Various Sects Of Islam

O.K. so now I thought I'd talk about the various offshoots of mainstream Islam (yes, there are a few).

First of all, I am a Sunni (aka Orthodox) muslim. As the mainstream of Islam, this accounts for about 80% of the worldwide muslim population. Our first, and most important text, is the Quran (or Koran). This was dictated directly to the Prophet Muhammed {pbuh} via the angel Jibril (Gabriel). It consists of 114 chapters (surah's) each classified as to whether they were revealed in Mecca or Medinah. In addition to this, there is a body of sayings and doings of the prophet {pbuh} known as the Hadith. These Hadith are not the direct word of God and hence may have been transcribed/heard incorrectly. This is why they are classified as Sahih (authentic), Hasan (fair), Da'if (weak), and Saqim (infirm). After the Quran, we mainly try to live by the Sahih Hadith's. As a result, Islam needs no clergy/priesthood to interpret the words of God/the Prophet because they're written in plain language anyway. Imams are not priests/monks but teachers (think of it like having Chemistry or Maths teachers...imams are Islamic teachers who fulfil duties such as conducting prayers, weddings etc...). According to Islam, faith is between YOU and GOD with no one intervening (i.e, you only pray to God and no one else).

When the Prophet {pbuh} died, as he had no sons, there was no clear line of succession. As a result, the later leaders of the state (Caliphs: Abu Bakr, Omar, Uthman, Ali, Muawiya...) were not recognised by certain muslims. These were later to become the Shia sect who hate the first three caliphs despite the fact they are honoured companions in Islam and indeed spend much time cursing them which is a direct slander on the Prophet {pbuh} who himself loved them very much (how do you claim to honour the Prophet {pbuh} if you hate the people he loved)? They only acknowledge Ali (the Prophet's {pbuh} son-in-law) and somehow claim to trace their descent from Ali's first or second son so calling themselves Sharif or Sayid. The other main difference within this sect is that Shia's do not recognise Sahih Hadith and therefore do not follow the tenants of Islam (to live by how the Prophet {pbuh} lived). Also, Shia's have a priesthood (mullahs/ayatollahs) which is why edicts, fatwahs, given by their leaders are hard to rescind, it's similar to a catholic disobeying the Pope. They may also take a more extreme view and go as far as revering Ali and their ayatollah's (it is forbidden to revere anyone other than Allah which makes this a form of shirk). There are also some who firmly believe in magical Sufi mysticism (known as mumbo-jumbo in orthodox Islam - this is a type of philosophical ideology that is a bit like a fusion of Islamic thought with Buddhism).
The majority of Shia's recognise a succession of 12 Imams, but a small group of them, reject the seventh. This sect is known as the Ismaili sect. A further offshoot of these (the Nizari's) dispute exactly who the seventh Imam was and say that Aga Kahn is a direct descendant and the saviour of mankind (even though this man spends lots of money gambling at the horses, something which orthodox Islam forbids).
There are many further offshoots of Shia's yet again but I must stress that despite the the majority following the above there are a few Shia's who do end up having beliefs very similar to Sunni muslims and true Islam.

And so on and so on...there are many minor sects of Islam today. It will take a lot of time to go into all of them so instead I will now point out some definite non-muslims that call themselves so but do not adhere to some basic tenets of the religion.

The Ahmadi's believe that a bloke called Ghulam Ahmad is the reincarnation of Jesus {pbuh}, the Promised Messiah, the saviour at the end of mankind (mahdi), and Krishna (quite multi-talented eh?). Firstly, muslims do not believe in reincarnation and secondly, one of the worst crimes in Islam is to believe in other gods besides the one true God (i.e. no polytheism) and Krishna is one God manifested as a pantheon of Hindu gods (at it's minimum, part of the Trimurti, but this is still defined as polythiestic). Ahmadi's also believe that Jesus {pbuh} didn't die but went to live in a village in Srinigar!
If you visit the Indian subcontinent you'll also find many of these so-called "muslims" dabbling in "grave worship" with crowds of them queueing up in order to pray by long dead "saints" graves. This does not conform to basic foundations of Islam as we have no concept of sainthood (no one can be closer to God because everyone is equal) nor are we allowed to pray to graves (we can only pray to God to ask for forgiveness of any sins of the deceased). Many of them also do not follow the 5 basic pillars of Islam and, for instance, do not fast or pray and are therefore not examples of true muslims. More importantly, they do not believe in the cardinal 1st pillar proclaiming the oneness of God and Muhammed {pbuh} being his last messenger which means they openly commit kufr and shirk.
It is mentioned explicitly in Islam that after prophet Muhammad {pbuh} there will be no further prophets but where will be 30 Dajjals who will masquerade as future prophets meaning Ghulam Ahmad is one of the thirty Dajjals mentioned that was foretold would come to mislead people.
The bottom line is whether these guys call themselves Qadiyanis or Lahories in order to conceal who they are, their basic beliefs are diametrically opposed to actual Islam - a good analogy would be a person claiming to be a sect of Christianity but not believing that Jesus existed, or someone professing to be a believer of Judaism, but believing that sat alongside Yahweh is a Sun Yahweh and a Rain Yahweh and a Fertility Yahweh etc etc - there are some things that inarguably take you completely outside the core of a given religion.

Another non-muslim group are the Nation of Islam or black muslims of the U.S.A. (good ol' US of A). These people are not muslims because they are basically racist (again, this is strictly prohibited in Islam). They believe that white people are the offspring of devils genetically engineered by a mad scientist on an island somewhere thousands of years ago (I mean come on, be serious). Islam states that it doesn't matter whether you're black, white, brown, orange, purple, blue, green... a muslim is a muslim and an equal. They also believe that Elijah Muhammed (their leader) was a prophet who shared God's powers. This goes against the first pillar of Islam and is therefore clear and blatant kufr (unbelief). This they ascribe to a man who had several illicit affairs with his followers and either forced them to have abortions or dumped them once the children were born (something which a prophet would never do). They further believe that God lived on Earth in the 60's (in San Francisco no less...I mean of all the places to choose, why there?) and was the 'spirit' of a man called Wallace. This is fundamentally opposed to the most basic of Islamic teachings and again goes against the first pillar of Islam by trying to ascribe a partner to God, so they are brazenly committing shirk. No I'm not making this up, these people seriously have some screws loose and similar to the Qadiyanis above, both Wallace and Elijah fit the description of Dajjals sent to mislead us. They also play hard and fast with some fundamental rules within Islam for instance disobeying the command for men to not wear gold or silk by claiming that "it's natural". Well pigs are natural too but we still can't eat them. I mean, even a cursory glance at our religion makes it clear that these people are not following Islam at all but instead some weird "cult of personality" sect. They only have to read the Quran they claim to follow to see what to do to be a true muslim, yet they don't (the Quran is a very easy to understand book that doesn't require special mystics or people to interpret for you, it's very easy to understand on your own if you're not a halfwit).
It's interesting to note that despite being thought of as prominent black muslims, both Malcolm X and Muhammed Ali later renounced this racist doctrine as against the spirit of true Islam and in so doing, reverted to Sunni Islam towards the end of their careers (n.b. reverted not converted because we believe all human beings are born muslim even though they may subsequently be raised to believe in other things and thus they are returning to Islam not entering it anew).

There are other (muslim and non-muslim) sects such as Zikris and Nurbakshi's...again...etc, etc...

Why make such a fuss you say? The reason is that these latter sects proclaim theirs is the only Islamic religion despite not conforming to even the basic foundations of Islam, and then I get grief from people wanting to know "Is that what Islam's really like?". The answer is no, Islam is a religion of peace and submission to God (not submission to some wierdo with grandiose delusions).

Can't I find all this info out on the web?

Yes you can but I've found that many of these sects will try very hard to conceal who they are in order to dupe you into believing they are orthodox. As an example, many orthodox Sunni muslims believe that these sects are on the fringes of Islam (similar to how many christians view JW's for instance). However, talking to them it is very difficult to get them to admit who they really are and they spend a LOT of effort trying to convince you they are mainstream or speak for all of us. Exactly the same is true of their websites. There are many websites with all-encompassing names such as Al-IslamOrg or MuslimOrg but that are actually sect websites that do not represent true islam. True to type, it is usually difficult to ascertain who they are as they try to conceal it by not referencing themselves unless you go digging around deeper in their pages. Conversely, true muslims are quite happy to proclaim ourselves as Sunni or Orthodox muslims from the outset and thus you know when reading these sites that you are reading about a representation of 80% of the faith (1.7 billion people), not a smaller group or sect who are trying hard to conceal it.

I hope that's cleared some misconceptions up (if i've got something wrong on these pages, please feel free to e-mail me with specifics so that I can correct any mistakes).