Month 10, Day 12: The Prophet Muhammad

For any other religion, I’d preface this post with a nice, royalty-free picture of the founder of the faith. But since Islam forbids any image of people (or animals), since that would constitute a “potential idol,” I’m limited to words as I try to fill you in on the life of the Prophet Muhammad.

Sadly, I feel like even my words are limited. Although other faiths seem to be able to laugh off negative or humorous depictions of their founders (think of “Buddy Christ” from the movie Dogma, for example, which I thought was hilarious, despite my Catholic upbringing), there seem to be a few Muslims (although I’m sure they’re not the majority) who, well, kind of flip out if you make fun of Muhammad—or even attempt to draw a picture of him. I personally think everyone needs to have more of a sense of humor. But I’ll do my best to stay focused and positive here. Really.

Anyway . . . Muhammad was born in Mecca (in Saudi Arabia) around 570 c.e. His family was part of the Hashim clan, which was part of the Kuraish (or Quraish) tribe. (This means nothing to me, but I’m trying to learn.)

Muhammad’s father died shortly before his son’s birth, and some sources say Muhammad’s mother died soon after his birth. (Other sources say she survived and sent Muhammad to be raised by a foster mother, then took him back later, but died when he was around five years old.)

Either way, Muhammad was raised to adulthood by his uncle, Abu Talib, who set the young man to working tending his flock of sheep. Sounds like big fun for a teenager, doesn’t it?

By the time Muhammad reached his early twenties, he was known in his area for his honesty and good character. Although he was poor, he got a lucky break. He took a job leading a caravan to Syria for a wealthy woman named Khadijah, who was so impressed with him that she asked to marry him. (Just for the record, she was 40 and he was 25—which proves that cougars existed even back in the olden days.)

Muhammad and Khadijah were married for many years, and during their marriage, Muhammad became a rich merchant. (I am NOT going to mention the term gold digger. Oops.)

But even a happy marriage and successful business weren’t enough for Muhammad (nothing ever IS enough for a man, is it, ladies?).

When he was 40, Muhammad started to feel restless and began to notice, as authors Brandon Toropov and Father Luke Buckles write in The Complete Idiot’s Guide to World Religions, “a powerful force in his life. A series of mystical experiences led him to conclude that he was being summoned to proclaim the word of the supreme and single God, Allah.” (Interesting—back in Muhammad’s day, a midlife crisis led to a career as a prophet, whereas today it generally leads to hair plugs and red convertibles.)

As with most people who believe God is calling them to do something, Muhammad was mostly ignored at first. Only a few friends and members of his family really believed he was, as he claimed, the last prophet of the one true God.

Over time, however, other people started to believe him—and that led the powerful chiefs of Mecca to make fun of him and, eventually, to attack him, fearing that his influence might damage the social order (if you recall the story of Jesus Christ’s life, this will all sound eerily familiar).

When Muhammad’s uncle, who had some pull with the local authorities, died, Muhammad lost a lot of his protection—and became the target of an assassination plot designed to crush his religious uprising.

Muhammad fled for his life and traveled to Yathrib (which later became known as Medina, or “City of the Prophet”). In 622, he had a group of his followers move from Mecca to Medina to join him. This exodus was called the Hegira, and it marks the first year of the Muslim era.

For a few years, there was skirmishing between Mecca and Medina. In 630, Muhammad said his enemies had violated a peace treaty, so he gathered forces and took over Mecca, destroying the idols housed there to emphasize his belief that only the one God, Allah, should be worshipped. This was the beginning of the world’s first Muslim state.

Muhammad didn’t get to enjoy his success for long, though. He died in Medina in 632.

So, what was Muhammad like as a person? Most of what we know comes from the Hadith, or the “sayings of Muhammad,” that were recorded by his followers. Unfortunately, just like with Jesus, a lot of this information was written down well after Muhammad’s death, so very little direct knowledge of Muhammad and his personality has survived.

I’m a snarky person by nature, so, of course, I always feel compelled to seek out the most negative side of any story. For Muhammad, it’s (unfortunately) pretty darn easy—just like it was for Jesus, back when I was studying Christianity in December.

I’ll limit myself to one critical comment: Despite the fact that Muhammad said no man should ever have more than four wives, Muhammad himself married a total of 14 women. But hey, he wasn’t just a sleazy womanizer. The four-wife limit, outlined in the Qur’an, was only revealed to Muhammad by God after he had already married the last of his wives. (Convenient? I think so, too.)

Okay, so let’s try to put a positive spin on this. Hmm. I’m trying. It’s just not coming to me. Let’s just go with the same thing I said about Jesus: His friends seemed to like him. How’s that?

Month 10, Day 9: Sin and Virtue in Islam

Since we were talking about sin and repentance last time, I thought today would be a good time to look a little more into what Muslims consider sinful—and what they consider virtuous.

Unlike Christianity and Judaism’s explicit lists of sins—the Seven Deadly Sins and the Ten Commandments—Islam’s Qur’an has lots of references to sin, but no overall list.

Me? I’m a list-maker at heart, so I’ll try to give you a few of the “biggies,” just for simplicity’s sake.

Major Sins in Islam

1. Worshipping idols

2. Not obeying your parents

3. Lying

4. Committing suicide or murdering someone else

5. Committing adultery or engaging in premarital sex

6. Collecting interest on investments

7. Stealing from orphans (Seriously? Is this something you run into a lot in your daily life? How about just no stealing, period?)

8. Making a free person a slave (I assume it’s okay to have a slave who’s already a slave. Nice.)

9. Killing a baby (again, who are the people who came up with these? Wow.)

10. Gossiping or slandering someone

I don’t know. It seems to me like there’s a lot left out and a lot that’s there that doesn’t really need to be. It’s okay to keep slaves, but don’t gossip! What the hell?

Anyway, if those are the major sins in Islam, then what are the major virtues?

Virtuous Deeds in Islam

1. Learning and being studious

2. Freeing slaves (which, if you ask me, seems to contradict the list of sins, where it’s okay to have slaves in the first place)

3. Being truthful

4. Respecting your parents

5. Donating to charity

6. Returning items after you borrow them (Seriously? That’s a major virtue? Isn’t that just common courtesy?)

7. Opposing injustice

8. Being kind to your family

9. Being kind to animals

10. Giving food to poor people

Overall, these lists strike me as either common sense (and hence, unnecessary to mention as “major” sins or virtues) or kind of kooky. How does fighting injustice even make it onto the same list with returning your neighbor’s lawn mower (or, in my case, my snow blower—you know who you are, sinner!).

Maybe I’m overdramatic, but I want “sins” to be sins—hell-worthy, absolute abominations, things like torturing animals for sport (hear that, Michael Vick?). And I also want “virtues” to be heaven-worthy acts of true nobility—not stupid little petty things like remembering to return books to the library.

Ugh. I’m in a bad mood. Maybe it’s the lack of wine. But I’ll try to move on. It’s probably a sin to be pissed off at the fact that I can’t have wine.

Month 10, Day 4: Tawba—Repenting for Sins in Islam

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. Oh, wait. That’s the Catholic way—always sneaking back up on me. Let’s try again.

Okay, I’m supposed to be Muslim this month, which means that alcohol of any kind is strictly forbidden (the Muslim alcoholic dude on Intervention a couple of weeks ago notwithstanding). And, I admit, I had a couple of glasses of wine yesterday.

No, I’m not an alcoholic. There were, I assure you, extenuating circumstances that led to my fall from grace. I went with my boyfriend to New York City and ending up waiting for him in Times Square, standing up next to a slightly decrepit-looking theater, lugging my briefcase and laptop, for over an hour in the 90-degree heat. After that, a cool, smooth Pinot Grigio at the little Irish pub sounded—and tasted—really, really good.

But I did feel a little guilty about it. Actually, I felt a lot guilty (damn you, Catholic upbringing—even when I’m Muslim, I worry about what the nuns will think!).

Even though I don’t agree that having a drink is necessarily a sin (just like I don’t agree that my hair is so sexually enticing that it has the power to turn men into drooling animals), I still feel guilty—because I broke the rules. And, for some reason I really can’t explain, I’m big on sticking to the rules.

So to get back on track to being a good Muslim, I need to admit my sin and make amends for it. In Islam, this process of repentance is called tawba. In order to receive forgiveness from God (or Allah), you need to do four things:

1. Feel sorry for having committed the sin in the first place.

Check. If guilt equals feeling sorry, I’ve got that covered.

2. Repent to God, asking, “My Lord, forgive me.”

Check. And a lot easier than trying to remember the Catholic Act of Contrition prayer I used to have to say. I like that.

3. Make some form of restitution for the sin. 

Okay, I’m not quite sure what to do here. Maybe I should fall back to the old Catholic solution and say a few extra prayers (as if five times a day isn’t too much for me already). I’ll work on this one.

4. Resolve in all sincerity not to commit the sin ever again.

Oh, crap.

Okay, I think I can resolve not to drink another glass of wine during the time I am a Muslim. I can make it 30 days without caving. But when September rolls around and drinking wine is no longer a sin, all bets are off.

Month 10, Day 3: The Five Pillars of Islam

More than a billion people around the world are Muslims—plus me, this month. So what is Islam really all about?

The Muslim holy book, the Qur’an (or Koran), outlines the five main obligations that every devout Muslim must follow. They’re known as the Five Pillars of Islam.

Pillar #1: Muslims must confess their faith in God and the Prophet Muhammad.

This one is pretty straightforward. All you have to do is acknowledge the following simple statement: “There is no god but God; Muhammad is the Prophet of God.”

For this month at least, I think I can go along with that.

Pillar #2: Muslims pray five times a day.

This one is harder. A lot harder. I had enough trouble remembering to say my once-a-day obligatory prayer for the Baha’i faith. Now I’m supposed to remember to pray five times a day? That’s rough.

And it’s not just a quick, easy prayer, either. There’s a whole series of movements and bowing and recitations that go along with the prayer itself (we’ll talk more about Muslim prayer later this week). Suffice it to say, it’s pretty demanding. Maybe it gets easier once you get the hang of it. I certainly hope so.

The five times for prayer are predetermined:

1. You pray before sunrise (which is always rough for me, although I’m thinking it might be easier to get up early now that I can’t have any wine in the evening).

2. You pray at midday, a little after noon (my obsession with lunch seems to be making me forget about this one, but I’m working on it).

3. You pray in the mid-afternoon. (Now, I’m not sure exactly when that is. To me, “afternoon” lasts from noon until 4:00 p.m., at which point it becomes “evening,” which lasts from 4:00 until 7:00. After that, it's "night." But my sense of timing may have been thrown off by years of working from 7:00 a.m. until 3:30 p.m., so I’m doing my afternoon prayer sometime around 3:30 or 4:00, to better coincide with what the average person’s idea of time is probably like.)

4. You pray just after sunset.

5. You pray at night, after it’s fully dark.

These last two prayers are kind of tough to regulate in the summer—the daylight can last until almost 9:00 p.m., and since I know I have to get up super early to do the sunrise prayer, I want to be in bed early, so it’s like I’m scrambling to do the post-sunset and nighttime prayers really, really close together. It feels a little harried to me, but what can you do?

Now, in places where Islam is the dominant faith, Muslims get the benefit of having a muezzin—someone whose job is to call the people to prayer, letting them know when the right time has come. Me? I’m on my own, with just my lack of attention span and flaky memory. But I’m trying.

Pillar #3: Muslims give alms to the poor.

A lot of religions suggest that believers should give money to the poor. Catholics, for example, are supposed to “tithe”—or give a percentage of their income to the Church.

But Muslims aren’t just encouraged to give money to those who are less fortunate. They are expected to pay a zakat, or “purification tax,” that goes to benefit the poor. Usually, it comes to around 2½ percent of a person’s total wealth, but some Muslims give even more.

Now, my question is: What if I’m poor, even if it’s only temporarily (I hope)? I mean, at the moment, things aren’t exactly going well, and I’d estimate that 2½ percent of my total wealth would amount to . . . oh . . . about 50 cents. If my 2½ percent isn’t enough to buy a homeless guy a cup of coffee, do I still have to pay?

I assume that I’m supposed to pay the zakat even if I’m not all that well off myself, so in honor of my month as a Muslim, I’ll be calculating the real 2½ percent of my wealth (which I sincerely hope is enough for a cup of coffee, but it’ll be close) and donating it to charity. I’ll keep you posted.

Pillar #4: Muslims fast during the holy month of Ramadan.

During the ninth month of the Islamic calendar, known as Ramadan, Muslims fast between sunrise and sunset. That means no eating, no drinking (not even water), no smoking, and no sex. It’s all about controlling your urges and making sacrifices to become closer to God. And since I’m a poor planner, Ramadan happens to fall this month.

Because I’m a wimp (and, I admit, a bit of a glutton), I’ll only be observing Ramadan for the second half of the month.

Before you say I’m copping out, look at it in perspective. If Ramadan is supposed to be one month out of the whole year, you have to look at my month as a Muslim as my whole year, which makes 2 weeks of fasting well over the appropriate amount of time.

So cut me a little slack. It’s going to be hard enough. I’ll be surprised if I don’t turn into a nocturnal creature, just so I can eat all night long and sleep all day. Ugh. I just remembered that I’ll still have to get up five times a day to pray. There’s always a catch when I think I’ve found an easy way out.

Pillar #5: Muslims are expected to make a pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca at least once in their lifetime, if they can afford it and can handle the physical strain of the journey.

Obviously (well, at least, I hope it’s obvious), I won’t be carrying out the fifth pillar of Islam this month. Not only can I not afford it financially, but the pilgrimage is supposed to be made at a particular time of year, and this isn’t it.

I have to admit, I’m glad for that. Even if I could afford a vacation, I’d kind of rather go someplace a little less balmy than the Middle East. If Texas was too hot for me, I’m guessing Mecca isn’t exactly my dream destination. 

So far, Islam is looking like the most demanding of the religions I’ve tried on. And I’m not sure I’m enjoying it. Truth be told, I don't like it at all. I don’t like all these rules and obligations and that so many things are forbidden. And I really, really miss having a glass of wine now and then. Huh. Am I talking about wine too much? I thought all the prayer and the covering my hair and stuff would be the worst part of being Muslim. But no. It’s the lack of wine. Strange.

 

Month 10, Day 1: My First Day as a Muslim

Today, I am a Muslim.

So far this year, I’ve simultaneously dreaded and anticipated each new religion. But this month, my month of Islam, I have to admit that I’ve really only been dreading it.

Don’t get me wrong. I have nothing against Muslims, like many Americans seem to. I do believe that Islam is inherently a peaceful faith and that the vast majority of Muslims are good people and not radical terrorists.

But at the same time, there is an element of fear. I never worried that “pagan fundamentalists” would come after me for making fun of the notion of fairies. I never even considered the possibility that anyone would attack me—either verbally or physically—when I kind of made fun of Jesus. But the fear that I could suffer some type of retribution for giving my real opinion on Islam—any aspect of it—is palpable. And it’s making me a bit reluctant to be myself and really give my all to this whole project.

But I’ll try, even though it won’t be easy. And it’s not just the fear that’s going to make this month difficult. As luck (and some unfortunate planning) would have it, this month is Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting. That means no food or drink or sex between sunrise and sundown—no small task during the summer, when it stays light for so long. Plus, there’s no pork (which is forbidden in Islam) and no booze—at all.

But I did prepare for this month of sacrifice in advance. On my last day of Shinto, I took the liberty of consuming two big ole pork chops and drinking a solid bottle (okay, maybe it was more) of wine. I may actually still be a little bit drunk today. But cut me some slack. Last night’s booze has to last me a whole 30 days.

Islam, here we go.