A funny experience at a mosque in Cardiff
Bismillah (in the name of Allah )
Previously I wrote about my experience in a mosque in Manchester and the interesting discussion I had with an elderly Muslim. Today I had a funny experience attending a talk in Arabic about fiqh (religious stuff or jurisprudence) in a Cardiff mosque after work.
What happened: The talk was about a low level topic. About the different classifications of water for the purpose of ascertaining purity for normal day usage. Eg what is pure water ( eg rain and rivers ), what is not so pure (eg a small lake that has been contaminated with something etc. That kind of level. So the first question in my mind was why was this low level topic being talked about and we have major problems within us? Eg demonisation of muslims in the west, sectarianism etc. This shows that muslims are still fast asleep and are yet to awake to their current reality in the west. This is point one.
The next major issue is a subtle point I spotted with the speaker. And I have noticed this with many speakers and scholars too. It's quite common I think. At certain points when weighing the evidence between two opinions some speakers say this opinion has this evidence and that opinion that evidence but "the correct opinion" is the second opinion for instance. There is something very wrong in the phrase I put in quotes above. One cannot say what the correct opinion is in this absolute sense. Because they are speaking as if they are God. Only God and his messengers can speak like this. We have to say, "in my opinion the correct opinion is this" for instance so that we maintain our humbleness and don't let arrogance and false pride enter. This is point two.
Furthermore the speaker may have been reading some scholar's book and simply quoting the scholar. So in that case he would feel unhappy that I am criticising that scholar. And this is a problem we have I believe in that some of the scholarly books we study are actually not very good. I think this maybe due to the influence of politics on Islam. It corrupts the purity of Islam and introduces corruption. And many people then read such books and consider them holy. Even though they are just works of humans. This is point three.
Anyway the speaker didn't accept my advice and then decided to question my understanding of Islam and then almost labelled me an infidel (a kafir or non believer). This was the funny bit. I was just offering him advice and I then got nearly labelled a kafir. I have come to expect this unfortunately within the Muslim community. We have become very ignorant and stupid. The non muslims are justified in labelling us as backward. Because we really are backwards. But not because Islam is backward. Far from it. But because we don't actually understand Islam. We just think we do. This is my view. This is point four.
Another funny thing is that another guy started calling me a Shia (it was a Sunni mosque). So again there is still plenty of sectarian hatred within the muslims today. This is why we are big losers today I believe. I had actually spoken with that guy before ( he is from another mosque that I visited ) and I never said to him that I was Shia. Yet he was adamant that i was. Such is our stupidly and deep grained hatred for each other. We muslims are basically very backward today. We should not be in much doubt about this. This is point five (sectarian hatred ).
Anyway I told him I was neither Shia or Sunni. I am just muslim. This is the understanding I have come to. I don't worship sects. I left them. They are not part of Islam. They came afterwards. We don't need them i believe. One can look at them as innovation (bidda) if they wanted to. They keep talking to us about bidda bidda and don't do bidda and yet they themselves maybe knee deep in it. Another funny thing. This is point six (bidaa).
There you go, lots of fun in Muslim land :-)
Ali Twaij
A Muslim geaser
Previously I wrote about my experience in a mosque in Manchester and the interesting discussion I had with an elderly Muslim. Today I had a funny experience attending a talk in Arabic about fiqh (religious stuff or jurisprudence) in a Cardiff mosque after work.
What happened: The talk was about a low level topic. About the different classifications of water for the purpose of ascertaining purity for normal day usage. Eg what is pure water ( eg rain and rivers ), what is not so pure (eg a small lake that has been contaminated with something etc. That kind of level. So the first question in my mind was why was this low level topic being talked about and we have major problems within us? Eg demonisation of muslims in the west, sectarianism etc. This shows that muslims are still fast asleep and are yet to awake to their current reality in the west. This is point one.
The next major issue is a subtle point I spotted with the speaker. And I have noticed this with many speakers and scholars too. It's quite common I think. At certain points when weighing the evidence between two opinions some speakers say this opinion has this evidence and that opinion that evidence but "the correct opinion" is the second opinion for instance. There is something very wrong in the phrase I put in quotes above. One cannot say what the correct opinion is in this absolute sense. Because they are speaking as if they are God. Only God and his messengers can speak like this. We have to say, "in my opinion the correct opinion is this" for instance so that we maintain our humbleness and don't let arrogance and false pride enter. This is point two.
Furthermore the speaker may have been reading some scholar's book and simply quoting the scholar. So in that case he would feel unhappy that I am criticising that scholar. And this is a problem we have I believe in that some of the scholarly books we study are actually not very good. I think this maybe due to the influence of politics on Islam. It corrupts the purity of Islam and introduces corruption. And many people then read such books and consider them holy. Even though they are just works of humans. This is point three.
Anyway the speaker didn't accept my advice and then decided to question my understanding of Islam and then almost labelled me an infidel (a kafir or non believer). This was the funny bit. I was just offering him advice and I then got nearly labelled a kafir. I have come to expect this unfortunately within the Muslim community. We have become very ignorant and stupid. The non muslims are justified in labelling us as backward. Because we really are backwards. But not because Islam is backward. Far from it. But because we don't actually understand Islam. We just think we do. This is my view. This is point four.
Another funny thing is that another guy started calling me a Shia (it was a Sunni mosque). So again there is still plenty of sectarian hatred within the muslims today. This is why we are big losers today I believe. I had actually spoken with that guy before ( he is from another mosque that I visited ) and I never said to him that I was Shia. Yet he was adamant that i was. Such is our stupidly and deep grained hatred for each other. We muslims are basically very backward today. We should not be in much doubt about this. This is point five (sectarian hatred ).
Anyway I told him I was neither Shia or Sunni. I am just muslim. This is the understanding I have come to. I don't worship sects. I left them. They are not part of Islam. They came afterwards. We don't need them i believe. One can look at them as innovation (bidda) if they wanted to. They keep talking to us about bidda bidda and don't do bidda and yet they themselves maybe knee deep in it. Another funny thing. This is point six (bidaa).
There you go, lots of fun in Muslim land :-)
Ali Twaij
A Muslim geaser
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