Celebrating Christmas
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Salaam Someone,
Apologies, I wrote that in haste. I was saying that I just found it strange how people go about it here, atleast from what I've seen. One person will buy a gift for friends and family... but at the same time, it's like a rule, that those same friends and family have to buy that person a gift. I think that's just a waste, most of the time, people end up getting gifts they never wanted anyway. Some people create "wish-lists" to avoid dissappoinments... I fail to see the purpose and point to it all.
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Salam Kyle,
I understand this all too well, my grandmother was "Mrs Chritmas", she would decorate her entire attic and all the kids in the neigborhood would come see it.
lol lol
You should see some streets here in Berlin! Some houses are in hard competition with their neighbours, who got more shiny sparkling windows and gardens! It gets more and more each year.I understand all too well, but we have to ask, WHY is it so compulsory? Is it because we are PROGRAMMED starting as early as the day after "thanskgiving" with songs, lights, SALE SALE SALE? Do you realize that this time is accounts for 50% of most buisnesses? So they spend BILLIONS of dollars on commercials? BILLIONS OF DOLLARS, for what? Because it WORKS!
Yes, Kyle somehow you`re right. If we would collect all this money and give it to the needing ones it would be much better than holding up high our capitalistic systems. But then again it is not only the Christmas-present-boom we ought to fight.
It was just today when I went to one of the biggest cinemas in the inner city. I was speechless of all that monumentary waste of money. Everything was shining and glittering. Every tree had shiny chains, huge screens with movies were shown open air, a bowling place, bars, food, music, light-shows,...A big party going on. It was overwhelming. What a temple of consume!!!
As if the whole world would live in peace and happiness...Birth of Jesus? Please show your evidence ofJesus being born on Dec 25th. In fact, give evidnece of ANY DATE.
I knew this will come up.Of course I can
t show you any evidence, and Im quite aware of it. But I see this more symbolic - it doesn`t really matter it was this or the other day to remember just the fact that Prophet Jesus was born. The Prophet - and not the son of God!! ?Bye
wardaOh, who is Macy?
Yes, all of us here in US have been and are being programmed, especially when MAcy's first kept thier doors open on Christmas Eve. -
Oh, who is Macy?
Macy's is a store and host a very large Christmas parade....in New York City I believe
Everyone has made very good points.
I completely agree that Christmas is a very, very commercial holiday.There is no evidence that Dec 25th is the birth day of Jesus, but at the same time I am not aware of anyone I know who claims that it actually is. Mostly is is just a symbolic day to observe the birth of Jesus. However, this is Christian holiday and the birth is celebrated as the birth of th son of God.
For myself, I am just not yet ready to give up a holiday that has meant so much to me for so many years. This is my first Christmas after coming to Islam and Christmas for me has always been such a happy time filled with family and love.
Maybe as I grow in my faith I may come to another opinion but for now I will Praise Allah for the birth of the prophet Jesus and be thankful for my family and friends. I will say thank you to those I love with a gift or two and will sit down to a turkey dinner surrounded by those I love.
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salaam alaykum IamSearchingForGod
the forum normally goes through this one at this time of year - its a kind of tradition all of its own wink
so let me start the ball rolling by saying that I will be celebrating christmas this year - will be giving my children presents which I tell them were delivered by a fat man who has elves working for him, will eat mince pies which I dont at any other time of the year and will bring a tree into the house which I will cover with electic lights. I may well sing some christmas carols which will claim things like Jesus is the King of Heaven and Santa has a reindeer with a particularly shiny nose - I don't beleive either statement to be true but Allah is aware of that fact.
I do this because I used to celebrate xmas as a non-relgious festival in the old days when I was an atheist and still celebrate it in the same way now I am a muslim.
peace all,
asdfjk
Salaam
There are things i like about this time of year and things i don't. I don't like the commercialism, but coming from a sunni family obviously there's no pressure to take part so no worry about that. but I listen to all the cheesy songs (Band aid 20 included!!) and I love the lights in the town centre, brings cheer to otherwise grim winter nights. They should keep them up until the end of January! This is how I "celebrate"
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Peace be upon you Someone,
I'm not trying to put the fault on women, but just making an observation. Please correct me if it's wrong.
No brother, make no apology, you are right on point! This is not a disrespect to the women, it is a compliment if correctly understood. The woman represents the female principle in life. While all humans contain BOTH principles, the man has more of the masculine principle, and the woman has more of the feminine. We can see this in Testosterone and Estrogen levels. The chinese call these principles "Yin" (Fem) and "Yang"(Masc).
The Yin is that part that is INNER and the Yang is the Outer. So by NATURE, women are more "spiritual", they are more "emotional", etc because they are more YIN! D The God has told us that the man and woman are not the same.
Look at the churches and see the overwhelming amount of women who are there. The YIN nature is that which helps them be the mother, while the father needs the YANG to go OUTSIDE and hunt and protect.
I am sure we can all reflect and gain a deeper insight on this.
So when it comes to the Christmas nonsense, which by the way is st the HIEGHT of the YIN season, let me repeat that, the HEIGHT OF THE YIN SEASON, the women will be effected much more.
So who do the consumers attack? The WOMEN!!! Isn't it true that society tries to label the woman as the "Shopper"? And don't many of them fall into this trap?
Lets leave emotions out of the discussions and we can see the tricks of the wicked clearly.
For what reason was the female infant buried? So that the wicked could manipulate the masses!!!!!!!!!!
When we UPLIFT the woman to her true status of QUEEN (Queen Sheba), then we can put her spiritual intuitaveness to work!
This is EXACTLY the conditions that were in place when one of the greatest civilizations was flourishing, that of ancient Egypt(Kemet).
We have to UPLIFT the woman to her proper status and stop allowing the wicked to use the "magic" that was learned from Harut and Marut to expoit them and by consequence, men.
In sayinig the above, I am not saying men do not get influenced, please remember that ALL HUMANS have BOTH priniplces, so men are influenced as well, sometimes more so do to ignorance. But I was just showing the truth of "Someone's" statement.
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Peace be upon you Peace,
I remember that saying my mom would tell me when I was young, "would you jump off a cliff if everyone else did?", now I get to turn it around on her
Fantastic!! D
Just keep in mind that it is because she is EMOTIONALLY attached, so you must be gentle with this. This is the inner battle, controlling the emotions. The best that we can do for ANYONE with ANY TOPIC is to show them WHY they FEEL the way they do about it. Logic must direct EMOTION. The EMOTION is an ANIMAL, which is why we have all the SYMBOLISM of animals in this reading(quran). Do you remember that you were taught that the "devil" was a red , animal like being with horns and hoofs? Right? D
This is all very old symbolism that we must ressurrect! D
Sorry, got off track, teach her about emotions.
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Peace be upon you Zenje,
Apologies, I wrote that in haste. I was saying that I just found it strange how people go about it here, atleast from what I've seen. One person will buy a gift for friends and family... but at the same time, it's like a rule, that those same friends and family have to buy that person a gift. I think that's just a waste, most of the time, people end up getting gifts they never wanted anyway. Some people create "wish-lists" to avoid dissappoinments... I fail to see the purpose and point to it all.
Yes!! It is all so insane when you think logically about it.
People at work create these "Polyannas" where they have a spending limit of , lets say, $10. So everyone draws names out of a hat and buys that person a $10 gift. Why doesn't everyone just keep thier $10 dollars and buy thier own gift, so they will be sure it is someting they need. It is such a ridiculous show of false "giving", to be SEEN OF MEN.
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Peace be upon you Warda,
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I understand this all too well, my grandmother was "Mrs Chritmas", she would decorate her entire attic and all the kids in the neigborhood would come see it.You should see some streets here in Berlin!
I always marvel at the fact that we are all over the world coming together to study THAT which will change our behaviors to righteousness.
Some houses are in hard competition with their neighbours, who got more shiny sparkling windows and gardens! It gets more and more each year.
O yes! We have that here for sure!! With my Dearly respected Grandmother, I was stating that she even took it INSIDE her house, to her ATTIC. So she must have promoted this for people to be aware that her attic INSIDE was decorated to such an extent. I mean like a museum! D
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I understand all too well, but we have to ask, WHY is it so compulsory? Is it because we are PROGRAMMED starting as early as the day after "thanskgiving" with songs, lights, SALE SALE SALE? Do you realize that this time is accounts for 50% of most buisnesses? So they spend BILLIONS of dollars on commercials? BILLIONS OF DOLLARS, for what? Because it WORKS!Yes, Kyle somehow you`re right.
Oh Yes!! The wicked do not play with thier money, they spend those millions because they get back billions!! It is a SCIENCE!
If we would collect all this money and give it to the needing ones it would be much better than holding up high our capitalistic systems. But then again it is not only the Christmas-present-boom we ought to fight.
Exactly, christmas is not the only trick, but it is the biggest and we have to ask WHY? It is because this time of the year is teh MOST RECEPTIVE time of the year. It is teh HEIGHT of the YIN season. Please study the YIN and YANG. The YIN is the female principle, that which makes us go WITHIN ourselfs. The night before the christmas is thh MOST POWERFUL NIGHT for receptivity,it is the day before the YANG starts to manifset itself.
Please look at the following web page, scroll down to the diagram in the middle. Dec 24th is the last day of teh winter solstice. The dark portion represents the YIN. Look at the dot indicatiin summer colstice and see what I mean.
http//www.chinesefortunecalendar.com/yinyang.htm
It was just today when I went to one of the biggest cinemas in the inner city. I was speechless of all that monumentary waste of money. Everything was shining and glittering. Every tree had shiny chains, huge screens with movies were shown open air, a bowling place, bars, food, music, light-shows,...A big party going on. It was overwhelming. What a temple of consume!!!
As if the whole world would live in peace and happiness...So true!
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Birth of Jesus? Please show your evidence ofJesus being born on Dec 25th. In fact, give evidnece of ANY DATE.I knew this will come up.Of course I can
t show you any evidence, and Im quite aware of it. But I see this more symbolic - it doesn`t really matter it was this or the other day to remember just the fact that Prophet Jesus was born. The Prophet - and not the son of God!!Yes, but we cannot even celebrate a prophets birth, because if so, we must celebrate them ALL equally, or else we are differentiating. D
Oh, who is Macy?
Very large department store in New York that was the first to keep its doors open later on Christmas Eve.
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Peace be upon you IamsearchigforGod,
For myself, I am just not yet ready to give up a holiday that has meant so much to me for so many years. This is my first Christmas after coming to Islam and Christmas for me has always been such a happy time filled with family and love.
There is no compulsion. I am not sitting here telling you it is easy, nor am I telling you that I did it faster than the speed of light. Understand that the sun does not rise al at once, it rises gradually. Take your time, but do not ignore the evidnece that you have heard here or wil see with your eyes. Do not be blind to the truth, because that is what emotions do, blind you. Your above response clealry indicates that it is an emotional tie. This system was sent to us so we could figure out what emotions are enslaving us, so we can struggle(jihad) to get free from them and to make the emotions our SERVANTS, not our masters. I wish you peace ALL YEAR LONG and may the God give you the clarity to eventually see the truth of this matter and the Power to overcome these emotions.
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Peace be upon you Nafisa,
and I love the lights in the town centre, brings cheer to otherwise grim winter nights. They should keep them up until the end of January! This is how I "celebrate"
Do you wonder WHY there is such a display of LIGHT? It is because this time of the year is when the LIGHT of the world RETURNS, the SUN! It is not the worshipping of the sun, but the understanding that the God has not let the days to continue getting shorter, and the nights to grow longer, and the days to keep getting colder. If it was just about lights, there would be no problem. There is nothing wrong with lights. What we MUST confront is the CULTURE that all this is being made to represent.
Some people don't even have electric in thier neighborhoods!! How can man celebrate and waste so much electricity while others cant even see where they are going?
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Peace Idolfree, all,
how true all of this. How to oppose any of those statements.
I wonder what words you would have if the topic was the intellectual and economical effort put in the creation of weapons to destroy, injure and threaten.
If the key is Oneness, then I understand that the battle towards good is in all levels. -
Peace be upon you Elena,
I wonder what words you would have if the topic was the intellectual and economical effort put in the creation of weapons to destroy, injure and threaten.
If the key is Oneness, then I understand that the battle towards good is in all levels.Yes, Oneness answers all of the questions D Indeed Christmas IS a weapon of mass destruction! cry
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Peace,
People at work create these "Polyannas" where they have a spending limit of , lets say, $10. So everyone draws names out of a hat and buys that person a $10 gift. Why doesn't everyone just keep thier $10 dollars and buy thier own gift, so they will be sure it is someting they need. It is such a ridiculous show of false "giving", to be SEEN OF MEN.
Funny, I was going to give the same example, I have here at work. I think the only ones who deserve gifts are children and the (REAL) needy.Trees are what gives the human being oxygen to breathe, what kind of perverse holiday incorporates the KILLING of our breathing supply?
lol I never thought of it that way before. It's funny though, the things you see when you take a step back and look at the whole picture. -
Peace be upon you Zenje,
never thought of it that way before. It's funny though, the things you see when you take a step back and look at the whole picture.
Aw man, its amazing isnt it? I could go all day on this one. I have plenty of ammo this year
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Peace,
Does time run fast or what? Its been two days that Christmas is over and guess what...before you know it, 2005 will be here and before you know it 2006 will be here and so on...
Now is the time to do all that we have to do to serve God the best
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Peace be upon you,
It was a good time to work on maintaining your PEACE inthe face of adversity. I hope all those who were unsure about christmas or did celebrate it made some mind altering observations over this past weekend.
Hopefully it has made us all stronger to reject it next year.
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Peace be upon you,
Her's what the Pope had to say about the Tsunami that killed thousands of human beings;
Pope John Paul said the tragedy made for a sad Christmas.
http//cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/story.jsp?idq=/ff/story/0002/20041226/1426625965.htm&photoid=20041226XINT103
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Peace,
I saw the Pope's speech on the Chrismas day and I have to admit idol worship was definetly there.
People were pretty much bowing infront of the Pope and they had a little baby Jesus statue and a man carried it in his arms and everyone was taking blessings from it...and I was telling to myself, God, I hope they do know that its just a statue, not the real Christ and whatever happened to "Thou Shalt NOT worship any other gods besides me"?
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Hello everybody
back again from days of harmony first and trouble lateron...cryI made the proposal to my family to collect the money we would spend on presents and give it instead to Help-Organizations. Further I think that this was my last christmas this way ... ?
Salam
warda