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[quote]Nida_e_khair

You say:

"Question for you (tilawat): Do you think that if we had slaves in the 21st century, we would still be allowed to have sexual intercourse with them?"

Certainly as Islamic Shariah is as valid today as 14 hundred years ago, but the laws in both secular and religious states generally prohibit the very institution of slavery now.  Even the UN Declaration of Human Rights does not allow it now.

Nevertheless, the scum of life who call themselves as Muslims and their countries as Islamic go to the 'kafir' countries like Ireland to work there as slave labour, are ever eager to 'marwaanrh',i.e., serve as sex-slaves too 
though seldom considered fit for that.

In fact it all depends on the kind of Islam you believe in. Just readt his article appearing on 'chowk.com':

"unflinching idealism ... since 1997 chowk illustration 
     
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 Sunday, December 03, 2006 5:21:14 AM archives sitemap contribute community unplugged about chowk 
 
 
  
   
  
Which Islam?
Mohammad Gill 
November 24, 2006        
 
 
  
“Which Islam?” Parvez butted in. “The Islam of the Flat Earth Society? The Islam of the religious scholars? The Islam of Iranian revolutionaries? The Islam of Saudi Wahabbis? The Islam of the state-obsessed Muslim Brotherhood and the Jamaat-e- Islami? The simpleton Islam of Tablighi Jamaat? He was so frustrated he did not realize he was shouting.” (Zia Uddin Sardar in ‘Desperately Seeking Paradise’, p.327)

I hadn’t read any of Zia Uddin Sardar’s (ZS) books. A couple of weeks back, I was leisurely browsing the collection of books on Islam in our local area library when I came upon Desperately Seeking Paradise by ZS. I was ticked off by the title but nonetheless I picked up the book and took it to the circulation desk for check out. The only motivation for me to borrow this book was that I wanted to read a book by ZS. I had quoted him in my “What is Islamization of Science?” and was disappointed because I didn’t have the opportunity of reading any of his works at first hand.

I read the whole book selecting chapters randomly. I was deeply touched by his desire to see the Muslim world developing into a leading society of the whole world. I empathized with him and was equally pained to see the Muslim world factually as one of the most confused and backward societies of the world. The confusion has engulfed the whole Muslim world. The Muslims believe that they were the glorious and the most successful people of the world in the middle ages because of their religion, Islam. The truth is otherwise. They became successful when they stopped Islam from invading their creative engagements in philosophy and science. Islam did inspire them to spread out in the world but their real success was due to their unequalled progress in science and philosophy. 
Mamun-al-Rashid’s Bait-el-Himah (House of Wisdom) admitted scholars of all religions. The ulema hated Mamun-al-Rashid for his liberal and skeptical views. He protected the Muslim skeptics, the Mutazallites, and patronized them in their creative work. The greatest scholars of Islam were skeptics. Religion was not their passion. Many of them were good practicing Muslims but their real devotion was to their intellectual pursuits.

Many of us who hark back to the past glories of our forebears wrongly believe that the excellence achieved by them was by virtue of their religious faith. Although secularism was not consciously the state policy, at an individual level secularism played a dominant role in the intellectual milieu. The Muslim scientists kept their religion as a personal and private practice and did not allow it to interfere in their work. Majority of us tend to believe that if we succeed in developing a pure Islamic outlook (Which Islam? is a bogey here also) intellectually and practically, every thing else will fall in place. ZS has comprehensively looked at it and has ended up in frustration. Having looked at the intellectual comprehension of Islamic theories and practices in many Islamic countries like Pakistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, etc. from close quarters, the question of which Islam? relentlessly stared in his face.

The universality of religion is indeed a chimerical concept (or a mis-concept) in which the followers of almost every religion freely indulge. This indulgence massages their ego and the feeling good about it. The empirical evidence totally refutes it. In the Muslim world of today, Iranian brand of Islam (Shi’ism) is fiercely pitted against the Saudi Wahabbi Islam. Both of them are extreme in their theory and practice. And both of them are arraigned against the whole world. The banality of the rational Muslims is these extreme views and interpretations of religion. Those of us who feel good about our glorious past, try to rationalize and give it as a proof of the greatness of our religion. When we try to find examples of good governance and fair and just treatment of the people by the state, we invariably end up only in giving examples of some good rulers such as Omar-al-Khattab, Omar bin Abdel-el-Aziz, the Abbasid khalifahs Harun and Mamun-al-Rashid among others. Apart from the good rulers, there was no continuing fair and just system of governance. There was no constitution and there were no rights of the common people. Whatever rights were given to them was a special favor of a particular ruler; they didn’t have any constitutional rights.

In a western style secular system, on the other hand, people have rights which are given to them by the constitution and not by a special favor of a particular ruler. Any head of the state cannot take them away by any whimsical act. In such a system, religion is a personal thing in which state does not interfere. However, public practice and display of any particular religion is not countenanced.

Although many of us despise the western style secularism, western science and philosophy, western democracy, and modernity, we do not have any reasonable and pragmatic substitutes for them. The result is an intellectual schism. We hate western education but acquire it nevertheless because without it we can not hope to have a decent living. We hate modernity because it is western in character and essence but we love to enjoy its fruits and products such as cars, travel by air, air conditioning and central heat, color televisions, refrigerators and microwaves, to name only a few of them. Why don’t we accept modernity and secularism as a matter of course?

When Islamic Spain and Baghdad were at their peaks of excellence and science and philosophy flourished there, many western scholars traveled from their far off countries to Spain and Baghdad in search of knowledge. They learnt Arabic so that they could read and comprehend books of science and philosophy written by the Muslim authors. When they returned to their respective lands, they translated these books in their language to transmit knowledge to their people. Books of Ibn-e-Sina and Razi were used as text books in Europe for several centuries even after the downfall of the Muslim world. The Europeans acquired knowledge from the Muslim world and produced in due time Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler and Newton. The foundation of science was laid in Europe using the scientific tradition of the Muslim world. Why can’t and shouldn’t do the same thing now? Why do we hesitate in acquiring the western knowledge and using it to lay the foundation of the modern scientific tradition? Anything that is manifestly good is good whether it is western or eastern. We should have no hesitation in acquiring “the good.” Let us forget “Pidram Sultan bood” (my father was a king). We should devote our energies in acquiring knowledge and advancing it further from its existing frontiers. We should keep our religion at a personal level and not try to make it universal. Because, such an effort is fruitless and futile.

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#240 by krishna_abcd on December 2, 2006 11:37am PT
#237 by ntsyed

If you are making the point that BECAUSE Swami Prabhupada started the movement in the USA, AND the movement is into proselytizing - THEREFORE it contradicts my claim that Hinduism is not into proselytizing, you need to think about the following points:

1) Hinduism has not been into proselytizing in India for thousands of years.

2) The movement in the USA got influenced by Americans with their Semitic upbringing.

3) EVEN if Prabhupada was directly responsible for proselytization, he would represent an aberration, rather than the trend in Hinduism.

[I think it would be easier if you defined the following terms...just so we're on the same page:

- converting 
- movement 
- proselytizing ]

Look up www.dictionary.com.

[and how do these fit in your definition of philosophies? ]

They have NOTHING to do with the definition of philosophies.

[Secondly, please tell us about who Swami Prabhupada was, if not a Hindu, and the objective of the Hare Krishna movement if not to increase the following of Hindu 'philosophies'...which requires proselytizing and conversion? ]

This is a repeat question. See the first point above.

[Fourth, if Hinduism is not a faith then:

- how does 'worship' tie in with (potentially) modifiable philosophies?

- if there's no concept of worship in Hindu 'philosophies', then what is prostration before statues etc., if not worship?

- if it is worship, then it must have something to do with faith - at least to the extent of elevating those people who offered those 'philosophies' to the level of gods and goddesses, as well as developing faith in their capabilities

- what is the philosophy behind Yellamma? As far as I've been able to see on the Internet, it's simply a commemoration / remembrance of an injustice against a woman and her sons, and has everything to do with 'faith' and nothing to do with philosophy

- licking the yoni of some goddess for relief in menstural problem appears only faith based

- reverence of a god's genital conjoined with that of a goddess appears same as above...based on faith - not in philosophy

- similarly, philosophy seems to have little to do with the concept of devadasis and more to do with faith

still you maintain that hinduism is not a 'faith'? ]

Hinduism is different things to different people. It is different for the peasant and the intellectual. The common man needs the mental crutch of faith to survive - they have colored their faith with different aspects of the Hindu philosophies - few bother to actually study the philosophy. But to the educated intellectual, Hinduism is strictly a philosophy - to be studied and debated at will. You can be an atheist and still be a Hindu - no question of faith there.

[Mr. krishna, every religion has a philosophy...even atheism claims to have one. Without a philosophy a religion is like an empty metal pot. Now, whether the philosophy has strong basis or not is a seperate discussion. But, you cannot separate the two with a few keystrokes. ]

Okay. Quote me a few verses from the Koran that elucidates this philosophy.

[Reply to interact #240]  
  
 
#239 by krishna_abcd on December 2, 2006 11:01am PT
#237 by ntsyed

I think after interacting with me for a while you will realize that unlike some others, I do not get easily deflected from the point at hand.

So I'll repeat my earlier post:

Show me the two sentences:

1) my "latest assertion", and

2) my "earlier claims".

Then we can see how they contradict each other.

We can take it from there. I'll wait for your response.

KINDLY PUT THE TWO SENTENCES SIDE BY SIDE, NUMBERED 1) AND 2) RESPECTIVELY.

We can address all other compelling issues like "licking the yoni of some goddess for relief in menstural problem " AFTER this.

Thank you.

[Reply to interact #239]  
  
 
#238 by kaalchakra on December 2, 2006 8:51am PT
ntsyed

Chowk must have convinced you that just because people are "educated," they do not come to possess "highly critical and logical thought processes." :)

An actual study of people who convert to Islam (or any other religion) cannot be based on our assumptions about what these people must have done, or must be like, but rather on actual accounts.

What kind/groups of people convert most often? What do they say before and after? What is their behavior toward self and toward other people like? What kind of needs they express for themselves? How they relate to other human beings and social institutiuons of their own societies? And so on.

[Reply to interact #238]  
  
 
#237 by ntsyed on December 2, 2006 6:59am PT
Re: # 235 by krishna_abcd

krishna_abcd - #225: 
"Hindus are not worried about "converting" other people"

ntsyed - #226: 
"I've had Hindus, other than Hari Krishna, hand me booklets on Hinduism at the airport in USA, just like the JW". You're free to call me a liar, the claim runs counter to your understanding of hinduism

krishna_abcd - #230: 
"The Hare Krishna movement became a proselytising movement in America....Have you noticed how the Hare Krishna movement is largely ignored by Hindus from India?"

krishna_abcd - #235: 
"The "movement" started with Swami Prabhupada in the USA. The Bhakti movement in India was not into proselytization."

which means, the movement Swami (a hindu) started in the USA WAS into proselytizing, and the best proselytizers available to him there were the Abrahimic Americans.

I think it would be easier if you defined the following terms...just so we're on the same page:

- converting 
- movement 
- proselytizing

and how do these fit in your definition of philosophies?

Secondly, please tell us about who Swami Prabhupada was, if not a Hindu, and the objective of the Hare Krishna movement if not to increase the following of Hindu 'philosophies'...which requires proselytizing and conversion?

I think we can skip "The Bhakti movement" for now, unless of course you feel compelled to indulge into details.

Thirdly, "largely [a relative term] ignored" implies the existence, albeit to a lesser [antonym of largely] extent.

Fourth, if Hinduism is not a faith then:

- how does 'worship' tie in with (potentially) modifiable philosophies?

- if there's no concept of worship in Hindu 'philosophies', then what is prostration before statues etc., if not worship?

- licking the yoni of some goddess for relief in menstural problem appears only faith based

- reverence of a god's genital conjoined with that of a goddess appears same as above...based on faith - not in philosophy

- similarly, philosophy seems to have little to do with the concept of devadasis and more to do with faith

still you maintain that hinduism is not a 'faith'?

Mr. krishna, every religion has a philosophy...even atheism claims to have one. Without a philosophy a religion is like an empty metal pot. Now, whether the philosophy has strong basis or not is a seperate discussion. But, you cannot separate the two with a few keystrokes.

The reason your family of philosophies have been modified by many before is to keep the religion alive. Otherwise, once people lose faith in a philosophy, they move on to the next best thing available. That appears to be the reason behind your propensities towards atheism/secularism by calling an entire civilization a family of philosophies (open to modification) that have nothing to do with faith, proselytizing, conversion, etc. It is the philosophy behind the entire Islamic system that attracts most people to it.

Take it easy and think.

:-)~~ 
[Reply to interact #237]  
  
 
#236 by krishna_abcd on December 2, 2006 2:00am PT
#232 by ntsyed

We can always talk about the rest of the points AFTER you post my two contradictory statements.

[Reply to interact #236]  
  
 
#235 by krishna_abcd on December 2, 2006 1:54am PT
#232 by ntsyed

[Hare Krishna movement: 
Would I be correct to assume that Hindu(s) initiated the "proselytizing" before Semitic Americans brought momentum to it?]

No, you would not be. Assume nothing. Check the facts.

[Even if the movement was "largely" ignored [but did exist in India]...]

The "movement" started with Swami Prabhupada in the USA. The Bhakti movement in India was not into proselytization. What the heck are you talking about?

[your latest assertion in this context contradicts your earlier claims. ]

Okay. For me to argue further with you , you'll have to substantiate this statement. Show me the two sentences:

1) my "latest assertion", and

2) my "earlier claims".

Then we can see how they contradict each other.

We can take it from there. I'll wait for your response.

[Reply to interact #235]  
  
 
#234 by ntsyed on December 2, 2006 1:38am PT
Re: # 231

I'm sure Yousuf Masih or Sreesanth's kissing their crucifix, or the relevant gestures, bother some too...

There has to be a bottom end of being pathetic....then again, this must be it.

;-)~~ 
[Reply to interact #234]  
  
 
#233 by ntsyed on December 2, 2006 1:36am PT
Re: # 228 by kaalchakra

It may be useful to explore the process in some sort of systematic manner. Don't you think?

Ditto!

The only known process is the age old practice of study and think as advised in the Quran & Sunnah. Quite a few Muslims can address one's curiosity on various aspects of Islam to the point of satisfaction, but then its one's own deliberations and assessment that compels one to embrace one ideology or another.

While an argument CAN be made that all those embracing Islam could be plain and simple fools or have "fundamental problem with their own nature", it is rendered moot by the fact that a lot of those people are highly educated and successful people. They possess highly critical and logical thought processes, and have compared Islam with their own or other religions. Even if they didn't, in terms of hubris and bigotry it would be an insult to one's own intelligence (rather than the converts) to make such a claim.

(As an aside, most people wouldn't have known that fear of offending Hindus had anything to do with banning Satanic verses :))

I hope you've read the book.

:-)~~

[Reply to interact #233]  
  
 
#232 by ntsyed on December 2, 2006 1:26am PT
#230 by krishna_abcd on December 1, 2006 10:19am PT

Hare Krishna movement: 
Would I be correct to assume that Hindu(s) initiated the "proselytizing" before Semitic Americans brought momentum to it? Even if the movement was "largely" ignored [but did exist in India], your latest assertion in this context contradicts your earlier claims.

You and majumdar not being siamese twins or main spokespersons [...just being scientifically and politically correct ;-)~~] is not the point. I'm sure thousand people have a thousand perspectives of the same thing, but there should be, and there must be, some commonality. The two of you present totally opposite focal points of the fourth or fifth largest religious group.

I'm glad the two of us agree on: "all three of us need to study the subject of our critique before digitizing our thoughts here." [ntsyed, #226] ..........i.e. I study the sources of philosophies in Hinduism and you study the Quran and Sunnah before offering our constructive critiques.

There is nothing to "defend" in Hinduism.

Why? 
(a) Is Hinduism flawless? 
that would be an absolute contradition of majumdar's admission, as well as your own in the previous posts.

Or is it simply indefensible? 
which defies the logic why such a large group of people believe in it and practically live it. Not to mention, that would be treading on very thin ice as far as RSS etc is concerned.

"Nothing to defend in Hinduism" establishes an absence of flaw. If that is so, then how could anyone claim to have improved it, "as many have done before", and how could anyone improve it now?

I think a better analogy could be used here. Geometry is a logical science...perfectly capable of defending itself due to its vast application to improve daily life in many different ways. Even the monitor, mouse, and keyboard you're using right now, as well as the characters you're looking at to learn my thoughts, are highly dependant on geometry. Furthermore, it should be defended because it facilitates life for all that appreciate nature. Whereas such capability in Hinduism has yet to be presented before this audience.

As I have mentioned before, you are still looking at this from the viewpoint of your semitic religions.

I beg to differ. The only point of view I have adopted here is the relevance or conflict between science and religion/ideology viz principles that define behavior. A quick review of this thread reveals it to be so. Therefore, there's no 'semitism' involved on my part.....just a logical thought process as demanded of the present day Muslims to prove why they shouldn't be bombarded to stoneage for their adherence to Allah, Quran, Prophet (pbuh) and his Sunnah whilst trying to enjoy the fruits of scientific progress.

I just stated a fact for you. That if you found flaws in the philosophy/philosophies, you would be making a contribution to Hindu thought - as many have done before.

For philosophies...the fact you stated makes perfect sense. But why so many people follow these philosophies so religiously, to the point of kill and get killed, does not.

suwarg & narg: 
This has nothing to do with Hinduism. You will not find any mention of this nonsense by the Hindu philosophers through the centuries.

Fair enough...this part does tie in with your argument. But then why do so many Hindus believe in these and devote their lives to achieve one and avoid the other?

I look forward to "more later...",

...though by the standards established thus far on this board by secular [confused] Muslims, apostates, hindus, atheists, and what have you, that Muslims utterly deserve to be annihilated for their alleged defiance of science...I think all the former deserve that fate more than the latter [Muslims] for failing to prove their allegations convincingly, if at all. Only if that was the MO at UNO, or whatever is left of it.....LoL

Shooting from the hip has a high risk of shooting one's own self in the foot.

Cheers 
:-)~~
[Reply to interact #232]  
  
 
#231 by teshah on December 1, 2006 8:10pm PT
Re: # 147

"You have to be....... sticking your behind in the air"

Properly washed, of course, but why?

Yousaf Masih who has now become Yousaf Musalli does this whenever he makes a century in a cricket match, irrespective of the fact whether his team wins or loses the match. Why?

[Reply to interact #231]

Sorry dear Nida, it was in fact to avoid burdening this site with the  material not liked by some gender-consciuous people that I had wanted your presonal e-mail.

Regards

Tilawat[/quote]

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