World that we are in is immense of different beings distinguished by physical structure and the power of reasoning. Primarily divided into two major categories named Human Beings and Animals.
Any living or extinct member of the family Hominidae (Modern man and extinct immediate ancestors of man) characterized by superior intelligence and articulate speech is called Human Being. And how we define animals in our dictionary is as
“Someone who treats others inhumanely, or is regarded as wildly violent or uncivilized”
Which is contemporary not well defined as we see destruction by human to humans: violating basic rights of other beings. As a superior being it is our major responsibility to take care of the rights of others including nonhuman as well.
Whereas animals possess the same living rights as we do which includes the rights to life and liberty, freedom from slavery and torture, and many more. And everyone is entitled to these rights, without any discrimination. We should treat them as a being rather than as unfeeling property.
The philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras (c. 580–c. 500 BCE) urged respect for animals, believing that human and nonhuman souls were reincarnated (be born anew in another body after death) from human to animal, and vice versa. Against this, Aristotle (384–322 BCE), student to the philosopher Plato, said that nonhuman animals had no interests of their own, ranking them far below humans in the Great Chain of Being. He was the first to create a taxonomy of animals; he perceived some similarities between humans and other species, but stated for the most part that animals lacked reason (logos), reasoning, thought, and belief.
According to Islam, human beings are allowed to use animals, but only if the rights of the animals are respected. The owner of an animal must do everything to benefit the animal. If the owner fails to perform their duties for the animal, nobody else has the right to use the animal. The duties humans have to animals in Islam are based in the Quran, Sunnah and traditions.
Muslims are not allowed to harass and misuse animals, which includes snatching a leaf from an ant’s mouth. Muslims have no right to brand animals hamstring or crucify animals before killing, or burn animals even though they cause harm to humans. Humans should obtain animal meat by a swift slaughter and avoid cutting lengthwise. In Islamic slaughter, the spinal cord cannot be broken. Removing wool from animals is prohibited because it causes them vulnerability.
Being an upper hand we should not exclude the animal rights from our society, we can have them as our pets: a part of a family, and can treat them as a being, a being with life, a being with a sense of emotional needs, a being with social interactions, as they are no harm no pain to us hence a pure joy!
And we should promise ourselves to live how our religion teaches us to live, should make ourselves valuable to world, should make ourselves beneficial to the other beings, and should not harm others neither by force nor by words, and then only then we can claim ourselves as the “Human Being”.
