We're not at war with Islam?

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Hobbes' Choice
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Hobbes' Choice »

Belinda wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 8:30 pm
Hobbes' Choice wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 5:30 pm
Boca wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 9:04 am

First, Islam isn't a religion like christinity, Islam is also ideology, lifestyle, social project, Science is no separate from Islam.
second, Islam from the beginning was promoting science, and never been anti like Christianity or any other religion, but since you have no knowledge of history of muslim civilization, you're babbling out of ignorance.
You are talking bollocks.
When I visited the local mosque, the young Muslim man who showed us round explained that Muslims believe that the world was made by Allah, and so it is reverence towards Allah's works that makes science appealing to Muslims. (Like the proof according to design). By contrast, there was an influence in the making of Christianity which actively disparaged the material in favour of the mental and spiritual, like what Nick is on about.
Nature is not designed.
Islam is not science. Everything it does flies against science.
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Seleucus
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Seleucus »

Boca wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 9:04 am
Hobbes' Choice wrote: Sun Sep 24, 2017 7:04 pm Lol.
That's why religions fought against every single step that science has made.
First, Islam isn't a religion like christinity, Islam is also ideology, lifestyle, social project, Science is no separate from Islam.
second, Islam from the beginning was promoting science, and never been anti like Christianity or any other religion, but since you have no knowledge of history of muslim civilization, you're babbling out of ignorance.
Maybe he doesn't know much about history of Islamic civilization? But I do, so let's unpack this topic a bit... It connects as well to the next points.
Boca wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 2:56 pmbut muslims are not in an ideal shape today.
Belinda wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 8:30 pmWhen I visited the local mosque, the young Muslim man who showed us round explained that Muslims believe that the world was made by Allah, and so it is reverence towards Allah's works that makes science appealing to Muslims. (Like the proof according to design). By contrast, there was an influence in the making of Christianity which actively disparaged the material in favour of the mental and spiritual, like what Nick is on about.
Hobbes' Choice wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 5:30 pmNature is not designed.
Islam is not science. Everything it does flies against science.
I see the story of Islam and science like this. Islam being the religion of illiterate caravan raiding pirates it obviously was not a juggernaut of science initially. But as Islam raped and pillaged its way across the Middle-East and North Africa it come into contact with much more advanced civilizations like the Greeks, the Persians and the Babylonians. Greek philosophy and Near Eastern wisdom obviously did not jive well with the simplistic superstitions of the Arabs who kept swarming up the warpath from what is today Yemen. At some points, particularly under Muawiyah I who established the Umayyads and Al-Mamun who ruled the Abbasids at their zenith during the so-called Islamic Golden Age, the non-Arab peoples of higher culture got the upper hand back. But at other times, the dark forces of ignorance and backwardness reigned as Arabs poured into the region, examples being the "rightly guided" caliphs or the anti-Mutazilite forces led by ibn Hanbal (today seen as the inspiration for Wahhabism) and Al-Qadir. Unfortunately the forces of ignorance won, the mostly Persian and Greek scholars of the Golden Age came to be seen as dissidents and the House of Wisdom fell into obscurity. By the end of the first millennium (AD) Islamic civilization was headed into darkness and decline. For wisdom there were a few results. (1) To some degree science and maths lived on the longest since they are culturally neutral and don't as obviously threaten Islamic mumbo jumbo the way Greek philosophy or theater do. (2) Islam shifted towards anti-rationalism so that "philosophers" like Al-Ghazali who championed irrationalism gained dominance and (3) reason and science were eventually overall rejected with people of wisdom and character leaving Islam for its mystical fringe, Sufism. So, while it is true that some medical and mathematical texts from the ancients made it back to Europe via Arabic, the revival of classical culture and wisdom that sparked the Renaissance owes its origins to Islam only in the sense that when the Muslims destroyed Constantinople, the Greeks fled as refugees, with their scholars and books to Italy. When we hear of the amazing science in the Quran, I for one am not overly amazed, the typical examples include the growth of the fetus which is seems impossible that a pastoral peoples wouldn't be aware of, the seeming reluctance to mix of river and sea water which sould have been obvious enough to the ancients one would think, and strangely, a scene where Solomon has a dialogue with ants. Since ants can't talk I have no idea why this verse gets often sighted as science in the Quran, though perhaps it is one of the nicer actually, St. Francis and Rama could talk to the animals as well.

You couldn't find a better short documentary on this topic than below, (final episode yet pending),

https://youtu.be/guYMAycJgYA
https://youtu.be/UUx9NzzTz-0
https://youtu.be/4YVxJoJUlss

By the way, I don't think all this has much to do with islam in the sense of Muhammad and the Quran and so on. Instead, I see it as the result of the Near East having been under imperial domination for literally five-thousand years; ever since Sargon one or another empirical dynasty ruled: the Babylonians, the Neo-Assyrians, the Achaemenids, the Seleucids, the Byzantines, the Ottomans, the French and so on. This drained the life and vigor out of the people turning them into rule-following zombies without more initiative or creativity. Islam is simply one chapter in a very long story of unfreedom and inequality.
Last edited by Seleucus on Wed Sep 27, 2017 3:49 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Seleucus
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Seleucus »

Belinda wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 8:00 pm Seleucus wrote:
I like to think that warrior culture and status of women can exist together; Sparta might be an example?
I simply don't know. I fancy that there would have to be effective contraception for women to be warriors. In times gone by I thought women were nearly always either pregnant or lactating.
I am so glad that you understand what I am talking about :)
What would be nice to believe is that there can be a vivacious and proud man, woman and for that matter trans without anyone's place having to be a zero-sum game against the others.
Are you an anthropologist, if it's not an impertinent question?
It's a weekend hobby. There's umpteen pre-Islamic temples to hunt down and explore in the country-side around where I live.
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Belinda »

Seleucus wrote:
Islam being the religion of illiterate caravan raiding pirates it obviously was not a juggernaut of science initially. But as Islam raped and pillaged its way across the Middle-East and North Africa it come into contact with much more advanced civilizations like the Greeks, the Persians and the Babylonians.
I like the attention to details of history, and the hard-headedness, which your potted history displays. I just want to rescue Muhammad's reputation if possible. Isn't it true the Muhammad was a fairly rich and accomplished trader who was accustomed to travelling far afield, and who learned beliefs other than his native beliefs from Arabia. Isn't it also true that Muhammad and his men raided other traders' caravans only because at that time his followers could not survive without so doing? I imagine that to be a successful trader one has to understand others' perspectives.

Boca had written:
First, Islam isn't a religion like christinity, Islam is also ideology, lifestyle, social project, Science is no separate from Islam.
What Boca wrote here chimes with what I have been told, that Islam(and Judaism) are unlike Christianity in that Islam and Judaism are religions of practice (praxis) whereas Christianity is a religion of belief. This boils down to if you are a good Muslim (or Jew) you do what is prescribed. If you are a good Christian you believe what is prescribed.
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Seleucus
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Seleucus »

Belinda wrote: Wed Sep 27, 2017 9:18 amIsn't it also true that Muhammad and his men raided other traders' caravans only because at that time his followers could not survive without so doing? I imagine that to be a successful trader one has to understand others' perspectives.
I expect it is a total lack of morality together with desert conditions making agricultural productivity impossible that is behind the Arabs being associated with thieving.
Belinda
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Belinda »

Seleucus wrote: Wed Sep 27, 2017 2:35 pm
Belinda wrote: Wed Sep 27, 2017 9:18 amIsn't it also true that Muhammad and his men raided other traders' caravans only because at that time his followers could not survive without so doing? I imagine that to be a successful trader one has to understand others' perspectives.
I expect it is a total lack of morality together with desert conditions making agricultural productivity impossible that is behind the Arabs being associated with thieving.
Then how is it that Muhammad who was an Arab wrote ('Received') a book that prescribes fairness and details of how to be fair in dealings with others.?

Isn't barley a successful crop in Arabia?

Seleucus wrote:
What would be nice to believe is that there can be a vivacious and proud man, woman and for that matter trans without anyone's place having to be a zero-sum game against the others.
Yes. But strict gender differentiation occurs in societies where warfare is endemic or frequent, such as tribal societies where there is an intertribal struggle for survival. The secret societies that initiate women, and men, into strict gender roles are necessary for perpetuating those roles around which the whole economy revolves.
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Seleucus
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Seleucus »

Belinda wrote: Wed Sep 27, 2017 6:36 pm
Seleucus wrote: Wed Sep 27, 2017 2:35 pm
Belinda wrote: Wed Sep 27, 2017 9:18 amIsn't it also true that Muhammad and his men raided other traders' caravans only because at that time his followers could not survive without so doing? I imagine that to be a successful trader one has to understand others' perspectives.
I expect it is a total lack of morality together with desert conditions making agricultural productivity impossible that is behind the Arabs being associated with thieving.
Then how is it that Muhammad who was an Arab wrote ('Received') a book that prescribes fairness and details of how to be fair in dealings with others.?

Isn't barley a successful crop in Arabia?
As far as I know barley was a staple in Mesopotamia in ancient times, grown via the network of canals coming off the Tigris and Euphrates. I understood that Arabia was the Arabian Desert since the end of the Ice Age. The peninsula was lush at that time, some identifying the Gishon of the Garden of Eden with one or another dry riverbed found there today. Saudi Arabia I recall reading imports 90% of their food these days.

Historically we know that Muhammad and his people were involved in raiding Arab Byzantine allies in the interior of the Levant, the Quran also describes caravan raiding and pillaging of villages. There is no way to justify it. Decent people work hard and produce from their land, and if they lack land they trade or seek employ. Compare the campaign of Alexander against the Persians which was in a sense justified because it was in defense against an anticipated third Persian Invasion of Greece. That's not the case with the Arab invasions which were acts of aggression.

But as I say above, the conversion of the Semites to Islam is not per say caused by the Quran and Muhammad but by (1) those people's dissatisfaction with control from Roman Europe and the (2) rejection by the Semites of Indo-European Christianity which is deeply pagan with its God having relations with a woman and then God coming into the world in the form of an avatar, Jesus. Such things are common in European paganism, but abhorrent to Semites who had long ago adopted a montheistic style central god, El, and whose culture had become rule-oriented after thousand of years of imperialism hence having no taste for "the Torah is fulfilled" and the only law is to love God and love your neighbor and the like. This is the Monophysite heresy. The Monophysite Christian Semites welcomed Islam as a religion compatible with their outlook, and the Arab invasion as an escape from Byzantine colonization.
What would be nice to believe is that there can be a vivacious and proud man, woman and for that matter trans without anyone's place having to be a zero-sum game against the others.
Yes. But strict gender differentiation occurs in societies where warfare is endemic or frequent, such as tribal societies where there is an intertribal struggle for survival. The secret societies that initiate women, and men, into strict gender roles are necessary for perpetuating those roles around which the whole economy revolves.
My take on this is like so: men who are only violent are brutes, men who are only gentle find themselves and their societies destroyed, a man must have both a violent and also a gentle side that he may nurture culture and enlightenment, and then be able to defend it.
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Belinda »

Seleucus wrote:
But as I say above, the conversion of the Semites to Islam is not per say caused by the Quran and Muhammad but by (1) those people's dissatisfaction with control from Roman Europe and the (2) rejection by the Semites of Indo-European Christianity which is deeply pagan with its God having relations with a woman and then God coming into the world in the form of an avatar, Jesus. Such things are common in European paganism, but abhorrent to Semites who had long ago adopted a montheistic style central god, El, and whose culture had become rule-oriented after thousand of years of imperialism hence having no taste for "the Torah is fulfilled" and the only law is to love God and love your neighbor and the like. This is the Monophysite heresy. The Monophysite Christian Semites welcomed Islam as a religion compatible with their outlook, and the Arab invasion as an escape from Byzantine colonization.
I am sorry but this it too dense for me. I even had to look up 'monophysite' for instance. And I was puzzled by your usage of 'pagan' which was originally a Roman term of abuse or so I thought.
Would it be possible for you and within the terms of the forum to make a new thread about ---- what would the title be? Maybe something like 'The Roots of Islam' ?
Boca
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Boca »

Belinda wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 8:30 pm
Hobbes' Choice wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 5:30 pm
You are talking bollocks.
When I visited the local mosque, the young Muslim man who showed us round explained that Muslims believe that the world was made by Allah, and so it is reverence towards Allah's works that makes science appealing to Muslims. (Like the proof according to design). By contrast, there was an influence in the making of Christianity which actively disparaged the material in favour of the mental and spiritual, like what Nick is on about.
So true, Islam is promoting science to learn God's universe so that believers keep on glorifying Almighty God with admiration.
but futile it is to explain this to atheists, because it's not their eyes which are blind, but their Hearts .
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Boca »

Harbal wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 8:40 pm
Boca wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 9:21 am We still eat during Ramadan,
I always suspected as much. Don't worry, I won't tell anybody. :wink:

God has created Earth to accommodate Humankind, and has created all sorts of provisions to feed Humans.
Maybe he did but you must have done something wrong to piss him off enough for him to ban you from eating bacon. Still, every cloud has a silver lining: more for the rest of us, yum.
Your low intellect isn't able to comprehend it.
It's good to know there are some advantages to being stupid.
anybody more stupid than you?? it's only from dawn to dusk, at other times, no prohibition.
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Harbal
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Harbal »

Boca wrote: Wed Oct 04, 2017 9:18 pm it's only from dawn to dusk,
You probably avoid it altogether then, you sound like something that is only active from dusk to dawn.
Belinda
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Belinda »

Boca wrote:
So true, Islam is promoting science to learn God's universe so that believers keep on glorifying Almighty God with admiration.
but futile it is to explain this to atheists, because it's not their eyes which are blind, but their Hearts .
Atheists are usually well aware of the power and beauty of the natural world. This is why I can sympathise with God-believers, that it is nice to be able to be thankful .

Does there have to be a supernatural object of worship?
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Seleucus
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Seleucus »

Fourth episode released, https://youtu.be/Ln13_9kO0II

If you are not aware of Al-Ghazali's work on The incoherence of the philosophers this is an especially important episode.
Belinda
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Belinda »

Seleucus wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2017 4:14 am Fourth episode released, https://youtu.be/Ln13_9kO0II

If you are not aware of Al-Ghazali's work on The incoherence of the philosophers this is an especially important episode.
This is popular historiography via a pretty and seductive video film play. As such it lacks seriousness because it lacks references to sources. The place of Islam in the modern world is too important a problem to be dealt with by popularised and inadequate words and pictures. I am sorry, Seleucus, I appreciate your effort to send the video, but it's not what I had in mind.

Actually the variety of comments after the video are slightly more enlightening despite that they are from self selected commentators.

______________________

A note to Boca.

There are some comedians who are Muslim and able to laugh at themselves.
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Re: We're not at war with Islam?

Post by Belinda »

Boca wrote:
if you're right, then explain what are the economic principles of Christianity ?
Among modern, liberal, Christians the economic principles are welfare socialist principles.

Among modern, right-wing , Christians the economic principles are capitalist principles that those believers legitimate partly by sentiments around rural feudal hierarchy, and partly by right-wing lies which aim to benefit the rich classes.

I see Islam as as possessing welfare standards which are as good as and more practical than those of Jesus. The bad side of Islam is that priests and holy books are more trusted than open-minded scepticism. Especially bad about Islam is that the Koran approves of killing outsiders, which the teaching of Jesus specifically condemns.

I understand that world of Islam includes scholars who modernise the precepts written in the Koran and for whom the gates of Ijtihad are not closed. Therein lies the hope for Muslims.
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