Cinemas, mosques and the power of prayer

A little humour for a Monday morning. I don't know if it's true or not, but that it seems very plausible and that we believe from our instincts about human nature that it might be true, is telling in itself...

In a small town in East Africa, a person decided to open up a cinema showing films of disrepute, which was right opposite to the mosque. The Members of the congregation started a campaign to block the tawdry business from opening with petitions and prayed daily against his business. Work progressed. However, when it was almost complete and was about to open, a lightning bolt struck the construction and it was burnt to the ground.

The mosque folks were rather smug in their outlook after that, till the cinema owner sued the mosque authorities on the grounds that the mosque authorities through their congregation and prayers were ultimately responsible for the demise of his project, either through direct or indirect actions or means.

In its reply to the court, the mosque autorities vehemently denied all responsibility or any connection that their prayers were reasons to the cinema's demise.

As the case made its way into court, the judge looked over the paperwork at the hearing and commented:
"I don't know how I'm going to decide this case, but it appears from the paperwork, that we have the owner of a disreputable cinema who believes in the power of prayer and we have devotees from the mosque who don't!"

Sarkozy speaks out against Burqa in France

Yesterday the French president said "The burka is not a sign of religion, it is a sign of subservience. It will not be welcome on the territory of the French republic."

This follows the establishment of a parliamentary commission to investigate whether the wearing of the burqa should be banned in public.

Following his speech, he is due to meet the Emir of Qatar - I wonder if he will suggest to him that women there should also remove their veils? If his view is that it is wrong in France as it "reduces them to servitude and undermines their dignity" then he ought to make the same point to the Emir about women in Qatar.

Except he won't. His speech yesterday was held to the French parliament - a right he put into the constitution for himself last year. This is the first time that such a speech has been held in over a century. Following in the footsteps of his imperial predecessor at yesterday's speech, it seems that in a hundred years, little has changed in Mr Sarkozy's mind about imposing his version of liberal values.

Let's remember what Obama said in Cairo, ‘it is important for Western countries to avoid impeding Muslim citizens from practising religion as they see fit - for instance, by dictating what clothes a Muslim woman should wear. We cannot disguise hostility towards any religion behind the pretence of liberalism.’

In the shadow of the sumptuous Versailles Palace, Sarkozy's comments seem little other than cheap shots at winning political points, without really addressing the heart of the issue. How can a politician determine what a woman should wear? If she is wearing it out of choice - as some women do - not that I necessarily agree with them - then refusing a women's right to choose what to wear is a form of oppression that women have long fought against.

If she is being forced to wear it - and this of course does happen - then what that woman needs is not a patronising president, but real tools to help her take control of her life - education and economics.

Besides, those women who wear burqa's are a tiny minority of Muslim women - why single those who are forced to wear it as sufferers of domestic oppression, when so many millions of women face domestic violence? A more holistic approach would reap greater benefits for women in both quality and quantity. It seems from his words that he cares more about his own popularity, then making changes for burqa-wearing women.

Hurrah!

Last week, my book Love in a Headscarf won the Best Published Non-Fiction prize at the Muslim Writers Awards. IslamOnline has described this event as the "Muslim Oscars" and it certainly is very glamorous.

I was extremely delighted to win the award, and hopeful that this acknowledgement will bring even more wonderful things in the future. (More awards please!)

Here's a pic of the trophy itself, sunning itself in the garden the following day...

And if you haven't bought a copy of the book yet, you can visit www.loveinaheadscarf.com to find out more, and purchase a copy. Happy reading :D

Is this an eco-epiphany?

I will be the first to admit that I have much improvement to show in making my living habits more environmentally friendly. Whilst there is a lot of chatter around us about how we all ought to be 'green', I have a sneaking suspicion that there is a lot more talk than there is action. I don't believe I'm the only one who talks green but doesn't go all out to act it.

This week we've had the plumbers in, and the water feed into the cistern in the loo has been disconnected, so we have to fill it up manually in order to flush. The first few times I tried filling it up from water bottles (running backwards and forwards to the temporary mains in the front garden to fill them up). Ten minutes later, (not to be too graphic about it), the cistern was ready for action. It was a lot of effort to answer nature's call. Later, we requisitioned a massive watering can for the job, and I could be seen teetering from front garden to bathroom with the filled vessel weighing about a third of my body mass.

I realised this very obvious fact: it takes a lot of water - clean water - to flush, and if you have to carry it yourself, it's a helluva lot of effort. What a waste of clean water! For the first time - and I'm being completely honest here - it occurred to me that perhaps those composting, old fashioned kind of loos are something we ought to seriously consider. The effort required really hit home.

I have been thinking about all this for a while, but this experience made me think a bit harder and may have created a tipping point. As a Muslim, it has occurred to me that the way we live is rather extravagant resource-wise and I ought to be more prudent and sensitive in my relationship with nature. Having recently moved from a city-centre flat to a house with a garden also seems to be helping with this earth-connection. I'll be asking for gardening tips soon.

Now, being an urban chick I think it will take me a while to make eco-adjustments, so I'm looking for simple straightforward suggestions for incremental changes that I can make. Any proposals?

Guest Post on Spirit21 from David Miliband, Foreign Secretary.

It's Friday today, Jum'ah, and as a special treat, the Foreign Secretary has written his first ever posting on a Muslim blog, here at Spirit21. David Miliband is no stranger to cyberspace and writes his own prolific blog over at the FCO website.

It would be fair to say that the relationship between the Foreign Office and the British and global Muslim community has been a tumultuous one (ahem, understatement), and many Britons, including British Muslims, believe that the Foreign Office needs to be held more strongly to account, and should adopt a more proactive and ethical approach to Foreign policy, working in partnership with Muslims and the Muslim world.

So here is your chance, people: our Foreign Secretary is reaching out and wanting to create dialogue, so take up the opportunity to question him - that's how we create change. I'll be posting my own comments a bit later, but dear readers - grill him, debate with him, criticise him, offer him positive and innovative policy ideas.

Foreign Secretary: here is your opportunity to listen and to make real change. And you should keep going with more direct engagement like this with the electorate - we like it when our elected politicians talk to us directly, really listen, and then make real the aspirations of the people of this nation.


David Miliband: Compromise and coalition of consent required

There is hardly a more important issue than how we build strong coalitions with Muslim majority countries on issues as diverse as non proliferation or climate change, or how we deepen understanding between people of different faiths. This was the theme of my speech yesterday in Oxford.

There is a need for humility in the West but there is also a need for responsibility from all sides rather than finger pointing. No speech can be the end of the matter. The speech focuses on the importance of politics and arenas for politics where compromise and communication are the order of the day. That is why I am grateful for the opportunity to engage through Spirit 21.

There are hard questions left unanswered in my speech and tensions within it. But if Gallup are right that the vast majority of people in Muslim majority countries say they admire the commitment in the West to the rule of law and free speech, but want to see these values consistently applied, then there is more than enough room for all of us to shape common rules for what the Prime Minister calls "the global society". As this morning's FT editorial says, if we are asking the rights questions, then at least we are on our way to getting the right answers.

David Miliband

Muslims 2.0?

I'll be speaking this evening at an event hosted by the Radical Middle Way entitled "Divan 2.0: Wired Warriors for the Soul of Islam". It will be a panel discussion and Q&A between some of the UK's most active cyber citizens.

So here are some of my inital thoughts: the web has certainly opened doors for Muslims - especially young Muslims - to have their voices heard and hold discussions that had very little space elsewhere. I'm one of those and my blog is testament to how the web helped me discover and shape my voice. But I do worry that there is a lot of yelling that goes on, and that we have lost the ability to discern wisdom and learning from polemic. And how does the invisible, intangible blogosphere fit into the social structure of a faith that is built around physical congregations such as the Friday prayers and the hajj? Are we destined to turn into two parallel ummahs, those who go to the mosque and those who go online?

Come along to the event to hear the panel talking about Wired Warriors for the soul of Islam

Date: Friday 22 May 2009
Location: Old Theatre, London School of Economics
Address: Houghton Street (off the Aldwych) London WC2A 2AE
Time: Doors open 6:45 pm; Starts 7:15 pm; Ends 8:45 pm

Save the Children's World Record Run this weekend...

I'm not one that usually advertises many other events on my blog, but this one caught my attention: Save the Children, and a new charity called IF which seeks to raise money for worthwhile causes through fun and innovative ideas, are staging a World Record breaking attempt for “the most people running 100 meters in a 12-hour relay.” (according to the Guinness book of records official title). I think the number will be around 3000 - 4000 people, who will run in relay at Mile End Stadium, and hopefully bring the record in for London. Each runner is being asked for £100 sponsorship minimum, which means that the run could raise upwards for £300,000, which will be donated to Save the Children's Humanitarian fund for Gaza.

It's great to see innovative ideas for fundraising, especially those which challenge the participants themselves. I wish all the runners well.

You can read more here, and of course, remember to get out your chequebook, or access your paypal account: http://www.ifcharity.com/gaza100.html

Muslims: beyond the caricature

This article was just posted at the Guardian's Comment is Free

The Muslim attitudes survey reveals a loyal community, keen on integration - far from the usual stereotypes

My British glass is half empty. According to a Gallup poll released yesterday, only half of the UK population identifies itself as very strongly British. And in Germany only 32% of the general public feels that way about being German. Who then identifies most strongly with their nation, reaching a whopping 77% in the UK? Muslims.

This refreshing piece of information is part of a wider picture that Gallup paints of a European Muslim population that is more tolerant and integrated, as well as more strongly identified with Europe's nations than other communities. It is an excellent and much-needed study, capable of informing the ongoing debate about the situation and place of Muslims in Europe.

The report investigates the usual allegations levelled at Muslims. It establishes that religiosity is no indicator of support for violence against civilians and that in the UK and Germany Muslims are more likely to state that violence is not justified for a noble cause than the general public.

This vital information needs to be channelled immediately into policy, where Muslims are only ever seen through the prism of violent extremism and are falsely considered to be predisposed to violence when in fact the opposite is the case.

The idea that Muslims want to live in isolated "ghettos" is also untrue. Muslims are in fact more likely to want to live in a neighbourhood that has a mix of ethnic and religious people: 67% of Muslims vs 58% of the general public in the UK, 83% vs 68% in France.

Muslims also believe that it is nonreligious actions that will lead to integration – language, jobs, education. For example, over 80% of Muslims in the UK, France and Germany believe that mastering the local language is critical.
Whilst both the general and the Muslim populations believe these things are essential for integration, these are the areas where Muslims are found to be disproportionately struggling. They have lower levels of employment and lower standards of living. For our public discourse and for government, this is where the focus needs to be and funding need to be applied.

The really worry is the gulf between how Muslims see their integration into society and how the wider population sees them. Some 82% of British Muslims say they are loyal to Britain. Only 36% of the general population believe British Muslims are loyal to the country.

This has its roots in misinformation and miscommunication across society and means we all need to work hard to dissipate the dark cloud of fear that hangs above our heads. The Gallup report points to other countries like Senegal, Sierra Leone and South Africa which have a very high level of tolerance and integration across society and suggests that this may be a result of governments that actively promote religious tolerance, recognise multiple religious traditions in official holidays and national celebrations and enshrine religious freedoms in the constitution.

As a British Muslim woman who wears the headscarf, I was particularly proud to see that in Britain the headscarf is seen positively. When asked what qualities it was associated with, a third said confidence and courage, and 41% said freedom. Some 37% said it enriched European culture.

Instead of building on the platform for understanding and communication that this report brings, the mainstream media coverage has sensationalised the report by reducing it to one thing: Muslim opinions about sexual relationships.

To be sure, Muslims are indeed more conservative than the general population, but this is perhaps a trait shared with other religious communities. In fact, the areas which concern Muslims are in some cases those that we find socially contentious anyway: pornography, abortion, suicide, homosexuality and extra-marital relations.

French Muslims appear to be more "liberal" with regards to sexual mores than German or British Muslims. This is a red herring. It does not necessarily mean that they have "more integrated" sexual attitudes. All it seems to reflect are broader views on sexuality in those countries. For example, the French public considers married men and women having an affair far more morally acceptable than Brits or Germans, and this difference is reflected in the Muslim population across all three countries.

The danger in focusing on sexuality as a litmus test of integration is that in turns this into a one-issue debate. The point here is that it is that it is completely irrelevant to a discussion of integration and a happily functioning society, where mutual respect and understanding for each others moral codes – whether we agree or not – ought to be the foundations for a shared vision of a shared society. We see this in the statistics about homosexuality: it's true that no Muslims in the UK found this to be morally acceptable (though there is a 5% margin of error for Muslims across all the statistics in the report). However, this needs to be seen in context of the fact that Muslims are more respectful of those different to themselves than the general British public. The important point here is not that we should have homogeneous social and moral attitudes, but that we can respect and live with those who hold opinions at different ends of that spectrum.

The message is this: we should use this report to silence those who spread hate once and for all. We need to move on from the monochromatic discussions of loyalty being either to the state or to religion, discussions that force a choice between "my way or the highway".

Our glass is actually more than half full. There is much hard work to be done, and many aspects of economic and social policy that need to be addressed, but the status quo offers all of us much hope for an integrated future. It is a future that can be built on the evidence before us of ample scope for dialogue and understanding.

Moments in New York

I'm in New York city at the moment, taking a few days of sightseeing before attending the next conference of Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow. I'm on Day 2, and so far I don't feel like I've quite managed to tap into the rhythm of the city yet, but have been observing moments and experiences. I like the cosmopolitan nature of the city so far - nothing is quite what it seems, nothing appears to have a place, and yet everything has jostled into position and asserted its right to be here.

Take the visit to the Museum of Modern Art, where one of my favourite exhibits was the Huggable Atomic Mushroom Cloud which made me chuckle with its explanation of "we can embrace our fears, literally".

This morning's visit to the Statue of Liberty revealed this gem: at the unveiling of the statue (for liberty, obviously) the suffragettes hired a boat to keep campaigning for the vote for women, and also protested that almost all the official invitees were men. Oh, the delicious irony that liberty is represented by a woman.

Delicious "stir-brewed" coffee in Greenwich village sitting opposte a preppy twentysomething new york woman crocheting a shawl for herself, explaining her penchant for older men.

Mother and two sons on the Ellis Island ferry: older son punches younger son viciously and then turns to mother: "I beat him because he's got no respect." Mother turns to protesting younger son: "Shut the **** up".

Resisting the urge on the subway to experience a marriage proposal (re: Coming to America), or to save the train from oblivion and come screeching to the surface as the tracks end (re: Speed), or ensconce in the cloakroom (re: The pursuit of happyness).

John D. Rockefeller Jr invests during the Great Depression in creating the almost wildly outrageous Rockefeller Centre (note: English spelling of 'centre'), creating 75,000 jobs at a time of huge unemployment. A visionary to learn from today?

Back to the Museum of Modern Art, I ask the guide for directions, which he does not communicate clearly. I ask again, and in what appears to be typical new york style, he slows down to stupid-speed and explains child-like (with physical demonstration) the difference between turning right and turning left. Laugh or cry?

In London it is sunny and 18 degrees. In NY it is raining and 7 degrees. Irony. Or just annoying.

Tomorrow, the Guggenheim and Central Park.

Questions on a postcard please

This was published in the April edition of EMEL Magazine

I have been missing out on a lucrative business opportunity. Facing a credit crunch before us, and being encouraged by the PM to fight the recession, I have registered a domain name and created my own Cyberservice which I believe will plug a much needed gap in t he Muslim market.

I base my new venture on investigations into what appears to be a worrying trend in the Muslim psyche. As a set of global communities we are facing unprecedented change and challenges, one of the most significant of which is the nature and relationship of Muslims with Authority. I write it with an uppercase 'A' because it seems we are not sure what the archetype of authority should be, and given the various kinds of authority we all deal with on a day to day level, we are not sure how we should relate to it.

We have Muslim countries whose leaders do not necessarily seem to follow an Islamic ethos. We have others who seek to impose their interpretation of Islamic law with great vigour undifferentiatedly across their entire populations. We have some Muslims who argue that we must follow scholars no matter what, and others who argue the opposite that we must use our own minds and our independent thinking to reach the answers.

'Twas ever thus, for the question of who has authority and how it ought to be exercised, questioned and obeyed lie at the heart of Islam. Even the Prophet's own authority was constantly questioned, and Muslims under his watch lived under a number of different rulers including the Christian King of Abyssinia, the Meccans who had not embraced Islam, and in fact rejected it thoroughly, as well as leadership of the Prophet himself.

There are two major changes however that do raise new challenges in our understanding of authority. The first is the immediacy of global connectivity. Where once the religious leader you followed - or opposed - was determined by your geographical location, now we have a global marketplace of leaders who are accessible through websites, video clips and television. It sometimes feels like scholars have to go out touting for business, and 'image' is everything.

The internet has brought another trend with it - the democratisation of knowledge. This is a good thing - knowledge is the lifeblood of Islamic life, and the immediacy, depth and range of information that is now available for people to educate themselves easily and freely is unparalleled. But how to choose which information is accurate and measured?

The challenge for Muslims is to face the combination of all of this readily accessible information with modernity's all-powerful individual and with an insecure - and unfounded - desperation to prove that their own understanding of Islam is always alwaysright. The outcome? A global nation of individuals who claim to have all the answers, unwilling to listen or to ask new questions, and who consequently are always stuck in the same debates: the veil, segregation, Islamism, the West.

With the constant spotlight on Muslims, we are expected to have answers to every question that anyone asks about Islam. But we are also guilty of not being able to just ask questions and spend time discussing them. We don't need to have a fixed pre-determined answer for absolutely everything. There is a joy and a creativity in asking questions, allowing others to explore them and then engaging in a dialogue about potential answers.

We need to re-introduce to our vocabulary questions that begin "why" "how" "what if..." We must have enough space to ask questions. Enough time to sit and be with those questions and be able to explore them, and enough confidence and openness to listen to those who propose answers at first or even second glance we do not agree with. Our desperate need to have answers to absolutely every single question has led to an outsized proliferation of the fatwa, where any and all questions are asked. There is indeed a place to ask those who have more knowledge and more wisdom for guidance on matters which we are unclear about, but it is worrying that we'll ask anyone anything, even things that appear to be common sense and in line with our fitrah, our conscience.

So, to make sure I cash in on this trend while it lasts, my new online business is this: DialaFatwa.Com. Am I being irreverent? It's a good question to ask.

"Love in a Headscarf" shortlisted for Muslim Writers Awards

Exciting news! My book Love in a Headscarf has been shortlisted by the Muslim Writers Awards for the Published Non-Fiction category.

The competition is stiff, with some great books also on the shortlist, but I'll be keeping my fingers crossed. The awards will be announced on May 27th.

We must face the crisis in Darfur

This was published today in The National

One of the loudest voices raised in support of Darfur has been George Clooney's. He is one of a number of American stars, including Angelina Jolie, Mia Farrow and Macy Gray, who have been working to raise the profile of this crisis. Their actions have been met with cynicism in the Middle East and in Sudan. "Hollywood celebrities think they can come and be famous by claiming they support the people of Darfur," said one of the president of Sudan's advisers.

Whatever their motives, Clooney and co are at least doing something. Middle Eastern countries, by contrast, have shown a shameful lack of interest in the suffering of the Darfuris.The nation's crisis began just as the 20-year conflict between northern and southern Sudan looked to be coming to an end. Rebel groups in Darfur began attacking government targets, accusing Khartoum of oppressing "Black Africans" in favour of "Arabs".

The language of race used to describe the conflict has been virulent, and evoked rather simplistic passions. In the West race is a sensitive issue, which may be one reason why Darfur has become a pet cause of Hollywood stars.

By the same token however, the apparent indifference of Middle Eastern countries may be because they consider Darfur to be a tribal or "black" issue.

But the conflict is not about race: closer analysis reveals that it began as a dispute over tribal lands between the nomadic tribes, referred to in shorthand as "Arab", and the permanent farmers, referred to as "African".

Famine, drought and changing land usage led to clashes about territorial rights which have yet to be resolved.

In addition, Darfuris became increasingly angry at the low level of services they received from the government by way of water, sanitation, health care and education and felt they had been left out while the government focused on Khartoum and the south.

I went to see Darfur with my own eyes at the end of last year. In the camps outside Al-Geneina, the capital of West Darfur, I saw families living in tents no more than three metres square, with rationed food and water.

Aid agencies were doing their best, but the Sudanese government is not keen on their presence and, with the crisis into its sixth year, donors are growing weary.

At one school I visited, scores of fidgeting youngsters dressed in white stood under the midday sun facing inwards to a small centre stage where their head teacher led them in vibrant song. Their joillity belied the pain many had endured, especially those old enough to remember the bloodshed, fear and crisis that began in 2003. I spoke to two young girls.

"I'd like to become a lawyer when I’m older," 16-year-old Fatima told me. "I want to be a writer," said her friend Layla. "Why?" I asked. "To make our country better," said Fatima. "So it doesn’t happen again," said Layla.

From Darfur, I went on to Cairo, Jeddah, Riyadh and Doha to highlight its plight. In these Middle Eastern cities, however, people were strangely angry that the conflict in Darfur was being raised as an issue. "What about Palestine? Why aren't you talking about Palestine?" they said.

But the oppression in Gaza and the West Bank does not outrank the suffering of Darfur, or vice-versa. Suffering is suffering wherever it takes place, and must be spoken about, fought against and stopped, no matter who the perpetrator, no matter where the location.Why should the suffering of Darfuris be diminished? Human hearts are big enough to remember and mourn the plight of many, not just one.

More than 1,400 people were killed in Gaza during Israel's recent onslaught, an event that can only be described in lay terms as a contained massacre, part of more than 60 years of killing and suffering.

In Darfur too, the numbers are heart-wrenchingly high. According to the UN, 300,000 people have been killed since the crisis began, a further 2.7 million people have been displaced from their homes, and five million people are living on aid. It makes for grim reading. Khartoum puts the figure of those killed closer to 10,000.

Whatever the number, the crisis is real, and the lack of instinctive empathy concerned me. It was as if people did not want to believe that such brutality could happen in another Arab Muslim country. Darfur is a complex issue, but this should not stop any movement for sympathy and aid to support the human beings who are suffering daily.

Middle Eastern countries, Arabs and Muslims, need to step up and start contributing to the aid effort. If they are serious about relieving suffering, then first they need to contribute financially. The amount donated so far has been pitiful, and has gone straight into the hands of the Sudanese government.

In addition, the Middle East needs to contribute human resources by training and dispatching more aid workers.

In terms of taking an active role in negotiating peace, Middle Eastern failures abound both for Palestine and Darfur. Only the recent Qatari initiative for peace in Darfur appears to have a measured, sustainable - and dare I say it - hopeful glimmer.

Last month the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a warrant for the arrest of the Sudanese president Omar al Bashir on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Many Darfur campaigners questioned the wisdom of such a move, fearing it would hamper their own efforts to resolve the crisis, especially when Sudan was moving with democratic elections and the Qatari initiative looked hopeful.

Mr al Bashir in response called the ICC "undemocratic", accused it of "double standards" and expelled 13 aid agencies from Darfur.

In defiance, he attended the Arab League summit in Qatar last weekend, which rejected the ICC warrant. "No Arab president will be let down," said a statement. "We are going to fight until the end."

The ICC along with aid agencies are seen to be pursuing a biased western agenda, leading Arabs to instinctively side with the Sudanese government without any real assessment of the situation. What Sudan actually needs is not blind support, but critical friends.

For the Middle East and for many Muslims, the contrast in approach to Darfur and Palestine is revelatory. Darfur is complicated.

Darfur means disentangling the moral rights and wrongs of all parties who are Muslim, and bluntly put, there is not the moral fibre nor the political will to do so.

Palestine is a simple moral judgment - them and us. The oppressor and the oppressed are clear, and the swell of public opinion is in one direction, making it easy to shout and protest. Both conflicts are horrific and are taking a huge humanitarian toll. Each life lost is a loss to all humanity, whether it be in Gaza, Darfur or elsewhere.

We must reach through the complexities of the political situations and apply universal moral standards. Only then will we be able to identify where in the conflict lies justice and ultimately peace.

To have the credibility and moral authority to do so, we must show an even and compassionate hand no matter where or against whom the suffering is being perpetrated.

When Clooney visited Darfur in 2006 as a reporter, he was accompanied by a man who is now president of the United States.

At that time Barack Obama said: "If we care, the world will care. If we act, then the world will follow." President Obama is sticking to his message. Last week he sent his envoy Scott Gration to kick-start peace talks between the Sudanese government and the rebels.

It is part of his wider outreach to the Middle East.

The time has come for the Middle East to reach out as well. An important first step will be to focus on achieving peace in Darfur.

Created from a single soul

This week, The Guardian's Comment is Free has been asking "Is religion good for women?" My response has just been published.

The Question: Is religion good for women?
Created from a single soul: If there is unequal treatment it is because those with power have forgotten the underlying principles of religion

I am irked by this question, the sense it carries with it that women are some kind of second best, an after-thought for religion, that require special attention. Women aren't a remnant, or an aberration whose existence is there simply to sweep up the leftover genetic code off the floor and perpetuate the species. Women are fundamental to successful human flourishing – both physical and spiritual. It comes as no surprise to me that with the constant oppression that women face – whether in the name of religion or the cultural codes that seem to exist across all societies – the result is human society as a whole lurching from one failure to another. How can the human environment we all live in blossom if half of its inhabitants suffer in so many ways because of their gender?

As a Muslim woman, I was annoyed by the opening blurb introducing the question "Is religion good for women?" that set the background to the question saying that the Abrahamic faiths "believe in a father God, ruling the world through a network of men". Islam emphatically does not believe in a father God. The divine is gender-neutral. The more I have discussed religion, the more I have found myself veering away from the word "God" for the very reason that it seems to carry historical baggage with it that in vulgar terms is very male, with a long beard and throne somewhere on high, which immediately engenders (yes, pun intended) a sense of exclusion in all of us who are non-male, or at the very least non-bearded, or non-throned.

Instead, I have found myself using other terms from within the Islamic paradigm like "the divine", or "the creator" or even borrowing from other mystical traditions with a word like "enlightenment", in order to get rid of the accepted male status quo within religion.

The fundamental way of knowing "the divine" as a Muslim are the 99 names which describe the qualities of the deity. Islamic scholars have grouped these broadly into two halves, male and female, and any comprehensive understanding and connection to the divine must understand and embrace both the male and the female attributes. By extension, human beings also aspire to manifest all of these qualities, which therefore underlines the critical importance of the female within any sort of understanding and practice of religion.

Men and women in Islamic theology were "created from a single soul", as quoted in the Qur'an, and are "made in pairs". The origins and relationship of men and women are therefore equal and equitable, neither one being able to exist or fully function without the other. The assumption behind the phrase "a network of men" is therefore also false. Every story related in scripture almost invariably has a man and a woman who carry the message together. Jesus and Mary, Moses and Miriam, Muhammed and Khadija. These stories are told in Islamic scripture with feisty, spiritual women who change the course of history.

Take the story of Mary as related in the Qur'an. Her father promised that his unborn child would be dedicated to God and would serve in the temple. He was surprised to find it was a girl – Mary – as only boys were traditionally dedicated for this purpose. He is instructed by the divine to continue with his dedication, and Mary went to live in the temple, shocking those around him with the idea that a woman could be worthy enough to serve the divine, a privilege previously accorded only to men. Mary's very presence in the temple was designed to crush oppressive and misogynistic ideas, but many of these are still perpetuated vigorously today. As an aside, I should mention that Islamic tale of Mary's birth of Jesus is told without reference to any male father figure. There is no Joseph, instead Mary is the epitome of the strong single mother whose neighbours gossip about her, but who raises a great child.

With such a powerful parable to draw on, and with the fundamental blueprint of gender relations in Islam being framed in the paradigm of "a single soul" I often ask myself why women are still treated as second best. I find it incomprehensible that women are excluded from some mosques, when by decree Mary was placed at the place of worship. I find it equally baffling that men treat women as lesser beings when the clear instruction is that both are created from the same spiritual fabric. All other actions must be carried out in the context of this basic human blueprint.

The problem is, those who have power will justify keeping it in any way they can, sometimes by conveniently forgetting the underlying principles of religion. The challenge is to reject black-and-white polarising questions like "Is religion good for women" and start from the basic fundamentals of equality. "Created from a single soul" seems a pretty good place to start to overturn the misogynists.

Googling Muslim Women

[This article was published in the March issue of EMEL Magazine]

I'd like you to try an experiment that I have conducted regularly for the last year: Google the search term "Muslim women", click on "images" and then have a look at the pictures that are returned to you by the search. The first time I did this, I was shocked, very shocked, but not surprised.

You'll find the first several pages are populated almost entirely by imagery of women in black niqabs, black burqas or black trailing cloaks. The others are unnerving pseudo-pornographic images with translucent veils that are best left un-described in a family magazine. The sad fact is that this result has changed very little over the time that I have been observing the phenomenon.

Google's mission statement is 'to organise the world' using algorithms that return the results to us that we were looking for. In any search we usually get a result that matches well what we were looking for, which is why Google has become an institution in our lives. When we are searching for information about Muslim women, the intelligent technology throws back these sombre anonymous uni-dimensional images assuming they are what we were referring to by 'Muslim women'. Worse still, perhaps that is all the imagery and information that it can find. If it is the former we can blame lazy stereotyping. If it is the latter, then it is we who are to blame by not providing alternative, compelling and more widely spread diversity on who and what Muslim women are.

Conduct a similar experiment on Amazon or in your local high street bookshop. The same images abound of books with subtitles like: "A heart-rending story of love and oppression", "sold" "burned alive" "honour killing". Even those books that tell of courage, struggle and freedom use this lazy visual shorthand of anonymous women's faces to adorn their books, despite the fact that the writers and protagonists themselves have gone to great lengths to make their names, ideas and voices heard.

The stories that are told in our public discourse about Muslim women are depressingly predictable. Most common is the Oppressed, as we've seen above. Some of these women truly have horrific stories, and it is absolutely right that they are at the forefront of our consciousness, and that we are working constantly to eradicate the attitudes and actions that give rise to these terrible experiences. However, these same images are used ignorantly as shorthand for the 'barbaric' and 'mediaeval' views that Islam is said to hold about women.

Then we have stories from the Liberated, who escaped from the Oppression, and have 'freed' themselves, and at one extreme of the scale have 'enlightened' themselves and even rejected Islam utterly, and yet peculiarly still continue to define themselves in relation to it.

And somewhere in between are the soft sensual tales from the 'hidden world' of Muslim women, the Exotic, which Eastern doe-eyed beauties inhabit and where secrets of desire, womanliness and oriental allure reside. This is a world of voyeuristic otherness.

In order to register in the public consciousness, Muslim women must fit themselves into one of these categories. But they don't. And they don't want to.

The challenge is that Muslims too have ideas about how and what Muslim women should be. They offer Muslim women a choice between hijab-religious or non-hijab-irreligious, making sweeping assumptions about a woman's moral and religious character based on what she wears. But this is a false dichotomy that is saturated with an irony that most Muslims are not even aware of: that the recommendations on modest dress in Islam are specifically in order to avoid defining people by what they wear, and yet we use religious clothing as a way to pigeon-hole women.

Whether Muslim or otherwise, the paradigms within which we understand Muslim women have been limited to these caricatured notions. In doing this, we ourselves have removed the freedom from Muslim women to express their own voices in a way which allows them to represent themselves as they wish to be represented.

We need to create a change in the perceptions about Muslim women, their rights and the way that they are treated. In order to do so we need first of all to create in our public discourse the possibility of different ways of being.

Islam says let love blossom

[I am posting this article belatedly. It was published in The National a few weeks ago to co-incide with the day which in Arabic is charmingly called Yawm-al-hubb, the Day of Love.]

Before reading this article I should warn you that it might be considered subversive. It may lead you into the paths of disbelief. Beware dear reader, for we are about to discuss Valentine's Day.Even though I am a Muslim, or perhaps because I am one, I will quite readily wish you "Happy Valentine’s Day" today. Even this simple act might land me in trouble with a handful of Islamic scholars such as the Egyptian cleric Hazem Shuman. He warned young Muslims this week that Valentine's Day was "more dangerous than Aids, Ebola and cholera". Wow, I had no idea that a red rose could be so lethal.

We enjoy such perplexing tales courtesy of the right-wing press, keen to promote the view that Muslims see Valentine's Day - and by extension love itself - as evil. Fox News last year covered a Kuwaiti MP who chaired a committee to prevent "such alien events from impacting on Kuwaiti society and spreading corruption". Britain's Daily Star tabloid newspaper elevated the former head of Al-Muhajiroun, Anjem Choudhary, to cleric status and quoted him saying that those celebrating Valentine's Day "would rot in hell".

Boy, if there is anything that Muslims are good at it, it is melodrama. But are Muslims such as these just as guilty as the right-wing press of confusing the celebration of love with love itself?

The origins of Valentine's Day lie not in the romance with which we associate it today, but in events any person of faith would uphold. The celebration is usually traced to a number of early Christian martyrs called Valentine who were persecuted by pagan rulers.

Another Valentine performed secret marriages for Roman soldiers forced to remain single by an Emperor who believed unmarried men made better soldiers.

Since these events happened well before the advent of Islam, it is notable that the individuals are remembered for standing up for their belief in God and upholding the sanctity of marriage, two fundamental pillars of Islam as a deen, a way of life.

There were already Roman celebrations linked to fertility, so it is possible the church decided to celebrate the feast of St Valentine at the same time to "Christianise" the festival. In the same way, Muslims in Egypt proposed to rename February 14 as "Prophet Mohammed's Day". One can only imagine that this was to defuse misconceptions young people may have about love and its various expressions.

Those who argue for moving to a more "proper" Islamic celebration are most likely the same who argue against a specific day for love in the first place, their objection being why should love be limited to Valentine's Day? But doesn't the same argument apply to celebrating Prophet Mohammed's Day? Shouldn't that be every day as well?

The connection with romantic love began with Geoffrey Chaucer, whose 14th century poem celebrating the king's engagement described it as the time when birds choose their mate. From then on romance and Valentine's Day become increasingly entwined. The French set up a "court of love" on Valentine's Day in 1400 to deal with love contracts, betrayals and violence against women, with the judges selected by the women themselves.

With the constant discussions about sharia courts, which deal mainly with women and personal law, perhaps they too should be renamed courts of love and aim to instil love and compassion between those in dispute? They could even allow female plaintiffs to choose the judges as in the French model - they would be selecting from a panel of judges, so all would be equally qualified. It seems a courteous and civilised way of resolving the current legal imbalances in many courts which do not allow women to be fully heard.

The modern Valentine's Day was created by Esther Howland, who mass produced cards of paper lace in 1847. Her seemingly innocuous act changed the face of the US greeting card industry which now credits Valentine's Day with the second largest sales after Christmas.

Approximately one billion Valentine's cards are sent each year, with women buying 85 per cent of them. Many are sent anonymously. It is a worrying echo of the stereotype that women ought to be shy in expressing their liking of someone, the hunted rather than the hunted.

Conversely, men spend twice as much as women on the day, suggesting that they too are under pressure to conform to a stereotype of wooing a woman with their wealth. Advertisers and marketers have turned love into a cosmetic, superficial experience.

On the other hand, Muslims seem to have reduced romance to a legalistic directive, determining their three words to be "it is bid'ah", a worldly innovation contrary to Islam. Expressing love on days such as Valentine's is "bid'ah". What is perplexing is not just this legal opinion, but that Muslims need to ask such questions. How did we reach the point where we ask legal authorities about matters of celebrating love? Consider other questions that are asked: "Is falling in love allowed in Islam?" or "Can a husband express his love to his wife?" They reflect the increasingly legalistic approach Muslims are taking in all matters of life.

These two polar opposites have both reduced love to a caricature of its true self, forcing us to choose between cheesy superficiality on the one hand and heartless rigidity on the other. It sounds almost like a "with us or against us" choice, and we all know the trouble that causes.

Presented with this stark absurdity, all human beings - which, of course, includes Muslims - will be forced to look into their hearts and realise that expressing love is simply common sense. Instead of fatwas on how, what and where to celebrate, we need legal scholars to decree a return to the way of the Prophet - common sense and humanity.

Those people of faith who oppose Valentine's Day are missing a trick. Faith is about celebrating love - love of the Divine, love of humanity, love of your companion. There is no need to reject a celebration of love; rather those who believe in the sanctity of marriage should recapture such events for their original celebration of marriage. And each Valentine's Day let us see love blossom and a thousand marriages bloom.

From blogger to author to blogger

The last few weeks have been exciting and enlightening to say the very least. My book "Love in a Headscarf" was published rather coquettishly on Valentine's Day (that's February 14th, for all those of you that oppose the essential existence of such a day). Despite being an utter and unfailing optimist, even I was completely overwhelmed by the amount of media coverage and interest it has raised.

The Guardian, BBC World, the Asian Network, the Turkish Media, the Daily Mail (yes! the Daily Fail even loved it - they published an extract which included a verse from the Qur'an - probably the first time ever outside an article commenting about the scary rise of shariah by the lovely Ms. MP), The Asian Writer, Eastern Eye, the lovely Muslimah Media Watch, IslamOnline, CommentisFree... the list goes on.

And you can leave your comments about the book or your own stories here: http://www.loveinaheadscarf.com/Story.html

In all the excitement, dear Spirit21 readers, the blog has gone somewhat neglected. But I return now to my first love, the InterWeb, and all of you who were with me before printed material came between us. So, a few pieces will follow shortly catching up with what has gone on in the last few weeks and which I haven't managed to post up yet. And more soon.

P.S. In teeny weeny writing, having said all that, do remember to buy the book! www.loveinaheadscarf.com :D

Love in a Headscarf - out now!

Exciting news! My book is out now, and available to purchase at all good bookshops and online. Yes, yes, it's shameless promotion, I know, but a first-time author's gotta do what a first-time author's gotta do. Click on the book cover to find out more. And if you like the look of it (and it seems quite a few people have), a couple of key-presses and postal delivery later you'll be the proud owner of the book, which is today covered in a double page spread in the Guardian.

You can also read more about the book at www.loveinaheadscarf.com

A Muslim Woman's Journey - "Love in a Headscarf" published today

The Guardian is joining me today in announcing the publication of my book "Love in a Headscarf"

I wanted to write about my experiences - not of oppression, or turning away from religion - but of love.

I sometimes wonder what someone who has never met ordinary Muslim woman thinks we are like. Perhaps they see us all as black-veil-wearing creatures in voluminous cloaks. Certainly those who search for images in Google under "Muslim women" are likely to think so.

Perhaps if you've never met a Muslim woman you might think we are all failing to "integrate", whatever that means, or to communicate with the people we live amongst, as Jack Straw would have us believe. It's possible that they think we are all opposed to freedom of speech and will use violence to attack it.

If you walk into any bookshop you will find stories of Muslim women with words like "oppressed" "sold" or "kidnapped" in the titles. Their tales of horror rightly need to be told, and the abuses which have been perpetrated need to be stopped. However, this genre of misery-memoir about Muslim women is fed constantly by publishers eager to confirm and exploit this stereotype. The tales are topped off with accounts of rejection of Islam and the nirvana of "liberation" from it. Both of these archetypal stories feature book covers almost exclusively of women with sad oppressed eyes staring out from behind a tightly wrapped niqab, camels and deserts in the background.

It is hard to tell whether publishers illustrate their books in this way because it reaps easy commercial rewards. Or is it that they themselves cannot see the complexity and variation amongst Muslim women, or are simply too lazy or cowardly to bring us new stories that avoid this one-size-fits-all approach.


I speak from experience - today sees the publication of my first book "Love in a Headscarf", a memoir of growing up as a Muslim woman. I was fed up of seeing the same old stories told all the time, and wanted to share one "from the inside", and in a way that itself was groundbreaking.

So I chose to write a humorous and light-hearted tale. I wanted to tell a story that touches each of us as human beings, looking at questions of love, life and meaning that we all share, but through the eyes of a Muslim woman. Most of all, I wanted to explore the contradictions and contrasts that we all face, and humour was the best medium for that. As Peter Ustinov said, "Comedy is simply a funny way of being serious."

I took the book to a number of publishers whose commissioning editors loved the story, but couldn't see it fitting with the existing mould of books about Muslim women. "We need an 'alias' of a book that is already out there so people understand how it relates to previous books," they explained, meaning it should be either a forced marriage story or one of escape from Islam.

With such black and white views about the stories that Muslim women are permitted to tell, how can it ever be possible to create an understanding of our diversity and complexity?

I hope my book brings a fresh perspective to the discussion about Muslim women. But there is a serious question to be asked – will it provoke the Muslim community to look into itself and wonder why these lazy stereotypes exist? Sometimes as Muslims we lack an intellectual honesty about ourselves, and are not brave enough to tell our stories as human beings on a journey, with all our flaws. If publishers are guilty of monolithic misery memoirs, then Muslims must also take some of the blame for not sharing our universal experiences in a language and context that everyone can relate to.

We need to connect to those around us at that very fundamental level of human experience. Today, on Valentine's Day, let's do it with love.

Spirit21 celebrates its 3rd birthday

Over the weekend Spirit21 was three years old, and it's been an exciting three years! This year has been packed full of new year resolutions, conferences and some thinking about Palestine and about love. You can read what happened in 2008, as well as a few thoughts I've had previously about birthdays.

Over these years since I first dipped my toe into the blogosphere, and into the wider world of the media, I've been asked constantly to write a memoir of my experiences as a Muslim woman. I've been asked to share the honesty, humour and insight that I try and put into my articles in a book. And this weekend, just as we celebrate Spirit21's third birthday, I will be announcing the publication of my first book, called "Love in a Headscarf".

You can read more about it at www.loveinaheadscarf.com

And for those of you who are in and about London you are invited to the launch on Friday evening at the City Circle.

What's love got to do with it?

This article was recently published in EMEL Magazine.

February plays host to Valentine's Day, and to the declaration of those 'three little words.' But what exactly are those three little words, and what do they reveal about our modern psyche?

A colleague of mine will be abroad, but will be sending flowers to his wife with the message: "I'm sorry I can't be there to take you out for an over-priced meal. Here are some over-priced flowers instead." He humorously conveys his love, but his words reflect a modern-day fatigue of being told what, when and how to feel, beholden to the manufacturing and commercialisation of emotion.

"Happy Hallmark Holiday" encapsulates our disillusion with modern angst for total perfection. Our very real, natural and rough-round-the-edges human processes are turned into flawless airbrushed ideals that do not resemble our lived experiences.

At the opposite extreme of expressing our feelings, we face another far too common three word phrase: "it is bid'ah", denying our natural fitrah to express love. Last year, the Saudi Vice Police were sent to all shops the week before Valentine's Day to ensure that nothing red-coloured was sold. Kuwaiti MPs declared that Valentine's Day was 'not compatible with our values.' The Internet is replete with questions asking whether Valentine's Day is haram, halal or bid'ah.

How did Muslims reach the point where we ask legal authorities about matters of celebrating love? Consider other questions that are asked: "Is falling in love allowed in Islam?" or "Can a husband express his love to his wife?" They reflect the increasingly legalistic approach that Muslims are taking in all matters of life.

Today, as Muslims, we have become servants of the law, instead of the law serving us in order to achieve higher spiritual perfection. Abiding by the law is not a purpose in itself: it is a means to an end. It is critical to respect the law, and our jurists and scholars, but we must be careful not to derive a false satisfaction from following the law for the law's sake over striving towards the underlying objectives of the law. Our current pre-occupation with legalities rather than ethos is directly connected to the fact that we have become unclear about our goals, our values and our principles as human beings who follow the faith of Islam.

Bluntly put, we focus on the minutiae instead of freeing ourselves to ask world-changing questions. Let's ask our scholars big questions that focus on Islam's concern for all human beings. If Islam is about social welfare for the whole of humanity, then let's ask: how do we use the institutions of zakat to put an end to world poverty? If the Prophet emphasised education by saying 'seek education even to China', then how do we ensure that every child goes to school? If Islam is concerned with physical as well as spiritual well-being, how do we ensure healthcare reaches all human beings?

What of those other three little words, "I love you"? We often hear that Christianity is the religion of love, but Islam - wrongly in my opinion - is characterised as far from this. Why is Islam portrayed in this way?

We must challenge the ideas that modern discourse - which includes Muslims themselves who have been brought up on a diet of legalistic directives - perpetuates that Muslims and Islam are lacking in love, or worse, are averse to it. The discussion of love - for Islam by its nature is predicated on love - is critical to our survival and contribution to the modern world. So much so, that I wanted to explore these forgotten ideas of love that underpin the very essence of being a Muslim, with humour, humanity and lightness of touch. The title and subject-matter of my forthcoming book, Love in a Headscarf, for these very reasons creates surprise at the juxtaposition of the idea of Muslims and love.

Muslims say that Islam is the religion of peace. Some go further and say that it is the religion of justice, and that justice underpins peace. I would go further still and say that Islam is the religion of Rahmah, compassion. For compassion to be exercised, justice must already be inherent. But compassion also expels the lurking remnants of hatred, fear and pain through love. Hate cannot push out hate, only love can push out hatred. Allah insists we know Him by His name Rahman, the Lovingly Compassionate. We too must reclaim our role as the people of Rahmah.

Beyond the bounds of religion

I had this published on the Guardian website today.

Beyond the bounds of religion
Muslims should see Gaza not as a tragedy for the Islamic world, but for all human beings

Obama is offering a hand of friendship to the Middle East and the wider Muslim world. This week he marked this new relationship, based in "mutual respect", by dispatching George Mitchell as his special envoy to the Middle East. Mitchell is a veteran of the Northern Ireland peace process and is widely held to be a fair broker.

"I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries," Obama stated. But is this enough to allow him to connect to the worldwide Muslim community which is watching to see whether his actions live up to his words?

The internet has exploded with Muslims expressing their anger, despair and frustration at the ongoing war. My inbox bubbles up with the emotion of email after email with photos of death, invitations to rallies and lectures, multiple Facebook campaigns and groups as well as the urgency of fundraising for aid.

For the first time since the rally attended by a million Britons just before the invasion of Iraq I have joined in protests. Held in London, around the country and across the world, they represented the people's voice in its most raw and purest form. Those who participated came from all over the country, from all ages, creeds, colours and backgrounds, including, but not limited to, Muslims. Those who raised their voices were all human beings, religious or not. But who was listening?

Not the BBC it seems, which has drawn huge criticism from across the board for refusing to air the Gaza appeal. Nor Lord Falconer who defended the BBC decision on Question Time on Thursday night by saying that seeing the suffering of Palestinians might make people "sympathetic to the Palestinians" and "hostile to the Israelis", implying that our instinctive moral judgment was wrong.

Muslims have expressed their feelings as members of the "ummah", sharing their anguish and heartbreak at the suffering of other Muslims in Palestine. The notion of ummah is embedded very deeply in the Muslim psyche. Its basis is Prophet Muhammad's observation that someone who does not wake up in the morning and feel the pain of other Muslims around the world is not a Muslim.

But Palestine is not a state populated only with Muslims; it encompasses those of Christian faith or none, all of them human beings. As well as the concept of "ummah", Muslims should be invoking the wider idea of humanity. There might be additional benefits in seeing the crisis in this way: evoking sympathy from the wider public and making common cause with those who support Palestine in order to achieve justice and peace, simply because it is the right thing to do.

Beyond the labels and stereotypes, Muslims, politicians, the people of the world, should know that this is a human calamity. Human beings are being killed before our eyes with nowhere to run, no food to eat, no water to drink. A Palestinian mother will see leaflets floating down from the sky to tell her that she and her children will be bombed and should leave. But where should they run? Egypt closed the border and places of refuge such as mosques are also hit.

This is a human crisis that the Palestinians have recorded on film, and which will haunt all of us as human beings. Once we said "never again". We must live by that promise.

Holding out for a hero

This is an article I wrote at Christmas for the Guardian, and realised I hadn't published the whole piece here. With the current political climate, I thought it might be worth asking the question again...


Jesus is probably the biggest celebrity in the messiah club. He gets a big celebration every year, with prickly trees, shiny baubles and fat chap in a floppy red hat. The nativity story goes that he was born in a manger, made a significant contribution to world theology, shook the Roman Empire and then made the final sacrifice for his people. It is a classic messiah tale - lowly origins, signs at his birth to portend his greatness, epic impact and change on an unimaginable scale, and heroic dedication till the very end. The messiah was the hope of the people, the one popular culture longed for. Think Gladiator, think Moses.

History is full of stories of such epic figures that saved people from injustice and oppression. Jesus is the best known, and the one we seem to hold onto as a timeless symbol in the western world. But symbol is all he seems to be in the early 21st century. A placeholder in an end-of-year Hollywood B-movie, a story of heroism without the hero. And let's not beat around the bush, yesterday's messiah, is today's hero.

The theories of the early 20th century that pronounced us to be "superman", told us about "ego" and gave us materialism, allowed us to put ourselves on a pedestal, and declare that the individual was a god. No longer would we suffer oppression or injustice - we had invented nuclear weapons in order to destroy those who threatened us. We had propelled ourselves into the impenetrable realm of the gods of yore as we sailed effortlessly to the moon and into the stars. We even had washing machines and vacuum cleaners to save us scrubbing and sweeping. We had all the answers and we could do anything we wanted. "They say that a hero can save us, I'm not gonna stand here and wait," sang Nickelback in the theme tune of the film of Spiderman. Why should we bother waiting for a hero when we could be our own saviours?

We're still very interested in heroes, as the latest TV hit series from the US proves to us: its title Heroes is the big giveaway. But we're less sure about heroism these days, and so are our heroes. The glamorous edge was taken off James Bond who was deliberately rewritten to be a less-than-glamorous gritty hero with serious emotional baggage in his latest film. And the epic hero Beowulf, brought back to life in this year's movie epic, is no longer the entirely noble character that he was defined as in the original writings.

In the early Old English story written about a legendary figure from around the turn of the sixth century, Beowulf was a more classic hero, a man to look up to and hail as a saviour. "I will kill your monster," he declares to the people who can no longer bear the beast's terror.

He does rid the people of the monster that is out there, but the monster within him, the child of his shame, continues to eat him alive from the inside and destroy him. We reduce our hero to the level of our own mundane and pathetic carnal trappings. The hero saves us in a burst of glory, but finds his own undoing in what he thought would save and elevate him. The hero and saviour that we once yearned for becomes a tragic figure. Is this a reflection of the hopelessness of our time? Does this mean we need a hero more than ever? This time does our hero need to save us from our own inner torment?

We thought we had all the answers, but now we discover that we are not as heroic as we once thought. Darfur, Abu Ghraib, rising poverty, the Iraq war and of course our own epic monster called climate change, to name a few have, shown us that we are still flawed, still yearning for the world to be a better place.

Are we too late? Will climate change spell irreversible doom? As with all messianic stories, we find ourselves battling against time. An independent film being made by a group of British Muslims to explore the idea of the modern day hero asks, "What if our generation is the last?" Like Beowulf, it turns the idea of the hero on its head, "Are we ready for a hero?" it challenges. The hero is no longer a stand-alone figure; he needs us. The film, 313 The Movie, is based on the concept that the Mahdi - the rough and ready Islamic name for messiah - will come to restore peace and justice to the world when there are 313 good people ready and willing to support him.

The student-protagonist of the film stamps his feet with our modern day defiance and pride: "You all need to wake up and stop dreaming, there ain't nobody comin' to save us." But his words also give voice to our present-day angst and despair: what if in reality nobody can save us, not even ourselves. Should we hope for a hero as our last resort?

Protest in London over the killings in Gaza

Yesterday I participated in the protest march in London, to show our outrage as human beings as the enormous and flagrant loss of innocent civilian life in Gaza, as numbers of dead have exceeded 800 in the last two weeks.

The atmosphere was electric, and the roads were absolutely utterly jam-packed. Human beings from up and down the country literally poured through the streets. Estimates vary between a paltry 12,000 up to 100,000. It certainly felt much closer to the upper end of that spectrum.

People completely filled Bayswater Road from Speakers Corner, to Notting Hill down Kensington Church Street and along Kensington high street. The presence was solid and full across the whole road for that whole stretch. The police was present in huge numbers right from the very beginning. Check out these photos. The first shows the vigour with which the police was present - this is right near the beginning, but they've already knocked over a protester. Also notice the huge range of people who attended, and the passion with which they came from so far away, to show this: that the killing must stop.

Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow

Today I'll be speaking at a press event at the Foreign Press Association for a conference to be held next weekend in Doha. 300 young Muslim leaders from 76 countries which include minority and majority Muslim countries, will convene, in an event which is totally unique.

The press release describes: "In an historic time of change and diversity, young Muslim leaders from a broad range of countries are convening to push for change from within the global Muslim community. An Italian imam, a Saudi fashion designer, an Iranian rapper, a Pakistani madrasa reformer, an American blogger, and a Dutch lawyer are among the participants attending the 2009 Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow conference. This new generation of community-based, forward-thinking Muslim leaders will come together to share a wide range of strategies and leadership styles, to 'make tomorrow a day when Muslims are known around the world as people of peace,' in the words of one invitee.

These young Muslim leaders - from Senegal to Somalia, Indonesia to Iraq, Britain to Bahrain, and Kosovo to Kuwait - will propose innovative solutions to challenges facing Muslims globally such as the crisis of religious authority, violent extremism, competing values, and strained relations with the West.

The Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow are answering a global call for change on behalf of the world's Muslim community and will communicate their shared message of tolerance and progressive leadership by authoring a joint statement addressed to world leaders."

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Now added: video clip from BSN on the conference

"New year, new you." If only.

EMEL magazine has invited me to be one of their commentators, starting in their January edition which is out now. EMEL is a Muslim lifestyle magazine distributed widely across the UK and internationally, and now entering its sixth year, it is the first glossy magazine of its kind in this country.

Twas' the night before Eid, and all round the house, there wasn't a sound... except for the phone ringing with a call from the distinguished editors of EMEL magazine. I put on my best suit, and my most posh voice, for one must give such distinguished callers their full due. Would I like to write for the magazine starting from the January edition? they asked.

As a long time fan of EMEL, I was delighted. I was particularly thrilled because it meant that as the year begins I will immediately be starting something fresh and exciting. New year, new me, I declared smugly addressing the self-help gurus who will be plastered all over our pages in January, giving us advice on how to make new year resolutions and stick to them. Ha! I've beaten you at your game, you patronising pundits.

Those new year articles explaining how the coming twelve months can lead to a smarter, brighter, more beautiful you, always make me feel bad. I read them last year, and the year before, and probably the one before that. I failed to achieve superwoman status then, and this year will most likely be no different. They worsen the mid-winter gloom.

In 2009, the Islamic new year is at the same time as the calendar new year, and this means that the pressure will be intensified. My intentions every year are much the same: read more, get fit, and spend more time focusing on spirituality. It's a simple strategy: one goal each for mind, body and spirit. These three are the foundation of a human being, and even though I recognise the importance of nourishing each of them, I feel frustrated that I can't seem to actually do it.

I know that I'm on the right track, and that at some point I will meet my targets because I have made a niyyah to achieve these goals. Islamic teachings pointed out the importance of intention well before we ever heard the term PMA, (positive mental attitude). I will get round to it. I will, I will. Eventually, that is. It's just that life is so busy. First the sales (pick up a few must-have discounted suits for work); then engage in some spring cleaning (it all went to pot during the festive season); also need to re-inject some momentum into work (shake off the bad habits of the slow holiday period); plan a holiday for the spring (make the most of the Easter days off); and before you know it, it's almost summer and I'm still thinking I'll get to address my resolutions at some point. I console myself with the thought that at least I've held onto them, instead of resigning myself to failure.

And therein lies the rub: the being busy. It gets in the way, without us even realising. I must meet this urgent deadline, I think, and then one more, and in the blink of an eye, we wonder where it has all gone. How long were you in the world, we'll be asked. A day, or maybe half a day, we'll respond. These words of the Qur'an cast a shadow over my life, especially at a moment where we turn back to review the months past, and prepare ourselves for the year to come. It is a sickening feeling to reach December and wonder what happened since last January. The busy-ness and the ease of procrastination are our greatest enemies. That's what happens between niyyah and 'amal, action; the difference between those who simply believe, and those who believe and do good deeds.

This January, much will be written about Barack Obama, as he is sworn into office. If there is any one person of our time who embodies the enormous change that can be created in twelve months, then Obama must surely be a contender. Last year he was barely considered a challenger for the Democratic nomination: this month he will become arguably the most powerful man on the planet.

Will his Presidency herald a new era for the world? Will this mean a new beginning for the USA? Much hope rests on his shoulders, but he will only be as good in leadership, as his constituents are in followership. If we feel swept away by his passion for hope and renewal, it only means that we've finally pushed aside all the delays, distractions and excuses, and got round to actually making the change. New year, new you? It's there for the taking, if only we actually do something.

Black Heart, Red Hands, Clear Smile

You ask for it, you are a tease,
I know your wish
For me to crack your jaw
To slap your face
To scratch your skin
To leave my mark.

You're pushing me,
Unlocking your wrists
"You have no right,"
Your words are hissed
Through broken teeth
"You have no right."

You make me laugh,
Cheap homeless witch
With talk of 'rights'.
Our friends know me,
My sovereign strength,
They know I'm right.

Who'd hear your words,
Pathetic semite
Our friends know what to say:
"Stop pushing, girl,
It's not his fault,
But sovereign defence."

Sit quietly in your corner,
I've closed the walls,
The Pharaohs are my friends.
The sea is sealed
You have no rights, no worth,
Admit you long for me.

You look at me with children's eyes,
You ask for it
You bare your mother's breast to me,
Still asking for it
Your hands of tormented youth push me away,
You drive me to it.

Can't you see, it's not my fault,
You invoke my suffering on you.
Can't you see, it's not my fault,
You attack, I defend.
Can't you see, it's not my fault,
You make me do it, you make me do it.

Turkey's Bridge that should bind us together

I travelled to Turkey and found myself asking, is this country really the bridge between civilisations, and do we need a bridge anyway?

One of the great cliches about Turkey is that it is the bridge between Europe and the Middle East, the connection between Christendom and Islam. When you stand on the bridge over the Bosphorous, the river that runs through the centre of Istanbul, you feel a profound sense of geographic importance. You are told that on one side is Europe, and on the other you are told is Asia. Cross the bridge, and these oft-repeated words make you feel as though you are stepping across cultural, historic and civilisational tectonic plates. Is this really true, or do we simply think it is the case because the mantra of "the bridge" has been repeated so many times?

Turkey has a long and ancient history of peoples and empires. In the nearer past, it was taken by Alexander the Great in 334 BC. It fell to Rome in the 1st century BC and remained under Roman rule till Constantinople was named as the capital of the Byzantine Empire in 330 AD.

In the 7th century, Islam began to rise to the east of Byzantium. The Arabs took Ankara in 654 and by 669 they set siege to Constantinople. It is said that one of the companions of the Prophet, Ayub Ansari, was buried in Constantinople. They brought a new language, a new civilisation and of course a new religion called Islam.

There was considerable cultural engagement between the Muslims and the Byzantines. The Byzantine emperor Leo adopted the Islamic view that pictures of human beings should be banned. When the Arabs saw the domes on Byzantine churches they adopted them for Islamic architecture of buildings like mosques. The Arabs also translated classical Greek works of science and philosophy into Arabic.

As the Muslim empire grew and came under the control of the Abbasids centring on Persia, the Turks - who were a nomadic people from Central Asia - had been moving westward and under the Turkish Seljuk clan they took the sultanate in Baghdad. By the 11th century they had taken Anatolia from the Byzantines. In the thirteen century they were overrun by the Mongols, but were united in 1300 by Osman who established the Ottoman dynasty.

In 1923 the modern secular state of Turkey was founded by Ataturk. Despite the country's centrality in the Muslim world to this point, and in spite of what is still considered in parts to be a religious people, Ataturk confined religion to the Ministry of Religious Affairs, the mosque and the private domain at home, where it has remained ever since. One of the great ironies of Turkey is that it is a Muslim country that does not permit its women to wear the hijab in an official public space such as a university or in parliament.

More recently, Turkey applied to join the European Union, and in 2005 began accession talks. This seems to have been met by a mixed reaction both in the EU and in Turkey. With a population of over 70 million, the world's 17th largest economy and a geographically strategic location, Turkey is asking itself is it Turkey that needs the EU or the EU that needs Turkey? With thorny phrases like "Christian club" being bandied about recklessly, Turkey along with the Muslim world is asking itself whether it is the fact that it is a Muslim country that is creating resistance in some European quarters.

Given the fluidity of history, culture and trade across the landmass that is modern-day Turkey, it seems strange to think of it as anything but Europe. Visit Istanbul and you certainly feel like you are in a European city. It is quite different from Damascus, Jerusalem, Cairo or Baghdad. Travel west across the country and you feel a change in granularity and perspective as you near the borders of Syria and Iraq, but it is slow and gradual. The attitudes, cultures and peoples change gently rather than with the abruptness of stepping over a bridge. And that seems perfectly natural - why should a country change suddenly in the middle of its territory?

The same question can be applied to larger areas of geography, history and culture. Why do we think that Europe and European ideals (however you choose to define them) end at a fixed geographic point? This has never been the case previously, and nor should it be. Our European world does not end abruptly with a glass wall hemming us in like the globe that enclosed Truman in The Truman show. Real life doesn't work like that - it didn't in the past, and it doesn't need to in the future. Unless we say it so many times that we start ourselves to believe the corrosive propaganda.

Ask those who repeat the mantra "the bridge" about how they see that role being carried out, and the answers are tenuous at best. That's because the very notion of bridge implies separation and division that must be stuck together with a plaster. Our geographic and cultural connections are not like that. There is no chasm that yawns ominously between us like an infernal abyss. They are much more fluid and tightly interconnected. Our architecture, our intellectual roots, our commerce, genetics, and history all overlap and inter-relate. There is no epic gulf that requires spanning physically or metaphorically. It would be better to see Turkey as weaving together the strands of our interconnections. We don't need to bridge the divide, what we need is to be bound together.

This article was published in The Muslim News

Spirit21 in 2008 - a year in review

We are nearing the end of the year, and it is the traditional time to look back and see how we fared over the last twelve months. In particular, it's been a year since I won Best Blog and Best Female Blog at the Brass Crescent Awards. Much to my excitement I've been nominated again. It's not the only recognition the blog has received. I won Best Non-Fiction Writer at the glamorous Muslim Writers Awards, and was named an 'influential blog' by the BBC.

Shari'ah was big news this year. The Archbishop of Canterbury made some comments about Shari'ah courts which created a national controversy, and which reverberated round the world. I tried to get underneath the dense text with a detailed analysis of his speech. I mentioned a few other words too to highlight that we need to have a conversation about real meaning, not just tabloid screaming. (I used words like Shariah, fatwa, hijab, apostasy, niqab, cousin-marriage, Imam, Muslim women. I think some readers had anxiety attacks after that.) Separately, the Lord Chief Justice re-ignited the debate started by the Archbishop, and I commented that we had a significant problem with the S-Word.

I spent a lot of time writing about Muslim women, and declared that it was Time for a Womelution. It is time for things to change, and I kept up the pace demanding "Let Muslim Women Speak" both here at Spirit21 and at the Guardian. It seems that everyone out there is happy to tell Muslim women what they should think and say, but won't let them say it for themselves. It wasn't the only thing that made me cross. I was riled by the book Jewel of Medina, written by an American author about Ai'shah the wife of the Prophet. It wasn't about blasphemy or censorship that the author annoyed me, but rather at her delivery of a sex-obsessed Mills and Boon frippery, about a woman and a period of history that was crying out for a high calibre text. What a wasted opportunity. I read the book and wrote a review for the BBC. It was painful. Watch paint dry, I advised readers, it is more fascinating than the book.

I was still fascinated by hijab, niqab and modesty and wrote several articles trying to understand the different perceptions of modesty and hijab. Modesty is not a black and white issue got some interesting feedback - some people told me in person that it was the best piece I've ever written, others said they didn't get it at all. I also asked, whose body is it anyway, and wondered why it is considered inflammatory by some for a women to cover her hair or face. I made reference in the former article to the rise of the muhajababe, the fabulously stylish and sometimes skimpily clad be-headscarfed Muslim woman, and posted a cartoon asking, what is the meaning of hijab, and wrote a piece considering, can you dress provocatively and be religious? It should all be based around a woman choosing her clothing for herself, but is it really a free choice, and what exactly is she choosing?

The amazing Muslim women who often are considered oppressed and forgotten inspired me to create The Magic Muslims, ordinary Muslims with Extraordinary superpowers, foremost amongst them being SuperJabi. They also included MagicMullah, HipHopHalalMan and WonderBibi. Watch out for them, there will be more in the coming year!

I was also published in the book Conversations on Religion, alongside other high profile dignitaries in the field of faith (or absence of) such as Richard Dawkins, the Chief Rabbi, AC Grayling and the Archbishop.

On the subject of conversations, I had some amazing dialogues with people in Indonesia and Turkey, where I spent a good amount of time this year. Indonesia prompted me to think of sun, smiles and spirituality, whilst in Turkey I found myself asking, what does a Muslim country look like? Hopefully I made some fans whilst out there too...

My comments about Valentine's Day being banned generated some interest as i was asking if it was the day or love that was being prohibited; just as exciting was an interview with the charming and sparky Riazat Butt for the Guardian about hajj. They also enjoyed posting a piece exploring our modern ideas about what kind of hero, messiah or mehdi, we are looking for these days. Do we really need one?

Most controversial were two pieces related to what was happening on the political scene. I had people respond to them with enormous prickliness (or excitement, depending) even months later in person, so they've hit a chord! I tried to separate out the political agendas that have confused the need for social cohesion with preventing violent extremism, and seems to see Muslims only through the prism of (potential) terrorism. Later in the year the political insinuations that Muslims were not wanted in politics appeared to grow stronger, and I wrote with much passion that it seems that we Muslims were being told that "The only 'proper' Muslim is a non-political one." The article proliferated wildly and despite a certain level of anonymity as a writer, i had people 'in person' searching me out to comment on it.

Phew! What a year! And inshallah, 2009 is going to be even more exciting - there are already some fabulous things in the works - watch this space!

(p.s. vote for Spirit21 Best Blog and Best Female blog at the Brass Crescent Awards to show your support!)

Armchair spirituality is not enough

If the hajj teaches us anything, it is that you have to get involved spiritually and physically in order to make lasting and impactful change.

Muslims from all around the world will be travelling to Makkah in early December to take part in the hajj pilgrimage which takes place in the first ten days of the month. All the pilgrims dress in stark white clothing, indistinguishable from each other, as their clothing levels out the differences of prince or plumber. Their white brilliance contrasts with the Ka'bah which is draped in black cloth and around which they circulate to perform the duties of the pilgrimage. For many, it is a dream come true to visit in person the place which they face every day as they perform their five daily prayers. Each person is simply a soul, undifferentiated by wealth, status or colour. You can no longer hide behind clothes, make-up or social status. It is a sobering experience to come face-to-face with the grim realities of the bare souls of others, as well as your own.

The pilgrims then move to a desert expanse known as Arafat which represents the starkness of the Last Day. It is a place to ask for forgiveness, and make peace with oneself and the Creator. With no distractions, and a clear uncluttered head and unencumbered body, the change that is needed becomes apparent in your heart, and resolutions for making life better are quick to emerge. Pilgrims comment about the profundity and solidity of the change that occurs in this barren setting, which somehow frees the inner spirit. The physical presence in a challenging environment stimulates personal growth and development. No matter how much someone explains the environment and sensation, it never has the impact of being there in person. You have to taste it, breathe it, live it.

The journey passes through the night towards Mina, where Abraham was asked by God to sacrifice his beloved child and to show that he was willing to give up what was dearest to him. The pilgrims make a symbolic sacrifice of an animal, to represent the surrender of something of utmost importance to them for the sake of God. Still following Abraham's actions, they throw seven pebbles at stone satans, as though they are stoning the devils of their own inner desires.

Exhausted, the pilgrims return to Makkah, physically broken, but spiritually elated. The hajj pushes the human being to the limits of physical and spiritual endeavour. The lasting impact that hajj creates, and its success in creating change is down to the fact that it address both the physical and the spiritual. The body and the spirit are integral and interconnected parts of the human being that need nurturing. They must both go on a real, symbolic and ritual journey together in order to make change.

The images of these pilgrims is broadcast across the world on television networks, and we can watch the painstaking journey that each person is experiencing as they go through this most rigorous and gruelling of physical and spiritual challenges. Going through the event, and feeling the pain and elation at every moment is what cements the spiritual experience.

We sit and watch the journey of hajj from the comfort of our armchairs, enthralled by the experience, but not able to access the benefits for ourselves. We cannot create the same impact as walking those footsteps and tasting the sweat and tears, whilst we sit ensconced in the soft sheltered environment of our own homes. So it is with developing our own communities and our own spirituality. We like to shake our fists at community leaders, the state of the Ummah, and the ongoing problems we face, from the sanctuary of our sofas. It is like expecting your cheers whilst you watch your football team play on TV to have an impact, or as though shouting at the television set will change events as they unfold. It is like walking the footsteps of the hajjis watching through the live TV coverage: this can never create that type and strength of change.

If we believe that by sitting at home and engaging in armchair protests that we can make an impact, then we are deluded. Muttering astaghfirullahs whilst propped on a comfortable cushion with no connection to the outside world cannot create change. The hajj gives us that very evidence - you have to be right in the centre of things to make an impact.

It is the same with spirituality. To refine our souls and our ethics we have to interact with the world around us. It is only through participation and relationships with other human beings that we can truly learn what it means to be the purest of souls. Muslims are quick to point out that asceticism is rejected by Islam - physical separation is prohibited in that sense. Sitting on our sofas, and complaining about the world around us, is only one step away from that.

Proceeding with patience and prayer is the hallmark of a human being, and that is because the spiritual relationship with the Divine can only flourish through interaction and participation with society. This requires us to extract ourselves from the cushioned comfort of our armchairs, and to step out of the front door to take part in the world.

Brass Crescent Awards, nominations now open - please vote (for me!)

The nominations for the Brass Crescent Awards for 2008 are now open. I'm pleased and honoured that Spirit21 has once again been nominated for Best Blog and Best Female Blog. There are some great sites that have been shortlisted, so do spend some time reviewing them all and enjoying the diversity and expanse of the 'Islamophere'.

And of course, if you feel that Spirit21 deserves it, please nominate it for Best Blog and Best Female Blog.

Closing date is December 19th, so get yourselves down there and happy voting!

The one about the priest, the rabbi and the mullah...

I have a theory, and I'm hoping you can help... I'm hoping that a bit of intercultural and interfaith humour can help bond us together and ease tensions. So I'm looking for jokes to bring together faiths.

Here is a starter for ten:

A priest, a rabbi and a mullah walk into a bar. The barman says "What is this, a joke?"

What does a Muslim country look like?

I've been in Turkey for the last few days, spending time between Istanbul, Ankara and Gaziantep, which is Turkey's sixth largest city, located in the south-east of the country.

Although Turkey may not be the UK's closest Muslim country in geographical terms (I believe Morocco may be closer), I think that historically and culturally it may be the closest as part of our European heritage.

The people I've met here are passionate about describing Turkey as the 'bridge' between Europe and the Middle East. Nowhere is that more poignant than here in Istanbul, where the residents point to the bridge across the Bosphorous that links Europe to Asia symbolically as well as physically. The architecture, landscape and climate feel at once both European and Asian, interwoven in an inexplicably successful manner.

The melange is on the one hand confusing. What is Turkey? What is its place? Is it European, or is it Middle Eastern? Does it rest on a history of fluid cultures, peoples, invasions and empires? Or is it embracing and driving forward the 21st century?

On the other hand, the paradoxes that face Turkey are the same ones that face the rest of the increasingly globalised borderless world, except Turkey's history and geography force it to face the seeming contradictions front and centre. Do affiliations relating to one part of a nation's identity, trump other ties, or can they co-exist? Or - and this is where Turkey's real potential for the future may lie - is a multifaceted and complex nation like Turkey which has several connections, going to drive forward a sustainable and peaceful global future?

These questions and challenges make Turkey a Muslim nation different to any other. It is at once traditional Muslim heartland, but also part of the European family. Its secular political system, which keeps religion firmly in the private domain, whilst its people are fervent about calling themselves Muslim, is quite distinct from other Muslim countries that I have visited.

I asked myself the question "Why does Turkey feel different to other Muslim countries that I've visited?" The answer may lie in examining our own expectations of what a Muslim country should or should not be. Or it may lie in Turkey's continuing volatile debate to understand its own identity as a European Muslim.

Audacity of a non-American Dreamer

Audacity of a non-American dreamer

Yes we can
Make a change
Yes we can
Find a way
Yes we can
Have a dream
Yes we can
Make it real

Is it words?
That may be
Is it words?
We will see
Is it words?
It's in our hearts
Is it words?
That's where we start

It's not one man
That brought us here
It's not one man
That made it clear
It's not one man
That said it's now
It's all of us
That showed us how

Change can come
Our eyes have seen
Change can come
But does that mean
That change will come?
We'll wait and see
For change to come
Change we must be

Shelina Zahra Janmohamed

Rahmah not Rubbish

We love to tell the stories of the life of the Prophet, but have we really learnt to apply them to our daily lives?

One of the favourite stories that Muslims like to recount is that of the woman who threw rubbish at the Prophet. We like it because it tells a simple human tale of compassion that wins out over malice. It is the triumph of patience and good manners over hatred.

The Prophet walked along a particular street every day on his way to conducting his affairs. From one of the windows, a woman who was angry at him for preaching the message of one God, would throw rubbish at him. Each day he would walk past, and each day she would throw her fetid refuse at him. One day, as he is walking past, there is no rubbish thrown at him.

Let us pause for a moment, before completing the story, and really truly think about what it must have been like to face this daily occurrence. We recount it very glibly, and don't really feel it in our hearts.

Dear reader, please take a moment to create this situation as though it is real to you, and feel the emotions that rise up within you. You are walking under a window, and a pile of stinking vegetable peelings, rotting banana skins, three day old meat trimmings and some used toilet roll hits your head. You live in a hot environment, and so the mixture of putrid waste is particularly disgusting. A voice rings out above you: "******* Muslims! Terrorist! Osama lover!" and the abuse continues. We can all easily fill in blanks of the insults that Muslims face everyday. I would feel angry, furious. That is the natural human response.

Now we return to the behaviour of the Prophet himself. One particular day, there is no rubbish thrown at him. He is concerned and so he enquires after the whereabouts of the woman. When he is advised that she is unwell, he goes to visit her to see the state of her health. She is shocked when he arrives, knowing full well the extent of her abuse. His kindness and patience in dealing with her cruelty wins her over, and she accepts the message that the Prophet has been preaching.

How much we love to tell this story! How proud we are of the Prophet's exemplary character! But we fail to apply this in our daily lives. Let us return to our imaginary scene above. Would we have asked about the well-being of our abuser? Would we have taken time to get to the bottom of why they abused us? Would we have dealt with compassion and reason with them?

Many Muslims today already do suffer this kind of abuse, from simple rude comments on the street, to derogatory content in the media, to smearing in political circles, to books which cause offence. Sometimes we find it hard to connect it to the stories of the Prophet because we have not internalised the human experiences of the individuals whom we rightly venerate. And this is because we have not put ourselves in the shoes of their real human experience.

When we see an attack on Islam or Muslims, we ignore the example of the Prophet to return violence with rahmah, compassion, and concern, and instead return it with anger, protest and in a handful of cases with violence. It is easy to wax lyrical about the Prophet's patience, but have we really ever imagined ourselves in the situation, as we did a moment ago? Can we now imagine how hard what he did was? When scorn is poured upon Muslims, upon Islam and heartbreakingly on those whom we respect, we must rise above the instinctive response to retaliate with base violence. Defending yourself, and asserting your rights is indeed critical. It is right and proper to rise up to the full extent of law and justice. But we have to also bear in mind the vision that Muslims ought to have for society: to create an equal, fair and tolerant world that is based on knowledge and compassion.

A visionary can only take a dream and turn it into reality by meeting abuse with knowledge. And when those who are thirsty to know about all the values that can make us the best of human, they will look to wherever they can find that knowledge. If Muslims are not offering accessible knowledge, then that thirst will be quenched wherever even the mirage of truth appears. Where there is abuse, it must be replaced with knowledge and compassion, rahmah. That is what happened when the Prophet stepped into the woman’s home. As the Qur'an says, when we face those who are ignorant, we should return it with peace; that is the spirit that leads to quantum change.

This article was published in The Muslim News

The Jewel of Medina - Sherry Jones meets Bridget Jones

The following review that I have written of the book has just been published by the BBC

A romantic telling of the life of one of the wives of Islam's prophet has caused controversy among some Muslims - and its publication has been indefinitely postponed in the UK amid fears of a violent reaction. But is The Jewel of Medina actually any good? Blogger Shelina Zahra Janmohamed is one of the few people in Britain to have read it.

The Jewel of Medina is a chest-heaving, brassiere-busting book of outrageously tacky historical romantic fiction.

Some parts of the media are suggesting that this book is at the forefront of defending free speech. The author wants it to reach out to solve our global problems of intercultural dialogue. Between them they had me rolling around on the floor laughing.

The book claims to tell the story of Aisha, the wife of the Prophet Muhammad, through her own eyes, from the age of six, through adolescence and into adulthood. But although she lives through one of the most dramatic periods of history, the narrative conveys little of the enormity of the changes of the era, and of which Aisha was a huge part.

Sherry Jones, the author, says she wanted her book to be "at once a love story, a history lesson and a coming-of-age tale".

In order to do so, she fabricates a storyline about a lover, Safwan, whom Aisha runs away with - but then decides to leave and return to Muhammad.

But this invented plot dominates, leaving barely any room for the real history and importance of her story.

Whether you believe her to be fact, fiction or fantasy, and Muslims believe her to be very real, Aisha is of great significance in global history. The one fifth of the world population who are Muslim regards her as the wife of the Prophet Muhammad and a "mother of the believers".

She is said to have been a leading scholar and teacher and recounted many of the traditions about the personality of Muhammad.

Muslims hold Muhammad, Aisha and other religious figures very close to their hearts, dearer to them than their own parents, and just as much to be respected, protected and defended.

Muslims believe they went through enormous hardship in order to keep the spiritual message of faith intact, and in return wish to honour their contribution. This is to be carried out in a measured and peaceful manner, in keeping with the spirit of Islam that advises returning harsh words with good ones, and malice with mercy.

With this in mind, I would have ignored this book and let it fade into obscurity. Allowing the book to be remembered only for the lack of interest it generated would have been the ultimate poetic justice. The original publisher pulled out - and those parts of the media who wanted to stir things up said Muslims wanted it banned.

So, in order to find out what the (manufactured) fuss was about, I found myself spending 12 dreary hours reading this cringe-worthy melodramatic prose. Even if you feel that it is your duty to read it in the defence of freedom of speech, don't do it, I beg you. Go out and enjoy the last sunny days of autumn, play with your children, watch paint dry. You'll thank me for it.

Bodice-ripper

So let's deal with its literary merits. If you're a man, you'll probably hate this bodice-ripper. If you like well-written prose, then you should steer clear too. What it does have going for it is pace and saucy pre-TV-watershed romance.
Open it randomly and you read churning phrases such as: "His eyes like honey flowed sweet glances over my face and body," or "Is your young bride ripe at last?" Grab a crumbling Flake and a pot of ice-cream.

The author claims she wants to humanise Aisha, to reach out to the Muslim world and to create debate. I found the opposite of this spirit in the book. Muslims will not recognise the characters and stories here because they vary so wildly with recorded history. As the copyright note makes clear, this is a work of fiction.
Take, for example, the night of "Hijrah". This was the moment when the first band of Muslims left the hostile city of Mecca to move to Medina where Islam flourished - a turning point in Islamic history. But the book changes events to place Aisha at the house of Muhammad.

Jones changes the very essence of these individuals, so their characters are at odds with historical traditions. Ali, the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet, as well as one of the great leaders of early Islam, is portrayed as conniving, hot-tempered and lascivious. The Islamic texts document him as a consistently staunch defender of truth and justice, an upstanding character.
So, if you drive a wedge between Muslims and others by fictionalising core characters, how can the book be a platform for debate?

Jones admits that she has introduced concepts that were absent from the period and place to help to create her story. For example, Aisha is put into purdah, seclusion, as a child, but this is an Indian sub-continental idea then unknown to Arabia.

A huge focus of Aisha's energies is to become the hatun, the lead wife, and make all the other wives bow to her. But hatun is a Turkish concept - and bowing is contrary to all Islamic teachings.

What we end up with is an outdated Orientalist reading of an exoticised woman.
Aisha's angst is the angst of 19th Century western writers who couldn't understand the culture they were observing. And when they couldn't understand, they maligned the ideas they found unfamiliar, such as veiling of women like Aisha.

The result is an awkward unconvincing story, created to fit a pre-existing pre-determined idea of what life for Muslim women ought to be like. The cover art is The Queen of the Harem, a 19th Century Orientalist painting of a European-looking woman.

Sex, sex and more sex

The most irritating thing is its constant obsession with sex. The author sees it everywhere and in everything, and makes Aisha do the same. Her life is reduced to a parody of a smutty Bridget Jones diary.

I lost count of the references to "child bride". Even till relatively modern times, marriage for women in their early teens was completely natural and common in parts of the world, including Europe.

Many Muslims will indeed be offended by this book, and they should make clear why they feel hurt. If our society upholds the right to offend, then the right to be offended goes with it. But it is respect and empathy for their feelings that Muslims want, not fear.

What we need for debate and discussion are accessible histories of all the key figures in Islamic history. As Muslims, instead of honouring these individuals blindly, we will accord them much more respect by opening our eyes to their achievements through critical re-examination of their lives. This cannot be done in an atmosphere of fear and intimidation.

Some Muslims oppose a style of writing and analysis that offers insights into the very human lives these individuals led.

I believe this opposition is misplaced, because that is what we already do with the words and deeds of the Prophet, known as the hadith: we read, empathise and re-apply the essence of those day-to-day experiences.

The crucial issue in creating positive understanding and dialogue through such writings is that they must be historically sound, and see the world through the experiences, morality and realities of the protagonists themselves.

Brass Crescent Awards - Nominations for 2008

Spirit21 was the winner of Best Blog and Best Female Blog last year at the Brass Crescent Awards. Nominations have now opened for 2008, and I'd ask readers and visitors to pop along and have a look. It's an exciting and vibrant initiative, which they describe in their own words as "an annual awards ceremony that honours the best writers and thinkers of the emerging Muslim blogosphere (aka the Islamsphere). Nominations are taken from blog readers, who then vote for the winners."

The first stage is for people to make nominations on the site. This phase is open till October 24th, after which the judges will create a shortlist.

If you've enjoyed reading spirit21, and you feel that it has made a positive contribution to the blogosphere, then I would humbly (and in true cheeky style) ask you to make a nomination in the Best Blog and Best Female Blog categories, to see if I can win again. Do remember to write a few words as they all help the judges to come to a decision.

Do you love this blog? Or like it? (or have at least a slightly warm fuzzy feeling when you come by?)

Place your nominations now... www.brasscrescent.org

Make Eid, Not War

Ramadan is a celebration of togetherness and tolerance, so let's break out the Eid sweets and put away the bitterness for good

The best Eids are those you experience as a child. You are elated with tingles of excitement which send shivers of pleasure and anticipation through you. That inner excitement as Eid approaches never disappears because in its essence Eid is a very simple matter. You have fasted all month, suffered headaches and growling stomachs, re-arranged the routine of daily life, read more Qur'an than in the whole year most probably, tried your best to be nice to friends and family, and reflected on your own life and where it is going. You have been working hard, physically and spiritually and so the joy of Eid is simple because it is a celebration of an achievement that looks daunting and unachievable. The joy is pure because the task was undertaken in order to get closer to the Divine. Eid is exciting because it celebrates renewal, refreshment and rejuvenation.

The physical and spiritual stretch has been enormous and as the month draws to its finale, you feel both exhausted and elated. It is the triumph of the achievement of spirit over body that makes Eid such an amazing event. As a community we experience more togetherness and unity than at any other time during Ramadan: we've all been in it together. Suddenly there is an explosion of love and trust. Until night before Eid. And then our spiritual and community synchronicity fizzles away under the weight of disagreement about the moonsighting.

After a month of tolerance and understanding our togetherness vanishes oh-so-suddenly. Is it sapped by the multitude of phone calls round the world to establish if a sliver of crescent has been spotted? Is it the plethora of text messages that ratchet up our bills to the mobile network companies? Is it the uncertainty of whether to cook Eid breakfast or not?

Ramadan is about unity of spirit. We reject the physical so we can concentrate on our connections as souls. As with hajj, when we fast, the outer is irrelevant. Each human being we come across who is in this state of worship is a beautiful thing for us to appreciate. Ramadan is the epitome of love, peace and goodwill to humanity. We know that "Allah cannot be contained anywhere in the universe except in the heart of the believer", and "there are as many ways to know Allah as there are human beings". Yet we insist on squabbling over our differences whether they be about Eid, the specifics of how to pray or do wudhu, what time the fast breaks, or how long or short out trousers, beards or headscarves should be.

We then approach the final days when Eid is almost upon us, and as soon as we see the exit gates back into the dunya, the spirit of unity that we worked so hard to cultivate is lost. Worse still, we we take pleasure in returning to the intolerant bickering like an ex-smoker returning to his beloved cigarettes. Was the peace, harmony and unity of Ramadan so transient and painful that we longed to return to the disagreements and divisive behaviours that we experience all year round?

If so, then it reveals more about us as a Muslim community than we might like to admit. If we had truly learnt to be as happy for our brothers and sisters as we are for ourselves, and if we had internalised the notion that we must celebrate difference, then we would not fall out over Eid the very second - and yes, it is the very single second - that Ramadan ends.

If others are celebrating Eid before us, we should be joyful for them. They have reached their triumphant end. But we too have joy, for we are blessed enough to have an additional day of Ramadan. Who would wish to pass up even a single minute of this month? If we are celebrating Eid before others, then what better blessing than to prepare the way for those who are still to come and join us to start our fresh journey into the year? It's Eid, let's relax and chill out. We managed to keep it together under the physical duress of Ramadan, let's not lose it over deciding which day is Eid, and then return to the mire of un-ending disputes the year-round. The Prophet says that any day that is better than the previous one is a day of Eid for the believer, so why not make it Eid every day?

On a more practical note, if we celebrate all of our Eids together, then we can have up to three days of festivities, joy and of course highly delicious and calorific sweets. Instead of being stingy and tightening our belts towards Eid, let us be joyful, generous and above all happy enough spend a trio of exuberant days celebrating not only the completion of Ramadan, but also the immense achievement of learning to accept, support and celebrate our differences.

This article was published in The Muslim News

What is the meaning of hijab?

Let Muslim Women Speak

This just posted on the Guardian website at Comment is Free. Swing by and leave a comment.

The last few weeks have been particularly eventful for Muslim women on Comment is Free. We would have felt extremely exhausted by all the excitement, were it not for the fact that - with the notable exception of Samia Rahman and Reefat Drabu - we were spared the ignominy of having to participate in the debate ourselves.

AC Grayling started us off by equating the headscarf with an iron shackle and stating that Muslim women are complicit in their own oppression. In the process of attacking the abhorrent denial of freedom that Muslim women can wrongly suffer, Grayling (in)advertently takes away the very same freedom of choice to decide to wear the hijab if we choose.

Julie Burchill bigged up Christianity, and in the process scathingly dismissed Islam and Muslim women. The only "Muslim" women she suggested as role models - Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Irshad Manji - were those she claimed had rejected Islam and were no longer Muslim.

Cath Elliott on the other hand says she's not holding out for women to emerge empowered from religious communities. She asks some good questions, such as why does God always appear to be a "He"? Why are the decision makers in politics and economics still predominantly male? But let's not be weasely as some pundits are: Muslim men often wriggle out of addressing these difficult questions by deflecting attention away from themselves; and it needs to stop.

Islamic theology has a strong framework for a blueprint of gender equality. I know that this is a deeply unfashionable thing for a Muslim woman to say, but let me explain.

In Islam, God is not gendered, not physically located, nor carnal. There is no original sin – the two genders were "created from a single soul" which is entirely pure and good. God is "like nothing else" we can imagine, and in that sense is neither male nor female. However, in order to know God, there are at least 99 qualities or names, that are characterised as masculine and feminine, and both are equally critical in learning about and approaching the divine.

Both genders have their own free will and have their own minds and must make their own contribution. Qur'anic and Islamic narrative has plenty of examples of such women: Mary's immaculate conception is a strong vision of a woman raising a child as the head of the family without any men present. Hagar raises her son while her husband is away, Aasiya the wife of Pharaoh stands up to her dictatorial bloodthirsty husband. All of them are celebrated as role models for both men and women.

Neither is marriage supposed to be a subjugation for women, but a completion and partnership for both man and woman. Every man that is held up as an example has a woman by his side (or you could argue it is vice versa) who is exemplary in her own right: Adam with Eve, Rachael with Moses, Mohamed with his wife Khadijah.

With such a framework and strong and robust archetypes to inspire Muslims, what went wrong? How did we end up at a place where Muslim women are not fully empowered and find themselves at the unprotected and miserable end of cultural oppression endorsed in the name of Islam? There is no denying that Muslim women do suffer and have not been granted the freedoms, choices and opportunities that are the right all human beings, and guaranteed by Islam. But somewhere between the ideals of faith, and the pleasure of patriarchal power, that respect and those rights were lost.

Which brings me neatly to the latest set of discussions about the proposed Muslim marriage contract. The idea of having a contract between the two parties is embedded in the very notion of Islamic marriage. The goal is to allow both parties to be clear about each other's expectations of the relationship. It would probably help most couples – Muslim or otherwise to have such an agreement.

The basic rights are guaranteed with or without the written document. These are that neither party can be forced to marry – they must do so of their own free will; that both parties may divorce should they choose, and that neither a woman nor a man can be prevented from marrying the person of their choice. As Reefat Drabu of the Muslim Council of Britain put it, the contract "is not a re-invention of the shariah."

So why the hoo-ha about the document?

Ed Husain flags up the core of the real problem beautifully by recounting the tale of an imam who refused to conduct a nikah in the absence of the bride's father's permission. But he draws the wrong conclusion in thinking that the contract papers would have saved the day. Since the imam's actions were clearly out of line with the principles of Islamic marriage it is unlikely that the document would have changed his mind.

Instead, what the document champions is the notion that the behaviour of the people who hold authority needs to be questioned, or as Drabu puts it, the need of a "change in behaviours". No authority should ever be too humble to be challenged. What it also highlights is the extreme need for accessible and easy to understand information.

What is most important about the concept behind the marriage contract should be the reiteration to Muslim women – and to Muslim men – that knowledge is a powerful thing, and that empowerment and questioning are two fundamental components of the Islamic spirit.

Knowledge is about learning and about being brave enough to ask questions, and about getting your voice heard: education and courage. Laying down challenges for the status quo can be a transformative rather than antagonistic activity.

What that means for many commentators is that we may say, believe and do things which don't fit in with the caricature of a Muslim woman who would be desperate to be "liberated" from Islam if only she knew it.

You may find our voices reverberating with the view that we like being Muslim women, we just want to make our lives better and in line with true Islamic principles. It would be nice if those who debate vociferously about Muslim women would therefore move over and give us the seat at the table that we're demanding

The MagicMuslims solve the Ramadan moonsighting issue...

The MagicMuslims are here again, using their cartoon superpowers to make the world a better place. They bring levity and humour to a world that needs a smile. They are 'Ordinary Muslims, with extraordinary powers.' Brought to you by Spirit21, if you haven't seen them before, you can read more here.

Muslims follow a lunar calendar, and the beginning of each month is signalled by the sighting of the new moon. This becomes a particularly frenzied and controversial affair for the highly auspicious month of fasting, Ramadan, and leaves many confused over how such a simple matter ever got so complicated...

Enjoy the cartoon.

Re-interpreting Ramadhan

Ramadhan seems to mean being hungry by day, and laying tables full of fatty fried foods and high calorie treats by night. Have we completely missed the month of fasting's messages of moderation and spiritual liberation?

As the credit crunch takes us into its firm grip, you might be forgiven for thinking that Muslims would be particularly prepared for tightening their belts. I put forward this bold thesis, as we get ready to begin fasting in the month of Ramadhan, a month highlighted for physical restraint and a rejection of excess. With years of experience in control and temperance, Muslims should be well-prepared to exercise moderation and eschew extravagance, but is that really the case?

The Qur'an advises those who believe, that fasting is prescribed for them, as it was for those who came before them so that "...you become of those who are conscious of God." Physical restraint in all spiritual traditions - which includes but is not limited to Islam - is directly related to a blossoming of the spirit, and therefore a closer relationship to the Divine.

If you listen to any explanation of the spiritual and physical meaning of Ramadhan and why Muslims fast, one of the key reasons that features will undoubtedly be along the lines of... to remember those less fortunate than ourselves who have less to eat than we do. It makes perfect sense as an explanation: Muslims deny themselves food and drink (and other physical pleasures) during daylight hours, which create painful hunger pangs and a parched state of dehydration that offers a mild and temporary hint of the traumas and difficulties that people suffering food shortages, droughts and famines around the world must suffer. But this very weak and brief pain is tempered by the knowledge that within some hours- even if the number of those hours reach double digits - we will be tucking into food and drink again.

It is of no doubt that the hunger and thirst that we experience during Ramadhan is something we would never ordinarily feel. And in that sense it allows us a peek into the lives of those who are truly suffering and can have no respite from the shortages of food and comforts that we take for granted. Our experience is incomparable in magnitude and it would be arrogant and patronising to complain that we now 'know how it feels'. But it can soften our hearts and at least give us a glimpse of the suffering that others go through, within the parameters of our own lives.

However, whilst we may be living the physical experience - albeit briefly - have we really grasped the meaning and spiritual experience? As soon as the adhaan rings out at maghrib time as the sun sets, we all settle down to heaving tables of our favourite foods. Tables buckle under the weight of specialities made for each individual's palette. Every child is cooked their favourite, starters are multifarious and highly calorific and main courses include several varieties. Not to mention the many sugar-filled and fatty desserts which slip so easily and pleasurably past our lips. For those from the sub-continent, think samosas, bhaajis, halwa, kebabs, pakoras. It comes as no surprise that many people leave the month of Ramadhan heavier and more rotund than when they started.

This is not to mention the hours and hours that are ploughed into culinary production. You might imagine that the reduced number of meals, and the reduction in appetite might mean that less cooking needs to be done. Instead, the kitchen is on full alert for a greater stretch of the day - and night. It is usually the women who lead the culinary preparation and it is right that the cooks want their families to be well-taken care of. But if we started to look holistically at the purpose of Ramadhan - to free ourselves from our physical indulgences and open up possibilities of spiritual exploration that we otherwise deny ourselves - we might find that all that additional time spent cooking could actually be used to maximise our gains from Ramadhan. By not eating, and by having to cook less, Ramadhan suddenly offers a huge amount of extra time (at least three hours saved by avoiding breakfast and lunch and perhaps more if dinner was a light simple meal) which could be devoted to activities we all claim we do not have time for - lingering over prayers, reading Qur'an, community service, mediation and reflection. If you don't cook that extra plate of samosas will it really make that much difference to the iftar experience? But if you spent all that extra time to read a few pages of the Qur'an – especially in the month of Ramadhan when the value and merit is so much greater - imagine what impact that could have.

Eating and drinking in the hours of dark becomes a festival of indulgence at the polar opposite of the hunger and thirst we underwent for a few paltry hours. We acquire bipolar disorder - riding high in the daylight hours and then binging at night. What does that say about our understanding of the very meaning of hunger as empathy, hunger as freedom from the physical and release into the spiritual? We have followed the literal rules of Ramadhan, but what about the meaning? Instead of physical restraint and spiritual freedom, we have greater indulgence and have blinded ourselves to the spiritual opportunities. Ramadhan is not only about feeling the pain of those less fortunate, but about being able to distinguish and implement the very concepts of moderation rather than excess.

In conversation with God...

As we approach the month of Ramadhan, it's time to get my head into shape, and my soul more tender so that they spiritual days of fasting can work their magic. At a prep-lecture last night, the speaker talked about the importance of engaging in munajat (moo-nah-jaat) with the Creator - intimate conversation. I was moved to think about how little we (for which read 'I') focus on creating space for ourselves and in dialogue with the Divine. Sadly, I think a lot translations of the Qur'an (and other Holy scripture) create the sense of distance, grandeur and scariness of the Creator, when perhaps we should be think more along the lines of best friend?

In that spirit, I rather liked this animated short by Matthew Walker called 'Operator' where a man calls the operator to get the number for God so he can have a chat. Spot on. Enjoy.

Temporary note: there seems to be a problem with the video running which i'm looking at fixing, in the meantime click on the link above, or please come back when the video is running properly. Sorry!

The Problem of the S-Word

Let the tabloids and politicians spend their time foaming at the mouth over words like Shar'iah, we should be spending our time pioneering services and solutions to meet our community needs

Shari'ah is once again big news. The Lord Chief Justice has said that, "There is no reason why Shari'ah principles, or any other religious code, should not be the basis for mediation or other forms of alternative dispute resolution." His comments follow a speech earlier in the year by the Archbishop of Canterbury who had been discussing the role of faith in the public sphere and had used the issue of Shari'ah courts as an example of where this could be done. The Lord Chief Justice commented about that speech: "It was not very radical to advocate embracing Shari'ah law in the context of family disputes, for example, and our system already goes a long way towards accommodating the Archbishop's suggestion.

Predictably, the tabloids went berserk, and sadly some of our sound-bite simplistic politicians followed suit. What a furore! This was a simple discussion about civil arbitration, a provision that is rooted deep in English law. As Madeleine Bunting wrote in the Guardian, "Because of the provision for mediation by a third party in English civil law, there is already a degree of accommodation for Shari'ah law in our legal system." In fact, she argues, if we don't want Shari'ah we would have to remove the "fundamental option of mediation outside the legal system when agreed by both parties… [which]…will require a pretty radical reform which would stir up a lot of opposition."

Clearly then, our politicians and media are not concerned with the actual essence of what the mediation process will be, but more upset about the word 'Shari'ah' itself.

The Shari'ah courts were a solution that Muslims created to deal with life for their new communities in the UK. It is important that we are clear that it is absolutely right and proper that a community should be able to create structures and institutions to support its individuals and families to operate smoothly and according to its principles and values. Of course those structures should and do operate within the law of the land. However, their creation was based on models familiar to the communities from their countries of origin, where the decision-making role of the 'court' was its primary purpose. The courts in those countries would have been supported by more accessible and prevalent mosques and Imams, and a community that was most likely majority Muslim. Most of these support services - which acted as buffers to problems and disputes before the final limit of legal jurisdiction - are not easily available to us in Britain.

So today, Muslims turn to bodies like Shari'ah courts as much for their Islamic decision-making status, as increasingly for their pastoral services. However, dealing with disputes requires counselling, therapy and support before a case can reach any final definitive verdict, all of which are an extension of a legal court's traditional role. Individuals who are trapped in a dispute - whether marital or of another personal nature - want both support and recognition for their distress, which today they find may not be available elsewhere. They wish to feel the supportive hand of guidance and authority in resolving their pain based on the same principles by which they try to govern their own lives. It is therefore exactly in this grey area between civic dispute and any mediation ruling that an arbitration service based on Islamic principles can add tremendous value to our community.

Those who participate in the existing Shari'ah courts give a great deal of their time and energies, but in order to achieve this goal they need more skills and resources, more focus, more participation from the community to meet the growing needs for pastoral care. We need more women, more counsellors and more youth workers to name but a few of the skills required.

Most importantly what they need - what Muslims need - is to give themselves the freedom to think more freely about the purpose and function of such resources within the community. We must not diminish the need and importance of such mediation and resolution centres. They are a vital component of Muslim community institutions. But thinking of them within the prism of decision-making only, carries so much history and expectation with them that sometimes it can become impossible to create new models of operation.

Will we ever find the freedom to dive into the very essence of our needs and pioneer new tools and methodologies to meet our changing times and circumstances? Ali ibn Abi Talib, the fourth Caliph says, "Do not bring up your children the way that you were brought up, because they live in different times." We live in a different time, and we need to pioneer new solutions.

Note: Cartoon is taken from Spirit21's own MagicMuslims superheroes, visit www.spirit21.co.uk/magicmuslims

The only 'proper' Muslim is a non-political one

Last week Hazel Blears has announced that the government would fund a "Theology board" for Muslims in the UK. In an interview with Radio 4, she said lots of nice - and true - things about Islam: that it is peaceful, that it is a religion of compassion, and then Kaboom! She claimed that this board will allow for a "proper interpretation" of Islam. I felt like I was stuck in the blurry screen waves of a bad 1970's sitcom which was transporting us back to the Middle Ages, to a time when the Government dictated to the public what is and isn't proper in religion. And this was indeed, about as funny as aforementioned sitcom.

The government has stated that it is doing its best to tackle Islamists who are the source of extremism. According to the government, Islamists are all without exception terribly violent and bloodthirsty. Islamists are apparently the cause of the world's problems - earthquakes in China, climate change, food shortages, the fuel crisis and poverty and malnutrition to name but a few. The only good Islamist is an ex-Islamist. The government has then used this premise to go on to define its entire policy about Muslims in the UK around the issue of security, ignoring issues of economics, society, education and deprivation.

The term 'Islamist' was once applied to anyone who used Islam as a political ideology. Muslims who do not have a political ideology of any sort are okay and need not be worried about being infected by Islamism. But the problem is that the term 'Islamism' has now been stretched to mean any Muslim who is political.

Blears insinuates that Muslims who are not politically active are the preferred kind of Muslim. She said in a speech to the Policy Exchange: "The fact remains that most British Muslims, like the wider community, are not politically active, do not sit on committees, and do not attend seminars and meetings. They are working hard, bringing up families, planning their holidays, and going about their business." Jack Straw was also quite clear about this two years ago: you can't be a Muslim woman in niqab and visit your MP to engage in the political process.

So if you are a poor confused brainwashed Muslim who cannot tell the difference between someone who is peddling violence and someone who is rocking their head with Britolerant chanting, then the government is going to help you decide your opinions, don't you worry, poor little Muslim.

The stance of the government takes the handful of criminals who have engaged in violent activity and states that this is a perverted interpretation of Islam, and needs to be exposed as such. Tony Blair said in a discussion with young Muslims "we have to accept that this is therefore a Muslim problem, and a problem with Islam." I reject this utterly.

This is a criminal issue, which needs to be exposed and rejected as such. The criminals are invoking the mantle of Islam as protection. The only way to get rid of them is for everyone together - including Muslims and the government - to isolate those horrible violent activities as outside the philosophy of Islam. There is no need for a 'proper' interpretation of Islam, because these activities are not to do with Islam. Rooting the problem falsely within Islam has created a hostile and prejudiced environment where the criminal activities cannot be properly attacked. The government doesn't like to hear this being said, but this is the only sensible right-minded way forward.

The recent refusal of ministers to attend IslamExpo is a case in point. Irrespective of their opinion of the organisers, it was a chance to engage with forty thousand Muslims who want to create and settle into a comfortable peaceful British Islam. It smacks of an increasing confusion on the part of the government who are now not only failing to engage with Muslims, but are actively disengaging with those Muslims who are working to a positive peaceful agenda. Blears is playing a dangerous and - in my opinion - futile game which can only backfire as it will leave the vast majority of peaceful Muslims feeling resentful at being singled out for undemocratic dictatorship of their religious views, something with which the government has no business.

My government - the one that I dutifully pay my taxes to, the one that I actively engage with through support and through criticism as part of my duties as subject and citizen, the one that I cast my vote for (or against), the one that I have represented abroad on official business, the one that I support through my labour resources and contribution to the economy - this government tells me that I cannot be a Muslim and engage in politics. Government you have failed to understand that it is I, and millions of others who engage in political activity, that have put you into a position of power. And this statement refers not just to the Labour party, but to any party in power, so Conservatives take note too. Your holding of the reins of power is at the behest of those who vote you in.

If our government makes a statement that a Muslim with a 'proper interpretation' of Islam is one that does not engage in political activity then our government does not have a 'proper interpretation' of its role and authority.

I wrote a piece a year ago stating "Five Things I love About Being a British Muslim Woman." In it I emphasised the importance as a Muslim of contributing to the nation that you are part of, and that part of being a contributing member is to be proud of what is good in that nation and to offer positive criticism to make the country a better place.

I continue to be committed to the people of Britain and to making our country a flourishing, forward-looking nation. In return the government has made a mockery of Muslims like me who want to engage in the political process by the rules of democracy, shared values and freedom of speech that the government claims underpin our shared vision of society. And the government is also making a mockery of the claims of democracy and freedom of speech by illegitimately excluding from political participation those whose opinions the government does not like. The government needs instead to think clearly for itself and avoid pandering to any which old voice which is popular in fear-mongering circles for their actions are undermining both the positive goals of social cohesion as well as the political process.

Blears said that "You can't win political arguments with the leaders of groups... who believe in the destruction of the very democratic process of debate and deliberation". By excluding the Muslim opinions that the government doesn't want to engage with through the devious method of saying that being a political Muslim is unpalatable, it is the government itself who is destroying the democratic process of debate.

The Global Ummah Needs to Start Local

Muslims are rightly proud of the diverse global ummah, but we should be more willing to embrace the diversity of the British Muslim communities, and channel it to drive forward new ideas

Outside of the period of hajj in Makkah, the UK is home to the most diverse Muslim community in the world. The extraordinary mix of ethnic origins and opinions from across the theological spectrum make it a unique moment in the history of the Muslim world, representing a microcosm of the diversity that Islam has always aspired to.

Islam and Muslims have travelled fluidly through history - across the Arabian Peninsula on horseback, by boat along the Eastern coasts of Africa and across to India and into the South Indian seas. It was often trade, by sea, or across the Silk Road, that flung Muslims eastward to China and Indonesia and west towards Morocco and Spain. In fact, records of the slave trade to the Americas suggested that Muslims had made it across the Atlantic long ago.

The re-drawing of national boundaries, wars, post-colonialism and the ease of travel and communication which have been the driving forces of the twentieth century, have once again shuffled Muslims around the world. Their movement has been mostly into Europe and North America, and nowhere has this redistribution and melting pot of Muslims been more apparent than in the UK.

In 2001, the British census estimated that there were 1.6 million Muslims in the UK, a number which is now forecast to be close to 2 million. This makes Muslims the second largest faith group in the country, and Muslims make up more than half of the non-Christian faith community. Almost three quarters of Muslims in the UK are from an Asian ethnic background. Those from Pakistan make up 43 per cent, from Bangladesh 16 per cent and Indians and other Asians make up 14 per cent. We probably could have guessed that. But did you know that 17 per cent consider themselves to be from a 'white' background, whether that is White British, Turkish, Cypriot, Arab or Eastern European? And did you know that 6 per cent of Muslims are of Black African origin, from North and West Africa, particularly Somalia.

We also know that all these figures are out of date, and show little of those of Middle Eastern origin who have joined us on this green and pleasant land in the last few years. If you haven't spotted your country on the list, then you make up that great overlooked fact of British Muslims - that they come from all the blessed corners of this God's great earth.

But so what?

First, it is important to take note of these astounding facts. We live in an historic time and place for Muslims. We have more ideas, cultures and perspectives in a concentrated space than ever before, to inspire, motivate and produce more than ever before. If ever we were to create something overwhelming, tumultuous and inspirational, then the time has never been more ripe. The great age of Muslim learning flowered because minds were open to new ideas, perspectives and cultures. Thinkers would wait eagerly for new books and learnings to travel across the ethnicities and languages of the Muslim world.

Islam is also about appreciating different people and knowing them. The Qur'an is quite clear about this, and Muslims love to quote that Allah created people into "tribes and nations" so that we may "know each other". We take positive pride in the diversity across the global Ummah. We claim that we love all our brothers and sisters, and that we feel their pain, wherever and whoever they are! Of course, this statement of bravado only lasts as long as we don't have to go to a mosque that 'belongs' to those of a different ethnicity. As long as we don't have to marry them. As long as we don't have to have children with them. As long as we don't have to work in communities together. There are exceptions, but they are relatively few.

We will protest vehemently for the Palestinian cause, and we may deplore the terrible situation in Iraq, but do we know any Palestinians or Iraqis here in the UK? It is easier to care for those thousands of miles away, then to look after those on our doorstep.

Nowhere in the world do we have more opportunity than in the UK, to put into action the ethos that the Prophet taught us - to treat all human beings as equal in worth, and to appreciate our variations and differences. At no time in history have we had the opportunity to infuse so much culture, so many ideas and so much vivacity into the future of Muslims.

History will judge us harshly if we remain enclosed in our ethnic and ideological bunkers. Our future generations will be even less forgiving if we fail to create the magic of cultural fusion and intellectual development that history has shown is in the DNA of the Muslim spirit.

This article was published in The Muslim News
Statistics quoted can be found in greater detail at the National Office of Statistics

In the Land of the Ayatollahs, Tupac Shakur is King

If there is one thing that Shahzad Aziz does not want us to forget, it is that people in the Middle East are human beings too. A successful professional, Aziz throws in his job to engage in a once-in-a-lifetime journey through the Middle East, chalking up visas to two thirds of the Axis of Evil on the way. The result is a personal reflection on the reality of the human voices hidden beneath the political rhetoric and media hype about the erroneously named 'Clash of Civilisations' and the 'War on Terror'. He names his book with the curious title In the Land of the Ayatollahs: Tupac Shakur is King. He needs the lengthy title to capture the contradictions and complexities of a region that is caricatured as full of fist-waving mullah's and miserable oppressed women in long black cloaks.

The book is part travelogue, part recounting of opinions of the people he meets on his journey, and part analysis of the complexities of the confused relationships between the dominant world powers and the Middle East. It takes time for Aziz to find his rhythm, as he tries to balance the narrative of his own travel experiences, the opinions of those he meets and his deconstruction of a kaleidoscope of issues ranging from the Arab-Israeli conflict to American corporate imperialism.

The book is a well-articulated example of the range and depth of issues that burn in the hearts of many Muslims. Aziz is fully in his stride as he outlines his own historical analysis of such topics, and his ability to convey his opinions and rationale shines. You may not agree with him, but as a voice reflecting many unheard young British Muslims, his discussions must be taken seriously. Where the book struggles is in conveying the travel experience that the reader longs for. Why does he not meet any Ayatullah's in Iran despite the name of the book? Why does he not visit the mosque of Sayeda Zainab in Damascus, despite that being one of the great draws of the city?

Aziz is personable and reflective, and his sheer enthusiasm and dedication to his task will carry you through the book. For Muslims, this book will give voice and clarity to the questions they are asked. For everyone, Aziz offers the chance to create a personal connection to the smells, images and sounds of a world that is full of people just like us.


Shahzad Aziz talks to Spirit21 about his book, In the Land of the Ayatollahs.

The travel writing market has an explosion of books. What did you think your book would add to the discussion about the Middle East?
In the Land of the Ayatollahs is a series of honest reflections written from the viewpoint of a Muslim from the West as he travels to the Muslim heartlands in the East. The 'journey' from Tehran to Jerusalem is indeed physical, but also intellectual and personal. Writing in the style of a travelogue, I use my travels as a canvas to explore issues as diverse as globalization and identity, to the War on Terror and of course, the Arab-Israeli conflict.

You also covered topics like the Salman Rushdie 'affair', and the need, or otherwise, for a Reformation in Islam. Why did you think this was relevant to a book about the Middle East?
One of the central themes of the book is to try to explain why the Muslim world and the Western world can see the same event or issue so differently. In this respect the Salman Rushdie Affair provided me with a really good prism in which to explore this issue. It also allowed me to put forward to the Western reader a critique of the Satanic Verses novel.

The issue of whether Islam needs to go through a reformation is also very emotive. To some, simply asking the question is offensive and blasphemous. To others, it is the answer to many of the problems within the Muslim world today. During my travels it was a topic that came up over and over again. I knew that if I overlooked such an important topic, then I would compromise the integrity of my project and my intentions in writing this book in the first place.

What was the thing that most surprised you during your travels?
Wherever we may live in our global village, the 21st century human being is a multitude of complimentary and contradictory identities - identities that we create and nurture ourselves and others which are imposed upon us, whether we like it or not. To the Arab and Israeli border police I possessed all the hallmarks of a sophisticated jihadist terrorist and therefore needed to be temporarily detained and interrogated, but to the shop sellers in the bazaars and souks of the Middle East, I was a dopey Western tourist, who was there to be fleeced.

Spirit21's readers are an adventurous bunch. What one place in the Middle East do you recommend to them as a must-visit?

Esfahan in Iran is a truly beautiful city, Muslim architecture at its best. Damascus in Syria is also an amazing city. In fact just thinking about it makes me want to go there.

How do you hope people will be inspired by your book?
I didn't set out to inspire people. If there is one point I wish to make, it is to undermine the, 'them and us' and 'with us or against us', discourses. Thankfully, the world is an infinitely more complex, diverse and sane place than that being advocated.

Modesty is not a black and white issue

Modest dress is a key component of Islam, but it's important to retain personality and aesthetics in the way we dress

This week I tried out the most extreme black cloak to make it into my wardrobe. A piece of elastic attached it to the top of my head, and then the single piece of long fabric hung snugly over my hair, sweeping over my shoulders and down past my feet. The final flourish was for me to hold together the two edges under my chin. Two eyes, a nose and a squashed mouth peeked through the gap under the black sheet. My husband peered into the bedroom, and nearly dropped his mug of tea.

"You look like a black blob," he said, horrified. "Where have you gone?" He poked underneath the black cloth like a serious Sherlock Holmes. Despite feeling uncomfortable about the cloak, no man was going to tell me how to observe modest dress. "Don't you want me to hide my figure so I'm not attracting attention?" I barked at him. He froze, rabbit in headlights, and then looked at me for a clue.

"Of course I want you to be modest," he said, certain that this was the right answer.

"And isn’t this long cloak, the most modest thing I could wear?"

"Well yes. Erm, well no, well yes, no, yes, yeah... no? yes, yes... "

I looked at him sternly, with the if-you-dare glint of a determined Muslim woman, who has pro-actively chosen to wear the headscarf and modest dress. He looked more terrified of me in my new guise of crazy-eyed Muslim harridan than he had of the black blob. But he was right to be distressed.

The question about how we should define modesty is constantly plaguing the Muslim community. Neither men nor women can map out any consistency or meaning in the higgledy-piggledy implementation of the rules of modest behaviour. At work you can interact with the opposite gender but not at Islamic conferences. Muslim men can shake hands with non-Muslim women, but not vice-versa. Brides who normally wear hijab will uncover in front of men to be shown off. In some communities, men will push into the women's section during weddings, but will enforce segregation at home. In others it is the opposite, with women not allowed to participate in mosque management due to the fitnah (division) this could cause, but happily socialising together.

The spirit and implementation of modesty is confused at best. Women and their clothing have become hijacked into being the symbol of how religious we are as a community. If women are properly covered, then everyone seems to think they can rest easy.

Her choice of dress is inextricably linked to a judgement about her spiritual status. At the sober end she is considered overly pious, not to mention excruciatingly dull. By contrast those women who choose not to wear a headscarf, are immediately judged to be irreligious, un-spiritual and not considered to be 'properly' practising. There has been a visible increase in the number of women wearing the hijab (head covering), the jilbab (loose fitting long dress) as well as the niqab (face covering).

Colours are subtle: greys, browns, blues, blacks. These women cite their dress as a freedom, an escape from the body-obsessed post-modern world, as well as a greater commitment to the values of Islam. At the other extreme is the rise of the Muhajababe. Her head covered, she probably wears skinny fit jeans and lycra t-shirts. For her, the headscarf itself has shown her commitment to her Muslim identity and faith.

We sighed simultaneously at the black cloak I was still wearing. "We all end up looking the same, I feel anonymous and unknown. I'm not me anymore," I mourned to him. "Some people say that our voices should not be heard either. I'm part of a black silent mass at the back of the room. Surely individuality is important? Especially if Allah says that there are as many ways to know Him as there are human beings?"

He responded enigmatically: "Each flower that God has created is specifically a different colour, and design. Even when they are closed, they make an effort to show their personality, and individuality."

I squinted dubiously at him. "Does this mean you think women don't need to wear niqab, jilbab or even the hijab?"

"Defining what 'modesty' means isn't easy, and we Muslims spend an awful lot of time on the outward signs like dress and physical separation. Where we need to focus more is on the complex relationships between modesty, personality and aesthetics."

I draped the abaya playfully over his shoulders. "Modesty isn't just for Muslim women to worry about," I reminded him. "To build a strong community we all have to be concerned with inner spirituality as well as outer codes of conduct like dress." Grinning cheesily, I pointed at the cloak: "Modesty is definitely not a black and white issue."

This article was published in The Muslim News

Can you dress provocatively and be religious?

I've just got back from BBC Asian Network discussing the issues around revealing clothing and being a person of faith. Can you wear a short skirt and low cut top and call yourself religious? Can you show off your assets in tight jeans and a teeny tight white t-shirt (I'm talking about the men here!)

It's a topic of passionate discussion, and that's because it is much more complex than it appears. First (and let's be honest about this), the conversation is almost always sparked off about complaining about women not being properly covered up. Rarely is the question asked in relation to men. Muslim women who do not wear the headscarf are immediately assumed to be less religious than those who wear it. Those who do wear it, are immediately assumed to be over-zealous and seated on their prayer mats for 22 hours each day. Those who do and don't wear hijab are constantly frustrated by these caricatures which block their path to exploring their faith and spirituality. Why should we judge an individual's constant struggle to be a person of faith by what they wear? We cannot judge that status. Judgement is only for God. What we can do is comment on the impact that their dress makes on those around them, and what we think it reveals about their understanding of modesty - for whatever is inside, always shows itself on the outside.

More challenging for our modern society is the issue this topic raises with regards to public and private faith. Even when you have strong inner values, we are told that they can and should be divorced from your participation in the public domain. Faith, we are told, is a private matter. But faith, de facto, must be public because it shows itself in the relationships you build with the people around you. For example, faith encourages compassion and kindness. There is no point exhibiting these values only at home - you need to demonstrate them in the world 'out there'. In fact, you must exhibit them out there, because part of being a person of faith is making the world a better place.

Modest dress and behaviour is part of all religions, in order to maintain humility, but also to make it easier to build relations with others. We have forgotten in our post-modern society that everything we do has an impact on others, and that whilst we have the freedoms of individuality, they come with responsibilities to others. It's not just all me-me-me. If modesty is an inner value, it must and will show itself to the world around us.

The MagicMuslims go to the Elections

If you want to meet the MagicMuslims, you can find out more here: http://www.spirit21.co.uk/magicmuslims/

Making the Mayoral Elections count

The elections on the 1st of May will determine not only the Mayor of London, but also the members of the London Assembly. The London Assembly is an elected body of 25 members, part of the Greater London Authority, that scrutinises the activities of the Mayor of London and has the power, with a two-thirds majority, to amend the Mayor's annual budget. So along with making an informed decision about who you want to vote in as Mayor, it's just as important to pick the right candidate for the London Assembly from your particular constituency, as they will also have a direct influence on London.

There are nine candidates standing for mayor, but Boris Johnson and Ken Livingstone are without doubt the two leading contenders. As with a lot of politics these days, it seems to be a battle on personality. My worry about BJ is that he is capturing voter interest simply because he is Not-Ken. Whilst some little fringe elements are off talking about his views on Palestine or Iraq, I think as Londoners, we need to ask ourselves questions about BJ, and about Ken and the other candidates about what can they really DO for our city.

On the ultra-macro level do they have the vision to create a world-leading city that celebrates the multicultural and diverse nature of the city? Do they have the wherewithal to position us as a global player as power shifts slowly from the West to China and India? Do they lead on environmental issues which affect us on the global level, but also in our own day to day experiences of living in this city? On the realities of day to day, how will they make life better? What services will they offer, introduce and change? Really important, and I think seriously overlooked by even leading journalists, is the candidate capable of working with the system and making change? Can they actually deliver on the blurb they spout? On closer analysis, do they have the skills and commitment?

Alas, I share the view with many that the choice before us is very poor. But if we don't vote, then we are simply casting a vote for whoever ends up being elected. Anyone who says that not voting is not supporting the system is so utterly wrong. Not voting is actually totally supporting the system. So in order to make a choice, here are some interesting facts I found:

Commitment to exercising the duties of an elected official:
- Boris Johnson MP has only voted in 48% of Parliamentary votes
This is very low, and doesn't appear to have any excuse. A very half-hearted approach to exercising public responsibility - doesn't show respect or commitment to the people who elected him

Leading the fight against racism and gender discrimination by example?
- "Black people have lower IQs", a statement published under his watch as the editor of The Spectator
- "The chicks in the GQ expenses department – and if you can't call them chicks, then what the hell, I ask you, is the point of writing for GQ." (Life in the Fast Lane p57)
Whether you take the words at face-value, or buy into Boris' excuse that they are 'ironic', it certainly shows a strong lack of respect. If nothing else, in an age of soundbites, a leader has to show common-sense and political sensitivity in ensuring their words do not fuel hatred or encourage discrimination.

A sympathy and understanding for fighting inequality and poverty:
- 'We seem to have forgotten that societies need rich people, even sickeningly rich people, and not just to provide jobs for those who clean swimming pools and resurface tennis courts'

Respect and neighbourliness
- 'There seems no reason to behave respectfully towards that little old woman coming out of the Post Office if you feel that she belongs to a culture that is alien from your own' (Lend Me Your Ears p207).
Nice to see a leader advocating a breakdown of respect, especially towards the elderly. Surely good manners is something our city and its leaders should aspire to?

Respect for Muslims
- After the July bombings he said 'Islam is the problem' and "Having given due warning, we would dispatch an American-built ground-assault helicopter and blow the place to bits. Then we would send in bulldozers to scrape over the remains, and we would do the same to all the other houses in the area thought to have been the temporary or permanent addresses of the suicide bombers and their families"
Not much respect going on for people, faith, and most importantly for democratic process here. Whatever you make of the bombings, surely our leaders should respect the law?

Finally, I thought you might like this little piece of irony. Boris claims he is not in fact Islamophobic, and bases this claim on the fact that his great-grandfather knew the Qur'an off-by-heart. (which is like saying black or Asian people cannot be racist, it simply doesn't follow). His ancestor was a minister in the Turkish government after the caliphate fell and "when the British occupied Constantinople for four years at the end of the first world war, he collaborated with them". Nice.

Happy voting.

******************************************************
A bit of background on the process:

How the Mayor is elected in this year's scenario of more than 3 candidates:
Voters cast a vote for their First Choice candidate and have the option of casting another vote for their Second Choice candidate. Any candidate who receives more than 50% of First Choice votes will be declared the winner. If no candidate gets more than 50% of First Choice votes, the top two candidates with the most First Choice votes go through to the second round. The remaining candidates are eliminated but the second choice votes on their ballot papers will be counted. The candidate with the highest total of First and Second Choice votes is elected.

Some blurb about how the London Assembly is elected:
The London Assembly is made up of 25 members: 14 Constituency Members who represent different areas in London and 11 London-wide Members who represent the city as a whole
The First Past the Post system is used to elect the Constituency Assembly Members - the candidate with the most votes in each constituency is elected. A form of proportional representation is used to elect the London-wide Assembly Members. Votes across London are added together regardless of constituency boundaries.

The Muslim World is Larger Than We Think

The Muslim world is made up of more than just people from the Middle East and the Subcontinent, and drawing on our wider heritage and perspectives could help us address the pressing questions of Islam and modernity

It would probably come as a surprise to most people to know that the largest ethnic group within the world's billion or so Muslims, are not in fact, Arab. Nor are they Pakistani, or even Bangladeshi for that matter. Even the entire Muslim populations of Europe and America do not feature at the top of this list, and neither does China.

In Britain, our perceptions of Muslims - and thus of Islam - are shaped by the fact that the media shows us coverage of the Arab world as 'Islam' and also because the majority of Muslims in this country are of Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin. The issues and challenges that raise themselves in the Muslim community, and which spill over into the national discourse about Muslims and Islam, therefore naturally stem from our Arabic and Sub-continental-shaped spectacles. Even within the Muslim communities the problems we see and the solutions we propose continually hark back to world-views and religious paradigms based in Arab and Sub-continental perspectives on history and modernity. British Islam tastes of korma curry with a side-serving of hummus. In the global political arena too, the Sub-continent and the Middle East (read 'Arab') are also front and centre when it comes to 'The Muslim World'.

With this restrictive bi-focal approach, we try to address the big questions facing Muslims today. We ask in this context, how do we get to a meaningful understanding of Islam and governance in the modern world order of nation-states? Should we choose to interact (or not) in democratic processes, and if so, what methods should we use? What should our identity and role be in this globalised world? Is there a dichotomy between nation and ummah, and if so, how do we reconcile them?

The biggest challenge out of all of these for Muslims, is to find meaningful proposals to create a framework for participation with positivity and integrity in this new world order. Muslims constantly hark back to a 'better time' of Islamic empires and Caliphates, which were the spiritual home of Muslims, and for the most part were their physical homes too. However, such an empire, or a universal 'home' state no longer exists. In many cases Muslims live as minorities within non-Muslim majority countries. There is no option - and in many cases no desire – to 'go home'. Muslims should already feel respected and at home, and should not be treated as aliens. In the context of such a relationship, it is timely for Muslims to construct a robust place within the national community that they are part of and establish very clearly the contribution that they will make.

This desperately needed enterprise is being subverted by a small minority who wish to hijack this process of development and change. Their desire is to return to a 'better time', and to 'Islamicise'. But they created these false notions through Arab-Sub-continental lenses. The neo-conservatives who have created their empty identities and standing in opposition to this so-called 'Islamist' political ideology also see the world in these two blinkered dimensions.

So here is the surprise. Large swathes of Muslims are asking the above-mentioned first set of positive questions about this new globalised world that we live in. The groundswell is to participate and contribute, to explore traditional notions of Islamic governance and to advance new ideas of engagement and civic participation. By no means are they getting it all right but, as Confucius says, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

The most significant and flourishing example of this is Indonesia. This is a country of 221 million people, of which 88% are Muslim. This makes Indonesia the world's largest Muslim population, a fact unknown and overlooked by most people. The country stretches from Thailand to Australia, punctuated by lush rainforests and epic lively volcanoes. Its spirituality is understated but intricately and gently woven throughout the fabric of society. Mosques are plentiful (as are other places of worship), almost on every street corner, but they are softly tucked in, little oases in the hubbub of day to day life. Scattered liberally amongst the emerald green rice fields are small huts, used to protect workers from the tropical rain storms, and offer an accessible place for prayer.

The country is founded on five principles, the first of which is the 'belief in the one and only God.' For a country with an overwhelming Muslim majority, its political principles define it not as Islamic, but as theistic. There is concern to ensure that the huge variety of ethnicities that make up the nation, as well as its six official religions, share a sense of cohesion which is expressed in another of its founding principles: 'Unity in diversity'. It also envisions a just and civilised humanity, social justice for the whole of Indonesia and finally, and perhaps most significantly democracy guided by the inner wisdom in the unanimity arising out of deliberations amongst representatives. It is this fusion of democracy and faith that makes the physical, spiritual and social landscape of Indonesia so fascinating.

Ten years after the overthrow of a totalitarian government, the country is racing through a reformasi, and asking piercing questions about nationhood and faith. Whilst travelling there, I was constantly surprised by the strength of feeling amongst all the people I met about driving their country forward.

How did the fact that I am both British and Muslim manifest itself, and how did I relate to my nation, I was constantly asked. Instead of simplistic shock at the existence of Muslims in the UK, the Indonesians greeted my fusion of British Islam with thoughtfulness. They reflected on what they could learn from the experience of British Muslims, to create a cohesive nation state that could respect faith, benefit from it, and use it as a force to create unity - a slippery and elusive goal for a country of its huge geography, variation and population. They wanted to learn about how minorities were treated, and apply positive experiences to their own nation.

There was no possible question of not participating in political and civic processes. Faith - whether Muslim or otherwise - was a natural part of civic life. There was no need to make a headline fuss of it. It did not dictate the political agenda. Instead, it offered fresh perspectives on dealing with social, political and economic issues. None of this is to say that Indonesia is not dealing with pockets of extremist activity like we are in the UK. Indonesia has many human rights and security issues of its own to deal with. Despite the challenges it is facing, it was refreshing to be in a Muslim majority country, amongst politically and civically active Muslims, for whom Islam was not the only item on the agenda - if in fact it was on the agenda at all. Creating a society where faith is woven into nationhood, and exists happily under its banner were of greater concern to people on the street.

I came away thinking that as British Muslims we had many things we could learn from them. Indonesia sits very firmly as part of the Muslim world, and sees itself as a key player amongst Muslim nations. It is attempting to deal with some of the questions that face both Islam and faith in general in this new millennium. And like a child learning to sit up and survey the world around it, their experience can offer Muslims fresh eyes onto our modern day challenges. Muslims speak with pride about sharing the joy and pain of a global ummah. But sometimes we forget that the ummah stretches much further not only in geography, but also much further in culture, politics and creativity than we might think.

This article was published in The Muslim News

Bishop Nazir-Ali to speak at Interfaith forum about pluralism

Imagine my surprise when I came across a listing for a lecture being held this evening by the East London Three Faiths Forum: "FAITH IN A PLURAL COMMUNITY with Bishop Nazir Ali (Bishop of Rochester)". Surely an interfaith group should be worried about some of the comments he has made?

The Telegraph wrote: 'In an outspoken attack on the custom of Muslim women to cover their faces, the Pakistani-born bishop said that the Islamic community needed to make greater efforts to integrate into British society. "It is fine if they want to wear the veil in private, but there are occasions in public life when it is inappropriate for them to wear it," he said.'

[shelina's comment: if the Bishop knew anything about the veil, then he would know that the concept of wearing it in 'private' is comical - the veil is a public matter, not a private one]

In January 2008 Nazir-Ali wrote that Islamic extremism had turned "already separate communities into 'no-go' areas" and claimed that there had been attempts to "impose an 'Islamic' character on certain areas". When he was challenged to name such areas, by various leading figures including Hazel Blears, he has failed to provide such evidence. He has failed to actually back up such a divisive statement. For a man of faith, it seems a strange way to build up community links and inter-faith work.

I have sent some people along to attend the lecture, and will post up their comments once they are in.

London, the city that would like to sleep, but can't

[Readers are advised that this is a rant-post about London's roadworks, and as such I am on my soap-box throughout. It was written on Monday night, and I've only just recovered sufficiently to post it up.]

It is 146am and Thames Water is drilling in the street outside my home. It is loud. We've complained almost every day for the last three weeks. Westminster council regularly sends us letters to tell us that the matter has been resolved. Each time we ring, they advise that the late night roadworks must be an emergency. We tell them that it's a pretty long emergency if it's been going on since last August and will continue till next August. Why can't they stick to working during the day and leave us to sleep as the Lord intended at night?

The first few times we complained nothing happened. Last week they sent a chap to assess the generator that remains on all night. It is very loud and harrumphs noisily throughout the night. He agreed that it was loud, louder than acceptable. He told us that there were a few options to solving the issue. Thames Water could pad the generator so the noise would be muffled. They could move it elsewhere. Or they might do nothing because it would be too difficult. No points for guessing that (c) was the option they chose.

Today, the operator at the council's environmental pollution unit took the biscuit. She trotted out the usual line that the works must be due to an emergency. Surely you should know if it's an emergency, I countered. Why should I know that? she said. But it's not an emergency anyway, I whimpered, exasperated and sleep deprived. They've been doing this for six months already and have another six months to go, I pointed out. It can't be a twelve month emergency, surely. There was a long silence, followed by another silence.

Why should I know that it's an emergency, she repeated finally. Because, I sucked my teeth wearily, you are the COUNCIL. My voice rose into a high pitched upper-case screech. YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO KNOW AND THEY'VE BEEN DOING THIS FOR SIX MONTHS. More silence, then she hung up.

I tried calling my MP Mark Field, but none of his numbers has voicemail, so I couldn't leave him a message. Sending an email simply wouldn't have hit the mark. I then tried to check the details for councillors in Westminster, but the Westminster website was handily not responding. Neither could I check details of the roadworks as said website was down. It is worth noting that Mark Field is a conservative MP. I have not seen him visiting my street or the roadworks, nor has he made any comment about the major activity going on here. I wonder if he represents the likely behaviour of Mr Johnson when it comes to getting involved in the nitty gritty of London life?
I called the Metro. Despite being averse to some of their reporting methods, they have a vested interest (so to speak) in London matters. Metro was out of office till 5am. It was still only 106am. The only people left were the police. I rang them - surely deep sea drilling in the wee hours had to be an offence of some sort? The nice lady was helpful with her time and sympathy but helpless to actually do anything.

Finally, my husband gingerly headed into the street to talk to the workers, who no doubt were as unhappy as we were that they were out drilling, sawing, running cranes and creating a din in the middle of the night. Unless of course they get paid four times normal, which they might well do. Apparently Thames water were at fault for not advising us that the works were going to be carried out. Funnily, on every previous occasion that we've called Thames Water they have not admitted any blame.

With all avenues now exhausted and feeling nauseous from the stress and fatigue, I admitted defeat. There was no one left to hear my weeping. In the run up to the mayoral elections, surely someone should be there to hear the pleas of Londoners who simply want a good nights' kip in order to go to work tomorrow and earn some dosh in the era of impending credit crisis? If a London resident weeps, in a forest of roadworks, does anyone hear?

As a London resident, it feels as though the mayoral election is more about prestige and pomp for the individuals involved. Rather than a personality analysis of the blues, reds and yellows, i'd like to know how the endless roadworks will be gotten rid of, why repairs take years rather than months to complete, and why no-one actually bothers to tell us - the ones who pay local and government taxes - what's going on, and when to expect intolerable levels of noise. I don't hear about the day to day issues on how to make the city not just tolerable, but also pleasant for the residents who live here. If I'm contributing a Mars bar a day, to new developments, then I'd like to be able to enjoy that Mars bar in peace.

Happy Birthday To Me

I've discovered that I share my birthday with Garry Kasparov (world chess champ - perhaps a day for strategy and brains?), Samuel Beckett (playwright, most famously of 'Waiting for Godot', so some hope for me developing deeper high-brow writing skills?) and Thomas Jefferson, third president of the USA (I leave you to draw your own conclusions on that one!).

Interestingly, (well, according to Wikipedia, anyway) it is thought the large-scale celebration of birthdays in Europe began with the cult of Mithras, which originated in Persia but was spread by soldiers throughout the Roman Empire.

You may be aware that some segments of the Muslim communities do not celebrate birthdays of any sort, either their own, or even that of the Prophet Muhammed. I know that they cite this as "bid'ah", based on the view that this was not part of the Prophet's way (something I don't feel is strictly correct, but that's my personal view). However, I was curious to discover that Jehovah's Witnesses do not celebrate it either as they state it is a pagan custom. Apparently some Jews do not celebrate birthdays either (I'd be interested to find out more from any Jewish readers if this is the case), stating that the day of death is better than the day of birth, and also citing the only example of a birthday celebrating in the Torah being that of the Pharaoh, and who would want to emulate him?

In any case, I find birthdays a great way to take some time out to show someone they are special. Yeah, yeah, I get that you are supposed to show them everyday, but let's be realistic - a day specially focusing on someone is a real treat to renew and strengthen loving attachment.

And of course, birthdays are a good excuse for a get-together and some cake. Mine's a double chocolate with fresh strawberries, if you were wondering.

"Conversations on Religion" book launch

Tomorrow is the launch of a new book entitled Conversations on Religion edited by Mick Gordon and Chris Wilkinson. "A stimulating collection of interviews on the subject of religion and belief, including high-profile names such as Richard Dawkins, Rowan Williams and Jonathan Sacks." Here is the blurb:

Conversations On Religion addresses questions such as; How do we define religion? Can we define faith? Why in our twenty first century world are so many people religious? and What should our ambition for religion be?

Mick Gordon and Chris Wilkinson explore these questions together with 18 well-known religious thinkers and commentators, including: AC Grayling, Giles Fraser, Rowan Williams, Lewis and Matthew Wolpert, Don Cuppit, Muhammad Yusuf Al-Hussaini, Tariq Ramadan, John Gray, Alistair McGrath, Abdelwahab El Affendi, Richard Dawkins, Julia Neuberger, Fraser Watts, Azzam Tamimi, Ann Widdecombe, Karen Armstrong, Shelina Janmohamed, and Jonathan Sacks.

The result is a fascinating insight into human nature. We human beings are strange in our commitment to beliefs which we inherit, imbibe and choose. We find them difficult to let go. For better and for worse, this is our commonality. The task is to better understand and attempt to take responsibility for those different beliefs and positions which seem to mean so much to us. Conversations on Religion is an important part of that process.

Yes, well-spotted! There is a chapter with me amongst all the well-known names, reflecting on what faith and religion mean to me, and answering some of the questions that come up time and again about extremism, Muslim women and organised religion.

Tony Blair's faith, globalisation and poverty

Last week was a busy week. Apologies to readers who noticed a complete blank on the blog - I was out listening, learning, thinking and in a few rare moments, I was moved too.

On Tuesday evening, Dr Eboo Patel of the Interfaith Youth Core, based out in Chicago, was speaking at the British Library on "In Martin Luther King's Footsteps", on the 40th anniversary of his death. Dr Patel is a remarkably eloquent presenter and wove a powerful narrative about the role of faith - and in particular interfaith - in addressing the issues of identity, division and extremism. He spoke of his own journey to be comfortable in living in the spaces of being Indian, Muslim and American and how he has reconciled the three, no longer feeling the need to hide or crush any aspect of his being. What shook him was when he realised that whilst he was busy struggling around ethnicity and nationhood for himself and his peers, the discourse he was part of paid scant or no attention to faith and religion as forming a sense of self and citizenship. Around the same time he also realised two further things about young people - that religious extremism seemed to be on the rise amongst - and appealed most strongly to - young people. He wondered why? He also noticed that young leaders - like Dr King - who play such an important role in our social consciousness as change-makers and peace instigators, rarely have their faith discussed. Dr King, he pointed out, is rarely spoken about as Reverend King. Where was the narrative about faith informing young leaders and the contributions they have made? How could these stories reach out to young people of faith to embrace them into a positive contribution by contributing their own faith stories?

Tony Blair later in the week also spoke about Faith and Globalisation at Westminster cathedral. Outside the stunning building were hordes of protesters who could be heard inside the hall throughout the lecture. "Murderer! Murderer!" they cried. Their placards said "BLIAR". Inside he spoke about how faith needs to be reclaimed from extremism, and how it can be a tool for good. He also spoke about how as the gravity of power moves from West to East as political and economic change happens, that faith can be one of the channels through which we can create conversation about shared values and 'purpose'. Given his record in political office, particularly with regards to war, I think there will be widespread scepticism about his new role and that of his foundation: The Tony Blair Faith Foundation. Great name - can it deliver what it promises? It seems to be we ask the same question whether Blair is a political or a religious leader.

However, much to my embarrassment, I have to confess that in a week of big ideas, I was most moved by the closing moments of Eastenders on Friday evening. Yes, sorry, I know I've just blown my credibility, but let me explain... Long-lost chav Bianca, with four children in tow, is thrown out of her home. She is too proud to ask for help, and too worried that the authorities will separate her from her children if she admits to her homeless penniless situation. After sleeping the night at the bus-stop, and trying to wash up in the park toilets, they have to face the police patrol who has been observing them and who now feels they need to step in. Fearing they will take her children, Bianca punches the officer, who then arrests her and bundles her into the police car and leaves the children in the park. It's not high-brow TV but it got me right under my skin and into my heart - the vulnerability of humanity. I'm hoping there are huge inaccuracies - why would they arrest her when her plight is obvious? Why would they leave the children unattended?

All this to one side, it was this that made me actually weep: the easy slip from comfort into poverty, criminal record and homelessness, the high level of child poverty. As someone blessed with comforts, the fact that 600,000 children in London alone live below the poverty line still holds me in shock, when we are in the top 5 richest nations on earth. With the London mayoral elections coming up, I checked the websites of the three candidates of the big parties, and I have to report that it is certainly not obvious what they are planning to do to alleviate this issue, this huge massive issue that faces what should be a world-class city, and a world-leading country.

I'm no expert about homelessness and poverty, but each day for a long time now, I have felt that this is an area I need to learn more about, and then get more strongly involved in. If you can help me learn about the issues, but more importantly about how to solve these issues medium-term, long-term - nay, forever, please help me learn. Even bloggers need those who can offer education and learning.

The Muslim Writers Awards - winner for Best Non-Fiction Writer

[Readers are advised that this posting comes with a High-Cheese-Factor warning]

As I stood on stage to accept this award under the glittering lights and in front of a thousand people, I felt a huge surge of emotion. It sounds cheesy, I know, but my lips were trembling as I tried to share my feelings with the audience. I felt - and all day today have been feeling - overwhelmed. Although I have always written since I was child, it is only two short years ago that I set up this blog as a cheeky place to be me, and to find my own voice. I am very moved, and extremely honoured that what I write and speak from the heart has touched others. And I am humbled that these words have been deemed worthy of an award.


Here is the beautiful award. I must confess that I got out my cloth and spray today and gave it a bit of a polish.

The rise and rise of Muslim awards

This week sees not one, but two, glittering awards ceremonies designed to recognise achievement and encourage talent in the Muslim communities. The Muslim News Awards for Excellence was held on Tuesday to recognise individuals and organisations for contributions in areas ranging from arts and science, to citizenship and enterprise. Now in its 8th year the awards have shown consistency and have made a real impact on promoting the positive contribution of British Muslims to British society. As this year's guest of honour David Milliband said, he was proud of the Awards not just as a politician, but also as a fellow citizen.

This evening will see the second Muslim Writers Awards which are aimed at encouraging Muslims to reach out more to their pens and keyboards and find their voices. Gordon Brown pledged his support for the awards, stating: "This is a wonderful opportunity to bring excellent writing by Muslim writers to new audiences, and increase the mutual understanding of the people of Britain." Again the event is a glittering event being held at the ICC, as a black tie do.

And I should modestly mention that I have been shortlisted for one of the Muslim Writers Awards, apparently from amongst 10,000 entries. If I win, the blog will show jubilation. If it goes all quiet tomorrow, dear readers, you'll know why...

Tranquility in remembrance

The Qur'anic stories of the Prophets offer us a reminder and an emotional connection towards the spirituality that Muslims strive for. Shelina Zahra Janmohamed is therefore troubled by an increasing negativity towards remembrance and emotion.

This year, the occasion of Easter and the occasion of the birth of the Prophet Muhammed, fall very close to each other. Both are clearly incredibly significant events to the faiths of Christianity and Islam respectively. Both mark the lives of individuals who have made a world-changing contribution (universe-changing some might say). Easter weekend falls from March 21st to March 24th, whilst the birthday of the Prophet falls somewhere between the 20th and the 25th, depending on which sources of history you refer to - the Islamic date usually being either the 12th or 17th of the 3rd Islamic month Rabiul Awwal.

Easter - along with the other occasions of the Christian calendar - appears to me to be a unifying event for the Christian community. I do not agree with the doctrine it reinforces (having chosen to be a Muslim rather than a Christian), but I do admire its focus and reflection on an historical event that can stir emotions and also shed light on our current and future circumstances.

It is an undeniable truth that the study of history and its remembrance is an aid to mapping a wiser brighter future. That is why Scripture - like the Qur'an - recounts the stories of Prophets and communities past, so that we can reflect on what happened to them, why it happened, and then avoid their mistakes. And the very point of narrating the stories and parables of these human guides is to offer an emotional connection and a human example of spirituality and worship.

The Qur'an repeatedly remembers what has happened to the Prophets and peoples before us. It tells us that the Prophets were sent as bearers of good news and guidance but also as warners. It re-iterates their stories in chapter after chapter, reminding us of their birth, lives and deaths and urging us to remember them and what they said to their people. Sura Saffat (The Ranks, Chapter 37) for example, is a poetic essay of the lives of the saleheen, the good. It tells us about Prophets such as Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Lot, Moses and Aaron. After the individual commemoration of each Prophet, the Qur'an says, salam, peace, to each one. In case we missed this repetition, it rounds off the chapter by saying, salam, to all the messengers, and then praises Allah.

With all of this in mind, I have been startled in recent years by the growing numbers of messages I receive in the form of emails, newsletters and sombre advice telling me that I should refrain from remembering events such as the birthday of the Prophet. Such advice sometimes goes as far as to tell me it is haram to commemorate the Prophet's birth. I am told not to commemorate his birth or death, not to mark the death of near or respected individuals, not to spend time in spiritual reflection on various nights throughout the year, not to remember the dead.

I find this deeply troubling. The sign of a mature community is one that can reflect on what has past. It needs to study what has happened and learn the lessons of history and then move forward. Where we found ourselves wanting, we must mourn and then convert our remorse into a more positive future. Where we found good, we must rejoice. To stop remembrance severs our roots. It leaves us floating precariously in an unanchored vacuum where we have no frame of reference. That is when we become weak and pale as a people.

What I also find troubling is that this growing negativity towards remembrance is aimed at quashing human emotion as a component of faith. There is an emotional value that remembrance brings to our faith, and by denying remembrance we are eroding the emotion of faith. It is natural for human beings to be joyful and emotional in remembering those who have done good to them - particularly when they have sacrificed their lives to bring us that goodness. The Prophet is the best example of this. It is the natural condition for a Muslim to feel love and happiness in relation towards him. In fact, the Qur'an tells us that the people asked the Prophet what he wanted in exchange for teaching them about Islam and the Qur'an answers that all he wanted is muwaddah, love. We should bear in mind that the Qur'an tells us that even Allah and the angels send their blessings on the Prophet, and that those who believe do the same.

The fitrah of the human being is to remember. It is also the fitrah of the human being that he or she will rush in the direction in which emotion pulls it. Without that emotion to drive it, the path is arid and laborious. Infused with emotion and remembrance it appeals to the instinct which is placed in each human's heart to reach for the Divine. Remembrance is what opens the heart and creates love and tranquility.

The theological arguments about whether the birthday of the Prophet should be celebrated or not will continue to rage, I'm sure. However, as people centred around faith and spirituality, what we do need is an understanding that remembrance - in whatever way people choose to exercise it - is a crucial component of our community ethos.

This article was published in The Muslim News

Indonesia, the land of sun, smiles and spirituality

Here is a brief account of my recent trip to Indonesia. I'll be posting a video in the next few days, and then publishing a more formal piece about the visit.

It was a hot sticky evening in Jakarta, and we were about to return to our hotel after an amazing day visiting schools, women's groups and an Ambassador's reception. I was being a typical Brit complaining in the face of the torrential rain, imminent flooding and lengthy traffic queues. My Indonesian host on the other hand, smiled gently and serenely: "It will be ok, we'll be there very soon". He smiled again, a heartfelt peaceful smile.

You could read his response as the typical Indonesian approach to 'rubber time', which allows for timing to be flexible and unstressed. In the face of Mother Nature's stormy interventions into our plans, living by time elasticity is probably a sensible approach. But I preferred to see it as an example of that other Indonesian trait - a positive smile in the face of adversity. As my host explained, a smile can often ease away immediate problems.

This smile was prevalent wherever I went. People were gentle, hospitable and friendly and had ease and kindness in dealing with people. A smilier bunch of people I've never met, it certainly gave me pause for thought.

I began the journey in Jakarta, the financial heart of Indonesia. The country has the largest Muslim population in the world, more populous than the entire Arab nation. The country crams in 221m people of which about 88% are Muslim. It stretches from Aceh in the north which is parallel to Thailand, enveloping Malaysia and Singapore all the way to Papua in the East, and barely within spitting distance from Australia.

About 13 million people reside in the huge sprawling metropolis of Jakarta, a city lit up with bright neon lights by night, and overcast with monstrous smog by day. My lasting memory is of the wide boulevards which criss-cross the city, but which are crammed with standstill traffic for most the day and night. The city has no metro system, and even a trip a few miles away can take a couple of hours.

The city has South East Asia's largest shopping mall (Mangga Dua), Indonesia's largest mosque (Masjid Istiqlal) and the largest share of Indonesia's population and economy. Quietly hidden amongst the skyscrapers are small simple mosques which are woven into the fabric of the city, but which are rarely front and centre. Except on Fridays, when a drum is beaten before the adhaan to announce Juma (Friday prayers), and streams and streams of people pour into and then back out of the mosques. Scooters are the vehicle of choice, filling up the scooter parks next to the mosques.

The mosques have space for women to pray - again a reflection of the relative ease with which women participate in public life. The scholars, politicians and activists which I met dealt with women in a natural, un-contrived manner. The respect was innate and natural. It was a non-issue.

Jakarta is also home to Mini-Indonesia, a drive-thru theme park that is home to traditional houses from around the country, plus a rather spectacular lake that has islands in the shape of the Indonesian archipelago. Built by Suharto's wife it proved unpopular to start with as many locals were evicted to make way for the enormous site.

Next it was off to Yogyakarta, commonly called Jogja, a much smaller, gentler cultural town. It is home to South East Asia's largest Hindu temple (Prambanan) and the largest Buddhist temple (Borobudur). The former was built around the 10th century and the latter in the 8th and 9th century, but they were quickly abandoned for unknown reasons. As the guide to the sites said, "These sites are Hindu and Buddhist, but most of the visitors are Muslim. This is Indonesia." A statement that is the perfect summary of the respectful spirituality of this vast diverse nation.

This should have come as no surprise in a country where one of the five principles upon which the state is built is "Unity in diversity." These five pancacila were the foundation of the new nation that declared its independence from the Dutch in 1945. The country was based on a theistic vision of statehood: belief in the one and only God. It also envisioned a just and civilised humanity, social justice for the whole of Indonesia and finally, and perhaps most significantly democracy guided by the inner wisdom in the unanimity arising out of deliberations amongst representatives.

It is this fusion of democracy and faith that makes the physical, spiritual and social landscape of Indonesia so fascinating. Jogja was a perfect example of this with the ease with the which the locals look after Prambanan and Borobudur. They are horrified at the attempted terrorist attacks aimed at destroying them.

Yogyakarta was heavily affected by an earthquake measuring 6.2 in 2006. Bantul, a small suburb of Jogja was almost entirely destroyed taking a hit of almost two thirds of the 3500 dead. I visited some house rebuilding projects being run by the British NGO Muslim Aid. I spoke to one family that had been housed. The father had been injured by falling debris in the quake and was unable to work to support his four children. Muslim Aid had given them a brick house with three rooms so they could re-build their lives. This was a huge boon to the family whose breadwinner is the mother. She earns their living by peeling garlic cloves by hand, for which she earns about 30 pence per day. Each house costs 4 million rupiah - a mere £240, in order to give a family a home, and allow them to get on with their lives.

I also went to visit House of Lawe, ("Conserving tradition, empowering women") a local project not far away which gives people the resources to create yarn, fabric and handicrafts to sell in the local community and with which to support themselves. It is the oldest such project in the area, and the day I arrived was the launch of their new women's handicraft project.

Earthquakes and tsunamis are not the only epic disasters to befall Indonesia. Set in the 'Ring of fire', volcanoes are widely prevalent throughout the country. Merapi is Jogja's own volcano, and it erupted in 2007. Since this was still monsoon season, the path to the volcano was closed due to potential torrential rain and sodden ash in the path. On the way, we chanced upon a missionary church built in one of the poorer villages. It stood in the same style of rectangular thatched building used for mosques, town halls and prayer areas.

Before leaving town, I visited the local shopping mall, another 'biggest...', which was jam-packed with the same American brands wherever I turned – Starbucks, McDonalds, Pizza Hut, KFC, Dunkin' Donuts, Hard Rock Cafe. It was like home away from home (note the irony). What was surprising was that the prices were similar to those in the UK, in a country where poverty runs at approximately 40 per cent.

Next stop was Bali, the Ibiza of Asia. The Ozzies had popped over just as the Brits might have done to the Spanish coast. My base was Legian, just north of the infamous Kuta, made notorious by the Bali bombings of 2002. The public face of Bali was a body shock coming from quiet sleepy Muslim Yogyakarta. Bali is mainly Hindu, although quite different in flavour to Indian Hinduism. It is sprinkled with in-your-face adult entertainment and fast food joints. A gentle walk on the sea front led to a disconcerting number of offers for marijuana from dreadlocked Indonesians.

The spirit of the island changed heading further inland. The landscaped changed from frenetic building work to jaw-dropping green paddy fields with unbelievable curved terraces, with hot steam rising when the rains came pouring down. Hobbits could be seen traversing the greenery. The taxi-driver trailed me through batik shops, art houses, wooden carving joints, furniture shops and silversmiths trying hard to earn commission from any sales I might generate, but the quality was sadly too tourist-y. But then we reached Ubud, the touristic and artistic centre of the island which is replete with expensive shops, and fortunately balanced by a cheap bustling market (bargain hard!). I ventured nervously into Monkey Forest where about a hundred cute little monkeys bounced around chasing after visitors and snatching away any loose items.

I imagine that Bali was once what Lombok is today which was the next stop - an unspoilt magical island to the east of Bali. Affected heavily by the drop in tourism after all the catastrophic events, Lombok's fledgling tourist industry took a downturn. As a result, top end hotels are a bargain (book your rooms now! Sadly I get no commission). The sands are soft, the sea is calm and deep blue, the food is tasty and cheap, the people are helpful and friendly. I felt like I was in paradise. Until a trip to Gili Trawangan, part of the Gili Islands. After an hour on a motorised catamaran across perfect inky blue waters, I really did find paradise. Perfect white sand beach. Perfect turquoise sea, perfect gentle breeze. I drank fresh lime soda stretched out on a sun-lounger watching the waves kiss the shore. Did I really have to come home?

Lombok is stunning. The roads wind dramatically along the coastline revealing mile upon mile of idyllic beaches on one side, and lush green palm groves on the other. It is called the Island of a Thousand Mosques, and lives up to its name with tiny mosques dotted subtly throughout the forests, paddy fields and small towns. The countryside is punctuated with small huts to allow for both shelter from the rain, but also for convenient prayer places. And this is the story of Indonesia. It is a country that seems at ease with its faith at a human ordinary people level. It is interwoven into the rhythm of life, not in-your-face.

Only ten years on from the reformasi and the country's move to democracy, the nation is showing signs of an active civic engagement in democratic process. People are asking questions about nationhood, democracy and faith. I was asked many times – how do you reconcile your faith with being British – by people who were asking how they could create Indonesia into a country that was at ease with all its faiths as well as its nationhood.

Coming from a country where participation in the political process is at an all time low, the Indonesian vigour and enthusiasm at civic engagement was overwhelming. In Britain the shutters have come down on exploring our national identity in an open and progressive manner. In Indonesia I found the opposite – ordinary people, not just politicians - asking questions about the values that bind its people irrespective of faith and ethnicity, and how to deal fairly and intelligently with minorities. They do not have all the answers, and they are certainly far from perfect in many areas. In fact, their record in some areas is poor, and there are many trouble spots the country will have to negotiate through at a political and state level, extremism being at the forefront of everyone's minds. But whilst extremism dominates the world's view of Indonesia, at a local people level they want to be known as a people of moderation and peace (check out the video I will be posting soon).

It was exciting to travel in a country of such variety in its people, places, ethnicities and faith that is asking questions of itself and is capable of creating change so rapidly. From the bustle of Jakarta to the serenity of Lombok, and all the places I didn't even get a chance to visit, Indonesia is a place that should be firmly on everyone's radar.

Excrutiating jetlag

It's 6am and I'm wide awake, and I have been for the last hour and a half. I'm far from feeling fresh and perky, but instead I'm suffering a constant headache and fatigue. I've travelled extensively before but this return trip from Indonesia has sunk a right hook into my stomach and left me reeling. I know the adjustment is supposed to be a day for every hour of time difference, but I can't face up to a week of jetlag agony.

I have many photos, stories and videos to share of Indonesia, so bear with me and they will soon be up, with full commentary and a Shelina ready for discussion!

Greetings from Indonesia

This is a huge country whose islands play join-the-dots all the way from Singapore to Australia. It contains three of the world's six largest islands, sits nervously on the ring of fire which makes it prone to volcano eruptions, earthquakes, hurricanes and of course to tsunamis. It is hot, densely populated and in the current rainy season it is very very wet. And it has some of the nicest, politest, mild-mannered people I have ever met. They are constantly smiling, always go out of their way to help and are a gentle considerate people.

The country's capital is also at a total standstill because of the traffic. Never was a metro system more needed. But it is a country of immense contrasts too - a skyline of skyscrapers in Jakarta, and malls filled with global designer labels jostle with poor housing and workers that live on less than 35GBP per month. The country wears its Islam, its nationhood and its democracy in its heart. I'm constantly asked questions about Britain, the government, and I'm asked to share reflections on being Muslim and British. Only ten years into democracy and reformasi, my first impressions of Indonesia are of a country that is pulsing with faith, politics and nationhood and making great strides to race into the 21st century. My impressions are also of a vast and cultured land with huge variation in countryside, ethnicities and cultures. They also make a fantastic cup of coffee. Java, they call it...

Spirit21 reveals The Magic Muslims...

Spirit21 is proud to reveal The Magic Muslims - Ordinary Muslims with Extraordinary Powers. Fun-loving, quirky and joyful in life, once you've met them, you'll want to keep coming back for more. Any Muslim you meet could be a MagicMuslim - a quiet superhero trying to bring happiness, humour and compassion to the world.

I'm really excited to bring you these characters - created and commissioned as original Superheroes by Spirit21 for everyone to enjoy and interact with. Every month or so a new cartoon with the characters will be published, so you can check out their antics in the world. I hope you enjoy them, as much as I enjoyed creating them. Please share your comments and thoughts, but do remember the copyright!

Make sure you get to know The Magic Muslims better here

Time for a Womelution

The Muslim community needs to make a quantum leap in addressing the issues of gender roles, gender worth, and gender relations, and so this week I am declaring a 'womelution'.

The debate about Islam, women and rights seems to have reached a dead end. We are stuck, all of us together - Muslim and otherwise - in a groundhog day regurgitation of the same arguments about women and Islam. It's all talk with few new ideas and intellectual works being produced, little social change happening, and Muslims still not facing up to the fact that we need to address the subject of gender. We must reject this status of 'stuck'. Stuck, is no longer an option. God does not change the state of a people until they change it themselves.

We must also reject the notion of 'fixing women'. Fixing women, doesn't fix the problem. Let's replace the issue of 'women' with a debate about women and men. After all, God does say He created human beings in pairs.

What we need is for men and women to work together so that we can make substantive change and real improvements. What we need are open hearts and inquisitive minds so that we can make a positive move forward. What we need, is a womelution.

Inspired by women, but for both men as well as women, the womelution is positive, engaging, creative and forward-looking. This is not a bloody revolution, but looks inside all traditions and heritages, to both genders, to all ages and multifarious ethnicities and languages.

The womelution is about making real change: intellectual change but most importantly, real social change. It is characterised by compassion, humanity and humour and most of all by respect. It is not about women versus men, but about being on the same side, creating the best for everyone. It is rooted in Islam and its foundations are within the Muslim conception of the world. Its premise is that Islam has more to offer than it is currently given credit for, and it has a blueprint that can contribute to humanity in general. The womelution encourages questioning, respectful challenging and constructive criticism.

1. We need to re-ignite the tradition of intellectual debate

We need new thinking and output that moves forward Islamic scholarship on the issues of gender. The world has changed and we need to face up to that. We must ask challenging questions - but with respect and within the spirit and ethos of the Qur'an and the teachings of the Prophet. Every time we look at the words of the Qur'an we are advised that they will reveal something new. In the same way, when every new generation looks at Qur'anic verses and the Prophetic traditions it will be through new lenses.

In 2008, I invite every Muslim scholar, every Imam, and academic to tackle the issues around Islam and gender. It can be in the shape of a theological discourse, or a social reform, small or large, but it must offer something new and positive that leads to real change.

2. Communal spaces, particularly mosques, need to re-balance gender participation

Although a womelution is about both men and women, it is undoubted that in some areas - such as those of mosques and other public forums - getting women involved is the first priority. This will benefit both men and women. Those mosques or community centres which currently have no space for women need to create areas for women and start engaging with them. The many mosques where women are already actively involved need to make sure that there is at least one woman who is on the management or executive committee of that mosque or centre, and that she has actual authority and empowerment vested in her.

Let 2008 be the year for asking questions and offering answers about how men and women should share mosques and community spaces, and when every single mosque up and down the UK succeeds in appointing a woman into an official position.

3. Women must themselves actively pursue improvement and change - for the sake of society as a whole

Men need to open hearts, minds and doors, but women must also grasp the mettle and engage in change. It can and will be difficult and will feel uncomfortable. Both men and women need to understand that women must participate to create a successful community. Women have new perspectives and approaches, and will bring forward issues that have not yet been addressed. Women will double the resources, brains and energies at the disposal of the Muslim community.

4. Change must be based on addressing the needs of both men and women

What are the traditional gender roles that we are upholding? How do men and women currently interact, how are responsibilities distributed, and are these rooted in culture or faith? Once we've asked these questions we need to assess: what should be our definitions of gender roles and what should be our notions of gender worth? We don't live in a traditional world anymore. It is worth remembering that the greatest failing of the community of the Prophet Abraham was that they did what their fathers and forefathers before them did without questioning it.

The biggest social and practical issue facing us today though, is that of gender relations - how should men and women relate to each other, and how do we implement personal law? Muslim women have become the bastions for maintaining and regulating gender relations. The concepts of hijab, niqab and segregation have been confused with the real concept of modesty in etiquette, behaviour and personal relationships. What does modesty really mean? What is its role in Muslim society, how should both men and women practice it, and how should it regulate the world of gender relations?

5. Confidence, compassion and curiosity are the values that will drive positive change

It's time also to put paid to the frankly silly but insidious suggestions that Muslims are alien to Britain. Muslims must be confident in themselves, in their Islam and in living in Britain. We must have curiosity and confidence in asking questions to make the lives better of everyone around us - Muslim and otherwise. It also requires compassion and empathy for our neighbours which, of course, comes with the right to be treated with respect and love in return.

This year should be the beginning of a womelution, a marked change in the tempo and confidence of the Muslim community, with a particular focus on gender. We will need vision and creativity and to be positive and work together. This is the only way that we will move forward.

And if you're still confused, it's pronounced wi-mah-lou-shun.

P.S. We also need a little inspiration and some humour. As my own personal contribution, I dedicate four Superhero characters, which you will find on my blog www.spirit21.co.uk/magicmuslims

This article was recently published in The Muslim News

Time for a Womelution - a preview

The Muslim community needs to make a quantum leap in addressing the issues of gender roles, gender worth, and gender relations, and so later this week I will be declaring a 'womelution'.

The debate about Islam, women and rights seems to have reached a dead end. We are stuck, all of us together - Muslim and otherwise - in a groundhog day regurgitation of the same arguments about women and Islam. It's all talk with few new ideas and intellectual works being produced, little social change happening, and Muslims still not facing up to the fact that we need to address the subject of gender.

What we need is for men and women to work together so that we can make substantive change and real improvements. What we need are open hearts and inquisitive minds so that we can make a positive move forward. What we need, is a womelution.

If you come back on Friday 29th Feb, you'll be able to read the full article, and you will also find a humorous surprise waiting for you...

Indonesia beckons

In about ten days I will be off to Indonesia, and will have about ten days there. At the moment, I've made no plans of where to go or what to do.

Does anyone out there have any suggestions of how to plan out my stay? I'd like to get a flavour of the place, see some beautiful landscapes, enjoy some culture, eat some delicious food, get a bit active, and be a bit pampered. I'd also like to meet some interesting people.

I'm open to ideas - particularly from my visitors from Indonesia - I know you're regulars!

So, if you feel that there is something I should check out for my own personal enjoyment, or to report back on for wider interest, or people I should talk to, please let me know.

I'm also thinking about getting a camcorder, so I can capture the place and maybe even try my hand at vodcasting. If you have any particular model that you want to recommend, I am very willing to take recommendations. Please advise!

Observations on my high street - things that made me cross

Part of my local high street is being dug up. The half height barriers have been erected where the pavement and tarmac are being pulled up and then resurfaced, and the pedestrian walkway is temporarily re-directed around these areas. I was walking through these areas behind two young lads today. There was nothing out of the ordinary until one of them put his arm through the barriers and pulled out a large shovel, and his compatriot did the same and pulled up a large long piece of concrete. They then carried on walking with their new implements. They were cool. They didn't even bother to see if anyone had noticed, just carried on walking, carrying a shovel and a piece of concrete. They must have been around 15 years old, walking around about 2pm on a weekday afternoon.

It didn't look like they had picked them up to help an old granny with her gardening. It just smacked of stocking them up for violence. I was infuriated. They had committed theft in open daylight, and there appeared to be a violent intent. My high street is extremely busy, and since it is in central London is a well-used part of town. There was no policeman or member of the law anywhere to be seen. Despite worries about my own safety (i'm only little) I said "Hey, put that back". They turned to look at me, and I repeated that they should return what they had taken. Even though they had looked at me, they ignored me.

Twenty yards along was another set of roadworks with two workers. I stepped over to one and pointed at the two kids. They've taken a shovel and a large piece of concrete, I told him. Who, he asked. He didn't look very bothered. The two kids over there, I pointed. I can't see them, he mumbled. I think they are going to hurt someone, I told him. Where are they? He bobbed up and down trying to see them. Well they are probably half way up the street by now, I snapped at him. I turned pointedly to him and said - they stole your goods, and they will probably hurt someone, aren't you going to do something? He pulled out his phone and started whispering into it, whilst the kids walked off.

I was surprised at myself for telling the two lads off - they could easily have swung the shovel at me. But I was proud of myself in a small way for having a bit of courage - surely we all need to have a bit more of that? Didn't make a blind bit of difference though. But why did nobody else notice. And importantly why was there no police or anyone of authority around in such a busy area?

Finally, a question to you -what else, if anything should I have done? With hindsight I wondered if I should have shouted out and caused a commotion. But what would I have said? "shovel thief, shovel thief!!" I also wondered if I should have pulled out my phone and taken a picture of them (and maybe had it stolen, or got a smack), but would the police have done anything with the picture? I doubt it.

Dear blogosphere - what should you do in such a situation?

Is it Valentine's day that is being prohibited or... love?

Various Muslim 'authorities' round the world have issued declarations that it is prohibited to celebrate Valentine's Day, including some in our own beloved United Kingdom. The Saudis predictably have gone the whole hog and sent the Vice Police round all the shops to make sure nothing red-coloured is sold for the whole week. They've even issued a fatwa against it. (surely this opens the way for a bit of cheeky subversiveness with another colour... how about the Saudi green... ?) Indonesia, Hyderabad and Kashmir amongst others seemed unhappy about the celebration too. The Kuwaitis are not pleased either, but they have captured one of the reasons that the day of luurve has got under their skin - a number of Kuwaiti MPs described Valentine's Day as a Western tradition that is not compatible with Kuwaiti values.

Whilst the neo-con-we-have-Islam-it's-medaeival-brigade may be reading the above and shouting "see! see! we told you!", it seems that there are two things at play here.

The Kuwaiti statement captures the first of these - what is the need to pick up celebrations from round the world, particularly the post-colonial-west, particularly when even the countries of origin recognise the shallow commercial nature of that celebration? Whilst in the UK we may smile at the day, most people actually make a concerted effort NOT to make a big deal about it.

If these countries want to reject the day on the count that it is consumerist, shallow, reductive of love to a one-off day, lacking in merit or just simply tacky, or reminding them of imperialist days gone by, then who are we to tut-tut? The western reportage seems to be taking the line that the rejection of this day is an affront to civiliation. But what business is it of ours whether other countries like or dislike our idiosyncratic cultural celebrations?

The second thread that seems to be running through some of the 'Islamic' edicts, I find much more perplexing, and that is the idea that Valentine's Day is 'unIslamic' and perhaps even 'haram' to celebrate it.

IslamOnline's Q and A says that the day is bid'ah, an innovation, and since it emanates from pagan sources, we should not participate. There are warnings that celebrating the day can lead to various kinds of immodest behaviour (!). Surely the correct and much more sensible approach is to advise people on the boundaries of modesty (dress and behaviour), rather than focusing on one specific event?

What I find perplexing is that the day now is simply an excuse to remember love. My husband surprised me with a rose at work (despite the fact that he calls it a hallmark holiday), I left him a surprise chocolate heart. I sent my female friends declarations of my love and friendship. Everyone felt a bit happier, no? What could be wrong with that?

As part of the information I received about why I shouldn't celebrate Valentine's Day, I found these quotes: "Love is a psychological sickness", and "If a man is in love with a woman... his heart remains enslaved to her, and she can control him as she wishes... In that case, she will control him like a harsh and oppressive master controls his abject slave"

I worry about this - that love is considered a negative and corrosive thing by the 'authorities'. It seems to be a 'top-down' thing. Popular discourse - including in Saudi - uses as much more common-sense approach as this cartoon from Saudi Arabia shows.

Now, I'm no scholar, but this negativity is not my understanding of love in Islam. It just doesn't seem to make sense at all with the basic foundations of Islam. A good example of love being rooted at the very birth of Islam is illuminated in the story of Muhammed and his wife Khadija, described as a true love story, a relationship built on mutual respect, trust and truth through adversity. The Qur'an also talks about how a married couple are blessed with love, as part of their marriage. Love, is a blessing for human beings, a wonderful thing to give and be given.

What could be better than love? Islam is, after all, the state of loving the Creator and loving Creation...

The Art of Conversation - Britons, Britain, Muslims and Islam

Readers of a sensitive disposition should be advised that this article contains words of a difficult nature. What you are about to read may cause a temporary shut down in common sense and a brief outburst of hysteria.

Shariah.

Are you still there? I have smelling salts if you need them. Beware, here are a few more: fatwa, hijab, apostasy, niqab, cousin-marriage, Imam, Muslim women.

We can take a short breather now, and collect ourselves. Phew. I apologise if my outburst has reduced some readers to gibbering ranting Alf Garnett type creatures.

When the Archbishop mentioned the scary S-word, all rational debate - even if it be to score a resounding knock-out in the first three minutes for the secular corner - was suspended. What on earth have we just experienced in the last few days? Rowan Williams barely mentioned the word 'shariah' and the country was in an Armageddon-style-end-of-the-world frenzy. It wasn't even possible to get a word in edgeways to say that he was not in fact advocating shariah law. Instead, the media was awash with images of floggings from Somalia to the rings of Saturn and all the way in between.

Now that we are in the post-MTV, post-spin sound-bite century, we have lost the ability for discussion and debate. Sophistication and subtlety are a thing of the past. What I rue most is the lost art of conversation. Mention a word, and its caricature will be whipped up in front of you. Muslim woman in hijab? Poor, oppressed woman, one of four wives forced into marriage to her cousin, barely speaks English, wishes she could wear a mini-skirt... Muslim Imam? Mad ranting mullah burning a flag... Fatwa? Sentence to death for parking on a double yellow line.

It is completely impossible to have any kind of conversation about these issues without tantrums and hysteria. If British culture, values and laws are robust, then they will stand the test of discussion about these concepts, and vanquish anything that turns out to be barbaric or medaeival, or simply just not suited to the stiff upper lip and rugged British constitution. The knee-jerk ranting that surrounds us belies a lack of confidence and an unfounded sense of mistrust in the historic institutions that have made this country great.

We must ditch the cartoon (pun entirely intended) responses to any Muslim-sounding word that decorate our front pages week in week out. If we could get away from the unhelpful and misleading stereotypes that have lodged themselves into the public psyche, then maybe we could work our way through these minefields that seem to explode every few weeks. We might find our national debate engaging in that elusive thing - progress. Instead, the conversations that we need to have are being de-railed by the inability to communicate on the same wavelength. How can Muslims be part of the national conversation, if their terminology is at best unheard and misunderstood, or worse is misrepresented and the object of scaremongering?

P.S. To reduce the burden on some 'opinionated' readers, I have prepared some comments in advance that you might like to make. If you still feel het up, you can register your vote for your preferred tantrum. (1) What on earth is this Muslim complaining about? If she doesn't like it here she can go home (2) Stop blowing us up if you don't want us to react with hysteria every time you mention a foreign word (3) All Muslim women are oppressed. This is a fact. Thus Muslims are wrong on every possible count and we are right about everything (4) The sooner Muslims get it into their thick heads that this is Britain and we do things the British way, the happier we will all be

The Archbishop makes front page news

"...The end of the world is nigh! Armageddon beckons! What will become of us! Alas, this is the black day at the end of time of which we were warned, and which threatens us with the dark clouds of despair and the explosion of the universe! Woe is us! Shariah courts are upon us! Take your sons, take your daughters! Hide from the awful fate which signals doomsday! The Mozlims will bring the end of civilisation as we know it! And it is Mr Senior Christian himself who has brought this doom - doom, i tell you, doom!!!!!!! - upon us...." ***

Oh sorry, was that not what the Archbishop said. Oops. It doesn't matter does it? surely he was just an excuse to talk about how terribly backward Muslims are (and be horrified at the foreign sounding word 'shariah' without really knowing what it means, or acknowledging the fact that neither the AoC nor Muslims are calling for its implementation?

I was particularly tickled by the fact that The Sun is calling for Rowan Williams to be given the boot, and has got page 3 girls telling him what they think of him. I personally didn't think The Sun gave two hoots about the Church, and couldn't care less - not sure how their immoral views and open disregard for religion give them any rights over the choice of AoC...

*** You can read this text in the voice of Douglas Murray, Martin Bright or Bishop Nazir-Ali. Alternatively Smithers or Burns from the Simpsons make good options too

Archbishop of Cantebury causes furore over 'sharia courts' - an overview

The media frenzy has unfolded in a most unexpected way in the last two days over the Archbishop of Cantebury's lecture on Thursday night. I say 'unexpected' because it appears that very few journalists indeed have actually bothered to read the lecture. I'm not surprised. It's a pretty tough read. The AoC is deeply intellectual and his complex and sophisticated argument seems to have been lost on our post-MTV soundbite society. The front pages of the spectrum of papers today, and the online media seems to have heard the words 'shariah' and 'court' and spun yarns about the AoC suggesting a parallel legal system that condones capital punishment in the UK. The commentary appears to have no relationship whatsoever to what he actually said.

To help along those of you who don't want to spend a few hours deciphering the lecture, here is my summary in a (hopefully helpful) Q&A format. Enjoy. I've used his own words in many places, and paraphrased other bits where he waffled on a bit.

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The aim of the speech is to tease out the broader issues of the rights of religious groups within a secular state
- Should there be a higher level of attention to religious identity and communal rights in the practice of the law?
- What level of public and legal recognition should a religious group have - and this question is not just related to Islam.

How do we craft a just and constructive relationship between religious law and the statutory UK law?
- How should faith communities relate to the law, for example in cases such as that of the Catholic adoption agencies last year?
- Should there be something like a delegation of certain legal functions to the religious courts of a community - and this question is relevant not only to Islamic law but also to areas of Orthodox Jewish practice.

What is Shariah?
It is difficult to have any discussion about shariah in this country without creating fear. Society is anxious about this idea perpetrated by opinion polls that Muslims want to be free to live under shariah law. Shariah is a method of jurisprudence and not a rival system to the UK legal system. Submitting to shariah has nothing to do with demanding Muslim dominance over non-Muslims. The believer has to offer voluntary consent to submission to the shariah

How should we deal with citizenship and the concept of 'uniformity under the law'?
Citizenship as an abstract concept of equal access and equal accountability does not form the entirety of social identity and personal motivation. Citizenship in a secular society should not necessitate the abandoning of religious discipline any more than religious discipline should deprive one of access to liberties secured by the law of the land, to the common benefits of secular citizenship. Having a uniform identity as a citizen and only a citizen leads to a weak and failed state. Relegating other relationships and commitments to the private sphere is an unsatisfactory account of political reality in modern societies. The 'uniformity under the law' argument is actually in danger of undermining the principle of liberal pluralism by denying someone the right to speak in their own voice, in the context of their own motivations and conscience.

How should law and society deal with 'multiple affiliations'?
The thinking in the modern world is dominated by European assumptions about universal rights. Asking that corporate identities or supplementary jurisdictions be recognised then appears to be incoherent if we want to preserve the great political and social advances of Western legality. However, we already do recongise that our social identities are not based on belonging exclusively to one group only. We have multiple affiliations – and this is a good thing. This then means that religious communities must recognise that its adherents have affiliations other than to their faith community. Equally, the secular government should also recognise this.

Should the legal system pay more regard to communal identities such as corporate religious identity?
Any such system must be protected from abuse
The first objection to paying attention to religious identity is that litigious individuals will misuse the system by appealing to religion. The key will be to find a method to distinguish between culture and religion, to be able to differentiate uninformed prejudice from religious prescription. A group acting in such a religious context must have recognised authority. The secular lawyer needs to know where the potential conflict is real, legally and religiously serious, and where it is grounded in either nuisance or ignorance.

We must not have a parallel system, and no individual should be disadvantaged
The second issue to deal with is that by recognising a 'supplementary jurisdiction' we might be reinforcing repressive elements in minority communities which may have serious consequences in areas such as the liberties of women for example in relation to forced marriage or inheritance. In the former the difference between culture and religion becomes apparent. No 'supplementary' jurisdiction could have the power to deny access to the rights granted to other citizens or to punish its members for claiming those rights. No-one is likely to suppose that a scheme allowing for supplementary jurisdiction will be simple

What happens to the Rule of Law if we allow for multiple affiliations and multiple jurisdictions?
The universalist vision of equal accountability still applies. Secular law is about monitoring multiple affiliations to prevent the creation of mutually isolated communities in which human liberties could end up being seen in incompatible ways. It is derived from the notion of a 'common good'. The rule of law is about establishing a space accessible to everyone in which it is possible to affirm and defend a commitment to human dignity as such. Individual communities in fact cannot claim finality or supremacy because they have to come to terms with the actuality of human diversity

The Abrahamic faiths have been part of the construction of the 'universalist' account of human dignity.
The 'Abrahamic' faiths consistently emphasised themes to do with the unconditional possibility for every human subject to live in conscious relation with God and in free and constructive collaboration with others, offering clarity for a universalit account to emerge.

Although this discussion seems to be about Islamic law, it opens up a wide range of current issues about our legal system and the character of law.
It would be a pity if the immense advances in the recognition of human rights led, because of a misconception about legal universality, to a situation where a person was defined primarily as the possessor of a set of abstract liberties and the law's function was accordingly seen as nothing but the securing of those liberties irrespective of the custom and conscience of those groups which concretely compose a plural modern society. In order to ask intelligent questions about the relations between Islam and British law, we need to deconstruct the crude oppositions and myths we have about the nature of sharia or the nature of the Enlightenment, and this requires us to think about the very nature of law.

Happy 2nd birthday Spirit21

Spirit21 is two years old today. And what a difference a year makes! The highlight of the year was no doubt winning the Brass Crescent Awards for Best Blogger and Best Female blogger. But also there were several publications in the Guardian, and appearances on the BBC. My personal favourites were the article I wrote on Five Things I love about Being a British Muslim Woman, which attracted all sorts of unexpected attention, and the Christmas Eid carols which I wrote the lyrics for and which I commissioned, and which continue to make me smile.

Most of all, what 2007 brought was a relationship with my readers, and for that I thank all of you who showed your support, and especially those who took time to post comments. May the conversation long continue.

I'm hoping that 2008 will be onward and upward...

Social cohesion not gender confusion

The government's latest announcement about funding for Muslim women to help curb terrorism confuses social cohesion with extremism, and it also forgets that women cannot single-handedly solve our social ills.

Apparently, we're not very assertive. And apparently, we need the government's help. And apparently, some training courses are going to solve the problem. Thus spake the government when announcing that they would help us Muslim women to stop extremism. By going on some courses. Once we've been suitably trained, we'll go on to spy on our kids, create community cohesion, and curb terror. We'll then stop for afternoon tea. After dunking our digestives in our chai, we'll reverse global warming and achieve world peace. Muslim women will save the day! (I know we're good, really really good, but I'm not sure we're superhuman!)

Please don't misunderstand me - the initiatives announced by the government, in and of themselves, are good projects. Women do need more support, they are a fundamental building block of the community, they do need more attention. So bring on the training, bring on the resources, bring on the focus.

The projects proposed by the Department of Communities and Local Government are much needed. The communities in question, and the women that form part o