THE DOCTOR AND THE SHEIKHS' DEBATE

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Dr: I came over to Hajj for Umrah and when I would see something happening between you guys I would go further investigate to see if what you were doing had any back up proof or if it is made up from superstitions.

Sh: This is exactly how one should be perusing their own faith. If you allow me to leave for now and God willing I will see you in Mecca.

In My Room with My Roommates

I spent the rest of the two days after the Sheikh left in Medina debating with my own friends.

Every night after the Isha prayer we would sit in our room and someone would mention a topic and we would talk about it. When debates such as these start it then becomes very clear how much, even the ones that have come for Hajj, have problems with their theological discussions.

There were so many unanswered questions and some of them were so simple and some that did not a very straight forward simple answer. Maybe it would better if our television would spend more time in answering and debating theological debated discussions rather than all the soap opera series. And they should care who that person is because there are very important questions out there that these sympathetic momenin of the Islamic Republic have and once answered to it would prevent them from getting influenced by any doubt coming across their way as the answers have been given hundred years ago.

Anyone of our dear friends that were too scared or shy to bring up a question would say: Let's imagine or a friend of a friend asked me this question what should I say? But it is very clear that the question was from their doubts.

Questions mentioned can be from principles of beliefs or completely outside of it or it could be about history and similar to that. With hope that this problem is dealt with by our Islamic broadcasting countries so that our youth and older would be less scared. And most importantly if someone questioned something we wouldn't be judgmental and accuse him of being an infidel.

Attention in Conducting Ordinances, Obsession and or Creating Concerns Today was the last day. I read the farewell supplication in Baqi and the Shrine of the Prophet and started to get ready to Muhrem (Pilgrim clothes) and go to the Mosque of Shajarah. People that were doing this at the time were anxious and stressed out and I managed to calm them and thankfully the problem was somehow sorted.

I have to add that the honored religious clerks of the tour group do add extra stress to everything.

They would say things that were not necessarily needed to be done. Or things would be discussed that the possibility of it happening would be close to nothing.

Being careful and making sure you conduct the ordinances correctly is a separate issue than creating concerns. The ordinances of Hajj are much easier than some of the religious clerks of

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tour groups make them out to be. But unfortunately there is less attention made to the presence of the heart or the feelings they should have once they are conducting Ihram and Tawaf (walking all the way around the Kabba) and saay (Running ritual of the pilgrimage) and voghof (Hault at Arafat). There is mostly talk about the philosophy of Rami Jamrat so these stones get to hit Satan or how to hit the stones. But focusing on just one thing disrupts the other. Once you look at the pilgrimages to Hajj you realise that they are more focused on hitting Satan with stones than to understand the ordinances and rami -ing their inner soul. When The Great Prophet returned from visiting Hajj the second time round he did Tawaf on his camel at once noticing how much attention should be paid in keeping your left shoulder aligned with the Kabba and how important it is to make sure that is done correctly. Yes, it all should be paid attention to but some of the Grand Ayatollahs' that have come to Hajj and have realised the situation or their representatives that have come over and reported back to them have made things a little easier. For instance the Tawaf that needs to be done between the Maqam (Station of Ibrahim) and the Kabba which is not a necessity anymore and there are very few that ask for it to be done.

The same applies to Ihram too. For instance when you conduct Ihram there is a saying that when you want to start praying you enters it by saying: "ﺗﻜﺒﻴﺮ ﺍﻻﺣﺮﺍﻡ ًْﻩ "which is the same as saying " ﺍﷲ "ﺍﻛﺒﺮfor entering and by saying "Salam" you finish the Ihram of praying. Now for Ihram in Hajj by saying:

"ﻟﺒﻴﻚ ﻟﺒﻴﻚ ﺍﻟﻠﻬﻢ "and it finishes with Taghsir and eventually with the Tawaf of Nisa. Now while you are in Ihram for Hajj if you accidently conduct something that is forbidden it will not create a problem but if you do it with full knowledge then there are punishments which the most expensive of them all is a camel. Now a Hajji who has spent a couple of million Tomans just to come over, for any reason conducts something that is not allowed with full knowledge he should not disregard its contents within.

Eventually all the rest of my friends entered Ihram in the Mosque of Shajarah. I wished that they would design Umrah to be much easier than what is there now. Normally the tour groups arrive

Due to the weather being very good most of the tour leaders insist on taking the pilgrim's the same night so they can finish their ordinances for Umrah. There are a couple of problems doing it this way. Firstly, most of the pilgrim's are tired and do not have enough strength to conduct the ordinances with their hearts fully into it. Secondly, most of the Iranians and Shias arrive at the same time creating a very busy atmosphere. Thirdly, most of the religious clerks despite the orders of the Ayatollahs', still recommend that the pilgrims conduct the non compulsory ordinance of doing Tawaf between the Maqam and the Kabba. Fourthly, if the ordinances of some of the pilgrims especially the Tawaf are carried out at the same as the floor of Masjid Al Haram being washed, which happens early mornings, then the Tawaf of many pilgrim's would come across as a problem. And last but not least, in Umra, the timing where Iranian pilgrims are carrying out the Tawaf of Nisa collides with the Morning Prayer. There are lines being made

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everywhere in the Mosque an hour before the Morning Prayer starts and this causes a problem for them. Hopefully these issues will be resolved in the future.

In any case I went and carried out the ordinances for Ihram and exited it. I waited around to go to Arafah and to start another Ihram.

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Day Third of Zihijjah

First Meeting with Sheikh Ibrahim in Mecca

I finished the ordinances that were required to be done for Umrah and headed towards the Mosque. The distance between my hotel and Masjed Al Haram was a lot so I had to either use a taxi or a bus to get to the hotel. The quality of the service in this Hotel however was much better than the one in Medina even though the rooms were a little smaller. I had Sheikh Ibrahim in my thoughts. I did try to contact him but was unable to reach him until eventually on the 3rd of Zihijjah in Masjed Al Haram, after praying my Asir prayer I gave him a call. He picked up and said that he was in Masjid Al Haram so we agreed to meet in front of Bab Al Umrah.

Going to Bab Al Umrah is very difficult after the Zuhr and Asir prayer as it is very busy. I struggled to walk past all of the worshippers. On the way I saw one of my friends that lived in the same city as me. I stopped to speak to him for a few minutes. I gave him the address to my hotel and asked him to visit me later as I didn't have time to speak to him any further and had to meet up with my Arab friend. I think that he got a little upset with me but I had no choice.

I met the Sheikh as soon as I got to Bab Al Umrat. We met and greeted each other and I started asking about the couple of days that we were apart. We sat close by until it got less crowded.

Sh: I got sick after conducting the Umrah ordinances but Praise to the Lord I feel much better.

Today is the first day that I came to the Mosque and its good that I got to see you on the first day.

Dr: I am glad to see you too. I did try contacting you a couple of times but no one answered or maybe it was out of service or even turned off. I thought to myself that you ran away from me and were not willing to meet up again.

Sh: No, May God forgive me, my mobile was off most of the time. It is because I hardly use my phone therefore don't pay much attention to it. I always take it with me when I am out so if I needed to make a call I could. I am not only in no desire of running away from you but I was looking for you. I was waiting to feel a little better and thank the Lord that I get to see you now.

Dr: Thanks and praise to God as I really enjoy talking to you too.

Sh: I have never managed to have a discussion and debate so thoroughly about things and I think that out of all of my visits to Hajj this one has been the most blessing. To be able to debate in such a scientific way has been a treasure.

The Situation with Human Sciences in Iran

Dr: There is a very interesting debate related to being re-compensated over debating humanity associated issues or other non compulsory subjects in the School of Ahl al Bayt.

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Sh: Scientific debates are highly regarded. There are so many mentions of the importance of talking about Science.

Dr: Unfortunately the Islamic Ummah is behind in the science world. We not only are not ahead in the experimental sciences but we also have not displayed a good portrayal in the humanity and religious sciences either.

Sh: We are definitely behind in the experimental sciences but in the sciences of interpretation, education and history we are prosperous.

Dr: Yes, but not to the extent where we would be able to respond to today's questions. If you go to any of the Universities that are in the Islamic countries you see that they only concentrate on the humanities or the translated books of psychologists and western professors of education.

Sh: Yes, that is unfortunate even though we do have a lot to show for ourselves.

Dr: Do you intend to have our debate here?

Sh: Yes, because the path is busy. It will calm down in an hour's time and the Taxi's will be cheaper therefore, let's continue our conversation here.

Dr: Unfortunately, most of the various Islamic Universities research in fields such as social applications for the current and future situations which in reality have no substantial effect on our youth.

Sh: Yes, that is correct. How is the situation in Iran?

Dr: Many educational narrative books concerning topics from the Prophet and Ahl al Bayt have been widely researched since the revolution and the war with Iraq. Thousands of bachelor, post graduate and doctorate projects in the field of humanities have been carried out. But in Iran the economics of Islam, Islamic Psychology, Islamic science of education, Islam in family, children's rights, parents, citizenship, marriage, human rights in Islam, the laws of war in Islam and many more discussions have been extracted from Islamic books and some are already being taught in Universities and the rest are to be prepared to be trained.

Sh: Yes, but I doubt that if any of the other countries including Egypt have done anything as so detailed. The reason is that in our book of Sihah Al Sittah we have no such thorough information to make books out of for every field.

Dr: There are thousands of Hadith's in the School of Ahl al Bayt that one could approach it from any corner and would be able to find Hadith's in the fields of humanity, life and mind.

Sh: We are unaware of many of the books of Hadith's that you have and/or we do not use.

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Dr: But we do use your books even though they are not rich enough to be contented with by themselves.

Sh: Do you mean to say that we have that many books that are unrelated to worshiping?

Dr: Yes, for instance we have a book called Bahar ul Anvar which is 110 volumes.

Sh: One hundred and ten volumes?!

Dr: Yes, One hundred and ten volumes.

Sh: Do you mean to say that you have this many Hadith's?

Dr: Yes, we have this many Hadith's.

Sh: Are all of these Hadith's originated from the Prophet's Ahl al Bayt?

Dr: They are all stated to be from the Ahl al Bayt but the writer or in better words the one that has gathered all the Hadith's together has said that not all of them are correct and the specialists have to sit and distinguish between the right and the wrong.

Sh: It still is a lot even if half of them are correct.

Dr: We have many sources of research and unfortunately our Sunni brothers are deprived from them.

Sh: They have not been computerised.

Dr: Most of them are now computerised.

Sh: On which programmes?

Dr: For instance the book is Nahj ul-Balagha, Bahar ul Anvar and let me make it easier for you;

most of our authentic books of Hadith are now on software.

Sh: They say that the book of Nahj ul-Balagha is from Ali Karram Allah Vajha.

Dr: Yes, most of the sources used for research regarding humanity studies are from Nahj ul- Balagha which contains his speeches, letters and governs.

Sh: I have seen in Egypt that Sheikh Muhammad Abduh has written an interpretation about it.

Dr: Yes, and it is very famous.

Sh: Most consider him as Shia.

Dr: The content of the book shows that he is not a Shia but he is a pious believer and a very fair Sunni.

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Sh: If you have these softwares please give them to me.

Dr: I have some that I can put on a temporary hard drive and will give it to you.

Sh: Thank you. Would it be possible to access the books too?

Dr: Yes, I have a friend in Lebanon that has all of these books. He participates in the Egyptian book fair. He will come to Egypt in two months. If you want you can give me your number in Egypt and I can ask him to contact you and you can request any book from him. It will be my treat.

Sh: Thank you my telephone number in Egypt is this...

Dr: That is a very straightforward telephone number. Normally the codes for Arabic countries are three numbers and not as straight forward.

Sh: To be honest I am not familiar with the reason behind it.

Dr: I will tell him to contact you for sure.

Sh: By the way what happened to the importance of having scientific discussions over other discussions?

Dr: Yes, you are right, in the nights of Qadr, there are many ordinances mentioned in our books.

At the end of the ordinances there is a saying written in Arabic (apparently it's for any science.)

saying that the scholars have said above any ordinance there is a higher reward in having scientific discussions.

Sh: Wow that is very interesting. Of course this has also been recommended by Quran. How many times have we read words like... ﻳﺘﺪﺑﺮﻭﻥin ﺍﻓﻼ ﺗﻌﻘﻠﻮﻥ، ﺍﻓﻼ ﻳﺘﻔﻜﺮﻭﻥ، ﺍﻓﻼ Quran?

Dr: Yes, they are mostly talking about the same thing. What I mean to say is that the values of our scientific discussions are possibly even higher than the Tamattu Hajj that is non compulsory.

That is because we are getting to understand many important scientific notes. Where as someone who comes over for pilgrimage just worships and carries out his Hajj and returns home. Not much changes in his life.

Sh: We have Hadith that the value of one hour of thinking is more than a lifetime of worship.

Dr: This Hadith is completely correct. That is because the path of a person's life can change with an hour of thinking. A person can change his life where as if he spends a lifetime worshiping and not make a correct decision between right and wrong in an important moment of his lifetime all of his worships can be wasted.

Sh: For instance, the arrangements and thoughts of the highly regarded companions throughout the Islamic times were certainly better than the non compulsory prayers of others.

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Dr: You must already know that the Prophet used Mecca as a place to preach Islam in his last years of life. Many of the people of Yasrib would come over from Medina and the Prophet would sit and talk to them. The result of talking to them for two years in Hajj was the reason why the Prophet immigrated to Medina and all the development of the world happened because of it.

Sh: Yes, that is correct. It really was because of that. There were many people in the same time as the Prophet that had spoken with him and had come from Medina. Many of them came to Hajj but did not have a huge impact on the rest of the pilgrim's of the world.

Dr: We have a phrase where we say it was an Ibrahimi Hajj meaning a Hajj that is enlightening and confirms the statement of facts.

Sh: By the way, where is your hotel situated? If you agree lets go to my hotel while we are in Mecca because my hotel is closer.

Dr: I wouldn't want to impose.

Sh: Of course your hotel would be much better but it is further away. My hotel is less luxurious but it is closer.

Dr: I do not have any objection but don't forget that in a couple of days I have to go to Arafa and Mena and the ordinances that come with it.

Sh: Actually it would be nice to continue our discussions in Mena.

Dr: I believe based on what we discussed then we would only have three days from now to have our discussions.

Sh: Do not forget the main discussion which is about the Caliphate. I am waiting for that debate.

Dr: Allow us to debate that after we have finished Arafa and Mena.

Sh: Okay then come to my hotel after the Zuhr prayer. We shall meet in front of the door of Fath (Bab al Fath) in Masjid Al Haram.

Dr: It will be very hard to get a driver from that door if you agree lets exit from door of Umrah (Bab al Umrah). That way there are plenty of buses and taxis and it would easier.

Sh: I agree but stand outside of the door of Umrah.

Dr: Very well. Goodbye.

Sh: Good to see you.

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Day Fourth of Zihijjah

I finished my Zuhr Prayer in Masjid Al Haram and then headed towards the door of Umrah to meet with the Sheikh. I saw that Sheikh was with a couple of his friends. He introduced them to me and said that Doctor is our guest today. The Sheikh's friends were from Egypt. One of his friends was Sheikh Abubakr Usman, a professor at the Alazhar that sold books and owned his own publishing company. The other was a medical doctor from Egypt who lived in England, Dr Zohair. He had joined the tour group of Egyptians. Dr Zohair had a friend name Dr Amr Mosa who was also an Egyptian from England working as a Medical doctor. I asked Amr Mosa, if he had any relations with the famous Amr Mosa? He replied: Yes, we are both Egyptian and we are both tall and named Amr Mosa (laughingly) what more relations would you need?

We came to pass the door of Umrah when we saw that the guidance officer at the Masjid Al Haram was distributing books. Some people were gathered there looking for books too. I had heard that books of Quran were distributed early mornings after the prayer and then for the rest of the day there were only books preaching the Wahabi way. The friend of Sheikh that sold books said: I have seen these books. There are other ways the Wahabis advertise their faith and normally most of them are discriminating the other faiths. They forbid the reading of supplication for the graves; talking against cruelty and talking about politics are regarded as innovation in Hajj.

I said: But they are spending a lot of money for this and some people just take these books and dump them further on all mostly take it to their hotel and leave them there.

Eventually we got the Sheikh's hotel. The hotel was very much older than our hotel. People were sleeping on the floor in the hotel and food was given to the rooms. The hotel almost looked like the hotels that the Iranian Pilgrims used to go to in the 80's.

A small plastic cloth was spread on the floor. Lunch was Arabic food made by the hotel. They were placing the food on plates for people and giving out plastic spoons and forks. It must be said that everything was in plastic, the forks, spoons, cups and the cloth. The only thing that was not plastic was the water and food.

Sheikh apologised if the food was bad and said to me that my food was better. I started saying good things about the variety of the Egyptian foods and Sheikh excused us and said that he wishes to leave me with as he wanted to continue our discussion. His friends objected and said that we should debate in his room together. Sheikh said that our discussions were specialised religious debates and tedious for them. The friend that sold book objected and said that he would like to be part of the debate. What is better than discussion religion on Hajj? Sheikh continued to object and the others continued to persist and eventually Sheikh gave in and accepted for the debate to continue in his room, accompanied by them. We had special Egyptian tea and coffee and sweets and plenty of other snacks. Of course the Egyptian Medical Doctors from England

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enjoyed them more than I did and they did end up offering some English sweets that they were carrying with them.

Sheikh said: Then allow us to continue our debate and if you guys had any questions then you can ask away.

Doctor Zohair (Medical profession) said: But we are the debatable type and we cannot just sit and watch if we had any questions we will straight up ask away.

I said: I hope that our debate will not be tiresome for you and if there was anything you wished to ask, please ask away.

Islam and Politics

Sh: It would be good to talk about the interference of religion in politics? In Egypt we get to be told many times how politics should not interfere with religion. It is best that I ask your opinion regarding this in the presence of my Egyptian friends as you come from a country that is the centre of politics in the Islamic world meaning Iran.

Dr: I am definitely in agreement to start such a discussion.

Sh: In most of the Islamic countries religion is separated from politics and the politicians are separate from the religious leaders and in reality they both are two separate governing bodies.

Where as in Iran there is only governing religion and is famously known as the Shia government.

Politics interfere with religion and the politicians are the religious leaders and this is a serious difference between the other Islamic countries.

Dr: It wouldn't be so bad to know the view of our other friends.

Dr Zohair: I am a Medical Doctor and know nothing of politics. I have been living in England for a very long time and I was born in Jamal Ab dul Naser time. I would not allow someone else to interfere with my profession and a religious leader feels the exact way. For example: Sheikh Ibrahim, we would come to you if we had any religious questions but we would never interfere with your profession. Why do we not respect the same thing for our politicians? Why do we interfere with their affairs? In my opinion politics are also a specialised field.

Dr: Do any of our other friends have anything to say?

Jamal Ahmad (the book seller): In some of the Arabian countries such as Egypt the religious leaders have their own governing body and in a way they are competing for power. What I mean to say is that power is held on a two way scale but the scale is holding up both of the weights.

Dr: How do the religious leaders get paid in Egypt? Where does the budget for securing the religious groups come from?