This month IQRA! celebrates its first anniversary as the newsletter of the Islamic Society of Greater Columbus. However, IQRA! was established originally as the newsletter of Muslim women's Network. Sr. Hiba Nasser talked to IQRA! about the journey of this publication from dreams to reality.
"Sister Daaiyah Saleem and I had been thinking about a newsletter to serve women's issues. the Sisters at the English Study Circle discussed that and decided to start a newsletter back in November," Sr. Hiba said. "The name IQRA! came from the Holy Quran: Recite. It was the first word in the revelation. we chose Muslim Women's Network not to establish a new organization but rather to support a network for women; to express that IQRA! was a women's effort to help women and open a forum to provide education and support for them. The newsletter started in November 1993 with only 2 ads worth $8. That was the estimation of how much it would cost to produce 76 copies. That was all our ambition at that time," she added.
By May 1994, the editorial board of IQRA! met with members of the Muslim Students Association (MSA) to discuss the idea of expanding IQRA! to meet the needs of the community at large rather than to meet women's needs only. Sr. Daa'iyah, editor in chief then, felt, "IQRA! seems to have tapped into a need of the community."
IQRA! was re-organized in terms of staff, orientation and goals as of June 1994. The new team adopted a 5 point scope which it has adhered to since. The newly organized IQRA!@ sought to expand its objective from a focus on women's issues to a community wide plan to unite, inform, mobilize, entertain, and educate Muslim readers in the greater Columbus area. the team members have utilized a new two-tier agenda to implement their five goals: Producing a quality newsletter and building a sustainable institution.
First, an administrative structure was formed composed of an editorial board and staff members. Job descriptions served as a primary tool for new positions like business and financial manager, public relations, marketing and distribution, as well as the traditional editorial and reporting jobs. Searching for qualified and dedicated staff members was and remains the biggest challenge facing IQRA!
Second, the character of the newsletter was enriched with new and innovative focus on community problems investigations emphasizing subject, content, and format. These include fixed theme columns like Family Matters, Children's Page, and Why Not, that address specific educational needs, the social news page, ISGC news, and Dear Editor, which reach out to interact with the community, and Poll-time which surveys public opinion on certain events. Recently, the concept of reporting was extended from writers' personal impression to the more time consuming concept of "investigation" to bring together different sides of the issues, like the Oklahoma Bombing coverage, the Hajj issue, and the Islamic schools issue.
The changes in IQRA! were significantly reflected in distribution, which jumped from 400 in the first issue to 600 typically, 750 in Eid, and 900-1000 in Special Events. Unfortunately, feedback to questionnaires and suggestions has not been encouraging. IQRA! is in desperate need for readers help through objective criticism to improve.
The business orientation also changed to include other professionals like lawyers, realtors, and doctors. Recently, IQRA! took a new turn. After Eid, IQRA! collected formal annual subscriptions. The resource base, thanks be to Allah, and the readers' contribution has improved dramatically. IQRA! takes pride in that it does not burden the ISGC or the MSA with requests for funds. IQRA! has become self-sufficient with enough surplus to cover at least 3 issues in advance. The current challenge is to cope with the growing mailing requests from across the country and re-design the objectives to include non-Muslims who are interested in IQRA! despite its focus on Muslims.
We thank all the brothers and sisters who are dedicated to keep working on improving IQRA! We are working into having IQRA! available electronically. we hope that in the near future we will read IQRA! published in color. we are very proud of our young contributors. Thanks to 13 year old Basil Gohar who is providing us with his beautiful "Why Not?" articles. we are very grateful to the Abdullah family who are supporting printing IQRA! at a super low price, coping with our short-tie request to do the job, and helping in the distribution process.
We made a pledge on the first day to make this publication a quality newsletter. However, we are humans and very deficient and error prone. We need your help to minimize mistakes and expand. At this point we are in need for your ideas and comments. Give us your thoughts, ideas, and opinions. Hopefully this effort will be accepted for Allah's sake.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Monday, May 10, 2010
June 1995 Women General Body Representatives
IQRA! Special Report
The Islamic Society of Greater Columbus (ISGC) is a reality now. After months of electing the Board of Trustees, and after months of the hard work to put a "suggested constitution" in place, the constitution passed with flying colors. Last month was also an active one, preparing for the nomination and the election of the General Body Representatives (GBR). There were 14 brothers and 2 sisters who accepted their nominations. by the time of the election, one brother and the two sisters pulled out. Unfortunately, rumors were heard that the sisters were pressured to withdraw their nominations.
IQRA! interviewed both Sr. Hanan Farhan and Sr. Farida El-Henawy asking the following questions:
IQRA!: Why did you accept your nomination to the GBR?
Sr. Farida: I wanted to be a representative so that I'll have the chance to express women and children's needs and concerns.
Sr. Hanan: Allah says: "O people, We have created you from a male and a female." The Prophet , peace and blessings be upon him, says that women are sisters and partners of men. I believe that Muslim women have a role in building the Islamic society. Certainly, Muslim women have the obligation and the responsibility that complement men's. No man can play the role of the woman. Consequently, there was nothing to do except accepting the nomination to the GBR to participate in the decision making, in developing the future of this community, and in helping putting our decisions in place.
IQRA!: Have you received any support from the community to continue and be members in case you did win the election?
Sr. Farida: The period of time you are mentioning was very short. The support I got was minimal. the support actually came after my withdrawal!
Sr. Hanan: Like any other matter, there were pros and cons. Unfortunately, the majority was against having women on the GBR. But since I believe that being in this position is not deviation from the Islamic ruling, I insisted on proceeding.
IQRA!: Why did you decide to pull out of the GBR election?
Sr. Farida: I prefer not to discuss that now.
Sr. Hanan: My reasons and principles to accept the nomination in the first place have not been changed. I was the last to withdraw. First because I was left to be the only woman there, and second because I felt that one chair was not enough to represent all the women in the ISGC. I would like to emphasize that the Islamic society is like a bird. One wing represents men and the other represents women. How would a bird fly and get higher and higher with only one wing? If we want to be better and better, we must encourage women's participation at all levels including the level of decision making and execution.
IQRA!, as a part of its own investigation, acquired the following ruling of The Fiqh Council of North America from the American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 9:4, pp. 588-89. [On the issue of] "Whether women may share in the management and administration of mosques, Islamic schools, and executive councils of Islamic organizations. It was noted that there is no legal reason to prevent this essentially organizational concern and also, that this matter was not a source of controversy among the classical jurists, for the question of general sovereignty does not arise."
One prime example: Muslim Youth of North America (MYNA), a continental Muslim youth organization, in which a sister has been the youth chair of MYNA for several years.
Should the ISGC be two communities or are we supposed to be a true ONE community? Some people talk how 'ikhtelat" (mixing between brothers and sisters) is haram (unlawful) and that we should not allow it to happen in our ISGC. To clarify this point IQRA! would like to cite some passages from the book, "The liberation of Women in the Time of the Message" by Abdul-Halim Abu-Shukkah. In this book, the author leaves no doubt that the Muslim community at the time of the prophet, Peace and blessings be upon him, was indeed one community, where brothers and sisters dealt with each other and interacted on a daily basis according to the principles and regulations of Islam.
There are more than 350 authentic hadith (in Bukhari and Muslim) that list such types of interaction in various situations, like:
1. In the mosque, when prayers are held.
2. Gaining knowledge and education whether in the mosque or elsewhere.
3. In Makkah during Hajj and Umrah.
4. In celebrating Eid, during Eid prayers, and after during the celebrations.
5. In a legal court where men and women used to settle their disputes. This even included husbands and wives.
6. During "janazah" (funeral) and what comes after it from prayer to offering condolences etc...
7. During "jihad" (fighting for the cause of Allah) where women used to help in nursing and even in the actual fight, combat.
In addition to the public situations above, a lot of interaction took place also in personal matters like family visits, giving gifts, visiting a sick person, enjoining the good and forbidding the bad.
The Islamic Society of Greater Columbus (ISGC) is a reality now. After months of electing the Board of Trustees, and after months of the hard work to put a "suggested constitution" in place, the constitution passed with flying colors. Last month was also an active one, preparing for the nomination and the election of the General Body Representatives (GBR). There were 14 brothers and 2 sisters who accepted their nominations. by the time of the election, one brother and the two sisters pulled out. Unfortunately, rumors were heard that the sisters were pressured to withdraw their nominations.
IQRA! interviewed both Sr. Hanan Farhan and Sr. Farida El-Henawy asking the following questions:
IQRA!: Why did you accept your nomination to the GBR?
Sr. Farida: I wanted to be a representative so that I'll have the chance to express women and children's needs and concerns.
Sr. Hanan: Allah says: "O people, We have created you from a male and a female." The Prophet , peace and blessings be upon him, says that women are sisters and partners of men. I believe that Muslim women have a role in building the Islamic society. Certainly, Muslim women have the obligation and the responsibility that complement men's. No man can play the role of the woman. Consequently, there was nothing to do except accepting the nomination to the GBR to participate in the decision making, in developing the future of this community, and in helping putting our decisions in place.
IQRA!: Have you received any support from the community to continue and be members in case you did win the election?
Sr. Farida: The period of time you are mentioning was very short. The support I got was minimal. the support actually came after my withdrawal!
Sr. Hanan: Like any other matter, there were pros and cons. Unfortunately, the majority was against having women on the GBR. But since I believe that being in this position is not deviation from the Islamic ruling, I insisted on proceeding.
IQRA!: Why did you decide to pull out of the GBR election?
Sr. Farida: I prefer not to discuss that now.
Sr. Hanan: My reasons and principles to accept the nomination in the first place have not been changed. I was the last to withdraw. First because I was left to be the only woman there, and second because I felt that one chair was not enough to represent all the women in the ISGC. I would like to emphasize that the Islamic society is like a bird. One wing represents men and the other represents women. How would a bird fly and get higher and higher with only one wing? If we want to be better and better, we must encourage women's participation at all levels including the level of decision making and execution.
IQRA!, as a part of its own investigation, acquired the following ruling of The Fiqh Council of North America from the American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 9:4, pp. 588-89. [On the issue of] "Whether women may share in the management and administration of mosques, Islamic schools, and executive councils of Islamic organizations. It was noted that there is no legal reason to prevent this essentially organizational concern and also, that this matter was not a source of controversy among the classical jurists, for the question of general sovereignty does not arise."
One prime example: Muslim Youth of North America (MYNA), a continental Muslim youth organization, in which a sister has been the youth chair of MYNA for several years.
Should the ISGC be two communities or are we supposed to be a true ONE community? Some people talk how 'ikhtelat" (mixing between brothers and sisters) is haram (unlawful) and that we should not allow it to happen in our ISGC. To clarify this point IQRA! would like to cite some passages from the book, "The liberation of Women in the Time of the Message" by Abdul-Halim Abu-Shukkah. In this book, the author leaves no doubt that the Muslim community at the time of the prophet, Peace and blessings be upon him, was indeed one community, where brothers and sisters dealt with each other and interacted on a daily basis according to the principles and regulations of Islam.
There are more than 350 authentic hadith (in Bukhari and Muslim) that list such types of interaction in various situations, like:
1. In the mosque, when prayers are held.
2. Gaining knowledge and education whether in the mosque or elsewhere.
3. In Makkah during Hajj and Umrah.
4. In celebrating Eid, during Eid prayers, and after during the celebrations.
5. In a legal court where men and women used to settle their disputes. This even included husbands and wives.
6. During "janazah" (funeral) and what comes after it from prayer to offering condolences etc...
7. During "jihad" (fighting for the cause of Allah) where women used to help in nursing and even in the actual fight, combat.
In addition to the public situations above, a lot of interaction took place also in personal matters like family visits, giving gifts, visiting a sick person, enjoining the good and forbidding the bad.
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