For those of you who have read my previous blogs, its no secret that I am Muslim by name only and no fan of organized religion. But my wife is a staunch Bahai and because of that, I find myself entangled in religious discussions with friends, relatives and sometimes strangers a lot more often than I like to; but hey, I am an Iranian male. That is, foozool and opinionated. So I dive in at the first chance. Having laid down the background, I will now go on with the meat of this blog.
Last Friday night, we met an Iranian couple who had come to the U.S. via Canada. They were both highly educated; finished med school in Iran, residency in Canada and now fellowship at the USC medical center.
Around 9 pm they both disappeared for a while. After they re-joined us in the living room, we found out that they had gone to say their nightly namaz! This started a very hot religious discussion.
Unlike the so called Muslims in our group who started ridiculing this couple, they were very respectful of my wife but were very insistent that Muhammad was “khatamonl Anbia” and that there will never be another prophet from God on earth. And that’s why my wife had to forget about the Bahai thing (because its a false religion and more like an “ism”) and become a Muslim for salvation and forgiveness.
My question to these people was how and why Muhammad was the absolute last prophet? Why didn’t God select Jesus? After all, there is not a whole lot of difference between teachings of Jesus and Muhammad. Well, Muhammad has instructed killing people a lot more but aside from that the rest is pretty much the same. So what was special about Muhammad?
Humanity is changing so rapidly that we can’t even imagine 50 years from now much less 500. Does any same human being think the teachings of Islam will be pertinent and practical for year 2508?
If there is a God which I am not sure about and if these prophets he keeps sending are actually from a source like God, why would he stop sending them? At least the Bahais say that in 850 years or so, another prohet will come, which is a very bold claim. I mean why not 85 years from now? But they have not closed the door.
It is ironic and funny how the devout of any religion think their ideology is it and is the best and the panacea for humanity.
All I know, root of all evil has been in Judaism, Christianity and Islam up until now and I am damn certain Muhammad is not the last of the prophets; no way, no how. There is just nothing special about him.
