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Muslims and Internal religious disputes in Sri Lanka: Part: 2

 (by DR RIFAI)

  It is not a secret that there is some kind of religious tension among Islamic groups in Sri Lanka today. I think that many of us would agree with this observation.  Recent time this religious tension has dramatically increased in Sri Lanka. Until late 1980s, Islamic groups worked side by side without any major confrontation or conflict. Islamic groups were introduced into Sri Lanka in late 1950s and since then Islamic groups have been working side by side without any major internal disputes or conflicts and yet, in recent time this peaceful trend has dramatically changed and each group begun to compete one another in the field of Islamic works. There is no harm in completing each other in good works and yet, literally fighting each other in the name of Islam and blaming one another in the name of Islam is not acceptable at all,

 We Muslims live as a minority community and each and every acts and actions of Muslim community is monitored and observed even scrutinised today by Non-Muslims with the support of modern technology. We may think that it is our internal problems among us and yet, this internal dispute among us has its huge impacts and repercussions among wider Sri Lankan community. We are well aware that 90% of Sri Lankans are non-Muslims and they are closely monitoring our social conducts, manners and behaviours. Most of these Non-Muslim people will not open the Holy Quran or Prophetic traditions to know about Islam rather they would look at the manners and qualities of Muslims around them and they would judge Islam with actions and behaviours of Muslims around them. We Muslims if we fight each other among us we would become an obstacle between the message of Islam and Non-Muslims in Sri Lanka.  Non-Muslims would run away from Islamic message because of our actions and conducts in Sri Lanka.

       Consider for instance, what happened in recent time in Beruwala between two groups of Muslims. One group of Muslims ransacked and burned down a mosque belonging to another group.  Moreover, they butchered two people and injured many more inside the mosque. This incident was reported in many Newspapers and TV stations with live coverage. What are the implications and impacts of this incident in our wider Sri Lankan community? What do Non-Muslims think about Islam and Muslims after watching this incident live broadcasting?  Do not you think that this incident would give many negative impressions about Islam and Muslims? Definitely some Non-Muslims would describe Islam as a religion of cruelty and killing and rather than coming closer to Islam and Muslims they would run away from Islam and Muslims because of incident like this?  Psychological scars of this incident would remind in the minds of Non-Muslims for a long time in their memories particularly Non-Muslims who witnessed this incident in Beruwala.

       Sometimes we do not resolve our problems in our villages or in our mosques and we report our disputes to police and they take up our dispute into courts. As a result of this sometimes our internal problems are reported in public Medias and newspapers. This gives bad impressions about Islam and Muslims in Sri Lanka. I shall refer to one or two incidents that happened in recent time.  It was reported (should be authenticated) that two groups of Muslims went to a Police station to make a complaint about an internal religious dispute between them?   This particular dispute was over some form of religious rituals in daily prayer. One group argued that the position of hands should be placed over belly in prayers and the other group argued that the position of hands should be placed over chest in daily prayers.  The dispute over this issue aggravated between these two Muslim groups and they approached a Non-Muslim Police Inspector to arbitrate between them and the shrewd police Inspector after listening to both parties (it was reported) said to them that you do not need to keep your hands neither over your chest nor over your belly rather you keep both hands as we Buddhists keep together and pray as we pray. Then your problem would be solved? This was the reply they received from a Non-Muslim Inspector for taking our dispute to him and yet, we have not learned lessons incidents like this?   Many more incidents like these were reported in recent times.   

Unfortunately we report to police stations and courts to seek justice and arbitrations from non-Muslim judges and officials. Of course justice is absolute and we could seek justice from any one and yet, do these people have any clue about our internal disputes or do they know our religious disputes and differences of opinions to do justice on these disputes. What signals these incidents send about us into wider community in Sri Lanka?  

To be continued?   

4 comments:

  1. The reward is not for the action but for the intention. Allah will not watch one move finger or not, or where one keep his hand, but one's inner quality. mean thakwa. now Islam became one of the big joke. shia- sunni in middle east. and here also is same it is the Thawheed and others.

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  2. In my opinion the conflict between Islamic faith groups is much graver. The intolerance within these polarized groups is at the peak. As per the Beruwela incident, one group has gone to the extent of torching a Masjid and killing fellow muslims. This intolerance is getting worse and the groups in every nook and corner of Sri Lanka are trying to market their brand name with the slightest opportunity. This is sowing seeds for more division and a recipe for a disaster. This trend could be stopped only by the muslim public boycotting these groups.

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  3. I am fully agree with Sri Lankan who says to boycott these groups because these groups were not available in our for fathers period (about 4-5 decade before). So our grand parents and parents followed Islam in peacefully without these groups and why we want to create a division in the name of Islam today. We believe only one Allaah, we pray one direction i.e Ka'ba, we follow one Rasool (SAW) and one Quran, So what went wrong for the conflicts today eventhough we have only one as mentioned above.

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  4. In the article part 1, the author mentioned the priorities between Muslims' socio economic developements and the dogmatic issues. In this article, he focused especially the SL islamic movements' differences.
    While the Islamic movements are at rise, the innocent people brand themselves naming themselves in these groups, criticize each other and attack each other without knowing the severity. This is a negative aspect- which I agree. But the solution is not cornering ourselves from these movements and be part of Shaitan's plans. Each and everyone is responsible for their actions and accountable what they do in this world. This is our belief. Unity is very important. My suggestion is learn Arabic language and learn the Theen and be united rather than branding ourselves.

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