Islam not a true religion?

The Missing Link · 07-09-2005, 01:33 AM

While I was on vacation, I read the latest book to my favourite series: Shadow of the Giant, by Orson Scott Card. It's science-fiction, but this book is really a philosophical discussion that presents issues which merit a lot of consideration, especially after you put the book down. One such passage struck on me when I read it, and now after the London bombings, I'm re-examining it to see what truth, if any, it holds. Consider the argument that Virlomi presents here:

Quote:

"No one is faithful to God who has no choice[," Virlomi said. "]That is why Hindus are truly faithful, for they may choose not to be Hindus and no harm comes to them.
"And that is why there are no true Muslims in the world, because they may not choose to cease to be Muslims. If a Muslim tries to become a Hindu or a Christian or even a simple unbeliever, some fanatical Muslim will kill him.'"
..........................
"Islam is a religion that has no believers," she said. "Only people who are compelled to call themselves Muslims and live as Muslims under fear of death."
..........................
"My blessing above all blessings on Caliph Alai. O noble of heart, prove that I am wrong. Make Islam a true religion by giving freedom to all Muslims. Only when Muslims can choose not to be Muslims are there any Muslims on Earth. Set your people free to serve God instead of being captives of fear and hate..." (65-66)

Comments? Opinions?

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[ July 09, 2005, 01:35 AM: Message edited by: The Missing Link ]

Nick · 07-09-2005, 06:36 AM

You're kidding, right?

No, really, you think that's a valid point? Maybe if you viewed the entire Muslim religion as to being confined into areas like Afghanastan under the Taliban or in the current situation in Iran, it might have some sort of grounding in reality. Fact is that the same could be said of tthe vast majority of Christians in the US (though they won't get killed for turning away, they certainly face some sort of social problems due to it).

Going into the core premise of the argument (No one is faithful to God who has no choice), there is an inherant flaw to it. Every current major religion in the world (save to my lack of better knowledge Buddism)--meaning Christianity, Judeism, Islam, and Hinduu--were all spread by force. Every single one of them practiced some form of holy war and extermination of competitors. What you're seeing here in the west is the fundamental breakdown of Christianity due to political philosophies changing the way nations were run. Really, the shift from monarchy to liberal democracy (ed: liberal in this sense doesn't mean leftist) was the thing that actually allowed people to not be killed, tortured, or run off for their religious beliefs. You don't see that in the Muslim world as much due to much of it being in the developmental phase. Development combined with a shift to a liberal-democracy seems to fall into Aristotle's concept in Politics that only the top class in his ideal society could actually have political thought because they had the most leisure time. Western countries aren't worried about revolutions, famine, or any other calamity and can thus turn to matters like personal spirituality.

In short, the major issue is that the Muslim world for the most part isn't run by a secular state. Muslims in the US, UK, and France have no problem leaving their faith or converting to some other religion because they've lived in and experienced a secular society and education.

The Missing Link · 07-09-2005, 12:36 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by The Great Tyrant:
No, really, you think that's a valid point?

Quote:

Originally posted by The Missing Link:
I'm re-examining it to see what truth, if any, it holds.

The point is that I haven't given it serious thought yet, considering the fact that I really haven't had any free time to myself since... last night after getting back from vacation. I was merely saying that it's one of the more memorable quotes from the book.

I also should have given some sort of context from the book, because that would have grounded the argument in a little more detail. Since you bring up the point of there being two different worlds--those like the former Afghanistan and modern democracies, this referred to the "liberation" of India by a collective of countries (in the Middle East) called the Islam Alliance from Chinese control of the country. However, after this liberation, the Muslim military refused to leave the country. Also this piece was advertised as propoganda by Virlomi (an Indian) in order to force the Islamic Alliance's hand to show whether they were or were not indeed liberators or conquerors of the country.

So maybe my question is biased to the context, and a new question should be proposed. Is religion instituted by force really a religion at all?

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Dusty · 07-09-2005, 02:21 PM

^^I think it definitely is a valid argument, were TML to make it. Have you ever heard of Salman Rushdie? In his novel The Satanic Verses, he directly says "I have lost my faith in Islam" (paraphrase of course, Rushdie is rather longwinded). Consequently, a fatwa was issued against him by Iran, calling on all faithful Muslims to assassinate the writer. The threat was so real that Rushdie was forced to go underground--in London. That means that Muslims even in Western nations still face the same oppression from Islamic fundamentalism, and it's not confined to the Middle East. Granted, that's for a high(er)-profile figure, but that goes both ways; if extremists are able to defy or threaten to defy the protection offered by a nation as developed as Britain (viewed in the recent attacks), then the control they extend from their theocracies over the rest of the Islamic diaspora is even more palpable to the average Muslim.

I think your argument is partially flawed in the implicit connection between the (Catholic) church from the Middle Ages and the one existing today. There have been so many policy changes, many of which the late Pope presided over, that (though the philosophies established by St. Thomas Aquinas and others remain) it negates the implication that, if Islam is in fact not a true religion for Card's reasons, neither is Catholicism.

I of course can't speak on behalf of other religions, only hobble along and pretend I know what you mean. I'm not actually a Christian either, so I might be completely wrong.

(But when you say Jewish holy war, do you refer to Zionism?)

You seem to be following a bit of Positivism here in the implication that developed nations see an inevitable decay in the ranks of the faithful. I would suggest the U.S. as a counterexample, as some of the really, really creepily (to my Irish-Catholic sensibilities) zealous Protestant sects, like Baptist and Pentecostal, are swelling like leeches. However, it's true that this is mostly due to the massive influx of Central-to-South American immigrants; that is, Catholics coming from undeveloped countries to one where Catholicism itself is already on the wane, so that might abate in the next generation.

I think it's kind of funny, actually. Catholicism is declining in American because middle-class whites associate it too much with the worldwide church (in a word, condoms--we want em), and it's declining because Hispanic immigrants think it's strayed too far from the worldwide church.

Going with TML's more recent clarification, though, I've got to say no.

[ July 09, 2005, 05:22 PM: Message edited by: Dusty ]

Glyph Phoenix · 07-09-2005, 05:30 PM

It's not really about the religion itself. (Because there's too many damn ways to interpret things.) It's about the people. People who are forced into praying for or maybe even believing in a religion may not be real followers. But even if the religion has been forced on others (which nearly all of them have), if people really believe in it (on their own accord) it should count as a religion by this definition.

***CaptHayfever*** · 07-09-2005, 05:34 PM

Basically, Islam is a religion, but some of its official members do not truly believe in it.
Kinda like every other belief system in the world.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

**Dylan** · 07-09-2005, 05:44 PM

I think maybe that passage refers to the violent Muslim fanatics, or any other violent religiously-grounded fanatic, for that matter. It's not the religion that's killing people for their preferred faith, it's the fanatics.

~Dylan

Glyph Phoenix · 07-09-2005, 05:47 PM

Awesome. You guys said it with less parenthesis.

Nick · 07-09-2005, 07:24 PM

Timestamp check, glazed over that disclaimer. Sorry about that.

O. Scott Card is an interesting writer, but even putting it into context still means you're looking at a fictional world. Granted, its a better commentary on Islam than, say, the one presented by CS Lewis in (i think) A Horse and his boy in the Narnia series.

Looking at the rephrasement, you have to wonder (as pointed out by myself and someone else) if any religion is truly valid. Again, each religion is based on war, fear, forced conversion, or some combination of the above. Going by the "force doesn't equal valid," we're sitting on 2000+ years of religion established by rule of fear or force. While we technically have a "choice," (and that's even debatable), our ancestors surely didn't. Someone in the Massachusettes Bay colony could not say, "Yeah, that Puritan thing is full of crap," because they'd be burned at the stake or otherwise killed. Look at Spain during the unification. They killed everyone that wasn't Catholic and then used the spectre of genocide in the New World to convert the natives. When you look at it, there aren't any (again, maybe buddism) religions that aren't tainted by violence.

(Read the Old Testament, particularly during the exodus from Egypt and the reclaimation of the "promised land." While you may or may not prefer to believe in the whole "horns bringing down walls" and "power of god smiting thyne enemies" deal, there is archeological evidence of a Jewish conquest of the area).

When you look at the numbers, the extremist Christian movement still makes up under 15% of the total population. They just happen to have the loudest voices in most cases. You're not going to see a massive crowd of Joe Average Christians screaming and holding signs at <insert event here>.

Catholicism has a slew of problems, especially in the west, but that's another discussion.

Glyph's point brings us to the issue of "choice." Does a person growing up in Saudi Arabia have the same "choice" in religion as a person growing up in the States? Absolutely not. However, this isn't to say that the person in the Muslim world is forced into a mosque at gunpoint and forced to worship a religion that he truly doesn't believe in. The way its presented there isn't too far different as to how religion was presented in Europe before the coming of liberal-democracy. There is one right (Islam) and everything else is wrong, just as medeval Europe had the 'truth' (Christianity) and the heresey (everything else).

Erdawn Il Deus · 08-06-2005, 09:40 PM

Muslim fanatics are controlled by those who exploit faith as a means to some end and are probably unfaithful themselves.

Moving on, personally I think there is a problem on our shores as well. Catholicism is measured as like, the hugest widespread religion (christianity blah blah not making a line blah BLAH), but how many of the "surveyed" people were only Catholic by baptism and not by Faith? i think many. I grew up Catholic, am Catholic, but my beliefs are ridiculously un-catholic (not through apathy, just my own idea of God and Religion and Faith. But I reckon if I was surveyed on one of the fancy-shmacny computer-controlled pop-scans, I'd be labelled as a Catholic.

I think Catholicism is spread by habit and alienation more than by sheer faith (although there are plenty enough of those faithful). Course, I think most if not every one of us watched the Pope's Funeral in some way, but the Pope was respectable enough as a man as well as a Pope that he deserved it.

So yeah. My thoughts.

***CaptHayfever*** · 08-07-2005, 06:35 PM

....I actually didn't see any of the funeral.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

Glyph Phoenix · 08-07-2005, 11:19 PM

I wasn't even aware that he had a funeral. I mean, he died, so it stands to reason that he had a funeral, but I never heard of it until now.

07-09-2005, 06:36 AM	#2
Nick Banned Join Date: Dec 1969 Posts: 0 Thanks: 0 Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts Points: 10,973.00 Bank: 500.00 Total Points: 11,473.00 Donate	You're kidding, right? No, really, you think that's a valid point? Maybe if you viewed the entire Muslim religion as to being confined into areas like Afghanastan under the Taliban or in the current situation in Iran, it might have some sort of grounding in reality. Fact is that the same could be said of tthe vast majority of Christians in the US (though they won't get killed for turning away, they certainly face some sort of social problems due to it). Going into the core premise of the argument (No one is faithful to God who has no choice), there is an inherant flaw to it. Every current major religion in the world (save to my lack of better knowledge Buddism)--meaning Christianity, Judeism, Islam, and Hinduu--were all spread by force. Every single one of them practiced some form of holy war and extermination of competitors. What you're seeing here in the west is the fundamental breakdown of Christianity due to political philosophies changing the way nations were run. Really, the shift from monarchy to liberal democracy (ed: liberal in this sense doesn't mean leftist) was the thing that actually allowed people to not be killed, tortured, or run off for their religious beliefs. You don't see that in the Muslim world as much due to much of it being in the developmental phase. Development combined with a shift to a liberal-democracy seems to fall into Aristotle's concept in Politics that only the top class in his ideal society could actually have political thought because they had the most leisure time. Western countries aren't worried about revolutions, famine, or any other calamity and can thus turn to matters like personal spirituality. In short, the major issue is that the Muslim world for the most part isn't run by a secular state. Muslims in the US, UK, and France have no problem leaving their faith or converting to some other religion because they've lived in and experienced a secular society and education.

07-09-2005, 02:21 PM	#4
Dusty Junior Member Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Under your bed Posts: 205 Thanks: 0 Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts Points: 2,932.00 Bank: 500.00 Total Points: 3,432.00 Donate	^^I think it definitely is a valid argument, were TML to make it. Have you ever heard of Salman Rushdie? In his novel The Satanic Verses, he directly says "I have lost my faith in Islam" (paraphrase of course, Rushdie is rather longwinded). Consequently, a fatwa was issued against him by Iran, calling on all faithful Muslims to assassinate the writer. The threat was so real that Rushdie was forced to go underground--in London. That means that Muslims even in Western nations still face the same oppression from Islamic fundamentalism, and it's not confined to the Middle East. Granted, that's for a high(er)-profile figure, but that goes both ways; if extremists are able to defy or threaten to defy the protection offered by a nation as developed as Britain (viewed in the recent attacks), then the control they extend from their theocracies over the rest of the Islamic diaspora is even more palpable to the average Muslim. I think your argument is partially flawed in the implicit connection between the (Catholic) church from the Middle Ages and the one existing today. There have been so many policy changes, many of which the late Pope presided over, that (though the philosophies established by St. Thomas Aquinas and others remain) it negates the implication that, if Islam is in fact not a true religion for Card's reasons, neither is Catholicism. I of course can't speak on behalf of other religions, only hobble along and pretend I know what you mean. I'm not actually a Christian either, so I might be completely wrong. (But when you say Jewish holy war, do you refer to Zionism?) You seem to be following a bit of Positivism here in the implication that developed nations see an inevitable decay in the ranks of the faithful. I would suggest the U.S. as a counterexample, as some of the really, really creepily (to my Irish-Catholic sensibilities) zealous Protestant sects, like Baptist and Pentecostal, are swelling like leeches. However, it's true that this is mostly due to the massive influx of Central-to-South American immigrants; that is, Catholics coming from undeveloped countries to one where Catholicism itself is already on the wane, so that might abate in the next generation. I think it's kind of funny, actually. Catholicism is declining in American because middle-class whites associate it too much with the worldwide church (in a word, condoms--we want em), and it's declining because Hispanic immigrants think it's strayed too far from the worldwide church. Going with TML's more recent clarification, though, I've got to say no. [ July 09, 2005, 05:22 PM: Message edited by: Dusty ]

07-09-2005, 05:30 PM	#5
Glyph Phoenix Member Join Date: Jul 2004 Gender: Posts: 1,774 Thanks: 2 Thanked 1 Time in 1 Post Points: 7,039.00 Bank: 500.00 Total Points: 7,539.00 Donate	It's not really about the religion itself. (Because there's too many damn ways to interpret things.) It's about the people. People who are forced into praying for or maybe even believing in a religion may not be real followers. But even if the religion has been forced on others (which nearly all of them have), if people really believe in it (on their own accord) it should count as a religion by this definition.

07-09-2005, 05:34 PM	#6
*CaptHayfever* Smash Supermod Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: (n) - the place where I am Gender: Posts: 19,787 Thanks: 238 Thanked 943 Times in 574 Posts Points: 117,618.41 Bank: 1,847.49 Total Points: 119,465.90 Donate	Basically, Islam is a religion, but some of its official members do not truly believe in it. Kinda like every other belief system in the world. And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

07-09-2005, 05:44 PM	#7
Dylan Banned Mod Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: Teenage Wasteland Gender: Posts: 6,372 Thanks: 1,008 Thanked 1,006 Times in 461 Posts Points: 38,588.07 Bank: 0.00 Total Points: 38,588.07 Donate	I think maybe that passage refers to the violent Muslim fanatics, or any other violent religiously-grounded fanatic, for that matter. It's not the religion that's killing people for their preferred faith, it's the fanatics. ~Dylan

07-09-2005, 05:47 PM	#8
Glyph Phoenix Member Join Date: Jul 2004 Gender: Posts: 1,774 Thanks: 2 Thanked 1 Time in 1 Post Points: 7,039.00 Bank: 500.00 Total Points: 7,539.00 Donate	Awesome. You guys said it with less parenthesis.

07-09-2005, 07:24 PM	#9
Nick Banned Join Date: Dec 1969 Posts: 0 Thanks: 0 Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts Points: 10,973.00 Bank: 500.00 Total Points: 11,473.00 Donate	Timestamp check, glazed over that disclaimer. Sorry about that. O. Scott Card is an interesting writer, but even putting it into context still means you're looking at a fictional world. Granted, its a better commentary on Islam than, say, the one presented by CS Lewis in (i think) A Horse and his boy in the Narnia series. Looking at the rephrasement, you have to wonder (as pointed out by myself and someone else) if any religion is truly valid. Again, each religion is based on war, fear, forced conversion, or some combination of the above. Going by the "force doesn't equal valid," we're sitting on 2000+ years of religion established by rule of fear or force. While we technically have a "choice," (and that's even debatable), our ancestors surely didn't. Someone in the Massachusettes Bay colony could not say, "Yeah, that Puritan thing is full of crap," because they'd be burned at the stake or otherwise killed. Look at Spain during the unification. They killed everyone that wasn't Catholic and then used the spectre of genocide in the New World to convert the natives. When you look at it, there aren't any (again, maybe buddism) religions that aren't tainted by violence. (Read the Old Testament, particularly during the exodus from Egypt and the reclaimation of the "promised land." While you may or may not prefer to believe in the whole "horns bringing down walls" and "power of god smiting thyne enemies" deal, there is archeological evidence of a Jewish conquest of the area). When you look at the numbers, the extremist Christian movement still makes up under 15% of the total population. They just happen to have the loudest voices in most cases. You're not going to see a massive crowd of Joe Average Christians screaming and holding signs at <insert event here>. Catholicism has a slew of problems, especially in the west, but that's another discussion. Glyph's point brings us to the issue of "choice." Does a person growing up in Saudi Arabia have the same "choice" in religion as a person growing up in the States? Absolutely not. However, this isn't to say that the person in the Muslim world is forced into a mosque at gunpoint and forced to worship a religion that he truly doesn't believe in. The way its presented there isn't too far different as to how religion was presented in Europe before the coming of liberal-democracy. There is one right (Islam) and everything else is wrong, just as medeval Europe had the 'truth' (Christianity) and the heresey (everything else).

08-06-2005, 09:40 PM	#10
Erdawn Il Deus Senior Member Join Date: May 2003 Location: Threading the jeweled thrones of earth under my sandalled feet Gender: Posts: 2,990 Thanks: 4 Thanked 45 Times in 39 Posts Points: 23,721.11 Bank: 788.45 Total Points: 24,509.56 Donate	Muslim fanatics are controlled by those who exploit faith as a means to some end and are probably unfaithful themselves. Moving on, personally I think there is a problem on our shores as well. Catholicism is measured as like, the hugest widespread religion (christianity blah blah not making a line blah BLAH), but how many of the "surveyed" people were only Catholic by baptism and not by Faith? i think many. I grew up Catholic, am Catholic, but my beliefs are ridiculously un-catholic (not through apathy, just my own idea of God and Religion and Faith. But I reckon if I was surveyed on one of the fancy-shmacny computer-controlled pop-scans, I'd be labelled as a Catholic. I think Catholicism is spread by habit and alienation more than by sheer faith (although there are plenty enough of those faithful). Course, I think most if not every one of us watched the Pope's Funeral in some way, but the Pope was respectable enough as a man as well as a Pope that he deserved it. So yeah. My thoughts.

08-07-2005, 06:35 PM	#11
*CaptHayfever* Smash Supermod Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: (n) - the place where I am Gender: Posts: 19,787 Thanks: 238 Thanked 943 Times in 574 Posts Points: 117,618.41 Bank: 1,847.49 Total Points: 119,465.90 Donate	....I actually didn't see any of the funeral. And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

08-07-2005, 11:19 PM	#12
Glyph Phoenix Member Join Date: Jul 2004 Gender: Posts: 1,774 Thanks: 2 Thanked 1 Time in 1 Post Points: 7,039.00 Bank: 500.00 Total Points: 7,539.00 Donate	I wasn't even aware that he had a funeral. I mean, he died, so it stands to reason that he had a funeral, but I never heard of it until now.