living islam _ Islamic tradition

The Fate of Non-Muslims in the Afterlife

Ch5.
by Nuh Ha Mim Keller

The reason that contemporary writers affected by the writings of Guénon and
Schuon, such as Chittick and Gai Eaton (or such
as Martin Lings, Titus Burckhardt etc.), seem to want the universal validity
of all religions at any price, even to the extent of attributing it to
masters like Muhyiddin ibn al-`Arabi ("in principle") or Emir `Abd al-Qadir
("he protected the Christians against massacre by taking them into his own
home because he understood" [as if other scholars considered massacring them
halal]) would seem to be the emotive impalatability of followers of other
religions going to hell....

Our Comment (OmarKN):

The problem with tentative generalizations such as the above
"(They) seem to want the universal validity of all religions at any price"
is that they are wrong, unjust and beside the point.
As to our knowledge, R Guénon who was Shaykh Abd al-Wahîd Yahya, did not "want the universal
validity of all religions at any price", but taught what was from the Quran and Sunna, in that Islam has a wider sense as 'acceptance and surrender to Allah' and the more specific sense of 'the religion and law brought by Prophet Muhammad'
ﷺ.
But this does not mean other religions are 'valid' as Islam is valid.
Further there has to be - and there is - a difference between someone worshipping God, especially from the people of the book, and those who are atheists, materialists, and whatever:

...Indeed it was [the change of qiblah] momentous, except to those guided by Allah.
And never would Allah Make your faith of no effect. (Sura 2-143)
But Allah knows most and best!

(1) There are some peoples who have not been reached by the message of the
Prophet of Islam (Allah bless him and give him peace) that we must worship
the One God alone, associating nothing else with Him. Such people are
innocent, and will not be punished no matter what they do. Allah says in
surat al-Isra', "We do not punish until We send a Messenger" (Koran 17:15).
These include, for example, Christians and others who lived in the period
after the spread of the myth of Jesus godhood, until the time of the prophet
Muhammad (Allah bless him and give him peace), who renewed the call to pure
monotheism.

The great Muslim scholar, Imam Ghazali, includes in this category those who
have only been reached with a distorted picture
of the Messenger of Islam (Allah bless him and give him peace), presumably
including many people in the West today who know nothing about Allah's
religion but newspaper stories about Ayatollahs and mad Muslim bombers. Is
it within such people's capacity to believe? In Ghazali's view, such people
are excused until after they have had an opportunity to learn the
undistorted truth about Islam (Ghazali: "Faysal al-tafriqa," Majmu'a rasa'il
al-Imam al-Ghazali, 3.96). This of course does not alter our own obligation
as Muslims to reach them with the da'wa.

(2) A second group of people consists of those who turn away from God's
divine message of Islam, rejecting the command
to make their worship God's alone; whether because of blindly imitating the
religion of their ancestors, or for some other reason. These are people to
whom God has sent a prophetic messenger and reached with His message, and to
whom He has given hearing and an intellect with which to grasp it but after
all this, persist in associating others with Allah, either by actually
worshipping another, or by rejecting the laws brought by His messenger
(Allah bless him and give him peace), which associates their own customs
with His prerogative to be worshipped as He directs. Such people have
violated God's rights, and have accepted to go to hell, which is precisely
what His messengers have warned them of, so they have no excuse:

"Truly, Allah does not forgive that any be associated with Him; but He
forgives what is less than that to whomever He wills" (Koran 4:48).

In either case, Allah's mercy exists, though for non-Muslims unreached by
the message, it is a question of divine amnesty
for their ignorance, not a confirmation of their religions validity. It is
worth knowing the difference between these two things, for one's eternal
fate depends on it.

text continues at: http://masud.co.uk/ISLAM/nuh/amat.htm

See also our page:
Clearing of some misunderstandings
Are Non-Islamic Religions Valid?
at: livingislam.org