Articles of Faith in Islam

 Articles of Faith in Islam

Faith is recognized in Islam as a higher step than practicing Islam. It is a matter of belief

in one’s heart. Every faithful Muslim believes in the following articles of faith:

God

Monotheism is central to Islam—a belief in only One God, Unitary, Supreme and Eternal,

Omnipotent and Mighty, Merciful and Compassionate. Belief in a plurality of gods or in

the extension of God's divinity to any person is emphatically rejected. Islam rejects the

human attributes that the Jews and the Christians added to their doctrines such as

God’s wrestling with his prophet or the incarnation of God. God created nature through a

primordial act of mercy; otherwise there would be pure nothingness. God provided each

element of his creation with its own proper nature, or laws governing its conduct, so that

it follows a characteristic pattern. The result is a well ordered harmonious whole, a

cosmos in which everything has its proper place and limitations.

Messengers of God

A Muslim has to believe in all the messengers of God without any distinction among

them. Every known nation has at least one messenger from God. They were chosen by

God to guide mankind and deliver His divine message that is submission to the Will and

Laws of God. They were sent at different times and places. All prophets are human; they

have no share in divinity, but they are the most perfect exemplars for humanity. The

Quran mentions the names of twenty-five prophets, and Muslims accept them all. All

prophets are considered national or local messengers, with the exception of Muhammad

who is considered a prophet for all nations and all time. The message of all prophets

was basically the same because it came from One God. Muhammad stands as the last

messenger, and the crowning glory of the foundation of the prophethood. This is not an

arbitrary attitude, nor is it just a convenient belief. Thus, the Quran describes

Muhammad as the “Seal of all Prophets.” From this arises the Islamic belief that

prophethood was accomplished and finished with him and that the Quran is the final and

authentic perfect revelation of God, consummating and superseding all earlier holy

books. The Quran acknowledges the miracles of earlier prophets (Noah, Abraham,

Moses, Jesus, and others). Muhammad’s eternal miracle is the Quran, the like of which

no human can reproduce.

Although right and wrong are inscribed in the human heart, the inability or refusal

of many people to interpret that inscription has made prophetic guidance necessary.

This guidance is universal; no one on earth has been left without it. Adam was the first

prophet; after his expulsion from the Garden of Eden, God forgave him (for this reason

Islam does not accept the doctrine of original sin). The messages of all prophets

emanate from the same divine source. Religions are, therefore, basically one. They all

call for worshiping One God.

The Holy Books

As a result of believing in all the messengers of God, Muslims also have to believe in all

the scriptures and revelations of God. In the Quran, a special reference is made to the

books of Abraham, Moses, David and Jesus. But long before the revelation of the Quran

to Muhammad, all the holy books had been lost or altered. The Quran stands untainted

for the past 14 centuries.

The Angels of God

Muslims believe in the Angels of God. They are purely spiritual and splendid beings,

whose nature requires no food, drink or sleep. They have no physical desires of any kind

nor material needs. They spend their whole time in the service of God. There are many

of them and each one of them is charged with a specific duty. If we cannot see the

Angels with our naked eyes, it does not necessarily deny their actual existence. There

are many things in the world that are invisible to the eye or inaccessible to our senses,

and yet we believe in their existence e.g. electricity and sound. Belief in the Angels

originates from the Islamic principle that knowledge and truth are not entirely confined

to the sensory knowledge or the sensory perception alone.

The Day of Judgment

The divine activities of creation, sustenance, and guidance end with the final act

of judgment. This world will come to an end some day, and the dead will rise to stand for

their final and fair trial. On the Day of Judgment, all humanity will be gathered, and

individuals will be judged solely according to their deeds. The “successful ones” will go

to the Garden (heaven), and the “losers,” or the evil will go to hell. Because God is

merciful, He will forgive those who deserve forgiveness. Only God knows the real nature

of heaven and hell, and their exact descriptions.

If some people think that they are shrewd enough and can get away with their

wrong doings in this life, they are wrong, for they will not be able to do so on the Day of

Judgment. Also, if some pious people do good deeds to please God and seem to have

no appreciation or acknowledgment in this temporary world, they will eventually receive

their full reward on that day. Absolute justice will prevail for all.

Belief in the Day of Judgment is the final relieving answer to many complicated

problems of our world. There are people who commit sins, neglect God, and indulge in

immoral activities, yet they seem to be “superficially” successful in business and

prosperous in life. And there are virtuous and God-minded people. Yet they seem to be

getting fewer rewards and more suffering in this life. This may seem puzzling and

incompatible with the Justice of God. If the guilty can escape the human laws unharmed

and, in addition, be more prosperous, what is, then, left for the virtuous people? There

must be some way to reward goodness and arrest evil. If this is not done here on earth,

and we know that it is not done regularly or immediately, it has to be done some day.

That day is the Day of Judgment. This is not to ignore injustice or tolerate mischief in this

world. This is not to sedate the deprived or comfort the exploiters. Rather, it is to warn

the deviants from the right path and remind them that the Justice of God shall run its full

course sooner or later.

Besides the Last Judgment, which will be on individuals, the Quran recognizes

another form of divine judgment, which happens to nations, peoples, and communities.

Nations, like individuals, may be corrupted by wealth, power, and arrogance, and, unless

they reform, these nations are punished by being destroyed or subjugated by more

virtuous nations. This has been evident all over the history of humanity.

The Ultimate Plan

Muslims believe in the timeless knowledge of God and in His Power to plan and execute

His Plans. God is not indifferent to His world nor is He neutral to it. His knowledge and

power are in action at all times to keep order in His vast domain and maintain full

command over His creation. He is Wise and Loving, and whatever He does must have a

good motive and a meaningful purpose. If this is established in our minds, we should

accept in good faith all that He does, although we may fail to understand it fully, or even

think it is bad. We should have strong faith in Him and accept whatever He does

because our knowledge is limited and our thinking is based upon individual or personal

considerations, whereas His Knowledge is limitless and He plans on a universal as well

as individual basis.

This does not in any way make man helpless. It simply draws the line between

what is God’s concern and what is man’s responsibility. Because we are by nature finite

and limited, we have a finite and limited degree of power and freedom. We cannot do

everything, and He graciously holds us responsible only for the things we do. The things

that we cannot do, or things that He Himself does, are not in the realm of our

responsibility. He is Just and has given us limited power to match our finite nature and

limited responsibility. On the other hand, the timeless knowledge and power of God to

execute His plans do not prevent us from making our own plans in our limited sphere of

power. As a matter of fact, God encourages us to think, to plan and to make sound

choices, but if things do not happen the way we wanted or planned, we should not loose

faith or surrender ourselves to mental strains and shattering worries. We should try

again and again, and if the results are not still what we wanted, then we know that we

tried our best and rest assured that we are not held responsible for the results. The

important point is to try, and then leave the results to God. The Muslims call this article

of faith: the belief in “Qadaa” and “Qadar”, which simply means, in other words, that the

Timeless knowledge of God anticipates events, and that events take place according to

the exact knowledge of God.

The Prophet (Pbuh)

The Prophet (Pbuh)

Prophet Muhammad (Pbuh) was born in 570 A.D. in the city of Mecca, an important

trading center in western Arabia. Muhammad was a descendant of Prophet Ismael, son

of Abraham, through the lineage of his second son Kedar. Muhammad's father, Abd

Allah, died before he was born. His mother, Amina, died when he was 6 years old. His

grandfather Abd al-Muttalib then raised him until the age of eight. After his grandfather’s

death, Abu Talib, his uncle, raised him. Under the guardianship of Abu Talib,

Muhammad began to earn a living as a businessman and a trader. At the age of twelve,

he accompanied Abu Talib with merchant caravans as far as Syria. The Meccans

popularly knew Muhammad as ‘Al-Ameen’ for his impeccable character. The title Al-

Ameen means the honest, the reliable and the trustworthy, and it signifies the highest

standard of moral and public life. Upon hearing of Muhammad’s impressive credentials,

Khadijah, a rich and noble widow, asked Muhammad to take some merchandise for

trade to Syria. Soon after this trip when he was twenty-five, Khadijah proposed marriage

to Muhammad. Muhammad accepted the proposal. At that time, Khadijah was twice

widowed and forty years old.

Muhammad’s spiritual search had been long. At the age of 40, while in a cave on

Mount Hira outside Mecca, he had a revelation in which he was called on to preach the

message entrusted to him by God. Further revelations came to him intermittently over

the remaining 23 years of his life, and these revelations constitute the text of the Quran.

At first in private and then publicly, Muhammad began to proclaim his message: that

there is but One God and that Muhammad is his servant and messenger sent to remind

people to submit to the Will of God, and to warn them of the Judgment Day. The

Meccans responded with hostility to Muhammad's monotheism. Abu Talib protected him

as long as he was alive. In 619, however, Abu Talib died, and the new clan leader was

unwilling to continue the protective arrangement. At about the same time Muhammad

lost another faithful supporter, his wife Khadijah. In the face of persecution and curtailed

freedom to preach, Muhammad and about 70 followers reached the decision to move to

Madinah, a city about 400 km (250 mi.) to the north. This move, called the hijra (Arabic:

"emigration"), took place in 622, signified the first year of the Muslim calendar.

In Madinah an organized Muslim community gradually came into existence under

Muhammad's leadership. To guarantee the peace and serenity, the Prophet proposed a

treaty defining terms of conduct for all inhabitants of Madinah. All Muslims, non-Muslim

Arabs and Jews ratified the treaty. After his emigration to Madinah, the enemies of Islam

increased their assault from all sides. The Battles of Badr, Uhud and Allies (Trench)

were fought near or around Madinah. In these battles until the year 627, the

nonbelievers with encouragement from Jews and other Arabian tribes attacked the

Prophet and Muslim community. The Muslims lost many men while defending their city

and religion. This condition resulted in many widowed Muslim women and numerous

orphaned children. In these circumstances, Prophet Muhammad married several women

during his fifty-sixth year up to the sixtieth year of his life. He did not contract any

marriage in the last three years of his life, following the revelation limiting the number of

wives up to a maximum of four. This is the first time in the history of revealed scriptures

that a limit on the number of wives was imposed and the terms of conduct were

specified. The Prophet was instructed not to divorce any of his wives after this

revelation, Surah 33, Ayah 52. All of the ladies he took as wives were either widowed or

divorced, except Aishah, the daughter of Abu Bakr, his closest friend and the first Caliph.

In 632, he announced that God perfected and completed the religion of Islam. Three

months later, he died. At the end of his mission, the Prophet was blessed with many

hundred thousand followers (men and women) of Islam. Thousands of his friends

memorized the full text of the Quran, and prayed with him at the mosque and listened to

his sermon. Hundreds of sincere Muslims would find every opportunity to be with him

following five daily prayers and at other times. They used to seek his advice for their

everyday problems, and listened carefully to the interpretation and application of

revealed verses to their situation. They followed the message of the Quran and the

Messenger of Allah with utmost sincerity, and supported him with every thing they had.

By the time of his death, Muhammad had spread Islam on most of Arabia. His

followers carried the message of Islam after the Prophet, and within 100 years the light

of Islam reached Spain, North Africa, the Caucasus, northwest China and India, and

Islam embraced more territory than did the Roman Empire. In no event, Islam was

imposed by force on any population. This is evident because Muslims never attempted

to convert anyone according to the instruction of the Quran 2:256. Muslims ruled Spain

and India and their people were never converted to Islam. Also the existence of non-

Muslims in many Islamic countries attests to the fact that Islam did not spread by the

sword.

However, “half the truth” Evangelists claim that, in contrast to Moses and Jesus,

Muhammad was a man of war. They ignore the fact that Muhammad fought only a

handful of battles in his lifetime, resulting in barely 1,000 casualties on all sides. This

might be compared to Moses, who chastises his army for sparing the women and

children of the defeated Midianites, Numbers 31:15. Moses then commands his army to

go back and slaughter the women and the boys. This also might be compared to David,

who is praised in I Samuel 18 for killing his "tens of thousands," famously earning the

murderous jealousy of Saul who only killed his "thousands."

To compare Muhammad to Moses or Jesus, or against some contemporary

standard, is meaningless and obsolete. The world that Moses, Jesus and Muhammad

lived in was lawless and violent, different from even the Roman dominated world in

which Jesus lived. Strong vested interests opposed the monotheism each preached,

genocide was commonplace, and slavery was taken for granted. Women had few rights,

and might was the only law.

In this context Muhammad and Moses and all the other Biblical figures sought to

create a new society based on justice and on the belief in a Compassionate God. Their

achievements in accomplishing this in lasting ways form the only relevant contemporary

standard by which they can be truly judged.

Mahatma Gandhi published this statement in 'Young India,' 1924:

“I wanted to know the best of the life of one who holds today an undisputed

sway over the hearts of millions of mankind. I became more than ever convinced that

it was not the sword that won a place for Islam in those days in the scheme of life. It

was the rigid simplicity, the utter self-effacement of the Prophet, the scrupulous

regard for pledges, his intense devotion to his friends and followers, his intrepidity,

his fearlessness, his absolute trust in God and in his own mission. These and not the

sword carried everything before them and surmounted every obstacle. When I closed

the second volume (of the Prophet's biography), I was sorry there was not more for

me to read of that great life.”

Sir George Bernard Shaw wrote in 'The Genuine Islam,' Vol. 1, No. 8, 1936.

"If any religion had the chance of ruling over England, nay Europe within the next

hundred years, it could be Islam."

“I have studied him - the wonderful man and in my opinion far from being an anti-

Christ, he must be called the Savior of Humanity."

"I believe that if a man like him were to assume the dictatorship of the modern world

he would succeed in solving its problems in a way that would bring it the much

needed peace and happiness: I have prophesied about the faith of Muhammad that it

would be acceptable to the Europe of tomorrow as it is beginning to be acceptable to

the Europe of today.”

A historian once said, a great man should be judged by three tests:

1. Did his contemporaries find him to be truthful?

2. Was he great enough to rise above the standards of his age?

3. Did he leave anything as permanent legacy to the world at large?

This list may be further extended but all these three tests of greatness are

exceedingly satisfied to the highest degree in the case of Prophet Muhammad (Pbuh).