Navigating Unknown Terrain
By Deanna Othman
Every May and June, our community enthusiastically embraces a new generation of graduates—high school, college, and graduate school students who have excelled in their academic careers, and seek to take their efforts to the next level. All of them have come a long way down their respective educational paths—they’ve studied, struggled, worked hard and accomplished much.
Though this is all true; however, what everyone has already achieved is minimal compared to what we have the potential to achieve. As one completes one stage of their education, whether it is going from junior high to high school, or from high school to college, they often feel tired yet satisfied—as if they’ve done it all, and are ready to conquer whatever else may confront them. They feel that they are prepared to enter the next stage of their education, and once they reach the end they have placed in sight, their journey will be complete.
When I was in high school, and met people who were in college, I thought to myself, “Wow, when you go that far, when they actually hand you that degree, you must know everything there is to know about your particular field.” I remember thinking what a remarkable experience that must be. But as I went through college and graduate school, I realized that education is no more than a gradual realization of our own ignorance. The more we learn and the more we know, the more we find out how much more there is to know, and how we really know nothing compared to what is out there. You discover an infinite collection of subjects, theories, ideologies and philosophies you never fathomed could exist—and even more surprisingly—you never fathomed you could understand.
For our high school graduates: beginning college is like being thrown into a jungle where there are hundreds of different types of animals clawing at you, thickets of brush and plants clouding your vision and stifling your path, and your job is to emerge from this jungle by following the light which peeks through the dense blanket of leaves above your head, while taming some of these impediments that block your way, and using them to help you navigate the terrain. If you successfully tame and conquer such impediments, you will emerge from the jungle with far more experience and expertise than when you first entered it.
The animals clawing at you are the temptations and distractions that confront one on a college campus. Things ranging from drinking, improper behavior between men and women, indecency, parties and homosexuality are found among the students in all universities. And even more depressing is the fact that all of these things exist among populations of Muslim students. The distractions—the bushes and leaves that may cloud your vision in this jungle--are the rampant futile ideologies and philosophies that are propagated on college campuses and kept alive as part of the academic or intellectual tradition. From secularism to postmodernism, Marxism to Nihilism, most of these philosophies are reduced to a single common denominator—atheism. They seek to teach us that our world is a construct or theoretical entity, devoid of meaning, empty, Godless, and that we must reinfuse meaning into our world through modern creativity and discovery—which is exemplified by our society’s search for meaning in meaningless things. The average student, when confronted with these seemingly convincing, logical arguments, is ill-equipped to detect the gaping holes and fallacies within them. Often, many students buy into these ideas, while rejecting their own rich, intellectual, religious traditions.
Although these numerous ideologies students are fed may be meaningless, nevertheless, I believe there is a value in learning and understanding, or taming them, for it gives us insight into why our society is being shaped in a specific manner, what the minds in academia are thinking, and how we can easily disprove such theories based on nothing more than conjecture and flawed logic. However, we can never productively learn these ideas and emerge from this jungle unscathed if we do not follow the light that guides us, the light that peeks into the jungle. This light, the light of Allah (SWT), the light of Islam, will help us clear the jungle—to tear down the obstructions in our path and to allow more light to seep into the jungle, allowing others to see and be guided by this light.
Graduates, it is your duty to portray Islam as the beautiful faith it is—whether you venture into high school, college, graduate school or the work force. When people hear the word “Muslim” to describe you, they should envision someone who is smart, hard-working and successful. To those entering high school or college, if you work hard and demonstrate your abilities, no one will put you down because of your Islam, they will admire you more for it. As a person, you are what you prove yourself to be. Although the world is not perfect and people may prejudge you, once you show people what you are capable of, and do so while upholding your identity as a Muslim, you will never fail—in this life or the next.