Outlandish: Look into My Eyes

Aakib's Commencement Address

In lieu of embedding the Google Video, which is apparently impossible, try this link. I just tried it and it should work for you. If it does not, well, then you lose.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6719949393935159229

Zambia

There is never not enough time.
You just suck at being honest about how you use it.
(7-26-06)

So, I just thought I would point out that the total average life expectancy at birth in Zambia is 39.1 years. (For women, it is 38.6 years.) In addition, the total fertility rate is 5.18 children per woman (not including unsuccessful pregnancies). As of 1998, 63.7% of the population live beneath $1/day, on the international dollar.

However, these people, like you and I, will also be judged by God.

Obviously, God is The Just, so if a Zambian's condition in the Lower World is demonstrably different, would not his judgement likely differ from that of someone who is answerable within a different set of realities?

I think it is easy to believe we are doing the best we can, but it's probably just not true. But I can only speak for myself.

"Then, you will certainly be asked, on that day, regarding an-na'eem."

Sources: Population Division of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations Secretariat, World Population Prospects: The 2004 Revision and World Urbanization Prospects: The 2003 Revision, http://esa.un.org/unpp, 16 August 2006; 9:59:20 AM. Development Research Group of the World Bank Group, 2005 World Development Indicators, http://devdata.worldbank.org/wdipdfs/table2_5.pdf. The Qur'an 102:8

Turning of tides?

This afternoon, I sat behind two thin marble pillars, with the movable-glass geodesic ceiling of the masjid opened just a bit to let in the cool, gray sky and I was honestly surprised and inspired.

Situated on an exposed slab of floor just between two sets of Saudi-issued, brown palm-fiber carpets - complete with the double-sworded emblem - I listened incredulously to something I did not think I would hear coming from the pulpit of the Friday sermon in a 99% Sunni Arab masjid funded by Saudi Arabia.

Maybe I underestimated the true sense of intra-Islamic pluralism that others feel and believe in; or maybe I overestimated the controls that Saudi Arabia extends to the pulpits of the masajid that it has funded in foreign lands; maybe I am just judgemental and racist. Probably some of each.

Whatever the case, the imam admonished with urgency against intra-Islamic sectarianism in a way that I have only heard in personal conversation and not from arguably the most important platform in the day-to-day life of the ummah.

In an eloquent rhetoric of both intellectual and spiritual depth, the imam wove together aqidah, juristic principles of warfare, and political strategy of the neoconservative movement and warned that our infighting only led to our weakness.

"On the day of judgement, Allah will not ask you if you are shi'a or sunni," he reminded emotionally, "He will ask if you are a Muslim and will examine your hearts." He went on to urge an end to all labels and to intra-Islamic unity, unquestioning in the face of opposition.

I don't know if it was there or I expected it to be there, but I almost tried to see if there was a murmur across the crowd as he made the above impassioned plea. I don't know if a lot of brainwashed Muslim masses are truly ready to embrace shi'a and sunni as simply Muslims, period; but if the message doesn't start coming from the pulpits, then it will never penetrate the pews, so to speak. Looking at Iraq, it is already quite late, but maybe not too late.

I don't think he was saying that we have to agree with each other in terms of the points of difference - whether it be shi'a or sunni, sufi or salafi - but what he was saying is that it is completely unacceptable for those labels to mean something to the point of disunity and mutual annihilation.

I think I can safely say I have seen all combinations of those four: sunnis who hate shi'a; shi'a who hate sunnis; salafis who hate sufis; and sufis who hate salafis. It is, furthermore, fair to say that I have seen none of them result in productivity.

I loved Seyyed Hossein Nasr's point on this matter, (and if you don't know who he is, it is because, as Shaykh 'Abdullah Adhami said in London last weekend, his being shi'a wrongfully affects his scholarly impact), when he said in response to a question on what he thinks of shi'a sunni differences, "who do you think wants you to think about that?"

Photo is taken from the website of La Fondation Culturelle Islamique and is the room where I was sitting when the khutbah took place.

Samurai come?*

http://www.startribune.com/467/story/604366.html

Umm, yeah...about that...

Possible sword attack wounds 5 in Minneapolis
Staff reports, Star Tribune
Last update: August 09, 2006 – 9:53 AM

An attack, possibly using a two-and-a-half-foot sword, apparently left as many as five people with stab wounds early today in Minneapolis, according to broadcast reports.

Police received a 911 call to an apartment building at 31st Street and Lyndale Avenue S. at around 3:30 a.m., WCCO-TV reported.

Neighbors reported hearing a scuffle in one of the upstairs apartments and then the sound of people running from the scene, the station said. Police found two people with stab wounds in an apartment and recovered a sword, according to reports.

The victims were taken to Hennepin County Medical Center. Their conditions were not reported.
Witnesses said paramedics left the apartment carrying a bag containing severed fingers, WCCO said.

Three other people later showed up at the medical center with stab wounds and were arrested, KSTP-TV says.

No other information was available.

*Watch the first battle in the woods from "The Last Samurai."

George Galloway is the man.