Muslim scholars confirm Hindus constitute Ahl-e-Kitab mentioned in the Koran

[Guest guest]

shriadishakti , " jagbir singh "

<adishakti_org> wrote:

>

> To all devotees of His Ruh Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi,

>

> This weeks-old article by Sultan Shahin, Asia Times Online, Dec 6,

> 2003 must be deeply and thoroughly comprehended by those who wish

> to spread Shri Mataji's message of Al-Qiyamah (The Resurrection).

>

> Again i wish to emphasize that the Divine Plan of the Koran for

> humanity is pre-ordained to overcome all obstacles. As the first

> wave of His messengers of the Resurrection, we will prevail

> against all odds. So stand up and declare this Truth!

>

> jagbir

>

>

>

> " It seems to me, however, that a symbiotic spiritual relationship

> exists between the two great religions. It is a realization of

> this spiritual symbiosis, though largely unconscious, that I

> believe helped sustain this harmonious relationship despite the

> invading Central Asian hordes led by Ghaznis and Ghoris, who

> called themselves Muslim, and the British colonialists with their

> massive effort at divide and rule using all possible propaganda

> tools.

>

> Islam's encounter with other religions was quite violent. The

> history of Crusades launched by Christian powers is well known. It

> was Hinduism alone that provided Islam with a fertile ground for

> growth, something it had denied for long centuries even to

> indigenous Buddhism. Muslims' treatment of Hindus, too, was quite

> considerate and in keeping with the Islamic spirit of Lakum

> Deenakum Waleya Deen (For you your religion, for me mine, the

> Koran -109:5).

>

> As Hindus had the reputation of being polytheists and idolaters,

> Muslims could have treated them as Kauffar and Mushrekeen

> (religious deviants). Instead, the very first Muslim to conquer

> parts of India - Sind and Multan in 711 AD - Mohammad bin Qasim,

> accorded them the special status of Ahl-e-Kitab (people who follow

> divine books brought by messengers of God before the Prophet

> Mohammed) that was at first thought to be meant for Christians and

> Jews alone. (Muslims are permitted to have the best of social,

> including marital relations, with the Ahl-e-Kitab). Even the

> Central Asian bandits who invaded and looted India could not

> disturb the growing and deepening spiritual ties. A number of Sufi

> saints spent their lifetime in India, spreading the message of

> Islam, that literally means peace, that comes with total surrender

> to God. The Prophet Mohammed, too, is believed to have felt an

> attraction for India.

>

> The Indian sub-continent's pre-eminent poet-philosopher Allama

> Iqbal wrote:

>

> Meer-e-Arab ko aaee thandi hawa jahan se,

> Mera watan wohi hai, mera watan wohi hai.

> (From where the Prophet Mohammed received a cool breeze,

> That is my motherland, that is my motherland.)

>

> Hindus as Ahl-e-Kitab

>

> Some primordial spiritual connection must have been at work. For

> only recently have Muslim scholars learnt that Hindus indeed

> constitute the fourth major group of Ahl-e-Kitab mentioned in the

> Holy Koran repeatedly. For some mysterious reason, the Holy Koran

> had left this question vague. It mentioned a major religious group

> as " Sabe-een " as the ummah (community) of a prophet who had

> brought a divine book bearing God's revelation to the world. It

> also mentioned Hazrat Nooh (Prophet Noah of the Bible) as a major

> prophet ranking with prophets like Abraham, Moses, Jesus and

> Mohammed. But who the followers of Hazrat Nooh are was left a

> mystery.

>

> Painstaking research has been going on seeking the fourth major

> Ahl-e-Kitab. From Hazrat Shah Waliullah, Maulana Sulaiman Nadvi

> and Maulana Obaidullah Sindhi to a contemporary scholar from Uttar

> Pradesh, Maulana Shams Navaid Usmani, a number of scholars from

> the sub-continent, too, contributed to this effort. It is now

> clear that Hindus are indeed the lost ummah of the Prophet Nooh,

> whom they know as Maha Nuwo. Evidence from Markandaya Puran and

> several Vedas, and their description of " Jal Pralaya " (devastation

> caused by the Flood, as in the biblical and Koranic stories of

> Noah's flood) has been most helpful in this search.

>

> The authenticity and finality of the above-mentioned research has

> not to be accepted by any one, however, to be able to know that

> the Hindus do indeed constitute a major Ahl-e-Kitab ummah

> (religious community). According to the Holy Koran, there is not

> one nation in the world in which a prophet has not been raised

> up: " There are not a people but a prophet has gone among them "

> (35:24). And again: " Every nation has had a prophet " (10:47). And

> again: " And we did not send before thee any but men to whom we

> sent revelation [Divine Book] " (21:7).

>

> We are further told that there have been prophets besides those

> mentioned in the Holy Koran: " And we sent prophets we have

> mentioned to thee before [in the Koran], and prophets we have not

> mentioned to thee [in the Koran] " (4:164).

>

> It is, in fact stated in a famous Hadees (also written as Hadith,

> meaning sayings of the Prophet, as distinct from the Holy Koran,

> which is believed by Muslims to be the word of God revealed to the

> Prophet) that there have been 124,000 prophets, while the Holy

> Koran contains only about 25 names, among them being several non-

> Biblical prophets. Prophets Hud and Salih came in Arabia, Luqman

> in Ethiopia, a contemporary of Moses (generally known as Khidzr)

> in Sudan, and Dhu-i-Qarnain (Darius I, who was also a king) in

> Persia; all of which is quite in accordance with the theory of

> universality of prophethood, as enunciated above. And as the Holy

> Koran has plainly said the prophets have appeared in all nations

> and that it has not named all of them, which in fact was

> unnecessary and not even feasible. Thus a Muslim must accept the

> great luminaries who are recognized by other religions as having

> brought light to them, regardless of the terminology used to

> describe them, as the prophets that were sent to those nations.

>

> The Koran, however, not only establishes a theory that prophets

> have appeared in all nations; it goes further and renders it

> necessary that a Muslim should believe in all those prophets. In

> the very beginning we are told that a Muslim must " believe in that

> which has been revealed to Abraham and Ishmael and Issac and Jacob

> and the tribes, and in that which was given to Moses and Jesus,

> and in that which was given to the prophets from their Lord, we do

> not make distinction between any of them " (2:136). The

> word " prophets " in this verse from the Koran clearly refers to the

> prophets of other nations.

>

> Again and again, and in different contexts, the Holy Koran speaks

> of Muslims as believing in all the prophets of God and not in the

> Holy Prophet Mohammad alone: " Righteousness is this that one

> should believe in Allah and the last day and the angels and the

> books and the prophets " (2:177). And again in the same surah

> (chapter): " The Prophet believes in what has been revealed to him

> from His Lord and so do the believers; they all believe in Allah

> and His angels and His books and His prophets: And they say 'We

> make no distinction between any of His prophets' " (2:28). "

>

>

> Sultan Shahin, Asia Times Online, Dec 6, 2003

>

> http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/EL06Df05.html

>

 

 

" The Koran did not see revelation as canceling out the messages

and insights of previous prophets, but instead stressed the

continuity of the religious experience of mankind. It is important

to stress this point because tolerance is not a virtue that many

Western people today would feel inclined to attribute to Islam. Yet

from the start, Muslims saw revelation in less exclusive terms than

either Jews or Christians. The intolerance that many people condemn

in Islam today does not always spring from a rival vision of God but

from quite another source: Muslims are intolerant of injustice,

whether this is committed by rulers of their own — like Shah

Muhammad Reza Pahlavi of Iran — or by the powerful Western

countries. The Koran does not condemn other religious traditions as

false or incomplete but shows that each new prophet as conforming

and continuing the insights of his predecessors. The Koran teaches

that God had sent messengers to every people on the face of the

earth: Islam tradition says there had been 124,000 such prophets, a

symbolic number suggesting infinitude. Thus the Koran repeatedly

points out that it is not bringing a message that is essentially new

and that Muslims must emphasize their kinship with the other

religions:

 

Do not argue with the followers of earlier revelation otherwise than

in the most kindly manner — unless it be such of them as are set

on evil doing — and say: " We believe in that which has been

bestowed upon us, as well as that which has been bestowed upon you:

for our God and your God is one and the same, and it is unto him

that we [all] surrender ourselves.

 

The Koran naturally singles out apostles who were familiar to the

Arabs — like Abraham, Noah, Moses and Jesus, who were the

prophets of the Jews and Christians. It also mentions Hud and Salih,

who had been sent to the ancient Arab peoples of Midan and Thamood.

Today Muslims insist that if Muhammad had known about Hindus and

Buddhists, he would have included their religious sages. "

 

Karen Armstrong, A History of God,

Ballantine Books, 1993, p. 152