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“Avoid any religious organizations. They are full of
fundamentalists. Nothing but trouble” With this advice, my father sent me to the
US from France. His words made sense to me. I had spent my adolescent years in a
school where the discussion of any religion, let alone Islam, was forbidden. The
French are extremists when it comes to the separation of church and state –
secularism or as they call it, laicite. My parents prayed five (or six, counting
the optional night prayer, tahajjud) times a day, read the Quran every day, and
fasted during Ramadan. They had been on the pilgrimage to Mecca twice. Yet, not
in stark contrast to other Bengali Muslims, they did not believe in making
religion, a personal affair, public. I listened to my father’s words and smiled.
I was going to an elite boarding school in the middle of nowhere in
Massachusetts. I was sure there wouldn’t be any Muslims there. I told him not to
worry. I had other more important things to think and worry about: my studies
and making friends, fitting in. Religion was not really on my mind.
Five years have passed since I arrived in the US. I have learnt words and
concepts such as hijab (head-scarf), ijtihad (interpretation through reasoning);
I have studied Muslim scholars such as Muhammad Abduh, Rashid Rida, Muhammad
Iqbal. I have gone to mosques, attended Islamic lectures and conferences,
browsed Islamic web-sites, bought books on Islam.
I know of the existence of thousands of other Muslim students in the US who do
the very same things I have done as though we were all programmed clones of one
another. I also know of the existence of millions of Muslim students in Muslim
countries who, like me at the age of sixteen, found Islam irrelevent to daily
life, dry and boring. In the US, the glossy covers of Muslim publications,
fashionably-dressed speakers at lectures and conferences, websites and books
emphasizing the use of reason and logic fail to affirm the common Bengali
concept of public religion, often reduced to the image of the scraggly-bearded,
unkempt, fatwa-splurging mullah. While students who generally cannot find jobs
elsewhere engage in religious activity as a last resort back home, it is
students from the finest American institutions who are among the most active in
learning and informing others about Islam.
The US provides students with the independence and tools necessary to embark on
a journey to discover a latent part of their identity. Rather than being bullied
into praying by parents and religious teachers or dissuaded from learning about
Islam by secularist parents, students in the US have to make decisions on their
own. In many ways, the experience of those Muslims who discover and
whole-heartedly espouse Islam in the US resembles the experience of converts to
Islam: both make conscious decisions to learn about and accept Islam; they find
themselves in new communities with as many difficulties as pleasures; they
identify and define new goals and missions for themselves. Islam condemns those
who blindly follow in the foot-steps of their foreparents. Students who choose
to invest time and energy into their study of Islam step out of the
sleep-walking and blind following that many associate with Islam. Such conscious
decision-making stresses the importance of reason, logic, and knowledge of
history to reaffirm Islamic identity.
There are many Islamic organizations, from think-tanks to charities to political
groups. Thousands of Muslims flock to the many annual conferences held in
Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington DC, Boston, NYC, and other cities. The Nation
of Islam, which most Muslims consider un-Islamic, is also still very active.
Lectures on Sufi practices tend to draw crowds larger than those for Eid
dinners.
Muslim Student Associations are more or less active in most colleges and
universities. Most schools extend their financial and administrative support to
MSAs. Friday prayers, guest lectures, eid dinners, informational workshops, and
fundraisers for Muslim charities are common. At my college, most Bengali
students are actively involved in the MSA. The college is very supportive of
Muslim students and considers them an asset. We have a female Muslim advisor,
Friday prayers, halal (Islamically-lawful) meals, student-organized guest
lectures, as well as collaborative events (lectures, Eid dinners) with nearby
colleges. Although the MSA generally acts as more of a cultural than a religious
group, it provides Muslim students with a voice. As students come from all over
the world, they represent many different points-of-view; we have intense and
fruitful debates on the status of women, politics, activism, and other
Islam-related issues. We also invite speakers with different opinions.
American Muslims, whether second-generation Asians, African-Americans, Hispanic,
Latino, or white, are among the most vocal when it comes to Muslim rights and
Islamic teachings. They represent a whole range of views. A well-known convert,
a white former bra-burning feminist, speaks at gatherings on the logic she sees
in hijab and polygamy. One notable Hispanic convert is a staunch proponent of
polygamy while Amina Wadud, an eloquent African-American convert, has spent
years reinterpreting Quranic verses in an egalitarian light. The spectrum of
different ideas that we can see in any Muslim community in the US attests to the
diversity inherent in Islam. There is no one Islamic opinion on any given
matter.
In my point-of-view, the glamor and sensationalism of Islam on college campuses
and organizations can, however, make us misplace priorities. Many Muslims
concentrate so much on the crusade to disprove stereotypes and clear up the
repuatation of Islam in the media that we forget to look at our communities and
the real social ills that haunt them. In the rhetoric-heavy battle, I have read
statements such as “domestic violence does not occur in Muslim communities,”
“talking about sexual abuse in Muslim communities will only give Islam a bad
name” and so forth. Important issues are swept under a carpet adorned with
cliches such as “Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world.” We all
know or should know that Islam is not responsible for domestic violence or
sexual abuse; this does not take long to prove. In our attempts to prove Islam
as innocent, however, we assume a defensiveness that often prevents us from
using Islam as a solution to such problems.
Stereotypes have certainly taken the lives of Muslims as in the aftermath of the
Oklahoma City bombing; yet, there are problems within the Muslim community that
stifle lives and happiness on a day to day basis. Fighting stereotypes is
important, but so is fighting un-Islamic social ills. To be fair, the number of
social services run by Muslims for Muslims is increasing in the US. The
Islamic-American Zakat Foundation, for example, makes helping African-American
women whose so-called Muslim husbands abandoned them a priority. While it
acknowledges that conversion is a happy experience for most people, it
identifies and seeks to Islamically correct the problems that can arise –
certainly not because of Islam but because of Muslims who fail to live by Islam.
When dealing with non-Muslims, we certainly should work on dispelling
stereotypes; within the Muslim community, however, we should also try to
initiate change where necessary in accordance with Islam.
Aside from the heavy emphasis on fighting stereotypes at the expense of social
change, a certain self-righteousness envelops some students. While Islam
emphasizes humility, such individuals feel or at least act judgemental toward
less overtly-religious parents or people who do not for example conform to some
standard of modest dress. Women who cover their hair often look down upon their
non-muhajjiba mothers or friends even though respect for others and tolerance
are tenets of Islam.
Another problem is anti-Americanism. While most American and immigrant Muslim
leaders are very appreciative of the freedom to live Islam in the US as one
wishes, some still resort to excessive anti-American rhetoric to stir up
audiences. There is no doubt that the US’s foreign and domestic policy leaves
much to be desired when it comes to the treatment of Muslims; still, the US has
also given people who were born Muslim the opportunity to learn and appreciate
Islam and others the opportunity to choose Islam as their faith of choice. My
American friends have often been far more supportive of my interest in Islam and
related topics than many Bengali family friends and relatives.
Worse than anti-Americanism, in my view, however is the tendency to condemn and
criticize all that is culturally Bengali in the name of Islam. While millions of
people in Bangladesh practice both Islam and patriotism, some “born-again”
Muslims feel as if they must renounce their national heritage. They are simply
confusing patriotism with the nationalism that many scholars condemn because of
the divisiveness it can cause between Muslim countries.
One thing many of my friends complain about is the apparent absence of God in
all the activities and studies. So great is the emphasis on reason in the name
of Islam, that little time is left for people to try to sense and remember God.
This may be why Sufism provides a refreshing alternative to many students who
once viewed Sufism negatively.
I now have a great deal of respect for my parents’ Islam – an Islam that leaves
no room for ostentation, an Islam that is authentic because it comes from the
heart, an Islam that is not an excuse for socializing. Proofs of Islam’s
scientific accuracy, its emancipation of women, its commitment to egalitarianism
are at once of paramount and minimal importance. Education on women’s rights in
Islam may help mitigate female genital mutilation, unchecked polygamy and
repudiation, the prevalence of dowry, female illiteracy and so forth. Of a
different type When it comes to submitting to God, that is Islam, only my
mother’s night-long prayers stand firmly in my mind. While I demanded proof that
God treats men and women equally, my mother unconditionally surrendered herself
to God and found everything else irrelevant.
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