If you climb the mount of Kahlenberg, where the Ottomans established their military headquarters during the siege of Vienna in 1095 [1683 C.E.] because it offered an ideal observation of the city from favourable elevation, you will see a monument with a sign on it that says, “May God protect us against the evils of plague and Turks.” Right beneath the sign is a concocted lithograph illustrating Turks slaughtering Christian women and children. At that time Christians represented the Turks as the most savage, the most cruel, and the most barbarous people of the world. They said that the Turks would not be cruel or barbarous if they were Christian. Those who alleged that Islam was a religion of savagery were the Christian priests, who were the cruel and tyrannical dictators of that time. This falsification always occupied a major part of the religious lessons given in schools, and thereby the Christian children were brainwashed with the inculcation that Islam was a religion of savagery. This aweful vilification was carried on throughout centuries, preserving its vehemence till our time. Is-haq Efendi of Harput ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’, in his book, makes the following quotation from a booklet which a priest wrote for the purpose of traducing Islam in 1860:
“Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ always treated people with affection, kindness, compassion and helpfulness in communicating his religion. It is for this reason that five hundred people became Christians within the first few years of Christianity. In contrast, Islam, a religion of savagery, was imposed on people with force and under threat of death. Muhammad ‘alaihis-salâm’ tried to spread Islam by means of force, threat, fighting and holy war. Consequently, thirteen years after his claim to prophethood the number of people who accepted Islam as a result of mere communication was around one hundred and eighty. This would be enough to demonstrate the difference between Christianity, a true and humanitarian religion, and Islam, which is a religion of savagery. Christianity is a perfect and humanitarian religion which penetrates the human heart, inspires mercy and compassion, and never uses force or compulsion. One indication of the fact that Christianity is the only true religion is that the advent of Christianity invalidated Judaism, which was the unitarian religion previous to it. When Allâhu ta’âlâ sends a new
Prophet, the religions previous to him must be invalidated. Because Jewry refused Christianity, various disasters befell on them, and they suffered humiliation and degradation. For the advent of a new Prophet signifies the fact that the previous religions have been spoilt. On the other hand, the advent of Muhammad ‘alaihis-salâm’ did not abrogate Christianity, nor did various disasters befall on Christians, which had been the case with Jews, but, on the contrary, Christianity spread all the wider. Despite all the Muslims’ efforts, massacres and church-destructions, (for instance, four thousand churches were destroyed in the time of caliph ’Umar,) Christians are daily increasing in number and improving in welfare, whereas Muslims are suffering indignities, becoming poorer and poorer, and losing their value and importance world-wide.”
Is-haq Efendi ‘rahmatullâhi ’aleyh’ gives the following answer to the priest’s denigrations:
First of all, the information and the numerical figures provided by the priest run counter to facts. Qur’ân al-kerîm, Islam’s Holy Book, contains the injunction, “There is no compulsion in the religion.” Although Muhammad ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ never had recourse to compulsion or threat as he communicated the Islamic religion, the number of people who embraced Islam willingly and of their own accord increased in a short time. The statements made by SALE, a Christian historian and a translator of the Qur’ân al-kerîm, corroborate our argument. [George Sale died in 1149 [1736 C.E.]. He was a British priest. He translated the Qur’ân al-kerîm into English in 1734. He gave detailed information about Islam in the introduction of his work.] He states as follows in his Translation of the Koran, which was printed in 1266 [1850 C.E.]: “The Hegira had not taken place yet when Medina already did not contain a house without Muslim residents.” That means to say that urban people who had not even seen the face of a sword accepted Islam willingly only owing to the greatness and trueness of this religion and the nonpareil literary perfection of the Qur’ân al-kerîm. The following numerical figures are an indication of Islam’s rapid spread. By the time Muhammad ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ passed away, the number of Muslims was one hundred and twenty-four thousand (124,000). Four years after the passing away of the Messenger of Allah ‘sall-Allâhu ta’âlâ ’alaihi wa sallam’, ’Umar ‘radiy-Allâhu ’anh’ sent a forty-thousand-strong Muslim army, and that army
conquered Iran, Syria, a part of Anatolia up to Konya, and Egypt. ’Umar ‘radiy-Allâhu ta’âlâ ’anh’ never had recourse to tyranny. He never displayed cruelty to those Christians and fire-worshippers living in the countries that he captured from cruel dictators. His justice is acknowledged by the entire world, friend and foe alike. Most of the people living in these countries saw the justice and the ethical perfection inherent in the Islamic religion and became Muslims willingly. Very few of them remained in their former religions, such as Christianity, Judaism and Magi. Thus, as historians unanimously acknowledge, the number of Muslims living in Muslim countries reached twenty or thirty million in ten years, which is a comparatively short period in the context of its time. ’Umar ‘radiy-Allâhu ’anh’, let alone destroying four thousand churches, gave an harsh answer to the people who asked him what church he was going to convert into a mosque, when he entered Jerusalem, and performed his first namâz outside of the church.
Three hundred years after Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ was raised up to heaven, (alive as he was,) Constantine I accepted Christianity. With his support and compulsive methods, the number of Christians reached only three million. Any Jew who refused Christianity would be subjected to chastisements dictated by Constantine such as mutilation of ears and pelting with stones.
As for the allegation that when Christianity appeared Judaism was abrogated and Jews suffered sundry disasters; it shows that the priest has not studied history well enough and therefore is not aware of the facts. For it was a fairly long time before the rise of Christianity that Judaism was contaminated, Jerusalem was destroyed first by the Assyrian king Buhtunnassar (Abuchednezzar) [604-561 B.C.], and later by the Romans. After these destructions, Jewry suffered utter social disruptions from which they never recovered. Because all these events took place before the advent of Christianity, they have nothing to do with Christianity. Today, as we are to enter the twenty-first century, we see a Jewish state before us. Obviously, therefore, Judaism survives despite Christianity. As a matter of fact, before the establishment of today’s Israel, Jews occupied the leading positions in the European monetary sources, banks, institutions of press and heavy industry, and Jewish lawyers enjoy universal popularity. The Jewish population in Britain produced the
Empire’s wealthiest lord, Lord Disraeli.[1] Rothschild[2] , another Jew, was the world’s richest person. Even today, European and American bourses and most of the companies are in the possession of Jews. That means to say that the priest is completely wrong in his assertion that as soon as Christianity appeared Judaism disappeared and various disasters befell on Jews, which is no more than a hallucination that was conjured up in his mind.
Christian priests announce that Christianity is based on essentials such as affection, compassion, mercy, and mutual help. We had a Christian neighbor, a priest. We asked him about a passage that we had read on the hundred and sixty-ninth page of the Turkish version of the Holy Bible which was printed in Istanbul in 1303 [1886 C.E.]. The passage, the tenth through eighteenth verses of the twentieth chapter of Deuteronomy in the Old Testament, reads as follows in the Authorized (King James) version:
“When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it.” “And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee.” “And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it:” “And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword:” “But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee.” “Thus thou shalt do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations.” “But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth:” “But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Am’or-ites, the Canaanites, and the Per’iz-zites, the Hi’vites, and the Jeb’u-sites; as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee:” “That they teach you
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[1] Benjamin Disraeli, (1804-1881), English Premier in 1868, and again in 1874, until 1880.
[2] Meyer Arschel Rothschild, (1743-1812), German banker and the founder of the international banking firm, House of Rothschild; and also his son. Nathan Meyer Rothschild, (1777-1836), British banker.
not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their Gods; so should ye sin against the LORD thy God.” (Deut: 20-10 to 18)
We said to our Christian neighbour, “Your Holy Bible enjoins utterly cruel behaviour towards weak people. This commandment, which exists in your Holy Bible, has no proximity to the so-called Christian compassion and mercy which you repeat so frequently. Where is your mercy and compassion? This passage in the Holy Bible is a commandment of terrible savagery and cruelty. In contrast, our Holy Book, the Qur’ân al-kerîm, does not contain a single word encouraging such horrible behaviour towards the enemy. So your religion incites you to cruelty. On the contrary, the Qur’ân al-kerîm abounds with expressions of mercy, compassion, and forgiveness, and prohibiting cruelty. Then, how can Christian priests dare to allege that Islam commands savagery and Christianity is a religion of compassion? Here is a passage from your sacred book, the Holy Bible! This means to say that, contrary to your claim, the Holy Bible commands savagery, barbarism, and cruelty. How will you explain this?”
The priest first had recourse to prevarication, saying that he did not know of the passage. When we had the aforesaid Turkish version of the Holy Bible fetched and showed him the hundred and sixty-ninth page, he said, “Well, this passage has nothing to do with Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’. The passage is a quotation from the Torah, which belongs to Moses. The commandment you criticize is the one which Allâhu ta’âlâ gave the Mosaic people so that they should revenge for their expulsion from Egypt. The Egyptians refused the time’s true religion and even attempted to kill Moses (Műsâ) ‘alaihis-salâm’. Upon this Allâhu ta’âlâ commanded the Jews to revenge on them by annihilating the so-called nations of disbelievers. That is the meaning of this passage, which was added to the Holy Bible. It has nothing to do with Christianity.” Upon this we said to him: “Every religion has a holy book. Believers of a religion have to believe in its holy book in its entirety. Where its passages were taken from, or how they were organized, is not a matter of question. A holy book is believed as a Book of Allah and the passages it contains as the commandments of Allah. The holy book of Christians is the Holy Bible, i.e. the Torah and the Bible. Therefore, you have to recognize all the passages in the Holy Bible as the commandments of Allah. You cannot divide your Holy Bible by categorizing its passages with respect to their
authenticities, for instance by stigmatizing one passage as obsolete, another as concerning Jewry, and another as Mosaic or non-Christian. You cannot believe in one part and reject another. You have to believe in it as a whole. If this passage from the Biblical book Deuteronomy has nothing to do with Christianity, your ecumenical councils should have excised it from the Holy Bible or at least announced all over the world that it was a superstition inserted into the Bible afterwards. Since they did not do so, you should be believing in this passage as a commandment of Allah. Accordingly, you have to acknowledge that Christianity is an extremely savage, cruel, ruthless and death-dealing religion.”
The Christian priest was consternated. Because he had never read the Holy Bible completely, and had not even taken a look at the Old Testament and therefore it was the first time that he had ever seen it, he was agape with astonishment. Finally, he said to us, “You have embarrassed not only me but the entire Christendom. I am not a theologian, and I must confess that I am not very pious. I thought the Holy Bible contained only compassion, mercy and forgiveness. This terrible passage of savagery has had a disastrous effect on me. I am ashamed also that I am a priest. When I go back home, I shall tell some learned theologians about this. I shall apply to the authorities for the excision of this passage from the Holy Bible. This passage is certainly a superstition. For Allah would not give such a horrendous command. This passage must be a Jewish fabrication.” We consoled him. We gave him one of our publications in English, namely Islam and Christianity. We said, “If you read this book you will see that the Holy Bible contains many other errors. In fact, these errors are about twenty thousand according to a report!” The previous section, ‘The Qur’ân al-kerîm and Today’s Copies of the Torah and the Bible’, contains a comparison of the Bible and the Qur’ân al-kerîm. Please review that section!
The Holy Bible, which Christians believe in as a heavenly book revealed by Allâhu ta’âlâ, contains a high number of passages commanding cruelty and savagery. We will quote an insignificant number of them only as a lesson to the so-called innocent and compassionate Christians who call Muslims barbarians and Islam a religion of barbars.
The twenty-third and twenty-fourth verses of the twenty-third chapter of Exodus read as follows: “For mine angel shall go
before thee, and bring thee in unto the Am’or-ites, and the Hittites, and the Per’iz-zites, and the Canaanites, ...: and I will cut them off.” “... but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images.” (Ex: 23-23, 24)
In the beginning of the thirty-first chapter of Numbers “the LORD” commands Moses to “Avenge the children of Israel of the Mid’i-an-ites: ...” (Num: 31-2) And the seventh and later verses read as follows: “And they warred against the Mid’i-an-ites, as the LORD commanded Moses; and they slew all the males.” (ibid: 7) “And the children of Israel took all the women of Mid’i-an captives, and their little ones, and took the spoil of all their cattle, and all their flocks, and all their goods.” “And they burnt all their cities wherein they dwelt, and all their goodly castles, with fire.” (ibid: 9, 10) It is written in the later verses that Műsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ was angry with his officers because they had left the women alive, and that he commanded the slaughter of the male children of all the women. (ibid: 14, 15, 16, 17) A later verse, on the other hand, (verse 35) states that the number of girls unkilled was thirty-two thousand. Just imagine the number of the people slaughtered!
The initial verses of the seventh chapter of Deuteronomy read as follows: “When the LORD thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many nations before thee, the Hittites, and the Gir’ga-shites, ... and the Am’or-ites, and the Canaanites, and the Per’iz-zites, seven nations greater and mightier than thou;” “And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them:” (Deut: 7-1, 2)
The twenty-seventh verse of the thirty-second chapter of Exodus reads as follows: “And he said unto them, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughhout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbour.” (Ex: 32-27)
It is written in the eighth and later verses of the twenty-seventh chapter of I Samuel that Dâwűd (David) ‘alaihis-salâm’ and his soldiers “invaded the Gesh’u-rites, and the Gez’rites, and the Am’a-lek-ites” and “left neither man nor woman alive.” (I Sam: 27-8, 9)
It is written in the eighth chapter of II Samuel that Dâwűd ‘alaihis-salâm’ “slew of the Syrians two and twenty thousand men,” (II Sam: 8-5) and that later he slew “eighteen thousand men.” (ibid: 13) It is stated in the final part of the tenth chapter that he “slew the men of seven hundred chariots of the Syrians, and forty thousand horsemen,” (10-18) while the twelfth chapter reports that he killed the inhabitants of the cities that he had captured “under saws, and under harrows of iron, and under axes of iron, and made them pass through the brick-kiln.” (12-31)
It is written in the Old Testament that after Műsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’, Yűshâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ had millions of people slaughtered. (Josh: 8, and also later chapters)
The thirty-fourth verse of the tenth chapter of Matthew quotes Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ as having said, “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.” (Matt: 10-34)
It is written in the fifty-first verse of the twelfth chapter of Luke that Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ said, “Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:” (Luke: 12-51)
Again, the thirty-sixth verse of the twenty-second chapter of Luke quotes Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ as having said, “... But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.” (Luke: 22-36)
A reasonable person who reads the Holy Bible will see that it abounds in scenes of savagery and cruelty, and that all those scenes are ascribed to Prophets and to Allâhu ta’âlâ’s beloved slaves.
Following the commandments of that book, which they believed to be the Word of Allâhu ta’âlâ, Christians persecuted both one another and Muslims and Jews, perpetrating massacres that were written with blood in history. It is stated as follows on the twenty-seventh page of the book Kasf-ul âsâr wa fî qisâs-i-Enbiyâ, which was originally written in English by Alex Keith and translated into Persian by a priest named Merik: “Constantine the Great commanded the mutilation of all the Jews in his country by cutting their ears and exiled them to various places.” A book written by priests and entitled Siyar ul-mutaqaddimîn contains the following information: “In
Gratianus, after a consultation with his commanders, commanded the Christianization of all the Jews in the country and the killing of those who would resist.”
It is written in a book that was written by priests and which was printed in Beirut in 1265 [1849 C.E.] that two hundred and thirty thousand Protestants were slaughtered by Catholics on the grounds that they would not accept the Pope. It is written on the forty-first and forty-second pages of a book that was translated from English into Urdu by a Catholic priest named Thomas and which was printed with the title Mir’ât us-sidq in 1267 [1851 C.E.] that the Protestants appropriated six hundred and forty-five (645) monasteries, ninety (90) schools, twenty-three hundred and seventy-six (2367) churches and one hundred and ten (110) hospitals from the Catholics and sold them for nothing. With the command of Queen Elizabeth, numbers of Catholic priests were boarded on ships and hurled into the sea. Volumes of books were written to tell about these cruelties and disasters in detail. These books written by priests prove that the real barbars are the Christians who stigmatize Muslims as barbars.
Christian priests cannot find a single word in the Qur’ân al-kerîm to corroborate their allegation that Islam is a religion of barbarity. On the other hand, the passage above which we have quoted from the Old Testament shows that Christianity, instead of Islam, is a religion of utter barbarity. How can the Christian priests ever have the face to call Islam a religion of barbarity with such commandments of barbarity in their Holy Bible? Let them first examine their own holy book, read about the savageries perpetrated in the name of Christianity, and feel shame, at least a little.
The so-called innocent, civilized and compassionate Christians organized Crusading Expeditions in order to save the sacred homeland of Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ and Jerusalem from the hands of Muslims, whom they call barbars. The Christians of that time were leading a semi-wild life, whereas the Muslims had reached the zenith of civilization and were guiding the entire world in knowledge, in science, in arts, in agriculture, and in medicine. Wealth and welfare that they had been enjoying were the natural fruits of the high civilization they had reached. That high degree of welfare was dazzling the eyes of the half-naked Christian peoples, and they were covetous of the blessings the Muslims had been enjoying. All their thoughts were fixed on how to plunder
the rich Muslim countries. A pretext was finally found. It was necessary to recapture the sacred lands belonging to Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ from the Muslims.
A money-and-blood-thirsty and sadistical priest named Pierra L’Ermite came up with the claim that he had had a dream in which Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ had appeared to him and wailed for help, saying, “Rescue me from the hands of Muslims!” He launched a military campaign for the rescue of Jerusalem, continuously provoking and encouraging people. It was an opportunity looters were looking forward to. Dreaming that they would obtain valuable goods in the places they would go to, they joined the first crusading expedition mounted by Pierre L’Ermite. Their commanders were the lunatic priest L’Ermite and the poor knight Gauntier. Consisting of mere looters, the first crusaders had not left their countries yet when they began looting. They pillaged some cities in Germany. When they entered Istanbul, they pillaged the affluent Byzantine city with complete unaffectedness despite the cries of the owners of the goods they were stealing. Completely on the loose, the crusaders were making their way through towns and villages, attacking people and places at random, when they were stopped and annihilated by the Seljuki Turks before reaching Jerusalem. Then other crusaders appeared. Gradually, crusading became a matter of honour, and eminent kings joined the expeditions, which meant tremendous armies. According to a report, a one-million-strong, [or at least 600,000,] set forth to attack. The crusading expeditions continued for a hundred and seventy-four years, from 489 [1096 C.E.] to 669 [1270 C.E.], in eight waves. Later, crusaders were organized against the Turks. The Ottoman Turks made holy wars against the crusading armies and routed them in Nighbolu and Varna. Some fanatical Christians include even the Balkan War, which took place in 1330 [1912/13 C.E.], in those expeditions, and consider that war, which they fought against the Turks, as a crusading expedition.
The German emperor Friedrich Barbarossa, Friedrich II, Conrad III, Heinrich VII, the British king Richard the Lion-hearted (Couer de Lion), the French kings Philip Auguste and Saint Louis, the Hungarian king Andreas II were among the many kings and princes who joined the crusades. Perpetrating all sorts of savagery on the way and, as we have already stated, burning, destroying and plundering Istanbul, which belonged to
their co-religionists, the Byzantines, they arrived in Jerusalem. The following is a passage paraphrased from a five-volumed book about the crusading expeditions, by Michaud:
“In 492 [1099 C.E.], the crusaders were able to force their way into Jerusalem. When they entered the city they slaughtered seventy-thousand of its Muslim and Jewish inhabitants. The streets were flooded in blood. Heaps of corpses blocked the roads. The crusaders were so barbarous that they slaughtered ten thousand Jews that they met on the banks of the Rhine in Germany.” The Muslim Turks, on the other hand, did not slay a single woman or child in Vienna. The lithograph on the mount is imaginary. The crusaders’ savageries in Jerusalem, however, are blatant facts.
Ahmed Cevdet Pasha, ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’ states as follows in his book Qisâs-i-Enbiyâ:
“The crusading army invaded Jerusalem in 492 [1099 C.E.]. They put all its inhabitants to the sword. They slaughtered more than seventy thousand Muslims who had sheltered in the Masjîd-i-aqsâ. A considerable number of those Muslims were imâms (religious leaders), scholars, zâhids (extremely pious Muslims), and people too old to use a gun. The Christian barbars plundered the innumerable gold and silver candle-sticks and invaluable historical items in the treasury near the valuable stone called Sahratullah. Most of the Syrian cities came into the possession of the crusaders, and consequently a Kingdom of Jerusalem came into being. For many long years hundreds of battles were fought between that kingdom and the Muslims. Eventually, Salâhaddîn-i-Eyyűbî ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’ [d. 589 (
‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’ conquered Akkâ, which was the center of the crusaders, as well as the other cities, thus putting an end to the crusades.”
Remaining in the possession of Christians for eighty-eight years, i.e. from 1099 to 1187, Jerusalem was eventually rescued by Salâhaddîn-i-Eyyűbî, in the latter date mentioned. That blessed commander captured Richard the Lion-heart. However, instead of treating him as a prisoner of war, he showed him the same extremely kind and mild hospitality as he would have shown to the king of a neighbouring country paying him a courtesy visit. That was a prime example to show the difference between the ‘wild Islam’ and the ‘affectionate Christianity’!
It is true that Muslims converted some churches into mosques. Yet no churches were destroyed. On the contrary, many of them were reconstructed. When Sultân Muhammad Khân ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’ conquered Istanbul, he converted Saint Sophia, which was a church, into a mosque. It was one of the conditions stipulated during the negotiations for peace. It was not only a religious event but also a monument representing the Turks’ greatest victory. Our Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ta’âlâ ’alaihi wa sallam’ had foretold the conquest of Istanbul and had said, “How lucky for them ...,” about the would-be conqueror and his army. Fâtih Sultân Muhammad Khân, who ushered a new era by conquering Istanbul, had to announce the event to the entire world by converting Saint Sophia, which had been a symbol of Christianity, into a mosque, a symbol of Islam. Fâtih Sultân Muhammad Khân never destroyed Saint Sophia. On the contrary, he had it repaired. The Qur’ân al-kerîm does not contain a commandment concerning the demolition of churches. As we shall see later ahead, Muslim governments have always protected churches and other temples against transgression.
Now we shall tell you about the conversion of a mosque into a church accomplished by Christians, who consider themselves as affectionate, innocent, and compassionate. The following passage is a paraphrased translation from Spaneien=Spain, prepared in cooperation by Prince Salvatore, Prof. Graus, theologian Kirchberger, Baron von Bibra, and Ms. Threlfall, and published in the Würzburg city of Germany in 1312 [1894 C.E.]:
“Cordoba (Qurtuba in the Arabic literature) is one of the most important cities of Spain. It was the capital of the Arab Andalusian state in Spain. When Muslims under the command of
Târiq bin Ziyâd ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’ (crossed the Gibraltar and) landed in Spain in 95 [711 C.E.], they made the city their capital. The Arabs brought civilization to the city and developed it from a semi-wild habitation into the cultural hub of Spain. They built a grand palace [Al-Qasr], in addition to hospitals and madrasas (Islamic universities). Besides these, they established a Jâmi’a [grand university], which was at the same time the first university established in Europe. Up until that time the Europeans had been far behind civilization in knowledge, in science, in medicine, in agriculture, and in the humanities. Muslims brought them knowledge, science, and culture, and tutored them.
“Abd-ur-Rahmân bin Muâwiya bin Hishâm bin Abd-ul-Melik I ‘rahima-humullâhu ta’âlâ’ [d. 172 (
years later, that the mosque attained its consummate perfection. In 366 [976 C.E.] Hakem II[1] had a minber built of gold for the mosque. It cost all those long years of hard work to bring the mosque to the perfection of a stupendous, resplendent and extremely pulchritudinous masterpiece. The mosque was in a rectangular shape, with dimensions 120x135 metres. Two parallel arms, each
“The marble captions of the pillars commanded so strong admiration from the spectators that as soon as a visitor entered the mosque he would be infatuated with their beauty. It was such beauty as the world had not seen until that time.
“There were twenty entrances into the mosque. Before each entrance was a special orange-garden, whereby the mosque was surrounded with a verdant strip. Around the mosque were other sorts of gardens, ponds with water jets, and fountains. A number of shadirwâns (reservoirs with faucets at the sides) were built so that Muslims could make ablution. The floor of the mosque was of the most valuable marble ornamented with rare wood. The valuable Lebanese wood used for the construction of the ceiling provided the mosque with exceptional beauty and grandeur. There were carvings, engravings, reliefs, and beautiful writings on the walls and on the ceiling. If you entered the mosque and took a look around, you would feel as if there were not an end of that sumptuous jungle of pillars. At night the interior of the mosque became a dreamland with coloured lights gushing from the thousands of candles.
“It is written in a book entitled Naf-ut-tîb min-ghasnî Andulus-ir-ratîb, by the renowned historian Ahmad al-Maqqarî [d. 1041 (
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[1] Hakem II passed away in 366 [976 C.E.].
all of them were lit in the nights of Ramadân and ’Iyd as well as during the other sacred nights, that twenty-four thousand (24000) oqqas (
“The minarets were crowned with captions in the shape of a pomegranate. The captions were ornamented with precious jewels, pearls and emeralds, and the spaces between the stones were covered with pieces of gold. Munjid, a lexicon written by Christian priests in Lebanon, contains two exquisite pictures of the mosque of Qurtuba.
“When Christians annihilated the Andalusian state and invaded Qurtuba in 897 [1492 C.E.], the first thing they did was to attack the mosque. They rode their horses into the extremely beautiful and magnificent mosque, and ruthlessly slaughtered the Muslims who had sheltered in the mosque, so much so that blood flowed out through the doors of the mosque. Then they broke the gold minber and shared the pieces among themselves. Also, they shared the ivory rahlas (low desks used for reading). There was a splendid copy of the Qur’ân al-kerîm hidden in a secret drawer on the minber. Embroidered with pearls and emeralds, it was an exact copy of the Qur’ân al-kerîm handwritten by ’Uthmân ‘radiy-Allâhu ’anh’. They found that beautiful book and trampled it under their feet. Thus the two peerless and exquisite masterpieces, the minber and the copy of the Qur’ân al-kerîm, were destroyed completely. The ferocious Spaniards Christianized all the Muslims and the Jews by force of the sword. Those Jews who managed to escape their talons took refuge with the Ottoman Empire. The Jews living in Turkey today are the grandchildren of those people. On the other hand, Muslims, the earlier conquerors of the country, had never disturbed the Christians or Jews living there, nor had they prevented them from practicing their religious acts of worship.
“After annihilating the Muslims and Jews with unprecedented acts of barbarism, the Christian Spaniards began to demolish the masterpiece, the mosque. First they got down the pomegranate-shaped, gold-and-emerald-ornamented captions on the minarets and looted them. They substituted them with ugly captions made from ordinary stones, which so to speak, represented angels. They tore down the wooden ornaments on the ceilings, and broke the marble floors to pieces, putting ordinary stones in their places.
They scraped down the ornaments on the walls. They tried to pull down the pillars, in which they were partly successful. They whitewashed the pillars that survived the destruction. Hundreds of the pillars were pulled down and made a huge heap of marble on the ground. Most of the twenty entrances were closed with walls built with stones. As a final act of barbarism, they decided to convert the mosque into a church, in 929 [1523 C.E.]. They applied to the time’s emperor of Spain and Germany, Carlos V [Charles Quint (906-966 [1500-1558])], for permission to do so. Charles Quint first refused to give the permission. Yet the bigoted cardinals importuned him persistently, defending that it was a religious precept that had to be carried out. Ahead of them all was the cardinal Alonso Maurique, who had much clout, and who had already coaxed an approval from the Pope. Seeing that the Pope also was for the conversion of the mosque into a church, Charles Quint succumbed to the ecclesiastical cabal. It was decided that conversion into a church necessitated the demolition of many other pillars. So the number of the pillars that remained in the mosque was reduced to eight hundred and twelve, which means that at least six hundred of those valuable marble pillars were demolished. The church that was built impersonated an unsightly shape of the cross, with dimentions 52 to
The passage you have read above was written by a group of Christians among whom there were priests. It is the plain truth. Here you are: See who forced others to change their religion, who burned and plundered religious temples, and who perpetrated
cruelty. The name of the mosque in Cordoba is the ‘
Abd-ur-Reshîd Ibrâhîm Efendi [d.
The wildest and the most monstrous examples of the Christian cruelties and persecutions towards Muslims were perpetrated by the British in India. It is stated as follows in the book As-sawrat-ul-Hindiyya, which means ‘The Indian Revolution’, by Allâma Fadl-i-Haqq Khayr-âbâdî, a great Islamic scholar in India, and also in its commentary entitled Al-yawâqît-ul-mihriyya, written by Mawlânâ Ghulâm Mihr ’Alî and printed in India in 1384 [1964 C.E.]: “As the first stage, in 1008 [1600 C.E.], the British received
Ekber Shâh’s approval to open trade centers in the Calcutta city of India. During the reign of Shâh-i-Âlam, they bought land areas in Calcutta, and brought troops for the protection of those areas. Later the permission was developed into a privilege that they could enjoy throughout India as a reward for their successful medical treatment of Sultân Ferruh Sîr Shâh. Infiltrating Delhi during the time of Shâh-i-Âlam II, they seized the executive power and began to perpetrate cruelty. In the meantime, the Wahhâbîs living in India stigmatized the Sunnî, Hanafî and Sôfî Sultân Bahadir Shâh II as a heretic, a vilification which gradually developed into calling him an unbeliever. Supported by those slanderers, by the unbelievers called Hindus, and especially by the perfidious vizier Ahsanullah Khân, the British troops entered Delhi. They raided houses and shops, plundering goods and money. They put many people to the sword, women and children alike. It was impossible to find water to drink. They arrested the very old Shâh and his household, who had sheltered in the mausoleum of Humâyűn Shâh, and drove them towards the fortress with their hands tied behind them. On the way, Patriarch Hudson had the Shâh’s three sons stripped of their clothes, leaving only their underwears on them, and martyred them by shooting bullets into their chests. He drank from their blood and had the corpses hanged on the entrance of the fortress. The following day he took their heads to the British commander Henry Bernard. Then, boiling the heads in water, he took the soup to the Shâh and his wife. The hungry pair spooned the soup into their mouths at once. Yet they could not chew or swallow it, although they did not know what kind of meat it was. They took the contents out of their mouths and put them on the ground. Hudson, the villainous priest, mocked them, saying, ‘Why don’t you eat it? It is delicious soup. I had it cooked from your sons’ flesh.’ Then they exiled the Sultân, his wife and other close relatives to the city of Rangoon[1] and imprisoned them there.” The Sultân passed away in the dungeon, in
---------------------------------
[1] The former name for Yangon, the capital city of Myanmar (Burma).
Allâma Fadl-i-Haqq was martyred in a dungeon on the Endomen island in 1278 [1861 C.E.].
It is stated as follows on the back of the sheet dated 28 Dec. 1994 of the calendar issued by the Turkish daily newspaper Türkiye: “During the British reign of India, seventy Muslims were shot to death in the city of Amir on the pretext that a British girl riding a bicycle had been jeered at. When the (British) governor was asked what the reason for that heavy punishment was, he answered, ‘A British girl is more valuable than their gods.’ ” A picture that appeared on the 31 Dec. 1994 issue of the Turkish daily newspaper Türkiye illustrated a Bosnian girl lying in blood on the street and a Serbian soldier standing in a gale of laughter by her side. The subtitle said, “The seven-year-old Nermin, slain by the Christian barbarians in Sarajevo in Nov.
When the Russians invaded Afghanistan in 1400 [1979 C.E.] and began to play havoc with the country, destroying the Islamic works of art and martyring the Muslims, they first martyred the great scholar and Walî Ibrâhîm Mujaddidî, his wife and daughters, and his hundred and twenty-one disciples by shooting them. The British, again, were the cause of that barbarous massacre. For, when Hitler, the chancellor of Nazi Germany, defeated the Russian armies and was about to enter Moscow in 1945, he announced to the British and American authorities on the radio his wish to annihilate the Russians, saying, “I admit the defeat. I shall surrender to you. But let me go on with my war. Let me rout the Russian army and save the entire world from the nuisance called communism.” Churchill, the British premier, refused his request. The American and British forces continued to support the Russians and did not enter Berlin before the Russians arrived. It was their policy whereby the Russians continued to be a nuisance for the world.
We do not intend to make a list of the various barbarisms perpetrated by Christians or to enlarge on them. History teems with innumerable acts of cruelty. The tribunals termed Inquisition, the carnage called Saint Bartholomew and many other massacres perpetrated in the name of religion are the blatant examples of the inconceivable cruelties which Christians displayed against Christians of other sects and against people of other religions. None of the Muslim rulers or commanders or statesmen ever had recourse to the cruelties approximating to those perpetrated by Christians or deigned to cloak such cruelties
under religious causes or provoked the Muslim world against Christians. Islam never approves of cruelty towards any creature. All Muslim religious authorities dissuaded Muslims from cruelty. Here is a small example for you:
It is stated as follows in the eighth edition of Fazlaka-i-Târih-i-’Uthmânî (A Summary of the Ottoman History), and also in the third edition, in 1325 [1907 C.E.], of Târih-i-Dawlat-i-’Uthmâniyya (A History of the Ottoman State), by Abd-ur-Rahmân Ţeref Bey, director of the Maktab-i-Sultânî (The Sultan’s School): “Sünbül Agha, a retired Agha of Dâr-us-sa’âda, was sailing to Egypt, when his ship was attacked by the Maltese pirates, who martyred the Agha during the attack. The troops landing on Morea (Peloponnesus) from Venetian ships slaughtered thousands of Muslims, children and women alike. The eighteenth Ottoman Pâdishâh, Sultân Ibrâhîm, was an extremely compassionate person. He grieved deeply over the barbarity perpetrated by Christians. In 1056 [1646 C.E.] he issued a firman commanding retaliation against the Christian guests living under the Ottoman administration, [which meant slaughtering them,] for the Muslims massacred. Abu-s-Sa’îd Efendi ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’, the time’s Shaikh-ul-Islâm (The Chief of Religious Affairs), taking along the Bostancýbaţý (Commander of the Imperial Guards) with him, entered the presence of the Pâdishâh (Ottoman Empire). He said that the decree meant unjust homicide, which in turn was incompatible with the Islamic religion. Being strongly adherent to the Holy Book of Allâhu ta’âlâ, which was a common quality of all the Ottoman Sultâns, Sultân Ibrâhîm ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’ took the advice and rescinded his decree.”
Shems-ud-dîn Sâmî Bey [d. 1322 (
[Misguiding Muslims’ children with lies and slanders and with promises pertaining to money and position, the British and their Jewish collaborators demolished the Muslim Ottoman state. They popularized irreligiousness and spread it as a fashion among younger generations. They rationalized women’s going out without properly covering themselves in a manner prescribed by Islam, indecencies, alcohol parties, immoralities, and irreligiosness by calling them modern life styles. They annihilated Islamic scholars and Islamic knowledge. British spies and masonic agents disguised themselves as men of religion and ruined Islam’s beautiful ethical entity and its original system of religious practices. Islam was gone in essence, although it survived in name. In the time of the Party of Union, even the legislators, beys and pashas became enemies of Islam. They passed laws destructive of Islam. Adherence to one’s religion and belief was represented as a misdemeanour. Numbers of Muslims were hanged and butchered. Pious acts such as promulgating Islam’s commandments and avoiding Islam’s prohibitions were stigmatized as separatism. Those who performed emr-i-ma’rűf, i.e. who taught the true essence of Islam, were called enemies of the regime. Al-hamd-u-lillah (may praise and gratitude be to Allah)! The Christian aggressions have come to an end. The Islamic sun is shining again in our blessed country, (Turkey). The enemy’s lies and treacheries have come to light. True religious teachings are being written freely. Today every Muslim has to show gratitude for this freedom and do his best to learn the true essence of our sacred religion for whose sake our ancestors sacrificed their lives. If we do not teach our religion to our children and discipline them to adapt themselves to the Sharî’at (way of life prescribed by Islam), the enemies lying in wait and the idiots bought by them will resume their aggressions and begin to deceive our children. All the peoples of Europe and America believe in rising after death, in the existence of Paradise and Hell. Every week they fill their churches and synagogues. Their school curricula contains compulsory religious lessons. If a person says that Europeans and Americans are wise, modern and civilized and boastingly imitates them in lying, drinking, indecency and fornication, on the one hand, and does not believe as they do, on the other, is not he a liar? We Muslims say that Christians are ignorant, idiotic, and regressive. For they divinize Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ and his blessed mother. They idolize him, worship him, and thus become
polytheists. Among them there are people who work compatibly with the Sharî’at of Muhammad ‘alaihis-salâm’ in their worldly affairs. These people attain the blessings of Allâhu ta’âlâ, living in comfort and peace. However, because they do not believe in that exalted Prophet and in his Sharî’at, they shall suffer the eternal fire of Hell.]
Now, in order to show you how a true Muslim should behave, we shall translate a letter of our Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’:
The letter which our master the Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ had written (by his secretary) addresses to all Muslims and reads as follows: [The original copy of the letter exists on the thirtieth page of the first volume of Majmű’a-i-Munshaa-tus-salâtîn, by Feridun Bey.]
“This letter has been written to inform of the promise that Muhammad ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’, the son of Abdullah, has made to all Christians. Janâb-i-Haqq has given the good news that He has sent him as His compassion, and has assigned to him the task of safekeeping the deposit entrusted to mankind. This Muhammad ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ has had this letter recorded for the purpose of documenting the promise he has given to all non-Muslims.
“If anyone acts contrary to this promise, whether he be a sultan or else, he will have revolted against Janâb-i-Haqq and derided His religion, and will therefore deserve His condemnation. If a Christian priest or tourist is fasting with the intention of worship in a mountain, in a valley, in a desert, in a verdure, in a low place or in the sand, I, on behalf of myself, my friends and acquaintances and all my nation, have revoked all sorts of obligation from them. They are under my protection. I have forgiven them all sorts of taxes that they have had to pay as a requirement of the agreements that we made with other Christians. They may not pay jizya or kharâj, or they may give as much as they wish. Do not force or oppress them. Do not depose their religious leaders. Do not evict them from their temples. Do not prevent them from travelling. Do not demolish any part of their monasteries or churches. Do not confiscate things from their churches or use them in Muslims’ mosques. Whoever does not obey this will have disobeyed the command of Allah and His Messenger and will therefore be sinful. Do not impose such taxes as jizya or gharâmat on those people who do not trade but are
always busy over worshipping, no matter where they are. I will preserve their debts on sea or land, in the east or in the west. They are under my protection. I have granted them immunity. Do not impose (the taxes called) kharâj and ’ushr [tithe] for the crops of those who live in mountains and are busy with worship. Do not allot a share for the Bayt-ul-mâl [the State Treasury] out of their crops. For, their agriculture is intended only for subsistence, not for making profit. When you need men for Jihâd (Holy War), do not resort to them. If it is necessary to impose jizya [income tax] (on them), do not take more than twelve dirhams yearly, however rich they may be and however much property they may have. They are not to be taxed with troubles or burdens. If there should be an argument with them, they shall be treated only with pity, kindness and compassion. Always protect them under your wings of mercy and compassion. Whereever they are, do not maltreat Christian women married to Muslim men. Do not prevent them from going to their church and doing the worships prescribed by their religion. Whoever disobeys or acts contrary to this commandment of Allâhu ta’âlâ will have revolted against the commandments of Allâhu ta’âlâ and His Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’. They shall be helped to repair their churches. This agreement shall be valid and shall remain unchanged till the end of the world, and no one shall be allowed to act contrary to it.”
This agreement was written down by ’Alî ‘radiy-Allâhu ’anh’ in the Masjîd-i-sa’âdat in Medina on the third day of the month of Muharram in the second year of the Hijra. The signatures affixed are:
Muhammad bin ’Abdullah ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’.
Abű Bakr bin Ebî Kuhâfa, ’Umar bin Hattâb, ’Uthmân bin Affân, ’Alî bin Ebî Tâlib, Abű Hurayra, ’Abdullah bin Mes’űd, ’Abbâs bin ’Abd-ul-muttalib, Fadl bin ’Abbâs, Zubayr bin Awwâm, Talha bin ’Abdullah, Sa’d bin Mu’âz, Sa’d bin Ubâda, Thâbit bin Qays, Zayd bin Thâbit, Hâris bin Thâbit, ’Abdullah bin ’Umar, ’Ammar bin Yâsir ‘radiy-Allâhu ta’âlâ ’anhum ajma’în’.
As is seen, our exalted Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ commands that people of other religions should be treated with utmost mercy and kindness and Christian churches should not be harmed or demolished.
Now let us read the translation of the Immunity which ’Umar ‘radiy-Allâhu ’anh’, who is alleged to have destroyed four thousand churches, granted to the people of Elijah during his caliphate. The name of Ilyâs ‘alaihis-salâm’ is known as ‘Elijah’ among Christians. Likewise, they call Jerusalem ‘Ilyâ (Elijah)’.
“Herein is the letter of immunity granted by ’Umar ul-Fârűq ‘radiy-Allâhu ta’âlâ ’anh’, the Emîr of Muslims, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and has been written so as to comprehend their existence, their lives, churches, children, the invalid ones as well as the healthy ones, and all other people; as follows:
“Muslims shall not intrude into their churches, demolish any part of their churches, appropriate even a tiniest piece of their property, or use any sort of enforcement to make them change their religion or modes of worship or convert to Islam. No Muslim shall give them the smallest harm. If they want to leave their hometown by their own accord, their lives, property and chastity shall be protected till they have reached their destination. If they want to stay here they shall be in total security. Only they shall pay the jizya [income tax] which is incumbent upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem. If some of the people of Jerusalem and Byzantines want to leave here together with their families and portable property and evacuate their churches and other places of worship, their lives, churches, travel expenses and possessions shall be protected till they reach their destinations: The aliens shall not be taxed at all till harvest, no matter whether they stay here or go away.”
Signature:
Muslims’ Khalîfa ’Umar bin Hattâb
Witnesses:
Khâlid bin Welîd
’Abd-ur-Rahmân bin ’Awf
’Amr ibn-il ’Âs
Mu’âwiya bin Ebî Sufyân
’Umar ‘radiy-Allâhu ’anh’ attended the siege of Jerusalem with his blessed presence. Christians accepted to pay the jizya and went under the protection of Muslims. They handed the keys of Jerusalem to ’Umar ‘radiy-Allâhu ’anh’ himself. Thus they were freed from the heavy taxations, persecutions, torments,
oppressions and cruelties of their own state, Byzantium. Soon they saw the justice and mercy in Muslims, whom they had been looking on as enemies. They realized that Islam was a religion commanding goodness and beauty and guiding people to happiness pertaining to this world and the next. Without the least compulsion or threatening, they accepted Islam in large groups which were mostly the size of a quarter of a town.
A close examination of the two documents provided above will show you once again that the true Muslims, the true religious guides showed great toleration towards all the other religions, helped Christians and Jews, and even repaired their churches and temples, how much less to force them to convert to Islam or destroy their temples. Were not there any Muslims who maltreated Christians? Perhaps, there were some. Yet they were only a small number of ignorant people who were unaware of the commandments of our religion. Those people did so in consequence upon their sensuous indulgences, and were chastised by other Muslims. No Muslim with common sense and with sufficient knowledge of the commandments of Islam followed them. Those people, who were Muslims only in name, persecuted not only Christians but also Muslims. Their misdemeanour has nothing to do with Islam. Allâhu ta’âlâ declares in the hundred and sixty-eighth âyat of Nisâ Sűra of the Qur’ân al-kerîm: “Those who reject Faith and do wrong, –Allah will not forgive them, nor guide them to any way.” (4-168)
If explanations of the Qur’ân al-kerîm are examined, it will be seen that Allâhu ta’âlâ commands (Muslims) always to treat other people with mercy, compassion and forgiveness, to forgive those who harmed you, always to smile benignly and to speak softly, to be patient, and to prefer amity in social relations. It is written in the annals of the world that our Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ always recommended amity and offered a compassionate hand even to those who were opposed to him.
Because Christian priests shut their eyes to truth, represent Islam as a religion of barbarism, and educate young Christians with this fallacy, the trepidation which those poor Christians feel during their first visit to Muslim countries change to astonishment upon learning the fact. We shall give a few examples. The following are passages paraphrased from books written on this subject by Christians. It is written as follows in a book entitled Letters from Constantinople, written by Ms. Georgina Max
Müller, who had lived in Istanbul, and published in 1315 [1897 C.E.]:
“When we were in school, we were taught that Muslims were uncultivated people and that the Turks, especially, were altogether ruthless barbarians. That preconception was so deeply-rooted in my sub-conscience that I cannot describe the horror and the dismay I felt when I heard that my son, a civil servant in the Foreign Ministry, was assigned a duty in Istanbul. On the contrary, the days I spent in Istanbul were the happiest days of my life. After my son went to Istanbul, my husband Prof. Müller and I decided to visit him. My husband was a universally famous person doing research in historical events. He did not share my fears concerning the Turks, and wanted to pursue some research in those historical places. Throughout my preparations for the journey I shivered with the phobia ingrained in me. How were those savage Muslims going to behave towards us? At last we arrived in Istanbul. The first impression we had of Istanbul was its graceful scenery, which had an emollient effect on us. The real astonishment, however, came with the Muslims that we contacted for the first time. They were extremely polite, ultimately decorous, and utterly civilized people. As we strolled along the crowded streets of Istanbul, visited mosques, observed the Byzantine works of art forsaken in remote places, no thought of fear or danger occurred to us. All the people we met were extremely friendly towards us. They always offered us facility. That we were of another religion, let alone arousing antagonistic feelings, did not even make any difference to them. They showed the other religions the same respect as they did to their own religion. As I saw these, I felt burning indignation towards those who had given us that wrong information and education. Quite contrary to the fallacies with which we had been schooled, they did not hate Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’, but they believed in him as another Prophet. They did not interfere with or make fun of our religious rites. They respected us as human beings. In contrast to our looking on Muslims as Godless followers of the devil, they did not utter even a slightly unpleasant word about our religion.
“The axiom, ‘Civilizations cannot be brought together with Islam,’ which had been inculcated to us, should have been an excessively inflated form of a tiny seed of truth. That seed of truth is that Muslims are staunchly adherent to their customs and traditions and therefore reject some dirty customs that run
counter to their conventions and which western people cherish in the name of civilization. However, it takes only a little more discerning to realize that these things are mere trivialities that have nothing to do with civilization.
“The Turks are extremely staunch to their conventions and to Islam’s beautiful ethical principles. They always observe these values in arranging their daily lives. As far as I am concerned, the Turks are the best Muslims. When I compare them with those Muslims that I met in Iran and in Arabia, I see that they have the merit of true Muslims much more than the others do. It gives you a great pleasure to see the heartfelt sincerity with which the Turks perform their Islamic duties, and consequently you feel yourself closer to them, have deeper sympathy and respect for them. In the streets, in the fields, gardens and orchards, in market places and shops, you can see people of all classes and professions, soldiers, porters and beggars alike, kneeling down and prostrating themselves, or saying their prayers with their hands extended. All these performances are never intended for ostentation. A Muslim with true belief returns to his work as soon as he gets through with his prayer, which takes quite a short time. Muslims hold fast to the ethical principles written in the Qur’ân al-kerîm. One thing we should never forget is that these beautiful ethical principles have preserved their pristine purity for thirteen and a half centuries, without undergoing an iota of change. Most of these facts are not known in a European capital city. What makes today’s Muslims to be looked on as enemies of civilization is the Europeans’ ignorance of these beautiful ethical principles put by Muhammad ‘alaihis-salâm’. On the other hand, they do not seem to have heard about that great Prophet’s ‘sall-Allâhu ta’âlâ ’alaihi wa sallam’ utterance, which reads as follows: ‘I am none but a human being. When I communicate to you a commandment of Allâhu ta’âlâ, accept it immediately. However, when I say something from myself about worldly affairs, it is not a commandment of Allâhu ta’âlâ. I say it as a human being.’ There have been great improvements in scientific information since the time of Muhammad ‘alaihis-salâm’. The Islamic religion commands that the techniques used in those days should be modified so as to suit the new conditions. If this modification is managed in conformity with the ever-changing requirements of the time, the Islamic religion will not suffer any erosion, and it will always hold the limelight as a civilized religion.
“The Turks are so faultless in their benignancy towards the votaries of other religions that many of the state’s scientific and technical positions are occupied by Christian experts today. Then, why don’t we consider religious knowledge and science on separate platforms? As a matter of fact, we should not forget that in the west religious and scientific matters were separated from each other afterwards and it was with considerable difficulty that Christian priests were curbed from exploiting the religion in their political machinations. It was not a smooth business that Christians realized the evils of exploiting the religion in worldly occupations. Yes, the commandments of Allâhu ta’âlâ cannot be changed. The principles of worship, justice and morals communicated have to be maintained. For instance, the Church of Scotland declared that it would be sinful to play the organ in a church and announced that those who allowed the organ in their church would go to Hell. This reaction of the church shows that it would be wrong to attenuate the solemnity of the religious matters with scientific instruments that are used for worldly pleasures. On the other hand, the Ottoman counterparts of the European hidebound conservatives resisted against scientific and cultural renovations, rejected every new scientific discovery by saying that it was ‘a devilish contrivance’, and thus slandered the Islamic religion. In the course of time, Muslims will certainly rid themselves of these ignorant bigots.
“Europeans consider themselves as cruel and truculent people. However, all the stories told for the purpose of demonstrating their so-called cruelties come from mediaeval sources. Now let us put our hand on our heart and do some conscientious reasoning: Did not Europeans perpetrate cruelties in the Middle Ages? In my opinion, we Europeans were rough barbarians in those years. Our history teems with blatant examples of cruelty and torture. The Qur’ân al-kerîm, on the other hand, commands that prisoners of war should be treated well and priests, old people, women and children should not be hurt even during process of a battle. There were some Muslim commanders who violated these restrictions enjoined by the Qur’ân al-kerîm. Yet they were people who had not read the Qur’ân al-kerîm and who had learned religious knowledge from ignorant tutors. It will be very useful to have the Qur’ân al-kerîm translated and explained in all religions. However, I think some more time is needed for the realization of that task. For, in all Muslim countries it is considered sinful to use any language except Arabic in religious
practices. Some years ago a Muslim in Madras in India was condemned because he had recited a couple of Koranic verses in Hindi instead of in Arabic in a mosque. [For it was done not as an explanation of the Qur’ân but in the name of reciting the Qur’ân.] The Qur’ân al-kerîm is an extremely civilized and logical religious book. Some Muslims who do not understand the Qur’ân al-kerîm become playthings in the hands of fanatics who impose on them their personal absurd ideas and heretical beliefs. However, the Islamic scholars who study the Qur’ân al-kerîm see the fact that their religion is an extremely useful one and that the wrong indoctrinations being spread in some places are quite contrary to the Qur’ân al-kerîm. I assert openly that no other two religions are as identical in essence as ISLAM and CHRISTIANITY. These two religions are brothers. They are like the children of the same pair of parents. They have been inspired from the same soul.” [The lady author of the book says so and thinks so under the influence of the fallacies inculcated into her during her childhood. The fact is quite the other way round. The Qur’ân al-kerîm has been translated into a number of languages and explained in various languages. It would be wrong, however, to look on these translations and explanations as the Qur’ân al-kerîm itself or to recite them in acts of worship such as namâz.]
The letter paraphrased above divulges various facts. Islam never prohibits to translate the Qur’ân al-kerîm into other languages or to explain it in other languages. What Islam prohibits is to mistranslate the Qur’ân al-kerîm into, let alone other languages, Arabic itself, be it done for insidious and perfidious purposes or as a result of ignorance. Our Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ stated, “A person who translates the Qur’an al-kerîm in accordance with his personal understanding will become a disbeliever.” If everyone explains it as he understands it, there will appear erroneous explanations as many as the number of the heads, turning the Islamic religion into a crowd of inconsistencies and contradictions like today’s Christianity. Our Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ explained the entire Qur’ân al-kerîm to his Sahâba. He communited the murâd-i-ilâhî (what Allâhu ta’âlâ meant) to them. The Sahâba taught these meanings to the Tâbi’în, who in their turn wrote them in their books. There are thousands of books of tafsîr (explanations of the Qur’ân al-kerîm) written. Numbers of tafsîrs in Persian and in Turkish and thousands of religious books were written. One of the tafsîrs in Persian is Mawâhib-i-aliyya, which
was written in the city of Hirât by Huseyn Wâ’iz Kâshifî ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’ [d. 910 (
Now let us turn our attention to the reflections of another foreign lady on this subject. The following excerpts have been paraphrased from Twenty-Six Years on the Bosphorus, written by a British lady, named Ms. Dorina L. Neave, who lived in Istanbul between 1881 and 1907 [1325 A.H.].
After praising Muslims for their politeness and giving a few examples of the open-mindedness that they show to the votaries of other religions, Ms. Neave also dwells on some culpabilities and criticizes them. Please read what she says:
“There is a religious rite observed in the name of Muharram[1] here. I have been staying for years in Istanbul, and I have never gone to see that religious rite. The people who went to see them tell us that those Muslim rites are extremely severe and dreadfully wild. People who perform those rites come forward with the upper parts of their bodies naked, shout the names of Hasan and Huseyn, (the names of the Prophet’s two blessed grandsons,) and hit their naked bodies vehemently with the heavy chains they hold in their hands, which makes them bloody all over.”
Ms. Neave writes as follows about a rite of Rufâ’îs which her acquaintances attended: “As my friends told me, dervishes, [or Rufâ’îs,] naked down to their bellies and yelling, make a line, saying the (expression called) Shahâdat aloud and rocking their bodies backwards and forwards. Then, accelerating their movements gradually, shouting wild cries and yells in a sort of ecstacy or a fit of epilepsy, they spring in the air until they lose consciousness. Meanwhile, they stab themselves repeatedly with the knives they are holding in their hands, so much so that some of them fall down on the floor, their bodies bleeding all over. On
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[1] The first Islamic month.
the other hand, some Turkish women who believe that these men are fully blessed and sacred in this state of ecstacy bring their invalid children with them and throw the poor creatures under the men’s feet so that they should recover from their illnesses. For they believe that if these Rufâ’îs trample the children under their feet during their ecstacy the children will get rid of all their illnesses. I think that the crazy men trample the children to death, thus ridding them of their illnesses. How can people hold such beliefs? The cries of the Rufâ’îs in their convent, accompanied by the smells of onions and garlics suffusing the entire convent, make the visitors sick. After telling me all these, my friends added, ‘These eccentricities reminded us of the savageries of the middle ages. We have not seen such primitive behaviour in any other place. The terrible and horrendous sight made us sick.’ ”
Now let us carry on our examination of the two different texts. To a certain point Ms. Müller is right and seems to have studied Islam fairly well. Ms. Neave, however, is quite wrong. She associates with Islam the rite of Muharram, which has nothing to do with Islam and which was invented by ignorant people, and the rite of Rufâ’î, which, again, has no share from Islam, and concludes that this religion is wild and primitive. These rites were invented after Hadrat Ahmad Rufâ’î [d. 578 (
Ms. Georgina Müller’s suggestions, i.e. translating the Qur’ân and not exploiting the religion for worldly advantages, are only two of the many Islamic requirements always preached by true religious scholars and applied by governments who followed them. Owing to the books written by the scholars of Ahl as-sunna ‘rahima-humullâhu ta’âlâ’, the heretics belonging to the seventy-two aberrant groups, which were foretold by our Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’, and the stupid rites fabricated by false and subversive sufis for the purpose of demolishing Islam from
within have been disassociated from the Islamic religion. These great scholars announce to the entire world that the beastly rites called the rites of Muharram and the rites concocted and practised by the heretics called Rufâ’îs have nothing to do with Islam. Rites of this sort were prohibited by Muslim states. As it is written in various books, such as in Fatâwâ-i-hadîthiyya, in the final part of the two hundred and sixty-sixth letter in Mektűbât, in Hadîqa and in Berîqa, there is a fatwâ[1] stating that such rites are harâm (forbidden by Islam).
Islam is not based on games, music, magic, or feats of skill. Ahmad ibni Kemâl Efendi ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ [d. 940 (
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[1] An explanation given by an Islamic scholar as an answer to Muslims’ questions. The sources whereon the fatwâ is based have to be appended to it.
communicate Islam, not to make people Believers. Qur’ân al-kerîm commands always to show mercy and compassion to people. People who flout these commandments have no ties with Islam.
There are still passages containing the commandments of Allâhu ta’âlâ in today’s Holy Bible. These passages, like the Qur’ân al-kerîm, advise to treat people with compassion. The Islamic scholars acknowledge that the Pentateuchal and Biblical passages that are in agreement with the Qur’ân al-kerîm are the Words of Allâhu ta’âlâ. Nasrâniyyat, the original form of Christianity, was a religion commanding belief in the Unity of Allah. The dogma of Trinity, or Tripartite Godhead, was the result of misinterpretation which provided opportune material for Jews to play upon in their activities to demolish Nasrâniyyat. Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ advised, “And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; ..,” (Luke: 6-29) and invoked a blessing on his persecuters, saying, “... Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. ...” (ibid: 23-34) While both religions communicate mercy and compassion, and while both of them are based on patience and goodwill, why is all this enmity and cruelty against each other through the centuries? These savageries and cruelties are unilateral, and they have always been perpetrated by Christians, who acknowledge this fact.
The aforesaid horrendous events have been derived from literature written by Christian priests and Christian historians. There might be some justification for scepticism if we had obtained this information from books written by Islamic scholars. How long did these cruelties against Muslims continue? Let us refer to foreign sources to see how long these cruelties and the tribunals called Inquisition continued. According to European sources, the tribunals of Inquisition continued for six long centuries, from 578 [1183 C.E.] to 1222 [1807 C.E.], and in those hideous tribunals, which had branches in Italy, in Spain and in France, an untold number of people were unjustly slaughtered, burned, or tortured to death either in the name of religion or for the sake of priests’ personal interests or because they had propounded new ideas.
The Jewish and Muslim populations in Spain suffered from those tribunals until their complete extirpation was accomplished, whereupon the Spanish King Ferdinand V [d. 922 (
his pride by saying, “There are no Muslims or other irreligious people left in Spain now.” The tribunals of Inquisition, which stigmatized all sorts of scientific improvements and technical inventions as sinful, annihilated not only the votaries of other religions, but also all the illuminated members of the society.
Even Gallilee was sued in the court of Inquisition for his declaration that the earth was a round planet rotating and revolving, a fact which he had learned from the Muslims, and it was only his own official retraction that saved his head. The tribunals of Inquisition were supervised by members of the church, all the proceedings were conducted in strict secrecy, and the sittings and hearings were held behind the scenes. The Inquisition is a shame for the history of humanity, particularly for Christianity. Napoleon Bonaparte had to overcome a series of severe difficulties to abrogate Inquisition in Spain in 1222 [1807 C.E.]. Some time later the ferocious tribunals arose again, and sank in the pages of history in 1250 [1834 C.E.]. Although there is not a precisely known number of the death sentences pronounced by the myriad tribunals of Inquisition, that it is beyond millions is doubtless. As a matter of fact, saying that a small court of Inquisition in Spain alone sentenced twenty-eight thousand people to death would be enough of a standard whereby to make at least a rough guess of the number of the executions imposed by those highly numerous tribunals. Is-haq Efendi of Harput ‘rahima-hullâhu ta’âlâ’, in his book Diyâ-ul-qulűb, gives an estimate of the number of the (religious) transgressions, persecutions, and massacres perpetrated by Christians against Muslims and Jews, by Catholics against Protestants, and by Protestants against Catholics. Accordingly, the total number of the people who lost their lives during the crusades, in the battles fought for the annihilation of non-Christians during the reign of Emperor Theophilus and his wife Theodora, in the mass-executions carried out upon the command of the Pope Gregorius VII, in the massacres perpetrated in order to Christianize people by force, during the mass-butchery of the Muslim and Jewish populations living under the Andalusian state in Spain, during the blood-baths which Catholics perpetrated for the extirpation of Protestants, first on the night known as Saint Bartholomew and later in Ireland, in the bloody pogrom of Catholics organized and commanded by the British Queen Elizabeth, and in other similar carnages, amounts to twenty-five million, which is a fact written by Christian historians.
The mass-slaughters perpetrated by the Russians various times, e.g. in Central Asia in 1321 [1903 C.E.], during the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, all over the world after the First World War, and especially in Afghanistan in 1406 [1986 C.E.], compound that number several-fold.
The aforesaid documentaries, most of which have been borrowed from Christian sources, reveal the following facts:
1– Islam has never been a religion of savagery, and Muslims have never transgressed against Christians, none the least for bloody purposes. On the contrary, Muslims have protected Christians whenever they needed protection.
2– In contrast, Christians have provoked one another against Muslims and Jews, against their co-religionists belonging to other sects, perpetrated all sorts of persecution and barbarism against them, and turned the religion of Îsâ ‘alaihis-salâm’ into mere savagery.
Whatsoever the motives in the minds of those people who manipulated those barbarisms, be they personal interests, patriotic fantasies, plundering intentions, feelings of grudge and vengeance, which have nothing to do with religion, or be they sheer religious purposes, the outcome was the lives of innocent people.
Religion means THE WAY WHICH ALLÂHU TA’ÂLÂ APPROVES, which equips with pure moral qualities, which commands mercy and compassion, obedience towards elders and seniors and affection towards younger people and juniors, which guides people to truth, and which it is a grave sin to exploit for personel advantages. It is a desecration of religion to use it as a tool for political advantages or other harmful purposes and interests or to provoke some ignorant people in the name of religion. This is the most wicked sin in the view of Allâhu ta’âlâ, the Most Forgiving and the Most Compassionate. Can a pope or a cardinal who gathers people for the purpose of having Muslims slaughtered at the cost of violating his own holy book be said to be a religious man? What is Islamic in the demeanour of those bigots who incite Muslims against their Pâdishâh and statesmen by clamouring that “The people are losing their religion”? Al-hamd-u-lillâh (May praise and gratitude be to Allah) that today’s society hardly holds any idiots ignorant enough for the religious and scientific impostors to misguide. Today, owing to improved
communicative facilities and the high speed in transportation, young Christians and Muslims learn each other’s religion, visit each other’s country, meet one another and make friends. Now Christians also see the fact that Islam is not a barbarous religion and realize that the two religions are essentially identical.
Many Christians today state that they feel deep sorrow at the Christian cruelties they read about in history, that they no longer agree with those ignorant people, and that they know Islam as the most civilized religion and true Muslims as mature, civilized, well-behaved and affable people. In fact, they give the necessary answers to any remarks contrary to these facts. Let us pray so that people will know religion as RELIGION, so that they will not impudently use it for sordid personal purposes, and so that they will cooperate, struggle against irreligious Communists and endeavour for the liberation and rights of those nations who have fallen victim to their talons and people who have been moaning under their persecutions! May Allâhu ta’âlâ bless the entire humanity with the honour of Islam, which is the only true religion in His view, and with the fortune of perfect obedience to Him. Âmîn.