Have you heard about Madonna learning the Al-Quran? Here's a piece of Harper Bazaar's essay from On The Ret Carpet,

"I am building schools for girls in Islamic countries and studying the Qur'an," she said. "I think it is important to study all the holy books. As my friend Yaman always tells me, a good Muslim is a good Jew, and a good Jew is a good Christian, and so forth. I couldn't agree more. To some people this is a very daring thought."

Since I'm currently staying in an Islamic country, and the mother language isn't English, I often hear people talk about how less important English is, especially those major in Islamic field. Alhamdulillah because of my excellent UPSR result, I was chosen to enter an Islamic boarding school - I didn't stay in the hostel anyway.

Before I go any further, I'd like to thank to my junior who posted a status which kind sounded like this,

"It's okay if your English is bad. The priority is learning the Al-Quran  and (insert all the benefit of reading Al-Quran)."

I agree. It's okay, you don't have to worry so much if you have been such an ignorant  towards Al-Quran all these while! Be in line. Make sure how important English is in your life, learning the Al-Quran should be important as well. The priority is to learn Al-Quran. According to Oxford dictionary, priority means "the fact or condition of being regarded or treated as more important than others". 

However, it does not mean that you can abolish English. It is not okay to sort of forget about English, and just let yourself not improving your English skill. As I have said so many times earlier, I don't like English either and I don't think it is a priority but I do think it is essential to survive in current society.

Survive as a khalifah. Which is the main purpose of human being living on Earth. We have to face the reality, we all know how holy is Arabic language, but do you think we can survive without English? Trust me, most of dakwah program nowadays are done in English like The Twins of Faith, Being Me, basically those done by Mercy Mission World, to name a few because I really love their program! 

English is very close in current society right now, it's a language that considered to be understood by all nations. We can't just be in our comfort zone and only surround with people like us. Friends, we've been hearing azaan ever since the few hours we were born. In middle school, we learnt few syllabus from Azhar (that's what I've been told), and alhamdulillah we are really lucky that Allah has chosen us!

So now, entering a college has open up my eyes even wider. The higher education you get, except in Islamic fields, the more people will speak in English. If you want to mix with people, if you want people to be comfortable with you, you have to speak in English. Once they are comfortable, only then a da'wah can be done. Da'wah isn't only about sermon, it's about how you speak, eat, learn, approach people, basically it's about our attitude in daily life!

If at the first step, we don't even wanna approach them just because of their attire and such, how will they judge us? Arrogant extremist who only wanna mix with people just like them. I think I spoke quite in general, I hope there's none offenses taken. I'm not perfect, I'm still learning and I hope we can do our best in everything we do, insya Allah.