"You must destroy the West" -- so said a speaker at a recent conference featuring Islamic leaders in London. My column in Human Events this morning:
“You must destroy the West” -- so said a speaker at a recent conference in London. The conference featured Islamic leaders openly calling for the overthrow of the British government and the establishment of an Islamic state in Britain -- under the noses of British authorities who, just days before the conference, had announced a new crackdown against “hate speech” and “extremist” preaching. The episode was instructive -- or should have been -- for proponents of the Fairness Doctrine and “hate speech” laws in the United States.The conference organizer, Anjem Choudary, declared at the conference that “as Muslims, we will not submit to any man-made law, any government, or any prime minister -- Bush or Brown -- or Jacqui Smith. We submit to Allah.” Instead of submitting, he called upon Muslims to rise up: “It is our religious obligation to prepare ourselves both physically and mentally and rise up against Muslim oppression and take what is rightfully ours. Jihad is a duty and a struggle and an obligation that lies upon the shoulders of us all. We will not rest until the flag of Allah and the flag of Islam is raised above 10 Downing Street.”
Choudary called on Muslims to dare to take the risks involved in participating in the violent overthrow of the British state. “There are three types of Muslims,” he said: “those in prison, those of us that are on our way [to prison] and non-practicing Muslims. Brothers and sisters, if you do not fear your home being raided by the Kufar [non-believer] police, you are not enforcing the Sharia [Islamic law].”Speaking via a live feed from Lebanon, Sheikh Omar Bakri Muhammad, a jihadist leader formerly based in Britain but now barred from returning to that country, exhorted the conference attendees: “Do not obey the British law….We must fight and die for Islam -- this is the map and road to Jennah [Paradise].” He praised Osama bin Laden and asserted that Muslims had no obligation to obey secular laws rather than Islamic law.
Ironically, this conference came only two weeks after UK Home Secretary Jacqui Smith announced that the British government was taking new steps to stop “preachers of hate from spreading extremism in our communities.” So would Choudary and the other conference organizers and speakers be arrested? Unlikely: a British Home Office official said that “the new measures…only prevent individuals from coming here and spreading their hate in person.” As such, they “do not cover” this jihadist conference.
Later, the Home Office and London’s Metropolitan Police played hot potato with the conference. A Home Office statement said that it wasn’t their responsibility to determine whether or not any laws had been broken; rather, “it is for the police and the Crown Prosecution Service to investigate any breach of the law,” to which a Police spokesman replied: “It’s the Home Office that makes the laws. If it doesn’t know whether something is against the law, then who does?”
Good question -- and one that goes to the heart of the problem with “hate speech laws” in general. Even in the face of the London jihadist conference’s open calls to destroy British society as it is currently constituted and impose Islamic law there, no one is quite sure what constitutes “hate speech” and why hate speech laws are so dangerous. “Hate speech,” like the “fairness” that the Fairness Doctrine promises to establish, is in the eye of the beholder. Hate speech laws, like the Fairness Doctrine, are so vague in their application that law enforcement officials can easily become genuinely befuddled (like the UK’s Home Office) as to what crosses the line and what doesn’t -- and that very vagueness can make them a tool in the hands of those in power to silence dissent.
As America welcomes a new President who counts among his supporters many who would like to see the U.S. enact laws like Britain’s hate speech codes and the Fairness Doctrine, this London jihadist conference illustrates anew that such laws create more problems than they solve. As jihadists in Britain speak openly about their intention to overthrow the British government, British officials would be better off dusting off and enforcing old laws about sedition rather than trying to figure out if some dangerously vague new laws have been broken.
Seriously, if hate speech legislation is passed, bring suit after suit against every Muslim preacher who screams about the JOOOOZ and every printer of the Qu'ran for spreading the idea that the Jews are kin to apes and pigs. When a Leftist's client is in trouble, free speech will come back.
It is incredible that this Anjem Choudary and his barbarian friends can openly say that they want to destroy the West and Great Britain in the name of Islam. Before this so called conference, they preached hate and called upon resistance and death on coalition forces that is saving the stability in Muslim countries.
They have now openly turned against the country that houses them. Let me remind you that all these traitors live on welfare benefit checks from the British community.
What more do the British government need to settle this once and for all? What signals does the British government send to their citizens and neighbour countries. It is a disgrace really!
Can we stop this growing threat?
– YES, WE CAN!
Please have a look at their homepage, www.islam4uk.com, and you decide for yourself.
As British soldiers are still fighting "islamic extremists", surely the filth spouted by the likes of Choudary (who should be Public Enemy #1) is treasonous?
What a slime ball the man is, I can't stand listening to him.
From the article:
One can expect muslims to believe their "system" to be non "man-made" (which it MOST CERTAINLY is not), but why would anyone (especially government) tolerate such treasonable rantings from its lemmings?
Wait! I ask yet another rhetorical question. Forgive me.
Appeasers and cowards need to be removed from power positions...They are blind in one eye and can't see out of the other.
Competence has long left them if there was any to begin with.
The only reason Mohammadans act like this is because kufrs in charge allow it.
The new US President will most likely add another layer of appeasements, while at the same time silencing the opposition, or trying to...
This may mean a more 'creative' approach to
resisting Islamic hegemony in all its forms, is required.
We are not going to able to rely on government, as it is, to stem the tide of invasive jihad.
In fact, government has proved itself to be an obstacle...Or at least the power people in charge of it.
Instead of removing these appeaser types, America just elected more of them...I stand in awe of such wisdom...Allah must be tickled pink...
Why isn't Mr. Choudary being deported? What is the punishment for treason in the UK? Deportation would probably be more merciful to the offender.
Choudary says these things often, loudly, and with a flagrant disregard for his host country. Instead of being notorious, he's a celebrity.
God save the working class Briton, who doesn't have time to oust the b@st@rd. It's a job for the government, but they, like the government of the US, seem to be deaf, mute, and blind.
Oh! How surprised everyone (except the ordinary Briton) is going to be, when the forces of Mo'Mad are numerous enough to make this outlaw philosophy a reality!
How on earth are the British people going to combat this when it seems that the British government is turning a blind eye to blatant treason and Islam telling their followers to kill British Nationals?
How on earth are we supposed to combat Islam, when people such as Lionheart the Blogger have arrest warrants on them for speaking of the dangers of Islam, promoting no violence whatsoever, in order to save his country from Islamisation?
We are being sold out by Nulabour and the Establishments of Law and Order. Our very own elected politicians are selling out our country to a vicious death cult. The name Judas springs to mind here and it's despicable and nothing less. This makes me so angry.
Seems like "oppression" is a deceptive codeword for (many) Muslims, just like "innocents". "Innocents" means non-Muslims, and "oppression" means any system of law that isn't Sharia in a country where there is at least one Muslim, even if this Muslim is an immigrant.
It's almost time for the sane people to 'storm the bastile', I hope both of you are ready...
Too bad and too sad for Britons who love freedom, and who are only too aware of the high price that the generations that preceded them paid to earn that very freedom, that they don't have anything like the Second Amendment to the US Constitution in the United Kaliphate (formerly known as the United Kingdom.)
In America, at least, if the government turns against the interests of those it's supposed to serve (as the British Govt. has done so shamelessly), or if it fails to protect those it's supposed to protect (as the British Govt. has done too), ordinary citizens can protect themselves instead of being left vulnerable to hordes of barbarians like those under Omar Bakri's command.
OT -Here's an interesting site called "Islamoscope" not linked here on JW. I discovered it by looking up "the Islamic "Mein Kampf." You know, that little green book filled with hate and mass-murder commands.
http://islamoscope.wordpress.com/2008/03/30/islamic-mein-kampf/
How on earth are the British people going to combat this when it seems that the British government is turning a blind eye to blatant treason and Islam telling their followers to kill British Nationals?
Britain is still a democracy. Elect someone else. This starts in your own district of the House of Commons. Are Brits like Americans - the Congress (Parliament) is terrible but their own representatives are God's gift?
God save the working class Briton, who doesn't have time to oust the b@st@rd. It's a job for the government, but they, like the government of the US, seem to be deaf, mute, and blind.
The working class voter of every democracy needs to make the time. He elected the people who are throwing him around. Is he willing to give up whatever government check comes to him every month if that is the price of change? What are his priorities? Without life, he has no chance at liberty. Without liberty, he has no chance to pursue happiness.
For me this is not hate speech it is purely insurrection; Def: "an act or instance of revolting against civil authority or an established government".and it is also treason if the ones listening to Anjem Choudary and are proponents of what he states. Though Choudary is apparently careful to not use any specific terms of violence, using the term jihad should be enough if we draw on what jihad is defined as in the Quran. Now please don't tell me that the prosecution cannot quote from the Quran to convict people because it is a religious book.
In California anything "perceived" as a threat that is put over an electronic device such as a telephone,TV,FAX,Etc. is prosecutable as a felony. I would think that most state laws, and or federal laws have these electronic device laws in place when it comes to making threats.
The only reason Mohammadans act like this is because kufrs in charge allow it.
Yep. We are so stupid (America). And we've just elected an Appeaser-in-Chief, no doubt about it.
How long did the Roman empire last before allowing in the Barbarians?
Here is a demonstration of just how ridiculous this all is,
http://www.thepeoplescube.com/images/images_working/AppleMecca/Nike_recalled_air_Allah_Pri.jpg
Choudary is an extremist, but I don’t know if he violated any hate speech laws. I thought hate speech laws concerned ethnic or religious groups, and not countries or entire parts of the globe. I don’t know why you care, since you are against hate speech laws anyway. If you are against hate speech laws, Choudary’s conference should be OK. You want sedition laws back on the books, but until they are, Choudary can talk about overthrowing the government, as far as I know. I have read a few books by Derrick Jensen, and he talks non-stop about violently overthrowing “civilization.” He does not speak about the US government specifically, but I think this is certainly implied. Maybe you should start a thread about Jensen, but he is not Islamic, so I doubt you’re interested.
I think it is relevant that Choudary drew 100 people for his conference, and that is from the large city of London. (1) He is an extremist that few people listen to. So what. The KKK drew 200 people to a rally, and that was in Western Kentucky. (2) Maybe you should write a thread about the KKK, but they are not Muslim, so I doubt you’re interested. Even Derrick Jensen can draw 100 people, and that’s when he charges them $15. (3) Jensen asked the crowd if everyone owned an AK47. Imagine if Choudary said that.
1)The Evening Standard (London), September 12, 2008 Friday, “Next 9/11 in Britain warn banned Muslim militants,” by Simon Kirby
2) "It's hard to say, but about 200 members of the crowd were supporting the Klan”
The Associated Press State & Local Wire, March 23, 2002, Saturday, BC cycle
“Ku Klux Klan holds rally in western Kentucky”
3) portland.indymedia.org/en/2007/12/370180.shtml
From above:
"Maybe you should start a thread about Jensen, but he is not Islamic, so I doubt you’re interested."
and
"Maybe you should write a thread about the KKK, but they are not Muslim, so I doubt you’re interested."
---
Since this is known as the "JihadWatch.org" site, you're absolutely correct.
Read the left panel of the web site.
Because non-Muslims in the West, as well as in India, China, Russia, and the world over, are facing a concerted effort by Islamic jihadists, the motives and goals of whom are largely ignored by the Western media, to destroy their societies and bring them forcibly into the Islamic world -- and to commit violence to that end even while their overall goal remains out of reach. That effort goes under the general rubric of jihad.
Here we go again with this one.
The KKK does not have a philosophy that comports with more than the 200 or so people they can get to show up at any given time. They do not have a religion that tells them to believe the nonsense they do. They do not have moles in government, agencies, not-for-profits and the media that furtively attempt to get policies supporting racial preference adopted. Their philosophy is a dead end and they have no power whatsoever. No one fears the takeover of America or the West by racist takeover or infiltration. Basing a societal preference on race disqualifies such people from polite society as it is a nonissue.
However, let's talk about basing a preference on ideology, which is an issue. See, silly dave742, that's why we have different cultures and nations, rather than a kumbayah commune of Borg.
There are a billion Muslims, and several nation states that exist primarily in an Islam-driven governmental philosophy. They have a basic, innate ideology of jihad, whether individually active or inactive, no Muslim would dare refute the idea who wants to live. This ideology of domination through submission of others is abhorrent to free peoples. It is active, and being accepted by governement, agencies, not-for-profits, and the media.
No one is interested in hate speech laws or a Fairness Doctrine who cares about free speech, and freedom of conscience. How can you fail to see Robert's simple point, which is to use the absurdity of the Choudury example to teach about the absurdity of the "Islamphobe argument"? Do you not learn debate skills in the 8th grade? He is not saying, "Well, so-and-so does it too!", like a spoiled child. He says, "This is absurd and unenforceable by any measure".
I know it's a troll, people, but when they can't even use logic properly, sheesh.
"Choudary is an extremist, but I don’t know if he violated any hate speech laws."
Posted by: dave742 at November 12, 2008 11:11 AM
Robert does not support hate speech laws. On the contrary, he is all for free speech. He is pointing out the double standard example that Britain is setting and for the US to take notice. Hate speech only seems to be enforced when the speaker is critical of Islam, and not vice versa, for they, like Choudary, are rationalized as a small, inconsequential minority extremist.
Choudary's words are encouraged by Spencer in order to get to the central point...that Islam forbids Muslims to accept any other law but Allah's and work towards the implementation of Shari'ah globally.
Your suggestion that Spencer redirect his focus aside, it appears that not enough people are listening, even when the words of Choudary are heard and also by those who supposedly read the articles here, like yourself.
Robert's point about sedition laws was not to be taken literally. He offered that as an alternative to the UK trying to create new, ambiguous "hate speech laws".
You cannot be that daft Dave, can you? There is more truth in the world outside of the lexis nexis you know.
winoceros:
I have no time to address your post. It would take way too long. I'll make a couple comments.
"The KKK does not have a philosophy that comports with more than the 200 or so people they can get to show up at any given time."
"Precise data are difficult to pin down, but Potok's group counts as many as 150 Klan chapters with up to 8,000 members nationwide. More than 800 hate groups exist around the country, Southern Poverty research shows."
The Associated Press
February 5, 2007 Monday 10:04 PM GMT
Supremacist activity flourishes, fueled by anti-immigrant sentiments
BYLINE: By ERIN TEXEIRA
"No one fears the takeover of America or the West by racist takeover or infiltration."
You fear the takeover of the US and the West by Muslim extremists. Hilarious. Are you afraid of puppies too? Baby ducks?
awake:
"He is pointing out the double standard example that Britain is setting and for the US to take notice. Hate speech only seems to be enforced when the speaker is critical of Islam"
I don't understand why Choudry's comments constituted hate speech. He talks about overthrowing the government and ignoring laws. Jensen talks about the same thing, and he is not a Muslim. Choudrey and Jensen are ignored not because of their religion, but because they are not breaking any laws, and they are not a real threat anyway.
awake:
"There is more truth in the world outside of the lexis nexis you know."
I get my news from a database of thousands of news sources from around the world, I read books from all viewpoints, I live in large cities where I meet people from around the world from all religions, and I have travelled around the world. You live in Kansas and read nothing but Jihadwatch and if you have travelled anywhere it was with the army in order to kill "evil people". Teach me about the truth, master.
You fear the takeover of the US and the West by Muslim extremists. Hilarious. Are you afraid of puppies too? Baby ducks?
Are you blind? Got cinders in your eye's?
Yeah, I am afraid of baby ducks, the kind with fangs...
"You live in Kansas and read nothing but Jihadwatch and if you have travelled anywhere it was with the army in order to kill "evil people". Teach me about the truth, master."
Posted by: dave742 at November 12, 2008 12:43 PM
That comment is indicative of the type of person I suspected you to be. Firsdt of all, I live just outside NYC and am working in Manhattan right now, so spare me your boisterous claims about living in large cities (probably at the same time by your claim)
Tell me world traveller, how many Muslims did you discuss the Qur'an, or the central tenets of Islam with in your travels? What books of other viewpoints contrary to what Spencer writes about Islam and Jihad would you offer as a counterpoint?
Well, I'm listening?
More importantly, where did Robert or anyone else ever claim that Choudary broke a law here? You are, as usual, setting up a straw-man argument on Spencer's position.
Nice try.
Just a friendly reminder of the first time I saw 'ol Davey, world traveller, here at JW:
http://jihadwatch.org/archives/022932.php
Some excerpts:
"Why does every story on this site rely on such little evidence?"
Posted by: dave742 at October 2, 2008 11:36 AM
.....
And then, when challenged:
.....
"Yes, I exaggerated when I said "every story". I should have said "why does it seem like...". There are many incidents like what I brought up here, but I usually don't have time to detail them. IMO, your worldview is built on hundreds of stories similar to this of dubious credibility. I think your worldview is built on a house of cards, which is dangerous when you are advocating wars, possibly nuclear wars, based upon this worldview."
Posted by: dave742 at October 2, 2008 2:18 PM
Quite a dubious entry, don't you think? Apparently, Captain lexis nexis has embraced the straw-man tactic of dishonest discourse from the very beginning.
From above...I get my news from a database of thousands of news sources from around the world, I read books from all viewpoints, I live in large cities where I meet people from around the world from all religions, and I have travelled around the world.
Yeah me too, only I don't have ego orgasms over it...
I also worked in the mental health field for years, and know a wacko when I see one...
There is a difference between hate speech and treasonous sedition. Hate speech is restricted to hateful statements made on the basis of sex and race. I would argue that sexual orientation should be covered too, since it's a structural quality, but it's not. Treasonous sedition consists of statements or actions which seek to undermine one's state or government, or of enabling those who make such statements or commit such actions by aiding them or by not turning them in to the proper authorities.
Should Obama get his way - and he may, but only temporarily - banning Islamic texts MUST be the first order of business. Kepha's right that as soon as those who commit treasonous sedition are prosecuted or restricted under hate speech codes, that the Left will come to regret their pushing for their institution. As it is, hate speech codes are only enforced selectively on campus. Obama and the Left are basically moving to expand these campus speech codes to society at large. Campus speech cods supercede existing hate speech codes by extending them to religion (another reason why Islam should not be regarded as a religion), political affiliation, marital status (to cover pimping one's underage daughters into incestuous Sharia sex slavery), and living situation (to protect 40-year-old Muslims living in campus housing for pedophiles from having their wittew feewings hurt). I can say with experience that actual hate speech - statements made on the basis of race and gender - is only punished when non-Arabs say things that are offensive to a minority, and no, Jews are not considered to be a legitimate minority. Clay Slaughter from Affirmative Action explicitly told me that IU's Code of Conduct is a joke designed to make gullible idiots like myself believe that we have the right to go to school without being repeatedly harassed, stalked, and accosted. Why? I'm Jewish and the offensive students are Muslim. Had Christian or Jewish whites done and said the kinds of things that these Arabs said and did, not only would they be immediately brought before the Student Judicial Review, but they would have been expelled. When I met with Carol McCord from the Gender Incidents Team, who ignored my email and multiple voicemails for 6 weeks, as did the Student Ethics and Anti-harassment Programs until I emailed Pamela Freeman from Student Ethics and cc'ed 6 other people in order to confer a certain degree of accountability, after which they of course couldn't get back to me fast enough, she was incredibly unconcerned with my situation, which is not only deeply offensive but actually constitutes serious danger to my person, which involved not only repeated harassment - real hate speech - in my required courses, but repeated acts of stalking all over the campus. She told me what kinds of cases she regards as valid, i.e., parasitic sex slave baby factories who wear explicit calls for genocide, rape, torture, enslavement, plunder, and treasonous sedition on their heads who get called out on how offensive, inappropriate, and disgusting it is for them to inflict that upon decent human beings, since it's infinitely more offensive than any Confederate flag or swastika. And of course, any time I tried to enlighten this asshat as to the cultural issues involved in 'chatting' with Muslims in order to confront them (which was all that they offered to do, despite the fact that they are required by law to keep them away from me and by the Code of Conduct to put them before the Student Judicial Review), she repeatedly responded with venomous, anti-Christian tu quoque logical fallacies. This is what we're up against in Obama's America. Of course, banning Muslim religious texts won't happen until it goes to the Supreme Court, after which speech codes will be eradicated.
I cannot stand that Choudary loser. I tried to watch that clip the other day and I couldn't make it through 30 seconds of it. The impenetrable wall of narcissism and deluded supremacy that surrounds that sicko is disgusting. He talks like he's talking to himself, which is characteristic of narcissists - to not address others as of they were human beings, but I've never seen anyone take it that far. Narcissists usually talk as if other people are mirrors, not as if they're not even there. Oh, and that snotty tone in his voice and the switching between languages - not code-switching like actual people frequently do - just rambling in Arabic midway through sentences....Ugh! Here's some hate speech: that sicko deserves to be eviscerated and eaten alive by rats, starting with his neck, where his vocal cords are. I'm surprised that 'hate speech' codes don't cover severely inbred people too.
I went straight to Human Events.com to read Robert’s article there. Often on JW the entire text of an article is not presented although the link to the source always is. Visiting the site, I see that Human Events is a self-described part of the conservative movement. After reading Robert’s article I read the comments. I was impressed with the number of liberal wingnuts posting on a self proclaimed conservative site.
One commenter stood out, a Dave Mathews from Florida. This Dave fellow seemed fairly preoccupied with the KKK and is virulently critical of Mr. Spencer.
From Dave’s first comment to the article at Human Events:
“Robert Spencer's prejudice-pandering has now become as irrelevant as the KKK's.”
I believe that the troll named Dave commenting at Human Events may be the same person as Dave742 posting here at JW, although Dave742’s language is a bit more tame at JW (though he is becoming more unhinged as the thread continues), the preoccupation with the KKK is a common thread between posts at the two sites.
Another theme of Dave at HE is that those in the U.S. South are uneducated:
“Maybe the uneducated Southerners fear the Muslims, but I happen to live in a city populated by many Muslims, so many that I happen to see them nearly on a daily basis. No one is scared of their neighbors regardless of their religion ... no more so than they are scared of the Christian fundamentalist nutjobs in the Republican party.”
I compare that with Dave742’s comment toward awake:
“You live in Kansas and read nothing but Jihadwatch and if you have travelled anywhere it was with the army in order to kill "evil people". Teach me about the truth, master.”
While Kansas isn’t in the South, I still see a similarity in the style of bashing. Anyway, I’m just trolling for trolls.
Back on-topic. Clearly Robert posted this to point out the double standard that exists among government and the courts regarding what constitutes hate speech. I believe, as others have pointed out, that the Koran itself is hate speech. The real danger ahead, if hate speech laws are enacted in the U.S., will come from liberal judges who determine that the message of so-called islamophobes constitutes hate speech while the message of the Islamists calling for overthrow of our government and the killing of infidels does not. Would this not fall under the category of equal protection for all before the law? I fear that the liberals do not value this equality.
awake:
"Tell me world traveller, how many Muslims did you discuss the Qur'an, or the central tenets of Islam with in your travels?"
None. However, I talk with dozens of Muslims about these issues where I live presently. I even work with both an Iranian Shiite and a Sunni from Bangladesh.
"What books of other viewpoints contrary to what Spencer writes about Islam and Jihad would you offer as a counterpoint?"
Over the past few weeks I have been reading about Islamic Law in connection with the "closing the gates of ijtihad" garbage. I will be posting on that subject before long. I will get to the "jihad" question later, but I doubt it will be any less laughable than the ijtihad dogma. I can refer you to some sources of the ijtihad subject and Islamic Law in general:
Wael Hallaq is the foremost scholar on Islamic law. I have read 3 of his books and 3 journal articles, and they are all excellent and well sourced. "The Origins and Evolution of Islamic Law" is the best beginning book. The others are pretty dense, and I had to read them a second time after getting acquainted with the subject. Don't be afraid of the name, he is a Christian living in Canada. Other books I've read:
Muhammad Iqbal's "The reconstruction of religious thought in Islam".
"Islamic Legal Interpretation Muftis And Their Fatwas" by various authors.
"State, Society, and Law in Islam: Ottoman Law in Comparative Perspective" by Haim Gerber (a Jew!).
"The principles of Muhammadan jurisprudence : according to the Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi and Hanbali schools" by Abdur Rahim.
Not quite on the subject is "Social and Historical Change : An Islamic Perspective" by Mutahhari.
There are over a dozen journal articles I have at home on the subject. I would have to wait until tonight to list them. I don't feel like looking them up again.
Dave: None. However, I talk with dozens of Muslims about these issues where I live presently. I even work with both an Iranian Shiite and a Sunni from Bangladesh.
Now we are getting some where...You talk to the Mohammadans about 'these' issues...
Which issues? Do you discuss the Quran? Do you ask them to explain 9:5...9:29...5:33..8:39, or any of the Satanic verses? Do you discuss with them Mohammads child bride? His rapes, murders, thefts?
And since I assume you are a filthy kufr...why do you think they will give 'you' a straight story?
If you believe them straight up, you are gullible and not a good witness...Better read a few more books...Try Stealth Jihad...
Richard, you're awesome. One thing I love about this Dave yayhoo is that he's so up on his high horse about being from a "big city" and knowing "all kinds of diverse people." First, he's probably writing from Kansas or some other nowhere, because every time he says something like that he reminds me of the episode of News Radio in which Dave Foley kept insisting that he was "from the Midwest, where the real Americans are from," and then got outed as a Canadian and it was all just a cover to make himself seem "authentic" but his repeated insistence gave him away. This degree of snobbery can only come from a deep-seated inferiority complex. And who the hell cares if someone's from a small town anyway? Like people in small towns aren't hooked into the same global universe that we all are. Small-towners tend to be more patriotic, have more entrenched values, and to be no less educated or enlightened that anyone else; they're just humble about it. And irony is that, even if he's from a "big city" and "travels all over the place," if he'e constantly in contact with Muslims he's either (a) at a university (which he isn't), or (b) at some incredibly crappy job which only the most illiterate, inbred, non-English-speaking people can be hired to do, probably one which no non-fresh-off-the-boat Mexican would be willing to do or would have to do because of a lack of job prospects.
jdamn:
"(a) at a university (which he isn't), or (b) at some incredibly crappy job which only the most illiterate, inbred, non-English-speaking people can be hired to do, probably one which no non-fresh-off-the-boat Mexican would be willing to do or would have to do because of a lack of job prospects."
a) No, I am not at a University, but my wife is, and that is why I have online access (at 3 Universities) to Lexis Nexis and hundreds of other databases. That is also where I talk to many people from around the world.
b) Actually, the reality is quite different. I am a chemist doing cancer research in a pharmaceutical company. White people are a minority where I work, because you need to be educated. Most of my coworkers are from around the world. You would hate it.
duh swami:
Yes, I discuss religion with them all the time, and with others as well. I know, they are all lying to me and just waiting for the right time to chop my head off. The woman from Iran makes my desserts all the time. Do you think they are poisoned? They sure taste good.
awake:
Hey!! You were the guy who told me to "figure out a workaround to the closing of the gate of Ijtihad" on the following thread, followed by the statement "Good luck with that," and "maybe the 'Lexis Nexis' can facilitate that task for you you disingenuous dolt.":
jihadwatch.org/archives/023028.php
Well, I have done so. Lexis Nexis did not help, but databases such as JSTOR sure did. I gave some book refs above on the issue, and like I said, there are many, many journal articles. The issue you brought up is a complete joke, like everything else you people believe in. I have done the reading (including that of all the Orientalists who promote the idea), and I am just starting to write up my response. It will take a while, because this is certainly not my focus. I will get to the "jihad" thing, but I am sure that will take longer.
jdamn:
Thank you. I have my moments, I'll take 'awesome' in a heartbeat!
News Radio was great. Sure miss Phil Hartman.
Why study Islam Dave? What's your motivation?
Why does anyone study Islam?
1. Born Islamic...?
2. Converted to...?
3. Out of curiosity...?
4. Religious interest...?
5. To expose...?
6. To protect...?
7. Ego intellectual domination...? (I know more than you do...)
I personally fall into 3-4-5-...
Your writings seem closer to #7...That's because you brag on yourself a lot...
Dave, in all your reading, have you become convinced that Allah is the one and only God and that Mohammad/is was his messenger?
If your wife were at a university you would have a VPN at home, and wouldn't need to go to "3 universities" (very plausible!) to get articles off of Lexis Nexis. If you were as well-read as your claim to be then you would understand when and when not to capitalize "university/ies" (when it's a proper noun). If you do cancer research you would be well-read and surrounded by NON-MUSLIMS from around the world, mostly India and Korea. Indian Muslims have horrible educational backgrounds. If they were held to Western standards of literacy less than 1% of them would be considered literate. Read this article: http://islammonitor.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1475&Itemid=66
I actually just commented on JihadWatch two days ago that my best friends at my university are a Kenyan, a Bengali Indian, a Croat, and girl from the East Coast who's in the ROTC. Furthermore, I worked in a restaurant for 11 years with lots of Mexicans, whom I love as a group, to the extent that I speak perfect Kitchen Creole. I'm also working on a dictionary of an obscure Kenyan/Ugandan language and I have a degree in Italian. Yeah, I hate "foreigners." I don't even hate Muslims. I just hate Islam.
Finally Dave, we're not talking about religion. We're talking about jihad and Islam, which is not a religion any more than Nazism. If you knew anything about Islam or religion more generally you would know that. Sheesh, I knew that just from taking a high-school course in world religions my freshman year. Also, there's only a 1 in 10 chance that the Iranian woman who makes your desserts is Muslim. Iranian Muslims are a scant minority these days. But you would have to be well-read in subjects other than Islamist propaganda to know that.
duh swami:
Yes, I discuss religion
That's not exactly what I asked you...I asked for specifics and you give generalities.
I would suspect that you present a soft opposition and don't challenge much...In other words you may discuss, but I doubt you debate. It's not possible to debate the perfect religion to begin with...
They know that even if you don't...
duh swami:
"Why study Islam Dave?"
I am not a Muslim. I do not follow any religion. I am studying Islam because it is relevant to current events. I do admit that I enjoy showing how stupid you people are.
jdamn:
"If your wife were at a university you would have a VPN at home, and wouldn't need to go to "3 universities" (very plausible!) to get articles off of Lexis Nexis."
I don't know what a VPN is. I don't go to 3 Universities, I have online acces to them. I go to the libraries web page, sign on, and look up what I need. Actually, to look up the pro-"gates of ijtihad" viewpoint, I had to physically go to both MIT and Harvard libraries, because the references for this ridiculous viewpoint are all a hundred years old, and online access for material this old is scarce.
"If you do cancer research you would be well-read and surrounded by NON-MUSLIMS from around the world"
As I said, I work with two Muslims (from Iran and Bangladesh), and they are excellent scientists, regardless of what your stupid article says. There are also people from the UK, France, China, Sri Lanka, India, Russia, Vietnam, etc.
If you do cancer research you would be well-read and surrounded by NON-MUSLIMS from around the world, mostly India and Korea.
Posted by: jdamn
Maybe he feeds the rats.
Dave: I do admit that I enjoy showing how stupid you people are.
That's the expression of #7 above...Your ego is doing all your talking...If you have knowledge, you should be teaching, but you are too busy castigating, and trying to show off, which is your downfall.
You may know a lot, but it is wasted because no one is listening...But that's what mirrors are for...The guy in there always listens...
jdamn:
"Also, there's only a 1 in 10 chance that the Iranian woman who makes your desserts is Muslim. Iranian Muslims are a scant minority these days."
I didn't even read this until now. What the hell are you talking about? Yes, the woman I know is a Muslim. When I see her praying in her office I assume it is connected to her religion. I just asked here how many Sunnis and Shiites combined are in Iran, and she says 90%. I guess she doesn't even know her own country.
duh swami:
Yes, I discuss specifics. I cannot list them. If you want me to ask her something, let me know what it is. It would have to wait until tomorrow, because she just went home for the day.
dave comments:
"I am not a Muslim."
Liar, yes you are.
"I do not follow any religion."
Liar, yes you do: Islam.
"I am studying Islam because it is relevant to current events. I do admit that I enjoy showing how stupid you people are."
This dramatic shift to change the direction of duh_swami's question is evidence that you are a liar, dave, because liars like to get the heat off of themselves as quickly as possible and on to others, and that's exactly what you've attempted to do in that last statement. I don't believe for one minute that you aren't a Muslim, because there is too much overwhelming evidence in everything you've written that you are in fact a Muslim.
jdam:
"I have a degree in Italian"
Two of the 100-plus year old articles supporting the "closing the gates of ijtihad" idea are in Italian, and I don't know any Italins to translate them for me. You want to do it?
He wouldn't be able to access any of those articles without a VPN (a Virtual Private Network, for those who are wondering). One signs into university libraries to get into the search engines and to access catalogs of journals and books. One cannot actually access the articles without a VPN through a univeristy that subscribes to those particular journals. Furthermore, he wouldn't have access to 3 universities, plus it's creepy and illegal for him to use his wife's account, which means that she also allows him to be all up in her email, since her username and password would be the same. Plus, as a researcher, he should have access to medical journals through the same type of database that allows access to Lexis Nexis and JSTOR. Lexis Nexis contains many medical journals, so his story doesn't even make sense. And who the hell sits around reading scholarly articles (as opposed to interesting non-fiction) written by scholars in completely different fields from that in which one works? I love linguistics and I can barely handle reading scholarly linguistics articles, even those on CMC, my particular sub-discipline within a sub-discipline. It's just incredibly boring.
Plus, it seems like he would know that EBSCO is a better search engine for subjects in the humanities. JSTOR is for language-oriented liberal arts people like myself. Lexis Nexis is good for everything, but EBSCO is best for articles in the humanities. And there just isn't a lot of scholarly work on Islam in article form anyway. Sure, there are lots of law books, but he was claiming to read "lots of scholarly articles." Most religious scholars write books. There is a concerted effort within academia to not dissect Islam, even within religious studies departments. I'm also starting to think this is Abdullah Mikhail, judging from a few different facts:
1) An at least semi-fraudulent identity which he feels the need to impress upon us in order to lend himself some credibility, which normal people realize is established online over the course of time through the making of intelligent comments and insights, not through some un-provable claim to be someone important
2) His inability to make intelligent claims and his insistence upon attacking anyone who engages him
3) Arguments comprised entirely of logical fallacies (mostly circular logic, tu quoque, straw man, and ad hominem), lies, and half-truths
4) His language: he's articulate but his spelling and punctuation are still at a 2nd- or 3rd-grade level. He may be well-read but he is not a college graduate, let alone a cancer researcher
5) His inability to stay on task in presenting the few arguments he actually presents
The only reason I think he may not be AM is because he's not all obsessed with discrediting Mr. Spencer.
Yes, I discuss specifics. I cannot list them. If you want me to ask her something, let me know what it is. It would have to wait until tomorrow, because she just went home for the day.
Her??? I thought it was dozens of 'them'?
I thought it was you who had knowledge, and debated such issues as the 'obligation for jihad', or what do they really think of kufrs, with 'them', and you refer me to 'HER'???
Uh huh, sorry Dave...Your credibility level just went down another notch...
Give me the names of the articles, Dave. And the name of the university that subscribes to them. I wish IU gave me access to Italian journals. I can find them through the IU library, probably in English. There's also this thing called "Google Translate." And yes, it sorta works, and yes, you can copy and paste JSTOR articles once you have legitimate access to them, the kind you need a VPN for.
At this rate, Winston will never stop rolling over in his grave.
I agree with Champ...Dave's a Mohammadan...If not by conversion, in spirit...I wonder if he really read all those books he has listed?
He can't seem to answer a simple question, and referred me to 'HER', whoever that is...
He might be blinded by 'nice'. 'HER' is probably very nice, and attractive too I bet, right Dave...?
Your number is still a little foggy, but it's getting clearer...
Not only that Dave...but you seem to be posting from work. Are you on your own time, or 'borrowing' it from your employer?
jdam:
"One signs into university libraries to get into the search engines and to access catalogs of journals and books. One cannot actually access the articles without a VPN through a univeristy that subscribes to those particular journals."
You are a complete imbecile. I get access to journals by signing on and downloading them. For example, I just signed on and picked at random this article:
"Negro Conceptions of White People in a Northeastern City"
Paul A. McDaniel and Nicholas Babchuk
Phylon (1960-), Vol. 21, No. 1 (1st Qtr., 1960), pp. 7-19
Published by: Clark Atlanta University
"THIS STUDY duplicates for a northeastern city an earlier study of Negro conceptions of white people.1 It is concerned with the extent, uniformity, direction, and intensity of these conceptions among Negroes. The present inquiry is essentially and deliberately different in one ma- jor respect from the one after which it was modeled: In the original study Cothran used a sample drawn from a large metropolitan com- munity in the deep South, whereas the present study employs a sample from a different geographical area. This fact, difference in location, is of central importance; it is viewed as constituting an important vari- able in the conceptions that Negroes have of whites. It should also be noted that the present community has a very small proportion of Ne- groes (less than 3 percent)."
If you would like to test me, give me a citation and I will print a paragraph, or the whole paper if you like.
"Plus, as a researcher, he should have access to medical journals through the same type of database that allows access to Lexis Nexis and JSTOR."
As a researcher, I have access to chemistry and pharmaceutical journals, not Lexis Nexis or JSTOR or EBCSO. Why the hell would a pharmaceutical company pay for access to those databases? Imbecile.
"And who the hell sits around reading scholarly articles (as opposed to interesting non-fiction) written by scholars in completely different fields from that in which one works?"
I do. I tend to want to know about a subject before commenting on it. Silly me.
"I love linguistics and I can barely handle reading scholarly linguistics articles"
I am not surprised.
"He may be well-read but he is not a college graduate, let alone a cancer researcher"
I have a PhD in chemistry. Maybe you can help me. Today I was trying to reduce an aromatic nitrile to an aldehyde with DIBAL and got no reaction. I followed a patent ref for the identical procedure on the same substrate, except I used THF as solvent instead of benzene for safety, and used a DIBAL solution in DCM instead of hexanes. Do you think the solvent made the difference? Do you think I should try a tin or nickel reduction instead?
jdamn:
"Give me the names of the articles, Dave."
It will have to wait until tonight.
"And the name of the university that subscribes to them."
You can look that up in Worldcat.org
"I can find them through the IU library, probably in English."
You cannot find a translation of a 140 year old obscure italian article.
"There's also this thing called 'Google Translate.'"
It's worthless.
"you can copy and paste JSTOR articles once you have legitimate access to them, the kind you need a VPN for"
Once again, find me something like this:
http://www.jstor.org/pss/1051528
and I will print out the rest of the article for you, without knowing what the hell a VPN is.
Dave does not want to talk about 'HER'...not intellectual academic enough...
a little too on the emotional side...it's a lot easier to talk black holes, and string theory than emotional relationships...Parallel universes are great topics of diversion...
If you did not want to talk about this office romance Dave, why did you bring it up?
I bet you can hardly wait for 'HER' return in the morning...I don't blame you, loves grand, ain't it?
I won't put her on the spot with any tricky questions...She might get miffed at you...
Don't feed the trolls.
Why isn't Mr. Choudary being deported?
from another posting above.
The answer would be that he is a citizen of the UK. New laws have to be made to deport those who subscribe to ummah laws to the ummah, which can be anywhere where ummah people are the majority.
jdamn:
Where's that reference? I have to go home soon.
jdamn:
"Plus, it seems like he would know that EBSCO is a better search engine for subjects in the humanities. JSTOR is for language-oriented liberal arts people like myself."
More crap. Every single article I needed for my research on the "gates of ijtihad" question I found on JSTOR. EBSCO blows.
Where's that reference? I have to go home soon.
Posted by: dave742
Yep, at work...Dave just keeps telling on himself...But ultimately I agree with sheik yer'mami...Don't feed the trolls.
Bye Dave...have a good dinner, a few beers and some good reading...tell 'HER' duh swami said 'Hi', without any preconditions...
Jdman:
"And there just isn't a lot of scholarly work on Islam in article form anyway. Sure, there are lots of law books, but he was claiming to read 'lots of scholarly articles.' Most religious scholars write books."
I am reading your crap piecemeal. This is a good one. I'll print you out a nice list of articles directly relating to the "ijtihad" question tonight. "Not a lot of scholarly work on Islam in article form". Hilarious. Ever heard of the journals "Arab Law Quarterly" or "Islamic Law and Society"?
Where;s that citation you need the text of? I go home in 10 minutes.
A PhD in chemistry, huh; this coming from a guy who works with other Muslims and mixes various compounds all day, sounds like he works at a bomb factory.
EBSCO is awesome to anyone who possesses the search skills of the average 8th-grader. It gives you access to everything you can find on JSTOR, Lexis Nexis, WorldCat and most of the stuff available through PsychInfo. It just requires a working knowledge of 8th-grade library science/search operators. Seems like a researcher by profession, with a PhD no less, would possess those skills.
You never explained why, if you're a researcher, you need to illegally use your wife's university account(s!) to get into academic journals. A medical researcher would need access to medical journals, wouldn't he? Why is your workplace not a subscribing institution? Furthermore, what cancer research institution isn't at/through a university?
That makes no sense that you claimed that you needed to be at home to access stuff and then you claimed to have accessed the same stuff from work. Then you claimed to be leaving work to go home to access stuff. Plus, if you just log in to some university account to access scholarly articles, you could do that from anywhere, so why would you have to go home to do that? And no, you can't get into non-publicly-accessible scholarly articles without a VPN or without actually being on campus. That's why what you pasted above was an ABSTRACT, not an article. It was publicly available.
"And the name of the university that subscribes to them."
You can look that up in Worldcat.org
I can look up the name of the university that subscribes to them on Worldcat? Wha?
"I can find them through the IU library, probably in English."
You cannot find a translation of a 140 year old obscure italian article.
What 140-year-old Italian article is available online at all, a scholarly one, no less?
"There's also this thing called 'Google Translate.'"
It's worthless.
It's not great, but it's not worthless. It's come a long way. Italian's not a very hard language to translate. It's syntactically pretty similar to English, and syntax and idiomatic expressions are what computer translators have a hard time with. Scholarly article contain few, if any idiomatic expressions.
"you can copy and paste JSTOR articles once you have legitimate access to them, the kind you need a VPN for"
Once again, find me something like this:
http://www.jstor.org/pss/1051528
and I will print out the rest of the article for you, without knowing what the hell a VPN is.
Funny, Dave. I opened that article you found through Google Scholar. In order to see the entire article I just logged into my VPN, and lo and behold, I could open the whole thing in pdf form, and I had no trouble copying and pasting it. It seems like you would know how to do that, since the only way to read the entire article, or any article on your beloved JSTOR, is to open it as a pdf. But go ahead and "print it out" for me anyway, Abdullah.
Ladies and gentlemen
(I address those who have persevered thus far) - I suggest the following rule of thumb.
If Mr Spencer or any other jihadwatch board member posts an item for our consideration - be it an opinion piece/ analysis, or a news report - and there is, almost immediately, a frantic flurry of activity from posters who explicitly identify as Muslims, or from posters who sound very much like Muslim apologists, or Muslims pretending to be something other than Muslims, quite often resulting in the complete derailing of the thread or its diversion into only vaguely related sidetracks...
then it means that whatever is in the opinion piece, analysis or news report is IMPORTANT.
Do not read any further down the thread before doing the following: scroll *all the way back up to the top* and re-read the posted article, slowly and carefully, and ask yourself: would jihad- and sharia-minded Muslims want people to think about this stuff? Or would they prefer that we infidels didn't know about it and didn't think about it?
Read the article again. Read it again.
Then, and then only, if you feel like it, read through the comments and see how much dust is being kicked up.
jdamn:
“A medical researcher would need access to medical journals, wouldn't he? Why is your workplace not a subscribing institution?”
We subscribe to chemistry and biology journals. We do not need access to “Arab Law Quarterly,” for example. Try hard to understand that.
“Furthermore, what cancer research institution isn't at/through a university?”
Have you ever heard of the pharmaceutical industry?
“That makes no sense that you claimed that you needed to be at home to access stuff and then you claimed to have accessed the same stuff from work.”
God you are an idiot. I have access anywhere I want, which is why I was asking you for a citation over and over when I was at work. I needed to come home to look at my foot and a half tall stack of journal articles I already printed out. I did not want to look up the titles, and I do not have them memorized. Understand?
“Then you claimed to be leaving work to go home to access stuff.”
Yes. Hard copies of journal articles.
“Plus, if you just log in to some university account to access scholarly articles, you could do that from anywhere”
Yes, I can. I am home now. Give me a citation.
“And no, you can't get into non-publicly-accessible scholarly articles without a VPN or without actually being on campus. That's why what you pasted above was an ABSTRACT, not an article. It was publicly available.”
Where is it publically available? I made sure it wasn’t. Show me. And it was not an abstract you complete imbecile. It was the first paragraph of the article. Would printing the whole article prove anything? Why will you not simply give me a citation and I will look it up for you? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that?
“I can look up the name of the university that subscribes to them on Worldcat? “
You can look up what Universities have what books on Worldcat. Not articles.
“What 140-year-old Italian article is available online at all, a scholarly one, no less?”
It is not available online. I never said it was. What I said is that all the pro-“gates of ijtihad” refs are from hundred-plus year old sources, because nobody believes that garbage anymore, so you have to physically go to the library to get them. So here are the refs I need translated, or at least the parts relating to the “gates of ijtihad” being closed. Hint: there probably will be no such section:
Nallino C. A., “Delle assicurazioni in diritto musulmano hanafita” Oriente Moderno, 1927
Nallino C. A., “Intorno al divieto romano imperial del’ affratellamento e ad alcuni paralleli arabi,” 1936 Studi in onore di Salvatore Riccobono nel XL anno del suo insegnamento
“Funny, Dave. I opened that article you found through Google Scholar. In order to see the entire article I just logged into my VPN, and lo and behold, I could open the whole thing in pdf form, and I had no trouble copying and pasting it. It seems like you would know how to do that, since the only way to read the entire article, or any article on your beloved JSTOR, is to open it as a pdf. But go ahead and "print it out" for me anyway, Abdullah.”
I think I might be understanding you now. You cannot be this stupid. You are either trying to fake out other readers by spouting off jibberish, or you are trying to get me mad by spouting off jibberish. Yes, you can view the whole article if you have access to JSTOR. You say you have access through your VPN, but you won’t tell me what that is. I have access through the web.
Go here:
lib.harvard.edu/
Click on “E-Research” and scroll down to “Find E-Journals”. Let’s say you want to read the article I referenced above, which is NOT PUBLICALLY AVAILABLE. Type in “Phylon” in the title field and hit “Go”. Then click on “Find it” in the first entry. A new window will pop up that gives you an option to find the article in JSTOR. Click on “Jstor”. You will be asked for your password. I HAVE ONE. WHEN YOU ENTER IT, YOU WILL BE ABLE TO READ THE ARTICLE **Online**.
You said:
"One signs into university libraries to get into the search engines and to access catalogs of journals and books. One cannot actually access the articles without a VPN through a univeristy that subscribes to those particular journals."
This is BS, unless me having a password means I have a VPN, but you don’t seem to want to tell me what a VPN is. I have a password to what I showed you above and can access anything that Harvard has online, which is quite a lot.And I can access it anywhere in the world. Imbecile.
As I said multiple times before, if you want to test me, have me print out the txt of any article that you can access with your “VPN” while I am at home.
How about if I test you. If you can access the article I mentioned above, then what is the paragraph on the next page??? I don't believe you attend a University, because any University student anywhere has online access to journals. If you say you don't, you're either lying or are at one crappy University.
jdman:
My wife came home and told me what a VPN is. One of the 3 Universities that she has access to uses one, and I never use that library. The library that uses the VPN can still be accessed anywhere. The Harvard and other library DO NOT HAVE VPN'S.
If you can only access your University library on campus, you go to a shitty university. I guess it's the only place you could get in.
Wtf? You didn't ask me for anything. You ostensibly sent me that link in order to demonstrate that you could not copy and paste from it for the purpose of putting it through Google Translate. Then, when I informed you that the only way to read entire JSTOR articles was in pdf form which one can readily copy and paste, suddenly you want me to access it for you?
Here's your citation, Abdullah:
Citation
Review: [untitled]
Author(s): Delfina Serrano Ruano
Reviewed work(s): A History of Islamic Legal Theories: An Introduction to the Sunni Usul Al-Fiqh by Wael B. Hallaq
Source: Journal of Law and Religion, Vol. 15, No. 1/2 (2000 - 2001), pp. 379-383
Published by: Journal of Law and Religion, Inc.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1051528
And here's your next paragraph:
embodies the synthesis between the "rationalist" (ahl al-ra'y, who derive rules from individual reasoning) and the traditionalist (ahl al- hadith, who reject ra'y and defend strict observance of hadith).
From the tenth to the twelfth century, a process of systemization of the legal theory took place in which the disciples of Ibn Suraj (d. 918) participated. Drawing from recent studies, Hallaq points to the lack of a chronological continuity between the period of formation and that of systemization. (30-3
Or were you looking for this one?
Negro Conceptions of White People in a Northeastern City
Author(s): Paul A. McDaniel and Nicholas Babchuk
Source: Phylon (1960-), Vol. 21, No. 1 (1st Qtr., 1960), pp. 7-19
Published by: Clark Atlanta University
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/273730
The sample of 100 Negroes in Northeastern City was selected so as to represent different social classes as designated by educational achieve- ment and occupation (upper class, 25 respondents; middle class, 45 re- spondents; and lower class, 30 respondents). In addition, the sample was evenly divided between men and women and represented a wide age range. University
You weren't very clear.
And how did those Italian articles go from being 100 years old to 140 years old to being 72 and 81 years old?
And if you claim to have access to JSTOR through a university library then why are you putting in a password at the JSTOR site? You flip on your VPN and then, through your subscribing institution, you're in. You log in through JSTOR if you have an individual, personal subscription to the database yourself, not through an institution. And, like I told you, VPN means "Virtual Private Network."
Everyone in here knows that I'm a second-year MA student of linguistics at Indiana University. I actually said that I attend IU above. And yes, it is crappy, because even though it is universally regarded as a very reputable institution in several fields like law, medicine, linguistics, library science, and music, it is infiltrated by Islamists and whored-out to Saudis to the extent that I attend classes with brilliant people from all over the world and others who are unarguably retarded or psychopathic who were admitted simply because they are Arabs.
And, like explained above, "university" is captalized when used as a proper noun, as in "Indiana University," not, e.g., "I don't believe you attend a University [sic]." You cannot be a college graduate, let alone in possession of a PhD. And what pharmaceutical company do you work for, Abdullah? Lilly, based in Indianapolis, my hometown? Because there aren't 3 universities for your wife to have access to in that town. I knew you would go from being a "cancer researcher" to working for a "pharmaceutical company," in which case you don't research cancer at all, but rather medicine. That makes more sense, actually, since a microbiologist, not a chemist, would research cancer. So are you a pharmaceutical engineer or a cancer researcher?
"Oh what a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive" -- Sir Walter Scott
Sounds like jdamn has your number too, dave, so it will be fun to read how you're gonna squirm your way out of this one. You'll no doubt add more lies to cover the ones you've already told.
Liars, they're all the same. Yawn.
Hehehe.
Jdamn:
“Wtf? You didn't ask me for anything.” -JDamn
“If you would like to test me, give me a citation and I will print a paragraph, or the whole paper if you like.”
“Where's that reference? I have to go home soon.”
“Where;s that citation you need the text of? I go home in 10 minutes.”
“Give me a citation.”
“Why will you not simply give me a citation and I will look it up for you? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that? Why won't you do that?”
Again, I have to believe you are doing this on purpose to get a rise out of me. You people cannot be this dumb. You said I don't have online access. I do. I have repeatedly showed you so, and have repeatedly asked you to cite a citation that I could look up the text to in 3 minutes. You refused. You say I am not a PhD because I misspell words or don't capitalize corerectly. This is insane. If you like, get someone in the Chemistry department at your school to E-mail me on a thread, and I will show him how much chemistry I know. Cancer research is done at pharmaceutical companies, genius. The company I work for has found several novel cancer targets. That's research. I am an author on dozens of papers, and primary author on several, and am on nearly a dozen patents. What I do is research. Where do you think the biologist gets the compounds he tests, from God? Did you know that Lilly is not the only pharmaceutical company? Since you are such a genius, maybe you should have figured out that since I said I go to MIT and Harvard to get books and articles that are not available online, and since I have access to Harvard's online library, that maybe I live in Boston. Sherlock. There is no reason to tell you where I work. There's about two dozen pharmaceutical companies in the area. Come find me.
“And there just isn't a lot of scholarly work on Islam in article form anyway.” -JDamn
The following articles are most of the ones that I read that relate to the simple "gates of ijtihad" question. Sure. Not a lot of scholarly work on Islam in article form. This is a small sample of articles relating to one specific topic. Genius. You might want to read these, and the books I referenced above, so you can debate me on the issue once I get my post written.
Was the Gate of Ijtihad Closed?
Author(s): Wael B. Hallaq
Source: International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 16, No. 1 (Mar., 1984), pp. 3-41
"Aggiornamento juridique: continuité et créativité ou fiction de la fermeture de la porte de l'Ijtihad?"
Author(s): Abdel-Magid Turki
Source: Studia Islamica, No. 94 (2002), pp. 5-65
On the Origins of the Controversy about the Existence of Mujtahids and the Gate of Ijtihad
Author(s): Wael B. Hallaq
Source: Studia Islamica, No. 63 (1986), pp. 129-141
Cornell International Law Journal
Winter, 2007
40 Cornell Int'l L.J. 89
LENGTH: 22798 words
ARTICLE: Muhammad's Social Justice or Muslim Cant?: Langdellianism and the Failures of Islamic Finance
NAME: Haider Ala Hamoudi+
The Ijtihad Controversy
Author(s): Shaista P. Ali-Karamali and Fiona Dunne
Source: Arab Law Quarterly, Vol. 9, No. 3 (1994), pp. 238-257
The American Journal of Comparative Law
Winter, 2000
48 Am. J. Comp. L. 1
LENGTH: 17503 words
ARTICLE: Fox Hunting, Pheasant Shooting, and Comparative Law
NAME: ALAN WATSON & KHALED ABOU EL FADL
Interpretation in Islamic Law: The Theory of Ijtihād
Author(s): Bernard Weiss
Source: The American Journal of Comparative Law, Vol. 26, No. 2, [Proceedings of an
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Rigidity versus Openness in Late Classical Islamic Law: The Case of the Seventeenth-Century Palestinian Muftī Khayr al-Dīn al-Ramlī
Haim Gerber
Islamic Law and Society, Vol. 5, No. 2 (1998), pp. 165-195
From Islamic to Middle Eastern Law a Restatement of the Field (Part I)
Chibli Mallat
The American Journal of Comparative Law, Vol. 51, No. 4 (Autumn, 2003), pp. 699-750
From Islamic to Middle Eastern Law. A Restatement of the Field (Part II)
Chibli Mallat
The American Journal of Comparative Law, Vol. 52, No. 1 (Winter, 2004), pp. 209-286
Taqlid, Legal Scaffolding and the Scope of Legal Injunctions in Post-Formative Theory: Mutlaq and Amm in the Jurisprudence of Shihab al-Din al-Qarafi, Sherman A. Jackson, Islamic Law and Society, 1996
The "ʿUqūd rasm al-muftī" of Ibn ʿĀbidīn
Norman Calder
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 63, No. 2 (2000), pp. 215-228
A Reconsideration of the Position of the Marja' Al-Taqlīd and the Religious Institution
Ann K. S. Lambton
Studia Islamica, No. 20 (1964), pp. 115-135
The Social Logic of Taqlid and the Rise of the Mukhatasar, Mohammad Fadel, Islamic Law and Society, 1996
Legal Doctrines in Conflict: The Relevance of Madhhab Boundaries o Legal Reasoning in the Light of an Unpublished Treatise on Taqlid and Ijtihad, Lutz Wiederhold. Islamic Law and Society, 1996
"Empire and the Confessional State: Islam and Religious Politics in Nineteenth-Century Russia, Robert Crews, American Historical Review, Feb, 2003 108(1), p.50-83
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A. D. H. Bivar
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Norman Calder
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Mohamed Abdel-Khalek Omar
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Mohamed Abdel-Khalek Omar
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So is it pharmaceutical researcher or a chemist? Do you research cancer or engineer pharmaceuticals? Whether or not you can quickly look up a title proves nothing to me. You are an asshat. Period. You're probably sitting in a library somewhere waiting for me to ask you to look up an article. I hope you went all the way across town to do it. You came in here spouting a bunch of tu quoque logaical fallacies about the KKK, in typical Muhammadan fashion. Then you started attacking all of us. Then you painted yourself into a corner, and now you're walking in wet paint. Then you tried to discredit me. I'm just a student. I was never claiming to have published multiple articles or have a semi-important job or anything, dude. You're the one who was attacking us for possibly not being from big enough cities and for being small-minded. You got your feathers all afluff because you didn't understand how library access to JSTOR articles works, after you didn't understand that full-text JSTOR articles are only available in pdf form, readily copy-and-paste-able. Whatever, dude. Again, you're an asshat. A total titclown. Pardon my French.
Posted by: dave742 at November 12, 2008 2:34 PM
I am looking forward to your conclusion on ijtihad and jihad, based on your research.
You call us dumb? Now isn't that ironic.
Boast about your PhD all you want, but anyone who defends Islam/Muhammad/Quran to the degree that you do is not that intelligent, and it only serves to show a total lack of genius, Genius. One can only laugh.
jdamn:
"Whether or not you can quickly look up a title proves nothing to me."
Fine. I think I realize by now you believe nothing. When I post my response about the gates of ijtihad issue, I will make sure you are on the thread, and you can have a great time showing me that I am wrong. Also, all those articles did not come from a simple search. They came from reading, finding relevant information in one book or article, and looking up the references they cite. It takes a while to read all the stuff I cited, especially when I had to read a lot of it twice because of the complexity of the material.
"You're probably sitting in a library somewhere waiting for me to ask you to look up an article."
Right. It's after 10 o'clock, but I hid in the library bathroom when they closed so I could look up an article when JDamn was ready to ask me.. Very funny.
"You came in here spouting a bunch of tu quoque logaical fallacies about the KKK"
I said that the KKK can draw more people than Choudrey. The KKK is a worthless bunch of freaks, and my point is that more people listen to them than Choudrey. This is a valid point. If Choudrey drew 5,000 people, the issue would be different.
"Then you started attacking all of us...Then you tried to discredit me."
I did not attack anyone. Someone said to me:
"There is more truth in the world outside of the lexis nexis you know."
This is a derogatory statement, and I have every right to respond with my own derogatory statement. I am cordial to people when they are with me.
Someone asked me:
"What books of other viewpoints contrary to what Spencer writes about Islam and Jihad would you offer as a counterpoint? Well, I'm listening?"
They asked me a question, and then acted like it was some sort of challenge to respond, so I responded. Is that OK?
It is you, JDamn, who started questioning and challenging me on every damn thing I said, basically calling me a liar over and over again:
"(a) at a university (which he isn't), or (b) at some incredibly crappy job which only the most illiterate, inbred, non-English-speaking people can be hired to do, probably one which no non-fresh-off-the-boat Mexican would be willing to do or would have to do because of a lack of job prospects...If your wife were at a university you would have a VPN at home, and wouldn't need to go to '3 universities' (very plausible!) to get articles off of Lexis Nexis...Plus, as a researcher, he should have access to medical journals through the same type of database that allows access to Lexis Nexis and JSTOR...He may be well-read but he is not a college graduate, let alone a cancer researcher"
If someone calls me a liar repeatedly, I think it is acceptable to respond.
"Then you painted yourself into a corner"
This is silly. Everything I said was the truth, and I showed that clearly.
"You're the one who was attacking us for possibly not being from big enough cities and for being small-minded."
Once again, I made that comment in response to a comment made to me. You people are very good at calling people names and making accusation at others, but don't like it when people respond. Not surprising.
"You got your feathers all afluff because you didn't understand how library access to JSTOR articles works"
I understand how it works. You do not, because you go to some shit-ass UNIVERSITY because you couldn't get in anywhere else. You're telling me I don't know how the library works when I read journal articles daily, and write them, and at the same time you say that journal articles within your own field are boring. Very funny.
"you didn't understand that full-text JSTOR articles are only available in pdf form"
Yes, I understand that. I download them and read them all the time. Initially, you said that "one cannot actually access the articles without a VPN through a univeristy." This is wrong, because I do it constantly. Once you realized that I was right, and that you painted yourself into a corner, you tried to change what you said by claiming its all about the articles only being in PDF form. It's all very pathetic.
You said that I was at...
"some incredibly crappy job which only the most illiterate, inbred, non-English-speaking people can be hired to do, probably one which no non-fresh-off-the-boat Mexican would be willing to do or would have to do because of a LACK OF JOB PROSPECTS" (my emphasis)
I find this very funny coming from a linguistics major. Good luck with your job search once you get your MS in liguistics. Sounds like a 6 figure job to me. I hope you're not thinking about a PhD, I don't think it's for you.
"Now we are getting some where...You talk to the Mohammadans about 'these' issues..."
What dave meant was that he talks to his Muslim acquaintances and friends about issues like how bad American imperialism is, how 911 was probably an inside job, how Israel is evil, how Americans are stupid and bigoted -- you know, those "issues". No wonder he gets along with Muslims so well and no wonder they seem so nice and friendly to him.
"I have a PhD"
"I am a cancer researcher"
"I am an author on dozens of papers, and primary author on several, and am on nearly a dozen patents."
"I have absolutely no idea what a vpn is."
"you won't tell me what a vpn is."
FAIL
LOL, Abu Allah!
To Dave 742 and others:
The Ku Klux Klan was created by and staffed by Democrats. Read the "Democrats' Missing History" (Wall Street Journal). It was a "military arm" of the Democratic party. There are good online historical sites about the KKK; one recalls the Grand Jury investigation ordered by Pres. Ulysses S. Grant in 1870. The Grand Jury found that the KKK "invariably attacked members of the Republican party" (i.e., Blacks). One-third of the lynchings were of White people sympathetic to the plight of the Blacks.
dumbledoresarmy:
"then it means that whatever is in the opinion piece, analysis or news report is IMPORTANT."
The only smart one here. You figured out my master plan. I am only here to distract you from this important thread. Choudrey is the next OBL, and us evil Jihadists will do whatever he says. We now take orders from him, not Obama. We will defeat you! Allah Akhbar!!
Dave,
Your links are not active. I looked up Wael Hallaq, supposed scholar on Sunni history and jurisprudence and professor at McGill University.
He perception seems more of a radical departure from mainstream Sunni doctrinal interpretation, not part of a movement substantiating his claim that ijtihad is not closed.
Please clarify.
When Jensen's primitivist ideology has millions of followers/supporters worldwide, your comparison will be relevant.
A conference and a rally are two completely different things.
awake:
"Your links are not active."
Tell me which ones.
"I looked up Wael Hallaq, supposed scholar on Sunni history and jurisprudence and professor at McGill University."
He is not a "supposed" scholar. He is widely recognized throughout the field as at top, if not the top, scholar in Sunni jurisprudence. Pick up any book or journal article, (I'm talking about scholarly material), and Hallaq will be referenced often. Better yet, pick up a book of his at the library. You will notice a little difference between his writing and Mr. Spencer's (yes, I have now read two of Spencer's books).
"He perception seems more of a radical departure from mainstream Sunni doctrinal interpretation."
What you consider mainstream is mainstream for you. There are two groups of people. Orientalists who say whatever they want without any sources to back it up, and scholars who read the original sources and back up whatever they say with the original writings. I just started putting this material together, and this, for now, is just hearsay, but I have went through all the Orientalist material that claims a "closing of the gate of ijtihad," and not a single one gives any details as to what exactly they mean by that (defitions become very important in this issue), who, or what group, supposedly said this, etc. They simply make unsubstantiated statements. When you read what the Islamic scholars throughout history actually said, and study the history, the story is completely different. Again, I will show all this very clearly (and all of you will ignore it). I know what refs Spencer gives for this issue, and who the mainstream Orientalists are that Spencer does not reference. Their arguments are baseless, simplistic, and misleading.
Regarding what you think is mainstream. If I spend my life reading 9/11 conspiracy books, articles, and websites, and do not bother to read anything else, and someone then says my theory is wrong, and that Osama bin Laden is responsible, I could then say "this OBL theory is so far out of the mainstream - it must be wrong". But who's mainstream do you speak of?
Truth is, there are no scholars that still defend this. They are all dead now.
I can give you a hint as to what one of the issues is. Spencer gives a Mutahhari quote to defend his view:
jihadwatch.org/archives/2007/03/015565print.html
In part, teh Mutahhari quote says: "Perhaps it is for this reason that the right of independent ijtihad was gradually withdrawn, and the view of the Sunni `ulama became that they instructed people to practice taqlid of only the four mujtahids..."
Read the whole Spencer quote. The key to understanding this issue is to truly understand what Mutahhari is saying. As always, a start would be to read his whole article, and not a paragraph. Even reading the article Spencer referenced can be confusing if you are not familiar with the full meanings of the terms and ideas used. You cannot simply say "ijtihad" means interpretation, and saying that taqlid means "blind following" is far from the truth. This is why it helps to read several books. I have done so, and contrary to what you might think, I am not an idiot. Even so, I am just now starting to get an understanding for this one area of Islamic law. It is very complex. It's surprising those primitive people could have developed their logic and reasoning to such a high level. Anyway, was Mutahhari really saying the the "door of ijtihad" is closed? Do Muslims really believe this? No. You need to read the whole article and understand it. It helps to read some of his other material as well. Here is another article of his that Spencer does not reference:
al-islam.org/al-tawhid/ijtihad-legislation.htm
In that article he addressed the issue a little more clearly, but still not in much detail:
In part, he says:
"This brief description shows that when we talk of the closure of the door of Ijtihad in the Sunni tradition, we refer to the Ijtihad of the first kind, i.e. independent ijtihad. As to the second kind (al-Ijtihad al-mutlaq al-muntasib) and the third kind (ijtihad al-madhhab), their doors have remained open."
Sounds a little different? It is true that independent ijtihad is no longer practiced. This is more related to honoring the eponyms of the madhabs than it is to limiting interpretation. If independent ijtihad was allowed, there would be no religion of Islam left at this point. It would have fragmented to the point of nonexistence. Again, this is complex, and I will explain it later. The ijtihad that is practiced now and has always been practice throughout history allows for all the freedom of reinterpretation that any religion does.
You are immersed in a certain circle, but in the circle of scholarly research on the subject, all the "scholars" who claimed closure of the door of ijtihad are now dead. The people alive that still do have an agenda.
awake:
"I am looking forward to your conclusion on ijtihad and jihad, based on your research."
Just to clarify, since Jdamn might come back and call me a liar, I did not do any "research" on the subject. I read a bunch of material from both sides and deduced the obvious truth from it. I did no research, and my eventual answer will be nothing more than a compilation of other peoples thoughts. You cannot do "research" in this field unless you know arabic. Unless you read the original text and come up with your own theories regarding the originals, you are just a blathering Orientalist claiming to be a scholar. Orientalists do not cite original material to back up their controversial statements. They simply cite each other repeatedly back into the 1800's until the refs simply fade away. Anyway, I did no research. I do not know arabic (although I'm learning quite a lot of Arabic law terms).
I was asked to step in here, so here I am. The charge, apparently, is that only "Orientalists" say that the gate of ijtihad is closed. Unfortunately, that is not the case.
Islamic scholar Cyril Glasse -- not an "Orientalist," but a convert to Islam himself -- notes that “‘the door of ijtihad is closed’ as of some nine hundred years, and since then the tendency of jurisprudence (fiqh) has been to produce only commentaries upon commentaries and marginalia.”
Dave742 quotes Mutahhari: "This brief description shows that when we talk of the closure of the door of Ijtihad in the Sunni tradition, we refer to the Ijtihad of the first kind, i.e. independent ijtihad. As to the second kind (al-Ijtihad al-mutlaq al-muntasib) and the third kind (ijtihad al-madhhab), their doors have remained open."
Of course. That is what Glasse is referring to by the words "commentaries upon commentaries and marginalia." This is not reasoning that reopens questions that have been settled by consensus -- such as the necessity to wage jihad and subjugate unbelievers. It is merely reasoning on how and when one should do such a thing. For the jihad and Islamic supremacist imperative to be reconsidered would require a resumption of independent jihad, which Mutahhari acknowledges is not happening now.
There are some counter-currents, however, but gthey themselves prove the assertion that at this point the gate of ijtihad is closed. The Imam Hassan Qazwini, director of the Islamic Center of America, considers this closing off of new interpretations of Islamic law to be a serious error. According to David Smock, director of the Religion and Peacemaking Initiative of the United States Institute of Peace:
Other Muslims, however, disagree, and support the closure of the gate of ijtihad. Seyyed Hossein Nasr of George Washington University (hardly an "Orientalist"), in his consideration of Islam and modernity, Ideals and Realities of Islam, says: “Certain modernists over the past century have tried to change the Shari‘ah, to reopen the gate of ijtihad, with the aim of incorporating modern practices into the Law and limiting the function of Shari‘ah to personal life. All of these activities emanate from a particular attitude of spiritual weakness vis-à-vis the world and surrender to the world. Those who are conquered by such a mentality want to make the Shari‘ah ‘conform to the times,’ which means to the whims and fancies of men and the ever changing human nature which has made ‘the times.’ They do not realize that it is the Shari‘ah according to which society should be modeled not vice versa.”
Dave's explanation of my positions, like that of so many others, is more caricature than characterization.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
By the way, Nasr and Qazwini, who acknowledge that the gate of ijtihad is closed whether they like that fact or not, are not only Muslims and not "Orientalists," but they are still very much alive.
Thus Dave's assertion that the only people who are saying that the gate of ijtihad are closed are dead Orientalists and living people "with an axe to grind" is factually false.
Anyway, I refuse to submit to this in any case. I have to "axe to grind," and take scrupulous care to be accurate in what I say about Islam. That so many people find these facts to be unpleasant is what has given birth to the idea that I have an "axe to grind," but nonetheless it is still true that no one has ever managed to show that what I say about Islamic jihad and Islamic supremacism is false. Attempts to do so either indulge in falsehoods themselves (Robert Crane, etc., and our own Abdullah here at this site) or content themselves with broad-based accusations of inaccuracy without supplying any examples (Khaleel Mohammed, etc.)
RS
"The only smart one here. You figured out my master plan. I am only here to distract you from this important thread. Choudrey is the next OBL, and us evil Jihadists will do whatever he says. We now take orders from him, not Obama. We will defeat you! Allah Akhbar!!"
Posted by: dave742
If I didn't know any better, then I would think that you just called yourself a Jihadist. If you were not a Muslim, then a more natural comment would be, "and THE evil Jihadists", but you chose instead to write, "and US evil Jihadists". IMO, that was no accident, and an admission of being a Muslim.
At least Abdullah is more honest about who he is, and he doesn't pretend to just be "friends" with Muslims; he openly admits to being a Muslim. Quit with the charade, already.
I had no intention of getting into anything until my writing is done, which will be quite a while. To explain this issue will take a bit of time, and cannot be discussed intelligently without going into depth. I will make a couple brief comments.
“Islamic scholar Cyril Glasse -- not an ‘Orientalist,’ but a convert to Islam himself -- notes that "‘the door of ijtihad is closed’ as of some nine hundred years, and since then the tendency of jurisprudence (fiqh) has been to produce only commentaries upon commentaries and marginalia."”
First of all, to call Glasse a scholar is a bad joke. He wrote an encyclopedia of Islam geared for beginners that gives cursory definitions of terms. He then reprints the Encyclopedia endlessly for decades. That is the extent of his “scholarship”. He has never, ever, printed a single article in a journal. Here are a couple excerpts of reviews on Glasse’s “scholarly” work, which will give an idea on how he is viewed in the field:
“This reference work on Islam, which contains fifty colored illustrations, is aimed at readers with no knowledge of the religion… The New Encyclopedia of Islam is a useful resource for public libraries, high schools, and community colleges, and it would make a good gift for Muslims to give to non-Muslim friends who have inquired about various Islamic beliefs, customs, and practices. However, most definitions are much too basic to satisfy those who want to undertake a serious study of Islam. Moreover, scholars of Islam are likely to find the definitions inadequate for use in introductory undergraduate-level courses about Islam.”
Review by Eric Hooglund, Journal of Palestine Studies, Vol. 32, No. 1 (Autumn, 2002), p. 115
His book is not even to the level of an undergrad. What a scholar.
“This was potentially an excellent popular reference work. The process of competent peer review could easily have eliminated the above-mentioned defects and their potentially damaging effects on an unsuspecting wider public. The publication of a book such as this, no matter how well intentioned, says all too much about the continued profound ignorance of Islam in religious studies and the pitfalls awaiting unguided readers in this field.”
Review by James W. Morris, The Journal of Religion, Vol. 70, No. 2 (Apr., 1990), pp. 305-306
Glasse does what all Orientalists do (yes, he converted to Islam, but he is Russian, lives in New York, has a Masters degree, and I doubt he knows arabic – not what I consider a scholar in the field), he makes unsubstantiated statements. You gave his quote above. What is the reference he gives for this quote? My copy is at home, but from what I remember, there is not a single reference if the whole damned encyclopedia. He has a bibliography. Wow. What historical figure’s writings is Glasse drawing from when he makes his comment?
“Of course. That is what Glasse is referring to by the words "commentaries upon commentaries and marginalia."
What do you mean, of course? If that is what he is referring to, then why doesn’t he say so? He is writing a beginners guide to Islam. You don't think his blanket statement is misleading? Since you are a scholar in the field, I am sure you have read all the material i referred to above. Are you really telling me that there is no more to this subject than what you are saying? Are you accurately portraying this issue?
None of the Orientalists I have seen go into any detail about what they’re saying, just like Glasse. Here is the standard:
1. Ijtihad means independent interpretation.
2. Taqlid means “blind following”
3. The gates of Ijtihad are closed, and all that is left is taqlid.
This is ridiculous.
“This is not reasoning that reopens questions that have been settled by consensus -- such as the necessity to wage jihad and subjugate unbelievers.”
Show me what historical Islamic figure refers to this ijma. When was this ijma formed? I am curious.
“It is merely reasoning on how and when one should do such a thing.”
This is also ridiculous. I cannot go into this now, because this alone will be 5,000 words. I will.
At this point you quote a couple others who repeat the “gates of ijtihad” mantra. Once again, can you tell me what jurists said this? When the ijma was formed? If the gates have been closed for over a thousand years, you must have dozens of quotes from famous jurists throughout Islamic history. Can I hear them?
Qazwani says:
“During the Abbasid Dynasty (750–1258 CE), the Abbasids decided to outlaw all other sects in order to strictly control religion and worship, as well as political matters.”
Wow! Now that’s scholarship!
Proving a point does not consist of finding 5 or 6 people to make unsubstantiated blanket statements. I can quote dozens of professors and other relevnt experts that say Bush and Mossad are behind 9/11. Is the act of quoting them saying "Bush and Mossad are behind 9/11" good enough to prove the point? Or do you have to actually go into depth about why you believe what you believe in order to be considered serious? I will start working on a detailed response, and will post it when I am done.
"Dave's assertion that the only people who are saying that the gate of ijtihad are closed are dead Orientalists and living people "with an axe to grind" is factually false."
I said:
"all the 'scholars' who claimed closure of the door of ijtihad are now dead."
Qazwani is not a scholar. Scholarship consists of constructing a viewpoint while referring to whose writings led you to that viewpoint. In that sense, I have not found a single scholar that says that the doors of ijtihad are closed. I did not know about Nasr. I will get his book and look at it. I will not hold my breath when looking for a reference for his claims.
Dave
Most of what you have posted in response to my evidence is just ad hominem attacks against the sources I cited.
They can take care of themselves. Let's talk about your sources.
You say you have read Hallaq's "Was the Gate of Ijtihad Closed?" Very well. I trust then that you noticed this passage:
So Hallaq reports that, according to Shawkani, taqlid became the norm, and that anyone who claimed the right of ijtihad was resisted, condemned and defamed, such that those who still practice it do so via subterfuge.
This establishes my point, which is not and never has been that there is no independent reasoning anymore in Islam, but that those who are practicing independent reasoning are marginal, not mainstream or authoritative, and are vilified by the mainstream.
You challenge me re the jihad imperative: "Show me what historical Islamic figure refers to this ijma. When was this ijma formed? I am curious."
I am not in my office and won't be for several days, but there is abundant evidence for this. Historical Islamic figures? Here are a few:
Shafi'i school: A Shafi'i manual of Islamic law that was certified in 1991 by the clerics at Al-Azhar University, one of the leading authorities in the Islamic world, as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy, stipulates that “the caliph makes war upon Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians...until they become Muslim or pay the non-Muslim poll tax.” It adds a comment by Sheikh Nuh ‘Ali Salman, a Jordanian expert on Islamic jurisprudence: the caliph wages this war only “provided that he has first invited [Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians] to enter Islam in faith and practice, and if they will not, then invited them to enter the social order of Islam by paying the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya)...while remaining in their ancestral religions.” ('Umdat al-Salik, o9.8).
Of course, there is no caliph today, and hence the oft-repeated claim that Osama et al are waging jihad illegitimately, as no state authority has authorized their jihad. But they explain their actions in terms of defensive jihad, which needs no state authority to call it, and becomes "obligatory for everyone" ('Umdat al-Salik, o9.3) if a Muslim land is attacked. The end of the defensive jihad, however, is not peaceful coexistence with non-Muslims as equals: 'Umdat al-Salik specifies that the warfare against non-Muslims must continue until "the final descent of Jesus." After that, "nothing but Islam will be accepted from them, for taking the poll tax is only effective until Jesus' descent" (o9.8).
Hanafi school: A Hanafi manual of Islamic law repeats the same injunctions. It insists that people must be called to embrace Islam before being fought, “because the Prophet so instructed his commanders, directing them to call the infidels to the faith.” It emphasizes that jihad must not be waged for economic gain, but solely for religious reasons: from the call to Islam “the people will hence perceive that they are attacked for the sake of religion, and not for the sake of taking their property, or making slaves of their children, and on this consideration it is possible that they may be induced to agree to the call, in order to save themselves from the troubles of war.”
However, “if the infidels, upon receiving the call, neither consent to it nor agree to pay capitation tax [jizya], it is then incumbent on the Muslims to call upon God for assistance, and to make war upon them, because God is the assistant of those who serve Him, and the destroyer of His enemies, the infidels, and it is necessary to implore His aid upon every occasion; the Prophet, moreover, commands us so to do.” (Al-Hidayah, II.140)
Maliki school: Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), a pioneering historian and philosopher, was also a Maliki legal theorist. In his renowned Muqaddimah, the first work of historical theory, he notes that “in the Muslim community, the holy war is a religious duty, because of the universalism of the Muslim mission and (the obligation to) convert everybody to Islam either by persuasion or by force.” In Islam, the person in charge of religious affairs is concerned with “power politics,” because Islam is “under obligation to gain power over other nations.”
Hanbali school: The great medieval theorist of what is commonly known today as radical or fundamentalist Islam, Ibn Taymiyya (Taqi al-Din Ahmad Ibn Taymiyya, 1263-1328), was a Hanbali jurist. He directed that “since lawful warfare is essentially jihad and since its aim is that the religion is God’s entirely and God’s word is uppermost, therefore according to all Muslims, those who stand in the way of this aim must be fought.”
Oddly enough, none of them qualify these statements by stating that ijma is lacking for them.
I trust that you have also read Hallaq's A History of Islamic Legal Theories, specifically p. 238, on which Hallaq notes that "the traditional interpretation of these verses," namely, Qur'an 9:29 and 9:123, "led to a law that requires an unwavering war against non-Muslims until they die or convert..." Or submit, of course.
Now you can proceed with your ad hominems against Hallaq.
Finally, see, Imran Ahsan Khan Nyazee, Assistant Professor on the Faculty of Shari’ah and Law of the International Islamic University in Islamabad, in his book Theories of Islamic Law : The Methodology of Ijtihad In it, he quotes the twelfth century Maliki jurist Ibn Rushd: “Muslim jurists agreed that the purpose of fighting with the People of the Book…is one of two things: it is either their conversion to Islam or the payment of jizyah.”
Nyazee concludes: “This leaves no doubt that the primary goal of the Muslim community, in the eyes of its jurists, is to spread the word of Allah through jihad, and the option of poll-tax [jizya] is to be exercised only after subjugation” of non-Muslims.
Oddly enough, he doesn't say this is an ancient or discarded or disputed conclusion. But if this is so, why hasn’t the worldwide Islamic community been waging jihad on a large scale up until relatively recently? Nyazee says it is only because they have not been able to do so: “the Muslim community may be considered to be passing through a period of truce. In its present state of weakness, there is nothing much it can do about it.”
But I am confident that you will be able to prove that Nyazee is a dead Orientalist.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
The posting just above, by Robert, is one of the most useful and informative postings on Jihad (and ijtihad) that anyone could wish for.
Print it out. Post it up. Carry it around with you. Send it around to as many people, and websites, as you can.
Educate yourself, and then educate others. The material has been put there before you.
No one is asking you to go off to Tikrit or Ramadi, or fight in Tora Bora. You are asked only to read, understand, and then pass on to others. It's not much to task.
dave is exploiting the jungle of complexity that Islam offers which is often put forth (by Muslims) as an obfuscation of the forest for the trees. I think the key to Islam that is unique to their society is that they can function as relatively unified without the usual techniques or systems of unified behaviors or actions that we in the West normally assume are necessary. Maybe one of the main components of this is the brainwashed sense of "Us vs. Them" that makes it easier for Muslims to establish cohesion via grapevines over vast distances and through diversity that seems disorderly to Western eyes but actually facilitates communication, sort of like the communication that ants and other insects have over vast (relative to them) distances and differences in terrain which when you don't know the exact mechanics of it, will seem mysterious to you.
"Most of what you have posted in response to my evidence is just ad hominem attacks against the sources I cited. They can take care of themselves."
No. You cite them, you defend them. What are their sources??? Please tell me. How can you use an unsubstantiated, unsourced blanket statement as a source and then refuse to defend it? Is the process of a debate to have both sides come up with a list of people making unsubstantiated, unsourced, blanket statements, and then count how many each side has, and the most wins? Not when I debated. Using sources like this is meaningless. What about my references to Glasse consists of an ad hominem attack? I accuse him of being an imbecile by not having references. I am attacking his method of scholarship, not him. As I said in my last post, he does actually give a reason for his blanket statement, but the reason is ridiculous and is easily negated by sourced rebuttals. The reviews I showed were also not ad hominem attacks, but attacked the substance of his work. Charging me with making an ad hominem attack is merely a technique to avoid the issue of why nobdy claiming the closing of the doors of ijtihad seems to want to discuss it for more than one sentence or give any refs for the claim. You or nobody else will ever give an original reference for this claim.
"Let's talk about your sources."
Fine. I can discuss my sources. I will not simply say Hallaq can "take care of himself."
"So Hallaq reports that, according to Shawkani, taqlid became the norm, and that anyone who claimed the right of ijtihad was resisted, condemned and defamed..."
Yes, in this time period taqlid was possibly "the prevailing norm." First of all, does a "prevailing norm" constitute an ijma? Second, this "prevailing norm" by the Muqallids:
"provoked the advocates of ijtihad in the twelfth/eighteenth and thirteenth/nineteenth centuries to respond with a mass of writings in which the main subjects treated were taqlid, the evils that resulted therefrom, and ijtihad as a divinely prescribed legal principle. The authors of anti-taqlid works had increasingly mounted fierce attacks not only against those who claimed that mujtahids were extinct and that the gate of ijtihad was closed but also against the very essence of taqlid, the implementation of which had become a firmly rooted practice among the populace (including the great majority of its intellectuals)."
There was much resistance to this "prevailing norm". So what is the result when some defend ijtihad and some do not? Those who are qualified to perform ijtihad do so anyway! They just don't call it that. As Hallaq says: "In practice, therefore, the methodology of ijtihad continued to be employed but mostly without being recognized under its proper name."
So even in this time of rising support of Taqlid, ijtihad is practiced anyway, they just don't call it that. So what. In relation to the state of ijtihad during this time period, have you read "State, Society, and Law in Islam: Ottoman Law in Comparative Perspective" by Haim Gerber? His entire book explicitly supports Hallaq's thesis, and shows how ijtihad was used throughout this period.
Hallaq also explains how Shawkani says that "the alleged closure of the gate of ijtihad...is but one indication of the insipience of these blind muqallids who claimed that after the sixth/twelfth or seventh/ thirteenth century, mujtahids ceased to exist."
I agree with Shawkani about the insipience of blind muqallids who claim that the door of ijtihad is closed.
"This establishes my point, which is not and never has been that there is no independent reasoning anymore in Islam, but that those who are practicing independent reasoning are marginal, not mainstream or authoritative, and are vilified by the mainstream."
Wow. I didn't find anything like that in your description here:
frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=f9196424-1ed7-4995-87a7-e176982d1eb3
I will go into this more later, but what happens when these "marginal" jurists perform ijtihad and derive rulings and fatwas based on it? Do the "mainstream" jurists tell everyone to ignore those people who are performing ijtihad? Are their rulings and writings simply ignored? I have not heard of this idea anywhere. Couls you explain how it works?
"I trust that you have also read Hallaq's A History of Islamic Legal Theories, specifically p. 238, on which Hallaq notes that "the traditional interpretation of these verses," namely, Qur'an 9:29 and 9:123, "led to a law that requires an unwavering war against non-Muslims until they die or convert..." Or submit, of course"
Yes, I read the book. I'll wait until I go home and can read more than a partial sentence to comment on it.
Your other comments are about Jihad. I have not read about that yet. Seems like it will be a much bigger unertaking, but I doubt there will be much more substance. Thank you for giving me a starting point.
Regarding Shawkani and the Taqlid/Ijtihad debate during his period and what it meant:
“With the exception of the early period of the first few generations or so, there was perhaps never a time that could be characterized exclusively as one of ijtihad or taqlid. What [was] obtained, rather, was the dominance or ascendancy of one hegemony over the other at different points in time. Ijtihad, as I see it, dominated the formative period, taqlid gained the upper hand from about the sixth/twelfth century on. But these were, again, only dominant tendencies, which explains why one encounters, on the one hand, second/eighth and third/ninth century jurists, such as Ahmad Hanbal, Ishaq Rahawayh, Sufyan al-Thawri and al-Shaybani, who allowed mujtahids to follow other scholars by way of taqlid, while such post-formative figures as Ibn 'Abd al-Salam, Ibn Taymiyah, al-Suyuti and al-Shawkani could both practice and advocate ijtihad well after the sixth/twelfth century. Both regimes were, in other words, porous configurations, neither of which completely precluded activity in the opposite direction.”
Taqlīd, Legal Scaffolding and the Scope of Legal Injunctions in Post-Formative Theory Muṭlaq and ʿĀmm in the Jurisprudence of Shihāb al-Dīn al-Qarāfī
Sherman A. Jackson
Islamic Law and Society, Vol. 3, No. 2, Issues and Problems (1996), pp. 165-192
Ijtihad and Taqlid are always present. So what happens when Taqlid predominates? People like Shawkani “both practice and advocate ijtihad” anyway! BTW, the above article is very good in challenging the simplistic "taqlid=blind following" mantra.
MW Watt used Shawkani as a source when discussing ijtihad. Watt’s article was discussed in the following article, where it discusses the controversy that Shawkani was involved in. (Sorry about the reference to a reference. I don’t have the Watt paper yet). According to Shawkani, then,
“both sides of this issue held that ijtihad was prescribed by the Shari’a as a ‘communal duty.’ Watt states that this ‘means that the duty is fulfilled if some members of the community fulfill it, but that if nobody fulfils it the whole community is liable to punishment.’ The schools disagreed on whether ijtihad was necessary in every subsequent age or whether it could cease after it had been exercised for a certain period.”
The Ijtihad Controversy
Shaista P. Ali-Karamali and Fiona Dunne
Arab Law Quarterly, Vol. 9, No. 3 (1994), pp. 238-257
Interior quotes from:
MW Watt, “The Closing of the Door of Ijtihad,” Orientalia Hispanica, 1974
Watt makes it appear as though both sides of the debate realized that ijtihad was necessary, but disagreed on whether it always is. I guess I have to find this article.
dave742:
Who cares???
You do realize that while you are talking in circles about meaningless bull, you are talking to yourself, don't you.
Why is it that the whole point of islamic argument is to talk in circles until the other side either falls asleep or walks away in sheer boredom?
All the time quoting "arab law"
Jumbo shrimp
Military intelligence
oxymorons all
But at least, while you are busy here, you are missing the opportunity to bore us in other threads...
Later
Albert
Albert:
Your entire worldview is based on fallacies. I was told by "awake" that in order to address anything here, I have to "workaround" the "gates of ijtihad" issue. I have done so, and personally realize what a farce that whole thing is. I have not, as I said, put my whole argument together. I will then proceed from there. Of course I know everyone here will ignore it. I just like knocking on the closed doors in peoples minds and watching them bariccade it shut.
dave742,
You did pretty much the same thing you accused Spencer of doing, when you wrote then quoted:
...this "prevailing norm" by the Muqallids:
"provoked the advocates of ijtihad in the twelfth/eighteenth and thirteenth/nineteenth centuries to respond with a mass of writings in which the main subjects treated were taqlid, the evils that resulted therefrom, and ijtihad as a divinely prescribed legal principle. The authors of anti-taqlid works had increasingly mounted fierce attacks not only against those who claimed that mujtahids were extinct and that the gate of ijtihad was closed but also against the very essence of taqlid, the implementation of which had become a firmly rooted practice among the populace (including the great majority of its intellectuals)."
See what you did? You simply quoted a secondary source, Hallaq (apparently, though you don't even make that clear), who asserted things about how there were major defenders of ijtihad, but neither you nor he provided any primary sources. A secondary source making an assertion is pretty much the same thing as what you accused Spencer of doing when you wrote:
"How can you use an unsubstantiated, unsourced blanket statement as a source and then refuse to defend it? Is the process of a debate to have both sides come up with a list of people making unsubstantiated, unsourced, blanket statements, and then count how many each side has, and the most wins? Not when I debated. Using sources like this is meaningless. What about my references to Glasse consists of an ad hominem attack? I accuse him of being an imbecile by not having references. I am attacking his method of scholarship, not him. As I said in my last post, he does actually give a reason for his blanket statement, but the reason is ridiculous and is easily negated by sourced rebuttals."
So where are the primary sources for Hallaq's blanket statement? If he provides the primary sources, why did you even quote him at all instead of just giving us the primary sources that supposedly formed the actual evidentiary basis for his blanket statement?
"I was told by "awake" that in order to address anything here, I have to "workaround" the "gates of ijtihad" issue."
Posted by: dave742 at November 13, 2008 3:20 PM
Post a comment
And to date you have not done so. You have used an example of a supposed Sunni scholar who states that ijtihad is alive and well although all four major Sunni schools oppose it, with the Sunnis comprising over 80% of the world's Muslims.
These fatwas that you speak of are just what Robert has stated, commentary on top of commentary, yet the core aspects of Islam remain unchanged.
This imperative must remain to protect the Qur'an's supposed divinity, for wholesale doctrinal changes to Islam that are seen to undermine Allah's infallible word will cause the foundation of Islam to crack and bring the whole house down.
These Sunni scholars "perform" ijtihad to the extent of commentary to maintain traditional interpretations pf Islamic doctrine in the face of those in movements who seek to change it.
Since you laud Hallaq as a major Sunni scholar and one who strongly believes that ijtihad is vibrant in Islam today, maybe you can cite a single meaningful doctrinal reform that he has put forth that is accepted by the mainstream, or is that task secretly undertaken by other noted Islamic scholars who prefer to remain nameless?
To me it sounds like Hallaq is just another Muslim engaging in academic disinformation, trying to paint a prettier picture of Islam in order to salvage its tarnished reputation.
What mainstream scholars have publicly supported Hallaq's claim about ijtihad? What specific reinterpretations have they arrived at?
It is very strange that someone who is defending the idea that the doors of ijtihad were closed over a thousand years ago would bring up Shawkani, who is known as a mujtahid himself. Why bring up the existence of a mujtahid in the nineteenth century when the gates of ijtihad were supposedly closed hundreds of years before?:
“On the 3 May 1791, when Shawkani was slightly over thirty years old and recognized to have become a mujtahid…”
Bernard Haykel, “Revival and Reform in Islam: The Legacy of Muhammad al-Shawkani,” p. 143
“Shawkani, the imam of the Sunni mujtahids of his epoch, the Judge of Judges, the Shayk al-Islam”
Ismail al-Akwa, Hijar al-ilm, IV:2251
Cited in Haykel, p.190
“Also among the most beneficial books in hadith-based law is Nayl al-awtar fi sharh Muntaqa al-akhbar, as is Irshad al-fuhul fi tahqiq ‘ilm al-usul on the principles of jurisprudence, both of which are by the great imam, the renewer and mujtahid of Yemen of the twelfth century Muhammad b. ‘Ali al-Shawkani.”
al-‘Amri, al-Manar, pp.374-5, 118-23.
Cited in Haykel, p.207
DenverRodeo:
"So where are the primary sources for Hallaq's blanket statement?"
Hallaq did not make a blanket statement. A blanket statement equivalent to "the gates of ijtihad have been closed" would be "the gates of ijtihad have always been open". Hallaq does not make statements like this. He writes scholarly articles backed up by references. Here are the one you asked for regarrding Shawkani:
1)Shawkani, Irshad
2) Shawkani, al-Qawl al-Mufid fi Adillat al-Ijtihad wal-Taqlid (Cairo, 1974)
3) Shawkani, al-Badr
"If he provides the primary sources, why did you even quote him at all instead of just giving us the primary sources that supposedly formed the actual evidentiary basis for his blanket statement?"
Because I do not know Arabic.
awake:
"To me it sounds like Hallaq is just another Muslim engaging in academic disinformation, trying to paint a prettier picture of Islam in order to salvage its tarnished reputation."
Hallaq is a Christian. I know, he is a secret Muslim.
"What mainstream scholars have publicly supported Hallaq's claim about ijtihad?"
See nearly all of the articles and books I have referenced above.
I'll get to the rest of your post eventually. Once again, I had no intention of this subject coming up at this point. I have yet to write anything. You will just have to wait.
Dave
When you willfully misinterpret my statement about their having to take care of themselves, it makes me doubt your interest in discussing these matters in good faith.
Spelling it out: I wrote "They can take care of themselves. Let's talk about your sources." Does that mean I am unable or unwilling to defend my sources? Of course not. It means, I am granting your impugning of my sources for the sake of argument, and will prove my point from the sources you cite.
You say you didn't engage in ad hominems against my sources and then in practically the next breath called Glasse an imbecile. Do you know what an ad hominem attack is?
In any case, Glasse's Encyclopedia is a perfectly good source for the mainstream, prevailing, common views among Islamic scholars. That he doesn't cite sources proves nothing more than that he has written a popular book. Even the material you quote above, about how furtive the modern mujtahedin have to be, proves that the closure of the gate of ijtihad is indeed the prevaling, common view among Islamic scholars.
That you can produce rafts of quotes calling someone a mujtahid does not elevate him to the level of as-Shafi'i or ibn Hanbal, since -- as you yourself have acknowledged obliquely, although I am not sure you knew the meaning of the words in the material you produced -- there are secondary levels of ijtihad that do not touch on reevaluating settled matters.
You challenged me to provide historical figures in Islam who said that jihad warfare against and subjugation of unbelievers was an Islamic imperative. I did so, and added a modern Islamic scholar (and there are many others) who says the same thing. You have already asserted that this is false and sneered at it as a lack of substance, although I have quoted to you scholars from each of the Sunni madhahib. But glaringly absent amid your sneers was any actual refutation.
This is so typical. So many people have come in here like you, claiming I'm an idiot and that you have proof, and then quickly being reduced to slinging insults without substance and ignoring my substantive documentation of the positions I've taken.
But feel free to keep coming. I'm not tired.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
Oh, and by the way, Dave, if you're still around next week, I will send you info. on my sources. At no time and in no way did I ever say or imply what you have me saying -- that if I can cite more people than you can, I win, or whatever it was.
Your condescension and hostility is noted, but don't get me wrong -- I don't really care. You don't have the facts to stand on, and no amount of bluster and pasted-in publication data will obscure that.
But you will just have to wait, as I am at a conference this weekend and traveling next week also. I'm sure you won't mind.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
dave:
"Hallaq did not make a blanket statement."
You're quibbling, and stalling for time, and then blowing clouds of obfuscation.
What you quoted from Hallaq may not be precisely a "blanket statement" (if that phrase even has a precise meaning), but it is a broad assertion and no primary sources were given the first time around.
"Hallaq does not make statements like this. He writes scholarly articles backed up by references. "
That's just another assertion, now made by a non-scholar, you. It's worthless, without evidence to back it up.
"Here are the one you asked for regarrding Shawkani:
1)Shawkani, Irshad
2) Shawkani, al-Qawl al-Mufid fi Adillat al-Ijtihad wal-Taqlid (Cairo, 1974)
3) Shawkani, al-Badr"
What does "Shawkani" have to do with the price of tea in China? How does one guy named "Shawkani" and what he wrote prove that there was a "prevailing norm" about ijtihad during a long enough period of time to be relevant today? That's like someone citing one Christian philosopher from the Middle Ages to prove a broad assertion about the Scholastic movement in general. Talk about "ridiculous".
"If he provides the primary sources, why did you even quote him at all instead of just giving us the primary sources that supposedly formed the actual evidentiary basis for his blanket statement?"
Because I do not know Arabic.
If your not knowing Arabic prevents you from assessing his primary sources, how do you know his assertions are correct? You think by merely waving the magic word "scholar" around that is sufficient? You make a big deal of how evidence is necessary to assess claims, but you admit you can't even read the evidence to make your own assessment of the claim!
Mr. Spencer:
“When you willfully misinterpret my statement”
I did not willfully do anything. I just now thought for about two minutes about what you may have meant by “they can take care of themselves,” taking into account your explanation, but I still don’t understand. I accept that this is probably my fault. I am good at missing things, and my wife has to explain a lot of things to me when we go to see a movie. What I did at most was misunderstand you. This was not intentional. You saying I willfully did something is also a misunderstanding, because I willfully did nothing.
“You say you didn't engage in ad hominems against my sources and then in practically the next breath called Glasse an imbecile. Do you know what an ad hominem attack is?”
I just read the Wikipedia definition of ad hominem, and I still don’t see why what I said was an ad hominem attack. If I called Glasse an imbecile with no other comment or explanation why I am saying it, it would be ad hominem. However, I explained exactly why I think he is an imbecile. This explanation of my derogatory statement against him disqualifies it from being ad hominem.
“In any case, Glasse's Encyclopedia is a perfectly good source for the mainstream, prevailing, common views among Islamic scholars.”
I disagree, and so have at least two reviewers of his work. This is simply an unacceptable work for providing evidence for a complex subject, which the reviewers made perfectly clear.
“That he doesn't cite sources proves nothing more than that he has written a popular book.”
Really? Is that how it works? I looked on Amazon and see that the 2003 edition of Glasses’ book is ranked #782,449. The 2008 edition is ranked #282,482. Let’s compare it to Hallaq’s book for beginners. His book “The Origins and Evolution of Islamic Law” is ranked #214,240. I think Hallaq’s book can be considered just as “popular” as Glasses’. So let’s compare number of references cited in these two books. To make it fair, we will include the number of pages since more pages should mean more sources cited. Here are the results:
Hallaq: 206 pages, 460 footnotes
Glasse: 574 pages, 0 footnotes
I see no correlation between popularity an number of footnotes.
“Even the material you quote above, about how furtive the modern mujtahedin have to be, proves that the closure of the gate of ijtihad is indeed the prevaling, common view among Islamic scholars.”
Shawkani was not being furtive about anything. As Hallaq says, the “authors of anti-taqlid works had increasingly mounted fierce attacks”. Mounting fierce attacks is not being furtive. These debates have always been quite open. I ordered the Haykel book on Shawkani, and I am sure I’ll have much more to say on this soon.
“That you can produce rafts of quotes calling someone a mujtahid does not elevate him to the level of as-Shafi'i or ibn Hanbal, since -- as you yourself have acknowledged obliquely, although I am not sure you knew the meaning of the words in the material you produced -- there are secondary levels of ijtihad that do not touch on reevaluating settled matters.”
By settled matters, I assume you are speaking of ijma. In Hallaq’s “Aurthority, Continuity and Change in Ilamic Law,” he has an entire chapter titled “Jurist Typologies: a Framework for Enquiry.” I have also read other articles and books that address typologies. Nowhere have I found a typology that addresses the issue of a mujtihad being able to reverse an ijma. As far as I know, no mujtahid of any level can do this. Also, you have yet to show me who and when the consensus about the closing of the gates of ijtihad happened. I agree that there are no mujtahida of the "first degree" any more. (I put this in quotes because these definitions change from era to era and from person to person - the idea being the eponyms after a certain time were put into a class by themsleves). The idea that this means the gates of ijtihad are closed is ridiculous. Once again, I'll get to it. The rafts of quotes do not elevate Shawkani to the level of an eponym, but rafts of quotes calling him a mujtahid means that he practiced ijtihad. Youe do not need to be a school founder to practice ijtihad. Shawkani was a mujtahid, and he practiced ijtihad, The gates are not closed. If you think that only the 4 school founders can perform ijtihad, then you should cease your calls for reopening the gates, since those four people are long dead.
“You challenged me to provide historical figures in Islam who said that jihad warfare against and subjugation of unbelievers was an Islamic imperative. I did so, and added a modern Islamic scholar (and there are many others) who says the same thing. You have already asserted that this is false and sneered at it as a lack of substance, although I have quoted to you scholars from each of the Sunni madhahib. But glaringly absent amid your sneers was any actual refutation.”
I was asking this out of curiosity for the future. I have read nothing on the jihad subject you focus on, and simply wanted to know about the ijma related to this subject when I do read about it. You gave me a bunch of info about the different schools. I simply glanced over that, since I know nothing about it yet. It’s a reference for the future for me. I never addressed anything about what you said there. I barely even read it. BTW, do you consider each of those points as constituting an actual ijma? Just for my info for the future.
“ So many people have come in here like you, claiming I'm an idiot and that you have proof”
I did not claim you are an idiot. I claim you are deliberately distorting an issue to conform with your agenda. You cannot read books and articles by authors like Hallaq and never address the points he makes and then make any claim about discussing an issue “honestly”. So far we have discussed maybe one sentence of Hallaq’s, which I replied to, and to which you did not respond. We have yet to address the other hundreds of pages we dodn't adress.
“and then quickly being reduced to slinging insults without substance”
I made no insults without attaching substantive remarks to them. If so, show me.
“and ignoring my substantive documentation of the positions I've taken.”
I ignored something which I asked for out of curiosity which I have made very clear I know nothing about yet. Otherwise, I have addressed every single thing you have said point by point, as I did here. How about if you go over my posts again and do the same. You seem to have missed some things.
DenverRodeo:
"What does "Shawkani" have to do with the price of tea in China?...."
You're trying to comment on an article that you haven't even read, which makes this tedious. The passage of Hallaq you quoted mentions advocates of ijtihad in the 18th and 19th centuries, Hallaq names the most prominent of these, and they are:
Shah Wali Allah
San'ani
Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab
Ibn Mu'ammar
Shawkani
Ibn 'Ali al-Sanusi
Hallaq does not have the space to discuss all of these since he is writing a journal article and not a book, so he chooses Shawkani as being representative of the movement, and he discusses him. That is where the Shawkani refs come from. If you want to discuss the article further, please go to the library and read it first. My job is not to read it to you.
"If your not knowing Arabic prevents you from assessing his primary sources, how do you know his assertions are correct?"
So your stance is that Hallaq is lying about what his sources say, and all the others that have the same position and also give specific references are also lying about their sources, and it is only the authors who give give no sources that are telling the truth. Do you consider this to be a well thought out stance?
Mr. Spencer:
I feel that we are getting sidetracked too much by the language I use, and it takes too much time to address meaningless comments back and forth. I feel this is a big issue for you, so from now on I will write nothing that can be considered derogatory, and will be a perfect gentleman.
In order to make future discussions go more smoothly, can you tell me whose typology you prefer to follow regarding mujtahids and muqallids? It would help if we start on the same page. Also, referring to the typology you choose, can you please tell me what levels you consider to be capable of performing ijtihad?
Honestly Dave, your posts are convoluted and annoying.
Simply LIST Sunni scholars who support your claim that "the gate of" ijtihad are not closed, but rather, open and vibrant.
Simply provide explicit examples of ijtihad in action, accepted as mainstream ideology in Islam.
Otherwise, please cease and desist in this obnoxious, baselass claim of yours against Robert, self admittedly, out of your own ignorance.
awake:
I will compile a list for you and compile a similar list for your side as well. I will show it in due time. If you want to show me some Sunni scholars that say the gates are closed, feel free to so. Please don't bring up people like Glasse, it's annoying. My self admitted ignorance relates to the Jihad question. I have not looked into that. I know about the ijtihad question, and as I said, it is a joke. We have not even touched on a single point of mine yet. I have only answered Mr. Spencers questions. He brought up a couple sentences of my sources, I replied, and have not received a response. We have yet to visit the other thousand or so pages of info, but we will visit it in due time.
Mr. Spencer:
You said you would send me info about refs, Would that be through this thread? Or can you do so directly to my E-mail? Could you please at the same time send me your answers about the typology questions I asked? Thank you.
awake:
Just a quick one for my list. I like it because it is from a Jew confirming the study of a Christian. Neat.:
“This statement is no longer entirely surprising after Wael Hallaq so convincingly showed that the old theory of the ‘closing of the gates of ijtihad (free legal interpretation)’ was never more than half-truth at best. Much of the present study is an affirmation of Hallaq’s excellent study.”
State, Society, and Law in Islam
By Haim Gerber, p.17
Dave,
Haim Gerber is as much a Sunni Islamic scholar as Carl Ernst is. Do you know of of any Sunni Islamic scholars who are actually Muslim, who support these non-muslim commenters claims on ijtihad?
A single, living Muslim scholar?
dave,
"What does "Shawkani" have to do with the price of tea in China?...."
You're trying to comment on an article that you haven't even read, which makes this tedious.
I'm not trying to comment on it. I'm pointing out that your use of that article doesn't pass the test of evidentiary presentation of a claim in a debate which you yourself claim Spencer fails while you supposedly succeed.
The passage of Hallaq you quoted mentions advocates of ijtihad in the 18th and 19th centuries, Hallaq names the most prominent of these, and they are:
Shah Wali Allah
San'ani
Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab
Ibn Mu'ammar
Shawkani
Ibn 'Ali al-Sanusi
This information you present isn't helpful by itself. You have to provide more than that. You have to show proof that these advocates of ijtihad were not marginal, were not persecuted for being advocates of ijtihad, and/or that their "ijtihad" was in fact of a nature relevant to this disagreement you have with Spencer. (For example, there could be a debate between two people, let's called them "david" and "bob" -- bob maintains that the former Soviet Union was not as free a society as the US is, but david asserts that the former Soviet Union was just as free a society as the US is and cites "scholars" who also assert this, and when you read these "scholars" it turns out they are saying that the Soviet Constitution (which on paper guaranteed lots of freedoms and rights for the people) proves that the USSR was just as free as the US. Bob would then counter that just because there's a Constitution on paper doesn't prove freedom. Same goes for "ijtihad" -- just because a handful of Islamic scholars used that word doesn't mean they really practiced true freedom and flexibility of interpretation of the Koran and Sunna and that this by extension proves that Islam accomodates the ijtihad-activity of this handful of guys. I.e., your evidence hasn't established your claim at all, it just appears on the surface to be in that general ballpark.)
If you want to discuss the article further, please go to the library and read it first. My job is not to read it to you.
Your "job" here is to persuade us that you're correct. You haven't come close. Secondly, you keep doing what you accuse Spencer of doing.
"If your not knowing Arabic prevents you from assessing his primary sources, how do you know his assertions are correct?"
So your stance is that Hallaq is lying about what his sources say, and all the others that have the same position and also give specific references are also lying about their sources,
No, my stance is that you haven't proven that Hallaq's assertion about ijtihad is correct. Remember, you yourself said this is a complicated subtle issue. It's not a simple black/white fact that Hallaq is asserting, it's more on the level of interpretation based on a whole complex bunch of facts. In order to determine if Hallaq is correct, it's not enough to say other "scholars" agree with him, it's not enough to say that Hallaq has lots of nice references on each page, it's not enough to say he's a "scholar". Elsewhere you make a big deal about what exactly makes a claim "enough" to make it credible. But when it gets around to the claims you are pushing, suddenly all those expectations you have of others like Spencer are thrown out the window and when I challenge you on your inadequacy in this regard you keep dancing around and blowing smoke.
Show us the beef or shut up.
For posterity:
About that Glasse reference. Here it is:
http://books.google.com/books?id=focLrox-frUC&pg=RA1-PA209&lpg=RA1-PA209
Notice three things:
1) The incredible this Islamic scholar goes into on such an important topic.
2) The absolute absence of references
3) The sentence following Spencers quote is:
"Nevertheless, it is also clear that ijtihad is always necessary and inevitable because of the need to act in situations which are new or unique, or because information is lacking or competent authorities [sic: are] not present."
Although the reference and definition is pathetic, even Glasse qualifies his statement.
That was:
1) The incredible detail....