Islam

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Islam

Islam is the religion of Muslims. The word, which literally means "submission," signifies that human beings should, instead of taking the path of confrontation with God, surrender to his will and accept him as the lord and master of their lives. It also means "peace," and this meaning is related to the first in that submission to God is supposed to bring peace to human beings in this life and the next. Islam is ordinarily associated with the name of the seventh-century Arabian prophet Muhammad. However, it claims to have been the religion of all prophets—even those who preceded Muhammad. What is meant is that all prophets taught submission to God and promised peace as a result of that submission.

Muhammad

Muhammad (ca. 570–632), who was born in Mecca and belonged to its ruling tribe, Quraysh, began preaching Islam after receiving his first revelation in 610. The message criticized Arab idolatry and called for a return to the religion of Abraham, whom the Arabs acknowledged both as their great ancestor and as their religious and spiritual leader. The Quraysh were at first indifferent but became concerned, even alarmed, upon noticing that Muhammad was gaining dedicated converts. Though undeterred by the Quraysh's persecution of them, the Prophet and his followers migrated to Medina, to the north, when an opportunity of establishing a foothold in that wartorn city presented itself. In Medina the Muslims became the dominant element and, after a series of battles with the Quraysh, conquered Mecca in 630, two years before Muhammad's death. In a short time almost all of Arabia embraced Islam. Muhammad is regarded as the last prophet and is believed to have lived an exemplary life, which Muslims try to emulate.

Sources

The fundamental sources of Islam are two—the Qur'an, the name by which the collective revelations of Muhammad are known; and Muhammad's sunna, or exemplary conduct. Broadly speaking, the Qur'an is the source of dogma, whereas the sunna furnishes details of Islamic praxis in its ideal form. The sunna is available to us in the form of hadith, which consists of Muhammad's sayings and actions as transmitted by Muhammad's companions. A clear distinction is made between the Qur'an, the Word of God; and hadith, the word of Muhammad. Hadith, however, is essential to the exposition and understanding of the Qur'an. The Qur'an and hadith are the two principal sources of Islamic law, though analogy (precedent-based reasoning) and consensus (scholarly agreement on the solution to a given problem) are also recognized as being important.

Beliefs

Islam is often presented as a complete code of Islam—which is to say that Islam contains not only a belief system but also commandments pertaining to all spheres of practical life. Islamic dogma consists of three major beliefs: monotheism (there is only one God), prophecy (a series of persons were chosen by God to convey his message to humankind), and the afterlife (human beings will be resurrected, judged, and sent to Heaven or Hell depending on their performance in this world). Belief in angels and scriptures is also enjoined. But the first—belief in angels as creatures and servants of God—can be taken as a corrective to the idolatrous Arabs' view of them as God's daughters and thus subsumed under monotheism, whereas the second—that scriptures were revealed to some of the prophets—can be regarded as a supplement to the belief in prophecy. Called the Articles of Faith, these beliefs are often expounded in great detail by Muslim theologians but are essentially simple, which accounts for their enduring appeal. They are summed up in the Islamic Testimony: There is no god but God, and Muhammad is His messenger.

Rituals

Islamic religious practice takes the form of four main rituals, called the Pillars of Islam (the Islamic Testimony, on which they are grounded, is regarded as the fifth Pillar). They are: prayer (to be performed five times a day in a prescribed manner), fasting (during Ramadan, the ninth month of the Islamic lunar calendar), welfare due (mandatory charity, to be given once a year according to a certain formula), and pilgrimage (performed at the Ka?bah in Mecca at least once in one's lifetime). Taken together, the rituals will be seen to involve bodily exertion, spiritual and mental concentration, and expense of time and money; they call for serious commitment by the individual. But they also have a social and egalitarian dimension. In prayer, for example, rich and poor Muslims stand shoulder to shoulder behind a prayer leader who is not a priest and who may belong to any social class. Likewise, the welfare due seeks to help the poor and the needy in society.

Disciplines of Knowledge

As the fundamental text of Islam, the Qur'an had to be studied carefully. Preoccupation with the Word of God led to the rise of the discipline of Qur'an exegesis, with a large number of commentaries—some comprehensive, others specialized—being produced. Focus on the legislative and doctrinal material in the Qur'an gave rise to the sciences of law and theology (and the latter in turn to the rise of philosophy), whereas the spiritual teachings of the scriptures paved the way for mysticism. Since Muhammad was believed to have lived an ideal life worthy of emulation by Muslims and expounded the Qur'an through his words and actions, the fields of sira (Muhammad's biography) and hadith were developed both as aids to understanding the Qur'an and as possessing intrinsic importance and value. Interest in the life of the Prophet soon grew into an interest in the lives of other distinguished persons and in the careers of nations, and so biography and historiography were developed. Finally, the Qur'anic exhortation to study nature as the handiwork of God and as containing signs and evidence of the glory and mercy of God provided an impetus to the growth of natural sciences. The Islamic religious, social, and natural sciences are thus informed by a certain orientational and conceptual unity that ultimately derives from the Qur'an.

Major Issues in Islamic Thought

One issue each from theology, philosophy, and mysticism will be cited. A principal concern of the Muslim theologians was to explain the scope of human freedom in view of the divine omnipotence stressed in the Qur'an. Most theologians, while conceding that human freedom is necessary to meaningful moral behavior in this world and also to reward and punishment in the next, were inclined to accept a more or less predestinarian view, although a strong libertarian undercurrent has always been present. In philosophy Muslim thinkers sought to harmonize Islamic faith with Greek thought, but they ran into difficulties on such issues as the eternity of the world and were severely criticized by the orthodox for selling Islam short. In mysticism a reaction against legalism and formalism led many sensitive people to draw on the spiritual sources of the religion to have a more personal experience of God. Overall, Muslim intellectuals have tried to realize the ideals and norms of a monotheistic religion in different areas of thought and life.

Spread of Islam

After its establishment on the Arabian peninsula, Islam spread quickly outside. Iran, Iraq, and Syria were conquered early, as were parts of Central Asia, and successful military operations were mounted in North Africa, Spain, and India. Muhammad was succeeded by four caliphs (632–661), whom the Sunnites reverently remember as the "rightly guided caliphs" (cf. the Shi?ite view below). They were followed by the Umayyad (661–750) and ?Abbasid (750–1258 and later) dynasties. But more remarkable than the physical expansion was the acculturation of the large numbers of new converts. For example, Arabic became the lingua franca of the Muslim world—almost all of the primary sources of Islam, no matter where produced, are in Arabic—and possession of knowledge of the Qur'an and hadith gave anyone a position of respect in society. Likewise, well-defined rituals and values arising out of a set of simple beliefs imparted a basic unity of thought and approach in the theoretical and practical domains of life; and an essentially egalitarian society, by facilitating physical mobility, social interaction, and intellectual advancement—especially in cosmopolitan areas—opened up new opportunities, making Islam a desirable choice for the non-Muslim citizens. Today there are more than fifty countries, mostly in Asia and Africa, with substantial numbers of Muslims. Most Muslims are not Arabs (Arabs form only about 20 percent of the world Muslim population). In the modern period, until a few decades ago, large parts of the Muslim world were under colonial domination, and their economic and political systems have been heavily influenced by those of the colonizing countries. Problems of poverty, illiteracy, and oppressive political and economic structures plague many Muslim countries, but there are signs that a general reawakening, with a definite Islamic component, is occurring in many places. In many countries young Muslims are trying to rediscover their Islamic roots; the demand for Islamic literature—both classical and modern—is high; and a determination to implement Islamic law is noticeable.

Sunnites and Shi?ites

Islamic society was not without its problems, though. An early split was to have profound theological and political consequences. The Shi?ites (literally "partisans") believe that prophets are succeeded by infallible leaders and guides known as imams. The largest Shi?ite sect believes in a series of twelve imams beginning with ?Ali, Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law and fourth caliph after him, and ending with an imam who went into a state of occultation in the 870s but who is expected to make a triumphal return at the end of time. Most Shi?ites reject the caliphate of the first three of the rightly guided caliphs and interpret Islamic history differently from the Sunnites. Twelver Shi?ism has become a powerful political force in Iran since the 1979 revolution there.

Islam in America

The Muslims in America number about six million. They can be divided into two categories, indigenous and immigrant. In the 1930s Elijah Muhammad founded the Nation of Islam, criticizing the whites as devils and preaching a black supremacist doctrine. Malcolm X, a prominent member of the party, made the pilgrimage to Mecca, where he saw the Islamic egalitarian principle at work. Upon his return he renounced allegiance to Elijah Muhammad and supported mainstream Islam; he was assassinated in suspicious circumstances. After Elijah Muhammad's death in 1975, his son Warith Deen Muhammad gradually brought the Nation of Islam into mainstream Islam, although a group under Louis Farrakhan clung to the old philosophy; this latter group is not regarded by most Muslims as holding the right views.

The immigrants came to America in several waves. The early decades of the twentieth century saw the arrival of many Arab workers in the automotive and steel industries. In the middle decades students arrived, and then professionals, both groups representing a wider spectrum of the world Muslim population. Today the immigrant Muslims can be divided into two main groups—those from Arab countries and those from the Indian subcontinent. On the whole, the immigrants have been quite active in building mosques, schools, and Islamic centers. With their strong educational background and diversified vocational expertise they are relatively more resourceful and have taken the initiative in launching Islamic projects. But whether indigenous or immigrant, the American Muslims have several common problems. There is, for example, the issue of integration: To what extent may they assimilate to mainstream American society without losing their religious identity? There is also concern about giving the younger generation an Islamic education that is meaningful in the American context. Media coverage of Islam and Muslims is usually negative, and stereotypes abound. Several Muslim organizations now monitor anti-Muslim portrayals in literature, films, and public and private institutions, and some progress has been made in this regard.