Tag Archives: Muslims

This is Islam

Posted on April 26 2013 by Abdel Elsiddig

By Dr. Abdel Azim Elsiddig

Chicago

The Arabic word “Islam” literally means submission without question, suspicion or doubt (2:04), or finding peace of mind and joy through knowing, understanding and serving the only one God, Allah. Followers of Islam are called Muslims which simply refers to anyone who chooses to freely and unconditionally accept and follow Islam as revealed in the Quran and practiced by the Prophet Muhammad and his companions. Muslims believe that Prophet Muhammad was the last messenger of God and the Quran refers to him as the “Seal of the Prophets” (33:40).  Muslims pray five times every day in addition to other voluntary prayer services they do on their own in their attempts to follow the sunnah or practice of their Prophet Muhammad.

On Fridays, Muslims gather in mosques for communal prayers led by their imams or religious leaders. Every adult Muslim of sound mind is required to strictly adhere to the arkan or the Five Pillars of Islam: shahadah, or creed which is basically a firm belief and declaration that there is no deity worthy of worship or service except Allah (Arabic for God), and that Muhammad is his messenger); salat, or prayer (five times a day, at prescribed times); zakat, or charity which is the giving away of a certain percentage of one’s wealth to eight categories of people as prescribed in the Quran(9:60); sawm, or fasting (during the holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims refrain from food, drink and sexual relations during the day); and hajj, or pilgrimage (all Muslims who are able are required to travel to Makkah once in their lifetime).

Islam acknowledges that several prophets preceded Muhammad. Only God knows the exact number of the prophets and messengers who brought the same message of Oneness and Peace to humanity through history (14:9). The most notable ones besides Muhammad are Noah, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus who earned the Quranic title “steadfast” (46:35). Each of those four great prophets in addition to another great one, David, received revelation from God through scriptures as mentioned and contained in part into the Old and New Testaments. These predecessors to Muhammad are considered great prophets who spoke the word of God to certain people at a very specific time. Jesus, for example, was sent only to the Children of Israel at his time (61:06). See also Matthew 15: 24 where Jesus was reported to have said: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.” This specificity applies also to Moses (61:05) and to every other prophet save Muhammad who was sent as mercy to all of humankind (21:107).

Islam is the eternal message of Allah to all people without any exception. The mission of calling people to God began with Noah through Abraham, Moses and Jesus to reach its final and refined form with the final prophet and messenger Muhammad. Practically speaking, Islam in its final form is based on six basic concepts of faith (belief) and five fundamental pillars (words and actions) without which one’s belief is not complete. The six beliefs are: Continue reading →

Muhammad Versus Bin Laden Is A War Muslims Are Winning: Go Canada!

Posted on April 25 2013 by David Liepert

crabbe20130314182817433The battle with al Qaeda –for our safety, for our future, and for the hearts and minds of young Muslims like accused Boston Marathon Bombers Dzokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, and Chiheb Esseghaier and Raed Jasser, accused in Canada –by other Muslims– of plotting to derail a passenger train is the defining conflict of our times, but it isn’t a battle al Qaeda is fighting with America, as al Qaeda claims. No, al Qaeda is fighting Muslims for the future of our religion, and it’s a battle we have known was coming someday since Muhammad’s Islam began. Continue reading →

Don’t Blame Muslims for Boston or 9/11

Posted on April 23 2013 by MEE Administrator

ricciardelli_1350184137_600Cross-Posted from The Converging Zone

By Robert Ricciardelli

Blaming Muslims for the tragedy in Boston is like blaming the Newtown Massacre on single moms or home schooling because the perpetrator’s upbringing had both of those elements. Right after 9/11 Americans murdered a number of people because they “looked Muslim” even though they were actually from a completely different religion. Soon after the report that the Tsarnaev’s claimed to be Muslim, someone blaming Muslims for the Boston terrorist attacks attacked a Muslim woman with an infant.

Many are writing that the Boston bombers, Chechen brothers Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev – were devout Muslims. That is clearly not true. Continue reading →

Reconciliation: The choice of peacemakers.

Posted on March 16 2013 by MEE Administrator

Trac5board - Safi By Safi Kaskas January 20, 2010

Since 9/11Western and Muslim scholarship has characterized the political relationship between the Muslim world and the West as one full of tension and conflict. For evidence of this tension we need look no further than Barrack Obama’s recent speech at the heartland of Islamic scholarship, al-Azhar University in Cairo, in which he said ―…a time of great tension between the United States and Muslims around the world – tension rooted in historical forces that go beyond any current policy debate. ―Indeed Obama’s prime purpose was to open a pathway to bridging political alienation, wrote Richard Shumack in his article ―Islam and the West: facing conflict for mutual gain?

Is the tension getting any better? Unfortunately, the answer is a firm no. Continue reading →

Engaging Extremists Key to Peace

Posted on March 6 2013 by MEE Administrator

20130129135131978Cross-Posted from The Jakarta Globe

By Sumanto Al Qurtuby

For many people, the Rev. Paulus Hartono, a Mennonite church minister in Solo, Central Java, might be seen as a “deranged Christian.” While most people in this country, especially Christians and other religious minorities, tend to avoid hard-line Muslims, this pastor approached — and then befriended — members of Hizbullah (“Party of God,” a Solo-based Islamist paramilitary group not related to Lebanon’s Shiite Hezbollah). Continue reading →

An Amazing Discovery Today

Posted on March 2 2013 by Sam Shropshire

forgiveness_7

By Sam Shropshire

Friends, while studying the subject of “forgiveness” in Christianity and Islam, I ran across this prayer attributed to Mohammad. I thought it might be of interest to you. “O God! I seek refuge with You from laziness (that comes) from geriatric old age, from being in debt, and from committing sins. O God! I seek refuge with You from the punishment of the Hell Fire, the afflictions of the grave, the punishment in the grave, and the evil of the affliction of poverty and from the evil of the affliction caused by Al Masih Ad-Dajjal. O God! Wash away my sins with the water of snow and hail, and cleanse my heart from the sins as a white garment is cleansed of filth, and let there be a far-away distance between me and my sins as You have set far away the East and the West from each other.” I immediately thought of two scripture passages from the Torah (Old Testament) that many of us read or memorized in our youth: Continue reading →

Muslim Women, You Tube, and Third Space

Posted on February 15 2013 by MEE Administrator

Media technology and the Muslim world are interesting collaborators.  Cassette tape propagation of Ayatollah Khomeini’s sermons provided important precursors for the Iranian Revolution. Likewise, Facebook and Twitter offered political leverage in the Arab Spring developments. For observers, social media, in particular, is potentially changing the dynamics of the public sphere in the Muslim world.

New media technology provides a “Third Space” where some Muslims who are using social media to contest gender assumptions, normative aspects of religious practice, and cultural experience. In this context, YouTube offers such a space as an informal meeting place to create community and to express new identities.

Muslims around the world are familiar with YouTube as a source of religious information from well-known Islamic personalities. Now, rather than YouTubing for religious instruction from Dr. Zakir Naik, for example some are uploading for creative expression, a small number of Muslims are contributing to a new aesthetic of Muslim videography to express personal creativity and observations – mostly through satire or parody — on issues they face in daily life.

One of the more interesting dynamics is the emergence of Muslim women taking to YouTube to “talk back” on issues of identity and Western assumptions concerning the female experience.

Sister Randomina. Image via Facebook.

Sister Randomina is one visible American-Muslim woman on YouTube.

Read the rest of the story at Patheos Continue reading →

Saudi Arabia: When are We Going to Change Our Weekend?

Posted on January 29 2013 by MEE Administrator

250px-Saudi_Arabia_(orthographic_projection)Cross-Posted from The Saudi Gazette

Ibrahim Badawood
Al-Madinah newspaper

The changing of our weekend from Thursday and Friday to Friday and Saturday is something a large segment of our society, particularly the business community, has demanded. Businesses are understandably upset with the current Thursday and Friday weekend as they lose four days every week in their dealings and transactions with international banks and companies.

In a recent symposium on the issue, businessmen were unanimous in their opinion that the national economy incurs huge losses that run into billions of riyals due to the weekend difference with the international community. Continue reading →

And the Winner is…..Islamophobia

Posted on January 17 2013 by MEE Administrator

homeland

Cross-Posted from Loon Watch

By Rachel Shabi

America’s Middle East policy has been enthusiastically endorsed. Not at the UN or Arab League, however, but by the powerbrokers of Hollywood. At the Golden Globes, there were gongs for a heroically bearded CIA spook saving hostages and American face in Iran (the film Argo); a heroically struggling agent tracking down Bin Laden (Zero Dark Thirty) and heroically flawed CIA operatives protecting America from mindless, perpetual terror (TV series Homeland).

The three winners have all been sold as complex, nuanced productions that don’t shy away from hard truths about US foreign policy. And liberal audiences can’t get enough of them. Perhaps it’s because, alongside the odd bit of self-criticism, they are all so reassuringly insistent that, in an increasingly complicated world, America just keeps on doing the right thing. And even when it does the wrong thing – such as, I don’t know, torture and drone strikes and deadly invasions – it is to combat far greater evil, and therefore OK. Continue reading →