Islam

Islām (Arabic الإسلام, "submission (to God)") is a monotheistic faith and the world's second-largest religion. Followers of Islam, known as Muslims, believe that God (or, in Arabic, Allāh) revealed His Will to Muhammad (c. 570–632) and other prophets, including Adam, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus. However, that which was revealed to Muhammad was considered to be the final and ultimate revelation, and corrective of Jewish and Christian traditions. The Muslims hold that the main written record of revelation to mankind is the Qur'an.

In Arabic, Islām means "submission" and is described as a Dīn, meaning "way of life" and/or "religion." Etymologically, it is derived from the same root as, for example, Salām meaning "peace" (also a common salutation). The word Muslim is also related to the word Islām and means "one who surrenders" or "submits" to God, or a "vassal" of God.

Muslims hold that it is essentially the same belief as that of all the messengers sent by God to mankind since Adam, with the Qur'ān (the one definitive text of the Muslim faith) codifying the final revelation of God. Islam sees Judaism and Christianity as derivations of the teachings of certain of these prophets - notably Abraham - and therefore see them as fellow Abrahamic religions, and People of the Book. Unlike Christianity, Islam has not undergone any period of reformation

The basis of Muslim belief is found in the shahādatan ("two statements"): lā ilāhā illā-llāhu; muhammadur-rasūlu-llāhi — "There is no god but God; Muhammad is the messenger of God." One needs to recite and believe these statements in order to become a Muslim. All Muslims agree to this, and this is one of the five pillars of Islam.

Beliefs

Faisal Mosque, located in Islamabad, the capital city of Pakistan, was built in 1986. It is one of the largest mosques in Asia.

Six articles of belief

There are six basic beliefs shared by all Muslims:

• Belief in God, the one and only one worthy of all worship.
• Belief in the Angels.
• Belief in the Books (sent by God).
• Belief in all the Prophets and Messengers (sent by God).
• Belief in the Day of Judgment (Qiyamah) and in the Resurrection.
• Belief in Fate (Qadar)¹

The Muslim creed in English:

I believe in God; and in His Angels; and in His Scriptures; and in His Messengers; and in The Final Day; and in Fate, that Good and Evil are from God, and Resurrection after death be Truth.

I testify that there is nothing worthy of worship but God; and I testify that Muhammad is His Messenger.

God

Main article: Allah

The fundamental concept in Islam is the unity of God (tawhid). This monotheism is absolute, not relative or pluralistic in any sense of the word. God is described in Sura al-Ikhlas, (chapter 112) as follows: Say "He is God, the one, the Self-Sufficient master. He never begot, nor was begotten. There is none comparable to Him."

In Arabic, God is called Allah, a contraction of al-ilah or "the deity". Allāh thus translates to "God" in English; it is not grammatically a proper name, unlike the Israelite divine name Yahweh or the Christian usage of Jesus as a personal divine name. The implicit usage of the definite article in Allah linguistically indicates the divine unity. In spite of the different name used for God, Muslims assert that they believe in the same deity as the Judeo-Christian religions. However, Muslims disagree with the Christian theology concerning the unity of God (the doctrine of the Trinity and that Jesus is the eternal Son of God).

Although no Muslim visual images or depictions exist of God (because artistic depictions are considered idolatry), Muslims define God by the many divine attributes mentioned in the Qur'an. All but one Surah (chapter) of the Qur'an begins with the phrase "In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful". These are consequently the most important divine attributes in the sense that Muslims repeat them most frequently during their ritual prayers (called salah in Arabic).

Prophets

Main article: Prophets of Islam

File:Masjidnabawi.jpg

Masjid al-Nabawi in Medina. The mosque also has a tomb of prophet Muhammad and the first two caliphs, Abu Bakr and Umar ibn al-Khattab

The Qur'an speaks of God appointing two classes of human servants: messengers (rasul in Arabic), and prophets (nabi in Arabic and Hebrew). In general, messengers are the more elevated rank. All prophets are said to have spoken with divine authority; but only those who have been given a major revelation or message are called messenger. According to the Hadith, there are 124,000 messengers sent by Allah to different nations.

Notable messengers include Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad, all belonging to a succession of men guided by God. Islam demands that a believer accept all of the Judeo-Christian prophets, making no distinction between them. In the Qur'an, twenty five specific prophets are mentioned.

Muslims regard Muhammad as the 'Last Messenger' or the 'Seal of the Prophets' based on the canon.

Islamic law

Main article: Sharia

Muslims in Islamic societies have traditionally viewed Islamic law as essential to their religious outlook. For Muslims living in secular Western countries sharia ceases to be relevant as law, but remains a source of personal ethics (for example, the avoidance of pork and alcohol, and the use of Sharia-compliant banking services). The Qur'an is the foremost source of Islamic jurisprudence; the second is the Sunnah (the practices of the Prophet, as narrated in reports of his life). The Sunnah is not itself a text like the Qur'an, but is extracted by analysis of the Hadith (Arabic for "report") texts, which contain narrations of the Prophet's sayings, deeds, and actions of his companions he approved.

Religious authority

There is no official authority who decides whether a person is accepted to, or dismissed from, the community of believers, known as the Ummah ("Family"). Islam is open to all, regardless of race, age, gender, or previous beliefs. It is enough to believe in the central beliefs of Islam. This is formally done by reciting the shahada, the statement of belief of Islam, without which a person cannot be classed a Muslim. It is enough to believe and say that you are a Muslim, and behave in a manner befitting a Muslim to be accepted into the community of Islam.

Islamic eschatology

Main article: Islamic eschatology

Islamic eschatology is concerned with the Qiyamah (end of the world) and the final judgement of humanity. Like Christianity and some sects of modern Judaism, Islam teaches the bodily resurrection of the dead, the fulfillment of a divine plan for creation, and the immortality of the human soul; the righteous are rewarded with the pleasures of Jannah (Paradise, from the Hebrew pardes or orchard, also known as the garden of Heaven, from the Hebrew gan or garden), while the unrighteous are punished in Jahannam (a fiery Hell, from the Hebrew ge-hinnom or "valley of Hinnom"; usually rendered in English as Gehenna). A significant fraction of the Qur'an deals with these beliefs, with many hadith elaborating on the themes and details.

Other beliefs

Other beliefs include the Angels, the Jinns (a species of invisible beings), and the existence of magic (which is strictly forbidden).

The Five Pillars of Islam

The Five Pillars of Islam² is the term given to the five most fundamental aspects of Islam. These five pillars are different in the Shia and Sunni sects.

For the Sunni sect, the Five Pillars are the five most important obligations of a Muslim under Sharia law, and which devout Muslims will perform faithfully, believing them to be essential to pleasing Allah.

The Pilgrimage to Kaaba, Masjid al Haram, Mecca is one of the five pillars of Islam.

The Five Pillars of the Sunni sect are:

• The Testimony that there is none worthy of worship except God and that Muhammad is his messenger.
• Establishing of the five daily Prayers (salah).
• The Giving of Zakaah (charity), which is 2.5% of the net worth of possessions kept for more than a year, with few exemptions, for every Muslim whose wealth exceeds the nisab, and 10% or 20% of the produce from agriculture. This money or produce is distributed among the poor.
• Fasting from dawn to dusk in the month of Ramadan (sawm).
• The Pilgrimage (Hajj) to Mecca during the month of Dhul Hijjah, which is compulsory once in a lifetime for one who has the ability to do it.

The Qur'an

Main article: Qur'an

The Qur'an is the sacred book of Islam. It has also been called, in English, the Koran and the Quran. Qur'an is the currently preferred English transliteration of the Arabic original (قرآن); it means “recitation”.

Muslims believe that the Qur'an was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad by the Angel Gabriel on numerous occasions between the years 610 and Muhammad's death in 632. In addition to memorizing his revelations, his followers are said to have written them down on parchments, stones, bones, sticks, and leaves.

Muslims believe that the Qur'an available today is the same as that revealed to Prophet Muhammad and by him to his followers, who memorized his words.

Most Muslims regard the Qur'an with extreme veneration, wrapping it in a clean cloth, keeping it on a high shelf, and washing as for prayers before reading the Qur'an. The Qur'an is regarded as an infallible guide to personal piety and community life, and completely true in its history and science.

From the beginning of the faith, most Muslims believed that the Qur'an was perfect only as revealed in Arabic. Translations were the result of human effort and human fallibility, as well as lacking the inspired poetry believers find in the Qur'an. Translations are therefore only commentaries on the Qur'an, or "translations of its meaning", not the Qur'an itself.

Islamic view of Jews and Christians

Main article: People of the Book

The Qur'an uses the term People of the Book to include all monotheists, including Jews, Christians and Muslims. According to Islam, all nations were given a Messenger and guidance from Allah.

Exclusivistic thought in Islam

Muslims believe that Judaism and Christianity started out with the same message as Islam, but that eventually, due to their abandonment of adherence to strict monotheism, the followers of Moses earned God's anger (by worshipping the Golden Calf, mentioned in the Biblical account of Moses, and later Ezra) and the followers of Jesus went astray (by worshipping him). It is popularly held by the vast majority of Muslims that the Holy Tawrat (revelation given to Moses) and the Holy Injil (revelation given to Jesus Christ) have been corrupted over time and that the present day Bible and Torah share little or no resemblance to the original message. According to Islam, Muhammad was sent during a time of spiritual darkness and once the Qur'an was finally established, all past revelations were abrogated, making the Last Testament not only for the Arab nation but for all mankind until the Day of Judgement.

Some parts of the Qur'an attribute differences between Muslims and non-Muslims to tahref-ma'any, a "corruption of the meaning" of the words. In this view, the Jewish Bible and Christian New Testament are true, but the Jews and Christians misunderstood the meaning of their own Scripture, and thus need the Qur'an to clearly understand the will of God. However, other parts of the Qur'an make clear that many Jews and Christians used deliberately altered versions of their scripture, and had altered the word of God. The Quran clearly states that the necessary information which was written in the previous scriptures can also be found in the Quran: "And We have sent down to you (O Muhammad) the Book (this Qur’aan) in truth, confirming the Scripture that came before it and Mohaymin (trustworthy in highness and a witness) over it (old Scriptures). So judge among them by what Allah has revealed" [al-Maa’idah 5:48]

Historically, Islamic scholars have agreed that the Qur'an gives "People of the Book" special status, allowing those who live in Muslim lands (called dhimmi—protected people) to practice their own religions and to own property. People of the Book were not subject to certain Islamic rules, such as the prohibitions on alcohol and pork. Under the Islamic state, they were exempt from the draft, but were required to pay a tax known as jizyah, part of which went to charity and part to finance churches and synagogues. (They were, however, exempt from the zakat required of Muslims.)

One verse of the Qur'an says "God forbids you not, with regards to those who fight you not for [your] faith nor drive you out of your homes, from dealing kindly and justly with them; for God loveth those who are just." (Qur'an, 60:8), which is interpreted as a clear admonition not to be disrespectful or unkind to non-Muslims. According to a hadith, Muhammad said to his people "The one who murders a dhimmi [non-Muslim under protection of the state] will not smell the fragrance of Paradise, even if its smell was forty years travelling distance" [Sahih Ahmed].

The growth of Islam today

Based on the percentages published in the 2003 CIA factbook, Islam is the second largest religion in the world. According to the World Network of Religious Futurists, the U.S. Center for World Mission, and the controversial Samuel Huntington, Islam is growing faster numerically than any other religion; this growth is attributed to a higher birth rate, and a higher rate of conversion than other religions. In the U.S., more people convert to Islam than any other faith, especially amongst African Americans.

The religion of Islam brought by the Prophet Muhammad began in the Hejaz region of present-day Saudi Arabia in about 610, and now comprises 1.45 billion believers, 22.82% of the world's population. However, only 18% of Muslims live in the Arab world; a fifth is found in Sub-Saharan Africa, about 30% in the Indian subcontinental region of Pakistan, India and Bangladesh, and the world's largest single Muslim community (within the bounds of one nation) is in Indonesia. There are also significant Islamic populations in China, Europe (especially in the Mediterranean countries), Central Asia, and Russia. There are approximately 5 million Muslims in North America. The world population is growing at about 1.10% per year, but the percentage of Muslim population is increasing by 1.4% per year, mostly due to higher birth rate of African and Asian countries. If this is simply extrapolated, Islam may reach 2 billion adherents in 2020; it will not overtake Christianity before the 2030s, however, but since world population is projected to curb before that time, this estimate is unreliable. Birth rates in many Muslim countries have begun to decline, although more slowly than in other nations, which also may be a factor.

Religions based on Islam

The following groups call themselves Muslims, but are not considered Islamic by Muslims and Muslim authorities:

• The Ahmaddiya
• The Druze
• The Nation of Islam
• The Zikris

The following religions are said by some to have evolved or borrowed from Islam, but consider themselves independent religions with distinct laws and institutions:

• Babism
• Bahá'í Faith
• Yazidi

As to the questions of origins and relationship of the Baha'i Faith to Islam, the Muslim ecclesiatical courts in Egypt addressed this question directly during the 1920's. As of January 1926, their final ruling was that the Baha'i Faith was not a sect of Islam, but a clearly-defined, independantly-founded, Faith.

Some see Sikhism as a syncretic mix of Hinduism and Islam. However, its history lies in the social strife between local Hindu and Muslim communities. The philosophical basis of the Sikhs is deeply-rooted in Hindu metaphysics and certain philosophical practices. Sikhism also rejects image-worship and believes in one God, just like the Bhakti reform movement in Hinduism and also like Islam does. However, Sikhs are forbidden from practices such as eating ritually prepared meat (halal) that are central in Islam.

The following religions might have been said to have evolved from Islam, but are not considered part of Islam, and no longer exist:

• The religion of the medieval Berghouata
• The religion of Ha-Mim

See: Islam by country

See also

• List of Islamic and Muslim related topics
• List of Muslims
• Timeline of Islamic history
• Jihad
• Islamism
• Islamic economics

For more information, see the article entitled Sixth pillar of Islam.

References

• The Encyclopaedia of Islam
• The Koran Interpreted: a translation by A. J. Arberry, ISBN 0684825074
• Islam, by Fazlur Rahman, University of Chicago Press; 2nd edition (1979). ISBN 0226702812
• The Islamism Debate, Martin Kramer, University Press, 1997
• Liberal Islam: A Sourcebook, Charles Kurzman, Oxford University Press, 1998. ISBN 0195116224
• Progressive Muslims: On Justice, Gender and Pluralism Omid Safi, Oneworld Publications, Oxford, 2003. ISBN 1-85168-316-X
• The Challenge of Fundamentalism: Political Islam and the New World Disorder, Bassam Tibi, Univ. of California Press, 1998

Online academic sources

• Encyclopedia of Islam
• Resources for Studying Islam (Department of Islamic Studies, University of Georgia)
• Islamic Philosophy (Journal of Islamic Philosophy, University of Michigan)

Directories

• Links: Islam in Western Europe
• Links: Islam in South Asia
• Open Directory Project: Islam

Islam and the arts and sciences

• Islamic Architecture
• Islamic Art (Los Angeles County Museum of Art)
• Muslim Heritage (Foundation for Science Technology and Civilisation, UK)