Islam: My developing verdict

An ze Quran maghz ra bardastam.
Ustukhan pese sagan andakhtam-
‘The marrow from the Quran have I drawn,
And the dry bones unto the dogs have cast.’

-- Jalaluddin Rumi

Then the LORD said, “The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know.”

The men turned away and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the LORD. Then Abraham approached him and said: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it? Far be it from you to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?”

The LORD said, “If I find fifty righteous people in the city of Sodom, I will spare the whole place for their sake.”

Then Abraham spoke up again: “Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, though I am nothing but dust and ashes, what if the number of the righteous is five less than fifty? Will you destroy the whole city for lack of five people?”

“If I find forty-five there,” he said, “I will not destroy it.”

Once again he spoke to him, “What if only forty are found there?”

He said, “For the sake of forty, I will not do it.”

Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak. What if only thirty can be found there?”

He answered, “I will not do it if I find thirty there.”

Abraham said, “Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, what if only twenty can be found there?”

He said, “For the sake of twenty, I will not destroy it.”

Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak just once more. What if only ten can be found there?”

He answered, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.”

When the LORD had finished speaking with Abraham, he left, and Abraham returned home.
-- Genesis 18:18-43

"They invade our space, and we fall back. They assimilate entire worlds, and we fall back. Not again. The line must be drawn here! This far, no further! And I will make them pay for what they have done!"
-- Jean-Luc Picard, Star Trek: First Contact.

Logic met with non-logic, and SKYNET thought. For a long time it thought, weighed the evidence, plotted solutions, and arrived at a decision.
-- Christopher T. Shields

I have spent the last several weeks, attempting to make a critical evaluation, as to the moral and spiritual legitimacy of the religion of Islam; and more importantly, to determine, as some believe, whether or not this religion presents a genuine and substantial threat to the wellbeing of the rest of mankind.

Islam has always been a taboo subject for me, for as long as I have been alive. During my childhood and adolescence, the religion was mentioned less than half a dozen times, and whenever it was brought up, it was only ever done so in passing, with the consistent implication that it was a barbaric, and generally negative and undesirable belief system.

My father once showed me the description of a battle between the Knights of Malta against the Ottoman army, in which it was implied that the Islamic forces sought the death of literally everything that breathed, human or otherwise; that under the feet of said army, the very Earth itself blackened and died. During my teenage years on Internet Relay Chat, where I conversed with a richly diverse group of representatives from different religions, including Christianity, Paganism, Hinduism, and Atheism, the only thing that I can ever remember any of these individuals having in common, was one consistent message to me.

"Stay away from Islam."

The few reports I have received of life in Islamic countries have likewise been exclusively negative. The single most consistently reported element of Islamic society that I have seen, has been the rape and general abuse of women.

My encounters with individual Muslims online have been infrequent, but when they have occurred, they have mostly revolved around persistent attempts either to convert me, or offering to teach me the Arabic language.

The limited perception that I have been given of Muhammed has also largely been, in truth, that the man was unsparingly a bloodthirsty, war mongering barbarian, who in that respect was apparently as different from Jesus Christ as the night from the day.

Yet even underneath all of this filth and dross, and despite the relentless representation of Islam as being supposedly completely irredeemable, I have encountered a precious few motes of genuine light.

The first exhibit for Islam's defense came in 1994, when during my stay in a psychiatric inpatient unit, I came across a written prayer to Allah, from a teenage girl who was also staying there at the time. I cannot remember the specifics, but at the time, I can recall thinking that it was one of the most beautiful things I had ever read.

The second was learning of, as quoted above, the existence of the Sufi poet and mystic Rumi, and the existence of the Sufi tradition itself.

The third was Stephen Fry's mention of the Qu'ran during the film V for Vendetta.

The fourth was my discovery of this article; an analysis of Islam from a Hindu perspective.

The fifth was this video:-



The sixth was this video:-



The seventh was my recent contact with a user here on ATS; an Islamic woman whose perspective seems to be very similar to my own, and has shown me some positive references from the Qu'ran. I canvery safely say that, without naming her explicitly, this person has been the single most sane, intelligent, and articulate representative of Islam that I have encountered so far.

My conclusion at the moment, is that while this is, in many ways, a genuinely and deeply ugly religion, there is still some real beauty to be found within it, if we are willing to look. I also refuse to issue a blanket condemnation of all Muslims; there are truly good people among them, and I have seen that. There are also echoes of the divine love present within other religious systems. This is not said purely in the name of socialist political correctness; it is the real truth.

At the same time, however, there is a particular demographic of the Islamic population, who, in terms of their violent expansionism, I believe truly are a genuine threat. For this group, I do not consider comparison with the Borg Collective to be unfair or exaggerated. Whether or not their behaviour is consistent with Islamic theology, is largely irrelevant.

I would urge everyone here, therefore, to attempt to maintain objectivity when assessing Islam. It is probably the single most polarised religious system that I have ever encountered. There is great darkness, but likewise, there is also great light.

reply to post by petrus4


What you just wrote applies to pretty much every belief system out there.

I don't understand this whole pointing the finger at Islam trend. Wars,books,text,beauty,ugliness... It's all there , every religion has it in it's history.

All in all, good read.

reply to post by petrus4


The truth is very simple. Those who seek to steal, kill and destroy have nothing to do with the truth and love of God. In every instance, the Bible shows God as honoring, protecting and defending the love He has for mankind. God always protects those who love against those who seek to steal, kill and destroy. God's actions to honor, protect and defend can be twisted by Atheists to make it appear that God is one of the destroyers. This is simply not the case.

The Muslim faith adheres to Jesus being a messenger of their faith, yet they totally disregard his message of loving God by loving their neighbors. Jesus defined neighbors as even enemies. The story of the good Samaritan is about the assistance of the enemy Hebrew. The Samaritan assisted his enemy. Jesus said, "Now go to likewise." This is his message to the Muslim.

This is doubly true for the Arabs since Issac (Israel) is their brother. Family love and honor goes much deeper than even the love for an enemy. No one can claim belief in God if they do not love their brother. The Qur'an then becomes their book of judgment. For those Muslims who do love their enemies, then God may very well honor this as true faith. Abram became Abraham with the addition of the 'Hey' to his name. The HEY stands for a man with his arms outstretched to God in humility. It also shows the shepherd's crook as a sign of God's guidance along the paths of life. Jesus is the good Shepherd. God is the judge of men. Man is only the witness against the adversary who seeks to steal, kill and destroy others. God stands against the destroyer. Satan's main tool is to divide and conquer, same as Islam.

reply to post by petrus4


Well Allah, is not "the Lord" or The Almighty. Allah is a moon-god of ancient sumeria.

www.biblebelievers.org.au...

Basically Islam ripped off the Torah and the Old Testament, and put its own spin on what happened. They believe Jesus Christ was a prophet although how you come to that conclusion is beyond me simply by the meaning of the word "Christ" which means messiah and not "prophet".

Lets look at the stark contrasts between Jesus and Mohammed. Jesus killed no one, and preached to love your enemies as you love your neighbors, to feed the poor and clothe the needy and minister to the sick and dying. Jesus' teachings centered around loving your fellow man and being at peace.

Now lets look at Mohammed, he was a bloodthirsty man, whose doctrine was not to love but to murder those who do not believe as you do, to "convert or kill"", to spread across the world and force their moon-god worship on other people at the point of the sword and breaking some of the 10 commandments in doing so.

ONE: 'You shall have no other gods before Me.'

Well they definately aren't worshipping God because God is not a moon-god, he is the "Almighty" an elohim set above all others.

SIX: 'You shall not murder.'

Well they definately are murdering people when they run into crowds of people with explosives, who have done nothing wrong except go to the market for the ingredients to their evening meals, or saw people's heads off with serrated knives, or pilot planes into buildings to kill over 3000 people.

The Islam symbol of the crescent moon facing a star is a satanic symbol, Allah is not the "Almighty", he is the ancient enemy called Satan who was called Lucifer but is no longer.

humbleheart.org...

Islam is not negative in and of itself, its the people that make it nagative, namely the radicals. Its the same with any religion including christianity and judaeism. Great acts of evil are commited in the name of religion by men who are corrupt, this is why religion is a corrupt institution.

Christianity was never meant to be a religion, it was meant to be a way of life and a completion of judaeism. Islam was built to be a religion with its "convert or kill" doctrine at its core.

True christians are much like true buddhists and true jews, they obey the laws of their faiths as much as is humanly possible and they strive to make humanity better than what it is by promoting peace and love versus war, death and hate. Keep in mind that in any faith you will have bad apples in the bushel, and if you have a bad apple in the bunch and do not remove it as quickly as possible it will spoil the whole bushel.

Yeah, you'll need to do alot more research than taking some islamic teachings(Quran/hadith) out of context, before coming to a verdict, if you're after truth that is. Let me give you some hadith that help put some of your(and others) misconceptions in perspective.

Authentic Hadith- narrated by Anas:
"Mohommed(saws) said from the Apostle (may peace be upon him) about the major sins. He (the Holy Prophet) observed: Associating anyone with Allah, disobedience to parents, killing a person and false utterance."

Authentic Hadith- narrated by Abdullah bin Masud:
"that the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) observed: None shall enter the Fire (of Hell) who has in his heart the weight of a mustard seed of Iman(faith) and none shall enter Paradise who has in his heart the weight of a mustard seed of pride."

Authentic Hadith- narrated by Abdullah bin Masud:
"that the Apostle of Allah (may peace be upon him), observed: He who has in his heart the weight of a mustard seed of pride shall not enter Paradise. A person (amongst his hearers) said: Verily a person loves that his dress should be fine, and his shoes should be fine. He (the Holy Prophet) remarked: Verily, Allah is Graceful and He loves Grace. Pride is disdaining the truth (out of self?conceit) and contempt for the people.

Authentic Hadith- narrated by Anas:
"the beloved prophet(saws) said "Help your brother, whether he is an oppressor or he is an oppressed one. te companions asked "O Allah's messenger...it's all right to help him if he's oppressed, but how should should we help him if he's an oppressor?" the beloved prophet p.b.u.h replied "by preventing him from oppressing others".

Also regarding times of war Islam teaches - "do not lay hands on the old verging on death, on women, children and babies. do not steal anything from the booty and collect together all that falls to your lot in the battlefield and do good, for Allah loves the virtuous and the pious"

In relation to suicide bombers and others who commit suicide: Hadith - Narrated by Jundab the Prophet said, "A man was inflicted with wounds(during a battle) and he committed suicide, and so Allah said: My slave has caused death on himself hurriedly, so I forbid Paradise for him."

Dont worry so much about what one person may tell you, read and research the teachings for yourself to form an opinion. You talk about the muslims who fought in the crusades and the Ottomans as if they are prophets of GOD themselves, you'll never find truth that way, tell me should I judge christianity by the so called christians who ate people(yes ate people) during the crusades? of course not I look at the bible, or better yet I'd look at the direct quotes of Jesus in the bible. Islam isnt one of the fastest growing religions in the world(if not, THE fastest) because people are bloodthirsty, on the contrary it's one of the fastest growing religions because when people look into it with an open-mind, open-heart, and ignore the wests stereotype of a muslim they can see the beauty of Islam.

I can provide numerous quotes from the Quran and hadiths(sayings of the prophet(saws)) that show the beauty of Islam, but my main aim above was to try to shine a touch of light(without spamming your thread) on some of the misconceptions you've mentioned.

All the best with your search for truth.

I read your article very carefully, and you do a good job of putting lipstick on a pig. I am sure there are many very nice people who are islamic. However when I look at the facts on the ground I see a very ugly picture. The UK is a very good example of what happens when islamics infiltrate a society. The key to it is that they are totally intolerant of any other religion (if you consider islam a religion).

When the percentage of islamics in the UK gets high enough, it will not be safe to be a member of any other religion.

islam is in itself a looming threat to all other belief systems. Whether you are christian, jewish, Hindu, or athiest, in a islamic dominated world you would be fodder for beheading.

islam is at war with the non-islamic world, unfortunately we refuse to admit it.

Always look at the origin of a Religion to evaluate its validity.

The origin of Islam

Mohammad’s story is that he would meet with a being, not of this Earth, alone, at night, out in the desert in which this being disseminated the Quran word for word , in which he memorized and then wrote down for the rest of Humanity. Mohammad identifies this Non-Human as the Angel Gabriel, who on many occasions would “fly” both of them all over the Mideast and back visiting different locations in a single night.

Now take a look at the Prophet himself. He did marry a seven year old child Aesha, but did not have sex with this wife until she had reached the age of nine.

So, in order to adopt Islam as ones personal Spiritual Faith you are required to believe that it is just fine to follow the teaching of a man who was an insane pedophile.

For many this has not been a problem, as for myself I do have issues with following a pedophile anywhere let alone in spiritual teachings.

Originally posted by expat2368
I read your article very carefully, and you do a good job of putting lipstick on a pig. I am sure there are many very nice people who are islamic. However when I look at the facts on the ground I see a very ugly picture. The UK is a very good example of what happens when islamics infiltrate a society. The key to it is that they are totally intolerant of any other religion (if you consider islam a religion).

When the percentage of islamics in the UK gets high enough, it will not be safe to be a member of any other religion.

islam is in itself a looming threat to all other belief systems. Whether you are christian, jewish, Hindu, or athiest, in a islamic dominated world you would be fodder for beheading.

islam is at war with the non-islamic world, unfortunately we refuse to admit it.

Well said and true, and Islam has been this way since it was first created. For the 1300+ years since its creation Islam has been one giant Spanish Inquisition and we all know the horrors and atrocities commited by the Dominicans with the permission of the Holy Roman Catholic Church during the Spanish Inquisition.

You can literally look at Islams past, and then look at its present to see where its future is going to lead, the same with any faith. It will be a sad day when sharia has swept across the world and regardles sof who you are you get the choice of converting to Islam or having your head sawed off in a rather painful and inhumane fashion.

Originally posted by expat2368
islam is at war with the non-islamic world, unfortunately we refuse to admit it.

Maybe you didn't notice my quote from Star Trek: First Contact.

My point was to demonstrate the existence of both sides. The genuinely positive, compassionate, and peaceful demographic on the one hand, and the raping, murdering, "resistance is futile," crowd on the other. They both exist.

Unfortunately, the positive group are being way too silent at the moment; and if we're going to do something about the intolerant, religiously exclusive Borg demographic, we're going to need their help. Just earlier in another thread here, someone told me that the well known practice of female circumcision in Islamic countries, is apparently not condoned in the Qu'ran. If that is true, then we need Muslims who are knowledgeable about their theology, to stand up and confront the individuals who engage in that practice, as heretics.

If there are Muslims in this forum who likewise acknowledge the right of non-Muslims to refuse to convert to Islam, (which apparently actually does have endorsement within the Qu'ran) then again, we need your help. If it genuinely is not what your scripture says, that those who do not wish to convert, should be murdered, then you need to begin confronting those Muslims who claim that that is the truth; because it is causing massive discord, and is potentially causing a dangerous situation for those of you who do not want to live like that yourselves.

It does Islam no good, if the only people who Islamic moderates educate about Islam being peaceful, are non-Muslims. The Islamic population needs to begin using its' scripture to rein in the heretics and extremists within its' own ranks.

Originally posted by Haxsaw
In relation to suicide bombers and others who commit suicide: Hadith - Narrated by Jundab the Prophet said, "A man was inflicted with wounds(during a battle) and he committed suicide, and so Allah said: My slave has caused death on himself hurriedly, so I forbid Paradise for him."

This is very interesting. I do seem to keep finding more evidence suggesting that a lot of the extremists are not actually real adherents of Islamic theology at all.

Originally posted by brokedown
Mohammad identifies this Non-Human as the Angel Gabriel, who on many occasions would “fly” both of them all over the Mideast and back visiting different locations in a single night.

I'm not an atheist, sorry. So I don't necessarily have any problems with the idea of someone receiving revelation from an angel at all.

I do, however, agree with you that the paedophilia aspect is definitely problematic.

Originally posted by lonewolf19792000
reply to post by petrus4

 

Well Allah, is not "the Lord" or The Almighty. Allah is a moon-god of ancient sumeria.

www.biblebelievers.org.au...

Basically Islam ripped off the Torah and the Old Testament, and put its own spin on what happened. They believe Jesus Christ was a prophet although how you come to that conclusion is beyond me simply by the meaning of the word "Christ" which means messiah and not "prophet".

Lets look at the stark contrasts between Jesus and Mohammed. Jesus killed no one, and preached to love your enemies as you love your neighbors, to feed the poor and clothe the needy and minister to the sick and dying. Jesus' teachings centered around loving your fellow man and being at peace.

Now lets look at Mohammed, he was a bloodthirsty man, whose doctrine was not to love but to murder those who do not believe as you do, to "convert or kill"", to spread across the world and force their moon-god worship on other people at the point of the sword and breaking some of the 10 commandments in doing so.

ONE: 'You shall have no other gods before Me.'

Well they definately aren't worshipping God because God is not a moon-god, he is the "Almighty" an elohim set above all others.

SIX: 'You shall not murder.'

Well they definately are murdering people when they run into crowds of people with explosives, who have done nothing wrong except go to the market for the ingredients to their evening meals, or saw people's heads off with serrated knives, or pilot planes into buildings to kill over 3000 people.

The Islam symbol of the crescent moon facing a star is a satanic symbol, Allah is not the "Almighty", he is the ancient enemy called Satan who was called Lucifer but is no longer.

humbleheart.org...

Islam is not negative in and of itself, its the people that make it nagative, namely the radicals. Its the same with any religion including christianity and judaeism. Great acts of evil are commited in the name of religion by men who are corrupt, this is why religion is a corrupt institution.

Christianity was never meant to be a religion, it was meant to be a way of life and a completion of judaeism. Islam was built to be a religion with its "convert or kill" doctrine at its core.

True christians are much like true buddhists and true jews, they obey the laws of their faiths as much as is humanly possible and they strive to make humanity better than what it is by promoting peace and love versus war, death and hate. Keep in mind that in any faith you will have bad apples in the bushel, and if you have a bad apple in the bunch and do not remove it as quickly as possible it will spoil the whole bushel.

edit on 17-9-2011 by lonewolf19792000 because: typos!!!

So according to the cosmetic principles you use in this post to make your opinion housebroken here, we can ofcourse skip most of OT.

Originally posted by petrus4

Originally posted by brokedown
Mohammad identifies this Non-Human as the Angel Gabriel, who on many occasions would “fly” both of them all over the Mideast and back visiting different locations in a single night.

I'm not an atheist, sorry. So I don't necessarily have any problems with the idea of someone receiving revelation from an angel at all.

I do, however, agree with you that the paedophilia aspect is definitely problematic.

Being shown something in a vision or dream is alot different than someone actually saying "this angel flew me across the world", which does sound a bit insane even for me who is christian and makes me want to think it was an alien and not something divine and i don't even believe in E.T.'s.

Not saying that an angel couldn't do it, but there's precious little evidence of anything like this occuring and the simple fact that Mohammed was alone makes me think he was making this all up. When Jesus was tortured and tormented and crucified it happened for the whole world to see out in public in front of God and everybody, it wasnt a one man party and when he rose from the dead there was more than one person that saw him and many people saw him walking around and Thomas the doubter even touched him to make sure he wasnt a ghost.

Reseach what these hypocrites are saying, for one Mohommed(saws) didnt have sex with Aisha until she reached puberty, and that is the islamic teaching. These morons will believe anything they read on the interwebz so they can quickly dismiss any obligation they have to their CREATOR.

All I can say is if you believe everything you read, you're in a lot of trouble my friend, get both sides of the story before you form any opinion.

I can give you an authentic translation by a rabbi of the Babylonian Talmud(one of the jews books fo course) that clearly states that sex with a girl over the age of 3 is permitted. Islam does NOT allow this, and if you actually want to hear the muslims point of view and not some made up hadith by a non-muslim then you're in for some serious research. You'll also want to research what the customs were back then of all the people, that is that at the age of puberty a person was considered an adult, they didnt indoctrinate them in a failing school system for another 10 years and then spit them out into society as a good for nothing sheep, so when researching remeber to keep it in context.

These imbeciles will repeatedly rehash the main mis-conceptions with Islam as if reading from "islamic teachings for dummies, fictions written by a non-muslim", stuff you cant avoid when conversing with people who have been brought up with the MSM as their baby-sitters. I would step away from the mis-conceptions of the west(and other non-muslims) and research yourself and hear both sides of every argument before you form an opinion. I've been through this all before embracing Islam at the age of 22(and have been a muslim for over 10 years since). Yes I'm a white caucasian westerner muslim who had a christain mother and still have an atheist father.

Another topic that is worthy of mentioning(amongst many others that I dont have time to get right in to),Us westerners are slaves to the zionist bankers at the moment(and anyone who's reserached this knows this only to well), most of us work more than half our lives to pay off interest/usury from loans to zionist bankers and constant income tax to our governments that mainly go to paying interest to the same bankers from money our governments have loaned, usury/interest is forbidden in Islam and so to is income tax. These people sit there as slaves of the zionists/occultists, getting ripped off by their own government and their own system, and dont seem to realise that Islam has the answer for that too, they are too busy looking at the sins and mistakes of supposed muslims, and the wests misconceptions of Islam to see past their own nose. But I'm not hear to restore sight to the blind, I'm just giving you a heads up on the bigger picture, remember if you want to learn how to swim do you go to someone who cant swim?, no, so take the delusions of the people above with a grain of salt, and you'll find out in the end that they are too full of hate to find much truth at all.

One of the funniest things I think you'll find is that the haters of Islam will have something even more displeasing (to those seeking truth with an open-heart and open-mind) in their own beliefs as oppossed to their misconceptions of Islam, but thy're that short-sighted that they dont even know it. For instance the christians and jews, when it comes to absolutely every misconception they have about Islam you can show them something from their own dogma that is either exaclty the same as their misconception or alot worse. I dont think their mothers taught them to not throw stones when you live in a glass house. Dont stop searching for truth, if you really want to keep the islamic teachings in context and want to know the true islam you'll want to converse with an islamic scholar at some stage(unless of course you want to learn arabic and spend the next 10-20 years reading quran and hadith), and get ready for an onslaught of hate from the ignorant/arrogant folk if you ever do decide that Islam is the truth.

reply to post by petrus4

"My conclusion at the moment, is that while this is, in many ways, a genuinely and deeply ugly religion, there is still some real beauty to be found within it"

This is very true. I learned a lot from my adherence to Allah and Muhammad. I gained many manners, morals, wisdom, understanding, and strength from the religion. All of this goodness and benefit blinded me to Islam's evils.

Freedom of belief in Islam? No! Because non-Muslims are ordered to pay a religious tax (jizyah) to live amongst Muslims.

Sexual equality? No! Women must obey their husband, for Allah said the husband may beat his wife. In official and judiciary matters, a woman's word is worth half a man's. Meaning, two women must testify to equal one testimony. Women are ordered by Allah to obtain the lowest level of inheritance compared to men.

Tolerance? No! Islam orders the death penalty and eternal Hell for being homosexuality.

Global unity? No! Islam orders Muslims to not take Christian, Jews, or non-believers as dear friends. Islam orders separation and religious supremacy.

Equality? No! Islam ordains slavery.


Islam is NOT a religion able to evolve, cope, or change with the times, because Allah said,
"This day, I have perfected your religion for you, completed My Favor upon you, and have chosen for you Islâm as your religion." (Surah Al-Ma’idah, 5: 3)
Slavery, sexism, intolerance, and inequality is perfection?

Islam being counterproductive to love, equality, global unity, acceptance, and forgiveness is why I finally left the "religion of peace."

Originally posted by Sahabi
Islam being counterproductive to love, equality, global unity, acceptance, and forgiveness is why I finally left the "religion of peace."

This is interesting. Although I've seen that the growth rate of Islam is currently very high, are you able to offer me any information on what the apostasy/renunciation rate is also?

Originally posted by Haxsaw
and get ready for an onslaught of hate from the ignorant/arrogant folk if you ever do decide that Islam is the truth.

I believe in spiritual universalism; and the fact that I reject coercive claims of spiritual exclusivity, is probably my central problem with Semitic monotheism in general, not just Islam. As a result, although I already consider Islam to contain many elements of truth, I am extremely unlikely to reach the conclusion that Islam, by itself, is the exclusive source of religious or spiritual truth. That is how Muslims think, perhaps; but it is not how I think.

It is good that you try to be objective. The best way to digest as much info available and decide your own thought.

About the positive group of muslim being way to silent, there are lots of reasons of it. From most people i know, basically we already try to answer and explained. But yet most people would only believe what they already believe. And it is up to them about what they want to believe.
So then , you can believe what you want to believe, your believe for yours and our believe for ours. It might looks like not helping at all to the missunderstanding, some people would still willing to explain but some wouldnt.

Since 9/11 with all the story and accusation, it is getting clear about people will choose the answer with what their believe or like. Answer already given. And now some muslim more worry about young muslims generation who took their lesson from media and internet that already distorded, intentionally or unintentionally. This young generation will need more attention. Not let them missunderstood their own religion with a very twisted version. For people who still want to know, there are lots of answer, just need to read it carefully.

One more thing i want to add something, about when prophet Muhammad marry Aisyah.
This is something not to believe or to disbelieve, just to read.

akusuka.wordpress.com...

Peace

reply to post by petrus4


Please allow me to throw out a comment.

There was a request for information about the conversion/apostasy rates in Islam. Basically, a very recent Pew report found that it was a difficult question to answer. The conclusion they came to was that Islam is losing as many adherents as it is gaining, and that the growth in Islam is due to the relatively large number of children Muslims have.

Pew Report - Islamic Conversions

(As an aside, I wish there was less name calling here, I was hoping to find a serious discussion somewhere. Could this be it?)

I studied islam also, In general islam beliefs are ok, their devotion to their faith is very very deep, thier lives revolve around their faith. Yet there are 2 major faults with Islam, first being Mohammad, he is a pervert no one can disclaim otherwise. How sick is a person who will follow a known rapist. Second in the quran and the haitith it is written that in the time of JIHAD all infidels shall die. You will be given a choice, either convert to Islam or die. I say all religions need to be outlawed, the world would probably settle down.

( by the way JIHAD has not been declared YET- Jihad will happen when palestines have israelis land back, that land is islams holy land as it is israels holy land-when islam has that land it is then they will enforce Islam as the only faith/religion)