The Pakistani Spectator

Last year in April, Dr. John L. Esposito of Georgetown University offered a symposium exploring the definition of Muslim identity. This event was a global interactive conversation on religion moderated by Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham and Sally Quinn of the Washington Post.

A panel of journalists and religious scholars like Sherman A. Jackson, the Muslim Chaplain at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Ingrid Mattson, President of Islamic Society of North America, Salman Ahmad, a Pakistani born rock musician and rock star and Hadia Mubarak, a senior researcher at Georgetown’s Center for Muslim Christian Understanding and the first woman and first native-born American to be elected to lead the National Muslim Student Association (NMSA), spoke and answered the audience’s questions.

Sally Quinn of Washington Post stated the difficulties of non-Muslim were having non superficial contacts with Muslims. Sympathizing with Muslim-American, she said it’s difficult to become a Muslim in this country. She read a powerful statement written by a non Muslim opposed to having dialogues with Muslims. According to the content she read, Islam does not know love, diversity, and accommodation of people of other faiths, unfortunately.

In response to some Muslim participants’ complains against media bias toward Islam, Newsweek editor Jon Meacham said that the American media is not ideologically biased. However, it markets and presents to people what they like to see, listen, and buy, he stated.

Salman Ahmad, a Pakistani born rock musician and rock star, was also part of the debate on how being a Muslim can complement or conflict with the American way of life.

The speakers discussed the questions like what it means to be a Muslim in America, how does it inform who you are, what you think, what you do, and if for the faithful, Islam dictates and defines a moral compass, a political agenda, a spiritual journey, or if it’s a culture apart from the American experience.

Jackson questioned and stated the ambiguity of American culture which is accommodating numerous traditions and customs from around the world. He stated that Islam has a tremendous ability of absorbing people of various backgrounds.

Imam Hendi said that American Muslims could be the best bridge between East and West and we people from all faiths need to work hard to achieve this goal.

However, the feature speaker of the event seemed to be Ms. Hadia Mubarak who lamented angrily that since Sep. 11, the Muslim population in this country had been made to develop a sense of perpetual displacement and the ‘right wing bigots’ are trying to make American feel we Muslims are threats to our own country.

At one point, she made people shocked by saying that Turkey’s secular regime is not better than Taliban regime because it punishes the women for covering their head for religious reason.

From the debate, especially what Mubarak had said, it was obvious
that American born Muslims like her have much higher expectations for being accepted as an equal partner. However, the immigrants like me who have adopted this country as their home find this country as a place where we exercise a lot more social, economic and political freedom than in our home countries.

While she was venting her frustration, some of which justified, I was thinking of how Pakistan’s rulers have been ‘selling’ some of their own Muslim countrymen to the States as terrorists. While in Pakistan the families of these ‘sold’ were unaware of the whereabouts of their loved ones, in the States a few of them were found innocent, ironically.

I also thought of some of the so-called ‘right wing bigots’ with whom I used to do Bible study on Capitol Hill several years ago when I was working there.

During the studies, I found myself relearning Islamic holy book Quraan, which I studied as a child in a Deoband (a Suni sect of Islam) madarasa in Pakistan.

On the Hill, I was part of two Bible study groups. One was led by Dr. Frank Wright, then the executive director of Center for Christian Statesman Center, in the U.S House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s office, and other was led by a friend named Delores, then a staffer for Congressman Danny K. Davis.

Frank had earned his PhD in finance, but instead of learning some financial subjects I used to have very intense conversations with him on the interpretation of the various stories in Bible. Almost all members of Frank group were white Republicans. Their interpretation of Bible stories sometimes seemed to be too philosophical, at least to my very small brain.

My interpretations of stories about Jesus life would be rooted in to the centuries old setting of Middle East when there was no running water and electricity and where Jesus probably used to travel on a donkey, horse, or camel on mud soil, the kind of economic conditions in which — or even less developed — I was raised in Pakistan

The members of this group and I would be very inquiring about our different perceptions of Biblical teachings, but I never found intolerance among these ‘right wing republicans’ toward my different views about our religious investigations.

In Delores’ group, everyone was African-American. I generally found African-Americans friendlier and less constrained than whites. And coming from my own Pakistani economically poor background and because of my dark skin I would personally feel more welcomed and comfortable with this group.

I would, however, learn more in Frank’s group where the surroundings were more sober and scholarly.

During the studies, in my imagination I used to slip back and forth between my U.S. religious experiences and my childhood Qurran learning experience in the Deuband madarasa of my childhood.

After over a year of the Bible study I developed some differences with Frank, and remember one day having an argument with him in his office about our different interpretation of Bible and its applications in our current very capitalist society. At one point, I verbally trashed his ‘American Christianity.’

Later on, Frank told me that I was so angry that day that his staff was about to dial 911 because they thought I was going to have heart attack. We just used to have friendly fun during our several lunches in nearby restaurant close to the U.S. Senate building where I used to live as well. Mostly we would argue about people’s different percepts rooted in their cultural backgrounds on these heavenly books.

I know some people would call Frank a ‘right wing bigot’, but thinking retroactively I was the one who would behave like a bigot with him. He would explain to me very kindly that Christianity is not about winning the arguments; it’s about accepting Jesus as a savior, or God, which I never could comprehend.

At the Georgetown University seminar, I felt having flashback of my interactions with Frank as I listened to this young, angry and very articulate Mubarak covering her head as an observant Muslim and equating Taliban with Turkey’s secular government.

It’s known that our idiots ‘Muslim’ Taliban don’t allow young girls’ schooling, and equating them with Turkey’s secular government who does not allow their women to cover their head out of their religious obligation was a faulty comparison at best.

I tried very hard to keep my mouth shut about Mubarak’s generalization of calling ‘right wing bigot’ to the people I was part of for over a decade and whom I generally found decent folks who have different beliefs than mine. But mostly I had found them very tolerant– more than myself, at least.

I actually sometime used to insult these Christian buddies by telling them that they have manufactured their white capitalist Christianity which has nothing to do with the true Christianity that was endowed by God a couple of millennium ago in the Middle East. Sometimes I would ask those folks how they could claim to love Jesus, an Arab man, and simultaneously have so much contempt for Arabs for their political stance on the Israeli Palestinian issue.

In my subconscious, however, I would compare to them with some practicing Muslims in Pakistan who would start lying the minute they stepped out of the mosque.

Naturally, I have more respect for these Christians who accept their religion on their own accord and with whom I have been socializing and dating with some of their women for a couple of decades.

At the end of speaker’ speeches at the University I moved from the last back row for journalists to the ones at the front. Standing in line on my turn, I grabbed the mike strongly and rebutted Mubarak’s generalizing Christians as ‘right wing bigots.’

By giving my own example of learning through these Bible study groups, I told the crowd that instead of name calling, we have the unique opportunity of learning from each other by having civilized discourse.

Yes, there are some serious differences between the two monotheistic religions emphasized by some evangelical Christian leaders, but in their certain social views the American Christian leaders have a lot more common with their fundamentalist Muslim counterparts in Muslim Countries, I strongly believe.

Similarly, like some ‘right wing bigots’, who are vocal, so are some of the fundamentalist Muslims in Muslim countries on the matters of natural disasters. Both, ‘the right wing bigots’ and fundamentalist Muslim, tend to say that they are the punishment from God for our evil deeds.

These ‘right wing bigots’ are also not different from their Muslim counterparts on many social issues like abortion, the tolerance toward gays, same sex marriage, pre-marital sex, and many other religious and social matters.

Though Mubarak made a point of moral inferiority among Muslim societies by saying that the problem of corruption, oppression, and lack of freedom is not about Islam, it’s rather a problem of some Muslims dictators in those countries — mostly supported by our U.S government, I guess.

However, it’s only we, the Muslim masses, who could get rid of the problem of corruption, oppression, and lack of freedom by unleashing an intense ‘jihad’ that we sometimes dream of doing against Israel, for example, I would add to Mubarak’s statement. The U.S. economic aid to these countries does not take care of this problem at all. Sometime, it exacerbates the matter, as a matter of fact.

In the meeting, Mr. Salman Ahmad gave the background of Sufi Islam by defining them the most tolerant force in Islam. At the end of the gathering he sang Saint Bulhe Shaw’s poem which express about reaching God through loving his creation by going beyond religious dogma. The song says “Bulhia kee jana main kon…na ma Musa na Ferown”, means as a human being I am too limited to either have some self awareness or to know the reality of God and religion in the existential manners.

While listening Saint Buleh Shaw’s poem, I thought and enjoyed his views on the very inclusive nature of Islam rooted in the flexibility of this very simple religion. In my thoughts, I also made a comparison of what this great Muslim Saint said a long time ago and the American REM’s lyrics for the song “Losing My Religion”:

Life is bigger
Its bigger than you
And you are not me
The lengths that I will go to
The distance in your eyes
Oh no Ive said too much
I set it up

I especially like these kinds of songs because before the 9/11 I had evolved my social life among practicing Christians where I tried to transcend the one assumed way leading to our Creator. For example, I used to go to National Community Church (NCC) where then U.S. attorney general John Ashcroft was a member. These people hold their Sunday services in the movie theater at the Union Station, which could be called Washington’s railway station.

Some liberal Americans know Ashcroft as a ‘right wing bigot’, but for some Muslim it would be interesting to learn that this ‘bigot man’ — because of his religious commitment — does not drink and/or dance. Since I was living a few blocks from the Union station, I used to be part of a NCC’s Bible study group as well.

In this Bible study group, there was an Asian-American guy named John who used to date with a woman names Ruth, a daughter of Senator Jeff Sessions from Alabama. I know John for a decade. Since in the Bible study group we were the only two Asian-Americas, we became kind of buddies.

Like many Americans, I too, would feel people from Bible Belt were more intolerant toward people of color. I have also observed that it’s easier for two practicing Muslims to get along, especially if they share the mosque. I experienced the same between Ruth and John. Their religion was a great bonding force between them.

Right after September 11, I emailed the members of Bible study group an article written by the Dawn columnist named Ayaz Amir. It’s very critical of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East.

One of the staff members of Senator Sessions, who was part of the Bible study group, responded me with a harsh email letting me know about my ‘insensitivity’ toward the people who lost their lives on September 11.

It was the mutual insensitivity or my assertiveness as a Muslim that led me to part altogether from the Bible study groups and the religion I used to call American Christianity.

Were these ‘right wing bigot’ insensitive to me? Not at all. As a matter of fact, I used to behave like an aggressive man protecting Islamic ‘territory’, per say, among these committed Christians.

While dealing with my thoughts based on my religious experiences in the States, at the end of the debate during a reception I had some private small talk with Dr. Esposito. He told me that it’s very unfortunate that Muslims in America are going through a serious hardship, but their case is not unique. In the past, he said, it had happened to blacks, American Indians, Jews, Japanese, Irish, and Italian Americans– including himself. By some, he was related with Italian mafia just because he is an Italian-American, he said.

The moral of the gathering was that there is no way that the people of Abraham faith could survive and thrive by believing in the clash of civilizations. They have to come to terms with tolerable conditions among themselves. I tried to remind people that the right wing bigots are not the exclusive domain of Christianity.

Of course, there are a few of them in Islam as well. Mubarak should Google and see how many Sunni Muslims have killed Shia Muslims and vice-versa within last year. She would feel forced to call the ‘American right wing bigots’ as the most inclusive people on earth.

Last 5 posts by kami

• Ahsan Iqbal on Rethinking U.S. Policy - August 5th, 2008
• Who Made Taliban Terrorists? - July 2nd, 2008
• Donde Drug Trade Dollars De Afghanistan? - June 4th, 2008
• Cross Fire - May 30th, 2008
• Blaming Jews and Christians for Our Own Follies - May 20th, 2008

Trackback URL