Shiraz Maher has a piece over at the Wall Street Journal explaining why Saudi “deradicalisation” prisons are failing. I’ve reproduced it in full below.
It is now clear that the failed terrorist attack by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab on Christmas Day was directed by al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). The reasons for the sudden resurgence of this previously almost extinct chapter of the global jihad network lie not in Yemen, though—where AQAP is based—but across the border in Saudi Arabia.
For three years the Saudi Kingdom has been experimenting with a deradicalization program for captured Islamist terrorists in the CARE Rehabilitation Center. Rather than turning the jihadists into productive members of society, however, the center has replenished the terrorists’ troops by releasing some extremists who immediately rejoined al Qaeda. Unwilling to challenge their own brand of radical Islam, Wahhabism, the Saudis don’t seem ideologically best equipped to resocialize Islamist terrorists.
Located on the outskirts of Riyadh, it is not how you would imagine a typical Saudi prison, and indeed no one at the facility refers to it as such. Instead, the preferred term is “resort” and the inmates are called “beneficiaries.” In this laid-back atmosphere where inmates can take swimming lessons, play table-tennis, or enjoy video games, it is easy to forget the seriousness of their crimes.
However this initiative is packaged, though, it is still a prison housing al-Qaeda fighters. Every Saudi detainee released from Guantanamo Bay passes through the Center before being released, alongside scores of domestic radicals.
Since its inauguration in 2007, the Center has attracted such a carousel of foreign visitors that it now has a purpose-built reception and exhibition tract. It has been of particular interest to intelligence officials from the United States, Britain, France and Germany. Some Western officials were so impressed with the facility that it helped accelerate the repatriation of Saudi detainees from Guantanamo Bay on the condition that they first passed through the CARE de-radicalization program on their return.
The triumphalism surrounding the center, however, came to an abrupt end last year when two of its graduates, Said Ali al-Shihri and Abu Hareth Muhammad al-Awfi, appeared in an al-Qaeda video.
“By Allah, imprisonment only increased our persistence in our principles for which we went out, did jihad for, and were imprisoned for,” Said al-Shihri declared. Statements from al Qaeda now identify him as the terror group’s deputy leader in the Arabian Peninsula. The Saudi government concedes that a total of 11 graduates from the Care Center have now returned to al Qaeda. That much was inevitable.
After visiting the deradicalization center in 2008, a retired senior official from Saudi intelligence told me that not everyone at the Center was a hardened jihadist. It also houses Arab nationalists whose sentiments boiled over during the allied invasion of Iraq.
Herein lies the problem. It was mainly these nationalist fighters who passed through the Care Center when it first opened. Yes, these men may have gone to Iraq motivated by a loathing of America and the West, but realizing al Qaeda’s worldview was not their primary motivation. Having never truly embraced jihadist aims, they represented an easy and early success for the architects of the Saudi initiative. These sort of nationalists were easily won over by the generous financial assistance offered by the government to repentant jihadists, including money for home refurbishments, new cars, wedding expenses and a monthly stipend of $700.
This sort of bakshish does not work with true believers, though, and identifying them was not difficult when I visited the facility in July 2008. During my trip I met Ahmad al-Shayea, who travelled to Iraq in 2003, then aged 19, and drove a truck-bomb to the Mansour district of Baghdad, which killed nine people and injured 60 outside the Jordanian embassy. The blast catapulted Ahmad al-Shayea from the vehicle, leaving him alive but with horrific burn injuries.
Sitting on the trimmed lawns of the Care Center’s gardens, he was one of the few who quoted from the Quran and explained why he felt obliged to fight what he regarded as the occupation of Muslim soil by infidels. He also seemed among the least repentant of the inmates I met there.
Aside from Saudi nationalists, many of those who initially passed through the Care Center appeared to have been al Qaeda foot soldiers, not leaders. The latter, who are usually hardened ideologues, are particularly resistant to change.
Of course, the Saudis accept they must challenge the jihadist worldview if rehabilitations are to succeed. To do so, they have created the rather Orwellian sounding “Ideological Security Unit.”
“You cannot defeat an ideology by force. You have to fight ideas with ideas,” its director, Abdul-Rahman Hadlaq told me.
The problem is that the Saudi program does not go far enough. It can’t. To do so would mean challenging the dangerous literalism of Wahhabism itself—the austere and regressive form of Islam that is the official state-sanctioned version of Islam in the Saudi Kingdom. Yet, it is that very doctrine that first inspired radical movements such as the Taliban and al Qaeda.
Instead, the Saudi authorities rely heavily on kindred approaches based on the tribal and patriarchal structure of Saudi society to reform detainees. The main emphasis is on keeping detainees busy. The government finds them jobs, spouses and encourages their families to keep them in line. That much was true for Juma al-Dossari, whose marriage was facilitated by the government after he returned from six years of incarceration in Guantanamo Bay.
“I have a great wife. She tells me to forget Guantanamo. She says: ‘Just forget it.’ She says: ‘You’re a new man. You have a new life. You have your family. Focus on that.’ That makes me feel much better,” he tells me.
Omar Ashour, an expert on deradicalization programs at Exeter University, thinks this approach will ultimately result in more recidivism. “The Egyptians tried something similar in the 1970s and failed,” he says. “The Saudi program is not comprehensive because it doesn’t address the wider issue of religious and ideological reformation. While it doesn’t do that, it can only offer a temporary panacea.”
It appears that as long as the Saudis fail to address the regressive literalism and intolerance of their own state religion—which fuels radical Islam around the world—they will also fail to rehabilitate true jihadis.
59 Comments
This is exactly the point.
I’d go further, that they are not idiots and know exactly what they are doing with their state religion and their educational system’s curriculum. Their relationship with the muslim brotherhood and actions as financiers of jihadi activities world wide are deliberate in pursuit of an agenda, and everything appearing in opposition to the agenda expressed in the religion is merely a screen.
So, in a nutshell, Cameron – you blame the religion, per se – and not just the Saudi state’s interpretation of the same.
Cameron,
No its the Saudi interpretation of Islam – a narrow, bigoted, anti women and anti non muslim form – combined with the undue leverage that oil gives them – that are the key problems. They are exporting what amounts to religious fascism across the Muslim world and if it were anybody else they would be global pariahs for it. But no, its King Crude so we all bow and scrape and pretend they aren’t the heirs to Adolf, Martin and the Grand Muft of Jerusalem and that there is nothing to see here……
How to defeat religious extremism….invest heavily in renewable energy sources and render crude obsolete. Then Saudi is abckwater and we can treat them as they should be – enemies.
I can find nothing to disagree with in THC’s post. Well said!
An examination of core Islamic beliefs and history, common to a majority of sects, as well the works of many of islam’s most revered scholars and jurists, historic and contemporary, contradicts your hopes…. Common Humanist. The importance of the histories of first generations of Muslims in establishing islamic orthodoxies and creed can’t be underestimated, and all of that existed prior to wahabism and oil money. Islamic conquests and the formulation of the major schools of islamic law are demonstrations of a supremacist islamic agenda that again proceeds the arrival of Saud and Abd-al-Wahhab, Don’t fall into the fallacy of thinking humanistic ethics are universally accepted or that non-western cultures cannot posses their own culturally imperialist goals. The muslim brotherhood, widely accepted as possessing an Islamic supremacist political doctrine was formed prior to and without the support of Saudi oil money. Some estimates say that 10 trillion dollars has flowed to the middle east for oil since World War 2, much of that to the Saudis. If Western countries switched to alternative energy sources tomorrow the Saudis will have cash on hand for quite a long time, even if a large portion of their wealth wasn’t invested generating more money.
Interesting – given that you have clearly made absolutely no such examination. Even going so far as to admit that you do not understand the difference between Hanbali and Hanafi schools of fiqh. So, why should anyone take your opinion even remotely seriously, Cameron?
What a howler! The first centuries of Islam were marked by an enormous proliferation of sects. The establishment of the four main schools of jurisprudence, let alone the so-called orthodox philosophical/ethical schools of thought was not concluded until at least the fifth century after the death of the Prophet. The gates of ijtihad were not closed (as is the riff) until the 14th Century CE. Again, you do not know of what you write – why should anyone take you remotely seriously?
Can we take it, then, that you will accept the formation of various Christian schools of canon law and the 11th – 14th Century Crusades as indicative of a supremacist Christian agenda? Of course not, why should you be so deranged? Don’t write such utter cobblers, Cameron. What is sauce for the goose…
In other words you don’t like Brown and Black people and think they are violently predisposed savages. Incidentally, Muslims belong to a religion and come from many cultures – indeed some of them are Westerners and Europeans, Cameron. I know that will grate with your (I suspect) BNP agenda.
So what? That was not TCH’s point. TCH’s point was that there is presently a connection between Saudi funding and succour and the present success of such organisations.
Save us from any more of your ill-informed garbage, motivated by a clearly racist agenda, Cameron.
Abu Faris,
As is ever thus I am indebted to you answering far better than I could.
Cameron,
You have been filleted, well and truly!
TCH
“”An examination of core Islamic beliefs and history, common to a majority of sects, as well the works of many of islam’s most revered scholars and jurists, historic and contemporary, contradicts your hopes…. Common Humanist”"
Am happy to discuss the many and varied schools of Islamic thought that emerged in the 8th through to 13th centuries, until the fall of Baghdad to the Mongol Ilkhanate in the 12XX (I know, I could use Wikipedia but it annoys me that I can’t remember the exact year off the top of my head) and how eventually that lead to Wahhabism but I doubt you will be able to in any detail without the aid of said wikipedia.
Which is a shame ‘CAUSE I LOVE DEBATING HISTORY………sigh.
It’s cute how you two, abu and tch, like to fellate each other
abu…from the size of your post and tone …you obviously take some of what I said seriously enough to find it threatening. Personally, I don’t care. I do find some of your hysterical accusations laughable and telling.
Believing that cultures other than Western are capable of possessing their own ideologies, values, and expressions means I don’t like brown or black people. Do you not see any contradiction there? First, how do you know that I’m white? Just as there are blonde and blue eyed muslims, so there are Westerners with skin the color of midnight or a dusky brown, and lots who are a mixture. I supposes you subscribe to the belief that only white people are capable of racism, not recognizing again the contradiction.
Religion is a word, what we use it to describe isn’t bound by that word. Shinto-ism, Buddhism and Christianity are all religions, yet in function and practice differ greatly in the lives of their adherents. Christianity managed to successfully separate religious authority from the state in a way the vast majority of islamic states haven’t. Most recognize islam as total way of life governing the lives of muslims in a way that would make the most power mad priest cream himself, which places it way beyond most western conceptions of religion. I know enough about islamic law to know that there are, unless you are a bigoted sunni, 5 major schools, abu faris not 4. If it is necessary to torture homosexual before execution or not, or if you need to toss them off a mountain or a high building will do, the differences between some schools regarding treatment of gays. Well that really isn’t that important to me, cause regardless of nuance, I find them all disgusting. I don’t need to know every aspect and intricacy of nazi ideology to recognize that it’s fucked.
tch wikipedia is a great resource, but for a more in depth and detailed examination I would recommend altafsir.com or any of the host of tafsir sites.
Islam online has lots of interesting rulings on subjects islamic, and there is always that paragon of progressive though al-azhar university in Egypt.
The Crusades were a belated response to centuries of muslim aggression, unless you are a muslim with a victim complex or a westerner with a self-loathing guilt complex.
What tosh! Absolutely no historian would even dream of making such a ludicrous statement. Presumably you will have difficulty with the various crusades against Christian heretics (Bogomils and Cathars, anybody?), or indeed pagans (Teutonic Knights – now they should be right up your street!).
“Centuries of Muslim aggression”? Against France, or perhaps Denmark, perhaps the woe-begotten of Outermost Thule? Crusaders did not seem to come from countries much oppressed by Muslims.
You do realise that the relations between the Western Crusaders and, for example, the local Christians of the Middle East was not exactly a happy one (witness their slaughter in the pogrom-massacre of the population of Jerusalem as the pinnacle of the First Crusade)? Perhaps you might consider the relationship between the Crusading princes and the Byzantine Empire (up to and including the sack of Constantinople). Perhaps you might think about the healthy business being done by Venice and Genoa (amongst others) with the Muslim East before the Crusaders upset their rather profitable apple-cart?
No, thought not – such facts would simply interfere with your prejudice.
What is most amusing about you, Cameron, is that you are blissfully unaware of your own incredible ignorance of the subject-matter that concerns you so very much. One would call it a sort of foolish laziness, if one was going to be charitable.
I note you do not contest that you are, at least, a supporter of the BNP, incidentally; and you seem not unduly upset with my depiction of your position as basically motivated by a strong dislike of Brown and Black people. Equally, you leave unchallenged my assertion that you believe that Islam is a religion of non-European White people – plausibly because you don’t want to discuss Bosniaks, for example.
I am only surprised you have not yet claimed Islam to be a Zionist plot.
““Centuries of Muslim aggression”? Against France, or perhaps Denmark”
no… silly( abu you really should lay off huffin’ the glue, braincells to spare my friend you’ve too few)… not particularly against France or Denmark ….but against Christendom, you know formerly christian territories like Syria, Egypt, Anatolia, North Africa ….do I need to continue. Religious identity being at the time much more important than any national sentiment. An antidote to your ignorance, Pope Urban II called the first crusade after an appeal from Emperor Alexius I for help repelling the muslim Turks. The actions in Iberia were about reconquest because the territory had suffered in invasion and conquest by …. wait for it …. muslim Arabs and Berbers. As far as I’m aware the Levant was Byzantine, that is Christian territory, till succumbing to a muslim invasion. Face it, abu faris muslims like invading just aren’t that happy when it happens to them. You are right however in that the jihad, I mean crusade concept getting aimed at other groups beside muslims. Given the context of our little discussion, I didn’t think they were relevant, like I’m not going to on at length about the Hindu holocaust. You have heard of that one haven’t cha, tens of millions murdered and enslaved by invading muslim scum, hell bent on killing polytheists. Many of the Crusaders were semi_barbarian brutes, who could barely wash themselves, in fact many couldn’t, but with out the initial muslim conquests of formerly Christian territories the Crusades wouldn’t have happened. Some historians, you know the ones that you say don’t exist have said that the concept of holy war doesn’t exist in Christian theological thought till the run in with islamic jihad. See we learned that crap from your lot, can you imagine the islamic upset if Mecca and Medina were really occupied by Christian powers, like the birth places of the Sikh faith are occupied by muslims in Pakistan or Nazareth or Bethlehem have been by occupied muslims. The Jews got Jerusalem back by a hair but they are expected to give half of it to muslim, ( I know you are going to say “not all palestinians are muslim” yawn, the few Christian Palestinians left…. they are so few, do they really count considering hamas wants to start cleansing them from muslim territory).
Muslim mobs freak the hell out and kill each other, if there are not any religious minorities around to take it out on, ’cause they heard that somebody told a guy they know that he heard another guy told a fellow he heard about made a cartoon in a far off country ridiculing the islamic propensity for violent upset. So I understand kinda, abu faris, why you might be baffled by my lack of display or upset at your feeble insinuations that I’m some sort of frothing anti-Semitic bnp supporter, it upsets me about as much as being called a “fag” by some unsure in his sexuality fagbasher, says more about you than it does me… mate. oh ya those Bosniaks you’re talking about do you mean those leftovers occupying Serbian and Croat lands from the muslim invasions, or the last great attempt at muslims to colonize Europe, ….well the last one previous to the current one.
Have you heard this one… Old moehammed fabricated islam cause he was pissed off he couldn’t be Jewish, see his dad was a Jew not his mum, and as we all know you’re only jewish if mum’s jewish, I know jews allow conversion why he had to make up a religion baffles me
Some historians, you know the ones that you say don’t exist have said that the concept of holy war doesn’t exist in Christian theological thought till the run in with islamic jihad. See we learned that crap from your lot
Why do people who, having based their hatred of “Muslims” (a convenient descriptor for non-white people as a whole) on the premise of the much-touted violence and jihadism inherent in Islam, regard the racial and religious supremacist tendencies of European fascism and colonialist thuggery as either inadmissible or moot?
If you’re going to use doctrine-hatred as a cover for race-hatred, and introduce collective terms of religion and race to hate black and Muslim peoples, I’m struggling to see why the pile of corpses that other collective terms like “Christianity” and the “white race” are equally culpable of, is prettier than others.
The Crusades
Well, the genesis of the Crusades is the conquest of about half the Eastern Roman Empire by the Armies of the early ISlamic Empire. The ER Emperor wrote to the Pope requesting aid. I think he envisaged 7000 or 8000 Knights and instead he got 60,000 Knights, Soldiers and Pilgrims of the First Crusade.
Ah, I see Cameron has made that point.
The Levant only became majority Muslim in about the 14th century. The Mamluk Empire of Egypt was very intolerant – as opposed to say that of Saladin during the 12th Century.
However, Cameron, you are over doing the language and the tone, which kind of gives you away. Fellating? Pleasant chap.
Anyway, the idea that the Crusades just happened by spontaneous western aggression is a myth.
The Seljuk Turks were as violent in their treatment of fellow muslims in Persia or Anatolia then the Crusaders were. Still, that been said the massacre of probably a majority of the non Christian population of Jerusalem was a disaster.
That been said, how would Muslims in the 11th and 12th centuries have reacted if a Christian Empire had occupied the Hijaz??? Genuine question.
The period of Islamic Expansion, the response in the Crusades, the Jihad to retake the Levant and then the Christian and Muslim contestation of the Balkans, Med and Iberian peninsula are geo-politics with a religious glaze.
Am not religious so I look at this as history so can be quite dispassionate.
Argument welcome.
TCH
Crusades further – the reason why a request for military aid was translated into a mass religious movement was that Pope Urban saw a way of directing the energies of Europe’s military elite into something other then contesting each others land.
Urban saw it as a win win – aid fellow Christians and possible reunite the two major Christian Churches, reclaim the Holy Land and reduce levels of military violence in Europe.
The Abbasid Caliphs did something similar but heading east as it happens.
Cameron,
You have refused to engage with the central ideas of my previous posts, instead resorting to crude, sexual innuendo and personal abuse.
Am I correct in assuming that you are at least a BNP supporter; that you are a White racist; that your loathing of Islam, which is based on prejudice rather than any real evidence, is principally because you identify Islam with Brown and Black people who you feel are inherently inferior?
Your views on the Crusades appear to be drawn from the Children’s version of some 19th Century book of derring-do.
Incidentally, why do you believe this site is an especially useful place to peddle your fascist wares?
I hardly feel someone who is paranoid enough to think I am Habibi (on the grounds that we both write about Islamism and have Arabic names) is in any position to write of others mental health, incidentally. Nor do I feel that someone who has admitted that he does not, as a matter of principle, actually read what his interlocutors write, is in any position to comment upon their views.
In fact, what is your point, Cameron? Other than proving that your average fascist is poorly educated, not very bright, and exceedingly annoying?
Cameron
No, I have not “heard that one” since last I had the misfortune to plought through the incoherent ramblings of Nazi Arabists writing about Islam in the late 30s, actually. Revealing that you should have chosen this particular Nazi myth to peddle.
Can I sugest other than Stormfront as a source of future information about Arabs and Islam?
Are your increasingly weird posts on this site some sort of bit for attention?
*plough*, *bid* – I cannot find my specs, again.
Incidentally, I was aware of the Ja’afai school of fiqh, Cameron. I wonder if you could enlighten us as to its distinctive features – as you are clearly an expert in such matters.
On the issue of the treatment of homosexuals in Islam – I do find it a little rich that a fascist should be complaining of the same.
Ahhhh, so that is Cameron’s background. Clarity.
Cheers
TCH
The Common Humanist
You might be interested in what the late Mahmoud Muhammad Taha, murdered by the Sudanese state 25 years ago next week, had to say on the issue of jihad – it is enlightening.
A good introduction to his demands for a secular, democratic and socialist Sudan (which he saw as the consequence of his deeply held Muslim beliefs) may be found here:
http://www.alfikra.org/index_e.php
I work with one of his leading followers, who was with Taha at his execution in 1985, when he was hanged for sedition or apostasy (the judgement of the courts was never very clear as to why he had to die). Encouraged by their Islamist allies, the Nimeiri regime hanged a 70 years-old Taha all the same.
I shall be attending the gathering of his friends and family next week to commemorate the life, work and bravery of this true patriot and great scholar of progressive Islamic thought.
Taha’s life and work rather give the lie to Cameron’s prejudice and bigotry.
Hi Abu Faris
I had forgotten you are based there. Thankyou for the link. Will investigate.
Much obliged.
TCH
For example, Taha argued:
Towards The Second Message of Islam, Chap. 2, Republican Brotherhood, 1st Edition, 1980
http://www.alfikra.org/chapter_view_e.php?book_id=202&chapter_id=4
Some background might be useful: political power in Sudan traditionally lay in the hands of at least two very powerful, very wealthy Sufi Orders (turuq), led by hereditary Shuyukhs. Breaking the power of these orders and their ruling families fell, at first, to pan-Arabist nationalist forces (mostly in the military) of Nasserites and latterly Ba’athist orientation. In opposition to both arose the Muslim Brotherhood in Sudan.
The Nimeiri military regime initially leaned on support from other anti-Sufi, anti-religious forces (notably the once very powerful Sudanese Communist Party). However, the regime soon turned on their radical allies, siding instead with the Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood, leading Sudan into violent civil war and brutal policies of Islamisation.
Taha – a veteran of the anti-colonial liberation movement in Sudan, was opposed to both the Islamism of the Muslim Brotherhood and the corrupt, venality of the political dominance of the traditional Sufi Orders and their self-aggrandising ruling families. Whilst he rejected the atheism of the Communists, he opposed their banning (as a result of MB pressure) in the mid-’60s, on the grounds that it represented a restriction of human rights and the freedom of expression.
He was an incredibly brave and good man; for whom many, many Sudanese still hold the highest regard. His murder at the hands of the military dictatorship was a major tragedy and disaster for the peoples of Sudan.
Abu Faris,
Good link about Mahmoud Muhammad Taha. Thanks for posting.
Also impressed by how you manage to hold a sustained discussion with someone whose intelligence is limited to statements like “holy war doesn’t exist in Christian theological thought till the run in with islamic jihad. See we learned that crap from your lot“, as if passages in the Bible like Deuteronomy 20:10-18 simply didn’t exist.
Trying to understand any religion presents a challenge to the rational mind, but this challenge is the whole point of their being. If one tries to defend a religion without having understood it, the point has been missed. They are then defending not the religion but their own misunderstanding.
abu faris: have you read the following book by the tunisian politician mohammed charfi?
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Islam-Liberty-Misunderstanding-Mohamed-Charfi/dp/1842775111/ref=ed_oe_p
i found it excellent and most open-minded. likewise the following:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Quran-Users-Guide-Farid-Esack/dp/1851683542/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1263396530&sr=1-1
i used to be mates with farid but have lost touch since he moved to the netherlands and, latterly, harvard! a most interesting thinker.
b’shalom
bananabrain
Abu Faris,
Thankyou for the further background info. I confess that Sudan is not a part of the world I know in detail.
Abu Yusuf,
I guess am a historian at heart and attempt to tackle subjects such as religion as historical forces rather then spiritual/supernatural ones.
Whilst there are violent passages in the Old Testament, the New Testament is free from them. The militarisation of Western Christianity in the 9th to 11th centuries came about, I think, because:
1. There was a lack of central authority in large parts of Western Europe with the fragmentation of the Carolingian Empire (Charlemagne’s Empire). This lead to endemic rivalry and violence that successive Popes struggled to contain between rival Lords, Princes etc. A comparator in the Middle East would be the fragmented state of the Seljuk Empire in the late 1000s (which in part enabled the success of the First Crusade). Endemic violence will eventually seep into religious thought I suspect.
2. The confrontation lines between Christendom and other cultural blocks – in Iberia, the Mediterranean and Eastern Europe eventually militarised the religion along those frontiers to a large extent in the 10th and 11th centuries in particular (ignore Cameron’s ridiculous language however)
3. Without the Islamic conquest of the Levant from the Eastern Roman Empire the Crusades would never have happened in the Middle East. Although the partial militarisation of Christianity would have to an extent as there was the need to protect the Pilgrim Road to Jerusalem in any case and to re-conquor Iberia from the Moors and successors.
I don’t think that any of those points are controversial.
Environments shape religion do they not?????? Islam evolved in a martial environment in Arabia. Mohammed was a war leader as well as a religious one. Islam traditionally divides the world into the Dar Al Harb and Dar Al Islam, hard to shake the impression that the religion has a substantial martial element.
BUT, that is history.
What annoys me is commentators such as Cameron are unable to see that the Islamic world is as varied as anywhere else, with multitudes of opinion and practices.
Abu Faris,
Thanks again.
Without wanting to enter into a long discussion, I would add to your post by saying that the “militiarization” of Christianity as such (not just its Western flank), actually predates its meeting with Islam in the 9-11th century and Urban II’s so-called First Crusade.
Consider, for example, the violent and total suppression of the Gnostics, Essenes and Ebionites following the first council of Nicea, 325 CE, and the subsequent wars which resulted from the suppression of the Arian “heresy” a century later. I’m sure someone better versed in history than me could add to this list.
The point I’m making is that the violent suppression of heresy, and large scale suppression of “heretical” groups, has been part and parcel of Christianity long before the birth of Muhammad.
And the second point I’d make is that, in Christianity, this suppression was justified by out-dated, out of context and literalist readings of sacred texts, just as the Islamist idiots in Islam do to this day. And moreover, this is unfortunately just human nature on the part of a certain type of literal-minded, juridical person who takes it upon himself to be the scourge of anyone who prefers an esoteric, alternative or simply lax interpretion of religion. Human nature hasn’t changed all that much.
which is just what we have here in the context of deuteronomy 20:10-18. if you look at it in even cursory detail, this refers strictly to the “seven nations of canaan”, the hittites, amorites, canaanites, perizzites, hivites, jebusites and girgashites. it was established some 2,000 years ago that none of these groups were any longer identifiable. more to the point, it was their *actions* that were considered detestable, not their essential *natures* – in other words, you could tell these people by the way they behaved – if they weren’t indulging in child sacrifice or temple prostitution, they probably weren’t, say, a girgashite. i may have suggested elsewhere, incidentally, that but for this, i personally would not be able to spot a girgashite if they were painted purple and dancing naked on top of a harpsichord whilst singing “girgashites are here again”.
but, of course, none of this is any bar to people who wish to defame the Torah by suggesting that it is “genocidal”.
b’shalom
bananabrain
The Common Humanist
That is a very interesting point – but not one without controversy.
There is a very important paper on this very issue:
Korotayev, et al, Origins of Islam: Political-Anthropological and Environmental Context , AOASH, 1999.
The paper’s abstract is informative (of course):
The whole fascinating paper can be had at:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/16626045/Korotayev-et-al-Origins-of-Islam
LOL
A Philistine of Gath, however, was usually quite easy to spot – and from quite a distance!
cf; 1 Samuel 17
bannabrain,
Your interpretation of Deuteronomy sounds sensible to me. But unfortunately it is not the the interpertation which appealed to the Church fathers when they used it to nip all those “heresies” in the bud and establish the institution of the Church with its one unified theology and one great leader at the Holy See. If there are parallels here with Islamists, Khilafists et. al, then that is precisely my point.
There are some who see the Quranic injuctions against Jews (eg., “They will never be your friends”) as being limited to the Meccan Jews who were allegedly plotting, together with the Quraysh, against Muhammad’s challenge to the status quo. That was then. As there is no longer a Jewish community in Mecca, this verse no longer applies. Others will go a little deeper and see these verses as an allusion to the way certain jews at the time were behaving as being antithetical to the project of establishing God-consciousness in one’s self, and not an injuction to hate the whole of the Jewish peoples. Inner, not outer. You see, if there are parallels here with your interpretation of Deuteronomy then, once again, that is precisely my point.
Sounds like a trailer for Avatar.
This misses the point. It would have been better had the injunction never been delivered in the first place.
The fact that a Jewish tribe was in coalition with enemies of Muhammad was (nor ever should be) grounds for the statement that they (the Jews) will never be the friends of Muhammad (and those who support him).
There was (nor can there ever be) contextual or other grounds for such a sweeping, essentialising statement. It is a racist statement – more accurately an anti-Semitic statement; and as such it needs unremitting opposition, regardless of its source.
The source of your comment is, I believe, Quran 5: 80ff, especially verses 80 and especially 82. If so, you should note that verse 82 is not a verse that argues for contextualisation. It is not there the case that it is because of companionship with the Quraysh that the Jews should be rejected as “friends”; rather, it is a comment that Christians are closer to Muslims than Jews and Pagans.
Equally, the role of the term “friendship” needs to be carefully examined. “Friend” here means something closer to “patron”, or “protector”. Even so, this still does not take the unpleasant sting out of such verses.
Abu Faris,
How do you reconcile the ‘unpleasant sting’ of such a verse, and indeed many others of its ilk, with your faith in Islam? Does the existence of these verses impinge, in any way, your commitment to the faith?
Just curious.
Let’s see ….where to begin abu faris you have been a busy pretentious little beaver have’nt cha? It’s hard to see through the foggy mists of your ire and hypocrisy what exactly your points are, or if you are anything, but pointless.
Between you and common fellow, I find it difficult to distinguish which is a better illustration of the axiom, “education cannot bestow intelligence, but often education is used to conceal a lack of intelligence. For now, I’ll address some of abu faris’ fabrications, whines and moans, leaving his idiocies, conceits and fantasies for a little latter.
“I hardly feel someone who is paranoid enough to think I am Habibi (on the grounds that we both write about Islamism and have Arabic names) is in any position to write of others mental health”
I haven’t referred to you as habibi in this thread, and I wasn’t refering to the fellow who writes under the name Habibi. “Habibi” is arabic for friend, non?
I was using it in the same manner as I would use the words, “chum,…mate,…
friend, … or (i know you like this one) little buddy” . Make massive inferences on scant information and sticking with them even when presented with evidence to the contrary seems a trait you posses…I don’t know whether to admire your tenacity or dismiss you out of hand as a moron. I’m leaning toward the dismissing a moron side, based principally on your gargantuan intellectual pretensions.
“Why do people who, having based their hatred of “Muslims” (a convenient descriptor for non-white people as a whole) on the premise of the much-touted violence and jihadism inherent in Islam, regard the racial and religious supremacist tendencies of European fascism and colonialist thuggery as either inadmissible or moot?”
Expressing a disdain for , distaste of and opposition to islam, sharia, and islamic supremacism doesn’t constitute any form of racism, as islam is an ideological belief system not a particular race of people, you can’t even call it an ethnicity. It is like you are trying to say that muslims speak for all non-white people. Considering that the vast majority of non-whites are not muslim you “convenient descriptor” falls short rather quickly. To the second part of the quote, to a great extent the Europeans have overcome, if not overcome at least admit they exist and seek to address the supremacist tendencies of their cultures. When I see arabs granting citizenship to the millions of guest workers in gulf countries, or massive protests in Cairo against the genocides in Darfar, or hear the Turkish peoples express contrition or the murderous genocide by their grand fathers of the Pontic Greeks or Armenians, I will take charges and criticism of Western culture by muslims a bit more seriously.
“I was aware of the Ja’afai school of fiqh, Cameron. I wonder if you could enlighten us as to its distinctive features – as you are clearly an expert in such matters.
On the issue of the treatment of homosexuals in Islam – I do find it a little rich that a fascist should be complaining of the same.”
You are slow, or just intellectually dishonest, abu faris. I would think that calling you a sunni bigot, in your reference to the 4 major schools of islamic law as opposed to the recognition by non-muslim sources of 5 major schools 4 sunni and 1 shia, would demonstrate knowledge of Ja’fari fiqh. You asked for detailed expression of the differences between sunni and the shia schools, from an outsider’s vantage point the shia seem less sexually obcessed and frustrated than sunnis. You need more look it up yourself. I have no claim to expertise in matters of sharia, as I am not an expert in fascist or nazi ideologies. The reality is I don’t need such detailed knowledge of islamic, fascist, or nazi ideologies to realize that they are all authoritarian, idiotic, ….well, a host of unattractive descriptors, or to know that I wouldn’t want to live under any of these belief systems. You already know that I expressed a disdain for nazism and yet you continue to equate opposition to all forms of islam with an embrace of fascist thought, I wonder for whose benefit… You remind me of that apologist for evil, tariq ramadan.
Muslims moaning about European supremacy and colonial crimes, always seem to start the clock of atrocity, transgression and crime at a time that suits them best. I have no sympathy for Algerian and Libyan muslims, fanatic salifists or evasive “moderates” demanding reparations for the colonial period, while not acknowledging that Europeans first came north Africa to stop the constant slave-raiding by muslims, or their arab ancestors colonised the area before the european powers. Slaving ghazi scum whose justifications for the enslavement of non-muslims was and has been that fucking fiqh of which you are so fond, following that “perfect” example set by a psychopathic narcissist, mohammed as described in the sunnah and laid out in perhaps the greatest fraud in human history, the koran.
Tell me abu faris do you think that the koran as it is today is the unaltered word of God? and that old mohammed was the perfect man, a moral exemplar for all time?
Abu Faris,
Your objection to these Quranic verses are valid from a historical and moral perspective. As you yourself said, you are a historian at heart. But this is not the point that I was making, so it’s not surprising that you think my point misses the mark.
Other than the historical and moral perspectives or domains of interpretation, sacredly revealed texts have numerous others. (St. Augustine, Al-Ghazali and Abraham Abulafia all testified to this, amongst others. Meister Eckhart, Sahl Tustari and more recently Gershom Scholem could be cited as well).
There are also, for example, the pietistic, juridical and spiritual perspectives. (I still prefer the word ‘spiritual’ to other fashionable alternatives like ‘transpersonal’ or ‘wholistic’). The interesting thing about these perspectives is that they can be completely independent and even sometimes contradict each other. There are also more exotic interpretations like gematria, the science of letters, from which Kabbalah or the knowledge of Islamic talismans are derived.
Now, the juridical perspective takes the Quranic verses about Jews, for example, and derives tax legislation or national policy from it, or takes Deuteronomy and holds the Council of Nicea based on it. This is the most literalist interpretation and attracts the mostly the Khariji type: fundamentalists.
The historical perspective is interested in facts and historicity. From this perspective, you could argue about the truth or falsehood of the Quranic claim that “the [Meccan] Jews will never be your [ie., Muhammad's] friends”. Some would say that history bore out the truth of this statement. Others would argue for the opposite. Thats a discussion for the historians, and I’m not one of them.
Then there’s the pietistic perspective which holds that everying in the revealed text must be true, no matter what. Somewhat anachronistic nowadays, there are obvious problems with this perspective – especially in modern multi-cultural society.
The moralistic perspective seeks to derive moral guidelines from the texts. This perspective also lends itself to moral objections *to* the revealed texts. As, for example, your objection the verses about Jews are “racist”. The same could be said about Deuteronomy – a case in point.
Finally there is the spiritual perspective, though we are told that there may be untold numbers of ever-deepening levels of interpretation contained in this one perspective, with each successive level bringing us closer to the Truth. (Leave your philosophy lecturer hat off for a moment, please). The first level of this perspective speaks to us about the nature of the ego or, in modern terms, about psychology.
And now, finally, we arrive at the point of this diatribe, which is that bannabrain’s interpretation of Deuteronomy could be said to be a spiritual interpretation. Ie., one from which we can derive checks and balances on the human ego. To reiterate, bannabrain said: “it was their *actions* that were considered detestable, not their essential *natures*”. So by this perspective , deuteronomy is not a racist attack againts the seven tribes of Canaan, nor is it even concerned about who these tribes were or whether they even existed. What is important about the narrative is what effect it has on the egotistic behaviour of the reader – and in this case does so by laying stress on what is detestable. Being happy to see this kind of interpretation on Spittoon, I tried to offer a parallel in Islam by showing the spiritual perspective of the Quranic verse about the Jews.
Abu Faris, your objection to Quran verse was based on the historical and moralistic perspectives of interpretation, and I am not particularly interested in engaging in those perspectives.
That’s not saying your opinions aren’t valid. I’m sure you’ll have ample opportunity to discuss them with others.
Abu Yusef
Actually I am not a historian, I am a philosopher. It is a shame you are uninterested in the moral perspectives of interpretation. A religion devoid of ethical dimension seems a pretty poor show.
As you do not wish to discuss a central aspect of faith, I will leave it there.
Incidentally, it was not an objetion to the Qur’an’ it was an objection to your interpretation of the same (and – as bananabrain also suggests – your interpretation of the Talmud as well).
I do expect you to at least try to be civil, Abu Yusuf, when you are disgreed with – however, perhaps you would assume that was a philosophy lecture.
Cameron
I am not interested in your extended bout of flaming and insults. Take it elsewhere, Nazi boy. I would suggest a therapist, as you are clearly not very well.
Hassan
The issue is not whether a statement is or is not in a sacred text; but whether such a statement is morally defensible.
Abu Yusuf has merrily (yet unwittingly, it would appear) tied himself in knots in his attempt to value a religion without reference to its necessary, indeed essential, moral dimension. He has glibly talked of the many layers of interpretation, and has yet chosen to eliminate a structural element – because it runs smack bang into a morally indefensible and incorrigible element of the sacred text in question.
So desperate is he to defend a literalist interpretation (whilst quixotically floating the idea that he understands metaphorical meaning) that he rejects the very hidden (batin) sense that he claims to recognise. The fact remains very simply that a degree of the Qur’an is violently racist, especially towards Jews.
Abu Yusuf thanks me for reference to Taha – and yet clearly has yet to come to grips with Taha’s views on the distinction between the Surahs of Makka and Madina. Or rather, he attempts to find crude contextual excuses, or reduce a faith to amorality, rather than simply admit that a statement in the Qur’an is both morally reprehensible and deeply disturbing to attempts to portray Islam as – uniquely amongst world faiths – one which poses its believers no moral or intellectual puzzles whatsoever (again this is odd from someone who nods towards the idea that the Qur’an is of many layers of meaning).
Get over yourselves, my brothers! There are things wrong and they need to be mended.
Abu Yusuf
No, you offered a crude contextualising excuse for a morally repellent and violent view of an entire other people, actually. Exactly how the claim that Jews are “not to be your friends” has spiritual value escapes me.
However, as you seem intent on excusing the inexcusable, please – be my guest – and continue to furiously dig an even deeper hole for yourself. As it is, your position amounts to an implicit acknowledgement that Islam is essentially anti-Semitic. Are you sure you want to go there?
Abu Faris,
My only hope is that somebody understood my post.
Salamu ‘Alaykum
hard times to be muslim? especially when you co-religionists always seem to have more in common with those nazi scum i.e. hatred of Jews than those you falsely accuse of holding a national socialist vantage point. You know like the bloke your shit on above, abu yusuf. It would be so funny, if it weren’t so pathetic, like most of your arguments and rationalizations. You are a sad demented little creep.Now take your little pity me ball and scurry off and hide cause the big kids are being mean to you… whiner
I wonder how long I am supposed to put up with the demented abuse of Cameron?
After all, he clearly knows very little of what he writes and is repeatedly reduced to flaming and abusing his interlocutors. As I noted above, this is what passes for debate in the sort of clearly undereducated, oafish circles within which he usually moves.
Given that he has previously admitted that he does not read what I write, I find it odd that he can suggest that “most of my arguments and rationalizations” are “pathetic”. He seems to vary his line according to the petty abuse he wishes to shower.
Do you have anything other than displays of your worryingly obsessive and possibly pathological hatred for an entire faith community, together with your deeply unpleasant and plausibly unhinged manner, Cameron?
Just asking.
You accuse me of being a fascist, and at the very least a nazi sympathizer and then piss and moan about “demented abuse”. You can’t be serious? if you are… you’re even more pathetic than I would have believed possible in a human being. To enlighten you… It is completely possible to have absolutely no respect for a belief system without hating anyone. I have no respect for oh… say nazism yet don’t find it necessary to hate Germans, as well I’m not a fan of stalinism or leninism, most Russians I’ve met are interesting and pleasant people, many great chess players. Both those ideologies are still repugnant. Were I come from pretension, especially intellectual ones are a cardinal sin, and mister “I’m a philosopher” you are hypocrite and reek of a pretension that smells worse than a week old corpse under that Sudanese sun,
a victim of the janjaweed. MFA
Cameron,
Might I just say that you are clearly a deeply troubled soul, who appears to be unable to string together an argument without resort to personalised abuse?
My position on Islamism and on a number of related issues is known to the readers of this blog. One might find it at least a little strange if, as you assume, the editors of this blog were to grant me unfettered posting rights and I was – as you have repeatedly asserted, some sort of Islamist fanatic. However, as you clearly loathe all Muslims with equal vigour, then – naturally – it will be your assumption that any Muslim is, ipso facto, an Islamist.
I let my work here and elsewhere stand for me, Cameron. It is not chocker-block with abuse of my interlocutors, nor does it seek to personally offend others in lieu of reasonable, coherent or (dare I suggest it?) sane argument. However, as you have loudly informed us that you refuse to read my work, then you can hardly be reasonably be expected to grasp this.
I called you out as a fascist because of your increasingly shrill screaming about your paranoia about an entire faith community (one wich is also revililed by fascists), your personally abusive and highly aggressive manner (which is also shared by fascists), your clear belief that European (code for White) “civilisation” bests any other “civilisation” (a fantasy also shared by fascists in the West), the concomitant loathing of Black and Brown people (also shared by fascists)… shall I continue? It appears that others here are also fairly clear about your political and ideological condition, Cameron. Why deny yourself, my dear?
The comments about dead Sudanese and the janawid are so offensive that I shall not deign to respond. You are clearly flaming, my dear. Do give over.
Incidentally, “habibi” does not mean “friend” in Arabic – it means “My love”. Can I just say that whilst I would normally be very flattered by such an advance, I am afraid you are simply not my type.
Do take care,
AF
XXX
Do you have anything other than displays of your worryingly obsessive and possibly pathological hatred for an entire faith community, together with your deeply unpleasant and plausibly unhinged manner, Cameron?
Steady on old chap. Where does Abu Yusuf, at any point whatsoever, show “worryingly obsessive and possibly pathological hatred for an entire faith community” and “crude contextualising excuse for a morally repellent and violent view of an entire other people”; the faith community in question being Jews?
I see nothing of the sort. But I do get a strong sense of the unnecessarily aggressive and pontificating tone in your comments. It’s odd seeing someone who values interpretation attacking or deriding the interpretation of others. Tone it down dude. You’re seeing anti-semitism in the architecture and coming across almost as crazy as Cameron.
Abdul Hamid
The comment you allude to was directed at Cameron, not Abu Yusuf.
You then quote me:
A comment directed at Cameron,. not Abu Yusuf.
Again:
Which was directed to Abu Yusuf and was a comment on his attempt to excuse what I believe to be a reprehensible sense of anti-Semitism in the Qur’an via its passing off as a contextually determined or “spiritual” interpretation.
I cannot find anything odd or deranged in these comments. I do however wonder whether you should not re-read what I wrote and to whom before making such odd comments yourself.
Which would be fine and dandy; but I was not – and I was not attacking the person who you believe I was!
This is nuts. I’m off.
In that case, I apologise if I’ve got the wrong end of the stick!
Fine. Thank you.
My view is quite simple: Making comments such as “you must not make friends with people from X group” is bad enough.
Then arguing that this is mollified by virtue of some special circumstances is doubly reprehensible.
I am entirely unmoved by appeals to divine authority. A god which demands that I disavow or abuse people on the basis of their Otherness is not a god I care to recognise.
I am sorry if this makes Muslims feel uncomfortable when it comes to questioning on exactly such grounds a set of views in the Qur’an. Perhaps it is about time the Muslim community did feel uncomfortable about such matters. They are rather important issues, after all.
abu faris,
i must confess i am a little puzzled by the strength of your attack on abu yusuf (although not your responses to cameron, who appears to be a git) as he seems pretty conciliatory to me.
i don’t know about that – i would say it is the interpretations that need unremitting opposition, as it could be a highly instructive piece of text if treated in the right way, as a challenge rather than a justification. obviously it can be translated in a racist way, but it makes little sense to do so as one may become jewish through conversion. therefore, it must be referring to behaviours.
perhaps i’m not understanding either of you, but i am having trouble drawing this conclusion from what he’s written. like abdul hamid, i am somewhat perplexed.
damn the lack of an edit feature.
i should have said, incidentally, that where challenging passages exist, the first necessity is the will to challenge them arising from moral and ethical (not to mention spiritual and juristic) considerations!
b’shalom
bananabrain
Abu Faris (and Cameron),
I’m afraid you misunderstood my posts. But I’m encouraged that bannabrain understood them perfectly. (As in our last exchange, I accept the blame for not being clear enough in my writing style).
[Disclaimer: I will start the next sentence with the words "contrary to what you think", without in any way trying to disparage you, but merely to try and explain myself]
Contrary to what you think, I don’t hate Jews. And neither do I believe that Muhammad hated Jews or exhorted Muslims to hate them.
By way of proof:
1. ‘A funeral procession passed in front of the Prophet and he stood up. When he was told that it was the coffin of a Jew, he said, “Did he not have a soul?” ‘(Bukhari Volume 2, Book 23, Number 399)
2. Muhammad asked the Muslims to commemorate Ashura (10th of Muharram), which was the day Moses gained victory over Pharaoh and led the people of Israel across the Red Sea from captivity to freedom.
For me, the simple proof that Muhammad or Islam cannot hate Jews lies in the principle that God loves His creation, without exclusion, and therefore His messengers do the same. Now, I completely understand that this proof is no proof at all for many people, and that they require more concrete textual affirmations, and hence I quoted the above. (Indeed there are many whose agenda is to discredit the idea of God and/or Islam entirely, and for them even the textual proofs above are far from sufficient. But it is not my concern to “convert” them).
Now, if there are scriptural verses which seem to contradict this on a purely literal level then, to the human mind which always seeks some kind of resolution, this inconsistency constitutes a kind of “challenge”. We are therefore forced to either remain on the literal level and live with these inconsistencies or rise above the literal and re-interpret.
Those who stay on the literal level can be divided into two camps: a) the ones who continue to adhere to the religion but do so by ignoring one or other part of the religion which – to their literalist minds – appear consistent. By doing so they are left with an unbalanced and distorted appreciation of their chosen religion. And b) those for whom the literal inconsistencies prove too difficult and who then choose to leave the folds of religion entirely – either surreptitiously or openly, but often with some amount of bitterness.
Those who respond to the “challenge” by re-interpreting the scriptures will find many levels of meaning or perspectives in the sacred texts, and there are many great thinkers who have written about these levels of meaning. (I mentioned some of these “perspectives” and “thinkers” mentioned briefly in my last post). Sacred scripture essentially becomes an aid to meditation. It’s not just the Quranic verse on jews which have non-literal interpretations (I used that as an obvious example), but the whole of the Qur’an or the whole of the Psalms or the Torah have multiple levels of meaning.
Of course, those who do not believe in the transcendent source of sacred scripture find it difficult or unnecessary to even begin to seek non-literal interpretations. In this, they share a common ground with the devout believer whose mindset is incapable, for whatever reasons, of seeing anything but the literal. This common ground is often the battleground of “Islamist” vs. “humanist” – locked in mortal combat, one rejecting and the other accepting the scripture based on purely literal readings.
But anyway, personally I’m as far as possible from “desperately trying to defend a literalist interpretation”. And if I’m not interested in discussing the historical and moral perspectives on these comments pages it’s certainly not because I don’t “value” these perspectives (contrary to what you think), but because, as I said, I think those perspectives are being amply discussed by others here. Time is too short to re-iterate what others are saying. I’m also not particularly any kind of expert on history or echics. I was trying to introduce yet a different perspective, encouraged by bananabrain’s prior allusion to it. Perhaps a futile attempt, who knows.
Peace.
abu faris
“Incidentally, “habibi” does not mean “friend” in Arabic – it means “My love”. Can I just say that whilst I would normally be very flattered by such an advance, I am afraid you are simply not my type.”
You flatter yourself… and if you read my explanation of the context in which my use of the word was meant,… bloke, chum, etc you would find little to indicate any kind of advance, except your grossly inflated ego. looks like I’m not the only one who doesn’t bother to read everything written here. Thank you though for correcting, my understanding of the word. I though it might be suspect, it was an arab fellow who told me the translation of “habibi” was friend. A decietful arab…. go figure. Besides I like my girlfriends to be actually intelligent as opposed to merely believing themselves to be.
“I called you out as a fascist because of your increasingly shrill screaming about your paranoia about an entire faith community (one wich is also revililed by fascists),”
We are writing on a blog, if you here screaming …that’s your nightmare not mine, and far more representative of your paranoia. Melodramatic queen.
“your personally abusive and highly aggressive manner (which is also shared by fascists),”
You called me a fascist! and abuse leveled at you on my part in this thread is merely a response to that… you’re hypocrisy is truly staggering.
.your clear belief that European (code for White) “civilisation” bests any other “civilisation” (a fantasy also shared by fascists in the West),”
If you think Western civilization is strictly code for “white” you’ re the racist , not me. I see it more as a consciousness formed by collective histories, expressions, values and ways of thinking. Some thing akin to a collective organism that doesn’t possess hard delineated borders, blends into surrounding civilizations as they blend into it, and yet remains distinct.
Do I believe It is superior to other cultures and civilization grouping?
Undoubtedly, It’s the most innovative that humanity has created, it’s peoples enjoy the greatest degree of personal freedom and opportunity, intellectual and material. No other civilization currently occupying this planet can compete with it in terms of material prosperity. Countries normally associate have typically enjoy the highest longevity and lowest infant mortality rates. Western countries are the ones people risk life and limb to get to and live in. Western is the civilization that created and implemented the concepts of universal education and healthcare. It is the civilization that destroyed the open institution of slavery, for the first time in history. It invented so much of the technology that defines the modern world, Do I need to remind you that medium we are using , the net, is a product of Western Civilization? Not only did western countries invent so much of this technology it has freely shared the successful principles, i.e. education, and those technologies with the rest of the world. So much for your fantasy of superiority
Faults and Imperfections, the Western possesses in abundance, as it possess a self-critical nature that seems to inpart to define it’s intellectual life from other human cultures. I would love to see universities and intellectuals in the muslim word subject the koran to the same kind, level, and critical textual analysis that the Christian Bible has been subject.
” the concomitant loathing of Black and Brown people”
Show me anywhere I expressed anything approaching this…I’ve expressed a total and utter lack of respect for islam, that is based on the beliefs and positions articulated by islamic authorities and examination of it’s ideological tenents, observation of countries that profess an officially islamic state. To say islam represents all Black and Brown people… suggests a truly insane grandoisity on your part, …not to mention the hundreds of millions of Christian and Animist Africans that would disagree with you or the near billion Hindus. It is as idiotic as me calling you a racist for failing to include “yellow and red people” in the list of people people you say I loath.
abu faris you really don’t recognize your own hypocrisy, do you? Part of, granted it is difficult to distinguish your meanings between, the banality of your prose, your self-importance, and fantastic associations, your initial criticism of me was that, I failed to recognize the the plurality of interpretation and positions among muslims. Yet, you fail to recognize the plurality of political opinions of those who, as unpretentiously as i can express, find islam to be a steaming pile of shit…. shall I continue? No, I cant be bothered.. you’re a self-aggrandizing little moron whose idiocies have lost their appeal as toys to with which to play.
Abu Yusuf
Contrary to what you think, I never argued that you did. My argument was with your line of reasoning and its unfortunate consequences.
I really wish people would take the time to read what I wrote.
This is all I have to write on this matter.
What line of reasoning are you referring to?
Abu Yusuf
I made my position quite clear, here:
http://www.spittoon.org/archives/4775/comment-page-2#comment-15422
I remain deeply disturbed by a position that argues, as you have, it is uninterested in the moral perspective.
I am sorry if you and others found my position confrontational – put it down to a growing fury with the vile Cameron – and with some upset at being compared with that revolting individual.
http://www.spittoon.org/archives/4797/comment-page-1#comment-15503
And there are no “words of God”: there are at best the words of people seeking to explain the meaning of words like “God” to other people; and as a result, the divine resides in, through the human act – and when the correlation comes off, so to write, one finds the likeness and image of God in humanity itself.
Consequently, objections to passages in Scripture becomes not only possible -whilst retaining a sense of solidarity with the divine – but actually a necessity. To rewrite the above:
“It is extremely helpful to be able to point to people who can stand up and say in no uncertain terms: this isn’t right. Excusing it is even worse.”
The view in the Qur’an which claims that whole peoples should not be taken as friends, or leaders, or even acquaintances is not right – and excusing it is even worse…
Ands this without, for one moment, losing any real solidarity with the Divine, which having imbued at least this human section of Creation with intelligence and free will, demands we question even It; indeed, perhaps in so doing, we are best encapsulating and articulating it.
As moral thought is the way we humans articulate, grasp at the divine. There is no wall between the ethical and theological dimensions – and those that want it risk losing both.
And no, I find no conciliation possible, or such a tone detectable in any argument that seeks to excuse the inexcusable.