TIME THE LIBERAL MUSLIMS FACED THE EXTREMISTS

Women should be reminded that as face-masking is not found in Islam’s transcendent text, it is therefore a non-Koranic and un-Islamic habit, not a fundamental feature of their religion. Islam is not a faith of superficial symbolism.

NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

I published the article ‘Tun Dr Mahathir takes on 1 billion Muslims’ (READ HERE) a couple of days ago just to ‘test the waters’, so to speak. I wanted to see how the orthodox or fundamentalist Muslims would react.

As I had expected, none of them could argue their case other than scream empty rhetoric that was not backed by historical data. It is just like Christians screaming that Jesus is our saviour and those who accept Jesus will go to heaven without backing that statement with evidence other than meaningless verses from a Bible that was not written by Jesus.

Both Muslims and Christians are delusional and pathetic creatures who cling to myths to con themselves into believing that life after death is better than life on earth. If that is true why is everyone so scared of dying? If the next world is so good and better than this world then why not die today? Why fight to stay alive?

Okay, that article I mentioned above was regarding the issue of Hadith (sayings of Prophet Muhammad). I have already written many articles regarding the issue of Christians using the Allah word. Now let us go to the next and probably even more ‘explosive’ issue. And that is the issue of women covering their heads, hair or faces, which many Muslims believe is a command from God or Allah.

No doubt, yet again, I am throwing the cat amongst the pigeons to see what will happen. However, I am not going to argue the case for or against this issue. I am going to let Dr Taj Hargey do this for me.

Dr Taj Hargey is Imam of the Oxford Islamic Congregation and Chairman of the Muslim Educational Centre of Oxford who describes himself as a thorn in the side of the Muslim hierarchy.

Dr Hargey, a South African anti-apartheid campaigner who has lived in Britain on and off for the past three decades, has made many enemies because of his liberal brand of Islam which he preaches from a small assembly hall in Oxford.

This is what Dr Hargey said on 12th April 2011 and published in the Mail Online:

The decision by the French government to outlaw all forms of public face-masking, including the burkaand niqab, is welcomed by all thinking Muslims around the world.

The Muslim Educational Centre of Oxford, which has pioneered an enlightened and egalitarian Islam, salutes France for its bold legislative steps to eradicate this hideous tribal dress code that is deliberately given a completely false veneer of Islam.

However, since Britain tackles social problems in its own particular way and has different ways of doing things, the scourge of this foreign face-masking fad that is unfortunately growing in popularity in the Muslim community has to be confronted imaginatively and not exclusively through legal channels.

What is critical is that every effort should be made to disparage and discourage this tribal trend and cultural custom from infesting British society.

France, like other Western nations, has sovereign rights to implement any laws passed by democratic consent. Its National Assembly overwhelmingly approved legislation making all facial concealment in public a criminal act. Although France is entitled to exercise its legislative powers, this is too blunt an instrument to combat the blight of burkas on Europe’s streets.

What is required is an orchestrated and multilateral strategy to expose the twisted theology and cultural sexism that underpins this pernicious foreign fashion.

The practice of face-masking using a burka or niqab is not mentioned in the Koran. All that is required under Islamic law is that both genders dress modestly

It is important to understand why the burka and niqab have been expediently transformed into an emblem of Islam. Under the rapacious influence of Saudi Wahhabism and other extremist sects, many Muslim women in France and elsewhere have been conditioned by the repressive masculine fraternity that it is a religious necessity to completely conceal female identity in public.

All the Koran requires is that both genders dress modestly. But the misogynistic clergy defies the Koran text and distorts the reputed sayings (Hadith) of the Prophet Muhammad (recorded over 250 years after his death) to elevate an archaic pre-Islamic convention into a contemporary religious imperative.

Sadly, even here in the UK, most uninformed Muslims have succumbed to this vile Wahhabi-Deobandi propaganda to condone female face-masking on spurious theological grounds or inconsistent and bogus civil rights arguments.

Face-masking is a pre-Islamic Byzantine and Persian practice and is non-existent in the Koran. Indeed, since Muslim women are banned from hiding their faces while praying or when they perform the pilgrimage, why do they need to do so in the public realm?

Women should be reminded that as face-masking is not found in Islam’s transcendent text, it is therefore a non-Koranic and un-Islamic habit, not a fundamental feature of their religion. Islam is not a faith of superficial symbolism.

All educated Muslims must resist the importation of this Saudi and Taliban face-mask, not only because it is cultural, non-religious and a security risk, but also because it disempowers women by making them invisible and isolated while discriminating against men who cannot hide their faces in public.

Furthermore, face-masking inhibits effective social interaction and community cohesion. Moreover, it poses a burgeoning health hazard as fully shrouded women are not exposed to natural sunlight thereby lacking essential Vitamin D, which leads directly to increasing rickets and infant morbidity in the UK.

Forward-looking and progressive British Muslims who resist the Talibanisation of Islam in the UK should lead a coordinated campaign to rid this country of this alien cultural monstrosity.

Dr Taj Hargey is Imam of the Oxford Islamic Congregation and Chairman of the Muslim Educational Centre of Oxford.

Two days before the French law became operative, a group of integrated Muslims in Oxford burned theburka as a mark of our collective disgust and disdain.

What needs to be done now is to introduce a twin track strategy of LMR (lampooning, mocking and ridiculing face-masking) which will be combined with a systematic programme of re-education and information that will empower Muslim women and make them realise that this tribal rag and cultural cloth is not intrinsic but incidental to Islam. It is purely the product of male chauvinism and not religious necessity.