If we Muslims aren’t to share in modernity’s despair or unhappiness, if we wish to prise ourselves from this web of distraction, we need to see the world with a critical prophetic perspective. This perspective is one that wants us to marvel at Allah’s creation and be filled with a sense of awe and thanks…
Clothes & Souls that Make Us Want to Stand Out
One hadith states: ‘Whoever dresses in clothes of attracting attention (shuhrah, lit. ‘fame’) in this life, Allah shall clothe him in garbs of humiliation on the Day of Resurrection.’1 The way we dress can and often does, therefore, have to do with the inward state of our souls. We are told in the scholarly commentaries…
A Real Crisis in the Trust of Muslim Scholars and Leadership
LET ME START with this statistic: By 2050, it’s predicted Muslims will be as high as 18% of Britain’s total population, rather than the 4.5% that they currently are. With such numbers, this alone imposes on us the urgent task of evolving a socially and politically relevant, and theologically-authentic, set of leadership challenges that are…
Is Today’s Islam a Failure or Success Story?
This is one of the shorter essays in my forthcoming book, God-willing, entitled: Modernity & Muslimness: Sixty Short Essays that Should Matter. As part of the introduction to the book, I wrote: In his travelogue on Islam in late nineteenth century England, Asmay started by saying: 'Eight years ago, a faint sound began to come…
Modernity & Compulsory Schooling: the Theft of Children’s Minds?
‘We don't need no education We don't need no thought control No dark sarcasm in the class room Teachers leave them kids alone Hey teachers leave them kids alone! All in all it's just another brick in the wall.’ [Pink Floyd, Brick in the Wall] IN 1800 ONLY five percent of Britain had any formal…