Sr.
Khadija Story
Bismillah hir Rahman
nir Rahim
ShukranLillah that I have been able to
become a Muslim after so many years of searching for the Truth. I am
even more grateful to Allah swt for having me learn about the Ahlul Bait
a.s. so that I could become a Shi'i and come to the Oriiginal Islam.
I was born Muslim (submissive to Allah
swt), as everyone is because Allah swt has placed submission to Him
within our human nature. I was raised by my adopted family as a
Christian. As a young child I went to church every Sunday with my
parents and went to Sunday school. After my parents got divorced my
mother and i stopped going to the church since they treated us poorly
because of my parents' failed marriage.
As a teenager, I realized that I needed
to have a stronger connection with God and with religion than just doing
personal prayers and Bible readings at home. Even though I did not
really believe that there was a dire need to have an intermediary (like
a priest) within the relationship between God and humans, I wanted to
become more involved in a religious community.
I returned to the church I had gone to
as a child thanks to being friends with someone who went to this same
church. After becoming an active church member, I realized that the
church taught about God being in three parts-the idea of trinity, that
Prophet Isa a.s. was the son of God, and that through Nabi Isa's a.s.
sacrifice on the cross, we were forgiven of our sins.
I did not believe that God could
possibly be three different entities or personalities. I believed that
God was One essential power that had numerous traits and qualities like
humans do, except that He was the Best and had the Best of qualities and
traits (for example patience, love, and forgivenness).
I also did not understand nor believe
that Nabi Isa a.s. was the son of God in the literal sense. I could
understand that figuratively Nabi Isa a.s. could be described as the son
of God because he, like all of us can be seen metaphorically as being
either sons or daughters of Allah swt since He created all of us!
The Christian viewpoint that is and was
taught to me in church about God coming down in the human from of Nabi
Isa a.s. to understand us better, that Nabi Isa a.s. died on the cross
to have our "original sin" forgiven, and that our sins will be
forgiven no matter how bad they are as long as we totally give ourselves
to Nabi Isa a.s. did not make sense to me and seemed ridiculous.
In my high school studies, I do not
remember being taught much about other religions other than
Christianity, though I had respect for other religions as long as they
made sense to me and did not contradict what I knew to be True. By the
end of high school, I had come to realize that what I believed to be
true (from what I understood the Bible was saying) was in conflict with
what was being preached in the church.
Later on in my studies at college, I
learned more about Islam and became interested in furthering my search
for the "most truthful religion". I still remained involved in the
church's charity work, but didn't go to the Sunday sermons very often. I
wanted to learn more about Islam, but also about Judaism, since I knew
there was a lot in common between both of these religions and of course,
with Christianity.
Interestingly enough I came to learn
more about Islam not from a Muslim, but from a Jew. He was one of my
teacher's that I had in college who was teaching a course about the
"Arab-Israeli conflict". It was basically a course about Israel and
Palestinian issues. He taught what was truthful and was of the belief
that there was more in common between the two groups than any of their
differences.
This teacher spoke about both Judaism
and Islam which led to my interest in learning more outside of the
classroom. Due to my shyness, I did not feel comfortable directly
getting any information by asking a Jew or a Muslim a question in
person, so I did my own research through any readings I could find.
During the course taught by the Jew, a
debate occurred about the hijab. I surprised both myself ans I imagine
both my teacher and fellow students when I said that the reasoning
behind the hijab made sense to me and that I did not see anything wrong
with it. The teacher had explained that the hijab was meant to protect a
Muslim woman's modesty and that it was followed by the women as a moral
obligation because God had told them that they should dress with only
the hands and face showing.
I decided that I wanted to know how
people would react to me if I wore the veil in public. I knew that
Muslim women were treated differently becuase the wore more clothing
than most women do who live in the western world. I wanted to have first
hand experience of what people's reactions are to those who wear hijab.
As a whole, my experimentation with the
hijab led to my own self-realization that I felt comfortable and more
secure, more respectable when I did have the veil on, compared to when I
did not. Od course, I got the stares and odd, sometimes
uncomfortable looks. Overall, I had not had anyone say or do anything to
me that was violent or overly rude(that I can remember).
My explorations led to me realizing
that to become a Jew did not make sense since I would see myself as
going backwards in terms of revelation since Nabi Isa a.s. is not
accepted by Jews and I would not learn anything about Nabi
Muhammad (P.B.U.H.&H.P.). I would also not be accepted very easily by
the Jewish community since I was not born a Jew, I would be seen as
being at the bottom of the Jewish community's "ladder of respectability
and legitimacy". So even though I could have learned Hebrew since I was
accepted in the college course, I dropped out and aslo left behind any
interest in becoming a Jew.
Upon starting my university studies, I
looked into Islam whenever I had the time and the interest. It was more
towards the end of my B.A. that I paid more attention to being more
devoted to learning all that I could about Islam. Unfortunately, I had
better results with the materials than with actual Muslims!
One of the reasons why the books were
more reliable than the Muslims, is because the Muslims I met were all
men who did not practise Islam the way I knew it was supposed to be
practised. I never tried to speak to any Muslims myself, it was always
the Muslim men who came to me! I never really had any women who were
doing dawa. There was only one time that I remember when some Muslim
women were handing out flyers, but by then I had decided to stay away
from most Muslims because of my encounters with the men who were
drinkers and who only seemed to wnat sexual relations with me or any
woman who was not Muslim! I started feeling as though Muslim men saw
non-muslim women as not being of respect or fair treatment.
After taking some time away from my
studies to decide whether or not I should actually become Muslim or not,
I realized that even though some Muslims may not act the way they are
supposed to, I should not let my disappointment with some Muslims stop
me from becoming Muslim myself. By the time I got to this point in my
life I had met an Irani man who was helping me with becoming Muslim.
Alhamdulillah I took shahadah with him,
may Allah swt bless him for that. Unfortunately, he did not teach me
about salat or anything else and he didn't appear to be practising Islam
nor did he give the impression that he even wanted to be Muslim! I
decided it would be better for me if I cut my ties with him. Even after
all of this my interest in being Muslim didn't lessen, alhamdulillah!
I had no idea where to get specific
information from, who to speak to, or where to go. I had already
encountered the differences in madhab and was very confused. For example
I had read hadith from volumes of Muslim and Bukhari that did not make
sense and seemed to be outright stupid. One that I can remember is about
Prophets a.s. not being infallible and committing sins like adultry or
drinking alcohol.
If I had not met a Shi'i woman through
my cashier job, I do not think that I would have become a practising
Muslim as soon as I did. You see, I did not even realize that i was
already Muslim after taking shahadah with the Irani Br. So I did not
realize that I was expected to pray or fast nor did I even know how to
pray nor about any of the other obligatory practises.
I feel very privileged to have been
able to come to the True Islam right away instead of being Sunni first.
I t is very rare for this to happen and I know that the only reason I am
Shi'i is because Allahs wt directed me to this Straight Path. Without
His help I would have remained lost and searching for the religious
fulfillment I needed.
We are so much more enriched than any
other religion or sect because of the light and truth that comes from
being followers of the Ahlul Bait a.s. Their lives are examples of how
to live with dignity and respect. Their wisdom and knowledge can not be
claimed by anyone else, only Allah swt has the right to claim even more
knowledge than the Ahlul Bait a.s. since His knowledge is infinite.
Being able to have other positive
Muslim role models is very important for any Muslim who wants to be
practising properly and to have a community of other Muslims who place
the same amount of attention and importance onto their religion as you
do. Insha'Allah our community will continue to learn and to place more
importance upon being better Muslims. Until we show Imam Mehdi a.s. that
we are prepared for his return, it won't take place...and this is what I
fear, that his a.s. return might not come sooner than later because of
our community's lack of commitment and readiness.
Fe aman illah
Khadija |