Saturday 27 February 2010

Illustrations and Examples of the Lack of Logic in Muslim Argumentation

How do Muslims engage in dialogue? Here are three excellent illustrations from the answeringmuslims.org blog; two by David Wood and one example from Fatman (I suggest the reader to read the illustrations in their full context from the that blog; but I am just fascinated how this illustrates so perfectly what we are dealing with and which I myself have experienced firsthand):

http://www.answeringmuslims.com/2010/02/on-proper-and-improper-use-of-extra.html


DIALOGUE #1
CHRISTIAN: The Qur'an says, "Fight those who do not believe" (9:29). This means that Muslims are supposed to fight unbelievers.
MUSLIM: No, it simply meant that one particular group of Muslims was supposed to fight a particular group of Christians that was attacking them at a particular time.
CHRISTIAN: That's not what it says at all.
MUSLIM: But that's what it means.
CHRISTIAN: Can you give me a Muslim source saying that?
MUSLIM: No, but that's what it means.
CHRISTIAN: Well, since you can't give any Muslim sources that agree with your interpretation, let me give you some commentaries that agree with my interpretation. Ibn Kathir says . . .
MUSLIM: Ibn Kathir! Who cares what Ibn Kathir or any other Muslim commentator says!
CHRISTIAN: It seems you don't want to listen to classical Muslim commentators because they say that "Fight those who do not believe" means "Fight those who do not believe."
MUSLIM: Enough of this paranoid, Islamophobic racism!

DIALOGUE #2
MUSLIM: Christianity is a religion of violence and bloodshed!
CHRISTIAN: Nonsense. Jesus said that we are to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us (Matthew 5:43-48). He said that His followers do not fight, because the Kingdom of God is not an earthly kingdom (John 18:36). When one of His followers used the sword, Jesus condemned the attack (Matthew 26:52). Paul said that we "do not war according to the flesh (2 Corinthians 10:3-4).
MUSLIM: Yes, but all of those verses mean the opposite of what they actually say. They really mean that Christians are to hate their enemies and that they are to spread Christianity through the sword.
CHRISTIAN: That's not what the verses say.
MUSLIM: But that's what they mean. And to show you that Christians are supposed to hate their enemies and spread Christianity through the sword, let me quote a Christian theologian from a thousand years after the New Testament was written.


The third illustration is from Fatman; I am not posting all of it here due to certain inapropriate wordings, but the full quote can be read on the answeringmuslim.com blogspot:

http://www.answeringmuslims.com/2010/02/on-proper-and-improper-use-of-extra.html



I once had the following conversation

Muslim: To understand the Quran
you need to use the Hadeeths, but only the hadeeths that agree with the Quran.

ME: Well how am I to know which hadeeths agree with the quran if the
hadeeths are to explain the quran in the first place?

Muslim: Well
that’s were the science of the hadeeths comes in, see we have Scholars, and they
are really smart they study the quran and hadeeths and they know which hadeeths
to use.

Me: Ok then here is what Ibn Ksthir says, or this scholar or
that scholar...

Muslim: Scholars? Those are only men, we don't accept
everything a scholar says only what the quran says....

Me: But wait you
just told me that to understand the quran I need to read the hadeeths but only
the hadeeths that agree with the quran. And to know which hadeeths agree with
the quran I need to read what the scholars say, but now you say scholars are
only men and you don’t listen to men but only the Quran...

Muslim: Yes
you see now you understand... (I'm not making that part up, he really thought I
was getting it and was really impressed started doing the whole MASHALLA thing.
I mean he got really exited)

Pause for laughter because it gets
better...

The Muslim then proceeded to read some verses in arabic... and
then he said...

Muslim: See how beautiful that is (Then he gave the
challange to produce something like it in arabic)

Me: I dont understand
arabic, or have any clue as to what you just said.

Muslim: That’s ok I
understand arabic and I will tell you what the quran says,,, YOU HAVE TO TRUST
ME. (And no I'm not making that part up either

It was at this point that
the conversation really went down hill, because I was unable to control my
laughter at this point.

He finally said...

"Why are you not a
muslim now? I have read for you lots of verses from the Allahs book in his won
language Arabic. You should be a Muslim by now."

Now keep in mind this
conversation started because I was invited by a woman who converted to islam. I
guess these are the arguments that swayed her to leave christ.

Finally
it broke down to the point, where he said I wasted his time, something about my
mother working in a brothel with my sister

I have to say I have had several similar experiences when talking to Muslims. I will never forget debating a Muslim on rape in Islam and quoting a number of passages from the Hadiths in which Muhammad literally permitted his soldiers to rape female war captives whose fathers, husbands, sons had been either killed or captivated; he responded that the text did not say 'rape' but simply that these soldiers of Islam intended to have sex with these women. He somehow assumed that these soldiers had a romantic relationship with these victims.

Now try to imagine the logic: the women have been captured, their familes killed or captured and their lives are devastated forever; are we correctly to assume that these women would fall in love with these terrorists upon the day of their devastation, I simply don't think so!

And even if such would be the case, it would suggest that Islam, the Qur'an and Muhammad (the prophet of Islam) legalised and encouraged immorality, promiscuity and sex prior or outside marriage. Well that ought not to surprise us since Muhammad and his followers originally engaged in the use of prostitutes through contemporary marriages, known as muta marriages (marriages for one or two nights by payment).

2 comments:

GreekAsianPanda said...

"I have to say I have had several similar experiences when talking to Muslims. I will never forget debating a Muslim on rape in Islam and quoting a number of passages from the Hadiths in which Muhammad literally permitted his soldiers to rape female war captives whose fathers, husbands, sons had been either killed or captivated; he responded that the text did not say 'rape' but simply that these soldiers of Islam intended to have sex with these women. He somehow assumed that these soldiers had a romantic relationship with these victims.
"Now try to imagine the logic: the women have been captured, their familes killed or captured and their lives are devastated forever; are we correctly to assume that these women would fall in love with these terrorists upon the day of their devastation, I simply don't think so!"

Regarding this: I saw something like this in the Bible, regarding captive women; Deuteronomy 21:10-14. I know that the Bible passage is about MARRYING a captive, and not rape, but usually when one marries another person they intend to have sex with them. And it doesn't appear that the woman has a choice, and surely she's devastated, too. Are you condemning our God?

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

I am not sure whether you fully understand the difference here.

In ancient eras, the army often consistent of virtually every man in the society. After a battle between to enemies almost the entire male force of the society might be annihilated. The remaining part consisted of the women and children. If the winning faction was wicked in its culture, such women were often raped, tortured or killed in slow and painful ways. If the society was slighly civilised such women were simply integrated into the society as household slaves, concubines or wives. Often female slaves ended up as concubines or wives. In this was the society also multiplied. This later conduct applied to the nation of Israel through the Mosaic Law.

Notice that in the Mosaic Law the rape of female prisoners is nowhere referred to. A Israel male might only engage in sex with a female captive after a lenghty procedure and marriage.

You may call this rape, however, you will then fail to consider the historical aspect. In today's Western society a women forced into marriage or having no choice but to marry and then engaging in sex with her husband would be outrageous, I agree, but the era of Moses and David is not the Western society twenty-first century.

A response and challenge to those who oppose the Christian faith.