It’s now very pathetic each and every hour I tune on to my TV/Radio; I hear hundreds of Muslims are killed from unjustified reasons, is it a crime to be a SUNNI or SHEA? Is it an offense to be SUKUTI or QADIRIYA? What’s wrong to be Iraqi, Iran, Pakistan, Indian, Afghani, Malawian, Somali, North or South Sudan citizen? Have we shunned the words of Allah that reminds us that killing of one innocent life the sin committed is the same as killing the lives of entire humankind? What is the wisdom behind bombing a car with onboard hundreds of school children or passengers? Do they deserve this collective punishment just because they’re Sunnis or Shea; white or black in color; Yao or Chewa Tribe?
Dispute and discord among the believers, and partisanship, obstinacy and envy, which lead to bitterness and enmity among them, are distasteful and vile, harmful and sinful, for personal, social and spiritual life, by the testimony of truth and wisdom, and from the viewpoint of the supreme humanity that is Islam. Also, they are poison for the life of mankind.
O unjust man who nourishes rancor and enmity against a believer! Suppose that you were on a ship, or in a house, with ten people, one innocent, the others criminal. If someone were to try to make the ship sink, or to set the house on fire, because of that one criminal, you know how great an injustice he would be committing. You would cry out to the heavens against his injustice. Even if there were one innocent man and nine criminals aboard the ship, it would still be against all rules of justice to sink it.
In the same way, a believer may be compared to a house or a ship belonging to God, and he has, not nine, but as many as twenty innocent attributes such as faith, Islam and neighborliness. If, then, you cherish ill will and enmity against him on account of one criminal attribute that is adverse to you, and you desire the sinking of that ‘ship’ or the burning of that ‘house’ created by God, then this would be a most terrible crime.
As it is well-known, love and enmity are, like the light and darkness, opposites so they cannot be combined in a heart in their true nature. Indeed, unity in faith requires the unity of hearts, and the oneness of creed demands the oneness of society. You cannot deny that if you are in the same squad as someone, you will feel a friendly attachment to him; that a friendly relation will be formed between you and him due to your both being under the command of a single commander. You will also experience a brotherly relationship because of living in the same barracks, school or nation. All these things considered, you should understand the extent to which you are attached to a believer by ties of unity between you as numerous as the Divine Names, bonds of accord and relations of brotherhood coming from the light and consciousness of faith.
Both of you are the slaves of the same, One Creator, One Sovereign, One Object of Worship, One Provider… so there are thousands of ties of unity between you, to the number of His Names. Besides, your Prophet, your religion, your qibla, are one and the same, and the number of such ties amount to almost a hundred. In addition, your town is one, your country is one, your state is one; tens of things are one and the same for you. All of these ties require unity and oneness, union and harmony, love and brotherhood, and they are, as immaterial chains, strong enough to link all the planets together.
If, despite all this, you prefer those things, as weak and unimportant as a spider’s web, that cause dispute and discord, rancor and enmity and the bearing of grudges against a believer, then you must understand – unless your heart is dead and your intelligence extinguished – how great is your disregard for those ties of unity, how serious the slight you give to those causes of love, how serious your transgression against those relationships of brotherhood! Lets love one another for the sake of Allah and join our bonds for the betterment of our Islamic community, lets live by example as its part of calling to complete way of life.
Thank you brother for this heart touching article. For along time now, I ask myself almost similar questions that we muslims do profess of unwavering faith and yet copy,imitate other societies' ways of living. It is this blind following of other ideologies that brings us muslims into conflict within ourselves.we want to combine two conflicting ideologies together and still claim that we are following each one fully.For example the Libyans claim to be staunch muslims and yet today they are failing to follow Islamic teaching on burrial of a dead person.They are keeping a body for unjustified reasons while chanting Allah Akbar.If we muslims do not diagnose the disease within us,I can correctly predict that we will soon be people without religion and Islam will remain a religion without people. Because we will adopt cultures that are foreign to Islam and still claim to be muslims.Today as my brother has stated it above that every time one tunes in to the TV/Radio, the big items are the killings taking place in the muslim world.Does it mean that the non muslims do not differ in their communities? I know the answer that we normally give is that the media has wedged a war against Islam.But is a fact that most muslims lands are marred with conflicts,civil wars while Islam is the only religion in this world that lays down reasons on why someone can fight.and if as the last option one decided to fight, there are very strict rules of engagement.But on the contrary, we find most war abuse are committed in Muslim lands thereby making muslims appear most barbaric as far as war crimes are concerned. Why should we disgrace our beautiful religion like this? The funny part is we even chant Allah Akbar while committing these atrocities.Why should we subject Allah to such ugly trials because of our reckless, ignorance and ungrateful behaviours? Are we really going to face Allah on day of judgement and defend our actions? What are we going to say on that day on the ridicules we are subjecting Islam to,because of our claims? I believe if we turned back to the teachings of Islam earnestly and requested Allah to guide us honestly as we chant the our Fatihas in our prayers,Allah will show us that straight path.
May Allah guide us and show us the way to go, to restore the turnished image of Islam which we muslims have done with our own actions.