Page 37 - Islam Denounces Terrorism
P. 37
Adnan Oktar (Harun Yahya) 35
logical pressure. Neither will they use any worldly privilege to turn
someone towards religion. When they receive a negative response to
what they say, Muslims will reply along the lines of: "To you your reli-
gion, and to me, mine," as revealed in the verse (Qur'an, 109:6). Mus-
lims must respect and be compassionate towards all beliefs they
encounter, no matter what they may be, and behave forgivingly, justly
and humanely towards everyone, even if they don't believe in any faith
at all. This responsibility placed on believers is to live by the beauty of
the religion of God by means of peace and compassion. The decision
whether or not to implement these truths, whether or not to believe,
lies with each individual himself. Forcing that person to believe, or try-
ing to impose anything on him, is a violation of Qur'anic morality. In
fact, God issues a reminder to believers in the Qur'an:
If your Lord had willed, all the people on the Earth would have
believed. Do you think you can force people to be believers? (Qur'an,
10:99)
A model of society in which people are forced to worship is com-
pletely contradictory to Islamic morality. Belief and worship should
be directed to God by the free will of the individual. If a system
imposes belief and worship on people, then they will act as if they are
religious out of fear of that system. This will mean the encouragement
of hypocrisy and no Muslim would approve that. From the point of
view of Islamic morality, what really counts is that religion should be
lived with the love of God, for God's good pleasure, mercy and par-
adise in an environment where peoples' consciences are totally free.
The history of Islam is full of the compassionate and understand-
ing practices of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) and Muslim rulers
who have followed his way and respected all religions and built reli-
gious freedom. For example, Thomas Arnold, a missionary employed
in the service of the Indian government, describes that Islamic morali-
ty favours freedom in these words:
