One Ummah Network
Sat, 02 Dec 2000 08:23:28 -0800
Submission by: Mohammad Shafi J. Aga <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Topic: Musings of a Muslim, deeply concerned ************ Text: In the Name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful Assalaamu alaykum, Brothers and Sisters. We all believe in one God. We all believe He had sent down, from time to time, several Prophets for the guidance of mankind. We all believe that Mohammad (sallaLlahu alayhi wa sallam) was the last of those Prophets. We all believe that the Qur'aan is the final divine message superseding all previous such messages, which got corrupted because of human meddling therein. We all believe that the one God has guaranteed the incorruptibility of this last message of His, and its validity, for all times till the Last Day. And yet, we stand divided, hopelessly as it seems! We are divided into several sects. Every sect proclaims to be the true form of Islam, calling all other sects as heretic or kafir. On paper, we are monotheists. But are we strictly so, in practice? God reiterates at several places in the Qur'aan that He has explained his verses clearly and in different ways so that true believers can understand them easily. But what do we do? We disregard the divine reiteration and, in translations, interpolate human explanations and clarifications in brackets, which are not there in the original text in Arabic. And what do the less-learned amongst us do? We simply take the human explanations as the Gospel Truth and do not bother about checking them up with the divine explanations, which God says He has given in the divine Writ itself. In other words, we tend to prefer human gods over the One True God. Satan thus succeeds, subtly and surreptitiously, in making us commit the unpardonable sin of shirk. I have given only one example of our shirk. There are innumerable other ways in which our enemy # 1, Satan, entices us into this abominable sin. Our salvation, dear brothers and sisters, lies therefore in our trying to understand and strictly to follow the one and only uncontaminated, plain, divine Writ with us, the Qur'aan. Believe God, we can all understand it if we but try honestly and sincerely. If we do not try, then rest assured that we are doomed. Our only hope in ever uniting again lies in our strict adherence to the Qur'aan and not to the dictates of our several human gods. To those non-muslim believers in divine creation, who happen to see and then care to read this message, I say that we Muslims believe that our God is none other than yours. We are all creatures of the same God. The One God won't forgive us if we are in any way unjust to you at any time. We believe that Our common God has given the freedom of choice to every individual. If you do not believe in Islam, that is your choice. Nobody can force you to accept it. In fact, there is no question of forcing Islam on any one. No one can become a Muslim unwillingly. But as a fellow human being, I merely wish to convey to you my firm belief that steadfast adherence to the Qur'aanic guidance is the one and only salvation for every human being. I only hope you and we all realise this basic Truth before it is too late. It is my sincere prayer to God, during this holy month of Ramadhaan, that He grants us the wisdom to follow nothing but His guidance as given in the Qur'aan. Amen! Wassalaam, Mohammad Shafi J. Aga _______________________________________________________________________ Please visit http://personal.vsnl.com/mjaga/whyislam.html to get e-booklet 'Why I Believe in Islam' FREE of cost. You may also find other useful links in the URL, which you may like. _________________________________________ One Ummah Network E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Homepages: http://www.oneummah.net http://www.1ummah.org http://www.1ummah.net Free E-mail Service: http://mail.1ummah.net Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] E-mail Entire List: [EMAIL PROTECTED] The views expressed on One Ummah Information do not necessarily coincide with the views of One Ummah Network, with the Islamic Unification Movement, or its supporters. All the works presented by this service are properties of their authors unless otherwise stated. __________________________________________