Is the Sunna a Part of the Quran?: Extricating Revelation from Tradition

The umma is in disarray. What caused the disintegration of the once cohesive civilization? What held it together was abandoned in favour what split it apart. Revelation was abandoned to follow tradition. At the root of this debacle was a problematic approach to the revelation. There was a lack of appreciation of the uniqueness of revelation. Tradition was treated as "revelation from God" equal and even a part of the Book of Allah. The treatment of tradition as revelation rendered tradition "authoritative." Tradition became binding, a root of legislation, with the power to "abrogate" and even "replace" parts of revelation. This was shirk. The fall of the realm is traceable to six factors. The process was launched by a reorientation from revelation to tradition, which triggered a chain reaction. Every event triggered another event. The turn from revelation was triggered by the quest of hawkish rulers for a rendition of revelation that would justify aggressive jihad, waged under the banner of Islam, for the purpose of the propagation of religion through compulsion. But wars of aggression are prohibited in revelation. Hence, hawkish rulers engaged willing ulama. They accomplished this aim by recourse to the teaching of the abrogation of the verses of reconciliation by the verse of the sword. The turn was assisted by a reorientation from the Book of Allah to books of traditions. The reorientation was buttressed by requests of rulers to record the traditions. The turn from revelation to tradition was assisted by the repression of reason, the second event. The repression of reason was justified by treating using reason in religion as kufr. The third event was the treatment of tradition as "revelation from God." This embedded the teaching of "dual revelation" within the epistemology of revelation. The fourth event was the treatment of tradition as a "judge" of revelation. Tradition would "explain" and "detail" the Book of Allah. This reversed the relationship between revelation and tradition. The fifth event was recourse to the teaching of abrogation. This enabled the reinterpretation of the religion of reconciliation as a religion of war. The sixth was the reinterpretation of military jihad, a fighting in self-defence, as aggressive jihad, which transformed the religion of reconciliation into a teaching of war, and recast Islam as Islamism. The effects of these events was to transform the religion of reconciliation into a religion of war, Islam into Islamism. Muslims became belligerent and after a few triumphs, ended up on the losing side. For "Allah does not love aggressors." The teaching of abrogation enabled extensive tampering and with and corruption of the teaching of revelation. It enabled the reinvention of Islam as a religion of reconciliation as its nemesis, a religion of war. Tampering with the message of revelation was aggravated by the treatment of tradition as "revelation from God." For the tradition according to which "the blood of the kafir is halal for the believers" is tantamount to a brazen defiance of the teaching of revelation. These errors warped the teaching of the Bok of Allah. Regrettably, they also provide what is perceived by the misguided as a "justification" for the perpetration of violence in the name of Islam. Thus, these errors require urgent attention. It is necessary to subordinate all tradition to revelation. It also important to dispense with the notion that tradition "judges" revelation. Tradition could be treated as part of the past, but not as a binding root of legislation. For lawgiving in Islam is the exclusive prerogative of Allah. Extremists must be reined in. For the actions of a few extremists could trigger retaliation against the umma as a whole, as already transpired in the past a few times. Mongols slaughtered a million Muslims in 1258 in retaliation for the killing of Mongol traders and ambassadors dispatched by Genghis Khan to ask for justice.

• | Author: Leslie Terebessy
• | Publisher: Independently Published
• | Publication Date: Mar 15, 2025
• | Number of Pages: 00138 pages
• | Binding: Paperback or Softback
• | ISBN-10: NA
• | ISBN-13: 9798314212929