Your Lifestyle = Your Religion

Which Law rules your life?

In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful:

“Nay – those that keep their plighted faith and act aright –

Verily Allah loves those who act aright.

As for those who sell the faith they owe to Allah

And their own plighted word for a small price,

They shall have no portion in the Hereafter:

Nor will Allah (deign to) speak to them or look at them

On the Day of Judgment;

Nor will He cleanse them (of sin):

They shall have a grievous Penalty.”

(Quran: 76 – 77)

I have stated on many occasions that your true “religion” is not what you say you believe but what you actually practice daily. In other words, your “religion” is your actual lifestyle. I firmly believe that, based on years of study of lifestyles and “religions”.  By that measure, many of us are living fraudulent lifestyles if we judge our actual practices by our “religious” beliefs.

Because of the mental schisms created by man-made philosophies, many of us are led to believe that our “religion” is different and separate from our actual daily life. We have been carefully taught to believe that “religious” philosophy is “spiritual” in nature and, therefore, not applicable to “practical” life.  Many of us have been taught to compartmentalize our lives into “religious” and “secular” portions.  This allows us to be passionate “believers” in our “religion” and equally passionate performers of deeds absolutely abhorrent to its teachings without any conflicting feelings. In daily application, we support socially-destructive, man-made laws which blatantly contradict the “religious laws” which we claim to also believe.  Mind you, we willingly and knowingly elect the people who impose these conflicting laws upon our society. 

On the one hand, we claim to believe and respect the “law of God” (“religious” doctrine); on the other, we subjugate these laws to the “law of the land” (conflicting man-made laws).  These man-made laws direct us to perform and support activities often contradictory to our “religious” doctrine. There is no social outcry by those of us who “sincerely believe” in our “religion”, thereby indicating our tacit support for blatantly corrupt activities. This is only possible in societies where people have been deeply indoctrinated with the idea that their lives and “religions” are separate and unconnected; where the “laws of God” and the Day of Judgment are taken lightly.

  For most of us, “religious” activities are emotional salves; scheduled routines and performances that make us feel vindicated before God. Outside of these routines and schedules, we go about our “real” lives, doing what is “necessary to survive” in this material world. We don’t spare a random thought about our actions and their outcomes on the Day of Judgment; secure in our “religious” faith. Islam, however, debunks this attitude. It reminds us, at every turn, that whatever we do daily will be counted on the Day of Judgment. It keeps sincere believers focused on the fact that the Final Judgment will be about the life we lived while on Earth; every action, every thought, every intention.