Contentions 13! :-D :-D

A new set of Contentions by Shaykh Abdul Hakim Murad is now available online! A wonderful read.

Here are some of my favourite selections from this new collection..though really, they are all wonderful.

78.       The world is the way it is because you are the way you are.
85.       A saint is anyone who teaches you the meaning of wudu’.
93.       Traditional Islam is not the replication of the positions of the ancients; it is to seek what they sought.
94.       Look within, and what is outside you will become clear. Look around you, and you will understand yourself.
99.       A little worship with sincerity is all of religion; abundant worship for the sake of one’s image of oneself is nothing at all.

The full set can be found here:

well put

Westerners have singularly narrowed the history of the world in grouping the little that they knew about the expansion of the human race around the peoples of Israel, Greece and Rome. Thus they have ignored all those travellers and explorers who in their ships ploughed the China Sea and the Indian Ocean, or rode across the immensities of Central Asia to the Persian Gulf.  In truth the larger part of the globe, containing cultures different from those of the ancient Greeks and Romans but no less civilized, has remained unknown to those who wrote the history of their little world under the impression that they were writing world history.

~Henri Cordier

bbc thought of the day

The BBC thought of the day for September 1st 2008 featured Shaykh Abdul Hakim Murad. It’s well worth a read/listen. After the Rihla, he has become one of my favourite thinkers ever ever.

The text can be found below, and the audio can be found here. If you search his name, his other appearances on this BBC programme come up as well.

Thought for the Day, 1 September 2008

Abdal Hakim Murad

Good morning.

Today is Day One of the annual Muslim Challenge known as the month of Ramadan. It’s always a tough endurance event: no food or drink from dawn till dusk, and since God is the referee, cheating is not possible. So simple, but so compelling is the idea, that even people relaxed about the other duties of the faith make an effort. The result is that should you take a walk across London, tomorrow morning at about half-past three, you are likely to see lights on in about a tenth of the capital’s households. Those within are eating a very early breakfast, fortifying themselves for the rigours of the day ahead.

This might seem like a private Muslim eccentricity. But the Koranic verse which brought this commandment indicates that in fact there is nothing original about it. ‘O you who believe!’ it tells the Muslims, ‘Fasting is prescribed for you, as it was for those who came before you.’ And even the slightest study of most major religions will confirm that just about every faith, in one form or another, recognises the advantages of fasting.

But what, exactly, are the advantages? The same verse goes on to explain: we are to learn self-restraint. And this is, generally-speaking, the key benefit of fasting, recognised by most of the sages and saints of every religion. We have a tendency to binge, to splurge, to splash out; while religion wants us to be focussed on much higher things. Perfect stillness in meditation is not easy if one is able to reach for a doughnut. Tell the beast within that it must wait, and there is some chance that the soul will find the calm which it needs.

Nowadays we would probably call this ‘impulse control’. True, our secular age is often more worried about the health and beauty consequences of a supersized diet, than it is about the wellbeing of the soul. But even the most devoutly secular person will recognise that self-restraint is precious.

Yesterday, I returned to my endless conflict with the weeds in my garden. I know that when tackling the mortal enemy that is ground elder, or convolvulus, I have two options. Either I slice it off at ground level, which is quick, and fun, but allows it to reappear all too soon. Or I reach for the roots, which takes time and effort.

Weak human beings, Muslim or not, know that long training is needed before we gain the patience to uproot our tendency to crave and yearn for what is unnecessary. Fasting, in Ramadan, is a rigorous discipline, an opportunity to gain in self-restraint. We are unlikely to abolish the weeds in our souls, but when properly trained by this annual endurance event, we can keep them under control, and hope that, with God’s help, we can start to enjoy the experience of detachment.

copyright 2008 BBC

great article..

An excellent read.

You can find it here.

Ramadan Mubarak!

It’s finally here! Ramadan has actually begun! (insert sparkly Ramadan happiness here) I’m excited and delighted and nervous all at the same time. I’ve resisted writing a get ready for Ramadan post because..well, there are just so many blogs that have done that far better than I could, and it makes sense for you to read them instead.

S0, instead, here are some random posts that subhanAllah, are fantastic, and are a nice way to begin Ramadan.

Post 1: I Close My Eyes and I’m in Madinah: I’m always in awe of articles and blog posts that describe doing Hajj, being in Makkah or being in Madinah. Whenever I try to describe the experience, the words I use sound flat and not really reflective of the experience… So instead I read the words of more talented writers and feel really uplifted. This is one of those posts that makes me feel warm and cosy.

Post 2: Pursuit of Knowledge: Putting it Into Perspective :This is a truly wonderful article. I’ve been thinking a lot about the acquisition of knowledge and how that does/should impact our lives, and also about the implications of taking more classes, and reading and listening to more lectures as you consolidate what you’ve already learnt. I like what sr Aysha has to say on the topic. (insha’Allah Ramadan will be a time of emptying my buckets)

Post 3: This isn’t actually a post, but the Hanafi Ramadan Fiqh lectures (both Part 1 and 2) by Imam Tahir Anwar in the Zaytuna Ramadan Section are excellent. I highly recommend a listen.

Post 4: This last resource is a video, and from the wonderful folks at MeccaOne. I’m still watching this one, but it’s excellent!

And that’s all. Not sure how much I’ll be blogging this month, but insha’Allah will check in from time to time. I’ve been cleaning my room over a couple of days, and have found a lot of random notes/quotes that I wanted to post. So there may be some random posts coming up soon.

Deen on..and hope each day of Ramadan is going well.

The Pen

Take a pen in your uncertain fingers.

Trust and be assured

That the whole world is a sky-blue butterfly

And words are the nets to capture it.

~Muhammed al-Ghuzzi

good reminders..

A while ago, I saw a sign in a doctor’s office with the following written on it. This is a bit paraphrased cos I was madly trying to copy it down before the doctor actually came in.

Good Day:

wake up early
reflect
eat like a king
smile lots
encourage, compliment when due
be enthusiastic with everyone you meet

Bad Day:

wake up late
no shower
rush
no exercise
no spiritual reflection
rush rush-coffee muffin very fast
worry
sour expression
be mad at work

More 44 Scotland Street

Travelling back home this summer, I made the marvelous discovery that a new novel has been published the 44 Scotland Street series! The name of the book is The World According to Bertie, and I actually yelped for joy in the Heathrow airport Borders bookshop  when I saw it on the shelf. It’s not as satisfying as the other novels, (after 3 books you can guess what is going to happen to the characters) but it is full of delicious words that make it an enjoyable enough read. (the words that follow  are the words that I looked up afterwards).

apocryphal: of doubtful authenticity
quotidian: occurring every day
crowstepped: any of a series of steps at the top of a gable wall
paysage moralise: moralized landscape
fluted: having or marked by grooves
mullions: a slender vertical member that forms a division between units of a window, door, or screen or is used decoratively.
casus belli: an act or event that provokes or is used to justify war
dramaturge: A writer or adapter of plays; a playwright casus belli: an act or event that provokes or is used to justify war
echt: true, genuine
synaesthetic: A condition in which one type of stimulation evokes the sensation of another, as when the hearing of a sound produces the visualization of a color
fey: lots of meanings..which can be found here.
pugilist: the skill, practice, and sport of fighting with the fists; boxing
mots justes: exactly the right word or expression
atavistic: The return of a trait or recurrence of previous behavior after a period of absence.
pellucid: transparently clear in style or meaning
dalliance: frivolous spending of time; dawdling. 2) playful flirtation
mendacious: lying; untruthful 2) false; untrue.

My favourite paragraph in the book  is one that I want to implant firmly in my mind and heart. It  is near the end of the book and occurs when two of the characters are trying to decide what to name painting. I’ve wrote it out to remember it better..

” Domenica turned away from the stove. ‘It’s a line from Auden,’ she said. ‘”If equal affection cannot be/let the more loving one be me.” ‘

They were both silent for a moment. Behind Domenica, the pot on the stove simmered quietly; there was a square of light on the ceiling, reflected off window glass, shimmering, late light. Angus thought: yes, this is precisely the sentiment. That’s it exactly. That’s all we need to remember in this life, two lines to guide us. “

The Vision of Islam (Part 1)

Recently I’ve started reading the book The Vision of Islam by Sachiko Murata and William Chittick. I was reading it during the school year and loved it, but stopped when paper writing became too intense. Because too much time has elapsed since I first started the book though, I’ve started reading it again from the beginning. I’m not done yet but really wanted to share some introductory notes (not even close actually because so often there is a sentence or two in the book that really make me think, and I end up putting it aside to think about that one point, and then only return to the book the next day). If you’re looking for a good comprehensive introductory text on Islam though, I highly recommend this book. Also, a great companion to the book is the CD set by Shaykh Hamza Yusuf teaching the Vision of Islam.

Here are some notes from the initial pages of the book that I found quite interesting. Hoe you enjoy!

The Quran is a book of 114 suras. The word sura is generally translated as chapter, but the word literally means “a fence, enclosure, or any part of a structure”. The shortest sura is 10 words and the longest sura is 6100 words. The longest sura is the 2nd one, and after the 2nd one, generally speaking, the suras gradually decrease in length. The last 60 chapters take up as much room as the 2nd surah alone.

Suras are divided into ayahs, a word that is often translated as verses but that literally means signs. Due to the way that the Quran is organised Westerners may find it extremely difficult to appreciate the Quran, particularly when it is translated.

“Enough evidence is provided by Islamic civilization itself, and by great philosophers, theologians and poets who have commented on the text, to be sure that the problem lies on the the side of the reader, not the book.The text is undoubtedly one of the most extraordinary ever to be put down on paper. Precisely because it is extraordinary, it does not follow people’s expectations of what a book should be.”

“Simply attending synagogue, church or mosque does not mean that one sees things any differently from contemporary atheists. Our culture’s dominant ways of thinking are taught not in places of worship but in our media and educational institutions.”

” As a rule, it seems when people with no grounding in the Islamic worldview pick up a translation of the Qur’an they have their prejudices confirmed, whatever they may be.”

More to come later insha’Allah..

an excellent read.

I was sent this article by a friend today. Really well written, and one that has a lot of good reminders, particularly if you get confused by all the media coverage out there of Muslims who seem to really dislike each other. The author also has a recently published book titled “The Muslim Next Door: The Quran, the Media and that Veil Thing”. Can’t say for sure whether it’s a good book, but the preview of the book on Amazon looked very interesting. And I hope my public library is ordering lots of copies, because I’ve noticed there are very few quality resources available in local libraries and bookshops for people who aren’t Muslim, but are just trying to learn more about Islam (if you’re one of those people, three cheers from me). Yay for trying to fight through the fog of media nonsense!