Brahmin and Mullah

sigalph

``We will not waver, we w ill not falter, we will not fail. We will prevail because ultimately our cause is just``-George W. Bush

GOD BLESS AMERICA!!!

LOLOL

Mr. Sigalph allow me to thank you for this fit of hysterical laughter i just got over.

further to hobbytywho writes:

``Muslim conditioning welcomes no image of God, it`a almost sacreligious to suggest that an image of God is percieved by Muslims when they do pray to God. Perhaps you are not aware of the prohibition within Islam of any kind of religious icons.``

All very well.. and I honestly do believe that that is one of the more sublime, evolved teachings in Islam. However, that is not to say that the average Muslim (who, oddly, has no problems with references to the Almightly in anthropological terms such as ``Allah MiaN``) does not have some image of God.

The ideal is is not achieved by mere subscription to a belief, especially blindly. In fact, all meantion of God`s actions (created Man/ caused the Flood/sent the Quran) or sayings (``Thou shalt not [do this that and the other]``) -- all these things militate against the idea of an imageless God. Not for nothing did the Hebrew masters of yore insist that God cannot be known by any attributes; but only by what He/It is NOT!

To summarize... if the idol helps you perceive/experience the [your word for the `God` experience], the religious goal has been reached. Concepts/words, like idols are only the finger that points the way, not the Reality Itself, as the old Zen saying goes.

rgds,

PM

re. hobbyty #272

``What exactly is your position? Are you suggesting that Christians pray to Idols? If you are, You are wrong! ``

Ok.. If you say so. Guess I was under this crazy misconception that the idea of Jesus being God was idolatrous in the eyes of Muslims. Do forgive me my ignorance.

``Christians peasants are indebted to landlords in Punjab, not because of State policy or Islam.``

I was not sugesting that the latter was the case at all. Though...

``That they are Christians is incidental to the fact that they are poor, uneducated and unwilling or unable to make choices other than the indebtedness to the landlord, are not Muslim peasants in the same ring of fire?. So how is that discrimination against Christian peasants?``

If you are suggesting that the propensity for the local administration to look the other way when Christian peasants are raped is the same as when Muslim peassants suffer the same fate, then I cannot agree with you. Christain/Hindu peasants are doubly subjugated/discriminated against... first for being poor and then for being non-Muslim too.

I understand this is common knowledge among social workers in Pakistan.

rgds,

PM

PS.. about Allah and non-images... It takes Tibetian monks years of mental physical discpline to fathom the essence of Nothingness.. Glad to hear that every Muslim procaliming the inscrutability of Allah MiaN can accomplish this feat without such exercises in austerity.

Anarayan, if I read #250 right, did not draw aa distinction between imaged and imageless gods. It was between one`s that ha more than a mere conceptual hull (or name) and one`s that related to one`s EXPERIENCE of the transcendant, be it through fire, water, the air or the earth ... or anything else!

Too convoluted for your liking again? :) Well... religion is known to do strange thing to some minds :)

rgds,

PM

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Shankar babu,

I appriciate and reciprocate the ``peace``

Now the fireworks:

I am not implying that Caste is something that Hindus are proud of - on the other hand - there is no point trying to explain it away. It`s vile! We all know that and we all agree on that. If we just outlaw it but keep it within the teaching that make up Hinduism, we will be evading a national debate (indeed, India has made great strides in almost all other fields - except this) - It is this debate that will open the Hindu masses to opinions that till present, remain among a small number of persons. Trust me when I tell you that the consequences of such a debate will be felt in, and make an impression in Pakistan as well.

Be assured, I in no way, want to be associated with persons or ideas that suggest, that not just Hindus, but all persons, are other than the creation of God. On the other hand expect a reaction when Islam is debased merely for the purpose of debasing it. (as if Muslims need help with that!)

You must know by now, that when I say Islam, I`m not talking of the petty magic and personal power plays, that is passing itself off to uneducated persons as Islam. I hope you really do know that about the position I am taking. I remain open to informed, constructive criticism, preferably debate, not Egalitarian`s ``polemic``, but this criticism has a framework that is different from that of Hinduism. You may argue why different?

I had requested that you consider the implications of the word faith in relation to Islam. Hinduism does not require the same kind of faith, nor does it have the same relationship with redemption, and directly with forgiveness and the Allmighty- that is why I suggested that we can not compare these two on the same terms, they are structured differently.

In Islam, God is not a personage, has no physicality or visage - he is perfection, rather creation is his creation.

The word of God is itself perfect, by definition.

Is Islam perfect, yes it hold itself to be pefect. Islam says it is perfect, if one were a believer, one would not have problem accepting that. And tell me who wants to be an adherent of an imperfect religious faith? Think about it? As am example, will a person hold, that in ones search for a religious faith that will connect the person to the universe, one would knowingly choose a religion that claims it is anything other the word of God, perfect, all knowing, all seeing, the creator of the universe? Can there be any other option? Weak example follows: If one buys a car, does one buy one that does not work?If an adherent comes to the conclusion that his or her religion is imperfect, they can leave the particular religious community.

This is not to say that I do not take your point about messages becoming diluted over time, the Islamic remedy is that the word of God is eternal and preserved in his Book. Listen, I`m not suggesting you or anyone else believe, but if you or anyone is going to berate a religious sentiment, simply for the sake of berating it, expect a reaction.



Why then are there schisms in Islam, because people, Muslims are not perfect, personalities and historic events have brought about schisms. Please read How Quran says the unitary word of God will be split into many sects, and that many Muslims will be led astray. Similarly the sects within Christianity and Judaism. Why must non-Muslims accept the perfection of Islam? They do not have to, if they did they would be Muslims.

By all means scrutinze (give me spell checker, please) Pakistani social mores, State policies, even religious interpretations and scholars - you will find more Pakistani giving opinions than Indians -Please refrain from attacking Islam, The Quran or the person of the holy messenger. These are non negotiable. It`s not that it will crumble under the attack, but that it will injure closely, deeply held sensibilities and what does it accomplish other than giving injury? Nothing is served, only injury done.

Have you ever read the Quran? I realize it does not make for light reading, (on the other hand it might) but it is a book, it can`t hurt to simply read it as a book.

About your why I got angry - believe it or not, I wrote my original post because of a very similar reaction caused by similar posts, only the antagonists were different.

By the way - I must admit, the abusing stuff was fun - liberating even - but lets not have too much fun.

Egalitarian Brahmim (something that never existed)

India was partitioned not broken - try and follow along - Partition acknowledges ownership - ``broken`` does not.

Next time you think you can polute and dump on Islam and Muslims, first look into your own dirty arm pit of a country, and be REMINDED, not only of who you are but that many others in India are seeking a better way, not just Kashmiris or the 5 other armed rebellions in India:

Washington Post/ Sunday July 8, 2001

``Unhappy with the State they`re in``

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/world31703

sorry for the personal thing -

hobbytv,

You dont seem to hear me. Caste system is NOT OK for hindus. It was created by Manu, who, by no means is a revered figure in Hinduism. Maybe his experiment in sociology made sense in his era; but it cursed Hinduism forever & we are still paying for that failed experiment. Hindus have been trying to change it; unfortunately with slow progress.

Eventhough the caste system still persists, unfortunately, things have changed a lot since independance. I have cursed my fate for being born a brahmin. I had to bust my butt to get into medical school, whereas a person from a backward caste had 25% seats reserved for him. All he had to do was scrape through premed to become a doctor. The same goes for any professional education in any field or government job. Since most of India`s job bank is still under the public sector, a huge number of dalits have risen through the ranks in white collared jobs. It makes the Affirmative Action program in the US look tepid.

Does that mean the problem is solved? Heck no, far from it. It will take many decades to change prejudices of people. However, as more & more dalits become educated professionals, their castes will no longer be looked as that of ``bhangis``. Better still, I hope caste will become irrelevant, some day. One of my brothers married a dalit, his classmate in medical school. Do you think the brahmin pujari refused to marry them in a vedic ceremony (or worse yet, take a bath because he was near my sis-in-law)?!--heck no! Do you think any of our relatives boycotted the marriage?!--heck no. Just like middle class families in Pakistan, middle class Indians are more concerned about the girl/boy`s educational status, whether his/her family is of a similar socio-economic background etc etc.

India`s middle class/ literate class has increased tremendously since independance. With education, people tend to be more broad minded & tolerant. However, since there are still more illiterate people (not to mention bigotted literate people), there is still intolerance. But things have definitely improved. To say that the majority of hindus look down on lower castes is like saying the majority of Pakistanis are jehadi fundos. Please try & change your prejudices of us, while we try to change our prejudices of you.

The important thing to remember is Hindus are acutely aware of the problems in our religion & are making changes. I dont recall hindus saying ``our religion is perfect``.

Maybe you & I arent thinking on the same frequency. Lets see. Maybe you are saying Islam is perfect because it is the literal word of God. So muslims maybe imperfect human beings, but Islam (the religion) is perfect. Ok, I can understand that.

But if it is perfect, why has Islam split into several sects? It seems to me, just like Christianity, the interpretation of God`s word differs, depending upon which scholar is studying the Koran. Should God`s word be interpreted literally? should it be interpreted figuratively? Are you willing to say that the Ahmedis, Shias (if you are Sunni) etc etc are practising an imperfect form of Islam? Hence I often hear this debate as to who is a ``real`` muslim & who isnt.

If a parent gives two brothers the same message, isnt it possible/likely that that message could be interpreted differently by the two brothers?Then who (other than God Himself) has the wisdom to say which son is correct? Now multiply that with several brothers. All these brothers & their children are fighting (& sometimes killing) each other by saying ``I`m a better son of God than you are``.

Kinda takes away the perfection out of the religion, does`nt it? Or maybe I should say; when the religion of Islam was delivered by God to the Prophet (pbuh) it was perfect. I will definitely accept that as true. Unfortunately, when it passed down from one generation to the next, human nature kinda destroyed its purity. I wont single out only Islam for that criticism. Its happened to every religion.

I got angry for one main reason. The bottom line was some muslim posters on this thread implied that we hindus are the children of a ``lesser God``. I find that highly offensive. Remember this, when you criticise the social problems or the philosophy of my religion; I will turn around & tell you, first clean up the mess in your religion before you tell us whats wrong with our religion.

Needless to say, the same goes to us hindus as well. We have NO right to think we are better than you because we dont agree with everything your religion says or how muslims behave. Lord knows, our house is quite messy.

Peace

Anarayan 250

You are mistaken! No image comes to my mind when I think of the word Allah or God.

But I understand (I think) why you think what you do. It is because that is your conditioning, and the frequent use of icons and imagery in your religion.

Muslim conditioning welcomes no image of God, it`a almost sacreligious to suggest that an image of God is percieved by Muslims when they do pray to God. Perhaps you are not aware of the prohibition within Islam of any kind of religious icons. We, shamefully, tend to take the injuction against engraven images very seriously, yet, do not take seriously the injuctions against, lying, cheating, decieving and the like. Shame on us.

Egalitarian Brahmin (a contradiction in terms?)

My post on the caste must have touched an exposed nerve - There is nowhere to hide! I want the truth about your caste system and it`s relationship with your religion! And I want the truth of the discrimination and degradation this system has brought upon tens of millions of human beings!

When will you and those who believe like you in the caste system, muster the courage to provide some honest answers?

Who do you think you are fooling? You are still the coward who does plagerize and attempts to mask his hostility towards Islam and Muslims.

Some of you Indians, who mouth the word secular, have no deep realization of the meaning of the word - To persons such as yourself it is only a convenient mask. Secularism never, learn, never, was meant to be anti religion, any religion. You idiots do not realize that this concept had it`s origins in the Christian protestant movement, how could it be anti-religion. Even after two hundred years persons such as yourself are still stuck in the the monkey see monkey do mentality. Shame on you!

The cowardice of wanting to suggest that caste are really sects (Shia, Sunni) - Still not the courage to discuss caste - now you back peddle -

nowhere to hide, you and people like yourself have a choice, live like mice, avoiding the light of reason on your caste system, which is a corner stone of your religion, or live like humans, let air and shed light on the caste system and it`s connection to Hinduism - When you can do that, you can come talk to the rest of the world about what a tolerant bunch you are. In the mean time, I charge you and all those who will not reject the caste system, with having institutionalized discrimination, with inhumanly holding in cruel servitude, millions of your co-religionists and fellow humans. Shame on you for even justifying it by trying to explain it.

btw, Sorry for the personal attack. See, tolerance. polemic? First try and under the meaning of the word before you abuse it.



PM

What exactly is your position? Are you suggesting that Christians pray to Idols? If you are, You are wrong!

Christians peasants are indebted to landlords in Punjab, not because of State policy or Islam.

That they are Christians is incidental to the fact that they are poor, uneducated and unwilling or unable to make choices other than the indebtedness to the landlord, are not Muslim peasants in the same ring of fire?. So how is that discrimination against Christian peasants?

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TAhmed:

Here, I have to intervene. After a long time, I feel that you have hit the nail right on the head. Dammit, great job :-)!

I can write a lot more on that, but I am glad that you realized what was going on. Remember, I told you a while back that you are simply wasting your time. Sometimes the effort is worth it and sometimes it ain`t.

Kind Regards.

[Standing Ovation]

tahmed321 #268
Personal insults? What took you so long, sleeping on the job perhaps?

Are all chowkwallahs cowards like yourself or someone will admit that nonMuslims cannot be considered equal to Muslims in the general religious tradition?

Apparently its OK to keep abusing Hindu culture as the root of Pakistani problems, but bringing up the perfections of Islam is off limits for the infidels(who ought to shut up and take the cr-p and the blame for your sorry selves).

Sadna #246 : ``if Islam says that a nonMuslim can never be the equal of a Muslim, ``

This begs the question: does Islam say what you says it says? The answer to the begged question is: No. This must be the umpteenth time I have reminded you to stop writing your bs about Islam or Pakistanis. Doesnt do any good. I think your head is made of wood and you are incapable of understanding this. Instead of wasting months and months on Chowk and learning nothing (as is true in your case), I think you should try to improve your IQ by having your village barber transplant your brain with that of a cockroach.

MastRam # 76

I wouldn’t want to get involved in conservatives vs. liberals argument here… I would also like to stay away from discussion of liberal democracies vs. illiberal democracies… These matters have been discussed to death on this site with very little progress towards identifying the real problems that we face in South Asia. Coming back to the questions you pose in your letter, let us not just talk about an economically “just” society… Let us move on and talk about an egalitarian society.

I believe that an in-egalitarian democracy is vulnerable to the alienation which arises from deep inequalities, and the sense of neglect and indifference that easily arises among abandoned minorities. This, I believe, is what is happening to Indian democracy right now. And that is why democratic societies cannot be and should not be too in-egalitarian.

In societies like the USA where a considerable chunk of the society is made up of people who, as you point out, regard equality and liberty as contradictory terms / aims, a balance is achieved by adopting egalitarian policies with redistributive effect (and to some extent also with redistributive intent). Yes, some turn out like Bill Gates and, and yet, some like the homeless guy on the pavement. But the opportunities are there for everybody to turn out like Bill Gates.

jntuece99 #78

[But I am afraid you have generalized a little too much about India.]

May be.

[But we are moving ahead. You might have noticed that there are only some pockets in India where this happens. Many other volatile places in India remained peaceful.]

I don’t disagree with you there. But in a truly democratic, secular society which India claims to be, incidents such as Gujrat massacre are totally unacceptable... The least Indian Government can do is sack Mr. L.K. Advani (we know he doesn’t have the decency to resign) for his involvement with Hindu extremists. That would be a good start if India really wants to move ahead.



shammi #104

[Fairdinkum, have you ever visited India?]

Yes, on more than one occasion… my last visit to India was relatively recently… about a year ago…



Romair #73
[Just wondering if you could give an update in what is going on in Pakistan. How has working in Pakistan been? Any changes from before.....]

Romair: Hi.

Well, prior to my current experience, I had never worked in Pakistan before… So, it was a bit shocking… but now I am beginning to get the hang of things i.e. work ethics, and work culture etc. Things are not as bad as they might appear to many of us in the west or even in the middle east. I wouldn’t advise anybody to invest their life savings in a tech. based business in Pakistan though.

The changes I have noticed:
- McDonalds, KFC, Subway, Pizza Hut everywhere… revolting stuff.
- generally speaking people don’t follow politics and power play with much enthusiasm…
- women in the cities wear sleeveless.
- They go out on dates.
- Every now and then, we have musical concerts in all major cities…
- women dance and so do men…it is shown on ptv and its no big deal for anybody.

What is more frequent than musical concerts, is massacre of people in mosques and targeted and random killings of shias… and that is no big deal either.

Urstruly,

I have run out of time and energy :(
Will write to u tomorrow.

re urstruly #120:

You can`t keep away your dirty hands even from charity organizations. Here is the breakdwon for the 3 organizations that you allege spend ``80%`` of their collections on administrative and collection expenses.

American red cross: 17%

United way : 9%

Unicef : 11%

For reference purposes checkout www.give.org

If ones preference is for particular charities be it Edhi or Burney`s trust thats fine. Making up figures is not.

For a more substansive discussion of charities worth giving and those to avoid, check out the current issue of Worth magazine(Nov 2001). I think the list is online too.

later

-sac

#: 242

MT

To Schmuck / Klutz

No religion has to descend to the levels of the Cola empire to quote numbers and say they are th best. That is akin to a Tobacco company claiming superiority based upon numbers.

If somebody has to stoop to numbers to justify their (sic) greatness , then you have lost my attention.Why should somebody care whether there is one god or there is a multitude of them. Where is the evidence. Live for here for now , there is no need to instill fear into people about sins, the hereafter etc. and then leave them with your ``singular choice``. ( eg. AmReeka wight be presented with a liberal version , SE ASia might see the traditional desert version that is reserved for babarians I suppose).

As far as numbers go , I am cynical as are many others, a considerable portion could be through reproduction and many might be led the `` * * * * * *`` way by many inducements.

So prove that the only God is the only god that exists etc. and then beat your chests with your pride.



Reply #: 242

MT

Damn i lost ur attention???How heart-breaking indeed!.MT i wasnt really trying to gain ur attention anyway.

why should`nt one call his/her religion the best??i wasnt being proud (though i am proud to be a muslim), i was just stating the fact.As many muslims will agree with me. Well maybe it doesnt matter to u if there is one God or not.... but it does to me and many other ``HUMAN BEINGS`` (not only muslims)

re. klutz #260

``Our country doesnt try to curb minorities rights.I believe they are treated fairly by the govt. ...We dont go around killing people of other religions!!Our muslim brothers dont go around raping women from other religions!!! No one really cares about what muslims are going through...``

There may be a grain of truth in that last sentence, but you have to ask yourself why this might be the case with Muslims and not with say Buddhists, Hindus, Jews or Confucists...

Also, a trip to the Punjab countryside where the workers (tied down by lifelong loans to feduals) are predominantly Christian should reveal you ignorance of the extent to which Christain women are routinely raped, without any chance of redress, as the local administration is firmly in the hands of the feudals themselves.

Alternatively, a copy of one of Amesty Internationals reports could serve to fill those gaps in your knowledge.

As for Muslims not persecuting Minorites, is the blasphemy law almost always not invoked against Christians and Quaidianis -- OR Shiahs, who in the eyes of the persecuters anyway, are not Muslim?

rgds,

PM