IslamicAnswers.com: Islamic Advice

My dear brothers and sisters...As salamu aalaikum,

I am a reverted muslim, I accepted islam around 3 years back.......I studied Islam, followed up the debates, lectures by the scholars and was involved in various discussions on religion to ultimately embrace Islam.......It is said that guidance from Allah comes through various channels, it can be through miracles, dreams, some specific events in our life, a zeal from within to know the purpose of our existence...and there may be many more ways (Allah knows best)..........

For me, the driving force behind studying Islam and Alhamdulillah embracing it, was hatred towards the religion of Islam. Though I was not completely against Islam yet I never liked it much in the past......strangely, during my college days I fell in love with a muslim girl because of her simplicity, very modest dressing, understanding level, intelligence and extremely modest behaviour.......I just felt like respecting her from the bottom of my heart.......it was the beginning of an inspiration towards a culture (not apparently towards Islam though).

I was afraid of the consequences but still after a couple of years i told her about my feelings and the respect that I had for her.........she caught my intentions and told me without any delay that if I am beginning to like her then I should give up the thought straight away because she will not tolerate any such thing.......I got the message and kept quiet there after.......

She being a human had some feelings for me as well but her principles never allowed her to accept those feelings......however both of us were able to feel the respect we had for each other........Finally college was over and all of us were set to take different paths in our life.........we went miles apart from each other to different cities in opposite corners of the nation.....

Somehow we managed to stay in touch like we used to with other colleagues......At this stage life took a turn, she wanted to talk to me one day and I found her worried and crying......she told me that people are visiting her house quite often and talks about her marriage are going on she was also supposed to meet a guy whose parents met her parents recently......she then clarified to my anticipation that she is not liking this at all and its happening because she likes me.

I was so furious at her that if that's the case then why didn't she accept this before and why she is not telling her parents about it. I said I will talk to my parents as well, she told me that there is no use of telling all this to her parents because her religion prohibits such things and she is already committing a crime by even thinking all this. I was quite angry listening to this but some how convinced her to at least tell her state of mind to her parents so that they can understand what she is going through and can give her some time to consolidate herself.

Now an entirely new chapter got started and I received a mail from her saying - "My phone has been taken away from me and I was slapped on my face as soon as I told my mother about this, somehow I managed to send you this mail but I think I made a mistake by following your advice to tell this to my parents". I was shocked and was very angry about this reaction from her parents, several thoughts came into my mind that what kind of a thinking is this, what was her crime, why all this and these things made me think bad about Islam as well.

One day I received a call and her mother was speaking to me. She was too angry with me and was asking me that why I did all this to them? What do I want now?. I just tried to tell her that our intentions were, to simply tell her about what we think and nothing else.....the decision is always going to be your's.....she then told me that it is not possible in Islam for a muslim to marry a non muslim, its illegal. I was shocked again and began to think that (Astaghfirullah) what kind of religion is this, it produces terrorists and has such a narrow minded thinking and blah blah blah.......

Interestingly, with the guidance of Almighty Allah, instead of turning away from Islam I decided to learn more about the religion that what actually are the teachings of Islam and how come so many people around the world believe in such kind of thoughts despite being so much inhuman (astaghfirullah), and with this I also thought that I will raise questions about the authenticity of the concepts in the religion and will try to argue based on logic and principle of humanity that what's the harm in marrying her to me.........Though I was too naive to think that the girl will agree to marry me (despite of the fact that she liked me)......I also thought that if it is some sort of ritual to accept Islam then I will follow it for the sake of marriage.

This was the time that changed my life completely.....I went through the translations of Quran, listened to the lectures of scholars, went through the comparisons between various religions and Islam, followed up the debates and alhamdulillah I should say that I got divine help at every step that I took towards understanding Islam....whatever doubt that came to my mind got clarified through some thing or the other, one of my muslim friend's father was maulana and many of my queries got resolved through him.

I also watched lectures of Dr. Zakir Naik and found them very influencing. Finally by the grace of Allah almighty my heart accepted Islam, Alhamdulillah. Allah is surely the all powerful who can transform even the hatred in one's heart into a guidance towards the truth.

Now was the time to turn back towards the girl, whom Allah sent into my life as a means to reach the truth, and show her my gratitude for what I earned through her. I messaged her one day that I offered my first fajar prayer today. She replied to me saying that don't try to play with the religion, it's not a joke and please don'think about this. It took me sufficient time to convince her about my reversion to Islam and to explain her what else I went through. She was very much shocked with all this and cried a lot saying that she prayed a lot for me in the past and never told me about that.

I told her that I will talk to her parents now and will tell them about my reversion, she said nobody will believe me its useless. But now I was very much aware of the power of Allah and I told her that I will try my best to convince them. I talked to her mother regarding this but as expected she didn't agree.

By the time her entire family was knowing about all this and she went through some really hard time when everyone was cursing her and embarassing her emotionally for what she thought. She was asked to marry some one of their choice for the sake of her family's respect but she asked her parents to meet me once before deciding on this. They continuosly refused but after a lot of efforts and a condition that she will marry anyone of their choice if nothing good turned out in the meeting, her mother agreed to meet me.

My friend's father (maulana) and few more people (all muslims) who came to know me by that time told me that they will come with me to convince her parents. The meeting took place and maulana uncle tried to explain to her mother that I am a good person and he knows me for around one and a half year, others also talked good about me but nothing was impressive enough for her family members.

At last her mother said that if they (me and the girl) have decided on this then there is no use discussing all this, she is left with no option but she won't be able to sacrifice girl's father's honor and respect in the society for all this and that girl's father will not be able to face so much humiliation from the society, he is already too ill because of all this.

We came up with an idea that we will not disclose the fact that I am a reverted muslim, to their relatives. Questions to be answered at this stage were
1> how the nikah will be completed: maulana uncle took the responsibility of it.
2> what will be said to the people about me: some people said that they will become my relatives and will participate in the marriage.

It was also suggested that I should leave the country and settle somewhere else. Initially I was reluctant to it but looking at the scenario in my own family as well, where they were afraid of this fact being disclosed to my relatives that I am a muslim (since no one in my family was happy with my reversion), I thought it would be a good option to leave the country so that every one can be freed of this tension till their heart accept me as a muslim. I left the country and with the grace of almighty got a decent job outside my country.

Now my dear brothers and sisters we don't know what to do from here. How the marriage can be conducted? Because there are very few people who may be able to participate in the marriage from my side and also this is a big question that whether we will be able to hide my reality from girl's relatives so that her parents can live peacefully.

We don't want this marriage at the cost of pain, illness and tensions to be left for our parents. Our parents now realize and say that our happiness is important to them (though girl's father still hates me but he is ready to extend his help in this matter) but we are not able to find a way out of this. Please suggest us what can be done from here on.

I shall be thankful to you for this.

Jazak Allah,
Abdullah