maff wrote:

wbarwell wrote:

A-Meister wrote:

wbarwell wrote:

Speaker Monkey wrote:

maff wrote:

A-Meister wrote:

maff wrote:

An Islamic reformation
Sarah Crown
May 28, 2006 10:32 AM

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/sarah_crown/2006/05/an_islamic_reformation.html

Reza Aslan's debut book, No God But God, shortlisted for last
year's Guardian First Book Award, offers a coherent and eminently
readable analysis of the origins, development and future of Islam.
His talk yesterday was essentially a distillation of the contents
of his book, and none the worse for that. A teacher of comparative
religion at universities - including Harvard - across the US, Aslan
is a gifted speaker, articulate and persuasive.

The body of Aslan's talk was given over to the exposition of his
theory that the current outbreak of international Islamic terrorism
is predicated not on an ideological conflict between Islam and the
west, but on the fact that Islam itself is currently undergoing its
own version of the reformation that swept through Europe in the
16th century. The principle argument behind the Christian
reformation, Aslan explained, was who has the authority to define
faith, the individual or the institution. This, he said, is
precisely the argument taking place in Islam now. Future
generations, he suggested, will view Osama bin Laden - a militant
individualist - as one of the principle figures in what scholars
are now beginning to refer to as the era of Islamic reformation.

Kind of like a Calvin or Luther, huh?

Nah. There never was a Pope figure or the Vatican equivalent in
Islam.

Do you know what a Kaliph is, or who they were?

Islam has had no Caliph for over 1000 years.
Nor will it any more than Catholics, Protestants and
Orthodox Christians will ever rejoin in one massive religion.
There have been movements for over a century now to restore
the caliphate, which are absolute failures. Pipe dreams of religion.

Unfortunately, the Calvins and Luthers of Islam, al Ghazali and
Ibn Taymiya gave us the roots of Wahabism and denigration of critical
thinking. Al Wahab gave us the current violent strain of Islam
Look up Deobandi.

Look up the roots of Wahabism and you see the problem.
As long as these movements are powerful in Islam, Islam
is a problem for eveybody. The Luthers of Islam gave us
violence and jihad.

It cannot be trusted. It is evil because Islam has largely
been perverted. Its unsure that any would be reformists
will be able to ever purge Islam of this sort of evil,
as its roots are from the Quran.

Which begs the question: If the roots of the
problem are from the Quran, why should we
conclude it's been perverted? Perverted from
what, it's original, problematic roots?

The crazy bastards aren't any crazier today
then they were before, they just have more
money and technology aiding their insanity.

Ijtihad.

This is the principle that man has a right to make judgments,
to use logic and reason. Very early on, many Moslems
claimed the right to ijtihad to believe what reason dictates.
That is why during Islam's early golden age, many leading
Moslenms were moderateds, even skeptics. This produced
the golden age of scholars, scientists, philosophers and critical
thinkers.

The radicals, Taymiya and al Ghazali, attacked Ijtihad.
It has been proclaimed that the age of ijtihad is over, that
no man may set reason above dogma of religious teachers.

There are a few verses in the Quran about reason and knowledge
that fed the concept of ijtihad, but to try to use these verses to reason
about religion is now declared a heresy by these Wahabists and offshoots.
Like the Taleban.

Further more Taymiya claimed that it is a duty to kill
those moslems that drift from extreme fundamentalist positions.
as heretics.

That is a perversion of the quran's back doors to reason and knowledge
ameliorating superstition and fanaticism.

This is what gives you things like Islamists murderers of Algeria killing
entire villages, or Taleban destruction of entire provinces in
Afghanistan. Murder is a duty on those who are not pure believers.

The Quran made several statments about religion, there is to be no
compulsionof religion upon people. Taymiya and others have
perverted these sayings.

You should look at the history of Tamiya and what he did and how this is
still reverberting down through the world to this day.

All people should know this stuff to know what the West and
Islamic worlds are up against.

The rot is deep and ugly.

You must be joking. Christians with the power of the state were the
main factor behind imperialism and colonialsim..

Look up imperialism and Islam. From Mohammed to the collapse of
the Ottoman empire.
For centuries, Islam was the supreme imperalist, not any European
states.

maff wrote:

wbarwell wrote:

A-Meister wrote:

wbarwell wrote:

Speaker Monkey wrote:

maff wrote:

A-Meister wrote:

maff wrote:

An Islamic reformation
Sarah Crown
May 28, 2006 10:32 AM

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/sarah_crown/2006/05/an_islamic_reformation.html

Reza Aslan's debut book, No God But God, shortlisted for last
year's Guardian First Book Award, offers a coherent and eminently
readable analysis of the origins, development and future of Islam.
His talk yesterday was essentially a distillation of the contents
of his book, and none the worse for that. A teacher of comparative
religion at universities - including Harvard - across the US, Aslan
is a gifted speaker, articulate and persuasive.

The body of Aslan's talk was given over to the exposition of his
theory that the current outbreak of international Islamic terrorism
is predicated not on an ideological conflict between Islam and the
west, but on the fact that Islam itself is currently undergoing its
own version of the reformation that swept through Europe in the
16th century. The principle argument behind the Christian
reformation, Aslan explained, was who has the authority to define
faith, the individual or the institution. This, he said, is
precisely the argument taking place in Islam now. Future
generations, he suggested, will view Osama bin Laden - a militant
individualist - as one of the principle figures in what scholars
are now beginning to refer to as the era of Islamic reformation.

Kind of like a Calvin or Luther, huh?

Nah. There never was a Pope figure or the Vatican equivalent in
Islam.

Do you know what a Kaliph is, or who they were?

Islam has had no Caliph for over 1000 years.
Nor will it any more than Catholics, Protestants and
Orthodox Christians will ever rejoin in one massive religion.
There have been movements for over a century now to restore
the caliphate, which are absolute failures. Pipe dreams of religion.

Unfortunately, the Calvins and Luthers of Islam, al Ghazali and
Ibn Taymiya gave us the roots of Wahabism and denigration of critical
thinking. Al Wahab gave us the current violent strain of Islam
Look up Deobandi.

Look up the roots of Wahabism and you see the problem.
As long as these movements are powerful in Islam, Islam
is a problem for eveybody. The Luthers of Islam gave us
violence and jihad.

It cannot be trusted. It is evil because Islam has largely
been perverted. Its unsure that any would be reformists
will be able to ever purge Islam of this sort of evil,
as its roots are from the Quran.