being objective in the practice of life

Objectivity in life, by the practice of love, may come somewhat easy when it is an experience with someone who is close; however, if the person is not someone you are close too, it may be more difficult to be objective and productive. An experience that tested my willingness to be objective came last semester when i was working with the president of the Muslim Student Association at SFSU. The experience with him, though being difficult, proved to not only help my patience when someone is rude and disrespectful, but, also helped me to learn to respect peoples' opinions; especially, when they go against my own.

Last semester, the Muslim Student Association became inactive and almost lost our prayer room. In order to save the MSA, a group of Muslim students got together and made themselves in charge of the group, appointing a Shia as the president. Often times, as can be seen in what happened in Iraq after Saddam Hussein lost power, the Shia and Sunni Muslims do not get along with each other due to differences in beliefs. Luckily, in America, we usually do not have this problem. So it was a shock when i was tested in my objectivity after an experience with him.

One of my friend's dad is a religious scholar in Saudi Arabia, so, he sent 100 Qurans and a bunch of other islamic books to the Muslim Student Association as donations. One day, a friend and I were in the prayer room and the president was looking through the books that were just donated. I saw he was reading a very good book so i said, "Oh that book is really good. Do you like it?" His response was, "I am not reading them. I am just making sure there is nothing Wahabbi in them all." This was an insult. Wahabbi is a derrogatory term that the Shia Muslims made about Sunni Muslims and for him to say it to our faces was very insulting to my friend who was there with me and myself. Instantly we were filled with the feeling of fury.

It would have been so easy to attack him verbally or physically right then and there. Thank Allah, my friend and I both put our patience into practice and just walked away. Walking away is not really being objective though; or at least not completing the objectivity. So, a few days later, we both took turns talking to him one on one, afterwhich, he actually apologized and admitted being wrong. He later made the same mistakes with others and ended up quitting, but not because of this or my friend and I complaining.

Even when i was angry, I realized he is the president of the Muslims at school and he is my Muslim brother. My initial reaction was to walk away and I wanted so bad to tell everyone about what he had said about the gracious donation which was given to us. I spent the whole night reading about how I should react and deal with the situation. After reading many different Ayat and Hadith, I realized being patient, giving consultation, and hiding his flaw from others would be the best and most objective thing to do. The hadith i read that caused me to make this decision was the hadith reported in Sahih Bukhari, narrated by Abdullah Ibn Abbas that the Prophet (pbuh) said,

"A Muslim is the brother of another Muslim, so he should not oppress him nor should he hand him over to an oppressor. Whoever fulfills the need of his brother, Allah will fulfill his needs; whoever brings his brother out of discomfort, Allah will bring him out of the discomforts of the Day of Ressurection, and whoever veils the defects of a Muslim, Allah will screen his defects on the Day of Resurrection."

This experience helped me to learn how to be objective by being patient and kind in dealing with people when they insult me or say something harmful. By learning from this experience, I am able to have a better relationship with my family as well. I find myself being more forgiving and kind when dealing with them as well as listening to them even when I don’t agree with what I am saying. So all in all, Fromm is right when he talks about having patience and self-discipline by having rational faith using reason. For me, I used reason and logic when I turned to the Quran and Sunnah for guidance on how to deal with this experience of conflict and it worked, not only with this experience, but also, with many interactions with other people close to me, or people I don’t have a close relationship with.

Tala Al Badru Alayna

There is one song in the world I can bear to listen to and that song is “Tala al-badru alayna”. This song is around 1430 old and is still very popular among all Muslims. It is not so much a song as it is a poem. Nevertheless, it was first sung with great cheerfulness and meaning. This song is very important to me because it signifies the victory and reinforcement of my Islamic faith.

This song was sung by the children of the city of Madinah as the Prophet (peace and blessings upon him) made his entrance to the city after successfully winning the battle of Tabuk and escaping assassins on the return. Tabuk was the last battle that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) went to. On the way back some assassins from the Muslims tried to kill him, but his companion saved him. Upon seeing the Muslim army returning to madinah, the children and women ran out to meet them singing this poem they had prepared for the arrival. There hearts were so full of joy upon seeing the victory Islam had on that day. I feel the same joy every time I think about the victory Islam won over my heart. My favorite part of the song is the two lines “And we owe it to show gratefulness/When the call to Allah is called”. Whenever I learn Islam or am in prayer is when I am at my happiest and it is the time of my greatest humility. With the humility I have when I attend lessons, Quran readings, and prayer leads to overwhelming gratefulness that seems too little for Allah guiding me to his religion. Even the Prophet (peace and blessings upon him) was grateful at the time of the singing of this song as reported in many Hadiths in which it was narrated,

When the mountain of uhud came in the sight of Allah's Apostle he said, "This is a mountain that loves us and is loved by us. O Allah! Abraham made Mecca a sanctuary, and I make in between these two mountains a sanctuary.”

This was his gratefulness to Allah by asking Allah to send his goodness upon the area of Madinah in the same way Abraham asked Allah to bless the area of Mecca. This goodness is a blessing upon all the inhabitants of the city of Madinah to be righteous and to make them of the best to worship Allah. Allah’s Messenger (peace be upon him) was the first and best one to call people to Allah as the song says and so just saying these lines brings a smile to my face and a teardrop to my heart.

When I listen to the song, I feel as if I am one of the kids singing it and feeling so happy that the Muslim army returned victorious, leaving no other threat of hostility around the Muslims for the first time in years. Now, once again, the Muslims have threats from all over. The Muslim countries of Palestine, Iraq, and Afghanistan have been invaded and here in the United States and Europe there has been rises in hate crimes and unfair laws against Muslims. Listening and singing this song lets me imagine the feeling of security the Muslims felt after this splendid view of the Muslim army appearing next to mount Ehud in the valley of Wada’. I hope that, soon, the wars will stop, people will stop committing hate crimes and governments will stop legislating against Muslims just like when this song was sang. All the Muslim children in the world are taught this song and I hope we can repeat the joyous singing of it together one day.

Tala' al-badru alayna

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There is one song in the world I can bear to listen to and that song is “Tala al-badru alayna”. This song is around 1430 old and is still very popular among all Muslims. It is not so much a song as it is a poem. Nevertheless, it was first sung with great cheerfulness and meaning. This song is very important to me because it signifies the victory and reinforcement of my Islamic faith.

This song was sung by the children of the city of Madinah as the Prophet (peace and blessings upon him) made his entrance to the city after successfully winning the battle of Tabuk and escaping assassins on the return. Tabuk was the last battle that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) went to. On the way back some assassins from the Muslims tried to kill him, but his companion saved him. Upon seeing the Muslim army returning to madinah, the children and women ran out to meet them singing this poem they had prepared for the arrival. There hearts were so full of joy upon seeing the victory Islam had on that day. I feel the same joy every time I think about the victory Islam won over my heart. My favorite part of the song is the two lines “And we owe it to show gratefulness/When the call to Allah is called”. Whenever I learn Islam or am in prayer is when I am at my happiest and it is the time of my greatest humility. With the humility I have when I attend lessons, Quran readings, and prayer leads to overwhelming gratefulness that seems too little for Allah guiding me to his religion. Even the Prophet (peace and blessings upon him) was grateful at the time of the singing of this song as reported in many Hadiths in which it was narrated,

When the mountain of uhud came in the sight of Allah's Apostle he said, "This is a mountain that loves us and is loved by us. O Allah! Abraham made Mecca a sanctuary, and I make in between these two mountains a sanctuary.”

This was his gratefulness to Allah by asking Allah to send his goodness upon the area of Madinah in the same way Abraham asked Allah to bless the area of Mecca. This goodness is a blessing upon all the inhabitants of the city of Madinah to be righteous and to make them of the best to worship Allah. Allah’s Messenger (peace be upon him) was the first and best one to call people to Allah as the song says and so just saying these lines brings a smile to my face and a teardrop to my heart.

When I listen to the song, I feel as if I am one of the kids singing it and feeling so happy that the Muslim army returned victorious, leaving no other threat of hostility around the Muslims for the first time in years. Now, once again, the Muslims have threats from all over. The Muslim countries of Palestine, Iraq, and Afghanistan have been invaded and here in the United States and Europe there has been rises in hate crimes and unfair laws against Muslims. Listening and singing this song lets me imagine the feeling of security the Muslims felt after this splendid view of the Muslim army appearing next to mount Ehud in the valley of Wada’. I hope that, soon, the wars will stop, people will stop committing hate crimes and governments will stop legislating against Muslims just like when this song was sang. All the Muslim children in the world are taught this song and I hope we can repeat the joyous singing of it together one day.

stem/long stem or chaos/peace/chaos

The silence in the song “Stem/Long Stem” really drew me in and attracted me. I am not a fan of music and do not listen to it accept when forced to like when I am at work. Music really makes me uncomfortable. In the beginning of the song my heart felt extremely uneasy because of the beat. The silence that came in the middle and toward the end of the song provided a much-needed break from all the disturbances and distractions which music brings with it. This relates to life in many ways, which may be why I felt so strongly to write about this song. In life, especially working students’ lives, there is so much going on all the time, whether it’s homework or tests or work when involved with a student organization on campus. So this break of silence in the song represents the breaks that the busy person should take from the chaos happening in the world around them. This can come in many shapes and forms according to each person’s aspect of truth, culture, or religion.

The spoken word segment was also important to me because of my life experiences with the law and people in authority. I have suspended license because of a ticket I received for not having registration on my car a year ago. Actually I have accrued approximately 8 traffic tickets in the past 5 years, none of which were for moving violations. They were all for having no registration or no license. It is so frustrating that you get tickets for not having enough money to pay previous tickets. So, that is why I could totally relate to the guy speaking about waiting for trial because he had unpaid traffic tickets. I could also relate to him because I, too, waited in the holding cell behind the courtroom, waiting to go before the judge.

            

After explaining about waiting for the court in the holding cell, the spoken word becomes drowned in the return of the beat. That means he becomes drowned in the chaos again. It seems he is somewhat saved from the chaos while he is to himself in the courtroom holding cell. Maybe his name was called and this represents the chaos once he enters the courtroom, knowing he looks guilty wearing prison clothes.

            

Overall, this song really brings on the feeling of chaos followed by a time of peace, and then returns to chaos. The chaos is not overwhelming due to the break in the middle of it. To me, the song makes the point that we should take a break from all the chaos in our daily lives so that it does not become overwhelming and unbearable. Each person may have a different way to divert his or her lives from the chaos for a moment. Mine is prayer.