The difference between us and sunnis/shias

Zees

Do you think it is as simple (or difficult) as ijtihad?

Sunni?s acknowledge the theory of ijtihad provided you follow a scholar or get ijaza from one. So either way you?re linked back to the 4 schools of thought.

I think some people do ijtihad in their own time however when they hear rulings from imams, fatwas from sheikhs, hadiths from bukhari their thinking gets skewed so they don?t progress.

I don?t understand why sunni?s limited themselves to the 4 imams at least shia?s have marja?s with alive scholars today, yet they?re still faulty.
It?s easy to find faults but hard to find solutions, how would you think you could ?revive? ijtihad in the way your thinking?

I?d really like to know more about imam shafi and his role on hadith. know of any books/ site i could read?

I think part of the problem is people not knowing history. People will always blind follow because it?s easy and it is accepted. I think if you can get people to read history it might get them thinking because they?re too scared to read their own book of belief as they might misinterpret it so history might help i think. Though you can lead a horse to water but you can?t make it drink.

I doubt religion will be divorced all together, how hopeful is the individual? and what efforts do they make? Suggestions isn?t enough unfortunately, proactive action is important. That's why it's good to find like minded people so you can work as a team, project by project.

You gotta remember as well, religion is something people are really emotional about, so if you tend to threaten their beliefs, no one will even consider the argument.

Reformists firmly believe that the revival of Islam is as simple or difficult as opening the gates of Ijtihad. Ijtihad or independent reasoning is the only way forward for the Muslims. Opening of the gates of Ijtihad will immediately result in two things the first that Muslims will critically evaluate whatever they have received so from their forefathers and correct any mistakes that there forefathers made and secondly they will proactively use independent reasoning in tandem with the Quran to meet the challenges that they face today. That is the beauty of Ijtihad that you do not have to follow any scholar blindly nor do you need ijaza from anyone. Ijtihad or independent reasoning is the way of life for Muslims whereas all the religions of the world follow 'blind following' we are the people of knowledge and through knowledge do we seek out our lord. God himself exhorts mankind in the Quran to witness his creation and that these are signs for people who think.

The closing of the gates of Ijtihad means that Muslims are limited to the four interpreters(schools of thought) and that no new interpretations are allowed. Binding anyone to any interpretation is taqid(blind following) and is wrong. No interpretation whether hadith, or the interpretations of the salaf or the interpretations of the four interpreters is binding on everyone. Interpretation by its very nature is not binding, it is either relevant or not relevant anymore. Interpretations is an ongoing process it never stops as new variables come into our lives we use reasoning in tandem with the Holy Book to solve these problems. Interpretation is a human activity and errors do happen whether academic errors or deliberate errors(committed by the enemies of Islam). Thus previous interpretations can serve as a guide but they must be critically evaluated to remove the errors contained therein. The imams and sheikhs that you talk about believe in taqlid(blind following) and guide you by their knowledge of previous interpretations. They are the relics of the past and do not permit anyone to commit to new interpretations by using reason in tandem with the knowledge of the Quran. They say that whatever there was to know in the Quran has been explained by the previous interpreters. Does that make any sense to you, nor does it make sense to me. Quite a long(and very interesting i might add) story it is as to why the sunnis are limited to the four interpreters and why no new interpretations comes about. Anyhow the limiting to the four interpreters refers to what is called the closing of the gates of Ijtihad. The key lies in learning about the tradition itself and separating the wheat from the chaff.

Shias developed a new system when the twelfth imam went into occultation and that is the marja taqlid today since the old order became obsolete with the twelfth imam went into hiding, went missing or whatever . Suffice to say they broke further into two sects the Akhbaris(living in obscurity nowadays) and the Usulis the former favoring the previous system and the latter taking a lot from their sunni cousins to develop the new system that is prevalent is Iran today. Ijtihad is totally the domain of the sunnis, has always been since the death of the prophet but without a divine imam to guide them they had to resort to extreme measures and they did what(accepted Ijtihad) for which they had condemned the sunnis for centuries. Anyway they use a system which is a mix of 'blind following' and independent reasoning and the results are not good that is all i can say. Anyhow these are two distinct systems that were were followed by the sunnis and shias and their history goes back much further back to the pagans, Jews and Christians. Seek out my previous posts if you want to know more.

If the system of blind following is not abandoned by the Muslims than the choice of secularism becomes a real choice as people naturally desire to have progress in their lives. They would prefer the company of Islam along with progress in their lives but if Islam becomes like Christianity and refuses to go forward than it may very well have to be abandoned like Christianity. Then we will become like them we will say that we are Muslims but will know next to nothing about what Islam is.

Read about what Islamic reformists are saying about our Islam. My personal favorite is Fazlur Rahman Malik. His works are hard to come by. Anyway try to read what all the reformists are saying about the religion of Islam. A quick search on the google will bring out all the names of the reformists and you can than get their works or books.

SarahY

Hmm well thanks for the thoughts this is something i definitely want to look into.

salam

Meteora

Zees, it is not so much that sunni's make interpretations infallible. It is their misunderstanding and/or twisting of the scripture that forms their religion.

Ijtihad, or intepretation, technically has NEVER ceased in ANY religion other than maybe shiism, if what you said about them is true (since I never really studied shiism), in that they blindly follow an imam, therefore elimating all interpretations because they have a god in front of them.

Sunnism however does this to a degree. Usually when someone (or some random young, sunni muslim discusses whether an issue is haram or halal) gives a fatwa they will say imam so-and-so said so-and-so is haram, therefore it is haram according to the Quran, etc., but I do not think this is the case with most.

I mean, yes, ijtihad is over in the sense there can no more be "sahaba" (whom they blindly believe were actual friends of the prophet even when according to the Quran Muhammad could not tell himself if the people around him were FRIENDS or HYPOCRITES) or "collecters" of hadith to form the religion. Sunni's refer to this as "bid'ah" but the funny thing is they have more "bid'ah" to their religion than any other sect (reason is they have the highest number of fabrications i.e. man-made ahadith).

So yes, ijtihad is over in this case but notice that in here http//www.islamawareness.net/Music/prohibited.html a sunni "brother" (who would AFAIK be still after this article he wrote considered a brother in sunnism) gave his own fatwa (ruling or answer) on the issue of music. Although this is condemned since this not only disagrees with most current quote on quote "scholars of knowledge" who are revered, it also contradicts "scholars" of the past who are revered even more since they are closer to the time of the prophet (which would mean nothing) and this brings me to my next point.

The reason they don't allow new hadith collectors and/or "sahaba" is because they think they are too far off from the time of the prophet, and they think the time when the ahadith + tafsir were collected was the "evalutation" period (even claimed so my an imam I heard lectures of and refuted recently) and this was 200 years something after the prophet's death.

I will conclude by saying the major fault of sunnism is they have a horrendous understanding of the scripture, to the point they think it not only upholds itself but ANOTHER SOURCE (consisting of TWO things, HADITH and SUNNA, even though 456 makes hadith from only one being valid and 362 gives weight only to ONE sunna), and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Quran-aloners may not have an infallible understanding of the Quran (like anyone does) but our understanding is based on all Quranic verses unlike the sunni system that only relies on mistranslations like that of verses such as 597 (and they cite only the latter part since if they are to do so its entirety, their teaching will be exposed as baseless). The other reason is we don't revere human beings (i.e. Ibn Abbass and more so Bukhari) and we don't discard verses like 456 mentioned before, and 6836-39, verses which unsurprisingly has NO tafsir for in sunnism because it's hard to give an interpretation for these without them seeming to make the HADITH (456) and SUNNA (362) look like they're from Satan or something.

However it is obvious that not all "sunni's" (and I quote this for a reason, which I will mention now) are condemned by Allah. I think it is obvious and mostly accepted that it is INTENTIONAL shirk that is a sin and I think the only shirk is the INTENTIONAL shirk. A woman covering her hair or face since she believes inside that it is something God commanded cannot be criticized by a just God. The just God will obviously punish the SOURCE of the deception which according to my knowledge are the early Jews and Christians who did not follow the scriptures of God and introduced teachings that made it's way into all 3 monotheistic religions including Islam http//pressthat.wordpress.com/2007/09/06/hadith-plagiarized-from-the-bible/ and this is way there are many similarities between the corrupted Christianity and Islam, to name 2.

Alen

Peace,
Respectfully.

The biggest difference is this we (Muslims) follow The Quran and they (sunnis) don't.
I mean, i'm not being mean or rude, right, i'm being realistic, okay?
I've seen and heard and also read how they simply don't follow The Quran.
I've been reading this one translation of The Quran, i think by Yusuf Ali, and when i came to

2187 It has been made lawful for you during the night of fasting to approach your women sexually. They are a garment for you and you are a garment for them. God knows that you used to betray your souls so He has accepted your repentance, and forgiven you; now you may approach them and seek what God has written for you. And you may eat and drink until the white thread is distinct from the black thread of dawn; then you shall complete the fast until night; and do not approach them while you are devoted in the temples. These are the boundaries of God, so do not transgress them. It is thus that God clarifies His revelations to the people who they may be righteous.

There was a star where it says until night and on the bottom of the page was explanation it read that although layl means night, according to the practice of the prophet Muhammad, we break the fast at Maghrib.

Who's blind?
I'm not. nope
I mean, do you see? jedi

They break the fast at the time when the sky is blue and not dark or black. If that's not a clear and simple sign that they're ignoring The Message of The Quran, slap me silly. brickwall

God bless you all.
Peace. peace sun

Zees