Distinction Between "messenger" and "prophet"
Most Islamic commentators agree that "messenger" (rasūl) refers to those who bring a divine revelation which includes a new doctrinal system, while a "prophet" (nabī) is one who explains ethical teachings on the basis of an existing religion. Every messenger is a prophet, but not every prophet is a messenger.
Read more about this topic: Khatim An-Nabuwwah
Famous quotes containing the words distinction between, distinction, messenger and/or prophet:
“There is all the difference in the world between the criminals avoiding the public eye and the civil disobedients taking the law into his own hands in open defiance. This distinction between an open violation of the law, performed in public, and a clandestine one is so glaringly obvious that it can be neglected only by prejudice or ill will.”
—Hannah Arendt (19061975)
“Met face to face, these Indians in their native woods looked like the sinister and slouching fellows whom you meet picking up strings and paper in the streets of a city. There is, in fact, a remarkable and unexpected resemblance between the degraded savage and the lowest classes in a great city. The one is no more a child of nature than the other. In the progress of degradation the distinction of races is soon lost.”
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Year after year in gloom, and desolate despair;
A messenger of Hope comes every night to me,
And offers for short life, eternal liberty.”
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“It is the manner of gods and prophets to begin: Thou shalt have none other God or Prophet but me. If I were to start as a God or a prophet I think I should take the line: Thou shalt not believe in me. Thou shalt not have me for a God. Thou shalt worship any d_____d thing thou likest except me. This should be my first and great commandment, and my second should be like unto it.”
—Samuel Butler (18351902)