for anyone who cares to read (re: no freedome of religion for Muslims in Malaysia)

[whiteflag]

And lest I be accused of taking this verse out of context, the verses before this one talks about a proclamation that according to God all treaties with pagans had become null except with the pagan groups with whom Mohammed had some sort of political or military alliance. And those people were safe only as long as they were loyal.



What's the justification for this verse of the Koran?

Amna,

Open your eyes.

I did explain the context. The context is that God told Mohammed to announce that all treaties with pagans except the ones that were the most useful to Mohammed were nullified.

I read all of that sura from beginning to end. I could post the entire thing and it would make no difference.

Jesus allowed for no violence. None. Zip. Period. Nada. No exceptions. No excuses. No justifications.

Mohammed gave permission for violence. It does not matter what the circumstances are or what the rules are, or how honorable people are told to be or how much patience and all the other BS that was stipulated.

War is allowed. Therefore it can be abused by people and they can justify themselves religiously which is the worst sort of justification and causes the greatest viciousness. No truly peaceful religion would allow the opening for such abuse or cause such confusion. The allowance of even the least amount of violence is a FLAW. It is one that easily exploited by religious men who are angry and frustrated.

And it will always be until the history of war in Islam's name, including Mohammed's military campaigns, is repudiated by Muslims. Until that day there will always be a culture that will produce people like UBL and the name of Islam will drip in blood.

The war in Islam and the peace in Islam cancel each other out. Like a positive number and a negative number. Islam is like a person that speaks out of both sides of its mouth and ends up saying nothing much and confusing most of the people listening. (The Muslims who would not resort to violence under any circumstances are far outnumbered) It is a religion of situational morality. There is no law in Islam which doesn't have an exception. The Koran and the hadiths have exemptions for lying, stealing, killing and war. Islam says to have patience but it gives permission in some cases for people to give up on patience and non-violence. This is a weakness that must be acknowledged.

Muslims must stop trying to explain why the permission for war is not really a bad thing because all they are doing is making excuses and blaming other things instead of changing the confusing environment that unreformed Islam creates for Muslims like UBL and the suicide bombers.

As for the Koran being read in its original language. I could write a book of lies tommorrow disguised as a holy book, and if people were still reading it in the original language many years from now would that make any difference? What kind of logic is this claim about the Koran? It means nothing at all. Thousands of books are read in their original language. What matters is the message. The message of Islam is all over the map and in many cases incoherant. Even in its original language, the Koran is incomprehensible. It lacks any background or context and it is arranged in no order other than length of sura. Meaning if one wants to know what was going on and when it happened, they are entirely dependent on the contributions of human (fallible) scholars to provide the code (the context and time of "revealation") needed to decipher it. It was humans who gathered the hadiths and decided which ones were the most authentic and then wrote the commentaries which represent the true origin of the Islamic faith as it is known today. It was humans who decided to burn all but certain copies of the Koran. Thousands were burned.

Noone can just sit down with the Koran and read it and understand what the hell is going on and why without any other material or traditional knowledge provided by humans. In contrast, the Bible comes with all the material needed, context, times, commentary, the works. No Christian who has a Bible is dependent on any scholar to tell us what it is saying or how we are supposed to understand it. The New Testament presents a morally consistent message with only two exceptions and a happy, moral spiritually fulfilled Christian life can be easily derived from it with no other education in the Christian religion. The life built in this way will be consitent with the lives of other Christians. The New Testament passes the real test of any Holy Book, "Does it work?" with flying colors. Western civilization based upon its moral teachings is the most wildly successful, dynamic, creative and inclusive civilization ever known. The NT has given birth to countless humanitarians and non-violent movements the world over. Its values have crossed into the lives of the believers of other religions, like Gandhi, who found the blueprint for his non-violent movement in its pages (though it was the Gita that first inspired him.)

And in case any one should doubt its influence. The birth of our current civilization coincides with the advent of the Bible becoming widely available to all people in the 1500's. Its like an incredible power was unleashed as soon as the common man could read the Bible in his own language. In other words, whatever mistakes in the translations or what ever corruptions of the text, these have been proven insignificant to the success of the Gospel in the lives of billions and billions of people.

All this and its message on non-violence, patience, love and othe rmoral admonisions etc is consistent and allows for no exceptions under any circumstances. A Christian in crisis is allowed to act no different from one in a good situation if they want to be obedient to Jesus who was always consistent in all situations.

And no, Amna, I do not believe that anyone who denies that Jesus died on the cross can truly respect him or the people who believe in him. I think that someone who leaves it an open question is more respectful than the one who totally denies it. The death of Jesus, in all meekness and piety has inspired such incredible goodness and love in the world and has saved countless lives through the practice of non-violence. His death is the source of the power of Christians to overcome the worst possible situations. When we die for what we believe in, we see the Cross, and we know we are not alone. There is no more serious and unequivocal example of the power of love and non-violence in all the world.

 

[whiteflag]

Oh, I forgot to mention.

The Book of Mormon is read in its original language and due to modern technology and means of preservation, it is likely to be read for ages in English just excactly as it was originally written.

I believe that the Bahais also have a similar claim. What about the Hindus and the Bhuddists?

So the statement that only the Koran is read in its original language would be patently false.

 

[pinkfloyd]

is it true that mormons are allowed ( secretly ) to have a 1-3-6 number of wifes ??

 

[Tarik]

So I'm accused of ignoring your statements, whiteflag,

well, sorry about that, but all I wanted was to explain the principe of Jihad, when does Islam allow war. And, independent of when the verses I mentioned were manifested, they are valid, so the verse "there is no compalsion in religion" is the central message regarding the relationship between Islam and other religions.

Well, to understand and to interprate a verse of the (holy) Quran, you godda know the time of the manifestation, and the circumstances when this verse has been sent. Cause the Quran was sent, as you know, bit by bit.

You pointed out one fundamental difference between Islam and Christianity, in fact the christian principe of "not fighting back" and the islamic principe of Self-Defence. As you are a christian its not a surprise that you see the principe of Islam as a FLAW, cause otherwise you would deny your own religion, as well as I see the christian principe as a FLAW, cause its unworldly to me.

Almost all religions were exploited in a bad way, giving empires occasions for wars, for example what do Inquisition, burning of witches, scientists and jews have to do with christian charity? nothing

War is allowed in Islam. Thats true, but only as a self-defence.
At this point, the verses and the hadiths are very clear, Muslims are not allowed to attack first ( see quran 2:190).

But when it comes to war:" fight them wherever you find them.....",so there NO contradicitions here my friend, and like the Quran is saying itself, no doubts (2:2), but I will prove this at another time (it's gettin' late know).

About the Quran you said that noone can understand what the hell is going on there... .

First of all, the quran cannot be read like a novel. To understand the quran you have to speak arabic fluently, cause it is truly impossible to make a 100 per cent translation of the quran, cause of the richness of arabic language (for example there are more than 100 words for lion).
Is this a flaw? I don't agree! it pushes you to learn (like the quran more than 100 times is repeating:"use your mind"), and this book is the only one which is memorized by thousands of ppl all over the world.

You have to know the history of Muhammad (pwh) , cause he was the "living Quran". (I recommend Hamidullah's biography, by far the best one).
You godda know a lot (and I really mean a lot) of hadiths (the prophet's words) and of course Quran interpretations.

To be sure that you have a 100 per cent authentic hadith in front of you, check out if the hadith was translated by BUHARI, MUSLIM or TAHA. Then you can be absolutely sure that this is a authentic one,

Anyway its late no and I'm preparing myself for a 2 week vacation to Bosnia, so I will be absent for some time, so I hope you will be fair and not make duzens of replies...

take care

 

[whiteflag]

No, pinkfloyd. As far as I know, they are no longer allowed to have multiple wives period. I have heard that a decided minority of Mormons still practice polygamy in out of the way places and that law enforcement there generally looks the other way as long as they don't call attention to themselves. But I have no proof of that. All I know is that polygamy is illegal according to Utah law the same as in the other 49 states.

 

[pinkfloyd]

well , this case about the girl from Utah , can it be like possible that some guy ( maybe even old one ) decided to get married to this girl ( she's very pretty , talented , perfect ) took her away in full secret and the society, some cops , this is like a closed community right , they could get a deal , , i just read some Artur conan doyle stuff about sherlok holmes btw

 

[Amna]

Whiteflag, about the whole thing on the Quran being the only book that has stayed the same through out history; what I meant was that the Quran is the only book that (in Arabic) that has not been changed, not one punctuation, not one Arabic word in the book.

And please, don't try and tell me who doesn't understand it... I might not be an expert on it, but believe me... My brother, a friend of mine, and some other people in my community have studied it thoroughly.... And they have a passion for it... YES, THEY DO UNDERSTAND IT. I to, find it so interesting in learning all the things in the book... Everything has a reason to it.... Though some things might sound outrageous to u; u'd have to look at it from all directions to really appreciate it... VIOLENCE IS BAD. But, If your life was at risk b/c some crazy rapist murderer was after you, Islam gives u the right to self protect yourself. Call me crazy, but that isn't something that degrades a human being.

If you study Islam, or if you appreciate it, you would understand that it promotes RESPECT. The Prophet Muhammed was a character who was a perfect symbol of Respect. The words of God (in the Bible) had been scratched up by clerics etc. etc. The Bible had been retouched....So, Prophet Muhammed was the last Prophet sent by God, to send a Message that would not be scratched upon. We see the proof that the Quran has not been retouched... It has remained the same....
I don't mean to offend anyone... But I'm only saying this because this is where we believ Islam came from. I don't want to say anyones religion is wrong... I'm just telling you that this is what my bleifs are, and I respect everyone elses.
Many Muslims (i don't even want to call some of them Muslims) have not practiced Islam well... We see people mis-using it... But, no one has changed the book... No one has to teach it to us... We read ourselves and teach ourselves, and get help from eachother in trying to better ourselves...
All religions have'nt been used properly... We see people using religion as an excuse to take action out in anger....

I always tend to reply to this forum late at night... Actually it's nearly 2am.... So, I'm probably not making to much sense..... I hope I am....

good night
Amna

PS-
Pink floyd, thanx, we all go through hard ships... I only hope that we respect eachother and eachothers beliefs... This world is chaotic because their is a lack of respect and communication b/w everyone.

Maybe we should first start out by respecting all cultures and beliefs, before we start scrutinizing them.

 

[whiteflag]

So I'm accused of ignoring your statements, whiteflag,

well, sorry about that, but all I wanted was to explain the principe of Jihad, when does Islam allow war. And, independent of when the verses I mentioned were manifested, they are valid, so the verse "there is no compalsion in religion" is the central message regarding the relationship between Islam and other religions.

Yes, that is the central message of Islam's relationship with other religions, AS LONG as Islam is in weak mode trying to gain a foothold and legitmacy in a particular society. But every time Islam becomes dominant all of that changes. All non-Muslims become dhimmis. I could go into all the terrible details about just how "pluralistic" Islam really is when it becomes dominant over other religious believers. But just let me say this for now. Pluralism is enjoyed only by Muslims, those with the right belief, in Islamic society (which makes for a entirely false pluralism). And that is true in all countries with a majority Muslim population. (See the article that began this thread and some of Sula's responses about the "moderate" model Muslim states of Malaysia and Indonesia for some specifics)

You said that independent of when the verses were revealed, they are valid. And I am saying that this is exactly the trouble. No part of the Koran, according to a doctrine formulated by scholars, can be done away with. Its all valid, creating that schizophrenic situational morality situation that makes Islam the weakest religion because it causes the most confusion in fallible humans. Since, according to the decisions of fallible human scholars, all of the Koran is supposed to be equally valid, Islam literally has two EQUAL but opposite personalities for which Muslim scholars have been making excuses from the very beginning, especially when they don't have military strength or numbers on their side.

Funny how the most moderate and completely harmless Islam is to be found in Europe and in the USA where Muslims are the weakest and fewest in number and where the rule of law is the strongest. It seems that only in the West are we are told that Islam only seems exceptionally violent because we don't understand the context.

Or is it rather that we don't know or accept all the excuses for the violence of Mohammed and the first Muslims that modern Muslims are taught practically from birth?

BTW, who "convinced" you that the central message is as you said? Was it the same group of professional scholars who have worked for centuries to reconcile the ugly realities of Islam with the (inborn) peace loving natures of most its believers? Was it the same group who came up with a way to tilt the scales in favor of the good side of Islam without discarding any of the supposedly perfect Koran by coming up with nice lawyerly excuses to minimize the bad side of it? Isn't this the method you were taught growing up? Weren't you encouraged to see Islam in a certain light? Isn't that also what spin doctors and propagandists do? Do not spin doctors also support their positions with reasonable arguments and beautiful "preaching?" Isn't it true that spin doctors also always claim that the majority supports their view and therefore that makes it right? Didn't the communists get together and come to decisions about doctrine by majority consensus of their scholars? Isn't the first thing a propagandist does is encourage people to look at the "facts" and use their own minds to decide if they are true?

Don't spin doctors convince reasonable people by controlling the terms of the debate? Don't lawyers do the same? When someone is the beneficiary of centuries of apologetics and they also devote all of their time to perfecting their craft, what chance does some ordinary person have for refuting their arguments? Especially when these same professionals oversaw the training of the ordinary person's mind? Will the ordinary person ever percieve the trap built around their minds by these professionals if they only have the "light" the professionals allowed them? The final result of any thorough 'investigation" by that ordinary person then becomes a given in favor of the professional scholars especially when we also consider the conservative bent found in most human beings. We like it when someone stops the boat from rocking.

My point about the Koran is that Muslims are entirely dependent on the findings of the scholars about the materials that the scholars themselves collected in order to understand it.

Tariq confirms this

Well, to understand and to interprate a verse of the (holy) Quran, you godda know the time of the manifestation, and the circumstances when this verse has been sent. Cause the Quran was sent, as you know, bit by bit.

After Mohammed's death, it was Islamic scholars who provided the times of the "manifestations" It was the scholars after the death of Mohammed who decided to arrange the Koran out of chronological order. It was the scholars who decided on the methodology for collecting and including the verses of the Koran. It was human beings that decided any contraversies about its codification. The final arbiter was a leader embroiled in political and military problems with other original followers of Mohammed. It was a human who decided to gather and burn all copies of the Koran which did not agree with the "official" version. It was the scholars who collected and interpreted the hadiths without which the Koran is indecipherable. Islamic apologetics began with Islamic scholars.

All religions have scholarly traditions, and all religions benefit from their scholars, but not all religions are as dependent on scholars opinions as Islam is. This is why all other religions except Islam, have undergone the process of renewal that comes from by bypassing their scholarly traditions and returning to their original scriptures. All other religions have texts which can be independently understood without a code provided by some interpreter past or present. And all other religions have managed to find a vital and fresh perspective that has reenergized their societies (Christianity goes a step futher than even this, in that the original message of Jesus is delivered pure and intact into each true believers heart by the Holy Spirit. We use His very own testimony to test even our scriptures!) The end result is that we find once more that Jesus, Bhudda and generations of rabbis and gurus need no excuses for their conduct. We discover again the original strength of our religions by learning again to depend on their sane and consistent examples.

Again Tariq

You have to know the history of Muhammad (pwh) , cause he was the "living Quran". (I recommend Hamidullah's biography, by far the best one).
You godda know a lot (and I really mean a lot) of hadiths (the prophet's words) and of course Quran interpretations.

In other words you have to be familiar with centuries of excuses for Mohammed and what he taught Muslims to do. You also have to know the interpretations of scholars who have seamlessly blended all the contradictions created by the light and dark sides of his character. You have to internalize the method the scholars have perfected that makes the almost constant war of Mohammeds "prophetic" career and the peace that he mostly just talked about not contradict each other.

Finally, for this post at least,

To be sure that you have a 100 per cent authentic hadith in front of you, check out if the hadith was translated by BUHARI, MUSLIM or TAHA. Then you can be absolutely sure that this is a authentic one,

I have said it before but I'll say it again. I have studied Islam for ten years with the help of many moderate Muslim friends. I haven't always been a Christian and when I began to study Islam, I wasn't much of one. I thought that all religions were pretty equal. It is because of what I learned about Islam that I have the opinion of it that I do now. Having learned what Islam is all about, I realized that Christianity is the antidote to Islam and that made me decide to commit my life to Christ like I never had before. (Shortly afterward, I had a powerful mystical experience that I will never be able to fully explain. But during the course of this very complex experience, I felt all the anger and fear I felt towards Islam at the time drain out of me but I was still left with the determination to tell the truth about it.) All of the hadiths I know and have seen come from the three collections mentioned above. All the translations of the Koran that I have read are widely accepted.

 

[Amna]

Funny how the most moderate and completely harmless Islam is to be found in Europe and in the

Right, and Whiteflag, where did u come up with those statistics from.... Have u also lived and studied in ALL the Muslim countries. Excuse me, who are u to judge where the most moderate Muslims are....
Lets think about this one carefully..... Whiteflag, if you are so sure of yourself, go live in Pakistan, India, Turkey, or the hundereds of other countries.... I'm sure you'll notice that their are many more moderate Muslims... Just because u see a few extremists groups in the News, doesn't mean that all Muslim countries are extremists.....
Whiteflag, I'm sorry you have such a ugly outlook on Islam.... But, if you are saying that Islam hasn't done well in promoting peace... Then, I guess it is fare to say that all other religions have failed in that sense to.... I mean, the last time I checked, this world didn't only consist of so-called Muslims who have commited murder?

I'm very disturbed on how Islam has been used in some countries... But, the world consists of GOOD people and BAD people...


Btw, Tariq, where are u originally from? My parents are from Pakistan...

peace,
Amna

 

[candice star]

wow, this is such a serious discussion. but i'm proud of you guys who still pay attention in this issue. i think, it's really hard to finish this discussion, i used 2 talk bout this thing w/ my pals. 2 b honest, i'm tired of this issue (or any similar issues) cos i've never got the conclusions. i'm a muslim & have some best friends who r christians or catholics. as long as we believe that our religion & the other religions taught good things & peace, we'll b alright .

 

[Zoocoustic]

As far as I know, they are no longer allowed to have multiple wives period. I have heard that a decided minority of Mormons still practice polygamy in out of the way places and that law enforcement there generally looks the other way as long as they don't call attention to themselves. But I have no proof of that. All I know is that polygamy is illegal according to Utah law the same as in the other 49 states.

As a practicing member of The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter-Day Saints ("Mormons"), I can confirm that our church has banned polygamy. I quote from www.mormon.org, the Mormon church's official Q&A site:

"Question:
What is the Church?s position on polygamy?

Answer:
In 1998, President Gordon B. Hinckley made the following statement about the Church's position on plural marriage: 'This Church has nothing whatever to do with those practicing polygamy. They are not members of this Church . . . If any of our members are found to be practicing plural marriage, they are excommunicated, the most serious penalty the Church can impose. Not only are those so involved in direct violation of the civil law, they are in violation of the law of this Church.' "

 

[Amna]

PEACE......
THATS ALL I CAN SAY
THAT IS WHAT I WAS BROUGHT UP WITH....

MY RELIGION HAS TAUGHT ME THAT TOLERANCE AND PEACE COMES BEFORE ANYTHING..... RESPECT FOR OUR NEIGHBORS..

I FEEL PITY FOR THOSE WHO HAVE NEVER UNDERSTOOD ISLAM....

 

[candice star]

Amna, i feel the same way as u do. some ppl outthere often see Islam as an extreme religion.
i really want 2 say lots of things but sorry, i can't speak english very well.