Death to Apostates?
Iftokhara, from the London School of Islamics (do check out some of the postings there, by the way – it’s quite an eye-opener), commented on the preceding post. Here’s my reply:
Hello iftikhara.
A poll of young British Muslims found that 36% thought that any Muslim who leaves the faith for another should be “punished by death” [I assume they think the same fate should apply to those who become atheists].
Do you share that view?
If, like me, you find it abhorrent, doesn’t it concern you that schools – Muslim and non-Muslim – are not getting across the message that what an individual believes is up to them – every child should realize that religious belief or non-belief is their free choice?
If, on the other hand, you agree with those 36%, well, I wouldn’t want you anywhere near a classroom.
Be interested to know where you stand on this, iftikhara.
There is something inordinately perverse about a religion that finds it necessary to condemn people to death in order to protect its beliefs.Regards, Paul.
It is not “a religion”; it is people who are so psychologically insecure and immature that they cannot bear to live with the tension of being disagreed with. It is a characteristically fascist mentality.
I would have to agree Anticant: ‘it is not “a religion”. It’s about power and politics and maintaining control over large populations of people. Is that a definition of fascism?Regards, Paul
Just to add to my last comment: I don’t think that all religion is political. As I said in a much earlier post, it is when religion is conflated with politics that it is most dangerous and destructive.I’ve just started reading ‘The Islamist’ by Ed Husain, which seems particularly relevant to this topic. I might comment on it at a later date.Regards, Paul.
sorry to nitpick but many catholics think that sex before marraige is wrong – ironically it statistically makes no difference to their behaviour…what someone says it not what someone does – a group of philosophers reading this “finding” might be very scared – noble souls who have clearsightedly fused their intellect to their will- they could be as outraged as they are insightful :)but is this not a bit like being scared of cats because you have just watched tom and jerry…shoulds dont neccesarily make dos – I would be more interested in how many muslims in this country were killing apostastes not in the apparent internal inconsistencies of contemporary muslim thought.
Paul:Please point to just one religion, past or present, which is not directly or indirectly political in the sense of seeking to influence social behaviour.
This just in from iftikhara;*sound of crickets*;-)
Re: psiloiordinary’s comment:hahahahahahaha
Hello AnticantYou are talking about institutionalised religion, which is political in every sense.A couple of times during discussions I’ve referenced an article by Helen Philips in New Scientist (1 Sep.07) where she talks about ‘intrinsic’ and ‘extrinsic’ religion. I would argue that intrinsic religion and extrinsic religion are not compatible in some respects, even contradictory. Intrinsic religion is very personal where extrinsic religion is very public to make just one distinction. Most people don’t make any distinction, but I do. One of the major distinctions is to do with tolerance. Extrinsic religion is more likely to adopt an ingroup-outgroup mentality, which is the major cause of conflict, whether religion-based or not.Regards, Paul.
Paul:I am quite aware that there many different paths to greater personal awareness and inner spiritual growth. Many of these do not involve belief in the ‘supernatural’ or in a divine being.What I am saying is that those who do believe in these dubious concepts, whether members of an institutionalised church or not, inevitably seek to remould society more in the image of their faith and are, to that extent, political.I agree with Andre Gide, who said: “The deeper the soul plunges into religious devotion, the more it loses all sense of reality, all need, all desire, all love for reality…I am amazed at the coils of falsehood in which devout persons take delight.”
Hi Anticant,I respect your point of view, but I don’t necessarily agree with it.I’m about half way through reading The Islamist by Ed Husain, which is an eye-opening and terrifying book in many respects, but in the first 3 chapters he clearly shows the distinction between religion as a ‘faith’ and religion as a political ideologue.I don’t agree that all religions want to ‘remould society’, though I agree it happens.I grew up in a society that was very religiously politicised and then it all evaporated, and people became very cynical about religion in general. Religion is an easily accessible means to politicise people, but it doesn’t mean that religion axiomatically equates to politics.I can empathise with Gide’s comment – I’ve both witnessed it and experienced it – but there is something called perspective, which makes all the difference.Regards, Paul.
It’s a pity that Iftokhara won’t rejoin the debate. I think it’s still possible we have misunderstood Islam.I’m not religious. But of all the religions, Islam has – for me – a unique problem. The religion’s founder, Muhammad, is considered “al-Insan al-Kamil” (the perfect human). Islamic accounts of his life, such as that of Ibn Ishaq, portray him as – how can I put this nicely – a violent slave-owning pirate. There are descriptions of him committing acts which would today have him charged in the Hague for War Crimes, and in most countries, put on the Sex Offender’s Register.Almost all religions have bred fanatics who have done terrible things. I don’t know that Muslims have any worse record than followers of other faiths in this respect. But it is a big problem if the very founder of the religion himself is on record committing violent acts. Muhammad is unusual in having a high personal body count. Most founders of religions have a zero personal body count – eg Jesus, Buddha, Guru Nanak, L. Ron Hubbard & Sai Baba. According to Christian sources, Jesus killed no-one, and even refused to use instrumental violence where it might have been effective. There is one example of Jesus saying he came “to bring a sword”, which some interpret as permitting violence. But these are purely words, unsupported by any violent actions. So Christians who want to can choose to interpret the sword reference purely metaphorically. Christian sects such as the Quakers have embraced pacifism based on Jesus’ own example.Consider the case of Las Casas. Witnessing the genocidal cruelty of his fellow Christian Conquistadors in the Americas, Las Casas petitioned the Spanish King to halt the slaughter. He based his case on the personal example of Jesus.Unfortunately, such an example is not available to a Muslim who feels similarly repelled by the violence of fellow Muslims. Tamerlane – who may have killed as many as 17 million people during his conquests – wrote in his memoirs detailed accounts of his massacres of Hindus. These make clear his belief that he was simply copying the example of Muhammad.I think Muslim reformers can argue their way round the violent passages in the Qu’ran. Inverting the meaning of sacred texts has been done effectively many times by many religions. But the violent personal example of Islam’s founder, that’s much, much harder to deal with.
Paul says “there is something called perspective”. Thanks for telling me!My perspective is that there is NO ‘supernatural’, NO god or gods, and therefore that all religious belief is based on a fiction.If that is true, what use is religion in a modern world which desperately needs sane, rational, reality-based thinking to solve its problems?
Hello Anticant.I’m not anti-religion per se. I guess that’s where I differ to most of the people who contribute to this site.Regards, Paul.
Paul: I’m not anti-fairy tales as such – there are lots of insights to be gained from such tales as “Cinderella” and “Little Red Riding Hood” [such as that it’s dangerous for wolves to walk through the forest alone], but no-one claims they are true, or organises their life around them. What I am against is the delusion that fiction is fact, and that there is a Great Big Supernatural Someone in the sky who is interested in, and communicates with, human beings.
And what I am vehemently against is the behaviour of the great majority of people who believe religion – THEIR religion, of course! – is true.They mess up the world far more than most unbelievers do.
Anticant,I’m not entirely in disagreement with you, but I don’t put all religion or religious belief into the same box.Religion or God or whatever you want to call it is a personal subjective experience that some people have and some don’t. It doesn’t make one group of people superior or better than another. I don’t think atheists should become theists or theists atheists – I guess that’s where I’m different.Regards, Paul.
Paul:It depends whether you are using the word “God” in the abstract metaphorical sense of personal spiritual enlightenment, or whether you believe that a ‘supernatural’ God actually exists who has various attributes which we can argue about endlessly – created the universe, cares about humanity. gave us free will, sent his only Son into the world to be crucified for our sins etc. etc.I would accept the former use, which you evidently favour, were it not that the term ‘God’ is historically inextricably embedded in the latter concept of an actually existing all-powerful supernatural Being.Despite all the billions of words poured out down the centuries by believers, no-one has ever provided convincing evidence that God in the latter sense actually exists outside their own minds and fantasies.I doubt very much whether they will succeed in doing so even on Stephen’s hospitable and admirably patient blog!
Hi Anticant,I appreciate the clarification. I would describe ‘God’ as a sense of something beyond the self, and I think people, including myself, project their own ideals onto it. So it becomes a projection of the ‘ideal self’ either intentionally or unintentionally. For others, though, I think it’s a sense of connection to everything else, which is how Karen Armstrong describes it, if I interpret her correctly. That’s the best explanation I can provide. I hope that clarifies my position.Speaking of Karen Armstrong, she makes a distinction between those who have an egocentric view of religion and those whose view is egoless, and I think that’s an important distinction.Regards, Paul.
Paul:Not to accept there is something beyond the self [how do you define that, btw? I take it to mean each individual’s awareness of our own existence] is solipsism. You doubtless know the story Bertrand Russell tells of a lady writing to him to say she was a solipsist and was surprised there weren’t more of them, to which Russell replied: “Dear madam, I am surprised at your surprise”.I agree that God, or gods, are a projection of some people’s aspirations towards perfection; and while I don’t share Karen Armstrong’s pro-religious slant in her often interesting writings, the distinction which she draws between religious egocentrists and those – usually mystics of various faiths – who experience their inner quest as the abandonment of the ego is an important one.My point is that the latter type of spiritual experience and growth need not necessarily involve belief in the ‘supernatural’ and – in the case of Buddhism, for instance – does not. I myself practice meditation along non-supernatural lines.
Hi Anticant,I have no dispute with your view of spirituality. I have taken a great interest in Buddhism over many years, and I know Buddhists who are theistic and some who are not. On the subject of solipsism (yes, I’ve heard that anecdote attributed to Russell), it occurs in dreams, which is how one determines dreams from reality. Also in a story if one wants to get technical. Okay, I didn’t get you at first. It’s a paradoxical sense of something inside your mind that feels like it’s external, but I can’t take offense if people tell me I’m delusional because I can’t explain it.Maybe it’s a bad choice of words: ‘sense of something beyond the self’ – but I do know it’s purely subjective. The only scientific evidence that I know of is referenced by Helen Philips in the New Scientist article I keep referring to. To quote: ‘Brain-imaging experiments by Andrew Newberg at the University of Pennsylvania indicate that people in religious or meditative states show a transient decrease in brain activity in regions representing our map of the body and our sense of self. Religious feelings do seem to be quite literally selfless.’I tell everyone that I don’t expect anyone to believe what I believe, because what one believes should be based on one’s experience and everyone’s experience is unique. I have a sense of God as being something beyond me, and, for me, it’s feminine, following an experience I had in a Buddhist temple (on the only occasion I visited a Buddhist temple) facing a representation of Quan-Yin, the Goddess of Mercy. There, I don’t tell many people that, especially atheists.Now, it could be a projection, or it could be a concept in my mind or it could be something else – it’s not something I get too stressed about, believe it or not.Regards, Paul.
I think it only fair to assume IftikharA is giving previous comments some considerable thought. Followers of Islam are nothing if not thorough. For example, this is an extract from a forum of which I think IftikharA is a member (assuming it’s the same person). If this is the depth of thought put into a quick trim you may be waiting some time for a response to your questions.What does Islam say about keeping the beard and its length?. . . My question is not regarding the obligation to grow the beard and trim the mustache. This is clear from the statements of the Prophet (may Allah bless him and give him peace), the statements of the great Imams, and the practice of the early Muslims and righteous people up until the present day. My question is regarding the actual length of the beard, in which the beard must be grown. What did the great early Imams say regarding this specific matter? What is the position of the four madhhabs on this specific matter?….Muhammad ibn Hasan al-Shaybani reports in Kitab al-athar, from Imam Abu Hanifa, that “the sunna concerning it [the beard] is the handful, and consists in a man grasping his beard with his hand, and whatever exceeds that, he cuts” (ibid, 5.261). A Hanafi sheikh whom my wife and I study with, has told us (without mentioning a reference) that there is disagreement as to where this “handful” should begin from, some holding that one puts the index finger of it just below the lower lip, while according to others, one puts it below the bottom of the chin. The former will obviously result in a much shorter “handful.” The Shafi’i scholar Imam Nawawi in his commentary on Sahih Muslim says of the above hadith: As for trimming the mustache, it is also a sunna. It is praiseworthy to begin from the right side . . . . see hereMay Allah bless us and give us patience.