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| Nabil Rana of Kitchener-Waterloo chapter - Photo: Peter Lee/Record staff |
Source/Credit: The Record
By Liz Monteiro | March 12, 2011
WATERLOO — To the outside world, Jamal Alli must defend his faith almost daily.
Particularly when the University of Waterloo student goes to parties with his friends and someone notices he isn’t drinking.
“In a social setting, I’m always defending my religion,’’ the 22-year-old environment and business student said.
As a Muslim, Alli doesn’t drink. For the young man, unlike many his age, it’s not an issue.
“I can have fun without alcohol. It’s a derivative of evil,’’ he said.
For Alli, being true to his Muslim faith is important to him. He’s a member of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Students Association on campus.
Not only must he defend his faith to others, but also to those within the Islamic faith. Some Muslims don’t consider those of the Ahmadiyya faith to be true Muslims.
More than 80,000 Ahmadiyya Muslims live in Canada, but most Muslims consider them heretics because the movement’s 19th-century founder claimed to be the promised Messiah. For most in the Islamic faith, there is no other prophet after Prophet Muhammed.
Similar to other denominations, the Islamic faith in divided into many sects — about 72 of them — with the largest two groups being the Sunni and Shia.
The Islamic faith was founded 1,500 years ago and the Ahmadiyya Muslim community was started 122 years ago — in 1889 in Qadian, India — by Hadrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad.
Earlier this week, the students association sponsored a three-day conference, Explore Islam 2011, on campus. The conference offered exhibitions, displays and speakers addressing issues such as the myths of Islam, terrorism and Islamic law in the Canadian context.
At a session on the myths and realities of Islam, Mukhtar Cheema, a professor at the Ahmadiyya Institute of Islamic Studies in Toronto, said both women and men are equal in Islam.
However, the sexes are different, he added. There is work that men do and women do not do, he said.
Cheema said a woman is the “boss at the house level” while the man is the “overall boss.’’
It is the responsibility and obligation of the man to financially support his wife and children and take care of them, Cheema said. While women take care of the children and the house, they are not servants to men, he said.
Cheema said there is “great propaganda” within Western culture that Islam doesn’t treat women fairly.
“It pleases God to serve your mother. Paradise is under the feet of your mother said the Prophet Muhammad,’’ he said. “To get closer to God, you must treat your wife in a nice way.’’
About the veil, Cheema said it is often viewed in the wider culture as subjugating women, but the veil is “used to recognize women who belong to Islam, not to hid them.’’
For instance, women pray separately in mosques from men not because they are not equal to men but so as not to distract men with their beauty, Cheema said.
Cheema said the Qur’an — the Islamic holy book — tells women to dress modestly and be pious, and it’s up to women as to how they choose to live their faith.
Another word misunderstood in Islam and in Western culture is jihad, Cheema told about 40 people gathered to hear his talk.
People associate jihad with terrorism but this isn’t true, he said.
“Jihad is to strive in the way of Allah,’’ Cheema said. Jihad is a struggle to fight against ego, to purify oneself and to be a good citizen with character and morals, he said.
Muslims are only sanctioned to fight in self-defence. But Muslims who kill others in the name of Islam are going against the Qur’an and the Prophet’s teachings, Cheema said.
During a question-and-answer period, Julia Finlay, a student at George Brown College in Toronto, said the segregation of the sexes did not appear equal to her.
To this, Cheema said studies have shown that students learn more and have better concentration when they are separated from each other in schools.
Cheema said it is the duty of women to raise their children, but if the couple agrees to share child-rearing duties while both are working outside the home, then it’s not “un-Islamic.”
Nabeel Rana of Waterloo, a member of the Kitchener-Waterloo branch of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama’at, said he believes men are the primary breadwinners of the family but he also helps at home and raises his 10-year-old son.
“It’s not hard and strict,’’ said Rana, a software engineer at Research In Motion. His wife works as a product manager at a local high-tech company.
“The wife of the Prophet was a businesswoman. It’s totally allowed,’’ he said.
And as the Qur’an tells followers, his wife dresses modestly but it doesn’t mean she wears the hijab, a veil covering her hair, all the time. She doesn’t wear the hijab to work, he said.
Jamal Alli, who was born and raised in Toronto and of Guyanese background, said his mother and sister wear the hijab.
Alli said he hopes his future wife will be able to stay at home and raise their children while they’re young, but said he supports her working outside the home and pursing her career if she wishes.
“Because I grew up here, I don’t want to be rigid,’’ Alli said.
“Women are more nurturing. If she doesn’t have to pay the bills, why not stay at home and raise the children. Work at home is undervalued,’’ he said.
lmonteiro@therecord.com
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