Salaam alaykum, everyone!
I'm very happy to have come across this site.
I've always felt very alone, no other person I know rejects the hadith and follows only the Qur'an. This is very long, so I doubt anyone will read all of it but I will write it out anyway.
I started on this path long ago. It seems now to me that I was slowly being led in this direction. I was always keen on learning the Qur'an when I was little. I would always pester my parents for any information. My cousin would buy me books about the Prophets, so I would quickly finish those books. I don't think I realized it at the time, but I think I've always believed in God. I can't remember a time when my mother ever told me there was a God. One day, when I was four, I was upset and was crying, sitting with my head resting on my knees in the dark of the hall. I was afraid of the dark but soon felt comforted by God it was, I strongly believed then and even today, and feel into a restful sleep. I think that God was always there, comforting me, helping me, even if I didn't realize it sometimes.
When I was 11, I went to Islam camp, where I had two camp counselors - sisters - who I think were either from Israel or Palestine or even from somewhere else. I can't remember. They told me and other campers that their mother was raised Christian. But she learned about Islam and converted. She allowed her daughters to choose whatever belief they want, it was their choice. They learned about as many religions as they could, as they always felt that there was a Creator, and both chose Islam. I began wondering whether I was Muslim only because of my upbringing, because my family was. I certainly felt as though I believed but how did I know know that if I was born into a Christian, Hindu, or atheist family that I would not be Muslim?
So I began to learn about other religions, taking on an agnostic stance (ie. believing there is a Creator but unsure about my religious affiliation). I was sure that God would have sent the Truth down to us. I doubted that there was more than One God, that didn't make sense to me. My choice came down to Judaism and Islam, as those two religions were what I felt were truly monotheistic, did not attribute human or other creation qualities to God, and were close to what seemed like the Truth. I chose Islam in the end because in more than one sect of Judaism, a person has to spend years learning just to prove to religious "experts" that they were Jewish enough. I do respect the religions and Jews but that did not sit well with me, especially when I see faith as being between God and the believer, there is no medium that we must appeal to.
Anyways, it was still a long time until I started to read the Qur'an in a language I understood (except a few surahs while reading it in Arabic, but didn't particularly focus in on the meaning). When I was 15, my parents hired a woman to teach my siblings and I how to read and write in Arabic, in order to read the Qur'an (yet she didn't teach us how to understand it in Qur'anic Arabic). Meanwhile, she would teach us things from the hadith, such as wearing a hijab, and certain things that seem to go against the teachings of the Qur'an. She urged me to pray, in the very common way everyone else prays, including saying salaam to the angels, praying for the prophets, etc. I wanted to wait, until I knew the meaning of what I was saying in prayers and until I knew the meaning of prayer but she pressured me to do so.
I felt as though I was praying but not really understanding, although I stuck to my prayers. My teacher became ill so I stopped seeing her, as she couldn't teach anymore. I think it was when I finished high school and got into university, in my second year of school when the Islam club at my school gave out free copies of the English Qur'an that I really began to read to find its meaning, for myself. Before then, I would read a bit online for my own learning or to use verses to help other Muslims online or sometimes to refute a Islamophobes' argument (ie. that Islam teaches terrorism, astagfurrallah) but there was something about having a copy, in my hands, to read any time I feel.
So I began to read and read. While reading the Qur'an online was special, reading it more regularly, in my hands, more thoroughly really changed my perspective on life and the universe and on what I thought Islam was. I'm in my third year of university now and I think I've probably read every surah once, some I've read multiple times. The Qur'an showed me that the hijab is not necessary, that we can pray on our periods, showed me that the way people pray now is not the absolute way we must all pray (ie. I don't pray in rakahs now, I don't greet the angels, I don't mention the Prophets unless referring to how God guided them and I hope He would guide me too, etc), that Jesus won't come back before Judgment Day, and that we have no Saviour but God. It showed me that Islam - submission to God - is in everything we do, say, in nature, in the simple things, it showed me that religion is a part of everything. It was humbling. A good Muslim isn't a proud Muslim, they are modest, just, truthful, honest, and submit only to God. And to be honest, Muslims today that I've known, who have taught me previously, did not at all show me this side of Islam. Only through God's Words did I learn this, as well as reflecting and looking inside, as what I read provoked thought. Nothing in the Qur'an condones following the hadith. Everything I read seemed to prove to me that was the wrong path to go down. So that's what led to me to reject the hadith, although I was always skeptical of the hadith, as it sometimes contradicts itself and the Qur'an.
I don't claim to be a perfect Muslim or to be complete now that I follow only the Qur'an. I am human, vulnerable to temptation and sin and I have sinned. No, I have never drank, slept around, or any of that, but I sometimes don't pray, sometimes I am rude to people in certain situations. I still struggle, but that is part of my inner jihad.
However, I do feel lonely. No other Muslim I know shares my beliefs. They seem to follow the hadith - usually, it seems, more than they do follow the Qur'an - or else they don't care about religion (certain individuals have confessed this to me, as they are Muslim mainly in name because of family). So many Muslims feel that the hadith is the way to go. Sometimes I think that if they just read the Qur'an and I mean really read it, absorbing every word, that they would understand. The Qur'an says that God is the only friend we need, I should feel content with that, I know. However, I am glad that there are more of us than I ever imagined. I don't feel so alone now. Subhan Allah. So I am thankful for this community and may God guide us all, inshaa Allah.
