wow.
thanx, tom, that was awesome!

Good catch Tom.

Queer reference to "Qat chews" however. Ah well, Yemen.

dear all,

for some strange reason i thought that her being on the aqoul aggregator means everyone's reading stacey's blog.

oh well ...

mutawakkil's arguments are good. let's just hope he won't become another mahmoud mohamed taha / abdallahi an-na'im.

--raf*

Raf Bey

I am most allergic to newfangled technologies and services, such as "Aggregtators" which I consider to be bida' and therefore suspect for me.

I prefer to achieve sightings of blogs and the like through well worn traditional means.

This of course leads to some differences in the community, but no matter, we're big enough to accept that.

Only heretics and unbelievers would toy with the black magic that is XML.

Raf,

I was going to put this as a side-bar link, but my pithy one-liner started getting embarassingly long. I bow to your superior link-finding skills in posting to stacy's blog before I'd gotten there.

let's just hope he won't become another mahmoud mohamed taha / abdallahi an-na'im

Raf, in which sense do you say that? Do you mean that in the sense of the persecution they have faced or the religious conclusions they reached?

Great link to Stacy's blog. Cited this post over at Winds of Change. I couldn't master Trackback to 'Aqoul--perhaps I inadvertantly consider it bida', as well.

Anything in the least bit annoying, inconvenient, or momentarily at odds with your own skills should be considered bida' until a properly trained faqih comes along to tell you what an idiot you are.

Luckily this is rare, and people are generally too polite to mock you.

It is a brilliant solution in the short term.

ya shaheen,

i meant it in the sense that taha was executed and an-na'im is irrelevant to MENA & the muslim world at large. i do like their ideas, and PARTICULARLY the fact that they've stayed within the islamic discourse, since that is the only way to actually effect significant change. the moment one is perceived to be a secular/ist ... one's authority is severely curtailed. VERY sad, but apparently true.

dear AMac,

bid'a shmid'a.

--raf*

Raf,

Thanks for answering Shaheen's question; I'd wondered the same. Also for taking my comment in the spirit in which it was offered.

Oh come now Amac, I gave you a perfect reply. Far more useful than our Faqih Raf Bey.

Lounsbury,

Your logs will show that I've read quite a few of your posts. Many insightful remarks; I only wish I was as disciplined in organizing thoughts and putting them on paper (figuratively speaking).

The tone that you prefer in written exchanges just doesn't work for me. (I expect it's not one you regularly employ face-to-face or with intimates, but I could be wrong--we've all met people who do.)

The issues brought up on 'Aqoul continue to interest me; for the most part I'll forgo commenting, though.

Regards, and best of luck, AMac

Elementary question - what is the fuqaha’ ?

A collection of legal rulings ?

dear mark,

fuqahaa is simply the plural of faqih. one jurisprudent - many jurisprudents.

cheers,

--raf*

One of the joys of Arabic is the "broken plural" Faqih, Fuqaha. Maghrebi, Maghrariba.

While often strange, they have their own enticing regularity.

Thanks, Raf !

dear AMac,

i am quite certain that you've misunderstood L's comment - he was commiserating with your frustration about having to deal with user-UNfriendly technology.

dear all,

see ... THIS is why i prefer to have conversations over a few glasses of tea and a waterpipe. bahraini tuffah (apple) for me, please.

--raf*

Oh, AMac.
You have learned to deal with the jinn, surely you can extend your repertoire to the afriit?

My Dear AMac:

I'm wounded. Raf Bey was quite right, I was indeed commiserating with you and expanding on the concept (to abuse it further, plus exploit an in-joke between Raf Bey and myself). You've shown a sporting behaviour and a certain panache, I like that.

As to my tone, well, obviously in real life I have a wider repertoire, and as I actually generally am working in foreign languages, have to mix my wit.

Be that as it may, welcome to 'Aqoul, I am glad to have you as a reader - despite (or because) the painfully silly things written at Winds of Change.

Thanks for the clarifications, all.

Only heretics and unbelievers would toy with the black magic that is XML.

Now is the word for heretics the same as unbelievers or is atheist and apostate the same? And what if one "converts" to HTML? Or can you?

This stuff is HARD! Especially without the vowels.

Raf,

I haven't read much from Mohammed Mahmoud Taha or abdallahi an-na'im except for the bits that you can google here and there (I'd be more than happy to check any reference you might point out). So correct me if I'm wrong, but from the bits I understood:

- Taha was executed for political reasons, quite some time after he published his religious ideas. So religion was only a pretext. Had he been a friend of Numeiri's, he'd still be around.

- I don't think calling for the abrogation of any part of the Quran is remaining within the Islamic discourse. The Hadith, maybe (and even there, many conservative Muslims would call you an apostate), but the Quran? Don't even think about it.

You told me a few threads ago that my approach looked like Taha's (re women inheritence). In fact not so much (if I didn't misunderstand him that is), because he's out of the Islamic discourse, precisely. To remain within the Islamic discourse, you have to accept the premise that the Quran is not something you can change or abrogate (because it's the Word of God if you believe, or simply because it's The Law for most Muslims to be relevant to them if you don't).
As the Law, what you have to do in order to remain within the discourse is not trying to abrogate it, but act as a lawyer: get the right interpretation (twist) to make your case. Ironically, that is pretty much how fiqh evolved historically...

Matthew,

This stuff is HARD! Especially without the vowels.

Ever tried speaking Moroccan Arabic?

dear shaheen,

luckily for you - taha & na'im DID remain squarely within the islamic discourse. taha's main argument was that:

1 - everybody knows that some verses in the qur'an contradict each other. the generally accepted solution is to find out which one is the most recently revealed as that one will ABROGATE the earlier one(s). hence: verses revealed in medinah overrule verses revealed in mekka.

2 - the mekka chapters/verses are more focussing on general, universal issues and talk about humankind living together etc. the medinah chapters/verses are more focussing on running a polity and fighting enemies.

3 - "back in the day" it thus made sense to highlight the medinah chapters/verses at the expense of the mekka ones. but NOW this is no longer the case and it is in the spirit of the qur'an itself that now the mekka verses can be focussed on again. and, if verses clash, then the mekka verses can abrogate the medina ones.

granted, it's not a mainstream point of view, but it IS staying within islamic discourse.

you want to read taha's "the second message of islam" & na'im's "toward an islamic reformation" - available at amazon.

--raf*

Matthew,

This stuff is HARD! Especially without the vowels.

Ever tried speaking Moroccan Arabic?

Well, I tried pronouncing "couscous" without the vowels and it came out as a repetition of two very very very very bad Arabic words.