As American Muslims, should we stand with the Pilgrims or the Indians?

Since Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation in 1863 in the midst of the Civil War, Americans have celebrated a November Thursday as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise. Since 1970, a Native American group in New England has observed this same day as a National Day of Mourning. They are descendents of the indigenous Wampanoag Indians who encountered the Pilgrims that landed at Plymouth Rock. Each year at Plymouth Rock itself, the group - along with hundreds of allies - mourn the theft of their lands and food by the Pilgrims, and the enslavement and subjugation of their ancestors. At the same time, they also look forward to an America filled with justice and freed of brutality.

So, should American Muslims give thanks and praise the Creator, or should we mourn on this day? We should both give thanks and remember the past. We should stand in earnest compassion with the Pilgrims and in genuine solidarity with the Indians, helping each in their needs. As the Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, said: "A person should help his brother whether he is the oppressor or the oppressed. If he is the oppressor he should prevent him from doing so, for that is his help; and if he is the oppressed he should be helped against oppression."

As Muslims, we should always be thankful and truly grateful for all that we have. Although things could be better, things could also always be much, much worse. We should be mindful of the distance we need to go - as individuals, as a community and as a country. As America marks a Day of Thanksgiving, let American Muslims also commit ourselves to both an unfailing gratitude and to the struggles for racial & economic justice and peace.

Let's make this a day of thanksgiving and remembrance of our heritage as American Muslims. Let's recount the warts and all, so we can better understand our role in America in these remarkable times.

This Thanksgiving, let's remember the Muslims who arrived in America in the hulls of slave ships after crossing the Middle Passage. After all, Malcolm X did say, "We didn't land on Plymouth Rock; Plymouth Rock landed on us!" Historians estimate that a quarter of African slaves brought to America were Muslim. When Alex Haley traced his Roots, he traced them through Kunte Kinte to a Muslim village in West Africa. Historian Sylviane Diouf has eloquently described this experience in her book "African Muslims Enslaved in the Americas". Let's give thanks for those lifted out of slavery, and for the dignity in struggle of the late Rosa Parks and her generation.

Let's remember the vision of religious pluralism of our Founding Fathers. According to James Hutson, chief of the Library of Congress' Manuscript division, the Founding Fathers - especially Thomas Jefferson & George Washington - "explicitly included Islam in their vision of the future of the republic". Thomas Jefferson was more proud of his effort to pass Virginia's landmark Statute for Establishing Religious Freedom in 1786 than he was of his presidency. (Some say a future president would be similarly more proud of his stint as the manager of baseball team in Texas.) In his Autobiography, Jefferson praised the Virginia Statute's "mantle of protection," which included "the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo and the Infidel." Let's give thanks for the religious freedoms we enjoy.

Let's remember the hand of friendship extended by the Sultan of Morocco, who made Morocco the first country to recognize the independence of the United States. Isn't it amazing that it is a Muslim land that has that honor? The 1787 Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation between Morocco and the United States stands as the basis for the longest unbroken treaty relationship between the US and any foreign country in the history of the Republic. Let's give thanks for those sincere efforts at peacemaking and bridge building in our time.

Let's remember the great American landmark, the Washington Monument on the Capitol Mall in Washington, DC. It was completed in the 1880s in part with the gift of funds from the Ottoman sultan in Istanbul, who as Caliph was also the figurehead leader of all Muslims. The Sultan's subjects included the populations of today's Middle East hotspots: Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, and Saudi Arabia. If you go to the Washington Monument, you can see the Sultan's commemorative plaque inside the Monument, which features a specially commissioned calligraphed poem in the Arabic script for the American people. Let's give thanks for wisdom, foresight, and small kindnesses in our leaders, communities, and families.

Let's remember the first American colonial conquest & occupation in the Muslim world which occurred during the Philippines-American War in the early 20th century, a war in which about 1.4 million Filipinos died. General Pershing accomplished in 10 or so years what the Spanish couldn't in 400 years. Fresh from fighting the Sioux at Wounded Knee, Pershing helped conquer the Muslim Moro peoples of the southern Philippines. The Colt .45 Gun, which was the standard issue handgun of the US Armed Forces until 1985, was invented specifically for the conquest of the Muslim Moro peoples. In one fateful siege, the Battle of Bud Bagsak, American troops killed 2000-3000 Muslim men, women, and children. Let's give thanks for those Muslims and Christians in the Philippines and around the world who are today breaking barriers and working for a new dawn free of oppression, exploitation and hate.

Let's all remember our own shortcomings, and give thanks for the infinite mercy, forgiveness, and love of our Creator.

Let's give thanks. Let's pray and work for a future of peace, justice, and nonviolence.

GM, LOL! I totally get your point. As for Somalia, you'd know better than me. But, one of the themes I write about is how defects in cultures leave people vulnerable to harm as well as open up opportunities. To be fair, America's environmental problems, IMHO are linked to apsects of American culture. On the flip side, our power is certainly a function of our natural resources and geography but more so because our culture structures society in a way to maximally exploit these resources and technologies (which also leaves us vulnerable to environmental distress).

In a similar manner, Somalia's culture structures its society in a tribal manner which values family solidarity very highly. This is good in that people are taken care of who might otherwise die or suffer; it can be bad when people blindly fight for thier tribe instead of for national unity. Somalia's culture of the gun keeps people from easily oppressing others, but it also affords people the opportunity to create chaos and keeps the possibility of violence as a solution at the forefront. No culture is wholly good or bad and my ideas should in no way be used to justify forced cultural engineering; we Muslims have to recognize our internal defects and actually *want* to change them. Otherwise, no outside intervention will be successful, either our operations in Somalia or Europes' desire to force the US to sign the Kyoto treaty. Culture is extremely difficult to resist.

Yes, OmarG, mostly agree. About culture - if it is good - yeah - take it and adopt - ie. we could definitely use more representational gov't in Muslim countries. What we should resist strenously is whatever is contrary to our faith but I'm guessing that is what you probably meant.

OmarG, you do not know, but that does not keep you from speaking. Very Sad.

The immigrant Muslim opinion fest continues. Shameful.

GM, does not come back with clear evidence against what I am saying, just says to ignore me. More immigrant Muslim drivel. More conjecture and still more opinions.

Dear comment providers, I think I understand what Friendly Combatant has been trying to say. It roughly goes like this.

ÏYou may know me from The Learning Channel. Yes, IÌm the guy in the hospital show who came in the emergency room with Toxic Fecal Cerebral Sac. I remember when it happened. I was reading a passage in Mark, when Jesus said [allegedly], ÎI have not come to bring peace, but slaughter.Ì I realized then that in order for me to help out with the slaughter without getting caught is to sow dissension among Mohammadens. So I now do so with ballerina subtlety. I speak in tongues of the one person who can solve all of our problems so that you may be curious, and then I say cute phrases, like Îme thinks,Ì and I condemn book scholars. In fact, I condemn all book learnÌin. In fact, I condemn! I speak in vague terms because TFCS, the doctors tell me, prevents any kind of specificity. And being the fraud I am already, thatÌs really a bummer. So please, I beg of you all, to please give me more attention so I can share your responses with other fecally disturbed members of my church.Ó

How is it possible to sow anymore dissenssion amongst immigrant Muslims than there already is? Been to a Arab or Pakistani country club posing as a Masjid lately?

If the books published, you will learn who I am, then what? What argument will you fabricate then?

Go Home

A little taste of what is to come. Wake UP!

When immigrants become American citizens they take a solemn oath to "absolutely and entirely renounce" all previous political allegiances. They transfer their loyalty from the "old country" to the United States. Dual allegiance violates this oath.


Dual allegiance is incompatible with the moral basis of American constitutional democracy because 1) Dual allegiance challenges our core foundation as a civic nation (built on political loyalty) by promoting an ethnic and racial basis for allegiance and, thus, subverts our "nation of (assimilated) immigrants" ethic; and 2) Dual allegiance violates the core American principle of equality of citizenship.

more at:

http://www.cis.org/articles/2005/back1205.html

I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when required by law; that I will perform noncombatant service in the Armed Forces of the United States when required by law; that I will perform work of national importance under civilian direction when required by law; and that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God.


The oath is a vital part of patriotic assimilation, in some ways its symbolic heart. In taking the oath the immigrant is transferring allegiance and fidelity from his or her birth nation to the United States of America. This "transfer of allegiance" is central to who we are as a people and vital to our proud boast that we are a "nation of immigrants." It is central to who we are as a people because at the core of American self-government is the principle of government by "consent of the governed." The first words of our Constitution clarify that "the governed" are "We the People of the United States."

In taking the Oath of Renunciation and Allegiance, the immigrant is voluntarily joining "We the People," the sovereign American People. More significantly, by renouncing previous allegiance and fidelity, the newcomer is transferring sole political allegiance from his or her birth nation ? and from any other foreign sovereignty or political actor ? to the United States of America. For more than two centuries, the renunciation clause, this "transfer of allegiance" has been a central feature of our nation?s great success in assimilating immigrants into what has been called the American way of life. To simply say that we are a "nation of immigrants" is incomplete. We are, more accurately, a "nation of assimilated immigrants" and their descendants, whose sole political loyalty is ? or at least in principle and morally ought to be ? only to the United States of America.

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So in taking this oath, who exactly are you loyal to? Allah, your Muslim Ummah, who?

Immigrant Muslims are by definition hypocrites having taken this oath.

FC, you go from brilliance to bullshit in 30 seconds or less.

I don't know Muslims who, after taking allegiance to the Constitution of the United States, still maintain allegiance to foreign prince, potentate, state, etc. That said, the Government of the United States maintains dual-citizenship relationships with various countries. So it is within the law for a US citizen to maintain a dual-citizenship.

Now, regardless of which deity one worships, asking to choose between the Higher Authority of whatever kind, and state constitutes fear-mongering, and is not going to get you anywhere.

Current law, yes.

If you had bothered to read the entire paper you would understand that is something the founding fathers never intended - and very likely something instituted by our Jewish friends to destroy America, which I would say has been fully accomplished.

As a Muslim you can not hold dual allegiance to an Islamic State and a non-Muslim state.

That is the point, if you read more carefully what is being said. That is also one of the reasons Muslims are not allowed to immigrate to non-Muslim lands.

Hello!

FC, Have you heard of Asra Nomani?

Author and Journalist - a bit controversial.

Cluess is the word, FC. You have a lot in common with her. She is a couple of notches below you. You have the Islamic lingo down, she doesn't. So mix your concoctions are bit more elegantly :)

Check this out:
http://www.muslimwakeup.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=1021

You may just skim through my post. I don't insist that people everything I refer them to.

>>As a Muslim you can not hold dual allegiance to an Islamic State and a non-Muslim state.

Now, repeat after me: "There is NO Islamic state in the world today. There is NO... and NEVER was!"

I don't believe the Prophet ever set up a state; he merely counseled existing leaders what Allah required of them and gave advice to people and led armies to defend the faith (I think he was the only person in history who led armies for the sake of Islam; everyone else probably had alterior motives; they always do). But, he did not supplant the existing tribal leaders, even Abdullah ibn Ubayy!

"I think he was the only person in history who led armies for the sake of Islam"

I don't think that "Islam" ever needed an armed defense. It is Muslims who needed defense. Big difference!!!