In response to :
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mukto-mona/message/5964
========================================================

Dear Lopa;

Thanks for your e-mail. The prophet of Islam used to curse the poets.

Here are some samples


The Holy Quran
Poets are evils…26:224
Translation: Yusufali
[ash-Shu`ara' 26:224] And the Poets,- It is those straying in Evil, who
follow them:


It is better to fill one's inside body with pus than to fill it with
poetry...8.73.175, 176


Sahih Bukhari: Volume 8, Book 73, Number 175:
Narrated Ibn 'Umar:
The Prophet said, "It is better for a man to fill the inside of his body
with pus than to fill it with poetry."


Sahih Bukhari: Volume 8, Book 73, Number 176:
Narrated Abu Huraira:
Allah's Apostle; said, "It is better for anyone of you that the inside of
his body be filled with pus which may consume his body, than it be filled
with poetry."



Can't do buying and selling in a mosque, can't announce aloud about lost
items, can't recite poems and can't sit in a circle in a mosque on Fridays
before the prayer...3.1074

Sunaan Abu Dawud: Book 3, Number 1074:
Narrated Abdullah ibn Amr ibn al-'As:
The Apostle of Allah (peace_be_upon_him) prohibited buying and selling in
the mosque, announcing aloud about a lost thing, the recitation of a poem in
it, and prohibited sitting in a circle (in the mosque) on Friday before the
prayer.


There were some occasions when the Prophet liked poetry. It was only when
the poetry was based to praise Allah and His messeneger.


The examples you have shown does not prove that Islam encourages poetry and
the poets. There are many examples in the 'sirat' when the Holy Prophet
asked his followers to murder poets and especially those who used to write
lampoons.


Many of the poets/poetry you have quoted were written during pre-Islamic
days. Poetry and the poems were greatly prized during those 'dark' days.


Please note that many poets of the 'recent times' that the Cornel University
considers Islamic were not Muslims in true sense. Most of them were
secularists or freethinkers. Please show me who was a true Muslim.


Whenever a writer with an Arabic/Islamic name becomes famous the Islmists
try to portray him/her as a Muslim. In reality these writers were/are
freethinkers and/or even atheists. The late Kaifi Azmi was a great poet in
Urdu literature. Now, because his name sounds like a Muslim name, the
Islamists will surely call him a great Muslim poet. In reality Kaifi Azmi
was a memeber of the Communist Party of India and a hardcore communist.


But unfortunately whenever a famous poet bears a non-Muslim name the
Islamists will surely disparage and/or belittle him. Rabindranath is not
liked by many Islamists simply because he has a Hindu name. Nazrul is
greatly admired by the Islamists simply because Nazrul Islam is a Muslim
name. But Nazrul has written many 'Shyama Sangeet' eulogising the goddess
Kali of the Hindus. When this fact is mentioned the Islamists become
'amnesic'.


If and when Salman Rushdi/Taslima Nasrin become very famous and die, the
Islamists will call them great Muslim writers---that is for sure. Was Omor
Khayyam a great Muslim? Same goes for many other poets that you mentioned.


Please note that most of the poets that Cornel University cites were not
Arabs but Persians or of other race/nation? Why? It is because after Islam,
poetry was virtually banned in Peninsular Arabia. That is why the so called
'Islamic poets' were almost always non-Arabs.


Islam and poetry cannot co-exist. Islam and freething is unthinkable. Islam
and creative literature is impossible. It is as simple as this.

Best regards

Abul Kasem