Muslims of
East and Southeast Asians make up a significant portion
of the city’s population. Because
Seattle is a sister city to Tashkent in Uzbekistan and hosts an intensive Uzbek
language and culture program at the University of Washington, Soviet Muslims
visit periodically and have developed friendships with Seattle residents. Several hundred Afghan refugees have settled
in
Muslims of Seattle have four
major places for Friday prayers: Sheikh Abdul Kadr Idriss Mosque, also known as
the Islamic Center of Seattle; the Islamic International House at the
Communities of Muslims, mainly students, are found in the
western areas of
The oldest center currently
in use is the South Seattle Islamic Center.
During the early 1960s, two Muslim men working for the Boeing Aircraft
Company noticed each other skipping lunch during the Fast of Ramadan. One was a Pakistani, the other an Iraqi. They introduced themselves to each other and
began to exchange social visits in their homes.
Gradually other Muslim families were included.
In time this group decided that they needed a
mosque. A number of families began to
save money, wanting to put a down payment on a building without having to pay
interest on a loan. For about a year
they each saved $100 monthly, and finally bought a two-story house on a
half-acre of land in south
When the major mosque was built in north
In 1980 the Islamic School
was opened in the South Seattle Islamic Center.
Five Anglo American and African American women who had converted to
Islam saw the need for Islamic education and organized the school. “American Muslim women have accepted a
responsibility interfacing Islam with the non-Muslim community,” says Amina
Saleh, a local Muslim mother, acknowledging that American women have been major
movers in many of the local Muslim community projects. A Muslim lawyer put the women in touch with
the information they needed to become an accredited school with nonprofit
status. One family knew a Pakistani
woman in
The response of the immigrant community was very
positive. According to Rafia Khokar, one
of the five founders, “Just about every family who had a child in that age
group sent their children to that first school.” The men were more guarded in their enthusiasm
than the women, but they gave financial support. The north-south elongation of
Today the Islamic School is a private, full-time
elementary school accredited by the school district. It can accommodate 300 students, but are at
present only 25, ranging from preschool through fourth grade. Financing remains an issue. The annual tuition of $1,575 covers only 60
percent of expenses, with the remaining 40 percent donated by sponsors. The students, children of resident families
have come from
The teachers have come from a variety of ethnic
backgrounds, from Singaporean Chinese Muslim to Ethiopian. On occasion, non-Muslims have been hired to
teach in the school or in the day care center, but normally in the school
itself all teachers are Muslim. The
curriculum covers standard subjects, as well as Arabic language and Islamic
studies. Accomodation is made for daily
and Friday prayers. “Islam as a
twenty-four-hour way of life” is a goal of the co-administrators Mohammad and
Ann El-Moslimany, emphasizing the importance of upholding high ethical
standards. Religious instruction
permeates the whole curriculum, rather than being taught as a separate subject,
with Qur’anic verses brought up whenever they apply. Muslim greetings, blessings, and proverbs are
incorporated into daily speech. When the
Reflecting on why the five founders felt the need for a
separate Islamic School, Rafia Khokar says, “We wanted to be the
influencing factors in our children’s lives, and we wanted to share that with
others.” Protecting their children from
negative influences in American culture was not a primary goal. Rather, she says, “We wanted to be in a
powerful position because we felt they needed to be trained for leadership
roles.”
What is wrong with public schools? The separation of church and state is
confusing to teachers, Rafia suggests.
Teachers are restructed from teaching in areas that deal with questions
of morality. “What I see is that when
you’ve got a good teacher she’s strangled,” Rafia comments. “I don’t think public schools are about
building character, they’re about passing along information.”
By contrast, the goals of the Islamic School are
“You just want your children
to be God-fearing and sensitive,” Rafia concludes.
Beyond its educational function, the school also serves
as a general religious center. Several
communities make the Islamic School their location for prayer and worship,
including a group of Somali immigrants a Shi’a group of twenty-five – fifty people,
and an African American group of about twenty people.
A number of Muslim student
associations are present on the campus of the
The International Muslim Student Association (IMSA)
started as a Persian-speaking and Shi’a group.
Now it includes Sunnis and non-Persian speakers. Because its focus is political rather than
religious, it has moved into a complementary
role in relation to other groups.
There are also ethnically based Muslim student groups, such as the Cham
Muslim Students Union.
During the early 1970s, Muslim students at the
Because of some administrative difficulties, the West
Coast representative to the North American Islamic Trust visited in October
1991 to mediate a dispute between U.W. Muslim students and community
members. An interim governing board was
appointed to serve for one year, with the aim of developing “a system that
transfers the authority to the local community based on policies and procedures
instead of individual whims”[ii]
Periodically Muslim students at the university organize a
dawa program to provide information about Islam. Sun an activity took place for four days in
October 1991. Booths were set up in a
large room in the central student union building, where books and pamphlets
about Islam were made available. At one
end of the room, rows of chairs were arranged in front of a podium where prominent
local Muslims gave talks throughout the day and engaged their listeners in
discussions. A number of university
students perused the exhibits, many were non-Muslims with internationally
focused major. On the grounds in front
of the student union building members of the politically oriented IMSA engaged
in load soapbox-type oratory, targeting especially U.S. support for Israel.
The major mosque was built
in 1981, endowed by a Saudi whose daughter lived in Seattle. Today it is sometimes crowded during Friday
prayers, with estimates of as many as 400 attendees. The overflow congregation is forced to pray
in the basement. Striking against the
sky are the octagonal dome and narrow minaret.
Both are sheathed in copper and topped with crescents. As one commentator describes the building:
Clear-cut
volumetric composition is one of the building’s chief attributes: through
careful massing the small building appears much larger and assumes a public
importance unusual for its size…. The building’s classical air is no accident:
the architect derived the proportions using the Golden Section…
The red
brick walls are banded with buff brick and pierced by tall glass-block windows,
which are topped with concrete lintels in the shape of Moorish arches. An abundance of brass, copper and celadon
green ceramic tile highlight and define the main entry.[iii]
Inside
there is a large room for salat, with a latticed balcony for the
women. In the basement is a room for
ablutions, a large space for social activities, and a room for the women’s halaqa
with a separate entrance from outside.
The mosque commands attention as it sits on a corner lot and forms a
transition between a busy retail shopping street and a residential
neighborhood.
The mosque is governed by a
democratically elected committee. It has
a constitution that specifies the offices of the Executive Committee and the
procedures for the annual elections; any Muslim who pays membership dues of $10
per month may vote. In addition to the
Executive Committee, there are committees for Shura Council, Islamic Education,
Zakat, Cultural-Social Functions, and Sisters.
The Imam is not a professional scholar but a graduate student who
volunteers his service. At present, the
muezzin and the custodian are the only employees of the mosque.
The largest ethnic group at the
mosque is Indo-Pakistani, with the Arabs second in size. Many other backgrounds are also
represented. This is, however, a Sunni
mosque. Shi’is are welcome to come and
pray, but not to introduce distinctive doctrine. Also, there is an unwritten rule that no
political activity is to be allowed in deference to the U.S. policy of
separation between church and state.
Activities at the mosque include
Friday night halaqa after salat, children’s classes on Sunday
mornings, and occasional youth or student meetings. A Muslim Women’s Association called Sisters
United Through Islam has recently been formed and holds occasional potluck
dinners on Saturdays. In calling the
downstairs part of the building the community center or community area,
members recognize that the mosque is important as a cultural center even for
Muslims who are not religious.
During the halaqa after salat,
men and women meet in separate rooms.
They start with a short prayer, then take turns around the circle reading
the Qur’an. The meaning of a passage
also may be discussed. Religiously
knowledgeable people may break in the reading to correct pronunciation or
expound on a point. In addition to halaqa
meetings, the women have other gatherings to discuss such subjects as parenting
and CPR. Eid celebrations, especially
the Eidul-Fitr, the Feast of Breaking the Fast, are coordinated through
the mosque but held in larger facilities.
As many as 1,500 people have participated in this celebration.
The mosque also publishes an
eight-page English-language news magazine several times a year, featuring
articles on such subjects as financial investment, the Qur’an and the Sunna,
and topics of current political interest.
CHAM
MUSLIMS
A
unique presence that distinguishes the Muslim community in Seattle is that of
several hundred Chams, Muslims from Viet Nam and Cambodia. They first arrived in Seattle in 1978,
fleeing the Khmer Rouge and the Vietnamese Communist regimes. Out of 1,000 Chams accepted by the United
States in the first influx, about 400 came to Seattle, with more arriving
from1979 to 1982. Today it is estimated
that there are at least 100 families of Chams in Seattle.[iv] Many of the men are employed in the fishing
industry, in auto mechanics, or in interior remodeling. Women often work in sewing factories or in
seafood-processing plants.
Chiese records and Sanskrit
inscriptions make mention of the kingdom of Champa in southern Viet Nam as
early as the second century A.C.E.[v]
Chams speak a Malayopolynesian language, the only sizeable group to do
so in mainland Asia north of Malaya.[vi] Their earliest known kingdoms were Indianized
civilizations with Hindu rulers. From
the ninth century on the Chams found themselves “sandwiched between two
powerful and frequently aggressive neighbors – the Khmers of Cambodia and the
Vietnamese of Tonkin – and had to fight hard for survival.”[vii] When the Vietnameze won, Sinicization went
forward. From 1400 on Islam moved into
this milieu, spreading out from Malacca in Malaysia through traders, teachers,
and intermarriage.
Over 50 percent of the Seattle Chams
came from three villages in Indochina.
The decision to emigrate was a communal one. The elders met together and encouraged an
exodus, mainly of the youth, in light of the suffering that they were enduring
under the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and the Communists in Viet Nam. Chams were singled out fro torture and
barbaric mass killings because there were a minority ethnic group, because
their claim to be from the historic “kingdom” of Champa smacked of aristocratic
pretensions, and because they insisted on being religious. One way the Khmer Rouge detected them was by
observation at community meals. Anyone
who washed in a ritual way or who did not eat pork would be suspected of retaining
Muslim allegiance and would be killed.
In Viet Name the Cham wanted to escape from compulsory military service
in the army of an atheistic regime. It
is estimated that in a three-year period, from 1974 to 1977, the total
population of Chams dropped from 1 million (60,000 in Viet Nam, 700,000 in
Cambodia and the rest elsewhere) to 200,000[viii].
When they arrived in the United
States, then, the Chams came with a sense of heritage, destiny, and community
support and communal obligation. In the
early days they had no idea how to find other Muslims. In Pike Place Market, Seattle’s renowned
central farmer’s market, some of them discovered a shop sign in Arabic. Going into the store they met Muslims from
Pakistan. “We were so happy,” reported
one of the Chams. “They were like family
to us, [even though] we couldn’t communicate.”[ix] After this initial contact local Muslims came
to visit them, among the Iraqi-born Jamil Abdul-Razzaq and the American convert
Ann El-Moslimany.
At that time, in the late 1970s, Muslims
were meeting in the older two-story home that became known as the South Seattle
Islamic Center. Since then the more
substantial mosque in north Seattle has been built and most Muslims now pray
there. Because the Chams live in Ranier
Valley in south Seattle, however, they continue to meet in South Seattle
Islamic Center. Here the elongation of
the city along north-south waterways correlates with ethnic differences to
encourage separate worship centers.
In contrast to Muslim students and
immigrants from some other countries, Chams have maintained a strong sense of
community cohesion. In Seattle they live
close together, many occupying adjacent units in the same government-subsidized
apartment complexes. As a result of
having to struggle for their identity throughout their history they maintain a
strong allegiance to Islam and are deeply devout.
Because even the South Mosque is too
far to visit very often, the community recently has purchased another two-story
house just blocks away from their major apartment complex. They intend to transform this into a mosque,
school, and general center. Right now
classes are held on Sundays for the children at the South Seattle Mosque. It is reported that some 10-year-old Cham
girls have learned to recite the entire Qur’an in Arabic and have gone to
Malaysia to compete in Quranic recitation competitions where they have won over
native Arabic speakers. A few Cham
parents hope to send their children to universities in the Middle East.
Because they were able to keep their
extensive community support system intact when they immigrated, because
preserving their distinct identity is something they have had to struggle for
so hard and long, and because they prize orthodoxy and piety, the Cham hope to
create a true Islamic neighborhood in Seattle.
OTHER
MUSLIM COMMUNITIES
A
Druze community of about 200 is located in Seattle. In 1908, seventy-six Druze men met in that
city to start the first Druze organization in the United States. Some were new immigrants to the United
States; others had come from other states.
No Druze women lived in Seattle in those early years. The organization founded in 1908, El-Dirziat,
was a social and cultural association.
Its officers were Hassan Farris, Milhem Bshir, Hussein Kassem Yahia, and
Salim Najm Jaber. For worship, these men
met each Thursday night, “the eve of Friday,” in a designated home. Here they prayed and read the book of wisdom,
Al-Hikma.[x] During the 1960s a wave of Druze families
arrived, with still more arriving in the 1970s and 1980s, especially after the
beginning of the war in Lebanon. Because
they are a small community, there is no official worship center. Each family prays at home although they do
celebrate Eid al-Adha, their only religious holiday, as a group. A close-knit community, they also socialize
together a great deal throughout the rest of the year.
Several thousand Iranians live in
the greater Seattle area. About fifty
Shi’i families are known to practice their faith in Seattle itself. They meet for worship at the Islamic School,
were they rent space. During Ramadan
they sponsor activities two or three nights a week. They also meet to celebrate the birthdays of
Imams and prophets. During Mharram up to
100 people may gather for the evening events.
Because they lack an Imam, these Shi’i govern themselves by an executive
committee composed of five elected officers.
They operate within the guidelines of a local constitution. Elections are annual, and a majority vote
decides an issue.
Alongside the regular worship
meetings, the group runs a Sunday school for their children. Looking to the future, they make it a point
to worship in a combination of Arabic and English. “All languages are God’s languages,” says
Masood Irani, an engineer and a member of this worshipping community. “So we try to use English/Arabic, and try to
stay away from Persian, Urdu, Afghan, Pushtu…. We’re English-speaking. That is our goal. We defeat ourselves otherwise. We must create a religious culture based on the
English language. We are American
Muslims: we need to see it that way for our kids.”
African Americans in Seattle number
only about 50,000, and many are dispersed throughout the general
population. Muslim African Americans
worship with other Muslims or in small groups of their own. Syid Askia is one who meets with about twenty
other African Americans for regular Friday prayers at the Islamic School. Askia has watched the Nation of Islam for
many years. “When Warith D. Mohammed
took over the leadership,” Askia says, “there was now no excuse not to be a
Muslim.” He formally accepted the faith
in 1976. At that time a group of African
American Muslims were worshipping in a local school building on Martin Luther
King Way in Seattle. Askia joined them. With the national change of leadership and
reorientation, he remembers tremendous confusion, fragmentation,
decentralization, and falling away.
However, in his view, this was also a positive time for releasing energy
and realizing potential, for relearning religion. Now his group is “trying to internalize the
message.”
Askia believes indigenous American
expressions of Islam are vitally important.
Islam in Seattle is dominated too much by immigrants, students, and
visitors from outside the country, he believes.
Many of these people are “mesmerized by the West” and do not adequately
empathize with how African Americans have had to struggle to overcome their
environment. Many immigrants came from
colonized countries and therefore view religion in a different way. Some immigrants come from countries where
everything is provided and thus tend to depend on donations. “Even Northgate Mosque was a gift from
outside.” Such people are not used to
having to create their own “conscious community situation,” says Askia, who
also feels that too much use of Arabic can create a “priest class.”
Askia reflects on what being a
Muslim means to him in the American context.
“Al Islam by contrast took away the inferiority complex (nurtured by
racism), the biggest blockage to performance.”
Now the challenge is to create a model Islamic community through
education, business, propagation, and empowering individuals. “Our motto is: If you see a dirty glass, set
a clean one next to it; don’t blame the dirty glass,” he suggests. Askia points to models in Atlanta and
Oakland, but observes that African American Muslims in Seattle have not been as
successful in moving toward this model community because “there is not a lot of
collective anything here.” Also,
African American Islam often has grown stronger by absorbing the poor, he says,
but this does not work so well here because “Seattle is a very generous city.”
MUSLIMS IN
THE AMERICAN COMMUNITY
In
the past few decades, there have been some incidents of prejudicial behavior
from non-Muslims. An anonymous telephone
call announced a bomb threat at the north mosque. A couple of shots have been taken at the
building, and some beer cans thrown at it.
At Seattle Pacific University, a Free Methodist school, there was an
exchange of heated comments in 1985 when some students objected to Muslim
students praying on the Christian campus.
Occasionally an individual has been asked, “Why don’t you go back where
you came from?” Muslims in Seattle as
elsewhere express their sense of frustration when only Jewish “experts on the
Middle East” are featured in national and local media and resource information
centers.
Overall, however, anti-Muslim
incidents stand out as exceptions.
Seattle Muslims often try to be involved in local events, addressing
schools and organizations and influencing local libraries, media, and cultural
institutions. Speaking as president of
the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee in 1987, Riad Kayyali said, “In
Seattle, we are very lucky that there is really a decent atmosphere for
everyone to express their opinion.”[xi] According to news reporter Carol Ostrom,
“Seattle, say those monitoring violence against and harassment of
Arab-Americans, is an oasis of reason and understanding compared with many
other cities, partly due to efforts by groups such as the Church Council of
Greater Seattle and individual influential churches.” In 1986 a formal coalition was formed by the
Church Council of Greater Seattle, the Islamic Center of Seattle, and the
Western Washington Board of Rabbis. This
occurred in the aftermath of a visit from the late Meir Kahane, then a
controversial member of the Israeli Parliament.
As key members have moved away, however, the coalition no longer is
active.
The Seattle Public Library has made
efforts to improve its Islamic collection and reach out to the Muslim
community. It has purchased Islamic
books and audiovisual materials, published lists of books on Islam for both
adults and children, sponsored an Islamic art display and a talk on Islam’s
contributions to the sciences, and hosted a workshop for children on the Eid
holiday. During the Gulf War, the
Seattle Public Library was “one of the few libraries in the United States
prepared to help people cope with the trauma of the Gulf War,” according to
Amina Saleh, one of the founders of the Islamic School.
The Seattle Children’s Museum
included a series of workshops on the Eid during its Africa exhibit in the
summer of 1991. The University
Bookstore, one of the largest west of the Mississippi, has introduced a section
on Islamic books and continues to expand its selection of titles on Islam.
Focus on Islam is a TV talk
show which airs at 9:00 P.M. Sundays on TCI Public Access Channel 29. The host is a second-generation Seattle
Pakistani. It is an issues-focused
educational program with a discussion format.
Local Muslims appreciate the fact that it is on the air, but give it
mixed reviews in terms of quality. The
public station does not want to use tapes developed elsewhere, but requests
local production. The station previously
did run a series of tapes by Jamal Badawi, an internationally known apologist
for Islam. These tapes are now available
through the Seattle Public Library, thanks to a local American-born Muslim who
made the connection.
A particularly difficult issue for
Muslims in the United States relates to burial of the dead. Islam calls for burial on the day of death,
but government regulations make this difficult.
Over time the Muslim community in Seattle has worked out arrangements
with certain funeral homes that are able to provide this service to the Muslim
community. Currently some effort is
underway to buy a cemetery for Muslims.
In Mt. Pleasant Cemetery, which is now used, a section is set aside for
Muslims.
To illustrate community relations in
this part of the country, we note in conclusion two incidents related by local
Muslims. Whether apocryphal in details
or not, these contemporary legends are cited by local Muslims to illustrate the
way they feel about their place in community life in Seattle. The first concerns a Palestinian from the
West Bank who has been attending Washington State University in Pullman. Recently Israel called the student home. When he arrived, he was tortured and detained
in custody. His American wife sought
help from the community. To get the
Palestinian back, the local sheriff issued a warrant for his arrest. The sheriff sent out an All Points Bulletin
to pick up the young man. Soon the U.S.
government was asking for the return of this “offender”. Israel sent him back and he was reunited with
his wife and supportive community. In
another case, a gas station in Seattle hired a Muslim. Eventually, the Muslim wanted to move
on. When he did, the owner asked for
another Muslim to fill the position.
“I’m willing to pay $1.00 more per hour if necessary,” he is reported to
have said. “I want a Muslim because I
want somebody honest.”
[1] Published in Muslim Communities in North America; Haddad, Yvonne and Smith, James, eds.; SUNY Press, 1994. Chapter 8.
[i] Interviews with many Muslims in Seattle were conducted during October and November 1991 by Miriam Adeney, Kathryn DeMaster, and Robin Poling.
[ii] “Community News,” Al Huda: Newsletter of the Islamic Center of Seattle 14, no. 7 (November 1991) p. 8.
[iii] David Schraer, “Northgate’s Mosque: A Monument on the Strip,” Arcade 2, no. 2 (June—July 1982), p. 2. “The “golden section” to which Schraer refers is the most famous axiom for achieving pleasing proportion in the history of architectural design. According to this axiom developed by the ancient Greeks, “a line should be divided into two unequal parts for which the first is to the second as the second is to the whole” (Encyclopedia Britannica Vol. 17, p. 5).
[iv] Timothy McCarthy, Islamic Lecturer, South Seattle Islamic Center, interview, October 1991.
[v] Brian Harrison, South-East Asia: A Short History (New York: Macmillan and Co., 1967), p. 12.
[vi] Robbins
Burling, Hill Farms and Padi Fields: Life in Mainland Southeast Asia
(Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1965), p. 121.
[vii] Harrison, South-East Asia, p. 35.
[viii] Ibid.
[ix] Carol Ostrom, “The Moslem Way,” Seattle Times (March 16, 1989), p. E-4
[x] Sami Abulhosn, notes form personal research in Seattle Druze records, November 1991.
[xi] Carol Ostrom, “Arab-Americans Find Seattle Accepting, with Exceptions,” Seattle Times (October 24, 1987).