new boy at a big school I felt intimidated by the collective emotion of Dammaj and its size. On the tour Abu Bilal told me the Institute – or Masjid – had started as a small collection of mud-brick buildings, but had expanded as its reputation spread. Now it had a library and a mosque capable of accommodating several hundred worshippers. Loudspeakers blared to announce the start of classes and lectures. The complex was surrounded by intensively cultivated and irrigated plots.
Abu Bilal explained to me the rules: single male students were strictly prohibited from going into areas of the complex reserved for married men. The five daily prayers were compulsory: each student was required to arrive on time and in silence. In between, students were required to attend lessons on the Koran and lessons from the life of the Prophet Mohammed. The mosque was the only one in the Muslim world in which students were required to keep their shoes on. A hadith viewed as authoritative by Sheikh Muqbil stated the Prophet had prayed in this way, and he was not about to let a practice built up over the centuries get in the way of his students following the true path.
Dammaj was a place of religious ferment. There were perhaps 300 young men there when I arrived, almost every one of them bearded, with the ardent expression of those convinced they had found righteousness. They came from many places but were united by a rejection of the modern world.
Despite my lack of Arabic, I soon found out what was driving these young men – and most were under thirty. They felt Muslims – and especially Arab Muslims – had been betrayed by their own leaders and exploited by the West. Dictators had robbed the people in a sea ofcorruption but done nothing to help the Palestinians. The original religion had been corrupted by Western modes of thinking. And so it was time to return to the purest and most authentic expression of Islam.
Dammaj was a place of few comforts. I was given a bare room made of breeze blocks as my quarters, which I shared with Abu Bilal. We slept on blankets on the concrete floor, which was a luxury because most students were sleeping on mud floors. Food was frequently rice, beans and ginger tea. An egg was an extravagance. The toilet was a hole in the ground in the washroom. I had to learn how to clean myself with water with my left hand. The drainage system had not kept pace with the expansion of the Institute and a whiff of raw sewage would often interrupt our studying. But for all the discomforts, it was a haven of calm, self-discipline and devotion after my biker years.
The great question of the day was when and how Muslims should take up jihad in defence of their religion. Sheikh Muqbil refused to support violence against rulers and most Salafis saw education as the way to restore Islam. But some of his students would later criticize him for not speaking out against the presence of US troops on Saudi soil. This had been a cataclysm for Salafis: how could the infidel be allowed to set foot in the kingdom that protected Islam’s holiest sites?
Under a date-palm one autumn afternoon one student – an Egyptian – spoke for most when we discussed the evils that Islam must grapple with.
‘How can it be that the Custodian of the Two Holy Sites allows American troops to defile our lands? How can it be that our governments spend billions on American planes and tanks? They turn their back on Islam, allow alcohol, allow women to dress as prostitutes. Muslims have lost their way and it is up to us to re-educate them in Allah’s way.’
Many of Dammaj’s students had already returned home to set up similar institutes and schools across the Muslim world. Part of the appeal of this radical philosophy was that it bypassed the religious establishment and went directly to the fount of Islam. In that sense it empowered the poor and the persecuted and allowed them to spread the word, even if they had not benefited from decades of
Abu Bilal explained to me the rules: single male students were strictly prohibited from going into areas of the complex reserved for married men. The five daily prayers were compulsory: each student was required to arrive on time and in silence. In between, students were required to attend lessons on the Koran and lessons from the life of the Prophet Mohammed. The mosque was the only one in the Muslim world in which students were required to keep their shoes on. A hadith viewed as authoritative by Sheikh Muqbil stated the Prophet had prayed in this way, and he was not about to let a practice built up over the centuries get in the way of his students following the true path.
Dammaj was a place of religious ferment. There were perhaps 300 young men there when I arrived, almost every one of them bearded, with the ardent expression of those convinced they had found righteousness. They came from many places but were united by a rejection of the modern world.
Despite my lack of Arabic, I soon found out what was driving these young men – and most were under thirty. They felt Muslims – and especially Arab Muslims – had been betrayed by their own leaders and exploited by the West. Dictators had robbed the people in a sea ofcorruption but done nothing to help the Palestinians. The original religion had been corrupted by Western modes of thinking. And so it was time to return to the purest and most authentic expression of Islam.
Dammaj was a place of few comforts. I was given a bare room made of breeze blocks as my quarters, which I shared with Abu Bilal. We slept on blankets on the concrete floor, which was a luxury because most students were sleeping on mud floors. Food was frequently rice, beans and ginger tea. An egg was an extravagance. The toilet was a hole in the ground in the washroom. I had to learn how to clean myself with water with my left hand. The drainage system had not kept pace with the expansion of the Institute and a whiff of raw sewage would often interrupt our studying. But for all the discomforts, it was a haven of calm, self-discipline and devotion after my biker years.
The great question of the day was when and how Muslims should take up jihad in defence of their religion. Sheikh Muqbil refused to support violence against rulers and most Salafis saw education as the way to restore Islam. But some of his students would later criticize him for not speaking out against the presence of US troops on Saudi soil. This had been a cataclysm for Salafis: how could the infidel be allowed to set foot in the kingdom that protected Islam’s holiest sites?
Under a date-palm one autumn afternoon one student – an Egyptian – spoke for most when we discussed the evils that Islam must grapple with.
‘How can it be that the Custodian of the Two Holy Sites allows American troops to defile our lands? How can it be that our governments spend billions on American planes and tanks? They turn their back on Islam, allow alcohol, allow women to dress as prostitutes. Muslims have lost their way and it is up to us to re-educate them in Allah’s way.’
Many of Dammaj’s students had already returned home to set up similar institutes and schools across the Muslim world. Part of the appeal of this radical philosophy was that it bypassed the religious establishment and went directly to the fount of Islam. In that sense it empowered the poor and the persecuted and allowed them to spread the word, even if they had not benefited from decades of
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