MUḤAMMADANISM. The religion of Muḥammad is called by its followers al-Islām (الاسلام), a word which implies the entire surrender of the will of man to God. [[ISLAM].] Its adherents speak of themselves as Muslims, pl. Muslimūn, or Muʾmin, pl. Muʾminūn; a Muʾmin being a “believer.” In Persian these terms are rendered by the word Musalmān, pl. Musalmānān.
The principles of Islām were first enunciated in portions of the Qurʾān, as they were revealed piecemeal by Muḥammad, together with such verbal explanations as were given by him to his followers; but when the final recension of the Qurʾān was produced by the K͟halīfah ʿUs̤mān, about twenty-two years after Muḥammad’s death, the Muslims possessed a complete book, which they regarded as the inspired and infallible word of God. [[QURʾAN].] But as an interpretation of its precepts, and as a supplement to its teachings, there also existed, side by side with the Qurʾān, the sayings, and practice of Muḥammad, called the Aḥādīs̤ and Sunnah. These traditions of what the Prophet “did and said,” gradually laid the foundations of what is now called Islām. For whilst it is a canon in Islām that nothing can be received or taught which is contrary to the literal injunctions of the Qurʾān, it is to the Traditions rather than to the Qurʾān that we must refer for Muḥammadan law on the subject of faith, knowledge, purification, prayer, almsgiving, fasting, marriage, barter, inheritance, punishments, fate, duties of magistrates, religious warfare, lawful food, death, Day of Judgment, &c., and each collection of traditions has sections devoted to these subjects; so that it is upon these traditional sayings, quite as much as upon the Qurʾān itself, that the religious and civil law of the Muslims is based, both Shīʿah and Sunnī appealing alike to Tradition in support of their views.
When the Prophet was alive, men could go direct to him with their doubts and difficulties; and an infallible authority was always present to give “inspired” directions. But after the deaths of all those who knew Muḥammad personally, it became absolutely necessary to systematise the great mass of traditional sayings then afloat amongst Muslims, and thus various schools of jurisprudence were formed; the concurrent opinion of those learned regarding matters of dispute in Muslim law being called Ijmāʿ [[IJMAʿ]]. Upon this naturally followed the system of analogical reasoning called Qiyās [[QIYAS]]; thus constituting the four “pillars” or foundations of Islām, known as the Qurʾān, Ḥadīs̤, Ijmāʿ, and Qiyās.
Islām, whether it be Shīʿah, Sunnī, or Wahhābī, is founded upon these four authorities, and it is not true, as is so frequently asserted, that the Shīʿahs reject the Traditions. They merely accept different collections of Aḥādīs̤ to those received by the Sunnīs and Wahhābīs. Nor do the Wahhābīs reject Ijmāʿ and Qiyās, but they assert that Ijmāʿ was only possible in the earliest stages of Islām.
A study of the present work will show what an elaborate system of dogma Muḥammadanism is. This system of dogma, together with the liturgical form of worship, has been formulated from the traditional sayings of Muḥammad rather than from the Qurʾān itself. For example, the daily ritual, with its purifications, which are such a prominent feature in Islām, is entirely founded on the Traditions. [[PRAYER].] Circumcision is not once mentioned in the Qurʾān.
The Dīn, or religion of the Muslim, is divided into Imān, or “Faith,” and ʿAmal, or “Practice.”
Faith consists in the acceptance of six articles of belief:—
1. The Unity of God.
2. The Angels.