What Muslims might need to know about this web log.

As-Salamu'alaykum Sisters, and Brothers,

My name is Rebecca Copas, and you might be more likely to have noticed me as somewhat of an oddity, than have been formally introduced to me.

I converted formally only in 2005, but have been in prayer with the Ummah since 2001. What lead me into Islam was my experience as a teenager of attending a Corroboree, which was work made by traditional Aboriginal communities, which include many whose ancestors long ago converted to Islam. The work of that Corroboree is for re-building and sustaining traditional Kinship. Kinship is the term anthropologists gave to Aboriginal concepts of Ummah. So I have been bound in obligations, since January 1988, to work towards uniting the Ummah.

Following those obligations lead me in all sorts of directions which are not all discernable as related to Islam. I was first lead to join a group named Women Against Racism. I was lead to join the City of London Anti-Appartheid Group in London, which did the picket of the South African Embassy in Trafalgar square. I was arrested during the poll tax riot in Trafalgar Square, for protesting the taxing of democratic processes, and charged with violent disorder, which I was then later acquited from by a jury who observed that I was not the person in the photographic evidence which the police provided. So now, as a Muslim, it is that I tend to attract overt undercover policing attention, and my way of dealing with that is to have conversations with those who are only doing their job by observing me. I have no reason to fear them since I am at all times a law abiding person.

Eventually I accessed an allegory based in a tradition of the middle east, which connects with an esoteric school in Bagdad, but is mostly associated as being Sufi. After entering the Ummah through that method, I became quite sad about not having been adequately meeting my obligations in the Aboriginal community. I did not immediately recognise that I had entered into an Islamic tradition, and my first Ramadan of fasting, was through a sudden and inexplicable fear of eating, rather than a conscious decision to fast for Ramadan. Then I made a strong commitment to the Corroboree I had attended in 1988, and became blessed in a huge recovery of my health, after which I realised that I had been becoming a Muslim. Eventually another Muslim asked me if I am a Muslim, and when I said that I believe in everything Muslims believe in, he advised me that I had better make that my public face by expressing my self as a Muslim. So here I am, a Muslim.

This web log, is aligned with the very unusual methodology which enabled myself to become a Muslim.

It is not the teaching method most often preferred by the modern Muslim mainstream, yet is intrinsically connected with one of the seven traditional expressions of Arabic pronunciation in Qur'an. I am using the teaching experience which I found most beneficial for myself, as I was trained to think in the mindset of the dominant western European cultural paradigm. The success of that teaching method depends entirely on the strength of the allegory in which it is placed. Different allegories are more or less effective in different times and places. I am placing the tradition of using allegory as a teaching method, within that one of Islam's traditions through which any other of the schools learning sequences can bear fruit. The sounds in Qur'an which suit my ear are those which are lower and more gutteral, and then equivalently also finer to the ear at times. Those sounds suit my complex personality, and match to my own birth place in Armidale NSW. The Songline, (as we Aborigines call ley lines), (or Dreamlines), which I am born into, is that one whose story is the feminine version of Yusuf. aka Joseph whose coat/shirt is multicoloured. Here in Australia it is the story of the Rainbow Serpent, and among traditional Aborigines, I am reguarded to be the owner of a considerable cultural responsiblity for having developed a modern form of the rainbow serpent story. My health recovery exemplifies the passage of the Rainbow Serpent, in arising out of the depths of the water where the Koopoo the Kangaroo once dived into a pool he had dug too deep while on the run from the dogs. Koopoo is the characterisation of Yusuf's story at Katherine Gorge in the Northern Territory. After Koopoo turns into the Rainbow Serpent, a black headed snake appears on the rocks above the river, and then a wallaby.

In 2002 I travelled into my home town up the MacLeay river valley, and after a difficult and dangerous journey, (taking the back roads), at the top I saw a red bellied black snake and a wallaby of a species which is under protection to prevent its extinction. That information names much about my character within Aboriginal culture; and if you were to study the life cycle of those animals you can learn also about my weaknesses and strengths.

I also own the Dreaming (the responsibility for the transition of stories into modern contexts) of black goanna, of a turtle, of a pelican, and overall I belong in an Emu clan, through the tradition of patriachs in Aboriginal culture. But I have one other very special Dream I own also, which is the sugar glider. This is how I can be recognised within the Aboriginal tradition. I am allowed to use the name nungarrayi after my name, because I am recognised within traditional Kinship groups as owning reputable self knowledge within the story of a nungarrayi girl. So in many contexts I write my name Rebecca Copas nungarrayi. In fact, it turns out that nungarrayi is a name which can be translated into English as Rebecca or Rebekah, into Arabic as Rabia, and into Hebrew as Rivaq, since the story of every nungarrayi is true to that of Rebecca, as she is known to be the daughter in law of Abraham.

The information I am giving about my story is what validates me as a teacher of culture within the Aboriginal tradition. It is much more difficult for me to receive that same degree of validation among Arabic speakers usually, but not always; and I guess that one day Arabic comprehension will be among the skills I can share. I tend to comprehend parts of Arabic speech already, though I can not say what I want to express in Arabic. Also I have no education in the use of the correct spelling etc. But I listen to Qur'an in Arabic more so than in English.

This particular weblog might seem to be unaligned with most of the modern methods of teaching in Islam. However it is aimed in the first place towards English speaking persons who have lived a similar lifestyle, and have similar experiences to my own. All I can teach is what I know, and so I provide access for other persons alike to myself, to the way I found myself in Islam. Truly I try hard not to be offensive to other Muslims, however there is a way in our Australian culture, in which the weakness I am expressing when I verge upon being offensive, can be taken as a sign of trust. Surely if there is not mutual trust present, then nobody might trust what I have to express about the worth of learning through any Islamic process. So I relate to most Australians alike to the way any Australian might relate, and that at times can seem less appropriate for a Muslim. Yet I also notice that Muslims whom grew up in Australia, and have that Aussie school playground experience, tend to realise what I am attempting somewhat more accurately.

Australian culture is different from other mainstream English speaking cultures, because we focus our childraising practises upon developing accountibility in language expression in precedence to developing accountiblity in our public face. The advantage of this within Islam is of a higher degree of comprehension of the teaching of Solomon. That is compatible with Aboriginal conceptualisation of the Jinn. Aboriginal culture is very alike to Islam in its understanding of the function of Jinn, and in not relating to the concept of the Devil being a fallen Angel. Therefore the bind which Solomon's teaching places in language is essential for our culture. School playgrounds are somewhat of a wonderour marvel in that regard. The fact of how different our culture is from the American mainstream is obvious even only in examining the set of developmental milestones which medical experts expect of children. For example, the American baby is expected to learn to drink from a cup younger, while the Australian baby's mother might rather expect her child to be more interested in why they cup holds liquid, and so have to experiment by pouring it out often enough. Yet we also counterbalance that by expecting our children to be making real speech expressions far younger.

So to any Muslim reading my weblog, welcome, you are entering the culture which has long been governed by Rainbow Serpent Dreaming.

Alaykumu'as-Salam