Islam has to confront the unexcusable evil within before it becomes fit to exist in the twenty first century.

It is a relgion being run by despots and fuedals ruling over violent dictotorships and ruling over folks whose basic human rights are denied in every way. To make sure that the subjects of these countries are denied basic human rights, like democracy and any sort of rights for women, the Islamic rulers have a simple formula to divert the attention of the subjects-- SCARE THEM THAT THEIR RELIGION IS IN DANGER!

Their cry is fellow muslims... please do not ask for democracy or rights for women, for violent America/ the West/ Jews/ Buddhists/ Christians and Hindus are after your blood. Using this scare tactics, all Muslims dump their desire for democracy and instead pick up arms to either convert the rest of the world or exterminate it.

And while the rulers consort with a thousand men, women and children in their harems, simple- brainwashed Muslims, convinced that they would have the same in Jannat or paradise are motivated enough to blow themselves up.

Somebody should make a huge comedy out of this; an allegory or a black comedy where the Muslims at least get to know that they are being made a fool of.

The second black spot of Islam is its treatment of women. When all Muslim males are convinced that a woman is only fourth of a male, there is little hope for Islam. Maybe the religious texts need to be brevised by the intellectuals. But who would bell the cat and risk a fatwa?

But the net result of this fallacy is that the rich and powerful muslims manage four or more wives and the rest fifty percent have little or no choice left.

Many then end up marrying outside Islam and converting women from other religions to Islam. Statistics will bear me out that there are huge amount of Muslim men coverting women from other religion; the chances of Muslim women marrying outside Islam is nil in Muslim countries and very negligible in the west.

The punishment for an apostate is only too well known.

Strange is'nt it? Islam wants to convert people to become Muslim, yet kills anybody who wants to convert to become a Christian/...

A bit like the soft drink wars, where everyone is looking for customers.

What happens to the large amount of Muslim men who cannot find a mate? They are then again brainwashed by their fuedal masters.

To become jehadis.

THE JEHADIS KEEP DREAMING THAT THEY WILL GET to Have SOME SEX with HOURIS in Paradise and they blow themselves to achieve martydom, by killing all non believers...

As simple as that. A million studies sponsored by various think tanks will not get this truth. But it is so apparent....

So it is just fitting that in this new world, Islam, Muslim countries and all the nations of the world should pour in money for educating women in Muslim countries.

And this would be great for humantiy. Especially for Muslim women. After all it cannot be fun to live in a harem as the fifteenth wife of Osama...

cure for hot flashes and excessive sweats.

the unchangeing law of life says,
as for the foam and rubish it goes away ,and as for what is truth and wholesome it stay and last.

Since Islam is a political religion, answers to conflicts in the political arena should be sought in politics. "Just War" in self defense as answer to Islamic Jihad that cannot be resolved by political means. Jesus said that His kingdom was not of this world and one must give God what belongs to God and Caesar what belongs to Caesar. So responding to political Islam would be the responsibility of Caesar.

Only those who have never read the Bible or understood it could convert to Islam. It is necessary to read the Bible to fully understand the Biblical persons mentioned in the Quran, just as it necessary to read the Old Testament to fully understand the New Testament.

For Muslims it should be ---

Book I - The Old Testament

Book II - The New Testament

Book III - The Quran

Just as the New Testament refers to the Old Testament to explain the role of Jesus as Messiah, so too should Islam give references from the Old and New Testaments to explain Mohammad's role as a prophet.

Only those who have never read the Bible or understood it could convert to Islam. It is necessary to read the Bible to fully understand the Biblical persons mentioned in the Quran, just as it necessary to read the Old Testament to fully understand the New Testament.

For Muslims it shou

Muslims accept the virgin birth of Jesus but do not accept Him as Son of God. A paradox. For virgin birth reflects divinity. The Quran refers to Jesus as the Messiah who was born of the virgin Mary.

It can be said that Muslims treat Mohammad like god just like Christians treat Jesus, although angel Gabriel is supposed to have brought revelations to Mohammad. God spoke to the Jewish prophets, not angels. Jesus did not speak of any angel who brought Him revelations. He said that He was doing the will the virgin birth of Jesus but do not believe that Jesus is the Son of God. It is a paradox to accept the virgin birth and yet deny the divinity of Jesus.

Mohammad should have brought the Bible to the Arabs. The angel Gabriel who appeared to Virgin Mary to announce that she was to become the mother of Jesus, the Son of God, could have not told Mohammad anything else but to proclaim Jesus to the Arabs.

Islam is a political religion and Christianity is not. Compare the life of the founders. Simple.

Mohammad received his first revelation in 610 AD. He met with stiff resistance from the Meccans for twelve years and had managed to convert only about 550 people in twelve years. In 622 AD he fled to Medina and established a political rule. Muslim era begins with the flight to Medina and establishment of political rule. In the next ten years, until his death in 632 AD, Mohammad conquered all of Arabia as a military commander. He wanted submission to Allah as God and to him as political and religious leader and judge in all disputes. Jews do not mention the name of any prophet in their prayers to God. Jews do not look to the life of prophets as perfect and worthy of imitation. They obey the commands spoken by God through the prophets. Muslims on the other hand mention Mohammad every single time they pray to Allah, make it a point to emphasize that he is the last prophet, and they consider Mohammad's life as perfect and to be imitated.

Anonymous of July 25, 11:31 AM recycles the following claims :“Islam is Peace: Muslims did not commit the Crusaders, the Inquisition, the Holocaust, First and Second World Wars, did not nuke hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians, did not force convert to Christianity the whole of south America, did not enslave millions of Africans and did not invade any place on false pretenses.

As to the Holocaust and World Wars, the Muslims were and are too weak and fragmented to defeat Israel let alone engage in a World War. Turkey who was ruling all of the Arab countries was knocked out early in that conflict.

1. Islam is Peace?
The Quran, Hadith (tradition of their prophet) and Sira (history of their prophet) prove conclusively that “ Islam a religion of fear and terror and not a religion of peace by any means. There will be continuous war in the world as long as some fanatics will believe in Muhammad, his example and his teachings. The Islamic concept of peace meaning making the whole world Muslim is undoubtedly a mandate for war. After that peace will prevail in the earth of Allah. That is the ultimate exegesis of the Arabic word “Islam”.

2. Muslims did not commit the Crusades?
The first Crusade began in 1095… 460 years after the first Christian city was overrun by Muslim armies, 457 years after Jerusalem was conquered by Muslim armies, 453 years after Egypt was taken by Muslim armies, 443 after Muslims first plundered Italy, 427 years after Muslim armies first laid siege to the Christian capital of Constantinople, 380 years after Spain was conquered by Muslim armies, 363 years after France was first attacked by Muslim armies, 249 years after Rome itself was sacked by a Muslim army, and only after centuries of church burnings, killings, enslavement and forced conversions had some European Christians fought back.

3.The Muslims did not commit an Inquisition?
How do you describe the Dhimmi and Apostacy laws that are still in effect till this day?
As to what happened in Spain in the 15thCentury. The newly converted Berbers of North Africa along with their new masters had invaded and occupied parts of Spain for almost 800 years.
The Spaniards finally united and defeated the colonizers. They gave them a choice to accept the religion of the Spaniards or to go back from where they came. Had they allowed those people to keep their religion, Spain would be today another Sudan or Afghanistan. The whole of North Africa and the Middle East were Christians before the Arab invasion of that area. The Muslims did not evict the indigenous population but gave them three choices, to convert or be treated as a humiliated, overtaxed third class residents in their own countries or be slain.
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/pact-umar.html

4. Islam did not enslave the Africans?
Slave trade is ongoing till this day in many Muslim countries. The slave markets of Jedda in the so-called Holy Land (Saudi Arabia) and Omdurman (sudan) are thriving till this day. Besides it was the Muslim Arab tribes of North Africa that were specialized in the art of human hunting and who were familiar with the interior of the Black continent. Some of those slave traders gave their hunted the choice to convert to Islam or be sold as slaves. That is why many negroes in Africa have Muslim names and yet know nothing about that religion.
5. Muslims did not nuke hundred of thousands of Japanese.
That is because Muslims do not have nukes. Ahmadinajad is threatening to wipe out a whole country even before he built a single bomb. Besides the Americans did not do that in the name of their religion but in self defense.
6. Islam did not “force convert to Christianity’ the whole of South America.
No! But they force converted the vast majority of the people of the Middle East , North and Central Africa as well as part of Eastern Europe.
Nobody in the West forcibly converted anyone to any religion, because in this culture there is something called freedom of conscience; something you and your ilk will never comprehend.
7. Islam did not invade any place (like Iraq) on the basis of false pretenses.
Saddam in an effort to intimidate his neighbors, told them he had WMDs. They in turn turned around and informed Bush W. The President could not afford to wait until we begin to see mushroom clouds over our cities. Stop whining and get over it!

Observer:

“YOU ARE NOT ISLAMOPHOBIC, YOU ARE NOT A HATER OF ISLAM, YOU ARE JUST A PASSIONATE CITIZEN WHO WOULD LOVE TO PROTECT HUMANITY FROM THIS BARBARIC VIOLENT REVOLTING DARK FAITH WHO IS HERE TO HUMILIATE US ALL! GOOD LUCK GULLIBLE! ” . Anonymous.

I like to post a remark by captain Ed Edwards, shown on another thread of WAPO, as an answer to this sarcastic remark by Anonymous (July 27 at 7:30 AM):

“After working and living in Muslim controlled countries for years....believe me, we are all infidels ....and are lower than a dog in their eyes. At the end of the day....the Nations of Islam will slaughter us if we don't get rid of them first. Not a nice thing to say...even to think...but it IS reality. Ask any non-Muslim who has lived and worked in Islamic ruled countries...and they will attest to the above truth.
While not condoning Karadzic for everything he did or ordered others to do....perhaps he had/has the knowledge and foresight to know that it was/is either "them or us". Sad but true.
This comment is not in any way meant to degrade or in any manner violate the rules as set forth by The Washington Post. This personal comment is simply a reflection on the situation(s) as printed... concerning Serbs and Radovan Karadzic over the past twenty years.”
Capt. Ed Edwards
Brookhaven, MS 39601

I would also like to answer you nonsense above, by posting a remark, shown on another thread of WAPO. Read it and hopefully it will enlighten your shallow grey matter to differentiate between the ones that are truly full of hate like these NEOCONS Cabals Warmongers and not Muslims as you are trying hard to sell us the above lie based on a testimony. What is your opinion about this testimony from yet anothe Non-Muslim US citizen who doent belong to A Quiada and he is not a traitor either but who can see common sense when he sses one unlike you.

B2O2 wrote:
Garryh, I agree with your post except to point out that a peer-reviewed study published in the Lancet -- Britain's prestigious medical journal -- found that this war had caused 655,000 deaths (and violence was the #1 source, followed by various categories of infrastructure collapse) as of 3 years ago. So, if there ever are war crimes tribunals for the Cheney-Bush-Rice Oil Industry Advocacy Cabal (which the press complicitly still mistakenly refers to as a presidential "Administration"), the manslaughter count will be an order of magnitude higher than 100,000.

SO HOW MANY 9/11s THE NEOCONS ARE WILLING TO COMMIT AGAINST MUSLIMS IN ORDER TO JUSTIFY THEIR GRANDIOSE AND SENSE OF FEELING SUPERIOR.

I JUST WISH THIS WAR ON TERROR WAS SERVING THE INTERESTS OF THE US MIDDLE CLASS AND ORDINARY US CITIZENS INSTEAD OF MAJOR SHAREHOLDERS OF BANKING INSTITUTIONS INVOLVED IN THIS VENTURE WITH THE SUPPORT OF DEFENSE AND OIL COMPANIES THAT ARE BENEFITING FORM THE HIGH RISE OF THE PRICE OF GAS, THE SUBSIDY OF FAILED BANKING INSTITUTIONS AND MERCENARIES THAT ARE MILKING THE US TAXPAYER'S MONEY WITH COMPANIES LIKE BLACKWATER THAT IS MAKING BILLIONS OF DOLLARS FROM THE US TREASURY. TIME FOR YOU TO LEAVE YOUR COKOO LAND AND JOIN THE REAL WORLD!

“YOU ARE NOT ISLAMOPHOBIC, YOU ARE NOT A HATER OF ISLAM, YOU ARE JUST A PASSIONATE CITIZEN WHO WOULD LOVE TO PROTECT HUMANITY FROM THIS BARBARIC VIOLENT REVOLTING DARK FAITH WHO IS HERE TO HUMILIATE US ALL! GOOD LUCK GULLIBLE! ” . Anonymous.

I like to post a remark by captain Ed Edwards, shown on another thread of WAPO, as an answer to this sarcastic remark by Anonymous (July 27 at 7:30 AM):

“After working and living in Muslim controlled countries for years....believe me, we are all infidels ....and are lower than a dog in their eyes. At the end of the day....the Nations of Islam will slaughter us if we don't get rid of them first. Not a nice thing to say...even to think...but it IS reality. Ask any non-Muslim who has lived and worked in Islamic ruled countries...and they will attest to the above truth.
While not condoning Karadzic for everything he did or ordered others to do....perhaps he had/has the knowledge and foresight to know that it was/is either "them or us". Sad but true.
This comment is not in any way meant to degrade or in any manner violate the rules as set forth by The Washington Post. This personal comment is simply a reflection on the situation(s) as printed... concerning Serbs and Radovan Karadzic over the past twenty years.”
Capt. Ed Edwards
Brookhaven, MS 39601

And Jacob went out from Beersheba, and went toward Haran.
And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep.
And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it.
And, behold, the Lord stood above it, and said, I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed;
And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.
And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of.
And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely the Lord is in this place; and I knew it not.
And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.
And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it.
And he called the name of that place Bethel: but the name of that city was called Luz at the first.
And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on,
So that I come again to my father's house in peace; then shall the Lord be my God:
And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God's house: and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee.

Moreover the Philistines had yet war again with Israel; and David went down, and his servants with him, and fought against the Philistines: and David waxed faint.
And Ishbibenob, which was of the sons of the giant, the weight of whose spear weighed three hundred shekels of brass in weight, he being girded with a new sword, thought to have slain David.
But Abishai the son of Zeruiah succoured him, and smote the Philistine, and killed him. Then the men of David sware unto him, saying, Thou shalt go no more out with us to battle, that thou quench not the light of Israel.

Now these be the last words of David. David the son of Jesse said, and the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet psalmist of Israel, said,
The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and his word was in my tongue.
The God of Israel said, the Rock of Israel spake to me, He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God.
And he shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds; as the tender grass springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain.

Howbeit I will not take the whole kingdom out of his hand: but I will make him prince all the days of his life for David my servant's sake, whom I chose, because he kept my commandments and my statutes:
But I will take the kingdom out of his son's hand, and will give it unto thee, even ten tribes.
And unto his son will I give one tribe, that David my servant may have a light alway before me in Jerusalem, the city which I have chosen me to put my name there.

Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well; whose branches run over the wall:
The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him:
But his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob; (from thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel:)
Even by the God of thy father, who shall help thee; and by the Almighty, who shall bless thee with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lieth under, blessings of the breasts, and of the womb:
The blessings of thy father have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills: they shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him that was separate from his brethren.

If ye forsake the Lord, and serve strange gods, then he will turn and do you hurt, and consume you, after that he hath done you good.
And the people said unto Joshua, Nay; but we will serve the Lord.
And Joshua said unto the people, Ye are witnesses against yourselves that ye have chosen you the Lord, to serve him. And they said, We are witnesses.
Now therefore put away, said he, the strange gods which are among you, and incline your heart unto the Lord God of Israel.
And the people said unto Joshua, The Lord our God will we serve, and his voice will we obey.
So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and set them a statute and an ordinance in Shechem.
And Joshua wrote these words in the book of the law of God, and took a great stone, and set it up there under an oak, that was by the sanctuary of the Lord.
And Joshua said unto all the people, Behold, this stone shall be a witness unto us; for it hath heard all the words of the Lord which he spake unto us: it shall be therefore a witness unto you, lest ye deny your God.
So Joshua let the people depart, every man unto his inheritance.
And it came to pass after these things, that Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died, being an hundred and ten years old.

So Joseph died, being an hundred and ten years old: and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt.

So Jacob came to Luz, which is in the land of Canaan, that is, Bethel, he and all the people that were with him.
And he built there an altar, and called the place Elbethel: because there God appeared unto him, when he fled from the face of his brother.
But Deborah Rebekah's nurse died, and she was buried beneath Bethel under an oak: and the name of it was called Allonbachuth.
And God appeared unto Jacob again, when he came out of Padanaram, and blessed him.
And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name: and he called his name Israel.
And God said unto him, I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins;

And all the souls that came out of the loins of Jacob were seventy souls: for Joseph was in Egypt already.

And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink?
And he cried unto the Lord; and the Lord shewed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet: there he made for them a statute and an ordinance, and there he proved them,
And said, If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and wilt do that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee, which I have brought upon the Egyptians: for I am the Lord that healeth thee.
And they came to Elim, where were twelve wells of water, and threescore and ten palm trees: and they encamped there by the waters.

And the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord, when Ehud was dead.
And the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin king of Canaan, that reigned in Hazor; the captain of whose host was Sisera, which dwelt in Harosheth of the Gentiles.
And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord: for he had nine hundred chariots of iron; and twenty years he mightily oppressed the children of Israel.
And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, she judged Israel at that time.
And she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in mount Ephraim: and the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.

Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine; Ephraim also is the strength of mine head; Judah is my lawgiver;

Doth not wisdom cry? and understanding put forth her voice?
She standeth in the top of high places, by the way in the places of the paths.
She crieth at the gates, at the entry of the city, at the coming in at the doors.
Unto you, O men, I call; and my voice is to the sons of man.
O ye simple, understand wisdom: and, ye fools, be ye of an understanding heart.
Hear; for I will speak of excellent things; and the opening of my lips shall be right things.
For my mouth shall speak truth; and wickedness is an abomination to my lips.
All the words of my mouth are in righteousness; there is nothing froward or perverse in them.
They are all plain to him that understandeth, and right to them that find knowledge.
Receive my instruction, and not silver; and knowledge rather than choice gold.
For wisdom is better than rubies; and all the things that may be desired are not to be compared to it.
I wisdom dwell with prudence, and find out knowledge of witty inventions.
The fear of the Lord is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate.
Counsel is mine, and sound wisdom: I am understanding; I have strength.
By me kings reign, and princes decree justice.
By me princes rule, and nobles, even all the judges of the earth.
I love them that love me; and those that seek me early shall find me.
Riches and honour are with me; yea, durable riches and righteousness.

And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi.
And the woman conceived, and bare a son: and when she saw him that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months.
And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink.
And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him.
And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself at the river; and her maidens walked along by the river's side; and when she saw the ark among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it.
And when she had opened it, she saw the child: and, behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews' children.
Then said his sister to Pharaoh's daughter, Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee?
And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, Go. And the maid went and called the child's mother.
And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages. And the woman took the child, and nursed it.
And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I drew him out of the water.

And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink?
And he cried unto the Lord; and the Lord shewed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet: there he made for them a statute and an ordinance, and there he proved them,
And said, If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and wilt do that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee, which I have brought upon the Egyptians: for I am the Lord that healeth thee.
And they came to Elim, where were twelve wells of water, and threescore and ten palm trees: and they encamped there by the waters.

Now these are the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments, which the Lord your God commanded to teach you, that ye might do them in the land whither ye go to possess it:
That thou mightest fear the Lord thy God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command thee, thou, and thy son, and thy son's son, all the days of thy life; and that thy days may be prolonged.
Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it; that it may be well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the Lord God of thy fathers hath promised thee, in the land that floweth with milk and honey.
Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord:
And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.
And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:
And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.
And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes.

And she said unto them, Call me not Naomi, call me Mara: for the almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me.
I went out full and the Lord hath brought me home again empty: why then call ye me Naomi, seeing the Lord hath testified against me, and the Almighty hath afflicted me?
So Naomi returned, and Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter in law, with her, which returned out of the country of Moab: and they came to Bethlehem in the beginning of barley harvest.

Therefore the kinsman said unto Boaz, Buy it for thee. So he drew off his shoe.
And Boaz said unto the elders, and unto all the people, Ye are witnesses this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech's, and all that was Chilion's and Mahlon's, of the hand of Naomi.
Moreover Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of Mahlon, have I purchased to be my wife, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance, that the name of the dead be not cut off from among his brethren, and from the gate of his place: ye are witnesses this day.
And all the people that were in the gate, and the elders, said, We are witnesses. The Lord make the woman that is come into thine house like Rachel and like Leah, which two did build the house of Israel: and do thou worthily in Ephratah, and be famous in Bethlehem:
And let thy house be like the house of Pharez, whom Tamar bare unto Judah, of the seed which the Lord shall give thee of this young woman.
So Boaz took Ruth, and she was his wife: and when he went in unto her, the Lord gave her conception, and she bare a son.
And the women said unto Naomi, Blessed be the Lord, which hath not left thee this day without a kinsman, that his name may be famous in Israel.
And he shall be unto thee a restorer of thy life, and a nourisher of thine old age: for thy daughter in law, which loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven sons, hath born him.
And Naomi took the child, and laid it in her bosom, and became nurse unto it.
And the women her neighbours gave it a name, saying, There is a son born to Naomi; and they called his name Obed: he is the father of Jesse, the father of David.

So the Lord saved Israel that day: and the battle passed over unto Bethaven.
And the men of Israel were distressed that day: for Saul had adjured the people, saying, Cursed be the man that eateth any food until evening, that I may be avenged on mine enemies. So none of the people tasted any food.
And all they of the land came to a wood; and there was honey upon the ground.
And when the people were come into the wood, behold, the honey dropped; but no man put his hand to his mouth: for the people feared the oath.
But Jonathan heard not when his father charged the people with the oath: wherefore he put forth the end of the rod that was in his hand, and dipped it in an honeycomb, and put his hand to his mouth; and his eyes were enlightened.
Then answered one of the people, and said, Thy father straitly charged the people with an oath, saying, Cursed be the man that eateth any food this day. And the people were faint.
Then said Jonathan, My father hath troubled the land: see, I pray you, how mine eyes have been enlightened, because I tasted a little of this honey.

Hear, ye children, the instruction of a father, and attend to know understanding.
For I give you good doctrine, forsake ye not my law.
For I was my father's son, tender and only beloved in the sight of my mother.
He taught me also, and said unto me, Let thine heart retain my words: keep my commandments, and live.
Get wisdom, get understanding: forget it not; neither decline from the words of my mouth.
Forsake her not, and she shall preserve thee: love her, and she shall keep thee.
Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.
Exalt her, and she shall promote thee: she shall bring thee to honour, when thou dost embrace her.
She shall give to thine head an ornament of grace: a crown of glory shall she deliver to thee.
Hear, O my son, and receive my sayings; and the years of thy life shall be many.
I have taught thee in the way of wisdom; I have led thee in right paths.

And Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon.
And Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen.
And those officers provided victual for king Solomon, and for all that came unto king Solomon's table, every man in his month: they lacked nothing.
Barley also and straw for the horses and dromedaries brought they unto the place where the officers were, every man according to his charge.
And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore.
And Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt.
For he was wiser than all men; than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman, and Chalcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol: and his fame was in all nations round about.
And he spake three thousand proverbs: and his songs were a thousand and five.
And he spake of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall: he spake also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes.
And there came of all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all kings of the earth, which had heard of his wisdom.

This thy stature is like to a palm tree, and thy breasts to clusters of grapes.
I said, I will go up to the palm tree, I will take hold of the boughs thereof: now also thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine, and the smell of thy nose like apples;
And the roof of thy mouth like the best wine for my beloved, that goeth down sweetly, causing the lips of those that are asleep to speak.
I am my beloved's, and his desire is toward me.
Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field; let us lodge in the villages.
Let us get up early to the vineyards; let us see if the vine flourish, whether the tender grape appear, and the pomegranates bud forth: there will I give thee my loves.
The mandrakes give a smell, and at our gates are all manner of pleasant fruits, new and old, which I have laid up for thee, O my beloved.

Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.
It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.
Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.
As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth.
Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
Send thou men, that they may search the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel: of every tribe of their fathers shall ye send a man, every one a ruler among them.
And Moses by the commandment of the Lord sent them from the wilderness of Paran: all those men were heads of the children of Israel.
And these were their names: of the tribe of Reuben, Shammua the son of Zaccur.
Of the tribe of Simeon, Shaphat the son of Hori.
Of the tribe of Judah, Caleb the son of Jephunneh.

Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel.
And Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, which were of them that searched the land, rent their clothes:
And they spake unto all the company of the children of Israel, saying, The land, which we passed through to search it, is an exceeding good land.
If the Lord delight in us, then he will bring us into this land, and give it us; a land which floweth with milk and honey.

And the Lord said, I have pardoned according to thy word:
But as truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord.
Because all those men which have seen my glory, and my miracles, which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have tempted me now these ten times, and have not hearkened to my voice;
Surely they shall not see the land which I sware unto their fathers, neither shall any of them that provoked me see it:
But my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit with him, and hath followed me fully, him will I bring into the land whereinto he went; and his seed shall possess it.

For the Lord had said of them, They shall surely die in the wilderness. And there was not left a man of them, save Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun.

And told him, saying, Joseph is yet alive, and he is governor over all the land of Egypt. And Jacob's heart fainted, for he believed them not.
And they told him all the words of Joseph, which he had said unto them: and when he saw the wagons which Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of Jacob their father revived:
And Israel said, It is enough; Joseph my son is yet alive: I will go and see him before I die.

TO MAKE IT EASIER FOR ALL THOSE ISLAM HATERS, WHAT ABOUT BLAMING ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING ON ISLAM.

1) To make it easier accuses Muslims of ignorance and lying.
2) Accuses Muslims of anti-semitism, racism and Christiano phobia.
3) Accuses all Muslims of being radical and not accepting a soft liberal moderate gentle kind of Islam. You see what I mean! :)
4) Accuse Muslims of stealing the good verses (whatever this means!) of the Koran from Non Islamic Holy Books.
5) Single out verses out of context and hihglight them to Non Muslims to see the true nature of a barbaric Islam!
6) Portray the malaise of this world's violence since the creation of Adam on Muslims and Islam and with the sole pursuit of persecuting all the infidels!
7) Hihglight the word JIHAD / JIHADIST as an Arabic Word meaning KILL, KILL AND KILL For no other reason than BARBARIC (ohhh I like this word) KILLING!
8) Blame all the current economical problems from the weak dollar to the Trillions of dollars in debt to prime mortgages to subsidising farmers and mismananged banking institutions on Islam and Muslims.
9) Blame global warming and the high level of CO2 emissions on Islam and Muslims. I am sure they can take it too!
10) Ohhh just remembered Muslims too and Islam in particular is repsonsible about the high price of the barrel of oil, moving it from $40 to $140 in a record time! WOW How did mamange this in no time!
11) Silly Me, I forgot to mention the HOT topic of WOMEN IN ISLAM and that all NON-MUSLIMS Honour and Protect Women and give them their full rights in WORK, BUSINESS and at HOME too whereas Islam and Muslims degrade them and chain them to the kitchen's sink.
12) Muslims are hot headed and cant control their emotions and see the good that the NEOCONS are trying to give them. They are sacrifying their time and energy for free and even at the expense of the US Taxpayer so that Muslims will be adopting and be part of this wonderful philosophy called NEOCONISM!
13) Muslims shouldnt see US forces in Iraq as occupiers but guests who should be welcomed and allowed to dictate to the Iraqis how hey should run their country.
14) Muslims shouldnt look at the Extremists like Pat Robertson but to the Heros like Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove and Bush who for 8 years are working tirelessly to get rid of extremism from Islam. WE are so grateful! Keep it up "War on Terrrrroooorrrrrr!"
15) If your NBA team, American football team or Baseball team for this matter doesnt qualify to the finals, well I let you into a secret, blame it on Muslims. The good news everyone will agree with you and you will feel much better too. Nice therapy isnt it!
16) Obama is a trained Muslim who is infiltrating the infidels and trying to control the white house on behalf of Muslims!
17) The high price of food is the fault of the Muslims because they eat so much and do not exercise at all. They spend all their time stuffing themselves and the high prices are suppose to help them resist this temptation.
18) All the Violent acts that are leading to thousands of deaths per year in places like the USA is the cause of Muslims. These violent individuals are unable to get rid of their anger that they express towards Muslims and as a result of their frustration, they express it on fellow Non Muslims US citizens.
18) Hitler, Missoulini, Stalin, Pol-Pot, Franko are all Muslims in disguise but dont tell anyone. This is supposed to be a secret!
19) The sexual acts committed by priets towards children from Australia to California to other places around Europe is just a jalousy from Muslims to put these priests in the bad light!
20) If anything else fails to impress, make your own Muslims, give them Muslims names, brainwashed them and send them to suicide missions and this will definately show Islam and Muslims in a bad light.

YOU ARE NOT ISLAMOPHOBIC, YOU ARE NOT A HATTER OF ISLAM, YOU ARE JUST A PASSIONATE CITIZEN WHO WOULD LOVE TO PROTECT HUMANITY FROM THIS BARBARIC VIOLENT REVOLTING DARK FAITH WHO IS HERE TO HUMILIATE US ALL! GOOD LUCK GULLIBLE! :)

Radical Islam in mainstream UK

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article4407115.ece

What we do need to know about:

http://www.investigativeproject.org/article/732

Proof of what?

COMON where is you proof ?

“Blasts took place in both Hindu and Muslim areas. We need to maintain calm,” Cabinet minister S Wagela

http://www.ibnlive.com/

Muslims cant even liberate themselves, let alone anyone else.

To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never, to forget.

ARUNDHATI ROY

"Omar":

Why should a lair like u hide behind the name of one the most noble men ever lived on the face of this earth:Omar Ibn Al Khatab, the liberator of Jerusalem from the Byzantines.

Islam is a world crisis

Harold, Harold, Harold,

I see your are still thumping the bible. Now back to reality:

The Flaws and Errors in Judaism and Christianity:

1. Abraham founder/father of three major religions was either the embellishment of the lives of three different men or a mythical character as was mythical Moses, the "Tablet-Man" who talked to burning bushes and made much magic in Egypt.

Many of the 1.5 million Conservative Jews and many of their rabbis have relegated Abraham to the myth pile along with most if not all the OT.

Current crisis:

Realization that the Jews are not god's chosen people.
simpletoremember.com/vitals/ConservativeTorah.htm

2. Jesus was an illiterate Jewish peasant/carpenter/simple preacher man who suffered from hallucinations and who has been characterized anywhere from the Messiah from Nazareth to a mythical character from mythical Nazareth to a mamzer from Nazareth (Professor Bruce Chilton, in his book Rabbi Jesus). Analyses of Jesus’ life by many contemporary NT scholars (e.g. Professors Crossan, Borg and Fredriksen, On Faith panelists) via the NT and related documents have concluded that only about 30% of Jesus' sayings and ways noted in the NT were authentic. The rest being embellishments (e.g. miracles)/hallucinations made/had by the NT authors to impress various Christian, Jewish and Pagan sects.

The 30% of the NT that is "authentic Jesus" like everything in life was borrowed/plagiarized and/or improved from those who came before. In Jesus' case, it was the ways and sayings of the Babylonians, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Hittites, Canaanites, OT, John the Baptizer and possibly the ways and sayings of traveling Greek Cynics. earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html

For added "pizzazz", Catholic/Christian theologians divided god the singularity into three persons and invented atonement as an added guilt trip for the "pew people" to go along with this trinity of overseers. By doing so, they made god the padre into god the "filicider".

Current crises:

Pedophiliac priests, atonement theology and original sin/limbo!!!!

3. Luther, Calvin, Smith, Henry VIII, Wesley et al, founders of Christian-based religions, also suffered from the belief in/hallucinations of "pretty wingie thingie" visits and "prophecies" for profits analogous to the myths of Catholicism (resurrections, apparitions, ascensions and immaculate conceptions).

Current crises:

Adulterous preachers, "propheteering/ profiteering" evangelicals, atonement theology and people like Harold Zeller

I don't know why but I thought I was reading - a man's words - then there was a spark of hope. But in reading that he is indeed a she - I am less hopeful.

Women are already at a disadvantage from birth in the Islamic community - please save the Prophet freed the women 1400 years ago - line - as there is evidence that before Islam the women of the Middle East had significantly more freedom.

The writer talks about reforming the church - but the truth is many have left the church - and almost as many have created their own - personalised individual belief system - and are richer for it. In the Islamic world a person would be killed or imprisoned for this.

For many non-Muslims Muhammad was a bit of a scary character - and not Jesus-like at all – in many respects he was virtually the opposite. It seems the duty of a good Muslim is to make excuses for this - as well as to convince others of the same. Jesus was a Jew - and for Christians he allowed the stricter Biblical laws to be taken in their spirit rather than their letter. Muslims claim their religion and Prophet follows Christianity - but it is clear that Islam never got this distinction, they never got Jesus. Jesus was a Jew - and so Christianity was moderation of Judaism - but Muhammad was a Quraysh - his father and his father's father's religion was centered around the Kaaba - for 700 years before the event of Islam - they keepers of the Kaaba at Mecca. Which means that Islam's roots cannot be in Judaism as is claimed. At the Kaaba, also the pre-Islamic name of the Quraysh religion - Allah was worshipped, but not Allah alone, there were his three daughters Allat, Manat and al-Uzza (Sura 53:19), also known as cranes, Trinity Goddesses or even the Three Old Ladies - who coincidently are still officially the protectors of the Kaaba in Mecca today.

If Muhammad's father's religion had its origins in the Kaaba in Mecca - then the Biblical chronology had to be added later. Since the written language wasn't fully developed in the Arabia - of Muhammad's time - then the next best place for this to happen was in Syria - under the Syrian Umayyad. Syria best of all would have understood that if this religion were to survive in the Judeo Christian world - it could not have its roots in the Kaaba religion - therefore likely and wisely predicted that it was better to adopt or integrate the Biblical stories and Prophets into the Islamic story and Koran. By tagging on to the two greatest religion of the time - Islam was instantly given a validity that it would not have had purely as a product of the Kaaba.

One might wonder - that besides the sword - how Islam spread so quickly in the region. Besides being able to pass itself off as a legitimate extension of the bible - there was another thing often over looked - and that was the Goddesses. The daughters of Allah were already worshipped by the Syrians - some say that the Goddesses were imported from that region down to southern Arabia - so now there is this new religion with Judeo/Christian Kudos - where instead of worshipping the daughters/cranes you now worship the father Allah alone.

By the time Syria was riding out to take North Africa or any part of the Roman Empire they could get - this was not enough time to change hundreds of years of the religious practice of worshipping many Gods - down to just one - it is likely that they probably did not care that much - but with this Islamic army they could finally realise their ambitions to take Rome but not for Islam. The Syrians/Damascus went from worshipping the daughters of Allah to Allah himself - this is not a big change. And it was only after they took southern Rome - up to Spain and they settled down as leaders - that they began to translate and organise the Islamic text which was written in Old Arabic - which few could read - into the modern Syrian Arabic language that the Koran was first written and likely is still written in today. Along with the organising of the Koran (and likely seriously restructuring) into a readable text - they came up with the five pillars of Islam - ordered everyone in their new Roman colony to speak Arabic (Syrian style) - and with a new presentable (Koran) book in hand - offered everyone a chance to take up Islam as their personal religion (or pay the Jizya) - with changing the coins to Arabic - they finally erased all traces of the former rulers - the Byzantines - throughout their new Kingdom. Islam was at its greatest then because the Syrians ruled it - the Arabs would never quite rule it the same way again - the law and not its spirit is still in full force across the Islamic world and keeps its people enslaved.

I think the best thing that Muslims could do today - is to just be human. Forget about taking over the world - besides the fact that they will meet with enormous opposition - and without being able to wield the sword to bring the world to its knees in the direction of Mecca - Muslims if they don't wish to leave Islam - should find a way to reconcile with the modern world regardless of the written word of the Koran or Islamic clergy. So in a sense I agree with the writer - there should be reform in Islam - but with the realisation that the religion has its flaws.

If one reads the words of Noah, Daniel, and Job you will see that just Noah and 4 others were left after the flood. If you study the book of Daniel, just Daniel and 4 others were left after Nebuchadnezzar works. If you read the book of Job, you will see what Satan did after the LORD gave Satan all the power that Job had, just Job and the 4 who escaped to tell Job of the works of Satan. I ask you wise men, who is the perfect man, the one who shows mercy and saves with the power he has in his possession, or the one who destroys with the power that is in their hand. It was said the LORD gave Solomon peace on all sides, but he did not get peace from within his own house. Your worst enemy is the one’s you love. Who seeks the good in someone and builds them up, who seeks the sins and to try bring them down. David wrote “That thy beloved may be delivered; save with thy right hand, and hear me.” Solomon wrote “That thy beloved may be delivered: save with thy right hand, and answer me.” Look at the works of Joshua, “he read all the words of the law, the blessings and cursings” You will find that so called Christians believe that they are blessed of god but in reality the are cursed. This is what god creates “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.” “And God created great whales” Jacob climbed the ladder to the heaven of god and he saw what was there. If “darkness was upon the face” and Jonah was in the belly of the whale and that was hell, you will realized all that god creates is death and hell. Look at the words of Job. Study what Moses wrote. What were the works of Samuel, Saul, David, and Solomon. Job said “he would shew thee the secrets of wisdom, that they are double” Does Job try to save just himself. Look at the power of Noah, Nebuchadnezzar, and Satan. Remember all the blessings the LORD gave to Abraham and Isaac were given to Jacob. All the blessings that Jacob said of Joseph fell upon the face of Jacob. Joseph was the stone of Israel. Now I ask you wise men who is the Rock. Job said “he would shew thee the secrets of wisdom, that they are double” Look “And Joshua said unto all the people, Behold, this stone shall be a witness unto us; for it hath heard all the words of the Lord which he spake unto us” Jacob is the face of the earth, Moses is over all that are on the face of the earth, Solomon is the light of Jerusalem.

“And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered.”
“And wheresoever the children of man dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them All. Thou art this head of gold.”
“And the Lord said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand.”

Thou hast given a banner to them that fear thee, that it may be displayed because of the truth. Selah.
That thy beloved may be delivered; save with thy right hand, and hear me.

For thy mercy is great above the heavens: and thy truth reacheth unto the clouds.
Be thou exalted, O God, above the heavens: and thy glory above all the earth;
That thy beloved may be delivered: save with thy right hand, and answer me.

And afterward he read all the words of the law, the blessings and cursings, according to all that is written in the book of the law.
There was not a word of all that Moses commanded, which Joshua read not before all the congregation of Israel, with the women, and the little ones, and the strangers that were conversant among them.

“he read all the words of the law, the blessings and cursings”
“all the congregation of Israel, with the women, and the little ones, and the strangers that were conversant among them”

For thou hast said, My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in thine eyes.
But oh that God would speak, and open his lips against thee;
And that he would shew thee the secrets of wisdom, that they are double to that which is! know therefore that God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserveth.
Canst thou by searching find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?

“My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in thine eyes”
“he would shew thee the secrets of wisdom, that they are double”

And the sons of Noah, that went forth of the ark, were Shem, and Ham, and Japheth: and Ham is the father of Canaan.

And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.
And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered.
Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things.
But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.
And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man.
Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.

Then Daniel went to his house, and made the thing known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions:
That they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret; that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.

Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible.
This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass,
His legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay.
Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces.
Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.
This is the dream; and we will tell the interpretation thereof before the king.
Thou, O king, art a king of kings: for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory.
And wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them All. Thou art this head of gold.

There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil.

And the Lord said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of the Lord.
And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house:
And there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them:
And the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have carried them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house:
And, behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men, and they are dead; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped,
And said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.

Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no.

“I will rain bread from heaven for you”
“the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day”
“I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no”

Then I will give you rain in due season, and the land shall yield her increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.
And your threshing shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and ye shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely.
And I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid: and I will rid evil beasts out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land.

“I will give you rain in due season”
“the trees of the field shall yield their fruit”
“sowing time: and ye shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely”
“I will give peace in the land”
“I will rid evil beasts out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land”

But the land, whither ye go to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys, and drinketh water of the rain of heaven:
A land which the Lord thy God careth for: the eyes of the Lord thy God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year.
And it shall come to pass, if ye shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you this day, to love the Lord your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul,
That I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the first rain and the latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil.

“drinketh water of the rain of heaven”
“A land which the Lord thy God careth for”
“I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the first rain and the latter rain”

The Lord shall open unto thee his good treasure, the heaven to give the rain unto thy land in his season, and to bless all the work of thine hand: and thou shalt lend unto many nations, and thou shalt not borrow.
And the Lord shall make thee the head, and not the tail; and thou shalt be above only, and thou shalt not be beneath; if that thou hearken unto the commandments of the Lord thy God, which I command thee this day, to observe and to do them:

“the heaven to give the rain unto thy land in his season”
“to bless all the work of thine hand”
“the Lord shall make thee the head”

Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth.
My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass:
Because I will publish the name of the Lord: ascribe ye greatness unto our God.
He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.

“My doctrine shall drop as the rain”
“I will publish the name of the Lord”
“He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment”

Elric66,

You are absolutely right. Nobody died and no property was damaged in the "Piss Christ Art Exhibit" nor in any of the other cases where Christian symbols where used in an inappropriate manner. However, many died and a lot of property damage occurred when Mohammed was depicted in a cartoon.

Nobody sentenced Dan Brown to death when he wrote his anti-Christian novels, while Salman Rushdie fears for his life because he wrote a book that contains a reference to an incident in Islam's history that they do not like.

The difference is quite clear for anybody with some sense; Islam breeds intolerance. The brainwashed can choose to ignore this at their own peril.

It is annoying when Muslims continue to blame everything done by Western secular governments or European colonialists on Christianity. Times without number they have been advised to provide examples of violence in the life of Jesus or any teaching in the New Testament by Jesus or His disciples which advocates violence. There is no Scriptural basis for any violence done by Christians.

Time and again it has been pointed out that all but one of Jesus' disciples were marytred for their faith. For the first three hundred years, until Emperor Constantine accepted Christianity, Christians were persecuted by Roman rulers. Many of them were killed.

Observer:

Anonymous says:
“When women get older, men look for younger women to have sex with, so it is better if he marries one with the consent of the older wife.
And to the question if it was all fair to the first wife - the answer: Allah wants it that way, so who are we to ask?!!!!!!!!!!!”

Is it Allah who wanted this or is it Mohammad who wanted this to satisfy his sexual desires? If Allah is “just” why He allows Mohammad 9 wives along with unlimited number of slave girls, while allowing Muslim men only four women, and Muslim women ¼ of a man? Where does it say that a man has to get his first wife’s permission to marry a second one?
By the same logic , when a woman gets older, she looks for a younger man, why is it not better if she marries another younger man?
The WILL that you ascribe to God is that of a primitive sensual desert dweller. If you believe otherwise I have a bridge in St. Louise I would like to sell you..

July 25, 2008 8:07 AM

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I was merely repeating a conversation I had with a young Muslim woman in the West all hijabed for Allah.

"WOW as if the ones that are living in Darfur are not Muslims!"

The ones committing the genocide are Muslims. Make you feel proud?

Neo,

Bravo. These apologists cant or are unwilling to comprehend the difference. If they really want to put it in context, how many people died over the "Piss Christ Art Exhibit"? That is context. These apologists cant do that so they attempt strawman arguments.

Where is this land you call "Palestine"

Anonymous,

You are sadly mistaken. WWI and WWII were not religiously inspired wars, neither where the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (which, BTW, occurred within the context of WWII). While these wars were horrific and the death toll beyond imagination, they where not fought in the name of a religion. Rather they where part of a secular struggle for power. The ideologies that were responsible for some of the worst atrocities, for example Nazism, are deplored to this very day.

On the other hand, Muslims commit their atrocities in the name of Islam. They publicly and proudly proclaim that they are acting in accordance to their religious duty of Jihad. They cite verses from the Koran and Hadith to support their claims and Imams all over the Muslim world provide justifications for their vile actions.

In the name of Islam and Jihad (using verses from the Koran and Hadith), Muslim terrorists have proudly claimed their responsibilities for 9/11, the Madrid bombings, the London bombings, the Beslan Massacre, the attempted attacks on Fort Dix, the Heathrow bomb threats, the Scotland car bombings and hundreds of other acts of terror the world over. Notice the difference here; unlike the world wars, and other conflicts, these vile people commit their crimes in the name of Islam. Their justification is that they are bringing Jihad to Jews and Christians.

The driving motivation for their attacks is Islam. Therefore, like Nazism, I abhor it. These people explicitly quote certain verses from the Koran and Hadith to justify their actions. In order to determine the truth of this, I bough a copy of the Koran and some Hadith books and read them for myself. Unfortunately, I find their claims correct. All of their actions can be justified based on Islamic scripture.

Likewise, when Muslim zealots murdered Van Gough for his films, or threaten Greet Wilder, or pronounce the death sentence on Salman Rushdie for his novel, or imprison and ask for the death of a school teacher because she allowed her students to name a teddy bear Mohammed, or sentence a Saudi rape victim to lashes for allowing herself to be raped, or sentence an Afghan to death for leaving Islam, or cut of peoples hands in the name of the barbaric shariah law, or deny religious minorities their basic rights, they do so in the name of Islam.

They boldly state that they have the right to commit these atrocities because their religion tells them to do this. Christians are more numerous than Muslims, yet for the last several decades we have not heard about so many atrocities committed in the name of Christianity. Yes, we have had Christians commit atrocities, but they never claim divine inspiration for their actions. The number of murderous crimes committed by Muslims, IN THE NAME OF ISLAM, is out of proportion to any other religion. I hope you get the point.

"Elric66:
Anonymous,

Yes, we have seen Islam's "benefit" in Dafur, on 9-11, on 3-11, during the Motoon riots, during the murders of people like Van Gough, during the nightly car-b-q's in France, during the legal jihad's like what Geert wilder is going through etc"

WOW as if the ones that are living in Darfur are not Muslims! As for the other criminal acts, let me remind you that Islam is practised by 1.6 billion Muslims and there will always be a anon significant tiny minority that will not adhere to the ethics of the faith and are Muslims in Names only.

I mean if we take the millions (remind me was it 5, 10, 15 , 20, 25, 30 million or more including the Russians) of people that were slaughtered in Europe during the first and second World Wars, were these acts committed by Muslims too? And were these violent acts committed against civilians in their thousands or in their millions? Thank God Muslims have nothing to do with it!

Do I have also to remind you about Nagazaki and Hiroshima and the innocent civilians Japanese that have to pay the price without any discrimination between children, women, eldery and youngsters.

What about recently when no WMDs were found in Iraq and the country was turn into a mess with hundred of thousands of civilians paying the price for the obscene greed of the Neocons and their allies who want to help themselves to OIL that doesnt belong to them in the first place.

These so called Christians do not care about their own military personnel, let alone the Iraqis civilians who lived thousands of miles away from the US shores and yet represent a security danger to Cheney, Rumsfeld and Bush with their fictional WMDs.

NOW LET US COMPARE THESE 2 TYPE OF VIOLENCE, THEIR FREQUENCY, NUMBER OF DEATHS THAT THEY CAUSED AND HOW LONG THEY LASTED FOR AND THEIR EFFECTS ON LOCAL COMMUNITIES FROM IRAQ TO LEBANNON TO SOMALIA TO PALESTINE!

Andrea:

Islam is not a pick and choose religion.

If you accept islam, you also accept:

wife beating;
death for apostates;
underage marriage;
second class dhimmi status for non-mulims under islamic control (and the eventual extermination of those considered "pagan;" e.g., the Bahai in Iran);
prohibitions against proselytizing for other faiths or for conversion to another faith (i.e., no true freedom of conscience);
death for defaming the Quran or Mohammad (i.e., no true freedom of speech);
gender apartied;
polygamy;
the duty to subjugate unbelievers under islamic law (and the never ending war that duty implies - whether that war involves bombs or outright lies (dawa).

http://www.news.faithfreedom.org/downloads/probing-islam.pdf

How can you continue to align your self with this faith?

Anonymous,

Yes, we have seen Islam's "benefit" in Dafur, on 9-11, on 3-11, during the Motoon riots, during the murders of people like Van Gough, during the nightly car-b-q's in France, during the legal jihad's like what Geert wilder is going through etc

Why do Muslims and apologists keep avoiding the question on dhimmi laws in Islam?

This is a refreshingly personal and unprocessed article for a forum that has an "The Advance of Islam" section. It is comforting to know that there are indeed moderate Muslims out there that are uncomfortable with the radicalism in the Saudi strains of Islam - and that don't blame the media for portraying it, rather than the people actually committing the violence in its name.

:) I have a copy of the Koran and several books of Hadith. I also own some tafasir books. I do not speak out of ignorance, but knowledge. You fail to address the verses that call for polygamy, domestic violence, intolerance and bigotry that I pointed out below.

Aparently we cannot point out these hateful verses without being called ignorant or islamophobes. The points I raised in this discussion are from your own Koran, Hadith and jurisprudence. Don't blame me if you do not like them.

PS: I have provided references from the Koran to some of my statements. If you like, I can cite references from either the Hadith or the Koran for each of the points I make.

"Anthony:
So, is it true? Is ignorance bliss? Because some of y'all seem to be very devoted to your misconceptions. You must enjoy them.

Wa'salaam"

You are so right Anthony. They are but fooling themselves and no one else.

During this age of information, people can check any misconception about Islam by just googling it and doing their own independent analysis away from hate and Islamophobia.

Above all, you are asked to use your common sense and take notes of faith that calls for peace, humility, helping the poor and the needy and supporting justice and is implementation.

ISLAM IS HERE TO STAY BECAUSE IT IS A UNIVERSAL WAY OF LIFE THAT BELONGS TO THE ALLMIGHTY CREATOR AND WHO WANT TO SEE IT BENEFIT ALL CITIZENS OF THE WORLD WHETHER THEY ARE FROM THE NORTH OR THE SOUTH, EAST OR WEST.

Really Anthony? Why does Islam require Dhimmi laws? No Muslim or apologist has answered that simple question.

So, is it true? Is ignorance bliss? Because some of y'all seem to be very devoted to your misconceptions. You must enjoy them.

Wa'salaam

To all Emergents:

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

Revere Jesus?

Why, yes you do.

In one tradition of Muhammad we read that no further prophets will come to earth until ‘Isa returns as ‘a man of medium height, or reddish complexion, wearing two light garments, looking as if drops were falling down from his head although it will not be wet. He will fight for the cause of Islam. He will break the cross, kill pigs, and abolish the poll-tax. Allah will destroy all religions except Islam. He (‘Isa) will destroy the Evil One and will live on the earth for forty years and then he will die’. (Sunan Abu Dawud, 37:4310) The Sahih Muslim has a variant of this tradition: ‘The son of Mary ... will soon descend among you as a just judge. He will ... abolish the poll-tax, and the wealth will pour forth to such an extent that no one will accept charitable gifts.’ (Sahih Muslim 287)

http://www.answering-islam.org/Intro/islamic_jesus.html

Anonymous says:
“When women get older, men look for younger women to have sex with, so it is better if he marries one with the consent of the older wife.
And to the question if it was all fair to the first wife - the answer: Allah wants it that way, so who are we to ask?!!!!!!!!!!!”

Is it Allah who wanted this or is it Mohammad who wanted this to satisfy his sexual desires? If Allah is “just” why He allows Mohammad 9 wives along with unlimited number of slave girls, while allowing Muslim men only four women, and Muslim women ¼ of a man? Where does it say that a man has to get his first wife’s permission to marry a second one?
By the same logic , when a woman gets older, she looks for a younger man, why is it not better if she marries another younger man?
The WILL that you ascribe to God is that of a primitive sensual desert dweller. If you believe otherwise I have a bridge in St. Louise I would like to sell you..

I forgot to mention the following

1) Your prohpet called women "naqisat ack wa deen" i.e. has less intelligence and religion (presumably when compared to men).

2) Your prophet also said that hell mosly contains women.

3) Your Koran sanctions the rape of female prisoners of war in Surah 4:24 "And forbidden to you are wedded wives of other people except those who have fallen in your hands (as prisoners of war)".

Get the picture?

Getting a visa to live permanently in a Western country is also a strong incentive for Muslim men to marry women from the West.

It is more common for women to marry for materialistic reasons. Men tend to marry for sexual pleasure.

Western women marry rich Muslim men and convert to please their husbands.

ANONYMOUS

:) It appears that stating facts about Islam is Islamophobia. Islam shares the same story about Adam and Eve with Christians, and so your arguments about original sin is weird, to say the least.

I have read the Koran and Hadith, and here are some of the things that you seem to miss in your blind faith.

1) In Islam women inherit less than men (the formulas are quite complex for different scenatios, but the inheritance of women is always less than that of men).

2) The testimony of women in Islamic Sharia courts is worth half that of men (and at least one man has to be present if the testimony is to be valid).

3) Men divorse women by saying, "I divorce you". Woman cannot do the same and have to go through a lengthy legal struggle in order to get a divorce.

4) Worse, if the certain amount of time has not elapsed (I think you call it el eda), then the man can take back the wife he has divorced (without the woman having any say in the matter). Refusal results in the forced placement of the wife in "beit al taa" (house of obediance) where she must submit to the man.

5) Men are allowed to marry four wives while women can only marry one man.

6) Women are forced to wear certain types of cloth and are not permitted outside of their homes without a trusted male companion (mehram). Some countries, like Saudi Arabia, prevent women from driving since this would give them the independence of travelling alone without said mehram.

I could go on, but it gets rather boring. I have no idea where you get your statistics about the gender of converts to Islam (probably some Islamic apologist website), but, if it is true, it can probably be explained by the fact that most conversions to Islam occur when Muslim men marry non-Muslim women and insist that they convert to Islam (it has nothing to do with the absurd ideas you put forth).

Finally, the status of women in Islam is only one of the many things that needs reform in your religion. Intolerance, bigotry, lack of respect for freedom of speech and basic democracy, oppression of religious minorities in your midst and many other factors need to be reformed.

IF ISLAM IS ABOUT VIOLENCE, OPPRESSION AND INJUSTICE TOWARDS WOMEN, WHY WOULD 20,000 OF US CITIZENS JOIN THIS FAITH AS STATED BY NBC NEWS 3/4 OF WHICH ARE WOMEN!

DO NOT TAKE MY WORD FOR IT, CHECK IT OUT YOURSELF. IT IS NOT A PROPAGANDA COMING FROM AN ISLAMIC WEBSITE.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PS2creVhaM

Why are more Western women converting than men to Islam (Ratio 1:4)?

1. The Bible Convicts Women as the original
Sinners, (ie. Eve picking from the forbidden
tree){Genesis 2:4-3:24}. The Koran Clarifies it
was Adam Not Eve {Qur'an 7:19-25}

2. The Bible says "The Birth of a Daughter is a
loss" {Ecclesiasticus 22:3}. The Qur'an says both
are an Equal Blessing { Qur'an 42:49}

3. The Bible Forbids Women from Speaking in
church {I Corinthians 14:34-35}. The Qur'an says
Women Can argue with the Prophet {58:1}

4. In the Bible, divorced Women are Labeled as
an Adulteress, while men are not {Matthew 5:31-32}. The
Koran does Not have Biblical double standards
{ Qur'an 30:21}

5. In The Bible, Widows and Sisters do Not
Inherit Any Property or Wealth, Only men
do{Numbers 27:1-11}The Koran Abolished this
male greediness { Qur'an 4:22} and God Protects
All.

6. The Bible Allows Multiple Wives{I Kings 11:3}
In The Koran, God limits the number to 4 only
under certain situations (with the Wife's
permission)and Prefers you Marry Only One
Wife{ Qur'an 4:3} The Koran gives the Woman
the Right to Choose who to Marry.

7. "If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not
pledged to be married and rapes her and they are
discovered, he shall pay the girl's father fifty
shekels of silver. He must marry the girl, for he
has violated her. He can never divorce her as long
as he lives" {Deuteronomy 22:28-30}

8. The Bible also asks Women to wear veils as in
Islam {I Corinthians 11:3-10}, this lowers the
chance of rape, (God Forbid), see statistic link
below.

9. Women were given rights to Vote less than a
100 years ago in the (US), while the Quran (42:38) gave
Women Voting rights almost 1,500 years ago.

I do not need to keep listing the falsehood of those living and thriving on Islamophobia. Thank God, In Islam we reverred Jesus and his mother (Mary the Virgin), to the point that a chapter is listed on her behalf.

If Islam was anti Female, why would this faith bother to express the qualities of the mother of Jesus and highlighted to everyone to see. I wonder how the mother of Jesus was perceived in certain Christian quaters for centuries? :)

NOW I UNDERSTAND WHY SO MANY WESTERN FEMALE ARE REVERTING TO ISLAM! FALSEHOOD WILL BE XPOSED AND THE TRUTH WILL PREVAIL. THIS IS NOT MY PROMISE. THIS IS THE CREATOR's PROMISE!

Elric66

I agree. The point I was trying to make in my post, is that the behavior that the author complains about in the article is not the result of the cultural norms of a particular society (Saudi Arabia), but has basis in the Koran and Hadith.

Thus a reform would not mean changing the cultural attitudes of people, but changing the Koran and Hadith. Unfortunately, since, as you state, they are considered the word of God, then that is not possible.

Neo,

Islam cant be reformed because the Qur'an is the word of Allah and can not be reformed by man. This is why Islam is still stuck in the 7th century.

I wouldn't make a general statement about men from that statement. What I can do, is judge the man who wrote it, the founder of Islam, and the religion to which he is a "prophet".

It is true that men, over history, have tried to control women using philosophy and religion. But Surah 4:34 is the only case in which men are given the divine right to beat women. It is disgusting and repugnant beyond belief.

The Koran contains numerous other Surahs about polygamy,jihad,religious intolerance etc. It is for this reason that I think the religion is un-reformable.

It is with great regret I say this because a reform of Islam along the lines of the article would solve a lot of problems.

"Surah 4:34

Men have authority over women because God has made the one superior to the other, and because they spend their wealth to maintain them. Good women are obedient. They guard their unseen parts because God has guarded them. As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them. Then if they obey you, take no further action against them. Surely God is high, supreme"

Wouldn'y uou know it, written by a man to suit their selfish needs. Men are selfish......they will lie and tell you anything to get what they want out of you.

It is good to know that some within the Islamic community question the intolerance and bigotry of the mainstream version of Islam. It is also good to know that there are some people who wish to change this.

Unfortunately, I have read the Koran and Hadith and, with great regret, learned that this intolerance and bigotry has a basis in scripture. Polygamy, male dominance, religious intolerance, opposition to free speech and many other features of mainstream Islam that I find repugnant all have textual basis in the Koran and Hadith.

This Surah is one of the many examples of the teachings of the Koran that are pretty clear and cannot be interpreted in any different way

-------------------

Surah 4:34

Men have authority over women because God has made the one superior to the other, and because they spend their wealth to maintain them. Good women are obedient. They guard their unseen parts because God has guarded them. As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them. Then if they obey you, take no further action against them. Surely God is high, supreme.

---------------------

That the Koran explicitly states that men are superior to women, and allows beating women as one of the ways to "discipline" them is unforgivable. Similar intolerant texts abound in the Koran. It is for that reason that I believe that reformation of the religion is hard, if not impossible.

This is the rationalization with which a young modern Muslim woman living in a Western country came to accept as normal polygamy in Islam.

Men need a lot of sex.

They will look for sex outside marriage if the wife does not permit polygamy.

It is better for the husband to marry more than one woman than for him to have many secret lovers.

If a man looks for sex outside marriage because the wife does not allow polygamy the wife must be prepared for the husband to contract STD which he would then pass on to her.

Women are not sexually available when the wife is pregnant. So it is necessary for him to have more than one wife to ensure he does not need to look for sex outside marriage.

When women get older, men look for younger women to have sex with, so it is better if he marries one with the consent of the older wife.

And to the question if it was all fair to the first wife - the answer: Allah wants it that way, so who are we to ask?!!!!!!!!!!!

The real issue is equality of sexes and yet nobody dares talk about it.

Most religions have now conceded some degree of equality between man and woman, while Islam is violently against it. In India, there is a whole movement lead by orthodox muslims which is about the Muslim personal law, basically a means to keep four or more wives.

The basic reason for violence in Muslim countries too can be traced to this imbalance. Now in any society with hundred men and a hundred women, if the top powerful and the richest ten percent were to keep four wives and the next ten percent keep three wives and then the next ten, two each, then there would be an acute imbalance of women available for seventy percent of men.

Almost only 10% of the women available for 70% men.

Now what do these 70% do? Either they end up converting women from other religions to Islam or remaining bachelors or.... becoming jehadis.

THE JEHADIS KEEP DREAMING THAT THEY WILL GET to Have SOME SEX with HOURIS in Paradise and they blow themselves to achieve martydom, by killing all non believers...

As simple as that. A million studies sponsored by various think tanks will not get this truth. But it is so apparent....

So it is just fitting that in this new world, Islam, Muslim countries and all the nations of the world should pour in money for educating women in Muslim countries.

And this would be great for humantiy. Especially for Muslim women. After all it cannot be fun to live in a harem as the fifteenth wife of Osama...

The real issue is equality of sexes and yet nobody dares talk about it.

Most religions have now conceded some degree of equality between man and woman, while Islam is violently against it. In India, there is a whole movement lead by orthodox muslims which is about the Muslim personal law, basically a means to keep four or more wives.

The basic reason for violence in Muslim countries too can be traced to this imbalance. Now in any society with hundred men and a hundred women, if the top powerful and the richest ten percent were to keep four wives and the next ten percent keep three wives and then the next ten, two each, then there would be an acute imbalance of women available for seventy percent of men.

Almost only 10% of the women available for 70% men.

Now what do these 70% do? Either they end up converting women from other religions to Islam or remaining bachelors or.... becoming jehadis.

THE JEHADIS KEEP DREAMING THAT THEY WILL GET to Have SOME SEX with HOURIS in Paradise and they blow themselves to achieve martydom, by killing all non believers...

As simple as that. A million studies sponsored by various think tanks will not get this truth. But it is so apparent....

So it is just fitting that in this new world, Islam, Muslim countries and all the nations of the world should pour in money for educating women in Muslim countries.

And this would be great for humantiy. Especially for Muslim women. After all it cannot be fun to live in a harem as the fifteenth wife of Osama...

In England, until the fourteenth century, the Christian Bible was considered the preserve of the priestly classes. The Vulgate was a Latin translation by Saint Jerome, read and interpreted only by the clergy, as the Church deliberately discouraged common people from reading vernacular bibles. In fact, it was a crime to possess a vernacular bible.

In the centuries that followed, however, the efforts of men who challenged the Church, and the invention of the printing press, made the Bible available in plain English, to ordinary men and women.

If Christianity evolved, why can't Islam evolved?

The same text can be interpreted many ways, thus one interpretation is NOT cast in stone, as some here have claimed. The science of interpretation is called ijtihad and has many worthy advocates.

As for the assumption that an advocate of Islamic modernism has strayed from the 5 pillars, THAT is just Wahhabi/Salafi propaganda. Many modernists are devout Muslims who honor the discipline and rituals of Islam faithfully.

And for those who don't think that a Salafi/Wahhabi brand of Islam has infected North American Masjids, you obviously haven't been here or are greatly out of touch with reality.

Duderino tells me:
“It has been widely agreed among actual Muslims, for 1200 years or more, that the Qur'an is an ALLEGORY.”

Below is a definition of an allegory:

1.a representation of an abstract or spiritual meaning through concrete or material forms; figurative treatment of one subject under the guise of another.
2.a symbolical narrative: the allegory of Piers Plowman.
—Synonyms 2. fable, parable

Moi:
You mean to tell me that Mohammad’s trip to the seven heavens from mount Moriah in East Jerusalem was a fable? If so why are the Muslims consider the mosque built over that spot as their third holiest place? And why all those threats by Muslims to liberate by force that mound from the Israeli occupation? After all we know it is no fable that the Temple of the Jewish king, Solomon, was built there.

There is only one type of Islam, the fundamental type. Try talking to any Muslim about the veil, or the rule of having a male relative responsible for you, you will hear it is because Islam respects women, unlike the West. (They have a funny way of showing it). The cartoon riots, the suicide bombings and Taliban are the direct result of Islam as preached and practiced from the time of the Prophet. Better to realize what you are getting into if you plan on converting to Islam. Buyer's remorse, don't express it. Leave at your own peril. So sad...

Duderino, Duderino, Duderino,

Your awards:

#1 The oddest name for the week - a version of "doddering" no doubt.

#2The worst-case of Three B Syndrome yet seen i.e. Being Bred, Born and Brainwashed in the Islamic cult said cult founded by one womanizing (11 wifes), hallucinating (continuously talked to visions of pretty, wingie, talking, fictional thingies), warmongering, greed-lust driven, long-dead Arab named Mahound aka Mohammed aka Mobombed. Mahound is Sir Salman Rusdie's pen name for the long-dead Arab. Being an Islamic apostate, Sir Rushdie is still under an Islamic death fatwa and "doddering" still claims Islam is peaceful????

#3 Being a member of the most violent religion in contemporary times?

Islam wins by a landslide with the following notable gruesome events:

1) Assassination of Benazir Bhutto

2) 9/11, 3000 mostly US citizens, 1000’s injured

3) The 24/7 Sunni-Shiite centuries-old blood feud currently being carried out in Iraq, 4100 US troops and 86,136 – 93,995 Iraqi/Islamic civilians http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

4) Kenya- In Nairobi, about 212 people were killed and an estimated 4000 injured; in Dar es Salaam, the attack killed at least 11 and wounded 85.

5) Bali-in 2002-killing 202 people, 164 of whom were foreign nationals, and 38 Indonesian citizens. A further 209 people were injured.

6) Bali in 2005- Twenty people were killed, and 129 people were injured by three bombers who killed themselves in the attacks.

7) Spain in 2004- killing 191 people and wounding 2,050.

8) UK in 2005- The bombings killed 52 commuters and the four radical Islamic suicide bombers, injured 700.

I don't understand why these sorts of articles always bring out the crazies. You folks have plenty of your own websites where you can wow people with your complete lack of knowledge of religion, history, and pretty much anything that involves reading something besides a comic book or crappy periodical - the great sources of expert knowledge.

Awards (with associated performances):

Elric66:

Award for Best Imitation of a 12 year old (unless you are a child, in which case I retract my award) - Mo-bomb-ed? I try to imagine a non-retarded grown-up saying that, and it's actually pretty hard.

Christine:

The Grimace-inducing Stupidity and Arrogance Award - You, who are not a Muslim, know what Islam is - not the columnist, who is an actual Muslim. She doesn't know what it is. Of course not.

Concerned Christian Now Liberated:

The "I prefer reading trash to actual books" Award - There are THOUSANDS of books by Muslims, in English, about Islam. But your source is one of the dozen or so books by disgruntled former Muslims - by a woman who is no longer Muslim and is completely shunned by her community. Perhaps I should learn about Catholicism from men who were buggered by dirty pederast priests as little boys, at the systematic expense of any other source of knowledge about Catholicism. That would make a lot of sense. What would NOT make sense would be learning about Catholicism from a Catholic who hasn't been involved in some sort of perverse buggery.

Observer:

The I Don't Like Thinking About Things Award - A.) It has been widely agreed among actual Muslims, for 1200 years or more, that the Qur'an is an ALLEGORY. Go to m-w.com if you need to look up the meaning of that word. Just as "Animal Farm" is not about bizarre talking animals bothering each other on some weird farm, a significant portion of the stories in the Qur'an are ALLEGORICAL. And just as "Animal Farm" cannot be understood without the historical context of socialism, neither can the Qur'an be understood without a detailed understanding of history and particularly the intra-Muslim debates concerning the meaning of the less straightforward passages. Which you do not have, nor, I suspect, will ever have.

Encore: the short list of peaceful Western Judeo-Christian accomplishments that humanity will look for divine inspiration for centuries:

- Erased via systematic persecution Jewish and Muslim culture from Spain. Side note: most of those Jews that went to North Africa to live among Muslims, forming the largest Jewish community in the world - for almost 500 years. The rest, who mostly went to Holland, were exterminated both culturally and physically this time, during WWII - by Christians. Again.
- Systematically destroyed thousands of Native tribes and cultures from North and South America, killing tens of millions, and cynically breaking hundreds of treaties during that murderous campaign
- Enslaved many of the rest
- Racialized and glorifed slavery to an extent not seen since the Spartans (who were also, not surprisingly, white folks)
- Slaughtered tens of millions over centuries during the course of dozens of colonial conflicts
- Dropped two atomic bombs on other human beings, incinerating 100,000 mostly women, children, and elderly
- Mutilated their descendants for generations
- Unique among all races that have ever existed in industrialising genocide during World War II

Wait a minute! Those things aren't peaceful! Well, it's quite clear from the above unprecedented actions that white Christians are unique in their capacity for violence, a capacity that is clearly cultural and possibly genetic. I can only conclude that honkey Christians must be bloodthirsty zombie murderers, because I can't imagine a human being would do ANY of those things.

Andrea Useem's said column reflects the views of those people in the West who are really not in favour of observant religions; they think of religions as if they are philosophies like Communism. They do not like uncomfortable discipline on their lifestyles. But to satisfy their need for sprituality they turn to some religion. And they start having conflicts with the elements of discipline that all major religions require.

Islam and Hinduism are still very much Eastern religions; whereas Christianity and Judaism are Western religions. The ethos of the Western society is so much more freewheeling and indulgent of all kinds of behavioural liberties, is very different from the ethos of the Eastern society. Thus we see that sharp divergence in the points of views of Muslims & Hindus on one hand and Christians & Jews on the other hand.

Thus Western converts to Islam and also Hinduism feel the uncomfortable restraint of the Eastern ethos and do not like it.

Today among those in Western countries who call themselves Christians or Jews, the proportion of those who actually observe their religion faithfully, living within the discipline that their religion requires is rather small. In comparison a far larger proportion of Muslims and Hindus do observe their religion and do try to live within the disciplines that their religion asks for.

That is what a lot of these converts in Western countries from other religion to Islam find it hard to observe. At the same time many converts to Islam in US are so fed up with the permissiveness and dilution of discipline in today's real time Western Christian and Jewish orders and institutions, that they admire Islam's rather demanding discipline.

Andrea Useem's said column reflects the views of those people in the West who are really not in favour of observant religions; they think of religions as if they are philosophies like Communism. They do not like uncomfortable discipline on their lifestyles. But to satisfy their need for sprituality they turn to some religion. And they start having conflicts with the elements of discipline that all major religions require.

Islam and Hinduism are still very much Eastern religions; whereas Christianity and Judaism are Western religions. The ethos of the Western society is so much more freewheeling and indulgent of all kinds of behavioural liberties, is very different from the ethos of the Eastern society. Thus we see that sharp divergence in the points of views of Muslims & Hindus on one hand and Christians & Jews on the other hand.

Thus Western converts to Islam and also Hinduism feel the uncomfortable restraint of the Eastern ethos and do not like it.

Today among those in Western countries who call themselves Christians or Jews, the proportion of those who actually observe their religion faithfully, living within the discipline that their religion requires is rather small. In comparison a far larger proportion of Muslims and Hindus do observe their religion and do try to live within the disciplines that their religion asks for.

That is what a lot of these converts in Western countries from other religion to Islam find it hard to observe. At the same time many converts to Islam in US are so fed up with the permissiveness and dilution of discipline in today's real time Western Christian and Jewish orders and institutions, that they admire Islam's rather demanding discipline.

Ultimately, apocalyptic belief is a function of faith - that luminous inner conviction that needs no recourse to evidence. It is customary to pose against immovable faith the engines of reason, but in this instance I would prefer that delightful human impulse - curiosity, the hallmark of mental freedom. Organized religion has always had - and I put this mildly - a troubled relationship with curiosity. Islam's distrust, at least in the past two hundred years, is best expressed by it's attitude to those whose faith falls away, to apostates who are drawn to other religions or to none at all.
In recent times, in 1975, the mufti of Saudi Arabia, Bin Baz, in a fatwa, quoted by Shmuel Bar, ruled as followed "Those who claim that the earth is round and moving around the sun are apostates and their blood can be shed and their property can be taken in the name of God." Bin Baz rescinded this judgement ten years later. Mainstream Islam routinely prescribes punishment for apostates that ranges from ostracism to beatings to death. To enter one of the many websites where Muslim apostates anonymously exchange views is to encounter a world of brave and terrified men and women who have succumbed to their disaffection and intellectual curiosity.
And Christians should not feel smug. The first commandment - on pain of death if we were to take the matter literally - is Thou shalt have no other Gods before me. In the fourth century, St. Augustine put the matter well for Christianity, and his view prevailed for a long time: "There is another form of temptation, even more fraught with danger. This is the disease of curiosity. It is this which drives us to try and discover the secrets of nature which are beyond our understanding, which can avail us nothing, and which man should not wish to learn."

And yet it is curiosity, scientific curiosity, that has delivered us genuine, testable knowledge of the world and contributed to our understanding of our place within it and of our nature and condition. This knowledge has a beauty of its own, and it can be terrifying. We are barely beginning to grasp the implications of what we have recently learned.
And what exactly have we learned?

I draw here from a Stephen Pinker essay on his ideal of a university: Among other things we have learnedthat our planet is a minute speck in an inconceivably vast cosmos; that
our species has existed for a tiny fraction of the history of the history of the earth; that
humans are primates; that the mind is the activity of an organ that runs by physiological processes; that there are methods of ascertaining the truth that can force us to conclusions which violate common sense, sometimes radically so at scales very large and very small; that precious and widely held beliefs, when subjected to empirical tests, are often cruelly falsified, that we cannot create energy or use it without loss.

Ian McEwan. "End of The World Blues."

Amen Christine

You have to be completely ignorant of Islam which means "Submit" and Muslim meaning "one who submits" to call for an "emergent Islam". The Muslim you are looking for would be considered an absolute apostate, forsaking their Sharia Law and their faith altogether. You can not be a Muslim and not follow the book. You are asking Muslims to invent a new religion altogether-it would no longer be Islam. Islam is Islam. You can not change or take away from the book. They can not live in harmony with non-Muslims. They are required to bring their neighbors under subjugation through conversion, taxes, slavery, or death. That is Islam. Why don't you say what you mean-which is that you hope Islam will convert to another more peaceful faith? Your fantasy is dangerous to our security and way of life. Fantasy and reality can not agree or meet.

You have to be completely ignorant of Islam which means "Submit" and Muslim meaning "one who submits" to call for an "emergent Islam". The Muslim you are looking for would be considered an absolute apostate, forsaking their Sharia Law and their faith altogether. You can not be a Muslim and not follow the book. You are asking Muslims to invent a new religion altogether-it would no longer be Islam. Islam is Islam. You can not change or take away from the book. They can not live in harmony with non-Muslims. They are required to bring their neighbors under subjugation through conversion, taxes, slavery, or death. That is Islam. Why don't you say what you mean-which is that you hope Islam will convert to another more peaceful faith? Your fantasy is dangerous to our security and way of life. Fantasy and reality can not agree or meet.

You have to be completely ignorant of Islam which means "Submit" and Muslim meaning "one who submits" to call for an "emergent Islam". The Muslim you are looking for would be considered an absolute apostate, forsaking their Sharia Law and their faith altogether. You can not be a Muslim and not follow the book. You are asking Muslims to invent a new religion altogether-it would no longer be Islam. Islam is Islam. You can not change or take away from the book. They can not live in harmony with non-Muslims. They are required to bring their neighbors under subjugation through conversion, taxes, slavery, or death. That is Islam. Why don't you say what you mean-which is that you hope Islam will convert to another more peaceful faith? Your fantasy is dangerous to our security and way of life. Fantasy and reality can not agree or meet.

I read your article “The emergent Islam I want". First of all I am quite surprised at starting your article saying " I do not like going to mosques" and you seem upset that " men and women are avoiding each other’s" on Friday prayer's gathering. First,no one is forcing you to go to the mosque.Second,it is quite strange that you expect men and women to mix wth each others when being in Mousques, and should not “avoiding each other’s”. In Islam it is forbidden for men and women to mingle with each others in social gatherings or in any public event; while all Muslims arround the world respect that.Thus,you are not entitled to scrutinize Muslims according to your western secular liberal tastes and values, rather you should respect the teachings and the moral conduct of the Islam that is clear and straightforward to all beleivers of the faith whether they are originally-born Muslims or new converts. Your description of "Salafi" Islam and "fundamentalism" as if Islam is a multi types of beliefs or that Islam is exported commodity made in Saudi Arabia or "Wahabi Islam”, this is unfortunately a superficial naive stereotyping image of Islam propagated by Zionism and its western Media machine and reiterated by bloggers like yourself. First, there is no such thing as Wahabi Islam or Slafi Islam. Islam gets its teachings and moral values from two honered sources they are: the Glorious Quran and the Sunnah teachings or interpretations of the prophet Mohammed. A good Muslim has to be a fundumentalist and should not be ashamed of such description, fundamentalist Muslim is deeply and sincerely attached to the moral Islamic values and honorably applies it in his moral conduct and behaviors.

Kaleem Kawaja:
A MISLEADING COLUMN

BRAVO! AN EXCELLENT WELL ARTICULATED ARTICLE :)

Cry me a river Kaleem

A MISLEADING COLUMN

Andrea Useem's column clearly illustrates her total confusion about what the institution of religion per se is; especially what the religion of Islam is. She dislikes the discipline that either Christianity or Islam tells its followers to observe. 'Emergent Christianity' or 'Emergent Islam' are a play of words to justify the desire of a few people who want Christianity, Islam and other religions to dilute themselves to satisfy their permissive lifestyles, and to bargain with religions like in a flea market to see who will give them the best offer.

They want these religions to become more like a convenient drive-by movie locale or fast food restaurant. They threaten that if these religions do not change to satisfy their whims, they will walk out. Just like in a flea market they tell a store owner that unless the price is lowered they will leave.

But religions are a matter of lifetime need for spirituality and faith. One becomes Christian because he/she finds something in it that they do not find elsewhere. One becomes Muslim because he/she finds something unique in it. For sure Islam is not necessarily looking to increase the membership of its flock as the basic criteria; hence if some skeptic Muslims leave it, so be it.

Even in its early years proponents of Islam never tried to reach a certain quota, or to achieve a certain rate of growth, or to compete in number of converts with other religions. And they never bargained on what is Islam. At the same time they talked about "ijtehad" (living interpretation of Quran) to illustrate Islam's inherent lack of rigidity. The emphasis was always on the egalitarian message of Islam and Allah's promise that this is the eternal faith and divine truth.

Herebelow I have tried to respond to some of the strange demands from the article's author.

1. "the crudely written signs informing me I must cover myself"

Most mosques in America run on very meager budgets that come from donations from a small number of people in the community. Hence if the signs were crudely written it is because basically the Muslim religious institutions can not afford more stylish signs. It is amazing that the author of this article did not understand the basic need of sanctity of a place of worship, that women and men be dressed more respectfully there than say a shopping mall.

2. "the awkward way men and women avoid each other, or the Friday preaching that is just so irrelevant to my life, I usually feel happiest when I’m walking out the door."

A mosque is a place of worship where Islam asks men and women, to respect the sanctity of the occasion, and be in separate groups in the same prayer hall but maintain a respectable separation between them. Except for a few oddball fanatics among preachers most preachers generally talk about the message of Quran, Hadith, the guidance from prophet Mohammad, how to interpret them for use today in our lives and other Islamic elements.

Why is that not relevant to most Muslims? This is not a political rally or a football game or a seminar on financial investment or how to prepare your tax return. If the author feels happy walking out the door, she should stay out. Most people come to the mosque to hear about Islam and its basic sources, not a seminar on worldly entanglements.

3. "untainted by a Saudi-style conservatism or bitterness over the war on terror. "

Yes, we do not need Saudi style salafi extremist ranting. But in the so called war on terror the West has killed about quarter million Muslims all over the world in the last decade alone, has extinguished the civil liberties of huge populations of Muslims who live in the Western countries. For the victims who are bleeding from these wounds, whose family/friend/home-countries have suffered badly, this is a life & death issue. So for them this is Issue No 1; not for the author/her friends though, because they never suffered from this racist onslaught.

4. "the emergence of a post-modern, post-9/11 Muslim faith life."

What is post 9/11 Muslim faith life? Islamic civilization has 1000 plus years of very sophisticated philosophy, lifestyle etc. The Islamic faith of Quran is eternal and is not going to get diluted because some people so wish.

5. "where everyone – not just the anointed, institutional leaders – are content creators. "

In comparison to other religions Islam has NO religious hierarchy. Anyone can lead congregational prayers, give khutbas, talk about the basics of Islam, and interpret the sources of Islam. Try comparing with the heavy rituals of other religions and you can see.

6. "for every person who joins the faith, another leaves – challenging the common assertion that Islam is the “fastest-growing religion” in the U.S. "

The slogan that Islam is the fastest growing religion in US was actually propagated by the enemies of Islam who want to scare the average US citizens by telling them that their predominantly Christian country is being changed with people converting to Islam at a rapid rate. Their propaganda is succeding; average US citizens are developing negative views about Muslims.

If some transient Americans became Muslim looking for conveniences that they did not find in Islam and they left, there is no harm in that. Surely American Muslims are not trying to reach a quota of population or growth rate. US Jews are not concerned that their flock is not growing rapidly. Why should US Muslims care?

7. " I am equally impatient with American Muslims’ insistence on their own victimhood at the hands of “the media,” as if suicide bombers and cartoon-rioters were somehow an invention of Fox News."

Sixty years after the genocide of Jews in Nazi Germany they still talk about it every single day in the US and European media, in major organizations etc. And all top Western leaders still constantly talk about it, despite the massive rehabilitation of Jews and their being the most powerful community in US/Europe today.

Since 9/11 a huge number of innocent American Muslims have lost their civil liberties, senior American leaders make derogatory and hostile statements about Muslims daily, the media constantly lampoons Islam and Muslims. An applicant for a good job has to conceal his/her Muslim identity, and you are saying this nonsense.

A few months ago my daughter, a US medical college student, when filing an application for training was advised by her professor to not list her membership in Islamic Medical Association of North America, because that will adversely impact her chances.

The author/her friends living comfortably, not identified as a Muslim, had no effect on her or other members of her family or friends, so she can indulge in all this elitist hogwash.

8. "I’d also like to order up a come-as-you- are, online-friendly, community experience where I can be myself and deepen my faith."

To be a Muslim you have to have to have a creed and a belief system. Islam, like Christianity, is not a free for all. Can they allow those who violate the basics of Islm as good enough Muslims? Can Muslims accept that those who drink liquor, indulge in drugs, indulge in extra-marital sexual relations/homosexuality are not doing anything wrong? Can Muslim or Christian religious organizations allow the permissiveness of "come as you are" lifestyles in the name of tolerance? If you want to indulge in such lifestyles how are you going to deepen your Islamic or Christian faith? Can Muslims or Christians allow their mosques/churches to become like clubs and bars where music/dancing/partying is in vogue? What kind of Islam or Christianity will that be?

9. "communal venues like TalkIslam.info or the Progressive Muslim Network in my own backyard of Washington D.C. "

I am familiar with the "Progressive Muslim Network". On their blog website many messages contain four letter vulgar words, describing the permissive lifestyles of their subscribers. Some writers write short stories there describing in suggestive language the sexual exploits of some "free Muslims". One story I read there had dialogues among some "liberated Muslims" frequently using the "f" word and talking about their "exploits" with their girlfriends.


Kaleem Kawaja
Washington DC

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://newsweek. washingtonpost. com/onfaith/ guestvoices/ 2008/07/the_ emergent_ islam_i_want. html

A MISLEADING COLUMN

Andrea Useem's column clearly illustrates her total confusion about what the institution of religion per se is; especially what the religion of Islam is. She dislikes the discipline that either Christianity or Islam tells its followers to observe. 'Emergent Christianity' or 'Emergent Islam' are a play of words to justify the desire of a few people who want Christianity, Islam and other religions to dilute themselves to satisfy their permissive lifestyles, and to bargain with religions like in a flea market to see who will give them the best offer.

They want these religions to become more like a convenient drive-by movie locale or fast food restaurant. They threaten that if these religions do not change to satisfy their whims, they will walk out. Just like in a flea market they tell a store owner that unless the price is lowered they will leave.

But religions are a matter of lifetime need for spirituality and faith. One becomes Christian because he/she finds something in it that they do not find elsewhere. One becomes Muslim because he/she finds something unique in it. For sure Islam is not necessarily looking to increase the membership of its flock as the basic criteria; hence if some skeptic Muslims leave it, so be it.

Even in its early years proponents of Islam never tried to reach a certain quota, or to achieve a certain rate of growth, or to compete in number of converts with other religions. And they never bargained on what is Islam. At the same time they talked about "ijtehad" (living interpretation of Quran) to illustrate Islam's inherent lack of rigidity. The emphasis was always on the egalitarian message of Islam and Allah's promise that this is the eternal faith and divine truth.

Herebelow I have tried to respond to some of the strange demands from the article's author.

1. "the crudely written signs informing me I must cover myself"

Most mosques in America run on very meager budgets that come from donations from a small number of people in the community. Hence if the signs were crudely written it is because basically the Muslim religious institutions can not afford more stylish signs. It is amazing that the author of this article did not understand the basic need of sanctity of a place of worship, that women and men be dressed more respectfully there than say a shopping mall.

2. "the awkward way men and women avoid each other, or the Friday preaching that is just so irrelevant to my life, I usually feel happiest when I’m walking out the door."

A mosque is a place of worship where Islam asks men and women, to respect the sanctity of the occasion, and be in separate groups in the same prayer hall but maintain a respectable separation between them. Except for a few oddball fanatics among preachers most preachers generally talk about the message of Quran, Hadith, the guidance from prophet Mohammad, how to interpret them for use today in our lives and other Islamic elements.

Why is that not relevant to most Muslims? This is not a political rally or a football game or a seminar on financial investment or how to prepare your tax return. If the author feels happy walking out the door, she should stay out. Most people come to the mosque to hear about Islam and its basic sources, not a seminar on worldly entanglements.

3. "untainted by a Saudi-style conservatism or bitterness over the war on terror. "

Yes, we do not need Saudi style salafi extremist ranting. But in the so called war on terror the West has killed about quarter million Muslims all over the world in the last decade alone, has extinguished the civil liberties of huge populations of Muslims who live in the Western countries. For the victims who are bleeding from these wounds, whose family/friend/home-countries have suffered badly, this is a life & death issue. So for them this is Issue No 1; not for the author/her friends though, because they never suffered from this racist onslaught.

4. "the emergence of a post-modern, post-9/11 Muslim faith life."

What is post 9/11 Muslim faith life? Islamic civilization has 1000 plus years of very sophisticated philosophy, lifestyle etc. The Islamic faith of Quran is eternal and is not going to get diluted because some people so wish.

5. "where everyone – not just the anointed, institutional leaders – are content creators. "

In comparison to other religions Islam has NO religious hierarchy. Anyone can lead congregational prayers, give khutbas, talk about the basics of Islam, and interpret the sources of Islam. Try comparing with the heavy rituals of other religions and you can see.

6. "for every person who joins the faith, another leaves – challenging the common assertion that Islam is the “fastest-growing religion” in the U.S. "

The slogan that Islam is the fastest growing religion in US was actually propagated by the enemies of Islam who want to scare the average US citizens by telling them that their predominantly Christian country is being changed with people converting to Islam at a rapid rate. Their propaganda is succeding; average US citizens are developing negative views about Muslims.

If some transient Americans became Muslim looking for conveniences that they did not find in Islam and they left, there is no harm in that. Surely American Muslims are not trying to reach a quota of population or growth rate. US Jews are not concerned that their flock is not growing rapidly. Why should US Muslims care?

7. " I am equally impatient with American Muslims’ insistence on their own victimhood at the hands of “the media,” as if suicide bombers and cartoon-rioters were somehow an invention of Fox News."

Sixty years after the genocide of Jews in Nazi Germany they still talk about it every single day in the US and European media, in major organizations etc. And all top Western leaders still constantly talk about it, despite the massive rehabilitation of Jews and their being the most powerful community in US/Europe today.

Since 9/11 a huge number of innocent American Muslims have lost their civil liberties, senior American leaders make derogatory and hostile statements about Muslims daily, the media constantly lampoons Islam and Muslims. An applicant for a good job has to conceal his/her Muslim identity, and you are saying this nonsense.

A few months ago my daughter, a US medical college student, when filing an application for training was advised by her professor to not list her membership in Islamic Medical Association of North America, because that will adversely impact her chances.

The author/her friends living comfortably, not identified as a Muslim, had no effect on her or other members of her family or friends, so she can indulge in all this elitist hogwash.

8. "I’d also like to order up a come-as-you- are, online-friendly, community experience where I can be myself and deepen my faith."

To be a Muslim you have to have to have a creed and a belief system. Islam, like Christianity, is not a free for all. Can they allow those who violate the basics of Islm as good enough Muslims? Can Muslims accept that those who drink liquor, indulge in drugs, indulge in extra-marital sexual relations/homosexuality are not doing anything wrong? Can Muslim or Christian religious organizations allow the permissiveness of "come as you are" lifestyles in the name of tolerance? If you want to indulge in such lifestyles how are you going to deepen your Islamic or Christian faith? Can Muslims or Christians allow their mosques/churches to become like clubs and bars where music/dancing/partying is in vogue? What kind of Islam or Christianity will that be?

9. "communal venues like TalkIslam.info or the Progressive Muslim Network in my own backyard of Washington D.C. "

I am familiar with the "Progressive Muslim Network". On their blog website many messages contain four letter vulgar words, describing the permissive lifestyles of their subscribers. Some writers write short stories there describing in suggestive language the sexual exploits of some "free Muslims". One story I read there had dialogues among some "liberated Muslims" frequently using the "f" word and talking about their "exploits" with their girlfriends.


Kaleem Kawaja
Washington DC

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://newsweek. washingtonpost. com/onfaith/ guestvoices/ 2008/07/the_ emergent_ islam_i_want. html

Lee,

The way of Mo was to spread Islam by the sword

Duderino, Duderino, Duderino,

Ayaan Hirsi Ali looked and found Islam to be severely flawed.

Ditto for Sir Salman Rushdie.

And what did they get for looking, threats on their lives which continue today.

Suggestion: Read Ayaan Hirsi Ali book and then see if think Islam is such a peaceful religion.

Or maybe you cannot buy said book in the country you live in. Hmmm, I wonder why that is??

Well, all journeys begin with a single step. Simply walk away from your present mosque, and go start your own. Mohammed did this, and so can you. Find other like-minded people, and go into a new community of similar believers. Mosques exist all around the world as small communities that grow into larger ones. It is not as easy as staying with an established mosque, but it can be done, first by meeting in people's houses, then in rented buildings, and then in your own building.
If you don't like what you see, then change it for the better. That's the American way, and that was also the way of Mohammed.

Duderino says:
"There are people for whom rational discourse is well beyond their capabilities."

This is from someone who believes that the Creator is the author of a book
full of fairy tales about demons, devils, jinn and angels with thousands of wings. A book telling of talking ants, birds, donkeys and stones. A book of flying horses that shuttle to the seventh heaven. A book that promises to whoever kills an infidel a transit ticket to a place overflowing with black-eyed young and receptive virgins reclined by rivers of milk, honey and wine.

AMH,

That is the beauty of Islam for Muslims.

Convert says:
“For those of us who read enough to recognize the beauty of Islam”.

Unbelievable! Forget about the faults of those Muslim organizations that you often badmouth. They most likely know more about Islam than you do. What beauty do you find in the subjugation and enslavement of women? What beauty you see in humiliating, marginalizing and oppressing minorities? Do you see beauty in fighting and killing and being killed in fighting those who believe differently than yourself? Where is the beauty in any of that?

Interesting you mentioned slavery when Mo-bomb-ed took slaves as he went a jihading across the Middle East.

You didnt mention anything about Dhimmi laws.

Ok Elric, just this once, because this topic is not as clear cut as you seem to think it is, but a fairly simple one to learn about, which you do not seem to have taken the time to do.

The Qur'anic basis for laws on apostasy are disputed, with 2:217 being used as the relevant verse. You can look it up and read it yourself. It's difficult to conceive of the relevance of this verse to apostasy, and there are plenty of scholars who agree (see Hallaq). All justifications are derived from hadith, from which a justification for any course of action in any circumstance can be justified. Therein lies the danger of hadith - very few clerics know the science of assessing hadith authenticity and using them appropriately, which was worked out many centuries ago and is being readdressed by Turkish scholars as we speak. Furthermore, there is disagreement with the laws on apostasy in both Sunni and Shi'a jurisprudence, with some scholars saying there is no punishment for apostasy (see Goma'a and Montazeri). These scholars are in the minority, but that does not make them wrong. The majority of southern whites and their preachers believed the Bible told them slavery was the desired state that God intended for black folks. The minority of abolitionists disagreed. These sorts of views represented the majority until the 1950's. That does not mean they are correct or have anything to Christianity.

For every evidence of intolerance you can generate about Islam, there are dozens of counterexamples generated by credible Muslim scholars. You just have to take the time to look.

Duderino,

Im still waiting for an answer as why a "peaceful" and "tolerant" Islam would require dhimmi and apostasy laws. Come on and shut me up by answering it. You cant. You rather dismiss us without backing anything up. Its ok. Thats what losers do in a debate.

Andrea is making some important points which I have encountered myself at mosques. I think it is a function of the fact that mosques in this country are by and large controlled by first generation immigrants. The result is, to varying extents depending on mosque, a conflation of the culture of the immigrants in question with religion. That's why in many instances you have Pakistani mosques and Arab mosques and African-American mosques, though some mosques, particularly in very urban areas, hew better to the Islamic ideal of Muslims of all races working and worshipping together. I believe things will change as second and third generation Muslim Americans intermarry, blurring the ethnic boundaries, and grow as a community and settle on their own indigenous interpretations of the Qur'an and the Sunnah, adapted to the new and unique circumstances of life in a Western society.

As a side point to the more reasonable commenters on these message boards, I would recommend ignoring those commenters who revel in making silly, poorly informed generalizations about Islam and Muslims. Refuting their poorly conceived notions about Islam is not especially difficult, but it is nonetheless pointless, because they will NEVER listen to you. There are people for whom rational discourse is well beyond their capabilities. Better to discuss the article's topic, which is essentially about the development of American Islam, and report the more troublesome posters (both the radical Muslim simpletons and the Eurocentric yahoos) if they insist on using the message board as a venue for trying to transmit their silly, radical beliefs.

Daniel,

You dont see its a problem when people cover themselves so completely you cant identify who the individual is?

Ibrahim said:

"The real problem is that some Muslims want to take the easy from Islam, but leave out the things that are not "hip" and "cool" in western society, like covering themselves properly (this goes for both men and women)."

You may call it covering yourself properly. I would call it obsessive-compulsive prudishness, when you are ashamed of your own body, and I would call it being a self-righteous busy-body "old lady" when it comes to judging what other people wear.

Well if a letter by Thomas Jefferson said so it must be true. Ill go by the perspective prophets. Jesus was a man of compassion, love and peace. Mo-bomb-ed was a war monger, slave owner, and a pedophile.

I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition (Christianity) one redeeming feature. They are all alike, founded upon fables and mythologies.

Thomas Jefferson in a letter to Dr Woods.

Bethel,

Just that you are amazed that she could criticize Islam should tell you about Islam. But dont worry, the UN is going to make it a crime to criticize Islam soon enough. Thats should tell you something too.

I had no idea Muslims could criticize their faith--only in America.

Are you sure your name hasn't been written down in someone's little black book?

Andrea, you do have courage.

The real problem is that some Muslims want to take the easy from Islam, but leave out the things that are not "hip" and "cool" in western society, like covering themselves properly (this goes for both men and women). The problem is, if you accept that the Quran is the word of God, then the entire book is his law. God knows what is better for you than you do, for he is our Creator. So when you say, I love the prayers, but not covering up, you are picking and choosing which of Gods commands to follow.

What you want is an Islam that is apologetic and changes itself to fit in with Western society. But Islam is the religion of God, and it is better for you than man made ideologies and cultures.

Unfortunately people don't understand this, and it weakens our religion, and it allows the same repercussions that happened to Gods other religions; you begin to change the laws and guidelines set down by Allah and replace them, and soon, the religion is not the religion God sent to us for salvation.

Allah said that there are some things that you dislike, but they are good for you, and some things you like, but they are bad for you, and He knows best.

As noted previously by the Observer, this is way off topic but:

Jesus' passage ....."He that loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me." Matt 10: 37 etc. was according to many contemporary historical Jesus exegetes, said by said Jesus.

Very odd passage so why?

As per Professor JD Crossan, an On-Faith panelist,

"Crossan [Historical Jesus, 299-302] discusses Jesus opposition to the patriarchal family. He observes:

The strife is not between believers and non-believers but quite simply, and as it says, between the generations and in both directions. Jesus will tear the hierarchical or patriarchal family in two along the axis of domination and subordination. Second, and even more significant, is that the division imagined cuts across sex and gender. (p. 300)"

From the Jesus Seminarians in their book:

"The Five Gospels :

This saying, which must have been offensive to Jesus' audience when he first enunciated it, has suffered the fate of other harsh sayings in the tradition. Matthew softens it by making the love of family subordinate to the love of Jesus. But Luke and Thomas retain the rigorous form: hatred of family is a condition of discipleship.
The severity of this saying can only be understood in the context of the primacy of filial relationships. Individuals had no real existence apart from their ties to blood relatives, especially parents. If one did not belong to a family, one had no real social existence.

Jesus is therefore confronting the social structures that governed society at their core For Jesus, family ties faded into insignificance in relation to God's imperial rule, which he regarded as the fundamental claim on human loyalty. (p. 353)"

Continue, however, to remind yourself that this "simple preacher man" was not god and he was speaking to the history of the moment. We need to speak to our significantly more evolved history when reviewing such passages.

And as per Professor Bruce Chilton (in Rabbi Jesus), if indeed Jesus was a mamzer and therefore suffered from being an outcast from his family, then passages such as Matt 10:37 would reflect said background.

All that and Asim couldnt answer my simple question, just more taqiyya.

Andrea,
As a Muslim, I can relate to the content of your article-but need to clarify the following for U:

1// There is absolutely no hirearchy in Islam-there are jurists or doctors of law-Faqih's but no clergy of any sort;a Muslim prays directly to God any where any time any place-always preferably with a group for obvious reasons.

2// The so called "Saudi Salfisim" is not at all the benchmark of Islamic religious practice to follow:for example Wahhabism with which the corrupt AL Saud allied themselves with as their Esperit de corps(as per Ibn Khaldoun)imposed by force its brand of Islam on the whole of Arabia starting in the 18th century;in Hijaz where Mecca,Medina and Jeddah are,there prevailed a very gentle and mild Shafi Islam until the unfortunate advent of the tribe of Saud whose only priority is political power and not the interest of Islam.

This saud tribe of some ten thousand "princes" monoploize political power and own and operate Arabia as a piece of real estate-there is no distinction between their personal bank accounts and the public treasery which they plunder as a matter of decleared policy;this tribe even stamped its name on Arabia:saudi Arabia. Did the Prophet do such a shameful thing??? No.No.

There is such a fundamentel difference btween Islam as practiced in its pure form as was by the Prophet and his companions and this corrupt tribalism of al saud-the Prophet stated clearly that tribalism stinks and should be done away with.

If the saudis were to follow true Islam they would dethrone themselves-it is political power and the use of Salafism they want every one else to conform to so they look authentic and orthodox-the tribe of al saud itself does not even follow it-it's for the masses to follow. AL Saud are guardians of their wealth and power and the guardians of Islam.

A few years back I atttended the friday prayers in a mosque in Raiyad and the preacher spent the whole sermon on the virtues of growing a beard because the Salaf did!!! Being clean shaven I was supposed to feel guilty and as if I had broken one of the five pillares of Islam.Of course I don't deny nor contest the right of any one to grow a beard-but is Islam alll about beards!!! Of course the preacher would not dare to highlight the coruupation of his masters.

3// There are four sources of Islamic law:the Quran,the Sunnah, Consesus,Analogy and the latter two are based on and drived by Ijtihad which is an ongoing process of reinterpretaion of the divine law to suit new times,circustances and palces-a corner stone in Shariah which shows its built-in flexibility.

The Quran and the Sunnah can not be reformed-they can be reinterpreted as an on going process.Each generation of Muslims should work towards that end:even the Prophet stated that "The were will emerge a scholar or a leading reforemr at the turn of every century to renew your faith-meaning Sahriah for you-meaning the Muslim faithful."

The mecahnism for renweal is there and it's instituionalized-and it's the responsibility of Muslims to employ it-the life of the Prophet is the example par excellence to follow:the values never change,for example, piety,honesty,charity,compassion and of course the five pillars etc...circumstance do change.

I am amazed to see some Mulsims insisting on using SEWAK to brush their teeth in the 21st century because the Prophet cleaned his teeth that way 14 centuries ago!!! But there were no tooth brushes in 7th century Arabia or any where else for that matter. The Prophet rode a camel then-am absoultely confident that if he were with us today he would be a jet-sitter.

Generations of Muslims throughout history made substantail contributions to human civilization in all spheres of life:high culture and siences because they were inovative and creative for their age and circumstances-we can do that for our age and yet be unequivoaclly true to our faith.

Let me give an eaxmple:the great and inovative second Caliph Omar suspended the application of the penal code which dicatated the chopping of the hand of a thief because Islam is very stringent about the protection of private property-because a sevre famine had struck down-and yet that code is Quranic.

The great jurist AL Sahifi,the founder of one of the fourth schools of law was practicng interpretation of the law in Iraq in the 8th century,when he moved to Egypt and changed many of his Fatwas because he said a Fatwa changes with time and place-what suits saudi does not neccessairly suit New York-without comprmising the fundamnetals of Islam.

The mecahnism for reform is there-it is us Muslims that are lacking in initiative and lagging behind the Shariah itself and its built-in tools especially Ijtihad.

Even a leading scholar like Dr.Yousef Qradwai issued a Fatwa that a Muslim woman feeling her pesonal security threatened in the US immediately after 9/11 can shed off her head cover which is perscribed by the Quran.

Muslims in America and Europe have Islamic Councils to refer to on issues such as Salafism.

In some places like saudi, women wear Niqab-covering the face-which has absolutely nothing to do with Islam or the Quran at all-so do American Muslim women have to do the same?? No.No.

It was very recently that a saudi precaher on the well-known and respectable TV cahnnel Aqra was preaching that women should cover their faces-Niqab-outside the home without basing his position on or quoting the Quran or the Sunnah and when women who perforemd the Haj with Prophet-pbuh-did so with uncovered faces.

It is the heavy cultural baggage that we Mulsims carry around that we have to deal with and shed off and not Islam or the Quran.

3// Andera:I don't believe that Christian or Jewish reform expierences are relevant here to our Islamic experinece-it is a different ballgame altogether which is too detailed to discuss on this froum.

Anonymous wrote:

“Jesus said:
Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother….”.

Moi:
What does this have to do with what we are discussing here? If by this quote you intend to discredit Jesus as a means of defending your ideology it is not working. Even a simple minded person would not mistake this as a call for Jihad against the unbelievers. It is a prophecy of how much believers shall have to endure even from their closest relatives.

If thats all you have on Jesus then you are pathetic. Mo married a 6 year old girl which the effects are still being felt in the Islamic world. Nice try chuckles. Id quote Sure 9 verse 29 but for some reason, this blog blocks it. Look it up and then I can show how that verse has set up Islamic oppression towards non Muslims to this day unlike your Jesus verse which Id like you to show how Christians use it in a violent oppressive way like jihadists around the world use the Qur'an to kill and maim.

Also still havent found one apologist to explain why a peaceful tolerant Islam would have apostasy and dhimmi laws.

I believe man has the free agency to worship anyway he wants or needs to show reverence/devotion/respect to GOD.

I will not allow any human to dictate to me or to my fellow Americans what to believe, when to believe, or how to believe, I will fight for my rights and the rights of others to make their own choice. Free agency is a gift from GOD the Eternal Father.

AMERICANS STAND UP FOR YOUR RIGHTS -

Jesus said:
"Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own household. He that loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me."

Mo says:

"the allmighty creator that created all this perfect universe SPEAKS and his word is perfect, if you have any proof that the creator god does not speaks please come forward."

Yes God speaks, but not through a book that is riddled with contradictions. A book replete with scientific heresis, historical blunders, mathematical mistakes, grammatical errors and ethical fallacies.

Reality/Religion 101:

1. Abraham founder/father of three major religions was either the embellishment of the lives of three different men or a mythical character as was Moses, the "Tablet-Man" who talked to burning bushes and made much magic in Egypt.

Many of the 1.5 million Conservative Jews and many of their rabbis have relegated Abraham to the myth pile along with most if not all the OT.

Current crises:

Realization that that the Jews are god's chosen people.
simpletoremember.com/vitals/ConservativeTorah.htm

2. Jesus was an illiterate Jewish peasant/carpenter/simple preacher man who suffered from hallucinations and who has been characterized anywhere from the Messiah from Nazareth to a mythical character from mythical Nazareth to a mamzer from Nazareth (Professor Bruce Chilton, in his book Rabbi Jesus). Analyses of Jesus’ life by many contemporary NT scholars (e.g. Professors Crossan, Borg and Fredriksen, On Faith panelists) via the NT and related documents have concluded that only about 30% of Jesus' sayings and ways noted in the NT were authentic. The rest being embellishments (e.g. miracles)/hallucinations made/had by the NT authors to impress various Christian, Jewish and Pagan sects.

The 30% of the NT that is "authentic Jesus" like everything in life was borrowed/plagiarized and/or improved from those who came before. In Jesus' case, it was the ways and sayings of the Babylonians, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Hittites, Canaanites, OT, John the Baptizer and possibly the ways and sayings of traveling Greek Cynics. earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html

For added "pizzazz", Catholic/Christian theologians divided god the singularity into three persons and invented atonement as an added guilt trip for the "pew people" to go along with this trinity of overseers. By doing so, they made god the padre into god the "filicider".

Current crises:
Pedophiliac priests, atonement theology and original sin/limbo !!!!

3. Luther, Calvin, Smith, Henry VIII, Wesley et al, founders of Christian-based religions, also suffered from the belief in/hallucinations of "pretty wingie thingie" visits and "prophecies" for profits analogous to the myths of Catholicism (resurrections, apparitions, ascensions and immaculate conceptions).

Current crises:

Adulterous preachers, "propheteering/ profiteering" evangelicals and atonement theology. .

4. Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the assassination of Bhutto, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And who funds this muck and stench of terror? The warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

Current crises:

The Sunni-Shiite blood feud and the warmongering , womanizing (11 wives), hallucinating founder.

5. Hinduism (from an online Hindu site) - "Hinduism cannot be described as an organized religion. It is not founded by any individual. Hinduism is God centered and therefore one can call Hinduism as founded by God, because the answer to the question ‘Who is behind the eternal principles and who makes them work?’ will have to be ‘Cosmic power, Divine power, God’."
The caste/laborer system and cow worship/reverence are problems when saying a fair and rational God founded Hinduism."

Current crises:

The caste system and cow worship/reverence.

6. Buddhism- "Buddhism began in India about 500 years before the birth of Christ. The people living at that time had become disillusioned with certain beliefs of Hinduism including the caste system, which had grown extremely complex. The number of outcasts (those who did not belong to any particular caste) was continuing to grow."
"However, in Buddhism, like so many other religions, fanciful stories arose concerning events in the life of the founder, Siddhartha Gautama (fifth century B.C.):"

Archaeological discoveries have proved, beyond a doubt, his historical character, but apart from the legends we know very little about the circumstances of his life. e.g. Buddha by one legend was supposedly talking when he came out of his mother's womb.

Bottom line: There are many good ways of living but be aware of the hallucinations, embellishments, lies, muck, stench and myths surrounding the founders and foundations of said rules of life.

Why are people unable to believe that Islam cannot reform just because the Quran has some sections that seem outdated? Has anyone read the Bible lately?

The Bible, when taken literally, has just as many examples of violence and inequallity as the Quran. There are even examples of old men marrying young girls and men having multiple wives. However, over the years, Christianity (as practiced by most Christians) is a peaceful and loving religion.

Is it, therefore, so impossible to think that Islam (as practiced by MOST Muslims) could also be a peaceful and loving religion?

There are extremists and fundamentalists in every religion. There have always been people who have done horrible things in the name of God, Allah, etc. I hope that people will remember that the existence of these people who commit horrible acts does not mean that the religion they follow truly condones or encourages such acts.

If the only Muslims you are familiar with are suicide bombers and terrorists that you see on TV, Ms. Useem's article should serve as proof to you that there are others who are just like any other American.

"Quran cuts across geographic and linguistic and cultural barriers and unite all people of the world"

Really? The Sunnis and Shi'ites cant even get along. LOL

Islam (Submission) today is like a precious jewel that is buried under piles upon piles of man-made innovations. Our aim must be to purge these innovations by upholding the Qur'an and nothing but the Qur'an alone, and present the jewel of true Submission to the world.
Quran cuts across geographic and linguistic and cultural barriers and unite all people of the world
"O Mankind, God created you into nations and tribes so that you may get to know each other" -- Holy Qur'an
2:186 -- When my servants ask you about Me, I am always near. I answer their prayers when they pray to Me. The people shall respond to Me and believe in Me, in order to be guided and unite people

Holy Islam: Holy Illiteracy, Holy Poverty, Holy Backwardness

by Sujit Das

23 Jul, 2008

[A note to the readers: The olden unsolved ‘Chicken or the egg’ riddle does not bother me anymore because very recently another similar type of doubt rose within me. We all know that ignorance, poverty and backwardness are the holy heritage of Islam. But, which came first? Are Muslims poor because they are ignorant and backwards; or ignorant because they are poor and backwards; or backwards because they are ignorant and poor? The billion dollar question is; which came first – Muslim’s ignorance or Muslim’s poverty or Muslim’s backwardness?

I have spent enough sleepless night to solve this puzzle but in vain. I leave it to the readers to make inquiries and to come to a logical conclusion. Thank you.]

----

In Islam, pure illiteracy is divine. The uneducated prophet of Islam called himself “a guardian of the illiterates sent by Allah” (Bukhari, 3:34:335). Another hadith (Sunaan Ibn Majah V:4290) reveals that Allah loves illiterate people and hates educated people and he had promised the first entry to Paradise to the illiterate Muslims and the last entry to the educated Muslims. The reason was simple. Muhammad wanted to keep his followers away from education because he knew that his newly established religion could not survive if criticism is allowed. As Toland (cited Gunny, 1996; p. 95) wrote, “… because he [Muhammad] clearly saw that the spirit of inquiry would not favour him. This is how Islam maintained itself”. Qur’an (5:101, 5:102) very strictly prohibits criticism. Diderot (1975, p. 230) expressed the same reason of Muhammad’s concern to keep his followers in darkness of ignorance, because reason is the greatest enemy of Islam. He wrote “since he [Muhammad] could not read or write, and so this had encouraged Muslims to hate and have contempt for knowledge, which in turn secured the survival of Islam”.

Allah not only loves illiteracy but poverty also. As Imam Ghazali, one of the greatest Muslim scholars of all time, had pointed out; prayer, a big family and poverty will ensure Paradise. To promote further admiration of poverty among the Muslims, Ghazali wrote that Allah and His Prophet praised one who remains satisfied with poverty. He even goes to the extent to exhort Muslims to condemn wealth but praise poverty because it is better than wealth (cited Kasem, 2006).

http://www.islam-watch.org/SujitDas/Holy-Islam-Illiteracy-Poverty-Backwardness.htm

Catchy video of Mohammed

http://justifythis.blogspot.com/2006/05/pervert-prophet_12.html

Women are not required or obligated to attend a Mosque. If Andrea doesn't care for the Mosque why does she go there?
Why doesn't she find a different Mosque more to her liking or get together with like minded people and build her own mosque?

If Islam is such a great, tolerant and peaceful religion, why the need for dhimmi and apostasy laws. So far no Islam apologists will answer that.

For islam to reform, Muslims must be honest about Islam and admit to some of the falsehoods and inequities that the Quran, the hadiths and the sirat offer.

1) let us admit that the Quran is a book written by humans and therefore not the word of Allah for all times.

2) Let us admit that while Muhammad was a great man in many ways, he was not a prophet of Allah and made many bad blunders and committed many evil acts that included murder, child molestation, robbery and slave mongering. Christians have admitted to the non-divinity of Jesus but Christianity has thrived since that admission.

3) Let us fully liberate our women and bring them out of the lower class status that Islam bestows on them.

4) Let us allow apostasy without imposing the Islamic law of death for apostates . Then those who do not wish to be Muslims will leave and islam will be better for their departure.

Mo, Mo, Mo,

Still suffering from the Three B Syndrome I see. Being Bred, Born and Brainwashed in Islam is tough. But there is always the Five Step Program for Deprogramming Islam that has been quite successful. We have provided it to you before, Time to use it!!!!

To control a democracy,it is becoming more vital to control the media.
The principal media outlets in America are owned by six major companies[1].
The six largest cable companies have 80% of cable telivision subscibers.[2]
Even internet websites are being colonized by giant media corporations.[3]

1.Ben H.Bagdikian The new media monopoly,Beacon press,Boston
2.Edward Helmorewho sets the TV control?The observer[London]8 june 2008,p.6
3.Howard Rheingold, 'From screen to streets' In These Times,17 nov2003p.34

islam is unchangeable.

the 2 source of true islam,QURAN and SUNNA will never ever change because:

1-QURAN is the word of the creator allmighty god that is above changeing ,changeing or modeficationing or alternning or none containing is a serious sign of deficencey ,god allmighty is not never not deficent ,if you see any sign of deficencey in the creation please come forword,people with 2 eyes 2 ears can easily see it in the universe .

2-human beings whethere they muslims or none muslim are the subject of changeing ,alternating ,up and down ,sound mentality or insanity ,in other word deficencey is humanism and humanism is deficencey ,people with 2 eyes 2 ears can easily look at the universe and see it.

3-how to approach islam?
mankind need to look at the universe around him/her befor he/she look at the scripture ,mankind need to read the universe and the word of the creator of the universe.
the allmighty creator that created all this perfect universe SPEAKS and his word is perfect,if you have any proof that the creator god doesnot speaks please come forword.

4-it is imposible for the creator who created all this perfect universe to be unable or weak or deficent or dizzy or forgetable or not on time ,those are the characteristic of you and me the unchangeable humanism that will remain till the grave hole .

5-mankind need to read and when reading we humanbeings need to read in the name of the creator allmighty god who created and fashoined .

6-the changeing in the universe is always toward what is right not to what is false and bad this is life it doesnot favoir no body nor discriminate against no body., the ink is allready dried upon this unchangeable truth long long long time ago and to come .

7-as my respected sister nouri said befor ,islam(QURAN and SUNNA) is not a la chart islam. (QURAN and SUNNA)is to be approached with humbleness with a receiving hands ,the receiving hands of the deficent humanbeing who his/her life and death is entirely is in the upper giving hands of the creator allmighty god.
if your life and death in your own hands or in any human hands then by all means be all you can be!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh how I wish there were more Muslims like Andrea.

But Alas, the "True" Muslims will threaten and kill anyone who gets in their goal of world domination. I have grave doubts about the possibility that the majority of Muslims will throw away the the Koran,the writings of Mohammad and Shaira law, These writings and the people who believe them are what is wrong with the Islamic religion. Hoping they will give up their belief in these sacred writings is like Christians throwing away the bible. Neither would be who they profess to be.

Ain't gonna happen!

But I believe in miracles and will continue to pray for the conversion of Islam to a peaceful religion.

The real issue is equality of sexes and yet nobody dares talk about it.

Most religions have now conceded some degree of equality between man and woman, while Islam is violently against it. In India, there is a whole movement lead by orthodox muslims which is about the Muslim personal law, basically a means to keep four or more wives.

The basic reason for violence in Muslim countries too can be traced to this imbalance. Now in any society with hundred men and a hundred women, if the top powerful and the richest ten percent were to keep four wives and the next ten percent keep three wives and then the next ten, two each, then there would be an acute imbalance of women available for seventy percent of men.

Almost only 10% of the women available for 70% men.

Now what do these 70% do? Either they end up converting women from other religions to Islam or remaining bachelors or.... becoming jehadis.

As simple as that. A million studies sponsored by various think tanks will not get this truth. But it is so apparent....

So it is just fitting that in this new world, Islam, Muslim countries and all the nations of the world should pour in money for educating women in Muslim countries.

And this would be great for humantiy. Especially for Muslim women. After all it cannot be fun to live in a harem as the fifteenth wife of Osama...

Allow United States and Britain to control all the oil wealth in Islamic countries,next day Islam will become the most tolerant religion .

When Bin laden fought Russians he was called mujahideen by American president,but when he started fighting his own masters[Americans],he became the most wanted terrorist.

"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and fail to notice the plank in your own? [ Bible]

"Emergent Christianity" and "emergent Judaism" are both possible, but "emergent Islam" is impossible. It is impossible because it necessarily involves rejection of portions of the Koran and the Hadith -- and such rejection, as is well known, is blasphemy and apostasy -- and is punishable by death according to Islamic law. Ms. Aseem erroneously thinks that the Islamic fundamentalism she despises is limited to Saudi Arabian salafism or wahhabism. But this is false. The Iranian shiites are no different. The Muslim Brotherhood is no different. The followers of Abul Maududi are no different. The root of the problem is right in the Koran and the Hadith, both of which are considered sacred, sacrosanct and untouchable. With all due respect, Ms. Aseem, have you ever read the Koran and the Hadith? Islam is much, much more than the notion of the oneness of God or the rituals which attracted you to Islam. The fact is that jihad to spread Islam throughout the world and to force everyone to submit to the Shariah is part and parcel of Islam. The "five pillars" of Islam, the rituals, are meaningless without the plan to organize all of society ("complete way of life") and to make Islam supreme in the world.

Make that "to include the pretty, wingie thingies".

Anon, Anon, Anon,

The koran vitiates all that you say is good about Islam. The book needs to be deleted and a new version published without the violence towards women, the polygamy, the warmongering and the paranormal/mythical/hallucination events and "personages" to incluce the "pretty/ugly wingie thingies. The new book should also have references where the passages were taken from.

Andrea Useem does a wonderful job showing that Muslim come from all backgrounds and a range of viewpoints - this is a strength of Islam, regardless of what hardliners say.

Her article shows that when you strip modern politics away from the faith, there is something beautifully plural and universal underneath.

Ive noticed two main categories of critics on this particular message board

1. People with an anti-Islamic agenda, excited to highlight everything ever negative ever connected to the faith

2. Religious Muslims sensitive to any deviation from the dominant understanding of Islam as it exists today.

I would say to the Islamophobes that they do no service to humanity or world peace by hammering a faith and its adherents endlessly. You are driving wedges and sowing dischord. Evil deeds have been committed in the name of all religions. For those that care about human rights and world peace, the key is to persuade others to care. Not to attack, demonize or de-humanize.

To the religiously conservative Muslims who take issue with 'progressive Islam.' Please have no fear. The truth stands out from falsehood. Lets not judge any person who stands willing to compete in good deeds. Lets do God's good work for all people and let Allah (swt) judge us in the end.

Somali,

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a former Somalian, has written her autobiography, i.e. Infidel. Read about her experience with Islam, her female circumcision, the threats on her life and the assassination of her friend Theo van Gogh. Her story reinforces all the violence and backwardness of Islam.

Posted on July 23, 2008 21:10

Elric66:
"For those of us who read enough to recognize the beauty of Islam"

What beauty? Islam brings nothing but misery
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In the sublime moments of prayer, there is beauty. In recognizing the sacredness of every living being, there is beauty. In the knowledge that this magnificent beauty is beyond our full comprehension, there is beauty. In moments when we recognize our mutual condition of humanity, in frailty and in strength, there is beauty. In moments when we realize that we are all just human beings trying to understand our existential reality and in this this we strive and stumble together, there is beauty.

We don't have to be perfect or right all the time...we merely have to strive with a sincere heart to understand what is true and what is meaningful to our future growth. Even in this awkward struggle, there is beauty.

Somali,
Why are you so racist against white people? You make all all Somalis look bad. Imagine if someone went around making the same generalizations about black people. You gotta wonder why Moslems are so fired up, so "goddamned fundamentalist". Why they can't take any crictism. Of course, you can make the same argument for the Southern Baptists, aka the American Taliban.

"For those of us who read enough to recognize the beauty of Islam"

What beauty? Islam brings nothing but misery.

Reform? The only real solution is to swallow it whole, or to jettison the whole shebang; half measures won't do.

With revealed religion, either you believe in the tenets of said religion and its underlying notions about the supernatural and the place of humanity in relation to "God", or you don't, your belief in the tenets of said religion is metaphor, akin to the way a fan of fantasy novels may "believe" in trolls, jinn, and pixies, or a fan of sci-fi may "believe" in alien races and civilizations. (See Shelby Spong for an example...if you don't believe in the major tenets of Christianity, why continue the charade of calling yourself Christian?)

If this is the trend of the future (which I doubt it is, especially in Islam, which above all religions is opposed to change, reform, or textual criticism), expect to see the major religions become something more akin to clubs, political parties, or strictly social groups compared to what they are now.

If religion is to persist, (which undoubtedly it will, for better or worse, more than likely the latter), I'd rather see it become this, something the celebrates humanity, rather than focusing on ancient beliefs and customs of desert warlords and nomads, and their various beliefs about life after death, how we should dress, what we should eat, etc. Why groups like Muslims, Catholics, and other think that fasting or mumbling to yourself (while kneeling in church or prostrating yourself on a rug facing Mecca) makes you a better person or the world a better place is beyond me.

My mistake Tariq

Hear, hear.

PC

Peace be ever upon you Andrea as you are indeed a God-send.

For those of us who read enough to recognize the beauty of Islam and then had to deal with the sickinging deceit and lies of theISNA/CAIR/MSA/MAS/MWL Salafist, you are a beautiful voice rising above a horrid stream of debris.

Where have you been Andrea? We value your reasonable and compassionate voice and hope to hear much more from you. Keep the faith and speak out your truth clear and strong.

Islam is so much more than the treacherous have made of it. That deep spiritual well is brim full and ready to finally cleanse the dross of the past few tragic years. Andrea...we have great need of a voice like yours. Speak out strong and speak out clear...we are with you girl!

Actually Elric I was talking about the Muslims.

Coreligionist = one that shares a religion with you

I believe Mo-bomb-ed was a pedophile because he married a 6 yr old girl

Ms Andrea Useem,
do you really believe that the angel Gabriel began communicating with Muhammed ibn Abdullah in a cave on Mount Hira in the year 610 CE ?
Do you believe in angels?
Do you believe that the Lord and Cherisher is a reality or a human invention? Do you believe that the Lord created man out of a clot of
congealed blood ?
Why not believe that man and women have evolved
from more simple forms of life?
Why not believe in our common sense?
We don't have to believe in a Lord and Cherisher
to live by the Golden Rule and find spirituality
in our beautiful planet.We find spirituality also in art, in democracy where women are equal to men under all the laws.

Why Tariq? Because we are honest about what Islam is?

The responses from some of Andrea's (and mine) "coreligionists" are extremely intolerant and narrow minded

http://www.newsweek.com/id/139433

If she wants reform in Islam, she really isnt a Muslim. Get over it.

Somali

She's Muslim; get over it.

The Terrorist They Call "president" Is The Enemy Of Humanity!!

This woman may think she is Muslim, but she IS NOT even Muslim. so her views are irrelevant to me. The thing I hate the most is to ENDURE a lecture about My religion from some IGNORANT, ARROGANt stupid person whose only qualification for lecturing me comes from GETTING the white man's approval to publish their drivel on WAPO!!

If you are NOT Muslim don't talk to me about my religion!!!

Ms Useem and people like them want a cup-cake version of Islam.In the name of reform they actually want an Islam that meets their desires and political needs. Masquerading as reformists, their real goal is to change the Quran and repudiate the Hadith. The is the same thing that the Christians have done to their religion.

"Real Islam is open, loving, tolerant as preached by the Prophet."

Really? So why the need for dhimmi laws? Why the needs for apostasy laws? Why did Mo have people assassinated that offended him? Why does the Qur'an say a woman is worth half as much as a man? Why the need to marry 17 women including a 6 year old girl?

Nouri,

How did I lie? If you say Im lying than you are saying the Qur'an, ahadiths, and siras are lies. Sell your taqiyya elsewhere.

Ibrahim Mahfouz,

You are so right. These people call for reform but are in denial of what Islam really is. You cant reform something if you wont say whats wrong with it. Never mind the fact thats its impossible to reform because the Qur'an is suppose to be the word of Allah. They are suggesting Muslims reform what Allah said. They also dont understand Islam isnt a religion per say. It is but its a political structure, a race (ummah) and a culture all wrapped into one.

The problem is in the Islamic text and the examples of Mo-bomb-ed.

Ms.Useem argues for the reformation of Islam in the same manner that Christians had.
During the Age of Enlightment the West reformed its church and its practices and NOT the Christian religion. Islam cannot be reformed because the faults or sins of that religion are not only in how it is practiced but in the core of its ideology . Its basic tenants run counter to the civilized ideals of plurality , equality of sexes, human rights, freedom of conscience and separation of mosque and state.

Mohd. A. E. Ahmed, Victoria and all other Muslims out There,

Time for the weekly survey/poll about Islam:

Do you believe in:

1. In "pretty/ugly wingie"/paranormal thingies?

2. That the long-dead Arab did actually talk to the "pretty Gabriel" in the "Gabe" cave and therein received the warmongering and anti-female words now listed in the koran?

3. That Sunnis are superior to Shiites in all aspects of life?

4. That Islam is perfect and the koran inherently condones no sin even though the 24/7 800 year-old feud between Sunnis and Shiites give significant credence that suicides, assassinations, maiming, and murder are condoned by the koran?

5. That having multiple wives also gives significant credence to the sins of lust and polygamy?

6. That the condoned treatment of these wives gives credence that the koran allows the sins of anger and greed?

7. That Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s book, Infidel, is her autobiography and that in the paperback issue, p. 47 the statement:

"Some of the Saudi women in our neighborhood were regularly beaten by their husbands. You could hear them at night. Their screams resounded across the courtyards. "No! Please! By Allah!" is the truth?????

Real Islam is open, loving, tolerant as preached by the Prophet. He was radical in that time, when he proclaimed under God's eye women are equal to men, heaven lies under a mother'r feet, killing of one human being is like killing a humanity. All his examples are contrary to the Salified Islam preached today by the few Fundamentalists. This kind of extremism, hate, injustice & intolerance is not only akin to Islam, but it is also akin Christanity, Judaism, Hinduism,
by the same short sighted and extremist preachers.
It is no wonder the attendance in houses of worship is an all time low. The Higher Power, God, Allah, Dios, Yaweh, Vishnu are one and the same. A loving Diety and message to spread: the idea of Oneness, justice, peace, love, intolerance and nuture inner peace and tranquility.

The 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the Madrid and London bombings, are acts as typical of religion as falling on your knees and praying to the great invisible Skygod.

The Muslim hordes spreading the faith by the word and by the sword, or Catholics torturing and burning those who could not believe in the Skygod, are hard to ignore,when contemplating how sweet religion is.

I personally have found there is life after religion, a better, more rational life, where one no longer need suffer the headaches of cognitive dissonance from believing the unbelievable.

Better to put ancient myths behind us, and just be happy with the awesome reality of everyday life.
As far as we know, this is all she wrote.

Thank you for this article Andrea. I agree!

"I love you when you bow in your mosque, kneel in your temple, pray in your church. For you and I are sons of one religion, and it is the spirit."

-Kahlil Gibran

http://www.newsweek.com/id/139433

that's true anon-
also- just to share- i didn't marry into the faith of islam- and also reverted in the late 90's- but for whatever reason my first mosque experiences were at a progressive university mosque with an intellectual bent-

so much for stereotypes-
also- the people here complain endlessly about islam- and scream for just such a progressive muslim to speak up- and when one does, it shatters their little illusions and phobic predictable responses-

either we are to live together with respect- or try to scare each other into hating what is different-

i opt for a more reasoned and truly deeply respectful interchange

Eric66 said

"It can not change unless you think Muslims are ok with changing the word of Allah."

Ready or not, it's changing. And there is nothing that anyone can do or say to stop this change from happening.

Man's religious practices are merely the fashions of custom and culture, as changeable as the clothes we wear.

It is your illusion to suppose that there is such a thing in man's understanding as the "unchangeing word of Allah." It is your illusion to suppose, that each individual Muslim does not have an inner will, impervious to the externmal imposition of "correct" belief, and thought control.

This antiquated way of relgious expression simply cannot hold up in a modern world.

I am not worried at all about Islam, its future and its prosperity whether those encouraging Islamophobia or those hating this faith like it or not.

With Islam, warmongers, Neocons and Zionists will not be able to suck the blood of innocent victims or continue with their exploitations without being exposed for everyone to see even if certain media tries hard to block it.

Their bad intentions will be always exposed by the Creator who will stand to their ill advised plans that consist of conquering the World (They call it Globalisation!!) for the benefit of a tiny minority as is the case in the USA where the top 1% of the population control 50% of the country's wealth at a time when ordinary citizens cannot pay their mortgages and are asked to give more and more to subsidise those with an obscene lifestyle and who are making loses in areas like the banking sector.

The Creator will be always there to guide those with good intentions in their hearts and who sincerely want to help humanity in a just manner.

This band of people will always stand up against what is unfairly gained via corruption, bribes, intimidation, harassement as is the case with the Iraqi Oil that belongs to Iraqis not the Neocons and their Cabals who are ready to pay visit to the Church on a Sunday whilst their hands are full of innocent blood from Iraqis to US military personnel that are being used and abused like mercenaries for the service of the likes of Blackwater, Halliburton and certain Oil Companies with no Fear of God in their hearts.

MYTHS, LIES, DISTORTIONS, RUMOURS, NONSENSE AGAINST ISLAM WILL BE EXPOSED AND TRUTH WILL PREVAIL.

I AM SURE THERE IS A CREATOR WHO IS CAPABLE TO DEFEND HIS KINGDOM FROM LOW CREATURES THAT MAY THINK THAT THEY HAVE AN IQ TO DECEIVE BUT NOT FOR LONG!

I am not worried at all about Islam, its future and its prosperity whether those encouraging Islamophobia or those hating this faith like it or not.

With Islam, warmongers, Neocons and Zionists will not be able to suck the blood of innocent victims or continue with their exploitations without being exposed for everyone to see even if certain media tries hard to block it.

Their bad intentions will be always exposed by the Creator who will stand to their ill advised plans that consist of conquering the World (They call it Globalisation!!) for the benefit of a tiny minority as is the case in the USA where the top 1% of the population control 50% of the country's wealth at a time when ordinary citizens cannot pay their mortgages and are asked to give more and more to subsidise those with an obscene lifestyle and who are making loses in areas like the banking sector.

The Creator will be always there to guide those with good intentions in their hearts and who sincerely want to help humanity in a just manner.

This band of people will always stand up against what is unfairly gained via corruption, bribes, intimidation, harassement as is the case with the Iraqi Oil that belongs to Iraqis not the Neocons and their Cabals who are ready to pay visit to the Church on a Sunday whilst their hands are full of innocent blood from Iraqis to US military personnel that are being used and abused like mercenaries for the service of the likes of Blackwater, Halliburton and certain Oil Companies with no Fear of God in their hearts.

MYTHS, LIES, DISTORTIONS, RUMOURS, NONSENSE AGAINST ISLAM WILL BE EXPOSED AND TRUTH WILL PREVAIL.

I AM SURE THERE IS A CREATOR WHO IS CAPABLE TO DEFEND HIS KINGDOM FROM LOW CREATURES THAT MAY THINK THAT THEY HAVE AN IQ TO DECEIVE BUT NOT FOR LONG!

eric and arif -

the best way to address problems in the muslim world is not to launch rhetorical attacks on progressive muslims. deal with realities that need to be addressed - work to better international public health, education, economic opportunity in the underpriviledged corners of the world. Fix problems! Unless of course all you want to do is continue to argue on online message boards endlessly about personal beliefs you will not succeed in changing. its your call.

ms useem is reacting against the authoritarian salafi fundamentality that has repelled so many-

Islam is a preligion of moderation, it has no heiarchy to crystallize and ossify into a static entity-

while christian ethos have centered on individual salvation- and love, and the higher natures of man- it leaves those same seekers unprotected and vulnerable to the very real negative impulses of the lower nature of men-

islam is the religion of social justice- and as nouri stated- is a holistic religion-

it takes into account that we do not live in an ideal world- but one where the strong are not always the good-

building from the microcosm of the individual taking repsonsibility for their actions- and garnering strength from within themselves- to the macrocosm of all of unified society- there is much wisdom and practical application to discovering ones own nature-

ignoring the 'bad' leads one to be delusional-
none of us are on either side of the spectrum but components of the different desires and impulses struggling within ourselves-
our weaknesses- islam compels us to strengthen our souls-

o- and someone commented that fasting is only not eating half of the day-

actually- it is from sunup to sundown- today sunup is 5:44AN to sundown 8:20PM-
that is almost 13 hours where no food, or drink of any kind passes one lips-

on average, a person is awake 16 hours a day-

and the fast lasts for a full month-

try it sometime and then come back and let us know how easy it was- and what you learned-

Very well said Arif

"Nothing stays the same; everything changes; that is the nature of life. Islam will change too. It must change. In fact, it is changing now."

It can not change unless you think Muslims are ok with changing the word of Allah. If anything, Islam is getting back to its basic roots and foundations. Thats why the rise of Islamic terrorism and Islamic government getting more traditional in Islamic laws.

Nouri

Nothing stays the same; everything changes; that is the nature of life. Islam will change too. It must change. In fact, it is changing now.

Anything that makes you afraid of a human being's inner will to think and believe freely is not good, and is in fact corrosive and toxic upon the humanity and upon the world.

The days of cloistered and shelted Islam are over. Muslims are merely part of the crowd, now, of the many. Nothing, but nothing, will ever change that.

As a revert myself; born with a clean slate, then Muslim, then back to a very clean slate. I don't understand what converts to islam find worth hanging on to? To understand your problem you have to understand and comprehend the history of Islam's creation; it's foundation is war. Mohammed built his religion fighting the Jews and the pagans. He did not build the kaaba, he snatched it from the pagans. The prophets that Islam is so proud of were all Jews. The book Mohammed authored is gibberish based upon the Jewish scripture. After his first rich wife dies he is 49, she is the only one who keeps him in check. After she dies, he goes on a woman rampage. He marries 13 women between 49 and 63. Along the way he has several concubines. Some of his wives he acquires violently, one of his brides was a child. He loves no one, not any of his wives, history documents he had a "favorite" wife. Among his violent bride acquisitions one worth mentioning is Kinana's wife Safiya, 17 years old he was 60. He (Mohammed) kills her husband, father, and her people and then has sex with her. Mohammed does not wait the prescribed four months and 10 nights. Kinana her husband was tortured and killed before he "acquires" this bride. Also worth mentioning is his marriage to his sons wife. He finds her attractive and the son divorces her only for Mohammed to marry Zainab wife of Zayed.

He (mohammed) eliminates the Jews and Christians in systematic ethnic cleansing. Prophet fights violent wars with violent endings for his "enemies", He beheaded the men and the pubescent boys and enslaved the women and children. In the battle of the trench he eliminates the Jewish tribe of Quraizya and beheads 800 Jews! Can you imagine a prophet overseeing the beheading of 800 people? How many days does it take to behead that many people with a sward as your beheading tool?

Now you might ask what all this has to do with today's Islam, well everything. A religion that is born out of violence and conflict can only beget violence. Islam is about Jiahd; the Fighting kind. Post 9/11 Muslims in the West and especially in the US are in retreat, denial, what to do? How to "fight" back? Jihad, the other kind, ranting and complaining, blaming. How can Mohammed’s followers know anything else? Islam only thrives in conflict; it instinctively creates turmoil in any peaceful environment.

Arif

oooooppppssssaaaaDAiSY;

"iSLAMo-PHOBiA is correct to defend ITSELF (or Selves) against "iSLAMA-MAniA" Psychic Driving Techniques & Getting Attention Addiction!

"Their screams resounded across the courtyards. "No! Please! By Allah!""

Allah sanctions wife beatings, how ironic they would beg for Allah for the beatings to stop.

Hmmmm taqiyya fest on here too. If you truly believe in the Qur'an explain 9:29.

Id quote it but for some "odd" reason, its block. I wonder why.

Dear Andrea,

There are flaws and errors in all religions. Until these are corrected, there will be no worldly or theological peace.

To wit: The Flaws and Errors of Islam

Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/ plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" aka "pretty, wingie, talking thingies" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the assassination of Bhutto, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/ mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And who funds this muck and stench of terror? The warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

The current crises in Islam:

The Sunni-Shiite blood feud and the warmongering , womanizing (11 wives), hallucinating founder.

Necessary reading:

1. Ayaan Hirsi Ali's autobiography, Infidel

an excerpt:

paperback issue, p. 47:

"Some of the Saudi women in our neighborhood were regularly beaten by their husbands. You could hear them at night. Their screams resounded across the courtyards. "No! Please! By Allah!"

2. Sir Salman Rushdie's, Satanic Verses.

Andrea Useem's article is right on the money. Those posting the critical messages claiming "Islam is Islam and it cannot change" have little understanding of history or of the religion.

Useem is right to point to the recent domination of Salafists over the world of islam (fuelled in largepart by oil wealth and exploiting populations victimized and angered by colonialism). She should also have pointed out the malleability of Hadith - a body of ambiguous religious texts used by fundamentalists and political rejectionists to justify whatever they want - from terrorism to tyranny to chauvism.

I'm a muslim who has read the Quran, believes in the Quran and the Prophet and finds a beautiful ecumenical faith at peace with human existence. In my experience, those politically charged rejectionist Muslims place more stock in the Hadith - an ambiguous body of virtually authorless texts - than in the Quran - the one text Muslims should believe to be the word of God.

Thank you again, Andrea.

I like the title the emergent Islam I WANT!

Islam is not a way of life a la carte! When you look at Islam, you have to look at the bigger picture. You have to look why 1.6 billion people on planet earth are following this faith. You have also to say to yourself why is it the fastest growing religion in the world?

Is Islam responsible for the actions of a tiny non significant minority of Muslims who for one reason or another were misguided into taking certain actions like 9/11 or committing atrocities in the name of the faith, the answer is NO.

Things have to be put into prospective; it is if I am going to condemn Christianity for the actions of the Crusaders or those that committed the Holocaust or the slaughter of natives’ people from Red Indians to Aboriginals to segregating between Black and White as was the case in recent time in South Africa with its Apartheid system.

Nor will I condemn Judaism for the actions of a minority of Zionists who misinterpret the Torah in order to satisfy their personal gains when Ultra Orthodox Rabbis stand against occupying the territories of others and the commitment of a Genocide and Apartheid against the Palestinians.

Islam as any other divine faith calls for justice, tolerance, humility, helping the poor the needy and the weak and demands a stop to arrogance, sense of feeling superior and bullying.

It helps the true Muslim in a peaceful way to fulfill his/her obligations from sunrise to sunset form the guidance of the Quran and the actions of the messenger of Islam, Mohamed (Peace be upon Him).

It application depends on those that want to follow this way of life and what do they truly want from it, to take it as a whole or pick and chose what suits my temporary needs. The beauty in Islam is that you are not servant to a hierarchic figure such as the POPE and wait for his blessing; you have a direct line to God to be in touch with during your 5 daily prayers. You have five appointments a day to discuss your problems and your hopes and desires.

Furthermore your salvation is not from Jesus or anyone else for this matter. You make you own salvation with your own actions. Therefore you have the responsibility to decide what sort of deed you want to commit. A deed that will benefit you in this life and the Hereafter and benefit your family, your community, your society and humanity at large or a deed that will put your selfish desires above any other consideration.

Islam is based on logic, common sense and ability to differentiate right from wrong and to stand for the right path whatever the sacrifices may be as expressed by other messengers sent by God to fulfill this prophecy from the time of Adam to Noah to Abraham to Moses to David to Jesus to the last messenger Mohamed (Peace be upon them all), with one message a message of Peace and to worship none but the creator.

THIS IS THE ISLAM I WANT. A PEACEFUL FAITH BASED ON 5 PILLARS and THAT ASSISTS THE NEEDY AND FIGHT AGAINST INJUSTICE & IGNORANCE IN ALL ITS FORMS.

A FATIH THAT IS NOT BASED ON SPIRITUALITY ALONE BUT CONVEY OTHERS MESSAGES TOO FROM THE SOCIAL (FASTING) TO THE ECONOMICAL (GIVING ALMS) TO HUMANITY & UNITY (HAJJ) TO SUPPORTING SCIENCE (FROM ALGEBRA TO ASTRONOMY TO GARDENING TO ARCHITECTURE).

ISLAM IS A FAITH WITH A WHOLESTIC APPROACH!

Keep on longing because Islam is Islam, it cant change

Saudi-style Salafism is indeed a plague on Islam and America:

http://www.asecondlookatthesaudis.com

And the Muslim community is hardly the only one which is having a hard time acknowledging this. Just take a look at the willful ignorance of the would-be oil barons in the White House.

The approach taken by Andrea is to pick and choose what she likes about Islam and discard what she does not like. A very common approach in todays postmodern society for members of all religions. In the case of Islam, it is necessary because that religion clearly says to kill the unbeliever and to cut off the hand of the thief and has many other middle ages sort of laws and commands. The cultural baggage that comes with Islam makes it in its pure form totally incompatible with the modern world.

Picking and choosing and adding in elements of other religions you like is a way to make your own designer religion and it is called syncretism. Andrea is sanctioning syncretism. To not be syncretistic may appear old-fashioned so it is hip to be syncretistic and she is a hip, postmodern female who just thinks she is a Muslim.

My suggestion is give up on changing Islam because the prophet made it clear that nothing he has written or said can ever, ever, be changed. You can make up your own version of Islam but those who control that religion, though they may be a minority (which is the case with most organization - the die hards control), are the fundamentalist. They have the historical and written justification for their beliefs and you, Andrea, do not.

It is sad to see the passing of judgment on one's character based on one written piece. Others are claiming that she is questioning Islam. How about questioning the personal agenda's Muslim leaders have placed so conveniently with the preachings of Islam. This is not the religion, rather people in power twisting a powerful message to further their own agendas.

It is also important to note the various translations when reading a non-Arabic version of the Quran, are these the true meaning or someone's interpretation?

To bring to light the spirituality and peace in Islam, may I remind of the literal meaning of the world, would be a true reflection of the religion to the world.

Moshin writes: "The beauty of Islam is in its flexibility and practicality, yet no one would know that after attending a typical Friday sermon."
With respect, have you even read the Koran? The document is full of instructions telling the reader NOT to question the faith and admonitions about NOT befriending people of other religions. It even refers to Jews as pigs and to people who are not Muslim as heretics. Islam is not a flexible religion - at least - not according to the Koran. The problem with Islam is that humanity has moved on and Islam is rigid.

This was an interesting article which i found informative and telling. I too had an Islamic interest several years ago, due to a relationship with an Islamic woman, who espoused the Amaddiyah in Islam Movement that is now not tolerated and even persecuted in Pakistan. This was enough to tell me that I wanted no part of an intolerant and archaic Religion that does not allow any divergent lines of thought. Would God approve of persecution among his followers, of course not! Is there a true Islam? I do not believe so, there are too many sects. In addition, being raised in a largely tolerant Western religion, one with its own great traditions and dogmas, I could never change to a religious tradition so foreign to me and open to so many interpretations and that denigrates people, traditions, societies and women. I wonder why Women in general have not stood up and rebelled against the Imams and Governments that keep them down! Where is the outrage?

Thanks for the excellent article... As an ecumenically-minded muslim, I agree wholeheartedly with the need for an 'emergent' islam. thankfully, there are signs of this new development everywhere. international politics will be a stumbling block for some time to come, but progressive, ecumenical believers of all traditions are making gains in open societies around the world. this is a positive development that people of all beliefs should support and encourage.

it's heartening to read of a believer questioning islam; sadly, this is in essence forbidden by the koran and so by definition anyone who has the brains and courage to question will ultimately find themselves leaving islam. all that aside i must say that one thing that really irritates me about adherents to islam is their profession of "fasting." my understanding of a fast is to not take food. islam's version of fasting is to not take food from sunrise to sunset - leaving half the day in which to eat. this isn't a fast - it's a time shift. it's dishonest to call it a fast and people who don't know are left with the impression that somebody has made a sacrifice when in fact they haven't.

It seems very sad to me that a person who expresses frustration that the practices of one particular branch of a religion do not adhere to the larger tenants of a religion is treated with such hostility. Is it not noble to hope that the followers of a religion will focus more on the basic foundation of that religion?

RH --
The British had nothing to do with establishing the Baha'i faith. Many Baha'is have left Iran because they have been persecuted for many years and many Baha'is are still in Iran (it is the largest minority religion in the country) and are still being persecuted. The "world headquarters" are in Haifa, Israel because that is the resting place of Baha'u'llah.

the poster above referred to as "rh" is displays exactly that type of judgmental attitude that Andrea does not like about coming to the mosque. How about a little concern and compassion instead of scathing criticism that implies that the person is being less than honest or faithful.

Littledolphin said:

"Cut-and-pasting, swapping and selecting religious paths are currently the favourite past-times of many Americans. More disturbingly, Sacred Books are distorted or misinterpreted to satisfy the inventiveness and needs of the spiritual seeker, as your remarks imply."

And what do you suggest? Mental conformity and servitude to theologies written by men, for political and military purposes? People are gradually getting the courage to stand up against this sort of thing, and not allow your self-righteous intimidation to compel them into blind paths of relgious zeal, which have only brought unending suffering and tragedy to the Chrisstian West, and to the people of Islam. It is amazing to me that so-called religious people have become so twisted in their thinking that "freedom of thought" is actually seen as bad and as a threat the them.

As for building web-based religious communities: the American heathen reconstruction owes much of its success to the internet. There are many self-selecting groups of more-or-less compatible people, and it's easy to disconnect from a group that's not to your liking, especially if you've never actually met any of its members. If this sounds like both a good thing and a bad thing, you're right.

All this virtual networking builds a community that is part real, part illusory, and it's important to keep that in mind. It also puts a premium on the experience when we actually meet, which is also a good thing and a bad thing. Sometimes we can weed out the flakes and the creeps before we have to actually shake their hands, but when we do meet new people face-to-face, the hope that they'll be good people and an asset to the community is awfully strong. Managing this kind of community for stability and strength is a skill we're still learning.

OK, I'm confused. There are many different forms of Islam - Sufi being the first one that comes to mind. Or when you convert in Islam, is it like fundamentalist Christianity, where they tell you lies about all the other sects?

Personally, I'm an Orthodox Christian, but I became that after seeing lots of different faiths that I couldn't embrace, and finally found home.

Dear Andrea,
My suggestion is simple. Eliminate the influence of superstition from your life and become a secular humanist. Does it not seem strange that the almighty creater of the universe only speaks to his favorite creation (Humankind) through individuals who see visions others cannot see and hear voices others cannot hear. Also, he last spoke to his pets 1400 or so years ago and through an individual who could not write.
Examine religious claims with the same rigor that we use for scientific claims and you will be led to the real truth. An unfettered mind if a great gift - much greater than the mindless ritual of empty religious dogma. Good luck in your quest.

I know that a lot of people have a meaningful experience with organized religion- for good or ill. But I don't understand what utility progressives find in churches. Vapid ideas like the "oneness of god" and the "effectiveness" of prayer are meaningless and unqualified. I also don't see the utility or point of "disciplined fasting", why not just choose vegetarianism and do some good for the world? The "compassion of charity" is the only quantifiable idea I can relate to here. Charity arises from our human instinct for community- our village is only as good as its weakest citizen.

There are many progressive causes that need our full attention and energy right now. Those causes don't need the added burden of having helping hands righteously clasped shut in "prayer."

Salaam Andrea,

What you wrote today in the Post is both well written and long overdue. As a Muslim in my late 20s born and raised in this wonderful country, I have found that most mosques do not play a positive role in teaching and encouraging faith while providing guidance on how to make positive contributions in our local communities. The beauty of Islam is in its flexibility and practicality, yet no one would know that after attending a typical Friday sermon.

The great hurdle in addressing this issue is in finding like-minded communities and religious leaders who can sustain mosques of the type you and I desire. While I do believe there are many Muslims in this country who share our concerns, we need a new generation of religious leaders to emerge who transcend culture and adherence to particular strands of Islam. Such leadership can provide legitimacy to our concerns.

Again - well said Andrea!
Mohsin

It is clear that the faith you are involved in does not satisfy you, or does not bring you comfort and complete happiness. Your remarks about entering and exiting the Mosque, your place of worship, are especially informative.

I assume that these observations have some relation to how you feel about your faith and need little correction.

Therefore the religious path you are currently on is not for you.

Why you remain with this faith; why you tolerate subverting your soul to this affair; why you "go through the motions" at your place of worship, while actually feeling uncomfortable within its Sacred Walls, requires serious reflective thought.

On the one hand we perhaps can say that your faith is letting you down. On the other hand we can say that you are letting your faith down. But there is another remark one can make, and it is this, although I am sure it can be said in a more comforting manner: We can say that you are spiritually juvenile.

Reflecting on your remarks the third choice seems to fit your current state of spiritual affairs. I suggest you stop fingerpointing where the blame or problem lies with your spiritual dissatisfaction, as you have done in your article ( you mentioned the Saudie's conservativism ). I suggest you start growing up and begin taking steps towards greater spiritual responsibility.

Cut-and-pasting, swapping and selecting religious paths are currently the favourite past-times of many Americans. More disturbingly, Sacred Books are distorted or misinterpreted to satisfy the inventiveness and needs of the spiritual seeker, as your remarks imply.

Unfortunately as a consequence of adopting these current "cut-and paste" religious paths any spiritual insight becomes grotesquely convoluted due to seekers comprehensive attempt to satisfy their subjectively-created, often unfounded, spiritually "incestuous" demands.

Moral decay, via moral-relativism, obviously follows; and the seeker's spiritual insight, to avoid the obvious innate paradoxes of adopting this malformed path of spiritual well-being, employs itself with deciding the next best thing to purchase on lay-away.

MS Andrea,

You can have any religion you want. You are welcome to worship your fearless leader Mr. Bushenstein. You can take fellow chosen Max Boot as your prophet and guide giving you a boot for guidance.

As far as a subservient Islam the British tried it for more than a 100 years and it has not had any traction. The British established Ahmadiya movement in India (Head of Ahmediya ordered his followers to submit before British rule). The British established Mr. Bahai as a British lover in Iran.

The ahmadiya movement has been squeezed out of Pakistan and back into London. The Bahai's have been squeezed out of Iran and have their world headquarters in Israel (Muslims unable to stomach Bahai's love of the west).

MS Andrea you are welcome to join either the ahmediya or the Bahai where as a member of the chosen ms andrea could pick and choose her religion.

Islam has stood for more than 1400 years whereas many andreas and their fellow chosen have come and gone.

rh

Another Western woman who converted to Islam because of marriage? Andrea is a German name.