In an unsigned opinion piece, Investors' Business Daily poses some tough questions for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a self-described mainstream group with a troubling history of extremism and intolerance, documented here. (Hat tip: LGF ). Among other things, IBD asks:
- Is it true that 26 chapters of the Quran deal with jihad, a fight able-bodied believers are obligated to join (Surah 2:216), and that the text orders Muslims to "instill terror into the hearts of the unbeliever" and to "smite above their necks" (8:12)?
- Is the "test" of loyalty to Allah not good acts or faith in general, but martyrdom that results from fighting unbelievers (47:4) — the only assurance of salvation in Islam (4:74; 9:111)?
- Are the sins of any Muslim who becomes a martyr forgiven by the very act of being slain while slaying the unbelievers (4:96)?
- Are those unable to do jihad — such as women or the elderly — required to give "asylum and aid" to those who do fight unbelievers in the cause of Allah (8:74)?
- Does Islam advocate expansion by force? And is the final command of jihad, as revealed to Muhammad in the Quran, to conquer the world in the name of Islam (9:29)?
- Is Islam the only religion that does not teach the Golden Rule (48:29)? Does the Quran instead teach violence and hatred against non-Muslims, specifically Jews and Christians (5:50)?
Via Matoko/jinnilyyah in the comments to Winds' Moderate Muslims Sighted in Madison comes a hopeful answer from an unexpected locale: Sana'a, Yemen by way of Cairo.
In Kafrayn for the Price of One, scholar Stacey Philbrick Yadav offers a synopsis of Yemeni theologian Muhammed Abd al-Malik al-Mutawakkil’s 2004 book, Islam and International Human Rights Declarations. (Hat tip: 'Aqoul ) From soon-to-be Dr. Yadav's description, al-Mutawakkil is an important thinker in a center of Islamist scholarship, so her description of his thesis is noteworthy (but RTWT ).
- The reason that Muhammed took up arms against the Quraysh was because they were preventing people from converting to Islam. It cannot logically hold that he would take up arms in defense of individual choice, and then deny it to others.
- There are scores of ayat mentioning the offense of kufr (unbelief), but no mention in the Quran of any worldly punishment. There are comparatively few mentions of the crimes of adultery, theft, and murder, but there are clearly articulated worldly punishments in the text of the Quran itself. Despite an ill-substantiated hadith to the contrary, one cannot hold that the immutable and perfect Quran simply “neglected to mention it.” ...
- Those who draw a distinction between a kafir (unbeliever) and a murtad (apostate, or one who has “turned his back” on Islam after previously submitting, by birth or by conversion, to its authority) and advocate killing the murtad simply on the basis of his apostasy are also in error...
Each of these points is exhaustively documented by reference to the Quran, the Sunna of the prophet, and the writings of the fuqaha’. What is particularly interesting is that he cites clerics with conservative reputations, thus making the "hard case."
This week, Abdul Rahman's life was seemingly spared by realpolitik, rather than because of any outburst of conscience on the part of the leaderships of the world's Islamic communities. How encouraging, then, to learn of significant scholarship that looks to square the circle of Islam and Enlightenment ideals of Human Rights--from within that Faith.
Marc Schulman writing at American Future has some really relevant thoughts and links on this subject.
Btw, since no other comments on this I did the comment unthinkable and copied the whole linked to article.
[Naw--I abbreviated your comment, changing it to a fair-use excerpt and a link to Schulman's "The Heart of the Matter" instead... -AMac]
Read the rest
I think the important thing is that Muslim scholars are asserting that the suras in question do not mean what had been asserted by the jihadis.
That is what we need. Heck they still argue Old & New Testament meaning, can't we stand with those who say maybe Mohammed wasn't in favor of this.
I hope so.
Cordially,
Uncle J
Unfortunately, IBD is being pretty stupid. This is kind of like asking the World Council of Churches whether The Bible condemns homosexuality as a sin. Heck, the Episcopalians even disagree with themselves.
There are many different strains of Islam. Some of them are quite obnoxious, others are perfectly compatible with a modern liberal democracy. The answers to the IBDs questions depend on which school of Islam thought the particular Muslim you're asking belongs to.
As for pointing to verses in the Quran to "prove" that Islam "means" this or that, it's a fool's game. Islamic jurisprudence uses distinctions so finely-based and arguments so convoluted and detailed that they will cause a tax attorney's eyes to glaze over and roll into the back of his head.
The bottom line is that a good Islamic jurist has enormous latitude to interpret the text as he sees fit. Violent whackos use this to twist The Quran (and other sources of Islamic jurisprudence) to support their vision of violent struggle. Peaceful Muslims, by the same token, interpret these materials rather differently.
Anon -- your logic fails because "peaceful Muslims" do nothing but cower in terror.
When atrocity after atrocity is perpetrated in the Islamic World, when the argument is made in the Islamic World that jihad is a duty against the infidel, when the argument is made that all territory ever held (500 years ago) by Muslims must be reconquered, that apostates must be killed, etc. ...
"Peaceful Muslims" voices are never to be found.
We see "God Bless Hitler," or "Freedom go to Hell!" but not one Muslim demonstration against these sentiments.
All evidence suggests that the dominant and authentic voice of Islam is rooted in what the Jihadis say it is. Otherwise it would not have worldwide and extremely deep support among Muslims. Otherwise we'd see "peaceful Muslims" arresting those in Muslim countries who display these sentiments.
Sorry, but says who?
You can exhaustively reference that to the Quran until you're blue in the face, and it makes not one jot of difference. As the Yemeni theologian well knows, Islam is not just the Quran. The Hadiths are effectively just as important, and if al-Mutawakkil rejects the Hadiths then he belongs to some religion other than Islam.
The most important Hadiths to Sunnis are the Sahih Bukhari collections, and they say this:
The Shi'ites do not hold this collections of Hadiths in the same regard, but they must find plenty of support for killing apostates in the other five Hadith collections, because apostasy is punished by death in Iran. As well as in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Yemen, Sudan and Mauritania.So I'm sure al-Mutawakkil means well, and good for him, but he's the one who's in error.
"The reason that Muhammed took up arms against the Quraysh was because they were preventing people from converting to Islam. It cannot logically hold that he would take up arms in defense of individual choice, and then deny it to others."
Logic? Of course it can "logically hold". The logical flaw in this analysis is the assumption that the motivating idea is individual choice. What if the motivation is that everyone must convert and if you prevent people from doing that then you must die?
Anon -- your logic fails because "peaceful Muslims" do nothing but cower in terror.
There is a certain element of truth in this -- not the "your logic fails" part but the "cower in terror" part.
Certainly, the violent are intimidating to those who are not particularly radical and would just like to get on with their lives. But you need to remember that Islamic terrorism kills far, far more Muslims than it does "infidels." In hot spots like Iraq and Afghanistan there are thousands of civilians killed by "jihadis" every year. (In Iraq it's several tens of thousands.) Even places like Jordan are not immune.
Under conditions like that, it's easy to see how a normal person would be intimidated and reluctant to publicly contradict the hard boys. We have the same problem in many gang-infested neighborhood in the U.S. Even here, many people are afraid to speak out because they don't want to be the next drive-by shooting victim.
All evidence suggests that the dominant and authentic voice of Islam is rooted in what the Jihadis say it is.
But the ironic thing is that Al-Khouly is actually speaking out against many of these Islamic excesses and he's still getting pilloried by the West. Yeah, he's got some odd ideas and he holds a number of positions that I think are outright wrong. Nonetheless, he's not a "radical jihadi" and he represents a strain of Islam that could probably rub along quite well with the West. You have to be objective and pragmatic about your definition of a "moderate Muslim." If you guys are expecting a "moderate Muslim" to be a cross between Thomas Jefferson and Mahatma Gandhi, you're going to be permanently disappointed.
Unlike the MEMRI excerpt, the full transcript shows that the exchange between Wafa Sultan and Al-Khouly was the Islamic equivalent of a debate between Madeleine Murray Ohare and Billy Graham. Al-Khouly is not a poster boy for enlightenment values but, then again, neither is Pat Robertson. I urge folks here to read the entire transcript and then discuss the implications of his religious views as a counter to the more problematic and radical strains of Islamic thought.
for the last few centuries at least the muslims and the christians have largely co-existed. Except for western colonial imperialism things have been pretty quiet. But now things are different. What could have caused this change to occur ? Perhaps the "few bad apples" defense should be applied here as well. We may have awoken a sleeping dragon when we supported these radicals in their fight in Afghanistan against the Russians.
Oh, choice! the big angry dog gives us a school on the meaning of the haditha!!!
here is a school for you, Christians.lol.
i wasn't aware you read arabic, Glen-san. ;)
what exactly do you think they do in madrassas'?
they argue constantly about the shades of meaning in various texts.
How about the Christian version?
In Sir Richard's Root of all Evil documentary, he interviews a colorado springs pastor, a supporter of abortion-doctor-murderer Tom Hill. The pastor unequivocably believes Tom Hill is in heaven. Tom believed he was going to heaven for executing the precepts of his faith. Just like a jihaadi, right?
Look at death row conversions. One of my born again friends told me (elaborated with many quotes from the bible) that executed murderers go to heaven as long as they accept Christ.
How is Tom Hill different in his ideology from Muhammed Atta?
Well, I'll explain it to you, and you can explain it to that funny old git Richard Dawkins. Excuse me, Sir Richard.
Both Atta and Hill were murderers who believed that their actions were sanctioned by God. In this respect they are quite alike.
Tom Hill believed that he was saving innocent lives by his murderous action, and that God would reward him for this. He was quite mistaken, as any Christian demonination could tell you, because Christian salvation is through repentance of sins, not through being proud of your sins. Also, Christians are expected to recognize their own sinful nature - not to wipe sin off the face of the earth, which would require univeral extinction.
Atta believed, on the other hand, that Allah would reward him precisely for killing innocent people. So do the suicide bombers who blow themselves up on Israeli buses. How many Muslims agree with this is unknown. However, a disturbing number of non-Muslims seem to find it perfectly understandable.
It is the centuries-old conlusion of Catholic and Protestant Christianity that murder is wrong, and that a man cannot be the instrument of his own salvation.
Your example of the death row inmate is different. Christianity does indeed teach that he can be saved: By repenting of his sins, not by committing more murders.
Atta believed he was saving innocent lives also, the lives of his tribe threatened in his view by the encroachment of the west. And he did not believe he was taking innocent lives. In the view of the fundamentalists, no westerners are innocent. Haven't you heard that?
Didn't you hear me at all? That pastor said Tom Hill was in heaven. He preaches it to his flock. He is encouraging more abortion-doctor-murders, isn't he?
I specifically asked my born-again friend about repentenance.
He said that was not neccessary.
Only faith.
Are you a born-again?
"Deuteronomy 21: 18-21
If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them:
Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place;
And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard.
And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die"
I dont know how you can read the old testament in particular without coming away thinking Yahweh is a jealous, cruel, warmongering, child killing, mass murderer- and i will provide quotes from god himself to prove it ("for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God" duet 5:9 etc).
Point is, throwing scripture in each others faces is useless. Lets talk about what people are advocating now.
You know, i just really resent the approach to Islam presented by IBD. There is no humility, no recognition of shared values, no acknowledgement that in the bad old days christians put the heathen to the sword with gusto and burnt scientists/heretics at the stake.
There is no genuine desire to learn. No desire to reach out and communicate.
All you want to do is lecture.
Matoko, although you bring it up in the form of tu quoque, you do raise a useful point.
The Old Testament harks back to a Judaism that was willing to convert / retain believers at the point of a sword. Between then and now, they had that notion kicked out of them by just about everyone. The verses stand, the practice changed.
Certainly the establishment church built on the New Testament had the same attitude towards spreading or defending the faith by force. As part of the Reformation, the Christian community had that kicked out of them as well, pretty much by each other. Some of the doctrine is still there, the practice changed.
Islam is obviously still the home of these attitudes, at least in part. They aren't compatible with a globalized world rife with the potential for mass murder. The notion of conversion / reversion by force is also going to get kicked out of the Islamic world, one way or another. Who will do it - Muslims themselves or outsiders?
I'd love to see and believe that it will be the former. That's not the track we're on, as we all know. If there's to be a meaningful discussion about options between 'Just get Osama' and 'Nuke them all', we need a scorecard - a who's who - some way of drawing distinctions for those who will never read Arabic or have an interest in the fine points of theological discussion. It's going to come down to an ability to decide between safe/not-safe to live alongside. And the distinctions must be drawn in an atmosphere poisoned by events like the cartoon jihad, the Afghan converso, the Dubai ports deal, sometimes contrived by extremists and always amplified by the MSM.
In that environment, CAIR deserves all the calumny and tough questions dished out by IBD. Their role hasn't been to limn meaningful distinctions, but to obfuscate. Small wonder, considering their patrons support and fund all too many believers in religion-by-force, and wish us not to notice. If you wish to help us understand useful distinctions, good on you. If you're interested in obfuscating the existence of that attitude in Islam, you're no more useful than CAIR.
#13 Matoko:
I recognize that in the bad old days Christians put the heathen to the sword with gusto, and burnt scientists and heretics at the stake. Also with gusto.
And we shouldn't forget it. Christians, and more generally, those who live in a Judeo-Christian tradition.
By the vengeful, anti-human-rights, absolutist, pre- (or anti-) Enlightenment standards of the Church of the Bad Old Days: how many of today's Christians are Good Christians?
We've already identified one, Tom Hill. I suppose the Phelps sect would qualify.
How many more? A majority of Americans? A plurality of Red-Staters? A significant rump of right-wing evangelicals?
Or a tiny minority?
> There is no genuine desire to learn. No desire to reach out and communicate. All you want to do is lecture.
Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander. The analogous questions as they pertain to Islam now matter, broadly. To Christians, Jews, Hindus, Bhuddists, secularists, atheists. And Muslims.
If you took a poll of the Ummah and asked IBD's questions, what range of answers would you get? Would only a tiny minority of Muslims give intolerant, pre-Enlightenment answers?
Re-read the comments at Stacy's blog (Al-Hiwar, linked in the main post) or where things get going at 'Aqoul. Enlightened Muslims are asking these questions about their own faith traditions. And a darn good thing, too.
I wonder if there is an impulse to circle the wagons 'round our own. If those outside the faith attack the Wahhibis, etc., then it's only a matter of time before they assault other Islamic traditions...and strangle internal efforts at reform in the process.
What the Muslim community (or communities) believes and does now matters greatly to the rest of the world. Perhaps it would be better if this was not so.
But it is. Outsiders' questions won't go away.
Tim Oren, you are like many in that you see Islam as a static entity. Granted, the uncreated, revealed, and perfect Qu'ran does make Islam more resistant to change.
But it is changing.
I wrote a post about that, you can read it if you like.
http://quantumghosts.bl*gspot.com/2006/02/tribological-interaction.html
the Cartoon jihaad, Abdul Rahman, even DPW (which bitterly disappointed me), are all part of the process of acculturation, cultures rubbing against each other.
I have no use for CAIR or any other identity politics organ.
I have more to say about these issues and the MEMRI translation, when Armed gets home from work and puts up my post.
BS, Matoko. I explicitly said that Islam will change, or be changed. The question is how and by whom. As with the other religions, the writings will remain, but they will be practiced differently.
I'll await with interest your explanation as to why I should be concerned about one word in a MEMRI translation, as opposed to the picture of Islam painted for the Western public by the Danish and Afghan affairs.
okfine. ;)
but mebbe armed will not like it enough to post.
Anon wrote: "Violent whackos use this to twist The Quran (and other sources of Islamic jurisprudence) to support their vision of violent struggle. Peaceful Muslims, by the same token, interpret these materials rather differently."
Your phraseology ("twist" vs "interpret") contains an unfair assumption that the extremists are misinterpreting the Koran. There is plenty of textual evidence in the Koran and the Hadiths to dispute your view.
Anon wrote: "Unfortunately, IBD is being pretty stupid."
You are grossly unfair to call IBD stupid. The question is not what ALL Muslims think, but what CAIR thinks. There is good reason to believe that CAIR is a terrorist front organization whose purpose is to excuse and defend Islamic extremists while attacking all who criticize extremism.
The question is not what ALL Muslims think, but what CAIR thinks.
Piffle. IBD is asking for definitive answers. There aren't any, any more than there are definitive answers as to what Christianity teaches about homosexuality or divorce.
Islam is not a religion of peace, it is just a religion. Its adherents can use it to justify all kinds of behavior they want to justify. This is neither unusual nor unique to Islam.
> Islam is not a religion of peace, it is just a religion. Its adherents can use it to justify all kinds of behavior they want to justify.
Yep. Hence the merits of the questions IBD addresses to CAIR. Other Muslims have some good answers. CAIR not so much.