Assalamu alaikum, I have a lot of thoughts in my head, just not sure how to get them out, or even if I should. Just have been doing a lot of reading, and a lot of it is *not* beneficial. And I freely and openly admit that before I go any further. So I’ll just link to where I’ve been going, providing my commentary along the way, and Inshallah, no traffic is generated to these sites as a result, or maybe I should put out a disclaimer and say that I don’t necessarily endorse the sites I’m linking to. But I begin this journey hesitantly, because I want to share my thoughts with someone, yet am at the same time afraid to do so, because I feel that sense of vulnerability creeping in, that I’ve talked about before. But here goes anyway.
So anyway…
It seems the “moon fighting” has already begun (scroll down the page to see what I’m talking about). *sigh* I don’t even think I’m even going to try to have an “opinion” on this issue anymore, because if the Muslim astronomers can’t agree (not to mention their lack of adab/their sarcasm at how they talk of other scholars/astronomers that they don’t agree with), then how are the rest of us “regular Muslims” supposed to agree on this issue? It’s kinda like the whole madhhab thing, you’ll find one opinion, that looks to you, the unknowledgeable one, to be sound, then find another opinion that seems just as good as the first, and then I’m, well, I hate to use the word but “confused”. Or maybe I should say “unsure”. I’m just about ready to just give up and follow my comunity, regardless of what I might think. Especially since the rest of my household (husband included) will be doing the same. Perhaps if I were single (and sighted) I could get away with outwardly going with the community while inwardly following my own days, but there are a few problems with this that I can readily think of. The first being trying to schedule time off work. I can just see me requesting a day off, and then being asked something like “why did you take that day off when the Eid was yesterday”? Or something like that. Or, let’s say I “attend” the Eid prayers, while secretly fasting, because the local sighting has the Eid coming a day later? If I were sighted I could probably get away with this, making up an excuse that I’d already eaten, or not staying around long enough after the prayer, or something like that, but being blind, and not necessarily knowing my surroundings, I can’t just get up and leave, and doing so would draw undue attention to myself, and in my experience in gatherings like this, someone will invetiably bring me some food to eat, what then? Make up an excuse, say I’m not feeling well? Then I’ll get the questions, or the suggestion that I should drink something, and awkwardness would ensue. It just seems easier to go with the flow on this one, and I’m not sure if there’s a valid fiqhi opinion for starting “on my own day” yet celebrating Eid with the rest of the community? Gosh, I sure don’t want to make it seem like I’m making up my own fiqh as I go along but… Well, that’s the best “compromise” that I can come up with. At least until my community decides to follow a local sighting and sight the moon every month (and I made a suggestion to my husband that perhaps our local masjid or at least all of the masajid in polk county could establish a moon sighting committee, and sight the moon every month, yet nothing has come of this so far), or until Saudi does the same for every month and not just for some of them. And this seems to be the decision that makes me feel the most at peace and takes away a lot of the doubt. So Inshallah it’s the right one. Besides, along with the madhhab issue and so many other issues we’re facing today, given that there’s so much confusion, I make dua and I have the hope that Allah will forgive us and have mercy on us, because speaking only for myself, I’m really trying to do my best.
And I’ve been reading through a couple of blogs that I know I have no business reading through (perhaps I should go back to trying to perfect my virtual long jumping abilities via Klango). Because this blog and this one (the one we all love so much), are giving me the impression that all Muslims, or at least most of us, are dysfunctional, that most if not all of are leaders are corrupt, and that there’s a “immigrant Muslim conspiracy”, to hijack the American Muslim agenda, not to mention supporting terrorist groups, etc. And though some leaders may indeed be corrupt, etc., and may be contributing to massive amounts of hurt and pain within and without their respective communities, the message I’m getting that most, if not all, of our Muslim leaders are corrupt and are only in it for their own selves, I’m sorry, I know it’s the naive side of me coming out, but I have to say that this is something that I just can’t yet get my head around, and if I actually started to believe this wholeheartedly, it would really be disastrous for me. Because if it is true that we can’t trust *any* of our leaders, then who, actually, can we trust? I don’t generally need someone to give me the Islamic ruling on every little thing I do, but I would like to increase my knowledge, but if you’re telling me to avoid just about all of the entire Muslim community, who then, should I learn from?
I really think there is a lot of pain within the Muslim community, or I should say, there seems to be, mainly because they got burned by one “scholar” or “da’ee” (sorry for speling) or another, and they’re taking that pain out on the whole community by supposedly “exposing” everyone, whether or not they did anything or not. I mean, surely, and I really hope surely, not all of our leaders are engaging in some of the supposed stuff I’ve been unfortunately privy to reading in the past few days, weeks, and months. It just can’t be! I’m sorry, it just can’t.
And I have to say that a good majority of the “stuff” that people have experienced has really bypassed me, and Alhamdulillah for that, but my goodness! Is there any good out there? If you read the two blogs above, you’d get the impression that the answer would be “no”. And I’d have to emphatically disagree with that notion. Because I have to believe that for every “bad” leader or “bad” Muslim, there are maybe tens or hundreds of others who are doing good work, who you don’t ever hear about. And perhaps we just need some balance, to “get the word out” on people we really need to avoid or be careful of, while at the same time try to spotlight the people who are doing good work in our communities. Because I have found a lot of my reading of late to be quite iman-deflating. And yes, I know it’s my own fault.
I’ve also been reflecting on the latest article from Imam Zaid’s site, though it’s unfortunate that they’re still using a captcha in order for you to comment *sigh*. I’m really trying to suppress the frustration I am once again feeling (that I always feel any time I come smack up against something that is inaccessible). Because I respect Imam Zaid, and I want to give him, as well as the site admins/webmasters, etc., the benefit of the doubt that maybe they tried to fix the issue and couldn’t or maybe they forgot about it or something. But I can’t help but feeling shut out, excluded, etc., and it hurts even more when it’s happened on the site of someone that I respect and hold in high regard, not to mention the fact that I’d thought that the webmaster had been contacted about this before? Oh, well, it’s not like I had any comment that I’d wanted to make anyway, except to say “Mashallah, good job” or something like that, I just wanted to know that I could comment if I so chose to. A fellow blogger (who happens to be blind) describes having a visual captcha on a site as akin to having a “no blind people allowed” sign on the door. And aside from the WebVisum firefox plugin, that not everyone has as not everyone uses Firefox, that’s pretty much what you’re saying. That if you use a visual captcha, that you don’t want the blind/visually impaired to comment on your site, or you don’t want them using your services as you won’t be able to log in without utilizing the captcha, or any number of scenarios in which the visual captcha is being employed today. And being that I hold Imam Zaid in such high regard, it really pains me to feel as though I’m being harsh about the matter. But not having access to things, that sighted people generally take for granted, pains me too, and causes untold frustration, almost on a daily basis.
Anyway…
Am currently reflecting on <a href="http://www.suhaibwebb.com/blog/general/hip-hop-in-the-21th-century-the-rise-of-satanism-in-urban-america-by-sh-abul-hussein/"Suhaib Webb's and Manrilla’s posts regarding hip hop and Islam. And my thoughts haven’t quite collected themselves enough to write any kind of response. Except to say that while much of mainstream hip hop is guilty as charged, I also don’t think you can throw the baby out with the bath water, so to speak, especially when you’re talking about rap/hip hop as an art form, and not the materialistic/”religious” side of it. And as regards Muslims filling up their ipods/mp3 players with nashids and hip hop songs as opposed to the Qur’an or Islamic lectures, well, hmmm, can you blame hip hop for that, or music in general? I actually have Qur’an on my mp3 player, though I don’t have any lectures as I don’t currently have any to put on my mp3 player, as I stream most of mine online. But maybe the lack of any kind of Islamic material on people’s ipods/mp3 players is just a symptom of a much bigger problem than “hip hop” ’cause if it wouldn’t have been “hip hop” it’d have probably been something else.
And there you have my journey through the blogosphere, and it’s a journey, that some parts of which I hate to admit that I’ve taken. But anyway… At this point, I’m trying to find something a bit more spiritually uplifting and restorative. Because I really do need it.
A Response to a Comment
Posted by Ginny on July 17, 2009
Assalamu alaikum, I’m bumping the following comment up to post level, as I wrote a lengthy response that deserves a post in and of itself. And this is related to this recent post.
Comment is below.
Who Decides What? (Link)
Bismillah…
1. It is not for an unqualified layperson to deicde whether there is clear proof in the Kitab/Sunnah or not, nevertheless I will give my insights…
2. The people who decide are those qualified within the ranks of Ijtihad who understand the Qur’an and Sunnah. Accordings to all the Madhahib, the Mu’tamad (relied-upon position) is that all instruments besides the Duff are Haram…
3. Shaykh Nuh narrates on the authority of Imam al-Bukhari who narrates it in his Jami’ as-Sahih that Sayyidinah Rasulullah SallallauAlayhiWaAlihiWaSallam said something along the lines of the following (paraphrasing):”There will be a group of people at the end of time who will say that sex, wine and musical instruments are Halal and a mountain will collapse on them”. If Allah causes them to be destroyed, does this indicate that Allah is pleased with them? Please clarify? Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani has mentioned that it was Sahih, in his book where he deals with Bukhari’s titles…
4. Hujjat al-Islam al-Ghazali, one of the greatest thinkers of the world understood that authority lies with Allah and his Messenger Salawat Rabbi wa Salamuhu Alayh. I mention this because his writings are often mis-translated to indicate subscription to questionable opinions. The Imam says in his Ihya under the section of “Amr bil Ma’ruf wan-Nahy ‘an al-Munkar” that if you come across musical instruments being played, you break them in order that they become unusable.
5. As laypeople, we follow the conclusions of the Mujtahid’s of our Madhhabib. In the Hanadi Madhhab musical instruments besides the Daff are Haram. In the Shafi’i Madhhab, the final conclusion of the madhhab comes from Imam an-Nawawi who says that they are Haram in his Minhaj.This is also the position of the Maliki school as Sahib Sharh as-Saghir has mentioned. (Forgive me for forgetting the full name of the book).
6. It may be well-worth it reconsidering your stance while comparing it to what the majority of the Ummah’s scholars understood of the Qur’an and Sunnah before making it out that there is no direct evidence.
7. My insights are not meant to be antagonistic but I think that it is important to be honest when discussing evidences of the Nusus…
Wassalam
And my response follows, but first… “what is a nusus”, and if you have to say something like “I don’t mean to be … ” it probably means you’ll end up being exactly what you “aren’t trying to be”.
Assalamu alaikum, thanks for your answering, and perhaps “as a layperson” I shouldn’t have “tried to make a decision”, etc. I’ve said often on this blog that I’m struggling with this issue, I’m still struggling with it. I guess if I felt that music was totally halal, I’d not have devoted as much time and space on this blog detailing my struggles with it, not to mention describing my fear of it being haram. If I thought it was absolutely halal, with no strings attached, I’d not have given any further thought to it. . Are their any “traditional” scholars or “knowledgeable people” or people who are not “lay people unqualified to make decisions on this matter”, who deem music to be permissible? Because I’ve been told that there is not unanimous concensus on this issue, and this is among the “traditional”/”classical” scholars, meaning that we’re not just talking about “non-traditional” scholars like Yusuf Qaradawi, etc. And I mention this only because when the Qaradawi opinion is mentioned, I’ve seen “traditional” Muslims say something to the affect of “oh he’s not credible ’cause he’s a Salafi” “he wasn’t properly trained”, etc. I don’t know whether this is true or not, however, if this issue supposedly isn’t a hard and fast”the scholars unanimously hold that music is haram” kind of thing, who, exactly, said it was permissible, what were their qualifications, and if they were indeed qualified, then why are the “music is haram” scholars seemingly ignoring these possibly equally valid opinions? I also have a question about the section of the book you cite where it says that if you come across musical instruments, you should break them until they become unusable? Was this statement meant to be taken literally, or was it meant as a way of showing the seriousness of listening to music, was it meant to be allegorical in nature? Because if the statement is to be taken literally, are we serious? Does this mean, say, if I’m at my parents’ house and I come across my father playing his guitar that I should break it? Or, if my mother-in-law is listening to cassettes of traditional Gambian music, where a kora or balafone is played, and they are singing about certain historical or religious figures (as kora players and griots do), I should break the cassette so she can’t listen to it? Or, if I’m in The Gambia and someone is playing a drum or a kora that is deemed as “haram”, by the majority of scholars, according to the text you just cited, I should break those instruments? And offend and upset fellow Muslims in the case of my mother in law, not to mention my non-Muslim family in the process? Forgive me if this appears sarcastic, but even if music is haram, by concensus as you seem to suggest, I just can’t see myself going and breaking other people’s property just to prove a point. Perhaps I’d go in the other room, or move away from it, but breaking it?
And what is, exactly, a lay person allowed to make decisions and judgments about? What are things that we can deduce on our own, and what are things that we have to “leave to the scholars and the qualified”. Because if I believe some of what I’ve read, I can’t even walk outside of my door to take my dog out to use the bathroom without going to a scholar to see if it’s halal. I’m told on one hand Islam is supposed to be simple, that anyone can learn to understand and follow it, yet when I voice my questions/reservations about the issue of music, I’m told that I have no right to do this, that I’m just a layperson, that I’m not qualified. However, I’m not qualified to seemingly make decisions for myself, but based on the say-so of someone else, I’m being told to go and break someone else’s musical instruments so they can’t play them again. And I have to say that I’m lost here… I’m saying that I’m struggling with this issue, I want to know all of the “legitimate” opinions on this issue, and I guess I wanted to know that I was not the only one struggling with this. And instead, I got the exact kind of a response that I did not want, the kind of self-righteous “how dare you criticize the scholars”or “how dare you make a decision that you’re not qualified to make” response that I have to say makes me just want to hang around the “common people”, because it seems the “ones more knowledgeable” are too harsh and judgmental.
Let me try to break it down just one more time so that people will understand what I’m saying. Firstly I listen to music, and I know probably some of it is definitely not halal based on the content, I know that, and I know that I will be held accountable for this. What I want to know is, have the “qualified scholars” *unanimously* agreed that music is haram? If so, what are the “proofs”, I don’t want to use the charged word “dalil”, but what was their basis for drawing this conclusion? If there are any scholars that deemed music to be halal, how did they come to this conclusion? And why did they differ from the majority of scholars that deemed music to be haram? And what of the well-known story of the Prophet (since you mentioned that opinions should conform to the Qur’an and Sunnah) allowing Aisha to watch the Abbyssinian entertainers? Were they playing musical instruments? Because I’ve seen this cited as allowing for the permissibility of music (as long as it did not talk of anything known to be haram). Is this a weak haddith? Was Aisha the only one permitted to watch/listen?
Is music haram in the same way that fornication, backbiting, murder, gossip, etc., are haram, or is a “lesser grade haram”, is there a punishment for listening to music, say if I lived in a so-called “Islamic state” and the people assigned to uphold morality came into my home and found me listening to music or playing the piano, what is the punishment for that? Is there a prescribed punishment for listening to music?
And what if I can’t give it up? Yes, you could give the simple answer and tell me that it’s just my nafs, that I’m listening to the temptings of the Shaitan and then wash your hands of me, and gleefully tell yourself how much better you are than me, or maybe throw some more articles and “dalil” my way and hope that I feel guilt ridden enough to delete all of my mp3’s and break my Ipod. However, is there a more merciful, “less strict” ruling that I could adapt until I am sufficiently rid of the Shaitan to give up music?
I’m really not being sarcastic, I’m trying to get as much information to make a decision.
It’s things like this that imho, drive new Muslims and struggling Muslims away, the “you’re not allowed to ask” or “you’re not allowed to make those sorts of inferences ’cause you’re just a layperson so you need to just shut up and follow the scholars that I tell you you have to follow ’cause the rest are deviant” or somehow “not knowledgeable enough” or somehow “bad” in some way.
I thought Islam was supposed to be easy and simple, I mean that is what the “dawa material” says. I can understand that murder is haram (because it’s in the Qur’an and the Sunnah, and I can find it and read it), same with fornication, backbiting, gossiping, etc. However as I said, the issue of music isn’t clear. I can read the Qaradawi opinion (and he sites Qur’an and hadith to back up his opinion) and I can read the Shaykh Nuh opinion (and he also cites Qur’an, hadith, and other sources), so what makes one opinion any more or less valid than the other? And does this also show that the “haramness” of music isn’t as much of a “unanimous” opinion as we are led to believe?
I hate to say this but I almost feel like I was sold a lemon of a car, so to speak, before I became a Muslim. And “the real story” wasn’t revealed to me until after I converted. I believe in Allah and the Last day, I bare witness that there is no god but god and that Muhammad is His Servant and Messenger, I know that I’m supposed to perform prayer, fast, give charity, and make Hajj when I’m able to. I know I’m supposed to be good to my parents, to be good to my neighbors, to help people, to try to stay away from what Allah has forbidden and do what He commands. It’s just that sometimes what’s “halal” and what is “haram” is not so cut and dry and sometimes there are differences of opinions, and I feel like I’m being yelled at by two different salespeople like “no come over here, this is correct” and the other person is saying “no come over here this is the right way, that other guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about, he’s wrong”.
And maybe this is the downside of the Net, where information for every perspective, from just about every scholar, is available, and that inclues all of the conflicting info. Perhaps if I trusted my local imam enough, or I was close enough to a “person of knowledge” and knew that I could confide in them without the self-righteousness that I so often see in Muslims, perhaps they could research the issue, and give me an opinion that I could handle, without feeling as though I was condemning myself to Eternal Hell-Fire for turning on the radio. An example of this would be something like “OK sister, I know you are struggling with this issue, yes music is haram, however, it’s not as haram as other things, and you are struggling, so let’s make dua that Allah makes a way for you”. Or “sister, maybe things are not as bad as you think they are, there were many reputable scholars that held msuic to be permissible, just make sure they don’t talk of haram things, here, let me get you some stuff to read”. In any case, what I want is understanding, mercy, (the same Mercy that Allah will have for all of us on Yaum-al-Qiyama), kindness, the knowledge of my circumstance, that I’m blind and just as women dressing skimpily is a struggle and challenge for men in the summer, that for me, being that music is obviously so audio-intensive, that perhaps giving it up is almost impossible, that some sort of understanding of my situation, or an allowance could be made for me? And again, this is assuming that by unanimous concensus of the scholars, that music is haram. Or does Islam not work like that? Funny how the “traditionalists” tell us how complex and all-encompassing Islam is, how differences of opinion should be a mercy, etc., yet when you start talking of Music or women’s issues, all of a sudden, the “Salafis” and the “traditionalists” don’t sound that far apart from each other.
I want to know what exactly I’m “qualified” to make decisions about! And what I’m not? What should I ask a scholar about and what should I leave to my own judgment? Because I’m starting to not trust my own judgment, because one person will say one thing when I ask and then I’ll find another (just as qualified” opinion that says something else. Maybe I should just pick one person to follow but who would that be?
I don’t mean to be sarcastic. But getting a comment from someone I’ve never heard of or read before, about an issue that I’ve clearly stated bothers me, who gives me the kind of answer I’ve said I didn’t want, who seems to have know sensitivity to the fact that not everyone is on the same spiritual plane or follows the same scholars as they, or is struggling with an issue, well, that just really leaves a bad taste in my mouth! Perhaps I shouldn’t ask about things that I don’t want an answer to. Perhaps I shouldn’t write about things publicly if I don’t want a response. And who knows, maybe at some point, I’ll read this and shudder for my lack of knowledge, lack of understanding, lack of taqwa. Allahu Alim. I’m just struggling, trying to understand, trying to do the best that I can.
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