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a dark subject

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a dark subject
al-ajnabia
01/18/04 at 15:04:33
[slm]
This is a tricky subject to talk about so I will preface it:
Muslims believe that children are born in islam, with the most memory of what is right and what we should do, but we quickly forget, and we need guidance and reminders and Islam is what Allah gave us to be reminded with. (Does any one know which verses and hadith support this?)
I was living in a very bad neighborhood a few years ago with a lot of drugs and other problems.  I was even living downstairs form a real deviant who was spying on me and turned out to be a suspect in the nationally broadcasted Jill Behrman case.  Well any way, I had a long string of days reflective of this situation.  I was struggling with changing my mode of dress, at the ime I covered most of my awra but not in a way that was distinctively muslim.  Living alone in such a neighborhood I felt the danger was too great.  I later attempted it any way and it took about three weeks for someone to figure out how to get a commit warant and so there was the knock on the door and in order to avoid complete incarceration ater a day in the hospital I took off my attemp at hijab. This wasnt the first comit warant against me and I knew what the consequences could be. The next summer was the year those saudi school girls burned and I went full on smart ass. one day I even wore a head scarf (pink silk) a red and pink tank top and pink jean shorts to the grocery store.  On the way home i saw where one of the Tibetan locals had left me a grain offering ( they suspect me of being Milarepa).  I only thought that it was nice to see grain again after having lived down town for so long.
The crack in my skull and the life I had befor I could honestly say that I was leading my own life in any way shape or form, it gives me thoughts that are different than those of other people, as well as a modest income (but that came years after the actual cracking).  Sometimes I fail to hear religion in the ubiquitious sayings, and yet I can see it as the motivation behind an appaling string of obscenities, sometimes ???.
Oneday I got an urge to walk to campus at an unusal time but during working hours and I saw a long haired , thin, dark skinnedwoman walking back and forth along my busy road in front of the elementary school in that time honored way.  It dawned on me that this woman in tight jeans was a hijabi. i'm standing there in a state of "surely not" but four men of my tribe verify the situation and its endemic nature in this town (I'm the articulate one with the luxury of circumstances that allow me to be a loose canon).
My past was rough, like that of all my tribe, sometimes people bring things up anecdotaly though I went years without so much as alluding to my past life.  It was the women and men seen ingaged in this that kept that kind of information in the local group conciousness. It is also these same that give infromation to others so they can criticize my expression and discount me utterly.  My tribe made sure to give me a real good bath before sending me to step up to the mike. I dont do everything that a normal and typical Muslim is expected to do but then, I dont know where anyone got that I am a "normal and typical" Muslim. Some stuff, I dont do it because of my health, other stuff because I dont understand how to do it right and have no one who can teach me. Some stuff I tried to do anyway, but I stoped doing the stuff I was doing right to do things I didnt know how to do and finally I had to realize I was doing wrong in this and Allah knows my situation.
I think my tribe remembers and practices half of Islam that has gotten lost undre the erosion religions go through when they get mingled with matters of state. I admit that there is a lot that I could learn from the state sponsored Islams, but those who know of them could learn a lot from the wild and free too. I'm a kind of living museum I think. Worth preserving, and yet there are empty wings, I am only willing to retain perminant collections that dont attack my antiquities, especially not the ones that are still fully functional.  
The previous question about dawa, if someone took a person like me on for dawa they would have to only tell me what they honestly knew and express to me how it really works for them, and they might do good to forget to pack their platitudes.  Otherwise I might do some really messed up stuff to them.
Well, those are my thoughts for the day,
Salam,
Al-ajnabia
01/18/04 at 15:11:58
al-ajnabia
Re: a dark subject
theOriginal
01/18/04 at 17:48:58
[slm]

Wow.  Profound.

I'll be honest..it was very well-written, although the facts seem a little strange to me.  Maybe it's your precise attempt at humor, but then again it could be entirely the opposite, in which case, please don't find it offensive.  Whatever it was, it was really good...and I could probably analyze it to its strip, but it wouldn't do justice to the point you were trying to get across.

Maybe I can request a part II.

Wasalaam.
Re: a dark subject
Maliha
01/19/04 at 12:54:45
[slm]
What is this??!! Is this really your life you are sharing?! I am sorry I may be nai've..but i don't understand most of it. You are Native American? Where were you born? China? Who forced you to have babies? What tribe? You really died twice? I didn't get the story of the hijab/shorts combo?

I am sorry, I can't really grasp it...But it sounds so sad:( all those thing happened to you? Subhana Allah:( are you seeking help to try and sort out your past? Redress to try and bring your tormentors to justice? Are you writing  a book?

sigh...May Allah aid you in all your hardships and may He shower you with His Mercy and Healing breezes to continue growing and evolving on His path (Amin).

your confused and saddened sis. :(
[slm]
Re: hijab shortscombo
al-ajnabia
01/19/04 at 15:46:28
[slm]
A long time ago up in the mountains there was this rich boy but his dad died and left him and his mother and sister destatute.  The mother did the best she could to send the boy to religious school. in the mountains people paid religious schollars to recite things and he earned some money this way but it was also the cusom to offer beer to the schoolars after a recitation and so the boy was walking home drunk and singing and his mother freakeked and hit him on the head with her frying pan.  The young man then quit rekigious school and never spoke again.  Instead he sang. Hes laying there in sick bed while hes getting his ballance back and all he hears about is how this family did this bad thing and how this family did that bad thing to his family from his mother and so when he gets up he goes to sorcery school and wehnt he two families are uniting in awedding he drops a house on them and sends giant scorpions to take care of the survivors.  Later he sees the distruction he has caused and decides to repent so he goes to a "great schollar" who jerks him around so he leaves and goes to live in a cave in the mountains.  He can keep warm by thinking of it and so he forgets to wear colthes and his sister gets tired of it and brings him a blanket to cover his parts with so he cuts up the balnket and uses it to cover his fingers and toes and other things of similar shape.
As years go on his head begins to screw back on straighter and he becomes a great sage and starts wearing a skirt. His name was Milarepa.
The Tibetans really dig this guy.  My Atire that day of the pink hijab brought him to mind. It was nice to see grain again after living down town for so long. It was a stark contrast to to the thoughts of school girls burning behind locked doors for lack of their abayas. It was just laying there being grain thats all.
Does any one ever stop to think how different the Prophet's (saws) words were at the time he said them to the people who were hearing, I mena nobody talked like that back then. Hm.  Does plain speech mean the same as crude or base speech? the language of the Quran was not the courtly speech of the day.
Just me again,
Salaam,
Al-ajnabia :-)
Re: a dark subject
al-ajnabia
01/20/04 at 21:48:22
[slm]
I need to be very careful how I phrase this.
Some people may doubt the existance of my tribe but we are really quite numerous.  We tend to live singly with others either of non full status or no status so we tend to not be obvious except to ourselves.  We had higher hopes at one time but the draft lottery during the Viet nam war was very hard on the age goup preceeding mine and something decimated my age group in the early 90's that I cant explain. But we have been havein some success in another generation but we still have them hidden in the woods with twigs tied to their heads so people jsut think they are wild deer, and not our precious few young horses.
Other groups of people have high middle and low people, we are under such circumstances however that all but our high break ties and wander off. Some eventually wander back and either they have grown or we find some use for them.
The meaning in the quran are vast so are the topics covered.  Each people reads more often those portions they need most often in such a way that they wear grooves to those portions.  Simply glancing through their eyes are drawn to the well worn paths and not away from them.  It can get to such a state that when a people in different circumstances have worn different grooves in their own qurans they can seem to be talking about two different books.
Most of us have had head injuries and cant fast for instance, however I dont know any among us that can be said to have fallen lax in charity. We really work those alternative routs because most of us live entire lives without ever being in circumstances to use the types of paved roads that are available to other countries.  
The world is still vast , but what do you think my fate would be if I were to save up my head checks and move to saudi in a couple of months.  I wouldnt even get there, but if I did, would I be a citizan, in twenty years would I become a citizen?
We take ouselves seriously, and the quran seriously. In the previous story of the four witnesses, they had origionally tried to, one had tried to handle the matter discretly by informing somone in a masjid in america about this thing, not publicly but discretely,  they tricked him into swearing and they deprived him of his abiilty to bear witness to them.  He had told them of our community-people and when four then went back(they hadnt given him a chance to provide his four witnesses so the deprivation is actually invalid) the witnesses saw that by the same standard there was no one they could bear witness to.  Now we have to be seriously well educated to stick with the pack otherwise we just loose the ablity to see each other.  These were impecable men of good witness.  

Back in the old old indian days all sorts of people would wash up on shore.  A man we called quetzalcoatl was among them and he told the people somehting of islam. (yes the story changed over the years in some places) A lot of pirates were muslims and it was usually pirates who washed up on shore.  If they tested to be "good muslims" (there were "bad muslims" who had hurt quetzalcoatl) we kept them if not we threw them back.
Lots of people in america have no idea of their deep connection to this tradition and yet they are still a part of it, some hadnt grown enough who returned but they had shaped up pretty much, they couldnt become a tribal leader we could rely on to always find their way home but they were certainly good enough, so they dont always know and dont understand why they are so offended at times, and the lower sort doesnt know either but they think the middle sorts words a pretty cool and they copy them.
This is the same anywhere isnt it?
I dont like to see muslims who dont seem to have the ability to walk a mile in another person's mocasins.  In hopes that they are atleast sincere I worry about them.  Though I dont think Allah really sends idiots to the fire I heard all through Ramadan about the continuance of different levels of circumstances into jannah.  I assume most of us are trying to aim for the top, and also I assume that since we get to Jannah after the day of reconing we will find our circumstances to be fair. I dont like to think of people being dissapointed even for the moment or two it takes to accept the justice of the descision.  I dont like to even think about wearin those shoes.
Well, just another bit of steam that needed out,
Salaam,
Al-ajnabia :-)
Re: a dark subject
al-ajnabia
01/21/04 at 18:35:52
[slm]
I just read a hadith and I'm paraphrasing but it said, the prophet said "whoever says that none deserves to be worshiped but Allah and has faith in his heart the size of a barley grain will be taken out of Hell fire" and he said the same thing substatuting wheat grain and again substatuting an atom(or wahtever it was pre translation).  
The pile of grain was barley grains.  It could have been wheat grains, but I may not have noticed the pile of atoms.   :)
It would be nice to find enough information and things so that I could tell a bunch of sincere individuals that they dont have to wear red every day anymore.  i mean, I'm not just sitting here wistling dixie.
It seems a little off the wall, but I sure would be cool if it works out.
any way, stinks that I cant just say, come on over I am sure of your welcome.
well, Salaam,
Your own funky old ajnabia  :-)
Re: a dark subject
al-ajnabia
01/22/04 at 20:46:08
[slm]
I keep thinking of all the people I know of just in this community who want to be more active muslims or even come out of the muslim closet but find themselves held back from it by this scam being perpetrated in our community.  
We have what is called a masjid, but there is no one to witness to at this one either.  
It is wrong to force slaves who wish for chastity into prostiution, and it is wrong to bear witness against married women commiting infidelity unless there are atleast four witnesses, but what if I live in a town where these two have been confined, where pimps pick their best one to have as a "wife" here.  how can we deal with this?
I'm so sad when I hear my class mates say they are thinking of bringing their wives to this community because so many of these ladies are so sheltered they have never been tested in the temtations that are here in this college town and if they go the Masjid which is supposed to help them face these challanges, well that is one place where they are recruited into bad stuff and there where people organise to cover these activities.
This masjid has no dawa program, they do not respond to people asking to learn how to pray, I have never heard of them sending anyone on Hajj.
They have a nice building, that seems to be about it.
I've had hopes that after I get my MA in TESOL next spring of teaching english to the wives of some of the muslim grad students and being part of programs to help them be here in this community without becoming part of our problem here.  I would day dream about teaching a class or two at the Masjid, but as I got to know how big a problem I was facing, I began to think of trying to stimulate interest in a store front masjid.
I have a limited number of hours of productivity I mean more so than most because of my head thing.
So, I'm just ideas.  
But I was watching the news tonight and another muslim charity is shutting down due to being involved in bs. I know that there are people out there who want to put into soemthing but want to know that it isnt going to that.
Back when I was a kid people used to come here from the mid east with these huge allowances that usually got spent in gawdawful ways.  Some of us used to wonder what would happen if one of these young men got the idea to take on the crap that was keeping him out of islam at home and try some stuff out around here.  Theres a lot of us praying for that actually, we even have that previously mentioned enclave of Tibetans that keep slippin me hints and if they came over they would send for thier friends and wouldnt that be something to write home about.
Then there are the descendants of the Nation of Islam wandering around.  The ones who got sort of let down by them  but havent yet felt drawn to any existing masjid situation.  Wouldnt it be fun to target them and help establish things there.  I know some stuff like Al Islam has already happend but they have yet to establish a presence in this community.
I guess my angle on this is that I am very tired of being a part of the opium trade and the "white" slave trade and I get sick of people from these endeavors keeping established real islam out of the comunity where I live.
I mean they are professors for crying out loud!
Ugg, I'm losing my train, I'll work on a better framework for these ideas but there is no time to fool around.  They recruit all the time and try not to let anyone get out of their grasp. I'll keep working on it
Salaam
Al-ajnabia :-)
Re: a dark subject
timbuktu
01/22/04 at 22:08:59
[slm] this is one of the best threads ever.

although i still do not understand most of it, i think there is a lot of wisdom, and history, and food for thought here. i feel that the only person able to understand you with any success will be sisters JustOnederful and Nur_al_Layl.

but i am also trying.

thank you for sharing such profound thoughts with us. please keep them coming.


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