09/09/2022
THERE ARE MATTERS in our deen which are inviolable. The position of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ is one. Loving him and obeying him is absolute and unconditional. It is a matter of Iman.
The Prophet ﷺ said: ‘None of you will have iman till he loves me more than his father, his children and all mankind.” (Bukhari)
His ﷺ position is also well known. He is the best of creation and the highest in jannah. The believers on earth and the angels in the heavens ask for blessings to be bestowed on him.
إِنَّ اللَّهَ وَمَلَائِكَتَهُ يُصَلُّونَ عَلَى النَّبِيِّ ۚ يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا صَلُّوا عَلَيْهِ وَسَلِّمُوا تَسْلِيمًا
‘Indeed, Allah confers blessing upon the Prophet, and His angels [ask Him to do so]. O you who have believed, ask [ Allah to confer] blessing upon him and ask [ Allah to grant him] peace.’ (Ahzab 56)
So if we see him ﷺ being insulted or denigrated, like we saw this week with the republishing of the terrible cartoons by Charlie Hebdo in France, it rightly causes us great pain and anger.
How should we respond?
Some say that we should not respond at all. For a response will only cause more difficulties for Muslims. And anyway the position and status of the Prophet ﷺ will not be affected in any way by words of the ignorant and haters.
It is true that the status of the Prophet ﷺ will be untouched regardless of whoever tries to belittle him. But whether we respond or not is not about his ﷺ status but about ours! How we respond defines us and our standing in front of Allah ﷻ on the Final Day. Surely loving the Prophet ﷺ is more than just words and means putting him before ourselves and our comforts.
Not responding not only emboldens those who do such vile actions but it sets a negative example for our future generations. If we are silent, then what are we teaching our children? And what will they teach theirs? Over time what is sacrosanct becomes irrelevant. We can see the Christian experience to see just where that has led them. Today when God and Jesus and the foundations of their belief are ridiculed all they can do is shrug their shoulders and accept it.
So not responding is an option that cannot be entertained. It never was. Even at the time of the Prophet ﷺ when the Quraysh attacked him, we saw that Allah ﷻ would defend him through ayat of the Qur’an. These ayat would be actively recited by the Messenger ﷺ and the sahaba in public and were not words written on the pages of a book hidden away.
تَبَّتْ يَدَا أَبِي لَهَبٍ وَتَبَّ
'May the hands of Abu Lahab be ruined, and ruined is he.' (Masad 1)
وَمَا صَاحِبُكُم بِمَجْنُونٍ
'And your companion is not [at all] mad.' (Takwir 22)
Our dismay and anger should give us the energy that moves us to take the correct actions. Islam does not permit us to take the law into our own hands or to turn to violence regardless of the provocation. We see in the seerah that the Prophet ﷺ and the sahaba were limited to discussion, debate and dawah in Makkah.
It was only with the Hijra and the formation of the state in Madinah that the tenets of Islam were protected by the authority of that state. We saw that protective effect even in the dying days of the Uthmani Khilafah just 100 years ago. In 1913, the English author George Bernard Shaw considered writing a book against the Prophet ﷺ. But the existence of the Uthmani state was enough of a deterrent. In Shaw’s diary of 1913, he writes: ‘I had long desired to dramatize the life of Mahomet. But the possibility of a protest from the Turkish Ambassador – or the fear of it – causing the Lord Chamberlain to refuse to license such a play, deterred me.’ [Hesketh Pearson’s biography of George Bernard Shaw]
We can see how the absence of this state today, that unifies and represents the Muslims, has led to so many of the fitan that we are experiencing. Only last week we saw how some people were burning the Qur’an in Sweden. Would that have occurred had there been a state that would have expressed the sentiments of the Muslims on a world stage and enacted consequences?
Until that reality is re-established, we have the example of the sahaba of Makkah- discuss, debate and engage in dawah. We all, young and old, can strive to equip ourselves with the ideas, skills and confidence to do this.
It is through dawah that we can introduce the Prophet ﷺ to the general people as the true mercy for mankind. It is through questioning and debate that the strength and rationality of our beliefs will become apparent. And it is further through discussion and debate that the weakness and duplicity of ‘freedom’ also become apparent. For instance, it is argued that in civilised societies one should have the freedom/right to offend! Really! Is it not uncivilised in reality and a cause of increasing hatred and division?
We encourage discussion, debate and fair speech. We do not accept cheap insults and personal attacks.
ادْعُ إِلَىٰ سَبِيلِ رَبِّكَ بِالْحِكْمَةِ وَالْمَوْعِظَةِ الْحَسَنَةِ ۖ وَجَادِلْهُم بِالَّتِي هِيَ أَحْسَنُ ۚ إِنَّ رَبَّكَ هُوَ أَعْلَمُ بِمَن ضَلَّ عَن سَبِيلِهِ ۖ وَهُوَ أَعْلَمُ بِالْمُهْتَدِينَ
‘Invite to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good instruction, and argue with them in a way that is best. Indeed, your Lord is most knowing of who has strayed from His way, and He is most knowing of who is [rightly] guided. (an Nahl 125)
