Bring on the cacophony of sound!

So the rhetorical attack.

Rather than answer questions, put the other guy down. That is effective in bullying but not in debate.

My stance on killing women: bad thing to do.
My stance on widows: they are human beings and should have the full rights of any other human being.

Your attempt to stereotype: do you have any scriptural basis for sati or the mal treatment of widows in the Hindu scriptures you have said you read?

The real argument: 1) culture v ideology. 2) criteria by which we say a cultural practice or ideology is wrong.

I think culture is largely defined by the ideology in charge. Thus if an ideology claims to affect culture positively, it must also claim the negative effects either through promotion of those effects or through lack of correcting those effects (commission v ommission). Most of the worlds previous ideologies are misogynists. This, to my modern moral sense of seeking eternal truths, has always been a wrong. The equivalence of the female in her full role in society has not been corrected until the advent of scientific reasoning and in large part due to unions and socialist political structures. Various ideologies in the past have attempted to correct this cultural history, all have failed. We as people who have concluded that women deserve equal rights (that the Buddha concluded, that Rama concluded, that Krishna concluded, and Mo even sort of concluded) are obligated to point out that the ideologies of the past failed to correct this. This prompts us to recognize that the scriptures of the past are inadequate for the future without re-interpretation; addendum and thus we need better validation of "god's will" than the books that literalist keep worshiping.

Criteria: statistical method:

production function of ethical behavior
Principles: ahimsa, egalitarianism, freedom (human rights beyond tribalism)

= f(ideology, psychology, biology, power...)

determine the marginal contribution of each factor in social context. Establish differences in liklihood of positive and negative normative values. - a statistical, empirical approach to spirituality. Once we have a base statistical description of normalcy, then we can see what drives people to exceed normal variances in good and bad behavior.

not a criteria: books, tribal allegiance, name worship over ideas...

any binary solution (we were right you were wrong) is suspect.

hariaum

Navin,

What is your stance on the Hindu ritual of Satti? What is your opinion on the treatment of women specially widows in Hindu society?

the ideology of scientific and democratic societies reduced the attacks on women substantially. When does an ideology have to take responsibility for the culture? If never, then isn't the ideology irrelevant? If an ideological power base is in control of the society, is it not then responsible for that society's morality?

the double standard of preventing people in Europe from denying the holocaust and preventing people from criticizing an ideology is a non-starter. One denies a historical event. The other denies a idea. If society wants to move ahead, it can not deny history, but it must challenge ideas. History is, of course, not simplistic, but it is far more concrete than the idea that a man 1300 years ago talked to god and god said he will never have a prophet again.

The muslim and islam are different. How are we to decide which muslim represents islam? Is statistical study of attitudes valid? Is statistical study of imams valid?
Does anyone have the right to interpret the koran, is the teaching of the koran a universal moral ethic, or is it bound to a historical / conditional evaluation?

Isn't it time to say hitting a woman is wrong (period). . .

Isn't it time to say using war as a political tool is wrong.

Isn't it time to say the individuals search for truth is greater than any book.

Isn't it time to say, regardless of why a man became a muslim, he should have the right to leave islam.

hariaum

And Finally,

You wrote,

“if there was any common ground with moderate muslims, can we get that back?”

Ofcourse we can. We are ready to forget and forgive. But seems like even the Noble Peace Prize winning President of yours isn’t ready to abandon the anachronistic belief in firepower. Those 30,000 troops will further destabilize Pakistan, which will be a much bigger problem than Afghanistan or Iraq and frankly the world cannot afford a destabilized Pakistan in the current situation. As long a US stays in Afghanistan Pakistan will remain destabilized. Maybe there is an ulterior motive for this troop surge. There are no logical goals to achieve in Afghanistan. Maybe the real goal is to destabilize Pakistan enough to justify entering Pakistan. Really, there’s no magic formula to it. Stop poking your noses in every goddamned affair of the world and we can then coexist peacefully.

****the enlightened freedom to desecrate:

You wrote,

“what are you talking about? i don’t know where you get the idea of a freedom-of-speech double standard here? is there a specific incident you’re thinking about?”

Im sure you know that we’re talking about the Cartoons that were published in Denmark and re-printed all over European Newspapers to humiliate muslims even more. So you know I was talking about Europe not US. I don’t think there were any protests in USA over the cartoons. In Europe you cannot question holocaust, but you can lampoon the Prophet of Islam and by extension declare all muslims as terrorist but you cannot question the holocaust even in the form of an academic debate. This is obviously a double standard.

****bad muslims:

You wrote,

“of course not. i’d put the # of “bad muslims” at about 2%, maybe – that’s about 24,000,000 bad muslims engaged in militant lesser jihad. (i’ve got no problem with “greater” or “inner” jihad, it’s that pesky “lesser” one that bothers me....) i really don’t have to look hard to find muslim references to “great satan” and so forth.”

Can you back it up with actual proof? 24 million muslim jihadist terrorists? That seems like a huge stretch to me. Al-Qaida and all its affiliates probably number in thousands only. Sounds like a bit of wild imagination to me. Have you done a similar research on militant Christians? I know there are plenty calling for a showdown with Islam in your country. What’s your rough guess on that?

****war hysteria

Walter, I greatly admire your views on Iraq. It speaks of someone who is pained by the tainted image of his country. I can give you a piece of my mind. Most of us muslims are ready to move on. We do not live in the past. All you need to do is end the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan and find a just solution to Israel/Palestine crisis. All this war hysteria will then become manageable. The current situation is providing cannon fodder to the extremists on both sides.

****honor killing

With regards to honor killing in Brazil, you said;
“really?! do you have a source for that info? while i am “impressionable”, i’ll need more than just your word on that.... i know brazil changed a law in 1981”
I don’t know if there is a list by some independent body on honor killings. Brazil is particularly notorious for its domestic violence like Pakistan. Both of them have rampant poverty and law and order issues as well as huge populations. I also found a citation from wiki that says,
“In two Latin American countries, similar laws were struck down over the past two decades: according to human rights lawyer Julie Mertus "in Brazil, until 1991 wife killings were considered to be noncriminal 'honor killings'; in just one year, nearly eight hundred husbands killed their wives. Similarly, in Colombia, until 1980, a husband legally could kill his wife for committing adultery.”
I think this pretty much proves my point that honor killings are a cultural thing rather than a religious thing. Do you know about the tradition of Sati in Hindu religion? Isn’t that a perfect example of religion sanctioned honor killing?

****my islamic sources: (cont....)

You wrote,
“no, no, no! there is a huge difference. jihadwatch and christopher hitchens DO NOT advocate violence. the “mirror image” would be if, say, pat robertson were to cite scripture to recruit 15-25 yr olds to bomb “muslim” shopping centers and mosques in the u.s.

so, seriously, who is the christian “mirror image” of osama bin laden? i don’t think there is one.”

Walter, I don’t think there is a huge difference between these two sets of opinions. You may disagree on it. But I remember the kind of point of view that was prevalent in USA prior to the Iraq war. You guys (I mean Americans in general) were in no mood to listen to the voices of reason. There were Senators in US who used to say lets Nuke Mecca and Medina and they used to get away with it. You sound like someone who is concerned about the Iraq debacle, but I don’t think most Americans get sleepless nights over the fact that the caused something to the tune of 600,000 innocent deaths through their vote. Where does this complete disregard for the death and destruction of a totally innocent nation comes from? It is because the Iraqi’s were so dehumanized in the American psyche by these hatemongers that effectively the only good muslim became a dead muslim. They only saw Iraqis as terrorists, suicide bombers. How do we know the scums of the earth who perpetrated that odious torture in Abu Gharaib, or those soldiers who indulged in the death orgy at Haditha weren’t motivated in part by Fox and other hate media outlets. You yourself mentioned that George Bush was given sermons by one such hate monger. Were you surprised when he said that God appeared in his dream and ordered him to attack Iraq? Why do you think Americans re-elected Bush to continue his wars for another 4 years even though all his lies with regards to WMD’s and all the mass killings of Iraqis were exposed? Let’s look at the deaths that Osama has caused and compare them with ones caused by your merchants of hate. You be the judge~!

****my islamic sources:

You wrote,
“the fact is i’m not concerned about the “good muslims”.....”

Walter, I’ll reserve my judgement on Hitchens and his like minded atheist fanatics. I don’t think you would disagree his views are on the somewhat extreme side of what atheism stands for. He believes in poking fun at religions and isn’t quite looking for co-existence but only his faith (or nofaith) to be the dominant faith. Anyways, I hate to say that to you but wise men have said that you’re known by the company you keep. The same can be applied with regards to the books or one’s reading habits. What would you think of the person who reads pro-nazi or white supremacists literarture and tries to verify it with main stream media etc. I don’t think I was able to make my point clearly in my last post. Try and think of yourself as a muslim for a moment. And then listen to what Osama says about Christians. He calls your society evil, sex crazy, perverted, corrupted etc. In a funny way he thinks you guys have no respect for women, that all you do is portray women as sex objects. He says that you are enemies of Islam since you attack muslim countries, utterly destroying them, you have no qualms about dropping bombs on wedding parties or killing people for not stopping at checkpoints. You torcher and rape muslim prisoners. You talk about bombing Mecca and Medina and you stand by other enemies of Islam like Israel etc in killing innocent defenseless muslims. I cannot see how your blood doesn’t start to boil when you allow yourself to be exposed to this kind of ‘truths’. And yes if you try to go out and find whether what he is saying is true or not you will find most of it to be true.

In spite of all this overwhelming majority of muslims totally ignore the militants. Because we understand their motivation behind all this propaganda is just wage wars and justify their terroristic acts against innocents. I can only wish that you and other people in the west who follow Pat Robertson and Jihad Watch’s etc don’t only look at the ‘truths’ but also look at the motivations of the people who are using these ‘truth’s’ to spread hatred. You cannot even imagine the problems of us moderate muslims. We are struck between a rock and a hard place. On one hand we got USA and its Christian allies (coalition of the willing) taking on one muslim country after another, helping Israel maintain its brutal occupation etc. On the other hand we got these terrorists extremists on our side who have risen up in response to all these wars. We would like both of you to stop terrorizing us. I can understand when you say that we need to take more responsibility for the people who sit amongst us and are our co-religionists. But it would help if you guys too cut down your war cries. Get out of Iraq and Afghanistan immediately and find a just solution to the Palestine crisis.

You asked,

“a few questions:
1)you said there are 6 reliable hadith. which ones?
2)is this a sufi thing? that is, are these the 6 hadith sufis accept, but other muslims accept others? or are these the 6 hadith that all muslims agree are reliable?
3)is "ahadith" the plural of hadith?
4)what's the best english translation of the koran? “

1. the six reliable books of Hadith or Ahadith are the ones compiled by;
a. Bukhari
b. Muslim
c. Abu Daud
d. Nisai
e. Tirmizi
f. Ahmed Bin Hambal

2. Its not a sufi thing. These books are universally recognized by all Sunni Muslims as being reliable.
3. yes
4. All translations are good. But a translation can never be as good as the actual word.

****apostasy:

Walter, if the argument is whether Iranian Government discriminates against Bahai’s I’d probably agree with you, its wrong, I condemn it. But as far as my stand of no death penalty for apostasy, I still stand by it. Even this trial, as unjust as it might seem, doesn’t prove me wrong. The surah’s in the Quran regarding apostasy are in reference to imposters known as “Munafiqeen” who joined Islam with the purpose of harming it from inside. Allah exposed them through this Surah. People reverting from Islam is hardly an issue for us as a very very tiny minority takes that road. I cannot think of any high profile reversion from Islam of someone who was say an Imam or a Mufti on the other hand there are dozens of former Rabbi’s and Christian priests and other highly educated men and women who have converted to Islam. In terms of conversions Islam is the leading religion throughout the world including US and Europe, despite of the 24/7 negative coverage Islam gets. I wonder what’s your reasoning of that. Why do you believe that’s happening? So what I mean to say is that I understand your concerns that their remains an ambiguity with regards to whether apostasy is punishable, and I say there shouldn’t be any. But I can say with certainty that if there were mass executions for conversion from Islam, we would have had a definitive position on it by now. The only reason it is being ignored is because there is so little of it.

***islamabused women: (cont....)

"this sounds like a rule a mufti made up....actually, sounds a bit like the catholic church, like christianity prior to the reformation. don't you have an urdu translation of the koran? and your 6 reliable hadith?"

Walter, I think you have a lot of misconception about muslim cultures. That stems from your lack of reading of credible stuff. There are plenty of western scholars who you can associate with more easily, like the 2 people I know of on this website John Esposito, and Karen Armstrong. They are considered neutral to the best of my knowledge. They have criticized despotic Islamic regimes for their excesses but the also have an understanding of the Islamic Civilization, Culture and Faith. Grab a book by one of these or a similar scholar for a change. Try to broaden your perspective. It can only help, believe me. With reagrds to us picking up Quran everyday before going to work and looking at guidelines how to go about our work today, it doesn't happen like this. Ours is a society bounded by laws of the land just like yours. These Laws in our case have originated from the Islamic Scriptures like Quran and Hadith and works of other well known muslim lawmakers, jurists etc. There is some western influence as well because of the colonial past of the last century. All in all we go about things in a way that is not much different from yours. Domestic violence is as old as humanity itself, no amount of enlightenment has been able to finish it off completely. We can lessen it and with the passage of time it has lessened to a great extent. I can talk of myself, I cannot think of anyone in my immediate acquaintances who would even think of beating his wife. And frankly there aren’t many women around who’d tolerate you shouting on them let alone beating. But yea on the the countryside it’s an issue. The government can only do so much. It doesn’t have means implement laws at such micro level. So yea, I’ll admit this is where our society has failed to protect the rights of women, and are worse off than you guys. But more and more women are coming out, and there are NGO’s and lawyers here to take up their cases. The video you cited doesn’t say anything new. We’ve already discussed it. I didn’t hear him say some women want to get beaten.

Hello Walter,

Good to be back here~! Need atleast a couple of hours to sit down, read your posts and frame a response. But its something I enjoy, and like you once I get down to writing I usually do it in one go.

***islamabused women:

You said,

“so, if it's really just a "light tap", why the "not on the face" rule...? can a woman “tap” a man? and what about the bukhari hadith: bruises "as green as her veil"? how many husbands can a muslim woman have? (these are really rhetorical. you needn’t answer.)”

My understanding for men not allowed to hit women on the face is because its considered demeaning. A woman is not allowed to hit a man. Even the man is only allowed to hit a woman in situations that are extra-ordinary and don’t get met on most occasions. You can notice the number of caveats that are attached with it to ensure that rarely does such a situation ever occur. You still haven’t provided me the link to that other Hadith so I am no position to comment on it.

test~!

yasser,
eagerly awaiting replies... i know it's a lot, but once i get going...

this will time out on dec 18th, i think. should be no problem.

Hello Walter and Navin,

Thank you both for your comments. I am stuck up with a few issues right now. I'll definitely attempt to reply and respond to your posts tonight. Hopefully this thread is open till then, if not we can find another one.

Thanks,

Yasser

Yasser and I have an agreement: sufis are the true soul of Islam.

I, seeing myself as a mystic, feel mysticism is the soul of a true relationship with the supreme being. Even though Rumi makes discriminatory use of Hindus and women, I think there is a genuine search for truth beyond the book.

It is precisely because the sufis seek to get beyond the book, though, that other muslim's keep killing them off.

But, the soul of a man can be great (and in Hindu scripture the perfect creation of a perfect god). If we extend the analogy of Sufis as the soul, then the material representation of islam, like the material representation of a man, is fraught with dirt. Thus we do not stand to meaningfully judge a soul, but we do stand to judge the representation of that person in the material world by their actions. (Of course the koran and bible are all too happy to judge souls and condemn them as the hated of this devilish god - but they are just books). And so what is the worldly representation of Islam?

As much as Y proposes the history of christianity and europe as the judgment criteria of the enlightening aspect of those cultures, so much so the rest of us have to judge islam and the middle east based on their history. And so we should.

The charge of inadequate knowledge to judge is equal to those that judge christianity and those that judge islam or any other culture. Thus the charge is empty of reasonable debate. Of course the charge is also empty as to the judgment of individuals of whom we have even less knowledge. Obviously, the idea is to judge based on the best information available. Denial does not add to the debate. Provision of data or reasoning behind an opinion adds to the debate.

hariaum

yasser, i said,
"if we had just stayed in afghanistan, finished the job, helped rebuild a bit, then got out, muslims would have seen that we’re not after muslims. it could have even turned out america would have been seen as having done a good thing in afghanistan – destroying oppressive terrorist regimes and “freeing” the common regular-muslim afghans.... by “doing” iraq bush diluted and confused everything."

continuing that thought:
think back to "before iraq". what was your reaction to just afghanistan?

i think "moderate muslims" were still "on our side" - or at least weren't against us... by "doing iraq", bush squandered that post 9/11 "afterglow" - that brief moment where the world sympathized with us and possibly wanted to help or unite with us. maybe they thought that finally we would join them in fighting terrorism. at least it was a moment where we all, including moderate muslims, felt we had a common goal - ending religious terrorism.

is there any truth to that in your mind?

iraq cost america the "moral high ground". first, by doing it at all, and second, by doing it so poorly (allowing post-sadaam anarchy). and the torturing...omg...it doesn't matter that our torture was arguably less inhumane than sadaam's....i don’t think we killed too many people that way...oh, brother...

anyway, my point/theory/question is that before iraq, moderate muslims may have been uncomfortable with our presence in afghanistan, but understood/sympathized with why we were there. true? false?

if there was any common ground with moderate muslims, can we get that back?

yasser,
you said,
"Walter, there is a saying here which translated to English roughly means that the most dangerous lies are the ones mixed with a bit of truth."

there's a saying here: "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing."

yasser,
re: honor killing: i meant to say "brazil changed a law in 1991."

****the enlightened freedom to desecrate:
you said,
”Even if I am to take your word and consider all the lampooning of Religious figures revered in minority cultures and flushing and tearing of their books as a mark of enlightenment, why doesn’t your so-called enlightenment (and I know I have asked this question at least a couple of times before without getting a reply ) extend to me If I want to mock Jewish people by saying holocaust was a sham or even worse justified.... So why there are some standards for some people while different standards for other people?”

what are you talking about? i don’t know where you get the idea of a freedom-of-speech double standard here? is there a specific incident you’re thinking about?

in america, you can say whatever you want about the holocaust. you can write a book, go on t.v. and host a holocaust-denying website – no problem. you can publicaly criticize congress, the president, gays, women, jews, christians and the pope.

first, notice that there will NOT be “fatwas” from the pope. ONLY islam-criticizing writers and apostates need fear death threats from religious leaders. and second, you will not be jailed for “insulting america” or insulting jesus, yahweh, or george washington.

yasser,
****bad muslims:
you said,
”Do you really believe that all 1.2 Billion muslims hate you and are out there to get you?”

of course not. i’d put the # of “bad muslims” at about 2%, maybe – that’s about 24,000,000 bad muslims engaged in militant lesser jihad. (i’ve got no problem with “greater” or “inner” jihad, it’s that pesky “lesser” one that bothers me....) i really don’t have to look hard to find muslim references to “great satan” and so forth.

****my neutrality about islam
you said,
”Needless to say that if I were ever to get an honest neutral opinion on the Holy Quran you’d be the last person I’d come to.”

well...i would certainly be honest! and i would be critical. but, really, if you think about it, i probably WOULD be able to offer a “neutral” opinion on all three branches of judeochrislam – as i don’t have a “dog in the fight”. i don’t have any allegiance to any of them in terms of the truth of the subject matter. i think they’re all false. but, if i were to evaluate all three in terms of the level of “moral enlightenment” of the old testament, the new testament and the koran, i’d put the koran last and the n.t. first. it’s not surprising that the n.t. was an “improvement” over the o.t. – it was written later, so “moral development” would be expected. in contrast w/the o.t., there is no physical fighting advocated or condoned by the writers. for me, from my neutral vantage point, the koran was a step backwards, back to the days of god-sanctioned wars.

now, i have heard it said that while the koran seems brutal to us today, it was an improvement for most people in arabia at the time. well, that may be true. things must have been bad... (i love/hate the verse (17:31), where people are instructed not to SELL THEIR CHILDREN just to stay out of poverty. it’s just too funny/sad. it’s like something from an onion article.)

and, if you think some more about it, do you think your “muftis” are neutral? like any member of any church hierarchy (i.e. bureaucracy) they are interested in keeping their jobs by keeping you religious.

yasser,
****war hysteria
you said,
”We can help lessen all this war hysteria through better understanding of those that are unlike us not by making them like us.”

again, i offer 1000 more apologies for iraq. it has given the world the wrong impression of us. i soooo wish bush hadn’t been president when 9/11 happened. maybe that was osama’s genius – he waited until clinton was out. iraq would not have happened if gore had won the 2000 election. without iraq, we would/could have done so much better in my old stomping-grounds, afghanistan. our entire mission should have been to “get” osama and al qaeda.

if we had just stayed in afghanistan, finished the job, helped rebuild a bit, then got out, muslims would have seen that we’re not after muslims. it could have even turned out america would have been seen as having done a good thing in afghanistan – destroying oppressive terrorist regimes and “freeing” the common regular-muslim afghans.... by “doing” iraq bush diluted and confused everything. giving him the benefit of the doubt (assuming he was just stupid/mislead), he may have thought he was “fighting terrorism” in iraq. if he really thought sadaam was some kind of terrorist supplier or collaborator there would be some tiny measure of justification for iraq. as it turns out there was absolutely no reason to go into iraq and a 1000 reasons not to.... oh, i wish bush hadn’t been president... ugh...

****honor killing
you said,
”I don’t think your Jihad Watch Website would ever tell you this, but the country with most number of honor killings is Brazil.”

really?! do you have a source for that info? while i am “impressionable”, i’ll need more than just your word on that.... i know brazil changed a law in 1981.

i did find this on wiki: in pakistan, ”Nilofar Bakhtiar, advisor to Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, stated that in 2003, as many as 1,261 women were murdered in honor killings.”

they did list “brazil” as a country that had honor killings but didn’t give a body count. sure made it seem like it’s more prevalent in the muslim world. they did mention a few happening at the hands of hindus, but the # were much smaller than for muslims.

again SOURCE PLEASE for that “the country with most number of honor killings is Brazil” claim.

you said,
”You have an impressionable mind. I almost get the feeling if you were a muslim, you would have been easily duped by osama and his ilk.”

oh please. “impressionable mind”... like i’ve said, i check the sources. and if i were muslim, i’m pretty sure i’d have opted for apostasy by now...

yasser,
****apostasy:
you said,
”I looked up the bahai’i guy you cited and it turns out he wasn’t quite punished for apostasy but infact for converting another woman and apparently in Iran that crime is punishable by death.”

yes i was aware of that fine distinction. does that really matter? his “crime” was essentially creating an apostate.

in our “death for apostasy” discussion, i have obviously been pointing out the extreme: death penalty for apostasy. it’s absurd that that’s even a possibility. my real point is that there should be NO PENALTY AT ALL. there should be NO TRIALS and NO LAWS AT ALL about apostasy. in enlightened societies, religion (or lack thereof) is not the subject of civil/criminal laws. you quoted lovely verse 109:6, and i’m sure also love to quote 2:256 when answering charges that islam is intolerant. those are great verses. how can there be “no compulsion” when there are ANY LAWS AT ALL about apostasy? in fact, any laws at all about religion.

****my islamic sources:
you said,
”I’ve heard Christopher Hitchens and I think he’s an idiot. Even though he says he’s an atheist his views are obviously slanted towards Christianity/West when it comes to Islam.”

i don’t think he’s an idiot. you can certainly say he’s anti-islamic, and that he uses shocking rhetoric, but he is almost always factually correct. and he’s in no way “slanted” towards christianity. he’s as tough on christians as he is muslims. and you criticized “jihadwatch” et. al. as “hate mongers”. i know their slant when i read them. and they may only report “bad things” about islam, but it’s all TRUE. i challenge you to find a false story on jihadwatch.

the fact is i’m not concerned about the “good muslims”. i know they’re out there too. they’re not the problem (except to the extent they have not revolted – marched on mecca – against the human rights atrocities in “islamic culture”).

you said,
”Im disappointed you take such people and website as your source of education.”

as i have said, i don’t take any information uncritically. i check the sources.

you said,
”They are mirror images of Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaida on our side.”

no, no, no! there is a huge difference. jihadwatch and christopher hitchens DO NOT advocate violence. the “mirror image” would be if, say, pat robertson were to cite scripture to recruit 15-25 yr olds to bomb “muslim” shopping centers and mosques in the u.s.

so, seriously, who is the christian “mirror image” of osama bin laden? i don’t think there is one.

yasser, good to "talk" to you. i enjoy our exchanges.

***islamabused women:
yasser, you said,
"Only as a last resort can the husband give that tap to the woman so that the woman understands she needs to seriously reconsider her ways if the marriage is to last....The word that you translated as scourging is Muzraboon....Its from the root word zarb. This can mean anything from a light tap to a hard slap....I think its safe to assume that we’re talking about a light tap. Also even that tap cannot be on the face...."

so, if it's really just a "light tap", why the "not on the face" rule...? can a woman “tap” a man? and what about the bukhari hadith: bruises "as green as her veil"? how many husbands can a muslim woman have? (these are really rhetorical. you needn’t answer.)

you said,
"And a majority of muslims are like me who don’t even understand Arabic. So we cant just look up for justification for wife beating for instance and beat our wives. We have to go to an expert and take a religious decree (fatwa)...."

this sounds like a rule a mufti made up....actually, sounds a bit like the catholic church, like christianity prior to the reformation. don't you have an urdu translation of the koran? and your 6 reliable hadith?

you said,
"...and believe me if a mufti ever allows scourging your Jihad Watch’s and Pat Robertson’s would make sure that their followers are the first to know"

this "expert" mufti says some women WANT to be beaten... easily found by googling “mufti wife beating”.

Mufti of Egypt Sheik Ali Gum'a: Wife-Beating Is Permitted by Islam in Muslim Countries:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fb6D9G4gpW8

a few questions:
1)you said there are 6 reliable hadith. which ones?
2)is this a sufi thing? that is, are these the 6 hadith sufis accept, but other muslims accept others? or are these the 6 hadith that all muslims agree are reliable?
3)is "ahadith" the plural of hadith?
4)what's the best english translation of the koran?

test~!

PART VI

Walter, you keep saying this that muslims should never get provoked if you attack our countries, kill our babies, torcher and imprison our innocents, insult our Prophet and religion, tear and flush our holy books. It all smacks of inherent racism that’s been the hallmark of Europeans and has resulted in violent genocides of its minorities. Europeans have traditionally been the most intolerant people. They believe in taking all the world has to offer as their own but hate it when they have to share it with others. What do your polls say on the Europeans opinion of muslims? Im not the expert at polls you are, do you think their attitudes are any different to those towards the Jews when they started migrating towards western Europe in big numbers. We know what all these expressions of hatred led to last time round. If I remember correctly, cartoons were a vital tool for the nazi’s in shaping public opinion and hatred for the Jews. It seems Europe cannot quite shed its racist past.

Even if I am to take your word and consider all the lampooning of Religious figures revered in minority cultures and flushing and tearing of their books as a mark of enlightenment, why doesn’t your so-called enlightenment (and I know I have asked this question at least a couple of times before without getting a reply ) extend to me If I want to mock Jewish people by saying holocaust was a sham or even worse justified, Jewish people should have no right to get offended in an enlightened society should they? Isn’t that your argument? So why there are some standards for some people while different standards for other people?

PART V

“but again, these people were motivated by their religion. there's no christian (or other religions) equivalent to this going on in the world today. there are no secret christian soldier training camps anywhere.”

There you go again Walter, Do you want me to keep repeating myself? How do you know these people were motivated by religion. Couldn’t they be motivated by the death and destruction US meted out to Iraqi’s and Afghanis? Your background info is as always pretty poor. The fact is that it was one of these boys family who first alerted the FBI through CAIR about their suspicious activities and the fact that they went missing from their homes. Why do you fail to associate that behavior with the parents religion? Also, these boys went to two madarassah’s one operated by Lashkar-e-Toyba and the other by Jaish-e-Muhammad and were denied entry by both these madarassahs. They were caught by the Pakistani Police on leads from the people in the locality who were obviously wary of their new Arab neighbours. They were all muslims too. So how do we know if it’s a religious issue? And please don’t get me started on the Christian Soldier training camps, secret or whatever. If you really want to make this Christianity vs Islam war I can cite you dozens of references. For the moment just remember that both Bush and Blair said in one way or another that God ordered them to attack Iraq. We know both of them are devout Christians.

I cannot explain Sufism to you in 4 points. You would probably need to read books to understand Sufism. For me it’s the soul of Islam. You take away Sufism from Islam you take away all its beauty. Im not surprised you wouldn’t know much about Sufi’s. We are deliberately ignored by your media because we don’t quite fit into the picture of muslims you want to portray. But the fact is most muslims do adhere to the non-violent message of Sufi Saints. We believe we are the true muslims. We believe in co-existence and respect all religions and their religious deities. I am no Sufi myself. I’m a mere follower of the Sufi path.

PART IV

I think I have spoken enough on the apostasy issue. The link you cited mentions muslim scholars arguing whether its right or wrong. I remember saying that there is no agreement among muslims on death for apostasy. You can see for yourself. I think you can easily makeout that I am in the camp of those Scholars who believe apostasy is not punishable by death. I also believe we are in majority. I can say for sure such a thing can never happen in Pakistan.

The viable idea is “for them their faith for me my faith”.

PART III

****my “islamic” sources:

Walter, there is a saying here which translated to English roughly means that the most dangerous lies are the ones mixed with a bit of truth. All these sources you cite are basically hate mongers. They have mushroomed after 9/11 and their sole purpose is to realize the Samuel Huntington dream of clash of civilizations. All of them attempt to perpetuate hatred between Christians/West and Islam that has existed historically. I do not know Sam Harris but I’ve heard Christopher Hitchens and I think he’s an idiot. Even though he says he’s an atheist his views are obviously slanted towards Christianity/West when it comes to Islam. The points he raises are so childish even I can take him on. Im disappointed you take such people and website as your source of education. They are mirror images of Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaida on our side. Osama is brilliant at mixing truths with lies and urging muslims to brace for a final showdown with the West/Christians as our only option. If I were to follow your guide and listen to Osama when he says USA has invaded our lands, is killing innocent muslims, is raping muslim women etc and then look to verify whether it is really happening, Id be hating you and what you stand for just like your hate preachers hate us. But I do have the common sense to realize what is the motivation of osama and his ilk for saying such hatefull things so I tend to ignore whatever they say. Really Walter, even though our views are poles apart, I like you. I like the way you talk to me. And I believe if we were ever to meet I’d probably enjoy your company. I wish there was some way I could explain you my friend that hatred breeds hatred. There’s no end to it. We can help lessen all this war hysteria through better understanding of those that are unlike us not by making them like us.

I don’t know what to make of the Turkish Story you posted. You obviously want to convey that because they are muslims, they indulge in honor killing. I don’t think your Jihad Watch Website would ever tell you this, but the country with most number of honor killings is Brazil. In Colombia it was legal to kill your wife if you saw her with another man until a few years ago. You have an impressionable mind. I almost get the feeling if you were a muslim, you would have been easily duped by osama and his ilk. Honor Killing is a cultural thing. It even happens in Godless Societies. It’s a crime, no religion can condone it.

Do you really believe that all 1.2 Billion muslims hate you and are out there to get you? Can you even imagine the consequences if it were true? Your views on the Holy Quran are your views and they have been shaped by reading all the hate filled garbage you’ve allowed yourself to be exposed to in the last eight years. Needless to say that if I were ever to get an honest neutral opinion on the Holy Quran you’d be the last person I’d come to.

PART II

****apostasy, still

Yes, I am contradicting Wikpedia’s stand. If you know how Wikipedia is maintained, Its not not immune to making mistakes. The reason being we do not see many deaths for this crime. The examples you’ve cited are dubious at best. I looked up the bahai’i guy you cited and it turns out he wasn’t quite punished for apostasy but infact for converting another woman and apparently in Iran that crime is punishable by death. (Btw that woman wasn’t punished). I tried to find an Iranian version of the story but all I found were the links to your Jihad Watch and similar hateful websites, finally did get one AFP story which said that such an execution never happened and its all western bias and propaganda. However, I think I have been consistent in maintaining that I do not view Islamic world as devoid of mistakes and wrong doings. I do not agree with everything we do. The Shariah Law has been misinterpreted by oppressive regimes In order to maintain their iron fisted rule. But the fact is there are thousands of Bahai’s in Iran and they are all considered apostates. Just because one gets a death penalty doesn’t mean apostasy is punishable by death. If it were the case all of them would have got Death Penalty. In Pakistan we have Ismaili’s and Ahmadi’s who are considered apostates. Really Walter, if you’re hell bent on finding faults with a belief system, you’ll get those because if you have these pre-conceived notions and a deadest minds that refuses to look at the wider picture and only wants to focus on the hateful things. None of your Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism. Buddhism and yes Atheism can escape this slandering.

Walter,

I can see you’ve been working overtime~! Thanks for the response. I’ll try to give my take on these issues.

***islamabused women:

Walter, you can haha and lol all you like. I have given you the position Islamic experts have taken on the issue. Beating that result in bodily harm is not allowed. Man has been given the duty of looking after his household. Islam is not an idealistic atheistic belief system. It’s a practical religion and it doesn’t overlook the everyday issues that we humans face. And the recourse it suggests are as good as it gets taking the human psyche into consideration. So if a woman strays away from the righteous path, or does not give her husband his due, the husband has the chain of options that are quoted in the Surah and explained by the experts. Only as a last resort can the husband give that tap to the woman so that the woman understands she needs to seriously reconsider her ways if the marriage is to last. Ofcourse as a further last resort either of them can apply for a divorce (yes Islam allows women to divorce her husband). The word that you translated as scourging is Muzraboon. It’s a word we use in urdu as well. Its from the root word zarb. This can mean anything from a light tap to a hard slap. We never use it in relation with lashing. And since experts who know better than I do have concluded that a husband is not allowed to cause bodily harm to his wife, I think its safe to assume that we’re talking about a light tap. Also even that tap cannot be on the face. So yes we can conclude that this is largely symbolic and even that is not required. Its an option that a husband has. I couldn’t find the other Hadith you quoted on the web. Maybe you can post a link to it in your next post. I told you before, we muslims just don’t take words from the Quran and Hadith and act upon them. We go to people who are called Mufti’s and who can understand the Quran and Hadith better than we do and direct us. Honestly, whatever your motivation maybe, you probably know more about Islamic Laws than a regular/normal muslim like me does. Only a tiny, tiny minority learns the Quran by heart. An even smaller number would know all of the Hadiths. And a majority of muslims are like me who don’t even understand Arabic. So we cant just look up for justification for wife beating for instance and beat our wives. We have to go to an expert and take a religious decree (fatwa) and believe me if a mufti ever allows scourging your Jihad Watch’s and Pat Robertson’s would make sure that their followers are the first to know.

Bukhari is one of the six books of Hadith that are considered reliable.

test~!

yasser,
***danish cartoons (and koran desecration):
You wrote something like "the rioters were provoked"
and i said,
“uh...sorry...no excuse. that’s like blaming the girl for rape because she was dressed sexily...”

you said,
"Im sorry I do not see any relation to the actual situation with the analogy you quoted."

sometimes it is said by rapists that "the girl wanted it", that she was dressed provocatively and "she made me rape her..."

i'm saying even if provoked, rioting (killing !) over cartoons (portraying islam as violent...ha!...too funny...) is not morally justified.

i tell you...those cartoon would have faded into obscurity had not the muslim reaction been so perfect...that's what made them great. the idea that there are publishers who won't publish them or include them in editorial cartoon books appalls me. it's freedom of speech, man, it's messy.

you said,
"Im saddened to hear your views regarding the tearing and flushing of the Quran. It speaks of someone who has absolutely no respect for the culture and traditions of other people."

it is the messy reality of freedom of religion, separation of mosque and state, and freedom of speech and so on. there is no "freedom to not be offended". in enlightened society, anyone can burn, flush, desecrate HIS OWN bible, koran, cross, flag or whatever. he CANNOT desecrate someone else's things. it can be messy.

this enlightened attitude makes us give permits to nazis to march on town hall etc... since everybody hates them, we even give them police protection!

you said,
"Its not even a question of whether my God is bigger or your God."

is this a reference to general william "my god's bigger" boynkin? what a jerk. the religiosity of bush et. al. was frightening. one of bush's "personal ministers" was end-timer franklin graham. (google if you don't know him.) he visited the white house many times. many of bush's crew involved in that iraq mania were crazy religious people (but i don't think cheney, rumsfeld, wolfowitz were).

yasser,
i wish all muslims were as good as you. (when i earlier said i wished all muslims were sufis, i didn't even know you were a sufi! "sufi" always plays the role of "peaceful islam" in debates...) but when you say things like "there's no death for apostasy" in islam you lose credibility. and, i hope you don't really think "everything's ok" with islam's human rights positions. the first step towards enlightenment is realizing there's a problem...

in your words, what makes a sufi? - in terms of doctrine? my understanding is shallow, but includes:
1)don't take all the hadiths seriously,
2)accept teachings of other "great thinkers" like buddha, gandhi(?).
3)like to dance...
4)are not considered "real muslims" by some other muslims.

also, if i may...why sufi? by "birth"? (parents etc...) or choice?

yasser,
here's what i read today in the washington post:
"Five men from Northern Virginia who were arrested Tuesday in Pakistan traveled abroad hoping to work with jihadist groups and battle U.S. troops in Afghanistan, Pakistani officials said Thursday. The men contacted extremist organizations, including two with links to al-Qaeda, and proudly told their Pakistani interrogators, "We are here for jihad,""

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/11/AR2009121101337.html?hpid=topnews

these people are from just a few miles from my house. many were born in the u.s. all their neighbors and acquaintences are saying what "nice boys" they were. to me, that makes it even scarier. i'm officially reserving judgement 'til more comes out, but so far, seems like they had "bad intentions". don't know what the crime is yet...

but again, these people were motivated by their religion. there's no christian (or other religions) equivalent to this going on in the world today. there are no secret christian soldier training camps anywhere.

yasser,
what do you have to say about this? "Islamic Scholars Wrestle With Death-For-Apostasy Issue"
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/47401
and this?
http://pewglobal.org/reports/display.php?ReportID=265

this second link is to a fuller version of that "pew" poll you poo-pooed earlier. it's a reputable poll. you can see the questions yourself. if it's "off", it's not off by too much. for instance they say 78% support death for apostasy, maybe it's only 70% or 60% or even somehow 40%. can we agree that EVEN IF it's only 40%, that's a BIG problem?

seems to me like the "death for apostasy" thing is not exactly ancient history in the minds of the ummah, as you'd have me believe. it's NOT TRUE to say there is "no death for apostasy in islam."

it is there as a viable idea in the minds of MANY MANY muslims, including "scholars".

Navin1,
you said,
"Holding superstition to the fire of the intellect is the ultimate worship of Truth....You have my vote to continue to put us religionists to the fire. Thanks."

you're welcome!

part 2:

anyway, in addition to checking these “neutral” sites (post, times, wiki), i always go to the scripture, where possible. that is the most disappointing part for me. like most Americans, i became “interested” in islam on 9/11. before that, i knew of “terrorism” as something that happened “over there”, probably in lebanon, israel and palestine. i saw all those bombings and the israeli/palestinian problems as a shame, but not really affecting me. on 9/11 i was forced to wake up and ask, “why do they hate us?” how can osama bin laden (i’d never heard of him before then) cite scripture as justification for his bombing?

the horrible thing about the koran/hadith is when i checked his references, and the claims of the “islamophobes” re verses like 9:5 and 4:34, i found out OBL was RIGHT! – or at least i can see how a muslim might think OBL is scripturally and therefore morally justified. the koran is a horribly brutal, unenlightened book. i had the same reaction, by the way, when i first read the bible as an adult. all that “vengeful god”, “joshua’s conquest” and how they killed neighboring peoples for religious reasons. the o.t. is a horrible book, by objective modern standards. when i got to the n.t., it seemed like a giant leap forward, morally. mind you, it’s still false, but it’s “nicer”. sure, there’s the promise of hell, but there’s no more of joshua’s jihad or smashing other people’s religious “idols”. the koran seems to be a “throwback” to the “good ol’ (i.e., violent) days of the o.t..

****apostasy, still

so, is it your contention that wiki is wrong in saying:
1) a majority of muslim scholars support punishment for apostasy
2) a majority of muslim scholars think death is the “proper” punishment

you asked for an example of a killing for apostasy in the last 100 years, and i gave you mahmoud mohamed taha. you essentially said, “well, that’s afghanistan – that doesn’t count.” does ruhollah rowhani count? http://www.nytimes.com/1998/07/24/world/iran-hangs-bahai-in-religion-case.html

****my “islamic” sources:
you asked where i get my info on islam – it’s NOT from pat robertson. believe me, i find my alignment with robertson et. al. extremely uncomfortable. i am generally definitely what people in america would call “liberal”. i read the “A” section of the wash post every day. i hear of some of the worst atrocities of islam from sam harris, christopher hitchens et. al., and from websites like jjhadwatch and answeringislam. before you get all in a huff about that, i DO NOT take what they say uncritically. when they site “bad muslim things”, i always check the references. i’ll go to the n.y. times or the wash. post and, yes often wiki to make sure they’re not making stuff up. it turns out what they say is generally true. it’s not hard to find articles about “caning” or “blasphemy prisoners”, or “honor killings”.

i was just reading an human rights website where they reported that since “honor killing” is, strictly speaking, against the law in turkey, there’s a problem that too many male family members are going to jail for honor killing their women. so fathers are pressuring their daughters to commit suicide so the men don’t have to go to jail for honor killing.... it’s unreal to me. see here: http://www.religiouswatch.com/nw06c.htm go down to the july 17th entries...ugh...)

”But in the past two years, Turkey has revamped its penal code and imposed life sentences for such killings, known as honor killings, regardless of the killer’s age. But the violence has continued, if by different means: parents are trying to spare their sons from the harsh punishments associated with killing their sisters by pressing the daughters to take their own lives instead.

Families of disgraced girls are choosing between sacrificing a son to a life in prison by designating him to kill his sister or forcing their daughters to kill themselves, said Yilmaz Akinci, who works for a rural development group. Rather than losing two children, most opt for the latter option.”

end part 1

Walter,

Holding superstition to the fire of the intellect is the ultimate worship of Truth. In the Hindu / Buddhist traditions we are advised to use our buddhi (intelligence) to figure out what are eternal truths and what are temporal / relative truths. You have my vote to continue to put us religionists to the fire. Thanks.

hariaum

yasser,
i would say i am categorized as "atheist" - to the extent that no religion i've ever heard of seems to be correct to me.

yasser, hi there.
***islamabused women:
i reread those links you gave on v4:34.
”...gentle tap on the body...” ha ha hahaha hahaha hahahaa.... omg....
and “...a symbolical tap with this very light object.” it’s just too funny (tragic, actually).... we ARE talking about how hard you can hit your wife. the fact is under certain circumstances “beating” is allowed. all that other stuff about “respecting women” and “last resort” is just obfuscation. OF COURSE you should try other things first.... the websites assured me there are hadiths with qualifiers like “gentle” and “symbolic” and “tap”, but gave no references. do you know which hadith those “good” beating verses are from?

besides, what am i supposed to think??? when your websites claim, “gentle symbolic tap”, but Bukhari (72:715) says, “A woman came to Muhammad and begged her to stop her husband from beating her. Her skin was bruised so badly that she it is described as being "greener" than the green veil she was wearing. Muhammad did not admonish her husband, but instead ordered her to return to him and submit to his sexual desires.?!?!?! omg!

so, since i’ve given you an actual bukhari verse talking about how seriously bruised this woman was, and (hopefully) you’ll give me verses talking about “love taps”... well, given these contradictions (i’m assuming you’ll come up with the “good” verses where they regulate beating...), how’s a muslim supposed to know what to do?

the fact is islamic scripture provides ample “wiggle room” here. it’s hilarious/tragic that islamic scholars have had to address this. don’t you think a god inspired book would say something more along the lines of, “NEVER EVER BEAT YOUR WIFE, EVER, EVEN IF SHE DISOBEYS YOU.”? instead, we’re having this surreal discussion about how hard and with what implements men may “tap” their wives. it’s just horrendous, disgusting and unenlightened. women are people too. we shouldn’t be discussing whether it’s a “majority” or just “some” islamic scholars. as with “apostasy” and hudood (sp?) laws, EVERY islamic scholar should come out firmly against this (i suppose that’s difficult, because it IS in the texts...). instead they hide behind qualifiers like “gentle” and “symbolic” and “tap”. i seriously doubt bukhari was doing much “tapping”. sheesh...

is bukhari "unreliable"?

I guess 54% of Pakistani kids belief doesn't count as a majority.

hariaum

Walter,

Ok I have verified that Hadees. It does exist. I looked up to find the context and found that it does not speak of all apostates but specifically those who either joined Islam and were infact enemies of Islam and only joined muslims to harm them. They are known as 'munafiqoon'. The other instances where the apostates were killed during the life time of Prophet Muhammad was not because they revereted but because they committed other serious crimes punishable by death. This is a subject best dealt with by experts. Im posting a link that will clarify in detail that infact Islam does not condone killing of apostates. The other proof I can cite with regards to my claim is that, there has never been an instance of a apostate being killed through a Shariah court. So obviously that one Hadith you quoted was not able convict the apostates. Both the proponent and opponents must have argued their points and its obvious that opponents have won. Here's the link I talked about

http://www.pakistanlink.com/Opinion/2006/Apr06/07/06.HTM

Im sorry that I wrongly attributed you to Christianity. Do you follow any set of religous principles or consider yourself an atheist/agnostic? It'll be easier for me to understand where you're coming from that way.

yasser,
you keep saying "your christianity". i'm not christian.

yasser,
that is hadith is bukhari, 9:83:17.

Walter,

You didn't write the name of the book from which you quoted this Hadith. Im sure you know there are several different books of Hadith's. So I wont be able to comment on this Hadith unless I can verify it.

Walter,

Read those links closely, they will answer your misconceptions.

You seem to have a lot of knowledge on Islam, Hanafi, Maliki, Hanbali and Shia thats about whole of Islam. The only school of thought missing is the Shaafi's. I do not really know what their position is. But they are a minority point of view. I do not accept wikipedia's claim that most muslims scholars believe apostasy is punishable by death. If they are citing the Taliban Mullah's they are as much a mainstream view as the KKK is mainstream Christian. They would even kill us muslims if we get in their way. The examples wikipedia cites are laughable at best. If you're gonna start quoting Kings from middle ages. then your Christianity didnt fare much better. Justinian I, who I believe is much more significant in Christianity than those shadowy Mamluk Kings are in Islam, decreed death as punishment for apostasy and indeed killed a lot of people as well. There have been other instances of Christian persecuting their fellow Christians for apostasy throughout history. And ofcourse kings of old times used to play politics as well. Declaring their opponents heretics or practicers of sorcery to get them killed. Your Christianity's record isn't quite exemplary in this regard. I hope you're not serious about citing Afghanistan's example. Afghanis haven't had a proper government system for ages so there's no way those punishments were government sanctioned or neither can they be accused of following Sharia. I dont know how much evidence does it take to convince you. You should learn to start looking around you more than trying to decipher meanings from a book you are ill equipped to handle. Apostasy is not punishable by death. The fact is you cannot cite a SINGLE high profile case to prove your point. Its almost like in your twilight zone you'd feel better if muslims started punishing apostates with beheading? I can see no other reason why you're so vigorously bent upon proving a falsehood that cannot be backedup by evidence.

part 2:
so, wiki says a MINORITY of muslim scholars think apostacy shouldn’t be punished. what am i supposed to think? are the scholars wrong? or is wiki wrong? can i blame 80% of pakistanis “on the street” for supporting the death penalty for apostacy when a MAJORITY of muslim scholars support it?

and really, i can’t blame them, for when i check the islamic scripture myself and read,
Allah's Apostle said, "The blood of a Muslim who confesses that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that I am His Apostle, cannot be shed except in three cases: In Qisas for murder, a married person who commits illegal sexual intercourse and the one who reverts from Islam (apostate) and leaves the Muslims." hadith Volume 9, Book 83, Number 17: Narrated 'Abdullah.

as to the punishment, though you chided me for saying “beheading”, that same wiki page, you must not have read, says,

“Most Islamic scholars agree that the appropriate punishment for apostasy is beheading.[citation needed] Mamluk Sultan Baybars II also practiced torture of apostates. A case is recorded when a woman who had apostatised was led through the streets of Cairo dragged on her bottom, then strangled in a boat in the middle of the Nile and thrown into the river. In modern times, followers of the Ahmadiyya sect in Afghanistan were stoned to death.

yasser,
i skimmed those links, but on first glance they didn't "excuse" those v4:34. i'll reread them.

meanwhile, read this...

***apostasy laws:
i said,
"and apparently, historically, islamic scholars have determined that beheading is the islamic way. i suppose that’s somehow more humane than stoning...”

and you said,
”There's no agreement among Islamic scholars that beheading should be the punishment for apostasy. I would really like to know the source of this claim. Did you even read the wikipedia link you yourself posted? Let me paste an excerpt from that link”

then you quoted this from the page:
”Some Islamic jurists, such as Hanafi jurist Sarakhsi,[5] Maliki jurist Abu al-Walid al-Baji, and Hanbali jurist Ibn Taymiyyah,[6] and some contemporary Islamic jurists, such as Shafi`i Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa[7][8] and Shi'a Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri,[9] argued or issued fatwas that either the changing of religion is not punishable or is only punishable under restricted circumstances.[10][11][12][13] Some groups within Islam such as the Shi'a Ismaili reject death for apostasy altogether.[citation needed]"

well, yes, i DID read from the page – the whole page. further down there is a very similar passage that clarifies:

“A minority of medieval Islamic jurists, notably the Hanafi jurist Sarakhsi (d. 1090),[5] Maliki jurist Ibn al-Walid al-Baji (d. 494 AH) and Hanbali jurist Ibn Taymiyyah (1263-1328), held that apostasy carries no legal punishment.[6] Some contemporary Islamic Shafi`i jurists, such as the Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa,[7][8] some Shi'a jurists such as Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri,[9] and some jurists, scholars and writers of other Islamic sects, have argued or issued fatwas that either the changing of religion is not punishable or is only punishable under restricted circumstances, but these minority opinions have not found broad acceptance among the majority of Islamic scholars.[10][11][12][13]”

end part 1

"yasser and i are about to discuss what islam says about beating women - how hard, under what circumstances, for what reasons... for now, yasser's blaming a bad translation for me thinking v4:34 allows beating."

Walter,

You aren't paying much attention to my posts. Thats a turnoff for me. Did you check out those two links I provided. They clearly describe how hard, and the circumstances associated with beating. I am not an expert on Quran, as in I havent taken a Islamic studies major. And believe me its a proper subject and people have invested their lives into it. We muslims are advised to seek counsel with those people when reading the Quran. It is in mostly poetic form of the highest order. So for someone to just read translations (which is never as good as the actual word anyway) and consider himself an expert is pretty dumb. Its like I can read all those books on anatomy without ever going to college and start considering myself a doctor. Read those two links first and let me know if you're still having problems with this verse.

Navin1, you said,
"It is good to here that apostasy is no longer a capital offense in Islam. Is this even a debate elsewhere?"

weird, isn't it? like the twilight zone. yasser and i are about to discuss what islam says about beating women - how hard, under what circumstances, for what reasons... for now, yasser's blaming a bad translation for me thinking v4:34 allows beating.

yasser,
i'll get to your points in the "islamabused women" post and the others soon. in the meantime, you didn't answer: which is the best english version of the koran? you said pickthal is bad, but what's good? in which version version should i read verse 4:34?

this is kind of like my fundamentalist church twilight zone experience. i think we're about to have a conversation about how hard allah allows a man to scourge, beat, hit, physically admonish, "instruct" perhaps...a woman.

It is good to here that apostasy is no longer a capital offense in Islam. Is this even a debate elsewhere? Of course the right thing to say is that anyone who kills anyone in the name of religion holds an evil ideology and any god that says to kill people so as to defend the faith is probably also evil.

"Also, Paul Marshall notes: "Other countries, like Egypt, that have no laws against apostasy, instead use laws against 'insulting Islam' or 'creating sectarian strife.' In 2003, Egyptian security forces arrested 22 converts and people who had helped them. Some were tortured, and one, Isam Abdul Fathr, died in custody. Last year, Gaseer Mohamed Mahmoud was whipped and had his toenails pulled out by police, and was told he would be imprisoned until he gave up Christianity."

Bassiouni continues: “States that recognize it as a crime punishable by death include Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Sudan. However, there are no known cases in recent times in which someone charged with apostasy in these countries has been put to death.”

However, Marshall asserts that "in the last ten years Saudi Arabia has executed people for the crimes of apostasy, heresy, and blasphemy" and "in the 1990s, the Islamic Republic of Iran used death squads against converts, including major Protestant leaders, and the situation is worsening under President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The regime is currently engaged in a systematic campaign to track down and reconvert or kill those who have changed their religion from Islam." http://97.74.65.51/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=4923

hariaum

I don't know if the subtlety of language is in the way here but perhaps the overwhelming themes are obvious:

Women in the koran

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/women/long.html

hariaum

Walter,

There are dozens of authentic translations of the Holy Quran available on the web. Why did you have to go the website of an American University and pick out a translation done by a person who is not an Arab. Marmaduke Pickthal is a well respected muslim scholar, and he was perhaps amongst the first people to translate Quran to English. But there are certain sophisticated details in Arabic language which only an Arab scholar can understand. I have also read many translations of the Quran and beleive me nowhere does it says scourging. Following are a couple of links I found out that are authentic to the best of my knowledge. They also provide the context to which this surah addresses us muslims.

http://www.themodernreligion.com/women/w_abuse_badawi.htm

http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?HD=11&ID=4863&CATE=121

I am yet to come across an incident where a woman was scourged and the husband cited these Quranic verses sanctioning his act. There are other reasons for wife beating ofcourse (and in some case husband beating as well) and it happens all over the world. I hope these two links that I provided will clear your doubts~! looking forward to your response to the rest of the post.

hello, yasser. glad you found your way here. i'll respond sporadically, as time permits. this jumped out at me as your charge of my "making stuff up" required a quick response...

***islamabused women:
you said,
"Walter, There you go on again. Making up stuff as you go along. Nowhere does the Quran Sanctions Scourging. Read the book first my brother~!"

i'm not sure if your trying to fool me or really think this.

some years ago when i heard "islamophobes" claim the koran condones wife-beating, i too was shocked! so, before i could believe such a horrible thing, i DID "read the book first my brother", and was repulsed to find verse 4:34:

"Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the support of women). So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them. Then if they obey you, seek not a way against them. Lo! Allah is ever High, Exalted, Great."

i love how it ends with an exaltation to allah for his wisdom in allowing (requiring?) men to scourge disobedient women....lovely.

the above is the "pickthal" translation, and i understand translation from arabic is a tricky thing. which translation do you prefer? some say "beat (lightly)"... i use this site for koran references http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/crcc/engagement/resources/texts/muslim/quran/

***religious freedom:

So Walter what are these religious freedoms that muslims have in western countries that we do not extend to non-muslims here??

“only in a SECULAR SOCIETY can there be true FREEDOM OF RELIGION. that’s the big idea islam needs to embrace”

Did you follow the recent vote of the “Secular Society” in Switzerland?? They have banned Muslims from building Minarets with their mosques because they likened them to missiles. That’s enlightenment of a free thinking society for you. You can have that referendum anywhere in Europe, the consensus amongst most experts is that the result wont be much different. There is literally an unannounced ban throughout Europe on muslims building mosques or their having their own graveyards. They mostly pray in factory warehouses or abandoned churches. I can tell you about Karachi, the city I live in. Here Christians are less than 2% of the total population but there are atleast 15 big churches that I know of (you can look it up on wikipedia). None of them have been customized as in asked to cut down their heights or alter their arches to take an Islamized shape. Christians build them whichever way they like. In addition to those churches there are plenty of smaller churches spread all over various Christian colonies. Plus the farcical Free Society of French secularism that we have already discussed. So your argument that freedom of religion is only possibly in Secular countries isn’t quite backedup with evidence

Walter Sorry I missed the following part

***america – the christian nation!?:

My argument was never whether America is a Christian Nation or not. You quoted me correctly where I said that Bible is the progenitor of all Western Constitutions and Laws. I stand by it. They definitely dont stop at religous holidays. Freedom of Religion is not a revolutionary concept that was introduced by people who drafted the American Constitution. It goes back several centuries. I will againt cite the 800 year muslim presence in Iberia. Let me quote you what Andrew Jackson, 7th President of US and someone who faught the Civil War (probably played a role in drafting the constitution as well) said in reference to Bible,

"That book, Sir, is the Rock upon which our republic rests"

Another US President, Calvin Coolidge had this to say;

"The foundations of our society and our government rest so much on the teachings of the Bible that it would be difficult to support them if faith in these teachings would cease to be practically universal in our country"

I will agree that the US constitution gives more rights to its minorities than any of those European countries, but to say that it is devoid of any inspirations from the Bible is completely wrong. However, we do know that there are special laws for muslims in US where they can be locked up and torchered in jails for years without ever being convicted of any crime. Or the racial profiling laws thats are exclusively muslim specific. The US Constitution fails to protect muslims against these violations of basic human rights. With regards to us moderate muslims teaching the fanatics amongst us, I agree with you. And you should also do the same with your own fanatics like Robertson, Buchanan, Beck, Hannity, Spencer etc. who believe that US is indeed a Christian Nation founded on Judeo-Christian Principles and often cite this as the reason for waging wars against muslims. You need to isolate these fanatics. I think you can start with yourself~!

Walter, I have attempted to respond to all your questions. The ones I left were because I thought Id be repeating myself If I answer those. Still if you need more clarification on any of them, Ill be happy to give it.

Yasser

***islamabused women:

Walter,

There you go on again. Making up stuff as you go along. Nowhere does the Quran Sanctions Scourging. Read the book first my brother~! Don’t become a sheep following hate mongers wherever they take you. Wife beating is a crime in Pakistan. Just like it is in your country. And you shouldn’t read too much into those polls. They aren’t an absolute science. A lot of them turn out to be false. Plus they can be easily manipulated by positioning your questions in such a way that you can elicit a response of your own liking. Follow the facts and you’ll be better off.

***danish cartoons (and koran desecration):

You wrote,

“uh...sorry...no excuse. that’s like blaming the girl for rape because she was dressed sexily...”

Im sorry I do not see any relation to the actual situation with the analogy you quoted. There’s nothing sexy about portraying a figure that is revered by a fifth of humanity who they love more than their family. The fact that your government sanctions funds for pictures of Jesus soaked in urine of Jesus has no bearing on us. He is your Prophet. We don’t like what you do. We infact see that as a symbol of degeneration of your society. Who decides that your society is the purest of all? But the fact remains, we do not allow your religious figures to be desecrated in our countries. Im saddened to hear your views regarding the tearing and flushing of the Quran. It speaks of someone who has absolutely no respect for the culture and traditions of other people. Its not even a question of whether my God is bigger or your God. The fact that you don’t see any issue with a foreign army coming from thousands of miles away in garb of liberators, locking up innocent people in hell holes and devising devilish techniques for mental disintegration of prisoners including desecrating their holy books and symbols, clearly exposes your colonialist mentality.

***an islamic UDHR:

Walter, you’re stretching this argument a bit too far. Muslims are asking nothing on the scale of the examples that you cite like lynching etc. Banning books that questions holocaust is ok with the current UDHR, you never responded why you believe that’s ok. The current UDHR is based on Judeo Christians principles because they happen to be in majority in the UN. I know all about the tyranny of majority. 4 out of 5 countries of the UN Security Council happen to be pre-dominantly Christian. Their tyranny when it comes towards vetoing resolutions that concerns us is well known to us. I think the OIC states would not want a wholesale overhaul of the UN Charter. All they want is that our sensitivities be taken into consideration just as those of yours are taken. That is a fair demand whichever way you look at it. Frankly I do not see it as a human rights issue.

You wrote,
“yes, tyranny of the majority. does this french decree ban “headscarves” or covering the face? i think there’s a big difference there.”

Well you can look it up yourself. The French have banned the headscarves. It means you probably cannot enter French Schools even wearing hoodies. Some upholders of Human Rights the French turned out to be~! And lets not fool ourselves, this ban has been specifically designed to target muslims. I saw some movies on the Internet highlighting the lives of girls who have to sit at homes because the French Government bans them for exercising their rights of self expression. Its telling that none of those so called feminists of Europe never speak for these girls.

***apostasy laws:

"and apparently, historically, islamic scholars have determined that beheading is the islamic way. i suppose that’s somehow more humane than stoning... but can you agree that “big city” laws don’t usually apply to “country muslims”? i.e., that justice is local? that “tribal elders” use Islamic laws to decide cases – whether or not that’s official government policy?"

Walter,

There's no agreement among Islamic scholars that beheading should be the punishment for apostasy. I would really like to know the source of this claim. Did you even read the wikipedia link you yourself posted? Let me paste an excerpt from that link

"Some Islamic jurists, such as Hanafi jurist Sarakhsi,[5] Maliki jurist Abu al-Walid al-Baji, and Hanbali jurist Ibn Taymiyyah,[6] and some contemporary Islamic jurists, such as Shafi`i Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa[7][8] and Shi'a Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri,[9] argued or issued fatwas that either the changing of religion is not punishable or is only punishable under restricted circumstances.[10][11][12][13] Some groups within Islam such as the Shi'a Ismaili reject death for apostasy altogether.[citation needed]"

How many killings for apostasy do you know of for conversion to other faith? I can think of none in the last 100 years. doesn't that prove to you anything? In Pakistan Ahmadi's and Ismaili's are considered apostates. There are atleast a few hundred thousand of them. Never ever has any of them been beheaded. I would really like to know what is your source to all this info on Islam. I remember you once said you entirely agree with everything Pat Robertson says on Islam and I know I have mistaken your sense of humor for serious comments in past. i am seriously hoping he is not your only source of learning Islam. That would be a tad bit embarrassing. But seriously, I would like to know what kind of books you have studied on Islam. With regards to tribal justice system, they are a cultural thing and not a Islamic thing. That’s a generalization people make out of ignorance. However, there have been crackdowns by the government on these local courts wherever they transgress laws.

test

yasser,
below, i re-posted my last few posts (the ones you hadn't responded to yet) from the old thread. comment away!

***danish cartoons (and koran desecration):
you said,
”On the Danish Cartoons thing, its regeretable that all those deaths occured (Most of them occured in one country, Nigeria!). But i've said it before on these blogs, it was an astutely timed provocation...we were hearing horrible stories from Abu Gharaib...”

uh...sorry...no excuse. that’s like blaming the girl for rape because she was dressed sexily...

abu gharaib was horrible. i apologize 1000 more times. (though i just heard news recently of some pakistani torture scandal...) there’s taking religion seriously, and there’s being childishly hyper-sensitive and obsessive about it. a rational person would say, “how is my god harmed by (a non-believer, no less!) flushing a piece of paper with ink on it down the toilet?” how fragile is your god that that bothers you? in the united states we have public funding for pictures of jesus soaked in urine... people complain about it, but that’s freedom of speech and separation of church and state in action.

have you heard of “the onion”? it’s a sometimes-hilarious parody newspaper. they’ll have articles like an interview with post-9/11 muhammad atta, in hell. atta is “quoted” as being surprised to find himself in hell, and saying how he thought there’d be virgins etc...awaiting him in heaven. anyway, the muslim reaction to the Danish cartoons is straight out of the onion. the idea that cartoons depicting islam as a violent religion would be met with...well...violent muslim protests is just too funny. muslims proved the cartoons right! lighten up! it’s just a joke. and it’s only funny if there’s a grain of truth. the muslim reaction made those cartoons even funnier...

you asked,
”Whats wrong with demanding no more mass burnings of the Quran, No more desecration of Holy figures? Whats wrong with that? Wouldn't the world be a better place if we learnt to respect each other's culture?”

those are great aspirations. those are the goals of the UDHR. to the extent that “desecration of holy figures” and “mass koran burning” is happening, that’s a shame. as to whether it’s illegal or immoral, that depends: if i steal your koran and burn it, that’s bad – and illegal. if i burn MY OWN koran, well, that’s my business – at least in a country that protects enlightened human rights. as a corollary, i hate it when people burn american flags. i love america. but i totally support their right to burn american flags.

***islamabused women:
i said,
“islamabused” women would be victims of “scourging” (koran 4:34) and other misogynistic verses, practices and rituals".

you said,
”...You said Scourging?? in Pakistan?? I though you had been to Pakistan? Ask your dad if you were too young to remember. When was the last time a woman was whiplashed in Pakistan? We dont give such punishments dude!~ You're wrong here as well just as with everyother thing.”

i don’t mean government-sanctioned scourging. i mean koran-sanctioned scourging in the privacy of one’s own home. we can talk about how hard a man is allowed to hit a woman (islamic scholars have...), but do we really want to go there? the fact is wife-beating is in the koran. edhi expends great energy housing, protecting and legally defending islamabused women. hopefully, most muslim men are nice about it, don’t exercise their god-given right to scourge, behave respectfully, and NEVER beat their wives. but, should they choose to scourge, they can point to v4:34. sure, women are beaten in “western culture”, but we can’t point to scripture for justification. and, how many husbands can a wife have in islam?

again, i refer you to this poll for pakistani’s level of religious tolerance:
http://reasonweekly.com/religion/78-of-pakistanis-support-death-penalty-for-apostasy-83-support-stoning-adulterers
and this study on domestic violence in pakistan:
http://www.hrcp-web.org/ReportsDisplay.aspx?id=3

***an islamic UDHR:
you said,
”Yes the OIC has demanded their version of UDHR. Whats wrong with that? In any democratic dispensation you have the right to demand what you believe is correct with justifiable means. If theirs ever a voting on that the OIC would probably lose considering only fifth of the countries are muslim.”

human rights should not be a majority-rules issue. are you saying if there were enough muslim countries that would make it moral to subject the rest of us to islamic laws? what if the majority wants something immoral like, say, lynching black people in alabama or banning books? a democracy needs a neutral human rights constitution to protects itself from itself... you know, tyranny of the majority and all that.

you said,
sudan’s public order act was ”Just as wrong as the Christian Majority French Nation's decree that any girl who covers her head wont be allowed to study in French educational Institutions (isn't that extremism of the other end??).”

yes, tyranny of the majority. does this french decree ban “headscarves” or covering the face? i think there’s a big difference there.

***america – the christian nation!?:
you said,
”Can you say Christianity plays absolutely no role in governing in predominantly Christian countries? The separation of Church and state is a fancy word. The progenitor of your constitutions and your laws is indeed the Bible.”

well, if by “role” you mean our national holidays are christmas and easter, then, ok, there’s a christian influence on laws. if you mean that tolerance, individual rights (including freedom of religion) and democracy are “christian principles”, then i beg to differ. please don’t think of those enlightenment ideas as “christian” or “biblical”. you moderate muslims have to teach those crazy militants that embracing those ideas isn’t “unislamic”. they can’t think “separation of church and state” is a christian idea. and it’s not.

where the bible imagines one god, the declaration of independence welcomes all gods. the u.s. constitution was the first constitution to PREVENT jesus (or any god) from making society’s rules. where the first amendment guarantees freedom of religion, the first commandment prohibits it. thomas jefferson et. al. fought hard to keep jesus (any god) out of the constitution. the fact that we ARE NOT a christian nation is what was revolutionary about america.

***apostasy laws:
you said,
”And pray tell when was the last stoning to death for apostacy that happened in any country?”

agreed that stoning for apostasy is not LEGAL today, but MOST people in pakistan would impose some form of death penalty for apostasy if given the chance. stoning would be saved for adultery...
http://reasonweekly.com/religion/78-of-pakistanis-support-death-penalty-for-apostasy-83-support-stoning-adulterers

and apparently, historically, islamic scholars have determined that beheading is the islamic way. i suppose that’s somehow more humane than stoning... but can you agree that “big city” laws don’t usually apply to “country muslims”? i.e., that justice is local? that “tribal elders” use Islamic laws to decide cases – whether or not that’s official government policy?

the very fact that there have been TRIALS for apostasy recently in egypt, afghanistan and iran says enough. the very idea that there would be ANY laws about apostasy is unenlightened. legal distinctions aside, islamic vigilantes these days seem to prefer stabbing.... and famous apostates must live in exile, like nazi war criminals or something.... again, it’s islamic laws being applied to society at large.

references for egypt, afghanistan, iran, stabbings and exiled apostates...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostasy_in_Islam

***religious freedom:
i said,
“almost by definition, religious freedom for the 600,000,000+ people in these countries is impossible.”

and you said,
”Impossibel? Huh? How did you endup with that Statistic? Can you back it up with actual proof? You're pretty lax with these absolute words you use Walter.”

if you add the populations of the countries designated “islamic” (iran etc...) and the countries with “islam” as the “national religion”, you get over 600,000,000 people living in countries with some degree of governmental religious favoritism. by enlightened standards, this is not freedom of religion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Muslim_majority_countries muslims may think they’re being enlightened and magnanimous by “allowing” non-muslims to live in muslim society. and maybe by pre-enlightenment standards they are. jefferson, madison et. al. put an end to all that with their secular constitution. only in a SECULAR SOCIETY can there be true FREEDOM OF RELIGION. that’s the big idea islam needs to embrace.

It is indeed deplorable what is happening to the poor defenseless Jewish people of Yemen, who have lived peacefully with the Yemenese muslim majority preferring their Yemenese heritage over the life of prosperity in Israel or USA. As a muslim I am ashamed that there are such muslims who consider it somehow righteous to hurt defenseless Jewish people who niether have means nor the intentions to cause them any harm. And yes I agree that it is as grave a concern if not more, than the banning of the Minarets in Switzerland. I am all for On Faith starting a thread on this issue. I doubt most muslims are even aware that this is happening in Yemen. No true muslim, moderate or radical can ever agree to the persecution of a defenseless minority in our midst. Maybe if a thread such as this is started, we can highlight this issue as well as finding a solution, prolly getting a fatwa from the Egyptian Mufti on this blog deeming this act unislamic.

And thankyou farnazmansouri1 for bringing this up. Our differences withstanding, this is a clear violation of human rights and needs to be highlighted even more forcefully~!

In a very short while, Yemen will be officially Judenrein. Coming under increasing attack from violent Islamist gangs, Yemen's 350 remaining Jews are under heavy guard. These Yemeni Jews practice a unique form of Judaism, which will soon be lost to our culture.

They, like all Middle Eastern Jews, have been in the Middle East since long before Mohammed set foot upon the earth. The Jewish presence in Yemen dates back to the Solomonic era--3,000 years.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/24/AR2009112403898.html

I think that the plight of living human beings is a little more important than architecture. The murders of Jews in Yemen, however, is not of interest to OnFaith. Where is the outcry from Muslims? The protests?

Synagogues have been firebombed in Florida, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, France, Sweden, Venezuela, Holland, etc., for months, and where is OnFaith.

Jews are unsafe in the streets of Europe. Will, it, too, soon be Judenrein like the MIddle East?

Where is the outcry from Muslims?

The end of a three-thousand-year-long culture is occurring in Yemen....

The protests from Muslims?

From OnFaith?

Hi Walter,

There's less traffic here~! I think we can continue our discussion over here. I too would very much like to get your feedback~!

The Swiss decision had nothing to do with the call to prayer - that was already illegal. It was about the architecture.

I agree that a ban is ridicules, but where is the outrage against Muslim countries that ban or restrict the Christian church?

As a dual national Swiss-American living in the USA, who voted in this initiative after giving it careful thought, I believe I have something to say to my fellow Americans who may find this decision by the Swiss people puzzling. For me, my vote in favor of the initiative was about preserving culture -- NOT religious intolerance. Muslims remain free to worship as they wish. Switzerland is a very small country, maybe a little bigger than Massachusetts with a population of 7 million people. It has distinct cultures that have been around for hundreds of years. If it were to become a melting pot like America, in a generation or two there would be no Switzerland.

The vote by the Swiss people was NOT misguided as the author states. If she had a real clue how democracy works in Switzerland, perhaps the world's only functioning direct democracy, she would realise that there is no excuse for an uninformed vote.

Katharine Henderson

You wrote, "After hearing about the Swiss vote to prohibit the building of mosque minarets earlier this week, my mind went quickly to Jerusalem where one of my greatest pleasures is hearing the Muslim call from minarets echo across the hills, soon to be followed by the bells of Christian churches in the Old City, mixed with the chants of Hebrew prayers from the faithful at the Wailing Wall."

I have never been to Jerusalem nor have I been to Saudi Arabia but I was wondering, if you have ever experienced "one of my greatest pleasures", as you put it, if you have ever been to Saudi Arabia or some other selected places on this planet?

You also wrote, "How sterile would this public space be if cleansed of all of this infinite variety to stimulate the senses?"

If one actually listens, there are many other "stimulations of the senses", besides the man-made ones, out there in God's creation.

You also wrote, "Given this definition, it would seem that for the Swiss, church bells are appreciated or tolerated because they are either assumed to be meaningful, or charming, or simply unnoticed as part of the usual background."

Like it or not, some may take these "some sounds as legitimate and others as "unwanted" noise", as you put it, and relate it to the "reality" that is going on in the world.

You also wrote, "To expect God to be cribbed and confined only to the sounds we know, like church bells, seems blasphemous. For in such acts we are making God small and in only our own image."

For anyone that says that they "believe" in the bible and not think of absolutely every human being past, present and to come to be their brothers and sisters is to 'rip out page one', "Let Us make man, mankind, in Our Image...", yet many who profess to be "Christian", do not believe in the "brotherhood of man", do they?

We human beings seem to be very good at what someone once said, "God has created us in His Image and we have been trying to return the favor ever since".

You concluded with "Bring on the cacophony of sound!", after all of the "sounds" and/or "noise", one may find that God seems to, more often than not, come to us in the "silence", something that many of us seem so afraid of.

As I have said, God is a Trinity yet One, God is a Being of Pure Love, God is a searcher of hearts and minds, not of religious affiliations or lack thereof.

I have met God and that is why I wrote and have written and will continue to write what I wrote above.

God does not force Himself on us and anyone trying to force God on another is wrong.

God is neither a male, a female nor an it even tho God-Incarnate came as a Male, I use the male pronoun simply because it is handy to use pronouns.

Take care, be ready.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.