New Preaching to the wrong audiences

Standfirst: Zakir Naik must first address the unIslamic character of those Muslims he says are not properly following Islamic teachings.

COMMENT

By Ravinder Singh

Zakir Naik is a great talker and seems to have a photographic mind. He can rattle away quotations from the holy books like a machine gun. No doubt a lot of people find this impressive, especially those who do not have knowledge of other religions, or even a deep knowledge of Islam. He himself acknowledges that people who do not have an in-depth knowledge of religion will easily believe what they hear from people they consider to be learned in religion.

He exploits his credentials of being a physician to claim that he is a man of science and a logical person in order to attract crowds and mesmerise them. I wonder whether Islam approves of such self praise.

He argues that there is no such thing as converting into Islam as everyone is born Muslim in the first place. So when a non-Muslim embraces Islam, he is not converting, but reverting, to Islam.

He acknowledges that many of the Muslim countries in the world are not properly following the teachings of the Quran. If this is the case, then we must ask why he is not preaching in these countries. Why should he concern himself with the the fate of non-Muslims when there are, in his own words, so many Muslims in Muslim countries who are not fit to go to heaven as they are not following the teachings of the Quran? Wouldn’t his efforts be better rewarded if he works to make Muslims properly follow the teachings of the Quran?

God is not concerned about what religion one professes, but rather about how a human treats another human and how he treats nature. What is destroying humankind today is not the fact that there are numerous religious beliefs, but greed, corruption and all manner of uncivilised behaviour, such as the intolerance of the existence of those different from oneself.

If he is concerned about saving humankind, it is the uncivilised behaviour of human beings that he should be talking about. What is the point of having every human become a Muslim if humans are not behaving towards each other as humans, if they are exploiting the weaker ones, if modern-day slavery is allowed to go on, if babies are produced only to be dumped in drains, dustbins and toilets?
He must first address the unIslamic character of those Muslims he says are not following the proper teachings of Islam. Convert or revert them to become the kind of Muslims that the Quran wants them to be. No need to waste time and create ill feelings between the believers of different faiths by talking of the greatness of one religion over another, by comparing one religion with another. This serves no purpose except to make some people feel superior over others. The Prophet Muhammad did not do so and neither did he order anyone to do so.

He should be talking about the moral character of people and not of their religions. The Prophet never said that the whole world must be of one religion, but all prophets said that people should be of good moral character.

If he wants to talk in Malaysia, he should be talking about baby dumping, Mat Rempits, fraud, corruption, the auditor-general’s reports, and similar topics that deal with moral character. He should be putting the fear of God in the people who are involved in these crimes instead of telling non-Muslims they will not go to heaven if they do not “revert” to Islam.

Ravinder Singh is an FMT reader.