and/or www.mantra.com/jai (Dr. Jai Maharaj)
2010-09-15 19:19:56 UTC
Everything you've heard about Islam is true
By Tim Dunkin
RenewAmerica
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Once again, Islam has been in the news recently. And, as is typically
the case, the circumstances surrounding this state of affairs are not
positive, and the behavior of the Muslims involved provides yet
another public relations nightmare for a socio-religious system
already laboring under a mountain of self-inflicted wounds.
First, we have some crazy nut of an imam in New York City who wants
to build a triumphalistic "community center" (really, a mosque), just
two blocks from Ground Zero. As it turns out, this imam has a history
of doing all kinds of typically nutty Islamic things, such as calling
for the imposition of shari'a law in the United States. Imam Rauf has
managed to do what few others in America ever could, which is to
unite over 70% of the American people into opposition against
something. While some on the Left and in the Islamic community may
think that this whole "Ground Zero Mosque" affair is earning them
brownie points from a sympathetic public -- the dubious principle of
"any publicity is good publicity" seems to be in evidence here -- I
can assure them that this is not the case.
The second recent story about Islam was the declaration by a Florida
pastor named Terry Jones that his church was going to burn a
truckload of Qur'ans on the anniversary of 9-11. Personally, I think
that this proclamation was more a publicity stunt than anything else,
and I would caution conservatives and Christians against hitching
their wagons to Jones' horse. Pastor Jones is an apparent associate
of Fred Phelps and the Westboro "Baptist" Church out in Kansas -- a
cult group made up mostly of Phelps' own family, and which is most
well-known for picketing military funerals with signs saying things
like "God hates US soldiers" and so forth. As an aside, Phelps has
also in times past been a close associate of...Albert Gore, Jr.,
which leads me to suspect that Westboro "Baptist" Church is a front-
group used by the Left to try to tarnish the reputation of legitimate
Christianity in this country.
At any rate, what is disturbing about this affair is not the burning
of the Qur'an -- Jones has the right to do whatever he wants to with
his own property, which those Qur'ans presumably are. No, what is
disturbing is the typical Islamic response, which has ranged from
screeching idiots burning Bibles and US flags in front of American
embassies (to show us, I guess, that burning things is wrong) to
state-sanctioned death threats against Pastor Jones. It seems that
there are an awful lot of threats of murder from the Religion of
Peace, does it not? To people paying attention and who can get past
the "mean ol' pastor is gonna burn a holy book" superficiality, the
message about Islam is voluminous.
Unfortunately, we have a lot of people in this country who aren't
paying attention. As a result, there are a lot of myths about Islam
that people seem to believe because the news media and Muslim
propagandists tell them to believe them. I'd like to take this
opportunity to address a few of these myths.
So what do I know about Islam? I've spent the last nine years
studying it -- its theology, its history, its philosophy. Yes, I've
read the Qur'an. I've even picked up a little Arabic along the way,
though I'm certainly not fluent. I've read broadly on this subject,
from secular, Western, Christian, and Islamic sources themselves.
I've digested everything I could get my hands on, from the most
technical and academic works that probably only a couple of thousand
other people in the world have read, to the most puerile, blatant
rah-rah propaganda put out by Muslim publishing houses from all
across the Muslim world. I've grounded myself in a knowledge of the
social, political, historical, and cultural milieu of the ancient
Near East leading all the way up to the rise of Islam and beyond.
I've even written a book about the subject, entitled Ten Myths About
Islam. http://www.studytoanswer.net/islam_myths.html I am not
saying all this to toot my own horn. I am saying it so as to
demonstrate that I do, indeed, have some credibility to discuss this
topic that goes beyond "All I needed to know about Islam, I learned
on 9-11."
So let us start with the first pervasive myth that we often hear from
Muslims, which is that "Islam means peace." This argument represents
a common tactic that is used by Muslim apologists in the West, which
is to try to frame the discussion in such a way as to mislead, by
using Islamic terms that Muslims know Westerners will misconstrue. In
this case, it is technically true that the term "Islam" can mean
"peace" in Arabic. Islam is derived from the Arabic root form slm,
one of the meanings of which in Semitic languages can mean "peace"
(the Arabic word salaam is cognate with the Hebrew shalom, for
instance). However, as with all languages, the meaning of a word is
not determined by its denotation (its "dictionary" definition, so to
speak) only, but also by its connotation, the implied meaning that is
carried with the word in the minds of its native speakers.
In this case, "Islam" means peace -- but in a vastly different sense
from how Westerners and Americans think of it. When we hear the term
"peace," we think about people getting along together, people being
willing to tolerate each others' differences, and so forth. Not for
Islam. Islam's view of "peace" has to do with the other connotative
meaning of "Islam," which is "submission." Indeed, the term "Muslim"
most perfectly means "one who has submitted." For the Muslim, "peace"
means the absence of conflict that arises when there are no other
belief systems besides Islam. The way Islam brings peace to a land is
by terminating the existence, by one means or another, of all other
ways of life. Peace exists when everyone has submitted to the Islamic
system, either by converting or by accepting a position as third-
class citizens in their own countries. And of course, dead men tell
no tales.
Hence, when a Muslim tells you that "Islam means peace," he is being
truthful, but in a dishonest way. He is counting on you to apply your
definition of "peace" to the statement, when the Muslim really has in
mind his connotation of the term -- which is a far different thing
indeed.
This is, obviously, a form of lying, which brings me to my second
point, which is the claim often voiced that Muslim and Judeo-
Christian ethics and morals are the same, or at least are compatible,
allowing them to exist side by side in a pluralistic society. They
are not. While the Judeo-Christian tradition values things like
honesty, the Islamic does not. Indeed, the example given above of the
way Muslims approach the term "peace" is an example of taqiyya, which
is a device used by Muslims whereby they are allowed to lie to
infidels for the sake of concealing damaging information about Islam,
or to protect themselves. Using taqiyya, a Muslim may freely present
false or misleading information about Islam to an unbeliever, so long
as some sort of advancement of Islam is made. This may mean making
false claims, lying about terminology, or breaking an oath or treaty
once it becomes advantageous to Muslims to do so (more on this
below). Taqiyya is often coupled with kitman, which describes "mental
reservation" that Muslims will have when they outwardly engage in un-
Islamic behavior so as to fool an infidel. For instance, a Muslim may
present himself to Westerners as "moderate" or "assimilated" by
eating pork or drinking alcohol, relying upon his "mental
reservation" that he really disagrees with what he himself is doing,
but has to do it so as to stay "undercover," so to speak, thereby
absolving him of the act before Allah.
The Qur'an reports that the breaking of oaths to the infidel was
approved by Allah,
"Let not the believers Take for friends or helpers Unbelievers rather
than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from
Allah: except by way of precaution, that ye may Guard yourselves from
them. But Allah cautions you (To remember) Himself; for the final
goal is to Allah." (Surah 3:28)"
In context, the text is telling Muslims that they may not take
infidels as friends -- unless doing so can be used to advance Islam,
in which case, Muslims may present themselves as false friends. The
use of dishonesty to gain the upper hand against the enemies of Islam
is demonstrated clearly in the ahadith (saying attributed to Mohammed
that are used to "fill out" the Qur'an). For instance, in one
situation, Mohammed absolved a Muslim warrior in advance because he
was going to have to use deception to fulfill his vow to kill an
enemy of Mohammed,
"According to Ibn Humayd- Salamah- Muhammad b. Ishaq- 'Abd Allah b.
Al- Mughith b. Abi Burdah: The Prophet said, "Who will rid me of Ibn
al-Ashraf?" Muhammad b. Maslamah, the brother of the Banu 'Abd al-
Ashshal said, "I will rid you of him, O Messenger of God. I will kill
him." "Do it then," he said, "if you can." Muhammad b. Maslamah went
back and remained for three days, neither eating nor drinking more
than would keep him alive. The
Messenger of God got to hear of this, so he summoned him and said to
him, "Why have you left off food and drink?" "O Messenger of God," he
said, "I said something, and I do not know whether or not I can
fulfill it." "All that you are obliged to do is try," he replied. "O
Messenger of God," he said, "we shall have to tell lies." "Say what
you like," he replied, "You are absolved in the matter." (from the
History of al-Tabari, Vol 7, p. 95)
Modern Muslim commentators agree -- Islam allows lying when it helps
Islam,
"Falsehood is not always bad, to be sure; there are times when
telling a lie is more profitable and better for the general welfare,
and for the settlement of conciliation among people, than telling the
truth. To this effect, the Prophet says: 'He is not a false person
who settles conciliation among people, supports good or says what is
good." (A. al-Tabbarah, The Spirit of Islam, p. 255)
Keep in mind that "what is good" most definitely, for the faithful
Muslim, includes advancing Islam. Likewise, "settling conciliation
among people" can be construed as helping to establish the "peace"
that Muslims believe they are called to establish on earth.
One very pertinent outflowing of the taqiyya principle is that of the
hudna, or treaty of convenience. In such a case, Muslims are allowed
to make peace treaties with infidels, and then break them once they
have regained their strength and believe themselves to have the upper
hand again. The example of a hudna par excellence is found in the
Muslim mythology surround Mohammed. Mohammed negotiated a 10-year
peace treaty with the Meccans, against whom he had been fighting.
However, several years before the end of the treaty terms and once he
felt he had sufficient strength to defeat the Meccans, he launched a
surprise attack on Mecca and took the city. We see hudnas being
employed today in the many "peace agreements" that the Palestinians
and other Muslims will make with Israel, but will then break with
impunity once they think they have some sort of upper hand. They make
these agreements knowing full well that they do not intend to honor
the treaty stipulations. And, again, this is fully justified from the
Muslim traditions,
"And an announcement from Allah and His Messenger, to the people
(assembled) on the day of the Great Pilgrimage,- that Allah and His
Messenger dissolve (treaty) obligations with the Pagans...." (Surah
9:3)
Treaties made with unbelievers can be dissolved when the time comes
to dissolve them. This is why the Palestinians constantly declare
cease fires with the Israelis, but once they replenish their stocks
of rockets and mortars, they start firing at the Jews again without
warning. They never intended to honor the cease fires any longer than
it took for the next load of explosives to be smuggled in from Egypt.
All of this talk of war and broken treaties leads to my next point,
which is to address the claim that "Islam is a peaceful religion" and
that violent Muslims "only make up a small minority." As we saw with
their definition of peace" above, when Muslims talk about Islam being
a peaceful religion, they mean that it is a religion with a tendency
to try to force other religions and ways of life to submit to Islam -
- though that's not what they want you to think. Islam does, indeed,
have a long history of bloody conquest under the banner of jihad.
Indeed, most of the people groups across the world who are Muslim did
not get that way by peaceful persuasion. The Syrians? Conquered by
Muslim Arabs. The Egyptians? Conquered by Muslim Arabs. The Berbers
of North Africa? You guessed it -- conquered by Muslim Arabs. The
Indians who now make up what is today Pakistan? The Persians? The
Greeks in Asia Minor? The Bosnians? The Azerbaijanis? Yep, you
guessed it.
What's more, this violence to spread Islam is the rule, not the
exception. The Qur'an and the ahadith contain numerous injunctions
urging Muslims to fight against unbelievers. The sirat (biographies
of Mohammed written by early Muslims) contain numerous examples of
offensive violence on the part of Mohammed -- who is viewed by
Muslims as the supreme example to be emulated. For any Muslim to deny
that their religious writings are full of commands to offensive jihad
is simply and outrageously dishonest. Indeed, though most faithful,
traditionalist Muslims may not themselves be violent, they
nevertheless do support the principles of establishing Islam by the
sword, and often support the more radical elements who are
perpetrating violence.
Muslims will try to rebut this bloody history by using the tu quoque
fallacy, that is, they will try to distract away from the violence of
their own religion by trying to point to somebody else's. "What about
the Crusades?" they might say. Well, what about the Crusades? Those
were largely defensive wars designed to stop the Muslim threat to
Europe and to take back lands that had formerly been part of
Christendom, but had been forcibly taken for Islam. Further, the
Crusades were as much a secular as they were a religious enterprise.
Trying to use the Crusades as a counterbalance to fourteen centuries
of spreading Islam offensively by the sword is ridiculous.
Further, while the Qur'an and the ahadith explicitly command faithful
Muslims to wage "holy" war, the same cannot be said for the Bible. To
the extent that there was religious impetus behind the Crusades, that
was in spite of, rather than because of, the teaching of New
Testament Christianity. Nowhere in the life and times of Jesus Christ
do we see any example set by which faithful Christians would be
provoked to commit acts of violence against others for the sake of
spreading their religion. Indeed, the New Testament says exactly the
opposite,
"For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For
the weapons of our warfare [are] not carnal, but mighty through God
to the pulling down of strong holds...)" (II Corinthians 10:3-4)
To the extent that a Christian has a warfare for the sake of his
religion, it is a spiritual warfare. Anything else cannot rightly be
called "Christian."
This leads to another one of those counterintuitive falsehoods that
Muslims will tell us -- that jihad only refers to defensive warfare,
not offensive. The only time Muslims would ever engage in jihad, we
are told, is if they are attacked first.
There are several problems with this argument. First, it is simply
refuted by Islam's own history. For thirteen centuries, Muslims
routinely appealed to jihad for the advancement of Islam, to bring
more and more parts of the world into the deen (way of life) of
Islam. Historically, Muslims themselves have always understood that
jihad means offensive warfare. In fact, they were completely cool
with this. The initial Arab expansion was labeled a jihad. The Turks
justified their incursions into Europe on the basis of jihad. It
wasn't until the latter half of the 20th century, when it became
fashionable to portray the Muslim world as third-world victims of
horrible (Christian) European imperialism, that Muslim apologists
started arguing that jihad was only waged in self-defense. Before
that, jihad was something Muslims were proud to rely upon to prove to
the infidels that Islam was superior, by forcibly subjugating the
infidels to the Islamic way of life.
Oh, and never let anyone tell you that jihad only refers to some sort
of peaceful, inner struggle against temptation and sin. That is
completely unmitigated nonsense that has no historical, factual basis
whatsoever.
Another problem with the Muslim taqiyya about jihad is the definition
of "are attacked first." In the eyes of faithful Muslims, any slight
against Islam is an "attack." Supporting Israel is an "attack."
Allowing cartoonists to draw naughty pictures of Mohammed is an
"attack." The French legislature banning the burqah is an attack." It
doesn't matter if these "attacks" take place entirely within one of
our own countries -- it's still an attack upon Islam. Radical Muslims
have already, and will continue to, use these as pretexts for waging
holy war against the West. Their "defensive" war ends up being pretty
offensive, when you get right down to it.
The third problem with the "defensive war" argument lies in Islam's
peculiar view of world history. In the Islamic system, once a piece
of territory comes under Muslim control, by all rights it has to stay
under Muslim control. Any removal of land or populations from the
control of Islam, then, becomes a pretext for perpetual warfare to
regain it to whatever extent Muslims are able to wage it -- even if
the territory and populations were liberating themselves from Muslim
imperialism. This is much (but not all) of the reason why Muslims
hate Israel -- "Palestine" was ruled by Islam for over thirteen
centuries, so even though it is the Jews' own homeland, they no
longer have any right to it, in the Islamic worldview. The same goes
for any other place where Islam once ruled, but no longer does. Take,
for instance, Spain. The Spanish waged a centuries-long struggle to
liberate their own country from Islamic domination. The Muslims, in
turn, view the Spanish as having committed a grave affront to Allah.
This explains, for example, the statements about reclaiming "Al-
Andalus" (Spain) for Islam in some of Osama bin-Laden's videotaped
ramblings. What bin-Laden was saying is that Islam needs to reconquer
Spain.
As an aside, this ought to cause us to stop and think about some of
the odd, weird claims about history that Muslims will often make. For
instance, they claim that Offa, an early Anglo- Saxon king, converted
to Islam (without, of course, any historical evidence at all).
Likewise, a common Muslim claim is that Muslims discovered the New
World before Europeans, and even that the name "California" comes
from "Al- Kalifiyyah" (the Caliphate), supposedly showing that
Muslims had colonized it first. As laughable as these claims are,
what they really amount to is an attempt to give Islam a pretext for
waging this "defensive" jihad against the United Kingdom and the
United States, since our two countries supposedly were "once Muslim"
and need to be "returned" to the Islamic caliphate. The purpose for
these seemingly ridiculous-but-innocuous historical revisions is
really to "prepare the ground" for further warfare.
While we're on the subject of how Muslims deal with non-Muslim
peoples, let's talk about something called dhimmitude. It is not
uncommon for Muslim apologists in the West to declare that, along
with its astounding peacefulness and love for soft, cuddly teddy
bears, Islam is also a tolerant system, one in which Muslims and non-
Muslims live together in peace and harmony. Conversions to Islam,
they say, are voluntary and made by those who realized the truth and
logic of Islam.
Well, no. Historically, when Islam has conquered a country, one of
two sets of circumstances usually attained. If the country was not
one populated by "people of the Book" (i.e. Christians, Jews, or
Zoroastrians), then the population usually suffered an initial frenzy
of rapine, pillage, and bloodletting, followed by the imposition of
Islam onto whoever was left (for instance, this makes up a good deal
of Indian history from the 8th to the 19th centuries). If the country
was populated by "People of the Book," then the inhabitants were
given the "three choices" -- death, dhimmitude, or conversion.
Dhimmitude is, essentially, the reduction of a native population who
didn't want to die, but yet who also didn't want to convert to Islam,
to a place of third-class citizenship within their own country. The
origin of this institution lay in the dhimma, a "treaty" which
victorious Muslims would force onto conquered populations in which
the Muslims agreed to "protect" the infidels in return for their
(involuntary) support of the Islamic state and their humility before
Muslims. Think of it, in a sense, as a giant, worldwide protection
racket.
Dhimmis, as the infidels are then known, could continue to practice
their religion, but they could not in any way let it be publicly
seen. They were not allowed to rebuild or repair churches or
synagogues which fell into disrepair. They were not allowed to ring
bells or issue calls to prayer. They certainly were not allowed to
evangelize or to dispute about religion with Muslims. No dhimmi
church or synagogue could stand taller than the local Muslim mosque -
- if they did, the steeples would be knocked down. Dhimmis also had
to pay a special, prohibitive tax called the jizyah, which was levied
only upon conquered populations.
On a personal level, no dhimmi could hold any sort of public office,
could not testify in court against a Muslim, could not pursue any
legal action against Muslims, or even seek redress should they be
cheated or stolen from by a Muslim. They could not ride upon a horse,
and had to dismount from a donkey if in the presence of a Muslim
(these were signs of humiliation and the superiority of the Muslim).
In many districts, dhimmis had to wear special clothing that clearly
marked them out for ridicule and separation.
All in all, the purpose of these disabilities was to "encourage" the
dhimmis to convert to Islam. Either way, dhimmis supported the
Islamic state, either through their taxes, or by becoming Muslim and
lending their manpower to it. However, the prime purpose was to force
the conquered populations to adopt Islam. This is shown historically.
In the very early Islamic state after Muslims had conquered much of
the Middle East and North Africa, these dhimma stipulations had not
yet been implemented, and consequently Muslims remained a small
minority among a sea of conquered peoples. Around the middle of the
8th century, however, a series of hardline caliphs came to power who
began to lay greater and greater hardships on these populations. It
is only then that we find in the archaeological and historical
records that significant numbers of people began to convert to Islam.
Clearly, the penalties were what did the converting, not the logical
sense and reason of the Islamic religious system.
Another thing that often happened in dhimmi lands was the destruction
and/or conversion of their major buildings, religious or secular,
into symbols of Islamic superiority. For instance, when the Turks
conquered Constantinople, they turned the Hagia Sofia into a mosque -
- specifically to show the superiority of Islam over Christianity. In
the same way, they converted the Church of St. John in Damascus into
the Great Mosque of the Umayyads. The Temple Mount in Jerusalem was
coopted, and the Dome of the Rock was built, taking Judaism's holiest
site, and converting it into an Islamic centerpiece.
And that, folks, is what the Ground Zero Mosque is really all about.
The World Trade Center had long been the object of Muslim hatred,
since it represented in their eyes the power and capacity of Western
commercialism and capitalism (both of which are inimical to
traditional Islam). Islam felt that it won a great victory the day
Muslim terrorists brought the towers down on September 11, 2001. By
building a mosque at the site of the towers' destruction, this is a
way of proclaiming the superiority of Islam over America and the
American way of life. What once was the center of American capitalist
power will soon have a Muslim mosque on it, if Rauf gets his way --
and that will send a message to the entire Muslim world that America
is a dhimmi land.
There are many, many more things I could discuss in this essay --
I've only really touched on some of the major points in which Muslims
will try to persuade people that what they see before their own eyes
is not really true. I could discuss any number of other areas --
Muslim anti-Semitism, the treatment of women, the false claims about
Islam being "the fastest growing religion in the world," the eclectic
and manmade origins of the Qur'an, even such surprising topics as the
likelihood that Mohammed as a historical person probably didn't
really exist, or that Allah is not the same as the God of the Bible,
but is instead a monotheistic form of the ancient Middle Eastern moon
and fertility god Hubal. Again, please check out my book online to
see discussion of these and a whole lot more.
The take home message is this -- don't let yourself be sidetracked by
the propaganda. History tells us something far different from what
the apologists tell us who are trying to convince us that a Ground
Zero mosque is a great yet innocuous thing, or that Muslims only hate
Israel because the "Palestinian homeland" was ruthlessly stolen by
rapacious, imperialistic Zionists. Once we begin to see how the
Muslims actually think about things, we can understand why they do
many of the things they do, and be forewarned about what their next
moves may be. Make no mistake -- there IS a clash of civilizations
going on. It is one which Islam has initiated, but which we must be
prepared to face and fight if we are to maintain our culture,
civilization, and way of life.
More at:
http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/dunkin/100915
Jai Maharaj, Jyotishi
Om Shanti
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By Tim Dunkin
RenewAmerica
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Once again, Islam has been in the news recently. And, as is typically
the case, the circumstances surrounding this state of affairs are not
positive, and the behavior of the Muslims involved provides yet
another public relations nightmare for a socio-religious system
already laboring under a mountain of self-inflicted wounds.
First, we have some crazy nut of an imam in New York City who wants
to build a triumphalistic "community center" (really, a mosque), just
two blocks from Ground Zero. As it turns out, this imam has a history
of doing all kinds of typically nutty Islamic things, such as calling
for the imposition of shari'a law in the United States. Imam Rauf has
managed to do what few others in America ever could, which is to
unite over 70% of the American people into opposition against
something. While some on the Left and in the Islamic community may
think that this whole "Ground Zero Mosque" affair is earning them
brownie points from a sympathetic public -- the dubious principle of
"any publicity is good publicity" seems to be in evidence here -- I
can assure them that this is not the case.
The second recent story about Islam was the declaration by a Florida
pastor named Terry Jones that his church was going to burn a
truckload of Qur'ans on the anniversary of 9-11. Personally, I think
that this proclamation was more a publicity stunt than anything else,
and I would caution conservatives and Christians against hitching
their wagons to Jones' horse. Pastor Jones is an apparent associate
of Fred Phelps and the Westboro "Baptist" Church out in Kansas -- a
cult group made up mostly of Phelps' own family, and which is most
well-known for picketing military funerals with signs saying things
like "God hates US soldiers" and so forth. As an aside, Phelps has
also in times past been a close associate of...Albert Gore, Jr.,
which leads me to suspect that Westboro "Baptist" Church is a front-
group used by the Left to try to tarnish the reputation of legitimate
Christianity in this country.
At any rate, what is disturbing about this affair is not the burning
of the Qur'an -- Jones has the right to do whatever he wants to with
his own property, which those Qur'ans presumably are. No, what is
disturbing is the typical Islamic response, which has ranged from
screeching idiots burning Bibles and US flags in front of American
embassies (to show us, I guess, that burning things is wrong) to
state-sanctioned death threats against Pastor Jones. It seems that
there are an awful lot of threats of murder from the Religion of
Peace, does it not? To people paying attention and who can get past
the "mean ol' pastor is gonna burn a holy book" superficiality, the
message about Islam is voluminous.
Unfortunately, we have a lot of people in this country who aren't
paying attention. As a result, there are a lot of myths about Islam
that people seem to believe because the news media and Muslim
propagandists tell them to believe them. I'd like to take this
opportunity to address a few of these myths.
So what do I know about Islam? I've spent the last nine years
studying it -- its theology, its history, its philosophy. Yes, I've
read the Qur'an. I've even picked up a little Arabic along the way,
though I'm certainly not fluent. I've read broadly on this subject,
from secular, Western, Christian, and Islamic sources themselves.
I've digested everything I could get my hands on, from the most
technical and academic works that probably only a couple of thousand
other people in the world have read, to the most puerile, blatant
rah-rah propaganda put out by Muslim publishing houses from all
across the Muslim world. I've grounded myself in a knowledge of the
social, political, historical, and cultural milieu of the ancient
Near East leading all the way up to the rise of Islam and beyond.
I've even written a book about the subject, entitled Ten Myths About
Islam. http://www.studytoanswer.net/islam_myths.html I am not
saying all this to toot my own horn. I am saying it so as to
demonstrate that I do, indeed, have some credibility to discuss this
topic that goes beyond "All I needed to know about Islam, I learned
on 9-11."
So let us start with the first pervasive myth that we often hear from
Muslims, which is that "Islam means peace." This argument represents
a common tactic that is used by Muslim apologists in the West, which
is to try to frame the discussion in such a way as to mislead, by
using Islamic terms that Muslims know Westerners will misconstrue. In
this case, it is technically true that the term "Islam" can mean
"peace" in Arabic. Islam is derived from the Arabic root form slm,
one of the meanings of which in Semitic languages can mean "peace"
(the Arabic word salaam is cognate with the Hebrew shalom, for
instance). However, as with all languages, the meaning of a word is
not determined by its denotation (its "dictionary" definition, so to
speak) only, but also by its connotation, the implied meaning that is
carried with the word in the minds of its native speakers.
In this case, "Islam" means peace -- but in a vastly different sense
from how Westerners and Americans think of it. When we hear the term
"peace," we think about people getting along together, people being
willing to tolerate each others' differences, and so forth. Not for
Islam. Islam's view of "peace" has to do with the other connotative
meaning of "Islam," which is "submission." Indeed, the term "Muslim"
most perfectly means "one who has submitted." For the Muslim, "peace"
means the absence of conflict that arises when there are no other
belief systems besides Islam. The way Islam brings peace to a land is
by terminating the existence, by one means or another, of all other
ways of life. Peace exists when everyone has submitted to the Islamic
system, either by converting or by accepting a position as third-
class citizens in their own countries. And of course, dead men tell
no tales.
Hence, when a Muslim tells you that "Islam means peace," he is being
truthful, but in a dishonest way. He is counting on you to apply your
definition of "peace" to the statement, when the Muslim really has in
mind his connotation of the term -- which is a far different thing
indeed.
This is, obviously, a form of lying, which brings me to my second
point, which is the claim often voiced that Muslim and Judeo-
Christian ethics and morals are the same, or at least are compatible,
allowing them to exist side by side in a pluralistic society. They
are not. While the Judeo-Christian tradition values things like
honesty, the Islamic does not. Indeed, the example given above of the
way Muslims approach the term "peace" is an example of taqiyya, which
is a device used by Muslims whereby they are allowed to lie to
infidels for the sake of concealing damaging information about Islam,
or to protect themselves. Using taqiyya, a Muslim may freely present
false or misleading information about Islam to an unbeliever, so long
as some sort of advancement of Islam is made. This may mean making
false claims, lying about terminology, or breaking an oath or treaty
once it becomes advantageous to Muslims to do so (more on this
below). Taqiyya is often coupled with kitman, which describes "mental
reservation" that Muslims will have when they outwardly engage in un-
Islamic behavior so as to fool an infidel. For instance, a Muslim may
present himself to Westerners as "moderate" or "assimilated" by
eating pork or drinking alcohol, relying upon his "mental
reservation" that he really disagrees with what he himself is doing,
but has to do it so as to stay "undercover," so to speak, thereby
absolving him of the act before Allah.
The Qur'an reports that the breaking of oaths to the infidel was
approved by Allah,
"Let not the believers Take for friends or helpers Unbelievers rather
than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from
Allah: except by way of precaution, that ye may Guard yourselves from
them. But Allah cautions you (To remember) Himself; for the final
goal is to Allah." (Surah 3:28)"
In context, the text is telling Muslims that they may not take
infidels as friends -- unless doing so can be used to advance Islam,
in which case, Muslims may present themselves as false friends. The
use of dishonesty to gain the upper hand against the enemies of Islam
is demonstrated clearly in the ahadith (saying attributed to Mohammed
that are used to "fill out" the Qur'an). For instance, in one
situation, Mohammed absolved a Muslim warrior in advance because he
was going to have to use deception to fulfill his vow to kill an
enemy of Mohammed,
"According to Ibn Humayd- Salamah- Muhammad b. Ishaq- 'Abd Allah b.
Al- Mughith b. Abi Burdah: The Prophet said, "Who will rid me of Ibn
al-Ashraf?" Muhammad b. Maslamah, the brother of the Banu 'Abd al-
Ashshal said, "I will rid you of him, O Messenger of God. I will kill
him." "Do it then," he said, "if you can." Muhammad b. Maslamah went
back and remained for three days, neither eating nor drinking more
than would keep him alive. The
Messenger of God got to hear of this, so he summoned him and said to
him, "Why have you left off food and drink?" "O Messenger of God," he
said, "I said something, and I do not know whether or not I can
fulfill it." "All that you are obliged to do is try," he replied. "O
Messenger of God," he said, "we shall have to tell lies." "Say what
you like," he replied, "You are absolved in the matter." (from the
History of al-Tabari, Vol 7, p. 95)
Modern Muslim commentators agree -- Islam allows lying when it helps
Islam,
"Falsehood is not always bad, to be sure; there are times when
telling a lie is more profitable and better for the general welfare,
and for the settlement of conciliation among people, than telling the
truth. To this effect, the Prophet says: 'He is not a false person
who settles conciliation among people, supports good or says what is
good." (A. al-Tabbarah, The Spirit of Islam, p. 255)
Keep in mind that "what is good" most definitely, for the faithful
Muslim, includes advancing Islam. Likewise, "settling conciliation
among people" can be construed as helping to establish the "peace"
that Muslims believe they are called to establish on earth.
One very pertinent outflowing of the taqiyya principle is that of the
hudna, or treaty of convenience. In such a case, Muslims are allowed
to make peace treaties with infidels, and then break them once they
have regained their strength and believe themselves to have the upper
hand again. The example of a hudna par excellence is found in the
Muslim mythology surround Mohammed. Mohammed negotiated a 10-year
peace treaty with the Meccans, against whom he had been fighting.
However, several years before the end of the treaty terms and once he
felt he had sufficient strength to defeat the Meccans, he launched a
surprise attack on Mecca and took the city. We see hudnas being
employed today in the many "peace agreements" that the Palestinians
and other Muslims will make with Israel, but will then break with
impunity once they think they have some sort of upper hand. They make
these agreements knowing full well that they do not intend to honor
the treaty stipulations. And, again, this is fully justified from the
Muslim traditions,
"And an announcement from Allah and His Messenger, to the people
(assembled) on the day of the Great Pilgrimage,- that Allah and His
Messenger dissolve (treaty) obligations with the Pagans...." (Surah
9:3)
Treaties made with unbelievers can be dissolved when the time comes
to dissolve them. This is why the Palestinians constantly declare
cease fires with the Israelis, but once they replenish their stocks
of rockets and mortars, they start firing at the Jews again without
warning. They never intended to honor the cease fires any longer than
it took for the next load of explosives to be smuggled in from Egypt.
All of this talk of war and broken treaties leads to my next point,
which is to address the claim that "Islam is a peaceful religion" and
that violent Muslims "only make up a small minority." As we saw with
their definition of peace" above, when Muslims talk about Islam being
a peaceful religion, they mean that it is a religion with a tendency
to try to force other religions and ways of life to submit to Islam -
- though that's not what they want you to think. Islam does, indeed,
have a long history of bloody conquest under the banner of jihad.
Indeed, most of the people groups across the world who are Muslim did
not get that way by peaceful persuasion. The Syrians? Conquered by
Muslim Arabs. The Egyptians? Conquered by Muslim Arabs. The Berbers
of North Africa? You guessed it -- conquered by Muslim Arabs. The
Indians who now make up what is today Pakistan? The Persians? The
Greeks in Asia Minor? The Bosnians? The Azerbaijanis? Yep, you
guessed it.
What's more, this violence to spread Islam is the rule, not the
exception. The Qur'an and the ahadith contain numerous injunctions
urging Muslims to fight against unbelievers. The sirat (biographies
of Mohammed written by early Muslims) contain numerous examples of
offensive violence on the part of Mohammed -- who is viewed by
Muslims as the supreme example to be emulated. For any Muslim to deny
that their religious writings are full of commands to offensive jihad
is simply and outrageously dishonest. Indeed, though most faithful,
traditionalist Muslims may not themselves be violent, they
nevertheless do support the principles of establishing Islam by the
sword, and often support the more radical elements who are
perpetrating violence.
Muslims will try to rebut this bloody history by using the tu quoque
fallacy, that is, they will try to distract away from the violence of
their own religion by trying to point to somebody else's. "What about
the Crusades?" they might say. Well, what about the Crusades? Those
were largely defensive wars designed to stop the Muslim threat to
Europe and to take back lands that had formerly been part of
Christendom, but had been forcibly taken for Islam. Further, the
Crusades were as much a secular as they were a religious enterprise.
Trying to use the Crusades as a counterbalance to fourteen centuries
of spreading Islam offensively by the sword is ridiculous.
Further, while the Qur'an and the ahadith explicitly command faithful
Muslims to wage "holy" war, the same cannot be said for the Bible. To
the extent that there was religious impetus behind the Crusades, that
was in spite of, rather than because of, the teaching of New
Testament Christianity. Nowhere in the life and times of Jesus Christ
do we see any example set by which faithful Christians would be
provoked to commit acts of violence against others for the sake of
spreading their religion. Indeed, the New Testament says exactly the
opposite,
"For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For
the weapons of our warfare [are] not carnal, but mighty through God
to the pulling down of strong holds...)" (II Corinthians 10:3-4)
To the extent that a Christian has a warfare for the sake of his
religion, it is a spiritual warfare. Anything else cannot rightly be
called "Christian."
This leads to another one of those counterintuitive falsehoods that
Muslims will tell us -- that jihad only refers to defensive warfare,
not offensive. The only time Muslims would ever engage in jihad, we
are told, is if they are attacked first.
There are several problems with this argument. First, it is simply
refuted by Islam's own history. For thirteen centuries, Muslims
routinely appealed to jihad for the advancement of Islam, to bring
more and more parts of the world into the deen (way of life) of
Islam. Historically, Muslims themselves have always understood that
jihad means offensive warfare. In fact, they were completely cool
with this. The initial Arab expansion was labeled a jihad. The Turks
justified their incursions into Europe on the basis of jihad. It
wasn't until the latter half of the 20th century, when it became
fashionable to portray the Muslim world as third-world victims of
horrible (Christian) European imperialism, that Muslim apologists
started arguing that jihad was only waged in self-defense. Before
that, jihad was something Muslims were proud to rely upon to prove to
the infidels that Islam was superior, by forcibly subjugating the
infidels to the Islamic way of life.
Oh, and never let anyone tell you that jihad only refers to some sort
of peaceful, inner struggle against temptation and sin. That is
completely unmitigated nonsense that has no historical, factual basis
whatsoever.
Another problem with the Muslim taqiyya about jihad is the definition
of "are attacked first." In the eyes of faithful Muslims, any slight
against Islam is an "attack." Supporting Israel is an "attack."
Allowing cartoonists to draw naughty pictures of Mohammed is an
"attack." The French legislature banning the burqah is an attack." It
doesn't matter if these "attacks" take place entirely within one of
our own countries -- it's still an attack upon Islam. Radical Muslims
have already, and will continue to, use these as pretexts for waging
holy war against the West. Their "defensive" war ends up being pretty
offensive, when you get right down to it.
The third problem with the "defensive war" argument lies in Islam's
peculiar view of world history. In the Islamic system, once a piece
of territory comes under Muslim control, by all rights it has to stay
under Muslim control. Any removal of land or populations from the
control of Islam, then, becomes a pretext for perpetual warfare to
regain it to whatever extent Muslims are able to wage it -- even if
the territory and populations were liberating themselves from Muslim
imperialism. This is much (but not all) of the reason why Muslims
hate Israel -- "Palestine" was ruled by Islam for over thirteen
centuries, so even though it is the Jews' own homeland, they no
longer have any right to it, in the Islamic worldview. The same goes
for any other place where Islam once ruled, but no longer does. Take,
for instance, Spain. The Spanish waged a centuries-long struggle to
liberate their own country from Islamic domination. The Muslims, in
turn, view the Spanish as having committed a grave affront to Allah.
This explains, for example, the statements about reclaiming "Al-
Andalus" (Spain) for Islam in some of Osama bin-Laden's videotaped
ramblings. What bin-Laden was saying is that Islam needs to reconquer
Spain.
As an aside, this ought to cause us to stop and think about some of
the odd, weird claims about history that Muslims will often make. For
instance, they claim that Offa, an early Anglo- Saxon king, converted
to Islam (without, of course, any historical evidence at all).
Likewise, a common Muslim claim is that Muslims discovered the New
World before Europeans, and even that the name "California" comes
from "Al- Kalifiyyah" (the Caliphate), supposedly showing that
Muslims had colonized it first. As laughable as these claims are,
what they really amount to is an attempt to give Islam a pretext for
waging this "defensive" jihad against the United Kingdom and the
United States, since our two countries supposedly were "once Muslim"
and need to be "returned" to the Islamic caliphate. The purpose for
these seemingly ridiculous-but-innocuous historical revisions is
really to "prepare the ground" for further warfare.
While we're on the subject of how Muslims deal with non-Muslim
peoples, let's talk about something called dhimmitude. It is not
uncommon for Muslim apologists in the West to declare that, along
with its astounding peacefulness and love for soft, cuddly teddy
bears, Islam is also a tolerant system, one in which Muslims and non-
Muslims live together in peace and harmony. Conversions to Islam,
they say, are voluntary and made by those who realized the truth and
logic of Islam.
Well, no. Historically, when Islam has conquered a country, one of
two sets of circumstances usually attained. If the country was not
one populated by "people of the Book" (i.e. Christians, Jews, or
Zoroastrians), then the population usually suffered an initial frenzy
of rapine, pillage, and bloodletting, followed by the imposition of
Islam onto whoever was left (for instance, this makes up a good deal
of Indian history from the 8th to the 19th centuries). If the country
was populated by "People of the Book," then the inhabitants were
given the "three choices" -- death, dhimmitude, or conversion.
Dhimmitude is, essentially, the reduction of a native population who
didn't want to die, but yet who also didn't want to convert to Islam,
to a place of third-class citizenship within their own country. The
origin of this institution lay in the dhimma, a "treaty" which
victorious Muslims would force onto conquered populations in which
the Muslims agreed to "protect" the infidels in return for their
(involuntary) support of the Islamic state and their humility before
Muslims. Think of it, in a sense, as a giant, worldwide protection
racket.
Dhimmis, as the infidels are then known, could continue to practice
their religion, but they could not in any way let it be publicly
seen. They were not allowed to rebuild or repair churches or
synagogues which fell into disrepair. They were not allowed to ring
bells or issue calls to prayer. They certainly were not allowed to
evangelize or to dispute about religion with Muslims. No dhimmi
church or synagogue could stand taller than the local Muslim mosque -
- if they did, the steeples would be knocked down. Dhimmis also had
to pay a special, prohibitive tax called the jizyah, which was levied
only upon conquered populations.
On a personal level, no dhimmi could hold any sort of public office,
could not testify in court against a Muslim, could not pursue any
legal action against Muslims, or even seek redress should they be
cheated or stolen from by a Muslim. They could not ride upon a horse,
and had to dismount from a donkey if in the presence of a Muslim
(these were signs of humiliation and the superiority of the Muslim).
In many districts, dhimmis had to wear special clothing that clearly
marked them out for ridicule and separation.
All in all, the purpose of these disabilities was to "encourage" the
dhimmis to convert to Islam. Either way, dhimmis supported the
Islamic state, either through their taxes, or by becoming Muslim and
lending their manpower to it. However, the prime purpose was to force
the conquered populations to adopt Islam. This is shown historically.
In the very early Islamic state after Muslims had conquered much of
the Middle East and North Africa, these dhimma stipulations had not
yet been implemented, and consequently Muslims remained a small
minority among a sea of conquered peoples. Around the middle of the
8th century, however, a series of hardline caliphs came to power who
began to lay greater and greater hardships on these populations. It
is only then that we find in the archaeological and historical
records that significant numbers of people began to convert to Islam.
Clearly, the penalties were what did the converting, not the logical
sense and reason of the Islamic religious system.
Another thing that often happened in dhimmi lands was the destruction
and/or conversion of their major buildings, religious or secular,
into symbols of Islamic superiority. For instance, when the Turks
conquered Constantinople, they turned the Hagia Sofia into a mosque -
- specifically to show the superiority of Islam over Christianity. In
the same way, they converted the Church of St. John in Damascus into
the Great Mosque of the Umayyads. The Temple Mount in Jerusalem was
coopted, and the Dome of the Rock was built, taking Judaism's holiest
site, and converting it into an Islamic centerpiece.
And that, folks, is what the Ground Zero Mosque is really all about.
The World Trade Center had long been the object of Muslim hatred,
since it represented in their eyes the power and capacity of Western
commercialism and capitalism (both of which are inimical to
traditional Islam). Islam felt that it won a great victory the day
Muslim terrorists brought the towers down on September 11, 2001. By
building a mosque at the site of the towers' destruction, this is a
way of proclaiming the superiority of Islam over America and the
American way of life. What once was the center of American capitalist
power will soon have a Muslim mosque on it, if Rauf gets his way --
and that will send a message to the entire Muslim world that America
is a dhimmi land.
There are many, many more things I could discuss in this essay --
I've only really touched on some of the major points in which Muslims
will try to persuade people that what they see before their own eyes
is not really true. I could discuss any number of other areas --
Muslim anti-Semitism, the treatment of women, the false claims about
Islam being "the fastest growing religion in the world," the eclectic
and manmade origins of the Qur'an, even such surprising topics as the
likelihood that Mohammed as a historical person probably didn't
really exist, or that Allah is not the same as the God of the Bible,
but is instead a monotheistic form of the ancient Middle Eastern moon
and fertility god Hubal. Again, please check out my book online to
see discussion of these and a whole lot more.
The take home message is this -- don't let yourself be sidetracked by
the propaganda. History tells us something far different from what
the apologists tell us who are trying to convince us that a Ground
Zero mosque is a great yet innocuous thing, or that Muslims only hate
Israel because the "Palestinian homeland" was ruthlessly stolen by
rapacious, imperialistic Zionists. Once we begin to see how the
Muslims actually think about things, we can understand why they do
many of the things they do, and be forewarned about what their next
moves may be. Make no mistake -- there IS a clash of civilizations
going on. It is one which Islam has initiated, but which we must be
prepared to face and fight if we are to maintain our culture,
civilization, and way of life.
More at:
http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/dunkin/100915
Jai Maharaj, Jyotishi
Om Shanti
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