An Open Letter to the Dunya

I wrote this on my phone while on a flight...

An Open Letter to the Dunya

By: Yasmin Mogahed

It’s hard to explain the freedom. It’s so deep and so real. Looking through the confusion, the empty boxes and hollow images, I saw you – Dunya. You place veil after veil over my eyes. Trying to win me, deceive me, enslave me to your lies. When the truth is you couldn’t give me even a drop of water when I stood at your door begging. I was on my knees before you, desperate for you to fill me.

What I see now is a glimpse of clarity that only the stab of perpetual disappointment could carve. And I sit here surrounded by your henchmen, your army of liars sent to keep me in chains. But I won’t be your prisoner anymore. I will no longer be that little girl lying awake at night thinking of you. I am no longer that heartbroken child wasting her tears on you. My unrequited love can no longer break me. You won’t break me. I won’t bend to your glitter and false promises. I am no longer that faithful subject standing before your false throne. My tears are no longer yours to have. And my heart is no longer your sanctuary.

You can’t live here anymore.

I’ve traveled a long way to come here. Sometimes there were deserts where all I needed was a single drop of water that you couldn’t give. Sometimes storms, where all I needed was a flicker of light to guide my path. But I asked you again and again for what you could not give. For all you have is pomp, boasting and chattel of deception. And so I found myself again and again in deserts without water, in darkness without light. But I am no longer your slave for there was a man who came to liberate me from this. A man who came to liberate me from this slavery to the slave, and bring me to the slavery of the Lord of the slave.

The Stab

The Stab
By: Yasmin Mogahed


Don’t grieve at the stab.
It’s only meant to free you.
From the chains that bind you to the earth
and shackle you to the shadows of people.
The mirage of water cannot quench.
But is so beautiful to the thirsty.
I’m afraid. Of never knowing another life.
Different. So different.
If I let go, will You take me higher?
Above grief, want, loss.
Above all that I’ve ever known.
Take me higher. Unbind me from the earth.
Like a vaccine, it sickens, to make you stronger.
The stab is temporary. The freedom, eternal.

We buried a man today: a reflection on death

I wrote this in the car on my way back home from the burial of a righteous soul. May Allah have mercy on him and his family. Ameen.

Jan 14, 2011 8:19 pm

We buried a man today: a reflection on death

By: Yasmin Mogahed

We buried a man today. And here I am now on my way home in the caravan of the living. For now.

For now, you and I are in the caravan of the living. But not because we’re headed for a separate land. Not because they’re going and we are not. Only because our caravan lagged behind. Right now we’re driving back to our homes, our beds, our tvs, our stereos, our jobs, our exams, our friends, our facebook, and gchat. Right now we’re driving back to our distractions, our idols, our deceptive illusions. But that’s just it. I’m not driving back to my home, my bed, my tv and my stereo. I’m not returning to my job, my exams, my friends, my facebook and gchat. I’m not on my way back to my distractions, illusions and idols. I’m driving back to where I began. I’m driving now to the very same place he went to. I’m on my way to the same place. I just don’t know how long my drive will take.

I’m driving back to where I began: with God. Because God is Al-Awal (the Beginning) and God is Al-Akhir (the End).

My body is taking me there, but it’s only a vehicle. When I get there, it will stay behind. As he did today. My body came from the ground and it will go back to the ground, as it came. It was only a shell, a container for my soul. A companion for a while. But I’ll leave it here when I arrive. Arrive—not depart. Because that’s my home. Not this. That’s why when Allah is calling the back the righteous soul, He says, ‘irjiee’: return.

The beautiful, noble soul that we buried didn’t depart from life today. He just entered a higher—and God willing--better level of it. He only arrived home. But the body is made of the material world and so he had to leave it here. The body is of the lower world. The world where we need to eat and sleep and bleed and cry. And die. But the soul is of the higher world. The soul has only one need: to be with God.

And so while the body cries and bleeds and feels pain from the material world, the soul is untouched by these things. There is only one thing that can cut or stab or hurt the soul. There is only one thing that can kill it: depriving it of its’ only need: to be close to its’ Originator. To be near God. And so we should not weep for the arriving soul--It isn’t dead. We should weep instead for the one whose body is alive, but whose soul is dead because of its’ alienation from that which gives it life: God.

And so the believing soul races home, even while in this life.

Oh Lord, make my soul a sanctuary, a fortress within. That no one and nothing can disturb. A place of calm, silence, serenity, untouched by the outside world. The soul that Allah calls al-nafs al mutmaina. The soul that Allah calls back saying: ‘ya ayatuhal nafs ul mutmainnah, irjiee illa rabike radiyatan mardiya. Fadkhulie fee ibadee wadkhulee janatee.

“(To the righteous soul will be said:) "O (thou) soul, in (complete) rest and satisfaction!"Come back thou to thy Lord,- well pleased (thyself), and well-pleasing unto Him!"Enter thou, then, among My devotees!"Yea, enter thou My Heaven!” (89:27-30)