Thoughts on the Koran

The BBQ Pit
81

Moving on past the squabbles it’s interesting that Mohammed wasn’t the only prophet in the region at the time. (I lean on 18th century Islamic scholar George Sale in the following. Sale’s translation of and commentaries on the Koran earned praise from no less a figure than Voltaire and is still worth reading today.)

Mohammed’s rise had inspired imitators, the most considerable being Moseilama, of the tribe of Honeifa in Yamama, and al Aswad of the tribe of Ans.

Moseilama had headed an embassy sent by his tribe to Mohammed in the ninth year of the Hejira and professed himself a Muslim. On returning home however Moseilama saw an opportunity and announced that he too had been visited by an angel who had commanded him to share Mohammed’s labors as an equal partner and prophet. He even eventually produced another Koran of which, alas, only this fragment has been preserved by Abulfeda, a 13th century Kurdish historian:

Sounds rather obscure but then mystics throughout the ages have always taken this route, the people expect religious stuff to be opaque. He promptly sent a letter “from Moseilama the apostle of God to Mohammed the apostle of God” proposing that they should split the Earth between them, one half for him and one for Mohammed. No prizes for guessing how that went down. Mohammed already had his feet under the table, he had no intention of letting a competitor in. Addressing his reply to ‘Moseilama the liar’ he told the guy in so many words to go pound sand.

Moseilama, who in one story preserved by Abulfeda, shows himself to have been as horny as Mohammed, actually gained some traction after the prophet’s death but only for a short few months. Abu Bekr, the next leader of the Muslims, assembled an army to gently reprove Moseilama and show him the error of his ways, in other words to kill him and his followers. Mission accomplished.

Not much needs to be said about al Aswad, who set up for a prophet in the year Mohammed died. He had a cognomen, Dhu’lhemar or the master of the ass because he used frequently to say ‘the master of the ass is coming unto me’ (say what? I don’t know and neither Sale nor Abulfeda elaborate). This dude managed to hold Yemen for a while but in the end was brought down by the treachery of his wife, who let his enemies in while he slept in order that they might cut off his head.

There were more but you get the picture. It’s a little like Palestine in the 1st century with messiahs popping up all over the place. Significant difference though, the Jewish messiahs were inspired by their interpretations of biblical writings, the Arabians were imitating Mohammed, at least I know of no evidence of earlier prophets in the area.

I cheerfully admit though that I could well be wrong. Unlike some in this thread I realize that to err is human.

More thoughts later. Yes, I know, you can hardly wait. :slight_smile:

82

Excellent the usual angry bigot Clothahump incoherent Yosemite Sam cartoon tesponse, including the incoherent reference to The Liberals…

Yes I realize you are impressed by this. If you are studying the history of the history writing it is quite interesting.

Et alors… the limited secondary sources exactly as I said, not the primary and in a time when both the translation and the access to the wide body of the eastern texts was limited and indeed biased in access, with a scholarship over 200 years out of date.

So I think you have a post later about the admissions of errors. Ironic this post.
Gibbon was strong in the Latin and indeed brought revolution to the analytical history. But he is dated by more than the two centuries in both the information and the sores and the analytical tools available.

It is embarrassing to cite him in this context for the eastern subjects, Christian and Islamic he was never strong in, unlike the classical Latin empire.

What a strange thing to write after your response only confirmed exactly what I wrote that you reacted to… Irony.

83

Well, since nothing you’ve posted over there actually qualifies as a “stupid liberal” idea, quoting Ramira over there would continue your impressive 0-for streak.

ETA: Ramira, don’t let the ignorant bigots get you too frustrated. I know very little about Islam besides the broad strokes, and I always read your posts eagerly, to educate myself.

84

But it’s true. You know full well, or you should do, that there are no existing contemporary sources for Islamic history other than the Koran itself, which of course cannot be treated as history, although that’s exactly what many Muslim historians do, both now and in the past. In reading historical sources one must always be conscious of who is writing, why they are writing and when they are writing. To dismiss ‘old’ historians as you seem to do is a mark of pure ignorance. Often they had access to materials which no longer exist, just as we now have use of discoveries made since their time.

It is really difficult to have a serious discussion with you, Ramira, your mindset is so closed and your knowledge and reading so limited that sometimes it’s like talking to a recalcitrant child.

Let’s just agree to disagree, although I’m quite content to trade insults with you if that’s what floats your boat. I guarantee you will exhaust your stock of them long before I do.

85

Let us, as the old French farce has it, return to our muttons.

I will say this for Islam: unlike Christianity it has retained the purity of Mohammed’s original message. If St Peter or St Paul visited Rome today and walked into St Peter’s Basilica they would wonder what on earth this religion was. The crucifix would seem familiar but the images of saints, references to a Trinity, the worship of Mary as the Mother of God? They would leave in a hurry to find if any trace of the religion they had preached existed anywhere, the simple gatherings, the plain places they would meet, with no idols adorning the walls, etc. (If Jesus himself had visited Rome he would have left the church shaken and horrified at the appalling blasphemies he had witnessed.)

Now let us picture Mohammed returning to Mecca or Medina and entering a mosque. He would recognize instantly the surroundings, he would listen to the preacher with pleasure, hearing his message preached just as he himself would have done so fourteen centuries ago. There is but one God and Mohammed is his prophet. No making one god into three, no virgin births, no setting his mother up as the Mother of God.

All this speaks well for Islam and does no favors at all for Christianity.

Now, let us posit an alien seeker of truth visiting Earth and casting an eye (or something) over its religions … But enough for now. I’ll leave our alien friend in orbit until tomorrow.

86

You do know full well, or you should do, that the same is true of the Bible.

If you could try engaging and understanding rather than proselytizing, you would find having a serious discussion much less difficult.

87

May one ask why Clothy hasn’t been banned yet? TWICE in this thread alone he has uttered the forbidden words and no mod warnings, no mod notes, no banning, nothing. Is the rule in abeyance? Is it a universal abeyance? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?

88

DP’s post here shows the dangers of:
[ul][li]a little knowledge, a very little knowledge[/li][li]basically not knowing what one’s talking about[/li][li]being a jackass[/li][li]being an ignorant bigot[/ul][/li]
Advice for the new year: Don’t be a DP.

89

I’ve asked about the language via PM, and have been told that the words “fuck off” are okay, whereas adding something like “and die” is a violation. Same with “fuck you.” The word fuck isn’t the issue, so much as the word following it, and it’s that word that makes it acceptable/verboten.

I’m not sure if I’m allowed to post the actual PM convo, but I will if it’s allowed, and people want to read it.

90

Jeez…and here I’ve been holding very justified FO’s to the Usual Suspects inside for years…

91

If you mean the direct written evidence of the specific actions of the Prophet, as in chronicles, it is more accurate to say there is very lintel evidence of the internal Arabian events.
This is not the same as “Islamic history” and is not true after the expansion outside of the Arabian peninsula.

But of course this is a complete non sequitur from what I wrote, perhaps due to you having a distorted idea of the sources of the Islamic history, and confusion about the statements applying to the first stages and particularly to the time of the Prophet and more general observation.

My comment that this non sequitur replies to was the observation that it is embarrassing to cite and to quote as your source of analysis a work more than 200 years out of date, in both its access to the sources and it’s method. This would be true as well for citing to Gibbon for the West but is doubly true for the East where Gibbon was never strong, not for the Byzantines and not for the Islamic empire.

In two centuries much more in the sources, the alternative texts and the tools for the cross comparison of both the textual sources and the non textual, including the physical as in the archaeological.

,
So, this claim is relevant to me why? I have never made any comment using the Quran as a historicaldirect record. I can only perceive this as a clumsy straw man smear attempt since

This is silly excuse making and an empty blanket assertion.

First, of course you are attempting to cover up your mistaken reaction to my comment, correct in fact, of Gibbon relying on limited secondary writing for his eastern/Islamic analysis, and having less sources as the Western historians of more than 200 years ago were in no way in good access either to the sophisticated linguistic understanding of the classical Islamic languages nor even the wide body of the sources - the Islamic and Mizrahi Jewish - that only really become available centuries later.

Second, I did not dismiss the old historical works, I commented that it is embarrassing to cite them as a direct source as you did, given a subject where they have been surpassed by centuries of further data and improved information. You erect a pure straw man.

At least I can see that your weak critical thinking is not limited to the drinking deeply and without thinking of the Russian dezinformatisia vodka.

Amusing and ironic comment.

92

Fuck off … all of you … just, fuck off

93

OK if I just fuck around?

94

Round, round, fuck around, I fuck around
Fuck around, WOO-OOO, I fuck around!

95

I recognize that, its the Bitch Boys, right? My parents had their records.

(That’s a plastic disk that plays music. No, not a CD, it’s even older!)

96

Don’t fuck around
Don’t fuck around
Don’t fuck around
Don’t fuck around
Don’t fuck around
Don’t fuck around
Don’t fuck around
With Billy, Billy
Billy the mountain

97

It’s indicative, Ramira, that you speak so authoritatively of Gibbon when you haven’t actually read his work. Bluff can carry you only so far. The historian was renowned for using primary sources, where available. As you know there are no primary sources for Mohammed’s life so historiographers turn to the oldest known sources. And by the way dismissing Gibbon as unimportant is akin to insisting the US faked the moon landing or that Islamic fundamentalists didn’t take down the twin towers, sc. you may certainly hold that position but you’ll be in the company of fools and charlatans if you do.

A tip for making your posts easier to read: try using elegant variation (look it up). With your limited vocabulary it may be difficult but it’s worth the effort. And, yes, I know that in your language I’d have much greater problems but then I wouldnt be foolish enough to argue with people in a language over which I had no great command.

Now the gadfly is dealt with let me return to Islam and its rival religions. I believe I left an alien up in the air (or lack of it) but I’ve decided that I do not need a dispassionate observer from another planet. I can fill that role adequately myself.

OK, let’s look at Islam and Christianity objectively. I gave Islam points for maintaining the purity of their doctrine. Now I have to take them back on another score, and that is the methods used by these religions to spread the word.

Early Christianity did it by persuasion, at least for the three first centuries. The word of Mohammed was spread by the scimitar and brute force. Now you may reply that the Christians had no choice as they had no power but this does not detract from the initial achievement. Points must be subtracted of course for the enthusiasm with which they took up the sword after their rulers converted, slaughtering pagans and fellow Christian ‘heretics’ in ways as cruel as they were inventive.

So kudos for early Christianity, black marks for early Islam and contrariwise black marks for later Christianity’s disgraceful intolerance and kudos for later Islam’s tolerance of other religions (up to a point).

Now let’s look at the differing state of the world in the times of Jesus and Mohammed. Jesus faced a Roman Empire at its most powerful and dominant. Even had he wanted to be a crusading warrior king he would have had no chance.

Had Mohammed been born at that time also and tried to lead his followers in a quest for religious empery over North Africa and Syria the Roman legions would have crushed them like ants. Islam would have died in its cradle.

But Mohammed was fortunate. In his time the Roman Empire was a shadow of its former self and its Byzantine rulers with few exceptions were cowardly and soft. (The Emperor Heraclius had a few notable victories but none of them had any effect on the path of history.) In Persia the powerful empire of the previous century, of Chosroes I and Chosroes II, was now languishing under the rule of Boran, the Queen-Regnant, and although at the first sign of approaching danger she was toppled to make room for Yezdegerd III that ruler was not made of the stuff of his mighty Sasanid forebears and the armies he commanded were not the armies which had made the Roman Empire tremble and had marched to the walls of Constantinople.

In short Persia too was weak and disunited. A century earlier either Chosroes would have chased the Arabs back into their deserts, powerfully chastised them and snuffed Islam out at its birth. Again, Mohammed was fortunate that he was born a century later.

So to a dispassionate observer it would seem that luck was the major factor in the rise of Islam. If it is replied by a Muslim that Allah created this ‘luck’ one might well concede that to be possible, were it not for the later course of history. Did Allah create the ‘luck’ that saw the Muslims eventually driven back by the majority Christian nations, their lands overrun, their empires toppled leading to their current position of surly underdogs to the overwhelming power of those nations?

A dispassionate observer might conclude that there was no god guiding Islam, nor Christianity for that matter, that these religions, as all religions, were the creation of human hands, and that like all such creations they were subject to the blind forces of time and place. It would be comforting to believe that mankind would eventually outgrow all superstitions, organized or otherwise, but, like the historian, I fear that when one system died another would always arise to take its place. My own personal conviction, shared of course before me by others, is that the fear of death lies at the root of all superstitious beliefs and until science can assist us with that, if it ever can, by such methods as uploading the mind to servers or creating artificial bodies which can be constantly replaced, the follies of religion will persist.

98

From the Washington Post on the latest terror attack on an Istanbul nightclub.

Congratulations to you, you terrorist piece of shit and all the others like you. You have made the simple statement that your god is great into a manic cry heralding pain, suffering and brutal death to completely innocent people. Do you shitheads really believe that your god will be proud of you? What the fuck sort of god do you bow down before? He sounds more like Moloch or Baal than Allah.

And yes, I know it’s the same cry that the Arab armies of Islam used when riding to the slaughter of whole cities but that was history. The world has moved on a little since then, asswipes. It’s called fucking progress. Human fucking decency. But you wouldn’t know anything about such concepts.

I am certainly not pinning your retarded deeds on the vast majority of your co-religionists. That would make me as dumb as you. But if you’re trying to persuade people that you are truly representative of your religion then you’re going the right way about it. And fuck you for that too.

99

Look up the term “Fuck off”. It basically means “get lost” or “Go away, boy, yah bother me!”

Here, from The Urban Dictionary:

fuck off
when someone is being bothered by another person and is starting to get really pissed off and wants them to just go away or shut up
Jon: Yo give me $2.50 for lunch, I have no money.
Chris: No
Jon: Please yo, don’t be a fag, I’m hungry
Chris: Fuck off Jon!

100

No one wondered about what the phrase means, you piece of fecal dandruff.