Islamic Horizons March/April 2010

Heart of the Community

Discussing her conversion, Khadijah Rivera, a Puerto Rican ex- Roman Catholic, wrote: “Reverting to Islam would be complicated by my childhood training that Jesus Christ was my savior and salvation. To pray to anyone but him would be blasphemy. I therefore studied several religions when I left my church and its rigid teachings. But they were all Christian and not much different from the original one. Of course they all believed that the papal aristocracy was nonsense and I praised them for that. But they could not justify Jesus Christ in a sensible nor logical manner.”

On 22 Oct. 1983, this activist who had been going from marches to study groups of dialectical materialism, Maoism, and socialism- and even to China to see the system for herself-embraced Islam. She wrote: “I have become stronger and more resolved to not only raise a family of Muslims, but also to become a da’iee and spread the good word [of Islam] among Hispanics. After the tragedy of 9/11, many Muslims removed their veils for fear of assaults. I was destined to die as a Muslim if need be, for my only defense was faith! Alhamdulilah, neither did I remove the veil nor hide. I stood up and went on live television to speak to Hispanics on Telemundo on the noted Cristina Show from Miami. I had become a modest but resonant Muslimah. Rather than roll over, I made an uproar about the injustices done to Muslims.”

Soon after her conversion, she married an Egyptian Muslim and gradually noticed that many of his co-workers were married to non-Muslim Latinas. Hoping to uplift Hispanic women, in 1988 she founded PIEDAD (Propagacion Islamica para la Educacion de Ala el Divino [having faith and compassion]; (PiedadOnline.com). The majority of members of this womenled organization, consisting of both Latinas and non-Latinas, are converts. PIEDAD’s leadership has joined the Shura Council of the League of Latino Muslims Organizations and actively participates in local mosques and communities to collaborate, share information, and devise strategies to better all communities. Its five national chapters, with more than 300 members, now focus on helping converts adapt to living in a sometimes hostile society.

Rivera, involved in some two dozen social causes, encouraged members to become active in their mosques, for that is where “the life and pulse of the Muslim community” is located. During her life, this social activist, community worker, and mother of five taught at a local Tampa Bay school and, after school, helped immigrant Burmese children learn English; worked for three years at the Universal Academy of Florida-the high school was closed so its students could attend her funeral; and was a coordinator of Project Downtown Tampa, a student-initiated project that assists the homeless and needy. Beginning in summer 2009, she worked at CAIR’s Tampa office; two weeks before her demise on 22 Nov., she was a featured speaker at the Seventh Annual Hispanic Muslim Day in Union City, NJ.

One friend summed up her life as a perfect example of how to be American and Muslim as well as how Muslims can be a positive social force. Another tribute said that not only did she feed empty stomachs, but she also touched the hearts of the fallen and downtrodden. Regardless of how society saw these people, she treated them with the respect and dignity she believed everyone deserves.

She is survived by her children David Sanchez (39), Andre Rivera (38), Mahmoud Abdel-Mohty (24), Maryam Abdel-Mohty (22), and Aisha Abdel-Mohty (21).

Islamic Horizons is the bi-monthly publication of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA).

Islamic Horizons
March/April 2010

Widely Sharing Love of Islam

Hajji Ibrahim Benjamin Perez Mahomah passed away peacefully in his sleep on 8 Dec. 2009 after a fight with brain and stomach cancer. He was laid to rest in Livermore, CA.

One of the first, if not the first, Hispanic converts to what he thought was Islam in the San Francisco/Bay Area back in the 1950s, he told Deborah Kong of the Associated Press in June 2002 about his conversion.

A Puerto Rican, he was nevertheless drawn to the Nation of Islam meeting in 1957 out of curiosity. The only Latino at the meetings of dozens, then hundreds, of African Americans, he reminisced: “Their food was delicious. They were friendly. I liked it there and I stayed.”

Eventually joining mainstream Sunni Islam, he traveled around the country introducing Islam to Hispanic and Native American peoples, especially in the California prison system. The first president of the California Latino Muslim Association, a speaker at various Islamic conventions and conferences, as well as a contributor of several articles to Islamic magazines, he was widely known as Imam Perez.

He leaves his wife of fifty-four years, Cecilia Perez, daughters Diana Perez, Patricia Perez Navarro, and Rachel (Perez) Juarez – his son Benajmin Perez Jr. died in 2004; nine grandchildren: Lina Perez Vega, Leticia Ochoa, Marianna Juarez, Benjamin Perez III, Melinda Perez, Cecilia Navarro, Sophia Perez, Raul Juarez III, and Nicolasa Navarro; and one great-granddaughter.

Islamic Horizons is the bi-monthly publication of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA).

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The Message International
November-December 2005, pg 17

Maslamah al-Majriti wrote a number of works on mathematics and astronomy, studied and elaborated the Arabic translation of Ptolemy’s Almagest, and enlarged and corrected the astronomical tables of the famous al-Khwarizmi. He also compiled conversion tables in which the dates of the Persian calendar were related to Hijrah dates, so that for the first time the events of Persia’s past could be dated with precision.

Al-Zarqali, known to the West as Arzachel, combined theoretical knowledge with technical skill. He built a water clock capable of determining the hours of the day and night and indicating the days of the lunar months. He also contributed to the famous Toledan Tables, a highly accurate compilation of astronomical data. He also compiled valuable tables of latitude and longitude.

Al-Bitruji developed a new theory of stellar movement, based on Aristotle’s thinking, in his Book of Form, a work that was later popular in the West. The names of many stars are still those given them by Muslim astronomers, such as Altair (from al-tair, “the flier”), Deneb (from dhanab, “tail”), and Betelgeuse (from bayt al-jawza, “the house of the twins” or “Gemini”). Other terms still in use today such as zenith, nadir, and azimuth are also derived from Arabic and so reflect the work of the Muslim astronomers of al-Andalus.

Abu al-Qasim al-Zahrawi was the most famous surgeon of the Middle Ages. Known in the West as Abulcasis and Albucasis, he was the author of the Tasrif, a book that, translated into Latin, became the leading medical text European universities used during the Middle Ages. It has a section on surgical instruments of elegant, functional design and great precision.

Ibn Zuhr, known as Avenzoar, was the first to describe pericardial abscesses and to recommend tracheotomy when necessary.

*Islamic Spain also made contributions to medical ethics and hygiene as well.

Ibn Hazm insisted that moral qualities were mandatory in a physician. A doctor, he wrote, should be kind, understanding, friendly, and able to endure insults and adverse criticism. Furthermore, he went on, a doctor should keep his hair and fingernails short, wear clean clothes, and behave with dignity.

Ibn al-Baytar, the most famous Andalusian botanist, wrote a book called Simple Drugs and Food, an alphabetically arranged compendium of medicinal plants.

Ibn al-‘Awwam listed hundreds of species of plants and gives precise instructions regarding their cultivation and use. He wrote of how to graft trees, produce hybrids, stop blights and insect pests, and also, how to make perfumes.

In the study of geography, Ibn Battutah, made important contributions. Born in North Africa, then in the cultural orbit of Islamic Spain, Ibn Battutah travelled extensively for twenty-eight years and produced a travel book that proved to be a rich source for both historians and geographers.

Ibn Khaldun, the first historian to develop and explicate general laws governing the rise and decline of civilizations. He was the first to give rise to sociology and in a sense, he was the first modern philosopher of history.

By Sayyed Mohammad

http://www.irca.org.au/Islam/Poems/principles.htm

In the name of Allah, Most Beneficent, Most Merciful

I

Know, child, that God is only One,
And has no Partner or Son;
He has made us and everything,
All beasts, all fowls, all birds that sing,
The Sun, the Moon, the Starry Sky,
The Land, the sea, the mountains high.
He knows whatever we think or act,
By Him is seen the real fact.
And only He does what He wills,
He makes, He keeps, He saves, He kills.
Forever the same, no age, no youth,
He is Perfection, He is Truth.
Almight, All-Seeing, Wise,
He had not form, or shape or size.
But Self-Existing is our Lord,
And is always to be adored.

II

Our God is Just, and loves the right,
The wrong is hateful to His sight,
To all His creatures He is Kind,
He gave us reason that we might,
Know good from bad, wrong from right.
This is the first to light our path,
To gain His grace and shun His wrath.
But gift of reason varies far,
Some wise and others foolish are.
The eyes of mind our passion dims.
And reason oft is quenched by whims.
For second guide we have the men,
Of larger mind and wider ken,
Who could from God a message get,
His Law before the people set.

III

We call them Prophets, know you well,
Coming events they could foretell.
No nation was without such guide,
To warn them and from sins to chide.
Each Prophet taught in his own sphere,
To worship God and Him to fear.
But thousands of such Prophets came,
Of whom we know not the name,
Of some well-known I mention make,
The Lord God bless us for their sake!
Job, Jacob, Joseph, Abraham,
Elias, David, Solomon,
Lot, Moses, Aaron, Ishmael,
Hud, Noah, Jesus, Daniel;
With Adam first and Muhammad last,
Between the two all others pass.
Their minds were brighter than our own,
But otherwise all flesh and bone;
God did not in them incorporate.
They were but men and seperate.

IV

The books of God, a third guide form,
And us of His Commands inform,
God sent them through His Prophets Great,
Repealing Older by the Late;
The Qu’ran now the Law in force,
The other Books have run their course.

V

In all these Books ’tis plainly said,
The graves will once give up their dead;
A new life God will give to men.
Who made us once and will quicken again.
That day we shall, to judgment brought,
Be called to answer what we wrought,
And shall be judged by Faith we had,
And work we did good or bad.
The good shall get a festive treat-
Everlasting bliss and heavenly seat.
Where such the pleasure, such the mirth,
We’ve never dreamt of on this Earth.
The bad shall go to hell and fire,
And suffer pains and torture dire.
But sense of guilt to conscious mind,
Is more than all the plains combined.
While sense of having please our Lord,
Is greatest bliss and highest reward.

VI

The Qu’ran teaches us to pray,
Our Lord God five times a day;
To fast the days of Ramadan lent,
To give alms to the indigent;
To visit Mecca once in life,
And to make for God every strife.
Find here the Muslim laws in brief,
May God guide all to this belief.

Amen.