The Tarasoff Rule and Islamic Psychiatry
While many places across the world begin to reopen with caution, returning to “normal life” during the pandemic is not a godsend for those suffering from a spate of mental health conditions or for victims of domestic abuse. UN Women has found that the pandemic has led to an “increase in gender-based violence, and warned that the pandemic will likely disproportionately affect women.” With anxiety … Continue reading The Tarasoff Rule and Islamic Psychiatry
Suffering in Silence: The Convert Identity
From the virtuous days of Dhul Hijjah to momentous Eid mornings, we treasure these precious days and the acts of worship, celebratory preparations, and communal moments that are all part of the tapestry of Muslim culture across societies. Western Muslims—mostly immigrants or family of immigrants—reminisce upon the Islamic holidays spent in their homeland, yearning to make equally satisfying observances in their new home. At the … Continue reading Suffering in Silence: The Convert Identity
Fazlur Rahman as a Modern Mutakallim
A Book Review of The Theological Thought of Fazlur Rahman: A Modern Mutakallim by Ahad M. Ahmed Fazlur Rahman (1919-88) was “a notable scholar of Islamic philosophy and an important liberal Muslim thinker of the twentieth century,” who is considered “to be amongst the most influential Muslim modernists in both the Western and Muslim worlds.” This is how Ahad Ahmed introduces this famed Pakistani-American scholar of … Continue reading Fazlur Rahman as a Modern Mutakallim
Nadir
What err’rs have you made, foolish one? What spurs you to these acts, my son? How does it feel, the guilt you bear, That steels upright your longest hairs, Your skin that crawls in bustling nests Of bullets ants, enraged at best? What have you done to make it weigh, Your heart enleaded, filled with shame, Like fallen stars – You’ve fallen far. You’ve failed … Continue reading Nadir
Diasporic Wanderlust: Sh. Abdal Hakim Murad’s “Travelling Home”
A Book Review of Travelling Home: Essays on Islam in Europe by Abdal Hakim Murad There is something strange happening in the Western world. Across hardly a half-century, religious observance in the West has not merely slackened, but vanished. The sudden decline of organized religion throughout Western civilization has been so precipitous, so staggering, that it in fact lacks any sort of parallel throughout history, … Continue reading Diasporic Wanderlust: Sh. Abdal Hakim Murad’s “Travelling Home”
Ayasofya: The Dagger Removed
‘’Either I will conquer you or you will conquer me”; this sentence, uttered by Fatih Sultan Mehmet, referred to Istanbul. This city has a subtle connection with the sacred Islamic cities of Mecca and Jerusalem; the qibla (direction of prayer) in Istanbul is towards both the Ka’ba and Al-Aqsa. For us Muslims, it is a beautiful blessing to face both the first qibla in Islam … Continue reading Ayasofya: The Dagger Removed
Relics of Triumphalism
Hagia Sophia has a storied heritage, but at no time has she been living in the past. Her walls embellished with marvelous Abrahamic vestiges of the distant past, Hagia Sophia excites aesthetic envy the world over. Strings of naked lightbulbs line the confectionaries and kebab stands that populate her casual vicinity in warm summer evenings—her odd, mismatched minarets visible across the Bosporus from Üsküdar, where … Continue reading Relics of Triumphalism
Has Religion Made a Comeback?
Giant Turtles, Big Bang Cosmology, and the End of Materialism I remember sitting in my world history class as a nine-year-old learning that the silly and primitive people of the past used to believe that the earth rested on a giant turtle. I vaguely recall being taught that these simple and primitive people used this turtle to explain earthquakes: anything that sits on the back … Continue reading Has Religion Made a Comeback?
Humanism between Islam and the West
A Book Review of Ali Shariati’s Marxism and Other Western Fallacies Ali Shariati Mazinani was an Iranian revolutionary and sociologist whose work is largely on the sociology of religion. He is widely considered to be one of the most influential Iranian intellectuals of the 20th century[1], and has been dubbed the “ideologue of the Iranian Revolution.” Despite experiencing an illustrious career shortened by an early … Continue reading Humanism between Islam and the West
A Critique From Above: A Reflection on Revolts
No time in recent memory has seen ‘violence’ laid bare as much as in our current political moment. The violence of concern is that of colonial racism – a violence produced by the secular nation-state. Of course, the modern form of lynching visited upon George Floyd is not news to anyone aware of the costs of late capitalism and neocolonialism. Yet, as an Ummah, we … Continue reading A Critique From Above: A Reflection on Revolts
