Messengers of Allah and their importance to mankind.

In the name of Allaah, the most beneficent, the most merciful.

MESSENGERS OF ALLAH :

  • Let me clarify that Islam recognizes Abraham, Moses and Jesus as Allaah's Prophets, besides a number of other prophets mentioned in Quran, like Noah, John, David, Solomon, Ishmael, Isaac, Job, Jonah, Joseph and others (peace be upon all of them). Naturally, the Muslims give all of them the respect they deserve.

    Besides those mentioned by name, there have been other prophets whose name has not been mentioned in the Qur'aan.

    • " And messengers we have mentioned unto you before and ( O Muhammad ! , there are) messengers we have not mentioned unto you. " (4:164)

And were messengers sent only to the Semitic people, the Jews and the Arabs?

NO. Allaah sent messengers to all nations.

  • "And for every nation (there is) a messenger." (Quran 10:47.)
  • The basic message of all the messengers was: to ask the people to worship The One God and not to worship anyone besides Him.

    And now, let me explain the terms ISLAAM and MUSLIM, which repeatedly occur in this lecture.

    The Holy Qur'aan quotes various messengers proclaiming themselves to be a Muslim and/or asking their followers to be Muslims, including Prophet Abraham (2:131), Prophet Jacob (2:132), Prophet Jesus(3:52), Prophet Moses (10:84), etc. A Muslim means one (who has) submitted (to the will of Allaah). Islaam means SUBMISSION (to the will of Allaah), while it also means PEACE.

    The prophet who brought the God's religion, for the last time, under the name Islaam, is Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). The teachings of all the earlier prophets have also been essentially the same, i.e.,

    • 1) to serve The One God, making religion pure for Him,

      2) to establish worship; and

      3) to pay the poor-due.

IMPORTANCE OF PROPHETS:

  • Let us now consider the importance of the prophets for mankind.

    PROPHETS are the ONLY MEDIUM

    between THE ONE GOD and the MANKIND,

through whom we can recognize Him and know, accept, follow and

benefit by His Guidance.     

  • The GUIDANCE, the PROPHECIES and the MIRACLES brought by the prophets are totally beyond the powers of an ordinary human being and THEY CONFIRM RECIPROCALLY :
    • 1. the EXISTENCE and the MIGHTINESS of THE ONE GOD whose messenger the prophet claims to be;

      2. the PROPHETHOOD of the PROPHET; and

      3. the TRUENESS of the BOOK or LAW given through the prophet.

    Believing in a prophet of God and following the guidance brought by him, whenever the prophet arrived in the past, was not a matter of option, but compulsory. With the limited knowledge given to man, he is bound to be in a state of confusion, ignorance and dispute, in most of the matters, and thus go astray, unless guided by his CREATOR.

    A simple example is how an Economic System devised by MAN, - relying purely on man's intellect, - and totally ignoring God's guidance, turned out to be AN EMPTY, SATANIC PROMISE OF EQUALITY and within a few decades laid many a nation which adopted it, in shambles. Thus, submitting to and following God's guidance is indispensable.

    And where to find GOD'S GUIDANCE ? Of course, in the divine scriptures left behind by the honourable prophets of God.

HOW THE OTHER NATIONS TREATED THE SCRIPTURES GIVEN TO THEM:

  • The Jews and the Christians whom Allaah calls as The People Of The Book, and also other people, are endowed with His books of guidance. But unfortunately, they have, for ages, been endlessly tampering with the revelations of God. The many modifications, suppressions, deletions and additions have resulted in uncertainties detrimental to the interests of mankind.

    If one were to browse through the index relating to the 'revelations of Allaah' in an English translation of Qur'aan, we find the following words about what the DISBELIEVING PEOPLE did with the revelations of Allaah:

    They doubted, neglected, disputed, denied, distorted, changed, ridiculed, scorned, rejected, plotted against, strove against, turned away from, indulged in hating, hiding and indifference, indulged in vain discourse about, were stubborn about, treated as magic and jest and sold (traded its teachings) for a small price or gain. That is how they treated the revelations of the Lord.

QUR'AAN IS PROTECTED BY ALLAAH:

  • But Qur'aan is the one book of Allaah which has remained unchanged and undistorted and will ever be so. Allaah has taken the responsibility about this:

    " We have without doubt sent down the Message; and We will assuredly guard it (from corruption)." ( Qur'aan 15:9 )

    Now, fourteen centuries later, we know for sure that Allaah's promise has been fulfilled.

    As said earlier, the GUIDANCE, the PROPHECIES and the MIRACLES, brought by a prophet, CONFIRM RECIPROCALLY:

    • 1. the MIGHTINESS of the ONE GOD whose MESSENGER the PROPHET claims to be,

      2. the TRUENESS of his claim to PROPHETHOOD and

      3. the WORTHINESS of the SCRIPTURE brought by him as the source of guidance.

    The prophets performed miracles, by leave of the Almighty, to demonstrate the truth of their prophethood. In the case of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), he has repeatedly pointed to the Qur'aan as a miracle given to him by the Almighty. Qur'aan shows the most straight path and offers the mankind the best guidance on all matters and solution for all of man's problems. The fact that such a book was recited by an unlettered man, constitutes the biggest miracle in itself and confirms the divine origin of the book.

THE FINAL GUIDANCE FOR MANKIND:

  • Though people of the earlier religions forgot a portion of the advice given to them, distorted the teachings and changed words from their contexts, Allaah has, by His bountiful mercy, rectified these distortions and have shown to them the correct religion through Muhammad, Islaam and Qur'aan; the prophet, the religion and the book, sent as the FINAL GUIDANCE for mankind.

    If Allaah wills, by the time we conclude this lecture, you will be convinced that the basic belief of Islaam, on which the religion is completely based,

    • " THERE IS NO GOD EXCEPT ALLAAH ;

      MUHAMMAD IS MESSENGER OF ALLAAH."

    is an unshakable truth.

    One who has NO RELIGIOUS BELIEF can be given the correct religion anew. And one who has a FALSE RELIGION can also be shown the correct path with relative ease. But people who really have God's Religion given through His prophets sent to them, but have distorted it, need to be given the correct version of the distorted teachings and happenings to their prophets, alongwith the correct religion, ISLAAM.

    Qur'aan devotes a fairly large portion of its text for such correction of the distorted belief about the earlier prophets and religions.

    Read about such correction of distorted teachings in Christianity: in the next article....