Messages

91

General Discussions / Re: 53:1

« on: August 29, 2016, 03:55:11 AM »

Salam Yahya

53:1
By the star when it goes down,

This verse is followed by
53:2
Not has strayed your companion and not has he erred,

The stars in 53:1 is mentioned to give an idea about the sacredness or truthfulness of the next claim that was being made about the Prophet being on the correct path.

There are many cultures where people make oaths by mentioning other things like the head. From my culture, it is fairly common to make oaths by saying that I promise on my parents or children, by which we mean that I am not lying because in my culture it is believed that lying when u take an oath by naming ur dear ones, u risk putting a curse on them and urself. It is considered a big sign of a person's truthfullness in my culture.

Maybe at the Prophet's time, the Arabs held stars and planets with esteem not unlike how ppl in my culture treat dear ones. Or maybe the Arabs were at awe with stars and planet, so such an oath was the best way to convince them. This maybe has nothing to do with science, or how stars do not fall, meteors do.

Then again, we are not told whether stars are created somewhere else above the sky and then dropped in their assigned position in the galaxy or not. We do not know. Maybe stars and planets are not made in the positions that they occupy currently in the sky.

Our ultimate destiny is heaven/or hell, but we are not currently being tested in heaven or hell. We are also told that our ancestors were asked to go down. Maybe, somethings in creation ( living and non- living), like us , are created in one place, tested in another and ultimately end up in a completely different resting place.

We always have to keep in mind that the primary audience of the Quran was 7th century Arabs. They did not have our understanding of science nor our culture. Revealing scientific knowledge which they couldn't have understood on any level, would have served no purpose. It would have confused them more and make them more doubtful about the veracity of the Quran. God is the ultimate judge, He has chosen words very carefully in the Quran. Also present day Arabs do not share the same understanding with their 7th century ancestors regarding a lot of religous and cultural aspects. Time changes even the culture of a country and its people.

92

General Discussions / Re: 67:5 and 37:6 shooting stars or planets

« on: August 29, 2016, 03:24:54 AM »

Salam All

And on a related note, I have noticed often that quite a few of us are very eager to prove the scientific correctness of the verses of the Quran. This I believe was never the purpose of scripture; to use human understanding of science or basically flawed human understanding of God's created laws as a criterion to judge scripture. Science was never authorised by God as the criterion . We were asked to use reason/intellect. But that does not automatically equal to science. I do not intend to offend anyone when I say this, but science has its limitations. When we choose to overlook this we hurt noone but ourselves.

How can science be a criterion to judge scripture or God? When He is the source of both Science and Quran? If, we had been informed by Allah that science is the ultimate criterion to judge Him by or His Scripture by,then I would have never objected. Many has left the fold of Islam because they cannot reconcile their scientific understanding with incidences in the Quran, e.g. Virgin birth of Jesus, Moses' stick turning to a snake, Jesus resurrecting the dead etc. Science has no explanations for these and has claimed these as untrue stories. But would you believe science or Quran? And say my understanding and science may have deficiencies but God and His message is beyond any flaw or deficiency?


This approach of making science the ultimate benchmark has its own loopholes. We are not a fully rational creation, we have emotions and desires as well. This is how we were created. So, the path to understanding our creator cannot be via reason alone. We have to use all our gifts/abilities, ( reason, intellect, logic, emotion, doubt etc). We are not a completely rational creation and approaching God and Scripture using ration alone will lead us astray and there is ample proof of that around us. Tread very carefully!

May God bless us all 

93

General Discussions / Re: 67:5 and 37:6 shooting stars or planets

« on: August 29, 2016, 03:02:53 AM »

Salam Yahya

67:5

And certainly We have beautified the heaven nearest with lamps, and We have made them (as) missiles for the devils, and We have prepared for them punishment (of) the Blaze.

Here the Arabic word that has been translated as ' with lamps' ( in some other translations as luminary astral objects) is 'bimaṣābīḥa'

37:6
Indeed, We [We] adorned the sky [the world] with an adornment (of) the stars.

Here the Arabic word that has been translated as 'stars' is 'l-kawākibi'
 
The Arabic word for planet is 'kawkab' and star can be translated as ' najma' as well as 'kawkab' but most popular word for a star is 'najma' and for a planet is 'kawkab'

In 37:6 the Arabic is 'kawkab' and God says He has decorated the sky with these 'kawkabs' which is essentially correct if we take 'kawkab' to be stars/ planets or both. This verse does not talk about shooting stars.

In 67:5 the word is ' bimasabiha' , and the Arabic word for ' shooting star/ meteor' in Arabic is 'sihab'. I have posted about the formation of Arabic words and roots before in another post. In arabic, words are assigned meanings from their roots and in both the words ' bimasabiha' (where ' bi' basically means 'with', which means sky decorated with  ' sabiha') and ' sihab' have same roots 'sin-ha -ba'. Words that are formed using this roots mean meteor/shooting star .

I hope this answers your question.

94

General Discussions / Re: does thumma mean simultaneously

« on: August 27, 2016, 01:53:00 AM »

Salam

Can u please quote the verse? I have to know the context before I can comment.

95

General Discussions / Re: 17:32

« on: August 27, 2016, 01:48:03 AM »

Salam Yahya 

No absolutely not, that is what makes us human brother. If u don't act on it knowing that u want to but refrain because it is a sin, this is what it means to be a human. God knows and He will compensate u after judgement takes place. Have faith in God, He is the most merciful.  We are expected to put our desire to obey God and not sin over our basic instincts. If we look at the list of things that are sinful, u will notice that God has asked us to engage in those activities but to follow God's rule. For example, we can eat the meat of grazing animals, but not the meat of pigs. Those who consume pigs can tell u how tasty that is. But knowing all this God wants us to not consume pig for His sake. To test our obedience. If we consider, the permissibility of a sexual relationship, then God wants us to get married first. All these desires that we have are how we were designed by Allah, we were meant to have a desire for the flesh of animals, we were meant to have the desire to mate. But God gave some conditions that have to be met before we satisfy these desires legally. This is done simply to test us. If we were not vulnerable and did not experience a desire to consume pig or do zina, then arguably life wouldn't have been a test and asking believers to refrain from these activities would have been redundant. We will be recompensed and God will be happy with us if we follow His orders because Allah knows what a difficult test He designed for us. We are expected to follow Allah's order despite the allure of sin. Sin is meaningless if it is not alluring. Nobody will sin, if these things did not have some benefits for us. Every sin can be justified, if u can get away with it. But, God never claimed that commiting sins did not have any worldly benefit for us. It is mostly the case, that we usually pay a heavy price in this world when we decide to not sin and choose to follow Allah's guidance.

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General Discussions / Re: How to recite while praying behind an Imam

« on: August 24, 2016, 10:03:57 PM »

Salam munir rana

That is what I said in my first post on this topic. This is practised inorder to synch prayer in congregation. Otherwise one person may be in his second rakat and another person maybe performing fourth rakat at the same time. This is done for convinience. This was my point all along.

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General Discussions / Re: How to recite while praying behind an Imam

« on: August 24, 2016, 04:52:25 PM »

U can always choose to recite a different sura or no sura at all. And bow with the imam. But you have to utter something during prayer. You will not be sinning if u do not recite what the imam is reciting. We can stop at any completed verse. A whole surah does not have to be recited. U can choose to communicate with God in your own language while the imam recites a surah. The choice is yours. If u don't remain silent u are not sinning. This requirement to remain silent is not a Quranic requirement. U can recite whatever you want.

We are simply asked to bow down with those who bow down but salat still remains a personal communion with Allah.

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General Discussions / Re: How to recite while praying behind an Imam

« on: August 24, 2016, 04:29:57 PM »

Salam Munir Rana

Thank you. May Allah bless us all with the company of like-minded people. I really like interacting with all of you on this forum. 

No there is no verse where it is asked of us to recite the Quran back during praying. But that does not mean we cannot recite the Quran back while praying. We are not told this is unacceptable either. This can be done as best practice since some of the verses are really sincere arabic prayers, i.e verses where we implore Allah to forgive us and bless us. I see nothing wrong in this provided we understand what we are saying.
During prayer we r asked to utter not listen to someone else's utterings. But we can choose to recite /utter the same surah along with the imam. But this will not be possible during Asr prayer since imams do not recite this prayer loudly enough. Actually they recite this prayer silently which is completely contrary to what is asked of us in the Quran.
Since they will not recite some prayer loudly, we won't be able to recite along with imam even if we want to. So they say it is acceptable to not recite the surahs because of various surah length. U may decide to recite a surah twice as big as the one the imam decides to read silently. This is unacceptable to them.
The question Sardar Miyan asked was not whether reciting Quran is allowed or not, so I did not say anything about whether we r asked to recite Quran in Salat in the first place.

Current traditional salat fulfills the requirement of the Quran, there is no need to re-invent the whole prayer ritual.

I agree wholeheartedly with the opinion of Br. Joseph in the link provided below:
http://quransmessage.com/forum/index.php?topic=1339.msg6267#msg6267

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General Discussions / Re: How to recite while praying behind an Imam

« on: August 24, 2016, 02:35:13 PM »

Salam Gahaiile

7:204
And when is recited the Quran, then listen to it and pay attention so that you may receive mercy.

Is asking us to be silent when the Prophet/ someone else used to recite the revelations he received i.e the Quran. The ayat is not telling us to listen silently to the Quran during prayer. Prayer is not the context here. The Quran is not only recited during prayers. This ayat tells us to listen to the Quran attentively, we are asked to listen silently i.e not talk among ourselveves/ interrupt recitation of Quran. This serves a purpose, if we continue to talk among ourselves then we won't be able to concentrate  and ponder about the verses. That is how we receive mercy from Quran, by pondering and extracting knowledge and wisdom. So that we r guided. Not that the act of remaining silent when someone else reads the Quran will earn u mercy. This doesn't happen. U do not receive mercy from reading Quran and if u do not ponder over its verses and apply its wisdom to lead your life. This ayat does not mean that when someone is reciting Quran now ( current times) in prayer, we have to remain silent and listen. We are not asked to remain silent during prayer in congregation. We are free to recite whatever surah we want standing behind the imam. But this is not done because of practical reasons so that everyone's prayer starts and ends with the imam. The verse u quoted is not talking about prayer or recitation during salat. The word salat does not even appear in 7:204 in the original arabic Quran.

U can always choose to read a short surah and wait for the imam, and bow down when he bows down. Or simply stop reciting at the point the imam bows down, we are asked to recite from Quran, but it is not a condition that an entire surah has to be recited. We can always choose to recite whatever verses we are connecting with when we are offering prayer.

Verses have to be read within the context of the Quran. It does not matter which sheikh or scholar says what. They were all fallible humans. They also quoted verses out of context.

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General Discussions / Re: How to recite while praying behind an Imam

« on: August 24, 2016, 12:27:52 PM »

Salam Sardar Miyan

According to the Quran, there is no silent prayer. All prayer have to be offerend in a tone of voice that is not too loud or too quite.

We have to recite something during praying. The Quran asks us to recite our prayers. Talk to God. This claim is contrary to what the Quran says that , during praying behind an imam we do not have to recite anything. If the Wutanic requirement of recotation is not needed behind an imam, then why should we kneel or bow with him? The imam can do all the kneeling and bowing for us as well? Then bowing or kneeling down should not also matter. We can just all stand behind the imam and do nothing. The imam is not making sense, he is cherry picking and sayin things that have no Quranic sanction!

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General Discussions / Re: How to recite while praying behind an Imam

« on: August 24, 2016, 12:09:59 PM »

Salam.

U r welcome. Why is duplication an issue? When multiple people are praying together, duplication is given. They make an issue out of duplication when it is not an issue at all. The Quran does not say that duplication is not allowed during praying in congregation. These things are not from the Quran. Duplication will also take place when we recite what they are saying it is ok to recite, i.e duplication of attahiyat. Why is then duplication of attahiyat not a problem? This is not logical. I have to recite something during prayer, that is why they allow the recitation of attahiyat. Otherwise we will all be reciting nothing behind an Imam, and bowing down and kneeling, not so different then what is done in an aerobics excercise  class. Nobody will believe them if they say we are going to be ok if we recite nothing and just bow and kneel when they bow and kneel. The Quran is very clear that we have to recite our prayers. We cannot remain silent and follow someone else during an entire prayer. They cannot get away making such a claim. That is why they say we can recite these things. What that imam is saying has no Quranic reason. It is simply for the ease of the imam. He cannot walk out or stop leading a prayer if one of us is not done and choose to recite a surah twice the size of the one he chose to recite. Just so that salat begins and ends at the same time with the imam, they claim such a thing. If u ask them to show where in the Quran this approach is described, they will not be able to show u anything that supports this practice from the Quran. The point is, this is not a Quranic thing. This is simply done for practical reasons.

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General Discussions / Re: How to recite while praying behind an Imam

« on: August 24, 2016, 11:45:52 AM »

Salam Sardar Miyan

The real question is why is the Imam saying such a thing? Maybe because the attahiyat and other recitations the Imam is saying we can recite on our own( according to him) is constant for all, if prayer is offered in the traditional manner. Traditionally we all recite the same thing on those stages so it is not going to be any different than what the Imam is reciting.

But, when it comes to reciting the second surah after the recitation of surah fatiha, we have a lot of choices, anyone can choose to recite any sura, no matter how long or how short. But if that is allowed to happen then everyone will not be in synch while praying in congregation.Someone will finish prayer an hour before another, depending on the length of the sura he wishes to recite after surah fatiha.

Because of the ease of synching prayer with each other and the imam, they say we cannot recite anything we want at this stage. This will lead to the very real possibility of someone prostrating for fourth rakat and another for second rakat at the same time, for a four rakat salat.  This has no other reason in my opinion.

However, if we choose to recite the same surah along with the Imam, then what is the problem? This is not going to be possible all the time because traditionally most muslims offer some prayer silently. Which the Quran opposes. If you r not aware what surah the imam is reciting u cannot recite along with him, atleast during these so called silent prayers. That is why they justified it in their minds, that it doesn't matter, just follow the robotic movements of the imam. U will be ok during all prayers, silent or not silent. Doesn't matter what the imam is reciting. Just follow the Imam's lead!  All this is done to justify what they are doing. None of this is mentioned in Quran.

But the most important question is, why is the Imam saying such a thing? What is his source? When the Quran is absolutely  silent over what we should recite while praying and it is completely our choice. The Imam is only doing this for practical reasons, this has no Quranic sanction.

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General Discussions / Re: 17:32

« on: August 22, 2016, 04:00:52 AM »

I did... There are people belonging to various age groups on this forum , some are very young and everyone can access every thread, so I did not want to spell it out.. Brother Joseph talks about sinful thoughts on a thread on masturbation .. Look it up

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General Discussions / Re: 17:32

« on: August 22, 2016, 03:50:13 AM »

Salam Gahaiile

Well I think it is self explanatory. I am not sure what's tripping u up. Sinful thoughts are most of the time what leads someone to commit something like zina. A lot of sins begin as thoughts. Thoughts lead to action. We are asked to be mindful of our thoughts. The concept of sinful thoughts was broached and discussed in detail on this forum especially on threads discussing sexual indiscretions. There is also the concept of willful thinking and unwanted thinking, we are asked to be weary about our wilful and unwanted sinful thoughts and not to indulge in them.  Also, it is subjective, something can be sinful for somone but not for another because each person is affected differently and with different intensity. Some people are not moved to commit sinful actions just because they have sinful thoughts but indulging in them longterm does lead to commiting sins.

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General Discussions / Re: 17:32

« on: August 22, 2016, 01:12:35 AM »

Salam

Again this does not have a yes/no answer. Opposite genders can have food together and also intermingle with each other righteuosly. If talking with ppl from opposite gender will cause you to have an illegal relationship of a sexual nature with them, then you are asked not take partake in such an action. Again it is subjective. Whatever can make u commit zina , u have to avoid it. But this does not mean anybody else has to avoid them too because not everybody gets affected just from talking or interacting. U r asked to get away from whatever affects u. But you cannot pass an universal ban just because u get affected or some other ppl do. Quran does not ban these activities ( righteous intermingling). There is no ban in watching tvs and movies as long as watching does not cause u to have unrighteous thoughts or commit unrighteous activities