Islam

Friday Sermon: Thoughts on Islam 4: The Different Traditions Within the Sunni Branch of Islam

Published

7 months ago

March 3, 2023

Eric

By Babatunde Jose

The term Islamic tradition may refer to: Islamic Traditionalist theology, Islamic scholarly movement, originating in the late 8th century CE. Ahl al-Hadith, “The adherents of the tradition”, Traditional Islamic schools and branches, Islamic mythology, and the body of traditional narratives associated with Islam.

Sunnis regard themselves as the orthodox branch of Islam. The name is derived from the phrase “Ahl al-Sunnah”, or “People of the Tradition”. The tradition or sunnah in this case refers to practices based on what the Prophet Muhammad said, did, agreed to or condemned.

Traditional Islamic law, or Sharia, is interpreted in four different ways in Sunni Islam. The schools of law, or madhab, developed in the first four centuries of Islam. The four schools of law are the Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi’i, and Hanbali traditions, each based on the beliefs of their founders.

Even though the main split in Islamic practice is between Sunni and Shi’a Muslims, there are several rifts within the Sunni community raging from the so-called fundamentalist or extremists, Islamists and the ultra conservatives who seek a return to the era of the caliphate.

There are some liberal and more secular movements in Sunni Islam that say that Shari’a is interpreted on an individual basis, and they reject any fatwa or religious edict by religious Muslim authority figures.

There are also several fundamentalist movements in Sunni Islam, which reject and sometimes even persecute liberal Muslims for attempting to compromise traditional Muslim values.

The Muslim Brotherhood and Jamaat-e-Islami organizations are fundamentalist Islamic groups that have given rise to offshoot groups like Hamas who wish to destroy secular Islam and Western society through terrorism to bring back to the world a period of religious Muslim rule.

Sunnism is one of two broad movements that evolved in the Muslim community after the Prophet’s death in 632 c.e. Disagreement over who was Muhammad’s legitimate successor led to a schism between two groups, Sunnis and Shiites, resulting in two interpretations of Islam and two different sacred histories.

Sunnis were not the only Muslims who embraced the Shari’a as a spiritual guide, but because Sunnism provided the foundation for its development, the Shari’a became inextricably connected to how people understood Sunnism.

When scholars speak of the classical period of Islam (900–1200 c.e.), they are usually referring to a time when consciousness of the Shari’a combined with other great achievements throughout the Muslim world, forming the pinnacle of Islamic, and Sunni, civilization.

By the end of the classical period, however, Sunnis faced an important question: whether new perspectives could be incorporated without seriously modifying the assumptions of its system. Some ulama argued that the door to new insights should be closed, and the result was a social order that found it difficult to confront changes associated with modernity. Since then, Sunni Muslims started living in the past.

Beginning in the thirteenth century a unified sense of Sunnism was also challenged by the emergence of independent states and emirates, who relied less on an international Sunni value system. That, along with the loss of any real power behind a unifying figure like the caliph, led to political fragmentation in the Islamic world, which signaled a weakening of Muslim cohesion. By the time of the Renaissance in Europe in the 1500s, when the West challenged Muslim civilization, the word Sunni had taken on a meaning close to “doctrinaire.” Thus, Sunnism often appeared to Western commentators as Islam’s “orthodoxy.”

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries political issues increasingly dominated Sunnism. As a result of Western colonialism, the Muslim world was severed into small nation-states, each vying for legitimacy, further weakening Muslim cohesion. By the end of the twentieth century most Muslim countries were dealing with militant fundamentalist groups bent on reform.

These anti-Western and anti-regime movements were characterized by a commitment to the international triumph of Islam and a rigid opposition to all things not of Islamic origin. Although such groups considered themselves Sunni, their views were not shared by the majority of Sunnis; instead, they represented a new Islamic identity that could not be understood in terms of classical Sunnism. Today, we see them as the Islamists, fundamentalists and extremists who prefer violent interpretations of the Quran and hadith.

Early in the classical age of Islam another view of the religion, known as Mu’tazilism, developed within Sunnism. The scholars who shaped this perspective tried to apply a rational and allegorical interpretation to the Quran. Ultimately Sunnis rejected their approach, insisting that the Quran was not a matter for philosophical speculation but rather a set of codes by which one should live. This is why some commentators do not speak about orthodoxy in Islam but “orthopraxy,” meaning a standard way of living.

Islamic law does not function as law in the West does. Sunnis generally practice according to one of four schools of jurisprudence, which vary on some issues and are distributed regionally: Hanafi (Iraq, Turkey, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan), Maliki (North and West Africa), Shafi’i (Yemen, Egypt, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines), and Hanbali (Saudi Arabia). Because of historical factors such as population movements and changes in the ruling dynasties, Muslims in areas such as Syria or the West may find multiple schools in the same location.

While the Kaaba serves as the prime symbol for all Muslims, it has always been in the hands of Sunnis, with the King of Saudi as the custodian of the Holy Mosques.

An important leader at the pinnacle of Islam’s classical period was Harun al-Rashid (786–809), whose caliphate in Baghdad was seen as taking Sunnism to unsurpassed excellence and splendor.

Sunnism was also invigorated by Akbar (1556–1605), a Mughal emperor who firmly established Islam in northern India.

Mustafa Kemal, known as Ataturk (1881–1938), was responsible for a major rethinking of traditional Islamic statehood. His reforms in Turkey shifted the state’s goals away from embodying religious ideology and toward adapting Sunnism to a modern society.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876–1948) founded the Islamic Republic of Pakistan in 1947, attempting to maintain a Sunni identity within a Western political structure.

Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918–70) applied a socialist ideology to the Islamic state when he established a republic in Egypt in 1956.

Backlashes against non-Islamic trends have resulted in Sunni reform movements. One of the most important was Wahhabism, a conservative reform movement founded by Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab (1703–92).

A second movement emerged around Hasan al-Banna (1906–49), whose Sunni Egyptian organization, the Muslim Brotherhood, spread throughout the Arab world, providing institutional growth for Islamism, or fundamentalism.

Sunni radical leadership has continued to express a wide variety of perspectives. Osama bin Laden (born in Saudi Arabia in 1957), Al-Qaeda encouraged the use of terror and indiscriminate violence to overthrow Western culture and political structures.

Of perhaps equal relevance, though representing a different outlook, is Wallace Warith Din Muhammad (born in 1933), head of an Islamic movement in the United States—first called the Nation of Islam and then the American Muslim Society—begun by his father, Elijah Muhammad (1897–1975). Warith has dramatically changed an American sectarian movement into one of the most respected Sunni organizations in the Western world. In the United States the Muslim feminist perspective has been expressed effectively in the writings of Egyptian-born Leila Ahmed (born in 1940).

Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (1058–1111), head of a school in Baghdad, underwent such a spiritual revolution that he abandoned his career and wrote books reconciling the mystical tradition with Sunni legal thinking.

Sunni civilization was also influenced by writers such as Jalal al-Din al-Rumi (1207–73), a Sufi poet and savant; Ibn al-Arabi (1165–1240), a theosophist and metaphysical thinker; and Ibn Khaldun (1332–1406), who founded the study of societies (and by extension, sociology) with his concept of ‘asabiyya (group cohesion).

Modern religious reformists include Jamal al-Din al-Afghani (1839–97), a political revolutionary who resisted British imperialism in Islamic territories; Sayyid Ahmad Khan (1817–98), a Muslim modernist and advocate of Westernizing reform in India; Muhammad Abduh (1849–1905), an advocate of Islamic modernism in Egypt; Sayyid Abdul Ala Mawdudi (1904–79), a neoconservative reformer and fundamentalist ideologue in Pakistan; and Sayyid Qutb (1906–66), the principal theorist of the contemporary radical Islamist movement.

Because Sunnism has no priesthood and no explicit religious hierarchy, there is no one spokesperson for the tradition. Over the course of history, the ulama have come to be considered official authorities of Islamic learning, and they have often represented Sunnism.

The scholarly class has exercised more control over the Sunni point of view than any other group, except, perhaps, until the rise of Islamism, or fundamentalism, in the contemporary period. Under the influence of Islamism another aspect of contemporary Sunni life has come to the fore: a small number of people, using media and technology, have been able to have a disproportionate power over public opinion.

Finally next week we look at Sufism and Islamic mysticism; the various Islamic orders, especially Qadiriyya and Tijaniyya.

Barka Juma’at and a happy weekend.

SEEKING ALLAH’S PROTECTION:

I seek the protection of Allah’s perfect words from the

evil of whatever He has created. (Muslim)

I seek protection in the perfect words of Allah – which neither the upright nor the corrupt may overcome – from the evil of what He created, of what He brought into existence, and of what He scattered, from the evil of what descends from the heavens, and of what rises up to them, from the evil of what He scattered in the earth and of what emerges from it, from the evil trials of night and day, and from the evil of every night visitor, except the night visitor who comes with good, O Merciful One. (Ahmad)

I seek the protection of Allah the Supreme, than whom there is nothing greater. And I seek the protection of the perfect words of Allah which no man – virtuous or evil – can even transcend; and I seek the protection of all of The Most Beautiful Names of Allah – the ones I know and the ones I do not know – from the evil of everything He created, brought into existence, and spread over the earth. (Muwatta)

I seek protection in the perfect words of Allah from His anger and punishment, from the evil of His servants, and from the evil suggestions of the devils and from them appearing to me. (Ahmad)

Life is bread, water, and shade; so, do not be perturbed by a lack of any other material thing. And in heaven is your provision, and that which you are promised. (Quran 51: 22)

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Islam

Friday Sermon: The Forgotten and They Remain Forgotten

Published

1 day ago

September 29, 2023

Eric

By Babatunde Jose

They did not offend God; they go to church on Sundays and attend the Jummah on Fridays. As poor as they are, they pay their tithe and offer sadaka to the poor and needy when they can afford it. They keep the commandments. They stay up at night to supplicate to God to cushion their plight and sometimes offer propitiation to the African gods. The churches, especially the new-age churches are filled to the brim with them. They form more than 90% of congregants in our mosques. But they remain the forgotten, poor, the dredge of society, hewers of wood and drawers of water. They are the forgotten and they remain forgotten.

In their inner minds, they ask God why He has forsaken them. Their plight leads to a revisit of the thorny issue of Theodicy; an attempt to answer the question, why God allows suffering, why supposedly Benevolent and Omnipotent God allows their plight which is capable of shaking the foundation of their faith. In desperation they would cry out as in Matthew 27:46 “Eli Eli Lama Sabachthani.”

Here are people who wake up at 4am in order to prepare to go to offices that open at 8am. If they fail to get there, their fate is sealed; they lose their job and might never get another. Early risers see them at the bus stations in the worst of early morning weather, rain, or mist, with little or no protection against the elements. Yet, they are always punctual and never late. Yet, they work for pittance; a minimum wage that cannot fill the fuel tank of a Camry. They are the wretched of the earth, the ‘agbale oja’, road sweepers. Some engage in subsistence farming which no longer subsists them. However, today they are part of our swelling army of unemployed. Poor, with no visible means of livelihood: Moving without motion.

Soon, they will find no answer to their questions and no leaders to ameliorate their wretched conditions and they will revolt. It will be spontaneous and unprovoked because they need no more provocation. They have had enough. If they do, there are historical precedents.

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. – John F. Kennedy.

Notable historical revolutions would include: The French Revolution which began in May 1789 when the Ancien Régime was abolished in favor of a constitutional monarchy. Its replacement in September 1792 by the First French Republic led to the execution of Louis XVI in January 1793, and an extended period of political turmoil. This culminated in the appointment of Napoleon as First Consul in November 1799, which is generally taken as its end point. Many of its principles are now considered fundamental aspects of modern Liberal democracy.

The Russian Revolution was a period of political and social insurgency across the territory of the Russian Empire, commencing with the abolition of the monarchy in 1917 and concluding in 1923 with the Bolshevik establishment of the Soviet Union at the end of the Civil War.

The Reformation was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in particular to papal authority; it was a revolt against Papal theocracy, ecclesiastical privileges, and the hereditary paganism of the Mediterranean races. The Reformation was the start of Protestantism and the split of Protestantism from the Roman Catholic Church.

One area of concern has been the notion that Islam forbids protest and rebellion against rulers. However, Allah would never in His infinite knowledge and power encourage nor acquiesce to oppression; hence we find it totally abhorrent when Islamic scholars posit the claim that Islam forbids protest and rebellion against corrupt leaders.

Such claims are not only tendentious, vexatious, unethical, and unsupported by the Holy Book and Islamic history.

The presence of so many hadiths which forbid obeying a corrupt and perverted ruler are not supported by the Holy Qur’an and are all fabrications.

These hadiths were forged by the Umayyad and ‘Abbasid dynasties for the sake of justifying their perverted and oppressive conducts.

One of the issues about which the Sunnis and the Imamate Shias differ is obedience to a corrupt ruler or submission to a tyrannical government.

For most Sunnis, the caliph cannot be dismissed and removed from office, even if he is corrupt and perverted. The only thing Muslims can do is to advise him to change his corrupt ways.

In contrast, the Imamate Shias not only regard obeying a tyrannical and corrupt ruler not to be permitted but consider it to be forbidden (haram) by Islamic law to submit to such a leader. In certain circumstances, it is even obligatory (wajib) to revolt against a tyrannical ruler.

What can be inferred from the reasons put forward by those who oppose revolting against a corrupt and perverted caliph is that preserving political and social structures of the Caliphate is binding and incumbent on followers. However, this is not true as it tends to perpetuate oppression and tyranny.

The only political system that must be preserved is a government whose leader is just and acts according to Allah’s orders as prescribed in the Quran. However, if the political system rules ‘in the name of Islam’ but its leaders are corrupt and perverted, then conserving such a structure is not supported.

There are many edicts or fatwas issued by Sunnis about obeying corrupt and oppressive rulers, among them are the following:

1. That the sultan and caliph cannot be dismissed from office, even though he is corrupt…” Nuwi, Sharh Sahih Muslim, vol. 12, p. 229.

2. Qadi Abu Bakr Baqilani writes, ‘it is not permitted to revolt against him’. The Muslims can only go so far as to advise and warn him about the negative consequences of his actions. It is of course not binding upon the people to obey him when he invites them to participate in his sinful actions, but they cannot dismiss him from office.

There are several narrations which assert that it is incumbent to obey an imam and caliph, even though he might be an oppressor or even if he forcibly usurps and seizes people’s property. Because the Prophet (SAW) has said, ‘Listen to and obey your ruler, even if he is a slave with a flat nose or an Ethiopian.” Baqillani, Al-Tamhid.

However, some scholars have opposed this point of view, and instead believe that a corrupt ruler should not be obeyed. Some of those who have opposed obeying the corrupt ruler are Mawardi in his book “Al-Ahkam al-Sultaniyyah, p17; ‘Abd al-Qahir Baghdadi in his book “Usul al-Din” p278; Ibn Hazm Zahiri in his book “Al-Fisal fi al-Millal wa al-Ahwa’ wa al-Nihal”; vol. 4, p. 175 and Jurjani in his book “Sharh al-Mawaqif”, vol. 8, p. 353.

Other opposing views are held by the Mu‘tazilites, the Khawarij, the Zaydis, and a number of other sects. They even say that it is incumbent to revolt against an oppressive ruler. They have resorted to the following Quranic verses to buttress their claim,
“… and help one another in goodness and piety…” Surah al-Ma’idah 5:2.

“… but if one of them acts wrongfully towards the other, fight that which acts wrongfully until it returns to Allah’s command…” Surah al-Hujurat 49:9.

“… My covenant does not include the unjust.” Surah al-Baqarah 2:124.

It can be understood from Quranic verses that the Imamate and caliphate are not bestowed upon or granted to oppressive and corrupt people, and that if the ruler is a corrupt man, it is not at all permissible to obey him. The following parts of the Quran will suffice to buttress our point: Surah al-Baqarah 2:124; Surah Yunus 10:35; Surah Hud 11:113; Surah al-Ma’idah 5:4; Surah al-Qalam 68:8; Surah al-Qalam 68:10; Surah al-Ahzab 33:48; Surah al-Shu‘ara’ 26:151,152; Surah Insan (or Jathiyah) 76:24; Surah al-Kahf 18:28.

We must realize that every hadith must be compared with the Holy Qur’an; if it is contradictory to the verses of the Holy Qur’an, it cannot be considered authentic because all Muslims believe the Holy Qur’an to be the final word on the matter.

Finally, there is obvious contradiction and disagreement between hadiths which prohibit following a corrupt ruler and those which say that it is incumbent to follow the Muslim ruler whether he is corrupt or not.

In accordance with the law of incongruity, the final judge is Allah’s Book, the Holy Quran: And the Quran will always be in support of revolting against a system that has failed the people in all materials particular: They were voted in thinking they would bring the desired change to our country, we hope the renewal of hope will not turn to a forlorn hope.

We look forward to reconfiguring the healthcare system, electricity, schools, and general welfare, since all these, they provide for themselves at the expense of the commonwealth. Upon all these, we hope the conclave will not renew the looting of our patrimony. Most important of all, we look forward to the reduction of poverty in the land.

Even the Holy Prophet proclaimed: “Any man who Allah has given the authority of ruling some people and he does not look after them in an honest manner, will never feel even the smell of Paradise.”

Barka Juma’at and a happy weekend.

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Islam

Friday Semon: Destiny and Fate Re-Examined

Published

1 week ago

September 22, 2023

Eric

By Babatunde Jose

What is the belief in destiny in Islam? That Allah has decreed all things from eternity. He knows what will happen, when it will happen, how it will happen, and He has written it and willed it. This includes the pettiest of human affairs.

Qadar literally means “power”, (J. M. Cowan (ed.) (1976). The Hans Wehr Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic. Wiesbaden, Germany) but translated variously as: fate, divine preordainment, predestination, divine decree, decree of Allah: Qadar is the concept of divine destiny in Islam. At the same time, human beings are responsible for their actions, and will be rewarded or punished accordingly on Judgement Day. There is therefore a contradiction and hence different schools of thought.

Predestination/Divine Destiny is one of Sunni Islam’s six articles of faith. Some early Islamic schools (Qadariyah and Mu’tazila) did not accept the doctrine of predestination; Mu’tazila argued that it was “unthinkable” that God “would punish man for what He himself had commanded” or preordained.

Qadariyah means will. This understanding says what happens to humans is a personal will. According to them, humans are fully responsible for their actions.

Predestination is not included in the Five Articles of Faith of Shi’i Islam. At least a few sources describe Shi’i Muslims as denying predestination, and at least one Shi’i scholar, Naser Makarem Shiraz, argues “belief in predestination is a denial of justice”.

Does a preordained power that we call destiny or fate control both the nature of the events that occur in our lives and the resulting planned or spontaneous actions we take? Contrary to popular belief…there are those who strongly believe that there is not!

In orthodox Islam, God’s control over what happens in his creation is absolute. “Allah has decreed all things from eternity”. He knows that they will happen, when they will happen, how they will happen, and “He has written that and willed it”. al-Qada’ wa’l-Qadar by Dr ‘Abd al-Rahmaan al-Mahmoud, p. 39.

“He knows what is in land and sea; not a leaf falls, but He knows it.” (Q.6:59).

But at the same time, human beings in their life on earth have the choice to do good or evil (Free will), are responsible for their actions, and will be rewarded or punished according to an eternal afterlife.

This poses the question, raised by the early Islamic rationalist Mu’tazila school of thought; if everything that has happened and will happen, including all acts of good and evil, has already been determined by God, doesn’t that mean that everything a human being does during their life is only following God’s decree? How can human beings be responsible for this, and even be punished with eternal torment in hell for it?

The question was/is not unique to Islam, and the debate over whether free will exists is not even limited to religion. According to Justin Parrott of the Islamic Yaqeen Institute, “it has been an important issue throughout history”, addressed by the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle over 2000 years ago. Orientalist Alfred Guillaume points out the dilemma “has exercised the minds” of theologians of all religions “which claim to present” a god that is both almighty and moral.

According to Maria De Cillis, “the apparently unsolvable conflict between the concepts of free will and determinism (or divine predetermination)” has not only been “a matter of great interest” but also of “heated controversy”, extending beyond academia and the ulama and into politics “by virtue of the repercussions that this debate has in a social context”.

For example, when tyrannical and corrupt authorities encourage fatalism towards tyranny and corruption by pointing out that these maladies are “divinely willed and preordained”. De Cillis, Maria (22 April 2022). “ISLAM. Muslims and Free Will”.

According to Justin Parrott, “the idea … that everything has already been decreed by the Creator from eternity and the “myriad of philosophical conundrums that arise” from the issue has caused some Muslims to experience doubts of faith. “Are we forced to do what we do, or are our choices meaningful?”

De Cillis writes that the issue was so sensitive, that the Prophet (SAW) allegedly taught believers to abstain from considerations about destiny (qadar), calling it ‘a deep sea, a dark path and God’s secret’.

One of the most authoritative Sunni intellectuals, the theologian and Sufi master, Abū Hamid al-Ghazali (d.1111), reports in his masterpiece, The Revival of the Religious Sciences, the tradition according to which Muhammad (SAW) … proclaimed: “Refrain from speaking about qadar.”

As a result, the scholars emphasized that providence is a secret of Allah and that “going too deeply into it philosophically” will lead to “misguidance”. The creed of Al-Tahawi warns “that providence” is such a secret that even God’s most obedient and holy creatures were not let in on the mystery.

The principle of providence is the secret of Allah Almighty in His creation that has not been given to an angel near Him, nor to a prophet or messenger. Exaggeration (al-ta’ammuq) and debate regarding it leads to failure, progressive denial, and a degree of transgression. Take every precaution against that kind of debate, thinking, and insinuation, warned the sages..

But one may say then, “What’s the use of striving in this life if we will get what is already decreed by God?” What is the essence of striving when the end state is already pre-ordained? The catch here is that that end, or preordainment is never known to man but only God. If it were known that I would be rich and famous, why would I make any effort. To this end, it is only God that knows the end state.

The answer to the conjectures above is very simple. Man cannot strive against the destiny that was not revealed to him. Therefore, because destiny is never revealed, life is a struggle against unknown fate. We struggle, pray, and supplicate because we are never sure of what our ‘ori’ has chosen. This therefore brings into question the related concept of fatalism.

What is this thing called fatalism and what role does it play in our lives?

Fatalism is a belief that things happen, and we have no choice but to accept the outcome of events.

Fatalism is a doctrine that stresses the complete control of all events or actions to fate or destiny, and is commonly associated with resignation, acceptance, conformity, concession, and submission.

Those who embrace fatalism believe that bad events cannot be avoided…and they are powerless to change the future. Thus they wallow in misery, poverty and impoverishment.

Fatalism is a false, misleading, dangerous, and manipulative premise. What will be is not necessarily what must be!

One does not have to be a prophet in any sense of the word however, to entertain a strong bias for action, self-reliance, and self-determination…and an intense dislike for fatalism, excuses, and subjugation. This exactly is the bane of our people when we resign our fate to the spiritual realm: God will deliver us from our clueless and thieving leaders. We congregate in churches and mosques to pray for deliverance when we should be on the barricade fighting for our freedom and emancipation.

“The Greek idea of fate is moira, which means “portion.” But there is more to life than just fate. There is also genetics, environment, economics, and so on. So, it’s not all written in the book before you get here, such that you don’t have to do anything. That’s fatalism.” — James Hillman

Fatalism is a tool of the weak, lazy, indolent and for those inflicted with a courage deficit … it’s their way of giving up, surrendering freedoms, and accepting the inevitable (without putting up a fight). Those who embrace fatalism believe that bad events cannot be avoided…and they are powerless to change the future. Yet, ‘when life gives you lemons, make lemonade’ – Dale Carnegie.

In retrospect, the various schools present a conundrum that could lead the enquirer to the warm embrace of atheism.

Perhaps it would suffice to hearken to the wise counselling of the Holy Prophet (SAW) that man should not dabble into concepts which are the exclusive preserve of Allah. Providence is a secret of Allah and “going too deeply into it philosophically” will lead to “misguidance.”

When people adhere to apocalyptic prophecies, they usually do so because they believe in predestiny.

But does predestiny really exist? For the sake of argument, let us assume that it does: at any given moment in the present, there is a future already created that is as solid and as real as any moment in the past or present. Perhaps time is not as linear as we have believed. If such a future already exists, does that mean that it is inevitable and must occur? No.

The point being made is that the future is shaped largely by intention backed by action: the stronger the intention and the better it is backed up by action, the more solid the future will tend to be.

Some people would argue that the true seer would foresee the future and predict our destiny. Prophecy has really only one value: as a tool to either change or ensure the future. The future is therefore malleable. A future reality, no matter how solid it is or how many prophets have agreed to its existence, can be changed.

It will be irreversible only if people continue to perform, or fail to perform, those actions which will cause that future to come about, and no one does anything effective enough to counter those actions or inactions.

This is exactly where we find ourselves today. Complacency and imperviousness to change which erroneously has been termed resilience; but truly, our ‘Mumu’ never end. The day it ends we will chart a new destiny for ourselves and our children.

Let the oppressed, pauperized, and impoverished gather their acts and struggle to remove the shackles of socio-economic impoverishment they have been subjected to over the ages. It is time to set the captives free. Poverty, destitution is not our destiny, we should resolve to shape the future.

Barka Juma’at and a happy weekend.

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Islam

Friday Sermon: Creation Revisited: A Summary

Published

2 weeks ago

September 15, 2023

Eric

By Babatunde Jose

In concluding the series on Creation Revisited, we affirm that not only does the existence of matter, of motion, and of life, testify that there is God, but the magnitude and magnificence of creation announce the same grand truth: the work reveals the Workman. (Quran 20:50) (Quran 13:3)

Three years ago, the world woke up to a momentous event with the landing of NASA’s Perseverance robot on Mars. Perseverance landed after a seven-month journey covering 300 million miles, traveling at unfathomable speeds of up to 12,000 miles per hour. Described as one of the most challenging technological feats human beings have ever attempted, it was made possible by the predictability of scientific facts and calculability of physical data and propulsion systems.

It was not a deed left to random or accidental happenstance. It reflected the facts made possible by the order in nature, speed of light, predictable distance, that engenders accurate mathematical calculations and geo-positioning. Man’s space odyssey could not have been possible if the facts of order in the universe kept changing at random. This order did not come about through chance, but a well-designed plan by a benevolent Creator. Order and not chaos or chance is what makes scientific advance possible. Order makes the world go round.

The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews indulged in no mere poetic rhapsody when he wrote, “Every house is builded by someone: but He who built all things is God.” Hebrews 3:4 Similar sentiments are expressed in Quran 13:2 See also (Quran 2:164).

Here on earth, we are confronted with phenomena, for which no explanation is adequate. There are incalculable hosts of creatures, varying in size from gnats to elephants, each requiring its regular food, the total amount of which for a single day defies human computation if not the imagination. From whence proceed such ample and unfailing supplies? Only one answer satisfactorily meets the case: from the living God! See (Psalm 104:14).

In July 2007 at a meeting with the clergy, Pope Benedict XVI noted that the conflict between “creationism” and evolution (as a finding of science) is “absurd”. He recognized the thesis and antithesis of the whole debate but added a clincher when he said: But on the other, the doctrine of evolution does not answer every query, especially the great philosophical question: where does everything come from? And how did everything start which ultimately led to man? I believe this is of the utmost importance.

Truly evolution has many questions unanswered and where new facts emerge to upturn existing paradigms, efforts are made to cover up, or discredit. Who built the pyramids of Egypt, South America, and Asia? Who built the ‘megaliths? Did supposedly stone-age civilization have the technologies to achieve such feats? At what time did man emerge in the natural order? Dates keep changing with unearthing of new discoveries that make nonsense of old dates. Sometimes evolutionists engage in deceits and hoax such as that of ‘Lucy’ the Ape-man touted as our progenitor.

Professor Reiner Protsch von Zieten was famous for finding missing links suggesting interbreeding of Neanderthals with humans-until he was exposed in 2005.

Fifteen to twenty years ago, palaeontologists were certain that Homo Erectus – the supposedly immediate human predecessor of Homo sapiens – first appeared in Africa around 1.5 million years ago. So, it was said, Europe itself remained unoccupied until about 500,000 years ago, while Homo sapiens sapiens was deemed to have first appeared there only about 35,000 years ago. A mere fifteen years later, the thinking is almost unrecognizably different, for Homo sapiens sapiens is now believed to have appeared at least 120,000 years ago, while southern England and Spain are known to have been occupied by human beings 1.5 to 1.8 million years ago…In addition to this, it is now admitted that the human brain has remained roughly the same size for at least 1.7 million years – John Gordon (Egypt: Child of Atlantis).

On a lighter note, it is very amazing to note that despite the saltiness of the seas, we still need to add salt to fish when cooking them. Allah be praised.

The clouds hold millions of tons of water – suspended in the Skies without any support. It is not by chance but by an immutable law which we cannot explain.

The baby antelope or baby giraffe starts walking immediately it is born; learns to run with the herd lest it becomes ‘Suya’ for predators. We can go on and on ad infinitum.

When God created nature and its laws, He gave man the latitude to develop on His Creation. That is why we have been able to make all the scientific discoveries and advances. Even cloning and hybridization of plants and animals were so ordained.

The air performs many functions for the good of mankind. While it covers us without any conscious weight, the air reflects, and thereby increases the life-giving heat of the sun. The air co-operates with our lungs, thereby ventilating the blood and refining the fluids of the body, stimulating secretions, and regulating our natural warmth. We could live for months without the light of the sun or the glimmering of a star, but if deprived of air for a very few minutes we quickly faint and die.

The atmosphere with such varied and beneficent adaptations, diffuses vitality and health, retains, and modifies solar heat, transmits odours, and conveys sound. Not by chance!

The air bladder which enables the fish in the water to increase or decrease their specific gravity could not have been a product of evolution, fishes were created with air bladders ab initio.

It is no accident of creation that fishes do not have ears. If God wanted them to hear, he would have given them; but they need them not.

One circumstance relating to the natives of the deep is very peculiar, they are obliged to plunder and devour one another for necessary subsistence. To compensate for this depletion, God made fishes very prodigious in their breeding. They spawn not by scores or hundreds, but by thousands and tens of thousands. Praise God!

In the Holy Qur’an, Allah calls our attention to his creations and appeals to us to study them closely in order that we may know that He is the Most Powerful, Most High, so that we can revere and worship Him. (Quran 7:174). (Quran 40:81)

Allah did not stop at these wonderful creatures, but He gave mankind the intellect to explore them to get benefits from them. (Quran 45:12-3)

African Disasters: Flood and Earthquake

Mediterranean Storm Daniel passed through eastern Libya last weekend of Sept. 9, bringing heavy rainfall and flooding that resulted in large-scale destruction. Daniel dropped so much rain on Libya’s northeast that two dams collapsed, sending water into already inundated areas. Derna is bisected by Wadi Derna, a seasonal river that runs south from the highlands and into the ocean through the city. During heavy rain caused by storm Daniel, two major dams collapsed upstream the Wadi Derna, causing a torrent of water to burst into the densely populated city centre. Half of the city was washed into the Mediterranean Sea. Up to 20,000 people are now feared dead. And thousands rebered destitute.

Earthquake in Marrakech: Over 3,000 killed in rare, powerful earthquake. The quake, Morocco’s strongest in more than a century, hit the country’s High Atlas Mountain range near Marrakech. The death toll has continued to climb in the wake of the rare and powerful 6.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Morocco last Friday night.

“As we pray for ourselves every day, let us remember our brothers and sisters in Libya and Morocco. . . .May Allah grant those who are dead Jannatul Firdaus and ease the pain of those in distress, shower His mercies on those of us in other areas so that we stay free from such calamities.” Aameen. – Hamza Jose

Barka Juma’at and a happy weekend.

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