Earlier this week Grand Mufti Abdulaziz al- Sheikh, a descendant of Mohammad ibn Abdel-Wahhab, the founder of Wahhabism – Saudi Arabia state religion, announced atop his pulpit that Iranians were not in fact Muslims.
“We must understand they [Iranians] are not Muslims, for they are the descendants of Majuws, and their enmity toward Muslims, especially the Sunnis, is very old,” the Saudi cleric said.
His attack it needs to be said was really directed at Shia Islam. His attack it needs to be said embodies what Wahhabism truly is: a vengeful, reactionary dogma which cornerstone was laid upon the blood of the innocent.
But who are those Muslims, Wahhabism now seek to cast out of Islam for it cannot bear their sight any longer?
A better question would be: What is Wahhabism but the expression of an abomination risen from the mind of a heretic, whose understanding of the Scriptures could not even reach his lips?
On whose authority is Wahhabism speaking but its illegitimate and untrue self?
Who are those who are working to divide what God made whole? Who are those who work to sully God’s faith and betray the Message He imparted on his servant: the prophet Muhammad, so that he would in turn entrust it to the First Imam of Islam: Imam Ali?
Who are they but the very apostasy they are claiming onto others?
There can be no heresy in following in the footsteps of the House that rose above all others. There can never be heresy or untruth in enacting the very oath which the Prophet Muhammad called upon his community, his ummah, to take so that Islam would be preserved in its unity, in its continuity, and its integrity.
“O Messenger! Deliver what has been revealed to you from your Lord; and if you do it not, then you have not delivered His message, and Allah will protect you from the people; surely Allah will not guide the unbelieving people.” (5:67)
It is those who seek to betray, lie and pervert who in fact need to be cast out, not those who follow, not those who remain loyal regardless of hardship. The very word Shia means followers of.
Who are the Shias of Ali but not the followers of Muhammad and God’s servants?
Who are the Shias of Ali, but not the keeper of a Word and a Tradition Wahhabism has long vowed to disappear for its Light challenges its Darkness?
Let me speak to you of Islam, and those souls who have chosen to stand in its Truth for they recognised in its verses and the words of their Imams God’s call to His people. Allow me to tell you of a faith which beauty lies in its universality and embraces of all of God’s children, whichever their manner of prayers, whatever their origins … Let me tell you of Islam and the Love which is carried in its Scriptures – the very Scriptures which echo those of the Torah and the Bible.
Let me speak to you of the Shias of Muhammad for their voices have been stolen by those in Riyadh who intend to steal religion away from God and pervert His Scriptures so that, they, themselves could rise deities above mankind.
We live in a time of great ignorance … We live in a time of great deceit, whereby the tyrants are claiming the martyrdom of their victims, whereby truths are dressed up as lies, so that criminals could reinvent the divine to their image.
Who are those clerics calling for the death of God’s people? Who are they but not a devolution? Who are those who dare speak against the people of the Book (Christians and Jews) but not the abject Fascism we were warned against?
Islam is not to be found in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia perverted and twisted Islam so that its people would be cut off from the truth. Today Saudi Arabia is turning its anger towards the one nation which most of all has stood in Islam traditions: Iran.
Iran does not own Islam … but it speaks it. Iran does not have a monopoly over Islam … Islam can be found wherever the oath of Ghadeer still lives, wherever loyalties are bound to the only House which ever was – that of our beloved Prophet Muhammad.
To Saudi Arabia I say: “You call us infidels but it is you who have betrayed. You call us reformers but it is you who reneged on your Imam and denied your Prophet.
You call for our demise … We pray still for your salvation.
You call from your pulpits and your golden corridors for the people of the Book to perish under your blade … We will stand with whoever has God on their lips and call them brother, for we recognise God in all His Creation.
You have disappeared the world religious heritage, you have slayed religious communities and called it righteous. You have spitted hatred and violence and assigned blame on those pages of the Quran you cannot possibly understand in your arrogance.
How can you wish ill upon Jews and Christians when their faith is an echo of the faith which you claim?
How can you read vengeance when God commanded you … all of us to see in Christians and Jews the voices of God’s prophets?
Will you deny Moses and murder his followers, his Shias? Will you murder Jesus’s children and deny your Messiah’s call when God appointed you to him and commanded you to wait for his return?
Will you deny what you were yourself commanded to believe?”
For all the lies, deceptions and vile attempts to denigrate, belittle, and outlaw the true, unadulterated message of Islam, the Shias of Muhammad, the Shias of Ali, the Shias of Hassan, the Shias of Hussain, the Shias of AhlulBayt have withstood for their strength lies in the Quran, and their heart have recognised the call of their Prophets and Imams.
Today Saudi Arabia has sent its High Priest to sully Ayatollah Ali Khameini’s message to the world … Truth it appears wounded the kingdom.
In Saudi Arabia’s attack against Islam it is its intent to lay waste all faiths opposed to its own which was laid bare. By denying Iranians their faith, Saudi Arabia essentially placed itself outside of Islam.
Islam was always united; it is men such as Abdulaziz al- Sheikh who have sought to fragment that which God made whole.
Islam I will continue to argue is One: one Book, one Message, one God …
By Catherine Shakdam for the Shafaqna Centre for Middle Eastern Studies – This article can also be found on the Huffington Post
source : Shafaqna
