KR

1. (May 2024) Girls, you will be tested in your Duas later this month. You have to learn all these Duas, including the one for entering the graveyard. 2. (December 2023) Girls are not allowed to go to the graveyard.

A few months ago, Mengal showed up in the UK. When he was in Batley, a very senior scholar said he takes great pleasure watching in his video clips from the internet. This same scholar prohibits video making and photography of any kind in his mosque and the locality in general. It's like there Batley is a haram (حرم) unto itself, where things inside it are disallowed but beyond it are fine.

Whilst we appreciate this open and sincere embrace from the mothership, let us not forget this was in part due to the openness and commitment to scholarship displayed by the likes Qari Tayyib, a true visionary. Here's the implicit acknowledgement from the article: "The elders of the school, shaped by their old world traditions of hospitality and, especially, respect for scholarship, were generous and helpful to a stranger. There was also a tradition of openness to outsiders thanks to the school’s involvement in the nationalist movement. The fact that it was a woman who sought this help seemed more of a problem to American academics than it was to the Deobandis." Otherwise I'm tempted to argue this is an exception and not the norm. Compare Metcalf's experience to Sophie Gilliat Ray's in her essay, Behind Closed Worlds. This is a Welsh sociologist, now Director of Centre for Study of Islam in the UK at Cardiff University. Her essay, given that she earned funding but was unable to conduct research, much like studying an inmate who chooses not to co-operate, was a list of pathetic excuses fobbing her off. Others were less courteous, barring her from entering the premise because her gender and faith. I'm not suggesting the motivations behind her study were altogether innocent but who is to know? How would have Qari Tayyib known Metcalf's motives, yet look how she has turned out? A better defender of the Deoband and Tableegh than most, defending them in circles where it would have been well-nigh impossible for Deobandis and Tableeghis to defend themselves (CIA, Whitehouse etc). What this boils down to me is a commitment to scholarship. Otherwise dada giri and cult like attitudes breed suspicion: one is supposed to follow and not ask any questions. So to reiterate: Whilst the Elders allowed a non-Muslim American uni student to conduct research about their seminary, do you think your UK, .ZA or even Gujarati seminary would permit such a candidate today? والله أعلم. https://theidealmuslimman.com/2017/04/20/metcalf-guest-deoband/ Source: https://www.facebook.com/unamazi/posts/1484108988307387

Whilst we appreciate this open and sincere embrace from the mothership, let us not forget this was in part due to the openness and commitment to scholarship displayed by the likes Qari Tayyib, a true visionary. Here's the implicit acknowledgement from the article: "The elders of the school, shaped by their old world traditions of hospitality and, especially, respect for scholarship, were generous and helpful to a stranger. There was also a tradition of openness to outsiders thanks to the school’s involvement in the nationalist movement. The fact that it was a woman who sought this help seemed more of a problem to American academics than it was to the Deobandis." Otherwise I'm tempted to argue this is an exception and not the norm. Compare Metcalf's experience to Sophie Gilliat Ray's in her essay, Behind Closed Worlds. This is a Welsh sociologist, now Director of Centre for Study of Islam in the UK at Cardiff University. Her essay, given that she earned funding but was unable to conduct research, much like studying an inmate who chooses not to co-operate, was a list of pathetic excuses fobbing her off. Others were less courteous, barring her from entering the premise because her gender and faith. I'm not suggesting the motivations behind her study were altogether innocent but who is to know? How would have Qari Tayyib known Metcalf's motives, yet look how she has turned out? A better defender of the Deoband and Tableegh than most, defending them in circles where it would have been well-nigh impossible for Deobandis and Tableeghis to defend themselves (CIA, Whitehouse etc). What this boils down to me is a commitment to scholarship. Otherwise dada giri and cult like attitudes breed suspicion: one is supposed to follow and not ask any questions. So to reiterate: Whilst the Elders allowed a non-Muslim American uni student to conduct research about their seminary, do you think your UK, .ZA or even Gujarati seminary would permit such a candidate today? والله أعلم. https://theidealmuslimman.com/2017/04/20/metcalf-guest-deoband/ Source: https://www.facebook.com/unamazi/posts/1484108988307387

Shaykh Hatim’s books and Tahqiqat

بنت الرحالة عبدالله فلبي https://www.facebook.com/share/r/gPKGQg3KwFVmVbtE/?mibextid=xCPwDs

All the lessons are available. But when will you start studying? Yes, I get it, you downloaded the lessons on this and that book and you bought this and that edition of this and that book, and now you're very excited. But I already know lessons on everything are available and good editions of books can be bought. What I don't know is when you're going to actually start following one of those lessons or studying one of those books. Everything is available, nothing special about that. If you want to be special, start studying.

A key takeaway from this is that muftis cannot re-engineer society by way of fatwa. That isn’t their job either. Their job is to present solutions for the situations Muslims are in.

An indefatigable people https://x.com/damiyenr/status/1787191568870310341

أوراق نماء ما الذي يحدث عندما يشتغل الفقيه التراثي في أفق حداثي؟ ياسر المطرفي

حظرته لأنه من قوة جهله عد ابن قدامة من طلاب ابن تيمية، فجاء من حسابه الآخر ليثبت جهلي كما ترون لتعرفوا لماذا حظرته 🤔

A popular challenge nowadays issued by segregationist extremists to scholars on the other side why have a more nuanced position on ikhtilat is whether they are happy for their own wives to be in mixed settings. It might seem at first this argument is a slam dunk, but it is in actuality weaker than a cobweb. The fact is that many Muslim women want to act upon ورع - a higher form of caution. Nobody from the segregationist extremists has the right to force these women to enact a relaxed form of segregation. The question here is NOT whether or not these Ulama are happy for their wives to attend mixed settings. The real question is why these segregationist extremists are policing and judging everyone who does not conform to their strict view. It’s so ridiculously strict that even many signatories from the Hundred Molvis have been found to have fallen foul of their own statement. They should declare themselves as transgressors. I have the receipts. So what is it going to be folks? This hypocritical charade of compelling everyone to have unreasonably high expectations of wara’ on gender segregation that was not even present in the era of the Sahabah, and a needless trigger-happy attitude against over 90% of the men and women in the Ummah? Or eat humble pie, for many of these signatories to retract this absurd statement (clearly some of them are clueless), to stop judging others, and to work on their own selves and faults? Absolutely nobody is going to change their behaviour because of this statement. It doesn’t even come across as sincere Nasihah. It is a power move - nothing more. It’s as if the signatories are trying to win over extremist nutjobs who follow ASDesai, like the Tory Party lurching to the right to appeal to Reform voters.

The attempt for a puritanical approach to defining a sin called *ikhtilat* is no less than the Madkhali endeavour of defining *khuruj*, who inadvertently steamrollered Sahabah and Tabi'un who spoke out against the Umayyads and cast them as Kharijites. These Hundred Molvis are prepared to demolish anybody who stands in their way in order to get impose their view on the Muslims. It doesn't matter if they steamroll over the longest serving rector of Darul Ulum Deoband Qari Tayyib, or Mufti Taqi, or anyone else who does not conform to their arbitrary and ill-defined standards of segregation.

On the theme of cancelling deceased scholars and re-labelling them as unashamed and overt sinners, here is the late M. Yaqub Qasimi : https://www.instagram.com/p/BTma8gbgJ1_/ Anyone who knows what he has done for the Muslims of the UK and the calibre of the man shall be horrified at the prospect of laying a finger on him. But the Hundred Molvis are clamping down hard. Dead or alive, you are not beyond their scrutiny. So, a message to the Hundred Molvis: Stop beating around the bush and declare him a transgressor, since that now seems to be your job. Pass a fatwa saying nobody can say رحمه الله after his name. The Dewsbury and Batley folks on the Hundred Molvis list the can start first since he was their neighbour. Oh and by the way, if someone thinks this pic was a one off for which he can be forgiven, how about this serious sin and unforgiveable crime of ikhtilat by M. Yaqub according to these self-appointed Hundred Molvis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXR8mrLswPQ

Notice where Abu Naumaan’s ‘conveyor belt theory’ appears again. I have nothing to say about this absurd remark. Make no mistake about it – Akram Nadwi is a soft target. Maybe Abu Naumaan should pick on people and institutions of greater consequence, like Qarawiyyin or Tetouan University in Morocco, Mahad al-Fath al-Islami in Damascus, Ebrahim College in London and many others. Or perhaps Abu Naumaan can take a look at S. Bashir - whom I have had the honour to read to in my time at Madinah - who visits the UK and listens to Qira’at from sisters, face to face: His female students are of the highest calibre in Tajwid in the UK, hands down. Making an ignorant comment against a person like Akram Nadwi with little fear of blowback is easy, but there are 1001 people and places Abu Naumaan should think of criticising before cowardly targeting Dr Akram Nadwi. I know for a fact that some teachers in Dewsbury were skeptical of the class layout at Ebrahim College in London. But when they actually visited EC, saw the checks and balances in place, and saw the results they were (and still are) producing with the students, they became believers in their model and accepted it as a valid method of teaching. Sometimes, all it takes is to sit down and communicate. Secondly, Abu Naumaan went on to say:

“Muhaddithat book is good book. But when we read that, it seems they [Akram Nadwi] are trying to say that the whole khidmat of hadith is done by women only and men didn't do anything. This is the impression a person gets, whereas the khidmat of hadees throughout 1400 years was done [by men]. What does the Quran says? وما أرسلنا من قبلك إلا رجالا... So this responsibility is also on the [male] Ulama Kiram... but that does not mean that we give the credit only to the ladies.” 

Really? Even a ten year old child can understand that writing a book on female scholarship does not mean he is denying male scholarship. But this point seems to be lost on Abu Naumaan. Maybe he really has a deep-seated hatred and no love for Akram Nadwi, which is funny given that M. Bawa in his speech immediately after Abu Naumaan stressed the importance of loving everybody and not having hatred for anyone. I guess that love is only reserved by Abu Naumaan for his own cronies, with none to be shared outside his circle whatsoever. Everyone else is to be judged by a higher standard and is not afforded any excuses.

The irony to the above is that Limbada Abu Naumaan himself did a hitjob on a rival Deobandi seminary by speaking out against their relatively relaxed approach to gender interaction in the classroom. This all demonstrates that the red lines for these molvis vary from one to another. To this date, they have not defined what those red lines are. Here is some of what I wrote on Limbada Abu Naumaan's lecture at the time, some six years ago - compare that with the videos above, which for him are all ok (maybe because sitting next to Mufti Taqi granted him immunity): Abu Naumaan was short on details in his lecture against ikhtilat. In particular, he did not give any indications on which aspects of gender interaction were clear red lines, and which were subject to valid difference of opinion. But listening to Abu Naumaan, it appeared that anything less than fully-walled segregation and full-face veiling leads to mini-skirts, which led me to assume that only gender interaction according to Abu Naumaan means listening to each other’s voices. But this begged the question why Abu Naumaan does not consider the voice of a woman to be awrah (nakedness) as well (and therefore must be concealed), since that too can be an equal cause of titillation of men by his standards. Abu Naumaan’s conveyor belt theory of “‘a woman with hijab but without the veil’ to ‘wearing mini-skirts’” is well established in his mind, but it might be difficult to substantiate it in real life. But seriously, what is Abu Naumaan’s view on men listening to a woman’s voice? I really don’t get it. Abu Naumaan also stated on Sunday that women should never be on a podium, speaking in front of men. This begs the question whether the Ulama of Darul Ulum Deoband – specifically Qari Muhammad Tayyib – had their wits about them when Indira Gandhi was ‘invited’ to speak to them on DU Deoband’s centenary celebration gathering. I gather from Abu Naumaan’s words that the veil is obligatory, because he did say:

“And those who say there is no harm in opening face and running around here and there... Allah know what type of Muslims they are” 

I am uncertain why he assumes that not wearing veil automatically results in a woman running around in circles to show off their faces to everyone. In societies where there is no a predominant culture of the veil – Indian Sub-Continent, Indonesia, Malaysia, Turkey, Egypt, Palestine, Levant… – are women in headscarves without the veil seen to be “running around here and there”? One must wonder where Abu Naumaan comes up with these crazy assumptions. Unfortunately, it did not stop there. Abu Naumaan seemed to apply the verse of al-Ahzab لئن لم ينته المنافقون والذين في قلوبهم مرض والمرجفون في المدينة to those “who go against this instruction of hijab”! Seriously!? Is this what the verse is referring to? This is just a horrendous interpretation of the verse. Abu Naumaan brazenly disrespected the audience by saying this. I doubt he would have the gall to repeat this in a circle of learned individuals. But anything goes in front of a bunch of ignorant laymen I guess. But it didn’t end there. Abu Naumaan decided to target Akram Nadwi. His attack on Nadwi was twofold. Firstly:

“We have some people teaching in Oxford, writing books ‘al-Muhaddithat’, Dr Akram Nadwi, and promoting this behaviour of freedom and intermingling between sexes, and sitting them together in the masjid with no veil or curtain between. This goes against the principle of Haya. Such people then take their topi off as well, and not only that but start shaking hands with women as well, and then chatting, and then one thing leads to another.”