Title:
What do Muslims Believe? Tawheed - Unity of God
Article:
The very essence, interwoven within the fabric of Islam, is
the conviction in the Creator of the Universe.
The belief in the Sole Entity that developed and designed the grandestand the most diminutive elements of existence is the most basic concept of
faith. God is the Composer of the
harmony in the Universe; orchestrating the melodies of nature, time and space.
It is He who fine-tunes the very development of being, overseeing its
life and death, nurturing its growth and progression.
The very heart of Islam is the unshakable certainty in the reality of the
One God. The One Indivisible; The
One Unequalled, Unparalleled. This
is Tawheed; the absolute Unity of God.
It is not a mere quantitative expression of God's existence, but it
also includes the qualitative essence of the Almighty; a single Being,
functioning under Its own discretion in deliberate manners far beyond the grasp
of human intellect. Moreover, Tawheed
is not a concept that extends itself to understanding the nature of God, but
rather, as a declaration of God's existence as the Self-Sufficient, the
Self-Subsisting and the Supreme Being. This
testimony of mind and body, heart and soul is the result of the observable
splendor within the vastness of reality.
Although Tawheed is simply an expression of God's
singularity and uniqueness it goes further only by nullifying ideologies,
regarding God, that have developed as a result of the human condition.
It negates the very misperception that identifies the Deity with the
universe and nature; as is the belief in pantheism.
God is not everything. Nor is the universe divine.
Any such idea confines the Creator to the universe and to the limitations
of its functions. The doctrine of
Unity in Islam also rejects the concepts of Henotheism in which there is belief
in one god yet no denial of the existence of other gods.
This contradicts the supremacy of the Almighty and potentially renders
His powers negotiable with others. The
monotheism of Islam recognizes that God is Omnipotent and therefore does not
share power with anything nor is there a remote possibility of other deities
existing other than the One God. Anything
exalted, other than the Almighty, is driven down, lowered and sunk by the Truth
of the Lord. Tawheed deposes
the man-made gods and refuses to define Him as intertwined with the universe.
Everything is not God as panentheism suggests that it is.
The idea that God is some macro-entity that this universe dwells within,
or upon, or any such thing, is vehemently objected to.
Even the belief that nothing exists except God is contrary to Islamic
doctrine. There is no deity except
the One God; this is the very foundation of Islam.
No other theism or non-theism has been so detested by Islam as that of
polytheism. Tawheed abhors polytheism.
The principle of Tawheed is polar opposite of any doctrine that
encourages the worship or belief in more than one god.
To create, revere or worship any deity other than the One God is the
greatest offence in Islam. To liken
anything to God is the most diametric contradiction one can make towards this
centerpiece of Islam.
Tawheed is the doctrine of the One God. One
that is not divided amongst Himself. One
that exists alone, sharing no sublimity, no grandeur, no majesty.
He is the Supreme, Transcendent, existing beyond existence.
He is the Creator extrinsic of creation.
He is the One God. The
Only God.