Re: Idiotic imams and khutbahs

hey na'eem,

actually, when i wrote about choosing to hurt someone while manipulating
other people to think like us, i was thinking of what that imam is
doing.  but it does go both ways...

power struggle... well, i don't think a power struggle implies equality
of actions that lead to the struggle.  it can also imply resistance to
wrongful loss of power.  nor do i think it implies that there are only
two players - in this case i think everyone in the community is involved
in the struggle.  i think this imam has his own ideas of what he's
supposedto be doing, in this situation, as "imam", and apparently
(though i know nothing about him, obviously), it seems he has decided
he's allowed to, or even supposed to, use his position to coerce people
into adopting the values he has decided they should hold.  i think
that's at the heart of any definition of power struggle - an attempt to
control thoughts and perspective, sometimes right down to your
perspective on your own self-worth.

and inserted into those values is included thinking he has more power
than they do.  he seems to be lost from original ideas of what an imam
is, and maybe, to some extent, the community is also, thinking that he
has power over their relationships with god.  i guess i think of this as
a serious and general problem, that of taking the easy way through life,
passively relegating important things like how you think and what you
feel to outside entities, while somehow strangely assuming that's what
you're supposed to do, this adopting of some particular "school of
thought".  (any arena, not just religion: god, money, kindness,
children, politics/power, etc.  whatever.)


about god?  well.... yeah, everything IS about god, and that's the
terrible thing about this situation.  this imam's making what he's doing
seem to be about god and islam, but it's really just about him.


community:  sure.  i'm sure there are some communities that are thriving
and real, and extend broadly across people's lives.  sounds nice.....

charmi