4/7/09

a lot of students i know have been here for years without having gone home to see their families; others are separated from their spouses and perhaps children for extended periods, whether because of visa issues or finances or whatever…

as i check my email a niqabi is sitting beside me talking to her spouse, attempting as best she can to be discreet and remain unheard. for my part, i am doing my best not to hear her – i’ve covered my ears with the headphones. she’s telling him, in extremely eloquent classical Arabic, how much she misses him, and occasionally she throws in some classical poetry.

i’m embarassed and at the same time moved by listening to her.

“your pain cannot be compared to mine – it runs through my blood and i feel it with my heartbeats… ha!… believe or not, that is your affair, and mine is to be patient, and Allah is the best sufficiency…”

 

motions of modernity

“As we rode through the streets of Riyadh my wonder and amazement increased and increased… gone was the barren desert, and here were wide streets, gardens of flowers and green grass, mansions and villas…

The students who were with me, noticing my expression, started to explain proudly about the advancement that had taken place in the city. One of them, after pointing out every new and modern thing that there was to behold, said to me: “Is this the first time you’ve been to Riyadh?”

“I knew Riyadh before you were born”, I replied.

As the car pulled up to al-Deera district, and we reached the Grand Mosque, my face lit up, like one who, lost in a great crowd, suddenly sees someone he knows.

“This is the Riyadh that I know!” I said, “This is it, with its narrow souqs, and its mud and clay houses…

these are the abodes of my memories – and memories are what give life to a place.

Those modern buildings, for all of their ornamentation, are foreign to me, and these – despite the state they are in – I feel as if they are from me, and I from them.”

– Ali Tantawi (the Damascene, not the Egyptian mufti),

 trans. w/ slight modifications  fr. Fusul fi-Da’wa wal Islah.

 

What Has Your Knowledge Done For You?

al Hasan, the son of ‘Ali, may Allah be pleased with them, mentioned the following story:

A man died, leaving his wife, son, and a servant. Before passing, he implored his servant to take good care of his son. The servant did, raising him to be a good person, and, when he was of age, he helped him to get married. Then the son wanted to seek knowledge, so he asked the servant to help him in that regard. The servant prepared a mount and got him ready, and he went off.

He found a scholar, whom he questioned about knowledge. The scholar told him: “When it is time for you to leave, then tell me – I will teach you all that you need to know.”

A short while later, the man said to the scholar: “The time has come for my departure, so teach me.”

“Be mindful of Allah, have patience, and do not rush.” said the scholar.

- and in these three things there is the sum total of goodness, said al Hasan –

The man set off to return home, unable to forget what the scholar told him – how could he, when they were only three things? – when he got back, he came down off of his mount and walked into the house.

His wife was lying asleep, and beside her there was another man, also sleeping. “What should I be patient for here?” thought the man, and he rushed to his horse to get his sword. But when he was about to take up his blade, he said to himself “Be mindful of Allah, and have patience, and do not rush.” So he walked back to the house.

When he went inside and saw them still sleeping, as before, he said “No! There’s nothing to wait for here!” And he rushed back to his sword. Then he said to himself: “Be mindful of Allah, and have patience, and do not rush”. So he went back.

But when he saw them the third time, he said “There’s nothing to wait for!” and he went back. Then he said: “Be mindful of Allah, and have patience, and do not rush”. So he returned.

When he went in, the man woke up, and rushed to him, hugging him and kissing him and congratulating him on his return. “What have you learned after leaving us?” (The man was his son, i believe… travel took a long time back then.)

“By Allah!,” said the man, “I have learned great things – I have walked back and forth between your head and my sword three times this night, wanting to kill you, and it was only what knowledge I learned that prevented me.”

(Narrated by al Bukhari in al Adab al Mufrad).

 

a true friend

 If an acquaintance only burdens you with formality
           Then leave them, and trouble yourself not with worry 
For amongst men are replacements, and in leaving is relief - 
          And the heart will stay patient for a truly beloved eternally.  

Yet not everyone for whom your heart yearns shares the feeling, 
          Nor every ‘good do’er’ sincere in what they’re revealing -
If kindness comes not naturally then what joy
          Can there be in friendship that is only perfunctory.

No good is a friend who betrays a beloved,
         Meeting them after closeness with coldness;
Who rejects time spent together in happiness,
         And reveals secrets only yesterday veiled.

Farewell to this life if one cannot find
        A true friend – honest, noble, and kind. 

(trans.. well, tried to translate.. fr. the arabic; al-Shafi).

 

He who seeks pearls must dive into the sea

- al-Shafi’i

 

poverty of the soul is worse than that of the body

forgot to post this: 

Reflections on Slumdog Millionaire

“There are people who live in the filthy mental slums of their own making, reveling in the squalor of stupidity and sloth.

There are people who live in the putrid slums of their egos, encased in a world where their intellect has been amputated by the machinations of their own arrogance.

There are people obsessed with perpetual “fun” and reverie, people who live entombed in slums dedicated to their desires [z: to mask the emptiness that they fear facing].

The vast majority of these people do not live in the slums depicted in Slumdog Millionaire.” 

 

appendum

Galloway: America has given Israel missiles that can target not just every city in Lebanon, but every city in the Arab and Muslim world including Iran! Why should America be allowed to give long range missiles to Israel including hundreds of nuclear missiles, but

(Anna interrupts) Because it’s given it to a terrorist organization!

Galloway: But, they are not a terrorist organization! Only in the mind of Rupert Murdoch’s Sky and The Times and the -

(Anna interrupts) I wont, come on! I want to stop you there, Mr Galloway! Prescribed terrorist organization.

Galloway: They are not a terrorist organization! It’s Israel who is the terrorist

(Anna continues talking at the same time) One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. We know that perfectly well.

Galloway: (speaking at the same time) Precisely. Precisley.

 

back.

look away for a second, and all sorts of things happen.

George Galloway says decision to ban him from Canada ‘inappropriate’-

i’m sure the word he used was a sight more colorful than inappropriate, but CBC has a way of drifting towards the boring. 

(thoughts: i don’t understand why all the columnists who write for major papers, as well as the political party reps, have to blunt the edges of their arguments protecting free speech by prefacing them with tediously drawn out notices of how they don’t like GG as a person, nor do they like his politics, and how they agree that he supports terror, blah blah blah. 

My guess is that the political establishment as well as the media cannot tolerate unreserved support for anyone who speaks out against isra’-eel; as well, the influence of pro-zionist lobby in Canada is no longer something that can be overlooked.) 

so, in a show of support for the one politician in the western world (besides ron paul) who speaks some sense on TV, I am posting some of GG’s more standup and standout clips: 

That SKY interview - 

Anna: How can you justify your support for Hizbollah and its leader Sheikh Hassen Nasrullah?

Galloway: What a preposterous way to introduce an item! What a preposterous first question!

Twenty-four years ago, on the day my daughter was born and I have just celebrated her 24th birthday, I had to dash at the maternity to see giving birth, from a mass demonstration in London against the Israeli invasion and occupation of Lebanon. Israel has been invading and occupying Lebanon all of my 24 years of my daughter’s life. The Hezbollah are a prt of the Lebanese Resistance who are trying to drive, having successfully driven most Israelis from their land in 2000. Israel from the rest of their land and to get back those thousands Lebanese prisoners who are kidnapped by Israel under the term of their illegal occupation of Lebanon. It’s Israel that is invading Lebanon!

It’s Israel that is attacking Lebanon, not Lebanon that’s attacking Israel! You’ve just been carrying a report “Ten Israeli Soldiers on the border getting ready to invade Lebanon, and you ask us to mourn that operation as if there were some kind of war crime! Israel is invading Lebanon and has killed 30 times

Anna: . (Interruption by Anna)

(Galloway does not stop) more Lebanese civilians than have died in Israel. So, it’s you who should be justifying the evident bias, which is written on every line of your face and is in every nuance of your voice and is loaded in every question that you ask.

GG interview on CBC about Afghanistan

Really liked this one, he showed a lot of sympathy for the guy who interviewed him, whose name i cannot pronounce or spell, and answered his questions very kindly, like an old uncle might talk to a young nephew. 

for the rest of them, see: http://www.georgegalloway.com/page.php?page=content/video.html

really too much good material to post here. 

2) Guantanamo guard converts to islam. 

Not the story i was expecting to see in Newsweek. 

 

3) moved recently, alhamdullilah – liking the new apartment, need to do something with the lighting. one thing not having an ikea around does is forces you to wander through mazes of narrow souqs looking for a desk lamp. it’s quite nice, though perhaps because of my hate-to-waste-time-shopping attitude i find it kind of frustrating at times. 

reflections on renting in syria: 

i once read a book in school in which the main character philosophizes that “there are two kinds of people: good people, and landlords.” 

while i can’t totally agree with him, i appreciate the sentiment much more fully after having lived the life of a renter and student in rukn-ad-din. 

keep us in the dua’s (:

 

War turns Six.

War wears Spider-Man T-shirts and loves soccer. But the dangers outside his parents’ home often force him to stay inside, where he’s glued to a computer screen.

His favorite game is “Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.” He hijacks cars, steals motorcycles, shoots pedestrians and runs over bystanders on the street. Digital blood seeps from the bodies.

Most 6-year-olds aren’t allowed to play “Grand Theft Auto.” It’s too graphic. But War has seen real blood.

In 2006 he went with his brother to pick up kebabs when an explosion tore through the market. People ran from the bakery next door burning alive. But he wasn’t scared, he said.

His father ran to the market when he heard the blast, barefoot and frightened. A neighbor saw the two boys and pulled them away from the carnage.

War recounted the tale to his father, Mohammed Abd Badr, without a trace of fear.

That same year, War sat in the car as his dad drove down the dark streets of his neighborhood one night. A car stopped in front of them, and members of the Shiite militia, the Mahdi army, pulled a man from the trunk of the car and shot him.

They left him on the street and drove away. It was one of thousands of killings by street militias at the height of sectarian violence. The body was one of many that littered the streets like garbage in 2006 and 2007. Often, 50 bodies were found a day.

Badr got out of the car to see if it was someone from the neighborhood. Some boys distracted him briefly and warned him not to approach the body. When he turned, his son was gone.

War looked into the face of the dead Sunni man.

“What are you doing?” his father asked, running up to the little boy.

“Look baba,” he said. “Poor man.”

 

tikun olam.

fr. the recent report of Israeli soldier’s action during the Gaza massacre:

One account tells of a sniper killing a mother and children at close range whom troops had told to leave their home….

In another cited case, a commander ordered troops to kill an elderly woman walking on a road, even though she was easily identifiable and clearly not a threat.

Testimonies, which were given by combat pilots and infantry soldiers, also included allegations of unnecessary destruction of Palestinian property.

“We would throw everything out of the windows to make room and order. Everything… Refrigerators, plates, furniture. The order was to throw all of the house’s contents outside,” a soldier said. One non-commissioned officer related at the seminar that an old woman crossing a main road was shot by soldiers.

The soldiers’ testimonies also reportedly told of an unusually high intervention by military and non-military rabbis, who circulated pamphlets describing the war in religious terminology.

“All the articles had one clear message,” one soldier said. “We are the people of Israel, we arrived in the country almost by miracle, now we need to fight to uproot the gentiles who interfere with re-conquering the Holy Land.”

“Many soldiers’ feelings were that this was a war of religion,” he added.

Defence Minister Ehud Barak told Israel Radio that the findings would be examined seriously.

“I still say we have the most moral army in the world…”