Behind the Ink

Sat, 08 Aug 2020 01:17:20 GMT

To God We Belong and To Him We Return

Born in the early 70’s in the interior of Gambia, Imam Fode Drame was the second surviving child of Oummou Sylla and Al-Hadj Ousman Drame. Oummou, a young and protective mother, was not only known for her striking beauty but also for her exceptional devotion. Al-Hadj Ousman was an esteemed scholar and healer whom countless individuals from diverse regions of West Africa flocked towards throughout the year. By the age of two, Oummou was called back to her Creator and young Imam Fode prematurely parted from the tenderness of his mother’s arms and watchful sight. Having the role of both mother and father, in addition to his teaching and leadership duties, Al-Hadj unconventionally brought his son to accompany him while he taught. Little by little, the spirited boy had not only memorized his father’s Islamic teachings, but the entire Quran. As a surprise to many, young Imam Fode soon surpassed his father’s own students and could no longer study with his age mates.

A Budding Scholar

Young Imam Fode’s love of learning soon took him away from his father’s wing and brought him to Dakar where his maternal uncle, Shaykh Soubki Sylla, a notable scholar, arranged for him private schooling to prepare him for university. There, he mastered French and English, and also took it upon himself to study Hebrew, Latin, Greek and German, and perhaps most importantly, ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphics.

By his early 20s, he was no longer under the aegis of his father or uncle, but in a world completely different to that which he knew: Montreal. By his third year of university, however, God had different plan for him. He was offered an imam position in a small suburban mosque, and despite his initial reason for coming to Canada, he took on the position.

Being of a different cultural background and unusually younger than most of the mosque’s congregants, Imam Fode’s deep insight of the Quran and good nature won him over to the hearts of the community. His mother’s saintly devotion and his father’s spiritual training had now come to life in a different context three thousand miles away, and had produced profound realizations which would not only shape his teachings, but change the lives of those around him.

The Far West

Imam Fode's new trajectory soon brought him the far West -- British Columbia -- and by 2005, he founded his own non-profit organization, Zawiyah Foundation. This charity not only grew into a school and full-fledge platform to distribute his knowledge, but as an international community. By 2015, his lectures began to be aired live; and today they are viewed in all continents on a weekly basis.

One cannot help but notice that the study of linguistics is what brought Imam Fode to Canada; yet it was also language which God first taught Adam. Clearly, as being the first instrument taught to the First Man, language is more than a mere tool of communication, but a profound way to move and reform people and to connect individuals not only to others, but to their inner selves and essentially, to their Creator. And that is the core of Imam’s work: he teaches, unites, heals, and writes through the knowledge that God has granted from the language of the Quran.

The Purpose of Responding

Wed, 08 Jul 2020 01:17:20 GMT

What is the Purpose of Responding?

Definition of Death and Life

What differentiates life from death is responding. It is often assumed that the presence of the faculties like hearing, seeing, and feeling means life and their absence means death. This, however, is not the case. The dead can hear as well as the living, the only difference being that the dead do not respond while the living do respond. It is therefore true that a life of responding is synonymous with living, as anyone who responds is surely living.

Life, however, is not static. It grows in proportion to our increasing ability to respond. The better we respond, the better we live, until we reach the level of excellence whereby we respond accurately and in a timely fashion. That system of excellent responding or being an excellent responder places our life in the present: the middle between the past and the future. Living in the present is the only true life and being a true responder means to remain youthful and creative. We thereby overcome the forces of death and senescence, like infertility and passivity, by maintaining vigorous youthful creativity.

Creativity

Two of the most distinctive qualities of God Himself are creativeness, for He is continuously creating, and youthfulness, for God does not grow old, unlike the way He is represented by some religious traditions as an old venerable patriarch. God is eternally youthful, creative, and strong; and those three concepts are inseparable from one another: everything which is creative is young and everything which is young is strong. The word excellence represents the ultimate instance of these three concepts for an excellent responder is ever creative, ever young, and ever strong.

He who created the death and the life so that He may try you and mark out who among you is most excellent in work. And He it is The All-Mighty, The Oft-Forgiving. (The Quran, chapter The Dominion, 67:2)

Allah is the one who created you out of weakness, and then out of weakness He made strength, and then after strength He made weakness and grey hair. He creates what He pleases. And He is The All-Knowing, The All Powerful. (The Quran, chapter The Romans, 30:54)

Why Death and Life were Created

The purpose of death is to appreciate life and to embrace it with love and care. If there was no death, we would not appreciate life to its full value. It is for this reason that death exists, as a reminder of the blessings in our life and how much we need to cherish and love life. But death does not constitute the only means to the purpose of life.

The ultimate purpose of life is to act in ways that will increase its capacity, while putting further distance between us and death. Those actions are known as gratitude. The more we offer gratitude, the more we increase in life and we move further away from death. In other words, the purpose of life is to respond by way of gratitude until we become excellent responders always engaged in gratitude.

Then We raised you after your death so that perhaps you may offer gratitude. (The Quran, chapter The Cow, 2:56)

Have you not seen those who fled from their homes in thousands for fear of the death and Allah said to them, “Die,” and then He brought them back to life. And truly Allah indeed is Master of Favor unto the mankind but most of the mankind does not offer gratitude. (The Quran, chapter The Cow, 2:243)

Gratitude, in turn, has the purpose to attain to the good pleasure of God.

If you show ingratitude, truly Allah is All-Self-Sufficient from you. And He does not please the ingratitude for His slaves. But if you are grateful, He is pleased with it for your sake. And no bearer of a burden can bear the burden of another. Then unto your Lord will be your place of return, then He will inform you about all that you used to do. Truly He is All-Knowing about the essence of the bosoms. (The Quran, chapter The Flocks, 39:7)

The Highest Purpose

With the good pleasure of God, we attain to the highest purpose: to have unfettered access to the knowledge of God, treasured in the unseen.

Knower of the unseen nor does He cause anyone to take a look at His unseen. Except such a one as He pleases from a messenger then He indeed will cause a guard to go ahead of him and from behind him. (The Quran, chapter The Jinn, 72:26-27)

Since the knowledge of God is infinite, therefore growth also becomes perpetual; with every new knowledge that we gain, we become more creative and our youthful vigor enhances.

And they ask you about the spirit. Say, “The spirit is from the commandment of my Lord and from the knowledge you are given only a little.” (The Quran, chapter The Night Journey, 17:85)

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