New Muslims: Talk less and listen moreWho can ever forget the overwhelming feeling of taking shahadah?
Wherever it happens – at a friend’s house, down the phone, in an imam’s office or at the center of a vast Masjid on Jummah, it is a heart-thrilling, experience.
Immediately after you testify to the Oneness of God and that Muhammad (peace be upon him) is His final Prophet, you are squished by your new sisters (or brothers if you are male).
Tears in eyes, your new family thrust phone numbers and email addresses at you, pledging with heartfelt intensity to ‘be there’ when you go through ‘tests’ about which, at that moment, you may have no idea.
And then, sometime after the fizzy, amazement fades, it will be you. On your own. With God.
It took me weeks to come down off that first spiritual high and look around at my new life, thinking: “Wow, how did I get here and how do I carry on this journey?”
Helpfully, as in all things, the Quran has the answer. This verse tells precisely what is expected of the believer.
{Righteousness is not that you turn your faces toward the east or the west, but [true] righteousness is [in] one who believes in Allah , the Last Day, the angels, the Book, and the prophets and gives wealth, in spite of love for it, to relatives, orphans, the needy, the traveler, those who ask [for help], and for freeing slaves; [and who] establishes prayer and gives zakah; [those who] fulfill their promise when they promise; and [those who] are patient in poverty and hardship and during battle.
{Those are the ones who have been true, and it is those who are the righteous.} (Al-Baqarah 2: 177)
This beautifully detailed verse appears before us, as a mountain to climb.
What to Do First?
Your gratitude at being chosen for this perfect faith can quickly turn into a rather confused sense of zeal. Do I adopt an orphan first or give away my old clothes then rethink all my old promises and see which ones I haven’t kept then…? Talk about a life spring clean!
I would like to pass on one of the most potent pieces of spiritual advice I have received since becoming Muslim. Alhamdulillah, it has been repeated by each imam and scholar who has offered me support on my way, until it is imprinted on my brain.
“Slow down. Take your time. God knows you, He knows you are trying. So take your time and go back to the beginning. And above all ask for God’s help in all things.”
Back to the Beginning?
Well that seemed a bit of a blow when I first heard it. Surely I was further down the path of knowledge, after a year than when I first took my shahadah. How long before I ‘knew’ stuff then?
Humility, then, is the best foot forward. The primary aim of Islam is to be able to answer this question with heartfelt sincerity.
Who is Allah? And why and how must I love Him?
Knowing God and understanding His divine attributes is a vast subject, one for those with knowledge to teach. A good idea, as you set out on this path, is to attend one of the growing number of excellent 3-5 day Basic Islam courses, springing up across Europe and North America. Such retreats are food for the soul and guidance. They take you out of your current environment (i.e. worries) and can put you in touch with learned people able to both answer your questions and raise your faith.
You may feel you are strange to everybody now you are a Muslim. Taking this time then to be around sisters and brothers from your own cultural background, I found this a real blessing. Many thanks are due to the Islamic Education and Research Academy (Iera – MuslimNow) for their subsidized retreats for new Muslims.
As we each take our first baby steps on the path to understanding, one of our greatest challenges can certainly be our new peers.
A few months ago, on a retreat, I met a 20 year old British revert to Islam. She said her shahadah and then had a series of pretty awful experiences at the hands of other Muslims. Men preyed upon her for her white skin – sad but true. But far worse than male lechery (a part of life for young women today), was the confusing advice on Fiqh – practical matters – from the sisters.
“I took my hijab off today and I hate it now!” Announced the young sister after a week of wearing hijab. She had been cornered by a group of hijabis who threw questions at her like poison darts.
“So which school of Islam do you follow then?”
“Name the greatest Prophets”
“Are you Hanafi then because you pray like a Hanafi?”
Later the same day she was cornered in a corridor by young Muslim girls who didn’t wear the hijab, yet. Faux intellectual bullying is a sad epidemic in our community.
“Where does it say in the Quran you have to wear hijab – can you tell us huh?’’
“The Prophet’s wives wore it didn’t they?” Stumbled the girl.
“Name them then!” came the harsh response.
{Behold! You are they who disputed about that of which you had knowledge; why then do you dispute about that of which you have no knowledge? And Allah knows while you do not know.} (Al-Imran 3: 66)
You may feel pushed into making decisions on matters about which you know little or nothing. You may also see, in people’s way of prayer, a lot of apparent ‘contradictions’ in Islamic practice. There are four major schools of thought in Islam (madhhab) all of which are considered valid. It is hard to understand when we arrive in the deen and seek out absolutes in all things with the enthusiasm and zeal of the enthusiastic amateur. But, don’t be rushed.
When a discussion leads into something about which the listener does not have knowledge, men of great quality such as Imam Shafi’i simply said “I do not know” and left it like that. Seeking knowledge means accepting that we are worthy of knowing only a little at a time. And more, that until each teaching is absorbed and then practiced with consistency and sincerity in our daily lives and worship – why should the next treasures be unlocked for us?
One of the principles we learn from Islam is that being silent is better than speaking.
Learning to listen and to be quiet, to ponder on existence and wait patiently for God’s guidance – is one of Islam’s many gifts to humanity. Do this and your heart will begin to feel at ease in a way you have not experienced before.
Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: “Whoever is silent will be successful.”
Learning to be quiet and to live without music playing in the background of my life took me a while. Again, no fatwas on this page about music being haram or halal! Just a sisterly suggestion that now can be the perfect time to take a break from time wasting. There I said it. Stop wasting your time! Ibn Al Qayyim says:
“Wasting time is worse than death because death separates you from this world whereas wasting time separates you from Allah”.
So much on TV is foul and demeaning. Sarcastic people, doing mean things to one another. Women being denigrated to little more than a jumble of body parts – like is existence really best summarized as ‘it’s all about the Hair!’?
Not easy to stay spiritually connected when allowing ourselves to be bombarded with images of strangers’ body parts, harsh language and of course the unending pursuit of material goods and wealth. Please, turn off the TV and radio. Find a recording of the Quran and allow your ears to attune to its inspirational ebb and flow. A home where the Quran is recited has angels present. As the ads say – for far lesser things – ‘Try if for a month and notice the difference!’
God the Exalted makes it very clear, when He says:
{O ye who believe! Obey Allah, and obey the messenger, and make not vain your deeds!} (Muhammad 47: 33)
We live in a great age to be Muslims. Never has so much information been available on our faith, so instantly. But we are just far too busy to study right? The companions of the Prophet, used to tend their fields, their market stalls and their businesses by day, following the Prophet memorizing his words in the afternoon and then stay up for hours at night worshipping God. They certainly had blessed time. And that’s what time is when you seek closeness to the One who made you.
So what’s on your iPod or in your car CD player right now? When you’re cooking at home, why not seek out lectures on YouTube? For working mums, busy students, dads and business people; the car, the kitchen, the bus and the subway are our lecture theatres. And the lessons, in how to live a better way of life in Islam, well they quickly mount up, day by day, InshaAllah.
May Allah SWT be your guide on the straight path now and always.
Peace. Lauren: Please find below some of my personally recommended links to inspiring resources which have and continue to help me and my family on our journey.
Changing my religion
by economist.com
MUSLIM converts have an image problem. A handful, like Richard Dart, a
Dorset native jailed last month, have been implicated in terrorism.
Samantha Lewthwaite, who was married to Germaine Lindsay, one of the 7/7
bombers and himself a convert, is wanted by Kenyan police in connection
with an alleged bomb plot.Even without the taint of extremism, women are sometimes pitied for joining a religion accused of oppressing them. Despite these concerns, converts, for the most part peaceable, propel Islam’s transition from an immigrant religion to a home-grown one.
Calculating convert numbers is tricky. The census in England and Wales only asks about people’s current religion. Mosques do not record conversions centrally, and some new believers keep their conversions quiet. But using census data on race and religion, and questionnaires issued to mosques, Kevin Brice, a researcher at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David, reckons around 5,200 Britons turn to Islam every year, bringing the total number of converts to about 100,000.
Proselytising has little do with it. A handful of Muslim groups hand out tracts in the street. But most are more concerned with issuing press releases condemning extremism than wooing converts, says Leon Moosavi, an expert on Islamic conversions at Liverpool University.
Those who embrace Islam tend to do so after years of contact with Muslims. Reasons vary. Some, mostly women (who make up around two-thirds of new believers), want to marry a Muslim. Others are fed up with the bawdiness of British society. Many speak of seeking a sense of community. Batool al-Toma, an Irish-Catholic convert who runs the New Muslim Project in Leeds, was attracted, she says, by the spirituality of Islam and the warmth of relationships she saw among Muslims.
For men, prisons have proven a fertile ground for conversions. Just over 11,000 prisoners are Muslims, about 13% of the total. Last year an inquiry by the home affairs select committee named prisons as a breeding ground for radicals. But a study by the prisons inspectorate in 2010 produced a more positive conclusion. Converts, a third of those interviewed, said the discipline and structure of Islam helped them to cope with prison life.
Others cited the support they received from their Muslim “brothers”. Some were initially attracted by the prospect of a cushier spell in jail—more time outside their cells, for example, and better food at Ramadan, but then completed their conversion.
Upon release though, some prisoners are shunned by their fellow Muslims, says Tracey Davanna, who studies Muslim prisoners at Birmingham University. Ex-cons are not the only ones who find integration tough. Many mosques are ethnic clubs, says Mr Moosavi, and can be unwelcoming to converts. Few mosques offer substantial support to new converts.
Organisations such as the New Muslim Project have sprung up to fill the gap. It provides certificates of conversion that new believers can leave with their wills in case appalled relatives refuse an Islamic burial. Two mosques in Britain are now run by converts.
The Ihsan mosque in Norwich encountered antagonism from some Muslims, says Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison, who has been a member of the community since the mid-1990s. Some questioned whether new believers should be in charge of a mosque, he says. But it has flourished. At Friday prayers they struggle to squeeze everyone in.
Despite successes like this, fears persist that this home-grown Islam will produce more Mr Darts and Ms Lewthwaites, intent on havoc rather than faith. New-foundzeal may leave converts vulnerable to radical strains of Islam. Isolation from their old life and lack of integration with moderate believers can only make that risk worse.
YouTube Recommendations
Sheikh Hamza Yusuf: Stations of Gratitude
Ustadh Ali Hammuda: Praying Attentively
Readings
The Holy Quran - http://www.quranproject.org - for your free copy
Agenda to Change our Condition – Hamza Yusuf and Zaid Shakir
Don’t Be Sad -Aaidh ibn Abdullah al-Qarni
(HSH)
Sources:
1.OnIslam
2. MuslimVillage.com
3.The Economist (economist.com)
ameen
ReplyDeleteThank you for writing this - it speaks volumes about my conversion. Another thing you didn't mention is just being outright excluded from the other sisters. I wore a hijab for about a year and other hijabis would ignore me or just stare at me. I didn't go to the mosque, it was located so far away from me and I didn't have a vehicle, and I think that's why they reacted so strangely to my existence. I remember I was in a mall well over a year after my conversion and one hijabi walked up to my fiance (they were in the same program at school) and started a conversation with us - she was very friendly to me, but her friend - WOW - she literally just stared at me tight lipped! I said salam alaikum nice to meet you and she stared blankly at me, no smile, no walaikumasalam nothing! I seen her later without my fiance at the bus stop and same thing, this angry blank stare. Needless to say now that I do have a vehicle you will not catch me dead at that mosque after such experiences. I feel alone and disconnected but that's that. I took off my hijab eventually because I couldn't handle the segregation from BOTH communities, the Muslim one and my native community, where I was rejected for every job I applied for and people threw rocks at me on the street. I am much, much, happier now, even though I feel completely disconnected from any Muslim community that exists here at least I am comfortable in my own skin.
ReplyDeleteThe right of a Muslim woman is to be respected for her mind and for being her own person:
DeleteA Muslim Woman is Required to Dress a Certain Way When She Goes Out in Public. For a Muslim woman, her modest dress is an expression of a universal sisterhood. An Islamic dress also liberates the Muslim woman, and she is then automatically respected for her mind instead of her body.
Simply put, she retains her dignity! It is like saying: I am a respectful woman. I am not for every man to look at, touch, or speak to. I am protected, exactly like a precious white pearl which, if touched by everyone, will become black and dirty.
A woman’s modest dress protects society from adultery and other forms of illegal sexual relations that lead to the break up of families and corruption of society.
This is a cool site. We need more mentors once people enter islam to help assist them with the basics of our Deen.
ReplyDeleteA successful Muslim sister was asked by the people of the West, 'How is it possible that an intelligent lady like yourself, well educated and incredible successful, can be so backwards in thought, which is shown by your 'choice' to cover yourself up [i.e. hijab]'.
DeleteThe sister very intelligently, and rightly so, replied, 'If you look back into history, you'd notice that the not-so-intelligent people barely covered. As intelligence increased, clothing was introduced. It is not I who is backward, for I am moving forward, with intelligence. Backwards are those who wear less clothes, like the ancestors did whence cohabitation in caves were a norm.
NAKED IN SPITE OF BEING DRESSED!
ReplyDeleteAbu Hurairah (r.a.) reports that the Messenger of Allah (s.a.w.) warned, “I have not seen two parties of the occupants of Hell (because they do not exist now; they will come into being later in time). One party will consist of those who will hold whips like the tails of oxen, with which they will slash the people (in a cruel manner). The other party will consist of women who will be dressed, yet naked. They will be those who tempt men and are tempted by them. They will have large heads like the bent humps of camels. They (the two parties) will neither enter Paradise nor smell its scent. And verily its scent can be smelled from such a large distance.” (Bukhari, Muslim)
The point of discussion here is the second party mentioned by the Prophet (s.a.w.) i.e. women who will be naked in spite of being dressed. The implication is that they will wear clothes of such thin material which will not conceal their bodies. There may also be another implication: If the cloth is not thin, the dress will be so tight-fitting on the body that it will reveal the whole shape of the body and thus will eliminate the purpose of concealing the body.
Another meaning of being dressed and yet being naked is that there will be inadequate clothing on the body leaving a large part of it naked, especially those parts which modest women conceal from the view of men. Nowadays, Muslim women wear transparent clothing, or garments without sleeves or the sleeves are so short that their arms are visible. Their legs are naked, head bare and the neck of the dress is so large and open at the front and back that the upper part of the body is clearly exposed.
Thereafter he (s.a.w.) continued that these women will tempt men and will be tempted by them. In other words the fashion of remaining naked will not arise out of poverty, but because women will want to expose their bodies to tempt men. Another means of temptation they will adopt is that, while walking, they will shake their heads (which will be without scarves) just like the hump of the fast running camel shakes and bends downwards. The comparison with the hump of the camel illustrates how the women will enlarge their heads by tying their head upwards in big knots.
At the end of the Hadith it is said that such women will neither enter Paradise nor smell its fragrance. Thereafter it is said that the scent of Paradise is smelled from a great distance. This Hadith does not mention the distance from which the fragrance of Paradise may be smelled. Some Ahadith, however, say that the scent of Paradise can be smelled from a distance of a hundred years’ journey. Just imagine what a misfortune it would be to be deprived of not only Paradise but even its fragrance.
May Allah give our women the ability and the correct guidance to cover their bodies according to the Shariah. Ameen.