Methods

There’s no getting away from it. This is essentially a blog about religious conversion. Particularly, conversion from Christianity to Islam. But more generally, it is about the process of conversion, the phenomenon of religious belief, Islamic theology, the Quran, Sufism, and so forth.

I am generally tired of conversion stories. Everybody’s got one, and nobody’s is particularly special. And it is not uncommon for a recent convert to take to the internet in order to immediately and to zealously spread the Good News of his newly found faith. The zealous neophyte becomes an instant expert in the spiritual life, a world-renounced apologist, and an uncompromising fighter of ‘heresies’ which he himself held to be true just weeks ago.

This blog is not that. And may God correct and forgive me if it were.

I struggled with the presentation of the content here. I had written drafts of well-reasoned apologetics sprinkled with slight jabs and grievances. All of them were thrown out.

Rather than putting forward such methodical content which would probably be more suitable for an academic paper, I would rather describe and chronicle my personal encounter with God in ways more appropriate. The Bible, the Quran, the Tao Te Ching, the Rig Veda, and all Holy Scripture from various faiths do not speak in terms of dry academia or bullet-pointed apologetics. Rather, language about God is poetic. Impressionistic. Sometimes disjointed and messy. Often vague. Full of imagery. Cryptic prophecy. Love poems. Historical accounts. Laments. Mythology. Letters and addresses. Laws. Sayings. Aphorisms. Songs.

Even the Quran is not linear in its approach — often jumping from one thought to another. God’s ways are not our ways. His understanding is not our understanding. Yet this is the beauty of God’s revelation and God’s creation.

And so, I intend many of the posts here to be in the form of a personal journal entry, perhaps. A conversation with myself. Impressionistic and personal. There are many apologists for Islam who are much more eloquent and competent than myself.¹ If anything, the more I understand Islam, the more I understand that I know nothing about it at all. It is a massive depth of true theology, spiritual life and tradition that — even after flirting with Islam for over 20 years and reading about it for just as long — I realize that I’ve only just now begun to even scratch the surface of it.

Writing some of this out helps me to clarify my own thoughts on these matters, and it is my hope and prayer that perhaps it might help others as well.

I can only approach this subject with fear and trembling. Everything that is good, beautiful, and true within these pages is attributed solely to God alone. Any error or misstep is totally my own, for which may God forgive me.

Forgive me as well, my brother, and pray for me.

سُبْحَانَ ٱللَّٰهِ

[1] For a good example in the English-speaking West, simply search for the names Abdal Hakim Murad and Sheikh Hamza Yusuf online, as well as my personal friend, Mahdi Lock.