Page:Maulana Muhammad Ali Quran.djvu/16

xvi rebellion and anarchy. The person in authority may belong to any religion, hut he is to be obeyed in the same manner as the parents are to be obeyed, though they may not be believers in Islam. According to a saying of the Holy Prophet, even if a Negro slave is placed in authority he must be obeyed.

Four fundamental institutions.

The four fundamental institutions of the Muslim faith are noted below at some length, especially the prayer.

Prayer is an outpouring of the heart’s sentiments, a devout supplication to God, and a reverential expression of the soul’s sincerest desires before its Maker. In Islam the idea of prayer, like all other religious ideas, finds its highest development. Prayer, according to the Holy Qur-án, is the true means of that purification of the heart which is the only way to communion with God. The Holy Qur-án says: "Recite that which has been revealed to you of the Book and keep up prayer; surely prayer keeps (one) away from indecency and evil, and certainly the remembrance of Allah is the greatest" (29:45). Islam, therefore, enjoins prayer as a means of the moral elevation of man. Prayer degenerating into a mere ritual, into a lifeless and vapid ceremony performed with insincerity of heart, is not the prayer enjoined by Islam. Such prayer is expressly denounced by the Holy Qur-án: "Woe to the praying ones who are unmindful of their prayers" (107:5).

With a Muslim his prayer is his spiritual diet, of which he partakes five times a day, and those who think that it is too often should remember how many times daily they require food for their bodies. Is not spiritual growth much more essential than physical growth? Is not the soul more valuable than the body? If food is needed several times daily to minister to the needs of the body, is not spiritual refreshment at the same time badly needed? Or if the body would be starved if it were fed only on the seventh day, has not the soul been actually starved by denying to it even the little which it could get after six days? The founder of Christianity himself emphasized this when he said: "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God" (Matt. 4:4). What Christ taught in words has been reduced to a practical form by the Holy Prophet Muhammad.

It may be noted that while other religions have generally set apart a whole day for Divine service, on which other work is not to be done, Islam has given quite a new meaning to Divine service by introducing prayer into the everyday affairs of men. A day is not here set apart for prayer, and in this sense no sabbath is known to Islam. What Islam requires is this, that when most busy a Muslim should still be able to disengage himself from all worldly occupations and resort to his prayers. Hence it is also that Islam has done away with all institutions of monkery, which require a man to give up all worldly occupations for the whole of his life in order to hold communion with God. It makes communion with God possible even when man is most busy with his worldly occupations, thus making possible that which was generally considered impossible before its advent.

But while Islam has given permanence to the institution of prayer by requiring its observance at stated times and in a particular manner, it has also left ample scope for the individual himself to select what portions of the Holy Qur-án he likes and to make what supplications his soul yearns after. General directions have no doubt been given, and on these the whole of the Muslim world is agreed, for these directions were necessary to secure regularity, method, and uniformity; but in addition to these, ample scope has