Assalamu Alaykom Wa Rahmat Allah.
Alright, so I wanted to make a post like this for quite a while. But before I start, let me just quickly tell why im posting this. When I was young I was trying to get to know my religion more and more and get closer to Allah because I was facing lots of problems in life and was suffering from depression (I also wasn’t the best muslim because I was sinning ☹ but I was still a practicing muslim). Anyways, when I started to learn more and more I realized that the type of islam that was being preached by current scholars is very difficult and harsh to follow. I tryed to accept it somehow but the more I tried, the more resentment I developed towards islam. I felt like the only thing scholars of islam had to offer was fear and the loss of our self-worth (thinking that this is the only way to humbleness and humility).
A lot of the scholars today keep bombarding us with how everything we do is haram and how much you should fear Allah and no matter what you do, you will never be as good as those people at the time of the prophet because your inherently evil. This is the type of mentality that I was able to observe and deduce from these people. Its like no matter how much you try your still evil because you don’t practice all the things that the prophet used to do (As if they expect you to be like a prophet or better). This is what started to make me feel quite resentful towards our religion and Islam in general.
Ok, so basically, what I wanted to talk about is how scholars had made islam so unbearable to me and a lot of other people as well. I wanted to dedicate this post to discuss some of the things that are considered as Shubuhat (doubtful matters) that made scholars label it as haram just because they wanted people to be on the safe side instead of saying the truth (that is that they are unsure but are bias against those things).
1) Music: Though there are some really good arguments made against music, those arguments are still not 100% solid. The reason is that there are some really good evidences that contradict those evidence in favor of the prohibition. (
http://www.shahbazcenter.org/is-music-haram.htm)
I do admit that the majority of the songs of today promote promiscuity, violence, sex and drugs. But there is still good music that don’t have any of these things in them! And that is why I think putting a haram label on ALL MUSIC IN GENERAL is completely wrong and insane!
2) Interaction with the opposite gender: Time and time again. We have heard it! Stories about 2 friends falling into temptation and committing zina. But guess what, we also heard stories about 2 friends of the same sex commit acts of homosexuality or stories about incest as well. Are you going to make those 2 haram as well? Im not saying that all boys and girls should have bfs & gfs. But to go as far as saying that all interaction between the genders is forbidden unless in times extreme need is insane. They even regard mixed school/university/job as haram! How much more are these people going to take away from us? All im asking for is being moderate in the ruling of prohibition. A friendly conversation between the opposites should not be considered as haram.
3) Cosmetics: Some scholars say that all cosmetics are considered haram except in the case of extreme skin burns or facial structure damage. Wrong! Braces should be allowed because they restore that natural form of the human body. Breast implants for flat chested women, double chin removal, nose jobs for people with crooked or large noses. All these can be considered as restoring the original form of the human body. But some scholars regard it as haram
4) Men wearing nongold and silk adornments: They claim it’s a form of imitation of women. Are fang necklaces and dog tags adornments of women? How about we look into how earrings came about, then we will see who was imitating who! (PS im not saying this because I wanted to wear earrings, instead I used to want to wear an adornment of high sentimental value back then, but was discouraged because of claims like this)
5) Wedding anniversaries: Some claim its imitation of kuffar, some say its innovation and making an eid for yourself. First off, an Eid is an occasion of celebration for a group of people and is of religious basis. A wedding anniversary is neither.
6) Birthdays: same as the one before
7) Playing video games: waste of time.
8) Watching movies: haram because music and free mixing
9) Wearing T-shirts that has drawings on them: drawings are haram! What about plan ones? Still haram because its imitation of kuffar.
On and on the list goes. If you actually realize, most of these prohibitions can applied to almost every single thing a human does in his day to day life in this era. So how is the person supposed to live? This mentality that most religious muslims have is so hard to apply in this day and age. Everything has to be related to the worship of Allah somehow in their minds.
Honestly this is but a fraction of what I wanted to say but unfortunately, I don’t have much time. Its extremely difficult to put my thoughts and way of thinking in an organized and neat way for you guys to understand my full picture of things so I apologize for that.
Its important to note, I want you guys to understand that Im not saying this to insult or destructively criticize anyone. I just wanted to share my mind with people who might be willing to listen and give me constructive feedback whether they support my opinion or not. So feel free to add on to this or open up a new perspective for me to look through.
Wa Alaikum Asalaam,
Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us my brother. My own thoughts on what you have written in your post is that "are these rulings" really harsh? or is the reality that they are against our own desires? Most of the things you have mentioned are of the worldly things which not only distract from the Hereafter but are harmful and have corrupting and negative influences on our hearts and souls.
Surely there is enough distraction and corrupting influences in the world already and these worldly desires you posted about are just adding to that. Not only that but surely we have already lost focus, or losing focus on the bigger picture in that we can die at any second which there is no difference of opinion on, and so we only have little time - some of us more than others. Therefore is indulging in our worldly desires really going to help us in this world and the next? Should we not be shunning anything that pulls us towards having love for the world and instead striving to go towards that which increases our desire for the Hereafter and to be with Allah?
Let me comment further on the points you made:
1. So you already acknowledge the utter filth that is apparent in todays mainstream music industry. An industry that is totally satanic and full of occultic symbolism, subliminal messaging, appealing to the lowly carnal desires, unspeakable negative and evil influences on our hearts and souls. Can anything good really be totally taken over by so much evil? Do your research on the industry and you will realise what it is really about and how the celebrities, actor/singers have sold their souls for fame. This is an industry that has created the worst people on Earth to be "idols" for the youth and mankind. Shaythan uses music as his weapon and believe me it is an effective one espeially to "distract" and corrupt the hearts and minds of the youth.
You mention there is "some" good music. So your stance on this is to "fight" for the very little good music - if any - there is out there when the vast majority is totally controlled by evil? Where is the logic in that? Anyone who looks at the evidence for prohibition for music will realise that there is far greater evidence for prohibition than there is against. To be honest with you there is not much difference of opinion against prohibition of music at all except on certain occassions and using limited instruments. So my brother you are holding onto nothing with any substance here.
2. With regards to interaction with the opposite sex then the example you gave with comparing a same gender friendship to an opposite gender friendship is absurd. You even mentioned incest? Why would you give such an extreme example which is totally irrevelant to what we are discussing? Yes there are isolated instances and cases where this may happen but of course in the vast majority of cases things like that do not happen. If they do then surely there is a corruption in the heart of the person who is inclined in such a way.
What does happen in the vast majority of cases is that friendships between opposite genders gradually or instantly turn into much more than just friendships. Me, you and most of the people reading this have seen it and exprienced it around us but you are acting as though you have lived a sheltered existance that these things only happen in fairy tales?
My brother the stance of having limited interactions with the opposite gender particularly when it comes to private interactions is not just an "isolated" opinion of a few scholars but it is a well known and established stance that is in the Qur'an and authentic Hadith and strongly supported by the past 1400 years of classical and scholarship. To be honest with you such prohibitions are far more important now than they have ever been because of the increasingly promiscuis and sexualised society we live in.
That is not to say that we should shut ourselves away and never even look at the opposte gender let alone interact with them. But the point is that we limit our ineractions with them to what is necessery. There is no reason to expand further on why. Anyone with a little common sense knows that it only takes one conversation whethr at work, college, University, on the streets, shopping mall etc to spark or ignite passions and then things progress from there. There are tonnes of examples of these things happening all around us all the time, so there is absolutely no denying this fact at all and the dangers of freely mixing with the opposite gender. We were created as human beings to generally be attracted to the opposite gender, so do you think the creator is not the best one to give us advice on interaction between the genders?
3. You mean to say "cosmetic procedures". I do not know of any majority opinion that states that if you have burns, or significant injury which changes the appearance of a bodily part that it cannot be corrected with corrective cosmetic surgery. However you say breast implants for flat chested women and nose jobs for people with large noses? So when did a flat chest or large nose become a deficiency? I find your logic very strange and very much influenced by the so called "societal norms" being pushed by those who deem what women and men should look like - not how they were created by Allah.
So all of a sudden according to you the differences in the way Allah created us all with different sized noses, ears, chest, skin colour and shade etc includes many deficiencies? My brother desist from such harmful thinking lest you claim you know what is better than Allah. Allah has created us in the normal human form. It is "us" who have decided what is more beautiful and what is considered "deficient". This is pure arrogance and in fact this type of thinking is what causes a lot of suicides in our societies when certain people especially the youth are come under immense pressure to "physically conform", but feel like they cannot then many end up taking their lives or living in severe depression and feeling low confidence and self esteem.
What may become deficient can happen through a natural birth defect, injury, illness etc but a person born with differences in physical form and appearance is absolutely not deficient! These people feel this way beause of the "perfect photoshopped human image" being pushed all over the media. There is no doubt that this is utter deception. In fact when Allah talks about this world being a deception then believe me it is more so than we think. We only have to look around us and research into what is going on to realise that we are living a lie.
5 and 6. If you want to mark an anniversary or a birthday with some contemplation on what has passed and make a Dua for a blessed, happy and successful year ahead etc then there is nothing wrong with this. Anything more than that will be considerred an innovation. This has nothing to do with being restrictive just for the sake of it. Many of us fail to understand the wisdom behind many things so we just pull a tantrum and call it archaic and restrictive. But we should try to understand the wisdom behind many of the things we become rebellious about. In this particular case it is so that we do not become like those who follow and worship other than Allah in their customs and celebrations. Surely you have heard of " You are what you eat and you are who your friends are". Then what we eat and who we follow and hang around with will surely shape who we are. If not now then eventually. What we have to understand is that many of the wisdoms behind Islamic principles and teachings is taking preventative measures - or "prevention is better than cure".
So in this case we are dissallowd to follow in the customs and practices of the disbelievers - much of which have pagan roots if you really look into it such as birthdays, anniverseries, New Year, Halloween etc. This is in order to preserve the pure and unadulterated way of life (deen) that Islam has given us. If we had a religion that was "anything goes" then surely we would have ended up like the modern day Christians whose practices and beliefs are nothing like the practices and beliefs of early Christians. This is because it has become a "anything goes" religion. But those who make excuses say it is because they are being "progressive". I do not see anything progressive about people losing all trust and faith in the Church. Actually what attracts many Christians to Islam is the "unadulterated" preservation of Islamic beliefs and practies. But if we want to live a "anything goes" kind of life then that is upto us. But surely we should be living lives where we put almighty Allah first. That is the real test of this life and the true success in this world and the next!
7. It depends on the type and nature of the game but surely nowadays video games are very different from the early days of Atari. Amiga and Commodore 64. Video games have become so advanced that they are essentially like movies that we can control. Not only that but many of them are very explicit, voilent and can even take months to complete which involve spending significant amounts of time. So there is no doubt that video games like movies and mainstream music can be a terribley corrupting influence on society particularly the youth. Not only that but it can take significant amounts of our most valuable asset - time.
As if there was not enough evil influences on our children but video games can present a huge danger to their psychological development. In fact there was a study done that looked at a class of children, where half of them played a "soft" game and the other half played a voilent game. There were some tests carried out on the children and it was found that in general the half that played the voilent games became much more desensitised than the other half that played soft games. So parents need to be very careful as to the nature and type of games their children are playing as well as restricting the amount of time they spend on such games as these games can become very addictive and will absolutely distract us from the "true reality, purpose and focus of our lives" to that of a virtual fantasy reality that gaming offers.
8. This is very similar to my response to music but of course as well as Music, gaming, Television and the media - it goes without saying that the movie industry whether hollywood, bollywood, lollywood or nollywood is totally satanic. This is very apparent with the type of sybomlism and themes contained in the movies as well as the utter filth, promiscuity, voilence and horror that movies contain. It only takes a little research to establish what these industries are really about and the extent to which celebrities, actors, musicians sell their soul for fame. It also does not take much thought to establish that these movies have a very corrupting influence on our hearts and souls just like the gaming, music, Television and the media industry. Much of this negative corrupting influence is subliminal. This is no secret or "conspiracy" for it is something well known and if we really opened our eyes we would be able to see these evil industries for what they really are.
So if we want to keep putting corrupting, negative, toxic influences into our hearts then we are only damaging ourselves. For surely there is enough toxicity thrown at us by pollution and the food, water and medicine we consume but on top of that we are mentally and physically corrupting ourselves further by constantly feeding our minds and hearts filth, rather than trying to clean and purify our hearts with the remembrance and glorification of Allah and spending our time learning and doing good and putting him "first" in all of our affairs! This is true success for surely our enemy shaythan wants to distract us until we are destroyed!
9. My brother you only have to look at how the Jesuit Catholics corrupted Christianity with putting animate imagery all over the Churches to realise what a terribly damaging influence animate imagery has had on corrupting religions to the point that animate pictures and idols had become a source of worship. This is not only limited to Catholicism, Hinduism and many other religions particularly those of pagan origin. Even many people from our own faith have pictures and images of "peers" (saints) and Awliyah (alleged friends of Allah) up in their houses or they create dargah's (shrines) in which they put flowers and make offerings. Eventually these places become places where people come from afar to make Dua to them. Notice how it starts from an image to remember the saint but then gradually progresses to the point where these people become essentially worshipped.
That is not to say that images on clothing etc may become a source of worship but it is the principle. In Islam we take great care to avoid any type of idolatary practices or imagery which can be deemed as shirk. This is because if we looked throughout history and the stories that Allah has given us then most of the nations of the past that we destroyed were those who worshipped other than Allah by creating images of idols and made them a source of worship. Therefore we keep away from all animate imagery, do not create images nor put them up in our homes. Lest shaythan decieves us for he is the biggest deciever of all!
My brother if there is evidence in our deen to prohibit us from something that is harmful to us, potentially harmful to us or at least will harm us more than doing us any good then why do we have to rebel in accordance with our desires? Have we studied the deen to the depth of classical scholars and those who have inherited their knowledge today? Or is saying that my father studied in "Al Azhar" really enough to make us understand this deen and many of the wisdoms behind many of its teachings and principles? Why do we have to become so rebellious? What will we achieve by furthering that which will potentially harm us and those around us?
You say Scholars are making things unbearable for us by prohibiting this and that, but my brother if you do not like the stance and approach of a particular scholar then find one whose stance and approach appeals to you. There is not a lack of scholars out there. You are making it out like the vast majority of scholars are like that which is totally false and even misleading. There are many scholars out there who are trying their best. They also have immense pressure on them especially in the present climate. They also have to be very careful what they say and the way in which they say it. However many of them are only trying their best to forward the knowledge from scholars of the past and also expanding on their works and applying it to present times. Just because you see todays society as "progressive" and more advanced than before it does not mean we should welcome all of the potentially evil, corrupting influence upon ourselves. We already have enough of that. We need more purity and goodness in our lives.
If we want freedom then we have it. By all means we have free choice to live how we want. But remember on that day when we are all gathered together then it will be those of us who tried to put Allah first in our lives that will be truly successful. Then we will look back and think "what did I achieve from following my desires in the world? What did I achieve from being rebellious on that which was only for my benefit to avoid or limit." So my brother know that there is no compulsion on us for the way we live our lives but we have choices to make and diffeent paths to take but if we act treacherously in this world then there can only be a wretched end for us!
May Allah enable us to focus on the bigger picture and what is really important and that which will help and benefit us to get closer to him and away from that which will harm us in this world and the next. Ameen
(Peace be upon you)
