The Islam of Mohamed, Salahuddin Khuda Bukhsh [black female authors .txt] 📗

It is clear beyond doubt that Christian and Jewish influences, to a large extent, unsettled and disturbed the beliefs of the Pagan Arabs and paved the way for the prophet. Resistance to his faith there was, but it was resistance on the part of those, who sought to maintain the old faith and superstition; not on account of any warmth of conviction or sincerity of zeal, but on account of the fear and apprehension that the success of Islam would mean loss of large incomes derived from the temples and old heathen practices.[8] But resistance, founded upon such a selfish basis, could not prevent, and indeed did not prevent, the onward progress of Islam. In the deadly conflict between Islam and the Arab Heathenism Islam triumphed.

We, now, proceed to enquire as to what was the basis or, in other words, what were the sources from which Islam was derived. Islam freely borrowed from Judaism and Christianity and even did not hesitate to adopt practices prevalent in Pre-Islamic Arabia. In fashioning his religion the prophet adopted an eclectic method, retaining or rejecting from the older systems whatever seemed to him necessary and proper. It is not exactly within the scope of my paper to precisely specify or to accurately define the exact obligation of Islam to Christianity or Judaism. Such a discussion would take me far afield. Professor Wellhausen is inclined to belittle the influence of Judaism in the birth and infancy of Islam and points to the Islamic conception of Jesus, as the greatest of the prophets before Mohamed, as a conclusive proof of his contention. But the present writer is not prepared to attach much weight to this argument. If the Islamic conception of Jesus, indeed, is to be put forward as indicating the absence of Judaic influence on early Islam; with equal force might the Islamic conception of Jesus be urged as subversive of the theory of Christian influence, so stoutly advocated by Professor Wellhausen.[9] The basis of dogmatic Christianity, namely, the sonship of Christ, Mohamed inveighed against early and late. It would be idle to deny the indebtedness of Islam to Judaism. Mohamed has not merely accepted dogmas and doctrines of Judaism, minute Talmudical ordinances, but has even adopted, in its entirety, some of the Jewish practices and, far above all these, that which indeed constitutes the very foundation of Islam, namely, the conception of a severe and uncompromising monotheism.[10] The fact is that both Judaism and Christianity were used and used freely by the prophet in building up his religion. Nor is this a new theory. The prophet never put himself forward as introducing something new but he invariably claimed for himself the honour of reviving the old and the true beliefs which had fallen into neglect and oblivion. But besides the Jewish and Christian sources, not a small portion of Islamic ritual and ceremonials were mere reproductions of Pre-Islamic practices. The entire ceremonies relating to the pilgrimage (Hajj) and the sacred service, at the temple of Mecca, have survived in Islam with little or no variation from the days of Arab Heathenism;[11] the only change that Mohamed effected in them was to allow the pilgrims to put on a particular pilgrim dress consisting of two pieces of cloth of which one covers the hip and the other breast and shoulders; while the head has to be kept uncovered, as in ancient days, when they used to make up their hair into a sort of wig by means of some glutinous substance. And so indeed it has remained, to this day, the prescribed pilgrim costume. After visiting the Kabah they used, in heathen days, to visit the two rocky hills of Safa and Merwah on which were placed two bronze idols. Mohamed went so far in his toleration of the heathen pilgrimage customs that he suffered the visit to Safa and Marwah to continue as before, but had the two idols removed. Of the history of the origin of the forms of the prayer, prostration, ablution, and fasts our knowledge is vague, uncertain and shadowy.

Islam has, says Von Kremer,

largely drawn upon Judaism, Christianity, the religion of Zoroaster and possibly even from Manichenism. From Parsiism it has taken both directly and indirectly. A number of obviously Parsi ideas have penetrated into Islam through the channel of Jewish books; notably the Talmud. The doctrine of the resurrection, most of the legends relating to heaven and hell, and the entire system of demonology have found their way into the Qur´an through Judaism. So indeed did the description of the trial and the tortures of the dead in the grave by two angels Munkar and Nakir. The idea of the bridge sirat as thin as a hair, which leads to paradise across the abyss of hell is certainly derived from the Parsis; having passed over into the Qur´an through the Midrash. But Islam has not hesitated to borrow directly from Parsiism. It is a significant fact that the word din, which so repeatedly occurs in the Qur´an, has been borrowed from the Parsi books. In the Huzveresh it appears in exactly the same form (old Backtrian dæna).[12]

It is not suggested that the prophet had access to the written books of either the Jews or the Christians; though in some passages of the Qur´an we can trace direct resemblances to the text of the Old Testament and the Mishna.[13] His knowledge of the Jewish and Christian books, at times faulty and imperfect to a degree, was derived almost exclusively by oral communications.

I trust I have said enough to illustrate the condition of Arabia before Islam and the sources from which the prophet of Arabia received his religious inspiration. I, now, go on to explain Islam and its tenets.