Often when I get to this point in the year I find myself looking back and reflecting on how quickly the past twelve months have seemed to have passed by. But this year quite the reverse is true: I’m not wondering where all the time went, but pondering how many memories seem to fill the …
I opened The Independent this morning to find a photograph of someone I once knew staring back at me. An entire decade has passed since we last set eyes on one another, but this article by Johann Hari brought memories flooding back. Not because his article resonated with me, mind you, but because his narrative …
The old Pakistani uncle at the mosque is due his seventy excuses too.1. “If a friend among your friends errs, make seventy excuses for them. If your hearts are unable to do this, then know that the shortcoming is in your own selves.” — Hamdun al-Qassar, narrated by Imam Bayhaqi in his Shu`ab al-Iman 7.522. …
Why all the killing? I really cannot comprehend it at all. A bomb planted in a Peshawar marketplace extinguishes the lives of 91 in an instant as it rips through everything in its path; 200 more are left injured. Just a matter of hours earlier 150 are slaughtered in Baghdad. Islam holds that indiscriminate violence …
Some of my friends are angry with me, dispatching lengthy emails voicing their dissatisfaction. I know I should be hurt and offended, but instead I find myself thinking that this is just the voice of the Divine, revealing itself through His creation. I could compose great tracts in my defence, but I fear it would …
There is a disease that I have harboured for the best part of my life. It accompanied me as a child, an adolescent and an adult; as a Christian, an atheist, an agnostic and a Muslim; and in times of both health and sickness. I would define it as a disease of the soul — …
Recent months have seen a sudden upsurge in devotion to the Christian faith amongst followers of the British National Party (BNP) and the English Defence League (EDL). In June the BNP chimed against the Islamic colonisation of Britain, seen in the widespread conversion of churches throughout the land: the Central Mosque of Brent; the former …
I have long been one of those admirers of the Muslim woman, who says, ‘How I wish I had faith the strength of theirs.’ For to take upon a visual marker of identity outside the norms of society and to wear it whenever one wanders into the public eye takes great courage. Observing English women …
Dear Editors, Explain to me, would you, what this means: ‘Sebastian Faulks outburst risks anger of Muslims’? Or this: ‘Sebastian Faulks has risked sparking Muslim outrage…’ Does it mean that you have not yet found any angry Muslims and you’re stirring? Or is it just that you’ve taken your risk assessment training a tad too …
Every evening as Maghrib calls, a baby fox appears at our back door, ready to pounce… on a pair of slippers or a football. We have learned not to leave the garden flip-flops out now, for otherwise we will find them abandoned on the lawn in the morning, mildly chewed. So now the fox just …
It is unsettling that I have a daily routine almost as regular as my five prayers: to peruse the online press for the latest reviews of the latest Netbook computers to go on sale. I am amazed by these little machines: attracted by their looks and fascinated by their form. But just as the full …
Deify not mere mortals, for it is liable to end in tears, nor set out seeking their approval. This is the lesson we learned when we admired the writer too much and praised them beyond their station, forgetting mashaAllah and subhanAllah, forgetting that everything is by the will of God. When we forgot our manners, …
Remember when you ask yourself, “What purpose have I?” that you have a purpose. It is easy to delete your email address, to cut yourself off, to head for the hills and vanish—it is easy to hide yourself away, but you will forever remain in hearts of the people you touched. Remember as you head …
The past two weeks have seen this blog go through the full mid-life crisis. First going into maintenance mode, then reappearing for a couple of days, then being deleted and replaced with the finale from a Walt Disney cartoon, then momentarily restored, only to be shunted into a sub-directory, to be abandoned in favour of …
It is said that Moses—peace be upon him—was walking with his disciples when they came across a donkey’s corpse. One of them said it smells so bad. The other said it looks so ugly. Moses, however, looked and said: ‘Mashallah, its teeth are so white.’ The gratefulness of the ears is to hear goodness with …
