..."compulson in religion, forced conversion, the status of humiliation, degradation, and physical insecurity known as that of the 'dhimmi,' or death"

Islam the "Religion" of Peace

Believe it or not....

Posted by: exsgtbrown at March 12, 2007 9:11 AM

I dont believe it. :-)

Posted by: Elric66 at March 12, 2007 9:59 AM

Islam must not think much of itself if it needs to force people to convert.

Posted by: Elric66 at March 12, 2007 10:20 AM

Islam is so desparate, they kill you if you do not convert, and they kill you if you leave....

Islam is a paranoid thrill kill machine on steroids....

(Of course, members of Islam kill each other if one is not Islamic enough)....

Posted by: exsgtbrown at March 12, 2007 10:28 AM

At the time, when that verse is supposed to have been “revealed”, there were maybe 300 Muslims around Muhammad, so they certainly meant rather that others were not forced to stay Jewish, Christian or whatever.

Another interesting take is that not the religion itself was meant, but the cult. Concretely, Muhammad wanted to reintroduce the animal sacrifice, supposedly to get back to Moses’ practice – he is talking of it in that (2nd) surah, not long before the “non compulsion” verse, and the he is supposed to have reintroduced those bloody rituals. Well, as a matter af facts, they have been practiced to this day by Muslims.

For the rest, there is a good article about the interpretation of that verse in history, there: http://www.danielpipes.org/article/2110

Quote:

Proceeding from least liberal to most liberal, the no-compulsion phrase is considered variously to have been:
• Abrogated: The passage was overridden by subsequent Koranic verses (such as 9:73: "O Prophet! Struggle against the unbelievers and hypocrites and be harsh with them").
• Purely symbolic: The phrase is a description, not an imperative. Islam's truth is so obvious that to coerce someone to become a Muslim does not amount to "compulsion"; or else being made to embrace Islam after defeat in war is not viewed as "compulsion."
• Spiritual, not practical: Governments may indeed compel external obedience, though they of course cannot compel how Muslims think.
• Limited in time and place: It applied uniquely to Jews in Medina in the seventh century.
• Limited to non-Muslims who live under and accept Muslim rule: Some jurists say it applies only to "Peoples of the Book" (Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians); others say it applies to all infidels.
• Excludes some non-Muslims: Apostates, women, children, prisoners of war, and others can indeed be compelled. (This is the standard interpretation that has applied in most times and places).
• Limited to all non-Muslims: Muslims must abide by the tenets of Islam and may not apostatize.
• Limited to Muslims: Muslims may shift from one interpretation of their faith to another (such as from Sunni to Shia), but may not leave Islam.
• Applied to all persons: Reaching the true faith must be achieved through trial and testing, and compulsion undercuts this process.

EOQ

Posted by: ajm at March 12, 2007 10:53 AM

Islam is so paranoid because it can't stand up to the light of truth. They have to resort to force and fear, that's why Islam can not bear to be criticized. Anyone who criticizes Islam immediately starts getting the death threats because Islam can not stand up on its own under criticism. It falls apart like a house of cards

Posted by: kelisw at March 12, 2007 11:01 AM

Of course there is no compulsion in religion. If you could simply compel someone to believe in Islam, you wouldn't need all of this Jihad!

It is never possible to force someone to believe in something they don't want to, but it is possible to kill them. It may be the only option left if they don't convert. How else are you going to cleanse the world of disbelieving minds and make all the world for Allah?

Posted by: Jimmy the Dhimmi at March 12, 2007 12:06 PM

Hugh,

Somebody posted this on my blog, what do you make of it?
Would be interesting to get your or Roberts thoughts on this. I think it touches many issues and goes where we haven't gone yet:

Some things are stirring in Europe to the question: What to do with Islam?

The philosophical basis to countermand Islam is available. The arguments also exist and the rationale is solid. Islam, through the Quran and the Sunnah, is doctrinally aggressive, invasive, war-like, and especially imperialistic in a religious and a nationalist sense.

It is especially imperialistic because it opens the route for Islamic countries to interfere in the affairs of another country on behalf of a small or a minority Muslim population. (This parallels the promotion of the western agenda that lectures and sometimes imposes sanctions on other countries, especially non-democratic ones, if they do not uphold the liberal ideology (human rights being an example).

On the point of Islam, few nations will challenge Saudi Arabia to open its country to churches and Buddhist temples, but Turkey readily summons the Danish ambassador over a call to ban mosques from Denmark. Malaysia will give special dispensations to Muslims immigrants from Indonesia and Burma, but will do nothing to help Thai Buddhists fleeing Muslims killing the latter in southern Thailand. Islamic countries, when they violate national sovereignty, have borrowed well from the western liberalism: they say their religion transcends ethnicity and nations.

In spite of the march of Islam, the Quran and Sunnah are also highly vulnerable to criticism once they are tabled next to liberal ideology, both as a political and a value system. This vulnerability has now been exploited in Europe and best encapsulated in the page: Stop Islamification of Denmark (SIAD). It wants to take the same agenda to all of Christian or secular Europe.

Central to its raison d’etre is that nations once independent of Islam remained entitled to deal with the “religion” as it sees fit. That is, this is a national, sovereign issue. This approach has by far the most credible tools and has the clearest and most concrete answers to the question: What to do with Islam?

Answer No 1: The Legal Path
The principal idea is that Islam, whether practiced by moderates or otherwise, is fundamentally antithetical to existing civil and constitutional laws in Europe. If this were so, then the fundamentals of Islam – as spelled out in the Quran and Sunnah – are subject to judicial review. Judicial review (although a norm in America) is uncommon in Europe but it brings to the fore, indeed the possibility that Islam, in parts or in totality, is illegal, unlawful or both.

Example of judicial review: SIAD is challenging specific chapters and verses of the Quran and Sunnah that violates two existing constitutional provisions in Denmark.

This is a innovative approach in that it not only draws attention to the illegality found in Islam per se, the review pushes the envelope to take action thereafter. Stop Islamification of Denmark says that if Islam violates the Danish constitution, then it is incumbent on the state to ban all the mosques.

This, of course, has its problems, chief of which is the human rights provision that guarantees freedom of conscience, the backhanded way of saying freedom of religion or no-religion. Europe now realises, even if belatedly, that the human rights that they made as doctrinal dogma is now the same cause of its own afflictions from an invasive Islam.

Answer No. 2: The Political Path
Islam is, among other things, also politics. But the delusion of the west in believing that church and state are or can be separable is one reason for European ineptness in dealing with Islam. The answer then is to press for legislations that will change the status of religion, especially Islam, into a body-politic.

This is to say that Islam, in particular, must be made answerable to rules governing, say, the conduct of politics and especially to rules for the conduct of a society. It is akin to treating it like a chamber or civil society or especially as a political party. Once legislated, Islam will be taken for its word. Its “religious” text like that of the charter of a political society is subject to scrutiny and its members subject to restrictions, according to law. It is not enough that Islam, like other religions, has no special place outside of politics or the state, it must be legislated to ensure that the objective of separation is achieved.

Example of political review: By marching to Brussels on Sep 11 2007, Stop Islamification of Europe (SIOE), an offshoot of Stop Islamification of Denmark (SIAD), is making a clear political statement, and this is contained in the following:

SIOE wants all religions to be treated in law the same way as political parties with no special legal protection. This should apply especially to Islam because it is a combined political, legal and judicial system administered and overseen by un-elected theologians, completely contrary to Western concepts of democracy.
Answer No 3: The Sovereign Path
Islam is insidious in violating the sovereignty of a nation not only because it puts the state secondary or subservient to a higher law, that is Islam, but it also opens the channel for “Islamic countries” to intervene on behalf of a local minority Muslim population. Building mosques, funded by Arabs, is a demonstrable example. Intervening on behalf of an armed Muslim group fighting its national government is another.

The demand for the return of sovereignty is not about giving the state even more powers than that it has in its possession. But it is to compliment the powers of the state on the ground, in the villages and homes, all of which are farthest from central control. This is where government powers are weakest in dealing with Islam. A second reason to grant additional powers to the grassroots rather than central authority in combating Islam is this: Politicians who seized the instruments of power but are sympathetic or fearful of Islam can easily redirect the purpose of the state to serve Islam or the minority, immigrant group.

At an international level there is one problem if individual European nations now demand to retake their sovereign independence. They must reciprocate on the same principle. If in Islamic countries they stone their Muslim women, then it is oblige to say nothing, do nothing: it is none of your business. They will have to keep their western liberal dogma to themselves.

Hence, sovereignty is embedded in the precept that an independent nation is entitled to deal with a foreign institution, such as Islam, as it sees fit. For this purpose, local jurisdictions, at village and county levels are most effective because Islam, before it wriggles its way to the centres of power, thrive in such places.

A third and serious problem to this approach is this: Local jurisdictions are fearful or indifferent to dealing with religion. This has arisen from decades of constant harangue that religious equality, as the flipside of political, social and economic, are desirable and possible.

This notion of leaving faith at the door of the church and temple is so blatantly irrational and unrealistic, few people challenges the assumption. It assumes that faith and the Self are separable, like material things. It assumes all faiths are about individual salvation, a route to heaven. It assumes all people have faiths and all faiths are the same in essence. Confucius was right, 2,000 years before these assumptions have now dawn on Europe: Respect the gods but keep your distance.

The consequence of the western fallacy has been that Islam has so far been treated, in power centres, with velvet gloves and so shielded from criticisms.

But once western countries treat Islam like it is any sphere of daily life, it then removes the centrality of religion’s hold on its peoples and the nation. It changes the paradigm because, after all, imams do not just preach God. They also speak of jihad, conversion, annihilation, women, infidels and apostates. This is stuff of politics. They affect the sanctity of existing and prevailing civilisation so that such a religion should therefore be placed under independent and national jurisdictions. The imams and their religion must be held accountable.

Example of sovereign power: There is yet to be any. Some countries have a ministry for regulating religion. Westerners won’t even touch it. Now, they better so that one of the first items in stopping Islamisation is the creation of a ministry/department of religion or of civil affairs or of local affairs. Islam is at the top of the department’s agenda and it is charged not with promotion thereof but with regulation. Muslims do not sit as director-general; such a person may offer advice. In all conflicting situations, Islam must yield not the local culture, as provided for in constitutional provisions. At local levels, the department must have the final say in any thing remotely connected to religion, Islam in particular.

Endnote:
The March on Brussels on Sep 11 is the beginning of a European demand at grassroots to retake national sovereignty. This may be a flash-in-the-pan, for one reason: the Europeans have yet to hone in on its reasons for doing so. Stopping Islamisation is not improbable except that the dilemma is not remove: How can Europe empty itself of Islam without violating its own value systems of equal and human rights? The obvious answer says that those rights were either a fallacy or they were deeply circumscribed to apply only to citizenship and/or to law. Even the latter is a problem

Restatement of its raison d’etre is necessary because Europe, by stopping Islamisation, is redefining terms originally set out 40 or 50 years ago on the rights of civil society and the charter for human rights. It is self-immolation to go about putting straightjackets on Islam and then say those activities are in observation of the rights, as they are presently defined. An international congress a few days before the march should rewrite the principles that western societies have so arrogantly lectured the world. This, not the march, will be the momentous event in western history.

In short, to answer the question about what to do with Islam, Europe must first answer the problem it created for itself and beyond: Are all humans equal?

Posted by: sheik yer'mami at March 12, 2007 12:38 PM

That Centanni has not been called out for his cowardice --- of both the physical and intellectual types --- is emblematic of how broken our public discourse has actually become.

Not only may we not name our enemy, we aren't even allowed to name our cowards.

Disgust indeed.

Posted by: Alarmed Pig Farmer at March 12, 2007 2:14 PM

… intolerable pressures put on the most helpless, such as the Mandeans in Iraq, or to a lesser extent, the Copts in Egypt, the Christians in Lebanon and in the "West Bank," and the Chaldeans and Assyrians of Iraq.

Intolerable and relentless.

Islam never sleeps, it’s always pushing, without stop. Every time non-Moslems takes a weekend off to enjoy life, Dar al-Harb is made that much smaller.

Posted by: Alarmed Pig Farmer at March 12, 2007 2:29 PM

Ishaq, p. 547, Upon the conquest of Mecca, Abu Sufyan had been captured and brought to Muhammad.

"...he [Muhammad] said [to Abu Sufyan], ‘Isn’t it time that you should recognize that there is no God but Allah?’ He answered, ‘You are dearer to me than father or mother. How great is your clemency, honour, and kindness! By God, I thought that had there been another God with God he would have continued to help me.’ He said: ‘Woe to you, Abu Sufyan, isn’t it time that you should recognize that I am God’s apostle?’ He answered, ‘As to that I still have some doubt.’
I said to him, ‘Submit and testify that there is no God but Allah and that Muhammad is the apostle of God before you lose your head,’ so he did so."

Posted by: Khaybar Oasis at March 12, 2007 3:23 PM

sheik ver'mami,

It is an interesting piece you quote. It asks amongst other things: 'How can Europe empty itself of Islam without violating its own value systems of equal and human rights?'

For a start the rights we recognised might be equal but they are also limited. Incitement to commit criminal acts such as breaches of the peace etc. are not considered a legitimate exercise of free speech. I may hold and express any views I wish, with limits only on how I express them but once again my rights to act on them are severely curtailed when acting on them would infringe the rights of others.

I think it is erroneous to claim that this degree of tolerance arose out of Christianity in any obvious or necessary way. The history of Christianity shows quite clearly that Christians have not always and everywhere been tolerant nor does one have to look too far to find examples of modern Christian intolerance.

There were, however, certain preconditions that led people to emphasise those aspects of Christianity which predispose to real tolerance of others.

People sometimes cite the 30 years war. But I am not sure that there is any evidence that people tire of sectarian violence and decide for that reason alone to settle their differences and live in peace.

We have to look at factors like the development of the modern nation state which in all cases involved the development of a strong central power with a monopoly of violence both internally and externally. Any act of violence is therefore a crime against the state as well as against an individual and the perpetrator is prosecuted in the name of the state. Over time the legitimacy of conceding to the state this monopoly came to be accepted by all sectors of society at large. Now this was not always a smooth process and was opposed by vested interests and minority populations and such opposition was often ruthlessly repressed. But this created the framework within which representative institutions could govern with the consent of the majority and within which also the franchise was repeatedly widened. The later happening as prosperity increased so and ever wider sections of the community had a real stake in society.

The nation state was in time able to ensure an almost unprecedented degree of physical security for its citizens within its own borders. Two world wars, however, showed that the nation state was in itself incapable of preventing unprecented levels of external aggression.

Islamic societies never developed strong central governments with a monopoly on violence. And although murder is now considered a matter for intervention by the state in some rural and tribal areas police intervention is limited to recording of the facts and of any agreement between tribes relating to blood money. In Islamic law too, as far as I am aware, murder is not considered a crime against any greater interest than the victim's family or tribe. Although there were verses which could have been used to make murder a crime against God in this, as I suspect in many cases, the tribal view seems to have prevailed.

I think that religions, in both their original revelations, and in their subsequent interpretation both reflect and reinforce the societies and social institutions in which they arise and are subsequently interpreted. It is not irrelevant that Ibn Taymiyya wrote at the time of the Mongol invasions, for example.

Just because the response we see from islamists to the crisis which the muslim world has found itself in in the last two hundred years can be easily defended in terms of the islamic texts and the interpretations of some islamic scholars does not mean that it is a necessary reaction. In my view if religions could not be all things to all men they would not have survived.

So we need to look at the wider society, but also at how children are socialised. As others have pointed out - in Arab, and presumably many other islamic societies - people have to deal with many petty tyrants in their lives, to a far greated extent in the West, the first such tyrant being for most people their father.

And I think it is the concept of power, as something to be used not only to benefit oneself and one's family, clan, tribe, but also as something to defeat others, outsiders, that we find the common element in the Qur'an, society and family. Of course their will be variations from family to family, and presumably geographical and social variation too.

But from my own experience working in the Middle East there were many times when what seemed like completely irrational behaviour to me could only be explained by a desire to defeat others regardless of whether one benefited directly oneself. Of course, this behaviour only becomes rational on the assumption that everyone else is your enemy and is trying to defeat your. I found this kind of behaviour much more common there than in the West. Furthermore, this is the kind of behaviour which Middle Eastern society rewards.

Posted by: kevin at March 12, 2007 3:30 PM

There is enormous compulsion in Islam, and coherent apologists for Islam don't apologize for the compulsion. They reckon that it is for the good of the subject peoples, or for the good of the Muslims themselves.

My limited understanding of the thinking is that if people are granted significant liberty, they will stray from the narrow behavioral path that leads to the Islamic version of eternal life. For the sake of the people's own "good," every deviation from this path, every kind of innovation, every novel idea that touches on religious matters (and probably beyond them into cultural matters, the two being intertwined) must be brutally suppressed. To tolerate deviation is to tempt the entire society and thereby to expose it to the risk of damnation. So every hint of "non-Islam" must be purged away, or oppressed so severely that it is not a temptation to the Muslims.

I think that this underpins the idea that I have seen that jihadists reckon that they are doing the infidels a favor by waging war on them. If they leave us alone, we'll surely go to hell, but if they conquer us, some of us may convert to Islam and perhaps escape damnation.

There is enormous compulsion in Islam.

Posted by: Dhimmisoftheworldunite at March 12, 2007 3:40 PM

This is the Ayah of the Sword
http://www.kafirnation.com/Downloads/ibnkathir.rar

Mujahid, `Amr bin Shu`ayb, Muhammad bin Ishaq, Qatadah, As-Suddi and `Abdur-Rahman bin Zayd bin Aslam said that the four months mentioned in this Ayah are the four-month grace period mentioned in the earlier Ayah,

﴿فَسِيحُواْ فِى الاٌّرْضِ أَرْبَعَةَ أَشْهُرٍ﴾

(So travel freely for four months throughout the land.) Allah said next,

﴿فَإِذَا انسَلَخَ الأَشْهُرُ الْحُرُمُ﴾

(So when the Sacred Months have passed...), meaning, `Upon the end of the four months during which We prohibited you from fighting the idolators, and which is the grace period We gave them, then fight and kill the idolators wherever you may find them.' Allah's statement next,

﴿فَاقْتُلُواْ الْمُشْرِكِينَ حَيْثُ وَجَدتُّمُوهُمْ﴾

(then fight the Mushrikin wherever you find them), means, on the earth in general, except for the Sacred Area, for Allah said,

﴿وَلاَ تُقَـتِلُوهُمْ عِندَ الْمَسْجِدِ الْحَرَامِ حَتَّى يُقَـتِلُوكُمْ فِيهِ فَإِن قَـتَلُوكُمْ فَاقْتُلُوهُمْ﴾

(And fight not with them at Al-Masjid Al-Haram, unless they fight you there. But if they attack you, then fight them. )﴿2:191﴾ Allah said here,

﴿وَخُذُوهُمْ﴾

(and capture them), executing some and keeping some as prisoners,

﴿وَاحْصُرُوهُمْ وَاقْعُدُواْ لَهُمْ كُلَّ مَرْصَدٍ﴾

(and besiege them, and lie in wait for them in each and every ambush), do not wait until you find them. Rather, seek and besiege them in their areas and forts, gather intelligence about them in the various roads and fairways so that what is made wide looks ever smaller to them. This way, they will have no choice, but to die or embrace Islam,

﴿فَإِن تَابُواْ وَأَقَامُواْ الصَّلَوةَ وَءاتَوُاْ الزَّكَوةَ فَخَلُّواْ سَبِيلَهُمْ إِنَّ اللَّهَ غَفُورٌ رَّحِيمٌ﴾

(But if they repent and perform the Salah, and give the Zakah, then leave their way free. Verily, Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.) Abu Bakr As-Siddiq used this and other honorable Ayat as proof for fighting those who refrained from paying the Zakah. These Ayat allowed fighting people unless, and until, they embrace Islam and implement its rulings and obligations. Allah mentioned the most important aspects of Islam here, including what is less important. Surely, the highest elements of Islam after the Two Testimonials, are the prayer, which is the right of Allah, the Exalted and Ever High, then the Zakah, which benefits the poor and needy. These are the most honorable acts that creatures perform, and this is why Allah often mentions the prayer and Zakah together. In the Two Sahihs, it is recorded that Ibn `Umar said that the Messenger of Allah said,

«أُمِرْتُ أَنْ أُقَاتِلَ النَّاسَ حَتَّى يَشْهَدُوا أَنْ لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللهُ وَأَنَّ مُحَمَّدًا رَسُولُ اللهِ وَيُقِيمُوا الصَّلَاةَ وَيُؤْتُوا الزَّكَاة»

(I have been commanded to fight the people until they testify that there is no deity worthy of worship except Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, establish the prayer and pay the Zakah.) This honorable Ayah (9:5) was called the Ayah of the Sword, about which Ad-Dahhak bin Muzahim said, "It abrogated every agreement of peace between the Prophet and any idolator, every treaty, and every term.'' Al-`Awfi said that Ibn `Abbas commented: "No idolator had any more treaty or promise of safety ever since Surah Bara'ah was revealed. The four months, in addition to, all peace treaties conducted before Bara'ah was revealed and announced had ended by the tenth of the month of Rabi` Al-Akhir.''

﴿وَإِنْ أَحَدٌ مِّنَ الْمُشْرِكِينَ اسْتَجَارَكَ فَأَجِرْهُ حَتَّى يَسْمَعَ كَلاَمَ اللَّهِ ثُمَّ أَبْلِغْهُ مَأْمَنَهُ ذَلِكَ بِأَنَّهُمْ قَوْمٌ لاَّ يَعْلَمُونَ ﴾

(6. And if anyone of the Mushrikin seeks your protection then grant him protection so that he may hear the Word of Allah (the Qur'an) and then escort him to where he can be secure, that is because they are men who know not.)

Posted by: KAOSKTRL at March 12, 2007 4:05 PM

Snip
(and besiege them, and lie in wait for them in each and every ambush), do not wait until you find them. Rather, seek and besiege them in their areas and forts, gather intelligence about them in the various roads and fairways so that what is made wide looks ever smaller to them. This way, they will have no choice, but to die or embrace Islam,

Posted by: KAOSKTRL at March 12, 2007 4:11 PM

"But from my own experience working in the Middle East there were many times when what seemed like completely irrational behaviour to me could only be explained by a desire to defeat others regardless of whether one benefited directly oneself."
-- from a posting above

A highly intelligent soldier told me what his near-year in Iraq had taught him. There was a grasping desire by everyone to get from the Americans whatever could be gotten: goods and services, money, support against local rivals or enemies. What struck him the most was that if an Iraqi, individual or in a group, discovered that something the Americans were going to do would also be of benefit to others, others who were not of the same ethnic group (Arabs vs. Kurds), or the same sectarian group (Sunnis vs. Shi'a), or might even be non-Muslims (what if, perish the thought, Christians were to be helped by something the Americans did) then very often any enthusiasm for the project by that Iraqi would disappear. It was not enough for something to be of benefit to him. It also mattered that it not inadvertently (or still worse, deliberately) help others who were not of his group or tribe. There was, he thought, and other returning soldiers have confirmed this, an astonishing lack of any sense of any loyalty to others, little sense of the nation-state (not surprising), but also little sense of much beyond the family or possibly the tribe, and that was it.

One wonders if other returning soldiers -- not the hopeless generals, who see so little, but the officers lower down, and the men -- can offer their own observations to expand upon this.

Posted by: Hugh at March 12, 2007 4:39 PM

It is not enough that I win, you must also lose .

Posted by: KAOSKTRL at March 12, 2007 8:43 PM

In the light of some posts above - Hugh's re. Iraqi attitudes as observed by Americans, and the final paragraphs of Kevin's post - I would like to share the following excerpt from a news item from the Bible Society in Turkey (UBS World Report no. 399/ 13, 1.2.2006). It concerns a young Kurd from Turkey who was engaged to translate scripture into Kurdish.

"Born into an educated family, he became politically aware at an early age. “I never believed in the Muslim religion when I was a student in high school,” he recalls. “I actually hated being Muslim.”

After taking a degree in Philosophy, he went on to study for a doctorate in International Relations. At the time of joining the Bible Society, he was working on his thesis, which he completed in 2000.

His career prior to coming to the Turkish Bible Society had been a mixed one.

While studying for his Philosophy degree, he had a job in a hotel. And later, while researching and writing about the Kurdish people, he opened his own restaurant in Istanbul. Somewhat provocatively, however, he gave the restaurant a Kurdish name and the project was a failure. It was not the only time his political outlook has brought him misfortune: later, a newspaper article he wrote in which he referred to the Kurdish minority cost him his job as a university teacher.

Although his intellectual and political development began at an early age, his spiritual shaping took place more recently. Shortly before he was offered the opportunity to work on the Kurdish Bible, an incident occurred which, though it didn’t seem significant at the time, seems now to suggest the presence of God’s hand on his life.

Result of prayer

“I was on holiday in Izmit,” he says. “I went to a district called Selçuk, formerly a Christian area where there is a church called Mother Mary Church.

“I went into this church and for the first time in my life, I can say, I prayed. And then after a few days, my friend – the one who was working in the Bible Society – phoned me and said, ‘There is a translation job. Would you like to help with the work?’ I have asked myself many times if the phone call was the result of the prayer.”

He adds, somewhat mysteriously, that he had already thought of translating part of the Bible into Kurdish when the offer came his way. “I had the idea before I knew about the Bible Society – maybe it was God’s plan,” he laughs.

By the time he was engaged on the project he was of the firm opinion that the Kurds would benefit greatly from having the Bible in their own language."

NOW COMES THE INTERESTING BIT.

As he became immersed in reading and translating the New Testament, he found that he was being deeply affected by it.

He discovered that Christianity’s culture was quite different from that of Islam. Certain Bible teachings highlighted the differences strikingly. “It totally changed me to deal with how you are taught to forgive people, to love people and live with them in peace. The Bible says ‘Love your enemies and your neighbours’ and ‘Treat your neighbour as you would like to be treated.’ This affected me.”
THIS GOES TO SHOW THAT ALI SINA'S STATEMENT ABOUT THE GOLDEN RULE BEING UNKNOWN IN ISLAM, IS TOTALLY TRUE AND CORRECT.

From then on, while still a Kurdish intellectual, “In my heart,” he says, “I believed in Jesus.”

“When I recognised the Bible, I learned to be flexible… to listen to people… to forgive them… and to be more patient. For example, if you are among Muslims, you would always fight.
'if you are among Muslims, you would always fight'.
SEE THE CONNECTION WITH HUGH'S AND KEVIN'S POSTINGS? SEE HOW THE RELIGION OF WAR STUFF PANS OUT IN DAILY LIFE, RIGHT DOWN AT GROUND LEVEL?

"I don’t want to fight; I always wanted to convince people, to argue with them. … to understand them.”

The year after he became a translator he undertook a short course in Christian theology. Since giving his life to Jesus Christ, he has been a vocal advocate of the Christian faith.

“I have spoken with hundreds – maybe thousands – of people on the issue of being Christians and Muslims,” he says. “And I am always supporting the totally different Christian culture. "

Posted by: dumbledoresarmy at March 13, 2007 2:22 AM