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Hypocrites, Sports in Islam, Hospitals

Issue 442 » September 7, 2007 - Shaban 25, 1428

General

Living the Quran

Surah al-Baqarah (The Cow)
Chapter 2: Verses 17-20

Hypocrites
"Their similitude is that of a man who kindled a fire; when it lighted all around him, Allah took away their light and left them in utter darkness. So they could not see. Deaf, dumb, and blind, they will not return (to the path). Or (another similitude) is that of a rain-laden cloud from the sky: in it are zones of darkness, and thunder and lightning: they press their fingers in their ears to keep out the stunning thunderclap, the while they are in terror of death. But Allah is ever round the rejecters of Faith! The lightning all but snatches away their sight; every time the light (helps) them, they walk therein, and when the darkness grows on them, they stand still. And if Allah willed, He could take away their faculty of hearing and seeing; for Allah hath power over all things."

The first parable means that when a person, Muhammad (Allah's peace be upon him), spread the light of Truth that discriminated right from wrong and virtue from vice, those who used their faculties properly began to distinguish between these things. But the hypocrites, who were blinded by self-interest, could not see the right path even with the help of this light.

Allah deprives of the sight only he who is not a seeker of truth; who chooses error for himself instead of guidance, and who shuts his eyes to the truth. When the hypocrites themselves turned away from the light of truth and chose to wander only in the darkness of falsehood, Allah also let them go astray.  And thus they become "Deaf" to hearing the Truth, "dumb" to speaking the Truth and "blind" to seeing the Truth. 

In the second parable, by thrusting their fingers into their ears, the hypcorites delude themselves for a while that they have escaped destruction. But they cannot, in fact, save themselves because Allah, with all His powers, is encircling them on all sides.  The first parable depicts those hypocrites who in their inmost hearts did not believe in Islam at all, but had become 'Muslims' for the sake of self-interest or expediency. The second parable gives a description of those hypocrites who were suffering from doubt, suspicion and lack of faith. Though they were not wholly unbelievers, they practiced Islam only to the extent, which may not involve them in trouble.

In this parable rainfall stands for Islam which came as a blessing to humanity; pitch darkness, thunder and lightning stand for the impending obstacles, the threatening dangers and the glaring difficulties which were being experienced on account of the strong resistance from the opponents of Islam. When the situation eased a little, they began to move onward on the path of Islam, but when the clouds of difficulties began to appear, or when they were given such commands as were against their self-interest or their superstitious beliefs and prejudices, they again stood still in sheer perplexity. 

Finally, it is important that we realize that Allah could, if He so willed, totally deprive these hypocrites also, of the power to see the Truth just as He deprived the hypocrites described in the first parable. But Allah does not do so because it is His will to give them respite to see the Truth and hear the Truth to the extent they want to see and hear it. That is why He left them with only as much power as they made use of in seeing and hearing the Truth. 

Source:
“Towards Understanding the Quran” - Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi
Understanding the Prophet's Life

Sports in Islam

Features of sports in Islam are many. In fact, many Islamic obligations include physical activities in addition to spiritual activities and ways of straightening behaviour. Prayer, for example, is a spiritual purification as well as motions for the body. Hajj also involves physical effort in its various rituals. So do visiting fellow Muslims and the sick, and walking to mosques. All kinds of social activities in Islam can be considered to be a physical exercise of the body and a way to strengthen it, as long as these activities are done moderately.

Among the sports that the Prophet, peace be upon him, played are the following:

1. Running. It was a form of training for traveling, jihad, seeking provision, etc.  It was reported by Ahmad ibn Hanbal that the Prophet raced Aishah and she outran him. Then they had another race where he outran her, whereupon he said, "This time makes up for the other."

2. Horsemanship and horse racing. In Sahih Muslim it is reported that Allah's Messenger said, "Ride horses, for they are the legacy of your father Ismail (Ishmael)."

3. Archery. A number of hadiths show that this sport was popular among early Muslims. Uqbah ibn Amir said, "I heard the Messenger of Allah saying while he was on the pulpit, 'In the verse, [And make ready against them all you can of power, including steeds of war], the word power means archery; the word force means archery.'"

4. Fencing. Arabs knew a sport by the name niqaf, which is in fact the origin of fencing as known today. One of its forms was a special dance that the Prophet witnessed being done by Abyssinians inside a mosque. This niqaf refers to some movements being performed with arrows. In a narration reported by Abu Salamah, those Abyssinians were playing with their spears.

5. Wrestling. The Prophet wrestled with a number of men, one of whom was Rukanah ibn Abd Yazid ibn Hashim ibn Abdul-Muttalib, who lived in Makkah and was a skillful wrestler. (Al-Hakim, Abu Dawud, and At-Tirmidhi).

6. Swimming. As-Suyuti reported that Abu Al-Qasim Al-Baghawi narrated on the authority of Ibn Abbas that the Prophet and some of his Companions once swam in a stream. That day, the Prophet said, "Let everyone among us swim towards his friend." The Prophet himself swam towards Abu Bakr until he embraced him saying, "Here I am and my friend" (see Al-Zurqani's comment on Al-Mawahib Al-Ladunniyyah, vol. 1, p. 194).

Source:
"Sports Practiced by Early Muslims" - Atiyyah Saqr
Cool History!

Hospitals in the Islamic Civilization

During the Islamic civilization, hospitals had much developed and attained specific characteristics:

1. Secular: Hospitals served all peoples irrespective of color, religion, or background. They were run by the government rather than by the church, and their Directors were commonly physicians assisted by persons who had no religious color. In hospitals, physicians of all faiths worked together with one aim in common: the well-being of patients.

2. Separate wards: Patients of different sexes occupied separate wards. Also different diseases especially infectious ones, were allocated different wards.

3. Separate nurses: Male nurses were to take care of male patients, and vice versa.

4. Baths and water supplies: Praying five times a day is an important pillar of Islam. Sick or healthy, it is an Islamic obligation; of course physical performance depends on one's health, even he can pray while laying in bed. Before praying, washing of face, head, hands, and feet must be done, if possible. For certain conditions, a bath is obligatory. Therefore, these hospitals had to provide the patients and employees with plentiful water supply and with bathing facilities.

5. Practicing physicians: Only qualified physicians were allowed by law to practice medicine. In 931 A.D., the Caliph Al-Mugtadir from the Abbasid dynasty, ordered the Chief Court-Physician Sinan Ibn-Thabit to screen the 860 physicians-of Baghdad, and only those qualified were granted license to practice (Hamarneh 1962). The counterpart of Ibn- Tbabit, Abu-Osman Sai'd Ibn-Yaqub was ordered to do the same in Damascus, Mecca, and Medina. The latter two cities were in need for such an act because of hundreds of thousands of pilgrims visiting them every year. This was to prevent taking advantage of these pilgrims and to curb the spread of diseases among them.

6. Medical schools: The hospital was not only a place for treating patients, but also for educating medical students, interchanging medical knowledge, and developing medicine as a whole. To the main hospitals, there were attached expensive libraries containing the most up-to-date books, auditoria for meetings and lectures, and housing for students and house-staff.

7. Proper records of patients: For the first time in history, these hospitals kept records of patients and their medical care.

8. Pharmacy: During the Islamic era, the science and the profession of pharmacy had developed to an outstanding degree. The Arabic materia medica became so rich and new drugs and compounds were introduced because the Muslims had contact with almost all the known world at that time, either through control or trade. Their ships sailed to China and the Philippines, and their convoys made trades with black Africa, Europe and Asia. Chemistry became an advanced science, and there were means and need for a specialization called pharmacy.

Thus, the main Arabian hospitals were models for medieval hospitals built later in Europe. They were rather medical schools to which those seeking advanced medical knowledge, from the East or West, attended.

Source:
“Contributions Of Islam To Medicine" - Ezzat Abouleish