Farid Esack you breath new life
into faith and what it means to be faithful; you paint a fresh and alive
picture of Islam and what it means to be spiritual. I may not practice Islam,
but to watch Esack work through his spirituality within Islam helps guide even
me through my spiritual path and well-being.
He writes with the right amount of wit, wry humor or comments that he
makes as he traces the legal steps of the religion.
As he expands in “More to the
Rituals than Motions?” the questions he raises speak beyond Islam. “Where do
the formal prayers for into the Islamic scheme of things that they should be
seen as synonymous with the trust assumed by humankind? Prayers,, being the
second of the five pillars of Islam, can not be viewed apart from the rest of
the structure for they do not have an intrinsic value apart from the rest of
the structure for they do not have an intrinsic value of their own.” Taking the
risk to look at the previously unquestioned aspects of religion/faith, Esack
makes all practicers of religion look at themselves, what we each do for our
religion/faith and question it. Esack pushes us to question what we have been
told for so long to never question. When I pray, am I being sincere in my
words, my actions or am I thinking about other things? Am I only kneeling
because this is what I am supposed to do? What would hold more value to Allah:
performing each prayer perfect and on time each day or working to spend my days
in connection with Allah so my prayers may be a little ‘off’ but are in the
most sincere form of connection with Allah. Esack, while not discounting the
importance of these strict rituals, also puts forth the idea that these rituals
are not what actually connect us to Allah. He has some weight saying this, as
he was an incredibly devout and legalistic practice of Islam for most of his
early life. He realized during these years that he was not achieving the close
connection that he wanted to have with Allah. He was legalistic in his prayers
and rituals, but that was not what creates that spiritual connection,
inherently that is.
I think
Esack is onto something with this realization of his: rituals and legalistic
following does not inherently equal a deep meaningful spiritual connection with
Allah, or any god. It reminds me of my own spiritual and religious path. For
me, I actually began going to church on Tuesdays and praying. I began being
purposeful in how I interacted with the world and its people. The difference in
connection, I can attest, is profound.
Now, I
thoroughly enjoyed, on a intellectual and exasperated level, Esack’s story of
“Pepsi Shows the Way”. It just figures that globalization would have a direct
and obvious effect upon religions despite their old age. Nothing is left
unaffected by globalization, not even the most sacred of places.
I also,
thoroughly enjoyed how multiple lines of Esack’s book could be read to support
homosexuals. For example, under the section of “Between Allah and a Neurotic
Self” he writes “”an authentic relationship with one’s self will lead to one to
an authentic relationship with Allah.” One could read this to say that for individuals
finding themselves attracted sexually to those of the same sex, that they
should not try to ignore or stuff down those feelings, because that would mean
that you are being inauthentic to yourself and inauthenticity with yourself
leads to an inauthentic relationship with Allah. I find this powerful because
it encourages people to be who they are and not allow any one else to dictate
one’s own identity.
After all
of our discussions about modernity and Islam and if these two can work
together, I feel like Esack would claim that Islam and modernity could work
together. Esack proposes and very modern version of Islam, one made for the
world coming towards us.
W.H.B.
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