Islam in Crisis (part 1)

temporal #39

>>for me it is not kosher to allege that a 1500 year old belief system justifies or even condones an act that in essence is relatively only a modern phenomena…
>>

Jihad, killing of innocents, declaring others Kafirs, violence began with Muhammad. Nothing modern to Islamic violence.

#19
no_more

you know what..you seem to carry a closeted admiration of islam deep down..your hateful outbursts kinda reveal that..so try to be a little sophisticated next time, like your comrades arjun and sameer.

Thank you for a superb article Mr. Talib. Those of us who call ourselves Muslims have a duty to not only defend Islam against Western mis-conceptions, but foremost we must ourselves examine what is it that allows our religion to be high-jacked by the likes of OBL. Islam is in crises. I am looking-forward to Part2 of your thesis to see what solutions you propose .

Sameer #3
QuantumQuark #31:

addressing the writer of this article I wrote:

…"an abdication of intellectual responsibility``…directly lays the blame at the Muslims…perhaps it would be better had you replaced Islam in Crisis with Muslims in Crisis…

sameer you say: “temporal: I would rather agree with the author in saying about Islam in crisis instead of Muslims in crisis.”

…think it is clear from above that am questioning the author not making a statement of preference or choice.


i agree with both of you on one count… any faith or belief and its adherers are so intertwined that it is mostly difficult to distinguish one from the other on a public forum…but since this appears to be both a scholarly attempt as well as an individual’s quest it is important for individual views to be taken into view as well…

sameer re: …”the worse the (living) conditions are for the practitioner the better the grounds for the growth of orthodoxy and fundamentalism” …you call it ‘chicken and egg situation’ and yet go on to disagree?

for me it is not kosher to allege that a 1500 year old belief system justifies or even condones an act that in essence is relatively only a modern phenomena…

terrorism against innocents perpetuated by individuals (hamas, lashkar et all) or states (Israel, the US, India, Russia) has to be condemned…i agree with you…but am not going to paint the entire past of the faith for the deeds of the few in this period…

rgds,

t

mohar11 #28 you write ``I am NOT prejudiced against muslims - I have NO reasons to be.``
Your posts speak for themselves.
You continue: ``Neither is the author, Mr. Talib, whose views I emphatically agree with.``
You imply that I am categorizing Mr. Talib with you. I have in fact applauded him for his excellent article (see my post below). I am sorry I have to say this, but you are merely being deceiptful.

mohar11 #28 as for the rest of your post, you write ``You guys chose to fight mullahs and militants on their own terms - by reciting verses and pontificating how Islam means peace and how the kafirs can never understand the beautiful religion of Islam.``
I never called anyone a ``kafir``, and indeed I have always stressed that being a muslim is no big deal, and the Quran teaches respect for all faiths. Nor have I ever said that kafirs cannot understand islam. So once again, you put words in my mouth. Next time, I suggest you cut and paste what i have written and then tell me if you agree or disagree with it.
You also call me a ``self-styled liberal`` - i have never used this meaningless label on anyone, let along myself.
As for your sarcastic remarks about ``beautiful religion of Islam``, this just reveals your hatred for Islam that you just denied in the beginning of your post.

#31 by QuantumQuark wrote :

``Ras said: ``It appears that Islam is not in crisis but that some Muslims always are .``

Isn`t a religion composed of both the belief and its believers?
PS,

I can understand the ephemeral ``Temporal`` is destined to ignore time or the human dimension in this case. What`s the reason for your abstraction Ras?``

Not much abstraction here, just reality. Islam has many facets and a
rainbow of thought amongst its believers. A fanatical minority has
been given the most coverage by a fanatical western media looking to
sell a more regressive product.

In an earlier article I had written that ``Islam is a religion and not a profession``. There have been and are some Muslims who have converted the religion into a profession, and unfortunately we in America
are not immune to their presence. It is this group that derives its strength from the the misery of other Muslims and it fanatical about
its interpretation of the scriptures.

Ras

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nazarhayatkhan #24
Not agreeing with #30, I find your questions very good. Where ever Hinduism is like Islam, discriminating against others, teaching them hatred of others, teaching fanatical violence, it must change or others must force Hinduism to change if Hindus are wanting others to respect them.

Can you respect Hinduism if it teaches discriminating against others, hatred against others, teaching fanatical violence in the name of God? Problems with Islam have become so big that they must be done work on immediately. Others will also have to do thinking and correcting work on their religions before they become hopeless and violent cults like Islam.

Do Mohammad (peace never be upon him) and Islam deserve the respect of nonMuslims?

Do Nazism and Hitler deserve the respect of Jews?

To discriminate on the basis of #religious# dogma, to deprive others of their rights, to kill on the basis of #religious# beliefs, and to demand the victims` respect.

This is what is a cult.

Re: #1 By Temporal and #18 by Ras

Temporal said: ``…perhaps it would be better had you replaced Islam in Crisis with Muslims in Crisis…"

Ras said: ``It appears that Islam is not in crisis but that some Muslims always are .``

Isn`t a religion composed of both the belief and its believers? Can belief be isolated from its believers? If it can, who`s essence of the belief are we referring to? Your`s? Mine? Abraham`s? Moses`s? Mohammed`s? Ahmad`s (of Ahmadis)? Let`s forget about the kafirs for once.

To quote H.G. Wells from `The Time Machine`: ``Can an instantaneous cube exist?`` Without time a solid cube is but an abstraction in the human mind. Without believers can a belief exist? Or is it too a mere abstraction in the human mind?

QuantumQuark

PS,

I can understand the ephemeral ``Temporal`` is destined to ignore time or the human dimension in this case. What`s the reason for your abstraction Ras?

jay #27 here boy! time for your electric shock treatment.

nazarhayatkhan #24 I think you are falling into the same trap as some other people - you read insulting posts from the likes of jay and others about muslims, and decide to toss a few into their glass houses as well. Your questions are of course are of a more thoughtful nature than the brazen insults and threats that are routinely tossed by one-tune posters like jay, but they do seem to me to be somewhat directed to the same goal - to belittle other people`s religion, culture while glorifying ones own. It would be great to have a serious discussion on religion, but with the goal of understanding and appreciating the good points of other people`s religion (hinduism or islam or whatever) and traditional culture.
I hope you will keep this in mind as you get responses from hindu posters to your question.

#5 by tahmed32
//... try and shed your prejudices about muslims and islam. (and please lets not start an argument on this. if you find it too hard to shed your prejuedices, that is fine and I have no desire to try and convince you otherwise)...//

Look man - if you don`t want ``arguments`` then stop throwing baseless charges at me and then adopt a holier-than-thou posture. I think I will have to rebuff your unprovoked accusations.

I am NOT prejudiced against muslims - I have NO reasons to be. Neither is the author, Mr. Talib, whose views I emphatically agree with.

Please note the following excerpts from the article:
+++
1.....the real issue is not what the scriptures of a religion say but how its traditional doctrines, including deviations ‘said and unsaid’, are received and understood by its followers...

2.....Deviations from the scriptures, he rightly maintains, ``do not arise from nowhere but have roots, however twisted, in the faith itself``....
++++

The point is - at this moment, it is meaningless to debate which verse in Koran says what and in what context. The fact is, militants and fundamentalists have completely enveloped the religion of Islam. Theirs is the face that the outside world sees when they look at the giant arc of Islamic countries and their people. This is a crisis of epic proportions that has come to threat world peace which has very few parallels in history.

You can`t rescue Islam from such a crisis by reciting a few benign verses from the book. As the author as pointed out - ``....the fundamentalist Muslim, perhaps with more literal justification , [can] cite a verse which in so many words calls for the ‘slaying’ of non-believers in a violent ‘jihad’....``. The mullahs will simply drown you out with their own interpretation of the verses and the masses will tend accept the mullah interpretation rather than yours.

Yet that is exactly what people like you are doing all along. You guys chose to fight mullahs and militants on their own terms - by reciting verses and pontificating how Islam means peace and how the kafirs can never understand the beautiful religion of Islam. You guys are stupid enough to fight the retard mullahs with logic derived from the source that they consider themselves masters in and they can justifiably do so since they have the legitimacy from the masses as the preachers of the book - not you.

In fact, for them, self-proclaimed ``liberals`` like you are just next to the infidels they so much despise - they probably consider you worse than the infidels.

Yet, anybody who points out the fallacy of your stands, the stupidity of your actions, is immediately branded as ``prejudiced against Muslims``. Wake up before it is too late!

Dr Salam`s advice to countrymen

`Dr Salam`s call` (Jan 30) stresses the need for using science to serve the supreme interest of mankind. The fact is that Dr Abdus Salam was not only a theoretical physicist with a vision for the 21st century and beyond, but also a dedicated organizational practitioner and a born teacher with an unsatiable urge to teach science, specially to young talented students of the Third World.

For this noble cause, he established the International Centre for Theoretical Physics at Trieste, Italy, from where during the last 35 years more than 80,000 young scientists from poor countries have gained the latest scientific know-how to benefit their nations.

Dr Salam also established in many countries the Trieste-type science transfer centres of excellence which are still yielding positive results. Recently, an African state, Republic of Benin, issued a special coloured postal stamp with a photo of Dr Salam to honour him for his services to promote science in Africa.

/////In his own country not even a road is named after him. The triest centre was established in italy because the great pakistanis will not allow it to be in pakistan.