The Struggle Against "the Religion Of Irreligion"

[uyghur]

by Harun Yahya


(Friday 16 July 2004)


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"Indeed, the disbelievers of our time are determined not to abandon their "religion" because their ancestors, Darwin, Lenin, Stalin and Mao, had put their faith in it and worshipped its gods. Their ancestors believed that life came into existence from lifeless matter, that living beings evolved from one another as a result of mutations, and that there is no Creator who created everything from nothing.."


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RELIGIONS OF IRRELIGION: MATERIALISM AND DARWINISM


Materialism is an ideology that has existed since time immemorial and holds that the only absolute being is matter. According to this false belief, matter has existed from the infinite past and will remain forever. The most significant feature of materialism is its rejection of the existence of a Creator and other religious beliefs. There are many movements and ideologies in the world that hold irreligion as their main dogma, and materialism is the foundation of a great majority of them. To put it another way, the most effective influence in irreligion is materialism.


Since the time of the Sumerians and ancient Greeks, materialist thinking has permeated human history. However, it was mainly in the 19th century that this superstitious belief made its way to a well-established system of thought. But one obstacle to materialist understanding as it gathered momentum was the question, "How did the universe and living beings come into existence?"


It was within the same century that the theory of evolution, presented by Charles Darwin, provided an answer (which actually had no scientific validity) that the materialists had sought for so long. According to this baseless theory, lifeless materials came together coincidentally due to random forces to form the first cell. And according to Darwinism, all living beings on the earth subsequently developed thanks to the evolution of that very first cell.


Through these claims Darwin quickly became the architect of the greatest falsehood in the history of science. His theory, grounded on not a speck of scientific finding, is but fallible reasoning, as he himself admitted. Indeed, Darwin confessed in his book The Origin of Species that the evolution theory was lacking in the face of many important questions.


Still, he expected that advances in science would make it possible to overcome those difficulties and that new scientific findings would consolidate his theory. He often mentioned this in his book, but contrary to what Darwin hoped, advances in science actually disproved the fundamental assumptions of the theory, one by one. Indeed, in spite of all the evolutionist propaganda, the theory of evolution is, as stated by Michael Denton, an Australian biologist, "a theory in crisis."


Throughout the 19th century scientific facts pertaining to the theory of evolution were totally unknown. Meanwhile, for materialists in search of scientific support, this theory was seized as an unprecedented opportunity since what Charles Darwin presented was denial of the existence of a Creator. At that period the assertion that human beings had developed from inanimate materials by pure chance was exactly what the materialists wanted to hear.


Phillip Johnson, a professor at the University of Chicago, renowned and well respected in academic circles for his books and criticisms of the theory of evolution, makes clear what the theory represents for irreligious systems of thought:


...The triumph of Darwinism implied the rejection of God and set the stage for replacing biblical religion with a new faith based on evolutionary naturalism. That new faith would become the basis not just of science but also of government, law and morality. It would be the established religious philosophy of modernity.1


The words of Phillip Johnson indicate the real aim of the advocates of this philosophy of irreligion. Materialists, driven to form an irreligious society that rejects the existence of Allah and His law, claim that there is no one to whom human beings must feel responsible. The misguided rationale satisfies their desire for a kind of human being who is not accountable to anyone. Their ambition is summed up by one of their scientists as follows:


Man stands alone in the universe, a unique product of a long, unconscious, impersonal, material process, with unique understanding and potentialities. These he owes to no one but himself, and it is to himself that he is responsible.2


Any person of sound mind and conscience can see, without difficulty, the senseless reasoning inherent in the statements above. The author of these statements, a scientist with a material outlook on life, attributes man's existence to his own success. However, it is obvious that at no stage of this process did man exercise his own faculty of decision-making or authority. It was Allah who created man on earth in perfect form, but the passion for being "accountable to no one" led materialists to expect that unconscious and mindless matter could form conscious and intelligent beings.


It should be remembered that the longing of disbelievers for freedom from accountability is not peculiar to materialists and evolutionists of the 19th and 20th centuries. In the Qur’an, Allah informs us about the existence of previous peoples who shared the same mind-set:


“Does man think that he will be left neglected? Had he not been a sperm from semen emitted? Then he was a clinging clot, and [Allah] created [his form] and proportioned [him] and made of him two mates, the male and the female? Is not that [Creator] able to give life to the dead?” (Surah al-Qiyama 75:36-40)


As the verse points out, Allah created man from a drop containing sperm and proportioned him. By no means could man have had any authority to exercise over his own creation because he himself was created. However, despite the explicit description by Allah, some people still dare to attribute their existence on earth to themselves and claim to be "unaccountable" beings.


The concept of man's unaccountability, encouraged by materialist thinking and supported by the theory of evolution, dominates modern social structure and the scientific and ideological world of today. This deviant understanding which wages war against the moral values that provide order and unity to society has resulted in generations exposed to ever increasing decline.


Today, science has proved that materialist conceptions as well as the theory of evolution are false, that they are not based on any scientific evidence whatsoever, and that they continue to be refuted by scientific findings. Yet, under the persistent social inculcation of the last 150 years, materialism and the theory of evolution are still being advocated by many people as though they were proven facts. That is because the advocates of irreligion desperately need them both to deny the existence of Allah and to distance people from religion and moral values. Otherwise, they would be deprived of any grounds on which to defend their irreligion.


DEFENDING A THEORY ABANDONED BY SCIENCE


Many scientists of our day clearly admit why they continue to defend the concepts of evolution and materialism despite more recent scientific facts. For instance, Phillip Johnson quotes and comments on statements by Richard Lewontin, a geneticist from Harvard University and fervent advocator of the evolution theory with blind faith in materialism:


"The primary problem is not to provide the public with the knowledge of how far it is to the nearest star and what genes are made of... Rather, the problem is to get them to reject irrational and supernatural explanations of the world..." What the public needs to learn is that, like it or not, "we exist as material beings in a material world, all of whose phenomena are the consequences of material relations among material entities. In a word, the public needs to accept materialism, which means that they must [reject] God..."


These statements clearly indicate the materialists' outlook on life based on misguided rationale. Facts introduced by science today reveal that the claims asserted are contrary to logic and reason. But despite all scientific data, they are blindly committed to their beliefs and continue in efforts on behalf of their cause. Dr. Michael Walker, an anthropologist from the University of Sydney, explains why the theory of evolution is still being promoted:


One is forced to conclude that many scientists and technologists pay lip service to Darwinian theory only because it supposedly excludes a creator.


Phillip Johnson, who refuses the scientifically unjustifiable claims of Darwinism, elaborates on why it has had such an "irreplaceable" importance for the unbelieving leaders of science and why they maintain it at all costs:


Leaders of science see themselves as locked in a desperate battle against religious fundamentalists, a label which they tend to apply broadly to anyone who believes in a Creator who plays an active role in worldly affairs... Darwinism plays an indispensable ideological role in the war against fundamentalism. For that reason, the scientific organizations are devoted to protecting Darwinism rather than testing it, and the rules of scientific investigation have been shaped to help them succeed.


The prominent advocates of materialist and atheist philosophies committed to promote them throughout the world have, as stated by Johnson, embraced Darwin's theory of evolution solely because it provides a so-called scientific basis for their own ideologies. This was observed from the time the theory of evolution was first put forward. Karl Marx, the founder of dialectic materialism who harbored enmity against religion, often stressed the significance of the theory for his ideology. And in a letter Marx wrote to his close friend Engels, he made clear his thoughts on Darwinism:


...This is the book which contains the basis in natural history for our views.


And after having read Darwin's book, The Origin of Species Friedrich Engels commented:


Our theory is a theory of evolution, not a dogma to be learned by heart and to be repeated mechanically.


An American botany professor, Conway Zirkle, explains why the founders of communism, Marx and Engels, adopted Darwinism:


Marx and Engels accepted evolution almost immediately after Darwin published The Origin of Species… Evolution, of course, was just what the founders of communism needed to explain how mankind could have come into being without the intervention of any supernatural force, and consequently it could be used to bolster the foundations of their materialistic philosophy. In addition, Darwin's interpretation of evolution – that evolution had come about through the operation of natural selection – gave them an alternative hypothesis to the prevailing teleological explanations of the observed fact that all forms of life are adapted to their living conditions. Actually, natural selection made it possible to drop teleology completely and, as a result, the scientists could explain the organic world in materialistic terms.


As these statements make clear, the sole reason why Marx and Engels supported Darwin was the aversion they felt for religion. That is why they held on to mechanisms which had no scientific value and were merely figments of the imagination. Indeed, Friedrich Engels explains in his book why he considers the theory of evolution important:


He [Darwin] dealt the metaphysical conception of nature the heaviest blow by his proof that the organic world of today – plants, animals, and consequently man too – is the product of a process of evolution going on through millions of years.


Obviously, Engels also made the mistake of assuming that the theory of evolution gave an explanation for how the millions of different types of living beings on earth came into existence. It was not only Engels who assumed that Darwin's theory was a verified fact, but Joseph Stalin, the bloodiest communist leader of history, also stressed the significance of the theory in his autobiography:


In order to disabuse the minds of our seminary students, of the myth that the world was created in six days, we had to acquaint ourselves with the geological origin and age of the earth, and be able to prove them in argument; we had to familiarize ourselves with Darwin's teachings.


Clearly, the common point between the materialist systems of thought and Darwin's theory of evolution is, without doubt, irreligion, and the sole purpose of their advocates is to make people deny the existence of God. In the Qur’an, Allah points to the end of those who deny and lead people to denial:


Then who is more unjust than one who denies the verses of Allah and turns away from them? We will recompense those who turn away from Our verses with the worst of punishment for their having turned away. (Surah al-An‘am, 6:157)


The refutation of materialism will bring an end to the disbelief which is presently in rapid social ascent with each passing day. Toward this end, it is essential to make people aware of the fact that matter is not of an eternal nature and that, in terms of science, the theory of evolution is entirely unjustifiable. Thus, all ideologies that reject the existence of God can be eliminated, and this will be the inescapable end of materialist thought. As Allah stated:


What those [people] are engaged in is destined for destruction, and worthless is what they have been doing. (Surah al-A‘raf, 7:139)


Idolaters of the 20th Century


Allah informs us in the Qur’an about people who worshipped beings other than Him and took statues as deities, giving detailed accounts of His prophets' struggles with those people. Many assume that societies of the past that worshipped idols had a primitive lifestyle and therefore held such a religious view. Consequently, they think that some African tribes currently worship totems because of their primitiveness.


However, on closer examination of the beliefs and viewpoints of societies identified as idolatrous in the Qur’an, it is noticed that those societies bear striking similarities to some contemporary ones. Just as the peoples of the past took lifeless statues or wooden and stone objects as deities, the rationale that accepts lifeless matter as a form of deity is also prevalent in our day. Before proceeding with comparisons between past and contemporary rationales, some information provided in the Qur’an about idolatrous societies should first be reviewed.


One of the communities identified in the Qur’an is that of Prophet Abraham:


“[Mention] when he said to his father, 'O my Father, why do you worship that which does not hear and does not see and will not benefit you at all?”


“When he said to his father and his people, 'What are these statues you are devoted?' they said, 'We found our fathers worshipping them.' He said, 'You were certainly, you and your fathers, in manifest error.'”


As stated in the verses above, Prophet Abraham's father and people embraced lifeless matter as deities which they themselves made with their own hands and which lack any power to create. Considering anything to be a deity means the attribution to it (either in part or in full) of the powers of creation, sustenance, blessing, healing, reckoning, and controlling natural occurrences.


The Idolatrous Belief That Dominates Societies of Today


Idolaters of the past claimed that lifeless statues carved from wood and stone, unable to speak or move, possessed power and even that they created the universe and exercise control over it, so they bowed before them and called on them for health, sustenance and blessings. In light of these facts, it is obvious that people in our day hold the same idolatrous rationale as did idolaters of the past who worshipped lifeless statues. Materialists and evolutionists believe that inanimate substances formed of unconscious atoms possess power. They claim that as a result of chance, lifeless matter organized itself to create complete and complex living beings.


Furthermore, they attribute all occurrences in the universe to lifeless and unconscious atoms in nature. For example, materialists and evolutionists imply that a tornado or an earthquake (which they call "the wrath of mother nature" or "a calamity of nature") occurs at the discretion of "nature." However, they fail to explain what this force called "nature" is or from where it springs. The elements they call "mother nature" or "nature" are actually no different from deities of past idolatrous societies called "earth mother" or "fertility goddess." Only their symbols have been removed; divinity is now attributed to invisible, inanimate matter and to coincidence, which are believed to possess the power of creation.


Pierre Paul Grassب, a French zoologist and fervent evolutionist, explains the hidden gods of evolutionists and materialists as follows:


Chance becomes a sort of providence, which, under the cover of atheism, is not named but which is secretly worshipped.


For example, evolutionists consider a rose blooming in its vivid red color out of muddy soil divine because they believe that the rose came into being all by itself or that the inanimate elements constituting a rose can spontaneously design and form the flower. Similarly, the evolutionists view oranges, apples, strawberries, bananas, grapevines, flowers, deer, lions, elephants, ants, honeybees, flies, marine animals, melons, and parsley, in brief, all living as well as non-living beings to have been capable of creating themselves since they claim that all of these beings and millions of others developed to their current physical states through their own will and consciousness.


Evolutionists can tell countless similar stories about the billions of living beings dwelling on earth. Terms such as "natural selection," "random mutation," and "geographical isolation," which provide a so-called scientific touch, embellish the scenarios produced by evolutionists. What they ultimately advocate, in fact, is that lifeless matter in nature can spontaneously form perfect living beings: a banana, an orange, a fly, a stem of parsley, a cat, a carnation, a whale, a giraffe, an ostrich, a butterfly, a spider, an acacia, a mandarin, an ant, an elephant, a violet – as well as their next generations.


Again, according to this ridiculous belief, blind atoms first came together, then somehow organized themselves to form an eye that can see. Their behavioral pattern was so calculated and conscious that it ensured the organization of other atoms which would form the eye cavity and patiently waited for the coincidences which would shape the eye cavity before forming the eye. Evolutionists see the atoms that constitute the eye as deities because they assume them "capable" of creating such a perfect organ. Just as peoples of the past adopted deities associated with rain, the evolutionists also adopted deities – the atoms making up an eye.


From this standpoint one may conclude that the religion of materialists and evolutionists has more than billions times billions times billions of gods to revere. To claim that every being in the universe came into existence spontaneously through coincidence is to accept each one of those beings and forces as a creator. This is no different from the failure of logic which makes one prostrate himself before totems or call on wooden statues for health and prosperity; however, with one difference – the age in which the idolaters happen to live.


However, it is plainly obvious that nothing in the universe can be attributed to coincidences, that a superior consciousness and will is responsible for the life on earth. Every detail of the human body and of nature itself abounds with signs of a great wisdom. The owner of this wisdom is Allah, Lord of the heavens and earth.


False Religions Formed by the Materialistand Evolutionist Outlook on Life


At the root of materialist philosophy lies the desire for a society that rejects not only the existence of Allah but spiritual and moral values, so materialists must implant atheist ideology into people's minds and spread it within society. While rejecting Allah's religion, they can still accept an altered form of religion compatible with materialist views. George Gaylord Simpson, one of the leading names in the Neo-Darwinist movement, describes the sort of religion which is acceptable to evolutionists:


Of course there are some beliefs still current, labeled as religious and involved in religious emotions, that are flatly incompatible with evolution and therefore are intellectually untenable in spite of their emotional appeal. Nevertheless, I take it as now self-evident, requiring no further special discussion, that evolution and true religion are compatible.


Below, some of the attributes of false religion inclusive of distorted beliefs held extensively under the name of religion will be outlined. Unaccustomed to thinking deeply, however, people often fail to notice the faults inherent in those beliefs. It is an important responsibility for sincere believers in Islam to warn people against humanly devised false religions and convey to them the message of the Qur’an, which is the unique source of wisdom that Allah sent down to guide His servants.


1). A false religion holds that God is in the sky.


Despite having faith in the existence of Allah, many people hold extremely erroneous convictions about where He is. Because the materialist maintains that nothing really exists except matter, he inevitably assumes that Allah has to be within the material universe yet fails to imagine the kind of space He might inhabit.


But Allah is the Creator of space, and He is unbounded by it. It is only created beings that are bound by space, and Allah is exalted above all creation, while He encompasses all of it in knowledge.


People under influence of the materialist view of life fail to grasp this obvious truth, assuming that Allah resides in the heavens. Some people look up into the sky while praying, but a person who knows that Allah is all-aware feels His presence wherever he turns. Allah informs us of this reality:


And to Allah belongs the east and the west. So wherever you [might] turn, there is the Face of Allah. Indeed, Allah is all-Encompassing and Knowing.(Surah al-Baqarah, 2:115)


Vision perceives Him not, but He perceives [all] vision; and He is the Subtle, the Acquainted. (Surah al-An’am, 6:103)


2). A false religion is one that holds that God created the universe, including man, and then left them to their own devices..


False religion holds that Allah first created the entire universe with all its living beings and then left them on their own, simply watching from a distance. According to this understanding, people determine their destiny by themselves alone.


However, Allah is not only unbounded by space but also by time. Therefore, when He created the universe and man, He created them together with their past and future, as if in a single moment. That is to say, Allah created everything with its individual destiny. Without having experienced it, a person can never know his future. But Allah knows the future of every person and every single moment he will experience. He certainly did not create the entire universe and then leave it to its own devices; rather, He created every moment of the lives of all beings from their beginnings to their ends. Everything, whether the fall of a single leaf or the events a person experiences throughout life, takes place in accordance with the destiny predetermined by Allah, who conveys this fact to man in numerous verses:


And with Him are the keys of the unseen; none knows them except Him. And He knows what is on the land and in the sea. Not a leaf falls but that He knows it. And no grain is there within the darknesses of the earth and no moist or dry [thing] but that it is [written] in a clear record.(Surah al-An’am, 6:59)


3). A false religion is one without belief in the existence of Paradise and Hellfire.


Some people under the influence of materialist thinking do not believe in Paradise and Hell although they might believe in Allah. The major reason for this is the claim that they cannot be sure about the existence of anything they are unable to see with their eyes or touch with their hands.


For a man of wisdom and intellect there are countless signs pointing to the existence of Allah and the Hereafter, such as the present heavens and earth, created with flawless design and unique harmony, and the cell, building block of all living beings. Any person of sound mind can readily understand that Allah created all living beings initially and thus He is able to bring them to life again after their death. Those who refuse to grasp this reality are described in the Qur’an as follows:


And they say, 'When we are bones and crumbled particles, will we [truly] be resurrected as a new creation?' Say, 'Be you stones or iron or [any] creation of that which is great within your breasts.' And they will say, 'Who will restore us?' Say, 'He who brought you forth the first time.'… (Surah al-Isra, 17:49-51)


It is actually the soul and not the body that makes a person what he is. It is not the heap of flesh and bones that constitutes a man; it is his soul. Death puts an end to the body, while the soul continues to live for all eternity. Death is only an experience of transition for the soul to the life of the Hereafter.


Regarding the struggle against the religion of irreligion, there are two important matters that need to be dealt with. One is to disprove the theory of evolution from a scientific perspective so that people will know they have not come into existence as a result of coincidence but through an act of Allah's creation.


The other is to inform people about the real essence of matter and thus help their understanding of the true religion. That Allah encompasses all things and is unbounded by time and space, that all beings are created with their individual destinies, that Paradise and Hell already exist, and that all acts of human beings are ultimately created by Allah are facts introduced by the true religion which are easy to comprehend.


LEADERS OF IRRELIGION WHO CALL PEOPLE TO THE FIRE


In the Qur’an, Allah relates that there have been cruel and tyrannical leaders who drew people away from Allah's path and ordered them to reject His religion. Allah defines them in one verse as "leaders summoning to the Fire." This type of leader is best illustrated by Pharaoh's character as described in the story of Moses, but similar types have existed throughout history. Employing the same methods, these leaders carried out atrocities against their peoples, distanced the masses from true religion, and dragged them to destruction in both this world and the Hereafter.


In our century leaders such as Adolph Hitler (known for his merciless and bloody massacres throughout Europe), Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin and Mao Tse Tung, and their mentors, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, can be compared with Pharaoh. Charles Darwin nurtured the cruel views of those leaders and supported disbelief with his theory of evolution.


As declared in the Qur’an, Allah's messengers and pious believers always encountered cruel leaders as fierce enemies whenever they came to warn a society. The Qur’an points out that Moses was sent first to Pharaoh:


Then, We sent after them Moses with Our Signs to Pharaoh and his establishment, but they were unjust toward them. So see how was the end of the corrupters.


In our day the most important fronts of disbelief and irreligion have been communism and anarchism, both of which are based on materialism and the theory of evolution. The founders of these ideologies are no longer alive has not reduced their influence; rather, it still persists and is being further intensified by some circles. For a better understanding it might be beneficial to examine the attributes and methods of leaders who "call people to the Fire."


1). They are enemies of religion who hinder their peoples from faith by resorting to oppression.


The major motive of leaders such as Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky and Mao, who adopt materialism and apply it to their political systems, is the elimination of religion. Karl Marx, the mentor of communism, shows how materialists view religion:


It [religion] is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness.


In an essay entitled The Attitude of the Workers’ Party to Religion,, Lenin explains the stance of communism:


Marxism is materialism. As such, it is as relentlessly hostile to religion as was the materialism of the eighteenth-century Encyclopaedists or the materialism of Feuerbach. This is beyond doubt. But the dialectical materialism of Marx and Engels goes further than the Encyclopaedists and Feuerbach, for it applies the materialist philosophy to the domain of history, to the domain of the social sciences. We must combat religion: that is the ABC of all materialism, and consequently of Marxism..


Although Marx did not live long enough to realize his ambitions, Lenin embraced his evil heritage and established a regime based on irreligion. And the cruel regime of Stalin practiced it very strictly. He carried out the bloodiest massacres in world history, ordering the execution of more than 20 million people. Pol Pot, the communist dictator of Cambodia, who was responsible for the murder of three million people out of a population of only nine million, is also among the most notorious of irreligious leaders. And Enver Hoxha, Albania's communist leader, ordered heavy penalties for every kind of religious belief and worship and declared that he "had founded the first entirely atheist state in the world."


These "pharaohs of the 20th century," bereft of mercy, compassion and love, harbored bitter enmity towards religion as did the ancient Pharaoh, punishing and torturing those who believed. His oppression is depicted in the Qur’an:


[Pharaoh] said, 'You believed him [i.e., Moses] before I gave you permission. Indeed, he is your leader who has taught you magic, but you are going to know. I will surely cut off your hands and your feet on opposite sides, and I will crucify you all.


2). Defenders of disbelief follow the religion of their predecessors.


It seems incomprehensible that tyrants who carry out pitiless massacres against thousands of people including women and children are followed by so many; however, it is not only true of our own age. In the Qur’an there is extensive mention of societies refusing to give up perverted beliefs, which they referred to as "the religion of our ancestors." One passage states:


And when it is said to them, 'Follow what Allah has revealed', they say, 'Rather, we will follow what we found our fathers doing.' Even though their fathers understood nothing, nor were they guided? The example of those who disbelieve is like that of one who shouts at what he hears nothing but calls and cries [i.e., cattle or sheep] – deaf, dumb and blind, so they do not understand.


The situation of modern disbelievers who reject every kind of religious and moral value is accurately depicted in the verses above. Indeed, the disbelievers of our time are determined not to abandon their "religion" because their ancestors, Darwin, Lenin, Stalin and Mao, had put their faith in it and worshipped its gods. Their ancestors believed that life came into existence from lifeless matter, that living beings evolved from one another as a result of mutations, and that there is no Creator who created everything from nothing..


Today, many people who still have faith in "the religion of their fathers" blindly believe these fallacies which have now been repeatedly disproved by science. Allah draws attention to the fact that disbelief is passed down from one generation to another:


Similarly, there came not to those before them any messenger except that they said, “A magician or a madman.” Did they suggest it to them [i.e., their descendants]? Rather, they are a transgressing people.


Even when books of scientific evidence are presented to such people and abundant explanations provided regarding their erroneous mind-set, they would not abandon it. The loss of one's abilities to see and comprehend is described in the Qur’an as follows:


And We have certainly created for Hell many of the jinn and mankind. They have hearts with which they do not understand, they have eyes with which they do not see, and they have ears with which they do not hear.


METHODS OF FIGHTING AGAINST THE RELIGION OF IRRELIGION


The total eradication of disbelief from the face of the earth is essential for the salvation of all people, both in this world and the Hereafter. It is the responsibility of all believers to eliminate disbelief by communicating the message of the Qur’an.. Allah holds every believer responsible for safeguarding himself, his close relatives, and humanity in general from the torment of Hell.


Some people belittle themselves by thinking, "Am I strong enough to oppose disbelief?" This is but a negative suggestion from Satan to make people lose time and hinder the spread of the Qur’an's message. It should be remembered that, as stated by Bedi¸zzaman, "the consent given to ignorance is no different than ignorance; the consent given to error, ignorance and cruelty is erroneous, ignorant and cruel." Hence, those who remain silent, those who do not strive against disbelief although they have the means, and those who obstruct the efforts of others who fight disbelief instead of providing support to them are either knowingly or unknowingly supporting disbelief themselves and facilitating the accomplishment of evil goals.


A sincere believer can never remain uncommitted on such important matters. In compliance with the Qur’an's directives, he will remain extremely alert, vigorous and resolute. The plight of every person who is oppressed, who cannot afford a loaf of bread, who is homeless and out on the streets appeals to his conscience and he feels responsible for them. For example, millions of Muslims endure oppression in Kashmir, East Turkistan, and Palestine only because of their beliefs. In recent years in Kosovo and Bosnia hundreds of thousands of people were brutally tortured, forced out of their homes and lands, and even massacred before the very eyes of the world.. No person of sound conscience can ignore the dismal facts, and all Muslims must work together to remove the tyranny of disbelief over mankind as Prophet Muhammad (saas) stated:


Anas bin Malik narrated that Allah’s Messenger said: “Help your brother, whether he is an oppressor or he is an oppressed one. People asked, “O Allah’s Messenger! It is all right to help him if he is oppressed, but how should we help him if he is an oppressor? The Prophet said: “By preventing him from oppressing others.”


The most effective method in fighting disbelief is, without doubt, that employed by Prophet Abraham. People at the time of Abraham worshipped idols they made with their own hands and then expected help from these so-called deities. Prophet Abraham reminded the people that these "deities" before which they prostrated were inanimate beings lacking ability to do a single thing. Just like those who idolized lifeless statues at that time, the disbelievers of our day take lifeless atoms, unconscious nature, and coincidence as deities.


The method used by Abraham to save his tribe from their erroneous beliefs and to awaken them is related in the Qur’an as follows:


When he said to his father and his people, 'What are these statues to which you are devoted?' they said, 'We found our fathers worshipping them.' He said, 'You were certainly, you and your fathers, in manifest error.' (Surah al-Anbiya’, 21:52-54)


“…‘And by Allah, I will surely plan against idols after you have turned and gone away.' So he made them into fragments, except a large one among them, that they might return to it [and question].” (Surah al-Anbiya’, 21:57-58)


When his people were away, Abraham broke the idols they worshipped and showed them the obvious fact that these lifeless statues were incapable of doing anything at all, much less creating something.


Upon the people's return they questioned Prophet Abraham. His response is quite significant because it demonstrates their inconsistent attitude:


“They said, 'Have you done this to our gods, O Abraham?' He said, 'Rather, this- the largest of them- did it, so ask them, if they should be able to speak' So they returned [blaming] themselves and said [to each other], 'Indeed, you are the wrongdoers.' Then they reversed themselves, [saying], ‘You have already known that these do not speak.'” (Surah al-Anbiya’, 21:62-65)


Abraham's people admitted awareness of the reality: “You have already known that these do not speak.” But they continued to accept those lifeless beings as deities solely because of their commitment to the beliefs of their ancestors and rejection of Allah.


The materialists and evolutionists of our day possess a very similar mentality. When considered with an open mind, any evolutionist would have to agree that life is much too complex and perfect to have been formed by mere coincidence. These scientists would also agree to the fact that life must have had a beginning, that is, it was not eternally existent. But despite these realizations they keep their bigoted attitude and deem it impossible to abandon their false deities and place faith in Allah.


Evolutionist scientists must believe in the theory of evolution based on materialism in order to be able to reject Allah, although they know the theory is false. And these individuals are but a few of the leading materialist evolutionists of our day.


Just as Prophet Abraham broke the idols of the idolaters and removed the basis of disbelief by exposing their foolishness, believers of today must break the idol of today and render disbelief ineffective. The methods can be listed as follows:


1. Being knowledgeable about the ideas and ideologies advocated by irreligious movements


2. Proving the invalidity of materialism and evolution with scientific evidences


3. Communicating the true religion related in the Qur’an


4. Explaining evidences pointing to the existence of Allah


5. Explaining the kind of life and morality taught in the Qur’an


6. Uniting men of conscience


When supporting one another, believers should motivate other believers to do good deeds and appreciate beneficial services rendered. Bedi¸zzaman pointed out that believers should encourage one another with feelings of brotherhood:


O people of faith! If you do not wish to enter a humiliating condition of slavery, come to your senses and enter and take refuge in the citadel of "Indeed, the believers are brothers” (Surah al-Hujurat: 49:10) in order to defend yourselves against those oppressors who would exploit your differences! Otherwise you will neither be able to protect your lives nor defend your rights… then make your guiding principle in life the exalted principle, "The believers are together like a well-founded building, one part of which supports the other." Then you will be delivered from humiliation in this world and from wretchedness in the Hereafter.