Beyond the Shrouds of Islam (by ContraSuggest)

On several occasions I have been asked to explain my critical views of Islam.  Although I have done so in private letters and communications, I have never posted a blog on the subject.  Since most Americans, and the major media outlets that Americans look to for their information, continually display ignorance about the history and disposition of Islam, I felt it was time to broach the subject here at the OTPE.  Before I begin, there are two things I’d first like to get out of the way.  One, I harbor no ill will towards law abiding Americans who happen to be Muslims.  Two, I do not believe that President Obama is a Muslim.  It’s a shame that I have to state these things up front, but I strongly suspect that I’ll be accused of believing them somewhere down the road.  What you’re going to get here is a fact-based, historical analysis regarding the main problems with Islam, unknown to the average American.  I’ll begin with Islam’s version of Holy Scripture:

Foundational Texts of Islam:

Koran (or Qur’an) (Words of Allah)

Sira (Life of Mohammed)

Hadith (Traditions of Mohammed)

These are the three sources from which all Islamic belief is drawn; although the media only speaks of the Qu’ran, the Sira and Hadith are perhaps more important, for they provide the only context within which the Qu’ran can be properly understood.  Now let’s dive right into the three things that I believe most people don’t know about Islam, but should:

1. In theory and in practice, Islam is more of a socio-political ideology than a religion
2. Islam is the only one of the world’s major “religions” that does not have a version of the Golden Rule
3. Islamic thinking uses a kind of dualistic logic that is alien to our Western thinking

I’ll briefly touch on each of these three points. 

(1) Radical political Islam has existed ever since the 7^th century when predatory Muslim hordes first issued forth from Arabia, unprovoked, in order to conquer a decaying Byzantine world.  The Christian Middle East, Northern Africa, and Western Europe were ferociously invaded and conquered by Muslim armies, 200 years before the first Christian Crusade was launched.  The unrelenting jihad has continued, almost unabated, for 1400 years, claiming nearly 300 million lives.  In any country or province where brutal Muslim law (Sharia) is practiced, it is used as an alternative to other systems of law and other forms of government (which makes its implementation anywhere in the U.S. a serious threat to our secular rule of law and representative government).  Muslim law distinguishes itself from other forms of government to such a degree as to reveal its political nature. 

The great theorist of The Muslim Brotherhood, Sayyid Qutb provided this instructive quote in 1948:

“We only have to look in order to see that our social situation is as bad as it can be.  …we continually cast aside all our own spiritual heritage, all our intellectual endowment, and all the solutions which might well be revealed by a glance at these things; we cast aside our own fundamental principles and doctrines, and we bring in those of democracy, or socialism, or communism.”

^(Source: Quote- Social Justice in Islam, translated by John B. Hardie and Hamid Algar, revised edition, Islamic Publications International, 2000, pg. 19).

If Islam is not a political doctrine then why does Qutb juxtapose it with other forms of government rather than other religions?  He is in effect admitting that Islam is a political doctrine.  Oh, and by the way, political Islam, rather than religious Islam, makes up the largest part of subject matter in Islam’s foundational texts. 

 

(2) Every one of the world’s major religions has some version of the Golden Rule, namely, the concept that one should “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”  Every religion, that is, with the exception of Islam.   Over the centuries, the Catholic Church has been the greatest promoter of the natural rights doctrine (outlined and defended by Aquinas and many others); and the United States of America was founded upon that same doctrine.  It holds that all people, regardless of creed, color, national origin or social standing, are equal in the eyes of the creator, and possess unalienable rights upon birth (see the second paragraph of The Declaration of Independence for the most eloquent statement concerning these rights).  In Islam there is a set of rules that applies to believers and another set that applies to unbelievers.  One may not lie, cheat, murder or steal from a fellow Muslim; but doing those things to non-Muslims is not only permissible but encouraged, this is clearly outlined in the Hadith.  Westerners regularly fail to live by the Golden Rule, but it is the standard by which we are judged and the ideal which we aspire to; there simply is no corresponding doctrine or belief in Islam.

(3) When faced with two statements that contradict each another, Western logic informs us that at least one of those statements must be false.  Not so with Islamic dualistic logic.  The Muslim holy books are filled with glaring contradictions that make the Bible look like a Nobel-winning chemistry dissertation, in terms of its consistency.  The Qur’an contains the words of Allah, as told to us by his one and only profit Mohammed.  Since Allah is perfect, everything that he says is the unimpeachable truth.  Therefore, if one sura (chapter) of the Qur’an says that unbelievers should be shown tolerance and left to their own devices; and another sura says that the unbelievers should have their heads and the tips of their fingers cut off; in Islamic thinking, both are considered true!  I expect that the “moderate” Muslims that the media always tells us about choose to adhere to the former sura; Islamic fascists, like Osama bin Laden and Kalid Sheik Mohammed, choose to adhere to the latter.  But there are further twists: firstly, the vast majority of the statements concerning unbelievers in the Muslim holy trilogy are of an intolerant, violent nature; only a small minority of them urge tolerance.  Then there’s the Islamic doctrine of “abrogation.”  The Qur’an’s moderate suras were written in Mecca, before Mohammed and his followers were forced to flee that city; the intolerant suras were written later when Mohammed settled in the city of Medina. The doctrine of abrogation in Islam holds that the later writings take precedence over the earlier writings.  So the harsher, more intolerant suras take precedence over the earlier, more tolerant ones. The sad truth is that there is far more in Muslim holy writings, history, and tradition that inspire the bin Ladens of the world than the Muslim moderates of the world.

Finally, it’s rather clear to see that whatever brutal, regrettable actions have been taken throughout history by some adherents to the world’s non-Muslim religions; with very few exceptions, those actions were in violation of those various religions’ tenets.  The opposite is true of Islam; this is the historically verifiable legacy of jihad.