Dear Ms. Tapal:  

Your use of the term, ‘backing out’ does not truly represent the situation with any degree of fidelity. You had proposed (Ref. your post #10) for me to indulge in some kind of debate with your husband about his book and I rejected the proposal (Ref. my post # 14). Now you are claiming that I have backed out of some kind of challenge. Only if I had consented or shown any inclination for any such indulgence, you may have been in a position to claim that I have backed out but that is not the case. Please try to understand, my priorities are not exactly the same as yours. I have already spent too much time on this book, its review and then replying to some of the posts from MCC faithful. In fact, I would prefer to make this my last post on this subject as I have other more pressing issues to attend to.   

Regarding your assertion of any benefit to the community with a debate, I have serious doubts about that. I have been informed about the disgraceful behavior of some of the MCC members in your last function which was held last week. I am informed that Dr. Tahir Qazi, who had been invited to speak at your function was booed and interrupted several times to make him stop his presentation half way. It is shameful that your organization failed to show due respect and a little patience to allow your guest speaker to complete his presentation of only 15 slides. It is also a matter of concern that no one from MCC officials made any effort to check the unruly MCC members in the audience. I am also informed that the MCC’s Vice President from Ottawa, stood up and demanded Dr. Qazi to stop, as she had traveled from Ottawa only to listen to Mr. Fatah? Then, another young lady demanded to end Dr. Qazi’s presentation, a loyal member of MCC or perhaps a member of your family? In view of such outrageous and shameful behavior displayed by your MCC’s Vice President and other members of the organization, any self respecting individual would naturally distant himself from your group. So, please stop badgering me to have any debate with your husband – I have better things to do with my time. Recall Mr. Masud Shiekh’s post #13 , in which he emphasized on rules of engagement etc. Obviously he knows your organization and its peculiarities fairly well while I do not.   

When you talk about the community, you may be thinking about half a dozen family friends who may also be the loyal MCC members. The Canadian Muslim community at large may not be in agreement with the thesis presented in the book. Those who may be willing to give a second thought, further get discouraged by the insolence and discourteous behavior you folks display. Take a look for instance at your own post #10 - Is that the way one invites respectable people for an honest and sincere dialogue?   

Judging from the posts in this thread, it seems that the MCC folks are agitated like the proverbial natives in the jungle on arrival of the white man. They are now beating their drums louder and louder. I wonder if any one is left behind from MCC membership who has not yet paid the homage to the book on this forum?  I guess, there should not be very many left behind now. According to an article I was reading recently in which the author wrote about MCC that it is nothing but ‘a few individuals and a coffee table’. It seems that the MCC folks have turned the coffee table into a writing table, churning out letters of reverence (for the book) escalating the chase of their favorite mirage.   

I am not sure if there was a need to introduce the article, ‘What jihad really means’ from the Ottawa Citizen in this thread. You seem to be under the impression that the article solves some long standing issues about the concept of jihad. Here are my comments on this article: 

 

What jihad really means  (By Tarek Fatah and Salma Siddiqui) 

The article, in its tone and connotation, is an addendum or an extension to the book, ‘Chasing a Mirage’ without offering a meaningful value to its readers and certainly no service to Islam and the Muslims. Using repeatedly the derogatory and the undefined phrase, ‘Islamist’, the article appears to assert that certain Islamic scholars had ideologies different from those held by the authors. In order to offer some appeasement and a little spice to an average main stream reader, Bin Laden has been brought in as well. To my knowledge, Bin Laden has never claimed to be an Islamic scholar.  

The authors have tried to create a false hallow effect as if 1.3 billion Muslims of the world truly believe and follow the faith as presented by the named triad plus Bin Laden. This article is yet another effort to further confuse the general public who are already bewildered in the post 9/11 socio-political environment mostly by articles of this nature. The Canwest publications network comes handy to encourage the publication of such material. 

In reference to the exchange of two Muslims as cited in the article, I do not see how the authors have merrily arrived at the conclusion that respondent Safa Fouda has (ironically) proved Akbar Hussain’s point. The authors are obviously not serious about judging the message, instead, busy playing with words.  

The authors have raised a couple of questions, but did not bother to provide their own opinion or understanding about the questions. One of the questions they have raised is: what jihad really means? And the other is: why can’t Muslims recover? 

It would have been more meaningful for their readers if the authors had added their own thoughts to provide the answers. What they have done instead, is quoted several scholars with whom they do not agree on ideological basis. Also, they have dragged in Bin Laden who is a political activist rather than a religious scholar or a philosopher.  

The authors have failed to indicate in the article that the basic and fundamental laws of Islam are derived from the Holy book, the Quran. Any edict or decree taken from any other book may well be the opinion of the writer of the book. The Quran has clearly spelled it out that one has the free will to accept or reject the Quranic message but at their own peril, as they are responsible to God for their beliefs and actions. It is therefore unimportant and futile to keep dragging the names of those, who, on times deviate from Quran and show reliance on other books such as Ahadith even when there is a clear contradiction with the Quranic teachings. Regarding jihad, the Quran describes it briefly in verse (22:78). No one is holding a gun to any Muslim’s head to follow Modoodi or Qutb when explaining the meanings of jihad.  

Other than an attempt to muddy the water, I see no sense or value to bring Bin Laden in the context of this article. The readers must recall that it is same Bin Laden who was trained and funded along with many others by the Americans during 1980s to fight against the Afghani invaders who happened to be the Soviets. Today (assuming he is alive), Bin Laden is doing exactly the same along with many others – fighting the Afghani invaders.  

The important questions that arise here are: do the authors of this article have a personal conviction for a sense of right and wrong? Do they follow the Quranic teachings or at least some other ethical system or do they blindly follow the Neocons? Did they protest against the likes of Bin Laden and the Mullahs during the 1980s when ordinary simple folks were being hired to fight for Afghanistan against the Soviets or was the arrangement acceptable to them because the Americans had said so? Do these authors have their own conscious and independent moral values or do they change their morality standards with the changing political culture around them?   

The question (why can’t Muslims recover?) has nothing to do with Islam. But, it has plenty to do with economics as a direct consequence of politics, both domestic and international. The need for recovery obviously indicates the existence of a deficiency and a problem. It would be logical to determine the nature of deficiency and its root cause before one should venture out to resolve the problem. The problems we talk about are the effects; we need to determine and eliminate the cause(s), the effects will disappear by themselves.  

Regarding the authors’ concerns about Qutb’s Brotherhood ideology or Modoodi’s philosophy, we all know those ideas are derived from Ahadith and many of us do not put much faith in most of this literature. The way to deal with this dilemma would be to have a dialog with the leaders of the mosques rather than demanding action through newspaper articles making it sound like a political rhetoric rather than a sincere wish to review controversial or grey areas.  

In the cover letter Ms. Tapal has stated:

 (it) “should be read by this forum because it gets to brass tacks of the jihad issue without much fuss, ripping apart the hypocrisy so many Muslims spout when defending jihad”.
 

All I see in the article is a reproduction of a bunch of statements made by certain scholars or leaders but no analysis is offered by the authors themselves, no effort is made to discuss the subject in the light of Quranic teachings. Without such analysis I see no grounds to claim that the hypocrisy has been ripped apart.  

Would the Authors or their spokesperson, Ms. Tapal be so kind to enlighten us, the FoTH folks about What jihad really means?  

Javed I. Chaudry