The Islamist

by Ed Husain

  I mentioned to Faye the teacher’s interrogatory questioning and the unwarranted need to justify Kelly’s presence in class. The following Saturday, during the coffee break, I congratulated Kelly for her strength in standing up to him. We spoke for a while and, for the first time in many years, I was able to converse with an ordinary American without any feeling of rancour or animosity. Post-9/11, for a former Islamist, that was a miracle.

  Kelly, I learned, was a business consultant and fluent in French, Italian, and Spanish. She was married to an Englishman and now lived in London permanently. Born in the outskirts of Chicago, she was studious and well-mannered. We both shared a passion for Arabic, for different reasons, and had an avid interest in current affairs.

  Soon we were exchanging e-mails on history, philosophy, poetry, ethics, and, of course, religion. Kelly was an agnostic and a borderline atheist. She was also liberal in her political and social views. I knew that many of my Muslim friends would disapprove of me befriending an agnostic, liberal, non-Muslim American female. My old Islamist acquaintances would see this as entering blasphemous territory, befriending the worst of our ideological enemies. My becoming close friends with Kelly was a deliberate attempt to prove to myself that human love and friendship could be built on the basis of our common humanity, and we need not hate and desire destruction simply because of our differences, be they religious or otherwise.

  For both of us our friendship was a huge personal outreach programme. Kelly had hundreds of questions to ask me about Islam and Muslims, and I had hundreds for her about modern America. For me, Kelly was the litmus test of whether I was able to befriend an American without wishing to convert her, or impose my views on her. She questioned me on Muslim status of women, capital punishment, human rights, jihad, and all the while she maintained her liberal views. And why not?

  After hours of discussion, we were amazed by how similar our worldviews were. Despite her agnosticism and rejection of her Catholic upbringing, we were able to see eye to eye on almost every controversial issue. Where we disagreed, we did so with respect and understanding for the other’s position. However, underlying our differences was a common desire to see a healed human race, free from the fanaticism of secularism or religion.

  Kelly never pre-judged Faye or me. Faye wore a headscarf, I a Muslim skullcap, Kelly a baseball cap. And yet we were all able to get along. Today, Kelly remains one of my closest friends.

  Imam Hanson visited Britain again in late 2002. When Faye and I mentioned him to Kelly, to our astonishment she wanted to come and hear him speak. Kelly shocked Faye and me by wearing a Muslim headscarf out of respect for both the mosque and the scholar. I so wished other Muslims could see that an agnostic, liberal American from Chicago sits among us in hijab, not because she is convinced, but out of respect for her fellow human beings. Kelly gave me hope that amid the chaos of extremist, literalist Christianity in America, there were decent people who sought a better, more compassionate world.

  After that meeting, for the first time in my life, I approached Imam Hamza Yusuf Hanson and shook his hands. I had been taking Islamic lessons from him via audio tapes and CDs for two years; I considered him a teacher and an inspiration. In person, he was a kind, observant scholar with a gentle handshake. I felt as though he did not look at me, but into me. It was a surreal experience.

  ‘How are you?’ he asked, as though he knew me.

  I knew he was facing a tough time from extremist elements within the Muslim population in Britain and America, so in an attempt to encourage him to continue with his magnificent work of calling people to God, away from political Islam, I told him that he had deeply touched the lives of both myself and others I knew. I informed him about my intent to study in the Middle East and he took a genuine interest in my memorizing the Koran. I was humbled and embarrassed by the attention he gave to someone as insignificant as me. To make matters worse, he asked me to pray for him. I left the mosque that afternoon more convinced than ever that Imam Hanson was not an advocate of moderate, spiritual Islam because that was what the West, particularly the United States, wanted, but because at its essence, that’s what Islam is: moderation. The Prophet Mohammed spoke several times to his companions about his way being a middle way, and in one of the most authenticated statements warned against extremism. I knew, I had experienced, what the Prophet was warning against.

  Imam Hanson and his teachers were not creating a new Islam to suit the West, but manifesting the primordial persona of the Prophet Mohammed, reclaiming the Prophet’s faith from the hijackers of planes, assassins of presidents, murderers of the innocent, and seekers of political power. If Imam Hanson’s conduct had touched me, it was because he had taken the Prophet as his role model. The Prophet took an interest in the lives of people who surrounded him; he often asked the children of Medina about their pets. His high rank with God did not prevent him from being humble towards his friends. Once, the Prophet asked his former enemy Omar, the later caliph, to ‘remember me with your Lord, O young brother’. It was this sublime character that had touched Imam Hanson’s life, and in turn my own.

  That was my first and last meeting with the Californian scholar who, like me, had travelled a path of conflict and anger only to realize the mistakes he had made and stand courageously to oppose hatred in all its forms, secular and religious.

  13.

  The Road to Damascus

  My religion is love’s religion: where’er turn her camels, that religion my religion is, my faith.

  Ibn Arabi, thirteenth-century Muslim theologian

  After 9/11 I knew that my time of trying to live an isolated existence, enjoying the company of the Sufis, was over. The world’s media were now discussing my religion, something I had considered extremely precious and personal. More than ever I needed to learn Arabic to help me understand my faith at its core.

  After months of discussion, Faye and I decided that Damascus in Syria would best suit our needs. Imam Hanson had studied with Bedouin tribes, pure in tongue and piety, in the deserts of sub-Saharan Africa. Faye and I settled for a metropolis.

  As we worked towards our move, I increasingly wore Arab clothes and lived like a hermit: minimal food, no television, and long hours of study. As I reconnected with my faith, all around me Islamists were emerging as a strong voice. Islamist groups organized conferences, the media gave them vast amounts of airtime, and they began to be seen as ‘mainstream’ Islam. I, a spiritually oriented, moderate, mainstream Muslim, like millions of others, had nothing to say. We did not advocate suicide bombings, challenge the governments of countries, threaten to hijack - why should we make the news?

  With British Muslim leadership firmly in the hands of Islamists at the Muslim Council of Britain, and a similar Islamist takeover of other representative bodies in the United States, I ignored the new Islam industry. My old acquaintances, Inayat Bunglawala most prominent among them, and other Islamists were dominating the airwaves as representatives of British Islam. Mainstream Muslims at mosques succumbed to Islamist pressure to join the MCB in the name of ‘Muslim unity’. In itself, the aim was laudable. However, the public face of the MCB, as well as its many politburo-styled committees, was constantly dominated by Islamists. Mainstream British Muslims from various Sufi traditions were not considered worthy of becoming leaders of the MCB. They were mere support fodder, a convenient statistic for MCB leaders with which to harangue government ministers and browbeat the media. The politicking of the MCB and its own extremist sympathies was to come to the fore after a terrorist attack on Britain.

  My years of Islamist ranting now seemed so hollow, meaningless, and destructive. It was God, I read in the Koran, who bestowed political leadership, mulk, and it was God who withdrew it. To me God was no longer a legislator but an existence that breathed life into the deepest vessels of my heart. ‘God moves between a person and his heart,’ I recited. In another verse: ‘I am closer to you than your jugular vein.’

  God was no longer beyond human reach, in
need of governmental endorsement. God was around us, in us, for us.

  Repeatedly the Koran called for reflection, meditation, and contemplation on the world. It offered parables to trigger our remembrance of God. The Koran desired yusr, or ease, and not hardship in adherence to faith. There was an elasticity, nuance, and plurality in the message of the Koran that Islamists had somehow overlooked, in the process reducing our noble faith to terrorism, anger, and conflict.

  While Faye and I planned our studies in Syria we took Cambridge courses to qualify as teachers of English as a foreign language so we could support ourselves while we were studying. We both resigned from our jobs in London, reassured our worried families, and prayed that all would go according to plan. In early 2003 Saddam Hussein effectively invited the US army to invade Iraq by playing cat-and-mouse games with United Nations arms inspectors. Our families and friends cautioned us to stay away from the Middle East. There was talk of US tanks rolling into Damascus after Baghdad, statues of Hafez and Bashar al-Asad to be toppled. Syria was Iraq’s neighbour, and Faye and I felt as though we were heading for a war zone. Should we go, or wait until the war ended? But if the war spread to Syria, we might never get to learn Arabic at all.

  With Faye’s agreement, I decided to leave first, to test the waters. At Damascus airport I was met by a British friend, Peter, who offered to put me up in his student flat.

  ‘Three of us live there because it is very close to the institute at which we study,’ he explained to me as we boarded an old bus.

  ‘How many rooms do you have?’ I enquired.

  ‘Three,’ he replied.

  ‘So how do you have a spare room? I am more than happy to book into a hotel till my wife arrives,’ I suggested.

  ‘No, no. It’s quite all right. One of my flatmates, Qaleem, left this morning for jihad. His room is empty.’

  I was not sure if I heard right. ‘Sorry?’ I said.

  ‘Jihad. Qaleem has gone for jihad in Iraq. Several students from our institute went with him,’ explained my fully composed friend. ‘Isn’t it on the news in Britain?’

  I could not believe my ears.

  ‘You’re not seriously suggesting that fighting for Saddam Hussein is a jihad, are you? After all, this man declared a so-called jihad in 1981 against the Iranians and then killed nearly a million Muslims. He called it a jihad when he occupied Kuwait.’

  ‘Shhhh,’ said my friend. ‘This is Syria. You’ll get us arrested.’

  I was dumbfounded that young Muslims in Syria could possibly think they were fighting a jihad in Iraq. I had come to learn Arabic in a country where students from religious seminaries were rushing to aid a military dictator.

  Deeply disturbed on my first evening in a dusty, polluted Damascus, I went with my friend to pray the Esha, the last prayer of the day. Unlike young people in Britain, most young Syrians prayed as their parents did. No rebellion in prayer, at least. After prayers I expressed gratitude to God for bringing me to a land where I could study the language of the Prophet, but complained that he had put me in the room of an active and misguided jihadist.

  I had travelled far enough from political Islam to know that America and Britain toppling Saddam did not warrant a jihad. Besides, my friendship with Kelly had taught me much about America and Americans.

  Despite my friend’s requests, I had not unpacked my bags yet. I decided I would sleep on the sitting-room couch and then move out as soon as possible.

  When we reached his flat we could hear the racket inside from half a street away. Muttering in disapproval, Peter opened the door and I followed him in.

  ‘Qaleem!’ he exclaimed. ‘What are you doing here?’

  He was addressing a skinny, smiling, loudly-spoken teenager. Other students from the seminary had heard that Qaleem had returned, and they were there to honour him rowdily. Al-Jazeera blasted at full volume from a TV in the corner.

  Peter introduced me to Qaleem and we exchanged nods. He spoke no English and I no Arabic. Peter explained that Syrian border guards had sent Qaleem back to Damascus - the government did not want Syrians fighting for Saddam Hussein. I was pleased to hear the government of the land, at least, was sane.

  Suddenly, Qaleem requested quiet as al-Jazeera interviewed a political analyst. Qaleem listened briefly and then punched the air, spat at the screen and yelled, ‘Jasoos! Jasoos!’

  ‘It means “spy”,’ translated Peter.

  ‘Why is the speaker on television a spy?’ I asked.

  ‘Because he supports the removal of Saddam. Anybody who argues for democracy in Iraq these days is condemned by most Arabs. In Iraq, a jasoos will be killed.’

  That sent shudders through me. Was I ajasoos? Here I was with Saddam enthusiasts where I believed in a free and democratic Iraq. Something deep within me warned me to be silent and learn from the passions of powerless people.

  In the hours to come Iraq’s notorious Minister of Information, Saeed al-Sahhaf, rallied the Arab world by promising victory over the Americans and denying that Americans could possibly enter Baghdad. To Sahhaf ’s hollow rhetoric, Qaleem and others cheered.

  CNN and the BBC were broadcasting pictures of American troops approaching Baghdad, but the young people surrounding me refused to believe their eyes. There was an inherent distrust of Western news organizations, an inclination to reject them as biased reporters of events, supporters of Israel and enemies of the Arabs. Any call against the West, even from a dictatorial murderer like Saddam under the banner of a false jihad, easily won acceptance because of this underlying hatred of the West, based on British and French conduct during the middle of the twentieth century. Unless the wrongs of history are corrected, particularly in relation to Palestine, that mindset of hatred will persist.

  I observed Arab anger but vowed to remain silent until I had learnt Arabic myself.

  Soon, with Peter’s help, I found a small flat in Salihiyyeh, midway up the historical Mount Qassioun. Faye arrived and we distanced ourselves from the student jihadis and slowly drew closer to Sufi Muslims from the West studying Arabic and Shariah in Damascus. We enrolled at the Languages Institute of the University of Damascus and studied Arabic full time while Faye taught English part time at the British Council, and I did the same, first at the university and then with her at the Council. My application to work at the university resulted in a stressful time for me: the head of faculty, Dr Waddah al-Khateeb, insisted that he would have to obtain security clearance. The Syrian intelligence services contacted their British counterparts and I worried that perhaps my Islamist past would show up. Would I be expelled from Syria? I was relieved when I was cleared, but what if I had been an unreconstructed Hizb member, or an extremist from another group? My worries about lax security were soon to prove well founded.

  Our days were tough, challenging, and physically draining, but every day we were bestowed with a renewed drive and passion to persevere. Those days were also memorable for the many new friends and acquaintances we made. We studied with Germans, Russians, Italians, Japanese, Iranians, Turks, French, Spaniards, and, of course, Americans. Often the classes became forums for inter-faith dialogue. Where better to bridge the gaps between Islam and Christianity than in Damascus - the city on the road to which St Paul saw the light?

  Most of the students in several of our classes were Muslims. And yet, when discussing controversial topics or simpler things in life such as attitudes to humour, Faye and I found ourselves forming alliances with Americans, Canadians, and Australians. Away from Britain, something was happening to us: we had more in common with other English speakers, Caucasians, than we dared admit.

  My teachers were respectful and committed individuals. Many were Muslims, some were not. But they all refused to call me by my first name: Mohamed. This was an honoured name and reserved for the Prophet, not to be used in vain. My middle name, Mahbub, means beloved in Arabic and that caused embarrassment among both my female teachers and my own peers. It was then that I decided on Ed, the last syllable from the
Prophet’s and my own name, as a suitable compromise. Veneration and love for the Prophet Mohammed ran deep in Syria; they were hallmarks of a true Sufi. Street beggars forced passers-by to dig deep into their pockets by whispering, ‘Ala Hubb al-Nabiyy’: for the love of the Prophet. The muezzins, after their calls to prayer, sang songs of love.

  On the advice of my father I searched for a Sufi master. During my search I spent much time at a serene mosque above the tomb of Ibn Arabi. Ibn Arabi was born in Spain in 1165 and travelled widely before settling in Damascus, where he died in 1240. Patron saint of Damascus, he was a prolific writer and provocative thinker. Where Rumi taught that the way to reach God was through intense, divine love, Ibn Arabi’s method combined virtue, knowledge, and experience.

  Every visit was calming and cleansed the soul. I came away feeling closer to God, wanting to engage in worship, and trying to be considerate of those who surrounded me, regardless of faith, race, or gender. After morning and dusk prayers at Ibn Arabi’s mosque, an elderly teacher of the Koran, Shaikh Sukkar, would sit and listen to adults reciting the Koran. Those sights reminded me of my childhood days with Grandpa. Ibn Arabi’s mosque attracted Sufis from all over the world: I saw Turks, Iranians, Africans, and Asians pay their respects to this master of esoteric knowledge.

  I do not claim to be a Sufi: it is an exalted rank not deserved by one who sleeps full nights, away from the pre-dawn prayer mat. Those who know me are all too aware of my failings. I succumb to the whispers of the nafs, the lower ego, far too often. In Arabic, the word for human is insan, derived from nisyan, which means forgetfulness. As a human, or insan, one who forgets, I am given to frequent amnesia, lapses in conduct, and distraction from God. But my hope in the eternal and infinite mercy of God, the benevolence of His Messenger, and the warm calls of the awliya, the people of God, keep me going. Rumi’s invitations keep me running back: