Many Ribbis Killed With Prophets (3:146)

 

بِسۡمِ اللّٰہِ الرَّحۡمٰنِ الرَّحِیۡمِ

In the Name of Allah, the Rahman, the Merciful

وَکَاَیِّنۡ مِّنۡ نَّبِیٍّ قٰتَلَ ۙ مَعَہٗ رِبِّیُّوۡنَ کَثِیۡرٌ

And how many a Prophet there has been beside whom fought numerous Ribbis

In an alternative reading:

وَکَاَیِّنۡ مِّنۡ نَّبِیٍّ قُتِلَ ۙ مَعَہٗ رِبِّیُّوۡنَ کَثِیۡرٌ

And how many a Prophet, with him many Ribbis, was killed

(Surah 3:146)

The word Ribbiyyun, plural of Ribbi, is interesting and occurs exclusively in this Ayah. It is recognized as being a borrowing from either Hebrew or Syriac. It therefore corresponds to the Jewish term “Rabbi” which is actually correctly pronounced “Ribbi” by the Sephardic and Yemenite Jews. A Ribbi is therefore a learned man of God.

During the Second Temple period, the Jews were divided into dozens of sects and parties. It seems those closest to the Truth were those of the Pharisaic tradition, also known as Rabbinic Judaism. Unlike the heretical Sadducees, who denied the bodily Resurrection, the Pharisees acknowledged that along with a written Scripture the Prophet Moses received the Oral Torah at Mount Sinai. For our Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, we Sunni Muslims similarly believe that not only was the Quran, the final sacred Text or Scripture, revealed to him, but also the Similitude of the Quran, which is an unwritten Revelation that is known as the Sunnah:

أَلاَ إِنِّي أُوتِيتُ الْكِتَابَ وَمِثْلَهُ مَعَهُ

“Beware! Indeed, I have been given the Scripture and with it its Similitude”

(Sunan Abi Dawud)

The latter Prophets of the Israelite dispensation, namely, John the Baptizer (Yahya) and Jesus, came from the Pharisaic or Rabbinic tradition, although they railed against corruption and hypocrisy that had seeped into the Pharisees. Other denominations such as the Samaritans, Sadducees, Essenes, Karaites, etc., are therefore heterodox.

Likewise, in the Islamic dispensation, we observe that the Ribbis, or the learned and pious divines of this Ummah, all hail from ahl us-Sunnah wal-Jama’ah, or Sunnism, indicating that the sects which have been deprived of the blessing of Sainthood, such as the Kharijites, Shi’ites, Mu’tazilites, etc., are obviously heterodox.

The setting up of rival Shrines and alternative pilgrimages to that which is established in Islam is like the deviation of those Samaritans who did not worship in Jerusalem nor accepted the sanctity of the Temple therein. The Hadith—rejecters Ghulam Ahmad Parwez and Muhammad Shaikh both rejected the sanctity of Jerusalem and that Masjid al—Aqsa spoken of in the Quran is in Jerusalem (they identify it with the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina). The heretical Zikri sect based in Baluchistan reject the sanctity of the Ka’bah and Mecca and instead make a pilgrimage to the mountain Koh—i—Murad near Turbat. The Shi’ah have added to the Shrines by declaring the towns of Najaf, Karbala, Mashhad and Samarra holy and undertaking pilgrimages to them, often with greater fervor than the pilgrimage or Hajj to Mecca.

In our time a great fitnah has surfaced in the creating of rival Ka’bahs to the Ka’bah in Mecca. Many ignorant so—called Muslims flock to these replicas and perform similar rites like Tawaf around them. Incidentally, the Tefillin or phylacteries worn by Orthodox Jews during worship, includes a black box placed on the forehead and leather strap that is wound seven times around the forearm is meant to be a foreshadowing and symbolic representation of the Ka’bah and the seven rounds of its Tawaf.