Ysabella

I'm not a Muslim, but please Consider the Following. Lots of horrible things are done in the name of Xtianity every day, and it's the same with Islam. Could you create a religion that no one could pervert and misuse to justify their own agenda of hate?

I'd say that there are quite a lot of peace-loving Muslims and it is mostly a religion of peaceful ways. It is made clear that you are to read the Quran, in the original Arabic form, to really know it; loads of atheists on this board can argue about misinterpretation of the Bible in English if you go back and compare to Greek and further to Hebrew. We are more familiar with the vast range of conclusions people come to given the books sacred to Judeo-Christianity, so consider the range there could be of interpretations of the Quran, even if they've had a few less centuries - considering whether you include the Sunna, the Hadith, or not. And the imprecision of the Arabic language (as it seems to Westerners, anyway, or at least to me - if the term could mean either "beat your wife" or "strike your wife with a feather" I have trouble with that imprecision).

Islam has a vast number of factions and subdivisions, so sweeping statements about Muslims don't sit well. Many Muslims will tell you that Jihad is mostly your personal struggle always to fully submit to the will of God. The concept was extended to defense and later to some conquering but it's quite clearly not applicable to killing civilians on a distant continent, no matter how hard you try, unless you're insane.

Maybe it's a problem that hits religions at a certain age? When were the Crusades...roundabout 1090-1290 according to a quick Google search. And Islam comes from around 625. Maybe it's a religion coming-of-age around the early teens of centuries.

Orpheous99

It would seem that many Muslims don't "understand" the Qu'ran either since many believe the same way which bin Ladin does.

Have you read the bible in any detail, and not just the parts "adopted" by Islam?

One thing you may not want to realize is that most of us here are not the average sheep which are attracted to religion andwe actually do read up on belief systems. This is one reason why we're atheists and agnostics. The average theists has absolutely no idea which is actually in their "holy books", most of them go by what they are told is in them by their priests and clerics.

-DM-

1) What is and isn't difficult to understand is, of course, largely a matter of opinion.
2) The difficulty of understanding of a so-called holy book such as the Quran probably depends to a great extent on one's background. If one were raised as a Muslim, for example, then it is likely that the difficulty of understanding the Quran would be much less than the difficulty of understanding the Bhagavad Gita.
3) There is no way that you could know with certainty that someone was "too lazy to read up" unless you were omniscient. Are you?
4) Do you think you fully understand anything, including the Quran?
5) You begin your post with what amounts to an insulting statement and then end it with "peace." This is, in my opinion, a bit oxymoronic.

--Don--

DMB

Jojo-sa: You didn't pick up my reference to the fatwa against Salman Rushdie. So I will ask you explicitly:

• Do you approve of this call to believers to kill Rushdie for his "blasphemy"?
• Do you approve of the death penalty for "blasphemy" as currently practised under islamic law in Pakistan?
• Do you approve of the death penalty (or any penalty) for apostasy?
• Do you approve of the inequality of the sexes, as enjoined by the koran and practised in many islamic countries?
• Do you approve of the inequality of treatment of believers and dhimmi as traditionally practised in islamic countries?
• Do you believe in the concept of the dar al-Harb and the dar al-Islam?
• Do you accept the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?

I would suggest that satisfactory answers to these questions from you and all other muslims who seek to convince us of the virtues of islam woudl be a lot more effective than simply telling us how peaceful islam is.

sighhswolf

I think that the quotes for the text are self evident, and Don has already done an excellent job of posting those words of wisdom concerning the relationship between Muslims and infidels.

Understand one very important issue here sir.
You have alledged that to read and understand the
prophets words and the holy texts, requires a "special" training, a linguistic and artful
interpretation of the texts.
An understanding of the nuances of language.

Now, in that light lets compare the texts of the Holy Bible and the Torrah and the Koran (my prefered spelling) and wonder of wonders the very same allegation is made in reference to all three books.
The very same argument that you have put to us, is the very same argument the Christians and the Jews use to interpret their holy text in a way that favors their convictions.
Now let me say to you, in all honesty, why do you think that it is necessary to develop this advanced training to understand the texts?

I would say to you, the same thing I would say to any of those perveyors of religion, and that is if
these texts are so very difficult to understand, then how would the average human being EVER know
if they contain truth?

If your texts as those of the Christian Bible and the Torrah contain values and admonitions that can be explained only by the most ardent student
of linguistics, what good are they?
If the average person cannot read the books and comprehend the meaning for themselves, then those books become a tool for those who would use them to further their own wants and desires and ambitions.

They become tools for oppression if they cannot be comprehended and used by the common man.
If I cannot pick up a book and read it for myself and interpret the text exactly as it is written
then that book is useless.
This is the very same argument that is foremost on the lips of theologians, and one that is an insidious plot to rearrange the text into an abomination of what they were originally designed to be.

I stand by my thoughts, if a supreme being had taken the time to be involved in the writing of any text to be used by mankind as a guide for this existence, it would be clear concise and without controversy in it's meaning.
There would be no need for interpretation, nor would there be a need for intermediaries to explain the texts.

My point is that it is difficult to listen to a lay person who is trying to convey the meaning of the texts in a manner inconsistant with the prevailing thought processes of those who are the holders of power and knowledge in Islam and who are the chosen of Islam to convey it's message
throughout the world, in all forms of media.

"War is a blessing for the world and for all nations. The Koran says "Fight until all corruption and all rebellion have ceased."
The wars the prophet led against the infidels were a blessing for all humanity.
Imagine that we will soon win the war. That will not be enough, for corruption and resistance to Islam will still exist.
The Koran says," War, War until victory".
The Mullahs with corrupt hearts who say that all this is contrary to the teachings of the Koran are UNWORTHY OF ISLAM.
Thanks to god our young people are now to the limits of their means, putting gods commandments into action. They know that to KILL
THE UNBELIEVERS is one of mans greatest missions".
Ayatollah Khomeini
On the birthday of the Prophet Mohammed 1984.

Sir please be my guest and interpret this speach as you understand it.
Because it does not seem to be a peace loving
non-violent Islamic approach to the rest of the world.
And if this interpretation of Islam and the texts
of the Koran are not consistant with "linguistics
and nuances of language" please favor us with a lesson so that we may have a more in depth explanation that has seemed to escape the leaders of the fundamentalist Islamic world.

I apologize if I seem rather combative here, but the facts are the facts, no amount of sugar coating can make the bitterness any sweeter.
If you wish to convey the message that Islam in it's purest form is peace loving I am afraid you have taken a difficult if not impossible task upon yourself, and one that the leadership of the Islamic world has proven time and time again to be false.

However if your interpretation of the texts is different than the Holy minions of the faith, then I sincerely hope you will succeed in your
quest to have that understanding spread throughout
the world, so that the image of Islam may somehow
be salvaged in world opinion.
Wolf

Orpheous99

Originally posted by Don Morgan:

3) There is no way that you could know with certainty that someone was "too lazy to read up" unless you were omniscient. Are you?


I think that he is using the old fallacy of one must first believe in it absolutely to understand it fully, but if that were true than one wouldn't have to read it since they already believe. So, if we actually read the Qu'ran then we would become believers since only believers can understand it.

-DM-

I have. I find your viewpoint and the viewpoint of those who agree with you about the "Islamic view on jihad" dishonest given what the Quran itself has to say about the treatment of disbelievers and given what some very knowledgeable Muslims, including Muslim educators, say about the Quran.

The guy who thinks he knows more but is completely biased in his viewpoint may, in fact, be more dangerous than either the guy who knows little or the guy who knows nothing.

So far as I am concerned, liberal Muslims and liberal Christians who hold to a watered-down version of their respective religions in order to make them more palatable to the masses do not do nearly enough to criticize and condemn those aspects of their own holy books and religious belief systems where those books and belief systems are deserving of criticism and condemnation.

Take your own advice. Do enough reading of what some Muslim educators think of the Quran and you might change your tune.

I could make the same statement, namely that you have for sure passed judgement on the Quran and Islam. Not only that, but you seem completely closed-minded to criticism of either.

I could also ask the same question about you and your beliefs. I just wonder based on what information?

What makes me wonder is your rather blind support of anything and everything which anyone might find to criticize in the Quran as well as your nonsensical assertions about what the Quran allegedly says that it doesn't really say. Surely you have not arrived at these things on your own but rather are taking the "information" of others as fact. There is, for example, the nonsense that you posted regarding a verse in the Quran which allegedly "relates clearly to Big Bang only discovered recently," the nonsense as if it were something special that the Quran states that all living things come from water, and the nonsense about the female ant, all of it in the <a href="http://iidb.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=45&t=000059" target="_blank">Koran thread</a> now in this forum.

I'm afraid, jojo-sa, that your batting average with the nontheists that you find here in our discussion forums is going to be very low in your attempts to convince them that your holy book, the Quran, is something special as compared to all the other holy books and/or that it doesn't condone or promote violence. Keep in mind that, like you, we reject the validity of other holy books. The main difference between you and us is that we also reject the Quran. My personal opinion is that the Quran is a book which is not worthy of belief or devotion to its teachings and that it does promote or at least condone violence in the name of "God." In this it is not unlike the Bible. And in attempting to make it seem otherwise with the Quran, you are not unlike Christian apologists who try to make it seem otherwise with the Bible.

So-called revealed religions such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all claim to be the one, true religion. They allegedly emanate from the same "God" yet they disagree with each other on major points. They all do or have condoned or promoted violence. None of them or their holy book is worthy of our belief or devotion.

--Don--

[ January 31, 2002: Message edited by: Don Morgan ]</p>

-DM-

My opinion is the same. If a perfect, omnipotent, omniscient "God" had anything to do with the writing of a holy book, he could have, should have, and would have done a better job of it than the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Quran, the Book of Mormon, The Key to the Scriptures, etc., etc.

While I applaud this sentiment, I go farther. I want the violence in the name of the Quran stopped -- even if that violence is misguided. I want it stopped by Muslims themselves. I want Muslims everywhere to condemn, denounce, and get rid of the terrorists in their midsts.

I will accept nothing less.

--Don--

-DM-

I do not think it would be difficult even for me to write a so-called holy book which clearly laid-out the ethical/moral rules by which we are to live (you wouldn't have to agree with them, of course), which holy book could not be perverted and misused to justify an agenda of violence (which is, after all, what we are talking about here). It should be even less difficult for a perfect, omnipotent, omniscient and loving supernatural being to do so.

If sweeping statements about Muslims don't sit well, then the same should be true with regard to sweeping statements FROM Muslims about Islam (e.g., jojo-sa's statements).

Yes, and many Christians will tell you that the Bible doesn't really condemn homosexuality (when it really does), or that it doesn't really subjugate women (when it really does), or that the people who burned the witches at Salem "weren't really Christians."

Maybe. But maybe it would be better to wise-up about religions, especially so-called revealed religions such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam -- all of which claim to be the one true religion -- and just dispense with them.

--Don--

lpetrich

And what brings you to that conclusion?

I'm not sure that I have the patience to go on some sacred-book wild goose chase.

That would only be a problem if the Koran is super easy to understand. But your comments suggest that it is not.

I'm sure that you've seen many of my postings by now; do I seem like a dummy? Also, I'm a computer programmer, making me a sort of creator, if only a very limited sort of one by some standards.

(Advice in Arabic deleted...)