Road to Jannah

Tazkiyah Purification of the Soul Retreat in Upstate NY: June 2008!

So I watched Miss Austen Regrets this past Sunday on PBS. It’s a new biopic on Jane Austen’s life. Set towards the end of her life (she died at the young age of 41), it was definitely a much darker and more complex characterization of her life.

I really like Jane Austen for so many reasons and feel a connection to her. First, she’s given us all these great books and heroines and heros to look up to, to admire, to sigh over. Secondly, I think her personal life parallels mine.

Most poeple think that traditional, courtship culture doesn’t exist nowadays, but I’m here to tell you it does!!! Yes! Among Muslim cultures. Ours is the most relentless marriage culture that ever existed. Like Jane we cannot have pre-marital relations or ‘date’. Somehow we have to find husbands before we are considered spinsters and like in Jane’s era we have our own balls that are conferences, conventions, private dinner parties and so on. Guys rate girls on their beauty, families, and so on and girls rate guys on their wealth/family. Come on, admit that you do it too. For certain the mothers do. Our line would be: It is truth universally acknowledged that as soon as a Muslim guy graduates from med school, he’s in need of a wife! And we definitely do have our own matchmaking mamas and the usual struggle of marrying as per our parent’s wishes for establishment versus holding out to marry for love.

In Miss Austen Regrets it seems that Jane held out and ended up living a pretty miserable life, worried about continuing financial problems of her whole family, being shuttled between brothers who had their own difficulties, having a sister who lost her fiancee and selfishly didn’t want Jane to marry either, a mother who continually harped on past refusals of Jane. Someone said in a review that it probably wasn’t realistic that her mother was like that. Well news to you, every desi mother is like that, and she reminds her daughter everyday about her unmarried status. So I can see it as very likely. It’s in a benevolent way of course, mothers want the best for their daughters. You can’t blame them for trying to stay within societal norms.

Many times in the film you find a melancholy Jane looking out at the water or staring at nothing, showing perhaps her regrets. The film shows a few of her ‘lost loves’. The first being her wealthy ‘tall and awkward’ neighbor whose proposal she accepted only to change her mind the next day. Then there’s her sister in law’s brother who she refused and he went on to marry someone else. And a few others. But I have to say, I don’t think she regretted anything. Looking back on my own life, I can’t say I regret refusing anyone or making certain choices. Even though like Jane, I ended up alone. Those were the tough choices I had to make, I couldn’t have made any other. Watching these films, you might think, oh she should have just married the neighbor what was the harm. Easy for you to say! How would you like a forced marriage with a Mr. Collins or even a slimy John Thorpe. Not so appealing now huh. They’re not even possibilities you know?

So Jane had her tumultuous life and had a niece she tried to advise like I have my niece (but she’s a little too young for marriage advice yet). Jane wrote on and off during her life, as I try to be creative here and there. Her birthday is the same as mine. Her father was bookish and scholarly, mine is a professor. She is humorous, yet dark at times like I am mostly. Like Jane if I had a family or children I doubt I would have been creative or been able to do the things I’ve so far done in my life.

In the end Jane says she ‘lived the life that God intended for her.’ And I believe the same for me.

Where were you?

I remember right out of high school being at ISNA Headquarters in a tiny little cornfield town called Plainfield, Indiana. Very plain, except for the surrounding farms and fields and maybe a new development at the edge of town. And in a special week in a warmer than usual August attending what would be the fledgling beginnings of a youth program called Alim. Back then it was a few classes a day on various subjects like Islamic law, Arabic, and Hadith. The class that was to be my favorite was on Seerah by a man then unknown as Abdul Hakim Jackson.

So many years later, I found myself again a few weeks ago in a Seerah class by a now fairly renowned Dr. Professor Sherman Jackson. This time in an elegant law building on the campus of NYU on a busy touristy December weekend in Manhattan.

I never realized until taking this class again what an impact that one week in August really had on me. So many of the principles of Dawah I have carried with me over the last ten years, guiding my activities in my community, on my website, in my interactions with others have been solely derived from that one class in August. So many of my ‘theories’ and ideas of Islam were so thoroughly influenced, it has lasted to this day. (Not to mention inculcating a life-long love of Seerah, which my bookshelf attests too.)

The reason I tell you this is that, this time, before and after the class so many people asked me to take notes and share it with them.

How can I share notes of 6 hours a day? How can I explain a person’s hand movements and expressions, inflection of voice and laugh? How can I impart the atmosphere of a class, the energy between teacher and student, the underlining of a word in chalk. The before class, the after class, the private interactions, the harmony of praying together. The shared emotions of a group listening to the last moments of their Prophet’s life and then witnessing a new Muslim testifying the declaration of faith in front of you as tears slide down a person’s cheek next to you.

Even if I have audio, video, how can I make you have the experience.

How can I give you something that has affected me for ten years?

I can’t.

Why weren’t you there?

Yes, you had this test coming up, this paper to write, this party to attend, this obligation and that. But, what about the last class? And the one before that? The one after that? The one coming up? What about the one ten years ago/from now?

Time slips by so quickly and we miss the opportunities that we could have benefited ourselves with. How can any Muslim come to a good age and not know a word of Arabic? How can they not know anything about Seerah, Islamic history, Hadith? Are we not ashamed of calling ourselves Muslim and knowing nothing about our religion except what we need to get by.

We all have obligations. We all have goals. But where were you? Where are you in this caravan of knowledge, self-improvement and spirituality? Where is your motivation? Where is your zeal and love for Islamic knowledge?

Yes. I know we all have ipods, audio downloads and youtube. But can you imagine an Imam Siraj speech’s affect on a 15 year old at a MYNA camp, compared to watching it on youtube? Can you imagine listening to a podcast of Sh. Hamza’s Saturday night speech at ISNA and having the same buzz of being there? Can you imagine a week long profound class on Seerah in notes. Have you ever tried to read notes from an Islamic class?!

Have you ever seen a picture of the Kabah and have you ever been there?

It’s NOT THE SAME. You need to be there. I can tell you how sweet it is. What it feels like. What it looks like. But will you ever taste it?

Never.

So, next class, next speech, next conference, next retreat think about it. Maybe you can shift some things around. Maybe you can organize your schedule so you can attend.

Maybe you can be the one writing the notes.

P.S. This is not directed at anyone particular, not even those who asked for notes I direct this to myself first. (I did not attend the Makkan period class when it came last year, how much I regret this you now know) I hope only that we may all make extra effort in the future in improving ourselves as Muslims.

So, yeah I’m addicted to sad poems and songs. I don’t know why. My sister thinks I’m crazy and morbid. I think ironically they just make me feel better. Sometimes it’s nice to wallow and eat ice cream and feel that others have tougher lives than you do. And you know you can’t have highs without lows!!

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salaam,

So I’ve kind of been thinking about this idea FOR YEARS. That is creating a matrimonial site. But the obvious problem has always been how to filter out the freaks and protecting the sisters. I still don’t know how to do that. But last night we had a halaqah here and the shaikh talked about how if you help to remove a burden from someone in this life, Allah will lift a burden from you on the Day of Judgment. And I know how hard it is to look for someone decent, especially for older people.

Yes I know there are a billion sites out there, but they all charge money and I think are pretty much full of freaks. So I don’t know. It’s still an idea… suggestions, criticisms, naysayers? what do you guys think??