Trying to Understand Islam

Trying to Understanding Islam

 

I was born in a Muslim populated and controlled country – but I know little about the Islam religion. Raised and cultured in the United States, it has been a struggle to explore my family’s heritage and background after we left the island of Java, Indonesia around circa 1950.

It was a time of civil war and the people who did not belong to the Muslim population, had to depart without all their belongings, leaving behind relatives native to the island and move out of the country. I clearly remember domination and discrimination as the tools of the government taking over the country from its former possessor, the Netherlands.

Living in the United States since the age of 11, I have acquired all my customs, culture, education and even my military experiences from the USA. I acquired my United States citizenship when I served in the U.S. Army and went to South Vietnam to fight a most unpopular war.

When the two planes struck the World Trade Center (WTC) on September 11, 2001, and the third plane hit the Pentagon, my mind was blown into pieces of horror and anger that took years to get over. Every year, every anniversary of that mass destruction of our humanity in New York City, I feel a little hate towards those who participated and cannot deny these feelings are stronger than I ever expected them to be.

My mind was irrational – how could this have happened in our own country where we were supposed to be safe from such terror attacks. No rational mind could wrap the facts and truth around this event without losing a touch with the reality that something bad had happened and nobody could have stopped it. Naturally suspicious in nature I wonder – could they have stopped it or was this part of our destiny as a free nation?

From that moment on, I grew more suspicious of those who shouted the hate and chants of “death to America, Allahu akbar.” I still hear the echo in my mind of those words and am reminiscent of its meaning as it was translated immediately after the 9/11 tragedy.  However, the media exposed and exploited this chant to become a slogan of hate and war; a jihad kind of action.

Yet, in all reality, this chant has nothing to do with war; it is a peaceful introduction to all their Islam prayers. No matter how incorrect this chant was applied, the media wouldn’t cut loose of these words and managed to twist the truth around so we all hated and feared those to be words of a jihad and not peace.

Still, we heard those celebratory chants from Palestinians and other Muslims around the world as the WTC burned to the ground taking with it, thousands of innocent lives. The memory remains vivid and the hate sometimes burns deeper than I would ever want to admit to under certain circumstances. Slowly, I am becoming convinced the chant is indeed benign in meaning but remain cautious about those who chant it.

Thus, even born in a Muslim country with some slight recollection of its way of life, I appear to be still clearly upset about the chant and have negative views about Islam and its religious views and purposes in our world. I can’t help but find it inflammatory in nature and harder to forget or forgive.

Echoing, clearly inside my head I hear, ““Islamic extremists have declared war on America.” Perhaps it is true, conceivably I might be suffering from a severe case of Islamophobia and everything connected to this religion. Somehow, I still believe that many believe that this is the religion of Jihad and a massive religion that preaches a Holy War on non-Muslims that includes the Christians and Jews; that it shares none of our values and is barbaric, aggressive, primitive and sexist; that it supports terrorism, and wants to destroy our Western way of life.

I have to admit that I am still guilty of holding some of these perceptions myself despite knowing next to nothing about Islam. With the mainstream media acting as a complicit agent in promoting islamophobia by daily equating extremists with all Muslims, how do I even begin to counter my own Islamophobia? Certainly, I have a responsibility to address this matter constructively and peacefully. I should be able to relate and understand Islam better than I do now.

Inside prison, as an officer and an administrator, my experiences with the celebration of Ramadan exposed me to some of the Islam practices – certainly, insufficient in quantity and quality of knowledge. As a religion, I gave it my respect like I did all the other religions in the world. However, my respect was hindered by the 9/11 event as I could not disconnect the event with Islam. I was stuck in a rut and overwhelmed by a powerful social condemnation that the media inspired.

The Ramadan fast is meant to remind Muslims of what life is like for the poor, who can’t eat or drink whenever they choose. That was one principle I clearly did understand. I ensured the religious ceremonies and the appropriate fasting or time allotted was adhered to and tried to ask as much about Islam that I could under the circumstances.

I have a choice, I can move on and begin to trust the words of Islam or I can cling onto my fear that there is something subversive about this religion not yet revealed. I might admit some ignorance of Islam; in fact I will admit that this ignorance is one reason for writing this today. I want to look and find the peace in the hearts of all people whether they are Muslims or not – I want the world to come together in peace and leave the wars behind.

I have fought in a war – a man-made hell where people died and suffered. It [war] cannot continue to exist under any or all circumstances but I fear it will be renewed as soon as one war is won or lost and the truce created does not prevail or sustain such tranquility in our world.

Today we deal with a potential World War III as we fight in the Middle East over land, oil and powerful influences. We see Israel suffer and barely buffered against aggressions by many others. At the same time, I condemn the violence on both sides of this struggle in the Gaza strip or the territorial squabbles.  I see Russia jockeying for more power and influences and the apathy of rich and powerful Arab nations doing nothing to stop the war. I cannot help but think, this is the end game we have all be waiting for – surely we can do better than this.