2019 Jan class notes by DJ 17 Year old male
Notes of class of Jan 27 submitted 2/1/19 by DJ Male Age 17 (unedited)
Last Sunday on January 27th, I went to the Green stairs academy class for my weekly studying. When I first entered the class, everyone was sitting on the ground or either praying and some type of desi music was playing in the background very softly.
My teacher told me to pray two rakat’s of prayer and deeply focus on the prayer and ignore all worldly things while doing it. While I was praying, I tried to focus deeply in my prayer and I felt as if I was In front of god.
After we all finished our prayer, we all sat down and started our testing and practice session. We did this for around 30 minutes but I did not test and I practiced instead. I have already gotten half of the prayer memorized in both Arabic and English all the way up to the tashahhud. I just need to finish the prayer and next week hopefully I will be ready to test out the entire prayer in both Arabic and English.
After our testing session, we had our lecture given by our teacher. In the lecture we talked about what happened in the news and one of the news was that In India, a man raped a three year old girl. We talked about how disgusting and heinous this crime was and why is it so prevalent. We also talked about how in some parts of the world, rape and abuse crimes going unnoticed or the perpetrator is never brought to justice. The reason why this is, is because in some cultures if a women tells someone that she had been raped or abused, instead of helping here, they will shame her because she has damaged the honor of her family. This type of culture is very prevalent in the Middle East, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India. We also talked about the concept of revenge such as killing someone who has murdered a member of your family. This is common in the cultures of the Middle East, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
After talking about the news we switched the conversation and we talked about Islam and philosophy. I learned a lot during this conversation and it was very helpful. I learned that all men are created equal is the premise of Islam and not one is considered below. I also learned power, passion, and poverty is a cancer upon mankind and one must not fall into it and must live a humble and respectful life.
I also learned the internet is a place where you can view anything and this is very dangerous because you can easily commit sins and become closer to the shaytan.
I also learned that society judges you by the way you dress and look instead of judging you as a person in terms of behavior and unfortunately this is very prevalent in our society. The Quran also says to stay away from bad things because it will lead you to do bad things.
Lastly I learned that the best books to read about the Prophet Muhammad, is by Karen Armstrong because she is one of the very few non-Muslims who writes a honest and good biography of the Prophet Muhammad.
After our lecture, the leader of our mosque came to visit us to give a lecture. I also learned a lot of things during that lecture and it was very useful. Some things that I learned were that Allah has created us to love him freely and that Allah has created humans to know him.
I also learned the most rewarded Sunnah is a smile and happiness and you should always be a positive person when you interact with other people. I also learned that Ibadah means to worship god and you should always strive to do Ibadah because it will strengthen your faith as a Muslim. I also learned that the Prophet Muhammad said you should value your life and be careful because life is short.
After the Masjid leader left, our class ended and I went home. In conclusion, I learned a lot today in class and it was very helpful in understanding Islam and humanity in general better and I hope I can learn more things next week.
by DJ – male – 1/12/19 – 17 years old – Essay for class of 1/6/19
Last Sunday on January 6th I went to class but I arrived late. When I first entered, I saw everyone was sitting on the ground in a circle and meditating. I also saw a guest who was a middle aged man who looked Turkish I presumed and I thought maybe he was interested in joining this class. Anyways, I took off my shoes and sat down crossed legged with the rest of the class and we listened to some spiritual music. The spiritual music was like a mantra and it kept repeating something like “Allah who” “Allah who”. The reason why we meditate before class is to clear of soul and mind.
I closed my eyes and concentrated deeply and I felt a sense of spiritual calmness fill my mind. After our meditation, we all prayed 2 rakat’s of prayer which was good because I did not pray Fajir prayer early morning on that day. After our prayer, we all sat on chairs and now we had our testing/study lesson which lasted about one hour. During that period, I worked on memorizing my prayer in both Arabic and English. I have far half so far memorized my prayer up to the Tashahhud and I am currently working on memorizing the Tashahhud in English and hopefully I’ll be able to memorize it soon, so I can move on and fully memorized the prayer. I also memorized Al-Asr, Al-Kawthar, and Al-Ikhlaas in English and I also worked on reviewing the prayer in English and working on improving any previous mistakes that I struggle on sometimes.
After that, we had a lecture and I ate some veggie pizza and drank some deer park water. Some of the things that I learned during the lecture was that there was a total of 4 caliphs in Islamic history and I also learned that the Prophet grandson was killed in a city called Karbala which is in Iraq. He was beheaded in the battle of Karbala which was against the Umayyad Caliphate.
I also learned about Zam Zam water and how it contains high PH levels. Zam Zam water is also spiritual water that can cure you if you are sick and an example of this is when our teacher told us one day he gave a Christian Zam Zam water because he was sick and the man drank it and after a few days he was cured. The science of this is that when you give someone something that will try to cure him, there is a 50% chance that he will cured because the perception of his mind thinks he will be cured, so his mind and nervous system increases the effort of his body fighting the disease. After a few days the Christian man became ok. All of this had to do with psychology of the human mind and I found this to be very interesting but I am not sure if this will work on everyone and also will the water work if someone has a very severe disease.
I also learned that the Kaaba was used for pagan purposes by the Arab tribes before Islam came and an interesting thing that I learned was that Shia’s will generally invite Sunni’s to their Mosque, while Sunni’s will generally not and I guess the reason behind this is the Sunni and Shia divide and the dislike of Shia’s which the Sunni’s have a history of. I also learned that the mentality of being a goat and not a sheep is very important because in the real world you must strive to a leader to make the world a better place according to what a true Muslim means. A sheep is someone who is ignorant and does no contribution to society whatsoever. They are the ones that must be told what to do and will not take it upon themselves to work hard in their life’s and strive to become a better human being and a Muslim.
I also learned that Islam teaches a person that they are accountable for their own actions and you must be wise when making decisions because it will affect you in the future. A good example of this is time, which is a very valuable thing that you cannot retain back. So you should not waste anyone’s time because that will noted on the day of judgement. Last thing that I learned was that a human being is not born with religion, they are taught it and your religiosity evolves over time. The more you study about your religion, the more you will understand it and become a more morally good and wiser person.
After the lecture, 3 guests came to visit us. Two of them were former students who came to talk about their experiences and one was someone who wanted to join the program. One of the guests was my teacher’s daughter and she talked about the experiences of being in this program and how good it is. She also talked about her experience as being the daughter of my teacher and his style of parenting. The other guest talked about her experiences in the program to and how it has helped her in college and as an adult. After our discussion, our class time was over and everyone started to leave. I asked my teacher if I can take a book home from his library and he said yes but it had to be a non-Islamic book because he needs them. I toke a book about U.S.M.C sniping which my teacher brought from one of his friends. I found the book to be interesting and decided to take it because I like reading and I have an interest in books about history and the military. After that, my parents came to pick me up and I went home. In conclusion, I learned a lot in class and I hope to use the knowledge that I learned in my own life as a Muslim American and as a human being.