Quran and rationalism
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peace
The Quran isn't for "simple minded" people. It's for people who think. Symbolism is hard to understand, And I don't understand much of it yet, I admit. But I realize that the only thing that makes the Quran believable is taking those stories as metaphors. If you take them literally, then your belief in the Quran is blind.
If you are too lazy to think, or just want something to blindly believe in, I recommend the Bible.And what is easier to do, make stories with or without a deeper, symbolic meaning?
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peace
Are you questioning Allah's words that this Quran is easy to understand, and that it was revealed to all mankind?
You will get all your answers when you are shunted from causes and effects on your departure day... -
Mate read the quran better or learn arabic...
And Allah said to the doubtful, they will know this Quran as they know their own children... -
peace
What's the point of reading it if all I'm supposed to do is blindly believe whatever it says?
In fact, no one should be reading the Quran at all, since it is a book for people a who think. Since we aren't supposed to ponder and reflect and think on what it says, we aren't supposed to read it.
If the Quran really is what you say it is, I'd rather study the Harry Potter books since they do have a moral, a lesson, a deeper meaning that I can benefit from in my daily life.
If the Quran really is a book with ancient tales, as you say it is, then I don't want to waste my time on it. -
peace
Bro you havent understood a single thing i said... lol -
I never disputed a deeper meaning to Allah's Greater Signs. I just am saying that this does not invalidate that.
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oh yes it does.
what lesson do we gain from reading about weird, invisible beings that we can't see (and when there is no evidence of their existence). What do we learn from a man turning sticks into snakes, a man healing the blind and dead with superpowers, etc? If what we are reading about stuff that we can't understand, how are we supposed to learn from it? -
O Yes we learn... and none of these miracles were performed but by Allah's leave...
And the lesson for you is that you are unable to trust Allah... See through and beyond the miracles but you have no right to overrule them... I am amazed at your lack of God consciousness, you are stuck in the worship of rationalism... -
peace
The problem is, you need miracles because for you, Gods amazing creation isnt enough. You want God to go against Its creation, break Its laws, to prove Its powers to you. You are unable to trust the ability to think and verify that God has given you.
Please give me an example of what we learn from miracles such as Jesus healing the blind. -
Brother you are still not getting it.
It has nothing to do with learning, and everything to do with faith.
What you are showing is you have no faith so far...
Peace
Nabster -
peace
What is faith?
What you have is blind faith.
The only reason you call it "faith" is because you know that the Quran goes against logic. You know that the Quran (the way you look at it) can't be understood using our brains. So we should just believe everything it says without question because it is from God. If anything goes against logic, it's just a case of "our logic isn't good enough."
You are the one who is not showing any faith in God because you don't think God's creation is good enough. You don't think the Quran can be a smart enough book to contain symbols and metaphors. You don't have faith in the God given power we have to think and learn.
So did I get you right this time?It all has to do with learning. The more we know about this world, and about ourselves, the better people we become. And that righteousness is what brings us closer to God. Not believing in some non-existant beings and miracles.
Im sorry if I seem to be aggresive. No offence is intended.
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Bro I feel very sorry for you, may Allah guides you, are you a submitter or a preacher of falsehood?
Shaitan is a genius too, but he will go to Hell.
I have neither the time nor the patience to carry on arguing with you.
I have more important and interesting things to do.
Glad tidings
Nabster out -
peace
The Quran is not easy to understand.
Now I agree with you, because the Quran is not for the faint hearted and the Quran never claimed to be an easy book
I think that's the reason we even have this forum.
but it is also a place for many nonsense and conjectures by the misguided ones
But I think it's impossible to understand when you take it literally.
peace
I guess it is the other way around, because when they fail to understand it literally what they do is bloody manipulate as if they are smarter than God, however most of what is brought in as fairy tale explanations by a few non arabic speakers rockies do not stand a fraction of logic
See their plan is simple, if the literal is hard to understand "due to their lack of Arabic", then they bloody confuse the subject with pleanty of nonsense and conjecture
A true believer will be fully aware of those with Allah will
Salam
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Thank you again for your intervention Ahmed
Allah blesses you...
Nabster
PS I find the Quran muhkamaat very easy to understand but sometimes hard to practice (apart from hudud).
However the verses about the end of the world and Jehannam are very scary.
The verses about creation of the heavens and the earth and description of Paradise are beautiful. -
Thank you again for your intervention Ahmed
no worries bro, you are a dear brother in Islam
Allah blesses you...
Likewise mate
PS I find the Quran muhkamaat very easy to understand but sometimes hard to practice (apart from hudud).
of course they are easy to understand and hard to implement, whoever think that it will be easy to implement is naive really
However the verses about the end of the world and Jehannam are very scary.
of course bro, because if you remember, Allah told us many times that THIS QURAN IS A WARNING, therefore Allah must tell us in advance if He is going to punish the wrong doers, He was so fair and just to tell us what is the punishment exactly in advance, imagine Hhe only told us that there will be punishment without going into details, then we get the shock of an eternal life when He surprises us with all these sort of horrific and humiliating punishment, this is fairness at its max bro.
now those wrong doers CAN'T have an excuse
The verses about creation of the heavens and the earth and description of Paradise are beautiful.
They are and most of the Quran verses are, I love the Quran mate, I spent as much as you studying it in its original language not the many confusing translations done by some language ignornats
take care
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According to me, nature can be said to be a book of God, as well as the Quran.
So, there cannot be contradictions between nature and the Quran.
However, it is possible that the knowledge we have of the laws of nature is imperfect or incorrect.Agree with u bro..
My approach is then to evaluate the reliability of the scientific knowledge (knowledge of the laws of the nature). For example, I will consider that a stick cannot physically move like a snake. On other issues, I may consider that the scientifically knowledge is unreliable.
And, when I estimate that, for an issue, the scientifically knowledge is reliable; I will endeavor to stick my interpretation of the Quran to it. In the case of the stick moving like a snake, I will see it to be metaphoric.Of course.. the stick / a pile of wood material can be moved 'like a snake'.
Superman can fly without wings..
Rabbit can talk... (ie Bugs Bunny)
Its all just a matter of 'illusion'.. human perception of things..Peace
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Salaam JM,
OK, how do you explain this tendancy of the sunnis to fabricate false miracles about the prophet ?
I was told in a thread here that the notion of shia 12 imams was "stolen" from persian. I also heard that the story of night ascencion was "stolen" from zoroastrian. So I guess that is how they fabricated the hadiths which is to justify what their fathers have been doing by "borrowing" the prophethood of Muhammad.
Another reason maybe to make an arab prophet superior to the prophets of children of Israel.
Regarding sunni and shia, they are only blindly following those fabrications.
IMHO, these false miracles have been fabricated by unbelievers who need that to have faith in God.
What should be the other possibilities, then ?
They should be mentioned in the Quran, isn?t it ?Another possibility would be the language aspect of quran. I am taught that the language of quran is eloquent which is "far above" the human language. Since I don't speak arabic, I cannot really know "how far above" but that is quite logical considering the challenge below
223 And if you doubt any part of what We have, bestowed from on high, step by step, upon Our servant , then produce a surah of similar merit, and call upon any other than God to bear witness for you -if what you say is true!
Allah knows best how the proofs were presented at that time.
Your ?Allah knows best? means to me that you don?t know what are really the proofs alluded to in the Quran.
I will now explain my own opinion. I may add that what I am going to advance is my current understanding, and it needs to be backed by further study of the Quran.
Why I choosed to believe in the Quran ?
IMHO, the Quran is a sign (ayat), a proof because of the meaning of its contents.
In the Quran, God devotes a lot of words to tell us about the fate of all nations. There is a common pattern to all theses stories
When a nation sticks to God?s laws (values, principles?), it prospers.
And, reciprocally, when a nation abandons God?s laws, it perishes (the nation can have success for some time, but it eventually perishes).The main message of the Quran to the people is the following believe in God, stick to God?s laws and you will have success in this life and in the hereafter.
There are also, in the Quran, many verses about life, nature, whose lesson is that the idols people worshipped, as well as the leaders people served, have no power, and that all power is in the hands of God.
The goal of God?s message was to put an end the chiefdom system (along with its tyranny, exploitation, ignorance?), and to give birth to a new way of life, where all men and women would be deemed equal. It planted the seed of what will eventually allow humanity to unite, and put an end to all forms of injustice.
Before studying Islam, I have read a lot about psychology, biology, and many other sciences, in order to understand the human nature. And I have came to the conclusion that God?s message, as it is put in the Quran, is what the human being needs to stop injustices, and achieve global unity and peace.
Why I consider the Quran is from God ?
I think that the belief in a just God is deeply ingrained in everyone?s mind (and this is confirmed by recent scientific studies). And I consider the Quran to be from God because the Quran does not promote the interests of some human group or sect ; on the contrary, the Quran sets all human being equals, and this is what is to be expected of a just god.
For example I cannot consider Christianity to be the message of God because it holds that the Christians, trough baptism, will be saved.
In the same way, Sunnis and Shiaism promote the superiority of their sect.Since God, by definition, should be just and equitable, a message where everyone will be judged according to one?s deeds is cogent with the conception of God that is inherent to our human nature.
Why I don?t believe in miracles ?
In the Quran, God states that he has bound the universe with laws, and that these laws are unchangeable.
Some examples
- A nation who does not stick to God?s message eventually perishes
- Someone who does good deeds will be rewarded in the hereafter
- When I drop an object, it falls
- All human beings are born from the sperm of their father in the womb of their mother
It includes all the laws of the universe, in particular the laws of nature (physical laws, the laws of human psychology, etc).
For me, the only true miracle is that these laws never change. The laws of time don?t change; the laws according to which the earth revolves around the sun don?t change?etc
I am aware that, if God willed so, he could do miracles (exceptional breaking of one of these laws). But he doesn?t, because a sound faith should not rely on this.
In the Quran, we see that only the unbelievers need miracles. The knowledgeable find God?s message self-evident. Thus, asking for miracles is no more than a sign of disbelief.
Since the message God revealed to his messengers was the same as the one he revealed to Muhammad, and since God refused to help Muhammad through miracles, God has undoubtedly refused to help Moses or Jesus do miracles too, and the accounts of Jesus or Moses deeds should be understood symbolically.
For example, the curing of the blind by Jesus may mean that, with God?s message, God has opened the eyes and showed God?s light to a disbeliever.Obviously, what I have exposed here needs further studying and elaboration.
More reading here http//www.free-minds.org/forum/index.php?topic=5261.0
Hope it will help
Peace