Modern Muslim Preachers: Money, Religion and Hatred
أكتوبر
15
Like other Egyptians and Arabs, I am taken by the phenomenon of the modern preachers and their influence on our life. They affected not only religious but also social and political aspects.
الجندي وخالد: بختلف مع الاتنين .. لكن عمرو خالد افضلI am completely against such preachers who depend on shallow interpretations for Islam which are highly welcomed by those who belong to the middle-class. However, I could not help liking the impressive model of Amr Khaled, and terribly disliking Khaled Al-Gendy.
The latter made use of his entitlement to give Islamic pieces of advice to promote for hatred and to encourage the desire to hoard money rather than reflecting the tolerance and easiness of Islam.
I found myself interested in Al-Gendy, for the first time, when I attended Dr. Aiman Nour trial as a human rights observer. Al-Gendy was present as a witness. I saw the prestigious preacher playing with words and giving eluding answers to prove the charge of Dr. Nour. I think he forgot or pretended to have forgotten that dividing the witness is not of Islam. He had rather to mention his witness in full regardless of being it with or against.
Just few weeks latter, the name of Sheikh Al-Gendy was circulated in the media as one of the inciters of Sudanese refugees' massacre in Mostafa Mahmoud square, Al-Mohandiseen. Dozens of innocent poor Sudanese refugees were killed, as he condemned their strike and declared that he found their existence there so disgusting. He exerted no effort to discover the reasons why the strike was launched.
Afterwards, I was interested in knowing more about the phenomenon of this Sheikh. I discovered many contradictions which prove the defects of this phenomenon. The sheikh invested his fame among half-intellectuals in co-founding "The Islamic Phone Project". The project is based on answering the religious inquiries on phone and the charge of the call is to be added to callers' phone bills. The charge of the minute reaches 1.50 L.E. and the average call takes 5 minutes; i.e. the caller shall pay the average of 7.50 L.E. to get the religious advice. These funds go directly to the hands of the Sheikh and his partners, including Sherif Esmat Abdul Majeed the son of the ex-General Secretary of the Arab League; Esmat Abdul Majeed. Sherif is a close friend of Khaled Al-Gendy who calls himself a Muslim preacher. He is merely a mosque imam like other thousands of his colleagues hired by The Ministry of Awqaf!
Al-Gendy also made use of his fame as a preacher and founded "Al-Gendy Import and Export Co." According to laws, the owner of such company is called a "trader". Thereupon, we ask: what is the relationship between import and export activities and Islamic preaching? What will the sheikh trade?
That is not all! The trader, imam or preacher – whatever he likes to call himself – declared himself recently as an opponent of the cultural dialogue initiative, during the crisis of publishing prophet Muhammad Cartoons in Denmark. He was bidding against the preacher Amr Khaled and Sheikh Yousuf Al-Karadawi who called for the dialogue.
He even insulted the women who do not wear Islamic hijap (scarf) by describing them as "animals walking in the streets".
He used to condemn unlawful [ourfi] marriage all the time. Then he himself got married unlawfully!
We still have more to say about the truth of such suspicious preachers who contribute in forming the mentalities and life concepts of many youths and citizens. They are known for their contradictions through giving themselves the right to do what they prohibit others from doing. They even mix between religion and trade with its doubtable revenues!
I feel so sorry for the discovery of these facts and more. I really wanted to fail in proving that such preachers prefer money and hatred to religion.