Islam and God-Centricity

Reassessing Fundamental Theological Assumptions

Arif Abdul Hussain

• Publisher: Al-Mahdi Institute
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781999862138
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Islamic Theology

Islam and God-Centricity: Reassessing Fundamental Theological Assumptions
is the second book in a multi-volume series. In this volume, an essential feature
of Prophet Mu?ammad’s message of God-centricity is propounded, namely
the spirit of sincere inquiry and continual learning. This feature is quintessentially
the definition of what it is to be human. The history of humanity
has been punctuated by waves of progression and regression, both of which
are the effects of either the presence or absence of the spirit of sincere inquiry
and continual learning within individuals, communities and societies. Today,
there is no facet of life in which this spirit is lacking more than in the realm
of religion. Paradoxically, Prophet Mu?ammad taught that genuine inquiry in
every aspect of life is intrinsic to the Godly life – it is inherent in the process of
becoming God-conscious ( muttaq? ). Fundamental to this process is the questioning
of theological assumptions of religion that prevail in the culture that
one is born into. This book endeavours to convey the necessity for every Muslim
today to initiate sincere religious inquiry and to take the reader through
an analysis of current prevailing Muslim theological assumptions.

Night Six

We understood destiny as two things: fate of humanity on earth and salvation in the Hereafter. We discussed the end goal for human existence upon this earth. We stated that those exclusivist assumptions, that one group of people will attain supremacy over the rest of the mankind, are wholly inaccurate, false and inconsistent with our human condition. Many faith systems have this exclusivist eschatology. We examined the verses of the Quran and the hadith literature pertaining to the fulfilment of the collective human body. Intellectually, our knowledge base increases through our individual, communal, and collective endeavours. History is composed of us all contributing in one way or another. In the Quran, God says that He taught Adam all the names. Where are these names? These names are there, yearning to be discovered – to be found. The surge of humanity towards completion is a collective endeavour. We are all evolving together. God wants us to explore! He wants us to understand. He wants us to learn. He wants us to become the supreme species on the face of this earth. He wants humanity to arrive at intellectual completion. That is the first thing.

The second thing is that humanity, as a collective body, has to become morally refined. It has to arrive at the pedestal of morality where there is agreement that humans as humans need to abide by these moral truths – these rights, whether they believe in God or not. As Husayn ibn Ali said on Ashura that, “If you neither believe in God nor are fearful of accountability in front of Him, then at least in your human capacity do not stoop to such a despicable degree. The acts that you are committing are unworthy of a human being!” There are moral values, there is something like human dignity. We also stated that morality is connected to the collective humanity. Majority of morality becomes redundant in an individual existence. Morality only has value – any sense of existence – in a collective capacity. For example, if I was the only individual on the face of this earth, speaking the truth would have no value. Being fair in transactions, being charitable, righteous, and saving life would have no meaning. Therefore, human destiny binds all of us together.

Now think about this: had we not been of different groupings, persuasions, colours and cultures, how would we explore these same human truths? For instance, if we were one tribe, one nation or one religion with the exact same thoughts there would be no notion of inalienable human rights, which is premised on difference. But due to the variety of multiplicity throughout existence, we are able to evolve to a level where we declare that there is a sense of human morality that embraces us despite our variety. And the Quran says this, “We have made you nations and tribes.” (49:13)

We also touched upon the final element of the collective eschatology – spiritual fulfilment. The state of completion in which there is God centricity or belonging to God at an intimate level. Not just living a life for the sake of it, not just an arbitrary life but a real substantive life which comes through being God-centred. Then we gave the narration that when the Mahdi appears he will rule upon the people of Injīl with their Injīl, Torah with their Torah, Zabūr with their Zabūr and Quran with their Quran . God is even more explicit in the Quran that whosoever, from among the Abrahamic faiths and Sabians, believes in God, the Last Day, and does righteous deeds, they will have their reward, there shall be no fear upon them, and nor shall they grieve. The Quran is giving this message of plurality! This verse is repeated twice, and there are ample of verses giving the same meaning – from Sūra al-Baqara to al-Mā’ida. Four chapters of the Quran are stating this. The Prophet enacted this plurality in the creation of his Ummah, and the eschatology regarding the Mahdi is talking about this plurality.

To briefly recap: the collective success of humanity is foretold by our religious texts and is anticipated in light of our human condition. The final end of mankind on the face of this earth is that humanity arrives at a level of maturity despite their differences and particularities, where they see the salient truths and realise that knowledge is a common heritage that we are all growing through and adding to. In fact, this variety adds charm to knowledge. What one person can see, the other cannot because they have different perspectives, and when both the different perspectives come together the synthesis adds to the human knowledge base. This knowledge cannot grow save through particularities and differences. Similarly, common morals and common morality cannot exist save in the ambit of differences and plurality. Common spirituality, that God-centricity and becoming godly, cannot be understood save within the context of plurality.

You will see the Christian, Jew, and Muslim – Shia or Sunni and you will notice that from all of them there are people who are godly and others who are not. You will find a distinction not through religion but through another yardstick altogether: “godliness” and “godlessness”. “Lakum dīnukum wa-liya dīn.” This is the distinction that the Quran is making, “For you is your dīn (religion), and for me is my dīn” (109:6) That dīn is nothing but wholesome surrender to God – the principle of all splendor and human aspirations. Only through distinctions of religion, language, culture, ethnicity and gender that we realise the all-embracing nature and beauty of the Most Beloved. Only through variety and plurality we understand that God is at once manifested through each and beyond all determinations. True God-centricity is in transcending limitations and allowing the light of God to reveal itself through different mediums.

The Quran strikes only one distinction, “godly people” and “godless people”. It is within the collective capacity that we begin to arrive at this truth, the realisation that actually spirituality goes beyond religious persuasion. You can be godly in the folds of any religion. I ask a question that if everybody on the face of this earth were to become a Muslim, would there not be differences? Of course, there would be differences. There would be differences in the way in which they understand Islam. Look at the numbers of sects we have in Islam itself. If everybody became a Sunni Muslim would there not be differences? Of course there would be differences! There would be differences in jurisprudence and theology. One will say the justice of God means this, and the other will say the justice of God means that. One will say the sunna of the Prophet means this, and the other will say the sunna of the Prophet means that.

You will never be able to rid the human community of variety and plurality. Everything is individual; there are no universals on the face of this earth. They only exist in the mind or at a metaphysical level. There is only individual! And by ‘individual’ we mean that there are individual existing things – you are one person, and I am one person – that is it. This individuality yields plurality. No matter how much you try, you cannot rid the world of plurality. It is not possible, and you can never do away with it.

Now, if we insist that the exclusivist position is the truthful one, that out of the seventy-three sects, seventy-two will be damned and one will be saved, then we are in effect stating that God is the biggest failure in His decision to create a khalīfa on the face of this earth – He has totally and miserably failed! But of course, this is inconsistent with the verse of the Quran in which God says, “Nobody will go to hell save the most wretched!” (92:14-16). It also is inconsistent with the verses that state that the Jews, Christians, Muslims and Sabians will go to paradise so long as they believe in God and the Last Day, and perform righteous deeds. So we have a choice. Either we cling to the negative exclusivist eschatology, which is totally infested with absurdities, or we uphold the human collective eschatology, which is actually mentioned in the Quran and maintains that the overwhelming majority of humanity will arrive at that glorious state of human success.

Now, how will our acceptance of the collective eschatology shape our attitudes in this life? We will be invested in bringing about collective growth and salvation. We will be concerned with the collective fulfilment of humanity. The Muslims will no longer think in terms of their exclusivist Islam when it comes to worldly success. Rather, they will think in the terms of the inclusive state of islam, an islam that allows for all humanity and faiths to work together and collectively as one human community to arrive at that level of success destined for humanity as a whole. This concludes our discussion on eschatology in terms of humanity’s destiny on earth.

Now, we move on to the other sense of destiny that is entailed in the notion of qiyāma, salvation in the Hereafter. Qiyāma is that point of individual salvation, but even here if you look at the verses of the Quran , God talks about salvation and damnation in a collective context. Sūra such as al-Maryam, al-Zumar, al-‘Arāf, and many others discuss the fact that whole communities will be admitted to paradise or hell. In one Sūra, it is said that one community will curse its sister community. The latter community will ask, “Who has prepared this seat for us inside hell?” This shows that even in the Hereafter the communal identity is very dominant and that it determines our ultimate fate. The fact that whole communities have been destroyed due to their insolence and disbelief is evidence of this collective-damnation. On the other hand, notions such as “the best Ummah” is demonstrating collective-salvation, in addition to worldly success.

It stands to reason that worldly life gives communal identities to members of given communities. This identity is not only indicating the arbitrary features such as location, language, and customs. The communal identity goes well beyond these things and actually fashions the outlook of its members – the psychology, ethics, morality and spiritual orientation of the people of the communities. Thus, it is now easier for us to understand how a godly community ensures the salvation of its members due to its shared moral and spiritual orientation, whereas an ungodly community impacts its members in a contrary manner. There are many testimonials of this in the Quran where a group of people in hell lament and blame others for their ill fate.

What is the understanding of qiyāma and salvation that prevails through our community today? It is that my personal purity constitutes my salvation. This attitude is a huge damnation upon the community because the community believes that purification of the soul is being divorced from the world altogether and becoming pious. I ask what does piety mean for you? Is it to look miserable all day long? Is it to take the prayer beads and sit on the prayer mat all day long or to pray and fast all day long? If this is your piety then know that the Prophet of Islam said, “The sleep of a scholar (ālim) is better than the wakefulness of a ignorant person.” At that time when the Prophet uttered these words we did not have the (ālim) that we have today – the scholars of fiqh and Islam. Ālim, at that time, meant somebody who was learned. Imam Ali said, “If you have a moment before death, the best thing to do in that moment is to learn something.” Why? Knowledge is connected to salvation on qiyāma. There is something going on! It is a question of fulfilment, the completion of the human journey. How do we complete it? We complete it by becoming godlike.

I often give this example. There are certain insects, on this planet, that have soft beaks and have been created without eyes so they cannot see. The food that they feed off has to be dead insects and the only way they can feed is to dig their beaks into whatever is below them. If that which is below them is hard they will not be able to dig into it. Now consider this, because they cannot see and they have soft beaks, how are they able to live and feed? Pay careful attention as what I am about to explain is truly amazing! Through volcanic eruptions, the first level of gases that are released carry many small insects away from where they are and they die en-route because they cannot withstand the heat – so they die while being transported. They arrive at the peaks of a mountain. Before the second layer of gases are released, it snows so these dead insects are covered in snow and preserved. The second layer of gases is a stronger one so it carries these unseeing, soft-beaked insects to the mountains. They arrive and the only thing they know is to dig the surface below them. They start digging in accordance with their nature and they find dead insects there waiting for them. Imagine if a person has this understanding and then says, “Praise belongs to Allah the Lord of the worlds (al-hamdu lillāhi rabb al-‘ālamīn)” Imagine how that person, in his or her prayer is transformed through that knowledge that Allah is so meticulously taking care of everything that exists – he begins to become godly!

This notion of “piety” of sitting on the prayer mat and becoming gloomy and miserable, and fasting all day long, what good is this piety if it does not bring goodness in the heart towards the other? What good is such piety if it does not bring reformation of character and soul? As Rumi gestures, “Why don’t you understand? Goodness is not in ṣalāh. Goodness is what you become through that ṣalāh.” If after that prostration you are not surrendering to Allah then what value was that prostration? If after that hunger of the fast you are not becoming charitable towards the other, then what good was that fast? If after going around the Kaʿba seven times your heart does not become one with the Ummah of the Prophet Muhammad then what good was that circumambulation around the Kaʿba? This notion of “piety” that we have today is a bit of a failure! We all ought to be pious, so we can attain salvation. However, salvation is not attained through this sense of piety. Rather, salvation is attained through the fulfilment of our human growth at an intellectual, moral, and that deep-seated spiritual level.

People often say this to me after hearing my speeches you know what, the non-Muslims are definitely going to go to hell. My response is why are you so obsessed? Paradise is so big that if all seven billion of us go to heaven, it will still be infinite and endless! What is your problem? Why can’t you stand others going into paradise? You can’t even stand each other going into paradise! What is wrong with you people? Your God is giving paradise to all people – He is the charitable one. Why have you become such misers, and that too in the name of God?

Think about what I am saying. I know it might seem a little comical but think about it thoroughly. You know something, when I sit with a Christian I say you may have a truth that I might need. If you convince me of anything, I will take it. I am in a state of surrender to my God. This formalistic Islam, Christianity and Buddhism mean nothing to me – these are merely titles. That which is true is what God is giving and my task is to receive it from wherever I receive it. It belongs to me, and we need to share as human beings. When people say that non-Muslims are going to hell, I respond well how many Muslims are going to heaven? According to you, seventy-two sects are going to go to hell as well. It is going to be a very lonely place this paradise of yours! And for you to a have a heart like this, despite your neighbours being godly, shows that you have already kindled a hell inside your soul! You are in the process of making your own hell and heaven right now, in every moment of your life. You are the hell and you are the heaven.

I will give this example, somebody asked me, “What is success and what is failure?” I said, “You are the yardstick of success and you are yardstick of failure.” When a student goes to university and he asks what is failure, I will not say failure is getting less than a desired mark on the paper. Rather, failure is when you don’t study and fail to actualize knowledge. What is success? I will not say the hundred-thousand-pound job you land after your degree. Rather, success is you arriving at that state of competency. You are the failure or you are the success. So, if you can condemn someone to burn in hell despite them being god-centric then it shows that you have kindled your own fire. Why would any soul want to condemn another to hell? Are we better than the prophets? Find me one prophet who when asked about the people of earlier times said they are all in hell. The prophets said that we don’t know; Allah knows best.

The Prophet of Islam said I don’t even know what will be done to me and you. I don’t even know my own fate, let alone the fate of others. I am at the mercy of my God. How can I pass judgment upon others? Which Quran are we reading? Why are we reading without thinking, without understanding? This level of arrogance! This level of ungodliness from people who are worshipping God five times a day? Look at the Muslim community killing each other and tearing each other apart. It is due to these false assumptions, which need to be checked, evaluated and critiqued. The Quran needs to be read once again.

When somebody says to me but they don’t believe in Prophet Muhammad! I will say did God know this or not? If God is saying that the Sabians, Christians and Jews are going into Paradise, does God know that they don’t believe in Prophet Muhammad or not? God does know it yet we are baffled. So I will say as a response where in the Quran has God given centrality to the belief in any prophet? Where? Where has God said to believe in the Prophet in order to arrive at salvation? The Quran has always said to believe in God and the Last Day and do righteous deeds, you will have your reward. You are your point of growth and the prophets are intermediaries.

Where in the Quran has any verse given centrality to the prophets? The Quran says, “Verily, in the apostle of God you have a good example”(33:21), and “If you love God, follow me; God will love you and forgive your sins.” (3:31) It starts with you and God, and it ends with you and God. I do not deny the intercession of the prophets, saints and Imams . All of them are valid. But the main point is always the centrality of God and the individual, and the growth in the individual. So, it is possible for a person who does not believe in the Prophet Muhammad to nonetheless believe in, and live in accordance with, the essence of Prophet Muhammad’s teaching. That individual may not perform the daily prayers, circle the Kaʿba, or keep fasts in Ramadan like us and yet have salvation through their own system of devotion. Look at this verse of the Quran, “Every community faces a direction of their own, towards which He turns them … So compete with one another in doing good works. (2:148) Therefore, it is Allah who decides the different rites and rituals for different communities.

The meaning conveyed by the aforementioned verse and it’s like is that you have your rituals and Sharia, and they have their rituals and Sharia. Don’t worry or argue about them, instead compete over goodness. Now, does the “religious-other” believe that lying is good? Do they believe killing is good? Do they believe their God ordains them to indecency? Do they believe their God ordains them to lying and cheating? No! So, they are believing in, and practicing, the principles and essence of Prophet Muhammad’s teachings. They may be practicing the “forms” of Moses but the “essence” of those forms is the same as Prophet Muhammad’s. They are seeing the Prophet Muhammad in a different face but they are believing in the same essence.

The ultimate destiny, or the ultimate qiyāma, is a point of salvation. It is for those who become godly. It is the completion of the human being or a soul through embracing God totally. And this salvation is only possible through growing through God and removing our lack through God. “I am scared, I am frightened” – convert this into confidence and trust through reliance on God. This is salvation on the Day of qiyāma. “I am ignorant, I cannot understand the glory of my God.” Gain knowledge and try to find God in everything. “I am morally deficient. I distinguish in terms of colour.” Then go beyond colour. “I distinguish in terms of gender.” Then go beyond gender. “I distinguish in terms of religion.” Then go beyond religion. “I distinguish in terms of social status.” Then go beyond status. These are your deficiencies. Qiyāma, or salva...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Forward
• Night One
• Night Two
• Night Three
• Night Four
• Night Five
• Night Six
• Night Seven
• Night Eight
• Night Nine
• Night Ten