Table of Contents
Introduction
This is the third article in the ‘Be Proud of Your Islam‘ series. It explores the crucial responsibility of Muslims to save humanity and share the message of Islam with the world. Through the example of a hospital employee, the article demonstrates the dangers of neglecting this duty. It also reflects on how the absence of Islamic values contributes to the decline and corruption seen in the world. Click here to read the full series.
Embracing Our Duty: The Muslim Responsibility to Guide Humanity and Uphold Justice
Imagine you are an employee in the intensive care unit of a hospital. Dozens of COVID-19 patients are being admitted, and you are responsible for administering oxygen and monitoring their condition. Today is your shift, but you choose not to go. Perhaps you are distracted by personal matters, or maybe you simply forgot about your duty. Meanwhile, the patients begin to suffocate and die as you remain at home. Is this a crime?
“Why is it a crime? I didn’t directly cause anyone’s death!” you might think.
But in reality, you are responsible because you neglected your duty to save lives. This is exactly what happens when we, as Muslims, neglect our responsibility to guide people away from disbelief. As Muslims, we are entrusted with a great reward for fulfilling our duty:
“Indeed, ALLAH has purchased from the believers their lives and their properties [in exchange] for that they will have Paradise“1
(Suraat ‘At-Tawbah, 9:111)
Our duty as Muslims is clear. ALLAH says in the Qur’an, “You are the best nation produced [as an example] for mankind“2 (Suraat ‘Ali-‘imraan, 3:110), and “[And they are] those who, if WE give them authority in the land, establish prayer and give zakāh and enjoin what is right and forbid what is wrong“3 (Suraat ‘Al-Hajj, 22:41).
Our responsibility is to remove obstacles that hinder the message of Islam and to create an environment that allows humanity to flourish. It is to prevent the suffering that arises from injustice, to protect future generations from falsehood and misinformation, and to free people from the chains of materialism and exploitation by capitalist powers.
Instead, our duty is to establish justice and create a world where persecution does not exist, where people are not led astray from the truth, and where falsehood is not disguised or forced upon them.
We must create the conditions in which people can freely choose the right path, guided by clear evidence:
“…that those who perished [through disbelief] would perish upon evidence and those who lived [in faith] would live upon evidence“4
(Suraat ‘Al-‘Anfaal, 8:42)
Guidance must be distinct from error, and the truth must shine clearly, free from the deception of falsehood:
“There shall be no compulsion in [acceptance of] the religion. The right course has become distinct from the wrong...”5
(Suraat ‘Al-Baqarah, 2:256)
The Consequences of Neglect: What the World Has Lost from the Decline of Muslim Responsibility
What does all of this have to do with the initial example? The answer lies in the concept that faith is life, while disbelief is death. ALLAH illustrates this in the Qur’an with the example of one who comes to faith after being in disbelief:
“And is one who was dead and WE gave him life and made for him light by which to walk among the people...”6
(Suraat ‘Al-‘Ancaam, 6:122)
When we neglect our responsibility as Muslims to guide humanity, both we and the world suffer. The world has seen remarkable advancements in technology, yet spiritually and morally, it has plunged into a decline, a descent that continues at an alarming pace. To understand the gravity of this, we must reflect on the examples of what has been lost due to the decline of Muslims.
The title of a book by the Indian scholar Abu Al-Hassan Al-Nadwi (may ALLAH have mercy on him) “What did the world lose with the decline of Muslims?“, speaks to this. Consider this: 99% of the Earth’s resources, which ALLAH created for all people, are controlled by less than 1% of the wealthy. The wealth of just 26 people is equal to what half of the Earth’s population owns.
Meanwhile, thousands of people die daily from hunger, disease, poverty, cold, heat, and displacement. Half of the world’s population struggles to secure their daily needs. Yet, we as Muslims are entrusted with ALLAH’s book, which warns us, “…so that it will not be a perpetual distribution among the rich from among you“7 (Suraat ‘Al-Hashr, 59:7). This imbalance is a clear sign of what the world has lost due to the decline of Muslims.
Moreover, consider the wars that are waged for the benefit of powerful capitalist interests—weapon manufacturers, oil companies, banks, and reconstruction firms. These wars deliberately enrich the few while sinking entire nations into debt. Internal conflicts and massacres are often fabricated through the manipulation of global powers and institutions like the World Bank, ensuring that people remain oppressed. As Noam Chomsky describes in What Uncle Sam Really Wants, and Naomi Klein discusses in The Shock Doctrine, these tragedies are used to further the profits of political elites and capitalist giants, who benefit from the suffering of others.
The Global Impact: How the Decline of Muslim Influence Has Shaped the World’s Injustice
When you witness how leaders of powerful nations—presidents, secretaries of state and defense, members of Congress, and figures like Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, and Donald Rumsfeld—profit from wars they instigate, despite their claims of serving their people’s interests, you begin to understand what the world has lost with the decline of Muslims.
When the vulnerable among humanity, whether Muslims or others, are tortured, burned, imprisoned, raped, humiliated, and stripped of their property, when they are impoverished and displaced under the watch of an international system manipulated by its puppets, millions of people are left to endure unimaginable suffering in detention camps. Major powers even study effective methods of torture, focusing on breaking the detainees’ spirits, as discussed in The Shock Doctrine.
Meanwhile, we, as Muslims, have ALLAH’s Book, which made the purpose of war to ensure that there is “no [more] fitnah“8 (Suraat ‘Al-Baqarah, 2:193)—so that people are not oppressed. It commands us to treat those who repent, establish prayer, and give zakah as “your brothers in religion“9 (Suraat ‘At-Tawbah, 9:11). It also includes among the recipients of zakah those “whose hearts are reconciled“10, encouraging us to use our wealth to help guide people to the true religion. When we reflect on these principles, we realize just how much the world has lost with the decline of Muslims.
The Moral Crisis: How the Absence of Islamic Values Has Shaped a World in Decline
When humanity reaches an unprecedented level of moral decline, where thousands of children are killed daily through abortion, and for a time, thousands of aborted fetuses are treated as clinical waste and burned to generate power, heating British hospitals, it is clear what the world has lost with the decline of Muslims.
When children born of adultery are abandoned in garbage containers or placed in “baby boxes”, growing up resentful and psychologically scarred, and when illegitimate births become the majority in some societies, we see the profound impact of the absence of Islamic values in the world.
When laws are quickly passed to support those who deviate from the natural order, and people are urged to replace the terms “father” and “mother” with “parent number one” and “parent number two” in families with two males or two females, the loss becomes evident. When countries enact laws to protect homosexuals from treatment, and the World Health Organization criminalizes discussing the possibility of treatment, and when laws mandate that schoolchildren be taught about LGBT culture and gender transitions, even against the objections of many parents—including non-Muslim ones who say “Let children be children”—this too reveals what the world has lost.
Parents who prevent their children from attending sexual education classes that promote gender transition are now being criminalized, even threatened with having their children taken from them. This reality is unfolding in countries like Canada, the UK, and Scotland. In contrast, Muslims possess a preserved revelation that lays out a straight path to prevent such deviations, revealing the immense loss the world has faced through the decline of Muslims.
When science is manipulated to serve atheistic ideologies, moral deviation, and capitalist interests, and when prestigious journals publish studies advocating for the legalization of newborn killings, under the guise of “after-birth abortion” or “neonatal euthanasia”, we see the depth of the moral and ethical erosion in society.
When young men and women are lost and adrift, suffering from psychological disorders and a sense of purposelessness, and suicide becomes widespread, we witness the devastating consequences of this decline. Suicide has become the third leading cause of death among youth aged 15-19, with 800,000 people taking their own lives every year. In countries like Japan, student suicides reached alarming levels in 2020, and in Fresno, America, an exhibit with 1,100 backpacks was placed to represent the number of university student suicides each year.
Meanwhile, we possess a light from ALLAH—a preserved revelation and a clear Book—that defines our purpose in life, gives meaning to our existence, connects us to the Hereafter, and provides strength in times of hardship. In this context, it becomes clear what the world has lost with the decline of Muslims.
The Consequences of Abandoning Islamic Guidance: A World Enslaved, Oppressed, and Lost
When humans are reduced to mere numbers, controlled by digital credit systems as seen in China—where surveillance cameras track every move and your credit score decreases based on your compliance with the state’s regulations, restricting your freedom of movement, travel, and even reproduction—it becomes clear what the world has lost with the decline of Muslims.
When women suffer widespread abuse—rape, harassment, sexual exploitation at work, objectification, and being forced to dress in ways that attract customers to benefit employers, while also enduring physical abuse and humiliation—while we, as Muslims, are entrusted with a Book that honors, protects, and safeguards her, placing men as her protectors and maintainers, as ALLAH says, “Men should be constant caretakers of women“11 (Suraat ‘An-Nissaa’, 4:34), we truly understand the loss the world has suffered with the decline of Muslims.
Most importantly, when the majority of humanity worships creation—whether humans, idols, animals, or their own desires—living and dying for the benefit of capitalist giants and tyrannical rulers, we witness a profound loss. People live decades without ever fulfilling their true purpose:
“And I did not create the jinn and mankind except to worship ME“12
(Suraat ‘Adh-Dhaariyaat, 51:56)
People are driven to glorify statues of dictators like Kim Il-sung in North Korea or Mao Zedong in China, while we know that ALLAH has sent us to guide humanity away from worshiping creation toward the worship of the Creator alone. We were sent to liberate people from the injustice of false religions to the justice of Islam, from the narrow confines of worldly existence to the vastness of this life and the Hereafter.
At that moment, you will truly understand what the world has lost due to the decline of Muslims, and you will grasp the profound meaning of ALLAH’s words:
“And if it were not for ALLAH checking [some] people by means of others, the earth would have been corrupted“13
(Suraat ‘Al-Baqarah, 2:251)
The Unspoken Burden: Awakening to Our Duty Amidst a World in Despair
You might say, “But all these problems you mention also exist among us Muslims. We suffer from suicide, we oppress and enslave just like others do”. You might say, “Why do you believe that Islam alone can save humanity?” Or perhaps, “You’re burdening Muslims with too much! What about us? Who will save us?” You might argue, “The world you’re talking about won’t listen to me while I’m struggling in this state, and our nation is in such a difficult condition”.
I won’t answer these questions today, but, ALLAH willing, I will address them in the next article, so as not to make this one too long. Today’s article is meant to inspire us, to awaken the sense of responsibility and mercy that we, as Muslims, are entrusted with toward humanity.
We conclude with a reflection on the story of an American woman who converted to Islam after a long, painful journey of confusion and searching for truth. She shared her experience after sitting with her daughter, who had secretly embraced Islam. That night, her daughter read some translated verses from the Qur’an. The aunt recalled
“I took the Qur’an, held it before my face, kissed it, and said, ‘Why didn’t anyone tell us about this?‘”
This is a powerful, painful question that should echo in our hearts: Why didn’t anyone tell us about this? Perhaps, we don’t fully appreciate the treasure we have, but for someone who has been deprived of it all their life, it is everything. The aunt continued:
“One night, ALLAH guided me to a verse in a surah that says: ‘This day I have perfected for you your religion and completed MY favor upon you and have approved for you Islām as religion‘14(Suraat ‘Al-Maa’idah, 5:3)“
Source:
- Dr. Eyad Qunaibi. ماذا خسر العالَم بانحطاط المسلمين – كن عزيزاً بإسلامك [3]. YouTube Video.
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Fadel Soliman, Bridges’ translation ↩︎
- Fadel Soliman, Bridges’ translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
- Saheeh International translation ↩︎
1 thought on “Muslim Responsibility Towards Humanity: A Wake-Up Call”