The Manrilla Blog | Life. Art. Religion. Culture.

Today was an odd turn of events that had the building which houses my office on UPenn’s campus, play host to a talk on Islam by one of today’s most darling Muslim pundits, Irshad Manji. A self-proclaimed Muslim reformist, activist, human rights lobbiest and lesbian, Irshad gave a talk to an attentive audience which was comprised of both Muslim and non-Muslim, old and young alike. Dr. Leonard Swidler, from Temple University, was also on hand to add to the discussion. But, unfortunately, like her book, The Trouble With Islam Today, the talk was filled with nothing more than drivel. And that’s just the good part.

So much of the dialog today regarding Islam is in how it can fit into the master narrative of Western discourse. This encompasses everything from morals, ethics, to aesthetics, such as standards and concepts of beauty. When Islam fails to authenticate a narrative that falls within the margins of the dominant culture, it and vis-a-vie, the Muslims, are condemned as being backwards, barbaric, and even morally, ethically, and intellectually bankrupt. And when a people are deemed barbaric or morally bankrupt, the slippery slope to subjugation, whether it be figuratively, psychologically or physically can never trail far behind. This process of brutalization bears striking resemblance to the types of psychological terror that have been visited upon various minority groups in the West, especially in America, when they failed to meet the criterion of a dominant force that often have a pattern of “moving the goal post” when it suited itself opportune.

A major portion of my critique on Manji’s arguments and positions as well as comments that Dr. Swidler gave, were that neither Manji nor Swidler are scholastically equipped to answer any such questions regarding the intellectual tradition of Islam. Manji is a journalist of questionable objectivity and Swidler’s expertise lies outside the fold of Islam. Manji often relies on crude reductionism coupled with a woefully absent basic familiarity with the Islamic Tradition. Buzz words like ijtihad, fatwah and of course, the crowd pleaser, jihad, are tossed out to lend to her some Islamic academic credibility. In fact, Swidler’s presence is somewhat questionable as Temple University could have certainly offered up someone who would have been far better suited to the task at hand. In light of access to scholars like Khaled Blankinship, it remained a curiosity as to why Manji chose a non-Muslim religious professor to engage in talks about Muslim reform.

But to take things a step further, Manji’s book, The Trouble With Islam Today, is guilty of the same crime that many of its contemporaries are: making the personal experience an ontological narrative. To help further explain my point, let me offer this explanation: because of the trials and tribulations that Manji faced as a child, because of the personal experiences that Manji had and the choices she’s made, she has taken the sum of those experiences and built the foundation of her argument around them such that they take on a scope that is completely inappropriate. That because they were or are issues for Manji they must be equally important issues for all Muslims in all times and in all places. A great deal of Manji’s contemporaries, such as Ayan Hirsi Ali to name one, frame their arguments in the same manner. But to reiterate, these criticisms of Islam do not simply stop at personal narrative, they apex again at how Islam falls short on a laundry list of items such as equality, human rights, tolerance and progression. In where Islam fails to be equal, tolerant or progressive in the “Western” paradigm that Manji offers up, Islam is deemed to have a problem. So this left me asking some simply but pertinent issues. Are any of these issues true? And if so, how, and in what way? And again, if so, what would be the best way of looking for resolutions. Read more this entry »

Or is it just a big waste of time and a growing fitnah for our community? I am troubled by things that I read on the blogosphere and it has made me address the validity of blogging. We all know that Allah will ask us what we spent our time doing. I do not want that to be add to the list of things I already know I have to ask forgiveness for. Instead of seeing a healthy dialog [which is what some of us who blog want though I have to question the intentions of others] much of what I read seems to be filled with malice and cowardice. Referring to the post above, a dialog commenced about the permissibility of Mother’s Day and within a short period we went from trying to feel out each other’s points, make counter arguments and having a dialog to a brother slandering Dr. Sherman ‘Abd al-Hamik’ Jackson. And let me tell - I ain’t gonna let that happen without a fight! Dr. Jackson has done more for Muslims through his writings and his talks and his genuine suhbah [companionship] than this joker could ever hope to attain and yet he saw fit to substitute slander and back-bitting for intellectual insight. If one is unable to argue and have discourse in a dignified manner, then shut up. If you can’t remain civil without making ghiybah on recognized scholars, you don’t have the skills to examine the issue from various angles and are not conversant with the Muslim intellectual tradition, then keep your mouth shut!

I have not decided to completely bow out of the race just yet - but it is on the table. And to a great degree, it will be based on the assessment of whether or not blogging is beneficial. I did just receive a number of emails from readers who thanked me for what I write - that is encouraging. Al Hamdulillah for that. But I’m not doing it to win popularity contests. I do it to write about and discuss relevant issues. But time will tell if this is the best format for that.

And God knows best.