5 Myth about Islam

reply to post by OhZone



Any Pig farmers here?

I was told that pigs need a lot of water hence the very practical ban on the pig rearing which then became a religious ban on the poor pig. It is strange that both jews and moslems share this ban. I would have thought that Islam would have acted to further differentiate itself from the older Judaism

reply to post by tiger5


That is not the reason eating pigs is wrong.

Judaism is a religion, and so based on some spiritual logic. Eating certain foods has a particular, albeit sublte emotional influence on consciousness. The old addage of 'you are what you eat" is completely spiritually valid. The characteristics of the animal that is eaten one actually integrates. That does not mean if one eats a cow he begins to graze the fields for grass. No. traits are different from characteristics. In the case of a pig, we find that it is obscenely ditry. It is rolling around in mud and # and it infact eats its own #. When you actually open up a pig, we find that its organs are remarkably similar to a humans (even its anterior artery is similar in function to a humans). This amongst other reasons is why eating pork is foribdden. It has a very downing spiritual affect on consciousness. One become rowdy and careless when he eats pork and it has a negative affect on the mind. On a further level, because its a principle that the spiritual is mirroed in the physical, the pigs defiled spiritual characteristics become parasitic at the physical level; that is, pigs have more parasites than any other meat.. and it is simply not healthy to eat pork.

So i suppose the Jews have it right.

reply to post by dontreally


Not trying to knock you, but could you post a link or something that supports that? It's an interesting theory and would like to look into it the behaviors associated with eating certain foods.

Pig anatomy I learned when I had to dissect one. ewwww

reply to post by searching4truth


Like a scientific study or something? I dont think science is interested in validating Jewish Kashrut. lol

This is the 'esoteric' reason for why pigs arent eaten. This is a pretty universal spiritual belief - that certain foods contribute some aspect to consciousness. This is why in eastern ascetic systems they only eat vegetables and legumes. Meat can be 'heavy' and so has the affect of lowering or weighing down the consciousness towards the physical.

Jews based on their own religious beliefs feel that certain Kosher meats - sheep, shoats, cows, poultry can have an uplifting effect (although it is emhpasized in Judaism that one should eat meat more than two or 3 times a week. many of the mystics only eat meat on shabbat, while having a vegetarian diet on the other days) on consciousness when prepared in a certain manner. It has to be slaughtered with a swift swipe of the blade at its interior artery (leading to the immediate cessation of consciousness), only certain parts can eaten (for instance, the sciatic nerve has to be removed) and the meat has to be covered in salt which soaks up the blood (the blood is associated with carnality and instinctive sttes of consciousness. This is why certain pagan ritual often included blood letting or blood drinking, like in the rites of dionysous where an animal was torn apart and eaten raw)

reply to post by imperium1984


Well, here is how I understand it:

Noble Verses 15:2-3 "1Again and again will those who disbelieve, 2wish that they had bowed (to God's will) in Islam. 3Leave them alone, 4 to enjoy (the good things of this life) and to please themselves: 5let (false) hope amuse them: 6soon will knowledge (undeceive them)."

I've used numbers to refer to different parts. I believe this may be the translation of the OP and not an official translation (if such a thing exists).

1 - "Again and again" is important here, because it does not necessarily refer to "one after the other" but rather "successively over time".
2 - So, over time, disbelievers will wish they followed the pillars of Islam.
3 - Don't evangelize them.
4 - Enjoying the good things in life, means those things that have negative consequence: addiction, sexual promiscuity, stealing, anything that has good result/is pleasurable to you... Anybody who lives outside "balance", so to speak. Those who go to excess.
5 - Let false hope amuse them, as in the false hope of joy through pleasure. Enjoying the good things in life; i.e., making use of them. Think about a heroin addict. The pleasure during the high is always followed by the pain of the low. The pleasure-seeking addict becomes amused / enjoys the drug.
6 - Eventually knowledge (experience) will show them the error of their ways. Sometimes this comes too late (as in you don't learn it until you die of it, such as an overdose).


So, the jist: Leave the disbelievers alone because change can only come from within oneself, through knowledge/experience.

Taking another look at all of this, I'm starting to see the Eastern aspects of Islam.

I don't see anything violent about that at all.

Originally posted by Sphota
Taking another look at all of this, I'm starting to see the Eastern aspects of Islam.

I don't see anything violent about that at all.

Some of the Koran is very benign. Especially the verses written before Muhammed was powerful.

Check out this link

gentleislam.com...

For instance, 0% of the Koran written in Mecca (when Muhammed was weak) is devoted to jihad, while 24% of the Koran written in Medina (when Muhammed was a powerful warlord) is devoted to Jihad.

'Greater' jihad (the inner struggle) makes up 2% of those Jihad verses and 'minor' jihad (the violent kind) makes up 98%.

Jihad occupies 21% of the Hadith and 67% of the Sira. Overall, it takes up 31% of the 3 holy Islamic books.

I have read that some English translations are English 'lite' as in they tone down the violent passages.

For instance 'kill' better translates as murder and the derogatory names for non-Muslims are also not translated accurately.

I don't know if that is true because I don't read 7th century Arabic.

One very respected translation of the Koran was by Pickthall, Muhammad Marmaduke William, an Oxford educated Muslim convert :- The Meaning of the Glorious Qur'an (London, 1930).

This website uses the Pickthall translation

skepticsannotatedbible.com...

His translation sticks closely to the Arabic text and to the interpretations made by Muslims

www.muhajabah.com...

Originally posted by dontreally
This is the 'esoteric' reason for why pigs arent eaten. This is a pretty universal spiritual belief - that certain foods contribute some aspect to consciousness.

Nonsense!

The ancient 'holy books' were the only written material of the day and included information and advice about every aspect of everyday life, including the pragmatic and mundane.

Pigs were deemed 'unclean' for health and safety reasons, swine-flu is not new! People got sick from eating pork just as they got sick from eating bottom feeders that grew strong feeding off human effluence, shellfish being another 'unclean' food.

reply to post by ollncasino

That link you posted (gentle something something?) has dozens of factual errors, and tonnes of "statistics" that are not referenced, and thus, unfortunately, can in no way be proved.
And using percentages to prove a point is idiotic. According to that logic, since a greater percentage of the Quran talks about "hearing" than "looking", all muslims should close their eyes, and only go about by the sounds they hear. Or that since the Bible talks more about "Fear" than about "Peace", that must mean that fear is a better motivator. Or that since Christ is called "Son of Man" more often than "Son of God", that means he was not from God.
The higher frequency occurrence of one thing does not nullify or reduce the importance of another thing.

Also picking up a point from the pdf you linked, I'm quite amazed how many people on ATS (usually using it as a "point against islam") go on and on about "the Quran is a mess", "it can't be understood", "it makes no sense" etc.
No offence meant, but are these people illiterate? Are they idiots? Do they have have a problem with comprehension?
Here. They can start from the beginning and go on from there. You can choose the Picktall translation if you wish (I certainly wouldn't call it the most accurate, but it is certainly one of the more 'poetical' english translations available). I seriously don't see why anyone wouldn't understand it.

Then they say "Oh, but that is because someone later reordered everything in the Quran. If you order the Quran chronologically, it starts to make sense!"
Sorry, but that is BS. The Quran had a specific order right from the start, and it wasn't chronological order. Every year during Ramadan, the Prophet would recite the Quran in order throughout the month. If you attempted to read the Quran in the order the verses were revealed, however, it would be completely confusing, with jumping from one topic, then talking about a completely different topic, then several dozen verses on, going back and completing the original topic.

Then they say "Oh, but you need the sira of the Prophet in the background so as to be able to understand the Quran!"
Once again, sorry, but the Sira ARE NOT PART OF THE ISLAMIC SCRIPTURE. They may make for interesting academic study, and if you wish, you could investigate the so-called "chronological" Quran with the background of the Sira, but again, that would be unnecessary- and could very likely give you false information (seeing how the sira are unverified).

And as for claims that the English version is a "lite" or "less violent" version of the actual quran- again, nonsense. It's a very convenient excuse, because most would think that there is no way to disprove this. Unfortunately for those who make such claims, there are several dozen translations available online, there are concordances available online, there are arabic dictionaries available online- if any such "liteness" was put forward, it would be instantly detected and called out. Interesting that so far this hasn't happened, ey? Well, except for vague claims.

I don't quite know why I keep responding to you, ollncasino. It is quite obvious that while you do not have complete or comprehensive knowledge on the subject, you are unwilling to learn more, and you are completely entrenched in your interpretations, and are unwilling to hear the whole story, and when a point you put forward is proven wrong, you ignore it, or focus on something else, or bury it in tonnes of repetitive, digressions.
Perhaps I hope that any who see your posts and assume they are accurate because you posted them, will then see my responses, where it shows that you are not accurate.

Or maybe I'm just a hopeful optimist

PS: There is no word for "murder" in quranic arabic. If you asked someone to translate "murder" for you into arabic, they'd tell you the arabic word for "kill".

"My opinions are facts, your facts are opinions: A study in the Journal of Risk Research found that people were far more likely to classify a scientist as an 'expert' if his or her conclusion matched their own."
(Discover Magazine, December 2010, p. 19)

This is for those "I'm right and you're wrong" posters... take a deep breath and a step back, and try to see things from the opposing view.

As for the OP, I'll leave the theology discussion to theologians as I am more interested in politics and economics... although in countries where there is no separation between church and state they all become intertwined.

In my humble opinion, all religious texts are open to interpretation. By definition God is infallible, however, God did not directly write, nor publish, nor translate any religious text. They were transmitted to a human being who is by definition fallible. (Though the original receiver of the message is often given a somewhat godly status)
The message is then transmitted through word of mouth to other fallible humans, who, in turn dictated them to teams of fallible scribes (since one man could not transcribe quickly enough). Then all these scribes' versions were put together to arrive at the "official" version of scripture. Anyone who has played the Chinese telephone game knows how far from the original message one can get, now add hundreds (even thousands) of years, multiple translations and politics to the mix... well you get the idea!

My point is, do not try to argue exact wording... it is the interpretations of these texts and actual beliefs that can, and must be discussed. Religion has been used as a political tool since the beginning of time, it is no different today.

the Billmeister

Originally posted by babloyi
That link you posted has dozens of factual errors, and tonnes of "statistics" that are not referenced, and thus, unfortunately, can in no way be proved.

You are like a broken record.

Don't you remember when you found 'fault' with the translation of the Koran I cited (Marmaduke Pickthall's translation cited above), without realising that it was one of the most respected translations!

By Muslims, no less!

Originally posted by babloyi
I don't quite know why I keep responding to you, ollncasino.

It gives you a chance to make a knee jerk defence of everything Islamic?

Strange how you have proved NONE of your allegations in your post. But then, when do you ever?

Still, in a way it is irrelevant what is in the Koran.

What really matter is what Muslims actually do...

For instance

[size=4

]The religion of peace's death toll in 2010.

1,987 Jihad attacks

9,175 people murdered (many of them Muslims) and

17,436 injured!

www.thereligionofpeace.com...

reply to post by ollncasino

Originally posted by ollncasino
It gives you a chance to make a knee jerk defence of everything Islamic?

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black . I don't think you've made a single post on this site that wasn't knee-jerk anti-islamic.

Pickthal's translation certainly isn't perfect. It certainly has many faults. But I think you misunderstood my point (as usual before). Where did I find fault with the translation?
EDIT:
I've gone through your previous posts on ATS trying to find what you were talking about (and whew...what a wave of islam-hatred....at least I occasionally talk about something else), and I think you are talking about this?
i.e. where you mass posted a bunch of your "interpretations" (biased and distorted heavily to prove your point of course), and where I showed you how only one verse (out of all those you referenced) was a possibly valid point (because of an issue of mistranslation), while the rest were you (or the website you had pasted from) distorting and taking verses out of context?

I'd have explained how everything that pdf article stated was wrong, point by point, but to what purpose? You'd just ignore it, and then state (like you just did in your previous post) "it doesn't matter what the Quran says, look at how many people were killed!" and then post those nonsense statistics from that Islam-hate site (according to which, when a person does something wrong, it doesn't matter if their religion says it is wrong, it is the fault of the religion that they did it, ESPECIALLY if that religion is islam).

It says that there are 91 references to how Muhammad is a perfect muslim in the Quran. This is a bald-faced lie. I might as well up and create a pdf and say "the sky is bright green". So...
FAIL

The pdf talks about the "Trilogy of texts". No such title has EVER been given to Islamic scripture.
FAIL

The pdf seems to think that the faulty sirat are part of the Islamic scripture. They are not.
FAIL

It says that the term "kafir" is applicable to all "polytheists, idolaters, People of the Book (Christians
and Jews), atheists, agnostics, and pagans". This is a lie.
FAIL

Need I go on? Does it serve any purpose? Because you'll just ignore the fact that your nonsense "Statistical Islam" pdf is just that: nonsense.

Originally posted by babloyi

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black

. I don't think you've made a single post on this site that wasn't knee-jerk anti-islamic.

There is a dfference between you and I.

I post links and evidence while you have posted yet another diabtribe with no links and no evidence...

Originally posted by babloyi
Need I go on? Does it serve any purpose? Because you'll just ignore the fact that your nonsense "Statistical Islam" pdf is just that: nonsense.

Yet, you still have not provided any evidence of your position, merely your own personal opinions and rambles.

I know you take yourself very seriously, but how can you expect me to do so when you don't prove what you say?

reply to post by ollncasino

How is it my own personal opinion? So what I say is untrue, but some random pdf on some website (which provides no evidence, just loads of bogus numbers) is true? Sorry, ollncasino, fact is fact. A person can say that "Blue is the best colour", but they can't say "5 is 2".

Sorry, ollncasino, 5 is not 2.
There are not 91 references to how Muhammad is the perfect muslim in the Quran. How do you expect evidence of this? You want some link to some expert that says "There are not 91 references to Muhammad as the perfect muslim in the Quran"? Don't be absurd. People don't go about wasting their times stating what obviously not true. You're not going to find an expert opinion on the web saying "The sky is not brown" and then another saying "The sky is not green" and another saying "The sky is not gold".
Where is your proof that there are 91 references to Muhammad as the perfect muslim in the Quran? A misinformed (or misinforming?) pdf on some random website? There aren't even 91 total references to Muhammad in the Quran!
So if I set up a website saying "The sky is brown" and then link you to it from here, suddenly this is proof that the sky is brown?

Same with this "trilogy of texts" nonsense. And the sirat nonsense. And all those nonsense statistics on that pdf.

I don't take myself all that seriously. I'm talking to you, aren't I?
How about YOU prove what you say?

Originally posted by babloyi
So if I set up a website saying "The sky is brown" and then link you to it from here, suddenly this is proof that the sky is brown?

I provided links and evidence. You have provided none.

reply to post by ollncasino

You provided a link. A link is not evidence.

I can provide links too, but that does not turn nonsense into fact!
www.alternativevet.org...
Look! A link! That must mean homoeopathy is true!

You provided no evidence, sorry. Where is your evidence?

Originally posted by babloyi

www.alternativevet.org...
Look! A link! That must mean homoeopathy is true!

You still have not provided any links or evidence to support your assertions.

A reasonable conclusion would be that you are unable to.

reply to post by ollncasino

Yeah, I did provide evidence. What is your obsession with links? Scholarship and research seems to have changed since I went to college...I'm not sure when "links" became "evidence".

Are you serious? How can I provide a link that there are NOT 91 references to Muhammad being the perfect muslim in the Quran?
Do you seriously think that there ARE 91 references to Muhammad being the perfect muslim in the Quran? SERIOUSLY? Or are you just playing some idiotic delaying and deflecting game because you probably now realise that it is not true?

Go check the Quran. There is your evidence. And just a suggestion...do better research than strange pdfs on the internet, who's only references is THEMSELVES (seriously, their only references are links to their own website, where there is another copy of the same article! Amazing how much dishonesty can get you! ).

Originally posted by babloyi
Go check the Quran. There is your evidence.

Which is what the people who wrote a statistaical report on the Koran did...

Originally posted by babloyi

...do better research than strange pdfs on the internet, who's only references is THEMSELVES

You haven't even read the report have you?

It does have references. Even though your mind is closed you could still open your eyes!

And getting back to the point YOU STILL HAVE NOT PROVIDED ONE SHRED OF EVIDENCE to back up your pro-Islamic rants.

Why I am not surprised.

Good arguments Ooz lol at people attempting to twist your words around and can't back up their arguments. You're all brainwashed by the media..wake up.