Tim Stanley is the man who argued — with a straight face — that boredom, not Islam, motivated young Muslims from the West who went to Iraq and Syria to join the Islamic State. In this new piece, he digs deeper. Comments interspersed below:
“Bill Maher is wrong: we can’t blame Isil on Islam,” by Tim Stanley, the Telegraph, September 12, 2014 (thanks to Joeb):
Is Isil Islamic or not? It’s an interesting, obviously sensitive question that I’m not super qualified to answer – and it’s important to display a little intellectual humility when examining something so complex. Bill Maher did not do that when he got into a row with Charlie Rose about the matter – in a clip that is now almost as popular on social media as a kitten falling off a TV set. He made three points that seem to form the crux of the “Islam is the problem” argument:
1. The Koran contains passages that urge intolerance towards non-believers and thus is reasonably used by Isil as justification for its militarism.
2. Islam as a cultural, global phenomenon is intolerant to a degree that, again, makes Isil look extreme but still part of the same family.
3. Ergo, Islam poses a unique threat among religions towards liberal democracy.
I can’t answer these questions from a theological perspective because I don’t read Arabic and my knowledge of the Koran is slight (although if we’re condemning something based upon selective passages then I could write an entire blogpost illustrating why Christianity or Judaism are equally anti-social).
“…My knowledge of the Koran is slight” — ah, well, there’s your problem right there. Tim Stanley is attempting analysis of something about which he knows little, and admits that his ignorance encompasses the core document to which the Islamic State points as its primary justification and motivation.
Nonetheless, he immediately ventures: “if we’re condemning something based upon selective passages then I could write an entire blogpost illustrating why Christianity or Judaism are equally anti-social.” I’d like to see him try. The idea that the Jewish and Christian Scriptures are equivalent to the Qur’an in their capacity to incite violence is extremely common, but that doesn’t make it true. There is nary a single passage in the Jewish or Christian Scriptures that is remotely equivalent to the open-ended, universal command to believers to wage war against and subjugate unbelievers found in Qur’an 9:29.
There are violent passages in the Jewish Scriptures, but these are descriptive, as opposed to the Qur’an’s passages enjoining violence, such as 2:191, 4:89, 9:5, and 47:4 — no one is called to imitate them. The Qur’an also contains numerous exhortations to imitate Muhammad, who himself, according to the earliest available Islamic sources, led wars against unbelievers, participated in beheadings, etc. There are also passages enjoining draconian punishments, but both Jewish and Christian exegetes have understood these in ways that reject literalism — which is why you don’t see adulterers stoned today except by Muslims, even though the punishment appears in the Bible as well as in Islamic law.
In short, Stanley’s airy confidence that he “could write an entire blogpost illustrating why Christianity or Judaism are equally anti-social” as Islam is based on ignorance of the texts involved, as well as by how those texts have been interpreted by the mainstream interpretative traditions of all three religions.
But, thinking about this as a historian, Maher’s analysis does share something in common with the fundamentalists he despises: he thinks that religion is static and not susceptible to political interpretation. As such, he buys into Isil’s own claim to be a legitimate expression of Islam. That’s naïve.
No. Maher doesn’t necessarily think that at all. To think that Islam is uniquely capable of inciting its adherents to violence is not at all to say that “religion is static and not susceptible to political interpretation.” But those interpretations are indeed guided by the scripture of the religion in question, even among those who reject literalism and fundamentalism. It is not possible rationally to hold, as Reza Aslan does, that religions can be made into whatever those who believe in them want to make them, which is an essentially nihilistic claim that words mean nothing, and that ideas have no effect. Believers can make their religions into many things, but as a train is guided by the tracks, so what they can make them into is generally guided by the religion’s core principles.
Islam is not a monoculture. Sunni and Shia look very different, both have generated schools of thought that take starkly contrasting approaches towards issues of gender, the relationship between church and state, and the role of Jihad.
Really? Then why do Shi’ite Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia, both Sharia states, look so similar in their oppression of women? Why do the Shi’ite Khomeini’s statements about jihad and Islam sound so much like the Sunni bin Laden’s? And as for “the relationship between church and state,” both Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shi’ite Iran viciously oppress and persecute the church — but of course Stanley is actually speaking in a clumsy manner about the role of religion in politics, about which Sunnis and Shi’ites do indeed divergent views, although in both traditions the ideal state is one in which Islamic law is implemented.
Both have evolved within cultural contexts that have helped to shape their outlook; their impact upon those societies has waxed and waned. Take a trip to urban centres in the Islamic world in the 1970s and you’d be struck by the degree of freedom enjoyed by women, secularisation and the relatively limited role played by Islam. I’ve just finished reading Rodric Braithwaite’s account of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Afghantsy, and he notes how the explosion of rural fundamentalism took urban dwellers by surprise – after all, women in the 1960s enjoyed access to primary school education, university attendance and the declining use of the hijab. Likewise, Michael Axworthy’s Revolutionary Iran points out that even after the Islamic revolution had taken place the country’s new leadership would not dare to take away women’s right to vote. Politicised Shia, argues Axworthy, did not run away from modernity but instead tried to find some synergy with the needs of Islam. Educational opportunities for women actually expanded.
The point is that political Islam is a recent invention – a reaction to the failure of post-war Arab nationalism and socialism – and not the definitive form of historical Islam.
It is true that Muslim societies just a few decades ago were much more secular and Western in outlook than they are now. But this doesn’t prove that “political Islam is a recent invention” — quite the contrary. Secularism and the Western outlook were the recent inventions in the Islamic world. Then they were overwhelmed by a reassertion of traditional Islam and Sharia, including political Islam. And those who were doing the reasserting appealed to Muslims precisely on the basis of loyalty to Islam and the need to heal their societies, as they saw it, by restoring the proper obedience to Allah.
Indeed, it breaks down the wall of separation traditionally found in Muslim societies between church and state
This is pure fiction. Has Stanley never heard of the caliphates?
and reflects the rural conservatism and near-feudalism of a vanguard that felt dispossessed by globalisation, American intervention and liberalism. It is a particular historical experience of Islam in the same way that the Spanish Inquisition was for Catholicism or the Defenestrations of Prague were for Protestantism.
Isil’s extremism is not the norm across the Islamic world. Maher cited a Egyptian Pew poll in his interview that, he impled, showed global Muslims are militant and radical. I’m not familiar with that poll, but a 2013 Pew poll of the entire Islamic world found massive variation in attitudes. Plenty of support for democracy in South Asia but little in Pakistan; 89 per cent said women should not be compelled to wear the hijab in Tunisia compared to just 30 per cent in Afghanistan. All Muslim societies contain majorities who say that people should not be compelled to follow Islam and that suicide bombing is wrong. Only in two areas is there something closer to conservative unanimity. First, Muslims want access to Sharia courts – which is entirely reasonable given that a) it’s their cultural norm and b) in some countries those courts might be regarded as less corrupt and less prone to political manipulation than the state’s alternative.
Does Stanley realize what Sharia courts are all about? Does he have any idea about the contents of Sharia mandating the second-class status of women and non-Muslims?
Second, Muslims retain conservative opinions on women and homosexuality. That’s sad, but it’s not just a Muslim thing. Russia and Africa are also deeply homophobic.
Africa is a complex case with the anti-gay persecution in Uganda, but Russia doesn’t hang gays from cranes in accord with religious law, as does Iran.
That unpalatable views can be found in all societies is reflected in poll numbers that finds 16 per cent of the French feeling sympathy towards Isil (that’s 27 per cent among those aged 18-24). Only 5 to 10 per cent of France is Muslim, which suggests that sympathy for the devil is found among many non-Muslims, too.
Indeed — after all the Western cultural self-hatred that has been dominant for the last forty or fifty years, this is no surprise.
Does all of this mean that we can safely say, as the President did, that Isil has “nothing to do with Islam”? That, too, would be naïve. Historically, Christianity has the capacity to and has produced movements just as horrific as Isil
Really? Name one. The Crusaders committed atrocities, but never on as thoroughgoing and systematic a basis. And even during the time of the Crusades, many Muslims found the Crusader lands preferable to the neighboring Muslim lands.
The Spanish Muslim Ibn Jubayr (1145-1217), who traversed the Mediterranean on his way to Mecca in the early 1180s, found that Muslims had it better in the lands controlled by the Crusaders than they did in Islamic lands. Those lands were more orderly and better managed than those under Muslim rule, so that even Muslims preferred to live in the Crusader realms: “Upon leaving Tibnin (near Tyre), we passed through an unbroken skein of farms and villages whose lands were efficiently cultivated. The inhabitants were all Muslims, but they live in comfort with the Franj [Franks, or Crusaders] —may God preserve them from temptation! Their dwellings belong to them and all their property is unmolested. All the regions controlled by the Franj in Syria are subject to this same system: the landed domains, villages, and farms have remained in the hands of the Muslims, Now, doubt invests the heart of a great number of these men when they compare their lot to that of their brothers living in Muslim territory. Indeed, the latter suffer from the injustice of their coreligionists, whereas the Franj act with equity.”
Who were this Christian equivalent of the Islamic State, if not the Crusaders? The Inquisitors? The Spanish conquistadors? Only the latter even come close, but most of the deaths they caused were through accidental spread of diseases to which the Native Americans were not immune.
– but what matters is that this contemporary threat has emerged from an Islamic society and, therefore, is something that we obviously have to address as an Islamic problem. But British intelligence also indicates that many Jihadis have a surprisingly slightly understanding of their chosen fundamentalism, and it may well be that violence and chauvinism are the real motivators for something to which Islam merely provides the language of expression.
British intelligence, after all its disastrous failures to distinguish “moderates” from “extremists,” and its craven appeasement of Islamic supremacists, is hardly an impressive authority to invoke.
Put it this way, is North Korea Marxist? Technically, yes. It emerged from the communist expansion of the 1940s, it adhered to Stalinism long after everyone else abandoned it, and it still favours command economics over the market. But it is also a racist monarchy that has asserted the primacy of nationalism over the class struggle. And if we accept its own claim to be socialist, are we not a) legitimising it and b) in some way implying that all of socialism has a little blood on its hands?
Uh, yeah. And it does.
The latter proposition is patently absurd. Pyongyang no more speaks for the Labour Party than Isil reflects the opinions of your local mosque.
To say that North Korea is socialist is not in the least to say that it speaks for the Labour Party. This kind of muddled thinking, so widespread today, is one reason why Britain and the West in general are in the fix they’re in.
Anon says
Another Truthophobic dufus, an irrational fear that if we speak the truth about Islam all @#$% will break loose.
jihad3tracker says
Hello Anon —
Pardon me for jumping on your skateboard, but here is a path to contact Tim Stanley ( a required fill-in-the-box asterisk type ) .
Be polite and gentle if you write to him, whose actual mindset is “I don’t know much about Islam but here I go with opinions anyway”.
BTW —- FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO HAVE NOT SEEN THE BILL MAHER / CHARLIE ROSE VIDEO — Watch it ! ! ! ! !
Astonishing progress for even the most clueless idiots — ISIS’s slaughter of Infidels and two beheadings finally awakened a good percentage of the Privileged Guilt Leftists.
jihad3tracker says
OOPS !!!
Here is the link to Tim Stanley —
http://www.timothystanley.co.uk/contact.html
——————
Mitch says
“Astonishing progress for even the most clueless idiots — ISIS’s slaughter of Infidels and two beheadings finally awakened a good percentage of the Privileged Guilt Leftists.”
-I’m not a Maher fan but credit where it’s due. He’s not recently awakened – he’s been on this — loudly — since 911. Many worthwhile clips on Youtube.
gravenimage says
True, Mitch. Bill Maher is *not* perfect, and he often seems to lose ground periodically in his understanding of Islam. But by contemporary standards—especially contemporary *Liberal* standards—he had long been a clear-eyed breath of fresh air (to mix my metaphors).
Angemon says
Un. F***ing. Believable. The guy admits he can’t argue Maher’s points from a theological perspective, he admits that he barely knows the quran and somehow he concludes that islam is not to blame for the islamic state and that Christianity and Judaism are “equally anti-social“.
Also, anti-social? Really? Murdering and raping unbelievers because of religion is being “anti-social”? Where are the christian and judaic equivalents of the islamic state? Where are the christian and jews cutting throats of those who refuse to convert to christianity or judaism?
Good thing he made those assertions early on, saved me the trouble of reading the rest.
mortimer says
Why does anyone care WHAT this UNINFORMED person think?
An uninformed opinion is not worth having, let alone EXPRESSING in public.
john spielman says
just another brainless talking head, sad because there is so so many in the land of liberal makebelieve
Jay Boo says
“the land of liberal make believe”
says, Ouch!
A liberal like Bill Maher talking down Islam.
You know that has really got to hurt.
After licking their wounds and hurt PC pride the liberal talking heads prefer to shoot the messenger so as not to have to look at the message.
Freedomfriend says
It is important for the spoutings of people who are given a platform to misinform, such as the know nothing Tim Stanley, to be debunked.
Mitch says
A better question, perhaps would be: “What does anyone care what INFORMED people think?”
Because, alas, it is the uninformed like Tim Stanley who control our schools, our media, our government.
Don McKellar says
You will notice that comments are closed on that piece.
It makes you wonder if MSM are soliciting propoganda from retards in favour of Islam (and lying through their teeth or hopelessly ignorant and completely uninformed) to simply get hits on the net and generate ad revenue? I have a feeling that is part of these ridiculous hit pieces which serve only to infuriate an informed and educated audience.
Alarmed Pig Farmer says
It makes you wonder if MSM are soliciting propoganda from retards…
Doing that is now routine practice in the news entertainment biz. Roger Aisles is out there hiring retards as fast as he can. Watch Fox RINO News for an evening and you’re glazed with the sugary icing of words like extremist, radical, fringe, hijackers and perverters of a solid, even admirable, belief system. Misunderstood. Can’t get enough retards, and the more self-assured and pompous, the better. Reality doesn’t matter anymore. Perception *is* reality, and they are derived from emotions.
mortimer says
Why does anyone care WHAT this UNINFORMED person thinks?
An uninformed opinion is not worth having, let alone EXPRESSING in public.
nacazo says
this dude is on his way to become muslim and he’s practicing how to spread the taqqiyya before he goes public with his conversion.
Almach says
that would be the only explanation for saying stupid things like that.
Champ says
“…My knowledge of the Koran is slight”
Ya think!
Diane Harvey says
All of this is getting better and better. Non-Muslims arguing the points about Islam, excusing it at every turn. “No, no, we can’t read those passages. Surely they can’t, I mean can’t, mean that plain meaning. Mohammed couldn’t be that cruel. No, there has to be something else.”
This is a scream. Bring on the popcorn.
John C. Barile says
Bu-But only the Arabic is authoritative! A-And–what about the Crusades, the Inquisition, th-the Scopes prosecution?! And Jesus telling his followers to buy SWORDS, huh?–what about ALL THAT??!! /sarc
Alarmed Pig Farmer says
You know, maybe it’d be best at this point if we just shut down all history departments everywhere. Fukuyama was ridiculed and shunned when he floated his End of History theory. Turns out that history *is* indeed slowing to a halt, but in a different way. Factual reality-based history has disappeared, replaced by a burgeoning suite of ideology-based narratives. I thought narratives were written by fiction writers. Oh wait, Professor Stanley here is in the *business* of writing narratives. Your history of the Holy Ko-Ran is slight? Then shaddap, dumbass.
John C. Barile says
Yes please, thank you very much.
Jaladhi says
Why would MSM give any credence to stupid guys like him?? Looks like MSM is just as stupid as him!!!
Alarmed Pig Farmer says
Why would MSM give any credence to stupid guys like him?? Looks like MSM is just as stupid as him!!!
No, think about it. They bring in a dude with a credential and presumed credibility, the guy disgorges a torrent of self-serving fantasy-based nonsense at odds with the facts, and the news entertainers are happy. Doesn’t matter whether they’re stupid enough to believe this guy’s bilge, he and thousands like him get the air time and the column space instead of rare birds like Spencer.
Wellington says
He’s ready to blame most everything and everyone but the real culprits——-Islam and Muslims. Figures.
artie galvin says
Tim Stanley’s arrogance is unbelievable. How can he make judgments without knowing what it is he’s talking about. Imagine If I were to try to refute the theory of relativity with Einstein. I would look like a fool , as does Time Stanley. Why does anybody listen to this boob? Baffling, to say the least.
somehistory says
There are so many good arguments that could be made against what this guy, who admits he doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but proceeds to talk about it anyway, said; but just to limit mine here to something I do know.
First of all, these clowns that bring in Christianity (and Judaism) when trying to make islam look better than what the actions of adherents prove it to be, have already lost the debate.
In the book of Deuteronomy 32:35, the Jews were told not to take vengeance upon themselves, but to leave payment for evil to their God.
In the book of Romans 12:19, Christians are told the same thing and to stay away from wrath; that God will deal with evildoers and repay them for their evil as He decides.
And there is a Proverb 24:17 that goes to the point of the worshiper of the True God not even being *happy* over the calamity or the *fall* of ones enemy. We are not to gloat over the stumbling of our enemy, much less go after him with the sword.
The muslim is supposed to imitate the false prophet who did everything his evil heart wanted and then excused himself by pretense that it was commanded by his god.
The Christian is supposed to do his best to imitate Christ who treated others with respect, love, kindness, all good things. And commanded His followers, “Love your neighbor as you love yourself (Mark 12:31)” and “Do to others what you wish them to do to you (Matt. 7:12).”
Jay Boo says
One night Islam’s useful idiots will wear out their once welcomed usefulness.
Then we can say …
Tim Stanley, just relax and sit tight as you hold your little head in your lap tonight and tell yourself again and again not to worry because everything is going to be alright.
gerard says
” we can’t blame Islamic State on Islam”
You can’t, but anyone who has read the Koran can.
Yet another apologist for Islam! Doesn’t he know he’s losing his country? And helping it on it’s way!?
Salah says
“Islam is not a monoculture. Sunni and Shia look very different…blah…blah”
I must admit he’s right on this one.
Sunni Muslim: Muhammad is in Paradise!
Shia Muslim: Yes, but his private parts are in Hell!!!
http://crossmuslims.blogspot.com/2011/07/private-parts-of-muhammad.html
gravenimage says
But, thinking about this as a historian, Maher’s analysis does share something in common with the fundamentalists he despises: he thinks that religion is static and not susceptible to political interpretation. As such, he buys into Isil’s own claim to be a legitimate expression of Islam. That’s naïve.
………………………………………
“Share(s) something in common with the fundamentalists”—how often have we heard *this crap*? This would be like saying Winston Churchill “shared something with Nazis” in regarding Fascists as thuggish, warmongering supremacists.
More:
Islam is not a monoculture. Sunni and Shia look very different, both have generated schools of thought that take starkly contrasting approaches towards issues of gender, the relationship between church and state, and the role of Jihad.
………………………………………
My God, what rot. Both sects regard women as second class citizens who should be forcibly veiled and stoned to death if they commit “Zina”—you find this is Shia Iran and in Sunni Saudi Arabia. There is no difference. And the “relationship between church and state”—really, mosque and state—you find no such separation in either Saudi Arabia or Iran. And both sects believe fervently in waging violent Jihad against the “filthy Infidel”, and both states have funded violent Jihad.
Of course, there are many more Sunni examples than just Saudi Arabia.
Here’s more insanity from the moronic Tim Stanley:
“Islam is way more English than the EDL”
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100230090/islam-is-way-more-english-than-the-edl/
By the way, this tool considers himself an art historian—and he’s a damn mediocre one.
Alan Derpowitz says
“Muslims want access to Sharia courts – which is entirely reasonable given that a) it’s their cultural norm…”
Absolutely no courts or law of any type can be a “cultural norm” because people do not have contact with them enough in their lives.
Attitudes about food, gender, treatment of animals are cultural norms because people interract with such concepts every day.
Law and the courts is something we interract with, but not enough for it to be a “norm”.
And the fact is self interrest and the desire for justice for oneself will trump any sort of “norm” one can imagine. In England when Muslim woman learned the difference in outcomes between Sharia family courts and British law courts, they didn’t give a damn about “cultural norms”.
Do you think a thief in a radical muslim countly, looking at the prospect of amputation, will be happy his legal system is keeping to cultural norms?
That cultural norms in law could be something that is blanketly desireable is pesudo intellectual waffle that doesn’t take practical human nature or common sense into account.
fair_dinkum says
this man is a stooge. a public fool.
Bill was onto this a while ago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XA64SX_52m8
Champ says
Somewhere a village is missing its idiot …
Max Publius says
Funny how new historians have a campaign to show Western history warts and all, while simultaneously vigorously sanitizing Islamic history.
I’m waiting for the future book “Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your Islamic History Textbook Got Wrong”
ECAW says
This man is a prize berk (that’s cockney rhyming slang but I’m not going to explain it!). Every time he writes something similar in the Telegraph the comments are filled with a sea of contempt. Perhaps the Telegraph just use him as clickbait or as a balance to their more sensible articles on the subject.
Isn’t it encouraging though that the dhimmi tendency are getting ever more clamorous and desperate in their attempts to kid us that all this has nothing to do with Islam. The dogs in the street are starting to notice that it has. The more hot air the establishment pump into this balloon the bigger will be the bang when it explodes.
Beagle says
To gain insight into the jihadi mindset it is not enough to merely read the Quran, though Stanley has not managed even that. The Quran is disjointed rubbish which will glaze the eyes and cure insomnia without the background Hadith and basic understanding of the life of Muhammad. Naturally Stanley has not only failed to read such material but seems unaware of it.
At some point after learning something about the three prongs of the Sunnah, Quran, Hadith, and Sirat one should by then have stumbled across the notion that all this material makes up a legal system called sharia.
So all this rot about picking and choosing any old interpretation of words you like goes away as one is faced with a 1400 year legal tradition which is in no way apart from the core texts. Stanley introduces “Sharia courts” abruptly as a seperate phenomenon, a sort of alternative dispute resolution for Muslims wholly separate from the texts he is either mostly unfamiliar with or totally unaware.
Overall, his methodology is a bit like me saying I don’t know much about maths, but I have some very important insights on Hawking radiation and black holes which will really shake up the silly physics community heading in the wrong direction. It gets worse.
Even when all of these parts, Quran, Hatith, Sirat, and Sharia have been somewhat digested in pieces one must understand the likely way they fit together as a unified whole in the mind of a jihadi. This is not easy when the components are illogical, out of order, written poorly, inconsistent, and often about mundane seemingly insignificant subjects.
This is where abrogation and the life of Muhammad become critical.
To make sense of the most important text, the jumbled Quran, Al Tawba (Sura Nine) is a life saver. Being last in time it abrogates just about every peaceful interpretation so-called experts bring forth in their Islamic apologetics. Even the most intelligent and studious jihadis rely on Al Tawba like a crutch.
This is validated through the life of Islam’s ‘perfect man’ (33.21) Muhammad. In a sense Muhammad’s entire early life is abrogated by his jihads for conquest, conversion, enslavement, and booty. Otherwise there is simply no way to reconcile such a diverse, but not in a good way, lifetime.
Ultimately the more someone tries to live his or her life through the literal Islamic texts, without creative mental gymnastics like a Zhudi Jasser, the more sword jihad becomes the only logically consistent path.
But what do I know? I just spent a significant chunk of 14 years reading the texts, jihad literature, terror news, and much more to figure it out. I should probably trade that for another unrelated academic credential so I can truly understand Islam and jihad.
SpiritOf1683 says
Obviously this ‘historian’ doesn’t know that Mohammed robbed, enslaved, killed and beheaded hostages, and that ISIS and other Muslim terrorist outfits think “If beheading was alright for Mohammed, then its alright for us”.
duh_swami says
I want to start off saying I know nothing at all about what I write, and by the time I’m done, you will be sure of it.
Godfrey Kemal says
Now imagine if Mohamed popped up in the Islamic State, what would his review be of the so called “Islamic State”:
1. Beheading Infidels = Sharia compliant !
2. Violent Jihad conquests = Sharia compliant !
3. Enslaving Infidel women and children = Sharia compliant !
4. Forcing Christians to convert or pay “Jiyza” (religious tax)= Sharia compliant !
5. Confiscating property of Christians = Sharia compliant !
6. Establishing a Caliphate = Sharia compliant !
7. Destroying churches and ideally converting to Mosques = Sharia compliant !
8. Being a “martyr” while waging Violent Jihad = not just Sharia compliant but instant access to Paradise with 72 black eyed virgins, Jihad Jackpot baby!!!
9. Beheading “Apostates” of Islam (ie, Shia Muslims whom Sunni Islamic State considers false) = Sharia compliant!
10. Murdering children = Oh, NOT Sharia compliant
RESULTS: 9 out of 10 aint too shabby!
nacazo says
correction:
10. Murdering children = Shariah compliant.
Saheeh Muslim
Book 019, Hadith Number 4321.
It is reported on the authority of Sa’b b. Jaththama that the Prophet of Allah (may peace be upon him), when asked about the women and children of the polytheists being killed during the night raid, said: They are from them.
Saheeh Bukhari
Volumn 004, Book 052, Hadith Number 256.
Narated By As-Sab bin Jaththama : The Prophet passed by me at a place called Al-Abwa or Waddan, and was asked whether it was permissible to attack the pagan warriors at night with the probability of exposing their women and children to danger. The Prophet replied, “They (i.e. women and children) are from them (i.e. pagans).” I also heard the Prophet saying, “The institution of Hima is invalid except for Allah and His Apostle.”
carpediadem says
Tim Stanley: “It’s an interesting, obviously sensitive question that I’m not super qualified to answer”
But he’s answering it anyway.
He’s probably bored.
duh_swami says
The best way to approach a difficult subject, is to know nothing about it that makes you think pre-thought thoughts. You have to start with a blank mind. A clean slate with nothing written on it. It would seem Tim has mastered the art of blank. Going blank without passing out is hard to do. For most people it takes years of meditation and contemplation to go blank without falling over.
tpellow says
Stanley admits he knows little of the tenets of Islam, and little of Islamic imperialist history over nearly 1,400 years.
Yet he denies the Islam of the Islamic State, and the concomitant extreme violence.
Stanley is a dangerous ‘Utopian’ who denies that the barbarism is being committed in the name of Islam; he wants to believe, without the evidence, that Islam can somehow be separated from violence and repression.
The West needs to understand the impact of Islamic forces as they actually today, and to build up its defense strategy against them, not to appease them.
The West’s nations would be safer places without the presence of Islamic jihadists and their sympathisers. Policies of mass immigration from Islamic countries have facilitated the entry of this Islamic Trojan horse. And, of course, such policies are based on a false understanding of Islam.
No Fear says
It was boredom that made the Nazis kill the Jews…not Hitler, not Mein Kampf.
Alarmed Pig Farmer says
It was boredom that made the Nazis kill the Jews…not Hitler, not Mein Kampf.
Have you ever seen a mapping between Mein Kampf and the Holy Ko-Ran? It appears that the former was written with the latter on Adolph’s cell room desk, used as a guide. What he called My War wasn’t his war, the whole fantasy was based on the Holy Prophet’s war… a most violent and remorseless war on good.
Before anybody thinks conspiracy theory on this, it’s an openly acknowledged fact that Adolph had the Moslem Bible in that cell.
Alarmed Pig Farmer says
Not that this needs to be said aloud, but academic standards have plummeted since the 1970s. It’s happened in terms of the quality of people hired to teach, what they’re held to, the quality of the curriculum and raw materials used, such as the type and quality of books used in instruction, and in the level of motivation of students. Hell, since the global warming fraud heated up, even the scientific method has been thrown out the window. It’s all bad.
joeb says
If we checked Tim Stanley’s credit card bill, we would find a charge for excavator hire from some company or other.
He clearly felt the hole he dug with the previous nonsense wasn’t deep enough. Utterly deluded beyond belief.
Richie says
Thats right, Muslims are always victims, even when they rape and kill
gfmucci says
If its true that being fatherless in childhood confuses a man’s thinking and emotions later in life, this dude was born without a mother OR a father.
onisac says
Tim Stanley, is an ignorant fool. He should do a little research on the history of Islam, before he opens his mouth, next time.
William says
“I can’t answer these questions from a theological perspective because I don’t read Arabic and my knowledge of the Koran is slight (although if we’re condemning something based upon selective passages then I could write an entire blogpost illustrating why Christianity or Judaism are equally anti-social).”
Mr. Stanley says that he lacks knowledge of the Koran and does not speak Arabic, which is why he cannot give a theological perspective. On the other hand, he is confident that he could write a great deal about the theological perspective of Christianity and Judaism. But is he any more qualified to discuss the theology of Christianity and Judaism than he is of the Koran? He implies that he lacks knowledge of the Koran because he does not speak Arabic. Well, does he speak Koine Greek (the original language of the New Testament) and Hebrew (the language of the Jewish Book)? If he doesn’t speak those languages, according to his own standard, he lacks the knowledge of those texts too.
I would guess he is a Christian in name only, or maybe he is an atheist. He is most likely not knowledgeable about the contents of the English translations of the Bible or the Torah, other than what exists in our literary culture.
His double standard and hypocrisy are so evident when held to the very same standard that he is holding himself to when he says he cannot answer theological questions about the Koran. Yet, he is ready to write an entire blogpost as if he were an expert in Christianity and Judaism, but of which he is not qualified. The man is contemptible.
somehistory says
Great response, William.
Kepha says
I second kudos to William. However, don’t say “Bible or the Torah”. The Torah is the first five books of the Bible.
Myxlplik says
“…My knowledge of the Koran is slight”
“if we’re condemning something based upon selective passages then I could write an entire blogpost illustrating why Christianity or Judaism are equally anti-social.”
The lens through which Tim Stanley views the world is through the western religion of Multiculturalism. He admits his knowledge is slight, but through the mystical powers of Multiculturalism he can gather enough global Earth mana to Magically KNOW all other faiths are equal, thus rendering Islam just as toothless as Christianity, so he need not delve into the needless and tiresome labor of actual study.
The God of Multiculturalism is all powerful, merciful, and benevolent.
R Cole says
We can’t blame Islamic State on Islam, but apparently we can blame it on American imperialism.
We know – we know ~ if anything happens in the world – America done it – even Islamic supremacy – but lets see if this view stands up to history:
Barbary wars 1700’s – Islam vs newly formed USA
Sounds all too familiar:
Muslim Pirates Sold a Million Europeans as Slaves:
A lot of crimes have been committed over the centuries – but to say the ISIS action has no precedent in Islam – is patently false.
:: ::
He seems to be in favor of Islamic courts – as they are often viewed by Muslims as being ‘fairer’. In one of these UK courts there was a case where a women who sought a divorce from her husband – stated that he beat her with a baseball bat, while she held one of their children in her arms, as she cooked the family meal – was asked by the Shari’a judge – if she was a good Muslim wife – and what had she done to cause her husband to strike her.
:: ::
You wonder how largely backward Arab Muslims managed to take over a place like Ancient Persia – it could not have been by violence alone – it is what we have seen many on the Left fall prey to – that is the suggestion that when one learns about Islam – it makes one superior [based on the belief that Islam/the Koran holds superior knowledge]. In their defense of Islam they adopt an authoritarian position – such that they believe that anyone with a different view should not be heard – even that their fundamental right to freedom of speech be denied. [Thank god for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – Huh!]
As it is Islam that they are protecting – it’s start as you mean to go on. But they should not expect everyone to be bedazzled by Islam’s smoke and mirrors. Lest we end up like Persia, lined up in a race to the 7th century bottom.
Natalie says
When you exonerate Christian history as opposed to ISIL, you entirely forget the brutality of the Inquisition, which was regularly burning people at the stake, and expelling them with no more than the shirts on their backs, and imposing unduly large taxes on those who stayed, and then requiring conversion to Christianity, after which the people involves would be subject to close observation. Sound familiar? Hmmmm, just like ISIS!
Angemon says
Natalie posted:
“When you exonerate Christian history as opposed to ISIL, you entirely forget the brutality of the Inquisition, which was regularly burning people at the stake, and expelling them with no more than the shirts on their backs, and imposing unduly large taxes on those who stayed, and then requiring conversion to Christianity, after which the people involves would be subject to close observation. Sound familiar? Hmmmm, just like ISIS!”
I take it that not only you know nothing about history you also expect everyone else to be equally historically illiterate, otherwise you wouldn’t try to push that steaming pile of crap on us. The inquisition had no power whatsoever over non-christians, they judged relapsed converts to christianity and heretic christians. Forced conversion and expulsion policies came from the ruling power. Take Spain, for example. In 1492 they expelled the moors. Muslims were allowed to stay in Spain and freely practice their religion. Long story short, they were such a source of problems to the Spaniards – who, at the time, were fighting with the muslim ottoman empire for the title of super-power – that in the 17th century the Spanish Crown told them “convert or GTFO”. Compare that with what ISIS is doing to, let’s say, the Yazidi. Can you honestly say that what the inquisition did and what ISIS is doing are even remotely comparable?
William says
Natalie,
There is no need to exonerate Christian history or the Inquisition. Those who carried out the inquisitions spoke for no religion. They did not operate in the name of any religion. More importantly, their victims were overwhelmingly Christian, and no faith teaches people to massacre innocents. The Inquisitors were not operating in the name of any religion, and what they did went against the most basic beliefs of Christianity. Therefore, they represented a perverted, oppressive ideology that bears no relation to Christianity.
Angemon says
I see what you did there 😉
+1
gravenimage says
“Just like ISIS”. Ah—not quite.
This would have been true—and even then, just to an extent—if Christians and Yazidis had invaded the Islamic State and oppressed the Muslims there for 700 years before they fought back and expelled the occupying Infidels.
Hmmmm….maybe *not* “just like ISIS”.
Further, this happened five hundred years ago—not today. There is nothing like the Spanish Inquisition in the West now, and has not been for centuries.
Moreover, the West criticizes the Spanish Inquisition *all the time*, both academically and popularly—and has for a very long time.
Whereas criticism of Muslim savagery is often met with death threats from members of the “religion of peace”.
All in all, just witless moral equivalence…
Natalie A Sera says
You folks accuse me of not knowing history, but have you no clue what the inquisition did to the Jews of the time? Pay humongous tax, convert to Catholicism, leave or die a horrible death. Sounds EXACTLY like what ISIS is doing now.
And I’m not implying an equivalence between Catholicism THEN and ISIS NOW. Christianity has developed and grown and left most of its barbarous ways, but Islam hasn’t.
So please don’t make statements about me when you know nothing about me.
Angemon says
Natalie A Sera posted
“You folks accuse me of not knowing history, but have you no clue what the inquisition did to the Jews of the time? Pay humongous tax, convert to Catholicism, leave or die a horrible death. Sounds EXACTLY like what ISIS is doing now.”
Once again: the inquisition could only judge christians. The imposition of taxes and forced conversion for non christians came from the ruling political power, not from the inquisition. Even if the inquisition had done what ISIS is doing like you falsely claim, it would have done so despite of christian tenets, not because of them, unlike ISIS who does it because of islamic tenets, not despite of them.
“And I’m not implying an equivalence between Catholicism THEN and ISIS NOW.”
Your words are:
“you entirely forget the brutality of the Inquisition, which was regularly burning people at the stake, and expelling them with no more than the shirts on their backs, and imposing unduly large taxes on those who stayed, and then requiring conversion to Christianity, after which the people involves would be subject to close observation. Sound familiar? Hmmmm, just like ISIS!”
and
“have you no clue what the inquisition did to the Jews of the time? […] Sounds EXACTLY like what ISIS is doing now.”
“just like ISIS” and “Sounds EXACTLY like what ISIS is doing now”. Nope, no implied equivalence between Catholicism THEN and ISIS NOW there… Just because you say that the inquisition did something then and ISIS is doing exactly that now it doesn’t mean you’re trying to make some sort of equivalence, right? RIGHT???
BTW, are there any reports of ISIS burning people at the stake or did you lie about that too?
Anon says
Quote “When you exonerate Christian history as opposed to ISIL, you entirely forget the brutality of the Inquisition, which was regularly burning people at the stake, and expelling them with no more than the shirts on their backs, and imposing unduly large taxes on those who stayed, and then requiring conversion to…”
People who are trying to be deceptive often resort to just implying things, rather than using level-headed transparent discourse. Even if your weak, exaggerated statement WERE true, which it’s not, WHAT are you trying to imply, say, etc. That no-one should be criticizing ISIS/ISIL or Islam? No one should try to stop ISIS, wow, just let it run its course, run wild I guess. Show me where 150 million Christians are currently threatening world peace with forced “conversion” as in:
There are about 1.5 billion Muslims worldwide.
(http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html)
Using a low-end estimate of ten percent (http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2003/10/how-many-islamists)
that gives us a result of 150 million Muslims that are militant or forcing sharia law on society (i.e. forced conversion among other things).
Do you know ANYTHING about world history? Christianity went through a major reformation, Islam has NOT. Do you want CURRENT world problems to be addressed or just play deception games about the past. Even the nothing-wrong-with-islam Pew Research site says:
“Taking the life of those who abandon Islam is most widely supported in Egypt (86%) and Jordan (82%). Roughly two-thirds who want sharia to be the law of the land also back this penalty in the Palestinian territories (66%). In the other countries surveyed in the Middle East-North Africa region, fewer than half take this view. In the South Asian countries of Afghanistan and Pakistan, strong majorities of those who favor making Islamic law the official law of the land also approve of executing apostates (79% and 76%, respectively).”
http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-beliefs-about-sharia/
I mean, get a clue.
SpiritOf1683 says
Obviously you don’t know much history. The Spanish Inquisition claimed around 3,000 victims in 350 years. ISIS claims that number often in one week, and certainly inside a month. And as you think Christianity and the West is so bad, then off you go to ISIS-land. Perhaps you might be fortunate and avoid being beheaded. And lets whitewash the previous 770 years before the Reconquista was complete, for it is the Reconquista, along with Charles martels victory at Tours in 732, and the victories at Vienna in 1529 and 1683, and Malta in 1565 which left the West free and not ruled by butchers like ISIS. Defeat in those, particularly Tours in 732 would have been irreversible.
SpiritOf1683 says
On top of this, we’re seeing medieval barbarianism in Islamic lands in the 21st Century. Would Natalie fancy living in a country like Pakistan? It is a fair bet that those who indulge in moral equivalence, implying that Christianity is no better than Islam would fight tooth and nail to avoid being sent packing to an Islamic country like Pakistan, Somalia, Iraq or Syria.
GeoffM says
Well the Spanish learnt a lot from the Muslim invaders. Forced conversion, Jizya taxes etc
It was not enough to conquer the Muslims, it was necessary to expel or convert them as Muslims, then as now, were a fifth column that the Christian population could never trust..
ECAW says
Natalie – Inquisition past, ISIS present. Do you notice an important difference?
voegelinian says
Inquisition good, Islam bad.
jamshid says
We have all kind of stupid people,historans, presidents ,scintists,drs,profosors,jurnalists,senator and great idiots like jon kirri etc. Thanks to that god which i not belive in it.
Anushirvan says
I hope Labour will be very glad to realize that, somehow, Stanley seems to imply there are enough people out there who would associate Labour with utterly totalitarian socialism. Is Stanley more or less nudging towards this position himself, maybe ? The mind boggles !
Funny stuff !
Would such people be right ? Or would they be wrong ?
He may be forced to elaborate on the matter at some stage !
LOL
Kepha says
Tim Stanley, Uncle Kepha used to wear his hair like that–back in the Sillier ‘Seventies.
Tim Stanley is indeed one more specimen of credentialed ignoramus, or whom we have too many. But since Bill Maher is mentioned, I can’t help but recalling that not too long ago, he was one of the biggest moral equivalencers out there. While I’m glad Maher has awakened to see Islam as something horrible, I still think he’s just a little teufelsdreck.
GP says
The recognized leader of the IS or ISIS or ISIL has a PhD in IS LAMic studies, but that is not really IS LAM. Right?
But hey, the IS has recruiting centers throughout America and the West and these are called mosques. Every one of these mosques is a potential jihadist mill and every imams needs to watched very very closely. “Radical Muslims” will try to slit your throat and “Moderate Muslims” will simply smile and nod. IS LAM is a cult of murderous jihadists, rapists, and bloodthirsty devils. These butchers will find there is a special place in Hell for the most vile evil savages. That will be their eternal reward.
GP says
Specifically, how is a mosque a threat to the community within which it is built?
Every single mosque in the world, by definition, is modeled on the mosque of Muhammad in Medina in accordance with the Sunnah. The Sunnah interprets the Qur’an by reporting exhaustively on everything that Muhammad said, did, or consented to. Therefore, his Medina mosque, the first mosque, was a place where he gave judgments, where he decided who would be executed, where he instituted policy—domestic and military— where Jihad war strategies were designed. Consequently, it was a storage place for arms, a military training base, and was where troops were blessed and dispatched. Literally they were sent to conquer – first the whole of Arabia, and then the rest of the known world. Therefore if the present-day mosque is modeled as per the Sunnah of Muhammad then there should be very serious concern. As is well-known, Muslims are required to follow the example (Sunnah) of Muhammad—and according to Sura 33:36 it is not an option or a matter of opinion: “It is not for a believer, man or woman, when Allâh and His Messenger have decreed a matter that they should have any option in their decision. And whoever disobeys Allâh and His Messenger, he has indeed strayed in a plain error.” This explains and establishes beyond doubt why arms have been found in mosques in various countries, and in different capital cities.
GeoffM says
That guy has widely been debunked in the UK – he is a fraud and the rubbish he churns out “as a historian” is just Left Wing nonsense masquerading as knowledge.
Mirren10 says
The fact that in both of the articles this moral imbecile wrote, ”comments are closed”, really says it all.
I think he’s perfectly aware he’s talking through his backside, and doesn’t have the courage or academic honesty to face the barrage of criticism from those who are more intelligent and informed than himself. Just a typical morally compromised leftard. Blech.