Download www.williamsunday.net

Islam
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Islam comes from “salam” = peace
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Islam comes from “salam” = peace
❏ secondary meaning = surrender
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Islam comes from “salam” = peace
❏ secondary meaning = surrender
❏ “The peace that comes from surrendering one’s life to God.”
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Islam comes from “salam” = peace
❏ secondary meaning = surrender
❏ Like Judaism and Christianity, Islam is monotheistic.
❏ Adherents of Islam are called muslims.
❏ Allah - “the God” (as opposed to “a God”)
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ God created the world.
❏God created humans (Adam and Eve)
❏Noah and his son Shem
❏Shem led to Abraham, who married Sarah
❏Abraham also married Hagar, who bore him Ishmael
❏Sarah then bore Isaac.
❏Ishmael went to Mecca / the sons of Ishmael became Muslims
❏The sons of Isaac, who remained in Palestine, became Hebrews.
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏Muhammad - b. 570 CE d. 632 CE
❏Seal of the Prophets - no legitimate prophets will succeed
him
❏Married Khadija, a wealthy widow
❏Meditated in a cave a month out of the year
❏An angel came to him in his cave and said, “Proclaim”
❏He was 40 before his ministry began.
❏Claimed his only miracle was the Koran itself
❏First 3 yrs=40 converts. First 10 yrs = several hundred
families.
❏Was offered leadership of city of Yathrib, north of Mecca.
❏Yathrib became Medina, the city of the Prophet.
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏The Koran - qur’an means recitation
❏An earthly facsimile of an Uncreated Koran
❏created through trancelike states over 23 years
❏God preserved accuracy
❏Continues God’s revelations to the Jews and to the Christians
❏The culmination of those revelations.
❏ Sees Christians as having compromised their religion by deifying
Christ. Islam accept the virgin birth of Jesus and his prophet
status.
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏God as fearful but compassionate
❏compassion and mercy cited 192 times
❏wrath and vengence cited 17
❏ Allah deliberately created the world. Shares a similar worldview
to Judaism in the sense that the world is overwhelmingly good.
❏ infidel - word often used related to Islam. The proper sense of it
is one who lacks thankfulness.
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Five Pillars
❏ The shahadah - There is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is His
Prophet.
❏ Daily prayers five times a day.
❏ Charity
❏ Fasting / Ramadan
❏ Hajj / Pilgrimage
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ The shahadah - There is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is His
Prophet.
❏ At least once a Muslim must slowly say this and mean it
wholeheartedly.
❏Shirk – associating anything but God with divinity (no idol
worship)
❏Kufr – ungratefulness to god (revelations as reminders)
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Daily prayers five times a day.
❏Arising
❏when sun is overhead
❏in mid-afternoon
❏at sunset
❏before retiring for the night
❏ No social distinctions / Women separate to avoid sexual
distractions
❏ The story is that Allah suggested 50, but Moses helped
Muhammad talk Him down to 5.
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Charity
❏ Those with wealth should share with the poor.
❏ Specific - 2.5% of wealth to needy Muslims.
❏Persons in need
❏Slaves buying freedom
❏debtors unable to meet obligations
❏strangers and wayfarers
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Ramadan (holy month of Islamic calendar)
❏ Observance of Ramadan is necessary.
❏ Ramadan matches lunar calendar (354 days), so it moves
through year
❏ Commemorates the first revelations of the Koran
❏ Fasting from dawn to sunset
❏
all able-bodied Muslims
❏
neither food nor drink nor smoke passes lips (no sex
either)
❏
fosters discipline, compassion
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏ Hajj / Pilgrimage
❏ one in life must travel to Mecca if financially and physically able.
❏
heighten commitment to God
❏
promotes international understanding
❏ 500,000 pilgrims. Walk around 7 times and touch the Ka’ba itself.
Kaaba
❏
Ka’bah / Ka’ba – house built on
spot of Adam’s house by
Abraham / houses black stone
–meteorite
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏
If the Five Pillars are what to do, there are also things
forbidden.
❏gambling
❏lying
❏thieving
❏eating pork
❏drinking intoxicants
❏being sexually promiscuous
Islam - history / essential tenets
❏
Social teaching
❏Economics
❏Status of women
❏Race relations
❏Use of force