2001-August-10

The Muslim Journal

Justice In Islam: How Close Are We Muslims To Western Democracy? Part 6

Imam W. Deen Mohammed

(Imam W. Deen Mohammed gave the following address on June 16, 2001, in Detroit, Mich., at Orchestra Hall.)

They had tribal gods that   divided   tribe against tribe. Some of us want to make these great classical religions of Christianity and Islam as tribal religions.

We want to divide the Muslim community up into tribes, with one tribe following this idea of Islam and another one following that idea of Islam. One church follows this idea of Christianity, and another follows that idea of Christianity. And there are bitter rivals, with one hating to see the other advance.

One is backbiting the other and putting down the other and undermining the other. They will make a whole sermon just on discrediting somebody else or some other religious leader or religious order. We are in bad shape. But if we could come back to the main ideas, we could have a beautiful work.

We have in common with Christians and this great society a belief in man as a special creation of G-d and that every man is given by his G-d excellence of creation, an honorable creation, a noble birth. And we have an inherent will that the world did not give us. There is a will in us that G-d created us with. We ignore it, and the world can blind us to it. But one day, it is going to rise up somewhere in somebody and make things come back to where they are suppose to be.

We believe in that inherent will. And we believe that G-d created man's material substance as a bow and his spirit as an arrow. His material substance, one day, will get tired of suffering and going the wrong way, and his own material matter is going to pull back and strain the spirit and fire a desire out as an arrow. It will show you the way to go home.

The Indians use to fire an arrow to tell the rest of them where they were going. The one appointed would shoot an arrow as far as he could in the direction they were suppose to go in. And all of them would see where the arrow went and they would go in that direction. After they got to the arrow, they would fire an arrow again to keep them going in the direction they were supposed to go in.

The one bow does not fire just one arrow. It fires two arrows that are going to one aim or one destination. The two arrows are the human spirit that G-d created us with and the Spirit of G-d in us. G-d did not create us with a human spirit, without His Spirit also being there.

That is why the human spirit is so powerful. G-d is always there with it. The power in your human spirit is Almighty G-d. He's there just waiting on you to accept the better part of yourself and to love and respect that better part of your own self. Once you accept your better life and respect it, G-d comes into the spirit with you and joins you. And your effort, then, is not just your effort. Your effort is also Divine Effort; your effort is G-d's Effort.

In our Holy Book, it says "they were seen fired in one direction going to the same objective or same aim. Two arrows fired from one and the same bow." It means that man strains inside to take his life forward. That straining is like pulling back the bow, and it fires his will and spirit. When it fires, it is not only his will and spirit, it is also G-d's Will.

If we can wake up to believe that and accept that, we will never feel hopeless ever again. How can we feel hopeless or helpless, if we believe what that is saying? That G-d has created us but not to be alone. He created us to have a will as humans, and that will is so powerful until it can defeat the world. But G-d will not leave that will to battle the world by itself. His Will is right there with you, working with you, to see you succeed.

Allah said to Muhammed: "I am closer to you than your own jugular vein in the neck that carries blood to the brain. And Allah says to Muhammed: "When My servants call on Me pleading, 'Oh G-d, help me,' tell them I am near." Some of us when we get in trouble will yell like G-d is 50 light years up above in the sky, and we don't know that He is right here. Allah said to Muhammed: "I hear the caller when he calls."

In another place Allah G-d says: "I hover between a mortal and his heart." Your
mortal life, your consciousness being alive, etc., your flesh body your senses as matter and material and your heart that registers pain and kindness, of that G-d says He hovers between the two. Your heart troubles you, and your flesh troubles you — two kinds of trouble. There can be a lot of trouble in my body, and yet my heart is feeling good.

So G-d says He hovers between the two. Hover is to say that He is invisible, like a spirit. He is not matter. A bird hovers. It is anything that can float on or ride the air, to stay above. So He is riding the air between your mortal concerns and your spiritual concerns, and He is just that close.

G-d is closer to your heart than you are, and He is closer to your mortal flesh and blood body than you are. He is inside you, just waiting on you to wake up and respond properly. This is the idea that Christianity has, Judaism has and Islam has in common. Perhaps some other religions have it, too.

I've mentioned before that Master Fard was an "outsider," a man of another race from outside of America. But that man introduced to the poorest of this city and to the most uneducated of this city a belief that Islam is "freedom, justice and equality."

To be continued.