Is THEM Guilty of Shirk? - Dr. Wesley Muhammad

Now, did his philosophical approach to Islam corrupt the Muslim ummah's concept of Allah, as Dr.
Wesley proclaims? I do not accept this assertion. While it may be true that Al-Ghazzali's idea of Allah is
the same as the majority of today's Muslim world, most Muslims have not studied Al-Ghazzali's writings
on the subject. I understand the idea of G-d the way I do, not because of Al-Ghazzali; but, because it
makes more sense to me than to believe in anything in creation as a G-d, whether it is a man or divine
man, a bird or divine bird, a statue, saint, angel, or divine bird, divine statue, divine saint, or divine angel.
It has nothing to do with Al-Ghazzali, it has to do with reason and the experience of history. My reading
of the Qur'an does not make me see Allah as a man; it makes me see Him as greater and bigger than
anything.
AL-GHAZZALI OR SCIENCE?
Admittedly, I am not a historian and I am no expert on the influence of Greek philosophy on Imam Al-
Ghazzali. However, what I do know is that world history shows a progression of human belief and
knowledge from its early superstitious and pagan understanding of the planet and world we live in to a
more rational, scientific, and educated understanding of ourselves and our world.
Early man worshipped things in creation as Gods; the wind, fire, rain, etc. We believed in powerful spirits,
demons, ghosts lurking in the night. We worshipped the sun, the moon, stars, angelic beings, statues; all
kinds of things, including powerful men and women, who were our witch doctors, kings, pharaohs, popes
and the wizards of Oz.
As man became more knowledgeable of himself and his world, he began discarding those beliefs and
began reducing the number of supernatural, "divine" beings in his world. Eventually, a good number of
humans realized that even the powerful and great men and women who claimed to be G-d or claimed
that G-d ordained them with the right to rule were only mortal men like the rest of us. This is history 101.
It is not surprising that the Arabs just coming out of paganism, polytheism, and idolatry still struggled to
overcome the cultural tendencies of their past. Look at how even today we talk about how Muslims mix
their culture with Islam and think that their cultural proclivity is the religion. Even in the midst of the
most educated society in human history, there are many who hold superstitious, pagan, and polytheistic
beliefs. What can we say?
I make this brief summary to say that people of all cultures, ethnicities, and nationalities originated in
superstitious beliefs and gradually began growing out of those superstitions with the growth of reason and
science. We should not condemn Al-Ghazzali because he picked up the tool of his rational mind to
analyze and deduce explanations of religion. He is not responsible for the majority of mankind rejecting
the notion of a tree, bird, lion, man, king, pharaoh, emperor, pope, self-proclaimed or mysteriously
designated divine man as G-d of the universe. It is not Al-Ghazzali's fault, it is education's fault. Despite
the superstitious proclivities of many 21st century people, we have too much documented human
experience showing us that nothing in creation is a G-d to be worshipped; not even the most
knowledgeable and talented people or most powerful civilizations.
It is interesting that Dr. Wesley would cite the influence of Greek culture and thinking on the non-Arabs
who converted to Islam and brought this influence with them to corrupt the true concept of Allah. I say it
is interesting, because what he is referring to is Greek philosophical thinking, not Greek religion. Had the
Greeks not started thinking with reason, they would have remained believers in a concept of G-d not too
dissimilar from what Dr. Wesley would have us believe is the Semitic concept of G-d.
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