Disclaimer: The author of this article, Mr. Mohammad Fahad Taimur Butt, is not
associated with Discovering Islam.
Introduction
The name came from smashing the words Ur and monotheism together. Ur was the
city in Mesopotamia that Ibraheem (Abraham) (AS) used to live in and monotheism
is the worship of one God. UrMonotheismus is the anthropological theory that states
that all religions devolved from monotheism; man was originally monotheistic,
then degenerated into pantheism (everything is divine) or henotheism (one
supreme deity and lesser deities) or polytheism (multiple deities), totemism
(idol worship), and then animism (spirits). The term was first coined by Andrew
Lang in 1898 who opposed the idea of "revolutionary monotheism".
UrMonotheism is the same as the Islamic point of view, as
Ibn 'Abbas relates, "Indeed these five names of
righteous men from the people of Noah. When they died Shaytan (Satan) whispered
to their people to make statues of them and to place these statues in their
places of gathering as a reminder of them, so they did this. However, none from
amongst them worshipped these statues, until when they died and the purpose of
the statues was forgotten. Then (the next generation) began to worship them." (Bukhari
8/534).
Therefore,
of course I will be biased. However, I have evidence outside of Islam to support
this anthropological theory. Should this theory be true, it would help solve the
question of the fate of the unlearned.
It goes like this, “How are those who don’t know the religion supposed to get to
paradise,” or “what was God’s way before [insert religion here]”. Ask this
question to a Christian, he may not have an answer (because it's impossible to
believe in the Trinity without knowing about Jesus, so what of the fate of
Native Americans?) or he might say "Jesus was a Jew". Ask this to a Jew, he
would say, "We are the chosen people”. Ask this to a Buddhist/Hindu/East Asian,
they might remain silent. Also, don't ask this to an Atheist.
Well, what did the five greatest prophets in Islam believe in prior to their
revelation, as they would only receive revelation if the correct religion is not
found in their society? It should make sense that if they were to die before
receiving revelation, that they would still have exemplary character and piety:
1.Noah (AS)
was a monotheist.
2.Musa (AS)
was a monotheist (his mother was an Israeli who followed the teachings of
Abraham and also grew up under the care of Asiya)
3.Ibrahim (AS)
was a hanif (i.e. a monotheist) in the presence of polytheism.
4.Isa (AS) was
a Jew-monotheist.
5.Mohammad
(SAW) was a hanif in the presence of polytheism.
These religions all follow the principle of Tawheed however are not formally
Muslims! Both the hanif faith and Judaism have uncompromising monotheism whereas
Trinitarian Christianity does not. You might contest that these prophets were
the best of men, so how is the layman supposed to get to paradise? The Quran and
Sunnah has a direct answer to this.
In Sura Yunus, verse 47, Allah says:
·
And (remember) when your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from
their reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, (saying):
And for every nation there is a messenger. And when their messenger cometh (on
the Day of Judgment) it will be judged between them fairly, and they will not be
wronged.
Also in Sura Nahl, verse 36, Allah says:
·
And (remember) when your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from
their reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, (saying):
And verily We have raised in every nation a messenger, (proclaiming): Serve
Allah and shun false gods. Then some of them (there were) whom Allah guided, and
some of them (there were) upon whom error had just hold. Do but travel in the
land and see the nature of the consequence for the deniers!
Furthermore in Sura Ghafir, verse 78, Allah says:
·
And (remember) when your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from
their reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, (saying):
Verily We sent messengers before thee, among them those of whom We have told
thee, and some of whom We have not told thee; and it was not given to any
messenger that he should bring a portent save by Allah's leave, but when Allah's
commandment cometh (the cause) is judged aright, and the followers of vanity
will then be lost.
To every nation was supposedly sent a messenger to inform them of the nature of
their Creator. Furthermore, the Quran and the Hadith tell us that humans were
born believing in God (this is supposed to make the messenger's job a bit less
difficult). Therefore a society could be monotheistic because of a messenger or
because monotheism is natural.
For example, in Sura Al-A'raf, verse 172, Allah says:
·
And (remember) when your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from
their reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, (saying): I not
your Lord? They said: Yea, verily. We testify. (That was) lest ye should say at
the Day of Resurrection: Lo! of this we were unaware.
It is recorded in the two Sahih Books from Abu Hurayrah who said that the
Messenger of Allah said:
·
And (remember) when your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from
their reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, (saying):
Every child is born upon the Fitrah, it is only his parents who turn him into a
Jew, a Christian or a Zoroastrian. Just as animals are born having full bodies,
do you see any of them having a cutoff nose at birth?
Muslim recorded that `Iyad bin `Himar said that the Messenger of Allah said:
·
And (remember) when your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from
their reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, (saying): And
(remember) when your Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from their
reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, (saying):
Allah said, 'I created My servants Hunafa' (monotheists), but the devils came to
them and deviated them from their religion, prohibiting what I allowed'.
The Challenge
In summary, the Muslims' claims are two and the goal of this
investigation/presentation is to support the following two claims in a secular
fashion:
1.There were
messengers who proselytized people to Islam before Mohammad (SAW) to other
nations
a.Evidence:
There were monotheistic religions in societies that were not influenced by
Abrahamic religions.
b.Evidence:
Not only did they practice monotheism, but other nations also independently
practiced obscure Islamic traditions.
2.Man is born
on the fitrah and are therefore naturally monotheistic
a.Evidence:
Expert opinions say so
I will use these claims to support the argument from consistent
revelation. Argument from inconsistent revelations asserts that it is
unlikely that God exists because many faithful adherents claim to possess the
truth and exclude others from it. So my argument from consistent
revelations asserts such similar beliefs that developed independently must have
come from the same source, God- this is essentially Urmonotheismus.
Now we will examine the aqeedah (belief) of various tribes around the
world that are not influenced by Abrahamic monotheism. The following supports
claim 1.
"Ngai or
mwene-nyaga is the Supreme Creator and giver of all things. He created the first
Gĩkũyũ communities, and provided them with all the resources necessary for life:
land, rain, plants, and animals. Ngai cannot be seen but is manifested in the
sun, moon, stars, comets and meteors, thunder and lightning, rain, rainbows, and
in the great fig trees (Mugumo)."
"The
Gĩkũyũ were – and still are – monotheists believing in an omnipotent God whom
they refer to as Ngai. All of the Gĩkũyũ, Embu, and Kamba use this name. Ngai
was also known as Mũrungu by the Meru and Embu tribes, or Mũlungu (a variant of
a word meaning God which is found as far south as the Zambezi of Zambia)."
It’s important to note that not only the Gikuyu tribe were monotheistic, but
also the Embu, and Kamba tribes as well!
The Dinka
The Dinka
people of modern South Sudan
believed in 'nhialic aciek' and 'nhialic wa' which translated to God the creator
and God the Father. In it, the author comments on how the Western perception of
the word God ought to not be used in this context because the Dinkas' God was
not the Christian God.
Lienhardt
writes in his study of the Dinka religion in his book Divinity and Experience on
pages 29-30:
"Nhialic
is figured sometimes as a Being, a personal Supreme Being even and sometimes as
a kind of being and activity which sums up the activities of a multiplicity of
beings, while the word 'God' has no such extended meaning in our common speech.
So the word Divinity, thus written with the capital letter and without the
definite or indefinite article, is here used to translate nhialic."
It's worth
mentioning that the literal translation of Allah in English is "The
Deity/Divinity".
Maw-Maw and Neyam-Neyam
The
Maw-Maw and Neyam-Neyam peoples of modern sub-Saharan Africa believe in
monotheism. In the words of
Fethullah Gulen
(the same guy tied with July 15, 2016 Turkish Coup):
"The
observations of Professor Mahmoud Mustafa on two primitive African tribes
confirm what has been said above. He notes that the Maw-Maw believe in God and
call him Mucay. This God is One, He acts alone, He does not generate and is not
begotten, and He has no partner. It is not possible to see Him or to feel Him,
but only to know Him through His works. He dwells in the heavens, from whence He
confers His commands to all. That is why the Maw-Maw raise their hands when they
pray. Another tribe, the Neyam-Neyam, expresses similar ideas: the belief in One
God who decrees and confers His orders to all, and what He says is absolute;
Everything in the forest moves by His will, and punishes those who deserve it."
Now look
at Sura Ikhlas:
Say: He is
Allah, the One and Only;
Allah, the Eternal, Absolute;
He begetteth not, nor is He begotten;
And there is none like unto Him.
The Chinese during
the Shang Dynasty
Emperor Cheng Tang
The Shang
Dynasty of Ancient China (1600-1046 BCE) believed that deceased ancestors could
talk to smaller gods and influence what happens to the living family. They, by
definition were not monotheistic; rather they were henotheistic. They used to
also worship smaller deities in addition to one powerful God. According to
US History:
"In
addition, the god worshipped by everyone during the Shang dynasty was Shang Ti,
the "lord on high." Shang Ti was believed to be the link between people and
heavenly beings. The souls of ancestors, it was thought, visited with Shang Ti
and received their instructions from him. It was therefore very important to
make sure that Shang Ti was happy."
Over time
there was a shift from broken theism to pantheism. After the Shang dynasty, came
the Zhou dynasty (1046-256 BCE). Basically, they mixed God with something unseen
that was also created by God, heaven. They began to call God, "Heaven" or Tian.
Furthermore, the Zhou invented the mandate of heaven which meant that the gods
approved of the Zhou dynasty rule. According to the
Encyclopedia Britannica:
"As a god,
tian is sometimes perceived to be an impersonal power in contrast to Shangdi
(“Supreme Ruler”), but the two are closely identified and the terms frequently
used synonymously. Evidence suggests that tian originally referred to the sky
while Shangdi referred to the Supreme Ancestor who resided there. The first
mention of tian seems to have occurred early in the Zhou dynasty."
It was
during this time that Confucianism, Taoism were developed and Buddhism were
spread. Confucianism is closer to the Shang religion, they believed in a God
however ancestors are also worshiped. Taoism is closer to the Zhou religion and
believes basically in pantheism and "following the Tao". Buddha as a figure is
followed by both religions. Ideas with buzzwords, 'enlightenment', 'the path',
'tranquility', 'self-discovery', 'meditation', 'unity with the community' began
to develop. Although these people were not strictly monotheistic, it helps to
prove the point that people did recognize one powerful lord and therefore
suggests Urmonotheismus.
"According
to Lewis H. Morgan, their religion is characterized by a monotheistic belief in
an all-powerful creator known as the "Great Spirit", or "Ha-wen-ne-yu." [Morgan
writes:] "The Iroquois believed in the constant superintending care of the Great
Spirit. He ruled and administered the world, and the affairs of the red race."
(1954, 146). The Iroquois failed to see the need in developing a detailed
conception of their creator."
"This
knowledge was thought to be above and beyond their capabilities to understand.
His power was administered to the material world through "a class of inferior
spiritual existences, by whom he was surrounded." (1954, 147). While divine
attributes concerning the Great Spirit remained undeveloped, the Iroquois gave
detailed descriptions of this lower class of spirits (angels) that interacted
with the material world."
"According
to Morgan, the Great Spirit does not have any type of positive authority over
the Evil-minded, except for the power to overcome him when necessary (1954,
148). The red race is left to choose either obedience to the Great Spirit or
submission to the Evil-minded. It is important to note that the Iroquois
developed the idea of an immortal soul. This soul was judged by the Great Spirit
upon the death of the body. The threat of punishment in the afterlife increased
morality concerns, which aided in the success of the Iroquois Nation."
The
article describes the way the Iriquois described God as undetailed. This is
similar to the Islamic belief that God is far past human comprehension (And
there is nothing like unto him, in the last verse of Sura Ikhlas). The
article also describes "Invisible Agents" known as Ho-no-che-no-keh sent by the
Great Spirit (possibly angels). They believe in a brother of the Great Spirit
that is evil and is called "Ha-ne-go-ate-geh". There exist agents of evil in the
real world (i.e. shayateen). They believe in human agents that have a connection
to the Great Spirit like prophets. The Iroquois also believed in an afterlife
with a potential punishment or reward just like Muslims do. These are
suspiciously Islamic concepts!
Tribes Among the Aboriginals
Many
tribes among the Australian Aboriginals
believed in monotheism. The aboriginal people were the native people of
Australia and were spread all over the continent and had over 250 languages
before colonization (more languages mean more cultures and possibly by extension
diversity in religion). In the words of Erich Kolig who wrote in 1992:
"In the
19th century, ethnographers working mainly in south-east Australia, recorded a
widespread belief among the Aborigines in a supreme male deity who seemed to
surpass others in imporance and exaltedness. Aborinines knew of him by various
names, such as Biaame, Nurrundere, Nurelli, Martumnere, Biamban, Bunjil,
Daramulun, Mami-nga-ta, Mungan-ngaua, and countless others many of which mean
"father", or "our father," or simple "elder." In the anthropological literature,
subsequently, this deity was referred to as All-Father, Sky God, High-God (Hochgott),
Supreme Spirit and Supreme Being and surrounded by such an ethnographic aura as
to invest it with qualities of (almost) monotheistic proportions."
"Aborigines seem to have believed this divine character to dwell in the sky and
to be, though somewhat otiose, of a benign disposition towards humanity. Basic
creative deed, of both a natural and cultural kind, were attributed to him, such
as having shaped basic features of the earth, having instituted initiation
ceremonies and life-giving rituals, laid down laws and customs, and the like. On
a more abstract level of exegesis, one might say that he represented the
principle of good, having combated and triumphed over evil in some form or
other. Having retreated from his sojourn on earth, he was believed now to live
in the sky, aloof aloft, and according to some beliefs, sitting on a throne."
An example
of an approval of the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) which
indicates that Allah is exalted and high is the hadeeth (report) concerning the
young slave girl, to whom the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him)
said: "Where is Allah?" She said: "In heaven." He asked, "Who am I?" She said,
"The Messenger of Allah." So he said to her master: "Set her free, for she is a
believer."
The Kapauku
The
Kapauku People of modern New Guinea
were monotheistic. The following is from an extract from the book, The Kapauku
Papuans Of West Guinea by Leopold Pospisil.
"The
universe itself and all existence was Ebijata, "designed by Ugatame", the
Creator, Ugatame has a dual nature: He is supposed to be masculine and feminine
at the same time, is referred to as the two entities, and is manifested to the
people by the duality of the sun and the moon. To my enquiry whether Ugatame was
the sun and the moon I received the answer a firm denial. The sun is conceived
as the ball of fire, because it provides light and is warm; moon is believed to
be a cold light like that of a firefly or the bacteria that infest rotting wood.
Sun and moon are only manifestations of Ugatame who thus makes his presence
known to the people. they definitely are not Creator himself..."
He
continues in another passage:
"Ugatame
is omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent, credited with the creation of all
things and with having determined all events. Strangely enough, however, he is
not believed to exist himself. When I questioned this contention, a Kapauku
defended skillfully by a question: "But how can he exist when he created all the
existence?" Obviously Ugatame is beyond existence, because to Kapauku all that
exists must be of phenomenal nature; one must be able to see, hear, smell, taste
or feel it. But the Creator is beyond this phenomenal dimension, because of the
simple reason that He created it. because He is so to speak, in the fifth
dimension and is not of phenomenal nature, He is able to be omnipresent."
They
believed that the sun and moon were not the creator himself, as do Muslims. They
questioned, "But how can he exist when he created all the existence?". This
means that you cannot see Ugatame with a telescope directed at the cosmos. He
exists outside of our reality. For such a primitive people, they seem to have a
very intricate and suspiciously Islamic aqeedah (belief).
Akhenaten
Akhenaten
(supporter of Aten) was the ruler of Egypt and changed the state religion from
an organized, institutionalized, ecclesiastical, polytheistic worship of a
family of gods to the worship of one God, Aten. Aten was represented by a sun
with rays coming down from it, but over time even that symbol was banned and
Aten was only written phonetically. According to
Ancient Egypt Online:
"He also made it clear that the image of the Aten only represented the god, but
that the god transcended creation and so could not be fully understood or
represented." Akhenaten claimed that he had a connection with Aten just as the
previous kings of Egypt claimed. Author Hamdi bin Hamza Al-Suraiseri Al-Johani
makes a case claiming that Akhenaten was the Dhul-Qurnain mentioned in the Quran.
According
to
Wikipedia:
In the ninth year of his reign (1344/1342 BC), Akhenaten declared a more radical
version of his new religion, declaring Aten not merely the supreme god of the
Egyptian pantheon but the only God of Egypt, with himself as the sole
intermediary between the Aten and the Egyptian people. Key features of Atenism
included a ban on idols and other images of the Aten, with the exception of a
rayed solar disc in which the rays (commonly depicted ending in hands) appear to
represent the unseen spirit of Aten. Aten was addressed by Akhenaten in prayers,
such as the Great Hymn to the Aten: "O Sole God beside whom there is none".
Aten's name is also written differently after the ninth year of the Pharaoh's
rule to emphasize the radicalism of the new regime. Aten, instead of being
written with the symbol of a rayed solar disc, now became spelled phonetically.
So even
the symbol of the sun was destroyed and now only the name existed. Just like
iconoclastic religion of Islam. Also, the phrase "O Sole God beside whom there
is none" sounds like a familiar prayer with the Muslims, la ilaha illa
anta... (there is no God but you...). With the demise of Akhenaten, came the
resurgence of the powerful polytheistic priesthood that preceded Akenaten.
How can it
be possible that all of these nations have so similar monotheistic beliefs yet
we some claim that they all developed independently? There are only two
explanations: that all these nations’ religions had common descent or that
monotheism is built in the societal fitra (inclination) allowing monotheism to
truly develop independently in multiple instances.
If they
had a common origin, then that suggests that God did send prophets to each of
these areas. If it is societal fitra, then this raises another question: what
(or who) makes us have the desire to worship, to revere something, to adopt a
religion?
Many other nations also independently practiced obscure Islamic
traditions
There
existed traditions practiced by societies that can barely be explained with
anthropological evolution and suggests common descent of religion (see what I
did there?). I will take the example of the practice of circumcision.
Bukhari
and Muslim narrated that Abu Hurayrah said: The Messenger of Allah (SA) said:
·Ibraheem
(peace be upon him) circumcised himself when he was eighty years old, and he
circumcised himself with an adze.
In fact,
circumcision did not come into Islam from Judaism because it was already a
custom of the Arabs (There’s a very relevant Christian history with circumcision
and gentiles
here).
Circumcision is very awkwardly practiced... well
everywhere
●
Aboriginal Australians
●
All of Madagascar
●
Some Pacific Islanders
●
Western and Central and Eastern Africans (Tribal religions AND Abrahamic Faiths)
●
Muslims and Jews
●
The Xhosa in South Africa (Nelson Mandela tribe) and other southern African
tribes
●
Jews (Jesus too)
●
South Koreans
●
Filipinos
●
Really Ancient Europeans (38,000 to 11,000 BCE)
●
Pythagoras in Alexandria Egypt (before Jesus)
●
Ancient Egyptians 5000 years ago depicted it in hieroglyphs
●
The Aztecs
●
Pre-Islam Arabs
There are
some health benefits to it.
It protects against infection and has sanitary properties.
It seems peculiar that so many cultures are willing to perform such a painful
surgery (which could possibly cause more disease) for the sake of health. Surely
not all of the aforementioned cultures could have found the medical benefits to
circumcision independent of each other.
But then
you might question: well the only custom they shared was circumcision. The
existence of the other religious ceremonies these other nations have, should
refute your claim that a religious ceremony can be used as evidence to suggest
Urmonotheismus. Well, you’d be right, if this verse did not exist. In Sura
Al-Hajj, verse 67 says:
●Unto each nation have We given sacred rites which they are to perform; so
let them not dispute with thee of the matter, but summon thou unto thy Lord. Lo!
thou indeed followest the right guidance.
This
implies that between nations of the past, it was possible for Muslims (i.e.
monotheists who submitted to the will of their creator) to have differing
rituals despite their theology remaining the same. For example, the Hajj was
prescribed to the nation of Mohammad SAW and not to Musa AS.
So, could
this behavior of circumcision be caused by religious reasons or is it simply
societal fitra (natural societal disposition)? Punishments such as scalping
(removing the scalp of a dead person as a trophy) developed independently
between cultures as well, so does that mean it refutes my argument? Well, no.
Scalping served a deranged purpose (as a trophy) whereas circumcision barely
did.
The point
is not that Islam is being practiced in all of the sites which practice
circumcision. Rather, circumcision suggests that perhaps there were prophets
whose messages degenerated over time or that there is a societal fitrah towards
Islamic practices. I have discussed two evidences (prevalence of monotheism and
obscure Islamic traditions) in support of the claim that there were messengers
who proselytized people to Islam before Mohammad (SAW) to other nations.
Monotheism is natural at birth
Atheists love to assume that religion is just an acquired idea created by
society to explain the world around us. They propose that now that we have
science, there is no need for creation stories and no need for a God to
attribute everything to. However, a belief in God is not just an intellectual
need that they argue has been fulfilled (not), it is innate as our innate sense
that killing is wrong.
You will never -deep down- stop believing that you have a soul, that there is a
creator, that there is an afterlife, no matter how much you try and stamp out
this instinct, it is 'set in stone'. You should be able to understand and/or
relate after watching the following minute-and-a-half-long video featuring
Br. John Fontain. You must watch it:
This is what I'm talking about! Although the man is apparently saying that he
doesn't believe in God and that he might have intellectual reasoning for it, in
times of crisis he abandons his 'rational' atheism. This means that he wasn't
fully convinced with his atheism. There have all been times in our lives where
in crisis we call out to a higher power to save us as in Sura Luqman, verse 32:
●And when
waves come over them like canopies, they supplicate Allah, sincere to Him in
religion. But when He delivers them to the land, there are [some] of them who
are moderate [in faith]. And none rejects Our signs except everyone treacherous
and ungrateful.
Do we have an emotional, psychological belief in God, and if so, why? Is this
this emotional psychological proof in God more visceral than superficial
intellectual proofs? Why does this exist?
Nury Vittachi writes in Science 2.0 in his article, "Scientists discover that
atheists might not exist, and that’s not a joke":
While militant atheists like Richard Dawkins may be convinced God doesn’t exist,
God, if he is around, may be amused to find that atheists might not exist.
Cognitive scientists are becoming increasingly aware that a metaphysical outlook
may be so deeply ingrained in human thought processes that it cannot be
expunged.
While this idea may seem outlandish—after all, it seems easy to decide not to
believe in God—evidence from several disciplines indicates that what you
actually believe is not a decision you make for yourself. Your fundamental
beliefs are decided by much deeper levels of consciousness, and some may well be
more or less set in stone.
This line of thought has led to some scientists claiming that “atheism is
psychologically impossible because of the way humans think,” says Graham Lawton,
an avowed atheist himself, writing in the New Scientist. “They point to studies
showing, for example, that even people who claim to be committed atheists
tacitly hold religious beliefs, such as the existence of an immortal soul.”
This shouldn’t come as a surprise, since we are born believers, not atheists,
scientists say. Humans are pattern-seekers from birth, with a belief in karma,
or cosmic justice, as our default setting. “A slew of cognitive traits
predisposes us to faith,” writes Pascal Boyer in Nature, the science journal,
adding that people “are only aware of some of their religious ideas”.
Furthermore Barney Zwartz writes in his article: "Infants 'have natural belief
in God'":
Infants are hard-wired to believe in God, and atheism has to be learned,
according to an Oxford University psychologist.
Dr Olivera Petrovich told a University of Western Sydney conference on the
psychology of religion that even preschool children constructed theological
concepts as part of their understanding of the physical world.
Psychologists have debated whether belief in God or atheism was the natural
human state. According to Dr Petrovich, an expert in psychology of religion,
belief in God is not taught but develops naturally.
She told The Age yesterday that belief in God emerged as a result of other
psychological development connected with understanding causation.
It was hard-wired into the human psyche, but it was important not to build too
much into the concept of God. "It's the concept of God as creator, primarily,"
she said. Dr Petrovich said her findings were based on several studies,
particularly one of Japanese children aged four to six, and another of 400
British children aged five to seven from seven different faiths.
"Atheism is definitely an acquired position," she said.
Lastly, psychologist Justin Barrett writes in his book “Born Believers”:
“Scientific research on children’s developing minds and supernatural beliefs
suggests that children normally and rapidly acquire minds that facilitate belief
in supernatural agents. Particularly in the first year after birth, children
distinguish between agents and non-agents, understanding agents as able to move
themselves in purposeful ways to pursue goals. They are keen to find agency
around them, even given scant evidence. Not long after their first birthday,
babies appear to understand that agents, but not natural forces or ordinary
objects, can create order out of disorder…This tendency to see function and
purpose, plus an understanding that purpose and order come from minded beings,
makes children likely to see natural phenomena as intentionally created. Who is
the Creator? Children know people are not good candidates. It must have been a
god…children are born believers of what I call natural religion…(end
quote)”[17]
Conclusion
I love using long quotes because they take the words right out of my mouth. It
seems as though babies are programmed to be believers in God as the causer for
everything. Two atheist parents could find their 4 year old coming home and
saying, "God is everywhere". Barrett says,"If we threw a handful on an island
and they raised themselves I think they would believe in God." . This is the
exact position that Muslims have! However skeptics would argue that just because
it is an instinct that we should be skeptical of it and therefore God doesn't
exist. That's preposterous because this only solidifies the claim of the Hadith,
"A child is born upon the fitrah..." and this can even be considered a
psychological miracle of Islam!
There were messengers who proselytized people to Islam before Mohammad (SAW) to
other nations because there existed monotheistic religions and obscure Islamic
traditions which were practiced in societies that were not influenced by
Abrahamic religions. Humans naturally incline towards theism from birth.
Therefore, the Quran's and Hadith's claims are plausible and this serves to
strengthen the Muslim's iman.
Islam, with its concepts of hanif and tawhid, truly is a universally accessible,
cross-cultural religion with a simple theology and confounding implications! Can
tawhid within a society develop organically without the aid of a prophet? Why
does our innate belief in God persist despite our modern age explanatory power?
Can we ever run away from the stamp on our souls from our creator? Is the
atheistic argument from inconsistent revelation obsolete? Has it been replaced
with its antagonistic argument, the argument from consistent revelation
with the discovery of Urmonotheismus?
In Sura Al-A'raf, verse 172 says:
●And
(remember) when thy Lord brought forth from the Children of Adam, from their
reins, their seed, and made them testify of themselves, (saying): Am I not your
Lord? They said: Yea, verily. We testify. (That was) lest ye should say at the
Day of Resurrection: Lo! of this we were unaware.
All credit, praise and glory is to God, the king of kings, and the master of the
Day of Judgement. Only the mistakes are mine.
سبحانك اللهم و بحمدك و أستغفر و أتوب إليك
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Important Announcement
Discovering Islam is pleased to inform
you about
a
great book by
End Times Research Center:
The End Times : Based on Numerical Analysis of
the Quran, Hadith, Arabic
Words, and Historical Events
This book (which consists of more than 3000
pages) explains why
the Mahdi
will
emerge
most likely
in year2023, the Dajjal
will
emerge
most likely
in year2024, and Jesus will return most likely in 2025,
in-sha-Allah (if Allah is willing).
