From: belal@silvercornish.engin.umich.edu (belal  khalid)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.islam
Subject: Re: Quran, Adam and Original Sin
Date: 10 Jan 93 19:17:51 GMT
Organization: Oberlin College Computer Science
Originator: zeeshan@occs.cs.oberlin.edu (Zeeshan Hasan -Moderator)
X-Posted-From: occs.cs.oberlin.edu
NNTP-Posting-Host: sol.ctr.columbia.edu

Assalam-u-eleykum,

There has been considerable unrealistic criticism about my last article '
Quran, Adam and Original Sin' especially from those persons, who are used to 
take the literal meanings of certain verses, instead of realizing in depth 
message.
 
I won't say any thing else about the critics, since my aim is not to 
start a starwars with anyone, my aim is only to show the clear picture to the 
truth seekers. Even if only a single person has gained something from my 
article, I will consider my effort successful. Further only those persons who 
are extremely interested in knowing the truth and in depth meaning of verses 
are encouraged to read the following explanations, as I know, it will be 
very boring for any materialistic person.

		ADAM, HIS CREATION AND HIS PARADISE
		-----------------------------------
Here, I am giving some explanation of some of the verses of Ch 7 of Holy 
Quran to support my views.

And We did create you and then We gave you shape; then said We to angels, 
'Submit to Adam'; and they all submitted. But Iblis did not; he would not be 
of those who submit. (7:12)

God said 'What prevented thee from submitting when I commanded thee? He said, 
'I am better than he. Thou hast created me of fire while him hast Thou created
 of clay. (7:13)

God said, 'Then go down hence; it is not for thee to be arrogant here. Get 
out; thou art certainly of those who are abased. (7:14)

GARDEN OF ADAM
The story of Adam is incapable of being fully understood without our first 
being acquainted with the scene of its occurrence. Was Adam first placed in 
Paradise and was it in Paradise that the scene described in this and the 
following few verses was enacted. All doubts on this score are set at rest by 
the plain words of the Quran, I am about to place a vicegerent in the earth 
(2:31) It was indeed in this very earth that the creation of Adam and all that
 followed it took place. The Bible as well as Zoroastrian and Hindu religious 
writings also lend support to this view. The Holy Prophet is reported to have 
described the Nile and the Euphrates as the two rivers of (the garden), 
referring to the place where Adam lived; (Muslim, ch on Jannat); and the 
Hadith too, places Adam in Mesopotamia which is watered by the waters of the 
Tigris and the Euphrates. It was, therefore, here that the garden of Adam was 
situated and all the different incidents mentioned about him in Quran also 
took place here; and if there be any incident which cannot be proved to have 
literally occurred on this earth, then that incident will have to be taken in 
a figurative sense. 

ADAM NOT THE FIRST PERSON ON EARTH
Another fact worth remembering is that the verse 2:31, according to which 
Adam was created on this earth, also tells us that he was not the first man 
to live on this planet, and that other men lived even before he was brought 
into existence. In 2:31 Adam has been called 'Khalifa' a word, meaning a 
successor, shows that he had predecessors whom he succeeded. The verse under 
comment also clearly points to the same conclusion. Addressing the people, it 
says, And We did create you and then We gave you shape; then said We to the 
angels, Submit to Adam. The plural pronoun 'you' in the clase, We did create 
you, having preceded the words containg the command to angels to submit to 
Adam, which is preceded by the conjunction 'then' shows that it was after the 
creation of men, and not only Adam, that God ordered angels to submit to Adam 
and that therefore human beings were already living on this earth when angels 
received this command. It is, thus, wrong to conlude that the human race began
 with Adam, that its whole life is only a little more than six thousand years
 and that the different races now living on this earth are all necessarily 
descended from Adam. The aborigines of Australia or the Red Indians of America
 or the Negroes of Africa may not be the descendants of the Adam about whom 
the Quran speaks in the verse under comment. See also 2:31.

FIGURATIVE NARRATIVE OF ADAM
As already pointed out, events which cannot be literally shown to have 
occurred on this earth must be regarded as having taken place in a figurative 
sense. That figurative language has actually been used in this narrative is 
clear from the following facts;

1. The angels were bidden to perform 'sajda' (falling prostrate before Adam) 
which is not permissible for any being other than God. So God could not 
command the angels to fall prostrate before Adam in the literal sense of the 
words. These words must therefore be taken only in the figurative sense i.e 
that of submitting and rendering every kind of help . This is why the Arabic 
expression sajda has here been translated as 'submit to', which is a 
perfectly correct rendering according to the figurative idiom of the Arabic 
language. 

2. The command to fall prostrate before Adam was given to the angels only; but
 Iblis who is not an angel, is also apparently included in it; which proves 
this inclusion also to be a figurative one.

It should be remembered that the incident mentioned here is in no way connected 
with the first progenitor of the human race, who may be called the first Adam.
 It is only with the later Adam(who lived on this earth about six thousand 
years ago and from whom Noah and Abraham and their posterity were directly 
descended) that the present story is connected. 

3. We are told in 20:119 that when God placed Adam in the garden, He told him 
that he would not become naked therein. But in 7:23 we are told that he did 
in fact become naked. So one of the two statements will have to be taken 
figuratively. 

The straight and simple meaning for the verse is only this: the angels are 
bidden to submit to Adam and to help him in his work. This commandment was 
given to the angels when Adam was made a Prophet.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------


And O Adam, dwell thou and thy wife in the Garden and eat therefrom wherever 
you will, but approach not this tree lest you be among the wrongdoers. (7:20)

But Satan whispered evil suggestions to them so that he might make known to 
them what was hidden from them of their shame, and said, 'Your Lord has only 
forbidden you this tree, lest you should become angels or such beings as live 
for ever. (7:21)

So he caused them to fall into disobedience by deceit. And when they tasted of
 the tree, their shame became manifest to them and they began to stick the 
leaves of the Garden together over themselves. and their Lord called them, 
saying, 'Did I not forbit you that tree and tell you; verily Satan is to you 
an open foe? (7:23)

He said, Go forth, some of you being enemies of others. And for you there is 
an abode on the earth and a provision for a time. (7:25)

He said, 'Therein shall you live, and therein shall you die and there from 
shall you be brought froth (7:26)

TRUTH ABOUT FORBIDDEN TREE
As The place where Adam was made to reside has been metaphorically described 
in the Quran as a garden, therefore in the description that follows the 
metaphor is continued and Adam is represented as forbidden to approach a 
certain 'tree', which was not a tree in its literal sense but a certain family
 or tribe from which he was bidden to keep aloof, because the members of that 
family were his enemies and they would have spared no pains to do him harm. 

WEAKNESS OF ADAM
Every person has certain weaknesses which are hidden even from himself but 
which become exposed at a time of strain and stress or when he is tempted and 
tried. For instance, some men are cowardly, but they are not generally 
conscious of their cowardice. Then, however, they encounter a danger, and 
their heart fails them, they realize their weakness. So it was when Adam was 
tempted and deceived by Satan that he became aware of his natural weaknesses. 
The Quran does not say that the weaknesses of Adam and his wife became known 
to other people, but that they became known to themselves.

The word 'shame' treated under 7:21 above is not used here in the sense of 
'nakedness' but rather of 'objects of shame' or 'weakness', because no man's 
nakedness is hidden from him. Some of Adam's weaknesses were indeed hidden 
from him and he came to realize them when his enemy lured him away from his 
position of security. 

TRUTH ABOUT ADAM'S PARADISE
The verse (7:25) shows that Adam was commanded to emigrate from the land of 
his birth. This constitues a further evidence of the fact that the garden 
which Adam was bidden to leave was not the Heaven or Paradise of the Quran 
because, as the Quran itself tells us, Paradise is a place from which nobody 
is ever turned out (15:49), nor can Satan deceive or even approach any one 
there. It appears that Adam emigrated from Mesopotamia, the land of his birth,
 to a neighbouring land.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The above explanation of the verses of Quran clearly proves that the Adams 
story is told in a figurative language in Quran and that the Adam was not the 
first person on earth and that the incident did not take place in paradise. 

My next articles will be about 'Truth about Djinns' and 'Existence of God' . 
Stay tuned. Khuda Hafiz and I end with the prayers 

'May god give us knowledge and wisdom to understand the true meaning of 
Quran'.


Belal

All views are not mine, but I don't claim that I have been fully able to 
produce every thing in correct form as 'to err is human and to forgive is 
divine'.