OnIslam.net

Salam Mr. Karnalkar,

Thank you for your question.

Actually, your question is rather vague. What exactly does your fiancée mean by Hindu? Does she mean belonging to the religion of Hinduism or to India as a region? In general both assumptions are far from the truth.

Islam started in the Arab Peninsula, thus the first Muslims were originally ethnically Arabs. The religion of the Arabs at the time of the revelation of Islam was that of paganism and not of Hinduism. The origin of Islam and the Muslims had nothing to do with Hinduism, either as a religion or ethnicity.

The fact that Islam started between Arabs does not alter its universal message. The Quran stresses in a number of verses this global nature of the Islamic message. You may refer to the following verses in the Quran: "90:6" "1:25" "87:38" "28:34" .

Thus it is clear that from the very beginning the call for Islam was never meant to be confined to Arabs or to any other ethnicity. Nowadays, praise be to Allah, you find Islam in Asia, Africa, Europe, the two Americas and Australia embraced by peoples of different colors, who recite the Noble Quran.

In this feature, Islam bears a resemblance to the two heavenly religions that came before it – namely Christianity and Judaism. Though Christianity started in Palestine and Judaism in Egypt - where Moses received revelation at Mount Sinai - the two religions extended allover the world to spread guidance for all humanity. They were not meant to be restricted to the people of Egypt or that of Palestine.

I think the reason behind your fiancée's confusion about the relationship between Islam and Hinduism is that when the Indian Peninsula was opened to Islam in the tenth century at the hands of the great Muslim conquers Spaktakin and His son Mahmoud of Ghuznah, most people converted to it. It is because this part of the world is heavily populated, a majority of Muslims now belong to this part of the world, which is the Indian Peninsula.

The Muslims of this part have always been acting like active da`is (callers for the religion). You can always feel their dynamism in spreading Islam everywhere you go in Europe and America. The first modern Quranic translation that helped millions to understand Islam was accomplished by the Indian Yousuf Ali. So were the first recognized translations of the two famous books of Hadith (sayings of the Prophet) were achieved by the two Pakistanis Farouqi and Muhsin Khan…

There are other examples that are beyond number of the participations of the Indian Muslims so that they, as well as we, must be proud of and that may cause this confusion in the minds of non-Muslims that Muslims are from Hindu origin!

Thank you again for writing to us and many congratulations for your coming marriage. Please always keep in touch.

Salaam.

Useful Link:

Is Islam a religion for Arabs only?

Does Islam Have Pagan Roots?

Muhammad & the Origins of Islam