The Very First Friday Congregational Prayers for Quranists in the USA on Friday 1/1/2016

Was published in Arabic in January 1, 2016

Translated by Ahmed Fathy

1- We have written here on our website several times concerning the suffering of Quranists in Egypt due to their desire to perform together the Friday weekly congregational prayers. Here, we give a brief note on that subject.

2- We have been the alpha preacher in the Salafist group named (the Call for the Truth) when we used to be a 'moderate' Sunnite who aimed at reforming the so-called Sunna by making the Quran the sole criterion to judge and exclude hadiths (Sunnite sayings and narratives). When we began to criticize and find grave errors and faults in tomes of Al-Bokhari and to explain the huge difference and contradictions between such tomes and the Quran on several subjects such as the so-called intercession and the false claim that Muhammad is the chosen or preferred prophet by God apart from other prophets who preceded him, troubles ensued between us and the people of this Salafist group in parallel with our quarrels with Al-Azhar University professors. Eventually, I left both the group and the university post. Since 1985, in Egypt, we began to experience a new type of suffering and torment; we began to preach the Friday congregational prayers sermons in the pulpits of mosques in (the capital city) Cairo, (the Nile Delta city) Tanta, and other Egyptian cities whenever possible. Troubles and problems ensued every single time. Some Wahabi Salafists made their priority job to chase me out of every mosque I sermonize in. at one time, my in-law the late hajji M. Al-Baz had established a mosque in his village, Al-Ibraheemiya, in Al-Sharqiya Governorate, in the Egyptian Delta, and we used to preach the Friday sermon there by traveling every Friday from our house in Cairo to the village. Yet, Wahabi Salafists as well as men of the Egyptian State Security Apparatus were bent on driving us out, and confiscated the mosque; the mosque was turned into a Sunnite location to vent their anger and slander against our person. Later on, some Quranists cooperated in their own modest means to establish a mosque for Quranists in (the middle-class) Al-Mohandeseen District in Cairo. They named the mosque (Al-Furqan Mosque). This mosque was later on turned into a battle field. Eventually, men of the Egyptian State Security Apparatus conspired to assassinate us inside the mosque by feigning a scene of quarrelling at first that would have ended in our being killed. But the plot failed. God saved us from their cunning plotting. Later on, Wahabi Salafists confiscated the mosque, and they renamed it (Al-Furqan and Al-Sunna Mosque). We have been arrested along with 62 Quranists, from Cairo and other Governorates, inside the mosque by men of the Egyptian State Security Apparatus. This was the first arrest wave to incarcerate Quranists in November 1987. Egyptian press at the time focused on moral assassination of our person during my incarceration when we could not be allowed to defend ourselves. Once released, we decided to perform Friday congregational prayers at our house along with other family members. On some occasions, some extended family members as well as other Quranists used to gather at our house to perform Friday prayers and listen to our sermon, sometimes at our house in (the low-class Cairene) Al-Matareyia District, and on several occasions at our house in our village, Abu Herez, in Al-Sharqiya Governorate. We used to pray together away from any friction or stirring up the ire of terrorist Wahabi Salafists who took their time in abusing us to every attentive ear and declaring us to others as unbelievers/apostates. Our secret gathering to perform Friday prayers at home never appealed to the terrorist Wahabi Salafists and was never palatable for men of the Egyptian State Security Apparatus, who feared what they call 'illegal' gatherings. We used to here Friday sermons from Sunnite mosques surrounding us in which the Wahabi Salafists used to abuse and threaten us by death. Men of the Egyptian State Security Apparatus felt at the time that a gathering of weak family members of wives, children, and relatives pose a threat to them; they began to arrest some of our family members and relatives, to torture them, and then to release them with torture signs on their faces to terrorize others and to stop us from visiting our village. We topped traveling there to protect our family members and relatives. We confined ourselves to perform Friday prayers at home in Al-Matareyia District with Cairene family members as well as some Quranists. We felt the heavy watching eye of men of the Egyptian State Security Apparatus on us, and later on, we received orders and threats to stop such gatherings at home. That we did to protect others. We advised them not to come and visit us, as we feared their being arrested. Yet, some Quranists who used to pray weekly at our home began to gather in another Quranist's house to perform Friday prayers. This resulted in the second arrest wave of Quranists in 2000. Some of them received sentences varying between 3-year or 5-year imprisonment when accused and condemned in 2002 with the crime of contempt of Islamic religion! We ourselves have managed to flee to the USA before issuing a warrant of arrest to us, on 10/16/2001.

3- In the USA, we felt a yearning to perform Friday congregational prayers. We published here on our website an article titled "A Mosque For the Sake of God, O Muslims!" After ten years of publishing this article on our website, we never prayed the Friday noon prayers in congregation; we used to pray alone. Now, on 1/1/2016, at the onset of a new year which we hope will be a better year for all Quranists and all the weak people who suffer all over the world, we performed the very first Quranist congregational Friday prayers in the USA. Our house in Virginia that contains the IQC as well is not spacious enough to perform congregational prayers. Our two brothers, Abdel-Razak and Abdel-Lateef, have proposed to perform the congregational prayers at their home temporarily along with those present among the offspring of the family. By sheer coincidence, our nephew Dr. Othman and his daughter Salma have come to visit us. They joined the congregational prayers of course. We felt it to be a blessed gathering to perform Friday prayers in the hall of the house of both my brothers, which is situated near our home in Virginia. With the aid of the Almighty Our Lord, we will go on performing the Friday congregational prayers at the same location, until we can manage to perform it in a rented place.

4- We call every Quranist who live near Virginia, Fairfax, VA, to join us. He or she is more than welcome to join us and can call us beforehand: 0874962703.

 We hope soon to upload the sermon of this day via the YouTube website, videoed by our nephew, who is in the preparatory school, Shihab Abdel-Razak Mansour. We seek the aid of God, Our Lord and Guide and Sole Source of Help.

Signature:

Dr. Ahmed Subhy Mansour