Towards Understanding Islam
Some may think it pretentious of me to write
a foreword to a book by an Islamic thinker as outstanding in our time as
Mawlana Mawdudi, especially when any need to introduce the eminent author
or his remarkable book Towards Understanding Islam has
been magisterially fulfilled by Brother Khurshid Ahmad. Towards
Understanding Islam has already made its mark and this edition
is only an improved English version. However. I can hardly neglect this
opportunity to express our gratitude to Allah, subhanahu wala'aia
for having enabled us to bring out a new revised version of a book which
has so deeply influenced such a large number of men and women. Only
recently I received a letter from a friend in Brazil, saying how a leading
journalist had embraced Islam purely because of the simple and persuasive
exposition of the Islamic way of life in Towards Understanding
Islam. There must be innumerable other examples of a similar kind and I
hope that the book will be even more effective in its present form.
The Islamic Foundation envisages a
comprehensive plan to bring the moving and inspiring work of Mawlana
Mawdudi before the world at large. in English and other major European
languages. Towards Understanding Islam is only the
first step and we hope that other important books by him, certainly some of
the most influential in our age, will soon find their way to thirsty souls
and hungry intellects.
We pray to Allah to bless our effort with
mercy and acceptance.
13 December, 1979
4 Miiharram 1400 A.H.
K. J. Murad
Director General
AUTHOR'S PREFACE TO SECOND
EDITION
The present edition of Towards
Understanding Islam is more than a new translation of my book
Risalah Diniyat: it is an entirely new and revised version. The
first edition, which was rendered into English by the late Dr. Abdul Ghani
(Director of Public Instruction, Afghanistan), was very brief and sketchy.
Unfortunately, Dr. Abdul Ghani did not live to improve the translation. I
later revised the original book and made substantial additions to it. Prof.
Khurshid Ahmad, to whom my heartfelt thanks are due for this labour of
love, has now skillfully translated this revised edition of Risalah Dinivat.
I am confident that the book will serve its purpose better in this new
form.
My object in writing this book has been to
provide all those Muslims and non-Muslims alike who have no access to
the original sources with a brief treatise giving a lucid, comprehensive
and all-embracing view of Islam. I have avoided minute details and
endeavoured to portray Islam as a whole in a single perspective. Apart from
staling what we Muslims believe in and stand for, I have also tried to
explain the rational bases of our beliefs. Similarly, in presenting the
Islamic modes of worship and the outlines of the Islamic way of life, I
have also tried to unveil the wisdom behind them. I hope this small
treatise will go far towards satisfying the intellectual cravings of Muslim
youth, and that it will help non-Muslims to understand our real position.
Lahore ABUL A'LA
11th September, 1960
It is a cherished intellectual fashion of our
times to highlight the challenge of secular civilization to faith and
religion. There is however, very little reflection on the challenge that
religion particularly Islam poses to the sensate culture of the age. For
the last few centuries religion in the West has been on the defensive, most
often apologetic, at all times making concessions to and compromises with an
approach to life and culture that is alien to the values and ideals of
religion. The Muslim World has also weathered the global onslaughts of
Western civilization, especially its politico-economic arm, imperialism,
which inflicted many a dent and deformity. The religious approach to life
and its problems was discarded and the role of religion in the socio-
economic spheres became minimal. At both the conceptual and operational
levels the faith and religion of all those under colonial rule, and of the
Muslims in particular, was reduced to a secondary position, if not to one of
total irrelevance. The situation is now changing. The tide of Imperialism
has receded. The Muslim World, after attaining political independence, is
now engaged in an ideological effort to rediscover its cultural personality.
By drawing upon its own spiritual and historical sources it is trying to
develop new attitudes and roles for restructuring its own society and for
the establishment of a new world order. This new resilience in the Muslim
World symbolises the revivalist movement of Islam.
The Muslims look upon the crisis of the
twentieth century as a crisis of values and believe that the way out of the
human predicament lies in the construction of a new social order. The real
need is not to seek concessions here and there or to effect a few changes
in the institutional superstructures. What is needed is a searching
re-examination of the foundations on which the entire structure of society
is built and of the ideals, which the culture aspires to achieve. The
crisis in economic and political relations is the natural outcome of the
ideals, values and institutions that characterize modern civilization.
Islam, therefore, suggests that it is only through summoning mankind
towards a new vision of man and society that its house can be set in order.
This calls for a basic change in man's approach. It is only through a
thorough understanding of the social ideals and values of religion and a
realistic assessment of their socio-economic situation resources,
problems and constraints that faith-oriented communities can develop a
creative and innovative approach to the challenges confronting humanity
today. This approach must be ideological. The real objective which inspires
the Muslims is not a package of economic and political concessions nor even
certain changes in the economic superstructure, but the construction of a
new world order, with its own framework of ideals, values and foundations.
The Western approach has always assumed that radical change can be brought
about by changing the environment. That is why emphasis has always been
placed on change in structure. This approach has failed to produce proper
results. It has ignored the need to bring about change within men and women
themselves and has concentrated on change in the outside world. What is
needed, however, is a total change within people themselves as well as in
their social environment. The problem is not merely structural, although
structural arrangements would also have to be remodeled. But the starting
point must be the hearts and souls of men and women, their perception of
reality and of their own place and mission in life. The Islamic approach to
social change takes full cognizance of these aspects.
Islam is an Arabic word. It is derived from
two root-words: one Salin, meaning peace and the other Silm,
meaning submission. Islam stands for "a commitment to surrender one's will
to the Will of God" and thus to be at peace with the Creator and with all
that has been created by Him. It is through submission to the Will of God
that peace is brought about. Harmonization of man's will with the Will of
God leads to the harmonization of different spheres of life under an
all-embracing ideal. Departmentalization of life into different watertight
compartments, religious and secular, sacred and profane, spiritual and
material, is ruled out. There is unity of life and unity of the source of
guidance. As God is One and Indivisible, so is life and our human
personality. Each aspect of life is inseparable
from the other. Religious
and secular are not two
autonomous categories; they represent two sides of the same coin. Each and
every act becomes related to God and His guidance. Every human activity is
given a transcendent dimension; it becomes sacred and meaningful and goal-centred.
Islam is a worldview and an outlook on life.
It is based on the recognition of the unity of the Creator and of our
submission to His will. Everything originates from the One God, and
everyone is ultimately responsible to Him. Thus the unity of the Creator
has as its corollary the Oneness of His creation. Distinctions of
race, colour, caste, wealth and power disappear: our relation with other
persons assumes total equality by virtue of the common Creator. Henceforth
our mission becomes a dedication to our Creator; worship and obedience to
the Creator becomes our purpose in life.
The Creator has not left us without guidance
for the conduct of our life. Ever since the beginning of creation He has
sent down Prophets who have conveyed His message to humanity. They are the
source from which to discover God's Will. Thus we have the chain of
Prophets beginning with Adam (peace be upon him) and ending with Muhammad
(peace be upon him). Abraham, Moses, Noah, John, Zechariah and Jesus (peace
be upon them) all belong to this golden chain of Prophets. The Prophets
David, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad (may peace be upon them all), brought
revealed books of guidance with them. The Qur'an, the Book revealed to the
Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), is the last and final of these books
of guidance.
The Qur'an contains the word of God. In it is
preserved the divine revelation, unalloyed by human interpolation of any
kind, unaffected by any change or loss to the original. In it is distilled
the essence of all the messages sent down in the past. In it is embodied a
framework for the conduct of the whole of human life. There are explicit
criteria for judging between right and wrong; there are principles of
individual and collective conduct. In it are depicted the human follies of
the past. In it are warnings for humankind, and in it are assurances for
continued guidance for those who seek God's help.
The Qur'an has depicted a path, the Straight
Path (Siral al-Muslaq'lin), which when followed
revolutionizes the whole of life. It brings about a transformation in
character and galvanizes us into action. This action takes the form of
purification of the self, and then unceasing effort to establish the laws
of God on earth, resulting in a new order based on truth, justice, virtue
and goodness.
Men and women play a crucial role in the
making of this world. They act as God's vicegerents (Khulofa')His
deputies and representatives on earth. They are morally prepared to play
this role. Success lies in praying it properly, by enjoining what is right
and for hiding what is wrong, by freeing people from the bondage of others,
by demonstrating that a sound and serene society can only result if one
harmonizes one's will with the Will of God. This makes seeking the
Creator's pleasure one's purpose in life, treating the whole of creation as
one's partner, raising the concept of human welfare from the level of mere
animal needs to seeking what is best in this world and what is best in the
Hereafter.
This is the Islamic worldview, and its
concept of men and women and their destiny. Islam is not a religion in the
Western understanding of the word. It is at once a faith and a way of life,
a religion and a social order, a doctrine and a code of conduct, a set of
values and principles and a social movement to realize them in history.
The uniqueness of Islamic culture lies in its
values and principles. When Muslims, after an illustrious historical
career, became oblivious of this fact and became obsessed with the
manifestations of their culture, as against its sources, they could not
even fully protect the house they had built. The strength of Islam lies in
its ideals, values and principles, and their relevance to us is as great
today as it has ever been in history. The message is timeless and the
principles Islam embodies are of universal application. In our search for a
new world order today, Islam emphasizes that we must aspire to a new system
of life through which to approach human problems from a different
perspective, not merely from the perspective of limited national or
regional interest, but from the perspective of what is right and wrong, and
how best we can strive to evolve a just and a humane world order at
different levels of our existence, individual, national and international.
That the present order is characterized by injustice and exploitation is
proved beyond any shadow of doubt. But Islam suggests that the present
order fails because it is based upon a wrong concept of man and of his
relationship with other human beings, with society, with nature, and with
the world. The search for a new order brings us to the need for a new
concept of man and his role. From the viewpoint of world religions in
general, and of Islam in particular, the focus of the discussion must be
shifted to a new vision of man and society, to an effort to bring about
change at the level of human consciousness, of values, leading to new
cultural transformation.
This is the, concept of Islam that lies at
the root of the contemporary resurgence of Islam. It is in the framework of
these parameters that the Muslims are today awakening to a new world role,
facing the problems of modernization, challenging the secular concepts and
institutions of the world establishment, purging their thought and society
of alien intrusions from Western civilization, and harnessing their
resources to build a new order at home which could act as a window on the
Islamic order for all humankind. Amongst the chief architects of this new
awakening in the world of Islam is Mawlana Sayyid Abul A'la Mawdudi.
Born in 1903 C.E., Mawdudi started his public
career as early as 1918. He wrote and spoke as editor, scholar, religious
thinker and leader of a movement, authoring over a hundred works of
varying size and delivering more than a thousand speeches. His death in
September 1979 marks the end of an era.
He made his debut in the intellectual life of
the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent in 1927, at the early age of twenty-four,
and created a stir by his voluminous scholarly work Al-Jihad
fil-lslam ("Jihad in Islam") first serialized in a newspaper, and
subsequently published in the form of a book in 1930. From the early
thirties he was a major, dominating, undaunted figure on the intellectual
scene of the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent. The monthly magazine, Tarjuman
al-Qur'an, which he edited since 1933, has been a major influence on
the minds of the Muslim intellectuals of the subcontinent. Since the
forties, when Mawlana Mawdudi's writings began to be available in
translated versions, especially in Arabic and English, his ideas have
attracted an increasing number of people far beyond the confines of the
subcontinent. It is no exaggeration to say that by the time of his death he
had become the most widely read Muslim author of our time, contributing
immensely to the contemporary resurgence of Islamic ideas, feelings and
activity all over the world.
Islam, however, was never a merely
intellectual concern of Mawlana Mawdudi. He consciously tried to live Islam
and to live for Islam. As far back as his mid-twenties he had resolved not
only to devote all his energy to expounding the teachings of Islam, but
also to do all that lay in his power to transform Islamic teachings into
practical realities. Mawlana Mawdudi was always emphatic in asserting that
Islam is not merely a body of metaphysical doctrines, nor merely a bundle
of rituals, nor even merely a set of rules of individual conduct. It is
indeed a way of life, the bases of which lie rooted in Divine Revelation; a
way of life which is permeated with God consciousness and is oriented to
doing God's Will and actualizing good and righteousness in human life. A
Muslim is committed to follow this way of life, to bear witness to it by
word and deed, and to strive in order to make it prevail in the world.
Hence, in addition to his intellectual contribution, in 1941 Mawlana
Mawdudi founded a movement known as the Jamaat-I-Islaim ("The
Islamic Organization"). He led this movement as its chief from its
inception till 1972. Even after getting himself relieved of the duties of
its formal headship for reasons of health, he continued to be a major
source of guidance and inspiration for those associated with the
Jamaat-I-Islaim, and indeed for a very large number of men and women
across the globe, who do not have any affiliation to that organization.
More and more people, particularly Muslims of the younger generation, are
coming to appreciate Mawdudi and even identify with the vision of Islam
that he articulated so lucidly and incisively.
Mawlana Mawdudi, therefore, was no mere
academician; he was also a man of action engaged in a grim struggle for the
implementation of the Islamic vision. During this struggle the many
sterling qualities of .his character came to the surface notably his
magnanimity and tolerance. It is because of his involvement in practical
matters, especially since 1948, that Mawlana Mawdudi often had to suffer
persecution at the hands of the men of authority in Pakistan who failed lo
perceive the real motives and true character of his movement. Many a time
he had to court imprisonment, not unlike some of the great heroes of Islam
Abu Hanifah, Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Ibn Taymiyah, Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi, and
Sayyid Qutb of our own time, to name only a few luminaries. Not only that,
in 1953 he narrowly escaped the gallows and, in 1963, the bullets of an
assassin. In braving persecution for the sake of his cause, Mawlana Mawdudi
displayed a serene dignity and heroic fearlessness, which won him the
abiding love and respect of friends and foe alike.
It is remarkable that despite the exacting
tasks laid on Mawlana Mawdudi's shoulders as the head of a large movement,
he remained prolific as a writer and his writings remained impressive, not
only qualitatively, but also quantitatively. His magnum opus,
of course, is his translation and tafs'ir (exegesis) of the Holy
Qur'an, an epitome of his elegant literary style, his erudition, and the
clarity and brilliance of his thought. One of the major characteristics of
Mawlana Mawdudi was his ability to bring out the relevance of Islam to the
problems and concerns of man in the present age. This is largely because he
combined with his Islamic scholarship awareness and knowledge of the
intellectual trends and practical problems of man in the modern age. In
encountering the challenge of modernity. Mawlana Mawdudi displayed neither
ultra-conservative rigidity, nor proneness to be overawed by the ideas and
institutions current in our time simply because they were fashionable in
the modern age or had gained respectability among the nations which are
currently the leaders of the world. He wanted the Muslims to appropriate
creatively the healthy and beneficial elements from the cumulative treasure
of human experience, and to employ them to serve the higher ends of life
embodied in the Islamic tradition. It is this aspect of Mawlana Mawdudi,
which has attracted many but at the same time repelled many others,
particularly the ultra-conservative and the ultra-westernized elements in
Muslim society.
Towards Understanding Islam
is another of his important books. It is an elementary study of the
basic concepts and principles of I slam. It offers a simple, understandable
and unsophisticated interpretation of the meaning and message of Islam for
the ordinary reader, particularly the young. It is not written in the
browbeating style of theology books, rich in awe-inspiring jargon and legal
quibbling but of little help in bringing the reader into direct contact
with the spirit of the faith.
Towards Understanding
Islam is a religious text with a difference. It offers a
simple exposition of Islam; its approach to life, the articles of its
faith, its worship and prayers, and the scheme of life, which it envisages.
The method of exposition is steeped in the methodology of the Qur'an. It
offers in summary form the essential teachings of Islam. And as the book is
primarily meant for lay readers and students no attempt is made to burden
the mind of the reader with difficult or philosophic dissertations. The
language and style of the author are clear, candid and rational.
Originally written in 1932 in Urdu, under the
title Risalah Dmiyal, the book was intended as a textbook for
students of the higher classes and for the general public. It served an
important need and became a popular Islamic reader. Most of the schools and
colleges of the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent adopted it as a textbook in
theology and made its study a part of their curricula. It has been
translated into many of the world's languages, including English, Arabic,
Hindi, Persian, German, French, Italian, Turkish, Portuguese, Swahili,
Indonesian and Japanese. Malayalam, Tamil, Pushto, Bengali, Gujrati and
Sindhi.
The first English translation appeared in
1940 (Translator: Dr. Abdul Ghani) and ran into many editions. In the early
fifties the need for a new translation was felt for more than one reason.
The earlier translation suffered from certain deficiencies. Moreover, the
author re-edited the text in the forties, making substantial alterations
and revisions. I was assigned the task of rendering a new translation based
on the revised text (sixteenth [revised] edition), which I accomplished in
the mid-fifties. Although I kept the earlier translation before me, only a
very few paragraphs were finally embodied in the new translation. Strictly
speaking, I did not venture a literal, word-for-word, translation of the
original text. I tried to follow the original as faithfully as possible,
but departed wherever necessary from a strictly literal rendering in the
interest of a more effective communication of the meaning of the text. The
learned author was kind enough to go through my translation in 1959 and it
was offered to the public with his approval.
During the last two decades many reprints of
the 1959 edition have appeared. As the years went by I came to feel that
the translation needed further improvement. My long stay in the United
Kingdom (1968-78) provided me with an opportunity for further reflection
upon a work done in my student days. Now the Islamic Foundation is
publishing a revised translation. I am grateful to my friend Paul Moorman.
Editor. Middle East Education and a former Foreign
Editor, The Times Higher Educational Supplement,
for his meticulous assistance in revising the present text. I would also
like to place on record the assistance I received from Khwaja Abdul Wahid
and Ansar Azam in preparing my first translation. I cannot but record my
profound debt to Mawlana Mawdudi for the influence his ideas and his noble
example have had on my own life, in all phases of its development so far,
and how impoverished I feel by his departure from our midst towards
life-eternal. May Allah bless his soul and enable his intellectual progeny,
to which I among others feel proud to belong, to continue his mission.
Towards Understanding Islam is one of those books, which
have changed the lives of many and set them along the Islamic path. Over a
million copies of this book have appeared in different languages of the
world. It is a unique privilege to be associated with the production of
this edition of the book.
Institute of Policy Studies,
Islamabad, Pakistan.
1st Muharram, 1400November 20,1979.
KHURSHID AHMAD
Go to Top
Chapter
1
ISLAM What does it Mean?
The
Nature of Disbelief
The
Blessings of Islam
Every religion of the world has been named
either after its founder or after the community or nation in which it was
born. For instance, Christianity takes its name from its prophet Jesus
Christ; Buddhism from its founder. Gautama Buddha; Zoroastrianism from its
founder Zoroaster; and Judaism the religion of the Jews from the name of
the tribe Judah (of the country of Judea) where it originated. The same is
true of all other religions except Islam, which enjoys the unique
distinction of having no such association with any particular person or
people or country. Nor is it the product of any human mind. It is a
universal religion and its objective is to create and cultivate in man the
quality and attitude of Islam.
Islam, in fact, is an attributive title.
Anyone who possesses this attribute, whatever race, community, country or
group he belongs to, is a Muslim. According to the Qur'an (the Holy Book of
the Muslims), among every people and in all ages there have been good and
righteous people who possessed this attribute and all of them were and
are Muslims.
Islam is an Arabic word and connotes submission, surrender
and obedience. As a religion, Islam stands for complete submission and
obedience to Allah.1 (1. Another literal meaning
of the word Islam is "peace' and this signifies that one can achieve real
peace of body and mind only through submission and obedience to Allah. Such
a life of obedience brings with it peace of the heart and establishes real
peace in society at large. - Editor.)
Everyone can see that we live in an orderly
universe, where everything is assigned a place in a grand scheme. The moon,
the stars and all the heavenly bodies are knit together in a magnificent
system. They follow unalterable laws and make not even the slightest
deviation from their ordained courses. Similarly, everything in the world,
from the minute whirling electron to the mighty nebulae, invariably follows
its own laws. Matter, energy and life all obey their laws and grow and
change and live and die in accordance with those laws. Even in the human
world the laws of nature are paramount. Man's birth, growth and life are
all regulated by a set of biological laws. He derives sustenance from
nature in accordance with an unalterable law. All the organs of his body
from the smallest tissues to the heart and the brain, are governed by the
laws prescribed for them. In short, ours is a law-governed universe
and everything in it is following the course that has been ordained for it.
This powerful, all-pervasive law, which
governs all that comprises the universe, from the tiniest specks of dust to
the magnificent galaxies of the heavens, is the law of God, the Creator and
Ruler of the universe. As the whole of creation obeys the law of God, the
whole universe, therefore, literally follows the religion of Islam for
Islam signifies nothing but obedience and submission to Allah, the Lord of
the Universe. The sun, the moon, the earth and all other heavenly bodies
are thus 'Muslim'. So are the air, water, heat, stones, trees and animals.
Everything in the universe is 'Muslim' for it obeys God by submission to
His laws. Even a man who refuses to believe in God, or offers his worship
to someone other than Allah, has necessarily to be a 'Muslim' as far as his
existence is concerned.
For his entire life, from the embryonic
stage to the body's dissolution into dust after death, every tissue of his
muscles and every limb of his body follow the course prescribed by God's
law. His very tongue, which, on account of his ignorance advocates the
denial of God or professes multiple deities, is in its very nature
'Muslim'. His head which he want only bows to others besides Allah is born
'Muslim'. His heart, which, through his lack of true knowledge, cherishes
love and reverence for others, is 'Muslim' by intuition. These are all
obedient to the Divine Law, and their functions and movements are governed
by the injunctions of that law alone.
Let us now examine the situation from a
different angle. Man is so constituted that there are two distinct spheres
of his activity. One is the sphere in which he finds himself totally
regulated by the Divine Law. Like other creatures, he is completely caught
in the grip of the physical laws of nature and is bound to follow them. But
there is another sphere of his activity. He has been endowed with reason
and intellect. He has the power to think and form judgments, to choose and
reject, to approve and spurn. He is free to adopt whatever course of life
he chooses. He can embrace any faith, and live by any ideology he likes. He
may prepare his own code of conduct or accept one formulated by others.
Unlike other creatures, he has been given freedom of thought, choice and
action. In short, man has been bestowed with free will.
Both these aspects co-exist side by side in
man's life.
In the first he, like all other creatures, is
a born Muslim, invariably obeying the injunctions of God, and is bound to
remain one. As far as the second aspect is concerned, he is free to become
or not to become a Muslim. It is the way a person exercises this freedom,
which divides mankind into two groups: believers and non-believers.
An individual, who chooses to acknowledge his Creator, accepts Him as his
real Master, honestly and scrupulously submits to His laws and injunctions
and follows the code. He has achieved completeness in his Islam by
consciously deciding to obey God in the domain in which he was endowed with
freedom of choice. He is a perfect Muslim: his submission of his entire
self to the will of Allah is Islam and nothing but Islam.
He has now consciously submitted to Him Whom
he had already been unconsciously obeying. He has now willingly offered
obedience to the Master Whom he already owed obedience to involuntarily.
His knowledge is now real for he has acknowledged the Being Who endowed him
with the power to learn and to know. Now his reason and judgement are set
on an even keel for he has rightly decided to obey the Being Who bestowed
upon him the faculty of thinking and judging. His tongue is also truthful
for it expresses its belief in the Lord who gave it the faculty of speech.
Now the whole of his existence is an embodiment of truth for, in all
spheres of life, he voluntarily as well as involuntarily obeys the laws of
One God the Lord of the Universe. Now he is at peace with the whole
universe for he worships Him Whom the whole universe worships. Such a man
is God's vice-regent on earth. The whole world is for him and he is for
God.
In contrast to the man described above, there is the man
who, although a born Muslim and unconsciously remaining one throughout his
life, does not exercise his faculties of reason, intellect and intuition to
recognise his Lord and Creator and misuses his freedom of choice by
choosing to deny Him. Such a man becomes an unbeliever in the
language of Islam a Kafir.
Kufr
literally means 'to cover' or 'to conceal'. The man who denies God is
called Kafir (concealer) because he conceals by his
disbelief' what is inherent in his nature and embalmed in his own soul
for his nature is instinctively imbued with Islam'. His whole body
functions in obedience to that instinct. Each and every particle of
existence living or lifeless functions in accordance with Islam' and is
fulfilling the duty that has been assigned to it. But the vision of this
man has been blurred, his intellect has been befogged, and he is unable to
see the obvious. His own nature has become concealed from his eyes and he
thinks and acts in utter disregard of it. Reality becomes estranged from
him and he gropes in the dark. Such is the nature of
Kufr.
Kufr is a
form of ignorance, or, rather, it is ignorance. What ignorance can
be greater than to be ignorant of God, the Creator and the Lord of the
Universe? A man observes the vast panorama of nature, the superb mechanism
that is ceaselessly working, the grand design that is manifest in every
aspect of creation he observes this vast machine, but he does not know
anything of its Maker and Director. He knows what a wonderful organism his
body is but is unable to comprehend the Force that brought it into
existence, the Engineer Who designed and produced it, the Creator Who made
the unique living being out of lifeless stuff: carbon, calcium, sodium and
the like. He witnesses a superb plan in the universe but fails to see the
Planner behind it. He sees great beauty and harmony in its working but
not the Creator. He observes a wonderful design in nature - but not the
Designer! How can a man, who has so blinded himself to reality, approach
true knowledge? How can one who has made the wrong beginning reach the
right destination? He will fail to find the key to Reality. The Right Path
will remain concealed for him and whatever his endeavours in science and
arts, he will never be able to attain truth and wisdom. He will be groping
in the darkness of ignorance.
Not only that; Kufr is a
tyranny, the worst of all tyrannies. And what is 'tyranny'? It is an unjust
use of force or power. It is when you compel a thing to act unjustly or
against its true nature, its real will and its inherent attitude.
We have seen that all that is in the universe
is obedient to God, the Creator. To obey, to live in accordance with His
Will and His Law or (to put it more precisely) lo be a
Muslim is ingrained in the nature of things. God has given manpower
over these things, but it is incumbent that they should be used for the
fulfillment of His Will and not otherwise. Anyone who
disobeys God and resorts to Kufr perpetrates the greatest injustice,
for he uses his powers of body and mind to rebel against the course of
nature and becomes an instrument in the drama of disobedience. He bows his
head before deities other than God and cherishes in his heart the love,
reverence and fear of other powers in utter disregard of the instinctive
urge of these organs. He uses his own powers and all those things over
which he has authority against the explicit Will of God and thus
establishes a reign of tyranny.
Can there be any greater injustice, tyranny
and cruelty than that exhibited by this man who exploits and misuses
everything under the sun and unscrupulously forces them to a course, which
affronts nature and justice?
Kufr
is not mere tyranny; it is rebellion, ingratitude and infidelity. After all
what is the reality of man? Where do his power and authority come from? Is
he himself the creator of his mind, his heart, his soul and other organs of
his body or have they been created by God? Has he himself created the
universe and all that is in itor has it been created by God? Who has
harnessed all the powers and energies for the service of man man or God?
If everything has been created by God and God alone, then to whom do they
belong? Who is their rightful sovereign? It is God and none else. And if
God is the Creator, the Master and the Sovereign, then who would be a
greater rebel than the man who uses God's creation against His injunctions
and who makes his mind think against God. harbours in his heart thoughts
against Him, and uses his various faculties against the Sovereign's Will.
If a servant betrays his master you denounce
him as faithless. If an officer becomes disloyal to the state you brand him
as a traitor and renegade. If a person cheats his benefactor you have no
hesitation in condemning him as ungrateful. But such acts cannot begin to
compare to the one, which the disbeliever commits by his Kufr. All
that a man has and all that he uses for the benefit of others is a gift of
God. The greatest obligation that a man owes on this earth is to his
parents. But who has implanted the love of children in the parents' heart?
Who endowed the mother with the will and power to nurture, nourish and feed
her children? Who inspired the parents with the passion to spend everything
in their possession for the well being of their children? A little
reflection would reveal that God is the greatest benefactor of man. He is
his Creator, Lord, Nourisher, Sustainer, as well as King and Sovereign. So
what can be greater betrayal, ingratitude, rebellion and treason than
Kufr, through which a man denies and disobeys his real Lord and
Sovereign?
Do not think that by committing Kufr
man does or can do the least harm to Almighty God. Insignificant speck on
the face of a tiny ball in this limitless universe that man is, what harm
can he do to the Lord of the Universe Whose dominions are so infinitely
vast that we have not yet been able to explore their boundaries even with
the help of the most powerful telescope; Whose power is so great that
myriads of heavenly bodies, like the Earth, the Moon, the Sun and the stars
are, at His bidding, whirling like tiny balls; Whose wealth is so boundless
that He is the sole Master of the whole universe: and Who provides for all
and needs none to provide for Him? Man's revolt against Him can do Him no
harm: on the other hand, by his disobedience, man treads the path of ruin
and disgrace.
The inevitable consequence of this revolt and
denial of reality is a failure in the ultimate ideals of life. Such a rebel
will never find the thread of real knowledge and vision; for knowledge that
fails to reveal its own Creator can reveal no truth. Such a man's intellect
and reason always run astray; for reason which errs about its own Creator
cannot illumine the paths of life.
Such a man will meet with failures in all
the affairs of his life. His morality, his civic and social life, his
struggle for livelihood and his family life, in short, his entire
existence, will be unsatisfactory. He will spread confusion and disorder.
He will, without the least compunction, shed blood, violate other men's
rights and generally act destructively. His perverted thoughts and
ambitions, his blurred vision and distorted scale of values, and his evil
activities will make life bitter for him and for all around him.
Such a man destroys the calm and pose of
life on earth. And in the life hereafter he will be held guilty for the
crimes he committed against his nature. Every organ of his body his
brain, eyes, nose, hands and feet will complain against the injustice and
cruelty he had subjected them to. Every tissue of his being will denounce
him before God Who, as the fountain of justice, will punish him as he
deserves. This is the inglorious consequence of Kufr. It leads to
the blind alleys of utter failure, both here and hereafter.
The
Blessings of Islam
These are the evils and disadvantages of
Kufr. Let us now look at some of the blessings of Islam
You find in the world around you and in the
small kingdom of your own self-innumerable manifestations of God's divine
power. This grand universe, which ceaselessly works with matchless order
and in accordance with unalterable laws, is in itself a witness to the fact
that its Designer, Creator and Governor is an Omnipotent, All-Powerful
Being with infinite power, knowledge and resources, a Being of perfect
wisdom. Whom nothing in the universe dares disobey. It is in the very
nature of man, as it is with every other thing in this universe to obey Him
Besides endowing man with the capacity to acquire knowledge, the faculty to
think and reflect, and the ability to distinguish right from wrong. God has
granted him a certain amount of freedom of will and action. In this freedom
lies man's real trial; his knowledge, his wisdom, his power of
discrimination and his freedom of will and action are all being tried and
tested. Man has not been obliged to adopt any particular course, for by
compulsion the very object of the trial would have been defeated. If in an
examination you are compelled to write a certain answer to a question, the
examination will be of no use. Your merit can be properly judged only if
you are allowed to answer the questions freely, according to your own
knowledge and understanding. If your answer is correct you will succeed; if
it is wrong you will fail, and your failure will bar the way to further
progress.
The situation, which man faces, is
similar. God has given him freedom of will and action so that he may choose
whatever attitude in life he likes and considers proper for himself Islam
or Kufr.
By the correct use of his knowledge and
intellect a man recognises his Creator, reposes belief in Him, and, in
spite of being under no compulsion to do so, chooses the path of obedience
to Him. He understands both his own nature and the laws and realities of
nature itself: despite the power and freedom to adopt any course, he adopts
the way of obedience and loyalty to God, the Creator. He is successful in
his trial because he has used his intellect and all other faculties
properly. He uses his eyes to see the reality, his ears to listen to the
truth and his mind to form right opinions. He puts all his heart and soul
into following the right way he has so chosen. He chooses Truth, sees the
reality, and willingly and joyfully submits to his Lord and Master. He is
intelligent, truthful and dutiful, for he has chosen light over darkness.
Thus he has proved by his conduct that he is not only a seeker after Truth
but is its knower and worshipper as well. Such a man is on the right path,
and is destined to succeed in this world and in the world to come.
Such a man will always choose the right path
in every field of knowledge and action. The man who knows God with all His
attributes knows the beginning as well as the ultimate end of reality. He
can never be led astray, for his first step is on the right path, and he is
sure of the direction and destination of his journey in life. He will
reflect on the secrets of the universe, and will try to fathom the
mysteries of nature, but he will not lose his way in mazes of doubt and
scepticism. His path being illumined with Divine Vision, his every step
will be in the right direction. In science he will endeavour to learn the
laws of nature and uncover the hidden treasures of the earth for the
betterment of humanity. He will try his level best to explore all avenues
of knowledge and power and to harness all that exists on earth and in the
heavens in the interests of mankind.
At every stage of his enquiry his
God-consciousness will save him from making evil and destructive uses of
science and the scientific method. He will never think of himself as the
master of all these objects, boasting to be the conqueror of nature,
arrogating to himself godly and sovereign powers and nourishing the
ambition of subverting the world, subduing the human race and establishing
his supremacy over all and sundry by fair means or foul. Such, an attitude
of revolt and defiance can never be entertained by a Muslim scientist
only a Kafir scientist can fall prey to such illusions and by
submitting to them expose the entire human race to the danger of total
destruction and annihilation2. (2. The situation,
which confronts modern man today, is similar. Dr. Joad says: "Science has
given us power fit for the gods, and to its use we bring the mentality of
schoolboys and savages." The famous philosopher Bertrand Russell writes:
"Broadly speaking, »e are in the middle of a race between human skill as to
means and human folly as to ends, every increase in the skill required lo
achieve them is to the bad. The human race has survived hitherto owing to
ignorance and incompetence: but, given knowledge and competence combined
with folly, there can be no certainty of survival. Knowledge is power, but
it is power for evil just as much as for good. It follows that unless man
increases in wisdom as much as in knowledge, increase of knowledge will be
increase of sorrow." (Impact of Science on Society, pp. 120-121.) Another
leading thinker has put the paradox in these words: "We are taught lo fly
in the air like birds, and to swim in the water like fishes: but how to
lire on the earth we do not know." (Quoted by Joad in Counter Attack From
the East, p. 28.)
A Muslim scientist, on the other hand, will
behave in an altogether different way. The deeper his insight into the
world of science, the stronger will be his faith in God. His head will bow
down before Him in gratitude. His feelings will be that as his Master has
blessed him with greater power and knowledge so he must exert himself for
his own good and for the good of humanity. Instead of arrogance there will
be humility. Instead of power-drunkenness there will be a strong
realisation of the need to serve humanity. His freedom will not be
unbridled. He will be guided by the tenets of morality and Divine
Revelation. Thus science will in his hands, instead of becoming an
instrument of destruction, become an agency for human welfare and moral
regeneration. And this is the way in which he will express his gratitude to
his Master for the gifts and blessings He has bestowed on man.
Similarly, in history, economics, politics,
law and other branches of arts and science, a Muslim will nowhere lag
behind a Kafir in the fields of inquiry and struggle, but their
angles of view and consequently their modus operandi will be
widely different. A Muslim will study every branch of knowledge in its true
perspective. He will strive to arrive at the right conclusions.
In history he will draw correct lessons from
the past experiences of man, and will uncover the true causes of the rise
and fall of civilisations. He will try to benefit from all that was good
and right in the past and will scrupulously avoid all that led to the
decline and fall of nations. In politics his sole objective will be to
strive for the establishment of policies where peace, justice, fraternity
and goodness reign, where man is a brother of man and respects his
humanity, where no exploitation or slavery is rampant, where the rights of
the individual are upheld, and where the powers of the state are considered
as a sacred trust from God and are used for the common welfare of all. In
the field of law, the endeavour of a Muslim will be to make it the true
embodiment of justice and the real protector of the rights of all
particularly of the weak. He will see that everybody gets his due share and
no injustice or oppression is inflicted on anyone. He will respect the law,
make others respect it, and will see that it is administered equitably.
The life of a Muslim will always be filled
with godliness, piety, righteousness and truthfulness. He will live in the
belief that God alone is the Master of all, that whatever he and other men
possess has been given by God, that the powers he wields are only a trust
from God, that the freedom he has been endowed with is not to be used
indiscriminately, and that it is in his own interest to use it in
accordance with God's Will. He will constantly keep in view that one day he
will have to return to the Lord and submit an account of his entire life.
The sense of accountability will always remain implanted in his mind and he
will never behave irresponsibly.
Think of the moral excellence of the man who
lives with this mental attitude his will be a life of purity and piety
and love and altruism. He will be a blessing unto mankind. His thinking
will not be polluted with evil thoughts and perverted ambitions. He will
abstain from seeing evil, hearing evil, and doing evil. He will guard his
tongue and will never utter a word of lie. He will earn his living through
just and fair means and will prefer hunger to a food acquired unfairly
through exploitation or injustice. He will never be a party to any form of
oppression or violation of human life and honour. He will never yield to
evil, whatever the cost of defiance. He will be an embodiment of
goodness and nobility and will defend right and truth even at the cost of
his life. Such a man will be a power to be reckoned with. He is bound to
succeed.
He will be highly honoured and respected.
How can humiliation ever visit a person who is not prepared to bow his head
before anyone except God the Almighty, the Sovereign of the universe? No
one can be more powerful than he for he fears none but God and seeks
blessings from none but Him. What power can make him deviate from the right
path? What wealth can buy his faith? What force can shape his conscience?
What power can compel him to behave, as he does not want to?
He will be the wealthiest. No one in the
world can be richer or more independent than he for he will live a life
of austerity and contentment. He will be neither a sensualist, nor
indulgent, nor greedy. He will be contented with whatever he earns fairly
and honestly and however much ill-gotten wealth is heaped before him he
will not even look at it. He will have peace and contentment of heart and
what can be a greater wealth than this?
He will be the most revered, popular and
beloved. No one can be more lovable than he for he lives a life of
charity and benevolence. He will be just to everyone, discharge his duties
honestly, and work for the good of others. People's hearts will be
naturally drawn towards him.
No one can be more trust worthy than he for
he will not betray his trust, nor will he stray from righteousness: he will
be true to his word, and straightforward and honest in his dealings. He
will be fair and just in all his affairs, for he is sure that God is
ever-present, ever vigilant. Words fail to describe the credit and good
will, which such a man commands. Can there be anyone who will not trust
him? Such is the life and character of a Muslim.
If you understand the true character of a
Muslim, you will be convinced that he cannot live in humiliation, abasement
or subjugation. He is bound to prevail and no power on earth can overwhelm
him. For Islam, inculcates in him the qualities, which cannot be driven
out.
And after living a respectable and
honourable life on this earth, he will return to his Creator Who will
shower on him the choicest of His blessings for he will have discharged
his duty ably, fulfilled his mission successfully and emerged from his
trial triumphantly. He is successful in life in this world and in the
hereafter will live in eternal peace, joy and bliss.
This is Islam, the natural religion of man,
the religion that is not associated with any person, people, period or
place. It is the way of nature, the religion of man. In every age,
in every country and among every people, all God-knowing and truth-loving
men have believed and lived this very religion. They were all Muslims,
irrespective of whether they called that way Islam. Whatever its name was,
it signified Islam and nothing but Islam.
Go to Top
Chapter 2
Faith:
What does it Mean?
How to Acquire the Knowledge of
God?
Faith in the Unknown
Islam means obedience to God. And it is
common sense that this obedience cannot be complete unless man knows
certain basic facts of life and places firm faith in them. What are those
facts? And what are the essentials, which a man must know to fashion his
life in accordance with the Divine Way? This we propose to discuss in the
present chapter.
First of all, one should have an unshakable
belief in the existence of God; without this, obedience to Him is clearly
impossible.
Then, one must know the attributes of God.
It is the knowledge of the attributes of God, which enables man to
cultivate the noblest of human qualities and to fashion his life in virtue
and godliness. If a man does not know that there is One and only One God
who is the Creator, the Ruler and the Sustainer of the Universe and there
is none else to share with Him even a shred of Divine power and authority,
he may fall prey to false gods, and offer his homage to them in search of
favours.
But if he knows the divine attribute of
tawhid (Oneness of God), there is no possibility of this. Similarly, if
a man knows that God is Omnipresent and Omniscient and sees, hears and
knows everything that we do in public or private including our
unexpressed thoughts! Then how can he afford to be disobedient to God? He
will feel that he is under eternal vigil and will, therefore, behave
accordingly. But he who is not aware of these attributes of God may be led,
because of his ignorance, into disobedience. It is the same with all the
other attributes of God.
The fact is that the qualities and attributes
which a man must possess, if he wants to pursue the way of Islam, can be
cultivated and developed only out of profound knowledge of the attributes
of God. It is the knowledge of God's attributes, which purifies a man's
mind and soul, his beliefs, morals and actions. And a mere cursory
acquaintance with or just an academic knowledge of these attributes is not
sufficient there must be an unflinching conviction firmly rooted in the
mind and heart of man so that he may remain immune from insidious
doubts and perversions.
Moreover, one must know in detail the
way of living by following which one can seek the
pleasure of God. Unless a man knows the likes and dislikes of God, how can
he choose the one and reject the other? If a man has no knowledge of the
Divine Law, how can he follow it? Thus knowledge of the Divine Law and the
Revealed Code of Life is essential.
But here, again, mere knowledge is not
enough. Man must have full confidence and conviction that // is
the Divine Law and that his salvation lies
in following this code alone. For knowledge without this conviction
will fail to spur man to the Right Path and he may be lost in the blind
alley of disobedience.
Finally, man must also know the consequences
both of belief and obedience and of disbelief and disobedience. He must
know what blessings will be showered upon him if he chooses God's way and
leads a life of purity, virtue and obedience. And he must also know what
consequences follow if he adopts the way of disobedience and revolt. Thus,
knowledge of life after death is absolutely essential for this purpose. Man
must have an unwavering belief in the fact that death does not mean the end
of life; that there will be resurrection and he will be brought to the
highest court of justice, to be presided over by God Himself; that on the
Day of Judgement complete justice will prevail; and that good deeds will be
rewarded and misdeeds punished. Everybody will get his due; there will be
no escape. This is bound to happen. A sense of accountability is essential
for fully-fledged obedience to the Law of God.
A man who has no knowledge of the world to
come many considers obedience and disobedience quite immaterial. He may
think that the obedient and the disobedient will both meet a similar end:
after death, both will be reduced to mere dust. With this attitude of mind,
how can he be expected to submit to all the inconveniences and troubles
that are inextricably associated with the life of active obedience, and
avoid committing those sins which do not apparently bring him any moral or
material loss in this world? With this mental attitude a man cannot
acknowledge and submit to God's Law.
Nor can a man, who lacks firm
belief in the life hereafter and in the Divine Court of
Judgement, remain steadfast in the turbulent waters of life with its
temptation to sin, crime and evil; for doubt and hesitancy rob a man of his
will to action. You can remain consistent in your behaviour only if you are
firm in your beliefs. You can whole-heartedly follow a course only if you
are sure of the benefits that will accrue to you by following it and of the
losses that will engulf you if you disobey it. Thus, a profound knowledge
of the consequences of belief and disbelief and of the life after death is
crucial.
These are the essential facts, which one must
know if one wants to live the life of obedience, that is, Islam.
Faith is what we have described in the
foregoing discussion as 'Knowledge and Belief. The Arabic word lman,
which we have rendered in English as faith, literally means 'to know', 'to
believe' and 'to be convinced beyond the least shadow of doubt'. Faith,
thus, is firm belief arising out of knowledge and conviction. And the man
who knows and reposes unshakable belief in the Unity of God, in His
Attributes, in His Law and the Revealed Guidance, and in the Divine Code of
Reward and Punishment is called Mu'min (faithful). This faith
invariably leads man to a life of obedience and submission to the Will of
God. And one who lives this life of submission is known as
Muslim.
It is therefore clear that without faith
(lman) no man can be a true Muslim. It is the indispensable essential;
rather, the very starting point, without which no beginning can be made.
The relation of Islam to lman is the same as of a tree to its seed.
As a tree cannot sprout forth without its seed, in the same way it is not
possible for a man who has no belief to start with, to become a 'Muslim'.
On the other hand, just as it can happen that, in spite of sowing the seed,
the tree may, for many reasons, not grow, or if it does grow, its
development may be impaired or retarded, in the same way, a man may have
faith, but due to a number of weaknesses, he may not become a true and
staunch Muslim.
From the viewpoint of Islam and lman,
men may be classified into four categories:
1Those who have firm faith a faith
that makes them whole-heartedly submit to God. They follow the way of God
and devote themselves heart and soul to seeking His pleasure by doing all
that He likes and by avoiding all that He dislikes. In their devotion they
are even more fervent than is the common man in pursuit of wealth and
glory. Such men are true Muslims.
2. Those who do have faith, who believe in
God, His Law and the Day of Judgement, but whose faith is not deep and
strong enough to make them totally submit to God. They are far below the
rank of true Muslims, deserve punishment for their defaults and misdeeds,
but are still Muslims. They are wrongdoers but not rebels. They acknowledge
the Sovereign and His Law and, although they are violating the Law, they
have not revolted against the Sovereign. They admit His supremacy and their
own guilt. Thus they are guilty and deserve punishment, but Muslims they
remain.
3.Those who do not
possess faith at all. These people
refuse to acknowledge the sovereignty of God and are rebels. Even if
their conduct is not bad and even if they are not spreading corruption and
violence, they remain rebels and their apparent good deeds are of little
value. Such men are like outlaws. Sometimes outlaws may act in accordance
with the laws of the land, but this does not make them loyal and obedient
citizens; in the same way the apparent good deeds of those who revolt
against God cannot compensate for the gravity of the real wrongs, revolt
and disobedience.
4 Those
who neither possess faith nor do good deeds. They spread disorder in the
world and perpetrate all kinds of violence and oppression. They are the
worst of the people; for they are both rebels and wrongdoers and criminals.
The above classification of mankind
shows that the real success and salvation of man depends on faith (lman).
The life of obedience (Islam) takes its birth from the seed of
lman. This Islam of a person may be flawless or defective. But without
lman there can be no Islam. Where there is no Iman there is
no Islam. Where there is no Islam there is Kufr. Its form and nature
may vary, but it remains Kufr and nothing but
Kufr.
How
to Acquire Knowledge of God?
Now the question arises of how to acquire
knowledge of and belief in God, His Attributes, His Law and the Day of
Judgement?
We have already referred to the countless
manifestations of God around us and in our own selves, which bear witness
to the fact that there is One and only One Creator and Governor of this
Universe and it is He Who controls and directs it. These manifestations
reflect the divine attributes of the Creator: His great wisdom. His
all-embracing knowledge, His omnipotence, His mercy. His all-sustaining
power in short His attributes can be traced everywhere in His works. But
man's intellect and capacity for knowledge have erred in observing and
understanding them. Some men have argued that there are two gods, others
have professed belief in a trinity, and still others have succumbed to
polytheism. Some have worshipped nature and others divided the Creator into
the gods of rain, air, fire, life, death and so on.
Similarly, men have put forward many
erroneous notions about life after death; for instance, that man is reduced
to dust after death and will not rise to life again; or that man is subject
to a process of continuous regeneration in this world and is punished or
rewarded in future cycles of life.
Even greater difficulty arises when we come
to the question of a code of living. To formulate a complete and balanced
code that conforms to God's pleasure merely using human reason is an
extremely difficult task. Even if a man is equipped with the highest
faculties of reason and intellect and possesses matchless wisdom and
experience, the chances of his formulating the correct views on existence
are slight. And even if, after a lifetime of reflection, he does in fact
succeed he will still lack the confidence that he has really discovered the
truth and adopted the right path.
The fullest and fairest test of man's wisdom,
reason and knowledge might have been to have left him to his own resources
without any external guidance. But this would have meant that only those
with the determination and ability to find the path of truth would find
salvation. God, therefore, spared His human creatures such a hard test.
Through His Grace and Benevolence He raised for mankind men from among
themselves to whom He imparted the true knowledge of His attributes,
revealed to them His Law and the Right Code of Living, gave them the
knowledge of the meaning and purpose of life and of life after death and
thus showed them the way by which man can achieve success and eternal
bliss.
These chosen men are the Messengers of God
His Prophets. God has communicated knowledge and wisdom to them by means of
revelation (Wahi), and the book containing the Divine Communications
is called the Book of God, or the Word of God. The test of man's wisdom and
intellect therefore lies in this: does he recognise God's Messengers after
observing their pure and pious lives and carefully studying their noble and
flawless teachings? A man of wisdom and common sense would accept
instructions given by the Messengers of truth. If he denies the Messengers
of God and their teachings, his denial would signify that he was devoid of
the capacity to discover truth and righteousness. He would fail his test.
Such a man will never be able to discover the truth about God and His Law
and life after death.
It is an
everyday experience that when you do not know a thing, you look for
somebody who does know. If you get ill and you cannot treat and cure
yourself, you go to a doctor and follow his instructions without question.
Why? Because he is properly qualified to give medical advice, possesses
experience and has treated and cured a number of patients. Similarly, in
matters of law you accept whatever a legal expert says and act accordingly.
In educational matters you trust in
your teacher. When you want to go to some place and do not know the way,
you ask somebody who knows it, and follow the way he points out. In short,
the course that you adopt in your day-to-day life about matters, which you
do not or cannot know, is that you approach someone who does know about
them, accept his advice and act accordingly. You make every effort to
select the proper person. But from then on you accept his advice
unquestioningly. This kind of belief is called "belief in the unknown"
(Iman-bi'l-ghayb).
Iman-bi'l-ghayb
signifies that you get knowledge of what was not known to you from one who
knows. You do not know God and His real attributes. You are not aware that
His angels are directing the machinery of the whole Universe according to
His orders, and that they surround you on all sides. You have not the
proper knowledge of the way of life through which you can seek the pleasure
of your Creator. And you are in the dark about the life to come. Such
knowledge is given to you by the Prophets, who have had direct contact with
the Divine Being. They are the persons whose sincerity, integrity,
trustworthiness, godliness and absolute purity stand as irrevocable
witnesses to the truth of their claim to knowledge. And above all, the
wisdom and force of their message makes you admit that they speak the truth
and deserve to be believed and followed.
This conviction of yours is Iman-bi'l-ghayb.
Such a truth-discerning and truth-acknowledging attitude is essential for
obedience to God and for acting in accordance with His pleasure; for you
have no other medium than God's Messengers for the achievement of true
knowledge, and without true knowledge you cannot proceed on the path of
Islam. Go
to Top
Chapter 3
Prophethood: Its Nature
and Necessity
Brief History of Prophethood
The Prophethood of Muhammad
Muhammad's
Prophethood: A Rational Vindication
Arabia The Abyss of Darkness
The Saviour is Born
Diamond in a Heap of Stones
A Revolution Comes
Why all that Enmity?
A Changed Man at FortyWhy?
His All-embracing Message
His Contribution to Human
Thought
The Greatest Revolutionary
The Final Testimony
The Finality of Prophethood
Our
discussion so far has made the following points:
1.The right course for man is to live
in obedience to God, and for such a life of obedience knowledge and faith
are absolutely essential: knowledge of God and His attributes. His likes
and dislikes. His chosen way and the Day of Judgement: and unflinching
faith in this knowledge: this is Iman.
2. God has graciously spared man
the arduous task of acquiring this knowledge through his personal effort
alone. Instead. He has revealed this knowledge to the Prophets He has
chosen from amongst men and commanded them to convey the Will of God to
other human beings and show them the right path. This has saved man from
much great misfortune.
3. The duty of men and women is to recognise
a true Prophet of God, to have faith in him and his teachings and to
scrupulously obey him and follow in his footsteps. This is the road to
salvation.
In this
chapter we shall discuss the nature, history and other aspects of
Prophethood.
God has
most graciously provided man with all that he needs in this Universe.
Generally every new-born child arrives in the world endowed with eyes to
see, ears to hear, a nose to smell and breathe, hands to touch, feet to
walk and a mind to think. All those potentialities, powers and faculties,
that a man needs or can need are most carefully provided and marvellously
set in his tiny body. Every minute requirement is foreseen and provided
for.
It is the same with the world he lives in.
Everything essential for his life is provided: air, light, heat, water and
so on. A child on opening his eyes finds his food in his mother's breast.
His parents love him instinctively and in their hearts has been implanted
an irresistible urge to look after him, to bring him up and to sacrifice
there all for his welfare.
Under the sheltering care of His system of
sustenance the child grows to maturity and at every stage of his life
obtains from nature all that he needs. All the material conditions of
survival and growth are provided for: he finds that the whole Universe is
at his service.
Furthermore, man is blessed with all those
powers, capacities and faculties - physical, mental and moral , which he
requires in his struggle for life. But God has not distributed these gifts
equally. This would have made men totally independent of each other and
would have excluded mutual care and co-operation. Thus, although mankind as
a whole possesses all that is needed, between men capacities are
distributed unequally and sparingly.
Some possess physical strength and prowess;
others distinguish themselves for their mental talents. Some are born with
a greater aptitude for arts, poetry and philosophy, some possess sharpness
of tongue, others military acumen, commercial intelligence, mathematical
keenness, scientific curiosity, literary observation or philosophical bent.
These special aptitudes make a man distinct and enable him to grasp those
intricacies, which elude the common man. These insights, aptitudes and
talents are the gifts of God. They are innate in the nature of those men
whom God has destined to be thus distinguished. They cannot be acquired
merely by education and training.
Reflection on this disposition of God's gifts
also reveals that man's talents have been distributed in a marvelous way.
Those capacities, which are essential for the general maintenance of human
culture, have been endowed to most people, while extraordinary talents,
which are required only to a limited extent, are given only to a small
number. There are many soldiers; peasants, artisans and workers; but
military generals, scholars, statesmen and intellectuals are comparatively
few. The general rule seems to be: the higher the capacity and greater the
genius, the fewer people who possess them. Supergeniuses, who leave an
indelible mark on human history and whose achievements guide humanity for
centuries, are fewer still.
Here we are faced with another question: do
people just need specialists in the fields of law and politics, science and
mathematics, engineering and mechanics, finance and economics and the like?
Or do they also need men to show them the right path the way to God and
salvation? There must clearly be someone to tell man the purpose of
creation and the meaning of life itself: what man himself is and why
he has been created: who has provided him with all the powers and
resources and why: what are the proper ends of life and how are they to be
achieved: what are the proper values of life and how they can be attained.
Our reason refuses to accept that God, Who
has provided man with even the smallest of his requirements, would not
provide for this greatest and most vital need. It can never be so. And
it is not so. While God has produced men of
distinction in arts and science. He has also raised men with deep vision,
pure intuition and the highest faculties to know and understand Him, to
them. He revealed the way of godliness, piety and righteousness. He gave
them the knowledge of the aims of life and values of morality and entrusted
them with the duty to communicate Divine Revelation to other human beings.
These men are the Prophets and Messengers of God.
The Prophets distinguish themselves in human
society by their special aptitudes, natural bents of mind and a pious and
meaningful way of life, more or less in the same way as other geniuses in
art and science distinguish themselves by their extraordinary capacities
and natural aptitudes. The genius in man is its own advertisement and
automatically persuades others to recognise and acknowledge it.
Thus, a Prophet's mind grasps problems which
defy other minds; he throws light on subjects which no one else can; he has
insights into such subtle and intricate questions that no one else would
have even understood after years of deep thought and meditation. Reason
accepts whatever he says; the heart feels its truth; and experience of the
world testifies to every word that flows from his mouth. If, however, we
ourselves try to produce the same or a similar work, we inevitably meet
with failure. In all affairs his attitude is that of truthfulness,
straightforwardness and nobility. He never does or utters wrong, nor does
he commit any evil. He always encourages virtue and righteousness, and
practices himself what he preaches to others. Neither his words nor his
deeds are prompted by self-interest. He suffers for the good of others, and
never makes others suffer for his own good.
When it becomes quite clear that a person is
a true Prophet of God, the natural dictate of this realisation is that his
words should be accepted, his instructions followed and his orders obeyed.
It is illogical to accept a man as God's true Prophet and yet not to
believe in what he says and not to follow what he ordains; for your very
acceptance of him as God's Prophet means that you have acknowledged that
what he says is from God and that whatever he does is in accordance with
God's Will and Pleasure. Disobedience of him is disobedience of God and
disobedience of God leads to ruin.
Therefore, the very acceptance of a Prophet
makes it incumbent on you to follow his instructions unconditionally. You
may not be able fully to grasp the wisdom and usefulness of" this or that-
order, but the very fact that an instruction has emanated from a Prophet is
sufficient guarantee of its truth. One's inability to understand it does
not mean there is something wrong with it. Rather it is our understanding,
which is at fault.
Some men admit the integrity and truthfulness
of a Prophet, but do not put faith (Iman) in him, nor do they follow
him in the affairs of their life. Such men are not only Kafirs, but
imprudent: for not to follow a Prophet after admitting him to be true means
that one knowingly follows untruth. And what folly can be greater than
that!
Some people declare: "We do not need a
Prophet for our guidance and we can ourselves find the way to truth." This,
too, is a wrong view. You have probably learnt geometry, and you know that
between points there can be only one straight line; all other lines must be
crooked or will fail to touch the points in view. The same is the case with
the way to truth, which in the language of Islam, is called the Straight
Path (al-Sira( al-MuslaqJm). This path begins from man and
goes straight up to God, and this path can by definition be one and only
one; all other paths must be aberrations. This Straight Path has been
indicated by the Prophets, and there is and can be no straight path besides
that. The man who ignores that path soon finds himself lost in the maze
created by his own fancy. What can you think of a person who loses his way
and, when a good man shows him the right one, defiantly declares: "I will
not take your guidance nor accept the way you have shown to me, but I will
myself grope in this unknown region and try to reach the object of my
search in my own way?" This, in the presence of the clear guidance of the
Prophets, is sheer stupidity. If everybody tried to start from scratch, it
would be a gross waste of time and energy. We never do so in the sciences
and arts: why here?
If you go a little deeper into the matter, it
will become clear that a person who disbelieves in a true Prophet cannot
find any way, straight or otherwise, to God. This is because a man who
refuses to believe the advice of a truthful man adopts such a perverse
attitude that he ceases to understand the difference between truth and
falsehood and becomes a victim of his own obstinacy, arrogance, bias and
perversity. This refusal may be due to false arrogance, or blind
conservatism and obstinate adherence to the way of one's forefathers, or to
slavery to the lower desires of the self, whose gratification becomes
impossible by submission to the teachings of the Prophets.
On the other hand, if a man is sincere and
truth loving, the road to reality opens up to him. He will find in the
teachings of the Prophets the very echo of his own soul and discover
himself by discovering the Prophets.
Above
all, a true Prophet is raised by God Himself. It is He Who has sent him to
mankind to convey His message to His people. It is His Command that one
should put one's faith in the Prophet and follow him. Thus, one who refuses
to believe in God's Messenger refuses to follow Gods Commandment and
becomes a rebel. There is no denying that one who refuses to acknowledge
the authority of the viceroy of a sovereign actually refuses the authority
of the sovereign himself. This disobedience turns him into a rebel. God is
the Lord of the Universe, the true Sovereign, tl ..- King of Kings, and it
is the bounden duty of every man to acknowledge the authority of His
Messengers and Apostles and to obey them as His accredited Prophets. Anyone
who rejects the Prophets of God is a Kafir, be he a believer in God
or a disbeliever.
Now let
us look at the history of prophethood. Let us see how this long chain
began, how it gradually unfolded itself and finally culminated in the
prophethood of the last of the Prophets, Muhammad (blessings of Allah and
peace be upon him).
The human race began from one man:
Adam. It was from him that the family of man grew and the human race
multiplied. All human beings born in this world have descended from that
earliest pair: Adam and Eve1. (1. This is a
very important and revolutionary concept. Its logical outcome is unity of
mankind and the equality of human beings. It is stupid to distinguish and
discriminate between men on grounds of class, colour, race or territory. In
an age when nationalism, narrow racialism and bloodthirsty anti-semitism
have torn the world into shreds, this creed of the unity of mankind is a
powerful ray of hope for the future. Editor.)
History and religion are agreed on this point. Nor do scientific
investigations into the origin of man show that originally different men
came into being, simultaneously or at different points of time, in
different parts of the world. Most scientists conjecture that one man
would have been brought into existence first and the entire human race
might have descended from that one man.
Adam, the first man on earth, was also the
first Prophet of God. He revealed His religion Islam to him and told
him to convey and communicate it to his descendents: to teach them that
Allah is One, the Creator, the Sustainer of the world; that He is the Lord
of the Universe and He alone should be worshipped and obeyed: that to Him
they would have to return one day and to Him alone they should appeal for
help: that they should live righteous lives in accordance with God's
pleasure and that if they did so they would be blessed and if they did not
they would suffer both here and in the hereafter.
Those of Adam's descendants who were
good trod the right path, but those who were bad abandoned their father's
teachings. Some began to worship the sun, the moon and the stars; others
took to the worship of trees, animals and rivers. Some believed that air,
water, fire, health and all the blessings and forces of Nature were each
under the control of a different god and that the favour of each one could
be won by worship. In this way ignorance gave rise to many forms of
polytheism and idolatry, and scores of religions were formulated. This was
the age when Adam's progeny had spread over the globe, and formed different
races and nations. Every nation had created a different religion for
itself, each with rituals of its own. God the one Lord and Creator of
mankind and the universe was forgotten. Every kind of evil custom grew;
many evils began to be considered right and many right things were either
ignored or condemned as wrong.2 (2. This view of
the history of religions is diametrically opposed to the so-called
evolutionary view of religion, which regards nature-worship as the first
stage. More modern scientific studies are confirming the view that worship
of one God (Tawhid) was the earliest Form of worship and all other forms
are perversions of that original religion. Those who want to pursue the
topic may refer to Prof. W. Schmidt's valuable research treatise. The
Origin and Growth of Religions, English translation by H. J. Rose (London.
Methuen). Editor.)
At this stage God began to raise
Prophets among every people. Each one reminded his people of the lesson
they had forgotten. They put an end to idol-worship and the practice of
associating other deities with God (shirk), did away with all
customs of ignorance, taught them the right way of living in accordance
with God's pleasure, and gave them laws to be followed and enforced in
society. God's true Prophets were raised in every land and among every
people. They all possessed one and the same religion the religion of
Islam.3 (3. There is a common misconception,
mostly among Western writers, that Islam owes its origin to the Prophet
Muhammad (blessings of Allah and peace be upon him) and some of the writers
even go to the extent of calling him 'the founder of Islam'. This is a
travesty of the truth. Islam has been the religion of all the Prophets of
God and all of them have brought the same message from Him. Prophets have
not been the founders of Islam: they have only been the messengers of it.
Islam consists of the Divine Revelation conveyed to mankind by the truthful
Prophets. Editor.)
No doubt the methods of teaching and the
legal codes of different Prophets varied in accordance with the needs and
the stage of culture of the people among whom they were raised. The
particular teachings of each Prophet were determined by the kind of evils,
which he was trying to eradicate. When people were in the primitive stages
of society, civilisation and intellectual development, their laws and
regulations were simple; they were modified and improved as the society
evolved and progressed.
Such differences were, however, only
superficial. The fundamental teachings of all the religions were the same,
i.e. belief in the unity of God adherence to a life of piety, goodness and
peace, and belief in life after death with its just mechanism of reward and
punishment.
Man's attitude towards God's Prophets has
been strange. He has ill-treated them and refused to accept their
teachings. Some of the prophets were expelled from their lands; some were
assassinated: some, faced with indifference, preached the whole of their
lives without winning more than a few followers. But despite the
harassment, derision and indignity, to which they were perpetually
subjected, these Apostles of God did not cease to spread their message.
Their patient determination at last succeeded: large groups of people and
nations were converted to their creed.
The false tendencies, born of centuries of
deviation, ignorance and malpractice, now took another form. Though they
accepted their Prophets during their lives and practiced their teachings,
after their deaths they introduced their own distorted ideas into their
religions. They adopted novel methods of worshipping God; some even took to
the worship of their Prophets. They made the Prophets the incarnations of
God or the sons of God; some associated their Prophets with God in His
Divinity.
In short, man's varied attitudes in this
respect were a travesty of his reason and a mockery of himself; he made
idols of those very persons whose holy mission was to smash idols.
By intermixing religion, rituals born of
ignorance, baseless and false anecdotes and man-made laws, men so changed
and perverted the teachings of the Prophets over the centuries that they
became lost in a welter of fictions to the extent that it became impossible
to distinguish the grain from the chaff. Not content with this, they made
up so many stories about their Prophets that real and reliable accounts of
their lives became impossible to discern. Despite all this, the work of the
Prophets was not altogether in vain. Traces of truth survived. The idea of
God and of life after death was assimilated in some form or other. A
few principles of goodness, truthfulness and morality were accepted
throughout the world. The prophets thus prepared the mental attitude
of their respective peoples in such a way that a universal religion could
be safely introduced a religion which accords with the nature of man,
which embodies all that was good in all other creeds and societies, and
which is acceptable to mankind.
As we have said above, in the beginning
separate Prophets appeared among different nations or groups of people, and
the teaching of each Prophet was meant specially and specifically for his
people. The reason was that at that stage of history, nations were so cut
off from each other geographically that opportunities for mutual
intercourse were non-existent. In such circumstances it was very
difficult to propagate a common World Faith with an accompanying common
system of law.
In addition, the ignorance of the early
nations was so great that it had given different forms to their moral
aberrations and distortions of Faith. It was, therefore, necessary that
different Prophets be raised to preach the Truth to them and win them over
to God~ to gradually eradicate evils and aberrations; to root out ignorance
and teach them the simple, pious and righteous life. God alone knows how
many thousands of years were spent in thus educating man, and developing
him mentally, morally and spiritually.
With the progress and spread of commerce,
industry and the arts, intercourse was established between nations. From
China and Japan, as far as the distant lands of Europe and Africa, regular
routes were opened both by sea and land. Many people learnt the art of
writing; knowledge spread. Ideas began to be communicated from one country
to another and learning and scholarship began to be exchanged. Great
conquerors appeared, extended their conquests far and wide, established
vast empires, and knit many different nations under one political system.
Thus nations came closer and closer to one another, and their differences
became less and less.
It became possible under these circumstances
that one and the same faith, envisaging a comprehensive and all-embracing
way of life, meeting the moral, spiritual, social, cultural, political,
economic and other needs of men and embodying both religious and secular
elements could be sent by God to the whole of mankind. More than two
thousand years ago mankind had reached such a mental awareness that it
seemed to be craving for a universal religion.
Buddhism, though it consisted only of a set
of moral principles and was not a complete system of life emerged from
India, and spread as far as Japan and Mongolia on one side, and Afghanistan
and Bokhara on the other. Its missionaries traveled far and wide in the
world. A few centuries later, Christianity appeared. Although the religion
taught by Jesus Christ (peace be upon him) was pure Islam, his
followers reduced it to a hotch-potch called Christianity, and even this
overtly Israelised religion spread to far-off Persia and Asia Minor and to
the distant climes of Europe and Africa. From these events it is evident
that the conditions of mankind in that age demanded a common religion for
the whole human race. Indeed, when people found no complete and true
religion in existence they began to develop existing religions, however
defective, incomplete and unsatisfying they might have been.
At such a crucial stage of human civilisation,
when the mind of man was itself craving for a world religion, a Prophet was
raised in Arabia for the whole world and for all nations. The religion he
was given to propagate was again Islam but now in the form of a complete
and fully-fledged system covering all aspects of the life of man. He was
Muhammad, the Prophet of Islam (blessings of Allah and peace be upon him)!
If we cast a glance at the world atlas, we
find that no other country could have been more suitable than Arabia for
the much-needed world religion. It is situated right in the middle of Asia
and Africa, and Europe is not far away. At the time of Muhammad's
(blessings of Allah and peace be upon him) appearance central Europe was
inhabited by civilised and culturally advanced nations; these people were
about the same distance from Arabia as were the people of India.
Look at the history of that era, too, and you
will find that no other people were more suited to be endowed with this
Prophet than the Arabs. Great nations of the world had long been struggling
for world supremacy as a consequence they had exhausted their resources and
vitality. The Arabs were a fresh and virile people. So-called social
progress had produced bad habits among the advanced nations, while among
the Arabs no such social organisation existed, and they were, therefore,
free from the inactivity, debasement and decadence arising out of luxury
and sensual satiety.
The pagan Arabs of the fifth century had not
been affected by the evil influence of the artificial social systems and
civilisations of the great nations of the world. They possessed all the
good human qualities of a people untouched by the 'social progress' of the
time. They were brave, fearless, generous, faithful to their promises,
lovers of freedom and politically independent not subject to the hegemony
of any of the imperial powers.
There were not also certain undesirable
aspects of their life as well, as we shall mention later on, but the reason
for this was that for thousands of years no prophet had risen among them,
nor had there appeared a reformer who might have civilised them and purged
their moral life of its impurities. Centuries of free and independent
desert life had bred and nourished extreme ignorance among them. They had,
therefore, become so fixed in their traditions of ignorance that to
humanise them was beyond an ordinary
At the same time, however, if some person of
extraordinary powers were to give them a noble ideal, they would readily
rise to act for the achievement of such an ideal. They would be prepared to
face the hostility of the entire world in the cause of their mission. It
was just such young, forceful and virile person that was needed to
disseminate the teachings of the World Prophet, Muhammad (blessings of
Allah and peace be upon him).
Take also the Arabic language. The more you
study its literature, the more you will be convinced that there is no other
language more suited to express high ideals, to explain the most subtle
aspects of Divine knowledge, and to impress the heart of man and mould it
into submission to God. Small phrases and brief sentences express a whole
world of ideas: they are so powerful that their very sound can move men to
tears and ecstasy. They are so sweet that it is as if honey were being
poured into one's ears; they are so full of harmony tha0t every fiber of
the listener's body is moved by their symphony. It was a rich and powerful
language such as this that was needed for the Qur'an, the Great Word of
God.
It was therefore, a manifestation of God's
great wisdom that He chose Arabia as the birthplace of the World Prophet.
Let us now see how unique and extraordinary was the blessed personality
chosen by God for this mission.
If one
were to close one's eyes and imagine oneself in the world of 1400 years
ago, one would find that it was a world completely different from ours. How
few and far between were the opportunities for the exchange of ideas! How
limited and undeveloped were the means of communication! How meager was
man's knowledge! How narrow his outlook! How enveloped was he in
superstition and wild ideas!
Darkness held sway. There was only a faint
glimmer of learning, hardly strong enough to light up the horizons of human
knowledge. There was neither radio nor telephone, neither television nor
the cinema. Railways and cars and aeroplanes were undreamt of, and printing
presses were unknown. Hand-written books or copyists alone supplied what
little literary material there was to be transmitted from generation to
generation. Education was a luxury, meant only for the most fortunate, and
educational institutions were very few and far between.
The store of human knowledge was scanty,
man's outlook was narrow, and his ideas of men and things were confined to
his limited surroundings. Even a scholar of that age lacked in some
respects the knowledge possessed by a layman of today, and the most
cultured person was less refined than the modern man in the street.
Indeed, humanity was steeped in ignorance and
superstition. Whatever light of learning there was seemed to be fighting a
losing battle against the darkness prevailing all around. People used to
spend a whole lifetime acquiring the modest information, which is now
everybody's heritage. Things, which are classed as myth and
superstition today, were the unquestionable truths of that age. Acts,
which we now regard as barbarous, were then the order of the day. Methods
which appear obnoxious to our moral sense today constituted the very soul
of morality: incredulity had assumed such proportions and had become so
widespread that people refused to consider anything as sublime unless it
appeared in the garb of the supernatural, the uncanny and even the
impossible. They had developed such inferiority complexes that they could
not imagine human beings possessing saintly souls.
In that benighted era, there was a territory
where darkness lay even heavier than elsewhere. The neighbouring countries
of Persia, Byzantium and Egypt possessed a glimmer of civilisation and a
faint light of learning. But Arabia stood isolated, cut off by vast tracts
of desert.
Arab traders travelling great distances,
which took them months, carried their wares to and from these countries,
but they had little chance to find out anything about them. In their own
country, they did not have a single educational institution or library.
No one seemed interested in the cultivation and advancement of knowledge.
The few who were literate were not educated enough to understand the
existing arts and sciences. Although they did possess a highly developed
language capable of expressing the finest shades of human thought in a
remarkable manner, a study of the remnants of their literature reveals how
limited was their knowledge, how low was their standard of culture and
civilisation, how saturated were their minds with superstitions, how
barbarous and ferocious were their thoughts and customs, and how decadent
were their moral standards.
It was a country without a government.
Each tribe considered itself to be an independent sovereign unit. There was
no law except the law of the strongest. Loot, arson and murder of innocent
and weak people were the order of the day. Life, property and honour were
constantly in jeopardy. Tribes were always at daggers drawn with one
another. Any trivial incident was enough to spark off a ferocious war.
Indeed, Bedouins from one tribe thought they had every right to kill people
from other tribes.4 (4. Prof. Joseph Hell writes
in The Arab Civilisation (p. 10); These struggles destroyed the sense of
national unity and developed an incurable particularism; each tribe deeming
itself sufficient and regarding the rest as its legitimate victims for
murder, robbery and plunder.)
Whatever notions they had of morals, culture
and civilisation were primitive in the extreme. They could hardly
discriminate between pure and impure, lawful and unlawful. Their lives were
barbaric. They reveled in adultery, gambling and drinking. Looting and
murder were part of their everyday existence. They would stand stark naked
before each other without any qualms of conscience. Even their women-folk
would strip nude at the ceremony of circumambulating the Ka'bah. They would
bury their daughters alive lest anyone should become their son-in-law. They
would marry their stepmothers after the death of their fathers. They were
ignorant of even the rudiments of everyday life such as proper eating,
dressing and washing.
As regards their religious beliefs, they
suffered from the same evils, which were playing havoc with the rest of the
world. They worshipped stones, trees, idols, stars and spirits; in short,
everything conceivable except God.
They knew nothing about the teachings of the
Prophets of old. They had an idea that Abraham and Ishmael were their
forefathers, but they knew next to nothing about their religious
preachings and about the God Whom they worshipped. The stories of 'Ad and
Thamud were to be found in their folklore, but they contained no traces of
the teachings of the Prophets Hud and Salih. The Jews and Christians had
passed on to them certain legends relating to the Israelite Prophets. They
presented a harrowing picture of those noble souls. Their teachings were
adulterated with the figments of their own imagination and their lives were
tarred black. Some idea of the religious conceptions of those people can
still be got today by looking at those Israelite traditions which Muslim
commentators of the Qur'an have conveyed to us. The picture presented of
the institution of prophethood and of the character of the Israelite
Prophets is the very antithesis of all that those noble followers of truth
stood for.
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