Volume 8, No. 2 June-July-August 2000

Editor: Ali R. Fazely

Associate Editors: Saied Andalib and Milan Sulc

P.O. Box 80333

Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70808

E-mail: fazely@home.com

http://Journal_of_Submission.homestead.com

Once again, by GOD's Grace we are back to the above title and God's persistence to keep His word pure. Bear in mind that laws and regulations practiced in many parts of the world in the name of Islam have nothing to do with God's commandments in the Quran. This is nothing but attributing falsehood to God and is a great blasphemy. These practices are equivalent to additions and deletions to the Quran in order to preserve their traditions and the pride of the days of ignorance. These Signs sent from God and His insistence that the number of verses in Sura 9 is to warn us that His word has to be obeyed without imput from people's opinions.

15:9 - Surely, We have revealed the reminder and indeed We are its protector.

The mathematics again preserves the number of verses in Sura 9 as being 127 verses and this time points to the very first sura in order of revelation, chapter 96.. Again the mathematics crosses number bases and glorifies GOD by absolute submission to Him. Let us study the first sura ever revealed, chapter 96. This sura was the very first one revealed. The number 9619 is a very interesting prime. It is a lonely prime and its index is 1187 which also happens to be a lonely prime. The index of 1187 in the domain of lonely primes is 114, the number of chapters in the Quran. As I mentioned, 9619 is a lonely prime and it is the 790th such prime. If one assumes that 790 is written in the base 19, then if one writes it in base 10 it is 2698. Remember that 2698 is the number of times the word GOD appears in the entire Quran. Therefore, verse 96:19 possesses a pivotal role in the Quranic mathematical structure. Now let us review the verse 9:127 and its mathematical properties. The number of the numbered verses in the un-initialed chapters up to 9:127 is 670. The total number of numbered verses up to 9:127 is 1362 which is the 1143^rd composite and we already know that:

1143 = 9 X 127

and;

1143 - 670 = 473

473 = 11 X 43

Now let us examine the permutation group properties of the number 1362. We can make 24, 4-digit numbers as shown in the following table.

Let us look at the group elements with indices of 1, 4, 9 and 19. The index number 1 is 1236 and it is the number of numbered verses up to and including 9:1. If one assumes that 1236 is written in base 8 or octal, then converted to the decimal base it is 670. As, mentioned above 670 is the number of verses in the un-initialed suras up to and including 9:127. Therefore, 1236 signifies the beginning and ending of sura 9 by GOD's design. Index 4 is the number of numbered verses up to and including 9:127. The group element with index 9 is 2316. If one assumes that 2316 is written in base 8 or octal, then is converted to the decimal base it is 1230. The number 1230 is the number of verses in the initialed verses up to and including 19:1.

Such is GOD's Design, Creator of all things.

By: Hossein Kowsari

Islam-total surrender to God and only God - is as old as creation. Before humanity appeared on the scene it was the religion of the universe and all the creatures that inhabited it, and continues to be the religion of nature. All of God's prophets and messengers practiced Islam and brought the message of Islam for humanity - surrender to God and worship of God alone. The first man of knowledge was a Moslem - one who practices Islam in actions and attitude. He was created with almost infinite potential to assimilate divine attributes in order to fit himself as the vicegerent of God on earth. Some religions start the life of humanity with what is generally termed the Fall of Man. The so called Christian version depicts the expulsion of man from paradise because of having eaten the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Quran too uses the term for the transitional period when man was given freewill to be able to go at his own peril, of course-even against God and nature. According to Quran, it was not knowledge but ignorance that drove him out, it was the misuse of the freewill granted to him, that caused his downfall. Quran does not base its superstructure on the fall. Sin or grace, virtue or vice are not inherited. Man's responsible existence started with his freewill and his endowment of knowledge. Humanity is not tainted with any original sin because of the disobedience of a primeval progenitor. Faith in the moral order which Quran enjoins and all prophets and messengers have confirmed presupposes freewill. If man were born with an incorrigible congenital bent towards sin, the Creator would be more diabolical than divine. Such a God would be neither just nor good. Quran categorically and emphatically repudiates such false doctrine - original sin- transmitted by inheritance.

17:15 " Whoever is guided is guided for his own good, and whoever goes astray does so to his own detriment. No sinner will bear the sins of anyone else."

2:254 "Give (to others) from Our provisions to you, before a day comes where there is no bargaining, there is no nepotism, and there is no intercession..."

Humanity starts with the emergence of freewill which may manifest itself as disobedience to God or the laws of nature. Man does not start life with perverted instincts. All of his instincts, like the instincts of animals, are instruments of the preservation of life; it is only with false knowledge and perverted freewill that disorder sets in.

30:30 "Therefore you shall devote yourselves to the religion of strict monotheism. Such is the natural instinct placed into the people by God. Such creation of God will never change. This is the perfect religion, but most people do not know."

Thus Islam is not a man-made creed, it is not a set of instructions, rituals, and laws; it is the natural religion, religion of nature. In the case of man, nature within him rightly adjusted to the nature without him, will harmonize him with himself, and of course with God.

Islam, the religion preached and practiced by all the messengers and prophets, from Abraham to Zartosht (Zaroastar), did not obviously originate with Muhammad. Islam means peace and surrender (to the will of God). These two meanings have a common psychological root. God is the universal creative and preservative will of existence, God stands for harmony and anything that stands for conflict is anti-God. No man can be at peace with himself or with others or with his environment unless he voluntarily surrenders her will to the universal will, will of God. Sin is nothing but self-centered particularity. It is egotism and arrogance that refuses to recognize God, The Absolute, The Unique, The One, and refuses to recognize that the good of all is the good of everyone.

Quran promulgates the doctrine of unity of religions, however, it considers only theistic religions as true religion and thus recognizes only those creeds in which the absolute oneness and uniqueness of God is realized; all else is barbarity and ignorance which degrades man to such an extent that he becomes subhuman. Quran says in 7:179 "...they are as cattle; nay, they are in worse error..."Wherever there is true religion there is no monopoly of salvation. Quran says Abraham was not a Jew and Christ was not a Christian; their religion was the same primeval and eternal Islam- submission- the religion of the identification of human and divine will to attain that perfect harmony which is the ideal urge and goal, not only of humanity but of the entire creation. Quran says, 2:113 " The Jews say, the Christians have no basis (for their beliefs), while the Christians say, the Jews have no basis (for their beliefs)- and both quote the scripture..." Both of them - as so many other groups - assert for their respective groups the monopoly of salvation and truth.

Quran categorically repudiates all ideas of monopoly in truth or salvation. Salvation or peace here and hereafter is for him who submits to God and does vituous deeds; the very essentials of religion. Belief in the moral order or the law of moral compensation along with belief in God, as the source of the moral and natural order completes the faith of man if he is also doer of good deeds. Quran implicitly and explicitly repeats this message throughout;

2:62 "Surely those who believe and those who are Jews and Christians and the Converts, (...) whoever believes in God and the Last Day and does good, they shall have their reward from their Lord, and there is no fear for them, nor shall they grieve."

This is not a mere religious tolerance which is a very negative attitude; it is a positive injunction to extend the brotherhood of faith to all those who have the essentials of faith although they may differ in their rituals. Each creed has its rituals, of course, and there are rituals for the followers of Quran as well, but Quran gives subordinate and secondary place to all the rituals. It is enjoined upon the followers of Quran, for example, to turn his face toward the Holy Mosque in Mecca, while offering the daily prayers. But fearing lest it be considered as part of the essence of submission to God, Quran says there is no special virtue in this that you turn your face toward the east or the west; 2:115 "God's is the east and the west; therefore wither you turn there is God's countenance". 2:177 "Righteousness is not merely turning your faces towards the east or the west. Righteous is the one who believes in God and the Last Day and the angels and the revelations and the prophets..."

Islam is eternal, it is a creed that can never become outworn. It is not like the creeds that have their day and then cease to be. Human history is a limbo of outworn creeds and discredited dogmas, here today gone tomorrow, as Quran says, 3:137 "(Many) ways of life have come and gone before your time; roam the earth (O man) and see what happened in the end to those who rejected the truth."

The eternal teachings of Quran cover all aspects of life from particulars to general, nothing is left out as it must not be since it recognizes no other source. It enjoins that the development of life must remain open on every side, the road to infinite knowledge must be open, the road to the conquest of nature through understanding must be open; the way to the unity of humanity and to the one world must be open. All gods must be dethroned to make way for the worship of the One God, All Powerful Creator and Sustainer. All intermediaries between God and man must be brushed aside and discarded so that man may directly contact God at any time of the day or night, at any location, at any place, and virtually stand face to face with his Creator, life eternal. Man shall not worship man and no professionally religious priesthood is recognized.

The ideal man in Quran is conceived to be a being before whom even angels prostrate because he God's spirit in him, because of his superior knowledge and because he surrenders to God; he is God's vicegerent on earth. Quran says everything in the heavens and earth is destined to be controlled by man on the condition that he is true to his real self and identifies his will with God's will-universal will. Islam means the conquest of peace and happiness and the attainment of power through surrender. This surrender is not to be a surrender to any natural force or to any mundane power but to God and God only. According to Quran, man's real self is a divine self because God breathed His own spirit into it. Man's nature is an implicit covenant with his Creator and the fulfillment of that eternal covenant is life eternal. Man is a goal seeking animal. His life becomes a failure when he sets up the wrong goal for himself. Quran has set up a goal before man which he can approach eternally. God is and must be the source as well as the goal of life. Recognizing God as the promulgator of the moral order and the judge of good and evil, we are asked to synthesize the concepts of love and justice. According to Quran the two concepts include each other. If God is loving and just, then Him alone man must serve, obey and worship. The first Sura that we repeat in all daily prayers, and on every momentous occasion says " Thee alone we serve and Thee alone we ask for help". The word 'ibadat' translated here as 'serve' has a much wider significance in the original Arabic than is conveyed by the word 'service'. It means wholehearted obedience as well as worship. It means the total surrender of will to the will of another, thus the word 'abd' from the same root means slave, one whole will and life are always at the disposal of his master. Islam, total and sincere surrender to the will of God necessarily does and must lead to that type of action and attitude, as denoted by the word Ibadat; without any trace of pride and arrogance on our part.

What is asked by God is voluntary and loving service. If God is our ideal, we are asked to serve Him only. If the ideal is the sum total of all the values of life, then surely no man can rightly serve anything else. When we serve other things besides the ideal we go astray and jeopardize our lives. When we serve individual instincts without subordinating them to the ideal we create chaos in our lives. If we serve money, the material things of life or power we are not true to our higher selves. When we serve other human beings out of love or material gains, we do injustice to ourselves and to others. When we superstitiously serve gods of our own making or the forces of nature; being overawed by them, we are injuring the dignity of humanity. True freedom, true self actualization and highest self esteem lies only in the service of ideal. The man who serves many ideals and diverse urges, mutually hostile and uncoordinated, disrupts the harmony of his being. Quran says;

39:29 "God sets forth a parable; as man who has for his masters several partners, at variance with one another, and a man depending wholly on one; are these two comparable? All praise belongs to God, but most of them do not use their reason."

Life cannot be lived completely unless all our ideals and urges are merged in a single all embracing ideal whose service should be completely satisfying by doing justice to all aspects of our being. The tragedy of human life is that man is dominated by false fears and is tempted by illusory gains which draw him away from the ideal. Exclusive service of God means identification with the will of God. Total surrender also means, not the negation of our dignity, but is complete fulfillment; it is the only way of self-realization. It means the conquest of life and happiness and tranquility, we stoop- to God and none other- to conquer, and we will conquer; as Quran says, "...it is they who have achieved triumph."

There is now, as has been throughout history, revolt against "religion" from those who preach "self" above all and consider service of God to be slave morality and teachings; to those who say religion was born out of ignorance and fear by man. They assert that religion teaches slavery; it is an opiate for the oppressed concocted by the exploiters of humanity; man, they claim, should not serve any power except the dignity of his own humanity. I have put the word religion in quotations at the beginning of the above paragraph because the way the so called "religions" are practiced today, some of the charges may be true. This corruption of the unity of shared ideals of all religions - worship and serving God and God alone with no intermediaries and no priesthood of any kind - is man made and thus blame lies elsewhere and not with God who sent all the messengers with the same essential, universal message.

All objections, therefore, are nullified when we keep in mind the Quranic concept of God, as preached by all messengers, and the service and worship that is due Him. God is a creative being; He is a life force. He is Rabb, the Cherisher, the Forsterer, He is God of development, a guarantee of the preservation of life and its values. When we are asked to serve God we are asked to serve and advance reason and justice in life. There is no commandment which is not in the interest of our own advancement. According to Quran, every act of rightful living is an act of worship. The entire creation is meant to worship God and does worship God voluntarily or involuntarily, consciously or unconsciously. Enjoying the good things of life, procured by rightful effort, is an act of worship.

7:32 "Say: who has prohibited the nice things God brought forth for His servants and the good provisions..."

17:44 "The seven heavens extol His limitless glory, and the earth and all they contain; and there is not a single thing that does not extol His limitless glory. But is it you who does not grasp the manner of their glorification".

We are asked then to serve and worship Him whom all nature serves and obeys. Obedience to the laws of our own nature is worship and service of God. We are not asked to obey a power external to us because of fear. Quran says that true religion is our own nature divinely created and ordained. The Ideal, then, that we are asked to serve exclusively, is also the Ideal of entire creation. Service of God is living in time with the infinite and harmonizing with the laws of our own being.

All life is God - created, God-guided, and God-nourished. Every aspect of existence can serve the purpose of our life; man is destined to command all existence. But man can do this by knowledge and obedience to God's laws. We rise through knowledge only when we obey the dictates of knowledge; thereby we become masters and not slaves of existence. Surrender to God the Ideal, is freedom in the true sense. We must refuse to be slaves to any partial aspect of existence or to any being other than God, however threatening it may appear. Man is enslaved by man; he is also enslaved by his own ignorance. He has a tendency to serve any power by which he is enslaved. Truth is deliverance from any and all types of slavery.

Man is a worshipping animal. If he will not worship God, he will worship idols of his own making. There is no greater calamity for man than to worship things that are not only below God but even below himself. He who worships any thing or any being except God degrades himself beyond measure. Islam; total surrender and worship of God is not a magical act to bring about supernatural interference’s in a causally regulated world. It is not flattering an infinite power to win favors from Him. It is not a set of instructions, rituals, declarations and prohibitions. It is truly dedication to the spirit of life. It is the gaining of freedom, it is the winning of independence by repudiation of all "powers" except the All Powerful, the source of all power.

Islam is the winning of independence and the attainment of peace and tranquility by repudiation and total rejection of any and all beings as having any ability to do anything for us - except God, the One, the Only One , the absolutely Unique One - the One Who cannot be described, cannot be compared, cannot be imagined - the One Who neither begets nor is begotten, the Eternal, the Uncaused Cause of all that exists, the Doer of all things, the One Who gives us life, the One Who gives us contentment and tranquility, the One Who guides us, the One Who feeds us, the One Who quenches our thirst, the One Who will not abandon us, the One Who gives us all that we have, the One Who heals us when we get sick, the One Who can forgive us and our foolishness, the One Who hears our prayers in the middle of the day, or in the middle of the night, the One Who is always there for us to turn to; the One Who will not disown us; we belong to Him, we will return to Him; the One Who knows us infinitely better than ourselves, the One Who is near us, always; the One Who is Rabb, Lord of us all, of all the worlds, of all beings, of all that exists, Lord of believers and rejecters, of the arrogant and the humble, Lord of Moses and Pharaoh, Lord of Jesus and Caesar; Lord of Muhammad and the Persian king; Lord of the lions and the lambs; the One Who has told us never to lose hope of His mercy because only ungrateful rejecters of truth lose hope of God's mercy.

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