Islam for Non-Muslims

• RELIGIOUS FAITHS VS IRRELIGIOUS IDEAS
• 1 The Present State of the World Religions
• 2 Religious System as a Historical Reality
• 3 The Evidences of God across the Universe
• 4 The Absolute Oneness of God
• 5 The Reality of the Afterlife
• 6 The Growth of Irreligious Ideas
• 7 Worshipping Natural Elements
• 8 Worshipping Imaginary Idols
• 9 Worshipping Human Beings
• 10 Inventing Relationship to God
• 11 Inventing the Idea of Reincarnation
• 12 Inventing the Theory of Evolution (Darwinism)
• 13 Inventing ‘Nature’ as the Creator of the Universe
• 14 Importance of Religion in this Secular World
• ISLAM AS A RELIGION
• 15 Addressing the Criticisms of Islam
• 16 Islam as a Magnet for the Non-Muslims
• 17 The Quran as the Original Divine Book
• 18 The Quranic Reality in Archeological Findings
• 19 Muhammad (pbuh) as the Great Prophet
• 20 Islam as the True Religion
• 21 Islam as the Universal Religion
• 22 Islam as the Eternal Religion
• 23 Islam as a Practicable Religion
• 24 Islam as an Enjoyable Religion
• 25 Islam as the Peaceful & Savior Religion
• 26 Islam as the Progressive & Rational Religion
• 27 Islam in Health & Hygiene
• 28 Islam in Promotion of Science
• 29 Muslims in Practices of Science
• 30 Islam & Other Monotheisms: Similarities & Differences
• 31 Islamic Tolerance for Other Religions
• 32 Islamic Rights for Non-Muslim Citizens
• ISLAM AS A WAY OF LIFE
• 33 Islamic System vs. Human Ideologies
• 34 Moral & Social Impacts of Islamic Rituals
• 35 Moral Discipline in Islam
• 36 Sinning of 3 W’s: Women, Wine and Wealth
• 37 Dignity & Equality of Man in Islam
• 38 Human Rights in Islam
• 39 Social Duties in Islam
• 40 Dignity & Rights of Labor in Islam
• 41 Dignity of Women in Islam
• 42 Rights of Women in Islam
• 43 Marriage & Family Life in Islam
• 44 Political Philosophy in Islam
• 45 Economic Principles in Islam
• 46 Islamic Economy vs. Capitalism & Communism
• 47 Patriotism & Internationalism in Islam
• 48 Understanding Controversial Issues in Islam
• 49 Conversion to Islam: Problems & Prospects
• 50 Conclusive Message to the Non-Muslims

20: ISLAM AS THE TRUE RELIGION

Introduction:    All religions originating from God started as genuine religions. However, Islam is a class by itself when it comes to maintenance of original purity down to this day.  Accordingly, God labeled Islam as the “Religion of Truth” and certified the Quran as immune from “any forgery” (9:33; 39:28).  Exceptionally for the Book of Islam, there had never been temptation or any other reasons that could compromise its originality through any of the three possible methods: (i) addition (ii) subtraction or (iii) substitution. Now follows a discussion about this in a comparative format.

(A) Evidences of Distortions in Other Books:

(1) Quranic Proofs: Being the latest in the series of scriptures, the Quran was in a position to reveal God’s observation on conscious tampering of the earlier scriptures through use of the above 3 methods.  To be specific, it complains against those "who wrote the Book with their own hands" (addition), who “hid in the Book” much of revelations (subtraction) and “who changed the words from their (right) places" (substitution) (2:79; 5:15; 5:13). 

    The Quran also dug out the conspiracy of hiding the references of the upcoming Prophet of Islam “whom they found mentioned in their own (scriptures)” (7:157).  In an exciting revelation, Jesus foretold about the upcoming Prophet “whose name shall be Ahmad (nickname of Mohammad)” (61:6).  However, any citations about the Prophet were deleted in all the versions of the Bible except the one written by Saint Barnabas.  Likewise, you will not see any reference of the Quran “in the mystic Books of former peoples (Torah and Bible)” where “it (forthcoming Quran) was (announced) without doubt”, much to the “knowledge of (many) Jewish scholars” (26:196/197). Proofs of such tampering of earlier scriptures are thus well- documented and widely-known.

(2) Inconsistencies in Earlier Scriptures: As partial changes were deliberately introduced in earlier Books, the added portion of human contents often conflicted with the divine truth or real life situation.  Look at the example of medieval Church that punished Galileo for his scientific discovery that earth goes around the sun.  Do you think the Creator God knowing everything about the Universe willfully presented wrong theory in the Bible that the sun revolves around the fixed earth?  Why would He lie that way in the Bible while He told things differently in the Quran that are indicative of the sun-centered theory (“each one runs for an appointed term”-13:2). Thus the circumstantial evidences offer you a clear insight into the role of human hands in making up the earth-centered theory the above way.  You will never see such “discrepancies” in the Quran as its originality was never compromised (4:82).

(3) Different Versions of other Books:  While numerous copies of the Quran are all identical in contents, most other scriptures have different versions with more or less dissimilar contents.  For example, Christianity has numerous versions of the Bible that were authored by different disciples (e.g. Mark, Mathew, John, Luke) and later day followers (like the version of British King James) of Jesus, long time after his death.  Naturally, their contents cannot be uniform due to infusion of differential human elements.

(B) Possible Reasons for Changes in Other Scriptures:

(1)  Contents Changed through Updating Efforts:  The scriptures prior to Islam addressed the needs of respective age, regions or community and hence they were likely to be outdated with the progress of time.  This gave their followers a reason to make necessary adjustments in order to keep pace with time.  The Quran, on the other hand, representing Islam, the finality in the series of God’s religions, is meant for all the people and all the time to come.  Accordingly, God fashioned the Quran as a comprehensive Book to meet the needs of diverse people, with built-in-flexibility to adjust with changing time.  So the need for changes for adaptability was not there for the Quran.

(2) Contents Got Mixed Up for Compilation after Death of Prophet:  Other scriptures are not unmixed words of God.  Because the messages of God revealed to other prophets were usually compiled as Book by their disciples decades after their death. For example, the first gospel of the New Testament was written by Mathew around 70 AD, about 4 decades after death of Jesus. As a result, God’s messages were likely to get mixed up with the statements of the prophets when their disciples wrote the scriptures.

     Conversely, the Quran contains the direct speech of God; it is like the audio-taped Message of God sent via Angel Gabriel to the Prophet.  He took utmost care to preserve the messages as the direct quotations of God.  As a precaution, he prohibited his followers from recording his own sayings and doings (Hadith) during his lifetime so that his messages did not blend with those of God.  For example, the first Hadith by Imam Bukhari was completed in 846 AD, over 2 centuries after his death in 632 AD. Thus the Messages of the Quran and Hadith were separated by an unbridgeable time gap.

(3) Differences in the Recording Facilities:  Other scriptures were older than the Quran by six centuries or more.  Since almost all these Books were revealed in the same area (Middle East), it would be a reasonable theoretical assumption that the quality of recording devices (mostly crude substitutes of paper) for the older scriptures was lower than the case of relatively later day Quran.  This unintended factor also might have been partially responsible for the loss of originality (if not of existence) in those Books. The same also explains the fact that the inadequacy of recording facilities at least partially contributed to total disappearance of many scriptures revealed to earlier prophets.  

(C)  Factors Contributive to Purity of the Quran:

(1) Divine Guarantee of Quranic Purity: Memorization:  God has expressed strong determination to “guard” the Quran from corruption so that “none can alter” it (15:9; 6:34). “Exalted (in dignity), (it is) kept pure and holy” (80:14).   In order to live up to this promise, God has made it easier to “understand and remember the Quran” (54:17). As a result, the Muslim world has produced millions of people known as Hafiz who memorize the Quran by heart.  It is a wonderful feature that makes the Quran a unique book as you will not find a second book of similar volume that lives in the memory of so many people.  It has therefore been easier to detect any conspiracy-driven variation in versions of this Book by comparing with their memories.  If, God forbid, all the copies of Quran somehow vanish from this planet, it would not be difficult to recover the original Quran from the memory of those preservers. 

(2) Three Paths to Quran Preservation: Recording, Memorization and Recitation:  The Prophet took the highest possible care in preserving the Quran.  After receiving the Messages, on the spot he memorized the verses and read them back to the Angel Gabriel for verification.  Sometimes Angel Gabriel himself recited the verses to him. Immediately after that followed the recording of each and every word by the “hands of the honorable, pious and just scribes” (80:15/16) that included his secretary Zaid and about 50 others.  They recorded the revelations exactly as were dictated by the Prophet and then verified with him through rehearsal.  Similarly the Prophet recited the Quran during daily 5 times of compulsory prayers and also beyond.  Inspired by God “to remember whoever wills” (80:12), his disciples memorized and recited the verses back to the Prophet for checking.  The early Muslims were so particular about sanctity of the Quran that they committed to memory even the exact date and place of revelations and were punctuation-perfect in recitation.  This trend also continues among the Muslims as of today.

(3) Uniformity among the Copies of the Quran:  By test of originality, other scriptures do not compare favorably with the Quran.  Many of the earlier Books as we find today are rarely mass-produced in the original language of their revelation (like Hebrew for Torah, Greek and Aramaic for Bible).  Available in translated form, different versions of these Books vary so much so in contents that a common reader will be puzzled to single out the real one.

By contrast, the Quran originated in Arabic language which is recognized by the United Nations as one of the 6 official languages.  It has also been translated into different languages and also by different authors in the same language (say English).  However, these translations are done directly from the original Arabic version of the Quran which is the same standard text in Arabic.  As a result, there is hardly any chance for wrong translations or interpretations and in case there is any, the readers will refer that to Arabic Quran for detection and correction.  The Arabic Quran was revealed about 15 centuries ago but it did not change even for a word, let alone a sentence.  To confirm this truth, the Arabic Quran of any age or any place may be compared with its 2 of earliest copies still available at the museum of Istanbul (Turkey) and national library of Tashkent (Uzbekistan).

(4)  Quran Does Not Inspire Any Changes:  The Quran emphasizes on honesty rather than forgery.  Despite deletion of forecasting about its upcoming Prophet in previous Books, the Quran retains appreciative references of other prophets including Moses, Jesus etc.  Had the Quran been changed, probably these citations would have been deleted first in an act of revenge.  Similarly, the controversial issues (like polygamy, strict penal code etc.) which often attract external criticisms could have been written off the Quran.  But these were never done for the sake of the Quranic purity.

Conclusion: The above discussion establishes Islam as the truly divine religion as it is based on the Quran that entirely originated from God.