BLASPHEMER
Who is really insulting Allah SWT, the Qur’an, and
the Prophet Muhammad SAW and his legacy?
“Do you preach righteousness and fail to practice it yourselves, although you read the Scripture? Do you not understand?” [The Noble Qur’an 2:44]
There is no doubt that many people feel very passionate about calling out those who ridicule and defame the Prophet Muhammad SAW or the Commandments of Allah SWT. I am one of those people and this piece is more for me than anyone else, because we must be reminded of our duty and our sincerity to Allah and His Messenger SAW before anything else, Insha’Allah.
Whether it is France or any other country; whether it is cartoons, jokes, laws, news reports, or even opinion pieces, we stand in outrage when his name is uttered with disrespect. We call for blood, punishment, and boycotts, yet we fail to understand the real tragedy in all this. We fail to recognize who the true blasphemers are.
“And let those who oppose the Messenger’s (Muhammad SAW) commandment beware, lest some Fitnah befall them or a painful torment be inflicted on them.” [Surat An Nur: Ayah 63]
When you love someone you want to do the things that please them and you avoid the things that they dislike. If it is someone of status then you want to make sure that you respect them and follow them. If they tell you to do something, you do it, and if they ask you not to do something, you will never do it. All because you love them and you do not want them to be disappointed in you or not love you back.
Our relationship with Allah as our Master and His Messenger SAW is beyond this. Allah chose the Qur’an as our Book and Muhammad SAW as our leader, our teacher, our guide, our example, our beloved. This relationship is divinely decreed. If we are Muslims then we must accept it, testify to it, submit to it, and act on it with all our heart.
But, while we find that we are so easily offended on his behalf, we do not judge ourselves with the same standards. We are not people who reflect on our own condition and how we break our promise and our oath of devotion to the Qur’an and his example everyday. Then, I beg to ask, who is really insulting him or the Book? Those who know or those who do not know? Those who believe or those who do not believe? Those who vowed to respect and follow them and break that promise everyday or those who never made such a vow and are left to dwell in their ignorance and arrogance?
“Are those who know equal to those who do not know?” Only they will remember [who are] people of understanding. [The Noble Qur’an 39:9]
We want to protest against their insults and their not respecting our Prophet SAW or the Book of Allah and His Commandments, yet we don’t realize that they haven’t taken an oath to respect and follow them. We have. And, if we realized how much worse it is to call ourselves Muslims and then do the opposite of what Allah and His Messenger SAW commanded us to do, then we would not have a voice to protest. Not a whisper, because we would want to bow our heads in shame instead.
You may be confused, but this is something I have really pondered over. Is my rage over these acts justified or am I making a show of my devotion to Islam, because I am overcompensating for my own ignorance and lack of self control to the point where I may be out of the religion all together? It is good to be upset when someone insults our Deen, but it should cause us to reflect not just react. We are supposed to be people of understanding, like the Sahabah RA were when faced with similar situations, Insha’Allah.
We learn that the enemies of Allah and His Messenger SAW will always exist and they will always push our buttons, it is what their heart calls them to, but I want to ask what our hearts are calling us to? And, if we are to stand for Islam and Our Prophet SAW, then we better be ready to answer that call in our own lives as well, because for this we will be questioned in the Hereafter!
So, let us dissect this to make it easier to understand and digest. Let us analyze just a little of what we have been commanded to do in Islam and what we actually see in the Ummah as a majority, Insha’Allah.
1. We commit Shirk (worshipping anything besides Allah or associating partners with Allah) and don’t bat an eye. We take what we found our ancestors doing and continue their legacies, instead of honouring the word of Allah and the Prophet Muhammad SAW. All across the Muslim world, we worship graves, make monuments to the dead, and make pilgrammage and sujood to such places. We take the word of man over Allah and His Messenger SAW. We wear amulets (taweez), decorate our homes with talismans (e.g. evil eye and hand of Fatimah or Hamsa) for protection, or go to soothsayers and magicians to help us with our problems and ask about the future, or calling on the Kuffar for aid and support when Muslims exist in countless numbers as we should be calling on Allah SWT alone. There are countless other acts that we do in our daily lives that we have no proof of and if someone does give us sincere advice from the Qur’an and Sunnah, we reject it citing such and such Shaykh and such and such Leader, Subhan’Allah. Why are we not protesting this atrocity? Such an atrocity that it causes the heavens and the earth to shake and near explode? Where is our pride and our love then?
“O men! Here is a parable set forth! listen to it! Those on whom, besides Allah, you call, cannot create (even) a fly, if they all met together for the purpose! and if the fly should snatch away anything from them, they would have no power to release it from the fly. Feeble are those who petition and those whom they petition!” [Al-Qur’an 22:73]
2. We commit countless Bid’ah and rejoice in them. We don’t find proof for what we practice from the Qur’an and Sunnah of the Prophet of Allah SAW. We celebrate holidays that have no basis or evidence from even the Sahabah RA, such as celebrating the birth of the Prophet SAW, reading the Qur’an on behalf of the dead (Qur’an Khwani), non-Muslims holidays, death anniversaries, all sorts of milads, yet we insist on these activities as if they are obligatory. We don’t perform regular Salah, but will stand for fabricated voluntary acts, Subhan’Allah. Is this not an insult to the Prophet SAW and his legacy, when he said in his last sermon on Arafat during the Farewell Hajj:
Reason well, therefore, O people, and understand the words which I convey to you. I leave behind me two things, the Qur’an and my example, the Sunnah and if you follow these you will never go astray. All those who listen to me shall pass on my words to others and those to others again; and may the last ones understand my words better than those who listen to me directly. Be my witness, O Allah, that I have conveyed your message to your people”. (Bukhari)
And on the same day, Allah revealed:
“This day I have perfected for you your religion and completed My favor upon you and have approved for you Islām as religion.” [The Noble Qur’an 5:3]