Moral Concept of Islam

him on trial in this world. God has given man such freedom to prove whether he has the will and capacity to remain on the straight and narrow path. That is why the Prophet took care to urge his fellow men to “follow divine morals.” The Islamic ethic is based on the concept of morality being a universal reality. God has determined similar standards of conduct both for man and for the rest of the universe, and nature in its entirety serves as a model for human conduct. What Miguel de Cervantes has said about a good painter is also true of a good man. He says: Good painters imitate nature; bad ones vomit it. The part of nature distinct from man is obliged by divine decree to abide by—in scientific language—the law of nature. The existence of this law is confirmed by the Quran when it speaks of the earth and the sky being subject to divine dictates. The Quran further makes it obligatory for man to follow these same dictates. There is, indeed, a single divine law to be observed by men and nature alike. Where man has to do this of his own free will and by his own intention, nature does so out of compulsion. The same principle of Islamic conduct is professed in the third chapter of the Quran: Do they seek for other than the religion of God, while all creatures in the heavens and on earth have, willing or unwilling, bowed to His Will? (3:83) This verse clearly indicates that God wishes to see human life resting on the same principles that He has laid down for the rest of nature. Human life too should reflect the same obedience to rules that nature manifests for our benefit time and time again.