Extremism in any aspect of life is deplored, be it Deen or Dunya. In our worldly lives, our businesses, our domestic affairs, our social relations, extremism is detested. No one likes a person who jokes too much, or who is too serious, or a visitor who overstays his welcome. Similarly, too much self-praise, or too much boastfulness, etc., are habits people dislike. The reason is that these are acts of extremism and exaggeration. We can also include under this heading practices such as over-eating, over-sleeping, or doing any permitted worldly act more than necessary. Over-indulgence in fulfilment of desires, or any other practice is detrimental to both physical and spiritual health.

Exaggeration is another bad habit among people. Sometimes a matter is quite straight-forward, but people make it very complicated. An event may be innocent and harmless, but through exaggeration it is blown out of proportion. Such characteristics are harmful to our social lives, as well our spiritual lives. This brings a host of evils in its wake. Such exaggeration has been berated as lying, in the Hadith.

In Deen extremism is even more serious, for reasons we will expound later on Insha-Allah. Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam) said:

"Beware of Ghuluw (extremism) in Deen, for indeed people before you have been destroyed only because of extremism in Deen."

This hadith makes it clear that extremism is not tolerated in Deen, and it can lead to destruction, both physical and spiritual. Bid’ah or innovation is also an excess in Deen, for it also represents transgressing the limits as defined by Allah. Allah says in The Quran:

"And these are the limits of Allah, so do not transgress them."

In another verse Allah Ta-‘Aala issues the command to make dua, so He says:

This means that even in dua we are ordered to maintain certain limits and holds. It is sunnat when on a journey to recite the takbeer when going up a hill or incline. Once the Sahaba were returning from a jihad campaign, and as they ascended a hill, they began shouting the takbeer loudly, at the top of their voices. Nabi-e-Kareem (sallallahu alaihi wasallam) stopped them, saying: "Have mercy upon yourselves, for the One you are calling upon is not deaf nor far off." Here we also see the folly of some hujjaj who shout the talbiya at the top of their voices, especially in front of the Holy Ka’bah. Besides being disrespectful, this has also been declared a bid’ah by the Ulema. In fact, in Hajj we witness a tremendous amount of guluw or extremism. For instance, stoning the jamaraat with bricks and boulders! The Shariah has never issued such a command. Sometimes shoes and umbrellas are flung, anything that people can lay their hands on. Look at the behaviour at hajar-e-aswad, as well as during the other stages of Hajj. The same can be said about excessively loud dua after faraz salah. The ulema have prohibited loud dua and zikr when following a janaaza; to do so on such an occasion is a bid’ah.

Bid’ah means to invent new customs or practices in Religion, which were not provided for by the Founder of that Religion, nor were such actions observed by the Gairul-Quroon, i.e. the best generations after Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam). Bid’ah also means to make something unimportant important, or to make a mustahabb act farz, or to change something optional to compulsory. Dua after namaaz is sunnat, and to do it collectively is, at the most, mustahabb. So if any person does not participate in such a collective dua, we have no right to condemn that person or regard him to be on falsehood. When such attitudes prevail, the signs are there very clearly that bid’ah has set in.

These principles can apply to every aspect of Deen. When we transgress a limit set down by Allah, or we commit an excess or act of extremism, we are shifting towards Bid’ah. And if such an act is done deliberately and wilfully for whatever reason, it becomes an innovation out and out.

The Ahle Kitab have been prohibited from guluw. The reason is obvious when you investigate the nature of their extremism. Verse 171 of Surah Nisaa, after forbidding them from committing excesses (guluw), explains the way in which they committed excesses, i.e. by deifying Nabi Eesa (alaihis salaam). They raised him to the pedestal of Godhood, while he was only a Prophet and Servant of Allah. In order to force this Godhood of Nabi Eesa into their religion they had to invent the Doctrine of Trinity. This was the evil Bid’ah they committed. Sadly, Muslims today seem to be heading in the same direction, when one looks at the Bid’ah that they are perpetrating. One of the chief causes of the Christians today having an adulterated deen is the fact that were not cautious to avoid bid’ah from penetrating into their deen. Christianity bears numerous examples of such innovations. Their Christmas, Easter, Lent, Atonement and so many other practices and festivals are either pagan-orientated customs, or were introduced by so called holy people after Nabi Eesa. Since they drifted from the true teachings of their Deen, and they failed to adhere in practice to these teachings, nor were they learned enough in their religion to be able to sift out truth from falsehood, they fell hook, line, and sinker into the trap of bid’ah. With the passing of time, slowly the entire edifice of their Divine Religion was eroded, until nothing was left but its name. Does this not sound familiar among Muslims too?

You may ask how did this exaggeration find its way into the religion of the Christians. The answer is well documented, one which even western, Christian writers, in fact, the Doctors of Theology in their religion, have accepted. The doctrine of trinity and sonship of Jesus, like the doctrine of atonement and several others, was invented (and that’s the only word for it) by a jew named Saul, later on changed to Paul. Today he is the ‘revered’ St. Paul, the actual founder of modern-day Christianity. We won’t go into the details right now, but suffice to say that this man was initially an enemy of the Nasaara. Then suddenly, out of nowhere he appears and claims that he had seen a vision of Nabi Eesa and the latter had commissioned him to propagate his Religion. Now, the important thing for us here is the exaggeration he perpetrated with regard to Hazrat Eesa (alaihis-salaam). It appears this Saul had ulterior, sinister motives for embracing Christianity. He saw this as an ideal opportunity to hurt the people he hated the most, yet without any fear of retaliation or retribution. Among the beliefs that he inserted into Christianity was the godhood of Jesus, and him being the son of God. This was the excess that the Quran condemned. This was one of the worst acts of bid’ah to creep into Christianity.

If we will continue to allow new customs and practices to prevail over our Deen, or to find its way into our religious life, then we face the very same calamity that has already struck the Nasaara, i.e. interpolation and distortion of Deeni practices and beliefs. Hence, committing excesses and bid’ah are integrated; they are intrinsically interwoven with each other. The two go hand in hand. Only, the first (guluw) precedes the second. Extremism has a run-off that leads to bid’ah.

A strikingly similar act of exaggeration as perpetrated by the Nasaara has been successfully introduced into the Muslim Ummah several centuries ago. Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam) had long ago warned: "Do not elevate me as the Nasaara had elevated Eesa bin Maryam, for I am only a servant. So say: (He is) the servant and Messenger of Allah." Because of the power of this hadith shareef no Muslim, especially during the early eras of glory and spiritual wealth, would ever claim that the Messenger of Allah was anything but a great Rasool. It would therefore be impossible for anyone to succeed in foisting such a belief onto the Ummah.

History has it that one Abdullah bin Saba, (a Jew from Yemen who embraced Islam at the hands of Uthman (radhiyallahu anhu), but his motives were corrupt) attempted to introduce this belief into Islam. He tried to promote the status of Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam) to the rank of Allah, but he failed miserably. Now let us draw a comparison here. Ibni Sabaa failed to do what Paul of the Christians succeeded in doing, that is to portray the image of their Rasool as a God and/or son of God. Reasons for the failure of one and success of the other were the strong belief and practice of Sahaaba and the opposite among followers of Christianity at that stage. That is, when Paul fabricated this false belief people believed it because they were themselves weak and unstable in their Religion. Meanwhile, the followers of Islam were moulded by Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam) so wonderfully that they were steadfast in amal and in aqeeda. Hence the failure of Ibni Sabaa to invent Divinity for Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam).

However, having failed at this attempt he tried another line of attack. After the death of Hazrat Uthman (radhiyallahu anhu) (for which this same Ibni Sabaa was partially responsible) there developed two distinct parties among Muslims. Those who supported Hazrat Uthman and wanted to catch and punish his killers, and another group that pledged their support for Hazrat Ali. A study of the situation at that time reveals that Hazrat Ali had no way of determining the identity of Hazrat Uthman’s killers, for the following reasons:

The killers were a large group of people.

Before the attack Hazrat Uthman had asked most of the people to leave his home, even the sons of Hazrat Ali who wished to protect him. So when the killers did attack, there were hardly any eyewitnesses. The few who were there had to fight for their lives against a horde of attackers. Later on they could not recall who was who.

The killers subsequently went into hiding. Since Hazrat Ali had his hands full with outbreaks of factionalism, it was extremely difficult for him to hunt down the killers. He thought he might get a chance to do it later, but no one gave him this chance. The next thing he knew he had two major battles on his hands.

This was what Ibni Sabaa seized upon. When a group stood up to oppose Hazrat Ali (with the motive of forcing him to find and punish the killers), he sided with the supporters of Hazrat Ali. He then began praising Hazrat Ali, and seeking out ahadeeth of Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam) which he heard from Sahaaba to praise Hazrat Ali. When he decided that these ahadeeth are not too extensive and won’t succeed in changing aqeedah, he started fabricating beliefs about Hazrat Ali. One such belief was the Divinity of Hazrat Ali, claiming that he was God incarnate, exactly the same lesson Paul fed to the ignorant Christians. Remember that at the time feelings and emotions were running high, and in a volatile climate a spark is enough to ignite a blaze. That spark proved to be the exaggeration about Hazrat Ali that this kaafir/Jew/Munaafiq, Ibni Sabaa conjured up. Today, one sect among the Shias, namely the Ismaili sect maintain this belief that Hazrat Ali was God. They went further, to claim that the subsequent Imams, who succeeded Hazrat Ali also enjoyed the same status.

We can thus see, that the bid’ah of the Christians eventually found its way into the lives of some Muslims too, although not in relation to The Prophet of Islam. The status of Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam) is far too great for such a belief to be maintained about him. Allah would not allow this. Nonetheless, exaggerations were formed about Hazrat Ali, only these differed from one sect to another.

For this reason it is said that like the real founder of modern day Christianity was the hypocrite and Jew, Paul, the founder of the religion called Shiasm was another Munafiq and Jew, namely Ibni Sabaa. It is indeed amazing how much in common the Christians have with the Shias. We will elaborate on this in another article, Insha-Allah.

Some sects among the Shias, such as the Imamiyya sect do not believe that Hazrat Ali was Allah Himself, but they too exaggerate the status of Hazrat Ali by claiming, for example, that he was supposed to be the first Khalifa after Rasoolullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam), when the entire ummat including Hazrat Ali himself, knew otherwise.