What Should Be The Mus­lim Reac­tion To Christmas ?

All praise be to Allah alone, for mak­ing us Mus­lims and bestow­ing us the deen of Islam to dis­tin­guish right and wrong. The hol­i­day sea­son is upon us again, and the ugly head of Satan is ris­ing again to inspire peo­ple to indulge in inno­va­tion and shirk. What pro­ceeds is an ana­lyt­i­cal view of Christ­mas and appro­pri­ate Mus­lim con­duct dur­ing the Christ­mas sea­son. More impor­tant­ly, what should be the Mus­lim reac­tion to Christmas ?

Quite a num­ber of Mus­lims today, espe­cial­ly those liv­ing in Chris­t­ian-dom­i­nat­ed coun­tries or those influ­enced to a large degree by west­ern cul­ture, have been led to con­sid­er that tak­ing part in the Christ­mas cel­e­bra­tions of friends and rel­a­tives is, at very least, a harm­less past time if not a legit­i­mate source of plea­sure for chil­dren and adults alike.

In many instances, the pres­sure to con­form with the prac­tices of soci­ety is too great for those of weak resolve to with­stand. Par­ents are often tempt­ed to give in to the plead­ing of chil­dren who have been invit­ed to par­ties. They do not know a lot about why this hap­pens because the par­ents do not tell their kids about it.

Any belief sys­tem or rit­u­al (Christ­mas or oth­er­wise) in any reli­gion should sat­is­fy each of the fol­low­ing cri­te­ria to be labelled as authentic :

1. It should have its evi­dence from the scrip­tures or from the authen­tic say­ings of the Messenger.
2. The Mes­sen­ger him­self and his com­pan­ions should prac­tice and prop­a­gate it.
3. The Scrip­ture or the Mes­sen­ger’s say­ings in which this belief sys­tem is present should be pre­served from alter­ations or perishment.

Was Jesus Born On Decem­ber 25th ?

Nei­ther the date 25th Decem­ber nor any oth­er date of Jesus’ birth is men­tioned in the Bible. Not until the year 530 C.E., that a monk, Diony­sus Exi­gus, fixed the date of the birth of Jesus on Dec. 25th. ​“He wrong­ly dat­ed the birth of Christ accord­ing to the Roman sys­tem (i.e., 754 years after the found­ing of Rome) as Dec. 25, 753.“1This date was cho­sen per­haps in keep­ing with the hol­i­days already indoc­tri­nat­ed into the pagans.

Roman pagans cel­e­brat­ed Decem­ber 25th as the birth of their ​“god” of light, Mithra.

“In the 2nd-cen­tu­ry A..D., it [Mithraism] was more gen­er­al in the Roman Empire than Chris­tian­i­ty, to which it bore many sim­i­lar­i­ties.“2

“The rea­son why Christ­mas came to be cel­e­brat­ed on Decem­ber 25 remains uncer­tain, but most prob­a­bly the rea­son is that ear­ly Chris­tians wished the date to coin­cide with the pagan Roman fes­ti­val mark­ing the ​“birth­day of the uncon­quered sun” (natal­is solis invic­ti); this fes­ti­val cel­e­brat­ed the win­ter sol­stice, when the days again begin to length­en and the sun begins to climb high­er in the sky.“3

Oth­er pagan ​“gods” born on Decem­ber 25th are : Her­cules, the son of Zeus (Greeks); Bac­chus, god of wind (Romans); Ado­nis, god of Greeks ; Freyr the Greek-Roman god.

But What About San­ta Claus ?

The ​“San­ta” char­ac­ter was fur­ther devel­oped in 1809 when an amus­ing but inac­cu­rate his­to­ry of Dutch tra­di­tions was writ­ten. Wash­ing­ton Irv­ing, influ­enced by north Euro­pean Christ­mas cus­toms, pic­tured St. Nicholas rid­ing in a wag­on mer­ri­ly over rooftops, drop­ping presents down chim­neys, the first time this had been sight­ed. Need­less to men­tion, the word ​“San­ta Claus” appears nowhere in the Bible. How­ev­er, Saint Nicholas (San­ta Claus) was a real bish­op who was born some 300 years after Jesus^(P). Accord­ing to leg­end he was extreme­ly kind and went out at night to dis­trib­ute presents to the needy.

“Ver­i­ly, Allah for­gives not that part­ners should be set up with him in wor­ship, but He for­gives except that (any­thing else) to whom He pleas­es, and who­ev­er sets up part­ners with Allah in wor­ship, he has indeed invent­ed a tremen­dous sin.“4

Chris­t­ian belief states that the one God reveals him­self in the three per­sons of Father, Son (Jesus Christ) and Holy Spir­it. These three per­sons are nev­er­the­less regard­ed as a uni­ty, shar­ing one ​“sub­stance”. Prophet Jesus^(P) is ele­vat­ed to divin­i­ty, sits on the right hand of God and judges the world. The Holy Spir­it, who in the Hebrew Bible is the means by which God exer­cis­es his cre­ative pow­er, in Chris­t­ian thought becomes a part of the God-head. Paul made the Holy Spir­it the alter ego of Christ, the guide and help of Chris­tians, first man­i­fest­ing itself on the day of Pentecost.

Con­se­quent­ly, Shirk in Ruboobeeyah occurs in the Chris­t­ian belief that Jesus^(P) and the Holy Spir­it are God’s part­ners in all of His domin­ion, in their belief that Jesus^(P) alone pro­nounces judge­ment on the world and in their belief that Chris­tians are helped and guid­ed by the Holy Spir­it. This form of Shirk occurs when any act of wor­ship is direct­ed to oth­er than Allah.

“Indeed they do blas­pheme those who say that Allah is Jesus, the son of Mary, but Jesus said ​“O chil­dren of Israel ! Wor­ship Allah, my Lord and your Lord”. Who­ev­er joins oth­er gods with Allah, Allah will for­bid him heav­en and the fire will be his abode.“5

‘Abdul­lâh ibn Mas’ud (may Allah be pleased with him) nar­rat­ed that Allâh’s Mes­sen­ger^(P) said : ​“Any­one who dies wor­ship­ping oth­ers along with Allah will def­i­nite­ly enter the Fire.” I said, ​“Any­one who dies wor­ship­ping none along with Allâh will def­i­nite­ly enter Par­adise.“6

Mus­lim Reac­tion Towards Christmas

Being the cus­to­di­ans of Truth and the ​“best Ummah cre­at­ed for mankind” and ​“wit­ness­es unto mankind” (ummatan wasa­tan), we Mus­lims just can­not stay still as the soci­ety around us is entrapped by Satan. Enjoin­ing good and for­bid­ding evil should be our theme.

The fore­most thing to realise is that Christ­mas is a big inno­va­tion which is lead­ing a big part of human­i­ty to shirk (asso­ci­at­ing part­ners with God). Chris­tian­i­ty has trans­gressed the lim­its set by Allah ; there­fore show­ing hap­pi­ness and joy on Christ­mas, Hal­loween, East­er and Good Fri­day is like shak­ing hands with Satan and telling him to car­ry on the good work.

Remem­ber that Allah com­mand­ment for us in the Qur’an :

“Help you one anoth­er in virtue and right­eous­ness, but do not help one anoth­er in sin and trans­gres­sion. And fear Allah, ver­i­ly Allah is severe in pun­ish­ment”.7

It is high­ly rec­om­mend­ed for all Mus­lims to car­ry brochures on Islam with them to pass on class­mates, co-work­ers, neigh­bours etc. after dis­cussing Islam. Thus the hearts and minds of non-Mus­lims should be exposed to the beau­ti­ful mes­sage of Islam.

Say : ​“He is Allah, the One and only,
Allah, the Eter­nal, the Absolute,
He beget­teth not, nor is He begot­ten.
And there is none like unto Him.”

And ver­i­ly, only God knows best ! 

[cite]

1. Ency­clo­pe­dia Bri­tan­ni­ca, 1998 ed.[⤶]
2. The Con­cise Colum­bia Ency­clo­pe­dia, 1995 ed.[⤶]
3. Ency­clo­pe­dia Bri­tan­ni­ca, 1998 ed.[⤶]
4. Qur’an, 4:48[⤶]
5. Qur’an, 5:72[⤶]
6. Nar­rat­ed in Bukhari and Mus­lim.[⤶]
7. Quran, 5:2[⤶]