Peace and Blessings of God be upon you! You are
now standing at the Gateway of God's Greatest Gift to Man: Islam, which is the
Complete Way of Life as taught to us by all the Prophets of God.
We
request you to enter this portal, with a free mind and a free heart, looking for
God's Truth. Hopefully, this site will help you to get a true understanding of
Islam, which is the Life of about a billion and half people inhabiting our
planet.
You get authentic information about Islam here, so that you have
the chance of knowing what Islam really is. Please have the patience to
carefully read the following pages and compare the information you get here with
whatever you had thought about Islam previously. If required, you can supplement
your knowledge with further reading of the Original Sources of Islam and other
books by scholars who have studied Islam in depth and live in Islam. If you as
an outsider, observe those people who call themselves Muslims, you may not see
much of Islam in them; or their life may misrepresent Islam, as in the case of
the followers of any religion, for that matter. If you want to study what
Christianity is, you go to the great scholars of Christianity as well as to the
Bible, the Holy Book of Christianity. So also in the case of Islam, where you
need to get information about it from the most authentic sources. Then only can
you judge Islam as well as Muslims as to how they really compare with the
followers of other religions, or how they fare in their observance of this Great
Religion.
Islam is the religion decreed for mankind by God*, Who revealed it to His
prophets; and they in turn, taught it to the people around them. The word, Islam
means 'Peace' and also 'Submission to the Will of God'. From the beginning of
mankind on the face of the earth, revelations came to God’s chosen prophets; and
the first prophet was the first man, Adam and the last Prophet was Prophet
Muhammad, (peace be upon him), through whom the Religion of God was perfected.
And in between, thousands of prophets came to the peoples who inhabited
different lands in different periods of history. The Holy Qur’an, the Scripture
of Muslims, mentions by name only twenty five of these prophets, of whom the
most important are Abraham (Ibraheem [pbuh]), Moses (Moosa [pbuh]), David
(Dawood [pbuh]), Jesus (Eesa [pbuh]) and Muhammad [pbuh].
All these
prophets of God taught basically the same message of Islam to their
people.
The word “Islam” today is mostly used to refer to the final form
of the Religion of God taught by the last prophet, Muhammad (pbuh). It is often
counted as the latest of the three monotheistic religions, Judaism, Christianity
and Islam. In this sense, Islam emerged in the Arabian peninsula, which we know
today as Saudi Arabia, in 612 C.E. through Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). Judaism is
believed to be based on the teachings and the laws of Prophet Moses, while
Christianity is said to take its social and moral codes from the teachings of
Prophet Jesus. All three religions are believed to have their roots in the
teachings of the patriarch Abraham, who also was a great Prophet of
God.
The Holy Qur'an states in Chapter 2 (verses, 124-130), that God
appointed Abraham an Imam or leader to the people. But when he prayed to God to
bless his children too, God answered that He would bless only the good among
them and not the evil doers. And God took a covenant from Abraham and his son
Ishmael (Isma’eel [pbuh]) to sanctify the House of God (that is Ka'aba) at
Makkah, for those who come to pray there and compass it around. And Abraham
prayed again to make his children Muslims or people obedient to God; and also to
send among them a Messenger who would rehearse God's signs to them and instruct
them in scripture and wisdom and purify them.
In answer to this prayer of
Abraham, God sent a Messenger to the Land of Ka'ba from among Abraham's own
children, and he was the Last Prophet of God, Muhammad (Peace be on
him).
And it was through Muhammad (peace be upon him), that the Guidance
of God for mankind was completed and perfected. Muhammad (peace be on him)
taught the people, the Book of God called the Qur'an, and instructed them as to
how they should lead a life in Submission to God. The details of the Guidance of
God exemplified in the life of the Prophet, are called the Sunnah or the Example
of the Prophet. The Qur'an and the Sunnah together form the foundation of Islam;
and it is on this foundation that the Great House of Islam stands.
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