Islam is an Abrahamic faith. Nevertheless, Islam is perceived with apprehension by non-Muslims.

Regrettably, Muslims experience disagreements not just with non-Muslims, but also with Muslim of differing persuasions. The RAND Corporation Report highlights a range of challenges facing the umma.

Islam and Muslims are associated with terrorism. Is there any foundation in revelation for this perception? Is the negative perception of the Muslim umma due only to Islamophobia and propaganda? The trials of the umma are partly due to the umma’s ignorance of its religion.

The umma turned from the Book of Allah to books of traditions, thinking that persons guide better than Allah. This was a catastrophic error.

Traditional ulama produced “traditional” Islam, while politicized ulama produced “political” Islam. Traditional exegesis requires “judging” revelation in the “light” of tradition.

This "methodology" produced “traditional” Islam. The emergence of political Islam, by comparison, emerged thanks to weaponized exegesis, the alleged "abrogation" of the verses of reconciliation by the verse of the sword (9:5).

Rulers asked the ulama to record traditions, in defiance of the prohibition of "adding to revelation" by Allah (69:44-46). The messenger prohibited writing his traditions, too.

Rulers engaged willing ulama to "interpret" the Book of Allah to render unlawful wars lawful. Bellicose ulama reinvented Islam as an agenda for waging unlawful wars of aggression to propagate Islam by the sword (jihad al-talab), for the purpose of territorial expansion, euphemistically referred to as "preemptive jihad.

" They embedded an alien ethos within Islam, the ethos of aggression . But Islam is a teaching of reconciliation, not a religion of aggression.

The reinterpretation of Islam as "a religion of war," as Abu Bakar al-Bagdadi put it, was buttressed by hawkish traditions. Replacing revealed rulings with rulings from traditions required treating tradition as “revelation.

” This enabled tradition to "judge" revelation and to become a “second” root of legislation. But the designation of tradition as "revelation" in the sense of tanzil entails a lapse into shirk.

For Allah possesses the exclusive right to legislate in religion. Religious rulings require being grounded in revelation understood as tanzil, what Allah “sent down.

” This is found in verses 44, 45 and 47 of chapter 5 of the Book of Allah. By contrast, wahy (inspiration) may be provided even by evildoers.

In different words, treating tradition as tanzil defies the teaching of revelation. For the Book teaches that we are to “judge” by tanzil (what Allah sent down).

This requires attention. The sharia requires rehabilitation to ensure that all legislation in religion is rooted in revelation (tanzil).

Prescribing capital punishment in cases of blasphemy, adultery and apostasy encroaches upon tawhid, the teaching that the power to legislate in religion belongs to Allah alone. Is treating tradition as a “second” root of legislation in keeping with tauhid? It is also necessary to emphasize justice.

It is important to restore the Book of Allah as the exclusive root of legislation in all matters in religion. Following tradition in preference to revelation brought disasters upon the umma.

The Mongols devastated the Abbasid empire after the killing of a caravan of Mongol traders. The Abbasids also killed the Mongol ambassadors sent to request justice for the killers of the traders.

The Abbasids perpetrated these transgressions because they acted according to the tradition which says that “the blood of the kafir is halal for the believer” rather than according to the Book of Allah that teaches that “Allah does not love wrongdoers. ”.