Community of Islam - Essay Example

Community of Islam Community of Islam Introduction Islam is the second largest religion in the world, and contrary to popular belief, the majority of Muslims are not Arabs; they are in Asia, in countries like Indonesia and Malaysia. Moreover, within the last fifty years, Islam has gained a significant presence in most western countries, with rapidly expanding Muslim populations in France, England and the United States. Muslim community and practices Islam basically means submission to the will of God. So Muslim community have a strong faith on the oneness of God and obeys and respect Him with complete will by following the principles set in Quran and transmitted to mankind by Muhammad, His Messenger on earth. Muslim community all around the world has strong believes on oneness of God, on uniqueness of the Holy book Quran and religion Islam. Muslim community all around the world practices their religious values in the same manner because the entire Muslim community has the same belief. To practice their faith, Muslims must accept five primary obligations which Islam imposes. The first pillar is Shahdah or belief in Allah, the creator and Muhammad, the messenger. This is the most important for the community of Muslims to follow and strictly believe because this lays the basis of the religion Islam that there is no God than Allah and Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) is the last messenger of Allah. The second pillar is Salah or prayer. Prayers are obligatory and must be offered five times a day. These involve postural changes including kneeling and bending. Ritual cleanliness and ablution are required before offering prayers. Friday prayers or Jum’ah are special and must be offered in congregation at a mosque. There are rules for prayers in a mosque (that all the members of Muslim community are suppose to follow) that require devotees to wear clean clothes The third pillar is Zakah or tax on wealth and alms for the poor. Like prayer, zakah is considered a form of worship. It enshrines the duty of social responsibility by which well-to-do Muslims must concern themselves about those less fortunate. The zakah prescribes payments of fixed proportions of a Muslim's possession for the welfare of the community in general and for its needy members in particular, whether Muslims or non-Muslims. This tax is often levied and disbursed by the state, but in the absence of a government collecting system it must be disbursed by the taxable Muslims themselves. In addition, all Muslims are encouraged to make voluntary contributions to the needy called sadaqah. The fourth pillar is Sawm or fasting during the month of Ramadan. The fifth pillar is Hajj or pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia. This is obligatory and must be undertaken at least once in a lifetime. One of the most moving acts of faith in Islam, the hajj is, for those Muslims who can get to Mecca, the peak of their religious life, a moment when they satisfy a deep yearning to behold at least once the Ka'bah - the House of God and the physical focus of a life time of prayer. The hajj is at once a worldwide migration of the faithful and a remarkable spiritual happening that, according to Islamic tradition, dates back to Abraham, was affirmed by Muhammad, and then, by Muhammad's own pilgrimage, systematized into rites which are simple in execution but rich it in meaning. 1 Islam has made provisions for the sick. Prayers are excused if a person is bed bound. Those unfit to leave home must pray at home and resume mosque prayers as soon as fit, especially on Friday. People unable to kneel or bend during prayers may use appropriate furniture. Muslim community in UK Today it is estimated that there are about 1.8 million Muslims in the UK 2 based mostly in metropolitan areas such as London, Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow. About half were born in the UK and come from all over the world. Those from the Indian Sub-continent account for the largest group, with significant numbers from Cyprus, Turkey and Yemen. There is also a growing convert community (estimated at 10, 000) 3 and their descendants, some of who have become well known in the broader Muslim population. The UK exists as a nexus point for the greater Muslim community in Europe but also, in a number of ways, the Muslim world. The UK’s colonization of many parts of the Muslim world, and the resulting migration, has meant that England now has one of the most ethnically diverse Muslim populations in the world. The UK is host to Muslim press initiatives that have considerable impact externally, English being the language of communication internationally. 4 That the UK happens to exist as one of the few non-constitutional monarchies with a head of state that serves as the head of an established Church adds to an already intriguing state of affairs. This situation has been challenged in a number of ways in recent times by various sectors of British society, particularly after the Prince of Wales suggested that as the next monarch he would be “Defender of Faith” rather than the “Defender of the (Anglican) Faith.” 5 The Muslim community finds itself in the center of this debate, being demographically the largest religious minority in a country that is officially a Christian state. This situation has been contested in a variety of ways, and at present, there appear to be three main currents of thought: 6 1) Secular constitutional reform 2) An embryonic multi-faithism 3) Liberal Anglicanism The Muslim community has only recently taken strong positions on the question of “establishment,” although its presence (as the largest non-Christian religious community) has encouraged debate in the mainstream on this topic. If the UK, as an EU Member state has been able to integrate a community as heterogeneous as the British Muslim community (to the point that it can just as easily be called “British Muslim communities”) in legal, political and social terms, there are likely lessons to be learned by other states in the EU. 7 Reflecting on the strength of feeling in the Muslim community after the Rushdie affair, Paul Weller noted that ‘by insisting that they do not want to be dealt with as an ‘ethnic minority group’ or in terms of ‘race relations’ considerations, and in demanding recognition primarily as a faith community, Muslims are posing fundamental questions to British society. In a cultural milieu where ethnicity, nationality, class and fashion have been seen as the major determining factors of individual and corporate identity, for a group to define itself primarily in terms of religious identity represents a major break with the prevailing social ethos. 8 Weller’s observation and Gilliat-Ray’s commentary provide some useful insights. The UK has traditionally welcomed immigrants, but just as elsewhere, their integration was through specific prisms. A community that insists on a primarily spiritually derived identity creates methodological issues that require some adaptation before; in this regard, the UK is not exceptional. Through the current lens of “race-relations,” a number of demands of the Muslim community have been partially accommodated; Vertovec notes in particular the following: 9 1) Permission to establish facilities for ritual slaughtering of animals for consumption, 2) The setting aside of areas of local cemeteries for Muslim use 3) The provision of halal (ritually permissible) food in public institutions such as schools, hospitals, and prisons, 4) The designation of prayer facilities in the work place, 5) Time off for Muslims to enjoy their religious festivals, 6) The broadcasting of the adhan (call to prayer) within certain limits This was, by and large, the result of work laid down by the first generations of Muslim immigrants in the 1950s and 60s. They and the second generation became subsequently more conversant with British life, and focused their political life on British society and British institutions, rather than their countries of origin, which has translated into a thriving media. The Muslim media in the UK has produced magazines such as Q-News, which has been published in the UK since the 1980s and remains the most read European Muslim publication, primarily targeting young professionals, as well as Muslim News, probably the oldest Muslim media in Europe still running, focusing more on the older sections of the community. Lately, a new magazine entitled Emel has seen its first issues, with other newsletters and magazines from specific organizations and mosques contributing to a large and vibrant Muslim British media. There has been several viewpoints vis-à-vis “Islamic education” 10 in the UK, similar to all debates relating to the education of religious minorities in a predominantly Protestant Christian society. One may be defined as “the acceptance of a minority group by a majority population, in which the group takes over the values and norms of the dominant culture,” 11 or the “assimilationist viewpoint.” Were this viewpoint to be standard in the education field, there would be only state schools with a basic curriculum throughout; this, however, is not quite the situation at present. Muslim advocates, and other more “integrationist” voices, argue that while there should be basic standards through all educational institutions, these standards can be met while still allowing for variation according to the backgrounds of the students. As such, the UK has had a number of Jewish, Methodist and Roman Catholic schools for many years, funded by the state. Furthermore, the proponents of Muslim “faith”-schools state four reasons for their position: 1. The provision of appropriate religious and moral education; 2. The maintenance of cultural traditions of the minority faith group; 3. Improving the educational achievement of minority faith pupils; and 4. The provision of single-sex education for secondary school age girls. 12 In theory, the state funds “faith”-schools that meet appropriate Ministry of Education criteria; in practice, this excluded Muslim schools until 1997. One commentator in 1996 noted “How can it be right for voluntary aided status to be granted to Jewish schools, in some cases before they had even opened their doors, whilst operational Muslim schools, fulfilling all the educational criteria for voluntary aid, find the official goal posts being moved continuously? 13 Proponents for such schools argue that the existing system allows for faith-schools, and as such, Muslim schools should not be discriminated against. In addition, they note that quite apart from equal opportunities considerations, Muslim faith schools contribute something to their students that state schools would not. 14 Some have called for the end to all state-funded faith schools on the basis that they reinforce divisive communal identities instead of aiding the integration of the students into mainstream society; other reasons include the concern that such schools have poor standards in terms of educational provision, and that there is a lack of provision of equal opportunities for girls in Muslim schools. 15 In such proposals exists the idea of secular state schools, with a multicultural and multi-faith standpoint on the part of the educational system; such schools would see the aim of religious education as “promoting understanding and using the tools of scholarship” in order to enter into an emphatic experience of the faith of individuals or groups. 16 As in other member states of the European Union, the Muslim community in the UK has been seeking for some time the creation of a representative body; their interests as a community could not be successfully represented in front of the state without one, said the Home Secretary in 1994. 17 As yet, there remains nothing comparable to the (elected) Board of Deputies of British Jews in the Muslim community; a number of organizations have, however, attempted to fill the role of ‘representative’ of the Muslim community to the mainstream, albeit in different ways with dissimilar priorities. As far as representing the Muslim community to the rest of British society, particularly the UK government, two organizations, the Union of Muslim Organizations (UMO) and the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) are perhaps the most influential. Headed by Dr. Aziz Pasha, who has remained the personality behind it ever since it was established in the 1970s, the UMO is one of the largest and best-established Muslim umbrella-groups in the UK. In the 1970s, the UMO held a number of meetings “which culminated in a formal resolution to seek official recognition of a separate system of Muslim family law, which would automatically be applicable to the British Muslims” 18the proposal was submitted to various government ministers, and reiterated publicly in 1989 and 1996. However, while the UMO still commands a good deal of respect among British Muslims as well as within policy-making circles, its influence is slowly beginning to wane in comparison to the MCB, which was established in 1996, primarily as an effort to become a representative body with which the State could contact the Muslim population in the UK. In this regard, it has met with some limited success, in that the UK government does use it as a reference point, particularly after the events of the 11th September 2001, when the state was in desperate need of a Muslim representative body. Nonetheless, the MCB’s effectiveness among Muslims is damaged by this very strength — that the government (and the media) recognizes it as a body to be dealt with, which in turn inspires a reputation (rightly or wrongly) for it being “pro-government” among the Muslim community. Tending to focus on lobbying the Home Office on Muslim issues, as well as hosting public events that are attended by high-profile politicians (including the prime minister), the MCB is particularly noted for advocating that Muslims should be “constructively and fully involved with local and national affairs” and that such involvement may manifest itself through lobbying or formal representation, despite tensions that might arise with respect to the position taken by the UK government on a variety of domestic and international issues. Less active on the national scene, but still significant are organizations such as the Islamic Society of Britain (ISB) (an MCB affiliate) and the UK Islamic Mission (UKI.M.). Set up in 1990 more as a social education enterprise for Muslim Britons, the ISB assumed more of a public role after September 11 2001 and a number of their members and spokespeople began to be contacted by mainstream media as authentic voices of the Muslim community. It takes a distinctly British Islamic identity to be a goal, free from Eastern cultural biases of migrant generations, a development that may be seen in conjunction with the emphasis on “integralisation” of European Muslims by Ramadan and others. Other less widely spread organizations exist, such as the UKI.M., set up in 1962 to convey the true spirit of Islam to the Western world with a remit to ensure that the Muslim identity continues through education, and to propound Muslim participation to create a better society. For all these organizations, the concept of a British Muslim identity is taken for granted as a goal for Muslims in the UK, without detriment to Islam; such a stance should not be underestimated, for together, these organizations represent the overwhelming majority of Muslims in the UK. When we consider the Church situation and relation with Muslim community, Muslim community has weighed in favor encouraging the continuation of a link between the State and the Church. Two British Muslims, Tariq Modood106 and David Rosser-Owen (who echoes the arguments of the Jewish Chief Rabbi of the UK, Dr Jonathan Sacks), have offered the reasons for their community in this regard: 1) All religions face similar challenges in the context of massive secularization. 2) Diversity requires that there be an over-arching public culture. 3) If this public culture has any religious component, it will be that of the Church of England (due to historical reasons rather than intended preference). 4) Dis-establishment would not replace establishment with anything ‘demonstrably better’ from the perspective of the minority religious communities. As such, Muslims generally support the status quo in terms of framework (that the state-religion link take the form of a state-church link), since it makes their case for more accommodation of their religious needs easier to argue, but urge changes in the way this status quo plays itself out “For us (Muslims) there must be a church-state link, or rather a religion state link, in order to keep touch with Reality . . . This need not militate against the interest of the other faith communities, providing the dominant religion acts as an advocate for them, and does not abuse and exploit its dominant position. 19 Muslims would, in short, like to see the Church, from its unique ‘coin of vantage’ provided by establishment, act as the advocate for all belief systems and to speak out against any attacks on any of the religions represented in the United Kingdom. The overriding concern among the Muslim community does not seem to be the existence of a Church-State link, but whether that Church-State link is used only to the benefit of Anglican Christians or for society as a whole. Legislation is viewed as having more of a direct effect over how the Muslim community will develop, and naturally, across the EU, this is another major impediment to the integration of Muslims in European societies. Conclusion In Britain, just as all over Europe, Islam has a long lineage. According to Winter “For British Muslims, the past does not have to be ‘another country.’” 20 This has not gone unnoticed by the British Muslim community of today. T. J. Winter goes further than this and argues, differently from Matar, that traditionally British national identity “lacks a history of self-construction against an Islamic rival” and thus the formation of a thoroughly British, yet Muslim, identity will not “be obstructed by a core constituent of traditional national identity,” unlike some European national identities.21 However, there remains some reluctance to admit that the British Muslim community has ‘arrived’; i.e., that it is now integral to British society. An examination of the British Muslim community reveals that on a variety of levels, there is still much work to be done. In political, economic, social and educational terms, the community cannot be favorably compared to other demographic religious minority communities in the UK. Despite these obstacles, however, evidence suggests that the British Muslim community is committed to a British identity. The media it has produced is concerned with the UK as its primary focus of activity. It has involved itself at many levels of political participation, created lasting institutions, and does not view itself as a temporary implant. Although ‘it is not easy to be British and Muslim at the same time,’ Muslims can seek some form of middle way. They might remain faithful to Islam while identifying fully with Britain. In that sense, integration means the adaptation of British structures to facilitate the practice of Islam within them. Read More