Muhammad Saws Quotes

Seek knowledge from the Cradle to the Grave

I was brought up to believe that how I saw myself was more important than how others saw me.

Di zaman milenial ini, satu-satunya yang paling patut untuk kita idolakan dan kita cintai, adalah beliau yang hidup tanpa Facebook, Instagram atau Twitter, namun memiliki 1,7 milyar followers. Beliau, adalah Nabi Muhammad SAW.

I went to the West and saw Islam, but no Muslims; I got back to the East and saw Muslims, but not Islam.

The Prophet (SAW) said: 'Knowledge is only gained through learning and clemency is only gained through perseverance.

It is a great shame for anyone to listen to the accusation that Islam is a lie and that Muhammad was a fabricator and a deceiver. We saw that he remained steadfast upon his principles, with firm determination; kind and generous, compassionate, pious, virtuous, with real manhood, hardworking and sincere. Besides all these qualities, he was lenient with others, tolerant, kind, cheerful and praiseworthy and perhaps he would joke and tease his companions. He was just, truthful, smart, pure, magnanimous and present-minded; his face was radiant as if he had lights within him to illuminate the darkest of nights; he was a great man by nature who was not educated in a school nor nurtured by a teacher as he was not in need of any of this.

‏" كَانَ رَسُولُ اللهِ صلى الله عليه وسلم فَخْمًا مُفَخَّمًا ، يَتَلأْلأُ وَجْهُهُ ، تَلأْلُؤَ الْقَمَرِ لَيْلَةَ الْبَدْرِ" ‏

I felt like the Islamic scholar Muhammad Abduh (1849-1905), who said on his return from a trip to Europe to his homeland Egypt 'I saw no Muslims in Europe but I saw a lot of Islam,' and of his homeland 'There are a lot of Muslims here but no Islam.

The Most Excellent Jihad is the Conquest of One’s Self.

Nabi Muhammad SAW dipersetujui sebulat suara oleh semua umat Islam sebagai al-nabi al-ummi, nabi yang buta huruf. Namun demikian, sunnahnya lengkap dengan aphorisme dan tindakan-tindakan yang menguatkan konsep ilmu dalam al-Quran dan menjadi pencetus dan kuasa pendorong bagi pembangunan intelektual dan tamadun masa depan dalam Islam.

The Merciful is kind to those who are merciful. If you show compassion to your fellow creatures in this world, then those in heaven shall be compassionate toward you. -The Prophet Muhammad (SAW), as narrated by Abd'Allah bin Amr from "The Bounty of Allah

Apabila Allah SWT mencipta agama untuk panduan hamba-Nya, maka Dia tidak akan membiarkan Islam yang murni itu dalam keadaan hina-dina. Mudah bagi Allah SWT untuk membuka hati manusia supaya menerima agama-Nya, tetapi sengaja Allah SWT adakan suasana sukar sebagai gelanggang bagi Rasul-Nya dan orang-orang beriman berjuang mendapat anugerah Allah SWT.

O Allah, I take refuge in You from anxiety and sorrow, weakness and laziness, miserliness and cowardice, the burden of debts and from being over powered by men." (Prophet Muhammad SAW, narrated by al-Bukhari)

عَنِ الْحَسَنِ بْنِ عَلِيٍّ ، قَالَ : سَأَلْتُ خَالِي هِنْدَ بْنَ أَبِي هَالَةَ ، وَكَانَ وَصَّافًا ، عَنْ حِلْيَةِ رَسُولِ اللهِ ‏صلى الله عليه وسلم ، وَأَنَا أَشْتَهِي أَنْ يَصِفَ لِي مِنْهَا شَيْئًا أَتَعَلَّقُ بِهِ ‏

whereas the Arabs were in favour of the man but against the message, the Jews were in favour of the message but against the man. For how could God send a Prophet who was not one of the chosen people? None the less, when the pilgrims brought news of the Prophet to Yathrib, the Jews were interested despite themselves and eagerly questioned them for more details; and when the Arabs of the oasis sensed this eagerness, and when they saw how the monotheistic nature of the message increased the interest of the rabbis tenfold, they could not fail to be impressed, as were the bearers of the tidings themselves.

- The Azan story - The five daily ritual prayers were regularly performed in congregation, and when the time for each prayer came the people would assemble at the site where the Mosque was being built. Everyone judged of the time by the position of the sun in the sky, or by the first signs of its light on the eastern horizon or by the dimming of its glow in the west after sunset; but opinions could differ, and the Prophet felt the need for a means of summoning the people to prayer when the right time had come. At first he thought of appointing a man to blow a horn like that of the Jews, but later he decided on a wooden clapper, ndqiis, such as the Oriental Christians used at that time, and two pieces of wood were fashioned together for that purpose. But they were never destined to be used; for one night a man of Khazraj, 'Abd Allah ibn Zayd, who had been at the Second 'Aqabah, had a dream whieh the next day he recounted to the Prophet: "There passed by me a man wearing two green garments and he carried in his hand a ndqiis, so I said unto him: "0 slave of God, wilt thou sell me that naqusi" "What wilt thou do with it?" he said. "We will summon the people to prayer with it," I answered. "Shall I not show thee a better way?" he said. "What way is that?" I asked, and he answered: "That thou shouldst say: God is most Great, Alldhu Akbar." The man in green repeated this magnification four times, then each of the following twice: I testify that there is no god but God; I testify that Muhammad is the messenger of God; come unto the prayer; come unto salvation; God is most Great; and then once again there is no god but God. The Prophet said that this was a true vision, and he told him to go to Bilal, who had an excellent voice, and teach him the words exactly as he had heard them in his sleep. The highest house in the neighbourhood of the Mosque belonged to a woman of the clan of Najjar, and Bilal would come there before every dawn and would sit on the roof waiting for the daybreak. When he saw the first faint light in the east he would stretch out his arms and say in supplication: "0 God I praise Thee, and I ask Thy Help for Quraysh, that they may accept Thy religion." Then he would stand and utter the call to prayer.

So it is with Moslem women and their veils,’ Michelangelo said. ‘When they saw Muhammad’s wives wearing veils, they sought to imitate them, and so now nearly all Islamic women wear veils even though there is no stipulation in their Holy Koran that they do so.

In after-years he would tell of an incident that took place at one of their encampments: "We were with the Prophet when a Companion brought in a fledgling that he had caught, and one of the parent birds came and threw itself into the hands of him who had taken its young. I saw men's faces full of wonderment, and the Prophet said: 'Do ye wonder at this bird? Ye have taken its young, and it hath thrown itself down in merciful tenderness unto its young. Yet I swear by God, Your Lord is more merciful unto you than is this bird unto its fledgling. And he told the man to put back the young bird where he had found it. He also said: "God hath a hundred mercies,and one of them hath He sent down amongst jinn and men and cattle and beasts of prey. Thereby they are kind and merciful unto one another, and thereby the wild creature inclineth in tenderness unto her offspring. And ninety-nine mercies hath God reserved unto Himself, that therewith He may show mercy unto His slaves on the day of the Resurrection.

With astonishing consistency, the people of Kültepe and Duttepe all saw the same figures in their dreams at regular intervals: Boys: the female primary-school teacher Girls: Atatürk Men: the Holy Prophet Muhammad Women: a tall, anonymous Western film star Old men: an angel drinking milk Old women: a young postman bringing good news

In the United States I saw how the market liberates the individual and allows people to be free to make personal choices. But the biggest drawback was that the market always pushes things to the side of the powerful. I thought the poor should be able to take advantage of the system in order to improve their lot. Grameen is a private-sector self-help bank, and as its members gain personal wealth they acquire water-pumps, latrines, housing, education, access to health care, and so on. Another way to achieve this is to let abusiness earn profit that is then txed by the government, and the tax can be used to provide services to the poor. But in practice it never works that way. In real life, taxes only pay for a government bureaucracy that collects the tax and provides little or nothing to the poor. And since most government bureaucracies are not profit motivated, they have little incentive to increase their efficiency. In fact, they have a disincentive: governments often cannot cut social services without a public outcry, so the behemoth continues, blind and inefficient, year after year.

The jealous and the foolish ones thought that they won after Prophet Muhammad [S.A.W.] had gone from Mecca to Medina! In history, they are only known as the evil conspirators but Hazrat Muhammad [S.A.W.] is the last prophet and the greatest human being!

The best of you in Jahiliyyah are the best of you in Islam, as long as they have understanding.” [Prophet Muhammad (SAWS

In the United States I saw how the market liberates the individual and allows people to be free to make personal choices.

Tie your camel and rely on God: Prophet Muhammad (saw)

Sheikh Ali Bin Haiti’s Dream Once al-Ghawth al-A’zam Sheikh Abdul Qadir Jilani (r.a) was delivering a lecture. Sheikh Ali bin Haiti (r.a) was seated in front of Sheikh Abdul Qadir Jilani (r.a) in this gathering. During the lecture of the great Ghawth, Sheikh Ali bin Haiti (r.a) fell asleep. Sheikh Abdul Qadir Jilani (r.a), who saw this, descended from the Mimbar and stood in front of the sleeping Sheikh Ali bin Haiti (r.a) with both his hands folded in respect. After a while Sheikh Ali bin Haiti (r.a) awoke to find Sheikh Abdul Qadir Jilani (r.a) standing in front of him. He immediately stood up in respect. Sheikh Abdul Qadir Jilani (r.a) smiled and said, “The reason I am standing in front of him is because he was seeing the Holy Prophet Muhammad ﷺ in his dream and I was seeing the Prophet ﷺ with my physical eyes.

Its real deity, I saw, was no longer of a spiritual kind: it was Comfort. No doubt that there were still many individuals who felt and thought in religious terms and made the most desperate efforts to reconcile their moral beliefs with the spirit of their civilization, but they were only exceptions. The average European - whether democrat or communist, manual worker or intellectual - seemed to know only one positive faith: the worship of material progress, the belief that there could be no other goal in life than to make that very life continually easier or, as the current expression went, 'independent of nature'. The temples of faith were the gigantic factories, cinemas, chemical laboratories, dance halls, hydroelectric works; and its priests were the bankers, engineers, politician, film starts, statisticians, captains of industry, record airmen, and commissars.

Three things follow the dead person to his grave, two of which return and one of which remains with him. His family money and deeds accompany him to the grave, then his family and wealth return and his deeds stay with him.

Sabda-sabda beliau bukanlah sekedar syair-syair maupun kata-kata hikmah sehingga tidak ada penyair dan pujangga yang bisa menyamainya. Perkataan yang terlontar mengandung makna yang sampai pada hakikatnya, karena keluar dari bibir yang di belakangnya ada pikiran, yang di belakangnya ada hati, yang di belakangnya ada iman, dan yang di belakangnya ada Allah. Itulah perkataan yang tiada tercecer dan mubadzir, tidak ada pertentangan dan penyimpangan, karena semuanya mengandung faidah dan sesuai dengan fitrah kita.

However, medieval Islam did not display interest in all aspects of Greco-Roman civilization: Islam remained inimical to classical art, drama, and narrative. Moreover, as we saw in chapter 1, during the early Muslim conquests there was a conscious destruction of the monuments of the pre-Islamic past. And in Spain, historian al-Andalusi tells us that such rulers as the Umayyad Abd Allah (888–912) and the dictator Muhammad Ibn Abu Amir al-Mansur (c. 938–1002, known to Christians as Almanzor) had precious books of ancient Greek and Latin poetry, lexicography, history, philosophy and law burned for their presumably impious content.

One thing was for sure: I had no interest in questioning whether Islam was inherently a religion of peace or one of war, whether the terrorists had misappropriated an innocent faith or the liberal Muslims were only in denial of what Islam actually taught. I'd never claim to know what "true" Islam stood for; religions were too big to make it that simple, there was too much history and too many verses, and everyone just took the parts that they wanted anyway. For a prophet's message to become what they call a world religion, it'd have to be big enough to accommodate all kinds of personalities. Good ones, mean ones, greedy ones, kind ones, hard ones, soft ones, and they all own Islam as much as it owns them. The water has no shape; it's shaped by the bottle. I could see that as a Muslim, contrasting Qari Saheb's sweetness with that maniac Rushdie, and I even saw it with Catholics in Geneva, between sweet Gramps and that dickhead monsignor or Fat Ed.

قال أبو عيسى محمد بن سورة الترمذيّ حَدَّثَنَا مَحْمُودُ بْنُ غَيْلانَ ، قَالَ : حَدَّثَنَا مُعَاوِيَةُ بْنُ هِشَامٍ ، قَالَ : حَدَّثَنَا سُفْيَانُ ، عَنِ الأَعْمَشِ ، عَنِ إِبْرَاهِيمَ ، عَنْ عُبَيْدَةَ ، عَنْ عَبْدِ اللَّهِ بْنِ مَسْعُودٍ ، قَالَ : قَالَ لِي رَسُولُ اللَّهِ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ : " اقْرَأْ عَلَيَّ " فَقُلْتُ : يَا رَسُولَ اللَّهِ ، أَقْرَأُ عَلَيْكَ وَعَلَيْكَ أنزل ، قَالَ : " إِنِّي أُحِبُّ أَنْ أَسْمَعَهُ مِنْ غَيْرِي " ، فَقَرَأْتُ سُورَةَ النِّسَاءِ ، حَتَّى بَلَغْتُ ( وَجِئْنَا بِكَ عَلَى هَؤُلاءِ شَهِيدًا ) سورة النساء آية 41 ، قَالَ : فَرَأَيْتُ عَيْنَيْ رَسُولِ اللَّهِ تَهْمِلانِ " صححه الألباني

Certainly, Muhammad understood that there were distinct theological differences between Islam and the other Peoples of the Book. But he saw these differences as part of the divine plan of God, who could have created a single Ummah if he had wanted to but instead preferred that “every Ummah have its own Messenger” (10:47).

Semua bidang keahlian khusus yang diajarkan di semua fakultas itu sekunder. Yang primer, yang utama adalah bagaimana seseorang menjadi manusia. Seseorang menjadi dokter itu sekunder, menjadi insinyur itu sekunder, jadi presiden itu sekunder, karena yang nomor satu adalah menjadi manusia. Apakah manusia itu? Tanya pada yang buat manusia, begitu mestinya. Untuk bisa bertanya pada yang membuat manusia, dekat-dekatlah dengan orang yang paling dekat dengan yang membuat manusia, sekaligus dekat dengan ciptaan-Nya, yaitu Nabi Muhammad SAW. Karena Nabi Muhammad sangat dekat dengan Allah, sangat dicintai oleh Allah, ya, kita belajar pada manusia Muhammad. (h.26)

Ya Rasulullaah, apa yang menghalangi tuan? Demi Allah, aku tidak meninggalkan satu majelis pun dimana aku pernah duduk di sana dalam keadaan kafir, kecuali aku datangi untuk kemudian aku tunjukkan di sana ke-Islam-anku tanpa rasa khawatir dan takut. Bisakah kita tidak menyembah Allah secara sembunyi-sembunyi lagi...?" -Umar bin Khattab ra

Where establishment Islam was becoming less tolerant, seeing the Quran as the only valid scripture and Muhammad’s religion as the one true faith, Sufis went back to the spirit of the Quran in their appreciation of other religious traditions. Some, for example, were especially devoted to Jesus, whom they saw as the ideal Sufi since he had preached a gospel of love.

As the Tawrat [Torah], the Zabur [The Psalms of David], the Injil [Gospel] and the Quran are divine books, the Veda [written in about 1200 B.C.] also has divine elements in it. For example, just like the Bible [in the book of Isaiah, chapter 29, verse 12], there is prophesy in the Veda [in Atharvaveda, book 20, Hymn 127, verses 1-13] about the arrival of the final Messenger of God, Prophet Muhammad (S.A.W.)!

Seorang laki-laki dengan tergesa-gesa datang kepada Amirul Mukminin, Umar bin Khattab ra, ia berkata: "Wahai Amirul Mukminin, aku melihat si fulan dan fulanah saling berpelukan di belakang pohon kurma." Umar langsung mencengkram kerah bajunya, mengambil tongkatnya dan memukul laki-laki itu dengan tongkat tersebut satu kali.. "Mengapa engkau tidak menutupinya dan engkau berharap dia akan bertaubat?", tegas Umar bin Khattab ra. " Sesungguhnya Rasulullaah SAW pernah bersabda, 'Barangsiapa yang menutupi aib seseorang di dunia, niscaya Allah akan menutupi aibnya di dunia dan akhirat.'" Di lain waktu Umar bin Khattab ra, berkata: "Beginilah seharusnya kalian berbuat, jika kalian melihat saudara kalian tergelincir langkahnya maka tutupilah dan tolonglah serta berdo'alah kepada kepada Allah agar Dia berkenan mengampuni dosanya. Dan janganlah kalian menjadi pembantu setan untuk mencelakakannya.

The basic process of climbing a mountain was therapeutic, almost cathartic. There was the simple act of walking into the woods and away from the world. Then there was the climb itself, where the body worked: muscles flexed and released, lungs rose and fell, the heart beat. It was as if the complications in my life were breaking down and the only thing I cared about was the next place I'd put my foot or finding something to hold to pull myself up. After all that work to get to the summit came that views from the top. The failed Catholic in me saw it as a spiritual journey, much like the ones any holy man had made in leaving behind society. Christ, Buddha, Muhammad - they all did it, and they came back with clarity. For me the climb was my confession, working out the troubles of my past. Sitting on top was communion. On each hike I allowed myself to be pulled apart and then put back together again.

قال الإمام أبو عيسى محمد بن سَوْرَة الترمذي حَدَّثَنَا مُحَمَّدُ بْنُ إِسْمَاعِيلَ ، قَالَ : حَدَّثَنَا عَبْدُ اللَّهِ بْنُ صَالِحٍ ، قَالَ : حَدَّثَنَا مُعَاوِيَةُ بْنُ صَالِحٍ ، عَنْ يَحْيَى بْنِ سَعِيدٍ ، عَنْ عَمْرَةَ ، قَالَتْ : قِيلَ لِعَائِشَةَ : مَاذَا كَانَ يَعْمَلُ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ فِي بَيْتِهِ ؟ قَالَتْ : " كَانَ بَشَرًا مِنَ الْبَشَرِ ، يَفْلِي ثَوْبَهُ ، وَيَحْلُبُ شَاتَهُ ، وَيَخْدُمُ نَفْسَهُ " . صححه الألباني رحمه الله .

Izinkan kita menggunakan analogi azan. Kita semua maklum bahawa azan sebagai suatu praktis keagamaan tetap bergema sejak dari Bilal r.a. dipilih Rasulullah saw melaungkannya sehinggalah ke hari ini. Azan adalah "religious presence" yang tidak dapat dikalah dan disenyapkan. Nada kesaksian (pengakuan akidah mempercayai Tuhan Yang Maha Esa serta keRasulan Muhammad) anjuran, peringatan dan harapan, semuanya terkandung dalam azan. Ia bukan saja dilaungkan pada masuknya setiap waktu solat, juga dikala suka dan duka umat Muhammad. Meskipun mungkin banyak yang tidak menunaikan solat tadi, azan tetap akan berkumandang, tanpa takut, tanpa segan dan tanpa ragu. Inilah simbol kehadiran, kesungguhan dan harapan ("religious presence"). Dan harapan dari praktis agama inilah yang akan menguatkan kita yang mahu menggerakkan visi profetis ( visi keRasulan ) bagi melawan nyahkemanusiaan (de-humanization ) , dengan kesaksian kita untuk bertakwa kepada Tuhan Yang Maha Esa.

1:315-316 WHITE-BIRD SENTENCES In my dream large white birds, larger than geese, were flying. As they flew, they were praising. I understood the bird-language. One was saying, I praise you in all circumstances, and another was saying the same in other words, and another in yet other phrasing, but I could not remember what I should say. I interpret this dream to be telling me to be continuously grateful, no matter what, in my waking life, and also to remember that there are a hundred thousand ways to praise. These white-bird sentences begin in nonexistence, where creation makes entity from nonentity. What flows through us as praise comes from where Moses and Jesus are standing with the other friends of God. Another night in the state between waking and sleep I saw a gazelle coming toward me with an open mouth. It put my whole head in its mouth and turned its lips in arcs around my forehead and chin and the sides of my head. The gazelle-maw got larger and larger. It could have swallowed my whole body. About to lose consciousness, I began to chant, No power but yours, no power but yours.... The strange malevolence that was trying to devour me went away. Peace came. Now I know how epileptics feel. In another dream I was eating salty food. My gums became brackish. I woke with a salt taste in my mouth. Events happen here that no one records. Universes overlap. We are led in ways we will never understand. It should not surprise anyone when the angel Gabriel comes and take Muhammad away in an instant. Someone asked, If the commands of God are preeminent, then what choice do we really have in life? Between the words preeminent and commands lies a great mystery. The divine essence is not like anything, nor can we examine it or its effects. Try to trace to a source just one thing that has ever come to you. Now imagine you are blind from birth and that you have never seen this world or recognized any of its meanings.

Radicals have value, at least; they can move the center. On a scale of 1 to 5, 3 is moderate, 1 and 5 the hardliners. But if a good radical takes it up to 9, then 5 becomes the new center. I already saw it working in the American Muslim community. For years women were neglected in mosques, denied entrance to the main prayer halls and relegated to poorly maintained balconies and basements. It was only after a handdful of Muslim feminists raised "lunatic fringe" demands like mixed-gender prayers with men and women standing together and even women imams giving sermons and leading men in prayer that major organizations such as ISNA and CAIR began to recognize the "moderate" concerns and deal with the issue of women in mosques. I've taken part in the woman-led prayer movement, both as a writer and as a man who prays behind women, happy to be the extremist who makes moderate reform seem less threatening. Insha'Allah, what's extreme today will not be extreme tomorrow.

Ibn-Ishaq tells how it happened: “When Muhammad saw that his own people turned their backs on him, he was pained by their estrangement from what he brought them from God, and longed for a message that would reconcile him with his own people. He would gladly have seen those things that bore down harshly on them softened, so much so that he kept saying it to himself, fervently wishing for such an outcome. Then God revealed Sura 53, beginning with ‘By the star when it sets, your comrade does not err, nor is he deceived, nor does he speak out of his own caprice.’ But when Muhammad reached the words ‘Have you thought on Lat and Uzza, and the third one, Manat?’10 Satan added this upon his tongue: ‘These are the three great exalted birds, and their intercession is desired indeed.’” And here they were: the infamous Satanic Verses. The three “daughters of God” were no longer false gods, but giant high-flying birds covering the earth with their wingspans, graced with the power to intercede for those who worshipped them. The moment Muhammad recited these newly revealed verses in the Kaaba precinct, the response was overwhelmingly positive. “When they heard them, people rejoiced and were delighted,” ibn-Ishaq

We had stopped for our noon prayer. As I washed my hands, face and feet from a waterskin, a few drops spilled over a dried-up tuft of grass at my feet, a miserable little plant, yellow and withered and lifeless under the harsh rays of the sun. But as the water trickled over it, a shiver went through the shrivelled blades, and I saw how they slowly, tremblingly, unfolded. A few more drops, and the little blades moved and curled and then straightened themselves slowly, hesitantly, tremblingly... I held my breath as I poured more water over the grass tuft. It moved more quickly, more violently, as if some hidden force were pushing it out of its dream of death. Its blades - what a delight to behold!

Certainly Aisha never saw herself as merely a means of political alliance, let alone as just one wife among many. In fact if there was one thing she would insist on all her life, it was her exceptionality. There was the age at which she had married Muhammad, to start with. She had been a mere child, she’d maintain: six years old when she was betrothed and nine years old when the marriage was celebrated and consummated. Few disputed her claim in her lifetime; indeed, few people cared to dispute with her at all. As one of Islam’s most powerful politicians would remember years later, “There was never any subject I wished closed that she would not open, or that I wished open that she would not close.

Terkadang kelompok yang anti madzhab menggugat kita dengan pendapat sang pendiri madzhab atau para ulama dalam madzhab yang kita ikuti, seakan-akan mereka lebih konsisten dari kita dalam bermadzhab. Kaum Wahhabi ketika menggugat kita agar meninggalkan tahlilan dan selamatan tujuh hari selalu beralasan dengan pendapat al-Imam as-Syafi'i yang mengatakan bahawa hadiah pahala bacaan al-Qur'an tidak akan sampai kepada mayit, atau pendapat kitab I'anah al-Thalibin yang melarang acara selamatan tahlilan selama tujuh hari. Padahal selain al-Imam as-Syafi'i menyatakan sampai. Kita kadang menjadi bingung menyikapi mereka. Terkadang mereka menggugat kita karena bermadzhab, yang mereka anggap telah meninggalkan al-Qur'an dan Sunnah. Dan terkadang mereka menggugat kita dengan pendapat imam madzhab dan apra ulama madzhab. Padahal mereka sering menyuarakan anti madzhab. Pada dasarnya kelompok anti madzhab itu bermadzhab. Hanay saja madzhab mereka berbeda dengan madzhab mayoritas kaum Muslimin. Ketika mereka menyuarakan anti tawassul, maka sebenarnya mereka mengikut pendapat Ibn Taimiyah dan Ibn Abdil Wahhab al-Najdi. Sedangkan kaum Muslimin yang bertawassul, mengikuti Rasulullah SAW, para sahabat, seluruh ulama salaf dan ahli hadits. Ketika mereka menyuarakan shalat tarawih 11 raka'at, maka sebenarnya mereka mengikut pendapat Nashiruddin al-Albani, seorang tukang jam yang beralih profesi menjadi muhaddits tanpa bimbingan seorang guru, dengan belajar secara otodidak di perpustakaan. Sedangkan kaum Muslimin yang tarawih 23 raka'at, mengikuti Sayidina Umar, para sahabat dan seluruh ulama salaf yang saleh yang tidak diragukan keilmuannya. Ketika mereka menyuarakan anti madzhab, maka sebenarnya mereka mengikut Rasyid Ridha, Muhammad Abduh dan Ibn Abdil Wahhab. Sedangkan kaum Muslimin yang bermadzhab, mengikuti ulama salaf dan seluruh ahli hadits. Demikian pula ketika mereka menyuarakan anti bid'ah hasanah, makas ebenarnya mereka mengikuti madzhab Rasyid Ridha dan Ibn Abdil Wahhab al-Najid. Sedangkan kaum Muslimin yang berpendapat adanya bid'ah hasanah, mengikuti Rasulullah SAW, Khulafaur Rasyidin, para sahabat, ulama salaf dan hali hadits.

Recognizing Muhammad Before Muhammad appeared in form, there were scriptural references. People imagined how he would be and called on his presence in battle and sickness. They had thoughts and language about Muhammad. What good was that? Not everyone recognizes Muhammad. Many have a conception of him they can stand to live with. They don't know that if the shadow of Muhammad's true form falls across a wall, the wall will bleed! And it will no longer have two sides! What a blessing to be one thing. When others saw Muhammad, their awe evaporated, as counterfeit coins turn black in the flame. There are false coins who claim they want to be tested, all bravado. And there are touchstones that do not reveal impostors. There are mirrors that hide your flaws. Avoid hypocritical praise, and keep away from flattering mirrors, if you possibly can.

Agama Islam, suatu agama yang telah pernah menakhlukan dunia, telah dua kali membangun imperium yang kalaulah tidak meluas sejagad, setidak-tidaknya di bawah suatu panji politik tunggal telah menyatukan seluruh atau bagian terbesar rakyat-rakyat yang telah menerima seruan (Nabi) Muhammad (SAW). Imperium pertama di bawah Harun Al Rasyid, sezaman dengan kerajaan Karel Agung. Karena akar persatuannya kurang mendalam, kerajaan ini telah kehilangansseluruh esksistensinya, kecuali eksistensi di bibir saja, jauh sebelum penghapusan secara formal oleh orang Mongol dengan penggarongan kota Baghdad di tahun 1258. Mengenai kerajaan besar Islam kedua, yaitu kerajaan Utsmaniah, kerontokan berangsur-angsur dan kehancurannya dalam 1918 akibat Perang Dunia I, di dunia Timur telah meninggalkan suatu kehampaan politik yang sampai kini, tiga puluhlima tahun kemudian belum terisi - Jacques Duchesne Guillemin

After the loss of so much of the learning of the past, the destruction of manuscripts and the slaughter of scholars, it was more important to recover what had been lost than to inaugurate more change. Because the Mongol military code made no provision for civil society, the ulama continued to govern the lives of the faithful, and their influence tended to be conservative. Where Sufis such as Rumi believed that all religions were valid, by the fourteenth century the ulama had transformed the pluralism of the Quran into a hard communalism, which saw other traditions as irrelevant relics of the past. Non-Muslims were forbidden now to visit the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, and it became a capital offence to make insulting remarks about the Prophet Muhammad. The trauma of the invasions had, not surprisingly, made Muslims feel insecure. Foreigners were not only suspect; they could be as lethal as the Mongols.

QUEEN OF THE SAND "Oh father, behold the desert queen" and I looked and I saw an inscription but age deprived my understanding. My daughter cried out, "Oh father, King of the Desert, behold she who bears my name". Then I realise it was Zara Muhammad The Queen of the Sand. The mercy of princesses. The sons delight and the father's pride. Oh daughter of Arab, what bringeth thou thee to the Kingdom were daughters are enthroned, where women rule, and where the sons of men marvel at the beauty of the stars. The Sand Queen replied, "It the glory every daughter of the Sand has spoken of brought me this far" "What glory, oh Adored Zara?" I asked and she roared with voice of a bird rejoicing over showers of seeds and she said "You my Lord and King, for your beauty has reached the ends of the world" It was then I realise that this poem was written not only for Zara Muhammed but also for Zara Vote and Victor Vote. Greetings of great Great Zara, Queen of the Sand. Poem by Victor Vote for Zara Muhammed

The traumatic aspect of drinking ayahuasca is that in order to heal yourself, you must first confront the wound; by forcing you to deal with your own inner garbage, ayahuasca shows you things about yourself that you might not want to see. I wish that a whole country could drink ayahuasca—not merely every individual citizen of a country, but the country itself, the spirit of the country. I wish that a flag could drink ayahuasca, that we could just fold the Stars and Stripes into the shape of a cup, pour in the tea, and transport Uncle Sam into another dimension. He’d have to fight his way out of some nightmares, but he’d be cleansed. What would he find? William S. Burroughs wrote that when you drink ayahuasca, “The blood and substance of many races, Negro, Polynesian, Mountain Mongol, Desert Nomad, Polyglot Near East, Indian—new races as yet unconceived and unborn, combinations not yet realized—pass through your body.” When Burroughs drank, he actually saw himself transformed into both a black man and a black woman. What if some freedom-hating narcoterrorists snuck into the Fox News studios and put ayahuasca in Sean Hannity’s coffee, just before he went live? What would be the day’s fair and balanced news for America? If America drank ayahuasca and then withdrew into the filthy pit of its own heart, confronting all its fears and hate and finally purging itself of that negative energy, maybe America would come out Muslim: sucked through a black hole by the Black Mind, young Latter-Day Saint crackers with smooth cheeks, short-sleeved white shirts, and name tags confront nightmarish visions of getting swallowed whole by giant grotesque “Jolly Nigger” coin banks and then find themselves vomited back up as Nubian Islamic Hebrews in turbans and robes selling incense on the subways. The “God Hates Fags” pastor, eyes wild with a new passion for Allah, boards a helicopter to drop thousands of Qur’ans upon the small towns below. I want to see ayahuasca’s vine goddess clean out America’s poison. But what would happen if a religion could drink the vine? What if I poured ayahuasca into my Qur’an?

Social life was similarly affected by the teachings of the Koran. At a time when in Christian Europe an epidemic was regarded as a scourge of God to which man had but to submit meekly - at that time, and long before it, the Muslims followed the injunction of their Prophet which directed them to combat epidemics by segregating the infected towns and areas. And at a time when even the kings and nobles of Christendom regarding bathing as an almost indecent luxury, even the poorest of Muslim houses had at least one bathroom, while elaborate public baths were common in every Muslim city (in the ninth century, for instance, Córdoba had three hundred of them): and all this in response to the Prophet’s teaching that ‘Cleanliness is part of faith’. A Muslim did not come into conflict with the claims of spiritual life if he took pleasure in the beautiful things of material life, for, according to the Prophet, ‘God loves to see on His servants an evidence of His bounty’. In short, Islam gave a tremendous incentive to cultural achievements which constitute one of the proudest pages in the history of mankind; and it gave this incentive by saying Yes to the intellect and No to obscurantism, Yes to action and no to quietism, Yes to life and No to ascetism. Little wonder, then, that as soon as it emerged beyond the confines of Arabia, Islam won new adherents by leaps and bounds. Born and nurtured in the world-contempt of Pauline and Augustinian Christianity, the populations of Syria and North Africa, and a little layer of Visigothic Spain, saw themselves suddenly confronted with a teaching which denied the dogma of Original Sin and stressed the inborn dignity of earthly life: and so they rallied in ever-increasing numbers to the new creed that gave them to understand that man was God’s vicar on earth. This, and not a legendary ‘conversion at the point of the sword’, was the explanation of Islam’s amazing triumph in the glorious morning of its history. It was not the Muslims that had made Islam great: it was Islam that had made the Muslims great. But as soon as their faith became habit and ceased to be a programme of life, to be consciously pursued, the creative impulse that underlay their civilisation waned and gradually gave way to indolence, sterility and cultural decay.

As soon as my father’s car turned into our driveway, I ran out and told him of the unpleasant future that awaited him, forever. He let out a hearty laugh. I started to cry. Once my father saw my tears, he sat down with me and said, “Firoozeh, when the Prophet Muhammad forbade ham, it was because people did not know how to cook it properly and many people became sick as a result of eating it. The Prophet, who was a kind and gentle man, wanted to protect people from harm, so he did what made sense at the time. But now, people know how to prepare ham safely, so if the Prophet were alive today, he would change that rule.” He continued, “It’s not what we eat or don’t eat that makes us good people; it’s how we treat one another. As you grow older, you’ll find that people of every religion think they’re the best, but that’s not true. There are good and bad people in every religion. Just because someone is Muslim, Jewish, or Christian doesn’t mean a thing. You have to look and see what’s in their hearts. That’s the only thing that matters, and that’s the only detail God cares about.” I was six years old and I knew that I had just been made privy to something very big and important, something far larger than the jewels in the Shah’s crown, something larger than my little life in Abadan. My father’s words felt scandalous, yet utterly and completely true. In the midst of my thoughtfulness, I heard my father continue, “And when you’re older, Firoozeh, I’ll have you try something really delicious: grilled lobster.

When we made up our minds to leave for Medina,” one emigrant would remember, “three of us arranged to meet in the morning at the thorn trees of Adat,” about six miles outside Mecca. “We agreed that if one of us failed to appear, that would mean that he had been kept back by force, and the other two should go on without him.” Only two of them reached Adat. The third was intercepted halfway there by one of his uncles, accompanied by abu-Jahl, who told him that his mother had vowed she would neither comb her hair nor take shelter from the sun until she had seen him again. On the way back, they pushed him to the ground, tied him up, and forced him to recant islam. This was how it should be done, the uncle declared: “Oh men of Mecca, deal with your fools as we have dealt with this fool of ours.” Women were not dealt with much more kindly. Umm Salama, who was later to become Muhammad’s fourth wife after she was widowed, told how her kinsmen were enraged when they saw her setting out by camel with her then husband and their infant son. “You can do as you like,” they told her husband, “but don’t think we will let you take our kinswoman away.” “They snatched the camel’s rope from my husband’s hand and took me from him,” she remembered. Then to make matters worse, her in-laws turned up, and a tussle developed over who would take custody of the child she was cradling in her arms—her family or her husband’s family. “We cannot leave the boy with you now that you have torn his mother from our kinsman,” her in-laws declared, and to her horror, both sides “dragged at my little boy between them until they dislocated his shoulder.” In the end, her husband’s family took the child, Umm Salama’s family took her, and her husband left alone for Medina. “Thus was I separated from both my husband and my son,” she would say. There was nothing she could do but “sit in the valley every day and weep” until both families finally relented. “Then I saddled my camel and took my son in my arms, and set forth for my husband in Medina. Not a soul was with me.

My own observations had by now convinced me that the mind of the average Westerner held an utterly distorted image of Islam. What I saw in the pages of the Koran was not a ‘crudely materialistic’ world-view but, on the contrary, an intense God-consciousness that expressed itself in a rational acceptance of all God-created nature: a harmonious side-by-side of intellect and sensual urge, spiritual need and social demand. It was obvious to me that the decline of the Muslims was not due to any shortcomings in Islam but rather to their own failure to live up to it. For, indeed, it was Islam that had carried the early Muslims to tremendous cultural heights by directing all their energies toward conscious thought as the only means to understanding the nature of God’s creation and, thus, of His will. No demand had been made of them to believe in dogmas difficult or even impossible of intellectual comprehension; in fact, no dogma whatsoever was to be found in the Prophet’s message: and, thus, the thirst after knowledge which distinguished early Muslim history had not been forced, as elsewhere in the world, to assert itself in a painful struggle against the traditional faith. On the contrary, it had stemmed exclusively from that faith. The Arabian Prophet had declared that ‘Striving after knowledge is a most sacred duty for every Muslim man and woman’: and his followers were led to understand that only by acquiring knowledge could they fully worship the Lord. When they pondered the Prophet’s saying, ‘God creates no disease without creating a cure for it as well’, they realised that by searching for unknown cures they would contribute to a fulfilment of God’s will on earth: and so medical research became invested with the holiness of a religious duty. They read the Koran verse, ‘We create every living thing out of water’ - and in their endeavour to penetrate to the meaning of these words, they began to study living organisms and the laws of their development: and thus they established the science of biology. The Koran pointed to the harmony of the stars and their movements as witnesses of their Creator’s glory: and thereupon the sciences of astronomy and mathematics were taken up by the Muslims with a fervour which in other religions was reserved for prayer alone. The Copernican system, which established the earth’s rotation around its axis and the revolution of the planet’s around the sun, was evolved in Europe at the beginning of the sixteenth century (only to be met by the fury of the ecclesiastics, who read in it a contradiction of the literal teachings of the Bible): but the foundations of this system had actually been laid six hundred years earlier, in Muslim countries - for already in the ninth and tenth centuries Muslim astronomers had reached the conclusion that the earth was globular and that it rotated around its axis, and had made accurate calculations of latitudes and longitudes; and many of them maintained - without ever being accused of hearsay - that the earth rotated around the sun. And in the same way they took to chemistry and physics and physiology, and to all the other sciences in which the Muslim genius was to find its most lasting monument. In building that monument they did no more than follow the admonition of their Prophet that ‘If anybody proceeds on his way in search of knowledge, God will make easy for him the way to Paradise’; that ‘The scientist walks in the path of God’; that ‘The superiority of the learned man over the mere pious is like the superiority of the moon when it is full over all other stars’; and that ‘The ink of the scholars is more precious that the blood of martyrs’. Throughout the whole creative period of Muslim history - that is to say, during the first five centuries after the Prophet’s time - science and learning had no greater champion than Muslim civilisation and no home more secure than the lands in which Islam was supreme.

Say (O Muhammad SAW to Mankind) If the sea were ink for (writing) the Words of my Lord, surely, the sea would be exhausted before the Words of my Lord would be finished, even if we brought (another sea) like it for its aid.

So when the night overshadowed him, he saw a star. He said: Is this my Lord? So when it set, he said: I love not the setting ones.

Love and the Eyes A believer may come to know the reality of another person either through his or her face, or through his or her words. God says: And if We wish, We could show them to you, then you would recognise them by their mark. And you will certainly recognise them by [their] tone of speech, and God knows your deeds. (Muhammad, 47:30) And the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said: ‘Beware the insight of the believer, for he [or she] sees by the light of God.’ [148] This is generally the case with the believers, but there is something special—a great mystery—about a person’s eyes which may: (1) express love; or (2) engender love in the beholder himself or herself [149] , or (3) engender love in the one who looks into their eyes. In other words, love may: (1) be seen by others in a person’s eyes; (2) ‘enter’ a person through his or her eyes into his or her soul and heart as they look at someone else, or (3) cause another person to love them as a result of a meeting of the eyes—of ‘eye-contact’. God alludes to all of this with His words: He knows the treachery of the eyes and what the breasts hide. (Ghafir, 40:19) Thus the eyes betray love in the soul and heart, and make it plain to see; and the eyes can also cause love to grow, when there is prolonged eye-contact. This allows us to understand the two Hadiths: Ibn Mas’ud and Hudhayfah both reported that the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said: ‘The glance of the eye is a poison dart fired by Iblis [the Devil]; whosoever leaves it through fear of Me, I shall replace it for him with a faith whose sweetness he shall experience in his heart.’ [150] And ‘Ali bin Abi Talib (a.s.) reported that the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said: ‘O ‘Ali, do not follow one glance with another, for you are permitted the first one but not the second.’ [151] Conversely, when Mughirah ibn Shu’bah wanted to ask for a woman’s hand in marriage, the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said to him: ‘Look upon her, for it is more likely that you will bond with each other.’ [152] This explains the importance of lowering one’s gaze [153] , which God commands the believers to do, with His words: Tell believing men to lower their gaze and to guard their private parts. That is purer for them. Truly God is Aware of what they do. / And tell believing women to lower their gaze and to guard their private parts, and not to display their adornment except for what is apparent, and let them draw their veils over their bosoms and not reveal their adornment, except to their husbands or their fathers, or their husbands’ fathers, or their sons, or their husbands’ sons, or their brothers, or their brothers’ sons, or their sisters’ sons, or their women, or what their right hands own, or such men who are dependant, not possessing any sexual desire, or children who are not yet aware of women’s private parts. And do not let them thump with their feet to make known their hidden ornaments. And rally to God in repentance, O believers, so that you might be successful. (Al-Nur, 24:30-31) Similarly, God warns His Messenger (s.a.w.) as follows: And do not extend your glance toward what We have given to some pairs among them to enjoy, [as] the flower of the life of this world that We may try them thereby.

Altogether there is little that can be said about "knowledge" in pre-Islamic Arabia. There existed, it seems, an original elementary concept of knowledge as the piecemeal acquisition of material data. It was, in the course of time, replaced by, or rather, amalgamated with a concept of knowledge as something possessing different degrees of realization. Eventually, there came the additional insight that knowledge constituted a higher and truer form of reality. Such was "knowledge" in Arabia when Muhammad (SAWS) came and forged the concept into the basic tool and objective of divine revelation, thus setting the stage for that reverence for knowledge which was to become the main theme of Islamic civilization.

Our Prophet ﷺ showed KINDNESS while he was treated with hostility, He showed LOVE and COMPASSION to everyone, even to his enemy. Sent by the MOST MERCIFUL to the world as a MERCY, He is the BEST of creation, the most noble man, Described by his wife as a WALKING QUR’AN. Follow his SUNNAH as best as you can...

Allah has no partners, Allah has no equal, Allah the All-Seeing, the All-Hearing, the All-Powerful. Allah the Everlasting, who has no beginning and no end, Beyond our imagination, we cannot even begin to comprehend, Praise Allah and upon Muhammad ﷺ our blessings we send.

Aneh sekali mazhab cinta yang diajari baginda Nabi Muhammad SAW. Tidak pernah bersua muka mahupun bertentang mata dengan kita, Tapi cintanya melebihi cinta seorang kekasih.

Namun kewajipan ini tidak akan menjadi nyata dengan hanya menjadikan al-Quran dan hadith sebagai panduan utama melainkan adengan turut berpegang pada method yang diguna oleh para salaf yang soleh dalam memahami kitab Allah dan sunnah Rasulullah s.a.w. Mengikut para salaf kerana alasan mereka adalah golongan Islam yang terawal bukanlah sesuatu yang harus dan mesti, tetapi kerana mereka adalah golongan muslimin terawal yang paling berupaya memahami ayat-ayat suci dan sunnah Rasulullah s.a.w.

The social reformers, the revolutionaries, the communists – all of whom undoubtedly wanted to build a better, happier world – were thinking only in terms of outward, social and economic, circumstances: and to bridge that defect, they had raised their 'materialistic conception of history' to a kind of new, anti-metaphysical metaphysics. The traditionally religious people, on the other hand, knew nothing better than to attribute God qualities derived from their own habits of thought, which had long since become rigid and meaningless: and when we young people saw that these alleged divine qualities often stood in sharp contrast with what was happening in the world around us, we told ourselves: 'The moving forces of destiny are evidently different from the qualities which are ascribed to God; therefore – there is no God.' And it occurred to only very few of us that the cause of all this confusion might lie perhaps in the arbitrariness of the self-righteous guardians of faith who claimed to have the right to 'define' God and, by clothing Him with their own garments, separated Him from man and his destiny.

There was no law; no police would come if we called; there was no one to intervene. Shia Muslims were killing Sunni Muslims and vice versa. There was no control in the country, and nobody was safe. The majority of the population in my country were Sunni Muslims, as were my family. My family had followed the Prophet Muhammad for generations. My father was a leader in Islam. I had been searching for peace in Islam, but I now saw with my own eyes there would be no peace. Islam is a religion of war, with killing justified under the term jihad, which is a war or struggle against unbelievers or infidels. Yet Muslim was killing Muslim. And jihad exploded in my country with such horrific ethnic cleansing that many Jews and Christians were also killed.

Yet Najran was divided. Those in favor of accepting Islam argued that Muhammad was clearly the Paraclete or Comforter whose arrival Jesus had foretold in the Gospels. Those against maintained that since the Paraclete was said to have sons, and Muhammad had no son, it could not possibly be he. Finally they decided to send a delegation to Medina to resolve the matter directly with Muhammad in the time-honored manner of public debate. But Muhammad preempted the need for debate. In a piece of consummate theatricality, he came out to meet the delegation without his usual bevy of counselors. Instead, only his blood family were with him: Ali and Fatima, and their sons, Hasan and Hussein. He didn’t say a word. Instead, slowly and deliberately, in full view of all, he took hold of the hem of his cloak and spread it high and wide so that it covered the heads of his small family. They were the ones he sheltered under his cloak, he was saying. They were the ones he wrapped around himself. They were his nearest and dearest, the Ahl al-Bayt, the People of the House of Muhammad—or as the Shia would later call them, the People of the Cloak. It was a brilliantly calculated gesture. Arabian Christian tradition had it that Adam had received a vision of a brilliant light surrounded by four other lights and had been told by God that these were his prophetic descendants. Muhammad had certainly heard of this tradition and knew that the moment the Najran Christians saw him spread his cloak over the four members of his family, they would be convinced that he was another Adam, the one whose coming Jesus had prophesied. Indeed, they accepted Islam on the spot.

The greatest Jihad is to battle your own soul, to fight the evil within yourself.

The first person we saw when we entered the building was Muhammad Ali, perhaps a perfect symbol for the decade to come - a former powerhouse battling a degenerative disease.

Remembering your scent, wherever I saw a flower, I smelled it and tears began to pour. Wherever I saw a cypress in the meadow, I kissed its feet in memory of you. ***** எங்கெங்கு ரோஜா பூத்திருந்தாலும் உன் நறுமணத்தை நினைத்துக் கண்ணீர் பொழிந்தேன்; சைப்ரஸ் நெடுமரத்தை எங்கெங்கு கண்டாலும் உன்னை நினைவுகூர்ந்தேன் விழுந்து முத்தமிட்டேன்!

Gabriel. The message was not from God. Yahweh does not contradict Himself, but the Quran clearly does. Muhammad saw something, of that we have no doubt. But it was not a messenger from Yahweh.

Islam provides the method by which our hearts can become sound and safe again. This method has been the subject of brilliant and insightful scholarship for centuries in the Islamic tradition. One can say that Islam in essence is a program to restore purity and calm to the heart through the remembrance of God. This present text is based on the poem known as Maṭharat al-Qulūb (literally, Purification of the Hearts), which offers the means by which purification can be achieved. It is a treatise on the “alchemy of the hearts,” namely, a manual on how to transform the heart. It was written by a great scholar and saint, Shaykh Muhammad Mawlud al Ya’qubi al-Musawi al-Muratani, As his name indicates, he was from Mauritania in West Africa. He was a master of all the Islamic sciences, including the inward sciences of the heart. He stated that he wrote this poem because he observed the prevalence of diseased hearts. He saw students of religion spending their time learning abstract sciences that people were not really in need of, to the neglect of those sciences that pertain to what people are accountable for in the next life, namely, the spiritual condition of the heart, In one of his most cited statements, the Prophet said, “Actions are based upon intentions.” All deeds are thus valued according to the intentions behind them, and intentions emanate from the heart. So every action a person intends or performs is rooted in the heart. Imam Mawlud realized that the weakness of society was a matter of weakness of character in the heart, Imam Mawlud based his text on many previous illustrious works, especially Imam al-Ghazali’s great Ihya’ Ulum alDin (The Revivification of the Sciences of the Religion). Each of the 40 books of Ihya‘ Ulum al-Din is basically about rectifying the human heart. If we examine the trials and tribulations, wars and other conflicts, every act of injustice all over earth, we’ll find they are rooted in human hearts.

Perhaps the most important development in the differences between the Sunni and the Shia in modern history has been the development of a new school of thought in Sunni religiosity: Salafi or Wahhabi Islam.  The Wahhabis date their history back to the mid-18th century, when an Arab thinker named Muhammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab (1703-1792) developed a new theology that violently rejected what he saw as the corruption of Islam and the growing Christian domination of the Muslim World.  Looking for a source of the ongoing scandalous humiliation of the Muslim world, he looked inwards to flaws within the Ummah.  According to al-Wahhab, if the Muslims were the chosen people of God, their subservience to Christians was not due to Christian superiority but due to God withdrawing his favor because the Muslims had turned away from Him. In this worldview, the goal of the modern Islamic community should be the rejection of corruption and perversion and a return to the true, pure faith of the Prophet and his Companions.

In the realm of Maya's veil, Where illusions dance and sway, Ram and Krishna, wise and true, Saw through the world's ephemeral hue. Allah, the All-Merciful, proclaimed, "This mortal stage, a fleeting game, Where egos strut and passions flare, A testing ground, a soul's repair." Muhammad, the Prophet of Light, Expounded on the material plight, A transient realm, a fragile guise, Where true treasures lie beyond the skies. Oh, heed their words, their wisdom deep, And seek the essence, the soul to keep, For in the depths of spirit's embrace, Lies true reality, time's endless chase.

When I saw once again the slim, tall women who were swaying in indescribable rhythm, striding over the fields and carrying pitchers free on their heads with arms outstretched, I thought to myself: Nothing in the whole world - neither the most perfect automobile nor the proudest bridge nor the most thoughtful book - can replace this grace which has been lost in the West and is already threatened in the East - this grace which is nothing but an expression of the magic consonance between a human being's Self and the world that surrounds him ...

Although of Jewish origin myself, I conceived from the outset a strong objection to Zionism. Apart from my personal sympathy for the Arabs, I considered it immoral that immigrants, assisted by a foreign Great Power, should come from abroad with the avowed intention of attaining to majority in the country and thus to dispossess the people whose country it had been since time immemorial. Consequently, I was inclined to take the side of the Arabs whenever the Jewish-Arab question was brought up - which, of course, happened very often. This attitude of mine was beyond the comprehension of practically all the Jews with whom I came in contact during those months. They could not understand what I saw in the Arabs who, according to them, were no more than a mass of backward people whom they looked upon with a feeling not much different from that of the European settlers in Central Africa.

Serving humanity is the priority of the real dervish, not serving in some overly sentimental sense of being charitable to those “less fortunate” than we are, but through recognizing the Divine Light in all human beings, and acting accordingly. Think of all the numerous ways that our Prophet (Allah’s peace and blessings be upon him) would constantly suggest to his community to help those who were poor, sick, widowed, orphaned, and some way in need. Spend your time thinking how you can help your neighbor, rather than worrying about tekke politics. As a dervish, you only exist to serve; forget about sleights to your ego. We are only dust under the feet of Muhammad (s.a.w.s.).

And when, prior to going into the Muslim world, I didn't have any -- Elijah Muhammad had taught us that the white man could not enter into Makkah in Arabia, and all of us who followed him, we believed it. And he said the reason he couldn't enter was because he's white and inherently evil, it's impossible to change him. And the only thing that would change him is Islam, and he can't accept Islam because by nature he's evil. And therefore by not being able to accept Islam and become a Muslim, he could never enter Makkah. This is how he taught us, you know. So when I got over there and went to Makkah and saw these people who were blond and blue-eyed and pale-skinned and all those things, I said, "Well!" But I watched them closely. And I noticed that though they were white, and they would call themselves white, there was a difference between them and the white one over here. And that basic difference was this: in Asia or the Arab world or in Africa, where the Muslims are, if you find one who says he's white, all he's doing is using an adjective to describe something that's incidental about him, one of his incidental characteristics; so there's nothing else to it, he's just white.

Many verses in the Quran can be construed as including Christians and Jews in the Muslim community, because Muhammad saw himself at first as a missionary to all peoples but later narrowed his intended audience to pagan Arabs. Muhammad became disillusioned with the People of the Book and condemned them as “unbelievers.” Conflict with the Jews led to the redefinition of Islam as a new confessional religion and led to new laws and rituals to provide Muslims with a separate identity.

Death and life are two sides of the same coin; you cannot have one without the other. Each time you surrender, each time you trust the dying, your faith is led to a deeper level and you discover a Larger Self underneath. You decide not to push yourself to the front of the line, and something much better happens in the back of the line. You let go of your narcissistic anger, and you find that you start feeling much happier. You surrender your need to control your partner, and finally the relationship blossoms or ends. Yet each time it is a choice—and each time it is a kind of dying. It seems we only know what life is when we know what death is. The mystics and great saints were those who had learned to trust and allow this pattern, and often said in effect, “What did I ever lose by dying?” Or try Paul’s famous one-liner: “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). Now even scientific studies, including those of near-death experiences, reveal the same universal pattern. Things change and grow by dying to their present state, but each time it is a risk. We always wonder, “Will it work this time?” So many academic disciplines are coming together, each in their own way, to say that there’s a constant movement of loss and renewal at work in this world at every level. It seems to be the pattern of all growth and evolution. To be alive means to surrender to this inevitable flow. It’s the same pattern in every atom, in every human relationship, and in every galaxy. Indigenous peoples, Hindu gurus, Buddha, Moses, Muhammad, and Jesus all saw it clearly in human history and named it as a kind of “necessary dying.” If this pattern is true, it has been true all the time and everywhere. Such seeing did not just start two thousand years ago. All of us have to eventually learn to let go of something smaller so something bigger can happen. But that’s not a religion—it’s highly visible truth. It is the Way Reality Works. Yes, I am saying that the way things work and Christ are one and the same. This is not a religion to be either fervently joined or angrily rejected. It is a train ride already in motion. The tracks are visible everywhere. You can be a willing and happy traveler. Or not.

It is stated that the Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him) was taken up into heaven (while he was still alive) and saw angels dwelling on various heavenly levels performing specific movements. This should be a profound sign of the spiritual significance and importance of the body and its motions. It is one indication of the sacredness of the body and the truly profound meaning of certain motions and gestures of that body.

As is the case with most prophets, Muhammad’s birth was accompanied by signs and portents. Al-Tabari writes that while Muhammad’s father, Abdallah, was on his way to meet his bride, he was stopped by a strange woman who, seeing a light shining between his eyes, demanded he sleep with her. Abdallah politely refused and continued to the house of Amina, where he consummated the marriage that would result in the birth of the Prophet. The next day, when Abdallah saw the same woman again, he asked her, “Why do you not make the same proposition to me today that you made to me yesterday?” The woman replied, “The light which was with you yesterday has left you. I have no need of you today.

And when, prior to going into the Muslim world, I didn't have any -- Elijah Muhammad had taught us that the white man could not enter into Makkah in Arabia, and all of us who followed him, we believed it. And he said the reason he couldn't enter was because he's white and inherently evil, it's impossible to change him. And the only thing that would change him is Islam, and he can't accept Islam because by nature he's evil. And therefore by not being able to accept Islam and become a Muslim, he could never enter Makkah. This is how he taught us, you know. So when I got over there and went to Makkah and saw these people who were blond and blue-eyed and pale-skinned and all those things, I said, "Well!" But I watched them closely. And I noticed that though they were white, and they would call themselves white, there was a difference between them and the white one over here. And that basic difference was this: in Asia or the Arab world or in Africa, where the Muslims are, if you find one who says he's white, all he's doing is using an adjective to describe something that's incidental about him, one of his incidental characteristics; so there's nothing else to it, he's just white. But when you get the white man over here in America and he says he's white, he means something else. You can listen to the sound of his voice -- when he says he's white, he means he's a boss.

Islam is aniconic. In other words, images, effigies, or idols of Allâh are not allowed, although verbal depiction abounds. There was a question long debated in Islam: can we see Allâh? The Prophet said in a hadith, "In Paradise the faithful will see Allâh with the clarity with which you see the moon on the fourteenth night (the full moon)." Theologians debated what this could mean, but the Sûfîs have held that you can see Allâh even in this world, through the "eye of the heart." The famous Sûfî martyr al-Hallaj said in a poem, "ra'aytu rabbi bi-'ayni qalbî" (I saw my Lord with the eye of my heart). Relevant to the focus of this paper is that Sûfîs have always described this theophanic experience as the vision of a woman, the female figure as the object of ru'yah (vision of Allâh).

The aforementioned philosopher and Sûfî, ibn al-Arabî, saw a young girl in Makkah surround by light and realized that, for him, she was an incarnation of the divine Sophia.

The two men they saw were in fact angels, which is why it did not hurt Muhammadsa when they opened his chest. They reached into his chest to clean his heart by removing any envy and weakness, and they replaced it with compassion and mercy. One of the angels was named Gabriel.

We are the online Quran academy which is providing the facility for Muslims to learn Quran at their home. We are the leading Quran Academy in Pakistan which are providing this service for almost 5 years. We have Qualified male and female teachers who are teaching the students in a very beautiful way. We as an online Quran academy, our mission is to spread the message of Allah and his Prophet Muhammad S.A.W to Muslims all over the world. So, that they can know about the meaning of their life.

Hinduism’ is thus the name that foreigners first applied to what they saw as the indigenous religion of India. It embraces an eclectic range of doctrines and practices, from pantheism to agnosticism and from faith in reincarnation to belief in the caste system. But none of these constitutes an obligatory credo for a Hindu: there are none. We have no compulsory dogmas. This is, of course, rather unusual. A Catholic is a Catholic because he believes Jesus was the Son of God who sacrificed himself for Man; a Catholic believes in the Immaculate Conception and the Virgin Birth, offers confession, genuflects in church and is guided by the Pope and a celibate priesthood. A Muslim must believe that there is no God but Allah and that Muhammad is His Prophet. A Jew cherishes his Torah or Pentateuch and his Talmud; a Parsi worships at a Fire Temple; a Sikh honours the teachings of the Guru Granth Sahib above all else. There is no Hindu equivalent to any of these beliefs. There are simply no binding requirements to being a Hindu. Not even a belief in God.

To love Muhammad is one thing, but to imitate him - to try to be 'like' him - is another. He was the last messenger and the last prophet, so how can we expect to imitate what is by definition unique and unrepeatable? In the first place his virtues are to be imitated, and they were providentially exemplified in the extraordinary variety of human experience through which he passed in his sixty-two years of life. He was an orphan, yet he knew the warmth of parental love through his grandfather's devoted care for him; he was the faithful husband of one wife for many years, and after her death, the tender and considerate husband of many wives; he was the father of children who gave him the greatest joy this world has to offer, and he saw all but one of them die; he had been a shepherd and a merchant when young, and he became a ruler, a statesman, a military commander, and a law-giver; he loved his native city and was driven from it into exile, finally to return home in triumph and set an example of clemency which has no equal in human history. Not only do we know almost everything he did, we know the exact manner in which he did it.

The world is a prison for the believer and paradise for a non-believer.

The other approach, taken by survivors of the old Madrasa i-Rahimiyya, was to reject the West in toto and to attempt to return to what they regarded as pure Islamic roots. For this reason, disillusioned pupils of the school of Shah Waliullah, such as Maulana Muhammad Qasim Nanautawi – who in 1857 had briefly established an independent Islamic state north of Meerut at Shamli in the Doab – founded an influential but depressingly narrow-minded Wahhabi-like madrasa at Deoband, 100 miles north of the former Mughal capital. With their backs to the wall, they reacted against what the founders saw as the degenerate and rotten ways of the old Mughal elite. The Deoband madrasa therefore went back to Koranic basics and rigorously stripped out anything Hindu or European from the curriculum.