Belief, Disbelief and Previous Communities

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Belief, Disbelief and Previous Communities
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Modern Debates over the Quran

• Richard Bells Theory accidental insertions
• Revisionism Quran produced from liturgical
  material circa 800 CE
• Quran misreading of early Muslim textual
  tradition theory of Christoph Luxemberg
• Early variants of the Quran?
• Sanaa find etc.
• General Consensus the arbitrary problem
• No traces of civil wars
• Early evidence ex. Dome of the Rock

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Muhammads Message the Short, Short Version

• One deity only, Creator of all, with no partners
• Day of Judgment, when all people will be judged
  for their faith and deeds regardless of who they
  are
• Salvation lies in belief in God and doing good
  deeds
• This is not a new message this is the true
  religion of Abraham revealed by God to every
  community through the medium of prophets
• Previous messages have been corrupted, Muhammads
  message will remind humanity

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Belief

• Revelation communicates the Unseen (ghayb)
• This is a book in which there is no doubt,
  guidance to the pious. Who believe in the
  unseen, perform the prayer and spend in charity
  out of what We have provided them. (21-3)
• Speculation (zann) vs. Truth and Revelation
• Most of them do but follow speculation (zann),
  and indeed speculation does not suffice at all
  like the truth. Indeed God is most knowing of
  what they do. (1036)
• And they say, There is nothing but the life of
  this world, we die and live, and nothing destroys
  us but Time, when they have no knowledge of
  that. They do but speculate. 4524

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Belief

• Commerce a major idiom in the Quran (ex. scales
  for deeds, the Day of Reckoning/ Accounting)
• These are those who purchase error at the price
  of guidance, so their commerce does not prosper,
  neither are they guided. (216)
• Who will offer up to God a goodly loan?
• Light vs. Darkness
• God is the light of the heavens and the earth
• Disbelief is like being swamped by waves in a
  dark sea

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• The plight of unbelievers on the Day of
  Judgment is as darkness on a vast, abysmal sea.
  There covers him a wave, above which is a wave,
  above which is a cloud. Layer upon layer of
  darkness. When he holds out his hand to can
  scarcely see it. And he for whom God has not
  appointed light, for him there is no light.
  (2440)

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• Their parable is that of one who sought to
  light a fire, and when it illuminated what was
  around him God took their light and left them in
  darkness, unable to sense or perceive. Deaf,
  dumb and blind, thus they have no course of
  return. Or like a cloud in the sky, dark with
  thunder and lightning, they place their fingers
  in their ears from the thunder of the fear of
  death, and God encompasses the disbelievers. The
  lightning almost snatches away their sight,
  whenever it gives them light they walk in it, and
  when it shrouds them in darkness they stand
  still. If God wanted He could take away their
  hearing and sight, indeed God is able to do all
  things. (217-20)

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Disbelief

• Notion of Disbelief Kufr ??? kafir ????
  disbeliever/infidel
• Disbelief is due to pride choice
• Nay, but those who disbelieve are lost in false
  pride and shism. (382)
• Noah says And Lo! Whenever I call unto them
  that Thou mayest pardon them they thrust their
  fingers in their ears and cover themselves with
  garments and persist and magnify themselves in
  pride! 717
• Indeed man is overweening, when you see him
  consider himself self-sufficient. Indeed to your
  Lord is the return. (966-7)
• But hearts harden and God can seal them
• Have you seen him who makes his desire his god?
  And God sends him astray purposefully, and seals
  up his hearing and his heart, and sets on his
  sight a covering? Who will guide him after God?
  Will you then heed? (4523)
• Has it not come time for those who believe to
  humble their hearts at the remembrance of God and
  what has been revealed from the truth and not be
  like those to whom the Book was revealed before?
  Time grew long for them, and their hearts became
  hard, and now many of them are iniquitous.
  (time long) 5716
• Miracles dont work on the unbelievers

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Disbelief

• But who chooses?
• Indeed it is a reminder. So he who wishes
  remembers it. But they do not remember unless
  God wills, He is the fount of piety, the fount of
  mercy. (7454-6)

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Belief and Deeds

• Those who believe and do good deeds
• Belief is tied to action and vice versa
• And who is better in word than he who believes
  in God, does a good deed and says, Indeed I am
  one of those who submits to God.
• Deeds without belief are worthless
• And as for those who disbelieve, their deeds are
  as a mirage in the desert. The thirsty one
  supposes it to be water, till he comes upon it
  and finds that it is naught. He finds in its
  place God, who will pay him his due, and God is
  swift in reckoning. (2439)
• Belief without deeds is worthless too!

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The Quran in Relation to Earlier Scriptures

• The People of the Book
• A Series of prophets
• And there is no nation to which a warner has not
  come. (3524)
• Some not mentioned
• Same message And indeed We have raised in every
  nation a messenger, saying Serve God and shun
  false gods (1636)
• Disagreement follows revelations?
• Muhammads place and the place of Islam
• Quran as confirming previous scripture He has
  revealed unto thee, Muhammad, the scripture
  with truth, confirming that which was revealed
  before it even as He revealed the Torah and the
  Gospel. (33)

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Ecumenicalism vs. Exclusivism

• Invitations and Appeals Quranic pleas for Jews
  and Christians to heed their own scriptures
• A Common Word Say, O people of the book! Come
  to a common word between us and you that we
  shall worship none but God, and that we shall
  ascribe no partner unto Him, and that none of us
  will take others for lords besides God. And if
  they turn away, then say Bear witness that we
  are those who surrendered (muslimun)! (364)
• Confirmation of salvation by truth of earlier
  messages?
• Lo! Those who believe, and those who are Jews,
  and Christians and Sabaeans whoever believes in
  God and the Last Day and does good deeds surely
  their reward is with their Lord, no fear shall
  they have and neither shall they grieve. (262)
• Nay, whosoever surrenders unto God and does good
  deeds, his reward is with God. No fear need they
  have and neither shall they grieve. (2112)
• Deeds are Nothing without belief atheism is no
  ticket.

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Forming the New Faith Tradition

• Correcting existing beliefs of People of the
  Book
• Judaism a rejection of exceptionalism. That is
  because they say, The Fire will not touch us
  save for a certain number of days. That which
  they used to invent has deceived them regarding
  their religion. (324)
• Christianity a rejection of the divinity of
  JesusThey surely disbelieve who say, Lo! God
  is the Messiah, son of Mary. The Messiah
  himself said, O Children of Israel, worship God,
  my Lord and your Lord, Lo! Whoso ascribes
  partners to God, for him God has forbidden
  Paradise. His abode is the Fire, for evildoers
  there will be no helpers. They surely disbelieve
  who say Lo! God is the third of three when
  there is no God save the One god. If they desist
  not from so saying a painful doom will fall on
  those of them who disbelieve. (572-73)

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Islam and Hanifism

• What is Islam / Surrender
• Do they want something other than the religion
  of God, when to Him surrender all that is on the
  earth and in the heavens willingly or unwillingly
  and to Him will they be returned? Say We have
  believed in what was revealed to us, what was
  revealed to Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob and
  the Tribes, what was given to Moses and Jesus and
  all the prophets from their Lord. We do not
  distinguish between any of them, and we will
  surrender (muslimun) to Him. And whoever follows
  other than Islam/Surrender as a religion, it will
  not be accepted from him and in the Hereafter he
  will be among the losers. (383-5)
• Abraham as Superprophet
• Not Jewish or Christian Hanif!
• Muhammad as Definition of New Religion he is
  the sole religious authority (ex. Abu Amir the
  Hanif is exiled)
• Islamic History the solidification of a faith
  tradition