By Adis Duderija, New Age Islam
15
September 2023
I am an academic at Griffith University with a
Muslim background who specializes among others, in doing research and teaching
on the Islamic intellectual tradition, Islam and Gender and Islam and
Muslims in the West related topics. Recently one of my third-year Muslim
students made me aware of an article about a video in which a celebrity
Australian Muslim preacher with huge following on social media (hundreds of
thousands of followers Instagram and You Tube)
named Mohamed Hoblos, addressing a Muslim audience, explicitly stated that a Muslim who intentionally misses one
of the daily five prayers as prescribed in orthodox Sunni Islam is “[you
are]worse than murderer, worse than a
rapist, worse than terrorist and worse than a paedophile in the eyes of Allah”.
This video was recorded in 2017 and the article
in Daily Mail was published in 2018. Yet
Hoblos continues to preach to Muslim audiences without being held accountable
for the extremely harmful message contained in this talk. It is essential to
address the issue of accountability for Muslim celebrity preachers like Hoblos
and the role of mainstream Muslim leadership in this respect and examine the
implications of their influence on Muslim communities in the West and
interfaith relations.
The
Persistence of Harmful Views:
Despite the gravity of his remarks, and several years after
this, what I could only describe as shocking and truly appalling talk, I could
not find any evidence online of any Imam in Australia who criticized his talk.
To the contrary, a simple popular search engine reveals that Hoblos since 2017
and until as recently as July 2023 has
repeatedly been given platforms to
continue his public engagements and has
been going on speaking tours throughout Australian mosques and Islamic
societies including the Gold Coast mosque
, Lakemba mosque
in Sydney, As-Sunnah
Mosque in Lakemba, Islamic
Centre of WA, Islamic
Society in Darra ( Brisbane) ,Kuraby
Mosque in Kuraby ( Brisbane) Preston Mosque in Victoria, ,Omar Mosque in
Wollongong, and Othman Bin Affan (OBA)
Mosque in Cabramatta area where he
apparently drew
record crowds.
Since the
mind-numbing talk of 2017, he has also continued with his public engagements
and online
media presence with the Sydney based
group OnepathNetwork ( the name of this organization is very
revealing of their worldview and approach to Islamic tradition) that has
affiliates throughout Australia. Moreover, from my very basic online search I
could also find that at least some of his public
engagements take place in gender segregated settings.
Concerningly, Hoblos public engagement and speaking tours
transcend the borders of Australia. For example, my basic online search
revealed that in 2022 he was invited to go on speaking tours as the
main speaker across five cities in the UK (
these are claimed to have been sold out) and in the same year he also addressed Muslim audiences in Canada .
All of this should be
deeply concerning and raises questions about the integrity and accountability
of Muslim leaders who provide him with these platforms.
The
Responsibility of Muslim Leadership:
Conscientious
Muslims, particularly those in positions of leadership within Islamic centres
and mosques, must confront the issues posed by individuals like Hoblos. First
and foremost, it is crucial to ask how someone with such disturbing views can
still be given a public platform more than five years after the disturbing
remarks he made that were made public and written about online. This question
speaks to the responsibility of Muslim leaders in safeguarding their
communities from harmful ideologies. By allowing such speakers to address
young, impressionable audiences, the risk of perpetuating harmful beliefs
increases exponentially. The failure to address this issue undermines the
credibility and integrity of Muslim leadership and their commitment to
promoting a reasonable and ethically beautiful understanding of Islam.
As such
there are several questions that I want to pose to all conscientious Muslims,
especially those in position of Muslim leadership such as in form of leading various Islamic centers/organisations
and mosques, may they be in Australia or generally in the West:
1. How can
this individual, despite his extremely disturbing views that he never publicly
retracted and that were expressed over 5 years ago, be regularly provided with
public platforms in which he continues to assume positions and roles of
religious leadership and opportunities to preach often to young impressionable
Muslim audiences?
2. Why do
individuals like him have such a huge social media following? What does this
tell us about how Islam is conceived and interpreted among these Muslims if
Hoblos is seen and upheld as an authentic and desirable representation of
Islam?
3. What
kind of image about Islam or Muslims in the West are non-Muslims going to have
if people like Hoblos are portrayed as the public face of authentic Islam and
how does this impact Muslim-non Muslim relations in western societies?
Mohamed
Hoblos is not an isolated case; there are other celebrity preachers and imams
in Australia and in the West who espouse deeply concerning views without facing
accountability. This is particularly so in relation to their views on women’s
rights in the context of marriage/ domestic
violence , divorce,
or generally about
femininity/female bodies and women sexuality that have not led to any serious
accountability.
Moreover,
we cannot escape the fact that the portrayal of individuals like Hoblos as the
public face of authentic Islam has broader implications for Muslim-non Muslim
relations in Western societies. Non-Muslims, encountering such figures, may
form very negative perceptions of Islam and hinder efforts toward interfaith
dialogue and mutual understanding that weaken social cohesion and cause social
tensions between Muslims and non-Muslims. Moreover, the retrogressive views of
individuals like Hoblos on women rights, female body and sexuality are directly
responsible for persistence of patriarchal values justified in religious
language that we continue to find in Muslim contexts in
general and in the West in
particular. I am also of the view, that is
backed by some academic research, that it is because of the
social-media amplified voices of individuals like Hoblos that are upheld as
quintessentially Islamic that many Muslims in the West have been abandoning Islam since they view it as morally
deeply problematic.
Accountability
and the Way Forward
Muslim
leaders must take proactive measures to address this issue of celebrity
preachers’ expression of harmful views such as in the case of Hoblos. It is
imperative to establish clear guidelines for the selection of speakers and to
hold them accountable for the messages they disseminate. In this respect,
mosques and Islamic centres should capitalise from and draw on the insights
from proponents of cosmopolitan
and gender
just interpretations of Islam that do exist.
The
significant influence of Muslim celebrity preachers like Hoblos on the minds of Muslims and
non-Muslims alike cannot be ignored. Muslim leaders must uphold their
responsibility to protect their communities and the image of Islam by ensuring
that harmful views are not perpetuated under the guise of religious authority.
Preachers like Hoblos must be held accountable for their harmful views. This
necessitates a critical evaluation of the platforms provided and the
accountability mechanisms in place. By actively addressing these concerns,
Muslim leaders can contribute to fostering a more ethical and reasonable
approach to Islam as well as a more harmonious relationship between Muslims and
non-Muslims, especially in the West.
----
A
decades old patron of New Age Islam, Dr Adis Duderija is a Senior Lecturer in
the Study of Islam and Society, School of Humanities, Languages and Social
Science ; Senior Fellow Centre for Interfaith and Intercultural Dialogue,
Griffith University | Nathan | Queensland | Australia.
URL: https://newageislam.com/debating-islam/muslim-celebrity-preachers-accountable-harmful-views/d/130682
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