What is Islam? Ask a Muslim

[Cúchulainn]

What are your (whoever wants to answer) views on Sufism?

Oh and regarding the dubious nature of Mohammed that doesn't change some of the interesting philosophic ideas that are within the Qur'an.

Marcus Aurelius had some interesting ideas while at the same time killing a lot of Christians.

[sumskilz]

and Sabbians (whoever they are)

Mandaeans http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandaeism

[ptoss1]

How divided are Muslims?

[Nesimî]

1. Our prophet fought for only two months of his twenty three years of prophecy. He was always poor throughout it. Warlord indeed.

2. Aisha (as) was 18 when they were married as she was eight when surah al-Qamar came.

3. The Banu Qurayza betrayed the muslims during the battle of Hendek, and the males of fighting age were killed in retribution.

I like Sufism, check Mevlana and Ahmet Yesevi if you are interested. Pir Sultan Abdal and Yunus Emre are good too, but translations might be hard to find.

[Sar1n]

1. Our prophet fought for only two months of his twenty three years of prophecy. He was always poor throughout it. Warlord indeed.

Really? I have to call BS on that. Just caravan raid campaign against Mecca lasted several years.

[LWT]

3. The Banu Qurayza betrayed the muslims during the battle of Hendek, and the males of fighting age were killed in retribution.

Is this even an excuse?

Quran 5:17 They have certainly disbelieved who say that Allah is Christ, the son of Mary. Say, "Then who could prevent Allah at all if He had intended to destroy Christ, the son of Mary, or his mother or everyone on the earth?" And to Allah belongs the dominion of the heavens and the earth and whatever is between them. He creates what He wills, and Allah is over all things competent.

According to the Holy Trinity, Jesus is God the son. So if your parents, with all respect, believe in this trinity, then they are disbelievers and won't go to Jannah. I advise you pray for them and try to guide them to Allah.

In other words, it's the same as in any other religion. In my town there are multiple christian dominations that believe that only they can go to heaven and all the other people in the world go to hell. Maybe you should convert to every one of them, just to be sure.


On topic: Is it true that muslims still believe in ghosts?

[Shamshir]

Deleted by author

[Denny Crane!]

and the males of fighting age were killed in retribution.

How can there be any defence of this?

[Enemy of the State]

1. Our prophet fought for only two months of his twenty three years of prophecy. He was always poor throughout it. Warlord indeed.

As already mentioned, he spent a great many years ambushing Meccan caravans in the desert, killing the caravaneers simply for the crime of being from Mecca.

2. Aisha (as) was 18 when they were married as she was eight when surah al-Qamar came.

Do you deny the hadith that state she was 6 when married and 9 when they had sex? One hadith, Al-Tabari, says she was 10 during first intercourse. Hardly an improvement though. This view has traditionally been uncontroversial.

3. The Banu Qurayza betrayed the muslims during the battle of Hendek, and the males of fighting age were killed in retribution.

This isn't really helping your case. Do you believe in collective punishment?

[John ''True Grit'' Wayne]

Was Muhammad a terrorist

[Nesimî]

The historical accounts I have read don't say such things, and I find the idea that he would marry a girl so young strange, as his first wife Khadijha (as) was fifteen years older than him. As for the Banu Qurayza, they turned cloak mid battle during the Meccan siege of Medinah, I do not really know how a modern military tribunal would treat this issue, but that was the punishment then.

I have to say, you don't like us very much, but your posts are logical and don't resort to pointless insults. I wish other people could post like you, my friend.

As for the ghosts... We believe that martyrs live on in a different way, but otherwise no. You may be confusing us with Shintoists.

And we could argue back and forth about the history for any amount of time, but I am here to tell you about Islamic thought and philosophy. If you already know what you need to know, then you do not need me.

[Denny Crane!]

So retribution of this manner is acceptable, the killings. Or you are saying that they were only acceptable at the time, what was then in then and what is now is now. That would make for moral relativism. Do you believe in the absolute objective morality or relativism as seems to be implied?

[Nesimî]

If a whole tribe broke a covenant during the peak of a religious conflict, in the middle of an assault on a besieged town, then I would have executed those involved, just as any military court would. I am saying it was acceptible in the situation, not the time. Perhaps time could be a factor too, as it may be easier to pinpoint the perpetrators with modern technology, but considering how military prisons/courts around the world currently behave, I highly doubt it would make any difference.

And now, to the question of the Quran and God's existance, I will answer according to the Sunni sect which I follow.

There are two theological schools of thought (itiqadi) in modern Sunni Islam, those who follow Imam Maturidi, or those who follow Imam Esh'ari. Both of these scholars said that man could not reach haqiqat, meaning truth, the shortened version of this word, hak, is a synonym for God.

Maturidi says that man could partially reach it, Esh'ari says that he could not reach it at all. I follow Esh'ari in that hypothesis. As you can see there is a tinge of agnosticism in the beginning, for someone outside/newly entering, and this makes a lot of sense, because if someone could simply "open his/her eyes and see the truth," as some misguided theists suggest, then there would be no need for holy books, and no need for prophets. In sufism there are four doors of soul. Shariah (Don't get me wrong, this just means following the rules), Tariqa (path/way), Haqiqat (Truth), Marifet (ability/proficiency.) Even someone who is successfully applying Shariah to his own life with the five prayers, fasting, zakah etc is to known to doubt. Doubt only leaves with the higher levels of spiritual transcendence.

I could argue intelligent design, but that rarely convinces anyone. I could talk about chance of proteins aligning and whatnot, but I know that nearly everything in the physical must have a material explanation, and so did Islamic philosophy nearly 1000 years ago, when Imam Al-Ghazali said in his Alchemy of Happiness, that "The rules of this world must exist, or else there would be no science, but it is truly a big mistake to forget who is the servant and who is the master."

Some say, "This could not be a coincidence." We answer, "There is no coincidence, there is the will of God taking place, through the laws of the Universe which he created." This is why evolution isn't really a problem, except in certain places.

Ghazali likens spiritual enlightenment to the view of a text by different people. (I'm paraphrasing here so I may have a few mistakes)

A physician may see a beautiful poem written on paper and say "This must have been written with a pen." A physicist may have a larger view, and see the pen, and perhaps a glimpse of the hand that is holding it. The more a person is enlightened, the closer he draws to the truth.

But how does one even begin this enlightenment if not a muslim to begin with? A cycle of belief and signs isn't really fulfilling or convincing, so what this means in terms of a person outside of the religion is that ideally, we should be able to draw them to it with the perfection of the philosophy. Do not lie, do not steal, do not kill, everyone is equal without regard to race, do not gossip, a smile is charity, pay the laborer his wage before his sweat dries up.

Too many of us neglect these things, and too many of us look at unbelievers with anger and condescension, while ignoring the fact that we probably would do the same things were we born to a different family. Centuries after the Golden Age of Islam, we are poor, we are uneducated and we are uncivilized, and this was mostly brought upon us by ourselves. I truly hope we can once again become civilizations worthy of our philosophy.

[Enemy of the State]

If a whole tribe broke a covenant during the peak of a religious conflict, in the middle of an assault on a besieged town, then I would have executed those involved, just as any military court would. I am saying it was acceptible in the situation, not the time. Perhaps time could be a factor too, as it may be easier to pinpoint the perpetrators with modern technology, but considering how military prisons/courts around the world currently behave, I highly doubt it would make any difference.

An entire tribe does not defect. Only individuals are capable of acting. Would you consider it morally right for the United States to massacre and enslave an entire Afghan village if it turns out there are some insurgents there? That would be a war crime. Collective punishment is morally reprehensible. What happened to the Jews of Banu Qurayza was clearly collective punishment.

Chanyu, I have no doubts that you're a good person. Picture yourself in the shoes of Muhammad or one of his soldiers. Could you personally behead those people?

[Timotheus]

You are a muslim turk right?

Then I want to ask you about what you think of the islam political situation in Turkey, as it is drifting to a more religious goverment(society) althought in past they tried hard to show themselves as secular nation "Kemalism".
The question is, do you like the idea of the state Turkey becoming more religious and backward i.e. imposing sharia laws/ reinstating religious seats/ banning red colour makeup from airplanes etc or do you support the secular kemalists?

[Denny Crane!]

Gonna go with EotS on this one, how on earth do you judge collective guilt like that and here is a quick question, can you think of a modern example since you think a modern tribunal would act no differently?

The analogous situation is to me as was put, finding insurgents in a village, maybe even protected by the villagers so all men are put to death (and why just men, not women if it is this day and age, so all responsible adults are executed for the transgression).

[Nesimî]

I believe it was not our Prophet who gave that judgement, but a man named Sa'd ibn Muadh. It seems it was prescribed from verses in Deutronomy (20: 12-14)

Please do not bring up the War on Terror, it makes me disagreeable.

I do not know what I would have done. Would I have found it easy to kill so many people as a collective punishment? Probably not. Would I have been able to kill people who stabbed me in the back as I was on the verge of extermination myself? Possibly. But as far as I know the choice was made out of necessity, as the Banu Qurayza would have considerably swelled the ranks of the enemy in Khayber, had they been exiled.

[Nesimî]

You are a muslim turk right?

Then I want to ask you about what you think of the islam political situation in Turkey, as it is drifting to a more religious goverment(society) althought in past they tried hard to show themselves as secular nation "Kemalism".
The question is, do you like the idea of the state Turkey becoming more religious and backward i.e. imposing sharia laws/ reinstating religious seats/ banning red colour makeup from airplanes etc or do you support the secular kemalists?

Neither, shortly. I can elaborate in the PA or in VM/PM if you like.

[John ''True Grit'' Wayne]

Why do Jihadists like this guy want to die for Jihad...What is Jihad and why do people like the guy here exist.Is Muhammad to blame..

[Nesimî]

Because they are ignorant fools who think they can blame their fates entirely on the west. They are a product of poverty and illiteracy. And two machineguns? If it wasn't for the Al Jazeera logo I would think that was from a John Woo movie.