Pakistan Travelogue I CC

A much belated happy Easter to you, PM, and ana. How is life?

Pakistan Travelogue I Stuka

So you finally made it to Pakistan! Did you meet up with your old Lahori semi-flames? ;) :)

Cairo: A Foreigner’s View strongspirit

Don`t assume that most Pakistanis have any emotional commitment to the land of Pakistan.

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? True to his role, Vertex has written a very Muslim post.

Later now :)

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Amit

Nazar Hayat Khan, Hamidm, ferozek, sameerjb and earlier Bilal Ahmed

All four are absolutely first rate people. The best of the best. However, my assessment is that the only Chowkies who would even imagine these four playing the roles of posterboys of Islam are mostly non Muslims. A real Muslim to me seems to be someone like Vertex, or temporal, atif, and such.

Anyways, we have beaten this horse long enough. See you tomorrow :)

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Amit

I suggest a similarity, not between robots and Muslims, but between robots and all human groups. If we can closely define the circumstantial parameters and the needed details of group membership, it is very frequently possible to predict, within certain limits of tolerance, how most Muslim groups will behave, how most Christian groups will behave, how most Hindu groups will behave, and so on.

This cultural argument is pegged at the group level, but surprisingly safe predictions can often be made even at the individual level. What we need is a long-enough and varied-enough exposure to the individual`s behavior or ideas. Don`t you think on most cases relevant to Chowkies, we can tell what Romair`s `brilliant` spin will be? Or even mine?

That expression of surprise at the possibility of people being affected by their religious leanings and the accompanying reference to nazism were semi funny because they reflected embedded behavior in the context of Indian inter-religious discussions. A less defensive description would have `stereotyping.` I am sure you have seen such things before :)

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Amit

I suggest a similarity, not between robots and Muslims, but between robots and all human groups. If we can closely define the circumstantial parameters and the needed details of group membership, it is very frequently possible to predict, within certain limits of tolerance, how most Muslim groups will behave, how most Christian groups will behave, how most Hindu groups will behave, and so on.

This cultural argument is pegged at the group level, but surprisingly safe predictions can often be made even at the individual level. What we need is a long-enough and varied-enough exposure to the individual`s behavior or ideas. Don`t you think on most cases relevant to Chowkies, we can tell what Romair`s `brilliant` spin will be? Or even mine?

That expression of surprise at the possibility of people being affected by their religious leanings and the accompanying reference to nazism were semi funny because they reflected deeply embedded behavior in the context of Indian inter-religious discussions. A less defensive but not any more intelligent description would have `stereotyping.` I am sure you have seen such things before :)

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Dear ShoreSaheb

Brother, you are putting me on the spot :)

But you are indeed a great guy. When opportunity arises, I will consider it a privilege to unhesitatingly introduce myself to you.


Amit

Back for some quick thoughts :)

I will have to write in greater detail about key divergences between the doctrines and religious motivators of Christianity and Islam. The fact that they both passed through similar historical points should not at all assure us that both are moving in or will ever go in the very same direction (even if we forget the whole issue of how fast their mosaics of motivations enable them to move).

Polygamy banning in Pakistan but not in India

I hope you don`t think that Islam has become any more `progressive` in Pakistan than it is in India. It has become nothing of the sort :)

All that differs is that Muslims find themselves living in different socio-historical conditions.

There are a few general principles that explain an anstonishing amount of variation in both liberal and conservative Muslim logic, language, and behavior. Notice, for instance, how Muslims don`t ask for Shariah when they are in the US, particularly after 9/11, but want one when they find themselves in Canada. The same thing is happening in Europe, in Thailand, in Singapore. One could go on. It`s not that Islam has `changed` in any fundamental sense here or there. It`s the original Islam as taught by Mohammad who argued for the quite pragmatic adaptation of Muslim behavior in the face of different non Muslim circumstances.

This pragmatic adaption is not driven by any principle (except for those who are willing to accept Islam itself as a sufficient principle). Thus, an average Muslim intellectual will rarely be heard arguing - ``this behavior or way of thinking is clearly wrong or immoral. I shouldn`t do this.`` He would be heard saying - `given current circumstances in which we Muslims find ourselves, we need to follow different behavior or promote different thinking.`` So we will be dangerously mistaken in treating all changed Islamic behavior as principle-driven ``learning.``

See, the rigid structure of Islam is EXTREMELY flexible in one aspect: in what Muslims may do or say in relation to non Muslims. One of the Islamic unsayables that most non Muslims are finding out to their dismay is how often and how easily non Muslims are accused of crimes they did not always commit. And, this may be only partly related, but did 9/11 bomber Muslims feel justified in fornicating and drinking in the years, months, and days they were preparing to blow up people? I bet these Muslims did. Even better, all other liberal Muslims will tell you that they were not at all justified. That is the beauty of Islam, and its great strength against non Muslims.

Within clear Islamic constraints, Islam does not prohibit Muslims from learning a few good things from non Muslims. More likely, in doing so, Muslims will be heard claiming that all this good non Muslim stuff is really just Islam.

Everything else being the same, a Muslim wants to be rich, comfortable, admired just as much as any body else. So I would agree with you if you suggested that most individual people born as Muslim may learn a few peripheral things that do not threaten their basic Muslimhood. In some very very very rare cases like Sameer a few may even take the ultimate learning decision to put Islam behind them. As people, Muslims are good, bad, inquisitive, sharp, dull, like everyone else.

But is Islam itself changing in any meaningful global sense? Yes, but it is changing in its own Islamic, quite regressive, way, it is not going to follow the lead of Christianity and Hinduism, it will not change the way you, I, or the West may hope for. How exactly it is changing, that is where our focus ought to be. Avoiding its differences from other religions won`t succeed. We need to live with its ideology and its various arguments.

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Dear ShoreSahib

I am infamous among a small circle of well-wishers for saying things that are considered the great unsayables in India. You see, more than a thousand years of Islamic slavery has beaten the juice out of the spines of most of these Hindus. Being followers of Hinduism, most of them are incapable of admiring an Iqbal - the greatest Islamic philosopher of modern times. I hope a few of them will come to admire a mere Ralph :)

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Dear ShoreSahib

Roop Kunwar isn`t the only example of evil in other religions. They are far too many of them for anybody`s comfort. The differentiating factors for any religious system are the different ways in which it both enables and disables a majority of its followers to meet the challenge of recongizing, acknowledging, and ultimately trying to solve evils.

Just like there is good everywhere, so is evil. Religions differ in what they do (speaking indirectly) with what you yourself consider to be good and what they do with what you consider to be evil.

By the way, I think there are some very good things in Islam that many other religions don`t have. But some good things don`t make a religion an ideological friend of good things.



Amit

I wrote a detailed answer but it disappeared. I think you misread the entire Raja Rammohan Rao episode by giving all the credit to Lord B. May be some other time. Need to do some real work now :)

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Kaurasach

You answered your own issues so precisely. You reached for the notion of balance :)

As strong opposing forces balance out the extremes in any system, strong contradictory principles are able to moderate fanaticism, over time, in all real religions. That is just not the case with Islam.

To continue with the systemic metaphor, for any stable balance to be achieved, all counterveiling forces must be considered to operate on the same plane. If some motivating factors are so overwhelmingly stronger DOCTRINALLY that they operate on a different plane altogether, then after every temporary disturbance, the whole system will always reconfigure itself around this extreme force.

The characteristic of this system is the repeatable stability provided by this extreme force, not the `moderating` side notes causing temporary disturbances. The long history of Islam is rife with good people causing temporary disturbances. By the way, each and every one of these people would like to think he or she followed Islam. The cost of openly not following Islam, specially if you are once stuck with it, is too high for most mortals.

Now, of course, Islam calls itself the religion of `moderation` and `balance.` That is IslamSpeak - a topic important to non Muslims all by itself :)

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Dear ShoreSahib

No doubt your intentions are very good. Even admirable. There are many many Muslims who are very good people. Even if we use simple statistics, we will find that significant numbers of people can be, at least in their hearts, good human beings no matter what the ideology of their surroundings is.

Being good, these people will like to believe in a ``beautiful`` religion. Cliches and laments like ``the West follows Islam, Muslim in Muslims countries follow Christianity`` would not be so morbidly popular had there not been a deep and understandable religious angst among Muslim liberals.

From a non Muslim point of view, people can call their religion by any name they want, and give anything the label of their religion. We naturally love a person like you. What would be a mistake for us is to forget two facts - 1) that by your own reckoning 99% of Muslims do not share your enlightened beliefs, and 2) there is no overwhelming and commonly comprehensible evidence in Quran to tilt the argument in your favor.

To summarise: As a very good person, you have painted very many good things as Islam because you want your religion to include those good things, not because most Muslims think so or because there is any unambiguous doctrinal or empirical reason.

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Amit # 31

Further, at least as far as Christianity and Islam are concerned, the differing developmental trajectories of these religions are not explained by any inherent, genetic inferiority of Muslims. The non PC fact is that despite sharing much dogmatic and violent content, the Bible and the Quran are two very different books, propelling large numbers of their readers in different directions. What is possible over time for most of the followers of one book is not always possible or even desirable for the majority of the readers of the other book. In other words, there are DOCTRINAL DIFFERENCES.

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Amit # 31

Those arguments clearly imply that Islam is a less developed form of other religions. Surprisingly many liberal Muslims trying to label anything and everything good by the name of Islam too fall into the same sanguine and dangerous trap - ``Islam will one day get to where other religions have already reached.``

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Dear ShoreSahib

No, no, no, please don`t misunderstand me. I know that you believe in the ``One true Supreme Being in the Upanishads. Brhman, Allah, God the Father, Elohim are all the names of the same supreme being whose spirits permeates every atom of this universe.``

No intelligent person could believe otherwise. That`s why I have such genuine praise and affection for you. I may be bigoted in my beliefs, but my admiration for you is the greater because many people around you - many among your relatives and friends and neighbors and colleagues - do not for a moment support you in your beliefs.

The tragegy is that you still choose to paint your beliefs the label of Islam. That extreme willingness to twish facts to find a comfortable fit is the great misfortune.

Why Am I An Agnostic Muslim? Dear Mr. Mubashir Butt and Mr. ShoreSahib

You guys are wonderful wonderful people, the kind of persons I would love having as friends, were that possible. But, given my current understanding, and very much hoping that you will not take it amiss, I see you two respresenting one of the greatest of the myriad evils and weaknesses of Islam.

Good people simply refusing to see the truth about Islam because that whole prospect is simply too uncomfortable, too unsettling, too scary for them, or requires far too much change in their basic orientation. Ultimately, you with your fuzzy phrases become the greatest defenders of Islam, die-hard and slippery opponents of clear thinking, and as such pose the greatest danger to the goodness of man and mankind.

That sounds so offensive, although I sincerely, genuinely do not mean it to be :(

The fact is, to a Muslim, even the most rational, calm-minded questioning of the basics of his religion is invariably offensive. There is nothing that can be done about it.