Author: Corbin

Theresa Corbin is an indoor-sy type who holds a BA in English Lit and an Master's of Library and Information Science. She has lots of opinions and more work experience than cats have lives. Corbin has been a teacher, office manager, hemodialysis tech, fundraiser, designer, interfaith and inter-cultural bridge builder, public speaker, researcher, editor, and writer. Her hero is Elastigirl for obvs reasons. Corbin is a socially poised introverted and HSP. Her hobbies include thinking, giving unsolicited advice, and putting her phone on silent.
Ramadan Giving: 1-888-315-NISA

Ramadan Giving: 1-888-315-NISA

by Corbin ♥ 20 Comments

Written by Theresa Corbin


315NISAWith Ramadan upon us (what’s Ramadan? Click here),
Muslims need to start thinking about how we will increase our good deeds. Savvy Muslims know that good deeds get more bang for their buck in Ramadan. Specifically, we need to think about how we will invest our charity (since Allah promises a serious return on our charitable donations, I like to think of charity as investment banking).

So going forward, during the month of Ramadan, we islamwiches (not to be confused with islam-witches) will be sharing our charity investment ideas with you in hopes to draw attention to some great efforts that need our support. Let the giving begin!!!

Ramadan Giving Part 1: 1-888-315-NISA

What do they do?

1-888-315-NISA (also 315NISA.com) is a Muslim women’s helpline in North America. 

The helpline is operated by counselors who provide completely confidential and toll free support to Muslim women in crisis who feel they have nowhere to turn.

315NISA.com says, “Our principle is to be non-judgemental in our services. Our services allow for people to open up to our trained counsellors without worry. Our purpose is to assist in supporting, helping and creating a plan of action for the best possible solutions. We are there to listen when no one else is.”

Why is this important?

As 315NISA’s statistical research shows, many Muslim women feel uncomfortable or simply refuse to use resources outside of their religious and cultural spheres. Even when rape, domestic violence, depression and other serious matters are experienced by Muslim women, they feel silenced by familial, cultural and baseless religious pressures.

If our sisters are not seeking help, what is to come of them? They will likely (and many already have) face dire situations.

After reading the Statistical Research Report published by 315Nisa.com (you can find it here), I realized how serious the need for this type of resource for Muslim women is. Not because the report proved something to me, but because it reminded me of all the sisters that have come to me with similar problems. These sisters were looking for compassion, understanding and advice they knew they would never get from their families or religious leaders (a sad indictment of the state of our ummah (Muslim community worldwide))

The statistics reminded me of the sister who felt suicidal because she had been the victim of repeated sexual assaults at the hands of her stalker. She knew she could not divulge this information to her family because of their backward cultural understanding of honor and a woman’s virginity. This sister needed this service.

I was reminded of the sister who confided in the members of her mosque that a man in the community had raped her. Their response was not to comfort her and seek justice, as it should have been, as it is prescribed by Islam. Instead they accused her of wrong doing and made her feel like a pariah in her place of worship. This sister needed this service.

I was reminded of the sister who told me about the abuse she and other family members received at the hands of her father-in-law. Her father-in-law WRONGLY claimed that it was his Islamic right to do with his family as he wished. She understandably questioned whether she wanted to be a Muslim if it meant being at the whims of a man’s temper. This sister needed this service.

These problems are universal. Women from every culture, country, and color face these issues. But the problem in our communities is that women who face serious issues like these feel silenced. We cannot stand for this. We have to open up the dialogue and help our sisters. We must fix our problems. 315NISA is a starting point.

How can you help?

Give a sister in need this number 1-888-325-NISA so she has a place to turn.

Ask if you can post this number up in your Masjid.

Donate. Help 315NISA get the resources they need to keep this effort alive.

Fill out a contact form and see if you can be a resource to them. Offer your skills to them, I know they are in need of a professional video editor.

If our sisters are in need, it is our duty, it is our responsibility to provide for them.

If you are a Muslim woman in North American and you feel like you need someone to talk to about any challenge you face, please call 1-888-315-NISA. They are available during the times below and will have online chat available very soon, inshaAllah.

10am – 10pm Eastern

9am – 9pm Central

8am – 8pm Mountain

7am – 7pm Pacific

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Halal New Orleans Recipe Round Up

Halal New Orleans Recipe Round Up

by Corbin ♥ 62 Comments

Written by Theresa Corbin

Since Ramadan is about a week away, it only seems fitting to talk about food. What follows are from articles I have written for Aquila Style -a magazine for Modern Muslim Living- and a previous islamich post.  SOOoooo Yes, I am totally about to quote myself …

The southern USA has a rich tradition of unique cuisine.

This culinary uniqueness reaches a fever pitch in the port of New Orleans, Louisiana. It is as if New Orleanians decided to represent their melting pot of different cultures in a literal cooking pot […] New Orleans is a fantastic destination for any hungry traveler or foodie looking for fanciful fare.

However, as is the case with most southern cuisine, the New Orleans food experience can be a gastronomic “landmine” for Muslims.

Most recipes either use parts of the pig or have some pork added for “flavour”. And when you do find a dish that looks pork-free, you will often find that there is alcohol added.

As a convert living in southern USA, who grew up on New Orleans food, I have had to tweak my mother’s recipes into home cooking the halal way. From gumbo minus the ham hock stock to bread pudding without the rum drizzle, New Orleans and American southern food doesn’t have to be passed up because of its haram components.

New Orleans is famous for its gumbo

halal gumbo

[…]Unfortunately for the Muslim who takes a trip to New Orleans to try this stew, gumbo is almost always made with pork. Whether it is in the stock, a ham bone thrown into the roux for flavor, or pork sausage as one of the meats added to the stew, pork is almost always an ingredient in gumbo.

But there is no reason why Muslims should miss out of this robust multi-ethnic dish. Gumbo doesn’t need pork – shrimp, chicken, crab, or even fish can replace that part of any gumbo.

Click here for the recipe.

 

 New Orleans BBQ Shrimp


BBQ-Shrimp

BBQ Shrimp (deceptively named because it has nothing to do with barbecue sauce or grilling) is usually cooked with beer. I did a little research and some creative cooking, and discovered that the recipe could be adjusted for the halal palate.

Click here for the recipe.

 

 The All Important Crawfish Boil

crawfish1

Even though the crawfish boil usually entails some un-halal aspects, those can easily be switched out for their halal counterparts. So, if you have access to crawfish, even if it isn’t live or from the Gulf of Mexico, you need to think about having a boil. You will first thank Allah, then thank me.

Click here for the recipe.

 Bon Appetit!

Follow us (upper right of the page), email us (islamwich@yahoo.com), like our face with your face on Facebook, like the post, share it, pin it, comment on it, and/or do whatever social media magic it is that you prefer. Find out more about us in the understandably named “About Us” page and browse other posts in our brand spanking new “Table of Contents”.

In conversation with an American Convert to Islam, Part II

In conversation with an American Convert to Islam, Part II

by Corbin ♥ 1 Comment

Part II of my interview with Saadia Haq.

See Part I here

Follow us (upper right of the page), email us (islamwich@yahoo.com), like our face with your face on Facebook, like the post, share it, pin it, comment on it, and/or do whatever social media magic it is that you prefer. Find out more about us in the understandably named “About Us” page and browse other posts in our brand spanking new “Table of Contents”.

A writer from the East's avatarThe Human Lens

Thanks for joining us back, with Theresa Corbin; the founder of Islamwich blog-site and an American convert to Islam. We continue our conversation on her life as a Muslim and in particular women rights in Islam, her rights as a Muslim American woman and use of hijab etc. 

Saadia Haq: How easy or difficult is for you to take on certain aspects of practical life as a Muslim, e.g. the daily prayers, fasting etc.?

Theresa Corbin: Since I converted in the beginning of Ramadan, I was instructed to begin fasting right off the bat and that was extremely hard for me considering my untrained stomach did not take it well. But luckily it was in a month where the days were relatively short, so I didn’t die lol. The salat was only difficult for me to institute in my life because in most places in the West, if…

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In conversation with an American Convert to Islam, Part I

In conversation with an American Convert to Islam, Part I

by Corbin ♥ 5 Comments

Saadia Haq, a phenomenal human rights journalist, took the time and blog space to interview me!

See Part II Here

Follow us (upper right of the page), email us (islamwich@yahoo.com), like our face with your face on Facebook, like the post, share it, pin it, comment on it, and/or do whatever social media magic it is that you prefer. Find out more about us in the understandably named “About Us” page and browse other posts in our brand spanking new “Table of Contents”.

A writer from the East's avatarThe Human Lens

Native New Orleanian and Muslim convert Theresa Corbin, is an established author and social media practitioner. In her literary work, the focus is strong on themes of conversion, integration, societal stereotyping, bridging gaps between cultures and religions. Additionally, she is a well established blogger and you can visit her site for more: Islamwich

Saadia Haq: What religion were you affiliated with before your conversion? How practicing were you in this faith and how much did it mean to you?

Theresa Corbin: I was raised Catholic and as a child I took my religion very seriously (I was a serious kid). I went to mass every Sunday. I participated in the choir, the church youth group and was sincerely concerned about the state of my soul. But as I got older and learned more about the world, I began to wonder if Catholicism was the end all be all of…

View original post 1,231 more words

Take Back Islam: #BringBackOurGirls

Take Back Islam: #BringBackOurGirls

by Corbin ♥ 12 Comments

Written by Theresa Corbin


Take-Back-Islam

As the world waits and worries over the fate of the girls who were abducted on April 14 from a school in Nigeria, a terrorist group, Boko Haram, steps forward and claims responsibility for the repulsive act. And all this evil based on the premise–as their name states–that Western education in sinful (much of which is based on the Golden Era of Islamic discovery) and that Allah tells them to sell these girls as sex slaves (did someone forget to take their Thorazine?).

But somewhere between May 2013 and the recent kidnapping the story changed. CNN reports that Shakau, the leader of Boko Haram, in May 2013 “first announced in a video that Boko Haram would start kidnapping girls. The kidnappings, he said, were retaliation for Nigerian security forces nabbing the wives and children of group members.”

Now after the deed is done and the world is looking at Nigeria, Shakau claims he did it in the name of Allah (God) and Islam. Has he forgotten about his original motive of retaliation?

If there were ever a case of twisting religion to suit agenda, this would be it.

Shakau and his band of criminals are simply trying to give their retribution some form of justification that the world will not be able to ignore.

Bring-back-our-girls

It is the oldest trick in the book. Distort Islam beyond recognition (or fill in the blank with any other ideology) and use it to promote political agenda in order to attain power. Make sure you do so in impoverished area with an ill-educated population. Keep the people uneducated. Use terror to force people into submission.

Then tell the world you have some sort of supreme knowledge no one else has and what you do is in the best interest of your people. And voila your greed and blood lust are sated (right out of the North Korean play book). 

The premise on which they claim to stand so thinly veils their greed for power it is almost childish.

Boko Haram has not only kidnapped these innocent girls and threatens to sell them into sexual slavery [ “O ye who believe! Ye are forbidden to inherit women against their will. Nor should ye treat them with harshness” … Quran 4:19], 

they have also:

–Assassinated Muslim clerics for criticizing Boko Haram’s violent nature [killing him (a Muslim) is disbelief -Bukhari].

–Bombed churches [In a letter to St. Catherine’s Monastery, Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) dictated, “No one is to destroy a house of their (Christian) religion, to damage it, or to carry anything from it to the Muslims’ houses … No one of the nation (Muslims) is to disobey the covenant till the Last Day (end of the world).” ].

–Burned down over 200 schools [“If anyone travels on a road in search of knowledge, Allah will cause him to travel on one of the roads of Paradise” … -Abu Dawud]

–Murdered fifty-nine male students at the Federal Government College of Buni Yadi  [“… if any one slew a person – unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land – it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if any one saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people.” Qur’an 5:32] 

Boko Harma has kidnapped, murdered and maimed countless others all in an effort to set themselves up as supreme rulers of Nigeria claiming Islam (their own made-up version) as their right of power. 

However, 99.999999% of Muslims in the world are not buying it. We will not allow them to usurp our religion and superimpose their own ideology and agenda. We will not offer Boko Haram or any other group like it aid or comfort.

Arsalan Iftikhar, international human rights lawyer and adjunct professor of religious studies at DePaul University in Chicago, says

As a Muslim human rights lawyer, it is obscene and absolutely un-Islamic for these lunatic human traffickers to invoke the name of God while kidnapping young girls and threatening to sell them into sexual slavery. The leaders of Boko Haram have clearly never read the Holy Quran, which states quite clearly that “oppression is worse than murder” (2:191) and that nobody “shall force girls to commit prostitution” (24:33).

Hassan Mostafa, chair of the Islamic Centre of Southwest Ontario, says,

When the leader of this organization started making ridiculous references that he was told by God or Allah to enslave these young women, we felt the need to clarify that this in no way represents Muslims in Canada or around the world.

Imam Khalid Latif, Executive Director and Chaplain, Islamic Center at New York University, says,

They [Boko Haram] espouse a perversely skewed interpretation of Islam that I personally believe carries no legitimacy and is far removed from any Islam that I or the majority of Muslims practice. 

Sheik Ahmed el-Tayeb of Al-Azhar, An Islamic institute in Egypt, says 

Harming the girls ‘completely contradicts the teachings of Islam and its tolerant principles.’

Religious Endowments Minister Mohammed Mohktar Gomaa says,  

The actions by Boko Haram are pure terrorism, with no relation to Islam, especially the kidnapping of the girls.

It is time for the Muslims to stand up together in outrage about the filth that is done in the name of our religion.

We demand that Boko Haram brings these girls back to their families, to their childhood, and to their education!

We demand that Boko Haram and groups like it STOP misappropriating Islam for their agendas!

#BringBackOurGirls   #TakeBackIslam

Read more about our Take Back Islam effort: here, here, here, and here

Follow us (upper right of the page). Email us (islamwich@yahoo.com). Like our face with your face on Facebook (facebook.com/islamwich). Tumble with us on Tumblr (islamwich.tumblr.com). Pin with us (pinterest.com/islamwich). Follow us on twitter (@islamwich).

Like the post, share it, pin it, comment on it, and/or do whatever social media magic it is that you prefer. Find out more about us in the understandably named “About” page and browse other posts in “Table of Contents”.

Take Back Islam: Sexual Rights of Women Should Not Be a Secret

Take Back Islam: Sexual Rights of Women Should Not Be a Secret

by Corbin ♥ 16 Comments

Written by Theresa Corbin

Take-Back-IslamI recently wrote an article for aquila-style about the sexual rights of the Muslimah.

(The first few paragraphs are in a block quote below)
 I wrote this article in reaction to what I found to be lacking in Islamic literature. As the article below recounts, literature enumerating the woman’s rights in a marriage and specifically regarding sex is hard to find.
But Allah did not forget about the female when it comes to giving her sexual rights, it is just that perhaps the scholars or the authors of Islamic literature that is readily available think it is not good for mass consumption??? I don’t know why a woman’s sexual rights within a marriage is kept under wraps while everyone can recount hadith specifying a man’s sexual rights in a marriage, I can only guess why this is. 
 

If we are shy to talk about such things, we need to think about the greater implications.

Sisters, if we don’t know our rights in regards to intercourse (And I am not talking about the 18th century word for conversation ;)) then how will we be able to ask for them? How will we be able to go about being married and not feeling oppressed? Brothers, if you hide your head in the sand about your wive’s sexual rights, how will you know if you are failing in your duties?
Imagine being in a marriage and a sexual relationship in which your partner continues to cause you pain and leaves the act before you have achieved pleasure (Not that this is always the case). And imagine living like this for years because neither you nor your partner understand what is due to you.
 

If you look at it from male perspective it is fair to say that this is a form of oppression.

Then why don’t we look at it the same way for women? Is it because we think of women as a giver of pleasure and not a receiver? This is a narcissistic approach to love and intimacy. Oxymoron? Yup!

… 

Recently, I was walking through an Islamic bookstore and I came across an entire aisle of books with titles that enumerated the ways a woman is to be a good wife and all the rights her husband has over her.

Out of curiosity, I began looking for the section on a wife’s right over her husband. I knew it had to be somewhere. It was neither next to the section on women being dutiful wives, nor was it in the section about all the ways to go about getting married … it was nowhere.

To balance out all the books about being good wives was just one book entitled Winning the Heart of Your Wife, half of its 64 pages being a note from the publisher. While this book offered some good advice, it also left a lot to be desired …

Read the rest on Aquila Style. Then come back and read on.

If we look to the example of the Prophet (PBUH), we will find that he was gentle and playful with his wives. He offered them foreplay and never left them wanting.

Many of us know very little about the Islamic sexual rights of a woman and even fewer of us understand the anatomy and the reasons behind these rights.

So let me tell you how Allah has created the female (many sisters might not even know this about themselves).

So much thought and “honor” is put into the hymen. When very few people actually know anything at all about this part of the female anatomy. And if we have heard anything about it, it is only in terms of how it should “broken” (sexual violence much?). The hymen is not a layer of skin that covers the female sex organ that needs to be broken. It is layer of skin that surrounds the vagina, it stretches during foreplay and it even heals itself when torn.

It’s true that women may experience pain or bleeding the first time they have sex, but it’s not because of their hymens; more likely, they began having intercourse without proper foreplay to lubricate the vagina. And as it turns out, hymens tell you nothing about a woman’s sexual history. Not every woman is born with a hymen, and the shape and size of a hymen differs dramatically from woman to woman. Since the hymen doesn’t appear to serve any purpose, it may very well be vestigial. –howstuffworks.com

Hence the importance of foreplay. Bleeding caused by sexual intercourse does not always happen when the woman is a virgin. And conversely it can happen when a women isn’t a virgin. Bleeding during intercourse happens when the male has not provided enough foreplay and causes tearing and pain.

It is almost comical to think that an entire custom of proving virginity with bloody bed sheets is really just built around men being bad at sex. That is, it would be comical if it weren’t a great source of pain.

Not only is foreplay an Islamic duty and a deterrent to causing pain, it is also a path to mutually pleasurable intercourse.

While it is debated whether the husband is obligated to bring his wife to orgasm, the hadith I mentioned in the Aquila-Style article gives us a guideline. Imam Malik recounts that a man should not interrupt sexual relations with his wife until she is fulfilled, unless she has given her permission. This tells us that it is not for the man to decide when sex is finished. He must wait for her as best as he can (circumcision of the male helps prolong the sex act). Whether the wife reaches orgasm (nearly impossible if she has suffered female circumcision, but that is for another post) or is she is just done with the experience, it is up to the wife to say when the intimacy is over. 

If a woman is promised that the sexual experience will be enjoyable and that she is in control of when it is over (her Islamic rights), she will be more inclined to want to participate. If husbands follow Islamic guidelines, they won’t be begging or manipulated their wife with a hadith of angles cursing them. Such manipulation is oppression when the husband demands his rights but is not fulfilling his rights to her. Both parties need to be sexually fulfilled.

Why can’t we be frank and about sexual rights of women within a marriage?

Why isn’t there more literature explaining what is due to the women in her marriage bed? It is so important to a happy and fulfilling marriage, a happy family and therefore a happy society that it seems criminal to not make the masses aware of these facts.

#TakeBackIslam

Read more about our Take Back Islam effort: here, here, here, and here

Follow us (upper right of the page), email us (islamwich@yahoo.com), like our face with your face on Facebook, like the post, share it, pin it, comment on it, and/or do whatever social media magic it is that you prefer. Find out more about us in the understandably named “About Us” page and browse other posts in our brand spanking new “Table of Contents”.

Take Back Islam: Rape is NOT Zina

Take Back Islam: Rape is NOT Zina

by Corbin ♥ 31 Comments

Written by Theresa Corbin

In Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, a 23-year-old woman was “awarded” a one-year prison term and 100 lashes for committing “adultery” and trying to abort the resultant fetus after being abducted and gang raped – Saudi Gazzette.

We live in a world where men in charge conflate rape with sex. We live in a world where women living in “Muslim” countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran and many more, are charged with zina (adultery) when, in fact,  they have been victims of rape.

This is a dangerous game men play with the lives and well-being of women.

No one is free when others are oppressed

Rape is not sex. Rape is not zina (adultery). Rape is ightisab (taking something by force). The history of Islamic scholarship bares this out. It is well-known that in “Fiqh-us-Sunnah” (an Islamic legal book) rape is included in a definition of hiraba (terrorism or crimes of violence), which states: “A single person or group of people causing public disruption, killing, forcibly taking property or money, attacking or raping women, killing cattle, or disrupting agriculture.”

But by conflating adultery with rape, the “Islamic” courts insist that a victim of rape should produce four witnesses.

However, the four witnesses demanded in the Quran does not even apply to rape. The four witnesses are only required when accusing a woman of adultery (zina). 

“Those who commit unlawful sexual intercourse of your women – bring against them four [witnesses] from among you. And if they testify, confine the guilty women to houses until death takes them or Allah ordains for them [another] way.” (4:15)

It is absolutely absurd to claim that a rape victim is accusing herself of being unchaste and committing adultery and then demand she produce witnesses!

In reality–which seems to not exists when it comes to rape in these Muslim countries–Islam as a crime despicable rape where the rapist is put to death or given 100 lashes. And the victim is not to be put under societal or legal pressure, but should be offered state sanctioned support.

But I guess these lawmakers in “Islamic” countries didn’t see the verse after the four witness verse that says both involved in sin of adultery should be punished.

“Punish both of those among you who are guilty of this sin, then if they repent and mend their ways, leave them alone. For Allah is always ready to accept repentance. He is All-Compassionate.” (4:16)

The fact that these “men” in charge call rape adultery and do not even punish the other party (rapists get off Scott free or even get to marry their victims) in the act is blatant evidence of their extreme misogyny and lack of understanding of the religion of Islam.

Because of this severely skewed sense of “justice” rape has sky-rocketed in the offending countries.

International rape scale

According to the Archives of Women’s Health study Violence Against Women in South Asian Countries:

“The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) found a sharp rise in cases of rape over the decade with estimates suggesting that for every two hours, one woman was raped somewhere in the country. Other reports suggested the figure could be far higher, given that many instances of rape are never reported [understandably], as a result of social [and legal] pressures. Incidents of abusive incest and rape within marriage are also said to be common although most occur in a hidden form in the society.”

Why?

These governments and “scholars” twist and distort Islam till it is unrecognizable. But the question is why? What do they gain?

They step on the rights of women to gain political power, using rape and humiliation as a tool. One notable example is General Zia of Pakistan who gained his political power through systematic oppression of women, as can be seen in his introduction of the 1979 Hudood ruling.

Rahat Imran writes in an essay, Islamic Laws, Gender Discrimination, and Legal Injustices, that:

“Zia used the ‘women card’ as the first and most obvious symbol for his Islamization plan, knowing that a large majority of the male population of the country would have little problem in digesting its implementation […] because the law not only serves the purpose of terrorizing and subjugating women, but also resolves critical and controversial issues like proving rape in the court of law in men’s favor”

This and other grabs for power at the expense of women’s rights, like the Ayatollah Khomeini’s “Islamic” revolution, paved the way for future oppression of women under the guise of Islam.

Today the torch of violence against and subjugation of women in “Islamic” countries has been handed down to the likes of the Taliban who burn the flame brightly to the detriment of all. 

What can we do?

It is time we pull the rug out from underneath these “men” who rule on false claims of Islam.

The first thing we need to do is understand the truth. Learn the reality of Islam and not the version that has been bought and sold by governments and/or people seeking power.

Then we MUST educate those around you.

And call these corrupt rulers and law makers out on their heinous crimes against humanity and God. Where ever you see oppression done in the name of Islam, speak up. It is your duty.

#TakeBackIslam