Blind faith

SPRING 2009

It was in this semester I finally realized one of the most important themes about faith.

UNDERSTANDING

It all started when I took the course “Religious Study 107- Intro to Islam”. Deceived by the words “Intro” and “Islam”, I confidently judged the course as an easy-to-score-an-A course. Why not? I was born a Muslim, raised a Muslim, been living in a country that the majority of its citizens are Muslims, and being taught about Islam formally (in school) since I was 7. So, why not take this course and get an A for my humanity credits?

My early judgment of this course turned out to be a ‘not-so-cool’ judgment, mostly because after the first class, I began to have a clearer version of what this course would be like. In brief, this course is about the history of Islam, from its early years until recent, issues in Islam and a whole lot more. (Yes, what an Introduction to Islam!!).

Put aside the nature of this course, what I’m more interested in sharing today is the way this course was handled. To my evaluation, I’d say that 92% of this course was conducted through discussion among students (Sunnis, Shias, Christians, Jews, Buddhist, and Atheist) and the professor, while the other 8 % consist of writings and exams. The main point here is that in this course, I was able to learn about Islam differently from when I was schooling in Malaysia. Back then, most of the students, including me, would never question about anything that have been told by the teacher (ustazah). Even in high school, we would never question anything being taught (at least in my school). Maybe Islamic Education is only taught to Muslims students, so, we tend to accept all information without a slight doubt. Put t in another way, we were comfortable with what we the teacher told us, mostly because they are similar to what we have always believed.

However, learning about Islam in another school in another country which majority of its citizens are Christians has exposed me to a new experience. Learning Islam has never been the same. Whenever the professor told the class about something on Islam, there would be a lot of questions being asked by the students, both the Muslims and non-Muslims. For instance, there was one time when we learnt about the life of Muhammad S.A.W. (peace be upon him), and the professor said that Muhammad was illiterate to prove that he did not write the Quran himself, almost half of the class raised up their hands to ask questions. And one of the questions that caught my attention was “Is there any proof that shows Muhammad was illiterate? Or is it just based on the hadith?” This question was asked by a Christian friend.

Interesting. That is how I felt. There are lots of things about Islam being questioned. Also about the differences between Sunni and Shia. What makes things more interesting was when most of the questions are the questions that I, as a Muslim, could never answer. Not because I am not an ulama or whatever, but because I have never questioned about any information that I received when I studied Islam back in Malaysia. No skepticism. Perhaps I was scared to question things on religious matter. Why? Because I was scared that I do not believe in Allah, in Muhammad, or in Quran enough that would make me a Musyrik. Because I was scared that the teacher would be mad at me for questioning too much about Islam. Because sometimes, even the teacher herself would never satisfy my hunger for absolute answer by just telling me “Only God knows”.

So I wonder. When we believe in something, how do we have faith in it? Is it enough to just accept things that we do not understand why they are the way they are? Is it enough to have faith in something just because our parents believe in the same thing? Or because the wise men said so?

Now I know. In order to have faith, we should understand it as a whole. We need to understand why we have to do this, and why we have to do that. It is not necessary to search for logical reasoning to satisfy our skepticism. As long as we understood, there is no room for blind faith.