Surprising article. Muslims being self critical!

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Fraser,
It would be well if you made it clear in your immediate comments exactly why you've brought in these definitions. I think I'll try for you, if only to try to head off potential trouble. You need to reiterate at times, your purposes for what you post, and your fundamental disagreement with essential errors of a false religion like Islam, while you are trying to correct caricatures of it.

Early on in the thread, Fraser tried to establish a difference between violent radicals, and their interpretations of Islam, and more mainstream Muslims. The comments he quotes above are what he is representing as the more "stable" views of the majority of Muslims, what he is labeling "orthodoxy".

The persuasiveness of his case it is not my purpose to defend or rebut.
 
Ok, I better clear things up.

1) I am not a Muslim
2) My purpose for disputing the these issues is that we as Christians should not have false ideas - notice I never disputed the fact Islam was evil - as there is enough wrong with other people beliefs to insult them by. If we start bringing in false facts we a) stop them from listening to us and drive a wedge between us b) we start thinking in a different way and when we want to make decisions our false ideas - say about a Muslim - may influence what we end up with.

I believe it is important to to at least know your enemies otherwise we will never defeat them.

I am trying to find sources for the information I posted but most of it is from oral learning from my Islamic teacher and lengthy debates with other people. These verses are not unfamiliar to me as I have pulled them on people before and realised how silly they were in context.

Yes I have read a reasonable amount of the Qur'an but it does not really help you in understanding Islam too much except for being a brief overview. It does not matter what we think their scriptures mean - it is their interpretation that counts and all I can do is give you that. I have not read the Qur'an in a while except for yesterday and it is not the biggest aid to understanding the false religion of Islam. Oh wait I read it two weeks ago when I had an assignment on it but appart from that...
 
Fraser,

You still haven't defined (as far as I can tell) what exactly IS orthodox in Islam. You have only reiterated to us what your Muslim friends have [i:62f28be320]said[/i:62f28be320] is orthodox. Is this orthodox Sunni or orthodox Shiite? I'm guessing Sunni(?).

Somehow I doubt that a Wahabist Muslim would concur...but would probably, like an orthodox Christian referring to a modernist "Christian", proclaim that the others have strayed from the faith and need to be reformed.
[b:62f28be320]Finn[/b:62f28be320] mentioned as much several posts ago.

How are we as outsiders to discern between the internicene rifts within Islam? And why should we hold either side as being more genuine than another?

You mentioned:

"It does not matter what we think their scriptures mean - it is their interpretation that counts and all I can do is give you that..."

How do we (or you) know that what you have been taught is not the equivalent of a Mormon claiming to hold the "true Christian faith"...or a Jehovah's Witness...or a Liberal churchman, etc. etc. etc.? Because they taught you a few lines of Arabic and some doctrine?

My contention is that this flexibility of interpretation means that in the real world Islam is whatever it has to be for pragmatic purposes. Here in a America (and the West) where they are a minority, it is a "religion of peace and tolerance, etc, etc." But where Islam is either dominant or ascendant we see plenty of examples of extremism. Like forced slavery, conversion and genocide in Sudan; Wholesale slaughter like in Algeria's civil war; Systematic coercion and oppression of all religious groups in every country where Sharia (Islamic law) is enforced like Pakistan, Iran, Afghanistan, Nigeria, etc. etc. etc.
 
You have a good question. The orthodoxy I am refering to is Sunni which is mainstream Islam although Shi'a would disagree. Shi'as are a minority - and a small one at that - and feature very little in Islamic Militancy so on that matter they are a minor point. Sunni Islam is by far the largest of the groups but I have not got statistics on me right now but they dwarf any others by far.

My orthodoxy I am refering to the historicaly excepted basics of Sunni Islam - and need I remind you that a Wahabist Muslim is a Sunni in a certain way. You could say they are the more learned ;)

In a way, when modern Islamic militancy is concerned, Sunni Islam holds the orthodoxy as most of them are Sunni and indeed the MODERN concepts of terrorism have been mostly been born out of Sunni Islam. So the orthodoxy with which to judge them by is Sunni orthodoxy...
 
The Hadith is critical to understanding the Qur'an. It defines all the terms that are already assumed in the Qur'an.

www.islamicity.com has some good resources.


I have a lot of Muslims friends who never would've dialogued with me had I not taken time to really read their writings, learn many of the Arabic words, etc.

If any one misrepresents another religion because of ignorance, that is equivalent to lying, and a violation of God's law.
 
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