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The Mahdi

Father Jake had a question regarding the Mahdi and the use of the name “Mahdi Army” by Muqtada as-Sadr. He’s gone out and done a fair amount of research, and I wanted to add my two cents. From a theological perspective, the idea of the Mahdi is incredibly ill-defined, because the idea of the end days are ill-defined in the Qur’an. While we have a sense that the mountains will crumble, stars will fall from the sky and the sky itself will tear, there is no equivalent to the Book of Revelations in the Qur’an. (For a wonderful discussion of…

Muslim liquor store owners get help with moral dilemma

Muslim liquor store owners get help with moral dilemma – chicagotribune.com. Prescribed by his Islamic faith to pray five times a day, Mazen Materieh often prostrates himself on one of the prayer rugs in the basement of his corner store. When he is done, he returns to his perch behind the counter, where he sells liquor, lottery tickets and pork skins — all forbidden by the Quran and the Prophet Muhammad. h/t GetReligion Too often, news stories portray people of faith at extremes. They’re either totally righteous or totally hypocritical. In most cases, I think all of us fall somewhere…

Next Time You Are in … Cairo – TIME

Next Time You Are in … Cairo – TIME. A walk down the main thoroughfare of Darb al-Ahmar is a fascinating, raucous look at daily life in the Egyptian capital: you get honked aside by trucks and motorcycles, sideswiped by donkey carts and greeted enthusiastically by children. The area is home to the poorest population in the city, but these days many of its once decrepit mosques and palaces, from the Fatamid to the Ottoman eras, are being restored under the auspices of the Aga Khan Development Network’s (AKDN) Historic Cities project.