Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Islam and Adultery

Wa`alaykum As-Salamu wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh.

In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.

All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be upon His Messenger.

Dear brother in Islam, we would like to thank you for the great confidence you place in us, and we implore Allah Almighty to help us serve His cause and render our work for His Sake.
Islam has taken a firm and decisive stance against Zina (fornication or adultery). Allah, the Almighty, commands in explicit and unequivocal words: (And come not near unto adultery. Lo! it is an abomination and an evil way) (Al-Isra’ 17: 32).

Thus, Islam not only prohibits Zina, but also closes all the avenues and means leading to it. This is achieved by prohibiting every step and means leading to stimulating desires, opening ways for illicit sexual relations between men and women, and promoting indecency and obscenity.

In his response to your question, Sheikh Ahmad Kutty, a senior lecturer and Islamic scholar at the Islamic Institute of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, states:

Adultery in Islam is one of the most heinous and deadliest of sins. Its enormity can be gauged from the fact that it has often been conjoined in the Qur’an with the gravest of all sins: shirk or associating partners with Allah.

The enormity of this sin is no small measure due to its dire consequences affecting individuals, families, and societies. Among these are that it entails infidelity and erodes the trust and tranquility that are the foundations of a fulfilling family life; it dissipates one’s energies; it undermines peace at home; it corrodes the purity of one’s soul and hence destroys one’s faith; finally, it exposes the person to the wrath of Allah, thus resulting in eternal damnation.

It is no wonder then that Allah and His Messenger have sounded dire warnings against adultery in so many ways. To list only a few instances:

Allah says in the Qur’an, (And come not near unto adultery. Lo! it is an abomination and an evil way) (Al-Isra’ 17: 32).

(And the servants of the Beneficent) are those who do not invoke another god with Allah, and who do not…commit fornication/adultery, for whoever does that shall receive the penalty; for him shall the torment be doubled on the day of resurrection, and therein he shall abide forever, disgraced, save him who repents and believes and does good works; those, Allah shall change their misdeeds into good works. And Allah is Forgiving, Compassionate) (Al-Furqan: 68-70).

The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said, “Whoever guarantees me that he will guard his chastity, I will guarantee him Paradise” (Al-Bukhari).

Abu Hurayrah reports that the Messenger of Allah said, “No one commits adultery while still remaining a believer, for faith is more precious unto Allah than such an evil act!” In another version, it is stated, “When a person commits adultery he casts away from his neck the bond that ties him to Islam; if, however, he repents, Allah will accept his repentance” (Al-Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawud, An-Nisa’i and others).

The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) further said: “[Under Islamic laws in an Islamic state] It is not lawful to shed the blood of a Muslim except for one of three sins: a married person committing fornication, and in just retribution for premeditated murder, and [for sin of treason involving] a person renouncing Islam, and thus leaving the community [to join the enemy camp in order to wage war against the faithful].” (Al-Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawud, Tirmidhi, and An-Nasa’i)

During his ascension, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) was escorted by Jibreel and shown different types of punishments meted out to those guilty of various major offenses. While recounting the various scenes shown to him, he said, “Then Jibreel took me and we passed by a group of people with terribly inflated bodies emitting worst foul smells just like that of open sewers; when I enquired who they were, he replied, ‘These are those who commit adultery!’” (Ibn Khuzaymah)

The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “Faith is like a shirt that Allah places on those He chooses; but whoever commits adultery his shirt will be taken off from him; if he were to repent sincerely, Allah will place it back on him.” (Al-Bayhaqi)

“There are three types of sinners that Allah will not speak to on the Day of Resurrection; neither He will purify them nor will He even look at them; rather they will suffer severe punishment: an older person who commits adultery, a king or ruler who lies to his subjects, and a poor person who acts arrogantly!” (Muslim and An-Nasa’i)

“When adultery becomes rampant in a nation Allah will expose them to His chastisement.” (Abu Ya`la)

“When promiscuous behavior becomes rampant in a nation, Allah will send upon them such (strange) diseases that their own ancestors never heard of.” (At-Tabarani)

“There are seven categories of people who will be granted protection under the shade of Allah on the Day when there is no other shade;… among them is a young person who is seduced by a woman of great beauty and wealth and yet he rejected her advances saying ‘I fear Allah!’” (Al-Bukhari and Muslim)

The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said, “O mankind! Beware of fornication/adultery for it entails six dire consequences: three of them relating to this world and three to the next world. As for the three that are related to this world, they are the following: it removes the glow of one’s face, brings poverty, and reduces the life-span. As for its dire consequences in the next world they are: it brings down the wrath of Allah upon the person, subjects him to terrible reckoning, and finally casts him in hell-fire” (Al-Bayhaqi).

Excerpted, with slight modifications, from: www.muslims.ca

Given the above, it is to be noted that the punishment specified for an unmarried person guilty of fornication in the Shari`ah is 100. In the very beginning of Surat An-Nur, it is stated that: (The woman and the man guilty of adultery or fornication,- flog each of them with a hundred stripes: Let not compassion move you in their case, in a matter prescribed by Allah, if ye believe in Allah and the Last Day: and let a party of the Believers witness their punishment) (An-Nur 24: 2).

As for the punishment specified in the Shari`ah for the married adulterer or adulteress, it is stoning to death. In the Kuwaiti Encyclopedia of Islamic Jurisprudence, we read the following:

Ibn Qudamah wrote: “Muslim jurists are unanimous on the fact stoning to death is a specified punishment for married adulterer and adulteress. The punishment is recorded in number of traditions and the practice of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) stands as an authentic source supporting it. This is the view held by all Companions, Successors and other Muslim scholars...”

Islam And Terrorism

Terrorism and resistance are two different things. Resistance by the people of an occupied country like Palestine, Golan and Iraq today and South Lebanon yesterday, is a sacred and fundamental right and duty in all cultures, old and new, and enjoys sanction even in international law laid down by western countries although this right will be invoked only when a western country will fall under occupation. Palestinians have every right to take recourse to all forms of resistance against the West-backed zionist zealots who have stolen their lands and do not let them live in peace in even the remaining 22 per cent of their historic homeland.

Apart from this there is senseless violence by some Muslims which is justified in various ways, political, religious and historical. This violence has received moral and material support from some wealthy and influential people in Muslim majority societies, especially the Gulf and Pakistan. Insurgencies in places like the Philippines, Pattani, Valley of Kashmir, have no meaning and have no hope of success either. These senseless movements have only succeeded in butchering their own youth and offering local governments a handle to unleash a reign of terror against their innocent Muslim populations.

It is a matter of shame for people in Muslim majority states that when sons of Muslim minorities approach them for help to build modern institutions like colleges, universities, research and media houses and the like, there is no response except for funds meant to build mosques and madrasahs. But if a few insane hotheads form a guerrilla organisation and go begging for funds with concocted tales of persecution they would not be disappointed until very recently. The correct approach should have been to tell these youth to go back to their homelands and make adjustment with their majority communities and governments, join civil society groups working for non-violent change, and live as useful and law-abiding citizens and try to earn respect and rights through hard work and dedicated service to their societies and countries. But, alas, this did not happen.

The Muslim press all over the world was and continues to be agog with stories of Muslim persecution, some purely concocted. When I personally checked some of these cases, including the Valley of Kashmir, they turned out to be incorrect and grossly exaggerated. I do not deny that there is persecution and human rights violation. But rights are denied to Muslims not just because of their religion but because they are the weak, uneducated and poor in their societies. They need to wage a long-term "greater jihad" against their illiteracy and poverty. But this is a long and tiring Jihad which is practiced only by healthy societies like Japan and Germany after the Second World War. Bereft of a long-term vision, some disgruntled Muslim youths take the shorter and easier path of "lesser jihad" and in turn bring ruin and disrepute to their religion and co-religionists and only add new problems. This is not the Islamic path. Indeed this is imitation of leftist movements led by Mao and Che Guevara in the 1950s and '60s which were lapped up first by Arab communists in the 1970s, a decade later tiny groups of "Islamists" in places like Egypt and Algeria emulated them bringing disrepute to Islam by killing foreign tourists and even slaughtering their own co-relgionists. Algerian terrorists freely, literally, slaughter Muslims who do not share their ideology. Organisations like Takfir wa'l-Hijra which killed the Egyptian Awqaf Minister Shaikh Dahabi in 1977 and Jihad Organisation which killed President Anwar Sadat in 1981 have only brought shame to Islam and pain to millions of law-abiding Egyptian Muslims who are not free now to offer even their basic Islamic duties as a result of this lunacy. Today all mosques in Egypt have been nationalised and imams receive official khutbas (sermons) to deliver, rather recite, on Fridays. Harmless Islamic activities, including freedom of expression, have been severely restricted.

At the present time this lunacy has been hijacked by Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaidah outfit and tiny scattered groups allied to him. Very recently, Abu Mus'ab Al-Zarqawi [real name: Fadeel Nizar Al-Khalayleh of Jordan], said to be one of Osama group's ideologues, has issued a statement which justifies killing Shias [who in Salafi belief are not "Muslims", indeed most Muslims around the world are not "Muslims" in the eyes of these lunatics] and condones killing even innocent Muslims since killing will hasten their entry into Paradise [text in Al-Hayat Arabic newspaper, 12 Feb. 2004]. This perverted and insane logic which justifies murder is behind the senseless criminal acts of mass murder seen last Ashura in Karbala, Baghdad and Quetta.

It is high time Muslim leaders and scholars around the world take a clear and strong stand that these insane elements are galaxies away from the Islamic message of universal peace, compassion and tolerance, that anyone fanning Shia-Sunni hatred is an enemy of Islam and friend of the enemies of Muslims. We totally disown these fanatics, condemn their ideology and their supporters whoever and wherever they may be.

A word is also necessary here about the role of Pakistan in all this since General Ziaul Haque suddenly discovered Islam as a tool of his foreign policy. The general, having hanged a popular and elected leader, was in need of supporters at home and abroad. And just as Sadat had used "Islamists" in Egypt to counter the leftists after his palace coup against Sabri faction in 1971, General Zia used Islamists at home and abroad to legitimise his usurpation of power. Pakistan overnight became the "Chowdhury," or champion, of Islam all over the world. In a live interview on Aljazeera television on 9 June 1999, I had confronted the Pakistani participant (Abdul Ghaffar Aziz) if Pakistan was the “Chowdhury of Islam”? He tried to dodge the question repeatedly but at the end had to concede that Pakistan is not and cannot be a Chowdhury of Islam.

Slowly "Jihad" became a cottage industry and Pakistan became the home and shelter of Jihadis of all colours from all over the world. The West too for some time played an active role in helping and financing this new industry as long as it was directed against the Soviet Union (Reagan’s "Evil Empire") in Afghanistan. A lot of planning and petrodollars were involved in this enterprise. Within this congenial atmosphere, where even the state through ISI became a partner in the Jihad industry, a plethora of fanatic armed gangs started operating within Pakistan killing its own Sunnis, Shias, Muhajirs, Pathans and so on. A lot of violent outfits in neighbouring countries were encouraged, financed, armed and trained to operate in Central Asia, in friendly China's Sinkiang, in enemy India's Kashmir. This enterprise has brought only shame and disrepute to Islam and Pakistani rulers. After causing the murder of hundreds of thousands of people, Pakistan has now thrown out Arab revolutionaries or surrendered them to the US, abandoned Kashmiris and is shamelessly surrendering Sinkiang rebels to certain death at Chinese hands. This change took place not because Pakistan suddenly realised the futility and un-Islamic nature of this deceitful enterprise but because the world scenario suddenly changed as a result of the American resolve after 9-11, for Pax Americana's own reasons, not to allow whatever it considers "terrorism" around the world.

Despite Advani's unfounded claims about “Islamic terrorism” in our own country, Indian Muslims were mature and wise enough not to be lured or provoked into terrorism. Shameful events like the martyrdom of Babri mosque and pogroms in Gujarat did influence some angry Muslim youth but this was so rare that even foreign observers like America’s Mr Haas have confirmed that there was no terrorist trend among Indian Muslims. We have a clear example to offer: father of the Indian nuclear bomb is president of India today while the father of the Pakistani bomb is discredited and disowned by his own masters. World’s largest Muslim minority, which is bigger than the population of Pakistan, has a lesson for all Muslim minorities: shun the suicidal path of violence, adjust with your native societies, learn to live as loyal minorities and try to reach high positions through hard work and sincere service to your home countries and the humanity at large. This will be a great service to Islam which teaches us that "love of homelands is part of faith" as the Prophet, peace be upon him, had said. (The Milli Gazette, 16-31 March 2004).

Friday, July 16, 2010

NEW Beautiful Names of Allah

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

What is Qiblah?

Definition:
"The direction that Muslims face when engaged in ritual prayer."

In Muslim religious practice, worshippers must all turn to face one single direction during daily prayers. This qiblah is the direction of the Ka'aba in Mecca, in modern-day Saudi Arabia. When possible, mosques are constructed in such a way that one side of the building faces the qiblah, to make it easier to organize worshippers into rows for prayer. The direction of the qiblah is also often marked in the front of the mosque with an ornamental indentation in the wall, known as a mihrab.

It should be noted that Muslims do not worship the Ka'aba. The Ka'aba is a capital and focal point of the entire Muslim world.
Pronunciation: "qib" (rhymes with "bib" with a strong, gutteral "q" sound) - "la"
Alternate Spellings: qibla, kiblah, kibla
Examples:
When Hashim was preparing for prayer, he laid his prayer rug and faced the direction of the qiblah.

Praying method in Islam

How To Perform the Muslim Prayers

Muslim Prayers

Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Five times each day, Muslims bow down to Allah in prayer. If you are learning how to pray, or are just curious about what Muslims do during prayers, follow along with these general guidelines.

Difficulty: Easy

Time Required: 10 minutes

Here's How:

Make sure your body and place of prayer are clean. Perform ablutions if necessary. Make the intention to perform your obligatory prayer.
Standing, raise hands up and say "Allahu Akbar" (God is Most Great).
Standing with hands folded over chest, recite the first chapter of the Qur'an in Arabic. Then recite any other verses of the Qur'an that you would like.
Raise hands up, saying "Allahu Akbar." Bow, reciting three times, "Subhana rabbiyal adheem" (Glory be to my Lord Almighty).
Rise to standing while reciting "Sam'i Allahu liman hamidah, Rabbana wa lakal hamd" (God hears those who call upon Him; Our Lord, praise be to You).
Raise hands up, saying "Allahu Akbar." Prostrate on the ground, reciting three times "Subhana Rabbiyal A'ala" (Glory be to my Lord, the Most High).
Rise to a sitting position, saying "Allahu Akbar." Prostrate again in the same manner.
Rise to a standing position, saying "Allahu Akbar."
This concludes one rak'a (cycle or unit of prayer). Begin again from Step 3 for the second rak'a.
After two rak'as, one remains sitting after the prostrations and recites the first part of the Tashahhud in Arabic.
If the prayer is to be longer than these two rak'as, one now stands up and begins again to complete the prayer, sitting again after all rak'as have been completed.
Recite the second part of the Tashahhud in Arabic.
Turn to the right and say "Assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullah" (Peace be upon you and God's blessings).
Turn to the left and repeat the greeting. This concludes the formal prayer.

Tips:

There are five daily prayer timings. Formal prayers can be done during a window of time between the start of one prayer and the start of the following prayer.
If Arabic is not your native tongue, learn the meanings in your language while trying to practice the Arabic.
Software programs are available that can help you learn the correct positions and Arabic pronunciations. Better yet, pray with other Muslims to learn.

What You Need: