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Da’wah in the West: Promise and Trial

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I. The Marvel of the Spread of Islam

Nobody who observed the spread of Islam in the non-Muslim World, especially in the West, and still more especially in America, the United Kingdom and Western Europe during the last thirty years, can fail to wonder at the marvel, or to discern the hand of the Almighty (may He be Glorified and Exalted) at work, The configuration of so many diverse forces, arising in such disparate corners of the earth, determined by such varied chains of historical conditions, all focusing upon the aforesaid Western countries is too much for any kind of planning except the divine. The causes of Muslim immigration up to that time are themselves the result of a tremendously complex development within the Muslim World. But, had these causes been restricted to the Muslim World, the Muslims seeking to immigrate world never have arrived in the West. They were inextricably interwoven with the relations those Muslims had with the West (colonialism, studentship and training, tourism, visits to relatives, fortune-seeking) , as well as dependent upon the West’s rise as industrial and political world leader, relating itself to the Muslim world in a variety of ways.

On the other hand, the causes of the conversion of native Westerners to Islam have to do with the whole intellectual and spiritual development of the West, a development which in the last three or four decades seems to have prepared large segments of the population to be receptive to the Islamic message. The erosion of religious feeling, whether Christian or Jewish, the rise of the sciences of nature and technology under the aegis of a philosophy defiant of God and of everything supernatural; and the nihilism to which industry, urbanism and the whole structure of modern life had led all these seem like the unfolding of real salvation plans for a Heilsgeschichte aimed at the West. Another “fullness of time” seems to be in full bloom before our eyes, awaiting only the disposition of Islam to bring it to fulfillment. That is exactly the sort of grand design which only the divine Designer can bring about.

Two main forces are jointly responsible for this marvelous spread of Islam in the West: the spiritual bankruptcy of the west and Muslim hijrah or emigration.

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Role of the Family in the Spread of Islam

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The family, is indeed, the best tool for Islamic Da’wah in the West. There is no institution, there is no mechanism that I know of, that can convey Islam as well as the living example of an Islamic family in the West. The Islamic family, if it is rightly Islamic, is the very ideal to which Western people today aspire. In other words, the reality of Western people today stands diametrically opposite; if they can say that they can stand at the bottom of human, social and ethical development, because of what we see happening around us in their midst, the Islamic family with its ideals, with its norms and standards, stands at the opposite highest, and therefore, there can be no better way of convincing Western man, the non-Muslim man or woman, of the value of Islam, of the greatness of Islam, than to invite them to visit a Muslim family. But then, the Muslim family must be a good one. In other words, it must be truly Islamic and it must live up to the standards expected of an Islamic family. And now as to the dialectic of this relationship.

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Paying tribute to the Faruqis

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The following is the Preface to Tariq Quraishi, “Ismail Al Faruqi: An Enduring Legacy” (MSA: 1986) by Ghulam Nabi Fai, Acting President of the Muslim Students Association of the United States and Canada.

The brutal murders of Prof. Ismail al-Faruqi and his wife Prof. Lois Lamja’ al-Faruqi on May 1986 in Philadelphia have left a void in the world of Islamic learning and human relationships. As martyrs (shuhada’), Allah has glorified their status — a goal that every Muslim seeks and only a few attain.

The Faruqis have been acclaimed as the pioneers of Islamic Studies on the American continent. Through their scholarship, both have laid the foundation of an Islamic methodology of learning not only for the study of religion but also in other disciplines. By doing so, they have, in fact, fulfilled one of the most urgent in tellectual needs of the Muslim world as it seeks to form an islamic world view in the modern age. The value of their contributions to the non-Muslim world lies in their ability to make it appreciate rslam and its endow ment to human civilization.

To the world of students, they have left a legacy of knowledge to be applied as the world of Islam continues to encounter different intellectual and practical chal lenges which demand responses. Through their Quranic vision of Islam, which is not restricted to any particular historical era, they have reemphasized the universalis tic claim of Islam.

Dr. al-Faruqi, however, was not an intellectual recluse. His life was intertwined with the lives of Muslim students whom he constantly endeavored to teach how to exemplify the integrative beauty of Islam through the MSA. He gave it a new direction. For him the MSA, as a varied and potent representation of the ummah, was an important component of the process of Islamiza tion both in its intellectual and practical aspects.

The author, Br. Tarig Quraishi, has been an associate of the Faruqis. As one of the early supporters of the MSA, he has, over several years, served in the process of shaping the Islamic minds of his fellow students through his writings in the Is Horizons and al-It tihad, the two early Islamic voices of the student com munity in North America. In this booklet, Br. Quraishi has given an authentic portrayal of the multifaceted personalities of the Faruqis, their thoughts and ideas.

This booklet is a humble contribution from MSA to the memories of the Faruqis whose attachment to and involvement with the world of students and learning have become eternalized facts of our history.

Philadelphia
Safar 6, 1407
October 9, 1986

The Scholar’s Pen Is Mightier Than The Assasin’s Blade

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S Parvez Manzoor

The Faruqis are dead, brutally murdered in their home. The brilliant scholar of Islam and his gifted spouse are both gone, snatched by the icy hand of death. The valiant knight and his lady have fallen, slain not in combat but in ambush. The sneaky blade of a barbarian has smitten them, earning not glory but eternal damnation. The ink of the scholar has mingled with the blood of the martyr, triumphing over both hatred and ignorance. Peace has finally come to the Palestinian expatriate, ending the agony and ignominy of exile. Only the grief of a bereaved Umma continues.

In mourning the departure of the Faruqis, the eye weeps, the heart cries but the mind searches for answers. Was this merely a wanton act of a senseless killer or the planned deed of a fanatical group? Was the tragedy caused by the external or the internal enemies of Islamic faith? Was the scholarly couple ‘liquidated’ by the Assassination Squad of the Chosen or was the Holy Revenge its ultimate rationale? Alas, within the lonely and unfriendly fortress where the Muslim thinker moves, looking across his shoulders for pious rage from within and the crusading fury from without, any of the above votaries of violence and fanaticism could have answered this roll call of infamy.

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The Communicator: The Dialogue at Its Best

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During his years at McGill, Dr. Ismail al-Faruqi’s talent as a disputant was recognized by his peers. His ability to pursue the opponent’s argument to its logical conclusion was augmented by his mastery of the rhetoric. The way he conducted himself during his encounters with people of other faiths can be seen in the following excerpt from his dialogue with Bishop Kenneth Cragg and Father Michael Fitzgerald at Chembesy on June 26, 1976.

Fitzgerald: I would like to ask for clarification of Dr. al-Faruqi’s statement that Islamic da’wah is ecumenical par excellence, by virtue of its comprehensive recognition of all the religions as de jure. In fact, what is meant by all religions? Having recourse to Apollo and other gods and goddesses is a kind of religion, but would Islam recognize this as well as all other religions as de jure?

al-Faruqi: Islam recognizes all religions as de jure, and then it invites the adherents of these re ligions to begin the task of criticism. No religion is ruled out by the Muslim a priori. In other words, if I meet someone who has never heard of Islam and who worships, for example, an “X” or “Y”, whatever that may be, I as a Muslim am not free to call him a pagan, or to regard him as condemned by God; rather, I must talk with him in order to discover what his religion is, in the belief that God must in His mercy have sent a prophet to him, for the Qur’an says: “And there is no people unto whom God has not sent a prophet” (Q. 35:24)

Believing then that God in His mercy must have told him something, I meet with him with a view to being instructed about his faith, and then I invite him to research his own tradition in order to discover the essential message that God has given him. And if, in relation to that central revealed core, the rest of the beliefs and practices of that religion as developed through history turn out to be a pack of lies, that would be an empirical discovery for me. But for the Muslim this must never be an a priori decision which condemns a man because he “doesn’t believe in my God my way”.

However, if I discover that religion has been corrupted and falsified beyond recognition, then I have a duty to tell him about the Qur’an, God’s final revelation, to present it to him as rational truth, and invite his consideration. If he says, “I don’t want to listen”, then either he is malevolent or a fool.

Cragg: What you are saying, then, is that God has sent prophets everywhere, but ex hypothesi these prophets must be consistent with Islam.

al-Faruqi: Yes, Islam as religio naturalis, din al fitrah.

Cragg: But that which in Buddhism is antithetical to Islam and to rationalism is not simply chaff mixed with wheat, if I may put it that way; it is the very wheat of Buddhism. By your analysis here it must then have been a false prophecy which brought the Buddhist to that belief.

al-Faruqi: I won’t say a false prophecy. I would say that a true revelation through an authentic prophet has been thoroughly falsified.

Fitzgerald: But by which historical criteria is the “true” prophet to be identified? And where is the “true” prophecy of which you speak within Buddhism?

al-Faruqi: I don’t know, but it can be researched; the fact that I assume it to be there at the origin is at least a good step in the direction of ecumenical tolerance.

Cragg: It seems rather an escape hatch of a theory, because if a prophet is really a prophet then his message becomes known, it is balagh, communication; and if it has not survived historically it must be mythical.

al-Faruqi: No. At one time it was known. But then later on it became falsified as the Hebrew message became falsified, and the Christian message was falsified.

Taken from “Islamic Da’wah: Its Nature and Demands”. American Trust Publications, Indianapolis, 1986. pp. 11-12.

Welcome to Ismail Faruqi Online

Ismail Faruqi Online
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Welcome to the new and revamped look of Ismail Faruqi Online.

Who is Isma’il Faruqi? Dr. Isma’il Raji al-Faruqi (January 1, 1921 – May 27, 1986) is a renowned Palestinian-American philosopher who is widely recognized by his peers as an authority on Islam and comparative religion. He spent several years at Al-Azhar University in Cairo, taught at several universities in North America, including McGill University in Montreal. He was Professor of Religion at Temple University, where he founded and chaired the Islamic Studies program. He died in 1986.

This site is dedicated to him and we welcome you to bookmark it. It will contain his articles and books that he had written on various subjects, ranging from comparative religion to Islam. See his biography on Wikipedia.

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