Dawud Wharnsby
Canadian singer-songwriter, poet, performer, educator and television personality.
"When it comes to "Islam" — I look at the word as the verbal noun it is: an action word. I see Islam as something someone does, not something someone "belongs to". I believe that "religion", as the world commonly knows it today, is a divisive factor in community. When I was about 15 years old, I renounced a belief in the importance of "religion", seeking rather to find answers to life's questions. My spiritual quest has always been to bring me closer to my purpose in life, a better relationship with the force that brought me into existence, and how to relate to fellow human beings. When I was 17, I started reading scriptures from around the world and the more I read the more commonality I saw between them all. When I discovered the Qur'an at the age of 20, it seemed to be the most organic in its message. I got out of "religion" and got into life. To this day, I renounce a trust in the institutions of "religion".
“I began to see that some Muslim women look down on others for not covering, or that many Muslim men judge sisters who wear hijab differently from those who don’t. A sister shows up at the mosque one day without hijab and she is treated rudely; she shows up the next day with hijab and she is treated like a queen. Such a scenario is a blatant treatment of the woman as an object, no different than the judgements we see made in secular society of women’s appearances. In the end, it is not about the piece of cloth. It is about the relationship with God, and I know I don’t want anybody judging me so I don’t think it is right for us to judge each other.”
“If we can take the time to mute the noise we’ve build around ourselves the rhythm of the heartbeats and the purpose may be clear.”
“Build me a tomb for when I die, build it 50,000 feet into the sky... Build me a boat I want to discover America, build me a boat to take me to the edge of the seven seas, build me a boat and you can sail along with me, we’ll spread our money, power, religion and disease. ...Who are they to say that we own nothing and our lives have gone astray?”
"Allah made us all a different shade and colour. Nations and tribes recognize one another! ’Cause every single person is your sister and brother."
“Pictures of politicians preen across our TV screens, pretensions plaques and posters fill our minds and magazines. Promises a burning match, igniting dreams of straw…”
“It has nothing to do with age, it's not our languages, religion, gender, coulour of our skin; It’s a soul within a well, that echoes deep beneath the ego’s shell. True life can’t ever start, until we offer up our heart.”
“If we can just be brave enough to be each others mirror, we may finally recognize the face of conscious that we fear.”
"Hope as rich and green as the trees of an oasis."
“I saw a dream, Earth safe and green. No hunger no war, water so clean. I’ll work for the world that I saw, set my mind and say insha Allah.”
"But on the day the scrolls are laid, with every word and deed displayed, we we read our account, I know, for one, I’ll be afraid.”
“If a fist can hold a sword, and a fist can clench a pen, but the points of both are missed, by dull, tarnished pride of men. We must open up our hands, raise our palms up high to see, the mazes of our unique selves, end with similarity.”
“Eating education is like eating Christmas pudding: Too much can make your stomach sore, too much can spoil your whole Christmas. Learning from a man who learned all he learned from another, can lead you to a safe place, but destroy your sense of wonder. Trapped inside a book, locked inside a lecture, when do you find the time to love and spend your days in forests? And when ideals are fleeting ~ tell me then who do you turn to? They prove to you that God is dead, but to them you’re just a number.”
“Put all our pride away, always find a gentle word to say, you know we shouldn’t be full of ourselves when we should be full of humility."
“What of wars we have survived, genocides and hollow costs/holocausts? Have our hopes for humankind like scriptures and mass graves been lost?”
“You and I, wonder at the sky, call God a different name. As we try, learn and long to fly - you and I are so differently the same.”
"Watch the grown ups all twirling with the clock throughout the day. Watch them spinning through the hours while the time hands tick away. They talk and grip the world, as they would catch a falling knife. Reality deceives them ’neath amusing games of life."
“Someday we’ll realize, perhaps much to our surprise, the keys to free a smile have been with us all the while: look for good, and spread that good around.”
“There’s always work that must be done...Life’s so simple when we simply work to make it fun.”
“Fences and forts with walls and flags, caw caw - they’re so funny."