Islam

Islam is a monotheistic religion based on the teachings of Muhammad, a 7th century Arab political and religious figure. The word "Islam" means "submission." The followers of Islam are called Muslims or Moslems. Muslims follow the teaching of Muhammad, whom they believe to be God's last and greatest prophet. Muslims believe that God (Allah, in Arabic) revealed the Qu'ran to Muhammad. The Qu'ran is considered to be the pure and holy word of Allah. Like Christianity, and Judaism, Islam originated in the Middle East and claims to trace it's roots back to Abraham. Muslims do not believe that Muhammad was the founder of Islam, rather that he restored the original faith of Abraham and the prophets, which had been corrupted and/or misinterpreted over time. Islam is the second largest religion in the world, with over 1.4 billion followers, the numbers of Muslims is rapidly growing, mainly due to high birth rates in Muslim countries.

The Five Pillars of Islam is the term given to what are commonly understood to be the five core aspects of Islam-

Mecca, the Islamic holy city.

Five Pillars of Islam

• Shahadah (Profession of Faith) -The Shahadah is the Muslim profession of faith. 'ašhadu 'al-lā ilāha illā-llāhu wa 'ašhadu 'anna muħammadan rasūlu-llāh, a loose English translation reads "There is none worthy of worship except the God, and Muhammad is the messenger of God" This testament can be seen as the foundation of all of the other tenets of Islam.

• Salat (Ritual Prayer) -All Muslims are required to Pray to Allah five times each day while facing Mecca.

• Zakat (Charity) Able Muslims must donate to the poor based on the wealth one has accumulated. In current usage it is interpreted as 2.5% of the value of most valuables and savings held for a full lunar year.

• Sawm (Fasting) All able-bodied Muslims (children, the elderly, and the ill are exempt) must fast during daylight hours during the daylight hours of the entire month of Ramadan. According to Muslims, this purifies the body and soul.

• Hajj (Pilgrimage) All able-bodied Muslims must make a pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in their lives.

Pages from the Koran, the holy book of the Islamic religion.

Islam and Christianity

While Muslims do not believe Jesus to be the Son of God or in the resurrection, they consider him to be one of God's most important prophets. However, the Qu'ran warns against worshiping Jesus, for fear of idolatry.

The Qur'an states that Christians will be punished, though the nature of the punishment is not specified: “Unbelievers are those that say: ‘God is the Messiah, the son of Mary.’ He that worships other deities besides God, God will deny paradise, and the Fire shall be his home. None shall help the evil-doers. Unbelievers are those that say: ‘God is one of three.’ There is but one God. If they do not desist from saying so, they shall be sternly punished.” (5:73-75)

However, Islam does recognize Christians and Jews as "people of the book" since both refer to one God only, and recognize Abraham (Ibrahim in Arabic) as a founding prophet.

Islam and Paganism

Although most Muslims profess belief in a single, almighty God, some Western scholars believe that some Muslim beliefs, like some of the church, can be traced back to distinctly polytheistic antecedents. Some, for example, have attempted to link Allah to a moon deity, though Allah is cited in the Koran as the God of Abraham and Isaac (Judaism and Christianity). Others have pointed to the pagan roots of various Muslim prohibitions, such as the ban on pork (also practiced in Orthodox Judaism) originating in the 3rd-century AD Damascene cult of the pig-god Jamal. There is some evidence that some traditional Muslim scholars have been suppressing this information as well as various recently-recovered scrolls that hint at early Muslim human sacrifice, which was also a part of early Judaism.

Sharia

Sharia is the body of Islamic law. The term means "way" or "path"; it is the legal framework within which public and some private aspects of life are regulated for those living in a legal system based on Muslim principles of jurisprudence. It is not actually part of the canonical Koran; that is to say, it is not believed to be the direct word of Allah by Muslims, but rather the interpretation of it.

Sharia deals with many aspects of day-to-day life, including politics, economics, banking, business law, contract law, sexuality, and social issues. Some Islamic scholars accept Sharia as the body of precedent and legal theory established before the 19th century, while other scholars view Sharia as a changing body, and include Islamic legal theory from the contemporary period.^{[Citation Needed]}

There is not a strictly codified uniform set of laws pertaining to Sharia. It is more like a system of devising laws, based on the Qur'an, Hadith and centuries of debate, interpretation and precedent.

Before the 19th century, legal theory was considered the domain of the traditional legal schools of thought. Most Sunni Muslims follow Hanafi, Hanbali, Maliki or Shafii, while most Shia Muslims follow Jaafari (Hallaq 1997, Brown 1996, Aslan 2006).

Laws and practices under Sharia:

Marriage laws

• The Muslim man who is not currently a fornicator can only marry a Muslim woman who is not currently a fornicatress or a chaste woman from the people of the book.
• The Muslim fornicator can only marry a Muslim fornicatress.
• Men can marry up to four wives, but only if they are treated equally. Those who do not consider themselves capable of maintaining just behavior between wives, should refrain from this practice.
• The Muslim woman who is not currently a fornicatress can only marry a Muslim man who is not currently a fornicator.
• The Muslim fornicatress can only marry a Muslim fornicator.
• The woman cannot marry without the consent of her guardian. If she marries, her husband becomes her new guardian.
• The guardian may choose a suitable partner for a virgin girl, but the girl is free to contest and has the right to say 'no'.
• The guardian cannot marry the divorced woman or the widow if she didn't ask to be married.
• The number of husbands is limited to one.
• "Do not marry unless you give your wife something that is her right." It is obligatory for a man to give bride wealth (gifts) to the woman he marries.[5]

Divorce laws

• A woman who wishes to be divorced usually needs the consent of her husband. However, most schools allow her to obtain a divorce without her husband's consent if she can show the judge that her husband is mistreating her, failing to support her financially, or is impotent. If the husband consents she does not have to pay back the dower.^{[Citation Needed]}
• Men have the right of unilateral divorce. A divorce is effective when the man tells his wife that he is divorcing her. At this point the husband must pay the wife the "delayed" component of the dower.
• A divorced woman of reproductive age must wait three months before marrying again to ensure that she is not pregnant. Her ex-husband should support her financially during this period.^{[Citation Needed]}
• Under certain circumstances (abuse, for instance), the wife may ask a judge to separate the couple.
• If a man divorces his wife three times, he can no longer marry her again unless she marries another man and then
• These are guidelines; Islamic law on divorce is different depending on the school of thought.[6]

The penalty for theft

• In accordance with the Qur'an and several hadith, theft is punished by imprisonment or amputation of hands or feet, depending on the number of times it was committed and depending on the item of theft.[5][6]

The penalty for adultery

• In accordance with hadith, stoning to death is the penalty for married men and women who commit adultery.[7] For unmarried men and women, the punishment prescribed in the Qur'an and hadith is 100 lashes.[8]