Love Divine

I came across this humbling reflection on Sh. Hamza Yusuf’s blog :

“According to a beautiful hadith, the Prophet, God bless and grant him peace, said that on the Last Day, when the last two souls are brought forth before God, they are both condemned to hell. As the angels escort them to their final fiery abode, one of them wistfully looks back. Thereupon, God commands the angels to bring him back and asks the man why he turned back. The man replies, “I was expecting something else from you.” God responds, commanding the angels, “Take him to My Garden.”

It is our expectation of God that determines where we are. This points up the need for thinking well not only of God but also of God’s creation, despite the fact that we are all messy, imperfect works in progress, struggling along in this journey.

We either surrender to God or to the substitutes for God, which are invariably hollow. But true love, which is the love of God, is the single most powerful force in the world. It is a love that “alters not when it alteration finds.” It grows and never diminishes. If someone claims to have lost it, it can only be said that such a person did not have it to begin with. “It is the star to every wandering bark.” And in loving God, one must paradoxically love all of God’s creation, merely for the incontrovertible fact that everything is God’s creation. God does love everything in that He brought everything into existence from an act of divine love, and those who love God purely, and with the penetrating inner eye of reality, can only be a mercy while in the world.”

Read the entire article, A Reflection on Divine Love, here.

 

Hello. Fancy a date?

Do you fancy a date? (Edible fruit, not candle-lit suppers I hasten to add – that’s a whole other website.)

I’ve been happily stuffing my face with Palestinian fairtrade Medjoul dates. These juicy morsels bear no relation to the syrup-soaked squishy cellophane-wrapped supermarket offerings. And wonder of all wonders, my autopsy inspections have (so far) discovered not a single bug lurking inside these fat beauties.

Medjoul or Mejool dates are large, moist, naturally sweet dates around two and a half times bigger than your common or garden date. Apparently these dates were once reserved for royalty, but in these revolutionary times mere plebs like you or I can feast like Sultans of old. High in fibre, potassium and essential vitamins, dates provide a guilt-free sugar fix.

This Ramadan make an ethical consumer choice, and support Palestinian farmers by buying a box of fairtrade Medjoul dates. These bonny babies are not cheap. They cost around £50 for a 5kg box, and the price reflects the difficulties in growing, harvesting and exporting the produce. However, tis possible to divide up a box and share the cost amongst friends and family.

If you’re in the UK, look up Zaytoun’s list of retailers for your nearest stockist. The Palestinian fairtrade website also has a list of international partners.

 

EcoIslam magazine free download

The latest issue of EcoIslam, the newsletter of  IFEES, the Islamic Foundation for …Green Stuff!, is now out has been out for a while. (Sorry)

Download it for free, here

Featuring articles on:

• Islamic beliefs and Sumatran forest management
• The Copenhagen Conundrum
• Islamic Gardens in the UK
• Planting trees in Indonesia
• The green mosque initiative
• The Climate Summit

 

Hadith of the Day – Lighten up

The Prophet (peace be upon him) said,

“Anytime you lighten the load of your servant, a reward is alloted to your scales on the Day of Judgment.”

Hadith Al-Bayhaqi

 

Minaret ban?

Minaretmuse is not a-mused at the Swiss minaret ban.  Of course I’m biased in favour of all things minaret-ish (except for hideous plasticky ones). But what harm is there in a slender spire pointing to the heavens guiding our minds to higher things? It’s not as if they had a minaret-plague on their hands, there are only four in their entire country! Tch. In retaliation, I shall be banning all cuckoo clocks – now that’s a ban worth having.

My compatriots’ vote to ban minarets is fuelled by fear

Source: Chan'ad @Flikr

Tariq Ramadan

It wasn’t meant to go this way. For months we had been told that the efforts to ban the construction of minarets

in Switzerland were doomed. The last surveys suggested around 34% of the Swiss population would vote for this  shocking initiative. Last Friday, in a meeting organised in Lausanne, more than 800 students, professors and citizens were in no doubt that the referendum would see the motion rejected, and instead were focused on how to turn this silly initiative into a more positive future.

Read the rest here.

 

Sweetness and Light in the House of God

I was blog-bouncing, like you do at 1.40am when you’re meant to be sleeping. And I came across this lovely idea of giving out little packets of sweets ( it’s not ‘candy’, I’m British) to share the love on Eid. And I remembered that girl in the Haram in Makkah. Let me tell you about the girl.

Source: Number-8 @Flikr

It was a few days after Hajj, and Makkah was filled with pilgrims from every corner of the world, just like every year. Only this year was different – because I

was there, amongst the other 3 million or so. Finally, really there. But that’s another story – back to the girl. After Dhuhr prayers the mosque would empty out as much as it ever did during Hajj. Today I thought I’d sit and gaze at the Kaabah awhile, so I found a spot with a clear view to watch the circling pilgrims doing tawaf beneath the burning midday sun. And that’s when I saw her, draped all in black. I guessed she might be Iranian, she wore that kind of head-to-floor robe. She was young, in her teens or early 20s perhaps, with a sweet, solemn face. But that’s not what caught my eye.

 

EcoIslam magazine

EcoIslam is the magazine of IFEES, the Islamic Foundation for Ecology and Environmental Sciences. It’s available for free download as a PDF from the IFEES website.  Essential reading for followers of the Green Deen.

EcoIslam issue 6 (click to download)

“In this edition, we have a special report on the deforestation in Indonesia and the “Sumatran Declaration”.
Other articles include:
- New initatives from the Mindanao region of the Philipines
- Stopping Bird Hunting in Lebanon
- Green Muslims in Washington DC
- Update on the Prince Charles’ Rainforest Project
- Book review on “199 ways to please God” – The Green Religion
and much more.

 

Hadith of the Day – Repent & Return

The Prophet (peace be upon him) said,

“Allah is more pleased with the repentance of His slave than any one of you is pleased by finding his camel which he had lost in the desert. ”

Hadith Bukhari

 

Rmdn Mbrk!

Ramadan Mubarak one and all. Love this pic, found on Flikr by The Blind Glass, s’called ‘Gratitude without words’. And after 16 hours of fasting, gratitude is heart-felt, coming straight from the soul. Never thought a date could taste so sweet

Source: The Blind Glass on Flikr

 

They have eyes too

A saying of Shaykh Ahmed Zarruq (May Allah have mercy upon him):

“If you desire to live such that your religion is safe and your portion is full and your honour is sound, guard your tongue and never mention another’s faults, remembering you yourself have faults and others have tongues. Watch your eye, should it ever reveal the faults of others say to it  ‘O my eye, other people have eyes too.’