'Hijab' in the Time of 'Islamophobia'

  

In his Friday Sermon of 25 February 2022~ 23 Rajab 1443 AH, Imam- Jamaat Ul Sahih Al Islam International Hazrat Khalifatullah Munir Ahmad Azim (aba) of Mauritius eloquently explains the ethics of Hijab in Islam. Speaking against the backdrop of the ongoing controversy in India and elsewhere over unfair restrictions on the civic freedoms of Muslim girls and women to access education and employment in the name of their religious attire, Hazrat Khalifatullah (aba) offers an exposition on the Islamic approach for the protection of women's identity, dignity,  privacy interests, and rights in the social order. 

 

As Hazrat Khalifatullah (aba) alludes in the discourse, the present controversy over Hijab is indicative of a deeper crises in societies fuelled by internal political conflicts over unemployment and other issues, including the recognition, accommodation and integration of minority groups. Liberal States in the West and elsewhere swear by their commitment to democratic values and fundamental human rights- including freedom of conscience, freedom of religion and minority rights- and yet, the apparently neutral policies that they espouse betray direct or indirect discrimination- with disproportional impact upon the religious minorities living in the land; forcing the minority communities to choose between their commitment to religious beliefs and cultural practices and the dictates of national culture -raising searing questions of justice and equity in law and policy. 

Consider the present, manufactured controversy over Hijab. The 'presence' of Muslims as a people manifesting their religious practices such as Hijab and going about their everyday lives apparently challenge pre-existing notions of 'secular' public sphere with their rules of engagement such as uniforms in academic institutions and dress code in employment, etc. Majoritarian intolerance and hatred against minority groups point to political mobilization. Illiberal forces weaponize secular law to erase the 'hated' symbols of minorities- such as the Hijab- from the public sphere. Indeed, beneath the veneer of liberal quibbling over the role of 'religious' symbol- Hijab- in 'secular' space, with no corresponding attention to the symbols of the majority that are all over the public sphere; Islamophobia- the prejudice and suspicion and hatred and intolerance against Islam as a religion and Muslims as a community- is 'the elephant in the room' that needs to be called out. 

With ideologies of racial supremacism, ethnic nationalism, and religious majoritarianism increasingly gaining public support in several multicultural states,  'Islamophobia' is indeed regrettably widespread in our times. In the names of modernity and secular values of women's emancipation and empowerment, the Islamic headscarf and other veiling practices are viewed as 'oppressive' by the non-Muslim world. Hence, Muslim girls and women are left with no option but to resist and mount legal struggles to gain recognition and public acceptance for their Hijab. It is instructive to note in this context that without clear respect for the inherent dignity and rights of the human person and her free choices, including the recognition of 'difference' in the spirit of diversity; without an ethic of compassion for 'minority' groups who don't share the values of the majority; the claims of upholding liberalism, democracy, secularism and human rights are empty or hollow. As more and more women- [both Muslims and non-Muslims]- are recognizing the appeal and benefits of Islamic teachings and embracing the convenience of the Hijab, the societies that seek to ban Islamic values are destined to be profoundly transformed in their approach sooner than later- whether they like it not, Insha Allah, Aameen. 

Read the Friday Sermon Below: 

Muslim Family Life

 

Islam stands for harmonious relations among human beings. Islamic teachings promote peaceful coexistence among people in society: be it at home; among one’s family circles, or within the larger clan, or with other peoples. Islam exhorts everyone to respect and safeguard one another’s dignity, interests and rights. Indeed, in the Islamic view of the Divine scheme of things for the world, all humans remain on a plain of equality. No one has any share in God's divinity, or any superiority over fellow beings, nor any exceptional status that allows them to act with hubris or arrogance. Contrary to pagan notions of special claims of privileges attached to tribal/racial descent, social or national origin, and other markers of group identity; Islam seeks to foster a feeling of realism by reminding man of his truly humble origins and of his duty to cultivate best relations with all of humanity as we are from one another- like a family, as it were.

The Holy Prophet Muhammad (sa) famously stated: ‘Behold, God has removed from you the arrogance of pagan ignorance (jahiliyyah) with its boast of ancestral glories. Man is but a God-conscious believer or an unfortunate sinner. All people are children of Adam, and Adam was created out of dust'.  The Holy Prophet (sa) reminds us that all the world is family, and that he who renders the greatest service to God’s creation is the dearest and nearest to him.  

Allah (swt) states in the Holy Qur’an: ‘O mankind, We have created you from a male and a female; and We have made you into tribes and sub-tribes that you may recognize one another. Verily, the most honourable among you, in the sight of Allah, is he who is the most righteous among you. Surely, Allah is All-knowing, All-Aware.’ (49: 14)

'Musleh Maoud' Day 2022

  

A majestic Sign of special nearness, communion and holy communications between Allah (swt) and his devoted servant, the Promised Messiah Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (as) of Qadian (1835-1908); Prophecy Musleh Maoud, although revealed 136 years ago, continues to resonate among the believers in the Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya. 

Far beyond its historical relevance in the early days of the Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya and its partial fulfillment through the dreams vouchsafed to the great, second caliph of the Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya Hazrat Mirza Bashir-ud-Din Mahmud Ahmad (ra) in 1944, the Prophecy has gained much contemporary spiritual attention due to certain prescient observations left behind by the second Caliph while claiming to be the 'Musleh Maoud' (Promised Reformer) in the previous era, especially with the advent of the Divine Manifestation in Mauritius in the last two decades in the person of Hazrat Khalifatullah Munir Ahmad Azim Saheb (aba). 

Indeed, against the backdrop of the second Caliph's own prophecies and statements vis-a-vis the fulfillment of prophecy Musleh Maoud, based on the supreme authority of Divine revelations, Hazrat Khalifatullah (aba) has clearly and consistently acknowledged before the global spiritual community that he is 'Musleh Maoud' in this era, as of 20 February 2004. 

Alhamdulillah, this week the Jamaat Ul Sahih Al Islam International commemorated the Musleh Maoud Day in India and elsewhere with much spiritual fervour and in Thanksgiving to Allah (swt). Special Jamaat meetings took place both in Tamil Nadu and in Kerala, at the historic Mosques of the Jamaat- the Siraj-um-Munir Masjid, VK Puram, and at the Noor’ul Islam Masjid, Mathra, Summa Alhamdulillah. 

'Hijab' and the Law

The recent expulsion of a number of ‘Hijab’-wearing, young Muslim students in Karnataka, and the subsequent imposition of a ‘ban’ on religious attire in academic institutions raise disturbing questions about Executive excesses, given their profound implications on the future of individual choice, religious freedom, and minority rights in India. Given the fact that multiple religious symbols  and attires are accepted and accommodated as part of the nation’s secular ethos and composite culture, and most Muslim girl children had been wearing headscarves along with their School uniforms for many decades all across the country without any issue, the present manufactured controversy against ‘Hijab’ in coastal Karnataka can only be seen as a manifestation of the tectonic shifts that are currently underway in Indian politics, especially the growing muzzle-flexing by Islamophobic extremists in the country who enjoy impunity from law despite their vitriolic campaigns for the erasure of all markers of Muslim-cultural identity from the public sphere of India as well as threatening to commit mass atrocities against the minority community. Hence, attacking a religious and cultural practice like ‘Hijab’ in the name of ‘uniformity’ in the class-room dress code is only the latest episode in the larger political project of remaking India into a ‘Hindu Rashtra’. 

Constitutional Secularism in India

As a large country with over a billion- people: professing different faiths and belonging to diverging denominational groups; a variety of regional traditions and food cultures; indigenous communities; speaking several languages; India cannot but remain as a shining example of unity in diversity. It is this spirit of tolerance, accommodation and inclusion that is the hallmark of the Indian nationhood as envisaged and consciously chosen by the founding fathers of the Constitutional order when India regained independence from British colonialism in 1947. Respecting the dignity of the individual, and accommodating cultural differences by express recognition of minority rights; evolving the bond of fraternity across all category distinctions and constructing a public order where every social group finds equal access to flourish in togetherness is the idea of India that emerges from that founding document of the secular republic.

Revealed Poems- 03 February 2022

 

Bismillah-ir-Rahman-ir-Rahim

 Whenever I think of You, my Lord

I think I fall in love

It seems the earth is pushing up

 

You pull from far above

Your grace and Charm is what I like

 

Your bounties I admire

My eyes and heart are filled with You

What is more that I require!

Revelations of 10 February 2022

 

On Thursday, 10 February 2022 Sahebzada Abdul Muhaymine Salim Azim, the son of Hazrat Khalifatullah Munir A. Azim (aba), conveyed a very important mystical experience he has had on that day, and also the Divine revelations that were vouchsafed to his respected father, the spiritual father and Imam of the Jamaat Ul Sahih Al Islam International, in his presence. By the immense grace of Allah (swt), the holy revelations received by Hazrat Saheb (aba), and witnessed by members of the holy family on the occasion, contain a number of themes relating to true faith in God, and also sound advice useful for the devotional life of the believers. Timeless in character, these sublime messages, inter alia, revive Islamic teachings, and renew the sacred legacy of the great masters of religions from the past such as Lao Tzu, Hazrat Muhammad (sa), Hazrat Ali (ra) and Garib Nawaz Hazrat Khwajah Muin-ud-Din Chishti (ra), and also the enduring spiritual poetry of Allama Muhammad Iqbal. Masha Allah, Alhamdulillah, Allah-u-Akbar!     

Read the Text of the Revelations Below:

Bismillah-ir-Rahman-ir-Rahim

 

When the people of Islam let the thread of

Unity go from their hands,

They fell into a hundred mazes.

We are dispersed like stars in the world;

Though of the same family, we are

Strangers to one another.

Sexual Assault in the Nizam-e-Jamaat

  

Recently, alleged incidents of incestuous relations and other forms sexual crimes- including child sex abuse and rape, involving  members of the reigning Caliph’s own family within the Nizam-e-Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya became international headlines, shocking and embarrassing Ahmadis everywhere. A woman member of the ‘first family’ of the Jamaat- no less than a granddaughter of the 3rd and the 4th Caliph through different bloodlines- publicly revealed her struggles for justice within the Nizam-e-Jamaat. After apparently being sexually abused and exploited as a child by her own father for many years, the woman said that she was also raped on different occasions by three influential persons in the Jamaat/close male relatives of the present Caliph Mirza Masroor Ahmad Saheb. 

From the record of conversations with the Khalifatul Massih V that the impugned lady publicly shared over the Internet on the alleged incidents, it appears as though the Caliph Masroor Saheb has virtually failed to actively intervene and take substantive and procedural measures to deliver justice to a deeply vulnerable and traumatized woman family member at a critical juncture of her life. With no process of justice in the Nizam-e-Jamaat, the victim approached the British Police, and investigations are presently on all those incidents of sexual assault and other crimes, and the Police is apparently holding interviews with members of the family of the Caliph himself in this matter. 

The claims and counter allegations in the present controversy over issues of criminal justice within the Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya highlighted the need for clarity of principles and practice on a number of related matters within an Islamic perspective. In a recent Interview with the Sahih Al Islam You Tube Channel, Imam- Jamaat Ul Sahih Al Islam International Hazrat Muhyi-ud-Din Al Khalifatullah Munir Ahmad Azim Saheb of Mauritius spoke about Islamic teachings pertaining to sexual offences. Hazrat Khalifatullah's guidance came in the backdrop of a series of questions and clarifications raised by many Ahmadi Muslims from around the world.