SX43%LIVERPOOL.AC.UK@evans.ucar.edu (11/19/90)
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As-Salaamu alaikum all,
This is long but, well it aint half relevant
right now, as you can see. The author [who seems to have the same style
as a sister who has written for Islamic Horizons before, but I dont
recall the name] brings out the similarity between the deplorable
situation of muslims today, and those of the time of 'Saladin' as the
West names him, uncannily.
Will we ever learn ?!
With Peace,
Fazal.
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Author : Unknown
Title : 'Salah al-Din : A Champion for Islam'
Source : MuslimWise magazine (Oct 1990).
Lines : Around 250
Contact: BM MuslimWise,
London WC1N 3XX
England, UK.
Telephone : 081-902-5968/6074 (England)
Keywords : Crusaders, Jerusalem, Tawheed, Mi'raj, Islam.
Highlights :
...Edward Lane had said,'his career was one long championship of Islam'
...But Salah al-Din had one substantive obstacle, some Muslims. No
surprise here.
...But Muslims were hopelessly disorganized. Not because they did not
have facility with tools of war. Allah knows that they practiced enough
on each other.
...Their idea of Tawheed was all for one and one is me.
...spent 18 years getting the attention of muslims, tooth and sabre, in
order to liberate muslim land.
...When Salah al-Din had finally united the hearts in the core lands of
Islam, virtually all the Blessed land returned to muslim hands within
five months.
...Allah allowed the muslims to take the city as a celebration of the
anniversary of the Mi'raj, the Prophet's Ascension into heaven.
[ Reprinted here *with* permission. ]
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SALAH AL-DIN : A CHAMPION FOR ISLAM.
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THE CENTURY, drawing to its close, had been hard on the Muslim world.
Philosophical doubt had crept in on Faith from the West. Schismatics
were rampant in the East. And the Muslim psychology was being torn
between blind faith and mysticism.
The lands of Islam were a shambles politically. Ethnic based
factions, and factions of factions, had sprung up everywhere. Muslim
countries were at constant war with each other. Jerusalem and the Blessed
lands around it had been occupied. Al-Aqsa Mosque was a magnet for
desecration. Lebanon was a wreck. There seemed no hope for the
prosperity (_Salah_) of the Faith (_al-Din_).
But when Allah wants a thing --you know the formula : _Be!_ =
_is_. And in this century (Oops! the 12th not the 20th) '_is_' equalled
Salah al-Din, a champion for Islam.
Born in the year 532 A.H. (Anno-Hijri), 1137 C.E. (Christian
Era), in Tekrit, on the West Bank of the Tigris between Mosul and
Baghdad, loved dearly by his father, Ayyub, and nourished on the lofty
principles which he set before him, Salah al-Din the Kurd soon showed
signs of the blessings which were always to accompany him. He had a
spirit born to command.
The only thing is, he didn't want to command. He did not want to
fight. And he would have rather gone to the rack than to Egypt.
Of course, all this did not matter much because Allah wanted him
to command. Allah wanted him to fight. Allah wanted him to go to Egypt,
to command, to fight, to fight a lot, as a matter of fact. The
Crusaders, the Arabs, the Turks, the Kurds, more Crusaders (Indiana
Jones ?) --Salah al-Din was going to fight them all. And another thing
Allah wanted for him was to win...BIG!
But there was one more wrinkle. The youthful Salah al-Din liked
the life of ease, the favourite son of a favored governor has few
complaints about life. He enjoyed worldly pleasures and luxuries. But
uniting Muslims in order to get them to beat the Crusaders instead of
each other was going to take something special. This too would succumb
to the formula 'Be !'='is'. For Allah would give Salah al-Din the most
potent force in the world, Islam in the heart of a man, with all its
striking austerity, compassionate zeal and sterling virtue.
Miraculously, Allah gifted Salah al-Din with these necessary
qualities in a single stroke. Within two months of his coming to Egypt,
his Uncle, whom he was forced to accompany there, died. Suddenly Salah
al-Din was the ruler of much-coveted Egypt. In an instant, he was a
changed man. From that time on, as Edward Lane has said, 'his career was
one long championship of Islam'.
'No sooner did he assume the overlordship of Egypt, than the
world and all its pleasures lost all significance in his eyes,' says Ibn
Shaddad, the Qadhi (Judge) of his army.'With a heart-felt sense of
gratitude for the favour bestowed by Allah upon him, he renounced the
temptations of pleasure, and took to the life of sweat and toil, which
increased day by day until Allah summoned him to His Mercy. Such is the
meaning of the words of the Most High : 'Perchance you may hate a thing
whereas it is good for you. And you may love a thing while it is bad for
you.'
And the 'Hate a thing, while it is good for you..' did not stop
there.
'When Allah gave me the land of Egypt with so little trouble, I knew
that he meant for me the Blessed Land also, for He Himself planted the
thought in my heart.' said Salah al-Din.
He soon had the satisfaction of seeing his administration
respected and order established in all aspects. He lavished the money the
Fatimids had been storing up in the Palace wall safe on the people, won
all hearts, and brought the faction-ridden country under obedience to
his rule.
The clouds of his munificence and liberality poured down their
waters so abundantly that there has never been recorded in history
endowment such as he displayed when he was responsible for governing
Egypt. He took great pains to establish the Sunnah more firmly in Egypt
with the aid of the 'Ulama. People came to visit him from every walk of
life, and flocked to his court from all parts. He never disappointed the
hopes of a visitor, nor allowed him/her to depart with empty hands.
When the crusaders heard that Salah al-Din was a hit in Egypt,
they were convinced that he would soon overtake them, lay waste their
usurped dwellings, and wipe away all traces of their rule. Very
insightful people, these crusaders. That is a fairly precise description
of what he was going to do, give or take a trace or two. But Salah
al-Din had one substantive obstacle, some Muslims. No surprise here.
Their minds were on everything but Islam. They had a natural
strength in the region of roughly a zillion to one over the crusaders,
who were just gobbling up land and beating the hell out of the local
muslims. But muslims were hopelessly disorganized. Not because they did
not have facility with tools of war. Allah knows that they practiced
enough on each other. Not because they had no money. The entire region
reeked of wealth and dirhams. And not even because they lacked political
skills. Machiavelli had nothing over many of these rulers, who printed
out treaties at Prontoprints'.
Their Iman (Faith) was disorganized. Their idea of Tawheed was
all for one, and one is me. They stopped trusting Allah. Then they
stopped trusting each other. Then they became paranoid. Then they
started killing each other. 'Each one distrusted his neighbour, and some
were arrested by their colleagues,' says Ibn Shaddad. 'This inspired
terror among the others, and estranged the hearts of the people from the
ruler.'
It was not just battles between the races. Blood brothers were
leading armies against one another, laying siege to each others' homes,
executing each other. Everyone wanted to play chief, and nobody wanted
to be a bedouin. So they tore the Middle East into ugly little
fiefdoms. You could not pass from Halab to Hamah without a military
escort.
And pretty soon there were people from across the ocean who could
not speak your language, insulted your Prophet, and did not worship your
God, hoisting a cross onto your mosque and not allowing you to pass from
Syria to Egypt.
So Salah al-Din inspired everyone with Islam, they united, kicked
out the crusaders, and lived happily ever after, or at least until the
20th Century. Right ?
Wrong.
In Salah al-Din they saw Islam, a mirror that didn't reflect the lines
they had spent generations carving out in the Middle East and upon
muslim hearts. So they opposed him, from Morocco to the mountains of his
own people in Kurdistan. Kings in North Africa not only refused to stop
crusader ships from coming through the Mediterranean (US Sixth Fleet?),
but replenished them in their ports. The Kurds of Mosul sent an emissary
to the crusaders, persuading them to attack Salah al-Din's army in
Syria. Halab, which he came to consider the backbone of his Jihad
against the crusaders, had to to be subdued on at least three different
occasions. And for several years upper Mesopotamia, Diarbakr, Khalat,
Syria, Azerbaijan, and other countries were deluged in blood in one of
the worst civil wars in history between the Turks and the Kurds.
All told, Salah al-Din spent 18 years getting the attention of
Muslims, tooth and Sabre, in order to liberate Muslim land. During that
time, Muslims took not one inch of the Blessed Land back from the
crusades and were barely holding out in Egypt and Syria. Yet slowly,
Islam in the heart of Salah al-Din worked its wonder through the land.
Through example. Through persuasion. Through teaching. Through Sunnah.
Through time and understanding. 'Kurds, Turks, Arabs and Egyptians, they
were all muslims and his servants when he called,'Lane writes : 'In
spite of their differences of race, their national jealousies,and tribal
pride, he had kept them together as one host.'
People stopped asking stupid questions like : 'Is Salah al-Din
immigrant or indigenous ?'
They started asking the right questions like how is his practice of
Islam ?In what ways does he demonstrate Iman ? What is he like on the
battlefield when it all comes down ? Can he lead humbly ? Does he see
the big picture ? Is he determined ? And can he get the job done with
Taqwa ?
On 17 Rabi'a II 583 [26th June 1187], everybody stopped asking
questions. They had found the answers in their own breasts. And then
they took the bullish solution into their own hands. When Salah al-Din
had finally united the hearts in the core lands of Islam, virtually all
the Blessed Land returned to Muslim hands within five months.
By Friday, 27th Rajab [2nd October 1187], the Muslims were 'knock
knock' knocking on the door to Al-Aqsa Mosque. Allah allowed the Muslims
to take the city as a celebration of the anniversary of the Mi'raj, the
Prophet's Ascension into heaven. Truly this is a sign that this deed was
pleasing to Almighty God. 'It was the victory of victories,' recalls Ibn
Shaddad. 'A testimony for the faith to a multitude of people --scholars
and nobles, merchants and masses-- who were brought there by the news of
Salah al-Din's victories and success in the lands on the Mediterranean
coast. All the 'Ulama came to join Salah al-Din, both from Egypt and
Syria. There was not a single well-known dignitary but he had come to the
camp.
The joyful shouts of _Allahu Akbar!_ and _La ilaha illa Allah!_
rent the skies. After 90 years, Friday prayer was held again in
Jerusalem. The huge cross that glittered on the Dome of the Rock was
thrown down. An indescribable event it was, the blessings and the
succour of Allah were to be witnessed everywhere on that day.'
Yet when Salah al-Din said Islam, he meant it --for himself,
Muslims, kafirs, animals, trees, crops, the whole thing. He was a man of
both justice and compassion. For example, Salah al-Din had not merely
taken Jerusalem. He overwhelmed it. The cries of the praises to Allah by
his armies beyond the walls shook the foundations, if not of the city,
then of the christians inside. They asked for mercy. He gave it.
Every man, woman, and child was allowed to ransom themselves for
a paltry price. He kept order in every street, and refused to allow
People of the Book to be verbally abused, much less molested. Then he
gave his Zakat, right on the spot. He ordered his guards to proclaim in
the streets that all elderly christians who could not pay were free to
go. They began to emerge from the postern of St. Lazarus at dawn and
were still streaming out of the gates by nightfall.
What a far cry from the victorious christians of 1099 (and
1990s), who killed, tortured, shot in cold blood and burnt defenceless
muslims in the streets of Jerusalem and in Al-Aqsa. 'Fortunate were the
merciless, for they obtained mercy at the hands of the Muslim sultan,'
writes Lane.
Once, on an expedition, a scout brought up a woman rending her
garments, weeping and beating her breast without cease. 'This woman came
out from the crusaders and asked to be taken to the sultan, so I brought
her here,' the soldier said. Salah al-Din asked her through his
interpreter what was the matter. 'Some muslim thieves came into my tent
last night and carried off my child, a little girl. All night long, I
have not ceased begging for help, and our princes advised me to appeal
to the King of the Muslims. 'He is very merciful,' they said. 'We will
allow you to go out to seek him and ask for your daughter.' So they
permitted me to pass through the lines, and in you lies my only hope of
finding my child.'
Salah al-Din was moved by her distress. Tears came into his eyes,
and acting from the generosity of his heart, he sent a messenger to the
marketplace of the camp, to seek her little one and bring her away,
after repaying her purchaser the price he had given. It was early
morning when her case was heard, and in less than an hour the horseman
returned, bearing the little girl on his shoulders. As soon as the
mother caught sight of her, she threw herself on the ground, rolling her
face in the dust, and weeping so violently that it drew tears from all
who saw her. She raised her eyes to heaven and uttered words that none
of the muslims understood. They gave her back her daughter, and she was
put on a horse to return to the enemy's army.
But where do you think Salah al-Din would like to have gone after
re-establishing Islam in the heart of the muslim lands ? Peaceful
Jerusalem ? The gardens of Damascus ?
'Well, when by Allah's help not one crusader is left on this coast,'
Salah al-Din once said, 'I intend to divide my territories, and to
charge the successors with my last commands. Then, having taken leave of
them, I will sail on this sea to its lands across the water, until there
shall not remain upon the face of this earth one unbeliever in
Allah, or I will die in the attempt.'
He would have loved to be precisely ... _where you are, mate !_
Courtesy : Islamic Horizons.
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