A Better Day, Woo-Hoo! (& Alhamdulilah)

Y’all know I’ve been doing a lot of homework lately on all sorts of fronts ranging from the personal to the familial related to the relationship and faith based. One of the biggest questions I’ve had to answer is: What does it mean to be a Muslim?

And I’ve not been able to define the essence of it until this very moment. I think a part of my struggle is because being a Muslimah - in terms of the foundation I am about to mention - is such an integral part of me that I don't think of it as an element of Islam, but rather of my own identity, when it is in fact *the* very essence of Islam from which all else stems.

When I began attempting to answer this question, I found myself mired in the outward expressions of Islam: salaah, syam, zakaat. (Respectively: prayer, fasting, charity.). Granted, these are among the five pillars, these are roots of living life as a Muslim, but today I realized these rest on an essential foundation...

The basis: Spirituality
This essential foundation upon which a Muslim stands and from which the other four pillars are derived: It is to be a believer. It is to believe that ‘There is no God but God and his final messenger is the Prophet Muhammad’.

This is the essence of being a Muslim. This is what it means when we declare ‘I am a Muslim’.

It is not A belief, but rather: It is Belief and it is to be a believer.

It is not a statement that one says lightly, it is not a sentiment said in order to appease other Muslims, it is Belief which sits in one’s heart. It becomes the essence of you; it becomes your heart.

If Islam were Monopoly, ‘There is no God but God and his final messenger is the Prophet Muhammad’ would be ‘GO’.

Before the 'rules' were revealed to Muhammad (pbuh), rules which defined and organised the 'Ummah' (nation) - such as fair trade in commerce, how to write a will, how to treat your wife, how to raise your children, how to treat the environment and animals, how to behave toward women, children and elderly in a time of war, what sorts of manners to possess etc. - it was the spiritual that was the message Allah sent through him. The message of spirituality as it is manifest in belief and worship of Him, the one sole God.

Muslims say: Allahu Akbar and this to English has been translated as “God is Great” when it should, in fact be “God is Greater”. The Arabic of “God is Great”, is actually Allahu Kabeer.

This is a critical distinction for to say that “God is Great” is lovely, but to say that “God is Greater” is true.
“God is Greater…than what?”
“God is Greater…than everything.”

A true Believer, when he sees and is impressed with the wealth of a man, will remember that the wealth he sees is nothing compared to the wealth possessed by God, because “God is greater”. The temporal becomes exactly what it is: worldly.

Finally, it is to believe that the Quran is the final revelation. As Muslims, we believe that in this book sit the words of God. It is neither the magnum opus of a man named Muhammad nor is it the human interpretation of God’s message, but rather it is His message.

The way of a Muslim is defined in this very Quran. And if the Quran was a part of Monopoly, my friends, it would be the dice that you throw. Only lucky for us that it is everything but random.

And so what does the above foundation then mean in terms of being a Muslim? It means we are the diplomats of the Quran. It means that we not compare ourselves with the Muslim who steals resources from the poor, but rather the Muslim who refuses to do so. We are the diplomats of the Quran and of its message and its ethics and morals and manners and in our treatment of others, of our wives and sisters and husbands and children and communities, of those we are at war with and those we come into peace with. It is the pursuit of knowledge and it is the texture of our lives.

For those of you interested in learning more, Yusuf Islam (formerly known as Cat Stevens) here articulates beautifully the steps of his own journey. Consider this brain food and take the time to feed your mind and expand your knowledge and heart.

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PHEEEE-YEW! And now that this is clear in my mind and my heart, the rest of my life can flow and follow naturally and at a pace that will not exhaust me nor hurt me...and I'm gonna chill out a little and relax and enjoy life and all of it's wonderful expressions and trappings. Right now, I'm going to go for a swim!

I need something flaky. Someone please post a picture of something pretty and sparkly. Preferrably in pink.