What Muslims are taught in their mosques - unbiased

[Montalban]

Volume 1, Book 2, Number 25; Narrated Abu Huraira: Allah’s Apostle was asked, “What is the best deed?” He replied, "To believe in Allah and His Apostle (Muhammad). The questioner then asked, “What is the next (in goodness)?” He replied, "To participate in Jihad (religious fighting) in Allah’s Cause.

for reference:
freerepublic.com/focus/news/744510/posts

Jihad in the sense of territorial expansion has always been a central aspect of Muslim life. That’s how Muslims came to rule much of the Arabian Peninsula by the time of the Prophet Muhammad’s death in 632.
danielpipes.org/article/990

 

[Grace_Seeker]

No one denies that there’s other aspects. The centrality part comes from the fact that the only absolute guarantee a Moslem has in getting to Moslem heaven is by dying for the cause.

That is the interpretation that some are giving. It is not a universally accepted belief in Islam. How can you say that something that is believed by only a comparitive few is “central”.

And you did say that war was central to Jihad. If you want to change it to violence is central to Jihad, that is fine, but I still dispute that is true as well.

Jihad is not even one of the 5 pillars. Yes, some like to speak of it as a 6th pillar. That is why I agree that Jihad is central. But I don’t see the evidence yet that Jihad as war or violence is central. One can live a life of Islam without ever going to war, but one cannot live a life of Islam with practicing Jihad. So, if one can live a life of Islam and never practice war or any form of violence, and yet once must be engaged in Jihad, then obviously, war and violence are not central to Islam, even though there are some who make it central to their own particular lives.

So what? The only one that concerns us kafirs is the deadly one. The rest doesn’t matter to us at all. The Muslims can peacefully jihad themselves till the cows come home and we wouldn’t even know.

So what? It matters whether you are speaking the truth about Islam or not. It matters because to there is more to Islam than the picture you are painting. And you paint with such a broad brush that those who are not in favor of violence and who seek to root it out of Islam are getting covered with the same colors as those you are concerned about. In 1941 that way of thinking led to putting thousand of loyal, patriotic American citizens in intermninent camps for the crime of simply being Japanese. That type of thinking was wrong then and it is wrong now.

 

[Grace_Seeker]

Volume 1, Book 2, Number 25; Narrated Abu Huraira: Allah’s Apostle was asked, “What is the best deed?” He replied, "To believe in Allah and His Apostle (Muhammad). The questioner then asked, “What is the next (in goodness)?” He replied, "To participate in Jihad (religious fighting) in Allah’s Cause.

for reference:
freerepublic.com/focus/news/744510/posts

Jihad in the sense of territorial expansion has always been a central aspect of Muslim life. That’s how Muslims came to rule much of the Arabian Peninsula by the time of the Prophet Muhammad’s death in 632.
danielpipes.org/article/990

Sorry, I trust my sources to interpret Islam better than yours.

 

[Montalban]

Regarding your question on terrorists, I say every Muslim should be a ‘terrorist for the anti-social elements of society’. A terrorist is a person who causes terror. The moment a robber sees a policeman he is terrified. A policeman is a terrorist for the robber. Similarly every Muslim should be a terrorist for the anti-social elements of society, be they thieves, pick-pockets, black-marketers or rapists. Whenever an anti-social element sees a Muslim, he should be terrified. It is true that the word ‘terrorist’ is generally used for a person who causes terror among innocent people. But a true Muslim should only be a terrorist to anti-social elements and not to innocent people. Infact a Muslim should be a source of peace and solace for innocent and righteous people.

irf.net/irf/dtp/dawah_tech/ques22.htm#c

Islam advocates force as a means of maintaining/promoting Islam

 

[Montalban]

Sorry, I trust my sources to interpret Islam better than yours.

What sources? I’ve also included Islamic ones too!

 

[Grace_Seeker]

What sources? I’ve also included Islamic ones too!

Daniel Pipes was the one I had in mind.

Regarding your question on terrorists, I say every Muslim should be a ‘terrorist for the anti-social elements of society’. A terrorist is a person who causes terror. The moment a robber sees a policeman he is terrified. A policeman is a terrorist for the robber. Similarly every Muslim should be a terrorist for the anti-social elements of society, be they thieves, pick-pockets, black-marketers or rapists. Whenever an anti-social element sees a Muslim, he should be terrified. It is true that the word ‘terrorist’ is generally used for a person who causes terror among innocent people. But a true Muslim should only be a terrorist to anti-social elements and not to innocent people. Infact a Muslim should be a source of peace and solace for innocent and righteous people.

irf.net/irf/dtp/dawah_tech/ques22.htm#c

Islam advocates force as a means of maintaining/promoting Islam

Yes. It does.

I didn’t say I agreed with Islam, neither its theology nor all of its practices.

 

[Montalban]

Physical jihad is the pinnacle of Islam, and some scholars regarded it as the sixth pillar of Islam.
islamqa.com/index.php?ref=34830&ln=eng

Ibn Jareer said:

So fight them until there is no more shirk, and none is worshipped except Allaah alone with no partner or associate, and trials and calamities, which are disbelief and polytheism, are lifted from the slaves of Allaah on earth, and religion is all for Allaah alone, and so that obedience and worship will be devoted to Him alone and none else.

islamqa.com/index.php?ref=34647&ln=eng

 

[Montalban]

Yes. It does.

I didn’t say I agreed with Islam, neither its theology nor all of its practices.

So although they urge everyone to be a terrorist, it’s not central to Islam?

 

[Montalban]

Did you even read your article from Christianity Today?
"Which of these stages is meant to be normative for Islam?

According to standard Islamic jurisprudence, it is the fourth—expansionist jihad, understood as armed struggle against unbelievers, whether or not the Muslim community has been attacked. The law of abrogation in Qur’anic hermeneutics (see Suras 2:106; 13:39; 16:103), in which later revelation always trumps earlier texts, affirms this.

Islamic history bears out this expansionist bent. One century after the appointment of the first caliph, Abu Bakr, Islam had become an empire reaching across North Africa up to Spain in the west and across Asia into India in the east. By the end of the next century (the second century Anno Hegirae), Muslim territorial conquests had peaked, and Islamic jurisprudence had fully defined the behaviors and conditions governing “holy war.”

The terms of jihad closely parallel Augustine’s “just war” conditions. Only proper government authorities can conduct jihad. Fighting must avoid harming non-combatants, hostages, prisoners, and property (especially trees and landscape), and its ultimate goal must be to secure justice and peace.

For Islam, however, the causes of justice and peace are synonymous with the advance of the Muslim state, for politics and spirituality are inextricably bound together in the dream of one world under the complete dominion of Allah and His followers. So whereas Christian “just war” principles do not support the notion of establishing the kingdom of God by force, the Islamic doctrine of jihad unapologetically does.

When the ummah (community or state) of Islam faces its history of coercion and expansion, there is no shame or repentance. Islam, unlike Christianity, teaches in its most authoritative sources that force is justifiable in the cause of Allah. Far from feeling regret over past conquests, Islam takes pride in this heritage.

Indeed, many Muslims look back on the first three centuries of Islam as the golden years of their heritage and long for a return to world ascendancy."

They take pride in it; but you think it’s ancillary. They’ve practiced it through history to expand the Islamic state; for you it’s a mere appendage!

 

[Grace_Seeker]

Physical jihad is the pinnacle of Islam, and some scholars regarded it as the sixth pillar of Islam.
islamqa.com/index.php?ref=34830&ln=eng

Ibn Jareer said:

So fight them until there is no more shirk, and none is worshipped except Allaah alone with no partner or associate, and trials and calamities, which are disbelief and polytheism, are lifted from the slaves of Allaah on earth, and religion is all for Allaah alone, and so that obedience and worship will be devoted to Him alone and none else.

islamqa.com/index.php?ref=34647&ln=eng

And there are worse things than this that can be found. Where have I denied that this view exists? I have said that it is still the minority view within Islam. And that therefore it is false to say that violence is central to Islam if such interpretations as this are not widely held.

Note, even the author understands that they are not widely held, he repeats his prayer, “We ask Allaah to bring the Muslims back to their religion.” Why? Because Muslims don’t presently buy what he is selling as Islam.

Also, take a look at this question and answer from the same source: The state does not allow them to broadcast the adhaan via loudspeakers; what should they do?. Given that the Adhaan is obligatory in Islam, one might think that any limitation on it would be call for a Jihad in the form of violence against the government. The questioneer seriously fears war. But that is NOT what is called for. Rather his answer, in part, includes the following guidelines:

try to have the government ruling cancelled, so long as you use wise and appropriate means of doing so. It is also essential to avoid confrontation with the state or provoking any trouble with followers of other religions,

 

[Grace_Seeker]

Did you even read your article from Christianity Today?
"Which of these stages is meant to be normative for Islam?

According to standard Islamic jurisprudence, it is the fourth—expansionist jihad, understood as armed struggle against unbelievers, whether or not the Muslim community has been attacked. The law of abrogation in Qur’anic hermeneutics (see Suras 2:106; 13:39; 16:103), in which later revelation always trumps earlier texts, affirms this.

Islamic history bears out this expansionist bent. One century after the appointment of the first caliph, Abu Bakr, Islam had become an empire reaching across North Africa up to Spain in the west and across Asia into India in the east. By the end of the next century (the second century Anno Hegirae), Muslim territorial conquests had peaked, and Islamic jurisprudence had fully defined the behaviors and conditions governing “holy war.”

The terms of jihad closely parallel Augustine’s “just war” conditions. Only proper government authorities can conduct jihad. Fighting must avoid harming non-combatants, hostages, prisoners, and property (especially trees and landscape), and its ultimate goal must be to secure justice and peace.

For Islam, however, the causes of justice and peace are synonymous with the advance of the Muslim state, for politics and spirituality are inextricably bound together in the dream of one world under the complete dominion of Allah and His followers. So whereas Christian “just war” principles do not support the notion of establishing the kingdom of God by force, the Islamic doctrine of jihad unapologetically does.

When the ummah (community or state) of Islam faces its history of coercion and expansion, there is no shame or repentance. Islam, unlike Christianity, teaches in its most authoritative sources that force is justifiable in the cause of Allah. Far from feeling regret over past conquests, Islam takes pride in this heritage.

Indeed, many Muslims look back on the first three centuries of Islam as the golden years of their heritage and long for a return to world ascendancy."

They take pride in it; but you think it’s ancillary. They’ve practiced it through history to expand the Islamic state; for you it’s a mere appendage!

Hey, I grant you that modern Muslims have engaged in some revisionist history. They think that all of those wars were simply “defending” themselves. And I don’t buy that as true. However, what they look back on as the golden age (and yes, would love to see again) is the great swath of Islam under one Caliphate that stretched from Persia to Spain. It is that glory that they long for, when they felt they controlled their own lives and destiny. Americans had their own ideas about Manifest Destiny and the British Empire still relishes its own golden age of the sun never setting on it. Both accomplished those things by taking lands from others. Does that make war central to what it means to be American or British?

 

[Montalban]

And there are worse things than this that can be found. Where have I denied that this view exists?

You haven’t. You’ve instead try to play this down based on your own opinion oft repeated.

I have said that it is still the minority view within Islam. And that therefore it is false to say that violence is central to Islam if such interpretations as this are not widely held.

And that is again your opinion.

Note, even the author understands that they are not widely held, he repeats his prayer, “We ask Allaah to bring the Muslims back to their religion.” Why? Because Muslims don’t presently buy what he is selling as Islam.

PRESENTLY is the key word in an almost admission of your error. I noted that the majority of thought over the majority of time believe that it is central to Islam; indeed there are some modernists PRESENTLY opposed to this; you take them to be the majority.

Also, take a look at this question and answer from the same source: The state does not allow them to broadcast the adhaan via loudspeakers; what should they do?. Given that the Adhaan is obligatory in Islam, one might think that any limitation on it would be call for a Jihad in the form of violence against the government. The questioneer seriously fears war. But that is NOT what is called for. Rather his answer, in part, includes the following guidelines:

Did you note that on that island Islam is only 20% of the population? Like Muhamed before them, Moslems know when to hold back their weapons because they are too weak. Spead lies, and increase in numbers and then strike.

All this is is delaying war.

 

[Montalban]

Hey, I grant you that modern Muslims have engaged in some revisionist history. They think that all of those wars were simply “defending” themselves. And I don’t buy that as true. However, what they look back on as the golden age (and yes, would love to see again) is the great swath of Islam under one Caliphate that stretched from Persia to Spain. It is that glory that they long for, when they felt they controlled their own lives and destiny. Americans had their own ideas about Manifest Destiny and the British Empire still relishes its own golden age of the sun never setting on it. Both accomplished those things by taking lands from others. Does that make war central to what it means to be American or British?

Certainly Britain and America have great periods of glorifying war.

However Britain is not an ideology. Nor is America - though some say it’s a state of mind. False comparisons seem to be a thing you do at present.

 

[Palladio]

Really, the only point which could occupy my attention is the one about the Pew Research Trust poll, where you raise the charitable question of my memory–quite fine, thanks, holding several languages and a couple of advanced degrees from places you may have heard of.

You argue, wrongly, that because a majority of Muslims in the U. S. are not for suicide bombing of civilians, we are supposed to be relieved. The other questions in the poll come to similar results, but I’ll look at the seven percent figure.

On the assumption that the seven percent are dead wrong, I’ll model the problem.

Swiss drug company x announces that seven percent of its aspirin, not the top seller but widely available, is laced with a fatal poison in its U. S. market.

Two kinds of people are most directly concerned, even linked to this sad fact: the makers, who must be reeling from surprise and disgust at the high percentage of failure in their product; the prospective buyers, who now face a certain situation, whether they have bought the drug or not.

Is it hard to imagine their surprise, however, that fully seven percent are poisoned? It is obvious what the most rational and most moral thing it is they can do–not buy the product–as it is what the company must do: recall it at once, all of the drug everywhere in the U. S.

But it is worse than that, since the company’s discovery of seven percent is based on a sample. The margin of error is scientific, and small. But as astronomically high as the figure is, it could be higher: only a complete pill by pill inspection (say) would allay the doubt, pending which seven percent in a conservative (yet, again, incredibly high) figure.

Equally, it is worse for the consumer: his risk of death rises with the percentage increase which further inspection might well reveal.

For both parties, however, serious questions linger: are there other drugs x manufactures equally fatal? If so, how do we know? Should the company, rightly faced with a crisis in consumer confidence, pull out of the U. S.? Should the consumer, naturally rocked by the scandal, place any trust in the company itself?

It is very easy to see that Islam is producing more than its fair share of fatal opinion even on these very shores, and that its ways are best seen where it is most prevalent: the Middle East, where those opinions express themselves freely and openly and where it oppresses all other religions.

Islam is a political religion–unlike Roman Catholicism–violent in its scripture and in its history.

We can debate how violent–an academic point, but I would say very violent–but we are preparing and we must prepare for the long haul with these people, just beginning to find their way here.

To love my enemy, I must first know who he is.

 

[Montalban]

To love my enemy, I must first know who he is.

I agree.

From what I see of Grace Seeker’s rebuttal one could easily say that (no matter how many Moslem sites I cite) I have not yet shown that this opinion is that of the majority.

 

[Palladio]

I agree.

From what I see of Grace Seeker’s rebuttal one could easily say that (no matter how many Moslem sites I cite) I have not yet shown that this opinion is that of the majority.

Yes, and we both see how much water that holds. Whatever immigrant group in the U. S. has even held such disgusting opinions in such a high percentage as the Muslims do here? Most alarming! As my wife and I were going over the figure a few weeks ago, it dawned on us how much very higher the percentage must have been, since some may have edited their response out of fear of being found out. Really quite disgusting, and dangerous. We seem to have Islamic attempts–that we know about–at the rate of two a year since 9/11. Are we worried about any other group? Can we be? The danger is clear and present.

 

[Montalban]

Yes, and we both see how much water that holds. Whatever immigrant group in the U. S. has even held such disgusting opinions in such a high percentage as the Muslims do here? Most alarming! As my wife and I were going over the figure a few weeks ago, it dawned on us how much very higher the percentage must have been, since some may have edited their response out of fear of being found out. Really quite disgusting, and dangerous. We seem to have Islamic attempts–that we know about–at the rate of two a year since 9/11. Are we worried about any other group? Can we be? The danger is clear and present.

Even in this country of ‘multi-culturalism’ a leading Sheikh here calls women meat and when Moslem youth gang-raped Anglo-Aussies (on the basis that they were ‘white’ women) he supported these thugs and helped THEM play the victim!

Islam’s all about the abrogation of responsibility. Men are urged to treat women as sex-slaves and women must cover-up.

You seek discussion with and they deem it to be insults.

Even well-meaning Christians wish to see some good in this evil ideology which has as much going for it as Fascism. (even in the 1930s there were people who stepped up to praise Nazi Germany - they got unemployment under control! )

 

[Montalban]

Yes, and we both see how much water that holds. Whatever immigrant group in the U. S. has even held such disgusting opinions in such a high percentage as the Muslims do here? Most alarming! As my wife and I were going over the figure a few weeks ago, it dawned on us how much very higher the percentage must have been, since some may have edited their response out of fear of being found out. Really quite disgusting, and dangerous. We seem to have Islamic attempts–that we know about–at the rate of two a year since 9/11. Are we worried about any other group? Can we be? The danger is clear and present.

Even in this country of ‘multi-culturalism’ a leading Sheikh here calls women meat and when Moslem youth gang-raped Anglo-Aussies (on the basis that they where ‘white’ women) he supported these thugs and helped THEM play the victim!

Islam’s all about the abrogation of responsibility. Men are urged to treat women as sex-slaves and women must cover-up.

You seek discussion with and they deem it to be insults.

Even well-meaning Christians wish to see some good in this evil ideology which has as much going for it as Fascism. (even in the 1930s there were people who stepped up to praise Nazi Germany - they got unemployment under control! )

 

[Palladio]

Even in this country of ‘multi-culturalism’ a leading Sheikh here calls women meat and when Moslem youth gang-raped Anglo-Aussies (on the basis that they were ‘white’ women) he supported these thugs and helped THEM play the victim!

Islam’s all about the abrogation of responsibility. Men are urged to treat women as sex-slaves and women must cover-up.

You seek discussion with and they deem it to be insults.

Even well-meaning Christians wish to see some good in this evil ideology which has as much going for it as Fascism. (even in the 1930s there were people who stepped up to praise Nazi Germany - they got unemployment under control! )

So far as it is political, it seem absolutist or totalitarian. The Bathist party aped the Nazis in its platform sixy years ago. So the term Islamo-facism is for that reason and others an excellent one.

Anybody who can read the Koran and Hadiths and not be worried has his head stuck deep in the sand.

God bless.

 

[Rodrigo_Bivar]

No. My premise is based on the actual lives of Muslims, their beliefs and their practices.

As if…

Why did you bring up the hadith then?

Oh… please don’t base your knowledge of Islam on your friends not practising jihad on disbelievers. We know not every Muslim practises jihad - but the doctrine of jihad is well enshrined in Islam via the Quran.

That is the REAL Islam, by the way.