The Kafir
- philhoraia
- May 25
- 4 min read
Who is a kafir?
Definitions:
Etymology
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Active participle of the verb كَفَرَ (kafara, “to disbelieve; to cover; to conceal”) from the root ك ف ر (k-f-r).
Pronunciation
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Adjective
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كَافِر • (kāfir) (masculine plural كَافِرُونَ (kāfirūna) or كُفَّار (kuffār) or كَفَرة (kafara), feminine plural كَافِرَات (kāfirāt) or كَوَافِر (kawāfir))
active participle of كَفَرَ (kafara)
(obsolete) farmer quotations ▲
كَمَثَلِ غَيْثٍ أَعْجَبَ الْكُفَّارَ نَبَاتُهُ ثُمَّ يَهِيجُ فَتَرَاهُ مُصْفَرًّا ثُمَّ يَكُونُ حُطَامًا
kamaṯali ḡayṯin ʔaʕjaba al-kuffāra nabātuhu ṯumma yahīju fatarāhu muṣfarran ṯumma yakūnu ḥuṭāman
Like the example of a rain whose [resulting] plant growth pleases the farmers; then it dries and you see it turned yellow; then it becomes [scattered] debris
ingrate, ungrateful quotations ▲
قَالَ أَلَمْ نُرَبِّكَ فِينَا وَلِيدًا وَلَبِثْتَ فِينَا مِنْ عُمُرِكَ سِنِينَ (18) وَفَعَلْتَ فَعْلَتَكَ الَّتِي فَعَلْتَ وَأَنتَ مِنَ الْكَافِرِينَ (19)
(18) He said “Did we not rear thee among us as a child? And thou didst dwell many years of thy life among us, (19) and thou didst that thy deed which thou didst, and thou wast one of the ingrates.”
Translated by Marmaduke Pickthall كافر - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
كافِر
- Person who disbelieves in God
- Person who disbelieves in God's existence
- A person believing in or practising religious heresy
- disbeliever; miscreant; atheist; unbeliever; apostate; heretic; infidel; rascal
المختصر
The word occurs in about three verses.
S 2:41 And believe in what I have sent down confirming what is with you and do not be the first kafir of it. And do not buy my verses at a low price and me then you fear.
S 2:217 They ask you about the sacred month, fighting in it. Say: Fighting in it is big and blocking from the way of Allah, and kufr in him, and the Sacred Mosque, and expulsion of its people from it, is bigger with Allah. And fitnah is bigger than killing. And they still fight you until they bring you back from your religion if they can. And he who bounces back among you from his religion then dies while he is a kafir, those--their deeds have become worthless in the dunya and the hereafter. And those are the companions of the fire, they abide indefinitely therein.
S 64:2 He is the one who created you and among you is a kafir and among you is a believer. And Allah is a seer of what you do.
Now, a Muslim can be a kafir. If we look at S 2:285 we read:
The messenger has believed in what has been sent down to him from his lord and the believers. All have believed in Allah and his angels and his books and his messengers. We do not distinguish between any of his messengers. And they have said: We have heard and obeyed. Your forgiveness, our lord, and to you is the destiny.
If you were to ask a Muslim as to whether he can 'believe in' quran without actually believing what it says, wouldn't he say No?
Yet Allah's boss told Muslims not to believe when the Torah, supposedly Allah's book, is translated for them.
Narrated Abu Huraira:
The people of the Book used to read the Torah in Hebrew and then explain it in Arabic to the Muslims. Allah's Messenger (ﷺ) said (to the Muslims). "Do not believe the people of the Book, nor disbelieve them, but say, 'We believe in Allah and whatever is revealed to us, and whatever is revealed to you.' "
How can they believe what it says if they don't know whether the translator is telling the truth? The translator has no reason to lie. The opposite of believing is disbelieving. The objection arose because 'Allah's prophet' had no idea as to the contents of 'Allah's' book.
Can Christians and Jews be kuffar? Quran in S 5:57 makes a distinction between 'those given the Book' and kuffar.
Those who have believed, do not take those who have taken your religion as a quip and a game from those who were given the Book before you and the kuffar as protectors. And fear Allah if you are believers.
In quran the author makes a number of claims as to what people have supposedly said.
S 5:17 Disbelieved [kafara] have those who have said: Allah, he is the Messiah the son of Maryam. Say: Then who dominates against Allah in a thing if he wants to destroy the Messiah the son of Maryam and his mother and all those on the Earth? And Lah’s is the dominion of the skies and the Earth and what is between them. He creates what he wills and Allah is mighty over everything.
S 5:72 Those who have said: Allah, he is the Messiah the son of Maryam, have disbelieved [kafara]. And the Messiah said: Banu Isra’il, worship Allah, my lord and your lord. He who associates with Allah, Allah has forbidden him the Jannah and his shelter is the fire. And the wrongdoers have no helpers.
S 5:73 Those who have said: Allah is the third of three have disbelieved [kafara]. And there is no god but one god and if they have not desisted from saying it, painful torture will touch those who have disbelieved among them.
Considering S 5:57, how might Christians have entertained those ideas?
Further reading:
Phil asked:
"How can they believe what it says if they don't know whether the translator is telling the truth? The translator has no reason to lie."
Muhammad knew that the Jews were lying to him (and his men) - Corruption of the Book: https://koran-contradiction.link/islam-corruption-of-the-book/
So the instruction is to believe in the book (Torah) not the recitation of that book and the lies that Jews were inserting (or lies by omission).