{"id":999,"date":"2004-09-23T05:45:58","date_gmt":"2004-09-23T05:45:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/?p=999"},"modified":"2004-09-23T05:45:58","modified_gmt":"2004-09-23T05:45:58","slug":"2004-9-23-yoga-not-halal-html","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/?p=999","title":{"rendered":"Yoga not halal"},"content":{"rendered":"
This<\/a> is the kind of stupid thing that gives Muslims a bad name:<\/p>\n

A religious edict saps the energy out of yoga enthusiasts in Egypt, where clerics say the 5,000-year-old practice violates Islamic law.<\/p>\n

Answering a religious question put forward, Egypt’s highest theological authority called yoga an “ascetic Hindu practice that should not be used in any manner of exercise or worship.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The undated but recent edict was signed by the mufti, Ali Gomoa.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The edict, published in the pan-Arab daily newspaper Al-Hayat and obtained Sunday by the Associated Press, called the practice of yoga “an aberration” and said mimicking it is “forbidden religiously.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There is a serious problems with the use — and perhaps the tradition itself — of fatwas, especially when they are given out by a government appointed sheikh. There is not meant to be in Islam, as far as I can tell, an “official fatwa-maker.” This is why Ali Gomaa has occasionally clashed with Al Azhar University, which has a council of scholars that often give out fatwas. But in principle, fatwas can be made by any person, and are usually personal advice given to individuals, not a reflection of government policy (and indeed Egypt has not banned yoga). The problem is that when an idiot or extremist decides that yoga is haram<\/i>, or that a certain writer has insulted Islam, or that it’s OK to kidnap Americans working in Iraq, it often looks like he’s speaking to all Muslims. Particularly if someone powerful — the state, a fundamentalist group, a university — had decided that this person is entitled to make fatwas.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This<\/a> is the kind of stupid thing that gives Muslims a bad name:<\/p>\n

A religious edict saps the energy out of yoga enthusiasts in Egypt, where clerics say the 5,000-year-old practice violates Islamic law.<\/p>\n

Answering a religious question put forward, Egypt’s highest theological authority called yoga an “ascetic Hindu practice that should not be used in any manner of exercise or worship.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The undated but recent edict was signed by the mufti, Ali Gomoa.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The edict, published in the pan-Arab daily newspaper Al-Hayat and obtained Sunday by the Associated Press, called the practice of yoga “an aberration” and said mimicking it is “forbidden religiously.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There is a serious problems with the use — and perhaps the tradition itself — of fatwas, especially when they are given out by a government appointed sheikh. There is not meant to be in Islam, as far as I can tell, an “official fatwa-maker.” This is why Ali Gomaa has occasionally clashed with Al Azhar University, which has a council of scholars that often give out fatwas. But in principle, fatwas can be made by any person, and are usually personal advice given to individuals, not a reflection of government policy (and indeed Egypt has not banned yoga). The problem is that when an idiot or extremist decides that yoga is haram<\/i>, or that a certain writer has insulted Islam, or that it’s OK to kidnap Americans working in Iraq, it often looks like he’s speaking to all Muslims. Particularly if someone powerful — the state, a fundamentalist group, a university — had decided that this person is entitled to make fatwas.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[6,194],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/999"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/999\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/amrani.cc\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}