"Till today, those who believe in Muhammad honor
and love him. Anyone of those who believe in him would ransom his own family and
wealth to see him, even if but once."
Excuse me, if Muhammad was a prophet, why would
anyone honor him? Or ransom family, specially since "Allah" is the true and
one God to be worshipped?
- Farias, 17 October 2002
Answer
I wish you had provided the reference for the
quotation you sent me. But in any case, it is not clear to me what the author of
this statement meant by saying that one should ransom his family in order to
"see" the Prophet. Short of having an elaboration of what the author is trying
to say, I am, unfortunately, not able to address this. I can, perhaps, only say
this much that I have not seen anything in the Islamic literature that suggest
anything resembling this phrase. I will, however, offer the following brief
notes regarding the position of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) in Islam as
it relates to your question.
Muslims believe Muhammad (p) as a Prophet of God
just like other prophets including Jesus, Moses, Abraham, and so on. They do not
believe him or any other prophet to be a god. Suggesting that would actually be
offending to a Muslim. Muslims worship only One God and they do not associate
anyone or anything else with God. They have highest respects for all prophets
but they do not consider them anymore than ordinary human beings, with the
exception that they received revelations from God to call people to
righteousness.
You asked if Muhammad was a prophet then why would
anyone honor him. I am not sure why you would object to anyone honoring him or
any other person for that matter. Perhaps you associated honoring someone with
worshipping God. Such an association would not be correct. It is alright to show
honor and respect to not just prophets but also to one another who are around us
including our parents and the elderly.
Among many misunderstandings about Muslims and
Islam, one is that they worship "Allah" who is some kind of a tribal god to
them. Allah is actually the Arabic for the same universal God Who is worshipped
by all including the Jews and the Christians. The word "Allah" is a contraction
of two words - "Al" and "Ilah", meaning "The God". All Semitic languages (like
Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic, etc.) use a similar pronouncing word for "God". For
example, the Arabic "Allah" is similar to the Hebrew "Elohim", which is actually
a plural word. When one looks at the singular word for "Elohim", which is
"Eloah", one can see further similarity. Same thing can be said for Aramaic,
which was the language spoken by Jesus (peace be on him) but now is an extinct
language.
I will close this with a few verses from the Qur'an
which will further clarify the position of Muslims regarding Prophet Muhammad
and other prophets:
Muhammad is no more than an
Apostle: many were the Apostles that passed away before him. If he died or
were slain will ye then turn back on your heels? If any did turn back on his
heels not the least harm will he do to Allah; but Allah (on the other hand)
will swiftly reward those who (serve him) with gratitude. (Qur'an 3: 144)
Say (O Muhammad): "We believe in
Allah and in what has been revealed to us and what was revealed to Abraham,
Ishma`il, Isaac, Jacob and the Tribes and in (Books) given to Moses, Jesus and
the Prophets from their Lord; we make no distinction between one and another
among them and to Allah do we bow our will (in Islam)." (Qur'an 3:84)
We have sent thee (O Muhammad!)
inspiration, as We sent it to Noah and the Messengers after him; We sent
inspiration to Abraham, Ishmail, Isaac, Jacob and the Tribes, to Jesus, Job,
Jonah, Aaron, and Solomon, and to David We gave the Psalms. (Qur'an 4: 163)
We gave him (Abraham) Isaac and
Jacob: all (three) We guided: and before him We guided Noah, and among his
progeny, David, Solomon, Job, Joseph, Moses and Aaron. Thus do We reward those
who do good: And Zakariya and John and Jesus and Elias: all in the ranks of
the righteous: And Ismail and Elisha and Jonas and Lot: and to all We gave
favor above the nations: (To them) and to their fathers and progeny and
brethren: We chose them. And We guided them to a straight way. (Qur'an 6:
84-87)
I hope that this brief reply was helpful to you.
- Mushfiqur Rahman, 18 October 2002
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