The Book Exploring and Exposing Islam

There are many books on Islam which highly and in strong words criticize it, but rarely a book which entirely explores and exposes it's horrible nature without the need of expressing in words of criticism. Such a rare book is Islam - Maker of Muslim Mind written by Prof. Sheshrao Moray (India). This is an English version of his original Marathi book ‘Muslim Manacha Shodh'. This book being though apparently informative and objective but really and effectively highly explosive was originally printed for private circulation. Surprisingly and fortunately five scholars of the Jamaat-e-Islami, a well-known fundamentalist organization appreciated the book as presenting true Islam and wrote 61-pages review sent to the author, which has been included in abridged form (27 pages) as a foreword in this English edition.

This book presents only the original Islam. It means that the teachings of Islam which was presented, taught and understood during the prophetic life period (610 - 32) of Muhammad. There are three sources of original Islam: the Biography of Muhammad, the Qur'an and the Hadis (Sunnah). After the death of the Prophet Muhammad, there arose various sects among Muslim community but all of those unanimously and firmly believe in this original Islam as the Divine or True religion. Thus, this book presents Islam which is acceptable to all the people and sects of the Muslim community over the world.

Even though the Qur'an is the fundamental text of Islam, the knowledge of the biography of Muhammad and Hadis is utmost necessary to understand the meaning of the Qur'an itself. The Qur'an is the collection of messages from Allah received by Muhammad during 23 years of prophetic period as and when the occasions for them arose. Therefore meaning and significance of the verses of the Qur'an cannot be grasped unless the situation in which they were revealed is known. Since the Qur'an itself does not refer the context of the verses, the incidents in the life of the Prophet have to be separately studied to provide the background. For this it is said that ‘the Qur'an is the written biography of the prophet'; and the latter ‘is the living Qur'an'.

Hadis is the collection of the sayings and doings of the prophet. These are gathered from the reminiscences of his followers and afterwards compiled by various scholars and now are available in book-form. Hadis is said to be the dictionary and guide to the Qur'an. Hence this book deals with these fonts of Islam: the biography (176 pages), the Qur'an (296 pages) and the Hadis (67 pages). If you read this book you will get total picture of Islam and the master key to study and understand it further. It is not exaggeration to say that no other book on Islam incorporates these three fonts together and gives correct direction and point of view to understand the teachings of original Islam.

There are apparently many contradictions in the Qur'an itself. For example, it exhorts the Muslims to be patient, not to abuse idols, not to make compulsion in religion, use sword only for defence. But, there are many verses enjoining exactly otherwise. Why this contradiction? This book gives the answer. The prophet had lived 13 years at Mecca and then after migration (Hijrat) 10 years at Medina. In Mecca, he had a few followers among large numbers of hostile idolaters. His followers had to suffer persecution at their hands and so he decided to migrate to Medina. Hence the teaching in the verses revealed in Meccan period is of submissive nature. During Medinan period, the prophet had established a state, a military; day by day his strength increased; finally before his death he became the ruler of the whole of Arabia, the Land of Islam. Hence teaching in verses revealed during Medina period is of more and more aggressive nature, advising to use the sword to make Islam supreme in the world. Thus, in reality, there is no contradiction in the Qur'anic teaching, contradiction lies in the situations; the Qur'an in the Meccan period teaches how Muslims should behave when they are in minority whereas in Medina period teaches how to behave when they are in majority. Prof. Moray has explored this point so clearly that the reader would get an insight to understand the correct meaning of the so-called contradicting verses of the Qur'an.

This book, citing number of verses and Hadis clearly points out that Allah has divided the mankind into two parts: believers (in Islam) and disbelievers (in Islam, i.e. Kafir's). Allah guides, loves, favors, helps, forgives, corrects faults, exalts, makes victorious, makes rulers, rewards, grants heaven - only to the believers. He does exactly opposite to the disbelievers. Not only this, he also misguides, misleads and sends astray the disbelievers. According to the Qur'an, the disbelievers are disobedient, ingrate, traitors, liars, miscreants, evil-doers, unjust, transgressors, perverse, corruptors, mischief-makers, aggressors, worst of beasts and so on. Exactly is opposite for the believers. Further the Qur'an says that Allah and the believers are the enemy of disbelievers. This earth belongs to Allah, his prophet and his believers; and the disbelievers have no right to live upon the earth. Thus the Qur'an divides the mankind into two hostile camps; one struggling constantly against the other; this struggle (Jihad) would continue until the whole world becomes believer in Islam. Two chapters (88 pages) are devoted for exploring horrible nature of Islamic Jihad.

Excellent chapter in this book is ‘Peace, Brotherhood, Tolerance, Justice...' (86 pages) This chapter deals with each and every verse of the Qur'an which apparently advocates the modern human values arising from freedom, equality and brotherhood. On the basis of these verses, so-called progressive Muslim scholars assert that Islam teaches these modern human values. However going behind these Qur'anic verses, finding out the situation in which those are revealed; pointing out the correct meaning of these verses, Prof. Moray clearly shows how these scholars are misleading the non-Muslims.

According to Islam, it is The Only Divine and True Religion. However, it is not a new religion but the same sent by Allah through previous prophets and books to each and every community on the earth. The Qur'an enjoins every Muslim to treat all these previous prophets and books with equal regard. Prof. Moray explains this point of contradiction. Every Muslim has to believe in all previous prophets and books but in its pristine form and not in the present distorted form. As per Islam, originally all religions, books, prophets and their teaching was same and it was just contained in the Qur'an, but afterwards they got distorted and corrupted. It means all mankind should accept Islam, the Qur'an, Muhammad as their religion, book and prophet in their pristine form. Prof. Moray states that this is not equality of religion but hailing and vindicating Islam for the purpose of propagation.

According to Islam, a Muslim must obey only Allah's command and laws as contained in the Qur'an and Hadis. Allah is the sovereign in all matters and accepting anything (for example: Constitution, Parliament) sovereign is an unpardonable offence of shirk (which means accepting anything equal to or along with Allah.) He will not bow before anything except Allah. To him everything is Allah.

Thus, this book reveals correct picture of original Islam and in turn also reveals how Muslim mind is built up and works according to the teachings of Islam. By writing this book and obtaining approval from Muslim scholars Prof. Moray has done a good service to the mankind. It is now our duty to understand Islam from such books in its correct perspective and find out way and means to accept the challenge of Islam to the humanity. It is not the misguided or bigoted Muslims but the original Islam itself which is the main cause of Muslim extremism and terrorism in the world.

Name of book  - Islam: Maker of Muslim Mind

Author              - Prof. Sheshrao Moray

Pages               - 670

Publisher          - Rajhans Prakashan, Pune

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Price                - Rs. 800/-