They affirm for God only the attributes by which He has described Himself and those with which His Messenger has described Him—without stripping Him of any perfection, without likening Him to His creation, and without asking how or distorting the meanings.

From the moment Muhammad—may God bless him and grant him peace—was sent, nothing counted as Islam except what he prescribed, for Islam is the servant’s submission to God, Lord of all worlds, and to none besides Him. Whoever submits to God and to another alongside Him, thereby setting up a rival, is a polytheist. God the Exalted says:

“Among mankind are those who take, apart from God, equals whom they love as they should love God; but those who believe are stronger in their love for God.” (Qur’an 2:165)

As for the one who, out of arrogance, refuses to worship God and will not submit to Him, such a person nullifies God’s right to be worshipped and is worse than the polytheists—like Pharaoh and his ilk. The Most High says:

“Indeed, those who are too proud to worship Me will enter Hell humbled.” (Qur’an 40:60)

True Islam consists in worshipping God alone with no partner, and He is to be worshipped only in the manner He commands. Whatever He commands becomes, at that very moment, part of the religion of Islam; and whatever He forbids ceases to be part of it—just as ‘the Rock’ was once part of Islamic practice, but when He forbade it, it was no longer so. For that reason, anyone who clings to the Sabbath or other abrogated laws is not following Islam—let alone someone who actually alters them.

Never has God been pleased with any religion other than Islam, nor has any of His messengers—especially the Seal of the Prophets—ever accepted from anyone anything but the religion of Islam, whether from