Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Removing the Veil: Freeing Islam from Its Traditions

Removing the Veil: Freeing Islam from Its Traditions

Terebessy, Leslie

Paperback

General Education

ISBN13: 9798424081149
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: Feb 27 2022
Pages: 230
Weight: 0.69
Height: 0.48 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
Muslims are experiencing tribulations because they strayed from the straight path. They turned from revelation to tradition. The transmitters of traditions emerged as authorities for the umma. This was not just a result of problematic exegesis and jurisprudence. The turn to tradition was triggered by rulers who requested the recording of traditions. The rulers requested the recording of traditions because they wanted a religious justification for the repression of dissent within the realm, and a religious justification for waging wars of aggression abroad. The wars were to enlarge the empire. The justification of the repression of domestic dissent was provided by the apostasy law, based on a tradition. The religious justification for unlawful wars of aggression was furnished by the abrogation of the verses of reconciliation by the verse of the sword. Henceforth, Islam would be propagated through compulsion, prohibited in revelation. For the verse that teaches that there is no compulsion in religion was among the abrogated verses. The teaching of abrogation represents a stunning tampering with the teaching of peace. It transformed the religion of peace into a religion of war. Militant ulama transformed Islam into Islamism. They also provided religious justification for present-day acts of militant jihadism. This justification occurs for example in the tradition according to which the blood of the kafir is halal for the believer. Tradition is expected to judge revelation in Islam. But treating tradition as a judge of revelation reverses the relationship between revelation and tradition. It subordinates the rulings of Allah to the judgement of persons. This is problematic. It encroaches on the preeminence of Allah. How did this transpire? The emergence of these perceptions was enabled by the prohibition of using reason in religion. This prohibition rendered the umma bereft of reason. This was a catastrophe. For the prohibition of using reason in religion prevented exegetes from comprehending revelation. Preventing the umma from understanding revelation in turn alienated the umma from its religion. Because of estrangement from revelation, the umma turned to tradition. But tradition is a poor substitute for revelation. Muslims turned from the Book of Allah to books of traditions. The Book says: And the messenger saith: O my Lord! Lo! mine own folk make this Qur'an of no account. They justified turning away from the Book of Allah by asserting that tradition, too, is revelation, and that tradition contains the Book of Allah. The treatment of traditions as revelation was to equip tradition with the authority to judge the Book of Allah. It was to enable tradition to rectify putative flaws in revelation. These flaws allegedly encompass ambiguity, incompleteness and incoherence (contradictions). For example, it is alleged that revelation features unclear verses. It is also asserted that revelation does not provide sufficient details on how to pray. These assertions are in defiance of revelation presenting itself as clear, detailed, and coherent. The effort to explain, render revelation clear, detailed, and coherent is predicated on a rejection of key features of revelation: clarity, completeness, and coherence. In so far as efforts to explain revelation by recourse to tradition resulted in an eclipse of revelation by tradition, the relationship between tradition and revelation requires rethinking. It requires an epistemological transformation, a paradigm shift. For the traditional paradigm diverted the umma from following revelation to following tradition. The paradigm shift required is the shift from a prophet-centric paradigm to a paradigm centred on Allah. For the prophet-centric paradigm produced a parallel faith based on tradition rather than revelation.

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