Closing Pandora's Box

O ye who believe! be strict in observing justice, and be witnesses for Allah, even though it be against yourselves or against parents and kindred. Whether he be rich or poor, Allah is more regardful of them both than you are. Therefore follow not low desires so that you may be able to act equitably. And if you conceal the truth or evade it, then remember that Allah is well aware of what you do.¹

O ye who believe! be steadfast in the cause of Allah, bearing witness in equity; and let not a people’s enmity incite you to act otherwise than with justice. Be always just, that is nearer to righteousness. And fear Allah. Surely, Allah is aware of what you do.²

In my 6^th form class there were 10 boys (including me). We had quite a weird bunch of guys.

• One was gay. He was an excellent singer. We made fun of him.
• One was extremely homophobic, spoke like a robot and loved America more than anything. We made more fun of him.
• One was a diehard Chelsea fan and came to school drunk on many occasions. We had a lot of banter with him, because he was a little mentally challenged loud mouthed.
• One was called Eid. His ability to change his tone from ghettoese to well spoken, grammatically correct English was quite startling. But with a name like Eid, how could you make fun of him?
• Two were Manchester United fans (like me), hard working (not like me), good guys (I was a bit of a *insert appropriate word here* back in the days).
• One was an Arsenal fan. Dynamite comes in small packages. He was small. Every Monday I’d happily remind him, “For the last however many seasons, the only silverware Arsenal have seen has been the studs on their boots.”
• One had the most ostentatious hair ever and would be seen each morning during registration drinking a can of relentless with a carrot cake.
• And then there was me.

Our form got along well with each other (apart from American kid). We played hilarious pranks on one another, like on valentines the gay guy gave the homophobic guy a rose. We shared a lot of friendly banter (mainly about football) and also a lot of homework (usually chemistry).

I was good friends with most of my form, especially the gay guy. We used to sit next to each other in Biology class, had long discussions (mainly me making fun of him) and he even nearly tricked me into seeing a BMW once (not the car). There was another Muslim guy in my maths class who hated the gay guy. “F***ing f*g,” he would say. “Look at that poofter. Stay away from me!” Once I was discussing this with the gay guy and I told him, “Though I do not think homosexuality is right, I also do not think it is right to discriminate against any person.”

But this post isn’t about the gay guy or any of the guys mentioned above.

*****

I was standing in the queue at the post office. In front of me were two hijabi girls, who had just come out of school. They had been talking about all sorts of stuff; boys, one’s boyfriend, Lady Gaga’s new song and then one of them said:

Girl 1: I heard this siiiiiccccck joke this morning.
Girl 2: What?
Girl 1: Why do Jews have such big noses?
Girl 2: Errrrm I dunno.
Girl 1: ‘Coz the airs free init.
Girl 2: I don’t get it.
Girl 1: Ah don’t worry about it, I got another one. How do you get 6 million Jews into a car?
Girl 2: Errrrm dunno.
Girl 1: *with a smug I am so clever look on her face* Stick ‘em all in the ashtray.

If looks could kill, she’d have been a gonner if her eyes happened to have crossed mine.

*****

When I wrote my 3-part thoughts on hate (1,2,3) I got an email from someone who wasn’t too happy with the points I made. “You don’t understand Islam at all,” The person said. “You’re a Jew lover.” Followed by a lot more things that are not appropriate to mention here. Am I really?

Fear of the unknown makes people do irrational things, say irrational things and believe irrational things. I already wrote a whole post on that in part 3 of the series on hate, but I wanted to revisit the topic. A significant proportion of Muslim youth (and adults) have this notion in their head that all Jews and Christians are worthy of Allah’s wrath. They seem to think they’re doing Allah a favour by spreading the hate. Some even go as far as usurping the rights of anyone that is not a Muslim. I’d like to ask them why?

“They’re killing our innocent brothers and sisters in Palestine,” they say.
“Who?”
”The Jews.”

Let us analyse that. That reply seems to insinuate that all Jews are responsible for the conflict happening between Israel and Palestine. If that was the case, what were those Jews doing marching in London among the pro-Palestinian protestors in the wake of the Gaza bombings (2009)? If all Jews are bad, then I guess following the same logic all Muslims too should be terrorists after what happened on 9/11 in America, 7/7 in London and with that young man (Abdul Farouk Abdulmtallab) trying to blow up his balls on the flight from Amsterdam to Detroit. Let’s be just, and use the same measuring stick. If due to the action of a few Jews the whole of the Jewish community is labelled as being bad, then why not the same for the Muslims, and the Christians and the Hindus etc.?

If Jews are so bad, then why did the Holy Prophet Muhammad^(saw) marry one [Refer to Sister Sara’s comment below] why does the Holy Qur’an allow Muslims to marry them? The Holy Prophet Muhammad^(saw) married a recently converted Jew. And when the other wives of the Prophet taunted her or behaved harshly towards her she did not respond. Once Hadhrat Aisha^(ra) and Hadhrat Hafsa^(ra) called her a ‘Jew’ but she remained quiet. On the arrival of the Holy Prophet^(saw), she mentioned these happenings. He replied, “If they claim to be from the family of the Prophet then why didn’t you say that I am far superior because I am daughter of Haroon^(as) (Aaron), niece of Musa^(as) (Moses) and the wife of Muhammad?”. This wondrous woman I refer to is none other than Hadhrat Safia^(ra).

The Holy Qur’an talks of the Khaira-Ummah in the following words:

You are the best people raised for the good of mankind; you enjoin what is good and forbid evil and believe Allah…³

Let us not transgress the rights of justice (refer to translation at the top of the article) owed to one another for that is a commandment given to us by our Lord. I have been brought up being taught respect for others, their beliefs and their way of doing things. Just because it’s different doesn’t necessarily mean it’s wrong.

I was looking for a wallpaper of a Mosque to put onto my PC at home. Scrolling through pages and pages of pictures on Google images I came across the following picture. It looked beautiful:

That is to say, until I clicked on it and read the text on the right hand side. Bad people are found in every group, every religion, every society and every culture. I’d like to see you prove me wrong.

Come to think of it, once you remove the layers of labels everyone is surrounded by, we’re all essentially the same at the core. Whether we belong to different religions, different sexualities, different races, different sets of football fans, deep down inside, we all feel the same pain, the same hurt, the same happiness, the same fear etc. After all, we are all human and that is where it matters. Forget the labels and see the people who reside behind them.

Or maybe I’m just wrong, and just too nice. Maybe hate is the way forward (despite the lessons history teaches us contrary to that belief).

________________________________

Picture 1, showing mosque wallpaper taken from here
¹Holy Qur’an - Al-Nisa' Chapter 4 : Verse 136
²Holy Qur’an - Al-Ma'idah Chapter 5 : Verse 9
³Holy Qur’an - Aal-e-`Imran Chapter 3 : Verse 111

…Continued (Click here to read part 1 & here to read part 2)

One reason I very much liked the film American History X was due to the message it portrayed about hate and how one man (Derek) who was saturated with it turned his life around. This change was the culmination of a chain of events, each making him question his hate and anger. I found the following quote very powerful and it is something we should take some time to contemplate on:

There was a moment, when I used to blame everything and everyone for all the pain and suffering and vile things that happened to me, that I saw happen to my people. Used to blame everybody. Blamed white people, blamed society, blamed God. I didn't get no answers 'cause I was asking the wrong questions. You have to ask the right questions. Has anything you’ve ever done made your life better? – Bob Sweeney (American History X).

A lot of the time we are shackled down by our own negative mentality, blaming others in an excuse to justify things that we don’t want to deal with. If only we asked ourselves the right questions and broke down the barriers of distrust, paranoia and suspicion, life would be so much easier. We’d have more time to enjoy than to pick out the bad points of a person, people, place or even a thing. 

In the previous post, I briefly mentioned how a fear of the unknown can lead to one hating that unknown thing; be it a person, thought, rule, or inanimate object.

The veil is something which causes a lot of angst and fear among people because one cannot tell who it is behind that cloth or why they have chosen to cover themselves up in such a manner. Many people due to their limited knowledge or bad experience have come to associate negative things with the veil and some countries have gone as far as either banning the wearing of the veil or wish to impose a ban. This particular interview was published in The Times 2 supplement found inside The Times (Friday 19^th November 2010). Due to political correctness and or for a fear of offending the veil wearer, many people may refrain from asking questions. This is to help them understand the practicalities of how things are done once the veil is on and lets one learn about why this particular lady has chosen to cover herself up. I think the honesty and humour with which this woman answers the questions should be applauded. There are very few people out there who would be willing to do such a thing, even though it is a way of removing misconceptions.

(Click on the image to download – 7.9mb)

Openness and transparency is an important way to remove the plants of hate growing within our environment whether at home or in the wider community. Educating oneself about others and asking questions is one way we can achieve that.

I’d like to end this by quoting a narration about hate from the end of the film American History X:

So I guess this is where I tell you what I learned - my conclusion, right? Well, my conclusion is: Hate is baggage. Life's too short to be pissed off all the time. It's just not worth it. Derek says it's always good to end a paper with a quote. He says someone else has already said it best. So if you can't top it, steal from them and go out strong. So I picked a guy I thought you'd like. 'We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory will swell when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.'

Where is the love? – Black Eyed Peas

I posted a few lyrics from the song ‘Where is the love’ by Black Eyed Peas at the end of part 1. I wanted to share with you the full music video but due to issues with privacy, I couldn’t embed it here. You can watch the video by clicking on the link above.

…Continued (Click here to read part 1)

Click here to watch episode (available in the UK ONLY)

Last week’s Panorama (Monday 22^nd November 2010), shown on BBC focused on faith schools and in particular Islamic schools. For those of you that are not in the UK, let me give you a brief summary of what some of the points raised:

• Of the many thousands of  schools in the UK, 160 are Muslim schools.
• The vast majority of which are “good Muslim schools, but there are also some that have an ideology that is a cause for concern”
• Some schools are directly funded by a mosque and mosque policy is usually reflected in the rules of the school.
• Students are exposed to radical anti-west speakers and thinkers who openly incite hatred against the west.
• Many part-time (after school / weekend) classes use the Saudi national curriculum which caters for 6-18 year olds. Even from an early age children are taught that Jews and Christians are like monkeys and pigs. The curriculum also contains information on how to carry out “medieval Islamic practices” such as amputations of the hands and feet.
• Students are often told to refrain from “evil western practices” such as listening to music and that one should not have any contact or dealing with the “kuffar”.

*****

“In time we hate that which we often fear” – William Shakespeare

A young mind absorbs knowledge just like the way a dry sponge sucks up any moisture around it. A child growing up in a household full of love and laughter will develop into an individual who is loving himself / herself. A child whose environment is saturated with hate by those around them will surely be affected by it. The first primary school I went to was predominantly white. There were only 3 non-whites there; me, my sister and another Asian boy. In year 5 a black French boy joined my class. One day we had a supply teacher to cover the afternoon lessons. She was a lovely Jamaican lady (I can still remember what we did in that lesson). While she was teaching a boy kept repeatedly talking and as any teacher would, she told him to be quiet and concentrate on his work. He put his pen down, got up and looked at the teacher with eyes like a snake’s full of venom, and shouted, “Go swim back to your country, you’re not wanted here.” Everyone gasped. Later that day I saw the child’s father walking into school. On his arm was a tattoo of a symbol that I did not recognise at that young age. I was 9 or 10 at that time. It was only a few years later while studying World War II did I understand the horrors the swastika had come to represent. We never saw the teacher again.

I don’t think hate is a feeling as such. Feelings are like happiness, anger and nostalgia for example; they’re temporary to an extent. Also we have no control over our feelings, they just happen. It would be more appropriate to describe hate as a verb rather than an adjective. You can feel hated and if you were to say I am feeling hate, that still insinuates the hate is being directed at you as apposed to emanating from within you. It is an extreme form of dislike. The superlative form of dislike which is the product of ignorance and is taught, learned or acquired and exhibited through anger, lack of trust and suffering to mention a few.

In the episode of Panorama we are made aware of the hate that is being spread in some faith schools. The programme quotes Orthodox Jewish, Evangelical Christian and Muslim school to be involved in saying things that may be deemed offensive. Despite that, it specifically chooses to elaborate on the radical nature of the teaching at some Islamic Schools. Education in imperative for the development of an individual and thus the roles of schools can never been underestimated. I think faith schools are a good thing as they allow for increasing one's spiritual knowledge as well as catering for their worldly knowledge. Having a mosque or church close to the school is like having a hospital in close vicinity to a medical school.

Knowledge is a double bladed sword if it is not obtained properly or used in a productive manner. A lack of it can drown one into the depths of ignorance from which it is hard to recover. On the other hand, those with knowledge can spread it in such a manner that instead of bringing enlightenment to the lives of others, it brings darkness. A darkness in the form of fear. As Yoda says in Star Wars, "fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. And hate leads to suffering." What disappointed me the most was the fact that so called 'scholars', whose words many people take for granted without any questioning, were selectively picking and choosing those things to teach that are representative of a specific narrow minded type mentality.

In the translation of the first Chapter of the Qur'an the scholar says, "Guide us not on the path of those who have earned thy displeasure, namely the Jews, nor those that have gone astray, namely the Christians." The mention of the Jews and the Christians is not in the actual Arabic text of the Qur'an. I do not by any means claim to be a scholar and feel free to correct me if I am wrong, but many nations incurred the wrath of God over time; the 10 plaques of Egypt come to mind. Was the Pharaoh and his people Jews? One of the many reasons so many prophets were raised was because mankind had forgotten the teachings sent down from heaven. If only the Christians had strayed from the right path then technically does that mean all those before them were following the true teachings? The university at which I study is no more than 15 minutes walk from Tooting Islamic Centre (mentioned in the programme). Once a special guest from there was invited to give a talk about the status of Jesus (a.s.) in Islam. Judging by the contents of the talk it should actually have been named, ‘Why Christians are wrong in their beliefs about Christ.’ I felt thoroughly ashamed for having wasted my time and was even more sympathetic towards all those Christians who had gone to learn something new about another faith.   

Many people are guilty of misquoting verses from religious texts and presenting a small portion of it completely out of context. One of the speakers in the programme quotes verse 14 of chapter 60 which reads, 'Oh ye who believe! make not friends of a people with whom Allah is wroth.' This verse on it's own seems to be telling Muslims to abstain from having any dealings with those that do not believe. What the people who use this verse to advocate exclusivity fail to mention is the context in which this verse was revealed or what the Qur’an says a little earlier. When this verse was revealed, the Muslims were at war with the Meccans and some Muslims out of their friendship would pass on sensitive information to the enemy. In light of this, the above verse (Chapter 60 : Verse 14) was revealed. This is not just a message for Muslims, but a message that all countries and nations strictly follow. During the second world war posters were made to remind the public that careless talk costs lives. Regarding one’s attitude towards non-Muslims, the Qur’an says, ‘Allah forbids you not, respecting those who have not fought against you on account of your religion, and who have not driven you forth from your homes, that you be kind to them and act equitably towards them; surely Allah loves those that are equitable. (Chapter 60 : Verse 9).

Even more surprising was the fact that children from the ages of 6 – 18 in Saudi Arabia are being taught the Jews and Christians look like pigs and dogs. They are being led to believe the world is divided into two groups of people; the Muslims and the non-Muslims. The seed of hate and intolerance is being planted in their hearts and is being cultivated every day they go to school. For that minority of Muslims who do believe in the heinous and absurd claims made against the Jews and Christians, I would like to remind you of a hadith of the Prophet of Islam (s.a.w.). He is reported to have said, “A time will come when nothing will remain of Islam except its name and nothing will remain of the Qur’an except its script. Mosques will be full of worshippers, but as far as righteousness is concerned they will be empty and deserted. Their ‘ulama’ (religious scholars) will be the worst creatures under the canopy of the heavens. Evil plots will originate from them and to them will they return” (Mishkat). Many people argue about the authenticity of this saying, but I think casting a quick glance over the world is enough to understand.

This reminds me of an excellent quote from the book To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee in which the father Atticus is defending a black man in court who is accused for having raped a white girl. The book is set in Alabama, in the 1930’s when segregation of whites and blacks was common. He says while addressing the jury “confident that you gentlemen would go along with them on the assumption – the evil assumption – that all Negroes lie, that all Negroes are basically immoral beings, that all Negro men are not to be trusted around our women, an assumption one associates with minds of their calibre. Which, gentlemen, we know is in itself a lie as black as Tom Robinson’s skin, a lie I do not have to point out to you. You know the truth, and that truth is: some Negroes lie, some Negroes are immoral, some Negro men are not to be trusted around our women – black or white. But this is a truth that applied to the human race and to no particular race of men. There is not a person in this courtroom who has never told a lie, who has never done an immoral thing, and there is no living man who has never looked upon a woman without desire.’ Stereotypes are wrong, we all know it. I personally know Jews who have protested for the rights of Muslims in Palestine and Christians too. We would be walking in the footsteps of the Nazi’s if we were to say that all Jews and Christians were bad people.  

Though the Panorama programme raised some very important points about the regulation of faith schools in England, it was also very biased. Apart from mentioning one good Muslim school at the beginning no attempt was made to highlight the more pleasant and true teachings of Islam. Those individuals who already have misguided and or prejudiced views about Islam due to a lack of knowledge or bad experience will be further strengthened in their beliefs. Islamic law for the punishment of theft (the amputation of a hand) is referred to as a medieval practice. That’s an unfair comment I think. There are two means of execution used in the USA; the electric chair and the lethal injection. Imagine this scenario. The condemned is initially given sodium thiopental which acts an anaesthetic. Next, an injection of pancuronium bromide is given which causes total paralysis. This gives the person a calm look, so that when the 3^rd and final injection of potassium chloride is given to induce death, the death is as calm as possible for the onlookers. Due to the lack of research regarding the use of anaesthesia in execution, what if actually not enough of it is being administered? What if the condemned person experiences ‘asphyxiation, serve burning sensation, massive muscle cramping and finally cardiac arrest’? Is that really humane? This is a debate that has been going on for a very long time. You can  download and read an article about it here.

*****

We all have a choice. Just like we can choose to love (refer to the love described in the quote in this post) a person, we can also choose to hate. This is a choice made depending on our experience of that person, group of people or thing. I remember walking towards the hospital to get into university a few weeks ago. It was raining; not heavily and not lightly either. Everyone had their shoulders hunched up, trying to stop the rain from hitting their faces. Seeing all those annoyed people, I dropped my shoulders, lifted up my face and felt the rain against my skin. It was a beautiful feeling. Sometimes a thing may look bad due to our lack of knowledge or due to what we see other people doing and so we may follow them in avoiding that thing. Try lifting up your face to the rain next time and feel it’s refreshing touch on your skin.

I’d like to end this post with something that my dad has said to me many times:

If you believe you are right, then give the other person the same right to believe they are also right. 

…Continued (Click here to read part 3)