Let Us Be Muslims. Sayyid Abul A'la Mawdudi
to God while the meaning of Disbelief is denial and disobedience of God. Muslims and Unbelievers are both human beings; both are slaves of God. But one becomes exalted and meritorious by reason of recognizing his Master, obeying His orders and fearing the consequences of disobeying Him; while the other disgraces himself by failing to recognize his Master and carry out His orders. This is why Allah is pleased with Muslims and displeased with unbelievers. That is why He promises true Muslims that they will be rewarded with Heaven and warns unbelievers that they will be cast into Hell.
The two things which separate Muslims and Unbelievers are, therefore, knowledge and actions. That is, you must first know who your Master is, what His orders are, how to follow His wishes, which deeds please Him and which displease Him. When these things are known, the second step is to make yourselves true slaves of your Master by giving up your own wishes in deference to what He desires.
If your heart desires to do a certain act and your Master’s order is against it, you should carry out that order. If something seems good to you but your Master says that it is bad, you must accept it as bad. And if something else seems bad but your Master says it is good, then you must accept it as good. If you think a certain action will be harmful but your Master says that it must be done, then done it must indeed be, even though it may entail you in loss of life or property. Similarly, if you expect to benefit from a certain action but your Master forbids it, you must refrain from it even though it might have brought all the worldly treasures.
This is the knowledge and actions by which Muslims become true servants of Allah, on whom He bestows His mercy and whom He rewards with honour and dignity. Conversely, Unbelievers, since they do not possess this knowledge, are Allah’s disobedient slaves and are denied His blessings.
Now, in all fairness, tell me: If you call yourselves Muslims but in fact are as ignorant and disobedient as an Unbeliever, can you in reality be superior to the latter merely on the strength of bearing different names, wearing different clothes and eating different foods? Can you on this basis be entitled to the blessings of God in this world and in the Hereafter? Islam is not a race or family in which membership is automatically passed on from father to son. A high caste priest’s son will not command respect in the eyes of God, if he does wrong deeds, just because he is born into a priestly home; nor will He look down on the son of a low caste family, disregarding his good deeds, simply because of his birth.
On this point God hās explicitly stated in His Book: ‘Indeed the noblest among you in the sight of God is the most Godfearing of you’ (al-Ḥujurāt 49: 13). That is, the more you know God and the more you obey His commandments, the more honourable you are in His sight. Ibrāhīm was born into the home of an idolator, but he came to know God and obeyed Him. That is why God made him Imam (leader) of the whole world. The son of Nūḥ was born into a prophet’s home but he did not understand God and disobeyed Him. Despite his high family connection, God so punished him that the punishment became an object lesson for the world.
Understand, therefore, thoroughly that whatever differences there are in the sight of Allah between man and man depend entirely on the state of their knowledge and actions. Both in this world and the Hereafter, God’s blessing is reserved for those who recognize Him, accept the right path shown by Him, and carry out His commandments. Those who do not do these things, whether their names are Abdullah and Abdur Rahman or Kartar Singh, Smith or Robertson, are identical in the sight of God. They are unworthy of His blessings.
Why Are Muslims Humiliated Today?
Brothers! You call yourselves Muslims and you believe that Allah showers His blessings on Muslims. But open your eyes and see if those blessings are in fact descending on you? You cannot know what will happen to you in the Hereafter until after your physical death, but you can most certainly look around you and see your condition here on earth.
There are so many hundreds of millions of you in the world that if each of you were to throw a single pebble they would make a mountain. But even though there are so many Muslims and Muslim governments, the world is in the hands of those who have rebelled against God. Your necks are in their grip, to be turned to whichever side they like; your heads, which should not bow before anybody except Allah, are now bowed before human beings. Your honour, which no one dared to touch, is now being trampled upon. Your hands, which were once always held high, are now lowered and stretched out before your enemies. Ignorance, dependence, poverty and indebtedness have subjected you to ignominy everywhere.
Is this the blessing of Allah? If it is not – but rather a sign of anger – then how strange it is that it is Muslims on whom it is descending! You are Muslims and yet are wallowing in ignominy! You are Muslims and yet are slaves! This situation is impossible as it is for an object to be white and black. If Muslims are the loved ones of God, how can they be treated disgracefully? Is your God (God forbid) so unjust that – while you, for your part, acknowledge His due and obey His orders – He allows the disobedient to rule over you, and punishes you for your obedience to Him?
If it is an article of faith with you that God is not unjust and obedience to God can never result in disgrace, then you will have to concede that there is something wrong in your claim to be Muslims. Although you may be registered as Muslims on your birth certificates, Allah does not base His judgements on what is written on pieces of paper. God prepares his own list of obedient and disobedient servants, and it is in this list that you must search to find your true position.
Allah sent you His Book so that you may know Him and learn how to obey Him. Have you ever tried to discover what is written in it? Allah sent His Prophet to teach you how to become Muslims. Have you ever tried to find out what His Prophet has taught? Allah explicitly informed you which behaviour debases man in this world and the Hereafter. Do you avoid such behaviour? What answers do you have to these questions? If you admit that you have neither sought knowledge from God’s Book and His Prophet’s life nor followed the way shown by him, then how can you claim to be Muslims and to merit His reward? The rewards you are getting now are in direct relation to how good Muslims you are; and your rewards in the Hereafter will be calculated on the same basis.
We have already seen that the only difference between Muslims and Unbelievers is in the matter of knowledge and actions. Men who call themselves Muslims but whose knowledge and actions are the same as those of Unbelievers are guilty of blatant hypocrisy. Unbelievers do not read the Qur’ān and do not know what is written in it. If so-called Muslims are equally ignorant, why should they be called Muslims? Unbelievers do not know the teachings of the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him, and the straight path he has shown to reach God. If Muslims are equally ignorant of these, how can they be Muslims? Unbelievers follow their own desires instead of the commands of Allah. If Muslims are similarly wilful and undisciplined, setting their own ideas and opinions on a pedestal, indifferent to God and a slave to lust, what right have they to call themselves Muslims? Unbelievers do not distinguish between Halal (what is permitted by Allah) and Haram (what is prohibited by Allah) and make indiscriminate use of everything and anything, irrespective of whether it is Halal or Haram. If Muslims behave the same as non-Muslims, what difference is there between them and Unbelievers?
Put simply: If Muslims are as devoid of knowledge about Islam as Unbelievers, and if a Muslim does all those things which an Unbeliever does, why should he be considered superior to an Unbeliever and why should his fate not be the same as that of an Unbeliever? This is a question on which we must all reflect very seriously.
My dear brothers! Do not for a moment think that I am trying to brand Muslims as Unbelievers. This is not my purpose at all. I ask myself, and implore each one of you similarly to ask his own heart, as to why we are being denied the blessing of God. Why are tribulations of all sorts descending upon us from all sides? Why are we disunited and shedding each other’s blood? Why are those whom we call Unbelievers (that is, the disobedient slaves of God) everywhere dominating us? And why are we, who claim to be His obedient slaves, living in servitude in so many parts of the world?
The more I have reflected