Crisis solutions for UK Muslims

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#16 [Permalink] Posted on 8th June 2017 16:07

Let me give an example.

I've received many messages recently about voting for labour.

All in the typical secular sense, how every vote counts, use our vote, use our power, make a change etc etc.

Very few used it as an opportunity to remind us about our primary and then told us to vote. Shaikh saleem dhorat was onenof the few who at least made an attempt to remind us and not treat it in such a secularised manner as can be seen here

www.idauk.org/pdf/electoral_commitments_of_a_muslim.pdf

However the majority of Muslims will continue in the secular fashion thinking they are benefitting Muslims and doing something and so our situation will deteriorate.

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#17 [Permalink] Posted on 8th June 2017 17:04

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So you are saying the problem is lack of education and understanding amongst muslims about their deen and the importance of trying to live a life of Taqwa?

If so how do we educate them? What are the practical steps needed to arrive at that destination?

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#18 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 11:34

Abdur Rahman ibn Awf wrote:

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I believe there's slightly more to it than education and taqwa.

We have to seriously review our objectives for starters.

Yes we all pay lip service to our objective being "To attain the pleaseure of Allah Almighty" but if we actually expand on this to, for example, "To attain the help and mercy of Allah Almighty" then we can start reviewing our actions to see if they are the actions that will actually work towards attaining his help and mercy, or if they are the types of actions that will attain his anger and wrath.

Other primary objectives could be: To attain taqwa, To understand and live a life of tawakul, To implent the education we have learned.

Education alone is not enough.

The above objectives will, for starters, force us to stop paying mere lip service to the objective of attaining the pleasure of Allah almighty, and actully force us to review our actions.

Take for example an alim, graduate of madrassah, whom I know, who lives about 2 to 3 minutes walk from the masjid, he is active in teaching from his home, but rarely goes to the masjid to read salaah with jamaat for no real apparent reason, although he has been reminded. Are his actions overall now attaining the pleasure of the Almighty, or attaining his anger?

Or take for exampe the sister who decided to go vote for labour (again going back to the example of voting as that was the recent hype amongst muslims), when she goes to vote to help the cause of the Muslims and get Corbyn elected, but goes without a hijaab or goes with a colourful and patterened hijab that attracts more than it protects, are her actions of going to vote in this state actually helping the cause of the Muslims and attaining the pleasure of Allah Almighty, or are they attaining his anger and therby taking the Muslims into a worser situation?

Or take for example the Muslims who is hyper active in mocking back home cultural practices and telling people to leave them as they are not Islam but culture. And then instead of adopting the sunnah himself, he goes and adopts western cultural baggage. Are his actions actually attaining the help and mercy of Allah Almighty, or are they attaining his wrath?

This is, I believe is amongst our main failings as Muslims. We have become secularised, believing it is our worldy actions that will bring about change, rather than merging those actions with our Taqwa and Tawakul, hoping that those actions will bring about the mercy and help of Allah Almighty rather than his anger.

I hate to say it, but many if not most Muslim activists and organisations have unfortunatley, by observation, fallen into this trap. That's why the masjids are still empty in relative to the number of Muslims in the area and that's precisley why our situation continues to grow worse even though we now have many more money, organisations, academics, businesses, politically aware people and activisits than ever before.

But we don't think like that. In our seularised sate most Muslims activists and organisations have forgotten to think about and understand Taqwa and tawakul and instead focus on:

1. Being professional (in the western sense becasue of the inferiority complex we've developed)
2. Being positive (in the western sense becasue of the inferiority complex we've developed)
3. Being academic and well spoken (in the western sense becasue of the inferiority complex we've developed)
4. Being forward thinking (in the western sense becasue of the inferiority complex we've developed)
5. Being engaged ((in the western sense becasue of the inferiority complex we've developed)

How many ayahs, hadith and actions of the sahabaah tell us, that without taqwa, tawakul and working towards attaining the pleasure of Allah Almighty, our situation will not change regardless of the worldy means we take. "Allah does not change the situation of a people until they change what is within themselves".

The worldy means are secondary. They are needed but they are the secondary thing we implement. The primary things, we have forgotten in our secularised sate.

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#19 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 12:45

Everything you state is 100% correct.

But with all due respect your post does not offer any practical solution. Years ago when I was feeling down I used to listen to lectures and for some reason certain lectures would end up making me feel more depressed. The reason for that was the speakers would go on about the problems in the community, "We got gang problems, we have rise of drug dealers, prostitution, rise of divorce rate, our lives and our businnesses are not in accordance with Quran and Sunnah we are in a state of heedlessness we are not living our lives with Taqwa,.."

Sure but how you going to instil Taqwa into 3.5 Million Muslims in this country? What practical steps are needed to plant the seeds of deen that will be cause for transformation in the future?

I am not to sure if there has been in the last few centuries a utopia, were every single muslim lived a life of Taqwa and Tawakkul.
In the last century we have had indvidual efforts that have brought varying degrees of success, and had an impact on future generations.

Haji Imdadullah Muhajir Makki رحمة الله عليه for teaching the fruits of Taqwa and Tawakkul and impacting an entire generation of Ulemah.
Maulana Ilyas رحمة الله عليه and Tabligh Jamaat reviving the love for deen in the most remote locations in the world , Shaykh Hassan Al Banna رحمة الله عليه and his Ikhwan, reviving the knowledge of deen in a nation being steeped in European culture, secularism and atheism.

Surley we need efforts that will protect the Imaan of our future generations...

I dont know how old you are but if you look at where we were 30 years ago as a community here in the U.K. and were we are today ALLAH is indeed most gracious he instils barakah even in the smallest efforts. ALLAH through his infinite Mercy revived the deen amongst a community were almost an entire generation 30 years ago was in danger of losing it.

Alhamdulillah Wa Shukrulillah.

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#20 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 15:56

Everything you say is 100% correct also.

I was not offering solutions in my last post. Only further highlighting the core problem. After all, for any solution, first the problem must be correctly identified.

Groups like tabligh, institutes like IDA, and organisations like islam21c are major parts of the solution. They are not the problem. Shaikh hassan al banna did immense work, I consider him, along with shaikh zakariyyah and mawlana ilyas to be the major mujaddids of the last century.

But whilst we have some excellent examples like the above, I have seen a masive increase in individuals and groups/organisations who have been heavily influenced by the western narrative since the "war on terror". The way they speak, the actions they do, the things they call for, may intially seem non-problematic. BUt they are extremely problematic. Becasue they are stepping stones to drawing people away from the Islamic values and ideals.

I will refrain from mentioning names, for now anyway.

But to highlight what is massively on the increase amongst the masses I will give you an example. Remember many of these things are not yet out in the open, but many many people have started to think like this. You will see more of this and much worse over the next few years, and i'm talking from people who would outwardly seem god fearing. And yes even the ulama.

You just posted an excellent piece from that piece:

"I saw the surprised and disapproving frown forming on my friend's face. Forcing the Qur'an on a child? How politically incorrect. How backward. How unenlightened. One simply did not say these things in polite, modern, company."

I've come across this very mentailty from people who consider themselves to be very active working for a solution for Muslims.

From the same piece:

"There were years when, long after the double-Eidee wager had faded away with other remnants of childhood, with all the impetuous, rebellion of youth, of spending my days in smoke-filled rooms, strategizing with socialist/activists, and my evenings protesting against the Iraq war on the frozen streets of Toronto. Of not praying at all, of not so much as glancing towards the dusty shelf where my Qur'an sat the entire year."

I can guarantee you, many of the Muslim organisations and individuals that "strategize" and are "activists" have this same problem. I personally know people who are closely associated and actively promote well known organisations that are trying to find solutions to the problems of Muslims in UK, and they even stopped praying! When they were simple minded Muslims, not strategising and coming up with new solutions they were a totally different type of person.

Yes we have more active people than 30 years ago. But their quality is no where near.

And I am not calling for or expecting utopia. The fact is we are almost in a state of complete dystopia, spiritually, so I am only saying that we need a massive improvement and that is the first and foremost thing thing that needs improving before our social condition will improve. The more we improve spirtually, the better our social condition will get.

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#21 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 17:04

Ryder wrote:

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Okay I finally got it.

True the emergence of this westernised Islam is a, is a major issue. Probably requires a seperate thread. Brother Daniel writes on these issues alot.

Daniel Haqiqatjou

The right wing has been ramping up its anti-sharia activism. The only way the left can oppose this and "defend" sharia is by fundamentally distorting and misrepresenting it.
Why? Because the sharia is in most ways the antithesis of liberal values (much like orthodox Judaism and traditional Christianity are).
I can see it now. CNN brings on an anti-sharia person to debate a sufficiently liberal brown person.
The anti-sharia stooge says something like, "Sharia demands Muzlems kill gays and wage jihad!!!"
The brown dope responds with equal vehemence, "Islam tolerates all sexual choices and orientations and jihad is just about struggle like when a single guy struggles to find a hot date!!!"
The average viewer thinks, well one of them has to be right.
The CNN clip then goes viral. Muslim youth who don't know better think it's the best thing ever because they tend toward the left and are looking for anything to reconcile Islam with the liberalism that's been pounded into their heads via school, media, and, increasingly, Muslim orgs.
Those kids grow up with that distorted understanding of sharia. They insist that anyone who disagrees with that understanding is an out of touch extremist who needs to be silenced and thrown out of the community.
And that's the end of sharia for at least one generation and the following generations won't fare much better.
Sorry to be depressing, but this is called realism. What are you going to do about it?

Daniel Haqiqatjou

7 June at 02:42 ·
It is certainly true that a Muslim's faith in Islam shouldn't wholly depend upon a specific imam, scholar, or da'ee for the simple reason that that figure might be doing inappropriate things outside of public view, and if those things came to light, that Muslim's faith would be shaken...
...But then what would we say about having one's faith depend upon specific Muslim activists who oftentimes do inappropriate things in full public view?

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#22 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 17:15

Bismillah.

For those who have not read it, Shaykh Hassan al Bannas letter to a muslim student is an interesting read, what is even more interesting is the story of the shaykhs Dawah method .... www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2...

The lecture by Shaykh Ahmed Deedat... "Dawah or Destruction" is also relevant to the thread.
youtu.be/49zX4gf0Z2U

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#23 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 17:51

JazakAllah for pointing out the writings of Daniel Haqiqatjou. I was not aware of it.

The westernisation of Islam has been happening for some time. My biggest concern is that now it is happening from within what would, a few years ago, be known as normative, orthodox Muslims and organisations.

There is a lot of social engineering going on.

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#24 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 17:51

Bismillah.

"Yes we have more active people than 30 years ago. But their quality is no where near."

You must be too young to remember 30 years ago.

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#25 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 17:58

Maybe not 30, but I can just about remember 20 years ago. And the deterioration over the last 20 is bad enough.

Of course there are some people with very good quality now also, but we seem to have a lot of froth surrounding and drowning out that quality now. That froth was minimal 20 years ago.

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#26 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 19:11

Abdur Rahman ibn Awf wrote:

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If only Muslim students did this...

Letter to a Muslim Staudent

www.iupui.edu/~msaiupui/letter.html

Be critical, with insight, and be just and well acquainted with people. Do not let your goodness draw you to forget their bad, and their bad hurt you to forget their goodness. Rather study them as would a researcher and an examiner. Encompass with knowledge all of their affairs, and then with an eye of insight, scrutinize it all. Present back the good that you find to your people and nation, and return with it victorious and supported. Other than that, throw it back on them and do not come back until you have dusted off your hands and emptied your mind of it all.

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There is no Plan B!

http://www.central-mosque.com/

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#27 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 19:18

Ryder wrote:

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That explains alot about your previous posts let me give you a brief overview.

My memory stretches back to the late 1970's

The era you are talking about 20 years ago was an exciting period of revival which sort of began in 1991 with many young and dynamic English speaking Mashaykh emerging. ...

30 years ago was the age of Jahiliya.

Your talking about girls wearing floral Hijabs , back in the 1980's there was no hijab... I went to a School 98% muslim not one girl covered her hair, having a dupatta round the neck was fashionable. Infact the muslim neighbourhood I lived in I cant even remember seeing a woman in the streets wearing a Hijab, there was no concept of that or Niqaab. Hijab was something that Arabs wore we Desis had dupattas.

I was 18 the first time I saw some young guys wearing Imama with topi, 2 guys in the entire neighbourhood they were religious students I think. Of-course some elders wore the Imama desi style wrapped around the head. But Imama with topi that was the first time I saw it, them two brothers used to look really odd walking on the street. May Allah reward them for reviving a sunnah.

Teaching of deen in English was Zero, Zilch. and in very obscure places that did teach deen in English Some parents would object to that.. " Why are you teaching English, Masjid should teach in our own language and culture".

If you were muslim youngster you was just taught the basics parrot fashion any stuff you did was merely because it was a custom ... We did not have a clue what the meaning and purpose of Bismillah was, or Asalaamu alykum was infact I did not know until I was in my 20's nor did any of my friends we said those things out of cultural custom. No Idea who The Prophet (saw)

was other then he was the messenger of Allah.

When I said the following ..."ALLAH through his infinite Mercy revived the deen amongst a community were almost an entire generation 30 years ago was in danger of losing it. "

Then that was no exaggeration infact an understatement. We did have concepts of things like haya not because they were Islamic but because was inherited from our Desi village culture, besides that it was all about Asian Culture, Bollywood, and Bhangra music.

With the parents of that generation, everything was about holding onto our cultural identity... Some parents
would prevent their kids speaking English at home, eating Desi food was important and our culture, Bollywood was better then hollywood, desi music was better then English music. Girl wearing Trousers was okay because it was similar to a Shalwar, her wearing a modest loose skirt was not allowed, because a skirt was part of Gora culture.

Hardly anyone under the age of 40 prayed their farz in Masjid, in those days a person in their early 30's praying regularly was considered odd. Praying was something you did was you reached your 40's

The Jumah attendance was way, way, lower then today, regular salah was usually uncles in their 60's, 70's
preparing for the next life. ...And their was a-lot of despondency amongst them whether their youth would remain Muslims.

Maulana Tariq Jameel states that when he first came to England, the Non-muslims were openly stating that within a couple of decades the Muslims would become fully assimiliated, and establishment was working towards that. That is no exaggeration either.

The fact we have an entire generation of youth out there who are muslim in this country is a miracle.

Sure we cannot find a solution to our problems, until we identify those problems as you stated.
But we cannot work for the future until we know our history where we was and where we are.

Its important to know what happened and the factors that by the Grace of Allah led to the revival of Deen.

30 years ago no Islamic lectures in English, and hardly any books in English...First time I heard a lecture in English was 20 years old. Imagine that.

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#28 [Permalink] Posted on 11th June 2017 20:18

Thanks for that overview. I found it very beneficial.

Alahmdulillah, as you say we have many blessings to be thankful for and the situation is better now than 30 years ago.

My memory regarding the whole Muslim situation will only go back as far as the late 90's early 2000s. I beleive that time period was probably the peak of revival.

Then 911 happened. And all the social engineering and westernisation gained a major boost. Instead of revival the focus shifted to assimilation. It went beyond intergration to outright assimilation.

And that is my biggest concern now. I am seeing otherwise orthodox muslims and organisations getting taken for a ride with some of the things they are coming out with. And it has all been coming step by step, so that a person will have already accepted the previous step to make the next step easier to accept.

Just like Barsisa the monk. Except in this case it is not so much our actions that are being changed, but our thinking, our mentalities, our views and our values. Once our minds are colonised, our actions will come by themselves. It is the minds I am concerned about, becasue I have seen the practical application of this mental colonisation in a number of people I know personally.

But of course, alhamdullillah we still have some excellent ulama and organisations also may Allah almighty increase them.

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Letter to a Muslim Staudent