Tag: Islam

Timeline of Muhammad’s Life using Time Toast

For the first day in class studying Islam, after I gave a brief overview of Muhammad‘s life and how Islam originated in the Arabian Peninsula, I gave an assignment for students to make a timeline of Muhammad’s life that contained at least 8 major events in his life.  His birth and death could be two of those events.  They had several options for how to present the information: Xtimeline, TimeToast, Prezi, Pixton, or GoAnimate.  All the students were familiar with Prezi, but most of them had never heard of the other electronic tools.  The classes only had about 20-25 minutes to create an account on one of these sites, learn how to use it, research Muhammad’s life, create the outline, and post it to a class forum.  If they didn’t finish in time, it was their homework, so of course; most of them finished in time.  I only assigned 8 events in hopes that they would generate different outlines that can be shared and compared to learn more details, and this would also give them the opportunity to dig deeper into some of the events that interested them from my overview.

Here are a couple of the timelines that resulted from the students who chose to use Time Toast for this in-class assignment (sorry, they wouldn’t embed in Word Press):

Life of Muhammad Timeline 1

Life of Muhammad Timeline 2

As always on work generated from my World Religions class, feedback is much appreciated.  Students check in on the comments periodically.  For Apologetics, I’ll have them create their own blogs and I’ll share the best posts on Facebook to get traffic to their blog posts.

Andy WrasmanLeave a comment

Islam and the Five Pillars

Christianity speaks of a foundation for our beliefs – Jesus Christ!  
Islam has pillars.  
Pillars, of course, hold up the roof of a building.  The pillars of Islam are then viewed as holding up the Islamic faith.  Following these pillars are essential to all Muslims.  Salvation comes through observing these pillars, yet, there is no guarantee to any Muslim that he or she has followed these well enough, as well as having other good works in their lives, enough to warrant salvation from Allah!
The Five Pillars of Islam
  1. Creed – The creed of Islam is “There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger.”  When this single sentence is spoken in faith it makes a person a Muslim.
  2. Prayer – Muslims must pray five times a day facing Mecca.
  3. Charity to the Poor – Muslims must give a percentage of their income to the poor.  Generally, this is 2.5%.
  4. Fasting during Ramadan – Muslims must fast from food and water every day of the ninth month of the Muslim calendar.  This fast is known as Ramadan.   When the sun goes down, they can eat and drink.
  5. Pilgrimage to Mecca – This pilgrimage is called Hajj.  Muslims must travel to Mecca once in their lifetime if they have the financial means to do so.  Once in Mecca, there is is a series of numerous acts that must be performed, but the central task involves worship in the Kabbah.

So… how can a Christian present the Christian faith to a Muslim using these five pillars? 

First, ask questions, even if you already know the answers.  Show that you want to learn from them.  Ask,  “What are the five pillars to you?”

For the Creed, which for them is “There is no God but Allah, and Muhhammad is his messenger,” you can share that Christianity also has creeds.  The Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed.  You could also share that you too believe in only one God.  They’ll likely argue that… and say that you believe in three gods.  But you can then share the Christian faith to them more.

For the daily prayers, you can ask questions about what are the prayers you say?  Why do you have to say them in Arabic?  You can can share that Christians pray too, and that God hears our prayers at all times, not just at certain moments, because he is all powerful and knows all things and wants to listen to what his children have to say.

Charity – you can share that it’s good that they give to the poor.  You can share that Christians give too.

Fasting – you can share that Christians fast too, but that it’s optional for us, and that we can do it anytime we want, and that the purpose for the fasting for us is lead us to pray and to remind us to pray.

Hajj – you can share that to Christians this entire life is a pilgrimage!  This is not our home.  Our home is in heaven with God and we are just strangers passing through this world to our eternal home with God.

They may even ask you more questions about these similarities.  If you have a Bible you can share verses from the Bible with them.  Many Muslims have not read the Bible, yet they believe that the prophets of the Bible, and even Jesus, were prophets for Allah, so their words should be authoritative (although they believe the Bible has been corrupted).

Andy Wrasman3 Comments

“I’m Ready to Die for Mohammed.”

Today on Sept. 11th, 2012, Muslims in Egypt scaled the US embassy walls in Cairo, captured the American flag, tore it to bits, and burned it outside the embassy walls.  Apparently, they are made because America is making a film that insults the prophet Mohammed.  The name of the film isn’t given, nor is the American film company.  I wonder if these Muslims actually think that the American government is making the movie?

Check out the guy’s sign on the far right of the above image.  It says on the bottom, “Ready to Die for Mohammed!”  Why would he be ready to die for Mohammed?  Shouldn’t he be ready to die for Allah?

According to a Yahoo News article, “Washington has a big mission in Egypt, partly because of a huge aid program that followed Egypt’s signing of a peace treaty with Israel in 1979. The United States gives $1.3 billion to Egypt’s military each year and offers the nation other aid.”

As America remembers Sept. 11th, 2001 in our way, the Muslims overseas remember it in their way!!!

For more information, check out the following article:

http://news.yahoo.com/egyptians-angry-film-scale-u-embassy-walls-163506344.html

Andy Wrasman1 Comment