Malaysia: Friday sermons must promote love, not hatred

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - The Friday sermon, which should be an opportunity to impart knowledge and lessons to Muslims, has instead become a way to spread hate.  This worsening trend makes it seem like the Department of Islamic Development Malaysia (Jakim), which prepared these sermons, is dominated by groups whose agenda is to sow discord among Muslims in Malaysia.Jakim, which is funded by taxpayers, is also being turned into a propaganda tool of certain political groups. So, it’s not surprising that national laureate Datuk A. Samad Said has stopped going to the National Mosque for Friday prayers. Instead, he goes to Masjid India where the sermon is in Tamil which he cannot understand. In today’s sermon, Jakim claimed that Shia Muslims are encouraged to perform acts of sodomy and defend contractual marriages (mutaah).It claimed that the spread of Shia in Malaysia was worrying since its followers are those who are educated and have a background in religious scholarship. These followers, it said, were spreading Shia teachings among university students and the public.“Five of their beliefs include encouraging sodomy, celebrating the Karbala on the 10th of Muharam (the first month in the Muslim calendar), defending the practice of mutaah, questioning the sanctity of the Sunni branch of Islam and declaring themselves the true Sunni,” claimed Jakim in its Friday sermon titled "Virus Shia".According to Jakim, the Fatwa Council in 1996 had declared that Shia was haram (forbidden) in Malaysia and made it compulsory for Malaysian Muslims to only follow the teachings, customs and beliefs of the Sunni branch of Islam.But where was Jakim when former prime minister Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and the minister in charge of religious affairs at that time, Tan Sri Abdul Hamid Othman, signed the Amman Message of 2005 in Jordan to recognise Islam’s diverse branches such as Sunni, Shiite, Ibadi and Thahiri?“Whoever follows one of the four Sunni sects (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafie and Hambali), or the two Shia sects (Jaafari and Zaydi), or the Ibadi sect and the Thahiri sect is a Muslim.“It is impossible to declare them as ignorant and deviant,” said the agreement that was also signed by Malaysia.These frequent attacks on the Shia will harm Malaysia’s relationship with Muslim countries with large populations of Shia followers such as Iran, Iraq and Lebanon.  It should be remembered that Jakim’s foolish sectarian politics will destroy Malaysia’s image as a moderate Muslim-majority country.Jakim should also remember that one of Islam’s fundamental tenets is that its believers must love one another. If Jakim continues to spread hate, Islam as an official religion in Malaysia, will no longer be respected. /129