From Legal Times, with thanks to Skeetstreet:
In a recent criminal trial in Virginia, the prosecutor told the jury that the defendant couldn't be trusted to tell the truth, that he would lie to their faces -- all because of his religious beliefs.
That's entirely reasonable. The Qur'an says that "any one who, after accepting faith in Allah, utters Unbelief - except under compulsion, his heart remaining firm in Faith - but such as open their breast to Unbelief, on them is Wrath from Allah, and theirs will be a dreadful Penalty" (16:106). So those who utter unbelief under compulsion are exempt from the dreadful penalty. How can someone who believes this be expected to honor an oath to tell the truth on the witness stand, when to do so could put him in jeopardy?
The defendant, an American citizen accused of supporting terrorism, was convicted. The religion in question, of course, was Islam.Now, the Virginia attorney representing Ali Al-Timimi is pushing for a new trial, saying that prosecutors secured the guilty verdict by appealing to religious bigotry against Muslims.
Is it bigotry to be aware of Qur'an 16:106 and point out its implications? I didn't make up those implications. The classic Qur'anic commentator Ibn Kathir says that this verse makes "an exception in the case of one who utters statements of disbelief and verbally agrees with the Mushrikin [polytheists] because he is forced to do so by the beatings and abuse to which he is subjected, but his heart refuses to accept what he is saying...The scholars agreed that if a person is forced into disbelief, it is permissible for him to... go along with them in the interests of self-preservation..."
Might perjury then be justified "in the interests of self-preservation"? Is it "bigotry" to wonder about this? Or dhimmi idiocy not to?
The case illustrates the difficulty in prosecuting suspected terrorists who subscribe to a form of militant Islam, without airing tenets of the religion itself before a jury. And it raises the question of how far is too far when it comes to using a defendant's religious beliefs as evidence of criminal intent. The issue will likely continue to confront judges as more cases against accused terrorists come to trial.Timimi's lawyer, Edward MacMahon Jr., is seeking to overturn Timimi's conviction, citing prosecutorial misconduct and the prejudicial impact of statements he says portrayed Islam as a violent religion. One specific objection: that Assistant U.S. Attorney Gordon Kromberg instructed the jury in his closing argument that Timimi, a devout Muslim, would lie to jurors because the jurors were "kafir" -- or nonbelievers.
I find it amazing that you could take a verse out of the koran on one thing and change it around to mean something else. I don't care if the prosecutors did it first, it is still unbelieveable. The verse in question was revealed during a time when Muslims were being persecuted on the Arabian penninsula. It was common practice for captured Muslims to be tortured by the non-Muslims until they gave up their religion. This verse was meant for those who said they didn't not believe in God (Allah) only to escape physical harm and torture. Now, how you can say that a person will lie on a witness stand because of this verse? The witness stand and trial has nothing to do with this man refuting Islam or God (Allah). Regardless, judging from your posts on this site, it's quite clear you aren't here to give a balanced or even honest interpretation on the Koran. It just sounds like typical Islamophobia to me. Oh ya, before you jump on me, I am Catholic. Born and raised in the good 'old USA. The difference between you and me is that I have a masters in this field and you don't.
Actually I have a friend who was raised a moslem in pakistian. He no longer belives in god period. But he stated to me any nonmoslem who thinks he can be friends with a moslem is a fool. Never belive what they say. To lie or decieve a nonmoslem is a great honor. Tempster you sadly don't know what you are talking about. The fact is having a Phd in this field does little to qualify you for the facts about
the honorable use of taqiyya and kitman. Maybe if you open your eyes you can learn about them.
Regardless of when the verse was written, for centuries Muslims have and continue to use taqiyya and kitman. If fact the protest of tempster is an example.
Perjury is perjury. Every group has individuals that are guilty of doing this, BUT there is only one religion that has promotes perjury in their holy writings and gives worshipers a pass for lying. Only one group states that lying to Infidels is permissible and today such lying is not under the threat of bodily harm or other dire circumstances. It is done because Muslims see the advantage of lying and know that the Koran says that lying is permissible.
Tempster, congratulations on your Masters degree, I'm sure we're all very impressed.
Too bad for you that your degree cannot change the words written in the Qur'an, and the fact that the Muslims follow those words to the tee.
You should try to stop apologizing for and defending the Islamic cult, mate.
it makes you sound like your degree came from the ol' Kracker Jack box, wonky. By the way, mate, if your degree is in Islamic studies, it doesn't count.
Islamophobia is a fake word relating to a fake religion. Islam is a political movement by way of violence cloaked in a religious covering. Wake up, dopey.
"The classic Qur'anic commentator... Ibn Kathir"... versus... the Tempster who has... a Master's Degree!
That degree of yours must be why Islamic bookstores around the world sell multi-volume sets of Tempster's commentary on Qur'an and nobody reads Ibn Kathir.
The prosecution alleges jihad is the motive. Muslim's believe all is fair in love and war- literally. "War is deceit" said Mohammed (who did not have a Master's Degree either, by the way. I suggest you snub him if he tries to talk to you).
I am surprised where you were sniffing Mr. Spencer's credentials you couldn't detect his M.A. (check the bio). It certainly doesn't say much for you that you would make such a bone-headed assertion without even a cursory check. This site has hosted many discussions of higher education, degrees, and their value or lack thereof. Something tells me Hugh "Mesa Nostra" Fitzgerald will be giving you an earful on degrees as well.
"Oh ya, before you jump on me, I am Catholic. Born and raised in the good 'old USA. The difference between you and me is that I have a masters in this field and you don't."
--- from a poster above, who assures us that Muslims wouldn't lie to protect themselves or their religion
The poster "born and raised inthe good 'old [sic] USA" who offers as part of what he takes to be a convincing rebuttal that "the differnce between you and me is that I have a masters in this field and you don't." Nyah, nyah. Case closed.
But this means nothing. Much of American education is a farce. There are English majors who graduate from the "best" schools (a marketing ploy) who have not read Shakespeare. It is possible to get a "masters in the field" of Islamic or Middle Eastern studies, or a doctorate, or a faculty position, or promotion, or even tenure, without once having studied, or understood, taqiyya and kitman -- or for that matter, having bothered to inform one's hapless, helpless students.
There is no substitute for study and thought. A goddam "master's" means nothing, and given the makeup of most of MESA Nostra, where apologists for Islam rule the roost, a "master's" in Middle Eastern studies may be a sign of having gone through the requisite misinformation.
This extends even to the way in which seemingly apolitical courses on Arabic language are turned into sessions of subtle or not-so-subtle propagandizing. The reports one receives on what actually takes place in some courses on Arabic, even at such places at Princeton (anyone take a course from a certain Coffin lady?), where pro-"Palestinian" attitudes are imbibed with the verbs and the nouns, are horrifying.
For a brilliant report by one teacher of Arabic, a Lebanese scholar of "Uruba," or Arabness (Arabdom, Arabtum, Arab identity, nationalism, what have you) please visit the website www.eccelibano.com, and you will find the most acute indictment of the Middlebury Language Program, its director, its faculty, the negligence with which the administration permits all sorts of outrages from that faculty as they ensure that the hapless students (the author singles out both the Jewish students, quick to assume dhimmi attitudes, and what may be just as significant, the contemptible treatment meted out to those students who were sent ot Middlebury from the army).
If anything demonstrates the need, not only to take apart, one by one, the nonsense, lies, and cliches of the MESA Nostra brigade, especailly where it has completely taken over a department as at Columbia, but to have the government set up entirely new programs in the Arabic languge and Islamic studies, where the former can be taught by minorities (i.e., Lebanese Christians, Arabic-speaking Jews, possibly Kurds and Berbers and Armenians who might speak Arabic perfectly but refuse to subscribe to the dangerous imperialist notion of "the Arab world" which is dissected so beatifully at www.eccelibano.com) and the latter taught by scholars of Islam who have no need to defend the faith, no need to ignore Arthur Jeffery, Richard Gottheil, Joseph Schacht, C. Snouck Hurgronje, David Margoliouth, and a cast of hundreds of other scholars -- so very carefully ignored today, when Muslims and their apologists have seized control of the relevant departments all over the Western world.
The difference, pace the poster above, is not that he "has a master's" but that he is either hopelessly naive (that can be cured) or simply hopelessly stupid (that can't).
Meanwhile, let him begin by googling "taqiyya" and "kitman" and reading just a bit more in the Hadith and the Sira, since I suspect most of his "master's" was spent on the Qur'an, in a highly tendentious, where attention is given to those verses that have been abrogated, but no doubt he never learned about "naskh" (abrogation) or did terribly much by way of wading into the muhaddithin.
La betise s'est mise a penser. That's the damn problem.
It^s the courtcase that is interesting here, not the fool that posts here under `tempster`. >It remains to be seen if that judgement holds up, that would be really some achievement....
Tempster sounds like King (Tut Tut) Tolerance with a new mask.
The master's degree oh-so-understanding Catholic, who, for some unknown-but-to-hum reason, finds his way to an anti-radical jihadist website to construct a bogus apologia for the Koran's clear "lie when you have to" dispensation for Muslims when they are "in the hands" of the infidels.
King Tempster whomever-
The Koran (Qur'an, whatnot) is a tool for the believers to use to overwhelm the kafirs. Nothing in its is limited to the past, as its special pleaders always try to claim, unless they need to say the exact opposite on a different website to answer an inverse question. They will use any method, including honeyed deception, to overcome their non-Muslim enemies (called "concealers of the truth"), whether on the literal battlefield, or under cross-examination (insulting to any true Muslim to have an infidel dog asking anything of them).
To paraphrase the Mexican bandit from "The Treasure of Sierra Madre":
"Truth? We don't need to tell no stinkin' truth!"
As a Catholic, you should be appalled at the Muslim estimate of 'Jesus the Christ' (Isa) as a theological fraud who had his God "Allah" send an apparition to "die" on the cross in his place ...to fool the stupid Jews and Romans watching, and who also was a mere mortal prophet, not the Messiah, or Son of God, and a spiritual figure of far less worth than the Great Mohammad (pb&j).
Cut the taqiyya. Just say you're a Muslim giving out the plea bargain of the day.
Which, in this instance (on a post about "strategic and Koranically-approved lying") is paradoxically ironic.
BigSleep, I love that Huston quote. You've made my evening complete. Wonderful.
The witness stand and trial has nothing to do with this man refuting Islam or God (Allah). Regardless, judging from your posts on this site, it's quite clear you aren't here to give a balanced or even honest interpretation on the Koran. It just sounds like typical Islamophobia to me. Oh ya, before you jump on me, I am Catholic. Born and raised in the good 'old USA. The difference between you and me is that I have a masters in this field and you don't.
Posted by: tempster at July 8, 2005 07:13 AM
First of all, how would you know what scholastic credentials "you" has, whoever "you" are?
Islamophobia is a word coined by seditious muslims to imply non-existent prejudice, and embraced by left-wing Marxists to promote political correctness and social Marxism. Since political correctness is the strongest weapon in their arsenal, they excoriate anyone who disagrees with the Islamic agenda or dares to criticize Islam. What's worse in today's world than being accused of bigotry or racism, even when one is guilty of simply telling the truth about an unpleasant reality? But it's nice to know that you were blessed with the ability discern the education levels of total strangers, who you pretentiously assume are less educated than yourself because they aren't apologists for Satanic Islam.
If you have a Masters in the "field", exactly what field would that be? Muslims have committed numerous, unprecedented, bloody genocides during their barbaric conquests of former Christian, Jewish, and Hindu lands over a span of almost 1400 years. But to hear them tell it, they are the poor, pitiful, persecuted victims of Crusader aggression. We know better.
Islam is the most bellicose, intolerant, malevolent ideology ever contrived by evil minds. Muslims believe they are superior to all other people and that it is their right and duty to impose Islam on the entire world. They will continue to maim, kill, oppress, and commit one heinous atrocity after another until they are defeated. But they will insist all the while that it's just a "few radicals" who give Islam a bad name. They will lie and deceive until their evil perfidy is exposed for all to see. It's a shame that an erudite scholar like yourself is unfamiliar with taqiyya and kitman, two of Islam's most treacherous tools of deception and subterfuge. There will never be any "peace" in Islam; it is a doctrine of perpetual war and if you haven't figured that out after obtaining a "Masters in the field", you are hardly qualified to imply that we are ignorant.
I have a masters in this field and you don't.
tempster
That is an arrogant statement and completely false, I also have a “masters” in bs
albeit, mine is an Honorary one.
I bet Tempsterist...has no degree's at all...a lying blowhard no doubt...he does sound a lot like a made over KT...maybe they are related...
There is no such thing as the "past", as far as muslims and the Quran are concerned, whatever happened "back then", is alive and well in the present. The message is consistant over time, and muslim behavior is consistantly in conformity to it...
Tempster has a masters in this field and you don't.
Yes I'm sure that this field hand has a master to pull his strings and tell him when to jump.