Why Did They Become Muslims

Meanwhile, they stab themselves repeatedly with the knives they are
holding in their hands, so much so that some of them fall down on the
floor, their bodies bleeding all over. On the other hand, some Turkish
women who believe that these men are fully blessed and sacred in this
state of ecstacy bring their invalid children with them and throw the
poor creatures under the men’s feet so that they should recover from
their illnesses. For they believe that if these Rufâ’îs trample the
children under their feet during their ecstacy the children will get rid
of all their illnesses. I think that the crazy men trample the children to
death, thus ridding them of their illnesses. How can people hold such
beliefs? The cries of the Rufâ’îs in their convent, accompanied by the
smells of onions and garlics suffusing the entire convent, make the
visitors sick. After telling me all these, my friends added, ‘These
eccentricities reminded us of the savageries of the middle ages. We
have not seen such primitive behaviour in any other place. The terrible
and horrendous sight made us sick.’ ”
Now let us carry on our examination of the two different texts. To
a certain point Ms. Müller is right and seems to have studied Islam
fairly well. Ms. Neave, however, is quite wrong. She associates with
Islam the rite of Muharram, which has nothing to do with Islam and
which was invented by ignorant people, and the rite of Rufâ’î, which,
again, has no share from Islam, and concludes that this religion is wild
and primitive. These rites were invented after Hadrat Ahmad Rufâ’î
[d. 578 (1183 C.E.), in Egypt] and by religiously ignorant people. It is
a mistake made by most Europeans to waste their long stay in an
Islamic country and insult it on account of a few pieces of hearsay
without inquiring into the matter, instead of utilizing all those years
going around and observing the scientific and religious lessons taught
in the hundreds of madrasas and the prayers of namâz which
hundreds of thousands of Muslims make ablution and perform in
perfect physical and spiritual cleanliness and with deep pious
reverence in mosques. It is rooted in Christian bigotry and an enmity
against Islam.
Ms. Georgina Müller’s suggestions, i.e. translating the Qur’ân and
not exploiting the religion for worldly advantages, are only two of the
many Islamic requirements always preached by true religious scholars
and applied by governments who followed them. Owing to the books
written by the scholars of Ahl as-sunna ‘rahima-humullâhu ta’âlâ’, the
heretics belonging to the seventy-two aberrant groups, which were
foretold by our Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’, and the stupid
rites fabricated by false and subversive sufis for the purpose of
demolishing Islam from within have been disassociated from the
Islamic religion. These great scholars announce to the entire world
that the beastly rites called the rites of Muharram and the rites
concocted and practised by the heretics called Rufâ’îs have nothing to
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