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Do not imagine that God has a human form, or failings,
or qualities; do not attach human attributes to God,
the Arabs were told. Muslims were warned in the strictest
of terms against the trap of anthropomorphism. An
authenticated episode from the Prophet’s life
will illustrate this aspect of Islam.
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The Prophet was not blessed with a son. Though, there
were 4 daughters, both of his sons had died as infants.
This had left him a sad man. But then, to his great
delight, a boy was born to him in the evening of his
life, when he was almost 60 years of age. The households
happiness knew no bounds and with great delight they
named him Ibrahim (Abraham), after his patriarch who
had proclaimed Monotheism to the world thousands of
years ago, and had according to Muslim belief, built
the Ka'bah.
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child was an exceedingly cute baby and was very dear
to all, most of all to the father. And then, just
when the boy was one year old, tragedy struck. The
child expired.
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By
this time, hundreds of people had come into the fold
of Islam, and as the sad news spread, they started
gathering outside the Prophet's house to condole him.
By a remarkable coincidence, just as the crowd was
getting larger and larger, there took place an event
which mystifies the world even today; a total eclipse
of the sun! The crowd was stunned!
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Celestial bodies had always played a major role in
Arab life. After all, it was hardly a dozen years
ago (during Jahiliyat), when under the influence of
the Persians, the Arabs used to worship the star Sirius
in the constellation Canis Major. The Arabs depended
upon the exact point of sunrise (which shifts through
47 of arc from north to south along the horizon for
6 months and then back again in the next six), to
know the coming seasons. The size of the moon disk
told them the date. They had no equals in the world
when it came to navigating the trackless desert, but
that was possible only because of their uncanny skill
in using the stars as guides!
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