Also, I contrast this with my local mosque, who like to hold lectures around the time of fajr, maghrib/isya’ but taints this good deed by the manner with which they do it:

1) they broadcast the lectures with loudspeakers so that for a couple hundred metres around all houses – whether people/children are muslim or non-muslim, resting or sick, asleep or just came in off shift, praying or eating – are forced to listen to the lecture which is usually garbled with echoes so it’s mostly just noise – but that irritating kind where your mind thinks it can just about make out words, but can’t.
2) they then ignore complaints and requests to turn the volume down, even from the religious affairs board, and express resentment that they are being asked to not disturb others. because of the political sensitivities, nobody dares to fine them or do anything more stern than a warning.
3) they start half an hour before maghrib, then pause just enough to call the azan, then start talking again for a good half hour or even an hour more before breaking for the congregational prayer (also broadcast to all). this being southeast asia we have short sunset periods so that’s nearly the *entire* maghrib period. and then another half hour after isya’. this means that everyone else who for whatever reason isn’t at the mosque is distracted from their own maghrib and dhikr or family time (not everyone is muslim) for between 1-2 hours.

so, even though what they’re doing is good – organising knowledge gatherings at the mosque – because of the lack of adab, this is the impression it gives to my foreign convert husband:

1. the people of the mosque are riya’ and like to feel important. otherwise they would not feel the need to force others to hear all the good stuff they’re doing.
2. they are inconsiderate and arrogant, because they refused to change when they found out people’s rights are affected by their activity.
3. they like themselves more than their religion, because they would even cut off the mike while the ending note of their own azan was not yet over, so that they can start broadcasting their own voices again.
4. a muslim-majority country tolerates inconsiderate civic behaviour if it’s done by “mosque people”, and the people have no realistic recourse to regain their rights.

maybe these aren’t completely fair and true, but they are certainly understandable conclusions – indeed people draw conclusions from your adab first, your knowledge second. this is what i saw demonstrated in the past year – you cannot teach compassion while your teaching method has no compassion, you cannot teach rationality when the arguments you use are not rational, you cannot teach Qur’an and Hadith when your manner towards other people are not remotely like the manner of our Prophet pbuh.

I disagree, sister. As a Muslim, actually our good deeds are done for the sake of Allah’s pleasure, not for the sake of helping other humans. My understanding is that we *should* see our good deeds as trying to increase His favour, and even if we’re motivated by love and compassion for others, that love and compassion also needs to be for the sake of Allah. The alternative view of doing it for people’s sake starts to veer very close to “self-sufficiency” – which Allah warns us will lead us astray.

I think this article also shows a good example of not jumping to conclusions about people’s motivations when they’re behaving in a contrary or anti-social way. Sometimes if you *ask* them, fully intending to understand, you find out that actually their concern is very close to Allah’s Way (note: for realising this you need recourse directly to the Qur’an, rather than your local cultural-religious references), sometimes more so than yours. It’s very humbling and enriching.