Being Muslim

Sets you up for the road ahead: why pace matters more than speed, where Islam sits in the human story, and how knowledge of the religion reaches us through its scholars.

Key points

• Check your intention before you begin, take things in gradually, and expect hard days as well as good ones.
• Don’t overhaul your whole life in the first few months. Find good Muslim friends, and stay yourself: Islam refines who you are rather than replacing you.
• Every soul affirmed Allah as its Lord before this life (7:172). Prophets came again and again to remind people of that covenant, ending with the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ.
• The hadith of Jibril gives the religion three dimensions: islam, what the body does; iman, what the mind affirms; and ihsan, the state of the heart. Neglect one and the whole goes out of balance.
• Arabic is the language of the prayer and of recitation. Du‘a, study and reading translations can be in any language.
• Knowledge comes from the Qur’an and the Sunnah through qualified scholars. The four schools differ on details, not essentials, and that range of valid views is a mercy.

Think aboutOf the three dimensions, practice, belief and the heart, which gets the least of your attention right now?

Write a fa’idah from this chapter

The six things a Muslim believes, beginning with the Shahadah, together with a short case for why belief in God is rational.

Key points

• The Shahadah has two halves: denying every false object of worship and affirming Allah alone, then committing to live by that through following the Prophet ﷺ.
• Tawhid means Allah has no partner, parts, equal or need. Shirk is the one sin not forgiven to someone who dies upon it.
• Faith should rest on reason, not only on imitation. The chapter explains necessary, possible and impossible propositions, and why a universe with a beginning needs a cause.
• Angels are made of light and never disobey. Jinn are made of fire and have free will, and Iblis refused to bow to Adam out of arrogance.
• Four revealed books are named: the Torah, the Psalms, the Gospel and the Qur’an. Only the Qur’an has been kept unchanged.
• Twenty-five prophets are named in the Qur’an, five of them the Messengers of Resolve. Muslims believe ‘Isa was not crucified and will return.
• The questioning in the grave, the resurrection, the Scale and the Bridge are real. Decree and free will sit together: we answer for our choices, not for what befalls us.

Think aboutThe chapter says we will be asked about how we responded to events, not about the events themselves. How does that change the way you look at a hard week?

Write a fa’idah from this chapter

The longest chapter: the five rulings of Islamic law, then a practical walk through purification, prayer, zakah, fasting and Hajj, voluntary worship, and rulings particular to women.

Key points

• Every act falls under one of five rulings: required, recommended, permitted, disliked or forbidden. Four of the five carry no sin, and a good deed is written ten times over.
• Filth (najasah) is something physical you wash away. Ritual impurity is a state you lift with wudu or ghusl. Telling them apart settles many beginners’ worries.
• It covers wudu, ghusl, the four conditions before prayer, each position of a rak‘ah and what to say in it, and the times and lengths of the five prayers.
• A journey of about 48 miles lets you shorten the four-rak‘ah prayers to two, and join prayers while you are on the road.
• Zakah is 2.5% of wealth held above the nisab for a full lunar year, given to eight kinds of recipient.
• The fast runs from first light to sunset. The ill, travellers, pregnant and nursing women may break it and make it up, and guarding the eyes and tongue is as much a part of it as food.
• Hajj joins sacred time, place and ritual, most of it following Ibrahim, Hajar and Isma‘il. Voluntary prayer, fasting, charity, du‘a and dhikr build on the pillars.

Think aboutAl-Ghazali’s six inner qualities of prayer are concentration, understanding, reverence, awe, hope and shame. Which one would change your next prayer the most?

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Ihsan in practice: what the inner self is made of, how vices are uprooted and virtues grown, and the character the Prophet ﷺ modelled.

Key points

• We are born with a fitrah that leans towards the good, so Islam has no original sin. The ego (nafs) wants its appetites, reason is meant to lead it, and the heart is where they meet.
• Refinement means finding the balanced middle of each trait, as the Prophet ﷺ did. Anger, for example, is a fault in excess but needed in the face of injustice.
• Seven doors lead into the heart: the tongue, eyes, ears, hands, feet, stomach and private parts. Guarding them is how the law shapes the spirit.
• The vices covered are rage, resentful envy, suspicion, arrogance and vanity, showing off, heedlessness, and avoiding the thought of death.
• The virtues covered are repentance, taqwa, detachment, hope with fear, reliance on Allah, gratitude and contentment. Each state has its fitting response: thanks in ease, patience in hardship, repentance after a sin.
• Noble character in brief: courtesy, wanting for others what you want for yourself, putting others first, good speech, patience, honesty, trustworthiness, forbearance, generosity and justice.

Think aboutRepentance is remorse, stopping, and resolving not to return, with a fourth step when someone else was harmed: putting it right. Is there something you could put right this week?

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Why the Prophet ﷺ is both our example and a source of law, how to love him and send salawat upon him, and a short life from Makkah to Madinah.

Key points

• His Sunnah is the model for worship, character and even daily habits, and his words and approvals are a source of law. An innovation is blameworthy when it alters something fundamental, not simply because it is new.
• Among his titles are al-Amin, Habib Allah, al-Mustafa, the Seal of the Prophets and the Intercessor. Loving him more than anyone else is part of complete faith.
• Each salawat on him brings ten blessings from Allah, and Friday is the day to send more.
• The life runs from his orphaned childhood, Halimah and his marriage to Khadijah to the first revelation at Hira, persecution, the boycott and Ta’if, the Night Journey, the Hijrah, Badr, Uhud and the Trench.
• Hudaybiyyah looked like a setback and opened the way to the return to Makkah in 630, where he forgave the people who had driven him out.
• He passed away at sixty-three, soon after the Farewell Hajj, and Abu Bakr was chosen to lead. The chapter closes with some of his miracles, from the splitting of the moon to the palm trunk that wept for him.

Think aboutHe was always first to greet, let others let go of a handshake first, and gave everyone his full attention. Which of his habits in this chapter could you take up this week?

Write a fa’idah from this chapter

What the Qur’an is, how it is arranged and preserved, why it cannot be imitated, how to read it, and the seven themes that run through it.

Key points

• The Qur’an is Allah’s own speech, brought by Jibril over twenty-three years. Only the Arabic is the Qur’an; a translation conveys its meaning.
• It has 114 surahs, arranged roughly from longest to shortest after al-Fatihah. Makkan surahs centre on belief and the Hereafter; Madinan surahs add the laws of a community.
• It challenged its hearers to produce something like it, then ten surahs, then a single one, and the poets of Arabia could not.
• Read it two ways: recite it in Arabic every day, even before you understand it, and read a translation to reflect. Memorise what you need for prayer first, then build.
• Verses quoted out of context mislead. The chapter shows how 2:191 concerns a particular enemy in a particular situation, as the verse before it makes clear.
• Its seven great themes, after Ibn Juzayy: Allah’s lordship, prophethood, the Day of Judgment, legal rulings, promised reward, warned punishment, and the stories of earlier peoples.

Think aboutTry both ways of reading this week: a few lines recited in Arabic each day, and one passage read slowly in translation. What did each give you?

Write a fa’idah from this chapter

The sacred calendar: a lunar year whose days begin at sunset, Friday and its prayer, Ramadan and its Eid, and the Eid of the Sacrifice.

Key points

• Worship follows the lunar calendar, whose months begin with a sighted crescent and last 29 or 30 days. An Islamic day starts at sunset, so “Friday night” comes before Friday.
• Jumu‘ah is required of resident men without a valid excuse and recommended for everyone else. It has two adhans, a sermon in two parts and two rak‘ahs in place of Zuhr, and talking during the sermon is not allowed.
• In the masjid: shoes off at the door, two rak‘ahs on entering the prayer hall, and voices kept low. Major ritual impurity keeps you out of the prayer hall only, not the whole building.
• Ramadan is a month of generosity, extra worship, the Qur’an and Tarawih. Laylat al-Qadr falls on an odd night of the last ten.
• Zakat al-Fitr is due for every member of the household before the Eid prayer. Eat a little before the prayer of Eid al-Fitr, and nothing before the prayer of Eid al-Adha.
• The Eid prayer comes before its sermon and has extra takbirs. At Eid al-Adha an animal is sacrificed in memory of Ibrahim, and the takbir is said after each prayer for the days that follow.

Think aboutThe chapter calls time the capital we invest for the next life. Which of these sacred days will you plan for this year?

Write a fa’idah from this chapter

Islamic law in everyday life: what the law protects, food, dress, money and hygiene, manners, family, the wider community, and the place of culture.

Key points

• The law protects five things, in order: religion, life, intellect, family and property. Falling short of a ruling doesn’t take you out of Islam; denying the law’s authority would.
• No pork and no intoxicant in any amount. Permitted animals must be slaughtered humanely in Allah’s name, and meat from Jews and Christians that meets this standard is allowed.
• Men may not wear gold or silk. In public a man covers from navel to knee, and a woman all but her face and hands, with less required among women and close family.
• Inheritance follows fixed shares, and up to a third can be left by will. Riba is forbidden, which is why interest-free loans and co-ownership finance exist.
• Daily adab: begin with salam and return it as well or better, eat with Bismillah and the right hand, dress right side first, speak truthfully and gently, honour elders, and learn the du‘as for daily acts.
• Between unrelated men and women: no seclusion, lowered gaze and no touching. Marriage is a witnessed contract, and kindness to parents and ties of kin hold even when the family is not Muslim.
• The ummah is a brotherhood above tribe. Overlook others’ faults, accept valid differences, know the strict limits Islam sets on armed force, and keep what is good in your own culture.

Think aboutThe book ends by asking you to pace yourself and keep learning. Pick one piece of adab from this chapter and practise it until it is a habit.

Write a fa’idah from this chapter