It is said that when Rabi'ah, the famous lady from Basra went for pilgrimage, she camped at a long distance from the Ka'aba and addressed Allah the Almighty, saying: "I would not go for tawaf, my Lord. You send your Ka'aba to me." It is also said that suddenly the Ka'aba disappeared from the vision of the people who were doing their tawaf. Is this true?
A miracle is something supernatural which happens all of a sudden. People look at it and are unable to explain it except to attribute it to Allah and His power. A miracle normally happens to support a prophet or a messenger so that his people may be more responsive to his teachings. The Qur'an tells us of many a miracle performed by prophets such as the staff of Moses turning into a snake which swallowed all what the sorcerers of Pharaoh could produce through their magic tricks. Prophet Saleh had his she-camel as a miracle. She could drink as much water and produce as much milk as all the camels which the whole population had. Prophet Jesus could heal the blind and the leper and bring life back to the dead, by Allah's sanction. When one reflects on one of these miracles, one cannot escape the conclusion that they are the work of Allah. No human being can do such things on his own.
When one speaks of the ability of Allah, we say that it is absolute. He can accomplish what He wants without exerting Himself in any way. Whatever He wills is done in an instant. An action like lifting the Ka'aba from one place to another is extremely easy for Him, although it appears to be miraculous to us. Indeed, He can lift a whole city or a country, or a continent, or the whole earth altogether and turn it upside down. Nothing defies His will or stops its accomplishment. Indeed, He does what is much more miraculous than that all the time, every second or split second. He gives life to His creation. If you reflect deeply on the birth of any child, you are bound to see the miraculous nature of creation. Compared with it the lifting of a huge building, or moving it from one place to another looks very easy. After all, it can be done by man, using lifts and other machines. Ancient temples which have survived for thousands of years were moved by man so that they would not be submerged by water when the High Dam was built on the river Nile.
But we take the birth of a child as extremely natural, while we think of the lifting of a temple as miraculous. The reason is obvious. The birth of children is so familiar to us that we tend to overlook its significance, while the lifting of a building is something that we cannot imagine happening easily because it is so unfamiliar to us. To Allah, however, all things are equally easy, because all laws of nature are familiar to Him. It is He who has made those laws and put them into operation. He can stop any of them at will and He can replace them all or cause them to operate in any different manner.
When we understand that, the difference between the natural and the supernatural becomes easy to understand. To us, what is not familiar to our sense is bound to seem supernatural, miraculous. To Allah, there is nothing supernatural, because it is He who has created all things and given their nature.
In human life, there can be two types of supernatural events performed by people. The first is the one which has already been mentioned of a miracle performed by a prophet. We read in the Qur'an that Allah shows Moses, His messenger the miracle He has chosen for him and makes it clear to him that he can perform that miracle whenever he wants, in order to convince his people of his message. A prophet can make use of his miracle at any time, and challenge his people to do something similar, as happened with Moses when the Pharaoh gathered all his magicians and sorcerers in order to defeat Moses.
The other type of supernatural event is a miracle done by Allah in honor of one of his good servants, either in response to his prayers or to relieve an emergency. This sort of miracle is done by Allah when it is not expected by His good servant. He does not know of it, nor does he imagine what shape or form or purpose it may have. When it happens to a person, he feels that Allah has honored him beyond description and does not try to show off. I will give an example of our modern times.
In a country which was under one of the most cruel dictatorial regimes for a long time, those who advocated an Islamic government were rounded up and subject to different form of torture in order to extract confessions from them about their colleagues and brothers, especially those who managed to escape arrest. One of them who knew many people who were still at large was brought for interrogation. He feared to tell of his brothers if the torture became very bad. He prayed to Allah to help him not to say a word which will lead to the arrest of anyone. When he was questioned about others, he denied all knowledge of any of them. He managed to withstand the simple forms of torture such as beating and flogging. When his inquisitors were fed up with him they decided to inflict more torture on him and use electricity. His lips trembled with a prayer to Allah to help him. When the electricity was connected to his body it did not work. Furious, the inquisitors tried the torture machine in different ways, but it did not work whenever it was connected to him. They tried it on one of their soldiers and it worked. They tried it again on their victim but it still did not work. At this point, the tortured man said to the top inquisitor: "Maybe, your machine does not work with people whose static electricity is of a certain type or who have a certain blood group. Why don't you try it yourself to see if your body is like mine?" The man fell to the suggestion and held the wire himself. The machine worked and he had a very bad electrical shock.
I heard this story from the man to whom it happened after he was released. He was all modest, praising Allah for the favor and saying that he could never forget that moment when Allah greatly honored him and bestowed on him so much of His grace.
Such miraculous events do happen to good servants of Allah, as an honor to them, in response to their prayers and to relieve emergencies. As I have already said they do not expect a miracle to happen until it happens. They cannot demand it from Allah because no one can put himself in a position which enables him to demand something from his Lord. We must not forget that the relationship between any human being and Allah is one of a servant and his master. It is always the master who demands and commands. The servant's role is to obey.
In this story which is attributed to Rabi'ah, we are told that she demanded that the Ka'aba comes to her. Can we ask first why did she refuse to go to the Ka'aba herself? Allah states in the Qur'an: It is a duty owing to Allah by all people that they must go on pilgrimage to the House. That House is the Ka'aba. The Ka'aba stands in the place where Ibrahim and Ismail had built it, in fulfillment of Allah's commands. It is to that spot we go for pilgrimage. This story tells that Rabi'ah refused to go there and wanted the Ka'aba to come to her. Does this not mean that she refused an express command of Allah and countered it with a demand of her own that the Ka'aba come to the place she had encamped? How could she do that? What was she trying to prove?
Moreover, those people who are doing the tawaf at the Ka'aba itself in response to Allah's orders saw it being taken away suddenly. This means that Allah disregarded them all and took the Ka'aba to that woman who refused His orders! Is it possible that Allah tells his obedient servants who are doing His bidding to stop obeying Him because He wants to honor a woman who is disobedient to Him!
If it is true that she said those words, then she was giving an example of absolute rudeness. Her rudeness is not directed to any human being, but to Allah Himself. If you asked your son to bring you a glass of water and he retorts: I will not do that, you go and bring me a glass of water because I am thirsty. What would you say to him? Would you bring him the water and increase his pocket money that day? Those who tell us this story want us to believe that Allah did exactly that and removed the Ka'aba from its place to where that woman was so that she could do the tawaf. The rudeness of her words is only matched by the stupidity of those who imagine that Allah would respond in that way to such rudeness.
The truth is that we are all servants of Allah. We worship Him as He wants us to worship Him, not as we imagine His worship should be. Moreover, our worship must take the form which the Prophet, peace be upon him, has taught us. No other form is valid or acceptable to Allah. I repeat that He wants us to offer the pilgrimage to the House, i.e. the Ka'aba, where it has stood ever since it was built by the two noble prophets, Ibrahim and Ismail, peace be upon them.
The absurdity of the whole story becomes more clearly apparent when we remember that the Prophet, peace be upon him, himself and his companions were in Madinah for several years and none of them could go to Makkah to offer the pilgrimage or the Umrah. Allah did not bring the Ka'aba to the Prophet, peace be upon him, to do the tawaf of the pilgrimage. Moreover, when the Prophet, peace be upon him, went with his companions to do the Umrah in the sixth year after his immigration to Madinah, Quraish stopped them and did not allow them to enter. They encamped about 30 km away from Makkah where negotiations with the polytheists of Quraish went on for several days. The result of these negotiations was a peace treaty which stipulated that the Prophet, peace be upon him, and his companions would go back that year without entering Makkah. They were in a state of consecration, i.e. Ihraam. When they were so prevented from entering Makkah and doing the tawaf at the Ka'aba, they slaughtered animals in compensation and released themselves from Ihraam and went back home delaying their Umrah for a full year in accordance with the terms of the peace treaty achieved at that time and known in the history books as the Treaty of Al-Hudaibiyah. Allah did not bring the Ka'aba to them to do their tawaf and finish their Umrah, because the Umrah must be done at the Ka'aba. The Ka'aba does not go to anyone, so that he or she can do the Umrah. That did not happen to the Prophet, peace be upon him, himself. How can it happen to a woman, no matter who she was and what she was. She could not be more honorable than the Prophet, peace be upon him, peace be upon him. Anyone who suggests that does not know what he is talking about. But Sufis tell us all sorts of stories like this one. None of them should be believed.
• Rape victims, society's attitude
You have mentioned recently that a woman who faces rape is not required to sacrifice her life to escape the advances of the rapist. Your answer is well appreciated. May I ask for further clarification, what if the woman conceives as a result of this barbaric act? Who has claim to the child? Is she allowed to have an abortion? What should be the attitude of her husband and the community? Sometimes a victim of rape is rejected not only by her husband, but also by the community and even by her parents. In such cases, she is made to suffer endlessly. Please explain.
The considered ruling is that which I have explained in the past and to which you have correctly referred. If a woman is assaulted by a man and she finds herself facing a real threat of death, she is not to be blamed for being raped. It is impossible to rationalize in advance the behavior and reaction of a woman who finds herself in such a situation. What we should say is that a woman who faces attack by a rapist should try to defend herself with all possible means. She should not and need not kill herself. If, however, she kills the rapist, she simply acts in self-defense and she is not to be blamed for killing him. If he kills her, she is a martyr.
If the rapist overpowers her despite her efforts to repel him, she cannot be considered guilty of anything. Neither her family nor the community should be too harsh against her even though she may become pregnant as the result of rape. It is unfortunate that some victims of rape are treated as if they are guilty. If we are to be candid about such situations, we have to admit that such attitude is the result of a subconscious suspicion that the victim have had a share of the guilt in the affair. In Islam, we do not judge people on the basis of suspicion. We only judge them on the basis of clear evidence.
If the victim of rape becomes pregnant as a result of being assaulted, she needs not have an abortion. Indeed, the same rules which apply to all cases of pregnancy apply to her with regard to the permissibility or otherwise of having an abortion. As I have explained in the past, abortion is allowed when the continuation of pregnancy threatens the life of the mother. Apart from that, a small minority of schools of thought allow abortion in very early pregnancy, but the considered opinion of the overwhelming majority of scholars, over many centuries, is that deliberate abortion is forbidden from the moment of conception, unless the continued pregnancy presents a danger to the mother's health.
There is a general rule which applies to other cases of suspected parenthood. It states that "The child belongs to the man on whose bed it is born, while the adulterer bites the dust." On the basis of this rule, if a married woman is a victim of rape and she gets pregnant, her husband is the father of her child. If she is not married, she brings the child up and the rapist again "bites the dust".
A community which casts a stigma on the victim of rape, must consider its attitude. If there is blame to be attached, it is not to the victim but to the community for failing to provide adequate protection to prevent crimes of rape altogether.
• Reformer for each century — is there one?
Some people quote a Hadith which suggests that every 100 years Allah sends someone to renew Islam for the Muslim nation. They support this claim with a list of such reformers including Umar ibn Abdelaziz for the first century and Imam Al-Shaf’ie for the second, etc. May I ask who was the reformer for the fourteenth century? Please comment.
The Hadith you have quoted is correct. However, it does not mean that the person referred to will bring anything new in Islam. He will simply call on Muslims to adhere to the faith of Islam in its purest form. He would call on people to correct their beliefs and practices so as to bring them in line with the pure form of Islam preached by Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him.
It is generally agreed that Umar ibn Abdelaziz was the first such reformer. His influence on the Muslim state was enormous because he eradicated all practices which crept into the government and which could not be sanctioned by Islam. Imam Al-Shaf’ie is generally agreed to have been the reformer for the second century. He brought Islamic scholarship to complete reliance on Hadith in preference to intellectual thought. There were trends which favored such intellectual approaches in Islamic scholarship but Imam Al-Shaf’ie put the work of scholars back on its proper course, namely, deduction of rulings only on the basis of the Qur'an and the Sunnah.
As for the reformers of following centuries, people tend to select some people who had positive influence on the Muslim nation or Islamic thought. However, there is no single list of such reformers which is completely agreed upon. May I suggest that it is not important to determine who was a reformer and who was not. The religion of Islam is taken from the Prophet, and we simply do not take the view or rulings or thought of any particular scholar as totally correct. Indeed the statement of Imam Malik is particularly relevant in this connection. He refers to scholars and people of lesser standing and says: "You may take some of the view of any person and leave out some, with the exception of the Prophet, the teachings of whom you should take in full."