Is Islam evil?
rto1
"Of course it is." "Islam" means "submission". That sounds more like
Adolph H. than Thomas J.
But a quick, easy, and to the point answer won't do.
"Sophisticated" critics usually react to the word "evil" with condescension
and derision. Describing something as "evil," in their view, generally
brands one as an unenlightened throw-back to the dark ages -- or the
equivalent of a televangelist preaching hellfire and damnation. Who forgets
the outcry when President Reagan described the Soviet Union as the "Evil
Empire?" Or today, when President Bush refers to the "Axis of Evil?"
Commentators unequivocally condemn the word as an outmoded judgmental term
unfit for today's multi-cultural world. Unless, of course, one wants to use
it to describe the United States of America or Western Civilization itself.
The question, "Is America evil?" is routinely discussed not just on message
boards and in chat rooms -- the Internet equivalent of bathroom walls -- but
by tenured professors and in respected newspapers. A New York Times book
review on January 11, 2004, quotes author Lance Morrow from his book: "Evil,
An Investigation". "Americans are struggling now with the possibility that
their country may be evil -- or, to be more practical, that their country
may be doing evil in the world." Just two weeks later, the front page of
Book Review section reads: "Is America an evil empire? Seven new books seem
ready to think so."
Most Americans are shocked at the notion of an evil America . Considering
our history, the attack on our country's character is hard to fathom. Over
the last two centuries immigrants came in droves, seeking refuge from
tyranny and poverty. They found unequalled freedom and opportunity secured
by a stable democracy. During that time, totalitarian barbarity threatened
to consume the world. America played a crucial role in defeating European
and Japanese fascism in WWII. However, Europe was left in ruins and half
enslaved by Communism. In Asia, Japan was in ruins and China soon became
Communist. We then faced the Communist strain of totalitarianism; one that
would result in the deaths of 100 million people and threatened to engulf
the world. Once again, our military might was crucial. We contained
Communism until it fell of its own internal contradictions. In short,
America has saved civilization.
Given the recent worldwide attacks by Islamic terrorists, why isn't the
question "Is Islam evil?" With few exceptions ( Turkey , for example),
Islamic countries are fascist, autocratic or theocratic, where women are
subjugated and minorities persecuted. Islamic countries are rife with
poverty and have been for centuries. Polls show that in many Islamic
countries a majority of Muslims lionize the man responsible for the
atrocities of September 11th and the terrorist gangs who routinely slaughter
civilians in Israeli buses and restaurants. In Arab schools and on Arab
television, children are taught the glory of becoming suicide bombers.
Almost everywhere that Islam borders other cultures, there is violence.
The idea, then, that Islam is evil has far more plausibility than the idea
that United States is evil. But merely, raising the question, "Is Islam
evil?" provokes an instant, inevitable outcry: "Bigot!" "Racist!" "Zionist!"
Indeed, the attempt to suppress debate on this question is so intense that
few people in the mainstream will ask it.
The level of banality goes beyond the empty name-calling. Typical knee-jerk
questions are: "How can you call all Muslims evil?" "Have you ever met a
Muslim?" "Don't you think Muslims have children, too?" Notice the switch
from the religion to the demographic group. Muslims, as individuals, range
from lapsed to devout, from "in name only" to fully practicing Jihadists. As
in all religions, some individuals retain the label even if they don't
practice the religion. Indeed, knowledge of the religion varies from person
to person. It is not at all unusual to find members of a religion who don't
understand the doctrines, practice, or history of their religion. As a broad
label, "Muslim" is nothing more than a meaningless demographic term. To
judge a religion, one considers those who understand and practice the
religion. Would we judge Catholicism by someone who, following the tradition
of their parents, calls themselves Catholic but has no knowledge of the
teachings of the Church, the Pope, the Saints, and the Bible?
Why is Islam exempt from critical analysis? In Western society, there is no
shortage of critics of Christianity. Indeed, on many college campuses it is
open season on anything that has the faint odor of Western Civilization --
Christianity included -- even though Christianity, like Islam, originated in
the Middle East . One might wonder why Islam, which sees itself as a
continuation or fulfillment of Judeo-Christianity, is not subject to the
same intense criticism. Instead, multi-culturalism treats Islam as a
protected species -- an indigenous ethos inseparable from a people.
Consequently, self-appointed Politically Correct thought-police stifle
debate on Islam by shamelessly playing the race card -- even though Islam is
not a race.
We Americans are incredulous to hear the vilification of our country, our
traditions and our principles. Yet, we hesitate to publicly condemn Islam as
evil when that is far more plausible. Or even raise the question! Yet, it is
clearly on people's mind. So much so that it is often answered in a
pre-emptive manner. "Don't blame Islam for the acts of a few", we are told.
"Islam has been hijacked by militants," say our leaders. No discussion. No
one explicitly asks the question. No one dares. We must not allow ourselves
to be deterred by this intimidation. The question is both legitimate and
important: "Is Islam evil?"
Negative moral pronouncements - bad and evil - are unavoidable if we are to
take the requisite actions to avoid what is harmful to our lives and well
being. Belief systems and ideas should be judged in the similar manner.
Ideas have consequences; if they lead to inimical results they are harmful.
If, by their very nature, they are blatantly horrific in their implications,
are they not evil? Tyranny, slavery, subjugation, and irrationalism are
clear cases. However, most evil ideologies are packaged to sell - including
religions. Let's dissect Islam and ask if it is inherently evil.
How shall we address this question? To understand how a belief system, like
Islam, can be evil, we have to start by asking: what do the ideas mean in
practice? When Islam is practiced, what kind of person does one become? What
kind of society is an Islamic society? Islam has 1400 years of history to
help us answer these questions. And we should compare Islam to other
religions and philosophies. However, let us proceed with caution. Merely
listing historical atrocities by demographic group -- whether Christian,
Jews, Muslims, or secular -- tells us little. We need to provide an
attribution analysis to determine whether it was because of the religion or
despite the religion. By carefully considering the interplay between ideas
and events, we can understand what ideas mean in action.
To get to the heart of Islam, start with its founder: Muhammad. Like
Christianity, Islam's essence is tied to the nature of a central figure who
gives the religion its distinctive soul. Muhammad's professional life as a
religious leader can be divided into two, roughly equal periods. In the
first, he preached tolerance while he struggled for acceptance in Mecca. But
in the second period, after he rises to power in Medina, he became
increasingly harsh, mean-spirited and warlike.
In Medina, he inaugurated his reign of terror by assassinating two critics
who posed no physical threat: an elderly man and a poetess. Unaccustomed to
the farm life of Medina, he tried his hand at raiding caravans traveling to
and from Mecca. After several failed attempts he finally succeeded -- during
the holy month. (As usual, he conveniently had a revelation to justify this
breach of regional ethics.) Muhammad had found his calling: plunder.
The mere existence of the Jewish tribes in Medina threatened Muhammad's
authority. Muhammad packaged his religion as the completion and perfection
of the monotheistic religions: Judaism and Christianity. His converts were
Arabs; Jews refused to accept him as an authentic prophet of their religion.
In a policy of ethnic cleansing, he banished two of the three Jewish tribes
and slaughtered the third. Of the several dozen battles fought either by
Muhammad or in his behalf, only one, the Battle of the Ditch, was defensive.
Islam, however, classifies them all as defensive, virtually removing any
meaning from the word. Muhammad had perfected his technique: slaughter.
The chapters in the Koran, called "Suras", are Muhammad's "revelations" from
God. The Suras from the Medinan period reflect the corruption of Muhammad's
rule. Sura 9, one of the last revelations, contains some of the most
uncompromising doctrines of aggression and belligerence. The progression
from the early Meccan Suras to the latter Medinan Suras transforms the
nature of the religion. The Koran and the Hadith (the collection of
Muhammad's deeds and sayings, often called "the living Koran") paint a bleak
but unmistakable picture: Islam is a warrior religion of conquest and
oppression.
Compare and contrast Muhammad's life to the life of Jesus. Is Jesus a
violent warrior? His worst act of violence is overturning the tables of the
money-changers in the Temple. In fact, in one part of the Gospels he
appeared to be advocating pacifism. Although he is called "King of the
Jews," he never ruled and gave no indication of ever wanting earthly rule.
According to the followers who recorded his deeds and sayings, Jesus' career
consisted of a few years as an itinerant preacher ending with his
crucifixion. According to the Gospels, he didn't rise to power but rose to
heaven.
As a devout Jew, Jesus' holy book was the Old Testament, which does have
some harsh passages and violent episodes. But the Jesus of the Gospels is
more concerned with the spirit of the law than with the letter. (Witness his
preaching on the Sabbath.) He boiled his religious beliefs down to two
essentials: love God, and love thy neighbor. In effect, Christianity
modified the religion of the Old Testament's ever-jealous, ever-vengeful,
take-no-prisoners Yahweh and his never-ending rules and regulations (see
Leviticus and Deuteronomy) with a more benevolent and less legalistic
message. Paul solidified this transformation by exempting converts from
Jewish law.
By contrast, Islam is a more of a throwback to the harsh old days when, for
example, Moses (acting on God's orders) had a man stoned to death for
gathering wood on the Sabbath. It is true that Muhammad's early revelations
have the more tolerant and peaceful aura we associate with the New
Testament. (Interestingly, it is these early passages that are often shown
to American audiences and university students, creating a distorted picture
but one that more closely matches the Western view of a religion.) But his
revelations grew more "Old Testament," as it were, as his power grew.
Christianity began as a reformation of Judaism. Early Christians didn't
focus on living well in this life but on saving their souls before the
impending return of the Messiah. As a result Christianity has no political
doctrine, except, perhaps, "Render unto Caesar, What Is Caesar's." Thus, the
Roman Empire could become Christian while remaining an empire. Many
centuries later, Christian apologists for the monarchy preached the doctrine
of the divine right of Kings to justify royal supremacy, but John Locke
could argue for individual liberty and against the Devine Right doctrine
while still remaining a devout Christian. The lack of an explicit Christian
political doctrine enabled Christians to consider differing political forms
and philosophies without clashing with the authority of a revealed text.
Muslims have no such advantage.
Of course, both Christianity and Islam share the problems of dogma and
authority, elements that lend themselves to illiberal societies. In
suppressing Christianity, Roman Emperors were fighting what they considered
an intolerant monotheistic cult. After the Emperor Constantine legalized
Christianity in 312 AD, Christians rose to power in the empire and by the
end of the century nearly suppressed all other religions. It wasn't long
before pagans were fed to the lions. It would be more than a thousand years
before religious tolerance returned to Christianized Europe.
In theory, Islam allowed for some toleration for Christians and Jews. But
they were subjected to slavery and a second-class status called Dimmis,
which was far worse than "Jim Crow". Due to Islamic proscriptions on
domestic slavery, Islam invented a large-scale race-based slave trade. Arab
Muslims imported slaves from Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa. Islamic slave
raids were common in southern Europe and sometimes reached the shores of
Ireland.
Christians and Jews are called "People of the Book" in the Koran, and as
such are allowed to live and practice their religion in subjugation.
Polytheists, atheists, pagans and idolaters aren't so lucky: they must
convert or be killed. One of history's bloodiest atrocities, prior to the
20th Century, took place during the Muslim conquest of India. Hindus were
massacred wholesale. India's Buddhists, no military and political threat to
anyone, were virtually wiped out. The vast destruction of Buddhist
buildings, art and culture was a terrible loss to history.
It is true that the 1400 years of Islamic history were punctuated by periods
of tolerance, in which Muslim scholars, with the aid of Christian and Jewish
scholars, managed to salvage some of the ancient Roman and Greek wisdom.
Under Islamic rule, mathematicians adopted Hindu numerals and advanced
algebra. However, the greatest minds of the Islamic world, Avicenna and
Averroes, were persecuted.
Averroes (ibn Rushd), one of history's preeminent Aristotelian scholars, was
banished by the Caliph; his books burned. Aquinas did for Christianity what
Averroes couldn't do for Islam: he reconciled Aristotle with Christianity --
thus setting the foundation for the secular, rational, scientific (and
Hellenic) worldview, with its emphasis on living well in this world, that,
with the Renaissance, became the dominant worldview in Europe; and via the
Enlightenment, America. Along with the growth of secularism, religion also
transformed. The work of Aquinas reformed Catholicism and ultimately set in
motion the questioning spirit that led to Protestantism.
Why was the Christian West able to move forward while the Islamic East
proceeded to decline? Was it just the fluke of Aquinas' demise on his way to
a tribunal and possibly escaping a fate similar to Averroes -- with similar
consequences for Europe?
Proponents of a moderate Islam point to a time when Muslim countries allowed
the study of philosophy and science. But given its history, one has to
wonder if Islam can furnish the environment for the stable and long-term
development of modern civilization -- or if it is just a place to
occasionally hide the great works and great thinkers during an otherwise
vast period of darkness.
What is undeniable is that, over the centuries, the Islamic world decayed.
For a while the stagnant systems Muslims lived under were limited in their
harmfulness because the authorities had only primitive means of forcing
submission. As soon as modern technologies became available, Muslim leaders
had the tools to increase the oppression. They did so by adopting the modern
collectivist policies of fascism and socialism while marginalizing Islam.
The failure of this faux modernization sparked an Islamic revival. Instead
of turning to the individualism and freedom welcomed in Eastern Europe and
the Pacific Rim, Muslims turn backwards. With the Islamic revival came a
renewed interest in the full practice of the religion -- including its
bellicosity and its imperial ambitions of world conquest.
We are told that the answer to fundamentalist Islam is moderate Islam. The
word "fundamentalist" comes from Protestantism, but used in a generic sense
means a literal interpretation of a religion. In Christianity,
fundamentalist denominations are considered different sects of
Protestantism. In Islam, fundamentalism is called "Islamic Revivalism." Is
this a different kind of Islam, or just a different degree of devoutness? Do
moderate Muslims belong to a different Islamic sect, or are they just less
dedicated (or perhaps even lapsed)? If by "moderate," we mean "reformed to
reflect moderation and modernity" -- like reformed Christianity -- where are
the reformed Muslim theologians and texts like there are in Christianity? Is
there a "moderate Islam," or is this just an oxymoron?
Perhaps, in theory, there could be a reformed, tolerant Islam, based on the
revelations of Muhammad's early Meccan period; but an omission of
intolerant, political Islam could merely leave young Muslims enraged at the
hypocrisy of the reformers who deviate or ignore the true Islam. We are left
with the following problem: it only takes a few true Muslims, who want to
practice Islam in its entirety and heed the call to Jihad, to take weapons
of mass destruction into Western cities and destroy civilization. At this
point in time, these weapons can only be created with state sponsorship - a
temporary limitation. Thus, we must return with some urgency to our original
question: Is Islam evil?
by Jason Pappas
Sanforized
snip <crap>
The short answer is yes.