Islam, What is it? Options

[Sparrowsmith]

Some people love you too much to hurt you
Some people love you too much to lie to you

If the truth would hurt, and two people who love you behave differently towards telling you the truth, which of them loves you more?
Love is FAR from an objective of universal force. Love is simply a projection of ourselves through empathy and desire
"I want this person to be happy, I will apply to them the principles that make me happy."
quite simple.

I have seen many people take contrasting approaches to love:
If you love them, let them go.
If you love them, hold them close.
If you love them, let them confront their fears
If you love them, keep them safe.

There is no directive or manual on how to live life, on how to love, or on how to be happy.

More importantly, if the islamic god (or any god for that matter) is a small part of an infinite thing, then why choose those words?
You can only choose a small portion of 'love' and what do we get?
MURDER, INCEST, RAPE, and, PEDOPHILIA

yeah, I understand the message or concept of a god, but religious texts are the exact opposite of the inferred meaning.
Furthermore, every single god ever created has always preached the same message at some point:
"Don't question things, knowledge is bad."

What kind of infinite being wants to minimize our potential? Only one that is actually finite, or created from a finite intelligence.
Just makes sense.

[seliphail]

tell me - which religion does this NOT describe
"I believe that an infinite Force exists, that i must be a good person, and that when i die i will be judged"

Catholicism and Hinduism, Mormonism, probably Islam.

In Catholicism, God isn't really a force at all, unless you're going to use Force in the most vague terms possible. There's absolutely nothing in Catholicism that says 'You must be a good person', because we believe in Free Will. You can do whatever the heck you want, we're just sure to know that certain actions have certain consequences. We believe we are 'judged' when we die, but it's much more complex than simply being judged, and additionally we don't fully die (souls and all that). On top fo that the resurrected body and soul thing sort of defies the definition of dying.

Hinduism the idea is to achieve Nirvana, pure spiritual essence (basically), not heaven, and not any form of god. Purely things that can be achieved through the human capacities with no assistance from the gods at all. The gods in Hinduism are there to explain things, but the message they teach is that through reincarnation you will eventually achieve spiritual bliss. There's nothing that says you have to be a good person, unless 'Good person' means meditating. They're actually never judged divinely.

Mormons believe that when they die they will become a sort of god in themselves because of their interpretation of the scriptures. They'll be judged in the sense that they will be rewarded for their efforts on Earth accordingly, but they don't believe in a hell so it isn't a judgement of damned or not like it is in Catholicism. Once again, there's nothing that says 'You must be a good person'. They say 'You must follow our laws', which vary from place to place and is at the discretion of their minister.

Islam has two basic schools of thought on the matter, one says being virtuous alone will grant you paradise, the other says only by following Allah's word will you achieve paradise. As soon as someone becomes a Muslim, you're saved and that's that. Everyone who's not goes to hell, everyone who is goes to heaven, pure and simple. There is no judgement because it's like having a pass to heaven or not. Obviously, they don't say 'You must be good', as you have the extremists who go around killing those who aren't Muslim.


There's alot more but I don't feel like going through them because I believe I've made my point.

yeah, I understand the message or concept of a god, but religious texts are the exact opposite of the inferred meaning.

Catholicism, again, is the opposite of what you said. The Bible (or any religious text I can think of, really) is not opposite to it's inferred meaning at all. The point of context has already been addressed, so find me a passage that says one thing but means another. Not two different passages, the same one.

Furthermore, every single god ever created has always preached the same message at some point:
"Don't question things, knowledge is bad."

No, not really. Catholicism, again, teaches that knowledge is what we should all be striving for, because it increases our knowledge of God (for various reasons I won't bother to explain). Hinduism is the same way, knowledge isn't bad, they just don't really care about some knowledge because it doesn't affect their spiritual lives.

I'm a little confused as to why you would say that in a thread on Islam, because it's already been mentioned that we owe much of our language and mathematics to Islam. Two of the most key points in modern civilization came from a place who's lives day in and day out were religion.

What kind of infinite being wants to minimize our potential? Only one that is actually finite, or created from a finite intelligence.
Just makes sense.

You're making very large leaps in logic and leaving holes wide enough to fit a hippo through. None of us can begin to fathom what an infinite being thinks, wants, or desires, because my physical standards we are finite beings. So first off you can't assume anything along those lines.
Secondly, you're assuming that these beings are controlling and corrupted like almost every politician today who wants to keep his or her power intact, which is not the case for 90% of gods.
Thirdly, a finite intelligence cannot create an infinite being as something cannot come from nothing (as proven by philosophers over the centuries). To say that a finite being created an infinite being is almost akin to saying a spec of dirt created the universe exactly how it is, and even that is an unfair comparison. How can a finite being create something(infinite being) that is beyond anything they can even begin to fathom?

This post has been edited by seliphail: Dec 27 2010, 01:58 PM

[Sparrowsmith]

tell me - which religion does this NOT describe
"I believe that an infinite Force exists, that i must be a good person, and that when i die i will be judged"

Catholicism and Hinduism, Mormonism, probably Islam.

In Catholicism, God isn't really a force at all, unless you're going to use Force in the most vague terms possible. There's absolutely nothing in Catholicism that says 'You must be a good person', because we believe in Free Will. You can do whatever the heck you want, we're just sure to know that certain actions have certain consequences. We believe we are 'judged' when we die, but it's much more complex than simply being judged, and additionally we don't fully die (souls and all that). On top fo that the resurrected body and soul thing sort of defies the definition of dying.

Hinduism the idea is to achieve Nirvana, pure spiritual essence (basically), not heaven, and not any form of god. Purely things that can be achieved through the human capacities with no assistance from the gods at all. The gods in Hinduism are there to explain things, but the message they teach is that through reincarnation you will eventually achieve spiritual bliss. There's nothing that says you have to be a good person, unless 'Good person' means meditating. They're actually never judged divinely.

Mormons believe that when they die they will become a sort of god in themselves because of their interpretation of the scriptures. They'll be judged in the sense that they will be rewarded for their efforts on Earth accordingly, but they don't believe in a hell so it isn't a judgement of damned or not like it is in Catholicism. Once again, there's nothing that says 'You must be a good person'. They say 'You must follow our laws', which vary from place to place and is at the discretion of their minister.

Islam has two basic schools of thought on the matter, one says being virtuous alone will grant you paradise, the other says only by following Allah's word will you achieve paradise. As soon as someone becomes a Muslim, you're saved and that's that. Everyone who's not goes to hell, everyone who is goes to heaven, pure and simple. There is no judgement because it's like having a pass to heaven or not. Obviously, they don't say 'You must be good', as you have the extremists who go around killing those who aren't Muslim.


There's alot more but I don't feel like going through them because I believe I've made my point.

yeah, I understand the message or concept of a god, but religious texts are the exact opposite of the inferred meaning.

Catholicism, again, is the opposite of what you said. The Bible (or any religious text I can think of, really) is not opposite to it's inferred meaning at all. The point of context has already been addressed, so find me a passage that says one thing but means another. Not two different passages, the same one.

Furthermore, every single god ever created has always preached the same message at some point:
"Don't question things, knowledge is bad."

No, not really. Catholicism, again, teaches that knowledge is what we should all be striving for, because it increases our knowledge of God (for various reasons I won't bother to explain). Hinduism is the same way, knowledge isn't bad, they just don't really care about some knowledge because it doesn't affect their spiritual lives.

I'm a little confused as to why you would say that in a thread on Islam, because it's already been mentioned that we owe much of our language and mathematics to Islam. Two of the most key points in modern civilization came from a place who's lives day in and day out were religion.

What kind of infinite being wants to minimize our potential? Only one that is actually finite, or created from a finite intelligence.
Just makes sense.

You're making very large leaps in logic and leaving holes wide enough to fit a hippo through. None of us can begin to fathom what an infinite being thinks, wants, or desires, because my physical standards we are finite beings. So first off you can't assume anything along those lines.
Secondly, you're assuming that these beings are controlling and corrupted like almost every politician today who wants to keep his or her power intact, which is not the case for 90% of gods.
Thirdly, a finite intelligence cannot create an infinite being as something cannot come from nothing (as proven by philosophers over the centuries). To say that a finite being created an infinite being is almost akin to saying a spec of dirt created the universe exactly how it is, and even that is an unfair comparison. How can a finite being create something(infinite being) that is beyond anything they can even begin to fathom?

First off, creation is different to manufacturing. A finite being can create an infinite being simply by saying it exists. That's what I meant.
If I want to manipulate you, I may create a reason for you to do so through lying.
What I don't want you to do is question the lie, this is why most liars keep their stories very superficial, this way they avoid committing to any specific event or time.
[In the beginning]
when was the beginning?
[created light]
what cause the light?

Superficial

The 'leaps of logic' are much smaller leaps than the leap of logic any religion takes in assuming that a being came from no where, created everything from nothing, and then the coup de grace (for christianity at least) made woman out of a rub, because god had run out of nothing...

That's irrelevant though. You issued me a challenge.
you must understand that it is almost impossible for a single sentence to be self contradictory, except a paradox. I was of course referring to paragraphs that are close together...

Anyway. Seeing as words can rarely lie, I will settle for an EVENT.
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/temple.html
who lies?
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/words.html
how are people judged?
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/withme.html
"He that is not with me is against me"
I find this interesting as the inferred meaning is 'he that is not by my side is in my way' but really it's a confusion of 'with me' meaning 'for me' and 'not with me' meaning 'against me'. But really, this is a generalisation. There are those who do not know, and thus cannot be against him. The sentence is too dramatic to be meaningful. It is a message of fear.
"Get with me, or get out of my way!" would be the one way to interpret it.

And the once peaceful message turns to violence. Jesus, a man incapable of ill will, has shown violence.
"He that is not with me is against me"
Same counts for the contrary.
"Unless they stand in our way, they stand by our side."
it's a threat to those who would stand against them

Christianity is an aggressive religion, but this is a MASSIVE tangent.

Islam:
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/contra/cando.html
Allah can do all things.
If Allah can do all things, he can make a rock that he cannot lift. If Allah can do all things, he can lift that rock.
Self contradictory. Nothing can do anything. Fact.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/co...tians_hell.html
also, check the bottom two for this. Just three verses apart...


Islam did bring about MANY scientific discoveries, but then always justified those discoveries through the quran (and still does). Further though, Islam primarily brought about discoveries that did not contradict belief. This is why the western world overtook the Islamic world, because of the renaissance, a time when discovery became worshipped above god's.
Age of enlightenment.
Or something like that.


Knowledge is fine, but skepticism is not. Believe what you're told. Research implies ambiguity or doubt: skepticism.
discovery means nothing, anyone can discover anything. The problem lies in frequency of success. The rationalist approach to science and philosophy is to sit down and think.
And think
and think.

It produces results, but also crazy theories (flat earth, etc)

Empiricism on the other hand is all about the evidence, and is much less likely to produce crazy theories.
Science uses this method today and produces more discoveries faster than Islam previously did. 90% of modern scientists are atheists.
Their pursuit of knowledge is often scoffed at as 'playing god'.

The more ridiculous the religion, the more questions are punished. Scientology is the best physical example of this.
I digress.

Islam is outdated, Rationalism had its time and nearly stuck us in the dark ages forever. Now is the time for Empiricism, which does more, faster.

[theBreadSultan]

ah but sparrow - you judge Love by what actions it drives people to.

there will be a million and one conflicting actions based on Love.

im talking about the Concept of Love

work your two people (truth and lie) backwards

"Why did you lie to her / tell her the truth"

"because i love her"

So i would argue that two completely conflicting actions having the exact same root cause -shows how universal Love is.

equally universal - Hate, Fear etc.

but Love has something special - because Love somehow enables us to do wonderful things - and it is a most positive vibe, most likely to create other positive vibes, be it hope, happiness, fulfilment, purpose etc. (bah hippy talk)

======
@ seli - and just quickly

OBVIOUSLY i am using the most vague and generic terms

catholics, hindus, AND mormens

can ALL have their religions summed up with the sentence i gave

there is no religion where all are treated equal upon death - thus all are judged
in every religion all must be "good" - as determined by that religion
there is no religion without some "Force" - be it god, the wheel of life etc

again using VERY generic definitions here
yet this applies to every religion there has ever been.

and yea - have to agree with sparrow,
didn't the apple give adam and eve forbiden knowledge?
speaking of which didn't most of the demons and evil things such as vampires etc come from adams first wife Lilith?

after all EVE was adams 3rd wife was he not?

BAH i digress -

as i said its all the same -

NO ONE IS A BIG SQUARE WITH A SINGLE DOT

STUPID GOD HAS 6 DOTS EVERYONE KNOWS THAT

NEY I TELL YOU HE IS OF THE TRINITY THE SQUARE OF GOD HAS 3 DOT

or perhaps little "flatlanders" (2 dimentional creatures)
you are seeing different sides of the same god (a dice) however as you are limited to such a small number of dimensions, you cannot even begin to conceive what god (or a dice) really is,

if God exists in 12 dimentions, how can we understand it - if we can only understand (at best) 10 dimensions?

[Sparrowsmith]

while we're off on a tangent (and I do hope we can get back on soon) love is a reason then.
"Why did you kill her?"
"Because I love her"
works, according to your theory. In fact.
"Why did you kill her?"
"Because I love her/Because I hate her/Because I fear her/Because I didn't care for her"

It all works.
An explanation is not universal.
"Why did you run over my kid?"
"I was speeding and didn't see him."
"Why were you speeding?"
"I was in a hurry."
"Why were you in a hurry."
"My wife was in labour and I had to get her to a hospital."
"why do you care if your wife gets to a hospital in time.?"
"Because I love her"

A child's death is the result of love.
How universal is that?
If he truly loved her he would of made sure she was within range of an ambulance in the days leading up to her labour, and furthermore he wouldn't have put her life in danger by speeding.
Love is not universal, the man was just an idiot in my example.
Stupidity =/= love


Love is not an emotion, it is an action.
Emotions are subjective, but actions are objective. Actions happen. Actions definitely happen.

[seliphail]

I'll get this out of the way immediately instead of quoting and taking up more space: You did not give me an example that, in the same passage, there was a contradiction in the saying and the meaning. You gave examples of where there are word for word contradictions, but they were all in different contexts. As we've already said, context means alot.

First off, creation is different to manufacturing. A finite being can create an infinite being simply by saying it exists. That's what I meant.
If I want to manipulate you, I may create a reason for you to do so through lying.
What I don't want you to do is question the lie, this is why most liars keep their stories very superficial, this way they avoid committing to any specific event or time.

However, you're still making the assumption that this infinite being wants to lie to us, which defies logic in that an infinite being would have no reason to lie to us.
Also consider that an infinite being would be the infinity of every thing, as is self-evident from the title. Evil, as it is understood to be, is the lack of good as Darkness is the lack of Light. Shadows do not exist, they are defined as the lack of light. Cold is the absence of heat, as absolute zero, the coldest possible temperature, is defined as a complete and utter lack of heat. A hole is an absence of dirt, the list goes on and on. An infinite being would only possess those qualities we as humans hold to be 'good'. With an infinite amount of light, there is no darkness, infinite amount of love, no malice. If not a, then b. Always a, therefore never b.
With that in mind, it's not that this infinite being won't lie to us, it becomes a fact that it cannot lie to us, as that would mean it is not infinite.

[In the beginning]
when was the beginning?
[created light]
what cause the light?

The 'leaps of logic' are much smaller leaps than the leap of logic any religion takes in assuming that a being came from no where, created everything from nothing, and then the coup de grace (for christianity at least) made woman out of a rub, because god had run out of nothing...

Yes, I lumped them together cause I read over things individually. lol

Context, I've already addressed this as have others. Genesis was written wayyyyy after the events happened, and they were written to the people of the time. To say 'The uncaused cause used prime matter to form the organism that would eventually evolve into the beings you are now' to people 6 or 7 thousand years ago would have meant absolutely nothing to them. It'd be like talking Differential Equations being used to compute the size of the universe and from that the rate of expansion to a first grader. That's cruel, if anything, to say 'This is salvation, but I'm not going to let you understand it.' Cruelty, as already addressed, is not possible for this infinite being.

Going off of Aristotle again (though he sort of stole it), there exists an Uncaused Cause. That is: Everything has a cause. Meaning, your parents caused you, their parents caused them, etc. etc. etc. evolution, etc. etc., Big Bang. Even if you are going to go with the multiverse theory and the Big Bang Collapse Hypothesis it all has to have started somewhere, something has to have caused it. But then, what caused that cause? The only possible answer derived purely from logic is that there is something that is outside of our time-space that caused the Big Bang (or whatever creation theory you wanna swing with).

From that, Aristotle also says that each and every event is evidence for God's existence, but that's out of my area of expertise as I'm not an Aristotlian Philosopher.

Islam did bring about MANY scientific discoveries, but then always justified those discoveries through the quran (and still does). Further though, Islam primarily brought about discoveries that did not contradict belief. This is why the western world overtook the Islamic world, because of the renaissance, a time when discovery became worshipped above god's.
Age of enlightenment.
Or something like that.

Islam is perhaps the only reason we are here. There is literally no hard science that doesn't use the mathematics brought about by their religion. Islam by extension has caused literally -every- advance in technology since it's time.

The renaissance was a revitalization of art and culture, not of technology and science. Renaissance is French for 'Rebirth' or 'Reborn'. It was focused on the rediscovery and implementation of the arts, all of which were originally pointed towards praising their particular religious deity.

Knowledge is fine, but skepticism is not. Believe what you're told. Research implies ambiguity or doubt: skepticism.
discovery means nothing, anyone can discover anything. The problem lies in frequency of success. The rationalist approach to science and philosophy is to sit down and think.
And think
and think.

It produces results, but also crazy theories (flat earth, etc)

The philosophy part of thinking is again what caused literally all of civilization. It turned out some weird theories because that was the most advanced technology they had at that time. Back then, it was the philosophers who theorized the atom, and even the sub-atom. With today's technology, we have confirmed the atom, and we're pretty darn sure about the sub-atom. With only action man stays within it's boundaries. Theoretical [subject] is using what they know and trying to discover more things, but they are all theorized and thought about.

Empiricism on the other hand is all about the evidence, and is much less likely to produce crazy theories.
Science uses this method today and produces more discoveries faster than Islam previously did. 90% of modern scientists are atheists.
Their pursuit of knowledge is often scoffed at as 'playing god'.

The more ridiculous the religion, the more questions are punished. Scientology is the best physical example of this.
I digress.

Islam is outdated, Rationalism had its time and nearly stuck us in the dark ages forever. Now is the time for Empiricism, which does more, faster.

Technology is also vastly superior to that of Islam. If you threw the genius' of the world together from birth and taught them only what was known back in the day they wouldn't have come up with what Islam developed over the centuries.
The next point is that there really is no evidence. Science can 'prove' scientific facts, but even the most anti-religious scientist will have to agree that science can only say 'This is the result of observation to this point'. There is absolutely no indication that things will be the same as they are now next year, tomorrow, in two minutes. Science is the study of creation, but it can't prove anything.

No, the pursuit of knowledge isn't scoffed off as 'Playing god'. It's encouraged within the Churches. It's scoffed to be playing god when they are trying desperately to create things that simply cannot be created. That's when it's scoffed off as playing god, because of the uncaused cause and all of that.

Rationalism is the only way we are where we are, and it's what holds everything together. Take that out, and everything we know falls apart.

there is no religion where all are treated equal upon death - thus all are judged

To judge is to make a decision on one's fate. Many religions believe that there is no judgement, meaning absolutely nothing decides what happens to them. Hinduism, and actually many branches of Protestantism says that there is only heaven and no hell because of God's eternal Love, Mercy, and so on. So actually, around 30% of the world's religion says there is no judgement.

in every religion all must be "good" - as determined by that religion

Not true. Hinduism again, nothing is good. Satanism, the idea is actually to be bad. Unless you're defining 'good' as whatever they tell you to do. In which case yes, you're right. Following that logic, every single couple that has ever existed is committing incest as we are all descended from the same gene of the first humans.

there is no religion without some "Force" - be it god, the wheel of life etc

Of course not. That isn't dependent on religion, though. There is no... Anything, without force. Refer to Aristotle's Cause Argument above. There has to be force of some sort.

after all EVE was adams 3rd wife was he not?

Depends on what religion you're referring to, actually. lol. Catholicism, the source of the Bible, Eve was his first wife. Of course, we have VERY specific definitions of what a marriage is, so that's kinda different.

you are seeing different sides of the same god (a dice) however as you are limited to such a small number of dimensions, you cannot even begin to conceive what god (or a dice) really is,

What you've described is more accurately named 'Truth', but you're right. Meaning, It's true that 2+2=4. I see it in English as two, Spanish sees it as dos, Japanese sees it as Ni. Seeing as whichever god you'd like to believe in is Truth, you're right.

[Sparrowsmith]

Of course god would not lie, god cannot lie.
But a man can, and a man invented god.

Furthermore, 'eat of the tree of knowledge, and thou shall surely die in the same day' was a lie.
But that was probably a metaphor...

Anyway, you begin every premise of your arguments with:
God exist, god is good.
Now prove both.
This is impossible. Please, try to do one at a time.
You can prove that god MAY exist, but you'll find that he's not good at all (genocide. Lots of genocide) or you can prove he is good, much like Santa Claus, and find that he probably doesn't exist (what with the genocide and all)

Also, multiple times in the bible God experiences grief or remorse or guilt. Perfect beings cannot experience guilt because they are incapable of malice and incapable of being wrong.
QED

You realise that no paragraph will ever contradict itself. I showed you passages from the same writer and of the passages right next to each other. Context does not change within a passage.
Furthermore, rules like 'thou shalt not lie' are broken in the thousands by god's most precious followers.

You would do well to study every absurdity and contradiction that the website offers BEFORE jumping to conclusions.
As for rationalism being effective, it is very effective. But Empiricism has done more.

[seliphail]

Of course god would not lie, god cannot lie.
But a man can, and a man invented god.

But then, who created man? Refer again to the first cause argument. Regardless of if man created their idea of this first cause, it does exist beyond man's acceptance of it.

Furthermore, 'eat of the tree of knowledge, and thou shall surely die in the same day' was a lie.
But that was probably a metaphor...

Context, again. Man was a much more perfect being then as compared to now. By disobeying God and allowing pride to get the better of him, man killed himself by introducing sin into God's creation (the world). The passage didn't lie, it requires one to consider alternative perspectives besides one's own.

God exist, god is good.
Now prove both.
This is impossible. Please, try to do one at a time.
You can prove that god MAY exist, but you'll find that he's not good at all (genocide. Lots of genocide) or you can prove he is good, much like Santa Claus, and find that he probably doesn't exist (what with the genocide and all)

You completely ignored the First Cause argument. It a completely valid argument that has been tried for centuries but holds true.

Something does exist that caused all of this, there is no other explination, period. It isn't a 'may' it's a MUST.
A = Cause, B = Creation.
Creation requires a cause.
Therefore, if not A, then not B.
Ergo, B, therefore A.
Therefore, A is true.

Perfectly valid logic and a sound argument to which there is no counterargument.

I also stated how an infinite being possess all 'good' qualities, otherwise it would not be infinite and thus not the first cause.

Genocide is a production of human weakness and malice, not God's. We all have Free Will, and we can do with it what we please. If God stopped us form doing things, that's no longer free will, is it? That's allowing us to do what we want so long as it's within a little circle in the sand. However, that's not the case.

I showed you passages from the same writer and of the passages right next to each other. Context does not change within a passage.

Which ones? I saw different books from the bible, in some cases different authors giving different words to different people. Of course I may not have looked closely enough, hence my request for affirmation.

Also, multiple times in the bible God experiences grief or remorse or guilt. Perfect beings cannot experience guilt because they are incapable of malice and incapable of being wrong.

Guilt is a negative things because...? One can feel guilty for doing the right thing.
Also, God cannot 'experience' these things as He does not have a body with which to experience them with, otherwise He would have to exist on a physical plane which would also mean he cannot be the first cause as it has to exist outside of our space-time.

You would do well to study every absurdity and contradiction that the website offers BEFORE jumping to conclusions.

Likewise for you and the bible. Almost everything I've heard of so far in terms of countering Christian arguments or against religion have been from very uninformed points of views on the subject. I've done my best to avoid topics that I know little about (such as the 'God is the cause of everything' argument) and I've made sure to point out that I don't know too much about it.

As for rationalism being effective, it is very effective. But Empiricism has done more.

Empiricism exists because of rationalism. Rationalism is what holds modern thought together. Rationalism provided the glue to make the house frame, and now empiricism is putting up walls and a roof, but take away the frame and it all comes crashing down.

[Sparrowsmith]

[I'm going to post this in the religious thread instead. Got a bit off topic. I'll leave some parts that are somewhat relevant]

You rely on the causation argument too heavily and ignore its most obvious flaw: where to draw the line.

Most atheists draw it at the big bang theory, some go further. Theists draw it at god.
But why draw it there?
Why say god is infinite?
What if god is almost infinite, and is actually made by the fusion of two prior slightly less infinite beings?
Or half a very infinite one?
Hell, what does infinite even mean?

the entire causation argument rests on the simple fact that infinity is impossible, so nothing can cause everything in infinite regression, therefore at least one thing happened all of its own accord.
If infinity is possible, then all things have a cause and it just regresses infinitely. No god.
If infinity is impossible then, again, god need not exist.

Most importantly, even if a god CAN exist, that doesn't mean one does. Maybe the answer is much simpler and fits with science, we just don't know yet.
There are some things we will never know, that doesn't mean you can fill in the gaps with anything that fits your fancy.
I'm not trying to be aggressive, and we're going somewhat off topic (though this does apply to Islam) but your making scientific arguments for the belief of a god that violates science.

Genocide is a production of human weakness and malice, not God's. We all have Free Will, and we can do with it what we please. If God stopped us form doing things, that's no longer free will, is it? That's allowing us to do what we want so long as it's within a little circle in the sand. However, that's not the case.

no, god committed genocide multiple times in the bible, have you read it?
He does it even more in the quran.

anyway, back to Islam...

[amaro57]

I won't reply to everything I have read, but...well:

First of all, why are you referring to a Skeptics website for facts?? I'd prefer places that have scholars that translate the MEANING of the Qur'an, as the Qur'an itself cannot be translated due to the language it's written in, such as the USC.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/contra/cando.html
6:100-101
"Yet they ... impute falsely, without knowledge, sons and daughters unto Him. ... The Originator of the heavens and the earth! How can He have a child?"

This is not the full translation and poorly pointed. It is not the translation of BOTH Ayat.

006.100
YUSUFALI: Yet they make the Jinns equals with Allah, though Allah did create the Jinns; and they falsely, having no knowledge, attribute to Him sons and daughters. Praise and glory be to Him! (for He is) above what they attribute to Him!
PICKTHAL: Yet they ascribe as partners unto Him the jinn, although He did create them, and impute falsely, without knowledge, sons and daughters unto Him. Glorified be He and High Exalted above (all) that they ascribe (unto Him).
SHAKIR: And they make the jinn associates with Allah, while He created them, and they falsely attribute to Him sons and daughters without knowledge; glory be to Him, and highly exalted is He above what they ascribe (to Him).

006.101
YUSUFALI: To Him is due the primal origin of the heavens and the earth: How can He have a son when He hath no consort? He created all things, and He hath full knowledge of all things.
PICKTHAL: The Originator of the heavens and the earth! How can He have a child, when there is for Him no consort, when He created all things and is Aware of all things?
SHAKIR: Wonderful Originator of the heavens and the earth! How could He have a son when He has no consort, and He (Himself) created everything, and He is the Knower of all things.

Self explanatory I'm sure.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/co...tians_hell.html
3:85
Whoso seeketh as religion other than the Surrender (to Allah) it will not be accepted from him, and he will be a loser in the Hereafter.

Alright, good enough. The problem here is the mistake to think "the Surrender (to Allah)", is Islam. Yes Islam can be translated into surrender, to believe in Allah. But here's a fun fact: Christians believe in a god, so do Jewish people, and others. What mainly differs Islam from other religions is that Christians believe that God has a son, and Jewish believe they are God's only chosen people. We all believe in a god. The people who do not believe in a god are those who are being referred to in this Ayaa.

5:72
They surely disbelieve who say: Lo! Allah is the Messiah, son of Mary. ... Lo! whoso ascribeth partners unto Allah, for him Allah hath forbidden paradise. His abode is the Fire. For evil-doers there will be no helpers.

People who say "Lo! Allah is the Messiah, son of Mary." are more or less claiming that God IS the messiah and that Mary IS God's mother!? Islam does not ascribe a single partner with Allah. Those are the ones who enter hellfire, not Christians who say that God has a son.

Of course god would not lie, god cannot lie.
But a man can, and a man invented god.

Furthermore, 'eat of the tree of knowledge, and thou shall surely die in the same day' was a lie.
But that was probably a metaphor...

Anyway, you begin every premise of your arguments with:
God exist, god is good.
Now prove both.
This is impossible. Please, try to do one at a time.
You can prove that god MAY exist, but you'll find that he's not good at all (genocide. Lots of genocide) or you can prove he is good, much like Santa Claus, and find that he probably doesn't exist (what with the genocide and all)

Also, multiple times in the bible God experiences grief or remorse or guilt. Perfect beings cannot experience guilt because they are incapable of malice and incapable of being wrong.
QED

You realise that no paragraph will ever contradict itself. I showed you passages from the same writer and of the passages right next to each other. Context does not change within a passage.
Furthermore, rules like 'thou shalt not lie' are broken in the thousands by god's most precious followers.

You would do well to study every absurdity and contradiction that the website offers BEFORE jumping to conclusions.
As for rationalism being effective, it is very effective. But Empiricism has done more.

So your saying that man also wrote the books? Sure man can lie about miracles and such, but the Qur'an is also proof that nothing like it could have been "made up". So you can't really say that man lies about God when God mentions himself in the Qur'an and other books.

Why are you bringing up the Bible in an Islamic debate? Allah made man, and he will judge each man he has created. Why he created us and is testing us, who knows but him? So why should he feel guilt if something happens (due to him?) to particular people if God already knows everything about his creation and each creations judgement? (Talking from an Islamic perspective here.)

Also, lies are a sin. We get bad deeds from doing them hence why Allah tells us not to lie. Simple as that.

[I'm going to post this in the religious thread instead. Got a bit off topic. I'll leave some parts that are somewhat relevant]

You rely on the causation argument too heavily and ignore its most obvious flaw: where to draw the line.

Most atheists draw it at the big bang theory, some go further. Theists draw it at god.
But why draw it there?
Why say god is infinite?
What if god is almost infinite, and is actually made by the fusion of two prior slightly less infinite beings?
Or half a very infinite one?
Hell, what does infinite even mean?

the entire causation argument rests on the simple fact that infinity is impossible, so nothing can cause everything in infinite regression, therefore at least one thing happened all of its own accord.
If infinity is possible, then all things have a cause and it just regresses infinitely. No god.
If infinity is impossible then, again, god need not exist.

Most importantly, even if a god CAN exist, that doesn't mean one does. Maybe the answer is much simpler and fits with science, we just don't know yet.
There are some things we will never know, that doesn't mean you can fill in the gaps with anything that fits your fancy.
I'm not trying to be aggressive, and we're going somewhat off topic (though this does apply to Islam) but your making scientific arguments for the belief of a god that violates science.

Genocide is a production of human weakness and malice, not God's. We all have Free Will, and we can do with it what we please. If God stopped us form doing things, that's no longer free will, is it? That's allowing us to do what we want so long as it's within a little circle in the sand. However, that's not the case.

no, god committed genocide multiple times in the bible, have you read it?
He does it even more in the quran.

anyway, back to Islam...

The Infinite theory of yours is interesting, I'll admit. I'll leave it be since it's a whole other subject on its own.

I really don't like the way you refer to it as "genocide". If a man kills another then sure, refer to it as genocide. If the people are Allah's creations, he knows everything about them, and he will punish them for valid reasons, aka we are his, he can do what he wants with us. I won't go into much detail, there's an object which we refer to (roughly translated) as "the Preserved Board" (Al-Louh Al-Mahfoud). In it is written everything from the beginning of this world, until its end, as it will happen. I misunderstood this concept at first thinking that everybody's fate is predetermined and we have no control over what will happen to us. That's wrong. We all decide what we shall do, Allah just knows what we shall do before we actually do it.

Example]
It's written on the Board that on XXX day I shall not pray Fajir. That doesn't mean that it was determined that I would not pray, but known that I wouldn't. Since we are Allah's creations, he knows us and what we will do before we do it. If I DO pray Fajir on that particular day due to a change of heart, it would've been written as so.

Anyways, since Allah knew there would be no salvation for some people, such as the people of (3ad/Aad), he punished them with winds. The reason he sent prophets is for the people that he knew would believe, to be given the opportunity to change. People who wouldn't believe and hurt the Prophets/Messengers like the Pharaoh would be punished.

Islam, outdated? I have never heard anybody refer to the biggest religion as such. Could some of the discoveries made today been made if not for the basis from Islam? Alright, most scientists are Atheist. But Islam (mostly the Qur'an) has stated things that Atheists are learning today due to the modern technology we have. We didn't have that back then. Just because they disregard religious factors doesn't mean the method is more effective. Even if they're discovering things faster, what are the scale of these "things"? I doubt they're as big some things Islam has stated beforehand.

Last thing, why would Allah even create a rock he couldn't move? What's the whole point of it?

*Waits for Sparrow* Cause dang I feel too serious in the serious dis-... oh.

[Sparrowsmith]

I won't reply to everything I have read, but...well:

First of all, why are you referring to a Skeptics website for facts?? I'd prefer places that have scholars that translate the MEANING of the Qur'an, as the Qur'an itself cannot be translated due to the language it's written in, such as the USC.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/contra/cando.html
6:100-101
"Yet they ... impute falsely, without knowledge, sons and daughters unto Him. ... The Originator of the heavens and the earth! How can He have a child?"

This is not the full translation and poorly pointed. It is not the translation of BOTH Ayat.

006.100
YUSUFALI: Yet they make the Jinns equals with Allah, though Allah did create the Jinns; and they falsely, having no knowledge, attribute to Him sons and daughters. Praise and glory be to Him! (for He is) above what they attribute to Him!
PICKTHAL: Yet they ascribe as partners unto Him the jinn, although He did create them, and impute falsely, without knowledge, sons and daughters unto Him. Glorified be He and High Exalted above (all) that they ascribe (unto Him).
SHAKIR: And they make the jinn associates with Allah, while He created them, and they falsely attribute to Him sons and daughters without knowledge; glory be to Him, and highly exalted is He above what they ascribe (to Him).

006.101
YUSUFALI: To Him is due the primal origin of the heavens and the earth: How can He have a son when He hath no consort? He created all things, and He hath full knowledge of all things.
PICKTHAL: The Originator of the heavens and the earth! How can He have a child, when there is for Him no consort, when He created all things and is Aware of all things?
SHAKIR: Wonderful Originator of the heavens and the earth! How could He have a son when He has no consort, and He (Himself) created everything, and He is the Knower of all things.

Self explanatory I'm sure.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/co...tians_hell.html
3:85
Whoso seeketh as religion other than the Surrender (to Allah) it will not be accepted from him, and he will be a loser in the Hereafter.

Alright, good enough. The problem here is the mistake to think "the Surrender (to Allah)", is Islam. Yes Islam can be translated into surrender, to believe in Allah. But here's a fun fact: Christians believe in a god, so do Jewish people, and others. What mainly differs Islam from other religions is that Christians believe that God has a son, and Jewish believe they are God's only chosen people. We all believe in a god. The people who do not believe in a god are those who are being referred to in this Ayaa.

No, notice the 'religion other than'.
Atheism is not a religion, and there are few religions without a god of some form or another, it would be meaningless to write something like that.

5:72
They surely disbelieve who say: Lo! Allah is the Messiah, son of Mary. ... Lo! whoso ascribeth partners unto Allah, for him Allah hath forbidden paradise. His abode is the Fire. For evil-doers there will be no helpers.

People who say "Lo! Allah is the Messiah, son of Mary." are more or less claiming that God IS the messiah and that Mary IS God's mother!? Islam does not ascribe a single partner with Allah. Those are the ones who enter hellfire, not Christians who say that God has a son.

Of course god would not lie, god cannot lie.
But a man can, and a man invented god.

Furthermore, 'eat of the tree of knowledge, and thou shall surely die in the same day' was a lie.
But that was probably a metaphor...

Anyway, you begin every premise of your arguments with:
God exist, god is good.
Now prove both.
This is impossible. Please, try to do one at a time.
You can prove that god MAY exist, but you'll find that he's not good at all (genocide. Lots of genocide) or you can prove he is good, much like Santa Claus, and find that he probably doesn't exist (what with the genocide and all)

Also, multiple times in the bible God experiences grief or remorse or guilt. Perfect beings cannot experience guilt because they are incapable of malice and incapable of being wrong.
QED

You realise that no paragraph will ever contradict itself. I showed you passages from the same writer and of the passages right next to each other. Context does not change within a passage.
Furthermore, rules like 'thou shalt not lie' are broken in the thousands by god's most precious followers.

You would do well to study every absurdity and contradiction that the website offers BEFORE jumping to conclusions.
As for rationalism being effective, it is very effective. But Empiricism has done more.

So your saying that man also wrote the books? Sure man can lie about miracles and such, but the Qur'an is also proof that nothing like it could have been "made up". So you can't really say that man lies about God when God mentions himself in the Qur'an and other books.

Of course it could be made up, saying that it's true within the books doesn't make it true. The Qur'an is nothing special at all. I've read several parts of it and it's the same old rubbish I could have made up when I was twelve. I mean no offense, of course, but the plot, the messages, and the morals are all incredibly putrid. And these were quotes I was given by muslims, and very intelligent ones at that.
Furthermore, almost all religious texts have originated in the middle east one after another after another. Of course he is mentioned in multiple different books, it's part of a series on god.
It's like saying Harry Potter must be real because he exists in multiple books.
Same author, doesn't count.
No, if some random Japanese island had written of Allah, that would make me believe, but instead they believe in shinto. I guess god/allah doesn't have time to spread the good word outside of the middle east.
What a shame.

Why are you bringing up the Bible in an Islamic debate? Allah made man, and he will judge each man he has created. Why he created us and is testing us, who knows but him? So why should he feel guilt if something happens (due to him?) to particular people if God already knows everything about his creation and each creations judgement? (Talking from an Islamic perspective here.)

Also, lies are a sin. We get bad deeds from doing them hence why Allah tells us not to lie. Simple as that.

The bible was a little derailment that happens in serious discussion a lot when a bible thread does not exist, I set one up to get rid of this problem. Job done.
However, I've read sections of the bible where god feels grief. It's written clear as day that he regrets his actions. I haven't read enough of the Qur'an to do the same, but I'd bet money that Allah regrets as well.

Also, lying isn't always wrong. This is easy to see.

[I'm going to post this in the religious thread instead. Got a bit off topic. I'll leave some parts that are somewhat relevant]

You rely on the causation argument too heavily and ignore its most obvious flaw: where to draw the line.

Most atheists draw it at the big bang theory, some go further. Theists draw it at god.
But why draw it there?
Why say god is infinite?
What if god is almost infinite, and is actually made by the fusion of two prior slightly less infinite beings?
Or half a very infinite one?
Hell, what does infinite even mean?

the entire causation argument rests on the simple fact that infinity is impossible, so nothing can cause everything in infinite regression, therefore at least one thing happened all of its own accord.
If infinity is possible, then all things have a cause and it just regresses infinitely. No god.
If infinity is impossible then, again, god need not exist.

Most importantly, even if a god CAN exist, that doesn't mean one does. Maybe the answer is much simpler and fits with science, we just don't know yet.
There are some things we will never know, that doesn't mean you can fill in the gaps with anything that fits your fancy.
I'm not trying to be aggressive, and we're going somewhat off topic (though this does apply to Islam) but your making scientific arguments for the belief of a god that violates science.

Genocide is a production of human weakness and malice, not God's. We all have Free Will, and we can do with it what we please. If God stopped us form doing things, that's no longer free will, is it? That's allowing us to do what we want so long as it's within a little circle in the sand. However, that's not the case.

no, god committed genocide multiple times in the bible, have you read it?
He does it even more in the quran.

anyway, back to Islam...

The Infinite theory of yours is interesting, I'll admit. I'll leave it be since it's a whole other subject on its own.

I really don't like the way you refer to it as "genocide". If a man kills another then sure, refer to it as genocide. If the people are Allah's creations, he knows everything about them, and he will punish them for valid reasons, aka we are his, he can do what he wants with us. I won't go into much detail, there's an object which we refer to (roughly translated) as "the Preserved Board" (Al-Louh Al-Mahfoud). In it is written everything from the beginning of this world, until its end, as it will happen. I misunderstood this concept at first thinking that everybody's fate is predetermined and we have no control over what will happen to us. That's wrong. We all decide what we shall do, Allah just knows what we shall do before we actually do it.

Example]
It's written on the Board that on XXX day I shall not pray Fajir. That doesn't mean that it was determined that I would not pray, but known that I wouldn't. Since we are Allah's creations, he knows us and what we will do before we do it. If I DO pray Fajir on that particular day due to a change of heart, it would've been written as so.

Anyways, since Allah knew there would be no salvation for some people, such as the people of (3ad/Aad), he punished them with winds. The reason he sent prophets is for the people that he knew would believe, to be given the opportunity to change. People who wouldn't believe and hurt the Prophets/Messengers like the Pharaoh would be punished.

no. If a man kills another, it is murder. If a man kills another because of their race, it's a hate crime.
If a man kills many in an attempt to stamp out that race (tribal war) then it is genocide.
If Allah kills all those people, it's still genocide.

No one gets to pick and choose who lives and who dies, not even a god. I'll explain with utilitarianism.
Every time you kill someone, you increase the fear of everyone else that they are going to die as well. Killing as punishment is the ultimate wrong, because punishment should be instilled to teach someone a lesson. You cannot kill one person to teach another the lesson, it's sick and violates free will. Killing someone else to teach the rest of us a lesson increases that fear even more than someone just being killed, because now people we care about may be killed because of something we do, or worse yet we may be killed for something a stranger does.
Slowly, the ball is now rolling. With so much fear over the lifespan that is remaining, the life becomes not worth living. A life lived in fear is not a real life. Furthermore, the death penalty has NEVER reduced crime. So killing criminals (or the loved ones of criminals) reaps no benefit whatsoever other than self indulgence and revenge.
Ultimately and eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, consumed with fear, and stabbing into the dark.

No one gets to choose who lives and who dies. Not unless a good can come of it, and no good ever comes from killing as punishment.
Also, if everything is predetermined then why does Allah show anger? This yet again killing out of punishment and is, of course, unjustified ever for a god.

Gods are the imaginary friends that cut off the bully's head in the playground. It's all fine and dandy until that god tells you to pick up the knife and do it yourself next time.

[amaro57]

No, notice the 'religion other than'.
Atheism is not a religion, and there are few religions without a god of some form or another, it would be meaningless to write something like that.

Islam, Christianity, and Judaism were, more or less, the same message revealed at different times. The reason to begin a new religion is due to the old religion becoming corrupted by man. By messages, I mean the books. All Messengers are Prophets but not all Prophets are Messengers. Atheism is generally no religion at all, and if Allah exists, I'm pretty sure those who didn't believe in the "true" God would be punished regardless. So Muslims, Christians, and Jewish believe in the same God in a sense. If any other religion believes in a God, it's either not the same, or the religion is to disfigured than the above three to be accepted.

Of course it could be made up, saying that it's true within the books doesn't make it true. The Qur'an is nothing special at all. I've read several parts of it and it's the same old rubbish I could have made up when I was twelve. I mean no offense, of course, but the plot, the messages, and the morals are all incredibly putrid. And these were quotes I was given by muslims, and very intelligent ones at that.
Furthermore, almost all religious texts have originated in the middle east one after another after another. Of course he is mentioned in multiple different books, it's part of a series on god.
It's like saying Harry Potter must be real because he exists in multiple books.
Same author, doesn't count.
No, if some random Japanese island had written of Allah, that would make me believe, but instead they believe in shinto. I guess god/allah doesn't have time to spread the good word outside of the middle east.
What a shame.

I'm pretty sure history and scholars have proven it COULDN'T have been made up. I'm also sure the Qur'an isn't a pleasure storybook to read and get fun unique morals from. Have you read the Qur'an in Arabic? Have you read past the stories? Are you telling me that the biological/geographical/etc science given to us is stuff you could have made up when you were twelve? The stories are to educate us on some of the Prophets, their lives, what they were put through. Give us a religion without information like that and people would start to get serious doubts. Most of the messages were released in the Middle East due to a very special bloodline. We call our Prophet Abraham the "Father of all Prophets". Heck all of the Main Figures from Christianity and Judaism which are Moses and Jesus are sons (not directly) of Abraham. All of the Prophets who received the messages (books) were his decedents and were in the Middle East I suppose at that time. Have you also read how the Prophets spread Islam outside of the Middle East? To Rome and other places? Allah gives Messengers and Prophets Islam, they spread it under his protection.

The bible was a little derailment that happens in serious discussion a lot when a bible thread does not exist, I set one up to get rid of this problem. Job done.
However, I've read sections of the bible where god feels grief. It's written clear as day that he regrets his actions. I haven't read enough of the Qur'an to do the same, but I'd bet money that Allah regrets as well.

Also, lying isn't always wrong. This is easy to see.

It would be illogical for Allah/God to regret any action of his. If he does something he can very easily undo it. I'd say get ready to pay up, so far from the people I've asked, nobody recalls anything of the sort.

Of course Lying isn't always wrong. It depends on your intention.

no. If a man kills another, it is murder. If a man kills another because of their race, it's a hate crime.
If a man kills many in an attempt to stamp out that race (tribal war) then it is genocide.
If Allah kills all those people, it's still genocide.

No one gets to pick and choose who lives and who dies, not even a god. I'll explain with utilitarianism.
Every time you kill someone, you increase the fear of everyone else that they are going to die as well. Killing as punishment is the ultimate wrong, because punishment should be instilled to teach someone a lesson. You cannot kill one person to teach another the lesson, it's sick and violates free will. Killing someone else to teach the rest of us a lesson increases that fear even more than someone just being killed, because now people we care about may be killed because of something we do, or worse yet we may be killed for something a stranger does.
Slowly, the ball is now rolling. With so much fear over the lifespan that is remaining, the life becomes not worth living. A life lived in fear is not a real life. Furthermore, the death penalty has NEVER reduced crime. So killing criminals (or the loved ones of criminals) reaps no benefit whatsoever other than self indulgence and revenge.
Ultimately and eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, consumed with fear, and stabbing into the dark.

No one gets to choose who lives and who dies. Not unless a good can come of it, and no good ever comes from killing as punishment.
Also, if everything is predetermined then why does Allah show anger? This yet again killing out of punishment and is, of course, unjustified ever for a god.

Gods are the imaginary friends that cut off the bully's head in the playground. It's all fine and dandy until that god tells you to pick up the knife and do it yourself next time. sleep.gif

How do you know punishment from Allah is a form of Anger always? People are given a chance more than once, they choose punishment. People who are corrupt are sent Prophets. Understand the Prophets listed in the Qur'an are only few of all the Prophets and possibly Messengers in history. The Prophets speak to the people, give them the true message of Allah, and urge them to convert. Prophets are usually someone in the community/whatever that is chosen. Would you want to see your friends and possibly your family suffer punishment from a dissatisfied God? Races punished by Allah like Aad and Thamoud were very very corrupt in terms of morale and behavior. The People turn down the message a first time, making fun of the Prophet, shunning him, and refusing to convert. Warnings of Allah's punishment revealed to the Prophet (Which he usually informs the people of) start to appear. Races dismiss them as mere changes in the weather and such, they finally realize it's true and start to retaliate as told in the stories, but it's too late.

The Roman Empire for example wasn't threatened by divine punishment in any way. It was left, it was not corrupt, but it's religion was. That's why after Islam grew strong, it tried to spread the religion to Rome and far other places. Some ambassadors returned messages of great hostility and some waged war at the Prophet for daring to try to change their religion. There is no divine punishment anymore, as there are no Prophets after Muhammad. The world is slowly going bad again as the fear and belief in people lessens. Allah doesn't "pick" who dies. He gives those who will corrupt the future chances. Not just one. Enlighten yourself, stop the terrible things your doing, or face punishment. You'll be used as an example for the future generations to see of the result of stubbornness even when something is staring at you right in the face, or you'll be used as an example for the future generations to see that sensible living and morals lead to prosperity in this life and Allah is most Merciful.

To put it basically, if your a thief who keeps stealing very valuable items, your going to get caught. Sure not everybody gets caught, but I'm sure we all know that Allah knows everything. You can't hide from him at all. You got picked in the Top Ten list to stand trial since your actions were the most extreme of the rest, you can either pay your time in Jail, or you can stubbornly insist that your innocent and face your death on the guillotine. Those are basically the races that got wiped since like I said, they were the most corrupt.

Allah doesn't want us to fear everything in our lives. He wants us to fear HIM. It's what stops true Muslims from committing sins. The fear of disobeying Allah. The fear of doing against what He laid out for us in the Qur'an or doing what he warned us of. The fear of what He might do to us in the hereafter. That's what we should fear, it a much, much bigger threat than a execution judgment from a courtroom. It's the fear of that getting executed usually means you did something very bad, it's only going to get worse later on. (When I say bad, I mean a big sin, not some minor sin or mistake.)

---------

On a completely different note, we're God's creations, he should be able to do whatever he wants from us. If God does get Angry, then he could wipe out people just based on his anger or "emotions". In Islam, we believe that Allah is merciful, he gives chances, he doesn't get angry at anybody if they did anything wrong, he gets dissatisfied that they don't believe in him. People who don't believe in Allah might still lead happy prosper lives in this world. The afterlife is another story,

[Sparrowsmith]

No, notice the 'religion other than'.
Atheism is not a religion, and there are few religions without a god of some form or another, it would be meaningless to write something like that.

Islam, Christianity, and Judaism were, more or less, the same message revealed at different times. The reason to begin a new religion is due to the old religion becoming corrupted by man. By messages, I mean the books. All Messengers are Prophets but not all Prophets are Messengers. Atheism is generally no religion at all, and if Allah exists, I'm pretty sure those who didn't believe in the "true" God would be punished regardless. So Muslims, Christians, and Jewish believe in the same God in a sense. If any other religion believes in a God, it's either not the same, or the religion is to disfigured than the above three to be accepted.

Of course it could be made up, saying that it's true within the books doesn't make it true. The Qur'an is nothing special at all. I've read several parts of it and it's the same old rubbish I could have made up when I was twelve. I mean no offense, of course, but the plot, the messages, and the morals are all incredibly putrid. And these were quotes I was given by muslims, and very intelligent ones at that.
Furthermore, almost all religious texts have originated in the middle east one after another after another. Of course he is mentioned in multiple different books, it's part of a series on god.
It's like saying Harry Potter must be real because he exists in multiple books.
Same author, doesn't count.
No, if some random Japanese island had written of Allah, that would make me believe, but instead they believe in shinto. I guess god/allah doesn't have time to spread the good word outside of the middle east.
What a shame.

I'm pretty sure history and scholars have proven it COULDN'T have been made up. I'm also sure the Qur'an isn't a pleasure storybook to read and get fun unique morals from. Have you read the Qur'an in Arabic? Have you read past the stories? Are you telling me that the biological/geographical/etc science given to us is stuff you could have made up when you were twelve? The stories are to educate us on some of the Prophets, their lives, what they were put through. Give us a religion without information like that and people would start to get serious doubts. Most of the messages were released in the Middle East due to a very special bloodline. We call our Prophet Abraham the "Father of all Prophets". Heck all of the Main Figures from Christianity and Judaism which are Moses and Jesus are sons (not directly) of Abraham. All of the Prophets who received the messages (books) were his decedents and were in the Middle East I suppose at that time. Have you also read how the Prophets spread Islam outside of the Middle East? To Rome and other places? Allah gives Messengers and Prophets Islam, they spread it under his protection.

The bible was a little derailment that happens in serious discussion a lot when a bible thread does not exist, I set one up to get rid of this problem. Job done.
However, I've read sections of the bible where god feels grief. It's written clear as day that he regrets his actions. I haven't read enough of the Qur'an to do the same, but I'd bet money that Allah regrets as well.

Also, lying isn't always wrong. This is easy to see.

It would be illogical for Allah/God to regret any action of his. If he does something he can very easily undo it. I'd say get ready to pay up, so far from the people I've asked, nobody recalls anything of the sort.

Of course Lying isn't always wrong. It depends on your intention.

no. If a man kills another, it is murder. If a man kills another because of their race, it's a hate crime.
If a man kills many in an attempt to stamp out that race (tribal war) then it is genocide.
If Allah kills all those people, it's still genocide.

No one gets to pick and choose who lives and who dies, not even a god. I'll explain with utilitarianism.
Every time you kill someone, you increase the fear of everyone else that they are going to die as well. Killing as punishment is the ultimate wrong, because punishment should be instilled to teach someone a lesson. You cannot kill one person to teach another the lesson, it's sick and violates free will. Killing someone else to teach the rest of us a lesson increases that fear even more than someone just being killed, because now people we care about may be killed because of something we do, or worse yet we may be killed for something a stranger does.
Slowly, the ball is now rolling. With so much fear over the lifespan that is remaining, the life becomes not worth living. A life lived in fear is not a real life. Furthermore, the death penalty has NEVER reduced crime. So killing criminals (or the loved ones of criminals) reaps no benefit whatsoever other than self indulgence and revenge.
Ultimately and eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, consumed with fear, and stabbing into the dark.

No one gets to choose who lives and who dies. Not unless a good can come of it, and no good ever comes from killing as punishment.
Also, if everything is predetermined then why does Allah show anger? This yet again killing out of punishment and is, of course, unjustified ever for a god.

Gods are the imaginary friends that cut off the bully's head in the playground. It's all fine and dandy until that god tells you to pick up the knife and do it yourself next time. sleep.gif

How do you know punishment from Allah is a form of Anger always? People are given a chance more than once, they choose punishment. People who are corrupt are sent Prophets. Understand the Prophets listed in the Qur'an are only few of all the Prophets and possibly Messengers in history. The Prophets speak to the people, give them the true message of Allah, and urge them to convert. Prophets are usually someone in the community/whatever that is chosen. Would you want to see your friends and possibly your family suffer punishment from a dissatisfied God? Races punished by Allah like Aad and Thamoud were very very corrupt in terms of morale and behavior. The People turn down the message a first time, making fun of the Prophet, shunning him, and refusing to convert. Warnings of Allah's punishment revealed to the Prophet (Which he usually informs the people of) start to appear. Races dismiss them as mere changes in the weather and such, they finally realize it's true and start to retaliate as told in the stories, but it's too late.

The Roman Empire for example wasn't threatened by divine punishment in any way. It was left, it was not corrupt, but it's religion was. That's why after Islam grew strong, it tried to spread the religion to Rome and far other places. Some ambassadors returned messages of great hostility and some waged war at the Prophet for daring to try to change their religion. There is no divine punishment anymore, as there are no Prophets after Muhammad. The world is slowly going bad again as the fear and belief in people lessens. Allah doesn't "pick" who dies. He gives those who will corrupt the future chances. Not just one. Enlighten yourself, stop the terrible things your doing, or face punishment. You'll be used as an example for the future generations to see of the result of stubbornness even when something is staring at you right in the face, or you'll be used as an example for the future generations to see that sensible living and morals lead to prosperity in this life and Allah is most Merciful.

To put it basically, if your a thief who keeps stealing very valuable items, your going to get caught. Sure not everybody gets caught, but I'm sure we all know that Allah knows everything. You can't hide from him at all. You got picked in the Top Ten list to stand trial since your actions were the most extreme of the rest, you can either pay your time in Jail, or you can stubbornly insist that your innocent and face your death on the guillotine. Those are basically the races that got wiped since like I said, they were the most corrupt.

Allah doesn't want us to fear everything in our lives. He wants us to fear HIM. It's what stops true Muslims from committing sins. The fear of disobeying Allah. The fear of doing against what He laid out for us in the Qur'an or doing what he warned us of. The fear of what He might do to us in the hereafter. That's what we should fear, it a much, much bigger threat than a execution judgment from a courtroom. It's the fear of that getting executed usually means you did something very bad, it's only going to get worse later on. (When I say bad, I mean a big sin, not some minor sin or mistake.)

---------

On a completely different note, we're God's creations, he should be able to do whatever he wants from us. If God does get Angry, then he could wipe out people just based on his anger or "emotions". In Islam, we believe that Allah is merciful, he gives chances, he doesn't get angry at anybody if they did anything wrong, he gets dissatisfied that they don't believe in him. People who don't believe in Allah might still lead happy prosper lives in this world. The afterlife is another story,

I'll hit your points quickly as I'm really not well enough to go into detail...
First off, you say Islam, Christianity, and Judaism are the same religion, or belief in the same god.
And yet the majority of all death throughout human history has been between THESE THREE RELIGIONS! I guess god should have told them that. Crusades, Anti-semitism, current wars, etc...

Secondly, you say that all the "biological/geographical/etc science" in the qu'ran could not have been made up by me when I was 12... Well maybe not.
But before we truly debate this point, can you quote me a single scientific anachronism within the qu'ran?
I can guarantee that you'll find one, in fact, if my memory serves well, you'll find at least two dozen.
So I'll let you go and gather those.

Now, find me a passage from the qu'ran that proves the universe is flat.
You'll quote me this passage:
"The Day that We roll up the heavens like a scroll rolled up for books (completed),- even as We produced the first creation, so shall We produce a new one: a promise We have undertaken: truly shall We fulfill it. (The Noble Quran, 21:104)"

And I'll say.
And what's that about it being rolled up?
And you'll say
Why, that's the big crunch of course, the universe collapsing in on itself and starting again.

Then I'll ask the obvious question, has science proved the universe is flat?
and you'll say: Yes! The WMAP experiment performed by NASA

and I will run away with my tail between my legs.
Except.
For one little detail.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shape_of_the_...e#Flat_universe
the WMAP experiment was to solve this problem. If the universe is flat, it will never collapse into itself.
If the universe if curved, it will collapse into itself.

You'll say then that the quran passage above is not intended for this, or the science is wrong.
But if the quran passage is not intended for this, then perhaps none of the passages are intended for science. And if the science is wrong, then perhaps everything you think the qu'ran says is in fact wrong.
One single passage that self contradicts is all that is needed to disprove a religion.
And there it is.

This is called guess work. The writer guessed random things and said them in an ominous fashion. People have repeated such predictions throughout history.
It's all just a 50/50 guessing game.

Anyway, I'm too tired to keep this going. Sorry.

[theBreadSultan]

did wmap not return a 3% error?

thus proving only that the universe was flat on a local level - but may actually be curved slightly - like a Pringle apparently - on a larger scale

[Sparrowsmith]

indeed, it did.
But the point is that a flat universe and a big crunch cannot exist at the same time, which is exactly what the quran states.

Or rather, what the quran states UNTIL you prove it wrong. I went through two months of going through vague descriptions of science with someone online, each time I would ask the same question:
"But how do you know that's what is meant?"
and each time they replied
"Because it's proven by the science right there. That's what modern interpreters think it means."

and when I finally found that specific quote, there reply was
"Well maybe that's not what that one meant"

well if that's not what that one meant, then that's not what any of them meant.
You can't pick and choose prophecies. They're either clear as glass or lies

[amaro57]

I hope you get better soon Sparrow. =(

I'm just continuing the debate for others interested.

I'll hit your points quickly as I'm really not well enough to go into detail...
First off, you say Islam, Christianity, and Judaism are the same religion, or belief in the same god.
And yet the majority of all death throughout human history has been between THESE THREE RELIGIONS! I guess god should have told them that. Crusades, Anti-semitism, current wars, etc...

Not exactly sure what you mean here. You mean these religions are always at war with each other I presume. Allah has told us that they are the same religions. When the people of Mecca traded with the Christians while Muhammad was with them one day (when he was young) the Christians told the Middle Easters that their religion spoke of a final Prophet names Muhammad. (I may be incorrect, I just remember it this way.). Moses and Jesus are Islamic Prophets, they're also recognized in Christianity and Judaism. God doesn't just directly go to the crusaders and say, hey, your religions are the same, stop fighting. The religions are all the same in the fact that they have the same GOD. Other than that, they share numerous similarities. People, such as the crusaders, stubbornly insisted that their "version" of the religion was the correct one and waged war regardless of the points and challenges made by Prophets to prove them wrong. So he did try to tell them. You spoke of free will, their will was not to listen.

Secondly, you say that all the "biological/geographical/etc science" in the qu'ran could not have been made up by me when I was 12... Well maybe not.
But before we truly debate this point, can you quote me a single scientific anachronism within the qu'ran?
I can guarantee that you'll find one, in fact, if my memory serves well, you'll find at least two dozen.
So I'll let you go and gather those.

"Qur’an 27:18, tells the story of a talking ant in the time of King Solomon. Ants do not communicates with words, but with scent and smell, etc. This is a scientific error, regarding nature."

May I remind you that this is God? If he wants one of his Prophets to communicate with nature, so be it. It's not that the ant talks with words and everybody hears,just the Quran later recites the event. Just another example of a miracle stated in the Quran.

I'm not going to continue with the rest, but if you believe in any aspect of divine beings, believe in any God, then you don't question things like this. It'll only leave you confused and without an answer. I don't have enough experience as I'm only 15 to go around and prove all of the accusations wrong. Others are trying: http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Contrad/External/

Now, find me a passage from the qu'ran that proves the universe is flat.
You'll quote me this passage:
"The Day that We roll up the heavens like a scroll rolled up for books (completed),- even as We produced the first creation, so shall We produce a new one: a promise We have undertaken: truly shall We fulfill it. (The Noble Quran, 21:104)"

And I'll say.
And what's that about it being rolled up?
And you'll say
Why, that's the big crunch of course, the universe collapsing in on itself and starting again.

Then I'll ask the obvious question, has science proved the universe is flat?
and you'll say: Yes! The WMAP experiment performed by NASA

and I will run away with my tail between my legs.
Except.
For one little detail.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shape_of_the_...e#Flat_universe
the WMAP experiment was to solve this problem. If the universe is flat, it will never collapse into itself.
If the universe if curved, it will collapse into itself.

You'll say then that the quran passage above is not intended for this, or the science is wrong.
But if the quran passage is not intended for this, then perhaps none of the passages are intended for science. And if the science is wrong, then perhaps everything you think the qu'ran says is in fact wrong.
One single passage that self contradicts is all that is needed to disprove a religion.
And there it is.

This is called guess work. The writer guessed random things and said them in an ominous fashion. People have repeated such predictions throughout history.
It's all just a 50/50 guessing game.

Anyway, I'm too tired to keep this going. Sorry.

Please not THIS again. -_-

First of all, I wouldn't give you any passage based on your request. Nothing. At all.
http://www.islam-watch.org/Logical/Proof-Q...rth-is-Flat.htm (pointing to the comments, not the article since it's a weird debate)
I suggest reading all the comments. If you want my opinion on the matter, tell me and I'll give it to you.

http://www.islamicvoice.com/september.2000/religion.htm

Keep in mind the Qur'an was like poetry. That's why we 'sing' it (in a sense, if you ever go to a mosque). It uses metaphors and such things. Doesn't a writer create the words he puts on a scroll? Can't he take the scroll with his creation and roll it up (destroying it, or doing whatever he wants with it), and produce another scroll just like it? It's an art (poetry), you can't take it literally.

One of the main things I would prefer is to debate with someone who knew Arabic. Classical Arabic. Not to base all our arguments on English translations.

[Sparrowsmith]

Well, as far as Islam being a lot like Christianity and Judaism...
"Before her conversion to Islam, Khadija incidentally had been a Christian, and it was she who introduced the illiterate Mohammed to the biblical stories of Abraham, Issac, Sarah, Hagar, Ismael, Moses, etc. This is how Mohammed incorporated a bastardized version of the bible in his compilation that he called the Quran (from the Arabic word ‘Qurrah’ – to collect). So tt was Christianity that also gave the iconoclastic angle to Mohammed’s ideas, as also the entire Judeo-Christian hangover that is to be seen in Islam. The pre-Islamic pagan Arabs, knew nothing about the Bible or the Torah. The only link that they had with the Jews was the Arabic language that belonged to the Semitic family. Pre-Islamic Arab lore and poetry had no references to Moses, Solomon, Abraham. This Islam owes to Mohammed’s Christian wife – Khajida."
taken from this lovely little website: http://www.historyofjihad.org/

Perhaps not an unbiased source... Regardless Islam does owe its popularity due to its appeal to pagan arabs, much like how christianity and the like spread.
However, Mohammed did take the name Allah from the god his father worshipped, as opposed to Baal or any of the other gods of the time.
It should also be noted that many 'cultural' problems with Islam did not exist before Mohammed, such as the covering of women, and the murderous rampages to claim holy lands.

Islam is far from my strong point, so forgive me if I get some details wrong.
All signs point towards it being just slightly more blood soaked than other religions.

More importantly though, why would god give Mohammed the vision to take the holy lands, knowing full well that he had already promised the holy lands to two other sets of people.
If god REALLY is the god of all three religions, then why has he promised all of them the holy land and called them his special people?
Why lead them in war against each other?


As for your quran quotes, I said UNIVERSE not earth.
I know that no religious text would call the earth flat, because we've known for millennia that it is round.
Some MUSLIMS argue that the Qu'ran states the earth is flat.

So don't bring up the earth thing. I feel insulted myself when non-theists accuse religions of such narrow sighted thinking


also, your website on external contradictions is moot here.
Any good non-theist know that religions are the words of a true god, so the universe would sooner break than the word of that god.
No no no, external contradictions will never do.
INTERNAL contradictions, however, are powerful weapons indeed.

You cannot prove and Sutra without reciting the outside world. It's the job of people like me to refute such claims by comparing the Sutras against the same thing twice.
Imagine if you will, a cone of sorts and a circular hole.
The cone is the sutra, the circle is science/reality/whatever.
Just because you can make the cone fit partway in the circle doesn't mean it'll go the whole way.

At 15 you're more than qualified to defend your beliefs, just be sure not to be dogmatic about them. Take it from me, you are never too old or too young to be wrong.
Biologically speaking, we are all only seven years old at any one given time

[amaro57]

Well, as far as Islam being a lot like Christianity and Judaism...
"Before her conversion to Islam, Khadija incidentally had been a Christian, and it was she who introduced the illiterate Mohammed to the biblical stories of Abraham, Issac, Sarah, Hagar, Ismael, Moses, etc. This is how Mohammed incorporated a bastardized version of the bible in his compilation that he called the Quran (from the Arabic word ‘Qurrah’ – to collect). So tt was Christianity that also gave the iconoclastic angle to Mohammed’s ideas, as also the entire Judeo-Christian hangover that is to be seen in Islam. The pre-Islamic pagan Arabs, knew nothing about the Bible or the Torah. The only link that they had with the Jews was the Arabic language that belonged to the Semitic family. Pre-Islamic Arab lore and poetry had no references to Moses, Solomon, Abraham. This Islam owes to Mohammed’s Christian wife – Khajida."
taken from this lovely little website: http://www.historyofjihad.org/

Perhaps not an unbiased source... Regardless Islam does owe its popularity due to its appeal to pagan arabs, much like how christianity and the like spread.
However, Mohammed did take the name Allah from the god his father worshipped, as opposed to Baal or any of the other gods of the time.
It should also be noted that many 'cultural' problems with Islam did not exist before Mohammed, such as the covering of women, and the murderous rampages to claim holy lands.

Islam is far from my strong point, so forgive me if I get some details wrong.
All signs point towards it being just slightly more blood soaked than other religions.

More importantly though, why would god give Mohammed the vision to take the holy lands, knowing full well that he had already promised the holy lands to two other sets of people.
If god REALLY is the god of all three religions, then why has he promised all of them the holy land and called them his special people?
Why lead them in war against each other?


As for your quran quotes, I said UNIVERSE not earth.
I know that no religious text would call the earth flat, because we've known for millennia that it is round.
Some MUSLIMS argue that the Qu'ran states the earth is flat.

So don't bring up the earth thing. I feel insulted myself when non-theists accuse religions of such narrow sighted thinking


also, your website on external contradictions is moot here.
Any good non-theist know that religions are the words of a true god, so the universe would sooner break than the word of that god.
No no no, external contradictions will never do.
INTERNAL contradictions, however, are powerful weapons indeed.

You cannot prove and Sutra without reciting the outside world. It's the job of people like me to refute such claims by comparing the Sutras against the same thing twice.
Imagine if you will, a cone of sorts and a circular hole.
The cone is the sutra, the circle is science/reality/whatever.
Just because you can make the cone fit partway in the circle doesn't mean it'll go the whole way.

At 15 you're more than qualified to defend your beliefs, just be sure not to be dogmatic about them. Take it from me, you are never too old or too young to be wrong.
Biologically speaking, we are all only seven years old at any one given time

I don't like that website one bit to tell the truth. If it was a neutral website, it wouldn't have portrayed Muhammad as it did (which we Muslims take extremely offensively). Again, understanding Arabic is crucial and many sites and people blindly start claiming things without learning it. I'm not sure about the whole "word taken from his Father" thing, but Allah as in your theory might have originated from Illah. Illah can be translated to "God". So Allah is "The God" or such. Incorrect. Allah, names himself Allah. You can't "translate" it. Translate for example Japan from English to Arabic. See what I mean?

So how exactly did he "compile" this? I don't know that Khadija ever told him stories, it was impossible, she knew nothing. Even if she did, how did he compile all this info? Are you telling me Muhammad let Khadeja write it for him? Alright, so Muhammad went to a cave, even staying there more than one day row. He sometimes received food sent by Khadija for him in this cave. How did he write all this in the first place if he couldn't write and couldn't read what he wrote if he ever did. He spent most of his time away from his home I don't see a way he could have told Khadija to write his speculations. No, Khadjia was never Christian. A cousin of hers was. Most of the arabs where Atheist, Khadija's family was not Christian except a cousin of hers. After the Angel Gabrial came to Muhammad for the first time, he returned to Khadija frightened terribly. She took him to this cousin of hers and he said, in a sense, that he thought Muhammad was the Prophet spoken of in the Bible and he would have to fight just as Moses and Jesus did.

By how is "Covering of the Woman" a cultural problem? Look around you today, numerous "Muslim" women don't wear hijab or clothes stated in public. It was done as a protection, a way of showing that Women matter too since Arabs pre-Islam treated females extremely poorly. Even going as far as to bury them alive if one gave birth to a female daughter instead of a son.

For the matter of "bloody conquest", the only vision (I'm assuming you mean Manam) Prophet Muhammad received of liberation was that of Makaa. There were no other "Holy Lands". The only people who were killed were those who opposed with an army of their own. Everybody else, was left alone. After Makaa, when the Prophet sent ambassadors, the only nations he waged war against were those who killed the ambassador sent to them. Some nations refused politely/harshly and sent the ambassador back, nothing was done to them. If they had been killed, why are Christians today living in countries Muslim countries like mine, Jordan? Why did Jews and Christians live in the Madina with the Prophet?

Promised the Holy Land...are you talking about Palestine/Israeli? The reason why we Muslims consider it "holy" is because the first "Qiblah" was the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Then became the Ka'ba. Allah hasn't "promised" us the Holy Land for us only. Jews used to live with the Muslims in Palestine in peace (but not without some incidences) before Britain came. We are not his "special" people. We're just like any other human, the only difference is our belief. I don't mean to say that God created three different religions. Think of it in a renewal sense:

1- Religious Book (example: Torah)
2- Book gets Corrupted--->Judaism
3- Renewed Book (example: Bible)
4- Book once again gets Corrupted----> Christianity
5- Renewed Book that is invulnerable to change (Quran)
6- Quran----> Islam

Corruption means something incorrect was added, like "special" people. The Lands are for everyone, no one is "special" or "chosen". Jews can't fly, Christians can't run super fast, and Muslims are just the same. Allah isn't leading anyone against anyone else, if the people don't wanna listen, fine, they'll be dealt with later by Allah himself. The only people Muslims have fought were the ones who waged war in the first place, not the Prophet.

I'm terribly sorry about the Earth thing. I misread as it seemed extremely similar, forgive me. Usually, it's the ex-Muslims who say such things and have minimal knowledge of the Arabic Language.

Internal Contradictions? :

http://www.call-to-monotheism.com/refuting...s_in_the_qur_an
http://www.islamic.org.uk/internalc.html


On another note, some of you mentions Prophet Muhammad as a Pedophile and other...things. Why?

-Edited-

[Sparrowsmith]

I'm afraid that Muhammad is documented as being an incredibly detestable character outside of the qu'ran. He did marry a young girl and sleep with her, essentially making him a pedophile, he did lead many to war and kill, and he did design a religion that many have come to hate.
Why hate a religion of love?

No one in the history of mankind has spoken out against furry kittens, but millions have spoken out against death and injustice. When something receives insult on a sacrificial scale (see artists killed for depicting Muhammad) it cannot be called a peaceful religion.

You say yourself that you take great offense at Muhammad being insulted. This may be so, but no figure is untouchable. I'm sure you would laugh, or could laugh, at a humorous depiction of Jesus. So how insulted would you need to be before you could harm another? You seem a temperate enough person to not harm someone over something as superficial as words, but there are muslims who WOULD and DO harm over nothing but words, and their anger is justified by your anger.

Most importantly though, how can you be sure Islam is unchangeable?
why not Christianity?
What if the qu'ran becomes corrupted, god knows there are 'extremists' within islam, how can you be sure the religion remains pure?
What if the next religion is the 'true religion'?
Can you really know?

Is it not written at the end of the bible that 'nothing shall be added or removed from this book' and yet you claim the quran is of the same god?


Let's not forget that Khadija was a trader, and Muhammad made an impression on her by making large profits. Let's not forget there are only two ways of producing a large profit:
1 - to convince people who don't need your product that they do.
2 - to convince people who need your product to pay more.

Neither is a good way of doing things...

I really don't think Mohammed was good with women

Anyway, I'll finish by saying that islam has declined in its approach to women.

[amaro57]

I'm going to continue this discussion tomorrow, but Sparrowsmith, please stop linking to those absurd websites. The Prophet DID NOT Marry a 6 year old girl, I'll give you the evidence later on to prove it. I'd suggest you refer to actual books, not the Internet, as you can never really trust something you find there, such as the website you linked about the Prophet treating his wives.