{"id":1433,"date":"2024-04-26T09:01:59","date_gmt":"2024-04-26T08:01:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/?p=1433"},"modified":"2024-04-26T13:33:20","modified_gmt":"2024-04-26T12:33:20","slug":"the-art-of-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/?p=1433","title":{"rendered":"The Art of Community"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<style type=\"text\/css\">\n    p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center; font: 12.0px Baskerville; min-height: 14.0px}<br \/>\n    p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p3 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 2.0px 13.0px; text-align: center; text-indent: 13.0px; font: 12.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p4 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 30.0px; text-align: justify; font: 12.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p5 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 30.0px; text-align: justify; font: 12.0px Amiri; min-height: 21.0px}<br \/>\n    p.p6 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 8.0px 13.0px; text-align: center; text-indent: 13.0px; line-height: 16.8px; font: 12.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p7 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 2.0px 13.0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 13.0px; font: 12.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p8 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 14.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p9 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 13.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p10 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 2.0px 0.0px; text-align: right; font: 12.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p11 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 30.0px; text-align: justify; font: 13.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p12 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 2.0px 13.0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 13.0px; font: 12.0px Amiri; min-height: 21.0px}<br \/>\n    p.p13 {margin: 3.0px 0.0px 0.0px 13.0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 13.0px; font: 14.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    p.p14 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Amiri; color: #0000fe}<br \/>\n    p.p15 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: left; font: 12.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    span.s1 {font: 12.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    span.s2 {font: 12.0px 'Adobe Garamond Pro'}<br \/>\n    span.s3 {font: 12.0px AGAArabesqueSE}<br \/>\n    span.s4 {direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: bidi-override}<br \/>\n    span.s5 {font: 13.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    span.s6 {font: 11.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    span.s7 {font: 10.0px Amiri}<br \/>\n    span.s8 {color: #ff0000}<br \/>\n    span.s9 {color: #000000}<br \/>\n    span.s10 {text-decoration: underline}<br \/>\n    span.s11 {letter-spacing: 0.1px}<br \/>\n    span.Apple-tab-span {white-space:pre}<br \/>\n  <\/style>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h1 class=\"p2\"><strong><a name=\"_Toc3e3b6cee\"><\/a>The Art of Community<\/strong><\/h1>\n<h2 class=\"p3\"><strong><a name=\"_Toc4e354677\"><\/a><i>Zakat<\/i>\u00a0and <i>Awqaf<\/i> in the future of Islam in England<a name=\"FootnoteRef1\"><\/a><\/strong><a href=\"#Footnote1\"><sup>1<\/sup><\/a><\/h2>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p4\">\u201c<i>He has laid down the same deen for you as He enjoined on Nuh: that which We have revealed to you and which We enjoined on Ibrahim, Musa and \u2018Isa: \u2018Establish the deen and do not make divisions in it.\u2019 What you call the idolators to follow is very hard for them. Allah chooses for Himself anyone He wills and guides to Himself those who turn to Him<\/i>.\u201d (Surat ash-Shura 42:13)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"p6\"><b><i>Establish the deen and do not make divisions in it.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">At the beginning there is genuine wonder that there <i>is<\/i> anything whatsoever rather than nothing at all. Wonder is the beginning of philosophy, but gradually it turns into \u201cI wonder what? how? why?\u201d That leads to the cataloguing of existence \u2013 think of Linnaeus and his classification system for plants, and the work of Darwin, think of the detailing of the picture of the physical elements and so on, and the mapping and naming of the stars and galaxies. The next step is that the cataloguing becomes subject to our need to use the world, itself the result of our seeing the world as something to be used. That gives us the modern technological world. When we talk about technology in this sense, it is not about the machines and gadgets, for they are neither here nor there. But it is about man and society become machine, with a contrary trajectory of machine being brought to converge with humanity. Governance, medicine, education and policing have become automated ways of processing human beings to produce something.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\"><!--more-->This came about within the Judaeo-Christian world, which contributes its own essential elements to the tale. The Judaeo part gave the picture of the Divine as remote and austere, above the heavens, at the beginning and the end of creation, but nowhere to be seen in the present. In that present on the basis of an already demanding <i>shari\u2018a<\/i>\u00a0the rabbis proliferated rituals and laws, and then they found clever ways to circumvent the laws, particularly when it came to usury. Banking was born, but more importantly fiat money, a genuinely new religion, the idea that money could be invented out of nothing.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">The Christian part came about with the appearance of \u2018Isa, peace be upon him, who as a Messenger lightened the burden of the Mosaic <i>shari\u2018a<\/i>, for which the rabbis hated him as they had made an idol out of law and ritual. He also brought a wisdom, which almost vanished in the Greco-mix that was Paul\u2019s formulation, whose appalling contribution here was the god-man thesis, may Allah forgive us for mentioning it. It formed the modern subject, the being who gazes on the world of objects imperially and catalogues them and uses them, until paradoxically they turn back on him and use him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Then the Messenger of Allah appears, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, with the Book and the Wisdom, the <em>H<\/em><i>ikma<\/i>. Ibn Juzayy says in his <i>tafsir<\/i> that <i>Hikma<\/i>\u00a0itself is knowledge and <i>\u2018aql<\/i>,<a name=\"FootnoteRef2\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote2\"><sup>2<\/sup><\/a> and we would do well not to translate this latter too facilely as intellect. Its locus is the heart. He says that when in the Book <i>Hikma<\/i> is coupled with the Book, it means the Sunna. What some have turned into a sort of Judaic ritual and law is itself wisdom. Thus Islam reconciles <i>shari\u2018a<\/i>\u00a0and wisdom which were, unnecessarily, split and divided between the Jews and the Christians.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p8\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc67d118e2\"><\/a><\/span><b>Nihilism<\/b><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Nihilism is life drained of meaning. A useful dictum to take with us on our journey today is Carl Schmitt\u2019s definition of nihilism as \u201cthe separation of order and location,\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef3\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote3\"><sup>3<\/sup><\/a> to which Abu Bakr Rieger added a third term: time.<a name=\"FootnoteRef4\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote4\"><sup>4<\/sup><\/a> ISIS was a manifestation of an order in a location but with a disconnect from the age. To be free of nihilism an order needs to have a location and to be of its age.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Thus, the Internet is an order but without location. A number of countries today experience the opposite: they are locations without order. Originally when writing this I suggested that Somalia and Lebanon have been examples of that at various times in recent history. However, the work of Dr. Matthew Gordon in researching Somaliland\u2019s apparent anarchy forced me to revise my understanding:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p4\">\u2026I developed a sense that Somaliland had a story to tell that was buried beneath the existing literature, one that wasn\u2019t a simple story of peacebuilding and state-building, but of improvised, decentralised governance that looks very different to how a state functions, yet works despite (or, rather, because of) this statelessness. It was then that I decided to pursue a PhD, where I investigated the mechanics of how Somaliland\u2019s non-state governance operates.<a name=\"FootnoteRef5\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote5\"><sup>5<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"p7\">If the apparent anarchy of Somaliland is far from what it seems and is in fact a sophisticated and very workable inter-relationship between clans, tribes and families, and if, in an earlier moment in Lebanese history with the collapse of the government, the society continued to function very effectively without a state, then we must look further for our example of location without order. Given the concern of the greatest of the Western tradition with this matter, Turgenev, Dostoyevsky, Nietzsche, Heidegger and Schmitt et al, and their recognition of nihilism within our culture, then the precise dislocation between order and location I leave the reader to reflect on.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">The community of meaning needs a location and not merely to be a digital community, although perhaps there is no way to escape having some part in the digital.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p8\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc303ec53b\"><\/a><\/span><b>Community<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/b><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">First of all, community is fractal in nature and can denote everything from the smallest most inconspicuous grouping to the umma itself.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">The root of community is \u2018common\u2019, and it connects to other words such as communicate. \u2018Commune\u2019 as a verb means a very close and intimate kind of communication, but as a noun in France and Denmark and elsewhere, means a local unit of government underneath the state. What we hold in common gives community. Later we will come to look at the <i>awqaf<\/i> which bear a striking resemblance to the old institution of the commons, which were so whittled away and finally devoured by the state and by capitalism, just as was the case with the <i>awqaf<\/i>. We might extend this thinking to the Internet, which some might consider all that is left of community for many today, and which legally we think is a perfect case for being a commons rather than the feeding ground of capitalists. We would have to consider the mosque, which is or ought to be a waqf, and the marketplace is a waqf in the <i>shari\u2018a<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">In some sense, all that is earth. In heavenly terms, we hold language and meanings in common. And the philosopher Ibrahim Lawson makes a strong case for regarding community as the sharing of meanings \u2013 and remember that meaning can be of this worldly life life or the next, of the visible world or the unseen, of the high or the low, of the material or the spiritual \u2013 and on the basis of that he posits the idea of the learning community.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">At the base of the issue is the balance between individual freedom and the common good, one of the oldest matters that challenged the human intellect. But deeper still there is the relation between the One and the many, between unity and multiplicity, themes that have exercised human thinking since the beginning, and still do. Scientific thinking is an implicit articulation of the unity in the creation inasmuch as it expects and assumes that the same \u2018laws\u2019 operate at every level of the creation far and wide.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc3d236e7f\"><\/a><\/span>Gestell and the standing reserve<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">And yet, although we acknowledge the sense of unity, our universal experience is also of the multiplicity of beings. For the purposes of our thinking today, this issue of the individual and the community is the one that is germane. At some times, particularly times of great anarchy, people themselves have called for a despot and surrendered some of their individual freedom thinking that to be for the common good. At other times, such as our own, people seem to prefer the anarchy of democracy, the endless debate and argument. Hajja Aisha Bewley makes a formidable case for the Islamic paradigm, Amirate and <i>shura<\/i>, resolving this seeming conundrum.<a name=\"FootnoteRef6\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote6\"><sup>6<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc553bbdde\"><\/a><\/span>Amirate and Shura<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Amirate is not despotism but it does entail one man being in charge, taking responsibility and deciding. To balance that there is <i>shura<\/i>-counsel, which will include different voices at different times including the <i>fuqaha\u2019<\/i>, traders \u2013 in issues that involve their expertise, women \u2013 in issues that particularly pertain to them, and so on. <i>Shura<\/i> is not a fixed body of people, and it is not democratic in the sense that people\u2019s <i>opinions<\/i> are important, but that knowledge of different matters are to be found in different parts of the community at different times and in different circumstances, and the Islamic community is founded on knowledge. Al-Qurtubi cites the <i>mufassir<\/i> Ibn \u2018Atiyyah as holding that if an amir does not seek counsel, it is sufficient reason to remove him from office, even though he is not bound to follow the counsel he is given.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">The pre-eminence of knowledge being the case, then in the continuance of community in time the position of education is vital.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p8\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Tocdf1cc59\"><\/a><\/span><b>Education<\/b><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Returning to our theme of the \u2018learning community\u2019 whose essence is in the sharing of meaning, while the word \u2018community\u2019 has a particular present sense, it must also have, as part of its gestalt, time. A community whose raison d\u2019\u00eatre is to share meaning is then able to transmit meaning to the following generations. This is a completely different transaction from modern education, which is something \u2018done\u2019 to younger people in order to gain them admittance to the world of careers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Transmission here must include the crafts, skills and professions needed for life which are ordinarily transmitted in lived situations in circumstances such as apprenticeships; the wisdom skills of being persons in relation to other persons of different age, sex, race, language, colour, religion and culture transmitted in lived behaviour in the family and beyond; as well as the sciences and knowledges of the <i>din<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Regrettably transmission has been consigned to the technological processing of people we call education, whether \u2018Islamic\u2019<a name=\"FootnoteRef7\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote7\"><sup>7<\/sup><\/a> or not, and we don\u2019t know which is more disastrous.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">We have three terms that are translated as education: <i>ta\u2019deeb, ta\u2019leem, <\/i>and <i>tarbiya.<\/i><a name=\"FootnoteRef8\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote8\"><i><sup>8<\/sup><\/i><\/a><i><span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<h4 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Tocbc5cdd4\"><\/a><\/span><i>Ta\u2019deeb<\/i><\/h4>\n<p class=\"p7\">The first, <i>ta\u2019deeb,<\/i> is the transmission of adab, a wonderful word meaning courtesy, which is not the same as good manners \u2013 not in themselves a bad thing, discipline, and even literature. Adab can only be transmitted by people who have it; it can\u2019t be taught.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h4 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc7ceb266d\"><\/a><\/span>Ta\u2018leem<\/h4>\n<p class=\"p7\">The second term is the one that today we think of almost exclusively as the meaning of education, the transmission of knowledge and the sciences. And therein lies the rub, because <i>\u2018ilm<\/i> is thought of both as knowledge and methodical science, but the truth is that the latter has come to dominate our understanding. Even the <i>\u2018ulum, <\/i>as in the famous <i>Ihya\u2019 \u2018ulum ad-Din<\/i> of Imam al-Ghazali, usually translated as &#8216;The Revival of the Sciences of the Deen&#8217;,<i> <\/i>we think of as sciences, and would not translate them as \u2018knowledges\u2019. Imam Malik, however, trenchantly said: \u201cKnowledge is a light which Allah places wherever He wishes; it is not a great deal of narration.\u201d And he said this while perhaps being THE master of narration, the one upon whom al-Bukhari and Muslim and the authors of the canonical collections relied. He said this at the moment when the \u2018science\u2019 of narration was coming into existence and the practice of narrating hadith voluminously was taking the shape in which we think of it today. But let us content ourselves with the idea of knowledge as a light that must be transmitted, and which can only be transmitted by those possessing that light.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc6d34c7d\"><\/a><\/span>Fiqh<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">We have fiqh, which we wrongly think of as jurisprudence, but which in Arabic means understanding. Imam Abu Hanifah astutely posited that <i>\u2018ilm al-kalam<\/i>, the science of <i>iman<\/i>, is the greater fiqh, <i>al-fiqh al-akbar<\/i>, the title of the book he wrote on the matter. Ibn Juzayy said that <i>tasawwuf<\/i> is the fiqh of the inner. Sayyiduna Mu\u2018awiya, may Allah be pleased with him, narrated that the Messenger of Allah, peace be upon him, said: \u201cFor whomever Allah wishes good He gives him fiqh-understanding of the <i>din<\/i>.\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef9\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote9\"><sup>9<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc1a5e722d\"><\/a><\/span>Tarbiya<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Our last term is perhaps the most germane: <i>tarbiya<\/i>, again ordinarily translated as \u2018education\u2019, it is fostering the growth of another being, something almost entirely absent from our so-called educational systems today. Now, faced with the collapse of modern educational systems, we must not think of our task as having to erect a new more perfect system. In \u2018Umar\u2019s famous advice on upbringing of young people that it comprises playing with children for seven (years), teaching them for seven, and taking them as companions for seven, the two worse things we can do is to lay the responsibility of this entirely on the shoulders of the parents or, alternatively, to create an educational system of professionals. This is the duty of the community. In the <i>Republic<\/i>, Socrates envisaged a society where every adult would look on every child as potentially theirs and every child could look on every adult as their own parent. The traditional saying that it takes a whole village to raise one child is entirely apposite here.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">All of this must be born in mind for the time-based existence of community across generations. The Osmanli arguably made it the very motor of their khalifate, in the guilds and <i>akhi<\/i> organisations which were centred on <i>futuwwa<\/i>, the cultivation of brave, noble and generous qualities of character in young people.<a name=\"FootnoteRef10\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote10\"><sup>10<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p8\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc3402fb20\"><\/a><\/span><b> The Art of Community<\/b><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Wrongly we think of art as something to do with aesthetics. Iain Thomson, a noted Heideggerian, observed that art is about <i>what<\/i> <i>is<\/i> and <i>what<\/i> <i>matters<\/i>. The artist is concerned with creativity, and in that he is involved with the Divine name <i>al-Khaliq<\/i> \u2013 the Creator.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Although we must admit creativity to be, both in the case of artists and scientists, 5% inspiration and 95% perspiration, nevertheless without the inspiration nothing happens, but equally, without exertion and work nothing will happen as well. The artist is in touch with the wellsprings of creativity and that has a secret. There is a moment in creativity in which something beyond the artist happens; it is not his doing, although it is not revelation, for that is only for the Prophets and Messengers.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">This can help us understand the technical as well. Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi, may Allah be pleased with him, said words to the effect that it is relatively straightforward to understand that Allah created the natural order, trees, mountains, rivers, birds and fish, but it is not so immediately obvious that He created the airplane and the computer. We would add to that the robot and AI. The problem for technical man is that he has already assumed the position of observer and subject in a world of objects but does not realise that he himself is the object of another Observer\u2019s knowledge and the instrument of another Actor\u2019s action. He does not realise that which Allah cites as the insight of Ibrahim, \u201c<i>He said, \u2018Do you worship something you have carved when Allah created both you and what you do?\u2019<\/i>\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef11\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote11\"><sup>11<\/sup><\/a> This the artist is in touch with. The artists of community must be in touch with it too. They are not \u2018making community\u2019 in some kind of manufacturing process \u2013 they are within a process that is not of their own origination but which they are also engaged in, and must work for: \u201c<i>man will have nothing but what he strives for.\u201d<\/i><a name=\"FootnoteRef12\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote12\"><i><sup>12<\/sup><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Not being a mechanical but a living organic process this needs first of all a seed or a grain. Grain is <i>habbah <\/i>in Arabic from the same root as <i>mahabbah<\/i> \u2013\u00a0love. These people, who are the grains from which this will grow, are the people of <i>futuwwa<\/i> \u2013 the noble qualities of character, and those who love each other for the sake of Allah. The growth of community is the growth of that love.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">\u2018Ubadah ibn as-Samit narrated that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said that Allah, exalted is He, said, \u201cThose who love each other for My sake will be on minbars of light and the Prophets, <i>siddiqun<\/i> and <i>shuhada\u2019 <\/i>will envy them their position.\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef13\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote13\"><sup>13<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">But these grains need cultivation and nurturing, and they need the right setting and circumstances.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc2be50b82\"><\/a><\/span>Khalq \u2013\u00a0creating \u2013\u00a0creation<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\"><i>Khalq<\/i> means \u2018creating\u2019 as much as it means \u2018creation\u2019. Allah is the Ever-creating \u2013 <i>al-Khallaq<\/i><a name=\"FootnoteRef14\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote14\"><sup>14<\/sup><\/a> \u2013 as much as He is <i>al-Khaliq <\/i>the Creator. The <i>Khallaq<\/i> is the One Who creates ceaselessly, again and again, just as other words of similar form denote ceaseless activity: the <i>Razzaq<\/i> is the Ceaseless Provider, the <i>Wahhab <\/i>the Endless giver of gifts, the <i>Ghaffar <\/i>\u2013 the Endlessly and repeatedly forgiving. Allah, exalted is He, is constantly engaged with His creation, and He is near, not remote above the heavens, whereas we it is who are far from Him. Shaykh Mustafa al-Alawi, may Allah be merciful to him, in his book on the use of the Divine name as a dhikr said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p4\">I note that the Master Abu Ishaq ash-Shatily has this to say in his book of <i>Analogies<\/i>:<i> <\/i>\u201cThe Qur\u2019an brought the message of Allah, exalted is He, to humanity and of humanity to Allah. As for the lesson when it brought the address of Allah, exalted is He, to humanity, it set it out with the vocative particle required by distance and invariably without curtailment, as in His saying:<i> \u2018O My slaves who believe, My earth is truly vast,\u2019 \u2018Say, \u201cO My slaves who squander themselves\u2026\u201d,\u2019 \u2018Say, \u201cO men, I am truly the Messenger of Allah to all of you,\u201d\u2019 \u2018O you who believe&#8230;\u2019<\/i>, and when it brings the address of mankind to Allah, exalted is He, it is invariably without the vocative particle because originally the vocative particle is for admonition and Allah is beyond admonition, and also most of the vocative particles are for distance, for example, \u2018<span class=\"s2\"><i>Ya<\/i><\/span> \u2013 O,\u2019 \u2013 and Allah, exalted is He, made clear that He is near, especially to the supplicant, in His saying: <i>\u201cAnd when My slaves ask you about Me, then, I am near,\u201d<\/i> and in general near to the creation, as in His saying: <i>\u201cThere are never three talking confidentially but He is the fourth of them, and not five but He is the sixth of them.\u201d<\/i> He said: <i>\u201cAnd We are closer to him than his jugular vein,\u201d<\/i> so they took admonition from this through the scholars, firstly in dropping the vocative particle, and secondly in consciousness of nearness.<a name=\"FootnoteRef15\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote15\"><sup>15<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"p7\">We have considered community itself and the art of it and must now come to the point of our talk\u2019s subtitle, <i>Zakah<\/i> and <i>Awqaf<\/i> in the future of Islam in England, but first locating ourselves in our time.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p8\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Tocd3ca88\"><\/a><\/span><b>Time<\/b><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Are we at the end of a glorious enterprise or are we at the beginning of a new?<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">That these are the end times is irrefutable since the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, was sent just before the Hour.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">It has been narrated of the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, that he said, \u201c<b>I was sent just before the Hour<\/b> with the sword until you worship Allah alone without partner. And my provision has been put in the shade of my lance,<a name=\"FootnoteRef17\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote17\"><sup>17<\/sup><\/a> and humiliation and ignominy have been placed on those who oppose my order, and whoever resembles a people is one of them.\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef18\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote18\"><sup>18<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">He said, \u201cI was sent just before the Hour\u2026\u201d These are the last times and have been since his coming, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. And yet since then we have had great Muslim dawlahs, the Rashidun, Bani Umayyah, Bani al-\u2018Abbas, and the Osmanli and many other amirates, sultanates and kingdoms. It being the end times doesn\u2019t mean that there are not more dawlahs yet to come, indeed entire civilisations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">In the hadith of Abu Dawud about the Mahdi it is clear that he arrives after the death of a khalifah:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p4\">Abu Dawud also published \u2026 from Umm Salamah, that he, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said, &#8220;<b>There will be disagreement at the death of a khalifah<\/b>, so a man from Madinah will come out fleeing to Makkah, and the people of Makkah will come to him and bring him out (as a claimant for the khalifate) against his will and swear allegiance to him between the Corner (of the Ka&#8217;bah in which the Black Stone is) and the Station (of Ibrahim).\u201d<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"p7\">It is a longer hadith but what is important is that there already is at that time a khalifah who dies, which precipitates the appearance of the Mahdi. Therefore this cannot be his time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">If we are right on the cusp of the Hour, the advice of the Prophet, peace be upon him, is in the famous hadith of the sapling.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p4\">Anas narrated that the Prophet, peace be upon him, said: \u201cIf the Hour arises while in the hand of any of you there is a sapling, then if he is able not to stand before planting it, he should plant it.\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef19\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote19\"><sup>19<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"p7\">If the sapling we plant is that of the tree of Islam, where should we establish it and the new civilisation? We should do it here wherever we are, but if we can\u2019t do it here, if it proves impossible, we\u2019ll go wherever we need to. Allah\u2019s earth is vast.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">So we approach the issues of <i>zakah<\/i> and <i>awqaf<\/i> from the intention of establishing the <i>din<\/i> where we are, here and now. Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi, may Allah be merciful to him, addressed the Muslims in the mosque of Slough and said words to the effect: \u201cYou say that you are very bad Muslims because you came here only for the <i>dunya<\/i>. But Allah brought you here by means of your seeking the <i>dunya<\/i> in order to establish the <i>din<\/i>.\u201d He went on to say that the secret of Muslim community is that we have no clerics, and no Church in the sense of a centrally directed body dictating <i>\u2018aqidah<\/i> and practice. Thus when Muslims arrived in the west, they said to themselves: \u201cThis is all Allah\u2019s earth and we are still obliged to pray,\u201d and so they prayed at their work, in their homes and wherever they could. Then they said: we ought to do it in <i>jama\u2018a<\/i>, and people would pray in whatever makeshift way they could with others. And naturally from this, they said: we need mosques where the <i>jama\u2018a<\/i>\u00a0can be established, and they brought those about. Now is the time for Islam to come out of the mosque into the society, and specifically into the marketplace, and to clean it up. Muslims will do that when they understand the <i>mu\u2018amalat<\/i> and what they mean about transacting in the world. No one will tell them to do it, but they will naturally do it when they understand it. And the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0and <i>awqaf<\/i> are two doorways into that.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p8\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc113c59a1\"><\/a><\/span><b><i>Zakat<\/i><\/b><\/h3>\n<h4 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc60e106e1\"><\/a><\/span>Infaq \u2013 giving out\/spending<\/h4>\n<p class=\"p7\">In the pivotal first <i>ayats<\/i> of Surat al-Baqarah Allah, exalted is He, defines the people for whom the Book is a guidance, the people of <i>taqwa<\/i>. The threefold delineation of <i>taqwa<\/i> there is that it comprises belief in the unseen, establishment of the <i>salah<\/i>, and giving out from whatever Allah provides one. He, exalted is He, does not couple <i>salah<\/i> with <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0but with <i>infaq<\/i> \u2013\u00a0giving out or spending, which is of a more general nature than <i>zakat<\/i>, even one\u2019s efforts and service to others, and a smile. It is not restricted to wealth.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Now we don\u2019t need community for them to give us something, but rather it is vital for us to have this giving in our lives, and we need others who understand that and who give out. It is simply not the same to use Western Union to transmit some funds to the other side of the world for the care of orphans, which is certainly not a bad thing to do, as it is to take care of the orphan in your community. As with Carl Schmitt\u2019s dictum we need to bring the order and the location together.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">First, let us disabuse ourselves of a common erroneous notion about <i>zakat<\/i>, that it is social welfare, or that, as some wrote, Islam was the first welfare state. Do not take consequences for purposes. <i>Zakat<\/i>\u00a0is an act of worship of Allah which has beneficial social and economic consequences. But similarly <i>salat<\/i>\u00a0and fasting have numerous benefits for our health, but that is not the reason we do them. And yes indeed, the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0is the right of the poor and the needy and the other categories too. The correct way, as with the <i>salat<\/i>, is as the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said about the prayer: \u201cPray as you saw me pray.\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef20\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote20\"><sup>20<\/sup><\/a> Muslims take great care of how they perform the prayer. Muslims also took care of <i>how<\/i> the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0was paid, but today it has been redefined as a personal charity like the charity of the Christians.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Second, <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0is not a miserable dole allowing the recipient to continue from one handout to the next. It can and should be something that can enable them to climb out of whatever form of poverty they have got enmeshed in.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc557ef57\"><\/a><\/span>Purification of wealth<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Like <i>salat<\/i>, <i>zakat<\/i> has its preconditions. <em>S<\/em><i>alat<\/i>\u00a0requires purification after using the toilet and then <i>wudu\u2019<\/i> and <i>ghusl<\/i> in their times. <i>Zakat<\/i> requires purification of the market and transactions, because as Abu Hurayra, may Allah be pleased with him, narrated, the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: \u201cAllah is pure (<i>tayyib<\/i>) and only accepts what is pure.\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef21\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote21\"><sup>21<\/sup><\/a> The <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0must be paid whatever the source of the wealth, but for its acceptance as an act of worship it must be pure. If it is not accepted by Allah, then the person paying <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0has only lost some wealth to no good end for himself.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc51244eec\"><\/a><\/span>Leadership<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Like the <i>salat<\/i>, the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0has an imam, a leader of the community who organises its collection and distribution. Originally the word \u2018imam\u2019 denotes the political leader, who was also the one who led the community in prayer and delivered the <i>khutba<\/i>. Naturally he must be someone of trustworthy character who is unlikely to feather his own nest with the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0or use it for ends that are not appropriate even if noble, such as building mosques. If he is openly untrustworthy in this respect, it is obligatory not to pay him the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0if it is possible to withhold it from him, and to pay it directly oneself. (But this is not the case if there are mere rumours and suspicions about him, as is all too often the case where money is involved.)<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc6023e7e2\"><\/a><\/span><i>Zakat<\/i>\u00a0Collectors<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">The leader appoints <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0collectors, whom Allah, exalted is He, mentions in the Noble Qur\u2019an as themselves being the third group who may legitimately receive some of the <i>zakat<\/i>. He says, exalted is He, \u201c<i>Zakat is for: the poor, the destitute, <\/i><b><i>those who collect it, <\/i><\/b><i>reconciling people\u2019s hearts, freeing slaves, those in debt, spending in the Way of Allah, and travellers. It is a legal obligation from Allah. Allah is All-Knowing, All-Wise.\u201d<\/i> (Surat at-Tawba 9:60) The <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0collector is a dynamic element. He is not there to pry into our circumstances. He must be knowledgeable and be able to help people work out what they have to pay. The modern Muslim is abandoned to his own resources and asking around on the Internet for guidance about how to pay his <i>zakat<\/i>. Moreover, the collector is best placed to know who is in need of <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0funds, whereas when people are left to distribute their own <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0it goes to various friends and relatives, not out of any bad intention but because there is a limit to how much knowledge we each have of who is in need.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc62f45fdf\"><\/a><\/span>The eight categories<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">Another reason for the importance of leadership is that there are eight categories of recipients and the leader has to make the decision as to which categories receive funds, and that is not a fixed proportion but dependent on circumstances. The individual cannot be expected to understand these issues and to distribute his own <i>zakah<\/i> appropriately.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Tocf7ce7b4\"><\/a><\/span>The local community<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">It is done locally, and if the needs of the local community have been addressed, any surplus may be transferred to nearby communities who are in need. It can\u2019t be sent across the earth to the poor of remote societies, except in exceptional circumstance as outlined by Imam Malik below, although that may certainly be done in the case of voluntary <i>sadaqah<\/i>.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p4\">Malik was asked where <i>sadaqa<\/i> (<em>zakat<\/em>) should be distributed. He replied, \u201cAmong the people of the land from which the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0is taken. If there is anything left over after that, it should be transported to the nearest land to them. If the people of all those surrounding lands and cities are without need, and the imam hears of dire need in another land, because drought or something like that has struck their land and decimated their herds, and he therefore sends some of the <i>zakah<\/i> to them, I would see that as the right thing to do, because the Muslims are there to help each other whenever they have need of each other.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">Ibn \u2018Abbas narrated that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, sent Mu\u2018adh to Yemen and said, &#8220;Invite the people to testify that there is no god but Allah and I am Allah&#8217;s Messenger, and if they obey you, then teach them that Allah has enjoined on them five prayers in every day and night, and if they obey you in that, then teach them that Allah has made it obligatory for them to pay the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0from their property \u2013 <b>and it is to be taken from their wealthy members and given to their poor<\/b><span class=\"s5\">\u00a0\u2013<\/span> <span class=\"s5\"><b><i>tu\u2019khadhu min aghniya\u2019ihim<\/i><\/b><\/span><b><i> <\/i><\/b><span class=\"s5\"><b><i>Wa turaddu \u2018ala fuqara\u2019ihim<\/i><\/b><\/span>.<span class=\"s5\">\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef22\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote22\"><sup>22<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p11\">Sufyan<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>narrates \u201cZakat was taken from ar-Rayy to al-Kufah, but \u2018Umar bin \u2018Abd al-\u2018Aziz ordered it taken back to ar-Rayy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p11\">\u2018Imran ibn Husayn, a Companion who became Muslim together with his father seven years after the Hijra, was appointed zakat officer at the time of the Umayyads. When he returned from his mission, he was asked \u201cWhere is the money?\u201d He replied, \u201cDid you send me to bring you money? I collected it the same way we used to at the time of the Messenger of Allah and distributed it the same way we used to.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p11\">Farqad as-Sabkhi, a contemporary of al-Hasan al-Basri, says, \u201cI took <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0due on my wealth to distribute it in Makkah. There I met Sa\u2018id ibn Jubayr.\u201d Ibn Jubayr said to me: \u201cTake it back and distribute it in your hometown.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p11\">This was the practice during the time of \u2018Umar ibn al-Khattab. Sa\u2018id ibn al-Musayyab says, \u201c\u2018Umar sent Mu\u2018adh as zakat officer to Bani Kilab or Bani<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Sa\u2018d. Mu\u2019adh went there, collected zakat and distributed all of it, leaving nothing. He came back in the same clothes that he went in.\u201d<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p11\">\u2018Umar was once asked what to do with the zakat collected from Bedouin Arabs. He answered, \u201cBy Allah, I will hand out the <i>sadaqa<\/i>\u00a0to them until each of them becomes the owner of a hundred camels, male or female.\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef23\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote23\"><span class=\"s1\"><sup>23<\/sup><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc1f222fd8\"><\/a><\/span>Individuals and not institutions<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\"><i>Zakat<\/i>\u00a0has been reframed as something given to institutions, whereas it is entirely for individuals in need and the other categories, all of which comprise individuals. Many institutions seek <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0funds eagerly, but they are not valid recipients of it. There is, however, an issue that is hard to deal with in a small presentation like this: to do justice to the institutions that we do have and to convert them into bridges to the correct way of doing things. There is no sense in them simply folding. But it is unacceptable that they continue as is.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p8\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc29577645\"><\/a><\/span><b>Awqaf<\/b><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p7\">One key matter was that the <i>awqaf<\/i> secured the independence of people of knowledge inasmuch as they were not paid from state funds nor were they at the mercy of market forces. The independence of people of knowledge is something sorely missing from the world today, East and West, among Muslims and non-Muslims. We see it in the entire academic and scientific realm. Pharmaceutical research is at the behest of great corporations whose interests are entirely commercial. In a society predicated on amirate and <i>shura<\/i>, the independence of people of knowledge of all stripes is a fundamental requisite, meaning they cannot counsel the amir honestly if they are dependent on him. Another important model for us in this respect was Timbuktu where the <i>fuqaha\u2019<\/i> were traders and thus independent through their trade from the amir and able to counsel him fearlessly. Indeed, the other immense benefit was that they embodied the fiqh of the <i>mu\u2018amalat<\/i> in their trade in the marketplace and helped ensured it was clean of usury and other types of wrong action.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">The second benefit is that <i>awqaf<\/i> secure property, not for the Muslims, but to the ownership of Allah dedicated to noble purposes, but effectively under the control of the Muslims and to their advantage.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">The third benefit is that <i>awqaf<\/i> create employment for the people appointed to administer them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">The fourth benefit is that <i>awqaf<\/i> are devoted to noble purposes such as medicine and education and general charitable ends, and even to the sustenance of one\u2019s own progeny<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>and others relieving them partially or entirely of the need to work for a living and enabling them to devote themselves to other higher ends.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Ibn Juzayy al-Kalbi says:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p4\">\u201cAs for the one for whom the <i>hubus<\/i> (<i>waqf<\/i>) is dedicated it is sound for it to be a person, or something else such as mosques and madrasahs, and it is sound that it be for someone who is alive and present and for someone not yet born, for someone specific and for someone unknown, for a Muslim and for a <i>dhimmi <\/i>[one of the people of the Book living under Muslim governance with a <i>dhimmah<\/i> contract of protection], for a near relative or for a non-relative.<span class=\"s7\">\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"p7\">Similarly with health. To have a health system beholden to corporate commercial interests is appalling as we saw in the recent pandemic. To have health at the mercy of market forces, such that only those with expensive life insurance can afford it, is inhuman. A great number of Osmanli <i>awqaf<\/i> were dedicated to hospitals and medical services for Muslims, for men, for women, for the people of the Book and so on.<a name=\"FootnoteRef24\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote24\"><sup>24<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">One of the most upsetting things I heard recently was that some mosques and madrasahs are supported by mortgages. Apart from that being an utterly forbidden usury contract, it also simply devours the wealth of the donors and in the end may well leave them without mosque or madrasah, as the interest payments devour the donations leaving nothing behind.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc5306d6a7\"><\/a><\/span>The &#8216;Third&#8217;<\/h3>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p7\">Our Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, told us: \u201cWhen a person dies his action is cut off except from three: except for an ongoing <i>sadaqa<\/i>, or knowledge that is benefitted from, or a right-acting child who supplicates for him.\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef25\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote25\"><sup>25<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"p7\">This ongoing <i>sadaqa<\/i>, the <i>sadaqa<\/i>\u00a0<i>jariya<\/i>, is dearly loved by earnest Muslims, and they often used it for <i>awqaf<\/i>.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p8\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc64da7592\"><\/a><\/span><b>Islam in England<\/b><\/h3>\n<h4 class=\"p9\"><span class=\"s1\"><a name=\"_Toc5794b237\"><\/a><\/span>The state<\/h4>\n<p class=\"p7\">We finally come to the point that perhaps ought to have bee approached first of all: Islam in England. You will notice that I did not say \u201cin Britain\u201d. This was for a reason. Britain or Great Britain or the United Kingdom are various names for the \u2018state\u2019 that was erected in these isles. When we talk about the state we do so denoting organs of government, corporations, and banks. They are a seamlessly integrated whole dedicated to making use of the earth and its resources in a way that cannot be sustained.<span class=\"s8\"><span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">We have allowed ourselves to be processed from life to death, and the latter seems increasingly likely to come about by some form of euthanasia, since the elderly are viewed as simply useless burdens on the community and increasingly view themselves as such.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Education has become an industrial process designed to manufacture a citizen who will fit into the work process, and produce goods and taxes. It is a form of indoctrination in the belief that material reality is all there is, and training in skills that will be useful to banks and corporations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Medicine has been redesigned as simply a process akin to taking a car to the garage for repair, whereas in every society it was originally about how to live a good and healthy life first and foremost before dealing with illness.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Policing has become the force containing the crime of poor people that necessarily arises from the increasingly insane division of wealth that the usurious society excels at, making one person preposterously wealthy, and millions constantly on the edge of survival. In other words, the police deal with the petty crime while ignoring the major crimes that produce petty crime as a side effect.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">We are concerned about Islam IN England, not about \u2018English Islam\u2019, just as the world recognises the distinctive character of Islam in China, Arabia, Africa and Turkey without it then becoming Chinese, Arabic, African or Turkish Islam. It is recognisably the same Islam in every case.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">Clearly a major concern for Islam in England would be for the English people. I hesitate to use the D-word <i>da\u2018wa<\/i>, which has all too often become an affair of talking heads arguing about theology and a host of other matters. Our Prophet, peace be upon him, was characterised by his Lord as \u201c<em>H<\/em><i>arisun \u2018alaykum<\/i> \u2013 <i>deeply concerned for you.<\/i>\u201d<a name=\"FootnoteRef26\"><\/a><a href=\"#Footnote26\"><sup>26<\/sup><\/a> That being the case, that<i> concern<\/i> is Sunnah, and we must be people deeply concerned for our fellow human beings. Embracing the English people in this way, means embracing their culture and European culture, and doing what Muslims always did: filtering it to retain the best of it and removing what is harmful.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\">By establishing the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0and <i>awqaf<\/i> we will strengthen the Muslims here and contribute to the establishment of Islam. They will both go some way to alleviate the very genuine poverty that exists among English Muslims, and <i>awqaf<\/i> for education will raise the educational achievements of Muslims and their standing in society. <i>Awqaf<\/i> for the assistance of non-Muslims will certainly advance the <i>din<\/i>. The noble Hanafi madhhab argued the case for scholars to wear distinctive clothing because that would cause them to be respected and thus cause knowledge and Islam itself to be respected. The exact same case must be made for raising up English Muslims both materially and educationally and in all the ways that the <i>zakat<\/i>\u00a0and <i>awqaf<\/i> have always raised up Muslim society, thus causing Muslims to be respected and thus Islam itself. Then perhaps Allah, exalted is He, might be remembered in lands that have not known His remembrance and His Messenger, may Allah bless him and grant him peace.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p13\"><b>Footnotes<\/b><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote1\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef1\">1<\/a> \u00a0A talk given in the Rotunda, Brixton on Saturday 26th Ramadan 1445\/6th April 2024<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote2\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef2\">2<\/a> \u00a0Ibn Juzayy al-Kalbi, the Dictionary of Terms, <i>Kitab at-tashil li \u2018ulum at-tanzil.<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote3\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef3\">3<\/a> \u00a0\u201cDer Nihilismus ist die Trennung von Ordnung und Ortung \u2013 Nihilism is the separation of order and location.\u201d Carl Schmitt, <i>The Nomos of the Earth.<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote4\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef4\">4<\/a> \u00a0Abu Bakr Rieger, \u201cOrder and Location: What can we actually do?\u201d, The Question Concerning Economics, MFAS \u2013 The Muslim Faculty of Advanced Studies. <a href=\"https:\/\/themuslimfaculty.org\/11-order-and-location-what-can-we-do\/\">https:\/\/themuslimfaculty.org\/11-order-and-location-what-can-we-do\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"p14\"><span class=\"s9\"><a name=\"Footnote5\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef5\">5<\/a> \u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.geeska.com\/en\/where-intimacy-makes-state-dr-matthew-gordon-challenges-facing-somaliland\"><span class=\"s10\">https:\/\/www.geeska.com\/en\/where-intimacy-makes-state-dr-matthew-gordon-challenges-facing-somaliland<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote6\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef6\">6<\/a> \u00a0Aisha Bewley, <i>Democratic Tyranny and the Islamic Paradigm<\/i>, Diwan Press<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote7\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef7\">7<\/a> \u00a0The adjective \u2018Islamic\u2019 seems in general to be used when something foreign to Islam is introduced into it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote8\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef8\">8<\/a> \u00a0See Amjad Hussain, \u201c<i>Tarbiyah<\/i>\u201d, Early Madina, The Muslim Faculty of Advanced Studies. <a href=\"https:\/\/themuslimfaculty.org\/4-tarbiya\/\">https:\/\/themuslimfaculty.org\/4-tarbiya\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote9\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef9\">9<\/a> \u00a0Narrated by Mu\u2018awiya ibn Abi Sufyan<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote10\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef10\">10<\/a> \u00a0See Professor Mehmet Maksudoglu, <i>Osmanli History and Institutions, <\/i>Diwan Press, 2024<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote11\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef11\">11<\/a> \u00a0Surat as-Saffat 37:95-96<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote12\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef12\">12<\/a> \u00a0Surat an-Najm 53:39<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote13\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef13\">13<\/a> \u00a0\u2018Ubadah ibn as-Samit narrated it. Ahmad, at-Tabarani, al-Hakim.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote14\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef14\">14<\/a> \u00a0See Surat al-Hijr 15:86<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote15\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef15\">15<\/a> \u00a0Shaykh Mustafa al-\u2018Alawi,<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><i> \u201c<\/i>The Unique Name\u201d, <i>The Two Invocations. <\/i>Diwan Press<a name=\"Footnote16\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote17\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef17\">17<\/a> \u00a0Al-Munawi points out in <i>Fayd al-Qadir<\/i> that he, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, did not say \u2018the point of my lance\u2019 or of any other weapon, and that a part of the meaning of the word lance is that it is where the banner is attached.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote18\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef18\">18<\/a> \u00a0The <i>Musnad<\/i> of Ahmad, the <i>Musnad<\/i> of Abu Ya\u2018la, at-Tabarani in <i>al-Kabir, <\/i>from Ibn \u2018Umar.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote19\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef19\">19<\/a> \u00a0Ahmad, al-Bukhari in <i>al-Adab al-mufrad<\/i> from Anas<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote20\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef20\">20<\/a> Narrated by Malik ibn al-Huwayrith in Ahmad, al-Bukhari and Muslim, and an-Nasa\u2019i.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote21\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef21\">21<\/a> \u00a0<span class=\"s11\">Muslim narrated it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote22\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef22\">22<\/a> \u00a0Ahmad ibn Hanbal<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote23\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef23\">23<\/a> \u00a0The above quotes are from the <i>khutba<\/i>\u00a0of Hajj Abdussabur Kirke in Norwich 22\/03\/24<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote24\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef24\">24<\/a> \u00a0See Mehmet Maksudoglu, \u201cThe Waqf\u201d, in Shaykh Dr. Abdalqadir as-Sufi, <i>Sultaniyya.<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote25\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef25\">25<\/a> \u00a0Al-Bukhari <i>al-Adab al-Mufrad<\/i>, and Muslim, from Abu Hurayrah<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><a name=\"Footnote26\"><\/a><a href=\"#FootnoteRef26\">26<\/a> \u00a0Surat at-Tawbah 9:128<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; &nbsp; The Art of Community Zakat\u00a0and Awqaf in the future of Islam in England1 \u201cHe has laid down the same deen for you as He enjoined on Nuh: that which We have revealed to you and which We enjoined on Ibrahim, Musa and \u2018Isa: \u2018Establish the deen and do not make divisions in it.\u2019 &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/?p=1433\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;The Art of Community&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1433","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1433"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1442,"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433\/revisions\/1442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bogvaerker.dk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}