I [Director Take Heed Ministry] had decided, even before the terrible events in America of 11 September, to include an item on the beliefs of Islam. My decision was really in response to the unbridled coverage given to the religion of Islam by BBC 2 television in mid August. What are the ‘pillars’ and ‘beliefs’ of what one professing Christian referred to as one of the ‘great world religions’ [more on that comment later].

The Five Pillars

1. Confession of Faith (Shahada) ‘There is no God but Allah and Mohammed is the Prophet of Allah’ (‘Allah’ is the Arabic word for God).

2. Prayer (Salat) Must be said 5 times daily (daybreak, noon, mid- afternoon, after sunset and early in the night) facing Mecca. Noon prayers on Friday should be observed in a Mosque and include a sermon. The men and women are in separate parts of the Mosque.

3. Fasting (Saum) Lasts for the ninth month of the Moslem calendar (Ramadan) and during this time Moslems do not eat or drink between dawn and sunset.

4. Almsgiving (Zakat) Moslems must give 2.5% of their income to charity.

5. Pilgrimage (Hajj) Every Moslem is required to make the pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca at least once during his lifetime. There he observes various religious rituals such as washing, wearing special clothes (‘Ihram’) and circling the Kaaba 7 times (3 times quickly and 4 times slowly, kissing the sacred black stone each time).
Some Moslem groups recognize a SIXTH Pillar - Holy War - (Jihad). Declared to further the advance of Islam or to free Moslem peoples or lands. Those Moslems who are killed in such a war are assured of entrance into Paradise.

BASIC DOCTRINES

1. Belief in one God (MONOTHEISTIC - same designation as Christianity and Judaism).

2. Belief in angels, both good and bad. Each Moslem has his good and bad deeds recorded by two angels. Four Archangels are recognised (I) Gabriel - angel of revelation: (2) Mika’il - patron of the Israelites: (3) Israfil - will sound the last trumpet: (4) Azra’il - the angel of death. The Devil is known as Iblis or Shaitan.
3. Belief in scripture. Moslems believe in 4 inspired books:- (1) The Torah of Moses (first 5 books of the Bible - The Pentateuch): (2) The Zabur (Psalms of David): (3) The Injil (Gospel of Jesus): (4) The Koran - as this is God’s final word to mankind it supersedes and overrules all previous writings. Moslems believe that Christians have altered the Bible to suit their beliefs.

4. Belief in prophets. Moslems recognize many major prophets - Noah, Abraham, David, Jacob, Joseph, Job, Moses, Jesus and Mohammed. They believe Mohammed was both the last and the greatest. (Mohammed also spelt Muhammad).

5. Belief in the last day. Moslems believe in a day of resurrection and Judgment. The ‘Book of Deeds’ for each person will be examined and it’s either Heaven (Al Jannah, the garden or Al Firdaus, paradise) or Hell (An Nar, the fire).
This then is a brief summary of the core practices and beliefs of Islam. Following the events of 11 September I wrote [and posted to our ministry web site] an article called ‘Who Is On The Lord’s Side’? This article was prompted very much by my frustration at the public misrepresentation of Islam by professing Christians in places of authority like The White House, like Downing Street and like The Vatican. With one voice they were singing ‘Islam means peace’. The reality is that Islam means ‘submission’ and its goal is to bring the whole world into submission to their false God ‘Allah’.

One of the best articles exploding this myth of ‘Islam means peace’ appeared in the Daily Mail of Saturday 3 November. It was written by Ann Leslie and entitled ‘The Hypocrisy of Islam’. In it she wrote

‘As I listened to him [President Bush], other Islamists and a leader of the banned Moslem Brotherhood, I became increasingly exasperated by the repeated mantra: ‘Islam is a tolerant religion’ - when intolerance towards ‘infidels’ [Jews and Christians especially] seems to be on the increase.

‘Islam is about peace’ I kept being told - yet in the past 50 years no religion has produced so many wars among its own members. So war-torn is the ‘peaceable’ Islamic world that three quarters of the globe’s refugees are now Moslems fleeing as fast as they can to the West’s non-Moslem havens.

Why has resurgent Islam [now the world’s fastest growing religion] caused and inspired so many deaths, especially of fellow Moslems in the past half century?

‘Israel of course’ comes the answer. But is the existence of Israel the reason why for example Islamist Sudan is murdering and enslaving its southern Christians?

Is Israel the reason why this ‘peaceful, tolerant’ religion made Algerian Moslem fundamentalists feel obliged to slit the throats of other Moslems in their fields and villages? Is Israel the reason why Moslem Syria [one of the stops on Tony Blair’s Middle East odyssey] never hesitates to massacre its own Moslem dissidents?

Is Israel the reason why Moslem fundamentalists in the Philippines [who wouldn’t be able to place Israel on the map] are murdering other Moslems in southern Mindanao? Is Israel the reason why Nigerian Islamists, inspired by this ‘peaceful, tolerant’ religion turn to murdering Christians who don’t want to have Shariah law forced on them? I doubt it. Israel has become the over-arching excuse for the entire Moslem Arab community’s failure to come to terms with the modern world.

When Saddam Hussein gassed a village of 5000 Moslem men, women and children in Halabja, how many worldwide Moslem demonstrations took place against this grotesque crime? Arab Moslems are in a state of denial about their own sins, their own hypocrisies, their own double standards’

On page 4 I made reference to the fact that one professing Christian had publicly referred to Islam as one of the ‘great world religions’. This expression appeared in an article written by Church of Ireland cleric, Walter Lewis, which was published in the Belfast Telegraph of 6 October. In response I wrote to the Telegraph and they published an edited version of my letter on 13 October. Before reproducing for you what was published let me also draw attention to what the Pope said at The Vatican on 30 September - ‘Jews, Christians, Moslems adore the One God’ - that is a blatant untruth as both Muslim and Jew reject the Tri-une God of Christianity. Rome proclaims common spiritual identity and brotherhood for ‘Christian’, Jew and Muslim on the grounds of ‘common ancestry’ in Abraham. But is this biblically credible?
[ Source: http://www.takeheed.co.uk/news20.htm ]