RISTalks

From Identity to Community

Dr. Abdal Hakim Jackson - RIS Talks

Opening

In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah. We seek His help, forgiveness and guidance. And we seek refuge in Allah from the evil of our souls and from the evil of our deeds. Whomsoever He guides, none can misguide him. And whosoever He declares misled, none can guide him. And I bear witness that there is none worthy of worship except Allah, and that Muhammad is His servant and Messenger. Peace and blessings be upon him and his family and companions. May Allah open my heart and make it easy for me to speak. May He release the seal of my tongue so that my speech can be understood. And protect me from the evil of my soul and the foulness of my tongue. And let me be misguided, misguided, misguided without the right of the Lord of the worlds.

And after this, peace and blessings of Allah be upon you.

Main Presentation

First of all, I want to apologize for, I wasn't trying to be cool on the stage with my sunglasses and stuff. You can't see it from there, but there's these lights here and I must be getting, I don't want to say this, my daughter is here, she thinks she can still beat me running, but anyway.

I'm getting a little older and from reading all those bad Egyptian editions, it's starting to give me trouble with my eyes. So I was just trying to protect my eyes a little bit because I can't see without my real glasses now. The other thing that I want to start off by saying is, I've been to a number of RIS conferences and these RIS conferences are usually held in Canada.

And for me it's been a wonderful sort of Canadian experience. But at this moment I want to take the opportunity and welcome the Canadians to my country. Welcome.

The title of the theme that I've been assigned is the American Muslim experience from identity to community. And I've tried to take that assignment quite literally and that's what I'm going to try to

limit my remarks this afternoon to. But prior to going into the topic proper, I have a somewhat, what may be deemed to be a lengthy sort of preamble or introduction.

Because for me it's really important, especially in these days and times, that when one speaks, that one is actually understood to be saying what one intends to say. What I want to try and do therefore is to try to put you in a position to actually hear me and to hear me in the context in which I mean to convey the meanings that I'm trying to convey. Sometimes in order to really be heard, to be heard to the point that people can actually process what you're saying, it's not only enough that you speak clearly and eloquently, it's also necessary that people come to an understanding of the actual perspective from which you speak.

And what you say in your capacity as a father is not going to be understood in the same way as what you say in your capacity as a son. And so the perspective from which you speak is really going to inform what people take from your words. And what I'd like to do today myself is, as a preamble both to this talk and to the talk that I have to give later on this afternoon, I want to try and put you in a position to understand what I actually mean when I say what I have to say about the topic of the American Muslim experience from identity to community.

My Complex Identity

The first thing I want to say here is that one of the problems that I have in speaking in an American context has to do with the fact that I have a sort of complex identity. And I mean complex not in the sense of difficult to understand, but I mean in the sense of being made up of multiple ingredients. On the one hand, I am a Muslim.

And at the same time, I'm also a Westerner. In fact, I'm a very particular species of Westerner. I'm an American.

And so I am a Muslim American. And for many people, including unfortunately a significant number of Muslims, these two features are not easily interacted together. They don't combine to produce a synergy that can make for new possibilities and new promises.

For many people, this is an oxymoron. How can you be a Muslim and an American at the same time? You cannot honestly combine. You cannot effectively combine.

You cannot realistically combine being a Muslim on the one hand with being an American on the other. And what this has a tendency to do for a lot of people is when they hear you speak, they either hear you as a Muslim and nothing else, and they process everything you say in that context, or they hear you as an American and nothing else, and they process what you say in that context. And for me, this is a problem.

Because as I said, I speak not just as a Muslim, but as a Muslim American, as an American Muslim. And what do I mean by that? Because I know some people get a little shaky when they start hearing things like that. Islam and Amriqi.

In fact, I was in Cairo last year as a whole book entitled Islam and Amriqi. This sort of compromise Islam. I guess that means we're going to make three salats a day instead of five or something like that.

We don't wash our feet in wudu or something. I don't know. But that's not what I mean by the fact that I am an American Muslim.

By that, when I say that I'm an American, I don't just mean that I'm somebody who was just born in America or who simply lives in America or who just has an American or carries American citizenship. I am all those things, but that's not what I'm referring to. For me, when I say that I'm an American, I mean that I'm somebody who's psychological, who's intellectual, who's emotional, who's cultural profile was fired out of a centuries-long existence here in America and handed down to me generation after generation, something that has entered into my DNA and makes me part of who I am.

All of my childhood dreams take shape in America. And when I dream of success, going down to court and slam dunking like Dr. J, the people in the stands who are cheering, they're Americans in my dreams. When I dream about my daughters happily getting married and going to the wedding and crying, I dream about a wedding that's held right here in the country of my birth and of their birth.

When I dream of my sons successfully completing their college degrees and going on to successful careers, those dreams are an American. That's what I mean by myself being an American. I don't mean that I'm just born here.

I mean that my constitution has been shaped by the fact that I was born and raised here. And I have no apologies about that. At the same time, however, I'm a Muslim.

And when I say I'm a Muslim, I don't simply mean someone who was born to Muslim parents. I personally was not. I was not born to Muslim parents.

I came into Islam as a conscious choice. I looked around the society that I was in, and I undertook my own critique of that reality. And on the basis of that critique and by the assistance of Allah putting me in contact with people who could guide my hand, I decided to become a Muslim on my own free will.

When no gunboats out in the Atlantic Ocean, when no armies invading the American lands, this was my own free, uncoerced choice to become a Muslim. As a Muslim, then, when I say that I am a Muslim, when I say that I am a Muslim, I mean that I'm a Muslim and that my most basic, most fundamental, and primary commitment is to Islam. And when I say that, I don't mean just Islam as a religion in the sense of, you know, some sort of private set of beliefs that can be very neatly tucked away and limited to one's private life.

That's not what I mean when I say that Islam is my primary commitment. I mean that Islam is an orientation for me, an orientation towards life, an orientation that recognizes as its point of departure two main things. One, that this life that I have, that continues to pulsate within me, this is a gift from God.

That's the first thing. Second, as a point of departure, God is watching me as I live my life, and he is aware of how I'm living my life, and he will call me to account for how I live my life. That's what I mean when I say that Islam is an orientation for me.

And therefore, it informs the manner in which I go about living my life, and that is the primary thing that informs the way that I live my life. I might not always hit the mark. My wife and daughter are here.

They can probably tell you a little something about that. I might not always hit the mark, but that is my orientation. That is my ideal.

That is my aspiration. That is how I want to live my life. And so I'm an American on the one hand, born, raised, and fired in America, and I'm a Muslim on the other, whose primary commitment is to Islam.

Addressing Concerns About Loyalty

Now I want to pause and just take a moment, hopefully, to put some Muslims here at ease, because in the present climate, I'm sure there are a few of our brothers and sisters who are out there who are getting a little bit nervous, because when people start talking about their primary commitment being to Islam and all that stuff in this kind of an atmosphere, you know, that raises a few fears on the part of Muslims, because it implies that if your primary commitment is to Islam, then your primary commitment cannot be to the American state. And if your primary commitment is not to the American state, you are a problem. So there are many Muslims out there saying, Dr. Jackson is about to get us all locked up and deported.

So many Muslims are nervous when they hear those kinds of things. On the other hand, there are some people in this room. They are the liars and the hypocrites.

I don't mean munafiqeen in the sense of what we talk about munafiqeen in the Muslim community. I mean there are some non-Muslims probably in this room. They are liars and they are hypocrites.

And they are here to take my words, to twist them, and to then make them into a reason for America as a whole to be scared of Islam and these Muslims, these people who cannot be loyal to our own society. Those people, and there are some of them here, I can almost guarantee you, I don't know them by face, but they are here. They are jumping for joy.

Got them. He said it right out of his own mouth. His primary commitment is to Islam.

So let me then, because they are saying that if your primary commitment is to Islam, then you're just the fifth column. We got to do something about these people. Right? So let me then try to set the record straight.

And let me speak for myself as opposed to having someone else speak for me. My primary commitment is to Islam. And it's not to the American state.

Nor is it to any other state. Nor will it ever be to any other state. Including a so-called Islamic state.

My primary commitment is to living my life in a manner that God and his messenger have prescribed for me to live my life. And that means that sometimes, yes, I'm going to speak for society when society needs to be spoken for. And I'm going to speak even for the American state when the American state needs to be spoken for.

But sometimes I'm going to have to stand up and I'm going to have to speak against American society and against the American state in order to live my life in a manner that earns God's pleasure. That's what I mean when I say that my primary commitment is to Islam. And not to any state.

And those liars who are out there, I want you to hear what I say. Not only the American state, even an Islamic state. I will never prostitute my religion just to hand it over to some state to do whatever it wants to do with it as some kind of free permission to just go on and abuse people in the name of religion.

I won't do it. That's not what my primary commitment is. That's not what my primary commitment is.

A Different Form of Patriotism

And I would argue this, we don't need religious communities who are like that. I personally do not believe in that form of patriotism that says my country right or wrong. I don't believe in that form of patriotism.

In fact, we had that under Hitler. And we see where that led to. I believe in a different form of patriotism.

And this is why I wanted to take the time to position myself so you can understand where I'm coming from. Because for many of you, America might just be a country. Like so many other countries.

Let me tell you something. For me, America is home. Home.

But I don't believe in that form of patriotism that says my country right or wrong. I believe in a form of patriotism that takes off on a statement that we get from the Prophet Muhammad where he says, He said what? Help your brother. Whether he is right or wrong.

Then they said to the Prophet. That skipped a minute. Never mind.

Then they said to the Prophet, Oh Rasulullah, we know what you mean when you say help your brother if he is right. But how can we help our brother if he is wrong? What did the Prophet tell them? You help your brother when he is wrong by stopping him from being wrong. That is the form of patriotism that I believe in.

(Hadith Reference)

Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 2444

I will help my country. I will help my society as long as it is right. And when they are wrong, I will stand up and say you are wrong.

And I will do so not in an attempt to destroy or undermine you. I will do so out of a sense of duty to the place that I call home. To the place that I call home.

To the place that my children call home. To the place that my grandchildren are going to call home, Inshallah. So I want it understood what I mean when I say my primary commitment is to Islam.

And no one should be afraid of this. Muslims who have a sincere commitment to Islam. If they understand Islam, and I am going to talk about this in a minute.

This society has nothing to be afraid of. And in fact, it can expect to reap the benefits of a Muslim community. Who can bring a sense of sanity to some of the things that we see going on in our own society.

We can be the people who offer the alternative. We can be the people who reintroduce to our sort of national culture. That we don't simply spend our time in distractions.

But that we are a people who know the meaning of sacrifice and discipline. And so when we are hit with hard times, we know how to sacrifice and discipline. We don't have to go out and ravage other countries and ravage other resources.

Just in order to fill an ever-expanding appetite for more and more and more. This is part of what a healthy community of Muslims could contribute to this society. And this is what we need as Muslims to begin to focus on.

I believe in fact the last thing that America needs is a scared, cowardly, yes man and yes woman religious community. That's the last thing America needs. What this country needs from us is the courage to stand up and to speak the truth.

And to speak the truth even when it's against us. And when I say that we should help our society when it's wrong, I mean wrong. I don't mean that it's doing things just because we don't like it.

They serve, I don't know, mashed potatoes instead of couscous or baba ghanoush. This is cultural imperialism. And many Muslims are afflicted with this kind of cultural imperialism.

They blame the West when the West goes around the world and wants to impose its culture on everybody else. And then they come right here into their own Muslim communities and want to impose their culture in the same way. This is not my commitment.

At all. And that's not what I mean when I talk about my primary commitment being to Islam. Our country needs us.

And it needs us to stand up. And if we're going to stand up, we have to have something that we're going to stand up in the name of. And if we have compromised away all of the principles that define our religion as what it is, then we don't have anything to stand up in the name of.

All we have are interests and no principles. And that is what we have to avoid. So this takes me back to my original point about being heard.

Understanding My Perspective as Both Muslim and American

And heard to be saying what I'm actually trying to say. So now that you know that I'm an American, I have no apologies about that. And you know that I'm a Muslim, and I have no apologies about that.

You should know this then. When I critique America, I critique America not just as a Muslim, but also as a consciously self-identifying American. In other words, my critique of America for whatever I critique her of is an internal critique.

I'm critiquing my own. It's not an outsider, alien critique. It's a critique grounded in a sense of belongingness to America and duty to America.

That is the kind of critique that I am engaged in. And when I say belongingness to America and duty to America, I'm not necessarily talking about any particular policy of the American government. But I'm talking about my sense of belongingness and my sense of duty, again, to the place that I call home.

And so when you hear me critique America, don't just go off and applaud, because yes, another Muslim critique of America makes us so happy. I'm not critiquing America just as a Muslim. I'm critiquing America as a Muslim American.

And I'm critiquing her from within as a part of my own self-critique. Because I, too, helped make America. And I, too, own her failures as well as her successes.

So when I critique her, I critique her as an American. Conversely, when I praise America, and there is much to praise America about, despite our problems with many aspects of American foreign policy. And we have to, on the one hand, speak to what's wrong with American foreign policy.

But we cannot allow ourselves to be reduced to people who equate America with her foreign policy only. That's not only what she is. So when I praise America, I praise America not just as an American.

I also praise her as a Muslim. And I praise her as a Muslim in the spirit of what Allah says. Out of a sense of fairness, of integrity, and of honesty and truth, I will praise America when America deserves to be praised.

And there is much to praise America for. And the only people, the only two people who don't know that. One, somebody who's never been anywhere.

I've been around. I've been to many countries in the Muslim world. And I've seen.

Trust me, there is much to praise America for. That's number one. Number two, number two, number two.

Some people just can't bring themselves to praise something or somebody with whom they have a disagreement. We don't like what America is doing in Afghanistan. And therefore, we can't praise America for the freedoms that we enjoy at home.

No. We say, we don't like what you're doing in Afghanistan, and here's why. And we say, we love the fact.

We respect the fact. We appreciate the fact. We honor the fact that you provide these liberties for us and everybody else at home.

We are a fair and balanced community. That's the spirit in which I critique and I praise America. It's also the spirit in which I critique and praise the Muslim community.

And there are things that the Muslim community needs to be critiqued about. And there are things that the Muslim community needs to be praised about. And when I critique the Muslim community, don't just look at me, Shaif al-Islam al-Maliki.

He's one of those Americans who's not really loyal to the Muslim community. He's critiquing us. No, I'm critiquing you as a Muslim, as one of you.

And when I praise the Muslim community, I'm praising the Muslim community as an American as well, on the understanding that other fair-minded Americans would also praise that Muslim community. So this is the light in which I want you to hear what I have to say about the issue of the American Muslim experience from identity to community in all of the 15 minutes I have left now. But that's my fault.

The Challenge: From Identity Politics to Community

Now, I assume that this title is meant to carry a sense or, in a sense, to describe where we are as a Muslim community in America today. And then to talk about how we can get to where we need to go. Everybody recognizes that we are not quite where we would like to be today.

All right? We are a community that has been imprisoned by identity politics, a community that prided itself on its differences from those around them. We prided ourselves on that. And then 9-11 happened.

And we found ourselves then in a position where we now need to figure out how to reduce the differences between us and the people around us. After we had been a community who equated commitment to Islam with how much we differed from those who are around us, we then end up as a community who now wants to what? Reduce, diminish our differences with those around us so that they can accept us into the body politic as people who belong in America. And so the question becomes, how now do we reduce our emphasis on identity and how we're different from others and

get to a point where we can end up in community with those people who are around us? And I guess that's what I'm being called here to say a few words about.

Now, personally, I think it's really important to understand two things. One, how we got here. How did we get to the point where we are right now? And we as a Muslim community have to understand that and we have to take ownership and responsibility for it.

This didn't just happen. It didn't just happen. We just woke up one day and where are we? No, it didn't just happen like that.

We as a Muslim community were agents. We had agency in bringing this about. And we need to understand that and take responsibility for it.

Second, we need to ask, is this really where we should be? And if it weren't for 9-11, we would all be fine with where we are right now, still emphasizing the differences between those around us and ourselves. In other words, if 9-11 had not happened, we'd still be harping on (وَهُوَ كُفْرٌ بِمَنْ فَوْقَهُمْ وَمَنْ تَشبَّهَ بِقَوْمٍ فَهُوَ مِنْهُمْ). We'd still be harping on that. Is that where we are? Or do we recognize that we made a mistake? That we misunderstood something? And that as a result of that, we have to go back, get the right understanding, and correct that mistake.

Now, personally, I believe that we made a mistake and that we misunderstood the Sunnah of Muhammad (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ) that we misunderstood Islam, and that in many ways we betrayed the best tradition of the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ). And only by correcting this misunderstanding can we effectively find our way forward.

Three Major Mistakes We Made

Now, I've got three points that I want to hopefully try to rush through, but they're very important points. I want to begin by looking at the history and the demographics of America in the 20th century.

Dr. Omar has given us some very enlightening insight into America, primarily before the 20th century. But I want to talk a little bit about America in the 20th century. And the first thing I want to begin with is the fact that Islam in America is old.

And even beyond the individual sort of conversions that Dr. Omar talked about, even in terms of communal conversion to Islam in America, communal conversion to Islam in America is almost a century old. Almost a hundred years old. Noble Dru Ali founded the Morris Science Temple in 1913.

We are now in 2010. That's almost a hundred years. All right? But there are many here who are going to say, What? Morris Science Temple?

With that whacked-down Akida they had? Real Muslims? They didn't really believe in Islam as it should be believed in, and therefore they should not be counted as any kind of beginning of Islam.

First mistake. First mistake. On the basis of what do I say this? Yes, their Akida was not Islam.

So what? Astaghfirullah, ya akhi. You mean, so what? Listen to what I'm about to say. Because the problem that we have had as a community, we have had no historical consciousness.

We have not understood conversion to Islam as a process. We've understood it as an event. And it's never been that way.

Not even in the time of the Prophet (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ). This is one of our first mistakes. I want to ask you right now, and don't lie to yourselves. Be honest with yourselves.

What do you think Islam was like when it first went to India? You think they all had the right Akida? Really? What do you think Islam was like when it went to Southeast Asia? In Malaysia, Indonesia, and places like that. You think they popped up overnight with the right Akida? What do you think Islam was like in sub-Saharan Africa? When it first went to sub-Saharan Africa. It takes communities time to find themselves in a position of orthodoxy.

And we as a Muslim community need to understand that. And we need to understand how to chaperone these communities along that track. Not to come in and bust them all upside the head.

You ain't no Muslim. And then destroy the very process by which they might arrive at that. That was our first mistake.

And I want to call your attention to something here. I want to call your attention to something here. The famous eponym of the Ash'ari school.

Wrote a book called Maqalat al Islamineen. Wa Ikhtilaf al Musalmineen. The doctrines.

He didn't say I'm a Muslim. Of the Islamineen. What did he mean by that? Those people who identified with Islam.

Who associated themselves with Islam. And wallahi you read this book. And you read some of the doctrines in that book.

It will make your hair stand on end. But al Ash'ari understood something. Something that we have not understood.

That this is part of the process. This is part of the process. People, let me tell you.

This is strict time isn't it? Yeah this is R.S. I wanted to just give a sense. I mean this is real. This is real.

When I first became a Muslim. I'm a convert from Christianity. Right? I didn't want to hear nothing about no sunnah.

You know why? I'm coming out of Christianity. We got an intermediary. I understand Islam as you got a straight track to God.

That's what I want. And my understanding of the sunnah was they were standing in my way. And it took some time.

And some brothers and some understanding. To chaperone me through that. You understand what I mean by that? I wasn't rejecting Islam.

I'm trying to find my way. Trying to find my way. But we didn't give this movement here time to find its way.

First mistake. Right? And I want to say one last thing about this. This even goes back to the time of the Prophet Muhammad (صَلَّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ). You read in the books of Sira.

There's an incident they call it. That's an unlock. That's an unlock.

And it's like in the 8th year after the Hijrah. 8 years. After the Prophet had been in Medina.

Teaching and doing all that he was doing. He takes a group of Muslims out. And they find some pagans who have hung some things on some bush.

Sort of as a shrine. And what do they say to the Prophet? Oh Rasulallah. Make us a shrine like the shrine they have.

Clear what? Uh-huh. You see what I mean? What does the Prophet do? No. He says no, no, no.

You're still ignorant. All right. And he works with them.

This is not going to avail them. Huh? This is not going to avail them. No, no, no.

You can't do this. And he what? And he moves on. This is a part of the process.

The process. So the first mistake we made was we came to this whole thing with no sense of historical consciousness. Second, because of immigration quotas, Muslims from the Muslim world did not begin to come to America in any real numbers until after 1965.

1965, they changed the immigration rules. They programmed the National Origins Act. And Muslims were able to come over.

All right. Now, when Muslims came from the Muslim world, the process of Islamization. Does everybody understand what I mean by Islamization? Do I mean everybody has the right aqeedah? Do I mean everybody's praying five times a day like they should? Do I mean that nobody was doing anything haram? That's not what I mean.

I mean that the people had begun to identify with Islam, and they were on their way to finding themselves. Just like they were in India, just like they were in sub-Saharan Africa, just like they were in Southeast Asia. And somehow America gets denied this privilege of finding itself.

Uh-uh. You Americans, y'all going to be 100% Muslim tomorrow. That's it.

Right? So when we come over, what we do is we don't recognize something that the Prophet صلى الله عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ taught us through his sunnah. All right. In terms of how we interact with the societies around us.

And in fact, and this is a shame, Elijah Muhammad was closer to following the sunnah of Muhammad صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ in this regard than the Sunnis were. What do I mean by that? Elijah Muhammad, by the way, I know many of you are wondering, no, I was never a member of the nation of Islam.

All right.

I'm speaking as a Muslim here. But what did Elijah Muhammad do? He said there are wonderful aspects about American society and culture.

And what am I going to do? I'm going to take all of them and re-inscribe them with Islamic value.

And all the other stuff, I'm going to leave you. To the point that they are able to come up with an Islamic identity that is wholly made up of American cultural artifacts. Does everyone understand what I mean by that? And what they do, just like the Prophet was able to do, is show that you can establish your difference from the people.

Because you are. You are someone of tawheed. You are not someone of shirk or kufr.

You are different from them in that regard. While at the same time, remaining a part of them. Remaining a part of them.

And the benefit of this, just like it was in the time of the Prophet, is that when those people finally come around to actually hearing you for what you're saying. And they begin to contemplate the whole enterprise of entering into Islam. They won't feel like they have to commit cultural, racial, ethnic suicide or apostasy in order to do that.

They can just walk right across the street and they're still at home. This is what the Prophet did. Look at Arabian society.

Look at all the things that the Prophet accepted from Arabian society. Some he accepted in whole. Some he modified.

And by the way, don't get confused here. Arabian society at the time was a society that opposed Islam. This is a society where Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَى himself says, Who is he talking to? Arabian society.

And yet this society is a society in which the Prophet could do what? Take some of this. Leave some of that. Take some of this.

Leave some of that. To appropriate it according to what he saw fit. And here the bottom line is, is this.

Is that the Prophet was able to do this in large part because despite the fact that he was the Prophet. When he went to Medina as a society, he had the courage and the humility to ask. He didn't come in here and say, I'm the Prophet of God.

Nobody has a better understanding of Islam than me. I'm going to tell you what everything means. No.

He said, what? The Jewish community here, they're fasting on this day. Why are they fasting that? You hear what I said? Why are they doing that? He asked, why are they doing that? Why are they doing that? All right. And because he was able to rely on the insights of Sahaba who knew Medina better than he did.

Who understood the implications of what was going on. The Prophet was able to benefit from that experience. And to avoid missteps that could have cost him dearly.

And this is the second mistake that we as a Muslim community made in America. Arrogance. We did not have the courage and the humility to say, yes, we may understand Islam.

We know very little about America. We don't understand what's going on here. Let us ask.

Let us ask our Muslim brothers and sisters who are already here. Let us find out what's going on. This is the second mistake.

The Third Mistake: Confusing Non-Muslim with Un-Islamic

Third mistake. Third mistake. And I got 13 seconds.

But I want to, this is a very important point. I have two more points, but I want to limit it to this. Because this is a very important point.

And here's where the beginning of the solution resides. The third mistake that we made was that we lost our ability to distinguish between non-Muslim and un-Islamic. The people who came to this country from the Muslim world, they understood Islam.

And therefore the Islamic in the cultural terms in which they had grown up. And I'm not mad at anybody. This is not a blame game here.

I'm one of you. This is an attempt to understand where we are and how we can go on from here. All right? They understood that.

And if Islam and the Islamic is what we do back in Pakistan or Egypt or whatever, then the American is what? Un-Islamic. And we end up doing what? The more we move away from the Americans, the more we become what? The more Islamic we become. Some of us in this hall, Brother Omar gets up, walks on the stage, people say, We don't even know if we can clap.

No, no, don't get me wrong. If there are people who have

But that's not what we're doing. We're saying Pakistan.

Therefore, it's what? By the way, I'm not picking on Pakistan. Therefore, it's not Islamic. Does everybody understand what I mean by that? And we could not understand that many things that non- Muslims do may be non-Muslim.

Doesn't mean that they're un-Islamic. I got to stop. All right? And I want to read you as I go.

I hope you get this point because I'm skipping here. I want to read you a fatwa. An answer given by a classical faqih.

Very famous. Al-Izz ibn Abdussalam Al-Shafi'i Died in 660, 1261 of the Common Era. Al-Izz was so... Al-Izz was bad.

Al-Izz... How do young people say it? Al-Izz was a baller. Al-Izz had it going on so much that they referred to him as what? Sultan al-Ulama. The boss of the scholars.

They came to him and they asked him the following question. What do the jurists mean when they refer to foreign dress? Who are the foreigners and what is the difference between foreign and non- Arab? All right? This is Al-Izz's response in his fatwa. And if you want I can give you book, page, publication, date, the whole nine.

This is his response. Foreigners refers to those we have been forbidden by the prophet to imitate. Such as the Persian kings at that time.

This prohibition, however, applies only to what they do that is in violation of our religious law. What they do that falls under the legal categories of recommended, obligatory, or simply licit in our religious law is not to be abandoned simply because they practice it. Indeed, our religious law does not forbid imitating those who do what God the Exalted has permitted us to do.

This is 800 years ago. We forgot that. There's much more to this than that.

And I don't want to argue that we just go out on a free-for-all and do everything that non-Muslims are doing because there are issues of cultural and intellectual authority. But one of the major mistakes that we made was that we were not able to distinguish between non-Muslim and un-Islamic. And once we are able to make that distinction, then we will get rid of all the false differences between those around us and ourselves.

And in this way, inshallah, we can begin to move back toward a semblance of community. I apologize for going over time. Jazakallah Khair.

Closing

Quran 2:201