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Muslim Education Qua rt erly, Vol. 12, No.3, 1995The Islamic Academy, Cambridge, U.K.

THE MESSAGE AND THE MESSENGER

Syed Ali Ashraf

Islam never claimed to be a new religion. It has always claimed to be thepurif ied and perfected form of the Religion which God had sent to earlierProphets for the spiritual, moral and worldly guidance of human beings duringtheir exist ence on t he face of t he earth. Though i t admits the differences in ritesand rituals, it claims t hat t he essence is t he same: worship of God and Godalone for which human beings have been created by God. 1 According to Islamprophets are the chosen people of God through whom God had sent t hisguidance, as to how to worship Him, to a ll human habitat ions. But laterfollowers deviated from this guidance, invented or forged false ideas or godsand started worshipping other gods and goddesses besides or along with God orbecame total secula ri st s denying the existence of God and started worshippingthemselves or wealth and power. That was why God had to send other prophetsto bring people back into the 'fold'. Some of these prophets received messagefrom God and are known as Messengers ( in Arabi c, rasal); o thers tr ied t oreform the society and get the message of an earlier prophet re-implemented.Muhammad (peace be on him, as all Muslims are t aught to say after utteringhis name) is claimed to be the last Prophet. To him came the last mostcomprehensi ve message known as the Qur'iin. As through him the Messagehad come and was implemented, his sayings and doings provi de for a believerthe entire basic norm for the interpretation of the Qur' an and for theimplementation of its message in the life of the believer. This norm is knownas the Sunnah of the Prophet. Anyone who wants to understand Islam must tryto understand the Qur'an and the Sunnah.

Islam therefore does not t ry to deny Truth to other religions. In a seminarorganised by the Islamic Academy and the Department of Education ofCambridge University the representatives of Islam, Christianity, Judaism,Hinduism, Buddhism, and Sikhism, agreed that they (with some exception ormodification by Buddhism) hold to the following four beliefs:

(1) Belief in a Transcendental Reality, i.e. a Reality thattranscends al l l imi ta tion tha t particular qualities impose uponan object. With the exception of the Buddhis ts they believethis Reality to be the Essence of the Being whom they worshipand whose name inEngl ish is 'God' ...

The Message and theMessenger 5(2) Belief in the existence of the spiritual dimension in each

human bei ng.(3) Belief in eternal and fundamental values, such as Truth,

Justice, Righteousness, Mercy, Love, Compassion and Caretowards al l c rea tion. These values are to be found ref lected inthe human sel f and need to be encouraged, nurtured, ref inedand developed so that such seeds may grow, flourish andblossom." (4) Bel ief in the need for Divine (or Transcendental) Guidance.There is a conflict between selfishness and selflessness in eachindividual, a confl ict t hat is also mirrored in societ ies, races,states and groups of people. Human beings, therefore, needsome norms which transcend race, colour and groups. Thesenorms human beings receive from the Divine Source andthrough divinely inspired people. 2

The difference between Islam and other religions, therefore, lie in theclaim of Islam for fmal ity, comple tion and perfect ion and in the cha llenge ofIslam to other religions for their "unaut hori sed d isto rti ons and fal seadditions't.> Nei ther in the Qur'an nor in the Hadith collec tions do we find anylogical or historical justification of this claim. It is a matter of belief in theauthenticity of the Qur'an and the t ruthfulness of the Prophet tha t compels a llMuslims to accept thi s qual if icat ion of other fai ths in spi te of the ir commonbeliefs.

Even in these common beliefs there are certain basic doctrinaldifferences, which i t i s necessary for us to appreciate in order to understandthe ir common origin. In thi s discuss ion I shal l refer to Hinduism, Judaism andChristianity only, whi le comparing with Islam, because Buddh ism needs asomewhat dif ferent dimensi on or method of approach. Sikhism wi ll not berefer red to because whatever be t he Trut h i n what the Si khs beli eve in, fromthe Islamic point of view Guru Nanak cannot be regarded as a prophet chosenby God. After Prophet Muhammad, .peace be on him, there cannot be aprophet, according to Islam. We shall however discuss the above four beliefs ina different order. After i tem number 1 we shall t ake up i tem number 4 and t henitems 2 and 3.

Belief in a transcendent God is central to Islam. The basic confess ion of aMuslim is his or her recognition and admission and assertion that "t here i s nogod but God"-La ilaha illallah, It means there is no one worthy of worshipexcept Allah. God is One, Unique, Indivisible and Incomparable, without abeginning and an end.s He is the beginning and t he end, the manifest and thehidden and He has authority over everything." Though other religions acceptthis notion, Hinduism and Christianity differ from Islam in their concepts ofmanifestation of this Reality. According to Hinduism, though God is One(ekomevadditiam), He wanted to be Many (ekoham bahushshyam). Hence thisentire creation is His manifestation. The highest and most gloriousmanifestati on is in the human sel f. Hence the concept of god-humanity. Alongwith this comes t he concept of special incarnat ions the las t of which is known

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6 Muslim Education Quarterlyas Kalki whom two Hindu Professors of Hindu Theology ofBenares Universityand Jadavpur University identified as Muhammad, peace be on him. It isbecause of this faith in the manifestation of God in this creation that a Hinducan worship all natural objects.

According to Christianity, God descended in the human form of JesusChrist or in other word, manifested Himself through Christ in order to takeupon Himself the burden of the sins of the faithful and purify them. Otherwisethe difference between the Creator and the creature or the whole creationremains unbridgeable.

According to Islam God in His Essence remains Transcendent but Hecreates His Own Attributes or Qualities which He utilises in order to bring intoexistence every single item in this creation. That is why His Beauty, Power,Glory, Grandeur, Creative Quality, Destructive Power and other Qualities aremanifested through different aspects of the universe. It is impossible for anycreated being including the human being to understand that TranscendentEssence but i t i s possible for human beings to love and appreciate His Qualitiesbecause He has entrusted the human spirit with potential knowledge aboutthem. With the cultivation of that knowledge the human spirit gains the abilityto control and supervise the universe as the Vicegerent of God. Thatknowledge is the amanab or the trust that the first Man, Adam, accepted whenGod showed him the trust with which came the responsibility of knowing theCreation, cultivating the knowledge and becoming able to fulfil the duty ofGod's representative on this Earth. These Qualities of God are expressedthrough the 'Beautiful Names' of God, al-asma' al-husnii, which indicate andposit the Absolute Norms ofJustice, Truth, Mercy, Love, Beauty and hence themoral norms. The innate consciousness of these Absolutes is what the humanbeing has inherited through the primordial First Human Being whose spirit wasmade conscious of them so that he might understand the significance of thecreation that reflects these Qualities.

This awareness can only come through love and obedience . According tothe Prophet's statement no one can become a true believer (mu' min) if thatperson does not love God and the Prophet more than himself or herself, his orher family, tribe and entire humanity. Obedience is innate in this love. That iswhy God says, "Tell them that if you love God then follow me, then God willlove you.:" That is why the Prophet was asked to say, "My prayer, my rites,my life and my death are all for the Lord of the universe". 7 Though KennethCragg sees a basic difference between Islam and Christianity in this God-human being relationship and sees in Islam stress on obedience rather than onlove, he comple te ly overlooks this personal relationship. As the spirit of ahuman being is derived from the Spirit of God, this inner relationship is butnatural , eternal and complete. But because the human spirit is derived throughan order of God, its separateness cannot be eliminated. A human being cannever become God but his total self can become so transformed through thislove that, as reported in a statement of God uttered by the Prophet, "the servantdoes not see through his eyes, he sees through God's eyes, he does not speakwith his tongue, he speaks with the tongue of God, he does not walk on hisown feet, he walks with God's feee.8 This transformation comes through

The Message and the Messenger 7complete submission to God's Will as manifested in the revelations sentthrough the Prophet and in the person's selfless total obedience to the way oflife presented by the Prophet of Islam.

When this love pervades the soul, the human spirit becomes socompletely immersed in the consciousness of Divine Oneness, the inalienablequality of Divine Unity that any ideas of God having coexistents, coequals orpartners not only vanish from the mind, they are felt as supreme negation ofReality and hence regarded as the greatest sin committed by a human being. Itis shirk, the sin of associating partners with God. It was this tremendouspassion dominating the heart of Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h) that compelledhim to break the pagan idols and cleanse the Ka'bah, the House of God.Though the Arabs believed in 'Allah', they considered these gods andgoddesses as more intimately related to their daily lives and hence, worthy ofworship. The rejection of these man-made gods and goddesses established thebasic principle which prevents all Muslims from accepting the gods andgoddesses that are worshipped in popular Hinduism and the sonship of Christthough theological and mystical justifications are available. God and no oneelse is worthy of worship. Islam therefore draws the attention of human beingsaway even from the Qualities to the Owner or Possessor of these Qualities-toGod. Even though the Qur' an exhorts a believer to call upon God by HisNames, a Muslim does not worship a particular Quality of God. He worshipsthe Possessor and addresses Him and Him only. To worship a particularQuality is to limit God to that specific Quality but to cal l upon the Merciful isto pray to God to bestow mercy on us. A Muslim prays to God the Mercifuland not to Mercy as a g od or goddess.

In this God-human being relationship God's Will and the human willplay the most significant role. All these Names of God indicate God in action.In a sense it is a descent of God from His total Transcendence which is HisUnity of Being (in Arabic, ahadiyyah ) into the unity of Will active through theOneness of the Possessor of the Qualities. This is known in Arabic as the stageof wahidiyyah, The manifestation of these Qualities after God willed thecreation into existence is the stage of unity in multiplicity. It is known in.Arabic as the stage of wahdaniyyah. It i s at th is stage that human will gets thefreedom of choice. So that Humanity does not destroy itself, God sends Hisguidance through His Messenger in order that human beings may know what isgood for their nature and what is unsuitable and hence 'evil' for it. Thisfreedom has not been granted by God to external nature. It is controlled andguided by 'natural' laws. Neither the Sun nor the Moon nor the stars cangenerate new laws for themselves or evolve new laws. The enti re creation isthus governed by God. For human beings also God's Will is continuously andunceasingly operat ive but because of this freedom human beings may disobey,ignore or deliberately violate the 1T0rmand disregard this message. As Godpermits a human being to behave in this manner, it is with this permission tomisbehave that a human being does harm to himself or herself. His warningcomes in various forms including natural disasters but human beings maytotally ignore them as they are doing these days. That is why repeatedly Godsays in the Qur'an that ,"He does not do injustice and harm to us, it is we who

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10 Muslim Education QuarterlyIt is this first message which has given birth to different mystical,

metaphysical and theological explanations. The second Message is about thestraight path through which the human being is advised to proceed in order toattain nearness to God. It is this Message which is the source of the entire wayof life prescribed by God, the Shariah or Divinely determined law for humanadvancement towards God. No aspect of human life is left out. The thirdMessage is about the condition of the human being at the time of its attainingnearness to God and t he condition of those who neglect the path.In support of the above the Qur'an cites examples of those who havefollowed the path successfully such as the previous prophets and those whodenied the path and had gone astray, such as Nimrod, Pharaoh, 'Ad andTharnud people.

The Qur'an thus is at the same time a world of spiritual reality to whichthe human soul is attracted and a universe that contains this world and theworld beyond and the Hereafter, both the past and the present and the future,both what we know of and what we do not know and thereby it gives thebeliever the taste of a full life. This worldly life is never denied. It t reats this. existence as a reality to be organised according to a system and norms whichwill help an individual to understand human greatness and teach the personhow to attain i t.

In order to understand the Qur'an and follow the path of spiritualatt ainment, God tells the believer to obey and follow the Prophet. Theprinciples lai d down in the Qur'an would have led to confusion and subjectiveinterpretations leading to conflict among groups had not there been a person toshow the way to actualise the principles stated in the Qur'an.

In order to convey to humankind this comprehensive message Godneeded a person who can be t he prototype of perfection. The second par t of t heshahada or the witnessing principle that every Muslim recites and that isrecited five times when the muezzin calls all believers to prayer is: "I bearwitness to the fact that Muhammad is the Messenger of God". His life can bestudied by anyone who likes to do so in various biographies. But differentpeople have written from different points of view. It is necessary to stress thatno one can do j ustice to such a personality if that person does not have anyunderstanding of what spirituality means and what God-human beingrelationship is and what the path of spiritual attainment to nearness to God is.A person like Sir Syed Ahmed who took scientific empirical approach to be theonly correct approach to understand the Qur'an and the Prophet committedserious mistakes and forceful misinterpretations were the results. Pure modemrationalism which is also related to empiricism and is founded on certainassumptions but which completely ignores the existence of human spirit cannotunderstand Prophet's bodily Ascent to Heaven tmi'raj). Similarly anyone whotakes the western or Christian concept of marriage as the only valid norm forhumanity and also considers celibacy as the highest norm for a pure goodperson, will completely misunderstand the Prophet and demand all sorts ofexplanation for the Prophet having nine wives. I am not going to enter into anyof these discussions nor do I want to follow the apologetics. Professor HosseinNasr in his chapter on the Prophet in his book Ideals and Realities of Islam has

The Message and the Messenger 11already dealt with them briefly but successfully. I would advise readers to readMartin Ling's biography of the Holy Prophet as it will give all the answersfrom the point of view of one who understands what spiritual attainment in thepath of God means.One particular assumption that the Qur'an stresses and the Prophet hadmade about the prophets of all religions is the most convenient point to startwith. They may commit mistakes and temporarily support an incorrect thingbut they do not commit sins. Islam rejects such stories found in the OldTestament about earlier prophets as fabrications. Secondly, all these areprophets of Islam and all Muslims must bel ieve that they preached God's ownTruth and that whatever message they had brought is true. The Prophet ofIslam is regarded as the Prophet who from childhood till death was theembodiment of Truth.Islam stands for total equilibrium and the Prophet is the symbol of thatequilibrium. It is evident from his life that he was working all the time underthe direction of God. Sometimes he did take decisions himself but if he hadcommitted any error he was immediately told by God. As a result it will bewrong on our part to interpret all his act ions as his own choice. Though all theMuslims were treated brut al ly in Makkah he did not migrate till he hadreceived an order from God. It was a period of tolerance. Though the treaty ofHudaibiya was at f irst considered even by a person li ke Umar to be a d ishonourand disaster for the Muslims, he accepted i t because, as he said, he wasinstructed by God to do so. Bu t normally, as the Leader and Master he tookupon himself the burden of taking the final decision which he always tried toarrive at after consultation.

Notes1. Qur'an, 51:56.2. Fai th as th e Ba sis of Ed uca tion in a Multi-faith , Muui-cultural Country.Di scuss ion Documen t ll ,Seminar sponsored by the Islamic Academy and the Department of Education, University ofCambridge. The Islamic Academy, 1991, p.8:3. Quran, 4:46, 5:13, 5:4l.4. Qur'an, 112:1-4.5. Quran, 57:3.6. Qur'an, 3:31.7. Qur' an, 6:112.8. I:ladith Qudsl.9. Qur 'an, 2:57, 7:160,11:101,16;33,29:40.10. Quran, 4:79.II. Qur'an,13:1l.