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Irbis

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Posts posted by Irbis

  1. Destroyed UKR vehicles

     

    Look at how this conflict escalated - in 3-4 months it went from being a minor conflict with shots often fired in the air to being an almost full scale war with armored vehicles destroyed every day (72th guards mechanized brigade lost 15 vehicles on 12th August)


    A map. There is a newer one but only in Russian while this one is in English:

    BvklzwhIgAAdCui.jpg

  2. I am SlavicWolf... I simply forgot passsword to my old account so I had to create a new one after a not posting for a long time.

     

    I would say there is no difference between non-practicing Christians and non-practicing Muslims except in one thing - Christians are peaceful to the degree that they follow the teachings of Christ. Muslims are peaceful to the degree that they disregard the teachings of Muhammad.

     

    My argument would be fallacious if Muslims were allowed to pick & choose bits of their religion according to their personal taste - but the contract between man and Allah does not permit such a thing. In fact, it makes it illegal. It's like law - you can't enslave other people, at the same time claiming that you are a follower of US Constitution as it conflicts with both the Consitiution (13th amendment anyone?) and other legal documents that are in accordance with it.

  3.  

    And yet most Muslims are not terrorists.

    Most Muslims are ignorant of their religion, often projecting their own worldview on Islam, creating a faith that exists only in their mind. I do believe that once the truth about Islam reaches the masses, most of them will abandon it altogether, millions already have.

     

    However, sometimes it does not take much for a moderate, secularized Muslim to becoma a radical Islamist. Most suicide bombers actually come from middle class, non religious families. Doku Umarov (Chechen Islamist leader killed this year) was not religious at all until his 30s.

     

    Muslims who follow a watered down version of Islam really shouldn't count as Muslims - precisely because the contract between man and Allah includes a clause saying that man must obey everything Allah says, without the possibility of cherrypicking, with any breech of agreement resulting in the dissolution ot the contract. Muslims simply can't choose the verses they like and ignore those they don't like. Such behavior counts as apostasy.

  4. For simple reason - the New Testament does not contain even 1% as many hateful verses as the Quran does and violent verses of the Old Testament are confined to specific place and time - unlike their Quranic counterparts. Jesus, as depicted in the Bible, was an embodiment of goodness while Muhammad wasn't. The history of Islam, written by Musllims themselves, does not portray Muhammad as a holy man but rather as a cruel, unforgiving criminal. There is strong evidence that he was a narcissist. As Muslims have an obligation to emulate the examples of their prophet, their thoughts and feelings come to resemble his mind. They too become violent narcissists to the degree that they follow examples set by him.

     

    Islam has barely changed since the time of Muhammad. It is incapable of reforming itself, because it was purposedly designed in such a way to make any future attempt of reform futile. See the article posted by me today.

     

    To reform Islam into a more humane religion you would need a mandate from God. Baha'ullah claimed to have it but his faith cannot be called "reformed Islam".

  5. I find them credible. Here you have one such longish article http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124494788

    And another one http://www.answering-islam.org/Terrorism/violence.html

    Even Pope Urban did not cite these biblical verses when he wanted to start a crusade - while at thes aame time Islamic terrorists cite Quranic verses non-stop. Every single document written by Islamic terrorists is replete with quotations from the Quran.

     

     

    Here you have articles about obligation of holy war in Islam, three of them written by Muslims themselves:

    1. http://www.2600.com/news/mirrors/harkatmujahideen/www.harkatulmujahideen.org/jihad/o-jihad.htm

    2. http://abdurrahman.org/seerah/riyad/11/chap234.htm

    3. http://islamqa.info/en/20214

    4. http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Jihad_is_Compulsory_(Fard)

     

    You may also read "Religious and moral doctrine of Jihad" by Ibn Taymiyya (also available online)

    other resources on jihad http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Jihad_Literature

     

    Even the most bigoted Evangelical Christians do not say that Christians are permitted to kill nonbelievers over their faith... which is attested by a surprisinly low number of terrorist attacks in the name of Christ as compared to the number of terrorist attacks in the name of Allah.

  6. I have such a list of verses which counts more than 500 verses of hatred in the Quran. Unfortunately the website is in Polish so it isn't of much interest to people here. There is a list of more than 100 verses advocating direct fight agaisnt infidels. See for example here

     

    Regarding the violence in the Bible - there is no need to beat a dead horse. There are several articles in thw web dealing with the issue of BIblical vs Quranic violence, the conclusion of them is the same - that violence in the BIble is descriptive while violence in the Quran is prescriptive. The Bible is not a direct word of God (unlike the Quran) but an account of historical events written by men, and these violent verses are very well mitigated by historical context contained within the text itself - which is why no one uses these verses as advocating present day violence.

  7.  

    I just read a random section of about 20 verses and couldn't find such a passage. In fact, it sounded a whole lot like the Bible. Foods you can eat, cleansing rituals, and stuff like that. So, I call BS on this. Without specific references, this is just invective.

    I think we have to clarify a few things.

     

    All chapters of the Qur'an belong to one of two periods - they are either Meccan or Medinan. In the Quran, however, the chapters are not ordered in chronological order but from the longest to the shortest - so the first chapter "revealed" is sura 96 while the last one is sura 9.

     

    There is a sharp difference between verses of the Qur'an written in Mecca and those written in Medina. All peaceful verses in the Qur'an were written earlier. The reason behind their peacefulness is simple - while in Mecca, Muhammad had only a handful of followers. It was impossible for thse 70 or 80 Muslims to wage war against thousands of pagan so he made his Allah portray him as a mere warner, a humble messanger with no earthy powers. During this period he sounded almost like Christ

     

    These are examples of verses Muhammad wrote in Mecca:

    1. Be patient with what they say, and part from them courteously. (Q.73:10)

    2. To you be your religion, and to me my religion. (Q. 109:6)
    3. Therefore be patient with what they say, and celebrate (constantly) the praises of
    your Lord. (Q.20:103)
    4. Speak well to men. (Q.2:83)
    5. We well know what the infidels say: but you are not to compel them. (Q.50:45)
    6. Hold to forgiveness; command what is right; but turn away from the ignorant.
    (Q.7:119)
    7. Pardon thou, with a gracious pardoning. (Q.15:85)
    8. Tell those who believe, to forgive those who do not look forward to the Days of
    Allâh. (Q.45:14)
    9. Those who follow the Jewish (scriptures), and the Christians - any who believe in
    Allâh and the Last Day, and work righteousness, shall have their reward with their
    Lord; on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve. (Q.2:62)
    10. And do not dispute with the followers of the Book except by what is best. (Q.29:46)
    However, when he migrated to Medina and gained more followers, his thirst for power grew and he bacame more pround and violent, starting with raiding merchant caravans and assassinating his critics (including a mother of five who was stabbed to death on the eyes of her child) and ending with the conquest of whole Arabia. During this period, no more was Allah telling his prophet to be a mere warner and instead, he started telling him more savory things - which abrogated (nullified) earlier peaceful verses.
    These are examples of verses written in Medina:
    1. Oh you who believe! Murder those of the disbelievers who are close to you and let them feel your harshness. (Q.9:123)
    2. I will cast terror into the hearts of the unbelievers: smite above their necks and
    smite all their finger-tips off. (Q.8:12)
    3. No religion other than Islam will be accepted of anyone. (Q.3:85)
    4. Slay the idolaters wherever you find them. (Q.9:5)
    5. Kill them wherever you find them, and drive them out from wherever they drove
    you out. (Q.2:191)
    6. Fight them on until there is no more dissension and religion becomes that of Allâh.
    (Q.9:193)
    7. Fight them, and Allâh will punish them by your hands, cover them with shame.
    (Q.9:14)
    8. Make no excuses: you have rejected Faith after you had accepted it. If we pardon
    some of you, we will punish others amongst you, for that they are in sin. (Q.9:66)
    9. You who believe! Verily, the disbelievers are filthy. So let
    them not come near Al-Masjid-al-Harâm (the grand mosque at Mecca) after this
    year. (Q.9:28)
    10. Fight those who do not believe in Allâh and the last day... and fight People of the
    Book, who do not accept the religion of truth (Islam) until they pay tribute by hand and feel themselves subdued. (Q.9:29)

    11. Muhammad is a messanger of Allah and those who are with him are harsh against disbelievers but merciful to each other. (Q.48:29).

     

    It's hardly believable how rabidly obsessed that man was with disbelievers, fighting and subduing them. In fact, varous variants of the word "disbelief" (represented by Arabic root K-F-R) are the 5th theme most common in the Quran (repeated 525 times)

     

    It's precisely these and other similar verses that are used (together with examples from Muhammad's life) by Muslim terrorists to justify their acts of terror. They are also used to deny rights to non-Muslims, to persecute apostates and critics of Islam, in other words - all things we westerners hold as fundamental.

     

    If you want to learn more about Muhammad, read "The Sealed Nectar" by Safiur Rahman Mubarakpuri. It's the most detailed, most authoritative biography of Muhammad ever written. Moreover, it's available for free in a PDF format on various Islamic websites. PM me and I will send you a link if you're interested.

  8. People seem to think that because Islam is 600 years younger than Christianity, it looks like Christianity 600 years ago. In fact the differemnce we see now is a reflection of the differences between Jesus and Muhammad. Now in the Middle Ages Christianity got more radical because of political influence fo the Roman Empire on popes and Islam became slighty more moderate thanks to the influence of Greek philosophy (which soon faded). But the Middle Ages passed and the two faiths began diverging again, each in it's own direction.

     

    Given that Muhammad was a ruthless thug and every 12th verse of the Quran either orders Muslims to slaughter non-Muslims or spews hatred about how wicked they are, it's a miracle that Islamic terrorism isn't more common. These verses can't be discarded and they cannot be reinrerpreted. There is a limit of how a religious book can be reinrerpreted without falling into absurd.

  9. I think this article (written by a former Muslim) is a good summary.

     

    Since, thanks to Islamic terrorism the interest to know Islam has peaked and Islam has come under scrutiny, the westerners began asking, where are the moderate Muslims. Well, there is none. The concept is absurd. Muslims view this issue differently. You are either a ‘good’ practicing Muslim or a bad wishy-washy Muslim. It’s the latter group that the westerners have misnamed moderate Muslims. As far as Muslims are concerned they are ‘hypocrites.’ Not surprisingly, the ‘moderates’ also confess being hypocrites. They will tell you they believe in Islam but they are not good Muslims. In the back of their minds however, they plan to become ‘good’ Muslims once they have done all the ‘sins’ and enjoyed life enough.

    The Illusion of Reforming Islam

    Can Islam be reformed? All other religions have reformed; why not Islam?

    The problem with Islam is that it is rotten from its core. The evil is in its holy book. Many Muslims realize that there is something wrong with their religion. Unable to understand that the problem is the religion itself and unwilling to accept the truth, they pretend to reform Islam. The truth is that every Muslim knows that Islam cannot be reformed, but the idea has its appeal for the non-Muslims. When there is a demand for something there will be someone who will rise to satisfy that demand.

    Let us consider the etymology and meaning of the word “re-form.” It derives from Latin refōrmāre, which means to redeem, to reclaim, to renew. All these imply restoring something to its original shape. Let us first take a look at reform in Christianity.

     

    The Christian Reformation

    The Christian Reformation began as an attempt to reform, not the religion, but the Catholic Church. Many believers were troubled by the Church and its practices, such as the sale of indulgences (tickets to paradise) and simony (buying and selling church positions). They considered these as false doctrines and malpractices within the Church.

    Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli, John Calvin and other reformers protested these and other practices and beliefs of the Church such as Purgatory, devotion to Mary (Marina veneration), the intercession of and devotion to the saints, most of the sacraments, the mandatory celibacy for the clergy (including monasticism), and the authority of the Pope.

    None of these are doctrines of Christianity. These were practices of the Church. The reformers protested against the Church. They did not defy the authority of the Bible. They suggested that the Bible should be read literally. They rejected the allegorical interpretations of the Scriptures and took the texts of the Old and the New Testaments as something like statute law. The words meant what they said; any difficulty, contradiction, or obscure meaning was the fault of the reader and not the text.

    Anything not contained explicitly and literally in the scriptures was to be rejected, and anything that is contained explicitly and literally in the scriptures was to be followed unwaveringly. [1]

    This is the essence of Protestant Reformation

     

    The Islamic Reformation

    An analogous reformation also took place in Islam. It is called Salafism.

    Many westerners erroneously believe that Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab, (1703–1792) was the founder of Salafism, an extremist sect of Islam. This is not true. Abdul Wahhab did not found a new sect. He was a reformer of Islam in the same sense that Luther was of Christianity.

    The core of Abdul Wahhab’s thinking is that Islam is perfect and complete and its decline is the result of religious innovations (bid‘ah), and that an Islamic revival will result by purging the religion from foreign influences and by emulating Muhammad and his companions.

    The concept that Islam was perfect in its early stages is asserted in the Quran. “Today have I perfected your religious law for you, and have bestowed upon you the full measure of My blessings, and willed that self-surrender unto Me shall be your religion.” (Q.5:3)

    Abdul Wahhab proposed that Muslims should refrain from introducing any innovation and follow the examples of the salaf, (predecessors or early generations) hence the name Salafi.

    This definition is not an invention of Abdul Wahhab, but is based on a hadith that reports Muhammad saying, “The people of my generation are the best, then those who follow them, and then those who follow the latter (i.e. the first three generations of Muslims).[2]

    It is important to note that ibn Taymiyyah (1263 – 1328) was also a Salafi. He opposed the celebration of Muhammad’s birthday and the construction of shrines around the tombs of Sufi ‘saints,’ saying, “Many of them [Muslims] do not even know of the Christian [Catholic] origins of these practices. Accursed be Christianity and its adherents.”

    There is a hadith where Muhammad says, “I am the best Salaf for you.” [3]

    The desire to reform Islam and go back to its original pristine state is actually an old thought. Abdul Wahhab, however, succeeded to give shape to this concept, which took ground thanks to the Saudi kings who are his descendants through one of his daughters.

     

    The Similarities between Christian Reformation and Islamic Reformation

    There are many similarities between Protestantism and Salafism. The former rejects devotion to Mary and saints and their intercession. The latter rejects devotion to Muhammad, his intercession and the intercession of Islamic holy men (such as practiced in Shiism). Both these reform movements want to take their respective faiths to their original purity and eschew the innovations that have been added to the religion after the death of their founders.

    Dr. Ingrid Mattson, the president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), when asked whether Wahhabism is an extreme right wing sect of Islam, responded, “No it’s not true to characterize ‘Wahhabism’ that way. This is not a sect. It is the name of a reform movement that began 200 years ago to rid Islamic societies of cultural practices and rigid interpretation that had acquired over the centuries. It really was analogous to the European protestant reformation.”[4]

     

    The Outcome of Reform in Christianity

    Although Christian Reformation and Islamic Reformation are almost identical in their scope, their outcomes have been very different. The literal reading of the Bible became the underpinning of the social theories and organization of Protestant societies and the foundation of social organization of the English colonies in America.

    These reformers literally transformed the philosophical, political, religious, and social landscape of Europe. We still live in a society dominated by protestant theory of social organization.

    American political discourse is essentially Calvinistic. In other words its social organization is based on the literal meaning of Christian scriptures.

    According to Calvin and Zwingli, not only should all religious belief be founded on the literal reading of Scriptures, but Church organization, political organization, and society itself should be founded on this literal reading.

    Luther wrote a letter to Pope Leo, (which resulted in his excommunication from the Church) in which he explained the substance of his ideas. The letter is entitled “On the Freedom of the Christian.” This letter explains the core of Luther’s thinking. According to Luther, the essence of Christianity is “freedom,” or “liberty.”

    It is this concept that eventually gave rise to the notion of individual freedom, political freedom, and economic freedom.

    Most of the European Enlightenment revolves around freedom and the project of “liberating” people: liberating them from false beliefs, false religion, arbitrary authority, etc.–this is, what is called “liberation discourse.” Westerners still participate in this Enlightenment project today.

    That is why America invaded Iraq, to prevent a dictator taking control of most of the world’s oil reserves and to liberate Kuwaitis, and a decade later, to liberate the Iraqis. That is why America has fought nearly forty wars abroad, from Japan to Germany, to Italy, to Panama to Nicaragua, to Kosovo, to Vietnam, to Korea, to Angola, to Somalia, to Afghanistan. Whether these wars were right or wrong, the nation’s motivation has been always the same, to liberate people, to stop dictators, to export democracy and freedom. This idea of “liberating” people, so entrenched in America’s international politics, comes out of Luther’s idea of “freedom.”

    Other factors have also played a role in these wars, such as protecting the economic and political interests of America. However, the underlying denominator has generally been liberating people from tyranny. Liberating people and defending American interest are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

    There have been exceptions where America has acted purely out of self-interest or perhaps out of ignorance, such as when in 1953 the government of Dr. Mossadeq, the Prime Minister of Iran was overthrown.

     

    The Outcome of Reform in Islam

    What is the essence of the reformation in Islam? The essence of the Wahhabi belief is that man is a slave of Allah. People are ibad (slaves).

    This is diametrically a different discourse from the discourse of Protestantism, and here lies the essential difference between Christianity and Islam.

    On the surface, there are many similarities between Christianity and Islam. Both believe in a god; both rely on an intermediary between man and God; both faiths are eschatological – have a hell, a heaven and an afterlife, etc. However, in their core, they are very different, in fact opposite to one another. The reformation of both faiths took the same road, but going back to their roots, they went to opposite directions. Islam is not a continuation of Christianity, as Muhammad and Muhammadans claim. It is an anti-Christian belief. Christianity advocates freedom of man, Islam, his slavery. One brings the message of liberation, the other, of submission.

     

    muslims-agaisnt-democracy.jpg

    freedomofexpression.jpgcartoon-protest10.jpg

    The discourse of freedom, so essential to Christianity is contrary to what Islam stands for. When Muslims carry placards that read “democracy is hypocrisy,” and “freedom go to hell,” during their laud demonstrations, they are expressing the true message of Islam, which is anti-freedom, anti-democracy, pro slavery and pro subjugation.

    Muslims are not free to choose. They should obey Allah and His Messenger. “And it behoves not a believing man and a believing woman that they should have any choice in their matter when Allah and His Messenger have decided a matter; and whoever disobeys Allah and His Messenger, he surely strays off a manifest straying.” (Q. 33:36)

    It is not up to Muslims to decide what is good for them. This decision is already made for them and all they have to do is to obey, even when they don’t like it. “Fighting is ordained for you, even though it be hateful to you; but it may well be that you hate a thing the while it is good for you, and it may well be that you love a thing the while it is bad for you: and God knows, whereas you do not know.”(Q. 2:216)

    Islam can be distilled in its name: ‘Submission.’ Allah knows best. Therefore man must accept his command, blindly and unwaiveringly.

    islam-democracy.jpg

     

    Democracy means the government of people by the people. In Democracy men make the law. In Islam the law comes from God. Man must obey even if those laws appear contrary to reason and are oppressive.

    This is the reason why “moderate” Muslims cannot abrogate stoning, killing the apostates or other abuses of their fellow practicing Muslims, and that is why their protests don’t go beyond a lip service, and that too is only for the consumption of the western media.

    Both Christianity and Islam underwent reformation. They took similar paths, but they ended up in two opposite poles. While Christian reformation brought freedom, Enlightenment and democracy, Islamic reformation bore oppression, dictatorship and terrorism.

    Ibn Taymiyyah and Ibn Abdul Wahhab were reformers of Islam. Among the contemporary Islamic reformers we can name Maududi (1903 – 1979) who wrote an interpretation of the Quran and Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966), the leading intellectual of Muslim Brotherhood in 1950s and 1960s, who was the inspiration to all Muslim terrorists including Ayatollah Khomeini and Bin Laden.

     

    Reformation vs. Transformation

    What today’s so called Islamic reformers are proposing is not reformation, but transformation of Islam. Unlike the above mentioned reformers, these new reformer wannabes don’t want to go to the origin of Islam. They want to eschew a part of the Quran and the entire Sharia and invent a different religion, still calling it Islam.

    This is delusional thinking and impractical, both logically and logistically. It is also strictly prohibited in the Quran.

    These neoreformers want to change Islam and bring bid’a. Is that possible? Can believers have an opinion contrary to what the Quran says? We already saw that the Quran 33:36 prohibits the believers to have any choice in their OWN matter when Allah and his Messenger have made their choice. How can they decide what is good for the RELIGION?

    When the Quran says, “Fighting is ordained for you, even if you don’t like it,” the message is clear. This is God speaking. So how can you dispute with God? Once you accept the Quran as the word of God you cannot pick and choose and discard what you don’t like. This is strictly prohibited, not once, but repeatedly.

    Do you, then, believe in some parts of the divine writ and deny the truth of other parts? What, then, could be the reward of those among you who do such things but ignominy in the life of this world and, on the Day of Resurrection, they will be consigned to most grievous suffering? For God is not unmindful of what you do.” (Q.2:85)

    Am I, then, to look unto anyone but God for judgment [as to what is right and wrong], when it is He who has bestowed upon you from on high this divine writ, clearly spelling out the truth?(Q.6:114)

    "Wert thou to follow the common run of those on earth, they will lead thee away from the way of Allah. They follow nothing but conjecture: they do nothing but guess." (Q. 6:116)

    "Verily, as for those who suppress aught of the revelation which God has bestowed from on high, and barter it away for a trifling gain – they but fill their bellies with fire. And God will not speak unto them on the Day of Resurrection, nor will He cleanse them [of their sins]; and grievous suffering awaits them." (Q. 2:174)

    See also 16:89 and 39:23,

    "Such as We send down for those who make division, Those who break the Quran into parts. Therefore, by the Lord, We will, of a surety, call them to account"(Q.15: 90-92)

    "There is none that can alter the words of Allah." (Q. Q. 6:34 )

    "There is no changing the Words of Allah that is the Supreme Triumph." (Q.10:64)

    "And recite that which hath been revealed unto you of the scripture of your Lord. There is none who can change His words, and you will find no refuge beside Him." (Q. 18:27)

    How can one claim to believe in the Quran and disregard all these warnings?

    The so called reformers of Islam are misguided at best and deceptive at worst. Their efforts should not be welcomed. Whatever their intention, whether genuine or disingenuous, they are pulling wool over the eyes of non-Muslims and as the result giving legitimacy to a very dangerous creed.

     

    The Good, the Bad and the Ugly:

    Muslims can be classified in three categories, the good, the bad and the ugly.

    The good Muslims are those who follow the Quran and the examples set by Muhammad and become terrorists.

     

    The bad Muslims are those wishy-washy Muslims who don’t practice Islam completely, don’t read the Quran, don’t pray and rarely, if ever, go to mosque. Their knowledge of Islam is deficient even though their faith may not be necessarily weak. However, because of their lack of understanding of Islam they don’t harbor ill feelings towards non-Muslims, although they are often suspicious of them. They strive to improve their lives and live like others.

    Many of these bad Muslims will admit that they are not good Muslims and hope that eventually they will summon enough faith to become good Muslims. These are the majority.

     

    The ugly Muslims are those who know the truth about Islam but lie about it. They try their best to portray Islam in a good light. They even agree with you that the good Muslims are bad, and claim that Islam has been hijacked by the good Muslims.

     

    By sugarcoating Islam you cannot change its nature. You can purify filthy water and drink it. You can even purify urine into drinking water. But can you purify gasoline enough to make it drinkable? The essence of Islam is evil. It is not a contaminated good faith. You cannot reform it enough to make it a humane faith. Can you reform Nazism? This whole notion is misguided and absurd.

     

    What is the point of reforming a religion founded by a mentally deranged man who committed so much evil on Earth, lied, deceived, raped, tortured, raided, looted, massacred and committed the most despicable crimes? Why keep his cult alive and his memory honored? He deserves scorn, not recognition?

     

    Reforming Islam is impossible. It is either a dilution or a ruse. Jihad is based on two pillars, war and deception. I don’t want anyone to be fooled by the soothing promises of Muslim reformers. Moderate Islam does not exist. It’s a myth.

    I do not trust Muslims who are against Sharia. I do not understand them. What they say does not add up. I don’t know what they are up to. I do not trust people who say, I am a follower of Muhammad, but I do not follow Muhammad. There is something fishy, something dishonest and hypocritical about their claim.

    If you are a Muslims, be a Muslim. I don’t agree with you but at least I know where you stand and where I should stand to be safe from you. But if you are a Muslim and against Islam and the Sharia, I don’t trust you. You are either a fool or a crook. “You are neither hot nor cold. I will spit you out.”

    Some of these so called reformers hide their identity and face claiming to ‘fear Muslims.’ Why should they? They are not saying anything that CAIR does not say when it wants to Con Americans with Islamic Ruse. This is all sham.

     

    Reforming Islam is impossible, but to transform it you need divine authority. Only God can change his words. Where is that divine authority? If you are allowed to pick and choose from the Quran, why Osama Bin Laden should not have the same right? Which Islam is the right Islam? Wouldn’t this lead to more division and fight among Muslims?

     

    The only serious reformer of Islam was Baha’u’llah. He realized Islam cannot be reformed. So he founded a new religion and announced that he was vested with authority from God to annul all His previous mandates in the Quran.

    He told Muslims, whereas before you were told to slay the unbelievers, now God wants you to love all the people irrespective of their faiths. Whereas before He told you women are deficient in intelligence, beat them if you fear they may disobey you, now He says men and women are equal and give preference to the education of your daughters, because they will be the mothers and the primary educators of future generations. Whereas in the previous dispensation God told you all non-believers will go to hell, now He says it’s your deeds that matter and your faith without good deeds is worthless and that He is not going to discriminate against anyone because of his belief. It’s the purity of heart that matters not what you profess with your tongues. Whereas before He had built a huge rotisserie to burn humans for disbelief, He has actually shut it down. He wants you to obey him for the love of Him alone and not because you fear him. Just act as mature people. There is no threat. Whereas before He said, ”fighting is good for you,” now He is tired of all the fighting and says fighting behoove the ferocious beasts and choiced deeds behooves humans. Whereas before you were promised virgins, there are no virgins. Your body will rot here. The rewards are all spiritual in nature, like joy and love. There is no hanky-panky in paradise. Also there is no punishment, except the regret that you’d feel for losing the chance to develop spiritual limbs in this world.

    That requires courage. Now this was in 19th century in the middle of Shiite Persia. Of course Baha’u’llah was put in a dungeon and spent the rest of his life in exile. Many of his followers were executed. However, there is logic in that argument. The logic is that only God has the authority to abrogate His laws. This logic remains valid, until you ask, what was God smoking when he sent Muhammad? Baha’u’llah is the only credible transformer of Islam. But again, Baha’i Faith is not Islam. It’s entirely a different religion.

     

    mirage.jpg

    Reforming Islam is like chasing a mirage.

    You cannot reform Islam and you cannot transform it. All you can and should do, is dump it. Please, let us stop this charade. Either be a Muslim and do as Muhammad said or leave Islam and don’t become a shield for the terrorists. Don’t muddy the waters. Don’t mix among the enemy and pose as a friend. This is the same tactic that Palestinians use in war. They mix among civilians and innocent children to make it difficult for their enemy to target them. You are causing confusion. You provide a protective shield for the enemy. I am not writing this for you. I know you are not going to change. You are a deceiver. I am writing this for the non-Muslims so they do not fall into your trap and don’t provide for you free podium to deceive them.

    Islam cannot be reformed. They tried it in every imaginable way. The Mu’tazelis tired it, the Sufis tried it, hundreds of old and new schools tried it and they all failed. If you cannot stomach the Sharia, why do you want to keep Islam at all? Islam belongs to the toilet of history. Dump it and flush. Get rid of it and don’t fool yourself with this nonsense. Accept the truth. Yes truth matters. Islam is a lie. Muhammad was a mentally sick conman. Get over with it and stop this ridiculous farce of reformation.

  10. Well, Muslims have an obligation to emulate their prophet and he, being a pathological narcissist, had no conscience at all. He massacred entire populations and killed people for the slightest criticism of his person with total ease of mind. Muslims share his psychopathology to the degree that they follow his examples.

     

    Yes, I do think ISIS are very close to the purest form of Islam. Their actions are roughly consistent with both the behavior of Muhammad (who according to the Quran is the perfect man and an ideal example to follow) and the teachings of Islam as exemplified by the most authoritative clerics of all times.

     

    Reading the works of men such as Ibn Taymiyya, Ibn Qayyim, Al Ghazali, books about four Sunni schools of jurisprudence (Hanafi, Hanbali, Maliki, Shafi) would be a good start in learning what makes ISIS (and all Islamists) who they are. These men are basically Islamic equivalents of St. Augustine or Thomas Aquinas. Reading works of contemporary clerics (Sayyid Qutb, Abu Ala Maududi, Abdullah Azzam, Anwar Al Awlaki and many others) would also clarify many things.

  11. @John Cuthber:

    The stoning as depicted there has never been practiced by Jews, it looked totally different... the culprit was brought to some place high above the ground and thrown down and if they did not die, stones were used. And these weren't small stones but big heavy ones that were mean to finish the victim off. That story from the New Testament was probably fabricated by Christians in order to make Jews look like villans and make their prophet take more credit for "abolishing" these barbaric practices

     

    The second aspect of that punishment is that even before Jesus, Jews introduced such rigoristic standards of proof that death penalty became de facto illegal.

     

    These are the steps that must have taken place for someone to be eligible for death penalty for any offence under Jewish law:

    1. Before comitting the crime the perpetrator was warned by two kosher witnesses that the actions he/she is about to do is punishable by death. The witnesses must be upstanding citizens known to have never sinned in public, with the knowledge of both Torah and Talmud, plus they cannot be related to the perpetrator.

    2. The perpetrator accepted the warning, i.e. stated that he has heard the it but is going to do it anyway

    3. The perpetrator then comitted the crime immediately after accepting the warning. This is determined by the amount of time it takes to say "Shalom Lecha Rabbi", - about 3 seconds.

     

    Imagine that - you are about to commit adultery, two witnesses who are known to be perfect citizens warn you that it's a capital crime and you disregard the warning and commit the crime within, like, 3 second after that... how probable is such a sequence of events? O.o But all of that is needed just to consider the POSSIBILITY of giving you death sentence - as that's not everything so let's move forward.

     

    4. The punishment can be carried out only by the Sanhedrin, the highest religious court in Jerusalem which has been disbanded since 70 AD. So unless it is rebuilt, there is no one capable of carrying out your stoning.

    5. The witnesses were examined separately. Any discrepancy - even a minor one - would render their testimony invalid.

    6. The witnesses could be called to either defend the accused or to claim the other witnesses were lying (eidim zomemim)

    7. The judges (there must be 23 of them) would deliberate. During this process, a judge who argued for innocence could not change his mind and argue for guild, while a judge who argued for guilt would be allowed to raise arguments for innocence (after which he could not raise any arguments for guilt).

     

     

    5. The most junior judges would speak first with more senior judges speaking later on, so that the younger jusges would not be worried about contradicting the most senior judges.

    6. The court would then vote. A majority of two votes was needed for guilt.

     

    So your argument that the bible advocates stoning is pretty much BS. No one interprets it in such a way since, well, antiquity. I think that the Bible can have positive influence on people.

  12. "No, equanimity may promote reading it that way but the texts still say you should stone people to death for being different."

     

    Sorry for asking a question regarding an almost month old post but what punishment exactly do you mean? If you mean stoning for adultery in the Bible, then this is no argument - as Jews stopped practicing it completely AT LEAST by the time of Jesus, about 2000 years ago. In Talmudic law to be sentenced to death for any offence requires such an absurdally high standards of proof that a court that sentenced more than two people to death over the course of 70 years was considered bloodthirsty.

     

    That's a very racist way of putting things... Why not Easternized?

     

    Western Civilization is not a race.

  13. I know that severe malnourishment in childhood can negatively affect height for example, but can diet have influence on it as well?

     

    Teke Asia for example - the tallest of all East Asians are Northern Chinese, followed by Koreans and Japanese, with South Chinese and peoples of Southeast Asia being generally the shortest. I know that such disparity can be explained by genetic differences but diet differences have been suggested as well - more precisely, higher intake of meat and dairy products in the north as compared to more vegetable based died in the south. Is there any truth in this? I wonder.

     

    And East Asians in general are smaller than Europeans. For example, Dutch men have an average height of between 179 and 183cm (estimates vary) while Japanese men only reach about 170-173cm on average.

  14. Here you can discuss various aspects of the current war in eastern Ukraine as well as post news about it.

     

    Quite an important thing happened recently - the new PM of the "Donetsk People's Republc", Alexandr Zakharchenko confirmed recently that training camps for terrorists indeed exist in Russia and that 1200 of them are in the process of being trained:

     

    Video removed by moderator

     

    Besides that, Igor Strelkov (aka. Girkin), the military leader of separatists, resigned from his post of the defence minister of DPR. There are unconfirmed reports of him being wounded. Girkin is a Russian veteran who fought during the war in Bosnia on the Serbian side, with reports of him taking part in massacres of Bosniak Muslims in Visegrad. He also fought in the Second Chechen War in which he was responsible for the "forced disappearance" of numerous Chechns.

     

    The "humanitarian" convoy from Russia turned out to be mostly empty trucks. My opinion is that the convoy is either a ploy to hide the transport of weapons taking place somwhere else or was sent there empty on purpose in order to bring Russian terrorists back to Russia. It reminds me of the war in Abkhazia in 1992-3 when a "humanitarian convoy" (co-organized by the current Russian minister of defence, Sergey Shoigu) from Russia helped Abkhazian separatists conduct a counter-offensive on Sukhumi which proved successful and ended in a massacre of between 3,000 and 30,000 Geogians in Sukhumi + massive ethnic cleansing.

  15. One really weird feature of all desert monotheisms - mainly Judaism and Islam and to a lesser degree Christianity - is a weird obsession with human sexuality, with bizarre stories about Sodoma and Gomorra or how God killed a man for refusing to impregnate a woman. Judaism had death penalty for masturbation, homosexualism and extramaritial sex (they stopped practicing any of these punishments at least by the time of Jesus, though) and Muslims practice stoning adulterers and homosexuals up to this day. Christians consider these acts to be a major sin.

     

    Why? Couldn't they just let people do what they wanted to do instead of inventing fantastic stories?

  16. First of all - what "Palestinians" are we talking about? Half of these Palestinians are from Jordan, the rest is from Egypt, and most of them are descendants of recent migrants who started arriving there after an economic boom brought on by Jewish migrants. There has never been any Palestinian national identify, distinct from the neighbooring countries and there has never been a state called "Palestine" to say Jews have usurped their lands. If they feel bad in Israel, they can go back to where they came from... And they actually tried to do this in the 1970s but once in Jordan, they began an uprising to overthrow King Hussein's government after which he kicked them out. They cannot live in peace with anyone, not even with themselves.

     

    If Palestinians want to be prosperous, they can be. Lots of them live in Israel and enjoy the same rights as the Jewish Israelis. In some aspects they are even privileaged as they, for example, don't have to serve in the IDF. Besides them only orthodox Jews (circa 15% of all Jews in Israel) aren't conscripted by force.

     

    The problem with Hamas is not economic in nature, it is religious one. They hate Jews because their prophet hated them and the quran says Muslims cannot take Jews and Christians as friends or rulers. Given how much money they were given since the Oslo accords, they should be the richest region of the Middle East - but they prefered to use that money to finance war with Israel instead.

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