The Muslim Tearoom

[HardlyEverHoovers]

Salaams/peace to all! I'm already missing our old thread, so taking the bull by the horns and opening our very own Muslim Tearoom, all welcome (non-Muslims too of course), to chat, share, ask questions etc etc. Imagine a cosy cafe with floor cushions, tea and coffee of all kinds, and lovely cakes! Please join me!

Sis defuse my friend let her children be in the nativity providing nothing about their roles was directly in conflict with Islam, so her daughter was the star (literally lol) and her son was a sheep I think.

Her DD was initially the archangel but the lines were something that she didn't agree with so she asked the teachers to choose another child for the part (neither her nor her kids minded whether the part was small or whatever).

I reckon it is a good idea to play it by ear and see what happens inshallah.

Found it, the explanation of the verse form surah it's only four minutes long, I'm going to re-listen to the entire lecture, the speaker is Mufti Menk not Yasmin Mogahed, I like his lectures, he's very good mashallah.

The past couple of years I haven't allowed my 8yo DS to partake in his schools' Christmas carol singing concert in the church, as its followed by prayers. Am I overreacting? I allowed DC to participate in the nativity plays because they were aged 3-5 and I felt it was a gentle way of introducing them to the story of Jesus (as) but now my DS has a greater understanding of the differences between the faiths, and of his own beliefs, I don't want to confuse him with carols and prayers iyswim. AIBU?

And I'm really sorry I started what turned into a very heated thread

Crescent and defuse them nasheeds remind me of qawwali my dad used to listen to when we were kids, used to blast it out if his car en route to school in fact he still listens to it and I love it as well. Nusrat Fateh Ali and Sabri Brothers come to mind. Some of them I need to listen very carefully as it's in Urdu and I don't understand it as much but I get a good grasp. My mums brother is really into it, he's a big Sufi man, visits Konya, Turkey every year in December for the annual Mevlevi festival. Does lots of qawalli singing as well.

Fuzzy thanks for the link, also love Mufti Menk, guys like him are so different to the mufti's we used to listen to when we were kids. They used to be very aggressive and shouty shouty and frankly as a youngster I was not interested! I follow him on twitter he really is inspirational.

Swish we went to a C of E school and frankly I used to love visiting church, I was also in the choir. It had nothing to do with being muslim. We used to say The Lords Prayer freely to me it was like praying a Duaa in mosque. Still love the smell of a church, brings back fond memories.

swish i attended a catholic secondary school so prayer was a daily routine. Mass was a weekly routine. I used to attend both. I used to replace the word 'father' with 'Allah' in the Lord's prayer, but of course i also knew that Allah is not in heaven, but above His throne. I would listen to the mass and draw similarities in the messages of islam and christianity. I read the whole new testament because i enjoyed learning about christianity. In fact, i used to read a few verses to my sister at night before bedtime (we used to share a room) - she used to think that i was very uncool though! . I did get a A grade at GCSE in RE, so it paid off

My personal opinion is that if your dc has a good understanding of islamic beliefs already, then they might be ok, but if you feel they might get confused, then it might be worth pulling them out. A relative did it the other way with her ds. She pulled him out of nativity up to Y2 but then allowed the christmas carol singing in school from Y3 onwards, as she felt that he was able to distinguish between what was ok to sing and wasnt by that stage.

crescent my dh is quite anti-music too when it comes to nasheeds - with the exception of daff. I am more relaxed about it but i also know that he is theoretically correct. My new dilemma is schools teaching musical instruments. I dont mind, but DH is uncomfortable. Dont know whether to let it be, or discuss further. Any words of wisdom sisters?

I went to a regular primary school, but we all had prayers before lunch (hands together eyes closed) then one person would be chosen to say the prayer, I was always terrified it would be me as I didn't know the words (till a few years later) and everyone was expected to just know them, my cousin insisted he would say bismillah if he was ever chosen (he never was).

We also used to sing hymns a lot (my cousin would chant astaghfirullah right the way thro and told us we would burn in hell if we sang along !!!), again everyone was always expected to just know the words, for years I was incredibly confused as to why we were singing 'No one built the ark' then at madrassa we learnt the stories of the prophets and we learnt the story of Nuh (AS) and I vividly recollect saying to a friend it would be so much more sensible if we sang Noah built the ark at school...then the penny dropped.

I was a very confused child (and a pretty confused adult as it goes)

Defuse I have had a similar issue with my DCs. DH and I are atheists, but decided to send our DC's to a private Catholic school a year ago. DS is 11 and has coped really well with the religious side of the education (until the. He had been in state - state schools in France are Laic, is that the same word in English?) as he's old enough to understand about various different beliefs and he's pointed out that in fact most of the teachings he has had have been about similar values we have at home. DD however is only 4 and is absorbing it all as 'the truth' which I have to admit makes me a little uneasy, but there are plenty of other children in her class who have different faiths (quite a few are Muslim), so I'm sure if their parents put them there, then DD will be fine.

Salamalaykum everyone

Cote just to expand upon Crescents point about rising levels of suspicion of muslims. I have noticed over the past year and a bit that whenever Muslims write in newspapers such as the Guardian (it happens to be the one I read most but Im sure it happens in others) they get a really hard time even if they are writing about uncontroversial topics. One muslim female writer who if you saw the way she looked you would have thought her the poster girl of what Western, secular, liberals etc want Muslims to be was asked in the comments why she continued to affiliate herself with an ideology that was {insert your own negative word here}. So she was attacked for choosing to remain a muslim. Yasmin Alibhai Brown and Mehdi Hassan both complained of similar things in that whenever they wrote an article regardless of the topic they were attacked for being muslims. Baroness Sayeeda Warsi acknowledged this:

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/baroness-warsi-fewer-than-one-in-four-people-believe-islam-is-compatible-with-british-way-of-life-8464026.html

Even Glenn Grenwald received a roasting when he tweeted an article about Sam Harris and Islamophobia. He then wrote an article where he merely copied and pasted comments made by Sam Harris and received thousands of comments abusing him.

The problem I think is the overuse of the word taqqiyah. I think its actually reached a point that it is meaningless to muslims now. Its funny I was once accused of practicing taqqiyah when I condemned a terrorist attack as being against Islam. The person told me that anyway I had no textual evidence and the religious texts agreed with the Radicals. So basically either the vast majority of muslims are wrong and only the radicals have interpreted the religion correctly or the majority of the worlds muslims are practicing taqqiyah. I read a very dangerous descripton of taqqiyah written by a non muslim which stated it means muslims can lie and conceal their faith to the extent that they can drink alcohol eat pork pretend they have left the religion etc in order to achieve some sort of aim (I dont know what they think it is that we want). This is extremely dangerous as non practicing muslims and athiests with a muslim heritage like you could all fall in to this definition of faking it for a political goal like obama is being accused of now. Its not just the christian right or neo cons either its also the new athiests who think like this.

Hope that makes sense.

Should have written overuse and misunderstanding of taqqiyah. Its funny I think most muslims have never even come across the word or concept.

Thanks fuzzy for sharing your nursery experience. Yep I think my ds is just like your girls. Last week he didnt cry until I came to pick him up!

I was looking at the muslim mothers blog I posted earlier and one thing I noticed was she said "The best mums are not the ones who sacrifice everything for their children". This really struck a chord for me as I sometimes wonder whether I am doing the right thing by going back to work and whether I should just give it up to look after my ds. My mother sacrificed everything for me and I have very fond memories of having her always around when I needed her. Yet now as an adult those memories are tainted with guilt as I think that my happiness was at the expense of her own. What do you think? Have you felt that pressure to abandon your own personal goals and dreams for the sake of your children? My family are incredibly supportive of me but I have had off comments from certain people when I have told them I am working. Someone even said to me that they felt sorry for my son as he must miss his mum! I dont know if I am being oversensitive here though.

Defuse I probably would be hesitant about letting my child participate in nativity or go to church Swish. I would wait until they are a little bit older and can differentiate more clearly between fact and beliefs. I used to teach in a madrassa and once we were teaching the children about the story of Prophet Jesus PBUH and when asked where he was born even after being told the Quranic story, most said in a stable. But that might have been because I was such a bad teacher and didnt explain it well .

Walaikumassalaam, Sis Crescent in surah Yusuf, the only mention of shirts was the one smeared with sheep's blood the brothers bring back to their father Yaqub (as) as evidence that he was devoured by a wolf.

The brothers were jealous as he and his brother Benjamin were favoured by their father as was their mother. Yususf (as) is said to be the most beautiful of men in the Quran.

The plagues are mentioned in the Quran in surah Al A'rafat - the Heights;

"So We sent upon them the flood and locusts and lice and frogs and blood as distinct signs, but they were arrogant and were a criminal people" (7:133)

It doesn't go into massive detail, I think we get more details in other verses (not sure will need to check).

I stepped away from reading about the Prophets in the bible stories when I read the accusation made against the Prophet Job and Noah (they accuse him of being an alcoholic!).

It's worth getting a seerah of the prophets. Or just to read/listen to a good translation of the Quran.

As for the working mum thing.

I think personally that seeing me go out to work for us to enjoy the benefits of our labour is a very good life lesson to my girls.

I would send my children to nursery all over again as my DD thoroughly enjoyed and benefitted from nursery, the benefits of interaction with other children and adults, learning independence and the enjoying playing with toys we don't have (that's more my benefit I didn't have to fork out for crazy mad toys). Also the carers were amazing women, they were very loving and caring and kind Alhamdulillah. My DD went to a Montessori nursery which actually geared her to learning she still picks things up very quickly and loves school Alhamdulillah.

Also I work because I have to, given the choice I would work around my children, I already do to an extent, however I refuse to beat myself up over going out to work.

What exactly is the alternative, all these people who opine that a mother should stay in the home, are they offering to pay my bills? And no I do not wish to marry a moron who will treat me like shit on his shoes in order to stay at home, I'm not anyone mans slave, Allah gave me abilities and intellect and I will go out and earn a halal living and exercise my right to live the best life I possibly can.

Anyone who objects really needs to keep their opinions to themselves, because I really don't want to know.

Salam all. I have 30 days of Ramadan fasting to make up as I was breastfeeding. Problem is, everyday I say "Tomorrow I'll start inshallah" and of course tomorrow never comes

Is there anyone else who needs to make some up and do they fancy doing them with me?!

Hope I haven't embarrassed myself asking

Sis Crescent hope your toothache is better

Hope your toothache gets better crescent!

I have about 20+ years of fasts to make up Swish! Have done the odd one last few weeks and of course the Muharram ones. I am going to fast tomorrow inshallah so will keep you company

I've done the Muharram fasts too Alhumdulillah, now I'm doing ondays and Thursdays and intend to keep it up inshallah, should make up a fair few fasts inshallah.

I love fasting because the Hadiths regardign fasting;

Abu Hurairah relates that the Holy Prophet, peace be upon him, said: "Allah, the Lord of Honor and glory says: All other deeds of man are for himself, but his fasting is purely for Me and I shall reward him for it. The fast is a shield. When any of you is fasting he should abstain from loose talk and noisy exchanges. Should anyone revile him or seek to pick a quarrel with him, he should respond with: I am observing a fast. By Him in Whose hands is the life of Muhammad, the breath of one who is fasting is purer in the sight of Allah than the fragrance of musk. One who fasts experiences two joys: he is joyful when he breaks his fast, and he is joyful by virtue of his fast when he meets his Lord" (Bukhari and Muslim).

Sa'ad Ibn Sahl relates that the Holy Prophet, peace be upon him, said: "There is a gate of Paradise called Rayyan through which only those will enter on the Day of Judgment who are regular in observing the fast and no one else. A call will go forth: Where are those who observed the fast regularly? And they will step forth and no one beside them will enter through that gate. After they shall have entered, the gate will be closed and no one else will enter thereby" (Bukhari and Muslim).

Abu Sa'id Khudri relates that the Holy Prophet, peace be upon him, said: "When a servant of Allah observes the fast for a day for the sake of Allah, He thereby repels the Fire from him a distance of seventy years of journeying" (Bukhari and Muslim).

Specifically the bit Where Allah says fasting is purely for Him, that really speaks to me, doing osmething purely for the sake of Allah.

Also Happy Jummah everyone and remember to recite or listen to surah Kahf inshallah

Subhanallah Fuzzywuzzy thanks for that.

Also just googled about praying Surah Kahf on Fridays, I really didn't know! This is why I love this thread I learn something new everyday

'Whoever recites Surat al-Kahf on Friday, light shall shine forth for him between the two Fridays.' (Bayhaqi).

Thanks Little Tulip, I want to do them in one whole month so will start after the weekend inshallah. If I do a day here and a day there, I'll never do them. I'm going to do a time table like in Ramadan.
Fuzzy, you're an inspiration!