Part of Concepts of Ahl as-Sunnah (series completed)
· Lesson 1168 of 1251
Summary of Sunni concepts | Concept (1167) | Orientalism and its role in seeking to remove Islam from the reality of Muslims
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Transcript
Machine translation — may contain errors
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A summary of the concepts held by the Ahl al-Sunnah.
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Orientalism and its role in the endeavor to remove Islam from the reality of Muslims.
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Orientalism, in its origin, is intended to be the study of Eastern cultures and their heritage.
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This served as the gateway through which Westerners entered to understand the lives and thoughts of Muslims.
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Consequently, they sought to alter this by attacking the truths of Islam and distorting its fundamental tenets.
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They distorted these under the guise of scientific study of thousands of manuscripts and what they claim to be objective criticism.
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Their actions in this field are summarized as follows:
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First: Attacking the truth of Islam, the Qur'an, and Prophethood.
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They claimed that Islam is a distorted development of Judaism and Christianity.
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Or that it is a synthesis of a collection of Eastern religions.
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Born from the friction between Arabian paganism and the religions of Persia and India.
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They alleged that the Qur'an was authored by Muhammad, peace be upon him.
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Or that a Christian monk dictated it to him.
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This is an ancient fabrication.
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The disbelievers of Quraysh claimed it before, and the Qur'an proved them liars.
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As Allah the Exalted says:
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﴾But those who disbelieve say, "This is not but a falsehood he invented, and another people assisted him in it."﴿
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“Those who disbelieve say: This is naught but a lie that he hath invented, and other folk have helped him with it, so that they have produced a slander and a lie.” (25:4)
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And the Exalted says:
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“And We know well that they say: Only a man teacheth him. The speech of him at whom they falsely hint is outlandish, and this is clear Arabic speech.” (16:103)
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“And We know well that they say: Only a man teacheth him. The speech of him at whom they falsely hint is outlandish, and this is clear Arabic speech.” (16:103)
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They also echoed the allegations of the Rawafid (Shi'a extremists).
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That the current Qur'an accounts for only one-third of the true Qur'an.
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And that the rest was suppressed by the Companions, as they claim, for their own personal interests.
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And that it is hidden with the Rawafid.
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In what is falsely known as the Mushaf of Fatimah.
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Yet Allah, glory be to Him, says:
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“Lo! We, even We, reveal the Reminder, and lo! We verily are its Guardian.” (15:9)
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They also claimed that the revelation sent down to the Prophet, peace be upon him,
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was merely bouts of epilepsy and hysteria.
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Or, at best, a form of poetic genius.
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Every scholar of the Arabic language knows the extent of the falsehood and incoherence of this claim.
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Yet Allah, glory be to Him, says:
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“And We have not taught him (Muhammad) poetry, nor is it meet for him. This is naught else than a Reminder and a Lecture making plain,” (36:69)
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“And We have not taught him (Muhammad) poetry, nor is it meet for him. This is naught else than a Reminder and a Lecture making plain,” (36:69)
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They attacked the Sunnah.
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Basing their arguments on the existence of weak and fabricated hadiths within it.
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They sought to generalize this to the entire Sunnah.
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Or to establish that it is unreliable based on that.
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They forgot that those who pointed out that the Sunnah contains more than just authentic hadiths—
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that there are weak and fabricated ones—
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are the Muslim scholars themselves.
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And that they clarified this through precise scientific methodology.
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In which they distinguished between the authentic, the weak, and the fabricated.
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In what is known as the sciences of hadith and the discipline of Jarh wa Ta'dil (criticism and appraisal).
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They also attacked the major narrators and preservers of the Sunnah among the Companions,
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such as Abu Hurayrah, may Allah be pleased with him,
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and among the Tabi'un, such as al-Zuhri, may Allah have mercy on him.
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Second: The claim that Islam has exhausted its purposes.
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This is a chameleon-like call appearing in various forms.
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Sometimes they say it is a moral call,
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which came to extract Arab society from its bad habits.
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At other times, they claim it is a social movement,
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aiming to transform tribal society into a civil society.
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And at others, they claim it is an immature revolution
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against the class of wealthy masters in Makkah.
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The implication of all this is
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to consider Islam a transient phenomenon for a limited period of time,
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having no relation to contemporary reality.
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Third: Restricting Islam to devotional rituals,
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as is the case in the narrow Western concept of Christianity.
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And claiming that Islam has no involvement in matters of governance, social life, or economic activity.
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They overlook the fact that the Holy Qur'an
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is replete with verses that mandate ruling by the law of Allah,
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establish the foundations for ethics and transactions,
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and regulate the economy and trade.
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Allah, glory be to Him, says:
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﴾O you who have believed, enter into Islam completely [and perfectly]﴿
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﴾and do not follow the footsteps of Satan.﴿
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﴾Indeed, he is to you a clear enemy.﴿
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Meaning: follow all the teachings of Islam.
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Fourth:
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The claim that Islamic fiqh is derived from Roman law.
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They aim for two things behind this:
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The first:
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To invalidate the connection of fiqh to the law of Allah the Exalted.
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The second:
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To trivialize the adoption of contemporary man-made laws.
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For as long as ancient fiqh
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is derived, in their claim, from Roman origins,
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what is the obstacle today to borrowing from French or Swiss law,
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and so on?
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Fifth:
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The claim that the Shari'ah is incompatible with contemporary civilization.
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Where they label Islam as a tribal, desert religion,
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whose legislations do not harmonize with modern, civilized life,
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and that it is the cause of the current backwardness of Muslims.
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The truth is that the cause of this backwardness
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is the Muslims' abandonment of the teachings of their religion,
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which allowed the West to occupy their lands,
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implement their conspiracies to keep them ignorant, and plunder their wealth.
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When Muslims were holding fast to their religion,
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they conquered the world and became its masters through truth, justice, and knowledge.
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Sixth:
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The call to write in colloquial dialects
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and to abandon the Arabic language,
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under the pretext that it is difficult and does not suit contemporary life,
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and fabricating a conflict between the rules of grammar and syntax
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and the styles of the Holy Qur'an.
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Seventh:
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The claim that Islam despises women
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and does not enable them to live a dignified life,
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supporting with this the West's suspicious call for the liberation of women.
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The truth is that no religion or culture has done justice to women like Islam.
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Eighth:
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Distorting Islamic history
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and confining it to the political aspect,
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as if it were a series of disputes and conspiracies.
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They portrayed rulers as being drowned in debauchery, amusement, slave girls, poetry, and singing.
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They relied in this on the fabrications of the Rawafid and their forged historical writings.
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Ninth:
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Glorifying destructive movements and deviant sects,
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and inflating their roles,
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such as the Batiniyyah, for example,
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and the Ubaydiyyun, who are falsely called the Fatimids,
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as well as the Mu'tazilah, the Druze, and the Sufis.
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And being keen to highlight and praise deviant figures,
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such as al-Hallaj and Ibn Saba',
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and Abdullah Ibn Maymun al-Qaddah,
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and the Ubaydi ruler.
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Tenth:
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Trivializing Islamic civilization
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and claiming that it is borrowed from Roman civilization.
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Eleventh:
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Excavating ancient civilizations
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and reviving their knowledge,
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such as the Pharaonic,
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the Phoenician,
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and the Assyrian,
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so that Islam appears, at best,
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as merely one factor among several factors of Eastern civilizations.
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Twelfth:
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Establishing a secular methodology for scientific research,
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claiming impartiality and objectivity in it,
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even though the truth is the opposite.
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They insist on quoting from unreliable books
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that have no relation to the subject they are judging.
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They take from literature books
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that which they use to criticize the history of the Prophetic hadith and its sciences,
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and from history books that which they use to judge the history of fiqh.
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Among the examples of books they revere are:
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*Al-Aghani* by the libertine al-Isfahani,
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and *Al-Hayawan* by the Mu'tazili al-Jahiz.
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Finally,
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the Orientalists proceed in their endeavor to destroy Islam
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according to a studied plan.
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Therefore, it changes according to the requirements of the situation
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after evaluating the results of each stage.
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Currently, they are keen on avoiding provocative methods
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and overt attacks,
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and are implementing instead
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a plan to contain Islamic thought.