Re: Shaving The Beard:
The reason why Prophet Muhammad(SAW) ordered to grow beard wasn't bcoz of protection against sand or heat. You can shave your beard happily but please bring your evidence from Quran or Sunnah to refute the arguments and don't pretend like you know more than the Prophet(SAW),
Yaar im giving you factual stuff in regards to society...
The beard started out as natural order of things, men grew beards, why try to shave it of? It hurts when you do... Then it took on practical neccesity, then it became cutom and culture, and then it became part of relgion.
Im not taking religion into count here, I think relgion simply adopted the culture of the beard that existed long before the coming of Islam.
The Prophet may have simply refered to the custom of the day... Its a matter of interpretation. One has to wonder what the Prophet would say about a number of issues if he were living in this century. But in regards to the beard, I believe he was following the cutoms of the society he lived in. Considering we dont live in 7th century Arabia, a beard could hardly be mandatory.