13th Malaysia’s Election

 

1.  Today, our Prime minister, YAB Dato Seri Najib Tun Razak have announced  that Parliament have been dissolved effective immediately. So, we wait for few week for election to replace or maintain our government.

2. This election shall be the toughest election in Malaysian history. This election are expected to be a turning point to many Malaysian. The election that everyone can not predict and forecast.

3.  From the eye of Muslim Malays, the main clash are between Islamist Party (PAS) and Malays Party (UMNO).

4.  UMNO, a current government’s party have contribute a lot in term of religion, races and development and have put Malaysia as one of great nation in South East Asia. The current problem is they are lacking of great leader, spoil branch leader and too much bribery.

5. PAS, country’s main opposition were a strong opposition with good track record. They have govern state of Kelantan for more than 20 years. In last election, they have govern another state, Kedah for 1 term.

6. As both party were inherit a similar trait – Malays and Islam. The main theme for this election shall be a clash between ideology, fundamental, philosophy, foundation and the most important – leadership.

Who will govern country’s government or state’s government in next 5 years?

Fact and Evidence in Islam

Islam is a religion established by reason and evidence, and the supreme bases of its teachings are the Quran and the Sunnah. Islam does not exist without reason, and any utterance beyond reason is unworthy of association with it. Islam is the religion of Allah the Creator, the Omniscient. It is therefore impossible to find in its teachings anything that opposes truth, evidence and fact. If an opinion produced in the name of Islam fails the test of reason and evidence established in the Quran and Sunnah, then such an opinion cannot be said to derive from the teachings of Islam even though the one who makes that opinion assumes a religious title or dresses in a manner that reflects piety.

Similarly, any view must be excluded from Islam if it contradicts demonstrable truth or scientific certainty, or if it is prejudicial to the good of common humanity. A prominent scholar of Islam, al-Imam Ibn Qayyim al-Jauziyyah (d. 751H), said:

Indeed for the shariah of Islam, its construction and foundations are built on all wisdom and goodness for humanity in this world and the Hereafter. The shariah of Islam is all about justice, goodness and wisdom. Therefore, if any aspect that departs from justice into vindictiveness, from blessing into curse, from goodness into evil, from wisdom into foolishness, then it is not from the shariah of Islam even though it is interpreted as such. (I’lam al-Muwaqqi’in, Beirut: Dar al-Jail, 3/3.)

Facts not Personalities

Whichever observation about Islam that conflicts with the Quran and Sunnah, or which contradicts the fundamentals of human welfare established by shariah must be rejected without consideration of who makes that observation. Therefore, the opinions of even a mufti, a respected teacher or an ustaz or maulana (religious teacher) can be accepted or rejected on this basis.

The opinion of any individual —even the most respected Islamic scholar— may be questioned if it does not concur with evidence provided in the Quran and Sunnah. No one is maksum (infallible) other than the Prophets of Allah. The religious opinions of the esteemed, or of an ustaz, should not be swallowed without proper chewing. Allah proclaims in Surah al-Isra, verse 36:

“And pursue not that of which you have no knowledge; for every act of hearing, or of seeing or of (feeling in) the heart will be enquired into (on the Day of Reckoning).”

Imam al-Shatibi (d. 790H) said:

Thus, it is compulsory for us to follow the one that was guarded from making mistakes (that is, the Prophet Muhammad pbuh) and to stop from following whoever is not being shielded from mistakes whenever there may be doubt. Moreover, we should consider whatever comes from all imams (scholars) side by side with the Quran and the Sunnah. Whatsoever is accepted by both (Quran and Sunnah), we consequently accept, and whatsoever is rejected by both we consequently abandon. (Al-I’tisam, Beirut: Dar al-Kitab al-Arabi, p. 165.)

Respect and the observation of good manners when dealing with ulama (the Muslim clergy) are commanded by the nas (Scripture) of Islam, but this has never stopped a person presenting intelligent criticisms, or prevented his questioning the opinions of ulama, even though he maintains the disciplines of religion. This is a principle of truth that has long been practised by all established Muslim scholars.

Consider al-Hafizd al-Zahabi (d. 748H), the celebrated historian and biographer of distinguished members of the mediaeval Muslim community. In one of these biographies, Imam al-Zahabi praised the great scholar Waki’ Ibn al-Jarrah thus: “He was between the sea of knowledge and the imams (scholars) of huffaz (hadith).” Later, Al-Zahabi recorded the words of Yahya bin Aktham: “I befriended Waki’ at his home and also when he travelled. He fasted al-dahr (every day) and finished reciting the Quran in one night.”

Al-Zahabi commented on Waki’s achievements thus:

This is an amazing ibadah (act of worship) but for it to be practised by an imam (scholar) amongst the imams of hadith, then that is not normal. Indeed it was sahih (authentic) that the Prophet pbuh prohibited daily fasting and reciting the Quran (until completion) in fewer than three days. The religion is simple. Adhering to the Sunnah is more imperative. May Allah bless Waki’. Where can we find an individual as great as he? Nevertheless, he frequently drank nabiz (date wine) that could be intoxicating if consumed a lot. He made his own judgment with regards to drinking it (he does not consider it as prohibited so long as it does not intoxicate). Should he forsake it (the drink) on the ground of devoutness, that would be much better for him. This is because whoever avoids elements of doubt, thus his religion and dignity will be saved.

Indeed, it is sahih that nabiz is forbidden and prohibited, but this is not the place to deliberate it. For every person, each of his opinions can be accepted or abandoned (except for the Prophet pbuh). Take not as an example the wrong deeds of an alim (knowledgeable person). (Siyar A’lam al-Nubala, Beirut: Muassasah al-Risalah, 9/142-144.)

Waki’ was an established ulama, but an academic fault must be acknowledged as such and judged accordingly. It is clear that, while we are enjoined to respect others, especially religious teachers, respect should not impede our speaking the truth while always maintaining the discipline and manners taught by Islam.

Reject Unproven Views

I discuss this subject because there those in our community who will not dare question those regarded as ustaz, even though what an ustaz claims may be utterly groundless. It is as if such an ustaz has somehow obtained an infallible licence to say anything in the name of religion without presenting reason or evidence. Worse, some religious teachers in the old days warned their students that “whoever asks a lot of questions shows that his faith is weak.”

It is unsurprising, therefore, that some states in Malaysia have issued a number of strange fatwa, such as prohibiting the sale cows to Chinese, or that budu (pickled fish) is impure when spilled on clothing but is pure when consumed. However odd these edicts might be, no one has dared question the grounds on which these fatwa were issued for fear of being labelled “weak in faith”.

There is a religious speaker who goes about our country saying that, according to Islam, the remedy for AIDS is 100 lashes of a cane on one’s back. He claims that this is a genuine “cure” based on the teachings of Islam and is derived from research based on both the Quran and science. One wonders which scientist gave him that information; but on the strength of this claim alone, the speaker has received a number of invitations to provide religious enlightenment in a similar vein—and there are those who have received him well. I wish to pose some questions: since not all those with AIDS have been involved in immoral sexual activities, is it therefore “right” to whip everyone? Is having AIDS sufficient justification in the eyes of the shariah to subject a person to 100 lashes? Such ideas are clearly mistaken; but unfortunately there are mosques, even in Kuala Lumpur, that extend speaking invitations to those who champion such views. I am perplexed when I come upon people who are seemingly highly educated and trained to make best use of their minds—but when confronted by matters of religion, they prefer to abandon their education in favour of a silence that makes it seem as if Islam opposes logic and the intellect.

There was another religious speaker who claimed that he buried the body of a rich man, which later transformed into a supernatural entity without anyone knowing a thing. What is fascinating is that in a country based on the rule and application of law, no one looked into the matter of a missing person until the one who buried him told this astonishing story. Whatever the case, the story involved a celebrity and this in turn affected the religious beliefs of many. It was a baseless claim that should not have been made, but unfortunately there were many who believed it.

We have also heard about a certain individual who declared another an apostate; and later did the same thing to the students of a college on no greater merit than some news reports, the truth of which could not be ascertained. An allegation of apostasy—if it is at all true—is very serious and requires careful scrutiny, that is, iqamah al-hujjah (the construction of proof). Apostasy cannot be declared haphazardly, but there were many who accepted these allegations without further thought and in the name of religion, and regrettably the allegations were made by one learned in religion.This attitude extends even to matter of sin.

Exploitation

In some Malaysian states there are religious groups that impose various types of “taxes” on bereaved families, and sometimes these taxes amount to thousands of ringgit. Many rituals associated with the religion are performed and the corresponding bills will then be charged to families of the deceased. For this reason some grin widely upon hearing news of death, and even recitations and forms of solat (prayer) that were not taught by the Prophet pbuh are included in the list of costs incurred. The community dares not ask if religion is really so cruel that even distressed families deserving of support should be burdened further by these “costs”. Or is Islam so materialistically driven that only those with the largest purses can be assured of the absolution of sin and the attainment of reward in the Hereafter? If this is the case, then the Gates of Heaven will open only for those with the means to pay these “agents of Allah” here and now on this transitory earth. Does this truly represent the beauty of Islam that commands believers to perform good deeds and not depend on others?

My point is that it is the community’s right to ask questions in any discussion of religion. Neither an ustaz nor a respected teacher is God’s appointed agent, unlike the Prophets of Allah, such that their declarations are binding even if they lack nas. Islam is not man’s ultimate justification to do as he pleases—it is, instead, a religion built on reason and evidence. If each of us asks the ustaz for the causes of and reasons behind every one of his religious opinions, then we should, by doing so, help realise the principles of Islam and thus improve intellectual discussion in our own community.

We must guard against the complacent satisfaction of merely memorising religious opinions without thinking about them analytically and rationally. One of the foremost scholars of our own times, Prof Muhammad Qutb, said:

From another point of view, Islamic scholarship is bound to the way it was studied around five centuries ago. There was (then) the influence of Greek thought from ilm al-kalam (Scholastic theology) that was futile and unrewarding. More than that, the speculative excesses of ilm al-kalam diverted the study of faith towards matters that overloaded the mind to no purpose. It took the concept of faith away from that which provides the essence of life, and turned it towards mere philosophical disputation without direction or benefit. Religious students devolved from thinkers into mere memorisers: a student could appear learned simply on the strength of how many texts, lectures and footnotes he managed to memorise. However, he could not think for himself or even think independently. Consequently, the authenticity of knowledge was lost to the ulama and they turned to taklid and simply quoted from others. Scholarship was impaired further by a third factor, namely the obsessive devotion towards a certain mazhab, which affected all students. Everyone fixated on the mazhab that he grew up in. He turned his ultimate religious duty into an effort to prove that his mazhab and sheikh (teacher) were superior to any other…” (Waqi’una al-Mu’asir, p. 176.)

The practice of blind taklid was never taught by any imam of the Ahl al-Sunnah wa’l-Jamā‘ah (the Sunni community as a whole). On the contrary, imams have demanded that each person must strive to build his or her own intellectual ability. We read the following mentioned by a student of Imam al-Shafi’i, Imam al-Muzani (d. 264H):

“I have summarised all of this from the knowledge of al-Imam al-Shafi’i and from the meaning of what he taught in order to impart it to whoever wants it, along with notice of his prohibition of taklid (of his opinions) or of those of others, so that the reader will himself consider the evidence for the sake of his religion, and so as to be the more circumspect about it”. (Waliyy Allah al-Dahlawi, Al-Insaf fi Bayan Asbab al-Ikhtilaf, p. 100.)

If this form of learning should flourish, Islam will no longer be considered exclusivist such that only a privileged few may reflect upon it while the rest must follow blindly. Indeed, we are commanded to respect rigorous study and never to accept blind taklid. The development of the Muslim community will not take place as long as the intellectual competence of our religious leaders fails to meet the academic standards of an increasingly competitive world. The Muslim community must rally to support the advancement of tajdid (revitalisation) that began decades ago and which is still in progress.

Source : http://drmaza.com/home/?p=1855

Why were we Created?

All praise is due to Allâh and may His peace and blessings be upon his last Messenger sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam and on all those who follow the path of righteousness until the last day.

We have to answer the most fundamental question that every human being asks himself at some point in his or her lifetime. Not just Muslims, but every single human being.

“Why was I created? Why am I here? What am I doing in this world? Why did God create me?”

These questions, are questions which each and everyone of us reflects on at some point during their life. We have some answers, which are given generally, but usually these answers don’t satisfy us, they seem somewhat simplistic. We still wonder. “Why me? Why here?” I know all of you, generally speaking, in the back of your mind, you are saying “to worship Allâh, khallas (finish), what more is there to say? Why do we need to have a big long talk on why we were created, when we all know it is to worship Allâh?” But wait, if this is presented to a non-Muslim, the next logical question would be  “why does Allâh want us to worship Him?” and then your stuck.

It means, in our own minds it is not really clear to us. Why did Allâh create us to worship Him?

The question, why did Allâh create us, for some people, and we have to deal with those people around us, who don’t consider there to be any purpose in man’s creation because he is just a product of evolution that the forces of nature have produced him, and just as we don’t have apes, dogs or cows thinking about why they are here, then we don’t really have to think about it either. Of course that being the basis of the philosophy of western society, that man is without purpose, then the whole issue of government, morality etc has no basis in Revelation, there is no guidance there. The product of this is of course the corruption that we are living in.

For a Muslim, when we go in to this topic, we have to find our understanding in divine revelation and not human speculation. Because human speculation has no bounds, we can imagine all kinds of things, and is any of you have studied philosophy of religion, you can see how many opinions exist about the creation of man and existence. Because of the variety of philosophies, which are out there, no one can say this one is correct or that one is incorrect, because there is no guidance behind it. No divine revelation. It is only from divine revelation that we can determine the reality of our creation, because it is Allâh who has created us and he knows the purpose of our creation. We can hardly understand ourselves, much less try to understand the essence of things.  So it is for Allâh to inform us through the revelation in the Qur’ân and the Sunnah which was brought by his last Messenger sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam and the Messengers before. Now if we are to look, initially into revelation, to determine why was man   created, there is a deeper question that we should be asking before that. “Why did God create?” Before we even get to man, why did god create, because man is not the greatest act of creation that we should be so focused on why man. No, because Allâh says:

“The creation of the Heavens and the Earth is indeed greater then the creation of mankind; yet, most of mankind know not.” [Sûrah Ghâfir, verse 57]

Man is not the greatest act of creation, this universe is far more complex and far more magnificent then man. So the issue of creation should then go to why create? As opposed to simply why create man?

Fundamentally, we can say that the creation is the natural consequence of the attribute of creator. Allâh is the creator. That is one of his attributes. That is what he has informed us. That being his attribute, the creator, the natural consequence or the product of this attribute is his creation.

A painter, if we are to draw a similitude on a lower level, who tells you that he is a painter, if you ask him where are his paintings and he replies I don’t have any. What kind of painter is this? The concept of a painter who doesn’t paint, there is some thing not quite gelling together here, of course Allâh is beyond this. But if we are to understand on the simplest level, the two go together. The perfection of a painter lies in his paintings. His quality and his ability to paint, is manifest in his paintings. And Allâh, beyond all that, as creator, this quality of creation is manifest in the creation itself. Allâh didn’t create out of a need. No, the fact that he is the creator, is manifest in the creation.

Furthermore, consider the act of creation, this act, with regards to Allâh is unique. Though we use the term i.e. So and so created a table etc, actually it is in a limited sense. Human beings don’t really create, they manipulate, because they can only “create” what already exists. When we make a chair or a table, we didn’t create the wood, we had to take it from a tree, we didn’t create the metal, which makes the screws etc, we had to melt down rocks and take the metal out. So we are not creating from nothing. We are manipulating things which Allâh has already created in to different shapes and forms which are useful to us. We call it “creation” but the real act of creation, is creation from nothing, and this is unique to Allâh alone.

This is a concept, which many people in ignorance, because they couldn’t grasp the idea of creation from nothingness, it lead them to conclude that the world is Allâh. Those who say “inside of each and every atom is Allâh.” And you have people, who call themselves Muslims saying this. Non-Muslims have said this before and there are Muslims who claim this. That Allâh is inside each and everything, because Allâh is the reality and everything else is fake in their interpretation.  That means then, that the creation is Allâh, and Allâh is the creation. Very, very dangerous concept, which leads some of those who make this claim to say that you don’t have to worship outside of yourself. Ibn Arabi, was famous for this statement, he is considered to be one of the saints, amongst the so called Sûfî religion. Ibn Arabi said “There is no need to worship one outside yourself, you are Allâh. It is sufficient to worship yourself.” This is Shirk.

This concept of Allâh being within his creation, no distinction the creation and Allâh, it leads them to this shirk. Because they are unable to accept the uniqueness of Allâh’s creation, they compare the act of creation by Allâh to human creation. That is, just as we manipulate, Allâh took pieces of himself and made the earth and the universe. Others will say that all human beings have inside of themselves Allâh, that there is a part of Allâh inside each and everyone of us. The whole essence, the purpose of life is for us to realize that we have part of Allâh inside of ourselves, remove the material blocks which keep us from Allâh and again become one with Allâh in what they call “fana”.  This is again a teaching of the Sûfî religion.

Becoming one with Allâh, returning back to Allâh in this sense. But this is in fact part of the teachings of shirk. Shaytân (Satan) has deluded man into this imagination. It is part of the belief of the Hindus. Nirvana, the concept that when you die, you are reborn again, and you move up in stages, each time, if you are a good boy or good girl, you go up higher and higher, until you get to the top. You know you have reached the peak, because when you die the next time you become one with the universal soul, Nirvana. That is the end of rebirth. So your whole purpose is to return and become one with God again. This is all, as I said, a product of the inability to understand the concept of creation from nothingness, which is unique to Allâh. Allâh says:

“There is nothing like him, and he is the hearer and seer of all.”

So when we try to interpret Allâh’s creation like the way we create, then we have made Him like his creation and it leads us ultimately to those aspects of shirk which I have mentioned. This is quite common amongst the Muslim world today, because when you look into the various branches of the Sûfî religion, where they have prescribed various acts of purification, they call it dhikr, exercises to torture the body through spinning and dancing. What is the purpose of this? They will tell you, to liberate the soul from this earthly body and to achieve that state of “fana” or “itihâd”, a variety of names they have for it.

It is this concept, which lead al-Hallaj, many centuries ago, when he was promoting this idea, and he was put before a panel of judges questioning these concepts, which he was expressing. When they asked him to recant, to take this stuff back, he stood up, opened up his cloak and said “There is nothing inside this cloak except Allâh”. So they executed him. And of course, those in the Sûfî religion, they have stories that when they cut his head off, it rolled around saying “Allâh, Allâh, Allâhu Akbar etc”. It might have, that is Shaytân may have entered and said these things, as happened with the calf of the Isrealites, when the Prophet Mûsa (Moses) let Egypt and the people, after crossing the red sea, had a desire to have a god that they could see, so they made a golden calf which they began to worship. This calf was saying “moo” like the calves do. This is what convinced them that this was the real thing. We know it wasn’t the calf saying this. The evil jinn can enter the in to physical entities, make sounds and give these impressions. So there is no problem for us to say ok, maybe when they cut of al-Hallaj’s head that it said these things, because this was part of a test. If we are clear in terms of creator and creation, this is no problem for us.

Allâh is the creator and everything besides Him is His creation, which He created from nothing. It is not Him, nor is He it. This is the pure concept as taught by the Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam, his companions, and the early generations of righteous scholars, the students of the companions and those who came after them. The best of generations. That is how they understood this matter. There was no confusion in their minds. It wasn’t until Islâm spread to areas like Egypt, India and Persia, areas where the Christians had already gotten into deep philosophies, trying to explain how Jesus was a man and god at the same time. When they came in to Islâm they brought it with them. This is the reality. It is not something we should necessarily condemn them for or feel is unusual. It is natural, when a person reverts to Islâm, that they will carry with them what they believed before. What has been clarified for them, of the basic principles, they accept, and they reject things, which obviously contradict. But it doesn’t mean that every last thought that they have, and everything that was wrong in their philosophies, ideology and concepts will be erased. They will carry these things in with them. This is why in the later part of the Prophet’s sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam life, prior to his death, when he was coming back from one of the battles, his companions asked him to set aside a tree for them, that they could hang their weapons on, like the way the pagans would hang their weapons on trees, believing that when they hung the weapons, it became super-powerful, as if some power was coming from the tree, that their shields would now block steel and their swords would cut through the enemy. Some of the companions who had newly accepted Islâm, asked the Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam to designate one for them, a special one, an Islamic one. They understood that what the pagans had, this was wrong. These were the companions of the Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam and he had to clarify it for them. He said:

You are like the companions of Mûsâ who asked to have the calf built.

And he clarified for them that all of this is shirk and there is no place for it in Islâm. So if it could happen to some of the companions, then we cannot blame the generations who have come after them, who come into Islâm and carry with them some of their old ideas. What it is for us to do is to clarify.

So what we have in front of us then, is that Allâh created this universe out of nothing, and everything that is in it was created. For example:

“Allâh created all things, and he is the agent, upon which, all things depend.” [Sûrah 39, verse 62]

This is the reality. This is stressed for us, in order for us to realize that ultimately, all good, all evil, that takes place in the world, only takes place by the permission of Allâh. Therefore we should not seek any other channels to protect ourselves from evil, or to gather for ourselves good, as people commonly do today. They will go to fortunetellers, this is big business today, all the magazines have various forms of fortunetellers like dial a horoscope etc. in a society that has lost touch with Allâh, this is what is open to them. Allâh has stressed for us that no calamity will befall us except by Allâh’s permission;

“Nothing is taking place in this world except by the permission of Allâh.”

And the Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam further emphasized this principle by saying;

“If the whole of mankind gathered to do some thing to help us, they could help in anything which Allâh had not already written for us. And if the whole of mankind gathered together to harm us, then they would not be able to harm with anything which Allâh had not already written for us.”

Therefore what is required of us is to depend on Allâh, put our trust in Allâh. This is what we have to draw out of this attribute of Allâh being the creator. This creation exists because of that attribute. Its practical significance to us lies in putting our trust in Allâh.

There is another aspect, besides the fact that the creation exists because Allâh is the creator. We can also see from what the Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam has informed us, that in the creation there is manifestation of Allâh’s attributes of mercy, forgiveness, kindness etc etc. Allâh created man in paradise, they disobeyed Allâh, but Allâh had taught them how to repent, how to turn back to him and seek his forgiveness, then he would forgive them. Having done that, they were forgiven, Adam became the first prophet, and mankind was absolved of that sin. The story of Adam and Eve is the story of human existence. Human beings are given a consciousness of Allâh. When Allâh created all human beings, as he states in the Qur’ân, he took from Âdam (Adam) all of his descendents, and made them all bear witness that Allâh is their Lord. So we are all born with that consciousness. He has also given us a consciousness of what is right and what is wrong.

“We have inspired each and every soul to an awareness of corruption and righteousness.”

Allâh gave revelation through his commandments, not to eat of the tree. However, human beings forget. And when they forget Allâh then they fall into sin. We can absolve ourselves of that sin by means of repentance, and Allâh forgives us when we repent sincerely. The Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam said;

“The one who repents is like the one without sin.”

“If you did not commit sins and turn to Allâh seeking his forgiveness, then he would replace you with another people who would sin, ask Allâh’s forgiveness and he would forgive them.”

So in our sinning and asking Allâh’s forgiveness, the attribute of Allâh’s mercy and forgiveness becomes manifest. Allâh knew what we were going to do before he created us, he knew that he was creating a species who would sin. If he didn’t wan t them to sin, if it was not his intention to permit them to sin, then he could have created angels, more angels. But the had already created angels, so he chose to create a being, that would disobey his commandments through forgetfulness or just simple disobedience, but would turn back to him in repentance, and his attribute of forgiveness would become manifest. Similarly, his mercy;

The Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam is quoted as saying that when Allâh created the universe, He made an obligation on Himself, recorded in a document, kept by Him, that “My mercy precedes my wrath.” He sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam also was reported as saying;

“Allâh created mercy with a hundred parts. One of which was sent down upon the jinn and human beings and other living creatures. It is out of this one part that they love each other, show kindness to one another, and even the animals treat their offspring with affection. Allâh has reserved the remaining ninety-nine parts for his true worshippers on the Day of Judgment.”

This is the mercy of Allâh manifest in his creation. What is also manifest in creation, in the act of creation, the creation of man, is his attribute of justice, fairness, which comes out as the judgment at the end of this world. I am sure we have all read the ahadîth in which the Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam said:

“Allâh created some people for hell and some people for paradise.”

For allot of people, this is something very heavy. And the companions, they asked the prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam then what is the point in doing good deeds? If Allâh created some for heaven and some for hell then what is the pin in doing anything? It has already been decided. The Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam said:

“Each one of you will find it easy to do what he was created for.”

So if you choose the evil way, you find it easy and you carry on in that way, then that was what you were created for. But ultimately it is your choice. You choose hell. The fact hat Allâh has recorded, before anything was created, who would be in hell and who would be in heaven does not change the fact that it is we who choose. The judgment is only to manifest to those who go to hell, that they deserve to be in hell. It is only for them basically. Because if Allâh created you, and put you in paradise, with all that is in paradise, and you see those people in hell suffering, are you going to ask Allâh, why did you put me in paradise? No. your going to say “all praise be to Allâh!” you don’t want to question or to wonder, all you will be is ecstatic that you are of those in paradise. So the judgment is not for you, it is for those who are going to hell. If you happen to be amongst those who were created for and put in hell, you would say, why me? Why did you put me in hell? And Allâh would say; because you would have done so and so in your life. But you would say; no, no I wouldn’t. If  you give me a chance I would do good deeds. You would not give up arguing.

So Allâh has allowed us to live out our lives. So when we stand before him, our book of deeds is spread before us, we know without a shadow of a doubt, that we chose hell. That Allâh’s judgment is just. There is no injustice in it, in any way shape or form. Allâh says he oppresses no one. We will know that we chose hell.

And the only thing that remains for us, and I pray that it is not in fact us, who are going to hell, is to beg Allâh for another chance. Allâh says;

“If you cold only see when the sinners will bow their heads before their lord, saying; O Lord, we have now seen and heard, so send us back and we will do righteous deeds. Verily, we now believe with certainty.”

This is the only response, which will be left for them. Or as Allâh said;

“And those whose light scales of good deeds, they ruined themselves and they will be in hell eternally. The fire will burn their faces, and they will grin with disfigured lips, I will say to them; Were My Verses not recited to you, and you rejected them? They will reply; Our Lord, our misery overcame us and we were a people astray. Our Lord, bring us out of this, and if we ever return we will truly be unjust.”

When we die, there remains behind us a barrier, the Barzakh, none of us will come back, it is a one-way ticket. Those poor individuals who think they will get another chance, this is the new age religion, they think it is new, but it is just plain old Hindu delusion, that when you die, you get another chance to come back again. The effects of this actually, among Hindus, where I am in the UAE, there are a lot of Hindus here, everyday in the news paper you read about a Hindu man or woman who ties a rope to a ceiling fan, which is found in many of the homes, put it around their neck, kicked away the chair and passed out of this world. Suicide is common amongst them. Why? Because they think they have another chance. It will be a rude awakening for them when they meet the angel of death and find themselves in the next life, realizing that there is no coming back.

In the creation of man is manifest the grace of Allâh. This is a particular point which all of us should reflect on and be thankful to Allâh for. His grace, and Christians, they like to refer to us Muslims as those who don’t believe in the grace of God, we are those who look at God’s judgment and it is just about deeds, you do good then you go to heaven, you do bad and you go to hell, that is it, no grace there at all. For them the grace of God is there for all those who accept that he became a man, and was crucified by man, to provide salvation for human beings who’s sins had become so great that they could not remove that sin through any act themselves. So it was with the spilling of the “Blood of God” that we could be absolved of our sins. For them, if you accept that God spilt his blood for mankind’s salvation, then you have earned the grace of God. Does not matter what you do as long as you have accepted this belief in the grace of God.

Muslims also believe in the grace of God. Actually it plays a major and significant role. Often it is not stressed but it is important for us to realize how the grace of Allâh is manifest in our creation. The Prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam said;

“Observe moderation, but if you fail, try to do as much as you can moderately and be happy. For none of you will enter Paradise only because of his deeds.”

Of course when the companions heard that they said;

“O messenger of Allâh, not even you? And the prophet sallallâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam said, not even me. Were it not that Allâh wrapped me in his mercy. And bear in mind that the deed most loved by Allâh is one done constantly even if it is small”

What does this mean? It means that God’s grace is manifest in our lives in that were He to call us to account, one good deed, one evil deed, equal to each other, then we would not enter paradise, not even the prophets of Allâh. But Allâh through his grace and mercy has multiplied the value of the good deeds. Allâh says;

“Whoever brings a good deed, shall the value of ten like it. And whoever brings an evil deed will be punished with one like it. And they will not be wronged.” [Sûrah Âl-'Imrân, verse 160]

This is Allâh’s grace. Good deeds erase evil deeds. One good deed will erase at least ten evil deeds. Allâh’s grace is not arbitrary, simply because you say I believe you have his grace, no matter what you do, no. The more good you do, the more of his grace is manifest in you. If you chose evil and reject the good, then you don’t receive His grace, it doesn’t matter what you say. If you say, I am a Muslim, I believe, but really you don’t believe, it is just some words you are saying, them you will not be subject to the grace of Allâh.

So the creation is a manifestation of Allâh’s attribute of being the creator. In the creation of man within the scheme of things, there is manifest Allâh’s attribute of mercy, his attribute of justice and this is the reason for the creation of man from the point of view of Allâh. From human perspective, why did God create man in terms of for what purpose? Then this is the one we all know and are familiar with;

“We did not create the jinn and men except to worship us” [Sûrah adh-Dhariyyat, verse 56)

So relative to Allâh, we were created in a means or a way in which Allâh has chosen to manifest his attributes of creation, mercy, grace etc and he could have chosen another one. But relative to us as human beings, we know that our purpose is to worship Allâh. As we said, Allâh does not need our worship, a Allâh didn’t need to create. When he created us to worship him, he didn’t create us, out of a need for our worship, because Allâh has no needs. In a famous hadîth qudsî in which Allâh says;

If all of you, jinn and mankind, were to worship like the most righteous amongst you, it would not increase the dominion of Allâh in any way shape or form. And if all of us, jinn and mankind …

Therefore when we look for the purpose of worship, we have to look into man. Allâh created us to worship him, because we need to worship him. It is something he has given us as a means of benefiting ourselves. We are the ones who benefit from it. Worship has been established, fundamentally for the growth, the spiritual growth of man. This growth takes place through the remembrance of Allâh. When you look at all the different aspects of worship, you will see the core of it is focused on the remembrance of Allâh.

“Establish the prayer for My remembrance.”

This is the essence for the consciousness of God. Allâh says that he has:

“…prescribed for us fasting, as he prescribed it for those before us, so that we may fear him.”

Worship is there for us to remember Allâh. And it is in the remembrance of Allâh, that we achieve that consciousness. Because it is when we forget Allâh, that Shaytân causes us to disobey Allâh and fall into sin. So it is only in His remembrance that we can attain salvation. All of the various acts of worship from saying “Bismillâh” when we eat is to help us remember Allâh in order to grow spiritually.

Allâh has said that he has created us to test us, to see which of us is best in deeds. He is not testing us to know, in the sense that he doesn’t  already know, but this world is a test for us in order again that we can grow spiritually.

We cannot develop this spiritual characteristic of generosity unless some of us have more then others and then we are required to give of the wealth we have. When we give, we grow. Similarly, if we were not in a position where others had more then us then we wouldn’t have the ability to develop the higher spiritual quality of contentment, patience, satisfaction in what Allâh has given us.

So it is all there in order to bring out the higher spiritual qualities, which enable us to attain the state, which makes us suitable and eligible to return to paradise. The paradise from which we were created, we were created in paradise and for paradise. Through our choices we have left, in this life, a field of testing, where we can grow to a state where we deserve paradise.

The purpose of this life is the worship of Allâh, this life is a test. A test for us, will we worship Allâh, or will we forget Him. This is where our focus has to begin.

Author : Dr Bilal Philips

Banking on the ummah – Malaysia leads the charge in Islamic finance

OF MALAYSIA’S claims to fame, leadership in financial services is not an obvious one. Yet in some ways the country is the world’s most important Islamic-finance centre. Just over a fifth of the country’s banking system, by assets, is sharia-compliant; the average for Muslim countries is more like 12%, and often a lot less. Malaysia dominates the global market for sukuk, or Islamic bonds. The country issued the world’s first sovereign sukuk in 2002; in the first three quarters of 2012 it was responsible for almost three-quarters of total global issuance (see chart). Malaysia is also home to the Islamic Financial Services Board, an international standard-setting body.

These are big achievements for a relatively small country of just 30m people, of whom only about 60% are Muslim. In neighbouring Indonesia, which is home to the largest Muslim population in the world, only about 4% of the financial sector is sharia-compliant. Although the much richer Gulf states and Saudi Arabia have bigger Islamic banks, it is Malaysia, argues Iqbal Khan of Dubai’s Fajr Capital investment fund, that is the centre “for thought leadership in Islamic finance”.

How did the country carve out this niche? Malaysia’s Muslim heritage, outward-looking nature and links with financial hubs like Britain and Singapore made the place a natural candidate to bridge the worlds of religion and capitalism. The central bank, the Bank Negara Malaysia, is also supportive.

Two institutions in particular, both set up by the central bank, have contributed to Malaysia’s pre-eminence in the field. The first is the International Centre for Education in Islamic Finance (INCEIF). Established in 2005 and boasting about 2,000 students, INCEIF is the world’s leading university for the study of Islamic finance. The International Sharia Research Academy, housed within INCEIF, brings together scholars to produce an internationally acceptable rule-book for Islamic finance.

The second institution is the Islamic Banking and Finance Institute of Malaysia (IBFIM). It concentrates on vocational training, offering a variety of certificates in Islamic finance. IBFIM also acts as a consultancy to banks and firms that want to become sharia-compliant.

Zeti Akhtar Aziz, the head of the central bank, says that these bodies are the “pipeline to provide the banks with talent”. And not just in Malaysia. There are currently students from 80 countries at INCEIF; and IBFIM has taught people from Afghanistan, Nigeria, Palestine and elsewhere.

All of which gives Malaysia greater status within the ummah, the global Islamic community, important to a country that often feels on the periphery of the Muslim world. There are more tangible benefits, too. The Islamic subsidiary of Maybank, a big local lender, already accounts for about half of the group’s customers and is expanding abroad: it set up a subsidiary in Singapore 18 months ago and has also moved into Indonesia.

Ms Zeti argues that sharia-compliant banks are inherently more stable than conventional peers. Speculation is forbidden, and because charging interest is prohibited under sharia law, returns are based on profit-sharing. Perhaps. Islamic finance is hardly foolproof: Dubai’s debt crisis in 2009 showed that sukuk can help to inflate debt to unsustainable levels. But whatever its pros and cons, Malaysia will provide much of the evidence either way.

Source : http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21569050-malaysia-leads-charge-islamic-finance-banking-ummah

Lahad Datu invasion–In the end, All is about money

Here I would like to congratulate Malaysian Police, Army, Special Force, Commandos for their great  effort in defending our country. All being settle in 3 weeks, it was really great effort.

To the families of policemen who died in the line of duty, my condolences here are as heartfelt and deep as those of mine for the families of innocent citizens who died in the invasions.

Pic : Self declared Sultan of Sulu with his wife

 

KUALA LUMPUR, March 8 — The self-styled Sultan of Sulu Jamalul Kiram III has declared himself as the “poorest” Ruler in the world, saying that he had consented to his brother leading a group of armed followers to move to Sabah in search of work and a better life.

“I’m the poorest sultan in the world,” Jamalul told newswire Associated Press (AP) when interviewed in his tumble-down two-storey residence in a poor section of Manila, the capital city of the Philippines.

The 74-year-old, who is one of nine claimants to the Sulu Sultanate, reportedly said that his sultanate’s lack of power to help his followers had sparked off their move into Sabah’s east coast over three weeks ago in what is seen as an intrusion by Malaysia and has resulted in deadly clashes with 52 Sulu militants and eight Malaysian policemen dead.

His wife Fatima Celia said that Jamalul’s family is now in debt due to the costly expenses incurred when he campaigned to be a senator in 2007. He was supported by former Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo but did not win the position.

Jamalul was last year found to have kidney failure and had to go for dialysis, another costly burden which then caused his family to miss monthly payments for their house and almost had to give up the place if their friends had not assisted, Jamalul’s wife reportedly said.

Jamalul, who also has a heart condition, now spends most of his time in his bedroom — where there are two oxygen tanks — which also doubles up as an office.

Yesterday, The Philippine Star reported that the Kiram clan had not intended to reclaim Sabah but wanted more money than the current RM5,300 in annual stipend paid to the Sulu Sultanate, arguing that the sum was not “even enough to pay rental for an apartment” in Manila.

The news portal quoted Acting Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) Governor Mujiv Hataman, saying the message was relayed by “Princess” Jacel, the oldest daughter of Jamalul, in one of the backroom negotiations between the clan and Manila for a peaceful solution to the Lahad Datu standoff.

“Hataman also emphasised that Princess Jacel told them they did not have plans to reclaim Sabah, and that they were only asking for a bigger payment because the current rate was not even enough to pay rental for an apartment,” the report said.

The honorarium and ownership over the state was reported to be among the three issues raised by the sultanate with the Aquino administration before the Sabah standoff. The annual payment to the Kirams is distributed to all members of the family.

Jamalul had insisted that Sabah belongs to the Sulu sultanate and that it had merely leased North Borneo in 1878 to the British North Borneo Company for an annual payment of 5,000 Malayan dollars then, which was increased to 5,300 Malayan dollars in 1903.

Sabah, however, joined Malaya, Sarawak and Singapore to form Malaysia in 1963, after which Malaysia continued paying an annual stipend of RM5,300 to the Sulu sultanate on the basis of the sultanate ceding the Borneo state.

Source : Local newspaper

Malaysia hailed as most vital Islamic-finance hub

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia is the world’s most important Islamic-finance centre, although the richer Gulf states and Saudi Arabia have bigger Islamic banks and Indonesia the largest Muslim population, influential financial news magazine The Economist says.

Malaysia also dominates the global market for sukuk, or Islamic bonds, the magazine said in an article headlined Banking on the ummah:Malaysia leads the charge in Islamic finance, in its latest issue on Jan 5.

“Leadership in financial services is not an obvious one. Yet, in some ways the country is the world’s most important Islamic-finance centre,” said the magazine.

“Just over a fifth of the country’s banking system, by assets, is Syariah-compliant; the average for Muslim countries is more like 12%, and often a lot less,” it added.

On the Islamic bonds, the magazine said the country issued the world’s first sovereign sukuk in 2002 and in the first three quarters of 2012, it was responsible for almost three-quarter of total global issuance.

It said Malaysia was home to the Islamic Financial Services Board, an international standard-setting body.

“These are big achievements for a relatively small country of just 30 million people, of whom only about 60% are Muslims.

“In neighbouring Indonesia, which is home to the largest Muslim population in the world, only about 4% of the financial sector is Syariah-compliant.

“Although the much richer Gulf states and Saudi Arabia have bigger Islamic banks, it is Malaysia that is the centre for thought leadership in Islamic finance,” said the magazine, quoting Dubai’s Fajr Capital investment fund founder and CEO Iqbal Khan.

The magazine said Malaysia’s Muslim heritage, outward-looking nature and links with financial hubs like Britain and Singapore made the place a natural candidate to bridge the worlds of religion and capitalism. The central bank, Bank Negara Malaysia, is also supportive.

It said two institutions in particular the International Centre for Education in Islamic Finance (INCEIF) and the Islamic Banking and Finance Institute of Malaysia (IBFIM), both set up by the central bank have contributed to Malaysia’s pre-eminence in the field.

INCEIF, set up in 2005 and boasting about 2,000 students, is the world’s leading university for the study of Islamic finance.

The International Syariah Research Academy, housed within INCEIF, brings together scholars to produce an internationally acceptable rule-book for Islamic finance.

The IBFIM concentrates on vocational training, offering a variety of certificates in Islamic finance as well as acts as a consultancy to banks and firms that want to become syariah-compliant.

Bank Negara head Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Ungku Aziz was quoted by the magazine as saying that these bodies were the “pipeline to provide the banks with talent” and not just in Malaysia.

“All these give Malaysia greater status within the ummah and the global Islamic community,” she said, adding that they were important to a country that often felt on the periphery of the Muslim world.

Dr Zeti argues that Syariah-compliant banks are inherently more stable than conventional peers.

“Speculation is forbidden and, because charging interest is prohibited under syariah law, returns are based on profit-sharing,” she said.

Source : The Star

Why listen to the Vice Chancellor?

In a democratic country like Malaysia, it rests upon all the citizens of this country to determine the fate of our nation and communities. I feel that my fellow academics and I have a unique opportunity to advise and educate the citizens of this country about many technological, social and spiritual issues so that we can all one day call ourselves, truly a civilized nation.

In my 25 years at a public university, I have not seen much of the responsibility of the academics in educating the masses being highlighted or even mentioned at all.

Only a civilized and critically minded citizenry can exercise appropriate decisions in selecting who the parliamentarians should be to carry the issues that would bring much benefit to all and not just a few.

In my 25 years at a public university, I have not seen much of the responsibility of the academics in educating the masses being highlighted or even mentioned at all. Whether in departmental meetings, in faculty meetings and meetings with Vice Chancellors and top university officials, there is hardly a mention about the important and crucial roles of academics being the educators of the nation…much less being the conscience of a society.

The importance of academics engaging in public discourses and issues via the mass media or in writing popular books to explain scientific or social issues in a manner that is comprehensible to all is drowned by the dubious statements on the importance of publishing in so called ‘high impact’ international journals and securing million ringgit grants in order to boost the university’s international ranking. It seems that the success of our fully funded public universities is now dependent on a ranking figure by some rating agency and not on our evaluation of its contribution to developing the minds of our communities.

Traditionally and presently, the office of the Vice Chancellor is held by an academic, and not by some company manager or full time politician. If the said academic fails to appreciate the important roles of professors in educating and advising the people of this country, then he or she will develop policies for promotion and excellence based on a ‘cut and paste’ methodology of various so called ‘successful’ institutions. I have no problem of benchmarking ourselves against such well known institutions as Harvard or Oxford but let us do so critically.

Perhaps our society is 80 years behind in terms of social, technological and political awarenessas the US or the UK and so we should check at what these famous institutions had done for their society at that time. I am sure that these institutions gave much acknowledgement to their academics in terms of book writing for the populace as well as engagement in public debates and discourses. Since these institutions have come a long way from educating the public, their attention now turns towards other matters such as securing grants, industrial alliances and international competition for students.

It seems to me that Malaysian public universities have leap frog one whole century of knowledge generation and dissemination and imagine themselves ‘on par’ with other famous institutions. I can find a book on nuclear physics for children in the West but I cannot find one in Malaysia. I learnt about the beautiful discipline of Structure from a Professor in Structural Engineering through his two books ‘Why Buildings Stand Up’ and ‘Structure for Architects’. He has had even made a series of films on the subject matter. Where are these books and films in Bahasa Malaysia from our Structural Engineers from UTM?

I feel much saddened by the fact that such pressing issues as the Lynas issue or even the sex video of a Malay politician’ comes with a deafening silence. Where are our Professors of Environmental Engineering or Islamic Revealed Knowledge on such subjects? Are these academics frightened that their contracts will not be renewed?

I feel sad that whenever I want to hear a view by someone deemed as ‘opposition’, I would have to download the YouTube version of his lecture given at a noted university in Australia. Why can’t I listen to this man here at UTM?

Or these academics feel that their knowledge and research is bordered only by their peers and students at the university? So…knowledge is only for self-promotion and private wealth accumulation…not for society’s betterment?

Prophet Muhammad taught Muslims that the only thing that survives a dead person is his or her progeny, the wakaf property and knowledge left for community development. Among the three, knowledge is the longest lasting. A privilege to academics! But the Prophet also warned the academic and ulama that on the Day of Judgement, they will be one of the three personalities that will be judged harshly as to their conduct in this world. A warning to academics!

Professor D. Gareth Jones had written an interesting audit proposal to vet New Zealand Universities on the aspect of academic freedom and public discourses. In his paper entitled “Universities as Critic and Conscience of Society: The Role of Academic Freedom”, he deems a university as a failure if it punishes any academic for their public engagement in the media. He also deems it a failure for universities that have no professors engaging at all in public discourses.

One of the things that I would love to see for the first time in 25 years is a public discourse on an important national issue debated by panelists from academia, various NGOs and political parties. I feel sad that whenever I want to hear a view by someone deemed as ‘opposition’, I would have to download the YouTube version of his lecture given at a noted university in Australia. Why can’t I listen to this man here at UTM? He is a Malaysian and a veteran politician who has been appointed as a full professor at a noted American University. Where is our academic freedom?

Recently, a group of young lecturers complained to me that they feel stressed their first day on the job after the faculty briefing. They were stressed at the number of journal publications needed and amount of grants to be secured. When I asked them whether the faculty mentioned the importance of books and public engagement, they all shook their heads and said that nothing was mentioned remotely close to those responsibilities.

I felt a deep pain that the profession I love most has been turned into a paper publishing factory and not any chance given to be a visionary for a better society. I have 25 years to know that Deans of public universities are simply followers of the Vice Chancellor’s instructions. So I gave these new lecturers the only advice I could: If you listen to these kinds of Vice Chancellors, know that they will change and what they do is only for a selfish agenda.

But if you listen to your heart and conscience, and work towards developing the society, then your life will have a better meaning than just following someone else’s instructions. You are the expert in your chosen fields and only you and your conscience shall truly govern your KPI. So..why listen to this kind of VC? Be yourselves the conscience of society.

Dr Mohamad Tajuddin Mohamad Rasdi is the author of Why Listen to the Vice Chancellor? University as the Conscience of Society