“I have been given the authority over you, although I am not the best of you. If I do well, help me; and if I do wrong, set me right. Truth consists in loyalty and disregard for truth is treachery. The weak among you shall be strong in my eyes until I have secured his rights, if God wills it: and the strong among you shall be weak with me until I have wrested from him the rights of others, if God wills it. Obey me for so long as I obey God and His Messenger. But if I disobey God and His Messenger, you owe me no obedience. Arise from your prayer, God have mercy upon you!”
Archive for the 'Islam' Category
Some of you may have already watched this documentary aired on Channal 4 on 23rd April. It is by author and journalist Ziauddin Sardar who travels back to his homeland, Pakistan, to discover how it has become enguled in a bitter conflict between the two dominant forces in the country - the military and the mullahs.
I just saw it online and and found it very interesting. It is longish at almost 50 minutes so watch it when you have the time. Highly recommended!
Also, BBC’s Panorama claims that Bob Woolmer was poisoned before he was strangled. Panorama on Woolmer’s death would be aired today at 20:30 BST on BBC One and repeated on BBC News 24 Mondays at 00:30 BST and Tuesdays at 03:30 BST. So for all those who have access to BBC, do check it out. Otherwise, it should be up on their website by tonight.
Watch Between the Mullahs and the Military below
Continue reading ‘Documentary: Between the Mullahs and Military’
As the seminaries continue their attempt to impose and spread their perversion of Islam, the nation faces yet another obstacle. For those who are unaware of Jamia Hafsa and its dangerous antics, the following video clips have been put up:
A glimpse from within the madrassa:
Continue reading ‘Jamia Hafsa, Aunty Shamim and recent protests in the capital’
In regards to my rejoinder, I wonder what the chances of it being a self-fulfilling prophecy are? I feel the timing of this news is impeccable:
Seminaries plan ‘Islamic revolution’
By Inamullah Khattak (DAWN)
ISLAMABAD, April 2: Two religious seminaries, Jamia Faridia and Jamia Hafsa, are adamant to enforce “Shariat” in Islamabad and across the country and said they will announce their movement in the Lal Masjid on Friday.
They warned the government of serious consequences if it tried to create hurdles in implementing the “Islamic law”.
“We will start our Islamic revolution in Islamabad on Friday by launching a crackdown on CDs, DVDs and other secular activities in the G-6 sector. The exercise will be extended to the NWFP and other areas at later stages. We have full support of madressahs in various cities,” Jamia Faridia and Jamia Hafsa in-charge Maulana Abdul Aziz told Dawn on Monday.
“Ten thousand students of the two seminaries are ready to sacrifice their lives for Shariat and we are determined to enforce the Islamic law in Islamabad in order to make it example for people,” said Maulana Aziz, elder brother of Ghazi Abdul Rashid. Continue reading ‘10,000 plan to start an Islamic revolution in Islamabad’
Though I was in the midst of writing a post regarding the holy month of Rabiul-Awal and the birth of the Prophet (P.B.U.H.), I came upon an excellent article by Ms. Naureen Aqeel published in The News yesterday.
Following is the article in its entirety:
Loving the Prophet (pbuh), but how?
Love is a potent emotion and it is one of the most vulnerable avenues by which Satan attacks and misleads people. When limits are crossed in love, we often fall into the most despised sin in the sight of Allah, and that is the sin of Shirk (associating partners with Allah). We have the example of the people of Nuh (Alaihis Salaam) who, because of their great reverence and love for their pious elders, ended up making idols of them, which later generations began to worship.
Whenever the expression of love deviates from the method taught to us by Allah Almighty and His Messenger (Sall Allaho alaihe wasallam), it opens doors to shirk and innovation and we fall into sin while thinking we are involved in worship.
After years under the radar, we now live in times where Muslims are constantly in the spotlight. Our culture, our beliefs, our way of life and above all our religion, for the most part, are projected negatively to the rest of the world through Western Media. Strong words like hate, radical, fear, etc. are always associated with Islam to such an extent that people unfamiliar with the religion and it’s people begin to correlate them habitually but along comes a sitcom to save the day. The first Muslim sitcom viewed in North America, Little Mosque on the Prairie is a new Canadian Broadcasting Corporation sitcom that premiered on January 9th 2007. It has already gotten more than 2 million viewers watching it every Wednesday at 8pm. Set in a post-9/11 era, the sitcom focuses on a Muslim community in the prairies.
Continue reading ‘Sitcom: Little Mosque on the Prairie’
I prayed this week’s Friday prayers at a university campus so the khatib was a student. The khutba was mostly well researched, educational and well-intentioned. However, it made me think about the khutbas given back home in Pakistan. The title of this post summarises my take on them. People who have attended khutbas in Pakistan would definitely have experienced maulvis who lecture on destroying other nations and religions and make muslims the greatest nation. I find these khutbas to be extremely amusing for their lack of application of Islamic ideology and the inherently wrong message that they give.
Continue reading ‘Sermons of destruction’
The Muslim Mary. There are passages in the Quran that honour and respect prophets of other faiths. Hence, Muslims all over the world also honour and respect prophets of other faiths as they consider them prophets of their own faith.
If you are looking for the religious text with the most references to Mary, the mother of Jesus, look no further than the Koran, Jennifer Green writes.
Jennifer Green, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Thursday, December 21, 2006
Islam and Christianity revere Mary above all other women, a human divinely appointed to bear Jesus in a virgin birth. But the Koran mentions Mary 34 times, and names an entire chapter after her — more than she gets in the Bible, according to Cruden’s Complete Concordance. She is the only woman mentioned by name in the Koran, and some scholars say Muslims actually revere her more than Christians do.
Continue reading ‘The Muslim Mary’
In the last four years, Pakistan has played a key and active role in Weltpolitik. The War on Terror can be seen as the biggest test to be thrown at humankind at the turn of the new millenium and the events of 9/11 have caused a ripple effect throughtout the world. It is my personal opinion that it is important in these times of media propoganda, corruption and imperialism we must be completely aware of our reality and make sure that there no illusions.
A movie review by Robert Scheer in the Los Angles Times on January 11th 2005 does a good job to support the BBC documentary’s claims that pose thought-provoking questions for the viewers:
Is Al Qaeda Just a Bush Boogeyman?
Is it conceivable that Al Qaeda, as defined by President Bush as the center of a vast and well-organized international terrorist conspiracy, does not exist?
To even raise the question amid all the officially inspired hysteria is heretical, especially in the context of the U.S. media’s supine acceptance of administration claims relating to national security. Yet a brilliant new BBC film produced by one of Britain’s leading documentary filmmakers systematically challenges this and many other accepted articles of faith in the so-called war on terror.
Continue reading ‘Movie Review: The Power of Nightmares’
An interesting read. Mr Muhammad Saleem quetions the validity of effect of Islamic Finance on the world. He questions whether it is taking Muslims, as a community, forward. He compares it to venture capitralism in the West and its many advantages. I really don’t know too much about Islamic Finance apart from the diffrent products to be able to contribute to this. What do you think?
Islamic Finance has much to learn from the west
by Muhammad Saleem
Op-Ed page of the FT on January 19th
Proponents of Islamic finance maintain that as the Koran prohibits interest all financing must be done on a profit and loss sharing basis. In spite of all the lofty rhetoric in practice no more than five per cent of Islamic financing is done this way.
Instead, Islamic banks use a structure called murabaha, or cost plus pre-determined profit, for the vast majority of their finance deals.
Remarkably, the “profit” for an Islamic bank in a murabaha transaction and the interest a conventional bank would have charged on the same transaction happen to be exactly the same. Indeed Islamic banks in determining their “profit” even quote the rate as a margin over Libor or other similar indices!
Continue reading ‘Islamic Finance has much to learn from the west’
