On the Problem of Fiqh: Should I become a Baha'i?

The original post is long, and this is just a brief excerpt. Do click over for a fascinating and very personal reflection by this Muslim blogger. -gw

There is a part in the Qur’an (2:11-13) that says, “When it is said to them: ‘Make not mischief on the earth,’ They say: ‘Why, we only want to make peace!’ Of a surety, they are the ones who make mischief, but they realize not. When it is said to them: ‘Believe as the others believe:’ they say: ‘Shall we believe as the fools believe?’– Nay, of a surety they are the fools, but they do not know.” I worried that perhaps it referred to me. I had obviously strayed from the beliefs of mainstream Islam. I did not believe as others do. I felt like a reformer, but… My problem with fiqh put me in mind of Abdul Baha. Was his problem with the Ulema (scholars) the same as my own? Should I become a Baha’i? Maybe, but I never got into the Baha’i religion, and I could not bear the thought that I might never go back to the Muslim community of Montreal, so I never became Baha’i.

For a long time I existed in a kind of quantum state of Muslim / not Muslim. I was not sure what I should be, or do. I couldn’t find my place. Then at the beginning of this year, the wave function collapsed, and I started this blog. I decided, I may be a wiseass and a poet, and a musician, and a flirt, and I may absolutely love to drink and get messed up, but I’m a Muslim anyway. And if anyone has a problem with it, they can walk up to me on the street and tell me to my face.

http://sheikhjahbooty.wordpress.com/2008/03/14/why-i-am-not-a-pious-muslim/#comment-23

{Re-posted with permission}

{Photo: "Les arts de l'Islam (musée des arts décoratifs, Paris)," Uploaded on December 28, 2007 by dalbera on flickr, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 Generic}