By: Faten Sabri
Unity & Oneness of God
And hold firmly to the rope of God all together and do not become divided. And remember the favor of God upon you – when you were enemies and He brought your hearts together and you became, by His favor, brothers. (Aal `Imran 3:103)
The Creator sent the same message to prophets of all nations.
Ever since Man appeared on earth – from the time of Adam[1]– the Creator chose the most righteous person in a particular society to be a Prophet during that period to guide mankind towards truth and the ultimate goal of reaching Him. God would send a Prophet whenever mankind slipped into moral disaster and aimless lives, and after an earlier Prophets’ message was corrupted and seriously adulterated.
The Creator sent the same message to Prophets of all nations. A simple straightforward message and one condition of salvation: Belief in One God and to direct to Him solely in worship.
Every Prophet was the way for his followers in his time to get the salvation, and that was by following his teachings; worshiping like the Prophet does, not worshiping the Prophet himself.
And this is the message of Islam which was started with Prophet Adam.
Say, (O believers), “We have believed in God (The Creator) and what has been revealed to us and what has been revealed to Abraham and Ishmael and Isaac and Jacob and the Descendants and what was given to Moses and Jesus and what was given to the prophets from their Lord. We make no distinction between any of them, and we are Muslims (in submission) to Him”. (Al-Baqarah 2:136)
Symbol of Unity
Muslims believe that the Ka`bah[2] was the first place of worship built by the first Prophet Adam. It was later rebuilt on the same foundations by Prophet Abraham and his son, When Prophet Abraham rebuilt the Ka`bah with the help of his son Ismail (Ishmael), he started to circumambulate around the Ka`bah in a counterclockwise motion.
The counterclockwise Circumambulation of the Ka`bah reminds us of the movement of planets around the sun, the electrons around the nucleus, and the circulation of the blood in the human body. Muslims believe that the universe is praising the Creator as well.
This shows the unity of the universe. When Muslims do the pilgrimage, they circumambulate like Prophet Abraham around the Ka`bah.
According to history, God the Almighty firstly ordered Prophet Muhammad and Muslims to pray toward Jerusalem.
This continued even after they emigrated to the city of Madinah.[3] The reason behind this was to identify true believers from those who were not sincere in their faith. To elaborate more, the Prophet turned his face towards Ka`bah while performing prayers, and Muslims had to do like him, this was a sign of their obedience. Those who did not follow him, their disobedience was a sign of their hypocrisy. The Qur’an itself mentions this fact clearly in the following verse:
We decreed your former qiblah (the direction of prayer) only in order that We might know the Prophet’s true adherents and those who were to disown him. It was indeed a hard test, but not for those whom God guided. (Al-Baqarah 2:143)
Moreover, when Muslims from some part of the world pray to the Creator to the direction of Makah, they join their fellow Muslims praying elsewhere in the world in concentric human circles, they worship God towards the same spiritual center.
This means that Muslims pray to their Creator all the time. In other words, when some Muslims finish their 5 minutes prayer somewhere, another Muslims start their 5 minutes elsewhere.
The prayer timings depend on the sunrise and sunset and they concurrently occur with the movements of the pilgrims in Mecca, which is also consistent with the movement of the universe.
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Faten Sabri (1973) is a modern Jordanian Muslim thinker. She is well known for her frequent interaction with various cultures, religions and she speaks different languages. She studied comparative religions which made her able to discuss the controversial issues about Islam with the truth seekers and free thinkers. She wrote books about the message of Islam, the original concept of God and Jesus Christ in Islam and she has monthly articles in an international magazines. These books and articles were translated and distributed in more than 6 languages.
[1] (Adimanav, Aadim in Sanskrit) first man created by God.
[2] The Ka’ba is a building covered with black cover, it is placed in the city of Mecca (in Saudi Arabia). It has a door but no windows. No one is buried in the Ka`bah. A Muslim praying inside the Ka`bah can pray in any direction. An original part of the outer walls of the Ka`bah is the black stone believed by Muslims to have come to the Earth with Adam. Muslims do not believe that this stone is divine or has any healing or other special powers.
[3] Madinah is a city in (Saudi Arabia). At the city’s center is the mosque of Prophet Muhammad, which is his burial place. And is the second-holiest city in Islam after Mecca. Medina was Prophet Muhammad’s destination of his emigration from Mecca, and became the capital of the Muslim’s community, under Prophet Muhammad’s leadership.