Muslim soccer players make headlines

Soccer is something I enjoyed playing and also watching. The only thing I dislike is discrimination in soccer which involves racism over the black, Muslim and many more. Hence, to see all these player(especially Muslim) to come out alive from racism is just amazing. It is no longer a foreign thing right now to see vast amount of Muslim soccer player play in a big team. The rise is real. Check out the link below to see Muslim soccer players who has made their names on the headlines

http://www.totalsportek.com/list/muslim-footballers-in-premier-league/

Trump’s effect

Honestly, I am little bit scared when Trump won the presidency of United States especially when I am a Muslim international students from Malaysia, a country that have a background record of ISIS activities. Trump previously has his own agenda of not allowing any immigrants(who lived in a country that has a background of radical Islam activities) to enter United States. Well, even though it is not likable to happen as it needs approval from Senator and all, his notion may just uplift the spirit of his voter to hate the Muslims which scared me the most. I am not just fear for myself but for my female’s friends who wears Hijab which has the higher chance to be discriminated. Recently, there was a wave of harassment after Trump’s victory and one of it involved a Muslim woman and his family. Click on muslim family assaulted to get to know more of the harassment story.

However it is, I came here to United States to fulfill my sponsorship requirement and my ambition as well, of graduating from CU Boulder  and hopefully this atrocious acts won’t be my setback.

Black Mirror

I actually have watched this kind of movie where they used artificial intelligence (A.I.) to replace human being. But still, this movie is a bit mind bending to be honest. Watching this movie has dragged me to finish all the Season 2 of  Black Mirror because every episode has the suspense element which made me eager to watch till the end. The purpose I am writing this blog entree is to discuss how does this episode explore what it means to be human?

Well the story is about a woman named Martha who loss her significant one, Ash who died presumably in a car accident while returning his rental van. Martha just can’t accept the loss and what made it worse is she carries Ash’s baby inside her womb. Repercussion led Martha to order an artificial intelligent which looks similarly like her dead boyfriend Ash. The technology was impressive as it could imitate almost perfectly the way Ash talks, his physical attribute, ways of response, his silly jokes and many more. The A.I. was able to copy Ash moves from the memories of videos and pictures that Martha uploaded. But unfortunately it was not enough for Martha because the A.I. can’t respond to new things. For example when Martha asked him to get out from the room, he actually walked his way out while the real Ash on the other hand will not do that but instead will comfort Martha. The technology was never enough, because it was never a human but only a programmed piece of machinery that has no feelings. The fake Ash also don’t have all the detail physical attributes like scars, moles and aging skins which represent best what human is, which is the results of living. All the small details from bruises and scars are significant because it tells you how much you have lived.

It was torturing for me to see Martha live that way. And we can see a part in a scene where Martha shouted “it was unfair” repeatedly because every new thing that the A.I did was ingenue which made Martha distress. This episode really taught us that technology was never the real end solution, and something just can’t be replaced. Emotions, feelings, intuition, responses and logic are born within humans which can’t be replicated by technology.

What did I learn in class?

   Learning about Islamic religion back in Malaysia is all about memorizing facts which is somehow not too much effective for me because I will surely forget as time pass by. The knowledge I gained was only on the surface, not in detail. Hence, I signed up for Islamic Tradition with a hope that I can reinforce my knowledge even deeper and to not let Islamic education loss from my sight. Well, it was different learning about Islam in America compared to Malaysia; different in a good way. Learning here, I got to read a vast amount of inscription from articles to books which contain a more profound explanation about Islam as a religion. Not just that, my thoughts were really challenged critically to response to the readings assigned. Now, I hold a much gripper knowledge about Muhammad’s S.A.W life, pre-Islamic background, tales of Isra’and Mikraj, authenticity of Hadith and a lot more.

   Besides, I really liked when Professor Aun Ali taught how other things can relate to Islam. For example, the controversial story of Nicky Minaj on the summer jam and movies like The Color of Paradise which hold valuable lessons. But one of the things which somehow affected me emotionally is when Professor plays Quranic audio which made me reminisce a lot and a bit sentimental. Probably because it has been a long time since I recite The Quran and hear it. Sometimes it triggered the feel of crying because it made me recalls the time when my mom used to play the sound of Quran every time Maghrib prayer is about to arrive.

   From my own viewpoints, signing up for this class is a wise decision because of the knowledge itself which is difficult to find. Occasionally with the new information I gained, I will share to my housemate. For example, I told my friend how Buraq look like and events in Muhammad’s period. And having this information made me more knowledgeable about the true meaning of Islam and understand about the criticism that people made widely in mass media which undeniably because they were naive.

Hudud Law ?

In Islamic law, crimes are classified in three ways: hudud, qisas and Ta’azir. Hudud crimes are those specifically mentioned in the Koran as transgressing the limits which God himself has placed on people’s behavior. The hudud crimes are: theft, highway robbery, drinking alcohol, unlawful sexual intercourse and false accusation of chastity. Some jurists also include murder and apostasy (al-riddah) among the categories of hudud crimes.

The death penalty either by stoning (the more severe punishment for unlawful intercourse) or by crucifixion or with the sword (for highway robbery with homicide); cutting off hand and/or foot (for highway robbery without homicide and for theft

However, in some cases, Muslim law allows a criminal defendant to pay off the victim (diyya) and thus, to escape punishment.

There is an issue regardings the law of Hudud in my country, Malaysia. As everyone knows, Malaysia is a multiracial country which consist of multi religious community commonly Islam, Christian, Hindu and Buddha. The issue was implementing Hudud’s law in a country where Islam is not the only practice religion. It was the idea of Islamic politics (PAS) in Malaysia who feels the needs to implement this law. Hence, countless arguments and perspectives were throw out to debate about this issue. Below link (underlined: Hudud debates in malaysia) is Malaysia newspaper article regarding the debate of this law. Click on it to know more

Hudud debates in Malaysia

Islam and Science

     Islamic civilization experienced the golden age era of scientific research and discovery in between eighth and fifteenth centuries. It was Abbassid Al-Mansur who triggered the needs of scientific research when he established the House of Wisdom which served as the imperial center for the promotion of scientific activity (Haq, Mythbusters, 36). The House of Wisdom which is established as a library is a center for early manuscript translation from Greek texts into Arabic texts. Islamic civilization is well known for their remarkable achievement in the fields of astronomy, physics and medicine. In short, they were the best in almost every field of sciences from at least A.D. 800-1300(). Early Muslim astronomer has contributed a lot in the field of astronomy by improving astrological prediction and providing a naturalistic explanation of cosmic phenomena. The contribution did not end there as the astronomer helps their own Islamic society to determine the prayer times and demonstrates God’s wisdom and perfection (Haq, Mythbusters, 38). Nasir al-Din al-Tusi, a notable figure in astronomy, succeeded in explaining the motions of the planet in term of circular motion in which ancient Greek astronomer Ptolemy failed to explain (Haq, Mythbusters, 38). Whereas, Ibn al-Shatir who worked as a timekeeper and also an astronomer succeeds in establishing a lunar model that the Polish astronomer utilized which used highly sophisticated mathematical techniques from al-Tusi (Haq, Mythbusters, 38). In the field of medicine, Ibn Sina and Ibn al-Nafis had surely made an impact by making a lot of new discoveries and research. Ibn Sina who is a Persian physician-philosopher wrote a medical workbook called The Canon which is used as medical references in Europe for centuries after being translated into Latin. Ibn al-Nafis who is being referred as “the second Ibn Sina” made his way to the top of the medical field after discovered the pulmonary circulation of blood. Not to forget Ibn al Haytam, unarguably the most important figure in the history of optics who made significants contribution to the development of scientific methodology (Haq, Mythbusters, 39).

     Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali made an argument about the very idea of the law of nature because any such laws would put God’s hand in a chain (Haq, Mythbusters, 40). He had influenced many Muslim scientists about his perspectives that sciences are not well-suited with Islam as a religion which resulted to declination in Islamic sciences. In Islam, there should be no separation of science and religion because science which is the study of nature can open the perspectives that God is the most powerful and it is ‘his’ ultimate desire that wanted us the human being to venture and make a research and analysis about the nature resources He has created. They were many early Muslim scientist who linked science and religion together. For example, early Muslim astronomer who built the observatory tower for scientific purposes and Islamic purposes (indicate prayers time) as well. Another one is Ibn al-Shatir, a prayer timekeeper and also an astronomer. Investigating science resulted to them acknowledging the power of God which causes them to feel closer to God. Hence, it is unwise to say that religion as a blocking wall for a scientist to pursue further in scientific studies.

     The golden era of Islamic scientific activity has come to an end when two of its leading intellectual centers were being invaded. Cordoba was conquered by the Christians in 1236 while Baghdad was destroyed by the notorious Genghis Khan in 1258 (Haq, Mythbusters, 41). But it was not truly the end of the era as claimed by George Saliba the professor of Arabic and Islamic science that stated there was a genuine original and revolutionary production of all the sciences related field after the death of Ghazali (Haq, Mythbusters, 41). But the new production of research of sciences is not as many and significant as it was in the golden age era. The cold fact is that science is really declining currently in the Muslim world and was replaced by the Western scientist. Nevertheless, Islam as a religion was not a factor of the declining rate of scientific activity of the Muslim world, but it was more to the factor of mass invasion, instability in politics and others.

 

The Chess Player

The first question comes to my mind when watching Shatran ke Khilari for the first time is how is the chess game related to the situation of an English company who is soon going to take over Avadh? I was pondering about it for a long time throughout the movie until the near end scene where Mir one of the wealthy noblemen who played the chess said, “If we can’t cope with our wives, how can we cope with the British Army?” The king is similar to the chess player in context of failing in fully used the position they had and had no senses of being a responsible leader. Even though Wajid Ali Shah was a king, he despise to be a ruler and his attention is only to poetry and musical which he was very good at. The King zero interest in political manner made it easy for the English company to make the King signs treaty which resulted to the company taking over fully of the ruling government of Avadh. The chess player on the other hand is a wealthy nobleman which wasted most of their time playing chess until they disregard the presence of their wives. They should actually responsible in spending time with their wife and putting an effort to stop the Company from taking over Avadh. The king and the noblemen who only pursuit for own desire has caused them a great loss. Besides, another similarity is, although chess is originated in India, it is now innovated by the British by changing a few movement of the chess. It is similarly happened to the land of India who is then ruled by the British. The irresponsible character reflects the people of India at that era, which leaves explicit reason why India is in possession of British Company.

Sobhani’s and Soroush’s Arguments

     According to Sobhani, the role of the prophet is to deliver the revelation from God through intermediaries of Gabriel angel to all the mankind. He believes that the prophet, Muhammad did not create any of the words and meaning as it all comes from the almighty God. He also justified that the role of a prophet is not similar to any poetry because the words of the Quran cannot be understood by a metaphor of poetry solely, but a holistic approach (Sobhani, Ayatollah Sobhani’s First Letter, 279).

     The connection between the prophethood and miracles is that Muhammad is just the messenger of the miracles as the Quran is the miracles from the God. Sobhani understands the correlation of the miracles and the prophet by claiming that all the words, meaning, style and form of the revelation in Quran are from the God (Sobhani, Ayatollah Sobhani’s First Letter, 282). The miracles which are the beauty of the phrases, heart soothing words and righteous meaning of the Quran were created by the God.

     Sobhani criticized over everything that Soroush stated about his knowledge of Islam. He condemned Soroush’s statement of saying that the source of inspiration is not too much significant, whereas it was the utmost significant in order to understand in depth of the relationship between the Quran, prophet and the God himself (Sobhani, Ayatollah Sobhani’s First Letter, 281). Soroush’s statement reflects the perspectives of the unbelievers in prophet’s time which made them hard to understand what Islam is, resulted in them to stay as an unbeliever. Sobhani made it clear that the inspiration is not from one’s own inspiration but the inspiration is from Almighty God in producing a miracle book of Quran. Besides, Soroush attempts in saying that Quran is similar to any ordinary book made Sobhani criticized him even more. Sobhani claimed that the Quran is created upon the condition life of a writer which somehow gave impact to the writer ways of thinking (Sobhani, Ayatollah Sobhani’s First Letter, 283). The statements contradict with more than 100 Quranic verse and Sobhani responded by saying “how can we see it as human book and consider it to have been produced by human being, bearing in mind that there is no doubt about the honesty and sincerity of Muhammad” (Sobhani, Ayatollah Sobhani’s First Letter, 283). The firm consistency of the Quran adds to the point that it is not just a normal book. Sobhani also criticized Soroush statement of saying that Muhammad’s knowledge about the universe is just average and not more than any other people around him and the people today (Sobhani, Ayatollah Sobhani’s First Letter, 284). Sobhani argued by stating the prophet and his successors have indeed created a series of scientific facts which transcends from anything today.

     Soroush is inconsistent in his argument and criticism. At first, Soroush claimed that Muhammad created the meaning and words of the Quran but, later he claimed that the God created the meaning while Muhammad only created the stylus and the words. Any points he tried to make is wildly random with the lack of thoughtful research and strong background knowledge. Anything that he tried to explain is lack in reasoning, for example when he tried to explain that Muhammad has less knowledge than people around him. He had no reason of explaining what he stated. Hence, it is very clear that I agree with Sobhani points of argument because every point he made is supported by solid reasoning and Quranic verse. He extracted every meaning of Soroush claimed carefully and counter them with wise explanation and good examples.

 

Islamic law (Shari’a)

Islamic law is different from any conventional law. The structure of Islamic law is not only constructed by the perspectives of the intellectual people, but it was constructed in general for the educated and the non-educated. This is because the element of rational thinking is not sufficient enough to apply in Islamic law. For example, we can see the annihilation of the nature which was led by the rational and scientific thinking (Hallaq 2009, 15). The content of rational thinking, thus must be predetermined by the God who has revealed message and knowledge through the Quran and the Prophet (Hallaq 2009, 14). The Islamic law is born through the relationship of reasoning and revelation.

Islamic law or Shari’a was built upon four main sources which are: The holy Quran, Sunnah, consensus and analogical reasoning. The Quran is the predominant source of law, which means nothing should surpass the text of the Quran. The inscription in the Quran tells about the knowledge of human beliefs, the mighty God himself and how we should behave in this temporary world, compromising good and bad deeds. Hence, it is no doubt that a jurist has to refer to the Quran first as the main source as it embodied the words from the God itself.

The second sources of Islamic law should be Sunnah, any verbally transmitted record of the actions, statements and way of life of Muhammad. The one that a jurist pays attention is Hadith, a narrative form of what Muhammad had said (Hallaq 2009, 16). One of the examples of hadith is “He who plants, without permission, in a lot owned by other people cannot own the crops although he is entitled to a wage [for his labor].” (Hallaq 2009, 16). This exemplary of hadith which convey the righteous concept of fairness is derived to make Islamic law specifically in the area of property. The problem with Hadith would be identifying whether the Hadith is true or false as forgery of hadith is everywhere which is deemed for political and personal purposes. Another strain a jurist would face would be encountering one or more hadith related to the case he/she is trying to solve. The solution to this was making the former hadith far more superior than latter hadith (Hallaq 2009, 18). One of the example to find out which is more superior is by finding out whose first transmitter of hadith is the closest to Muhammad. But if the procedure fails, another method that a jurist can apply is abrogation; in which one of the hadiths is made to repeal, and thus cancel out the effects of, another (Hallaq 2009, 18).

If the jurist still cannot find the law through the Quran and Hadith which maybe due to the metaphor and grammar in Quran which is hard to interpret and failure to find the right hadith, consensus or ijma’ is the resort being the third source of Islamic law.  Consensus means agreement from all the community through the process of reasoning by mujtahid (a jurist who conducts jihad) by using the Quran and Sunnah as references. A number of perspectives on one fact, characterized Islamic law into legal pluralism which features adaptability to different societies and has the ability to change over time (Hallaq 2009, 27). Even though the cases related to consensus is limited, they were regarded as most significant (Hallaq 2009, 22).

The last source of Shari’a is legal reasoning or qiyas. The method of Qiyas is referred as analogy method. The familiar example would be determining whether wine is considered halal (food or drinks which adhere to Islamic law, means it can be consumed) or haram? (cannot be consumed by Muslim). There is a Quranic text which prevents you from consuming anything that will make you hallucinated, dizzy, wasting your time or unhealthy, but there is no Quranic text that said wine is haram. Hence, the similarity in terms of the effect of the wine and the drinks mentioned in Quran will make Wine haram for all the Muslims. The example mentioned has all the four elements of qiyas in which the first one, the new case must have a legal solution. The second one, the original case must be stated in either the Quran, hadith or sanctioned by consensus. The original case for this example would be the text in Quran that prohibits anyone from drinking anything that will harm you physically or mentally. The third element is the attribute common to both the new and original cases. For this example, the common attribute would be the negative effect of both the new and original cases. The final element is the legal norm found in original case must be transposed to new case (Hallaq 2009, 23).

These are all the four main sources of Shari’a which is established by Muslim community; a holistic law which can be implemented in the Muslim world.

 

Hadith and Criticism

    Fabrication of hadith is everywhere from late 7th century until today. Although it was truly a humiliating act, people are actively forging hadith for own purposes. Hence, to battle the ridiculously large number of hadith forgery, Ahl al-hadith invented the three-tiered approach which emerged fully in the 8th century, specifically to determine the originality of a hadith. The first step is providing the sources of who have transmitted the hadith, known as Isnad. It was important to know the Isnad because they were the major means of protecting the true teaching of the prophets against heretics (Brown, Hadith, 77). Demanding for Isnad helps to filter out any inauthentic and useless material which only leads to confusion among Muslims. The second step would be identifying the transmitter thoroughly and the contiguity of the transmitter as well. The transmitter will be evaluated within two criteria. The first criteria would be checking the transmitter personal believe and character which without a doubt has a righteous one. The second criteria are checking the reports of the transmitter in order to determine whether the sources of information is reliable (Brown, Hadith, 80). Besides, hadith must also be transmitted by a contiguous and unbroken isnad. For example, you came late to work today. When you asked your co-worker is there any important things from your boss that you missed, he nodded and explained. Then when you asked the other co-workers, the information was contradicted. This would make the chain of transmission from your boss broken and thus making the statement of the first co-worker that you asked as unreliable. The third tier is finding corroboration of a hadith itself. It means if the narration of the companion about a hadith is similar to another companion and it could be trace back to the witness, corroboration occurred and surpassing this stage would make the hadith reliable. The three-tiered approach is a good approach because it was very systematic and by knowing all the foundation of hadith in detail, for example identifying the isnad of the hadith, the transmitter and the hadith itself, we could definitely determine the originality of hadith.

    Goldziger and Schacht are one of the contributors to the study of hadith. Both them had different perspectives about the authenticity of hadith. Goldziher believes that the reason behind the fabrication of hadith was politics. He gave multiple examples of a ruler like the Umayyads who forged hadith to legitimized rule, political practices and maintained the dynasty (Brown, Hadith, 206).  The main principles he used to separate the fake hadith from the original were the anachronism and the Principle of Analogy(Brown, Hadith, 205). He is certain that any hadith that contain conflict in any sense is labeled as fabricated hadith. For Goldziher, hadith serve not as a document of the prophet’s actual legacy, but rather as a ‘direct reflection of the aspiration of the Islamic community’ (Brown, Hadith, 205). Schaft on the other hand studied the isnads and the diachronic tradition of hadith collection to know the authenticity of hadith(Brown, Hadith, 210). He made a hypothesis, that, the farther back the isnad of a hadith goes, the more assured we should be of its fabrication (Brown, Hadith, 213).  He also claimed that all the hadith he investigated are transmitted by one chain. For me, their criticism of the body of hadith is not fair enough. There are a lot of elements of biasness presented by both. Although some of the claims made were true, like saying the forging of hadith is driven by political power, but not entirely were forge just to fill in political desires, some were true and make sense. Schaft, on the other hand, focuses mainly on the relationship of Islamic law with hadith which made him disregard about others critical factors. Goldziher judgment which is solely on matn while Schaft is entirely on Isnad is not sufficient enough to determine the originality of hadith.

    Motzki criticism is the best approach to the hadith compared to others. His method of criticizing hadith is not just on one specific narration of the reports, but his resources compromised every narration of reports available.  He criticized Schacht and Junboll for only referring to a small number of sources in determining the common link. Motzki in the other hand, draws on a much larger body of sources included the early ones and the later ones. This would make the judgment more reliable. Besides, his criticization of hadith is less bias as he treated the hadith with the same respect as Muslim would be (Brown, Hadith, 226).  In one of his debates, he said it is not necessarily to have more than one isnad to transmit hadith, one isnad should be enough due to the fact that Isnads after all only came in the late 600s (Brown, Hadith, 228).   Motzki ways of analyzing the hadith seem similar to the three-tiered approach because he took account both the isnad and matn with a great concern which is why Motzki approach to hadith is the best compared to others (Brown, Hadith, 228).

 

 

The epic story of Shia-Sunni split

    Numerous main events can be seen throughout Hazleton’s narrative of After the Prophet. The first significant event is the death of Muhammad on June 8th,632. The major problem encountered by the Muslim was no successor was named by the prophet after his death. And due to the facts that he had no son nor designated heir just tick up the problems (Hazleton, After the Prophet, 11). The whole Islam history would be shifted differently if only the pen and paper had arrived. But this was not the case as Muhammad intentionally unnamed his heir because he had such a good faith in his people ability to decide who is the best for the community (Hazleton, After the Prophet, 50). The closest blood related and relationship with Muhammad would be Ali, his cousin and also son-in-law. He would be the ideal successor to replace Muhammad but the barriers which kept him from being the caliph was the great leadership examples of two seniors’ advisors of Muhammad which are Abu Bakar and Umar and the wives of Muhammad who despises and doubt the capabilities of Ali.

    The next main event would be the assassination of Uthman in which the question of the assassinator has still remained in question todays. The repercussion of the Uthman assassination led to a great shed of blood loss among Muslim’s relatives from three major civil wars. The first war was between Aisyah’s army with Ali’s army which is called the battle of the camel. It was triggered because of Aisyah’s agenda of avenging Uthman’s death and, as she and her followers were not on par with the idea of Ali as the new caliph (Hazleton, After the Prophet, 105). The war started when one of the troops which is either in Aisyah’s side or Ali’s side made a surprise attack. Although at first Ali,Talhah and Zubayr did not wanted to resolve the problems by war, it was just only a matter of time for someone to trigger the battle as it was avoidable (Hazleton, After the Prophet, 111). The second Muslim civil war was the Battle of Siffin, a battle fought by Muawiyyah the governor of Syria who is deemed to claim the caliphate title to himself (Hazleton, After the Prophet, 133), with Ali’s troop. Towards the end of the battle, Muawiyyah who was on the brink of losing the war commanded his troop to wave passages of Quran instead of waving the conventional white flag as a symbol of surrender (Hazleton, After the Prophet, 136). Muwaiyyah tricks of using the Holy Book of Quran as a political tools of negotiating have succeeded in manipulating Ali’s own men in which infused the third war between Ali and the people of Abdullah ibn Wahhab who succumbed to the idea that the role of Caliph should not be arbitrated, as the successor was a matter of divine rights (Hazleton, After the Prophet, 140).

    Aftermath resulted to divisions in Islam which are Sunni Muslim and Shia Muslim which can be seen today. Sunni Muslim is dominant in the Muslim world while Shia Muslim (Ali’s follower) believed that God chooses Ali to be Muhammad’s successor. Even though both of the groups has a different thought on who is going to be next in line for the new caliph, they both agreed on same things which are Allah is the almighty god and Muhammad is the successor. And what every reader should know is that the thing that unites the two main branches of Islam is far more supreme than what divides them (Hazleton, After the Prophet, 207). The idea of unity among Muslims which Muhammad beholds is miraculously outstanding in every aspects.

Interpretation of Quran

 

A commentator in Quran has to have a wide knowledge regarding the lexicon, grammar, literature style of text and the meaning of Quranic verse. Hence, it is no surprised when there are a lot of questions wandering in the mind of a commentator. The typical questions are whether the suras are revealed in Makkah or Madinah? What prompted the revelation of God to Muhammad? Why repetition occurs in Quran? (McAuliffe, The tasks and traditions of interpretation, 184). And many more. Nevertheless, all of the questions have the answers inscribed in Quran. For example, the God gave revelation to Muhammad when he was in grief danger. For instance, Muhammad received the revelation that the Quraysh were secretly plotting to kill him in order to prevent him from spreading his preach in Medina. The revelation indeed saved Muhammad’s life. While some of the revelations stand independently with no specific occasion which only be revealed to instilled the faith of Islam. And some of the revelations were a command by the God itself to Muhammad.  If I were a commentator, I would go in depth in the area of science in the Quran because the explanation of how the earth was made, how nights and days present and other scientific explanation in Quran are the proof of the existence of God. And to know that all of the explanations are scientifically proven would make my faith in God stronger.

A scholar’s ideas and interpretation of Quran could be in influence by many sources. The first factor that clearly could influences a scholar is the scholar’s references(teacher). Al-Tabari, the elite scholar who had widen his knowledge of the Quran by learning with a great deal of teacher (McAuliffe, The tasks and traditions of interpretation, 191). Undoubtedly, each one of the teachers has their own perspectives and notions which hugely plays a major role in influencing Al-Tabari in interpreting the Quran. The second factor is through the cultivation of spiritual discipline which is performed by a scholar named al-Tustari. The spiritual act like fasting has strengthened Al-Tabari wisdom and intellectual growth (McAuliffe, The tasks and traditions of interpretation, 193). The influence comes in form of insight from God itself about the interpretation of the Quran. And it is definitely true because Muslim is well believed that performing spiritual discipline could actually bless them and instill them with a weapon of wisdom, confidence and peace. Me myself as a Muslim will recite the Quranic verses often and sometimes fasting in preparation of facing big examination because I believed the spiritual discipline somehow could help me in memorizing and make me more focus during the examination. And no doubt the interpretation of Al-Tabiri vary widely and include both literal and metaphorical element (McAuliffe, The tasks and traditions of interpretation, 194). The other factors are the intention of the scholars itself and the effect of the surroundings which were demonstrated by Sayyid Qutb who specify his scope of writing and learning to radical social renewal after disgusted by the racism he saw in North America and Europe (McAuliffe, The tasks and traditions of interpretation, 199). And for me, the intention of a scholar is the greatest influence to a scholar. This is because when a scholar has an intention, it means he will lead himself to have one mindset which could block himself to see widely of a certain thing which resulted in ultimate biasness. While, the mindset itself is created from the scholar’s surrounding such as mass media or the scholar’s way of life.

The controversial sura in this reading is Al-Kafirun(Disbeliever). McAuliffe stated some of the modern writers misread the chapter 109 because the modern writers tend to disregard the critical tradition of the Quran (McAuliffe, The tasks and traditions of interpretation, 201) and the modern writer tended to make argument about the freedom of religion diversity in the passage. Firstly, Islam does promote religion toleration as stated clearly and specifically in Quran, ‘la ikhra ha fiddin’ (Quran 2:256) which means there is no compulsion in religion. The principle the modern writers tried to do is not valid. The term repeated in Sura Al Kafirun did not intend to state that other religions are forbidden but just to show that Muslim will stand strong by their faith in religion. The repeating meaning in Al Kafirun which is one of the tradition of Quran that has a lot of repeating verses with the only purpose to emphasizes how important it is and not to discriminate other religions aside from Islam.  I agree with McAuliffe because the interpretation of Quran can only be done with a critical knowledge and in-depth understanding of Quran.