Resist Assimilation (Part 1)

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

والصلاة والسلام على نبيه الامين

وعلى اهل بيته الطيبين الطاهرين المظلومين

والعاقبة للمتقين

 

According to a recent report from The Economist: “Horst Seehofer, the German interior minister and then-leader of Bavaria’s Christian Socialist Union, was in a conciliatory mood. Addressing a conference of Muslims in Berlin last November, he publicly reversed his earlier position that Islam did not belong in Germany. It could belong, he told his audience, as long as it embraced German, not foreign, values. His call for assimilation was underlined by the bill of fare at the official reception that evening, which included riesling wines and pork-topped canapés. If Muslims did not like the country’s nudity and alcohol, tutted an official, they could go elsewhere. The drive to integrate Islam on Germany’s terms is the brainchild of Markus Kerber, a top civil servant at the interior ministry and founder of the Islam Conference, a gathering of Muslim representatives that Germany has been holding intermittently since 2006. He wants to wrest control of the country’s mosques from foreign hands, a task he likens to that of Otto von Bismarck, Germany’s first chancellor, when he tried to prise the Catholic church from the Vatican’s clutches in the 19th century. Instead of relying on foreign support, Mr Kerber thinks, mosques in Germany could be funded in the same way as Christian and Jewish places of worship: through a voluntary religious levy on registered members of the faith. Foreign imams should be replaced by German ones, who would be trained at the new Islamic-theology departments that some of the German Länder have established at a handful of universities. Within a decade, Mr Kerber hopes, imams will need German certificates to be able to officiate.”

The conspiracy against Islam and Muslims that has come out in the open not merely in Germany, but throughout Western Europe, should be a matter of grave concern for our community. The governments of these countries are committed to forcing Muslims to “assimilate” into European culture and society. They undoubtedly see certain beliefs and practices associated with traditional, orthodox Islam, as a barrier to the nefarious project of assimilation. As the article itself mentions; “nudity and alcohol” are what stand out as examples of “German, not foreign, values”. The article has also hinted at the fact that part of what is meant by “assimilation” is that Muslims will have to start enjoying German cuisine, i.e., wine and pork, which was purposely served at the seminar in which Muslims were invited to participate for discussions on the project for assimilation. The Muslims of Western Europe, particularly Germany and France, need to awaken to the insidious conspiracies being hatched against their faith. It is my firm conviction that Muslim minorities in Europe and America must do everything in their power to avoid assimilation and even integration into the host society, in order to protect their faith and ensure the continuity of the faith among future generations of Muslims in this part of the world. The key to this is to maintain the independence of our religious institutions, our mosques and our imams or ulama, from the control of the government. The plan of our enemy is to require all our imams and preachers be certified from theological seminaries and academies run by the government. In other words, in order for someone to serve as an imam or sermonizer at any mosque in Europe, he must be a graduate of a government institution. Their aim is to prevent the ‘importing’ of imams and preachers from Muslim countries. If this evil project is realized, there will be a radical transformation in how Islam is taught and practiced in the West. Indeed, Islam will be entirely unrecognizable if this happens. The new series of imams will be nothing but government functionaries, completely indoctrinated into homosexualism, feminism, secularism and other anti-Islamic ideas. Muslims in Europe and America have to be urged now to recognize the conspiracy and take prelimary steps to frustrate it. We must, now more than ever, remain attached to our traditionalist imams, preachers and scholars. Their role in our midst must constantly be expanded so that their influence spreads further, especially among the youth. The vast majority of the Muslim youth today are lost and easy prey for any kind of nefarious intent against Islam. Part of the resistance to integration into European society is for Muslim immigrants and their children to maintain their native language. We also have to become more ‘ghettoized’, i.e. live in Muslim enclaves centered around the mosque, where we can preserve our separate religious character and there is less chance of being completely assimilated into the host society. We have to send our children to non-government, private Islamic schools and madaris. All Muslim children should be getting their education from private Islamic schools, but there is a particular need to produce more traditionally trained ulama, therefore, the madrassa serves a critical role for the maintainance of a strong and vibrant Muslim identity in the West.