The Muslim Converts’ Association of Singapore

Darul ArqamSingapore

www.darul-arqam.org.sg

Address: 32 Onan Road, The Galaxy, Singapore, 424484Tel: 65-63488344Fax: 65-64406724E-mail: info1@ darul-arqam.org.sg

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Darul Arqam Singapore

“Invite (all) to the Way of thy Lord with wisdom and beautiful preaching; and argue with them in ways that are best

and most gracious.”(Surah An-Nahl 16:125)

“Propagate my teaching even if it is only one sentence.”- Prophet Muhammad (SAW)

Guided by this Quranic verse and hadith, the Association has been promoting Islam and providing continuous guidance, support and assistance to Muslim converts and the general Muslim public in Singapore through various programs and services.

The missions of the association are;- To provide religious guidance and to render assistance to members as may be necessary

- To organize religious, literary, and/or recreational activities, and to publish Islamic articles and/or literature

- To participate and provide welfare services for the community where necessary

- To represent the interests of all Muslim converts residing in Singapore

Darul Arqam Singapore is divided into five different services such as; Converts’ Development Division Education Division Da’wah Dicision Corporate Affairs Division

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Finance Division

2002 97.14%

2001 94%

2000 91.5%

1999 87.7%

1998 85.7%

1997 77.9%

Table 1. The percentage of the converts’ among the attendants

Figure 1. The education procedure before conversion

Notes form the interview with “Converts’ Development Division Assistant Manager” Anis Maricar and “Education Division Vice Principal”

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Jamal Mohamed U Soe Thein ;

Basically the association consists of five divisions, and among these three of them are operational (Converts’ Development Division, Education Division and Da’wah Division) and two of them are non-operational (Corporate Affairs Division and Finance Division). The Converts’ Development Division consists of work like,

Welcoming people to Islam Teaching them “What is Islam?”

The procedure of education is like;The people who has interest in Islam, when they come to Darul Arqam we direct these people to the orientation session. And all the classes are conducted by the education division. After the orientation we tell them to attend the “Beginner’s Course on Islam” to find out more about Islam.

Then when they are ready to convert we give them a form to fill out. And basically in this form we are trying to get their personal data, their witnesses data.

After conversion there is “Evaluation”. We’ll give them 3 months time for evaluation. They will be evaluated for the basic steps such as their iman, salat, … so on. And they’ll attend the discussions with “Befriendlies”. In these discussions there are people who disagree with islam. So these group of people are very valuable. We train them and we let them talk.

They are asking many things about islam and we let the new converts to answer them. If they can not answer well then the teacher of the class answers.

This procedure continues for 11 weeks…And also we deal with people that are coming with problems after they convert and marry with a muslim. Some people has financial problems, and we direct these people to Finance Division and Finance Division uses the “Zakat” money to help them about their financial problems.

We also help people who wants to marry with a muslim. We train them before marriage and we let them meet.

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Note: The interview file is copied to the CD (26 mins).

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