An Open Letter to Bill Maher
By Dr Abidullah Ghazi
Chicago , IL
Dear Mr. Bill Maher,
Greetings! I have a certain familiarity with you and your habitual articulation of politically incorrect opinions in your satirical commentaries, the frankness of which I cannot but admire. And while I may not be your biggest fan, you have much higher ratings among my American-born children.
My name is Abidullah Ghazi and I am the founder and executive director of IQRA’ International Educational Foundation, an Islamic trust that develops curricula and educational material for Muslim children living in the West. I am a naturalized American citizen (and have been for more than forty years) who happens to be of Indian origin.
I heard you recently on CNN spelling out your alarm that the name “Muhammad” has become the most popular name given to newborns in Britain. You somehow are afraid that the Muslim birthrate may result in a cultural change in the country that we Americans have, perhaps, the closest relation with. While it appears that you don’t have any worries that “Muhammad” may overtake “Michael” in America, such fears are daily expressed by Islamophobes of a variety of stripes. It is very distressing for me as a liberal persuasionto hear that someone like you, with your freethinking background and outspoken humanism, should now lend your weight to such an irrational bigotry.
The Muslim citizens of the United States and Europe are today victims of the same disinformation that brutalized others yesterday. While it is political suicide to equate Blacks with high crime rates and career-wrecking to state that Jews are hardly an “oppressed minority,” Islam and Muslims are fair game for very public reproach.
We are the only group that is daily profiled by both the right and left in the national media and in public forums. This prolific and media-sanctioned eruption Islamophobia has made the lives of most Muslim children, who are American citizens by birth, very difficult. Several children are now forced to home-schooling or choose Islamic schools, which are blooming due to difficulties faced by Muslim children in public schools. Muslims are, like the Jewish community earlier, changing their names to secure a job. Such statements as yours would make life for more and more American and European Muslims difficult, or even unsustainable. While I advise you to become more watchful in your utterances, I wish to clarify two points here: the name “Muhammad” and this inordinate fear of some kind of Muslim takeover of the West.
“Muhammad” is the given name of Prophet of Islam; this you surely must know. Its literal meaning is “Much-praised.” When this name “Muhammad” was given by his grandfather Abdul Muttalib, it was an uncommon and unheard name. People asked him why he chose such a curious name for his grandson, to which Abdul Muttalib replied, “You know it means ‘Much-praised;’ I want my grandson to be praised by all.” It was, perhaps beyond Abdul Muttalib’s imagination this name would become the most popular name in the world ever after. In this light, what’s happening in the United Kingdom these days is of no big surprise.
According to Islamic tradition, any given name should have a beautiful meaning, for the Prophet Muhammad once said, “Give your children pleasing names, for they will surely grow in them.” In many Muslim traditions, family names are very often comprised of four parts and “Muhammad” is most often one of them for boys. For most Muslims what name could be better and more blessed than that of “Muhammad?” A Muslim parent’s hope would be for this name to become an aspiration for a child to follow the footsteps of the Prophet and grow as a messenger of compassion to all humanity.
Another reason for the popularity of this name among Muslims is based on faith in the Hereafter, where, according to Islamic beliefs, all humanity will be judged for their deeds. On that day the name of “Muhammad” can be of special help, for an Islamic tradition states, “God will call all humanity by name to come forward for accounting. When the name Muhammad is called all those named so will arise. As the Prophet was forgiven all his sins before he became a Prophet and after, he will be admitted to the mercy of God and to Paradise; then all those who would be standing with him will also receive the same divine mercy and a privilege to be with him.” For a believer what could be a better name in this world and the next?
In the Qur’an God promises to the Prophet:
“And have we not raised you high in honor?”
(Inshirah 94:4)
So every child named Muhammad, parents believe, may share this honor from God.
So Mr. Maher, I truly hope you can understand that naming a child “Muhammad” is not an act of rejecting of Western society – or a sign of extremism or terrorism -- but rather an affirmation of their faith in the Prophet Muhammad’s legacy of mercy and peace.
As for your apprehensions of an “Islamic takeover” I would advise you to look at the broad canvas of the fourteen hundred years of Islamic history. You will come to see a very different Islam than the one force-fed by the media. You will see the treatment of non-Muslims based upon the Qur’anic injunctions and the traditions of the Prophet which provide legal guarantees and freedoms to all religions, with places of worship legally protected. You will see an Islamic society extremely diversified in race, ethnicity, language, culture and even religious temperament. Islam is a religion of humanity and the principle of human oneness in diversity is unequivocally affirmed by the Qur’an itself:
O mankind! We created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that you may know each other (not that you may despise each other). Verily the most honored of you in the sight of God is (he who is) the most righteous of you.
Surah al-Hujurat 49:13
The freedom of religions was not only guaranteed by the Qur’an, it was practiced by Muslims in history. Every Muslim land, compared to the Western world, has been a mosaic of diversity; Istanbul is the headquarters of the Greek Orthodox Church and Muslim rule of 1000 years in India did not even make them a majority in their metropolises or capitals. In Islam diversity is a norm desired and created by God Himself, so it must be accepted:
To each among you have We prescribed a Law and an Open Way. If Allah had so willed, He would have made you a single People, but (His plan is) to test you in what He has given you; so strive as in a race in all virtues.
Al-Ma’idah 5:48
Muslims have a record of defending churches, synagogues, temples and places of religion and culture. It is also a historical fact that even in recent history all major crimes against humanity were committed by Western nations. Where are Muslims in this scenario except fighting aggression, oppression, occupation and battling for their survival?
As against the rich diversity of Muslim lands, immigration of Muslims and other religious and ethnic minorities in Europe and America is a recent and growing phenomenon. In the present global village and pluralistic society, fearing each other and having phobias about one another does not help. Four hundred years of colonization and westernization has transformed world society, for Muslim and non-Muslim, alike. Streams of immigrants are now transforming western societies. The United States, a happy marriage of fifty states living under the same rule of law, has been an inspiration for my former country India and the world. Now that our melting pot is a great laboratory of diversity, let us enjoy it and promote it. The European Union has opened the floodgates of diversity and interaction. We cannot think in colonial terms any more or follow narrow nationalistic or religious divisions. We must cultivate acceptance of diversity and co-existence.
I want to leave your other concerns for the time being and raise another issue with you. You are afraid of the future of England with increasing numbers of Muslims. The West and Christianity had 500 years to evangelize, convert, civilize and modernize the world: it is still the most powerful in all resources: media, military, commerce, technology and finance. Muslims in general and immigrants in particular have very little of these. Would it then not be more likely that the civilization that has taught the world, Muslims included, wearing torn jeans and tattered sneakers, could succeed in civilizing and absorbing in its melting pot, Muslims? After all we have Manjis, Numanis, and others whose Islam is acceptable to you. Perhaps you and the rightists fear that Islam is an idea that if presented properly would make sense and in this age of reason more people might appreciate it, if even not accept it?
I invite you to study the Islamic position on all the issues with which you have concerns, but be careful in case you find them logical, rational and relevant!
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