“I have left amongst you that which, if ye hold fast to it, shall preserve you from all error, a clear indication. The Book of God, and the word of His Prophet. O people, hear my words and understand.”
Guess whose words are these? Those of the Holy Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him). These words have been taken from his last sermon along with which also the last of the Revelations of God had come.
“This day the disbelievers despair of prevailing against your religion, so fear them not, but fear Me. This day have I perfected for you your religion, and fulfilled My favour unto you, and it hath been My good pleasure to choose Islam for you as your religion.”
The Prophet (PBUH) ended his last sermon with an earnest question: “Oh people, have I faithfully delivered into you my message?”
From thousands of throats arose a powerful murmur of assent:” “Oh God yea! Allahumma na’m.”
The Prophet raised his forefinger and said: “Oh God, bear witness!”
The reason I have deemed it necessary to write down this very important episode of history here in this column of mine is, that while we, from the extreme right to the extreme left, make either fervent or formal proclamations regarding our Islamic identity, we in general prefer to overlook a few basic requisites of our Muslim Nationhood.
Let me note down these fundamental requisites here.
(1) To preserve ourselves from all error, we as Muslims simply are not allowed to look beyond the Book of God and His prophet’s teachings for guidance and laws.
(2) God perfected for us only one way of life—that of Islam, and ordered us not to try to challenge this act of perfection by additions, subtractions and amendments of our liking and convenience.
(3) The Holy Prophet (the greatest and the noblest human created by God) in order to look up to his Creator with a sense of accomplishment needed the endorsement of none other the people as a whole. Meaning thereby that an Islamic society holds people second in the line of priority (next only to God), and not any clergy, any self -proclaimed messiah, or any self-appointed deliverer.
It is in the light of these basic requisites of Islamic Identity that we have to view the proclamations of the Maulanas of various makes and varieties.
(This Column was first published on 19-04-2007)
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