SPIRITUAL PROGRESS — Goal of Islam

THE WORD OF GOD It is those who have faith, and do not mix their faith with wrongdoing, who will be secure, and it is they who are rightly guided. This is the reasoning We gave to Abraham against his people. We raise in rank anyone We please—your Lord is wise and aware. We gave him Isaac and Jacob, each of whom We guided as We had guided Noah before. Among his descendants were David and Solomon, and Job, Joseph, Moses and Aaron. Thus do We reward the righteous. 6: 82 - 84 In this world there is only one Supreme Being—God, whose majesty and greatness are based on sound arguments. All other kinds of socalled greatness and the reverence for them are based on superstitious beliefs. God’s supremacy stands by virtue of its own strength, while all other godheads owe their existence to the acceptance of their followers. If their followers refused to accept them, they would become nonexistent. Looking to externals, the worshippers of these deities are misled into believing that they are more securely situated than the worshippers of the one and only God. But this is the worst type of misunderstanding. It is one who goes by sound arguments who is in the really safe position. But if it is by compromising with worldly considerations and customs that he attempts to better his situation, this has no value from the point of view of his final fate. Sometimes the domination of false deities becomes so universal that even the worshippers of the real God are overwhelmed by it and make compromises. Worldly considerations and material interests are so closely linked with these false deities that, to all appearances, it seems that there is no other way to have a respectable life than to effect a compromise with the structure formed under them. But this T HE Quran is the book of God. It has been preserved in its entirety since its revelation to the Prophet of Islam between 610 and 632 A.D. It is a book that brings glad tidings to mankind, along with divine admonition, and stresses the importance of man’s discovery of the Truth on a spiritual and intellectual level. Translated from Arabic and commentary by Maulana Wahiduddin Khan