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Kafir
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Kafir (Arabic: ; plural ) is an Arabic word meaning "rejecter" or "ingrate," also the term "Kuffar" the plural of the word "Kafir" is used to refer to peasants (???????? ??????????? ?????????) Surah 57 Al-Hadid (Iron) Ayah 20; as they till earth and "cover up" seeds. The term "Kufur" means "to cover up" this is why earth tillers are referred to as "Kuffar." In the Islamic doctrinal sense, the term refers to a person who does not recognize God (Allah) or the prophethood of Muhammad (i.e., any non-Muslim) or who hides, denies, or covers the "truth".
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Kafir (Arabic: ; plural ) is an Arabic word meaning "rejecter" or "ingrate," also the term "Kuffar" the plural of the word "Kafir" is used to refer to peasants (???????? ??????????? ?????????) Surah 57 Al-Hadid (Iron) Ayah 20; as they till earth and "cover up" seeds. The term "Kufur" means "to cover up" this is why earth tillers are referred to as "Kuffar." In the Islamic doctrinal sense, the term refers to a person who does not recognize God (Allah) or the prophethood of Muhammad (i.e., any non-Muslim) or who hides, denies, or covers the "truth". In cultural terms, it is seen as a derogatory term used to describe an unbeliever, non-Muslims, apostate from Islam and even between Muslims of different sects. You have to keep in mind that the spirit of Quran uses the word equaly for Muslims, in Sura 2 Verse 256, it is asking Muslims to take upon themselves the action of "kufr" of all unjust idols, persons or powers. It is usually translated into English as "unbeliever" "ungrateful" or "obliterator."
Etymology
The word is the active participle of the root K-F-R "to cover". As a pre-Islamic term it described farmers burying seeds in the ground, covering them with soil while planting. Thus, the word implies the meaning "a person who hides or covers". In Islamic parlance, a is a word used to describe a person who rejects Islamic faith, i.e. "hides or covers [viz., the truth]".
"kafara" ~ the root verb ~ means "he hid (something)" and "he covered (something)" or "He hid (something) by covering it up". Both "hiding" and "covering up" are indelible significations of all of the words arising on the verbal root.
Types of Kufr disbelief
Types of Kufr (Disbelief)-Adapted from 'Tafseer ibn Katheer
The Qur'an uses the word kufr to denote a person who covers up or hides realities, one who refuses to accept the dominion and authority of Allah. There are several types of Al-Kufr ul Akbar:
1. Kufrul-'Inaad: Disbelief out of stubborness. This applies to someone who knows the truth and admits to knowing the truth and admits to knowing it with his tongue, but refuses to accept it and refrains from making a declaration. The Qur'an states: Throw into Hell every stubborn disbeliever [Soorah Qaaf (50), Ayah 24]
2. Kufrul-Inkaar: Disbelief out of denial. This applies to someone who denies with both heart and tongue. The Qur'an states: They recognize the favors of Allaah, yet they deny them. Most of them are disbelievers. [Soorah Nahl (16), Ayah 83]
3. Kufrul-Kibr: Disbelief out of arrogance and pride. The disbelief by the devils (Iblees) is an example of this type of Kufr.
4. Kufrul-Juhood: Disbelief out of rejection.This applies to someone who aknowledges the truth in his heart, but rejects it with his tongue. This types of kufr is applicable to those who calls themselves Muslims but who reject any necessary and accepted norms of Islam such as Salaat and Zakat. The Qur'an states: They denied them (OUR SIGNS) even though their hearts believed in them , out of spite and arrogance. [Soorah Naml (27), Ayah 14]
5. Kufrul-Nifaaq: Disbelief out of hypocrisy.This applies to someone who pretends to be a believer but conceals his disbelief. Such a person is called a MUNAFIQ or hypocrite. The Qur'an states: Verily the hypocrites will be in the lowest depths of Hell. You will find no one to help them. [Soorah An Nisaa (4), Ayah 145]
6. Kufrul-Istihaal: Disbelief out of trying to make HARAM into HALAL. This applies to someone who accepts as lawful (Halal) that which Allah has made unlawful (Haram) like alcohol or adultery.Only Allah has the prerogative to make things Halal and Haram and those who seek to interfere with His right are like rivals to Him and therefore fall outside the boundaries of faith.
7. Kufrul-Kurh: Disbelief out of detesting any of Allah's commands. The Qur'an states: Perdition (destruction) has been consigned to those who disbelieve and He will render their actions void. This is because they are averse to that which Allah has revealed so He has made their actions fruitless. [Soorah Muhammed (47), Ayah 8-9]
8. Kufrul-Istihzaha: Disbelief due to mockery and derision. The Qur'an states: Say: Was it at Allah, His signs and His apostles that you were mocking? Make no excuses. You have disbelieved after you have believed. [Soorah Taubah (9), ayah 65-66]
9. Kufrul-I'raadh: Disbelief due to avoidance. This applies to those who turn away and avoid the truth. The Qur'an states: And who is more unjust than he who is reminded of his Lord's signs but then turns away from them. Then he forgets what he has sent forward (for the Day of Judgement) [Soorah Kahf (18), Ayah 57]
10. Kufrul-Istibdaal: Disbelief because of trying to substitute Allah's Laws. This could take the form of:
(a) Rejection of Allah's law (Sharee'ah) without denying it
(b) Denial of Allah's law and therefore rejecting it, or
(c) Substituting Allah's laws with man-made laws. The Qur'an states: Or have they partners with Allah who have instituted for them a religion which Allah has not allowed. [Soorah Shuraa(42), Ayah 8] Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says: Say not concerning that which your tongues put forth falsely (that) is lawful and this is forbidden so as to invent a lie against Allah. Verily, those who invent a lie against Allah will never prosper. [Soorah Nahl (16), Ayah 116]
Muslim relations with the Kafir
For dealing with non-Muslims, Jasser Auda, a director of the al-Maqasid Research Centre in the Philosophy of the Islamic Law in London, England, says that the general rule is mentioned in the verse that says what means:
- God welcomes you to be kind those who have not made war against you on account of [your] religion, and have not driven you forth from your homes, that you show them kindness (birr) and deal with them justly; surely God loves the doers of justice. God only forbids you respecting those who made war upon you on account of [your] religion, and drove you forth from your homes and backed up [others] in your expulsion, that you make friends with them, and whoever makes friends with them, these are the unjust.
Birr in this context is likened to birr al-walidain, the kindness that a Muslim should show to his or her parents.
Some Muslims believe that making friends with the Kafir is prohibited in Islam. Others consider the directive in Qur'an only for those Christians and Jews who were direct addressees of Qur'an or in war when there is a danger of transmission of secrets. As in Qur'an:
- O ye who believe! take not the Jews and the Christians for your friends and protectors (over the Muslims): They are but friends and protectors to each other. And he amongst you that turns to them (for friendship) is of them. Verily God guideth not a people unjust.
Shi'a jurists have traditionally deemed the person who does not believe in Allah (God ) and His Oneness to be ritually impure (najis) so that physical contact with them or things they touched would require Shi'as to wash themselves before doing regular prayers. As regards the people of the Book (i.e. the Jews and the Christians) who do not accept the Prophethood of Prophet Muhammad bin Abdullah, they are commonly considered Pak (pure).
Use outside Islam
By the 15th century, the word kafir/kuffar was used by Muslims in Africa to refer to the non-Muslim African natives. Many of those kufari were enslaved and sold by their Muslims captors to European and Asian merchants, mainly from Portugal, who by that time had established trading outposts along the coast of West Africa. These European traders adopted that Arabic word and it's derivatives.
Some of the earliest records of European usage of the word can be found in
The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation by Hakluyt, Richard, 1552-1616.
In volume 4, Hakluyt writes: calling them Cafars and Gawars, which is, infidels or disbelievers. Volume 9 refers to the slaves (slaves called Cafari) and inhabitants of Ethiopia (and they use to go in small shippes, and trade with the Cafars ) by two different but similar names. The word is also used in reference to the coast of Africa ( land of Cafraria on the coast of Ethiopia).
The word eventually changed into many forms — cafre (in Portuguese, Spanish and Greek), caffar, kaffer, kaffir, kafir, etc. (in English, Dutch, and Afrikaans). Those words were then used to name many things related to Africa, such as the Kaffir Wars, Kaffraria, kaffir lime, kaffir corn, and so on; see kaffir (disambiguation).
Some of those African slaves were taken by the Portuguese to work in their colonies in Asia. In some cities of Sri Lanka, in particular, the descendants of those slaves still constitute a distinctive ethnic group, who call themselves Kaffir.
By the late 19th century the word was in common use throughout Europe and its colonies, often appeared in the newspapers and other written works of the time. One of the Union-Castle Line ships operating off the South African coast even carried the name SS Kafir.
In South Africa, the word kaffir eventually became a racial slur, applied pejoratively or offensively by some whites to African blacks or to dark-skinned persons in general. In Jamaica, it is applied by some Jamaicans of Indian ancestry to Jamaicans of African ancestry.
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