Should it be Islam first or Malay first?

Lately, we can see than there are parties that are taking advantage on issue related to Malays and Islam. It seems that in Malaysia, Muslim are Malays and Malays are Muslim. That is the main problem here.

Any issue related to Muslim is taken care as if it is a Malay issue. Malays are sensitive because they think that anything insulting Malays means it is insulting Islam. But they are not sensitive of other religions sensitivity when they stepped on the cow head which is the God of Hindu, which in Malaysia ironically refers to Indians. Malaysians have the wrong understanding where they tend to relate certain race with certain religion. Muslim are Malays and Hindu are Indians. There is no where in the Holy Quran stated that Muslim refers to Malay. When a Muslim dies, the angel would not ask what race are you but instead will ask what religion are you?

So, my question is whether should we tackle the Islam sensitive issues from a Malay’s perspective or from a Muslim perspective. If you take it from a Muslim perspective then it will be easy to resolve because your judgment is based on what is best for Islam and what does Islam say about it. But if you tackle the issue based on the Malay’s perspective that is where the all disagreements come from.

For example, the latest issue on Prayer’s for Lim Guan Eng. Even though it is yet to be proven true but let us just make it as a basis for our intellectual discussion.

THE PRIEST BECAME A MUSLIM

I would like to share a very interesting story. Hope as a Muslim, we could learn something out of it. :)

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Yusaf Estes is a prominent Scholar who travels around the Globe Spreading the message of God, he also distributes video and audio lectures. Below is a very interesting short autobiography of how he converted from a Christian Preacher to a Muslim Chaplin, Yusuf Estes has written a short biography of himself and published it on his website http://www.islamtomorrow.com and www.islamtoday.com.

"My name is Yusuf Estes and I am the National Muslim Chaplain for American Muslims, sponsored by a number of organizations here in Washington, DC. As such, I travel around the entire world lecturing and sharing the message of the Christ of the Quran in Islam. We hold dialogs and discussion groups with all faiths and enjoy the opportunity to work alongside of rabbis, ministers, preachers and priests everywhere. Most of our work is in the institutional area, military, universities and prisons. Primarily our goal is to educate and communicate the correct message of Islam and who the Muslims really are. Although Islam has grown now to tie Christianity as the largest of religions on earth, we see many of those who claim Islam as Muslims, that do not correctly understand nor properly represent the message of "Peace, Surrender and Obedience to God" (Arabic = 'Islam').

Dear me, I am afraid that I got a bit ahead of myself, I was trying to give a bit of background on my own personal experience to see if it would in anyway benefit you in your ministry. This may seem quite strange that I would offer to help you, while we perhaps share a few different perspectives and concepts of God, Jesus, prophet hood, sin and salvation. But you see, at one time I was in the same boat as you. Really, I was. Let me explain.

I was born into a very strong Christian family in the Midwest.

A Circus in Malaysian Court

 

This is a court case that is really interesting but did not get the coverage of main stream media.

You sure have heard the news  about "RM27 million cop" few years ago. At that time, many of us thought that this is a dirty cop and now the police has taken him down. But after 3 trials for 3 different charges,, he was found NOT GUILTY for all 3, and this is big conspiration which is a fight between Bekas Pengarah Jabatan Siasatan Jenayah Perdagangan (CCID), Datuk Pahlawan Ramli Yusuff vs. Tan Sri Musa Hassan (Inspector General of PDRM) teamed up with Suruhanjaya Pencegahan Rasuah Malaysia (MACC).

Flash back news on the RM27 million cop is available here

It is beleved that it all started when Datuk Ramli as a Head of Commercial Crime Bukit Aman, was being very strict in upholding justice where he led the task to catch some big fish and commercial crime gangster which was told to have good links with the IGP. A case was then built in order to bring him down. He was found not guilty for all 3 crimes.

Some interesting and funny moments during the 3rd trial session is when a witness who is a MACC Investigation Officer for the case was called upon as a witness, he answered a question from his Superior, DPP Dato’ Seri Shafee Abdullah with an answer that was not in favour to MACC.

He was asked whether the company linked to Dato Ramli is a paper company, and the intention is to prove that Dato Ramli was in the Board of Director & making money from that company while he is still a government servant. But the Investiogation Officer who was called as a witness said that his investigation findings is that the company is really a paper company. This is really a BIG SLAP on MACC face! But he is truely an officer with high integrity! The judge then asked what is the case then???

If you are interested to read more on this circus trial you may visit Din Merican's Blog, he had covered it in detail as he managed to attend most of the court hearings.


A summary of the event is also available here http://dinmerican.wordpress.com/2010/08/21/at-ringside-dato%E2%80%99-ramli-yusuff-acquitted-for-the-3rd-time/

You better read the summary 1st if you have no clue about this case. :)


Read also another circus trial of Rosli Dahan who was once the lawyer for the RM27million cop.It is still on going and is also covered by Din Merican in his blog.