180571c2   
   From: bv8bv8bv8@gmail.com   
      
   HOW DOES ISLAM DIFFER FROM OTHER FAITHS? (PART 2 OF 2)   
      
      Description: Some of the unique features of Islam not found in   
   other belief systems and ways of life. Part two.   
      
   Balance between the Individual and Society   
   Another unique feature of Islam is that it establishes a balance   
   between individualism and collectivism.  It believes in the individual   
   personality of man and holds everyone personally accountable to God.   
   The Prophet, may the mercy and blessings of God be upon him, says:   
      
   “Everyone of you is a guardian, and responsible for what is in his   
   custody.  The ruler is a guardian of his subjects and responsible for   
   them; a husband is a guardian of his family and is responsible for it;   
   a lady is a guardian of her husband’s house and is responsible for it,   
   and a servant is a guardian of his master’s property and is   
   responsible for it.”   
      
   I heard that from God’s Apostle and I think that the Prophet also   
   said, “A man is a guardian of is father’s property and is responsible   
   for it, so all of you are guardians and responsible for your wards and   
   things under your care.” (Saheeh Al-Bukhari, Saheeh Muslim)   
      
   Islam also guarantees the fundamental rights of the individual and   
   does not permit anyone to tamper with them.  It makes the proper   
   development of the personality of man one of the prime objectives of   
   its educational policy.  It does not subscribe to the view that man   
   must lose his individuality in society or in the state.   
      
   In Islam, all men are equal, regardless of color, language, race, or   
   nationality.  It addresses itself to the conscience of humanity and   
   banishes all false barriers of race, status, and wealth.  There can be   
   no denying the fact that such barriers have always existed and   
   continue to exist today in the so-called enlightened age.  Islam   
   removes all of these impediments and proclaims the ideal of the whole   
   of humanity being one family of God.   
      
   Islam is international in its outlook and approach and does not admit   
   barriers and distinctions based on color, clan, blood, or territory,   
   as was the case before the advent of Muhammad.  Unfortunately, these   
   prejudices remain rampant in different forms even in this modern age.   
   Islam wants to unite the entire human race under one banner.  To a   
   world torn by national rivalries and feuds, it presents a message of   
   life and hope and of a glorious future.   
      
   The historian, A. J. Toynbee, has some interesting observations to   
   make in this respect.  In Civilization on Trial, he writes: “Two   
   conspicuous sources of danger - one psychological and the other   
   material - in the present relations of this cosmopolitan proletariat,   
   i.e., [westernized humanity] with the dominant element in our modern   
   Western society are race consciousness and alcohol; and in the   
   struggle with each of these evils the Islamic spirit has a service to   
   render which might prove, if it were accepted, to be of high moral and   
   social value.   
      
   The extinction of race consciousness between Muslims is one of the   
   outstanding moral achievements of Islam, and in the contemporary world   
   there is, as it happens, a crying need for the propagation of this   
   Islamic virtue ... It is conceivable that the spirit of Islam might be   
   the timely reinforcement which would decide this issue in favor of   
   tolerance and peace.   
      
   As for the evil of alcohol, it is at its worst among primitive   
   populations in tropical regions which have been ‘opened up’ by Western   
   enterprise.  The fact remains that even the most statesmanlike   
   preventive measures imposed by external authority are incapable of   
   liberating a community from a social vice unless a desire for   
   liberation and a will to carry this desire into voluntary action on   
   its own part are awakened in the hearts of the people concerned.  Now   
   Western administrators, at any rate those of ‘Anglo-Saxon’ origin, are   
   spiritually isolated from their ‘native’ wards by the physical ‘color   
   bar’ which their race-consciousness sets up; the conversion of the   
   natives’ souls is a task to which their competence can hardly be   
   expected to extend; and it is at this point that Islam may have a part   
   to play.   
      
   In these recently and rapidly ‘opened up’ tropical territories, the   
   Western civilization has produced an economic and political plenum   
   and, in the same breath, a social and spiritual void.   
      
   Here, then, in the foreground of the future, we can remark two   
   valuable influences which Islam may exert upon the cosmopolitan   
   proletariat of a Western society that has cast its net around the   
   world and embraced the whole of mankind; while in the more distant   
   future we may speculate on the possible contributions of Islam to some   
   new manifestation of religion.”   
      
   Permanence and Change   
   The elements of permanence and change coexist in human society and   
   culture and are bound to remain so.  Different ideologies and cultural   
   systems have erred in leaning heavily towards one or other of these   
   ends of the equation.  Too much emphasis on permanence makes the   
   system rigid and robs it of flexibility and progress, while a lack of   
   permanent values and unchanging elements generate moral relativism,   
   shapelessness, and anarchy.   
      
   What is needed is a balance between the two – a system that could   
   simultaneously cater for the demands of permanence and change.  An   
   American judge, Mr. Justice Cardozo, rightly says that “the greatest   
   need of our time is a philosophy that will mediate between conflicting   
   claims of stability and progress and supply a principle of growth.”   
   Islam presents an ideology, which satisfies the demands of stability   
   as well as of change.   
      
   Deeper reflection reveals that life has within it elements of   
   permanence and change - it is neither so rigid and inflexible that it   
   cannot admit of any change even in matters of detail, nor it is so   
   flexible and fluid that even its distinctive traits have no permanent   
   character of their own.  This becomes clear from observing the process   
   of physiological change in the human body, for every tissue of the   
   body changes a number of times in one’s lifetime even though the   
   person remains the same.  A tree’s leaves, flowers, and fruits change   
   but its character remains unchanged.  It is a law of life that   
   elements of permanence and change must co-exist in a harmonious   
   equation.   
      
   Only such a system of life that can provide for both these elements   
   can meet all of the cravings of human nature and all of the needs of   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)