My Understanding of the Islamic Religion-Personal Letter

Dear Friend,

Receive my greetings and well wishes. I hope you are doing well wherever you are. I am doing fine too, and busy with my Islamic religion studies. I hope to finish my studies soon, my Islamic knowledge has greatly grown and I have come to know and appreciate Islam as a positive religion. Unlike the Islamic religion depicted as tainted by Jihads and terrorism, true Islamic religion preaches peace and love. I will briefly detail information about Islam to you, due to your expressed quest in wanting to understand the Islamic religion.

The Arabic word Islam means ‘to submit, accept or surrender’. Therefore, Islam as a religion denotes submission and acceptance to one God (known as Allah in the Islamic religion). This acceptance should be followed by devout adherence to his commands and desisting from polytheism (worship of many or any other god apart from Allah). Thus, Islam is monotheistic religion. The Islamic religion and its edicts are outlined in the religion’s sacred text-the Qur’an. According to Islamic beliefs the Qur’an is verbatim word of Allah to mankind. The teachings of Allah were passed on to mankind via the great Islam religion prophet known as Muhammad.

Islam adherents believe that Islam is the universal complete version of a primordial single God religion whose revelation occurred at several times and in different localities. Its teachings are notably revealed to prophets such as Abraham, Jesus, Moses and of course Muhammad-the greatest of Islamic prophets. This is what I found to be most intriguing about the Islamic religion (the fact that it recognizes biblical prophets both of the old and new Testaments of the bible). Many people may be unaware of the fact that Muslims believe in Jesus as a minor prophet; the only difference however, is that Christians do not believe in Muhammad as Gods prophet. Therefore, in essence Islam has some slight reflections on Christianity because the teachings of these prophets remain the same in both Christianity and Islam. However, Islam traditions state that previous prophetic revelations and messages had been greatly distorted and changed as they were handed down and also through the documentation process (Nigosian, 2004).

Practices of religion in Muslim include the basic five pillars of Islam. These pillars consist of obligatory tasks of worship that any true Muslim should observe. The five pillars include shahadah, Salah, Sawm, Zakat and Hajj (‘The Religion of Islam’, 2010). Muslims’ religious laws touch virtually all aspects of Muslim life and the society as a whole. These Islamic laws encompass many things including warfare, banking, marriage, inheritance, welfare as well as the environment, and as such Islamic religion shapes the life of Muslims and their association as a whole. The shahadah is a basic creed in which Muslims recite oaths that testify that Allah is the one and only true God to be worshipped and Muhammad is his greatest of prophets. This creed forms the foundation of worship in Islam. The second pillar is the salah which includes prayers that should be recited five times in each day. The third pillar is sawm. This pillar requires all Muslims to fast on the Holy month of Ramadhan, and in turn offer assistance to the poor people in society. This also forms an important period for atonement and reflection of the personal sinful nature and sins committed in one’s life (‘The Religion of Islam’, 2010). The fourth pillar is the zakat or alms giving. All well endowed Muslims are required to offer part of their accumulated wealth to the poor. This show the humanistic phase of Islamic religion. This shows that Islam has a lot of positive aspects and concern for the less able and needy in society. The zakat is also used to fund the spread of Islam. This is contrary to the old understanding that Islam is spread via Jihad and bloody wars. The zakat forms some sort of missionary fund to spread Islam in a peaceful manner. This is also known as sadaqah in Arabic. The last pillar is the hajj which requires all able bodied and financially able Muslims to make pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca in the Islamic month of Dhu al Hijjah. This is mainly an act that shows devotion to the faith (Nigosian, 2004). These pillars form the fundamental foundation upon which the faith is built. As you can see my friend, there is no single teaching within the pillars of Muslim that advocates for violence or hatred, and thus conclusively; Islam is a peaceful and humane religion.

Majority of Muslims are affiliated to one of the two main Muslim denominations. The two are Shi’a and Sunni denominations. The religion is the second largest and fast growing religion in the world. The religion is predominant in the Middle East Arab nations as well as Asia.

Conclusively, Islamic religion preaches peaceful co-existence and love amongst all people in society. The religion is also tolerant with other religions as well as the atheists (kaffirs), and attempts to preach to them in a bid to convert them to the religion. Therefore, I would truly tell you as a friend that the teachings of Islam are very different from what is popularly known by many people.

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References

Nigosian, S. A. (2004). Islam: Its History, teaching, and practices. Indiana University Press.

‘The Religion of Islam’, (2010). Beliefs of Islam. Retrieved from Islam religion.com on 3^rdAugust, 2010 http://www.islamreligion.com/.

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