Siraj Wahhaj

Siraj Wahhaj (English: Bright light; born as Jeffrey Kearse) is a well known African-American Muslim revert to Islam and public figure for Muslims in North America. He is currently the Imam of Al-Taqwa mosque in Brooklyn, New York.

Biography

Born and raised in New York, he became a Sunday school teacher as a teenager, then later went to Wilfrid Laurier University (WLU) where he studied biology education.

In the 1960s he became attracted to the Nation of Islam and was taught under Louis Farrakhan at the height of the NOI's anti-Malcolm X rhetoric. He became a Sunni Muslim after the death of Elijah Muhammad in 1975 and Muhammad's son Warith Deen Mohammed took over and reorganized the organization, urging members to come to orthodox Islam. Kearse then changed his name to Siraj Wahhaj. He was chosen to study Islam at the Umm al-Qura university of Mecca in 1978. He also briefly taught a course in Islamic studies at Howard University. In 1981 he started his own mosque, Masijd ul-Taqwa, in a friend's apartment in Brooklyn. Although it originally started out with only 25 people, today it is well-known.

In 1988 he led his community in an anti-drug patrol in which they staked out drug houses in Bedford-Stuyvesant in the cold of winter for 40 days and nights, forcing the closure of 15 drug houses. This effort received high praise from the New York City Police Department and the media.

Since that time, Siraj has been active in many Islamic organizations. He has been vice president of the Islamic Society of North America since 1997 and has served on the Majlis Ash-Shura, a consultative council of Islamic scholars, since 1987. He is a member of the Board of Advisors for the American Muslim Council and has also served on the national board of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

Siraj is a fairly prolific speaker in America. He makes many appearances at major North American Muslim conventions, and numerous forums and lectures in New England. His audio and video lectures are also popular in America's Muslim community. He is known to encourage Muslims to be God-fearing, enjoin good and forbid evil, practice regular charity, stay away from drugs, abstain from pre-marital relations, and other issues as well. He has also appeared on several national television talk shows and has had interviews with several media outlets.

In 1991 Siraj offered an invocation (opening prayer) to the United States House of Representatives. He was the first Muslim to do so.

Controversy

In 1991 in an address to the Islamic Association of North Texas, he referred to Operation Desert Storm as "one of the most diabolical plots ever in the annals of history." [ [http://archive.salon.com/news/feature/2001/09/26/muslims/index2.html "Islam's flawed spokesmen"] , Salon.com, 26 September 2001]

He was included on a list of 170 persons as a "may be alleged un-indicted co-conspirator" in the plot to bomb the World Trade Center in 1993, as named in 1995 by U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White as one of multiple "unindicted persons who may be alleged as co-conspirators." He was called as a witness by the defense to testify as a character witness for Omar Abdel-Rahman who had previously spoke at Wahhaj's mosque.Jonsson, David J. "Islamic Economics And the Final Jihad: The Muslim Brotherhood to the Leftist/marxist - Islamist Alliance." Page 430.] However, a recent interview with a former federal prosecutor from the case, Andrew McCarthy, dispelled rumors of Siraj Wahajj having any actual involvement in the attacks. McCarthy stated that Wahhaj's name was included in a filing that prosecutors were required to provide to defense attorneys in the case, a list of all the names of people who could possibly be foreseen to come up in the evidence. The filing, McCarthy said, has been called a "co-conspirator list." But Wahhaj was never named by the prosecution. McCarthy said, "The only time he came up in a meaningful way before the jury is when the defense called him as a witness". In response to the rumors Siraj Wahhaj states, "People try to make the connection as if I'm endorsing some bad deeds that [were] done by Sheik Abdel-Rahman. That had nothing to do with it...Not only have I never been charged with anything, not one FBI agent has ever asked me one question in relationship to that bombing." [ [http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/07/22/islam.ads/index.html?iref=mpstoryview] , CNN.com, July 22, 2008]

External links

* [http://www.halaltube.com/category/siraj-wahhaj Siraj Wahhaj Lectures]
* [http://www.imamswahhaj.com ImamSWahhaj.com Official Site for CDs/DVDs by Imam Siraj]
* [http://www.abc.net.au/rn/relig/spirit/stories/s129522.htm Siraj Wahhaj's interview on Australian radio]
* [http://www.ibnmedia.com/showpage.asp?PageID=211 Imam Siraj Wahhaj on IBN MEDIA]
* [http://www.halaltube.com/siraj-wahhaj/video/guide-for-humanity-universal-teachings-of-the-prophet-icna-2007 Guide For Humanity]
* [http://www.meccacentric.com/siraj_wahhaj.html Lectures by Siraj Wahhaj on DVD and CD]

References