In this Epic you are not an Extra - God the Greatest Writer and His creation that is you

In this picture, the believers are seen besieging the towers of the One Eyed King,
aka the Dajjal aka the AntiChrist. But we reckon the malevolent spirit at
the end of time will give special attention to each and every child
of Adam and Eve. So don't worry about missing the action.
He will come to you.

Like all good epic story, however big the scope of events, World Wars, Famine, Civil Wars, Aliens invading Earth... a good writer would devolve the fundamental issues to a very micro and personal level of the characters in the story, however humble or nondescript they may be - A janitor caught in a firefight with alien monsters from Planet Zorg. A shoe-salesmen saving his daughter from a burning house. Ultimately, the writer draws the audience's attention to the personal and often profound inner struggle of the characters of the piece.

 

The Caliph. 

In these heady days of Middle East crisis (has there ever been a day in the Middle East without some crisis?), the announcement of the new Caliph of Islam, His Majesty King Abdullah II of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, the bitter violent civil war in Sham (Syria) and the Arab Spring, many earnest hearts are looking towards the End of Time sequence, with the coming of the Imam Mahdi and second coming of Jesus, the Prince of Peace. All sorts of fascinating, and often frightening things are prophesied to occur.

Ancestor of the Caliph on a walkabout in Jerusalem some years back.
Shadowed by a Saint.

But much like the writer of epics, God (and let's face it... who is a better writer than He?) has it planned for all of us to play a significant part in the ensuing struggle of Hope vs Despair, Love vs Hate, Truth vs Lies and Humility vs Hubris. No one will be left a bystander in the cosmic movement of events. For however big the stake is, we will all face our own personal Dajjal, our very own personal AntiChrist... and this is how he will come to us -

97. Do I Look Familiar?

Do you think the anti-Christ shall come garbed in black,

With black crows on his shoulders,

And a robe of black on his back?

No.

He shall descend as a man of God,

Calling himself Christ,

And come to you,

As you,

Offering paradise.

O’ self-indulgent one,

Will you be able resist yourself?

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So, you have been informed. Follow your conscience, subdue your Ego and your Nafs (base desires), and seek God's protection always. InsyaAllah you will be alright. We wish this for all believers, whatever your faith and however you worship our One Creator.

Amen, sunshine!

wa min Allah at-taufiq

Hate has no place in Islam

Love will show the Way

For all this crazy while it is You whom I desire...

With the timber of truth planted in the grove of love, we will bring down all
the castles and towers of the one-eyed king, he who divides and he
who pulls the veil over all mankind - but he cannot pull the veil
over God, His Prophet and the Saints!

For all this crazy while it is You whom I desire

I have prayed with Muslims and Christians,

I have prayed with Jews and Hindus,

I have turned the prayer wheel of the Buddhists,

I have seen the fire of the fire-worshippers,

I have been in the abbeys, mosques, temples and cathedrals,

I have sat in the auditorium of the agnostics,

I have contemplated the world through the eyes of the atheists,

I have stolen food with the beggars,

I have traded with merchants,

And from the soapbox I have lied

Like a born politician.

I am familiar with all of them

And I am friendly with all of them.

For I cannot choose the stranger I will meet in the bus,

Nor can I foretell the guest who will walk through my door,

For I am waiting for You, you see,

But until I meet You

How can I turn away 

Those whom You have sent to me?

I have become familiar with

The virtuous and the foolish,

The believers and unbelievers,

I have drank the water, I have touched the fire,

When the sad truth is...

For all this crazy while,

It is You whom I desire.

..........................

There is no god but God, sunshine. And there is only one humanity sprung from Adam and Eve. How will God become familiar to us if we are resentful and hateful to those He has sent to be our neighbours and friends, our family and colleagues? Who sent the stranger at the door? Who sent the beggar at the gate if not God? Would He desire familiarity with us when we are callous to those we are already familiar with?

God is Most Wonderful, Most uber-exciting, Most Tolerant and Loving... but sometimes I think we are asking too much of His Mercy and Compassion, when we ourselves are neither merciful nor compassionate. This is the sacrosanct teaching of Saidina Muhammad (pbuh). Pull away the false beard and abject falsehood of those who preaches otherwise!

Today is a fine day to fall in love, sunshine. Fall...

wa min Allah at-taufiq

Hate has no place in Islam

Love will show the Way

The One-Eyed King behind his Besieged Walls of Deceit and Conceit - Prose of Ramadhan Part 22

31. Affections of the Master II (a reappraisal)

There are those who would preach,

That choices have no role

In the Realm of Love.

But it does,

And at many times,

Your choice magnifies Love.

For have you not contemplated,

That when the Lord created us,

He too, chose.

My son Mikhail has his entire life ahead of him, while statistically I have passed more than half of mine. In the course of his life Mika shall have an ocean of choices to make. To weigh as best as he can, in the circumstances that he shall find himself in, which path to take, which door to open and which destination to choose. 

It is my earnest hope, that he shall always choose to magnify Love. To not be quelled and cowed by the illusion of our limitations. To not be bogged down by the baggage of regret and fear. To put faith in his heart and act upon his good conscience. And that perhaps, in the course of his mortal time, to unearth someone who shall always recall him to the Lord of Mercy and Compassion, as I have found in my son and his hypnotic glances.

If it is fated that I am to pass on earlier, I hope he shall remember his father's hopes. And if you bump into him on the street, or sitting next to you in the bus, tell Mika what I wished for him. So that he knows that his father is never truly gone.

When we act upon hate, envy, hubris and anger, we lose our choice to our manifested ego. It is our egos that choose, not us. It is only when we elect to do good, to be on the side of God that we retain our honoured gift from the Lord. To choose to be the gentle friend, the firm support to all humanity, as chevaliers in dowry to the court of Fatima az-Zahra the Renowned. The conspiracy theorists talk of the one-eyed king in the end of time and his vast black dominion. But in my writ, we are besieging the dark lord behind the walls of his conceit and deceit. He hasn't a snowball's chance in hell. Into the breach, my friends!

God bless you on this early hours of a Sunday morning in Ramadhan 2011.

wa min Allah at-taufiq

Jesus, the Mahdi, Dajjal aka AntiChrist, 4 Golden Rules of Interpretation pre Armageddon and The Camel Saloon (Whew!)

(If caption unreadable please click on picture)
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THE IMAM MAHDI (or simply the Mahdi) is a personality foretold by the Prophet to be born in the future, to revive the truest form of faith for all mankind. How the Mahdi intends to do this, I do not know. There has been quite a few claimants to be the Mahdi since Muhammad prophesied his coming. According to such Muslim lore as have come to the Sinner’s ear, together or perhaps soon after the arrival of the Mahdi, Jesus of the Immaculate Conception would descend from the heaven and they would greet each other to embark on their duties as the All-Loving God has anointed their hearts to bear.

THE DAJJAL / ANTICHRIST. Of their many tasks, (and I am sure they have a long list of Difficult Things To Do) the most publicized is their mission to battle and vanquish the Dajjal (the AntiChrist) and his armies.

THE FOUR GOLDEN RULES AT THE END OF TIMES. There are some specific details about Jesus, the Mahdi and the AntiChrist being expressed by both the wise and the ignorant – since I am neither, I shan’t say much – and I am sure you can find out for yourselves! I only beg you remember these 4 rules…

1. Things are always more complicated than it seems.

2. God always keeps the best secret for Himself until He Decides to spring the surprise on you.

3. If something smells like rat, then in all probability IT IS a rat. Even (or especially) in this anticipated Armageddon –End Times–Apocalyptic-Cosmic-Finale, things ought to be judge by the ultimate faith shared by all humanity, the religion of Love and your Conscience. Neither will betray you. So polish up your obedience to your Conscience, that you might actually listen to it when it REALLY matters.

4. Oh yes… perhaps the most important rule of it all – God loves you. And not just insignificant us, but every other man, woman and babe that dot this small chunk of space debris that we call Earth.

CAMEL SALOON AND THE SALOON OF INNER BEAUTY. Being a stranger (and sinner) in this parts, I was looking for Ms. Kitty’s establishment, but instead came across a Camel Saloon. A little bird perched on my pointy-hat turban and whispered… “Your poems are appalling. If you want to read REAL poetry, click to the Camel Saloon." As I am not the sort of sinner to ignore an imaginary bird, I have added the site to my blogroll. The worthy bartender at the Camel Saloon is Mr.Russel Streur. It is an active poetry blog site with really good poems for your consumption. Some whimsical, some serious but always heartfelt and real prose. As for me, I would call it The Saloon of Inner Beauty, simply because I believe that the word ‘camel’ comes from the Arabic word ‘jamal’ which simply means ‘beauty’ and can also mean 'the Inner Beauty of the Heart".

MY DEAR READERS, in this posting we (meaning the Mahdi, Jesus the Prince of Peace, a broken-back Camel and your humble sinner) are all congregating in the Saloon of Inner Beauty that you commonly call your heart. Is it still Happy Hour, Mr. Bartender?

Have a great Sabbath, mankind!

Pax Taufiqa.

IMPORTANT FOOTNOTE - (1) As far as I am aware, the Imam Mahdi has not authorised anyone to form his Army... so you guys (you know who you are) who are using his name for recruiting purposes for your political and often violent ends... I post to you one question - Who died and made YOU the Imam Mahdi? SO JUST DROP IT.

At the Conference of the Earnest I Found the Religion of Hubris

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CONFERENCE OF THE EARNEST. I spied upon a congregation of earnest people. Some of them looked slick and oily, others bright and sparkly like models in a skin whitening advertisement. Some were bearded and wore turbans, others wore the Jewish skullcap. Some looked like Christian bishops, and amongst the crowd I saw Mullahs with AK-47 strapped on their backs. There were also mystics, political lobbyists and cult leaders. They were all holding onto their respective holy books for dear life. A lot of them were shouting, and in the back, I could see a crowd of young ones, clamouring “Jihad! Crusade! Jihad! Crusade! The Dajjal! Red Heifer! Democracy! Capitalism! Jerusalem! Unity! Purity! Lies! Death! Eternal Life! Gog and Magog!” In a corner all to their own were priests of ideologies and dogmas in fevered debates - the Darwinists, Capitalists, Communists, Socialists, and all the other ‘-ists’ that your mind can google.

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NEMESIS OF MANKIND. On the pulpit was a man with white hair and he was raising the crowd’s spirit commanding, “We must fight for our religion! We must die for God! For Freedom! For Equal Rights! We must defend ……… (Well, just fill the blank space with whatever religion / ideology you want – it doesn’t matter really). Scurrying between the heaving mass of capitalist crusaders, armed bigots, and fuzzy muhajideens were a couple of nemesis of mankind – I recognize them, they were Uncertainty, Envy and Anger, unmasked and looking like pubescent trolls. They looked happy.

I CATCH ENVY. Behind the curtains I ducked, waiting for my chance. Then one of the little troll ran pass by and I managed to catch it by its collar. It was Envy. It looked hideous. It had hair but the colour is never the same, it had a face, but it changed every second, its shape shifting according to men’s insatiable and ever-changing desire and greed.

THE REAL RELIGION. I asked it, “What is this place?! Who are all these people? Envy smirked and said, “Look around, Taufiq. They are people who are adepts in the forms of their religion or beliefs – See, that is a big time Rabbi, and there you see an Evangelical TV star, and look, hey, that’s a world famous Jihadi! And I think we even have a Monetarist here somewhere…”

This evil imp wasn’t answering my question right. “Yes, yes, but what are they all doing here?”

Envy hissed, barring sharp carnivorous fangs, “They worship in their religion here.”

“What religion? All religions and ideologies are represented here!”, I argued.

“Bah! That is only the religion of their outer form, pet. The creed that they are truly following is the Religion of Hubris.”

Then smiling, Envy asked me, “Are you an intruder here, Taufiq, or are you here by SPECIAL invitation?”

Ouch. I immediately dropped Envy and ran for dear life.

.......................

How many times have we become the unwitting acolytes in the Religion of Hubris? May we all be guided by our conscience and our heart, elevated and unsullied by hubris. It is not an easy task, but in you I hope to find my guide and support - My brothers and sisters in the Religion of the Conscience, the Religion of Love. The most delicate and beautiful manifestation of our respective faiths, whatever it may be.

Have a good hubris-free day, Sunshine!

Pax Taufiqa.