CHAPTER I

THE IDEOLOGICAL FOUNDATION OF ISLAM ALLAH (GOD)

Knowledge of God and belief in Him constitute the very foundation of Islam. The subject is so vital that it calls for a thorough and clear discussion. For the purpose of clarity some simple demonstrations will be used. This may sound boring or too simple for those who already know something about the subject. Such informed Persons are invited to have patience and show appreciation of the importance of the matter.

There are individuals who like to doubt the concept of God in

the name of science, or because of a lack of experience and understanding. The attitude of such people reflects an uneasy mentality, although they claim to be learned intellectuals. My concern will not be with their claims; rather it will be with their true position. This will explain why a great deal of the discussion is designed in a simple shape as if it were directed mainly to children, and not to adults. On the other hand, a major objective of this work is to convey the true concept of God in Islam to the young Muslims. Another consideration here is that the concept of God in Islam is distorted in the minds of many non-Muslims who are so-called believers in God and advocates of religion.

For these reasons some simple and perhaps elementary demonstrations are used in this presentation. Yet the simplicity of some arguments here may provoke profound thinking in many adults. If it does so, it will prove to be a desirable and creative simplicity, which itself is a distinct characteristic of Islam.

As we look around in our environments, we see that every family has a head; every school has a principal; every city or town has a mayor; every province state has a premier governor; and every nation has a head of state. Moreover, we know beyond doubt that every product is the work of a certain producer, and that every beautiful art is the creation of some great artist. All this is obvious, yet it does not satisfy the hunger for knowledge and the curiosity of man about the great things in the world. One often wonders at the beauties of nature with its scenic charms and marvels; the almost endless horizons in the sky and their far-reaching expansions; the ceaseless succession-of day and night in the most orderly manner; the course of the sun, the moon, and the great stars; the world of animate and inanimate objects, the continuous process and evolution of man generation after generation. One often wonders because one would like to know the maker and maintainer of all these things with which we live and which we immensely enjoy.

Can we find an explanation of the great universe? Is there any

convincing interpretation of the secret of existence? We realize that no family can function properly without a responsible head, that no city can prosperously exist without sound administration, and that no state can survive without a chief of some kind. We also realize that nothing comes into being on its own. Moreover, we observe that the universe exists and functions in the most orderly manner, and that it has survived for hundreds of thousands of years. Can we, then, say that all this is accidental and haphazard? Or can we attribute the existence of man and, the whole world to mere chance?

If man were to come into being by accident or by sheer chance, his entire life would be based on chance, and his whole existence would be meaningless. But no sensible man can conceive of his life as meaningless, and no rational being would leave his existence at the mercy of fluctuating chance. Every reasonable human being tries to make his life as meaningful as possible and set for himself a model of conduct according to some design. Individuals, groups and nations do plan their course of action, and every careful plan produces some

desired effects. The fact of the matter is that man does engage in planning of one sort or another, and can appreciate the merits of good planning.

Yet man represents only a very small portion of the great universe. And if he can make plans and appreciate the merits of planning, then his own existence and the survival of the universe must also be based on a planned policy. This means that there is a Designing Will behind our material existence, and that there is a Unique Mind in the world to bring things into being and keep them moving in order. The marvelous wonders of our world and the secrets of life are too great to be the product of random accident or mere chance.

In the world, then there must be a Great Force in action to keep everything in order. In the beautiful nature there must be a Great Artist who creates the most charming pieces of art and produces everything for a special purpose in life. This Force is the strongest of all forces, and this Artist is the greatest of all artists. The true believers and deeply enlightened people recognize this Artist and call Him Allah or God. They call Him God because He is the Creator and the Chief Architect of the world, the Originator of life and the Provider of all things in existence. He is not a man because no man can create or make another man. He is not an animal, nor is He a plant. He is neither an idol nor is He a statue of any kind because none of these things can make itself or create anything else. He is not a machine. He is neither the sun nor is He the moon or any other star, because these things are controlled by a great system, and are themselves made by someone else. He is different from all these things, because He is the Maker and Keeper of them all. The maker of anything must be different from and greater than the thing which he makes. We also know that nothing can come to life on its own, and that the marvelous world did not create itself or come into existence by accident. The continuous changes in the world prove that it is made, and everything which is made must have a maker of some sort.

The Maker and Sustainer of the world, the Creator of and Provider for man, the Active Force and Effective Power in nature are all one and the same, and that is known to be Allah or God. This is the Secret of all secrets and the Most Supreme of all beings. The Holy Qur’an the True Book of God says:

It is God Who has subjected the sea to you, that ships may sail

The Supreme Master of the whole world and the Creator of everything is Allah (God). Because He is so great and different from the other beings, man can know Him only by reflection and through meditation. He exists at all time and His great power is in action everywhere in the world. Man has to believe in His existence because everything in the world proves that he exists. Belief in God and His great power alone can provide mankind with the best possible explanation of many mysterious things in life. This is the safest way to true knowledge and spiritual insight, the right path to good behavior and sound morals, the surest guide to happiness and prosperity.

Once man believes that God exists he must know His attributes and names. Generally speaking every perfection and absolute goodness belong to Him, and no defect or wrong applies to Him. In specific terms, one should know and believe the following:

Each one of these names and attributes of God is mentioned in various places in the Holy Qur’an. We all enjoy the care and mercy of God Who is so Loving and Kind to His creation. If we try to count His favors upon us, we cannot, because they are countless (Qur'an, 14:32-34; 16:10-18).

God is High and Supreme, but He is very near to the pious thoughtful people; He answers their prayers and helps them. He loves the people who love Him and forgives their sins. He gives them peace and happiness, knowledge and. success, life and protection. He well comes all those who want to be at peace with Him and never rejects any of them. He teaches man to be good, to do the right and to keep away from the wrong. Because He is so Good and Loving, He recommends and accepts only the good and right things. The door of His mercy is always open to any Who sincerely seek His support and protection (Qur’an, 2:186; 50:16).

The Love of God for His creatures is immense and beyond human imagination. We cannot measure or count His favors. He creates us and takes good care of us not only from the time of our birth onward, but even long before that. He makes us in the best form of creation and gives us all the senses and faculties that we need for our growth. He helps us when we cannot help ourselves, and Provides for us and for our dependents. He creates in man the mind to understand, the soul and conscience to be good and righteous, the feelings and sentiments to be kind and humane.

By His mercy we gain true knowledge and see the real light. Because He is Merciful He creates us in the most beautiful shape and provides us with the sun and the moon, the land and the sea, the earth and the skies, the plants and the animals. He is the Creator of all these things and many 'others for our benefit and use. He makes things that are of service to us in this life, and gives man dignity and intelligence, honor and respect, because man is the best of all created things and is God's viceroy on earth. The mercy of God gives us hope and peace, courage and confidence. It enables us to remedy our grief’s and sorrows, to overcome our difficulties and obtain success and happiness. Indeed, the mercy of God relieves the distressed, cheers the afflicted, consoles the sick, strengthens the desperate, and comforts the needy. In short, the mercy of God is active everywhere all the time in every aspect of out lives. Some people may fail to recognize it only because they take it for granted. But it is real and we can feel it with our hearts and appreciate it with our minds.

The Loving Merciful God never forgets us or lets us down or ignores our sincere calls upon Him. By His Mercy and Love He has shown us the Right Way and sent to us messengers and teachers, books and revelations-all are meant for our help and guidance. The Last Messenger from God is Muhammad, and the most genuine existing book of God is the Qur’an. From the traditions of Muhammad and the teachings of the Qur'an, we learn about the Forgiving God. If a person commits a sin or does something wrong, then he is violating the Law of God, committing a grave offense against God and abusing his own dignity and existence. But if he is sincere and wishes to repent, regrets his wrong deeds and wants to turn to God, faithfully seeks pardon from God and honestly approaches Him, then God will certainly accept him and forgive him. Even those who reject God or His Oneness are assured of. forgiveness, should they realize their erroneous attitude and resolve to come back to God. In his connection the Qur'an says:

God forgives not that partners should be set up with Him; but He forgives anything else, to whom He pleases; to set up partners with God is to devise a sin most heinous indeed (Qur’an, 4:48, 116).

In return for all these great favors and kindness God does not need anything from us, because He is the Needless and the Independent. He does not ask us to pay Him back, for we cannot reward Him or value His immeasurable favors and mercy. What He commands us to do, however, is only to be good, to be thankful and appreciative, to follow His recommendations and enforce His Law, to be the proper manifestation of His goodness and excellent attributes, to be His honest agents and true representatives on earth. He does not want to enslave us, because He is the One Who grants us dignity and honor. He does not wish to subjugate us, because He is the One Who emancipates us from fear and superstitions. He does not desire to humiliate us because He is the One Who creates us and exalts our ranks above all other beings. So whatever rules and prescriptions He passes unto us are designed for our own benefit and good. They are meant to help us to enjoy our lives with one another in peace and

kindness, in brotherhood and cooperation. They are destined to make us attain His most pleasant company and adopt the surest approach to eternal happiness.

There are various ways to know God, and there are many things to tell about Him. The great wonders and impressive marvels of the world are like open books in which we can read about God. Besides, God Himself comes to our aid through the many messengers and revelations He has sent down to man. These messengers and revelations tell us everything we need to know about God. So by reflecting on nature, by hearing the words of the messengers, and by reading the divine revelations we can gain most convincing knowledge about God and find the Straight Path to Him.

To complete this portion of discussion, some representative verses of the Qur’an may be rendered as follows:

The word Islam is derived from the Arabic root "SLM" which Means, among other things, peace, purity, submission and obedience. In the religious sense the word Islam means submission to the Will of God and obedience to His Law. The connection between the original and the religious meanings of the word is strong and obvious. Only through submission to the Will of God and by obedience to His Law can one achieve true peace and enjoy lasting purity.

Some outsiders call our religion "Mohammedanism" and address the believers in Islam as "Mohammedans". The Muslims both reflect and protest the use of these words. If our faith is classified as Mohammedanism and if we are called Mohammedans, there will be seriously wrong implications. This misnomer implies that the religion takes its name after a mortal being, namely, Muhammad and that Islam is no more than another "ism" just like Judaism, Hinduism, Marxism, etc. Another wrong implication of this misnomer is that outsiders might think of the Muslims, whom they call Mohammedans, as worshippers of Muhammad or as believers in him in the same way as Christians, for example, believe in Jesus. A further wrong implication is that the word Mohammedanism may mislead the outsider and make him think that the religion was founded by Muhammad and therefore takes its name after the founder. All these implications are seriously wrong or at best misleading. Islam is not just another "ism". Nor do Muslims worship Muhammad or look upon him the same way as Christians, Jews, -Hindus, Marxists, etc., look upon their respective leaders. The Muslims worship God alone. Muhammad was only a mortal being commissioned by God to teach the word of God and lead an exemplary life. He stands in history as the best model for man in prety and perfection. He is a living proof of what man can be and of what he can accomplish in the realm of excellence and virtue. More- over, the Muslims do not believe that Islam was founded by Muhammad, although it was restored by him in the last stage of religious evolution. The original founder of Islam is no other than God Him self, and the date of the founding of Islam goes back to the age of Adam. Islam has existed in one form or another all along from the beginning and will continue to exist till the end of time.

The true name of the religion, then, is Islam and those who follow it are Muslims. Contrary to popular misconceptions, Islam or submission to the Will of God, together with obedience to His Law, does not mean in any way loss of individual freedom or surrender to fatalism. Anyone who thinks or believes so has certainly failed to understand the true meaning of Islam and the concept of God in Islam. The concept of God in Islam describes Him as the Most Merciful and Gracious, and the Most Loving and most concerned with the well being of man, and as Full of Wisdom and care for His Creatures. His Will, accordingly, is a Will of Benevolence and Goodness, and whatever Law He prescribes must be in the best interest of mankind.

When the civilized people abide by the laws of their countries, they are considered sound citizens and honest members of their respective societies. No responsible person would say that such people lose their freedom by their obedience to the Law. No rational being would think or believe for a moment that such law-abiding people are fatalists and helpless. Similarly, the person who submits to the Will of God, which is a good Will, and obeys the Law of God, which is the best Law, is a sound and honest person. He is gaining protection of his own rights, showing genuine respect for the rights of others, and enjoying a high degree of responsible, creative freedom. Submission to the good Will of God, therefore, does not take away or curtail individual freedom.

On the contrary, it gives freedom of a high degree in abundant measures. It frees the mind from superstitions and fills it with truth. It frees the soul from sin and wrong and quickens it with goodness and purity. It frees the self from vanity and greed, from envy and tension, from fear and insecurity. It frees man from subjugation to false deities and low desires, and unfolds before him the beautiful horizons of goodness and excellence.

Submission to the good Will of God, together with obedience to His beneficial Law, is the best safeguard of peace and harmony. It enables man to make peace between himself and his fellow men on the one hand, and between the human community and God on the other. It creates harmony among the elements of Nature. According to Islam, everything in the world, or every phenomenon other than man is administered by God-made Laws. This makes the entire physical world necessarily obedient to God and submissive to His Laws, which, in turn, means that it is in a state of Islam, or it is Muslim. The physical world has no choice of its own. It has no voluntary course to follow on its own initiative but obeys the Law of the Creator, the Law of Islam or submission. Man alone is singled out as being endowed with intelligence and the power of making choices. And because man possesses the qualities of intelligence and choice he is invited to submit to the good Will of God and obey His Law. When he does choose the course of submission to the Law of God, he will be making harmony between himself and all the other elements of Nature, which are by necessity obedient to God. He will be consistent with the truth and in harmony with all the other elements of the universe. But if he chooses disobedience he will deviate from the Right Path and will be inconsistent. Besides, he will incur the displeasure and punishment of the LawGiver.

Because Islam means submission to the Good Will of God and obedience to His Beneficial Law, and because this is the essence or the message of all God-chosen messengers, a Muslim accepts all the prophets previous to Muhammad without discrimination. He believes that all those prophets of God and their faithful followers were Muslims, and that their religion was Islam, the only true universal religion of God (Qur’an, 2:128-140; 3:78-85; 17:42-44; 31:22; 42:13).

To sum up this discussion, it may be helpful to reproduce my statement which appeared in the Observer Dispatch (O.D.) of Utica on December 4, 1972. The statement shows how much distortion and confusion there is in this regard. The partial overlapping and repetition may be forgiven because of the extreme sensitivity of the issue and the need to reiterate the Islamic point of view.

Marcus Eliason reported from Israeli-occupied Jordan that "The Moslems," among other things, "worship Abraham as Ibrahim…"

It is incredible in this day and age, in this small world of ours, to read in fresh print that the Muslims worship Ibrahim. It is more incredible yet that this news comes from sources presumably knowledgeable and is passed on to a public entitled to know.

For centuries, many Westerners held and propagated the idea that the Muslims worshipped Muhammed, whose religion was called Mohammedanism and whose followers were known in the West as Mohammedans. Then it somehow became apparent to those Westerners that the Muslims worshipped Allah, a "deity of sorts." And now this new discovery that they worship Abraham as Ibrahim.

The fact is that the Muslims never worshipped Muhammad or any other human being. They have always believed that Muhammad was a mortal like the numerous prophets before him, and it is the highest tribute to humanity that a man could achieve the most exalted status of prophethood.

The Muslims believe that Muhammad was the last, not the only prophet, who reinforced and immortalized the eternal message of God to mankind. This message was revealed by God to many prophets of different nations at different times. including Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, David, Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad (peace be upon them). What is more important is that the Muslims believe in them without discrimination against any.

Because of their universal outlook and cosmopolitan orientation, the Muslims sorrowfully consider it an unfortunate misnomer to call them Mohammedans and their faith Mohammedanism. The implications are distasteful and for good reasons. The Muslims do not think of themselves as a racial or ethnic group with any exclusive monopolies. Their religion is not named after a man or place; it is transcendent and temporal.

The proper name of the religion is Islam and its followers are properly called Muslims. In the religious context, the word Islam means submission to the will of God and obedience to God's Law. The will of God is defined by the Koran as good and compassionate, and His law as the most beneficent and equitable, Any human being who so submits and obeys is, therefore, a Muslim in a moral state of Islam. It is in this sense that the Koran calls Abraham and all authentic prophets Muslims and designates their religions by one and the same title, namely Islam. Hence, the Muslim is not only a follower of Muhammad exclusively; he also follows Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and the rest of God's messengers.

Finally, the word Allah in Islam simply but most emphatically means the One and only Eternal God, Creator of the universe, Lord of all lords, and King of all kings. The only unforgivable sin in Islam is the belief in any deity besides or other than God. The most common daily prayer among Muslims is: "In the name of God, the most compassionate, the most merciful."