Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans is ALIM’s first Scholar-in-Residence. He converted to Islam while in high school. Upon conversion, Ustadh Ubaydullah began studying some of the foundational books of Islam under the private tutelage of local scholars while simultaneously pursuing a degree in journalism from Columbia. Since then, he has studied at Chicagoland’s Institute of Islamic Education (IIE), in Tarim, Yemen, and Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, where he is the first African-American to graduate from its Shari’a program. Ustadh Ubaydullah also instructs with the Ta’leef Collective and the Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN) at times. As the ALIM Scholar-in-Residence, Ustadh Ubaydullah is a core instructor at the ALIM Summer Program. He teaches History of Islamic Law, Shama'il, and Aphorisims of Ibn Ata'illah along with other courses.​​​​​

In many ways, it is the Islamic equivalent to the Passion of the Christ (upon him be peace) or the Exodus of the Children of Israel. And while I think it a misnomer to cite Islam as a tradition which sacralizes war, martial combat is rightly viewed as an occasionally necessary evil which exposes the best and worst of humanity.

On the 17th of Ramadan, in the second year following the Prophet’s migration, 313 soldiers prepared to face an opposing force of over 1000.​

​As the battle approached, they were harangued by naysayers who said they would surely meet their demise. In courageous defiance, they offered, “God will suffice us. He is a faithful guardian.” (Hasbunā Allah wa ni’ma al-wakīl). With providence, they won; and the Battle of Badr has since become a part of our sacred history.

Whenever I think about it, I find myself asking: Is there anything as meritorious as that? Is there any test of faith that even comes close to a willingness to sacrifice it all in the face of nearly insurmountable odds.

For some companions of the Prophet (ﷺ) and one in particular, the question of performing an act whose merit rivaled what had taken place at Badr was real. If seeking the pleasure of God is an equal opportunity endeavor, as is maintained by Islamic teachings, battle—which is primarily engaged by people unencumbered with domestic responsibility—cannot contain singular merit.

In the month of Ramadan, many of us find ourselves striving to increase our devotion while still tending to the ordinary responsibilities of life: work, family, preparing ifṭār, waking for suḥūr, and STILL trying to retain at least a semblance of the special devotional character of the blessed month—a jihād indeed! The activities unintelligently derided as “women’s work” have long been their own theatre of battle. And for those like me, who benefit from a partner who makes contributions outside the home and inside the home—but who nevertheless takes on a disproportionate amount of the household responsibility—it can be a rude awakening.
​
This isn’t easy.

In fact, those who care for their families have the same rank as soldiers striving in the way of God. I cite this brief vignette of the Sīrah (Prophetic biography) mostly for my wife. Hadiyah, this Ramadan has given me a new appreciation for your work and struggle.

The collection of Imam al-Bukhārī contains a tradition which features Asmā’ bint Yazīd (may God be pleased with her). She is sometimes referred to as Khaṭībat al-`Arab al-Anṣāriyya. A Medinese woman; she was elected by a group of women among the Companions (may God be pleased with them) to address to the Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ) some of their shared concerns.

By all accounts, she spoke brilliantly. When she highlighted the disparity between men and women with respect to accessing educational opportunities, the Prophet (ﷺ) responded by agreeing to host regular gatherings especially for women. Additionally, owing to the great esteem expressed for the men who had recently fought at Badr, she requested an action that women could do—seeing as though many of them were preoccupied with caring for their families and could not engage in combat—that would be as meritorious as striving (militarily) in the way of God.

The Prophet (ﷺ) assured her that if she “stayed with her family and looked after her children she would be given the reward of one striving in the way of God.” The Prophet (ﷺ)  likened homemaking to fighting in the path of God and some of us have yet to appreciate the profundity of the comparison.

The Prophet (ﷺ), “…doesn’t speak from caprice” and while I never doubted the truthfulness of the statement, I think I interpreted it as a kind of hyperbolic consolation. In other words, although no act of sacrifice could really rival risking life and limb in the path of God—as happened at Badr—caring for one’s family is commendable.

In actuality, caring for one’s family and striving militarily for the sake of God involve many shared virtues. The one that comes directly to mind, especially in the month of Ramadan, is exchanging a realization of the spiritual that comes about through enriching experience (Tarāwīḥ, night vigils, recitation of the Qur’ān, etc.) to a realization of the spiritual that comes about through service.

Ibn Aṭa’Allah wrote, “…There is no sweetness in jihād there is but the jagged edges of swords. So prosecute the jihād against your passions. This is the greatest jihād.”

There is likewise little sweetness in being too fatigued from a long day of child-minding to pray a lengthy, uplifting Ṣalāt al-Tarāwīḥ. However, echoing the great Alexandrian jurist, disciplining the soul isn’t sweet. It’s incredibly difficult but it’s where spiritual elevation lies.

How often have we as husbands/fathers bolted from home after iftār, leaving the house (and screaming, un-bathed children) in disarray so we could get to the “real” spiritual activity of praying Tarāwīḥ in the mosque.

The prayer contains immense spiritual value; however, so do the dishes and bedtime routine. 

Asmā bint Yazīd asked the Prophet (ﷺ) about how the women of the community could attain the spiritual rank of the men who participated at Badr and he directed her to care for her family.

“Ustadh Ubaydullah, prayer in congregation and specifically Tarāwīḥ are staples in my Ramadan regiment. Ramadan without the masjid just doesn’t feel the same.

I’ve heard all of the fatāwa (legal responsa) about Tarāwīḥ by satellite and I’m aware that the Prophet (ﷺ) would often offer Tarāwīḥ at home. I’m clear on that. But is there anything I can do to make up for what I’m missing because of the shut-down?”

The Battle of Badr, one of the greatest events in the history of Islam, was fought in the month of Ramadan. One of the companions (may God be pleased with them) who wasn’t able to participate asked the Prophet (ﷺ) about an action that could be done as a substitute. I could tell you about it but it might surprise you...

ABOUT THE AUTHOR​

It’s been no secret that not everyone has appreciated the attitudes of the Saudi Mutawwa’ and other security forces. They were seen as the preservers of an order that valued a certain kind of austerity. However, there is much change underway in Saudi Arabian society. There appears to be an endorsement of new cultural energies which hew more closely to an ideal of facilitating “religious tourism.”

On this trip, I felt that I was observing an intentional shift toward providing an experience which combines worship and family-friendly, immersive experiences built around religious themes. At the Cave of Hira Cultural District there is now a lighted path and gondolas to take pilgrims to the place the Prophet (upon him be peace) initially received revelation. Once a place that passersby would merely point to and the particularly devoted would make unofficial hikes to, it is now a shopping center replete with gift shops, cafes, ice cream parlors, toy stores and pizzerias.

There are no longer carping religious authorities hanging around to tell those who wish to pray or visit the cave they are engaged in bid’ah (unsanctioned religious practice without precedent) and everyone is free to make their videos or take selfies.

​For me, I’ve always appreciated the immense challenge the Saudi Arabian government and its infrastructure endures as Custodians of the Haramayn. Organizing millions of people from throughout the world which hail from every background imaginable to come together for pilgrimage must be incredibly difficult. And for all of our griping about the things we don’t like about how they’ve done it, we must at least commend them for doing it. 

That being said, some of my reluctance to celebrate cultural changes that might commercialize or cheapen a devotional experience can be sensed through the tone of my writing–even if I too appreciate the more relaxed, less restrictive atmosphere. But I wouldn’t be so arrogant as to suggest that Saudi Arabians must deny themselves or their society developmental or cultural change to satisfy my desire for authenticity or nostalgia.

​Allah will protect His House.

However, as someone who loves Makkah and is acutely aware of the potentially corrosive effects of a Western-styled, hyper-consumerist culture (because I’m fully immersed in it everyday), my prayer would be that the Custodians of the Haramayn exercise caution.

​I don’t presume that caution would be expressed in completely halting developments that coincide with plans to diversify their economy and open their society. Rather, the question which confronts development is always ‘Who’s development?’

​Indeed, it is the most ironic thing that a people would be denied the empowerment necessary to organically develop their society through the creation of their own cultural and commercial institutions. The predictable result, unfortunately, is that cultural development is subsequently outsourced. Firms and individuals that don’t share our outlook or devotional focus are tasked with curating an experience of our sacred spaces. This warrants our attention if only because we are protective of Makkah and its hallowed precincts.  ​

Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans is ALIM’s first Scholar-in-Residence. He converted to Islam while in high school. Upon conversion, Ustadh Ubaydullah began studying some of the foundational books of Islam under the private tutelage of local scholars while simultaneously pursuing a degree in journalism from Columbia. Since then, he has studied at Chicagoland’s Institute of Islamic Education (IIE), in Tarim, Yemen, and Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, where he is the first African-American to graduate from its Shari’a program. Ustadh Ubaydullah also instructs with the Ta’leef Collective and the Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN) at times. As the ALIM Scholar-in-Residence, Ustadh Ubaydullah is a core instructor at the ALIM Summer Program. He teaches History of Islamic Law, Shama'il, and Aphorisims of Ibn Ata'illah along with other courses.​​​​​

The Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ) is undoubtedly the most influential person that ever lived. Seeing the worshippers gathered at his mosque–who must have numbered over a million–it became abundantly clear: The Prophet (ﷺ) is sui generis among historical religious figures. His message and following have attracted people from every corner of the world while he has remained thoroughly historicized.

Of course, Christianity and the Gospel attributed to Jesus Christ (upon him be peace) arguably boast a larger number of adherents than Islam. However, my sense is that the Christian tradition places much less emphasis on the historical person of Jesus (upon him be peace). In that connection, the number of Christians that actively visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem or the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem is significantly less than the number of Muslims that visit the mosque of the Prophet (upon him and upon Jesus be peace).

Contrary to what many Muslims believe, the largest gathering in the world takes place not at Hajj, Umrah, or visiting the Mosque of the Prophet (ﷺ). That distinction actually belongs to the Hindu festival Kumbh Mela in India. The Haramayn are not singular in the number of visitors they attract. They are distinguished by the diverse concentration of people they attract. It seemed as though every shape, size, complexion, phenotype, language, social class, nationality, etc. had assembled to visit the Prophet (ﷺ).

​Even more impressively, across our differences and especially the differences in the exponents of Islam to which we adhere, we were able to worship together. We worshipped with a shared liturgy.

At one point, I asked my son, Najashi, “what have you learned being here in Madinah?” He paused, took a deep breath, smiled coyly and said, “that there are a lot of Muslims in the world!” At first blush, this seems like a simple reflection.

​But I’m not sure Muslim communities in the Modern West have considered what it means for our community to be removed from these enduring “civilizational riches” of Islam. Many of the college students I've counseled in the past that were experiencing crises of faith had suffered from having accepted an episteme that universalized contemporary Western norms while provincializing all else. To see oneself not as marginal and peculiar but rather reflected back to you in every guise and iteration imaginable is affirming.

As Dr. Umar Faruq Abd Allah brilliantly put it: “Ijtihād (critical and analytical deduction) from the texts (i.e the Qur’ān and ḥadīth) was reserved for the scholars but ijtihād of the scholars has always been for everyone.” 

In a certain sense, the historical rapprochement between the ‘people’ and the scholars can be viewed as deeply democratic. However, like the concept of ‘urf (vernacular culture that becomes law in certain situations), it has precedent but doesn’t seem to fit our community as neatly. Both take for granted that culture or an understanding of relevance among a people is monolithic and univocal enough to be represented as a single entity. Within an American Muslim community constituted of perhaps an unprecedented mix of ethnicities, socio-economic statuses, religious persuasions, and most importantly, histories: Who are “the people?”  

Popular endorsement and/or de facto disqualification of the scholars is one of the defining features of Sunni Islam and has persisted down to the present day. And while less sensational than allegations of sexual misconduct, a charge of irrelevance or being “out of touch” will have an impact on a scholar’s credibility.

It’s important to remember, irrelevant, in our context, is not so much a judgment of the scholar’s knowledge or training, but rather a statement about the sensibilities and cultural values which ground that knowledge and training. In other words, a scholar’s views on issues of race, gender, sexual identity, politics, economics, current events, etc. form a kind of setting against which his/her religious scholarship can acquit itself and be taken seriously.

Given the diversity of our community, any claim of irrelevance or relevance—for that matter—is bound to be only partly accurate. Nonetheless, there are a few factors that shape the contours of the conversation as I imagine it.  First, the idea of “relevance” in our current cultural moment resembles the concept of “cool” in that its real-time arbiters are young people.

Second, the scholars, for the most part, as a guild of religious personnel lack the benefit of institutional support like fully endowed positions. As a result, their engagement is almost exclusively with communities that have the infrastructure and resources to enlist their services. Inasmuch as these communities have similar demographic profiles, it should come as no surprise that there is some consistency in their critique of the scholars and ideas of relevance.

The scholars lack of exposure to the Muslim community-at-large often creates the false impression of a consensus to which they must conform or respond.

And lastly, the emergence of Islamic activism as a distinct social modality. For many Arab-American, Asian-American, and even African-American Muslims, social justice and political activism have replaced hip hop as the primary cultural arenas in which they can meaningfully engage the larger community. And like hip hop, which pressed Islam into the reclamation of Black cultural authenticity and identity, the social justice platform appears intent on pressing Islam into the service of inclusion, equity, and justice.

To be sure, I’m inclined to view these cultural phenomena (hip hop + activism) and Islam to represent a confluence of agendas: Dignifying oppressed people by giving them new ways of seeing themselves and the world through sacred symbols and language and striving for justice are the noblest missions of our faith. However, our appreciation of the relevance of the tradition and its representatives (the scholars) will come down to whether we see Islamic tradition as a wellspring of Divine and human knowledge that not only affirms the correctness of these aims but also dictates and delimits how they should be pursued or do we simply seek the instrumentalization of Islam in pursuit of these aims in a manner dictated by something or someone else? ​

Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans is ALIM’s first Scholar-in-Residence. He converted to Islam while in high school. Upon conversion, Ustadh Ubaydullah began studying some of the foundational books of Islam under the private tutelage of local scholars while simultaneously pursuing a degree in journalism from Columbia. Since then, he has studied at Chicagoland’s Institute of Islamic Education (IIE), in Tarim, Yemen, and Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, where he is the first African-American to graduate from its Shari’a program. Ustadh Ubaydullah also instructs with the Ta’leef Collective and the Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN) at times. As the ALIM Scholar-in-Residence, Ustadh Ubaydullah is a core instructor at the ALIM Summer Program. He teaches History of Islamic Law, Shama'il, and Aphorisims of Ibn Ata'illah along with other courses.​​​​

Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans is ALIM’s first Scholar-in-Residence. He converted to Islam while in high school. Upon conversion, Ustadh Ubaydullah began studying some of the foundational books of Islam under the private tutelage of local scholars while simultaneously pursuing a degree in journalism from Columbia. Since then, he has studied at Chicagoland’s Institute of Islamic Education (IIE), in Tarim, Yemen, and Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, where he is the first African-American to graduate from its Shari’a program. Ustadh Ubaydullah also instructs with the Ta’leef Collective and the Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN) at times. As the ALIM Scholar-in-Residence, Ustadh Ubaydullah is a core instructor at the ALIM Summer Program. He teaches History of Islamic Law, Shama'il, and Aphorisims of Ibn Ata'illah along with other courses.​​​

Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans is ALIM’s first Scholar-in-Residence. He converted to Islam while in high school. Upon conversion, Ustadh Ubaydullah began studying some of the foundational books of Islam under the private tutelage of local scholars while simultaneously pursuing a degree in journalism from Columbia. Since then, he has studied at Chicagoland’s Institute of Islamic Education (IIE), in Tarim, Yemen, and Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, where he is the first African-American to graduate from its Shari’a program. Ustadh Ubaydullah also instructs with the Ta’leef Collective and the Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN) at times. As the ALIM Scholar-in-Residence, Ustadh Ubaydullah is a core instructor at the ALIM Summer Program. He teaches History of Islamic Law, Shama'il, and Aphorisims of Ibn Ata'illah along with other courses.

Following the recent release of a video testimony by Sister Nela about leaving Islam after 27 years, and the theological response by Sheikh Hamzah Raza, writer and activist Umar Lee invited Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans to offer his reflections.

Umar: So one of the things I've thought about for a while is being a convert after the thrill is gone. We've all been there. Coming in energetic, idealistic, everything is fresh and new, at the masjid and with the Muslims as much as possible. Due to life, bad experiences, work, family, personal battles, or whatever, that thrill most often fades. So, how does a Muslim convert maintain the energy to just be a basic Muslim after the newness wears off and the thrill is gone?

​Ubaydullah: Bismillah. Thank you for allowing me to participate in this conversation. Last week, when I read the transcript of the dialogue between Sister Nela and Sheikh Hamzah I was deeply intrigued. I found Sister Nela’s honesty and sincerity compelling. And I thought Sheikh Hamzah’s insights were brilliant. To be sure, my desire to participate in the conversation wasn’t for inadequacy on either side. It was just good to see a conversation about the real issues. Conversion to Islam and the sustained, intergenerational practice of Islam are different things. I’m deeply invested in the American Muslim project and would like to see it go from the former to the latter. In that connection, the experiences of folks like our sister Nela are extremely valuable. I’m genuinely interested in knowing ‘what went wrong?’

The issue you raise here, about the novelty and romance of conversion wearing off, is something that goes wrong a lot. I loved your analogy of conversion being like a marriage. However, the analogy only makes sense for people who fall in love before getting married. Arranged marriages are different–I presume. Having a deep affinity for someone, maybe even considering them a soulmate and choosing them, only to be let down by them or worse yet harmed by them, must be incredibly discouraging. My heart goes out to anyone that has experienced that; in love or in faith.

One way of counteracting this “Paradise Lost” phenomenon is to remember yourself. Nearly all converts experience what I call a “pre-orthodoxy” phase. Aside from a tiny sliver of people (usually academics) who research Islamic tradition before converting, no one converts to Sunni or Shi’i Islam with a capital S! Usually, conversion doesn’t involve fiqh, aqeedah, madhabs, shaykhs, tariqas, minhajs, movements, tafsir, etc. Quite the reverse, conversion happens when what one understands of Islam coincides with what is in their own mind. This is why the experience is so deeply personal. When tradition is learned correctly, it provides new believers with tools, rules, and a broader context to deepen the exploration of what is in their minds. Conversely, when tradition is mistaught, it tells us that what’s in our minds is of no value. Overwrought notions of orthodoxy tell us that sound belief involves having someone else’s mind. This is incorrect. In summary, I don’t think it’s the monotony of religious practice that wears us down. Mastery of anything requires monotony. Rather, it’s the loss of personal connection to what we’re doing that starts to feel cumbersome. A person could practice Islam for 30 years and spend 29 years and 10 months as an imposter to herself. How is that sustainable? Converts have to find ways of combining their growing awareness of the tradition with that “pre-orthodox” personal spark that brought them into the faith. And Allah knows best.

Umar: I think we also need to make a class distinction before we go too far. I'll use myself as an example. I was in and out of juvenile, in the streets, a lot of friends getting shot and locked up (most would later be killed), kicked out of high school, and ended up at Job Corps. I just can't look back and see a scenario where anything other than Islam would've kept me alive. And I know many people with similar stories. And when you come in like that you're usually gonna cut ties from friends and even family so Muslims are basically all you have at that point and become your family. So family can be messed up and dysfunctional but it's still family. Those outside the family, Mainstream American society, become very strange. Your only non-Muslim vantage point ended during the time of your conversion. So honestly I have difficulty understanding many normative aspects of American culture now and even my family.

So I see Islam as giving me and others life and keeping us above the dirt. But I have a friend who became Catholic after 30 years as a Muslim and he has a much different background. He came from an affluent family. In his mind, he would've been much more financially successful, had a more stable family and home life, and had less drama in his life had he not gotten so deep into the Salafi Muslim experience. Is this two separate conversations based on class and entry?

Ubaydullah: Allah is the One from whom help is sought! I honestly don’t know if this is two separate conversations. I mean, the human condition can always be viewed from different vantage points. There is the universal and the particular.

I think the particular circumstances of one whose conversion entails a loss of financial stability, familial cohesion, and professional direction is different from the circumstance of one who seeks to enhance their access to those values through Islam. The stakes are actually much higher for the latter. As Islam, for him, has a broader promise on which it has to deliver.

However, from the universal perspective, both of them are voluntarily walking away from what they know to embrace a future that is unknown. Even a toxic normalcy still provides the continuity, familiarity, and comfort of a “norm” and giving up a norm is hard for anyone. And Allah knows best.

Umar: The inevitable fundamentalist burnout is another issue. It's not a matter of Salafi or Sufi because it's real with both. Once that engine burns out it can get really bad for some. I think the class distinction is also real here as well. I've seen women burn out in their middle aged years and go through a promiscuous college girl phase. Have also seen guys return to the streets and end up dead, in jail, or strung out. A friend of mine and Imam Suhaib Webb left the masjid, got back into the streets, and ended up getting bludgeoned to death and set on fire in a vacant house.

Yet, on the flipside, others have gone to college, got law degrees, are making nice money, and seem happier and much more stable once out of the door. Their relationships with their families most often improve as well.

Ubaydullah: May Allah have mercy on our brother. I think I can see more clearly where you’d like to go in addressing the issue of religious fundamentalism and social class. Henry Ford famously said concerning his customers, “they can have any color they want as long as it’s black!” In many ways, this is the logic of fundamentalism: What’s important for you to learn, is what I have to teach. So if I don’t know anything about recidivism, addiction counseling, family counseling, workforce development, parenting, college preparation, etc. those things aren’t important. In other words, for us, the mind-numbing appeal of fundamentalism is that it seduced us into the belief that all of the negative consequences of being poor, uneducated, fatherless, an ex-offender, and lacking employable skills, don’t matter as long as we know that God is literally established on His Throne–or as long as we know that God is not literally established on His Throne. I blame this inattention to improving the practical conditions of our lives on ourselves and our teachers.

As children we were taught, “self-preservation is the first law of nature.” If WE don’t insist, ourselves, on cultivating an ethic that addresses our real challenges, how dare we blame Islam for not providing a remedy? But it’s important to moderate my tone. There is no condemnation, only concern. I empathize deeply with brothers and sisters who went that route. I understand: Many of us embraced Islam in a society in which we felt devalued. We made Islam a source of counter-rejection of that which we felt had rejected us. So of course undergoing the rigors of learning classical Arabic and taking up temporary residency in the Muslim World was a more worthwhile pursuit than learning to write standard English and enrolling in college. I understand. I was there. And were it not for an encounter with Dr. Sherman Jackson (thank God for him), I could have been irreparably harmed there.

Admittedly, it is a little harder to find a similar place of empathy for the teachers. But this is the struggle to be Muhammadan in character. He (upon him be peace) said “Go, you are free!” to his former enemies. The teachers within these fundamentalist movements, most of which originated abroad, were the “ideological dope-dealers” that supplied our habit. And extending that analogy (for those familiar with addiction), they watched our lives come apart, families disintegrate, careers break down, health worsen; watched us get skinny and lose our teeth! And they kept supplying us. That’s brotherly love? And Allah knows best.

Umar: I feel this is a conversation many don't wanna talk openly about in public formats so let me be the bad guy. I can't tell you how many Black Muslims I've known over the years who have given me some version of this story; the WD masjid is a bunch of senior citizens, the Black Sunni masjid is too harsh, a bunch of guys who took shahadah in the joint, has a prison vibe, and brothers always hit them up for money, and the suburban “immigrant” masjid is cozier on many levels and a nicer experience, but the cultural gap will never be filled. This critique is particularly coming from middle-class and college-educated Black American Muslims. Maybe you can say the Atlanta Masjid of al-Islam is an example (who had a smaller Ramadan fundraising goal than any mid-sized Black church in America) or Masjid Muhammad in DC, or even a few spots in the Philly metro area are exceptions, but isn't the broader story that there is a shortage of spaces for middle-class and college-educated Black American Muslims? Particularly once you leave WD-oriented spaces? 

Ubaydullah: Look, Islam in the Black experience has always been a mostly urban, working class, phenomenon. And in many ways, that’s a blessing. One commentator observed, “Black Muslims and White Muslims are mirror opposites. The epicenter of Black conversion is prison and the draw of Islam is moral guidance. Conversely, Black Muslims have failed to make inroads among the middle-class and affluent within their community. This has resulted in Islam enjoying great authenticity among Black people but very little mobility. Whereas the epicenter of white conversion is college and the draw of Islam is mysticism. White Muslims have yet to make significant inroads anywhere but have even less among poor and working-class white people. Islam won’t enjoy authenticity among white people until Joe Sixpack has at least a familiarity with Islam.”

So to answer your question, I’m not sure I’d like to see Black masjids that resemble Greek letter organizations. I would like to see exchange and unity become the organizing principles of our masjids. One tendency I am critical of, in that regard, is the way we alienate Muslims that would otherwise contribute to our community. We treat religious authenticity as though it exclusively resides in religious knowledge and devotional outward appearance. So brothers and sisters that could potentially offer classes on financial literacy or nutrition or CDL acquisition, etc. feel as though the masjid has no interest in their expertise. This needs to change.

Umar: I know we've both seen a lot of converts pass away over the years. Some got Muslims funerals and some were unfortunately buried as Christians by their families. Forget about death for the moment, I routinely discover that brothers have no funeral plans and have told no one in their non-Muslim family whom to contact in the event of their death, but just aging. Most of our kids are thoroughly American. Even if the kids are Muslim, which isn't a given, the culture here is to put aging people in nursing homes. Most of these places are awful and many are abusive. Yet I see more and more Muslims enter them. Isn't the creation of nursing homes for Muslims in America a necessary evil? Isn't this something ISNA, ICNA, and other organizations should be making plans for?

Ubaydullah : Bismillah. Yes. Hard to imagine because respect and care for the elderly is a hallmark of most Muslim cultures. But inasmuch as many of us have adopted the model of the two-income, nuclear family, I think something will have to give.

Umar: I feel one of the things that really hurt Sister Nela is the condition of the second-generation Muslim kids. I know where she is coming from. We thought all these kids learning Quran and Arabic from a young age, studying deen, and being saved from “kafir schools” was gonna create a generation of super Muslims. It didn't turn out that way. A lot of these kids have left Islam. A lot! And I'm talking about even the children of high-profile Muslims and many of us know of these cases. Of course some other kids are on their deen and doing great. Some are not on their deen and still doing great. And some never miss a salat and read the Quran daily because they're in prison! One of my teacher's daughters abruptly left the masjid as a teenager and got knocked up by a neighborhood drug dealer. But there are many more examples of the Muslim girl at college with the white guy “who is really interested in Islam”. In fact, I was asked to be a witness just last week for one of these weddings where the white guy has basically faked a shahadah in order to protect the reputation of the South Asian family he was marrying into.

I feel these conversations are real, and we are talking about them privately, but the public discourse in the Muslim community ignores this? Still basic street corner dawah talks or dives into fiqh and aqeedah. Is there an avenue and a right place and time to discuss these issues?

Ubaydullah; Thank you, Umar. Thank you, Sister Nela. Thank you, Sheikh Hamzah. I’m grateful to all of you for talking about it. This is the most important conversation we need to have within our community. Conversion occurs within individuals and only requires moments. intergenerational sustainability occurs within communities and requires institutions. Conversion only needs to happen. Sustainability needs to work! The Blackamerican Muslim community is proof that people can convert to Islam. We are not yet proof that Islam works. To be fair, however, we have to take into consideration the mission Islam in Black America has undertaken. We’re talking about the lower bottom–a term that is sometimes used to describe the rung on the social ladder many of us come from–what Malcolm called the “armpit of America.” We’re trying to create productive people and sustainable communities in places that other religious groups don’t even attempt to go to. As one brother put it bluntly, “I became Muslim because the church couldn’t put the fear of God into me.” That’s strong. So the mission requires patience. But I’m really happy we’re talking about it. I mean, the Prophet (upon him be peace) didn’t have the charge of establishing Islam among the Abyssinians, Persians or Byzantines—all of whom were far more advanced than the Arabs in their civilizational achievements–he (upon him be peace) had to do it among the Arabs of Jahiliyyah (Ignorance). And with God’s help, he did it.

Umar: I think theology is important. There is no Islam without the shahadah.. but isn't sociology and the lived communal experience what keeps people or drives them away in the long term? If you're a single mother and want to raise your children around some positive role models and the local masjid is full of nuts (who are also usually broke) doesn't she begin looking at other offerings at some point? We know that for a lot of people, that suburban South Asian or Arab dominated Islamic Center is just not gonna be an option.
​
Ubaydullah : Glory to Allah! You know, bro…I was so intrigued by Sister Nela’s conversation with Sheikh Hamzah (may Allah preserve him and make him a true inheritor) that I ended up watching her entire interview with Darius on the Encourage Faith podcast. The interview was good, mashallah. But I just kept thinking, I can’t believe how unimportant theology is to her. Unsurprisingly, Darius’ line of questions led her down the “woman trapped in the patriarchal horrors of Islam” corridor. In her responses, Nela referenced her personal experiences in a manner that felt very genuine. Yet when she spoke about those things that she and Darius contended make Islam unsuitable for women, I couldn’t help thinking: And your response to the supposedly male-dominated Islamic religion is to embrace the belief that the Almighty, ineffable God is literally an anatomical male? That’s definitely a plot twist. But the more I reflected upon it, Nela’s experience was consistent with most people who embrace and/or leave Islam. It wasn’t theology that brought us into the faith and it isn’t theology which takes us out. And Allah knows best.

Umar: Studies show that Americans are becoming less and less religious. In educated circles, and especially more liberal and progressive spaces, religion is increasingly seen as something taboo. In many ways universities are functionally seminaries nowadays teaching Western secular humanism.

Ubaydullah: Powerful insight, Umar. May Allah elevate you. I’m worried about that too. It kind of reminds me of a statement attributed to Imam Malik. He said, concerning the emergence of systematic theology (Kalam): “If your faith in God is based on a rational proof, what will you do when someone gives you a superior rational proof that God doesn’t exist?” In that vein, if your identification with Islam is based on the cultural zeitgeist, what will you do when the zeitgeist changes? Unfortunately, for all of the pointless bickering we do about aqeedah (theology), when we actually need aqeedah, we can’t access it effectively. Aqeedah is supposed to represent a shared subjectivity through which we as Muslims see the world. I think our task at this time is recognizing that aqeedah can’t survive on its own. It must be supported by a world of culture (literature, song, performance, dance, theatre, architectural design, interior design, commerce, etc) that makes it feel real. This is the time of the Muslim artist, the culture creator. The difficulty is making sure we’re creating from the vantage point of our world view, not someone else’s. The trick of modern secularism is that people think they’re evaluating the propositions of secularism in a vacuum of objectivity. What!? You’re completely soaked in a lived experience that makes the claims of secularism seem plausible even before you start thinking about them. That’s actually what Islamic civilization used to do! And Allah knows best.

Umar: People end up back in the church for various reasons. One reason, and Sister Nela said this, is because it makes them feel good. Even I love old Black gospel music. I still think of my grandma's gospel songs as well. The Catholic Mass is also a very peaceful and serene experience. Then people go to the masjid and there's no singing, no clapping, and no serenity. You may have an imam screaming at you and telling you how bad you are. Of course, there are many Sufi traditions where there are joyful worship experiences. Is part of the issue Salafi thinking has become so dominant in America that people see that as the only practice of Islam? So, I'm gonna be that or not Muslim? Even if people don't claim Salafi, they may be familiar with a more Salafi style of worship. This is the norm in American masjids. If you wanted to gather and make dhikr or sing most of us wouldn't even know where to go.

Ubaydullah: You make a well-founded point about the hyper sober, nearly cold atmosphere of communal Muslim religious service in America. I think many would probably agree with you that this is the importation of Saudi Salafi influence. I actually think the real culprit is a completely different group. The Nation of Islam (NOI) always located its appeal in being an alternative to the Black Church. Black Protestant congregations across the spectrum routinely conducted religious services which included kinetic orality, song, dance, live instrumentation, inducing ecstatic states (catching the Holy Ghost), glossolalia (talking in tongues), etc. I think the NOI denounced much of that religious expression as slave religion. The idea being that it was both undignified or –to use the idiom of the movement–“civilized” men and women didn't conduct themselves in that way and it was ineffectual. What did all of that whooping and hollering do to liberate Black people from their oppressors? In fact, more than just song or dance, the NOI rejected the entire religious category of the metaphysical or “spooky”--in their idiom. Prayer was mostly invoked as a source of discipline but very rarely connection with the Divine. This is where the normative culture of Islam in Black America first began to crystallize. I think most of the subsequent dynamics in our history have been different responses to that point of origin. History is remarkable. Things never change as much as we think. The ethic of the NOI was mostly about in-group solidarity, right-moral behavior, and participation in the collective mission of the movement. The ethic of modern Salafism isn’t that different. It’s just that instead of a mission of resurrecting the Black man from his mental death. The mission is instead to establish the Prophetic way upon the understanding of the Pious Forbearers and purge the community of unsanctioned innovation. In both, however, a thoroughgoing connection with Allah through personal religious experience seems to be less of a focus.

​Our community is now at a place where we’re beginning to question that precedent and explore what our legitimate Islamically acceptable options might be in that regard.


And our last call is always:
All Praise is Due to Allah, The Lord of all being

The American Learning Institute for Muslims (ALIM) condemns in the strongest possible terms the violence that has been perpetrated against the Palestinian people by the Israeli regime and its enablers. It is at once harrowing and humiliating for the American community to watch passively as the lethal machinery of modern warfare is deployed against a defenseless, civilian population.

Contrary to some uninformed opinion, ALIM has never defined itself as apolitical or quietist. Over our more than twenty-year history, ALIM has offered an unrestricted platform to our faculty and guest contributors. This means we’ve learned from scholars and activists who have broadened the scope of our political awareness, challenged us to identify with the oppressed, and agitated concerning our complicity with injustice.

​Stated unequivocally, solidarity with our brothers and sisters suffering oppression is a core tenet of our faith. As such, to deny the imperative of advocating for them would violate our mission of empowering the American Muslim community through literacy. What Islamic literacy can our community claim if we fail to recognize the centrality of condemning injustice to Islam? How can our community claim empowerment if we can’t voice disapproval with the fact that our tax dollars are used to fund the unjustifiable deaths of our co-religionists?

An occupying force which boasts all of the appurtenances of modern, militaristic statehood (possibly including nuclear weapons) using its military might to kill civilians and destroy critical infrastructure in the name of “defending itself” against sporadic, guerilla attacks is unconscionable. This doesn’t demand trenchant analysis, and I would venture to say that very few American Muslims are even conflicted about it. However, the central issues of holding Israel and America accountable for the sheer brutality of the recent attacks in Gaza and the West Bank, affirming the dignity of Palestinian life and the inviolability of al-Quds as a sacred site of Islam are surrounded by a constellation of other issues which demand understanding, conversation, and deliberation.

​The Qur’an declares, …whoever kills a soul unless for a soul or for corruption [done] in the land—it is as if he had killed all of humanity…” [5:32].

Life is sacred, and all people, save the sociopathic and morally depraved, regard human bloodshed as an enormity. As such, I understand the tendency to treat the loss of precious human life with urgency not amenable to conversations about priorities, strategies, and generational shifts in culture that might be employed within our context to confront this issue. The abovementioned perspective is perhaps epitomized in the statement, “only those removed from a crisis have the luxury of theorizing about it.”

Stated differently, people are dying and for many, anything besides or in addition to a voluble condemnation of the state-sanctioned violence causing their deaths is simply an insensitive, unwise, wasteful use of time.

The celebrated collection of Imam al-Bukhāri includes the tradition of al-Nu’mān ibn Bashīr; in which The Messenger of God (upon him be peace) said, “The likeness of the believers in their affection, mercy, and compassion for each other is that of a body. When any limb aches, the whole body reacts with sleeplessness and fever.” We feel the pain of our Palestinian brothers and sisters with the same immediacy with which we feel our own. And yet, extending the analogy of the Prophet (upon him be peace), feeling pain is not the same as understanding illness and seeking a cure. In regard to the latter, distance from a crisis may offer perspective and clarity that proximity does not. 

For instance, does talking about the disproportionate amount of political capital the American Muslim community has expended on issues abroad represent a betrayal of our Palestinian brothers and sisters? I pray not.

​Is there any room for a perspective that recognizes that our ability to effectively advocate on behalf of Palestine might be contingent upon our ability to first be seen as a self-authenticating, legitimately American religious community? Is it significant that the Black American community, which enjoys the highest moral authority in America—especially with regard to issues of racial genocide and ethnic cleansing—only has a peripheral connection to the Palestinian issue? One is reminded of the great momentum gathered by the Free South Africa Movement (FSAM) and other anti-apartheid movements within the Black American community and how those affected a seachange in American attitudes toward apartheid South Africa. 

Fundamentally, there are elements within America that have displayed what can only be described as a completely irrational, obsessive commitment to eliminating all dissent concerning Israeli policy. Is it an abdication of our responsibility to our Palestinian brothers and sisters to engage in strategic planning about exactly what we are willing to sacrifice in pursuit of justice? Of course, here, we’re speaking directly about advocacy and political agitation.

However, God offers a powerful parallel concerning martial engagement: “Nor should the Believers all go forth to meet the enemy: if a contingent from every troop remained behind, they could devote themselves to studies in religion, and admonish the people when they return to them…” [9:122]                      

In other words, while great losses are anticipated in pursuit of justice and defense of the community, religious knowledge and the ability to help the ummah connect with faith through education, is a loss that should be avoided if possible. Does that have any bearing on what we should expect of Islamic educational organizations and institutions of higher learning in response to the crisis in Palestine?

At ALIM we’ve shown consistent dedication to circumspect thinking because we believe that doing so is in the best interest of our community. However, our repudiation of injustice in all of its forms and our solidarity with our Palestinian family is unstinting. May God aid them in overcoming injustice and may He make our American Muslim community a constructive element in the establishment of peace and justice. Amin

Ubaydullah Evans 

​Friday marked the first night of the blessed month of Ramadan. Mashallah, it appears that the three principal ways of determining the matla’ produced the same result: a) Global moonsighting b) Local moonsighting c) Astronomical calculation.

I was genuinely pleased at this outcome. In years past, I would celebrate the diversity of opinion on this issue.

During this year’s ALIM Winter Program we will be exploring this article. Referencing some of his earlier positions, Shaykh Taha introduces the article as an evolution in his thinking. I approached the article with a bit of reluctance. As previously mentioned, an esteem for difference of opinion is a foundational aspect of my religious outlook.

And yet, the experience of Gaza is undeniable. For the past 16 months we’ve not only witnessed, but supported with our tax dollars, a veritable genocide against our co-religionists. Embracing difference of opinion—instead of working to develop consensus—in our collective response to this crisis led to an inevitable weakening of our political capital. In other words, when the culture of diversity we embrace with regard to law and theology is extended to politics we sacrifice efficacy. Should we be celebrating the fact that all of us did what we wanted, even if none of us achieved what we wanted?

​According to exit polls from the most recent presidential election, the Muslim vote was nearly evenly split among the candidates of the two major parties and the Green Party candidate. The ability of our community to make a concerted intervention, wisely invest our severely limited political capital, and prove the indispensability of our collective vote was nullified by our diversity. I have to let that sink in.
 
Clearly, the diversity that I previously treated as a net positive may not always be in the best interest of our community.

​But is there an alternative? Is the term “consensus” just a euphemism for a process by which the will of the advantaged compels the endorsement of the disadvantaged? What about pragmatism? Have we simply become too atomistic in our orientation, too individualistic in our self-undertstanding to aim at being united? Is the American Muslim community comprised of too many distinct communities; ethnically, socio-economically, and religiously to be united? What is the process through which we can develop greater unity among ourselves? Is it majority rule? Should we embrace our diversity but subsequently develop out of that diversity certain points of consensus? 

At the very least, it is significant that a thinker as well-versed and circumspect as Shaykh Taha Jabir al-Alwani changed his opinion on this issue. We’d like to give him a hearing and place the matter before our community as a point of deliberation. Please join us at this year’s ALIM Winter Program. ​

Assalamualaikum dear ALIM family. I pray this message finds you and your loved ones in good health and high spirits, InshaAllah. As we near the end of the year, I wanted to take a moment to share some exciting updates about what's happening at ALIM and what lies ahead!

First, we want to give a huge shoutout to our Outreach Director, Yusuf Hassabelnaby, for organizing a wonderful booth at MASCON in Chicago! Thanks to the tireless efforts of our Ambassadors and ALIMni, we saw tremendous interest in our Summer Program. We connected with m any individuals eager to learn more about ALIM. We are deeply grateful for your continued support in spreading the word.

Planning is underway for our Winter Program in California. Join us from February 14–16 with Dr. Jackson and Ustadh Ubaydullah, along with local scholars, for a deep dive into the topic of Building Consensus and Unity in an Age of Polarity. This timely discussion will offer valuable insights for navigating the challenges of unity within our communities.

To prepare for the program we encourage you to read Preserving Unity and Avoiding Division: A New Approach to The Ethics of Disagreement in Islam by the late Sheikh Taha Jabir Al-Alwani, which will frame the discussion. It will also be the topic of our next Book Club in January. As you plan your New Year’s resolutions, consider making reading a priority in 2025, and join us for our Online Monthly Book Club, hosted by Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans! It’s a great way to stay connected with the ALIM community and enrich your understanding of Islamic thought.

Looking further into the year, we are thrilled to announce that the 26th ALIM Summer Program is already set for July, and spots are filling up fast! It’s truly heartwarming to see the children of our very first Summer Program participants now signing up to attend. Please help us spread the word to your family and friends — we want to make this year’s program the best one yet!

In exciting news, we’re also planning our second ALIM Umrah trip, scheduled for the winter of 2025, InshaAllah! Details will be out soon. The trip is open to anyone, but we would love to be joined by our ALIMni families. The scholars who attended last year’s trip— Dr. Sherman Jackson, Dr. Muneer Fareed, and Ustadh Ubaydullah Evans— enjoyed it immensely and encouraged us to organize another. May Allah, in His infinite mercy, invite us all to visit His house and His Rasul.

None of this is possible without your generous support. Whether through your prayers, spreading the word about our programs, or contributing financially, we are truly grateful for everything you do to support the mission of ALIM. Please consider supporting Islamic literacy through ALIM as we continue our work to bring transformative educational programs to communities near and far.

May Allah bless you and increase you in all that is good, and may He grant us success in our shared mission to serve Him and our communities.
​
Ws,
Shirin Khan
​Executive Director & Co-Founder, ALIM

​For better or worse, meritocracy shapes many of our ideals concerning achievement. On the one hand, as the famed Ibn Khaldūn summarized in his Muqaddimah: The work ethic of a people is strongest when the fruits of their labor are safe from the reach of government usurpation. Simply put, when people believe that hard work results in success, they work hard. This is meritocracy at its commendable best.

​On the other hand, an overemphasis on meritocracy may have the effect of minimizing the role of providence in success. Moreover, when success, and by extension prosperity, are separated from the Divine prerogative they are no longer embraced as tests and responsibilities. Quite the reverse, in the absence of an intentional acknowledgment of God’s favor, achievement—more than even appearance, talent, or status—can become a great source of delusion and ingratitude. If our individual worthiness, dedication, or ability has secured for us what we have, how do we view those who haven’t achieved as much? Are they definitively less worthy, unintelligent, or lazy? The Prophet (upon him be peace) said:

“Whoever has an atom’s weight of arrogance in his/her heart will not enter Paradise.” Upon hearing this, one of the companions asked, “God’s Messenger! But a man may take pride in his appearance; this is an expression of arrogance?” The Prophet (upon him be peace) continued, “Indeed, God is beautiful and He loves beauty. Arrogance, however, is expressed in the wanton rejection of truth and looking at people with contempt.” The spiritual consequences of arrogance are indeed grave.

Fortunately, God offers us a very expedient and effective way of reducing our susceptibility to it. Thanks and giving or ash-shukr and aṣ-ṣadaqa: Gratitude and charity are universally cited as foundational for a good life. For Americans and our often naïve beliefs around meritocracy; inundated with rags to riches stories and biographies which capture the heroic journeys of our cultural heroes, the need for these is even more immediate. The Islamic tradition is replete with conceptual frameworks which vivify the ideals of thanks and giving. In consonance with the spirit of the season and Giving Tuesday (which must be the most Islamic of all the days on the American social calendar after Mother’s Day!) we at the American Learning Institute for Muslims (ALIM) wanted to offer a few reflections.

In the 92nd chapter of the Qur’ān, Surat al-Layl, God contrasts the conduct and outcome of two categories of people. He says:

“…Surely the ends you strive for are diverse. (4) As for the one who is charitable and conscious of God (5) and firmly believes in the reward, (6) We will facilitate for them the Way of Ease. (7) And as for the one who is stingy, and considers himself self-sufficient, (8) and staunchly denies the reward, (9) We will facilitate for him the path of hardship (10)…” [92:4-10]

These are brief but comprehensive descriptions of a charitable person and a stingy person respectively. The descriptions mirror each other. Charity is contrasted with stinginess, taqwa or God-consciousness with delusional self-sufficiency, belief in other-worldly reward with denial, and a path of ease is contrasted with a path of hardship. The dissimilarity between charity and stinginess is obvious. The second contrast between taqwa or God-consciousness and delusional self-sufficiency; however, contains a subtle but illuminating point about extreme meritocracy. Why is taqwa connected to charity while delusional self-sufficiency is connected to stinginess?

It’s easy to acknowledge the obligation of giving when you recognize that you’ve been the beneficiary of giving. In other words, “thanks produces giving.” We must first be conscious of God and acknowledge that everything we have by way of life, faith, relationships, opportunities, talents, drive, etc. are expressions of Divine favor. The next step is acknowledging the people God used as a means of realizing His favor. The Prophet (upon him be peace) has mentioned: “He/She that fails to express gratitude to people, has not adequately thanked God.” The belief of being “self-made,” so prevalent in contemporary culture, is the acme of spiritual immaturity.

“Do they distribute the mercy of your Lord? It is We who have apportioned among them their livelihood and raised some of them above others in degrees (of rank) that they may make use of each other for service. But the mercy of your Lord is better than whatever they accumulate.” [43:32]

This verse is a potent reminder about privilege and how any of us is “made.” We are an inter-dependent community. Is it only the skill and acumen of the professional for which the rest of us should be thankful?  Should we acknowledge the capital and vision of the “self-made” entrepreneur or business person without acknowledging the support of their staff and clients? Even more, what about the people who harvest our food, transport it, and sell it; the people who build/repair our cars and pave our roads, collect our trash and maintain our homes, etc? Where would any of us be without them? So who can claim to be “self-made?” I fear that the devaluation of labor—not exactly surprising in a country that has failed to reckon with the role of slavery in achieving its prosperity—animates a lot of our fallacious ideas about being “self-made.”

Conversely, if one believes individual merit to be the source of their achievement, not only is giving not seen as an obligation. Even worse, giving might be seen as an affront to initiative or self-determination. Hence, they are “stingy and given to delusional self-sufficiency.” “I went out and got mine on my own; no one helped me, you expect me to give someone something? Who gave me anything?” Allah! But when God-consciousness/thanks is absent giving is also absent.

The verses we began with in Surat al-Layl end by contrasting the beliefs in heavenly reward and the resultant paths of the generous and stingy respectively. The person of generosity acknowledges that whatever goodness they enjoy in life is from God.  By extension, she believes firmly that the reward of God for charity will be even greater in the Hereafter. On the other hand, the “self-sufficient” believes the good he enjoys in life to be effects of things for which he was the cause. How can he believe there will be any good for him after death extinguishes his ability to cause anything?  And so in addition to being delusional, the path of “self-sufficiency” is also difficult. “He whom we bring unto old age, We reverse him in creation (making him go back to weakness after strength). Have you then no sense?” [36:68] In other words, age will probably strip us of any presumption of self-sufficiency. And even if age does not, death certainly will. Acknowledging our need for God and comporting ourselves as grateful recipients of His favor is comparatively easier. Give thanks and express gratitude through giving.

For the past 25+ years, ALIM's programming has sought to educate Muslims with the knowledge to be confident, empowered critical thinkers who engage modern society in a meaningful way. Help empower the American Muslim community through knowledge—support ALIM's faith-affirming in-person and virtual monthly programming today!

Learn more below about our annual faith-affirming ALIM Summer Program!

The results are in. Donald Trump will be the next president of the United States of America. In the lead up to the election, conversations within the American Muslim community were tense and sometimes even caustic.

A Trump presidency and the impending policy (foreign and domestic) consequences likely to accompany it risk exacerbating tensions. Among the many potentially explosive conversations I observed online was the recurring Blackamerican versus immigrant exchange

Perhaps my attitude might be excused by the fact that I didn’t plan on residing in Egypt long term. If I was there as an expat (and not a student) would my response have been different? My commitment to the Prophetic ideals of empathy, coalition building for the common good, prioritization of the vulnerable, concern for the Ummah, etc, would’ve kicked in at some point, right? For my soul, I certainly hope so. Nonetheless, this experience made me much less judgmental toward other groups of American Muslims that might have previously expressed similar disengagement vis-à-vis American social issues. To be sure, physical relocation is easier than the reorientation of one’s sense of being. And yet once we realize that this is it; this is home, we must course correct. To be concerned about each other at home and abroad is our mandate. I don’t suspect that a heightened awareness for our respective stories and some brotherly and sisterly grace will eliminate the differences in our priorities or political strategies. But it can help us to see each other with integrity.      ​

This most recent iteration of the genocidal campaign of the ethno-nationalist Israeli state has led many Muslims to question our faith. For some, that interrogation has taken the form of theodicy: What is the utility of worshipping a God who either A) Pre-ordains and decrees something so horrific, B) is unable or unwilling to prevent these catastrophic events from taking place in spite of the fact that He is being appealed to by supplicants incessantly? And though we’ve had our work cut out for us, Islamic scholars/teachers/preachers have attempted to respond.

​In the context of the story of Prophet Yūsuf, the Qur’ān states emphatically, “…and the Will of God always prevails, but most people do not know.” [{12:21}]

​This verse has been an anchor. However, for me the issue has been much more one of coming to terms with religious chauvinism. At base, Zionism represents the self-serving, other-obliterating, territorial ambition of a community bound by religious/ethnic identity. Decrying its devastating consequences as sacrilege is straightforward. Zionism is disgusting; a mockery of anything claiming to represent a meaningful engagement with the religious, metaphysical, or even political—for that matter—realms of human experience. On the other hand, turning the microscope inward is more difficult. Witnessing the barbarism of this Zionist genocide has compelled me to renew my faith. I need assurance there is no worldly project so essential to my religious/cultural goals that my faith in God or identification with the Muslim community could be instrumentalized to justify such inhumanity.​

​To be sure, this does not mean I now understand Islam to be a religion of categorical pacifism. Muslims have cultivated a tradition of armed resistance. And within the medieval period—often referenced as Islam’s “Golden Ages”—Muslims were themselves the partisans of an energetic, territorially ambitious, imperial project. Anyone familiar with Islamic history knows that these were not all “bloodless” transfers of power. And yet, at no time have we seen the development of a mainstream Islamic theology that makes statist ambition the sine qua non of Islam.

The idea that any amount of carnage and violence can be justified in pursuit of land or power is an anathema to Islam. No classical Muslim legal scholar has ever condoned the targeting of civilians even in the midst of a justified war. Muslims of conscience, especially those who earnestly engage our tradition should know that the violence being carried out against the people of Gaza and the Occupied Territories is unconscionable and categorically wrong. The identity of the perpetrator and legitimacy of the pursuit make no difference at all. Were the perpetrators of such indiscriminate violence against a beleaguered, displaced civilian population identified as Muslims and they were ostensibly acting in the interest of Islam, our condemnation would need to be consistent. 

If truth be told, I’ve always harbored skepticism about the idea of the “Abrahamic” religions. Of course, as a means of highlighting the common parentage of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, “Abrahamic” is fitting. However, inasmuch as there exists an ethnocentric religio-political dogma that raises to the level of state policy indiscriminate violence against other members of that “Abrahamic” community, what does that term mean? What could we possibly have in common with them—as religious communities?  While this is primarily a time of empathy and action on behalf our Palestinian brothers and sisters, I also feel compelled to acquit my religion.

When a bomb explodes in a Parisian night club and the attackers are identified as Muslims, our community feels a visceral need to disassociate with the violence. Similarly, as a Muslim that has acknowledged politics and power as being legitimate religious concerns for Muslim individuals and polities, I feel a similar need to disassociate: If I have ever said or written anything about the geopolitical aims, objectives, or priorities of Islam and Muslims that could have, in any way, been construed as legitimizing the kind of religious chauvinism and partisanship that animates Zionism, I wholeheartedly recant my statement. And more importantly, I repent to God. A vicious self-serving, other-obliterating political ideology should never be confused with dīn.

​At this time, more than at any other, it is incumbent on the Muslim community to make our values clear. We reject all measure of political violence which fails to distinguish between combatants and civilians. When these acts are carried out by desperate bands of resistance fighters they are reprehensible and lamentable and when they are carried out by well-funded, well-equipped state actors with the imprimatur of global superpowers they represent the nadir of our (in)humanity.

In his esteemed collection of rigorously authenticated Prophetic traditions, Imam al-Bukhārī records the statement of the Prophet (upon him be peace): “The best deeds in the sight of God are those that are performed with the greatest consistency.”
​
The American Learning Institute for Muslims (ALIM) has been hosting its annual summer program for a quarter century. Needless to say, much has changed in 25 years. However, ALIM has demonstrated incredible consistency. We’ve remained committed to our mission. We empower Muslims through Islamic literacy.

​From our inception until the present, our students have been consistently excellent. And I don’t suspect that this year will be any different. Our 2024 class will bring together a diverse range of experiences and interests. This should make for enriching exchange in the classroom.  We also anticipate our counselors making a significant contribution to the program. Their selfless dedication to enhancing the experiences of the students is always phenomenal. And we can’t forget to acknowledge our board, staff, and volunteers. This year they’ve carefully crafted the schedules of the students so as to balance culturally enriching activities and spiritual restoration with academically rigorous 8 hour instructional days. And lastly, our teachers; if precedent stands, both core faculty and visiting scholars will display passion, patience, and erudition.

In his Jām`i, the renowned traditionist (muḥaddith), Imam at-Tirmidhī records the following Prophetic tradition: “The scholars are the inheritors of the prophets.”

Previously, the men and women that have assumed the prophetic office of teaching within our program have upheld their trust. They have modeled faith-affirming, critical engagement with the Islamic tradition and thereby unlocked the potential of generations (plural!!!) of young Muslims. These core elements (The students, counselors, staff/board, and teachers) along with many other auxiliary components create the unique ALIM summer program experience. As this year’s program is set to kickoff, this is a short post dedicated to the incoming students: You are inheriting a great legacy.
     
I attended the ALIM summer program in 2005. I distinctly remember observing the pedagogical styles of the core faculty of ALIM for the first time. I was awe-struck by Dr. Jackson’s scholarship. He created an effective link between the world of the Qur’ānic revelation and our own. His class on the Prophetic Biography (Sīrah) included carefully selected historical references, insightful social commentary, and vivifying personal anecdotes.  Imam Muneer Fareed entered the classroom as an embodiment of rigorous training in traditional madāris combined with the analytical skill of a Western academician. If truth be told, in my year, Imam Muneer’s classes were the defining feature of ALIM. In a manner that can only described as brilliant, he challenged some of our oversimplified notions of tradition while still affirming the positive value of tradition. I observed his sophisticated mix of Socratic inquiry and devotion like a highly skilled acrobat walking a tightrope before a gasping audience. Shaykh Ali Suleiman Ali taught ulūm al-Qur’ān and Post-Prophetic history when I attended ALIM. After some years of Islamic study, I learned that these were topics of the highest level of consequence and difficulty. Those who cast aspersions onto Islam usually attempt to do so through textual deconstruction of the Qur’ān and bad faith readings of early Islamic history. Shaykh Ali fortified us against some of those negative influences. However, you wouldn’t have known that such intellectually rigorous work was taking place in those classes because he did it with such grace. Shaykh Ali also combines the best of East and West in his training but his avuncular charm conceals his immense intellectual gifts. 

Almost 20 years later and little has changed—aside from a lot more gray hair among the instructors (including yours’ truly!). Dr. Jackson will be teaching Sīrah and Islamic Intellectual History. I encourage the students to ask questions and critically engage the material. In spite of his redoubtable classroom presence, Dr. Jackson appreciates dialogue and exchange. As he is fond of saying, “Don’t worry! I’m a vegetarian when it comes to human beings!”  One of the biggest conceptual shifts that occurred for me at ALIM was being able to ask questions without feeling irreverent. Imam Muneer will probably challenge some of the students pre-conceived ideas about Islam is his classes on Sectarianism and Islam and Post-Modernity.

My advice to students: Don’t leave early! Don’t put up the walls of your intellectual/spiritual defenses. This might offer protection but it won’t foster growth. Venture beyond your comfort zone; your faith will be reinforced not debunked, inshallah. And Shaykh Ali will still be the knowledgeable, sage, unperturbed elder statesman that he’s always been. Be advised, true mastery lies in making the complex appear simple. Don’t overlook Shaykh Ali’s classes. Additionally, Ustadha Zaynab Ansari, Dr. Hadia Mubarak, Dr. Tayseer Safi, Dr. Omar Nasim and the inestimable Imams Zaid Shakir and Mohamed Maged will all make invaluable contributions to this year’s program. Each of them is an amazing scholar in their own respect. However, when viewed as a collective, the diversity and variability of their scholarship is profound. To be sure, we trust everyone who teaches at the program. However, we intentionally recruit scholars that hold differing views. This is not to confuse students but rather to expose you to the richness of our tradition.  

The Alimni are a diverse collective. Over the years we’ve had students of various backgrounds, representing a wide assortment of institutions and fields of endeavor. The consistent thread, however, has been excellence. I have little doubt the Class of 24’ will be no exception. You have my highest hopes but also highest expectations.

As a signifier of commitment to progressive values, the terms “diversity and inclusion” are nearly ubiquitous. The past decade or so has witnessed “diversity and inclusion” move from the Affirmative Action inspired charters of schools and businesses to a vibrant part of our media, art, and vernacular cultures. Put differently, we no longer only expect diversity and inclusion where we work or study; it’s something we’ve come to seek more broadly. Taken at face value, this shift toward plurality should inspire American Muslims with great satisfaction. Our faith affords inter- religious/cultural exchange and ultimately familiarity, spiritual value. The Qur’ān proclaims:

“O humanity! We created you from a single pair, a male and female and made you into nations and tribes in order that you might come to know one another! Truly the most honorable of you (in the sight of God) is the most God-conscious. Verily, God is All-Knowing, All-Aware” [49:13] 
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It’s worth noting that this verse contains a rare Qur’ānic reference. There are very few places the Qur’ān mentions something as an underlying purpose for the creation of humanity. We have been created to worship God. Women and men have been created to find sakīna (tranquility) in one another. We have been created to cultivate (ta’mīr) the Earth and serve as its stewards. We have been created to know one another.
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Correspondingly, whenever I ask any students who have completed the American Learning Institute for Muslims ALIM Summer Program (SP), many of them cite the program’s diverse faculty and student body as one of its strengths. Yes, while all of the instructors and students are Muslims, they normally boast an impressive array of backgrounds, life experiences, and perhaps most importantly, ideas and opinions. The ability to voluntarily form community and camaraderie with people who fundamentally think differently than oneself is rare. It should not be overlooked. In fact, of much of the diversity and inclusion celebrated in the current cultural moment, one commentator mentioned: “We celebrate the fact that we all look different, have different sexual preferences, gender identities, maybe even worship (or not) differently, but we all think the same.” When everyone’s right to live their “truth” is affirmed, what results is certainly a kind of diversity, but not a very challenging or deep one.

Since then, he has studied at Chicagoland’s Institute of Islamic Education (IIE), in Tarim, Yemen, and Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, where he is the first African-American to graduate from its Shari’a program. Ustadh Ubaydullah also instructs with the Ta’leef Collective and the Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN) at times.

As the ALIM Scholar-in-Residence, Ustadh Ubaydullah is a core instructor at the ALIM Summer Program. He teaches History of Islamic Law, Shama'il, and Aphorisims of Ibn Ata'illah along with other courses.

Dr. Sherman Jackson is very eloquent, mashallah. In fact, so appreciated is his ability to “turn a phrase” that we jokingly use the term “Jacksonian” to describe the rhetorical flourishes for which he’s known. However, the most eloquent I’ve ever heard him is in response to a question about the “essence of Ramadan.” For Dr. Jackson, such a broad, open-ended question was like a pitch right down the middle of the plate. So in his simple response, “Ramadan is about being hungry” he appeared to bunt. A slight chuckle could be heard among the audience. For many, he had either ironically or jokingly stated the obvious.
 
Hunger is undoubtedly our most primal urge. It is at once the greatest unifying factor within our humanity and the source of our greatest disparity. And for all that could be correctly said concerning our advocacy around hunger: the obligation to fight it, to repudiate the greed that subjects so many of our fellow men and women to it involuntarily, the unacceptable callousness with which we turn a blind eye to those afflicted by hunger, it remains a perennial human universal.