Oh brother. Why doesn't he complain to Osama bin Laden and Omar Bakri about THEIR use of the word "jihad"? From AP, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:
SALEM, Ore. — A Portland Muslim leader is asking a pesticide-industry lobbyist to retract a statement in which she warned that Senate Democrats had declared "jihad" against Republicans over an environmental dispute.Shahriar Ahmed, president of the Bilal Mosque in Beaverton, said use of the term in an e-mail dealing with a controversy over a pesticide-use reporting program perpetuates negative stereotypes about Muslims.
"The term 'jihad' here was used intentionally to aggravate the situation," Ahmed said during a news conference yesterday.
The word has been used by Muslim extremists to describe holy war, but Ahmed said mainstream Muslims use the Arabic word to describe a person's internal struggle to do good.
Ahmed went to the Capitol to criticize an e-mail sent by lobbyist Paulette Pyle of the pesticide-user group Oregonians for Food and Shelter.
In a July 15 e-mail to about 500 farmers and foresters, Pyle warned that "the Senate Democrats have declared 'JIHAD' against the Republicans because they are opposed to [Pesticide Use Reporting System] funding."
Pyle said she meant nothing derogatory about Muslims and only used the term in an e-mail to members and supporters of the pesticide group as a way to highlight the issue.
"When I wrote that e-mail, it was like, 'I've got to say something to get your attention,' " she said, referring to farmers who she said were busy with harvest.
Courtney Campbell, chair of the philosophy department at Oregon State University, said many Muslims would be offended by how the word is used in Pyle's e-mail because it has a deep meaning in their religion.
"It really is using a pretty central term in the religion in a completely inappropriate context," Campbell said. He compared it to the significance of the word Israel, which he said has a similar meaning to the Jewish faith.
Ahmed was joined at yesterday's news conference by Sen. Frank Shields, D-Portland, who said it appeared that the word was used in the e-mail in a "racist and religionist" way.
"Religionist"? I see the PC drones are catching on to the fact that Islam is not a race, but to get at what they want they have to invent a whole new word.
But Pyle said Shields is blowing the statement out of proportion."Good grief. Are you kidding? I never even thought about it in that context," she said.
They should be kidding. Any sane and reasonable person would be kidding. They are not kidding.
I suggest we send e-mails to this Professor, Courtney Campbell, chair of the philosophy department at Oregon State University, who said many Muslims would be offended by how the word is used in Pyle's e-mail because it has a deep meaning in their religion.
"It really is using a pretty central term in the religion in a completely inappropriate context," Campbell said.
In our e-mails to Prof. Campbell, we should agree with him that Pyle's use of the term "jihad" was inappropriate, because it trivialized a traditionally sincere concept of waging a war of imperialistic domination against non-Muslim Infidels everywhere (lesser Jihad) and of each Muslim individual waging an internal spiritual war inside himself or herself (greater Jihad) to psychologically condition himself or herself for the lifelong commitment to spread the Absolute Truth of Islam over the entire world by any means necessary.
If the world had Olympic game competitions for displays of "religionism", Islam would win gold, silver and bronze every single time.
They freaking invented the concept.
What chutzpah!
"The word has been used by Muslim extremists to describe holy war, but Ahmed said mainstream Muslims use the Arabic word to describe a person's internal struggle to do good."
-- from the article above
Not one of the four main schools of Sunni jurisprudence, not any of the learned Shi'a theologians, including of course the quotable Ayatollah Khomeini, not the theologian Al-Ghazali, not the historian ibn Khaldun, not the traveller Ibn Battuta, not a single important figure in the history of Islam would agree with the remark of Shahriar Ahmed, head of the Bilal Mosque in Beaverton, Oregon, that the JIhad is primiarily about a "person's internal struggle to do good." Anyone who doubts this should begin by going to the Qur'an on-line, and play about with certain words, or go to www.faithfreedom.org, and look at the articles on Jihad, or go to any of the many websites -- www.questioning-islam.org for example, or www.dhimmitude.org -- where one can find chapter and verse, or rather sura and verse.
And if this Shahriar Ahmed, head of the Bilal Mosque in Beaverton, Oregon, who is so terribly offended by an Infidel's use of the word "Jihad," wishes to insist that "most Muslims" understand Jihad to mean "a person's internal struggle to do good" then he is flat-out lying. If he dares to produce as evidence for this preposterous claim that single hadith, a "weak" hadith that does not even appear in Bukhari or Muslim, he must really take Infidels for complete fools. Many of us have been -- let's face it, we simply didn't give Islam a thought. It was the subject of picture books, where a burnoosed Arab stands with a camel and a palm tree, or the stuff of ARAMCO propaganda. But few thought to study the matter, or to study how the matter is presented by what turn out to be a carefully-deployed army of apologists, in Washington, and in a good many academic suppliers of the membership of MESA Nostra [For more on MESA Nostra, and the "MESA Nostra Contest" please google "MESA Nostra Contest" and "jihadwatch." The date for acceptable entries has been indefinitely extended.]
Shariar Ahmed is not sufficiently talented at taqiyya to do the job right. Most of those posting here could do the job for him, far better. Of course, it is getting just a bit tougher all way round. Too many people looking stuff up, questioning pseudo-authority, talking to defectors from Islam, reading Andre Servier, things like that. Most disturbing.
Any chance of a Jihad against Infdidels thinking they can learn about Islam? I mean, no non-Musim can possibly begin to understand the beauty and tolerance and peace and wonderfulness of Islam. For them to try is an outrage. For them to think they can find out something without the helpful guidance of the likes of Shahriar Ahmed, head of the Bilal Mosque in Beaverton, Oregon --- well, I never. Who do these Infidels think they are? My they are uppity.
But just you wait. Soon enough, they will be put in their rightful place. As they have, sooner or later, wherever Islam triumphed, and Muslims ruled. It may take some decades, but since those Infidels give no sign of really fighting back -- well, we only have to lie low, stop the most attention-getting terrorism (or cut it out altogether), and wait, offering Da'wa to the despairing, and the dimwitted, and every society has plenty of both.
This argument about the two kinds of Jihad will run into some difficult ground if it ignores the many instances of "jihad" (and its verbal permutations) in the Koran where an internal ethical struggle is arguably implied. I think in the long run it would be more productive for us to condemn both the "inner" and the "outer" Jihads, because the inner Jihad is a psychological brainwashing tool to further the outer Jihad, and both have the same goal: world domination by the Absolute and Final Truth of Islam.
By over-emphasizing the dominance of outer violent Jihad among Muslims, we will tend to paint all Muslims as front-line foot-soldiers, whereas the majority of them, in performing other duties in service of Islam and therefore not conforming to the Jihadist front-soldier behavior, will then be pointed to by the PC crowd as evidence that most Muslims are "peaceful" etc.
Some of the citations from the Koran that arguably imply a Jihad of inner struggle or which at least show no overt evidence of the outer violent Jihad and are therefore ambiguous -- lauding those who "strive and are patient", "strive in the cause of God", "did you think that you would enter Paradise without God knowing those who would strive amongst you and knowing those who are patient?", "As for those who strive in Our cause, We will guide them to Our paths. For God is with the pious", etc.
My point is that it doesn't matter whether Jihad is also internal, or even primarily internal: it serves the same end as the external violent Jihad: it in fact is more dangerous, as it enables the mass brainwashing of a culture that becomes the nourishing and astonishingly effective incubator of the minority of unprecedentedly fanatical front-line soldiers.
I just sent the senator an email expressing my outrage for his support of Mr. Ahmed's campaign to villify Ms. Pyle. Here is the senator's email address if you wish to contact him: sen.frankshields@state.or.us
"Courtney Campbell, chair of the philosophy department at Oregon State University, said many Muslims would be offended by how the word is used in Pyle's e-mail because it has a deep meaning in their religion.
"It really is using a pretty central term in the religion in a completely inappropriate context," Campbell said. He compared it to the significance of the word Israel, which he said has a similar meaning to the Jewish faith."
Where were Courtney Campbell and Mr. Ahmed when Yasser Arafat was exhorting Palestinians via PA TV to give their children up to martyrdom if they themselves were too old to fight, shrieking "Jihad, Jihad, Jihad"?
And would someone here more versed in Judaism than secular old me comment on how Campbell can suggest there is any equivalence between the significance of the "word Israel" to Jews with "jihad" to Muslims?
Jihad is in the Koran
Killing is in the Koran
Be-heading is in the Koran
Rape is in the Koran
Genocide is in the Koran
but when we tell the truth or make a mention of this the muslims get upset...
I really dont care anymore what the EVIL Koran and Muslims think...
How many Internet imams are required to create a holy statement?
Nobody knows.
Campbell and Shields (in particular) sound like the kind of cringing handwringer it's barely possible to satirise anymore. Ricky Gervais tried it anyway in the US version of The Office. Anyone remember the 'Diversity Day' episode?
Michael Scott: 'Is there any term besides Mexican that you prefer? Something less offensive?'
""The word has been used by Muslim extremists to describe holy war, but Ahmed said mainstream Muslims use the Arabic word to describe a person's internal struggle to do good."
Any evidence anywhere about "Muslims doing good? due to Jihad?
"mainstream Muslims use the Arabic word to describe a person's internal struggle to do good."
internal struggle to do a good dump more like.
Pyle's use of the word jihad was appropriate in the context, and there should be no apology or retraction.
Metaxy is right about the dangerousness of the "internal" jihad.
Our problem is to avoid having to eat our words when the muslims pull the switcheroo and try to claim that jihad is an "internal" struggle. This is the Dhimmi Set-Up Maneuver, and the counter-move is to refuse the Gambit by saying something like: "Well, he/they seem to be offended by everything these days." This takes some stamina, and not every speaker is prepared.
Of course, the muslims are trying to frame all discussion, debate and analysis by capturing all the nomenclature. We must not let them do this. We have to learn from the Civil Rights Movement and the Environmental Movement and the Women's Rights Movement and the Whale Movement and the Gay Rights Movement.
Capture the language used in the discussion. Give no ground. The only people that have come close to that are the anti-abortionists who have laid claim to the term: Pro-Life. And they have managed to keep their issue alive against the term: Pro-Choice. All the other movements have taken the high ground already.
Make no mistake. This is important. The muslims are waging this jihad (external) on a concerted basis in many places all the time. Slander suits, legal "equality" suits, acceptance legislation, head scarf rights, classroom posters, textbooks, everything.
I don't believe it was used in the proper context, and an apology to the Democrats is in order. (I can't seriously believe that the Oregon Democrats intended to murder the Republicans in the course of imposing their will over this issue)
cru sade' n. an inner spiritual struggle. Modern practitioners include USMC scout/snipers and Army Rangers.
Thanks for his address helox, I've just sent him a piece of my mind and asked him to apologize or resign.
As texan says,
"Our problem is to avoid having to eat our words..."
A difficult task without a firm grasp of the "Islamic Scholar's Flowchart".
Ex:
The Qur'an says: abc, which has been abrogated along the way by one or more ahadith, of varying degrees of veracity, which have been further interpreted and passed on to the masses as fact, more or less, by Islamic 'scholars', some of whom may not read or write terribly well, but who have, nonetheless hung out their 'shingles' (from Cairo to Zamboanga), and whose interpretations of the orginal Qur'anic text, as modified, have failed to pass the scrutiny of all four schools of Islamic jursiprudence (or is it eight?).....
It is not easy to avoid eating our words.
Hmmm. Okay, the next time somebody smashes their hand or bumps into something and yells, 'Jesus Christ'!! is going to get a fatwah from me. The name Jesus Christ has deep meaning for me and to use His name out of context will upset my 'religionism'. muslim Jerkoffs!
/sarcasm
From the article,
"Shahriar Ahmed, president of the Bilal Mosque in Beaverton, said use of the term in an e-mail dealing with a controversy over a pesticide-use reporting program perpetuates negative stereotypes about Muslims."
I take it the "negative stereotype" is the one where infidels are viewed as pests worthy of extermination?
"Any evidence anywhere about "Muslims doing good? due to Jihad?"
Islam has its own lexicon.
"Peace" = the sociopolitical stability that is the result of Muslims conquering a particular territory and making Islam dominant over the population.
"Self-defence" = attacking non-Muslim people who resist and/or repudiate the conquest & colonization of Islam.
"Doing good" = Supporting the ongoing spread of Islam in a variety of ways, including military conquest and colonization.
The re-crystallizing sentiment among the majority of Muslims is that Muslims have been impeded from "doing good" mostly because of the dominant hegemony of the modern West over the last few hundred years, with particularly repellant dominance (with American at the vanguard) growing this last 20th century.
Should a mosque be allowed in a town named "Beaverton"?
Isn't that haram?
I want to declare a "struggle" against stupidity, both internal and external.
And a fatwa against fatheads.
Democratic and Republican.
(They shouldn't trivialize such a fateful and fatal word like "jihad". Or the word "Nazi" or "gulag". They dilute the horrific to their juvenile level, which is why 9/11 happened... the unserious at the helm steering the West onto the shoals of historical ignorance.)
completely inappropriate context," Campbell said. He compared it to the significance of the word Israel, which he said has a similar meaning to the Jewish faith
WHAT KIND OF FOOL IS THIS PERSON ISRAEL IS A PLACE NOT A FAITH ??
AND ANY POLI WHO WOULD BACK DOWN OVER THIS TRIPE NEEDS TO BE KICKED OUT .....
THIS IS NOT EUROPE !!!
Part of the American Tribe
Squirrel Hunter
Spider Killer
GOD BLESS THE USA AND HER FIGHTING FORCES AND ALL WHO FIGHT WITH HER AMEN
Jihad-`describe a person's internal struggle`-constipation