Yaser M. Haddara

This is the third abridged translation of a bio of one of the figures of the modern Islamic movement as told in the book by sh. Abdullah al-Uqail.

They called him “father of the collegians” because he was one of the first group of university students to work with Imam Hasan al-Banna to establish the Muslim Brotherhood on university campuses in Egypt.

Born in 1911, his family was one of knowledge and deen. His father had earned the 3aalamiyya degree from al-Azhar and worked as a lawyer in sharee3a courts. He himself wound up in the Egyptian University (now Cairo University) studying in the Faculty of Humanities graduating with a B.A. in Arabic Language in 1938.

Ustadh Mohamed was introduced to the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) in 1933 by Sh. Tantawy Johary (an author of a Quranic tafseer in the early part of the 20th century that was distinguished by its consideration of Quranic references to modern scientific knowledge). Ustadh Mohamed and some of his colleagues had approached the sheikh with the idea of forming an Islamic society on campus. He suggested instead that they should join the ikhwan because they understood Islam as a comprehensive whole that encompasses every aspect of life not only worship, and because they focused on a holistic tarbiya (character development/growth) that utilizes practical (not only intellectual) means to facilitate the development and growth of the entire human being. He praised to them the founder of the movement, Imam Hasan al-Banna, who had been nominated by the rector of al-Azhar, Sh. Mustafa al-Maraghi, to be the editor al-Manar magazine after its founding editor, sh. Rashid Rida, had passed away.

Ustadh Mohamed and his colleagues (there was a group of six) accepted sh. Johary’s advice and joined the brotherhood. Mohamed Abdelhamid Ahmed was selected as the naqib (captain/representative) of the students in the movement.

Sh. al-Uqail came to know this brother through his writings in the al-ikhwan al-muslimoon magazine in the late forties. He later met him in Egypt as he had continued his activism with university students sharing his experiences and helping them organize on campuses.

Shortly after graduating he spent some time teaching in Iraq. He was joined there by another member of the MB, Kamal al-Deen Hussein, who was teaching in the Engineering Faculty in Baghdad. The two of them worked to advance the ideas of the Islamic movement in Iraq. Shortly thereafter sh. Muhammad Mahmoud al-Sawwaf, an Iraqi scholar who was studying in al-Azhar and was introduced to the MB there, came back to Iraq. The three of them together established and strengthened the presence of the Islamic movement in Iraq (Sh. al-Sawwaf would later lead ikhwan volunteers from Iraq in Palestine in 1948).

Ustadh Mohamed’s stint in Iraq finished in 1946 and he returned to Egypt and continued where he left off as a writer, teacher, and activist. A year later, Hajj Abdellatif Abu Qoura, the leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan requested his appointment in Jordan to teach in the Islamic College there. He spent one year in Jordan and returned in 1948 only to face a government crackdown on the Brotherhood and a prime-ministerial edict banning the organization and ordering the arrest of most members. He would later face arrest and torture again in 1954, 1960, and 1965. When he was finally released from prison he settled in Saudi Arabia and worked in various capacities as a teacher and magazine editor finally settling as an instructor in the Da’wa Department in the Faculty of Sharee’a in Umm al-Qura University (the department head at the time was sh. Mohamed al-Ghazzali rahimahullah). He continued in this position until his retirement in 1985 and continued to live in Makka until his death in 1992.

Contributions

Those that knew Ustadh Mohamed attest that to his dying days he was tireless in his work to call people to work in the service of Islam. He focused on students and encouraged them to feel their responsibilities to their deen and to use well the years of keen intellect and physical fitness. He held classes, gave lectures, participated in panel discussions, and wrote. Sh. al-Uqayl describes how he benefited with his colleagues from Ustadh Mohamed’s efforts during his studies in Egypt 1950-54. Ustadh Mohamed’s lectures invariably challenged the dominant anti-religious views that were well-subsidized and systematically propagated in Egypt for the first half of the 20th century.

He is described by Ustadh Mohamed Hamed Abulnasr (the 4th General Guide of the Muslim Brothers) with a fitting epitaph,

“Believers are many. But there are among the belivers ‘men that were truthful to the covenant they made with God; some of them have passed away, others still wait, and they have altered none of their covenant or integrity.’ Among those that were truthful in their covenant my noble brother the pioneering educator Mohamed Abdelhamid Ahmed – he is that in my estimation though I do not presume to inform God of the nobility of His servants. . . (Our brother) was the first to carry the idea of the ikhwan into the Egyptian University . . . He carried his da’wa and sacrificed everything he had in the path of da’wa. . . At a time when ideas opposed to Islam had dominated in our society and received every manner of support, he persevered and struggled and worked tirelessly until he met Allah with his perseverance hoping for God’s pleasure.”

About his own experiences Ustadh Mohamed reminisces that he and his colleagues established the first prayer room on their university campus when they convinced the Dean of the Faculty of Humanities (Dr. Mansour Fahmy) to allow them to use a room that used to be storage space for academic dress (caps & gowns). They started to call the adhan, which came as a surprise to a faculty that had a single Egyptian instructor! They would invite students that came to the prayer to listen to the lectures of Imam al-Banna, attracting many of them to the movement of MB.

When Imam al-Banna spoke at a meeting for the student members of the ikhwan in 1937 he said, “. . . I would be remiss as I start this talk if I did not salute with you that blessed moment four years ago when I met with six of your brothers reminding one another of the responsibilities that University students have for Islam . . . By the second year this annual gathering included forty of your brothers. At the end of the third year you numbered 300. We come now to your fourth annual gathering and you increase and not decline, ‘And the pure land: its plants grow out of the earth by the permission of its Lord.’”

For me, the most inspiring testimonial comes from ustadh Ahmed Abu Shady who talks about him in his memoirs. He says:

God so willed that I was close to ustadh Mohamed Abdelhamid Ahmed in the tribulation of 1965 and that I benefited much from his company. I learned more from him through his example and through living with him day to day than I learned from classes and readings. . . He was an endless ocean of knowledge. He spoke to us of the da’wa that he joined as a young man; he spoke of the poetry of Iqbal to whom he was particularly dedicated – he had memorized much of his poetry and when he recited it he would do so in a melodious voice that would inspire in us a response to the poetry similar to his own; and beyond these he would guide us to live the hikam of ibn Ataa. The hikam were like a song from his lips making steadfast the hearts of those that are oppressed whenever the crises gather and darken, and whenever tribulation bares its teeth and despair finds its way to all gathered . . . Of the hikam that he kept reciting to us until we memorized them:

• Let not the delay in the time of the giving, despite your persistence in the asking, a cause for your despair. For Allah guaranteed you the answering of supplication in what He chooses for you not in what you choose for yourself, and in the time that He wills, not in the time that you will . . . for He does with consistency and overwhelming power what He wills.
• If Allah is with you, then just who is against you? And if He is against you then just who is with you?

I am always moved when I learn of the lives of people like this. He worked tirelessly and he could have been famous or a celebrity. He could have become known as an author, as a political figure, as an activist leader, etc. Instead, what God chose for him was that he would be remembered by those that knew him and that his real impact would be in their character and in their lives, and then in the character and lives of everyone that they reached. He did write a few books. But the most influential of his “books” were the students and the brothers that learned from him in his times of ease and in his times of difficulty. May Allah accept him, forgive him, reward him, and keep us on the goodness in his path and his legacy. Ameen.

“Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.” This was today’s quote: the words of Abraham Lincoln. Fitting given today’s world.

One Friday halaqa early in my days at Stanford the main segment was a PBS Frontline documentary about various aspects of American foreign policy. As the end credits rolled music was playing in the background and they were playing a music video for some guy. One of the brothers mentioned his name and said he had many anti-war songs. One line caught my attention, it was something about how the government lies and justifies its wars by saying “we’ve come to the aid of a friend.”

Some time later (maybe months, maybe years, it’s all too long ago now) I wanted to figure out how to get the lyrics for that song. Trouble was I couldn’t remember the name of the artist, I couldn’t remember the name of the song, and I couldn’t remember the specific video. (The really scary part was that none of the brothers could remember watching this video or figure out what I was talking about, including the brother who’d expressed such great admiration for the singer ). In the early nineties when the web came along I tried to search for the phrase “the aid of a friend” but nothing came up. Well, I gave up. Almost.

Every few years, I’d try the same exercise again. I’d go on the web and search for the phrase “the aid of a friend”. Finally, last year I found it. The singer is Jackson Browne and he did have a period were he was producing increasingly political songs. If you search for his name on youtube you find him singing at an anti-war rally with Bruce Springstein in ‘81, and you find him as part of a group of artists doing an anti-apartheid video. The song I was looking for is called Lives in the Balance, and someone had decided to use it in a “video editorial” by juxtaposing the song with appropriate images of the “men who fan the flames of wars” and images of the actual wars. This video editorial focuses specifically on Iraq, but there are a couple others that followed up on the same idea that also include Palestine.

At any rate, I wanted to share this. Be warned that the videos include some disturbing images. If you’re not up to that, you can just listen to the audio here. Lives-in-the-Balance

Here’s the video editorial I mentioned:

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/eErbmvUwgZE" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

And I was finally able to find the original music video also on youtube:
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/QJvfNdakzkg" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Apologies for staying away for so long. I’ve been trying to write my 3rd episode in the discussion on humor, and it’s taking a long time. The primary reason for that is that when I decided to do just a little bit of research I found many more sources, and so many more examples, than I thought I would find! I do not claim that I am going to produce something comprehensive or scholarly but I do want to include a lot of diverse things.

One quick example – I came across a book specifically in the condemnation of unlikable people (dhamm ath-thuqalaa). By unlikable we mean people whose company does not bring pleasure to the people around them, who seem incapable of choosing the right words for the occasion, and who tend to overstay their welcome. The theme of the book is that such people have been criticized (or condemned or put down) by the Quran, the sunnah of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, and by scholars and sages in every age! One example is given of a man that came to Bashar ibn Burd, a well-known poet who was blind, and told him, “Whenever God takes away the gift of sight from someone, He tends to give him an alternate blessing to make up for it. What do you count as your alternate blessing?” Bashar’s answer was, “That I won’t be depressed to death by seeing you!”

In any case, it’s going to take at least another week before I can put that installment up here. In the meantime, I have a backlog of things I wanted to post, and responses to your wonderful comments that I wanted to make. I will be doing this over the next few days inshaa Allah.

Here’s a quick start.

Dr. Ahmed al-Kadi was invited to give a talk about Islam in Stanford’s Memorial Church. He started out by giving a traditional introduction discussing Islam, Iman, and Ihsan. Then he offered an insight that has stayed with me since. He mentioned five things, each of which is the only answer to a particular question according to the Quran and the hadeeth of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him.

• What is the only thing that God does not forgive?
  • Associating a partner with God in worship.
• What is the only reason that humanity was created?
  • To worship God.
• What is the only reason that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, was given messengerhood?
  • To be a mercy for all the Worlds.
• What is the only thing that is forbidden upon God?
  • Injustice.
• What is the only reason that something is made permissible or forbidden?
  • al-Tayyibaat, meaning things that are pure, wholesome, and of benefit, are made permissible. al-Khabaa’ith, meaning things that are impure, unwholesome, or of harm, are made forbidden.

He then spoke about the implications of each of these for the mindset of a Muslim, the relationship between a Muslim and others, and the behavior of a Muslim in this life. Thinking about these implications is left as an exercise for the reader .

When I referred to humor in classic texts in my first review of LM (seems so long ago now) I was thinking specifically of humor literature and humor in literature written by credible (in terms of scholarship and/or piety) authors in pre-modern times. When I started to think more carefully about what a piece on “humor in classic text” would entail, the first thing that came to mind was the stories told about the sahaby al-Nu’ayman. So I realized that writing on this subject I would have to begin by wondering about humor in the community of the sahaba first. But even then I realized that by itself such reflection would be insufficient. We have to ask the question of how things developed from there. I also took note of the fact that this is no theoretical exercise (as I said before I’m not writing a scholarly work here). The fact of the matter is that I posed this question in a very particular context: I felt that some reaction to the humor of LM was unrealistically restrictive. My argument (refined and better articulated in a phone conversation with my brother) is that (a) Muslims, including many of us that found some of the humor in LM uncomfortable, do not hesitate to laugh at similar humor in a non-Muslim context (a rather funny story about this follows below); (b) In Muslim societies, this sort of humor is normal both in art and in daily life; and (c) historically humor has mattered to Muslims, and the particular sort of humor we’re talking about has been ok with Muslims. So whatever it is that I am writing about classic humor is not a neutral, objective, open-ended investigation of how we may form an overall picture of classic humor. What I am actually doing is looking to see whether my assertions above stand up to scrutiny. In other words, integrity and honesty are important in this investigation. Completeness and the discernment of a holistic picture are not. The result is that this is an argument by example: it says something about existence and absolutely nothing about prevalence, preponderance, or norm-setting.

So let me take up my assertions one by one. A strong warning is appropriate at this juncture: some of what follows will push the envelope — it has to if I am going to be honest in chasing down my assertions. In practice, we have multiple responsibilities as Muslims and as decent human beings (there ought to be considerable overlap between these two categories ) with respect to humor of the sort I will bring up here. Those responsibilities will inshaa Allah be the subject of another piece (perhaps the fourth in this series). Until then, please don’t feel too guilty if you laugh, and don’t be too hard on me if you don’t .

Many years ago now I was a graduate student at Stanford. The highlight of my week was the Friday evening gathering of the ISSU (Islamic Society at Stanford University). Back then we were mostly graduate students and all male. Many of us were overweight, most were either foreign students or had lived overseas long enough to have thick accents, and almost all had healthy beards . I’m just trying to paint an accurate image here so you can develop some perspective on this story. Anyhow, the format of the weekly gathering was to begin with a meal (we rotated the cooking in teams) then read Quran and have a presentation (the presentations also rotated). Maghrib was done at the beginning or whenever its time came in. Ishaa was typically deferred to the end of the Jalsa (Ar. for sitting – that’s what we called it back then; today it’s more affectionately known as TGIJ and its audience has changed dramatically – you can check out the ISSU website from my blogroll). On one occasion, the food was particularly filling (some of you know what I mean) and one brother finished eating, got up off the floor, sat on one of the couches in the room, leaned back, stretched his legs in front of him, and stuck his hand in his belt. Simultaneously and spontaneously three other bros looked at him and shouted, “Al Bundy! Al Bundy!” . If you don’t know what I am talking about, try to find out about this really awful TV show called “Married . . . With Children.” The irony of course is not limited to the fact that these three brothers were immediately and simultaneously struck by the image of Al Bundy, but that almost no one in that room, and we were considered a fairly conservative bunch by pretty much everyone, needed to ask “who the heck is Al Bundy?” . (A further irony for me personally was upon coming to McMaster and finding out that my very good buddy here was a co-founder of the Married with children fan club – he blogs on hadithuna too, but at least for this article shall remain unnamed).

So generally, regardless of how “conservative” we are (within limits) we live our lives, we watch, we listen, and we laugh!

OK. Second point. Anyone that’s lived in a Muslim-majority country has seen movies or theater, heard jokes, etc. Like everyone else we have humor that spans a broad spectrum in terms of its audacity or raciness. The astaghfirulllah – sub7anallah – inshaa Allah joke is a well known example that transcends cultural boundaries. (For moral responsibility and social implications you’ll have to wait till part four ). Jokes about marriage, multiple marriage, marriage in paradise, in-laws, etc. all of them center around the comedy in relationships and gender roles. Even the “affectionate” official-sounding titles males tend to bestow on their wives or females claim for themselves (the government, the powers that be, the warden, etc.) are a testament to the perceived richness of marital relations as a source for humor.

So now we’re down to my last statement. Historically, humor has been important to Muslims, and the particular sort of humor we’re talking about has been ok with Muslims. We can further break this statement down into three components. (Depending on your inclinations you may wish to bemoan this “obsession” with lists and analyzing every thing into its component parts as an engineering tendency, or as being squarely in the tradition of our illustrious scholars such as Imam Ghazaly. Either way I beg your indulgence.)

The first component is to look at the significance, importance, and/or prominence of humor in Islamic intellectual history. The second component is to consider “racy” humor or sexual innuendo in jokes in the general history of Muslim communities (i.e. regardless of the authoritativeness or Islamic credentials of authors and purveyors of this type of humor). The final component is to consider the attitude specifically of authoritative voices (scholars, pious individuals, respected writers, etc.) with regards to the same matter. As an afterthought, we should also cast a brief glance on classical discourses on sexuality.

Obviously, this is getting way too long again. So at the risk of leaving you with an undesirable cliffhanger I am going to stop here and take up these questions in installment three inshaa Allah.

Jazaakumullahu khayran to everyone that expressed interest in this subject and jazaakumullahu khayran for waiting (assuming you did ).

One disclaimer to begin with: this is a blog entry not a scholarly research paper . I will quote a given hadeeth if it was quoted in a credible source without myself attempting to check its authenticity. In general, the points I make below are not in need of specific textual backup: where they are references to the sunna they are self-evident; where they are references to other individual or communal practice they are argued based on appropriate sources.

That said, it is reported (e.g. in al-Tabaqat al-Kubra by ibn Sa’d) that Zaid ibn Thabit was once asked to describe the character of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him. He said, “What can I say? I was his neighbor. When a piece of revelation would come to him he would call me and I would write it down. At the same time, he was with us – when we talk about dunya he would talk about it right along with us, when we talk about food he would talk about it right along with us. You want me to tell you everything such as that regarding him?”

The point of the hadeeth and others like it is that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him lived his life as a man. He would joke when appropriate, laugh when appropriate, cry when appropriate, and he would console his companions when they needed it. Many of us have heard some of the stories where the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him would make a joke – but he was always careful to speak exactly the truth. Notwithstanding this, he was a man of his people, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, and he would use the language and idioms of his people, sometimes subconsciously. For example it is narrated that he visited Umm Sulaym once and saw a young orphan girl that Umm Sulaym was raising. He had not seen her in a while and realized that she had grown. With characteristic gentleness and humor he remarked on it, but he used a phrase, common in the language of the Arabs, that literally was a du’aa against the girl! (In Arabic the phrase is لا كبر سنك. Unfortunately I am not sure exactly what it means or what its idiomatic usage was. Literally it is either a reference to teeth growing or to age increasing; i.e. a reference to growing up. And taken absolutely literally it would seem to be a du’aa that the person never grows!) The young girl was upset by this and went crying to Umm Sulaym. Umm Sulaym immediately got dressed and went after the prophet, peace be upon him, questioning him (some would say reproaching him) as to why he had made a du’aa against the young girl. The prophet, may God’s peace be upon him, realizing how the girl had taken it thought this was so funny and laughed hard! He then reassured Umm Sulaym that God does not bring to pass any supplication by the prophet, may God’s peace be upon him, intentional or otherwise against any individual unless that individual deserves it. Point being that even though the prophet, may God’s peace be upon him, put such a huge premium on the truth, every language has some leeway established through people’s customs where things are simply not meant literally.

The companions of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, certainly understood that they should enjoy their lives according to their customs without getting too picky about things. They joked with each other, both verbally and in practical jokes. The prophet, may God’s peace be upon him, on one of his travels was sitting in a small tent when one of his companions asked for permission to enter. When the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, told him to enter he jokingly asked (because the tent was so small) “All of me?”

In terms of practical jokes, the most famous companion for this is An-Nu’ayman ibn Amr. His many stories are told in al-Isaba by ibn Hajar (a book of biographies of the companions). Some of the stories happened during the time of the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him. For example the man was traveling in a trade caravan led by Abu Bakr (ra). In the absence of Abu Bakr (ra) he had a small argument with one of his friends, another companion named Suwaybit. The biographers actually differ on which of the two played the trick on the other, but to keep it simple I’ll stick with the version where An-Nu’ayman (ra) played the trick. He went off and found a group of people and told them that he owned a good hard-working slave that he wanted to sell and were they interested? They were so he warned them this guy is a smooth talker and quite argumentative. You come to pick him up after the sale he’s gonna swear up and down that he’s a free man. If you’re gonna listen to his protest and abandon him you’re just making it harder for me to control the guy and I don’t need this kind of headache. If you’re gonna buy him you pick him up and ignore what he says. They fell for it. So they come and pick the guy up and pay a price to al-Nu’aymaan and no matter how much Suwaybit protests they just ignore him. When Abu Bakr returns to the caravan people tell him what happened and he goes after those folks, explains the situation, and compensates them for their trouble. The narrator says that when the caravan returned to Madeena and the story spread, the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, and his companions kept telling the story and laughing about it for a year after! It is said that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, so appreciated the fun that an-Nu’ayman introduced that he prayed to God to bring happiness to an-Nu’ayman because he was so keen to bring a laugh to the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him.

His most audacious episode comes during the khilafa of Uthma (ra). An old blind man walking into the masjid was looking for the proper place to urinate. He was about to do so right in the masjid when people shouted out at him to let him know where he was. Al-Nu’ayman sprang up and ran to the man. He took his hands as if to guide him to the proper place. What he actually did was to take him to the other side of the prayer hall and told him, “Here! Go ahead and urinate!” Of course, as the man is about to do so people shout out again, he’s a little embarrassed, but mostly he’s angry. He asks the identity of the young man who treated him with such disrespect and learns his name. He swears that if he ever comes across al-Nu’ayman he would beat him up!

Well, al-Nu’ayman waits until he sees the old man coming into the masjid one day and he goes right up to him and asks if he’d be interested in finding al-Nu’ayman to beat him up. When the man agrees that he’d like that very much, al-Nu’ayman takes him by the hand and leads him right up to where the khaleefa Uthman is praying. He stands him behind Uthman and tells him this is al-Nu’ayman. The man lifts his walking stick above his head and starts beating up Uthman as hard as he can until people rush to stop him .

For those of us expecting the sahaba to be all prim and proper this may be a little unexpected. Ibn Hajar says these stories and others were documented in a book called “Humor and Jokes” written by Az-Zubayr ibn Bakkar (as best as I can tell this appears to be the grandson of Abdullah ibn Az-Zubayr and Asmaa bint Abi Bakr). These stories and others are cited in this fatwa by Dr. Yusuf al-Qaradawy on the subject of humor. (Among the other stories he mentions is literally a food-fight between Aisha and Sawda with the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, sitting between them and laughing!)

So far we have just scratched the surface. We’ve only talked about jokes as practiced by the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, and his companions. As for how our scholars looked at this we’ve only seen a hint so far. Apparently there was an early scholar that saw fit to compile a book just about jokes and humor. Apparently also other scholars saw fit to quote this book widely (it is cited by Imam Ghazzaly in the Ihya and by Imam ibn Hajar in al-Isaba, among others). Also, we can see that the jokes had something of a range, from the tamest pun, to the more playful as in the food fight I just mentioned, to the vicious type of practical joke that al-Nu’ayman (ra) was famous for. Finally, the hadeeth of Zayd (ra) and others like it indicate that we don’t know every joke told or heard by the prophet, may God’s peace be upon him. There is simply every indication that the prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, lived and promoted and encouraged and maintained an atmosphere of normalcy where people could simply go about their lives as normal, generally easy-going human beings who knew when they needed to be serious, when they needed to rise up to a challenge, and when they needed to make sacrifices, but who also knew that you needed a bit of fun in your life and that you just had to be normal!

We still need to take this further and see how it develops, but this particular post is already getting too long. So I hope it whets your appetite just a little . . . if there is interest inshaa Allah there will be part 2.

Al-hamdulillah, Little Mosque on the Prairie (hereafter LM) seems to be doing rather well. I haven’t been able to find a site that gives updated viewership or ratings for Canadian shows, but from the various reviews it appears that the show has settled in at about a million viewers regularly. The comparison is made with the benchmark Canadian show, Corner Gas, which gets a little less than 1.5 million viewers regularly. So the numbers seem to be healthy al-hamdulillah.

A number of Muslims are still very upset with the show, which I suppose is fine. I would have preferred to see our community in general simply accepting that comedy is largely a matter of taste and that we could agree that some of us will laugh while others will simply switch the channel. Unfortunately the bulk of the criticism seems to come at it from the “let’s all follow the Quran and sunnah” perspective, a perspective I personally find rather annoying since I take it for granted that in fact most of us are trying to follow the Quran and sunnah. I know I had promised a post (or maybe two) about humor in classical sources and I am almost ready to put that up so stay tuned inshaa Allah. I also received an email recently that’s been doing the rounds that summarizes the arguments against, so inshaa Allah I’ll take that up in a series of posts. All of this I intend to do in rapid succession if God wills, so if you’re interested in this please do stay tuned over the next two weeks.

Meanwhile, two things are “comforting” for those of us that have been enjoying the show. The first is all the right-wing rants against the show. Michael Coren bares his islamophobic teeth in this piece. (A short digression: I recorded an episode on the Michael Coren show a couple of months ago and the man was positively charming. I thought he was even-handed and quite fair in the way he ran the show. Off air he was respectful, friendly, and I would even say generous. This editorial seems to be written by a different person! Ironic how we can be so more vicious with each other when we’re not actually talking to a living breathing human being ). Another collection of hyperventilating rednecks may be found on this blog. The common theme in all these is their feeling that the show portrays all the Muslim characters in a good light (they are all lovable even if a little eccentric) whereas it does the opposite with the “white” townsfolk, especially the radio broadcaster. I disagree with their reading of how the non-Muslim folks are portrayed but therein lies the bulk of the irony: their perception is almost a mirror image of the Muslims that have reacted negatively to the show.

The second “comforting” thing was this online Q&A with the show’s creator Zarqa Nawaz. I had hoped to speak with her directly before blogging on this subject again but unfortunately did not get the chance. But this Q&A gives you a feel for what she likes and doesn’t like about the show. It should have been clear from the outset (and I had said this to a number of people verbally but didn’t put it in my previous review b/c I didn’t want to be distracted from the central messages there) that a show like this does not go on the air with one person entirely in control of the writing. So some things are gonna make it through that no one likes. Nonetheless, even some of the scenes that Zarqa found questionable I actually didn’t, which I suppose puts me in the extreme minority — so what else is new?

I’ve put comforting in quotes in the above two cases b/c in each case it’s a mixed blessing: on the one hand the perception of the show by hyperventilating rednecks tells you something about its positive impact and on the other hand we’re not necessarily seeking such a negative reaction; and on the one hand it helps to know that there is room for improving the show as Zarqa is better able to educate the rest of the writing team and on the other hand it’s not super great that this didn’t happen from the outset.

There are also things that are comforting, without the need for quotation marks. That the show seems to be successful al-hamduillah is a good sign. I hope it’s here to stay. The show has been getting funnier. And I believe (I don’t have scientific data here, just anecdotal evidence) that even among some of its critics the show has started to gain more acceptance. It’s also given us as a community the opportunity to discuss more of these issues.

So I’ve made a number of promises here that I’ll have to try and keep inshaa Allah. Over the next two weeks I will inshaa Allah blog about (roughly in this order):

1. Humor in classic texts
2. My personal review of episodes 3-6
3. The larger issues surrounding LM (some of these will be identified in the reviews; others come from the email I talked about earlier)

Until then, don’t worry, be happy! And please remember: Peace.

A recent news article speaks of Israel’s plans to investigate sheikh Raed Salah. Sheikh Raed is the leader of the Islamic Movement “inside the green line” (i.e. in the parts of Palestine taken for Israel in 1948). He has been routinely jailed by Israel on accusations of “sympathizing” with outlawed groups, etc. The last arrest led to a 2-year imprisonment for leading a banned demonstration (this is of course happens in the “only democracy in the Middle East”).

The accusations for this latest episode are no less amazing. He’s being investigated as a result of his words at a rally protesting the “excavations” at al-Aqsa. Two accusations are made:

1. He called for “an intifada to support al-Aqsa” — this is being labeled as incitement to violence. That makes sense! If the victim asks for help, it must be incitement .
2. He said words to the effect of “Our blood is on your clothes, on your doors, . . .” — this is being labeled as racism. Some old geezers like myself are likely to recognize these words as the lines of a very old poem about the oppression that Palestinians have suffered and continue to suffer. If they’re gonna investigate sh. Raed for the metaphorical reference of ‘my blood is on your hands’ I suspect the next step is to investigate all English teachers for teaching Macbeth!

The gall of it all!

I’ve been battling a cold for the last several days. At some point I felt like I’d just gotten from under a truck . I am still coughing, sniffling, sneezing, and generally feeling very miserable. I was so tired I couldn’t even blog . And it just got me thinking what it always gets me thinking under these circumstances . In high school biology they taught us that viruses were “the threshold of life” having some of the qualities of living things, but in other ways resembling non-living things. Then how feeble is the human being that is brought to a grinding halt by such a creature. And how arrogant is the human being that thinks to subjugate the Earth and all that lives upon it.

Yet, as soon as I have that thought, a kind of pessimistic needling comes along and I wonder how long I will may expect to remember <i>this</i> time? After all, how many times have I reflected upon disease and human frailty, only to forget a little while later and go back to ‘business-as-usual’. Or how often have I taken heed from the death of a loved one or a stranger, only to forget just a little bit later and return to life’s busy-ness.

There are those among the servants of God that are more constant in their remembrance even as they toil in His service in the company of others. There are those whose hearts are connected with God even as their bodies dwell on Earth, whose spirits are attached to the Latter Life even as they live out this one, and whose entire being yearns for the sight of God and the company of His messenger, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, even as they bear witness to the labors of humanity. They struggle and then they taste the sweetness of faith and intimacy with the Divine.

But as we aspire to have that be our abiding condition, we realize that everyone forgets. Some may forget less frequently, or suffer less in the loss. Yet the nature of human beings is that we forget. Far from being a source of regret or a “calamity” to dwell upon, it is probably more accurate, more productive, and truer to our purpose to remember (since we do forget) that the prime lesson for which Adam and Eve, peace be upon them, were placed in paradise for a time was the fact of human forgetfulness.

ولقد عهدنا إلى آدم من قبل فنسي ولم نجد له عزما

(We gave Adam the covenant beforehand and he forgot and we found no resolve with him). So the real trick is not that we do not forget. Wisdom may lay in accepting that we will forget and bringing to our selves reminders as often as we need them. Perhaps this is why the Quran tells us that we will constantly be tested in a variety of ways that we may return. Perhaps this is why the Prophet, may God’s peace and blessings be upon him, was constantly giving his companions brief reminders that would affect them but not tire or bore them. Perhaps each of us should establish constant mechanisms for remembering what we are sure to forget.

So as a reminder, meant for myself before it can be of use for anyone else, I looked up the hadeeth that I have heard so frequently, “Make the best of five before five: your life before you die, your youth before you age, your health before you ail, your spare time before you get busy, and your wealth before you get poor.”

Thursday we had Norman Finkelstein speaking at McMaster. A little bird tells me there were serious efforts to intervene with the powers that be, both on and off campus, to prevent the talk from actually happening. Al-hamdulillah those efforts were unsuccessful and the audience was edified by a compelling talk from a very articulate man of principle. The event was organized by MMPJ and SPHR, who are both to be congratulated on a courageous event, well-organized, and well-managed. They did us proud al-hamdulillah. In particular, there was a gaffe at some point where they tried to show a documentary from youtube that highlights some of Finkelstein’s views. They got the wrong video, and wound up showing a propaganda video produced by some of his “intellectual” foes painting him as a holocaust denier. The moderator, Prof. Graham McQueen from McMaster, reacted well and promptly to put things in perspective, then our sister Sabah, the president of MMPJ, took the podium and eloquently put the matter to rest. (One member of the audience saw fit to bring up the matter in the Q&A and Finkelstein was able to use the opportunity to expose some of the tactics of the afore-mentioned foes ).

We gave Professor Finkelstein the heartiest applause when in the course of his discussion he remarked that he happened to be familiar with the realities of life on American campuses in general through first hand experience since he had “for reasons I am not particularly proud of taught at a number” of said campuses. Obviously, this self-deprecatingly humorous remark was a reference to the fact that part of the price he’s had to pay was the lack of a secure long-term academic appointment .

We also gave him a well-deserved standing ovation at the end of the talk. If you have never heard of Norman Finkelstein I strongly suggest you at least look at his book, “The Holocaust Industry” (he has four other books). If you have a club for political activism/education on your campus I strongly suggest you brave whatever resistance you face and get this man invited to your campus. If our experience is any indication, it’ll be worth it.

One of my favorite clips is this minute from young Dilbert.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/g_kEGiSaLNU" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

One of the reasons I like Dilbert so much is that I can bear first hand witness to its uncanny accuracy in many an industrial environment. Clearly, not every company is a Dilbert-like company. And as with any comedic venture there has to be some exaggeration, although in this case it’s not very much at all .

I recently re-discovered the Dilbert website. But what’s more important is that with it I discovered the Dilbert blog (now officially the first “thing” on my blogroll). Scott Adams seems to have interesting insights even away from engineers, corporate culture, comic strips, and even comedy in general. He has this running argument with some atheist guy on the net that seems to think that for someone to as much as wonder out loud whether the Huxley-Darwin apes-at-the-typewriter model of the universe is compelling qualifies such a person for moron duty and immediately earns them the pleasure of his scathing attacks. This is not to say that Scott Adams is a theist or a creationist. What he believes is (a) his own business, (b) probably not easily categorizable in the convenient bins we intellectually keep, (c) neither particularly authoritative nor a guarantee of correctness in any case, and (d) should not be (and thankfully is not) entirely clear just from reading one or two entries on his blog. If he has spelled out his beliefs on the blog, or if he does so as a matter of course, or if he is in the process of doing so, I plan on reading the blog regularly enough that inshaa Allah I’ll understand. But whether he does spell out his beliefs or whether he just goes on expressing whatever particular insight he has on any particular day, it makes for good reading, and a starting point for further reflection. Good on ya Scott!