Expert: Lee Ann Fleetwood - 7/9/2007

Question
Hello Miss lee,

I want to ask you, that as many Muslim scholars say, that no matter how bigger sinner a Muslim is, he/she will surely enter paradise, after getting punishment for his/her sins, but the non-Muslims will have a eternal punishment, is it true? And if thats the case can i have its Citation please.

And those who reject Hadiths f.e Quranists, can they be called Muslims?

I was actually shocked, when i asked a question from Brother Yasser, who is also one of the Expert in Islam section, he said that:

"it is from these hadiths that we get extremely nonsensical & barbaric rules & laws like death penalty for adulterers & apostates (although the Koran does not advocate any such punishment), degradation of women, bizarre dress codes for women, killing of those who insult Muhammad, chopping of hands of thieves etc. I must mention that hadiths also contain many beautiful teachings too."

Thank you very much.

Answer
Salam Umer

God does not promise that only Muslims will go to Heaven and God does not send all non muslims to Hell by default. I apologize for not having my Quran with me at the moment but the ayat that says...Have no fear whether you be Muslims, Christian, Jewish, Sabeans etc if you act right and have trust in your Lord then be sure of the promise of Heaven(paraphrasing)....we must remember that Islam the word originally meant "submitter to God" it only came to be the name of our religion at some later point in history. So, even though there are Jews and Christians etc that do not call themselves Muslims...God is declaring that since we all submit and worship the same God(Allah) that we are all submitters to God(they have just corrupted their divine books and differed in practice)...in which case Jews Christians etc will be afforded the same conditions concerning punishment and reward, Heaven and Hell on the Day of Judgement...and God knows best.

To some extent I have to agree with Yasser on the issue of hadith. While there are many positive hadith that help us live our daily lives as muslims...there are also a lot of contradictory hadith(towards each other and especially regarding the Quran) which makes them in general a very unreliable code of law in which to follow. If you read about the history of hadith you will realize that there are very few actually considered 100% without fault..the rest(a vast majority) are considered either weak or just plain fabricated. Hadith are a man made text and not protected by God whereas the Quran is divine and protected from corruption by God. A muslim is one that submits to God...follows the 5 pillars to the best of his or her ability....many muslims around the world are finding it hard to follow and keep faith in hadith and also remain true to the Quran...but I for one would never call them anything other than Muslim....God does not say we must believe in hadith the same way we believe in the Quran in order to be considered Muslim...that again is a man made decree....we should not pass judgement on each other so quickly lest someone passes judgement on us. And that is what I believe.