MERGED-->The Pope insults Islam + Turkish official compares Pope...

[Irvine511]

Sir or madam, you have a choice. You can continue to believe and perpetuate misconceptions about Islam and the above-noted Surahs, or you can educate yourself first further on these things.

I don't know how many times such things about the Quran or Islam have been posted in the past six months...and it's always without context and it's always accusatory and it's always an "us against them" mentality.

Please go here for more context...or take some Religious Studies classes or, you know, God put Google on this earth for a reason. Use it:

http://www.free-minds.org/articles/gods_system/war.htm

thank you, Judah.

i am embarassed by, and for, my countrymen.

i hope you continue to post when you can -- it's clear that, these days, FYM very much needs your voice.

 

[Macfistowannabe]

I don't understand what the Muslim community wants. They claim they come in love and peace and tolerance and all that mantra, and yet they demand an apology that refutes the very thing they are demonstrating. Personally, I classify the Muslim reaction as 'evil and inumane,' as was so described in the Pope's self fulfilling prophecy of a speech, and im sure everybody else here does to. So what does the Pope apologise for....?

Those within the moderate Islamic community are peace-loving, religiously tolerant, and ashamed of the extremists who kill in the name of their god.

THEY TURN THE OTHER CHEEK AND LOVE THEIR NEIGHBOR IN SPITE OF THEIR DIFFERENCES. WE ALL KNOW THAT. THEY ARE NOT THE ENEMY.

But then we have the infidel-killing, Muslim killing sects of Islam who have defined their views with hatred for anyone who doesn't practice their religion, and as a result, we see blood and guts every day.

THESE ARE THE STATE-SPONSORED FASCISTS WHO ARE OUT TO KILL ANYONE THEY DON'T AGREE WITH.

It's too bad that Islam cannot be defined as a peaceful religion when the extreme wing believes in conversion by the sword.

It seems that the moderates are the only ones who want peace.

 

[Macfistowannabe]

So the angry looking people in that cartoon represent all Muslims?

NOBODY SAID THAT! NOBODY!

 

[Macfistowannabe]

I'm going to get hold of a copy of the Koran. I've never read it either, and I should.

There is more than one version out there. There is the original version, which includes more scriptures that were quoted in this thread, and there is the revised version which is a lot more infidel-friendly.

 

[yolland]

All right, this one's relatively brief, so I'll bite.

* Surah Muhammad [47]:3 says “When you meet the unbelievers on the battlefield, strike off their heads…"

This sura is set during one of the earliest sieges of Medina (where the then-small and weak Muslim community was based) by the Quraish who were, no surprise, "unbelievers," i.e., pagans. It's primarily a list of exhortations to the Muslims to have courage and defend themselves. Verse 3 says nothing remotely like the above, so I'm guessing he meant Verse 4, which DOES NOT mention decapitation (and I checked three different translations to verify that); rather it says (using Shakir's translation): "So when you meet in battle those who disbelieve, then smite the necks until you have overcome them, then make them prisoners, and afterwards either set them free as a favor or let them ransom themselves until the war terminates."

Even if it did say "strike off their heads," frankly, I don't understand what the big deal would be. It's talking about a BATTLEFIELD, after all, and that generally does mean killing, doesn't it? Would it somehow be less barbaric if the advice was to disembowel them instead?

* Surah Anfal [8]:12 says “I shall cast terror into the hearts of the infidels. Strike off their heads, strike off the tips of their fingers.”

Anfal is primarily set during the Battle of Badr, in which the still-weak Muslims of Medina were again under siege from the Quraish. Again it's largely a list of exhortations. In this case the quote is definitely advocating killing the Quraish fighters (the sunna states that the Muslims killed 70 of their 700 fighters, despite numbering only 300 themselves). Brutal method? Yep. But it's a battlefield and this is 7th century Arabia.

* Surah al-Nisa’[4]:74 says “Let those who would exchange the life of this world for the hereafter, fight for the cause of God….”

Nisah dates from the tumultuous aftermath of the Muslims' defeat at the Battle of Uhud, and particularly the ultimate expulsion of the Nadir Jews from Medina for having violated the Treaty of Mecca (622), by conspiring with the Quraish against Muhammad's forces to whom they had pledged support. Much of this sura employs the rhetoric of "fighting for God's cause" (i.e., not the Quraish's) in an attempt to rebuild morale and solidarity in Medina.

* Surah al-Nisa’[4]:56 says “The true believer fights for the cause of God, but the infidel fights for the devil.”

This is actually Verse 76, not 56. The word translated here as "devil", Shaitan--while related to the Hebrew proper noun "Satan"--is actually in Arabic an adjective meaning "astray" or "distanced"; the Arabic for "The Devil" is Iblis. "Infidel" again refers to the Quraish or their (treasonous) supporters.

* Surah al-Nisa’[4]:101 says “The unbelievers are your inveterate enemies.”

This verse genuinely is addressed to an "in general"-type scenario (i.e., not just to life under siege in Medina), but the context is missing. The verse begins "And when you go forth in the land..." followed by the above quote, then "It is no sin for you to shorten your worship if you fear that they [i.e., your pagan "unbeliever" enemies] may attack you," followed by another verse advising to keep a weapon nearby for safety's sake, even when praying. So basically, the message is, it's OK to skip your required prayers if you're under attack (phew!).

* Surah al-Ma’idah [5]:51 says “Believers, take neither Jews nor Christians for your friends.”

This much later sura is set shortly after the conquest of Mecca (from which Muhammad and his earliest followers had originally been expelled). The Muslims have now been established as a regional power to reckon with, but power can corrupt, and so some stern reminders of which way not to go are called for. Presumably no one is going to go the way of the decisively crushed Quraish at this point, so that leaves the other two religions of some standing in the region to worry about. Obviously it was a belief of Muhammad's that both the Jews and the Christians had screwed up The Message big time (otherwise why bother starting a new Abrahamic religion), and so the sura recommends to his contemporaries the same approach the Torah does: self-imposed social distancing. The sura does NOT call for violence against other "People of the Book," nor does it damn them to hell (Verse 69 says, "All those who [are Muslims], and those who are Jews, and Sabians, and Christians--whoever believes in God and a last day and does good--they shall have no reason to fear, nor shall they grieve" with reference to the afterlife).

Only in a truly Bizarro world can those passages NOT be an incitement for some to violence, to “evil and inhuman” acts.

Or an out-of-context world...not unlike the one certain extremists live in, perhaps...

Are there other passages in the Qur’an mitigating these? Yes. But many of these more benevolent passages are also considered by many Muslims to have been abrogated by the more martial ones.

How many is "many," do you suppose? I'm guessing he doesn't really know either.


Cutting and pasting is easy...tracking down sufficient resources to verify the context of passages one really knows nothing about is painfully slow. I can understand not taking the time to research these quotes...what I can't understand is why anyone would just assume that obviously they must be abstract, general directives meant to apply to all Muslims for all time. That is a dangerous way to think.

 

[yolland]

The voilent reaction has been universal and profuse in numbers.

Universal and profuse violence? There was the nun who was killed in Somalia. There were grenades thrown at some churches in Gaza (empty ones, so far as I know). There were effigies burnt (is that "violence"?) in Kashmir and Basra, neither of which were large demonstrations. Are there other stories of profuse violence I've somehow been missing?

 

[BVS]

There is more than one version out there. There is the original version, which includes more scriptures that were quoted in this thread, and there is the revised version which is a lot more infidel-friendly.

And how many versions of the Bible are there?

 

[all_i_want]

i am saddened to see that some people here share the same values (intolerance, lack of empathy, praise of unabashed ethnocentrism, seeing unilateralism as a vice, et cetera) that they despise when they see them in their 'enemies'. it is mind-boggling, but also very, very tragic.

 

[A_Wanderer]

What is so offensive is that the Catholic Church usually sides with Muslims on such issues as the Mohammed cartoons - but consistency is not found in faith.

 

[all_i_want]

What is so offensive is that the Catholic Church usually sides with Muslims on such issues as the Mohammed cartoons - but consistency is not found in faith.

is this only about faith, or just people -and institutions- acting in pure self-interest?

 

[verte76]

Everyone here knows that I'm a practicing Catholic. One with carpal tunnel syndrome. I had the Afternoon From Hell with that stuff, for what that's worth. Faith is strange stuff. I guess this is a typical FYM thread on Christianity. We now have several posters I recognize as being from *former* Muslims. No Crusades here, but I digress................I'll just sleep on it. No, faith isn't consistent, and I'll just leave it at that.