Imam Johari Abdul-Malik’s current job was created, effectively, on Sept. 11, 2001, as the nation reeled from the horror of terrorism and the world hurled outrage at the Islamic faith. In response, the 53-year-old former Muslim chaplain at Howard University became the director of outreach at Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, serving 3,000 worshipers every Friday. He sat down with The Washington Examiner at the start of the month of Ramadan, the busiest and most holy time on the Muslim calendar, to share his beliefs and his underlying hope for peace.
Do you consider yourself to be of a specific faith?
I grew up an Episcopalian. From my teenage years, though, I had a sense of a universal truth in Christianity, but certain things troubled me about its lack of universality, and about Trinitarianism. It was in my years in undergraduate and graduate school that I decided to accept the Prophet [Muhammad] whom I believe Jesus talked about who would come after him.
What that did for me is create a kind of a bridge — Jesus was the bridge between Jews and Gentiles, and then later to the children of Abraham. And that bridge extended to the Prophet Muhammad. And so although my faith, in practice, is called Islam, as a Muslim I don’t see my religion as something that is exclusive of Jesus, and Moses, and Abraham, but as inclusive of all of the prophets, and identifies all of them as messengers of God.
Explain the spiritual effect of fasting during the month of Ramadan.
The Quran gives as the objective of fasting that you might acquire taqwa — or a God-consciousness that leads to piety. And for this annual exercise of abstaining from things that normally would give you sustenance — food, drink, the feeding of your passions — the only real observer of whether or not you’re truly fasting is God almighty. The God-consciousness comes from that internal relationship.
It feels like driving on fumes, when you know your car shouldn’t have any more gas, and you’re just hoping you can get to the station before it cuts off. God is the fuel. And amazingly enough, after a while you have the feeling that God’s going to get me through this — I’m not going to be faced with an obstacle that I can’t overcome. Somehow I’ll get a second wind. It’s a stretch of your reliance upon God. And an understanding that maybe if I can rely upon God at this level, maybe I need to stop worrying about all of that other stuff.
Did anyone or any event especially influence your conversion to Islam?
I was in graduate school at Howard University, and one night was walking home from campus. Back in those days, that was a very rough neighborhood. And as I approached the corner of 14th and Euclid Northwest, there were two men standing on the corner, and one had a bottle in a brown paper bag. As I approached, one of them said, “Excuse me, Brother — can I ask you a question?” I said, “No problem, Brother.” He was talking to the man about God, and he asked if I believed in only one God, and I said yes. “So you believe in Allah?” I said yes. And that Muhammad was his only prophet — yes. He went down a list of things — I didn’t eat pork, I didn’t drink alcohol, and he said, “That’s Muslim, Brother.” At the end of the exchange, he said “Assalamu alaykum,” and I said, “Alaykum assalam.”
And I walked away and realized I must be a Muslim — I was living as a Muslim, I just hadn’t wanted to accept that I was a Muslim. Islam had been presented in my past as something different than what I believed in, and I didn’t want to become something else. But here I had found a faith that really was the way I was.
The word Shariah — people are always afraid of it — but it just means “way.” When Jesus said “I am the way,” that was Shariah. The Prophet Muhammad has his own Shariah. Moses has his own Shariah. They’re all on a din, or path, to God.
At your core, what is one of your defining beliefs?
This is hard because I keep hearing Jimi Hendrix in my head. I believe that when the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace — that’s his quote. I do believe that had we this sense of seeking the power of love, we could overcome so many of our difficulties. Ramadan helps you to get in touch with that.
– Leah Fabel
