Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site brl-tgr.ARPA Path: utzoo!lsuc!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!qantel!lll-crg!seismo!brl-tgr!matt From: matt@brl-tgr.ARPA (Matthew Rosenblatt ) Newsgroups: net.politics,net.religion Subject: Re: ISLAMIC TOLERANCE Message-ID: <1607@brl-tgr.ARPA> Date: Wed, 15-Jan-86 09:58:29 EST Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.1607 Posted: Wed Jan 15 09:58:29 1986 Date-Received: Sun, 19-Jan-86 20:59:45 EST References: <2360@sdcc6.UUCP> Organization: Ballistic Research Lab Lines: 160 Xref: lsuc net.politics:2943 net.religion:629 > I want to come to Matt Rosenblatt's interesting, and at first > troubling comments regarding The Qur'an's position vis-a-vis > non-muslims. After reading the verses he quotes, I immediately > felt there was something wrong, because they ( the quotes ) > did not fit in my view and knowledge of The Qur'an. . . . > . . . So I went back to my copy > of The Qur'an ( original Arabic version ) , and to my English > translation of it. And yes, some of his quotes were outrageously > wrong. [NIDHAL GUESSOUM] Maybe they WERE wrong. The translation I used was that of N. J. Dawood (Penguin Books, first published in 1956). The note on the translator says: "N. J. Dawood has also translated The Thousand and One Nights and Aladdin and Other Tales for the Penguin Classics. Born in Baghdad,he came to England as an Iraq State Scholar in 1945 and graduated from London University. He is a director of Contemporary Translations Ltd and managing director of The Arabic Advertising and Publishing Company Ltd, London. He has edited and abridged The Muqaddimah of Ibn Khaldun, translated numerous technical works into Arabic, and contributed to specialized English-Arabic dictionaries. He has retold for children a comprehensive selection of tales from The Arabian Nights, which will be published shortly in an illustrated edition." A pretty sharp guy, but nowhere does it say he is a devout Muslim. So I would expect devout Muslims to look on his translation the way Orthodox Jews look on some of the newer translations of the Bible made by Reform Jews who don't really believe in the factuality of Biblical accounts. The point I want to make clear is that it is NOT the "Qur'an according to Matt Rosenblatt," but the Qur'an according to N. J. Dawood, that I quoted. > 2) " If the people of The Book accept the true faith and keep > from evil, We will pardon them their sins and admit them to the > gardens of delight." so far so good... But then : > "If they observe the Torah and the Gospel and what IS (??) revealed > to them from Allah, they shall be given abundance from above and > from beneath" Qur'an according to Matt.. > In fact, the world IS should be WAS (!!!), refering to ..The Bible.. > Then it makes sense...The Qur'an makes it clear in several verses > ( including this one ) that Jews and Christians are allowed to keep > their faith and tradition. As long as they do follow it, they will > enter Paradise... [N. GUESSOUM] Is it clear that Jews can get away with observing only the Torah and not the Gospel, even if "They denied the truth and uttered a monstrous falsehood against Mary. They declared: 'We have put to death the Messiah Jesus the son of Mary, the apostle of Allah.' They did not kill him, nor did they crucify him, but they thought they did." (Qur'an, Chapter 4, "Women") Especially since the Jews deny the Divine authority of the Qur'an itself, and believe that the Prophet (Allah's blessing and peace upon him and his Companions) made it up himself -- how is such an unbeliever to enter Paradise? Doesn't a Jew or Christian at least have to admit that the Qur'an is from Allah? What does the Qur'an mean, "accept the true faith," if not "accept the validity of Islam"? > 3) Regarding the Prophet's actions, if the only problem Matt has > is regarding the punishment of Beni-Qurayda, good. Because the > reason for that one is simple : the Jews of Medina betrayed the > mutual defense pact they had signed with Muhammad by allowing his > enemies to infiltrate thru the Jewish part of Medina during the > battle of "Al-Ahzab" ( the tribes ),when a coalition of Arabian > tribes came to Medina to try to destroy the Islamic state. > Afterwards, Muhammad decided to punish the Jewish community of > Qurayda by burning some of their palm trees ( economic sanctions ) > and executed only about a dozen of them. [N. GUESSOUM] Decided WHAT??? To punish the Jewish community of Qurayda for something the Jews of Medina did? Good thing Matt Rosenblatt does not attempt to judge the Prophet's actions (Allah's blessing and peace upon him and his Companions) by the "Enlightenment" standards employed by most people on this net. > ( I have no idea where you > got the figure of 800. Did you think he threw an atomic bomb on them > or something ?) [N. GUESSOUM] The figure of 800 Jews, and the statement that they were beheaded (not nuked), comes from the Chronological Table of the Main Events in the Life of Mohammed (Allah's blessing and peace upon him & his Companions) that follows N. J. Dawood's introduction to his translation of the Qur'an. Is Mr. Guessoum sure he is talking about the same community of Jews as I am? There were the Quraysh, the Qurayza, and who knows what other Jewish outfits. Nowhere in his article does Mr. Guessoum tell us what the Shari'a is with regard to so-called "second-class citizenship" for Jews and Christians in Muslim lands. I do not write with the intention of condemning the Shari'a if, for example, it forbids intermarriage between Muslim women and non- Muslim men -- the Torah (l'havdil) forbids intermarriage between Jews and Gentiles, and has been branded "racist" by secular Israelis for doing so. If the Shari'a, based on the Qur'an, says that Jews and Christians may not be rulers and officers over Muslims in Muslim lands, only "Enlightened" Westerners would fault that -- Jewish law, as codified by Maimonides, says that non-Jews may not be rulers and officers in the Jewish land (i.e., Israel). The Qur'an, the Hadith, and the Shari'a stand on their own in the Dar al Islam. Now, if Muslims attempted to apply their law in Christendom or the Atheist USSR, they'd have a fight on their hands, and justifiably so, the same as if Jews attempted to apply Torah law to non-Jews outside the Land of Israel. By the same token, the mistake the "Enlightened" Westerners make is assuming that their liberalism has universal validity, and judging other societies, ESPECIALLY religious ones (which they really hate -- Voltaire and the other _philosophes_ detested the Church more than anything), by liberal, "Enlightenment" standards. This mistake has earned Westerners the justified resentment of, for example, the Muslim peoples. When it comes to obeying the Seven Noahide Laws that Jews believe G-d decreed for non-Jews to observe, a Muslim society passes the test, while a liberal, "Enlightened" society fails. Consider: Law Muslim attitude "Enlightened" attitude 1. Recognize G-d exists accepts rejects 2. No blasphemy against Him accepts blasphemy legal 3. No murder accepts accepts 4. No stealing accepts accepts 5. No sexual immorality (incest, adultery, accepts any sex between consenting homosexuality) adults is legal 6. No eating a limb cut from a living animal I don't know forbids cruelty to animals 7. Set up courts to punish sets up courts to punish violators of Laws 1-6, accepts violators of SOME laws; including capital punish- rejects capital punishment ment > I still have a few more clarifications to make, but this posting is > already too long. Please no cheap attacks. > > Respectfully, > > Nidhal Guessoum... In my previous posting, I had King David saying something to the Ammonites that, in reality, Jephthah said. Sorry about the misattribution, but the statement still applies: "Wilt thou not accept that which Chemosh thy god giveth thee to possess? So whomsoever the L-rd our G-d hath dispossessed from before us, them will we possess" (Judges 11:24). If Jews can't be officers in Muslim lands, that's fine, because Jews really shouldn't be living in Muslim lands in the first place, now that there's an Israel. One does not have to believe in a religion in order to have respect for it. If Islam is in some respects "intolerant" by Western standards, then let the Westerners not establish Islam in Europe and America. But Allah has seen fit to take Palestine away from the Dar al Islam and return it to the possession of the Israelites whose ancestors lost it ages ago on account of their sins. Accept the will of Allah, accept the primacy of Jewish law in the Jewish Land, and you will have no problem with religious Jews' accepting the primacy of Islam in Islamic lands, regardless of what the "Enlightened" unbelievers of the West say about "Islamic Tolerance." -- Matt Rosenblatt - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - TRUTH JUSTICE FREEDOM YIDDISHKEIT IVY THE AMERICAN WAY