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Belief in all the Prophets as a Requisite of True Faith
By: Ayatullah Muhammad Taqi Misbah Yazdi
In conclusion, the jurisdiction of faith in a nutshell is God, the Resurrection, the angels, the heavenly books, and all the prophets. We must have faith in all of them and all of the prophets, and not take any one of them as exception “We make no distinction between any of them.” If we say, “We accept one while denying the other,” this is tantamount to the denial of them all “It is they who are truly faithless.”
This question may come to the mind: Why is denial of a prophet tantamount to denial of all the prophets and true faithlessness? One who accepts, for example, ‘Isa (‘a) or Musa (‘a), he accepts one prophet at least. So, how can we say that he denies all the prophets? In reply, we have to say that we ask those who accept one of the prophets, ‘Isa or Musa (‘a) for example: Is this faith of yours based on the fact that ‘Isa or Musa belongs to your community and tribe, or because of the fact that he is a prophet of God?
If they say, “It is because he is a relative and next of kin of ours,” it is clear that this is worship of kinship and tribalism, and is not worship of God. In short, it is not faith but true faithlessness. The other option is for them to say, “Our faith is anchored in the fact that ‘Isa (or Musa) is a prophet of God, and what matters to us is God and His command, and not ‘Isa, Musa or kinship. In this case, we say that if the main criterion is the command of God, let us assume that God initially sends prophet A and gives him commandments, and then sends prophet B and abrogates some of the previous commandments sent through prophet A, and issues new commandments. Here, faith in God requires what? If a person has true faith in God, will he obey the commandments of prophet A or prophet B?
Obviously, if a person is really bound by the commandments of God, once God through prophet B annulled the commandments of prophet A, he will obey the second set of commandments. Or, if a prophet initially brought a commandment from God and after sometime, the same prophet brought a new decree contrary to the earlier decree from God, annulling the first commandment, it is clear that faith in God requires that the second order be executed.
This case which is technically called abrogation has happened to some of the decrees of our religion of Islam. One of them is the issue of the qiblah’s direction. Based on a divine commandment, the Holy Prophet (S) used to pray for many years toward Jerusalem. After some years, this verse was revealed: “So turn your face toward the Holy Mosque (2:144)” and the order was given that “From then on, you pray toward the Masjid al-Haram and the Ka‘bah.” If a person really believes in the Prophet (S), after the revelation of this verse, he will pray toward the Ka‘bah and not toward Jerusalem. When two contradictory orders are issued by the master, one after the other, everyone can understand that the second order must be obeyed.
In our discussion, God has initially sent Musa (‘a) and then ‘Isa (‘a), and the assumption is that we have accepted them on account of being prophets of God. For some time, we acted upon the commandments brought by Musa (‘a) from God, and after Musa (‘a), ‘Isa (‘a) brought commandments from God some of which contradicted the decrees of Musa (‘a). Here, if a person has faith in Musa, he has to accept ‘Isa because both of them are prophets who came from the One and Only God. The true follower of Musa is he who has faith in ‘Isa, and the true follower of ‘Isa is he who has faith in the Prophet of Islam, because one of the things mentioned by ‘Isa is that “After me a prophet whose name is Ahmad shall come.”
“To give the good news of an apostle who will come after me, whose name is Ahmad. (61:6)”
As such, denial of the Prophet of Islam means denial of the saying of ‘Isa and his apostleship. If a person says, “I have faith in ‘Isa but I will not believe in the Prophet of Islam,” his faith in ‘Isa is a lie, because one of the statements of ‘Isa is the glad tidings of the advent of the Prophet of Islam and obedience to him. That is why we say that faith in some of the prophets and denial of some others is actually denial of all prophets. For the same reason, the Qur’an emphasizes, thus: “We make no distinction between any of them.” For this reason too, we in Islam regard not only blasphemy against the Prophet of Islam (S) but also blasphemy against any of the prophets as tantamount to disbelief and apostasy.
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