Al-Furqaan Foundation

Group distributes Qur’ans to front doors

2009-12-18T17:03:35Z

DEARBORN — Many Dearborn residents have been wondering about the source of paperback Qur’ans found hanging from doorknobs throughout the city in recent months.

A copy of an English translation of the Qur’an hanging from the front door of a west Dearborn home in November. PHOTO: TAAN

The group distributing free copies of an English translation of the Muslim holy book hopes to create better perceptions of Islam by simply making the scripture available.

About 18,000 to 20,000 copies have been distributed in and around Dearborn over the past year, according to Wajahat Sayeed, founder and president of Al-Furqaan Foundation, also known as the Book of Signs Foundation, an Illinois-based nonprofit Muslim organization dedicated to distributing modern English translations of the Qur’an throughout the U.S.

“It’s meant to build relationships outside the Muslim community,” Sayeed said.

While the intent is to reach non-Muslim households to dispel misconceptions and foster a better understanding of Muslims and Islam, the effort in Michigan started in Dearborn, where many Muslims live, because the group has connected with local mosques and recruited distribution teams in the city.

Including distribution in the Chicago and Houston areas, Sayeed said about 200,000 copies of the Qur’an have been hung on residential front doors in plastic bags since the effort began in 2007.

“The objective is to make a modern English translation of the Qur’an available as widely as possible in this country,” he said, “as a way to build a bridge between the communities and so that people understand the religion, not from the actions of people, but rather from what the book says itself.”

The version being distributed by the group is a translation by an American Muslim who had a Western audience in mind.

“Other translations were done — I don’t believe they have any particular focus,” Sayeed said. “This particular one is geared more toward a Western audience, beacuse the terminology, the experience base is very different… There is an aya [verse] in the Qur’an that talks about ’slay them wherever you find them.’ This is very commonly quoted in the media, but the often neglected fact is that it is refering to a particular situation… Of course the media wants to talk about it as though it means ’slay any non-Muslim wherever you find them,’ but that aya is referring to a particular situation, which was in a combat situation… I think most people in the Middle East, for instance, would know that it can’t possibly be referring to ’slay them wherever you find them’ to indicate that you’re going to go around killing… That level of clarity — in some places [in this translation] you’ll find that it has been clarified that ‘wait a second, this is in a combat situation.’”

But he said the translation is direct and does not distort any meanings.

“It’s not like we have tried to modify the translation. It’s just a simple modern English translation. It doesn’t promote any agendas,” Sayeed said. “…The intent here is hopefully so that for the Western people, it’s clearer… We’re hoping to be honest brokers of information.”

The ultimate, long-term goal of the project is to get a Qur’an delivered to every home in America, though the level of fundraising necessary would likely take decades.

Sayeed said Al-Furqaan Foundation is funded entirely through donations from American communities, with no funding from any foreign country.

Source: http://www.arabamericannews.com/news/index.php?mod=article&cat=Community&article=2706

Testimonial From A Devout Roman Catholic

2009-12-16T02:08:20Z

To whom it may concern,

I received a Quran from your organization in the mail today. I just had to email the organization and say what an awesome idea this is. I am a devout Roman Catholic in college, but I have respect for all religions and I feel like the Muslim community particularly in the United State has not been portrayed fairly especially in the media. I plan on reading the Quran which you have sent becuase I am very much interested in what Islam teaches and I feel like being able to read this sacred text will allow people to overcome any lingering stereotypes, to bridge the gap of understanding, and most importantly to realize that we as Americans are wrongfully judging those of the Islamic faith based upon the actions of a few radicals and not on the wonderful, peaceful ideals the Quran and the faith teaches. May God bless you and find favor in your work as you try to enlighten those to the true meaning of the Islamic faith.

Christ Jesus, The Son Of Mary: A Muslim Perspective

2009-12-15T20:50:49Z

Throughout the ages, the personality of Christ (Peace Be Upon Him) has been the center of much controversy. Some have called him a false prophet and a liar while some others worship him as God or son of God who came to earth in human form. Similar controversies linger around his mother, the Virgin Mary. Islam on the other hand, considers Christ as a mighty prophet of God, from among His near ones and his mother as an embodiment of piety, chastity and righteousness. Unfortunately, this high reverence of Islam to Christ and the Virgin Mary is often ignored by the mainstream western intelligentsia and largely unknown to the common western populace. This well researched book describes the status of Jesus in divine Islamic texts and will enrich the knowledge of its readers and enlighten them about the true Islamic position on Christ Jesus – The Son of Mary.

Author: Adil Nizamuddin Imran
Publisher: Book of Signs Foundation

Click here to read more or purchase

Recent Feedback From Quran Recipients

2009-12-08T02:45:37Z

The 6000-Page Quran Commentary by Bediuzzaman Said Nursi

2009-12-05T05:47:10Z

Bediuzzaman Said Nursi said, “I will demonstrate to the world that the Qur’an is a spiritual sun that shall never set and shall never be extinguished.” Thus his voluminous work, The Risala-e-Nur Collection, sets out to do just that. It expounds the truths of the Qur’an and shows that they can stand up to the scrutiny of science and logic, which is often used to discredit religion and Said Nursi invites his readers to reflect on the world around.

Bediuzzaman Said Nursi

What is the Risale-i Nur?

The Risale-i Nur collection is a six-thousand-page commentary on the Quran written by Bediuzzaman Said Nursi in accordance with the mentality of the age. Since in our age faith and Islam have been the objects of the attacks launched in the name of so called science and logic, Bediuzaman Said Nursi therefore concentrated in the Risale-i Nur on proving the truths of faith in conformity with modern science through rational proofs and evidence, and by decribing the miraculous aspects of the Quran that relate primarily to our century. This collection now has millions of readers both in and outside of Turkey. Thanks to the Risale-i Nur, the Turks managed to maintain their religion despite the most despotic regimes of the past decades. Although its author faced unbearable persecution, imprisonment, and exile, while no effort was spared to put an end to his service to faith, he was able to complete his writings compromising the Risale-i Nur and raise a vast group of believers who courageously opposed the oppression and preserved the dominance of Islam in the country.

Bediuzzaman understood an essential cause of the decline of the Islamic world to be weakening of the very foundations of belief. This weakening, together with the unprecedented attacks on those foundations in the 19th and 20th centuries carried out by materialists, atheists and others in the name of science and progress, led him to realize that the urgent and over-riding need was to strengthen, and even to save, belief. What was needed was to expend all efforts to reconstruct the edifice of Islam from its foundations, belief, and to answer at that level those attacks with a ‘manevi jihad’ or ‘jihad of the of the word.’

Thus, in exile, Bediuzzaman wrote a body of work, the Risale-i Nur, that would explain and expound the basic tenets of belief, the truths of the Quran, to modern man. His method was to analyse both belief and unbelief and to demonstrate through clearly reasoned arguments that not only is it possible, by following the method of the Quran, to prove rationally all the truths are the only rational explanation of existance, man and the universe.

Bediuzzaman thus demonstrated in the form of easily understood stories, comparisons, explanations, and reasoned proofs that, rather than the truth of religion being incompatible with the findings of modern science, the materialist interpretation of those findings is irrational and absurd. Indeed, Bediuzzaman proved in the Risale-i Nur that science’s breathtaking discoveries of the universe’s functioning corroborate and reinforce the truths of religion.

The imortance of the Risale-i Nur cannot be overestimated, for through it Bediuzzaman Said Nursi played a major role in preserving and revitalizing the Islamic faith in Turkey in the very darkest days of her history. And indeed its role has continued to increase in importance to the present day. But further to this, the Risale-i Nur is uniquely fitted to address not only all Muslims but indeed all mankind for several reasons. First it is written in accordance with modern man’s mentality, a mentality that, whether Muslim or not, has been deeply inbued by materialist philosophy: it specifically answers all the questions, doubts and confusions that this causes. It answers too all the ‘why’s’ that mark the questioning mind of modern man.

Also, it explains the most profound matters of belief, which formerly only advanced scholars studied in detail, in such a way that everyone, even those to whom the subject is new, may understand and gain something without it causing any difficulties or harm.

A further reason is that in explaning the true nature and purposes of man and the universe, the Risale-i Nur shows that true happiness is only to be found in belief and knowledge of God, both in this world and the Hereafter. And it also points out the grevious pain and unhappiness that unbelief causes man’s spirit and conscience, which generally the misguided attempt to block out through heedlessness and escapism, so that anyone with any sense may take refuge in belief.

To conclude

The Holy Quran addresses the intellect as well as man’s other inner faculties. It directs man to consider the universe and functioning in order to learn its true nature and purposes as the creation and thus to learn the attributes of its Single Creator and his own duties as a creature. This, then, is the method that Bediuzzaman employed in the Risale-i Nur. He explained the true nature of the universe as signs of its Creator and demonstrated through clear arguments that when it is read as such all the fundamentals of beliefs may be proved rationally.

When this method is followed, a person attains a true belief that will be sound and firm enough to be withstand any doubts that may arise in the face of the subtle attacks of Materialism, Naturalism and atheism, or the materialist approach to scientific advances. For all scientific and technological advances are merely the uncovering of the workings of the cosmos. When the cosmos is seen to be a vast and infinately complex and meaningful unified book describing its Single Author, rather that causing doubt and bewilderment, all these discoveries and advances reinforce belief, they deepen and expand it.

Man’s most fundamental need is the need for religion, the need to recognize and worship Almighty God with all His Most Beautiful Names and attributes, and to obey His laws; those manifest in the universe and those revealed through his prophets. In explaining the message of the Quran, Almighty God’s final Revealed Book, brought and perfectly expounded by His final Prophet, Muhammad (PBUH), and Islam, the complete and perfected religion for mankind, Bediuzzaman Said Nursi demonstrated in the Risale-i Nur that there is no contradiction or dichotomy between science and religion; rather, true progress and happiness for mankind can, and will, only be achieved in this way, the way of the Quran.

Jeffrey Lang: Struggling to Surrender

2009-12-01T21:10:18Z

Here is powerful example of the Quran’s centrality in how Prof Jeffrey Lang came to know Islam and ultimately became Muslim.

“You can not simply read the Koran. Not if you take it seriously. You have to surrender to it already or you fight it. It attacks tenaciously, directly, and personally: it debases, criticizes, shames, and challenges. From the onset it draws a line of battle and I was on the other side.”

Why did he become a Muslim? His daughters would one day ask. He did not consider the choice that he made would affect generations to come. He is not a scholar of Islam. He writes about how it is to be Muslim from a Christian background, and being a minority in the Muslim community. He hesitated writing this book, because he felt it was too personal. He grew up catholic. He grew up with a mathematical and scientific mind. He gave up on being Catholic, long before he became Muslim. He became agnostic. He felt that being Catholic that it was not a logical religion. He felt that he alone created his existence. He began to feel mentally very lonely. He studied and received his doctorate in Mathematics, and yet he felt this was not enough.

He met a woman student who came to him for help. She was a Muslim woman, and she was covered head to toe. He felt that Muslim women were oppressed. His perception of Muslim women completely changed. She was a graduate student and teaching assistant and very capable of handling her students. He felt that there was a beauty and calmness about her.

He became very interested in religion and started going back to the Catholic church, but it did not satisfy his soul. Another Muslim student came into his life, His friend gave him a Quran.

He states:

“You can not simply read the Koran. Not if you take it seriously. You have to surrender to it already or you fight it. It attacks tenaciously, directly, and personally: it debases, criticizes, shames, and challenges. From the onset it draws a line of battle and I was on the other side.”

He was greatly affected by the Koran, and decided that he needed to talk to someone. He went to a mosque that was in the basement of a church. He had a great deal of emotional difficulty because the experience was too much for him to handle. He thought maybe he could walk and turn away. There were other men inside the mosque that persuaded him to stay and to embrace Islam. After a very touching moment with the Imam, he decided to convert to Islam. Emotionally, anyone who reads this first chapter, which I can inadequately convey, would very deeply be moved to tears.

His book is very dense reading. Every line is filled with conviction and knowledge which he wishes to convey. One can tell that he is extremely well read and full of self searching. He tells us that he understands what other new converts are struggling through.

He states that the Koran is the integral to the life of a Muslim. To the first Muslims, the language was spellbinding. The Koran sought to reform not to destroy the culture. It brought religion in a novel way. Religion must be more than an exercise in logic. Being a Muslim, there is no division between secular and spiritual, all of life is a sacred experience. The Koran is the revealed word of God.

God is addressing humanity. The Koran represents the mission of Muhammed pbuh as the restoration and the culmination of the Prophets.

The proof of Allah existence in within His signs:

“Do they not travel the land, so their hearts learn wisdom? (26:7)

Do they not examine the earth?(26:7) Do they nor look at the sky above them?”(50:6)

The implication within these questions that the evidence of this the truth of this message is to be found in the study of history, cultures and the nature among them.

“Read in the name of your Lord who created man from a tiny thing that clings….(96:1-5)”

Revealed the Prophet…Gabriel squeezed him and told him to read.

Reading and the ability to do so was considered to be a very divine gift. In reading the Quran, one finds beauty, coherence, transcendence and wisdom.

The Koran cannot be translated. It is only an interpretation when it is translated to another language and has no chronology in it like Bible. Islam also does not divide sacred and secular. Prophet Muhammed (pbuh) is a human instrument of who Allah speaks through.

The Koran is very scientific, for it describes many situations in nature from the fine particles that may be atom, to the development of child in the womb, the discovery how the earth rotates on its axis, to many other natural phenomenon, to the lives of bees and insects, to the expanding of the universe. What is amazing about the Koran that it explains these things in details.

The Koran states:

“He who created the Heavens one above the other. No fault you will see in the creation of the most Merciful. So turn your vision again. Do you see any flaw? Turn your vision and again your vision will turn back to you dazzled and defeated. (67:3-4)

God is more merciful than vindictive. He is more intent on saving more merciful than throwing into Hell fire.

What I feel that Lang writes in his book, is his experience and his profound amazement of what is in the Koran, from his personal view, with his scientific and mathematical background, that he found a great deal of logic in what impressed him in the Koran, what he could not find in the Catholicism that he grew up with.

Lang writes a great deal about Hadith in his book. Some of the Hadith he feels are more controversial than others. Some are more authentic than others. For new Muslims, this can be very confusing. The Koran does not delve into Prophet Muhammed inner personality. But when Prophet Muhammed feels concern over the Ummah, Allah tells the Prophet, that he is only the messenger. Throughout the Koran and the Hadith, Prophet Muhammed shines through. Lang states that to have had been the elect of God, to have won the love of his disciples so effortlessly, to have changed society and history to the extent that he did, he was surely much greater than merely the Arab ideal. Lang states that he must have possessed the kind of concern, compassion and spirituality that we can poorly approximate in ourselves. He was swift to dispense God’s will impartially, Prophet Muhammed was very concerned about justice. Even if his daughter Fatima were to steal, the same type of justice that was given to others, she would have to face it. The book describes how his early followers greatly loved the Prophet. Lang is very sincere in belief in the Prophet (pbuh). Critics have said of him that he is searching in the dark, about Islam, but I feel that he comes to the conclusion that he greatly believes in Prophet Muhammed’s mission and believes that Prophet Muhammed is a great mercy to mankind. I personally feel that those who become Muslim go through a questioning period and not blind faith. Many with great love and devotion accept Allah and his messenger with strong conviction. It takes time to get rid of all the baggage from the other faith that one has been brought up with.

There is so much inside this book, that it is so densely filled with information, that it is difficult to condense his ideas and thoughts into a short overview as this. In another chapter, he writes about the Ummah, and how Islam is a religion of equality, in everything you do within Hajj, within the prayer, in fasting, and other acts of worship, you do as a group effort. There is a great deal of unity in Islam. There is a great deal of responsibility to one’s parents and toward family. There are roles between husband and wife, although each of them have a different role to play, each are equal in the eyes of God. Each have the same amount of duty and worship towards God. There is a small segment on the relationship between husband and wife, our duties towards each other. Also one can divorce if one is not satisfied in the marriage, but it is something that Allah truly dislikes. He covers many different topics, that he struggles with, and what he has learned upon his journey.

He also talks about how the greater Jihad is not just going to war to fight for human rights but the struggle of righteousness within ourselves, which is the greater Jihad.

By Sr. Stephenie Bushra Khan – MuslimBridges Team

Source: http://www.muslimbridges.org/content/view/860/35/

You can purchase a copy of Jeffrey Lang’s Struggling to Surrender here. Your purchases support our Quran dawah project.

Discover Quran CD

2009-11-30T18:21:08Z

Click to Purchase

We are pleased to announce to you the latest product on our Send A Quran da’wah project titled Discover Quran. This is a CD that functions as a learning guide to Quran and Islam (Descubre Coran – Aprendizaje Guia para Coran & Islam). The product is offered free as a service to you. We only request a payment of $3.99 for shipping and handling. Click here to order.

Product Description:

This product is for Muslims and Non Muslims. Translated Quran in 29 languages: English, French, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Polish, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, Bosnian, Hindu, Bengali, Urdu, Turkish, and many more…

FIQE Youth Program

2009-11-02T22:31:39Z

Assalamualaikum wrt wbt,

It is our pleasure to invite you to our first weekend Youth Program in which we will learn more about the Quran and Sunnah’s approach on the contemporary Muslim Youth’s issues while looking into practical steps of coping up with daily interpersonal conflicts faced by us, the Muslim youths.

Location: University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Date: 6-8 November 2009
Speaker: Shaykh Omar Baloch & Br Fazrul Ismail (click here for speaker biographies)
Fee: $15

The Dilemma of Youths Today

One thousand four hundred and thirty years have passed since our Prophet (pbuh) made the first Hijrah and established the first Islamic state. 1430 years, and today, how have we progressed in being khulafa’ on the earth– better or worse?

History has shown that our struggles have always revolved around bringing about a universally ideal society – the ideal that Islam too, seeks to materialize. Indeed, it has not been a simple mission. Many have struggled and tried only to realize that it takes a collective effort to bring about any type of change.

The Quran reminds us:

“A man receives but only that for which he strives; that his endeavours will be judged, and only then will he receive his recompense in full.” (Quran 53:39-41)

“Truly, God does not change the condition of a people until they change what is in themselves.” (Quran 13:11)

The question is; what are our roles as Muslim youths to motivate those changes? What tools do we need to help guide purway towards establishing a better and ideal society?

Indeed, today’s youth are the future leaders and should not be dismissed. The youth of today need to learn the tools to maintain the dynamic momentum in faith to ensure positive advancement in building a better society. But WHY, HOW, WHAT and WHERE should we begin?

Be sure to join us as our speakers address the issues underlying the Muslim youth and how we can assist and make use of our potentials in living our everyday life as well as making impacts on the society we are in.

The Quran Conference: Building Our Relationship With The Quran

2009-11-30T18:21:45Z

Association of Quranic Understanding

in collaboration with

IQRA’ International and Al-Furqaan Foundation

invites you to the first annual

The Quran Conference

Building Our Relationship With The Quran

October 30th – November 1st, 2009
Holiday Inn, Skokie, IL

Click Here To Register

Promotional Video

Wishing You a Blessed Eid ul Fitr – Presenting a Gift from FIQE

2009-11-30T18:22:10Z

We at Al-Furqaan Foundation would like to wish Eid Mubarak to the Muslims across the globe.

Allahu akbar Allahu akbar Allahu akbar
Laa ilaha illa-llah
Allahu akbar Allahu akbar
Wa li-llahi-l-hamd

Allah is Greatest; Allah is Supreme!
There is no absolute reality but Allah
And Allah is Greatest,
And to Him rises up all praise.

In conjunction with Eid ul Fitr, we present to you two new lectures courtesy of our education division, the Furqaan Institute of Quranic Education.

1. Qur’an & Politics: Probing into the Mindset of the Elites
Politics & Qur’an dives deep into the mindset of the elite, using evidences from the Qur’an, as well as political theory, philosophers, and scientists.
Watch the Quran & Politics presentation here

2. Approaching the Subject of the Mahdi
How do we Muslims of the 15th century Hijri understand the Prophet’s (SAW) words when he tells us of the Mahdi and the whole end of times scenario? On a blessed night of the past Ramadan, Shaykh Omar Baloch shared with us the attitude in which we should see this subject.
Watch the lecture here.