Category / Miscellania

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Sayyid Habeeb Ullah Madani

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Shaykhul Islam Husain Ahmad Madani writes about his father, Sayyid Habeeb Ullah that in the field of taweez and amaliyaat he had notable skill and complete expertise. He used to mention, ‘There was a time when I had become so proficient that I used to write naqsh myself for curing illnesses and benefits were derived from them.’ At the time when my father granted me verbal ijazah to practice amaliyat and nuqoosh, he added, ‘I have fulfilled the zakah required for all the amaal within this common place book (his own hand-written compilation). There is no need for you to fulfil the zakah. I present you with ijazah; however, it will be better for you to carry out all the amaal in my presence once. Unfortunately, owing to my insolence and idleness I avoided this opportunity because I considered it an exertion and gave precedence to my Ilmi commitments. I was left regretting my decision thereafter.

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Tradition & Change: To Reform or not to Reform?

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Tradition is here defined as an intellectual tendency or social perspective of continuing the preservation of values, statements, norms and the like from one generation to the next. In contrast, modernity is the social outlook on life which is inclined to break with tradition. It is driven by the force to repudiate traditional values, customs and beliefs in favour of more radical ideas. A delineating feature of modernity is constant change whilst tradition is identified by continuation. Where do we stand regarding these two polarities as religious people?

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Religion vs Secularism

0bf85ece-2299-4e49-89d1-a97dcc5473d8-2060x1236What conventional wisdom promotes and dictates is the assumption that religion is an outdated weltanschuuang. It presupposes the reality of secular ideals vs. the myth of religion. It assumes the necessity of secularism versus the threat of religion. Much of the foreign policy of the last decade or so, and now with Theresa May and David Cameron’s new terrorism Bill, is underpinned by an assumption that somehow secularism is a saviour of religion. It sees religion as a dangerous phenomena and therefore it is in need, or more correctly, there is a necessity for it to be tamed. Continue reading →

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Habermas’ ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’

I wish to show the theoretical underpinnings of Habermas’ ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’. Namely, I want to highlight that Habermas’ work is underpinned with a binary position of religion versus the secular; of metaphysical claims against non-metaphysical ones. I want to show that the constraints of defining religion in secular terms presumes religious values to be speculative and therefore as less real than the materiality of other concepts. I want to show that Habermas implicitly suggests that religious reasoning and viewpoints are intrinsically and diametrically opposed to secular reasoning and it is only with the condition of institutional translation proviso that they are relevant in the legislative domain. This is based on a certain definition of religion and is neither based on a sociologically unified political formation nor on a singular religious logic (Mahmood 2009). This dichotomy of characterising religion as such is based on an a priori epistemological assumption of the nature of religion. Continue reading →

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When the Consumer Becomes the Consumed

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Jerry Mander is founder and distinguished fellow of the International Forum on Globalization, and was called “patriarch of the anti-globalization movement” by the New York Times. His early career was as president of a commercial ad agency, and then later, non-profit political advertising with Public Media Center, which concentrated on environmental and anti-war work. His previous books include Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television (1978), In the Absence of the Sacred (1991), The Case Against the Global Economy (1996), and Alternatives to Economic Globalization (2002). This article is reprinted from Chapter 10 of his new book, The Capitalism Papers: Fatal Flaws of an Obsolete System (Copyright © 2012 by Jerry Mander).

Is advertising legal? Most people agree that it is an uninvited intrusion into our lives and our minds, an invasion of privacy. But the fact that we can be aware of this without being furious, and that we do little to change the situation, is a good measure of our level of submission. There is a power relationship in advertising that is rarely, if ever, looked at, and yet it is a profoundly corrupt one. Some speak; others listen.

A. J. Liebling famously said, “Freedom of the press is guaranteed, but only if you own one.” Freedom of speech is also guaranteed. But only if you have a few million dollars for an effective media strategy. Soapbox oratory doesn’t sway the public anymore. But the powers of advertising go well beyond the amount of money spent. The true power is in the nature of moving-image media, projected for hours every day into human brains. It’s a form of intrusion we have never before in history had to face. Even now in the Internet age, the powers of television and advertising are undiminished and insufficiently examined or discussed.

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Ibn al-Jawzi: Having High Aspirations

Abdur Rahmān ibn al-Jawzī was born in 508 A.H. He was a profound scholar, orator and a prolific writer in tafsīr, hadith, history, and literary criticism. My first encounter with his writings was when I studied the Arabic anthology entitled Mukhtārāt min Adab al-‘Arab. Below is a translation of that very same passage taken from Ibn al-Jawzi’s book entitled Ṣayd al-Khātir.

May Allah grant us all the ability to achieve our optimum potential.

Shazad Khan   Continue reading →

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UK Riots: The Need for Religion

The recent riots that took the whole of the UK by surprise was not simply a race riot. Yes, Duggan was black and there are strong correlations between race and class but skin colour had nothing to do with the looting. Some of the worst violence happened in majority-white-neighbourhoods like Croydon. There is something deeper that caused this havoc and it includes all groups: black, white and brown. Continue reading →