Islamophobia and God Alone.
-
Alen, you ask how we can erase,delete such fears. Well, I don't think you can really. If someone hates you and wants to kill you for your beliefs, well you are in good company amongst the prophets
Peace,
Respect.Thank God, Hvala Bogu, AlhamdilAllah.
I'm very grateful to God that I live in UK.
hailI can set a good example ....
Peace. -
the main problem i see with such remarks is that they are true
they are true for the sectarians
that's why you can't debate with "islamophobes" they just describe what they read in the hadiths and books "explaining" the quran
the other problem is that such people are not open minded
and they will never accept any other explanation, and will just want to kick them out/eradicate todays Islam and Muslimthe only way this can change, is if a middle eastern country drops sectarian values and shows the example
-
Some of my thoughts on this "Islamophobia" term.
The term "Islamophobia" is as preposterous as contriving the terms 'fascistophobia' or 'fluophobia'. There is rational and reasonable grounds to be fearful and perturbed by how Islamic scriptures can and are destructively put into real life action by those who have ascendancy and follow the fundamentals of Islam. Is a person irrational and ?Islamaphobic? when they point out how a homosexual or an apostate in one of the many Muslim majority countries will face the death penalty or imprisonment if they are discovered to be a homosexual or an apostate, where the establishment warrant these punishments on an Islamic basis?
It is even more rational to have apprehensions about Islam when you peruse the Quran and read the copious amount of verses which have rampant instructions to kill / smite / slay / strike / subjugate the non-believers. Moderates will contextualise/historicise violent parts of the Quran in Western societies as a mental exercise in propitiation despite no part of the Quran saying any of it is within a context or only for a particular historical period. The likes of ISIS and many others do not however perform this cognitive buffet so some level of trepidation is fully justified as the correct response to the present and impending danger or Islamic doctrines. Followers of the fundamentals of Islam don?t just believe these are fictitious scriptures in the Shakespearean sense that should have no practical application. They are seen by those staunchly dutiful to the fundamentals of Islam as being pertinent to contemporary life in the 21st Century.
The crucial distinction that should be made is that awareness and a response to the menacing aspects of Islam as an ideology should not be commingled with Muslims as people, who should not face bigotry on the basis of their Muslim identity. ?Islam? and ?Muslims? are not synonymous terms. Muslims are very diverse and pluralistic and the only common trait every person who give themselves the "Muslim" label has is that they breathe oxygen. They are many Muslims who just like Jews and Christian give themselves that identity label but think the supernatural claims are complete twaddle(albeit more Muslims don?t disclose their non-belief in supernatural claims as openly), but will celebrate Eid with family and friends, just like cultural non-believing Christians celebrate Christmas. These nominal Muslims, many who don?t practise Islamic rituals at all and don?t spread odious rhetoric towards non-Muslims should be distinguished from the fundamental followers of Islam and not clustered as one entity.
The hatred towards Muslims is opportunely used by fundamental followers of Islam who then profusely and incessantly scream ?Islamaphobia? in their attempts to detract attention away from well-substantiated criticisms of Islam as an ideology. It serves to duplicitously portray the opprobrium Islamofascists ideological views receive as demonisation of all Muslims. It desires to quieten the ideological criticism of Islam that effect the aspirations of Islamofascists who do not wish to be hindered in expressing their loathing of those who do not subscribe to their views and for their actions to be combated.
To sum it up for Islamophobia to be a term which makes sense linguistically it would require the user of the term to show how not a single version or interpretation of Islam presently or historically has presented any danger to anyone or presents any danger to anyone at this instant in time. You would have to think the wrath faced by non-believers, homosexuals, women and apostates with Islamic scriptural validations since Islam's inception has all been one complete fabrication. This of course is intellectually impossible to do and would require the user to engage in an unparalleled level of denialism.
-
Some of my thoughts on this "Islamophobia" term.
The term "Islamophobia" is as preposterous as contriving the terms 'fascistophobia' or 'fluophobia'. There is rational and reasonable grounds to be fearful and perturbed by how Islamic scriptures can and are destructively put into real life action by those who have ascendancy and follow the fundamentals of Islam. Is a person irrational and ?Islamaphobic? when they point out how a homosexual or an apostate in one of the many Muslim majority countries will face the death penalty or imprisonment if they are discovered to be a homosexual or an apostate, where the establishment warrant these punishments on an Islamic basis?
It is even more rational to have apprehensions about Islam when you peruse the Quran and read the copious amount of verses which have rampant instructions to kill / smite / slay / strike / subjugate the non-believers. Moderates will contextualise/historicise violent parts of the Quran in Western societies as a mental exercise in propitiation despite no part of the Quran saying any of it is within a context or only for a particular historical period. The likes of ISIS and many others do not however perform this cognitive buffet so some level of trepidation is fully justified as the correct response to the present and impending danger or Islamic doctrines. Followers of the fundamentals of Islam don?t just believe these are fictitious scriptures in the Shakespearean sense that should have no practical application. They are seen by those staunchly dutiful to the fundamentals of Islam as being pertinent to contemporary life in the 21st Century.
The crucial distinction that should be made is that awareness and a response to the menacing aspects of Islam as an ideology should not be commingled with Muslims as people, who should not face bigotry on the basis of their Muslim identity. ?Islam? and ?Muslims? are not synonymous terms. Muslims are very diverse and pluralistic and the only common trait every person who give themselves the "Muslim" label has is that they breathe oxygen. They are many Muslims who just like Jews and Christian give themselves that identity label but think the supernatural claims are complete twaddle(albeit more Muslims don?t disclose their non-belief in supernatural claims as openly), but will celebrate Eid with family and friends, just like cultural non-believing Christians celebrate Christmas. These nominal Muslims, many who don?t practise Islamic rituals at all and don?t spread odious rhetoric towards non-Muslims should be distinguished from the fundamental followers of Islam and not clustered as one entity.
The hatred towards Muslims is opportunely used by fundamental followers of Islam who then profusely and incessantly scream ?Islamaphobia? in their attempts to detract attention away from well-substantiated criticisms of Islam as an ideology. It serves to duplicitously portray the opprobrium Islamofascists ideological views receive as demonisation of all Muslims. It desires to quieten the ideological criticism of Islam that effect the aspirations of Islamofascists who do not wish to be hindered in expressing their loathing of those who do not subscribe to their views and for their actions to be combated.
To sum it up for Islamophobia to be a term which makes sense linguistically it would require the user of the term to show how not a single version or interpretation of Islam presently or historically has presented any danger to anyone or presents any danger to anyone at this instant in time. You would have to think the wrath faced by non-believers, homosexuals, women and apostates with Islamic scriptural validations since Islam's inception has all been one complete fabrication. This of course is intellectually impossible to do and would require the user to engage in an unparalleled level of denialism.
By your own standards, "Christophobia" should also be an invalid term, because the exact same concerns you have about the so called "dangers" of Islamic ideology put into practice are even more relevant with regard to Christian/Jewish/Biblical ideologies.
The Bible has many more passages in it endorsing violence and calling for extermination of non-believers than the Pure Holy Quran. Some passages in the Bible even say it is moral to slaughter children and infant babies.
the question is why do Christian priests criticize Islam and the Prophet (peace be upon him) for alleged crimes which are even more pronounced in their own scriptures and from their own prophets. The Christian belief about their own prophets like Moses, Joshua, the Judges, the Israelite Kings David, Solomon, and Jesus, present all these figures as extremely violent and bloodthirsty according to the standard they have utilized to criticize Islam! Hypocrisy at its worst.
-
By your own standards, "Christophobia" should also be an invalid term, because the exact same concerns you have about the so called "dangers" of Islamic ideology put into practice are even more relevant with regard to Christian/Jewish/Biblical ideologies.
The Bible has many more passages in it endorsing violence and calling for extermination of non-believers than the Pure Holy Quran. Some passages in the Bible even say it is moral to slaughter children and infant babies.
the question is why do Christian priests criticize Islam and the Prophet (peace be upon him) for alleged crimes which are even more pronounced in their own scriptures and from their own prophets. The Christian belief about their own prophets like Moses, Joshua, the Judges, the Israelite Kings David, Solomon, and Jesus, present all these figures as extremely violent and bloodthirsty according to the standard they have utilized to criticize Islam! Hypocrisy at its worst.
We cannot compare apple with oranges.
-
A group always demonizes another group. So, it's not very odd that Christians talk crap about Muslims. That's how the human being works. So naturally, we only focus on the opponent's bad points (real or constructed), and not on our own.
-
The Christian world is not applying the madness found in their scriptures. I'm not sure what reasons they gave for their violent actions in the past, whether they quoted scriptures or not, but they don't seem to take their scriptures that seriously today.
-
The Muslims world take their scriptures more seriously than the Christian world... that is, more literally. This is simply because Islam is younger (as a world religion) than Christianity. Had they been equally old or young, they'd been much more similar in expression regarding following or not following scriptures.
-
Muslims often make this mistake. They see Christianity the way they see Islam, but in reality these two religions have very different contexts. Islam in the muslim world has not the same kind of relationship as Christianity in the christian world. It's a big mistake to think like this. If we see it this way it would immediately seem like there are many, many more believers in Muslims countries than in Christian. This is not true. People are indeed more religious in Muslim countries, because that's the culture, but they're certainly not more believers. This is an important distinction to make. We often fail to understand "the other" because we fail to see "the other" in the proper context. This is how racism and the like crops up.... because we fail to (or refuse to) understand the context.
Peace
-
-
We cannot compare apple with oranges.
- The Christian world is not applying the madness found in their scriptures. I'm not sure what reasons they gave for their violent actions in the past, whether they quoted scriptures or not, but they don't seem to take their scriptures that seriously today.
You're suggesting that it was only in the past that Christians were violent in the name of their doctrine, i.e., the Spanish inquisition, the Reconquista, the Crusades. This is a common fallacy. The Christians today are equally if not more violent. Even recent modern history bears testament to this fact. If the Christian apologists say that the Nazi and KKK version of Christianity is not authentic or true to the spirit of the faith, then isn't that what the vast majority of moderate Sunni Muslims including our Ulama have been saying about the tiny minority of extremists and terrorists who claim to represent Islam?
Former President Bush declared his invasion of Iraq, with the chemical (White phosphorus) attacks on Fallujah and other atrocities against humanity as a "Crusade". The Christian preacher Ann Coulter wrote and continues to defend her idea that the Christians should "invade Muslim countries, kill their leaders, and forcefully convert them to Christianity".
- The Muslims world take their scriptures more seriously than the Christian world... that is, more literally. This is simply because Islam is younger (as a world religion) than Christianity. Had they been equally old or young, they'd been much more similar in expression regarding following or not following scriptures.
The fact remains that the vast majority (I'm talking over 99%) of Muslims are peaceful, nonviolent, and moderate. They interpret the so called violent passages of the Pure Holy Quran in a historical context and with respect to guidance regarding a just/defensive war (the question of literal or figurative is irrelevant). This is exactly how Jews and Christians interpret the violent passages of their Bible. If, as the bigoted Christian priests suggest, the majority of Muslims are violent and extremist, than there would be over a billion members of the various terrorist cells and groups which in reality have only a few thousand people with them.
A religion being young or old is irrelevant. Whether Islam is young or old, the fact is majority of Muslims TODAY and in fact, throughout history, have been nonviolent and non-extremist.
- Muslims often make this mistake. They see Christianity the way they see Islam, but in reality these two religions have very different contexts. Islam in the muslim world has not the same kind of relationship as Christianity in the christian world. It's a big mistake to think like this. If we see it this way it would immediately seem like there are many, many more believers in Muslims countries than in Christian. This is not true. People are indeed more religious in Muslim countries, because that's the culture, but they're certainly not more believers. This is an important distinction to make. We often fail to understand "the other" because we fail to see "the other" in the proper context. This is how racism and the like crops up.... because we fail to (or refuse to) understand the context.
There is no way to measure belief. Only God Himself knows what is in a person's heart. Human nature is compelled to judge by actions and the manifest. And what is manifest is that churches are generally emptying while the construction of new mosques cannot keep up the pace for their demand. You have massive cathedrals that are being turned into museums, and across the street, a makeshift mosque overflowing with Muslim worshippers so that there are Muslims forced to pray outside the mosque on the walkways and parking lots!
So that is an indication that Islam is not only taken more seriously than Christianity by its adherents, Islam bears signs of life and a pumping heart.
You say Islam is young and Christianity is old. In a sense you are right. Islam is young in the sense it can be compared to a young man who is full of life, healthy, and energetic, while Christianity is old like an old sick man lying in a hospital on life support slowly rotting away...
-
By your own standards, "Christophobia" should also be an invalid term, because the exact same concerns you have about the so called "dangers" of Islamic ideology put into practice are even more relevant with regard to Christian/Jewish/Biblical ideologies.
Exactly! Once they did what Muslim countries are doing now. Churches and their followers crossed their limits by causing too much violence and killing a huge number of people. In the end, they were replaced by secular government. Now probably, its Muslims' turn? Allah doesn't like aggressors who feed people deception instead of truth.
16116 - You shall not utter lies with your own tongues stating "This is lawful, and this is unlawful," to fabricate lies and attribute them to God. Surely, those who fabricate lies and attribute them to God will never succeed.
587 - O you who believe, do not prohibit good things that are made lawful by God, and do not aggress; God dislikes the aggressors.
2159 - Surely those who conceal the clear proofs and the guidance that We revealed after We made it clear in the Book for men, these it is whom Allah shall curse, and those who curse shall curse them too.
The Bible has many more passages in it endorsing violence and calling for extermination of non-believers than the Pure Holy Quran. Some passages in the Bible even say it is moral to slaughter children and infant babies.
the question is why do Christian priests criticize Islam and the Prophet (peace be upon him) for alleged crimes which are even more pronounced in their own scriptures and from their own prophets. The Christian belief about their own prophets like Moses, Joshua, the Judges, the Israelite Kings David, Solomon, and Jesus, present all these figures as extremely violent and bloodthirsty according to the standard they have utilized to criticize Islam! Hypocrisy at its worst.
Because
Currently the laws found in the bible are not effective in christian places.
Not many Christians read the bible. They are easy to brainwash with Jesus is peaceful, Islam's God is violent.
Hatred towards Islam in Europe began long time ago. During 17th century, Quran there was accompanied by criticisms.
Jealousy.
For those who are in Evangelicalism, its a job to create hatred in people's mind about Islam. They are funded by zionists. I had a great comedy night once watching their channel. Female preacher went "We must help Israel because it is the land of God. When you support this country not only you, but entire America becomes blessed. -
Well, "Christianity" without certain elements and the delusion that Jesus is the son of God, is not a too bad faith. "Christian values" (then I mean values) are among the finest, but for people to really follow them wholeheartedly is another question. People who could truly interpret Quran would although preach the same stuff as Jesus in terms of humbleness and killing of one's own ego. It is the same teaching all along.
There are fools associated with what the man Jesus taught just like in with Muhammad, void of sound judgement (kafar) who do not use their brains, hearing or eyesight for something of value. And they focus more on "their" prophet than what is healthy, and they are usually a mediator between them and God against all teachings, while the prophet told them to be in God's light as one.
Be of one with God
-
You're suggesting that it was only in the past that Christians were violent in the name of their doctrine, i.e., the Spanish inquisition, the Reconquista, the Crusades. This is a common fallacy. The Christians today are equally if not more violent. Even recent modern history bears testament to this fact. If the Christian apologists say that the Nazi and KKK version of Christianity is not authentic or true to the spirit of the faith, then isn't that what the vast majority of moderate Sunni Muslims including our Ulama have been saying about the tiny minority of extremists and terrorists who claim to represent Islam?
You've got a point.
Former President Bush declared his invasion of Iraq, with the chemical (White phosphorus) attacks on Fallujah and other atrocities against humanity as a "Crusade". The Christian preacher Ann Coulter wrote and continues to defend her idea that the Christians should "invade Muslim countries, kill their leaders, and forcefully convert them to Christianity".
The fact remains that the vast majority (I'm talking over 99%) of Muslims are peaceful, nonviolent, and moderate. They interpret the so called violent passages of the Pure Holy Quran in a historical context and with respect to guidance regarding a just/defensive war (the question of literal or figurative is irrelevant). This is exactly how Jews and Christians interpret the violent passages of their Bible. If, as the bigoted Christian priests suggest, the majority of Muslims are violent and extremist, than there would be over a billion members of the various terrorist cells and groups which in reality have only a few thousand people with them.
True.
A religion being young or old is irrelevant. Whether Islam is young or old, the fact is majority of Muslims TODAY and in fact, throughout history, have been nonviolent and non-extremist.
Well, it matters in the way it has a grip on society, or lack of grip. Extremists are everywhere, but when religion is a large part of culture and society, even moderate and sensible people fall prey to nonsensical or harmful ideas, simply because they're not supposed to question things from religion. Of course, sensible people won't generally do bad things, but being afraid of questioning something is never good. In this way, an older religion would have lost more influence over the populace than a younger religion. At least this is what it seems like to me when comparing xristianity and islam. However, using the same logic, judaism would have even less influence, which is not true, if looking only at the time factor, so I guess there are more variables at play. Jews are a much smaller group with very different dynamics. I guess minorities are always more conscious about their identity. Anyway.
There is no way to measure belief. Only God Himself knows what is in a person's heart. Human nature is compelled to judge by actions and the manifest. And what is manifest is that churches are generally emptying while the construction of new mosques cannot keep up the pace for their demand. You have massive cathedrals that are being turned into museums, and across the street, a makeshift mosque overflowing with Muslim worshippers so that there are Muslims forced to pray outside the mosque on the walkways and parking lots!
True, however, I'm of the opinion, due to my own experiences, that the true believers (in God's eyes) constitute more or less the same proportion no matter what group (large enough) you look at. I think it would be arrogant to deem one religion as full of believers while another is full of something else. This is due to that people don't (as a rule) choose religions. They are born into them. Therefore the proportion believer/disbeliever would be fairly similar in the big religions.
So that is an indication that Islam is not only taken more seriously than Christianity by its adherents, Islam bears signs of life and a pumping heart.
Yes, due to it's youth, along of course with the spread of information in this age.
You say Islam is young and Christianity is old. In a sense you are right. Islam is young in the sense it can be compared to a young man who is full of life, healthy, and energetic, while Christianity is old like an old sick man lying in a hospital on life support slowly rotting away...
;D but even the young man will eventually become old and sick... with time... when the innocent ignorance is gone and bitter reality shows it's ugly face... hence the difference due to age that I earlier pointed out. The body of religions die with time, because they're only material, but the spirit of truth, at the core, lives on.
Peace
-
I'm not Christian
-
We are, unfortunately, caught in the line of fire when "Islamophobes" are looking for a scapegoat- at that point any Muslim of any stripe will do.
I run across the kind all the time in reading the comments on news stories (Yahoo! News is notorious for the amount of hateful people who comment), and every time I see X or Y being said about Muslims or Islam in general. They'll go on an on about how evil we are based on something someone did sometime or whip out a cherry-picked sura or hadith to prove this or that. My solution to it is to call them out- they want to provide a cherry-picked sura from the Qur'an, that's fine, but provide exactly where they got it and the context it was given in. Give me a hadith number and whose book it came from. In almost every case, they won't do it so I provide the entire sura and the surrounding context so that others who read will see the original commenter is woefully unprepared.
I'll also go to lengths to explain there are differences within the Islamic community, and- just like Jews and Christians- we have our differences in how we practice the faith. I explain about the hadiths and how they are almost always twisted and are completely unreliable in any case.
I will also put out an appeal to everyone who reads my response to go to the Qur'an for themselves and read it with their own eyes so they'll know what it says about any given item. I tell them to stick to the Qur'an and don't even try to make sense of the hadiths, even though that's what most Muslims profess to follow to some degree.
We cannot stamp out Islamophobia in one giant hammer blow, but we can each do our part to chip away at it and when confronted with false or out-of-context 'proofs' call then out on them and correct them and point out that we are all not cut from the same cloth. The best proof of that is our own example- don't get dragged down in flame wars online, and if it's in person be respectful but firm.