No Blind Faith
Cont’d from page 1
God brought you out of your mother’s bellies,
knowing nothing, and He gave you the hearing, the eyesight, and
the brains, that you may be appreciative. Do they not see the birds
committed to fly in the atmosphere of the sky?
None holds them up in the air except God. This should be proof for
people who believe. (16:78-79)
The innermost part of our faith resides in our mind. If we employ
it rationally, it will bring us closer to God. If we forsake it
then we will go astray. The reminder comes from the Quran:
Did they not roam the earth, then use their minds
to understand, and use their ears to hear? Indeed, the real blindness
is not the blindness of the eye, but the blindness of the hearts
inside the chest. (22:46)
The religion of our parents as preached by scholars, imams and
mullahs educates us not to use our intellectual faculties in religious
affairs. This education is spread through some false hadiths. Purportedly,
the use of the mind in religious matters would lead us astray. The
majority of Muslims uphold this sort of belief even though it opposes
the Quranic teaching:
When they are told, “Follow what God has revealed
herein,” they say, “We follow only what we found our
parents doing.” What if their parents did not understand,
and were not guided? The example of such disbelievers is that of
parrots who repeat what they hear of sounds and calls, without understanding.
Deaf, dumb, and blind; they cannot understand. (2:170-171)
Prophet Abraham’s father Azar and his
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community were idol worshipers. Abraham was a free thinker. He
did not follow the religion of his father blindly and put his effort
to find the truth as we learn from the Quran:
He said to his father and his people,
“What are you worshiping?”
“Is it these fabricated gods,
instead of God, that you want?
“What do you think of the Lord
of the universe?”
He looked carefully at the stars.
Then he gave up and said, “I am
tired of this!”
They turned away from him.
He then turned on their idols, saying,
“Would you like to eat?
“Why do you not speak?”
He then destroyed them.
(37:85-93)
How many of us really take heed from the above example
of young Abraham and verify the religions that we inherited from
our parents? Sadly, most of us blindly follow what our parents,
our imams or our scholars taught us and we do not bother to think
logically. We learn from the Quran:
Do not have any doubt regarding what
these people worship; they worship exactly as they found their parents
worshiping. We will requite them their due share fully, without
any reduction. (11:109)
Do we think that we will get God’s blessing
the easy way without any test from God? Do we think that God cites
all the examples in the Quran for entertainment purposes? What do
we learn from the following
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example of young Abraham from the Quran?
He said to his father and his people, “What
are these statues to which you are devoting yourselves?”
They said, “We found our parents worshiping
them.”
He said, “Indeed, you and your parents have
gone totally astray.”
They said, “Are you telling us the truth, or
are you playing?”
He said, “Your only Lord is the Lord of the
heavens and the earth, who created them. This is the testimony to
which I bear witness.
“I swear by God, I have a plan to deal with
your statues, as soon as you leave.”
He broke them into pieces, except for a big one,
that they may refer to it.
They said, “Whoever did this to our gods is
really a transgressor.”
They said, “We heard a youth threaten them;
he is called Abraham.”
They said, “Did you do this to our gods, O
Abraham?”
He said, “It is that big one who did it. Go
ask them, if they can speak.” (21:52-63)
Prohibiting the use of the mind has crippled the intellect of Muslims
in comparison with others. The minds of Muslims have been benumbed
for centuries, neutralized by false hadith. The teaching of the
Quran gives the mind a noble place. God deems human beings who do
not use their minds worse than animals, as understood from this
verse:
Cont’d on page 3
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