Islam as religion of peace

[Rex Little]

Interesting. A thread about the fundamental nature of Islam, and you have to wade through four pages before you find a quote from the Qu'ran.

So far, every quote given supports the notion that Islam is basically warlike; those arguing the opposite position are reduced to muttering about "context". Can anyone provide an actual Qu'ran passage which bolsters the opinion that Islam is a religion of peace? (That's not a rhetorical question; I'd really like to know.)

[Ben Kenobi]

I'm an atheist, and most of my overwhelmingly Islamic family doesn't hold anything against me (or my sister who's also an atheist, for that matter).

Ramo:
Kudos to your folks.

I know many, many very tolerant Moslems. I really don't know where y'all are coming up with this... There's absolutely nothing inherently violent about Moslems.

Inherently warlike? Not at all. Arabs are not generally more warlike than Europeans, it is a question of what the religion teaches.

And I apologise for the lack of quotes from the Q'uran. Does anyone know of a good online source?

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Ramo


I'm an atheist, and most of my overwhelmingly Islamic family doesn't hold anything against me (or my sister who's also an atheist, for that matter).

I know many, many very tolerant Moslems. I really don't know where y'all are coming up with this... There's absolutely nothing inherently violent about Moslems. At least, no more so than there's anything inherently violent about Christians.

I know tolerant muslims too, but if you're atheist and they like you, from a islamic theological perspective your family is already traitors. You'd be a "murtadd", which is, according to Muhammad, the worst crime of all, jihad against them is a demand.
2 hadith /words of the prophet say: "He who changes his religion has to be killed." "The blood of a muslim is free only in 3 occasions: When falling of the faith, betraying his wife and after a murder that has not been a blood feud." (translated by myself)

And that's not out of context, those hadith stand for themselves and I could quote the whole Sura 9 again, which is not some short line "out of context".

I'm not so sure about this seperation. I do believe that Islam teaches that it is okay to forcibly convert unbelievers to Islam.

Well, that, for once, is not true for Christians and Jews. Those groups can always surrender and accept the "dimma"-treaty, allowing them a limited freedom of sticking to their religion with all the nasty stuff, but anyway. And muslims HAVE TO accept such a surrender.
And you misunderstand for the pagans: It's not forcibly converting, it's only that those who don't voluntarily convert can be killed.

[gsmoove23]

How do trolls like this go 7 pages with, as Rex Little already said, only one or two selective quotes from the Koran. I see some people trying to use hadiths when in all cases the words of the Koran supercede hadith when they conflict. I see some arguements that religious discussion has frozen in Islam that completely ignore the large numbers of Islamic scholars who teach a peaceful interpretation of the Koran and yet for some reason don't make the news.

I've just been reading an interesting book called "Drinking the Sea at Gaza" by Amira Haas. It might be a little left leaning for all you hardliners but I think its valuable to anyone interested in learning anything about the palestinians. It talks about the struggles between Fatah and Hamas and points out how in the harder times when there is little hope the more violent passages of the Koran are bandied about, Hamas gains in support and the opinions of the people swing toward more fundamental interpretation.

Interpretation of religious text fits the times and in most places where fundamentalism is very strong the times are quite hard. This is true in the ME but you'd find in prosperous western countries muslim communities generally follow a far more liberal line of interpretation.

Generally these goofy anti-Islam arguements rely on the premise "what I see must be true". The majority of the groups on the US list of terrorist organizations are Islamic or at least come from Islamic countries so 1+1=2 but of course this couldn't possibly have anything to do with external events. No that would make things a little more difficult.

Of course if you start showing how through history the assumption that Islam is a violent religion turns out not to be true when compared to other religions then you're just trying to divert the issue from where it should be, muslim bashing. May I ask how you come to the conclusion that Islam is inherently violent. The only way you could is by showing it is relatively more violent then most other religions. The only way you could refute the claim is by showing it is equally as or less violent then other religions. Otherwise you would just make a thread on how religions in general are inherently violent.

[yavoon]

kind of a moot point tho eh gs? from what i gather the question is not what % of ppl interpret it this way, or wut % interpret it that way. since at all times religion has been treated as utterly maleable and convenient.

but what is actually contained in it. regardless of the peacenicks or the warmongers.

[gsmoove23]

The point is it doesn't matter what is contained in it. Apologists for christianity like to point at JC and say "see thats our religion" when in fact he makes it quite clear that he follows the OT and still holds to its laws. Do you even want to get into what the OT actually contains?

[yavoon]

of course it matters, just not to ppl who are intellectually dishonest.

which contains a large part of high level religious ppl, all under the guise of faith.

[gsmoove23]

Help me out here are you trying to help me or hurt me?

Intellectual dishonesty or very pious learned people who make the most of what they like in religious text and diminish what is inconvenient there is little difference. This happens alot, done by well meaning people when trying to address worldly problems with religious scripture. If they prefer violent action they go to text seeming to support violent action and the same for pacifists. Its a natural tendency and all religions with sacred text have passages that would seem to support both peaceful and violent action.

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Rex Little
Interesting. A thread about the fundamental nature of Islam, and you have to wade through four pages before you find a quote from the Qu'ran.

So far, every quote given supports the notion that Islam is basically warlike; those arguing the opposite position are reduced to muttering about "context". Can anyone provide an actual Qu'ran passage which bolsters the opinion that Islam is a religion of peace? (That's not a rhetorical question; I'd really like to know.)

OK, let me answer this, so no one tells me I'm all biased.

1.)One of the arguments is that some hadith are very directly condemning any unlawful act against the dimmi, the "protected" jews and christians (and even pagans according to hanafites): "What you do to one of the dimmi, you're doing to me." Of course, "lawful" acts against dimmi include a variety of acts we would call "unjust" or repressive.
But in this still lies the potential to move ahead, but it only works, when the conditions of the Dimma-treaties, as they are in islamic tradition, could be changed. This is a hard task but who knows, one day it works, because the exact terms of the treaty are not from Muhammad himself but later by the first 4 "righteous caliphs".

2.) The always used quran quote to show islamic tolerance is Quran 2,256 that says: "There's no force in faith."
Well, if one thing is out of context then this and there's nothing that justifies that this verse should make all the aggressive verses obsolete. It's rather the subsummation of what Muhammad experienced during his life: You can't force someone to BELIEVE from within, with his whole heart not even by pressure, but it doesn't say that you're free to choose your confession or free to criticize Islam...
But a consequence of this is that Islam focusses more on "Orthopraxis" than "Orthodoxy" - there's hardly been anything comparable to Inquisition in Islam because no one cared whether INSIDE you're firm in faith - no one can be forced and God will judge. Yet you had not to endanger the faith of the others and thus everybody is obligued to do all necessary muslim acts. Say the Shahada, most importantly keeping the Ramadan etc. But whether you believe or not, whether you know much of the Quran or not didn't matter - that made some kind of tolerance possible where only the shell had to be muslim, spoil the rest.

3.) Q 29,46: "Don't argue with the jews and Christians if not in the best way. Except with those who are unjust."
"the best way" obviously means by preaching and talking, not with force. But the clue is "except those..." - What means "unjust" - this opens all possibilities of interpretation. Fact is that in the earlier sures of the Mecca period, Muhammad thought of the Christians and jews of being "natural monotheistic allies against the pagans who would sooner or later accept him as prophet but of course he got disappointed, as also expresses the mentioned verse 2, 256. So, there's some more friendly verses on Christians and Jews and some more aggressive, putting them very closely to the pagans. The aggressive become more and more in the later parts of the Quran and in case of doubt, this is a general islamic rule, "younger" verses beat "older" ones when they contradict each other - and the second last sure speaks of Nazarenes "being the most friendly" towards muslims and "jews and pagans are the worst enemies"...

But just because christians in Islam are somehow preferred non-believers, this doesn't change anything about the relation to the pagans. This relation, read through the whole Quran, seems to be nothing but a total war "fight them (the pagans) alltogether as they fight you alltogether..."
The few modern and tolerant interpretations acknowledge that this total war only was meant against the pagans of Mecca in the times of Muhammad and have only limited temporal truth thus don't count today and hopefully their argument will be heard but some day...

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by gsmoove23
How do trolls like this go 7 pages with, as Rex Little already said, only one or two selective quotes from the Koran. I see some people trying to use hadiths when in all cases the words of the Koran supercede hadith when they conflict.

Sure, but if you give me the quran interpretation that conflicts with the hadith I posted in the last posts we can start talking. Amazing how those adverting that Islam is so peaceful can't come up with more than 1 or two very selective verses in all conversations I had yet while I can give you tons of intolerant ones (I haven't even started yet!)

It talks about the struggles between Fatah and Hamas and points out how in the harder times when there is little hope the more violent passages of the Koran are bandied about, Hamas gains in support and the opinions of the people swing toward more fundamental interpretation.

Sure, that's always how it happens. When you find yourself in an excellent position, don't feel threatened etc., there's no point in digging out aggressive stereotypes. Where I'm with you: All major religions must be so versatile as to be able to explain the world to people in almost contrary living conditions otherwise they wouldn't have spread. An all peaceloving religion would not explain the world and it's inherent reason to a variety of people, just like an all aggressive religion can't explain the world, when everything is running well...
But that doesn't change the fact that the Quran is full with violent language and in large parts clearly about the war against the pagans, directly accusing specifically named religions (jews but also christians) of being "the worst enemy", who "use to kill prophets" etc.

Generally these goofy anti-Islam arguements rely on the premise "what I see must be true". The majority of the groups on the US list of terrorist organizations are Islamic or at least come from Islamic countries so 1+1=2 but of course this couldn't possibly have anything to do with external events. No that would make things a little more difficult.

I honestly hope you don't mean my posts, for if you would carefully read them you'd have to see that I'm far from painting the world black and white or making simplistic arguments or trolling, but rather I elaborate my posts and try to address several facettes and layers of argument. Maybe I should repeat, to make you think, that I'm a)leftist, b)european, c) agnostic, d) anti-war, e) pro-palestinian.

Otherwise you would just make a thread on how religions in general are inherently violent.

Which is a very good topic for another thread.

[gsmoove23]

Sure, but if you give me the quran interpretation that conflicts with the hadith I posted in the last posts we can start talking. Amazing how those adverting that Islam is so peaceful can't come up with more than 1 or two very selective verses in all conversations I had yet while I can give you tons of intolerant ones (I haven't even started yet!)

I have never been one to say that Islam is so peaceful, just that as practised by millions around the world throughout history it has not proven to be more violent then most other religions which would be necessary in my mind for it to be called violent.

2 hadith /words of the prophet say: "He who changes his religion has to be killed."

As for this hadith, it contradicts the Koran which prohibits killing. All hadith are not accepted as truth and different sects of Islam put more or less weight on them. What is for certain is the Koran is the ultimate authority.

But that doesn't change the fact that the Quran is full with violent language and in large parts clearly about the war against the pagans, directly accusing specifically named religions (jews but also christians) of being "the worst enemy", who "use to kill prophets" etc.

and yet this is not reflected in the historic practise of Islam. My arguement is the hateful passages cannot be demonstrated as better or worse then any number of OT passages. What is perhaps more disturbing is direct references to Jews and Christians. Of course the OT has an advantage there, no presently established religions are mentioned because they didn't exist for the Jews. However the distaste for pagans is mirrored in the OT(So the Hindus are covered). All I can say is I find Islam no more violent then Christianity. To argue about this in anything other then a relative sense makes no sense.

I honestly hope you don't mean my posts, for if you would carefully read them you'd have to see that I'm far from painting the world black and white or making simplistic arguments or trolling, but rather I elaborate my posts and try to address several facettes and layers of argument. Maybe I should repeat, to make you think, that I'm a)leftist, b)european, c) agnostic, d) anti-war, e) pro-palestinian.

...and I'm a stunning blonde, 5'11", Dallas cowboys cheerleader. Sorry, I really don't know who you are, I can only judge you on what I read. I don't think you're necessarily a bigot but I find relying on the statistics of violent language displayed in an ancient text to label a religion, practised by a godawful amount of people, as violent to be a simplistic arguement.

[gsmoove23]

The few modern and tolerant interpretations acknowledge that this total war only was meant against the pagans of Mecca in the times of Muhammad and have only limited temporal truth thus don't count today and hopefully their argument will be heard but some day...

This is one of the comments that suggest to me you have a bias since there is simply no indication to me that the modern and tolerant interpretations can be called 'few'. What source do you use to come to this conclusion? The passages you have used clearly indicate a temporal struggle, whats more "fight them (the pagans) alltogether as they fight you alltogether..." sounds like a call to arms against a group that was already fighting the muslims. Does the longer passage fit your interpretation closer? If so please display.

[Dinner]

Let's face the truth here. There are many tolerent muslims just as there are many tolerent people of every religion/faith/race/national origin, but, this doesn't change the fact that the basic wording of the Muslim holy book is the most violent and hate filled of all the major religions. This is not bigotry; it is simply fact and by understanding this fact we can begin to understand the root cause of Islam's extreamists and how they are able to sway none extreamist Muslims to their banner of hatred.

[yavoon]

neither, I am just responding to what you write gs. no malicious or asskissing intent.

[gsmoove23]

Oerdin,

Unless you can give some evidence of this beyond your assumption it is bigotry. Lists of violent lines from the koran mean nothing when compared to the sacred scriptures of any religion. Have you made a line by line comparison of the Bible and the OT? Are their many studies that support your assumption that aren't funded by christian or anti-muslim groups?