islam

Contrary to what the West seems to think, it is not poverty that brings people like us so close to God. It's the fact that no one is more curious than we are to learn why we are here on earth and what will happen to us in the next world.

Religion is also a process of healing, I discovered _ a healing of the soul. Even our language points to this relation. The words __oly_, __holesome_ and __ealing_ all have the same root. (In German, this is even more striking: heilig, heil and heilen.) Muslims believe that all humans are born in a state of purity, our fitra, and it is only in the course of our lives that we tarnish our soul through bad habits and wrong behaviour. Through spiritual practices such as prayer, recitation of Quran and dhikr we can cleanse these acquired __lack spots_ in our soul and return towards our original primordial nature. More so, dhikr is said to enliven the heart.

When you help people, don't wait around to hear them say, "Thank you." A lot of times we do good things, but in the back of our mind we're hoping to get some appreciation. But if you make your intentions pure, and you expect only from Allah, He will take more care of you than you could ever imagine.

An outrageous instinct to love and be loved blinded your arms to lines of propriety___omen and Men, Christians and Jews, Muslims and Buddhists, white, black, red, brown. An outrageous instinct to love and be loved executed your brain every hour on the hour.

Islam is not unusual in having a tradition of martyrs. What is unique to Islam is the tradition of murderous martyrdom, in which the individual martyr simultaneously commits suicide and kills others for religious reasons.

Suffering is universal. It's the one thing Buddhists, Christians, and Muslims are all worried about.

It is pointless and impossible to maintain a modern ideology based on inaccurate memories of a dead and distant past.

everything that is in the world, there is a correspondence on every level of existence. The macrocosm is a reflection of the microcosm, and the way we experience the outer world is a reflection of our inner state: it is our mirror. If we are in harmony with ourselves, then we will be in harmony with the outer world, i.e. God. If we change from within, then everything around us also changes. I certainly knew how true this was.

The discipline gave me a sense of achievement. Not least, fasting is a test of willpower and, whenever I felt my willpower weakening, I would tell myself that I could eat as much as I wanted after sunset. But then the strange thing was that after fasting all day long, I tended to feel full with just a small snack.

Purify your intentions, your inner being, your heart and be sincere in your actions,_ he wrote. __od looks into your heart, not at your outer form. He looks at what lies behind the clothes _ He looks into your private sphere, not at your public show.

Allah, Most High, has truly blessed us. He has created just for us the mysterious spirit that He has breathed into us and by so doing distinguished us from all other physical creation. He has adorned us with our incomparable intellect, which further distinguishes us from all else in this creation. What other creature on this planet -another gift He has blessed us with- can even begin to create the likes of this Internet? Will we not stop, give thanks to our Merciful and Generous Lord? Will we not stop and realize how precious our lives are and begin to show each other more love, mercy, kindness and empathy? Will we not stop, take time, and reflect?

I__ see the arrow. I__ think about attitude and perception. Maybe the green arrow on the ceiling is to Muslims as the KJV in the Motel 6 nightstand is to Christians.

Kindness is a mark of faith, whoever is not; has no faith.

As I read the Qur__n and prayed the Islamic prayers, a door to my heart was unsealed and I was immersed in an overwhelming tenderness.

Islam is the only religion that gives dignity to the poor.

Quran, like most other scriptures, is a book of most wonderful truth mixed with the most disgraceful superstitions of human nature.

The important place held by Jesus among the world's six hundred million Moslems... and the agreement of both religions about the necessity for surrender to God as the means of salvation, thus makes it comparatively easy for a Moslem to address himself to Christians: the sympathy and the history are already there.

From imperial, economic and ideological causes, many cultures are the inheritors, and hence the prisoners, of attitudes of scorn and disdain for other faiths _ outlooks which are not ennobling to anyone.