Chapter 3
Still Working for Allah in the West: Theory and Methodology
How to Get the Most out of this Book
How do you get the most out of this book that you have in your hands?
And if I had available to me the resources – resources that I hinted at earlier, resources of time, money, secretarial, research and technological help and assistance as well as appropriate organizational backing and sponsorship – this manuscript would have been completed looking every inch like a book and printed, bound and distributed – sold for a respectable amount of money in the market – like a regular book.
Therefore, I want you to treat this material for all practical purposes like a serious book. I want you to read these pages carefully – page by page, section by section, almost line by line. Even though I try to write in a fairly informal and somewhat light style, things generally tend to get a little dense and heavy. Therefore, unless you are paying close attention, things may escape you.
Read these things item by item. Ask yourself if they make sense. If they don’t, ask me what I meant by passages or points that may not be clear to you. We need to give a Muslim the benefit of the doubt – that is the Hadith.
And if they do make sense to you, then ask yourself what you plan to do with them next. That is what I mean by working for Allah. That is what this seminar or camp of Still Working for Allah is about. What I have tried to do in this book is to lay out some broad parameters of what it means; what it requires; and how to go about it.
I don’t expect you to spend as many hours, days and weeks studying it as I have put into its compilation, but it is only fair to say that if someone has taken all this trouble, and spent all this time and energy into putting it together, the least we can do is to study it seriously and try to understand it as much as we can.
But you can do better. You can become my team of research assistants. I assign you the research tasks that need to be done and you do it. That way the work will get done and I will not be complaining of lack of resources. So also you will help with editing duties. No, I do not want you to edit my work. No one should make changes in someone else’s work. That is totally and utterly unacceptable. But you can identify areas that need some reworking and reorganization.
For example, I would like to rearrange this book into chapters. Then I would like to organize those chapters to parallel the topics in my syllabus. These are all areas with which I can use some help.
So also if you find any serious errors, bring them to my notice, and I would be happy either to correct them or to explain to you what I meant by those suspect spots and why I think they are not really errors.
And out of the kindness of your heart, make Du’a for me, for my parents and my family and for all those wonderful people who helped to organize this seminar and all my other camps and seminars everywhere. On my part, I make Du’a for you, your parents and your families.
May Allah accept my efforts and your efforts; may he purify our intentions and motivations; may he guide our steps; and may he enable and help us to work for him willingly, happily, successfully, even as our bodies and this entire universe work for him based on the way they are designed and programmed.
May Almighty Allah bless us all; and many he bless our parents, and our families; and may he bless all Muslim men and Muslim women and all believing men and believing women, the living among them and the dead, for, he is most forgiving and most merciful. Ameen!
All this is part of working for Allah – in fact, these are some of the very first baby steps on that beautiful path – the path of working for Allah.
END OF CHAPTER 3
Still Working for Allah in the West: Theory and Methodology
© 2003 Syed Husain Pasha
Dr. Pasha is an educator and scholar of exceptional
talent, training and experience. He can be reached at DrSyedPasha [at]
AOL [dot] com or www.IslamicSolutions.com.
