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What Islam means to me?

Born to respectable family, her father being a salesman and mother a highly respected social worker, Jameelah, as she herself has written, began a prolonged and concentrated study at the age of nineteen of what Islamic literature existed in English translation, in order to obtain more intimate knowledge at first-hand what it personally meant to be a Muslim and more detailed information about current events in the Muslim countries that what was ordinarily available in newspapers and magazines.

She had correspondence with a dozen young people in Arab world and Pakistan. Most of these pen-friends did not last long because she soon grew bitterly disappointed with their westernized mode of living, their idifference and sometimes outright hostility towards Islamic faith and culture and their childish minds. At last, she decided to develop corresponence with mature and influential Muslim leaders, especially among the Ulema. By the end of 1960, she had exchanged letters with Dr. Fadhil Jamali, formerly Chief Delegate of Iraq at the U.N.; Dr. Mahmud F. Hoballa, former Director of the Islamic Centre in Washington, D.C.; the late Shaikh Muhammad Bashir Ibrahimi, Chief of the Algerian Ulema and the soul of the struggle for freedom against French Imperialist domination; Dr. Mohammad El-Bahay of Al-Azhar; Dr.M.Hamidullah of Paris; Dr. Maruf Dawalibi, noted authority on Islamic Law, Professor of the Shariah at Damascus University and ex-Prime Minister of Syria; Dr. Said Ramadan, Head of the Islamic Centre in Geneva, and tried her best to contact the late Shaheed, Sayyid Qutb at that time serving a long prison sentence in Egypt.

In short, Sister Maryam Jameelah had been an avid reader of all books and periodicals in English she could find on Islamic subjects for nearly a decade. Lter on, she had correspondence wit Maulana Maudoodi who had no need to persuade her to adopt Islam because she was already on the 'threshold of conversion' and would have taken the final step even without his knowledge. Neither did Maulana Maudoodi exert any decisive impact upon the direction of her literary career as she had begun to write essays in defence of her ideas were already firmly established long before they knew of each other's existence.

Before her conversion to Islam, she had decided to devote herself for the cause of Islam. She makes it quite clear in one of her letters written from New York on the 5th of December, 1960 to Maulana Maudoodi. She writes:

"During the past year, I have discovered that I want to devote my life to the stuggle against materialistic philosophies--secularism and nationalism which are still so rampant in the world today and threaten not only the survival of Islam but the whole human race. With this goal in mind, I have already written a number of articles.

"I am a young American woman, twentysix years of age who has become so intensely interested in Islam as the only hope for the world that I want to become a convert."

I response to her letter, Maulana Maudoodi, in his letter dated January 21, 1961, wrote:

"The reason is that although you are still only thinking about your conversion, I am certain that you are already a Muslim. A person who believes in the Unity of God, in Muhammed (p.b.u.h) as His last Prophet and in the Holy Quran as God's Word and in the Life Herafter, is really a genuine Muslim regardless of whether he or she was born into a Jewish, a Christian or a pagan home. Your ideas bear witness to the fact that you believe in the above-mentioned truths. Therefore, I regard you as a Muslim and my sister-in-faith. No baptism or any proselytizing ritual before a priest is needed in order to enter the pale of Islam. If you are convinced of the truth that is Islam, you need only to affirm solemnly that:
"There is no god but Allah and Muhammed is His Prphet."

Then you should adopt some Islamic name(i.e. Ayesha or Fatima) and make a public announcement of your name and religion so that the Muslim world at large should come to know that you are a member of the great fraternity of Islam."

After her 'reversion' to Islam, Maryam Jameelah, wrote a letter to Maulana Maudoodi in which she made clear:

"Five days ago on the Eid-al-Adha after the prayers, in the presence of two of my Muslim friends for witnesses, I formally pronouned the 'Shahadah' which makes me a full-fledged Muslim. Then I received at the Islamic Mission of America in Brooklyn from Shaikh Dauod Ahmad Faisal my Islamic Certificate of Adoption. My Muslim name is 'Maryam Jameelah' with which I will henceforth sign all my correspondence and writing."

In anoter letter dated April 7, 1962, addressed to Maulana Maudoodi, regarding her acceptance of Islam, Maryam Jameelah wrote:

"I have made mistakes in my life and admit I have done some foolish things but my acceptance of Islam was the most positive, most constructive and sanest of all my actions. I am also convinced beyond doubt that Islam is the most potnet medicine for mental health. However, the Maulana may well be correct in the sense that because the transition from Judaism or Christianity to Islam means nothing less than the transition from Western to Islamic civilization and a wholehearted adoption of an entirely diferent way of life."

This is worthy to note that Maryam Jameelah, since her entering the fold of Islam, has devoted her life for the service and propagation of Islam. She has written more than two dozen books which have won fame all over the world. We reproduce hereunder a very short 'reviews' by the Press on her following books:

1. Islam versus the West: Maryam Jameelah, formerly Margaret Marcus, is quite a well-known figure in the Muslim world now. She is firmly opposed to the so-called westernizers within the fold of Islam and with eloquent reasoning, she argues that Islamic society can flourish and contribute is own in a technocratic civilization without having to sacrifice the inner principles of its being. (Daily Dawn, Karachi)

2. Islam and Modernism: She upholds Islam in its pure form and stresses the necessity for a re-evalution of Islamic history in that light. Written in a bitter tone but lucid style, the book makes very useful reading. The book is extremely readable and thought-provoking. Like all true Muslims, the author combines 'practice' with preaching. (The Pakistan Observer, Dacca, and The Criterion, Karachi).

3. Islam in Theory and Practice: The day of Islamic supremacy, this American-Jewish convert pleads, shall not be far away if only the Muslims realise their destiny, live up to the ideals of Islam, strive to uphold the Word of God inevery walk of their lives to establish Islam in its entirety in political, social, economic, cultural and all other aspects. (The Criterion, Karachi)

4. Islam versus Ahl Al-Kitab; Past and Present: She grew up in a Jewish family, a member of the Jewish minority in Christian America and then embraced Islam. She presents Islam as the only authentic religion through which mankind can be united. This book is Maryam Jameelah's best work to date.(The Muslim, London)

We feel in presenting two 'best' autobiographical articles of Maryam Jameelah which give answers to all the questions commonly put to the 'reverts'.

-----------------------------

Ever since the days of my early childhood, my life has been dominated by a religious outlook. This does not ever exclude my adolescence and early youth when, due to my disillusionment with the established Jewish synagogue and Christian churches I professed atheism for even then my life was religious in the sense that I was always in search of the absolute Truth which alone gives human life its meaning, direction and purpose. I am convinced beyond doubt that faith in transcendental theological, moral, social and legal values is one of the demarcations between the materialistic and spiritual view of life. The purpose of all materialists and materialistic societies whether past or present, is temporal happiness, pleasure, and enjoyment. The emphasis of the materialist everywhere is always on the transitory and how to extract the maximum pleasure, enjoyment and thrills of the moment. Chanbe is worshipped as value for its own sake. The moment a person asks one's self about Ultimate Truths, about the meaning, purpose and direction of life and death and what will happen after death, one enters the exclusive precincts of religion in which the physical sciences are powerless to help us. Materialists are always concerned with the transistory and the temporary while a genuine spiritual outlook the problems, we are facing today in the terrible universal moral degeneration, social disintegration and the dehumanization of our relationships with our family, friends and acquaintances, can be directly traced to the absence of fidelity to transcendental values, standards and ideals. The decadence of contemporary arts and culture is also due to the same cause. Modern man is in desperate need of faith and implicit obedience in a Supreme Authority to be able to distinguish between what is good and what is ugly and most crucial, what things in life are important and what are not. Only divine transcendental absolute law and morality can command universal respect, reverence, fear and obedience. Secular laws cannot possibly do this for people as obsolete tomorrow? The authority of Islamic morals and law, proceeds from Almighty Allah. Thus they are feared, esteemed, loved and obeyed simultaneously. Islamic commandments combine the internal sanctions of fear of Allah and His retribution in the Hereafter with severe but just corporal punishments for violation of those laws on which the health of both the individual and society depends. I have never regarded "change" as a virtue in itself. To me, the absence of permanence and stability in anything means the outright denial of the value of human existence and makes life frivolous, superficial and meaningless. My quest was always after absolutes.

Neither Judaism nor Christianity could satisfy me. I was repelled by the narrow parochial-mindedness of the synagogue and a faith severely impoverished by constant appeal to nationalist and racist sentiments and horrified by the atrocities of Zionism against the indigenous Arabs of Palestine which are justified, glorified and praised even by the most religious-minded Jews. I could never reconcile myself to the complicated, incomprehensible theology of the Christians and the endless compromises of the Church with moral, social, political and economic evils which accounts for the unparallelled dark historical record of the Church in Europe during the period of its ascendancy. As a child growing up in New York during the source of what Jewish training I received, it was but natural for me to be curious about the faith historically most closely akin to Judasim. I found that I could learn about the Arabs without also learning about Islam and its civilization and as soon as I discovered that it was not the Arabs who had made Islam great but the other way around, I wanted to know as much about this faith as I could. The superiority of the Quran over the Bible to me lay in its all-embracing universality in contrast to the narrow, rigid, nationalism of the Jewish scriptures which is one of the reasons, why Jews to this day have never been able to outgrow their tribal mentality. As this broad, all-encompassing universality in approach makes for the superior morality, it has exerted a drastic effect on the historical development of these faiths and the civilizations shaped by them.

Only in Islam was my quest for absolute values satisfied. Only in Islam, I did at last, find all that was true, good and beautiful and which gives meaning and direction to human life and death while in other religions, the Truth is deformed, distorted, restricted and fragmentary. If anyone chooses to ask me, how I came to know this, I can only reply that my personal life experience was sufficient to convince me. My adherence to the Islamic faith is thus a calm, cool, but very intense conviction. Unlike some other converts, I never saw the Holy Prophet during sleep at night in dreams; I never experienced my mystical visios and nothing dramatic at the time of my conersio evre happened. Since I have, I believe, always been a Muslim at heart and by temperament, even before I knew there was any such thing as Islam, my conversion was mainly formality, involving no radical change in my heart at all, but rather only making official what I had been thinking and yearning for many years.

For the Holy Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) and all the great and genuine Muslims after him, the purpose of life was achievement and not enjoyment. Pleasure and happiness in Islam are but the natural by-porducts of emotional satisfaction in one's duties conscientiously performed for the pleasure of Allah to achieve salvation in the life to come. In Islam, duties are always stressed above rights. In the materialistic world, achievement is equated with the capturing of political or economic power, fulfillment in the arts, sciences or professions and acquiring fame through these if one be exceptionally gifted, or enjoying an sample income from business, the professions or commerce. In Islam, achievement is rated on accomplishing what is enduring and worthwhile through benevolent useful and productive work, no matter how humble it may be, and to refrain from wasting one's time in empty self-gratification disgraced by sinful deeds. To the Holy Prophet(peace and blessing of Allah be upon him) and his Companions, depth of experience was always more important than breadth. In the fast pace of modern, mechanized living where to be active and always on the run, are in themselves prized as virtues and meditation and contemplation in solitude scorned as worse than useless, the experience of modern men and women may be broad and varied, yet their minds remain superficial, fickle and shallow. To those who suppose that stern religious, moral and social commandments o the Shariah a poor, limited and restricted life, I will point out to them from personal experience that many modern affluent people are miserable and unhappy even though they can do virtually anything they please They enjoy the highest standard of living in history, they are the best-dressed, best-groomed, best-fed, best-housed men and women anywhere with the least drudgery, they have the most freedom, the greatest variety of interesting social contacts, are unexcelled in the extent of their scular education, have the widest possible chance to enrich their self-indulgence and can do whatever they want, yet despite all these material advantages and opportunities, too many modern people are restless, dissatisfied, and even neurotic.
As a Muslim, the immediate purpose of my life is 'not to waste it!' The ultimate, long-range purpose of myself and any genuine Muslim is to attain through implicit obedience to Quran and Sunnah, the pleasure and acceptance of Allah and eternal salvation in the Life Hereafter.

Maryam Jameelah Begum
(Formerly Margaret Marcus)


[~Admin Add: Judaism in Islam, Washington Square Press, New York, 1954, reprinted under the new title, Judaism and the Koran, A.S.Barnes and Company, New York, 1962; and Ethical Religion, David Muzzey, American Union; and Religion without Revelation, Julian Huxley, New American Library, New York, 1956
Admin Comment: Before Quran comed down to mankind from Great Allah to the last Prophet Mohammed(peace be upon him) the Jewish and Christians made lot of changes in their books 'Bible, Tora', that the people were totaly in doubt on their books. If the Quran was the same like (people maded) Bible and Tora, the people would't that time believe on Quran and does't accept Prophet Mohammed, because they could say we have the same book why should we believe on Quran. Between Zaboor, Tora, Bible the Holy Quran is the only one book which is not been changed and updated by human.]



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