Rabbi Deborah Schloss invited local Muslims to attend an “interfaith Shabbat service” at her synagogue in Clear Lake, Texas.
The setting for Shabbat at Temple Beth Tikvah was typical: services followed by a shared potluck supper. What was different on April 7 was that at least half those in attendance at the Clear Lake synagogue were Muslim.
The Muslim guests, members of the Clear Lake Islamic Center, were present to share an Interfaith Shabbat Service. The local dialogue initiative focused on common religious themes.
Following the Shabbat service, TBT Rabbi Deborah Schloss and CLIC Associate Imam Shaykh Ibrahim Ezghair discussed the many similarities between the two Abrahamic faiths.
It is curious that not a single one of those “many similarities” between the “two Abrahamic faiths” is mentioned.
The congregation then shared a dinner of homemade dishes that ranged from biriyani to kugel, along with lively conversations that lasted late into the evening.
Food is always a big part of these interfaith meetings with Muslims, often the most memorable and certainly the least dubious part, of these encounters.
Let’s stop right here, with the “many similarities between the two Abrahamic faiths.” The phrase “Abrahamic faiths,” which has become quite popular in interfaith discussions, has been held up for examination by skeptical scholars, but their findings seem unfortunately never to filter down to the level of such determinedly interfaithing clerics as Rabbi Schloss. Aaron W. Hughes, a Professor of Judaism, has described the category “Abrahamic religions” as coming into use only recently, and notes that “it is a ‘vague referent.’” It is, according to Hughes, “largely a theological neologism” and “an artificial and imprecise” term. “Combining the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religions into this one category might serve the purpose of encouraging ‘interfaith trialogue,’ but it is not true to the ‘historical record.’ Abrahamic religions is ‘an ahistorical category.’ There are ‘certain family resemblances’ among these three religions, but the ‘amorphous’ term Abrahamic religions prevents an understanding of the ‘complex nature’ of the interactions among them. Furthermore, the three religions do not share the same story of Abraham.” The main connection is that the three monotheistic faiths all recognize a role for someone named Abraham, but the Abraham of Islam is so different from the Abraham of Judaism as to make claims of commonality ludicrous.
In Judaism, Abraham is the first Patriarch of the Jewish people and the first person to teach monotheism. In Islam, on the other hand, the Muslim Abraham (or Ibrahim) is the one who with his son Ishmael built the Ka’aba, and first gave Muslims their name, for “the faith of your father Abraham” is Islam:
“And strive for Allah with the endeavour which is His right. He hath chosen you and hath not laid upon you in religion any hardship; the faith of your father Abraham (is yours). He hath named you Muslims of old time and in this (Scripture) ,that the messenger may be a witness against you, and that ye may be witnesses against mankind. So establish worship, pay the poor-due, and hold fast to Allah. He is your Protecting friend. A blessed Patron and a blessed Helper!” (Sura 22:78 — Pickthall)
“He hath ordained for you that religion which He commended unto Noah, and that which We inspire in thee (Muhammad), and that which We commended unto Abraham and Moses and Jesus, saying: Establish the religion, and be not divided therein. Dreadful for the idolaters is that unto which thou callest them. Allah chooseth for Himself whom He will, and guideth unto Himself him who turneth (toward Him). (Sura 42:13)
In the Qur’an, the repeated phrase “the religion of Abraham” means Islam, and that “religion” is commended to Jews and Christians, who are rebuked for having rejected it:
“Say: Allah speaketh truth. So follow the religion of Abraham, the upright. He was not of the idolaters.” (Sura 3:95)
“Say: O People of the Scripture! Why disbelieve ye in the revelations of Allah, when Allah (Himself) is Witness of what ye do?” (Sura 3:98)
This is a denunciation of Jews and Christians for disbelieving in what Allah has revealed.
“Say: O People of the Scripture! Why drive ye back believers from the way of Allah, seeking to make it crooked, when ye are witnesses (to Allah’s guidance)? Allah is not unaware of what ye do.” (Sura 3:99)
A further denunciation of Jews and Christians for turning others aside from the way of Allah.
In Islam, Abraham is not “shared” with the Jews and Christians. He is, rather, appropriated in the same way that other figures from Judaism and Christianity, such as Noah and Moses and Jesus, were appropriated, but endowed for Muslims with a completely different significance, as prophets of Islam. Just as the Islamic “Isa” is quite different from the Christian “Jesus,” the Islamic “Ibrahim” has little in common with the Jewish “Abraham.”
According to the Qur’an, Abraham was neither Jew nor Christian:
“Abraham was not a Jew, nor yet a Christian; but he was an upright man (hanif) who had surrendered (to Allah), and he was not of the idolaters.” (Sura 3:67)
Abraham offered only “hostility and hate” toward Jews and Christians:
“There is a goodly pattern for you in Abraham and those with him, when they told their folk: Lo! we are guiltless of you and all that ye worship beside Allah. We have done with you. And there hath arisen between us and you hostility and hate for ever until ye believe in Allah only – save that which Abraham promised his father (when he said): I will ask forgiveness for thee, though I own nothing for thee from Allah – Our Lord! In Thee we put our trust, and unto Thee we turn repentant, and unto Thee is the journeying. (Sura 60:4)
One doubts that Rabbi Schloss is aware of just how much the Muslim Abraham differs from the Abraham of the Torah. The Abraham of the Qur’an is not a Patriarch of the Jews; he offers Jews only his “hostility and hate” because they do not accept Allah. The figure of Abraham is not a unifying but a divisive figure. As Mark Durie has noted, “For Jews he is the Torah-observant father of the Jewish nation, and a reminder of God’s irrevocable covenant with the Jews. For Muslims he is the prototypical Muslim prophet, a prominent forerunner and validator of Muhammad’s claim and the ground of Muslim claims that Islam both predates and supersedes the Biblical faiths.”
What is clear from her comments is that Rabbi Schloss has allowed herself to be persuaded by that deceptive phrase about “Abrahamic faiths” to assume “commonalities” among those faiths that, for Muslims, simply do not exist. These two Abrahams are very different, and the appropriation of the figure of Abraham, turned into a Muslim who “hates” Jews and other Infidels, is nothing for Rabbi Schloss to celebrate.
“We’ve had relations for a long time,” Rabbi Schloss told the JHV. “I’m interested in deepening those relations. I feel compelled by all of the bigotry, ignorance and intolerance that we see in our nation and around the world today. There’s no better time for both of our communities to intellectually know and feel deeply in our hearts that we’re all children of the same G-d. And, we express our relationship to this G-d in diverse and beautiful ways.”
Rabbi Schloss feels compelled “by all of the bigotry, ignorance and intolerance” that she sees “in our nation and around the world” to get to know Muslims better; she is interested in “deepening relations” with them. You can be sure that the “bigotry” and “intolerance” she has in mind is that against, and not from, Muslims. But are Muslims really the victims of “bigotry” (that is, Islamophobia), or are they, rather, the most dangerous of intolerant bigots themselves? Isn’t this “bigotry” and “intolerance” to be found in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iran, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Somalia, and dozens of other Muslim countries, to a greater or lesser extent, where the inculcated hatred of non-Muslims is omnipresent — in the school textbooks, in the sermons of imams, in the opinions of muftis, in the speeches of political leaders, in the chatter in cafes and on the streets, on radio and television and the Internet? Isn’t the hatred of the Infidels the message delivered both to and by Muslims living in those Infidel lands? In Rabbi Schloss’s universe, it is Muslims who are victims of “bigotry, ignorance and intolerance.” But every day brings fresh news of some atrocity, in which Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists and those without any religion are attacked and killed somewhere in the world by Muslims. At the same time, we almost never hear of Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists attacking and murdering innocent Muslims. That suggests that the main “bigotry” and “intolerance” both “in our nation” and “around the world” is quite different from the kind that Rabbi Schloss presupposes and deplores.
You open the paper this week, and the latest such news is of Coptic churches being attacked in Egypt, and Copts murdered, by those claiming to act in furtherance of Islam. Christians have been similarly attacked, raped, murdered in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Iraq, Syria, Indonesia (where Christian schoolgirls have been decapitated), the Philippines, all by Muslims. Hindus have been attacked in Jammu-Kashmir (has Rabbi Schloss ever heard of the 200,000 Hindu Pandits driven out of that area by Muslim terrorism?), Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia. In India itself, Muslim terrorists have struck against Hindus in Mumbai, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Pune, Varanasi. In Pakistan, Christians and Hindus have been subject to decades of attack, their churches and temples bombed, by Muslims. It is much the same in Bangladesh, where the Hindu population has plummeted, just as it has in Pakistan, since Partition.
Christian towns are overrun and their inhabitants massacred, all over northern Nigeria, in Jos and Abuja, and Kano and Baga and Maiduguri. Schoolgirls by the thousands have been kidnapped in Chibok and other towns by those Qur’an-quoting terrorists of Boko Haram. Two million black Africans, mainly Christians, with some pagans intermixed, have been killed by Muslims in a decades long civil war in the Sudan. A half million blacks were massacred more recently in Darfur by the Muslim Janjaweed. In Somalia, too, Christians are a constant target of Al-Shabaab. Al-Shabaab has also repeatedly attacked targets in largely Christian Kenya — trying first to carefully separate Christians from Muslims — most notably at the Westgate Mall and Garissa University massacres. Buddhist monks and farmers and teachers have been killed by Muslims in Thailand, while the last remaining Buddhists in Bangladesh, in the Chittagong Hills tract, are continually subject to small-scale attack by Muslims. Only in Myanmar have the Buddhists managed to more than hold their own by giving as good as they get (and thereby earning worldwide condemnation for daring to defend themselves with as much ruthlessness as the Muslims exhibit in their attacks).
In Europe, Muslims have used knives, guns, bombs, suicide vests, cars and trucks, against the Unbelievers – in Paris, Nice, and Toulouse, in Brussels (both at the Airport and in the metro), in Madrid (Atocha Station), and Amsterdam (Pim Fortuyn, Theo van Gogh), in London, with targets including riders on seven trains of the Underground, and one bus; in Woolwich, where a lone serviceman, Drummer Lee Rigby, was ghoulishly dismembered by Muslim savages; most recently, four people were run down and killed (and 50 wounded) on Westminster Bridge in what was to have been an attack on Parliament itself. In Berlin and Munich and Ansbach and Wurzburg, Muslims, apparently insufficiently grateful to Mrs. Merkel for letting them in, have run down, stabbed, and shot the Infidel enemy. A careening car was the kuffar-killing weapon of choice a week ago on a Stockholm street. Muslim terrorists recently bombed a metro train in Moscow, not for the first time, and have also killed hostages in a Moscow theatre and been responsible for the deaths of children taken hostage at a school in Beslan.
In the United States, Muslims have murdered thousands of non-Muslims in New York, Washington, Boston, San Bernardino, Fort Hood, Orlando, Chattanooga, St. Cloud, and many other places, using hijacked planes, pressure-cooker explosives, trucks and cars, guns, and knives. Is that what Rabbi Schloss was referring to when she deplored the “bigotry” and “intolerance” in our nation?
I’ve left out a lot.
Not only did I list only those attacks on Infidels that came immediately to mind), but I left out listing individually any of the terrorist attacks by Muslims on other Muslims, because they were deemed to be the wrong kind of Muslim — Ahmadis, Alawites, Shi’a, or Sunnis who were not Salafis, or otherwise deemed insufficient in their Islam. But such attacks have taken place in Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Pakistan, Indonesia, and Gaza.
Many of these attacks are listed at sites online. For Rabbi Schloss, they are just a click away. She could start, for example, at this link. And even such lists grossly underestimate Muslim “bigotry” and “intolerance” because they list only major attacks, not those where no one was hurt, nor those many attacks that were prevented by the security services but still deserve to be listed to indicate the size of the menace, the depth of the hatred. But at least such lists may cause even Rabbi Schloss to begin to get the idea that Muslim violence, both against non-Muslims and the wrong kind of Muslims, has been wracking our giddy globe for the last sixteen years (not to mention the past 1400 years), and shows no signs of abating. And while there have been more than 30,500 Muslim terror attacks in that time, how many terror attacks by non-Muslims on Muslims in Western Europe and North America, during that same period, can she list? It is not “bigotry” to be aware of these attacks, and of what Islamic texts and teachings have prompted them.
As for the “bigotry” she laments – meaning “bigotry” against Muslims – can she point to any textbooks in the non-Muslim world that say the kind of things about Muslims that Muslims are taught about non-Muslims in their textbooks? Is she aware, for example, of what is said about Jews and Christians in Saudi textbooks, texts that are used not just in Saudi Arabia, but sent to Islamic schools all around the world, including some in the United States? Here’s a tiny sample:
“The Hour will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews, and Muslims will kill all the Jews.”
“It’s allowed to demolish, burn or destroy the bastions of the Kuffar (infidels) — and all what constitutes their shield from Muslims if that was for the sake of victory for the Muslims and the defeat for the Kuffar.”
“The Apes are the people of the Sabbath, the Jews; and the Swine are the infidels of the communion of Jesus, the Christians.
Those quotations are from an 8th grade textbook.
A twelfth-grade Saudi textbook on Quranic interpretation professes that “treachery, betrayal, and the denunciation of covenants” are among the attributes of the Jews.
The anti-Semitic libel “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” is presented as historical fact in a tenth grade textbook on Hadith and Islamic Culture. More on Saudi textbooks can be found here.
Of course, it’s not just the Saudi textbooks that matter. It’s where this hatred originates, and fills the minds not just of Saudi schoolchildren, but of 1.5 billion Muslims – that is, in the Qur’an itself.
Perhaps Rabbi Schloss, who complains of the “ignorance” of others (about what her peaceful, tolerant Islam teaches) may discover that it is she who needs to familiarize herself with aspects of Islam that she no doubt will find unpalatable, and that until now she has managed willfully to ignore. But we have a right to remind her of what the Qur’an says about the Jews and she has a duty, for the sake of her congregants who may need instruction, to pass on that knowledge. Here’s how Jews are depicted in the Qur’an, and in the leading Qur’anic commentaries, as found in Robert Spencer’s helpful compendium.
The Qur’an depicts the Jews as inveterately evil and bent on destroying the wellbeing of the Muslims. They are the strongest of all people in enmity toward the Muslims (5:82); as fabricating things and falsely ascribing them to Allah (2:79; 3:75, 3:181); claiming that Allah’s power is limited (5:64); loving to listen to lies (5:41); disobeying Allah and never observing his commands (5:13); disputing and quarreling (2:247); hiding the truth and misleading people (3:78); staging rebellion against the prophets and rejecting their guidance (2:55); being hypocritical (2:14, 2:44); giving preference to their own interests over the teachings of Muhammad (2:87); wishing evil for people and trying to mislead them (2:109); feeling pain when others are happy or fortunate (3:120); being arrogant about their being Allah’s beloved people (5:18); devouring people’s wealth by subterfuge (4:161); slandering the true religion and being cursed by Allah (4:46); killing the prophets (2:61); being merciless and heartless (2:74); never keeping their promises or fulfilling their words (2:100); being unrestrained in committing sins (5:79); being cowardly (59:13-14); being miserly (4:53); being transformed into apes and pigs for breaking the Sabbath (2:63-65; 5:59-60; 7:166); and more.
And here, again from Spencer’s discussion of antisemitism in Islam, is how the most important Qur’anic commentators in the past glossed these passages, which they interpreted so as to be even more damning toward the Jews:
The classic Qur’anic commentators do not mitigate the Qur’an’s words against Jews, but only add fuel to the fire. Ibn Kathir explained Qur’an 2:61 (“They were covered with humiliation and misery; they drew on themselves the wrath of Allah”) this way: “This Ayah [verse] indicates that the Children of Israel were plagued with humiliation, and that this will continue, meaning that it will never cease. They will continue to suffer humiliation at the hands of all who interact with them, along with the disgrace that they feel inwardly.” Another Middle Ages commentator of lingering influence, Abdallah ibn Umar al-Baidawi, explains the same verse this way: “The Jews are mostly humiliated and wretched either of their own accord, or out of coercion of the fear of having their jizya [punitive tax] doubled.”
Ibn Kathir notes Islamic traditions that predict that at the end of the world, “the Jews will support the Dajjal (False Messiah), and the Muslims, along with ‘Isa [Jesus], son of Mary, will kill the Jews.” The idea in Islam that the end times will be marked by Muslims killing Jews comes from the prophet Muhammad himself, who said, “The Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say. ‘O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him.’” This is, not unexpectedly, a favorite motif among contemporary jihadists.
And then there are the Islamic authorities today, who show that these virulently antisemitic passages are not to be “contextualized” but are still valid for Muslims for all time:
Not just contemporary jihadists, but modern-day mainstream Islamic authorities take these passages seriously. The former Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar, Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi, who was the most respected cleric in the world among Sunni Muslims, called Jews “the enemies of Allah, descendants of apes and pigs.” The late Saudi sheikh Abd al-Rahman al-Sudayyis, imam of the principal mosque in the holiest city in Islam, Mecca, said in a sermon that Jews are “the scum of the human race, the rats of the world, the violators of pacts and agreements, the murderers of the prophets, and the offspring of apes and pigs.”
Another Saudi sheikh, Ba’d bin Abdallah al-Ajameh al-Ghamidi, made the connection explicit: “The current behavior of the brothers of apes and pigs, their treachery, violation of agreements, and defiling of holy places … is connected with the deeds of their forefathers during the early period of Islam–which proves the great similarity between all the Jews living today and the Jews who lived at the dawn of Islam.”
Rabbi Schloss has apparently been content to make pronouncements about Islam not on the basis of her own study of the texts, especially of the Qur’an and Hadith, and of the teachings derived from them, but instead on the basis of what she has “learned” about Islam as a result of her friendship with, and warm feelings for, the imam’s wife, Jasmine. Here is her saccharine description of that friendship:
“We decided to meet in neutral space. So, we began meeting in the local library, and then a restaurant,” recounted Rabbi Schloss. “We read a book together, written after 9/11 by three women: a Jew, a Christian and a Muslim.”
A guarantee, presumably, of its ecumenical value.
“Over the course of several meetings, the imam’s wife, Jasmine, and I became friends in ways that never would have been possible in mixed company. I consider her one of my closest friends.”
After only “several meetings”?
“She attended my daughter Priya’s Bat Mitzvah four years ago.’
“And, along with two of our congregants, I was honored to attend the wedding of Jasmine’s daughter, Sarah. People at the wedding went out of their way to make us feel comfortable. We felt warmly embraced by all the attendees. These are the types of friendships that can blossom when we embrace those of different backgrounds.”
These “types of friendships” tell Rabbi Schloss nothing about what 1.5 billion Muslims read in the Qur’an and the Hadith, and what they learn there about the duty of violent Jihad to spread Islam, or what they are taught to think about Jews and other Kuffar. If the Imam’s wife Jasmine became “one of [my] closest friends” after just a few meetings, and without discussing the most important aspects of Islam with her new friend, one wonders just how close this friendship with can possibly be. It may be uncharitable to remind Rabbi Schloss that many Muslims are seeking to shore up their positions in American society by finding gullible Kuffar who will respond to smiles and wiles, hence all these Meet-A-Muslim-Neighbor campaigns, which are based on the simple idea that person-to-person outreach should trump all those disturbing passages some Infidel might have run across in the Qur’an and that Muslims are determined to have overlooked.
Imam Ezghair, Jasmine’s husband, notes that “interfaith encounters like this are important, because Muslims are instructed by their faith to reach out to other religious communities, especially the Abrahamic faiths who worship one G-d.” (One God, but a very different God in each case.) In addition, he said, “minority communities in the United States often face similar challenges.” The phrasing here is deceptive. Muslims are not told to “reach out to other religious communities” in the sense in which non-Muslims ordinarily would interpret that phrase. “Reaching out to” implies, for most of us, extending the hand of friendship to, or attempting to meet half-way, or making feel welcome, or extending the hand of friendship to, other religious communities. Muslims are not told to “reach out to other religious communities” in any of those senses, but rather, are commanded to conduct Da’wa among “other religious communities.” They are further instructed that they are not to take Christians and Jews as friends (Qur’an 5.51: O ye who believe! take [sic] not the Jews and the Christians for your friends and protectors: They are but friends and protectors to each other). One wonders what Rabbi Schloss would make of 5.51? Does she think it is of no consequence? And what does she think of the instructions to Muslims to make an outward show of friendship to Jews and Christians if they, the Muslims, are still too weak to assert themselves, but to harbor hatred in their hearts? Here is one example from the well-known Qur’anic commentator Ibn Kathir: “The Most High said, ‘[U]nless you but guard yourselves against them, taking precautions’ — that is, whoever at any time or place fears their [non-Muslim] evil may protect himself through outward show — not sincere conviction. As al-Bukhari records through Abu al-Darda the words [of the Prophet], ‘Truly, we grin to the faces of some peoples, while our hearts curse them.'”
Rabbi Schloss may be unaware that Muslims are not allowed to take non-Muslims as friends, but that they are permitted, in order to protect themselves and further Islam, to feign friendship even “while our hearts curse them [the Infidels]”? If so, and once she is apprised of them, what will be her reaction? Denial? Anger? Are we not allowed, or even duty-bound, to raise for her some unpalatable truths? What does she make of these Qur’anic passages and commentators? How could she continue to ignore them? Would it really be enough to say “well, I know that Jasmine is one of my closest friends” whatever the Qur’an says? Or perhaps Rabbi Schloss was aware of 5:51 and the comment by Ibn Kathir on the admissibility of faking friendship with Infidels, and simply thought that few Muslims could possibly take such commands seriously. When 1.5 billion Muslims read Qur’an 5:51, don’t we non-Muslims have a right to assume that the vast majority of them will take that verse to heart, and furthermore, don’t we have evidence that they do, judging by their behavior, “in our nation and around the world”?
The “reaching out to other religious communities” of which the Imam speaks is deliberate and disingenuous, for the “reaching out” here refers to Da’wa, the Call to Islam, which is not what non-Muslim Americans think of when they hear the phrase “reaching out.” The Imam was consciously practicing taqiyya, religiously-sanctioned deception, to make it appear that Muslims have no overwhelming need or desire to convert “other religious communities,” but simply want to enroll those communities in larger efforts with their Muslim brothers and sisters. For non-Muslims will assume that “reaching out” to some group, religious or otherwise, means to make a special effort to have contact with its members, in order to try to help them, or to involve them in something that they had previously not taken part in. It does not mean, for most of us, to make contact with non-Muslims in order to persuade them to convert to Islam, but that is what the Imam means when he talks of “reaching out to other religious communities,” even as he knows perfectly well that few will understand him to be expressing that.
For now, the Muslims in Rabbi Schloss’s neighborhood, the ones who have become her new true closest friends, are trying to get their bearings, to establish themselves in a still uncertain environment. Rabbi Schloss is for now a useful tool. And once the Muslim community is larger, and feels more secure, then its members can go about their task of aggressively attempting to convert others; the time is not yet ripe; their numbers are still too low.
Along with that business of “reaching out to other religious communities,” the Imam attempts slyly to suggest that it is because Muslims are a minority, that they are being mistreated, as, he claims, all minorities are mistreated for the mere fact of being minorities. And as fellow victims, other minority groups ought to rally round the Muslims, for “we are – minorities – all in this together.” Here’s how he puts it: “When one of our communities is singled out, it’s important that we stick together. As minority communities, we all have been in these shoes at one time. It is particularly important for me and my community to reach out to the local Jewish community so that they can see us and relate to us, and we to them.” Why such a need to find support among Jews, one wonders? Could it be in order to put paid to some of those rumors about antisemitism among Muslims? And aren’t some Jews, of the rabbi-schloss school, only too susceptible to the challenge of demonstrating their no-hard-feelings broad-mindedness, and to lend a hand to their “Muslim brothers and sisters”?
“When one of our communities is singled out,” the Imam says, we must all rally round. Today it’s the Muslims, yesterday it was the Jews, tomorrow who knows? This suggests more than a hint of inexplicable victimhood. What oh what could be the reason why Muslims might today be “singled out” — if in fact they are? And why is it that Muslims seem to be “singled out” not in just one country, but all over the world, where Muslim migrants, no matter how welcoming the host country or its people, no matter how generous the welfare benefits of every kind lavished on these migrants, seem not so much singled out, as revealing themselves to be singularly unable to integrate peacefully, singularly demanding, and singularly dangerous? Could those 30,500 terrorist attacks by Muslims have anything to do with Muslims being “singled out”? Could it be that not all minorities are equally mistreated, that some minorities might have earned, through their behavior, the distrust and hostility of others? Don’t the endless attacks on Infidels by Al Qaeda, the Islamic State, Hamas, Hezbollah, Al-Nusra, Al-Shebaab, Boko Haram, and many other groups and groupuscules, make people in the West more likely to “single out” – with good reason – Muslims, rather than, say, such other minorities as Hindus, Jews, Buddhists, Mormons, Unitarians? Or does none of that matter, and Muslims really are just one more innocuous minority, more sinned against than sinning, mistreated simply because that’s the fate of all minorities? The Imam gives not the slightest hint of recognition – his well-practiced taqiyya must be a sight to behold – of the way Infidels and especially Jews (he is, after all, visiting a synagogue during a Shabbat service) are talked about in the Qur’an or the Hadith. He’s content to declare the willingness of Muslims “to reach out to other religious communities,” secure in the knowledge that the sentiment will be misconstrued.
The Imam might, after all, have taken a different tack, been more of a truth teller, and roundly declared that “it is important that we Muslims discuss openly, and try to change, Islamic teachings about Jews. We shouldn’t try to hide this unpleasant reality, we need instead to join those Muslims who want to reform Islam. We can’t get there if we continue to deny the problem, and if we deny the problem, others will be – are right now — perfectly justified in being suspicious of us. If Jewish and Christian holy books said the kinds of things about Muslims that our texts say about Christians and Jews, I don’t think we’d agree to have these interfaith meetings with Rabbi Schloss. So I am impressed that so many of you have come out this evening to welcome us. But at some point, I think it fair to say, these ‘interactions at interfaith events’ and these ‘positive outcomes [that] happen when laypeople connect on a personal level’ and even Rabbi Schloss’s greeting us ‘in a warm and caring way’ just won’t be a sufficient substitute for a real understanding of Islam. Non-Muslims need and deserve to know why these attacks by Muslims happen, ‘in our nation and around the world,’ and will want to know what is in the Qur’an and the Hadith. Making friends is not enough. We should be willing to discuss, not try to hide or misrepresent, the texts and teachings of Islam, and explain what we hope, and allow ourselves to believe, can be done about them. We are aware of the efforts of those who would reform Islam, such as Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Ibn Warraq, Mohammad Tawhidi, and others. We are also aware of the tremendous forces in Islam that militate against the slightest change, and insist on treating these would-be reformers as apostates who deserve death. Ayaan Hirsi Ali is forever condemned to appearing with a security detail, Ibn Warraq uses a pseudonym, Imam Mohammad Tawhidi now requires a police guard even in Australia. None of us can be sure that any reform of Islam will be possible. Some are hopeful, some are skeptical. But we certainly have to try. And the surest sign of genuine friendship should be our willingness to offer you, Rabbi Schloss, and your congregation, not taqiyya-and-tu-quoque along with the biryani, but the difficult truths about Islam that we have a duty to tell, and you have a duty to hear.”
EmHotep says
It’s all because of Ishmael vs Yitzhak issue 🙂
mortimer says
No, it’s because of the false prophet and the fact that the Persian and Roman empires experienced plagues and an economic slump for 20 or 30 years, thanks to which the Arab marauders were able to move in and usurp control of Egypt and Syria. They then invented Islam by pilfering bits and pieces of various religions according to the taste of Caliph Abd al Malik who created the Koran.
gravenimage says
EmHotep wrote:
It’s all because of Ishmael vs Yitzhak issue
…………………
EmHotep, Jews are not slaughtering Muslims–would that we could say the same for Muslims murdering Jews. Islam has hated Jews and called for their murder since the time of the “Prophet”.
EmHotep says
I would not generalize, I have never seen jews got killed here in Turkey or slaughtered. I have many jewish friends. So we should not be biased on this matter. At the end Arabs and Jews are from same race.
What I see here, this author writes always racists articles, it is really disturbing.
mgoldberg says
You said ‘I would not generalize’
But making an Ad Hominem argument- ie, the author always writes racist(s) articles, is really disturbing”
For me, people who claim not to ‘generalize’, then make a completely Ad Hominem argument, which means: (of an argument or reaction) directed against a person rather than the position they are maintaining.
Who do you think your fooling with your stupid comment? Oh, and it’s false just to make my point.
Dave de la Rond says
Oh so Ahmed has never seen Jews slaughtered in Turkey? How about the 17 of them in a synagogue in Istanbul a few years ago .No one was ever brought to justice , Disgusting and vile country
EmHotep says
You are wrong about the attack(s), it was combination of 3 attacks and planned by US created AL QAEDA.
EmHotep says
& I am not Ahmed, you are wrong again.
EmHotep says
Interesting people! Germany had committed genocide but you can still hate Turks, if this is not racism than what is racism?? Turkey was one of the first countries which recognised the establishment of Israel…
@ Dave de la Rond, you can’t even say which country you are from, but you look like a pure NAZI.
With this state of mind you can’t fight against islam and lose at the end…
Phil Copson says
Sorry EmHotep, but saying that “Arabs and Jews are from the same race” doesn’t make any difference to the Islamic teachings about the Jews, or other non-Muslims.
If you go back far enough, then all humans share a common ancestry – what difference does that make now ?
Robert Spencer’s articles are not “racist” – he is not inventing things – he is quoting what is written in Islamic texts, what recognised Islamic scholars have written about those texts over many centuries, what imans are instructing their followers today, and what those followers are doing in such great numbers around the world every day.
The weatherman is not responsible for the weather – he is just giving you the facts.
(Similarly, people who say that: “We all worship the same God.” are just talking nonsense. I don’t believe in any deities, but it is quite obvious that different religions have a completely different concept of what their God is and what he/she/it calls on them to do.
Mohammed simply took the Christian and Jewish principles and turned them upside-down. Where Christianity and others say “Thou shalt not kill.”, Muhammed said “It is your duty to kill non-muslims.”. Where Christianity says “Thou shalt not steal.”, Muhammed said that is fine to steal and extort money from non-muslims. Where Christianity says that “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbours wife.”, Muhammed said that it was fine to kill your neighbour and rape his wife, if they were non-muslims, and so and so on.
Robert is not asking you to believe him – he is asking you to read the Islamic texts and listen to the words of Islamic scholars to find out about Islam and what it has done – and is doing – to the world. Read it for yourself.
Where major figures figures in the history of world religion were too important and well-known to be ignored – such as Abraham and Jesus – Mohammed simply re-wrote the accounts of their lives to make them muslims and followers of his newly-minted friend “Allah”. Re-arranging/re-inventing the facts to tell a different story is only what any politician, lawyer,salesman, journalist, or desert-dwelling conman does all the time, it doesn’t require a mystical intervention.
It is quite obvious even to a 4-year old that if the various “Gods” are to be followed in such diametrically-opposed ways, then it couldn’t possibly be the same God, Abrahamic or any other variety.
JIMJFOX says
No, it’s because ALL “Faiths” are utterly ridiculous. Distinctions on theological grounds equally so.
Be sure, I make no comparisons with levels of violence, hatred, love or ‘goodness’ between any of them.
They are all batsh*t crazy.
Sorry Robert but truth is truth no matter how many deny it.
JIMJFOX says
And I’ll be amazed if this is not ‘moderated’ away…
Phil Copson says
All interesting stuff, no doubt – but what has any of it got to do with the price of fish ? We are where we are, and no jihadi is going to stop half-way through sawing somebody’s head off, because somebody pipes up and says “Er – excuse me Mo, but are you aware that Benjamin’s great-great-great-grandad-(recurring) actually invented the religion that has inspired you to cut his great-great-great-grandson’s (recurring) head off ?”. If the Jews were expelled hundreds of years before Mohammed set up shop, then it doesn’t seem likely that they cooked up his murderous manifesto anyway ?
The ancient history of religion is irrelevant to it’s followers today – other than for providing a series of laughable justifications for aggression and conquest – and discussing it’s convoluted and re-invented/re-imagined origins will do zip to dissuade a hate-propelled half-wit from mowing down walkers in Westminster or opening fire in Fresno.
Frank Verderber says
Rabbi Deborah Schloss is a reformed Jew. It means that she does what ever the Democratic party and Socialism tells her to do. She doesn’t believe the Bible is the final word of God.
Judaism is a covenant with Abraham. Christianity is the Covenant [found in Jeremiah] that comes through the lineage of David – ie. Jesus Christ. God is not done with the Abraham covenant so says Zechariah, and the New Testament books of Romans and Revelation.
Islam is a Jewish cult. This has been know to Christian and Jewish scholars for centuries. Mohammed received his understanding of the Old and New Testament form hid=s second cousin who was an Ebionite priest, and from his aunt and a Nestorian munch from Damascus. All he did was add Sabaean paganism to it such as use of the Kaaba and its meteorite stone and circumlocution, female genital mutilation etc.
Islam rejects the Abrahamic covenant and the Davidic covenant. Muslims believe that Abraham did not covenant with God who was mentioned as “El Shaddia” but the Arabs corrupted the moniker of God’s attribute with the Ababic word for Satan [Shetian].
Islam is a demonic Jewish cult after the teachings of the Elkanites, who became the Ebionites and those teachings can be found in their doctrines and in the pseudo-Clementine Epistles
EmHotep says
If I am not mistaken muslims accept ibrahim as a prophet. At least here in Turkey.
john spielman says
except that “ibrahaim” was supposed to sacrifice Ishmael not Isaac to God -so the lies started early in islamic pseudohistory!
will Rabbi Schloss seems to denying the animosity muslims have be toward all “unbelievers” especially the Jews!
EmHotep says
I hope muslims will change, but they start learning hatred from the book at early ages, especially in arabic speaking countries. That is why so many muslims left the religion in Turkey, especially after reading it in Turkish and learning all of the hateful verses.
gravenimage says
Unfortunately, Turkey is 99.8% Muslim, EmHotep.
Frank Verderber says
“If you accepted Abraham you would have accepted his God and Moses and the prophets that followed. As it is, you accept the word of an ignorant interloper who produced NO miracles. Who is God but Yehovah – from everlasting to everlssting. Allah means no more than “the god” – but only among the idols found in the Meccan Kaaba.
Phil Copson says
All interesting stuff, no doubt – but what has any of it got to do with the price of fish ? We are where we are, and no jihadi is going to stop half-way through sawing somebody’s head off, because somebody pipes up and says “Er – excuse me Mo, but are you aware that Benjamin’s great-great-great-grandad-(recurring) actually invented the religion that has inspired you to cut his great-great-great-grandson’s (recurring) head off ?”. If the Jews were expelled hundreds of years before Mohammed set up shop, then it doesn’t seem likely that they cooked up his murderous manifesto anyway ?
The ancient history of religion is irrelevant to it’s followers today – other than for providing a series of laughable justifications for aggression and conquest – and discussing it’s convoluted and re-invented/re-imagined origins will do zip to dissuade a hate-propelled half-wit from mowing down walkers in Westminster or opening fire in Fresno.
Monty says
Mohamed hijacked aspects of Judaism to suit his own foul ambitions. God actually warned His people that this would happen. He said that Ishmael would be a great nation and a thorn in Israel’s side. Esau was Isaac’s rejected son and he became friendly with Ishmael. The trouble began almost immediately with Esau being a real troublemaker to his parents.
mortimer says
The title of the book “Abrahamic Religions: On the Uses and Abuses of History” by Aaron Hughes speaks for itself. The term “Abrahamic religions” is a loaded and it turns out a BOGUS TERM meant to reassure everyone.
In fact, (as Prof. Hughes and the Rev. Mark Durie have pointed out), the term “Abrahamic religions” is actually a form of SUBMISSION TO ISLAM invented by a Palestinian priest who wanted to curry favor with local Muslims. The term is rubbish as far as history and theology are concerned.
The three faiths actually have three DIFFERENT VERSIONS of Abraham and the versions are somewhat irreconcilable. For instance, Judaism and Christianity disagree that Abraham was a MUSLIM as the Koran and hadiths insist. The Muslim version is seen to be (as with many other things in the Koran) to be a FABRICATION meant to validate Mohammed’s false prophecy.
The term should not be used by anyone who is knowledgeable. Read Hughes and Durie to find out why you should never say “Abrahamic religions”.
john spielman says
yes and there is NO evidence of any ancient historical narrative in Arabia that MONOTHEISM was practiced by any of Ishmael’s descendants- in fact the opposite is true the Arabs were polytheists at the time of muhammed’ so islam ‘s claim to be an “Abrahamic religion ‘ is FALSE as is most of islam’s claims because muhammed pbuh* was a demon possessed LIAR! and mass murderer thief rapist and pedophile pervert!
* pbuh- PERPETUAL; BANISHMENT UNTO HELL!
mortimer says
Schloss lives in a separate dream world. The “bigotry, ignorance and intolerance” she speaks of is coming from the JIHADISTS and their MULLAHS who instruct them in JEW HATRED and CHRISTIAN HATRED so evident recently.
Schloss is WILFULLY, CULPABLY NEGLIGENT because she has not mastered the JIHAD DOCTRINE, the TAQIYYA DOCTRINE, the KAFIR DOCTRINE or the MISOGYNY DOCTRINE of Islam.
Rabbi Schloss, WHAT IS IT THAT A SUPREMACIST WANTS?
carol says
Schloss is a schlep. For a clever Jewish rabbi to stand looking cheerfully supportive of a misleadingly-presented and thus palatable Islam is a PR coup and her new pals must be laughing quietly up their sleeves.
A fine, informative article by Hugh Fitzgerald. When you hear someone like the Pope speak of “the three great Abrahamic religions” you”re aghast and just KNOW he”s discredited Catholicism. Thanks to this article I’ll now be able to cut and paste a very full and authoritative reply to Muslim apologists and trolls.
Custos Custodum says
Nothing in the quoted article indicates that Deborah Schloss is actually clever, Jewish or indeed a rabbi.
Before mental hospitals released their inmates onto American streets, there were numerous inmates who believed themselves to be the pope, Napoleon, rabbits, rabbis etc.
Now the inmates have been released into the where they sometimes sometimes form like-minded communities enabling each others’ delusions.
However, fervently believing oneself to be a woman rabbit (or a woman rabbi) does not actually make one a rabbit (or a rabbi).
Wellington says
Rabbi Deborah Schloss——-yet another in a very long line of useful idiots. And I’m certain that pointing out to her what the Koran has to say about Jews in such Suras as 2, 5, 7 and 98 would have no effect. She would come up with some excuse or another why what these Suras say doesn’t at all indicate what they really mean and oh, btw, why not enjoy more food while we’re at it and let’s not forget to set a date for the next interfaith get-together with Muzzies.
Civilization is not preserved by the Schlosses of the world. No it is not. Those who preserve civilization are the anti-Schlosses of the world.
Be assured that Rabbi Schloss won’t get any of this. Not even a little. Eternally clueless. To the grave, which might come sooner rather than later were she to say and do what she has in a Muslim nation. She won’t get this either. I strongly suspect she doesn’t get much at all.
Custos Custodum says
Do you mean Rabbi Schloss or “Rabbi” Schloss?
Custos Custodum says
“Cultural Marxist” hacks would say that Deborah Schloss “identifies” as Jewish, as a woman, and as a rabbi.
jewdog says
It’s important to point out as Hugh does, as a starting point, that the Muslim Abraham is not like the Jewish or Christian one. The next step is to show how Muslims are far more often among the persecutors than the persecuted, as Hugh also does, again a key difference with Jews or Levantine Christians. Maybe then some myopic people will stop seeing themselves in Muslims, and start seeing Muslims in Muslims, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
gravenimage says
Very true–none of the Jewish prophets are the same in Islam.
Kepha says
I understand that in yiddish there is a saying :
בעסער אַ באָרד אָן אַ רבי ווי אַ רבי אָן אַ באָרד , or beser a bordt on a rav vi a rav on a bordt, or, better a beard without a rabbi than a rabbi without a beard. It seems that the Jews have the same problems with female clergy that Christians have–the female clergy just can’t imagine that anyone they’d share a cup of coffee with might actually be trouble.
Among Christians, female clergy are an innovation of rather fanatical 17th century groups (the sorts whom Puritans used to put in pillories or whip out of town at the cart’s tail), and then the “dreams and visions” sorts (never mind the Scriptures) of the 19th and 20th centuries, and finally the theological liberals who just can’t wait to say “me, too!” to the cultured despisers. It’s also interesting how a female Episcopalian bishopette [?] opened Washington Cathedral to Islamic prayers; and how so many are in the forefront of a kind of truth-be-da–ed ecumenicism; and how United Presbyterian Church in the USA preacherettes who engage in gioddess worship are also ones who see far more evil in Christian fundamentalists (seemingly defined as anyone who knows that the book of Job is in the Old rather than the New Testament) than in an Islam that would like to stone them.
Groaning,
Uncle Kepha
RonaldB says
Hi Kepha,
Great, great quote.
Apropos to your observation that female clergy are not only a recent innovation, but a blight on a rational approach to anything, here is a list of 70 Texas rabbis writing the Texas governor to support the mass importation of (Muslim) refugehttps://www.hias.org/blog/texas-rabbis-write-support-welcoming-refugeeses. Take a gander, and see what proportion are female.
Deluded Texas rabbis supporting the importation of Muslims who will kill them
Note I said female clergy and not females. Although females as a group would rather be at home or working at a more leisurely pace than men, there are many, many females breathtakingly effective and competent, especially in the movement to keep the US as a Western, liberal society. But, female clergy seems to self-select for formidable termagants uniformly far-left.
Interestingly, as recently as 2012, Rabbi Schloss publicly supported the right of Israel to take armed action against Hama in self-defense. Where she is now after breaking bread with her Muslim friends is anyone’s guess.
RonaldB says
Crap. My cut and paste got mixed up. Ignore the link, please.
Guest says
OT Explosive article by AfD member Dr. Nicolaus Fest: http://nicolaus-fest.de/mut-zur-intoleranz-islam-und-grundgesetz/ Islam breaks the The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany and should be banned.
This man is trained in law and uses absolute logic. Please read this article (google translate for now) and if someone has time to make a proper translation, jihadwatch should give it a page for people to discuss.
no_one says
It is sad that 21st century people have to suffer because of some 7th century lazy, illiterate thug. He probably heard something from the Torah and some of the heretical gospels, combined them and made up a religion of his own. Initially I though he was mentally ill if he was talking to “angels”, before that I thought he talked to devils. Now I think he lied about talking to any supernatural being. The thug just convinced people he did, mainly by the sward. Islam is no Abrahamic religion. It is the compilation, fantasies and wishes of a nasty and dirty 7th century thug. And monsters kill in his name.
no_one says
Sorry for the bad English. Still relaxing after long Easter services and parties.
gravenimage says
Your English is fine, no_one. Good post.
Manny says
Mohammed lied. He hodge-podged a mixture of Judaism, Christianity, and local Arabic indigenous cultures to form what he thought would be a political unity. He obviously was a political genius, but he was no prophet. It was all too convenient. Early Christians were persecuted and martyred. Early Muslims perscuted and killed to form a state. There was no political reason to formulate Christianity. But there was a political reason to formulate Islam. Mohammed is a liar.
Jim says
“no-one”, I believe you are someone special 🙂 I think you got it just right!
gravenimage says
Hugh Fitzgerald: Rabbi Schloss, Texas Taqiyya, and A Shabbat That’s Fairly Shalom
…………………
Suicidal dhimmitude.
somehistory says
One of the last times she will grin if those with whom she *communed* has anything to say about it. She won’t be grinning when her throat is cut and her blood makes the murderer shout with demonic glee.
She is an idiot. And moslims never turn down an opportunity to befoul and claim the place of worship of non moslims.
And Christians recognize Abraham for his faith in Jehovah and for the promises our God made to the man about “all nations blessing themselves because (Abraham) listened” to God’s Voice.
Jim says
I listened recently to an hour and forty something minutes of Avi Lipkom speaking on a You Tube video. I believe he has it right. He says all these ‘friendly’ groups of muslims all over America and Canada are only sleeper cells, that will be given their orders when war breaks out to kill all Jews and Christians. Right now they are just compiling the list! This is a holy war-the holy war!
somehistory says
I agree. All of them know all of the others and each group has its marching orders to implement at the word go.
Jeanette says
Unfortunately, we also got Arabs (and thus, Muslims) from Abraham.
Wish he had kept it in his pants.
Aloha Akbar says
Good point. But Satan would have found another way to grow his favourite false religion
Oren Elbaz says
Reading about these “interfaith meetings” makes me sick to my stomach.
We all know why these meetings are necessary in the first place – because one faith simply can’t live in peace with the others. And yet we all agree to pretend this not the case, and that everything is hunky dory. One party shows up in order to do some good old virtue signaling, while the other in fact wants to convert the first to its own religion. Nothing is sincere, and so no progress towards peace can ever be made.
Jeanette says
Insistent ignorance.
ploome says
excellent article…..did you send copy to the ‘rabbi’?
Benedict says
“And once the Muslim community is larger, and feels more secure, then its members can go about their task of aggressively attempting to convert others; the time is not yet ripe; their numbers are still too low.” –
A baby python won’t take on apes and pigs if it cannot coil itself around the necks of these symbolic animals and swallow them. In the meantime the charming cutie conducts interfaith dialogues over dishes – served as hors d’oeuvres to the real meal – asking its favorite question: does the Qur’an really say? It is just the nature of a python and it can’t be reformed out of its patterned skin, it can only shed it.
Ver Auger says
I am a scientist who has little interest in theology per se, but I am heartened when members of different faiths can socialize and dine together peacefully, assuming that no fistfights or gunfire broke out in the Temple’s parking lot after the dinner. I would rather they had been advancing science instead of religion, but I will settle for peace on earth and good will. God bless America, if there is a God. If not, then God bless us even more.
Jeanette says
Right.
But the violence will break out later, just as it has for 1,400 years.
Playing footsies won’t help anyone but the Muslims.
carol says
Yes, it’s buying time for infiltrators. Only the delusional or the evil or the frightened and coerced would follow such a creed.
Pong says
Scientists usually have deeper views even obout matters outside their profession. Bill Warner is a scientist and his background in science helps him to understand islam. Your wishful thinking certainly has very little to suspect a scientific background. Reminds me of ex- president Jimmie Carter, who called himself a nuclear physicist.
RonaldB says
Your approach is not very scientific.
Muslim and Jew, Muslim and Christian, Jew and Christian, all have completely contradictory theologies. It makes no sense for them to meet under an interfaith auspice. Interfaith is by its philosophy a commitment to find commonalities between different religions, and to water down the differences. You can meet a Muslim as a friend, as a debate opponent, or as a person who will teach you Islam, but it makes no sense at all to meet a Muslim as a person who will share religious beliefs with you.
A Christian (or anyone else) having an interfaith meeting with a Muslim is exactly like an evolutionary biologist having a science conference with a creationist. You can respect the creationist as a person and befriend him, but you do not share science with him.
Aloha Akbar says
Excellent analogy RonaldB.
1 Cor 10:21 “You cannot be drinking the cup of Jehovah and the cup of demons; you cannot be partaking of the table of Jehovah and the table of demons.”
Linda Cohen says
To me “Rabbi” Schloss is a lost soul and ignorant and not a Rabbi in the true meaning of that word. Reform Judaism is a deviation. A Rabbi by definition is: “a Jewish scholar or teacher, especially one who studies or teaches Jewish law or a person appointed as a Jewish religious leader. She is a leader of a cult. This is not new in Judaism. It is amazing we have survived. Shabbtai Tzvi is another sad example.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabbatai_Zevi
Ver Auger says
Orthodox Jews would not recognize a female rabbi any more than orthodox Muslims would recognize a female imam or orthodox Christians would recognize a female bishop. That is the ancient norm in all societies, with the exception of a few polytheistic cults. Still, why not let the old gal have her fun, it’s a big country. Are there any historical examples of openly female great rabbis?
I will take this opportunity to proselytize for science, where women are considered equal, especially if they happen to have brilliant male husbands (like Marie Curie did) or mentors (like Rosalyn Yallow did) not that they didn’t deserve the Nobels they won. Of course, a dead man cannot win a Nobel, and their work had to be recognized……
Ver Auger says
Robert, please fix your computer, or let me fix it! It is accusing me of duplicate posting, a serious academic misdemeanor.
I am a scientist who has little interest in theology per se, but I am heartened when members of different faiths can socialize and dine together peacefully, assuming that no fistfights or gunfire broke out in the Temple’s parking lot after the dinner. I would rather they had been advancing science instead of religion, but I will settle for peace on earth and good will.
God bless America, if there is a God. If not, then God bless us even more.
This is not a duplicate comment, darn it to heck!
More Ham Ed says
How many people born before the year 1900 are alive today on planet Earth?
Death is bigger than science.
Death is a larger issue than “fistfights.”
Death is a larger issue than guns.
Death is a larger subject than “peace on earth.”
Death is a bigger topic than “good will.”
“I am a scientist who has little interest in…”
Are you interested in the fact that you’re NOT GOING TO EXIST one day soon?
Ver Auger says
I agree with you that death is scary, and contemplating my own demise is worrisome. For that reason, I support efforts to limit the ingress of categories of foreigners who have a track record of killing people here with high probability. That is common sense, and it is comforting when politicians follow common sense measures. There is no religion I have found which provides much comfort in the death department. Religions contradict the known facts of cosmology, continental drift, animal and human evolution and biology and almost every other fact established at the cost of great personal sacrifice by the brave humans who have devoted their lives to science, who have done far more to advance the human race in all aspects than any religion ever has. Of course, religions can be studied with regard to their deleterious effects, but to me that exercise is only productive insofar as it yields clues to increase one’s personal safety in an environment which includes violent acts by religious psychotics.
david busnick says
Ham Ed; I don’t agree with your statement “Are you interested in the fact that you’re NOT GOING TO EXIST one day soon?” Firstly it isn’t factual that a person will not exist one day soon. Perhaps you wont exist in this dimension on this planet, but because your are an eternal soul you will exist in another dimension, either a place of torment or a place of peace and tranquillity, joy and ecstasy. You may try and trump what I say by bragging that your a scientist, big deal I know the one that created science!!
RonaldB says
I need for god to exist. Therefore god exists.
Phil Copson says
Exactly – as the saying goes: “God made Man in his image – and Man returned the compliment….”
More Ham Ed says
Hard to enjoy an event like that if there’s no ham.
Ver Auger says
Right. I also go to interfaith dinners to scarf up the ham not eaten by the Abrahamic attendees.
Manny says
I completely agree that Islam being an Abrahamic religion is a forced notion, and frankly nonsense. Judaism obviously is an Abrahamic religion, a priori. Christianity clearly evolved out of Judaism, so it is evident it is an Abrahamic religion. But how in the world is Islam an Abrahamic religion? By my calculation the time span between Abraham’s birth (estimated 2054 BC) to the year of Islam’s creation (fabrication is more accurate), 622 AD, is 2,840 years. Almost three millennium! You can’t even conceptualize such a time span. It’s like saying we are a Druidic religion because 3000 years ago we were Celts. And that’s less of a stretch than Muslims claiming they are Abrahamic. There is no continuity. It is myth, legend, garbage that there is a link between Islam and Abraham.
somehistory says
moslims know they have no legitimate claim to anything good or to anyone good, but they are all liars. So they lie and say they came from Abraham, and have all of the Bible’s prophets as their own.
Many people lie to advance their personal accomplishments beyond what they have really achieved or can hope to achieve. The nobody of the desert, lied and lied and lied again in order to advance himself in the eyes of all the people around him, and his followers continue to lie about him and about his lies and ties to satan the devil.
Knowing the importance of Abraham to Jews and Christians, it was a liar’s natural to claim ownership of Abraham and his son and future descendants.
dumbledoresarmy says
“Knowing the importance of Abraham to Jews and Christians, it was a liar’s natural to claim ownership of Abraham and his son and future descendants.”
Yes.
That’s the way *I* see it.
The Ummah comes up to the Jews and the Christians, with a fake smile, claiming kin, *exactly* as a dangerous conman who turns up to your door and pretends to be your long-lost cousin… in order to get his foot inside your door.
Kasey says
When will the World wake up to the fact that Islam is all about deception.
But then again, isn’t that what religion is all about anyway?
The avoidance of reality by suggesting that somewhere out there in space, from the beginning of eternity, a divine entity created everything, rather than it all being the result of the summation of natural forces. The ancients had no knowledge of real science back then and based their conclusions on supposition, superstition, dreams and myths
Noel says
The remit of science is to observe, measure and form theories regarding the mechanism. Then other scientists can try to disprove the theories. If they can’t then the theory may be true. Slowly but surely we understand more of the workings of the universe.
Science cannot explain Why, only How. Science reveals the beautiful and complex design of the universe, but you supercilious atheistic science worshippers deny the possibility of a designer.
This site is about warning each other about the danger and falsehood of islam. There are other sites out there for preaching atheism to those who want to listen.
Thank you for your time.
RonaldB says
Haha.
I agree with most of what you said, except that you got in a few licks against atheism at the same time you protested this is not a site to debate atheism versus belief.
But, wasn’t it Emerson who said consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds?
rbla says
“get to know Muslims better”
In the immortal words of Ebenezer Scrooge – “I wish the pleasure had been indefinitely postponed”.
Phil Copson says
Very apt – and so far as film adaptations are concerned, go with the Alastair Sim version….
Franklin P. Uroda says
I, a Roman Catholic, also have forbiddings about my Church’s declaration, in the Catholic Catechism, that there is some sort of commonality among Jews, Muslims and Catholics because of our Abrahamic roots. The Catechism was written decades ago, so perhaps the description or the Church’s relation to Islam has been re-evaluated.
Carl Goldberg says
One more useful idiot rabbi in the service of Islam!
Excellent article!!!
Smart guy says
To be a religion approved by God you have to have supernatural miracles that prove that God is on your side.
Only orthodox Christians have the miracle of the “Holy Fire” The Roman Catholic Church does not have such a miracle. They broke away from the original Church which is the Orthodox about 1,000 years ago..
Moslems and Jews do not have the miracle of the “Holy Fire”
Jesus said .”a sin against the Holy Spirit cannot be forgiven”
The Arc of the Covenant is in Ethiopia which was taken there by the Queen of Sheba during the reign of King Solomon. It is now in the possession of the Orthodox Christian church.
Any unauthorized attempt to move it will be met by the death of such unauthorized people.
Milton says
Not everyone claiming to represent Jews or Judaism actually does.
In orthodox, observant, Torah Judaism (Jews who keep or try to correctly keep/observe/practice as many of the 613 Mitzvoth as possible) female rabbi’s are not permitted. It is always in the reform, conservative and liberal ‘Judaism’ movements that female rabbi’s are found. So we can be confident that many of her views and practices are not aligned with those of the Torah Law. These new versions of Judaism are not Torah Judaism, but inventions of the last 100-150 years at most, designed to allow Jews to be more acceptable to and then vanish into wider society via intermingling, intermarriage and of course interfaith. There seems to be far less confusion amongst the orthodox/Torah/Observant communities regarding the history, qualities and aims of Islam and its practitioners.