Islam is NOT a political ideology, a political theology, a political system, a political venture, or a political empire. It is concerned only with the way Muslims practice their particular communal politics just as it is concerned with the way every Muslim practices his own particular politics in her own personal life.
Islam is a religion, a way of pursuing one’s personal life, continuously asserting while simultaneously acquiring deeper insights into ethics, principles, standards, morals, values, and qualities to attain in life.
A Muslim is one who witnesses the Shahadah, the assertion that God is One and Mohammad is His Prophet. After that he need not do anything more to remain in the fold of Islam. Whatever else he does or does not do is between him and God.
Shariah and Tariqah mean the same in Arabic i.e. "the way". The word Shariah has now come to denote Islamic Law but because Islam is meant for the Muslim for all time THEREFORE there is no fixed law in Islam. And THEREFORE, the Shariah changes not only with time and place but also with culture, knowledge, circumstance, belief, and intellect. And, THEREFORE the Shariah of one Muslim is NOT the Shariah of another Muslim. Pluralism is a cardinal ethic of Islam so that all people are free to choose their own ways,their own Shariah under Islam. THEREFORE, as the Tariqah (the Belief) so the Shariah (the Law).
However, the word Tariqah has come to denote the beliefs and traditions of the non-orthodox sects, the so-called heretic sects, in Islam. Well then know that I am a heretic, a non-believer in the so-called "Shariah-Islam" of the Muslim ulama, the so-called Muslim scholars, born and bred over a thousand years of medieval ignorance. Islam is indeterminate and no Muslim should be so arrogant and intolerant as to uphold his own particular Islam as the only Islam that must be followed by all Muslims leave alone all people everywhere. Indeed, there are ethics to be upheld in Islam but these are broad, general issues and their specificity is determined by the Muslim community concerned in time, place, culture, knowledge, circumstance, belief, and intellect.
Beliefs of human beings take place in 4 dimensions: 1. the material dimension 2. the emotional dimension 3. the intellectual dimension 4. the spiritual dimension When these four dimensions merge, a human being becomes a powerful force. When a whole community has these four dimensions merge, then we have a new world order. This did not happen in the time of Jesus of Nazareth. Had the Jews accepted the teachings and the leadership of Jesus as the Messiah then the Jews with the Jesus-ethic would have conquered the Romans emotionally, intellectually and spiritually long before the Roman Emperor Constantine became a Jesus-follower of his own accord three centuries later bringing the material power of the Roman Empire in tow. And then? In the 7th Century CE a man named Mohammad the Trustworthy (Al-Amin) began preaching a new belief system to the Pagan Arabs in the Arabian Peninsula. He was persecuted relentlessly and ex-communicated by his people, the pagan citizens of the Arabian city state of Mecca. He believed he had been called upon to deliver the Message (the Quran) from the nameless God Al-Lah (The God) of Arabian folklore. His belief gave him three qualities to an exceptional degree not given to any ordinary human being: 1. tenacity 2. fortitude 3. strength (in his physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual confrontations) His preaching was, in essence, similar to that of any other Biblical Prophet in that he emphasized ethics and ethical behavior. As he gained adherents and a base of operations, he then embarked into changing the traditions, the culture and the ethics of his people from that of pagans with NO belief in an hereafter to that of a people with: 1. Belief in the hereafter, 2. Belief in a Divine accounting of human action on this earth, and 3. In Divine intervention, whenever and however, Al Lah (God) decides according to His Will. The believer surrenders his own will to that of the One God and in so doing he becomes a Muslim, the one who surrenders his will; and his religion is then Islam, the religion of those who have surrendered their will to God. And then? And that gave rise to 1000 years of Muslim civilizations that ruled the known world from the 7th Century to the 15th Century and then huge parts of the world up to the 20th Century. So, you see, it all has to do with belief in the end.
Posts
