"Extremism is not the Problem"

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"Extremism is as American as Apple Pie." Shaykh Hamza Yusuf

"Violence is." Argues Hamza Yusuf, especially when talking to Amerikanos about Muslims. He points out that Amerikano culture is based on all kinds of extremism. If you think that's true, be sure you don't know basic facts about Amerikanos :P

He's not arguing about 100% elimination of violence, rather persecution of dissenting voices, and dominance of one strand of thought over the other.

Without being apologetic about anything, one founder of a school of Law Imam Shafi or perhaps Imam Malik was asked by Khalifa Mansoor: i want to implement your interpretation on all of my dominion. To this Imam replied in an emphatic nay. In the presence of other towering luminaries and in the light of one's legitimate right to recourse to a differing expert opinion, he refused this historical choice that could've influenced heavily the religious and legal history of Muslims, perhaps. It is exactly the betrayal of tradition that sects have taken up arms against each other while we dialogue non-Muslims with such civility that bewilders a local who had the nightmare of watching sectarian strife. Of course, honorable, respectable academic intra-dialogue is only necessary and perhaps sufficient if executed.

Miracles: To be or not to be?

Why should miracles be important to prove, or to serve as an evidence for the truthfulness of a Prophet?

Miracles did take place in the time of Last Prophet, as per sound narrations and consensus of ulema. Miracles did take in the times of Prophet Moses and Isa. It's very curious to know how the magicians/illusionists of Firoun's responded to Prophet Moses' miracle that was granted to him by Allah: they accepted Prophet Moses as Messenger of Allah and recongized his miracle to out of this world! That was nothing short of an experimental testimony.

However, i was puzzled by this statement of Imam Ghazzali in his autobiography: if a person was come to me and say 2+1 = 10; and he'll prove the truth of this statement by turning a stick into a snake - i should never lose certitude in my knowledge that 2 + 1 = 3 and not 10.

Hence, can a rational person [not rationalist per se] demand miracles? The miracle we need to believe in today is: "... Islamic view of a universe created by God, where the trees and the stars worship their Creator, and the sun and the moon follow exquisitely designed laws." And the only time when veils were removed from the people, as public, was the time of Prophets, when trees and stone would talk to Prophet.

We should also know that the nations which self-abdicated themselves, like that of Saleh, requested miracles of their choice. When those miracles were performed, even then they didn't accept Islam. This is true for the scientists of today. Dr Asad Zaman in his brief essay Big Bang writes:

"Sometimes, the evidence is so strong that it breaks through the barriers of unbelief. For example, one of the discoverers of the genetic basis of human life, Crick was quoted as saying, ‘An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going.” Very unwillingly, against his atheistic beliefs, Crick gave testimony to what the Quran (Surah Al-Waqi’ah 57-58) asserts as challenge: In the creation of man and the seed from which man is created are signs which cannot be denied by those who reflect. Just like many nations mentioned in the Quran, Crick continued to deny God even after witnessing the miracles of creation."

Apart from the so-called supernatural miracles, the evidences regarding the coming of the last Prophet is of utmost importance. Please read the chapter on Bahira the Monk in Martin Lings Muhammad. 

For me, miracles are an important testimony and evidence. They happen today with the righteous ones. Moreover, it is hard evidence for a very strong alternative view of physical world. It is anti-dote to a mechanistic view of things, which 'cuts the hand of God his creation'. However, with the very miracle of life, my own being and the tree that grows out of the earth naturally, is enough a proof for me. One should also know that Dajjal will use real life CG effects to show miracles to people and claim to be Divine.

Disclaimer: Allah knows best. These thoughts are still very pre-mature and at least some parts are doubtful to me too.

Fear & Hope

I was standing before water pot put on fire - it was boiling. I saw the bubbles develop slowly but at a fast pace, and i shrank into meditation. I recalled category A industries our professor was telling us about, which operate at temperatures above 5000 degree Celsius. I shrugged at very thought of boiling tea water touching human skin, too painful to imagine, let alone of 5000 degree Celsius. Again i was reminded of what our scholars and pious men and women tell us about when they recite Qur'an and narrate Prophetic hadith - about the destiny of man. There are three different destinies that all of us would share: heaven (inshaAllah), hell, and a neutral place between the two. I thought, looking at boiling water reaching its climax, how to better to fear hell. Fear of one object is better than all fears of this world, which in fact is the fear of one Rabb... Make your deal...

It is very urgently important to mention a fallacy many good Muslims sometimes fall into: they are told not to fear hell, portraying it as human weakness, in fact the perpetrators of such fallacies make fun of those who fear hell and hope for paradise. Some Muslims, unfortunately, are moved by such profane arguments, which are in fact sentimental in nature, and have you reality attached to it.

SMS Conversation: History and Relgion, 'Policy Lessons' for Each Ego

Umer: One must have a basement in a house especially if he wants t0 launch a business. Shams and Nirwani, founders of Telezoo.com, invested $1 million in this start-up of theirs. To keep it low-cost in the beginning, the office of Telezoo was located in the basement of their home.

Bahawal: As far as the basement idea is concerned, I'd rather prefer to have an underground air-conditioned gym or a cozy library/study then 'waste' it for entrepreneurial purposes :-) :P

... We scholars usually don't like to talk much this money making business. Just give us a little respect, a bit of fame and acknowledgement and a few fat books to analyze. That's all you want. Lols...

Umer: (After critizing on fame part with a Urdu couplet, asks) And what books and articles are you reading these days?

Bahawal: Hmmm... I'm reading but haven't fully understood a book by Dr. Sayed Abdul Latif, The Mind that Al-Quran Builds. (Also) I'm reading a book History of the Saracens by Syed Ameer Ali. Then I'm also reading, History of the Arab Peoples. Apart from that, I've been reading some articles on internet on Babylonia, its culture, the city of Ur, etc. And, the major points of conflicts b/w the three Abrahamic religions, and the list goes on.

Umer: Please keep telling as long as you can comfortably. Its so informative foe me.

B: (Smiles, through a gesture) ... To sum up its been all history and religion (that I am studying). And, I realize that we need badly to turn back to Allah, repent asap, understand the balanced path, and start hating in ourselves what we hate in others. We stupid and idotic people have already cost ourselves a lot through petty egos and pathetically limited reserves of knowledge, which we assume to be too much but which actually is too little. What do you say?

U: Yar! Excellent analysis! That's what many top pious scholars (more or less) are saying! SubhanAllah! May Allah guide us to the right path and give us taufiq (power) to realize and act upon these useful insights.

B: May it be so! I wish we all see the right path.

Inspired

Still an athiest/agnostic, having given up his pure Roman-Catholic background, Nuh Keller here reveals what the unjust hides:

On a vacation home from school, I was walking upon a dirt road between some fields of wheat, and it happened that the sun went down. By some inspiration, I realized that it was a time of worship, a time to bow and pray to the one God. But it was not something one could rely on oneself to provide the details of, but rather a passing fancy, or perhaps the beginning of an awareness that atheism was an inauthentic way of being.

These words keep resonating in my mind. Its a kind of a testament. Hence as inspiration. Therefore beautiful.

Seyyed Hossein Nasr on Rushdie Affair

Going through karen armstrong's books these days for 'special purpose', i encountered the representation of moderns' point of view on Rushdie affair. West was in uproar on that issue. They all were ablaze with sentimentalism on an issue that concerned life of one person, declaring that (hopelessly) it was attack on freedom of speech. And Mr. Rushdie emerged as a hero, on whom later were showered endless distinguished honors. And many Muslims, especially those living in west or affected by modernity, failed to sympathize with people of strong faith. Nonetheless, following short audio clip by Seyyed Hossein Nasr explains the Muslim reaction to Rushdie affair philosophically. I recommend it as very important for it'd also clarify many other issues raised by moderns now and then - the core idea/concept-as-a-living-force is SACREDNESS, right of God is the highest value & non-compartmentalization of religion from various vistas of life::

http://mac.abc.se/home/onesr/af/_audio/A065e_SH.Nasr_Sh.Tantawi_19.mp3