About five or six years ago,
two homeless gentlemen came to my work place looking for some support. At the
time I was working on an employment project that helped people into work, and
whilst the first gentleman was receiving support from one of the employment
advisors, the other explained to me that although he too was homeless, he had
dedicated his life to supporting other homeless people. He showed me a website
he had developed himself that listed support resources for the homeless,
including lists of local support organisations, shelters, soup kitchens, etc. I
noticed that the soup kitchens were practically all run from churches (which
isn’t surprising if you understand the emphasis placed on charity within
Christianity and also the practices of Christians, Jews and other groups in
London, particularly following World War 2) and that there was no mention of any
support services from mosques.
He then proceeded to tell me that his name was Abdur Rahman and that about three
years previously, he had converted to Islam. For a moment, I was quite confused;
why had a Muslim created a website listing support resources for homeless people
and not mentioned the resources available from the mosques? Why hadn’t he at
least included the details of soup kitchens run from mosques? The reality of the
situation struck me – there were no soup kitchens for homeless people run from
(or by) mosques in Tower Hamlets and, to the best of my knowledge, there still
aren’t.
How strange that in Tower Hamlets we have over 70,000 Muslims, about 40 mosques
and probably several hundred restaurant owners and not a single mosque-run soup
kitchen to feed the poor? We all know that charity is a fundamental part of
Islam; we’ve read the verses in the Qur’an and heard the sayings of the
Messenger of Allah (saw), so what’s gone wrong?
As the vast majority of the Muslims in Tower Hamlets are first generation
immigrants or descended from them, we tend to have poor relatives in countries
like Bangladesh or Somalia that need our financial support, so we tend to send
charitable donations ‘back home’. There’s nothing wrong with this, as in Islam
charity really does begin at home:
The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessing be upon him said): “Give sadaqah.” A
man said: “I have a dinar.” He replied: “Give it to yourself as sadaqah.” He
said: “I have another dinar.” He replied: “Give it to your wife as sadaqah.” He
said: “I have another dinar.” He replied: “Give it to your child as sadaqah.” He
said: “I have another dinar.” He replied: “Give it to your servant as sadaqah.”
He said: “I have another dinar.” He replied: “You would be able to assess better
(to whom to give it).”
However, is simply sending some money to relatives abroad enough? Allah (swt)
strongly encourages us to spend it charity in numerous verses of the Qur’an,
including:
“Those who (in charity) spend of their goods by night and by day, in secret and
in public, have their reward with their Lord: on them shall be no fear, nor
shall they grieve.” [Surah Baqarah, 2:274]
What’s interesting is that in Islam, no-one has an excuse for not giving sadaqah,
as the concept extends far beyond giving financial assistance, as is clearly
shown in the following ahadith:
Abu Dharr Al-Ghifari (may Allah be pleased with him) reported that once a group
of poor Companions, who were perturbed by their inability to give alms and
charity because of lack of financial means, appeared before the Prophet (peace
and blessings be upon him) saying, “The rich people have mostly seized all of
the rewards. They pray as we do, they fast as we do, and, on top of that, they
give away the excess of their wealth in charity.” The Prophet (peace and
blessings be upon him) asked, “Didn’t Allah appoint for you other ways of
charity? Every word of tasbih (glorification of Allah) you utter is an act of
charity, every word of takbir (saying Allahu akbar) is charity; every word of
hamd (praise) is charity; every word of testimony of the oneness (of Allah) is
charity; counselling good is charity; counselling against corruption is charity;
and you also stand to gain reward for your conjugal acts.” Then they asked, “Are
we going to be rewarded for fulfilling our sexual desires?” He asked, “Will you
not be punished for fulfilling your sexual desires outside the bounds of
marriage? Likewise, you will be rewarded for doing so with your own spouses”
The Messenger of Allah (SAW) also said:
“It is imperative on everyone to render acts of charity every single day that
the sun shines in the sky in order to express gratitude to Allah for every
single joint or faculty in his body. It is charity to restore peace between two
people with strained relations, it is charity to give a stranded person a ride
on his mount or lift his load onto it, it is charity to utter a good word, every
step one takes towards mosque for prayer is charity, to remove litter or
objectionable things from people’s path is charity.”
and,
“Charity is prescribed for each descendant of Adam (peace be upon him) every day
the sun rises.” He was then asked: “From what do we give charity every day?” The
Prophet answered: “The doors of goodness are many: enjoining good, forbidding
evil, removing harm from the road, listening to the deaf, leading the blind,
guiding one to the object of his need, hurrying with the strength of one’s legs
to one in sorrow who is asking for help, and supporting the feeble with the
strength of one’s arms – all of these are charity prescribed for you.”
and,
“Your smile for your brother is Sadaqah. Your removal of stones, thorns or bones
from the paths of people is Sadaqah. Your guidance of a person who is lost is
Sadaqah.”
What becomes apparent is that no matter who you are, where you’re from or what
your financial situation is, you have something to offer (even if all you have
to offer is a smile). The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him)
mentions such things as restoring peace between people (mediation or counselling),
removing litter, supporting the deaf, blind and feeble, etc. Sadaqah is not
simply about giving money, it’s about your time, expertise and effort.
Based on the above, and numerous other evidences that we are all aware of,
Muslims should be a dynamic force for good in our communities, supporting the
needy and destitute and also the community in general. If we truly believed (and
acted on those beliefs) then surely our communities would be buzzing with
activity, with Muslims working hard for the service of mankind and making a real
difference? However, we all have our ‘excuses’ for not being able to do these
sorts of things ourselves. We imagine that we have no time (although we seem to
find time for other trivial things) or that we have too many commitments; that
we have nothing to offer, that we don’t know what to do, that there are more
urgent priorities or, may Allah have mercy on us, that what we’re already doing
is enough . I doubt whether these excuses will be accepted on the Day of
Judgement (may Allah (SWT) have mercy on us all), but surely the very least we
could do is to help fund projects so that other people can fulfil these
obligations on our behalf.
We’re all aware of the needs of the community in Tower Hamlets; we all know
people who are having difficulties in their spousal relationships, but where are
our counselling services? We see the poor and homeless on the streets everyday,
but where are our soup kitchens? Where are our anti-drugs projects, our projects
to provide for and support the elderly or our Muslim funded youth centres to
keep our youth off the streets and out of trouble? And who’s ever heard of a
local Muslim-funded project to remove litter (one of the things the Messenger of
Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) specifically mentioned as being an act
of sadaqah)?
We can’t even claim that we don’t have enough resources. Allah (SWT) has blessed
this community with a great amount of wealth and a generous heart; in one
blessed night the East London Mosque managed to raise over one million pounds
(may Allah reward those who donated) and this is not an isolated example. We
donate millions of pounds every year; mosques are being developed and built so
that more people can pray, Alhamdulillah. But we also need to ensure that we are
funding projects and activities that we can deliver from these mosques, so that
the mosques are alive with activity every day, not just on Fridays. If we
donated just £1 a week for every Muslim in Tower Hamlets, we’d raise over
£3.5million a year! We also have an abundance of talent in our community:
accountants, lawyers, doctors, mechanics, builders, electricians, plumbers,
restauranteurs, entrepreneurs – the list is endless.
It seems as though we’re all waiting for someone else to take a lead – there are
very few people willing to be the vanguard of Islam. So I suppose this article
is, first and foremost, an invitation to those dynamic individuals whom Allah (SWT)
has blessed with energy and enthusiasm, to come forward with their ideas and
develop the projects we need. Secondly, it is a reminder to the rest of us that
we are obligated to support these projects with our time, effort and money when
the call comes.
How much longer will we sit around waiting for someone else to take the lead? If
there is one thing that we are definitely short of, it’s time:
“By (the Token of) Time (through the ages),
Verily Man is in loss,
Except such as have Faith, and do righteous deeds,
and (join together) in the mutual teaching of Truth, and of Patience and
Constancy.”
[Surah al-‘Asr, 103]