Okay, good. Now can we assume that you will learn Greek, Hebrew, and Syriac and read the entire Bible in all its original languages before you talk about Christianity in any capacity? If you object to this, then maybe you’ll see why I reject your stance regarding the Qur’an and any non-Muslim’s ability to critique it. You are starting from a point of view that says that it is THE LITERAL SPEECH OF GOD (as delivered by the angel Gabriel to Muhammad), dictated without error, and can never be translated without losing its divine qualities (because then it’s not the literal speech of God anymore, because we all know God is an Arab, or at least privileged the Arab language and culture above all others by choosing an Arab tribesman as his final messenger). Am I understanding your objection to translations correctly? Because this starts from a position that no serious person can argue from, either for (because it’s ridiculous) or against (because
if you already believe it, it is impossible to see the ridiculousness of). You have already chosen to believe the Arab-centric mythology surrounding Islam so completely that you actually believe it to be something other than a regular language. It is not just liturgical (preserved as sacred
within a worship setting), it is actually
divine in and of itself. Or at least this is how Muslims have explained to me before, in quasi-logical statements amounting to “The Qur’an is the literal speech of God, the Qur’an is in Arabic, therefore Arabic is the language of God”. The problems with this sort of idea should be obvious, and I sincerely hope that you do not endorse it.
The only time you mentioned anything from the translation of the Noble Quran, is when you mentioned 3 words. Not an ayat not a couple ayats. 3 words!! From 5:33. Then I showed you its context by adding 5:32 and 5:34 and the rest of 5:33.
Yes, and I clarified why the context of the verse, which you yourself provided, actually makes it WORSE, not better: Because it equates fighting against Muhammad and his religion with cold-blooded, unjustifiable murder. To someone who is naturally disinclined to believe Muhammad’s side of the story, this is the height of lunacy and egoism.
This depends on your definition of Culture. If you mean beliefs. Our beliefs are based on the Quran. Then yes we believe that the Quran is infallible indestructable unalterated word of Allah SWT, creator of all.
That’s nice, but it is not what I mean. I am talking about culture. The Arab Christians share a common culture with the non-Christian Arabs. With the exception of obviously Muslim-identifying names (Muhammad, Zainab, that sort of thing), there is little to distinguish them from one another. I have both Muslim and Christian friends from Arab lands named Nadia, and they eat the same food, and they pray in the same language, and they even both wear “hijab” (because my Christian friend is Orthodox). Obviously they do not have the same religion.
But don’t Christians believe that about the bible? Don’t Christians believe that if we don’t accept Jesus’ (pbuh) supposed sacrifice for the world, then we are to be damned burning in fire for he rest of our lives???
What does this have to do with the position of the Arabic language and culture within Islam?
I have no idea how you are differentiating the 2
Apparently not, yes. You assumed I was talking about the particular details of a certain religious faith. But of course not only Arabs can be Muslims, just as not only non-Arabs can be Christians (or Jews, or Hindus, or whatever else).
I think your beef is with the value we put in the language of Arabic.
Of course Arabic is valuable, sah? It is not God’s language, however; at least not any more than we can also say that Bengali, Estonian, Maori, Yupik, or any other language is also God’s language.
I believe God is the master planner. Don’t you? I believe everything happened for a reason. Don’t you? Well then why did all the prophets (peace be upon them) speak similar type languages.
What does this have to do with anything? Do you mean to argue that if Islam had come from Central Asia, Greenland, Eastern Europe, or some other place where Semitic languages are not spoken by the majority of people, it would somehow cease being the true religion that you think it is? Way to shoot yourself in the foot there.
If you know anything about the linguistic history of the area, you know that it is really quite understandable why all the monotheistic religions also have similar linguistic backgrounds. This area of the world was the home of the first writing system, of great Semitic empires prior to the rise of Arabic (and, indeed, great Arabic-speaking kingdoms prior to the invention of Islam, such as that of the Ghassanids), and of centuries of monotheism prior to Muhammad. As much as I hate to leave God out of anything, I feel your invoking of Him in this case shows more of your own ignorance than of His advance planning to make sure that Muhammad was Johnny-on-the-spot with the new religion, as necessary according to…Muhammad.
Do you think God Almighty did eenee minnie miny mo and randomly picked languages to convey his message?
Wow…I wonder what God was thinking prior to the arrival of Akkadian (the earliest attested Semitic language) in ancient Mesopotamia, when the language spoken and written (in cuneiform, the earliest known writing system) was Sumerian, an unrelated language isolate (in other words,
not a Semitic language)! Can you tell me? You seem to know a lot about God’s motivations.
What? I just said to see his posts about your Arabic nonsense, because he explained it better than I could. He is extremely knowledgeable, particularly since (I believe) he has a degree in that field of study.
I’ll just leave it at that because this is not on topic.