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When Cultures Collide Looking for some Islamic peacemakers-- a religion of peace at war with the world? We are seeing a growing dissatisfaction with a major religion in the world whose has certain members willing to do anything for their cause. I want us to look at the facts from history and Islam’s own teachings and practices today to draw our conclusions. I have held off on writing this but time after time the same violence continues. After what happened in London I find it absolutely necessary. There is a need to confront an ideology, a religion, and a large group of people that have become consumed with an abandoned dedication to a cause that uses killing as a justifiable means for its end. This concept is incorporated within the framework of a religion that is challenged by only a few in the media. We cannot afford to disagree with them and keep silent about this any longer. We have heard the phrase “Islam is a religion of peace” repeated over and over as a mantra in the media. They continue to tell everyone that this terrorism is not of Islam. The chosen representatives of the religion of Islam have used the media as a platform for their propaganda. The question everyone needs to ask is “do there actions prove this?” Islam’s history has been one of war from its beginning. It is true, many nations have a history of battles, but there is a qualitative difference. Jihad is a necessary element in Islam. Though there are different applications, in the past it meant Islam turning aggressive on those refuse the message and the messenger. History bears this out; it shows Mohammed as a general that planned near 65 campaigns and led at least 27 invasions personally. Certainly these would be considered Jihad. As Islam began to grow, several battles with the pagan tribes ensued. Muhammad eventually won these over and unified the people mostly by persuasion with threats into Islam. Mohammed said that God (Allah) commissioned him to fight all nations until they all say “there is no God but Allah.” He also fought the Jews and the Christians. Just as it is written Sura 9:5 “Slay the idolaters wherever you find them.” Any religious person who is not a Muslim is considered an idolater by Islam's standards. In his book, “Jurisprudence in Muhammad’s Biography, Dr. Muhammad Sa’id Ramadan al-Buti states “The Holy War, as it is known in Islamic Jurisprudence, is basically an offensive war. This is the duty of Muslims in every age when the needed military power becomes available to them. This is the phase in which the meaning of Holy War has taken its final form. Thus the apostle of God said: ‘I was commanded to fight the people until they believe in God and his message ...” (p. 134, 7th edition). Invitation comes first (to embrace Islam- if they refuse the only recourse is war . When Mohammed fled Mecca to Medina, he told the Christians: “We believe in what has been sent down to us (the Quran) and sent down to you (the Bible). Our God is the same as your God” (Surah 29:46). But later in Medina, when Muhammad gathered a following and was militarily strong and the Jews and Christians rejected his claims something changed, Allah told him: “Fight people of the Book who do not accept the religion of the truth (Islam) until they pay tribute by hand, being inferior” (Surah 9:29). Anyone who rejects Islam is considered an idolater and an infidel. This is the only religion that has commands and practices harm toward unbelievers and infidels. Islam has what is called abrogation in the Quran. That what was FORMERLY SAID for peace was then replaced by another statement for war as the prior example given. Many Muslims (especially their public spokesman) know this and will quote the former statement to trick their adversaries and quell their arguments. Quite a strategy of disinformation to present a image of peace to the public. Many who are Muslim are uninformed on these matters.The Qur'an it is not chronological. In the Qur'an the earlier chapters are the later and the later are the
earlier. When one understands this they can see the
sequence of events. The change in Mohammed's “revelation” is apparent when
comparing the Meccan and the Medinan surahs. Here are more examples: In surah
73:10 God tells Mohammed “Be patient with what they say, and part from them
courteously.” While in surah 2:191 God orders him to kill his opponents “Kill
them wherever you find them, and drive them out from wherever they drove you
out...” Mohammad’s followers had 50 more wars engaging to spread the religion of Islam (which means submission to the will of Allah, not peace). Muhammad decided to use force to subdue the Meccans and all those who opposed him. He led several raids: the raid of Uhud, the greater raid of Badr, the raid of Hunain, then the raid of Tabuk. These raids resulted in several small Jewish and Christians clans submitting to Muhammad. Muhammad continued raids against the Meccans, he exterminated the Jewish clans from Al-Madina. He expelled the Jewish clan of Banu Qainuqa (Battle of the Trench. Expulsion in 627 Ad.). Attacked another Jewish clan, Banu Alnadir. Banu Quraiza, sympathized with the Meccans during the battle of Ditch, and suffered a worse fate when its women and children were enslaved and its men were slaughtered. In 628 A.D. the Jews of Khaybar were dispossessed of their lands. Al-Madina had no more Jews. In 637 AD. Muslim armies conquered Mesopotamia, and Islam became the state religion. Jerusalem was captured in 638 AD. It became a center for Muslim and Christian pilgrims. They later invaded and conquered much of Europe; as they conquered, the cultures were absorbed. Many of their countries were once colonies of European powers. They were not taken by peace as some claim. Most of these countries were Catholic under the Byzantine Empire. It was Charles Martel whose army defended and defeated the Muslims at Tours 732 AD and halted the advance of Islam into Europe; otherwise they would have taken all of Europe. If it had it not been for the use of superior military strength Europe would be an Islamic society and government today. Less than 300 years ago that the advance of Kara Mustafa's Islamic armies into the West were halted at the gates of Vienna. That date was September 11th. In Islam dates are given importance. Will Durant points out in history “During his ten years in Medina, Muhammad planned sixty-five campaigns and raids, and personally led twenty-seven… …As the triumphant Arab armies swelled with hungry or ambitious recruits, the problem arose of giving them new lands to conquer, if only to provide them with food and pay. The advance created its own momentum; each victory required another, until the Arab conquests – more rapid than the Roman, more lasting than the Mongol – summed up to the most amazing feat in military history…In 635 Damascus was taken, in 636 Antioch, in 638 Jerusalem; by 640 all Syria was in Moslem hands; by 641 Persia and Egypt were conquered. {Will Durant, Vol. IV, pg. 170, 188}. Islam has always been a warring religion that has conquered and expanded by military force and has only been stoppable by another superior military force. This is what we face today, their territorial expansion continues in our time. Out of the over a dozen conflicts throughout the world today, nearly all of them have to do with Islam. Almost every war being fought on the face of the earth is tied to Islam right now. We are now in an age of a cultural and religious conflict. Harvard's Samuel P. Huntington wrote in his book The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, “Muslims make up about one-fifth of the world's population but in the 1990s they have been far more involved in inter-group violence than the people of any other civilization. The evidence is overwhelming.” There are numerous passages in the Qu’an that coincides with and justify warfare in this expansion of Islam. There are about 100 verses that endorse the use violence. Many are not about defending oneself as claimed. A plain reading of these is apparent, what they say is what they mean. Muslims will tell you that you don’t understand, you must read Arabic to understand the Qur’an, if this is so then the majority of Muslims do not understand their own religious book because the Islamic masses do not speak Arabic. Some Suras are regulations when fighting a war some are plainly aggressive. These verses will often not mean anything to the regular Muslim until their leaders give them a purpose and a mission. They are able to assemble them on obedience to the Qur’an in this manner. This is what bin Laden did. Anti –western and anti -American statements go on every week in the Mosques, not only on foreign soil but right here in America and England. It is a known fact that Islamicists are recruiting youth in America and elsewhere to Islam, once they are converted and they can be candidates to be trained for terrorism. So there will soon be a whole new generation of merciless murderers in the name of a religion under their fundamentalist leadership. Unless Islam does something to counter these actions publicly to withstand this growing problem why would anyone want to believe they are for peace instead of war? It’s not what one does but also what one does not do that will make a difference in this escalating war. The Struggle Within and Without Islam believes in a theocracy (called umma). The word Jihad means struggle or effort for the causes of Allah. Islam teaches the world is divided into two antagonistic categories: the Dar al-Harb (“abode of war”) and Dar al-Islam (“abode of Islam” also known as 'abode of the faithful'). Dar Al Harb is those with whom they are at war with until Judgment Day, this includes all non-Muslims. Within this dualistic worldview, “peace” can only abide where Islam has total political and cultural domination. But in reality the nations that are Islamic have unrest like anywhere else. If they don’t fight their enemies they often end up fighting among themselves. The Qur’an speaks of the struggle within oneself (inner jihad), the struggle within the Islamic community (external jihad). The struggle among unbelievers is an external jihad. It is this one which can become a militant aggression against those that oppose their beliefs. Jihad is the normal state of relationship between the non-Muslim and the Muslim. It is a perpetual conflict and Jihad preceded the Crusades by five centuries. Sura 9:123 in the Quran “O you who believe! fight those of the unbelievers who are near to you” 9:52 “…Allah will send His punishment from Himself or by our hands.” Their attitude toward Dar Al Haarb depends on several factors, most having to do with their perceptions of their own strength, and ranges from relatively peaceful co-existence as minorities in some countries (currently like the USA) to attempts to overthrow and impose their way of life on all citizens in countries where they are the majority (such as in Africa-Sudan or Nigeria as we see today). The main difference is in the religious practice. Muslims do not see any separation between religion, politics and society; they are essentially united together. Wahhabism is a form of Islam that surfaced within the last 200 years. It originated in Saudi Arabia, and it is the official theology of the Gulf states. Wahhabi’s practice this extreme form of Islamic fundamentalism, an us against them mentality. Bin Laden is a Wahhabi, the Taliban practices a form of Wahhabism. This type of Islam is similar to the early Islam of Mohammed with a few differences. Bin Laden's men are not just Muslims but also what some have termed Islamists. Islam is a religion, when practiced as Islamism (a totalitarian ideology) it becomes a problem. Islamism politicizes the religion, as it gives a blueprint for establishing a theocracy. When the religion of Islam is lived out in complete literal obedience to the Qur’an it is brought to this conclusion. Many Muslims do not take many of the verses literally and form their own concepts of living from it. So it is not aggressive until a leader informs the adherents what certain verses mean, applies them in a certain way, telling them how they are supposed to live by it.
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