The Islam Conundrum

2006-10-01
By

The dictionary defines religion as, “The expression of man’s belief and reverence for a superhuman power recognized as the creator and governor of the universe.” By this definition Islam qualifies as religion, so do numberless others. A definition this broad is ambiguous and must be further defined with the specific tenets and practices of the belief.

Simply because someone or some people say that they believe in a superhuman deity and revere him, the belief is accorded the privileged status of religion?

It is generally assumed that religion addresses issues of importance to daily life as well as matters that transcend it. Religion is thought to exercise a civilizing influence by ordering the social life, promoting spirituality, as well as advancing an array of human virtues. Zoroaster, for instance, based his faith on the triad of goodly thoughts, goodly speech and goodly deeds: Moses framed the fundamentals of his faith in the Ten Commandments; and Jesus placed love at the core of his religion.

Many people adhere to religion for providing them with comfort and a compass in life. It is these assumed benevolent features of religion that confer it special status. Yet concern with religion overreaching has led societies to enact safeguards against that possibility. Some, for instance, feared that Christ was a rebellious Jew aiming to challenge the ruling Romans. Perhaps to assuage this fear, Christ emphatically proclaimed, “Render to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” To this day, there are those who still believe that the Christ was a mere social revolutionary.

In the case of Islam there is no ambiguity at all. The mosque and the state were one and the same from the very start. During his lifetime, Muhammad embodied in his person all three branches of worldly secular governance—the legislative, the judiciary and the executive—as well as the religious domain. As a messenger of Allah, he transmitted Allah’s laws, adjudicated according to those laws and implemented Allah’s design. He also prescribed a set of religious instructions for the spiritual life of the faithful.

After Muhammad, the Islamic rule was continued by Caliphs and Imams. To this day, wherever it is able, Islam governs as the state, either directly as is the case in Saudi Arabia, or indirectly as practiced in places such as the Islamic Republic of Iran.

When religion crosses the line that separates it from the state, serious problems present themselves. In the case of Islam, the rule of the people, by the people, for the people is supplanted by the rule of Allah, by the faithful to Allah, for the pleasure of Allah.

Other problems arise. Liberty, deeply cherished by democracies, is replaced by submission—unquestioning obedience and adherence to the dictates and precepts of the all-knowing and all-wise Allah. It is this total form of submission that, among other things, prompted the Muslims to systematically burn libraries of the lands they invaded. They justified their action by contending that the Quran, the comprehensive unerring book of Allah, contained all perfect knowledge that humanity needs. To this day, in places where Islam rules many books are banned, newspapers and magazines are systematically either censored or shut down, and other non-print media are methodically blocked.

The contempt for free inquiry is encapsulated in the statement of Muhammad, “Al-elmo noghtatan katharoho al-jaheloon”—Knowledge is only one dot, expanded by the ignorant.

Once liberty is surrendered for submission, a host of serious consequences present themselves. The individual becomes little more than a passive obedient vessel of Allah and his perspective of himself and life is drastically changes. Once he submits to the all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-alls, then he is absolved of the responsibility of having to chart his own way in life.

There is considerable allure in submission to a powerful that is willing and able to take care of the person. It is not a bad arrangement. The problem is that all past claimants have invariably been proven as either fraud or failures in honoring their part of the bargain. Islam is no exception. A cursory glance is enough to show the condition of Muhammad’s flock. In spite of huge material wealth, Muslims in the oil-rich countries are imprisoned in the paralyzing mentality of submission and all the terrible ancillaries that go with it.

There is no reason to believe that Muslims have inferior intelligence. Their inferior existence is strictly a function of the primitive doctrine of Islam: a doctrine of nihilism, ignorance, and violence that denigrates this life and fixes the starry eye of the faithful on the next life. A case in point is the Islamic madressehs in places like Pakistan. Never mind the girls. Girls are not in the calculus—women are incidental in Islam. Consider the boys. Millions of young boys are enrolled in madressehs—religious boarding schools—learning very little beside memorizing and reciting the Quran. This is a case of total submission: Islam at its best, as championed by the oil-money-flushed Saudi patrons of the Wahabi sect.

Sadly enough, instead of Muslims marching out of the suffocating swamps of submission to the meadow of liberty, Allah’s faithful aim to drag the rest of humanity into the deadly Islamic quagmire. Islam may have been an improvement to the life of the savages that roamed the Arabian desserts some 1400 years ago. The 21st century world is not willing to surrender to the clearly failed and failing Islamic experiment, simply because of the claim that it is the one and only true religion of Allah.

Amil Imani is an Iranian-born American citizen and pro-democracy activist residing in the United States of America. Imani is a columnist, literary translator, novelist and an essayist who has been writing and speaking out for the struggling people of his native land, Iran. He maintains a website at http://amilimani.com/index/

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  • chas

    The idea of the separation of church and state has done more damage to the US in my lifetime than any other idea. The Muslim countries will experience a similar apostasy if they allow separation of church and state.

    What they really need to do is to excommunicate and militarily defeat any Muslims that do not practice chivalry. Muhammad always practiced chivalry. The men kept the women and children in a safe place and went to war. If they were defeated, the women and children survived. Terrorists intentionally fight in a way that maximizes the deaths of women and children, for its effect. They want to draw sympathy to their cause. All Muslims must insist that anyone who does not practice chivalry is not a true follower of Muhammad.

    They must also define the type of adoration that Sadam Hussein demanded in Iraq as a form of idolatry. Only Allah is to be given that devotion.

  • chas

    The idea of the separation of church and state has done more damage to the US in my lifetime than any other idea. The Muslim countries will experience a similar apostasy if they allow separation of church and state.

    What they really need to do is to excommunicate and militarily defeat any Muslims that do not practice chivalry. Muhammad always practiced chivalry. The men kept the women and children in a safe place and went to war. If they were defeated, the women and children survived. Terrorists intentionally fight in a way that maximizes the deaths of women and children, for its effect. They want to draw sympathy to their cause. All Muslims must insist that anyone who does not practice chivalry is not a true follower of Muhammad.

    They must also define the type of adoration that Sadam Hussein demanded in Iraq as a form of idolatry. Only Allah is to be given that devotion.

  • chas

    The idea of the separation of church and state has done more damage to the US in my lifetime than any other idea. The Muslim countries will experience a similar apostasy if they allow separation of church and state.

    What they really need to do is to excommunicate and militarily defeat any Muslims that do not practice chivalry. Muhammad always practiced chivalry. The men kept the women and children in a safe place and went to war. If they were defeated, the women and children survived. Terrorists intentionally fight in a way that maximizes the deaths of women and children, for its effect. They want to draw sympathy to their cause. All Muslims must insist that anyone who does not practice chivalry is not a true follower of Muhammad.

    They must also define the type of adoration that Sadam Hussein demanded in Iraq as a form of idolatry. Only Allah is to be given that devotion.

  • http://www.antipeonage.0catch.com Roger Knight

    chas said:
    “The idea of the separation of church and state has done more damage to the US in my lifetime than any other idea. The Muslim countries will experience a similar apostasy if they allow separation of church and state.”
    I respectfully disagree. It was Tom Jefferson’s idea, and the rest of the Deists who founded our nation thought it a pretty good idea. Those of a more devout belief in Christianity objected to this idea for perhaps some of the reasons you believe it “destructive”. However, they could not answer the question, then WHICH church shall not be separate from the state? The Anglican-Episcapalian? The Catholics? (No! No! And Hell No! Not the Papists! That was the American consensus of the 1780′s!) The Prebyterians? The Unitarians? What about the Jews? In 1787 we decided that the original Constitution shall ban religious tests for office holders becuase it was thought that it offended the right of Christian voters to not allow them the choice of electing Jews. And vice versa.
    The reason for SEPARATING church and state was and is THE ONLY WAY CITIZENS OF DIVERSE RELIGIOUS BELIEFS, INCLUDING ATHEISM, CAN LIVE TOGETHER IN THE SAME SOCIETY ON THE SAME PIECE OF GROUND THAT FORMS THE TERRITORY OF A NATION.
    The alternatives look like this: A number of churches having connections with the state forcing them to play politics to maintain or expand their participation in government.
    A Catholic church-state tyranny as we saw in medieval Europe where such dissenters as Galileo Galilei were put under lifetime house arrest or Giordano Bruno burned at the stake for suggesting the heresy that the stars are actually distant suns with planets orbiting them and perhaps on some of these planets are intelligent life forms looking back at us with their telescopes.
    An Anglican church-state tyranny such as we saw in Britain that prohibited Catholics from having political citizenship rights because the fear that would lead to a Catholic church-state tyranny. The damage that the lack of separation between church and state in November 5, 1605 almost led to the detonation of over 5,000 pounds of gunpowder right beneath the Houses of Parliament during King James speech opening the new session of Parliament! Guy Fawkes, a Catholic, was motivated by this discrimination against Catholics and wanted to kill the King and the Members of Parliament.
    The last alternative to church-state separation is the Islamic Caliphate imposing sharia tyranny on everyone, including those Infidels left alive and allowed to live as dhimmies. What the good man Amil Imani describes and warns against.
    As for me, I prefer freedom of religion and freedom FROM religion in keeping churches out of government and government out of churches.
    The damage, chas, is not due to the separation between church and state, it is due to the Milo Minderbinders who infest the leadership positions in our government, churches, corporations, labor unions, schools, colleges, universities, main stream media, etc. I would not be surprized if the leadership of bowling leagues is infested with Milo Minderbinders.
    Read Catch 22 by Joe Heller, you will then know what I mean. Or read the Wikipedia article:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milo_Minderbinder

  • http://www.antipeonage.0catch.com Roger Knight

    chas said:
    “The idea of the separation of church and state has done more damage to the US in my lifetime than any other idea. The Muslim countries will experience a similar apostasy if they allow separation of church and state.”
    I respectfully disagree. It was Tom Jefferson’s idea, and the rest of the Deists who founded our nation thought it a pretty good idea. Those of a more devout belief in Christianity objected to this idea for perhaps some of the reasons you believe it “destructive”. However, they could not answer the question, then WHICH church shall not be separate from the state? The Anglican-Episcapalian? The Catholics? (No! No! And Hell No! Not the Papists! That was the American consensus of the 1780′s!) The Prebyterians? The Unitarians? What about the Jews? In 1787 we decided that the original Constitution shall ban religious tests for office holders becuase it was thought that it offended the right of Christian voters to not allow them the choice of electing Jews. And vice versa.
    The reason for SEPARATING church and state was and is THE ONLY WAY CITIZENS OF DIVERSE RELIGIOUS BELIEFS, INCLUDING ATHEISM, CAN LIVE TOGETHER IN THE SAME SOCIETY ON THE SAME PIECE OF GROUND THAT FORMS THE TERRITORY OF A NATION.
    The alternatives look like this: A number of churches having connections with the state forcing them to play politics to maintain or expand their participation in government.
    A Catholic church-state tyranny as we saw in medieval Europe where such dissenters as Galileo Galilei were put under lifetime house arrest or Giordano Bruno burned at the stake for suggesting the heresy that the stars are actually distant suns with planets orbiting them and perhaps on some of these planets are intelligent life forms looking back at us with their telescopes.
    An Anglican church-state tyranny such as we saw in Britain that prohibited Catholics from having political citizenship rights because the fear that would lead to a Catholic church-state tyranny. The damage that the lack of separation between church and state in November 5, 1605 almost led to the detonation of over 5,000 pounds of gunpowder right beneath the Houses of Parliament during King James speech opening the new session of Parliament! Guy Fawkes, a Catholic, was motivated by this discrimination against Catholics and wanted to kill the King and the Members of Parliament.
    The last alternative to church-state separation is the Islamic Caliphate imposing sharia tyranny on everyone, including those Infidels left alive and allowed to live as dhimmies. What the good man Amil Imani describes and warns against.
    As for me, I prefer freedom of religion and freedom FROM religion in keeping churches out of government and government out of churches.
    The damage, chas, is not due to the separation between church and state, it is due to the Milo Minderbinders who infest the leadership positions in our government, churches, corporations, labor unions, schools, colleges, universities, main stream media, etc. I would not be surprized if the leadership of bowling leagues is infested with Milo Minderbinders.
    Read Catch 22 by Joe Heller, you will then know what I mean. Or read the Wikipedia article:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milo_Minderbinder

  • http://www.antipeonage.0catch.com Roger Knight

    chas said:
    “The idea of the separation of church and state has done more damage to the US in my lifetime than any other idea. The Muslim countries will experience a similar apostasy if they allow separation of church and state.”
    I respectfully disagree. It was Tom Jefferson’s idea, and the rest of the Deists who founded our nation thought it a pretty good idea. Those of a more devout belief in Christianity objected to this idea for perhaps some of the reasons you believe it “destructive”. However, they could not answer the question, then WHICH church shall not be separate from the state? The Anglican-Episcapalian? The Catholics? (No! No! And Hell No! Not the Papists! That was the American consensus of the 1780′s!) The Prebyterians? The Unitarians? What about the Jews? In 1787 we decided that the original Constitution shall ban religious tests for office holders becuase it was thought that it offended the right of Christian voters to not allow them the choice of electing Jews. And vice versa.
    The reason for SEPARATING church and state was and is THE ONLY WAY CITIZENS OF DIVERSE RELIGIOUS BELIEFS, INCLUDING ATHEISM, CAN LIVE TOGETHER IN THE SAME SOCIETY ON THE SAME PIECE OF GROUND THAT FORMS THE TERRITORY OF A NATION.
    The alternatives look like this: A number of churches having connections with the state forcing them to play politics to maintain or expand their participation in government.
    A Catholic church-state tyranny as we saw in medieval Europe where such dissenters as Galileo Galilei were put under lifetime house arrest or Giordano Bruno burned at the stake for suggesting the heresy that the stars are actually distant suns with planets orbiting them and perhaps on some of these planets are intelligent life forms looking back at us with their telescopes.
    An Anglican church-state tyranny such as we saw in Britain that prohibited Catholics from having political citizenship rights because the fear that would lead to a Catholic church-state tyranny. The damage that the lack of separation between church and state in November 5, 1605 almost led to the detonation of over 5,000 pounds of gunpowder right beneath the Houses of Parliament during King James speech opening the new session of Parliament! Guy Fawkes, a Catholic, was motivated by this discrimination against Catholics and wanted to kill the King and the Members of Parliament.
    The last alternative to church-state separation is the Islamic Caliphate imposing sharia tyranny on everyone, including those Infidels left alive and allowed to live as dhimmies. What the good man Amil Imani describes and warns against.
    As for me, I prefer freedom of religion and freedom FROM religion in keeping churches out of government and government out of churches.
    The damage, chas, is not due to the separation between church and state, it is due to the Milo Minderbinders who infest the leadership positions in our government, churches, corporations, labor unions, schools, colleges, universities, main stream media, etc. I would not be surprized if the leadership of bowling leagues is infested with Milo Minderbinders.
    Read Catch 22 by Joe Heller, you will then know what I mean. Or read the Wikipedia article:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milo_Minderbinder

  • chas

    I said, my lifetime. I don’t need a speech about the founding fathers. I am contrasting Americans, who had in their pledge “one nation under God” to give the finger to the atheist-communists, who hated God. Now we have been taken over, by the atheists. If a teacher wears a cross, she is fired. If a student tries to thank God, in a graduation ceremony, he is censored. You think you are creating a religion free zone, but you are really creating a new religion. You are requiring by law that everyone in the US be atheist. The chaos and despair have already become serious problems and will get worse.

  • chas

    I said, my lifetime. I don’t need a speech about the founding fathers. I am contrasting Americans, who had in their pledge “one nation under God” to give the finger to the atheist-communists, who hated God. Now we have been taken over, by the atheists. If a teacher wears a cross, she is fired. If a student tries to thank God, in a graduation ceremony, he is censored. You think you are creating a religion free zone, but you are really creating a new religion. You are requiring by law that everyone in the US be atheist. The chaos and despair have already become serious problems and will get worse.

  • chas

    I said, my lifetime. I don’t need a speech about the founding fathers. I am contrasting Americans, who had in their pledge “one nation under God” to give the finger to the atheist-communists, who hated God. Now we have been taken over, by the atheists. If a teacher wears a cross, she is fired. If a student tries to thank God, in a graduation ceremony, he is censored. You think you are creating a religion free zone, but you are really creating a new religion. You are requiring by law that everyone in the US be atheist. The chaos and despair have already become serious problems and will get worse.

  • Malakas

    Good article! The critique of Iranian style Islam is probably fair. Anybody want to give a potted history of the Spanish Inquisition?

    Repeat three times: “There is no God but No-God and ……. (substitute name of politician, media figure or benefactor) is His Messenger.

  • Malakas

    Good article! The critique of Iranian style Islam is probably fair. Anybody want to give a potted history of the Spanish Inquisition?

    Repeat three times: “There is no God but No-God and ……. (substitute name of politician, media figure or benefactor) is His Messenger.

  • Malakas

    Good article! The critique of Iranian style Islam is probably fair. Anybody want to give a potted history of the Spanish Inquisition?

    Repeat three times: “There is no God but No-God and ……. (substitute name of politician, media figure or benefactor) is His Messenger.

  • http://www.antipeonage.0catch.com Roger Knight

    Obviously, the separation of church and state does not require the firing of a teacher for a slip of the tongue or wearing a cross, or the censoring of a student who thanks God and his beliefs for helping him acheive the requirements for graduation. That is why the First Amendment ALSO protects freedom of religion and speech.
    The problem is the power mad political correctness brigades and the Milo Minderbinders who sold themselves to the political correctness brigades.
    As for motivation: follow the money.

  • http://www.antipeonage.0catch.com Roger Knight

    Obviously, the separation of church and state does not require the firing of a teacher for a slip of the tongue or wearing a cross, or the censoring of a student who thanks God and his beliefs for helping him acheive the requirements for graduation. That is why the First Amendment ALSO protects freedom of religion and speech.
    The problem is the power mad political correctness brigades and the Milo Minderbinders who sold themselves to the political correctness brigades.
    As for motivation: follow the money.

  • http://www.antipeonage.0catch.com Roger Knight

    Obviously, the separation of church and state does not require the firing of a teacher for a slip of the tongue or wearing a cross, or the censoring of a student who thanks God and his beliefs for helping him acheive the requirements for graduation. That is why the First Amendment ALSO protects freedom of religion and speech.
    The problem is the power mad political correctness brigades and the Milo Minderbinders who sold themselves to the political correctness brigades.
    As for motivation: follow the money.

  • http://freethoughts.wordpress.com/2006/10/02/167/ « Free Thoughts

    [...] Amil Imani: The Islam Conundrum [...]

  • chas

    “The problem is the power mad political correctness brigades and the Milo Minderbinders who sold themselves to the political correctness brigades.”

    My comment:

    I think we mostly agree. I haven’t read this book, but reading the reference you gave explained it a little better.

    But, the idea that we can in this country or Muslims in their countries can make things better by becoming more secular is not just mad, I think it’s dangerous. The problem is that, when everything is explained without reference to the supernatural, it strips the young people of their Christian and Muslim ways of understanding everything. This results in despair and chaos. These are the things that give meaning to our lives and give order to society. They will replace it with Harry Potter. They will replace it with street gangs. Being religious is one of the most basic things about our humanity. In the atheist-communist movement it became their religion. They fought to the death to impose it on the rest of the world. They were brutal on anyone in their own country, who threatened them or wasn’t as pure as they expected. There is no religion free zone that can be created by the separation of church and state, which is a neutral ground. There is no logical reason to expect atheists to be good people. Everyone is religious.

    The atheist statement “there is no God” is just as religious as the believer’s statement “there is a God.” It is logically impossible to be otherwise. Both are answers to the same question, “is there a God?” All the possible answerers to this question are equally religious answers, because it is a religious question. The Buddhist answer, “we find peace inside and don’t try to seek the help of the gods to obtain it,” or the Hindu answer “God is beyond our understanding,” or the agnostic answer “there’s not enough evidence yet,” or “we can’t talk about God here,” or “God is just used to control and manipulate people,” or “I don’t care about God, ”or “the opiate of the masses,” or the scientist teaching evolution’s answer “God is just an irrational idea used by prehistoric people to explain what they couldn’t understand,” all of these ideas become the religion of the people, who use it to explain God. All are attempts to answer the question “is there a God?” Everyone is religious.

  • chas

    “The problem is the power mad political correctness brigades and the Milo Minderbinders who sold themselves to the political correctness brigades.”

    My comment:

    I think we mostly agree. I haven’t read this book, but reading the reference you gave explained it a little better.

    But, the idea that we can in this country or Muslims in their countries can make things better by becoming more secular is not just mad, I think it’s dangerous. The problem is that, when everything is explained without reference to the supernatural, it strips the young people of their Christian and Muslim ways of understanding everything. This results in despair and chaos. These are the things that give meaning to our lives and give order to society. They will replace it with Harry Potter. They will replace it with street gangs. Being religious is one of the most basic things about our humanity. In the atheist-communist movement it became their religion. They fought to the death to impose it on the rest of the world. They were brutal on anyone in their own country, who threatened them or wasn’t as pure as they expected. There is no religion free zone that can be created by the separation of church and state, which is a neutral ground. There is no logical reason to expect atheists to be good people. Everyone is religious.

    The atheist statement “there is no God” is just as religious as the believer’s statement “there is a God.” It is logically impossible to be otherwise. Both are answers to the same question, “is there a God?” All the possible answerers to this question are equally religious answers, because it is a religious question. The Buddhist answer, “we find peace inside and don’t try to seek the help of the gods to obtain it,” or the Hindu answer “God is beyond our understanding,” or the agnostic answer “there’s not enough evidence yet,” or “we can’t talk about God here,” or “God is just used to control and manipulate people,” or “I don’t care about God, ”or “the opiate of the masses,” or the scientist teaching evolution’s answer “God is just an irrational idea used by prehistoric people to explain what they couldn’t understand,” all of these ideas become the religion of the people, who use it to explain God. All are attempts to answer the question “is there a God?” Everyone is religious.

  • chas

    “The problem is the power mad political correctness brigades and the Milo Minderbinders who sold themselves to the political correctness brigades.”

    My comment:

    I think we mostly agree. I haven’t read this book, but reading the reference you gave explained it a little better.

    But, the idea that we can in this country or Muslims in their countries can make things better by becoming more secular is not just mad, I think it’s dangerous. The problem is that, when everything is explained without reference to the supernatural, it strips the young people of their Christian and Muslim ways of understanding everything. This results in despair and chaos. These are the things that give meaning to our lives and give order to society. They will replace it with Harry Potter. They will replace it with street gangs. Being religious is one of the most basic things about our humanity. In the atheist-communist movement it became their religion. They fought to the death to impose it on the rest of the world. They were brutal on anyone in their own country, who threatened them or wasn’t as pure as they expected. There is no religion free zone that can be created by the separation of church and state, which is a neutral ground. There is no logical reason to expect atheists to be good people. Everyone is religious.

    The atheist statement “there is no God” is just as religious as the believer’s statement “there is a God.” It is logically impossible to be otherwise. Both are answers to the same question, “is there a God?” All the possible answerers to this question are equally religious answers, because it is a religious question. The Buddhist answer, “we find peace inside and don’t try to seek the help of the gods to obtain it,” or the Hindu answer “God is beyond our understanding,” or the agnostic answer “there’s not enough evidence yet,” or “we can’t talk about God here,” or “God is just used to control and manipulate people,” or “I don’t care about God, ”or “the opiate of the masses,” or the scientist teaching evolution’s answer “God is just an irrational idea used by prehistoric people to explain what they couldn’t understand,” all of these ideas become the religion of the people, who use it to explain God. All are attempts to answer the question “is there a God?” Everyone is religious.






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