Is our Understanding of Islam Changing?

A recent article on your website has attracted some interest, yet not without concern. The closing line of the article "Is Islam in CT changing?" ( by Salmaan Moronell - VOC website http://www.vocfm.co.za/is-islam-in-ct-changing/ ) reads "The Cape Muslims possess an unquestionable resilience that is unheard of in other Muslim minorities across the world. We should be proud of that"  begs many questions.

I imagine that any criticism of the article will in all likelihood get me labeled and branded, be it a salafi or a deobandi, since these are the two named "outliers" . Nevertheless, being a Muslim I seek not other labels and rather wish to focus on the subject at hand. Let us start to agree that we will skip the Shi'a, Ahmadi and Qadiani "sects". The question thus to be focused on is what is meant be "resilience". At first thought we could translate that word to "stubborn" and some debate will follow as we analyse that word. The writer acknowledges that inclusivity in "Islam" of the former two groups and have thus not made takfeer of them - alhamdulillah. The reality though is that resilience can also be taken to mean apathy or detachment and here one would then say "I just refuse to listen to him/them" - "you do your thing and I do mine". However, one often finds that unless the word bid'ah is used, people will listen to a salafi/deobandi and might even praise him after the talk for the truth he has spoken. The issue then revolves around the basis and grounding of certain thoughts, beliefs and practices. 

The history of the Cape Muslims is rich and we commend our forefathers for what they have achieved over the centuries and pray Allah showers them with His mercy. I am reminded though that Islam is much older that the few centuries that we have been at the Cape. The early Cape Muslims were mostly illiterate but hardworking people. Amongst them were people who had knowledge of the Deen and they practised the religion as best as they could. As humans, we are prone to error and to this extent certain practices developed at the Cape which are certainly in error. The errors were not, and may I add here "are not", only limited to matters of aqeedah but even in fiqhi issues. There certainly is room for fiqhi differences but the errors relate to a "misunderstanding" of certain laws. Perhaps we may excuse the Ulama for the errors of the community, individually and collectively, but in so doing what about awareness of a Cape culture of Islam developing which is based on error.

There are many examples of these errors which is rife in our community and here I am not even touching on Aqeedah. If this is what we call resilience then we on a losing wicket of note. At this point, some may argue that I have digressed and misunderstood the writer, but then I will argue that the writer has misunderstood the Islam, that was being presented and cemented in the hearts of people, lacked much of the basic requirements of Islam. If we were to argue that moulood and Ratib ul-Haddad (gadat) are key ingredients of our Islam, then where do prerequisites of Islam such as salah, zakah, fasting and hijab fit in. Where does the shaking of hands with non-mahrams fit in and the much more serious courting (and so on and so on). These are prevalent in the vast majority of cases in the Cape. Is the writer talking about this Islam?

As for the matter of Aqeedah, it starts with the acceptance of Allah as our Lord and that Muhammad ﷺ is His final messenger, our leader and teacher. We worship none but Him and He has given us the mechanism to worship Him through the teachings of Muhammad ﷺ. No teaching can supersede the Quran and Sunnah and unless and until we move away from "my Sheikh says" or "My father did this" or "we always did it this way" and firmly accept "Allah says" and "Nabi Muhammad" says, then our resilience is a noose around our necks.

And Allah knows best

We pray that Allah guides and protects us