Business in the guise of religion
Wednesday, 30 December 2009
BANGLADESH as one of the biggest Islamic countries in the world has an Islamic clergy to be proud of in terms of knowledge of the Quran and its interpretations. If this clergy only exerts itself widely and seriously, then there should be no reason for the people to be misguided or for them to engage in activities ironically opposed to Islam.
But in Bangladesh we see many persons posing as holymen or the enlightened ones on Islam and wanting the subservience of common people to their views and fiats. In many cases, their claims to religious eminence are dubious. But they would want people to believe otherwise for the furtherance of their pecuniary interests.
In many places in the countryside, a fertile religious business has cropped up in different ways. But there is sanction in Islam against many such things. Islam as the supreme and the last of the monotheistic religions expressly demands that humans shall pray to none but Almighty Allah for deliverance from any sort of predicament or fulfillment of wishes. Therefore, how consistent with Islam is such businesses in the name of Islam?
Gholam Mohammad
Eskaton, Dhaka.
But in Bangladesh we see many persons posing as holymen or the enlightened ones on Islam and wanting the subservience of common people to their views and fiats. In many cases, their claims to religious eminence are dubious. But they would want people to believe otherwise for the furtherance of their pecuniary interests.
In many places in the countryside, a fertile religious business has cropped up in different ways. But there is sanction in Islam against many such things. Islam as the supreme and the last of the monotheistic religions expressly demands that humans shall pray to none but Almighty Allah for deliverance from any sort of predicament or fulfillment of wishes. Therefore, how consistent with Islam is such businesses in the name of Islam?
Gholam Mohammad
Eskaton, Dhaka.