KHUTAB IX: 12. RELIGION AND BLASPHEMY (1)
12.
RELIGION AND BLASPHEMY (1)
Allah says addressing
the whole mankind, as follows:
يَا أَيُّهَا النَّاسُ إِنَّا خَلَقْنَاكُمْ مِنْ
ذَكَرٍ وَأُنْثَى وَجَعَلْنَاكُمْ شُعُوبًا وَقَبَائِلَ لِتَعَارَفُوا
إِنَّ أَكْرَمَكُمْ عِنْدَ اللَّهِ أَتْقَاكُمْ
إِنَّ اللَّهَ عَلِيمٌ خَبِيرٌ (الحجرات:13)
O
mankind! We have created you from a male
and a
female, and made you into nations and tribes
that
you may know one another. Verily, the most
honorable
of you with Allah is that (believer)
who has
the most pious (Q. 49:13)
The Qur’ān commentator
Mujāhid ibn Jabr (21-104/642-722) said that the Arabs in the past knew each
other by knowing their names, their parents’ names and the names of the tribes
to which they belonged. Sufyān al-Thawrī (97-161/716-778) said that the Ḥimyar
people who resided in Yemen dealt with each other according to their provinces,
while the Arabs in Ḥijāz (Western Arabia) dealt with each other according to
their tribes. As every tribe has its own tribal language it is estimated that
up to 7,000 different languages are spoken around the world, and about 90% of
them are spoken by less than 100,000 people.
Knowing
one another implies learning from each other’s characteristics, traditions,
cultures and religions. The concept of
religion is constituted of three factors, namely, God, Universe and Man. These
have connection with the concept of salvation. Hence, former President to World
Federation of Islamic Mission and Islamic Centre in Karachi, Muhammad
Fazl-ur-Rahman Ansari in his lecture at the Tokyo mosque in 1960 divided the
world religions into two categories: (1) Religions of Salvation, and (2)
Religions of Fulfilment.
Religions of Salvations are generally all religions
with the exception of Islam, which belongs to Religion of Fulfilment. Religions
of Salvation are divided into two categories:
a.
those whose concept of salvation is linear, namely, the advance of
human life is linear, passing through the gateway of death, to continue beyond
the grave, until it reaches heaven or hell. Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and
Christianity belong to this category.
b. those whose concept of
salvation is cyclic, namely, the continuous transmigration of souls in cycle
upon cycle until it reaches heaven (Moksha in Hinduism, and Nirvana in
Buddhism). Hinduism and Buddhism belong to this category.
On the other hand, the concept of fulfilment in Islam
is that the world is essentially good, God is Absolutely Good, and all His
actions are good, human personality are good and social relations are also
good. All human beings are born sinless which is contradictory to Christian
teachings that all human beings are born in sin inherited from Adam and Eve. A
person who inherits any kind of defect or sickness is not a kind of
condemnation, but a test, he has to find a cure for it, and to be patient with
it, and Allah would reward him for his patience.
Allah has given human beings with certain
facilities and powers to be used in its utmost for their own prosperity and
welfare in this earthly life. This is also a kind of devotion besides
performing the five-daily prayers, fasting in Ramadan, etc. Allah has
created the whole contents of the earth for them (Q. 2:29), and neglecting them
is therefore, renunciation of worldly life is not the teaching of Islam.
Hinduism in the strict
sense of the word is more of a social order than a religion. A Hindu can be a
person who believes in one God, three gods, millions of gods, or even no god.
It is said that it is the most undefinable religion in the world, as it is
actually the story of the race of Aryans of Central Asia. When they conquered
the northern plains of India they brought with them certain beliefs of
nature-worship and certain principles of social organization, and at the same
time they absorbed the beliefs and social habits of their subjects. Their
beliefs mixed together, and conflicting beliefs and mutually fighting gods and
goddesses were tolerated and accommodated. Therefore, Hinduism is a number of
religious systems, and the only common doctrines are of the karma and
transmigration of the soul.
Hinduism is for the Indians, like
Judaism for the Jews. Both are religions of their respective races. Unlike
Islam and Christianity which are missionary religions, Hinduism does not
believe in conversion to Hinduism. If a Hindu is born he is bound to racial and
caste-system. He is born either as a Brahmin (the highest caste), a Kshatriya,
a Vaishya, or a Sudra, and he cannot change his caste, no matter how great his
achievement is in life. A Brahmin remains holy, and the Sudra remains unholy,
and this remains unchangeable. Like in
Judaism where a non-Jewish is considered inferior, a non-Hindu is also
considered inferior in Hinduism.
The word karma is originally
from the Sanskrit word karman, meaning “action, effect, and fate.” Karma
in Hinduism as well as in Buddhism is (1) “the sum of a person’s actions in
this and previous states of existence, viewed as deciding their fate in future
existences.” It is also (2) “action, seen as bringing upon oneself inevitable
results, good or bad, either in this life or in a reincarnation; in Hinduism it
is one of the means of reaching Brahman.” It is also (3) “intentional ‘action’;
the workings of cause and effect, whereby virtuous actions lead to happiness
and non-virtuous actions lead to suffering.” In Theosophy[1]
karma is “the cosmic principle
according to which each person is rewarded or punished in one incarnation
according to that person's deeds in the previous incarnation.” It is the rule
of cause and effect: “As you sow, so you reap” (Galatians, 6:7). Salvation in
Hinduism is cyclic, namely, in order to attain to Salvation the human being
must undergo cycles upon cycles of rebirth. If a person commits more vices than
virtues in this life, he will be born again in this world in a lower caste, or
even in a lower category of existence, such as animals and insects. This is a
kind of punishment, until he breaks the cycles of rebirth and enters the heaven
(Moksha).
In rejecting these views of karma and transmigration
of the soul F.R. Ansari mentions three arguments, as follows:
1.
It is necessary that every man has to have a complete picture of his
previous life in order to realize his suffering or benefiting on any occasion
in this life, but this does not happen. Therefore, the purpose of his rebirth
would not be acceptable. In other words, it is like a man is being punished
without knowing his mistake.
2. Like an
immature seed, we do not bring it back and paste it to its tree, but rather we
select the mature seed to grow a better tree. Similarly, a person who is not
pure or mature enough to achieve Salvation should not be brought back to be pasted
in the earthly life, but rather he should be provided with conditions whereby
his impurity and immaturity may be put right, so that he might proceed to the
path of evolution.
3. Evolution is an established law of the human
personality and the universe which is always linear, whereas transmigration of
the souls is cyclic, and therefore it is unacceptable.
Buddhism was
born in India as a revolt against some
principles and institutions of Hinduism, especially against caste-system
and holding the idea of the impersonal concept of God or of non-existent of
God. The doctrines of Karma and Awa Gawan were retained. No wonder that some
scholars who incline to regard Buddhism as one of many sects of Hinduism.
The
founder of Buddhism was Siddhartha Gautama, a Hindu prince who left his house
in search of solution for the human sufferings. After years of contemplation
and meditation he attained Buddhahood, namely, Enlightenment, under a bodhi
tree at Buddh-Gaya in the province of Bihar, India. He found the solution to
conquer suffering, namely, to negate all desires. The world in unreal, like an
illusion, a trap, and the wise person (Buddhist) has to cut off all his
relations with the world. His life should be a roaming beggar who has no home,
and no worldly duty. Even Gautama himself when he returned to his naïve place
he did not visit his wife.
The concept of Buddhism that everything is like an
illusion means that it appeared to
exist in one way, but actually it exists in another way. It is like the optical
illusion where a line can look longer than another line, but actually is
shorter. Another example is that the ocean consists of a series of separate
waves that come and go. But if we look beneath the surface, we shall find that
the ocean is vaster and more mysterious than what we initially believed.
There are three main sects in
Buddhism: (a) the Mahayana was so called, because they were the majority
Group at the Council of Patna; it allows social relations as a natural and
necessary evil. (b) the Hinayana, the minority group, the most orthodox,
the most loyal to the spirit and the teaching of Buddha, and they believed in
asceticism; and (c) the Zen Buddhism was a new version of Buddhist philosophy
which permits and promotes militarist aspirations among militarist Japanese.
The doctrine of transmigration of souls or incarnation
has no solid foundation in human experience. Many people believe in some form
of reincarnation. Testimony of people who claim to recall people, places,
things and events from what they believe could be their past lives. Under
hypnosis many people recall the detail of their previous lives.
Stephen
Wagner, the paranormal phenomena expert in his article The Mystery of Past Life
Recall related this story:
“In 1824, a nine-year-old boy named Katsugoro, the son
of a Japanese farmer, told his sister that he believed he had a past life.
According to his story, which is one of the earliest cases of past life recall
on record, the boy vividly recalled that he had been the son of another farmer
in another village and had died from the effects of smallpox in 1810….”
Stephen Wagner’s commentary on this story is
this: “Past life recall is one of the
most fascinating areas of unexplained human phenomena. As yet, science has been
unable to prove or disprove its genuineness. Even many who have investigated
claims of past life recall are unsure whether it is an historical recollection
due to reincarnation or is a construction of information somehow received by
the subconscious. Either possibility is remarkable. And like many areas of the
paranormal, there is a propensity for fraud that the serious investigator must
watch out for. It's important to be sceptical about such extraordinary claims,
but the stories are nonetheless intriguing.”
(CIVIC, 2 October, 2015)
المصادر:
المكتبة الشاملة
تفسير الطبري (ت. 310 هـ(
تفسير القرطبى (ت. 671 هـ(
تفسير ابن كثير (ت. 774 هـ(
Ansari, F.R. Which
Religion. Karachi: The World Federation of Islamic Missions, Islamic
Centre, 1969
Landaw, Jonathan, & Bodian,
Stephan. Buddhism for Dummies. Indianapolis, Indiana: Wiley Publishing,
Inc., 2003.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/guide/languages.shtml
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/karma
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/karma
http://paranormal.about.com/od/reincarnation/a/The-Mystery-Of-Past-Life-Recall.htm
[1] Theosophy is any religious or philosophical system
based on intuitive insight into the nature of the divine, but especially that
of the Theosophical Society founded in New York in 1875 by Madame
Blavatsky and Colonel H.S Olcott
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