I was hesitant to post in this thread because I'm against your overall message. You're openly attacking Hadith and Sunna following Muslims, literally
coming off the same way Salafis and Wahhabis do. They also claim the only "true" Muslims are the ones who follow their perspectives. Some of them even
take that to the extreme and say it's ok to oppress, discriminate against, and/or kill those "fake" Muslims. In fact, ISIS and several of those other
groups justify their wars against Shiites by saying they must first "purge" Islam of its "impure" sects before they can attack their larger
enemies.
I think the overall message here
should be that it's ok to strictly follow the Qur'an, just as it's ok to follow various Hadith and Sunna. The
only real problem is when people try to force their beliefs onto others or require others to follow their interpretations. If that
weren't the
case, then God wouldn't have counted Christians, Jews, Magians, and Sabians as fellow "People of the Book/Scripture" (Surah 2:62, Surah 5:69, and
Surah 22:17). After all, their theological teachings should be much more "controversial" to a Qur'anist when compared to the teachings of the Hadith
and Sunna. Yet the Qur'an still considers them believers.
And for the record, the Hadith and Sunna are not all bad. In fact, there are many good lessons in them and there are many things in them which go
along with the Qur'an. I personally doubt the authenticity of most of them and I agree that the Prophet Muhammad and the first 9 or so Caliphs forbade
any Islamic "scriptures" other than the Qur'an. Then again, I also doubt the authenticity of virtually every other set of "religious Scriptures"
throughout the world, even if I accept some of the points in them.
However, I'll never begrudge someone who accepts any of these "Scriptures" as long as they don't try to force it onto others. That's also exactly how
I feel about every other religion since I actually agree with Surah Kafirun/Kafiroon, which commands tells us to tell disbelievers "unto you your
beliefs and unto me mine".
Besides, I think it's pretty arrogant and foolish to frame this as "Qur'anists vs current believers/virtually all Muslims". If anything, you should've
framed this as "
practicing Qur'anists vs
practicing followers of various Sunna and Hadith vs
non-practicing or barely-practicing
Muslims ". Because the vast majority of Muslims are no different than the followers of any other major religion; meaning they only follow bits and
pieces of their Scriptures and local interpretations from their region's dominant denomination.
You can't credibly fault most Muslims for some obscure crap in a controversial Hadith anymore than you can fault most Christians for one of the
controversial quotes from Martin Luther. That's because the vast majority of people from all religions spend far more of their time focused on their
daily lives, and barely know even the basics from their Scriptures. Many Muslims in incredibly poor regions don't even have a Qur'an of their own.
Ironically, I consider many of those people to be the purest of Humankind because they don't typically get caught up in the foolish fights over dogma
and semantics that the "religious elites" do. And regardless of the organized religion they claim, their core spiritual beliefs tend to center around
the basic tenets of good vs evil.
For the record, I consider myself a Muslim in the original sense of the word. I didn't become a Muslim because of the Scriptures or the stories of the
Prophets or their companions/disciples/lineage, etc. I only became a Muslim because of my personal relationships with God & Shaytan. As in, I only
accept the Qur'an as authentic because God told me too. And even though I've read the Qur'an in full many times, I refuse to worship a book. Instead,
I prefer to ask God directly for guidance as a normal part of my life. Sometimes, He'll point me a specific passage and other times He'll inspire me
to consult a fellow believer. But other times, He'll either answer me directly in my heart or mind, He'll put in check, or He'll set up a hilarious
string of "coincidences" until I get my answer.
edit on 19-9-2016 by enlightenedservant because: (no reason given)