Thursday, February 12, 2015

The difference between a cultual Muslim and a non-cultural Muslim

People might be mislead by the term "cultural". It usually refers to those who aren't religious and use Islam only for things like marriages, funerals, the occasional prayer, community identifying, and so on. But that's not what cultural means here. What I want to draw attention to is that many of us living in developed western countries view Islam from a cultural-free perspective. We practice the religion without any cultural interference. Those who are a part of this category are called "non-cultural Muslims". We have many rights and freedoms here, and these are not available in many of our own muslim countries. Many of our countries view Islam from their own cultural and tribal values. It can range from things drinking alcohol, belly dancing, marriages to actual Qurans (happen in tribal areas of Pakistan) to much more serious things like murder, rape, and suppression of rights and freedoms (like passing laws on women and non-muslims) which are unfortunately evident in many of our "Islamic" countries. These are the cultural muslims.

There is NO DOUBT, that the place we live in influences our views of Islam. Those of us living in the west don't relate our culture to our religion, and many of those who live in Muslim countries do. So obviously those engaging in the horrible acts and those who live in western countries cause cultural clashes. They claim we don't follow Islam because we don't attack others, or call people out for what they do (if you disagree with those Pakistanis who put up videos of actresses and news anchors then you're a kaffir for not agreeing with them), or don't spread bloodshed. They call us out for not supporting the Taliban, Al Queda, or ISIS. You can find these people posting this crap from their countries via facebook, youtube, forums (like ummah.com). On the other hand there's us, who can understand Islam PURELY because we live in places where's there's many cultures, united under one national culture of peace, tolerance, rights etc. Whats especially more disappointing is when we have "scholars" who also engage in that idiotic behavior. Saudi scholars are afraid of women driving and working, and Pakistani scholars never condemn domestic violence, honor killings, killings of minorities etc. And in Libya there's a scholar (can't remember his name, but he's out there if you google about his behavior) who said those who support women voting or working are flat-out apostates. Its the CULTURE that causes these people to think the way that they do.

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