Road to Jannah

Eid Mubarak dear readers! Let’s pray for a year with less struggles and more joys. Happy Eid!!! ;D

“Remember, remember the 5th November”

by Br. Khalid

For those in the UK, the above will be the instantly recognisable refrain associated with Guy Fawkes Night and the famous Gunpowder Plot.

Legend has it that Mr Fawkes and his conspirators were disenchanted with the then King, James I, and hatched a plot to kill him at the state opening of parliament.

By sheer luck, the police got wind of the plan and caught the entire gang in the basement of the House of Commons moments before they were about to light the numerous kegs of gunpowder they had dragged down there.

So pleased was James I with the foiling of the assassination, that he instigated a day of thanksgiving on November 5th (the day of the capture) and the rest, as they say, is history.

Besides reminding us that terrorism was alive and well in the 17th century, it seems odd that the day is  more remembered for Guy Fawkes than James I and like, Christmas, is nowadays just an excuse for family get togethers and celebrations (fireworks, bonfires etc) rather than having any real significant meaning.

It so happened that whilst I was pondering this quaint English tradition that I chanced over an interview with a certain Simon Cowell.

Mr Cowell for the uninitiated is the self styled music mogul of a generation and the man responsible for the X Factor.

Talking about the sudden demise of his father in the late 90s, he made these interesting comments:

“It was a horrible, horrible, horrible time, like I said. You believe everyone is going to live for ever and they don’t. And all the stuff you think you care about, the hit records and stuff like that, it’s just meaningless.”

“I can’t admit things, that’s why I can’t go to funerals and stuff like that. I find it very, very difficult to deal with that kind of reality. I shut myself off totally because it affects me so badly.”

It is said that there are four types of people when it comes to attitudes towards death and the afterlife.

1. The first group are so engrossed with this life and worldly pleasures that they simply deny it’s existence, since remembrance thereof will fill them with sorrow at that which they have to forsake.
2. The second group fear death because their repentance is, as yet, incomplete and wish for more time to rectify their affairs.
3. The third love their Lord and are pleased with (and yearn for) the means by which they are reunited with their beloved.
4. The fourth and last group, are those who are perfectly reconciled and content with Allah’s will such that they care not for themselves whether they live or die and happily resign themselves to the decision of their Lord.

It is always astounding how discussing death can be like the huge elephant in the room amongst non Muslims (as well as some Muslims) especially since everyone recognises it as a “reality” but still continue to deny it.

It is like that email which is  too hard to deal with or an assignment too complicated and wearisome that one would rather bury it and not have to deal with it in the hope that it will magically disappear.

It is indeed the height of folly that people strive with the utmost effort to chase their ‘dreams’ whilst completely ignoring the ‘reality’ before them.

Of course, Islam gives great counsel on the remembrance and contemplation of death and our Prophet exhorted us to do so often so that we would not be beguiled by this world and it’s charms.

With that in mind and with Halloween fast approaching, perhaps we should all be donning Grim Reaper costumes and go around chanting:

Remember, remember the shatterer of all pleasure

Not quite as catchy as the original ditty I grant you, but far far more relevant!!

 Seasons*

First rays of the sun on my face
Spring has come
Young and happy and full of promise
As pretty as the purple crocus
Pushing its way up to a world reborn

Long tall days full of lemonade
Books read on the porch, so much shade
This summer will never leave me
Gardens, parks and avenues
Roses in forever bloom

Celebration of color all around
Fall crunches under my feet
Clean crisp wind, apples abound
Has school started already?

First white crystals of wonder
herald the nearness of the end
Snowmen, boots and winter cold
Where have all the years gone?
Here I am Lord, Here I am.

 *This poem is not about the seasons.

Yayyyy Eid is almost here and as usual the conversation goes something like this:

me: wat are you doing for Eid?
friend: I dunno, what are you doing?
me: I dunno, nothin.
friend: me too. let’s do something.
me: Ok, What do u wanna do?
friend: I dunno, what do u wanna do?
me: I dunno, what is there to do?
…. etc!!!

And there’s no doubt Eid gets extremely lonely for converts and single ppl So here are some suggestions on things ppl can do:

1. Definitely take the day off from work and school! Otherwise it will feel just like another day. Also, dress up!!

2. Find some recent converts in the community and invite them over for lunch (or eat out somewhere).

3. Look for some not so well-off families in the community (kids whose father’s are in jail,etc), buy some presents for the kids, wrap them and bring them over to their house on Eid day!

4. Spend some time baking some yummies and bring them with you to the Mosque on Eid or the night before to share.

5. Have an Eid party at your house. Invite friends to come back to your place after the Eid prayer for lunch.

5. Go shopping and spend some Eidi!

7. Go to the movies?

8. Do some things that *you* really like to do! Like just for yourself. ie read a nice book, take a bubblebath, laze around the house, go for a walk, go to the park.

9. Help organize a community Eid dinner or kid’s Eid party in your community!

10. If all else fails…Go somewhere else for Eid. Go visit friends or family in a different city to make Eid more exciting

Happy planning and an early Eid Mubarak to all

Two new articles have been making major waves through the non-Muslim and Muslim blogosphere worlds recently. Interestingly enough the subject is the same, even though one is from a non-Muslim perspective and one is from a Muslim perspective. The topic:  Single Ladies.

The first article titled ‘All the Single Ladies’ published in The Atlantic is a very long narrative written by Kate Bolick detailing her life, her choices and how she came to be single.  Some parts regret, some parts self-blame, some parts accusation, some parts defiance, some parts drunken confession; the response to the article has been huge. And divisive. It’s safe to say the article has touched a major chord in people. Some bloggers are upset that she divides guys into two groups: deadbeats and ballers and she talks about how some ballers get taken and the rest become ‘playas’ spoiled for choice by desperate women and the single ladies are only left with deadbeats. Others are upset that she made a choice to turn down someone decent for marriage for no known reason and in so many words regrets it, but then goes on to defend her decisions. Others just call the piece anti-feminist, and others call it femi-nazi. (You know how that goes!) She also believes this wave of single women can be attributed to our current economy and lack of “male ambitiousness” which I’m sure pissed off a lot of guys. She’s also upset that her parents generation “the divorced generation” somehow instilled a fear of getting married and  ‘not settling” in their children and told them marriage was not the ‘be all and end all’ and that there’d always be someone out there for them. (But yet there isn’t; over time, like women the world over, she comes to believe there’s no one decent left.) Somehow in the end she tries to find meaning in singleness while coming to the final epiphany that marriage should always be “society’s highest ideal” and that perhaps the next generation of women will realize this.

The second article first appeared on Sh. Suhaib Webb’s website entitled ‘Wifehood and Motherhood are Not the Only Ways to Paradise’ written by Maryam Amir-Ebrahimi. According to the website’s Facebook spokersperson the article has broken all records of viewership and the response has been “off the charts”.  In the article, the author touches very briefly on how some girls only care about marriage to the exclusion of all else, while they could be educating themselves. She talks about the extreme pressure on Muslim girls to marry and how many believe that Allah created women only for wifehood and motherhood. Yet, she goes on, our history and tradition shows many examples of women who were more than “wives and mothers” and led in fields such as scholarship.

I’d like to point out that these two articles reinforce some other articles I wrote; namely that problems in larger non-Muslim society (the trend of single women) will affect or at least reflect and mirror the same problems among Muslim society, and secondly that this problem (the trend of single women) unchecked will come back to bite us, the entire Ummah with a whole host of other problems and repercussions.

Reading the first article made me feel sick, not because it was wrong or confused (which it was) but it echoes so much of what single Muslim women are going through now and will be going through in the next few decades. It’s almost like holding up a mirror and seeing the future of us. Confused, angry, blaming, not able to uphold this ‘Islamic ideal’ and still be us; I don’t think we’ll even have to wait a decade.

The second article I’ll say has been a long time in coming. I think ironically because of the amount of divorced and unmarried women, and older aunties with empty-nests, we’re finally coming to the realization that there is more to a woman’s life than marriage and kids.

For the first time ever, I heard a Shaykh answer a question about marriage by saying it was “Mubah” – permissible only, and if a person didn’t feel the urge or need to be married, they did not have the obligation to marry. That there were many examples in Muslim history of great women such as Maryam (ra) even who never married and dedicated themselves to a higher spiritual plane. And there were also men who did the same. This would have been unheard of even 5 years ago.

Muslim or non-Muslim we have to acknowledge that there’s something going on here:  Societal/generational change. There are so many complexities involved here about the trend of more Muslim singles, especially women. I’d like to blame it all on superficial guys, but going even beyond that, it involves being an immigrant generation trying to find partners in a non-Muslim society, the growing disparity between what sisters and brothers want and are looking for, the search for ‘perfection’, delaying marriage until men and women are completely ‘settled’, ‘expectations’, ‘superficiality’, ‘idealism’ and ‘lack of realism and experience’ involved on both sides, the ability of guys to marry decades younger, non-Muslims, converts and overseas. Not to mention religious, cultural and major, major parental limitations! Most of which have nothing to do with Islam.

And some people’s solution of “just getting married” is not the solution because these are only symptoms of a greater problem. The greater problem here is the very defining of women. The struggle here is that we’re trying to figure out the answer to these questions:  What are Muslim women supposed to be in society? What is our role? Is marriage truly our ideal? What is an ideal Muslim woman? Is the pinnacle of being a woman giving birth to a son? Being a mother? Is it being a ‘helpmate’ to a husband? Is the family unit (mother father + children), the only unit allowed in a Muslim society? What exactly is the purpose of our lives as Muslim women and what should we be doing at each stage?

To many single Muslim ladies growing up in the US and elsewhere, being an ideal Muslim woman meant being highly educated, opinionated, independent and active in society. Yet there is such a disconnect that on the marriage market this is the exact opposite of what’s desirable. Hence, the plethora of “baller” Muslim women, that every Imam in the US acknowledges; a surplus of ‘good’ older single Muslim girls.

Again as a single Muslim woman myself, I’m not going to stress ‘marrying down’ or ‘settling’ as the solution because that isn’t the solution. The problem isn’t even these girls! It’s us as an Ummah. We need to figure out what we believe the role of Muslim women is. If it’s to be a certain type/kind of girl doing certain things with certain established goals then maybe like Kate Bolick I can only hope the next generation of single Muslm ladies can find it.

In the meantime I hope we can begin to establish some kind of acceptance for us, all the single (Muslim) ladies, to become part of the Ummah.