This blog page will feature my personal thoughts, doubts, and demons concerning the poetic impulse and its eccentricities. This is where you learn of the real me as a poet engulfed in doubt, yet believes doubting makes it so. A poet whose words find hearts to rest in yet still cannot fulfill their creator, a jovial yet often failing, angry person who can hate a g-d he doesn't believe in, can curse a world he sorely loves. Love…what seems to vanish.
Day one: Festering doubts seem to share their spirits with others. Am I a valid person and does my poetic voice matter? By writing poetry, am I turning a new leaf or questioning the mathematics of the universe? Are the networks and probabilities being dissolved, am I corrupting the truth I cherish…am I making a difference in lives I will never know?
I can only be one person, and the world will not be saved. Words lift the thick deep from our eyes, and teach us to dig further into ourselves. The subject of my poem "The Digger" is this very thing. I tire of the nausea, the golden torch of a promised liberty and the efforts to expunge the violence and adapt to it– to forget that dark sleep emblazons us all. Yet what could exhaust my energies but a large body of poetry? Do I have more to give?
The politics of disaster and dalliance with narcissism– something my country has allowed in its members, and even encouraged– I don't see eye to eye with those who look to the wind, yet sense nothing. Long ago, my brave fathers tread a guilty earth and were aware. To demystify the poetic impulse is to stare into dark regions, to fear the beating of your heart yet thread the gold from the loom of your thought. In recesses of the soul, sweet honey thickens and captures words like bees and drowns them in amber.
No. Your individualism will not account for the stampede of flesh you are becoming. In due time, the child of your struggle will be born and you will cast away your sorrows and bleed anew. The suffering is neverending– and dreams often startle the dreamer.
Day Two: Yet freedom means there must be barriers. Otherwise there is nothing to cross, and if you cannot transgress you are not free. Law enables form to evolve, to seek beyond the shape and color. Art, poetry specifically, will engage the spectator– it will drive the sociable misfit to the other side of yearning.
I don't know what the 'courage to be' means, and I do not see the horizon, the sense of the second guess. I read recently that those who believe in a deity are better at reading others' intentions. Have I missed opportunities because of my lack of belief? Why should I trust a god that leaves me on my own to make decisions he will condemn or condone, and only asks for my love for this curse? A god who demands my love is a weakling. I can only ask that the male god who created men first out of loneliness look deeper into himself and find why he is so demeaning to homosexuals, especially since he wants me on my knees begging.
Not to mention his empty phrasing, calling all humanity "Man" in singular tense– suddenly expecting a man to be men collectively, as if every person was the same as any others. If he wanted something from me, he has lost his entitlement to it. It seems more and more people are embracing fascism morally– assuming each person is internally equipped with the same needs, desires, and personalities. How then, can diversity exist? Why then, are there a mix of races, languages, and patterns in life? Science discovers the law of non-duplication. God tries to erase it, making unreasonable demands on human nature. Even though he created human nature, he endowed "Man" with a need for him and free will. So all he asks for is blind worship– all the bad mistakes are yours only. If you won't love him, he condemns you to burning emptiness and fear…yet, he expects your love in fear and trembling.
I don't like having senselessness shoved down my throat. If this religion makes sense to you, by all means don't question it. I would encourage you to question the belief that there is a church that once talked of "the Elect", only clergy went to Heaven…then you could buy your forgiveness no matter who you were. Then it was convert or die. Now it's freedom, and if you don't believe we will beat you with a ruler in class and publicly embarrass you. Suddenly god loves freedom after he has executed all the infidels and natives.
Why should religious fervor act contagiously toward others? If god won't be responsible for the worse human tendencies, he reserves no right to the good ones either. If you don't think history matters, perhaps you don't understand the dynamics of time– the past creates the future. In historical narrative, it is always the murderer who writes the accepted tale. If your faith outweighs the freedom it supposedly grants me– "make this choice, else die and suffer"– I reserve the right to lash back at your demands, the ones that annoy me.
My anger isn't because of a lack of god– it's because the simpleminded cannot step away from their vengeful yet loving father in the sky. When did love take revenge for its own sake? How is it love to demand worship from me? Call the sentries and turn them to stone.
Day 3: I have spent several hours on Facebook today, posting poems and comments about politics. I often take discussions personally because no one comes out convinced of anything but me. Open-mindedness is often its own punishment. Yet it is a blessing.
Dark and light are the two heads of the same beast. Often solutions are like many-headed hydras that once one head is cut, more emerge. Solutions lead to problems, and problems are unresolved. Human nature is flexible to time and place because its key component is to adapt.
What are we adapting to these days? Authorities in high places sometimes encroach on our liberty to create the world as we wish, and it is often true we depend on these authorities to protect and unite us. I read that group selectivity makes for aggressive punishment toward those who are in the top ranks to keep natural checks on power. I sometimes wonder what goes through our leaders' heads as they command soldiers to their deaths and execute laws that can't work. Do they feel blameworthy? Henry Kissinger is releasing a new book that discusses his perspectives on foreign policy and the troubles worldwide (http://tinyurl.com/pyhgg5e). Is it better we left well enough alone or should the USA involve itself in conflicts overseas?
I wonder if our leaders are psychopaths in tightfisted pose. Jesus spoke beautifully of the wolves and sheep lying down in the same pasture. Isaiah the prophet wrote of beating our swords into ploughshares. Yet Washington, I believe, said those who beat their swords into ploughshares are beaten by those who don't. What an unfortunate lot we are! Wanting the best for all and unable to deliver it. Poetry, in its sublime aspects, touches the human spirit and addresses all its concerns. We long for peace, we want less trouble and an end to depravity and deprivation, and we struggle with our passions to subdue them. It's a battle to be human- every day is a struggle, a torment, and a failure.
Hope comes from learning to separate fact and fiction, and allowing yourself the freedom to simply live– knowing that your life isn't the global life, and that the troubles you see on the news are foreign to your own trouble. When you realize there is nothing you can do at the moment, you are free to simply be. So much misery confronts us through televised pleas for donations to feed starving children, news stories of military blunders, left/right divisions and discussions that lead nowhere, and the pursuit of truth- a truth that, like God, is everywhere and nowhere, impossible to apprehend.
Life is fullness or emptiness, your choice. Suffering is inevitable, but separating yourself from its sources will give you better perspective. You will see yourself as full in the emptiness, and the light will open you. Emptiness, luminosity…these are universal expressions of divine nature that is both action and non-action. The Western sense of non-contradiction has led us to blindly seek perfection and to lose the fundamental value of experience and our noble nature.
Day Four: There has been much talk of "Self" lately, and I have sought to come to an understanding with the essential meaning of this term. I think "Self" extends further than identity or surface thought. There is an inner core of being that all too often escapes our notice.
We, in our search and society, develop schisms and fragments of essence we strive to hide behind the cold complexity of our pain as a growing person. The rest of the world seeks to alienate us from the core realm of light. Do we realize that reaching this light is only darkness? That we are blinded by its commotion? That the wound that glows and festers without our recognition of it only widens and bleeds more?
I find myself in the trap of beauty all too often. I am a poet and poets love the array of beauty in the world, the wonder of proportion, the harmony of each part with another. Fitness and health are prerequisites to survival. People naturally desire longetivity, and this evolutionary effort serves the purpose of heightening our worldly understanding so we can improve ourselves, or circumstances, and our behavior. I strongly feel we are on our own in this effort. It is such a struggle to live, but we are accustomed to live, and no philosopher will recommend suicide or murder. Each to his own part, and the proportions will neatly fit.
Beauty relaxes in understanding. We must see a person as one whole of being, as both a fragment and the inevitable whole that seeks its own unity. Why are forces divided into two? Because a unity required two forces: thesis and antithesis. If we define God as the ultimate good, then this dialectic defines him as synthesis. Therefore, God cannot be the final beginning. Something reached ahead of his existence and the struggle of emptiness and chaos brought God together. God– a closed system confining all elementals– and Human, the open system that is divided in two and is persuaded to come together to build harmony. All of life is an open system, and God certainly lives– but existence precedes essence, and life is existence. What beings have in common with non-beings is the quality of existing, both feeding off each other. No one knows the origins because that is too far back, before the phenomenon of creation.
The Void is a predatory and complicated thing.
I believe Nietzsche did not rule out the supernatural altogether. Rather, he questioned the Christian assumption of God's purity. He also questioned the nature of life and concluded that living is an art. This is in line with living authentically, a maxim of existentialism. Passion is a futile and distressing thing, but without it our spirits are contented and restless. The heat is still stored but the momentum is unheard of. All of life requires the best of its members and we are all one through the transference of heat. All work is activity and transformation of energy.
Nietzsche proposes an interesting timeline concerning the real and apparent worlds. I believe he brought the two together in the final stages because when the illusory and the real meet, the illusory is destroyed. Gradually the two worlds (strictly a clash of philosophies: materialism and idealism) are imposed against one another and the real is made sovereign. Oddly, the ideal world is one of heretical vision and vague delusion. The true world is absent of such error, and only the fearless can swallow it.
The entire procession begins anew in the eternal recurrence. The play is repeated, restored, and drawn to a full close. The real world flirts with our imperfect being. At some point representation actualizes– then dramatic tension invites the Godhead to sweep the mess.
Yet God is a metaphor, a troubling concept, an inadequate account of our strivings. Alpha makes the first move, and after all is said and done Omega returns to explain the joke.
We are all walking carcasses, empty of objectivity, only existing and never being, being…what is being and why can't we define it?
Striving, empty watercourses through the poet's yearning. Architecture is like several sighs in the night when all that's left is an empty hat, dirty jeans, and a crumpled tie.
I don't sound distressed, do I? After all, I am channeling a persona?
Well…the poetic personality is a noble armor, but thin of heart. I find myself with odd, nightmarish people because I open my frequencies to fearful reserves. I meet people who bully, antagonize, and betray their closest friends or try to shrink them down. This personality is fitful and disturbed, but I brave the tears he causes and tarry down the path open-armed. Sometimes the gate must latch when my endeavors are under surveillance and I feel discouraged from my mission.
Poet. Poet is what? A friend to truth, a lonely seeker? Those don't exist anymore. Darkness cannot suffocate the crowded mind. All of us develop creative community and seek others to share our discoveries. Does it lessen the enchantment we have with loneliness and tormented words? Does language's emotive personality find higher reaping in solitude? Poetry is a solemn garment that attends the moon's funeral, and the moon was a harsh mistress. Poetry reaches out, it tosses the coin and sings.
I forgot to keep the curtains open this morning. I feel the fission and fusion of worlds stretched before me. Dissolution and disarray are partners in this business.
There isn't a god to appeal my case. Satan is a triumphant and vindictive lawyer who keeps all my sins in his tiny briefcase. When he opens it, they spill out across the floor and turn to luminous flame. No one is allowed to touch them but I am expected to understand how they blazed and why.
If you wish, reader, to understand this allegory: suffer. I cannot condemn suffering. It teaches humility, perseverance, compassion, and encourages disciplined thought. However, I abhor cruelty and simple-mindedness. Life is its own guillotine with blade ever rising, sharpening in the light, expecting devolution and nervous chatter. Keats wrote that society progresses socially and economically as it reaches out through time. I read of a concept, I believe Freudian, of the theory of decadence: guilt grows as society progresses. Maybe time isn't an outfolding of wings as much as a pair of shears that trims feathers and releases them to dance in the wind. Those feathers find each other and pile on the dirt floor, and carry the appearance of a bird. Guilt is a deep anger and dread– Original Sin, they say, is the breach between man and God. All of God's children, children of Adam, have been forsaken and are degrees from God. Yet, world, you are redeemable? Christ ascends after descending– is this a symbolic depth, a trust he holds?
Now, we are all Christ. The mystery is Aristotlean tragedy. The way we see ourselves and how Jesus was executed, though innocent, as a guilty one. We imagine ourselves as him in metaphor, hapless victims executed in a cruel existence for crimes we did not commit– the crime of existing, of being passionate. Fear and pity are compounded emotions. We feel ourselves on the Cross, and we pity the victim and his situation. Pity is dread, existentially speaking. Jesus' life parallels our own, and our minds fathom the plunder of retribution– we fear God, we tremble, and we beg as animals at a Master who seems distant and lost. The human beast only learns by fire.
Now, it is wise to respect cruel masters…even when their cruelty is disorganized, inexplicable, and frequent. To protest– to ask for more, to enjoin hands even– is to balance the powers that burden us. Fear and pity are the elements of tragedy: the strength of Christ's punishment and doubt, when we are forced to pity ourselves inwardly.
Love is a form of sublimation in some, a dissolving of the barrier between ego and world. Poets perhaps naturally sublimate their suffering, their contradictions and desire for consistency, and the inner rage of their solitude. Some say poets have a love-torn soul. Some say it is difficult not to love a poet, and others say if God gives you a poet then listen to him/her.
Many people commit their thoughts, ideas, and internal dialogue to paper, but what distinguishes a poet from others? Perhaps a soul that spends itself outward and dreams? Perhaps a sharp wisdom of the world that bites?
Nothing is merely the absence of Something.
Certainly emptiness is built for filling.
and we grasp it unaware.
that fill a distant, absurd Nothingness.
Because before something is filled, it must be empty.
and if something exists it must be true.
and yet from what do we strain?
Does cruelty contain a depth we misunderstand?
ignites, blackens, and perplexes the vision we hold.
to realize its law and limitation.
and un-dream the threads of my existence.
into a dark cave of comparison.
and grant wings to the unimaginable.
This poem was noted by Charles Bane, Jr. and my partner in business. Both though the poem was good. It was even compared to Tennyson's "Ulysses" by Dr. Chuck Taylor who said it fit into the "philosophical tradition" of poetry. A friend said it wasn't up to par with my other work, and she also said that not all readers will agree, and poems inspire different reactions. I would love your thoughts, whoever you are, on the poem.
No truer words were ever spoken about poets. The soul is a river, wide and deep, and some stick to waist-deep, others go under. But why is poetry such an intimate experience? Who are we bouncing ideas off? Is there some cosmic sense of Otherness "out-there" we reach toward to unite our fragile frames to Being? How can we conceive of what it means to Be when we ourselves are immersed in it?
Yes, Heidegger was a Nazi but let's put that aside for a broader understanding of his philosophy before we jump onto the social justice bandwagon. His questions are deeper than political philosophy. This is exactly why we should avoid censorship. Let's disparage Ezra Pound– but his aesthetics were always deeper than his shallow political persuasion. The same is true of Heidegger. If we burn libraries, we toss the baby out with the bathwater. What if Heidegger's fundamental questions and pursuit can enrich us in spite of his hideous political commitments?
Don't deep questions always lead in circles and generally bend toward an agnostic answer? Theologians tells us "we can't justify the ways of God to men." Thus, they explain nothing. Heidegger says we can't unveil much about the nature of Being because we are immersed in it. How can we define that which we participate in? Is a game defined by rules? If the sum is greater than the parts, how do we define Being without a counterpart? How do we determine if Being is the whole, or only part? If it is only part, then what is the rest of the sum?
Sartre proposes Being and nothingness. That which exists outside and within Being is nothingness– Aristotle would call it "potential." An actuality is the negation of potentials. So Being is then the negation of nothingness– in logic, this is two negatives forming a positive– thus, the negation falls full circle. As Heidegger discusses, reason runs in a circle and once you return you know you have completed it. He used Descartes's logic of the cogito, to the world, to God Himself, as an example. The circle proves my existence isn't a lie. This is all I know. I exist.
Poetry, being the art of language, shifts the conversation of Being. It rearranges the terms. It provides new symbolizations and situations.
The human capacity to create is unique in us. We transform. This material of Being and its flexibility should be embraced wholly. To live authentically is to create. Freedom is the only means we have at our disposal to unite the terms of Being and address them. When we act, we create. Being itself is a mode of existing and it substantiates us in our creation.
Being is meaning. Meaning is essential to living. It is using language to create fullness where there is emptiness. The poets are troubled beings. They are born broken. They are more human than human. They are vulnerable. They love, they ignite, they sparkle, and they gravitate.
Don't let the world fool into thinking this isn't important.
Much to think about here. More than think about- ponder. reflect upon. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you. I call each entry a "day" even though they aren't written in succession. I am obsessed with a god I don't believe in, in developing a new metaphysics based on dialectic, void philosophy, and German idealism. Boehme has been an inspiration for me because he posits the idea that something existed before God. That the Void birthed God, and that God is the organizer of matter. I call God the "unifying principle" or the "ultimate knowledge of the Good". I identify as a materialist, and have decided God is a substance. Much of the material world escapes the human eye. Living in Texas where the Bible is pushed heavily has lead me to a curiosity of Biblical texts. My favorites are Ecclesiastes, Job, Jeremiah, and Isaiah. There isn't a single poet (even Shelley who was admittedly an atheist) who doesn't repect the Bible literature, and hasn't some transcendental concept. God is the ground of being in existential philosophy. I have been most inspired by the Old Testament and Nietzsche in all my thinking.
Jung wrote that the human psychology develops in three stages: categories (many disparate elements acting out of order), duality (sort of a dialectical tension represented in binaries), and unity. For me, observation of unity is recognizing that all tensions (political left/right, for instance) are productive of the Ultimate Good and serve a higher purpose than themselves. Most people view themselves as a supreme entity representing a good which is distinctly their own good, but they cannot see that their opponent in the binary system is necessary to affirm and challenge their values. Unity then means appreciating your opposite– male and female eventually unite to birth the human race.
I am at the stage where I am reaching toward unity but still clinging to the duality of my middle age.


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August 24, 2020 March 30, 2021 Zapa
The Bedsit People. Part 4.
Giuseppe is a stocky, balding man, in his early 50s. A nervous, straightforward kind of guy, a bit of a brute.
Quintessential Italian, laddish at times, especially when talking about women. An old-fashioned type, an eccentric entrepreneur, a go-getter.
When I say stocky I don't necessarily mean that he's fat. He keeps himself in good shape, exercising in his room. He likes boxing. You can't tell how broad his physique is when you look at him because he wears rather baggy clothes. Even his uniform appears to be a couple of sizes larger than it should.
He has, however, the face and head of an ageing Italian dad. His head, round, bald and small, doesn't really seem to fit the rest of his body. A trickle of sweat, perhaps a sign of his restrained physical energy, is a permanent feature of his broad forehead.
I was sick recently with a pretty bad tonsillitis. My voice was gone and my throat was in so much pain. I had never had it so bad. One evening when I was feeling at my worst Giuseppe turned up at my door with a plastic beaker full of freshly cooked spaghetti. He apologised for not having any plates. We don't have a kitchenette in our rooms, so he makes pasta by mixing it with boiling water in a big vacuum flask, leaving it to rest for 15 minutes until it's done.
I really couldn't eat that spaghetti. It was so overcooked that it looked like it had been scrapped off the bottom of a barrel and dumped into that measuring jug. I was gagging with every spoonful. I apologised and said that my throat was in too much pain to even swallow, which in a way was true.
Then he said that the best thing to do if you have a bad throat is to gargle your own piss. I couldn't believe that he was suggesting that. He went on a long monologue on urine therapy. He said that he does it every time he had a bad throat and that it works miracles.
Little is known about Giuseppe's private life. He can be quite cryptic when asked personal questions. We know that he was in the army, and we think that he owns a house in Italy, somewhere in the mountains. It also appears as if he has some kind of long distance girlfriend there. But he has no plans to go back to Italy, and London is becoming more and more expensive for him.
Sometimes at work, when it's quiet, he spends the whole shift researching on the internet for the most affordable cities to live in. Recently he's become obsessed with Eastern Europe. He calls me over to the desk to show me Google maps, zooming into small towns in Ukraine and Bulgaria where apparently you can get a pint of beer for less than one pound. He seems to be using the price of beer as a barometer.
That's the thing with Giuseppe. He is a man of many strange habits, but his main obsession is money. It is beyond an obsession. It's compulsive.
He is all about saving. Every decision he makes is based on spending less.
He's had many schemes to save or make money, no matter how long or convoluted the scheme is. He likes a bet, football, horses, whatever he sees as an opportunity. He's not reckless though. He bets carefully.
He may sometimes fail, but he does not take big risks. He wants to know all the tricks in the book. He's busy coming up with new ones.
At work, he's a money making machine. He sees every guest enquiry as a chance to make a few more pounds. He's the master of the malicious art of up-selling.
A guest would come up to the desk with a banal question, or simply to ask the time, but if Giuseppe is at the desk, the ingenious fella would leave with a table booked in the local restaurant, a pre-booked minicab to get there and a ticket for the open tup sightseeing bus the next day.
I can't believe how easy it is for Giuseppe to trick people, especially considering how bad his English is. Guests find him interesting and amusing and fall for almost anything he says. Some come down to the desk later in the day or throughout their stay asking for him. A wiser few avoid him.
Giuseppe is, however, an ok team player. He splits the day's earnings fairly with whoever is working at the desk with him, but he will certainly push you to be as assertive as him during the shift, which makes the shift merely a competition to make money.
His saving methods apply to all areas of his life. Food, drink, clothing. He very rarely goes to restaurants or the pub. During our shifts together he sends me out to the dirty café up the road to get our lunch. A dingy sandwich place in the back of a self-service launderette, run by a scary Polish man with a tattooed face. The kind of man who looks like he's killed his grandma and her dog. Giuseppe's choice of sandwich never changes: brie cheese on granary bread.
Giuseppe loves a wholesale shop and he often drives all the way to places like Croydon or Dagenham to get stuff for cheap. This has translated into various business ventures, some of which failed.
Someone at the hotel told me the story of when he once purchased for almost no money a large quantity of pesto sauce in bulk through one guy he befriended in some industrial estate in Essex. He then managed to open up a stall in a food market somewhere in east London, where the only choice on the menu was his pesto pasta. The enterprise didn't take off, and he had to close the stall when the sales stopped covering the cost of renting that space. On the other hand, he saved a lot of money by having pesto pasta every day, for weeks.
As for his other spending habits, he told me recently that he never buys any toiletries, like gel, soap or shampoo. Through his contacts in the Hotel, he befriended this other Italian guy. The manager of a company that supplies wholesale hotel toiletries, who Giuseppe gets stuff from for almost nothing. He goes on his scooter to some warehouse in Harrow or Edgware and comes back with a box full of goods.
The only time I happened to be in Giuseppe's room I noticed a series of heavy cardboard boxes piled up on top of one another against the wall, each one with a little window cut on. Some of the boxes contained lots and lots of tiny bottles of shampoo, gel, and conditioner, and others contained hundreds, possibly thousands of very small bars of soap, the kind that you find in every hotel.
Giuseppe then confessed to me that he had managed to get all of this stuff almost for free and that he was getting some money by distributing it himself to local hotels. He claimed to have more than 2000 litres of shampoo and gel altogether, and that I was welcome to have some for free. When he heard that I was paying £4 for my special anti-dandruff shampoo for greasy hair, he nearly had a heart attack.
At first, when he moved to the Staff House from his 15-people house share in North Wembley, I was a bit worried that he would want to hang out all the time. But he turned out, perhaps unsurprisingly, to be a very private man. He keeps himself to himself and I never heard a noise coming from his room, which happens to be next to mine.
Once or twice he joined me and Bruno for a drink in my bedroom, very occasionally sharing a laddish anecdote from his army days. It's funny to see them both interact. Bruno thinks Giuseppe is stark driving mad, but harmless. Nothing makes Bruno laugh more than hearing about Giuseppe's adventures.
Needless to say, when Giuseppe's at home, he's always busy doing something. He's restless but also looking for some peace. He often talks about retiring in some beautiful paradise in some sunny country, surrounded by good looking girls.
In his peculiar ways, he's working towards that, when I see him from my window, walking in and out of the house, always carrying heavy plastic bags or mysterious boxes. I see him and I think that he's on a mission, his unique mission, going back and forth several times a day. I don't really know what he's up to. I never ask.
Categories The Bedsit PeopleTags bedsit people, bedsits, creative writing, diaries, fiction, immigration, london, london life, nonfiction, writing
Previous The Bedsit People. Part 3.
Next The Bedsit People. Part 5.

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text:
Category: On Harshness
"Finding Fault With All who Differ with Us in Fiqh Issues Even Though They are with Us on The Path of the Book and The Sunnah."
The Imaam said, "I fear that our brothers will grow up to slander and find fault with everyone who differs with us in fiqh issues even though they are with us on the path of the Book and the Sunnah, and thus fall into going to extremes and falling short."
Muhaddithul-'Asr, p. 87.
Al-Albaani's Advice to Every Muslim on the Face of the Earth
The Imaam said, "My advice for every Muslim on the face of the earth, especially our brothers who share with us their affiliation to the blessed da'wah, that of the Book and the Sunnah on the methodology of the Pious Predecessors–I advise them and myself to fear Allaah, the Blessed and Most High, firstly, and then [advise them] to seek more beneficial knowledge as He the Most High said:
"And fear Allaah. And Allaah teaches you." [Baqarah 2:282]
And [I advise them] to couple their meritorious knowledge which in our united opinion is that which does not digress from the Book, the Sunnah and the methodology of the Pious Predecessors, along with this knowledge of theirs and [along with] whatever increase in it they are able to seek–[I advise them] to couple that with action upon that knowledge, so that it will not be a proof against them but for them:
"The Day when there will not benefit [anyone] wealth or children. But only one who comes to Allaah with a sound heart." [Shu'araa 26:88-89]
Thereafter I warn them from joining many of those who have left the path of the Salaf in many, numerous issues, something which can be termed as rebelling against the Muslims and their Jamaa'ahs [i.e., like the Khawaarij], rather we order them to be as the Prophet عليه الصلاة والسلام said in an authentic hadith, "And be servants of Allaah, brothers," as Allaah the Blessed and Most High ordered you, and we should, as I said in a previous sitting and which I repeat again [here], and there is benefit in repeating [such points]–in our da'wah we should be gentle with those who oppose it and we should always and forever stand in line with His Saying, the Blessed and Most High:
"Invite to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good instruction, and argue with them in a way that is best," [Nahl 16:125] and the ones who have the most right for us to use [such] wisdom with them are those who are the most severe in their conflict/disagreement with us in our doctrine and our aqidah so that we do not bring together [both] the weightiness of the true call [itself which] Allaah عز وجل favoured us with and the burden of ill manners in calling to Allaah عز وجل.
So I hope that all of our brothers in all Islamic countries imitate these Islamic manners and seek, by doing so, Allaah's Face عز وجل [i.e., to do so sincerely] and not to want any reward or thanks [from the people]."
On Harshness | 13 | Slandering the Scholars of the Hijaaz and Accusing Them of Adulating Taaghuts [Evil Leaders]
Questioner: There are some youth in Holland and elsewhere, Salafis alhamdulillaah, we do not doubt their creed but they say vile things about some of the scholars, especially the scholars of the Hijaaz. They say, 'We don't trust them because some of them flatter taaghuts [evil leaders]' is this correct, O Shaikh?
Al-Albaani: From what I myself hear directly and from those things I hear through others, like you just told me now, it appears to me that those who speak against the scholars and charge them with flattering taaghuts [evil leaders], [it appears to me that] these people who accuse the scholars of the present day are, without doubt, from the youth.
And we, in turn, cannot think ill of them, i.e., of their intent–but we do suspect their knowledge. So firstly, the shallowness of their knowledge and their scant acquaintance with correct Islamic fiqh and [secondly] with Islamic manners which the Muslim youth should have been brought and raised up on, it is this, with regret, which the present day and age's generation of youth has been deprived of.
It is true that there now is an Islamic, as they say, awakening. But I say, firstly, that this awakening is in its early stages, it has not even reached half way yet, let alone its end. Secondly, that this awakening is an ideological and knowledge-based one which has not been accompanied by an awakening in manners.
For this reason we advise these youths to apply themselves eagerly to seeking knowledge and to do so sincerely for Allaah the Mighty and Majestic, firstly. And that they rectify/discipline themselves and teach themselves Islamic manners.
And if they do that, they will withhold their tongues from speaking ill of people in general, let alone speaking about the honour of the scholars who are the elite of this Ummah.
On Harshness | 12 | Having Bigotry Towards Shaikhs
Questioner: There are some youth with us who initially used to feel comfortable with/go to one of the scholars and another group would feel comfortable with/go to a different one. Then the situation escalated until partisanship occurred, i.e., all of them became partisan to a scholar, such that they would start to have enmity and would not sit with each other?
Al-Albaani: Of course, this is not permitted in Islaam. We always say that there is no partisanship in Islaam. Islaam forbids this factionalism.
Because this person who clings to the opinion of a certain scholar and that other person who holds on to the opinion of a different scholar–neither this scholar nor that other one are infallible as the Prophets and Messengers were.
For this reason the Muslims should live upon mutual love and [by giving] advice one to another and not show partisanship to any person in the world, except one–and that is the Prophet of Allaah صلى الله عليه وآله وسلم.
The most a Muslim can do is to trust in a scholar, [trust] in his knowledge, and the fact that he is, for example, distant from the vanities of this world and from jobs in the government which very often are the cause in leading an employee to deviate from the knowledge which he calls the people to.
So when a Muslim sees that a scholar is more knowledgeable, has more taqwaa and so on than another, there is no objection to him taking the opinion of that scholar but without slandering the other one.
So it is [a must] for them to be … as is said, believers are sincere advisors, [they] advise one other, so when one of them sees that such and such a scholar is more knowledge than so and so, because he presents proofs and evidences and so on … so that they come together and do not be enemies.
The important thing is that partisanship has been forbidden in Islaam through the text of the Noble Quraan, because it leads to the division, hatred and enmity that I have mentioned. And Allaah, the Mighty and Majestic, says, "And do not be of those who associate others with Allaah. [Or] of those who have divided their religion and become sects, every faction rejoicing in what it has." Ruum 30:31-32
And in an authentic hadith in Muslim and others, [there occurs], "… do not hate each other, and do not desert [cut your relations with] one another. And be brothers as Allaah ordered you to be …" or as he said عليه الصلاة والسلام.
So this is how the Muslims must live, especially under these regimes which try to turn them away from their religion and their manners.
On Harshness | 11 | Self-Conceited Student of Knowledge, how dare you issue a fatwaa?
So it is [a must] for him to actualise this aayah, "So ask the people of the message if you do not know."
For the example of these people who are not from the people of knowledge or from those capable of passing verdicts and yet have the audacity to [actually] issue religious verdicts [fatwas] is like that of the man who the Prophet عليه السلام supplicated against by asking Allaah the Mighty and Majestic to destroy him because he passed a religious verdict which led to the death of an innocent Muslim soul.
You know this hadith which Abu Dawud reported in his Sunan, that the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم sent out an expedition where they fought, evening came and went and in the morning one of them got up after having had a wet dream, he also had a great many wounds on his body. He asked the people with him if they thought he had a concession not to take a bath from ritual impurity. They replied saying that he must take a bath, so he did but died.
When news of this reached Allaah's Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم he supplicated against him [i.e., against the one who issued the verdict], saying, "They killed him, may Allaah kill them! Why did they not ask if they did not know? Verily, the cure for ignorance is to ask …" The student of knowledge must always and forever keep this hadith before his eyes so that he does not dare to deliver a religious verdict and so be afflicted with the same thing that the man whom the Prophet supplicated against was afflicted with, when he supplicated that Allaah the Blessed and Most High kill him.
And from what has preceded it comes to light that the bad consequences of being bold in giving fatwas affect the mufti firstly, and the one whom the ruling applies to, secondly.
Thus, once this meaning has established itself in the students of knowledge who have not attained familiarity with the Book and the Sunnah and [nor with] following up the statements of the Imaams and comparing them and choosing the strongest one amongst them, but [who have] only [learnt] how to say, 'I think such and such … I understand it to be like this …'—then let these people free themselves from/avoid both of these calamities which I just pointed to: firstly, that they themselves fall into a mistake, and [secondly] that they cause others to err.
And that is [achieved] by asking the people of knowledge and after that it is not their responsibility as to whether the one who issued the fatwa was mistaken or not. Because if he is correct, then how excellent, and if he made a mistake then the sin is on the one who issued it–so instead of him bearing the responsibility himself because he gave a verdict without knowledge and [as a result also] embroiled [in the problem] the one he gave the verdict to, [a verdict] not based upon knowledge, let him leave that sin for someone else …
And this does not mean that our youth, in their asking the people of knowledge, do not try to seek information about one scholar or another–between a mere claimant to knowledge and a true scholar, between a scholar of a madhhab and those ignorant of the Book and the Sunnah, and this is another issue.
What is important is that he asks those in whose knowledge and religion he trusts, when he does so he will not fall into the problem which that person who gave the verdict that the injured Companion had to take a bath fell into, and because of his ignorance of the Sunnah, he did not give the [correct] fatwa that it was [in fact] permissible for him to perform tayammum because water was harmful to him. And it really did harm him and was the cause of his death.
So this is a statement [I've made] and maybe I've prolonged it but I hope that Allaah the Mighty and Majestic will give us the tawfiq to act upon beneficial knowledge and that He makes us aware of our own worth and that He does not make us from those who are self-conceited, for self-importance is a pitfall, there being no greater trap than it.
On Harshness | 10 | Thousands of Companions, and only two hundred scholars? And today? 'I performed ijtihaad and came to the conclusion that …'
And I also see [it appropriate] that I mention that today we have been afflicted with the opposite of what we were put to test with in past generations. In the past we were afflicted with the rigidity of the scholars, let alone the students of knowledge, let alone the general masses, we were tested with the blind following of the madhhabs. And the Muslims continued in this rigidity for many a long generation.
Now there is a return, there is a blessed awakening to go back to the Book and the Sunnah, and there is no doubt that it has produced its ripe fruit–but now it's the opposite of that [initial] affair that we complain about. We used to complain about rigidity but now we [must] complain about uninhibitedness [i.e., dashing ahead].
"… 'I think that … my opinion is that … I think that this statement is incorrect …' and he interferes in every major and minor issue–all the while not being able to read a hadith correctly …"
Everyone who hears a statement from the Book or the Sunnah … not understanding anything from the Book and the Sunnah except a few phrases and words which he hears from some of the callers [daa'ees]–words which may be true and some of which may be incorrect … because of that [i.e., the few phrases he may have picked up, some of which are correct and some of which are not] he sees himself as having become a scholar, it being permissible [now] for him to say, 'I think that … my opinion is that … I think that this statement is incorrect …' and he interferes in every major and minor issue–all the while not being able to read a hadith correctly.
This [situation] has its dangers. And if the affair, and this is my personal opinion, if the affair hinges between following one of the four madhhabs and being rigid on it and between every Muslim becoming a claimant to knowledge and to ijtihaad, then there is no doubt that remaining upon what the forefathers were upon in following the madhhabs and discarding the opinions of the ignorant ones who have not studied any knowledge, is better. And this is by way of choosing the lesser of two evils.
A wise person or an author from Iraq made a very beautiful statement …, he said, "That I make ijtihaad and err is more beloved to me than for me to perform taqleed and be correct," he said, "I only said, '… more beloved to me …' and not that it is better because a mistake is not better than a correct answer."
For this reason, we have to advise our brothers who share with us in the da'wah and in adopting the Book and the Sunnah not to be deceived by themselves or by some of the pieces of information that they have learnt from others and which were not [acquired] through their own personal study.
For in relation to others this opens up a door [leading to criticism] concerning us which we will have no way of answering; for they raise an objection saying that we permit those who, as they say here in Syria, '… cannot differentiate between a long stick and the [Arabic] letter alif [even though both are straight] …'
Without doubt, this is a fault attributed to the Salafi da'wah but there is [also] no doubt that the Salafi da'wah does not approve of the adoption of personal opinions emanating from people who are not students of knowledge, and who, even if they are, have not yet matured or become fully developed in knowledge.
For this reason, I recommend that these people do not become conceited by their own opinions and that they seek the assistance of the people of knowledge, for the Quraan, as you know, divided the people into two categories: a scholar and a non-scholar.
And the situation was like this in all of the past generations, especially the first, the most illuminated generation, that of the Prophet عليه السلام. So the people used to be of two categories [like we said], the scholar and the layman, and this is what Allaah the Mighty and Majestic referred to in His Saying, "So ask the people of the message if you do not know." Nahl 16:43
Ibn al-Qayyim and others say that from amongst the Companions the scholars who would issue religious verdicts [fatwas] barely reached two hundred in number, two hundred scholars–they were not like the millions, maa shaa Allaah, of Muslims today where each one has an opinion to give, [saying], 'I have an opinion that …'–[no,] the thousands upon thousands of other Companions would not have each one putting forward his opinion, but they would, rather, implement His Saying, the Most High, "So ask the people of the message if you do not know."
And so based upon this aayah, it is obligatory to spread this reality among our Salafi youth and to cause them to live by it, such that they always and forever have before their eyes the fact that [if you are a scholar then] you perform ijtihaad and understand the Book and the Sunnah, and if you are not a scholar then it is not your obligation to say: 'I think such and such …,' 'I performed ijtihaad and came to the conclusion that …,' whether that be in declaring hadith to be authentic when you are not from the people [scholars] of Hadith, or whether it is in deriving a ruling and you are not from the faqeehs.
And due to this, when the Prophet صلى الله عليه وعلى آله وسلم sent Mu'aadh ibn Jabal and Abu Musa al-Ash'ari, may Allaah be pleased with them both, to Yemen, he counselled them with the following, "Be easy going and do not be harsh, give glad tidings and do not put people off, cooperate and do not be divided." [Muslim no. 4526, the Shaikh mentioned a shorter wording].
So all of this and what was mentioned before makes us pay heed to the fact that we should be forbearing and easy-going with the people.
And as I say on this occasion and how often I do say this: our call, walhamdulillaah, is the true call, and the people are heedless of the truth.
The truth in and of itself is heavy on the people, so it is enough of a burden on them that we call them to this truth which is [already] heavy on them. The burden of the truth is enough for them [to try and handle]. And this is what should deter and prevent us from adding to this load on them by our use of a harsh manner in calling them to the truth.
For when harsh manners are added to the intensity of the truth and its burden upon the people … if calling the people [to the truth] is accompanied by the intensity of the truth and its burden on them–and this is something correct, then it is not befitting that we add another burden to this one–which is not correct, [for] then this second burden [i.e., harsh manners] will be a hindrance for the people from accepting this truth which is weighty in and of itself, as He the Most High said, "Indeed, We will cast upon you a heavy word." Muzzammil 75:5
For this reason, part of what he عليه السلام said to Mu'aadh in the incident where he prolonged his recitation in the Ishaa prayer which led one of the Ansaar to cut off his prayer behind him, pray on his own and then go home, leaving the Jamaa'ah–so when this news reached Mu'aadh he was severe in his attack upon this Ansaari, such that he said about him, 'He is a hypocrite.'
And Mu'aadh, may Allaah be pleased with him, made this statement based upon the general principle which Ibn Mas'ood mentioned in his long hadith reported in Sahih Muslim, 'None would remain behind from the prayer in congregation except a hypocrite,' and likewise there is another hadith [which mentions] that the person who is in the mosque and hears the call to prayer but then leaves is a hypocrite.
[So] Mu'aadh used this general principle [when making his statement] concerning that person, and he was mistaken in doing so.
Because that man did not leave the prayer due to him following [his] desires but rather due to an excuse he had which he clarified to the Prophet عليه السلام when he complained of Mu'adh to him.
So the Prophet عليه السلام sent for Mu'aadh as is known and he عليه السلام said to him, "Do you want to cause fitnah, O Mu'aadh? Do you want to cause fitnah, O Mu'aadh? Do you want to cause fitnah, O Mu'aadh? It is enough for you to recite, 'By the sun and its brightness,' 'By the night as it envelops,' and surahs like it and when one of you leads the people in prayer let him make it light,' [Bukhaari and Muslim] to the end of the hadith.
So the point is that hardness and harshness harm the da'wah, and we, regretfully, notice about many of our brothers that every time the newer this person is to the da'wah the rougher he is in it, because he thinks that harshness helps the da'wah, whereas the reality is that it harms it and in this regard His Saying, the Mighty and Majestic, is enough for you, "And if you had been rude [in speech] and harsh in heart, they would have disbanded from about you." Aali-Imraan 3:159
On Harshness | 8 | Be Gentle
Questioner: What do you think about giving some general advice, O Shaikh, to the callers, namely, an advice about how to call to the establishment of a correct scholarly, methodology in Jordan?
Al-Albaani: Before everything, it is obligatory on our brothers who are eager to follow the Book and the Sunnah to study it in a precise, scholarly manner, with perception and the correct understanding, and [careful] deliberation from basing [one's knowledge] on the personal opinions of those who regard themselves as having become from the students of this noble pursuit.
And in addition to studying this knowledge, it is also obligatory that every student be keen to act upon what he has learnt, so that his knowledge not be a proof against him on one hand, and so that Allaah, the Blessed and Most High, benefits the people through his knowledge [on the other].
Thereafter it is fitting that a third point be noted, which is that when we want to call the people to the guidance and light that He has bestowed upon us it is obligatory that we be gentle and not severe/harsh with them and that we do not make it appear to them as though we are more special than them due to this knowledge.
We have to regard all of the people who we see as being far from the prophetic guidance صلى الله عليه وعلى آله وسلم as being ill. And there is no doubt that the non-physical illness sickness is more severe and harmful than the bodily one.
And if a medical doctor is supposed to treat his patients with kindness, such that many of them say that some patients become better just by hearing kind words from their doctor, then how much more so and how much more deserving it is that the student of knowledge, who has undertaken [the responsibility of] directing and guiding the people to following the Sunnah and following what the Righteous Predecessors were upon, be gentle in calling them, soft when dealing with them.
And if the Prophet صلى الله عليه وعلى آله وسلم reproached [the noble] lady Aishah, may Allaah be pleased with her, when she was stern when returning the greeting to that Jew who had visited the Prophet صلى الله عليه وعلى آله وسلم and who wickedly said when giving salaam, 'As-Saam alaikum,' [i.e., death be upon you]. So his salaam was not clear[ly recognisable] as being the salaam said by the Muslims and nor was it clear that it was a supplication for death upon the Chief of the Messengers. The Jew did not say it clearly and openly, and naturally, he would not have dared to have addressed the Prophet عليه السلام when the state [i.e., power] was his at that time, by saying, 'As-Saam alaikum,' [openly].
But due to the ignominy and the spite and the disbelief in the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم that was in the Jew's heart, he did not give the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم as-salaam which is one of the Names of Allaah, the Mighty and Majestic, as occurs in an authentic hadith, but [instead] he mumbled it and said, 'As-Saam alaikum.' And it goes without saying that that would not be hidden from the Prophet صلى الله عليه وعلى آله وسلم, so he عليه السلام, replied to him briefly, extremely concisely by saying, 'Wa alaikum,' ['… and upon you …'].
As for the [noble] lady Aishah, who was behind the hijab, no sooner had she heard this twisted phrase coming from that Jew than she said, 'And upon you be death and curses and the Anger [of Allaah], [you] brothers of apes and pigs!' So when the Jew left, the Prophet عليه السلام said, 'What is this, O Aaishah?' She said, 'O Prophet of Allaah! Didn't you hear what he said?' He said to her, 'Didn't you hear what I said, O Aaishah?'–and here is the point being proven–'There is no gentleness in a thing but it adorns it, and it is not removed from something but it mars it.' Bukhari no. 6602
So if the Prophet عليه السلام was like this with someone who spoke to that Jew in that stern way, i.e., Aaishah may Allaah be pleased with her–and she had the right to because she understood from the Jew's statement that he was supplicating for death upon the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم–what then should our stance be towards our brothers who at the very least share with us in the two Shahaadahs?
There is no doubt that we must be kind and not harsh with them.
PDF: An Advice to the Salafis to Show Kindness and Softness and to Reject Disunity and Differences … and to Leave the Unlegislated Type of Boycotting
Here is the PDF version of all the separate posts in one place. If you want to save it, right click on the link and go to 'Save Link/Target As':
Harshness.
On Harshness | 7 | Justified and Exaggerated Accusations of Harshness Against the Salafis
Questioner: In the talks of the brother Kamaal, he described the Salafis as having harshness and not being kind, so I don't know, do you think … that this feature is the one most common, the Saved Sect inshaa Allaah they are the strangers, or is it a characteristic of some people and what is your advice regarding this issue?
Al-Albaani: By Allaah my brother, I believe that there is a basis for this accusation but that it is exaggerated. We cannot free ourselves from faults such as this but I also think that the opponents of the da'wah exaggerate its extent.
And there are reasons for that some of which are from the nature of the jamaa'ah [itself], and some of them are from the nature of its opponents. If there is a jamaa'ah ordering the good and forbidding the evil from the generality of Muslims then it is this group.
For this reason when they urge the enjoining of good and forbiddance of evil it appears to those other people who are overly lenient in upholding this obligation [themselves] that there is harshness and extremism is in it.
For this reason the oppressive international disbelieving media calls these [so called] extremists, 'fundamentalists', because they are distinct from the others due to the fact that they are very eager for their Islaam and their religion to be a judge on earth, so this is what is connected to the reality of these strangers or the people of creed or the saved sect.
Another thing which may be a fault in them or some of them and no group or jamaa'ah is free of this, is that at times harshness may emanate from them which should not do so, but then this is exaggerated and then all who follow this correct methodology become included in it, and thus the matter moves from reality to imagination.
So for these two reasons, one of which is connected to the reality of these people who uphold this obligation which others do not uphold except the very few who are rare, and the other which is connected to their opponents who are not happy with this methodology which they tread upon especially when they are trying to tackle issues which those other [overly-lenient] people regard as secondary issues, this is what they call it [i.e., 'secondary' issues] when they are being soft, for otherwise they have called it [by names such as] 'trivial' and they say it is a cause for disunity … and so on …
So this is what I see to be an answer to your question.
On Harshness | 6 | An Advice to the Salafis to Show Kindness and Softness: Chasing Each Other's Faults
Many times severing ties and harshness occur due to suspicions and mistaken impressions crossing one's mind regarding one's Muslim brother. So this hadith which is the last [to be mentioned] came along to warn and forbid us from having bad suspicions of a Muslim.
So he عليه الصلاة والسلام said, 'Beware of suspicion, for it is the worst of false tales and don't look for the other's faults and don't spy, and don't hate each other, and don't desert [cut your relations with] one another. O Allaah's slaves, be brothers!' Bukhaari 6724
In the first part of the hadith he forbids us from having evil suspicions of a Muslim brother and further clarifies that by saying that it is the worst of false tales, that you [for example] say, 'So and so is like this, so and so is like that,' [it is the worst of false tales because] you have no proof from Allaah the Mighty and Majestic for what you say, and if you did have a proof which permitted you to have evil suspicions about your brother then it is [still] not allowed to backbite him.
Rather, as we stated at the beginning of this lecture, it is upon you to advise him and guide him and direct him to that course which you see is in accordance with the Legislation.
And oftentimes this evil suspicion will push the one harbouring it to commit these violations which the Prophet عليه السلام mentioned along with the prohibition of having evil suspicions about a Muslim when he said, '…and don't spy …' '… don't look for the other's faults [tahassus] and don't spy [tajassus] …'
Tajassus is to follow after a Muslim's mistakes in order to defame him and slander him and vilify him. As for tahassus then some scholars say that both these words [i.e., tajassus and tahassus] have the same meaning, but the reality is that tahassus [i.e., 'looking for the other's faults'] has a meaning which differs from that of tajassus [i.e., 'spying on'] because sometimes it is not correct to use the word tajassus in place of tahassus, for in the Noble Quraan there is the saying of Ya'qoob عليه السلام to his sons, '… go and find out [tahassasu] about Joseph …' Yusuf 12:87
So tahassus is running after someone's news, and listening to it, so here it is as though tahassus is more specific than tajassus.
Tahassus can be regarding something good and bad, but as for tajassus then it is only regarding evil. In this hadith the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم prohibited both things, he prohibited chasing up people's affairs and spying, for affairs are judged by their intent, so if the purpose behind tahussus is to attain some good then there is no harm in it, as for tajassus then there is no good in it whatsoever, for this reason it is not allowed for a Muslim to follow up on and listen to what a Muslim says with the intent of chasing up his mistakes and hidden matters, and to land him in something he would not like.
'Don't spy and don't be envious of one another,' why does a person envy his Muslim brother?
This is something which most regrettably a person–almost–has a natural propensity for, and I say 'almost', because I do not believe that Allaah created a person with a natural disposition to envy his Muslim brother, that is why I said, 'a person–almost–has a natural propensity for …' [but I said this] due to just how much jealousy [does in fact] overcome the people.
And the reality is that this disease, jealousy, is a chronic one and how often it emerges amongst the wealthy–whether rich in material gains or wealthy in terms of knowledge. So the person who is rich in materials gains is envied by those like him, and the wealthy in knowledge is envied by those like him, and then that results in being a cause for hatred and envious people to enter.
And the Prophet عليه السلام said, educating/disciplining us, '…and don't look for the other's faults and don't spy, and don't hate each other, and don't desert [cut your relations with] one another. O Allaah's slaves, be brothers as Allaah the Blessed and Most High ordered you to,' i.e., in His Saying, the Most High, 'And hold firmly to the rope of Allaah all together and do not become divided.' Aali-Imraan 3:103
So this was a speech and exhortation which I hope Allaah the Blessed and Most High will cause to be of benefit, and [I hope] that He grants us true brotherhood and friendship which we are all in need of actualising.
We ask Allaah the Mighty and Majestic to aid us in obeying Him in all that He has ordered.
Glory is to You, O Allah, and praise is to You. I bear witness that there is none worthy of worship but You. I seek Your forgiveness and repent to You.
On Harshness | 5 | An Advice to the Salafis to Show Kindness and Softness: The Threat Associated with Boycotting
And there are some authentic hadiths which we are also in need of remembering practically and not [leaving it at] just [being acquainted with them] as a notion or a piece of knowledge, and [one of them is] his saying عليه الصلاة والسلام, "Do not hate one another, and do not be jealous of one another; and do not desert [cut your relations with] each other, and O Allaah's worshippers! Be brothers. Lo! It is not permissible for any Muslim to desert [not talk to] his brother [Muslim] for more than three days.'" Bukhari no.6065
Why does he ostracise him? Out of hatred and jealousy, not for a legislated reason, not because he disobeyed Allaah and His Messenger; rather the worst that can be said is that: [the person being boycotted] disobeyed Allaah and His Messenger due to what the person arguing with him holds to be a misunderstanding, but he didn't openly proclaim disobedience, he did not believe that this [i.e., what he was doing] was a sin yet despite that [it is possible that] he is disobeying Allaah the Mighty and Majestic, so then [because of that] one of us comes along and boycotts him.
There is no doubt that this boycotting is legislated but cutting off from one another due to a difference in views and in understanding is the turning away from one another which is prohibited in the first part of this hadith, "Do not hate one another, and do not be jealous of one another; and do not desert [cut your relations with] each other …" Additionally, this characteristic or type of manners, i.e., being jealous of one another is something which has spread amongst our Salafi brothers.
So at times in some areas there will be a dispute over who will give a speech or lesson … 'No, I have more right!' 'No, he does!' Yaa Jamaa'ah, fear Allaah regarding yourselves.
If there is someone who has some knowledge and he wants to share what he knows amongst the people then leave him and let him speak and aid him in that. Do not look at each other to gain superiority and by being arrogant towards him because you see him to be less than you in terms of knowledge, and he may see the situation to be the opposite to you, and thus dissension and conflict begin.
And as a result of that these issues which the Prophet عليه السلام forbade in the authentic hadith occur, "Do not hate one another, and do not be jealous of one another; and do not desert [cut your relations with] each other, and O Allaah's worshippers! Be brothers. Lo! It is not permissible for any Muslim to desert [not talk to] his brother [Muslim] for more than three days.'"
It is obligatory to sever this boycotting and end it.
This hadith, in reality, is from the Mercy of Allaah the Mighty and Majestic upon His servants, because He did not forbid boycotting absolutely, but left open the opportunity for some sick souls to vent their anger and spite and jealousy within three days. It suffices a person to vent his anger through these three days, he has been allowed to do that. But if he exceeds that [time limit] then he has done something haraam.
And as occurs in some authentic hadiths, by exceeding the three days in which the Legislator has permitted him to boycott, he would deserve to enter the Fire, in another hadith [there occurs], 'It is not allowed for a Muslim to boycott his brother for more than three. They meet and so this one turns away from that one, and that one from this. And the best of them is the one who initiates giving the salutation to his brother,' i.e., if it is difficult for this Muslim who has, allowably, cut off from his brother for three days, but at the same time he has not forgotten the severe threat from the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم that it is not allowed for him to continue in that for more than three days, [if it is difficult for him] then the least that [can be done] … to actualise amicability between the two people who have cut off from each other after three days … immediately, straightaway it is enough to escape from this threat for him to initiate giving his brother salaam. Then after that salaam some talking will occur and after that talking some friendship … and so on. And as is said, 'Rains start with a drop, and then pours forth.'
So nothing less than a Muslim taking the initiative to give salaam to his brother who he had boycotted on the third day and in that is an escape from the threat that accompanies boycotting … for three days.
Listen along with me to this prophetic saying from the Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم and the threat it contains for the one who cuts off from his brother without a just cause, he صلى الله عليه وسلم said, 'The Gates of Paradise are opened every Monday and Thursday, and every servant who does not associate anything with Allaah is forgiven …' We rejoice at this, 'Because we are the callers to tawheed, and we are the ones who raise the banner of calling to tawheed, and to eliminating any form of shirk with Allaah,' so we then assume that we will enter Paradise without any reckoning or punishment, [like a flight] 'in transit' as is said today, because we are monotheists who do not associate anything in worship with Allaah–but this is not the case [i.e., we are not guaranteed Paradise].
Listen to this hadith and comprehend it and try to follow it as your model in your life, 'The Gates of Paradise are opened every Monday and Thursday, and every slave who does not associate anything with Allaah is forgiven, except a man between whom and his brother is a grudge. It is said, 'Wait for these two until they reconcile. Wait for these two until they reconcile. Wait for these two until they reconcile,' i.e., wait for them and do not forgive them until they reconcile and return to being brothers, '… on thrones facing each other.' Ibrahim 15:47
'The Gates of Paradise are opened every Monday and Thursday, and every slave who does not associate anything with Allaah is forgiven, except a man between whom and his brother is a grudge. It is said, 'Wait for these two until they reconcile. Wait for these two until they reconcile. Wait for these two until they reconcile,' then in another hadith he عليه السلام said, 'There are three whose prayer does not rise more than a hand span above their heads: A man who leads people [in prayer] when they do not like him; a woman who has spent the night with her husband angry with her; and two brothers who have severed contact with one another,' i.e., cut off from one another, harbouring mutual enmity.
So the evil effect of boycotting, ostracising and leaving one another without a legislated justification apart from a difference in opinion is that [one's] prayer is not raised to Allaah and is not accepted, as He the Most High said, "To Him ascends good speech, and righteous work raises it." Faatir 35:10
So the prayer of these two who have severed contact with one another is not raised up to Allaah the Blessed and Most High.
On Harshness | 4 | An Advice to the Salafis to Show Kindness and Softness: Revelation did not Come Down upon You
The First Point: That we should bear in mind–that every one of us should keep in mind that revelation did not come down upon him regarding the opinion he holds, and that it is possible that he is mistaken and the person he is arguing and debating with is correct.
When a person discusses [an issue] with him, each one of us should spontaneously bring to mind the fact that we are not infallible, whatever one's level from amongst us is, whether he is learning or a scholar.
How often the statement of the scholars is proven to be correct, 'There can be found in the inferior person, what is not found in the superior.' It is possible that the scholar is mistaken and the student is correct. The student maybe incorrect and the illiterate one who does not know may be correct.
Summoning this reality makes a person careful and causes him to stop at the truth [not being arrogant and rejecting it when it is pointed out by] the person he is having a discussion with.
And this is a type of manners taken from the Noble Quran, because Allaah the Mighty and Majestic mentioned in His Book that the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم used to address his people, who were polytheists–and what a difference there is between the polytheists in their misguidance and the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and his Companions in their eemaan–yet along with that Allaah the Mighty and Majestic taught him this lofty [part of] manners which we expressed as tolerance, so He said in the Noble Quran, "And indeed, we or you are either upon guidance or in clear error. Say, 'You will not be asked about what we committed, and we will not be asked about what you do.'" Saba 34:24-25
So this is the highest degree of tolerance during a debate, it does not mean a Muslim relinquishes his belief but in it is an assumption that one of the two groups is on the truth and the other is upon misguidance.
Who is this group [which is on misguidance]? He did not specify it here but whenever he calls them to having faith, telling them that if they disbelieve in what he صلى الله عليه وسلم has brought from Allaah the Mighty and Majestic, then, "Indeed, you [disbelievers] and what you worship other than Allaah are the firewood of Hell. You will be coming to [enter] it," Anbiyaa 21:98 [this is] when he declares his belief to them and explains their lot if they continue to oppose him صلى الله عليه وسلم.
[But] when he debates with them he صلى الله عليه وسلم says, "And indeed, we or you are either upon guidance or in clear error." This is how the Prophet عليه الصلاة والسلام addressed the polytheists, so how then should one of us address one of his own?
There is no doubt that he must be humble with him and show him tolerance, and not launch an all-out attack on him and become distant from him as one enemy does from another.
This aayah is very important, and we should remember it well, "And indeed, we or you are either upon guidance or in clear error. Say, 'You will not be asked about what we committed, and we will not be asked about what you do.'"
On Harshness | 3 | An Advice to the Salafis to Show Kindness and Softness: The Blessing of Tawheed
The Imaam continues, "Without doubt it was through the sending of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم to them with the Book of Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, and through his clarification/explanation [of it] عليه الصلاة والسلام.
Do you think we have a share in this aayah? We thank Allaah that we have a portion not to be slighted of this aayah where Allaah, the Mighty and Majestic, spoke … especially its middle part [where He said], "And remember the favour of Allaah upon you–when you were enemies and He brought your hearts together and you became, by His favour, brothers."
What is it that brought our hearts together and gathered us together here and there? It is nothing but eemaan in the obligation of returning to the Book and the Sunnah and returning to them for judgement always and forever … such that if something appears which indicates that there will be some difference and disunity, as He, the Most High, said, in the aayah which you all know very well, "And if you disagree over anything, refer it to Allaah and the Messenger, if you should believe in Allaah and the Last Day. That is the best [way] and best in result." Nisaa 4:59 … this is from what Allaah the Blessed and Most High has blessed and favoured us with …
… the Mighty and Majestic addressed us in the generality of the text whereas He addressed the Companions with it specifically, saying, "…And remember the favour of Allaah upon you–when you were enemies and He brought your hearts together and you became, by His favour, brothers. And you were on the edge of a pit of the Fire, and He saved you from it."
We used to be as most of the Muslims today live, and they are Muslims, but the Saying of Allaah the Blessed and Most High applies to a lot of them if not most of them, "And most of them believe not in Allaah except while they associate others with Him." Yusuf 12:106
"… Alhamdulillaah, Allaah the Mighty and Majestic has saved us from shirk, rather from all forms of shirk, so this is from the greatest of blessings upon us …"
So, alhamdulillaah, Allaah the Mighty and Majestic has saved us from shirk, rather from all forms of shirk, so this is from the greatest of blessings upon us. But we have to realise the completion of this blessing upon us by agreeing and not differing, as the beginning of this aayah orders us, "And hold firmly to the rope of Allaah all together and do not become divided."
That which confirms or that which can be a cause to preserve the unity of our ranks and unite our word if something which hints at division occurs, is what I said just now: sincerely advising one another regarding the religion of Allaah the Mighty and Majestic.
But this advice has to be as Allaah the Mighty and Majestic ordered in the following aayah, "Invite to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good instruction, and argue with them in a way that is best. Indeed, your Lord is most knowing of who has strayed from His way, and He is most knowing of who is [rightly] guided." Nahl 16:125
We read this in the Quraan all the time, but how often we, regretfully, leave [the limits set by] this aayah and do not implement it, nor do we call our brothers who share with us in our inclination and this Salafi methodology [based upon it], let alone other than them. Rarely do we follow this way and path which Allaah the Blessed and Most High ordered us with.
"Invite to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good instruction, and argue with them in a way that is best." Arguing in a way that is best requires what we mentioned just now: some tolerance, and this tolerance demands two things from us …"
On Harshness | 2 | An Advice to the Salafis to Show Kindness and Softness and a Mention of the Permitted Religious Tolerance
The Shaikh continued, "It is lamentable that there is some disunity and discord for extremely petty reasons; as such it is obligatory to keep before our eyes what is, in today's language, called, 'religious tolerance,' [at-tassamuh ad-deeni]–but with the meaning which Islaam allows.
'Religious tolerance' can be expanded to an extent which Islaam does not permit, but we know the correct meaning of tolerance; which is if we see that a person who is not a Salafi–let alone if he is a Salafi–has a specific opinion or independent judgement [ijtihaad], or that he really has made a mistake in some of his actions, that we do not rush to scold him and then to boycott him. Rather it is obligatory upon us to traverse the path of giving sincere advice, which was what we started this talk with when we mentioned the hadith, 'The religion is sincerity, the religion is sincerity …'
So if we advise him and he responds to it, then that is what we want, and if he does not respond then there is not any cause [for blame] upon us, and it is not permissible that we rush to ostracise him.
Rather it is [incumbent] upon us to remain with him, persevering in advising him from time to time, and now and then, until he becomes firm and upright on the correct path.
We note in many of our private gatherings let alone others, that an issue with two adversaries will have each one trying to pull the topic to favour himself, he will not present the issue without it being for him or against the other person, as should be the case in discussions to reach the truth as Allaah the Blessed and Most High ordered, and not to show that I, I am the one who is correct and he is not.
"… I will call to mind some texts from the noble aayahs which will benefit us in this regard and take us back, if Allaah wills, to being one hand, one rank, with not a single one of us boycotting any of his brothers, but rather persisting in instructing and advising him …"
As such, on this occasion we must remember that the aayahs and some authentic hadiths, knowledge of which I do not think is hidden from anyone of us, but whose implementation and execution is … for this reason [on this occasion] and using my weak memory, I will call to mind some texts from the noble aayahs which will benefit us in this regard and take us back, if Allaah wills, to being one hand, one rank, with not a single one of us boycotting any of his brothers, but rather persisting in instructing and advising him.
So all of us know the Saying of Allaah, the Mighty and Majestic, "The believers are but brothers, so make settlement between your brothers. And fear Allaah that you may receive mercy." Hujuraat 49:10 Here fearing Allaah is a general order to be distant from every act of disobedience to Allaah the Mighty and Majestic and to His Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم.
From that is following the guidance and light which Allaah the Mighty and Majestic and His Messenger ordered us to follow, likewise from that is what He mentioned before the order to fear Him which was to, "…make settlement between your brothers …" so reconciliation between the brothers should be attempted when there is an indication that there is something which could lead to disunity. And disunity is not restricted only to disagreement in aqidah, but rather to disagreements in the tenets [Ahkaam] of the Legislation which [our] noble Islaam came with.
This aayah, "The believers are but brothers, so make settlement between your brothers. And fear Allaah that you may receive mercy," … so the mercy which we all hope for from Allaah the Blessed and Most High is only obtained by fearing Him, the Mighty and Majestic. For this reason it is [incumbent] upon us to make peace between the differing parties.
Likewise in the Noble Quraan there occurs, "And hold firmly to the rope of Allaah all together and do not become divided. And remember the favour of Allaah upon you–when you were enemies and He brought your hearts together and you became, by His favour, brothers. And you were on the edge of a pit of the Fire, and He saved you from it. Thus does Allaah make clear to you His verses that you may be guided." Aali Imraan 3:103
There is no doubt that this aayah was [initially] directly addressing the Companions of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وآله وسلم, for He addressed them, saying, "… And you were on the edge of a pit of the Fire, and He saved you from it …" through what means was this deliverance [achieved]?
Without doubt it was through …"


text:
Moses and Frances Asch Collection Named to UNESCO's Memory of the World International Register
The Smithsonian's Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage announced that the Moses and Frances Asch Collection has been inscribed to UNESCO's Memory of the World International Register. This unique collection, housed in the Center's Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, includes Folkways Records and features material of both prominent and lesser-known writers, artists, poets, documentarians, ethnographers and musicians from around the world, including Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Pete Seeger, Harry Smith and Langston Hughes.
UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme aims to preserve and promote the world's documentary heritage. The Moses and Frances Asch Collection is the second Smithsonian collection added to the Memory of the World International Register, and one of only eight collections from the United States to be recognized. It joins the John Marshall Ju/'hoan Bushman Film and Video Collection, which was added in 2009 and is maintained by the Smithsonian's Human Studies Film Archives.
"The Moses and Frances Asch Collection serves as a unique testament to the breadth and depth of the 20th-century human experience," said Michael A. Mason, director of the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. "By recognizing its importance, UNESCO continues to support the living legacy of the collection and of our shared cultural heritage."
The Moses and Frances Asch Collection (1926–1987), acquired by the Smithsonian in 1987, includes a diversity of correspondence, audio and visual materials from Folkways Records and other labels founded by Asch. One of the most influential record labels of the 20th century, Folkways Records' 2,168 titles include traditional and contemporary music from around the world, documentary recordings, spoken word in many languages, instructional albums and documentary recordings of individuals, communities and natural sounds. Its albums remain accessible to the public through Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, the Smithsonian's non-profit record label.
Rooted in principles of cultural democracy and social equality, the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage supports the understanding and sustainability of cultural heritage and diversity in communities across the United States and around the world. The Center produces the annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival and Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, maintains and makes accessible the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, produces extensive research and educational materials and promotes cultural heritage policy for the benefit of communities around the world. For more information, visit folklife.si.edu.
Memory of the World: Cub recording
1947 cover for the short-lived Cub label's 78-rpm children's album Songs to Grow On, Smithsonian Institution.
Memory of the World: Em and Jack Elliot
Em and Jack Elliot, circa 1961. From The Elliots of Birtley: A Musical Portrait of a Durham Mining Family, compiled and edited from material collected by Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl, Smithsonian Institution.
Photo by Diana Davies, Smithsonian Institution.
Memory of the World: Moses Asch
Folkways Records founder Moses Asch at work in his office. Photo by Diana Davies, Smithsonian Institution.


text:
Q: How to pass User and LogIn as a parameter to a stored procedure? I have a script that drops the user if it exists and then recreates it. I have this repeated like 30 times. Shown below:
IF EXISTS (SELECT 1 FROM sys.sysusers AS s WHERE s.name = N'johndoe')
BEGIN
    PRINT 'Dropping user johndoe...'
    DROP USER johndoe;
END

CREATE USER [johndoe] FOR LOGIN [uat\johndoe];

I was wondering if it would be possible to write a stored procedure that accepts user name and domain name and then drops and recreates the user? So that I could call like:
EXEC usp_DropAndRecreateUsers @username='johndoe', @domainName='uat'

However, after writing a stored procedure, I realized it wouldn't be as easy as I thought. Which probably is the reason this wasn't already done. But still, is this even possible to do in SQL Server (2008 and above)?
What I did was (which doesn't work):
CREATE PROCEDURE dbo.usp_DropAndRecreateUsers
    (@username varchar(100),
     @domainName varchar(100))
AS
    DECLARE @loginName varchar(200) = '['+@domainName+'\'+@username+']';

    IF EXISTS (SELECT 1 FROM sys.sysusers AS s WHERE s.name = @username)
    BEGIN
        DROP USER @username;
    END

    CREATE USER @username FOR LOGIN @loginName;

Update:
The error is that when I use a parameter in Drop/Create User @username, it is considered as invalid sql statement. The error message reads: Incorrect syntax near '@username'.Expecting ID, or QUOTED_ID.

A: Rather than running from variable, create query and execute it
CREATE PROCEDURE dbo.USP_DROPANDRECREATEUSERS
    (@username varchar(100),
     @domainName varchar(100))
AS
    BEGIN
    DECLARE @loginName varchar(200) = '['+@domainName+'\'+@username+']';
    DECLARE @query VARCHAR(MAX);
    IF EXISTS (SELECT 1 FROM sys.sysusers AS s WHERE s.name = @username)
    BEGIN
        SET @query = 'DROP USER ' + @username;
        EXEC (@query);
    END

    SET @query = 'CREATE USER ' + @username + ' FOR LOGIN ' + @loginName;
    EXEC (@query);
    END

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


It's always a good idea to draw up your living will to best appropriate how your estate will be divided up upon your death. Estate planning is more important now than it has ever been before. In a world that's increasing replete with creditors and money hawks, and in a world where the court systems are backed up for eons, a living will can help you expedite your estate for your loved ones after you are gone, while offering a seam of protection for your assets and appropriating how they will be divided amongst the heirs. Keep reading to learn why your only feasible option is to have an estate planning attorney like Joe B. Garza Dallas Texas pen your living will.
A lot of people mistakenly place their trust in a paralegal to have their will created. This is an aberrant mistake that can actually lead to quite a cavalcade of problems and issues upon their passing. That's because a paralegal only has to attend school for a few years, whereas an attorney generally attends advanced school for a period of six or seven years. The difference here is expertise. An estate planning attorney has the experience and is familiarized with the laws regarding penning an infallible living will; a paralegal is not.
Anybody who has a decently sized portfolio should consider having their will drawn up. Even for persons who do not think that they are worth that much, there are many things to consider. Possessions, debts, portfolio, real estate, investments, the whole nine yards. Without a living will in place, you are basically leaving the discernment of your estate up to the executor. This can make for a messy estate where inheritances are not allotted to the persons of your choosing. Avoid this calamity at all costs. Get your living will in order today, and protect the future of your legacy after you are gone.
Learn more estate planning tips from Dallas, Texas Joe B. Garza.


DNAStar, Inc. has announced the signing of an agreement with the University Michigan that allows the University to use DNAStar's Lasergene software anywhere on its campus for all possible uses.
Sources at DNAStar indicated that it is likely that thousands of researchers at the University of Michigan will use Lasergene based on this agreement.
Lasergene is a comprehensive suite of tools for molecular biologists and geneticists used primarily in the analysis of DNA and protein sequences.
It has been sold in over 65 countries worldwide and the University of Michigan joins a growing list of organizations that are making Lasergene the standard sequence analysis software program for their organization.
"We are thrilled that an institution with the University of Michigan's reputation chose Lasergene as their standard tool for sequence analysis," stated Fred Blattner, DNAStar's co-founder, CEO and President.
"The University of Michigan is a world renowned research institution and they have made a clear choice to standardize their platform on the product that many consider to be the gold standard against which other molecular biology desktop software products are measured."
Tom Schwei, DNAStar's Vice President and General Manager added, "We have recently put a renewed emphasis on site license arrangements with major research institutes."
"With a site license, individual scientists continue to obtain all the benefits of the tool at their desktop."
"In addition, centralized IT managers have easy administration and coordination of needs within the entire institute."
"As more organizations begin to use core facilities and centralize their IT infrastructure, we expect to see an increasing number of arrangements like this in the future."


Many of our clients search for an escape where they can enjoy the finer things in life–a relaxing massage, a good cigar with friends, a game of billiards, darts or even indoor golf on our simulator. We are honored that so many choose The QG and we offer five different membership options to help you make us your home away from home.
All memberships are charged on the first of every month and can be used at both our Downtown Baltimore and Hunt Valley locations. They also include complimentary shoe shines and up to 4 hour valet for $8 at our Baltimore location.
10% off off additional barber services after credit has been applied.
reduced rates for the Indoor Golf Simulator at $10 per hour.
Discounted rate on additional spa services within you membership after credit has been applied.
Members will receive exclusive access to the lounge, their own smoking jacket, a personalized humidor locker, complimentary/discounted admission to cigar events, 10% off all cigars and accessories, An additional 10% off cigar box counts over 20, and a access to the clubhouse including benefits.
10% off of all drinks at CLOCK Restoration.
Access to clubhouse for you and guests, reduced rates for private rental of space.
Complimentary monthly meal and cocktail (must be redeemed in tandem and does not carry over). Can be redeemed at front desk or bar.
The master membership is a culmination of all previous memberships. With the ability to curate your membership with services that help you be your best self. Includes the Barbershop, Spa, and Cigar Lounge (or Wine Club) memberships and benefits.
Your base membership includes : Monthly hair cut or head shave, monthly 1 hour massage or facial, and Cigar Lounge or Wine Club locker.


AN ACT MAKING AN APPROPRIATION FOR EXPENSES OF THE EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT, BEING THE GOVERNOR'S OFFICE AND STAFF, AND FOR EXPENSES INCIDENTAL TO THE PROPER OPERATION OF THE GOVERNOR'S MANSION AND RESIDENCE OF THE GOVERNOR, FOR FISCAL YEAR 2004.
July 1, 2003, and ending June 30, 2004.........$ 150,812.00.
to the proper operation of the Governor's Mansion and residence of the Governor for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2003, and ending June 30, 2004. $ 400,993.00.


It was an awful day. At least that's how my narcissistic self was perceiving that specific Friday. I had failed another Statistics exam, after studying for three days in a row. I had just started fighting with my mom through Skype because my rent was too high – I used to leave the lights on at all times in my apartment. I know, don't judge me. And last but not least, I was having some drama with a group of friends from my floor. All I wanted was a freaking iced-latte and some sweet dessert. So, I decided to take the bus to the mall and sit in the really cute coffee shop inside.
However, due to the horrendous weather, the bus got delayed by a couple of minutes so I was forced to sit and wait and wait and wait! At time I was unaware that these minutes were going to change my college-mentality completely and would wake me up from my superficial and self-centered fantasies.
While I was sitting down, an old lady approached me. She asked, "Why are you sad?" Honestly, I didn't want to respond. I grabbed my phone and pretended I was texting people to avoid her. But she stayed there waiting for my response, so I looked up and said, "Nothing, it's alright." But while responding I noticed the lady had no teeth, her hair was pretty messy, she was a hunchback and the old dress she was wearing had a couple of holes. Nonetheless, despite all of these imperfections, she looked extremely happy and curious at the same time.
She asked, "Why are you sad?" Honestly, I didn't want to respond.
After all of her words, I was pretty ashamed of myself. She was completely true. My problems were so superficial in comparison to her problems. In that exact moment, I understood how lucky I was to even by waiting for a bus to drop me off at a mall so that I could purchase a nice dessert for myself. I was more than lucky to be living in a nice apartment with some of my closest friends, and even more lucky to be studying at one of the most prestigious schools in America! Since that day, I've learned to appreciate all of the occurrences that happen in my life, from the very small things to the huge things; from the failures to the accomplishments, because not everyone gets the chance to open doors like these ones!
Keep up with Isabella on Instagram, @isarolz!


text:
Bayonetta 3 Creator Insists it is Still On the Way!
Back in 2017, it was confirmed that a brand new game from the exceptionally popular Bayonetta franchise was on the way and, more so, that it would retain the somewhat tradition of being a Nintendo exclusive. Well, at least on its initial launch. – Since then, however, news on the game has been exceptionally limited and it even got the point that last year the creator of the game, Hideki Kamiya, felt compelled to take to social media to tell people to stop asking if the game had been canceled.
Following a report via Eurogamer, we do have some news on Bayonetta 3, albeit it isn't perhaps as detailed as you might have hoped.
Speaking in an interview, Bayonetta creator, Hideki Kamiya, confirmed that he is indeed still working on the third instalment in the franchise and, as per the original remit, it is still intended to be an exclusive launch for the Nintendo Switch. – Taking things a step further, however, while he wasn't able to reveal anything specific at the time, he did go onto confirm that some kind of announcement surrounding the game will be made at some point this year.
"I'm happy that there's still anticipation for the title, but one thing I would like to address is the trend I'm seeing which is people who are starting to ask if the game has been cancelled. I want you guys to take any concerns you have like that and throw them out the window immediately because we're still hard at work on it and it hasn't been cancelled by any means. Please look forward to it!"
What Do We Think?
So, something is coming this year from Bayonetta 3, but based on the comments made, I don't think we should get too excited that the game will definitely be released this year. I mean, sure, it's possible, but at the same time, based on the comments made, it may simply be a trailer with a launch date set for early 2022.
Given how absolutely amazing Bayonetta 1 and 2 were, however, I daresay that many of you who absolutely adored those games are eagerly anticipating the next addition. At the same time though, perhaps they (or you) can be willing to wait a bit longer for it to be done and done well if, after all, Hideki Kamiya is still pretty adamant that work is ongoing with it! – Which is it, so don't ask him if the game has been canceled!
Topics: bayonetta, Games, gaming, Nintendo, Nintendo Switch