Spirit in Action
Rodwaan Saleh - Islamic Society of North America
Rodwaan Saleh is the Membership & Affiliates Coordinator of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA). I visited with him as he accompanied a group of visitors to Eau Claire from Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen, on a trip co-sponsored by the National Peace Foundation.
- Broadcast on:
- 11 Jul 2010
- Audio Format:
- other
(upbeat music) ♪ Let us sing their song for the healing of the world ♪ ♪ That we may hear as one ♪ ♪ With every voice of every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world home ♪ ♪ And our lives will feel the echo of our healing ♪ - Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark Helpsmeat. 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 fruit in your own life. ♪ Let us sing your dead song for the dreaming of the world ♪ ♪ That we may dream as one ♪ ♪ With every voice of every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world home ♪ - We are joined today by Rodwan Saleh, membership and affiliates coordinator of the Islamic Society of North America, also called ISNA. I had the good fortune to meet Rodwan at an event welcoming a delegation from Yemen, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, a group co-sponsored by ISNA and the National Peace Foundation. And he generously offered his time to share with us about his organization and the religion and people that ISNA supports. It's a big job with millions of Muslims spread across North America, and Rodwan is well-equipped to help them in their interconnections with American society. Before we start talking with Rodwan, let's listen to some words and music from Yusuf Islam, the Muslim singer-songwriter, formerly known under the stage name, Cat Stevens. This is "Whisperers from a Spiritual Garden" by Yusuf Islam. (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) The eternal source of love was implanted in every part of existence, the desire for another. Though night and day outwardly appear as enemies, yet both serve on purpose, each seeking the other. (gentle music) Rodwan, thanks so much for joining me for "Spirit in Action." Marc, thank you very much for inviting me to really appreciate your time, and I appreciate this opportunity as well. I met you with a group that's visiting us, mainly from the Middle East, and I want to know what your connection is with that. You're the membership and affiliates coordinator. How is it that you got the privilege of traveling with these fine people? ISNA is a 45-year-old organization, and ISNA stands for the Islamic Society of North America. Part of the services that we provide the Muslim community in America is that we enable citizen exchange, and obviously the citizen exchange idea came through the State Department with cooperation with the National Peace Foundation. We brought citizens from different countries from around the world, but specifically this time we're bringing citizens from the Middle East, obviously Muslim countries. These Muslim countries are Yemen, United Arab Emirates, and also Qatar. Obviously Qatar is now a country that is absolutely an ally of the United States, which happened to be a neighboring country to Iran with a very approximate distance to Kuwait and also to Iraq. Of course, I'm interviewing you here. We're at the University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire. So you're in Wisconsin, but I understand you come from a foreign country called Indiana. I do sense the civilian rivalry there in the air. I do love Eau Claire. It is very beautiful, a little bit small for me, but I know that great things come out of small places. And the reason we chose Eau Claire is we found that this is the Midwest. This is America, and you cannot be more American than being in this area. That being said, we found that bringing this delegation to the base of American citizens, it gave them the opportunity to see Americans. And we found it to be a very hospitable place. And who knows, maybe I will be looking into moving into Eau Claire very soon. We should be so privileged, so privileged. How long have you been in Indiana? And you're somewhere near Indianapolis, Plainfield, I think? The headquarters of Isna is in Plainfield, Indiana, so we are headquartered in Plainfield, Indiana. And we've been there since 1983. I myself joined Isna about a year and almost year in change, about a year and three months ago. Originally, I do come from Texas, and as we say in Texas, once a Texan is always a Texan. But I am falling in love now with the Midwest and specifically Plainfield. I don't think that most Americans think of Indianapolis as the Muslim center of the United States. I'm not sure where we think it is. How is it you come to have your presence there? And how are Muslims distributed throughout this fine country? I think the only stimuli that allowed Isna to exist in the Midwest of America is the land was cheap. Not only that, Isna got the land for free, one of the students or the exchange students who came to America to study. He came from a very rich background, and his father bought the 124-acre land. And he donated it to the Islamic Society of North America. And the building that was built in there as well, this was in 1983. And so when the land was free, and there was available funds from the students who existed here through their rich parents, and built the building, there was no, obviously, any objection in establishing Isna, which happened to be in the Midwest. But I do agree with you, there is not much foot traffic. However, we were not looking for foot traffic, we were absolutely looking for the quality of work and the services that we can bring in a subcluded area where we can actually think and put things in perspective and bring the services to Muslim Americans who are now prospering in the United States. I'd like to talk a little bit about those services. First of all, what's your client-based? How many Muslims are you reaching out to? How many groups? How many mosques are there in the United States? America now houses not less than, I would say, 2,800 to maybe 3,000 mosques, or massaged, as we say them. Massaged is the singular for a place of worship for Muslims, and massaged is the plural. Muslims do not like to call their place of worship as mosque. The details of that will come later on, or it might even take time. But let's use the term "massaged" or "massaged". That being said, there is about 2,800 of them in America. My particular forte is that I do, through ISNA, provide the following services, through our basket of services, which is adult programs. We found that as immigrants come to America, ISNA can provide the following services, which is to teach them about how to coexist in America, for example. So to teach them how to adhere to the rules and regulations here in the United States, we do have, through our ISNA Leadership Development Center, Dr. Louis Safi, who is now produced one of the books for leadership development. And that's another thing that we go to these Islamic centers, and we talk to either the community itself, or also to the leaders of that community, and to develop them so they could serve the Muslims better. Another section is Imam training. We found that we have a lot of imams that come from overseas. And obviously the understanding of coexistence between Muslims, Jews, and the people of the Christian faith, which we Muslims call our brethrens in Christianity and our brethrens in Judaism, people of the book. Many of the imams will come from overseas because of their lack of coexistence to these other religions wherever they came from. ISNA is providing that training. So we do train our imams about interfaith, how to engage into an interfaith in their local community, and praise be to God. It has been a good progress. We found that many of our brethrens from the Jewish community, and also from the Christian community, throughout their rainbow of denominations. They have accepted the existence of a must-get in their area, and they have really truly, with open arms, welcomed many of these Muslim communities. One thing that I would say as well, which is extremely important, we found that there was a community that we did not have more solid of a relationship with them, which is our brethrens in the Jewish community. But through the URJ, the United Rabbis, or Reformed Jewish movement in America, we produced an article of understanding, and that has been now being used to be practiced in Muslim communities and also in Jewish communities to understand both communities that way. What happened in September 11th of 2001 was a moment that held great promise and threat. I was very sad to read that there were discrimination attacks on people of Muslim faith, people taken to be Muslims right after that point. So there was a lot of learning that went on. One of the great promises that I saw happening is it finally motivated a lot of Americans to learn about Islam and to find out more about our brothers across the sea and in this country. Can you talk about what role the Islamic Society of North America had in that kind of mutual education? It is absolutely unfortunate that we Muslims and people of other faith had to come together to understand one another. I would have loved that we proactively before 9/11 had to do that in order to know one another. But before I answer the question, I would like to say that it was a foreign entity that attacked the United States. It was an attack by ill-informed youth individuals who thought by doing such things they would bring their cause to the forefront, which is far from the truth. What they did, they truly mudded the image of Islam, that's for sure. And Islam had to play even a harder role by approaching the larger community, if not the international community, to clear our image once more. The problem with that obviously takes a lot of resources and so we truly concentrated our efforts to approach our brethrens of the Jewish community and also the Christian community. There is, however, a story that I would like to say to you. And the story goes that there was an Imam in Colorado who received a phone call and the phone call basically said, "Leave your mosque now because we're coming to vomit." Well, before he could call the FBI, before he could call the authority, what he did is he picked up the phone and he called his brethrens in the Jewish community, his brethren, his brethrens in the Christian community. And Lord behold, all of these leaders of different denominations, they in turn called their congregations. And within few minutes, that night at the time of "bombing" that must-get, these people came out. And every time I say this story, I can't help but wipe the tears from my eyes. The people who are non-Muslims came and surrounded this must-get, this particular must-get, and they were raising signs that says over our dead body. Obviously, the media was contacted and they were showing that and obviously nothing happened to that must-get on that night and nothing happened to that message afterwards. We do recognize that some people took the law into their hands and maybe a couple of Sich people who are Hindu were killed because of their outward appearance. They put on a turban and they do let their hair grow. They were attacked in New York and in some other parts of our country. But I could also say that many messaged or many "masks" in this country were attacked after 9/11. I wouldn't say that it was something that was rampant everywhere. I think our civility showed the world that despite our differences, we can in America get to or at least have an effort to get to know one another. Certainly as we come to Eau Claire or we go to smaller towns in Wisconsin or Minneapolis or other places in America, let alone plain feel Indiana, our neighbors came out. They asked us if they knew that I was a Muslim because I had or have had a good relationship with my neighbors before 9/11. The first thing they did, they would call me in the morning and they would say, "How are you today? Is there anything I can do? Did your manager say anything to you?" I know one of my colleagues whom his manager called him in his office and he said, "I know in that meeting one of our senior managers said an off-color word about Muslims in the meeting in regard to 9/11. I wanted you to know that we fired him." And so this Muslim colleague or this Muslim employee, he objected. He said, "Why would you fire him?" If I was in his place, I would have said the same thing. This was an atrocity. This was an event that touched all of us, all of us Muslim Americans, all of us Jewish Americans and all of us Christian Americans. But the vice president made sure that that person was fired and there was zero tolerance for something like this. What this tells me, it tells me that America is not only tolerant, America does exercise its civility at the time of hardship and that speaks storms. And this is one of the things that we would like to show our delegates as they come from overseas. Finally, Isna did play a larger role in this. We opened an office in Washington, D.C. We knew that the image of Muslims could not and will not be cleared unless we make an effort to be part and parcel of our democracy system here in America. And we were successful to open an office in Washington, D.C. We established great interfaith relationship. In fact, we dedicated an office in Washington, D.C. called the Office of Interfaith Relations from the D.C. area. I'm sure that one of the things that is commonly misunderstood in the United States is what our central Muslim beliefs about peace and war. For instance, the word jihad, which some people think of as simple external war going to war against someone as opposed to struggle, the spiritual growth that many of us go through. Could you explain a little bit about what your views and what widespread views are of these things in Muslim society? Certainly there is the known jihad, and I would like to say once and for all, they must know more about the Holy War. I would like to stand before any person and say, "What's holy about war?" The word "holy war" it actually offends Muslims. So there is nothing holy about war. War is destruction and there is nothing holy about destruction. And therefore Muslims abhorred the word "holy war." Jihad exists in two parts in Islam. There is the spiritual jihad, and the word jihad, you know, itself, literally it means struggle. And so I struggled to uplift myself. I struggled to make myself wake up in the morning, and that's a form of jihad. I struggled to study throughout the night so that I could get an aid in my course. That's a form of jihad. I struggled to write a good article to defend whatever issue as an op-it piece in any national newspaper. That's a form of jihad. So there is the jihad of our soul, the jihad by the pen, and the jihad by my tongue. There is also the physical jihad, which I will make no mistake about, nor will I thank the notion of anyone who says that Islam or Muslims did not engage in jihad. Yes, Muslims, through the Ottoman Empire or the Turks, they did engage in proactive jihad, meaning they would go to a city and they would proactively want to open that city. And the opening of that city most of the time was actually peaceful. In other words, as the expansion of the Muslim Empire was in its height, the form of jihad, which is the physical struggle, it had to exist. So, jihad does exist in two forms, which is the spiritual form and also in the physical form. The misunderstanding of a lot of Muslims who would like to engage into "the physical jihad", they themselves don't understand what it is. The physical jihad has to come through a formed army, meaning if a country is engaged in a physical jihad, meaning they have to have an army that goes out to fight, and whether they win or lose, that is something else. But what we see lately is a form of terror. It is what we call now terrorism. There is nothing worthy of jihad by secretly strapping yourself with explosives and detonate them in the myth of innocent people. There is no law in the world that would accept such things and that is absolutely against Islam. Now, we talked about jihad and peace and the understanding. The root word of Islam means "peace". However, the byproduct of that peace is the practice of the religion. One cannot be at peace with their own self or with God unless they truly practice their religion. And I assure you, if any Muslim truly practices their religion, they would not have to resort into a jihadist ideology. Obviously, President Obama did speak to the Muslim world, and he did say "on cleanse your fist" and "we will meet you with open arms". And that's the gestures of Muslims. There is a saying of the prophet, or a hadith, meaning a tradition of the prophet, or a saying. He says "a smile in your brother's face because it's a charity". And so the essence of smiling, it has to come or resonate from the bottom of our heart. Otherwise, you would be just smiling through your teeth and it will never be genuine. So a person who smiles generally in people's faces, why would he or she want to get involved in jihad? I want to explore this a little bit deeper because I recognize within Christianity. And of course, I'm Quaker, which is a separate strand of Christianity where we take very seriously the peace testimony as we refer to it. There are certainly Christians who believe that war is just fine and accept it on a much larger basis than most Americans do. I imagine within Islam, there's a variety of thoughts, a number of people who are very committed to peace, people who are used to doing the struggle in a way that does not use force. And I believe that there's probably a small minority of people who think that any kind of force is acceptable as long as they're doing it for their religious beliefs. Can you talk about how that broad band of Islam look at these beliefs? How small is this minority? How common is it in the United States, for instance? I understand that our Quaker brothers do sign a declaration that they will never be engaged in war. And as friends to the community or to the society or to the world, they will never sign up to be part of an army of any sort. Islam has that balance, and Islam does say, if you are attacked, you must defend your religion, your country, and your honor by all means necessary. Obviously, by all means necessary, that means war, and war does have people who would be killed or people who would be died. It does not make any sense that if the United States is attacked, do we use or we are supposed to use or exercise our caution in engaging in war because we are truly a superpower today. But I'd like to look at it from a different perspective. I, for one, this is my own personal opinion. I think dropping a nuclear bomb to kill 80,000, and then you drop another nuclear bomb to kill another 150,000 merely because we have been attacked in one of our shores vis-a-vis Pearl Harbor. To me, this is my own personal opinion. I think that is wrong. And so we also have to find justice when we engage in war. America was attacked on 9/11. I think the obvious and the wise decision should have been that we go after the people who attacked us. If we now have had a solid understanding and solid proof that it came out of Afghanistan, then we ought to have had the audacity to go to Afghanistan and not go to a country that did nothing to us under the suspicion that they might cause harm to us because they harbor some chemical agents that they might use against us in the future. When we engage in war, we also need to exercise wisdom, and that's what Islam teaches us. An eye for an eye does exist in Islam, but it is not an eye and a neck and a leg for just a tooth. I believe most of your listeners, if they are not Quakers, they would hopefully agree with me. But I am a firm believer that in America, we are wise enough that in the future if we do get engaged in wars, we ought to get into it with justice in mind. I have dreamed of a place and time when nobody gets annoyed, but I must admit I'm not there yet, but some things keeping me going. Maybe there's a world that I'm still to find, maybe there's a world that I'm still to find, open up a world and let be in, then there'll be a new life to begin. I have dreamed of an open world, borderless and wide, where the people move from place to place and nobody's taking sides. Maybe there's a world that I'm still to find, maybe there's a world that I'm still to find, open up a world and let be in, then there'll be a new life to begin. I've been waiting for that moment to arise, all at once the solace of peace will fill my eyes, now nice. Maybe there's a world that I'm still to find, maybe there's a world that I'm still to find, open up a world and let be in, then there'll be a new life to begin. Maybe there's a world that I'm still to find, open up a world and let me in, then there'll be a new life to begin. I've been waiting for that moment to arrive, all at once the solace of the world will be put right, now nice. That was "Maybe There's a World" by Yusuf Islam, back in the 1970s before his conversion to Islam. His stage name was Kath Stevens, and he's still singing of a better vision for the world. If you just tuned in, you're listening to Spirit in Action, this is a Northern Spirit radio production. You can always find these productions on my website, northernspiritradio.org. Today we're visiting with Radwan Saleh. He is the membership and affiliates coordinator of the Islamic Society of North America, known as Isna. Fortunately, he's joining us here in Eau Claire. We have the benefit of his visit, along with a number of visitors from the Middle East. I want to direct a question or two to you about the Middle East right now. Tell me, Radwan, what hopeful future could you see for developing peace in the Middle East? Clearly, it's been a Tinder box, it's been a threat to a lot of people's security, not knowing what would happen with Israel and neighbors, the Palestinians and the other countries around there. Sometimes we hear threats coming from Iran towards safety of Israel. Israel seems to react pretty bellicosely against their neighbors, doing what they think they need to do to protect their security. But in the meantime, in raging a lot of opposition, the group that you're traveling with here, what is the hope in having them here and what's your role with that as part of the Islamic Society of North America? I think the world would know and truly would understand when I say that seek to understand before you are understood. If we needed to understand other people, we must first try to understand why someone is acting or saying what he or she is saying first. And after finding that out, then I would have clear understanding, then I would sit with them and maybe talk. And fortunately, we did not do that. And a lot of times when we spoke, we spoke from the barrel of the gun. Because I do carry a bigger stick, therefore you listen to me and probably the world does not like that. America for some time did carry a big stick. But I would say this. I think the Middle East and the world await what America does or say on a continuous basis. I know for sure that there are many leaders in the Middle East. They do read the Boston Globe, the New York Times or the Chicago Tribune before they make many of their own decisions as well. America is a country today that speaks on behalf of the world because we have truly developed ourselves to be brokers of peace in so many parts of the world. I just feel sometimes we shove our own ideologies and democracy down the throats of so many people who don't know what they are chewing on. But besides the point, I think the issue with the Middle East requires, and I want to also give a disclaimer. It is above my pay grade. But I would like to say this. I think it is time for us to listen. Certainly the delegation that came in, they were absolutely amazed to see that laymen Americans are meeting them with smiles in their faces. This is in the middle of our own country. They are being met with smiles, open arms. One of the delegates gave the opening prayers in one of the churches right here on Broadway, the first congregation of Christ. And so that is hopeful. You talked about hope. I do believe that there is hope. And I do believe that when people talk with one another, good things come. And that obviously in turn will also force our governments to talk with one another. Without us, there is no governments. And so we need to talk and we need to engage in conversations. Well, could you enlighten me a little bit about something that I'm afraid I'm terribly ignorant about, Sharia law. I've heard of it as some of the people yesterday who we met with traveling from the Middle East. Some of them are trained as lawyers in Sharia law. And I was so ignorant, believe it or not, that I didn't know that it was a formal way of law. I thought it was some kind of code or something that I didn't know it was a law that could have courts or whatever. So please tell me what Sharia law is. And I'm imagining that a lot of our listeners are probably close to as ignorant as I've been. The Sharia law is like the traffic light that we have on our street. So long that I follow the green light and stop at the red light, follow all the traffic signs. I will never be sighted. But the second that I break the law, not only I would be sighted, but there would also be some fines. And therefore we are now breaking the law. At that time I am breaking the Sharia. And so the word Sharia means the law. The law happened to be the jurisprudence of Islam. The law dictates if two people divorced, what is the reward for that woman, the children and also the husband? When the father dies, how will the inheritance be divided? When two people get in disputes about a land, how would the judge rule? So first the judge would rule according to the Quran or the Quranic verses as Islam is not only a religion, but it's also a way of life. And if the answer is not there or it was not clear, we would look at the traditions of the prophet, or prophet Muhammad, may peace and blessings be upon him and upon all other prophets, Moses, Jesus and Mary and all of the prophets before may peace and blessings be upon them. And so we look at the Quran, and we also look at the traditions of the prophet, may peace and blessings be upon him, and the judge would rule then. If the judge, and according to our today's worthy affairs, if the judge couldn't find the answer, then what the judge will do will drive the answer from these rules that existed in front of him or her. However, the only person who can interpret the law fully and wisely is someone who knows the law very well, someone who is well learned, and someone who is a judge, me taking the law into my own hands and act out of ignorance or just pseudo understanding of the rulings from the Quran. It negates the interpretation of the Sharia or the law or jurisprudence in Islam. Maybe I should get back to some more issues, Radwan, that are not beyond your pay grade, I'm sure I'm asking you a lot of questions that any of us would have difficulty answering. But in your role as membership and affiliates coordinator, I'm sure you must deal with a wide variety of Muslims, a wide variety of Islam within the country. So we know that there's a variety of Wahhabism that's part of Saudi Arabia, we've heard of Shia and Sunni, and these things mean something maybe over in that country, but in the United States, what they mean? Do all of these subdivisions of religion exist here in the United States, or is Islam just Islam here? I think the world needs to look at Muslims in America in order to understand the full diversity of Muslims in the world, not only in America. I think Muslim Americans are the leading image and the leading force, and they are certainly at the forefront of a true representation of the Islamic diversity that exists around the world. That being said, Muslims are not considered Wahhabis, and I need to really take a minute and explain what Wahhabis is all about. A man by the name Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab, meaning Muhammad the son, ibn means son, so Muhammad the son of Abdul Wahhab, a young scholar in Medina, he saw that many Muslims of his own country, which today called Saudi Arabia, especially in the tribal areas. And in the nomadic environment, they started to revert back into worshipping idols, seeing that image hurt them very much. And so what did he do? He wrote a book, and the book had nothing but verses from the Quran that talked about the oneness of God. But this young man was very clever. He had excellent relationship with the rulers of Saudi Arabia who were just emerging from under the rulership of the Turks. Obviously, we know that Saudi Arabia took its independence in the early 30s before the discovering of the oil, obviously, by the help of the British and some help from the Americans, and they formed the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia being young, wanting to survive, they used Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab's ability to speak, and they wanted to show themselves that this is the new change, but we're coming in as a religious group. We are coming in as religious rulers. And Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab, obviously, classified all of these tribes as being Qufar if they do not revert back into the worshipping of the one God. Qufar means they are outside of the limits of Islam, and therefore, in certain parts, force was used into bringing these tribes to the alms of Islam. And therefore, the ideology, or I shouldn't even call it ideology, but the teachings of Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab spread rampant. There was also a stringent ruling on men must grow their beards, for example. Women need to address more modest, even to the point that a club only showing their eyes. And therefore, it became such a stringent and forceful way of worship. And therefore, people label it as Wahhabis. Muslims, especially from Saudi Arabia, they take offense to that, and I personally think it is the wrong labeling because Muslims cannot be Wahhabis. Wahhabis, I mean Abdul Wahhab, or Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab, was an individual who wrote a book trying to bring people to worship the one God, though the marketing strategy was the wrong marketing strategy, though the product was the best. But the so-called Wahhabis, they like to be called Salafi, and Salafi means going back to the original, meaning fundamentalist. And I wouldn't also think because the word fundamentalist also looked upon as something bad. A Christian he or she who practices their own religion fully, peacefully, and wanting to coexist according to the teachings of Jesus, peace and blessings be upon him, they are fundamentals. Don't we sometimes, in corporate America, say let's come back to fundamentals? Well, it means that let's come back to the basis of our religion. And the basis of our religion is fundamentalism, and therefore, I am a fundamentalist if I practice my religion well. And therefore, I would like to be labeled, for example, as a Salafi, not as a Wahhabis. Someone else who is now named Ishiye, if I follow the teachings of Ali, peace and blessings be upon him. Ali was the first cousin of Prophet Muhammad, and the story goes that as the tribes of Quraysh, or the Qurashites, who did not like the message of Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, as he was preaching to them in Mecca at a time where 360 idols were circled emulating the Kaaba, or at least surrounding the Kaaba, he was preaching Prophet Muhammad the oneness, or the tawheed, or the oneness of God. Ali at a younger age was the student of Muhammad, though he was his first cousin. And when Ali reached the age of 17 or 18 years old, and persecution on Muslims in Mecca was rampant, Prophet Muhammad was emigrating to Medina. And on that morning, he asked Ali to sleep in his bed, knowing that he is a young child who would not be killed because the formation of the Qurashites and other tribes came together wanting to finish Prophet Muhammad. And so the story goes that when Prophet Muhammad leaves and the tribes enter the house, they wanted to kill Muhammad and spread his blood upon all the tribes where the family of Muhammad cannot come to just one tribe, therefore they found Ali. After the passing of Prophet Muhammad, of course, I'm now really passing along history, and I don't have time, obviously go into details. But after the passing of Prophet Muhammad, the Shia, and the word Shia in Arabic, it means the allies of Ali. They raised arms and they said we want Ali to be the next Prophet, or at least to be the next Khalifa, or Caliph, or the Vice-Jern who would run the affairs of Muslims. But Prophet Muhammad did not want that. What Prophet Muhammad did, he said, let the people choose the leader after me. But Prophet Muhammad would always push Abu Bakr, which was his best friend and the companion of the Prophet, to lead the prayers during Prophet Muhammad's sickness. And so people naturally chose Abu Bakr, and that angered the people who wanted Ali to be, and so now it became the two words. The Shia means the friends of Ali, and Shia in Arabic literally means the friends or the sect of Ali, and they wanted Ali, for example. The word Sunni means one who follows verbatim the teachings of Prophet Muhammad, and therefore they call them Sunni. So now when we start to say there is a lot of clashes between Sunni and Shia in Iraq, or in Iran, or in other places where there is a majority of Shia, it is absolutely wrong because it is all based on politics and it is not based on religion. To close my point on this question, Islam is diverse, but within the diversity of Islam, it all pulls down into one source, which is the oneness of God. There is diversity in Judaism, there is orthodox Jews, and there is uniformed Jews, and there is conservative Jews. There is diversity, obviously there is a rainbow of diversity, or a rainbow of denominations within Christian religion, but it is not the same that is in Islam. The diversity that exists here in America is truly a true representation of what exists outside America. However, certain places around the Muslim world, you would go there and you would find a concentration of Shia, and you would find a concentration of Sunnis. And therefore when we come to America we truly see that rainbow of diversity because Muslims in America exist as Muslims, they don't exist as Shia or Sunni or something else. I want to go back to something that you mentioned way back at the beginning, Ratan. You said that you prefer not to use the word mosque, but must get is the word that you prefer to use. Tell me about that. You promised me an answer on that one. The word mosque is actually a derogatory word, and I am sad to say that it was given to the Muslims by the Christian Catholics of Spain. And the word is mosque is where mosquitoes form, and where mosquitoes form is where Muslims gather together. And so the army of the Christian force in Spain was actually calling, if you want to attack the Muslims, they would be forming like the mosquitoes in the mosque. I read this, and I don't know the absolute authenticity of it, and I obviously challenge all of your listeners to go back and to dig into it. However, the word masjit, the root word of that is sujud, and sujud means prostration. Therefore Muslims like to call their places of worship as the places of prostration. Muslims pray five times a day, early morning, before we do anything, before we go to work, we pray a seven minutes prayer, which involves putting our forehead on the ground, which is a formation during our worship. Another one is during lunchtime, for example, which also takes about seven to ten minutes. Another one is at about two hours before the sun goes down, and the fourth one is just when the sky is red, or the sun just started to settle, and the fifth one is before we go to bed. And these are five daily prayers, each one takes, I mean, the entire day, out of 24 hours, we dedicate half hour for the worship of God divided into five pieces. So the word sujud is part of our worship to God, and the word masjit, it became the place of worship for Muslims. So the word masq ought not to be used anymore. One more thing that I'd like you to clarify for me is imam. I don't think we have exactly that same kind of role in Christianity, but what is an imam? Is it a priest, is it a prophet, is it an inspired person, is he hired, is he, what is his role, or her role, maybe? It is his role, imam is someone who's in the front, and meaning that he is the person who's leading the prayers at the time. Anyone who stands in the front of the lines to lead the congregational prayers, he at that time is the imam. If it's only ladies in one place, let's say two or more, in one place and it's only ladies, they can also push one of the ladies to go, you know, two steps forward to lead the congregational prayers at that time. If it's mixed men and women in one congregational place such as the masjit, women would stand in the back, men would stand in the front, and the imam will stand at the forefront and lead the entire congregation in prayers, meaning he at that time is the imam. The word imam in a masjit, meaning a full-time imam, is as similar to a rabbi, a community that wants to prosper, a community that wants to solve their marital problems, a community that wants to develop their youth activities. In America, for example, they would need to hire an imam, and that imam not only leads the prayers, but he also acts as the spiritual leader of the community. And the word is spiritual leader, I use it loosely, and the reason I use it loosely is that a spiritual leader does not mean that I have to verbatimly follow whatever he tells me. But because of his authority and because of his imamship or because of his scholarship, what we do is that we allow the imam to also interpret the Quran and to teach from the traditions of the Prophet. Through out study circles on the weekends or maybe early mornings or maybe in the evenings. And the reason we do that is because we have chosen someone who is certified to be an imam. And fortunately, sometimes some people are not supposed to lead the prayers nor become full-time imams because they are not licensed to do so. We have seen many cases, and this is what Isna does now. We have seen many cases where the imam himself was the source of the problem, and we found that because of the lack of his knowledge about leading his community. Today's imams in our communities, they need to know how to lead their congregation from the American culture point of view. Some of the edicts the imam might give, it might be interpreted according to 1700 text book, for example, that is a scholar that existed three to five to maybe six hundred years ago in the history of Islam, wrote that book. And today the imams are encouraged to interpret the Quran and the Jewish prudence of Islam in accordance to the way of life here in America, meaning feq, which is the understanding of the Quran. To sum it up, an imam or the imams role is similar to the rabbi role in leading the community towards betterment spiritually. It is also similar to the priest in a church that leads the community for the betterment spiritually as well in the Christian world. And the only detail that I'm not clear about is who's doing the certifying, who's doing the licensing. Isna through the Harford seminaries, which Dr. Ingrid Madsen herself is the director now at the McDonald's Center at the Harford seminaries. By the grace of God, she does engage into producing, I guess, chaplains who could also become imams or Muslim representatives in hospitals or even military posts and things like that. An imam could be certified if that imam, for example, came to us from Egypt or other parts of the world and he had authentic full memorization of the Quran. The Quran has 114 chapters or 30 juzu means it's broken down into 30 parts. There is about 660 some verses in the Quran and that imam has to memorize them fully and also understand what they mean. And therefore, he would qualify as an imam and obviously he has to have understanding of the traditions of Prophet Muhammad because he could teach out of that as well. I know there's a lot more that we could talk about, but I think that probably there's a few other things you need to do while you're still here in Eau Claire. I want to thank you so much for joining me, Radwan, and also for being part of bringing this group in the Middle East from Qatar, from the Emirates and from Yemen to bring them here to have us meet each other face to face. I do think that's the way that we plant seeds of peace. First of all, I'd like to thank you very much Mark for inviting me for this interview. And I also would like to thank your listeners for patiently listening to my technical explanation of Islam and some Islamic thought. But I would say this at the end, which I hope it would be a beginning to all of us. And if I say, what is it that makes a man speak ill of another? For no reason except their own formulated preconceived ill notions. And what is it that makes a man look at another with gazing eyes of disgust and belittlement? For no reason except bigotry, hate, and ignorance. I think it is high times that we let loose of our preconceived ill notions about the world that exists outside of the borders of our own country. And perhaps we can truly seek out a new understanding of those who would like to come and also open their arms and shake hands with us. Make no mistake about it that the Muslim world awaits all of our American brothers and sisters. And the Muslim world does on continuous basis say we are willing to give up our last meal if you come to be our guest in our own homes. And I think that speaks to storms. It certainly speaks storms of peace in this delegation as they came here. They will go back in another week. And I already started to hear the discussions that exist between them. They do say that America is not only a peaceful place, but they are hopeful that they will come when America truly would bring hope to the world and bring peace to their own countries as well. With that, thank you very much. Thank you, Ratwan. [Music] [Music] His wisdom flowed from Heaven's book. Just like threaded birds. Just like threaded birds. He left his self to flee to God. And God sent him back to us. He was born to be the bill of ill. A will of the divine. He was born to be the bill of ill. He was born to guide. He prayed all his nights alone in stars and angels' sight. And in the day he lived away with blazing words so bright. He was born to be the bill of ill. A will of the divine. He was born to be the bill of ill. He was born to be kind. [Music] He taught the people to worship. Bowing to one God. Bowing to one God. His mercy stretched from east to west to every man, woman and child. He was born to be the bill of ill. A will of the divine. He was born to be the bill of ill. Nature supplied. He opened up the doors of love for every heart, parched with thirst. He was a mercy to the words and unto the universe. He was born to be the bill of ill. A will of the divine. He was born to be the bill of ill. He was born to guide. He was born to be the bill of ill. He was born to be the bill of ill. He was born to be the bill of ill. He was born to be the bill of ill. He was born to be the bill of ill. He was born to be the bill of ill. [Music] That also was music by Yusuf Islam, formerly Cat Stevens, and it's called the Beloved or the Beloved, a proper way to say thank you and farewell to today's spirit and action guest, Radwan Saleh of the Islamic Society of North America. The theme music for this program is "Turning of the World", performed by Sarah Thompson. This spirit and 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 alone. With every voice, with every song, we will move this world alone. And our lives will feel the echo of our healing. You