Who's a Muslim?

common label like nike if you ask any non-muslim..I.E.

Nike=Fashionable clothes
Muslim=Terrorist(al-qaeda,taliban etc..)
 
I am Muslim and we accept as a Muslim anyone who’s openly obvious the “shahabah” (declaration of our faith) "we testify that there is no god except for the God, and we testify that Muhammad is the messenger of God. We also believe that Muhammad is the seal of the Prophets and our final prophet
 
Yes, I think so. The term Muslim has become something that you use when you fill in a form. It has become something that you say when you are asked. The truth, from what I understand, is not like that.

A Muslim, from what I have learned, is only one when he is sincere when he makes the twin declaration of faith. If he says it just to please someone, or if he says it just out of fear, then his declaration of faith is invalid and he is not a Muslim. A Muslim is one who lives according to the twin declaration of faith. If he worships anyone or anything other than Allah, then he is not a Muslim. Even if he was a Muslim but if he attributes power to anyone or anything other than Allah, then he is no longer a Muslim.

Consider this scenario. A man is very ill. He feels that he is about to die. A doctor treats him. He becomes well. He thanks the doctor for saving his life. At that moment, if he dies, he dies a kafir. Why? Because he has attributed the power of life and death to someone other than Allah.

So, are we so ungrateful that we do not thank someone who has helped us?

Consider this scenario. A mailman brings a letter. You open the letter. Inside the letter is a check. It's a cash check for one million dollars. It's for you. Do you fall on your knees and thank the mailman for giving you the check? No, you don't. He didn't give you the check. He just brought the check. The person you thank is the one who wrote the check to you.

See what I mean?
 
Ali Mujahidin said:
If he worships anyone or anything other than Allah, then he is not a Muslim. Even if he was a Muslim but if he attributes power to anyone or anything other than Allah, then he is no longer a Muslim.

Consider this scenario. A man is very ill. He feels that he is about to die. A doctor treats him. He becomes well. He thanks the doctor for saving his life. At that moment, if he dies, he dies a kafir. Why? Because he has attributed the power of life and death to someone other than Allah.
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From my limited understanding, that action does not take one out of the fold of Islam. First of all we don't know what the person might really mean, he might thank the doctor but that doesn't negate that he might know that the act of the doctor is a means that which Allah has provided for him. What would be a statement of shirk would be if he had said something like "If it were not for you then I would have surely died.".

Allahu alam
 
Salam alaykum

Muslim is person who believes that here is only one God and Muhammed is last prophet. Also muslim follows sunnah and 5 pillars of Islam.
 
Hulk said:
From my limited understanding, that action does not take one out of the fold of Islam. First of all we don't know what the person might really mean, he might thank the doctor but that doesn't negate that he might know that the act of the doctor is a means that which Allah has provided for him. What would be a statement of shirk would be if he had said something like "If it were not for you then I would have surely died.".

Allahu alam
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Actually I am only saying what I have been told. It goes something like this. If the man says,

"Thank you, doctor, for saving my life."

then he had specifically stated that the doctor had saved his life. Which isn't true because it's Allah and not the doctor who has the power of life and death. What his real niyat is, only Allah knows. We only know what is zahir. And from his statement, what is zahir is that he had attributed the power of Allah to something else. That, according to what I am taught, puts a person outside Islam because in doing that he has negated the first part of the twin declaratation of faith. To be outside Islam is to be a kafir. It's as simple as that.

I was told this together with the lesson on salat and why we repeat the twin declaration of faith in salat. I was told that we make the twin declaration of faith in salat so that if, inadvertently, we had done something to put ourselves outside Islam, we would be back on track again. Of course, if a person consciously and deliberately hold the view that there is some other power other than Allah, then there is no doubt about where he stands.

Here's another example of what I learned.

If a person says that Islam needs to be reformed or needs to change according to the times, then, in effect, he is saying that Allah is telling a lie when Allah declared that Islam is a complete religion. In other words, he is saying that Allah is not as All-Knowing as Allah is supposed to be. So where does that leave such a person? I was taught that such an attitude puts the person outside Islam.

Perhaps you were taught differently?
 
sister herb said:
Salam alaykum

Muslim is person who believes that here is only one God and Muhammed is last prophet. Also muslim follows sunnah and 5 pillars of Islam.
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A Muslim is one who worships only the one God. Most people believe in God but the majority are astray because of the worship element of belief in God.

In fact the world 'Allah' is actually 'Al Ilaah' (it is pronounced 'Allah' because of the Arabic linguistics), with 'Al Ilaah' actually meaning 'the One worshipped'.
 
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Salam alaykum

Isn´t worships and believe means same? When we talk about Islam.

^o)
 
Ali Mujahidin said:
Yes, I think so. The term Muslim has become something that you use when you fill in a form. It has become something that you say when you are asked. The truth, from what I understand, is not like that.

A Muslim, from what I have learned, is only one when he is sincere when he makes the twin declaration of faith. If he says it just to please someone, or if he says it just out of fear, then his declaration of faith is invalid and he is not a Muslim. A Muslim is one who lives according to the twin declaration of faith. If he worships anyone or anything other than Allah, then he is not a Muslim. Even if he was a Muslim but if he attributes power to anyone or anything other than Allah, then he is no longer a Muslim.

Consider this scenario. A man is very ill. He feels that he is about to die. A doctor treats him. He becomes well. He thanks the doctor for saving his life. At that moment, if he dies, he dies a kafir. Why? Because he has attributed the power of life and death to someone other than Allah.

So, are we so ungrateful that we do not thank someone who has helped us?

Consider this scenario. A mailman brings a letter. You open the letter. Inside the letter is a check. It's a cash check for one million dollars. It's for you. Do you fall on your knees and thank the mailman for giving you the check? No, you don't. He didn't give you the check. He just brought the check. The person you thank is the one who wrote the check to you.

See what I mean?
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A person who puts trust in someone or some thing that is able offer help (a doctor in this case) and believes it has the power to heal has a deficiency of emaan, and is not a kafir. A kafir is one who directs worships to an object other than Allah.

It is deficiency of emaan because true and complete worship of Allah is for an individual to say that only Allah is able to heal, but one has to seek the healing from Allah through the doctor as the doctor has been blessed with knowledge of medical science. Ultimately the cure comes from Allah but Allah has placed an agent in this world through whom we will receive the cure from.

To further understand how hope in a doctor is a deficiency of emaan and not kufr, we need to understand what the Islamically definition of worship is.

Ibaadah means to combine the qualities of fear, hope and submission to Allah. These three qualities must be combined for it to be called worship, to have but one of these qualities is not classified as worship. Furthermore, from this definition the most comprehensive term of 'ibaadah' is then defined as 'all acts that are pleasing to Allah whether these acts are hidden or apparent'. Hence, fear, hope and submission are among the core qualities of ibaadah.

Going back to the example of the doctor we can now see that a person who goes to the doctor thinking he can cure him has not combined the qualities of fear, hope and submission. Rather only the exclusive quality of hope has been placed in the doctor which makes that person's emaan a deficient one.

The most beautiful explanation of kufr I've heard of is defined as 'giving all the rights that are due solely to Allah to someone else'. It is this supernatural fear, hope and submission in other than Allah that makes a person a kafir.
 
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sister herb said:
Salam alaykum

Isn´t worships and believe means same? When we talk about Islam.

^o)
Click to expand...

Belief alone is purely abstract. It can reside in one's heart without a person ever making any apparent, physical actions to prove his or her beliefs. Worship of Allah requires one to act on his or her belief. Unless the actions of speech, physical actions and and sincere, pure intention is present, worship has not been established.
 
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Ali Mujahidin said:
Actually I am only saying what I have been told. It goes something like this. If the man says,

"Thank you, doctor, for saving my life."

then he had specifically stated that the doctor had saved his life. Which isn't true because it's Allah and not the doctor who has the power of life and death. What his real niyat is, only Allah knows. We only know what is zahir. And from his statement, what is zahir is that he had attributed the power of Allah to something else. That, according to what I am taught, puts a person outside Islam because in doing that he has negated the first part of the twin declaratation of faith.
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Let's try another example brother, say a robber stabbed a man and the man dies. Would it be right to say that the robber killed the man? I think it would. Even though we know that in reality the life of the man is taken by Allah, the means of which it happened was through the the event that took place. Would a witness then be committing shirk if he said "The robber killed the man."?

Of course in both examples we are using life and death but actually we don't have to use life and death as examples. Imagine you lost your wallet, and you looked everywhere but couldn't find it. Then comes a friend of yours who has a dog who is very good with his sense of smell. He uses his talent and finds your wallet. You thank your friend for having his dog find your wallet. Then you proceed to say "If it were not for your dog, I wouldn't have found my wallet.". That statement would then be a statement of shirk, according to my understanding.

It could be that we were taught differently or we understood differently. Allahu alam.
 
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