The Beliefs and Practices of Islam

Introduction

The Quran begins with these words Praise be to God, Lord of the worlds, the compassionate, the merciful, King on the day of reckoning. Thee only do we worship, and to thee do we cry for help. Guide thou us on the straight path, the path of those to whom thou hast been gracious, with whom thou art not angry, and who go not astray. To Muslims, these are the uh call to the Lord, the call to their way of life, uh, the call for their identity, these opening words of the Quran. I think it’s very true when it comes to religious matters that you cannot help someone unless you first understand someone. So very often we set out to try to uh guide or teach or assist somebody, and we really don’t know where they’re at.

And we think we know what they think, we think we know what they believe, and we really don’t, and as a result, we’re we’re not very effective. And we make conclusions that are not fair, we make assumptions that are way off base. And so when it comes to the subject of Islam, uh which is a subject that over the last year and a half that every American has been forced uh to give more attention to and to more consideration. It’s really a religion that for the most part we have very little understanding of it. We have some distant impressions, and we have some uh ideas that have been impressed upon us really by just a handful of people, and really a handful of people that in a way have, even among Muslims, an extreme position.

And so it’s and it would behoove us to learn as much as we can about Islam. We’ve looked over the last two nights uh regarding the history of Islam, how it began uh with the life and the teachings of a man by the name of Muhammad, how it spread, how it really grew into a whole civilization, a whole way of life and encompassed everything, from economics to government to military action to a social order as well as a religious faith. And this morning, what we’re going to do here in the Bible class hour is actually talk about the nuts and bolts of the religion of Islam. What do Muslims believe and what do they practice? This is a very important part of this series that we’re engaged in and understanding Muslims, Jews, and Christians and searching for answers in the face of conflict.

It is the right thing to do when religious people have conflict for them to talk about it. But before we talk about it with each other, we need to do our, I guess, our homework so that we can understand each other as much as we can, so that we can have the best line of communication with them. And really, the more we know about other people’s beliefs, the more doors it will open to us, and they will respect the fact that we’ve cared enough about them to learn something about their perspective, especially if we’re attempting to try to help them, which I’m sure that you here in this audience, those of you who are committed Christians are interested in helping anyone to know the way of the Lord.

And so this morning, the information we’re going to look at will be to fill in the questions hopefully you have about what do Muslims practice, what do they believe? It’s going to be a real quick uh kind of summary of it, and I want to allow time at the very end, since this is a Bible class hour for us to have some questions and discussion at the very end of it. And so if you have something that pops in your mind I don’t address, write it down or make a note there, and we’ll talk about it at the end. And then the last two lessons today will be more of a comparison. We’re going to leave behind our information part and go into the uh actual challenge part for us to make comparisons and make decisions.

1. The Core Beliefs of Islam

What are the core beliefs of Islam? If you’ve been here the last two nights, uh you’ve got an idea of some of the basic beliefs of Islam, and that is that the Muslim religion is extremely monotheistic. They were a reaction to the polytheism of the day around them. That’s why they are adamant believers in there being only one God. And also there being no idolatry, more about that later. They also believe, and this is the thing that makes them unique, that there was a man who came along who was the seal of the prophets, that Noah was a prophet, and Abraham was a prophet, and Moses was a prophet, and that Jesus was a prophet. But the last prophet and the ultimate prophet of God was Muhammad, and that after him there was no more revelation from God.

And that his writings were in the Quran, which is the last message from God to mankind. And these are the messages, the teachings of Muhammad. And that they believe that there is a judgment. They are very much motivated by the afterlife, and that there is a heaven and a hell, a hell, a heaven that they refer to as paradise, commonly in the writings of the Quran. They are uh the Quran is just laden with statements about judgment, the wrath of God, uh, and heaven and hell. It’s filled with it. And these are really the core beliefs. And a person might say, well, you know, the idea of believing in one God, and the idea that there’s a judgment in heaven and hell, those are similar to uh the beliefs of Christians, and they are.

2. Sunni and Shi’i Muslims

But these two in the middle is the great wall. That Muhammad is the prophet of God, and the Quran is the last revelation from God, and that’s why we’re forced to have to research and think and make some decisions because Christianity and Islam, because of these two things, cannot be reconciled without compromising one or the other or both. I want to say a little bit about the idea of Sunni and Shi’i Muslims before we proceed, because I know a lot of people have questions about this. And I do believe that in the coming months there are going to be more discussions about the difference of Sunni and Shi’i Muslims because of the increased conflict in Iraq. If you recall over the last couple of nights, we talked about how that after Mohammed died, that there was no appointed successor of Mohammed to lead the Muslim community in Arabia.

And as a result, there was a controversy about who should take his place. Eventually a man who was one of his early disciples and close friends, Abu Bakar, inherited his position. He became the first caliph. Caliph means lieutenant, and it became the name of the leader of the Muslim community. And the first caliph was this man by the name of Abu Bakar. But a lot of people didn’t think he should be the leader, or some people thought he shouldn’t be the leader. They believed that the one who took Muhammad’s place should be somehow related to Muhammad, sort of like a monarchy, passes on its power. And they wanted a man by the name of Ali, who was the cousin of Muhammad and his son-in-law to be the caliph.

He had no sons at this at this point, or at least of any age, and as a result, they wanted Ali. And now we understand names like Muhammad and Ali and where these names come from that are repeated among Muslim people. And so this minority of people who wanted Ali resisted everybody else. Now, later on, after Abu Bakar passed away, and they had another caliph and another caliph, among the Muslims, Ali became the fourth caliph, and they accepted him. But there was a lot of controversy. And there was some conflict among the Muslims, and he was assassinated. And as a result, in these early days, there was a minority that pulled away from the rest of the Muslims, called the party of Ali or Shi’i, or the followers of Ali.

And from the early days, they did not recognize the first three caliphs as being legitimate. They believed that Ali should have been the caliph all along. And from the earliest days, there was a minority that pulled away from the rest. And this is continued down to present day. Now the rest of the things that we’re going to look at tonight, this morning, rather, hold true for both Sunni Muslims and Shi’i Muslims. Sunni means the idea of the established way or the way of tradition. Most Muslims in the world, the vast majority of Muslims in the world, are Sunni Muslims. But there are some Muslims, a minority of them, who are Shi’i Muslims. And the reason why this goes all the way back to the very earliest days of Islam with the division over who would replace Muhammad as the leader.

Now, why does this have impact? Well, most Shi’i Muslims live in either Iran or Iraq. Or at least that’s their territory of ancestry. Iran is mostly Shia Muslims. They are the ruling, they are the majority power in the land of the land of Iran. In Iraq, it is mixed. There are a lot of Shi’i Muslims who live in Iraq, but there are also some Sunni Muslims that live in Iraq. And note this, because in the coming days, if war takes place and there is a new regime, there is going to be conflict in who should be ruling Iraq between the Shi’i and the Sunni Muslims. There have been some meetings in Europe of Iraqi people, and you may have seen this on the news, discussing, well, who’s going to run Iraq when Saddam Hussein is gone?

And the Shi’is walked out the other day. They got disgusted with the Sunni Muslims. And I think this is going to play out more in the coming days. They may be able to pull it together, but note this conflict. It’s going to flare up in Iraq because there is a divisioning rock between Shi’i and Sunni Muslims. What makes them different? Well, down to present day, the Shi’i Muslims have some unique beliefs. They believe that there is a divine guidance handed down through the lineage of Muhammad. They believe in an inner light, sort of a mysticism. They’re sort of like charismatics. And while Sunni Muslims believe that God sends messages purely through the Quran, Shi’i Muslims say that there are some people who are in the lineage of Muhammad who have an inner revelation, and they can tell you about the will of God.

3. Repeated Themes in the Quran

They also have some unique traditions associated with the life of Ali and especially the assassination of Ali. There’s a certain celebration they go through, and you may have seen this on television where the men jump around and they have their shirts off and they’re cutting themselves and they’re striking themselves on their body. And this is in commemoration of the assassination of Ali. About 85% of Muslims in the world are Sunni, and about 15% are Shi’i Muslims. And note that in the coming month. I think that that’s going to be playing out in the news. But the things we have to look at now would hold true of both Sunni and Shi’i Muslims. The Quran is the holy book for the Muslim people. And there are some repeated themes in the book called the Quran.

Over and over there are these statements about that there is only one God. And understand the context in which Muhammad was preaching and all the polytheism. And this is a thing that he pounded on over and over and over. You know how us preachers are. We get on one thing, and if we’re preaching on angels, we’re still going to work that thing in. I mean, and that’s the way Muhammad was. The one thing he pounded over and over was that there was only one God, and these many gods that they were worshiping were false. Praises to God. The Quran has a lot of statements in it. Praising God, talking about his attributes, his character. There are all kinds, there are actually 99 names for God in the Quran.

The bountiful, the merciful, the mighty. And there are 99 names that God is known by, or Allah is known by. And there is really a hundredth name. But only the She camel knows what that is. The camel is looked upon in a very elevated way in Arabian culture, and you can understand why, because of the terrain and the aridity. And over and over is this theme in the Quran, the condemnation of unbelievers, especially infidels who don’t believe in the one true God. It’s filled with it. Consider a couple statements, though. Surah 26, 190. And let me make this point, the the Quran, I haven’t done that. The Quran is organized into surahs, which are sort of like books, but toward the end they’re more like chapters.

The sewers begin with a very short sewer that we read at the beginning. But then the longest sewers are at the beginning of the Quran. And as you read through the Quran, the sewers get shorter and shorter until you come down to the very end of the Quran and they’re just a few lines long. The Quran is approximately the length of the New Testament. Approximately the length of the New Testament. And as you read through the Quran, you see over and over these statements about the unbelievers and the infidels and the judgment to come upon them. In Surah 26, 190. Verily from the Lord of the worlds hath this book come down. The faithful spirit hath come down with it upon thy heart that thou mightest become a warner.

Mohammed saw as his principal role in the world as one who was sent to warn everyone about coming judgment. Much like an Old Testament prophet. And then later on, and more explicitly in Surah 33, verily God hath cursed the infidels and hath got ready for them the flame. On the day when their faces shall be rolled in the fire, they shall cry, Oh, would that we had obeyed God and obeyed the apostle, a reference to Mohammed. O our Lord, give them a double chastisement and a curse with them, as uh and curse them with a heavy curse. And this is very representative of some of the statements in the Quran. Very strong language, very specific language about unbelievers being punished and the kind of pain that they will go through.

4. Additions to the Old Testament Stories

The Quran is a book that also contains some references to Old Testament stories. You read about Adam in there, you read about Noah and Abraham, and Noah and Abraham are two key characters that are talked about in the Quran. But it’s interesting as you read the Quran, you come across statements about David or Solomon or some of these other characters of the Bible, that there are additions to the Old Testament stories. There are things said about Noah and things said about Adam that you don’t read about in the Old Testament. They are additions. I think one of the more interesting ones is about the creation. That when God created Adam, that he commanded, according to the Quran, he commanded the angels to fall down and worship Adam.

5. Little Direct Instruction and No Running Narrative

And there was one angel who said, No way. I’m not going to worship Adam. I’m superior to him. And God cursed this angel and sent him out. And the angel promised that he would be the enemy of mankind. He is called Elbrus in the Quran, but when you look in the context, it’s clearly a reference to Satan. And Satan is named Satan in other parts of the Quran. And that’s not recorded in the Bible. And you know, that’s just completely something that’s added on to what we read in the Old Testament. But that’s one of the more interesting ones as far as the origin of Satan. There are reminders over and over about judgment and paradise and hell. And when it comes to reading the Quran, one thing that strikes you if you’re used to reading the Bible is that there’s little direct instruction.

As far as you need to do this, you need to handle this situation this way, you need to treat these people this way. Now, there is some of that, but not like what you find, especially like in the teachings of Jesus, and what you find in the law of Moses, and what you find in the writings of the New Testament letters, the writings of the apostles and other prophets of the New Testament. Little direct instruction. There are parts that contain that. And then the literary characteristics of the book. And this why it this is why, to the Western reader, it is a very difficult book to read. And I think even Muslims would admit that to the Westerners it is difficult to read. This is an important point that the Quran is really absent.

There’s an absence of a really connecting and running narrative. You know, when you read the Bible, and if you read it just uh at a cursory reading, maybe you don’t pick up on this, but if you really take your time and look at it, you start in Genesis and you see that things are building. God’s made the world, and he destroyed the world with a flood, and then he’s picked this Abraham, and this Abraham had a son, and he had a son, and things are sort of building. And you get to the New Testament and see Jesus comes along, and his life is progressing in the gospels, and then he dies and he’s resurrected, and then his followers pick up his calls and they teach his message.

There’s a running narrative. The Quran doesn’t have that. And even when it refers to people like Noah and Jesus, they’re just injected here and there without any kind of cohesiveness. And that’s what the Quran lacks. It lacks a cohesive direction. You have the same repeated themes over and over. Heaven, paradise, and hell, judgment to come. There is only one God. There’s a condemnation of the infidels, and these things are repeated over and over, but there’s no real cohesiveness as you read it. And this is what’s troubling to Western readers. Muslim scholars say that the Quran is like a river, and that you can step into it any place. And it, you know, a river’s like that. You know, you can go to a river and you stick your foot in, and you know, you go to the same place and stick your foot in again, and it’s the water’s different because it’s moving.

And they say the Quran is like that. They use it’s just running all the time, and it’s not like you step into it and it leads from A to B to C to D to E. That’s not the way the Quran reads. It repeats the themes over and over. It’s probably more like the writings of the Old Testament prophets than any other thing in the Bible. When you read the book of Isaiah or Jeremiah, there are certain themes they talk about over and over: the judgment of God, the sins of Israel, the coming of the Messiah, the return of the people back to the land after captivity. And you read through Isaiah and Jeremiah, and they’ll jump back and forth between those themes, and that’s what the Quran does.

6. Other Sources of Authority for Muslim People

It uses these themes we’ve listed, and it just jumps back and forth, and there is no cohesiveness to reading it, and that’s why it’s a challenge to read. It really is. There are other sources of authority for Muslim people. Remember, we said that the Quran lacks a lot, as some, but it lacks a lot of real specific instructions as to how to live. And so when these Muslim communities began to flourish in the seventh century, they begin to look around and say, you know, we we need more instruction. And they concluded, well, since Muhammad was a prophet of God and everything he did was based upon the revelations from God, not only is the Quran left for us, but also anything that we know that Muhammad taught, or any examples that he left, like we use, quote, apostolic authority, examples of the apostles.

They said that any example he left, well, that must be authoritative for us. And so they began to work, and this is many years after Mohammed died. Together