Believers: Does God forgive investigation and doubt?

[Gharib]

I agree there are different types of doubt.
I tend to disagree with the slippery slope argument you have presented, but that is not what I am inquiring about.

thank you for agreeing and for the other part it is your choice to agree or not.

 

[McBell]

i too must say again, Allah does not fear anything. he is our creator has more love for us than a mother for her child, and he wants whats best for us ie paradise. so he is advising/giving guidance to us. and i must also say this again those that do not believe in Allah do not make him any less of a god and those that believe in him do not make him any more of a god.

i hope this is clear.

Nope.
However, I do accept the possibility that I am simply not grasping the idea you are presenting.

 

[Gharib]

Nope.
However, I do accept the possibility that I am simply not grasping the idea you are presenting.

quite possible. if so i don't know how else to explain it to you other than Allah wants to prevent us from hell, but since he has given us free will to choose, it would go against his teachings of human free will to forcefully prevent us from disbelief.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Save the analogies. Questioning is putting forth a question. When one puts forth a question to their faith to be answered that is literally wavering in Iman.

I was not talking about someone who is questioning, like a theist who asks a question about their faith. I thought I explicitly referred to someone who "considers it questionable", which is to say they doubt it using the English definition of the word, like a philosopher who considers the possibility of god questionable (but does not reject the possibility). Again, these are clearly two different things.

Everyone must make a decision, based on evidence, either in this world or the hereafter. Those who reject do so not because of a lack of evidence.

[Emphasis added] Sahar seems to disagree with you. See post # 92.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Just a simple question: is it possible for a righteous, thoughtful, sincere person, using reason and weighing the evidence, to doubt that "Allah is the real god and Muhammad the true messenger"? Has any sincere, thoughtful person ever doubted this statement, in this history of the world?

someone that has strong faith does not come to a point where he doubts Allah and his Mesenger, however someone who has weak faith and little knowledge does have such doubts. those doubts will either increase him in faith as a result of investigation into what he finds doubtful and believe in Allah more or he will end up disbelieving.

and doubt in islam is a result of the devil and we are encouraged to not pay attention to it as i have mentioned in my earlier posts, not just when it comes to doubting Allah or other religious matters, but other matters also such a a husband or wife doubting the faithfulness of their partner etc, they are all from the devil.

i hope i have answered your question.

No eselam I am afraid you did not answer my question. I did not ask about someone who has "strong faith". When you say this of course you actually mean "strong faith in Islam". Obviously, a person who has strong faith in Islam will not doubt the statement "Allah is the real god and Muhammad the true messenger", but someone with strong faith in Buddhism will doubt it. Anyway, I asked if a righteous, thoughtful, sincere person, using reason and weighing the evidence, has ever doubted this statement.

Let me make the argument a different way. You gave the example of Imam Bukhari who collected sayings of Muhammad. He didn't know, when he started his investigations, which sayings were authentic. So he had to rely on his reason and the evidence, and his knowledge, to judge the authenticity of the sayings he found, to the best of his ability. If he mistakenly judged a hadith incorrectly, could he be blamed? No. Should he have started his investigation by having faith in every hadith he found, and never doubting any of them? Of course not. If reason and evidence, and his best judgment, suggested that a hadith was weak or inauthentic, should Imam Bukhari have assumed this was the devil tempting him? No, because then he would not be able to separate the weak hadiths from the strong ones.

I am basing this off of what you said about Imam Bukhari .... do you agree with what I have said so fair about Imam Bukhari?

 

[Badran]

Just a simple question: is it possible for a righteous, thoughtful, sincere person, using reason and weighing the evidence, to doubt that "Allah is the real god and Muhammad the true messenger"? Has any sincere, thoughtful person ever doubted this statement, in this history of the world?

I'll add my answer in case it offers anything new. I didn't read the entire thread, i hope i'm not repeating stuff that have already been said before.

With exception of the "weighing evidence" part (because i'm not sure what do you mean by it), my answer to your question would be yes. A thoughtful, righteous, sincere person using reason might doubt anything, its quite natural. Questioning in general is actually pretty healthy since we established that he/she are sincere in doing so and are seeking the truth.

In my opinion, anybody who chooses which ever path (including not believing in god altogether) can be forgiven, and in some cases it might not even need to be forgiven, because it entirely depends on the person's intentions and the circumstances surrounding them while making these decisions. Every detail goes into this, Allah in our understanding is fair and just, powerful etc... he didn't make some silly qualifying factor that will determine who will be rewarded and who will be punished.

There is a huge difference between someone refusing the truth and someone missing the truth for whatever reason. And of course we are in no place to judge who is sincere and who is not, or who will be forgiven or not etc...

 

[Bismillah]

I was not talking about someone who is questioning, like a theist who asks a question about their faith. I thought I explicitly referred to someone who "considers it questionable", which is to say they doubt it using the English definition of the word, like a philosopher who considers the possibility of god questionable (but does not reject the possibility). Again, these are clearly two different things.

Why do you insist on arguing pointless semantics.

Doubt is one thing.

Rejection is another.

I cannot fathom compressing my statements anymore than that.

[Emphasis added] Sahar seems to disagree with you. See post # 92.

Frankly speaking, are you even reading my posts?

I have emphasized, multiple times, that one is presented evidence either in the dunya or the akhira, this world or the next.

As I said look up Itmam i hujjat, that is your simple answer.

 

[Gharib]

No eselam I am afraid you did not answer my question. I did not ask about someone who has "strong faith". When you say this of course you actually mean "strong faith in Islam". Obviously, a person who has strong faith in Islam will not doubt the statement "Allah is the real god and Muhammad the true messenger", but someone with strong faith in Buddhism will doubt it. Anyway, I asked if a righteous, thoughtful, sincere person, using reason and weighing the evidence, has ever doubted this statement.

Let me make the argument a different way. You gave the example of Imam Bukhari who collected sayings of Muhammad. He didn't know, when he started his investigations, which sayings were authentic. So he had to rely on his reason and the evidence, and his knowledge, to judge the authenticity of the sayings he found, to the best of his ability. If he mistakenly judged a hadith incorrectly, could he be blamed? No. Should he have started his investigation by having faith in every hadith he found, and never doubting any of them? Of course not. If reason and evidence, and his best judgment, suggested that a hadith was weak or inauthentic, should Imam Bukhari have assumed this was the devil tempting him? No, because then he would not be able to separate the weak hadiths from the strong ones.

I am basing this off of what you said about Imam Bukhari .... do you agree with what I have said so fair about Imam Bukhari?

yes i agree, thats the point i was making in regards to having doubts.

however since i didn't answer your question, and now that i am reading it and thinking about what you are saying in more depth, i cannot answer that question in the way you want to. i thought by your question you were asking if a muslim with such qualities could ever doubt that statement, thats what my answer was based on. but since your question asks for an islamic perspective, then i would have to clarify to you that islam views the righteousness of a muslim different to that of a non-muslim. example, there are muslims who do good and there are non-muslims who do good. the difference is muslims do good for the sake of god and non-muslims do good for the sake of 1. doing good, or 2. the sake of a god that doesn't exist (islamic perspective). so the same applies to your statement, what do you mean by righteous, thoughtful, sencere person? i can say that such people do doubt that statement but you must remember that i do not view such people with those qualities the same as i would a muslim. so how ever you look at it my answer is both yes* and no*, * - by yeas i mean like above, by no i mean the opposite of that ie a muslim with those qualities does not doubt that statement.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Thank you Badran, your post was very clear and you addressed the issue directly, instead of dancing around it. In my opinion, your view on this issue is much more reasonable than some of the alternatives.

There is a huge difference between someone refusing the truth and someone missing the truth for whatever reason. And of course we are in no place to judge who is sincere and who is not, or who will be forgiven or not etc...

What I find remarkable, Badran, is that sometimes it seems like language has been distorted to the point where it becomes impossible for a person to imagine alternatives to their own opinion. For example, I say "let's consider a nonbeliever who questions, or doubts, the existence of God". Then another poster replies, there are only two kinds of doubt: denying what you know in your heart to be true, and wavering in your faith. Apparently this poster cannot even imagine other possibilities. Or another example: I say something like "a thoughtful disbeliever" and another poster replies something like, "But a kafir cannot be thoughtful". Why can a kafir not be thoughtful? Because someone, at some time, has arbitrarily decided to define a word, kafir, which includes both "disbeliever" and "thoughtless" (or arrogant or in denial or whatever) as part of the definition of the word. And apparently the vocabulary to talk about a thoughtful disbeliever doesn't exist, or at least it has lost all usage and it has been almost totally replaced by "kafir". So the idea of a thoughtful (or sincere or knowledgeable) disbeliever is not rejected based on some argument, or some evidence; instead, it is excluded from consideration, it is even excluded from imagination, because the words that would be necessary to consider/imagine it are not allowed, or at least very rarely used.

 

[Mr Spinkles]

yes i agree, thats the point i was making in regards to having doubts.

Okay. So Imam Bukhari did not know which hadiths were authentic. Now, what about a person who begins his investigations, and his search for the truth, not knowing which scriptures are authentic? Wouldn't it be blameless for a thoughtful person seeking the truth, who does not know if the Qur'an or the Bible or the Buddhist or any other writings are authentic, to begin his investigations by looking at a wide range of books, and judging them to the best of his ability, based on reason and evidence? And of course this person would read not only Islamic books, like the Qur'an, but also Hindu and Buddhist books, and also the books of philosophers and historians and scientists. Could a seeker of the truth be judged very harshly for proceeding in this way?

 

[YmirGF]

What I find remarkable, Badran, is that sometimes it seems like language has been distorted to the point where it becomes impossible for a person to imagine alternatives to their own opinion. For example, I say "let's consider a nonbeliever who questions, or doubts, the existence of God". Then another poster replies, there are only two kinds of doubt: denying what you know in your heart to be true, and wavering in your faith. Apparently this poster cannot even imagine other possibilities. Or another example: I say something like "a thoughtful disbeliever" and another poster replies something like, "But a kafir cannot be thoughtful". Why can a kafir not be thoughtful? Because someone, at some time, has arbitrarily decided to define a word, kafir, which includes both "disbeliever" and "thoughtless" (or arrogant or in denial or whatever) as part of the definition of the word. And apparently the vocabulary to talk about a thoughtful disbeliever doesn't exist, or at least it has lost all usage and it has been almost totally replaced by "kafir". So the idea of a thoughtful (or sincere or knowledgeable) disbeliever is not rejected based on some argument, or some evidence; instead, it is excluded from consideration, it is even excluded from imagination, because the words that would be necessary to consider/imagine it are not allowed, or at least very rarely used.

That is a very insightful post, Spinkles. Nice to see you are catching on.

 

[Jacksnyte]

I think the religious "thought police" do a good job of cranking out large groups of people without the ability to imagine any other way of thinking if they are allowed to begin the indoctrination(a.k.a. brainwashing) early enough! "keep 'em ignorant, and you can keep 'em in line!" "How you gonna keep 'em down on the farm once they've seen the big city lights?"