Why I Left the West and Embraced Islam

[AbuMubarak]

In The Name of Allah, The Compassionate, The Merciful


Islam and the West: A Clash of Civilizations?
http://www.voy.com/123537/6/872.html

Abdul-Aziz ibn Myatt


Several years ago, I rejected the culture and way of life of the West and embraced Islam. Why? The simple answer is that I found in Islam a most noble, a most civilized, way of life: in truth, I found it to be the most civilized way of life I had ever known.

What I discovered about Islam - and what led me to convert to Islam - was the truth that Islam embodies honour. Islam provides a set of guidelines, a code of conduct, which guidelines and code of conduct - if followed - result in people living their life in a honourable, and thus a civilized, way.

What I found - and what at first astonished me - was that I felt more comfortable in the presence of Muslims than I did among my own people. Why? Because they were, or strived to be, honourable; because they possessed manners: attributes I knew from experience were often sadly lacking among my own people, and Westerners in general.

Why were Muslims like this? Because they were Muslims: that is, because they submitted to Allah (SWT); because they were aware of and believed in Tawhid, in the Unity of Allah (SWT) and accepted that Allah (SWT) had given them, in the Quran and the Sunnah, all the laws, the rules, the examples, they needed to live a good, a reasonable, a civilized, an honourable, life.

In brief, I came to understand that Muslims not only possessed a sacred, a numinous, perspective - an awareness of God - but also made this real in their everyday lives though their submission to Allah (SWT).

I came to feel, to know, to understand that in Islam the sacred really was still sacred. Thus, for example, the reverence Muslims have for the Quran (not even touching it unless they have performed the ritual cleaning that is Wudhu) and the genuine respect and reverence they feel toward Allah (SWT), exemplified by the many prostrations during prayer.

I could not but help contrast all this with the outright often selfish and profane arrogance of many people in the West who scorned the very idea of ritual cleaning or indeed of anything being sacred; who would refuse to prostrate themselves, and who lacked the civilized manners which I found Muslims to possess.

In brief, I came to find in Islam a civilized way of life.

The Arrogance of the West:

Recently, I have had made many attempts to explain the real nature of Islam to Westerners, especially those who study and teach in Western academic institutions.

I have discovered that there really is not only an immense ignorance about Islam among the peoples of the West but also - and perhaps more importantly - an immense prejudice and arrogance. For the majority of Western people really do consider themselves and their own way of life superior to Muslims and to Islam.

Thus I have found many, many people - especially among so-called "educated", academic Westerners - who say they are "enlightened" (and even liberal) yet who cannot even for one moment consider that there is or may be a valid alternative to their own Western view of reality.

In most of my recent conversations with so-called "educated" Western people the consensus is that the Western way is "enlightened", progressive or whatever, and that the way of Islam is at best "some foreign way of life" and at worst uncivilized, detrimental to "progress" and downright "backward".

Two conversations illustrate the arrogance of the West. The first involved a person who had just returned from a Muslim country. This person had gone there to study some of the art - the culture, the artifacts - of that country. Talking on their return, this person kept mentioning the "disagreeable rules" they had encountered, such as the separation of men and women, and the requirement that women dress in a certain way.

The view of this person was that what they experienced - the rules, the artifacts, even the ideas - were just part of the culture of that country, which culture could and should change, by "adapting" to the Western world.

In addition this person was very pleased that "global communication" - the exchange of ideas and ideologies to use their own words - was causing changes in this and other Muslim countries, by which of course they meant the infiltration of Western ideas and Western ways.

This person - through a respected academic and authority in their own limited field - made no attempt whatsoever to really understand what they dismissively called "the culture" of the country, and insisted on interpreting everything, from the country's art to its people, from the viewpoint of the West. Thus the art, the artifacts, of that country were viewed through the theories, the work, of Western artists, Western philosophy, and never, ever, from an Islamic point of view. For instance, beautiful Mosques were just beautiful works of architecture, not places where people met to bow down in submission to Allah (SWT) and certainly not places where a Westerner might learn something. Beautiful calligraphy was just beautiful calligraphy, not divine words which could - if followed - guide people to live in an honourable, a civilized, way.

The second conversation involved a Western academic who had the arrogance to deliver a lecture in which he made reference to the "clash of civilizations" - to the present conflict between Islam and the West. Even before this lecture I - known to him as a convert to Islam - had offered to explain about Islam, read from the Quran and Ahadith, and answer any questions he might have. But he was not interested, so certain was he of the validity, the truth, of Western values, Western law, the Western way of life.

Unfortunately, these two conversations are typical of the many I have had since the Jumaadi Al-Thaani attacks. For all the rhetoric spewed forth in the West about reason, and tolerance, few people - especially in the academic world - actually cultivate, never mind use, the civilizing faculty of reason.

Why There is no Clash of Civilizations:

There is no "clash of civilizations" because the West is not a civilization, merely a collection of modern nations who all follow the same way of life and whose people share the same fundamental values, system of government and outlook on life.

The West is not a civilization because a civilization requires certain standards of behaviour among its people (that is, honourable conduct and manners) just as it requires its scholars, its leaders - all those who lead and hold positions of trust and authority - to cultivate and use the faculty of reason.

In contrast, the Ummah - as I have discovered - is indeed a civilization, but one at present without a territory, a home, a country. (The one recent attempt to create such a country - the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (1) - has been arrogantly destroyed by the West.)

However, a clash does exist, but it is a clash of world-views, of ways of life. A clash between the Way of Al-Islam, and the material way of the West with its consumer-capitalist, global, culture and its arrogant people.

I have abandoned the West and embraced the Way of Al-Islam because I know that the Islamic way of life is morally superior to the way of West. I have embraced Islam because I found it to be guide to how we can live in a rational, honourable, civilized way. I have embraced Islam because I believe it can create a decent, good, noble society: a better world.

I have rejected the West because I know it is the way of greed, hypocrisy, dishonour, arrogance, profanity and overwhelming pride.

The difference between the West and Islam can be simply stated: the West believes in the human idea of "progress" achieved through continual change, and in the ability of human beings to not only determine their own fate but to determine what is right and wrong. In complete contrast, the Way of Al-Islam is the way of submission to Allah (SWT) alone: the way that accepts that we human beings are fallible, and have to rely on our Creator for guidance.

In brief: the West believes in and relies on its technology, its military power, its economic wealth, its ever-changing philosophical, social and political ideas and theories. In contrast, Muslims believe in, and only rely on, Allah (SWT) and turn to the unchanging Allah-given guidance of the Quran and Sunnah.

The West haughtily refuses to submit to anyone or to anything, and desires in its arrogance to dominate the whole world and have the whole world abide by its laws, its ideas, its way of life. In contrast, Muslims humbly and with thanks submit to Allah (SWT) and the guidance He has given in the Quran and Sunnah.

"Some people submit to Allah out of desire for reward: that, surely, is the submission of traders. Other people submit to Allah out of fear, and that, surely, is the submission of slaves. Yet another group submit to Allah out of gratefulness, and this, most certainly, is the submission of free human beings." (Source: Nahjul Balagha, Saying 237)


(1) "Our system is a true example of an Islamic system. For the enemies of our way of life and our Ummah, this system is like a thorn in their eyes, and they are trying to destroy it under various pretexts." (Mullah Mohammad 'Umar)

[abdus_sabour]

Assalalmu Alaikum

For more info about Myatt'[s reversion to Islam go to:

http://website.lineone.net/~davidmyatt/

and for some more of his Islamic writings go to:

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/alghurabah/

[AbuMubarak]

How was it that David Myatt, a Westerner with a long history of political involvement in extreme "right-wing" organizations - a former leader of the neo-Nazi group Combat 18 - came to be standing one Sunday outside a Mosque with a sincere desire to go inside and convert to Islam?

http://website.lineone.net/~davidmyatt/

[AbuMubarak]

A Question of Islam and the West

In the Name of Allah, The Compassionate, The Merciful

All Praise and All Thanks are for Allah (SWT) to whom we shall all return to be judged on The Last Day.

We praise Him and ask Him for help and forgiveness; and ask His protection from the mischief of our souls and the bad results of our deeds; whomsoever Allah guides, none can misguide; and whom He declares misguided, none can guide to the right path; and I bear witness that there is none worthy of worship but Allah: He is Alone, without partner. And I bear witness that Muhammad (salla Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) is the Messenger and Servant of Allah (SWT)



As I write this I am once again in a Muslim land, surrounded by the sights and sounds that I love, among a people whose way of life and culture I respect and which I myself am now part of. Yesterday I sat on the edge of the desert under the shade of a Palm tree beneath a perfect blue sky as, not far away, in the small village, the sound of the Athan could be heard. So I went to pray, and there in that simple Mosque amid my brothers, I was reminded that one of the many remarkable things about Islam in this modern world is its numinosity: the beauty, the sacredness, the intimation of the divine, which manifests itself in daily life especially through daily prayer, the recitation of the Quran, a love of the Prophet Muhammad (salla Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) and a remembrance of Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala).

It is this sense of the numinous that the West has almost totally lost, just as it is this sense of the numinous that is one of the great strengths of Islam in the modern world. It is this numinosity which so greatly impressed me before my own conversion/reversion to Islam, and it is this numinosity that the kuffar are trying so hard to undermine and destroy with their evil desire to change Islam and have Muslims imitate the materialistic, dishonourable, arrogant ways of the West.

This sense of the numinous is the reality of Islam because Muslims submit only to Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) - a submission they affirm five times a day when, in prayer, they prostrate saying Subhana Rabbi-yal A'Ala. For Muslims are aware - and know and understand - that all that is given, achieved, or taken away, in this life is the result of Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala), the gift of Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) or a test from Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala). There is thus a genuine humility in Muslims, a humility totally lacking in posturing, arrogant, bullies like Bush the infidel and his swaggering soldiers who believe they have the right to do what they do and who use whatever force is necessary to achieve their aims, intent as they are on humiliating Muslims and having Muslims bow down to their dictates, their demands. It is through daily Salat that we Muslims are reminded of our duty to Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) and thus remember our own humble place in this life, this world, this Cosmos.

In the course of my varied life I have experienced many things, lived among many cultures - but one of the most beautiful and moving moments was while traveling in the desert, doing Salat on the hot sand while a burning Sun sweated me. It was so fitting, so perfect, so human, so simple to praise and submit to Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) there, alone, in that place - to acknowledge His Prophet and to say His words. I was complete, whole, at peace, there for everything made sense in those moments of prayer - especially my own mortality. For there, there was only me, the vast desert, the Sun, and Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) and it was easy to suspend my prideful belief in my own abilities and my own knowledge. For there - and it might have been any century since the Message of the Prophet Muhammad (salla Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) - it was quite clear that life and death were a gift from Allah and Allah alone. There, at night, I lay looking at the sky, watching the shooting stars which every ten or twenty minutes, flashed across the sky, as our own mortal lives briefly traverse the horizon which is this Earth.

I knew then that we complicate things. We seem to insist that life is not as simple as it is - that there is not a perfect peace, a perfect understanding, in such submission, in such an acknowledgement of our duty; in our giving of thanks. We complicate things by insisting on imposing our own fallible interpretations on life - by responding in an animal, and not a human, an honourable way; by giving in to our lower nature; by believing we mere mortals have the answers and have the right, even a duty, to impose our own answers, by force if necessary, upon others. We complicate things by forgetting the simple, unaffected, perspective that the desert, that Islam, brings - which is of our fragile, mortals, selves, of our Rabb.

Life is simple, as Islam is. Islam is simply a guide to how we should live our lives in an honourable, civilized, way; a simple guide to the way which leads to the perfect eternal peace of Jannah. This simple honourable way is what the West with its arrogance, its hubris, its dishonour, its materialism, its hypocrisy, its new empire, has forgotten. Right, and laws, belong to Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) and Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) alone, just as honour is not possible without the higher perspective that an awareness of Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) brings. That is, Taqwa is the beginning, the foundation, of honour just as in the Prophet Muhammad (salla Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) we have the perfect example of the honourable man - the archetypal human being, the archetypal honourable and chivalrous man: fair, courteous, just, trustworthy, brave, tolerant, honest, generous, modest and pious.

"Indeed in the Messenger of Allah you have a perfect example to follow." [33:2 Interpretation of Meaning]

"And whosoever does not judge by what Allâh has revealed, such are the Kâfirûn." [5:44 Interpretation of meaning]

The West - and especially the leaders of the governments of the West, and their minions - have forgotten or never known the simple truth that it is Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) alone who has the understanding, the knowledge, the perfection, the wisdom to decide the things we mortals require to lead an honourable life and so achieve Jannah, and the simple truth that we Muslims must remember is that we have, in the Quran and Sunnah, the perfect, the only, guides, we need, to such a life and to Jannah: a gift as these are from our Rabb.

What have I learnt from my most recent return to Muslims lands? I have re-learnt humility, finding as I did the simple beautiful love, friendship, trust and hospitality of the Ummah, born from a striving to follow the perfect example of our beloved Prophet Muhammad (salla Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam). I have re-learnt that imitation of the kuffar is not a solution to the many problems that face our brothers and sisters in such lands. But most of all I have learnt that the real Islamic revolution - a return to the simple, numinous way of Quran and Sunnah - begins in the heart, in the mind, of each and every Muslim: with a simple return to total submission to Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) and Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) alone. There is then an avoiding in each and every way of imitating the kuffar.

From this return to the essence, to the simplicity of Islam, all else will InshaAllah follow - the Jihad to evict the kuffar from Muslim lands; the desire, the means, to re-establish an Islamic way of life based only on Quran and Sunnah, thus enabling us, as Muslims and through Shariah, to draw closer to Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) and His Prophet Muhammad (salla Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam), thus attaining InshaAllah the success which is Jannah, the ultimate goal of our own mortal life.

Narrated Anas ibn Malik: The Prophet (salla Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) said: Use your property, your life and your tongues in striving against the Unbelievers. Abu Dawud 14, 2498



May Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala forgive us for our mistakes and may He guide us to and keep us on the
Right Path.

Allah (Subhanahu wa Ta'ala) knows best.

Abdul Aziz
29 Jumaad Al-Awal 1424


http://website.lineone.net/~davidmya..._the_west.html

[AbuMubarak]

Richard Beauchamp sat in the parking lot watching the Muslims come and go. He had never been to a mosque before, and was nervous.

When he mustered the nerve to go inside, he was greeted warmly. He said that he'd been raised a Baptist, but felt drawn to Islam.

"They were extremely kind," said Mr. Beauchamp, 31, of Irving. "It was so easy to go back." His next visit was on a Friday during prayer time. Mr. Beauchamp didn't know the Muslim way of praying, so he sat in a chair and watched. Most men were on the floor.

"The chairs were for the elderly," he said. "I was so caught up in the prayers that I didn't notice."

Mr. Beauchamp said he became disenchanted with Christianity at a young age. He didn't understand how babies could be born with original sin. Nor did he understand how Christians could believe in one God and the Trinity at the same time.
His journey to Islam was a solitary one, which is common among American converts. He discovered Islam through books, before ever meeting a Muslim.

Within a year of his visit, he was sure he'd found a spiritual home. But becoming a Muslim meant a major lifestyle overhaul.
"I was living a normal lifestyle of a 20-something American," he said. "I was going out, going to pubs, and mixing freely with women. As a Muslim, I could no longer call up a friend, if she was a girl, and just hang out. I certainly couldn't drink anymore."

His friends took his conversion harder than his parents did.

"My lifestyle changed a lot, and it was hard for them," he said. "But when I read what Muslim writers said, it made me take a hard look at how I was living."

He said he'd had taken a dim view of Muslims growing up, which was a barrier to his conversion. Stories about the Iranian revolution, violence, and the capture of American hostages make him leery.

"It was a battle to get through the prejudices I had," he said. "But going to a mosque smashed all those negative beliefs. I saw extremely faithful people who were sincere and compassionate."

Mr. Beauchamp married an Indonesian woman that he's never dated. Because Muslims frown upon dating, he turned to the Internet to find his spouse.

"She's a good woman, devoted to Islam," he said. He corresponded with her for six months, and then flew to Indonesia to meet her and her family. He was there on Sept. 11.

"Many Americans are getting a distorted image of Islam," he said. "It pains me because Islam has brought me a sense of peace and a sense of purpose that I never had before."

[AbuMubarak]

Assalamualaikum.
Here is an interesting story from a brother. Thought some of you might like reading it as I did.
Wassalam.
Sister.

“Before I became Muslim, my habit when I visited any city or town was that the first building I would enter or look for in that city would be a place of worship, a temple or church or whatever. Allaah – may He be exalted – willed that I should enter a mosque when the Muslims were praying Maghrib. I waited until they had finished, then I met with the imaam of the mosque who started to talk to the worshippers after the prayer. I had a quiet and objective discussion with him which was the beginning of my journey to Islam.”<O:P> </O:P>

With these words begins the story of ‘Abd-Allaah al-Mahdi, in which he tells us how he came to Islam, how he entered this religion, and what influenced him.<O:P> </O:P>

Concerning his upbringing and his life before Islam, ‘Abd-Allaah al-Mahdi tells us:<O:P> </O:P>

Before I came to Islam, my name was Leonardo Villar. I was born on 4/12/1935 in a Christian family who belonged to the Catholic church. As a child I was brought up by my grandfather and grandmother, who taught me their beliefs, which was the doctrine of Trinity, the belief that the Nazarene was the son of God and that he was the one whom we worshipped alongside God. They started to send me to the English school, after I had repeatedly asked them to do so, but I did not complete my studies there, praise be to Allaah. At that time I was about five years old, and the principal of the school did not accept me at first because I was so young. But eventually he did accept me, after finding out for sure that I was ahead of my peers in my studies. <O:P> </O:P>

On one occasion I was asleep at the time of the siesta, and the door of the house was open. The chickens and hens came in and I woke up terrified. I took a towel and started hitting the chickens, and they flew up to the idols which we used to face when we prayed. They fell onto the floor and broke, and thus I discovered that they were merely wooden statues and not gods. I addressed them, saying, “You are wood, you are not a god as my parents claim. You cannot help yourself, so how can you help anyone else?” I decided to break them, but because I was so little and I was scared that my grandfather would beat me, I put them back in their place. I started to think about them, and I was certain that there had to be a true God Who had created the universe.<O:P> </O:P>

The following morning, I saw my grandfather sitting, and I sat down next to him and asked him, Are these idols gods? He said, No, but we make them the focal point of our prayer and it is as if we are before God when we pray. I remained silent, and I could not express what I felt in my heart.<O:P> </O:P>

A discussion with my grandfather

- When did this change in your life begin?<O:P> </O:P>

- In 1943, just before the end of the Second World War, I got hold of a book called “The Gospel of Barnabas”, in which I read words attributed to ‘Eesaa (Jesus) (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him). These words roughly meant, “Your God is my God and your Lord is my Lord.” I was surprised at that, because this was diametrically opposed to our beliefs. It was as if I could not understand it, but at that time I was no more than nine years old. I asked my grandfather about what these words meant, but he did not answer my question. Instead, he kept busy with a book, then he said, Do not read this book, for it will misguide you and take you out of your religion. Its author is not a Christian. I said, Is there a religion other than our religion? He said, Yes. I said, Is there a god other than our God? He said, No. I said, Is their religion better than our religion? He said, No, our religion is better than their religion, and our religion is better than all the religions.<O:P> </O:P>

I said, How do you know that? He said, I just know it, and I warn you not to read this book. I kept quiet and I did not know what to say.<O:P> </O:P>

After that, I asked my grandmother, then my father, my mother and my (paternal) uncles, but the answer was always the same – do not read that book.<O:P> </O:P>

I wondered, what is the secret in this book? Why are they telling me not to read it? Can anyone say something about his religion that tells lies about his Creator? What will happen if I read the book? And other questions which went around in my mind. Finally I resolved to read the book in secret in my room, and I read it over and over again. I started to enquire about the religion of ‘Eesa (peace and blessings be upon him). In 1947 I left school and stopped attending religious services. I went to a house where there was an old man and I asked him to tell me the stories of the Prophets who were known to them, such as Dawood, Sulaymaan, Ibraaheem, Moosa, Nooh and Aadam (peace and blessings be upon them all). And I asked him some questions about religion.<O:P> </O:P>

When my father found out that I had stopped studying, he got angry and threatened to kill me, and his anger increased when he found out that I had stopped going to church on Sundays.<O:P> </O:P>

Seventeen years without resting <O:P> </O:P>

- But did you succumb to your father’s threats? <O:P></O:P>

- I did not stop seeking for truth and I started to move from one city to another, from one island to another, for seventeen years without getting tired.<O:P> </O:P>

The turning point

- What was the turning point?<O:P> </O:P>

- In 1963 I reached the city of Marawi in Mindanao, which is in the south of the Philippines and has a Muslim population. My habit was that whenever I reached a new city, the first building I would enter had to be a place of worship, so I went into a mosque. The Muslims were praying Maghrib, so I waited until they had finished, then I met the imaam of the mosque and the people gathered around us. I said to the imaam, What were you doing just now? He said, We were praying. I said, Is this your religion? He said, Yes. I said, What do you call your religion? He said, Islam. I said, Who is your Lord? He said, Allaah. I said, Who is your Prophet? He said, Muhammad SAWS (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him). I paused, because this was the first time I had heard of this, and I started to think. Then I said to him: What do you think about the Messiah? He said, He is ‘Eesaa ibn Maryam (Jesus the son of Mary), peace and blessings be upon them both, and he is the Prophet of Allaah. I said, What was his religion? He said, Islam – because all the Prophets followed the religion of Islam. Then I realized that we would not be able to talk for long, and I was a stranger in the city. I asked him, Do you have a book which I could read? He gave me three books in English: <O:P></O:P>

One was The Religion of Islam by Ahmad Ghilwaash;<O:P> </O:P>

The second was a translation of the meanings of the Holy Qur’aan, translated by ‘Abd-Allaah Yusuf ‘Ali;

The third was a pamphlet about ‘Aqeedah (correct belief).<O:P> </O:P>

Then I left the mosque and went to the place for which I was headed, and I started to read the first book closely for ten days, from cover to cover… and I found what I was looking for.<O:P> </O:P>

Finally, I was sure that I had now found the religion of ‘Eesaa (peace and blessings be upon him), which I had been looking for for twenty years. The books described how to do wudoo’ and the “pillars” or essential parts of the prayer, so I went back to that part of the book and began to memorize it so that I would be able to put it into practice. On the morning of Friday, 24/6/1963, I went to the imaam’s house and asked him: Is it permissible for a non-Muslim to become Muslim if he wants to?<O:P> </O:P>

He said, Islam is not just a religion for us Muslims; it is the religion for all of mankind and you have to become Muslim. Then he taught me how to do wudoo’ and recite the Shahaadatayn, and how to do the prayer. When I had finished the prayer I asked him, Am I a Muslim now? He said, Yes.<O:P> </O:P>

Four years of study<O:P> </O:P>

Then I started to study Islam in the Islamic school in that city for approximately four years. Then I came to Makkah al-Mukarramah where I studied in a religious school. At the end of 1967 I got my student permit and in 1968 I received a grant to study at the Islamic University in al-Madeenah al-Munawwarah until 1979, where I gained the Certificate for completing my studies in the College of Daw’ah and Usool al-Deen. Then I was sent by Daar al-Iftaa – before it became a (government) ministry – to the state of Sabah in Malaysia. Until now I am still working as a Daa’iyah, calling people to Allaah, because the people who are being called are in urgent need of learning about Islam.<O:P> </O:P>

Al-Da’wah (Magazine), issue 1732, p. 26.<O:P> </O:P>

[AL-FIRDAUS]

I Had Not Gone Shopping for a New Religion
By: Michael Wolfe on: 22.08.2005

After twenty-five years as a writer in America, I wanted something to soften my cynicism. I was searching for new terms by which to see. The way one is raised establishes certain needs in this department. From a pluralist background, I naturally placed great stress on the matters of racism and freedom.

Then, in my early twenties, I had gone to live in Africa for three years. During this time, which was formative for me, I did rubbed shoulders with blacks of many different tribes, with Arabs, Berbers, and even Europeans, who were Muslims. By and large these people did not share the Western obsession with race as a social category. In our encounters being oddly colored rarely mattered. I was welcomed first and judged on merit later. By contrast, Europeans and Americans, including many who are free of racist notions, automatically class people racially. Muslims classified people by their faith and their actions. I found this transcendent and refreshing. Malcolm X saw his nation's salvation in it. "America needs to understand Islam," he wrote, "because this is the one religion that erases from its society the race problem".

I was looking for an escape route, too, from the isolating terms of a materialistic culture. I wanted access to a spiritual dimension, but the conventional paths I had known as a boy were closed. My father had been a Jew; my mother Christian. Because of my mongrel background, I had a foot in two religious camps. Both faiths were undoubtedly profound. Yet the one that emphasizes a chosen people I found insupportable; while the other, based in a mystery, repelled me. A century before, my maternal great—grandmother's name had been set in stained glass at the high street Church of Christ in Hamilton, Ohio. By the time I was twenty, this meant nothing to me.

These were the terms my early life provided. The more I thought about it now, the more I returned to my experiences in Muslim Africa. After two return trips to Morocco, in 1981 and 1985, I came to feel that Africa, the continent, had little to do with the balanced life I found there. It was not, that is, a continent I was after, nor an institution, either. I was looking for a framework I could live with, a vocabulary of spiritual concepts applicable to the life I was living now. I did not want to "trade in" my culture. I wanted access to new meanings.

After a mid-Atlantic dinner I went to wash up in the bathroom. During my absence a quorum of Hasidim lined up to pray outside the door. By the time I had finished, they were too immersed to notice me. Emerging from the bathroom, I could barely work the handle. Stepping into the aisle was out of the question.

I could only stand with my head thrust into the hallway, staring at the congregation's backs. Holding palm-size prayer books, they cut an impressive figure, tapping the texts on their breastbones as they divined. Little by little the movements grew erratic, like a mild, bobbing form of rock and roll. I watched from the bathroom door until they were finished, then slipped back down the aisle to my seat. We landed together later that night in Brussels. Reboarding, I found a discarded Yiddish newspaper on a food tray. When the plane took off for Morocco, they were gone.

I do not mean to imply here that my life during this period conformed to any grand design. In the beginning, around 1981, I was driven by curiosity and an appetite for travel. My favorite place to go, when I had the money, was Morocco. When I could not travel, there were books. This fascination brought me into contact with a handful of writers driven to the exotic, authors capable of sentences like this, by Freya Stark:

“The perpetual charm of Arabia is that the traveler finds his level there simply as a human being; the people's directness, deadly to the sentimental or the pedantic, like the less complicated virtues; and the pleasantness of being liked for oneself might, I think, be added to the five reasons for travel given me by Sayyid Abdulla, the watchmaker; "to leave one's troubles behind one; to earn a living; to acquire learning; to practice good manners; and to meet honorable men”.

I could not have drawn up a list of demands, but I had a fair idea of what I was after. The religion I wanted should be to metaphysics as metaphysics is to science. It would not be confined by a narrow rationalism or traffic in mystery to please its priests. There would be no priests, no separation between nature and things sacred. There would be no war with the flesh, if I could help it. Sex would be natural, not the seat of a curse upon the species. Finally, I did want a ritual component, daily routine to sharpen the senses and discipline my mind. Above all, I wanted clarity and freedom. I did not want to trade away reason simply to be saddled with a dogma.

The more I learned about Islam, the more it appeared to conform to what I was after. Most of the educated Westerners I knew around this time regarded any strong religious climate with suspicion. They classified religion as political manipulation, or they dismissed it as a medieval concept, projecting upon it notions from their European past.

It was not hard to find a source for their opinions. A thousand years of Western history had left us plenty of fine reasons to regret a path that led through so much ignorance and slaughter. From the Children's Crusade and the Inquisition to the transmogrified faiths of Nazism and Communism during our century, whole countries have been exhausted by belief. Nietzsche's fear that the modern nation-state would become a substitute religion, have proved tragically accurate. Our century, it seemed to me, was ending in an age beyond belief, which believers inhabited as much as agnostics.

Regardless of church affiliation, secular humanism is the air westerners breathe the lens we gaze through. Like any world view, this outlook is pervasive and transparent. It forms the basis of our broad identification with democracy and with the pursuit of freedom in all its countless and beguiling forms. Immersed in our shared preoccupations, one may easily forget that other ways of life exist on the same planet.

At the time of my trip, for instance, 650 million Muslims with a majority representation in forty-four countries adhered to the formal teachings of Islam. In addition, about 400 million more were living as minorities in Europe, Asia and the Americas. Assisted by postcolonial economics, Islam has become in a matter of thirty years a major faith in Western Europe. Of the world's great religions, Islam alone was adding to its fold.

My politicized friends were dismayed by my new interest. They all but universally confused Islam with the machinations of half a dozen Middle Eastern tyrants. The books they read, the new broadcasts they viewed depicted the faith as a set of political functions. Almost nothing was said of its spiritual practice. I liked to quote Mae West to them: "Anytime you take religion for a joke, the laugh's on you".

Historically a Muslim sees Islam as the final, matured expression of an original religion reaching back to Adam. It is as resolutely monotheistic as Judaism, whose major Prophets Islam reveres as links in a progressive chain, culminating in Jesus and Muhammad. Essentially a message of renewal, Islam has done its part on the world stage to return the forgotten taste of life's lost sweetness to millions of people. Its book, the Qur'an, caused Goethe to remark, "You see, this teaching never fails; with all our systems, we cannot go, and generally speaking no man can go, further".

Traditional Islam is expressed through the practice of five pillars. Declaring one's faith, prayer, charity, and fasting are activities pursued repeatedly throughout one's life. Conditions permitting, each Muslim is additionally charged with undertaking a pilgrimage to Mecca once in a lifetime. The Arabic term for this fifth rite is Hajj. Scholars relate the wudu' the concept of qasd, "aspiration," and to the notion of men and women as travelers on earth. In Western religions pilgrimage is a vestigial tradition, a quaint, folkloric concept commonly reduced to metaphor. Among Muslims, on the other hand, the hajj embodies a vital experience for millions of new pilgrims every year. In spite of the modern content of their lives, it remains an act of obedience, a profession of belief, and the visible expression of a spiritual community. For a majority of Muslims the hajj is an ultimate goal, the trip of a lifetime.

As a convert I felt obliged to go to Makkah. As an addict to travel I could not imagine a more compelling goal. The annual, month-long fast of Ramadan precedes the hajj by about one hundred days. These two rites form a period of intensified awareness in Muslim society. I wanted to put this period to use. I had read about Islam; I had joined a Mosque near my home in California; I had started a practice. Now I hoped to deepen what I was learning by submerging myself in a religion where Islam infuses every aspect of existence.

I planned to begin in Morocco, because I knew that country well and because it followed traditional Islam and was fairly stable. The last place I wanted to start was in a backwater full of uproarious sectarians. I wanted to paddle the mainstream, the broad, calm water.

http://www.jews-for-allah.org/Jewish-Converts-to-Islam/Michael-Wolfe.htm

[alikhlas99]

Is it me but has myatt turned murtad? I mean look at his site now.

[AbuMubarak]

hopefully those are old, non-maintained sites

or maybe he is on some spiritual quest and stopped by islam for a while and has moved on

Allah knows

[AbuMubarak]

another reminder

[Le Croyant]

Is it me but has myatt turned murtad? I mean look at his site now.

Which site?