The Practice of Islam in America

An Introduction

Edward E. Curtis, IV

• Verlag: NYU Press
• Jahr: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781479880201
• Thema: Theologie & Religion
• Thema: Islamische Theologie

An introduction to the ways in which ordinary Muslim Americans practice their faith. Muslims have always been part of the United States, but very little is known about how Muslim Americans practice their religion. How do they pray? What’s it like to go on pilgrimage to Mecca? What rituals accompany the birth of a child, a wedding, or the death of a loved one? What holidays do Muslims celebrate and what charities do they support? How do they learn about the Qur’an? The Practice of Islam in America introduces readers to the way Islam is lived in the United States, offering vivid portraits of Muslim American life passages, ethical actions, religious holidays, prayer, pilgrimage, and other religious activities. It takes readers into homes, religious congregations, schools, workplaces, cemeteries, restaurants — and all the way to Mecca — to understand the diverse religious practices of Muslim Americans. Going beyond a theoretical discussion of what Muslims are supposed to do, this volume focuses on what they actually do. As the volume reveals, their religious practices are shaped by their racial and ethnic identity, their gender and sexual orientation, and their sectarian identity, among other social factors. Readers gain practical information about Islamic religion while also coming to understand how the day-to-day realities of American life shape Muslim American practice.

Part I

Prayer and Pilgrimage

1

Salah

Daily Prayers in Muslim America

Rose Aslan

A 2009 short film entitled Forbidden Love opens with a scene of a female college student casually hanging out with her friends on a Southern California campus.1 The protagonist is a punk. She has lots of piercings and other punk paraphernalia. Given the film’s title, viewers probably think that they are about to watch a romance, perhaps a story of unrequited love. Instead, we eventually discover that the protagonist is not only a punk but also a Muslim. A female punk Muslim. Her forbidden love is not a person, but a religious practice. She loves to pray, or more specifically, she loves salah, the prescribed prayers performed five times a day by Muslims all over the world.

As the film gets going, the protagonist runs into a headscarf-wearing friend, a Muslim. Her friend warmly greets her, “as-salam alaykum,” peace be upon you, and the characters hug. The friend invites the punk to pray with other Muslims on the university quad. The punk Muslim wants to. But she sees some non-Muslim friends in the distance and she is too ashamed to pray in front of them. She wants a safe and private place to perform her salah. First, she stops in a stairwell, puts on a headscarf, and gets ready to pray. Still worried about being seen in public with a headscarf, she covers her hair with her hoodie. She is ready to begin. But she hears footsteps. Someone is coming. A male student gives her a suspicious look. She scurries away. She then attempts to pray in a classroom and even a bathroom—which is considered unsuitable for prayer because of its state of uncleanliness—but is interrupted both times. She looks at her watch and shrugs her shoulders.

Finally, she boldly walks to the same spot on the lawn where her Muslim friends just prayed. Still nervous, she cautiously pulls her headscarf out of her backpack. She looks around apprehensively. Having overcome her timidity, she dons her headscarf and begins her prayers. Soon, a tall, blonde woman who was watching her walks over, puts on a headscarf, and then joins her. Then, an African American woman wearing a head wrap joins the growing congregation. The female punk Muslim is now actually leading the prayers. The film ends with the three women prostrating in unison.

The short film raises a number of concerns addressed in this chapter. First, it begins to suggest how important daily prayer is to Muslim Americans. It also shows the racial and ethnic diversity—not to mention the diverse fashion styles—of Muslim Americans. Finally, it depicts the concerns and even feelings of vulnerability that some U.S. Muslims have when trying to maintain their religious practices as religious minorities.

This chapter examines what it looks like, sounds like, and feels like to perform salah as a Muslim living in the United States. Salah is one of the most basic and important rituals of Muslims, scholars and lay people, men and women, poor and rich, young and old. It is easily performed by anyone who can memorize a few lines of the Qur’an and du‘as, or supplications, in Arabic. For the vast majority of Muslims, whether Sunni or Shi‘a, there are five prayer times in a day: fajr, the predawn prayer; dhuhr, the noon prayer; ‘asr, the mid-afternoon prayer; maghrib, the sunset prayer, and ‘isha, the evening prayer. These prayers can be performed alone or in unison with a congregation behind a prayer leader. According to a Pew Research Center survey, Muslims perform salah more frequently than any other Islamic ritual.2 And yet there are virtually no studies of salah in the United States.3 As Marion Holmes Katz has noted, prayer has often received less attention in the study of Islam than other topics such as gender, law, and politics, in part because it has been overlooked as a simple ritual.4 This chapter shows that prayer is more than a simple ritual. It is a richly meaningful practice to Muslims in the United States.

Prerequisites for Salah

In his home in Durham, North Carolina, Hajj Ahmad is preparing for the sunset prayer, salat al-maghrib. Raised as a Conservative Jew in Tuscon, Arizona, Hajj Ahmad Abdul Hakeem is a convert to Islam in his late sixties. As a young man, he dropped out of university and spent a few years as a hippie. He used a lot of illicit substances, and then ended up working as a counselor in a drug abuse clinic while also studying for a B.A. in psychology. He has been Muslim for nearly forty years, having first become interested in Islam by studying Sufism. Hajj Ahmad converted to Sunni Islam at the age of thirty in 1978. Five years later, he embraced a Shi‘a interpretation of Islam. He eventually earned an MBA and moved to South Africa, where he pursued business projects and continued to follow a spiritual path.

Every day, Hajj Ahmad gathers himself, silencing the extra noises in his head. He carefully performs wudu, or ritual washing, concentrating on the meaning of this ritual meant to wash away the impurities of daily life. He rinses his mouth and then his nose three times each. He washes his face with water that he has collected in his cupped right hand, starting from the hairline and proceeding to just below the chin. He is sure to include the sides of the face too. It is sufficient to do this once, but if the believer desires it can also be done twice. Hajj Ahmad then collects water in his cupped left hand and washes his right arm from the elbow to the tips of the fingers on both the front and back of the arm. He then washes the left arm in a similar manner. He uses the remaining water in his right hand to wipe the top of his head downward from the middle of the head to the hairline. This is done only once. Finally, whatever moisture is left is used to wipe the top of each foot, beginning with the right foot from the ankle to the end of the toes. Once a Muslim is ritually pure and mentally and spiritually prepared, he or she is ready to engage in one of the most important practices in Islam: salah.

According to most Islamic traditions, Muslims must fulfill several prerequisites before beginning their salah. First, they must wear clean clothes and must find a clean place to pray. Next they must do their wudu. Sunni and Shi‘a Muslims have slight variations in practicing wudu. The most significant difference is that Sunnis wash their arms from their wrists to their elbows and Shi‘as wash their arms from their elbows to their wrists. In addition, Sunnis must thoroughly rinse their feet three times, while Shi‘as need only wipe their feet (or socks) with whatever water remains on their hands (after wiping their hair on their head). In order to be in a ritual state of purity for prayer, Muslims must perform ablutions after they use the toilet, pass gas, sleep, or have sex, among other activities.5

Preparing for salah can be a challenge for U.S. Muslims when they are outside their homes or mosques. First, the requirements of wudu are difficult to carry out in a regular sink, especially when it comes to the feet. It can be even more awkward to do so in a public restroom.6 Many short humorous Internet video clips depict young Muslim Americans finding themselves in awkward situations while performing wudu in public restrooms. Muslim Americans have come up with innovative solutions for these problems. A newly established company called Wudu Gear sells waterproof socks that allow Muslims to avoid washing their feet in the sink.7 The website even includes a copy of a fatwa, or a nonbinding legal opinion, from an Islamic institute in South Africa to prove that their products are religiously permissible. Previously, very strict Muslims could only wear leather “socks” if they wanted to avoid washing their feet in public restrooms.

Hajj Ahmad does not pray in public. His town is located right next to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where three young Muslim college students were murdered in February 2015. Those murders have struck fear in the hearts of many Muslims in the area. Since he is an older, white male, few people guess that Hajj Ahmad is a Muslim, and he chooses not to bring additional attention to himself by praying in public. He also avoids wearing any clothing that might signify his Muslim identity. If he is out of the house during prayer times and cannot find a private space for prayer, he will make up his salah once he returns home.8

Embodying and Performing Salah

In a living room somewhere in Irving, Texas, a young woman checks the time on her phone and puts down her Arabic textbook. Nicole notices that the sun has gone down and that it is time to pray the sunset salah. She walks down the hallway of her shared apartment to the bathroom where she performs wudu slowly and mindfully. She washes away physical impurities as well as the stress and worries of the day so that “my soul can be affected,” she says. She then goes to her room, where she pulls out her favorite prayer clothes from a drawer. The brown paisley outfit is trimmed with white lace. It consists of a long cotton skirt and a long veil that completely covers her hair and her body down to her hips. Her sartorial choices partly express religious requirements and partly her personal sense of style. The main requirement for clothing worn during prayer is that it be clean and modest. According to the Shari‘a, which is sometimes known as Islamic law and ethics but could also be understood as the Islamic way of life, men must wear modest clothing that covers their body between the navel and thighs. Women must cover their bodies, leaving visible only their hands, face, and sometimes feet. Nicole’s garment is simple but replete with meaning for her. She purchased it from a store outside Jerusalem’s Haram al-Sharif, or the Temple Mount, considered the third most sacred site in Islam. Whenever she dons the outfit, she is taken back to the sacred sites in Jerusalem, where she wandered the ancient alleyways of the city and met Palestinians from all walks of life. Once she is physically prepared for salah, Nicole attempts to clear her mind and focus on her Creator. She steps onto her prayer rug, which she always leaves open in her room, and begins her salah. She goes through the cycles of salah, bending down and prostrating her head to the ground while reciting verses from the Qur’an and also du‘as.

Nicole Fauster is a young U.S. Muslim woman of Ugandan descent in her early twenties. Raised by a single mother in the suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia, Nicole attended an Islamic middle school but otherwise was a student in public schools. When she enrolled at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for her bachelor’s degree, she became active in the Muslim Student Association. Nicole learned about the significance of salah from her mother, who kindled a real love for prayer in her daughter. Nicole describes herself as a burgeoning civil and human rights activist. She aims to fight anti-Muslim discrimination and wants to increase the access of the U.S. Muslim community to legal aid.9

Apart from reading the Qur’an, she identifies salah as central to her practice of Islam, as something that “is necessary for me to do as a Muslim.” As she put it, “this is something Allah has required of his servants to perform five times a day for my own benefit.” Nicole works hard to realize the spiritual dimensions of prayer and the serenity that it can produce. “I try to feel something in salah,” she said. In the past, she continued, “I used to go through the motions . . . but now salah has become a place where I try to tap into a certain place, where the soul is, the heart, the chest, the abdomen. . . . It’s like a muscle I am trying to get working. . . . It takes a lot of effort to make salah a point of connection to where I can physically feel something in my heart or chest.” She also prays to make sure everything in her life stays on track. When she prioritizes other activities ahead of salah, she feels a sense of dread that she is “putting the dunya, or material world, ahead of the responsibility [she] has to God.”

Salah is an Arabic word generally translated in English as prayer, but it means something more specific. (U.S. Muslims from South Asian, Persian, or Turkic backgrounds also refer to the practice as namaz, the Persian word for salah.) In Arabic, salah specifically refers to the formal prayers that Muslims perform daily according to their particular madhhab, or Islamic legal and ethical tradition. Muslims pray because the Qur’an requires it: “Truly I am God, there is no god but I. So worship Me, and perform the prayer for the remembrance of Me.”10 The Qur’an also makes clear that the desire to pray is natural since it is deeply embedded in human nature. According to the Qur’an, God “created . . . humans to worship God” (51:56).

Nicole describes salah as bringing her to a place of deep spirituality. During salah, her feeling of spirituality in her chest fluctuates. Sometimes it grows increasingly strong and overpowers her. Other times she has to focus more to evoke any sort of feeling during her salah. She likens salah to a lawnmower whose starter cord must be pulled a few times before it gets going. For Nicole, the lawnmower starts humming once she recites, “You alone we worship and from You alone we seek help” (Qur’an 1:5). She feels connected, at peace. As she recites the Qur’an, she embodies the meaning of the verses in her physical movements. Sometimes she is physically shaking as she recites the last v...