Saturday 4 April 2015

Islam (part 1)

I intend to keep this short  and succinct, but the neological Religion of Peace is, euphemistically speaking, not very peaceful, and has been so for the last 1400 years of its existence.

 In the present, terror attacks are ramping up all over the world. From the recent massacre of nearly 150 Christian students in Kenya, to last month's attack on a museum in Tunisia that killed 19, to the barbaric brutality of ISIS, al-Shabaab, the Taliban and Boko Haram, something is seriously wrong.

Yet, there is no denying it: there are billions of peaceful Muslims around the world, who are caring, compassionate and would never slaughter some French cartoonists for caricatured depictions of Muhammad. What is going on? Are those the true Muslims, the doctor of Pakistani heritage dutifully treating his patients in the USA, or is it the mujahideen strapping on a suicide vest and blowing up hundreds of rafidhas in Yemen? Which person is representative of Islam?

The answer is: both are.

Islam, although holding on to the universal principles such as the Five Pillars (syahadan, zakat, salaat, fasting during ramadhan and pilgrimage to Mecca) and others such as tawhid (oneness of God) has had various other precepts that are basically amorphous and shifting with the times. But fundamentally, at its core, Islam is dominionist and restrictive, extremely punishing to those who commit shirk (idolatry). Try Surah 48:29 or 9:29 from the Quran for example. Unlike the Bible, which Christians can pick and choose because of the Old Covenant-New Covenant dichotomy, the Quran and the other sacred texts, the hadith, are undistilled and show what is wrong when pre-medieval religious traditions are taken as "divinely inspired" and applied to modern-day contexts.


I dont mean to say that Islam is "pure unrestricted brutality" since its obviously not.I dont deny that Islam has a rich tradition that goes back centuries, and there are very intelligent, peace-loving devout Muslims either. They did have the Islamic golden age and some very fine calligraphy and geometric design. Furthermore, there are verses in the Quran that claim there is no compulsion in religion. Well whats going on?

 Turns out that the Quran was only compiled after Muhammad's death, and information gathered from various oral traditions. Muhammad did preach peace at times, but at others he openly slaughtered unbelievers.

Anyone superficially familiar with the history of Muhammad would know of his early years in Mecca, where he at first preached peacefully. He was persecuted and driven out, so he fled to Medina, where he consolidated his power.

And things changed.

He began killing poets who wrote against him. He organized caravan raids to weaken his enemies in Mecca. He killed prisoners of war (look here for a list of people Muhammad personally killed or order to kill).

He conquered Mecca and slaughtered thousands.

What the Islamists are doing around the world today, is fundamentally replicating Muhammad's warpath and such rivers of blood flow around Babylon and Jerusalem. A site ironically called the religion of peace is dedicated to cataloguing all the daily atrocities committed in the name of Islam.

I DO NOT advocate bigotry and discrimination in any way, shape and form. I have Muslim friends and will stand against any harrassment and discrimination against them. but it is important to remember that the ideology of Islam does not deserve equal treatment. There are more Christians than Muslims in the world today, yet there are significantly fewer Christian terrorist groups. Why? There are bloody groups like the LRA for example, but these groups are outnumbered by the number of Islamist groups (and the violence they commit) around the world.

Islam must be shown for what it is.




4 comments:


  1. Daren;

    "What is going on? Are those the true Muslims, the doctor of Pakistani heritage dutifully treating his patients in the USA, or is it the mujahideen strapping on a suicide vest and blowing up hundreds of rafidhas in Yemen? Which person is representative of Islam?"

    You are essentially correct, intellectually, in that if a Muslim claims the Muslims of hate and violence aren't true Muslims, they would commit the 'No True Scotsman fallacy'. This is because, as you pointed out, being a Muslim is not predicated on being peaceful. If you are to NOT commit the fallacy, the predicate must contradict the definition.

    Example: (this example would be to NOT commit the fallacy)

    I am a Scotsman, for I eat like one, speak like one, act like one:
    Response: you were not born in Scotland and have never been there, ergo you are not a true Scotsman.

    This is CORRECT, logically, for to be Scottish is predicated on being Scottish, it breaks the law of non-contradiction to then say you are Scottish if you are NOT Scottish.

    But with Islam, Islam is not predicated upon being peaceful.

    Now I explain all of this to show you that the next part of my response is NOT special pleading, for I have figured out these reasonings many years ago, and thought long and hard about them, and here they are;

    There are actually NOT any Christian organisations that are terrorist, because violence DOES contradict the teachings of the gospel. In so many places, Christ and the authors of the New Testament, make it astoundingly clear that it is impossible to act in a way that is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. For me to pick up a gun would directly break many unavoidable teachings of the New Testament, Daren.

    It will shock you, but to truly be in Christ is a spiritual matter. It is actually 100% possible that the pope does not know Jesus Christ, if the pope is not born again spiritually as Christ said.

    When we think of the unavoidable teachings of scripture such as Galatians 5, the fruit of the spirit, there is NO ESCAPE - Christ said we are known by our fruit. The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control, etc...

    If these are the fruits by which we know true Christianity, then would you say it is a contradiction of 'self-control' to rape someone? Surely you would, for it is a direct logical contradiction. Would you say that 'gentleness' is a description of what it means to beat your wife and kill others? You surely wouldn't, with you considerable intelligence you would see the contradiction immediately. For we are told that the fruit of the spirit breaks no laws, as there is no offense in God, for He is 100% righteous, all of these fruit are ultimately descriptions of Jesus Christ. I hope you consider my message to you this Easter.

    All the best...mike.

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    1. Thanks for the comment.

      Not to challenge you too much, but I have to ask you: to what level of kindness. empathy, compassion etc. displayed would then be a Christian be considered "a true Christian?" And how would you know that the "fruit" of the Spirit is not some result of hardwired empathy in our minds?

      And there are Christians who frequently cite Leviticus that homosexuality is an "abomination", while ignoring other parts of the Old Testament, such as stoning disobedient sons to death in Deuteronomy 21:18. The LRA for example, cited Old Testament laws as justification for their atrocities.

      And its never explicitly stated in the Bible that the moral guidelines in the New Testament abrogates the moral laws in the Old. If Im not wrong Jesus said he came to fulfill, not abolish the Mosaic law in the gospel of John. So does that mean the Mosaic Laws (including the Ten Commandments) have already been fulfilled? Wouldn't that be simply be equivalent to abolishing the law? The Bible is ambiguous about this.

      And the Christian ideal is a life of joy, love and peace. The Muslim ideal is a virtuous, holy man that keeps to the Five Pillars and abstains from alcohol or sexual sin. Yet it can be seen that both have moral failings on their part. Does that mean a Christian who does not have joy, love or peace is then not a "true" Christian?







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  2. I forgot to say Daren, I highly respect your intellectual capacities. Most people would have blundered here, and said that Christianity is exactly the same as Islam, most people would not have looked into the actual teachings of the religion in question, most atheists would just accuse someone like me of a double standard. So I was very pleased to read your astute delineations, for it can be difficult to find someone who is both capable AND willing, to think a matter through thoroughly.

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    1. I admit I always had a strange sympathy to Christianity....its rather odd why I feel this way about it, and not another religion like Islam.

      However there are a number of facts about the Bible that trouble me very much, but Im not going to go into further detail for now.

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