I forgot when the exact time I saw the article in yahoo news told me about the Brand New Sins released by The Vatican for the Catholic believers. One of the new sins is damaging the environment. This is a very nice release sides to environment and human kind. Isn’t it!
And on the other day, I read the March edition of TIME magazine. I found the similar article on the last page of the magazine.
The first passage was very interesting.
“The New Road to Hell. The Vatican reflects on its mortal sins for the modern age. Want Salvation? Pick up your trash“
These are part of those brand new sins: Genetic Modifications, Human Experiment such as cloning, polluting the environment, causing social injustice, causing poverty, becoming obscenely wealthy, taking drugs.
Wow.. Those were so specific!! Cool…Vatican seems keep their eyes on such world’s problems and those causes. Very nice job.
Actually, I don’t really understand how many kinds of sins are there in Catholic’s believer, and I’m not going to talk about it, too.
I just wanna share something about my thought after I read those articles (from yahoo news and TIME magazine). I thought about one notion. How about in my religion? What is the definition of sins in Islam actually? If the religion is established by God, why can we add many varieties of sins, like what Vatican did? If so, it means human take part in God’s power, doesn’t it?! By our intelligence, we will quickly response, that religion which adds so many brands new sins is not yet the perfect religion, isn’t it? Because that religion’s teaching cannot cope with the world’s movement.
Hmm…Doesn’t it interesting…..Let’s talk about sins in Islamic point of view. How Islam teaches us about this notion in such a beautiful way.
Let’s refer our discussion with Hadits Arba’in An-Nawawi #30 :
On the authority of ABu Tha’laba al-khushani Jurhum ibn Nashir (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (May the blessings and peace of Allah be upon Him) said:
Allah the Almighty has laid down religious duties, so do not neglect them; He has set boundaries, do not over step them; He has prohibited something, so do not violate them; about some things He was silent – out of compassion for you, not forgetfulness-, sp seek not after them. (A good Hadits related by Ad-Daraqutni and others)
[Abu Tsa'labah Al-Khusyaniy Jurtsum bin Nasyur ra. berkata, Rasulullah saw bersabda,
"Sesungguhnya Allah telah menetapkan sejumlah kewajiban, maka janganlah meremehkannya. Dia telah meletakan batasan-batasan (hukum) maka janganlah kalian melanggarnya; Dia telah mengharamkan sejumlah perkara, maka janganlah kalian jatuh ke dalamnya; Dia juga telah mendiamkan beberapa perkara sebagai rahmat untuk kalian dan bukan karena lupa, maka janganlah mempersoalkannya (Apa yang telah didiamkan oleh Allah ini)]
Moreover, we have another Hadits narrated by Imam Muslim.
On the authority of An Nawwas bin Sam’an may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (May the blessings and peace of Allah be upon Him) said:
“I asked to the Messenger of Allah (PBUH – peace be Upon Him-) about the righteous deed and the fallacious one. And Prophet Muhammad said:
Righteous deed is noble character and sin is anything that clutter in your mind, in fact you don’t like it if other people know about it (Narrated by Muslim # 2553)
Isn’t it very simple?! Sins are everything that hanging in your mind and you feel uncomfortable when others know about it.
Actually, in order to be honest to ourselves is very difficult, isn’t it! It is all about our heart’s speaking. Whether what we’ve done was sin or not. We need to continuously cleaning up our heart so that we’ll able to recognize it.
My point is -from presenting those two Hadits above- Islam has already defined what is Sin in a very general way. It can cope to every situation and every stage of world’s development. We do not need to redefine it anymore. We don’t have to discuss whether abortion is kind of a sin or not. Just ask your heart!! Or we shouldn’t doubt whether throw rubbish anywhere is kind of sin or not. Obviously, those makes us feel uncomfortable and we don’t want other people know about it, right!!?
Islam is the only perfect religion as Allah stated in Holy Quran Surrah Al-Maidah: 3:
“….This day, I have perfected your religion for you, completed my Favor upon you, and have chosen for you Islam as your Religion….”
We, as the believer do not allow adding anything to what Prophet Muhammad brought and spread all over the world. It will be considered as bid’ah. And Bid’ah is refused. Islam is established by The Holy Quran and As Sunnah Rasulullah (PBUH). Moreover, it is a way of life (Minhajul Hayyah). Holy Quran is a Miracle from Allah SWT.
This proves show us that everything (definition of Islam, what is sin, etc) has already defined and completed in era of Prophet Muhammad. And it is valid until the end of the world. We, as the believer of Islam, only follow what Prophet Muhammad PBUH did in his lifetime through is As-sunnah. And always use Holy Quran as our manual book. InsyaAllah we will not get lost in our journey in this world.
May Allah always enlighten our path, through the straight way to His Jannah. Amiin
Wallahu’alam bishawab.
