Salaam kenshin
shaykh nuh keller has a very straight forward and clear cut article on this that really couldn't be more to the point; enjoy!
:
the Qur'an says, "
We do not differentiate between any of His messengers" (Qur'an 2:285), showing that previous religions were the same in beliefs, and though differing in provisions of works, and now abrogated by the final religion, were valid in their own times.
As for today, only Islam is valid or acceptable now that Allah has sent it to all men, for the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) has said,
"By Him in whose hand is the soul of Muhammad, any person of this Community, any Jew, or any Christian who hears of me and dies without believing in what I have been sent with will be an inhabitant of hell" (al-Baghawi: Sharh al-sunna 1.104).
This hadith was also reported by Muslim in his
Sahih by `Abd al-Razzaq in his
Musannaf, and others. It is a rigorously authenticated (
sahih) evidence that clarifies the word of Allah in
surat Al 'Imran
"Whoever seeks a religion other than Islam will never have it accepted from him, and shall be of those who have truly failed in the next life" (Qur'an 3:85)
and many other verses and hadiths. That Islam is the only remaining valid or acceptable religion is necessarily known as part of our religion, and to believe anything other than this is unbelief (
kufr) that places a person outside of Islam, as Imam Nawawi notes:
"Someone who does not believe that whoever follows another religion besides Islam is an unbeliever (like Christians), or doubts that such a person is an unbeliever, or considers their sect to be valid, is himself an unbeliever (kafir) even if he manifests Islam and believes in it" (Rawda al-talibin, 10.70).
This is not only the position of the Shafi'i school of jurisprudence represented by Nawawi, but is also the recorded position of all three other Sunni schools: Hanafi (Ibn 'Abidin:
Radd al-muhtar 3.287), Maliki (al-Dardir:
al-Sharh al-saghir, 4.435), and Hanbali (al-Bahuti:
Kashshaf al-qina', 6.170). Those who know
fiqh literature will note that each of these works is the foremost
fatwa resource in its school. The scholars of Sacred Law are unanimous about the abrogation of all other religions by Islam because it is the position of Islam itself. It only remains for the sincere Muslim to submit to, in which connection Ibn al-`Arabi has said:
"Beware lest you ever say anything that does not conform to the pure Sacred Law. Know that the highest stage of the perfected ones (rijal) is the Sacred Law of Muhammad (Allah bless him and give him peace). And know that the esoteric that contravenes the exoteric is a fraud" (al-Burhani:
al-Hall al-sadid, 32).
Traditional Islam certainly does not accept the suggestion that
"it is true that many Muslims believe that the universality of guidance pertains only to pre-Qur'anic times, but others disagree; there is no 'orthodox' interpretation here that Muslims must accept" (Religious Diversity, 124).
Orthodoxy exists, it is unanimously agreed upon by the scholars of Muslims, and we have conveyed in Nawawi's words above that to believe anything else is unbelief. As for "
others disagree," it is true, but is something that has waited for fourteen centuries of Islamic scholarship down to the present century to be first promulgated in Cairo in the 1930s by the French convert to Islam Rene Gunon, and later by his student Frithjof Schuon and writers under him. Who else said it before? And if no one did, and everyone else considers it kufr, on what basis should it be accepted?
Universal Validity of Religions
