Spirit in Action
Allah Made Me Funny - Azhar Usman
Azher Usman is an author, artist, activist, philanthropist, lawyer, but most of all he's a very serious comedian. He gave the keynote address at the Ways of Peace II Conference on Nonviolence in the Islamic Tradition sponsored by FNVW. He's been part of the Allah Made Me Funny - Official Muslim Comedy Tour, The Laughing Peace Tour and The Make Chai, Not War Tour.
- Broadcast on:
- 08 Jul 2012
- Audio Format:
- other
(upbeat music) ♪ Let us sing this song for the healing of the world ♪ ♪ That we may hear as one ♪ ♪ With every voice, with every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world along ♪ ♪ And our lives will feel the echo of our healing ♪ - Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark helps me. Each week, I'll be bringing you stories of people living lives of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, creative action, and progressive efforts. I'll be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service, hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred food in your own life. ♪ Let us sing this song for the dreaming of the world ♪ ♪ That we may dream as one ♪ ♪ With every voice, with every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world along ♪ - It's a delight to welcome to Spirit in Action, a multi-talented, profound, and very funny man, Azar Usman. Azar originally came to my attention because of the comedy tours he's been part of, with names like, "Allah made me funny, make chai not war," and "The Laughing Peace Tour." Back in April, however, he was announced as the keynote speaker at the Ways of Peace two conference on non-violence in the Islamic tradition. The conference was excellent with deep theological and exciting practical presenters. A real all-star crew pulled together by friends for a non-violent world. Check them out at fnvw.org. When Muslim Congressman Keith Ellison had to cancel, we were all fortunate that Azar Usman could powerfully fill the keynote slot. Azar is a lawyer and activist, and as I said, a comedian, but also, as you'll hear towards the end of this program, he's something of a theologian, though he might dispute that term. We'll hear less than half of his keynote at the end, but first, we'll start with a clip from one of his stand-up routines. Then we'll grab Azar on the phone. Here is lawyer activist and comedian Azar Usman, on stage, doing stand-up. - I actually just got back from overseas. I'm going back to Europe, and I'll tell you what, folks, it's a totally different vibe outside of America than it is in America. All right, I want that was free. In the United States, I get dirty looks from being a Muslim. Sometimes it's kind of nice to be hated just for being an American. (audience laughing) I feel so patriotic. (audience laughing) I was in London, man. I didn't figure me out. I was just like, "Wait a minute. "You brought your American in me. "Let me out front and front, from Canada." (audience laughing) I'm not from Canada. So Canadian is here? Yeah, why don't you go back to where you came from? (audience laughing) I'm just kidding. I just always wondered what it felt like to be white. (audience laughing) Some people, when someone people say that, "Now, why don't you go back to where you came from?" I'm like, "Stokey in the night." (audience laughing) Now, hold on to do over there, man. (audience clapping) - Us, sir, it's great to have you here for spirit in action. - Great to be here, Mark. Thanks for having me. - You've been globed trotting quite a bit, haven't you? Do you do a lot of international as well as traveling around the U.S.? - I do. I do a fair amount of work really all over the world, and I've been very blessed and fortunate to take my stand-up to over 20 countries now on five continents, and it's really been an exciting journey, and I'm just thrilled at how it's going. - How does this draw on your experience as a lawyer? I mean, go through law school so you can do stand-up comedy. Isn't everyone's chosen path? - Right, right. You know, it's funny because I actually have a number of comics that are trained as attorneys, so it's not that uncommon, certainly not as uncommon as most people would think. That's the first thing. The second thing I would say about it is, you know, I've actually found that having a legal background in that type of training has actually come in quite handy in doing stand-up and writing comedy, because if you really think about it, you know, what does a lawyer do? The lawyer just has a very disciplined manner of thinking, and it's that discipline of thought that enables the lawyer to construct a logical argument. And so it's sort of like an argument is like, you know, A, B, C, therefore D, and the logic has to be tight and has to work, and it has to conform to rationality and the structures of logic. Well, a joke is very similar. It's just that, you know, A, B, C, and therefore Q, you know, like the punchline of a joke is funny precisely because you mislead the audience into thinking that something is coming, and then you surprise them with the punchline, and they say the essence of comedy is, of course, surprise. So I've actually found that the discipline of thought required to be a good lawyer, often translated quite well, to being a good comedy writer. - My sense is that you do these jokes for a very real purpose, that you are a spirit in action, and that you're taking real risks as you do this, because a lot of people in the US are not willing to, they're not willing to see the funny side of anything when it comes to the follow-up to 911, and they're the stereotype of what Muslims in Islam and what all that is. What got you into this comedy work, and the whole tour all made me funny. What led to that? - You know, it's really tough to answer that question, I've realized, 'cause I've tried to answer that, you know, just about every time I've done an interview like this. The most honest answer I can tell you is, I have no idea. (laughs) I'd never sat down and planned and thought about, you know, my life, the way it has actually unfolded. You know, I try to just follow my heart. I guess I was always kind of the funny guy, and finally, after working up the courage, I mean, truthfully, I had done a lot of sketch kind of comedy, and I had done some improv-ing and stuff like that. But stand up, it was very intimidating to me, because it's very different. It's getting on stage with prepared material, and try to get a group of strangers to laugh at what you've written. Anyway, I finally got up the courage to do it, that was over 10 years ago, and basically I just never looked back, and then 2004 rolled around, and I just saw an opportunity to really give it the old college try and make it a career. And I figured I didn't want to be a guy who lives with regret. I didn't want to look back at my life and say, you know, what could have been, I figured if I can give it a try, and it works great, and if not, you know, I've always got a legal career to fall back on, which is not a bad backup plan. - What was the atmosphere like for when you started doing it? You said about 10 years ago, and that's 911, and so the sensitivity of Americans over-sensitivity and the over-generalizations, I'm sure, that happened. Did you just say, yeah, I think I want to choose the most difficult time to launch into this, making fun about things that most Americans are not willing to laugh about. - Well, here's the thing, I actually started doing stand-up before 911, and it's funny because people have actually made times, like, so how did your act change, pre-9/11 versus post-9/11? And the most honest answer is it didn't change. You know, the stereotypes surrounding Muslims, you know, Arab, the Arab Sheik stereotype that runs as a motif throughout Hollywood history. There's a wonderful documentary about this, by the way, called Valentino's Ghost, which basically traces the history of the portrayal of Middle Eastern Arab Muslim peoples throughout Hollywood culture. So, you know, there's a lot of reasons for it, and the stereotypes that I kind of unpackaged and talked about, and China spotlighted on through my act, they've been around from before 911. And it's just that after 911, suddenly they were brought front and center. You know, the funny answer I give to people when they say, how did your act change before an afternoon 11? The answer I give them is, well, it didn't really change. The only thing that changed was suddenly people cared. Suddenly people are interested because it's all over the news, it's all over the public consciousness, it's all over the chatter. And so suddenly it became something that you had to deal with, you had to talk about, you had to think about, whereas it was easy to just kind of ignore it and keep it in the background prior to 911. - What would you say your purpose of the tour, the all that made me funny tour was, why did you go into that? I mean, just to make money maybe, or so you didn't have to go back to law work, but what was the purpose? - There's not that much money, trust me. Money has not been the big, the great motivator. Maybe eventually it'll come, but it hasn't done far. You know, I would say really, I mean, again, this might be cliche, a kind of a cliche answer, but really, I'd say this as an artist, and as somebody who takes art and my art, in particular very seriously, you know, you're just a creative outlet to express, you know, ideas from the heart. The three comics who formed the Alameda Funny Tour, Preacher Moss, who's at the heart of this whole show, he's the founder of the show, and then he invited me as the co-founder, and by the way, Preacher Moss is an African-American Muslim convert to Islam, and then you have myself an Indian-American born into a Muslim family. And our third guy is a Palestinian-American called Mohammed Amr, who is actually a refugee, who had come to America, and was basically stateless his whole life, born in Kuwait, kicked out of Kuwait during the first Gulf War, ended up in Texas, grew up there, and waited 20 years to become an American, and just became a U.S. citizen last year, and almost 30 years of age. So, you know, if you have three different perspectives, and a very unique kind of stories, all of which are part of the tapestry that formed the history of Islam in the United States. So, really, I mean, again, as an artist, I would just say we got into it because we had something we wanted to say. We ourselves didn't necessarily know what it was. It was just, it came from the heart. And once the show really started getting rolling, and fans started really responding, I think that really the show began to find its own voice. - Can you talk about any of the high points, or low points of it? Have you had really negative reactions, people whose phobia surfaced through the show, or people who were turned around and ended up seeing Muslims as real people? - You know, all of the above has happened. I would say overwhelming either responses and positives. Oh, you get two stories. One is, I do a show, I do a couple of different shows. So, one of them, of course, is all that made me funny with two Muslim comics, that I do a lot of performances just as a solo comedian, college campuses, comedy clubs, what have you. And that show, I haven't really given that one a name, but it's kind of coalescing into a one man show, which is called Citizen of the World. And I'll be doing a run of that show in Chicago, late in the summer. Then I do a show with a couple of Indian comedians that's called Make Chai Not War, and Make Chai Not War. It started kind of a Hindu Muslim solidarity show with a fellow comic of mine called Rajeev Satyal, who's a Hindu American Indian comic, and the two of us started that show together. And we've done that around the country. And then I do a show with a rabbi who's a comedian, called Rabbi Bob Alper. And Bob and I do a show called The Laugh and Peace Tour. And sometimes we also work with a Baptist minister of female comic named Susan Sparks. And so that show has really, again, found its own wonderful audience, a lot of interfaith activists and people who worked in that universe, love to bring our show out fundraisers, and we've done a number of habitat for humanity gigs and things like that. So we did a show one time in a synagogue, and the synagogue had booked just Bob and myself, and we showed up there, and I did my set and everything. And at the end of the show, this woman, almost teary-eyed, approached me very respectfully, very kindly, and she said, "Can I confess something to you?" And I said, "Sure." And she said, "Well, before the show, I saw you "and I walked out, I didn't know you were the performer." And I had just really ugly, negative, evil kind of repulsed. And she said, "I didn't know why, but I just didn't like you." And then as you said, and then I heard your act and I was brought to tears, because I realized I was being forced to look at myself, and I saw this thing that I had done, which is that I had basically judged you and reached all these negative conclusions about you. And she said, in her case, this is why the story stuck out in my mind, she said that she had an adoptive African-American son. She was Jewish herself. And she said, "You know, and I've spent my life "actually dealing with all the racism "and all the prejudice against my son "and not understanding why people are the way they are. "It's been a source of endless frustration for me. "And here I was doing the exact same thing to you. "And this is what brought her, almost brought her to tears." And she said, "You know, I just wanna thank you "for what you're doing, and I wanna apologize to you." And it was a wonderful, beautiful moment that she and I shared. But what it underscored for me is, this is precisely why I have to keep doing what I'm doing, because her point was exactly right. If somebody who is living the life of being aware of racism and unconscious racism and xenophobia and prejudice, if she herself could slip into that unconscious thing, well then what about the rest of Americans who most of whom have probably never even bothered to wrestle with notions like structural racism and unconscious racism and white privilege and things like that. So that was really encouraging and very inspiring. The second thing I'll just mention very quickly is, I recently did a gig with Allah made me funny to her at a large Muslim conference held in California. It was called Reviving the Islamic Spirit, very appropriate to your show of spirit and action. And there was a group of kind of Tea Party right wing, evangelical Christians who had assembled outside the convention center to put on like a protest. And it wasn't a large group, it was probably maybe about a dozen or so people, maybe two dozen. And they had posters and they were shouting and chanting in the whole nine. And it was funny because there were counter protesters who showed up to protest their intolerance who were not Muslims by the way, and they were getting into it. And then Muslims from the convention who were, you know, those probably a good 10,000 people at the convention, they were being instructed by the organizers not to go out and indulge this little side show because they were just trying to make a ruckus and create attention for themselves, et cetera, et cetera. And I, you know, being a comedian and being just who I am, I couldn't resist. So I ended up having a really nice conversation with kind of the head of the Christian group that was protesting. I don't know that there was any movement made by him, but I thought it was interesting that what I was saying on that street corner by a lot of the people who are part of his group as well as the counter protesters, you know, they were just ideas that nobody had ever thought of. And for example, the simple fact that, you know, everybody needs to just calm down and relax because there's so much talking past one another going on where people are, you know, very passionate about their views and very, especially when you bring religion into it, people are very passionate and ultra passionate, almost hyper passionate regarding the religious convictions. And then they've reached all these conclusions, some of which might be, you know, based on really wrong information or exaggerated claims or things they've just heard or read but are not actually true representations of what Muslim belief or what their religion teaches or what their scriptures say. And yet, you know, there's all this anxiety and people, I mean, their blood pressure was going through the roof. So just to walk into an environment like that and get everybody to calm down, introduce a little humor into the mix, get everybody to just realize that we're not having a real conversation until everybody just calms down. So that was another example of a situation where he was not there protesting our show per se but rather the very existence of this conference. And really, if you listen to what he's saying, he's protesting the existence of Muslims that Islam itself, which is, you know, that just kind of goes to show, I think, how unexamined some of these views are. - Good for you to stand up to it and do it in a respectful, and I think, again, comedy is a key here to reaching past some of these, the people who haven't calmed down. So good for you to do it. Let's listen to another clip of one of your shows about the one you getting on a plane. Let's listen to that, just right here. - I'll leave you with this, folks. I travel all the time telling jokes. I told jokes in over 20 countries all over the world. I'm blessed, too blessed to be stressed. But I'll tell you some of the folks. The one thing I hate about him is that I have to go to the airport. You can write your own joke right there. Come on, I'm saying he's, me walking into the airport, heads turn simultaneously. Security issue, we got a hominid four o'clock. (audience laughing) 10-4, over and out. You have a spelling one, I've got the hairy one. (audience laughing) Excuse me, sir, can I see your ID? My little name, actually, is Muhammad. (audience laughing) That's what I thought you're coming with me. (audience laughing) The only thing worse than that is the moment I have to get on the plane, okay? People are in shock. They're in the middle of conversations. They're like, "So, what do you remember?" I get the tail. (audience laughing) Father, good night. (audience cheering) Honey, I love you. (audience laughing) He's so hairy. (audience laughing) He was like getting on the plane. (audience laughing) They've been cute staring at me. (audience cheering) Can I be honest? Can I be honest, ladies? Can I be honest? (audience cheering) I don't really understand what these people are so scared of. I don't get it 'cause think about it. If I was a crazy Muslim fundamentalist terrorist about to hijack the plane, this is totally not the disguise I would go with. (audience laughing) This doesn't exactly slip me under the radar. (audience laughing) Of course, that guy's really nice to me once the plane safely lands. Then just look it over and slide it. (audience laughing) That's right. I'm just waiting for her to honest passenger at the end of the planet. Excuse me, sir. I thought you were gonna kill us. (audience laughing) I was arguing about that. Remembering how to go to the bathroom? I was gonna stab you. (audience laughing) Thank you very much, ladies. Thank you for all that. (audience cheering) (audience applauding) That's a clip of Azir Usman who does a number of comedy stand up tours. For those of you listening, if you wanna hear Azir doing some of his comedy, there's lots of opportunities out there, whether it is the Allah made me funny or make china war or the Laughing Peace Tour. You find out information about what he's doing via his website, azir.com. That's A-Z-H-A-R.com or follow the link from northernspiritradio.org. Let's switch gears here a little bit, Azir, because the way I came in contact with you, actually, I did hear you perform here in Eau Claire once, I don't know how many years ago, with Rabbi. And the one that grabbed me was the comment that people are gonna hear in just a moment at the end of the presentation you gave for the ways of peace conference. You mentioned about war is terrorism and the rich and terrorism is the war of the poor. And that's an original to you, where did that come from? - That's a quote of Peter Eustonov, Sir Peter Eustonov who was a British humorist, he passed away a few years ago. But he was really a polymath, just an amazing human being. But that quote is attributed to him. And it's actually beyond the other way around. He says, 'cause the surprise is the last part of it. So the first part of the statement was, terrorism is the war of the poor. Which is, you know, that is itself a very insightful remark. Terrorism is the war of the poor. And then he goes on to say, and war is terrorism of the rich. That I think is really what is kind of a mind-opening statement because it makes you confront the very fact that, you know, there is something to be said about the fundamental immorality of killing innocent people. And whether it's done, I've said this before, perhaps more poetic way of putting it, but whether it's done by, you know, a man with dark skin wearing white robes in a dark cave or a man with dark skin wearing a dark suit in a white house. You know, murdering innocent people for political reasons is precisely the definition of terrorism. It's the US government manual definition of terrorism. You know, the taking of innocent civilian life before the achievement of a political end. So what makes one, which is the vigilante violence of al-Qaeda and bin Laden and these nut jobs, which is, you know, obviously any rational thinking human being with a sound heart can see how disgusting and evil and immoral that behavior is. But what makes that any worse or any different than people who just because they have control over state governments and state apparatuses and militaries, what makes their killing of innocent people any less evil? So that's I think a fundamental moral question that we as contemporary, modern, rational thinking human beings have to confront. And so long as we're dishonest about our answer, I don't think the world is really gonna change, you know? I mean, that type of violence, political violence begets more political violence. - Yeah, and I guess maybe it's because everybody knew you had these profound thoughts from your comedy tour that you were invited to speak at the Ways of Peace Conference, non-violence in the Islamic tradition. You had to fill the shoes of Keith Ellison, which was a big one. - Yeah, which is insane to me. I was funny, he was one of my friends who was a big, you know, kind of political. And he's a friend of Keith's as well. So he saw somewhere on the web that they had swapped me in to be a replacement speaker. So he emailed me and said, "I guess you've arrived. "When you're filling in for a congressman." I just said, "Okay, I'm not sure where I've arrived to, "but sure, I'll take it." You know, Keith is a wonderful man, and I've actually gotten to know him a little bit over the last few years. By the way, he and I are both, you know, graduates of the Minnesota Law School. So that's a wonderful feather in my cap. But I know I'm a big fan of Keith's, and he says he's a big fan of mine, and we've had a chance to see each other, not only in public gatherings, but also in a few private settings. So I know he's just an amazing guy, and for me it was just a huge honor to be even thought of in that way, that I could, you know, deliver remarks. That would be, you know, in his feed. That was for me a great honor. So once again, I know that you were not one of the organizers of that conference, but I know that you were closely with the people who were behind that, and I want to express my gratitude again for that opportunity. - Well, we were fortunate to have you there. Was your first feeling on getting an invitation, which was greater, the dread or the excitement? - Oh, definitely the excitement. I don't have much dread in my life, to be honest with you. I don't get nervous anymore. I try to live my life in a state of what, one of my buddies, he's termed a state of full embrace. You know, living your life in a state of full embrace, means, you know, you're constantly assessing the situation, and regardless of how you assessed it, you have to embrace the situation. And for me, embracing the situation meant challenging myself and rising to that occasion, and coming prepared and doing the best job I could, knowing that I can't feel the shoes of Keith Ellison, but I can do the best I can. So the response was, I would say, very positive, and I felt very grateful for the opportunity, and just really delighted that people really seemed to appreciate what I shared. - Well, sure, and there's a lot to appreciate, and people are gonna hear it in just a moment. The topic was, "Nonviolence in the Islamic Tradition." And clearly, you found a way to build bridges and work towards people listening to each other, living together. Were you daunted by the idea? I mean, you're the keynote, but there were people up there who with, you know, decades of experience in theology, including specifically Islamic theology, you did an amazing job, and people hear that in a moment. But did you come in as committed to nonviolence? Is that your point of view, or did you have to struggle with that issue? - No, no, I would say that I already came committed to that philosophical point of view. You know, I've actually spent a lot of time, you know, around academics, and probably it's one of the dirty little secrets of mind, which is that I would love to one day do a PhD. So I'm always very thrilled to spend time with academicians and people who are intellectuals. So that is something I didn't feel daunted by, but rather I felt excited by. And then as far as, you know, nonviolence in particular, I mean, I'm a big believer in the simple fact that all wisdom traditions, all philosophical traditions, all religion, ultimately is trying to unlock the same four grand philosophical questions. If you boil them all down, what they're all answering is in some way, shape, or form in their own ways, is the same four questions. You know, number one, what is the origin of the universe? Number two, what is the true nature of a human being, and trying to understand the nature of our consciousness because we are different than every other existence, creature. Number three, what's the purpose of it all? Why does it all exist? And number four, what happens to me after I die? And that's it, you know, to me, esoteric reality, religion at the esoteric level, and then all spirituality and all religion, they're all actually talking about the same thing. It's just that outwardly in the realm of exoteric expression and exoteric religion is where they make statements that are apparently contradictory and apparently in disagreement, and those contradictions and those disagreements need to be resolved. And I think there's a lot of ways to do that, but for me, just, you know, I'm committed to that premise because I believe it, I see it, and I've studied it, and I've learned it, and I'm just convinced that it is the objective truth, you know, that there is ultimately one truth, and everybody's trying to talk about it, but the irony in the paradox is reality, as it truly is, in esoteric reality, is beyond words, and four. And for the moment we want to talk about it, we have to use words, and so we're limited by the tyranny of words and the expressions and language, and that's where the whole Pandora's Box has opened up because then you've got exoteric religion to deal with, and then everybody's disagreeing with one another, and then they're making textbooks claims about, you know, about salvation and what have you, and then suddenly it just becomes very difficult or problematic to have a conversation with somebody who doesn't understand the premise I just mentioned. - Or you can be a Quaker and just sit in silence and not talk to anyone, and then you don't have the misunderstandings of the words, just be still and know that I am God. - From the moment we left behind a beautiful teaching, which is so resonant with what you just said, he said wisdom is in 10 part, nine of which are silent, and the 10th is the wood in the company of people. (laughing) - When you were all people, all you wanted to do was talk. - Well, speaking of talking, I think we're gonna close out our show by listening to Ozr. When he spoke at the Ways of Peace conference, non-violence in the Islamic tradition, he was the keynote speaker back in April. Again, if you want to find Ozr, you can catch any of his comedy tours, stand up. His website is Ozr.com. That's A-Z-H-A-R.com or follow the link from northernspiritradio.org. Thanks so much for joining me, Ozr. - Thanks so much for having me, Mark, and thank you for doing what you do. I love your program. - You're listening to Spirit in Action. I'm Mark Helpsmeet of Northern Spirit Radio on the web at northernspiritradio.org. Listen to six years of archives, find links to guests, post a comment, and you can even make a donation. It's all good. Today's Spirit and Action guest is Ozr Usman, Muslim lawyer, activist and comedian, and keynote speaker at the conference sponsored by Friends for Nonviolent World. See them at F-N-V-W.org. Conference called Ways of Peace Two, non-violence in the Islamic tradition. You can listen to all of Ozr's keynote via my site, but right now, you'll hear a bit less than half of it. Let's go to the University of St. Thomas back on April 9th to listen to keynote speaker, Ozr Usman. - Well, I'll begin in the name of God, (speaking in foreign language) because I do believe in God, and I think it's important that we focus when we start out talking about these types of things. I'm just actually amazed at this gathering happening in Minneapolis and people showing such concern and such compassion for this topic. Nonviolence is something that I think for people of the heart is just natural, something that actually transcends religion and transcends specific wisdom traditions, and it's something I think that fundamentally, human beings who are in touch with their spirit and in touch with the cosmos and in touch with reality, often find themselves inclining toward. It's actually a bit of a paradox when we discuss non-violence, and at the same time, the restoration of justice, because often we find that sometimes in the establishment of justice, we have to exert force, and the interplay between the use of force and non-violent traditions is something that obviously becomes somewhat paradoxical, somewhat difficult to navigate and weave through, regardless of whether you're a Muslim, a Christian, a Buddhist, a Jew, or a person of no faith for that matter. So I tried carefully going into these, into my remarks. That said, I've put a lot of thought into the topic, and actually I wanted to begin, first of all, with a beautiful quote from the Quran, again, just to center what I'm here to talk about, and hopefully to get us kind of on the same page. It's a verse in the Quran that jumped out at me when I began learning a little bit about the friends for non-violent world, and the Quakers, and the, of course, religious society of friends, and it's a verse in the Quran that goes like this, (speaking in foreign language) In the name of God, most gracious, most merciful. (speaking in foreign language) This appears in the eighth chapter of the Quran, which is called Al-Anphal, which means the spoils of war, interestingly. And the second verse of this chapter, in which the Quran states, indeed, true believers are those whose hearts quake when God is mentioned, and when its revelations are shared with them, their faith increases, and they trust their Lord. Of course, the word Quaker, as I'm sure most of you are aware, is related to this idea of people who tremble in the way of the Lord. And it's certainly something, I think, that is a harmonic across a lot of wisdom traditions, because people whose hearts are alive in the Muslim tradition, we call them (speaking in foreign language) people of the heart. Their hearts come alive because they get in touch with the Spirit inside them. And that Spirit, which is inside all of us, the ruha, which is called in Arabic, it's called the ruha, is from the Quran informs us (speaking in foreign language) It is from the command of the Lord of the universe. And it is something which, though it exists, and it's created by God, is different than the physical created world. The soul and the Spirit of a human being in the Muslim tradition is created by God, but not in the same way as the physical created world, it's created from what's called (speaking in foreign language) from the command of God when God simply said be, and it came into existence. So this special thing inside of a human being, the Spirit, the soul, is basically the mystery inside all of us. It's the thing that makes us alive. It's the thing that defines who we actually really are, because before we were bodies, we already existed as souls. And even after we die in our bodies end, we will continue to live on in some spiritual form. And that thing, that secret, is in our tradition, precisely what we're talking about, what we talk about this thing called the Spirit, or the ruah, the soul, which makes us human. And the heart is the command center of the ruah. The qalib, the heart in a human being, is the command center of the soul, just as the ego, the nafs, is the command center of the body. And so this duality inside all of us, which is pairing up the physical dimension, with the non-physical dimension, that is to say the body with the spirit is precisely what the Muslim tradition is full of in terms of teaching and explaining to human beings the true nature of reality. My remarks are organized basically as follows. I wanted to start at a very meta-level, just thinking about the question of non-violence in the Islamic tradition. I know we've already had some remarks earlier today from people much more qualified than myself in fields such as theology and Islamic studies. So I won't, I'll try not to repeat anything that's already been said. But I did want to start with kind of a meta-view and then kind of drill down from there. So the bird's eye view is sort of like, what is the philosophical basis for even thinking about or discussing non-violence in the Islamic tradition? The second part of my presentation is the fact that classical Islam is actually well-equipped to deal with its confrontation with other religions, other wisdom traditions, other worldviews. And so I wanted to just remark on a little bit on classical Islam and the way Islam itself as an organized faith, as an organized religion sees itself and relates to other wisdom traditions. Thirdly, I want to talk, you know, sort of bring it back down to earth and talk a little bit about what's happening in the world today and some of the proto-Islamic movements in the Muslim world and specifically touch on the phenomenon of political Islam or Islamism as it's often called. And that'll tie in to, of course, what's happening right now in the modern Middle East and what's unfolding on our television sets everyday on El Jazeera English and on CNN. And then finally, I'll just conclude with a few remarks on the nature of the interconnected world that we're living in today and how all of what I've said hopefully fits together. So it's a Herculean task, but let's see if we can do it. First of all, I'd like to begin with a quote from Meg Greenfield. Some of you may be big news junkies, may recognize Meg Greenfield was a senior editor at Newsweek for many years. She passed away a few years ago and her memoirs were published. She's a very, very well-respected journalist and she wrote in 1979 at the height of the U.S.-Iranian crisis when American hostages were being held into Iran. She wrote a very interesting thing in Newsweek in 1979. So I just want to frame that as being over, what is that, 79, it's 30 years ago, 30 some odd years ago? She said we are heading into an era of expansion in our relationship with that complex of religion, culture, and geography known as Islam. There are two things to be said about this. One is that no other part of the world is more important to our own well-being, now and probably for the foreseeable future. And two is that no other part of the world is more hopelessly and systematically and stubbornly misunderstood by us. That was in 1979. And her mind to me of a quote of Malcolm X who about a year before he passed away in 1964 after he did a 20-country tour of the Middle East and in the Muslim world, came back to United States and held a press conference. And instead of a very interesting kind of flippant remark, he said all the Arabs need is a PR firm. (audience laughs) All the Arabs need is a PR firm. He said that in the mid-60s and here we are in 2011 where people still across the entire world and the United States in particular continue to, as Meg Greenfield said, stubbornly, systematically misunderstand this religion. With that as a beginning point and a departure point, I just wanna ask everybody to perhaps suspend a lot of the judgments or a lot of the preconceived notions or even what they may have read or heard in the present and the media regarding Islam. I wanna speak instead from not sources that are alien to the tradition or that are commenting on Muslims but rather from within the tradition. People often use the mantra nowadays, Islam is a religion of peace. I'm sure you've heard people say this. Islam is a religion of peace. The word Islam comes from the word peace, et cetera, et cetera. And I think there's a bit of a misnomer there because theologically speaking and ontologically speaking, Islam doesn't really call itself a religion of peace. And in fact, a simple look at Muslim history will show you that it's actually full of war. Islam has always seen itself fundamentally as a religion of mercy. In fact, the defining attribute of the God of Islam, if you will, which is of course the same God of all humanity, is that God is merciful. The two most common names that are used in our tradition to refer to God are Arahman and Arahim. And anybody who has studied Semitic languages knows that you can immediately recognize that they come from the same root word. Arahman and Arahim. The common trilateral root is Rah-ha-meme. R-H-M, Rah-ma. And Rah-ma comes from a word Rah-ma, all like all Semitic languages, all words in Arabic, in Hebrew, in Aramaic, in Syriac languages, they come from triratical root words. So the way you discover a new language or new meanings, unlock new meanings in a semantic field within these languages is that you figure out what the root verb is, the triratical root, and then you find out what the meaning of that is, and you can begin to piece it all together. So Rah-ma is the root word of Rah-man and Rah-im. What does Rah-ma mean? Rah-ma means to be merciful. And the noun or the basic noun that's formed from this word is Rah-im, which means the womb, the womb. And the womb is seen to symbolically represent mercy more than anything else in creation, why? Because the mother who was holding a child in her womb has nothing but absolute mercy. That's the defining attribute of her relationship with that child. So what is the definition of mercy? Mercy is defined in the Muslim tradition as, wanting good for others without wanting anything in return. Desiring good for others without wanting anything in return. So Rah-man and Rah-im, we translate that as the merciful, the compassionate, but really it doesn't do justice to the full range of semantic significance and meaning when we call God by these beautiful names, Rah-man and Rah-im. So the God of Islam is related to mercy, Rah-man and Rah-im. The prophet Muhammad is called Rah-ma-tul-il-il-il-im. The mercy to all the worlds. Again, why? Because his defining attribute in our tradition is that he wants nothing but good for others without wanting anything in return. And also the religion of Islam is called Dean Rah-man, the religion of mercy. So I mentioned all this to say cosmologically, theologically, the defining attribute of this religion has always been, as far as the way it sees itself, has been about mercy. Wanting good for others without wanting anything in return. And this, obviously, one can see, is intimately related to non-violence. How can you want good for others without wanting anything in return if you're going to engage in violence? Now we have to then make sense of the violent tradition, the use of force, of martial combat in the history of Islam. Dating back to the earliest community, as well as throughout its expansion as history. And this is definitely a topic which is outside the scope of what I can talk about and the time constraints that we have. But I will simply mention that one way to think about this is sort of to square the circle by realizing that everything I said about Islam being a tradition and a religion that is about mercy. And at the same time has a space for basically just war, to borrow a phrase, if you will, from the Christian tradition. And it's sort of like Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize while sitting as a president overseeing two ongoing wars. How do you get your mind around that? Well, a thinking person, if you bother to listen to his remarks at his acceptance speech, and you actually listen to what he said, he makes the case for exactly what we're talking about. The fact that you can be a man of peace. You can be a person who is about promotion of peace, who is about promoting non-violence. And yet at the same time, find yourself in situations where sometimes your hand is forced. And I realize that it's a debate and reasonable minds can disagree, and not everybody will be convinced that a president, presiding president, overseeing two ongoing wars and God knows how many undisclosed CIA covert operations around the world should be given the Nobel Peace Prize. I get that that's a debatable outcome in the first place. But for those who acknowledge that that obviously did happen, and there's certainly a case that can be made for why that was so, I would simply say that there is something that we can take from that same analysis and realize that a very similar interplay is going on in the history of Islam between its personality as a religion of mercy, and sometimes its need to engage in martial combat. This brings me to my remarks on classical Islam. One thing that I think is very important for us as modern human beings to realize, those are, as I said earlier, the same teachings that all prophets taught humanity. So now we've gone over a bit of the macro level of Islam seeing itself as a religion of mercy, connecting that to the divine origin of it all, connecting that to the wisdom traditions that came before Islam, and looking at Ghazali and some of what classical Islam was up to about a thousand years ago. And now I wanna just drill down and talk a little bit about the world that we're actually living in now. We find ourselves in 21st century America in a very globalized world, in a very interconnected world, and I think that it's fair to say in my view, and I think that others in the academia, I've argued this as well, that really all of the movements in the Muslim world, whatever flavor they've taken on, they're actually all trying to solve the same riddle. They're all trying to square the same circle. And that is, how do we live as Muslims who are faithful to the set of principles I mentioned a moment ago that are timeless, that are pre-modern, that are coming from the same divine origin, that are firmly rooted in the tradition, that are the timeless teachings and principles of our faith tradition, and yet at the same time, do so in a way that is utterly and completely fluid and comfortable in the world that we find ourselves in. A world that is utterly interconnected, that is utterly based on, and operating on technology and global communication. One that is totally globalized in a corporate way, and a world that is utterly given itself up to modernity. How do you do that? And Islamism, political Islam, is really just one manifestation for those who basically see themselves as proponents of liberation theology within the Muslim faith. That's just one expression of that. And Islamists, sadly today, they've gotten a very ugly and dirty name, it's a dirty word now, to be called an Islamist. But not all of them are violent. In fact, you'll find a lot of very nonviolent Islamists in the world. Turkey today, it's basically being run and they're now in there, what is it? Seventh or sixth term of running that country, they're basically a political party that's based on ideological understanding of Islam. And what we're finding today in places like Egypt and Tunisia, and even those places where violence is now erupted, such as Libya, Syria, Bahrain, Yemen, we're finding, basically people trying to still wrestle with the same problem. We're living in a world that's post-colonial, we're living in a world that's become rapidly interconnected. You're dealing with populations that are very young, most of whom are on the internet, they have cell phones, they're very connected, and suddenly Facebook has erupted into the world in a way that nobody saw coming. And so you have this incredible, incredible passion and this incredible amount of energy among young people who are, again, wrestling with the same problem. They're finding themselves, if you're a young Egyptian, for example, and I actually lived in Egypt for four months as a law student. When I was going to law school at the University of Minnesota during my summer after my first year, that was 1997, I spent four months in Egypt and got a chance to talk to a lot of people who were involved in these so-called liberation theology movements. And I did a human rights internship while I was there as well. And it was amazing just to get such a broad spectrum of views from people who outwardly look exactly the same, and yet inwardly they're informed by various sets of data points or they're influenced by different philosophical traditions. You know, one guy's a Marxist, one guy's a communist, one guy's a vowed American exceptionalist, one guy's considered himself an American Democrat, basically, a citizen of the world and renounces any notions of statehood and consider himself a cosmopolitanist, et cetera, et cetera. I found all these interesting people in coffee shops and hook-up bars in Cairo. These were the young people who now, I'm sure, are part of the brains behind everything that's happening. So I think that the way to think about it as Americans when we're looking at that part of the world is to realize that they're all wrestling with the same question. How do we, as Muslims in the modern world, live our Islam in a way that is going to be faithful to traditions that we believe are true and real and authentic, and yet at the same time be completely confluent with the modern world, the contemporary world. And it's a world, as I said a moment ago, that is not only interconnected and globalized, but also has this corporate dimension. And corporatism suddenly becomes a problem in some ways because it's seen as furthering Western hegemony and American brands. And I just returned from a trip with my family to Mecca. I went out of the religious pilgrimage to Mecca, stayed across the street from the Kaaba, the most holy site in Islam, and found it utterly bizarre that I would pray in front of this house that in Muslim tradition goes back to Adam himself, having been rebuilt by the prophet Abraham and his son Ishmael, and then re-established during the lifetime of the Prophet Muhammad as the house on earth for the worship of one God. This utterly pristine, if you will, this utterly ancient, this house of God, and I would literally walk out of that place and walk into the hotel I was thinking, which is connected to a mall. (audience laughing) And in the mall, I swear to you, there was a Claire's on the first floor. And all my kids wanted to eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner was Burger King. It's very bizarre, it's very bizarre. And so you can start to get your mind now, even by just a few examples I just mentioned, with some of the angst and some of the energy that people are feeling in that part of the world. You know, I've said a lot about a lot of things, and I'd like to just try to connect some of them up with the larger theme of non-violence in the Islamic traditions and the political reality going on in the world today. And I would simply submit to you that, you know, because the world has become so interconnected, and because, you know, as a poet once said, everyone everywhere wants to be American. And because America does rule and lead the world, whether that's culturally, militarily, politically, financially, what have you. The simple fact of the matter is, everyone does look to what's happening in America for leadership. And I would submit to you that what we find happening in the world today, you know, we have to really never divorce what happens, quote, unquote, overseas from what's happening right here in our own backyards. There is no doubt in my mind that anti-Muslim hysteria, anti-Muslim hate, anti-Muslim propaganda that goes on in the United States today is utterly connected to anti-Americanism abroad. It's a no-brainer. Every time somebody does anything crazy hating Muslims in America, it has a ripple effect, and it has a direct consequence in the Muslim world and in Muslim communities all around the planet, whether in the Muslim world proper or even in the Muslim diaspora in places like Europe and in places like parts of Africa, South Africa, for example, comes to mind. Utterly interconnected. The world, if anybody is still under the delusion that we are not utterly connected, I mean, really, we have to embrace the reality that we're not living under. The world of Facebook and Twitter and cell phones and texting and immediacy of something happening and everybody knowing about it. It's just a world that we are all inextricably linked and trapped in now, and that is a Pandora's box that is never going to close. We have to figure intelligently figure out what's going on and then understand as people who are working for non-violence and working to wage peace, if you will, we must figure out how to operate in that world and promote peace in a way that is gonna be intelligent in the way that's not gonna deny these realities. And the leaders of these movements, for example, again, Egypt comes to mind. They are obviously committed to non-violence. Their preferred path of resistance and of change and resisting oppression is through non-violence. And I humbly submit to you that we as Americans and people of non-violence and non-violent protest must become champions of everybody who in that part of the world is fighting injustice and promoting resistance and doing so in a peaceful manner. We have to, we have no other choice. And I would say to you further, and part of my final, final remarks, you know, one of my favorite quotes, two of my favorite quotes are from a guy called Sir Peter Eustonov, who's a British humorist. And Sir Peter Eustonov said comedy is just a funny way of being serious. But he also said, and as one of my favorite quotes, he said, terrorism is the war of the poor. He said, terrorism is the war of the poor. And war is terrorism of the rich. And I think there's a very profound truth in what he's talking about. And I think that we as Americans have to be honest about what our country, what our government, and what our military does around the world. We cannot, out of one side of the mouth, talk about condemning terrorism and political violence. And yet at the same time, out of the other side of the mouth, remain silent about atrocities that are committed by our troops, by our government, in our name without tax dollars. (audience applauds) And I said this when Bush was in office, I think it's still relevant even though Obama is now president. You'll see why he doesn't quite work anymore. But I said this when Bush was in office, which is that we have to become people of principle who condemn the taking of innocent human life no matter who does it, no matter who does it. Whether it's done, (audience applauds) whether it's done by a man with dark skin wearing white robes in a dark cave, or it's done by a man with white skin wearing a dark suit in a white house. (audience laughs) (audience applauds) And I know that sometimes it's politically unpopular to speak about these things because we've been brainwashed with this, what I believe is a very Nazi type of logic where you have to quote unquote support the troops, support the troops. I'm not exactly sure, I'm sorry? (audience murmurs) Yeah, bring them, exactly. Yeah, how about if we support them by sparing their lives? How about that, taking them out of harm's way. (audience applauds) But I think that we as Americans have to be honest about this as well. And unfortunately, the voices of courage and the voices of leadership that are courageously speaking about these things are very, very few as you all know. So in conclusion, we end where we began, which is that thinking people must wage peace and who are thinking people in the Muslim tradition, they are a little kulub, people of the heart, people of the heart, people who understand that physical existence and the labels that we put on one another only have a meaning to an extent, but fundamental truth and eternal truth transcends physical being. What connects us all is the spirit and what connects us all is the secret and the soul within. The current state of affairs in America, in my view is just a passing chapter in American history. When I watched those Peter King hearings, I actually felt like he was filming the highlight reel of the hysteria in 30 or 40 years, the way we watch footage from Dr. King's era and marvel in our shock at the utter intolerance and backwardness of people in the 60s is the way I think in 20 and 30 years people will be watching the Peter King tapes wondering that there was actually a time in American history where this was happening. So I don't lose sleep over that. The world is continuing to shrink. Everything and everyone is getting closer and closer together. And so I think people of the heart, it's time we all come together, put our differences aside and realize we have to share this planet. We're all going on a journey to the same destination. And so I pray that God gives us strength and brings the people of the heart together. Thank you very much. (audience applauds) - Comedian activist lawyer, Azzar Usman, was my spirit and action guest today. Track him down at azzar.com. That's A-Z-H-A-R dot com or via northernspiritradio.org. The theme music for this program is Turning of the World, performed by Sarah Thompson. This spirit in action program is an effort of northern spirit radio. You can listen to our programs and find links and information about us and our guests on our website, northernspiritradio.org. Thank you for listening. I am your host, Mark Helpsmeet and I welcome your comments and stories of those leading lives of spiritual fruit. May you find deep roots to support you and grow steadily toward the light. This is spirit in action. ♪ With every voice, with every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world along ♪ ♪ With every voice, with every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world along ♪ ♪ And our lives will feel the echo of our healing ♪ ♪ I'm really ♪