{"id":44644,"date":"2017-10-20T21:40:10","date_gmt":"2017-10-21T03:40:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=44644"},"modified":"2017-10-20T21:40:10","modified_gmt":"2017-10-21T03:40:10","slug":"early-islam-kind-superclan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/10\/early-islam-kind-superclan.html","title":{"rendered":"Early Islam as a kind of “superclan”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

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\"Muslim<\/a>
The headquarters of the Islamic Society of North America, in Plainfield, Indiana (outside Indianapolis)
A Wikimedia Commons public domain image<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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In company with several prominent local Latter-day Saint leaders, my wife and I visited\u00a0the headquarters of the Islamic Society of North America, which is located in Plainfield, Indiana. \u00a0We stayed through the Friday noon prayer, including the khutba<\/em> or sermon, which was delivered (on the subject of good deeds and righteousness) by Ahmed M. Elhattab.<\/p>\n

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I especially liked his quotation of a hadith<\/em>, or statement, attributed to Muhammad: \u00a0\u201cHe does not believe!\u201d the Prophet is said to have cried out. \u00a0\u201cHe does not believe! \u00a0He does not believe!\u201d \u00a0Those around him were frightened at what he said. \u00a0What he referring to them<\/em>? \u00a0Who, they asked, is it that you\u2019re talking about? \u00a0Who isn\u2019t a believer? \u00a0\u201cThat man isn\u2019t a believer,\u201d Muhammad responded, \u201cwhose neighbor cannot sleep at night for fear of the evil that he does.\u201d<\/p>\n

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I also like the passage that he cited, in this regard, from the Qur\u2019an: \u00a0\u201cO people, truly we have created you from a male and a female [i.e., Adam and Eve] and have made you [different] peoples and tribes so that you might come to know one another. \u00a0Truly, the most noble of you with God is the most righteous among you. \u00a0And God is knowing and aware.\u201d \u00a0(Qur\u2019an 49:13, my translation)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

In other words, in the end, our nationality, ethnicity, and lineage won\u2019t really make any difference. \u00a0Nor, for that matter, will our degrees or our wealth or our cleverness.<\/p>\n

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***<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Another snippet from a manuscript on Islam:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

In Medina, the Muslims became a kind of superclan, a tribe held together not by ties of kinship but by a common faith. And they began to act in a manner consistent with accepted behavior in early Arabia. They sent out raiding parties and clashed with Quraysh\u2014an unthinkable thing for most of them under old Arabian ideas, since most of them were of Quraysh. But Quraysh had expelled and abused them, and they had declared their loyalty to the new tribe of Islam.<\/span><\/p>\n

Eventually, Muhammad and his followers scored a major vic\u00adtory over the Quraysh of Mecca and won the privilege to make the pilgrimage to the Ka\u2019ba there. The city fathers, it now became clear, need never have worried. For the victorious Muslims proceeded to \u201cIslamicize\u201d the Ka\u2019ba. Under the direction of their Prophet, they incorporated its rites and rituals, in a purified form, into the new religion\u2014the legend of Abraham and Ishmael certainly helped here\u2014and those rites and rituals were now on their way to an importance that the early Meccan pagans could scarcely have fore\u00adseen. Since then, Mecca has gone from being a pilgrimage center for the Arabian peninsula, to being the center of the earth for perhaps more than a billion and a half Muslims the world over.<\/span><\/p>\n

In Medina, as Muhammad\u2019s faith began to spread throughout the Arabian peninsula, Islam began to distinguish itself from the two earlier religions. This was partly because adherents of those within their traditions. According to the Qur\u2019an, the Jews objected to the notion that God could call anybody he chose, not feeling himself restricted to one of them.<\/em>[1]<\/a> \u201cWhen it is said to them: \u2018Believe in what God has revealed,\u2019 they reply: \u2018We believe in what was revealed to us.\u201d\u2018 But the Qur\u2019an then points out, much as Jesus did in similar circumstances, that they had killed <\/em>the prophets who came to them in the past.[2]<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> 2:90.<\/span><\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> 2:91; italics in Dawood\u2019s translation.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Posted from Carmel, Indiana<\/p>\n

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\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 In company with several prominent local Latter-day Saint leaders, my wife and I visited\u00a0the headquarters of the Islamic Society of North America, which is located in Plainfield, Indiana. \u00a0We stayed through the Friday noon prayer, including the khutba or sermon, which was delivered (on the subject of good deeds and righteousness) by Ahmed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nEarly Islam as a kind of "superclan"<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    In company with several prominent local Latter-day Saint leaders, my wife and I visited\u00a0the headquarters of the Islamic Society of North\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, 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