Salâmun `alaika yâ al-Masîh! (Peace on You, Jesus)

In the end of year, some Muslims were trapped by Islamic legal questions on whether they were allowed to wish the Christians a merry Christmas or not. The answer varies and depends on the perspective of Muslim clerics. However, it seems that most of them forbid Muslims to congratulate the Non-Muslim’s holiday.

One of the reasons behind this prohibition is due to its negative implication. They presume that to congratulate Non-Muslims on their holidays (e.g. Christmas) is to justify their beliefs, while according to Islamic perception some aspects of these beliefs have been manipulated and corrupted (muharraf).

Some of them will add a brief historical data about Christmas, that it is a mere extension of a festival called Natalis Solis Invicti (birthday of invincible sun) which was a custom of Roman pagans. This ritual then adopted into the Christian’s tradition and became part of the Christian’s doctrine despite of different dates of celebration. The Roman Catholic Church, Protestant Church, Greek and Roman Orthodox Church celebrate it on 25 December. While most of Eastern Orthodox Church such as Coptic Church in Egypt, celebrate it on 7th of January.

These additional facts used to affirm the prohibition of wishing the Christians on Christmas day. Therefore, Muslims who tolerate Christian’s religious practice, for instance by wishing them a merry Christmas, will be regarded as admitting unjustified thing in Islam. 

They will also insert in their argument surah al-Maidah: 3 “This day have I perfected your religion for you and completed My favour unto you, and have chosen for you as religion Al-Islam” and Ali Imran: 19 “Lo! Religion with Allah is al-Islam”.  Popular interpretation of these verses asserts that Islam is the only perfect, complete and blessed religion.                             

Another reason behind this prohibition is an assumption that saying a merry Christmas will blemish common Muslim’s faith, which I think is exaggerated. Based on various reasons too, a famous Muslim cleric in Jakarta advised the President of Indonesia not to join the Christmas celebration and to appoint a Christian cabinet minister instead of him.
I think this advice will be neglected in countries with strong Islamic tradition such as Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Jordan etc, because it seems to underestimate the capability of Muslim (even president) to guard his faith. Everyone knows that congratulating the Christians on Christmas day is just an ethical conduct and part of social wisdom within society.
We sometimes fail to remember that many Muslims were no longer interested in building a social gap with others of different faith. They realize that congratulating non-Muslims on their holidays does not contain theological interest, but it is a way to build tolerance and respect among religious disciples.

Such trivial deed seems as an oasis in the dessert, within the escalation of religious intolerance today. I think wishing a merry Christmas will never bring about faith destruction for Muslims, but create peace and social harmony in this plural country. 

Based on this consideration, I sincerely wish all my Christian friends a merry Christmas in the similar wording to Quranic verses surah Maryam 33: “Peace on you (Isa or Jesus) the day you were born, the day you died, and the day you raised alive!”