Islam about non-muslims

BEWEGING VAN BELGISCHE EX-MOSLIMS - MOUVEMENT DES APOSTATS BELGES DE L’ISLAM

MOVEMENT OF BELGIAN FORMER MUSLIMS

STUDY OF ISLAM

Islam on the subject of non-muslims

Quran 48.29 “Muhammad (blessings and peace be upon him) is the Messenger of Allah. And those with him are hard and tough against the disbelievers but kind-hearted and merciful among themselves.“

S., a reader of our site who identifies herself as “one of the numerous converted sisters” started her mail to us as follows:

Dear Reader (I do not offer a Salam. I only greet my Muslim brothers and sisters with the invocation for peace), ...

We replied to her as follows:

Dear S.,
In your first sentence, you already give evidence of one of the prime problematic aspects of Islam, namely the wedge that Islam drives between Muslims and non-Muslims. Since you are a Muslim woman, you consider it normal practice to discriminate against non-Muslims by not wishing them peace. We in turn wish you peace, even though you hold an opinion different from our own. We judge people by their good deeds and conduct rather than by the ideology in which they believe or not believe.

Does this, presumably recent, convert to Islam adhere to a so-called “extreme or literal version” of Islam? Does she fail to fully understand what the subject is all about and take the issues out of their context? Is she consorting with the salafists? Has she misinterpreted Islamic ideology, and does that ideology conceivably harbour a great deal of respect for non-Muslims? Does she put Islam in a bad light by disseminating faulty information? Is she perhaps a Zionist agent?

Let us take a look at what Muhammad, obviously the role model for S, had to say about offering greetings to non-Muslims! The following tradition (Hadith) collected by Muslim, Book 26, Number 5389 already sheds some light on the question:

Abu Huraira reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: Do not greet the Jews and the Christians before they greet you and when you meet any one of them on the roads force him to go to the narrowest part of it.

Following in the steps of Muhammad, S. withholds her greeting of peace from us and as a good disciple of Islam she also rubs it in our faces. She tells us “I have delved deep into Islam” and, yes indeed, she appears to be well on her way to becoming a true Muslima. We can only hope she will not force us off the road with her camel when she meets us on our bicycle in the street somewhere. One hopes that she has not yet delved into the second half of the Hadith!

As already pointed out, one of the problematic aspects of Islam is its division of humanity into Muslims and non-Muslims. The unbelievers, the infidel, are in the Quran incessantly damned to Hell in every conceivable way and form of expression. As it is, the Quran repeats a number of themes ad infinitum. But where it concerns the theme of “the infidel”, it goes to extremes. The word “unbeliever” is found in the English translation we have used as our reference 180 times, mostly in combination with some sort of damnation. In our multicultural society, this carries the implication that Muslims who are followers of the Quran will hardly be inclined to have their children marry non-Muslims. Hence, two separate societies are evolving parallel to one another instead of one society wherein Muslim immigrants are intermingling with the local population. No doubt, many Muslims consider non-Muslims as equals, but this is contrary to the prescriptions of the Quran. Those are the Muslims who are deviating from Islam.

That the Quran has no particular love for the infidel, and calls for hatred, discrimination and segregation, may be demonstrated by the following verses:

3.28 Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference to believers. Whoso doeth that hath no connection with Allah unless (it be) that ye but guard yourselves against them, taking (as it were) security. Allah biddeth you beware (only) of Himself. Unto Allah is the journeying.

The leading Quranic commentator Ibn Kathir explains about verse 3.28 that “unless (it be) that ye but guard yourselves against them” means that you may show friendship towards them if you think you might otherwise end up in a difficult situation, but that “We smile in the face of some people although our hearts curse them.”

4.144. O Believers! Make not friends with disbelievers instead of believers. Do you wish to set a manifest evidence for Allah against you (through friendship with the disbelievers)?

5.51. O Believers! Do not make friends with the Jews and the Christians. They (all) are friends to one another (against you). And whoever of you makes friends with them will (also) become one of them. Surely Allah does not guide the wrongdoing people.

5.82. You will indeed find the Jews and the polytheists the bitterest of people in their enmity against the Muslims, and the closest in love and affection for the Muslims you will find those who say: ‘Indeed we are Nazarenes (Christians).’ This is because among them are savants (i.e. scholars of Shari‘a) as well as monks (i.e. ascetic worshippers) and (moreover) they are not given to arrogance.

8.21. And do not be like those who said (by way of betraying): ‘We have heard,’ whereas they do not hear.

8.55. Surely, worse than (even) all the beasts in the sight of Allah are the people who disbelieve. So they do not come to believe.

Since the recitation of the Quran is an integral aspect of the five daily prayers, the Muslim believer keeps reiterating a steady diet of hateful verses, again and again, day-in and day-out. In contrast, we ourselves have difficulty imagining that the following text would be recited during a church service:

Brothers and sisters, do not take Muslims as your friends. They are friends to one another. And whoever amongst you shall take them to their bosom shall become as one of them. Verily, God does not lead the ignorant.

This sort of exhortation, which in a Christian country like Belgium would be considered illegal for its blatant bias, is for a Muslim nothing more than business as usual. In 21st century Belgium the Muslim is free, under the guise of freedom of religious expression, to recite undisturbed the verses from the Quran that incite to hatred of, and discrimination against, people of a different faith.

One verse that the practising Muslim recites at least 6205 times in the course of a year is part of the opening-Surah (al Fatiha), the first chapter from the Quran:

1.7. [Show us the straight way] The way of those on whom Thou hast bestowed Thy Grace, those whose (portion) is not wrath, and who go not astray.

Scholars agree that Allah is talking about the Jews when he states “those whose (portion) is wrath” and that reference is made to the Christians when there is question of those that ”who go astray”.

That Allah’s wrath was visited upon the Jews because they did not recognize Muhammad as their Prophet is also proclaimed in the following verse from the Quran:

2.90. How evil a bargain they made in exchange for their lives: that they deny the Book revealed by Allah merely begrudging that Allah bestows (His revelation) out of His Bounty upon any of His servants He wills. So they earned manifold wrath of Allah and there is a humiliating torment for the disbelievers.

The Christians in their turn strayed from the righteous path since they attributed a divine nature to Jesus. According to verse 5.72, they will head straight to hell for this:

5.72. In fact they have become disbelievers who say: ‘Allah is the Messiah, son of Maryam (Mary),’ whereas the Messiah (himself) said: ‘O Children of Israel! Worship Allah Who is my (as well as) your Lord.’ Indeed Allah has forbidden Paradise to him who associates partners with Him. And Hell is his abode and the wrongdoers will not find any helpers.

Whoever should today be reckless enough to voice such a denunciation against Muslims and repeat it endlessly would be courting charges by the Belgian State via its anti-racism agency (CGKR) for incitement to hatred, racism, and discrimination.

Then there is the consideration that at the time of the foundation of Islam, all great world religions had already been in existence for at least 500 years. Muhammad had established contacts with the representatives of a number of these religions, for instance, Jews and Christians, but likewise polytheists, assumed by some to have been inspired by Hinduism. Since the Quran is a product of the world of Muhammad, this interaction with the faithful of other religions is naturally reflected in its writings.

The Islamic faith is in se a monotheistic religion, believing in one God. When Muhammad became convinced that he was a Prophet of God, he thought he would be able to quickly convince the Jews and Christians that he was another messenger and a continuation of previous messages, and that they would join in his Muslim movement.

Hence Muhammad’s inclusion in the Quran of multiple passages from the Old and New Testaments. The Quran tells all sorts of stories about Adam, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus. A number of these demonstrate that he misinterpreted some of those events. One example of such an error is the confusion between Maria, the mother of Jesus, and Myriam, the sister of Aaron, in verse 19.28 that speaks about Maria: O Sister of Haroun (Aaron), your father was not a bad man nor was your mother an unchaste woman. Muhammad was under the impression that this pertained to one and the same person, that Maria was Aaron’s sister, which historically is incorrect. The error was caused by the fact that Maria and Myriam are in Arabic depicted by the same characters, which sound like “Mariam”, in contrast to Hebrew, where these two names are spelled differently. Hence, Muhammad wrongly thought that these two historical figures were one and the same person.

Muhammad likewise adopted certain myths circulating in Arabia as Jewish or Christian dogma. We quote two examples.

The first example pertains to what the Christians refer to as the Holy Trinity, God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Muhammad happened to misinterpret this and turned it into God the Father, the Son, and the Mother. It is true that Maria is called the Mother of God, but this does not mean that in Christian dogma she is a member of the Holy Trinity.

5.116. And when Allah will say: ‘O ‘Isa son of Maryam (Jesus son of Mary)! Did you ask the people to take you and your mother as two gods besides Allah?’ He will submit: ‘Glory be to You! It is not (justified) for me to say such a thing as I have no right to say. Had I said it You would surely have known it. You know every such (thing) that is in my heart, but I do not know those (things) which are in Your knowledge. It is only You indeed Who Know Well all that is unseen.

The second example is that of Ezra. At the time of Muhammad, myths were circulating about Ezra that he was the son of God. The Quran generalizes this into a general Jewish dogma, which is of course incorrect.

9.30. And the Jews said: ‘‘Uzayr (Ezra) is the son of Allah,’ and the Christians said: ‘The Messiah is the son of Allah.’ These are their (absurd) utterances that they voice with their mouths. They (acquire) resemblance with the saying of those who have disbelieved before (them). May Allah ruin them! Where are they wandering distracted?

After Muhammad had vainly attempted to convert the Jews and Christians en masse to Islam, the tone of the “revelations” changed and verbal disagreement turned into physical conflict, meaning an endless succession of wars. At the end of his life, Muhammad ordered the deportation of the last remaining non-Muslims from the region (the Hejaz), which is reported in the following Hadith/handed-down tradition from Muhammad (Muslim, Book 19, Number 4366):

It has been narrated by 'Umar b. al-Khattib that he heard the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) say: I will expel the Jews and Christians from the Arabian Peninsula and will not leave any but Muslim.

The end of the multicultural society in Arabia! Muhammad’s Islam in action! The real Islam?

The Quran resolutely rejects the Christian Holy Trinity:

4.171. O People of the Book! Exceed not the limits in your Din (Religion) and speak nothing but the truth about Allah’s glory. The fact is simple that the Messiah, ‘Isa son of Maryam (Jesus son of Mary), is Allah’s Messenger and His Word which He conveyed to Maryam (Mary) and a Spirit from Him. So believe in Allah and His Messengers and do not say: ‘There are three (Gods).’ Refrain (from this belief); (that) is best for you. Verily, Allah is the Only One God, Holy is He, far above having a son. Whatever is in the heavens and whatever is in the earth (all) belongs to Him alone. And Sufficient is Allah as Guardian.

5.73. Certainly they (also) become disbelievers who say: ‘Allah is the third of the three (Gods),’ whereas there is none worthy of worship except the One God. If they do not desist from (the absurdity) which they utter, a grievous punishment will surely torment those of them who disbelieve.

The Quran uses the most unsavoury names for the infidel in one unending stream of invective variations:

98.6: They are the worst of creations.
2.99, 2.55: The trespassers
8.22, 8.55: Worse than the beasts
2.65: Most despised apes.
5.60: They are the ones damned by Allah and upon whom He has visited His wrath and whom He has fashioned into apes, swine, and servants of the devil.
7.166: And when they trespassed, which was forbidden to them, We said to them: "Be as despised apes."
7.179: They are like cattle, nay, more misguided (than this), they are the heedless.
7.176: He is as a dog
9.28: And you that believe, surely polluted are the worshippers of idols.
80.42: Those are the infidel, the perverted ones

9.125: As for those who harbour a sickness in their hearts, it adds pollution onto pollution, and they die as disbelievers.

42.45, 2.254, 5.45, 42.44: The unjust shall receive eternal punishment.
5.59: Since most amongst you are disobedient
8.23: If Allah had detected some good in them
45.31, 83.29: Yet were you of an arrogant spirit and became a guilty people.
4.76: They who are believers fight for the cause of Allah, but the unbelievers fight for the cause of the evil ones. Therefore, fight against the followers of Satan.
58.19: They belong to the followers of Satan
7.27: Verily, we have turned devils into the friends of those that are unbelievers.
7.30: They have away from Allah taken the evil ones as their friends and they believe that they are guided onto the righteous path.
2.10, 4.50, 9.42, 16.39, 16.105, 59.11: Their heart is afflicted by an illness and Allah has made it worse; them awaits painful punishment since they were perpetual liars
5.53, 7.178: Their labours have been in vain and they have been turned into losers.
38.2: But the unbelievers live amongst false pride and strife.
58.18: The Day on which they shall all be raised by Allah, they shall swear their oaths to Him as they have done unto you and they shall be under the impression that they have achieved something. Hearken. All of them are liars.
58.19: Satan is holding sway over them and has induced them to be forgetful of Allah. They are followers of Satan. Hearken, Satan’s party is the loser.
58.20: Verily, those that oppose Allah and His Messenger shall be cast down.

In the 21st century, the Shari’ah handbooks still abound with discriminatory measures to be taken against non-Muslims. You have now been made aware of their provenance.

Fortunately, many Muslims are not aware of all this, or they are following the dictates of their own humanity and do not pay heed to such sentiments. And after having heard all of the hateful messages from the Quran during their Friday prayers, they like to have a beer with their non-Muslim friends afterwards. “Way to go, men!”