studying Arabic, and reading Qur'an, and praying on a day to day basis. Would I still do those things if it meant not receiving the superficial respect some people give it? Am I just trying to be better than others, as opposed to being humble before God? There's no real way to test this, other than not doing those things, which is probably not a good idea. They form a large part of my personality, and I feel dead inside when I go for a while not doing them. So I'll keep them up, in the hope I don't fall into the same category as Satan.

So, Bravo John! An excellent usage of those NLP meta-model questioning skills ;o)

Syed Kutb and other Radicals

Here is an interesting article I came accross in my research in political Islam:

http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/84614

Read it critically. It contextualises some of the writings and ideas of Syed Kutb, for those of you who have read any of his works. For those of you haven't, don't bother - the books of Tariq Ramadan are more appropriate for creating a balanced understanding of Islam in 21st Century Britain.

I will soon be posting my thoughts on a good syllabus for British Muslims who want to gain a deeper understanding of their faith, without being indoctrinated by one school of thought over another.

'til then, Enjoy!

What is Shariah Law?

This is a brief piece I wrote for FOSIS to be delivered to all Student Union Executives, as part of a FOSIS pack. I was asked to explain the shariah... a humble task indeed, and one which I somehow managed to pull off in just over 500 words:

SHARIAH LAW

In 21st Century Britain, when one thinks of 'Shariah Law' one cannot help but conjure up images of the darkest, most barbaric practices. This creates a major barrier to understanding the way in which Muslims conceive of the world, their existence in the West, and their apparent rejection of any notion of secularism. It also creates a barrier to understanding the real difference between 'normal' Muslims and actual extremists, because of the temptation to blanket all Muslims who support this legal system as 'barbaric', as opposed to being the progressive, democratic force for good Britain needs.

So, what is the Shariah? Muslims believe the Shariah is 'the Way' to the Creator. It is the system of morals, beliefs, and practices that guide the life of every believer. In other words, it is the legal, spiritual and belief system that shows one how to be a faithful Muslim, in any given context. Its four primary sources are the two scriptural sources of Islam (the Qur'an and the Sunnah), the consensus of the majority of scholars who have dedicated their lives to studying those sources (ijma), and rational deduction (qiyas). There are also a number of scholastic tools within the framework of the Shariah, that provide the adaptability that have allowed Muslims to live in almost every culture on Earth for centuries. Those tools are ijtihad (the scholarly struggle to find a solution to a new problem not explicitly dealt with by the scriptural sources, by a scholar with the highest level of training in the Shariah), maslaha (weighing up the common good in a situation and minimizing the harm), and the fatwa (a non-binding legal ruling given by a scholar capable of ijtihad, in answer to a specific question or problem, to be applied only by the particular person(s) of a specific time and place).

The overall objectives of the Shariah are five: the preservation of life, intellect, property, family and religion. Many Muslim scholars, capable of ijtihad are of the understanding that the legal system of Britain is the Shariah for British Muslims, as it fulfils these five overall objectives.

In order to be productive, the Christian tradition went through an important process: the separation of the church from the state. This approach is so deeply engrained in our Western tradition, that the thought of anyone disagreeing with this separation seems absurd. However, the Islamic tradition had a different separation that essentially fulfils the same purpose: the separation of the acts of worship (the 5 pillars of Islam) from all other worldly affairs. Shariah still guides those 'other worldly affairs' but in a different respect. In worship, everything is forbidden, except for what has been clearly instructed by the scriptural sources. In life, everything is permissible, except for the few exceptions, which have been clearly forbidden by the scriptural sources. This is the 'Islamic' equivalent to secularism, which allows the legal code of the Shariah to demarcate the moral barriers that cannot be crossed by Muslims in any sphere of life.

Therefore, in the realm of participating in political life in the UK, Muslims are free and actually encouraged to be involved in British politics, as nothing in the scriptural sources contradicts this, and several stories from the scriptural sources encourage civic and political participation. The moral values and principles one can derive from the scriptural sources are those of truth, justice and transparency, which FOSIS aim to uphold. It must be noted at this point that the flexibility of Shariah has allowed for numerous, perfectly valid interpretations within different contexts, particularly in the political arena. Therefore, one may encounter Muslims following traditional or literal interpretations of the scriptural sources that, contrary to the reformist approach, will not permit any political participation in the West.

Who Really Speaks for Islam?

The following article is the response I wrote on behalf of FOSIS to the attacks from Lucy James of the Quilliam Foundation (http://www.guardian.co.uk/free-d/power-of-a-handshake). Unfortunately, the ptb (powers that be) decided not to publish this response... God bless 'em...

WHO REALLY SPEAKS FOR ISLAM?

This is a critical question to ask in a time when the international landscape has been changed, thanks to the atrocious acts of terror committed by a handful of criminals under the banner of Islam. In the continuing efforts to counter terrorism, the government and the public need to know who they can trust, who they should be monitoring, and who are the charlatans making money out of the public’s fears, and the Muslim community’s guilt.

The Quilliam Foundation (QF) embody the charlatans. An observant reader will notice the theme that runs throughout their discourse: there are good, moderate, ‘traditional’ Muslims, and there are bad, extreme, dangerous ‘modernist’ Muslims, sometimes blanketed under the term ‘salafi’ or ‘islamist’. This false ideology seems to have become doctrine since the publication of Ed Hussain’s “The Islamist”. The pitiful shame is that £1,000,000 of the taxpayers’ money is going into spreading this myth.

The shocking truth is that this myth makes identifying the real criminals more difficult for the authorities, because matters of faith or culture-based social conservativism (such as a man shaking a woman’s hand) are confused with matters of criminality. The truth is that no one grouping of British Muslims produces terrorists – there are ‘good’ and ‘bad’ Muslims in every category, a tiny minority of whom will be recruited to terrorism – unless Britain can unite to stop it.

When I was a student at the University of Manchester like Lucy James of the QF, I too was rather worried about the low voter turn out to Students’ Union elections. Despite running a harder, better campaign than my opponent for the position of Communications Officer in 2006, apparently I was not religious enough for the I-Soc to lend me their support, and as a result of student apathy, I lost the election.

Why would Manchester University Isoc not support an active member of FOSIS, the national umbrella body for Isocs, in a student union election?
For the one year I was at Manchester running in the elections, the Isoc happened to be run by apolitical traditionalists, and literalists, who seemed to care more for the length of one’s beard than the strength of one’s abilities. Were they dangerous ‘Islamists’? No. Would they shake a woman’s hand? No. Were the Isocs that preceded and followed them of the same school of thought, ideology, madhab, or political stance? No.

British Muslim students are more diverse than any other student religious grouping, based on their ethnicity, backgrounds, cultures of origin, schools of thought, nationalities, and political views. The leadership of each campus Isoc expresses that naturally diversity and changes every couple of years, and the heads of each of these Isocs elects the FOSIS national executive annually. FOSIS aims to respect that diversity, and represent their common interests. So it’s no surprise that the current FOSIS executive is made of individuals from every major school of Sunni Islamic thought.

Why is this important? Because the moment I speak out against the QF’s dangerous over-simplification of who the good and bad Muslims are, their only response will be to accuse FOSIS of allegiance to the bad, ‘modernist’ version of Islam. Perhaps they believe their own lies.

The only person who ever really spoke for Islam was the blessed Prophet Muhammad. The rest of us just have opinions – some of them better informed than others.