Are you inspired?

I was once asked by an organizer in one of our civic partners: What inspired you as an American Muslim to be an activist? That was a simple but a difficult question indeed.

Who inspires you? What motivates you to serve your community, to spend long hours volunteering for your Mosque, local charity or school, and to donate your wealth and time? And what inspire us as Americans Muslims?

To inspire means to encourage, motivate and stimulate. Inspiration is the stimulation of the mind or emotions to a high level of feeling and activity. Of course in matter of revelation, it means the Divine guidance or influence exerted directly on the mind and soul of humankind (1).

When talking about inspiration, we should be aware of the fact that people can be inspired by other people, leaders, writings, images, speeches, poetry, stories, history and sometimes by mere contemplation and meditation.

Inspiring could be a uplifting and positive. Prophet Mohammad peace be upon him, inspires us Muslims to be merciful, pious, kind and compassionate, Omar Ibn Akhttab inspires us to be just and strong in faith, Ali Ibn Abi Taleb, Khaled Ibn Alwaleed and Salaheddin inspire us to be brave and heroic, and Aisha, the mother of believers, inspires us to be inquisitive, curious, and probing.

One famous book that tried to use objective measures to rank the most influential or inspiring people in the human history is Michael Hart book, The 100, A ranking of the most Influential Persons in history (2) tried to rank people based on their inspiration on people, events and history.

He ranked Prophet Mohammad as the first person among the top 100 influential persons in history, because he is the only person in history who “founded” a great religion and “founded” a powerful state, and because he affects even today, the lives of more than a billion Muslims and many more. Michael Hart is not a Muslim, and only two Muslims made it to his 100 list (Omar Ibn Alkhattab is ranked also)

In the history of the US, Martin Luther King, Jr. tops the list of the most inspiring people followed by Abraham Lincoln, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. Even Oprah Winfrey and Elvis Presley make it to the top ten. Mohammed Ali and Malcolm X, both African American Muslims, are among the most influential American Muslims.

I am optimistic that the near future will bring more inspiring figures among American Muslims, and just to mention few: Nihad Awad, the director of CAIR, Hamza Yousuf, the Director of Alzaytona Institute, Dr. Hassan Hathout, the founder of MPAC, Ingrid Mattson, the present president of ISNA, Dr. Abdel Hakeem Jackson and more others.

I expect more American Muslims to climb up the ladder of inspiration, when they come out of their cocoons, truly embody their faith, follow the lead of their prophet, and become true witnesses on the community as the Quran asks us to be.

What makes us an inspiring community? How can we inspire others? How can embrace our inspiring history in order to build a better future? I will leave it to you to contemplate and think about it.

Share with us your inspirational stories, people, events, speeches and poetry. More importantly try to inspire others to do good deeds, to light a candle, to help others, to spread justice, to remove injustice, to eliminate oppression and torture, to fight bigotry and Islamophobia, and to make the earth a better place for us and for our children to live.

Mohammed Zaher Sahloul, President
The Mosque Foundation

1- The American Heritage Dictionary
2- Michael Hart, The 100, A ranking of the most Influential Persons in history