What is Religion, Revelation and Reason in the Eyes of Islam?
By Dr Nazir Ahmad Zargar
October 30, 2020
This article discusses three questions: what is faith, or
religion? Is it appropriate to call Islam a faith, or religion? What is the
position and importance of reason in religion, and Islam?
I base my answers to each of these questions on either the
common understanding of these terms as the experts define and explain them or
the Qur’an, the Book which claims to be the last revealed literal world of God.
[In the Islamic tradition the name of God is Allah. It is without derivation
and no plural can be formed from it. It has no feminine also. The English word
God can hardly be even an approximate substitute]
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What Is A Religion?
The word ‘religion’ refers to the relationship which binds
man to what he regards as sacred and divine. There are certain religions which
do not believe in God. Yet many others believe in gods and goddesses. Religion
is mainly about peoples’ concerns about death and after death. The secular
world has today relegated the religion to the private sphere. These people
insist that religion should not define our whole identity. It should rather be
one of the components of a person’s over all identity, if at all he believes in
a religion. Atheist Sam Harris asserts “the days of our religious identities
are clearly numbered.” By this way religion has been confined to a very tight
space. While in the past it was said that religion is opium of the people, it
is now argued that “religion poisons everything.” (Christopher Hitchens)
Is Islam A Religion?
The scholars of Islam hold that it is inadequate to call
Islam a religion in the common understanding. The Qur’an calls the primordial
religion or in the words of Ismail Raji, meta-religion, as al-Din, which means
‘way of life.’ In the classical Arabic various meanings of the word Din
include: Jaza (recompense), Ta‘ah (obedience), Dhillah
(humility). Hence Islam is generally defined as obeying and submitting to Allah
in humility. As Din, not religion, Islam requires the Muslims to live their
lives in such a way that their submission to Allah is reflected in every aspect
of life; from personal to the political. This clearly differentiates Din from
‘religion’ which pertains to a very minute part of a person’s whole identity.
So the English word ‘religion’ cannot convey the sense that is conveyed by the
Qur’anic word Din.
What Is Faith?
Faith is defined as ‘belief without evidence.’ Hence it is
now understood by many not to be grounded in reason. Richard Dawkins, perhaps
the most popular of the new atheists, insists that ‘religious faith does not
depend on rational justification.’ So it is generally held that while science
is about facts and proofs, faith is about mere inclination to believe without
sufficient evidence. This is where many people declare faith to be unscientific
and contrary to reason. It might be in this backdrop that for quite some time
now some people have been using a new term ‘post-monotheism’ pointing to the
claim that after monotheistic ‘faith’ there is now reason and only reason to
replace religion.
Faith in Islam
Like Din instead of ‘religion’, the right word in the Qur’an
is Iman rather than ‘faith’. While faith can be without evidence, Iman is
“reasoned reflection” where every believer is asked to think before he accepts.
The Qur’an constantly urges us to employ intelligence before we believe. Here
are a few instances:
When the deniers of truth will face punishment as natural
consequence, they will say: “had we listened or reflected.” So we are invited
to think on both the sources of Iman, the revelation, to listen to and the
creation, to use our intelligence for ‘apart from glittering light of
Revelation, there are in all nature around us and in our own conscience enough
manifest signs of God and His Unity.’ This is how the Qur’an invites us to
realize God in our very being without perceiving Him with our bodily eyes.
Iman is technically defined as to affirm as true all that
the Prophet Muhammad (Sallallahu Alayhi Wa Sallam) was sent with. But
even this unconditional trust in the Prophet is not blind. See how lovingly and
convincingly The Qur’an encourages the people to think before they trust the
Prophet: “Say (O! Prophet) I but exhort you to one thing; that you stand,
for Allah’s sake, by twos and singly, and then ponder, in your companion (the
Prophet) there is no madness. He is not but a warner to you of a severe torment.”
(34:46)
The prophet of Islam was not conversant with the art of
reading and writing. Then how could he produce such a miraculous Book which ‘in
the surpassing excellence of its contents, in the grandeur of its language and
style, and most of all in the completeness and all-sufficient of its teachings’
has ever been unchallenged. Given this the Qur’an very justifiably then asks
the deniers: “And if you are in doubt concerning what We have sent down upon
Our bondman then bring a chapter like it, and call upon your witness besides
Allah, if you are truthful.” (2:23)
Not only the immutable and miraculous Qur’an is produced as
proof of the Prophet’s claim, his own life is presented to his deniers as the
convincing evidence of this truthfulness.
It is surely for the first time in the whole human history that any
human produces his own character as proof for his truthfulness as this is so
bold a claim that nobody among the great reformers could dare about even think
of it for every human being is fallible. His enemies can anytime target his
character in order to let down his claim no matter how truthful he is. But not
the Prophet himself but it is God Who produces of the strongest rational
evidences in support of Iman in this form: “Say O! Prophet…. Of a surety I
have remained with you a life-time before it. Would you not then reflect?”
(11:16)
So what is this? The Prophet is addressing their
intelligence; he is challenging their conscience: ‘Have I not all this time
been renowned for my veracity? Have you all these years ever suspected me of
lying? How is it then that the moment I begin to preach the Unity of God and to
denounce your idolatry, you begin to call me a liar?
The Qur’an always invites people to use reason in order to
attain Iman. While inviting people to the truth of Islam, it does not tell them
close all the windows of you mind and believe blindly but it urges them to
reflect: “do they not ponder the Qur’an or are their locks upon their hearts?”
(26:24). Why don’t they read the Qur’an whose teachings are so clear or the
case is something else that they have become impervious to every argument and
evidence?
Similarly, the Qur’an produces the beautiful objects of
nature like the sky, earth, the Sun, the moon etc. which strike awe and wonder
and excite the human mind as evidences of the unique handiwork of their
Creator. And when humans are asked to believe in Him, their intellect is
addressed in this way: “Surely in the creation of the heavens and the earth
and the alternation of night and day, and the ships that sail upon the ocean
laden with what profits mankind; and in what Allah sends down of water from the
heavens and revives the earth thereby after its death, and scatters in it of
all sorts of moving creatures, and in the veering of winds and the clouds
subjected for service between heavens and earth; in these are signs to a people
who understand” (2:164)
An intellectually insolvent person when asking for evidence
wants Din to show him God. The purpose of Din in this world is not to see God
for that will end all intellectual faculties of man. When you see the Sun
directly with a naked eye, what else can you see then? Further, you cannot see
the Sun directly but you can through a pond of fresh water. God unravels to you
His mysteries and activates your intelligence through His revelation. Will you
then think?
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Dr Nazir Ahmad Zargar is Assistant Professor, Department
of Religious Studies, Central University of Kashmir
Original Headline:
Religion, Revelation and Reason
Source: The
Greater Kashmir
URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-ideology/religion,-revelation-reason-eyes-islam/d/124276
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