Aqaaid

Q: In India there are many festivals of false gods. Everywhere people celebrate it. In the IT Company that I work in people also celebrate these festivals. The company makes one entertainment program in which they say to the employees to come the next day with constumes. Then they worship false gods and dance in that program.

Many Muslim people, mostly girls, get involved in that. They wear clothes like the non Muslims. I tell them not to get involved in that, they tell "we are just going to have fun. We are not going to worship any false gods." Are they doing shirk?

Q: Which one is the shahada? Is it “lā ʾilāha ʾillā llāh muḥammadun rasūlu llāh” or the sentence in tashahhud “Ash-hadu an laa ilaaha ill-Allaah wa ash-hadu anna Muhammadan ‘abduhu wa rasooluh”? I thought they are the same but not sure. Which one should a new Muslim or a one out of Islam to say to become Muslim? 

Q: I'm a computer scientist and in my learning and use, there are often libraries of codes which are very popular and heavily used. They often contain a lot of math or pre built software. The problem is that the library sometimes might have a haram name like jupyter, greek mythology names much like the names of several planets. What should a Muslim to do in this situation?

Q: When we keep Islamic books, etc. in book shelves, dust accumulates on them with the passage of time. Will we be sinning if we don’t clean the bookshelves and the books of dust?

Q: What scripture was given to Yahya (alaihis salaam)?

Q: I recently was asked by a non Muslim if I can tell him the shahada to make him become Muslim because he wanted to become Muslim. So I told him the shahada in Arabic and also in English and explained what is Islam and what you should believe in to be a Muslim. He did it and he believed on what we all Muslims believe so he became Muslim.

After some time this guy asked me that someone told him that the shahada you believe and the things you believe in that the other guy told you. With that you can’t become Muslim because everything he told you is true but you must go to a masjid and repeat it with the masjid Imam so he can repeat with you then you will become Muslim. The other guy took him to a masjid and the imam repeated the same things.

My question is that is this guy became Muslim the first time I repeat the shahada with him or no he became Muslim when he met the masjid imam which one is truth  Can someone regular not an imam make someone become Muslim ? Or no only imam can make someone Muslim ? Am I sinful because I told him shahada first time and he believed it?

Q: Is using soap whilst washing the hands considered to be a sunnat?

Q: Somehow, I got interested in reading other books related to Islamic History besides reading my Daily Quran and Hadeeth. I got know about Khilafat O Malokiyat by Molana Modudi Sb., and I read that book. It was a very nice book. Somebody recommended reading "Al Raheeq ul Maktoom". I have read it too. Again, it was a realy nice book.

I want to read some more authentic books on Seerat of our Nabi (sallallahu alaihi wasallam), and Sahaba Kiram (radhiyallahu anhum), and Umahatul Momineen, and also Islamic History, which are being linked to Quran and Hadees. Could you please recomend me some books (names of books with author)?

Q: Allah is known as "eel" in a language but in English it looks funny. If I laughed at it, is it kufr? I know we should avoid it, but if done is it kufr?

Q: I have a question about the Sahabi who only did the bare minimum and didn't do too many optional acts. When another Sahabi stayed at his house for 3 days he didn't notice anything special that he was doing. Despite this, Rasulullah (sallallahu alaihi wasallam) said he was a jannati. Other Sahaba always followed the azeemat and took the more difficult path. So, as a general rule, should I take the easy path or the hard path when I have to make a decision?