Islam

By Bala Muhammad

Every Israeli Prime Minister makes it an article of faith to attack Palestine – both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. But as the West Bank is usually led by the compliant and complacent so-called Palestinian Administration of PLO inheritors, it is mainly spared the fury of Israel. But Gaza, the home of HAMAS and Islamic Jihad, always takes the brunt whenever an Israeli leader wants to flex muscle and show ‘manhood’.

With each passing day of the Israeli aggression against the Palestinians, with each additional death of a child or mother, Muslims worldwide are becoming more militant, more fundamentalist, and more jihadic. This is very ominous for the West, on whose behalf Israel is doing what it is doing.

Samuel Huntington, who died not too long ago, wrote Clash of Civilisations. Now, more than ever before, this Clash is at hand. If there is any cause that unites Muslims today, it is the Palestinian Question; if there is any future war that Muslim youth would gladly join and wage, it would be the Jihad to liberate Al Aqsa, Al Quds and Palestine. But for the Western-propped-up Arab regimes encircling Gaza, many young people would have gone into the Strip to join the martyred army of Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

In the matter of HAMAS, Faith will always be Triumphant. Incidentally, The Faith Triumphant is the title of Chapter Eleven in one of the most important books of the Islamic Movement, Ma’alim fit Tariq (Milestones), written by the Movement’s leading intellectual and Martyr, Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966) of the Muslim Brotherhood, Ikhwan al Muslimun.

In Milestones, Qutb wrote: “Allah says, ‘Do not be dejected or grieve. You shall be the uppermost if you are Believers’ (3:139). The first thought which comes to mind on reading this verse is that it relates to the form of Jihad, which is actual fighting, but the spirit of this message and its application with its manifold implications is greater and broader than this particular aspect. Indeed, it describes that eternal state of mind that should inspire the believer’s consciousness. It describes a triumphant state which should remain fixed in the believer’s heart in the face of everything, every condition, every standard and every person; the superiority of the Faith.

“It means to be above all the powers of the earth which have deviated from the way of the Faith, above all the values of the earth not derived from the source of faith, above all the customs of the earth not coloured with the colouring of the faith, above all the laws of the earth not sanctioned by the Faith, and above all traditions not originating in the Faith. It means to feel superior to others when weak, few and poor, as well as when strong, many and rich. It means the sense of supremacy which does not give in before any rebellious force.

“Steadfastness and strength on the battlefield are but one expression among many of the triumphant spirit which is included in this statement of Almighty God. The superiority through faith is not a mere single act of will nor a passing euphoria or a momentary passion but is a sense of superiority based on permanent Truth centred on the very nature of existence.

“The person who takes a stand against the direction of the society – its governing logic, its common mode, its values and standards, its ideas and concepts, its error and deviations – will find himself a stranger, as well as helpless, unless his authority comes from a source which is more powerful than the people, more permanent than the earth, and nobler than life.

“Conditions change, the Muslim loses his physical power and is conquered; yet the consciousness does not depart from him that he is most superior. If he remains a Believer, he looks upon his conqueror from a superior position. He remains certain that this is a temporary condition which will pass away and that faith will turn the tide from which there is no escape. Even if death is his potion, he will never bow his head. Death comes to all, but for him, there is martyrdom. He will proceed to the garden while his conquerors go to the fire. What a difference!”

So wrote Sayyid Qutb. Let us now end today’s treatise with the following story on Challenge, the type the Palestinians are facing: “The Japanese love fresh fish. However, the waters close to Japan have not held many fish for decades. So to feed the Japanese population, fishing boats got bigger and went farther. The farther the fishermen went, the longer it took to bring in the catch. If the return trip took more than a few days, the fish were not fresh. The Japanese did not like the taste.

“To solve this problem, fishing companies installed freezers on their boats. They would catch the fish and freeze them at sea. However, the Japanese could taste the difference between fresh and frozen, and they did not like frozen fish. So fishing companies installed fish tanks. They would catch the fish and stuff them in the tanks, fin to fin. After a little thrashing around, the fish stopped moving. They were tired and dull but alive. Unfortunately, the Japanese could still taste the difference. Because the fish did not move for days, they lost their fresh-fish taste. The Japanese preferred the lively taste of fresh fish, not sluggish fish. So how did Japanese fishing companies solve this problem?

“To keep the fish tasting fresh, the Japanese fishing companies still put the fish in the tanks. But now, they add a small shark to each tank. The shark eats a few fish, but most of the fish arrive in a very lively state. Because they are challenged, they kick and protest and ultimately arrive fresh. Or martyred.”

Allah has put a tiny shark (Israel) in the Arab tank. Only some fish called Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah are kicking. The others are frozen stiff. RIP. After all, L. Ron Hubbard once wrote: “Man thrives, oddly enough, only in the presence of a challenging environment.”

May Allah help the Palestinians.

Dr Bala Muhammad wrote from Kano, Nigeria. He can be reached via balamuhammad@hotmail.com.

• Book time: The Walking Qurʾan: Islamic education, Embodied Knowledge, and History in West Africa
• Author: Rudolph T. Ware III.
• Date of Publication: 2014
• Number of Pages: 330
• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
• Reviewer: Shamsuddeen Sani

After recently reading a book about Quranic Schools in Northern Nigeria, I was left hungry for a less Western way of presenting the subject matter. So I serendipitously laid my hands on this book, and knowing that I have read about the author in the past, I didn’t hesitate to devour it.

Following a broad introductory section, the book delves deeply into an interdisciplinary examination of the knowledge philosophy underlying Quranic education. This required an in-depth historical ethnography of the institution in modern-day Senegambia, which lays the way for comprehension of the conceptualization and transmission of knowledge. It also strengthens the case that internalizing texts, even by swallowing them, was crucial to understanding and remembering the material. This book’s central concept represents the embodiment and actualization of Islamic knowledge.

Importantly, these early chapters look at the emergence and long-term evolution of a native West African clerisy. Ware underscores how these African Islamic instructors and thinkers were the primary agents of Islamization in a continent unperturbed by the early Islamic conquests. In order to avoid rulers (and maintain their independence), they established a unique framework for the interactions between political and religious powers. It also emphasizes both moral and political economies of studying and teaching the Qur’an throughout the 18th century focusing on how the growth of the Atlantic slave trade led to the breakup of this model of pious distance from power.

As we near the middle of the book, Ware thoroughly explored the historical account of the enslavement of ‘huffaz’ in Senegambia from the 1770s until the advent of the French colonial rule in the late 19th century. With clerics viewed as embodied exemplars of the Quran, such incidents of enslavement were perceived as more than just violations of Islamic law, but as desecrations of the Book of God.

The book meticulously illustrates the chronological narrative of Senegambia’s revolts, rebellions, and even revolutions inspired by the enslavement of “the walking Qur’an.” Without going further into spoilers, these historical happenings culminated in the climactic radical movement by African Muslim clerics and their disciples, with a cascade of events leading to the overthrow of hereditary slave-owning kings in 1776, the abolition of both the Atlantic slave trade in the Senegal River Valley and the slavery institution itself.

These narratives would lack crucial context if they did not include the efforts of formerly enslaved people and other oppressed groups to use the legal abolition of slavery in the French colonial state to assert their dignity through the dissemination of the Qur’an in the early 20th century. They fought to transform their very selves through Islamic education while doing so from within the epistemology of embodiment and in opposition to regional traditions that stigmatized their bodies because of their social standing. The establishment of mass Sufi organizations and the emergence of new French and Muslim teaching forms were only two of the many changes in colonial Senegal’s political and educational landscapes fueled by this knowledge-sifting process.

This outstanding work profoundly serves as the first step for anyone interested in learning about Qur’anic instruction in West Africa. A significant chunk of detail about Quranic education in West Africa jumps right off the page, you can feel the author’s passion, and as he claims, this is the narration from within. The writing style is genuinely simple and engaging and has a powerful sense of atmosphere. It gives you a lot to chew on and is one of those books that it would not feel right if you didn’t give it the five stars it deserves.

Rudolph T. Ware III is a historian of West Africa at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He formerly taught at the University of Michigan and then at Northwestern University. His work aims to confront and dispel Western misconceptions about Islam.

By Ahmad Deedat Zakari

A Kano State pilgrim in Mecca has passed on in the holy city of Mecca. 

The Executive Secretary of the Kano State Pilgrims Welfare Board, Alhaji Muhammed Abba-Muhammad, disclosed this to the press on Saturday, August 6, 2022. 

The Executive Secretary said Idris Muhammad, who hailed from Madobi Local Government Area, passed on after a brief illness in a Hospital in Mecca. 

“The deceased has been buried according to Islamic rites at Grand mosque at Masjid Haram Shira yard in Mecca,” He said

He also prayed for the deceased and extended his condolence to his family.

By Dr Raji Bello

The past few years have witnessed a gradual emergence of references in public commentary and social media to a potential or actual rupture of relations between Hausa and Fulani groups in the Northwest geopolitical zone of Nigeria. Prior to this, the two groups had enjoyed a largely harmonious relationship for much of their history which was only punctuated during the period of the establishment of the Sokoto Caliphate.

Since Nigeria came into being at the turn of the 20th century, conflict between the two groups was limited to occasional farmer/herder disputes. While the region has distinct Hausa (majority) and Fulani (minority) communities in the rural areas, the urban centres tend to have mostly mixed populations united by the Hausa language and Islam, which eliminates the possibility of ethnic conflict.

The idea of Hausa/Fulani antagonism began to emerge several years ago in the commentaries of individuals from outside the North like Femi Fani-Kayode and Nnamdi Kanu who relished in promoting it as a potential tool for undermining northern hegemony, as they saw it. But recent developments in the Northwest like the emirship succession in Kano and Zazzau, and the violent conflict between rural Fulani and Hausa vigilante groups as well as the wave of banditry against local communities by Fulani elements has created narratives of Hausa/Fulani conflict among northerners themselves.

As we acknowledge this new reality, it is also important to recognise that there are two strands of these narratives out there and the motives of those who articulate each of them are different. I will group them into non-extremist and extremist narratives.

Non-extremist narratives

These are propagated by ordinary Hausa citizens who are concerned by what they see as the continued suppression of Hausa identity and prestige as well as threats to the security of Hausa communities in parts of the Northwest as a result of banditry. They hold an unfavourable view of the existence of exclusively Fulani traditional ruling dynasties in Hausa-dominated emirates like Kano, Katsina, and Zazzau which were established when the Sokoto Caliphate came into being over 200 years ago. They object to the references that are often made to the Fulani heritage of the emirs (although I believe that this is not done out of ethnic chauvinism but because of a need for historical accuracy). These are concerns that the state governments in the Northwest can engage, with a view to introducing reforms that would assuage negative feelings and lead to a more harmonious society.

Traditional institutions play a vital role in preserving our heritage but for some segments of society, they may also be permanent reminders of an unpalatable past. It is the responsibility of modern day governments to ensure that they strike a balance between the two i.e. preserving heritage while not alienating some segments of society.

Reforms could be introduced that would formally recognise and integrate the legacies of the pre-Caliphate Hausa emirs. Like a contributor Aliyu Ammani has suggested in a Daily Trust article, Hausa ruling houses could be included as contenders during succession to the emirships; our governors are fond of creating new emirates where they didn’t exist before and therefore, they should not find it difficult to create new ruling houses within the existing emirates. The Sokoto state government may also consider elevating the status of the Sarkin Gobir of Sabon Birni – the ancient Hausa kingdom of Gobir being the epicentre of the Sokoto Jihad.

Governments have a duty to recognise and preserve heritage holistically; the heritage of some segments of society should not be elevated over those of others in a post-Caliphate and post-colonial nation state. This is a recipe for entrenching communal tension and possible conflict. The Northwest governments should collectively nip these emerging issues in the bud and not allow them to fester and grow into major problems in the future.

I expect some readers to either say that these suggestions are too radical or that they will be impossible to implement. I’m used to hearing this from reform-shy Nigerians who like things to remain just as they are even when the existing situation is pushing us towards the edge of the cliff.

The second cause for concern is, of course, the ongoing wave of banditry against local Hausa communities in many parts of the Northwest in which Fulani elements are major actors. However, this is not primarily an ethnic conflict; if communities that have lived in peace for generations are now locked in violent conflict we need to scratch below the surface to find the actual causes.

The banditry is a symptom of the failure of governance at various levels. Even a report commissioned by the Zamfara state government (the MD Abubakar-led committee) has alluded to that by indicting former governors, top government officials, traditional rulers and members of the security services. There are chronic issues with agricultural land management, law enforcement capacity, corruption and maladministration by local officials and traditional rulers.

The lack of a long term plan by successive federal and state governments for transitioning nomadic pastoralists to modern and sustainable livelihoods is itself an evidence of leadership failure. While people are entitled to show concern about the apparent ethnic divide in the conflict, it is clear that it is not fundamentally an ethnic one.

Extremist narratives

These are deeply inciting and apocalyptic portrayals of the state of Hausa/Fulani relations in the Northwest which are propagated on the internet by people with no apparent desire for peaceful co-existence. Their aim seems to be to incite a major upheaval in order to undermine the fabric of society. They are a faceless mix of anarchists, genocide entrepreneurs and probably, people with a religious agenda. They often start their narratives by depicting the arrival of the Fulani in Hausa land hundreds of years ago as an invasion, then portray Usman Danfodio as the original Fulani bandit leader before dwelling on their favourite topic of interrogating the validity of Hausa-Fulani as a descriptive term for a segment of the population of the Northwest. They hide behind a veneer of seductive Hausa ethnic nationalism but their true agenda is to engineer maximum disruption in the Northwest which they hope would serve their interests.

There is a YouTube site and a Facebook page dedicated to the project (yes, it does appear to be a well-funded project) and I have viewed a few of their videos. Some of the voices on the videos bear distinct Nigerien accents (with French-influenced pronunciations) and some of their messages give a hint that they are non-Muslim Hausas. One of the voices called for unity among Hausa people of all faiths – Muslim, Christian and pagan to confront the Fulani threat, as they saw it. From my knowledge of northern Nigerians, it is very unlikely that a Hausa Muslim Nigerian would call for unity between Hausa Muslims and Hausa pagans considering how paganism is viewed in Islam. A Hausa individual who makes this call is likely to be a non-Muslim. And if those behind the extremist messages on the internet are non-Muslim Hausas, the question arises about whether they are working for a religious agenda or not. By saying “non-Muslim Hausas” I’m not necessarily alluding to the Hausa Christian community; there are also a small but assertive number of Hausa atheists and modern day pagans who are not necessarily enamoured of the prevailing order in Northwest society. If anyone feels that I’m being alarmist here, they should visit the YouTube channel of Jaruma Hausa Tv and listen to the messages themselves.

Conclusion

Authorities in the Northwest need to face the new reality of tension and misgivings between the hitherto harmonious communities of Hausa and Fulani. There are issues that are germane (the exclusivist Caliphate traditional dynasties in some of the Northwest emirates and the ongoing banditry) behind the new unease in ethnic relations which need to be actively addressed, in order to re-establish harmony. But it should also be recognised that not all those who are currently pushing narratives of Hausa/Fulani conflict or Hausa nationalism on the internet are working for peaceful co-existence. Some of them are merely exploiting contemporary issues in the Northwest to achieve their own dark agenda.

By Aisha Musa Auyo

There’s this widespread belief that going into marriage makes one complete. It’s one area that most couples have gotten wrong. We can probably blame our movies and fairytales for most of it. But, perhaps, it’s a mere misappropriation of the word ‘complete’ in relation to marriage.

It makes a great storyline that someone can come into your life and complete you. The problem is that you are already a complete person, created by Allaah with or without someone else in your life.

If you have perceived lacks and weaknesses, you need to seek Allaah, your Creator alone, to help you fill those spaces, not another person. As long as you feel you must have another human to complete you, you are a danger to them and yourself.

No one within themselves can fill you with everything you need. You will drain your spouse with unrealistic expectations, and when you finally discover that they cannot provide all that you need, you will become dissatisfied and frustrated. You will begin to think that you may have made a mistake picking your spouse, which could tear you two apart.

Now, suppose you begin to put your spouse in proper perspective, realizing that Allaah allowed you two to come together and complement one another with each other’s unique characteristics and strengths. In that case, you can then learn to appreciate your spouse without draining them.

Learning how to lighten the relationship with each other’s talents and abilities enhances and improves your lives together. This is not always the most straightforward key to understand and embrace, but as you figure it out, it will allow much of the tension in your home to drain away.

Aisha Musa Auyo is a Doctorate researcher in Educational Psychology, a mother of three, a Home Maker, caterer and parenting/ relationship coach.

By Babatunde Qodri

The heated arguments for and against Bola Tinubu and Kashim Shettima’s joint ticket started when the presidential candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) paid a courtesy visit to President Muhammadu Buhari in his hometown, Daura, Katsina State. The party’s flag bearer hinged his decision on the expedient need to perpetuate the stay of the ruling party in power. But, laudable as it may seem to APC lovers, Nigerians outside the ruling camp have faulted the decision citing likely consequences.

However, this short piece was inspired by a passionate conversation between one of my mentors and me. He frustratingly shared his view on the joint ticket, stressing that it is at variance with the country’s mood, especially regarding religion. According to him, the ticket became inevitable for the ruling party bent on winning elections without minding the implications for the people. He added it’s unarguably a design for electoral victory and will be tested at the polls. I agree with him.

Nigeria is a religiously polarized entity managed by politicians who deploy religion as a tool for political advantage. In a glaringly fragile country like ours, one would expect that every political decision should be underscored by the religious sensibilities of the people, at least for peace. But instead of politicians to consider this, they go about politics that stands detrimental to the country. This is what the APC Muslim-Muslim ticket suggests.

This is not to pander to the sentiments of some religious bigots whose outcry is rooted in what they stand to benefit from the calculation. Instead, it’s instructive to note that every political calculation that disregards the need for balance must be challenged. Of course, nations of the world develop without recourse to some silly religious sentiments. However, we need to be reminded that Nigeria, giving its very foundations, has been tied to religion, a consideration that political players must pay attention to.

Some might want to remind me of the June 12 1993, presidential election. Others might also talk about the 1979 election involving Azikwe-Audu and Awolowo-Umeadi combinations. Even in Nigeria of those innocent years, this presidential election ended in favour of Shehu Shagari, who used Alex Ekweme as his running mate. Nigeria is dreadfully divided along religious lines, thanks to our putrid politics. What about those who have justified the Tinubu-Shettima ticket based on competence? I have this answer for them.

Nigeria is a generously blessed country. We have Muslim technocrats who can do well in politics, so there are intelligent Christian politicians. The late President Musa Yar’adua, during his brief time in the office, used Goodluck Jonathan while Jonathan partnered with Namadi Sambo. These running mates did all they could in the course of serving their principals. If not for a decision made in response to the threat posed by influential candidates such as Atiku Abubakar (PDP), Peter Obi (LP) and Rabiu Kwankwanso (NNDP), what else explains the hypocrisy of the APC Muslim-Muslim ticket? Whatever it means to you, this decision would negatively affect the country in the following ways.

There would be an ethnoreligious tension in the country. There is no denying that ethnicity is inevitably bound to religion here. Our politics is deeply situated in religion and ethnic affiliations. Hence, people vote for a party based on how much such attunes to their religious and ethnic sentiments. And any political decision that trivializes these fundamentals might be thrashed away, and the country journeyed into needless rancour.

Plus, the ticket will hamper the chances of the ruling party in 2023. Some have argued that it’s not a threat since most votes come from the North, a region that overwhelming installed Buhari’s regime. Those people need to be told that such a point is stale in the context of reality today. Is this nice for the country in the long run? 2023 isn’t far.

Finally, a Muslim-Muslim ticket in a country beset by systemic killings and other vices inspired by religious sentiments isn’t an excellent idea. If our politics continue to disregard the fundamental polarity of Nigeria in terms of region and religion, then I am afraid the result won’t be friendly at all. However, all this is a reflection of Nigeria’s political retrogression. We need a new order where people will be convinced by neither region nor religion as the basis to choose who should lead them. I hope we get there soonest.

Babatunde qodri wrote via babatundelaitan@gmail.com.

By Alkasim Harisu Alkasim

I think Abduljabbar hires out for the Western world. AlhamdulilLahi! Our learned scholars bird-dogged his heinous acts and pulled him down. In his illusions, he aspired to transform Islam and thought he could play sports with the scholars of Kano. He did this to buy himself a public advantage and attention. In his book, Minhajus Sunnah, the erudite scholar Ibn Taimiyyatal Harrani quoted Nana A’isha thus: the Prophet says that he who seeks public attention by sinning against Allah, Allah will draw the attention of people to him and make them love him. But in the end, Allah will turn people against him … (My paraphrase).

Truth be told, Abduljabbar is not well-read. As of late, he was asked by a government lawyer about his studentship. He affirmed that since his father’s death in 1996, which is 26 years now, he has stopped learning before a teacher. He has only been revising for all that long. For your information, when his father died, Abduljabbar was in his mid-twenties. I can bet my last dollar that, at that very moment, he could not have completed the study of the six books of hadith. I also doubt if he has ever read a single many-volumes book from start to finish. A person who knows Abduljabbar very well and shares blood with the family of Sheikh Nasiru Kabiru once told me that the former had not completed the jurisprudence book titled Almukaddimatul Iziyya when he fled the majlis his father taught people. 

How Abduljabbar translates and misinterprets prophetic traditions that do not sit well with his faulty faculty shocks many people. This leads him to ascribe to the Prophet what even the likes of Abu Lahab, Abu Jahl, Walid bn Mugira had never done to the Prophet. His mistranslating of prophetic traditions illustrates how he lacks the nitty-gritty of translation. The fact that he has never taken his time to be adequately mentored destroys him. I have never seen as big a laughingstock as Abduljabbar. He thinks he is glorifying the Prophet despite all these horrible things. How can one magnify the Prophet by describing him with names even Satan will feel angry when one addresses him with?

I suspect this man is selling the secrets of his religion. I was wondering if a sensible person would ever do this. I can remember a tradition he once cited that reduced the Prophet’s charm. The first time I glanced at it, I got physically numb. As I checked the reliability of the reporters in Alhafizuz Zahabi’s book Mizanul I’itidal fi Naqdir Rijal, the hadith turned out to be counterfeit thanks to the weakness of the reporters. Sure enough, such traditions he falsified are mind-boggling and should not be attributed to the person of the best of Allah’s creatures. Therefore, I advocate his refusal of such traditions.

What is funny with Abduljabbar here is his ignorance of the fact that there are books whose singular themes are the history of reporters of hadith. There are also those books that did not necessitate only authentic or sound traditions. Thus, one can find all sorts of traditions ranging from the authentic, sound, and weak to even false ones. While giving the history of a reporter, the scholars mentioned some of the traditions they reported through him, directly or indirectly. If the reporter were weak, they would exemplify (a) weak (a)hadith he had reported. Such books comprise Tariku Baghdad by AlKadibul Baghdadi; Tariku Dimashqa by Ibn Asakir, to mention a few.

What motivated the above scholars and their likes to write down these ahadith was their thirst to show their absolute lack of authenticity. They brought forth the ahadith under the history of a particular reporter, as said earlier. For instance, any reporter of hadith, whether strong or weak, provided he had ever been to either Baghdad or Dimashqa, they wrote about him. 

Additionally, there are hadith texts whose authors preoccupied themselves with reporting ahadith a la classifying their teachers in alphabetical order. Such authors did not care to report even false ahadith they heard from their teachers. For instance, AlMuujamul Kabir, Ausad and Sagir by AdDabarani. Therefore, one can say it is a sin to report or mention a false hadith. Thus, it is noteworthy that such hadith scholars reported counterfeit traditions to show the world their falseness for people to avoid them.

There are books singled out to mention only false traditions, such as Abdullahi Bn Adiy’s book Alkamil fi Du’afa’ir Rijal, etc. Strangely, Abduljabbar cited ahadith from this book, not knowing that it was purposely written to give accounts of weak hadith reporters. This faux pas has illustratively emphasised the ignorance of Albduljabbari. Therefore, this and other shockers are enough to discredit his scholarship.

The Scholars’ Verdict on Blasphemy

Doubtless, the abominable utterances Abduljabbar has made against the Prophet demonstrate him as blasphemous. Like it or not, he is a blasphemer who has tried to tarnish the image of the Prophet, his companions and their righteous followers. His badmouthing of the religion of Islam cannot be reduced to writing. The extent to which his muddy utterances have reached in reducing people to tears is enough to tell you about the gravity of the situation. A young girl listened to one of such unprintable assertions of this fake scholar and immediately broke into tears.

Indeed, any Muslim that blasphemes against Allah or His Prophet deserves death. After citing many other scholars, Iyad bn Iyad bn Musa and Ibn Taimiyyah ruled that any Muslim that blasphemes against the Prophet will be condemned to death even if he repents. His repentance neither spares him nor assures him Allah’s forgiveness. Contrarily, if a nonbeliever blasphemes against Allah or His Prophet, he can be spared if he converts to Islam. Otherwise, he will go to the gallows. 

Last, the right action should be taken against any blasphemer regardless of their rank in society. This is to make people revere the Prophet all the more and watch their tongue. May Allah guide us, amin.

Alkasim Harisu Alkasim wrote from Kano via alkasabba10@gmail.com.

By Alkasim Harisu Alkasim

It took me a while to make up my to write on the embattled Abduljabbar Nasiru Kabara owing to the gruesome nature of what he has done. The misfortune still disturbs me. This controversial pseudointellectual prides himself on acquiring and accumulating an unmatched Islamic scholarship. He also boasts remarkable erudition and impressive oratory. But those who know him inside and out cannot be easily misled into believing this. In short, he fakes in-depth Islamic knowledge. Funnily enough, thanks to his persistent demand for a debate, the little braggart was granted his request. Abduljabbar has been blowing his own trumpet for as long as one can recall. He also despises the scholarship of the Kano ulema. He did not quit his prideful ways even when under house arrest.

In his wildest dreams, his scholarship surpasses that of everyone in the whole of Africa. He once boasted about knowing the Arabic language like the back of his hand and that nobody knows the language as he does in the African continent. He also claims super excelling in learnedness, hotshot scholar Nasiruddeenil Albani in the science of hadith – a field in which he had made a name for himself.

Abduljabbar also thinks he outclasses the Sheikhs Usaimin and his tutor, Bn Baz, in jurisprudence. Overall, he bests all the scholars that ever lived. As a wishful thinker, he wishes to renounce the traditions of the last Prophet. He means to cleanse prophetic traditions of impurities. But I don’t know the clearing up he is giving them. Because for a long, scholars have already worked on them. They have classified the authentic and the sound traditions and discriminated between the acceptable and the unacceptable traditions.

Abduljabbar is a charlatan aspiring to falsify ahadith. He considers any hadith his feeble mind fails to understand as a whopping lie against the Prophet. Shockingly, he judges Islamic rulings in line with his understanding – whichever he fails to comprehend, he, without much ado, invalidates. As a wish fulfiller, he describes Al-Bukhari as a concocter of traditions and a liar. He equates himself with Al-Bukhari and sometimes asserts that he is not even the match of this otherworldly scholar whose book has been prized as the second most authentic compendium after the Holy Qur’an (See Assuyudi’s Alfiyyatul Hadith and, AnNawawi’s Tadribur Rawi). This ill-intentioned fraud fakes profound knowledge. He is also a scatterbrain. Because he quickly forgets what he says, what transpires in court sessions, illustrates this. When given a chance to rack his brain, he can never remember what he had said in the past. I can remember listening to him contradicting himself and denying utterances he once made.

Abduljabbar’s denouncing some traditions in Sahih Al-Bukhari as false is hair-raising. He bragged about burning the midnight oil, reading and writing. This had become commonplace until the erudite hadith scientist Dr Sani Rijiyar Lemu revealed to the teeming public the sources from which he obtained his information. The hadith guru unveiled that Abduljabbar often copied the exact words of the scholars he plagiarised.

I could not help wondering how Abduljabbar keeps exaggerating his spending all night researching. The crooked pseudo-scholar did nothing but “copy and paste” in academic jargon. The deceitful Abduljabbar professionalises in plagiarism. Often, he ignorantly or knowingly plagiarises the works of occidentalism-inclined scholars and other orientalists. His concocted ideas and those of the Shiites are through and through worlds apart. A Shiite came out to deny ties with him not long ago. This had occurred a short while before that hot debate featured.

I was delighted at the news of the Mukabala. But my happiness prematurely died when the crude debater failed to prove himself and carry his points. The Mukabala demonstrated his utter incompetence all the more. On that day, he enormously flopped. He kept repeating himself and flip-flopping. He is used to switching to irrelevant topics whenever he runs out of ideas or feels slightly caught out. His Mukabala with the well-read and retentive Sheikh, Alkasim Umar Jibril Hotoro, exemplifies this. Fortunately, the one organised by the Kano State Government caused his empty boasts to run down. Surprisingly, he sweated all over in an air-conditioned room. “Mara gaskiya ko a A.C gumi yake” (loosely translates as the liar will sweat even in an air-conditioned room). This proverb is a remake of the familiar one, which reads, “Mara gaskiya ko a ruwa gumi yake” (the liar sweats even in water).

To defend his failure to speak for his views, Abduljabbar shamelessly said that the timeframe he was given to reply to questions was not enough. He said he could not clarify questions he took years discussing. He has forgotten, like the forgetful he has always been, that he often said he could answer any question when he awakens from a deep sleep. More so, as stated earlier, Abduljabbar bragged that even Albani, Bin Baaz and Ibn Taymiyyah could never catch him. Why the boast!

Look at the budding scholars that defeated him on that day. As a result, some of his fanatics parted company with him by calling it quits with his teachings. Finally, a person came out to declare his verdict in an audio clip. He bitterly regretted his keeping this Tartuffian scholar company. He announced that he had been with the fake scholar since his teaching one of his error-ridden books titled Asa Musa held at Gadon Kaya. When I read this book around 2015, as a budding student of hadith, I found unpardonable mistakes unexpected for a young student of hadith, let alone a guru. Even a toddler student of hadith could not make such enormously uncountable errors. Abduljabbar is not conversant with hadith jargon.

Alkasim Harisu Alkasim wrote from Kano via alkasabba10@gmail.com.

At a time when ignorance reigns 

When human’s soul lost its sense

Amidst Banu Hashim emerged a light

Which illuminations light the earth 

He led the Beduins on the right path

To save them from God’s wrath 

He was sent to the whole of humanity

To be the doctor of the heart and mind

I envy the cloud above his head 

Which followed and gave him shade

I envy the disciples that learnt from him

They learnt the Qur’an directly from him

I envy the soldiers that went on Jihad

For if I were there, I would work hard

I envy the eye that stared at his face 

It’s the most handsome of the Human race

I envy the she-camel that led his Mi’irage

For it was very great a voyage

I envy the spider that sprong its web

Which appeared to the foes as a cobweb

I envy the cup that gave him drink

For it fed his tongue, the truthful ink

I envy those that smelled his scent 

For his body emanated smell; fragrant

I envy the pot that cooked him food

Not excluding the recipes and firewood

He is Muhammad, the chosen one

He is Ahmad; the praised one

Those are the few I can mention

For his blessings have no dimension

Written by

Hussain Abdullahi,

©Avicenna

By Anna Mohr

The movie, There is a way, directed by Falalu A. Dorayi and produced by Abba El-Mustapha, is a simple but effective feel-good movie retelling popular tropes and stories in a predictable but heartwarming way. Following the recipe of Shakespearean dramatics and clichéd Disney movies in the 2000s, such as Cinderella Story or High School Musical, it easily can stand on its own while also covering issues of the Hausa society and giving insights into its culture – an entertaining and so sweet movie you can taste the sugar on your lips.

Isham is a middle-class university student with a pure heart who wants to get his degree through hard work. He falls high over heels for Fadilla, the daughter of a wealthy businessman. The two desperately want to be together but must face several problems threatening to destroy their relationship.

There is a Way was the first Hausa movie I watched, and although the story has already been told a thousand times, I easily became invested with it. Even though I rarely watch romantic movies, I have a soft spot for them. The quality of the film is fitting to the story itself: simple but refreshing. Please, do not expect finesse camerawork or outstanding dialogues – you will surely be disappointed. But the blunt storytelling is made up of dramatics that can easily compete with those of the Bollywood film industry.

The movie itself is certainly no piece of art. It is amateurishly made: the camera is wiggling, and the lighter colours in the scenes are sometimes glaring and unnatural. At the same time, the movie uses effects such as slow-motion, certain scenes are muted to create tension and dramatic music is played in between.

The story itself is predictable as typical for a romantic movie and has similarities to our Western fairy tales and Elizabethan or ancient love stories: Man meets a woman and falls in love at first sight, but their love is doomed, and they have to face challenges before being together. Also, the poor protagonist and his rich-born love interest are no rarity in this genre. Another aspect I recognized in the film is the flat characters: We have a pure-hearted hero who cannot do wrong. But instead, tragedy happens to him, and his pureness is challenged. I found that quite wasted because characters are made to make mistakes. They can only grow when they do wrong and when they fail. There is a sense of relatedness that I miss.

The characters themselves are introduced in simplicity. When Fadilla’s parents appear on screen, they are introduced with “Hello Mum” and “Hello Dad”, which is blunt and unimaginative to share the family ties with the viewer. The dialogues are just as direct. The movie is in English, and there is no dubbing involved, meaning that Hausa people speak a language that is not their own. That includes that the dialogues are often wooden and lacking finesse. “I will tell you the secret of …” is just one example of the movie’s very direct way of communication, and I daresay that it would have been more natural if the characters had spoken in their own language. The English script has some sentences that are generally not used, leading to many exaggerated dialogues. For example, “you harbour a criminal” when Isham is accused of cheating in an exam.

So, why do I like this movie?

Easy: Because it has charm. It is charming how Isham and Fadilla are swooning about each other. How they tell each other Shakespearean confessions of undyeable love as if they just teleported into one of his sonnets; how they are the embodiment of a Greek tragedy, a Hausa variant of Romeo and Juliet; how the world is joined against them, but they are still standing side by side.

Viewing the Hausa society and culture in the movie is also fascinating. When watching it, you may recognize that male and female characters are never touching each other – not mother and son, not father and daughter, nor the lovers. In addition, women are wearing scarves – hijabs – around their heads, so you cannot see their hair.

Another interesting fact is the mention of Allah instead of God, which I needed some time to get used to the first time I watched the movie. Also, certain issues are discussed: For example, the gap between poor and rich, the importance of education and the problem of corruption and blackmailing at university. These aspects convey the information I would not find out otherwise and give more insights than any textbook in school.

To put it all together, the movie is a people pleaser. You can easily be invested in the plot and follow the relationship between Isham and Fadilla, although the story itself is simple and predictable. At the same time, there are interesting aspects of culture and society. So, I recommend watching it!

Anna Mohr studies at the University of Cologne, Germany. She can be reached via amohr9@smail.uni-koeln.de.