Visiting Mosques and Making Friends with Muslims
(Links to Dr. Bayakly's lecture are near the end of this page)
We have recently written an article we expect to appear in a
publication for Rabbis and synagogue educators.
To see it click here.
Eunice and I regularly encourage our friends and acquaintances to go
visit a mosque,
and to make Muslim friends. We feel that this is interesting and
informative to our own beliefs,
and that we cannot afford to treat our neighbors, our American Muslims,
as strangers.
Any reader who has questions, or especially if you'd like us to join
you on a visit
to a mosque in Memphis, Tennessee, contact us. (edward@ordman.net)
Our "neighborhood mosque" is the Masjid As-Salaam; their website
is
http://www.memphismuslims.org/
One of our more interesting experiences there was attending a lecture
by our friend Dr. Nabil Bayakly,
entitled "History of Muslims in America". This lecture, by a
Muslim and to a Muslim audience, reminded
me very much of what went on in my grandparents' synagogues (my
paternal grandfather, who arrived
in the US from Lithuania in 1911, was an Orthodox Rabbi). In
those days they were sometimes called
"Americanization lectures", lectures to get immigrants adjusted to
their new country.
Dr. Bayakly, who is an impressive speaker, included some remarks about
Muslims living as minorities
elsewhere (the tale of a Chinese Muslim admiral who sailed to
Arabia to visit Mecca, and who some
claim sailed on to America), early settlers in the US who may
have been Muslims, Muslim Africans
brought to the US as slaves, and then later immigrants who went on to
form mosques and Muslim
organizations in America. And he then went on to point out to his
audience that this is now their
country, the country they need to care about, the country their
children are growing up in, that they
and their children are Americans and need to participate fully in
American society.
I found it moving, as a Jew, since it reminded me so much of what my
own grandparents
went through when they arrived here a century ago, with their strange
accents, languages, and customs.
And I found it moving, as an American, because I am proud of the way so
many other immigrant
groups have adopted America as home and Americans have grown to welcome
them. I am enjoying
the opportunity to participate in the process.
LINKS
History of Muslims in America - The
Slides
Dr. Bayakly has been kind enough to allow me to post the slides from
his lecture here. To view
them on line (not the best way, as some of the print is a bit fine and
I don't know how to zoom it
on line), click here.
To download the slides as a powerpoint presentation (3.2Mbytes), click
here.
Muslims in North America link: http:
//isna.com
The mosque's page: http://www.memphismuslims.org/
A nice book review - of two books on Muslims in America:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0320/p13s02-bogn.html
For an interesting effort at global Muslim moderation, look at
http://ammanmessage.com/
for an effort to connect different Muslim groups,
and at the more recent "Amman Interfaith Message" for an effort to
reach out to Christians. It is at
http://ammanmessage.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=95&Itemid=54
We find that one rather heavy going, but there is a very readable
interfaith message at
http://www.acommonword.com/index.php?lang=en&page=option1
Eunice has extracted a one page summary of this rather long but very
worhwhile document,
which we have used in discussions in Memphis. for a copy click here
For more information about our 2007 trip to Israel and Palestine, click here
Go to Ordman's home page