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Tawheed (Islamic monotheism)

As is well known, Tawheed (Islamic monotheism) is the basis of Islam, expressed by its fundamental declaration of faith: “There are no gods, but The God”. This means that there is and there is only one true God, who alone deserves to be worshipped.

According to Islamic view, and as is evident from a careful study of the history of religions, the concept of monotheism existed aforetime Islam. In fact there is virtually no major world religion which doesn’t claim to be monotheistic today. In fact this supports the Islamic claim that prophets were sent by God during all eras to teach man monotheism, and hence Islam is not a new religion founded by Prophet Muhammad.

All major world religions were originally monotheistic and their deviations from real Tawhid occurred gradually and subtly over the ages, even though they all always claimed to be on the true path. This led them to adopting bizarre doctrines such as pantheism, trinity, idol worship, saint worship, intercession and others; all these are manifested as the worship of creation rather than the creator. In Islam too the various heretical sects broke off from the main body of Islam diverging from the point of Tawhid.

Perhaps the greatest contribution of Islam in the ideological realm is its concept of monotheism. Even though it can be argued today that all religions accept the same One God, he is obscured by innumerable gods, goddesses, idols, avatars, god men, deities, angels, fairies, demons, spirits and trinities in other religions. This gave rise to the myths, which are prevalent even today and which were perhaps reinforced by the influence of atheism, that each religion has its own god or gods and religions are hence mutually exclusive doctrines evolved by circumstances and superstitions.

Islamic monotheism has served to shatter these myths. More than just that God is One, it has helped popularize the concepts that this God is the same whom all the religions accepts in common and that he doesn't belong to any race or group or possesses any form we can perceive. Thus Islam has helped the world to rediscover the true God.

However it must be clearly understood that monotheism in Islam doesn’t imply that Islam's view of the supernatural is identical to that of the atheists except for a belief in one God, and that one should not believe in any unseen thing or process as directly affecting man other than God. Islam in fact does recognize the existence of mysterious forces in the universe other than God called the Jinns, who can influence and affect human beings.

Islam accepts that there is truth in things like sorcerers casting spells using Jinns, Jinns inhabiting human body to exhibit dual personality, haunted houses and exorcism. (In fact the final two chapters of Quran is for exorcism). It accepts that "saintly" people may exhibit supernatural deeds (Karamat) similar to that (Mu'jizat) of the prophets (even though neither group are able to perform them at will). Also some truth is ascribed to fortune telling, magic and astrology. However the bottom line is that all these phenomena are caused by God alone as per his predestination, lie within his absolute knowledge and control, and man should seek refuge and succor only from God.

Categories of Tawhid
For ease of analysis and to counter the myriad form of deviations from Tawhid, Muslim theologians have categorized Tawhid into three:

1) Tawheed ar-Ruboobeeya (“The Unity of Lordship”)
2) Tawheed Al-Asmaa was-Sifaat (“The Unity of Allah’s names and attributes”)
3) Tawheed Al-Ebaada (“The Unity of Allah’s worship”)

It must be kept in mind that while these categories of Tawheed are studied separately, they do in fact overlap and form the part of an organic whole, and one should fully satisfy all these principles to complete the requirements of Tawheed. Deviating from the path of Tawhid, and ascribing partners to God is termed “Shirk”, which, literally meaning "sharing", is polythiesm in Islamic terms and is considered as the gravest and the only unforgivable sin in Islam.

Tawheed ar-Ruboobeeya (“The Unity of Lordship”)

The world Ruboobeeya (“Lordship”) is derived from the root Rabb (Lord). Tawheed ar-Ruboobeeya implies that Allah alone creates, sustains and maintains creation and he is the sole lord of the universe. Besides, all things that happen is solely upon his predestination. Hence there is no scope or base for any superstitions about good-luck charms, zodiacal signs or omens of bad luck, because as per Islamic tenets they cannot affect God’s plan in any way.

Tawheed Al-Asmaa was-Sifaat (“The Unity of Allah’s names and attributes”)

Allah has names and attributes which are taught by Prophet Muhammad such as “The Compassionate”, “The Merciful”, “The King”, “The Holy”, “The Source of Peace”, “Guardian of Faith”, “The Protector”…. and so on (in fact 99 names). Maintaining the Unity of Allah’s names and attributes implies that:

a) Even though there are also human attributes, they should be attributed to Allah in the same "sense"; however when applied to Allah they are implied in the absolute and ultimate sense, free from human deficiencies and limitations. So these attributes should not be given to any other than Allah. So any other than Allah should not be considered as infallible, all-knowing, all-seeing, eternal, having the knowledge of the future or the unseen etc.

Even it is not allowed in Islam to give Allah’s attribute as name to anyone in the definite form, example Ar-Raheem (The Most Merciful). However it is permissible to use these names in the indefinite form (Raheem, merciful) or preceding it with Abd (“slave of”), example Abd ar-Rahim (“The slave of the most merciful”).

Similarly names like Abdul-Rasool (Slave of the Messenger) or other names connoting subservience to any other than the creator should not be given to anybody either.

b) Human deficiencies should not be attributed to Allah either, like Bible does in stating that God “took rest” after the labour of creation, or that he “repented” for some of his bad thoughts and such. Nor should you imagine apparatus like “eyes” or “ears” for God, just because Quran says he sees, or hears; this may lead to idolatry, promote concepts of incarnation, deification of human beings, etc.

c) Allah should be referred only by the attributes taught by the Prophet, as there is no scope for man to independently define the Lord of creation. So you cannot call or conceive God as a “spirit”, as this has no support in the Quran or Sunnah.

Tawheed al-Ebada (“The Unity of Allah’s worship”)

This means that all forms of worship must be directed only to Allah. In fact it can be learned that the pagan Arabs during Prophet Muhammad’s time generally confirmed the previous two categories of Tawhid. (for example see Quran 10:31, 43:87, 29:63 etc). However Allah rebuked them for joining partners to Him (12:106). So it can be said that the major difference between Islam and other religions is in the matter of Tawheed al-Ebada.

People justify praying to saints, idols etc claiming that they merely act as “intercessors” to God rather than partners of God. (see Quran 39:3)

But Prophet Muhammad says: “Prayer (Dua) is worship” (Abu Dawud Vol 1, p.387, no.1474). So prayer is worship irrespective of whether you consider the being you are praying to as God, partner of God or just intercessor.

Also the Prophet said: “If you ask in prayer ask only Allah, and if you seek help, seek it only from Allah” (Ibn Abbas)

Previous religions too went astray on this aspect. Christians deified Prophet Jesus and directed their prayers to him. Catholics have saints for every occasion to help them as “intercessors”. Shias too vie with Catholics in this respect. There are all violations of Tawheed al-Ebada.

As per the Islamic tenets, another variant form of worship of the creation is to give the status of law giver to clergy or even secular leaders. This has been clarified by this Quran Verse:

“They (Jews and Christians) have taken their rabbis and monks as lords besides Allah” (Quran 9:31)

Prophet Muhammad explained this verse that this didn’t mean that Jews and Christians actually worshipped their clergy, but rather they accepted what is forbidden and allowed (Haraam and Halaal) as per what the clergy said, with no regard to the scriptures. Hence a significant part of Tawheed al-Ebada is not to accept morals or laws from any source other than, or in contrary to, God’s laws. This also implies that it is incumbent on the Muslim majority countries to implement Shariah (Divine Law) there. (also see Quran 5:44)

For a complete yet simplified treatment of the topic of Tawhid refer to “The Fundamentals of Tawhid” by Dr. Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips.

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