Alhamdulillah. Wassalatu Wassalamu 'ala Rasoolillah.
About the issue of using peaceful means in attaining peace or freedom or whatever goal it is out there, let me share to you a piece of my mind.
It is true that in Islam fighting is not the only means of attaining an objective. While many Muslims might agree with this, some may be reluctant to accept the idea that Islamic objectives can be achieved by ways other than Jihad. This is especially true when people starts to quote to you Quranic Verses, Hadeeth or Stories from the Seerah that specifies the conditions of or the merits of fighting for the sake of Allah. Unfortunately, if one has a contrary opinion, one is seen as having less faith, cowardice or worst - a government spy.
You might recall the hadeeth of Aishah when she narrated that the Prophet of Allah always chooses an easier alternative should there be two choices or ways of doing things confronting him - if both are permissible.
Is Jihad permissible in our times? Is Da'wah permissible in our times? Im asking this question in the context of Tausug scheme of things. The situation in Cotabato and Lanao might be different. Im separating the Tausug because I believe not all Bangsamoro are in the same socio-political condition.
I am yet to find a Muslim who would say Da'wah is NOT permissible. Concerning Jihad, I'm not sure about this as I haven't heard 'mainstream' Ulama condoning nor condemning it in our present context (Its maybe because Im not in contact with them at all). When I say Jihad, I do not mean kidnapping, bombing public places or things that have become associated with terrorism. I categorically condemn these as with those Major Ulama of our time like Bin Baz, al Albani and Ibn Uthaimeen. I mean legitimate fighting in the battlefield between combatants.
In any case the issue of Jihad can only fall into the five main categories of Islamic Jurisprudence. Wajib, Sunnah, Mubah, Makrooh or Haram. I assume that our Ulama's opinions fall into one of these categories.
Relevant Shariah Texts point to the permissibility or even the obligation of Jihad in our area, BUT, let me give a big but here...
Before that, you might already have realized that there are three levels of knowledge.
1. Knowledge of a thing (or a specific and relevant Shariah evidence) including its textual authenticity. Example is the hadeeth where the sacrifice/effort offered related to a particular act is equivalent to its rewards. (Making wudoo' using cold water in a very cold day). Having knowledge of it makes one perform wudoo' to pray Salatul Fajr.
2. Understanding - One must understand the real meaning of the Shariah evidence and its context. Same hadeeth. In winter time, if warm water is available (from heaters for example), it is not from the true understanding of the hadeeth to make wudoo' using a very cold water. The hadeeth only motivates a person to perform wudoo' in a situation where there is no water heater available (like fourteen centuries ago). One brother in his enthusiasm to follow the Sunnah actually collected pebbles and put it in a basket inside his toilet. After defecating, he uses it instead of papers! The Prophet of course used pebbles and water. But the true understanding is to use any suitable material that is easier to find and dispose like paper. (My relatives still use dried banana leaves - they call it Daag).
3. Wisdom - this is the hard part as you already know. Wisdom has been defined as putting things into its proper place (time and context). This includes knowing the evidence, understanding their true and intended meaning and applying or implementing it in the right time and context of the situation. This entails knowledge and understanding of both the Shariah texts and the real time situation. This also includes a good deal of certainty of the result(s) should the text be implemented or not implemented in a given situation.
So now we are faced with many variables here.
1. No doubt about Da'wah and other peaceful means of attaining our goals. (We have to define the goals first though.)
2. As far as the Major Ulama of our time, terrorism is not a legitimate Islamic solution at all.
3. Jihad might be Islamically legitimate but is it the only solution available?
In the third quarter of the last century, Tausugs (and other Bangsamoro) renewed their quest for independence by waging a war with the government. It has been thirty years since, hundreds of thousands died, millions are displaced, countless miseries. What we can surely say is that the Tausug are in no better condition than what they were in thirty years ago. The recent Jihad of Malik is a testimony that such endeavor is not sustainable where bullets run out after a three day skirmish. How can a small group fight an army with a full economy behind them?
What would the Prophet do in such a situation?
Remember when the Prophet and his companions were still in Makkah? Remember what he did in Hudaibiyyah when he opted for a ten year truce of no fighting that resulted in a surge of converts of tribes from all over Arabia that after three years after the truce (after the Quraish violated it) he came back to Makkah with ten thousand warriors?
Remember the hadeeth concerning Prophet Eesa and the Gog and Magog?
Then a people whom God had protected would come to Jesus, son of Mary, and he would wipe their faces and would inform them of their ranks in Paradise and it would be under such conditions that God would reveal to Jesus these words, ‘I have brought forth from amongst My servants such people against whom none would be able to fight; you take these people safely to the Mount of Toor, and then God would send Gog and Magog and they would swarm down from every slope. The first of them would pass the lake of Tiberius and drink out of it. And when the last of them would pass, he would say, ‘There was once water there.’ Jesus and his companions would then be besieged here (at Toor, and they would be so hard pressed) that the head of the ox would be dearer to them than one hundred dinars (old currency.
I still have to find the reference of the hadeeth but the story is quite famous. Imagine one of the greatest Prophet of Allah hiding from his enemies! Yet can one even dare say that he is coward and have no honor?
What I can conclude from this - whatever you call this - is that we as a people do not have the luxury of participating in this endeavor as it has been proven to be less than what we expected it to be, carrying with it more harms than benefits. As far as I can tell, this strategy has failed in the Tausug experience.
Im not saying that we should not defend our selves when evil people comes to our home and kill our family and steal our belongings. What I am saying is that collectively as a people, there must be a better way out there that has been prescribed in the Quran and Sunnah. It might be Islamic to fight. But it is also Islamic not to fight and engage in more sustainable and fruitful endeavors. Especially more so if the goal is the same.
Allahu alam.
Subhanaka Allahumma wa bihamdik. Wa ash hadu an la ilaha anta wa atubo ilaik.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Islam in Essence
MEANING
Islam is an Arabic word that literally means submission, surrender and obedience. It is an active, conscious, ongoing and continuous process of willfully submitting ones own will, surrendering ones own wishes and desires which results in dutiful obedience throughout ones life.
WHO
The object of this submission, surrendering and obedience is the Creator of the Universe. At this point of our discussion, whatever name you call or language you use pertaining to this creator is immaterial. What is important is that you believe that you were created and you just didn’t come from nothing or evolved from some molecule or single cell organisms. The Being you believe that created you – that is the object of this submission and obedience. Muslims believe that that Creator has a name that He Himself revealed – His name is Allah.
Further, this Creator is unique in His qualities one of which is that He is transcendent. He is above and beyond His creation. He is neither enclosed by the creation nor is any part of the creation above Him in any way. He is not a part of the created world nor is it a part of Him. His Being is totally distinct and separate from His creation. He is the Creator and the universe and its contents are all a part of His creation. Therefore whatever is found in the universe is not God. Since man’s cognition is limited by his experience in the universe, whatever he can think of and imagine in any shape or form could not possibly be God. However, God doesn’t have to be in the creation in order to affect them. He hears and sees and has power over everything without the need of being in the creation.
In essence this belief about the Creator is mentioned in the Qur’an,
“…There is nothing like Him, and He is the hearer and seer of all.” (Qur’an 42:11)
WHAT
The next logical question is what’s that submission entails and what is required from our obedience. In Islam, it is believed that only the Creator alone should be worshipped and that nothing from His creation is worshipped. In other words the Will of this Creator, the action that He requires from His creation is to offer their worship to Him alone. In Islam, this worship is the very purpose of creation.
“I did not create the jinn and mankind except to worship me” (Qur’an 51:56)
There should be no intermediaries between the Creator and the creation in terms of worship. The Arabic word for the one that is worshipped is called Ilah or translated as god.
Worship in Islam is not confined to prayers, supplications, fasting or pilgrimage but every deed that is done to please God is essentially worship. It can be expressed as calling to Him in times of needs. It also includes emotions like love, trust and fear, all of which have degrees which should only be directed to the Creator. Therefore supplicating to Prophets, dead saints, ancestors and asking their help is considered worship of them. Consequently, if the very purpose of creation is to worship the Creator, then the greatest sin is to worship the creation in lieu of the Creator.
HALF OF FAITH
If you can believe that the One who created you alone deserves your worship and veneration, then, technically you are a half believer. If you can accept that no one in the creation deserves this worship and veneration then you are a partial believer. This is because if one wants to embrace Islam, one has to declare the testimony of faith, the first half of which is “I bear witness that none has the right to be worshipped except God”.
Some people may be surprised about this fundamental and simple Islamic belief. That in reality Islam calls to the pure and unadulterated worship of the Creator, untainted by the worship of the creation.
HOW
At this point, we ask the question, if we can agree on the point that we should only worship the Creator alone and not worship anything else, how are we supposed to worship Him? Since the Creator gave us brains can we then decide individually for ourselves the manners and ways of worship? The answer is no because there will be confusion as to what manner of worship should be followed and mankind would be lost and cannot possibly fulfill the very essence of their existence.
The ‘how’ of worship was made shown to us by God by sending His prophets and messengers. There are about 125000 prophets sent by God to mankind, twenty five of them were mentioned in the Qur’an. Prophets like Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Jesus and lastly Muhammad were all sent by God and revealed to them scriptures in order to tell and remind mankind above all else that the purpose of their existence – that is they should only worship the Creator alone.
“And We certainly sent into every nation a messenger, [saying], ‘Worship Allah and avoid taghut [false objects of worship].’” (Qur’an 16:36)
The fundamental message of all the Prophets are the same. That is to worship the Creator alone. However, they manner of worshipping Him might slightly vary from one another and their Laws also varies from one another.
This concept is preserved in the following biblical passage,
I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. Exodus 20: 2-3
If a prophet, or one who foretells by dreams, appears among you and announces to you a miraculous sign or wonder, and if the sign or wonder of which he has spoken takes place, and he says, "Let us follow other gods" (gods you have not known) "and let us worship them," you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. Deuteronomy (13:1-3)
However, if Muslims are required to believe in all the Prophets like Moses, Jesus and Muhammad, does it mean that they should also be Jews, Christians and Muslims at the same time? Did God the Creator sent these prophets with different messages? Is God the author of confusion? Of course the answer is no. Then why are there different religions?
WHY
Islam maintains that the pure teachings of the prophets before Muhammad were lost and corrupted. This is due to the fact that none of the scriptures of these previous prophets remained intact in their pure form.
Since Jesus was the prophet preceding Muhammad, for the sake of brevity, we will only consider Christianity in our discussion. Most Christians believe that the New Testament is the Gospel of Jesus. Many would even say that each and every letter of the Bible is the word of God. In the first few hundreds of years after Christ there were many written accounts about Jesus and those accounts vary because they were written by people who had different views who really Christ was. If one would compare and contrast the epistles of James and Paul for example, one could say that these very early Christians had different view of Christ and consequently his message. Early Christian writings such as the Gospel of Thomas had different views of Christ which represents the view of the Agnostics and the Ebionites.
Furthermore these written accounts were copied and re-copied by hand. In due course of time, errors in copying crept in, and these errors were copied by later scribes and became part of the scriptures believed to be the Gospel of Christ.
Consequently, this variation led to different beliefs concerning the nature of Jesus. These books represented the scriptures of different forms of Christianities that exists side by side even in the same city. This difference ultimately led to discord and violence between their adherents. To preserve the unity and harmony of his empire, Emperor Constantine convene the Nicene Council in the fourth century over which the official scriptures about Christ is to be decided and the official ‘view’ of Christ should be adopted by the empire. These collections of books became the canonized gospels and this one form of Christianity recognized by the Roman Empire became the Roman Catholic Church. This is after thousands have been massacred and numerous ‘gospels’ were burnt.
To date, there is nothing that we can call the very gospel of Christ that he dictated to his disciples. Even the so called synoptic gospels were only written account of Jesus attributed to his disciples. Meaning, the gospel according to Matthew was not written by the disciple Matthew, the gospel of Mark was not written by the apostle Mark, and so on. The earliest of which was probably written at least 30 years after Christ. Those that remained fairly intact were the epistles of Paul (of course after his gospels were chosen at the Nicene Council) who didn’t see and meet Christ and had a different view of Christ’s message against the real disciples of Christ like James. It is important to note that these early accounts Jesus were written in Greek, a language that Jesus didn’t speak.
Moreover, many Christians didn’t know that these gospel-manuscripts were hand copied by scribes who were deeply influenced by cultural, theological and political disputes of their day, for almost fifteen hundred years before the invention of the printing press. Hence copying mistakes and intentional changes abound in what is now called the New Testament.
Concerning the difference of the surviving manuscripts, Dr. Bart Ehrman, one of the leading contemporary scholars of New Testament wrote in his New York Times best selling book, Misquoting Jesus – the Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why, wrote in page 10,
“…These copies differs from one another in so many places that we don’t even know how many differences there are. Possibly it is easiest to put it in comparative terms: there are more differences among our manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament”
With such magnitude of changes and discrepancies, how sure can we get concerning the true nature of Jesus and his message? In the end, after the corruption of the message of Jesus, the worship of the Creator was changed to the worship of the creation – like Jesus, Mary, and several pious people and saints.
The purpose of explaining this is not certainly to degrade Christian’s Holy Scriptures but to explain why God has to send Prophet Muhammad and why does He has to reveal the Qur’an.
This answers the question why God sent His last Prophet Muhammad peace and blessings of Allah upon him in order to communicate to them once again the purpose of their creation and re-establish the correct belief about God and the proper way of worshipping Him. This last communication of God to mankind is called Qur’an.
“He has sent down upon you [O Muhammad], the Book in truth, confirming what was before it. And He revealed the Torah and the Gospel.” (Qur’an 3:3)
The Qur’an doesn’t only confirm the truth that is contained in the older scriptures such as the Bible but it is a criterion over it. It is the final word from God in terms of who the Creator is and what does He wants us to do in this life.
“And We have revealed to you [O Muhammad], the Book [i.e. the Qur’an] in truth, confirming that which preceded it of the Scripture and as a criterion over it.” (Qur’an 5:47)
Fourteen hundred years before Dr. Bart Ehrman wrote his best selling piece, the Qur’an declared that the Bible was written and changed by people and condemns them,
“So woe to those who write the ‘scripture’ with their own hands, then say, ‘This is from Allah,’ in order to exchange it for a small price. Woe to them for what their hands have written and woe to them for what they earn.” (Qur’an 2:79).
THE FINAL WORD
Thus Allah had to send His final prophet, Muhammad so that His final word is revealed to mankind. Prophet Muhammad restored the original belief of mankind since Adam - that the Creator should only be worshipped. The way of worshipping the Creator is according to the prophet of their time. Hence, Jesus was the way, the truth and the life and no one can come to God in his time except through him. And so does Moses, David, Solomon, they were the truth and the way in their own time.
In our present time since the dawn of Islam, our way of worshipping our Creator is the way Prophet Muhammad taught us how to worship Him.
PRESERVATION OF QUR’AN
Moreover, since no prophet will come after Prophet Muhammad and no revelation would descend from God, then this final message has to be preserved. God promised in the Qur’an that it will be preserved and He Himself will do it.
“Verily We: It is We Who have sent down the Reminder (i.e. the Quran) and surely, We will guard it (from corruption).” (Qur’an 15:9)
Indeed the Qur’an has been preserved from the beginning of Islam until now. It has been preserved both in written as well as in recited form (memory). Both types of preservation complement each other especially in the early days of Islam when the Qur’an was first compiled in its totality in the era of first Caliph Abu Bakr (d. 634 CE ), and reproduced and canonized in the time of Caliph Uthman (d. 656 CE). Copies of these original manuscripts still exist today in museums in Turkey and Tashkent Uzbekistan.
John Burton a renowned orientalist had this to say about the Qur’an:
The method of transmitting the Qur’an from one generation to the next by having the young memorise the oral tradition of their elders had mitigated somewhat from the beginning worst perils of relying solely on written records.…the text which has come down to us in the form which it was organized and approved by the Prophet…What we have today in our hands is the mus-haf (written form of Qur’an) of Muhammad. [The Collection of the Qur’aan p. 239-40. Usool at Tafseer p. 160]
Perhaps there is no other book in the world that is memorized from cover to cover except the Qur’an. Preschool kids, housewives, laborers, lawyers, doctors and indeed every Muslim in the earth right now have to have some verses or chapters of the Qur’an memorized. It is said in Muslim prayers at least five times daily and in it is recited completely during the night time prayers in the month of Ramadan. In fact one would find during the daily prayers that the Imam (leader in the congregational prayer) is corrected by people praying behind him once he makes a small mistake.
Moreover, the Qur’an is probably the only book in the world with a fully developed science of how to read and articulate it’s every letter. This science is taught religiously in many mosques in the world. If this is the case, one would wonder that if the reading and pronunciation of the Qur’an has been fully preserved then how much more of its text.
CHALLENGES
“Then do they not reflect upon the Qur’an? If it had been from [any] other than Allah, they would have found within it much contradiction.” (Qur’an 4:82)
Consequently, the criterion of the authenticity of any scripture is the absence of contradictions both internally and externally. Internal consistencies mean that there should be no contradictions between the verses of the scripture that cannot be reconciled. External consistency means that there should be no contradictions between the copies of the manuscripts of the scripture.
CONCLUSION
Therefore, dear reader, if you can accept the belief that you should only worship the One who created you, gave you life, provide for you the air you breathe and food you eat, the earth you stand upon; if you can accept the belief that none of His creation deserves to be worship including the Prophets, pious men, saints, stones or trees; If you can accept that He sent prophets continually throughout human history in order to bring back mankind to the very purpose of their existence; If you can accept that the last of these prophets was Muhammad and with him the Qur’an, the very last revelation sent to mankind; then you are actually now knocking at the door of Islam. All you have to do is declare the testimony of faith.
“Ash hadu an La ilaha Illallah wa ash hadu Muhammadan Rasoolullah”,
I bear witness that nothing deserves to be worshipped but God and Muhammad is His messenger.
Abu Khalid
Islam is an Arabic word that literally means submission, surrender and obedience. It is an active, conscious, ongoing and continuous process of willfully submitting ones own will, surrendering ones own wishes and desires which results in dutiful obedience throughout ones life.
WHO
The object of this submission, surrendering and obedience is the Creator of the Universe. At this point of our discussion, whatever name you call or language you use pertaining to this creator is immaterial. What is important is that you believe that you were created and you just didn’t come from nothing or evolved from some molecule or single cell organisms. The Being you believe that created you – that is the object of this submission and obedience. Muslims believe that that Creator has a name that He Himself revealed – His name is Allah.
Further, this Creator is unique in His qualities one of which is that He is transcendent. He is above and beyond His creation. He is neither enclosed by the creation nor is any part of the creation above Him in any way. He is not a part of the created world nor is it a part of Him. His Being is totally distinct and separate from His creation. He is the Creator and the universe and its contents are all a part of His creation. Therefore whatever is found in the universe is not God. Since man’s cognition is limited by his experience in the universe, whatever he can think of and imagine in any shape or form could not possibly be God. However, God doesn’t have to be in the creation in order to affect them. He hears and sees and has power over everything without the need of being in the creation.
In essence this belief about the Creator is mentioned in the Qur’an,
“…There is nothing like Him, and He is the hearer and seer of all.” (Qur’an 42:11)
WHAT
The next logical question is what’s that submission entails and what is required from our obedience. In Islam, it is believed that only the Creator alone should be worshipped and that nothing from His creation is worshipped. In other words the Will of this Creator, the action that He requires from His creation is to offer their worship to Him alone. In Islam, this worship is the very purpose of creation.
“I did not create the jinn and mankind except to worship me” (Qur’an 51:56)
There should be no intermediaries between the Creator and the creation in terms of worship. The Arabic word for the one that is worshipped is called Ilah or translated as god.
Worship in Islam is not confined to prayers, supplications, fasting or pilgrimage but every deed that is done to please God is essentially worship. It can be expressed as calling to Him in times of needs. It also includes emotions like love, trust and fear, all of which have degrees which should only be directed to the Creator. Therefore supplicating to Prophets, dead saints, ancestors and asking their help is considered worship of them. Consequently, if the very purpose of creation is to worship the Creator, then the greatest sin is to worship the creation in lieu of the Creator.
HALF OF FAITH
If you can believe that the One who created you alone deserves your worship and veneration, then, technically you are a half believer. If you can accept that no one in the creation deserves this worship and veneration then you are a partial believer. This is because if one wants to embrace Islam, one has to declare the testimony of faith, the first half of which is “I bear witness that none has the right to be worshipped except God”.
Some people may be surprised about this fundamental and simple Islamic belief. That in reality Islam calls to the pure and unadulterated worship of the Creator, untainted by the worship of the creation.
HOW
At this point, we ask the question, if we can agree on the point that we should only worship the Creator alone and not worship anything else, how are we supposed to worship Him? Since the Creator gave us brains can we then decide individually for ourselves the manners and ways of worship? The answer is no because there will be confusion as to what manner of worship should be followed and mankind would be lost and cannot possibly fulfill the very essence of their existence.
The ‘how’ of worship was made shown to us by God by sending His prophets and messengers. There are about 125000 prophets sent by God to mankind, twenty five of them were mentioned in the Qur’an. Prophets like Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Jesus and lastly Muhammad were all sent by God and revealed to them scriptures in order to tell and remind mankind above all else that the purpose of their existence – that is they should only worship the Creator alone.
“And We certainly sent into every nation a messenger, [saying], ‘Worship Allah and avoid taghut [false objects of worship].’” (Qur’an 16:36)
The fundamental message of all the Prophets are the same. That is to worship the Creator alone. However, they manner of worshipping Him might slightly vary from one another and their Laws also varies from one another.
This concept is preserved in the following biblical passage,
I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. Exodus 20: 2-3
If a prophet, or one who foretells by dreams, appears among you and announces to you a miraculous sign or wonder, and if the sign or wonder of which he has spoken takes place, and he says, "Let us follow other gods" (gods you have not known) "and let us worship them," you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. Deuteronomy (13:1-3)
However, if Muslims are required to believe in all the Prophets like Moses, Jesus and Muhammad, does it mean that they should also be Jews, Christians and Muslims at the same time? Did God the Creator sent these prophets with different messages? Is God the author of confusion? Of course the answer is no. Then why are there different religions?
WHY
Islam maintains that the pure teachings of the prophets before Muhammad were lost and corrupted. This is due to the fact that none of the scriptures of these previous prophets remained intact in their pure form.
Since Jesus was the prophet preceding Muhammad, for the sake of brevity, we will only consider Christianity in our discussion. Most Christians believe that the New Testament is the Gospel of Jesus. Many would even say that each and every letter of the Bible is the word of God. In the first few hundreds of years after Christ there were many written accounts about Jesus and those accounts vary because they were written by people who had different views who really Christ was. If one would compare and contrast the epistles of James and Paul for example, one could say that these very early Christians had different view of Christ and consequently his message. Early Christian writings such as the Gospel of Thomas had different views of Christ which represents the view of the Agnostics and the Ebionites.
Furthermore these written accounts were copied and re-copied by hand. In due course of time, errors in copying crept in, and these errors were copied by later scribes and became part of the scriptures believed to be the Gospel of Christ.
Consequently, this variation led to different beliefs concerning the nature of Jesus. These books represented the scriptures of different forms of Christianities that exists side by side even in the same city. This difference ultimately led to discord and violence between their adherents. To preserve the unity and harmony of his empire, Emperor Constantine convene the Nicene Council in the fourth century over which the official scriptures about Christ is to be decided and the official ‘view’ of Christ should be adopted by the empire. These collections of books became the canonized gospels and this one form of Christianity recognized by the Roman Empire became the Roman Catholic Church. This is after thousands have been massacred and numerous ‘gospels’ were burnt.
To date, there is nothing that we can call the very gospel of Christ that he dictated to his disciples. Even the so called synoptic gospels were only written account of Jesus attributed to his disciples. Meaning, the gospel according to Matthew was not written by the disciple Matthew, the gospel of Mark was not written by the apostle Mark, and so on. The earliest of which was probably written at least 30 years after Christ. Those that remained fairly intact were the epistles of Paul (of course after his gospels were chosen at the Nicene Council) who didn’t see and meet Christ and had a different view of Christ’s message against the real disciples of Christ like James. It is important to note that these early accounts Jesus were written in Greek, a language that Jesus didn’t speak.
Moreover, many Christians didn’t know that these gospel-manuscripts were hand copied by scribes who were deeply influenced by cultural, theological and political disputes of their day, for almost fifteen hundred years before the invention of the printing press. Hence copying mistakes and intentional changes abound in what is now called the New Testament.
Concerning the difference of the surviving manuscripts, Dr. Bart Ehrman, one of the leading contemporary scholars of New Testament wrote in his New York Times best selling book, Misquoting Jesus – the Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why, wrote in page 10,
“…These copies differs from one another in so many places that we don’t even know how many differences there are. Possibly it is easiest to put it in comparative terms: there are more differences among our manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament”
With such magnitude of changes and discrepancies, how sure can we get concerning the true nature of Jesus and his message? In the end, after the corruption of the message of Jesus, the worship of the Creator was changed to the worship of the creation – like Jesus, Mary, and several pious people and saints.
The purpose of explaining this is not certainly to degrade Christian’s Holy Scriptures but to explain why God has to send Prophet Muhammad and why does He has to reveal the Qur’an.
This answers the question why God sent His last Prophet Muhammad peace and blessings of Allah upon him in order to communicate to them once again the purpose of their creation and re-establish the correct belief about God and the proper way of worshipping Him. This last communication of God to mankind is called Qur’an.
“He has sent down upon you [O Muhammad], the Book in truth, confirming what was before it. And He revealed the Torah and the Gospel.” (Qur’an 3:3)
The Qur’an doesn’t only confirm the truth that is contained in the older scriptures such as the Bible but it is a criterion over it. It is the final word from God in terms of who the Creator is and what does He wants us to do in this life.
“And We have revealed to you [O Muhammad], the Book [i.e. the Qur’an] in truth, confirming that which preceded it of the Scripture and as a criterion over it.” (Qur’an 5:47)
Fourteen hundred years before Dr. Bart Ehrman wrote his best selling piece, the Qur’an declared that the Bible was written and changed by people and condemns them,
“So woe to those who write the ‘scripture’ with their own hands, then say, ‘This is from Allah,’ in order to exchange it for a small price. Woe to them for what their hands have written and woe to them for what they earn.” (Qur’an 2:79).
THE FINAL WORD
Thus Allah had to send His final prophet, Muhammad so that His final word is revealed to mankind. Prophet Muhammad restored the original belief of mankind since Adam - that the Creator should only be worshipped. The way of worshipping the Creator is according to the prophet of their time. Hence, Jesus was the way, the truth and the life and no one can come to God in his time except through him. And so does Moses, David, Solomon, they were the truth and the way in their own time.
In our present time since the dawn of Islam, our way of worshipping our Creator is the way Prophet Muhammad taught us how to worship Him.
PRESERVATION OF QUR’AN
Moreover, since no prophet will come after Prophet Muhammad and no revelation would descend from God, then this final message has to be preserved. God promised in the Qur’an that it will be preserved and He Himself will do it.
“Verily We: It is We Who have sent down the Reminder (i.e. the Quran) and surely, We will guard it (from corruption).” (Qur’an 15:9)
Indeed the Qur’an has been preserved from the beginning of Islam until now. It has been preserved both in written as well as in recited form (memory). Both types of preservation complement each other especially in the early days of Islam when the Qur’an was first compiled in its totality in the era of first Caliph Abu Bakr (d. 634 CE ), and reproduced and canonized in the time of Caliph Uthman (d. 656 CE). Copies of these original manuscripts still exist today in museums in Turkey and Tashkent Uzbekistan.
John Burton a renowned orientalist had this to say about the Qur’an:
The method of transmitting the Qur’an from one generation to the next by having the young memorise the oral tradition of their elders had mitigated somewhat from the beginning worst perils of relying solely on written records.…the text which has come down to us in the form which it was organized and approved by the Prophet…What we have today in our hands is the mus-haf (written form of Qur’an) of Muhammad. [The Collection of the Qur’aan p. 239-40. Usool at Tafseer p. 160]
Perhaps there is no other book in the world that is memorized from cover to cover except the Qur’an. Preschool kids, housewives, laborers, lawyers, doctors and indeed every Muslim in the earth right now have to have some verses or chapters of the Qur’an memorized. It is said in Muslim prayers at least five times daily and in it is recited completely during the night time prayers in the month of Ramadan. In fact one would find during the daily prayers that the Imam (leader in the congregational prayer) is corrected by people praying behind him once he makes a small mistake.
Moreover, the Qur’an is probably the only book in the world with a fully developed science of how to read and articulate it’s every letter. This science is taught religiously in many mosques in the world. If this is the case, one would wonder that if the reading and pronunciation of the Qur’an has been fully preserved then how much more of its text.
CHALLENGES
“Then do they not reflect upon the Qur’an? If it had been from [any] other than Allah, they would have found within it much contradiction.” (Qur’an 4:82)
Consequently, the criterion of the authenticity of any scripture is the absence of contradictions both internally and externally. Internal consistencies mean that there should be no contradictions between the verses of the scripture that cannot be reconciled. External consistency means that there should be no contradictions between the copies of the manuscripts of the scripture.
CONCLUSION
Therefore, dear reader, if you can accept the belief that you should only worship the One who created you, gave you life, provide for you the air you breathe and food you eat, the earth you stand upon; if you can accept the belief that none of His creation deserves to be worship including the Prophets, pious men, saints, stones or trees; If you can accept that He sent prophets continually throughout human history in order to bring back mankind to the very purpose of their existence; If you can accept that the last of these prophets was Muhammad and with him the Qur’an, the very last revelation sent to mankind; then you are actually now knocking at the door of Islam. All you have to do is declare the testimony of faith.
“Ash hadu an La ilaha Illallah wa ash hadu Muhammadan Rasoolullah”,
I bear witness that nothing deserves to be worshipped but God and Muhammad is His messenger.
Abu Khalid
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Is the Islamic Law Outdated?
ISLAMIC STUDIES ACADEMY
Midterms Assignment
Summar 2008
Course Code:
FQH 402
Course Title:
Evolution of Fiqh
Due Date:
Instructor:
Dr Bilal Philips
STUDENT: AL MADZHAR AHMADUL
Explain why the statement “Islamic law is outdated” is false using points 2 and 3 of the Introduction on the distinction between Fiqh and Shariah as your basis, along with 2 practical examples.
Alhamdulillah wassalatu wassalamu ‘ala Rasoolillah
The statement “Islamic law is outdated” is false because of the fact that Allah, the Law Giver, the Wise could not possibly give mankind a certain set of Law and declare that such law are binding for them until the end of time, and would become non essential due to the passive of time.
One of the reasons of this misunderstanding comes from the way we identify with the phrase “Islamic Law” which does not distinguish between Shari’ah and Fiqh. Therefore what follows is an elucidation between the two terminologies and their corresponding illustrations.
I. Distinctions between Shari’ah and Fiqh: Shari’ah is fixed and unchangeable, whereas Fiqh changes according to the circumstances under which it is applied.
Example: the ruling on smoking.
When tobacco was introduced to the Muslim world some few hundred years ago, it was ruled to be detestable (Makrooh) by the Islamic Scholars. The only known bad effect of smoking at that time was bad odor. Since smoking, just like garlic and onions, causes bad odor, the ruling on them was applied to smoking. This is due to the fact that the Prophet did not use to eat foods containing onions and garlic.
In Sahih Muslim, Jabir reported:
The Messenger of Allah (Peace and salutations of Allah be upon him) said: He who eats garlic or onion should remain away from us or from our mosque and stay in his house. A kettle was brought to him which had (cooked) vegetables in it, He smelt (offensive) odour in it. On asking he was informed of the vegetables (cooked in it). He said: Take it to such and such Companion. When he saw it, he also disliked eating it. (Upon this). he (the Holy Prophet) said: You may eat it, for I converse with one with whom you do not converse.
This hadeeth tells us that onions and garlic are detestable due to their inherently noxious aromatic characteristics but it also tells us that despite of that we can still eat them.
The “Shari’ah” part of this ruling is the hadeeth of Jabir (and others) found in Sahih Muslim. The “Fiqh” part comes from analogical deduction (Qiyaas) of the rulings on smoking based on the rulings on onions and garlic.
However as science and medicine have advanced significantly in the last century, many health related effects of smoking have been well documented to the point that we can fairly say that there is already an Ijmaa’ or concensus between researchers and physicians concerning the evil effects of smoking on human health. In fact, it has been estimated that in the 20th century about 100 million have died of tobacco-related illness worldwide.[1]. This figure is more than the death resulted from any plagues or the individual world wars. Globally, smoking-related mortality is set to rise from 3 million annually (1995 estimate) to 10 million annually by 2030, with 70% of these deaths occurring in developing countries[2]. Moreover, the socio-economic impact of smoking is also no less harmful than its health effects.
Because of these descriptions, it cannot be from the good things that were allowed for the sons of Adam, rather it is from the filthy and foul things that were forbidden for them. Allah said:
Those who follow the Messenger (Muhammad), the unlettered Prophet whom they find written in the Torah and the Gospel with them, he enjoins upon them that which is virtuous and forbids them that which is evil; he allows them all that is good and forbids for them all that is foul. Al-A’raf (7):157
That is why modern Islamic scholars who are aware of danger and harm of smoking ruled that it is haram.
The “Shariah” part of this modern ruling for smoking is the verse of Al A’raf verse 157 (and others) and the “Fiqh” part is the application of the comprehensive word (Khabaaith: foul, filthy) from the verse to smoking.
Finally in relation to the first distinction between Shari’ah as fixed and Fiqh as changeable, onions and garlics continues to be Makrooh because of its basis from a direct Shariah evidence (the hadeeth) while the ruling of smoking has been changed from Makrook to Haram due to different results of Qiyaas.
II. Distinctions between Shari’ah and Fiqh: The Laws of Shari’ah are, for the most part, general: they lay down basic principles. In contrast, the laws of Fiqh tend to be specific: they demonstrate how the basic principles of Shari’ah should be applied in given circumstance.
Example: Women are prohibited to drive in Saudi.
It is widely believed that in Saudi women are prohibited to drive. This is because; it is said, Saudi Arabia applies a strict form and interpretation of Islam – the ‘Wahabi’ Islam. However, looking at the issue closely would reveal that that is not so.
Recently a senior of Scholar of Saudi states that “in principle women driving is permitted in Islam. Sheikh Abdul Mohsen Al-Obaikan, a member of the Kingdom’s Council of Senior Islamic Scholars.
The ban, he said, has to do with the social complications rather than the act itself. As an example, the sheikh referred to a fatwa from former Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdulaziz Bin-Baz that said it is permitted for women in rural areas to drive cars, but that they should be forbidden from driving in the cities where, as Al-Obaikan said, “youths (even) harass women accompanied by parents and drivers.
He said if certain issues are resolved, such as the problem of men’s behavior and traffic safety, then he sees no religiously motivated conflict with women driving.” [3]
It is clear from these statements that the basis of women being prohibited to drive in cities is from a basic Islamic principle of “The Means takes on the same rulings as their aims do” and from this; a secondary principle Sad ad-dara’i or preventing the means that can lead to haram is taken. There are several Qur’anic verses from where this principle can be deduced.
Dr. Saleh as Saleh in a discussion of Shaykh Abdur Rahman As Saadi’s fiqh maxims wrote:
Every allowable matter taken to abandon an obligation or to perform a forbidden act is itself haraam (forbidden). This is because in this foundation, the means take on the same ruling as there aims. That is why it is forbidden to trade or buy after the second call for jumu’ah; Allaah states[4].
O you who believe (Muslims)! When the call is proclaimed for the Salaat (prayer) on the day of Friday (Jumu'ah prayer), come to the remembrance of Allaah [Jumu'ah religious talk (Khutbah) and Salaat (prayer)] and leave off business (and every other thing), that is better for you if you did but know!_ Surah al-Jumu’ah (62:9)
Although trade is halal, but since doing it in the time of Jumu’ah prayer would cause one to miss it, it is forbidden. Similarly, driving is fundamentally allowed – men or women – but in Saudi, the Scholars and the government felt that there is a greater evil in allowing it due to a specific condition of their society.
This situation is specific to the Saudi society and must not be blindly applied to all Islamic countries. In connection to our topic, here, the Shariah law gives general rulings or principles which in this case is preventing the means that leads to haram and the Fiqh issue here is the specific situation of the Saudi society.
Summary
The statement “Islamic law is outdated” is not accurate because it doesn’t distinguish between the term Shari’ah and Fiqh. The Shari’ah of Allah cannot be outdated while its application, the Fiqh (understanding) of it can be, as demonstrated by the changing ruling of smoking. In the absence of specific ordinance from the Shari’ah, it nevertheless, lays down general principle that can serve as a basis for determining what is beneficial and what is harmful. The application of these principles can vary from place to place or time to time.
Wallahu ‘Alam.
[1] White WB. Smoking-related morbidity and mortality in the cardiovascular setting. Prev Cardiol. 2007 Spring;10(2 Suppl 1):1-4.
[2] Fagerström K. The epidemiology of smoking: health consequences and benefits of cessation. Drugs. 2002;62 Suppl 2:1-9.
[3] fatwa-online@yahoogroups.com
[4] Al-Qawaa'id wal-Usool al-Jaami'ah wal-Furooq wat-Taqaaseem al-Badee'ah an-Naafi'ah. The Basic Rulings and Principles of Fiqh –The Beneficial, Eloquent Classifications and Differentiations
Foundation -2 By Sh. 'Abdur Rahmaan ibn Naasir As-Sa'di, pg. 5.
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Usool al Fiqh Questions Summer 2008
ISLAMIC STUDIES ACADEMY
Mid-Term Assignment Spring 2008
Course Code:
FQH 302
Course Title:
USOOL AL-FIQH - II
Instructor:
Ismaila Rasheed
Due Date:
Mid term exams
AL MADZHAR J. AHMADUL
Assignment 1:
Allah says in the Qur’an 8: 60 …. “Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power …by which you may terrify the enemy of Allah”……
a) How do we apply the meaning of the word ‘power’ in our times?
Answer: Power here means steeds of war. Just like in the time of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم when he referred to shooting arrows as power. In our times, whatever means of war that is highly effective can be taken to mean power. In this aspect we have to distinguish between the means and the goal. At the time of the Prophet, the means of war are arrows, swords, spears, and animals such as horses and camels, that are part of medieval warfare. The goal of which is to defend oneself and defeat the enemy. The means in our times have changed as technology has changed. But the goal has remained the same. Islam has to be defended because there will always be falsehood and its people who is opposed to truth and its adherents. Thus, the word ‘power’ in the Qur’an can be taken to mean any modern weapon of deterrent, defense and offense.
b) Is the statement “By which you may terrify the enemy of Allah”… a justification for those who classify Islam as a terrorizing religion?
Answer: No definitely not. Rather we have to put this verse into context. In modern vernacular this ‘terrifying the enemy of Allah’ is none other than ‘deterrence’. Meaning, no one would dare to attack a country, for example, with a weapon that can inflict immeasurable damage such as nuclear weapons because of the disastrous consequences if the attack is reciprocated. When USA dropped the A bomb to Japanese Cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, this led to their unconditional surrender. No one would dare to attack a country as such. In fact, this ‘deterrence’ policy is the way how nuclear countries justلify their activities. The ‘enemies’ here are the aggressive ones who knew no rules and laws and who are thinking of attacking the nascent Muslim community. Please note that Nuclear weapon that indiscriminately kills none combatants and innocent people is fundamentally not allowed in Islam.
Further if one reads on to the next few verses,
But if they incline to peace, you also incline to it, and trust in Allah. Verily, He is the All-Hearer, the All-Knower.) ( And if they intend to deceive you, then verily, Allah is All-Sufficient for you. He it is Who has supported you with His help and with the believers.) 8:61-62
…one would see that this exhortation to amass means of protection is not one of aggressive in nature due to the fact that once the enemy inclines to peace, and the believers are convinced of their peaceful intentions then they are enjoined to put their trust in God.
Assignment 2:
The majority of scholars agreed that Ijmaa’ (Consensus) is a proof and it is compulsory to work with it. The question now is, has there been anything like Ijmaa’ in the history of Islamic legislation?
Taking into account that just after the Prophet’s departure (saw) the boarder of the Islamic Nation expanded and scholars also traveled from one place to another.
Yes there are lots of example that an Ijmaa’ occurred. In fact a scholar named Ibn Al Mundhir wrote a book that compiled the consensus that arguably occurred between the Muslims. Example such Ijmaa’ is the caliphate of Abu Bakr, the burial place of the Prophet, the collection of the Qur’an, the Taraaweh Prayer etc. The Muwatta of Imam Malik also mentioned several consensus such as the inheritance of paternal half-siblings, the inheritance of maternal half-siblings, the judgement of the sale with the precondition of being free of all defects, and the sale of meat for meat can entail a form of usury (riba al-fadl).
Wallahu ‘alam
Allah says in the Qur’an 8: 60 …. “Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power …by which you may terrify the enemy of Allah”……
a) How do we apply the meaning of the word ‘power’ in our times?
Answer: Power here means steeds of war. Just like in the time of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم when he referred to shooting arrows as power. In our times, whatever means of war that is highly effective can be taken to mean power. In this aspect we have to distinguish between the means and the goal. At the time of the Prophet, the means of war are arrows, swords, spears, and animals such as horses and camels, that are part of medieval warfare. The goal of which is to defend oneself and defeat the enemy. The means in our times have changed as technology has changed. But the goal has remained the same. Islam has to be defended because there will always be falsehood and its people who is opposed to truth and its adherents. Thus, the word ‘power’ in the Qur’an can be taken to mean any modern weapon of deterrent, defense and offense.
b) Is the statement “By which you may terrify the enemy of Allah”… a justification for those who classify Islam as a terrorizing religion?
Answer: No definitely not. Rather we have to put this verse into context. In modern vernacular this ‘terrifying the enemy of Allah’ is none other than ‘deterrence’. Meaning, no one would dare to attack a country, for example, with a weapon that can inflict immeasurable damage such as nuclear weapons because of the disastrous consequences if the attack is reciprocated. When USA dropped the A bomb to Japanese Cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, this led to their unconditional surrender. No one would dare to attack a country as such. In fact, this ‘deterrence’ policy is the way how nuclear countries justلify their activities. The ‘enemies’ here are the aggressive ones who knew no rules and laws and who are thinking of attacking the nascent Muslim community. Please note that Nuclear weapon that indiscriminately kills none combatants and innocent people is fundamentally not allowed in Islam.
Further if one reads on to the next few verses,
But if they incline to peace, you also incline to it, and trust in Allah. Verily, He is the All-Hearer, the All-Knower.) ( And if they intend to deceive you, then verily, Allah is All-Sufficient for you. He it is Who has supported you with His help and with the believers.) 8:61-62
…one would see that this exhortation to amass means of protection is not one of aggressive in nature due to the fact that once the enemy inclines to peace, and the believers are convinced of their peaceful intentions then they are enjoined to put their trust in God.
Assignment 2:
The majority of scholars agreed that Ijmaa’ (Consensus) is a proof and it is compulsory to work with it. The question now is, has there been anything like Ijmaa’ in the history of Islamic legislation?
Taking into account that just after the Prophet’s departure (saw) the boarder of the Islamic Nation expanded and scholars also traveled from one place to another.
Yes there are lots of example that an Ijmaa’ occurred. In fact a scholar named Ibn Al Mundhir wrote a book that compiled the consensus that arguably occurred between the Muslims. Example such Ijmaa’ is the caliphate of Abu Bakr, the burial place of the Prophet, the collection of the Qur’an, the Taraaweh Prayer etc. The Muwatta of Imam Malik also mentioned several consensus such as the inheritance of paternal half-siblings, the inheritance of maternal half-siblings, the judgement of the sale with the precondition of being free of all defects, and the sale of meat for meat can entail a form of usury (riba al-fadl).
Wallahu ‘alam
Sunday, April 06, 2008
Concerning Islamic Laws of Inheritance
ISLAMIC STUDIES ACADEMY
Mid-Term Assignment Spring 2008
Course Code:
FQH 202
Course Title:
FIQH OF MU’AAMALAAT - IV
Instructor:
Abdus Salam Ghouse
MA, College of Hadeeth
Islamic University of Madeenah
Assignment 1:
Is women's inheritance in Islam really unfair? Discuss this issue and rectify the doubts.
Answer:
The rights of woman in the western world compared with rights of Muslim women 1400 years ago. In the west, one can legally write a will to a dog while leaving the wife nothing. In Islam, the right of the wife and other relatives are protected. No one can cancel them. Men are responsible for the maintenance of women. Hence, the son of the deceased is responsible for his mother and his sister since the father died. Men do not always have greater inheritance than women. Siblings (a brother and a sister) of the deceased gets an equal share of 1/6th each. (Qur’an 4:11)
Is women's inheritance in Islam really unfair? Discuss this issue and rectify the doubts.
Answer:
The rights of woman in the western world compared with rights of Muslim women 1400 years ago. In the west, one can legally write a will to a dog while leaving the wife nothing. In Islam, the right of the wife and other relatives are protected. No one can cancel them. Men are responsible for the maintenance of women. Hence, the son of the deceased is responsible for his mother and his sister since the father died. Men do not always have greater inheritance than women. Siblings (a brother and a sister) of the deceased gets an equal share of 1/6th each. (Qur’an 4:11)
“…it is inaccurate to say that the female invariably receives less than the male counterpart. Nor does the standard explanation of the sexually differentiated shares seem satisfactory. The female uterine sister inherits equally with her uterine brother, and so does the mother with the father of the deceased. It is the daughter and the germane or consanguine sister who receive only half as much as their male counterparts when they inherit jointly.”
“The case of the wife is particularly interesting. Her share is on half of what the husband would inherit from her, were he the survivor. The full implication of this provision must be seen in the light of the fact that the husband and the wife hold their properties and possessions independently of each other; between them there is no mandatory community of property. It is an interestingly verifiable proposition that the Muslim husband usually owns more than his wife and is therefore likely to leave more behind than she would, if he were to survive her. If he survives her, which is less likely from a demographic standpoint, his arithmetically larger share of inheritance – the one half of her independently held and owned property – may in fact be equal to or even less than her arithmetically smaller share, the one-fourth of his independently held and owned property. This is assuming that there are no children involved; otherwise, is one-half becomes one-fourth and her one fourth an eight. At any rate, the two shares are arithmetically different; one share is the double of the other. Yet the value of a larger share (the husband’s ) of a small estate (the wife’s) may be equal to or perhaps even less than the value of a small share (the wife’s ) of a large estate (the husband’s). The end result here would seem that, while the two shares are arithmetically different, they are not necessarily unequal in the final analysis. And even if they appear mathematically unequal, Muslims would most likely contend that they are morally equitable in view of the husband’s varied financial duties, the demographic facts and the non community of property.”
“…In the Islamic scheme of society, women are free from the usual economic responsibility. They are not legally required to provide for any person, not even for themselves. IF they have no independent resources, they are to be fully maintained by their able male relatives. The female is always assured by law of adequate care. Even the wealthy wife is to be maintained by the husband, the needy sister by the brother, the mother by the son, the daughter by the father, etc. Every living person needs subsistence, and every able male is held responsible for his own and possibly for that of other dependents. But not every deceased person leaves property for inheritance. This may suggest that the male is more likely to be ‘liable’ than ‘beneficiary’. His obligations to relatives, male and female alike, may well exceed what he could possibly inherit from any of them. When he sometimes receives a larger share of inheritance, it is probably in recognition of his manifold obligation and in partial compensation therefore. The whole scheme seems so designed as to ensure equity. When a larger share of the property is allocated to the exclusively liable male, who may be responsible for an entire household or perhaps beyond, and a smaller share is allocated to the ‘carefree’ and economically ‘non responsible’ female, the allocation cannot be easily called discrimatory against women. It would be discrimatory indeed if men and women were given the same of equal financial responsibilities. Since they are not, the sociological concept of differentiation or the Islamic term of equity characterizes the Islamic system more accurately than discrimination.”
“However, the Muslim woman, by receiving a smaller share of the property than the man’s , is not in fact being denied the fruits of any effort on her part or the produce of any of her labor. It is not that she earned something which is being withheld or taken away form her. Whatever she takes of the property of the deceased relatives is in return for nothing material she has done, or contributed. She inherits our of compassion or kindness, so to speak, and not because she has discharged or will discharge any financial duty to any relative.” [1]
Assignment 2:
Mention the merits of laws of inheritance in Islam and prove that they are just and rational for humanity.
It ensures that relatives are given their due share and right while in the world today, non Islamic systems do not protect this right. Hence one can find deranged people leaving wealth to their dogs, house, or a tree, or strange lovers, to the exclusion of their family members.
It distributes inheritance from the perspective of equitability, not necessarily from the perspective of equality. Meaning, one who has the most responsibility receives the most allocation of resources. This equitable concept is acceptable in todays economic minds. This is because, Islamic law has assigned different roles to different members of the family.
This assignment of roles to different members of family is according to the very nature that Allah created men and women. Biological, hormonal, musculoskeletal, neurological, psychological differences between male and female have just been recently discovered and accepted by people of science whereas this delicate difference has been clearly demarcated by Islam by assigning different yet complimentary roles for them fourteen hundred years ago. The best selling book Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus” is a contemporary testament to this fundamental difference.
[1] The Family Structure in Islam. Hammudah Abd al Ati. Pp. 267-270. American Trust Publications.
Monday, February 18, 2008
Tale of a People
Tausug Islam Yahoo Group LogoTALE OF A PEOPLE[1]
I
Never was I a conquered, vanished race.
Freely flowing my blood had been in stream.
Wantonly had grown my bones: formed my face,
Ramified had my twigs remain untrimmed.
Manisfest'd are my clothes, my ways, my plead;
A free tongue I speak and articulate.
To God I submit had remained my creed,
Still to Makka I circumambulate.
Never was a Spanish monarch my name,
For their cross and sword to a crescent failed.
Nor the American had brought me shame,
For my wielding Kris never been derailed.’
So to you the pseudo-democracists,
Never will I to your imperialists!
II
So why'd we succumbed I refrain to ask,
To their honeyed tongue and their mystic charm?
Untold we then the face behind the mask,
The surface beauty, underneath but harm.
Stagnant we had and unnerved to move,
When strong is our thigh and firm is our breast.
When sharp is our blade and brisk is our hooves,
Why can't we just scourge and flog them to rest?
Nay, what is a deed with wrong intention?
What's left an act devoid of purpose?
When the mind is shadowed by illusion'
Framed mind and abled Will can't juxtapose
Even by now and unknown to us then,
Our thoughts had been shaped and contoured by them
III
Though enlightened we are from our slumber,
The nightmare to reality persists.
Questions formed as the lightning and thunder,
From where's that sound after the flash exist'd?
What must we do amidst this awareness?
What must have done, rather should I have asked?
Knowing where Paris had hit Achilles,
Knowing the face underneath the mask.
Scourging and flogging will not clear the mind.
Though necessary are them for the fight.
Free mind and abled will is the true rhyme'
Insha-Allah freedom will be in sight.
We must pass through the ways of the Prophets,
Or we end in the theater like puppets!
IV
Once upon a time and so long ago,
There's a story to tell and to relate.
There existed an archipelago,
Now it is called the Sulu sultanate.
And from Arabia Shiekh Makhdum had come.
Armed only with Tawheed sealed in his heart,
With the ways of the Prophet in his arm,
The submission to the will of God start'd.
Without the armor and the point of sword,
The kingdom grew to the neighboring side.
Abode to the commandment of the Lord,
To spread the message, compulsion aside.
Truth a guidance is without compulsion.
For action is naught but an intention.
V
Time had passed as we lift another page,
When the maritime exploiters arrived
For gold, god, glory they carried with rage,
Imposing terror to our native tribe.
But no! my people defended the land.
"Protect not only" but as commanded,
By Allah, his Prophet and for Islam,
So the hegemony was prevented.
And indeed only the edge of our shores,
Had they set their feet and ominous plans.
With such courage so they coined us the Moors,
With such valor like Muslim Africans.
To the right path we must stick my brethrens,
So for us the earth and of the heavens.
VI
Now let us journey to our nearest past,
When the white men but with black cloaks appears.
Bringing promises and freedom at last,
Thus end of Thirty and three-hundred years.
At first sight we fell in love like lovers.
Yielding and trusting in their neat façade.
When the bees kissed these orchid flowers,
Seeing an oasis yet a mirage!
Mimicking in the midst of mockery,
They fooled us with their wit and craftiness.
With shrewd plans that had left certainly,
Wandering in the waves of wantonness.
Beloveds, now we are learned already,
Shall we remain fixed, always unready?
[1] This is the tale of a group of people called Bangsamoro. The author tried to imitate the Shakespearean sonnet, 14 lines iambic pentameter. However, he failed to make the poem iambic, although it is in 14 lines and with 10 syllables each. This was written in Zamboanga City almost 13 years ago.
I
Never was I a conquered, vanished race.
Freely flowing my blood had been in stream.
Wantonly had grown my bones: formed my face,
Ramified had my twigs remain untrimmed.
Manisfest'd are my clothes, my ways, my plead;
A free tongue I speak and articulate.
To God I submit had remained my creed,
Still to Makka I circumambulate.
Never was a Spanish monarch my name,
For their cross and sword to a crescent failed.
Nor the American had brought me shame,
For my wielding Kris never been derailed.’
So to you the pseudo-democracists,
Never will I to your imperialists!
II
So why'd we succumbed I refrain to ask,
To their honeyed tongue and their mystic charm?
Untold we then the face behind the mask,
The surface beauty, underneath but harm.
Stagnant we had and unnerved to move,
When strong is our thigh and firm is our breast.
When sharp is our blade and brisk is our hooves,
Why can't we just scourge and flog them to rest?
Nay, what is a deed with wrong intention?
What's left an act devoid of purpose?
When the mind is shadowed by illusion'
Framed mind and abled Will can't juxtapose
Even by now and unknown to us then,
Our thoughts had been shaped and contoured by them
III
Though enlightened we are from our slumber,
The nightmare to reality persists.
Questions formed as the lightning and thunder,
From where's that sound after the flash exist'd?
What must we do amidst this awareness?
What must have done, rather should I have asked?
Knowing where Paris had hit Achilles,
Knowing the face underneath the mask.
Scourging and flogging will not clear the mind.
Though necessary are them for the fight.
Free mind and abled will is the true rhyme'
Insha-Allah freedom will be in sight.
We must pass through the ways of the Prophets,
Or we end in the theater like puppets!
IV
Once upon a time and so long ago,
There's a story to tell and to relate.
There existed an archipelago,
Now it is called the Sulu sultanate.
And from Arabia Shiekh Makhdum had come.
Armed only with Tawheed sealed in his heart,
With the ways of the Prophet in his arm,
The submission to the will of God start'd.
Without the armor and the point of sword,
The kingdom grew to the neighboring side.
Abode to the commandment of the Lord,
To spread the message, compulsion aside.
Truth a guidance is without compulsion.
For action is naught but an intention.
V
Time had passed as we lift another page,
When the maritime exploiters arrived
For gold, god, glory they carried with rage,
Imposing terror to our native tribe.
But no! my people defended the land.
"Protect not only" but as commanded,
By Allah, his Prophet and for Islam,
So the hegemony was prevented.
And indeed only the edge of our shores,
Had they set their feet and ominous plans.
With such courage so they coined us the Moors,
With such valor like Muslim Africans.
To the right path we must stick my brethrens,
So for us the earth and of the heavens.
VI
Now let us journey to our nearest past,
When the white men but with black cloaks appears.
Bringing promises and freedom at last,
Thus end of Thirty and three-hundred years.
At first sight we fell in love like lovers.
Yielding and trusting in their neat façade.
When the bees kissed these orchid flowers,
Seeing an oasis yet a mirage!
Mimicking in the midst of mockery,
They fooled us with their wit and craftiness.
With shrewd plans that had left certainly,
Wandering in the waves of wantonness.
Beloveds, now we are learned already,
Shall we remain fixed, always unready?
[1] This is the tale of a group of people called Bangsamoro. The author tried to imitate the Shakespearean sonnet, 14 lines iambic pentameter. However, he failed to make the poem iambic, although it is in 14 lines and with 10 syllables each. This was written in Zamboanga City almost 13 years ago.
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
On Christianity
Masjid Tulay in Lupah Sug
Discuss and explain why 3-5 people, places and/or events were critical to developing Christianity into what it is today.
All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds and all that exists. Peace and salutations of Allah be upon His Messenger Muhammad صل الله عليه وسلم .
I. JESUS CHRIST
Jesus Christ is the central of focus of Christianity. He serves many functions in the religion such as the saviour (foundation of salvation), the revealer of God, and the model of a pious life. He is one of the persons in Trinity which is the central theology of christianity. The core Christian belief is that, through the death and resurrection of Jesus, sinful humans can be reconciled to God and thereby are offered salvation and the promise of eternal life. This is the what the average Christian know and this understanding is what the canonized gospels seem to support. However, when all the sources and documents at the time of Jesus are taken together including the writings of the Jews, one might not agree with the Christian interpretation of who Jesus was, and consequently what his message was all about. Vital to this theses is the concept of Messiah. While the Christian concept of Messiah is the coming of the son of God and his death in order to provide salvation to all mankind, archeological findings such as the Qumran documents which includes the gospel of Thomas does not offer support such claims. It is does not matter what is written in it (gospel of Thomas), but what matters is what is not written in it. Meaning there is no mention of messianic elements that culminates in the supposedly death of Christ on the cross. The Gospel of Thomas was written much earlier than the canonized gospels. Apparently, the earlier the gospel is written, the more it conforms with a monotheistic worldview, much the same to the teachings of Moses. Conversely, the later the gospels are written, the more it goes far away from the monotheistism as it adds the basic elements of Christianity as advocated by Paul such as the gospel of John. However contemporary scholars on Christianity now acknowledge that Jesus peace be upon him was born a Jew, raised a Jew and lived all his life as a Jew. He was a teacher and even a Jewish Rabbi[1]. He didn’t teach Christian concepts such as the Divine atonement or vicarious sacrifice, much of which was promoted by Paul, our second person who was critical to the development of present day christianity.
II. ST. PAUL
Paul is rather a controversial character because admittedly, he was a persecutor of the followers of Christ. What is more controversial is the varying and even apparently contradicting narratives of his meeting with ‘risen’ Jesus thrice mentioned in Acts of Apostle in chapters 9, 22 and 26. But Christian exegetes easily dismiss the contradiction as having slight differences, easy to harmonize, and does not affect the basis of the narrative which is perfectly identical in substance[2].
Several theories were purported to explain the visions of Paul when he was on his way to Damascus. To discredit these theories, Christian scholars says that these explanations ‘suppose that it was Paul's faith in Christ which engendered the vision, whereas according to the concordant testimony of the Acts and the Epistles it was the actual vision of Christ which engendered faith’[3]. Another controversy concerning Paul he ‘had but a vague knowledge of the life and teaching of the historical Christ and even disdained such knowledge as inferior and useless’ [4] This is due to Paul’s statement in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 16:
“Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more.”[5]
However, it is argued that this understanding is improbable because Paul loved Jesus passionately and whose spirit he prided of having. But this is really an after the fact argument on the side of Christian apologist because the core issue here is the authority of Paul to transmit Jesus’ teachings and his closeness to him. A question could then be asked ‘did Paul really love the real Jesus’? Since today’s Christianity hinges on Paul’s claims to his meeting with Jesus it is no wonder that church’s doctors and apologists would defend the veracity of this incident.
Perhaps what is most astounding from an outsider point of view is the stark contrast of Jesus’ teachings and Paul’s teachings even in the canonized gospels themselves. Mark chapter 12 verse 29 says:
All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds and all that exists. Peace and salutations of Allah be upon His Messenger Muhammad صل الله عليه وسلم .
I. JESUS CHRIST
Jesus Christ is the central of focus of Christianity. He serves many functions in the religion such as the saviour (foundation of salvation), the revealer of God, and the model of a pious life. He is one of the persons in Trinity which is the central theology of christianity. The core Christian belief is that, through the death and resurrection of Jesus, sinful humans can be reconciled to God and thereby are offered salvation and the promise of eternal life. This is the what the average Christian know and this understanding is what the canonized gospels seem to support. However, when all the sources and documents at the time of Jesus are taken together including the writings of the Jews, one might not agree with the Christian interpretation of who Jesus was, and consequently what his message was all about. Vital to this theses is the concept of Messiah. While the Christian concept of Messiah is the coming of the son of God and his death in order to provide salvation to all mankind, archeological findings such as the Qumran documents which includes the gospel of Thomas does not offer support such claims. It is does not matter what is written in it (gospel of Thomas), but what matters is what is not written in it. Meaning there is no mention of messianic elements that culminates in the supposedly death of Christ on the cross. The Gospel of Thomas was written much earlier than the canonized gospels. Apparently, the earlier the gospel is written, the more it conforms with a monotheistic worldview, much the same to the teachings of Moses. Conversely, the later the gospels are written, the more it goes far away from the monotheistism as it adds the basic elements of Christianity as advocated by Paul such as the gospel of John. However contemporary scholars on Christianity now acknowledge that Jesus peace be upon him was born a Jew, raised a Jew and lived all his life as a Jew. He was a teacher and even a Jewish Rabbi[1]. He didn’t teach Christian concepts such as the Divine atonement or vicarious sacrifice, much of which was promoted by Paul, our second person who was critical to the development of present day christianity.
II. ST. PAUL
Paul is rather a controversial character because admittedly, he was a persecutor of the followers of Christ. What is more controversial is the varying and even apparently contradicting narratives of his meeting with ‘risen’ Jesus thrice mentioned in Acts of Apostle in chapters 9, 22 and 26. But Christian exegetes easily dismiss the contradiction as having slight differences, easy to harmonize, and does not affect the basis of the narrative which is perfectly identical in substance[2].
Several theories were purported to explain the visions of Paul when he was on his way to Damascus. To discredit these theories, Christian scholars says that these explanations ‘suppose that it was Paul's faith in Christ which engendered the vision, whereas according to the concordant testimony of the Acts and the Epistles it was the actual vision of Christ which engendered faith’[3]. Another controversy concerning Paul he ‘had but a vague knowledge of the life and teaching of the historical Christ and even disdained such knowledge as inferior and useless’ [4] This is due to Paul’s statement in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 16:
“Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more.”[5]
However, it is argued that this understanding is improbable because Paul loved Jesus passionately and whose spirit he prided of having. But this is really an after the fact argument on the side of Christian apologist because the core issue here is the authority of Paul to transmit Jesus’ teachings and his closeness to him. A question could then be asked ‘did Paul really love the real Jesus’? Since today’s Christianity hinges on Paul’s claims to his meeting with Jesus it is no wonder that church’s doctors and apologists would defend the veracity of this incident.
Perhaps what is most astounding from an outsider point of view is the stark contrast of Jesus’ teachings and Paul’s teachings even in the canonized gospels themselves. Mark chapter 12 verse 29 says:
One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?" The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.[6]
In another gospel, Matthew chapter 5 verse 17 Jesus reportedly said:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them.”[7]
Of course Jesus being a practicing Jew refers the law here to the Laws of Moses. But Paul seemingly audaciously contradicted Jesus’ commandments and teachings when he declared in Galatians chapter 2 verse 16:
“Know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.”[8]
One interesting to note at this point is that where are the rest of the disciples? Do they all believe just as what Paul believed?
III. THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM
The followers of Jesus continued to preach his gospels to the Jews and the non Jews. When the gentiles embrace Christianity in its early years, the question of whether they should be like the Jews or is their any some leeway for them not to follow the laws arose. What can be said concerning this is they like its theology but they don’t like its laws. Thus it became a necessity that the disciples should come together and meet in Jerusalem. Representing the community of Antioch were Paul and Barnabas while James is that of Jerusalem. The key issues were about circumcision, sacrificing things to idols, eating of blood of strangulated animals and fornication. The catholic encyclopedia claims that this “injunction was laid upon them, not in virtue of the Mosaic Law, but in the name of the Holy Ghost. This meant the complete triumph of Paul's ideas”.
This last sentence mentioning Paul’s ideas as being triumphant reveals the fact that in these early days of Christianity, the very first believers themselves were involved in controversy regarding a fundamental aspect of the religion. These questions are probably asked: “Shall we follow the Laws of Moses (just like what Jesus did in all his life when he was with us) or shall we abandon it? Is faith enough or are we required to follow the Law?
This ‘debate’ between James and Paul were recorded for posterity in the Epistle of James and the Epistle of Paul to the Galatians. In the first verse of the first chapter of Galatians, Paul declared that he is an apostle not from men nor through men but through Jesus Christ, probably referring to the fact that unlike the disciples who met Jesus as human, he met and received revelation from the risen Christ. He goes on to say in verse six that he marvels that the people of the Church of Galatia are turning away to a different gospel. Again in chapter two, he alluded to a person ‘who seemed to be something’[9] and his disdain for him. Then he enumerated that James, Ciphers and John as those ‘seemed to be pillars’[10] in the ninth verse. Paul then went on to proceed to cite the story of Abraham that just as he believed in God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.
James on the other hand in the beginning of his epistles mentioned about being patient from temptations (which breaks the law). It is perhaps worthwhile to quote James words:
Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.[11]
Concerning Abraham, he reportedly to have said:
You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness, and he was called God's friend. You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone".[12]
James, the brother of Jesus, the first bishop of Jerusalem had variant views of Jesus’ teachings in contrast to Paul’s Christianity. Robert Eisenman in his book James the Brother of Jesus: The Key to Unlocking the Secrets of early Christianity and the Dead Sea Scrolls portrays this kind of relationship between Paul and James.[13]
But somehow Paul’s ideas were triumphant and it is known as Pauline Christianity – a paradigm shift from the fundamental teachings of monotheism and adherence to the law in Judaism to Trinity and vicarious atonement. Consequently Michael Hart, a contemporary historian would have to put Paul as second to Jesus as the most influential person in Christianity.[14]
IV. CONSTANTINE I
Early Christians were persecuted, seized, tormented, put into flames, starved, and coerced into gladiatorial contests to amuse spectators. In 313 Emperor Constantine I, whose mother St. Helena was a Christian, announced the Edict of Milan which removes penalties for professing Christianity and returns the confiscated Church properties. His ascension to the throne is generally considered the beginning of Christendom (medieval and renaissance notion of the Christian world as a sort of social and political polity). Not only did he legalize Christianity but he also supported the Church from his own wealth and became its patron. However, it turns out that there are a number of different varieties of Christianities with different views on Jesus, such as the Gnostics Christianity vies a vis Pauline Christianity. It was extremely diverse during the second and third century that there are different brands of Christianity living often side by side, even in the same city.[15]
To uphold the unity of his empire, a unified doctrine has to be established. Therefore Constantine convenes the bishops to meet in Nicea.
V. THE COUNCIL OF NICEA 325 CE
Of two thousand and forty eight (2048) bishops who were invited, Constantine disqualified 1730 from having voice in deciding questions. Although the emperor did not decide the creed, he in fact influenced it indirectly by deciding who is to decide on the creed. This step dampened the spirit of the remaining bishops whom the emperor chose not to disqualify[16]. The result is the Nicene Creed which is an anathema to Unitarian belief championed by Arius.
Conclusion
The history of Christianity is a cognitive dissonance that is filled with controversy in its formative stage. Its teachings evolved in time from a sect of Judaism to a distinct religion of Trinity, Divine Atonement, and later the Original Sin (as expounded by St. Augustine). Although Christians will argue that it is only those who are imbued with holy spirit who should interpret the bible, however, looking at the gospels as historical documents and contemporary writings at the time revealed that Jesus could not have been what the gospels described him to be nor what the Christians perceived him to be. The differences between James and Paul over a fundamental issue is an important clue concerning who really was Jesus’ true disciple who followed him closely. Finally, if the core beliefs such as the Trinity and Divine atonement were so important to Christian understanding of themselves, then why is it that nowhere Jesus Christ explicitly taught this and leave his followers to figure it out and consequently differ about it.
[1] From Jesus to Christ. PBS. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/jesus/rabbi.html
[2] St. Paul, Catholic Encyclopedia. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11567b.htm. Jan. 7, 2008.
[3] Ibid
[4] Ibid
[5] King James Version. www.biblegateway.com
[6] New International Version. www.biblegateway.com
[7] Ibid
[8] New International Version
[9] Galatians 2:6
[10] Galatians 2:9
[11] James 1:23
[12] James 2:20-24
[13]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_the_Brother_of_Jesus:_The_Key_to_Unlocking_the_Secrets_of_Early_Christianity_and_the_Dead_Sea_Scrolls
[14] http://www.adherents.com/adh_influ.html
[15] From Jesus to Christ: The First Christians. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/first/diversity.html
[16] A Comparative Study of the Religions of Today. Muhammad Ali Muhiyaddin pg 43.
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