Main Beliefs
The Six Articles of Faith
- Belief in God
- Belief in His Angels
- Belief in His Books
- Belief in His Prophets and Messengers
- Belief in the Day of Judgment
- Belief in God’s Divine Decree
The Five Pillars of Islam
- Profession of faith (Shahada)
- “There is no god but God, and Muhammad is the messenger of God”
- One becomes a Muslim by reciting this phrase with conviction and it is central to Muslim.
- Prayer (Salat)
- Muslims pray facing Mecca five times a day: at dawn, noon, mid-afternoon, sunset, and after dar.
- Recitation of the opening chapter (Sura) of the Qur’an.
- Performed on a small rug or mat.
- Alms (Zakat)
- Muslims donate a fixed portion of their income to community members in need.
- Fasting (Sawm)
- During the daylight hours of Ramadan (the 9th month of the Islamic calendar), Muslims abstain from food and drink. Through this temporary deprivation Muslims renew their awareness of and gratitude for what God provides.
- The Qur’an was revealed during this month.
- Pilgrimage (Hajj)
- Every Muslim whose health and finances permit it, must make at least one visit to the holy city of Mecca in present day Saudi Arabia.
History of Islam
The history of Islam is closely linked with the Prophet Muhammed who is considered the last in a long line of prophets, including Moses and Jesus. Muhammad is considered the chosen recipient and messenger of the word of God through divine revelations. Therefore, everyone practicing Islam strives to follow his example. Muhammed’s teachings (hadith) and the descriptions of his way of life (Sunna) are the most important Muslim texts after the Qur’an.
Muhammad was born into the most powerful tribe in Mecca, the Quraish around 570 A.D. When he was 40, Muhammed began hearing voices and having visions. He often meditated at Mount Hira, near Mecca and on one occasion the Archangel, Gabriel appeared to him and told him the first of many revelations that became the basis of the Qur’an and which pointed to the existence of one God.
Muhammad’s teachings angered the citizens of Mecca, who practiced Polytheistic religions. When his wife died he fled from Mecca to Medina to avoid religious prosecution. His flight is known as the Hijra and marks year one of Islam on the Hijri Calendar.
While in Medina, Muhammad continued to receive divine revelations and continued to expand Islam’s community. Muhammad and his followers returned to Mecca when the people of Mecca surrendered after several years of violence. Muhammed and his followers destroyed the city’s pagan idolatry and further spread their faith in one God.
While Muhammad was sleeping one night, the Archangel Gabriel came to him and took him on a journey from the Ka’ba in Mecca to the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem
(believed to be the “Farthest Mosque”). At Al-Aqsa, Muhammad prayed with Moses, Abraham, and Jesus and was led by Gabriel through Paradise and then Hell. After facing God, he returned to Earth to spread what he had learned. According to Islam, Muhammad was the only person to see Heaven and Hell while still alive.
Structure
Islam broke into two factions after Muhammed died in 632. He had not named a successor and one faction, the Shi’a, thought ‘Ali, Muhammad’s closest surviving blood male relative, should be the next leader (Caliph) and the Sunnis successfully elected three of his most trusted companions by consensus to lead the Muslim community. Ali succeeded the first three as the fourth caliph.
The two factions of Islam still remain today. The Sunnis venerate all four caliphs and the Shi’is considers ‘Ali as the first spiritual leader. The split between the two groups has resulted in different ways of worship as well as religious and political views. The majority of Muslims are Sunnis and the Shi’is are concentrated mainly in Iran and Iraq, but also in Pakistan, Turkey, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Bahrain, and Kuwait.
In Islam, there is no formal clergy, ordaining body, or hierarchy. Individuals have a direct relationship with God and no one besides God can declare what is sinful or what is lawful. Individuals are directly accountable to their own Lord and Creator. A scholar is one who devotes years of their life to study Islam, but they do not bless people, or forgive sins. They are only able to impart information they have learned from the Qur’an and Sunnah.
Religious Symbols and Texts
This text is directly taken from http://www.metmuseum.org/learn/
“The Qur’an is the final, infallible, direct, and complete record of the exact words of God, brought down by the angel Gabriel and firmly implanted in the heart of His final Prophet and Messenger, Muhammad.
Muslims believe that the Qur’an, the holy book of Islam, was revealed to Muhammad over a period of twenty-three years, starting with the initial revelation at Mount Hira. After the Prophet’s death, his successors compiled these divine revelations in a manuscript.
The Qur’an contains prayers, moral guidance, historical narrative, and promises of Paradise. It opens with a short prayer called the Fatiha, the most widely recited passage, and is divided into 114 chapters (suras) organized in descending length. For binding and reading purposes, manuscripts of the Qur’an are often divided into thirty equal parts, called juz’.
Every chapter of the Qur’an (except one) begins with the bismillah, the collective name for the invocation “In the name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful.” Muslims often repeat this phrase at the start of an event or task—before giving a speech, beginning a meal, or even boarding a bus. The calligraphic bismillah is frequently written on both religious and secular objects. 
The Qur’an places Muhammad at the end of a long line of prophets that began with Abraham. Although narrative is not central to the Qur’an, it includes the stories of Noah, Moses, and Jesus. It recognizes Jews and Christians as “People of the Book”; as a result, Muslims accept many of the teachings of the Jewish Torah and Christian Bible. Many of the great Islamic empires (like those in Spain, Iran, India, and Turkey) were tolerant of religious minorities.”
The Brothers K 