A Question to the Muslims living in Sherwood Park
On Friday July 12, 2024, the young khateeb brought to the Minbar of the Masjid in the Park by Dr. Omar Farooq desecrated the whole history of the transmission of the text of the Qur’an from the Well-Guarded Tablet (al-lawh al-mahfuz) to the blessed heart of the Prophet, upon him blessings and peace, by Jibrial, the Trusted Spirit, by telling the congregation “Allah spoke to Jibril, Jibril spoke to the Prophet and that is how the Qur’an came.”
Anyone who understood the gravity of this claim had an immediate responsibility: to tell the congregation that this is incorrect.
When the salah finished, I went up to the Minbar, the same place from where the blasphemous words were uttered to inform the congregation how grave that claim was.
But I had hardly stood on the second step, when a man jumped up and stood on the first step and blocked me. A second man pounced, started to pull the microphone from my hand.
The first one started to repeat: I have a lot of respect for you, but he would not budge from his place.
The second kept pulling the cord of the microphone. I simply let it go to him, and continued to tell the congregation, why the claim just made was enormously wrong and what consequences such a belief can have.
On July 18, 2024, I received a legal notice, issued by David Foster of MaLennan Rose, acting “for the Westend Islamic Society of Edmonton (“WISE”), located at 125 Broadview Drive in Sherwood Park, Alberta (“Masjid in the Park”) with respect to the above-noted matter. WISE is compelled to send you this letter via legal counsel, stating, that “Finally, and again, to ensure clarity, at this time and until further notice, you are not to enter WISE property, including Masjid in the Park, until further notice.”
It has been 185 days of this Jahilliya ban, preventing Muslims from entering a Masjid, a masjid, moreover, that stands on the very blood and sweat of the person who has been banned.
Everyone involved in this situation is accumulating what they are accumulating in their books, every single day: The two men who pounced on me; Dr. Omar Farooq, his wife Mariam Farooq, and other WISE directors, on whose behalf this legal notice has been served.
But the general Muslim population of Sherwood Park, especially those who go the Masjid in the Park, also carry a responsibility to ask these individuals some basic questions. Is there even a single person in the community who has the courage to stand up next Friday and ask these people: why did you do what you did? Under which Qur’anic legal code?
Does no one know what happened to our dear liege-lord, Sayyidina Umar b. al-Khattab, not after the salah, but right during the khutba when he was told: “we are not going to listen to you until you explain where did you get this cloth for your thawb?
Was that person banned from the Masjid?
