CONCLUSION

To Our Young Generation

The holy Qura'an has given us a directive saying

"Do not give credence to what you have not yourself found out (to be true). Your hearing, your sight, your power of understanding, all will be held to account (for what they are used for). (17/36)

The character of Believers is laid down as under:

These are folk that when (even) Allah's ayah are presented to them, do not follow them as dumb, blind people (but exercise their judgment) (25/73)

If you agree that Faith is what is embraced as a result of discernment and logic, then even an axiom (a generally accepted fact) should not be accepted without critical examination, even though it may have an ancient currency.

But you ask any Muslim what is the Deen. He will, say, without a second thought, "Deen consists of Quran and Sunnah taken together." According to the prevailing perception, this answer is so authentic that we cannot even think of putting it to test! Does this mean that Qura’an is only one half of the Deen? Is Qura’an not the complete Deen?

Qura'an, the TRUTH

We know that "Deen" (faith) can only be something sure, not speculation, not conjecture.

Take the Qura'an. It declares repeatedly, that this book is the TRUTH. It says,

"This is the law which we have revealed to you. This is (entirely) the Truth. (35/31)

This great scripture begins with the words: "There is no doubt in this Book" In other words, it is the truth and not based on conjecture or probability. Its message is true beyond all doubt. This is about substance or text of the book.

How was this true book bestowed upon Muslims? How are they to keep it and in what capacity? Answers to these questions are clear and straightforward. This book was revealed to the holy Prophet and its compilation and Allah has guaranteed safeguarding.

"Verily the collection and teaching of this book is Our Charge."

He did not just vouchsafe compilation of Quran. He also gave the guarantee that there will be no alteration or interpolation in it till eternity:

"Certainly, we have bestowed the Quran and we shall safeguard it."(15/9)

And to give this safeguarding a practical shape, the Prophet was told that:

"Convey in consistent way that which has been bestowed upon you by your God so that no one should be in jeopardy for lack of the message" (6/70)

"Your task is to convey this to people" (13/40)

In other words if the Prophet did not convey the message to people he would not be doing the duty of a prophet. (Read this ayah and think again, is Qura'an only half the faith?)

We have before us what (and how much) the holy Prophet did about the Qura’an in obedience to Allah's commands. The core Sahaba (companions) were dictated every word of the Qura'an. There were thousands of Haffaz-the people who would memorize word by word and later recited it and heard it recited by others. So before he departed from this world he had made sure that God's word bestowed upon him had been conveyed to people in its complete state. It had been preserved in writing as well as committed to memory of thousands of the Haffaz.

In the address of the Last Haj (Hajjatul Wida), the Prophet obtained an acknowledgement from hundreds of thousands of people that he had conveyed the Allah's (complete) message to them. Then he made Allah a witness that he had done the duty of a Messenger. Everyone, Muslims and others, knows that the Qura'an that Muslims possess is to a letter, the same that was conveyed to them by the Prophet. After the Prophet, the Caliphs considered it their prime duty to preserve the Qura'an and took practical steps to ensure this. The result is that this Book, committed to memories of people, as well as committed to writing is being passed on to successive generations in its very original state, word by word, as conveyed by the Prophet.

Imperatives of Being God's Messenger

The very first thing to note is that Allah has not guaranteed safeguarding of any scripture other than the Qura'an. So Allah did not ordain collection of Hadeeth nor did He guarantee safeguarding it. What was the will of the Prophet himself in this matter? This is worth examining because Hadeeth, after all, is a collection of the Prophet's sayings and actions. In case he had willed Hadeeth to be part of the scriptures, he would surely have made the same arrangements regarding the Hadeeth as he made about the Qura'an. He would likewise have got them written up and committed to memory, having them recited and to listen to recitations for verifying their correct transcription, in short, made sure these had been preserved word by individual word. These steps should also have been part of the Prophet's task.

Surely, the Prophet's task was to leave the Deen with the Ummah in its most secure form. However, whereas he took such elaborate measures in regard to the Qura'an, he is not known to have taken corresponding measures regarding Hadeeth. In fact it is reported in the books of Hadeeth itself that the Prophet said,

"Commit nothing to writing from me excepting the Qura'an. Whosoever has written anything except Qura'an should expunge it. (Saheeh Muslim)

Give it a thought. Had Hadeeth been part of the faith would the Prophet not have taken measures for protecting it? Does it not follow then that Hadeeth is not a part of scriptures.

Defiance by the Religious Hierarchy

Whatever had happened with Allah's faith at the hands of nations that preceded Muslims, such as Jews and Christians, also happened with Islam. Allah completed the Deen by means of the Qura'an and the Prophet gave this Qura'an to the Ummah. However, shortly after departure of the holy Prophet, vested interests started asserting themselves. So this Deen also became a religion like the Deens that had been brought by earlier messengers. There was one difference, however, that the Qura'an remained safeguarded in its original form, because Allah had Himself guaranteed its safeguarding whereas the older scriptures had no divine protection.

Islam was first hit by advent of monarchy, to be followed by capitalism. Religious hierarchy emerged as guardian to both these enemies of Islam. The trinity converted the Faith to a “religion”. The Faith is not compatible with the religion so the religious establishment left no stone unturned to eliminate Faith from life of Muslims.

Anthologies of Hadeeth

In the Abbasi period, along with phenomenal progress in other Islamic academics and arts, publication of collected works of Hadeeth also thrived. Amongst collected works of Hadeeth, major books are Bukhari and Muslim. Of the two, Bukhari is considered the most reliable collection. It was compiled about 200 years after the Prophet's passing away. (Imam Bukhari died in 256 A.H.) These collections were not based upon any written matter, only on verbal reports. What degree of authenticity can be ascribed to record compiled in this fashion? It is obvious that fabrication of Hadees was also resorted to because it was so easy to do that. There is no obstacle to alter or add to the matter not based on any supporting written record. The extent of proliferation of fabricated Hadeeth can be imagined from the fact that according to Bukhari he had to choose from 600,000 Hadeeth and after a critical examination, he retained only 2630. In spite of all these flaws, Bukhari's is regarded as the most accurate book after the Qura'an. The various compilations of Hadeeth now classed as part of Islam number ten, out of which, six are of Sunnis and four of the Shia sect. The two sects reject each other’s collections.

Selection of Hadeeth

No one knows what the criteria of selection or rejection were. It is said that the compilers had vetted authors of the reports as to their integrity and truthfulness etc. However, this process could have included only people who were contemporaries of the compilers. How could ANY kind of verification be extended to eight successive generations that had passed between times of the Prophet and the lifetime of compilers? There are other eccentricities of a general nature but these cannot be discussed at length in this short essay.

All Compilers were Iranians

ll compilers of Hadeeth were Iranians, none of them an Arab. It is very odd that no Arab took up this work when it would be more logical for Arabs to do that. All compilers belong to the third Hijra century. As stated above, according to them, they found hundreds of thousands of Hadeeth but rejected all but a tiny fraction. All sources of Hadeeth were verbal reports. The ones they selected from hundreds of thousands were picked at sole discretion of the collectors without an institutional review. They had no commission or authority from Allah or his Prophet for this collection.

Give a thought to the question, how can one believe that the Hadeeth collected through such individual efforts, were in reality sayings or actions of the Prophet. Also consider the assumption that the Faith had to wait for two centuries for "completion" by Bukhari and none could make that effort before him. What would have happened if these people had not done this job? Would a half of the Deen get lost?

Ask yourself whether Allah, who declared the Deen as complete and the Messenger who was the final Prophet, would leave an important part of the Deen in suspense? Does this possibility merit serious contemplation?

Only the Qura'an is Word of the Messenger

We started with the assumption that to consider something as Deen, an important prerequisite is that it should be authentic. Hadeeth does not fulfill this condition. In fact the disputes between various sects of Muslims are caused by this factor. A Hadith, authentic to one sect, is rejected by the other, saying that it is not the saying or action of the Messenger. These disputes have been there for a thousand years. For Muslims, the only thing to be sure about is that the Qura'an is the book of Allah and it is the final book on which the Almighty decides matters of men and the universe and which decides the survival or demise of nations. Allah revealed no other book and none conveyed by the Prophet. Therefore, only the Qura'an is the word of the Messenger.

Challenge to Non-believers to Bring a Hadeeth of matching Standard

"Tell them to bring a Hadeeth like this (the Qura'an) if you are true of word" (Qura'an, 52/34)

This was a challenge to religious hierarchy of that time as well as to people at large, and no one could meet the challenge. It is a paradox that Muslims themselves seem to have accepted Allah's challenge, created “rival” scriptures, and spread them around the world by force of propaganda. They have accorded such sanctity to this challenge to Allah that according to leaders of theocracy non-acceptance of a single Hadeeth can exclude a Muslim from Islam.

Result of Conquest of Iran

The Islamic Ummah is beholden to Allama Iqbal for emphasizing that Islam we inherited from ancestors is not the Islam, which Allah gave us. The present Islam was fashioned in the days of monarchies, especially in Abbassid times. The religious hierarchy has been upholding and nurturing it since then.

Zoroastrian Iran avenged its defeat not only from Arabs but also from whole of Islam, uprooting its very foundations. Allama Iqbal summed up this in one sentence: -

"The conquest of Iran resulted, not in Iran becoming Islamized but Islam being Iranized". (Islam and Mysticism-New Era 28th July 1917)

Devotees of the Ajamite Deities

Allama Iqbal wrote in another letter, " Indian Muslims have been under Iranian influences since centuries. They are not familiar with the Arabic Islam or its objectives. Their ideals, literary as well as social, all are Iranian." (Iqbalnama Vol.1, P.24) He calls it Muslims' Magian heritage and in anguish, he writes:

This Magian heritage dried up Islam's sources of inspiration and stalled both the development of its spirit and the achievement of its objectives," (Ahmadiyat and Islam). The result was:

Civics, Mysticism, Sharia and the Word,

All worship the idols of Iran,

Reality is the hostage to absurdity

The Ummah got lost in traditions.

Islam Not a "Religion"…

The Deen (or faith) denotes a complete system of life and a law for collective existence of humans, which takes shape in a free state. On the other hand, a 'religion' shuns collective living. It believes in individual deliverance, ensconced in privacy and secluded in meditation. From this aspect there is hardly any difference between Islam and Vedanta of Hindus, Monotheism of Christians and Zoroastrianism of Iranians. It is for this reason that Iqbal; in his essay “New Era” dubbed Sufism a scaling ladder of the conjurer and an alien growth in Islamic soil.

Islam needs its free State for becoming a living system of life. This is the condition, which, if not met, reduces it to the state of just another 'religion'-not a Deen. True, Islam is founded on establishment of Salat, giving of Zakat, enjoining the merited and forbidding the prohibited.

According to our current concept of Islam, the establishment of Salat means just the saying of prayers. Similarly, Zakat implies only giving some money to the poor and to those who beg. Enjoining the merited means preaching in the Juma prayers. Obviously we did not need a free state for any of the above purposes because these could easily be performed equally well in slavery of the British or of Hindus. A Muslim in India, in spite of his present state of helplessness, can also carry these out. On theocratic level, Islam enjoins worship of Allah and refraining from duality, i.e. shirk (not worshipping any one other than Allah). No free state is needed for abiding by this injunction either.

The Qura'an provides that for establishment of the Deen,' power on earth' is necessary, because without that power neither we can worship Allah in the real sense nor avoid duality i.e. obeying commandments of other than Allah. It is laid down in the Surah 'Noor' that Allah has promised you your state so that you can adopt submission to Him and can avoid duality.

…But a System of Life

The Deen is a collective way of life in which all individuals are welded into a single entity and follow a uniform pattern of life. It is the commonality of their Deen, which makes them one Ummah. Let us remember that according to Qura'an, the modern term of 'school of thought" and sectarianism is a perfidy, a curse and shirk of a capital nature. It was for this reason that the Prophet was told

"Those who create splits in their system and divide into sects, you have no concern with them, O Prophet."

Please note that getting rid of these political and sectarian parties is an imperative of our Deen i.e. Islam. Allama Iqbal gave the idea of Pakistan solely for establishment of this Islam. The Quaid-e-Azam had to wage a multi-front war for ten long years with the Hindus, the British, the "nationalist" Muslims and the Maulvis and Maulanas for this purpose. Allah did gift us the promised piece of land. Despotism, theocracy, and capitalism were to be stamped out because these are foul systems. God's own light, the Qura'an had to become a manifesto in the State in accordance with the teachings of the Prophet.