'Muslim' A Tag Or Thought
May be @UmerQureshi sb or @faisalharoon sb can give better response
There are two dimensions to look at here, one is internal faith of a person, which will ultimately be judged by God on the day of judgement. The second one is social standing of a person w.r.t to their beliefs. If one call themselves a Muslim, they will be considered as such and if one call themselves a Non-Muslim, they will be considered as such. In matters of deciding someone’s fate for legal matters in a society, their confession will the final criteria, irrespectibe of what they believe internally. Regarding whether a Muslim can claim to be a non-muslim ( saying kalma-e-kufr ) when faced with persecution, Quran has given this permission provided one is faced with persecution and one believes in God inside their heart and there is no way for them to migrate to another place to avoid that persecution. As far as staying silent is concerned i.e. not exposing one’s identity as Muslim, this is a matter of strategy, as some circumstances may require an individual to stay silent to avoid religious stereotype or Islamophobia. And if it comes down to one’s life, one can claim to be a non-muslim, as mentioned above. This is an individual’s decision based on their circumstances, no general ruling can be given in this regard. But whenever we are to introduce ourselves, that should only be introduced as Muslims; not Christian, not Muhammadan, Not any other affiliation, just Muslim. Following thread will be helpful to some extent: Discussion 54287 The relationship that Islam creates among Muslims is relationship of brotherhood. Instead of dissociating ourselves from the rest of the Muslims, we should act like a conduit between them and the true messgae of Islam. Dissociating will neither help you as a person, nor will it add any positive value to the society, and neither is this a practical solution toward achieveing a solution to problems face by the world in general and by the Muslims in particular. Please also refer to the video below from 1:40 to 8:26 https://youtu.be/kPeb6mqQqyE?t=100
And one more thing sir These assumptions are not derived by fear, even if they seem to be, they’re not. And Allah knows the best. These things are coming out of frustration, that when we see people claiming to be follower of Quran do mischief. I don’t care what they do, but it hurts when they do it in the name of islam!