"This day, I have perfected
your religion for you, completed My Favor upon you and have chosen for you Islam as your Religion. Quran (5:3) "
It is a known fact that every language has one or more terms that are used in reference to God and sometimes to lesser deities. This is not the case with Allah. Allah is the personal name of the One true God. Nothing else can be called Allah. The term has no plural or gender. This shows its uniqueness when compared with the word god which can be made plural, gods, or feminine, goddess. It is interesting to notice that Allah is the personal name of God in Aramaic, the language of Jesus and a sister language of Arabic. The One true God is a reflection of
the unique concept that Islam associates with God. To a Muslim, Allah is the Almighty, Creator and Sustainer of the universe,
Who is similar to nothing and nothing is comparable to Him. The Prophet Muhammad was asked by his contemporaries about Allah;
the answer came directly from God Himself in the form of a short chapter of the
Some non-Muslims allege that God in
Islam is a stern and cruel God who demands to be obeyed fully. He is not loving and kind. Nothing can be farther from truth
than this allegation. It is enough to know that, with the exception of one, each of the 114 chapters of the Quran begins with
the verse: "In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate." In one of the sayings of
Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) we are told that "God is more loving and kinder than a mother to her dear child." But God is also Just. Hence evildoers and sinners must have their share of punishment and the virtuous, His bounties and favors. Actually God's attribute of Mercy has full manifestation in His attribute of Justice. People suffering throughout their lives for His sake and people oppressing and exploiting other people all their lives should not receive similar treatment from their Lord. Expecting similar treatment for them will amount to negating the very belief in the accountability of man in the Hereafter and thereby negating all the incentives for a moral and virtuous life in this world. The following Quranic verses are very clear and straightforward in this respect:
Islam rejects characterizing God in
any human form or depicting Him as favoring certain individuals or nations on the basis of wealth, power or race. He created
the human-beings as equals. They may distinguish themselves and get His favor through virtue and piety only. The concept that
God rested in the seventh day of creation, that God wrestled with one of His soldiers, that God is an envious plotter against
mankind, or that God is incarnate in any human being are considered blasphemy from the Islamic point of view. Read about
this. The unique usage of Allah as a personal name of God
is a reflection of Islam's emphasis on the purity of the belief in God which is the essence of the message of all God's messengers.
Because of this, Islam considers associating any deity or personality with God as a deadly sin which God will never forgive,
despite the fact He may forgive all other sins.
He is Self-Sufficient or Self-Subsistent
or, to use a Quranic term, Al-Qayyum. The Creator does not create only in the sense of bringing things into being, He also
preserves them and takes them out of existence and is the ultimate cause of whatever happens to them.
God's Attributes If the Creator is
Eternal and Everlasting, then His attributes must also be eternal and everlasting. He should not lose any of His attributes
nor acquire new ones. If this is so, then His attributes are absolute. Can there be more than one Creator with such absolute
attributes? Can there be for example, two absolutely powerful Creators? A moment's thought shows that this is not feasible.
The Quran summarizes this argument in the following verses:
The Oneness of God The Quran reminds
us of the falsity of all alleged gods. To the worshippers of man-made objects, it asks:
To the worshippers of heavenly bodies
it cites the story of Abraham: "When night outspread over him he say a star and said, 'This is my Lord.' But when it set he
said, 'I love not the setters.' When he saw the moon rising, he said, 'This is my Lord.' But when it set he said, 'If my Lord
does not guide me I shall surely be of the people gone astray.' When he say the sun rising, he said, 'This is my Lord; this
is greater.' But when it set he said, 'O my people, surely I quit that which you associate, I have turned my face to Him Who
originated the heavens and the earth; a man of pure faith, I am not of the idolaters.'" (6:76-79)
The Believer's Attitude In order to be a Muslim, i.e., to surrender oneself to God, it is necessary to believe in the oneness of God, in the sense of His being the only Creator, Preserver, Nourisher, etc. But this belief - later on called "Tawhid Ar-Rububiyyah is not enough." Many of the idolaters knew and believed that only the Supreme God could do all this. but that was not enough to make them Muslims. To tawhid ar-rububiyyah one must add tawhid al'uluhiyyah, i.e., one acknowledges the fact that is God alone Who deserves to be worshipped, and thus abstains from worshipping any other thing or being. Having achieved this knowledge of the one true God, man should constantly have faith in Him, and should allow nothing to induce him to deny truth. When faith enters a person's heart, it causes certain mental states which result in certain actions. Taken together these mental states and actions are the proof for the true faith. The Prophet said, "Faith is that which resides firmly in the heart and which is proved by deeds." The feeling of gratitude is so important that a non-believer is called 'kafir,' which means 'one who denies a truth' and also 'one who is ungrateful.' A believer loves, and is grateful to God for the bounties He bestowed upon him, but being aware of the fact that his good deeds, whether mental or physical, are far from being commensurate with Divine favors, he is always anxious lest God should punish him, here or in the Hereafter. He, therefore, fears Him, surrenders himself to Him and serves Him with great humility. One cannot be in such a mental state without being almost all the time mindful of God. Remembering God is thus the life force of faith, without which it fades and withers away. The Quran tries to promote this feeling of gratitude by repeating the attributes of God very frequently. We find most of these attributes mentioned together in the following verses of the Quran:
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