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[[image - Artistic Arabic Writing]]
(There is but one God; Muhammad is His messenger

ISLAM: THE RELIGION OF PEACE

ISLAM gives PEACE to the heart and soul.

ISLAM, in a religious sense, signifies complete submission to the WILL OF GOD.

ISLAM is the religion of MERCY AND WISDOM.

ISLAM'S teachings provide the perfect Code to maintain PEACE among men.

ISLAM can be considered as a universal religion, meeting at all times both the spiritual and worldly needs of all men and nations.

The Faith of Islam

Belief in the Oneness of GOD, the Books of GOD, the Hereafter, the pre-measurement of Good and Evil, Resurrection after Death.

Belief in the PROPHET MUHAMMAD, the last Prophet of God.

Belief in the KORAN, the last Book of GOD which gave glorious and Holy meaning to the Ancient Gospels.

Islam requires of its followers:

Declaration of Faith in the Oneness of God (whose proper name is ALLAH) and His Messenger MUHAMMAD;

Five prayers each day;

Fasting for one month (Ramadan);

Alms-giving from private gain; and 

Pilgrimage to the Holy City of Mecca at least once in a life-time, financial circumstances permitting.

[[image - black & white photograph of the Ka'ba during the Hadj in Mecca]]
[[Photo credit]] ARAB INFORMATION OFFICE
[[caption]] THE KA'BA in the Holy City of Mecca. Nearly a quarter-million Moslems visit this sacred site each year at Pilgrimage (Hadj) time.[[/caption]]

10     MOSLEM WORLD & THE U.S.A.

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Islam Today, and Tomorrow

Forty years ago, the Late H.G. Wells wrote in his well-known book "What Is Coming?" (published by MacMillan Company): "...The new population of Mesopotamia will be neither European nor Indian; it will be Arabic; and with its concentration Arabic will lay hold of the printing press. A new intellectual movement in Islam, a renascent Bagdad, [[sic]] is as inevitable as the year 1950..."

Five years ago, the noted American author and Pulitzer Prize winner Mr. James Michener wrote, in an article originally printed in the June 4, 1951 issue of LIFE magazine and later in his book "The Voice of Asia,":  "...Of all Asia's religions today, the most striking and significant is Islam... Not only are Pakistan and Indonesia Moslem peoples, but so are almost all countries west of Pakistan, forming a solid belt through the Middle East across Africa to the Moroccan shores of the Atlantic... Their cry of 'Back to Mohammed' - proclaiming their will for  spiritual strength and unity - is sure to ring through Asiatic politics even more loudly for the next fifty years..."

"...The Crescent of Islam has again become an imponderable factor in world politics," said Elgin Groseclose in an article in "The Christian Science Monitor" (of Boston, Mass.) entitled "Crescent and Sickle: The Revival of Islam and Its Significance" and printed in November, 1951.

"...Three decades ago," Mr. Groseclose continued, "the Crescent was figuratively in eclipse. So shrunken had become the force of Islam, so moribund its influence that in lands nominally Moslem it had fallen into disregard and impotence.

"Overnight, and almost unobserved, all this has changed... The cry of the muezzin again fills the air, and the radio waves quiver with the haranguings from the 'masjid' pulpits.

"Religious holidays again fill the official calendar. The fast of Ramadan was observed this year (1951 - Ed.) with a strictness not observed in 30 years."

"The New York Times," in its issue of December 30, 1951, printed an article entitled  "Nationalism in Islam," which read, in part: "...Nineteen hundred fifty-one for the Middle East was characterized by an observer this way: 'Blood, oil, tears and Suez'."

The years 1952 through 1955 also witnessed many extra-ordinary events in the Moslem world. A military junta brought about the fall and banishment of Farouk from Egypt. The independence of the Kingdom of Libya, in North Africa, was proclaimed, adding one more to the growing family of sovereign Moslem nations.

The past twelve months, however, have been perhaps the most fruitful for Islam in recent history. At least three more Islamic nations have won their goal of complete independence in 1956 - The Sudan from Britain and Morocco and Tunisia from France - and sovereignty for Malaya by August, 1957 was promised by England a few months ago. Other


OCT.-NOV.-DEC. 1956     11