In this incredibly delicate and tough subject,truly I too can’t help myself being stretched both sides. I wouldnt be telling the truth or else delude myself to say it shud be either or.

For my love and respect for the Prophet(saw), I would think we need a Global Islamic Council- a Majlis of Shura to convene and congregate on this and its greater value to Islam by that virtue itself.

In simplicity it is a noble effort and modern outreach to(in the context of Imam John’s other article that Islamic scholarship is to teach and disseminate the proper message of Islam,etc)touch the masses, both muslims and non-muslims brethrens to share, educate and propagate the beauty and truth of Islam as done by our beloved Prophet(saw).

This reminds me of a(similar context) some years back at my office when I wrote a poem on the Prophet(saw)and wanted to give it a title, but had a pretty tough time. I was advised by a senior not to add the word Muhammad as it could or may cause some issues. A little disappointed, but I guess it was for the better. And so I titled my innocent poem- “If The Prophet Came To Visit”. No issues…though I will never know otherwise. But it was a satifying and humbling experience.

However, what is being discussed here is far and beyond mere text and we must thread lightly. Great minds,scientific creativity and intelligence were the epitome of Islamic civilization and culture and progress. Much of which lost added to the giant canvas where fanatism has continuously painted their scary dark colours. It is a constant struggle to remove them, but I do see the arts, culture and creativity as our hope in presenting the past glory to life. How we do that is the part most crucial!!!

May ALLAH help all in their sincere efforts and forgive them and us for any wrong in our mind, words or action. Great thanks to Imam Suhaib Webb for this wonderful cyberjemaah and its blessed writers and contributors!.

Salaams..

Asalam aleikum brother, I apologize if I offended you in any form or shape. However, I think you need not to be too offensive on this issue. By Allah some muslim will find the move offensive and they will talk about it.

Inna lilah wa innah ilah raajun

But do you think we are near ready for that though? There is a bit of “Pandoras Box” here. But I can see where you are coming from….

When scholars of hadith explain through shamail/seerah works how the Prophet (saw) went about things, they act out things like how he walked, how he smiled, how he wore his turban etc. If someone videos that then you basically have the Prophet depicted on film !

If that is not haram why can we not have someone else do the same thing, and judge that based on what our sources say about the Prophet (saw)?

Okay the next issue is the actor, if the actor is not muslim or religious, then perhaps we fear that this is disrespectful. Well is it more disrespectful than the thousands of muslims called Muhammed who are non-practicing muslims doing all sorts of bad things? Or the many corrupt people who outwardly represent islam but are doing bad stuff behind the scenes?

What i am getting at is that, should we not have a little confidence in our iman, or is it that weak that depiction of the Prophet (saw) is going to negatively affect our iman? If it boosts the iman of 10000 and negatively affects 100, then is it not worth doing?

All those things are nothing, i can quote you quranic verses that are much more explicit (including commentaries that go into detail) about the birds and the bees, about war etc. Do you want to ban your kids from quran as well?

There are plenty hadith about intimate things, very graphic descriptions of things – they are much more explicit than not only the above film, but many other more graphic films, and these were taught to children from ancient times till now – in madrassas and other places – as people tended to get married young (<16). They weren't taught to encourage dodgy sexual behaviour, but to show the types of things humans do. The film does that too, and where it doesn't explicitly mention marriage or other rites that should be a precursor to these things, that is where has to explain stuff to kids.

What is suitable for a child depends on the context and the time.

What do you mean by depicting? The Prophet (saw) has been depicted for 500+ years all over the muslim world, as have sahabah and others, in persian miniature paintings. Usually his figure is painted but the face is blank or shown to be burning, and other indirect ways.

So there are several ways we could depict the Prophet (saw), but indirectly so, in a way similar in spirit to the miniature paintings. There are many creative/artistic film tricks that can be used to do this, in a way even better than the film ‘the message’.

The only thing most muslims would have trouble with is some hollywood actor in a normal hollywood way, in explicit form, depicting prophets and others.

However, i think the issue is slightly different in the modern time, as we have christians and others depicting their own prophets according to what they understand to be their law/shariah. And we are in such countries, images/movies are everywhere, depictions of prophets (often very negative and mocking depictions) are rife.

So given such a context, given that most people learn by movies/images and not by memorising texts, we have to make some changes as to what we should tolerate from non-muslims about their own prophets, especially when such things are relatively beneficial.

Things were never black and white, shariah was always contextual.