BBC News – John Mohammed Butt: The hippy who became an imam

So says Aziz at City of Brass. 

Remembering the Heroism and Ethic of Hazrat Ali (a.s.) in the Persian New Year «. Some months ago when I first wrote this piece, I was thinking about the beginning of Ramadan. Today, a few months on I am thinking about the beginning of Navroz, the Persian New Year. There are beginnings everywhere. The Qur’an begins with the fatihah. There is a tradition that the entirety of the knowledge of the Qur’an can be found in the fatihah; the entire fatihah is contained in the first line, bismillah ir-rahman ir-rahim, everything in that phrase is found in bismillah; all of that knowledge is…

Recently I had the chance to visit, after a 7 year gap, one of my favourite cities in the world, Istanbul.  The city is a perfect melange of East and West.  For some reason it feels like home to me even though I am not from there or live there,  It physicaly represents both my Western and Muslim identities.  Its very modern and cosmopolitan, yet steeped in history and tradition. Its been over 5 years since I have actually visited a Muslim-majority city and something did not feel right for the first few days.  Then it occurred to me that…