Comments on: Pope Benedict’s speech: Reading & reactions

By: bmsharef

bmsharef — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 19:04:51 +0000

Hi all, The whole discussion is outrageous and turned around putting Muslims (the victims) on the defensive!. Why are we discussing legitimate Muslim resistance to Western aggression, conspiracies and meddling in Muslim affairs and ignoring the real evil, terrorism and violence practiced by the Christians, the Zionist Israelis as well as others in Palestine, the Philippines, Kashmir, Afghanistan, Chechnya, Bosnia, Somalia, Sudan and Iraq, to name a few places? Muslims are even robbed of the right to choose their own leaders and form of government! Puppet regimes are installed in every Muslim state from <country-region /><place />Morocco</place /></country-region /> and <country-region /><place />Tunisia</place /></country-region /> to <country-region /><place />Egypt</place /></country-region />, <country-region /><place />Jordan</place /></country-region />, <country-region /><place />Saudi Arabia</place /></country-region /> and all the way to <country-region /><place />Indonesia</place /></country-region /> and <country-region /><place />Malaysia</place /></country-region />!  Algerians elect Islamic-leaning individuals in municipality and local elections but the French rejected their choice and prompted their stooges in the Algerian military to stage a cop de Etas, that is supported by the U.S. and the Europeans, against a democratically elected president and cancelled the results of the elections! Similarly, the Palestinians elect Hamas as their government and the “Democratic” West does not respect their choice and slaps sanctions against the whole Palestinian population to starve them into submission! Christian, Jewish, Hindu and any violence and atrocities by non-Muslims committed against Muslims is not violence, however, Muslim resistance to such violence committed against them on their own homelands is violence. The latest example, after the conspiracy against <country-region /><place />Afghanistan</place /></country-region />’s Taliban, is being witnessed in <country-region /><place />Sudan</place /></country-region /> and <country-region /><place />Somalia</place /></country-region />. In Sudan, the West instigated and supported the Christian repels in the South led by Africa’s foremost terrorism, John Garang for many years to destabilize Sudan and divide it into a Muslim north and Christian south that is rich in oil. However, when they failed and the government of Sudan negotiated and signed a peace agreement with the SPLA, the U.S. and the Europeans created other repel factions and unleashed them against Muslims in the Dar Fur region, killing and destroying villages then claiming that the Janjaweed and the Sudanese government troops are behind this. It is a win-win situation for the West for the victim and the accused are both Muslims! The fact is, the Sudanese government and the volunteer Janjaweed militia are combating the repels in the Dar Fur region who are terrorizing the innocent population of Dar Fur. NATO forces invaded Somalia in 1991, toppled its government then left it in turmoil and actually supplied and supported some armed gangs to keep <country-region /><place />Somalia</place /></country-region /> lawless and unstable for the next 15 years! As soon as a group of patriotic Somalis was able to take control of most of Somalia and restore order, rule of law and peace to the country, the U.S. and its Western allies become alarmed and disturbed moving swiftly to accuse three individuals of the Islamic Courts of being  members of “al-Qaidah” and conspire with Ethiopia to invade Somalia and openly support such invasion. Why was the <country-region /><place />Iraq</place /></country-region /> invasion of <country-region /><place />Kuwait</place /></country-region /> illegal and the Ethiopian invasion of <country-region /><place />Somalia</place /></country-region /> legal? Who decides what is good and what is bad? Is it God’s justice or military might? For such reasons, Muslims must fight back and must not pay head to whatever labels Western media and government propaganda use against them.    Violence and injustice are trade marks of the Roman Europeans who engaged themselves in violent campaigns against other nations throughout history. The Romans invaded vast lands in the east and south, raping, selling and buying their women and making their men into slaves entertaining the European masters as gladiators killing each other! The history of <place />Europe</place /> is so bloody and full of violence and atrocities both against each other and against other nations. The Roman Europeans were the first to develop and use weapons of mass destruction. It was not Muslims who dropped the first Atomic bombs on the innocent populations of <city /><place />Hiroshima</place /></city /> and Najazaki! It was not Muslims who used chemical weapons and Napalm in <country-region /><place />Vietnam</place /></country-region /> and <country-region /><place />Korea</place /></country-region />! In what name did the British, the French, the Dutch, the Spaniards, the Italians, the Portuguese, and the rest of the European hordes descend on and occupy Africa, Asia and everything in between? In the name of religion (Christianity), in the name of Democracy, greed or all of those? The Italians invade and occupy Libya then massacres its people and commit all kinds of atrocities. Similarly, the French occupy <country-region /><place />Morocco</place /></country-region />, <country-region /><place />Algeria</place /></country-region /> and <country-region /><place />Tunisia</place /></country-region />, while the British occupy the rest of the Muslim world. What did these invading Europeans expect except that their aggression and violence would be met with legitimate resistance.   When the Muslims took <country-region /><place />Spain</place /></country-region />, they brought knowledge, science, justice and high morals with them and made <country-region /><place />Spain</place /></country-region /> (al-Andalus) the beacon of civilization which brought <place />Europe</place /> out of the Dark Ages. The Evangelical preachers, preach nothing but lies, deception and hate against Muslims. Muslims, however, only say about Christian and Jews what their creator (Allaah Almighty) and His Messenger have said about them nothing more. Please do yourselves a favor, get a copy of an authentic translation of the meanings of the Quraan and read.

By: Mahdy Hassan

Mahdy Hassan — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 19:44:38 +0000

Kinzi, please tell me, what do you think of “Omar Bin AlKhattab”?

By: Mahdy Hassan

Mahdy Hassan — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 19:33:52 +0000

Kinzi, we call the Jewish “The Prophets Killers” its
in known in our religion, and it’s written in all three resources…

And about insulting Christians in Masjids, it’s not true, I
pray for 20 years now, and the times I heard Imam talks bad about Christians
are countable on one hand fingers…

For more information about Omar in English see this one:
http://www.anwary-islam.com/companion/umar-bin-khatab.htm

By: Craig

Craig — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 18:49:29 +0000

Hi Tololy :)

I won’t argue most of the points you bring up as I think we agree in substance if not on the details.

But I have to dispute this one:At this point I have to contradict
you, I do expect the Pope of the Catholic Church, if nobody else, to adhere to historical
and religious accuracy when he is lecturing about my religion. I do expect
this, and I wonder why you don’t. If a person in that status does not use
accurate information in his speeches then, really now, I’ll leave the
prediction of consequences to your sane judgement.

Here is where I go back to an early
point I made. In Islamic history, as well as in the sequence of the revelation
of Quran, events either happened before Muslims moved to Medina
(which means they happened in Mecca), or after
they moved (which means they happened in Medina)
and Suras were either revealed in Mecca or Medina. This means it is
both historically and religiously incorrect to announce that this Aya was from
the “early period” when Islamic history and Quranic sequence, it was not.

Islamic History and Quranic History are both rooted in theology. And a theology the Pope does not subscribe to. Why would you expect him to use such references, rather than viewing the rise of the Prophet (in etrms of power and influence) from an objective outside perspective?

Think of it this way, since somebody brought up the Nazis in the newest thread. What was an early versus late period in the history of Nazi Germany? A Nazi would probably describe Hitler’s publication of Mein Kamph as the early period, slong with his steady rise to political power in Germany. And everything that happened after he became Chancellor (since at that point Nazi doctrine was supreme in Germany) as the late period. That’s because Nazism was an ideology so a NAzi would use idological references. But what would a Historian say? A Historain would probably say that the early period BEGAN wehn Hitler became Chancellor, and the late period began with Hitler’s alliance with Italy and Japan to form the Axis and his military takeover of Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East. That’s because a historian is not looking at the ideology, a historian is looking at actual events.

At this point I have to contradict
you, I do expect the Pope of the Catholic Church, if nobody else, to adhere to historical
and religious accuracy when he is lecturing about my religion. I do expect
this, and I wonder why you don’t. If a person in that status does not use
accurate information in his speeches then, really now, I’ll leave the
prediction of consequences to your sane judgement.

I hope you understand what I was saying in the above comment, because I think the Pope was using Historical references rather than idiological ones. To a non-muslim it really doesn’t look like Medina was a "late" period in the Propeht’s rise. It looks like an early period.

Anyway, thank you for the level headed explanation, Tololy. I do apprecaite it. I learned a few things from you and I don’t disagree with you as much as you may think :)

By: kinzi

kinzi — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 18:39:50 +0000

Mahdy, thank you for the suggested reading of Omar Bin Alkhattab. Is there an English translation?

Forgive me for pursuing, but which of the other three resources said that Christians killed their prophets and Jesus Christ himself? Certainly not Bukhari? Jesus Christ said that the Jews had killed all the prophets, but it was the Romans who crucified him at the request of the mob riled up by the Jews. It was by no means a Christian who killed the prophet Mohammad (pbuh), and this is the first I ever heard a Jew poisoned him.

And, I wanted to add that I hear the same thing from my neighborhood masjid that Hatem hears. Quite degrading and insulting things about my faith, and errors about what our doctrine states. Maybe he and I live in the same neighborhood. He is right, I’ve learned to live with it and move on; like Jesus said, turn the other cheek when one is slapped. But when I read things such as you have written, and XX above, I am compelled to comment.

For all the reasons I listed previously, I would trust Tololy’s advice as a well-informed. My perception of her level of personal integrity may be idealized compared to the years you have known her. Another reason is that I don’t feel Tololy has contempt for my faith, and doesn’t "feel sorry for my sins and ignorance", rather she is quite respectful and engaging. It is people like her I feel I can discuss differences with, which is perhaps the essense of the post… how can the Pope hope to have dialogue and engage Muslims honestly when he quotes such things?

By: Mahdy Hassan

Mahdy Hassan — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 15:55:32 +0000

How do you think that I found those three resources, Kinzi???
I made a research; of course… You won’t find anyone can say a word about these
three resources, you can ask any Muslim you want.

And about Tololy, I know her for 6 years now, and she knows what
I think of her. I didn’t mean Tololy namely, I meant anyone. How you can tell
that this person is a devout follower???

I’m not good in preaching, you are
right; after Mohammad (pray and peace upon him) my second ideal is Omar Bin
Alkhattab, a very strong character; you can just fail in love when you read
about these two persons…