A Muslim Convert Once Before

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ The following is the journey of Ustadz ‘Umar James Dunlap.   It is taken from his blog, “The Lettered Wayfarer”, which is no longer available.   “Likely, this will cause some controversy, so I hope my readers will forgive me if I try to lessen the blow so to speak by clarifying the title of this blog.   I want to do so because, on the one hand, I want a catchy title that will grab peoples’ attention, but on the other hand, I do not want the article itself to come off as a diatribe or apologetic.   The whole of what I am about to write could be summed up by simply saying if someone wants to call himself ‘Salafi’, it is fine, and if someone wants to call himself ‘Sufi’, it is fine.   The terms I wish to clarify, firstly, are the words themselves, ‘Salafi’ and ‘Sufi’, and each term has two definitions; the first being how its followers perceive it, and then how those who choose not to ascribe to themselves such titles see i...