Muslims Will Have To Concede That Islam Is A Violent Faith
By
Sumit Paul, New Age Islam
2 October
2023
What
happened at a mosque in Balochistan on Muhammad's Birth Anniversary has again
raised an often-asked question: Is Islam intrinsically violent? Sad to say, it
is. Nearly sixty poor and innocent Muslims were killed at a mosque offering Namaz
on the day of the Birth Anniversary of Islam's founder. This is sad and
unfortunate. Bomb blasts have been taking place at regular intervals in the
Islamic countries like Pakistan (always the Numero Uno on this count),
Tanzania, Nigeria, Sudan, Somalia, among others. Muslims have been killing
Muslims. There seems to be no solution to Islamic militancy and terrorism.
A few years
ago, in the wake of the terrorist attack
in Manchester, UK, in which a suicide bomber blew himself up as thousands of
fans were exiting Ariana Grande’s pop concert, killing 22 people and injuring
59, the question arose: Is Islam violent? TOI invited yours truly and Maulana
Wahiduddin Khan's views on this issue. I categorically called Islam a violent
faith and Maulana defended Islam with his feeble arguments.
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View
Following
are my views:
‘Inherently
Violent’
SUMIT PAUL
Is Islam
inherently violent or are fringe elements besmirching its image? As a student
of Islamic theology and a complete non-believer, I’ve always felt that Islam is
inherently and intrinsically violent. Islam is the youngest of the three
Semitic faiths, namely, Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
History
of Halaal
Despite
Judaism and Islam being at loggerheads with each other right from Islam’s
inception, some 1400 years ago, there’re so many ritualistic legacies of
Judaism borrowed by Islam. The kosher of Judaism became Halaal in Islam. Not
eating pork and circumcision are common in both the faiths. There’re 21 other
major and minor rituals in both faiths that are common and Islam borrowed them
from Judaism, the oldest existing organised faith in the world.
Religio-ethnically, Islam is a tribal religion, with its origin is the desert
of Arabia. There were many warring tribes here, fighting and killing among
themselves. Professor Hamilton Gibb, renowned western authority on Islam, wrote
that the pre-Islamic shambolic scenario percolated down to the fabric of Islam
and therefore Islam could never part with its violent, pagan past. The ‘tribal
troglodytism’, a phrase coined by Samuel Huntington in his seminal essay ‘The
clash of civilizations’ (1963), explains the intrinsic violent streak of Islam.
As an efficient leader of those tribal people, Muhammad integrated the
constantly embattled tribes into a cohesive unit and Islam came into being.
That he had visions and verses descending upon him for 23 years are purely
theological issues. The then socio- ethnic issues formed the axis of the
neophyte Islam which had before it, two already great and established faiths,
Judaism and Christianity. Islam needed to establish itself as a religious group
competing with Judaism and Christianity, and so its advocates took a ruthless
stance.
Late
Professor Bernard Lewis of Princeton University, said, “ The violent measures
that the founder/s of Islam resorted to for establishing its supremacy over two
existing religions (Judaism and Christianity) became integral to the consciousness
of Islam and it could never give up violence.” He further stated that ‘violence
is Islam’s structural essence’. It’s Islam’s leit motif. It’s not always the
greatness of Islam’s holy book Quran and its seemingly simple teachings that
inspired heathens, pagans and idol-worshippers to embrace Islam, but often the
violent measures which compelled them to do so. Most of today’s subcontinental
Muslims rooting for Islam had unwilling ancestors, who had to accept it because
they had no other option. French scholar Francois Gautier has stated this fact
time and again in his books on the spread of Islam in the subcontinent. The
history of Islam is fraught with violent conversions. Algeria-born French
existentialist Albert Camus got so disgusted with radical Islam that when he
grew up, he left all manmade faiths and he wrote to his daughter and to fellow
existentialist Jean Paul Sartre, “I should be ‘thankful’ to Islam that I could
see its naked reality and the extended nakedness of all useless religions.”
During my postdoctoral research at Columbia University, I came across
unambiguously violent verses in the Quran. Many sane and sensible minds have
begun to question the very need of any religion and its by-product, god. It’s
high time, we discarded not just Islam but all man-made religions that have
outgrown their utility and become a veritable nuisance to humankind.
¦ Sumit
Paul extensively researched Islam at Cairo and Columbia University Post your
comments at speakingtree.in
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Counter
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‘Religion Of
Peace’
Maulana
Wahiduddin Khan,
The suicide
attack carried out in Manchester on 22 May, 2017 was ostensibly done in the
name of Islam, but in reality it was a satanic act. The methodology of Islam is
based entirely on peace, not on violence. A student of Islam must know that the
study of Islam is not like the study of a branch of science. For example,
chemistry is a discipline which has to be studied in the light of a single
framework based on the laws of nature. That is why chemistry students, when carrying
out an experiment, will always reach the same result. In chemistry, it is not
possible for one researcher to conclude that chemistry is a peaceful subject,
while another concludes it is a violent subject. Islam is different in this
regard. A student of Islam is always faced with two different models — Islam
and the Muslim community. A student has to study Islam in the light of these
two models. Without following the principle of differentiation between these two,
one cannot properly understand Islam. Islam, as a principle, is the name of an ideology.
The source of this ideology is a revealed book, that is, the Quran. It is this
revealed book that will decide what Islam is and what Islam is not. Another
aspect before a student of Islam is the followers of Islam.
Although
Muslims have accepted the religion of Islam, they are at the same time, part of
a society that shapes their thinking. But, Muslim society is a relative part,
not a real part of Islam. That is, the social aspects of the Muslim community
will be judged on Quranic principles. If they adhere to these principles, then
their actions will be in accordance with Islam, otherwise not. There are many
phenomena which have come to characterise the Muslim community due to the ‘age
factor’, although they are not ideologically justified in Islam. One of these
phenomena is violence. In the social sense, Muslims were part of a tribal
society and were naturally influenced by it. For example, when a tribal group
attacked them, they had to defend themselves. But this fighting was a result of
prevailing times and not part of Islamic teaching. A student must differentiate
between the ideology of Islam on the one hand and the history of Islam on the other.
The ideology is the real part of Islam, while the socio-cultural history of
Muslims is not entirely a part of Islam. For instance, in the early period of
Islam, battles in which Muslims engaged in with the Byzantine and Sassanid
empires are part of the history of Islam and not part of the ideology of Islam.
A student of Islam must differentiate between these two aspects, otherwise he
may not be able to have a correct picture of Islam. There are certain verses in
the Quran which give the command for war. This injunction is not meant to be
taken as a general principle, but appears in the Quran as a justification for
engaging in self-defence. These verses are applicable only when there is an
external threat. In the absence of such threat, these verses would be
inapplicable. ¦
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Islam needs
a thorough revamp. Instead of finding fault with other faiths and condemning
them for theological deviations, it's time for the Muslims across the globe to
introspect and find the causes that have tarnished the image of their religion.
They must also ask themselves as to why the whole world criticizes Islam.
There's no smoke without fire.
Instead of
defining and defending violent verses in the Quran, it's better if they're
removed permanently. Didn't Christians and Jewish make corrections in the Bible
and Torah to make the Books in sync with modern times?
You cannot
dictate your life by a 7th-Century book scribed by desert yokels in ambiguous
and incorrect Arabic. Strip the Quran of its violent spirit and make it a
benign book not just for Muslims but for the whole of humanity.
A book with
repeatedly threatening passages and a punitive Allah cannot be called a
pleasant screed. Muslims must embrace the modern values and ethos of a
civilized world instead of sticking to their primitive faith the way a toddler
refuses to part with his toy. They must stop pontificating and calling others Kafir
or infidels.
Let others
worship the way they want to. If Ahmadiyas believe in some other person and
revere him, what's your problem? Sublimate your obsession with Allah, Quran and
Muhammad into a passion.
So long as
mad and marauding Muslims remain obsessed with these three pillars of their
faith, they'll continue to indulge in massacres and mayhem all over the world.
In fine, Islam is sick. It, therefore, has to be medicated, treated in an
organised manner such as mass vaccination, etc. in a military type discipline.
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A
regular columnist for New Age Islam, Sumit Paul is a researcher in comparative
religions, with special reference to Islam. He has contributed articles to the
world's premier publications in several languages including Persian.
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-politics/muslims-concede-violent-faith/d/130800
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