Photo:Metropolitan Museum of Art

by Misha Habib

America has changed so much since my adolescence. Growing up as an American bred a very different outlook on life from the breeding it is providing today. And it is a shame because America is a piece of land that made a promise to allow everyone to speak the truth; to do whatever it takes to find the truth and to fearlessly defend the truth no matter what the consequences.

When I look back over the last decade I see one of the unfortunate consequences of its moral degradation…

To create national support for an enemy, the last decade has been spent breeding hatred and resentment against a symbol.

Accumulating support to annihilate the enemy was strategized along the lines similar to the ones used for the Soviet Union. In a hurry, the symbol chosen accidently represented far more people than they initially estimated. And as time began to show they really had no idea what the power of that symbol held.

By the time someone realized this symbol has far more strength than the iron curtain…
By the time someone realized their own people would spend their lives fighting for sanctity of this symbol.
By the time they realized it was too late…

America had become a victim of Islamophobia

The objective was to unite the nation against a common enemy- whether fear, vengeance or accumulating oil was the reason is irrelevant- we might eradicate the enemy and we might find alternative energy sources, but we most definitely have a new problem.

The US government likes to plan for the worst and hope for the best. The reality is that breeding a decade of hatred has led to what the government probably fears may have accidentally sown the seeds of a situation they never intended.

American children have witnessed countless displays of hate towards Islam and all its associated parts. Whether it be towards the person sitting next to them in the subway or instructions warning them not to play with the potentially evil Muslim children; worse if a family member, neighbor or any soldier the child cared about died on the battlefield fighting the evil Muslim enemy, the child has dealt with the loss on the reassurance that the sacrifice was for a good cause.

Media in a lot of ways does rule the world- and the American media has a significant control over the national minds. When I watch an American movie or television miniseries and a visual displays the sounds of the azaan (call to prayer), followed by hoards of people bowing down in worship I know something bad or violent is about to be introduced onto the screen. Whether it is Hollywood or American television productions the last decade has made something very clear- Arabic words, Arabic sounds, veils, beards and Islamic forms of worship- all these things represent evil.

Ten years of subliminal messages are a powerful enemy to fight.

In the last decade those seeds have grown. Those children are now adults. Their breeding has been blossoming in ways that those watering the seeds could not have imagined- the government has lost control of the hatred.

What we now have is regret and an urgency to do damage control. The situation must be handled before it leads to the frightening scenario of future national violence or the many unthinkable possibilities that anger and hatred result in.

Today when a politician or spokesperson comes in front of the camera saying Islam is about peace; reassuring us there are many good Muslims and we should build them mosques in the name of peace, that too on places like ground zero- these statements will seem absurd in the face of those programmed to hate anything and everything that has to do with Islam.

Subliminal messages have a far more powerful impact that can be quantified and reversed.

Sufism has become an umbrella term for the various methods of preaching and practicing a peaceful Islam. A desperate attempt is being made to use this label to display a positive side of the religion. People are waving the label Sufi like a white flag in a war zone.

The truth is not everyone knows who Sufis like Rumi are and most importantly they don’t care. So while people are using the kosher term of Sufism as a desperate attempt to make amends for the decade of hatred spread, unless those we are trying to convince are simultaneously introduced to the goodness and purity that comes from the message of Sufism, we are exploiting their name for a bandage solution- Rumi’s power cannot be denied but at the end of the day he was just a man- a man who found the truth in The Quran and wanted to share it with the world. You cannot market a product’s ambassador without supporting what the ambassador represents.

Presently the efforts being done in America to protect the Muslims focus on statements stressing the fact that good Muslims exist in the local communities – but they are lots of good human beings and good citizens in America; translated to mean a good person under the label of Islam is an exception not the rule. The majority of Americans only see the evil associated with Islam.

The Power of The Quran
So while it is difficult to pinpoint why Islam has such power over its community- for example why non practicing Muslims strongly support belief in the religion- I do understand where the passion comes from and why it is difficult for people to explain their loyalty.

Aside from being taught to pray in Arabic and being sent for classes to learn Arabic pronunciations to enunciate the Quran, I do not remember being taught to read and internalize the actual message in the book. At the same time its message was passionately ingrained in me- The love and excitement that the previous generations felt was infectiously passed on.

So how did I receive it?

Through an array of artistic forms- I remember being infused with deep philosophies of the wonders of the Divine – His many forms that rest inside us and how they are unleashed in all the goodness a person can indulge in- to respond to miserliness with generosity, to forgive and forget, to inculcate patience, to joyfully sacrifice, to show respect to those who have earned it. The graceful way to deal with disappointments… and the list goes on and on.

When that art is performed- for example when a person sings the poetry of the ancient preachers, the artist is trying to tap into the preacher whose words they are performing. The power unleashed is so strong it is felt. It is a very difficult concept to verbalize, which is why Muslims have trouble explaining what it is that keeps them holding on to Islam. But once they have sat in an audience where the Divine has been called through such lyrics, once they have felt the music that unleashes the Divine from within, they are forever aware that the Divine does truly exist and that unconsciously latches them on to the faith.

The last revelation revealed to Prophet Muhammad stated that ‘today I have completed my favor upon you and perfected your religion’. The first revelation to Muhammad was God introducing Himself as The Creator of man. The first revelation about religion however was revealed to Abraham- it started with Abraham and the complete religion is a culmination of all in between.

If a person does not accept all the prophets from Abraham to Muhammad they are missing out on the complete story- in the way one needs all the pieces of the jig saw puzzle to truly understand what the picture is.

Muhammad laid down the final pieces of the puzzle – the missing pieces that link all the previous pieces together to form one whole- that makes us stand in awe of him.

The Quran is a manuscript dictated from the Divine- if the words and their true meaning, actually get inside a person, they have made the connection. The confidence that comes from knowing that God has spoken directly to a person is what gives one that confirmation of His existence. That connection makes one a believer- we probably won’t understand how to use that knowledge. Unfortunately the exploitation of the believer arises when they look here and there for guidance as they are searching for more information.

People that make the initial connection are sometimes branded as moderate Muslims- once we make the connection we might or might not start to search. Either way we do feel there is truth in this path even though we cannot explain it.

If we are successful in our search our connection will align us to perfect harmony. In all Rumi’s years as an orthodox Muslim he felt something was missing. Shams e Tabriz helped him achieve other forms of the connection and then he felt complete.

Being a complete Muslim is rare and seldom discussed.

The focus these days seems to be on extremists and moderates- labels created for those practicing modern day rituals of Islam. It has nothing to do with being a complete Muslim. Rituals might or might not help one build the connection. They are tools to obtain the main objective. They are not an objective in themselves. It is all about the connection and nothing else.

Present day eastern artists are using the old lyrics, dance steps and musical melodies of ancient preachers. They may be just performing to the world (and perhaps to themselves) but they are preaching the existence of God and tapping into the Divine that rests within the audience- they are helping create the connection.

To the world it is beautiful art and very little is understood where those ancient preachers found their inspiration to create those dance steps and poetry.

So while most of us never read and understood the Quran, those ancient artists did and in such a way that they internalized the message to use the words as their inspiration for the art they produced.

You know there is something powerful about it, even though a person cannot explain it.

Growing up in New York I was constantly exposed to the dormant power spiritual music, dance and poetry unleashes. Every problem in the world can be dealt with through the couplets of a Muslim poet or the examples of the mystics’ lives; the importance of honesty through the life of Hazrat Abdul Qadir Jilani; the phenomenal status achieved through discipline and sacrifice by Hazrat Rabia Basri. All we have to do is sit back clear our minds and recite the poems or remember their stories and the answers will come to us.

The Solution
If we truly want peace in side America, we must win back the hearts and minds of the people. The people taking these steps don’t have to be believers, they don’t have to like anything that has to do with Islam, but they better find something that makes Islam extraordinary and start breeding it.

Find something truly magnificent and unique under the umbrella of Islam and sow its seeds in the hearts and minds of the people. I promise them it is there because I am living it.

To win the hearts of the American people honesty is above all the manner in which business must be conducted. The people want to know why they should support the practice of Islam- a label they have been bred to hate in the last decade.

Fear of a future civil war and violence will not suffice. They must find truth that this label is actually something to support and applaud. And once they find it, sow it into the soil of the land and watch it grow. Time has shown us how the truth does prevail. This tree will have enough strength to wither the ones planted 10 years ago.

America has taught me the power of dreaming, the importance of hope and the ability to change the world.

That is why I took out the time to side step from my task at hand to give my humble input to a land that is my own.

But now my eyes tire from holding back the tears and my arms hurt from the burden of the collapsing infrastructure around me, I do not think it is right to spend any more time worrying about the repercussions of hatred in a land as civilized and compassionate as America. The American people have the strength to admit their mistakes and do what is necessary to achieve peace and prosperity. I am sure of that.

I care immensely for the land that taught me to be who I am today. I want my children to have the same experiences of equality, kindness and love ingrained in them that I received. At the end of the day I am an American who has to worry about the future of the US while I stand in Pakistan trying to find ways to fix the present turmoil that my other homeland is drowning in.

Misha Habib is an American Pakistani who has been globe trotting all her life. Born and raised in New York she moved to Pakistan when she was eleven and has been observing the world as someone who appears Pakistani on the outside but is totally American on the inside. Misha has done free-lance writing for Pakistan’s leading English language magazines and the county’s top English newspapers like ‘The Dawn’ and ‘The News.’ ‘Love letters from Pakistan’ is her upcoming spiritual memoir written as 99 letters to Allah where she tries to understand what Allah is trying to tell the world through all the violence and chaos.