By Mike Ghouse
There is a group called “Muslims against Sharia” with the slogan “Islamic reform movement”, who are seeking to take their movement forward and are in the process of publishing the Reformed Qur’aan. They believe that “The verses in Qur’aan promote divisiveness and religious hatred, bigotry and discrimination and as such they must be either removed from the Koran or declared outdated and invalid, and marked as such.” Like many other Muslims, I was asked to review if we can remove additional verse on the top of nearly 300 verses. Most of the verses that they target reflect a common theme; Punishment. I pleased to express my opinion here below, that reform must be applied to our understanding, rather than removing the words of God.
Qur’aan certainly talks about punishment and hell fire for those who violate the rules of a smooth functioning society. If there were no punishment chaos will be the order of the day.
One can find ‘punitive’ verses are in every holy book. However, the critical elements these reformists forgot were the most powerful and dominant aspect of the creator; merciful, kind and dispenser of grace. It is the punitive verses that drive the self proclaimed reformists to “discard” them.
For the societies to function on equilibrium there must be law and order. When there is justice in a society, peace is a natural outcome. The Criminal and Civil laws are designed to bring net-peace to the society. For every violation of a rule, punishment is determined. If there were no punishment, then crimes go un-checked creating chaos in the society. When an individual affects that delicate balance he has got to pay it through punishment or repentance to restore it. If every one drove 60 Miles per hour in a school zone without any consequence to it, you and I may not have been alive to read this.
God is a loving God and wants us to get along with each other. He has given us the guidance as well as the temptations and the freedom to choose the right from the wrong and live in peace or go the wrong way and regret it. Ultimately, it is God’s grace that brings justice to an individual and the society based on one’s Karma.
The law of Karma is the simplest formula to understand. Every child is born with a clean balanced spiritual slate. As the child grows, that fine balance is altered every moment with his deeds. A positive balance indicates a happy and serene life whereas the negative balance indicates the opposite. Ultimately something dramatic has to happen to restore the negative balance and it can be achieved through repentance, apology or punishment, all are God’s formulae in every practicing faith. God’s justice ultimately prevails with His (Her or It) grace.
Let’s pick the first one of the three hundred plus verses the reformists want to remove, 1.6: The path of those upon whom Thou hast bestowed favors. Not (the path) of those upon whom Thy wrath is brought down, nor of those who go astray.”
From a common man’s perspective, in the word ‘wrath’ the kind God’s true motive appears to be cruelty, Well, then what should hold any one from murdering and butchering the other. If you are a good guy who holds the temptations to steal someone else’s hard earned goods, and the bad guys steal with no consequences to it, then every one may resort to stealing. What will happen to a society when every one is stealing, lying or cheating? No one would trust and everyone is frightened of the other.
Imagine the chaos that would follow if we were to remove the punishment aspect from our Constitution and our civil and criminal laws.
We know that God is just and his goal is peace to his creation at large, indeed his jurisdiction is the universe and beyond infinity. Qur’an, Al-Hujurat, Surah 49:13: “O mankind! We have created you male and female, and have made you nations and tribes that ye may know one another. The noblest of you, in sight of Allah, is the best in conduct. Allah Knows and is Aware.”
God is aware of our conduct and understands our temptations, he is closer to us than our jugular veins says the Qur’aan -50:16 “It was We Who created man, and we know what dark suggestions his soul makes to him: for we are nearer to him than (his) jugular vein.” A few theologians say, we are God’s representation and he is very close to us, indeed we are his manifestation, and are created in his image. God understands our intent before it becomes a thought and before it leads one to act.
Those who do not believe in God, at least they can follow the guidelines in the law books of civic society provided the books are an expression of the collective wisdom of the society and not a dictators law. It is naïve and immature to think that God’s laws are whimsical.
Indeed, it is our comprehension that is limited and we see what is good for us for that moment, where as the creator has the whole planet and its habitants to take care of. It is his creation and he knows best.
Removal of any verses from the Qur’aan is motivated by short term appeasement to someone for some gains or saving their tail for that moment. Instead I suggest the men and women study the impact of such removal and the consequences that ensue. The wrongs of some individuals or Islamic societies should not be ascribed to Qur’aan; rather it is their mis-understanding of the Qur’aan that led them to do wrong.
In the interests of peaceful co-existence, there is no doubt about reforming our understanding of Qur’aan, and there is resistance to it either. Please retain the integrity of God’s words and do not attempt to change or remove them. God is indeed kind, just and graceful.
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Mike Ghouse is president of the Foundation for Pluralism. His comments, news analysis and columns can be found on the Websites and Blogs listed at his personal website http://www.mikeghouse.net/. He can be reached at [email protected]