Alhamdulillah and by the Grace of Allah we had the opportunity to welcome Shaykh Mohammad Jamili back to Milton Keynes. This was an occasion to not only benefit from a great reminder about the Battle of Badr, but also a lengthy Q&A session where people were able to ask important questions and receive beneficial answers.
In a first for Lote Tree Traditional Learning, we then had the opportunity to have a community Iftar followed by Taraweeh prayers. This is an exciting development for Lote Tree because it confirms how we are growing as a community and there are already plans to put something in the calendar for next year’s Ramadan.
It was humbling to have an event like we did on Friday i.e. a community Iftar and Taraweeh. On the face of it, it seems like a small deal – 50 to 60 people in a small community hall sharing food. However, knowing that I was sat in my living room in 2015 with Lincoln and Shaykh Zubair telling them about my intention to step down as a trustee of the MKMA and to set-up a new organisation to focus on teaching Islam – it seems like we’ve come a long way. What started off as a small group of friends and students on WhatsApp has now become a group of over 100 people.
The goal was to provide traditional Islamic knowledge to residents of Milton Keynes and to do it in an accessible, family friendly way, with a focus on native English speakers born or brought up in the West. Alhamdulillah we have brought around 20 teachers and scholars to Milton Keynes since we have started – some of which have been from overseas. We have been able to offer weekend retreats and weekly classes in seerah, tafseer, fiqh, Arabic language as well as long term courses and short term courses.
We hope to grow inshallah, to serve more people, to propagate this beautiful religion amongst local Muslims so that they can have enough knowledge to teach their families being confident the knowledge has come from a bona fide source and not from pamphlets and YouTube.
To that end I am pleased to announce an increase in our teaching faculty by introducing Ustadh Shahzad, Ustadh Reduan and Ustadha Sabeena. This will allow us to offer a greater variety of courses at more accessible times. I am also excited to announce a long-term course by Shaykh Ahmed Sa’ad due to start in July which will be a fortnightly course focussing on two traditional texts – one in Creed (Aqida) and one in the Rules of Recitation (Ahkaamu-Tajweed)
Alhamdulillah we put our trust in Allah and ask him to rectify our intentions. Make duah that we continue to grow and benefit the Muslims of Milton Keynes and feel free to get in touch with us at events@lote-tree.org to find out how to donate or ask any questions. Please share Lote Tree and what we stand for with friends and family members.
Mohamed Suleman (Founder of Lote Tree Traditional Learning)
Lote Tree 