"And I go into women, and I eat meat, and I fast, and I break my fast. He is not of my people who maketh men eunuchs or maketh himself a eunuch."
Martin Lings, Muhammad, p. 169
Lately I've been reading Martin Lings's biography of Muhammad, which I actually started during Ramadan but haven't finished (anyone who knows me can testify that I have the bad habit of perpetually being in the middle of five books at once, often geographically - some at my office and some are at home, and some of the first floor and some are on the second). As you might expect there have been many biographies of the Prophet written, and while it's not my goal to read every one of them I do expect that I'll work my way through a lot of them. I read them less to learn about Muhammad and more to learn about the faith itself if that makes any sense. As I've said before there's always a danger in the fact that we know so much about the life of the Prophet because then we, essentially unbidden, have trouble viewing the Quran as revelation as compared as simply through the eyes of Muhammad; the classic example would be the many admonitions related to the care of orphans, which you can find yourself saying "well, of course Muhammad would care about orphans because he was an orphan" as compared to considering that God might actually want us to look after the weakest amongst us (unless you work for the Trump junta, of course). Again, as I've opined, there's also a danger in letting our respect for the Prophet turn into worship. The Prophet, PBUH, was a man, an extraordinary man, but in the end, as we're reminded in the Quran, a man. Still, reading biographies of Muhammad does help me understand more about the faith, and, well, they're also fascinating, because few people led a more amazing and in some ways almost inexplicable life.
The passage quoted above is a response from Muhammad to Uthman ibn Maz'un (not the Uthman of the Four Rightly-Guided Caliphs), who Lings reminds us was "the most ascetic of his Companions." Again, as Lings writes, Uthman "had become so bent on suppressing earthly desires that he asked permission of the Prophet to make himself a eunuch and to spend the rest of his life as a wandering beggar." Muhammad's response forms an unqualified rejection of extremism. Muslims often speak of themselves as the Middle Community for several reasons, and one of them is a stress on moderation and a rejection of extremism (although, sadly, we've produced more than a few). Over the last three months (has it been three months already?) that I've been involved in this project I've often made the point that there are aspects of Islam that remind me of other faiths, including Buddhism, mainly the very human, day to day struggle to control the ego. A big difference to that view would be the notion of renouncing the world and living your life as a wandering mendicant, which you still see in Buddhism although obviously more in Hinduism. In Islam we are instructed to be out in the world, which is why the five daily prayers also work as a metaphor for the faith; take a break from the world, reconnect with God, and then get back out there - people are depending upon you.
Martin Lings, Muhammad, p. 169
Lately I've been reading Martin Lings's biography of Muhammad, which I actually started during Ramadan but haven't finished (anyone who knows me can testify that I have the bad habit of perpetually being in the middle of five books at once, often geographically - some at my office and some are at home, and some of the first floor and some are on the second). As you might expect there have been many biographies of the Prophet written, and while it's not my goal to read every one of them I do expect that I'll work my way through a lot of them. I read them less to learn about Muhammad and more to learn about the faith itself if that makes any sense. As I've said before there's always a danger in the fact that we know so much about the life of the Prophet because then we, essentially unbidden, have trouble viewing the Quran as revelation as compared as simply through the eyes of Muhammad; the classic example would be the many admonitions related to the care of orphans, which you can find yourself saying "well, of course Muhammad would care about orphans because he was an orphan" as compared to considering that God might actually want us to look after the weakest amongst us (unless you work for the Trump junta, of course). Again, as I've opined, there's also a danger in letting our respect for the Prophet turn into worship. The Prophet, PBUH, was a man, an extraordinary man, but in the end, as we're reminded in the Quran, a man. Still, reading biographies of Muhammad does help me understand more about the faith, and, well, they're also fascinating, because few people led a more amazing and in some ways almost inexplicable life.
The passage quoted above is a response from Muhammad to Uthman ibn Maz'un (not the Uthman of the Four Rightly-Guided Caliphs), who Lings reminds us was "the most ascetic of his Companions." Again, as Lings writes, Uthman "had become so bent on suppressing earthly desires that he asked permission of the Prophet to make himself a eunuch and to spend the rest of his life as a wandering beggar." Muhammad's response forms an unqualified rejection of extremism. Muslims often speak of themselves as the Middle Community for several reasons, and one of them is a stress on moderation and a rejection of extremism (although, sadly, we've produced more than a few). Over the last three months (has it been three months already?) that I've been involved in this project I've often made the point that there are aspects of Islam that remind me of other faiths, including Buddhism, mainly the very human, day to day struggle to control the ego. A big difference to that view would be the notion of renouncing the world and living your life as a wandering mendicant, which you still see in Buddhism although obviously more in Hinduism. In Islam we are instructed to be out in the world, which is why the five daily prayers also work as a metaphor for the faith; take a break from the world, reconnect with God, and then get back out there - people are depending upon you.
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