Inzi Post-Bob: An Interview

khurram:

``You think all the mullahs went to Al-Azhar``

No, some of them have also gone to Oom, Deoband and even Karachi`s Binori Town Madrassa. :)

Hamidm/Dost Mittar: My additional two cents on the subject:

dost mittar writes I went into a couple of mosques in Delhi and found copies of English translations of the Quran which gave verses of the quran along with explanations of a wahabi type, frequently with the help of ahadith. I tried to obtain a copy of it from the bookstore attached to the mosque but learnt that they were not for sale and were only provided free to mosques by the Saudi embassy.

This Saudi propaganda is indeed one of the less discussed issues in newspapers etc. - however, this has been a major factor in replacing the Quran with the Hadees and Sharia (the tools for replacing democracy with kingship, by effectively making the ruler unaccountable to the people and enveloping the ruler in a de facto divine role (as mullah literally did by enveloping himself in a blanket he claimed belonged to the prophet), which of course is the anti-thesis of the Quran.

The fundamental problem - the reason the hadees and sharia finds fertile ground in India (and Pakistan, and in muslim countries elsewhere) is of course the same mindset which causes people to think that by sacrificing a goat on eid is that they will somehow be able to bribe a deity to intervene on their behalf. Such customs may traditionally have been innocuous (except for the goat in question), but have proved disastrous in today`s world where they provide an easy refuge to weak minds seeking to escape the confusion and uncertainty caused by a rapidly changing world.

Also note that the worst acts of terrorism are in fact conducted by ``muslims`` who in fact are totally different from the lota-wielding abdul that Hamidm brings up. Thus, the 9/11 terrorists were clean-shaven babus - and some of them (per newspaper reports) visited a striptease joint on their way to commit their murderous deed. Hardly the actions of a pious man. What they have in common with the lota-wielding abdul (or indeed in milder form those who think that by performing the hajj they will magically wash away their sins, or those millions who focus on rituals rather than on substance) is merely the same irrational mindset which leads them to the same confused and ignorant view of the message of Islam, of politics, economics and everything else.

khurram:

``They have to, or else they wil be sidelined as nominal muslims.
If you argue from outside Islam then you change the debate to Islam vs. some other universal value system.``

Not necessarily. Let me give some concrete examples: Lahoris love fun and they are at their boisterous best during the Basant festivities. Some mullahs have objected to it and they have been sidelined by simply saying that people need to have fun and it`s good for tourism. But if someone were to argue whether Basant is permissible in Islam or not, I suggest that Mullahs would win because they would undoubtedly find a link between Basant and some obscure or not so obscure Hindu god or goddess. Similarly, there seems to be an emerging trend towards yoga in some circles in Pakistan. But if one has to defend it as permissible according to islam, one may be hard put as the origins of yoga are certainly associated with the worship of Sun and other gods; thus practising yoga would be akin to practising shirk. To give an example from non-islamic world, blood transfusion could be in trouble if Jehovah Witnesses strict interpretation of the practice is to be challenged on religious, rather than medical ground.

#78 by kaalchakra/#79 by dost-mittar

When we debate on `moderates`, we have to see whether they exist. And if they do, who are they?

I had posted this a while ago on some board. This is very significant because only once we agree who`s an extremist and who`s a moderate, only then we can go forward.

Do see below as to whether there`s a difference between the so-called `moderates` and the so-called `extremists` inside Muslim countries. This survey does not cover expatriate populations whom have their own interests to protect which is obvious:

... bigger chart here:

Re #82, dost-mittar,
The vast majority of Lahoris celebrating Basant actually consider it permissible in Islam. And you will find a group of `mullahs` supporting it too. That is the `official` postion too. In Pakistan, govt. can`t get away with saying that something is against Islam but let`s do it for tourism etc.
Same with yoga and blood transfusion. Some people can argue that they are not permissible in a religious tradition. Others can argue from within the same tradition that they are permissible. Why do you presume that the 2nd group will lose? You are making a pre-judgement in favor of one group.

Re: # 87

captain cluless,

...... instead of wastng our time and valuable cyberspace you could have simply said ``the jews are responsible for 9/11 and all the mayhem in the world !`` .......... personally, i think it is all bcause of the lttle green men who just landed in you back yard .......

Re: # 87

Religious thoughts and beliefs offer value in human development, and will remain needed within the confines of individuals. Institutionalized religion is under threat. It has been 600 years since the last religious institution was created. These institutions played role to deliver more believers and in accumulating wealth and power.

With the rise of economic power and spread of education outside these institutions, their power has eroded. Roman Catholic Church saw its power reduced, except among the poor. Shankaracharyas delivered India to Hinduism almost 1,500 years ago, and nothing else. Lately, institutionalized Islam has not delivered anything other than terrorism. Many will dispute this, but which institution has ever owned the responsibility for doing harmful things, unless it is defeated. Only when the U.S. is seeing a defeat in Iraq that it is recognizing Iraq war was not about democracy.

That institutionalization of Islam is so easy, is one of the most intriguing aspect that any terrorist or disgruntled Muslim can create a terror institution. Even the right wing attackers in Oklahoma Bombing could not create such institution of massive power and reach. LTTE cannot either.

There is something very deadly in Fatwa, Jihad and easy oil money. These two words and concept have no other parallel in creation of institutions of death and destruction, and turning the world against all that is good in Islam. Sadly, people who could make the difference think that the fault lies in Israel or elsewhere.

Even in war, a proactive strategy works. So what, even if the fault lies in Israel or elsewhere. What is Islam’s answer, as it is portrayed to be Islam’s answer - not Palestinian answer or Arabic answer. Why all such answers have Jihad and Fatwa?

The first reform in Islam should be to get rid of these concepts. They have no value in modern societies. They hurt Islam more than even the act of OBL.

Dost-mittar #: There is a return to religion, quite a few places in the world.........It is showing its face through different means..........In India, USA, the Muslim world etc.......I think it will show up in China soon also, as it becomes more free.........And Russia also....I think the philosophical contradictions of secularism are coming to the forefront and people are being forced to chose between religion and athiesm.......And at a political level, many people are chosing religion...........

Religiously conservative forces now completely control politics in USA....Had Bush not screwed it up for them, it would be impossible for Democrats to win anything, as USA is fully in control of the Evangelicals and Religious Right.........BJP has the strongest or second strongers votebase in India.......Religious parties in many, if not most, Muslim countries will win outright elections......Pakistan, is infact, an exception in this case......Turkey, Egypt, Algeria, Palestine, Lebanon, Iran, Saudi Arabia etc. fall under religious political influence....

Europe is the only place where religion is going down......

The actual reasons behind the current, ``microscope`` on Muslims has little to do with jihad etc....It has more to do with the influence of Israel in US politics, which has now lead to a conflict between USA and Arabs, which is spreading out to all Muslims.......Had there been jihad carried out against the Sri Lankan govt., I doubt anyone would have bothered and there would have been no microscope.....However, since the USA is iinvolved, the publicity is huge.......

I don`t see this ending, for the simple reason that it is not a one-sided conflict......Regardless of how much the USA media tries to portray it, as such....It is not, as if, Muslims are Arabs started fighting the USA......Quite the other way around......Israel occupied land, killed Arabs, who then fought back, and were attacked by USA and so on.....

So, I don`t see how this cycle is going to end, until Israel and USA stop killing Arabs and other Muslims.......I don`t see that happening anytime soon, because the geopolitics are such that USA will keep bombing Muslim countries and Israel will keep occupying Palestine.......

....There is another factor you are not considering......You are looking at everything from an expat point of view......The only Muslims who are under scrutiny are expat Muslims........It is only their lifestyles which are affected by these conflicts.......They constitute a microscopic % of the total Muslims in the world........The Muslims who remain in their own country are not too bothered about how their actions affect the ex-pat Muslims.......Hence, they have no motivation to tone their end of the violence.......

If a guy yells, ``Go Ahmadinijad`` in USA, he could get hunted down.....However, if he yells it any Muslim country, he would be cheered.......I am not sure what would happen if he yelled it in India........

I think this vicious circle is going to keep growing.......Just the killings in Iraq by the USA, must have created tens of thousands of angry Arabs, whose family members have died........They are probably ready to carry out some violence against the USA, UK etc.......

Their motivation through religion will be about as much as Bush`s motivation through religion (or Vajpayee`s etc.), i.e........their main aim will be political or personal, and it will be channeled through religion........Not the other way around, as you are suggesting........

So, the moral of the story is that tahmad, hamidm, you or anyone else (moderate, athiest or otherwise) is not going to be able to do much.......If every moderate Muslim in the world got up and started singing, it wouldn`t do much to convince the guy whose brother has been killed by an F-16 fired rocket..........That guy is going to want revenge, and at the moment the path to revenge he sees is through religiously motivated militant factions..........

My guess is that, as this circle gets bigger, the USA will keep bombing one Muslim country after another.........And militant Islamic factions will continue to target US airplanes, buidlings etc........until one day there will be a nuclear explosion in New York........

If the profile of the 9/11 hijackers is correct, they had more in common with hamidm, then with OBL.........Hence the solution to all this does not lie in moderate Muslims doing anything.......They are nothing, but innocent bystanders......It is a political problem and the solution lies in a two-state Palestine-Israel resolution..........

Re: # 89


captain,

......... let me remind you what you said :``I don`t see how this cycle is going to end, until Israel and USA stop killing Arabs and other Muslims..`` .......... i guess you blame it on the bahais living in both these countries ....... but, like i said before, i still believe that little green men are to blame for all the ills that afflict abdul and his camel ...........

hamidm2 mian#: .....I believe I never mentioned Jews anywhere in my post........You seem to see them everywhere.......

......I did mention your good friend W........And yes, I do think he is responsible for much of the violence in the world.......I am not the only one......Most of the world thinks so.....There are, individuals, other than him, who are also responsible for some of the violence also....OBL is one of these.....

Hence, an end to this violence involves controlling people like yourself, who have wholeheartedly supported W.......It is this support which has resulted in more violence than anything else.......I thus find it odd, when you are lecturing others on non-violence and moderation.......And end to violence also involves controlling people who support OBL.......However, on this site, I have yet to run into anyone who supports OBL.........If you know of someone, kindly point it out........

In any case, I don`t see how this circle of violence will be solved until the Israel-Palestine issue is resolved.........The rest of us are mere bystanders in this war with you and W on one side and OBL and his version of you on the other........

Personally, I am neither with us nor against us, and would be more than happy if W and OBL blew each other up.......I, myself, however, would like to stay as far away from their war as possible, as I don`t want to get caught in the crossfire.........That, I think, is the best policy for every country and individual.......

hamidm2 #89: ``......... let me remind you what you said :``I don`t don`t see how this cycle is going to end, until Israel and USA stop killing Arabs and other Muslims.``

Yes, I did say that......Now where in the world did you see the word, ``Jew`` in there?.......Perhaps you should stop extrapolating, as you are not too good at it.......A friendly suggestion to you: It`s about time, you pulled your head out of your rear, rather than perpetualy telling everyone else to pull their heads out.......

Wake up!.......Bill O`Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, Wolfowitz, Feith, Gonzalez, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Pearle are out of fashion now....Your neo-cons lost......Their ideas are going down the drain......I tried to highlight the inabilities of W to you years ago.......You did not listen......You bet on the wrong horse...Look what that has done to you and to the Republican party.......The world is far more violent now than it ever was.......Even US`s own think tanks are stating that......As are Israel`s........

Israel and USA are two political entities.........And I do think, this violence is not going to end, until these two entities stop their killings........I am not highlighting the correctness or incorrectness of their killings.......I am simply stating a simple fact.......I am not the only one who thinks that......I think much of the world thinks that.........This, of course, does not justify any terrorism against them........But lets not be too naive and lets accept the fact that they have committed extensive amounts of state terrorism, and have killed orders of magnitude more individuals through state terrorism than they have lost........

All this violence and terrorism did not spring up from thin air........It is part of a political cycle........A cycle, which has its basis in Israel and Palestine.........That is the catalyst........Now it has grown to an extent, where whole countries are being bombed and attacked and whole skyscrapers are being blown up.......Don`t you think this has something to do with it.....

Or do you really think it is actually based on Dost-mittar`s interpretation of a few verses in a holy book? Do you also think the Sikhs blew up the airliner in Canada, because of Guru Granth, or was it because of the politics of Punjab....Do you think the Tamil Tigers are blowing themselves up because of the Hindu Vedas or because of the politics of Sri Lanka?

One can expect such incoherent commentary from the US politicians and radio talk show hosts, but one would expect something more coherent from you..........After all, you are something more than a naive American.......You spent time in Lahore.........

bulleya#87:

Nobody is forcing people to choose between atheism and religion - within Hindu religion itself, there are dozens of in-between possibilities and, if my undestanding of that religion is correct, one can be a Hindu and an atheist at the same time. But I do agree that people in general are becoming more religious. Hopefully, it is just a phase.

But comparing what is happening in the Islamic world to what is happening in other religions is akin to our desi folks saying that there is corruption in every society (Enron in the US, sponsorship scandal in our own country). Rahul Dravid has not taken to doing a knotty tuft of hair (choti) or trying to convert Zaheer Khan or Pathan). Yes, the BJP is a force in India and it certainly has an anti-muslim bias but I dont remember any BJP leader digging into the vedas to seek support for itself. And while the evangelicals are a force to reckon with in the US, very few of them invoke Biblical prophecies for the Middle East to support Bush.

NFP @66: Hate is a pretty strong word, a lot of people just found it boring, unoriginal and not very representative of your fiction writing skills. So is this what you`re going to be doing from now on? Is this truly the end of the ``Cactus Gas`` days? :(

Zeemax

People are not yet ready to hear that words don`t possess invariant meanings across different national, religious, and cultural boundaries.

For now we are stuck believing that a Chinese moderate is the same as an Indian moderate, the same as a Pakistani moderate, the same as an American moderate, the same as a Saudi Arabian moderate, and so on. Also a Budhist moderate is the same as a Christian moderate, a Hindu moderate, an Islamic moderate, a Jain moderate, and so forth.

What psychological hurdle keeps people from empirically (or theoretically) investigating this assumption isn`t easy to understand...It`s just far easier (and for some strange reason, more `moral`) to assume sameness and to keep abusing/deriding/fighting against everyone than to acknowledge divergent intergroup individual and social requirements, better learn what such differences are, and to use that understanding to construct creative solutions to the problem of sharing a common earth.

How misdirected and distorted our sense of `right` and `wrong` can get! Endless discussions, and nothing remotely like a common language!!

Re: # 96

Romair:

I understand your question. All I answer is to me even a single death is too high a price to pay. Therefore, death can be a measure. Your question indicates that you measure destruction and severity in terms of deaths, whereas I do not.

My yardstick is more complex and measures destruction and severity more accurately in terms of factors that affect civilian society, like economic, social, education and development.

My thesis is that Institutionalized religions have been harmful and have always used religious thoughts and values to benefit for the few for deliverance of believers, accumulation of power and wealth. Horror and ghastly stories of corruption, misuse of power and wealth included in their history.

It so happens that Institutionalized Islam is right now under pressure and that upsets many people who in my mind should take responsibility and help preserve great values of Islamic thoughts, and not hesitate in discarding the indefensible.

Do you agree with me that Fatwa and Jihad are the concepts that are hurting Islam more than anything? If so, then what are you doing as a responsible follower of Islam? Why answer to Palestinian problem must be found from Islamic tenets, or in terms of Fatwa and Jihad?

Why would you not reject these, are you afraid someone will stop calling you Muslim? Even if someone does, then why must your religion should care for what others call you, as long as you are happy to call yourself Muslim.