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Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Islam Fundamental Principles and Teachings Part Two : Foroo‘ Al-deen The Essential Principles and Practices of Islam Before beginning with the presentation of the second part of Islam’s outstanding teachings, it is worth mentioning that the first part of Islam’s splendid teachings; namely Os}ool al-Deen; the fundamental principles or beliefs of Islam, which were covered earlier – must be the belief of the individual out of reason and conviction by investigation, for they are issues related to thought and belief, and it is not sufficient for one to rely on and follow others on these matters.

However, in the case of Foroo‘ al-Deen or the essential rulings and practices of Islam that we are to discuss here, involve all aspects of life, covering one’s every acts, deeds, and movements from before one’s birth to after his death.

Since one is generally not able to readily attain expert knowledge in every aspect of all these acts, deeds, and movements, and acquire their rulings from their detailed sources that are mentioned in the four sources; namely the Noble Qur’an, the honourable sunnah – i.e.

the hadith of the prophet and the narrations of his peace be upon them all – consensus, and reason, therefore Islam has allowed one to follow a mujtahid (learned expert) who is fully qualified for taqleed on these matters, and to refer to him in order to make things easy for the individual concerned.

Of course Foroo‘ al-Deen are many, and so we shall mention the most important of them which are the famous ten, and then we will elucidate some of those that require clarification by the will of Allah.

The ten famous Foroo‘ al-Deen are as follows: S{ala> or the daily obligatory prayers, S{awm or fasting, Khums or the one-fifth religious duty, Zaka>h or the duty applicable to certain commodity, H{ajj or pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca, Jihad or striving, Amr bil-Ma’roof – promoting virtue or enjoining good, Nahy anil-Munkar – prohibiting evil, Tawalli – aligning with Allah’s disciples, Tabarri – dissociating from the enemies of Allah.

Needless to say, these ten principles, as well as other principles such as buying, selling, marriage, divorce, punishment, compensation are discussed in detail in our book The Manual of Islamic Law.