What is the True Face of Islam?

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What is the true face of Islam? This the burden of an article by William Kilpatrick at Crisis Magazine, July 10, 2014.

" .S. government officials were caught off guard by the recent rapid rise of ISIS in Iraq and Syria and its plan to establish a sharia-ruled caliphate state.

Either they weren’t getting enough intelligence from their agents in the field, or else they lacked the framework for processing the information. Since the American Embassy in Baghdad has some 15,000 employees and since we can assume that this includes a sizeable contingent of intelligence gatherers, a problem with the framework is the more likely explanation. The framework is built around the assumption that Islam is a religion of peace, and that the jihad threat is confined to al-Qaeda, which is “on the run.” The idea that jihad is an integral part of Islam—something we can expect to pop up almost anywhere in the Muslim world—doesn’t fit into the theory. Likewise, the framework is not sized to accommodate concepts such as sharia, caliphate, or religious motivation—let alone world conquest for the sake of Allah.

In fact, the CIA, the FBI, and the Pentagon are not even allowed to mention “Islam” and “jihad” in the same breath. Over two years ago, at the behest of Islamic activist groups, counterterrorism training manuals were purged of any “materials that portray Islam as a religion of violence or with a tendency towards violence.”

crisismagazine.com/2014/intelligence-failure

Of course many questions can be raised on this issue. The question I have and which William has raised is why has there been such wide spread failure to recognize the real political/social/religious aims of Islam? Keep your comments moderate.

Linus2nd
 
That the CIA, the FBI, and the Pentagon are not even allowed to mention “Islam” and “jihad” in the same breath shouldn’t be confused for we the people. Islam has much confusion within its own religion and in regards to carnal and spiritual so the conversation becomes difficult in the social political realm which injects completely carnal thinking with a spiritual ideological concept. So they are not clear themselves as to speak clear and also the government speaking on this issue seems somewhat the same.

So which Islam and jihad concept are we following, all lead to sharia law in one form or fashion? Is there a need for sharia law?
 
Islam is about world domination, what is wrong with pointing out what islam is really about?

Some use terrorism, some use the ballot box, some use the existing laws of a place to work toward what they want.

I would venture to say that most, my opinion, who want sharia law for others really do think/believe that they are doing this for the “other’s” good, any comments?

As far as “government officials were caught off guard by the recent rapid rise of ISIS in Iraq and Syria and its plan to establish a sharia-ruled caliphate state”, is this really a surprise to anyone except the “government officials” who “were caught off guard” ?

One of the things that I find quite telling is that when some, with very strong islamic feelings/beliefs or however one wishes to phrase it, say for instance that they want to completely destroy a certain country and drive it into the sea, so many of the aforementioned government officials who seem to refuse to see what is right in front of them, say/think/believe, who knows what, that they are just using hyperbole when in fact, they are stating a simple, very much held, truth of theirs.

I would say that it is these same “government officials” who were caught “off guard” that don’t believe what some people say as truth, as opposed to hyperbole, seem to be very good at deceiving themselves.

Of course, this does not seem to be something new or out of the ordinary for, at least, some intelligence agencies.
 
Why assume that Islam has one “true face”? It seems to me that this implies that Islam is a true revelation from God. Do you believe that?

If you don’t believe that (and it looks as if you don’t), then it doesn’t make sense to speak of Islam having a “true face.” Islam is simply a set of cultural traditions.

It is indeed important to acknowledge the role of violent Jihad in Islamic tradition and that groups like al-Qaeda are genuinely inspired by elements of the Islamic tradition.

Islamic reformist movements, from the beginning, have typically tended to be more violent than the mainstream. In other words, when Muslims try to return to a stricter interpretation of their tradition, this often (not always) results in their behaving more violently and intolerantly.

A “stricter” interpretation isn’t necessarily more “faithful,” though. Faithfulness to a historically verifiable “original tradition” has little to do with any religion, and faithfulness to the divinely intended meaning implies that God revealed Islam in the first place.

But there is a difference here with Christianity. Primitivist, rigorist movements in Christianity often (by no means always) reject violence, because the NT and the first few centuries of Christianity were non-violent.

Edwin
 
Contarini said:
Why assume that Islam has one “true face”? It seems to me that this implies that Islam is a true revelation from God. Do you believe that?

If you don’t believe that (and it looks as if you don’t), then it doesn’t make sense to speak of Islam having a “true face.”
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You’re confusing the term “true face” with “face of truth.” It actually means “real face.”

The real face of radical Islam is ugly. It hides under a veil, masquerading as righteousness. But what is truly under that veil, what is really under that veil, is total ugliness.
 
For me it is heard to believe in a religion that coverts by the sword which is what Islam did in the beginning, which is quite different from Christianity where the Apostles and those who followed them did not force people to convert to Christianity. This has nothing to do with those later times in history where people were forced into Christianity, but it was never the Churches teaching to do that, but over zelious people.
 
Nan_S said:
The real face of radical Islam is ugly. It hides under a veil, masquerading as righteousness. But what is truly under that veil, what is really under that veil, is total ugliness.
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This is true of any radical Religion, Christianity included.
 
how come the media never realizes that Islamics are more antiCatholic than antiChristian. We have a woman queen, God for a meal, the Crusades. The always lump us all together
 
The Black Moslems I work with are very friendly and polite. They are all American born. The Moslem ladies who run the cash registers at the stores I frequent are very polite, but they seem kind of shy. There’s a language barrier. Moslem men who own the local business generally don’t make eye contact with me, and their demeanor is businesslike. But they wish me a good day.

I also work with a very anti-Moslem coworker, an immigrant and a Coptic. When she goes on her diatribes, I tried to counter with moderate statements, like don’t stereotype, etc. then one day she turned to me and said, “I LIVED with them.”

I didn’t know what to say.
 
DaisymaeD said:
The Black Moslems I work with are very friendly and polite. They are all American born. The Moslem ladies who run the cash registers at the stores I frequent are very polite, but they seem kind of shy. There’s a language barrier. Moslem men who own the local business generally don’t make eye contact with me, and their demeanor is businesslike. But they wish me a good day.

I also work with a very anti-Moslem coworker, an immigrant and a Coptic. When she goes on her diatribes, I tried to counter with moderate statements, like don’t stereotype, etc. then one day she turned to me and said, “I LIVED with them.”

I didn’t know what to say.
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Perhaps you should live in Egypt and see what Islam is like face to face, wear her shoes for awhile.

Linus2ndt
 
Islam is not Catholicism. I think that’s where the problem lies.

God Bless.
 
Where the problem lies is where you live and to what degree sharia law is indeed law. From here how the demographics change depends on percentage of Islamic population compared to the general population. In other words when Islam is dominate in the population majority, then they decide to what degree of sharia law is installed. I call that slavery which it seems to me you discover the true face at this point and its degree of truth as the Coptic Christian above apparently did. If I am following this story correctly. :confused:
 
Linusthe2nd: after hearing my coworker’s stories, I most definitely do not want to live there! Her family had a really rough time of it. It’s not easy to be the minority in a Moslem dominated country.

I think I tend to shy away from stereotypes because we Catholics are bombarded with stereotypes against us, too. It doesn’t feel very nice.

On the other hand, there really are people in the world, and philosophies, that are not in our best interests. There really are people who want to harm us.
 
DaisymaeD said:
The Black Moslems I work with are very friendly and polite. They are all American born. .
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Probable converts from Christianity since Islam is about 70 years old in America. Various reasons also as we see with the Nation of Islam. I imagine today some conversion is fear driven also.
 
Linusthe2nd said:
What is the true face of Islam? This the burden of an article by William Kilpatrick at Crisis Magazine, July 10, 2014.

" .S. government officials were caught off guard by the recent rapid rise of ISIS in Iraq and Syria and its plan to establish a sharia-ruled caliphate state.

Either they weren’t getting enough intelligence from their agents in the field, or else they lacked the framework for processing the information. Since the American Embassy in Baghdad has some 15,000 employees and since we can assume that this includes a sizeable contingent of intelligence gatherers, a problem with the framework is the more likely explanation. The framework is built around the assumption that Islam is a religion of peace, and that the jihad threat is confined to al-Qaeda, which is “on the run.” The idea that jihad is an integral part of Islam—something we can expect to pop up almost anywhere in the Muslim world—doesn’t fit into the theory. Likewise, the framework is not sized to accommodate concepts such as sharia, caliphate, or religious motivation—let alone world conquest for the sake of Allah.

In fact, the CIA, the FBI, and the Pentagon are not even allowed to mention “Islam” and “jihad” in the same breath. Over two years ago, at the behest of Islamic activist groups, counterterrorism training manuals were purged of any “materials that portray Islam as a religion of violence or with a tendency towards violence.”

crisismagazine.com/2014/intelligence-failure

Of course many questions can be raised on this issue. The question I have and which William has raised is why has there been such wide spread failure to recognize the real political/social/religious aims of Islam? Keep your comments moderate.

Linus2nd
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Waste of time article based on- “The framework is built around the assumption that Islam is a religion of peace, and that the jihad threat is confined to al-Qaeda, which is “on the run.” The idea that jihad is an integral part of Islam—something we can expect to pop up almost anywhere in the Muslim world—doesn’t fit into the theory.”

Here we must assume that for some reason the agencies involved assume that al-Qaeda is the only radical Islamist organization in the world; and that these agencies placed ISIS in the non-radical Islamist organization category. The author is creating an artificial argument to support his conclusions.

A more realistic view would be that the agencies involved dropped the ball on predicting how organized, powerful, and how much support a radical Islamist organization such as ISIS could become and how quickly it could become so. But, why let reality get in the way of a good narrative.
 
Tom_Baum said:
Islam is about world domination, what is wrong with pointing out what islam is really about?

Some use terrorism, some use the ballot box, some use the existing laws of a place to work toward what they want.
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Are we talking about Islam or Christianity? World domination itself isn’t a bad thing/in error. The bad thing/in error thing is “why” and “how.” You’ve listed 2 just “hows” (using existing laws, voting) and 1 unjust “how” (unjust use of force/violence) which in the form you specifically mentioned (terrorism) runs counter to the orthodox teachings of Islam.
 
Nan_S said:
You’re confusing the term “true face” with “face of truth.” It actually means “real face.”

The real face of radical Islam is ugly. It hides under a veil, masquerading as righteousness. But what is truly under that veil, what is really under that veil, is total ugliness.
Click to expand...
Yes, and the poster wasn’t talking about radical Islam. The quote from the poster is “Why assume that Islam has one “true face”?” Unless one views all of Islam as “radical” (which I assume you don’t given you used a qualifier in front of Islam) you aren’t actually addressing the points raised by the other poster.
 
DaisymaeD said:
The Black Moslems I work with are very friendly and polite. They are all American born. The Moslem ladies who run the cash registers at the stores I frequent are very polite, but they seem kind of shy. There’s a language barrier. Moslem men who own the local business generally don’t make eye contact with me, and their demeanor is businesslike. But they wish me a good day.

I also work with a very anti-Moslem coworker, an immigrant and a Coptic. When she goes on her diatribes, I tried to counter with moderate statements, like don’t stereotype, etc. then one day she turned to me and said, “I LIVED with them.”

I didn’t know what to say.
Click to expand...
Remind her that the Muslims she “lived with” in Egypt aren’t the same Muslims that she “lives with” here. Her negative feelings toward Muslims and Islam is perfectly understandable and frankly justified, but these negative feelings and bad experiences with Muslims and Islam do not justify sinful behavior (stereotyping- aka judgment). Frankly, it boils down to does she identify herself as a Coptic or as an anti-Muslim. Christ called us to love everyone, even our enemies; and not all Muslims are our or her enemies.
 
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