Journey Part 3

Does the "real" world have to die in order to fulfill this journey? Dieing in a sense that one gives up all the rules of life--the desires, passions, goals....
Is there a way to correct one's life in a "proper" way and establish a direct path toward an inner peace and understanding? Does that not mean giving up one's right to test, experiment, and prove to a conclusion that this is a path that should be followed? Reaching for the Ka'bah on the inside...does this mean that one has to follow a path on the outside--follow certain practices, prayers and physical actions in order to continue? Or cannot one just meditate and contemplate while working toward this inner peace and goal of love and harmony?

Journey--Part 2

For me it was a spiritual journey, searching and becoming closer to myself. This interior journey parallels the external journey--grasping at the mysteries of life and probing into the heart where true love can be found. I don't want to sound like I am even close to where I am going but the small steps that I am taking are giving me a better sense of why I'm here.
To understand the influences of my outer life and to understand the desires that influence my feelings and actions...and ultimately discard them, to learn about the beauty of God's truth and to search for and acquire it is shari'at...... Will I ever find any of this on my journey, I do not know but it is a journey worth taking. Will I ever embrace that which is correct and reject these passions, I do not know. Will I ever be willing to listen and actually believe and trust, I do not know.
Is the world illusory and do we live in this illusory world with our bodies and physical self as we seek a spiritual path and inner transformation from a physical being to a light being? Are outer obligations necessary in order to achieve or embark on the journey? Do they really help the process? Do I want to admit that I, and all human beings, achieve a wealth that is incomplete and a happiness that is incomplete? Do I want to possibly believe that I can't struggle further to finally reach a physical completion that is satisfying and worth struggling for? Am I ready for any kind of divine knowledge, unity, and love? Do I possibly want to believe that there is any certainty to anything that cannot be tested and proven?
One heck of a journey to Philadelphia....

Journey

I had a wonderful journey this week and was able to spend a day with the folks at the Bawa Muhaiyaddeen fellowship. They passed on to me their expressions of love and heartfelt desire that all of you will be able to soon visit the fellowship and the Mazar. I was greeted with such warmth and care, given gifts of books, tea, and earnest dialogue that really gave me a great feeling of acceptance 3000 miles from home. The beauty of the Mazar, the resting place of Muhammad Raheem Bawa Muhaiyaddeen, was beyond words. Muhammad Lateef Hayden had me follow him on a beautiful 45 mile drive out into the countryside near Lancaster, Pa., stopping on the way to visit Chuck and Nina, members of the fellowship--Chuck having designed and organized the building of the Mazar. Again, the greetings and discussions were wonderful and engaging and their interest in the GTU and the newly established Islamic Center most genuine. We continued on to the Mazar, arriving just at sunset, enjoying the landscape and setting on the way while spending several hours inside, meditating and talking about Bawa.

Mostly though, the visit was beyond words. Just great feelings and warmth.

Journey

Today I am traveling on a journey to Philadelphia to visit the Foundation for Bawa Muhaiyaddeen. I have been reading about the spiritual journey (or mystical journey)and am just getting to the point of even understanding that you cannot begin to embark on the "real" spiritual journey without leaving your body and form behind. We still and always will be attached and live in the realm of the world as long as we are "within" our bodies and attached to this world.
How to transform this experience and enter the world of the soul and the light is an experience which is beyond my grasp although I would like to think that I have the ability to understand why you would have to do it.
I had a question about attachment which is: distinguish "freedom from attachment" from a real indifference that you would have if you were free from attachment? Another way of asking that question is, how can you not be indifferent if you are detached and have no feelings toward any object or person? Or, does freedom from attachment come with feelings and not indifference and, if it does, how does it come without feelings of remorse, pain, love, hate, need or desire?
Onward to my journey.

Shaykh Ahmadou Bamba

A different view of colonization from the eyes of the colonized.

I was just reading about a Muslim philosopher who led a successful nonviolent struggle for peace within the last century. Shaykh Ahmadou Bamba, who stated that “My religion is the love of God,” emphasized his spiritual heritage and wrote that he merely transmitted the messages of many great spiritual masters before him.

He was a founder of Mouridism, one of four Sufi movements in Senegal with several million followers. Faced with tourture and deportation, he responded with prayer and peaceful resistance, always emphasizing the virtues of pacifism and hard work in life. His followers aspire to live closer to God, following his example of living in peace, a Sufi philosophy.
His life reminds us of the adaptability of religion to different cultures, people and geographies throughout the world.
Ahmadou Bamba led a pacifist struggle against French colonialism in Senegal attempting to restore the practice of Islam away from French colonial influence. By doing so, Bamba led a spiritual struggle against this colonial domination of his culture.

It is always interesting to find these historic leaders who have remained in the shadows of our texts yet bring so much richness and life to our perspective of the cultural struggles that we have viewed from our Western lense. We have viewed west Africa from our colonial lense and rarely have we viewed its history from the perspective of the colonized. Richness abounds!

Pope and Islam

It was quite an historic day with the Pope making up for lost ground with the Islamic world, greeting King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. Here was the Pope who, not more than a year ago, implied that Muslims were "evil and inhuman," greeting the leader of the host country of Mecca.

New York Times

Pope Benedict Meets Saudi King at Vatican

By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
Published: November 7, 2007
ROME, Nov. 6 — Pope Benedict XVI and King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia clasped hands at the Vatican on Tuesday in the first official meeting between a pope and a Saudi monarch, who is entrusted to protect Mecca, the birthplace of Muhammad and the center of the Islamic world.
The two met for half an hour, speaking through interpreters, in a conversation that a Vatican news release said had been cordial and had covered the “value of collaboration between Christians, Muslims and Jews for promoting peace” and “the necessity of finding a just solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, among other themes.
Marco Politi, the Vatican correspondent for the Italian daily La Repubblica and a biographer of Pope John Paul II, said, “I think it is extraordinarily important that an official communiqué from the Vatican and an important Islamic state like Saudi Arabia mentions ‘cooperation’ between Christians Muslims and Jews — not dialogue but cooperation.”
The meeting, presaged by an upbeat front-page article in L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican’s newspaper, was also a clear attempt by the Vatican to repair damage done by the pope’s 2006 statement on Islam, which the Arab world had seen as insensitive if not incendiary.
In a speech in Regensburg, Germany, in September 2006, Benedict quoted a 14th-century Byzantine emperor who called Islam “evil and inhuman.” The comment led to protests in Islamic nations, and prompted some Islamic states to recall their Vatican ambassadors.
Firebombers attacked churches in the West Bank and Gaza, gunmen killed an Italian nun in Somalia, and the pope was threatened. The Vatican expressed “deepest regrets” but said the remark had been misinterpreted in a way that “absolutely did not correspond” to the pope’s intentions.
The article in the Vatican newspaper seemed to open the door for a diplomatic initiative toward Islam and the Middle East. It said the meeting with Abdullah was “of great importance.”
“In a world where the boundaries have become day by day more open, dialogue is not a choice but a necessity,” it said.
The article also acknowledged that some weeks ago Pope Benedict had received a letter from 138 Islamic religious leaders from 43 nations, appealing for more dialogue between Christians and Muslims. As the weeks went by with no response, some scholars here had complained that the pope seemed slow to address an important appeal. The Vatican allayed those fears on Tuesday.
The meeting represents a triumph of sorts for Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican secretary of state, and especially for Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. Cardinal Tauran, who previously served the church in Lebanon and Syria, is familiar with the Middle East and has promoted greater contact with Islamic states.
But official statements issued Tuesday did not mention establishing diplomatic relations between the Vatican and Saudi Arabia, and it was not clear that the topic was even discussed. In May, the United Arab Emirates became the latest Islamic country to establish diplomatic relations with the Vatican, the Vatican newspaper said.
One reason the Vatican wants to forge diplomatic relations in the Middle East, or at least increase its diplomatic influence there, is the presence of significant Roman Catholic populations in predominantly Muslim countries. Almost all are guest workers from elsewhere. The Vatican noted that 1.5 million Christians are in Saudi Arabia, the majority of them Catholics from the Philippines.
The State Department has criticized Saudi Arabia for religious intolerance and persecution of non-Muslims. “Charges of harassment, abuse and even killings at the hands of the Muttawa (religious police) continue to surface,” the department said in a report issued this year.
But little sign of tension was evident Tuesday. The pope gave the king a 16th-century engraving of the Vatican and a gold medal with his seal. The king gave the pope a sword, telling him it was “made of gold and precious stones.”
In 1999, long before becoming king, Abdullah met Benedict’s predecessor, John Paul II, who also met other prominent Muslim leaders, including, in 1999, Mohammad Khatami, a moderate cleric who was president of Iran.

Insha'allah

On the day when headlines show the Pope greeting King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, the GTU made even bigger news with the official opening of the Islamic Center. It was a beautiful event and a beautiful day. This op ed was in the SF Chronicle today.
Jack Luikart
The original article can be found on SFGate.com here:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/11/06/EDD7T6NQH.DTL
Tuesday, November 6, 2007 (SF Chronicle)
Studying Islam for a more peaceful world
James A. Donahue,Munir Jiwa
Despite popular assertions that religion is at the root of the world'sproblems as at no other time in recent history, closer study reveals thatit is not religion per se that is plaguing the world but themisunderstanding of religion. Positing a divide between Islam and theWest, or the religious and the secular, not only misrepresents Islam andMuslims, but the nature and mission of all faiths. Understanding andstudying Islam is a matter of great urgency - it is, in fact, critical, ifhumankind is to have a peaceful future. The Chronicle recently reported that despite an atmosphere of toleranceinthe Bay Area and the long history of Muslims in the United States, many ofthe Bay Area's 200,000 Muslims worry that they are seen by non-Muslims asoutsiders. How is religion so prone to being misunderstood? All too often we seereligion hijacked and twisted in the service of agendas wrought fromdeeply divisive issues, fueling fear and hatred, providing fertile groundfor the politics of polarization, which serves only to further divide.Study, debate and open dialogue, on the other hand, offer the promise ofunderstanding and living peacefully with each other. Because our work is graduate education in religion centered oninterreligious dialogue, engaging one another about difference is a way oflife for us at the Graduate Theological Union. In our teaching, researchand community conferences, as well as in our day-to-day operations as aconsortium of ecumenical and interfaith graduate programs, we embrace,rather than avoid, the critical tensions that arise from differentperspectives. A starting point for our work is the comparative study ofsacred texts - the Torah, Christian Bible and Quran. Our end goal is themaking of religious leaders and educators who will address issues ofreligious pluralism and difference in local communities, the nation andthe world. Why? Because one role of religion is to cultivate civiccharacter and virtue so differences in the public square can be peacefullynavigated and negotiated. In this way, rather than being a dividing force,religion can be a powerful catalyst for finding resolutions togeopolitical, economic and social problems. Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world. To study and teachIslam and to learn from Muslims is to understand the world and its complexand diverse faith traditions. As the West unfortunately casts a wary eyeon Islam, it is especially important to understand Islam in a broad,interfaith context. Today, the Graduate Theological Union will open aCenter for Islamic Studies in Berkeley that will focus on Islam as aliving world religion in a setting that includes the study of Judaism,Christianity, Buddhism and other religious traditions. The center will build an academic platform to help scholars andstudentsof many faiths understand Islam as a world religion with a theology ofpluralism and rich scholarly traditions. It also will sponsor conferencesto build bridges across religions and cultures, and it will serve as acommunity liaison with Bay Area Muslims. In all of these activities, itwill offer students and the larger community the opportunity to facedifferences and cooperate so even those who strongly disagree on issuesmight find enough common ground and a safe space to work together onprojects for the common good. One of our students recently asked, "Can I respectfully engage andwelcome'the other', while at the same time allowing others to be different?" Thisis an immensely important question. If asked by many, it offers a glimpseof what the Bay Area, the nation and the world could become. The very good, but under-reported news is that interfaith dialogue andaction is well underway in scores of academic, civic and religiouslocations around the world. We support these efforts. We look forward tocontributing in our own way, through interreligious education, to anunderstanding of Islam that could bring the world a step closer to peace.Because whatever name one gives to God, it seems inconceivable to us thatGod's purpose would be to divide humanity. James A. Donahue is the president of the Graduate Theological Union inBerkeley and a professor of ethics. Munir Jiwa is a professor of IslamicStudies and director of the Center for Islamic Studies at the GraduateTheological Union. www.gtu.edu----------------------------------------------------------------------Copyright 2007 SF Chronicle

Islam, Nonviolence, and Interfaith Relations

Just finished a good article by M. Mazzahim Mohideen (Islam, Nonviolence, and Interfaith Relations) who compared the monotheistic religions seeking areas of commonality. He also reached out to the non-monotheistic religions and philosophies saying, "The message of Islam is one of love, goodwill, understanding of others, truth, justice to all, kindness to all creatures created by God, and charity, which are the core values of all religions." There aren't fundamental differences in beliefs as to behavior of the human being and the human spirit---truth, justice, kindness and charity seem to be the common theme amongst them all--reaching to Buddhism and Hinduism.
In the more narrow stream of the religions of Abraham, several themes are very similar and clear:

• "The Christian God and Allah are the same supreme God"
• "If you ask a Muslim when Islam began, he would say it is as old as time, as old as God’s creation, as old as Adam and Abraham and Moses. Was not Abraham himself a Muslim and his son Ishmael the father of the Arab race? Every person is born a Muslim"
• There is "respect for life in its various forms."
• There are Similar prophets including Jesus, Abraham, Moses, David.

But a distinct difference in Islam from our more secular Western style is that "The Qur‘an makes it clear that religion cannot confine itself to one segment of human life, nor can it choose to abstain from exercising any decisive influence over everyday life. Religion is not a private matter for each individual. The moral dimension of human activity—be it political, social, or economic—is the concern of religion. Moral issues affect the relations not only between individuals but also among groups, communities, and nations."

"Islam preaches the brotherhood of man. The Muslim brotherhood is a community within the wider brotherhood of those who subscribe to the belief in the existence of the One God and the accountability of man on the Last Day."