Faith Is Not Inherited

"Quran, Surah As-Saffat, verses 69 to 70: They found their ancestors astray, yet they rushed to follow in their footsteps."

This article will determine how readers understand the other articles on this website. So please use a sharp mind and an open heart in understanding it.

The most mistaken and most dangerous belief held by almost all Muslims today is the assumption that a person born into a Muslim family is automatically Muslim. Know that religion is not inherited. What is inherited is straight hair or curly hair, white skin or dark skin. This is also made clear in the Qur'an, in the story of Prophet Ibrahim, who was born into a family that worshipped idols. But because he used his reason and kept striving, in the end he found the straight and true path, which is to worship the Creator, Allah.

Remember, we never asked Allah to be born into a Muslim family, and babies born into non-Muslim families never asked to be born there either. This means that every human being, no matter which family they were born into, is obligated, once they are of sound mind and have reached puberty, to investigate and examine their religious knowledge in more detail. For Islam itself, Allah has set all the conditions and pillars that a person must fulfill to become a Muslim recognized by Allah and His Messenger. So we cannot simply follow without a sufficient foundation of knowledge, especially the core, foundational knowledge of Islam, which is the knowledge of Tawhid.

Therefore, every Muslim who has reached puberty and is of sound mind must study, investigate, and examine the foundations of religion, such as faith, Islam, and Tawhid. This is the time to study in depth, not just to recite without knowing the meaning. We no longer want merely to memorize the 6 pillars of faith or the 5 pillars of Islam. We want to study each pillar of faith and pillar of Islam one by one, so that everything we do in religion is not just imitation but is built on knowledge. That way we become what is described in Surah Al-Mujadalah, verse 11: people who believe with knowledge, not faith by inheritance.

When we were children, if we were asked, "What is the first pillar of Islam?" we would answer, "Saying the two declarations of faith," and that was all. But here we will go deeper with these questions: What does it mean to make the declaration of faith? What are its conditions? What are its pillars? We believe many readers do not know what the pillars of the declaration of faith are, or what makes it valid. And even if you can memorize them, you may not be able to carry them out. What matters is not memorizing the 4 pillars of the declaration, but how to carry out each of them, one by one, when we make the declaration, so that it is recognized by Allah and His Messenger.

This is clear proof that we are still only Muslims by inheritance, or Muslims who just follow along. Let alone prayer, the second pillar of Islam: we do not even know the conditions and pillars of the first pillar, the declaration of faith. We can ask ourselves: what becomes of our declaration of faith if we do not know its pillars? And if our declaration is wrong because we did not know its conditions and pillars, then our Islam itself is in doubt, because the declaration is the condition for becoming a Muslim.

That is why, especially for those of us born into Muslim families, most of us have gone on happily performing acts of worship such as prayer and fasting for decades. We do not realize that what we have been doing may not have met the required conditions and pillars, because we have never studied the most fundamental knowledge of Islam, which is Tawhid. This is what makes us lazy in worship, lazy in prayer, and why so many Muslims today even abandon prayer. So, before our mistakes are exposed in the Hereafter, let us now examine all the foundations of religious knowledge, such as faith, Islam, and Tawhid, both outward (shariah) and inner (hakikat). God willing, on this website we will lay out all the religious matters that most Muslims today have forgotten. These matters have a very serious effect on whether acts of worship are valid, especially prayer. But remember, it takes an open heart and a clear mind to understand the messages in every article on this website. If readers are unwilling to think and open their hearts to these messages, they will never know or realize our fatal mistake in practicing religion.

So if religion is not inherited, since when have you been a Muslim?

For a clearer explanation, you can listen directly at our Tawhid classes in our study circles (majlis ta'lim) in the following cities: Jakarta, Surabaya, Samarinda, Balikpapan, Padang, Pekanbaru, Duri, Batam, Lampung, Makassar, Kuala Lumpur, Perak, and Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. Please write your WhatsApp number and your home city in the CONTACT section. God willing, this is purely religious outreach, with no commercial element and no payment of any kind.

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We do not teach Tawhid through the internet. All the religious articles on this website exist only to demonstrate and remind people of how important it is to study Tawhid. Studying Tawhid is like any ordinary religious class, such as those held in a prayer room (musholla) or a study circle (majlis ta'lim).

Faith Is Not Inherited

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