2001-November-16

The Muslim Journal

Your G-d And Our G-d Is One And The Same: Part 2

Imam W. Deen Mohammed

(These are Excerpts from Imam W. Deen Mohammed's Public Address in Racine, WS., on Oct 6, 2000)

Abu Bakr, Omar, Uthman and Ali were the four successors or rulers who came after Prophet Muhammed. But did they know scripture like Christians know scripture, like Jewish Rabbis know scripture? I do not think so.

Therefore, I don't think that those great men even with their great minds had the perception and grasp of Islamic knowledge and Qur'anic teachings that many of our scholars of today have.

Prophet Muhammed said also: "There will come a time when you will see Jesus Christ and myself together." Prophet Muhammed said that.

I believe that time is now, when our world is one. And for the first time the great religions are realizing that they have to work together and benefit from the knowledge and purity and wisdom and courage of each other. You can't do it alone. We have to benefit from the great blessings that G-d has bestowed upon us separately. We have to benefit by working together.

We are realizing that for the first time. Mecca is supporting dialogue with Christian leaders of the world. This is the first time this has happened. So we are definitely living in the Day of Religion, a new day. And I believe that the world will see these two great figures together in this day and time.

Muhammed the Prophet was born an Arab and a citizen of the peninsula we now call Saudi Arabia. This is a new name, for then it was called the land of the Arabs. In the Bible, you will find Mecca mentioned as Bekka. We are still aware in Islamic teachings that Bekka is the ancient name for Mecca.

In the Bible is the prophecy that water will run through that land. That prophecy means that it will not always be an idolatrous land. That it will be blessed with revelations from G-d. That pure water will rain down from heaven, and that desert will be blessed with rivers to run through it.

We know the great well of water, Zam Zam, is an underground water running through Mecca. Zam Zam must have influenced Muhammed the Prophet and the wise and spiritual men of that area long before this was mentioned in the Qur'an. In the Qur'an you will find mentioned many, many times over, "land under which rivers flow." The well, Zam Zam, actually comes from a great water source running beneath the earth in the area we now call Arabia.

Muhammed was born in that land, I say again, among idol worshippers, but he did not worship idols. It is said that there were a group of people who didn't worship idols, a small group, and we believe they were called Hunifah. The singular of the word is Hanif. In our Holy Book, Abraham was called "hanif"

It means that he was always obeying the best of his nature, upright in his nature in accord with the innocent nature that G-d created in all human beings. Like the newborn baby; no mother delivers a newborn as a criminal. There was a time in the history °f our criminal law in the United States, that it was felt they could perhaps make sterile criminals and protect from them having a child that could become criminal. This period in American criminology did not last long, and they ruled that no child is born criminal.

That is the belief of the believers in Christ Jesus and Muhammed the Prophet. That no one is born criminal. We come here as the creation of G-d; we are made in heaven by G-d Almighty and come here with a clean slate, innocent. We make it dirty after we get up some size.

Muhammed also came to promote the freedom of religion. He held his followers responsible for protecting the holy places of other religions. There were the Christians and another group in the Qur'an called Sabiens. There are still some of those people practicing their religion and also believe in One G-d. And the Jews' places of worship were protected also. All of them were protected by Muslims, if their holy places were in the land that was under Islamic authority

This tradition is documented showing that the Prophet mandated that the Jews should be allowed to practice their religion, and it clearly says ''as they had been practicing it." No changes were imposed upon them. It was also the same for the Christians. They too were allowed to practice their religion just as they had practiced it before.

In the Holy Book, this saying is not understood correctly by many Muslims and by many sincere and wise leaders in Islam. In the Qur'an, it says, "and fight them." It means those who persecute religion. It refers to idolaters mostly who persecuted the religion. Prophet Muhammed had two uncles who were bitter enemies right in his own family who tried to stop what he was doing.

The Qur'an says to "fight them, until there is no more persecution." Here is Prophet Muhammed told by G-d to fight those who try to deny you the freedom of your religion, but don't fight them forever. It says "until there is no more persecution and religion is free
for G-d"

It means that I, a man, can pray to my G-d and have my privacy in my religion with my G-d, and live in your land among you and disagree with you. But as long as I represent respect for decency and peace, I should be allowed to have my personal and private relationship with my G-d and go to my place of worship with others who have this relationship with G-d that I have and not be hindered or have my peace disturbed.

This is the Qur'an. This is what Prophet Muhammed was given from G-d. And some of the people will say, "Oh no." They say, "Also in the Qur'an it says that Islam shall become the dominant religion." So they take these two verses or two references and put them together Fight them until there is no more persecution, but you can't stop fighting them until Islam is the dominant religion.

Most of the scholars, teachers, leaders and Imams in Islam - the ulema - have a lot of respect and are highly regarded in the Islamic world. It is because Prophet Muhammed said, "The ink of the scholar is more precious than the blood of the martyr." The learned in the Islamic world do not agree with this kind of interpretation, that we are to fight other people until Islam is a dominant religion on this earth.

The word given in the Qur'an means that it will become the "most apparent" or most popular of the religions. Then the prophecy is coming true, for it is said that Islam is the fastest growing religion now. And maybe it will become the most prevalent and the most seen religion.