The Dark Side of Christianity

<div style="font-family:helvetica,sans,sans-serif;font-size:14px;text-align:justify;line-height:1.3em;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEI58TkB0UcmKlU5c8CsORbeeQvYwCkNP5oGTM49qW4xsQz384et1ay5un-KuXN9Yp3morUGiOXc-GnImMYsrYzkd__i7cHcZvFqOrtOh4kzpcTZSEOhTbfXKZmaqfEN7_le9l048Mq38/s0/bloody+cross.jpg" style="display: block; padding: 0em 0; text-align: center; "><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="800" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEI58TkB0UcmKlU5c8CsORbeeQvYwCkNP5oGTM49qW4xsQz384et1ay5un-KuXN9Yp3morUGiOXc-GnImMYsrYzkd__i7cHcZvFqOrtOh4kzpcTZSEOhTbfXKZmaqfEN7_le9l048Mq38/s0/bloody+cross.jpg"/></a></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #4d4d4d; font-family: Lato, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">There is a dark side to any religion. The Christian church has created a legacy that has seeped into cultures all over the world. The church played a part in hate, racism, bigotry, sexism and abuse. History was pretty grim during the Christian Crusades and during the Salem witch trials, which killed many innocent people in the name of God. More recently, some preached against condom use in AIDS ravaged areas of Africa because of Catholic tradition. We can acknowledge that the past portrays a dark side of religion. Christians can't blame atheism or the devil all the time. We need to tackle our own depravity. People don't want to hear this, but the church has their own mess to deal with before they can conquer the world for Christ. You don't have to hang witches to be a bad witness for Christ. There is plenty of nonbelievers to fill the hollows in the world. We've come a long way from the Salem witch trials and yet, we act in a dark method, refractory to what we read in the Bible. Is the church making us look bad by proxy? Perhaps. Here is how the dark side of Christianity operates. </span></p><h3 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: KlinicSlabLight, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 20px; font-weight: 100; letter-spacing: -0.02em; line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 12.5px; margin-top: 30px; text-align: justify;">We love to gossip.</h3><span style="background-color: white; color: #4d4d4d; font-family: Lato, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">We are instructed in the Bible to "Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear." Gossip is a serpent and can wreck lives, marriages and the body of the church. Words, including the Scripture, are twisted. Facts are exaggerated, and before you know it, people are ready to come to your house with pitchforks. Well, you get the point. It starts out as "Did you hear that Jim is seeing a therapist about his marriage?" The next thing you know is that Jim is going to have a divorce and will get custody of his kids. But gossip is a sin that God takes seriously and hiding behind the guise of Christianity is a cop out. God states in Leviticus 19:16: “Do not go about spreading slander among your people. Do not do anything that endangers your neighbor’s life. I am the Lord.” Don't be fooled as this happens in the church. George Washington talked about using our words foolishly! “The foolish and wicked practice of profane cursing and swearing is a vice so mean and low that every person of sense and character detests and despises it.”</div></span><h3 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: KlinicSlabLight, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 20px; font-weight: 100; letter-spacing: -0.02em; line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 12.5px; margin-top: 30px; text-align: justify;">We fuel division.</h3><span style="background-color: white; color: #4d4d4d; font-family: Lato, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">There was a story that people were upset that a church program was not being expanded to a certain age group of children in aftercare. This created a stir and people started to argue and tempers flared. Needless to say, people left the church over it and things were never the same. The enemy loves to cause divisions within the church and although this was a small-scale example, the force was extremely painful. When our egos are involved, a mess usually follows. It may be worse if you attend a country club church. This "Is a metaphor for a church where many of the members have a sense of entitlement instead of an attitude of service. They pay their dues to get their way. And if they don't get their way on every issue, even minor issues, they may sow the seeds of dissension that lead to a church split," author Thom Rainer wrote.</div></span><h3 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: KlinicSlabLight, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 20px; font-weight: 100; letter-spacing: -0.02em; line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 12.5px; margin-top: 30px; text-align: justify;">We murder in our hearts.</h3><span style="background-color: white; color: #4d4d4d; font-family: Lato, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">We don't need weaponry to destroy people and to become a dark representation of Christianity. Religion is always looking out for itself. Jesus wasn't religious. Many difficulties arise in our culture due to the animosity in our hearts. Jesus said: "Anyone who loves their brother and sister lives in the light, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble. But anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness. They do not know where they are going because the darkness has blinded them." When people perform acts in the name of God, they believe that their hate is justified. </div></span><h3 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: KlinicSlabLight, Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 20px; font-weight: 100; letter-spacing: -0.02em; line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 12.5px; margin-top: 30px; text-align: justify;">We allow sin to fester.</h3><span style="background-color: white; color: #4d4d4d; font-family: Lato, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><div style="text-align: justify;">We go to church to learn about Jesus' teachings and to grow together. Yet, we don't call out sin in the pews or in the pulpit. When this happens and we become more concerned about keeping up appearances, we lose our flavor. This can be the tolerance of idolatry, adultery, greed and known sin that is not dealt with. What is the point if we are the same as the world? Jesus famously said: "You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot."</div></span><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #4d4d4d; font-family: Lato, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #4d4d4d; font-family: Lato, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;">Christian history is full of dark stories and mayhem. Although we don't use swords or hunt for witches anymore, we do judge, ostracize and hurt people daily. We all need to be careful when we do anything in the name of God because we can go into a disruptive pattern in our own lives. The good news is we can turn the page.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #4d4d4d; font-family: Lato, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><br /></div>Corine Gatti | <a href="https://www.beliefnet.com/faiths/articles/the-dark-side-of-christianity.aspx" target="_blank">belief.net</a></div>

The Dark Side of Christianity

There is a dark side to any religion. The Christian church has created a legacy that has seeped into cultures all over the world. The church...

The Dark Side of Christianity

There is a dark side to any religion. The Christian church has created a legacy that has seeped into cultures all over the world. The church...

Read more »

Islam And The west

<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjelcXPf302NW5kVhHbU-hs9wJXtH9Ck1tX7Zgv5nmB-3Ra579V7OqzST1ffTN9WNyMN-ItT8qZwX0hIQXZd5RznIX38KL496Iv1nFnTJWXmJ38uM1bQI8U8nJcMTqm27G2o4eN8fbpyrZ/s0/islam+in+usa.jpg" style="display: block; padding: 0em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="800" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjelcXPf302NW5kVhHbU-hs9wJXtH9Ck1tX7Zgv5nmB-3Ra579V7OqzST1ffTN9WNyMN-ItT8qZwX0hIQXZd5RznIX38KL496Iv1nFnTJWXmJ38uM1bQI8U8nJcMTqm27G2o4eN8fbpyrZ/s0/islam+in+usa.jpg" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Islam, like any religion, is facing challenges to evolve and adjust to modernity and in particular to the economic and cultural power of a dominant West. Historically, what have been Islam's ancient and modern conflicts with the West? In a modern globalized world, what issues are confronting Muslims? And what is the impact on the West of the Islamic resurgence? Here are excerpts from the full interviews with: Chandra Muzaffar, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, Akbar Muhammad, Nilufer Gole, and Amina Wadud.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"></div><blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/interviews/muzaffar.html" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/muzaffarsp.jpg" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Chandra Muzaffar,</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;">A Malaysian academic and social activist who teaches at the Center for Civilizational Dialogue at the University of Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur, Muzaffar is a critic of what he sees as the damage and oppression brought on by indiscriminate globalization in third world countries. Founder and president of Aliron, a multi-ethnic Malaysian reform movement dedicated to justice, freedom, and solidarity from 1977 to 1991, he is now president of the <a href="http://www.just-international.org/">International Movement for a Just World</a>, an NGO based in Kuala Lumpur concerned with global politics and social justice. In October 1987, Muzaffar was arrested by the Malaysian government under the Internal Security Act and released without conditions in December 1987. The following year he was nominated by Human Rights Watch as a monitor. This interview took place on Oct. 10, 2001.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>Could you tell me what the key points are that have led to the misunderstanding of Islam in the West?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There are both historical and contemporary factors which would explain this misconception of Islam within certain circles in the West. I suppose one should begin with the fact that Islam occupied parts of Europe -- which had never happened to European civilization before that. That was one of the factors.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Then you had the Crusades, which was Christendom trying to, I suppose, impose its will upon the Middle East. And I use the term "Middle East" deliberately, because it was not just imposing its will upon the Muslim population; the Jews were also victims of that process. And, some would argue, the Orthodox Christians were also victims of that process. So it was basically western Christendom imposing its will with the Crusades, and because it stretched over centuries and it ended in defeat for the Christian princes. This, I think, had an impact on the psyche of Western civilization.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Then, of course, you had colonialism, which affected both sides and created a situation where the antagonism became even more serious.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now, after the colonial period, I think the major factor as being oil. The one commodity which is most important to industrial civilization, Western industrial civilization, happens to flow beneath the feet of Muslims, in the Arab world in particular. And I think the desire to control this source of power, as it were, on the part of the West has heightened the antagonism between Islam and the West. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now today, you have Muslim communities living all over Europe. It's the Muslim that constitutes "the other" in Europe on European soil today. Now there is also, I think, complicated relations between the two civilizations. So you have all these factors which have led to a certain misconception of Islam and Muslims in the West. But let me also add very quickly that I find that, in the last decade or two, there have been some very sincere and serious attempts to overcome the prejudices and antagonisms of the past.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>Do you think the Crusades actually affected the way Americans perceived the Islamic world? Can you take the American perception that far back?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">This is an interesting question. To some extent, these historical events have influenced the American perception, too, because America in that sense is part of the larger European Western civilization, and it carries that baggage, to some extent.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But I suspect that the more important factor has been the United States' economic and geopolitical position in the world today. And this one should link with not just oil, but also I think the whole question of Israel. In the case of the United States of America, more than in the case of Europe, I think Israel is a very important factor. The United States is perceived throughout the Muslim world as that superpower that protects Israel. And Israel is seen as the state that has usurped the rights of the Palestinians and the Arabs. The conflict of the last five decades which has also got a certain history behind it, has made it very difficult for Muslims to accept the United States of America as a friend. So you can see how the whole question of Israel has bedeviled relations between Islam and the West.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>Talk about the impact of colonialization on the Muslim world.</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As with other colonized people, Muslims were victims of the colonial process in almost every sense. It's not just the loss of control over administration, politics, the economy... These are the more obvious aspects of colonialization.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">What is not that obvious -- but is certainly far more insidious and perhaps in the long run, much more fatal for the colonized -- was the colonization of the mind. This has had a very profound effect upon people everywhere, and Muslims have reacted to it, partly because they are much more conscious than other colonized people of their own history and of their own identity. This is why you'll find that, even in countries like India, where the majority of the population was Hindu, it was the Muslims who first asserted their will against colonial dominance in various parts of the British Empire in India.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">This is also true of colonized communities in other parts of the world. So I think this whole question of reasserting identity, discovering oneself, trying to define one's space -- it has become very, very important to Muslims everywhere. Partly because of historical process, which in the long run, is perhaps much more powerful than the colonialism of the past, and that's globalization.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>Can you tell me what the impact of globalization, the dominance of the West, has had on the Muslim world? On Muslims?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There is the cultural dimension of globalization which Muslims are very conscious of. They feel that the sort of values and ideas, notions of living which are emanating from the West and beginning to penetrate their societies, influencing their young in particular -- that these are harmful; at least some of the more obvious aspects linked to music and dance forms and films and so on. They see these things as injurious to their own culture and identity. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">They're also conscious of the fact that the global political system is dominated by the United States, to a great extent, and some of the other big powers. And somehow there is perhaps wittingly, perhaps unwittingly, the exclusion of Islam from the global process. And they've also been reacting to that, I think. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There have been I think two major trends. There is a dominant trend which is, to a great extent, negative. Meaning that Muslims have become very conscious of the fact of dominance and they have become exclusive. They have become inward looking, in some respects. They have become very reactive and sometimes very aggressive. While one can understand the historical circumstance that may have given birth to some of these trends and tendencies, I don't think there is any justification for this from an Islamic point of view, or from the point of view of the relations between civilizations.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now there is a subordinate trend, which unfortunately remains very weak at this point in time. These are Muslims who say that, in the midst of globalization, you have to reassert the essence of Islam. And that is its universalism, its inclusiveness, its accommodative attitude, its capacity to change and to adapt, while retaining the essence of faith. In other words, expressing faith as something that is truly ecumenical and universal. Now that is a trend which has its adherents in almost every Muslim country, but it has remained on the margins. ...<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>Has there been a history of positive relationships between Western civilization and the Muslim world?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As in most other interactions between civilizations, there are always both positive and negative dimensions. And if one looks at some of the positive aspects of this relationship, one could argue that the way in which centers of learning in the West absorbed knowledge from Islamic civilization in the earlier period through the Iberian peninsula, in Sicily and even via the Crusades. The Crusades had a certain dimension to it which is not often emphasized. It was not just the wars. There was also the exchange of ideas by conquest and trade. You find that ideas pertaining to science and technology and navigation, all those ideas crossed borders and boundaries. So that was positive.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">You had a person who later became pope studying in one of the great centers of learning in the Muslim world. And he adopted a very open approach towards Islam. There wasn't the antagonism that his predecessors had shown. So that sort of interaction had existed in the past. And one could argue that, at the level of the mystics, there was a great deal of exchange -- even if some of it took place without the mystics themselves being conscious of this. These were idea that traveled across time and across boundaries.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now if one looks at the modern period, I would say that as far as politics and government go, Muslims have absorbed a great deal from the West, especially in relation to democracy, human rights, democratic forms of governance. There's been as great deal of absorption on the part of Muslims from the West. And I don't think there's any Muslim society today including those which have remained closed and cloistered ... that can ignore the force of democracy. It's been one of the greatest political forces of the 20th and 21st century.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>It seems the West has forgotten much about what Islamic civilization has brought to it. What do you think the main thing that has been forgotten that it should try and remember and learn about its debt to Islamic civilization?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I suppose the debt that the West owes to Islam in the realm of science would be something which the present generation should be made aware of, because science is so central to life in Western society. And if people are aware of the roots of science, and the evolution of science, the scientific method, for instance, which is so central to scientific inquiry, if people become aware of this, then I think the attitude towards Islam would also change.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And I suppose they should also be aware that there are ideas pertaining to inter-gender relations which would put Islam in a very positive light, because one doesn't see that today. One sees Islam partly because of the media, but partly because of the behavior of certain Muslim groups as a religion that is somewhat contemptuous of the <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/themes/women.html">role of the woman</a>. But if one is told, for instance, that chivalry as an idea actually grew out of Islamic civilization, that it was absorbed by the West... That there are all sorts of rights which are given to [to women], and these were rights that [Muslim] women enjoyed 1,400 years ago. If that sort of knowledge, that sort of information is disseminated in the Western world, then I think Western perceptions of Islam would change.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>You talked about the colonization of the mind. Explain more about what that process was.</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The essence of the colonization of the mind is how it influences the way in which we see ourselves. How we see the other, and the world as a whole. The way in which we see ourselves, for instance, in the larger hierarchy of things. The Muslim, like the Hindu, or the Christian, or the Buddhist who had been colonized sees himself as inferior to the West.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think that perception is something that's very, very serious, because what it means is that your history, your heritage, your patrimony, as it were, doesn't have the sort of status that it should enjoy. You begin to judge everything that you have in terms of the West. So that becomes the yardstick. It becomes the ultimate criterion for determining whether something is good or bad.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">You look at something very, very simple and yet profound, like notions of beauty. Why is that if you go to Shanghai, for instance, the mannequins now look very Caucasian? They don't look Chinese at all. So there's a certain notion of beauty which has come to be associated with the West. And others who will not be able to embody that notion of beauty, because physically, they are different. But somehow they see that as the ultimate, as far as beauty is concerned. So there's something wrong. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And it goes [further], for instance, if you look at the way in which the colonization of the mind expresses itself in things like the economy. We have come to accept the market and the way the market functions as a sort of God-given truth, if you like. You know that this is the only way in which it can function. And yet we forget that this is something very recent in human history. Markets have existed for a very, very long while, but markets operated in a different way. But today, you have a certain notion of the market that has become all pervasive.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">One can say that of almost everything else. And I think this is what the colonization of the mind is. If you look at textbooks used in many parts of the post-colonial world, you'll find that the way in which they look at world history is conditioned by this. The way in which they look at the history of their own societies somehow is defined and determined by the colonial experience.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">When I was in school, for instance -- and most of my primary and secondary school was after [Malaysian] independence, after 1957 -- the history books told my generation that Francis Light had discovered Penang, Stanford Raffles had discovered Singapore. I mean, that is a lie. Because Penang and Singapore had existed before Francis Light and Stanford Raffles came to these places.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">They had flourishing communities. They traded. They did all these things. They were part of larger empires. And yet somehow, the history books will tell you that they discovered these places. That is the myth of discovery, which is very, very dangerous, because what it means is that you did not have a history before that. You didn't exist. This is what it means. And if you look at this myth of history, myth of discovery, as it were, that is a very, very dangerous idea.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So I used to tell my students when I was teaching that it's not Francis Light that discovered Penang; it's the people of Penang who discovered Francis Light standing on their shore one day. You know, this is what really happened.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So I think it's this process of rewriting history that has to take place. But at the same time, one should be very careful about this. One should not go to the other extreme and deny everything that had happened, and try to glorify a past which should not be glorified. There are all sorts of warts and pimples on our own face, and we should acknowledge that. I find that sometimes Muslims, when they talk of their past and the glories of the past, tend to ignore the dark side of history. That, I think, is wrong.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">They must also acknowledge this openly that if you look at, say, the first four caliphs, three of them were assassinated. That is historical fact that you can't run away from. There were factions, that there were feuds. You did not have stability for long periods. You had corrupt caliphs. All these things are part of our history, and we must be willing to acknowledge that. And I think this is true of people everywhere. We must be willing to come to terms with our past. ...<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>[Regarding] worldviews and a Western worldview versus an Islamic worldview, what do you see as the differences between those two different ways of seeing the world?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">One should qualify the use of these two terms, "Islamic worldview" and "Western worldview" by saying that these are generalizations. Reality is much more complex.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But having said that, at this point in time, one can argue that faith is perhaps the principal distinguishing element between these two civilizations -- that Islam is very much a faith-based civilization. Everything, at least in the theoretical sense, centers around faith, that you believe in God and as a result of that, you hold on to certain practices and rituals. And you believe that politics should be conducted in a certain way, the economy should be run along certain lines and so on. All that emanates from faith and the oneness of God and God's revelation over time and the place of the Prophet Muhammad -- may peace be upon him. That's part of one's belief system, rooted in faith.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Western civilization, contemporary Western civilization as a product of the enlightenment, is a civilization that centers much more around reason. It's an enlightenment of the head, not of the heart. If you look at the way in which the Buddhists, for instance, talk of enlightenment, it is from the heart. But in the West, it's basically, the head. It's a rational attitude, it's empirical, it's secular in the sense that it's not linked to the revealed truth or to a scripture. It's different in that sense.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But if you begin to look at these two civilizations at another level, you'll find that there are a lot of similarities. Today, for instance, in the West there's tremendous concern about the environment. That is a value, a virtue that exists in other civilizations, from the Taoists and the American Indians, and to Islam. This is a very important principle: living in harmony with the environment.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And these are the meeting points that one should emphasize in a world where civilizational dialogue is, to my mind, the prerequisite for peaceful coexistence. We really have no choice. We have to learn from one another. We have to dialogue with one another. I've been very involved in this. I see this as my mission, to promote dialogue between civilizations and cultures.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>You mentioned the environment as one example of what the West can learn from Islam. What other things do you think the West should and can learn from the Islamic world?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The nexus between faith and action, the way in which faith interpreted in a very universal inclusive manner can inform deeds in different spheres of human existence. In politics, for instance, it would mean a more ethical approach to power. In the economy, it would mean a more ethical approach to profits and to markets and so on. And the same thing with culture; a greater emphasis upon character, rather than what is sensate and immediate. And so on and so forth.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So I think that's where faith comes in, this link between faith and action that's very important. As I said a while ago, it's faith interpreted in a very broad manner; it doesn't mean that one has to attach oneself to a particular notion of God. It's a notion of transcendence and a certain sense of awe, the mystery of life. I think this has to be restored in our lives.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I find that this is something that really separates very ordinary Muslims and people of other faiths -- Buddhists, Hindus, Christians and in Asia and Latin America -- from ordinary people in the West; this idea that life is a mystery, that there is something transcendent beyond all this. This, I think, is very important. ...<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>[Some people] think that the idea of human rights is [somewhat] different in the West and the Islamic world. Can you just clarify to me how that is seen?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Many of the rights which are enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 are rights which Muslim political thought would be able to accept and accommodate without any difficulty at all, whether it's freedom of expression or the right to a fair trial, the right to food, shelter, the right to found a family. Those things are all there.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The difference is at another level. It is at the level of the underlying philosophical premises, because if you look at the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, it is a document which is postulated on the notion of the individual. Now, in the case of Islam, as in some other civilizations, there is also a communitarian dimension that is very important. So it's not just the rights of individuals; there is also a certain notion of the community that is very crucial. And you must bring that community dimension into your articulation of rights.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">To give an example of this, which it would be very pertinent to our discussion, you take the Salman Rushdie phenomenon, the Salman Rushdie episode. He had a certain right as an individual, and he expressed that right. But in the course of expressing that right, Salman Rushdie hurt the collective feelings of a people. And one would argue that one should have taken that into account, too, while saying, "Look, a person has a right to articulate his position, this freedom of expression. [But] there is also a collective notion of honor that a community has." The community felt that it had been demeaned, that had it had been denigrated.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So that sort of notion is something that one shouldn't ignore, either. So this is something which Islamic philosophy is concerned about, where when you talk of rights, you must also think of the communitarian dimension. ...<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>With the Rushdie affair, was this fatwa -- this death threat -- a suitable response?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">A number of us wrote articles at that time criticizing Ayatollah Khomeini for issuing that edict. We argued that it was wrong, because a Muslim has a right to leave his faith and to take whatever position that he wants. And one cannot compromise as far as that right is concerned. You can criticize him for what he wrote, which is something else. But the right response to that is to write another book and attack the man. But you don't put him to death. That was wrong. I think most Muslim intellectuals were appalled at Khomeini's fatwa.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/interviews/feisal.html" style="clear: left; display: inline; float: left; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><blockquote><a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/interviews/feisal.html" style="clear: left; display: inline; float: left; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/feisalsp.jpg" /></a><b>Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf</b><br />Imam of Masjid al-Farah in New York City and founder of the American Sufi Muslim Association (ASMA) Society, a not-for-profit, non-political, educational and cultural organization dedicated to creating bridges between the American public and American Muslims. Born in Kuwait and educated in England, Egypt, and Malaysia, Abdul Rauf has a degree in physics from Columbia University in New York and a master's degree in plasma physics from Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey. Abdul Rauf is a member of the board of trustees of the Islamic Center of New York, and Islamic advisor to the Interfaith Center of New York. He is the author of Islam: A Search for Meaning and Islam: A Sacred Law, What Every Muslim Should Know About the Shari´ah. This interview was conducted March 2002.</blockquote></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>In what ways do Western values, morals, and cultural practices, intrude upon, and [in what ways] are they at variance with Islamic ideals?</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /><img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><span style="text-align: justify;">I think there are two aspects to this question, in the broader sense of the word. There are Western values regarding governance; Western values regarding separation of powers; Western notions regarding what the role of government is in society; Western notions in terms of democratic institutions and principles and ideas. And to a large extent, Muslims are very enamored of these systems, and would like to implement them in their own societies ... because these principles and norms are completely in sync with the principles of the Quran and the teachings of the prophet. And Muslims would like very much to implement these norms within their societies.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">When you come to speak about things like behavioral norms, gender relationships, or the kind of things that people will do, this is a separate issue. And there is another aspect of the West, and that is the attitude of the West towards the non-Western countries, in terms of trying to be presumptuous in telling them how they should even live their lives in ways that they are not accustomed to -- like modes of dress, for instance. In the 1930s, when the first shah of <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/portraits/iran.html">Iran</a> forced his soldiers at bayonet point to force Iranian women to take off the chador, for instance.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">People don't like to be told how to dress. This is a matter of personal individual conscience. Even we here in the West do not insist that our students in public schools wear uniforms. We give them that level of freedom. People do not like to be told how to do certain things in their personal lives. ...<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i><b>Do you think we have witnessed a period of reactionaryism against the Western influence within the Muslim world in the past 50 or 100 years?</b></i></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The 20th century was a century in which the Muslim world experienced at the hands of the West -- in the perception of the Muslim world -- a dismantling of some of its important constructs. The most significant of that was the dismantling of the Ottoman caliph. Because for the first time, the collective consciousness of Muslims, there is no caliph anywhere. And especially in major population centers of the Muslim world, those that were important at the turn at the beginning of the 20th century: Turkey, Egypt, Iran -- the traditional forms of rulership were replaced by militantly secular regimes; not only secular regimes, but militantly secular regimes, which did not even support traditional values which were cherished by the people.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/portraits/turkey.html">Turkey,</a> for instance, Ataturk himself forbade the calling of the prayer in the Arabic language. They changed the script of Ottoman Turkish from Arabic script to the Roman script. So the Muslim world felt that there was a deliberate attempt to create a split in that bond which Muslims had. ... So what happened create[d] a split between Arabs and Turks ... and refigure[d] the map and create[d] new identities of people.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">People [had] thought of themselves as part of a group -- you had the family, the clan, the tribe and extended notion of a tribe, a people, a nation. So you have for example the Uzbekis were split geographically. So you have some Uzbekis in Uzbekistan, some in what we call Afghanistan. The Pashtun people were split some in Pakistan, some in Afghanistan. The Hazaris were split between Iran and Afghanistan. We tell these people, this segment of Uzbekis, "Pashtuns and Hazaris, now think of yourself as ... a completely new identification based upon geography" which people did not have before. And this seeded conflict. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">We did the same thing in Iraq, and the Kurds lost out; they are split between Iraq and Turkey. So the West planted the seed for some grave problems in the Muslim world. But at the same time, they robbed the Muslim world, in the minds of the Muslims, of a sense of identity that was based upon people, and also a sense of pluralism that existed within the Muslim dialectic. Within, let's say, the Ottoman caliphate, they had had a principle of different peoples. So they had the notion that the sultan had political power over these different people. But these peoples had their different cultural norms, different religions, different religious leaders. As long as political homage was paid to the sultan, and they didn't act in a way which was treasonous politically, [they could all live together under the sultan]. They had their own court system, dealing with matters of religious affairs and so forth.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So we had a method of pluralism which worked. There were instances of intermarriage between the people and so forth, but people lived harmoniously. [The Western influence] created what Samuel Huntington calls "torn societies."... Huntington describes a torn society as "a society whose leadership, those who hold the reins of the power, identify with a different set of cultural norms than the people on whom they govern."<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>And what would be the key implications that came of this fracturing, tearing apart, in the way Islam has been lived?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think the major thing is that Muslims now think have been taught to think in certain ideas that are peculiarly Western -- the idea of nationalism, the idea of nation states. And in their attempt to fulfill their natural urge to perfect themselves as Muslims individually and collectively, they therefore try to create some peculiar hybrids.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Like the notion of an Islamic state, for instance. Several generations of Muslims now have been educated in ways that their mindset and ways of thinking, if not their language even, is very much Westernized. So they think in terms of Western ideas and concepts, even if they speak their own native languages. So the urge therefore to develop an Islamic nation state -- a concept which some people may regard as being an oxymoron, because the nation state is not something which developed out of the Islamic tradition ... The Islamic philosophical tradition was based upon identification of grouping of peoples, who had governed themselves according to living in certain ways and structured in a slightly different way. ...<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>There seems to be a growing conservatism, or conservative interpretation of Islam, taking hold. Is that something you have seen, or agree with?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think that in the 20th century there are certain waves that occurred. When you go back to the first part of the 20th century, there were some well-known voices who grew out of Islamic tradition but who were exposed to the West ... who felt the need to restate what it means to be an Islam in the 20th century, and they found many aspects of Western society to be highly admirable, and wanted to bring it to their own countries. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So there was an attempt to meld the best of the of the East with the best of the West. These movements ...were interrupted by events of World War II and the rise of militant dictatorial regimes, which completely changed the sociological complexion, the political complexion of much of the Muslim world. During that period of time -- I would say 1950s and 1960s -- there was a time when these regimes had the upper hand. And they felt that the way to fast-forward as societies, in terms of the industrial development, was to emulate the West in all of its aspects.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div> <div style="text-align: justify;">Their policies didn't succeed. And this resulted in a reaction to much of these policies, because "This newfangled way of doing things didn't work; let's go back and revisit our traditions, and let's find comfort in those traditions." ...<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>MUSLIMS IN AMERICA</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>What are the key differences between being a Muslim in America and being a Muslim in the Muslim world?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There are many aspects to that. There is the political aspect, the sociological aspect, the social and family aspect, the economic aspect. So there are many aspects to the to the difference between living in a Muslim country as a native especially, and living in this country. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If I were to look at maybe the broadest difference -- there is a sense of freedom in the United States. So one practices one's faith in the United States as an act of deliberate choice. If you are not [doing so, it's] not so much because of social pressure. There may be a certain amount of social pressure. But at a certain point in one's life, one is relatively free to live one's life as one chooses in this country.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And that sense of freedom makes one's religiosity or the defining lines of one's religiosity much sharper. Religion is a much more personal thing here. It is also a deeper experience within the personal envelope. One is forced to attach oneself to one's religion in a personally deeper way in terms of the existential issues.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Another aspect about living in the United States is that one experiences a lot of negative media attention to one's Islamicity. And that has resulted, and can result in, a reaction one way or the other by many people. Many Muslims feel in this country like the Christians did in Rome when they were fed to the lions. And here the lions are the media. We hope that perhaps things will change in the United States, as they did in Rome, as well.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>It seems there is a societal dimension to being a Muslim, in terms of the ways one would like one's society to be organized. Are there conflicts in that sense between how one would like society to be, and the realities of American society?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I would say that Muslims in America, especially those who come from other countries, experience both an attraction, a strong attraction, to the positive things that America offers: freedom, political freedom; economic mobility and well being -- the ability to live a materially comfortable life. These are all the things that draws people from all over the world, Muslim and non-Muslim, to this country.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">However, there are certain things that people even when they come from their own country, don't like to give up. They don't like to give up certain aspects of their cultural norms. Their practices of family relationships they try to maintain. Their cuisines they like to maintain. Those values, which they consider to be their ethics, they like to maintain.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And so Muslims who have come to this country generally believe that the democratic principles, the political principles, the economic structure of this country really resonates with the faith of Islam, and draw them to this country. In the sense that, let's say, American social norms or values are not supportive of the families -- in those issues, Muslims may happen to have a different opinion. [On] those values which violate their sense of decency, they may have a different opinion.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In a certain sense, much of the ethical and moral issues which Muslims feel strongly about in this country are shared by what you might call the Christian majority in this country -- more of the moral mooring, or the sense of decency, which is commonly shared in other faith traditions.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I also believe that, as the American Muslim community matures in this country, that the American Muslim community will be an interlocutor, and important intermediary between the West and the Muslim world. And more so today, because today, we have much easier communications between the immigrant Muslim population and their extended families in the Muslim world ... unlike those who immigrated a century ago from Europe, there are maintained contacts with the Old World and the New [World]. And this phenomenon will give rise to a much different sense of what it means to be a Muslim in the world.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>Tell me more about that. What is an American Muslim -- if there is such a thing as "an American Muslim" -- what is that?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think it is very much a work in progress. If you look at what happened to the Muslim-American community over the last, say, 40 years, it is a mosaic; it is a cross-section of the Muslim world.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">We look at the Muslim centers, or mosques, starting with the early 1970s as waves of immigration began to occur from the Muslim world. You found, as certain ethnic groups reached critical mass, that mosques sprouted with a very ethnic complexion. So we have a Turkish mosque in Brooklyn, an Albanian mosque. You will find a West African mosque, mainly from French-speaking West Africans from Senegal and Mali [in] the Bronx, for instance. You have also always had African-American mosques. You have Arab mosques, Hindu-Pakistani mosques, Bangladesh mosques. However, what we are seeing is that these mosques tend to be maintained in terms of their cultural complexion and their general collective psychology by the continued immigration from the from the Old World.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The second generation, the children of these immigrants, are finding themselves with a different psychic complexion, or psychological complexion. And I see a development of an American Islamic identity, which is currently a work in progress which will be kind of the sum total of these influences.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But amongst those who are born in this country, or came very early into this country at a very early age, they grew up with a sense of belonging to the American scene, which their parents did not have. The immigrants tend to come here with a little bit of a guest mentality. But those who are born and raised here feel they are Americans; we have to define ourselves as Americans. And just as I said earlier, when Islam spread to Egypt, and Iran, and India, it restated its theology and its jurisprudence within the cultural context of those societies. I also anticipated that Islam will restate itself within the language constructs, within the social constructs, within the political constructs of American society, as well. ...<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>[What do you think will come of the American influence on Islam?]</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think the major lesson that will that will come out of it is the increased democratization of Islamic societies, and the sense of greater equality amongst people, whether on the basis of gender, the elimination of any vestiges of a class society. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div> <div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"></div><blockquote><div style="font-size: 12px; line-heigh: 1.2em; text-align: justify;"></div><div><a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/interviews/akbar.html" style="border-left: 0px solid rgb(206, 206, 206); clear: left; display: inline; float: left; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><img border="0" src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/akbarsp.jpg" /></a><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Akbar Muhammad,</b></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;">An associate professor of history and Africana studies at Binghamton University in New York, Dr. Akbar Muhammad specializes in African history and Islam in Africa and the Americas. He received his Ph.D. at Edinburgh University in Scotland and performed extensive field research in northern and western Africa. He studied Arabic and Islamic jurisprudence at Al Azhar University in Cairo and is fluent in Arabic.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Dr. Muhammad is the co-editor of Racism, Sexism, and the World-System with J. Smith, J. Collins and T.K. Hopkins and has written on slavery in Muslim Africa, Muslims in the United States, and integration through education in Nigeria. This interview was conducted in March 2002.</div></div></blockquote><div></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>[Has there been a resurgence of Islam and if so, what are its goals?]<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></i></b></div><div><a href="https://www.blogger.com/#"></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div> <div style="text-align: justify;">Yes, there is a resurgence. That's very clear. Many non-Muslim peoples, after the end of colonialism, have attempted -- in fact, during the period of colonization or European colonialism of the 19th, early 20th century -- people have attempted to return to their roots, as it were, to give life to their earlier cultures. "We don't want to be like Europe; we want to return to our roots." Now, one can view the resurgence of Islam in a similar way.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">We want to bring back Islam. One might ask, for example, "Well, why didn't they do it at the time of independence, and immediately after independence?" The answer to that question is very simple. Governments which ruled Muslims were very often like colonial governments. They suffocated Muslims. They suffocated those wanted to go back to their original culture. With all due respect to Kamal Ataturk, in <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/portraits/turkey.html">Turkey</a>, I mean, this man attempted to suppress Islam. Now, there are several others who did the same thing, or they attempted to manipulate the repositories of Islam, the ulema, and to sort of thwart their efforts to bring Islam and Islamic values back to the public and make those values widespread and to rebuild Islamic institutions.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The question here for me is, are those Muslims who are engaged in this Islamic resurgence, this Islamic rebirth, if you like... Do they aim at building or rebuilding Islamic institutions? I would answer yes. Are they necessarily anti-West? I would say no. But I would say that they're against anyone who would attempt to forbid them this rebuilding of these institutions.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And the reason I think that they're so successful is because they're working at the mass level. They are helping the masses, where governments have not helped. They are giving aid to poor people. They are giving them medical help. They are treating them. They are trying to find jobs for them. Therefore, these ordinary people are joining these ranks as well.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"The resurgence of Islam." What does resurgence of Islam mean to me? It means to me the resurgence of Islamic principles. ... For example, social justice: propagation of, advocacy of, work and earning. Don't be lazy. Treat your neighbor, treat the other person, with equity, with love, et cetera, et cetera. Mercifully.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think there are a lot of values that these people are, in fact, instilling in the mass population that governments have sort of ignored. I think here we must look at the resurgence of Islam amongst ordinary peoples. To a large extent, this is what Islam did in the seventh century. I mean, after all, a lot of the prophet's converts had been slaves, or were freed slaves, and what we would call now low-income and uneducated people. These formed a large part of his following.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>If the principles and values that are being reintroduced are work, earn, don't be lazy, treat your neighbor -- if those are the values that are being taught and reawakened, why does it seem so threatening?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Threatening to the West? I'm not so sure that the West is saying that it's threatening to them. I don't believe that the average Muslim on the streets of a Muslim city wants to threaten the West. I don't believe that.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">What I do believe is that the average Muslim is anti Western-overbearing-influence. What do I mean by that? I mean by that that their governments are following the West, doing the bidding of the West. Their governments seen as implementing programs which are easily connected to what some have called the "arrogant West." In other words, you don't rule us directly anymore; you rule us indirectly. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I don't particularly think that the ordinary Muslim is necessarily anti-Westerner. By that, I mean I don't think the average Muslim is against the average Westerner. I think a lot of Muslims are against Western politics, Western governments, because of what they perceive that Western governments do and the influence they have in their countries -- pure and simple.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>In what ways is the morality of the West threatening?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think that any cultural export of the West which violates Muslim sensibilities [would] be considered threatening. ... Western perceptions of what is correct, for example, for women to wear, how they appear in public. They are against, for example, certain kinds of music, certain kinds of movies, even certain kinds of discussions on radio. For example, VOA and BBC carry certain kinds of discussions which Muslims find, not anathema, but against their moral values. Therefore they see this as a kind of imposition. You're imposing your values on ours. "Our society should not become like Western societies." ... I mean, you're talking about differences in values.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>But there are so many inconsistencies with that. For example, when we met at the train station yesterday [you gave me] a warm handshake. Some Muslim men will greet me and not reach out their hand at all. There are places in Iran where men would like to, but it's socially taboo for them to shake hands, so they don't. What's the value there? What is the truth?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Again, it's interpretation. There was a long time when, for example, Saudi monarchs would not shake the hands of even female prime ministers or ministers from government. And that has changed. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There is such a hadith which is attributed to the prophet. Now, the point is, how does one interpret touching? How does one interpret the circumstances in which the prophet made this statement? Does that circumstance apply? Should one not touch a woman who is not one's relative, et cetera, et cetera, in a different circumstance? This is a matter of interpretation.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So there will be those who will take this literally and say, "I apply this across the board." Then there are those who say, "No, this situation is quite different now. So I don't mind shaking the hand of a woman, though she is not my wife's sister, cousin," or whatever. "No, I don't mind shaking her hand." Interpretations themselves become law for those who interpret it as such. Who interprets a text as such, that interpretation becomes law.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /><img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK8LmGXm4JzWji7YHWTbnQn4DN4j-kzfdHAqHAyUdOPs7gr-K105iBFclTqS3zo5rkY3tyOVEllPDOD3U5zYuhO_zrVyxWSkmujFM3uTzCIznsiCgrv91h5o17a_-ZWU2qJ1DpT8dA9xfY/s80/golan.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"></a></div><blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK8LmGXm4JzWji7YHWTbnQn4DN4j-kzfdHAqHAyUdOPs7gr-K105iBFclTqS3zo5rkY3tyOVEllPDOD3U5zYuhO_zrVyxWSkmujFM3uTzCIznsiCgrv91h5o17a_-ZWU2qJ1DpT8dA9xfY/s80/golan.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><img border="0" data-original-height="80" data-original-width="80" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK8LmGXm4JzWji7YHWTbnQn4DN4j-kzfdHAqHAyUdOPs7gr-K105iBFclTqS3zo5rkY3tyOVEllPDOD3U5zYuhO_zrVyxWSkmujFM3uTzCIznsiCgrv91h5o17a_-ZWU2qJ1DpT8dA9xfY/s0/golan.jpg" /></a><b>Nilufer Gole,</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Professor of sociology at Bogazici (Bosphorous) University in Istanbul and a leading authority on the political movement of today's educated, urbanized, religious Muslim women. A prominent Turkish scholar, she is the author of The Forbidden Modern: Civilization and Veiling. Through personal interviews, Gole has developed detailed case studies of young Turkish women who are turning to the tenets of fundamental Islamic gender codes. Her sociological approach also has produced a broader critique of Eurocentrism with regard to emerging Islamic identities at the close of the 20th century. She has explored the specific topic of covering as well as the complexities of living in a multicultural world. This interview was conducted in June 2001.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Gole will be addressing the 15th ISA World Congress of Sociology in Brisbane, Australia, in July 2002.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b style="text-align: left;"><i>What we're witnessing is a revival of Islamic civilization. If that is the case, what are the key things that differentiate it from dominant Western civilization?</i></b></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Coming for those at the edge of Western modernity, like in Turkey ... this was the formula. In order to be civilized, you have to be Westernized in your clothes, in your mind, in your education, in your habitation, the way you organize your interior space, nuclear family, even how you walk in the streets with a man.</div></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div> <div style="text-align: justify;">I would say, Islam challenges this formula today. Islam wants to be modern, but civilized not in the Western way, but Islam. So they are trying to tell us, like with the "black is beautiful" formula, Islam is beautiful and trying to be a reference point in different sets of civilizations. You take it, you don't take it. You can be critical or not, as I am too, but they are trying to give a reference to a different source of being civilized in the modern world, with a lot of complexities. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">...Modernity is constructed, shaped, produced, invented by values which were not values of Muslim countries.... [Earlier, there] was this either/or thing. If you are modern, you can't be a Muslim. Now we are going beyond this either/or and you can be both Muslim and modern. ... I think this is one of the basic stakes that we face today. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There is no other way. If these two cannot work together, there will be always authoritarianism, either coming from secularism or modernity. Secularism or modernity will be imposed from above and by authoritarian means, or from any fundamentalist movement, religious or ethnic, seemingly opposing itself to that, but also imposing another kind of authority. So there must be a kind of give-and-take, a kind of borrowing between two different cultural values, between two different sets of values. ...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">When you look carefully to Islamist movements today, they speak more to modernity than to traditional religious rules. That's the interesting thing. The majority of these people in Islamic movements...are not, I would say, religiously defined. They have maybe less knowledge of religion, but they have a lot of knowledge on what's going on in modern society. They are more social-science students than coming from schools of religion. They have both religion and secular knowledge--but they are more in dialogue with modernity. Why today? Because, I think, it's almost the end result of modernization in these countries. More and more social groups are [being included] into the areas of modernity, like education, market, politics, mass media.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So the question is, the moment you are included into the system, what is your reaction? Either you want to be more assimilated, as we have seen in the first wave of even feminism, because the first wave of feminism was a feminism of assimilation, right? We wanted to be like men, equal to men. Then the second wave said, "No, why should I take an example and be a second-class man? First of all, I'll just be myself as a woman, different, and let them accept me through my difference and let me enrich the society through the values which was the real reason of my stigmatization, like emotionality, irrationality, or other things--privacy, intimacy."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;">So I think it's like this feminist mode of behavior, I would say. Islamists, the moment they are included into the system, instead of choosing to be assimilated to modernity, or to people like me or you, they say, "No, first of all, we want to reconstruct our identity through our difference and the reasons for our stigmatization, like Islamic faith, the dress code. We make it the forefront of our battle." That's an interesting thing.... Why don't they leave behind their Islamic codes, because they have succeeded? Well, they have said, "No, we want to be even more Muslim than what you expect."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There is this kind of exaggeration of this Islamic identity that we see today, which even disturbs their families, because their families were happy that their children were succeeding. So why do they make it so radical, so visible? I think this is because, instead of assimilation, that's something which I would say is very common in all new social movements. In that respect, Islamism today, or the Muslim movement, is not different from other social movements like feminism, like migrants in Europe, the second-generation migrants saying that we want to be accepted through our difference.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>It goes back to identity?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It goes back to identity politics, yes, exactly. This can be an enriching process as well. ... If there is a kind of debate which is not purely political but more cultural, and we become aware of the questions which are raised by these new Islamic figures, movements--questions which concern not only Muslims but all societies--that's my point. I think there is something to be enriched through that.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>Where do you think that would lead? Where do you think this is going?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">...The broader context is that I think Islam is the real dialogue with modernity today. It is not a clash of civilizations, as [Samuel] Huntington would put it, but on the contrary. In a way, Islam makes us aware of different aspects of modernity. So that is this intertwining process which interests me. I'm not working just on Islam being separate, but to what extent this dialogue, or this intertwining process--although, as with all intertwining process, there is a lot of cleavage, lots of conflict underlying it... I think it makes us aware of different problems, like different aspects of feminism--feminism seen from the Western angle, but now from Islam's. They bring almost a new horizon, to Western feminism as well, I would say--reminding boundaries, reminding more ties among women, and so on.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>Because Islam is working with modernity, it's almost raising a mirror up to it and saying, "Look at yourself"?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Yes, exactly. We are used to reading modernity from the West, from the centers of the Western countries, right? Now we understand that modernity is not only under the monopoly of Europe already, neither only in the United States, but it spreads out. Through colonization it started, but also through voluntary modernization like in Turkey. But now it is becoming more and more indigenous. That's something very important. We have adopted voluntarily modernization in Turkey, but without criticism. We thought we have to take it. And without processing it, in a way, without criticism.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;">But one of the basic aspects of modernity is this capacity of self-criticism, I would say. In a paradoxical way, I would say that Islam indicates another stage of indigenization of modernity, through criticism, because the only way to process modernity and to make it more indigenous is to criticize it, to take it through a kind of filtration. That's what is happening. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><blockquote><b><a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/interviews/wadud.html" style="clear: left; display: inline; float: left; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><img border="0" src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/wadudsp.jpg" /></a><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Amina wadud,</b></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;">Professor of Islamic studies at Virginia Commonwealth University and author of Qur'an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Woman's Perspective. An internationally known scholar on the subject of women in Islam, Dr. Wadud is also an expert on influences of Islam in America. She has spoken about these issues on television broadcasts internationally and is fluent in Arabic. This interview was conducted in March 2002.</div></blockquote></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div><b><i>To what do you attribute the Islamic resurgence movement in recent decades?</i></b></div><div><b><i><br /></i></b><div style="text-align: justify;">I think the globalization of the economy, as an aftermath of colonialism, has pretty much universalized capitalism. The way to negotiate one's relationship to the overall economic structure has been to identify one's political agenda: to either be with or against that overall globalization of economy. And the democratic systems have shown themselves to be the most amenable to that. And the question of Islam and democracy has been a very strong component of the resurgence, articulation of Islam. And that is also one of the reasons why it's deemed to be a political resurgence, even though I think that the stronger components have to do more with sort of a psychospiritual re-identification of the Muslim self in the context of modernity. And modernity means politics as well as economics. But also it has to do with the basic definition of what it means to be human.<img src="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/art/blank.gif" /></div></div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>And the notion of modernity comes because of the increased communications planetwide? How does modernity fit into this?</i></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I think postmodernity is really part of the reconfiguration of the idea of unity across the planet...meaning a greater homogeneity. Postmodernism has allowed us to understand that unity across the planet will be much more diverse. And that includes Islamic diversities. So the more recent manifestations of Islamic resurgence is very intimately tied to reconfigurations of identity, not only among Muslims, but across others. And that's why I say that it dovetails very well with a reformation of what it means to be [a] human being. And therefore, it relates to issues like human rights, because now we are questioning, well, what does it mean to be human, and therefore how do we ascertain what are human rights. And then Muslims have to ask, well, are these human rights commensurate with our own tradition? Are they in contradiction to our tradition, etc.? So, the basic identity of a Muslim now is being aligned with rethinking what it means to be a human being in modernity.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">[Source:  <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muslims/interviews/" target="_blank">Front Line</a>]</div></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></div></div>

Islam And The west

Islam, like any religion, is facing challenges to evolve and adjust to modernity and in particular to the economic and cultural power of a d...

Islam And The west

Islam, like any religion, is facing challenges to evolve and adjust to modernity and in particular to the economic and cultural power of a d...

Read more »

What does the Bible say about Islam?

<div style="line-height: 1.3em; text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: helvetica, sans, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx4YW6Kp7g3KP10vObGy7nKOJnD6qTB3PWYTlA2o_gEJb0O7NZQVN1AuRBGhIhb8kmUZUgbuqyqoaFQpOijG5Bzn9AXPeeEuvLdXMBOWDVhPaEBB9XOkI9-h7YH-xxwOxvJaCxBfcpyUpo/s0/santri.jpg" style="display: block; padding: 0em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="800" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx4YW6Kp7g3KP10vObGy7nKOJnD6qTB3PWYTlA2o_gEJb0O7NZQVN1AuRBGhIhb8kmUZUgbuqyqoaFQpOijG5Bzn9AXPeeEuvLdXMBOWDVhPaEBB9XOkI9-h7YH-xxwOxvJaCxBfcpyUpo/s0/santri.jpg" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">What does the Bible say about Islam?</span></b></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">In the book of Acts we see the apostles of Jesus evangelize many different groups. There are Jews, Samaritans, Roman and Jewish rulers, magicians, philosophers, idol worshippers, plus followers of Zeus, Artemis, and John the Baptist—but no Muslims. There is an obvious reason for this: Islam did not appear until about 600 years after Jesus. Therefore, when you read the New Testament the subject of Islam and the person of Muhammad are never mentioned (though Jesus does warn generally about false prophets in Matthew 7:15-16 and 24:24-25).</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">What about the Old Testament? Muslims claim that Muhammad was a descendant of Ishmael. This has made Muslims and Christians look to the book of Genesis to find an origin for Islam and Muhammad, but none of the accounts of Ishmael mention the religion of Islam or the person of Muhammad, nor do they give any expectation for Islam or Muhammad in the future.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">The Bible does not talk about Islam or Muhammad in the same way the Qur’an speaks directly about Christianity. It does not give us a model for how to understand Islam in the way it does for some other religions.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">As a result, Muslims who learn their faith are prepared against Christianity—this preparation is compulsory. They either politely reject or argue about the gospel message, and are suspicious and dismissive of the Bible. The Muslim community feels confident both in rejecting Christianity and in instructing Christians about the truth of Jesus. They are ready to debate and present Islam as a correction to Christianity—though they may not necessarily say that Christianity is wrong. They may simply try to present Christianity and Islam as being the same. It is very common to hear Muslims say that we both believe in God; we both believe in Jesus; we both follow Abrahamic religions. They also know where Christians and Muslims differ, and so what subjects to stay awayfrom. Islam prepares Muslims to present it in various ways.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">The situation is reversed for Christians. Since the Bible does not engage directly with Islam, learning about Islam is optional. Christians are not required to learn the main doctrines of Islam as part of being Christian, and many who actively learn their faith never learn about Islam at all. The result is that Christians are generally not prepared to talk with Muslims. They are not prepared for the Muslim objections to the gospel. They are not prepared for the well-researched attacks on the Bible and Christian doctrine. They are not prepared for the claims made of history. It can be quite unsettling when a Muslim challenges them in these ways.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">I am not saying that the Bible is insufficient. I believe it is very sufficient. What I am saying is that the way the Qur’an prepares Muslims to deal with Christianity is completely different from the way the Bible prepares Christians to deal with Islam, and Christians need to appreciate this.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">I have a friend who grew up in a Bible-believing church that taught the Scriptures well. He took full advantage of the training opportunities offered to him. After working as a doctor for some time, he completed a degree in theology at an excellent theological college. His first ministry position was on a university campus where he met an 18-year-old first-year Muslim student. The young Muslim brought up biblical textual criticism to show the corruption of the Bible, challenged my friend about the Christian relationship to the Old Testament, illustrated how Paul had corrupted Christianity, and quoted the Bible at length. My friend wrote to me and said:</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><blockquote><span style="font-family: Roboto;">The Muslim student was very articulate (for a first year) and pushed me just as hard intellectually as I pushed him. It made me realize that if I was finding this difficult, many of our students would struggle too. It made me realize how ill-equipped theological college left me for engaging with Islam.</span></blockquote></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">My friend was surprised but not shaken in his faith. This is sadly not always the case: I also know of a missionary couple who, after receiving their theological training, went out on the mission field and were exposed to the Islamic arguments against Christianity for the first time. One of them converted to Islam.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">I do not want to scare you with this information, but I do want you to understand our context. The Christian church has educated the West about Christianity very well for a long time, but we have not educated ourselves or the West about Islam. This is why we know so little about Islam today and are surprised by the rapid appearance of Islam on the world stage. This is why our educational institutions deal with Islam in a superficial way, and why the Western media and politicians say things about Islam that can only be described as absurd. This is why we can be so easily fooled.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">Islam is not optional anymore. It is a challenge to the church on every front, a challenge that shuts down alternative voices when it gains control. But Islam also brings many opportunities.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">The first opportunity is for evangelism. Since Muslims are meant to know about Christianity, talking about Christianity is something Muslims are meant to do! This provides Christians with a great opportunity because it gives us our opening line: “What have you heard about Christianity?”Whether they have been taught a little or a lot, it is a valid question to ask and one that they are meant to be able to answer.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">The second opportunity is for our preparation. Since we know the standard topics Islam prepares Muslims for, we can prepare ourselves in these areas (it is even helpful to know exactly which areas to prioritize). Of course, any issue may surface when talking with a Muslim, but topics like the Trinity, the incarnation and the reliability of the Bible are more likely to arise.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;">Finally, Islam brings a new opportunity for learning our own faith better. The pressures we face from the world often determine what areas of the Christian faith we focus on. Up until recently, the main pressure has come from the Western secular world. It has challenged Christians in areas like the existence of God, suffering and the goodness of God, the conduct of the church, religion and science, and sexuality and gender; but it cares little for discussing the Trinity, the incarnation, or how we are saved. Islam, however, does care about these subjects, and so in preparing to engage with Muslims we will learn how to better articulate our central doctrines for a new context and generation.</span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-size: 14px; text-align: justify;"><div class="auth-img-box" style="box-sizing: border-box; min-height: 80px; padding: 4px 4px 0px; text-align: center; vertical-align: middle; width: 80px;"><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><img src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0147/1830/4342/files/samuelgreen.jpg?v=1576127728" style="border-radius: 50%; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; height: 60px; max-width: 100%; object-fit: cover; vertical-align: middle; width: 60px;" tooltip="Samuel Green" /></span></div><h3 style="border-bottom: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.1em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="https://matthiasmedia.com.au/blogs/news/what-does-the-bible-say-about-islam" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Roboto; font-size: small;">Samuel Green</span></a></h3><span style="font-family: Roboto;"><i>Samuel Green studied chemical engineering (UNSW) and then theology at Moore Theological College. He works with the Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students as their Islamic specialist and travels around Australia and the world speaking and debating on this subject. He is one of the founding authors at answering-islam.org and the author of the ‘Engaging with Islam’ training material.</i></span><span class="auth-sig-social" style="box-sizing: border-box; display: block; padding: 6px; text-align: center;"></span></div></div>

What does the Bible say about Islam?

What does the Bible say about Islam? In the book of Acts we see the apostles of Jesus evangelize many different groups. There are Jews, Sama...

What does the Bible say about Islam?

What does the Bible say about Islam? In the book of Acts we see the apostles of Jesus evangelize many different groups. There are Jews, Sama...

Read more »

What Did They Say About Prophet Muhammad PBUH

<div class="separator" style="clear: both;display:none;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMudAtYLQ0Eyo7BcdkiQOxVzMA8MgezuTWeVfKq8BAjXiL3ziaddCqLNGteFXV9-YCfqU97iUQV0Qd4Tpw-j-B7TKCXYImR-FUU6U463vtB1XQq8XYrPh1SzZGSJB3aL8Gt26UBWGwbYPQ/s0/kacamata.jpg" style="display: block; padding: 1em 0; text-align: center; "><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="600" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMudAtYLQ0Eyo7BcdkiQOxVzMA8MgezuTWeVfKq8BAjXiL3ziaddCqLNGteFXV9-YCfqU97iUQV0Qd4Tpw-j-B7TKCXYImR-FUU6U463vtB1XQq8XYrPh1SzZGSJB3aL8Gt26UBWGwbYPQ/s0/kacamata.jpg"/></a></div><div class="clearfix" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15.359999656677246px; zoom: 1;"><h2 class="_5clb" style="font-size: 24px; line-height: 28px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"></h2></div><div class="_5k3v _5k3w clearfix" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px; margin-top: 16px; word-wrap: break-word; zoom: 1;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA41V7l0_LZR9aU6gl6zyVv1ETYp17qgpPHE8MDX6VSHoQB7BFbvvTkNHLwXuQtXaI9-wT7sSw6EGx7LdpN_OL9i5kw5eDSNlls26NacYhNxeh4A9IK5wX5ASj84rySe5j8hrqVisbJ4hh/s1600/98a2cfeb9fad5aa074234c92b89d7556.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 0em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="355" data-original-width="630" height="auto" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA41V7l0_LZR9aU6gl6zyVv1ETYp17qgpPHE8MDX6VSHoQB7BFbvvTkNHLwXuQtXaI9-wT7sSw6EGx7LdpN_OL9i5kw5eDSNlls26NacYhNxeh4A9IK5wX5ASj84rySe5j8hrqVisbJ4hh/s640/98a2cfeb9fad5aa074234c92b89d7556.jpg" width="740" /></a></div>During the centuries of the Crusades, all sorts of slanders were invented against the Prophet Muhammad, may the mercy and blessings of God be upon him.  With the birth of the modern age, however, marked with religious tolerance and freedom of thought, there has been a great change in the approach of Western authors in their delineation of his life and character.  The views of some non-Muslim scholars regarding Prophet Muhammad, given at the end, justify this opinion.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The West has still to go a step forward to discover the greatest reality about Muhammad, and that is his being the true and last Prophet of God for all of humanity.  In spite of all its objectivity and enlightenment here has been no sincere and objective attempt by the West to understand the Prophethood of Muhammad.  It is so strange that very glowing tributes are paid to him for his integrity and achievement, but his claim of being the Prophet of God has been rejected explicitly and implicitly.  It is here that a searching of the heart is required, and a review if the so-called objectivity is needed.  The following glaring facts from the life of Muhammad  have been furnished to facilitate an unbiased, logical and objective decision regarding his Prophethood.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Up to the age of forty, Muhammad was not known as a statesman, a preacher or an orator.  He was never seen discussing the principles of metaphysics, ethics, law, politics, economics or sociology.  No doubt he possessed an excellent character, charming manners and was highly cultured.  Yet there was nothing so deeply striking and so radically extraordinary in him that would make men expect something great and revolutionary from him in the future.  But when he came out from the Cave of Hira with a new message, he was completely transformed. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Is it possible for such a person of the above qualities to turn all of a sudden into ‘an imposter’ and claim to be the Prophet of God and thus invite the rage of his people?  One might ask, for what reason did he suffer all the hardships imposed on him?  His people offered to accept him as their king and to lay all the riches of the land at his feet if only he would leave the preaching of his religion.  But he chose to refuse their tempting offers and go on preaching his religion single-handedly in the face of all kinds of insults, social boycott and even physical assault by his own people.  Was it not only God’s support and his firm will to disseminate the message of God and his deep-rooted belief that ultimately Islam would emerge as the only way of life for humanity, that he stood like a mountain in the face of all opposition and conspiracies to eliminate him?  Furthermore, had he come with a design of rivalry with the Christians and the Jews, why should he have made belief in Jesus and Moses and other Prophets of God, may God praise them all, a basic requirement of faith without which no one could be a Muslim?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Is it not an incontrovertible proof of his Prophethood that in spite of being unlettered and having led a very normal and quiet life for forty years, when he began preaching his message, all of Arabia stood in awe and wonder at his wonderful eloquence and oratory?  It was so matchless that the whole legion of Arab poets, preachers and orators of the highest caliber failed to bring forth its equivalent.  And above all, how could he then pronounce truths of a scientific nature contained in the Quran that no human being could possibly have developed at that time?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><blockquote class="tr_bq">Last but not least, why did he lead a hard life, even after gaining power and authority? Just ponder over the words he uttered while dying: <strong>“We, the community of the Prophets, are not inherited.  Whatever we leave behind is for charity.”</strong></blockquote></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As a matter of fact, Muhammad is the last link of the chain of Prophets sent in different lands and times since the beginning of human life on this planet.  The following are writings of some western authors regarding Muhammad.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Lamartine</strong>, Histoire de la Turquie, Paris 1854, Vol II, pp. 276-77:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“If greatness of purpose, smallness of means, and astounding results are the three criteria of human genius, who could dare to compare any great man in modern history with Muhammad?  The most famous men created arms, laws and empires only.  They founded, if anything at all, no more than material powers which often crumbled away before their eyes. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">This man moved not only armies, legislations, empires, peoples and dynasties, but millions of men in one-third of the then inhabited world; and more than that, he moved the altars, the gods, the religions, the ideas, the beliefs and souls, the forbearance in victory, his ambition, which was entirely devoted to one idea and in no manner striving for an empire; his endless prayers, his mystic conversations with God, his death and his triumph after death; all these attest not to an imposture but to a firm conviction which gave him the power to restore a dogma.  This dogma was twofold, the unit of God and the immateriality of God; the former telling what God is, the latter telling what God is not; the one overthrowing false gods with the sword, the other starting an idea with words.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Philosopher, orator, apostle, legislator, warrior, conqueror of ideas, restorer of rational dogmas, of a cult without images; the founder of twenty terrestrial empires and of one spiritual empire, that is Muhammad.  As regards all standards by which human greatness may be measured, we may well ask, is there any man greater than he?”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Edward Gibbon</strong> and <strong>Simon Ocklay</strong>, History of the Saracen Empire, London, 1870, p. 54:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“It is not the propagation but the permanency of his religion that deserves our wonder, the same pure and perfect impression which he engraved at Mecca and Medina is preserved, after the revolutions of twelve centuries by the Indian, the African and the Turkish proselytes of the Quran. The Mahometans[1]  have uniformly withstood the temptation of reducing the object of their faith and devotion to a level with the senses and imagination of man.  ‘I believe in One God and Mahomet the Apostle of God’, is the simple and invariable profession of Islam.  The intellectual image of the Deity has never been degraded by any visible idol; the honors of the prophet have never transgressed the measure of human virtue, and his living precepts have restrained the gratitude of his disciples within the bounds of reason and religion.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Bosworth Smith</strong>, Mohammed and Mohammadanism, London 1874, p. 92:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“He was Caesar and Pope in one; but he was Pope without Pope’s pretensions, Caesar without the legions of Caesar: without a standing army, without a bodyguard, without a palace, without a fixed revenue; if ever any man had the right to say that he ruled by the right divine, it was Mohammed, for he had all the power without its instruments and without its supports.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Annie Besant</strong>, The Life and Teachings of Muhammad, Madras 1932, p. 4:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“It is impossible for anyone who studies the life and character of the great Prophet of Arabia, who knows how he taught and how he lived, to feel anything but reverence for that mighty Prophet, one of the great messengers of the Supreme.  And although in what I put to you I shall say many things which may be familiar to many, yet I myself feel whenever I re-read them, a new way of admiration, a new sense of reverence for that mighty Arabian teacher.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>W. Montgomery</strong>, Mohammad at Mecca, Oxford 1953, p. 52:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“His readiness to undergo persecutions for his beliefs, the high moral character of the men who believed in him and looked up to him as leader, and the greatness of his ultimate achievement – all argue his fundamental integrity.  To suppose Muhammad an impostor raises more problems than it solves.  Moreover, none of the great figures of history is so poorly appreciated in the West as Muhammad.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>James A. Michener</strong>, ‘Islam: The Misunderstood Religion’ in Reader’s Digest (American Edition), May 1955, pp. 68-70:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Muhammad, the inspired man who founded Islam, was born about A.D. 570 into an Arabian tribe that worshipped idols.  Orphaned at birth, he was always particularly solicitous of the poor and needy, the widow and the orphan, the slave and the downtrodden.  At twenty he was already a successful businessman, and soon became director of camel caravans for a wealthy widow.  When he reached twenty-five, his employer, recognizing his merit, proposed marriage.  Even though she was fifteen years older, he married her, and as long as she lived, remained a devoted husband.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Like almost every major prophet before him, Muhammad fought shy of serving as the transmitter of God’s word, sensing his own inadequacy.  But the angel commanded ‘Read’.  So far as we know, Muhammad was unable to read or write, but he began to dictate those inspired words which would soon revolutionize a large segment of the earth: “There is one God.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“In all things Muhammad was profoundly practical.  When his beloved son Ibrahim died, an eclipse occurred, and rumors of God’s personal condolence quickly arose.  Whereupon Muhammad is said to have announced, ‘An eclipse is a phenomenon of nature.  It is foolish to attribute such things to the death or birth of a human-being.’</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“At Muhammad’s own death an attempt was made to deify him, but the man who was to become his administrative successor killed the hysteria with one of the noblest speeches in religious history: ‘If there are any among you who worshipped Muhammad, he is dead.  But if it is God you worshipped, He lives forever.’”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Michael H. Hart</strong>, The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History, New York: Hart Publishing Company, Inc. 1978, p. 33:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“My choice of Muhammad to lead the list of the world’s most influential persons may surprise some readers and may be questioned by others, but he was the only man in history who was supremely successful on both the religious and secular level.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Encyclopedia Britannica</strong>:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“....a mass of detail in the early sources show that he was an honest and upright man who had gained the respect and loyalty of others who were like-wise honest and upright men.” (Vol. 12)</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>George Bernard Shaw </strong>said about him:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“He must be called the Saviour of Humanity.  I believe that if a man like him were to assume the dictatorship of the modern world, he would succeed in solving its problems in a way that would bring it much needed peace and happiness.” (The Genuine Islam, Singapore, Vol. 1, No. 8, 1936)</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He was by far the most remarkable man that ever set foot on this earth.  He preached a religion, founded a state, built a nation, laid down a moral code, initiated numerous social and political reforms, established a powerful and dynamic society to practice and represent his teachings and completely revolutionized the worlds of human thought and behavior for all times to come.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">His Name is Muhammad.  He was born in Arabia in the year 570 C.E., started his mission of preaching the religion of Truth, Islam (submission to One God) at the age of forty and departed from this world at the age of sixty-three.  During this short period of twenty three years of his Prophethood, he changed the complete Arabian peninsula from paganism and idolatry to worship of One God, from tribal quarrels and wars to national solidarity and cohesion, from drunkenness and debauchery to sobriety and piety, from lawlessness and anarchy to disciplined living, from utter bankruptcy to the highest standards of moral excellence.  Human history has never known such a complete transformation of a people or a place before or since - and imagine all these unbelievable wonders in just over two decades.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>LaMartine</strong>, the renowned historian speaking on the essentials of human greatness wonders:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“If greatness of purpose, smallness of means and astounding results are the three criteria of human genius, who could dare to compare any great man in modern history with Muhammad?  The most famous men created arms, laws and empires only.  They founded, if anything at all, no more than material powers which often crumbled away before their eyes.  This man moved not only armies, legislation, empires, peoples and dynasties, but millions of men in one-third of the then inhabited world; and more than that, he moved the altars, the gods, the religions, the ideas, the beliefs and souls, his forbearance in victory, his ambition, which was entirely devoted to one idea and in no manner striving for an empire; his endless prayers, his mystic conversations with God, his death and his triumph after death; all these attest not to an imposture but to a firm conviction which gave him the power to restore a dogma.  This dogma was two-fold, the unity of God and the immateriality of God; the former telling what God is, the latter telling what God is not; the one overthrowing false gods with the sword, the other starting an idea with the words.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Philosopher, orator, apostle, legislator, warrior, conqueror of ideas, restorer of rational dogmas, of a cult without images, the founder of twenty terrestrial empires and of one spiritual empire, that is Muhammad.  As regards all the standards by which Human Greatness may be measured, we may well ask, Is there any man greater than he?” [Lamartine, Histoire de la Turqui, Paris, 1854, Vol. II, pp 276-277]</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The world has had its share of great personalities.  But these were one-sided figures who distinguished themselves in but one or two fields, such as religious thought or military leadership.  The lives and teachings of these great personalities of the world are shrouded in the mist of time.  There is so much speculation about the time and place of their birth, the mode and style of their life, the nature and detail of their teachings and the degree and measure of their success or failure that it is impossible for humanity to reconstruct accurately the lives and teachings of these men.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Not so this man.  Muhammad, may the mercy and blessings of God be upon him, accomplished so much in such diverse fields of human thought and behavior in the fullest blaze of human history.  Every detail of his private life and public utterances has been accurately documented and faithfully preserved to our day.  The authenticity of the record so preserved are vouched for not only by the faithful followers but even by his prejudiced critics.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Muhammad was a religious teacher, a social reformer, a moral guide, an administrative colossus, a faithful friend, a wonderful companion, a devoted husband, a loving father - all in one.  No other man in history ever excelled or equaled him in any of these different aspects of life - but it was only for the selfless personality of Muhammad to achieve such incredible perfections.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Mahatma Gandhi</strong>, speaking on the character of Muhammad, says in (Young India):</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“I wanted to know the best of one who holds today’s undisputed sway over the hearts of millions of mankind. I became more than convinced that it was not the sword that won a place for Islam in those days in the scheme of life.  It was the rigid simplicity, the utter self-effacement of the Prophet, the scrupulous regard for his pledges, his intense devotion to this friends and followers, his intrepidity, his fearlessness, his absolute trust in God and in his own mission. These and not the sword carried everything before them and surmounted every obstacle.  When I closed the 2nd volume (of the Prophet’s biography), I was sorry there was not more for me to read of the great life.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Thomas Carlyle </strong>in his (Heroes and Heroworship), was simply amazed as to:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“how one man single-handedly, could weld warring tribes and wandering Bedouins into a most powerful and civilized nation in less than two decades.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Diwan Chand Sharma</strong> wrote:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Muhammad was the soul of kindness, and his influence was felt and never forgotten by those around him.” [D.C. Sharma, The Prophet of the East, Calcutta, 1935, pp. 12]</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Edward Gibbon</strong> and <strong>Simon Ockley</strong> speaking on the profession of Islam write:</div><div style="text-align: justify;">“I believe in One God, and Mahomet, an Apostle of God’is the simple and invariable profession of Islam.  The intellectual image of the Deity has never been degraded by any visible idol; the honor of the Prophet has never transgressed the measure of human virtues; and his living precepts have restrained the gratitude of his disciples within the bounds of reason and religion.” [History of the Saracan Empires, London, 1870, p. 54]</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Muhammad was nothing more or less than a human being.  But he was a man with a noble mission, which was to unite humanity on the worship of One and Only One God and to teach them the way to honest and upright living based on the commands of God.  He always described himself as, “A Servant and Messenger of God,” and so indeed every action of his proclaimed to be.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Speaking on the aspect of equality before God in Islam, the famous poetess of India,<strong>Sarojini Naidu </strong>says: “It was the first religion that preached and practiced democracy; for, in the mosque, when the call for prayer is sounded and worshippers are gathered together, the democracy of Islam is embodied five times a day when the peasant and king kneel side by side and proclaim: ‘God Alone is Great’...  I have been struck over and over again by this indivisible unity of Islam that makes man instinctively a brother.” [S. Naidu, Ideals of Islam, vide Speeches & Writings, Madras, 1918, p. 169]</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In the words of <strong>Prof. Hurgronje</strong>: “The league of nations founded by the prophet of Islam put the principle of international unity and human brotherhood on such universal foundations as to show candle to other nations.” He continues: “The fact is that no nation of the world can show a parallel to what Islam has done towards the realization of the idea of the League of Nations.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The world has not hesitated to raise to divinity, individuals whose lives and missions have been lost in legend.  Historically speaking, none of these legends achieved even a fraction of what Muhammad accomplished.  And all his striving was for the sole purpose of uniting mankind for the worship of One God on the codes of moral excellence.  Muhammad or his followers never at any time claimed that he was a Son of God or the God-incarnate or a man with divinity - but he always was and is even today considered as only a Messenger chosen by God.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Michael  H. Hart</strong> in his recently published book on ratings of men who contributed towards the benefit and upliftment of mankind writes: “My choice of Muhammad to lead the list of the world’s most influential persons may surprise some readers and may be questioned by others, but he was the only man in history who was supremely successful on both the religious and secular levels.”  [M.H. Hart, The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History, New York, 1978, p. 33]</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong>K. S. Ramakrishna Rao</strong>, an Indian Professor of Philosophy in his booklet, (“Muhammad, The Prophet of Islam,”) calls him the “Perfect model for human life.”  Prof. Ramakrishna Rao explains his point by saying: “The personality of Muhammad, it is most difficult to get into the whole truth of it.  Only a glimpse of it I can catch.  What a dramatic succession of picturesque scenes!  There is Muhammad, the Prophet.  There is Muhammad, the Warrior; Muhammad, the Businessman; Muhammad, the Statesman; Muhammad, the Orator; Muhammad, the Reformer; Muhammad, the Refuge of Orphans; Muhammad, the Protector of Slaves; Muhammad, the Emancipator of Women; Muhammad, the Judge; Muhammad, the Saint.  All in all these magnificent roles, in all these departments of human activities, he is alike a hero.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Today after a lapse of fourteen centuries, the life and teachings of Muhammad have survived without the slightest loss, alteration or interpolation.  They offer the same undying hope for treating mankind’s many ills, which they did when he was alive.  This is not a claim of Muhammad’s followers but also the inescapable conclusion forced upon by a critical and unbiased history.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The least you could do as a thinking and concerned human being is to stop for a moment and ask yourself: Could these statements sounding so extraordinary and revolutionary be really true?  And supposing they really are true and you did not know this man Muhammad or hear about him, isn’t it time you responded to this tremendous challenge and put in some effort to know him?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It will cost you nothing but it may prove to be the beginning of a completely new era in your life.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><blockquote class="tr_bq"><strong>Download</strong> E-Book WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT THE PROPHET MUHAMMAD PBUH <a href="http://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fdawah.invitetogod.com%2Febooks-dp337&h=vAQHPs8Nv&s=1" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><strong>right here!</strong></a>.</blockquote></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">[Source: <a href="http://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.islamreligion.com%2Farticles%2F196%2Fviewall%2F&h=yAQFKcLkl&s=1" rel="nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">islamreligion.com</a>]</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">[1] The term Mahometans and Mohammadanism is a misnomer introduced by orientalists certain due to their lack of understanding of Islam, in analogy to Christ and Christianity.</div></div>

What Did They Say About Prophet Muhammad PBUH

During the centuries of the Crusades, all sorts of slanders were invented against the Prophet Muhammad, may the mercy and blessings of God b...

What Did They Say About Prophet Muhammad PBUH

During the centuries of the Crusades, all sorts of slanders were invented against the Prophet Muhammad, may the mercy and blessings of God b...

Read more »