Singh: feeling the heat
Here again we see Muslims getting much angrier over anti-jihad efforts by non-Muslims than they ever seem to get about jihad violence itself. "Pakistan protesters burn Indian PM effigy," from AFP, December 19 (thanks to JE):
Hundreds of Pakistani protesters have burnt an Indian flag and an effigy of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, underscoring mounting tensions in the wake of the Mumbai attacks.Tribal elders, politicians and residents attended the anti-India rally in the south-western town of Chaman, in Baluchistan province on the border with Afghanistan.
"India wants to steal our water in Kashmir, and that is why it is piling pressure on Pakistan following the attacks in Mumbai," local politician Naseer Ahmed Bacha Khan told the protesters in Chaman....
It is a sorry state of affairs. Is there any state that can actually have a deterrent effect on Pakistan. India and US do not matter to it. In fact insufficient effect of US after 9/11,2001 has in many ways emboldened Pak even more after 9/11. If any country , then it is Pakistan that has positively gained after 9/11. It can sense the impotency of Nuke weapons at the hands of US and India. Remember after 9/11 when US chose Pak as a front line state against terror , how Gen. Musharraf growled and said in a typical Paki Military style " LAY OFF INDIA "!. How he connected India to that ?. It was his lingering fear that his Indian Hindu blood brothers know his ins and outs and might derail his grand designs of whatever he felt at that time. In 7/8 years after 9/11, US and NATO have messed up the region so bad that it is exposing US chinks and the regional players Pak. ,Iran , Regional insurgents,and the likes et al. In Mumbai now they have only tested waters as a sort of Pilot Project and the real action kept in Reserve for a better chosen time and place. It is high time for the International Community to understand and thwart any future potential misadventures of insane or very clever elements in Pakistan and surrounding regional area. Disarm Pak. military and neutralise their nukes.
sorry for incomplete mistake..
and the regional players Pak. ,Iran , Regional insurgents,and the likes et al.
and the regional players Pak. ,Iran , Regional insurgents,and the likes et al.are feeling emboldened.
Slightly tangential, but along the lines of muslims misdirecting protests...
Headline: Activists Protest Treatment Of Muslim Woman
DOUGLASVILLE, Ga. -- Civil rights activists gathered in Douglasville Friday to protest the treatment of a black Muslim woman who was briefly jailed Tuesday for refusing to remove her head scarf at a courthouse security checkpoint.
http://www.cbs46.com/news/18317828/detail.html#-
"While the Hindu elaborates his argument, the Moslem sharpens his sword. Between these two races and creeds…the gulf is impassable.
1931, 18 March. Albert Hall, London." (Broad, 231.)
Churchill's comparison of the Hindus and Muslims, and many of his other most telling remarks about Islam, can be found usefully gathered at this site:
http://www.weaponofmusicaldefense.com/thelibrary/Winston_Churchill_on_Islam_and_Mahommedanism
There are those "tensions" again!
It's suprising that people in such a slow laid-back part of the world are so very "tense".
;->
All over the world, muslims(pakis) are bent over backwards to blame this or blame that. We, Indians, know their game. Muslims always blame others. One day it's kashmir another day it's palestine. And on, and on, and on...
Muslims in pakistan are the same as muslims in America. There the same in U.K. There the same in Europe. There the same in somalia. Just pick up a newspaper. Read it for yourself.
It's early in the U.S. You can believe that the muslims here in America are different. But, they're not. Just ask U.K. Ban muslim immigration. Act now.
Thanks for that link, Hugh! "I can promise you nothing but blood, sweat and tears." True then and true today.
Coming from a Christian perspective, I want to know the answers to the following questions.
Do Muslims have a concept of a soul or spirit residing within the individual?
Do Muslims have a concept of sin as conceived within Christianity?
Do they have something like a conscience, as in the Christian faith? In other words, do they feel guilty if they commit a wrongful deed?
Do Muslims have an inward spiritual relationship with their God or is it an external relationship that is based on rituals and prescribed acts?
I would appreciate being educated by those of you who are knowledgeable about that religion.
Way to go Pakistan, show the love and peace!
Hugh: Thanks for the Churchill link. My favorite line by the Great Man is "...the Mahommedan religion increases, instead of lessening, the fury of intolerance." Just so. Churchill knew Islam well. Damn well.
norman,
please do not try to understand Islam in terms of Christian theological, eschatological or soteriological categories. At the risk of massive misunderstanding, the short answers to your questions are: No, No, No, No and No. But that means diddly-squat, because Christian definitions simply do not apply. In particular, the sin/guilt nexus that goes into Christian notions of "conscience" is totally alien to Islam.
But cognate terms and concepts do exist. In Islam, the word for soul or spirit is ruh, and the word for (inner, essential) self is nafs. The Quran says very little about either (e.g. 17:85); philosophical elaborations of these notions are to be found, almost exclusively, in Sufi works only. Mainstream Islam does not concern itself with "inward spiritual relationships" at all. In fact, personalized conceptions of one's Deity and relation thereto are disapproved of and actively discouraged.
Islam means submission (to the will of Allah): a Muslim is thus a slave of Allah, and need only fear Allah's judgment on the Final Day. That's it. Ethics and law are the same thing: all actions categorize into a 5-grade scale of obligatory, recommended, neutral (i.e. inconsequential), deprecated and forbidden. Allah's judgment is all, and to be feared. There is no room for guilt.
Here's a god rundown of Islamic "morality," Norman:
http://www.faithfreedom.org/Articles/AyeshaAhmed20729.htm
As for sin and guilt, no. They understand shame, though, but what shames them is very different from what shames us. Islam is a cult, so any semblance of good and bad really comes down to how it appears to others. Muslims have no moral compass, and being necessarily narcissistic, really only are, in their own eyes, how others see them. Shaking hands with a woman or a non-Muslim is incredibly shameful. The Mufti of Al-Azhar will probably lose his job for having shaken hands with a Jew, in fact. Being alone with a woman is incredibly shameful. Owning up to a mistake or a shortcoming is unforgivable. Raping your 6-year-old niece who is arguably retarded, is, however, exemplary, and one should advocate that others do so at every opportunity (provided that she is bought and paid for and properly genitally mutilated, of course).
So no, no conscience. If you read the texts it will be clear that any teaching which seems moral, even the early, peaceful, abrogated teachings, really only have to do with appearing moral, so they're essentially lessons in hypocrisy. Muslims can't have consciences because Islam can only be believed by narcissists. The question of souls is debatable. I would argue that in the Muslim worldview we're all just vessels for Allah's will, which goes back to the lack of responsibility. "Allah made me do it" is the perennial Muslim excuse, hence the "cat's meat" statement and behavior along those lines.
As for a relationship with Allah (please don't call their evil death-god 'God'), no. Allah is amorphous, unknowable, arbitrary, and very insecure. The rituals arguably have nothing to do with Allah, since they're only briefly mentioned in the Koran, if at all. That's all about brainwashing, numbing the mind, and killing one's capacity for rational thought or self-improvement. Hope that helps.
The Islam 101 link at the top is very useful for questions like these, as is the "About Islam" link in the banner at religionofpeace.com.
Just backing up what jdamn and pravasi have said, we have the testimony of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, in 'Infidel', the chapter entitled 'doubt and defiance'.
"A Muslim woman must not feel wild, or free, or any of the other emotions and longings I felt when I read those books {that is, western romances and thrillers - dda}.
"A Muslim girl does not make her own decisions or seek control. She is trained to be docile. *If you are a Muslim girl, you disappear, until there is almost no you inside you* {my emphasis added - and although Ayaan is here talking about women, this applies just as much to *any* Muslim - dda}.
"In Islam, becoming an individual is not a necessary development; many people, especially women, never develop a clear individual will. {Which, of course, makes them prime cannon fodder, and enables them to meekly - or, for that matter, enthusiastically - carry out horrible orders and perform the most ghastly atrocities against each other or against non-Muslims - dda}.
"You submit: that is the literal meaning of the word *islam*: submission. The goal is to become quiet inside, so that you never raise your eyes, not even inside your mind." END QUOTE.
It appears to me that not only are Muslims taught to dehumanise the Other, the Infidel; but they are also taught to dehumanise *themselves*; to make themselves into Things.
You see this also in Tawfiq Hamid's article
The development of a jihadist's mind
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1200475901923&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
when he relates how he was told that you must leave your mind, your brain, behind, when you enter allah's palace.
"During my first year of medical school, a Jamaah member named Muchtar Muchtar invited me to join the organization {i.e. Jemaah Islamiya - dda}.
"Muchtar was in his fourth year, and Jamaah had given him the title amir (prince or caliph) - a designation taken from early Islamic writings that is associated with the Islamic caliphate or amir almomenin (prince of the believers).
"I accepted his invitation, and we walked together to Jamaah's mosque for noon prayers.
"On the way there Muchtar emphasized the central importance in Islam of the concept of al-fikr kufr, the idea that the very act of thinking (fikr) makes one become an infidel (kufr).
"(In Arabic both words are derived from the same three root letters but have different meanings.)
"He told me, "Your brain is just like a donkey [a symbol of inferiority in the Arab culture] that can get you only to the palace door of the king [Allah]. To enter the palace once you have reached the door, you should leave the donkey [your inferior mind] outside."
"By this parable, Muchtar meant that a truly dedicated Muslim no longer thinks but automatically obeys the teachings of Islam."
END QUOTE.
Islam - mainstream, classical, jihad-and-sharia Islam - takes the heart out of your breast and the head off your shoulders: it removes both your capacity for empathy and your capacity to think and question.
Islam drives toward the creation of an army of soulless warriors, heartless and headless.
Thank you jdamn and pravasi for the information. The information do support the suspicions that I had about Islam. It seems contrary and opposite to Christianity. It seems so alien to our way of thought in the West.
How can people refer to this religion as sharing the same roots as Christianity. Islam is referred to as one of the Abrahamic religions. But how can someone say that with a straight face when Islam is so alien?
I am also curious why is it that people from the West and some with a Christian upbringing could voluntarily join Islam? I hear these converts say that Islam gives them something that they did not get from Christianity. What is that something? I want to speculate that these converts desire an escape from personal responsibility. And they find that escape in Islam. Since the Muslim has no need to internalize guilt and conscience, this is really an attractive religion to someone who feels that the expectations of Christianity and the dominant culture of the West are more than they can handle or live up to.
I have no training or learning in theology, so I am trying to grasp my way through the fog here. But I am beginning to see the light.
A great place to start to understand Islam is faithfreedom.org, Norman. It's run by a guy who was a Muslim, born and raised in Iran, and who now dedicates his time to helping people apostacize. Also, Robert Spencer's book 'Islam Unveiled' is a great place to start.
All that '3 great Abrahamic Faiths' stuff is just a meme propogated by Muslims for opportunistic purposes, like justifying their occupation of Jerusalem and trying to be accepted and trusted by kafirs, although they always betray us in the end, and it's just a matter of until they think they have the upper hand. If you know who the Islamic Abraham - or Jesus (Esau, actually; they never get his name right) or Moses - are you will realize that the faiths have nothing in common, although Islam is largely built on a few twisted Bible stories.
People join Islam in the West for various reasons. Some do it because they're dating a Muslim. Often that Muslim may know nothing about Islam and thus present a very rosy picture of it; often they are lying (al-taqiyya) and presentng a false front. This is very easy for Muslims because, like I said before, all Muslims are narcissists, so they live to be liked and approved of, have no true "selves" and project anything they think will yield that approval. I've known Muslim men who spoke in fake little girl voices because they think that we will like them if they do that. This is what a Muslim "personality" consists of, essentially - a front.
Some people become Muslims because Islam attracts bad people and Islam justifies and sanctifies just about any sort of abhorrent behavior. Some do it because they're empty inside, and since Islam teaches (and teaches, and teaches -- like 70+% of the texts) that kafirs are vile, dirty, sinful, base, etc., and that Muslims are perfect, it gives them a sense of superiorty that they could never achieve as kafirs. This is largely why, I think, Islam appeals to women. Islam hates all kafirs, but it especially hates kafir women, and women are competitive. If you're a Muslim woman you can be stupid, ugly, unproductive, and a total parasite loser, but better than any kafir so long as some schmo is willing to buy you as a sex slave and you can have kids. You can even hide your ugly and gain 50 pounds if you wear the whole get-up.
A lot of people become Muslims because they just don't know what they're getting into. Muslims, and all cult members, actively recruit. They are trained at painting a flowery image of Islam - again, its all about projecting an image, and image is all in Islam - and they treat it, to paraphrase Hugh, like signing someone up for the army, not like saving a soul. And once you say the shehada, that's it. You're in for life. The punishment for apostacy is murder. Muslims, Islam, and even Allah, are not very secure.
I'm also not sure that Westerners necessarily join Islam in order to shirk responsibility. I don't think that anyone who was raised in the Judeo-Christian tradition can ever really abandon all sense of responsibility in the way that someone who is born into Islam does. They just have no concept of it, which results in absurd projection and lies. You see that in converts, but never anything close to the way you see it in born Muslims. Converts don't look cops in the eye and claim that they weren't speeding when the cop shows them the detector. A born Muslim can conceive of no other response. I don't think it was always like that but today's Muslims are so much worse than Muslims were even 30 years ago. It's an eye-opener to older folks who have known Muslims for years. Those older Muslims would have never imagined that today's Muslims would be so extreme as they are today. It's a whole generation of depraved psychopaths, most of them in sheep's clothing.
That's my 2 cents.
Abdul Rehman Antulay, the minority ministor in Manmohan Singh's govt has come up with a conpiracy theory that Hindus are behind Mumbai attacks:
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/upa-proud-of-my-karkare-remark-antulay/80978-3.html
Abdul Rehman Antulay, the minority ministor in Manmohan Singh's govt has come up with a conpiracy theory that Hindus are behind Mumbai attacks:
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/upa-proud-of-my-karkare-remark-antulay/80978-3.html
Norman wrote:
I am also curious why is it that people from the West and some with a Christian upbringing could voluntarily join Islam? I hear these converts say that Islam gives them something that they did not get from Christianity. What is that something? I want to speculate that these converts desire an escape from personal responsibility.
..........................
I think that's definitely part of it for many, Norman. Hugh Fitzgerald often speaks eloquently of those who are looking for mental submission and a "total belief system"--which Islam offers in a way that Judaism and Christianity do not. With these religions you need to exercise your moral sense--indeed, often agonize over the most ethical course--with Islam you just need to be told what is "haram" or "halal".
This is why sites like "Ask the Imam" are filled with such minutia, including questions about the rules for the proper way to go to the restroom, and grotesque treatises like Ayatollah Khomeini's where he lays out in detail the permitted manner of disposing of an animal the questioner has just sexually copulated with.
Islam is often very popular among prisoners, also, because--unlike Christianity--it OKs the convict's violent and felonious urges--as long as they are aimed at Infidels, rather than fellow Muslims.
Just more proof that islam cannot ever get along with anyone, including each other. So much for the "religion of peace" mantra. It would be great if Pakistan and India just nuked each other amd saved the world from all the filth and death that always spins out from islam, especially in the case of Pakistan. We can all sleep better knowing they are our ally!
Thanks again jdamn and gravenimage.
Before 2001, I knew next to nothing about Islam or its history. I remember viewing Muslims as very religious because I noticed they prayed a lot and they observed many religious obligations. I saw them as devoted to their religion, more so than Christians do. They appeared quite disciplined. Besides being aware of Ramadan, Mohammed their prophet, the Koran their bible and the pilgimage to Mecca, I knew practically nothing else about Islam. I knew absolutely nothing about the history, except that the Moors were in Spain and were driven out at about the time of Columbus.
But, after 9/11, I began reading more and this website was one of the places where I began my education about the religion and the history of it. I thought the above noted qualities of Islam were admirable. Not anymore. I am coming to see the totality of the belief system and I find no redeeming or admiring qualities. I am aware of the fraud and deception that we are confronted with and it is discouraging to see people in responsible and leadership positions that are either totally ignorant or are colluding with the enemy. No one knows how this story will evolve and what the final outcome of the conflict will be. It probably won't be reached in our lifetime and so life will continue as it is now. Hopefully, people with the knowledge and judgement necessary to sustain the attack on our adversary will persevere.
I think that a lot of Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, etc. admire Islam's cohesion. This cohesion, of course, only exists in kafirstan, where they all have a common enemy. Rates of violence in Islamic nations are absurd, and the only way to maintain control of a Muslim population is to be like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, or Turkey and have 1/3 of the work force employed as cops or soldiers who shoot people for gathering in threes. It's a cult and the division of the world into Dar-al-harb and Dar-al-Islam will always keep Muslims aligned against us, but it's an alliance of hate. It's a hate cult. Their cohesion is a front of necessity, like the alliance between FDR and Stalin. Muslims will never join together for the common good. They can't even build a hospital. Islam only destroys.
"It would be great if Pakistan and India just nuked each other amd saved the world from all the filth and death that always spins out from islam"
Shame on you for wanting us Indians (most of us are not muslims) dead. What would you think if I said "It would be great if osama nuked new york and saved the world from all the filth (Iraq/Afghan Invasion) that emanates out of the US?". Of course I don't want any city nuked, I don't want any American to die. Pity your moral code is at the level of the muslims.