The Quran Still Speaks (to My Word-Loving Heart)

The Salah Series: Exploring the layers of the Islamic ritual prayer

Welcome to Letters from a Muslim Woman!

I share the joys and challenges of being a visibly Muslim woman in a sometimes-unfriendly world.

If you’re new to this newsletter, here are a few good posts to give you the vibe of this space:

• Beauty in the Eye of the Hijabi

• Ask Me Where I’m from

• Pray Tell? Five Times a Day I Find the Time and Place

Back in November, I shared a piece about the Muslim ritual prayer of Salah. The focus of that piece was how complicated it can be to find a place to pray when, like me, you don’t live in a prayerful society.

The response to that essay was the most I’d ever gotten at that point in this newsletter’s young life. You folks are really curious about Salah! And rightly so.

Kate Brook

articulated the overall curiosity so well with this comment: “I would so love to know more about the experience of prayer itself, all the 'layers and layers to explore' that can’t be covered in a single essay...just in case you're ever wondering what to write next 😂”.

And so, The Salah Series is born! This will be a collection of essays around the various layers of Islamic ritual prayer. Each essay will focus on one aspect of prayer, and share some personal thoughts and experiences around it. Some of these essays will be open to all readers, and some will be primarily for paid subscribers, with a longish preview included so you can decide if you want more.

If you’re a paid subscriber, look for the companion post to this piece, which will include recordings of my recitation of the Quran I mention in the essay below, in Arabic, along with the English translations read aloud.

I want to be clear that I’m not trying to replace Wikipedia. It’s easy to look up the basics of Islamic rules and rituals. What I’d like to do is delve into the reality of Salah from the lens of actual lived experiences, thoughts, and emotions. These pieces will slowly build on each other with the goal of leading you closer to a true understanding of what it means to be a practicing Muslim in Western culture.

Today I’m talking about the Quran, the Muslim Holy Book. You can think of the Quran as the Muslim equivalent of the Bible or the Torah. Muslims believe that the Quran is the word of God, and that it was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him - pbuh) through revelations from the archangel Gabriel over the course of the last 23 years of his life.

Muhammad’s prophethood started with the first revelation of the Quran, which was a simple yet powerful commandment.

Read.

I think a lot about this. Here was the first order from God. The beginning of a new branch of the Abrahamic faiths. And it was not to bow, or to pray. The first order from God to a man who didn’t know how to read or write. A man who would remain illiterate until the day he died, was to read.

The Quran was a miracle of poetry, revealed to a nation for whom poetry was everything. The Arabs would write and recite poetry on the fly, to express their pride, their love, their pain, their hopes and dreams. Every tribe, every city, had its poets, ambassadors who sang the praises of their people and of their land, the two so intertwined as to be one and the same.

Muslims teach their children from a young age to read and memorize verses and surahs, which are chapters in the Quran. The surahs range from only 3 verses long, to others that stretch to hundreds of verses and tens of pages. We cannot perform our salah without them.

Beginning of “Al-Fatiha” in a Quran with English translation provided (off page) - the calligraphy style of Arabic writing used for Quran is another artistic way its beauty is expressed - Photo by Md Shairaf on Unsplash

Every rak’a¹ of a prayer starts with a recitation of the first chapter or the Quran, called al-fatiha, which means the opening. The words are foundational, setting the tone for the conversation with God. We express our dedication and humility, praise his glory and ask for his guidance and mercy.²

Every Muslim knows the fatiha by heart. After it’s finished, more Quran must be recited, long or short. There are people who have the entire book memorized, from start to finish. This is an incredible honour, but it’s also an incredible amount of work.

And so we circle back to small children learning Quran. So small they have just learned to speak. We start our kids young on the short surahs like the three quls³, and gradually build up to longer ones.

My mother tells the story of getting my older sister ready for school, using the early mornings to go over Quran with her as they finished eating breakfast and packing lunch. As Mama drilled her on the new verses she had memorized, Teta, my grandmother, pointed to me in the high chair, my lips moving almost imperceptibly.

“What are you saying, Noha?” They asked me. “Are you saying the Quran?”

Baby Noha nodded, and opened her mouth to recite.

Fast forward 8 years, and I was not so eager. During summer vacation, our neighbour would come knock on the door to see if we could play. But before we could go outside, we had to be done our Arabic and Quran studies. With the cartwheels and wading pool that awaited me outside, the poetry was less enthralling.

Still, goodie-two shoes Noha sat and memorized. And recited. Sometimes, the verses were exaltations of God’s strength and glory. Other times, they were the stories of the Prophets.

Moses, parting the Red Sea.

Abraham, thrown into the fire by his own people for refusing to bow to their idols.

Once my words had been heard, and my work had been checked, I was allowed to go leave, and I wiled away the rest of of the summer day in backyards or racing down the street on my bicycle.

There are verses in the Quran that are so achingly beautiful, the writer in me is stunned. I haven’t memorized consistently in years, but I keep a regular reading practice. It’s like coming back to a favourite book. The words are familiar every time you read them, and yet they are different. Because you have changed, they also take on new meaning.

There is a verse in the Quran where God tells us, “Say, If the ocean were ink for the words of my Lord, the ocean would run out before the words of my Lord would run out.”

I read this and I recognize the poetry the way the Arabs did. The poetry I couldn’t hear when I wanted to go outside and play.

The Quran is not only stories of the Prophets, of heaven and hell and judgement day, of Islamic rulings and teachings. It is all of these things, and then it is also a look at its own beauty, marveling about the marvel that it is.

Read, was the first word God sent to Muhammad.

Talk of reading, and ink, and words. Talk of language as a way to explore, to feel into connection, into beauty, into understanding.

A special shoutout to our newest paid subscriber,

Clarice Dankers

! Thank you so much for your support, Clarice! A paid subscription is $7 a month. If you’re enjoying my perspective and want to support me, consider upgrading to help me spend more time on writing and share a voice that isn’t often heard.

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support my work, you can buy me a coffee below. It helps me more than you realize.

Let’s chat in the comments:

1. Do you have a holy book? Do you read it regularly?

2. Do you find beauty in the language of that book or is it mainly an academic exercise?

3. Is there another book you read over and over?

4. What do the words of your favourite book mean to you? Are they a fond memory? Are they therapeutic?

I am continuing to share resources, links, and information that I have found helpful regarding the crisis in Gaza and the West bank. This week I’m sharing two pieces:

1. Gazan Journalist Bisan Owda’s video of every day existence in the tent cities that have become the homes of the luckiest of the 1.9 Million displaced people in Gaza.

   alarabytv

   

   A post shared by @alarabytv

2. This incredible story from This American Life: The story of a woman from Gaza City who ran out of words. Seventy-two days into the war, Youmna stopped talking. (27 minutes).

Please continue to speak out, call your representatives, and call for a ceasefire, and end to the blockade, and an end to the occupation. The situation is absolutely untenable. I know many are fatigued and feeling hopeless, but we cannot turn away.

1. During prayer, we go through cycles of movement and recitation of Quran and of other supplications or praises of God. The cycles, called rak’as, start in a standing position and move to various postures until they end in sujood, with our heads on the floor in prostration. Depending on the prayer, a specific number of rak’as are performed.

2. You can find the recitation of the Opening, as well as its English translation, here: https://previous.quran.com/1

3. The three quls are so called because they start with the word qul, which literally means “say”. They’re instructions to Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) and his followers to say that God is one, to say that they seek refuge in God from the evils of the world. You can find the English translations of the 3 quls here (surat al-iklhas), here (surat al-falaq), and here (surat al-nas).