Islams Reformers

Jabrâ’îl (Gabriel) came to me. He brought the good news; he who
dies without having attributed anything as a partner to Allâhu
ta’âlâ, that is, without being a disbeliever, Paradise is the place
where he will go at last, even if he has committed adultery, even if
he has committed theft.”
The âyats and hadîths above indicate that belief and practice
are different from each other. The Mu’tazila and the Khawârij,
who said that practice was a part of belief, put forth as documents
the âyats, “If one becomes a disbeliever, it does not harm Allâhu
ta’âlâ who needs nothing,” (âl ’Imrân, 97) and “Allâhu ta’âlâ
made you love îmân. He placed it into your heart and He made
disbelief, sins and disobedience seem ugly to you.” (al-Hujurât, 7)
They further said that the following words of ’Umar (radiy-Allâhu
’anh) also emphasized the meaning they understood from the
former âyat: “I wish I could send official inspectors out to find
those who have properties but do not go on hajj and to make them
pay jizya, for they are in disbelief.” However, the word ‘disbelief’
in the âyat and in this quotation means the ‘denial of hajj’. In the
last âyat, îmân and sins are classified in different classes, but it does
not mean that they are opposite. There are many things which may
be together though they differ in respect of beauty and ugliness.
The âyat, “What a bad quality it is to be sinful after having
believed,” in the same sûra very openly defines the places of îmân
and sins. It tells that sinfulness is a bad quality unbecoming to
Muslims and that the sinner has îmân. The latter is understood
from here, because real evil and atrocity is in bringing îmân and
sinning together, hence a believer’s sinning is worse than a
disbeliever’s sinning.
A Muslim, who affirms the Existence and Oneness of Allâhu
ta’âlâ and the rules He has declared through His Prophet (’alaihi
’s-salam), certainly feels sorry if he somehow fails to follow these
rules. Someone else who does not acknowledge Allâhu ta’âlâ and
His Prophet (’alaihi ’s-salâm) and does goodness not as a
command of Allâhu ta’âlâ but for some other reason does not
even accept to be a human slave to Allâhu ta’âlâ. Allâhu ta’âlâ’s
treatment of these two surely will not be the same. A lazy son
useless to others but decent and thinks of his faults and feels
shame in the presence of his father and another son, who is
studious, clever and helpful to everybody but one day opposes his
father and utters offensive terms such as, “Who are you? I don’t
recognize you,” are to be treated differently by the father. The
first one is tolerated, while the other’s every goodness comes to
– 57 –