tradition – lonerloaner

Kindness and generosity.

kindness

Give of yourself so graciously that in the

end you efface the receiver and their

tongue speaks involuntarily,

“You’ve been kind to me”
-W.E.

‘Kindness never touched something except it made it more beautiful and cruelty never touched something except it made it more vulgar.’

Those words are immortal and sadly many of you will never know their origin because of the outrageous picture painted in the media nowadays of a people who are known worldwide by tradition to be the most hospitable and generous. What has culminated now in their modern new age generations are self fulfilling prophecies against their own heritage. They’ve severed themselves from their true history and instead indulge in reinforcing stereotypes of what society and media presents them as.

You will still find cultural pockets of tradition in Morroco, Egyptian deserts, Turkey, Yemen, Jordan and other Bedouin cities where the kindness and generosity will shame you into the above state of expressing gratitude involuntarily.

You can do many things to Arabs, I mean real, traditional Arabs, the type that know who they are and are tied to all things spiritual and are in love with humankind, not the bogus media pin up boys and girls that are blasted into your retina, but one thing you cannot do is call them miserly. If you do that, you may as well have killed them!

That is the highest insult for men and women of tradition.

Slay them with pens, educate them with swords.

Some people need to be shredded with words,

Others need to be taught with a sword.

What is society willing to afford?

Has man lost his way,

Severed the umbilical cord?

The attachment to all that is good and pure,

And can nothing more say?

Know, my sons.

Know my sons, men have codes.

Bravery is calling fear a liar.

Courage is proving fear a liar.

Chivalry, is knowing when to use courage or bravery.

Nobility is having the fortitude to follow through your conviction in both.

Honour is not straying from the code.

Honesty is the light that the code is illumed by

Truth is the gnawing at the soul that flat lines your ego.

Love is the energy that fuels all.

I hope that whatever I teach you or whatever I leave behind become firm foundations for you to build mountains upon and your progeny to build mountains on but no matter how mountainous you all may become, you remain grounded in the valleys of humility,

with people,

serving them,

being exemplar with the codes of being men,

of being human.

Do not forget that to be harsh when it is needed even in the face of relentless scrutiny is far nobler than laxity to please the lazy folk,

the unmotivated,

the detached,

the deprived of soul.

Know that kindness and gentleness in the face of a storm of violence and ridicule is more praiseworthy than siding with the masses.

Do not slip boys,

Hold to each other,

Hold to the above codes.

-ME

Moderate Muslim?

I cringe every time the ‘moderate’ label is applied to me. I understand it is probably meant to be a compliment, but the truth is that it is offensive in the way it would be to be called a ‘moderate intellect’. It carries the connotation that one’s faith is somehow diluted. It implies, condescendingly, that it is socially acceptable to be a Muslim, as long as you are not too Muslim.

– Waleed Aly, People like us.

I agree.

Nobility of Bedouins.

As he argued and debated on, he was met with an unfamiliar silence from his opponent. Never before was he defeated so gracefully.
“Cat got your tongue?” he yelled across the dinner table. Shamed and red-faced guests turned their gaze towards the insulted.

He was there, invited, as a formality of hospitality, the dignified thing families of prestige do when a marriage proposal walks through the door. The young man was unknown, of no formal royalty or family of status. The polite way of refusal was to invite them to a first and final dinner where the suitor would be ridiculed intellectually and demoralised spiritually as he would be met by a fury of wit and cruelty lashed in literary prowess.

After being met with a onslaught of words, poetry and prose, wity belittlement, his head lifted from the bowed neck position he maintained, a sign of his impeccable nomad training, training of the ancient Arabs that was all but forgotten as the city he resided in was modernised with the attire, technology and culture of the British invaders, poised as businessmen trying to advance a backward nation. He smiled sincerely, affectionately as if he read right through the pain of the father, his fears of letting his precious first child and only daughter go to someone unknown, someone unlike him, unlike his friends, a dust faced nomad.

His gaze pierced right into the heart of her father as he quietly said, ‘Uncle, I am no match for your intellect and charm, I am but a desert nomad, enshrined in the cloak of our people of past, clinging tightly to our heritage in hope to pass it on to our sons untainted. I have fought battles for you and our people and my guard is lowered before you, I dare not rise to your elucidation, and impeccable speech.

Forgive me, your generosity and hospitality is unsurpassed but I have overstayed my welcome and must leave.’

The father grinning from ear to ear rose and loudly proclaimed ‘Nonsense! You will do no such thing and my daughter will marry no other man, come and sit nearby me oh eloquent of tongue and noble of lineage. If Arabs have any dignity left it will only survive with men like you, men whom I wish all the daughters of men like me to find and wed. Our people will only be given back their honour through the likes of you. Come, near me you will sit.’

End part 1
ME