Ghazali On Women In Islam

________________________________________________

tahmed:

I think it was the controversy that created the havoc than the consistency of the author`s views. I do not care much for the author`s views, but I must admit that he writes very well. An observant chap! Specially, if you read his other stories they have the conscious element of observation, alertness, and sweetness (at times only). On the other hand, there is an obvious naivety displayed every now and then.

Later,

Let`s see if this post becomes the 400th one, thereby completing the fourth century, which is around the time the nameless author of this worthless article seems to think the world is today.

Also tells the great interest generated by an article that deserved at most one response. That response being directed to the chowk editors, reminding them not to be asleep on the switch when junk like this is sent to be published. But I guess, hits are what counts, not quality. Far better articles written on far worthier subjects on chowk (like the one on Darul-Sakun), on the other hand, simply slide quietly away into the Prev 10 cemetery. I dont have any solutions.

A Shiraz, the evil twin lies within. Sorry I came in late -- or are you just relieved? I agree that women are given the raw deal, but by all religions. And when they are ripe, it is the men who move in for the kill. And they do not consult their gods about how to go about doing it. They have their godforsaken hormones, their egos massaged by unsuspecting houris and the derangement caused by imbibing alcohol that goes by their own name.

I am touched by your concern for the female species. However, it would be interesting for you to see a few posts, especially by a certain Solitude, on both my board as well as this one. Do you think he shows any respect towards women? Is he any better than the Taliban , simply because he chooses to denounce religion? I wonder what kick he gets from wanting to see a woman with a moustache (it probably excites him a hell of a lot) or seeing me with my hair scattered.

It would be nice if the `compiler` of this article took note of these contradictions. And yes, btw, if you do notice Shiraz,er, Solitude, do ask him to get in touch with me, since he has scampered away from my Board. He needn`t worry, since I do not promote myself as a `lady`, a creature he seems to be so afraid of.

Meanwhile, do keep in mind that when you talk about the status of women it comes with the enhanced status of men. And most have fallen in the eyes of women, anyway.

Regards,

Farzana

Rabiya:#394

Aap ko aur sabhee CHOWK mohallay-vaalon ko:

bohut bohut

E I D M U B A R AK

ho.



wassalaam

PM # on your latest reply!

With the kind of institutions which have been strengthened 1000 years back under the influence of multiple influences like greek thoughts etc. But these institutions have been fossilized as REAL Islamic teachings for the past 1000 years. We can only expect Bin Baaz to degrade West and harp the greatness of Muslims in past as the real purpose and intent of Islam.

In Tillon Main Tail Naheen`` There is no oil in these sesame seeds as the saying goes.

We have to carry our own cross in this world and hereafter.

Religion may have a place in this world, but priests of every religion have absolutely no place to get their benefit in the name of religion at the expense of people`s emotions.

krasihd,

thanks for the response. The question(s), however, was..

``4) Are there any instances in which this Ijtehad produced jurispudence that overrode the explicit injunctions of the Quran/Sunnah? Are there any devices/loopholes through which this would be possible?``

You provided an instance of an ACTION (perhaps impromptu? perhaps unknowledgeable of Quranic injunction?) -- not of jurispudence.

There is no shortage of unIslamic laws and actions by Islamic leaders. That, however, was not the question...

My intent was to ascertain the extent of change possible through Ijtehad, which two hundered posts ago was quite the magic pill being passed around.

Later,

PM

---------

P.S I didn`t quite get your drift on intentions.

Omar (#386)

In which religion? I know that in the TOrah/Old Testament, the Porphet Amos sings the praises of the female attributes of God.

rgds

All I want to say is, this article only adds to he attested ignornace we are all ignorant of. Talk about ancient theories being tested today! We all need to take pride in our religion. Women are not victims, we are one`s who triumph through it all, and its our time to shine, as for Islamic feminism, there is no need, without women there would be no men. Respect and love for all!

Eid Mubarak!

Rabiya

Omar 1974

Your question has no context.

We only know God by HIS attributes.

And none of them is related to gender.

It is more of a language restriction, I think. Otherwise nobody knows the exact nature of God moreso, male or female.

Prem:#381

You were never guilty of anything my dear dear fellow human being & friend.Nor am I so innocent;)

Ever since the newtonian mechanics,the theologians of atheism & secularism(also known as philosophers & thinkers of modern age)have developed an inferiority complex so garangatuan that it managed to last 3 centuries and infest superior civilisations.

Rationalism (can also be,if I am allowed to coin new terms here,EXCUSIM or APOLOGISM,DOUBTISM) is the curse of the present-day human.Neccessity is no longer the mother of invention.It is invention who is in search of a long lost mother & seeking adoption.A product in search of a market.A war on the look-out for seeds of hatred.And an America itching to prop up a bogey-man------simply because it has nothing to do;like the local feudal who out of boredom kills a hari(serf).

Ever wonder why the society in search of happiness has the most sharaabees,bhangees,charsees,madkees,ganjees,and haramees in the world.This is what our Ba Ba Blacksheep are after.Here reason fails & Rationality takes over.This is the time when oven orders are placed and this is the time when it becomes important to pry open brains to look where the RATIONALITY emanates from.

The effects of intoxicants on deranging the brain are obvious.Heck,that`s the idea isn`t it?

Until & Unless we exorcise the demons of farangi colonialism from among our midst Pyaar,Prem and Ishque o mohabbet will continue to languish on the shores of Calicut.

wassalaam.

Scout

My apologies.

Re: TAhmad

``An inability to change one`s views is not an attribute of adulthood, I think, if by adulthood you mean maturity.``

You are right. What I meant to imply was that adults are less likely to see or admit the flaws in their beliefs than children...the irony is that adults are supposed to be more mature. Sorry for the sloppy language.

(Obivously, my statement is a general one...I`m sure there are adults who are exceptions to this.)

Hamidm:

As I read your enlightening and beautiful thoughts, something flashed inside me - my devilish mind took a yawn and woke up[greeting everyone with a polite hello and a sweet smile]. I could not resist asking you -- the sweet and
sarcastic one with all the foresights and the insights -- your esteemed perspective on few issues. These issues[Musai`l]require careful
contemplation and should be addressed when one is sober. A succinct argument will be very be much
appreciated!

Musail-ae-Tassuvuf`
@

question for Omar #386: I hope such profound questions do not take up too much of your time.

Rasaxena #375 ``c) Most participants are adults who aren`t going to change their opinions because of something they read on Chowk.``

An inability to change one`s views is not an attribute of adulthood, I think, if by adulthood you mean maturity.

Zahra:

Thank you.

The modern advanced generation like yours is the trail blazer for a new Pakistan and a beacon for the Ummah.Ylh,scout,urstruly,Omarphoenix,fairdinkum,

ali1,Umair and so many other staunch & proud muslims equally a success at the secular level are the ``Quindeels`` for the wayward caravaan.

``Andheri raath judaa apnay Quaflay say hai thoo

Teray liyay hai meraa shola`aa e nava Quindeel``

ALLAMA IQBAL.

Please savour the above by pondering over its profound meanings,once the music of the verses loosen their hold on you.

The farangi tomes are now the refuge of bugs, roaches,& termites-------the Ba Ba Blacksheep re-incarnate.Let sleepy `clods` lie.

Wassalaam.

Question for all.

Is it/could it be considered blasphemy to refer to God`s gender as female, in Islam by a Muslim in print?

Hey Pankaj!

just been kinda busy lately... and trying to kick the chowk habit :-) (with little success, obviously)

later,

P

PM #113

Sorry for belated reply.

The incidence, was with Umar RZAH when instead of distributing booty according to Koran, he distributed it among the conquered people.

I have to find reference.

This is not the only incidence, there are many among initial Muslims.

And the sarcastic approach is the only approach not for righteous people but self-righteous people.

Pankaj #373, `` Unfortunately I guess scout takes some things in life too seriously. Lighten up baby.``

Firstly, I think the use of the word ``baby`` here was uncalled for. This isn`t a bar or local hangout for you to take the liberty of calling me ``baby`` when I haven`t taken the liberty of calling you anything short of your name.

Secondly, don`t we all have to take some things seriously?

``But at the end of the game, it should be said ``No hard feelings``.``

Please read my post #358, to which Rsaxena responded agreeably (and which you quoted).

You`ll have the answer to your concern about this matter.



scout

http://www.economictimes.com/today/16econ12.htm

Britain summons Indian rail experts!

LONDON

INDIAN rail signal experts and maintenance engineers are being hired by a major British engineering company to repair the country`s faulty rail network.

A spokesman for the British company Jarvis Rail, which has a partnership agreement with Rail India Technical Engineering Services, confirmed that 14 signaling and design engineers had already been hired from India and the company was looking for 50 more at salaries in the region of 40,000 pounds per annum.

``We are looking for top-caliber, competent and capable staff,`` the spokesman said. ``There is a shortage of skilled workers, in particular, in the United Kingdom and India is a good source to find these.``

The step by Jarvis, which is based in the Hertfordshire village of Watton at Stone, north of London, adds rail specialists to the flow of Indian IT professionals and teachers finding jobs in Britain and other Western countries.

Britain`s troubled rail network has recently been overwhelmed by problems exacerbated by rising costs and poor track maintenance that has contributed to a series of accidents. Cancellation of regular services and routine delays, sometimes by as much as 10 hours, has affected every aspect of national life.

Ironically, it was British engineers who first built India`s own railway system, laying the Calcutta to Delhi track in 1851. In 1921 Edward the Eighth, then the Prince of Wales, paid a visit to India to see for himself the vast network of railways built by British companies.

This is the second time in less than a month that a British company has come knocking at India`s door in search of skilled professionals. Last month a British education recruitment firm announced it was hiring Indian teachers to teach English in British schools.

The Leicester-based Initial Education Personnel disclosed that it was hiring 120 Indian teachers and would pay them up to 20,000 pounds per month to teach in British schools.

Jarvis, which has 700 million pounds worth of contracts with Britain`s Railtrack, is currently bidding for the contract to maintain the British east coast line main from London to Scotland. A decision is expected early in the New Year.

Kevin Hyde, a senior executive with Jarvis, said, ``It`s very technical stuff, but basically there is a worldwide shortage of signaling and design engineers. India has more engineers than anyone else in the world and they have a good reputation.``

``We`re not hiring from India because its cheap labour. We`re paying the full consulting rate. In fact we`ve been recruiting from all over the world, but there are very few places left to recruit from for our signaling requirements.``

``The signaling system here in Britain is the same as anywhere else. A sudden upsurge in expenditure requires a design input and most countries haven`t maintained the level of skills for this once in a generation requirement. - IANS







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Dear FARANGI_KUSH,

A VERY late response.

You are right. Emotions--particularly joy, happiness--have their own value. It is foolish to always mess them up by bringing in the ghost of logic. I plead guilty.

True to my name, I have a very simple and simpleminded religion:

What brings happiness to you and to others is good; what brings pain to you and others is bad; what brings pain to you and but happiness to others deserves your attention--it may actually multiply your happiness; what brings happiness to you but pain to others also deserves your attention--it may actually multiply your pain.

As you can see, I do not always succeed in following my religion :)

Best

Re: Urstruly #376

I rest my case. (As I was saying, d is the fun part about Chowk...thanks for being the bakra to prove my point...idiot)

on
[Aurat and Taa`leem]
[Zurb-ae-Kaeem]
by Iqbal

on
[Aurat and Taa`leem]
[Zurb-ae-Kaeem]
by Iqbal

Rsaxena

Your bitchin` and moanin` on the other board (Babri Board) contradicts a,b,c,& d. Are you kidding yourself or playing with yourself? :)

Re: Pankaj

``RSaxena appears to be a young man who loves chowk for some playful activities.``

You got that right.

How can you take a message board so seriously....it is addictive and entertaining nevertheless.

I realize that:

a) This is a message board, not real life

b) No significant political or social movements are going to get started here - only bit#hing and complaining. It`s good to vent though.

c) Most participants are adults who aren`t going to change their opinions because of something they read on Chowk.

d) Some people take Chowk and other message boards too seriously - it is fun (childish fun I suppose) to needle them a bit.

RSaxena,

{{Anyway, aren`t you a grown man? Act you age. I know you aren`t a 20-something so there`s no excuse for any immaturity.}}

Hate to admit this, but I think your right. My apologies to you & anyone else who was offended by my raunchy language.

Hi scout and RSaxena

N.B This post is not meant for serious readers.

RSaxena: ``Yup, it`s all a give-and-take. No hard feelings...or even if there are, no use crying and whinning about them and throwing a fit.

``

Look scout, this is the true spirit of the game. I guess your(both of you) wavelengths match(or rather resonate) at some level. RSaxena appears to be a young man who loves chowk for some playful activities. Unfortunately I guess scout takes some things in life too seriously. Lighten up baby.But at the end of the game, it should be said ``No hard feelings``.

Dear PM

Howz is life. You appear to be quiet these days!

Cheers

Mushtaq Farooqui Sahib,

Thanks for the reply. Wish you every success with your projects.

Your ideas on the mystical nature - or side - of Islam I found very interesting indeed. I have known many devout Muslims who bear testimony to the ennobling nature of this aspect of Islam. And I am forced into a paradigm shift on reading Armstrong or Rumi and Shariati.

However, what troubles me is the question of whether, on the average, more humans would naturally be drawn/pushed towards the more mundane and anachronistic teachings Islam than the more sublime side you have been fortunate to have been exposed to, by your admission, from an early age. It would be great if we could focus only on the mystical and sublime (as does, say, Armstrong) and even see the metaphysical side of the some practical teachings. Yet I cannot help think of this as irresponsible in a way.

Is the successful following of (mystical) Islam contingent in some way upon intellect and education-- while the ``Lashkaris`` and neighbourhood mullahs condemned to a more practical and often vulgar reading?

best regards,

PM

sb #368,

thanks for the kind words at the end of ur post.

the teasing doesn`t bother me as much as it might have in the past.

PM #361, ``C`mon guys!! Show some love! You`ve long since finished debating the ISSUE of drinking.``

I agree. But I`m not showing love to these creeps.

:)

peace,

scout

ps: chowk addiction, maybe, but family breakup?

nahhhhhhhhh

to whom it may concern: ``so you are against alcohol but an occasional joint before going to night clubs is OK ?``

Who said a joint before going to a night club is ok? Where did this joint issue come from anyway?

I thought the pre-club high was Ex these days.

shankar #338:

Well, if you put it that way, what can I say, but :-) !

Something tells me though that we may not find this particular musalmaan`s company disagreeble in hell, though he might continue to harass us with racist slurs on the Indoo uppitiness...

Whatever happened to the conspiracy theorists as you reveal your conspiracies? F Versey would have spotted this one right away!

-----

scout #350: ``Ummm, last time I checked, social drinking, merlots, and Chardonnays weren`t normal Desi cultural aspects. How many times do I have to repeat that? Maybe things have changed now, but it`s due to Western influence.``

I specifically said that the people of an entire caste in India have been eking a living out of making and selling liquor for 100s of years. People have been drinking (not merlots and chardonnays and not in 21 century bars) socially in India since much before the western influence. I am a teetotaler, where`s the point in getting defensive? Just wanted to point out a few factual errors in your posts. After that, its a wide world and you are entitled to your views on the chowk.

I think the personal slurs in #343 and #344 from Solitude are uncalled for.

RSaxena, #339

``God help your patients and you``.

Surely you meant, God help your shrink and you!:-)

Kant...

All this hub-ubb for what? Do we realize that we`re taking Ghazali to be a beacon of purity, when we don`t even know what his own standing was.

Was Ghazali a man of his own learning or is the lineage of learning coming down to him the bigger cause of his biases. You are forgetting to observe that Islam is tainted with the brutalities of the early Khalifah`s, after the Rashideen, of course. Yazid and Muaiwyah didn`t sit on the throne to no effect. The lies they spread had to come back to bite us sooner or later.

Could this not be one of the results of their doings???

Don`t merely study the effect.

Examine the cause as well...

Buzzaz.

Re: shankar shrink

You seem to have gone through a 3-stage evolution...first you tried to be a self-flagellating, tree-hugging idiot looking for Pakistani friends, then you became sad and angry because a few hamidms and RSaxenas pissed you off, and finally you threw a fit/tantrum hurling phallic language at people (eg. your pleas with ylh to not get ``erections``)

Anyway, aren`t you a grown man? Act you age. I know you aren`t a 20-something so there`s no excuse for any immaturity.

shankar #338: Well, if you put it that way, what can I say, but :-) ! Something tells me though that we may not find this particular musalmaan`s company disagreeble in hell, though he might continue to harass us with racist slurs on the Indoo uppitiness...

Whatever happened to the conspiracy theorists as you reveal your conspiracies? F Versey would have spotted this one right away! :-)

scout: [shrug!] Its a wide world, and takes all kinds, I guess. See you around. (i think #343 and #344 from Solitude are uncalled for)

Re: scooty

``And I`m sure Solitude and Rsaxena don`t cry over my calling them kalay angrez or do they?``

Not at all. I`m sure Solitude doesn`t either but you can ask him that.

``Rsaxena,especially, calls me lots of things.

Doesn`t bug me too much. Oreo isn`t a bad word by the way.``

Yup, it`s all a give-and-take. No hard feelings...or even if there are, no use crying and whinning about them and throwing a fit.

Fuzair, scout, Rsaxena

Quit it already!!

scout, here`s something to think about ... chowk addiction and how it may lead to family break-ups. :-)

C`mon guys!! Show some love! You`ve long since finished debating the ISSUE of drinking.

regards,

Re: Scout #358

I don`t know, in the US, calling someone an Oreo is a term of derision: ``black on the outside but white inside`` is pretty insulting. It carries exactly the same connotations as kala angrez. Certainly my black friends in college described it as a pretty insulting term. Of course, it depends who is using it and the tone that is used. The opposite of this, as used by Chris Rock, is to call someone a `nigger.` Some blacks call each other `nigger` but that is its use among friends. When used insultingly by blacks it means the same as `white trash` (when that is used to describe whites).

In your case, I doubt you were using it as a term of endearment.

Regards.

Reply #: 352 OMAR1974
``PLEASE POST THE CORRECT CITATIONS FOR THE SOURCES you used for this compilation``

Revival of the Religious Sciences page 41
(Ihy`a `Uloum ed-Din by Ghazali)
and the Book Of Counsel For Kings page 233-34

Publisher : Dar al-Kotob al-`Elmeyah, Beirut

Most of them are from Kitab An Nikah. These are all Islamic books written by Muslims and studied by Muslim scholars. Other pages, volumes, publishers, city of publication are all on the main page - i.e. if you had cared to look before CAPSing me.

The common layman is strictly advised against reading the Quran and Ahadith on their own. I will quote from a major Islamic website :

``Warning (especially for Muslims)

Scholars of Islam did not allow students to quote from Quran and Hadith until the students had actually come to them and learnt from them directly. ``

But the few brace souls who want to put their faith at risk, those few who want to know rather than believe can do so without the gentle brainwashing censor of a devout(ly brainwashed) Muslim.

I once asked to borrow an Imam`s copy of Tafseer Ibn Kathir he looked at me quite lecherously while we both sat in his hujra.

He told me specifically ``it takes years of Islam before you can read the quran with its meaning``. I insisted and pleaded but he refused.

Why did I plead because my own father (a hafiz, a ``muttaqi`` etc.) refused to give me his own copy of the Quranic Interpretations. My father hid the copies because I was beating him at his own arguments and the Hafiz and ``Mudarris al Quran`` (my father) had to look up the references I provided in the Quran and nod his head in agreement. Those were very trying times for my father`s faith and he made sure I felt his trials as well. Today he sees the darkness within Islam, and is on his way to becoming quite a moderate.

In those days I knew Islam was wrong but I had no money or cloths to prove it. They had taken away all my ID papers and passports so that I could not even start a life of my own. But I knew that if I got hold of the Tafaseer of Quran (meanings and interpretations) I would further demolish their collective tyranny.

I was never subjucted to orthodox Islam - I was merely exposed to it. I was never forced into anything, I was spoiled, I was and still am the king! (they love me despite everything and I love them equally). In Islam a man has quite a few advantages and to give all that up is not easy.
I was not forced primarily because my father is a born again Muslim (he used to be a fighter Pilot -quite modern and secular until he turned Islamic -and is now moderating again).

I have never had problems with my grandmother stopping me from shaving ... (unlike some unfortunate women - but ofcourse there is no misfortue in being hairy! one can always find compatible men with hair on the back of their neck , and hair on the back of their hands - not to mention some men who are cheap enough to give themselves haircuts with shaved off side burns)

I am sorry ignore that, I am still suffering from a $108 haircut from a very feminine French hairdresser-dude.

Fellows, the best is yet to come ... so pull yourselves up. I do not mean you any harm - I am only one man against a mob - I only intend to demolish your (Borg) collective. I only ask that you let me love all humanity in the best way I know how : to expose those who have religious, sexist, homophobic, racist prejudices. In the meanwhile please stand up for your own selves - not some Ummah and you will see who is on your side (you ofcourse).

p.s. to a certain someone : so you are against alcohol but an occasional joint before going to night clubs is OK ? Please spare us ``confused`` Pakistani ``twenty somethings`` your ``pity``. You seem to have too much ``pity`` for _``twenty something``_ Pakistanis in particular.

And by the way : there are 2 girls who refused to kiss me. Both of them were Muslims and one of them was fasting and emanating that smell from her mouth which ``Allah prefers over musk`` (refs. will be provided). Things are coming along fine with her ... I don`t force her into anything and she ends up reading my mind and the minds of underground pornographers. Love her to death :)

As for the second Muslim girl I think she was afraid my teeth would get tangled in her moustache.

Tell her I would prefer flossing my teeth with her hair anyday over living a hairless existance. Tell her I am a sucker for her hair. Tell her I would sooner drink the waterfall of her hair and graze in that dark wild grass. Tell her I am so heartless because I lost myself in the web of her hair. ohh women ...

Fuzair #354, ``Your posts are (i) calling people who drink kala angrez or Oreos and worse and (ii) of how bad drinking is.``

I only abuse people I`ve suffered abuse from on Chowk. They are capable of defending themselves by the way. I`ve already apologized to chotu #255 because I was unduly harsh with him.

And I`m sure Solitude and Rsaxena don`t cry over my calling them kalay angrez or do they?

Rsaxena,especially, calls me lots of things.

Doesn`t bug me too much. Oreo isn`t a bad word by the way.

#346,

thanks

Solitude #344,

Your sense of humor is crude, lewd, and shows your lack of proper upbringing.

No wonder girls refuse to kiss you.

RSaxena,

{{It`s not just the wannabe Mullahs, it`s the shankars too. Oh but wait, the two aren`t necessarily different.}}

hmmm--must say you got a point there, prepuce-head. Maybe youre not as dumb as you sound. Ever since someone talked about the promise of 72 houris, I`ve never been the same. Aw, what the heck, to hell with my razor. Since hamid & you insist on going to hell, I might as well start being pious. Heck, I`ll even donate a houris to you (slightly used,of course), just to show you the generosity of my spirit.

Re: Scout #349

Where in any of your posts do you ever talk about educating people of the evils of excessive drinking? Your posts are (i) calling people who drink kala angrez or Oreos and worse and (ii) of how bad drinking is. The clear implication is that one drink and the person is destined to turn into an alcoholic drunk driver who kills little children and seduces (rapes?) young girls who are rendered vulnerable by alcohol.

I quote your post #329:

``Have you seen a mother cry because her 3 year old died was killed by a drunk driver? It`s horribly sad. Have you talked to a girl who lost her virginity to someone she didn`t even know due to drunkenness?

It all starts with social drinking.``

Presumably, if your point was education of people, you would then have gone on to say that the need is to ensure that our children/society/whatnot are educated about the evils, etc.etc. However you do not. You end it here. What is the implication to be derived from this? Only the one I did.

No one is objecting to your voicing your opinions--isn`t that what we all are doing here?--just to your constant abuse, personal attacks and holier-than-thou attitude. I don`t call people who willingly profess their religions idiots. I may think that they weak individuals who need a crutch but I am willing to ignore them in a spirit of live and let live as long as they ignore me. Its just that they all seem to want to reform me in spite of myself.

As far as enjoying a good merlot or cabernet goes, that is certainly Western. However we choose their drinks because they are far superior to our own. The same way that we choose their electric lights and not our own chiraghs, or their cars and not our own tongas, or their flush toilets and not our own bucket latrines.

Incidentally, the Japanese drink as much as any Gora, as do many Northern Chinese. Its a part of those cultures. Certainly the Japanese are among the few Asians that have the gene to metabolize alcohol rapidly (a Caucasian gene, incidentally), so I guess they are also Goras of sorts. Bantu Africans drink mealy beer (don`t try it, definitely an acquired taste) as a part of their culture. The only difference is that the Gora Saab has refined it to an art form: wine tasting is my idea of an evening well spent. We brownies and blackies are too poor and primitive to have raised it to the heights the white master has managed. So why reinvent the wheel or make-do with disgusting mulberry liquor when better is available? Excuse me now but trying to enlighten those that are determined to remain in the dark is thirsty work. Must have a drink to relax and unwind.

Solitude #343 you quote from Bukhari as if he is at equivalent to the Quran. Bukhari appears to have believed that too. Another commonality is the use of foul language. And I have a feeling the similarities dont end there. Incredible, you might think, but true.

Omar #334 ``Back in the 1960s when society in Pakistan, under Gen. Ayub Khan was yet carefree, and bereft of the intimidation of armed and bearded fanatics on the streets``

It was around that time, in Kohat, our teacher decided it was a nice sunny day, so the class could leave the cold classroom and she would teach in the sunny lawn of the school. As we were being taught, we heard loud scolds from nowhere: ``Khochaay Sharam karo! chadar orho, ser dhakao``. It was a fellow going by the school on a bicycle. Our teacher, a nice young lady, was wearing a sleeveless dress, was barely visible from the street through the hedge, but this eagle-eyed soldier of God spotted her nevertheless.

Moral: The culture is quite conservative among many people in Pakistan, particularly in the frontier, and things only seem worse today than was the case. This too will pass (with education, with increasing influence of the outside world)...

Re: Solitude

`` ``Allah curses those ladies who remove the hair from their faces ``- Sahih Bukhari Volume 6, Book 60, Number 408.``

Yuck, that`s nasty. As it is I have a complex about desi women who can grow facial hair faster than I can.

ATTENTION A.SHIRAZ,

PLEASE POST THE CORRECT CITATIONS FOR THE SOURCES

you used for this compilation, along with the correct page numbers, publishers, year and place of publication. I forwarded this article to some people. They just said in response that its all a lie spread to malign Islam and that Ghazali never said all this, only book unchanged is the Quran Sharif. You should have put all the citations at the end of the piece for each quote, having anticipated this reaction.

BTW, I highly reccomend the book TALIBAN by Ahmed Rashid (Journalist for The Telegraph & Far Eastern Economic Review) to everyone, well worth reading. All about the impact on Pakistan in the past 21 years, since its involvement with Afghanistan, & the Taliban. Available at www.desistore.com. The book does describe the actual implementation of the Islamic society as per Ghazali.

Solitude #343, ````Allah curses those ladies who remove the hair from their faces ``-Sahih Bukhari Volume 6, Book 60, Number 408.``

Only a fanatic obsessed with ancient gibberish would post this. Who gives a damn about what Sahih Bukhari says? Who is he anyway, and what do his words have to do with modern day society?

Shiraz, I didn`t grow up in a closed/strict environment as you did (you`ve said so yourself), so I never had to rely on gibberish to build my beliefs or hatreds. Religion was offered to me, not forced down my throat. I am lucky in that sense.

All I can feel for you and other confused Pakistani twenty somethings is pity.

sb #336,

``Please dont rant on and on about smoking and drinking being Caucasian and call people who enjoy a drink or two names!``

Ummm, last time I checked, social drinking, merlots, and Chardonnays weren`t normal Desi cultural aspects. How many times do I have to repeat that? Maybe things have changed now, but it`s due to Western influence.

by the way, name calling has become a normal occurence here. I`ve been called many names too, but I dont` complain, I just get back to them with names. Dont` get defensive plz. :)

``Like Saxena asked (i think), shall we stop using the light bulb because it is a western invention?``

I wouldn`t give Suxena so much credit. There are good Western inventions and bad ones. Comparing the light bulbs with Jack Daniels is idiotic.

Fuzair #337,

Wake up and smell the coffee mister! The last time I checked Chowk was for expressing your opinions and views. Do you want me to shut up just because some people on this board like drinking?

And where did you get this wild idea about my wanting to ban alcohol? I can only make people wary of it`s effects, nothing more. Yes, if I had a choice, I would ban it. But that`s not going to happen. Doesn`t mean I`m going to sit here and listen to merlot stories and not say anything about my beliefs.

What`s the point of even arguing if one doesn`t have personal opinions and beliefs?

Re: #337

You are wasting your time explaining those points to scout. Several others have tried before and given up; it`s no use. She inherently does not understand the concept of freedom of choice and the accompanying complexities. It takes a level of maturity she seems to lack. Nothing wrong with that, many of us are immature in different ways. But it doesn`t make her asinine comments any less annoying.

According to her thinking, if fatty foods give people heart attacks (many of whom are relying on public funds for part or all of their healthcare), then we should ban fatty foods.

Re: Fuzair

``Its hard to make a joke with people who have no sense of humor. Hamidm`s irony entirely escapes the wanna-be mullahs we have running around Chowk``

It`s not just the wannabe Mullahs, it`s the shankars too. Oh but wait, the two aren`t necessarily different.

Regarding EST Reply #: 343

Did I mention drinking strong alcohol causes hair to grow on your chest ? Is that the reason behind all the sanctomonious Islamic attitude? ``oh I have been scarred by 110 proof vodka ! now I am big foot and yogi bear in one !`` I suggest moving to Afghanistan - the Taliban are used to doing nikah with bearded men anyways- and they firmly believe in all the things you say (then they go to their poppy fields and prepare heroine for the entire world). Heroine won`t spring hair on your chest - who knows being high on heroine might even make you a heroine even in the eyes of the Taliban.

P.S. BTW I apologize for grabbing your arse that night, I was just drunk and being poetic.

And for a certain ``lady`` on this board (no offense intended to all the real ladies of the world) :

``Allah curses those ladies who remove the hair from their faces ``- Sahih Bukhari Volume 6, Book 60, Number 408.

So when are you going to show us your moustache?

``If any of your women are guilty of an indecency, ... confine them to houses until death claims them `` - 004.015 (Holy Quran)

SUKKUR, Dec 12: Three persons, including two women, were killed and two were injured in Garhi Yaseen, Daur and in Sukkur Tuesday on the pretext of ``indecency``.

Another woman had been gunned down in Dhakhri, on Monday, on a similar charge.

Khalida, 16, was killed and two persons were injured when armed persons opened fire on them in the Long Khan Gorchani village, near Daur, in the Nawabshah district, early Tuesday morning.

She was the daughter of a retired bank manager, Manzoor Ali Gorchani. Her uncle, Dr Mashooq Ali and other relatives, including Ehsan Ali, Mehboob Ali, Aijaz Ali and Imam Ali, came to their house armed with weapons. They opened fire on the girl, killing her on the spot. She was accused of having illicit relations with Momin Gorchani.

Later, they went Momin`s house but he was not present there. The enraged attackers opened fire and wounded Momin`s father, Abdul Rehman and another relative, Mukhtar Ali Gorchani. They were taken to hospital in a serious condition.

Earlier, Momin had told father, under oath, that the accusation was false. Although his father believed him, his uncles refused to accept his statement.

The girl`s father, Manzoor Ali Gorchani, got an FIR registered against his brothers, whom he held responsible for the killing. He stated in the FIR that the main reason behind the killing was a property dispute among the brothers.

Meanwhile, in Ghari Yaseen, a young boy, Ayo Shar was gunned down by two persons on the pretext of ``indeceny``.

Shar was standing at the Garhi Yaseen bus stop, unidentified armed persons appeared on the scene, opened fire on him, killing him on the spot. His friend, Abdul Rehman, had a narrow escape.

Later, two suspects -Luqman and Gulbahar Shar- were arrested.

In another incident, Mumtaz shot dead his 20-year-old wife, Shahzadi Begum, in the Sukkur district, after declaring her a `lewd`.

He then escaped. The police are conducting raids to arrest him.

Qabil Samijo strangulated his wife, Manher Khatoon, on the pretext of lewdness and indecency in the Gulab Shah Colony, Daharki, on Monday. Samijo escaped after the killing. A case has been lodged with the police.

Scout

Sometimes I am amazed by your perseverance and persistence on tormenting the mockig bird(s) till they are dead.

Re: scooty

``HEY now, how did you know I was severely myopic (no joke). I`m practically blind without my contacts.``

I knew it...btw, do you wear soda-bottle glasses when you don`t have contacts on?

``You spelled pseudo wrong,``

Thanks for being my spell-checker. Now go get me a glass of wine.

Re: shankar shrink

``OK, dick-for-brains...``

God help your patients and you.

Is self-flagellation a way for you to relieve yourself?

sb

{{Shankar, what does it take for a shrink to see the irony in hamidm`s posts?}}

Irony shmirony. I`m desparately trying to keep hamid in heaven. This guy`s screwing up all my party plans in hell. Its amazing what these guys do to gatecrash a party--just because they found out the drinks are for free.

Re: sb #336

Its hard to make a joke with people who have no sense of humor. Hamidm`s irony entirely escapes the wanna-be mullahs we have running around Chowk. After all, when you are doing God`s work, you don`t have time for frivolities. If there is a God, I`ll rely on his sense of mercy to save me. If he doesn`t, then he wasn`t much of a god to begin with, was he? (Or she, or it; don`t want to be genderist here).

Re: Scout #329

Not quite burst it. You are arguing that your personal experience has led you to become one with Carrie Nation. Not as close as a family member but pretty close.

In essence you are making the slippery slope argument in reverse. Usually its made as a case against govt intervention. If we ban hate speech, whats next? Banning politically unpopular speech? Banning my rival from speaking at all? Etc. Etc.

You advocate banning all alcohol consumption everywhere because someone, somewhere might drink too much and do something stupid/dangerous/deadly? You don`t see a problem with your logic?

Presumably, you would also want to ban tobacco. How about fatty foods? Fast cars? Knitting needles (sharp points you know)? Scissors? Knives? Guns? The list is endless.

Wait, or do you want to ban those items whose use has a social impact? Drunk drivers kill others, not just themselves. Second-hand tobacco smoke kills non-smokers. Grossly obese people kill only themselves, not others. So, to use Mill`s typology in a different sense, there are self-hurting and other-hurting actions. Are self-hurting actions (eating myself to death) OK but potentially other-hurting ones (drinking myself to death--I might drive while drunk) are not?

I have news for you. Virtually all actions are other-hurting in some way, shape or form. For example, if I pay taxes and these taxes are used to fund some sort of a social-welfare state, I am being hurt every time the state looks after some moron who was too stupid not to look after him/herself. If the state mandates warning labels on hairdryers--do not use while showering!!!!!--I have to pay for the cost of the label and all the lawsuits filed by idiots against the company and the cost of idiot-proofing the device. The classic is of course the infamous McDonalds` coffee suit. The coffee was TOO hot! I hurt myself because I am an idiot! Now you must pay!

So in a perfect Scoutian world, who gets to make the rules, other than you of course? Where do YOU personally draw the line? Just how big should the nanny state be? It seems to be a common feature in Common Law systems that every one has a positive duty to help the stupid. I say its time to thin the herd. Every one is ignorant about some thing at some time but the people who are permanently ignorant about everything are the ones that really need to be thinned out!

Personally, I am of the opinion that the ideal state of affairs would be something like the old French Foreign Legion which, reportedly, had no restrictions on drinking while on duty but the penalty for being drunk or incapacitated while on duty was being staked out in the desert. Similarly, the penalties for drunk driving were ludicrously low for years because we look after the stupid too much, no matter what they do. A month in jail for a first offense, treat drunk driving deaths as felony murder, and people will soon change their habits. The solution is not to ban alcohol but to punish stupid behavior

hmm..salam all

very interesting yet at times disturbing discussion :)

as for omarphoenix, urstruly, Farungi_kush..

let me just say

Allah karey Zor - e - bayan aur ziyada``

btw

i need to ask u ppl this..ijtihad can only be used where we do not find order or guindence from Allah (s w t ) and his prophet. thats how i understand..

so i dont think u can ijithad on circumcision and start cutting penises of rapist, coz there punishment is also there.

regards

PS: i d love to read more of Omar phoneix.

he is good.

Scout, coming from Pakistan, you should know, perhaps more than some urban Indians, about the caste system among the Indoos. Each profession had a caste associated with it. In my state, there is a caste whose profession it is to make and sell liquor. I believe this caste has been alive and kicking for atleast a few centuries now. Have a friend, a woman, who is not frightfully western but who would drink along with her parents in India. In the coastal areas of Andhra, women (of lower classes, since that seems to be important too) relish smoking strong, home-grown tobacco to this day.

Please dont rant on and on about smoking and drinking being Caucasian and call people who enjoy a drink or two names! And what are we doing in the west, calling the desis oreos? Btw, there is difference between drinking and drunk-driving.

Like Saxena asked (i think), shall we stop using the light bulb because it is a western invention?

Shankar, what does it take for a shrink to see the irony in hamidm`s posts?

Rsuxena #328,

``So that, little, myopic scout is what the issue is. Further, if you are indeed the psuedo-intellectual New-Age Muslima you pose as, what leads you to label a drinker as gora? What does it have to do with being gora and kaala?``

HEY now, how did you know I was severely myopic (no joke). I`m practically blind without my contacts.

You spelled pseudo wrong, and I`m not posing as anything at all. I just say what I feel. Drinking is predominantly a gora culture phenomenon, thus labeling the goras as drinkers.

There are exceptions to the rule though.

``Where were you educated (if at all), by the way?``

Everywhere, through experiences more than books.

Also Published DAWN: Letters to the Editor

Nov 17-2000

Pakistan: past and present

THE enemies of human freedom, ideological cousins and mentors to the Taliban, are calling today in Pakistan for a ban on Basant, and dance and cultural shows. In short, they would like nothing better than to crush the human spirit, lock it up, and throw away the key.

No one forces them to frequent cultural events or even to simply enjoy themselves, but yet they seek to impose upon others, their dreary and extreme views of how life ought to be lived, all the time. It is clear they are well armed, and now prepared to use whatever force is necessary to subjugate society. Their priorities for society are to force all men to grow breads, ban shorts in public parks, smash T.V. sets, satellite dishes, and confine women to the home, from whence they would not be permitted to leave unaccompanied by a close male relative.

Many people have left the country because of the spread of their virulent intolerance. Individualism they find utterly incomprehensible. Most Pakistanis are simply fed up of them and their intimidation of society.

According to a recently published interview, ``Munno Bhai said we had regressed. For many years after independence, it was common for girls to bike to their colleges. Today, in Lahore, it was not easy for a woman even to be seen driving a car. She was subjected to much jeering and humiliation.

``He told the story of a family which had gone to Gilgit by road and when it was driving through Kohistan, some young men in beards had screamed obscenities at the young women in the group. When asked why they were doing that, they had replied that the local Mullah had told them that if they saw unveiled women they should scream filth at them so that they learnt never to venture out of their homes again. Even in villages, where the women had always worked unveiled in the fields, it was becoming increasingly difficult for them to do so.``

Back in the 1960s when society in Pakistan, under Gen. Ayub Khan was yet carefree, and bereft of the intimidation of armed and bearded fanatics on the streets, and the bombings their meetings attract from RAW, there used to be such fun events as Horse and Cattle shows. Even the current generals must remember them fondly, for they all belong to that generation and bygone era.

No one can possibly successfully argue that Pakistani society has improved over the past two or three decades as a result of religious radicalization. If anything, society has clearly `regressed`. No one talks about the importance of the freedom value in society, it is only an abstract thing, that Pakistan demands for Kashmiris in IOK, but increasingly circumscribes at home.

OMAR MIRZA

Dar ul harb, New York

Dawn Letters to the Editor: December 9th 2000

Reordering the priorities

PAKISTAN has serious problems of all kinds - political and economic, to name but two categories. Jobless people commit suicide in increasing numbers, society has grown more and more violent, and the main concerns of some people while all this goes on, are whether the Governor of Punjab committed such an un-Islamic act, by shaking a foreign lady`s hand while her husband looked on, as to deserve censure. This, and the mentality behind the mean spirited ban on shorts in public parks shows only too clearly the real imprint of the 11 year dictatorship of Ziaul Haq on the country.

It is now only a matter of time before someone or the other has a light bulb go off in their head that the power of the state should be used to prevent women from leaving the home, driving cars, or for their manner of dress become the subject of national legislation, and so on. Some reeds of religious justification could undoubtedly be found for all this too if one looked for them with a particular regressive bent of mind.

Let me say this once and for all, on behalf of many who read this paper, that contemptible despotism that is opposed to the very notion of human liberty that Mulla Omar runs up there in the North, provides no model for Pakistan. Freedom of individual conscience, also means freedom from the oppressive religious views of others. I for one, not only plan to continue shaking hands with women who defiantly refuse to don burqas or hijab for that matter, and go jogging in shorts in public parks, I urge all others to do so as well, while they still can. Never mind if it gives anyone offence. I am offended they should presume to encroach on my liberty, or that of the remaining few free thinkers left in society, clearly a nearly extinct species on the endangered list.

Religious totalitarianism is clearly on the rise in Pakistan.

OMAR MIRZA

New York, USA

Disrespectful Ghazzali Bashing. Ghazzali`s Ihya has its own place in islamic thought. And also weak hadith have been profusedly quoted!!! This article is a NO-GO!

aamir

scout,

When God made RSaxena & hamidm, He put their brains in their prepuce instead of their heads. That explains why they think & act like dicks.

Alas hamidm was born on your side of the border. The Islamic eqvivalent of the bris took care of his intellectual prowess.

As far as Saxena goes, what can I tell you? If I insult the bum, he takes it as a compliment! Just watch how this post will give him a hard on:)

OK, dick-for-brains Saxena, start your show. Afterall, you wont care how much it will gross us out. Maybe ylh will get turned on..

Fuzair #327,

Sorry to burst your psychoanalytical bubble, but NO, I don`t have family members who are alcoholics. My aversion is due to seeing friends losing themselves to alcohol, seeing disease, etc.

Have you seen a mother cry because her 3 year old died was killed by a drunk driver? It`s horribly sad. Have you talked to a girl who lost her virginity to someone she didn`t even know due to drunkenness?

It all starts with social drinking.

Re: scooty

``Not drinking alcohol is not enjoying American freedom? Who`s ranting against American freedom?``

No, but you have argued in the past against giving people the right to choose whether or not they want to drink. Whether or not you drink is irrelevant to the issue.

You have often argued - with Lubna amongst others - against the of people being allowed to choose for themselves what is morally right or wrong (outside of theft, murder, and rape).

So that, little, myopic scout is what the issue is. Further, if you are indeed the psuedo-intellectual New-Age Muslima you pose as, what leads you to label a drinker as gora? What does it have to do with being gora and kaala?

Where were you educated (if at all), by the way?

Re: Scout`s posts on alcohol

I am just curious, none of my business, but this strong an aversion to alcohol AND not based on religious convictions usually means that there is either a family history of alcohol abuse or something similar. A friend of mine (an American) in college was a complete teetotaller and in his case it was because both his parents were alcoholics and his brother as well. He had developed an almost pathological (although understandable) aversion to alcohol. He told me once that he was afraid that if he drank, he too would become an alcoholic.

As I said, its none of my business but I was curious if you had a family history of alcoholism?

Regards.

Musthtaq Farooqi (re. 304)

Thanks for the long post on male/female spiritual characteristcs et al.

Attractive and compelling as I found the ideas (not different from those in far eastern mythology, eh?), extrapolating them from the teachings in Islam seemed, at best, like squeezing water from a rock.

Just goes to show what a good neeyat AND a good mind can do in combination, eh?

regards,

PM

PS. IF not too troublesome, could u email me about your work in IT schools and agriculture development in Pak too. (postmatser@yahoo.com). Please note the spelling.

Rsaxena #322, ``You are soooo right about this here young scout....I too can`t get over the irony in her living and enjoying American freedom while continuing to rant against it (and failing to fully understand it).``

Not drinking alcohol is not enjoying American freedom? Who`s ranting against American freedom?

Say a word against alcohol, and you become a thick skulled idiot. I think you need treatment from Dr. Shankar. I suggest electroconvulsive therapy.

Enjoying American freedom is more than drinking alcohol, a fact your kind (kala angrez FOB) wouldn`t know until you get your faces out of your stinking beer mugs.

Ref Lubna #: 47

You said {Yes, I do believe Ijtihad is still possible - in fact, it is reviving - and that there is a serious need for REFORMS in Islam.}

In the state of Kerala in India, which has over 90% literacy rate and where Muslims, Hindus and Christians have lived in relative harmony since the days of the Moplah Riots, a mullah decided on Ijtihad. He went so far as to say that other religions may also be correct. This gentle man was picked up in the middle of the night, tortured, killed, and his body buried in a shallow grave. Two days later, when the police discovered the body, the perpetrators had caught a flight to the Middle East and disappeared. This happened 7 years back. Yes, Ijtihad is possible, but it is mostly considered to be heresy and blasphemy. If an area with 90% literacy couldn`t handle the questioning of the tenets of Islam, what chance do other scholars in other areas have?

You said {Basically, it`s for the benefit of women that these laws exist. Later in the program someone on the phone made a very interesting suggestion to him: how about re-evaluating their ``values``. Instead of spending so much time, effort and money on laws that make Saudi a safe place for women, why not remove the threat - why not spend more time, effort and money on ``educating`` the youth - changing their attitudes towards women, teaching them to respect the other gender. Then maybe they won`t feel the need for such laws. The scholar didn`t have anything to say in response to that. He was clearly very disturbed by the suggestion.}

Why educate men? Why not go along with the typical Islamic punishment of amputation of the offending member? If your hand commits a theft, Islam demands that it be cut off. Extending the logic, we can clearly see what organ needs to be cut off for rapists. Since the mullah claims that women are likely to be attacked if they go out alone, why doesn`t he prescribe a slight repositioning of the knife during the circumcision ceremony? That ought to take care of the threats to women`s honor and dignity. But that would be Ijtihad, no?

Re: shankar shrink

You go sip your lattes and hug your trees elsewhere; leave hamidm alone!

Re: hamidm

``scout ....... now here is a woman who has bought the party line hook, line and sinker ....no matter how many surahs and hadiths you throw at her, she has convinced herself that it is better to be the veil-wearing twelve year old third wife of a pious tetotaler, five-a-dayer, ankle-bared, tasbeeh and watwani-fiddling momin......``

Hehehehehehehe, you are one hilarious mofo! You are soooo right about this here young scout....I too can`t get over the irony in her living and enjoying American freedom while continuing to rant against it (and failing to fully understand it).

``Have some morals, scout`s Muslim morals.``

How dare you define your own morals.

Life is black and white.

hamidm #310, ``the apostle mushtaq farooqi and how he contributed to the religious delinquency of young scout ......``

Who the hell is Mushtaq Farooqi? And how does speaking against alcohol make me a religious deliquent?

When did I even mention religion in our ``guftugoo?``

Why are you so obsessed with religion that you have to include religious satire into every post of yours, whether it is relevant to the discussion at hand or not?

``scout ....... now here is a woman who has bought the party line hook, line and sinker ....no matter how many surahs and hadiths you throw at her, she has convinced herself that it is better to be the veil-wearing twelve year old third wife of a pious tetotaler, five-a-dayer, ankle-bared, tasbeeh and watwani-fiddling momin......``

KYA BAKWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAS HAI YEH? Do you think while you write or does your brain disconnect from your fingers? I`m beginning to believe the latter.

surahs hadiths? Your mind is infested with a religious disease. Perhaps if you didn`t drink alcohol you`d be a sharper person, who can argue without using the shoulder of meaningless religious parody.

hamidm,

I`m very worried about your conduct on this forum. You keep on trashing pious muslims. Keep it up & youre definitely going to condemned to hell in eternal damnation...

Thats going to be a huge problem for us hindus. Since we`re going to hell for being heathen idol worshippers, were planning to have a party for eternity. So what if its hot in hell, we`re used to the heat. OK, so the beer will be warm & the wine may not be chilled. But the chinks have promised us all the free chinese food we can eat.

The last thing in hell we need is a gatechrasher like you. Please dont be a party pooper. You gotta admit you`ll feel very out of place among us heeng smelling banyas.



So be a good boy & have some more respect for the devouts;--if not for our sake, at least for yours..

Omarphoenix # 297

Great post. I regret that I missed it the first time. I like the confidence that you have in yourself. Being a parrot is lot better than being an Oreo cookie. I hope you have Oreos in UK, right? I mean the real ones that come in a box and they smell and taste real good?

Besides all of that I suggest you to use your discretion on engaging your neurons on more important stuff.

Oops, sorry. I meant Scout`s ``Headache and Hearburn`` response page, not Feroz`s.

Re: OmarPhoenix #297

I don`t usually bother answering people for whose intelligence I have no respect, considering it to be a waste of time and effort. For this reason there is no point in trying to enter into a debate on the merit (or the lack thereof) of interest (your other flamer to me) or wine (your current one). There is a huge difference between trying to talk to some one usually capable of intelligent discourse (e.g., scout--apologies for sounding patronizing) and a parrot that just mouths whatever has been taught it. In fact, we used to have a mian mitthu when I was about 12 that had a greater vocabulary and reasoning ability than yours: he figured out how to remove the wire holding his cage shut. Your cage is still wired tight. Hmmm, must apologize now to parrots.

If your Ex-catholic friend is an idiot, that makes me one as well? Superb logic they are teaching you in that fine institution of higher parrotting you attend. If you will read my posts, both here and at Feroz`s last article site, you will notice that I keep trying to draw a distinction between drinking and alcoholism. Given your fine reasoning skills, you see no difference. I assume that you also see no difference between eating three good meals a day and being 200 pounds overweight? Eating must also be condemned because some people overindulge in it? When do we start the jihad to ban all food?

Regards.

My previous post was in reference to hamidm #310, and please replace the word messenger with Mushtaq. My apologies to both messenger and Mushtaq in the first instance, and to chowk readers in the next for this error.

hamidm I think messenger is expecting a careful study of his ying/yang discourse, and respectful discussion, not your summary consignment of it to the fires of mansoora. As retribution, I hope you will translate his post into Arabic, memorize it, and repeat it for extra credit after each prayer.

Dear Molko,

Ooooh, Touchy touchy are we? Err what`s that thing call that you guys have been abusing...freedom of speech is it? Why are you guys getting all `rondhu`. I felt like being righteous and thought I`ll just read the posts. But then I thought, I might as well play on your level (not you personally). Only Joking, you won`t be hearing much from me since I only ever visit this place every so often.

Take care.

Omar Phoenix

Re: messenger #28.#104 and #289.

Truly inspired bit of divine comedy, thought provoking in a light hearted manner,albeit with some poetic liscence.One would envision a contract for a disney cartoon project in a sane world.

If we ever hope to understand these larger then life charachters they first need to be humanized and cut down to size only then people may be able to remove their rose colored glasses and be able to see them for what they were.only human.

Mushtaq, glad to see you back on chowk. I was wondering if you were still involved with the 2 projects for Pakistan: the IT schooling and the one for desert architecture/food growing techniques. My email address is still the same - please contact me.

sherdil

Omarphoenix

I think it irresponsible of you to tar everyone with that self-righteous brush of yours. Your beliefs are no one elses, so please spare us the sermons.

the apostle mushtaq farooqi and how he contributed to the religious delinquency of young scout ......

....now where did he descend from ...... for a moment i thought i had accidently stumbled onto a board from that hell hole in mansoora or that other seat of all wisdom, divine and temporal, in kabul ....... lord, why do we have to suffer fools and religious scholars .... it is enough to make one turn his back on the often vengeful and bloodthirsty gods worshipped by the conquistadors, the arab hordes and the thugs of eighteenth century india ......so we have heard all these silly circular arguments before and i do believe it is a waste of precious breath to argue the ridiculous dichotomies that exist in classical organized religion ....... how do you argue with someone who believes that a woman`s witness being equal to half that of a male actually protects her ? ...... the sad part is that some women, like scout, blinded by the heavenly glare of hobgoblin logic buy into these spurious, perfidious, deceitful and pernicious positions .........

scout ....... now here is a woman who has bought the party line hook, line and sinker ....no matter how many surahs and hadiths you throw at her, she has convinced herself that it is better to be the veil-wearing twelve year old third wife of a pious tetotaler, five-a-dayer, ankle-bared, tasbeeh and watwani-fiddling momin than be associated with the hypocrite who goes to the mosque twice a year and has a glass of merlot once a week and lets her drive and go to starbucks unaccompanied by a mehram and who does not beat her (lightly) if she is disobedient and who lets her believe that the earth is not flat as proclaimed by sheikh bin-baz ......but then as russell said :

``I do not think that the real reason why people accept religion has anything to do with argumentation. They accept religion on emotional grounds. One is often told that it is a very wrong thing to attack religion, because religion makes men virtuous. So I am told; I have not noticed it. You know, of course, the parody of that argument in Samuel Butler`s book, Erewhon Revisited. You will remember that in Erewhon there is a certain Higgs who arrives in a remote country, and after spending some time there he escapes from that country in a balloon. Twenty years later he comes back to that country and finds a new religion in which he is worshiped under the name of the ``Sun Child,`` and it is said that he ascended into heaven. He finds that the Feast of the Ascension is about to be celebrated, and he hears Professors Hanky and Panky say to each other that they never set eyes on the man Higgs, and they hope they never will; but they are the high priests of the religion of the Sun Child. He is very indignant, and he comes up to them, and he says, ``I am going to expose all this humbug and tell the people of Erewhon that it was only I, the man Higgs, and I went up in a balloon.`` He was told, ``You must not do that, because all the morals of this country are bound round this myth, and if they once know that you did not ascend into Heaven they will all become wicked``; and so he is persuaded of that and he goes quietly away.``

Hamidm, Fuzair, Molko & Others:

Have no fear, if the mullahs and their wives on this board will deny you your merlots and chardonnays, I will step in to prevent the human rights violations. Even this Indian cannot be that heartless! You are all welcome to cross the border...my little cellar promises something for everyone. I`ll drop some chicken in the tandoor; you bring the blondies and Italianas.

Cheers to life. Down with the prudes!

Pankaj #300, ``Jab zindagi ki kaduwahat sharab se

jiyada ho jaay, tab jaakar sharab mein logon ko mazaa aata hai.``

Aur phir kisi alcohol related beemari say marnay main mazaa ata hai shayad in logon ko.

Rdesikan #305, ``Scout--lighten up. I don`t think you`re a prude, but your comments make you seem like one. To each his or her own. Nothing wrong in that, right?``

I always say what I feel, if I feel strongly about an issue. If these thoughts portray me as a prude, so be it. I`ve been called a Ms. Mullah (thanks to Rsaxena) too. It doesn`t bother me.

:)

By the way, I`m not going to these nuts` homes and breaking their bottles of wine dramatically across their heads. I`m just talking (typing). Nothing wrong in that, right? ;)

Molko #298, ``BTW, how come we never have such arguments over tobacco? Just because it isn`t haram, though its effects are potentially worse than those of alcohol?``

Because I smoke.........no, just kidding.

Don`t even get me started on smoking. The reason why I never argued against it here, is that the beauty of different kinds of cigarrettes wasn`t brought up by interactors here as the ``beauty`` of wine was.

Ever see the ad, ``Kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray.``



Have you seen a person with half their face surgically removed to save them from the oral cancer (caused by smoking) that ate away their bones, and even then, they had a slim chance of survival? I have. It`s sad, really sad to see what human beings have done to the precious bodies that God has given them.

If only these alcohol guzzling, smoking idiots realize this.

Tipsys have now taken over this board. The godaweful stench is unbearable. Good luck and good bye.

Re connoisseurs of wine

Check out the latest print issue of the Atlantic or their website for an article on Robert Parker Jr., the reviewer who has turned the ossified wine business upside down

cheers

PS: Scout--lighten up. I don`t think you`re a prude, but your comments make you seem like one. To each his or her own. Nothing wrong in that, right?

Zehra

I understood all but the following words.

``Sae`pharae` Bareen Hae` Kya`?

Sumjhaa Naheen Tusulsal-ae-Shaam-ae-Sahar Ko Main!``

Care to translate it in English ?

Thanx :))

PS May be you like to translate the whole thing for the benefit of others. ( like any South Indian who is visiting this site. Its a different matter with me because I am a Hindi speaker).

Re: hamidm

``i say, let the fool join a lashkar so that he can embrace shahadat at rsaxena`s hands - good riddance to bad rubbish !``

Only if I have time after I am done sitting around in my lhoongi washing down a samosa with a shiraz, ogling a fine Swedish blonde, and thanking William Rehnquist for letting me keep more of my hard-earned dollar and over the 4 years.

Fuzair #294,

(puking)

Hi scout

Almira, dont take all these wine lovers seriously :)) Peene walon ko to peene ka bahana chahiye. Khushi mein to peena, gum mein peena aur jab kuch na ho to boredom khatm karne ke liye peena. I have tasted whiskey and believe me it has a pungent odor and a very bitter taste. Santare ka ras ya phir aangoor ka ras is tastier and much more soothing. Jab zindagi ki kaduwahat sharab se jiyada ho jaay, tab jaakar sharab mein logon ko mazaa aata hai. Since I dont drink(albeit tasted it once or twice), so I fully support you against these winelovers.

Concerned, Hamidm, and all other winelovers



For the benefit of you all, I have posted a couple of verses of the great Hindi poet Harivansha Rai Bachchan and its translation on Almira`s board. May be you like to read it.

Cheers!

PS Meant to be a light-hearted banter -:)

Dear Scout,

One of the great things about hanging around so many Non-Muslims is that you get to learn about their tricks. Over my pitiful existence of 21 years I have found that these people are lost. They don`t know what they want and for that my heart goes out to them. They don`t treat their religion/ thinking as a school of thought but as something that comes as part of the territory. These people like to win points, not discuss something and they will go to absolutely frivolous lengths to try to put you down. Note, they were never trying to understand, just win the point, just try to prove you wrong. One such example, an X- Catholic friend of mine claimed that Islam was racist because it said that all Non-believers would go to hell. When I explained that concept in a bit more detail and also explained that Christianity also believes in the concept of a hell, he yelled `no it`s not.,` and he said that repeatedly. The point, he was trying to get one over me and in the process even willing to put down his own religion.

Please don`t bother with these nutters. The other thing they come up with is `and why not.` It`s the oldest trick in the world and it`s wearing off. Also there`s the idea of rabbiting on like an orifice on diarrhoea by labelling and putting words in peoples` mouth and then saying `see I told you how bad this person is.` That`s just an example of the prejudices that have accumulated in people`s mind by watching too much CNN.

We have something they don`t have and so they want us to stoop down to their level so that they may feel comfortable.

Take care,

Omar Phoenix

Scout

Yes, part of the appeal of wine is the fact that it is an alcoholic beverage. For some people, that means it affords the opportunity to become intoxicated. That is their business. For others, the pleasure is much more refined. Not everyone who drinks drinks to get drunk, and many wine drinkers do practice moderation in their imbibing. Such persons get their desired `effect` without over-indulging.

Yes, we can do without wine, just as we can do without many things in life. But things such as wine often make life more pleasurable, and there is no need to deny oneself such pleasures just because others abuse them. You don`t stop eating rich foods just because some people over-eat and become unhealthy. You practice moderation, in addition to, as you said, getting exercise and taking better care of yourself.

BTW, how come we never have such arguments over tobacco? Just because it isn`t haram, though its effects are potentially worse than those of alcohol?

regards,

Molko

To all the alcohol lovers,

Please don`t make an arse out of yourselves. You`ve already done a good job. My God, all I hear you door handles (knobs) talk about in my hostel is how pissed and laid you`re going to get. .Oooh how stimulating. You know I would seriously burn a few neurones on your comments but how can you glorify something that kills people (drink driving accident), breaks relationships, prolongs depression.

My God, I`m so frigging lucky I`m a Muslim. Had I been like you pissed out losers during the 5 years of pure unadulterated sh *t I`ve been through, I would have drunk myself to dissolving my intestines. But hey, guess what, even though I`m in the land of milk, shagging and honey, I controlled myself (something called fear of God). Behold, I`m here and talking to you wonderful people who claim that you don`t need a Prophet to tell us about the dangers of addiction. Well we have all seen how responsible you all are. Moderation my butt cheeks.

Omar Phoenix

Fuzair #280, ``Given our diet, proclivity to overeat, smoke too much and not exercise, we desi men certainly do need a glass of red wine a day.

Umm, better make that two for me.``

No make that three for you. Good excuse. It takes a real man to change their diet, not to overeat, to exercise, and to stop smoking. There aren`t too many of those in this world. Most of them use alcohol as an excuse of some sorts.

FulSafa-o-Muzhab

Re: Hamidm and Chotu

I quite agree on the delectable qualities of a fine merlot but sometimes the palate craves a more robust, heartier, cabernet or a rough rioja as well. I would very heartily recommend a good Shiraz as well. And let us not forget the pleasures of beaujolais nouveau or a good Riesling or Gewurztraminer with gorgonzola cheese and pears! Ummmm!

Excuse me, most go and pour myself a glass now.

Molko #274, ``Scout, no need to be so self righteous. It`s a medical fact that a glass of red wine a day can lower one`s chance of heart disease.``

Medical fact my a==! One can have the same benefit (if not more) of curbing heart disease with a baby aspirin a day, or diet control, or moderate exercise, and simply taking better care of yourself. I could gather together research on how an hour of meditation every day could lower your risk of a heart attack by half. What the hell? Why get into the habit of drinking alcohol when you can do without it? What the hell?

``But, as in all things, moderation.``

That`s a beautiful phrase. Too bad it doesn`t work. Alcohol, in moderation? There`s a certain level that you have to have in your body to feel the pleasurable effects of alcohol. There is no moderation there. Either you`re there or your not. I`m sure people don`t drink alcohol just for the taste. Grape juice would have the same effect if you want taste.

hamidm (aka Daddy Kala Angrez urf Uncle Oreo) #282,

you say:

`` gora culture concept ! .... i swear by my six yard pathan shalwar that the pursuit of fine wine, beautiful women ( and boys ), tangy naswar, tangier bhang and, of course, the blissful sweet

smoke of peeli-pati charas is not something we learned from the farangis ..... we perfected the art of hedonistic pleasure all by ourselves .....``

So why is it that I hear about the ``fine Merlot wines`` and not the fine Lalukheti naswar or bhang or charas?

Is alcohol an integral part of Pakistani (or even Indian culture)? Does the average desi family have wine with dinner every day? Does the average

desi man/woman find the local bar a good place to ``hook`` up? Does the average 21 year old desi guy/gal celebrate adulthood with their parents by drinking? Do most desi kids celebrate Friday nights or the day after exams by getting drunk?

So where is this fascination with alcohol coming from if not from the gora culture? I`m sure the use of alcohol by men of all cultures has existed for centuries, but in this present day and age, it`s a direct result of the emulation of the West.

You cannot deny it. Present day use of alcohol as a pleasure source is due IN PART to Western glamourization.

you say:

``even as we live amongst ``them`` and enjoy the bounty created by a secular and pluralistic society, we despise their values, their culture - we smugly and derisively mock baseball, apple pie and chevrolet so that we protect our ``values``.......wake up and smell the bouquet of chotu`s merlot..........``

I personally despise the bad/negative qualities of any culture. Who`s mocking baseball, Apple pies, or Chevrolet? Not me. Because these American cultural concepts are not harmful to anyone or anyone`s health. If only us bayghairat desis adopted the good qualities of American culture and discared the bad, we`d be in a better shape.

It`s the desi man`s weakness that the first thing he does when he comes to the ``Land of the Free,`` he starts dating and drinking. Does he respect women more, as Americans do? NOPE. There are much finer Western values that we can emulate than alcohol, fine women (and boys), and hedonistic pleasures.

Wake up and smell the Apple Pie Uncle Oreo! (that is, if your olfactory nerves haven`t been burnt into disuse from the stench of alcohol)

``and nobody, i say nobody, gets huffy and start lecturing on the evils of alcohol and drug abuse - god knows, i get enough of that at pta and tafseer meetings !``

In retaliation to that ``order,`` I will say.

NOBODY WILL STOP ME FROM SAYING WHAT I FEEL.

peace,

scout

Oh you who don`t know will never know what a giant headache i have, and you must be wondering as to my absence from this majlis.Some of you are saying where is he! where is he! while faithful are being slain left right and center,faithful are being harried and harrassed,faithful have nothing left to say but hem and haw and they say ``while he is having fun in his hujra we are the ones paying the price with our lost sleep and productivity.Well let me set you straight you blathering idiots(oh why did I have to be encumbered with this goddamned bunch of low lifes)Some of you I would truly KUDDU-KUSH their useless brains and use it for enema!(hows that for recycling).

Its the women who are creating havoc in my life, you know I did not have a regular normal(ha ha whats normal anyways)childhood went through a lot of abuse and neglect never knew a regular day in my life but managed to pull through some how,especially I dont think I could`ve done without my first one, man was she coool oh uh.Man when I was tripping way out she took me in,just chilled me out and said man I`m with ya all the way. And man was she true to her word, she had money,she had connections,she had a house and had her own business, she even gave me a job, man i was actually a travelling salesman then such a friggin normal kinda existence, un-believable.But then i started having those damn hallucinations,weird flashbacks my oh my some physicians called it epilepsy some said he is crackin up and whad`ya know lots of loose talk.Man it made me so mad you won`t believe it.to one of em I says ``YOU LOOKIN AT ME!YOU LOOKIN AT ME?``man that sure freaked him out(he became my first convert),and I figured out the power of freaks and the rest like they say is history.

Oh I think I got away from my original subject (I think I have a wandering brain syndrome).Like i was saying after my first love passed away(may she rest in peace)I`ve lost my anchor I thought if one was good ten would be better my oh my was I wrong; people oh people hear me out on this one if nothing else, TEN IS NO GOOD, take it from one who has been there done that. I have no peace left I hate them all of them i say to them ``please leave me alone`` that is if i could but you know i have to prove something all the time so i have to do justice to them and that is no justice for me.For they keep squabbling,backbiting and keep on their general cattiness even to my little one my newest addition.Hey this personals thing really works,even though I kinda have to twist her dads arm to make him relent after all he`s got major rewards to reap.

I think i`ll stop here cause i can hear them starting the same routine again.Some body`s got to stop them. See ya

hamidm, fuzair and other lovers of wine:

would recommend `madhushala` by harivanshrai bachchan, perferably on cd as read by amitabh bachchan, if you haven`t heard it already.

THE POWER OF SPANKING

Hamidm #281

You are underestimating the power of spanking. Whereas a man spends time and money to get whipped by lather clad women while they time his appointment on a stopwatch, his wife gets it free. All she has to do to deserve this is by sleeping with the Gaama Gujar i.e. milkman or the Sheeda Guddi Baaz from the adjacent chobaara. Hey, and that is worth it. If a little spanking may help you keep your family together and saves your children from getting “adopted” by the neighborhood uncles, then so be it. Never EVER underestimate the power of spanking.

THE WIVES OF THE PROPHET

There have been a number of references in this discussion relating to the number and characteristics of the Prophet`s wives, along with attempts to draw inferences regarding the Prophet`s character based on these references. I have provided some facts below regarding his wives (I think I`ve covered all of them). I would like to preface this with the following quote from Adil Salahi`s Muhammad: Man and Prophet:

``It is tempting to explain most of the Prophet`s marriages in terms of the political, social or religious aims which attended each one of them. One must be wary, however, of oversimplifying matters, seeking justification for things which one should accept without too much worry. The Prophet was allowed by Allah to marry as many women as he wished. If he therefore availed himself of this permission for no reason other than that for which people normally get married, this should be an absolutely satisfactory explanation.``

KHADIJAH: She was a wealthy widow. Most biographers put his age at 25 and hers at around 40 at the time of the marriage. (Some reports suggest that the Prophet was nearer 30, while there are reports that she may have been 35, or even 25. Ibn Abbas, the Prophet`s cousin states that she was 28.) During the 25 years of their marriage prior to Khadijah`s death, the Prophet did not marry any other women.

SAUDAH: She married the Prophet during the second year after the Hijra, when she was around 50 years old. She was one of the earliest converts to Islam and had emigrated to Abyssinia with her first husband, who died there.

A`ISHA: She was the daughter of the Prophet`s companion Abu Bakr. She is reported to have been married to the Prophet at the age of 6, and reportedly consummated this marriage when she was 9. (Some researchers believe that the ahadith reporting Aisha`s age are inaccurate. Based on various historical data reported by Tabari, Ibn Hisham and others, one scholar has calculated Aisha`s age to have been between 14 and 20. Allah knows best.)

HAFSAH: She was the daughter of the Prophet`s companion Umar. She was widowed when her husband Khunais ibn Hudhafa was martyred at Badr. It is reported that the Prophet offered to marry her when Umar complained that Uthman and Abu Bakr had declined to marry her.

ZAINAB: She was a widow when the Prophet married her. Her previous husband Abdullah ibn Jahsh was martyred at Uhud. She died at the age of 30 during the Prophet`s lifetime.

UMM SALAMAH: Her name was Hind and she is considered to have been one of the earliest Muslims. She married the Prophet after her first husband Abdullah ibn Asad was martyred at Uhud.

ZAINAB BINT JAHSH: She was the Prophet`s cousin. She was previously married to Zaid ibn Haritha, the Prophet`s freed slave. The Prophet married her after Zaid divorced her and upon the revelation of verse 37 of Sura Al-Ahzab.

JUWAIRIYAH: She was the daughter of Al-Harith ibn Abu Dhirar, chief of the Al-Mustalaq tribe. Her tribe was captured during a military confrontation with the Muslim army. It is reported that during the distribution of the captives among the army, the Prophet took her for himself, granted her freedom and proposed to her. As her subsequent marriage effectively made her tribe the Prophet`s in-laws, the Muslims decided to free their slaves from the Al-Mustalaq tribe.

UMM HABIBAH: She was the daughter of Abu Sufyan, a Quraysh leader who commanded its armies in several battles against the Muslims. She was one of the early Muslims and emigrated to Abyssinia with her first husband Ubaidullah ibn Jahsh. Her husband converted to Christianity, and she continued to live with him. Shortly after the death of her husband, the Prophet arranged to marry her through the help of the King of Abyssinia.

SAFIYAH: She was a member of the Jewish Banu Al-Nadheer tribe, and had been divorced by her previous husband Sallam bin Mishkam. She married Kinana ibn al-Rabi` a little before the Muslims attacked Khaibar. Her father and husband were killed at Khaibar. She accepted Islam and married the Prophet after the fall of Khaibar.

MAIMUNAH: She had been divorced by her first husband and her second husband died. The Prophet agreed to marry Maimunah in response to the initiative of her sister.

MARIA: She and her sister were sent as gifts to the Prophet by the Coptic ruler of Egypt. It is reported that they both accepted Islam on their way to Medina and that Maria later married the Prophet.

Hamidm , urstruly

I have been enjoying your interactions, particularly hamidm`s 262. I agree that we try to derive too many conclusions from often ambiguous tone of our holy scripture. Religion unlike science depends on faith first and then attempts to prove its truthfulness. Therefore it is just a matter of personal devotion. And thats what Ghazali did.

I think we should read works of other Muslim philosophers like Ibn e Rushd, who gave his famous doctrine of double truth that is there is one truth of revelation and another of observation. Sometimes these agree with each other and sometimes don`t. So better to keep them separate. Unfortunately Muslim caliphs of his time and afterwards didn`t approve of his ideas and now his only books we can get are European translations. It is a pity the age of reason didn`t persist in Muslim society and till now Muslims at large are enslaved by the myhts and superstitions.

The first thing required for reasoning and rationalism is freedom to doubt. Somebody said that for reasoning it is neccesary to accept that all we believe is not necessarily true, all we like is not necessarily good and all questions are open. Religion on the contrary denies all these freedoms. We saw it with the rise of Christianity and burning of library in Alexandria which produced such great minds as Archimedus, Aristarchus, Ptolemy, Euclid, etc. but there practice of rationalism and logic was contrary to Christian beliefs. Same happened with the Muslim scientists by orthodox caliphs. A big blunder committed by Ghazali was his quote that `cotton catches fire not because it is in its nature but because God sends angels to light the fire`. Later on Ibn Rushd rejected this idea as it violates the fundamental principle of cause and effect of science. Ibn Rushd also rejected the occurance of miracles and ``azabs``. Because of his ideas he was banished from Spain and his books burned. This prohibition to doubt and question reality is the biggest crime of religion and the reason for our people`s intellectual and moral decline. We ourselves need to control and decide about our destinies.

``Give me the liberty to know, to think, to believe, and to utter freely according to conscience, above all other liberties.`` Milton

Urstruly (#275 and earlier)

You seem to be saying that the different and sometimes contradictory edicts in the Book are meant for different times and peoples. However, it is not clear how one is to decide which to go by when faced with such dichotomy. Shoud neeyat be enough of a guide to help choose the `right` path in a given time and place? I doubt the neighbourhood moulvi who calls for due punishment of the Ahmedi who dares to give the azaan, or admonishes his congregation to read 4:34 to nip their marital problems in the bud is necessarily acting with bad neeyat.

If common sense is to be used to `recognize` the right edict to follow, then one has to question the need of the edicts in the first place. Would not common sense suffice? Most devout Muslims are attracted to the timelessness and absolute nature of the Quran. Few want to have to use their common sense to make moral decisions. If they are pushed to they will, but with the `readymade` divine word of God at hand, few would take the trouble.

Have you considered that it might be your education and exposure to different value systems that has led you to such ingenious ways of approaching the Quran, whereby you are able to extract the best of it and reject the unpleasant?

I do not doubt that you have the Aha! experience when reading the Quran or its intro and I doubt even less that it addresses some very profound, non-rational side of your Self. But the danger in such experiences is that, in its subjectivity, it often ignores the real danger of differnt interpretations and different effects on others. Prem`s (#275) second-to-last paragraph nicely brings out this point.

(Incidentally, the `Aha` experience, coined by Jung I think, is one in which one recognizes in what one is reading one`s own nebuluos thoughts and feelings-- could your experience, then, not be so much of a process of `recognition`-- valid and exhilirating as it is?)

If hamidm and Shiraz err on the side of selectivity, your failing seems to be the lack of recognition of potential harm that can be caused by having a divine Word that contains ANY undesirable edicts.

What would you say about the `devout` capitalist (or Marxist) who lives a righteous life and attributes it (and his contentment) to the selective following of free-market/communisitc principles (insisting, of course, that common and neeyat must be applied when following the principles)?



On pardigm shifts: Paradigm Shifts may enable one to see things in a whole new way, often enough leading to a feeling of living on a different plane altogether, but I doubt that it will ever justify a `wrong` or reconcile irreconcilables.

That is why, even though all this laborious analyses and intellectualism will scarcely give us the deeper meanings of life, we still NEED it keep from safe from the danger of over-subjectifying.

Prem:#273

Let us play the game on your turf.

A couple with their new-born visit you and are bubbling with joy and trying to impress you with the little tid-bits of the new arrival.

Now you for some reason do not consider children a joy.On the contrary you loathe them.

Must you make sure that you point out the evils & inconvenience of having and raising a baby?

With a name like Prem you shouldn`t,of all people,have problem figuring this out.



``Ubb naa voh PREM,naa uss PREM kee yaadain baquee.

Aag iss ghurr mein luggee aisee,rahaa kuchh naa buchaa.

Jiss kee tasveer nigahon mein liyey baithhee ho.

Mein for dildaar naheen uss kee hoon khamosh chita``.

__________________________________________________

wassalaam

scout,

..... in all this talk about divine mesages and spiritual kaka, i almost missed your blasphemous comments about wine .....



``Of course. Some men don`t have the strength or will power to give up ``gora`` culture concepts.``

....... gora culture concept ! .... i swear by my six yard pathan shalwar that the pursuit of fine wine, beautiful women ( and boys ), tangy naswar, tangier bhang and, of course, the blissful sweet smoke of peeli-pati charas is not something we learned from the farangis ..... we perfected the art of hedonistic pleasure all by ourselves ..... even allah himself has promised us the best of wines and virgins if we behave ourselves for what is but a few minutes on the celestial clock ...... don`t tell me you didn`t read the arabian nights or babar nama or that masterpiece, kama sutra - the only worthwhile contribution to mankind made by our horrid cousins from across the border ......

....let`s not put ourselves down by ascribing all useful inventions to the white man ..... not that i am an expert on urdu literature, but from what little i know i would have thought that all our big time poets - ghalib and dard and meer and iqbal, were a bunch of irishmen...... or were they merely delusional like the rest of us...

......... and that brings up another point - all of us, specially desi women, stupidly presume that we, the faithful, live in the land of the pure, our little personal dar-ul-harb - protected by god and his angles, while the decadent white pigs wallow in the filth of western civilization ...... even as we live amongst ``them`` and enjoy the bounty created by a secular and pluralistic society, we despise their values, their culture - we smugly and derisively mock baseball, apple pie and chevrolet so that we protect our ``values``.......wake up and smell the bouquet of chotu`s merlot..........

.....coming back to the merlot thing ........ if the bedouins had been able to grow decent grapes, not even gabriel could have outlawed wine..... not that i want to quote from some satanic sources, but some badmashes say that even bad date liquour was quite okay with the prophet until omar messed it up for us .. .... astaghfirullah !... since that day muslims, bad and good alike, have had a fanatical, some say almost pathalogical, aversion to alcohol ....even though some of them , like good southern baptists, sneak in a gulp or two on our way to the bazaar or the urs of bari imam........... it seems to me that there are four tenants of the rabid muslim`s faith : one, aversion to alcohol; two, revulsion for the poor pig; three, fear of women and four, interest aka riba ..... and that is about the extent of the modern muslim`s religion ...... i say, let the fool join a lashkar so that he can embrace shahadat at rsaxena`s hands - good riddance to bad rubbish !

.....the sad part is that, given half a chance, this malady is easily corrected........ all the good momin needs is a taste of the fine napa merlot that chotu mentioned, succulent proscuiotto on melon and the company of a good woman .....and he will discover the joy of municipal bonds on his own ........

...... and nobody, i say nobody, gets huffy and start lecturing on the evils of alcohol and drug abuse - god knows, i get enough of that at pta and tafseer meetings !

urstruly,

if i understand you correctly 4:34 was meant for the savage bedouine and 4:35 is meant for the convent educated sophisticate ...... and here i was, thinking that the koran was god`s infallible word and good for eternity .... so i guess it is not permissible for a bureaucrat from islamabad to beat up on begum sahiba , but it is okay for painda khan from chak #36 to beat some sense into his disobedient wife, janat bibi, inspite of the fact that she is only twelve years old and a first cousin on both sides ..... what if that bonafide witch and enemy of islam asma jehangir hears about this ?

.... and since you mentioned the geneva conventions, are you in any way, astagfirullah, suggesting that the geneva convention supersedes the precedent set at khandaq which clearly stated that god wanted the jews dead and their women and children taken into captivity ..... anouzobillah, are you suggesting that god or his prophet erred or, as barry richards and ted olsen would argue, the law of the time must be followed ..... pardon me for being stupid, but i thought that god`s law was timeless and therfore we mortals do not have the right to divine anything by suggesting that there might have been anomalies - astagfirullah!....may allah protect us from the shaitan ...... laholaywala quwat - or as my grandmother would say, dafa door!...... blind faith and ignorance are certainly a bliss - it is like having that nice warm feeling when you have peeed in your dark worsted trousers ..........

Re: Scout #267

Hey, relax, have a drink! ;-) But seriously, why do you persist on insisting that alcolhol for desis is a Gora-wanna-be trait when we have such a long and glorious history of alcohol production and overindulgence of our own?

Granted distilled alcohol may be a Gora import but many non-Western cultures knew the trick of freezing wine, removing the layer of ice on top and thus increasing the alcohol content even if they didn`t know how to distill the stuff. After all, didn`t the Prophet ban alcohol, after previously only banning drunkeness, because the Arabs, good Muslims that they are, were saying their prayers while in their cups?

Given our diet, proclivity to overeat, smoke too much and not exercise, we desi men certainly do need a glass of red wine a day. Umm, better make that two for me.

Regards.

#278

oops wrong board. sorry.

Zahra

I think we should not scorn or scold Ali1 for him being blunt. A 12 years of civil war can do this to a man. Beleive it or not, his sentiments are exactly those which are moving men and material in Karachi these days. Again we must not single out one party or other. It is the politics of hate, whether it is done by MQM or Punjabi-Pakhtoon Itehad; they use the same rhetoric and it works like magic. It has been working like magic. I wish we could somehow channel this energy into positive use. We could have done miracles. Unfortunately we used it to hurt each other. So here we are-bleeding, beaten, tired and lost.

Damn,

Please ignore the postscript to my last post. It didn`t belong on this board.

Thank you.

PM:#263

You`re so right.

They are a treat to watch even at the age you are!

just that you refer to them as mental gymnastics.The even more intellectually inclined call them calsthenics.

You`ll be there one day!:-)

__________________________________________________

``Teri kitaabon mein aye hakeem-e muaash aakhir rakhaa hee kiya hai

Khoothe-Khamdaar kee numaish,mareez o kajdaar kee numaish``

ALLAMA IQBAL

tr:So what is there in your book,O scholar of economics.

A show-off of curves,and a display of the inverted bowl``

__________________________________________________

wassalaam

Dear Urstruly,

Have you considered the possibility that the awe, inspiration, and breathlessness you experienced on reading an introduction to the book you consider holy had more to do with you (or your upbringing) than with the book itself?

Let me give you just two examples of the power of the symbolic.

Recently, there was a report on NPR on Jerusalem. The reporter, a reasonable lady, informed the audience how utterly overwhelmed she was, how tears rolled down her cheeks when for the first time she stood atop some mountain in Jerusalem. She claimed to have understood why God had to choose that very rock to do whatever the story says he did.

Or, consider reasonable people who flock by millions to see the current Pope when he makes one of his (innumerable) foreign visits, and honestly burst into tears of joy when they `catch a glimpse of the divine.`

Conversely, symbols have no meaning unless those meanings have been already internalized, either consciously or unconsciously. My fundamentalist Christian friend is unlikely to accept your contention that the book holy to you has greater inspirational power than the book holy to him. And, there are an increasing number of people who believe that while both books do teach a few good things, they are also chockful of loads of harmful crap that has brought more misery to the world than good. Let me assure you that some of these people have tried reading the books and the only magical feeling they - unlike you - felt was one of utter disgust.

The point is, if you believe something, go ahead and believe it. Don`t try to explain it. I don`t think you can.

Best.

Prem

P.S.: I am not sure how any of this is related to the article. I read the article a couple of times -- after all, the author is an Indian!:) -- but couldn`t figure out what he/she was trying to say. I read his/her posts too, but no help there either. Can anyone please explain in simple Hinglish? Thanks in advance.

Scout, no need to be so self righteous. It`s a medical fact that a glass of red wine a day can lower one`s chance of heart disease. But, as in all things, moderation. There needs no prophet come down from a mountain to tell us that.

RE: scout #266

Once again, the message of the brilliant hamidm`s post is lost on you. It used to happened to me too at first...until I learned better...that`s the least the less brilliant of us can do.

But you don`t even seem to learn...tsk tsk. Kya hoga tumhara. Everything isn`t black and white.

Hamidm # 262

I was expecting such a reply. The discussion that we are having about two apparently contradictory edicts is not new. A lot has been written in general, and edicts like 4:34 and 4:35 have been discussed in length at various places by various scholars- such as Ghazaali and Moudoodi.

I view the Holy Quran as a collection of speeches. Please bear in mind that the format of a speech, usually, is totally different from that a book or a thesis. One must also bear in mind that Mohammad (pbuh) was just a medium to deliver the divine word.

Now imagine yourself delivering a speech on Theory of Relativity to a bunch of five star hotel Chefs. Will they understand a word that you would say? Similarly, Mohammad (pbuh) had a myriad of audience with varying degree of intelligence and social background. On one hand his audience were Badoin who used to bury their newborn daughters alive (a common practice in those days) and on the other hand his audience were the Jewish scholars of Medina. Just imagine yourself reading a column written by Miss Manners to the first group of people. He also used to deliver his ‘speech’ to the Arab tribal warriors who used to take pride in chewing the hearts and livers of their dead enemies. Imagine yourself reading the clauses of Geneva Convention to them. So the principle of ‘gradual learning’ (b’tadreej) was adopted.

The Holy Quran is a book about MAN. In order to successfully deliver its message it must appeal to the commonsense of man. This book is a book of commonsense with a format, which is completely different from any other book that we have ever read, even Bible. The message is for all times. So we the present day people are Mohammad’s (pbuh) audience too. So here it is 4:35. The message is also for the people 1500 years from us too. So what do you think if 4:34 used to make sense to the people of 1000 years ago as 4:35 makes sense to us, then would there be anything that will make sense to the people of 1500 years from now? We don’t know because we are not there yet.

The common sense, that you seem to prefer to follow, suggests that before delivering a verdict on anything we should examine its merits and demerits as well. Have you done that? You can start doing that by reading at least the “How to Read this Book” part. Please use the link that is given at my post # 264 addressed to AH 2000 and experience the phenomenon of “Aha!”

Paraphrasing your post:

...... mian Hamidm, the problem with us good non-believers is that we think that the good Muslims try to read too much into their religion ..... somehow, we have been misled into believing that they know the answer for everything from how to brush their teeth to solving an nth order polynomial; and it lies in the koran .... it is a silly notion that gets us into trouble with our bet better senses and makes us the laughing stock of the civilized world .…..

..... there is nothing wrong with seeking spiritual peace and salvation and building up brownie points to get into the promised gardens with houris and hot and cold running milk and honey, but let`s not make wild assumptions that all Muslims let their religion interfere with ‘each and every’ aspect of their mortal lives i.e. from how to brush your teeth to solving an nth order polynomial ........ since Muslims don`t ride camels and subsist on a diet of dates and maize anymore, therefore they don’t beat up on their wives and ahmedis and enemies of god either .......... because they follow the edicts such as 4:35.

Rsaxena

I see that you have been so consumed with your anger that you have lost all possible signs of sanity....

Hope you get well soon

YLH

IMPOSSIBLE DEMANDS

Slink # 249

At my work, sometimes, I am invited to certain meetings where I do not understand one single sentence the other participants speak. They use a jargon, which can only be learned through years of learning. Despite my utter exasperation, I am required to attend those meetings. There usually are other people in the meeting too who share my feelings. While they prefer to take a nap, I ‘phase myself out’ of the meeting. I start thinking about sweet Sindhri mangoes, Jaleebi, the pakoras that my mom used to fry, my Vespa, girls, and their perfumed letters. Sometimes, after the meeting, people ask me, “how did the meeting go”. My reply always is, “useless discussion, as usual”.

I think I can share the feelings of Simmi when he calls the religious discussions as useless. Like it or not, not everybody is in search of ‘truth’. So why not leave them alone. Why do we expect all believers to have all the answers? Why do we expect all believers to know all the Ahadiths by heart with proper context and history? Why do we expect all believers to have read The Book, memorized it, interpreted it word by word? Why do we expect that every little step that a believer takes, takes after consulting the Book. These are all impossible demands. These demands do not reflect upon the character flaw of the believers, they reflect upon the lack of common sense, mean-spiritedness, and dishonesty of those who make those demand and expectations. If somehow everybody were able to meet those demands, then that would have rendered all religious scholars jobless. Wouldn’t it? :)

As far as your argument about ‘stripping oneself’ is concerned I share my point of view with AH 2000 #257, as to why bother re-inventing the wheel, and I also share it with PM#258 when he says that it is impossible.

I would also like to reciprocate the feelings of goodwill that you have extended to me. I appreciate that. However, I have never………uh I just shut up :)

Re: scout

``Grow up!``

Why? What`s wrong with taking juvenile pleasure in needling the bakra? The only downside is risking carpel-tunnel syndrome or whatever the hell it is called from scrolling through 50 posts when the bakra (bakri?) neh-nehs.

Out of curiosity, is the shuttle-c#ck burkha required or not?

chotu #255, ``Give up fine wines !!!! Perish the thought.``

Of course. Some men don`t have the strength or will power to give up ``gora`` culture concepts.

As Farangi-Kush would say, the ``massas`` are giving up their left over wastage to the desis.

More and more goras are giving up alcohol, while us desis are glorifying the beauty of wines.

``Modern`` desi man = slave of the West

But if cirrhosis of the liver and artificial intoxication of the mind pleases you, GO FOR IT.

hamidm #262, ``, the problem with us good muslims is that we try to read too much into our religion ..... somehow, we have been misled into believing that the answer for everything from how to brush your teeth to solving an nth order polynomial lies in the koran ....``

I would take the word ``good`` out of the above statement. ``Good`` Muslims don`t necessarily take the Koran word for word, nor do they look for ways to brush their teeth in the book.

Most of them just try to be good kind people with high moral standards.

Please stop generalizing Muslims into one fundamental/fanatical category. It`s like calling all Hindu Brahmins racist pigs. Or calling every Orthodox Jew a blood thirsty Zionist. And we know that`s not the case.

After reading the article and also the most interesting replies (raising important questions), things come to mind, why not have a religion or something(one) which is dynamic not static. Is it God afraid to send more ``Aik Lakh choobiz hazar paygumber`` to the more intelligent and reasonable homo sapiens?

Just some heretic thoughts...

INCONSISTENCIES ?

AH 2000 # 248

Someone once said that the success of a book is not indicated by the number of people, who have read it, but it is indicated by the number of people who haven’t and yet they claim that they have. What do you think about The Book now? We criticize it, we love it, we die for it, we write theses about it, we abhor it, we pass our judgements on it-but did we read it?

Do you remember reading a book in your life when you were bewitched by its spell? You lost sense of time and space; the book that took you into another realm; the book that made you to forget to eat your lunch, besides the yelling of your mom-Victor Hugo and Baano Qudsia did that to me. I always thought that the experience of reading those two authors was exhilarating until I read this ‘Introduction to the Book’. Yep, that’s right, I am talking about the ‘introduction’ and not the Book itself. Just the introduction of the Book took my breath away. Later I came to know that I am not the only one marveled by its awe, inspiration, and syllogism. The actual text, which is in Urdu, is magnum opus of prose and a benchmark in inspirational writing. I am talking about the ‘An Introduction to Quran’ written by Syed Abou Al ‘ala Moudoodi.

Stephen R. Covey writes:

“The word ‘paradigm’ comes from the Greek. It was originally a scientific term, and is more commonly used today to mean a model, theory, perception, assumption, or frame of reference. In the more general sense it is the way we see the world-not in terms of our visual sense of sight, but in terms of perceiving, understanding, and interpreting.”

“The term ‘paradigm shift’ was introduced by Thomas Kuhn in his highly influential landmark book, ‘The Structure of Scientific Revolutions’. Kuhn shows how almost every significant break-through in the field of scientific endeavor is a first break with tradition, with old ways of thinking, with old paradigms.”

Covey gives an example to explain paradigm shift:

“Until the germ theory was developed, a high percentage of women and children died during childbirth, and no one could understand why………But as soon as the germ theory was developed, a whole new paradigm, a better, improved way of understanding what was happening made dramatic, significant medical improvement possible”.

Paraphrasing Covey:

“Perhaps the most important insight to be gained is in the area of paradigm shifting, what we might call the “Aha!” experience when someone finally “sees” ‘the picture’ in another way. The more bound a person is by the initial perception, the more powerful the “Aha!” experience is. It was though a light were suddenly turned on inside.”

Though I strongly recommend reading the ‘An Introduction to Holy Quran’ in Urdu, if possible, yet a good translation may also do the trick. Click the following link and you may experience a shift in your paradigm of looking at the book as a collection of “inconsistencies”. You might feel your “Aha!” experience too, so fasten your seat belt and click this:

http://www.iiu.edu.my/deed/quran/understand.html

BON VOYAGE

Thought some of you might find this interesting:

http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/10/fisher.htm

F_K, cartwheels are NOT recommended at your age. :-)

urstruly correctly points out :

[an-Nisa` 4:35] And if ye fear a breach between them twain (the man and wife), appoint an arbiter from his folk and an arbiter from her folk. If they desire amendment Allah will make them of one mind. Lo! Allah is ever Knower, Aware.]

.... but that still does not take away from the fact that a man with four wives and a herd of concubines can ``beat`` his wife as per section 4:34 of the constitution ..... unless of course, the framers of the constitution meant to override 4:34 with 4:35 ...... i don`t think that there is any conclusive proof that these articles were promulgated in chronological order, and some even sugggest that since the final draft was approved in Osman`s time, there might have been some mishief done ( Anouzobillah!)...... regardless, since no one can read god`s mind, and he has decommissioned gadriel, it would be very difficult for a temporal court of law to protect the ``disobedient`` wife from an occassional beating because she might be contemplating ``desertation``........... unless ghazali, like those idiots on the florida supreme court, rewrote the constitution or gave a clear definition of when a disobedient person is contemplating desertion - i don`t think so !

...... mian urstruly, the problem with us good muslims is that we try to read too much into our religion ..... somehow, we have been misled into believing that the answer for everything from how to brush your teeth to solving an nth order polynomial lies in the koran .... it is a silly notion that gets us into trouble with our bet better senses and makes us the laughing stock of the civilized world ...and those horrid heathens who live on the wrong side of the border .... i am sure these juvenile arguments about which toothpaste is halal and which muslim is a muslim gives rsaxena and the horrible hordes a lot of comfort ...... and i hate that ! ( in my case hatred for indians is a pathological condition and not caused by religion! )

..... there is nothing wrong with seeking spiritual peace and salvation and building up brownie points to get into the promised gardens with houris and hot and cold running milk and honey, but let`s not let religion interfere with our mortal lives ........ since we don`t ride camels and subsist on a diet of dates and maize anymore, let`s not beat up on our wives and ahmedis and enemies of god either ..........

Ras Siddiqui: [Sir Syed`s ideas are a much more realistic path for Muslims to follow while not giving up on their identity.]

Why do Muslims specifically have to follow other Muslims? Aren`t there other good people and ideas that a Muslim can follow. Above all what about common sense! what about rationality and other knowledge we have access to? Why do we have to keep looking into the work of Islamic scholars of the past and present. Why not read Greek philosophers of the past and why not even look for answers from the famous Behari/ Nepali guy of 2500 years ago. This Behari fellow knew lot more about human psyche than 100s of Ghazalis, Sheikhs Bin Baz and Mullah Omars.

hamidm, slink and cheema:

Great replies! I am so tempted to cut and paste part of your posts into an article and choose another penname, after some great Mutzalli (free-thinker, rationalist). Unfortunately there are already too many Ibn Al-Rawandis, the most well-known Mutzalli (or Mut`azali?). People who have opted for this penname must be very smart individuals.

Just to make it clear, the statement was made not by religious motivation and after witnessing the pain and suffering of various communities in India including Kashmiris, Sikhs, Muslims, Christians, Tamils, people of Nagaland....

My attempt was to expose a fundamentalism of another kind... Brahminism which plagues India today ...

It gives me heartfelt contentment to know that I have gotten under your skin Rsaxena.... Mullah I am not ... but thank god I am not a Indian!

Dear Shandana,

Good, thought provoking stuff. But is stripping ourselves of ALL acquired accoutrements ever possible-- without risking insanity, that is?

My own thinking is that not all folks are cut out for this important task. The best that society can do is provide rules and doctrines that jibe with the `natural` flows of the mind`s wanderings and the heart`s yearnings.

On questioning, I agree with you...If God and religion are about truth and reality, why should one be afraid to question (assuming the neeyat is `saaf`)? Is it possible that, as I think AH2000 suggests, bad strictures can create bad neeyat?

btw, `you wiped the dust off that book on yer shelf as yet?

:-)

slink,

you say: ``you can teach a man to repeat that parrotlike after you, but that achieves nothing other than emphasizing the supremacy of man over the supremacy of God, because when people put pressure on you to be `on the right path` they`re doing it because they are concerned with your place in THEIR world.``

Now that`s a very penertrating insight. Never quite saw it that way. Who was it that said that God is exalted when man is Man exercises any/all faculties to the utmost? (Or am I ust making this up?:) )

As for denuding oneself before one can find garments to call one`s own, well, I used to think that way too, but then, must we re-invent the wheel? (maybe in matters of faith we DO need to -- I dunno) Or is there a distinction between knwoing whats out there and believing it?

And how much truth is there to the belief that we cannot `know` unless we believe -- with all the attendent risks of such leaps of faith?

I guess in the end the tree will be judged by the fruit it bears. And THAT`S another can of worms right there.

rsaxena #251,

Grow up!

Hamidm writes: ``no knowledge of what ? isn`t it silly that most of us who are willing to circumcise our sons, give up fine wines ....``

Give up fine wines !!!! Perish the thought. For all wine lovers out if you ever have the opportunity, check out Darioush Wineries on the silverado trail in Napa valley. Setup by an Iranian expatriate, this winery boasts its Zorastrian and Iranian wine-making heritage. Extremely soft and velvety merlots. I lack words to describe the joy experienced in good company, with good food and good wine.

Peace.

Slink:#249

Scout #251 echoes my sentiments about your post.

Thank you scout.

________________________________.

If we,ALL HUMANITY,had the capability and desire to learn from the mistakes of others none of us(AS HUMANS) would be acting the way we do.The journey & the quest is more important than the destination(simply because it is unknown).No matter what diet-regimen & fitness programmes we follow we know that death cannot be cheated.But we are told to follow simply to feel good & great while we are living.Even after knowing all this some of us just do not do it.And we may be ``highly educated`` ``pious`` or whatever,but all that has nothing whatsoever to do what our inner man/woman is prompting us to do/not do.

``Jaantha hoon savaab-e taa-u-th o zuhd

Pur tabiyyath ithher naheen aathee``.

Ghalib

tr:Oh,I do know the rewards of obedience & piety

But!I somehow just don`t feel like it.

It just brings home the point that we neither have the desire nor the capability to learn from the mistakes of others and that all of us want to do our own thing,and THIS INCLUDES those who try to straighten every wrinkle and flatten every curve they come across.Beauty to some is in variety and chaos whereas some efficient types want eveything in squares and chess-board patterns.

By the above blabberings,I`m simply attempting to convey that we simply do not know even what we should know.But one thing is certain,the moment someone tries to stop us from looking behind the curtain our desire & appetite gets all the more whetted.

Adam & Eve were eager to go near the forbidden tree,despite the clear-cut orders from the ONE & ONLY Himself.

(It would be worthwhile to study this further on one`s own time & pleasure---I do not want to prompt anyfurther)

Similarly,the presence of Iblees,The Satan,with Allah`s express Will is another aspect to ponder upon.One should keep in mind that alongwith Adam he too is the arch-believer.He is NOT kaafir or mushrik by definition.Ironically,he is condemned simply because he tried to be `more royal than the Monarch`!He got punished for his unflinching belief to bow before the ONE & ONLY and not Adam,even though the ONE & ONLY himself orders him to do so.

(A lot of great books are available in Urdu and English and one can find them if one has the desire)

``Sunnee hikayat-e husthee tho durmiann sey sunnee

Naa ibtidaa kee khuburr hai,naa intihaa maaloom``.



Pandit Brij Narain Chakbust?

tr:The story of life,we heard,only from somehere in the middle.

Beginning we know not,and we know not the end either.

__________________________________________________

wassalaam.

Let us divert our discussion here from Ghazali to
Sir Syed.
Religion and reality can and do exist together.
Unfortunately by putting too much emphasis on religious dogma, we often end up ignoring the reality of the world around us.
Sir Syed is the only real success story for us in the past 200 years. Ghazali is outdated.
Sir Syed`s ideas are a much more realistic path
for Muslims to follow while not giving up on their
identity.
There may be more important work that Ghazali has
accomplished and can be credited for within Islamic thinking. But what has been exposed here in this article is not realistic enough for serious comment.

Ras

Re: Slink #249

Sounds like you`ve been reading Foucault: We are all prisoners of our own discourse. Some of us know we are prisoners and that there is probably more out there than we realize. Others of us, the true believers of any faith, religious or secular, prefer ignorant incarceration.

What do you do about the wilfully ignorant? Let them revel in their ignorance? OK by me but what about when they insist that I join them in revelling in ignorance?

What the teachings of Islam have produced in its youth:

``I say this because, now I am convinced, the only good Indian is a dead one!``

- Courtesy a 20-year-old Pakistani mullah on the Farzana Veresy board.

slink #249,

Hallelujah. ;)

We needed this awakening. I was getting sick of the criticisms, tunnel-visioned views expressed by the interactors here.

As I always say, it`s better for all to make God their religion and not religion their God.

Once again, bravo and thank you. You made my morning brighter (even though it`s snowing).

dear urstruly,

glad to see you passionately involved in something :) you write only God and man can know a mans Neeyat. true, but most men do not know their own neeyat. most people are not in touch with themselves and are therefore unable to realize the difference between the natural and the acquired. i think that for a man or woman to truly know themselves, they must first strip. take off everything `given` to them and then make a passionless study of what remains. the `givens` include religion, especially one which has been handed down to them rather than chosen for themselves. the message that people across the globe are responding to might be all the things you say it is. you can teach a man to repeat that parrotlike after you, but that achieves nothing other than emphasizing the supremacy of man over the supremacy of God, because when people put pressure on you to be `on the right path` they`re doing it because they are concerned with your place in THEIR world. they do not seek to bring you closer to God, or Brahma or Yahweh, they seek to bring you closer to themselves. why does Simi write that this is a purposeless discussion? who taught Simi that? under what guise? why the fervent need to eradicate all the ways in which man can get to know himself? if what they say is true we will all arrive at the same conclusion. and does it matter if you call it heaven and i call it nirvana? does it matter if you achieve epiphany through prayer and i achieve it through introspection? if God can speak all languages and understand my desires surely He knows what i`m thinking? if He knows what i`m thinking he must also know it is about him, because isn`t everything about Him? if prayer is submission, reflection and remembrance then isn`t thought worship refined? should you repress this form of worship because it is different from yours? is this the best use of the gifts He has showered on you, to make things the same rather than understand their differences? Simi writes anyone intent on understanding should study the Quran and Sunnah. i agree. study the Quran. study all religions. understand the natural and acquired traits captured in it`s evolution. don`t apply it in a vacum. if you study the Quran and then create an environment where you would never have practial experience of all the scenarios within then what`s the point? peace on earth people, peace on earth.
i`m hoping it`s not permanent, but i`ve recently been blessed with a renewed affection for life and a heightened sense of just how lucky i am to have the things i have. an unfortunate side effect is this wave of general good will to all and sundry. so, urstruly, i thought i`d start with you..peace...apologies for all previous rudeness..and g`night.

``All great truths arise as blasphemies`` - Bernard Shaw.

Muslim society as a whole is in a state of intellectual wasteland nowadays. Our salvation lies only in emancipation from superstition and myths and believing in reasnonig and rationalism. Lets not make facts sacred and start to question reality. Thats the only way we are going to reach the truth ( if there is any :)).

Good job solitude!

Urstruly (#244)

I must admit you make very good sense on the Neeyat bit there. Thought-provoking. On thinking through it a little, though I find that the question is not always simply a matter of good or bad neeyat (tho there`s no question the latter exists). Could it be that some folks are put off by inconsistencies more than others when it comes to divinely revealed scripture? In other words, could the author of #204 have been more `balanced` were he not asked to force some sort of reconciliation between `good` and `bad` edicts.

I know this demand ticks ME off.

But thanks for prompting me to check my own neeyat here. It was found wanting.

urstruly (#242)

``Should contradictory conclusions then breed contempt or mutual respect?``

Depends, obviously. Nothing wrong with feeling contempt for beliefs that one feels are degrading. Contempt for the those who hold those beliefs is another matter, though sometimes unavoidable.

``Mutual Respect!!!? C`mon, I thought you were my bigot-in-arms. How disappointing that you should start mouthing these late-twentieth century PC virtues! Next thing I know you`ll be saying all relgions lead to God! Or that men and women are equal. :-)

Sheesh!!

a follower of naqshbandian islam claims :

``[discussion] promotes confusion and allows people with no knowledge or background to influence Muslims who have little knowledge themselves.``

........ no knowledge of what ? isn`t it silly that most of us who are willing to circumcise our sons, give up fine wines and pork chops, take up jihadic arms against kafirs like rsaxena, risk shahadat, starve ourselves from dawn to dusk, throw our daughters behind the veil and generally make fools out of ourselves do so without understanding the ``true`` meaning of religion ...... for god`s sake, give me a break ! what are we - cows ? sheep? idiots? .... you don`t have to be a rhodes scholar or david boise to figure out gabriel`s garbled message ...... what`s so difficult about deducing that any code of law that allows promiscuous polygamy presents a rather dim view of women ?....... any penal code that proscribes death for stupid things like blasphemy or defaming long dead caliphs who happened to be related to a prophet, has to be a little crazy ........ what is this nonsense about man being incapable of understanding divine wisdom ? what utter nonsense ! ........even my seven year old demands an answer to why she should eat her vegetables ..... and the answer ``because`` is not enough ....... let`s show ourselves some respect and not be dragged down and degraded by `` blind faith`` which is a scurrilous euphemism for superstition and stupidity.......

.... so quit spewing out silly arguments like democrats in florida, accept the fact that gabriel may have got his wires crossed, and move on with your lives - stop looking for dimples where none exist !

SORE LOSERS?

RE: AH 2000 # 241

Sometimes my ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) kicks-in and I miss important things. So I am writing to clarify some other points in your post. A word on Niyat first; only God and the man himself knows his Niyat. We judge others by their actions and words since we can not read each other’s minds. Since you’ve asked, I would like to present post # 204, as an example, where poster has condemned the whole Quran and Muslims on the basis of verse 4:34. Such a reference of verse along with its proper translation suggests that the poster is a knowledgeable person. Now, one cannot say that he is dishonest and contemptuous because we can not read his mind but we may ask him how could he have missed the next verse i.e. 4:35. Answer to his questions was right there. Why he chose to “ignore” it? Niyat?

[an-Nisa` 4:35] And if ye fear a breach between them twain (the man and wife), appoint an arbiter from his folk and an arbiter from her folk. If they desire amendment Allah will make them of one mind. Lo! Allah is ever Knower, Aware.]

So what do we do here? Should we start condemning all Muslims because their faith tells them of spousal abuse (based on 4:34) or should we ask someone first, who has knowledge, why there are two apparently contradictory verses right next to each other. If one wants to base his reasons of not believing by choosing some from here and some from there then so be it. If one thinks that he is the absolute intelligence then so be it. We can not restrain someone who convinces himself by making his own interpretations based on only one part of something. The problem thus is not with the message it is with the person who only wants to understand that part of it, which he (dis)likes.

Doesn’t it explain the reason for the contemptuous, arrogant, self-righteous, self-important, egotistical, conceited, self-satisfying, and self-aggrandizing nature of their language and attitude? The reason is that they are sore losers. They just can not come to the terms with their indolence. They have imprisoned themselves in the confines of their own prejudices. These dungeons torture them. But they don’t understand that they are responsible for their own misery. Despite their sometime insidious, sometime corrupting, sometime arrogant, and sometime aggressive efforts the message has touched and captivated so many hearts around the globe and the universe for centuries.

AH 2000 241

Should contradictory conclusions then breed contempt or mutual respect?

Re. Urstruly (#235)

(If I may butt in here..) Is it conceivable that someone else may deduce diferently from the same ``lesson`` as did you EVEN WITH A `SAAF NEEYAT`?

Or must we simply assume that the `neeyat` was bad when what is learnt (by others) does not fit in with our view of the world?

Moreover, what is to be said of two people, both with saaf neeyats reaching contradictory conclusions from different lessons taught? (As an opponent of value-relativism, I`m sure you`ll have no problem coming up with examples)?

Finally, to what extent is neeyat conditioned?

Lookng forward to your thoughts...

Re: Simi #231

What are you afraid of if people challenge and discuss that 1400-year-old book?

Re: Fuzair #234

You mustn`t be unecessarily harsh with Urstruly...he has not eaten for a few weeks due to Ramzan and it is affecting him.

#231 - Simi

why should well-intentioned discussions lead to a test of faith each time. Cmon sheepish mentality wont get anyone anywhere not in this day and age.

Fuz-zy babe-eh, (#234)

Thanks for saving me the trouble of having to transcribe my thoughts into sentences. Nicely argued!

Simi`s assertion that ``[discussion] promotes confusion and allows people with no knowledge or background to influence Muslims who have little knowledge themselves.`` is weak on two counts:

1) It assumes most of the folks here being influenced have little knowledge (Then again, that`s what Azhar seems to claim too)

2) It is hard to imagine how those with little knowledge but presumably good heads can be influenced by those with ``no knowledge``.

Hiding behind claims of `complexity` or the need for `deeper understanding` is just an attempt to deter questioning of suspect issues. At least some matters, if not all, are pretty straightforward --at least until they are contorted out of shape by scholars trying to sanitize them.

Ninah : You may find this book interesting :

Women and Gender in Islam : Historical Roots of a Modern Debate by Leila Ahmed

Paperback Reissue edition (August 1993) Yale Univ Pr; ISBN: 0300055838 ;

-Arun Gupta

RE: Fuzair

Every idea is ``supported`` (I do mean supported)by two kind of people-opponents and proponents. It is the nature of your question whether it leads you to proponents or to the opponenets. In addition to that it also depends on your ``Niaat`` i.e. intention. If you go to either one of them with all the contempt in your heart then you can learn nothing; you are just venting your contempt.

Just think about your school years when you hated some of your teachers and liked some, you will know that you were miserable in those subjects taught by the teachers whom you used to hate.

Your contempt for the teacher didnt let you learn the subject.

Re: Urstruly #233

So I gain no knowledge from discussion? How can I tell who is an idiot and who is not if I do not discuss things with that person? Trying to expand my knowledge is confusion generating? Listening to more than one opinion is bad? Oy vey, no wonder I am so confused. I`ve been trying too hard to hear all sides of every argument. To minimize confusion, I should only listen to your, err, I mean the correct, side.

So let me sum up here:

If I discuss matters with a person who is critical of Islam, I am only generating confusion. Therefore, I should only consort with like-minded people, lest they weaken my belief in the innate Truth of the Koran. In this way, we can mutually reinforce our faith and form a common wall against all enemies.

Sounds like Islam has more problems than I thought it had.

RE: Fuzair

What Simi meant is that, when you seek knowledge, you dont go to an idiot. You go to a scholar. And if you want to learn Mathematics you dont go to a medical school. It has nothing to do with beleif it is common sense.

Re: Simi #231

A perfect example of, ``I believe because I believe. And because I believe it, it must be true.``

The Prophet (PBUH) did not like this kind of purposeless discussion and warned us against it. I personally find it promotes confusion and allows people with no knowledge or background to influence Muslims who have little knowledge themselves.

Followers of Islam who have sincere questions should study the Quran and Sunah and avoid such discussions.

Zahra#226

I realize that. I apologize.

Urstruly (#224)

Now that you`ve given me the pleasure of attaining Mystery status, you really think I`m going to divulge? I really am surprised you haven`t been able to guess tho. I`ve made little attempt to change my style of expression. But this is cool-- I`m still really being myself but the reaction from many are somewhat (hint, hint) warmer.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Hamidm,

I`d like to join Fuzair in commending you on your truthful and hard hitting prose. I do long for the day when religion and belief will be free from the mental and emotional shackles of fear.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

kutti or dosti now, urstruly? :-)

Urs

Re: Urstruly

``Well, you are too soft to be the wrath of Almighty called Zahra and you are too smart to be Sadna.``

He/she is definitely too smart to be you too so at least we can be assured that this isn`t one of your schizophrenia attacks.

re. Asif Naqshbandi (#218)

``This passage is cited by the modern Catholic writer Maura O’Neill, who writes on women’s issues in dialogue, and who rightly concludes: ‘Muslims do not use a masculine God as either a conscious or unconscious tool in the construction of gender roles.’ ``

I don`t know about where you were brought up, but where I was, God was often enough referred to as Allah MiaN -- is that really genderless?

Muhammed may strictly not be god to Muslims, but to all intents and purposes, he may as well be -- Perfect specimen of GOd`s image and all. (Or is hamidm misinformed about man as god`s image?)

Conceptually, Mohammed is a world removed from Allah, but emotionally, I wonder how great the distance really is??

Your long quote says something to the effect that Religion is a matter of the heart not of the mind. Maybe so. Maybe the best aspects of religon will only `register` in the heart, emotionally and are ABOVE our rational comprehension. But that is not the same as saying that matters of the heart may offend the minds sensibiities. Think of the mind and reason as a `primary filters` of reality. They may not be able to tell us WHAT IS, but can sureas hell tell us WHAT IS NOT.

The Don`t-rationalize;-just-FEEL position can be and is used to accomodate (and, if you think about it -- to RATIONALIZE) any nonsense under the sun.

I don`t think that was what sufism was about.

regards,

regards

Urstruly:

Besides the fact that your humor/sarcasm was well intended, I think using the word ``Almighty`` was ``very`` inappropriate. Please make a conscious note of it!

[TO MYSELF: Why am I surprised on Urs` creative attempts? I thought I read something about ``it`` in Mark Twain`s writings. Well, probably I should repost it for the benefit of many.]

Later,

Re: Hamidm #223

Nicely put. Its sad to see intelligent people trying desperately to reconcile their religion with the real world. However, the human mind is capable of endlessly compartmentalizing and rationalizing the unrationalizable, so we will always have religion with us.

I would still differ with Solitude in that, as I have endlessly argued, so far as ALL religious texts, interpreted as the literal WORD OF GOD, are full of so much kaka that the mind boggles. Why pick on Islam when there is so much juicy material in Christianity or Judaism? Oh yes, not too many of those folk are still insisting on following their religions literally.

Regards.

AH 2000 # 219

Now you got me worried. I am feeling those knots of anxiety gripping my stomach. Who are you? I tried to take a wild guess but couldn’t figure it out. Well, you are too soft to be the wrath of Almighty called Zahra and you are too smart to be Sadna. On the other hand you are too subjective to be a pragmatic like Scout and I couldn’t sense a hint of Michael Bolton, so it cannot be Zehra. No long sermons, so it can not be Ustaani Ji.

I looked into other possibilities too. This transvestite called Jay is known to have perverted fantasies but you didn’t mention Taliban and Jihad once, so it can not be him. And Rsaxena can not conceive such an idea; sometimes he tries and he finds himself rubbing Ben-Gay Balm over his head.

Awakening Hopeful- Naaaah she is too nice.

Who are you?

.... i believe solitude is doing one heck of a job in pointing out the idiocy of the positions taken by rabid religious extremists, fundamentalists, islamists, apologists for allah, the intellectually lazy, the brain-dead and the brain-washed, schizophrenics who believe in miracles and flying pigs - and all because they need to hang on to this steadfast rock of hobgoblin logic since they cannot accept their own mortality ..... whew ! that was a mouthful even for me ....

..... we can toss around hadiths and ayahs from the koran all day long to prove that islam, like all other great religions, does not treat women and slaves and rodents as equals with men who,after all, were created in His image ....... granted islam does not require women to jump into funeral pyres and has seldom burned them at stake for witchery ( although i do know some women who are highly suspect) but, it is a fact that whereas men of other faiths have learnned to put their ignorant practices behind them muslims, particularly the naqshbandi type, continue to wallow in medieval kaka, all the while proclaiming the perfection of god`s word and throwing out ridiculous arguments like, `` it says so in the book itelf`` or `` i challenge you tpo write a single verse like this or that`` or ``thousands of perfectly sane, succesful, women in the US and Western Europe increasingly converting to Islam`` ........ name twenty non-black professional women who can find a husband who would convert to islam - maybe the poor mormon girl who is one of seven sisters married to a pitchfork wielding moron finds being the fourth wife of a halwa guzzling mullah attractive ........ where was i ? .......... get real guys ... and as for you, ninah, i find it despicable that you would suggest that women who are ``providers`` should be spared the sunday beating .... discrimanatioin against the home engineers - shame on you !

As I tried to resolve the confusion between Aah Kurnaa and Aah Bhurnaa, some *typos * attacked me from right and left. Oooh..

Here`s the thought:

``I read it again and kind of agree with your reasonings, but I don`t think that Little Urstruly was crying in anguish or pain.``

Reply #: 217 Asif Naqshbandi

You seem to idolize Iqbal (oops idolization is Haram in Islam) without concern that he was a whoring drunkard - used by Pakistani Nationalists to give our country ``Islamic culture``. What should his past character matter to you ? After all even serial rapists and pedophiles become ``clean`` after entering Islam (or starting Islam). However people like Abu Jahal or Abu Lahab are maligned simply because they opposed Islam. That is enough to condemn them to ``hell``.
As far as my fear of hell. Have you ever thought that our ``complaints`` about your ``hell``s are not ``fear of hell`` but our request to you : ``Do not hate US so as to condemn us to YOUR idea of hell``.

Could you interpret it as an attempt to reach out to you with love ? Could you view it as a diffident effort at friendship ? Perhaps we are asking you ``if you hate us enough to confine us to your hell, if you hate us so because of your religion, would you not notice that your religion is cruel on you and me``?

Every religion runs on mindless rituals (you are not exceptional). The majority of Muslims have always been involved in mindless rituals from wars to collective prayers (for victory of the followers all over the world). It is the few who have always defined religion for the masses and through rituals they get people to swear their allegiance 5 times a day in order to ``break them`` and ``condition`` them for greater sacrifices.

Urstruly (#212),

Thanks for the link. I remember reading that particular posting, but not #192 (from sac) and your #196, both of which I agree with.

I should tell you that we have indeed `met` here before, myself under a different handle. I generally concur with your views but of late I`ve had the feeling you`ve been going too far down the dogmatic line. (maybe this is just a reaction to the wishy-washiness of the abosulte relativists :) )

sac`s #193 on that board pretty much sums up my thoughts and feeling on the matter. There`s a book I think you might be interested to read (probably already have) on the subject of relativist moralism (-ity?) The Closing of the American Mind. There`s a lot there on your hero Nietzche :)

(And Zehra, if you`re out there reading this, please don`t spill the beans:))

Those of you who want a view of females as held by traditional Islam (which I follow) please read this article:

[quote]Islam, Irigaray,

and the

retrieval of gender

Abdal Hakim Murad

(April 1999)

from http://www.masud.co.uk

The Prophet said that women totally dominate men of intellect and possessors of hearts.

But ignorant men dominate women, for they are shackled by an animal ferocity.

They have no kindness, gentleness or love, since animality dominates their nature.

Love and kindness are human attributes; anger and sensuality belong to the animals.

She is the radiance of God, she is not your beloved. She is a creator

- you could say that she is not created. -

- Jalal al-Din Rumi

The 1969 female eunuch was nothing but womb. The 1997 female eunuch has no womb.

- Germaine Greer

Can men any longer write about women? Will our discourse always fallaciously subjectivise the male, as the Lacanian digit to the feminine zero? Andrea Dworkin and many others are insistent here. And yet the theologian must oppose such a closure no less stridently. No-one should claim a monological right to instruct the other sex concerning moral thought and conduct. Moreover, and no less seriously, we must object to that anti-dialogical aspect of the prevailing academic feminism which, supported by biometric footnotes, proposes that men have nothing to say here because truly ‘female thought’ is on every level categorically different from the thought of males. On this view, sexual difference not only creates a predisposition to be interested in certain kinds of issues, but fundamentally affects every way in which we handle concepts. Knowledges are sexualised, we are told; ‘the very way in which we decide what is true and false is a function of sexual difference.`

One reaction against this view is voiced in detail by Jean Curthoys in her new book Feminist Amnesia. She applies a kind of Friedanite fundamentalism, lamenting the recent decline of 60s and 70s radical feminist theory which was grounded in assurances of identity between the sexes rather than mere equality. Conventional academic feminism today, she avers, draws on recent biology to posit a total epistemic discontinuity between male and female, so that all scholarship, and all conclusions about reality, are bifurcated accordingly, excluding all possibility of dialogue across the gender abyss. This aporetic cessation, she insists, is intolerable.

Clearly there is force to her complaint. But equally clearly, both she and her antagonists go too far. Biologists and philosophers now converge on a median position which suggests that men and women do indeed think differently, but not so differently that they can form no judgement on each other’s conclusions. It is not just the practical implications which make this inference inescapable (could we tolerate, for instance, separate encyclopedias for each sex?). More seriously, the claim to aporia is to be rejected as forming part of a recent feminist turn away from rationality itself as an oppressive product and tool of ‘male linearity’. On this view, women’s discourse, sceptical about attempts to deduce any intrinsically true facts about reality, is hence pre-eminently responsive to the project of postmodernism, while men languish amid the rationalising games of late modernity. This thesis of male backwardness is intriguing and has appealed to many; yet remains without persuasive proof. As the Maturidis insist, rationality and morality are observed by the mind, not merely constructed by it. Is this scruple a ‘linear male objectification’? Surely it is just objectification: to claim that women have a categorically more indirect, empathetic, spontaneous approach to reality may be tantamount to affirming that they are less capable of sustained argument based on fact. Such a conclusion is far from universal among feminists, converging as it does with a certain masculine stereotype. Of course, it is almost certainly true, as Professor Carol Gilligan has argued, that ethical responses differ markedly between the sexes. For her, women ‘make moral decisions in a framework of relationships more than in a framework of rights’. Women’s ‘moral processing is contextually oriented’. This is uncontroversial. But value judgements amid the hurly-burly of lived reality are one thing; large generalisations about the nature of the world are quite another. And in the latter field, neither revelation nor reason persuade us that the two styles of argument, the male and female, cannot overlap.

What follows, therefore, is not an androcentric apologia, although a deliberate or even unwilled male discourse is inescapable and is not inherently improper. It claims to be factual, not a self-authenticating view from within a particular ‘gendered’ language-game.

A second preliminary point raises the entire problem of gendered approaches to spirituality. The British religious philosopher John Hick, in a recent moment of feministic reflection, proposed that ‘because of the effects upon them of patriarchal cultures, many women have ‘weak’ egos, suffer from an ingrained inferiority complex, and are tempted to diffusion and triviality.’ He thus suggests that women experience greater difficulties in becoming saints because the spiritual struggle can only be undertaken by a coherent, confident personality. On this view, women must pass through two stages in achieving sainthood, while men require only one.

A little reflection will reveal that this position suffers from two sharp problems. For a start, it deploys an unexamined stereotype of traditional women as shallow and easily distracted; whereas any observation of women’s attendence at, say, salat, or a Turkish mevlud, suggests that women’s devotional behaviour tends to be not palpably less sober, or focussed or directed than that of men. Often it is women rather then men who retain a more serious faith under secularising conditions; although this may flower in the privacy of the home, rather than under public scrutiny in the mosque. Secondly, it implies that spiritual growth is a primarily mechanical, discursive procedure whereby the will overcomes passion, leading to the detachment from the world which is the precondition for sainthood. This begs some fundamental questions about the spiritual life; Hick’s image may hold good for some forms of Christianity and Hinduism, but cannot be applied to many other varieties of religious development, where the conscious, calculating will is deliberately pushed into the background. Specifically, what is characteristically male about love-based mysticism? The insistence that the mind is a prison, and that emotion and spontaneous love of God, triggered by relatively informal practices of the dhikr type, is a commonplace even of ‘male’ spirituality. Here, for instance, is a poem by Rumi:

‘In the screaming gale of Love, the intellect is a gnat.

How can intellects find space to wander there?’

And again:

‘Do not remain a man of intellect among the lovers, especially if you love that sweet-faced

Beloved.

May the men of intellect stay far from the lovers, may the smell of dung stay far from the

east wind!

If a man of intellect should enter, tell him the way is blocked, but if a lover should come,

extend him a hundred welcomes!

By the time intellect has deliberated and reflected, love has flown to the seventh heaven.

By the time intellect has found a camel for the hajj, love has circled the Ka‘ba.

Love has come and covered my mouth. It says: ‘Throw away your poetry, and come to the

stars!``

Perhaps a modern Protestant theologian will have problems with this; but most traditional religions assume that the way to God is through the heart, not the mind. So Hick’s idea that ‘patriarchy’ slams the door to God in the face of traditional women simply because they are (supposedly) less cerebral than men, seems distinctly unpersuasive. He is simply a victim of his own cultural and denominational limitations.

With these preliminary points in mind, let us now move on to the core issue. Modern women writers on religion, such as Rosemary Ruether, insist that all talk of gender in religions has to start in the beginning, with the archetypes. What do images of God tell us about the place of men and women in the world?

In her book Sexism and God-Talk, Ruether objects to ways in which Christian metaphors about God’s maleness are taken literally. For her, the Decalogue’s prohibition of idolatry ‘must be extended to verbal pictures. When the word Father is taken literally to mean that God is male and not female, represented by males and not females, then this word becomes idolatrous.’ She acknowledges that Christian doctrine affirms that all language about God is analogous. Nonetheless the use of male terms for the Ultimate Reality, and the characteristically Christian emphasis on the personhood of God, has regularly resulted in this kind of idolatry. Her solution is to urge the use of inclusive language, so that God is referred to from time to time as the ‘Goddess’, or as ‘She’. Ruether even objects to the idea of God as parent, suggesting, no doubt absurdly, that this encourages what she calls a virtue of spiritual infantilism which makes ‘autonomy and assertion of free will a sin.’

Despite her promethean confidence in her ability to revise tradition, Ruether has been famously outstripped by Mary Daly, a former Catholic theologian who now, like several influential feminists, describes herself as a ‘witch’. Her book Beyond God the Father rejects even the metaphorical possibilities of traditional language. To call God Father, she insists, is to call fathers God. The Trinity is thus revealed as ‘an eternal male homosexual orgy’. As the engendering matrix of the world, God is, in fact, paradigmatically female. And the world itself, as mirror of heaven, ‘bears fruit’, and is hence female also. The male principle is the alien force, the nexus of disruption, aggression, and sin. Daly seems to approach the almost dualistic notion that God is female, while the ‘horned’ devil is male. This gendered Manicheanism may seem a bizarre inversion of Augustine’s androcentrism, but her books are hugely influential, selling in hundreds of thousands of copies.

Not every figuring of the divine is androcentric, of course. Luce Irigaray observes that it is in the West that ‘the gender of God, the guardian of every subject and discourse, is always paternal and masculine’. Even Orthodoxy is more aporetic in its metaphorical gendering of the sacred. The paintings of El Greco, as they reflect his trajectory from the timeless icon-painting of his native Crete, through his studies in Venice under Tintoretto, to the Toledo of the muscular Counter-Reformation, reveal a process of increasing concretisation, with growing attention to perspective, expression, and sharpness of form. His Christ, in his late, ‘Catholic’ paintings, is more human than divine; and hence more humanly and authentically male.

In this respect, perhaps more than in any other way, ours is not a Western tradition.

Islamic theology confronts us with the spectacular absence of a gendered Godhead. A theology which reveals the divine through incarnation in a body also locates it in a gender, and inescapably passes judgement on the other sex. A theology which locates it in a book makes no judgement about gender; since books are unsexed. The divine remains divine, that is, genderless, even when expressed in a fully saving way on earth.

The source of this teaching is unproblematic for believers. Secular historians might see it differently, as confirmation that early Islam was not covenantally-defined. Andromorphic views of the divine were necessary to Judaism, which was communally constituted in opposition to neighbouring goddess-worship, whence the imagery of Israel as ‘God’s bride’. This continued in the Christian church, the ‘New Israel’, the ‘bride of Christ’, as the Church Fathers waged war on the goddess cults of late antiquity, and also, increasingly, on ‘woman’ herself as the paradigm of responsibility for the Fall. But Islam’s community of believers never saw itself as a feminine entity, despite the interesting matronal resonances of the term umma. The Islamic understanding of salvation history did not require that Allah should be constructed as male.

From a theologian’s standpoint it might be said that Islam averts the difficulty identified by Ruether through its emphasis on the divine transcendence (tanzih). The same ‘desertlike’ abstract difference of the Muslim God which draws reproach from Christian commentators also allows a gender-neutral image of the divine. Allah is not neuter or androgynous, but is simply above gender. Even Judaism, which generally has fewer problems in this area than has Christianity, does not go this far. In the Eighteen Benedictions said by pious Jews every morning and evening, we find the words: ‘Cause us to return, O our Father, to thy Law,’ while in Deuteronomy 8.6, we read: ‘As a man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you.’

Such references to God as Father are less common in the Old Testament than the New, but they are still abundant, and are thorns in the path of gender-sensitive liberal theologians.

When we turn to the Qur’an, we find an image of Godhead apophatically stripped of metaphor. God is simply Allah, the God; never Father. The divine is referred to by the masculine pronoun: Allah is He (huwa); but the grammarians and exegetes concur that this is not even allegoric: Arabic has no neuter, and the use of the masculine is normal in Arabic for genderless nouns. No male preponderance is implied, any more than feminity is implied by the grammatically female gender of neuter plurals.

The modern Jordanian theologian Hasan al-Saqqaf emphasises the point that Muslim theology has consistently made down the ages: God is not gendered, really or metaphorically. The Quran continues Biblical assumptions on many levels, but here there is a striking discontinuity. The imaging of God has been shifted into a new and bipolar register, that of the Ninety-Nine Names.

Muslim women who have reflected on the gender issue have seized, I think with good reason, on this striking point. For instance, one Muslim woman writer, Sartaz Aziz, writes:

I am deeply grateful that my first ideas of God were formed by Islam because I was

able to think of the Highest Power as one completely without sex or race, and thus

completely unpatriarchal . . . We begin with the idea of a deity who is completely

above sexual identity, and thus completely outside the value system created by patriarchy.

This passage is cited by the modern Catholic writer Maura O’Neill, who writes on women’s issues in dialogue, and who rightly concludes: ‘Muslims do not use a masculine God as either a conscious or unconscious tool in the construction of gender roles.’

This does not mean that gender is absent from Muslim metaphysics. The kalam scholars, as good transcendentalists, banished it from the non-physical world. But the mystics, as immanentists, read it into almost everything. We might say that while in Christianity, relationality is in the triune Godhead, and is explicitly male, in Islam, relationality is absent from the Godhead but exuberantly exists in the Names. To use Kant’s terms, the noumenal God is neutral, whereas the phenomenal God is manifested in not one but two genders. The two leading modern scholars of this tradition in Islamic thought are Izutsu and Murata, who have both noted the parallels between Sufism’s dynamic cosmology and the Taoist world view: each sees existence as a dynamic interplay of opposites, which ultimately resolve to the One.

The Sufi metaphysicians were drawing on a longstanding distinction between the Divine Names that were called Names of Majesty (jalal), and the Names of Beauty (jamal). The Names of Majesty included Allah as Powerful (al-Qawi), Overwhelming (al-Jabbar), Judge (al-Hakam); and these were seen as pre-eminently masculine. Names of Beauty included the All-Compassionate (al-Rahman), the Mild (al-Halim), the Loving-kind (al-Wadud), and so on: seen as archetypally feminine. The crux is that neither set could be seen as pre-eminent, for all were equally Names of God. In fact, by far the most conspicuous of the Divine Names in the Koran is al-Rahman, the All-Compassionate. And the explictly feminine resonances of this name were remarked upon by the Prophet (s.w.s.) himself, who taught that rahma, loving compassion, is an attribute derived from the word rahim, meaning a womb. (Bukhari, Adab, 13) The cosmic matrix from which differentiated being is fashioned is thus, as in all primordial systems, explicitly feminine; although Allah ‘an sich’ remains outside qualification by gender or by any other property.

Further confirmation for this is supplied in a famous hadith, preserved for us by al-Bukhari, which describes how during the Muslim conquest of Mecca a woman was running about in the hot sun, searching for her child. She found him, and clutched him to her breast, saying, ‘My son, my son!’ The Prophet’s Companions saw this, and wept. The Prophet was delighted to see their rahma, and said, ‘Do you wonder at this woman’s rahma for her child? By Him in Whose hand is my soul, on the Day of Judgement, God shall show more rahma towards His believing servant than this woman has shown to her son.’ (Bukhari, Adab, 18)

And again: ‘On the day that He created the heavens and the earth, God created a hundred rahmas, each of which is as great as the space which lies between heaven and earth. And He sent one rahma down to earth, by which a mother has rahma for her child.’ (Muslim, Tawba, 21)

Drawing on this explicit identification of rahma with the ‘maternal’ aspect of the phenomenal divine, the developed tradition of Sufism habitually identifies God’s entire creative aspect as ‘feminine’, and as merciful. Creation itself is the nafas al-Rahman, the Breath of the All-Compassionate. Here the Ash‘arite occasionalism which insists on preserving the divine omnipotence by denying secondary causation is shifted into a mystical, matronal register, where the world of emanation is gendered by the sheer fact of its engendering. ‘We have created everything in pairs,’ says the Qur’an.

This ‘female’ aspect of God allowed most of the great mystical poets to refer to God as Layla - the celestial beloved - the Arabic name Layla actually means ‘night’. Layla is the veiled, darkly-unknown God who brings forth life, and whose beauty once revealed dazzles the lover. In one branch of this tradition, the poets use frankly erotic language to convey the rapture of the spiritual wayfarer as he lifts the veil - a metaphor for distraction and sin - to be annihilated in his Beloved.

One thinks here of Christian bridal mysticism, but in reverse. St Teresa of Avila appears to use sensual images to convey her union with Christ. But again, Christ, as God the Son, is male. In Islamic mysticism, the divine beloved is ‘female’.

The kalam hence abolishes gender; spirituality deploys it exuberantly as metaphor, thereby displaying an aspect of the distinction between ‘iman’ and ‘ihsan’. The third component of the ternary laid down by the Hadith of Gabriel, ‘islam’, comprising the outward forms of religion, also recognises and affirms gender as a fundamental quality of existence, and this finds expression in many provisions of Islamic law and the norms of Muslim life.

The pattern of life decreed by Islam, which is the retrieval of the Great Covenant (mithaq), is primordial, and hence biophiliac and affirmative of the hormonal and genetic dimensions of humanity. Body, mind and spirit are aspects of the same created phenomenon, and are all gendered through their interrelation. To the extent that the human creature lives in wholeness, that creature’s spiritual essence is possessed of gender, whence the magnificent celebration of the genius of each sex which is so characteristic of Islam. The Prophet (s.w.s.) himself can only be fully understood in this light: his virility indicates his wholeness and hence his holiness. His archetypal celebration of womanhood, his multiple wives, recalls the virility of Solomon or other Hebrew patriarchs, or even of Krishna. Living life to the full, he embraced and utterly sacralised the divinely-appointed rite of procreation. His khasa’is, the rules which the Lawgiver fashioned for him alone, and which are listed by Suyuti in his al-Khasa’is al-Kubra, generally imposed upon him rigours from which his followers were exempt. The tahajjud prayer was obligatory for him, but only optional for other Muslims. He was entitled to fast for twenty-four hours, or for much longer periods (the so-called Continuous Fast - sawm al-wisal); although ordinary believers were required to fast from dawn to dusk only. His khasa’is are for the most part austerities; and yet among them we find the inclusion of an expansive polygamy. Several of his wives were elderly, it is true (Sawda, Umm Habiba, Maymuna), and their marriages may have been straightforward matters of compassion and political wisdom; but other wives were young. By his triumphant polygamy, the Blessed Prophet was indicating the end of the Christian war against the body, and rhetorically re-affirmed the sacramental value of sexuality that the Hebrew prophets had proclaimed.

Inseparable from this was his valour on the field of battle. His style of spiritual self-naughting linked to heroism has no European equivalent: it was not that of the celibate Templars, or the Knights of Calatrava, but resonates instead with the warrior holiness of Krishna, or the bushido of medieval Japan. The samurai ethic combines meditative stillness, military excellence, and love for women in equal measure; it is a spectacular expression of maleness which is illuminative of this, to many Europeans, most remote and ungraspable dimension of the Sunna.

And this leads us towards a further question. Feminists point out that early Christian celibacy was driven by a horror of the flesh, so that women were, in Tertullian’s words, ‘the devil’s gateway’. This could have no deep purchase in Islamic culture, with the hadith insisting that ‘Marriage is my sunna, and whoever departs from my sunna is not of me;’ a valorization of marriage which implicitly valorized functional womanhood in a way that the Church Fathers, with their preference for virginal perfection, had found problematic. It is true that a celibate advocacy developed among some second and third generation Muslim ascetics also, with Abu Sulayman al-Darani declaring, ‘Whoever marries has inclined towards the world’. However, this kind of sentiment tended to be expressed in the very early ascetical milieu, where the drive for celibacy, as Tor Andrae has shown, was the result of Christian monastic influence, and was later swept away by the tide of normative Sufism. In high medieval Islam the conjunction of holiness and celibacy was unimaginable, and few who aspired to God were unmarried: Ibn Taymiya was the rarest of exceptions.

This evolution of values again parallels the situation in early Christianity. A bitterly-fought scholarly argument debates whether the appearance of the first Christians improved or degraded the status of women, with Peter Brown and many feminists arguing the latter view. Ben Witherington observes that it is the later New Testament material (Luke, Acts) that advocates an improved role for women and a departure from the rabbinical (and hence post-prophetic) norms which shaped the attitudes of the first Christians. However, as Jesus was a Jewish prophet, loyal to revelation, and in particular to its interpretation within a compassionate template, it is reasonable to assume that there existed genuinely pro-female possibilities in the early Jesus community that capsized under the weight of pre-existent Hellenic misogyny which some authors of the Pauline epistles imported from the mystery religions, in the way that Foucault has shown in the second volume of his History of Sexuality.

It may be said that an analogous corrosion befell Islamic social history. Critically, however, this happened to a much lesser extent, for a set of reasons which demand careful attention.

Firstly, the above-noted refusal of the scriptures to attribute male gender to the Godhead deprived the tradition of an unarguable gynophobic foundation. The doctrine of the Names as archetypes for all bipolarities in creation ruled out any possibly consequent idea that humanity’s retrieval of theomorphism must entail a shedding of gender in favour of androgyny. On the contrary, the retrieval of theomorphism is the retrieval of gender, fully understood.

Secondly, the very word ‘woman’ had been for many Church Fathers a metonym for concupiscence; and patristic Christianity’s consistent preference for celibacy as a calling higher than marriage had entailed a particular attitude towards women. The model was, of course, Christ himself, as later figured and interpreted by the Church’s imagination. Islam, by stark contrast, maintained a version of the primordial, and also Solomonic, polygamous, heroic model of Semitic prophethood. As Geoffrey Parrinder has shown, sex-positive religions tend also to accord a higher status to the female principle; and Islam from its inception stressed that the presence of women’s bodies and spirits was in no way injurious to the spiritual life. The Prophet (s.w.s.) worshipped in his tiny room for much of the night, and when he was descending into prostration he would nudge aside the legs of his young wife Aisha, to make room. A far cry from the devotions of the Syrian monk, alone in his desert cell.

Also built into the archetypal patterns of Islam is a characteristic amendation to existing purity laws. Feminists have often identified these as a major sign and strengthener of misogyny. They exist in branches of Christianity, as is shown by Russian Orthodox hesitations about the reception of the Eucharist by menstruating women. In Judaism they are very elaborate, so that the menstruating woman is only sexually available for half of every month. Special bathhouses are required for her purification.

This reflects and responds to a very ancient, and very widely-observed taboo. In some primitive societies, women are banished from their husband’s house during this time; the Galla tribes of Ethiopia allocate special huts for menstruating women. Even today, the significant disruption to women’s behavioural patterns is acknowledged in some legislation: modern French law, for instance, even classifies extreme premenstrual tension as a form of temporary insanity.

Islam has preserved the memory of this ancient, and also Semitic hesitation, but in an interestingly attenuated and non-judgemental form. So in sura 2 verse 220 we read:

‘They will question you concerning the monthly course: Say, it is a hurt. So go apart from women during the monthly course and do not approach them until they are clean.’

What this means is clarified in the sunna. A hadith reports that:

‘A’isha was sleeping under one coverlet with God’s Messenger, when suddenly she jumped up and left his side. The Messenger said to her, ‘What is the matter? Are you losing blood?’ She said, ‘Yes.’ He said: ‘Wrap your waist-wrapper tightly about you, and come back to your sleeping-place.’’

There are echoes here of this primordial human unease, but they are very reduced. The naturalism of Islam constantly insists that holiness does not emerge from the suppression of human instincts, but from their affirmation through regulation, so that the natural rhythms of the body and the awe with which we regard them are not to be ignored, but need commemoration in religious ritual. Hence a woman is granted a suspension of formal prayer and fasting for several days in every month. Some feminists see this as a diminution of female spirituality; Muslim female theologians regard it as a reverent acknowledgement; others, such as Ruqaiyyah Maqsood interpret it as a relief from religious duties at a difficult time. The dispensation is easily deconstructed by either suspicious or benign hermeneutics, and resists total interpretation.

What Muslims do stress is that Islam valorises women by making the basic duties of the faith equally incumbent upon both sexes: the suspension for a few days each month is seen as a pragmatic and generous dispensation which does not vitiate this basic principle. The Five Pillars are hence gender-neutral. Similarly, Islam does not establish sacred spaces inaccessible to women. Women can and do enter the Holy Ka‘ba. The Inner Court of the Temple in Jerusalem before its demolition by the Romans was out of bounds to women, who faced the death penalty if they penetrated it. Under Muslim auspices, it was thrown open to both sexes. Hence the Dome of the Rock, the golden structure which still symbolises the Celestial City, and which marks the terrestrial point of the Mi‘raj, is allocated on Fridays exclusively to women, so that men pray in the nearby al-Aqsa mosque hall. Here, as elsewhere, the sexes are segregated during congregational prayers, and the reason given for this is again the pragmatic and unanswerable one that a conmingling of men and women during a form of worship which entails a good deal of physical contact would readily lead to distraction.

Women may penetrate the sacratum; but what of the ambivalent privilege of leadership? Who is the broker of God’s saving word? If in Judaism, women could not approach the Torah, while in Christianity they found themselves excluded from administering the Eucharist, does the new dispensation of Islam restrain them analogously?

Here Islam extends its feminizing of sacred spaces to its own epiphany of the Word which resonates within them. For the Shari‘a, the word made Book is open to female touch and cantillation. Symbolically, the custodianship of the first Qur’anic text was entrusted to the Prophet’s wife Hafsa, not to a man.

Regarding collective celebration of the divine word, it is clear that there can be no Islamic equivalent to the debate over women’s ordination, for the straightforward reason that Islam does not ordain anyone, whether male or female. Our recollection of the primordial Alast and our affirmation of the Great Covenant have already conferred holy orders upon us all. They are valid to the extent of our recollection.

The imam does not mediate; but the spiritual director may do so, by praying for the disciple and offering techniques of dhikr. It is a manifestation of the inescapably anti-feminine harshness of modern pseudosalafite activism that the Sufi shaykh is for such activists a figure not to be revered, but to be abolished. Sufism, and several other forms of Islamic initiatic spirituality, have frequently accommodated women in ways which purely exoteric forms of the religion have not: the Sufi shaykh, who exercises such influence on the formation and guidance of the disciple, and is often a more significant presence for the individual and for society than the person of the mosque imam, may be of either gender. The modern Lebanese saint Fatima al-Yashrutiyya is a conspicuous and deeply moving example; but there are many others. Frequently in those Muslim societies where the mosque has become a primarily male space, the tomb of a prophet or a saint supplies a sacred place for women, responding to their affective spirituality which flourishes, as Irigaray would have it, in the embrace of closed circles rather than in straight lines. The importance of some of the tombs of the Prophets for Palestinian women has often been noted in this regard. Pseudosalafism, with its nervousness about any public visibility for women, seeks to suppress such contexts, with the exception only of the tomb at Madina, which it construes not as paradigm but as exception.

Nonetheless, the issue of a possible female imamate has been raised in several communities in recent years, although the evidence suggests that very few women aspire to this ambivalent position. The imam of a mosque can claim none of the mediating authority of a priest: he does not stand in loco divinis; but is mainly present to mark time, to ensure that the worshippers’ movements are co-ordinated, and to represent the unity of the community. While in some cultures he may have the added function of a pastoral counsellor, this is not a canonical requirement. All four madhhabs of Sunni Islam affirm that the imam must be male if there are males in the congregation. If there are only females, then many classical scholars permit the imamship of females, and this is generally accepted nowadays. But women cannot lead men in prayer. There are in fact no Qur’anic or Hadith texts that explicitly lay this down: it is a product of the medieval consensus. Although those who reject the Four Schools, and attempt to derive the shari‘a directly from the revelation, sometimes repudiate this consensus, only a few, such as Farid Esack, have proposed it seriously. In practice, women activists in the Muslim world appear to have little concern for this, again, because of the absence of inherent prestige and authority in the imamate. One can be a religious leader without being imam of a mosque, the example of prominent theologians such as Bint al-Shati’ in modern Egypt, and a host of medieval predecessors such as Umm Hani, A’isha al-Ba‘uniyya, and Karima al-Marwaziyya, affording sufficient proof of this.

The discussion so far has moved downwards through districts of metaphysics to touch on issues of shari‘a. Theologically, as we have seen, Islam tends to assert the equality of the male and female principles, while in its practical social structures it establishes a distinction. To understand this paradox is to understand the essence of the Islamic philosophy of gender, which constructs roles from below, not from above.

Women’s functions vary widely in the Muslim world and in Muslim history. In peasant communities, women work out of doors; in the desert, and among urban elites, womanhood is more frequently celebrated in the home. Recurrently, however, the public space is rigorously desexualised, and this is represented by the quasi-monastic garb of men and women, where frequently the colour white is the colour of the male, while black, significantly the sign of interiority, of the Ka‘ba and hence the celestial Layla, denotes femininity. In the private space of the home these signs are cast aside, and the home becomes as colourful as the public space is austere and polarised. Modernity, refusing to recognise gender as sacred sign, and delighting in random erotic signalling, renders the public space ‘domestic’ by colouring it, and makes war on all remnants of gender separation, crudely construed as judgemental.

For Muslims, a significant development in the new feminism is the renewed desire for apartness. Contemplating the crisis of egalitarian social contracts, where the burden of divorce invariably bears most heavily upon women, Daly and many others advocate an almost insurrectionist refusal of contact with the male, and the creation of ‘women’s spaces’ as citadels for the cultivation of a true sisterhood. This cannot be immediately useful to Muslims. Hermeneutics of suspicion directed against either sex are irreligious from the Qur’anic perspective. God, as a sign, ‘has created spouses for you, from your own kind, that you may find peace in them; and He has set between you love and mercy.’ (30:21) Nonetheless, the feminist demand for apartness should not be cast aside; it may even converge significantly with Islam’s provision of it.

In her Ethics of Sexual Difference, Irigaray denounces the technological workplace created by men, which ‘brings about a sexuate levelling at a certain level, [and] neutralizes sexual differences’. To compete, women must assume the ‘tunnel vision’ of the achievement-oriented male, and hence relinquish aspects of their hormonally-coded essence for the sake of a public mercantile space which is biocidal, profiteering, anti-feminine, and now anti-gender. She also observes that ‘the sexual liberations of recent times have not established a new ethics of sexuality’, and that women have been the prime sufferers. But an insurrectionist feminist response ‘often destroys the possibility of constituting a shelter or a territory of one’s own. How are we to construct this female shelter, this territory in difference?’ The question is shared with Islam; but her response is disappointing, and surely futile. Like Levinas, she demands a revolution in love, a ‘fertility in social and cultural difference’ rooted in reconciliation, a new language of gesture, and valorization of the separate nature of femaleness by males.

Given her pessimism about the mutability of the male temper, apparently reinforced by new molecular genetic studies on gender difference, this looks like wishful thinking, and cannot provide more than part of the agenda for an authentic and affirming mutuality. However in her diagnosis we may locate the clue to the more moral and more spiritual solution for which she clearly yearns. ‘Our societies,’ she notes, ‘are built upon men-among-themselves (l’entre-hommes). According to this order, women remain dispersed and exiled atoms.’ But there is a rival cultural economy which cries out to be considered.

Traditionally, the Islamic public space is constructed and subjectivised primarily by ‘l’entre-hommes’, the men in white. The women in black signal a kind of absence even when they are present, by assuming a respected guest status. But Islamic society, rooted in primordial and specifically Shari‘atic kinship patterns, emphatically refuses to reduce them to the status of ‘dispersed and exiled atoms’. There is a parallel space of the entre-femmes, a realm of alternative meaning and fulfilment, where men are the guests, which intersects in formal ways with the entre-hommes but which creates a sociality between women, a space for the appreciation of nos semblables which is largely lacking amid the conditions of modernity or postmodernity, and which is more profoundly human and feminine than the academicised utopia of which Irigaray dreams.

Irigaray commends the new institution of affidamento, current among some Italian feminists, which seeks a withdrawal from the irreducibly male and abrasive public space into nuclei of relaxed female sorority. For her, this is ‘the token of another culture which preserves for us a possible and inhabitable future, a culture whose historical face is as yet unknown to us’. She acknowledges that the power-struggles and generally negative experience of women’s groups suggests that affidamento cells may not be able to merge to create a larger and stable women’s solidarity apart from men. But the random intrusion of women into the public space, and the consequent patterns of conflict, marginalisation, the neglect of children, and spiralling divorce, suggest that some form of localised, informal sorority may provide women with the matrix of identity which a fragmenting modernity denies them.

The Islamic entre-femmes has been explored by several anthropologists. Chantal Lobato, in her studies of Afghan refugee women, angrily rejects Western stereotypes, praising the warmth and sisterly richness of these women’s lives. As she records, such women’s spaces, with systems of meaning, tradition, and narrative constructed largely by women themselves, intersect with the male narrative through institutions such as marriage. We would add that intersection, critically, is not determined by either sex. Irigaray holds that all discourses are gendered; but Islam would say that this is not true: there are in fact three discourses: male, female, and divine. Tawhid, as we have seen, refuses to gender God or God’s word; and the Qur’anic text is hence a neutral document. It is read by men and by women, and hence imported and internalised in gender-specific ways. As such it supplies a barzakh between the two worlds of meaning, equally possessed by each. It is the missing link in Irigaray’s theoretical model which enables an authentic and stable inter-sexual sociality.

What this theology, and the anthropology which is emerging to support it, propose, is that normative Islamic society is concurrently patriarchal and matriarchal. The public space is primarily that of men, who may valorise it over the private; but the latter space is valorised by women, who may regard the public space as morally and spiritually questionable. Hence a feature of Muslim folkways is a kind of reflexive amusement. Men frequently construct a trivialising discourse on women; but women, as any eavesdropper on a Muslim female conversation will know, dismiss men and their concerns with an even more amused disregard. They are right to say, ‘Men, what do they know?’ And the male patriarchal dismissal is, from the male viewpoint, no less correct. Aspects of the hadith discourse which appear to diminish women can be affirmed, and also relativised, by adopting this perspective.

A final aspect of the concurrent patriarchy and matriarchy of Muslim cultures concerns the status of the mother. A weakness of Irigaray’s work is her worrying indifference to the aged; like many feminists, she appears to be concerned only with her semblables. While she accepts the reproductive and nurturing telos of the female body, she signally fails to consider its other natural trajectory, which is towards senescence.

The veneration of aged mothers is a recurrent feature of the Prophetic vision, in which kindness and loyalty to the mother, a rahma to reciprocate the rahma they themselves dispensed, is seen as an almost sacramental act. Ibn Umar narrates that ‘a man came to God’s Messenger (s.w.s.) and said: ``I have committed a great sin. Is there anything I can do to repent?`` He asked, ``Do you have a mother?`` The man said that he did not, and he asked again, ``Then do you have a maternal aunt?`` The man replied that he did, and the Prophet (s.w.s.) told him: ``Then be kind and devoted to her``.’ (Tirmidhi) Other hadiths are legion: ‘Whoever kisses his mother between the eyes receives a protection from the fire’ (Bayhaqi); ‘Verily God has forbidden disobedience to your mother’ (Bukhari and Muslim).

Anthropologists working in Islamic cultures hence consistently report a dual hierarchy which requires wives to be dutiful to husbands, while husbands must be dutiful to mothers. Modernity loosens both these ties, the former vehemently, and the latter absentmindedly; and the consequence has been a lopsided, frankly ageist new hierarchy which prioritises youth over age, and imposes ruthless forms of discrimination against those who were once considered the community’s pride and the repository of its memory. As medical advances prolong average longevity without substantially eroding the differential which separates male and female mortality, modern societies relegate increasing numbers of women to involuntary eremeticism in regimented but prayerless convents. In 1998 the Chicago Tribune recorded that sixty percent of inhabitants of American old people’s homes never receive a visitor. Given the gender ratio normal in such establishments, the percentage among women must be higher still. Hence the irony that young and middle-aged women in the West have broader horizons than hitherto (excluding, for the moment, the religious horizon), but must all fear a decade of solitary confinement at the end, staring into television screens, recycling memories, and fingering months-old greetings cards from relatives who rarely if ever appear. Even in the most Westernised of Muslim societies, the confinement of the old to what are in effect comfortable concentration camps, is regarded with the disgust that it merits.

Other aspects of Shari‘a discourse also call for elucidation. It cannot be our task here to review the detailed provisions of Islamic law, and to explain, in each individual instance, the Islamic case that gender equality, even where the concept is meaningful, can be undermined rather than established by enforced parity of role and rights. Such a project would require a separate volume of the type attempted recently by Haifa Jawad; and we must content ourselves with surveying a few representative issues.

Perhaps the most immediately conspicuous feature of Muslim communities is the dress code traditional for women. It is often forgotten that the Shari‘a and the Muslim sense of human dignity require a dress code for men as well: in fully traditional Muslim societies, men always cover their hair in public, and wear long flowing garments exposing only the hands and feet. In Muslim law, however, their awra is more loosely defined: men have to cover themselves from the navel to the knees as a minimum. But women, on the basis of a hadith, must cover everything except the face, hands and feet.

Again, the feminine dress code, known as hijab, forms a largely passive text available for a range of readings. For some Western feminist missionaries to Muslim lands, it is a symbol of patriarchy and of woman’s demure submission. For Muslim women, it proclaims their identity: many very secular women who demonstrated against the Shah in the 1970s wore it for this reason, as an almost aggressive flag of defiance. Franz Fanon reflected on a similar phenomenon among Algerian women protesting against French rule in the 1950s. For still other women, however, such as the Egyptian thinker Safinaz Kazim, the hijab is to be reconstrued as a quasi-feminist statement. A woman who exposes her charms in public is vulnerable to what might be described as ‘visual theft’, so that men unknown to her can enjoy her visually without her consent. By covering herself, she regains her ability to present herself as a physical being only to her family and sorority. This view of hijab, as a kind of moral raincoat particularly useful under the inclement climate of modernity, allows a vision of Islamic woman as liberated, not from tradition and meaning, but from ostentation and from subjection to random visual rape by men. The feminist objection to the patriarchal adornment or denuding of women, namely that it reduces them to the status of vulnerable, passive objects of the male regard, makes no headway against the hijab, responsibly understood.

A further controversy in the Shari‘a’s nurturing of gender roles centres around the institution of plural marriage. This clearly is a primordial institution whose biological rationale is unanswerable: as Dawkins and others have observed, it is in the genetic interest of males to have a maximal number of females; while the reverse is never the case. Stephen Pinker notes somewhat obviously in his book How the Mind Works: ‘The reproductive success of males depends on how many females they mate with, but the reproductive success of females does not depend on how many males they mate with.’

Islam’s naturalism, its insistence on the fitra and our authentic belongingness to the natural order, has ensured the conservation of this creational norm within the moral context of the Shari‘a. Polygamy, in the Islamic case, appears as a recognisably Semitic institution, traceable back to an Old Testament tribal society frequently at war and unequipped with a social security system that might protect and assimilate widows into society. However it is more universal: classical Hinduism permits a man four wives, and there are many Christian voices, not only Mormons, who are today calling for the restoration of polygamy as part of an authentically Biblical lifestyle. (See, for example, http://www.familyman.u-net.com/polygamy.html)

Faced with the failure of normative Western marriage and relationship codes, a growing number of contemporary thinkers are turning to this primordial institution for possible guidance. Phillip Kilbride, professor of anthropology at Bryn Mawr, aroused much interest with his recent book Plural Marriage for Our Times: A Reinvented Option. Audrey Chapman has written a more popular study entitled Man-Sharing: Dilemma or Choice, while in 1996, the women’s rights activist Adriana Blake published her Women Can Win the Marriage Lottery: Share Your Man with Another Wife.

These studies, from their different perspectives, present three major ethical arguments for polygamy. Firstly, the institution can, as its origins suggest, allow the reintegration into a post-war society of bereaved women, of whom a tragically large number now exist around the globe. Secondly, it can work to the advantage of women: an extended family is created which allows one woman to go to work, while the other cares for the children. The juggling of work and children which is a besetting hazard of modern relationships is thus neatly averted: showing polygamy as a frankly liberative option for women. Its advantages for children, also, have been amply documented by the recent research of Carmon Hardy, who shows the strong degree of family bonding and much lower incidence of crime among offspring of Mormon polygamists at the turn of the present century. Thirdly, polygamy is realistic; and from the Muslim perspective, we would identify this as a principal argument given the Shari‘a’s general realism. Muslims point out that modern Western societies are in practice far more polygamous than Muslim ones, the difference being that in the West the second relationship exists outside any legal framework. The present heir to the British throne, for instance, has been polygamous, and to traditional Muslims nothing seemed more absurd than that Diana needed to be divorced, and a constitutional crisis provoked.

True monotheism, as always, entails realism. Men are biologically designed to desire a plurality of women, and, unless we can carry out some radical genetic engineering work, they will always do so. And when a man has two simultaneously, the law may either deprive one of the two women of legal rights and social status, as in the modern West. Or it can recognise both as legitimate spouses, as in the Shari‘a. Muslims regard as an absurdity the present arrangement in the West where consensual relationships of all kinds are allowed and even militantly defended: homosexual, lesbian, and so on; whereas a consensual ménage a trois is still regarded as immoral. The last hangover of Victorian morality? In fact, a menage a trois is perfectly acceptable in modern Western law, as long as the parties to it live ‘in sin’ and do not attempt to marry. The absurdity of this position requires no comment.

There are other aspects of the Shari’a which deserve mention as illustrations of our theme, not least those which have been largely forgotten by Muslim societies. The intersections between the two gender universes are sometimes designed by the Lawgiver as rights of women, and sometimes as rights of men; and the former category is more frequently omitted from actualised Muslim communities. Frequently the jurists’ exegesis of the texts is plurivocal. Domestic chores, for instance, appear as an aspect of interior sociality, but this is not identified with purely female space, since they are regarded by some madhhabs, including the Shafi‘i, as the responsibility of the man rather than the wife. A’isha was asked, after the Blessed Prophet’s death, what he used to do at home when he was not at prayer; and she replied: ‘He served his family: he used to sweep the floor, and sew clothes.’ (Bukhari, Adhan, 44.) On this basis, Shafi‘i jurists defend the woman’s right not to perform housework. For instance, the fourteenth century Syrian jurist Ibn al-Naqib insists: ‘A woman is not obliged to serve her husband by baking, grinding flour, cooking, washing, or any other kind of service, because the marriage contract entails, for her part, only that she let him enjoy her sexually, and she is not obliged to do other than that.’

In the Hanafi madhhab, by contrast, these acts are regarded as the wife’s obligations. Another sufficient reminder of the difficulty of generalising about Islamic law, which remains a diverse body of rules and approaches. (Another important area, which cannot be detailed here, is the law for custody of children: the Hanafis prefer boys to leave the divorced mother at the age of 7, to live with the father; girls remain with her until the menarch. For the Malikis, the boy stays with the mother until sexual maturity (ihtilam), and the girl until her marriage is consummated.)

Islam’s theology of gender thus contends with a maze, a web of connections which demand familiarity with a diverse legal code, regional heterogeneity, and with the metaphysical no less than with the physical. This complexity should warn us against offering facile generalisations about Islam’s attitude to women. Journalists, feminists and cultivated people generally in the West have harboured deeply negative verdicts here. Often these verdicts are arrived at through the observation of actual Muslim societies; and it would be both futile and immoral to suggest that the modern Islamic world is always to be admired for its treatment of women. Women in countries such as Saudi Arabia, where they are not even permitted to drive cars, are objectively the victims of an oppression which is not the product of a divinely-willed sheltering of a sex, but of ego, of the nafs of the male. In this way, types of ‘Islamization’ being launched in several countries today by individuals driven by resentment and committed to an anthropomorphised and hence andromorphic God, appear to bear no relation either to traditional fiqh discourse or to the revelatory insistence on justice. This imbalance will continue unless actualised religion learns to reincorporate the dimension of ihsan, which valorises the feminine principle, and also obstructs and ultimately annihilates the ego which underpins gender chauvinism. We need to distinguish, as many Muslim women thinkers are doing, between the expectations of the religion’s ethos (as legible in scripture, classical exegesis, and spirituality), and the actual asymmetric structures of post-classical Muslim societies, which, like Christian, Jewish, Hindu and Chinese cultures, contain much that is in real need of reform.

By now it should have become clear that we are not vaunting the revelation as either a ‘macho’ chauvinism or as a miraculous prefigurement of late twentieth-century feminism. Feminism, in any case, has no orthodoxy, as Fiorenza reminds us; and certain of its forms are repellent to us, and are clearly damaging to women and society, while others may demonstrate striking convergences with the Shari‘a and our gendered cosmologies. We advocate a nuanced understanding which tries to bypass the sexism-versus-feminism dialectic by proposing a theology in which the Divine is truly gender-neutral, but gifts humanity with a legal code and family norms which are rooted in the understanding that, as Irigaray insists, the sexes ‘are not equal but different’, and will naturally gravitate towards divergent roles which affirm rather than suppress their respective genius.

Biology should be destiny, but a destiny that allows for multiple possibilities. Women’s discourse valorizes the home; but Muslim women have for long periods of Islam’s history left their homes to become scholars. A hundred years ago the orientalist Ignaz Goldziher showed that perhaps fifteen percent of medieval hadith scholars were women, teaching in the mosques and universally admired for their integrity. Colleges such as the Saqlatuniya Madrasa in Cairo were funded and staffed entirely by women. The most recent study of Muslim female academicians, by Ruth Roded, charts an extraordinary dilemma for the researcher:

‘If U.S. and European historians feel a need to reconstruct women’s history because women are invisible in the traditional sources, Islamic scholars are faced with a plethora of source material that has only begun to be studied. [ . . . ] In reading the biographies of thousands of Muslim women scholars, one is amazed at the evidence that contradicts the view of Muslim women as marginal, secluded, and restricted.’

Stereotypes come under almost intolerable strain when Roded documents the fact that the proportion of female lecturers in many classical Islamic colleges was higher than in modern Western universities. A’isha, Mother of Believers, who taught hadith in the ur-mosque of Islam, is as always the indispensable paradigm: lively, intelligent, devout, and humbling to all subsequent memory.

But until past ideals are reclaimed, a polarisation in Muslim societies is likely. The Westernised classes will reject traditional idioms simply because those styles are not Western and fail to satisfy the élite’s self-image. The pseudosalafi literalists will continue to reject Sufism’s high regard for women, and its demand for the destruction of the ego. The same constituency will defy legitimate calls for a due ijtihad-based transformation of aspects of Islamic law, not because of any profound moral understanding of that law, but because of a hamfisted exegesis of usul and because those calls are associated with Western influence and demands. Whether the conscientious middle ground, inspired by the genius of tradition, can seize the initiative, and allow an ego-free and generous Muslim definition of the Sunna to shape the agenda in our rapidly polarising societies, remains to be seen. No doubt, the Sufi insight that there is no justice or compassion on earth without an emptying of the self will be the final yardstick among the wise. But it is clear that the Islamic tradition offers the possibility of a truly radical solution, offering not only to itself but to the West the transcendence of a debate which continues to perplex many responsible minds, contemplating an emergent society where the absence of roles presides over an increasingly damaging absence of rules.

[/unquote]

Solitude,

your hatred for Islam amazes me. so much hatred...

you are worse than the most narrow-minded orientalist of the past. i dont know if you are a muslim or not [i doubt it]; but if you are--hey, if it is so bad, why don`t you leave? no one is forcing you to believe in it are they?

the problem with you so-called ``educated`` people [the irony is I am prob. more educated in a western sense than you as are thousands of so-called ``fundos``] is that you like to bad-mouth and ridicule our beautiful religion while at the same time complaining bitterly that in Islam those who willingly reject it, after being offered it properly, people like you, are going to Hell! You shout unfair!! This only exposes your deep-down fear that Islam is the Truth but you are so caught up in the trap of your own Ego and selfish desires that you try to deny the reality by ridiculing it...

and the SAD thing is--you then want people to take you seriously!!

and since when have you been a scholar of hadith?

you belong in the same category as Mir Ja`far and Mir Sadiq...and a great modern muslim like Iqbal places them in the deepest part of Hell in his Javidnamah...

BTw, sorry to burst your bubble, but traditional Muslims dont give a damn whether Bernard Shaw--or any other Orientalist or philosopher or celebrated Western scholar/personality praises Islam or not. We don`t need the stamp of approval of the kaafirs who only see islam from the outside. it is only the grovelling apologists--of whom there are many--that use such silly tactics or who try to interpret the religion to fit into the latest western thinking.

Oh, while I`m at it, let me tell you that all of the fanatical groups you so love to criticize are actually products of ``modernist`` Islam--they all can be traced to the wahaabi movement of muhammad ibn abd al wahaab al-najdi. it is the ``traditionalists``--those who follow the four schools of Law and the maturidi-asha`ri aqeedah of scholastic theology [kalam] and amongst whom are listed the sufis also that are active in a meaningful manner AGAINST the current of fanaticisim which is gaining ground precisely becoz pompous idiots like yourself with your self-satisfactory aura of superiority in a borrowed tradition drive them into ever tighter corners.

And of this Middle Ground--the Middle Way--the greatest exponent was none other than Imam al Ghazzali who struck a middle path between the extreme rationalism of the muta`zilites and the neoplatonists and the extreme literalism of the anthropomorphists. this middle ground came to be accepted as orthodoxy..

Finally, if Islam is so mysoginistic and horrible why are thousands of perfectly sane, succesful, women in the US and Western Europe increasingly converting to Islam?

I dont know what you think of Iqbal but one of his most famous verses was:

rasm-e-azaan reh gayee baaqi, rooh-e-Bilali na raha

Falsafa reh gya, TALQEEN-E-GHAZZALI na raha.

i apologise if it is a slight misquote.

Solitude,

your hatred for Islam amazes me. so much hatred...

you are worse than the most narrow-minded orientalist of the past. i dont know if you are a muslim or not [i doubt it]; but if you are--hey, if it is so bad, why don`t you leave? no one is forcing you to believe in it are they?

the problem with you so-called ``educated`` people [the irony is I am prob. more educated in a western sense than you as are thousands of so-called ``fundos``] is that you like to bad-mouth and ridicule our beautiful religion while at the same time complaining bitterly that in Islam those who willingly reject it, after being offered it properly, people like you, are going to Hell! You shout unfair!! This only exposes your deep-down fear that Islam is the Truth but you are so caught up in the trap of your own Ego and selfish desires that you try to deny the reality by ridiculing it...

and the SAD thing is--you then want people to take you seriously!!

and since when have you been a scholar of hadith?

you belong in the same category as Mir Ja`far and Mir Sadiq...and a great modern muslim like Iqbal places them in the deepest part of Hell in his Javidnamah...

BTw, sorry to burst your bubble, but traditional Muslims dont give a damn whether Bernard Shaw--or any other Orientalist or philosopher or celebrated Western scholar/personality praises Islam or not. We don`t need the stamp of approval of the kaafirs who only see islam from the outside. it is only the grovelling apologists--of whom there are many--that use such silly tactics or who try to interpret the religion to fit into the latest western thinking.

Oh, while I`m at it, let me tell you that all of the fanatical groups you so love to criticize are actually products of ``modernist`` Islam--they all can be traced to the wahaabi movement of muhammad ibn abd al wahaab al-najdi. it is the ``traditionalists``--those who follow the four schools of Law and the maturidi-asha`ri aqeedah of scholastic theology [kalam] and amongst whom are listed the sufis also that are active in a meaningful manner AGAINST the current of fanaticisim which is gaining ground precisely becoz pompous idiots like yourself with your self-satisfactory aura of superiority in a borrowed tradition drive them into ever tighter corners.

And of this Middle Ground--the Middle Way--the greatest exponent was none other than Imam al Ghazzali who struck a middle path between the extreme rationalism of the muta`zilites and the neoplatonists and the extreme literalism of the anthropomorphists. this middle ground came to be accepted as orthodoxy..

Finally, if Islam is so mysoginistic and horrible why are thousands of perfectly sane, succesful, women in the US and Western Europe increasingly converting to Islam?

I dont know what you think of Iqbal but one of his most famous verses was:

rasm-e-azaan reh gayee baaqi, rooh-e-Bilali na raha

Falsafa reh gya, TALQEEN-E-GHAZZALI na raha.

i apologise if it is a slight misquote.

Re: Urstruly

You used just the right word for this idiot - Laqoot.

Urstruly & AH2000:#209 #210

``When the massas see the merit in these Islamic injunctions,only then will we be convinced`` so say Farangi Daas and Ghulam Farangi.

Right now they are busy disinfecting themselves for any clinging muslim/hindu Indian/pakistani ``browning effect``.(Chemistry anyone?)

``Don`t call us ,we`ll call you`` they just chirped.

__________________________________________________

wassalaam.

Farangi Kush[Buzur`gvaa`r]:
It was not evident that Urs-truly was ``Aah Bhurnaa``[Sighing]or ``Aah Kurnaa``[Ouch-ing]. I read it again and kind of agree with your reasonings, but I don`t think that Little Urstruly`s was crying in anguish or pain. He was just ``Aah Bhurnaa`` like someone will *yawn. * I think you spelled out for him what he needed to decide for himself. Let him grow up, please!

* *Shukrun * *


``Evil Twin`` or ``Evil Twain`` ?

Somehow, I did not care to read the author`s signature very carefully, therefore I mistook him for ``Evil Twain`` than ``Evil Twin.`` Based on my assumption, I was 100% sure that the author`s write-up was influenced by Mark Twain`s ``Diaries of Adam and Eve.`` Following were few excerpts that made me smile and think that ``The Evil Twi/ain`` was, indeed, under the influence :-)

``MONDAY.--The new creature says its name is Eve. That is all right, I have no objections. Says it is to call it by when I want it to come. I said it was superfluous, then. The word evidently raised me in its respect; and indeed it is a large, good word, and will bear repetition. It says it is not an It, it is a She. This is probably doubtful; yet it is all one to me; what she is were nothing to me if she would but go by herself and not talk.

TUESDAY.--She has taken up with a snake now. The other animals are glad, for she was always experimenting with them and bothering them; and I am glad, because the snake talks, and this enables me to get a rest.

When I found it could talk I felt a new interest in it, for I love to talk; I talk all day, and in my sleep, too, and I am very interesting, but if I had another to talk to I could be twice as interesting, and would never stop, if desired.

NEXT WEEK SUNDAY.--All the week I tagged around after him and tried to get acquainted. I had to do the talking, because he was shy, but I didn`t mind it. He seemed pleased to have me around, and I used the sociable ``we`` a good deal, because it seemed to flatter him to be included.

WEDNESDAY.--We are getting along very well indeed, now, and getting better and better acquainted. He does not try to avoid me any more, which is a good sign, and shows that he likes to have me with him. That pleases me, and I study to be useful to him in every way I can, so as to increase his regard. During the last day or two I have taken all the work of naming things off his hands, and this has been a great relief to him, for he has no gift in that line, and is evidently very grateful. He can`t think of a rational name to save him, but I do not let him see that I am aware of his defect. Whenever a new creature comes along I name it before he has time to expose himself by an awkward silence. In this way I have saved him many embarrassments. I have no defect like his. The minute I set eyes on an animal I know what it is. I don`t have to reflect a moment; the right name comes out instantly, just as if it were an inspiration, as no doubt it is, for I am sure it wasn`t in me half a minute before. I seem to know just by the shape of the creature and the way it acts what animal it is.

MONDAY.--This morning I told him my name, hoping it would interest him. But he did not care for it. It is strange. If he should tell me his name, I would care. I think it would be pleasanter in my ears than any other sound.

He talks very little. Perhaps it is because he is not bright, and is sensitive about it and wishes to conceal it. It is such a pity that he should feel so, for brightness is nothing; it is in the heart that the values lie. I wish I could make him understand that a loving good heart is riches, and riches enough, and that without it intellect is poverty. {Thah}

At first I couldn`t make out what I was made for, but now I think it was to search out the secrets of this wonderful world and be happy and thank the Giver of it all for devising it. I think there are many things to learn yet--I hope so; and by economizing and not hurrying too fast I think they will last weeks and weeks. I hope so. When you cast up a feather it sails away on the air and goes out of sight; then you throw up a clod and it doesn`t. It comes down, every time. I have tried it and tried it, and it is always so. I wonder why it is? Of course it doesn`t come down, but why should it seem to? I suppose it is an optical illusion. I mean, one of them is. I don`t know which one. It may be the feather, it may be the clod; I can`t prove which it is, I can only demonstrate that one or the other is a fake, and let a person take his choice.[Beautiful]

By watching, I know that the stars are not going to last. I have seen some of the best ones melt and run down the sky. Since one can melt, they can all melt; since they can all melt, they can all melt the same night. That sorrow will come--I know it. I mean to sit up every night and look at them as long as I can keep awake; and I will impress those sparkling fields on my memory, so that by and by when they are taken away I can by my fancy restore those lovely myriads to the black sky and make them sparkle again, and double them by the blur of my tears.[Sweet]

After the Fall

It is not on account of his brightness that I love him--no, it is not that. He is not to blame for his brightness, such as it is, for he did not make it himself; he is as God made him, and that is sufficient. There was a wise purpose in it, that I know. In time it will develop, though I think it will not be sudden; and besides, there is no hurry; he is well enough just as he is. It is not on account of his gracious and considerate ways and his delicacy that I love him. No, he has lacks in these regards, but he is well enough just so, and is improving. [Beautiful....without any question]

Forty Years Later

It is my prayer, it is my longing, that we may pass from this life together--a longing which shall never perish from the earth, but shall have place in the heart of every wife that loves, until the end of time; and it shall be called by my name.

But if one of us must go first, it is my prayer that it shall be I; for he is strong, I am weak, I am not so necessary to him as he is to me--life without him would not be life; how could I endure it? This prayer is also immortal, and will not cease from being offered up while my race continues. I am the first wife; and in the last wife I shall be repeated.

At Eve`s Grave
ADAM: Wheresoever she was, there was Eden. ``

AH2000 #209

Since we have just met and we probably may not be on the same wavelength (though I strongly doubt it) therefore I request you to go to the following Chowk Article and check reply# 179

Click this:

http://www.chowk.com/bin/showa.cgi?bshah_oct2700

It is true that ahadith are used by Muslims to prove their point. When they want to make Islam seem harmless they will quote away weak and false ahadith to make it seem like a benign religion.

For e.g.
``Paradise is under the feet of mothers.``

Is quoted quite often but it is a daif hadith (weak hadith)[ Al-Da`ifah, no. 593.]. Why then Muslims quote it constantly ? to disprove to themselves (more than anyone else) that Islam is anti-woman. Above is a weak but common rumor spread while they purposefully ignore the more sahih (sound and solid) ahadith just so that their conscience does not kill them.

The ACTUAL hadith is :
``Paradise is under the shade of swords.`` A sahih hadith, collected by al-Bukhari, Muslim and others. [Sahih al-Jami` al- Saghir, nos. 3913-4.] It is corroborated and then re corroborated but you do not see Muslims quoting it. Why ? because today is not the age of swords and murder and hate. Today is the age of feminism and sensitivity and love.

Like chameleons they change colors but inside most of them have been conditioned to respond to commands from the Quran and Ahadith. Unwittingly they provide the world with a facade of Islam while their practising counterparts wreak havoc on the earth: massacring Christians and Jews and Hindus from Indonesia to Kashmir to the USA. The non practising muslim is the human shield of the fanatic. .

The non practising Muslim works while the pratising Muslim spends their money on Jihad and repressing dissent. The non practising Muslim defends his religious brother with sophisticated lies learned at Harvard and Cambridge. The non practising Muslim diminishes the intensity of the crimes of his step brother with : ``Look at me! I have gone to the same University, we share the same values and I am respectable - does that mean I cannot swear allegiance to my family-name? just because my family-members back home are looting and raping and are feared worse than the bubonic plague or AIDS? ``. They are the most powerful accomplices of terrorism (recently an Egyptian Muslim who had become a US Army soldier was arraigned on charges of involvement with the embassy bombings in Africa).

Then he goes directly to some mosque to pay ``mosque chanda`` and ``zakat`` that goes directly to some ``hizb`` or ``tahrik`` or jihadi militia. The non practising muslim is the oil that runs the corrosive Islamic machinery.

When they have to prove THEIR point they will quote the weakest and most fabricated of their OWN sources (not to mention the most outlandish flattery of NON Muslims : ``you know what burn-hard shah said about Islam ? he say Islam so great! wow we belong to such a great club! let us go murder some of those east timorese christians and the southern Sudanese and those pregnant women in algeria``).

When they have to prove their point they do not even bother to provide us with sources : just ``the prophet said so and so and such and such`` suffices for them.

But when someone exposes Islam with solid and clear and precise Quranic and Sahih (sound) ahadith the defenders of Islam start coming up with excuses (``oh you dont interpret right brother - you should stand on your head and then read the quran and then you will its true beauty!``).

AH 2000

Are you kidding? I am enjoying every word of it:)

re. FOUR WIVES (--AND TWO DAUGHTERS!)

I do not comprehend the moral dilema in having ``relations`` with your daughters. To put it in another way, ``what`s the big deal``?

If Baap Beyti Raazi to Kia karay gaa Qazi, or US Law, or Judge Judy or a liberal ape jumping from tree to tree.

(And don`t give us that liberal-monkey crap about power-imbalance and all that jazz -- just look at our glorious history. If it was good for the goose, it must be good for the goslings :) )

``I also do not think that the US Law of one Spouse at a time is established and driven by any morality-the denominator in this case is the Tax Deduction.``

Oh really?? I suppose the age-of-consent laws, the strictist amongst most Western nations, also has nothing to do with its Puritannical Religious history.

Still think Ur truly gonna enjoy conversations with me?? :-)

FOUR HUSBANDS?

Yep, That`s the question which is usually hurled as an answer to the question of four wives.

If the law of a country allows men to have four wives then women should be allowed to have four men. That makes perfect sense if you live in a secular country. If a man is allowed to marry another man and a woman to woman, so that they can claim each other on their tax deductions, then having more then one spouse shouldnt be a moral dilema. Or is it?

By relaxing the tax laws we can all be HAPPY.

I am feeling a little YLHish today, sorry about that folks.

Please read the first sentence in my last post as

``I do not comprehend the moral dilema in having more than ONE wife.``

FOUR WIVES

I do not comprehend the moral dilema in having more than four wives. To put it in another way, ``what`s the big deal``?

If Mian Biwi Raazi to Kia karay gaa Qazi, or US Law, or Judge Judy or a liberal ape jumping from tree to tree.

Men and women always find ways to by pass ``laws``. The swingers at one extreme and the milk man fantasy on the other will always be there no matter what you do.

I also do not think that the US Law of one Spouse at a time is established and driven by any morality-the denominator in this case is the Tax Deduction.

Goddamn those taxes.

tahmed321 (#203)

``You have obviously scraped the bottom of the barrel to come up with these examples. These are exceptions.``

I think the use of extremes to illustrate a point is quite okay. Since we were discussing the issue of respecting all religions, why leave out these ones that some people subscribe to as devoutly as others? Is validity attached to numbers?

``People think about Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism when discussing the world`s great religions, not the KKK or Hubbard`s Church.``

We were not discussing the world`s great religions only. Anyway, the use of the word `great` -- based on sheer strength of following is silly. In different ages and in different times, different religions have enjoyed ``greatness``.

``Since exceptions prove the rule, you have proved my point and I thank you for it and trust that you will be a man and admit it.``

Errr.. what was your point again?? Hey, if it makes you feel good, Okay, I`ll be `man` enough and admit whatever you accuse me of.

btw, the point I was making in #193 was that it is indeed risky to be openly honest when discussing religion. Or SOME religions anyway :)

Ta

AH #194 As examples of religions that are less than equal to others you provide the following examples: ``... The Church of Scientology, The Church of the Latter Day Saints, the Church of Satan, The Ku Klux Clan.``

You have obviously scraped the bottom of the barrel to come up with these examples. These are exceptions. People think about Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism when discussing the world`s great religions, not the KKK or Hubbard`s Church.

Since exceptions prove the rule, you have proved my point and I thank you for it and trust that you will be a man and admit it.

AH #195 I tried figuring out what you meant here, and all I got was a headache. Couldnt figure out what you meant.

macgupta #193 I too wish we would have a bit more humor on chowk that is really funny. I mean humor that is not designed to ridicule the ``other side`` of the religious or nation-state divide, but of the kind you posted.

ninah,

........ how silly can you get? when it comes to organized religion, especially islam, silliness knows no bounds ........ it makes otherwise wise men and women babble like idiots, foaming at the mouth, tearing at their hair and beating their chests to defend the indefensible, blinded by faith and the fear of the unknown .....scared out of their wits by the endless chantings of hell and brimstone and fire....they pound the streets in hijab, extolling the virtues of islam and the freedom it gives them to let the handi burn on the stove while they, married at ten or twelve as the fourth wife to a momin are free to bear half a witness to the articles of freedom enshrined in a divine constitution, signed sealed and delivered by the archangle himself - or is it, herself........ talk about being delusional and masochistic

``I think rationalization of everything we read in the Quran is the only way for thinking intelligent people to read and understand it so we can assimilate in our lives``

Rationalise This :

[4.34] Men are the maintainers of women because Allah has made some of them to excel others and because they spend out of their property; the good women are therefore obedient, guarding the unseen as Allah has guarded; and (as to) those on whose part you fear desertion, admonish them, and leave them alone in the sleeping-places and beat them; then if they obey you, do not seek a way against them; surely Allah is High, Great.

....... all the lawyers in philadelphia, even good ole judge sanders saul himself, cannot put a spin on this directive from Him himself which can justify any man made law against spousal abuse ..... even the Florida legislature cannot pass a law which can take away the god-given right to beat one`s wife on special occasions ...... and of course we cannot have a constitutional amendment to amend god`s infallible word ....... and he does not talk to us anymore - but then again, since this is the month of ramadhan he might change his mind........ however this can be dangerous business, because the faithful don`t take kindly to new revelations - ask the ahmedis .......

Ninah #198

“I rationalized the saying I had heard about women being more deficient in their intelligence vis a vis men( before I knew it was from a Hadith - and when I heard that I was very relieved -I didn`t think it could ever been said in the Quran”

Even if it was said in Quran, you could have rationalized it with your own logical mind and creative interpretation in light of the ENTIRE Quranic text... couldn’t you? Like you have rationalized the 4 wives issue or 1 man witness = 2 women witnesses issue? Why were you so worried?

Let me be blunt… when you talk about Islam being a complete system… and when you intend to run a country based on that system… a widely acceptable interpretation of all the decrees and all the injunctions is a must… It cannot be left to individuals to indulge in creative interpretations of Quranic injunctions and decide for themselves what an injection/decree “really” means… this would be like saying that whatever the interpretation of constitution of US of A may be (in the eyes of US courts/judiciary), I am going to rationalize all the laws based on my own understanding, and creative interpretation of the constitution. You are likely to end up in Jail if you did that.

Do you reject Islam as a complete system?

AH 2000

I have a feeling that we are gonna get along very well. I am looking forward to some meaningful conversation in near future.

Rsaxena

I have learned from the best of the best. Being the second best will be an honor.

Tahmad321

I am quite impressed with your post too. You know, I am impressionable. I do respect honesty and I think it can be done without agreeing. I also beleive that the contempt and honesty do not go together-. So you see me appreciating Jay, and Rsaxena but not this Laqoot who calls himself A.shiraz.

AH #190 I think Jay converted to Islam and has gone to perform the hajj to beg forgiveness for his sins. He has also obtained a Pakistan flag which he salutes every morning, following which he sings PakSarZamin.

tahmed321 (#192)

just to clarify...

you say: ``There are indeed some soft-headed folks (I plead guilty) who happen to think that there is more than one path to worshipping God, and one should respect other people`s beliefs.``

There may be a thousand different paths to worshipping God. It doesn`t, however, follow that every belief of every religion is what we might consider ennobling or leading to God.

Part of living a godly life would be having the wisdom to overcome degrading stricures, and the courage to speak out against them, don`t you think?

Tahmed321 (#192)

``...However, it doesnt take much to be honest when you are writing anonymously. So, I conclude that you are easily impressed``

I am glad you agree that with all those self-righteous, insecure, trigger happy folks around, it`s not easy to even BE HONEST and show oneself.

Love,

you-know-who

TAhmed321 (#180 & #192)

[AH2000 #175 ``Nothing irks me more than `neo-liberal` talk about `all religions being equally good`` and all.``

Why does this irk you? You should reserve your irk for more serious things, otherwise you may get a heart attack and what good would that do to you?]

Let me see now... The Church of Scientology, The Church of the Latter Day Saints, the Church of Satan, The Ku Klux Clan. What do they have in common? Anyone? Anyone?

(Okay so he KKK isn`t exactly a religion, but they may as well be... ummm... then again, they don`t have a vast supply of guilt, so maybe not :) )

The ``All Religions Are Good and Equal`` contention is only so much of political correctness. After all, with devotional fervour running as high as it does, it`s naturally much easier to just `keep the peace` in the short run while the seeds of intolerance and bigotry are sown and take root-- rather than set out ot expose the wrong in - shall we say `belief systems`?

`` Your point about many muslims being unduly defensive on anything with the adjective ``Islam``, even if it is a mere individual like Ghazalli who has no mention in Islamic theology (!).``

Were this debate only about Ghazali, it would have died out about a hndred or so posts ago. But then Shraz threw in other juicy stuff right out of the Hadith and Quran. THAT kind of `insulted` many of us, I reckon.

``What we ought to get mad about are when Islam - the system of values related to learning, fairness, kindness and charity and so forth - are attacked.``

If Islam is being ``attacked`` with words and ideas, surely it is powerful enough to repulse any such attack. This is hardly a battle where MIGHT can conquer all.

If Islam is being portrayed as other than ``the system of values related to learning, fairness, kindness and charity and so forth`` -- by all means, fight back -- IN KIND (as someone has finally done in quoting surah 4:19!) Don`t whine, snarl, pathetically change subjects or complain. Learn to live in a world where ideas are going to be challenged and need to be defended. If you can`t do it in the non-material world of cyber-space, one can only imagine what reaction you might show in `real life`.

``And only when by getting mad we are going to accomplish something.``

Quite right. We NEED to get mad about some things when we think they`re wrong. The author seems to believe that Islam is (or is very capable of)

perpetuating bad habits and sttitudes. He`s mad about it. He`s trying to `accomplish something`.

He`s obviously presenting a one-sided picture. There is a lot more to Islam. But rather than countering these admittedly embarrassing quotes with nobler ones, most here are getting into what PM aptly described as `intellectual contortionism`. If this in itself isn`t irksome, you must surely have very low expectations of the human mind and morality.

tahmed123 -- Bernard Lewis is a Western scholar of Arabic, and has translated some into English. One of his books had these jokes (and some more).

Why I love those jokes is because it completely humanizes those people from long ago for me. They were able to delight me from across hundreds of years and a very different time and place.

If we could somehow replace current grimness (as in the main article in this thread) with that ancient playful spirit we might be better off.

-Arun Gupta

Urstruly #178 I am glad you are impressed by what`s his handle`s honesty. However, it doesnt take much to be honest when you are writing anonymously. So, I conclude that you are easily impressed.

And furthermore: You are impressed because the poster expresses contempt for those who think all religions are equal. There are indeed some soft-headed folks (I plead guilty) who happen to think that there is more than one path to worshipping God, and one should respect other people`s beliefs. In fact, the definition of a kafir in my book is a person who ridicules others` beliefs, as is done sometimes by some people on chowk (some Hindus, some Muslims, but both basically kafirs).

So, it seem to me while being easily impressed you are also impressed by unimpressive thoughts.

macgupta #172 Those were really funny. Is this a website?

AH2000 #175 ``Nothing irks me more than `neo-liberal` talk about `all religions being equally good`` and all.``

Why does this irk you? You should reserve your irk for more serious things, otherwise you may get a heart attack and what good would that do to you?

Your point about many muslims being unduly defensive on anything with the adjective ``Islam``, even if it is a mere individual like Ghazalli who has no mention in Islamic theology (!). What we ought to get mad about are when Islam - the system of values related to learning, fairness, kindness and charity and so forth - are attacked. And only when by getting mad we are going to accomplish something.

Dear Author,

Unfortunately, you have not tried to go back to the source of islam, Quran, before writing this article about the golden age of Islam. I think the best thing (and this can be interpreted to the contrary as well) about Islam is that it does not insert any intermediates between the individual and God. Therefore, we are not bound, and should`nt be bound, to what any scholar says. Rather, since we have been given the freedom to reason and learn, take all information we receive with a degree of skeptiscm and then refer to the authenic sources (Quran, Some Hadith) before making our decision. The Quran says the following about women:

4:19 O ye who believe! Ye are forbidden to inherit women against their will. Nor should ye treat them with harshness, that ye may Take away part of the dower ye have given them,-except where they have been guilty of open lewdness; on the contrary live with them on a footing of kindness and equity. If ye take a dislike to them it may be that ye dislike a thing, and Allah brings about through it a great deal of good.

Just read through the verse again, and pick up on the main instructions. Equality and kindness are stressed. Look throughout the Quran and you`ll find references to ``those to do good.`` The moral and ethical code is repeatedly emphasized in Islam, which many people forget.

Another verse that I want to quote is:

``By (the token of) time, Verily man is in loss, except such as have Faith, and do righteous deeds, and (join together) in the mutual teaching of Truth, Patience, and Constancy.`` 103:1-3

I want to appeal to all to go back to the source of Islam before making accusations and sweeping statements. Reject controversial statements (even if they come from such scholars as Ghazali) if they are not in conformity with Quran. Love all and Respect all, which is the fundamental teaching of Islam.

This is to inform you all of the sad (well, for some, anyway) news of the passing of one `jay` from his earthly abode. Cause of death (sorry, t, was NOT swallowed by a rooster!) : Dehydration. (Those close to him suspect it might have had something to do with reply #179-- that he drooled himself to death at his computer)

Interview with Daniel Pipes on rediff :

http://www.rediff.com/news/2000/dec/04inter.htm

Q. In your recent presentation you drew a distinction between Islamist and Islamic. Could you elaborate on that?

A. By Islamic, I would mean anything connected to Islam. Islamist, I would mean anything connected to Islamism. Islamism, I believe, is the modern 20th century transformation of Islam into an ideology, a radical utopian ideology in the same traditions of fascism and Marxism. It is completely different from Islam. And its first enemies and first victims are Muslims.

. I am afraid the above articles suffers from gross generalizations which are unfair to both those who have a traditional understanding of the Quran and those who are `non practicing muslims`

Ninah (#173),

In your quest to reconcile what you FEEL is moral with the sacred and revered texts, you say you have begun to doubt the authenicity of the hadiths. Be warned, this is only he beginning of a painful journey of questioning.

Re-read #139 to see what I mean.

Is it any wonder that kufr is discouraged with the harshest of all punishments!!

regards,

Urstruly,

Who`s the better bigot, you or I? I think I was riding high for a while, then went dormant and you took over. What a sneaky fellow you are

Ninah #176

Dear Ninah,

I apologize for the inordinately aggressive tone in my last post addressed to you.

Thank you for since clarifying matters w.r.t your the unpalatable hadiths and edicts. If they bring you peace, I am happy for you.

regards,

Urstruly #178

``The last line of your post caught my attention. You are my kind of a guy. I respect honesty.``

LOL! That would be gal, thankyouverymuch.

Anyways, one `bigot` to another... you`d better believe I meant what I said in that last line :-)

As children we used to play an interesting game. Everyone sat in a circle and after one person had written a short sentence as proof, s/he whispered it to one of the players who whispered it to the next and s/he to the next until everyone had heard and passed on the whisper. The last person spoke it out loud.

The fun of the game was in finding the sentence to be something totally different from the original.

Somehow, reports of the hadith remind me of that gave we played as children.

*yawn *

same old same old...........desi corrosive negativity

thank God for my ``gora`` friends who respect my beliefs and don`t force religious negativity down my throat every day, like some Chowk interactors do.

Here is a bit of Islamic Culture :

Jihad culture spreading world over, says Lashkar chief

KARACHI: Lashkar-e-Taiba chief, Prof Hafiz Muhammad Saeed has said that Jihad culture is spreading throughout the world and Muslims of India are also actively participating in the holy war.

He was speaking at a seminar on `Ramazan and Jihad Fi Sabilillah` organized by Lashkar-e-Taiba, a militant wing of Markazud Dawa Wal Irshad, at a local hotel. ``A revolutionary change is observed in the attitude of Ummah towards Jihad and now the Muslims of all parts of the world are inclining towards this one of the primary obligations, prescribed by Islam,`` he added.

Earlier, another leader Hafiz Abdul Rauf while highlighting the services of Markazud Dawa Wal Irshad, said there was a general impression that the Markaz was confined to carrying out holy war only but it was also doing the propagation of Islamic teachings and playing its role for the purification of the society.

The Markaz was running 137 schools throughout the country at which 19,740 children were being taught Qur`aanic as well as other sciences, he said adding that a periodical `Mujallatul Dawa` was also being published for the promotion of Islam. Abdul Rauf said, ``There are 32 launching points of Lashkar-e-Taiba at Pakistan-India border from Sialkot to Siachin from where Mujahideen barge into Indian territories.``



-

Taliban Pakistan :

Action against `Taleban` demanded
KOHAT: Tribesmen belonging to Orakzai Agency have demanded action against a local group of `Taleban` who have established their own rule in the area.

They also expressed anguish over the expulsion of 50 families by the `Taleban` group from the area and demanded their immediate resettlement, people coming from the mountains said.

The disgruntled tribesmen have threatened to stop paying all taxes and electricity and phone bills if the political administration failed to vacate the area from `Taleban.` Gradually the group had become so influential in the area that it is now almost out of the reach of the political administration.

AH 2000 # 175

The last line of your post caught my attention. You are my kind of a guy. I respect honesty.

F_K # 177

Thanks for your guidance.

Zahra

Na Na Na NA Na Na

Zahra,Urstruly:170 & 171

Here it is //Aah kurna .

Aaa bhurna is //sigh a reflexive & involuntary act.

Aah kurna is //cry in anguish,pain ,mostly as a result of the extrovert acts of the tormentor.Now because it is expilictly expressed,hence,the fear of adverse publicity//ho jaatey hain budnaam .

I hope it helped.

__________________________________________________

WASSALAAM

Omarphoenix (#165)

This is interesting. You (not personally) fire back all you can, and when you run out of ammo, you claim that the war is unfair.

Do you honestly believe that x number of years in falana madrassa is going to make it any easier to reconcile the distasteful quotes presented here with present-day norms of decency --without the benifit of a lobotomy and/or brainwash? Do you honestly believe that the problem you see here is one of not having enough inforamtion?

If you do, I`d like to recommend The Emperor`s New Clothes as essential reading.

The biggest tragedy in all this for Muslims, I think, is that in expending so much energy trying to `defend the indefensible`-- both internally and externally, they would be able to appreciate what IS good in the religion that much less.

Solitude would have nothing to throw at you guys if you didn`t believe you had to defend EVERYTHING as gospel truth--`Perfect Man`, `Eternal Truth` and so on...)

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Could anyone tell me if there are any Muslim fiqhs/ sects , Shia or Sunni, that DON`T espouse those beliefs?

Urstruly (#170)

``Why is it a crime to question the character and integrity of author and a couple of other Chamchas and to call a theif a theif? While he insults 1 billion people and it is called a scholarly inquisition?...``

Oh, it`s no CRIME at all. Accuse all you want to my dear sir, but don`t pretend to believe that the pliagiarism in any way weakens his arguments. In any case, it`s a little doubtful whether reproducing a string of quotes, complete with references that, that have been around for a thousand years can count as plagiarism.

``...While he insults 1 billion people and it is called a scholarly inquisition?``

If quoting from sacred scriptures is insulting to a people, you have to wonder where the problem lies, wouldn`t you say? Incidentally, I don`t recall Shiraz ever claiming either to be a scolar or to be conducting a ``scholarly inquisition``. But I can understand why you, sir, might call it so. His prolificness IS impressive, even for a cut-and-paste artist :-)

And I really had no idea one billion people visited the chowk, all of them forced to read these interacts with guns to their heads!!

``Dont you people have a shred of decency and shame left in you?``

err.. which `people` are you referring to? If you mean the `ex-commie liberals`, I`m neither an ex-commie (who needs THEM with the leftist government we have in Canada :-) ) nor a liberal. Nothing irks me more than `neo-liberal` talk about `all religions being equally good`` and all. Pshaw!!!

``...when their daughter, a friend of mine who converted to Islam, came to visit her mother.``

Ouch, poor mother...offer my sympathies to her.

[A repost]

Here are some anecdotes taken from Bernard Lewis`s translations. They are from probably what are among the first joke books in history. The point is that the glum seriousness that the quotes of Ghazali show are only one side of the story. For the humor impaired -- please remember, they were written centuries ago by Muslims for Muslims, the most recent being at least 700 years old.

* * *

Someone said to Ash`ab: If you were to relate hadith and stop telling jokes, you would be doing a nobler thing.

``By God``, answered Ash`ab. ``I have heard traditions and related them.``

``Then tell us, `` said the man.

``I have heard from Nafi``` said Ash`ab,`` on the authority of Ibn `Umar, that the Prophet of God, may God bless and save him, said, `There are two qualities, such that whoever has them is among God`s elect.```

``That is a fine tradition,`` said the man. ``What are these two qualities ?``

``Nafi` forgot one and I have forgotten the other,`` said Ash`ab.

* * *

Some people came to al-Rustumi`s house on some business, and the time came for the midday prayer. They asked him, ``Which is the direction of Mecca in this house of yours ?`` He replied,`` I only moved in a month ago.``

* * *

A man of the Qadari School was traveling in the company of a Magian. The Qadari asked him, ``Why don`t you become a Muslim, you Magian?`` ``When God wills it,`` replied the Magian. ``God has already willed it,`` said the Qadari, ``but the devil won`t let you. `` ``I am with the stronger,`` said the Magian.

* * *

A Bedouin went to market and heard them speaking bad Arabic. ``Praise be to God,`` he said. ``They commit solecisms, and make profits. We commit no solecisms and make no profits !``

* * *

Sultan Mahmud [of Ghazni] was attending a sermon in the Mosque. Talhak went there after him. When he arrived, the preacher stood up and said that if anyone had committed pederasty, then on the Day of Judgement the youth whom he had abused would be placed on his neck, and he would have to carry him over the Bridge of Doom.

Sultan Mahmud wept.

Talhak said ``O Sultan, do not weep but be of good cheer. On that day you won`t have to go on foot either.``

* * *

A man announced that he was God. He was brought before the Caliph who said to him ``Last year there was someone here who claimed to be a prophet. He was executed.`` ``That was well done,`` said the man, ``for I had not sent him.``

* * *

A Razi, Gilani and a Qazvini went together on pilgrimmage. The Qazvini was bankrupt, the Razi and the Gilani were rich.

When the Razi put his hand on the curtain ring of the Ka`ba, he said, ``O God, in thanksgiving to Thee for bringing me here safely I set free my slaves Balban and Banafsha.``

When the Gilani grasped the curtain ring, he said, ``In thanksgiving for this I set free my slaves Mubarak and Sunqur.``

When the Qazvini grasped the curtain ring he said, ``O God, Thou knowest I have neither Balban nor Sunqur,neither Banafsha nor Mubarak. In thanksgiving for this, therefore, I set free my old Fatima with a triple divorce.``

* * *

In the time of the Caliph Wathiq, a woman laid claim to prophethood.

The Caliph asked her, ``Was Muhammad a Prophet ?``

``Certainly,`` she replied.

``Then,`` said the Caliph, ``since Muhammad said, ``There will be no Prophet after me``, your claim is false.``

The woman replied, ``He said `There will be no Prophet after me.` He did not say, `There will be no Prophetess after me.```

* * *

A tumbler scolded his son and said, ``You do no work and you waste your time in idleness. How often must I tell you to practice somersaults and to learn how to dance on a rope and to make a dog jump through a hoop so that you can achieve something with your life. If you don`t listen to me, I swear by God I shall abandon you to the madrasa to learn their dead and useless science and to become a scholar so as to live in contempt and misery and adversity and never be able to earn a penny wherever you go. ``

* * *

Mawlana Sharaf al-Din Damghani was passing by the door of a mosque just as the mosque servant got hold of a dog and beat him inside the mosque. The dog howled. Mawlana opened the mosque door and the dog fled. The mosque servant abused the Mawlana.

``My friend,`` said Mawlana, ``excuse the dog. He has no understanding: that is why he went into the mosque. We others, who have understanding, you will never see us in the mosque.``

* * *

In the month of Ramadan someone said to a dealer, ``In this month there is no business.`` He answered ``God give long life to the Jews and the Christians.``

* * *

One day Abu Nawas was seen with a glass of wine in his hand, a bunch of grapes on his right, and a dish of raisins on his left, and every time he drank from the glass he took a grape and a raisin.

``What does this mean ?`` they asked him, and he replied, ``This is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.``

* * *

A man who claimed to be a prophet was brought before the Caliph al-Mu`tasim. Al-Mu`tasim said, ``I bear witness that you are a stupid prophet.`` The man replied, ``I have only come to people like you.``

* * *

The Caliph al-Mutawakkil asked a slave-girl whom he was inspecting, ``Are you a virgin or what ?``

``I am what, O Commander of the Faithful,`` she replied.

* * *

Ash`ab heard Hubba the woman of Medina say ``O please God, do not let me die until you have forgiven me for my sins !``

Ash`ab said to her, ``Wicked woman ! You are not asking God for forgiveness, you are asking Him for immortality. ``

* * *

-akg

Little Urstruly:

Shouldn`t it be Aah Bhurnaa[sighing] than Aah Kurna or Aah Lainaa ? Just a question.

(?_?)

AH2000 # 162

Why is it a crime to question the character and integrity of author and a couple of other Chamchas and to call a theif a theif? While he insults 1 billion people and it is called a scholarly inquisition?

Dont you people have a shred of decency and shame left in you?

People`s voice.

My dear fellows,

Let us unite not based on hatred (of hindus or karantas or jews or me for e.g.) because that would be divisive.

Instead let us unite out of love for each other because we are human beings.

Things like countries (nationalism), religion (Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism), gender (Islam) will only cause more grief.

I notice some of you are getting the point - and you are feeling despondent and reacting in one of the following ways :

- oh us pakistanis are bad ! we are so and so etc.

- oh this author is bad ! he is so and so etc.

- oh they are all bad ! Islam is so and so etc.

It is not the fault of Pakistanis or Indians (we are born innocent).

It is fault of the following :

- my fault : my approach and way of talking has been bad (but that is because I don`t know any better). I apologize for my tone and for not being what you imagined me to be.

- to a large extent it is the ideaology that is prevalent in Pakistan : Islam. No matter how ``un islamic`` or ``westernized`` or ``liberal`` we act we have all been implanted with this virus (it is in latent form in non practising Muslims but it is ragingly active in the extremists like me : I was once a fanatic and devout Muslim - now I may be exposing the bad sides of Islam but I am doing it in the same way extremists would preach Islam.

Please don`t blame liberals or commies. Liberals are not interested in reading about religion. This whole compilation has been nothing but dry religious excerpts. No liberal would want the sorrow we are inflicting on each other. They are into enjoying life - they don`t spend time in front of the computer defending or rejecting Islam and getting carpal tunnel syndrome from typing personal attacks. They could care less. I am not a liberal or anything for till today I hang out with fanatics at the mosque and what is my excuse : ``to study them``)

I don`t know what the answers are. I know what I saw and read and practised and engaged in when I was a Muslim was inhuman (or ``divine``). It made me a bad person and large traces of it remain. These exposes are (perhaps) an attempt to regain my humanity.

Our people need us particularly when all the Islamic groups are taking over the country.

This is to correct the errata in my last post #167; before Munkar-Nakir (i.e Zahra) hits me with her fiery club over my head.

Hum aah bhi ``kartay`` hain to ho jaatay hain badnaam
Woh Qatal bhi kartay haiN to charcha nahiN hota.

Scout# 162

You dont need to worry. You dont insult people and then hide behind your pseodonyms or steal intellectual property and hurl at others. Anything contrary to that is wrong.

Omar# 165

Sounds like a plan to me. Godspeed.

Farangi_Kush

Hum aah bhi laitay hain to ho jaatay hain badnaam
Woh Qatal bhi kartay haiN to charcha nahiN hota.

A racist/bigot is defined as one who is winning an argument from a liberal. Am proud to be a bigot.

RE: Syed Ahmad

You dont even have the common decency to stand by your earlier sermon. It is just one post down for cryin` out loud.

However, I am glad that you are now able to differentiate between an insult and a message.

Dear Shiraz and all the evil quadruplets,

I would like to apologise now for the long post, but why the heck are you geezers and gals on this forum hurling abuse (though you may call it discussing) at Islam with `normal` people like Scout, Urstruly, fairdinkum Farangi-Kush, moi etc when we are not the scholars of Islam. I will admit, I don`t know everything about Islam because I`m a typically confused 20th century Muslim youth living in the West. Why because one person says one thing, the other says the other¡Kso I`ve decided to learn many things of Islam on my own. First thing after Pharmacy, I plan to learn Quranic Arabic. Then I`ll (inshallah) go for something more disciplined like a degree etc. I would like to answer you back and probably have all the answers too but I can`t. Why because I don`t claim to know all the answers and until I feel I don`t learn sufficiently about Islam, I won`t say much. Give me about 4 years to reply back and I`ll come back with a vengeanceƒº.

Now here`s the thrust of my viewpoint. What are you getting at? What is your aim? Why are you discussing these viewpoints with us? Go to Islamic Scholars. Though there aren`t many of them, they are one fine breed of humans and they WILL answer all your questions. It is true that many new `prophets` (ha ha what a laugh) start by talking to the weak. If that`s your aim, then what do you have to offer?

Should I speak to a 28 year old Catholic farmer and ask why an unbaptized child will go to hell? Should I ask a 23 year old Christian Civil worker why they continue to drink even though it¡¦s a destroyer. Shall I go to a normal 25-year-old musician and ask them why they bought the `African AID` (Forgot the name) CD to pay for the starving children in Africa when they voted for a government that rules in Capitalism, the law system that believes in burning thousands of tonnes of food so that prices are kept artificially high. Should I ask a Hindu 32-year-old shop owner why they have the caste system? Perhaps I should ask the so called `liberal` English mothers why they laid roasted Pork on the table when their daughter, a friend of mine who converted to Islam, came to visit her mother. Where was her love for her own daughter then?

And do you know what answer they will all give¡Kthey don`t know. They just follow the rules, they just follow their instincts. A society is a bit like a multicellular body, its complex and individuals are designed for usually one thing. Keeping this idea in mind, though I believe that everyone should have a lot of knowledge on their faith, there are usually some that are better than anyone else. Shiraz and all the others, if you have the guts then go to those types because they are specialised to answer your questions. Of course, then you cannot hide behind your fake name and you may find your years of ideas that have hardened crumble; that`s if you claim to be an apostate in the first place. Personally, I don`t buy that.

But otherwise, `don`t go to a 2 year old Black kid, knock him out and then claim that all blacks are weak,` if you know what I mean?

Omar Phoenix.

I think the author has an issue with replies like the one offered by Asif Naqshbandi. However, instead of arguing it out with people who hold Asif`s views, he is assuming that all, ``devout`` Muslims hold those views, and consider Ghazali the, ``Perfect Man`` (as Asif seems to). This is an incorrect assumption, which should be obvious from the replies on this thread. Only one, ``devout`` Muslim seems to consider Ghazali`s views accurate. Even he has stated, ``has strung together a series of sayings--apparently from Hazrat Imam Al Ghazzali (may Allah sanctify his mighty secret!) about women which are totally out of context and the purpose is to give the image that Islam is a totally mysoginistic religion. This is an old trick of the enemies of Islam.`` Perhaps implying that even he does not consider the views expressed in this article to be the manner in which women should be treated.

The author has then suggested in replies that Islam requires Ijtehad. This is definitely true in my opinion. However it is not the view the author had initially presented in the article. In the article he had stated that all, ``The devout Muslims want divisions along religious lines.`` The actual fact, proven by replies to this article, is that almost all devout Muslims actually support Ijtehad. Hopefully, the author has realized this, and that is the reason behind his appeal for Ijtehad, rather than the original appeal of considering all devout Muslims to be followers of Ghazali`s views on women.

My suggestion would be for the author to argue this case with Asif Naqshbandi, and that two only in the context of the views of Ghazali (which are in no way accepted by an overwhelming majority of Muslims as correct). Both of you seem to be on opposite extremes regarding Mr. Ghazali. Everyone else is somewhere in between, which is probably somewhere the correct interpretation of Islam lies, in my opinion. In another words, original views of the author`s are as extreme as the views expressed in reply #73 (in fact the author`s views are significantly more extreme); abeit at opposite ends of the spectrum.

I am great supporter of Ijtehad, however I think it is unethical to attempt to portray a completely incorrect picture of any religion by quoting one person, and assuming (without any consensus) him/her to be the true representative of the religion. This either indicates a lack of knowledge on the subject, or an effort to simply insult the followers of the religion. My own feeling, after reading your replies, is that you belong to the former category. I would suggest to prove the correctness/incorrectness of the views you have expressed, you find out how many of the repliers to Chowk consider themselves Muslims, and yet still feel Ghazali`s views on women to be inaccurate. That should give an objective idea.

People who are interested in Ijtehad on Islam need to base their arguments on much stronger footing than what is presented in this article. This article is cannon fodder for people who are not interested in Ijtehad. They can use it to point out the one-sided extremist views of the people who are at the other extreme. In fact, this article is so biased that nearly every replier on Chowk, who actually feels Ijtehad is desperately required (like myself), is opposing it. If your intention is to point out that Islam requires Ijtehad, then that should be admired. However, the request for Ijtehad should not be made by maligning the religion itself. On the whole, I think this article does more disservice to the supporters of Ijtehad, than anything else. It this feeds right into the arguments those extremists Muslims have been presenting about reform-minded Muslims, all along.

The way to counter extremism is not to jump to the other extreme. Don`t throw the baby out with the bathwater.

urstruly:#158

True to your form.Thanks urstruly.

temporal:

I second urstruly`s post adressed to you.

Thanks.

__________________________________________________

Wassalaam

interesting turn of events......

by the way, what`s wrong with writing under a pseudonym or two?

Urstruly (#153)

``I would like to vote in favor of solitude cuz one has to be clinically insane to come up with the crap that he usually hurls at us.``

Careful now, buddy. The penalty for referring to hadiths as `crap` is probably harsher than that for plagiarism.

:)

Could we discuss plagiarism on another board? Maybe the ``Chowk Voice``? Hey, I`d hate to see the original subject being changed.

Solitude # 152

You say: By the way the person who posted about Ghazali on soc.culture.pakistan was none other than : Shiraz (I am also known as Ibn al Rawandi amongst other pen names).

My Response: I hope you don`t think I was accusing you of plagiarism. Regarding the original article, I had stated my belief that you are the author in my reply when I said ``Personally, I believe that the article was written by the author and posted under a pseudonym on soc.culture.pakistan to get feedback and improve the article.`` But my belief counts for little and I welcome your clarification.

You say: Regarding reply #132 (about aurat) it was taken from another source. People post entire news items on responses and boards on chowk - they post materials from websites all the time (on the Replies page).

My response: I have nothing against posting related web material on this forum. In fact, posting related material drives discussion. But I feel that proper attribution when directly quoting another source is a minimum courtesy that needs to be shown to the original author/source. Again, your clarification is welcome.

``Hashasheen`` - ??? - what brought this up ????
Huh!!!!! Duhhh!!!!
According my recollection - Hashasheen - we political assasins that were fighting for their cause in the Shia-Sunni schism during the Abbasid & Omayyad period , `` Hash`` in the aforemetioned term comes from hashish, a drug of choice for the said assasins. I donot consider them messengers in my faith.. But then again faith is a very personal thing.

The pejorative in vogue ``ex-commie liberal``
would have been `` a capitalistic imperialistic stooge`` or a ``fascist bigot`` if I were argiung a conservative viewpoint. Notheless, If it used as a term of endearment - so be it .... - May be it is the holiday season spread it around ....

Perhaps it was used to reinforce and illustrate my first point about acrimony in pakistani debate in #157 - for that I am very grateful :)

Actually I was not trying to Insult Pakistani`s,
- I am sure ``we`` ( I am inclusive in this group) :) - do a much better job hurling absues at one another as you have so effectively done so in your reply, without my help. I am was trying to point out the lack of civility - particilarly amongst many of us - while claiming to be stalwarts of intellectualism.

As for my ``ilk`` - unfortunately it is the same as many of my fellow countrymen, - Maybe it has been my good fortune to be of the majority faith , otherwise my ilk would be godless, - or perhaps
my ``ilk`` is formented by a foreign hand trying to bring a measure of sanity and civility into debate - God forbid!!!!!..

you also stated .....

``any judgement different than your is non-sense and any argument from them is ``barking``.

Au contare Mon Ami, - I was arguing the fact that people should accomodate differing opinions....- How did you come up with the aforementioned conclusion ???- `` barking`` was merely used an epitaph for the lack of civility - not a difference of opinion - That monsieur is surely twisted logic or was it a machavillian transgression to evoke response contrary to what I had just stated - Aha!!! groucho would have been so proud of you ....

As for practising what I preach - `` I want to preach, but unfortunately the market for truth has been cornered so long ago by so few, - and you wont let me preach `` - I have come to the greivous conclusion that I too am so surely afflicted by the same malaise of causticity and
insult mongering. So instead of practising what I preach - I shall stop preaching and perhaps even join the melee` woof woof....

Enlightened Mr. Syed Ahmad.

Allow me to refersh your memory by reminding you that ``Hashasheen`` were also messengers. I strongly suggest you to use common sense while analyzing a material and before you start shooting your ex-commie liberal crap.

As usual you are insulting the judgement of Pakistanis as the people of your ilk are accustomed to doing for years; any judgement different than your is non-sense and any argument from them is ``barking``. Does it take an Einstien to make a differntiation between an insult and a scholarly endeavor? I also recommend you to practice first what you preach.

Some interesting observations....

1. Pakistani debate is acrimonious, - we not only have a repartee on the topic, but also try to maliciously malign the character of the opposing side.... - I guess it is what we pakistanis are so proud about - liberal or conservative, the suburbs or the slums - our no holds bar attitude, not only challenges the message -its humiliates and annhiliates the
messenger..

2. Several of the leading so called ``enlightened`` voices , believers of logic and rationale, when given the bully pulpit - behave just like the neighbourhood moulvi, - with their incendiary rhetoric, threats - and the absolutist validity of their viewpoint. Tested and tempereed by their own infallabile judgements... - Scary thought because they are behaving exactly like the Islamic extremists that they are trying to condemn..... _ There is almost no room for accomodation for a differing viewpoint - it is either my way or no way ...

Since there is room for both reason and faith
in our pursuit of itellectual and spirtual nirvana, - if such a state exists. Then why not argue the merits of both rather than condeming either or en masse. Even Western philosophy laments the shortcomings of an ``existentialist`` viewpoint, and faith ( Islamic, catholic or any other monotheisitic or polytheistic ) despite its shortcomings and its often bloody, irratic and conformist past is still a glue that holds
lots of values that are important to us...

Ghazali`s viewpoint are those of one person and they are are many others like him across the entire religious spectrum, _ but Ghazali has talked about law, culture, society and government
and there are some merits to many of his arguments in those fields... if not gender relations...

Take for example Maudoodi and his incendiary politics, - MAudoodi is one of the foremost scholars in post modern Islam - even his most fervent critics ( my self included) cannot deny.
Islamic scholarship gained valued insights into
early Islamic politcis and history primarily due to his forthright and candid legacy in the acdemic community.

On the other hand, his politics wre machiavallian, to the extreme, - hate mongering,
incitement to riot, murder, mayhem caused immeasurable harm to the body politic in Pakistan . Incidentally he was condemned to be hanged by the Lahore high court in the early fifties for incitement to riot - which resulted in the killings of innoncent Ahmadi women and children , just because they were Ahmadi .....

Since I have pontificated enough, Let us go back to our continued programming of barking at each other from opposite sides of the aisle..

Mr. Living on the Edge

Although it disgusts me utterly to address you directly yet I take this exception to tell you that you forgot to mention your theft of material that you have been putting in your posts-

``What the hell is going on on this site? Why we have A.Shiraz and A.Shiraz`z evil twin presented as two differnt authors? What is the purpose of this ``Notankki tamashaa``? Is it you (chowk Staff) or is it this Shiraz character who is trying to prove that he has ``sympathizers`` and company of like minded people? `` - Reply #: 153 Urstruly


1) Using ``hell`` in that context considered abusive in nature (in the English Language).

2) A. Shiraz`s Evil Twin was my idea - I wanted to separate my polemical side (dealing with Islam in particular) from my other more general fiction. You see I have many facets (like the horny shiraz, the horny shiraz and then other sides of my multi dimensional personality like the horny shiraz and the horny shiraz).

3)
[Begin _S_]

As far as ``sympathizers`` are concerned. I must confess I am being paid by the notorious organisation WIABTT6CASAP (Woop Islami Arse Back To The 6th Century As Soon As Possible).

[End _S_]
Where S = ``SARCASM`` OR ``NOT TRUE`` OR ``NOT SO FUNNY ATTEMPT AT JOKING JOKING``.

I also go by the handle of PM (Patrick) and the other ``Karanti`` slink ... (I wish)

[Just joking joking once again yaar]

p.s. if you want to verify that ibn_al_rawandi is actually Shiraz then email me but I must warn you I do not engage in any electronic flirtation. I adopted that nickname after I was started getting death threats and particularly after I was assaulted by Muslims who broke into my dormitory (you see I live life on the edge).

Temporal

Dear t,

You have doubled your respect in my eyes by exposing the real ``pseudo-intellectuals``; I always used to think that it was a relative term. I just recalled a conversation we had on Saima Shah`s thread a while ago.

If we want to maintain a standard at Chowk as it being an interactive on-line magazine then we should impose some discipline on at least writers, otherwise it is just a matter of days this wonderful place will turn into just another message board or another on-line tabloid. We already have plenty of them.


Chowk Staff: The ``we`` in second paragraph means you, the Chowk staff. Needed to clarify this, just in case you might be saying,``tooN mama lagda aiN``.

Chowk Staff!

What the hell is going on on this site? Why we have A.Shiraz and A.Shiraz`z evil twin presented as two differnt authors? What is the purpose of this ``Notankki tamashaa``? Is it you (chowk Staff) or is it this Shiraz character who is trying to prove that he has ``sympathizers`` and company of like minded people? How can we trace this al Rawandi character and verify the claims made by shiraz. I am losing respect for Chowk. What is your editorial procedure to filter copied material becuase I am also desperate to compile my first book.

``I just thought I`d put some links here to facilitate any investigation by Chowk staff.

This article also appeared on soc.culture.pakistan as written by ``Ibn al Rawandi`` on Oct 13, 2000. `` - Reply #: 150

Thank you for ``helping`` the chowk staff. By the way the person who posted about Ghazali on soc.culture.pakistan was none other than : Shiraz (I am also known as Ibn al Rawandi amongst other pen names).

Regarding reply #132 (about aurat) it was taken from another source. People post entire news items on responses and boards on chowk - they post materials from websites all the time (on the Replies page).

Mithuna, temporal, people!

It seems like either everyone of us is suffering from schizophrenic episodes of multiple personalities or we are just too desparate. I would like to vote in favor of solitude cuz one has to be clinically insane to come up with the crap that he usually hurls at us. Well what are the chances of two nuts exhibiting the identical symptoms eh? Even Jay, sadna and Rsaxena exhibit different personalities while hurling the same crap.

Re: temporal 140.

I just thought I`d put some links here to facilitate any investigation by Chowk staff.

This article also appeared on soc.culture.pakistan as written by ``Ibn al Rawandi`` on Oct 13, 2000. It can be seen on deja archives at:

http://x76.deja.com/[ST_rn=fs]/threadmsg_ct.xp?AN=681254102.1&mhitnum=0&CONTEXT=975946623.652607614

Reply #132 is the same as this article one Yahya Monastra which is available at: http://www.crescentlife.com/thisthat/aurat.htm

Please note that both links prove nothing. The author might have indeed been the creator of both pieces and used pseudonyms on the two pages. Personally, I believe that the article was written by the author and posted under a pseudonym on soc.culture.pakistan to get feedback and improve the article.

The case of reply 132 looks more serious. If Solitude missed the attribution because of oversight/carelessness, he needs to clarify.

PM

I urge you to read all my posts. I think Solitude`s assumptions are based on strawman fallacies... however it is also a matter of great concern that these strawman fallacies have actually been accepted as the part of religion by most Muslims.....

As much as I admire Solitude`s courage, I am afraid he hasnt called a spade for a spade. He is like an extreme swing of the Pendulum... which is good for that will eventually bring the pendulum of the nation in the middle hence the way of Moderation, which Freeland Abbot says is the way of Islam.

Pakistan Zindabad

My dear fellows,

Do not feel very bad. It is not your fault that Islam is a bad religion. When we expose Islam we are not accusing you of being bad. You may be kind and loving towards your mother and sisters and daughters and wives (some of the most sensitive men are from the Indian - Pakistani - Bengali community). This is not an attack on Muslims - this is a deconstruction of Islam.

Islam makes good people bad. You are good people. How do you feel when you are defending Islam ? do you feel angry ? do you feel bad ? do you feel upset ? do you feel like launching into personal attacks ?

If yes, then don`t let Islam make you feel bad, don`t let it make you feel angry or upset. YOU are noble and kind. When you were born you were all very cute and cuddly and warm and loving. You did not call your crib mates with such racist slurs as ``karanta`` or ``murtids``. We were all born happy and without prejudice.Then they mutilated us, they raised us within ancient and impractical and rigid laws, Islam instilled hatred in you against those who were from different religions, countries, gender, race, sexuality. That is the terrible legacy passed to you by some very ill days. Do not pass this onto your children. Put an end to this cycle of violence and hatred now.

Have hope and love and tenderness for all for we as human beings (and PAKISTANIS) are a noble and proud people and no religion can force us into submission!

Regarding accusations of plagiarism:

After reading Ibn Warraq`s ``Why I am not A Muslim`` (The publisher is Prometheus Press - buy it today! its a good compilation) the only similarity between his book and this article is :

- Ibn Warraq quotes Ghazali.
- This article quotes Ghazali.

Most of this article is excerpts from Ghazali`s books. Ghazali quoted the ahadith and Quran heavily. Every word Ghazali uttered was steeped in Quran (the Quran contains stories borrowed straight and often in a confused way from the Old and New Testament).

The footnote of the article says : ``compiler``. The excerpts are taken from books that are centuries old and within fair use. The duty of this compiler is merely to present and provoke debate. Are you doing a service to humanity by asking the Chowk Staff to remove everything here? (after all the interesting revelations and declaration of apostasies on this board). Do you fear this compilation or collection of quotes and excerpts ?

Here is another ``plagiarism`` :

The Prophet said, ``After me I have not left any affliction more harmful to men than women.`` - Sahih Bukhari Volume 7, Book 62, Number 33.

--

In light of your responses (Reply #: 140 ; #85) I would say the Prophet was wrong.

SameerJB #138 Good catch on references that Ghazzali could not have known about. As Shakespeare said ``O What a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to decieve``. Similarly, I remember another poster who claimed he a had seen a Pakistani schoolbook with the picture of a sikh and the text ``J for Jaleel``. I advised him that he could only be lying since, if there were such a textbook in Pakistan, the text would have been ``Z for Zaleel`` :-) Not that I doubt that a 10th century man like Ghazzali could easily have some pretty crude ideas in gender issues, but then (as I think you said), time to stop going back to the 10th century to raise issues and start looking into the future.

Your previous post (#138) was a joke obviously, but I will bet anything that in due course it will be taken by some humorless folks who will then quote Macrohard Inc. as another example of the backward Pakis.

re farangi_kush

``If at all Salman(Laanat ullah)ruahdie`s name would certainly be mentioned in the annals of muslim history for his greatest service to Islam.....He galvanised & fortified their ranks and made muslims assertive & bold during the last 25 years.``

Frankly, I`d leave the `laanat` part upto Allah to decide since He may not have appointed you his High Commissioner here. That said, your analysis of the official Islamic reaction to Rushdie is incomplete. The frenzy of anti-Rushdie outburst also reaffirmed Western perceptions of Muslims as intolerant bigots who are simply unable to handle diversity of thought and speech without resorting to murder and mayhem. The average Muslim in the West is still paying a heavy price for that. Frankly, few things are as distant from `galvanising and fortifying` as a state putting a price on the head of an unpopular author. That Khomeini stunt is called `cowardice`.

Indeed the US and moderate Muslim nations were to blame too. They were too timid. Turkey and Morocco and the US would have served the world and Islam best if they had promptly put a bounty on the head of the Devil i.e. Khomeini himself.

Shiraz, buddy, you`ve more than proven your point. You know this when you start hearing love stories and other less intelligible sounds from your `opponents`. Those that haven`t got it by now probably never will. My very sincere, completely uncondescending advice is that you now drop the ball and get on with other aspects of life. There is so much out there to enjoy, so much to love. This cannot but be holding you back (as much fun as it is)

You were almost completely right some time ago in saying that you`ve learnt that ``People and Religions cannot be changed``. I urge you to then do the only smart thing and stop trying.

Best regards,

Pat.

PS. Your courage is commendable, s is your willingness to call a spade a spade, against all the weight of convention. I apologize for sometimes pussyfooting myself when referring to your actions.

Farangi Kush,

Why leave the example of great men like Ataturk, Jinnah and Nasser and follow people who are the cause of the decay of the Muslims ie Maudoodi Qutb etc?

I see an inherent danger with Muslims like Maudoodi and Qutb... I think they are the greatest threat to the progressive Modern Muslim World I dream of. Please wake up!

Pakistan Zindabad

Interestingly enough the word Quran uses for woman is not ``Aurah`` but ``Nisa``....

Solitude dont push it man.

Yasser Hamdani

re. shortstop (#126)

dear Adam,

Thank you for your kind words and advice (Actually, I have already croosed the pond to the Land of Too Much, but miss, not least of all, the craziness back `home`).

My motivation here? I guess having been a teacher 12 years in Pakistan (straight out of high school) it grew a little sickening (a lot actually) to see students crippled mentally and emotionally by the demands of religion (not just Islam -- Catholicism too). From the brilliant 14-yo who decided that reconciling evolutionary theory with Islam was impossibe (and not worth the anxiety), and so chose to take the road to revealed truth, rejecting Reason altogether (perhaps he was too honest or intelligent to try and effect a compromise between the two) -- to the many pupils who`d well-meaningly urge me to convert so I could enjoy janaat like they would, to others (not just Muslims) who`d look upon followers of other faiths as morally inferior, to another briliant 15 y-o, son of a bigamist, who rejected religion lock stock and barrel and turned 180 degrees around (drugs, drinks, pros -- the whole deal) -- all such `fun` events affecting the lives of those I was often close to, have convinced me of the danger in thinking of religion as holding all and absolute answers. Esp. in this day and age when we cannot help but be exposed to other cultures.

I suppose what I find particularly disdainful are the attempts to sanitize and rationalize the less palatable aspects of religion, a trait exhibited by many an educated chowkie. We hear the word `honesty` associated with religious principles often enough. Apparently, intellectual honesty does not seem to be a big deal with most folks. If anything reals ticks me off, it is these exhibitions of intellctual contortionism by our intellectual creme de la creme. That, and the trait of burying one`s head in the sand. You`ve mentioned the way my queries in #57 are conveniently being ignored, while the liberals further excite themselves with their magic pill of Ijtehad and the more conservative take comfort in ashiqi (love) stories of yore.

Adam, you are very perceptive in sensing that I`ve been senseing a ``step-brother treatment`` (or is it that obvious?). As someone on another board said, this goes to show how far these folks, with their epiteths-hurling have come in their development. I`d add that often enough, worse than the epithets, has been the cold-shoulder treatment, the non-responsivess.

(btw, `karanta` is that that part of the the male anotomy that Muslims and Jews lose early in life and then assume that Christian (or don`t lose it anyway) should for some reason be ashamed for retaining it)

But thannk you for pointing out what I suspected anyway. Your post has helped me hasten a decision I had been considering lately. I could surely make better use of my time than debating issues with folks who obviously don`t consider `outside` criticism as worthy of consideration as even ridicule from their apostate ranks. (with apologies to fairdinkum, Lubna and Assad_K)

So long all....

PM



PS Maybe we`ll meet again in Paradise. I`ll be in the tent NEXT DOOR to the one that says ``72 houris`` ;-)

ATTN. CHOWK STAFF

Please seriously investigate Sameer’s post #85. Another post #132 is almost entirely lifted from the home page of Yahya that sac mentioned in an interact on another board.

If this is indeed plagiarism, than Chowk has already set a precedent to follow about two years ago with someone’s (Afraasiyar`s?) article on Manto.

regards,

temporal

PS: Am still helping with ‘transition’ and regretfully am unable to devote more time here.

``And God, who knows better than everyone else menstrual blood is actually the DIRECT source of NUTRIENTS`` - Reply #: 91 ninah


Yummm ... God knows and so do I ...

Regarding Menses :

``They ask thee concerning women`s courses. Say: They are a hurt and a POLLUTION: So keep away from women in their courses, and do not go near them until they are CLEAN. But when they have purified themselves, ye may approach them in any manner, time, or place ordained for you by Allah. For Allah loves those who turn to Him constantly and He loves those who keep themselves pure and clean. `` - (Quran 2:222)

Dear Shiraz: What is the source of all this information, you have been posting. I would like to get hold of the source.

Should I expect you explaining the word ``Nikah`` in your next post? What about the background of some non-Islamic words, like ``lungi, ``langot`` as in ``langotia yaar``? How about the word ``genteel`` used for Christians?

Have you considered the fact that most pastoral societies, as in most of the Middle East of more than 1000 years ago, were extremely paternalistic. The role and status of women was generally better in agrarian societies of Mesopotamia, China and India. The religions originating at these areas did not make any substantial deviation from the norm. They transformed the existing customs into injunctions. Such injunctions should only be binding for adherent to that particular time and geography.

If at all Salman(Laanat ullah)ruahdie`s name would certainly be mentioned in the annals of muslim history for his greatest service to Islam.....He galvanised & fortified their ranks and made muslims assertive & bold during the last 25 years.

Go ahead!Please make our century.:)----:)))

Hassan ul Banna(shaheed) and Syed Qutb(shahhed) were actually hanged 40 years or so ago by ``muslim`` egypt.Algeria,Tunisia,morrocco,Turkey are still at it.Maulan Maudoodi barely missed the noose in ``Islamic`` Pakistan.

They also contributed towards the same end.

``All visitors make us happy!Some by coming some by going``

__________________________________________________

WASSALAAM

While rest of the world talks and plans about post-modernism, many do not want to entertain any idea about post-ghazalism.

At least many urdu poets tried to counter some parts of ghazalism with beautiful romantic poetry.

Thank you Ghalib,.........

Now everybody make 20 copies of this post and distribute.....otherwise some may lose job, some may get sick, some may feel constipated, some may..........and most will have normal day.

Here is what my neurons firing randomly last night came up with:

1) Bill Gates announced to finance a Microsoft University in Pakistan. Pakistani government changed the name to Islamic Microsoft University. The Religious Alliance of Pakistan strongly protested. They issued an ultimatum to the government to change name to Islamic Macrohard University because Islam can neither be Micro nor Soft. They asked for nation-wide wheel-jam strike on next Friday if the name is not changed within 72 hours!

2) Bill Gates announced to finance two communication satellites in the low orbits over Southern and Northern Pakistan, named Mohenjo-daro and Harrapa respectively. The Religious Alliance of Pakistan protested the pre-Islamic names. They issued an ultimatum to change the names to Al-Ghazali and Taymimah (sp?), two of the great communicators of Islam. They asked for nation-wide wheel-jam.......!

Please do not make copies of it.

dear fairdinkum,

It`s generally a good idea if one is oursuing the truth, to examine the evidence as dispassionately as possible, allowing as little as possible of ones own desires to influence the process of hypothesising an deduction.

Fact: Bukhari spent 16 years of his life poring through 600,000 accounts to end up with 3,000 that he considered of the highese level of authenticity. That is, for every 1 that was accepted as authentic (or as near as authentic as poosible), 199 were rejected.

Now, in dealing with uncomfortables hadees, shouldn`t the first question be `why would Bukhari include something so obnoxious to our sensibilities?`

Well, the most probable explanation would seem to be that these views were no biggies in his time. Consider this... a couple hundred years from now descendants of people like you an me will be wondering what could have prompted Maulana Edhi to do something as scandalous as sacrifice a living animal on Eid. I suspect his apologists will then claim that the sacrifice was not `real`, just allegorical, or that only dead animals were killed :-). Still others will be saying... ``No, a man of his impeccable charachter coud never have thought of committing such cold blooded murder. Surely, we must question the authenticity of historical records.``

rgds

Pat

Solitude

Both Avicenna and Averroes were professing Muslims... and as for Averroes one thing we know about him is that he definitely was very pious in his personal life adhering completely to daily laws of Islam... And he was also a Qadi in Cordoba. Nevertheless it is sad that he was abandoned by Muslims and Ghazali was taken up.

Yasser Hamdani

PS Just to disprove your thesis, I dont think Ataturk was a great practising Muslim ... but I think his over all influence was a plus for the Muslim World and the common civilization that we share... and I believe in his life time he was hailed as the greatest hero of Islam all over the Muslim World.

I might not agree with all that Rushdie says but I admire his work a lot. Maybe it is time you stopped being a kid and stopped looking at things in theatrical perspectives.. ie good vs evil.. and started seeing it more in line with human confrontations and interactions.

Solitude and others can go on with their sordid versions.. I personally think that by leaving the option of Ijtihad (Reinterpretation and legislation) Islam quite clearly allowed for adaptation according to time period.

The simple fact that women were allowed to inherit property in 6th century Arabia and were not allowe d to inherit property in 19th century USA ... shows quite clearly which society was more oppressive.

The innate equality of man and woman in the Quran is perhaps best appreciated by Freeland Abbot in his book ``Islam and Pakistan`` and I quote

``The Quranic Eve shows another notable attitude of Muhammad. In the temptation of the tree, Adam and Eve are together in their weakness and blame falls equally on man and woman. Muhammad seems to have recognized that the sexes are equal. for he presses the point in other parts of Quran. That is far removed from Paul`s injunction for women to keep silent in Churches. It is another of World`s paradoxes that in Islam Silence eventually was imposed on women, and in Christianity women have been approached more closely to equality of status.``

Freeland Abbot, Islam and Pakistan, Chapter 1 page

16 Paragraph 2

Publisher: Cornell University Press Ithaca New York

1968

I URGE EVERYONE TO READ MORE OF THE QURAN AND ANALYZE IT!

And I ll like to end it by quoting from the great Ataturk who in 1924 hours before abolishing the Khilafah said to a French Reporter

``The Islam I profess has nothing against reason and progress. This nation has a second religion, religion of backwardness and superstition``

(Andrew Mango`s Ataturk)

Keep up the good work Solitude.

Pakistan Zindabad

On Awrah

In Persian and Kurdish, the word ‘awrat has been used to mean `woman`. In Persian, this use of the word is uncommon and a bit archaic. But In Urdu, ‘aurat is practically the only way to say `woman`. Although it comes from the Arabic word ‘awrah, this word is not used to mean `woman` in Arabic.

The original Arabic word ‘awrah comes from the root ‘ayn-wâw-râ’. The basic verb of this root, ‘awira / ya‘waru, means `to be blind in one eye, to be one-eyed`. One derived verbal form of this root is ‘awwara / yu‘awwiru `to deprive of one eye; to damage, mar, spoil`. Some nouns derived from this root meaning are ‘awâr `fault, blemish, defect, flaw, imperfection` and a‘war (m.) ‘awrâ’ (f.) `one-eyed`.

The word ‘awrah itself means `DEFECTIVENESS, FAULTINESS, deficiency, imperfection; pudendum, GENITALS; weakness, weak spot`.


In Islam awrah or `pudendum` (genital) has been defined to mean the part of the body that must be covered for the sake of basic decency.

This fit in with the institution of ``purdah`` (veil) which restricted women to their homes and made them cover their faces.

One ruling of the veil, applied in some Arab countries, said that women had to cover one eye and leave the other uncovered to see with (which directly goes back to the original meaning of having only one eye).

The view of woman as nothing more than something to be completely covered explains how the meaning of the word ‘awrah became transferred from a bodily defect to the very identity of Woman herself.

Today a Woman or ``awrath`` can only be spoken of as ``she whose entire being is veiled.`` But what is worse is the original semantic implication still underlying this word: defect, deformity, weakness.

It wrongs all womankind to designate them with such a derogatory term. The language we use affects the way we perceive reality. Calling Woman a ``defect`` is a putdown that continually lowers her social and even existential status. To give women the respect they deserve, Urdu speakers need to stop calling them ``‘aurat`` and use another word. Given the rich resources from which Urdu draws its vocabulary, that would not be at all difficult.

We could use Persian zan; or Sanskrit strî or mahilâ. Anything would be better than the present word ‘aurat. Since Persian is the source of most respectful words in Urdu, zan would probably be the best choice. It would then parallel the use of the Persian word mard meaning `man`. Zan comes from the Proto-Indo-European root. OR you could go back to your hindu roots , embrace your hindu heritage and use a word in sanskrit (if you are into roots, otherwise for practical reasons particularly in the west : ``lady`` should do)

Some people are getting pretty desperate considering they are quoting fornicators and drinkers like Ghalib and Rumi now to prove their ``point``.

I will make a bet : the same Muslims who want to slay Salman Rushdie will find their children celebrating Salman Rushdie as `` a great Muslim`` and will count him as an ``Islamic contribution to western civilization ... ``. Just like they do in the case of Ibne Sina (exiled, heavy drinker and womanizer who was declared an apostate and people called for his execution just as loudly as people thirst for the blood of Rushdie. Ghazali and other Maulanas declared him an apostate, his books were burned on charge of ``transmitting the Greek Sciences``), Ibn Rushd (considered as one of the five great heretics, his books were burnt, banned from Cordoba) and Al Kindi (the ONLY arab mind to have contributed to the sciences, his personal library was confiscated and the sixty year old man was lashed 50 times in front of a large crowd which roared with approval at each stroke for ``spreading the Greek / Aristotlean Scientific falsehood``).

The same people are now used as examples of ``model Muslims`` and all credit is given to Islam. Have you no shame ? (I know you will accuse me of being without any [she called! and things are looking good! what a tease ... ] and I proudly declare that I am without any. But you are supposed to be ``sharmeelay``, right?)

Each report in Sahih Bukhari was checked for compatibility with the Qur`an, and the veracity of the chain of reporters had to be painstakingly established. Bukhari`s collection is recognized by the overwhelming majority of the Muslim world to be one of the most authentic collections of the Sunnah of the Prophet (pbuh).

His collection of hadith is considered second to none. He spent sixteen years compiling it, and ended up with 2,602 hadith (9,082 with repetition). His criteria for acceptance into the collection were amongst the most stringent of all the scholars of ahadith.

Sahih Muslim :

Each report in Muslim`s collection was checked for compatibility with the Qur`an, and the veracity of the chain of reporters had to be painstakingly established. Muslim`s collection is recognized by the overwhelming majority of the Muslim world to be one of the most authentic collections of the Sunnah of the Prophet (pbuh).

Out of 300,000 ahadith which he evaluated, only 4,000 approximately were extracted for inclusion into his collection based on stringent acceptance criteria. Muslim was a student of Bukhari.

For those who have a problem with Ahadith:

``I have left amongst you two things which, if you hold fast to them, you will never stray: the Book of Allah, and my Sunnah.``

Sahih. Related by Malik as mursal/mu`allaq/balaghat (depending on choice of terminology), and related twice as musnad by al- Hakim. The meaning of the hadith is contained in the Qur`an, in the mention of the Book and Wisdom (2:129, 2:151, 2:231, 3:164, 4:113, 33:34 & 62:2); al-Shafi`i says, ``I have heard the most knowledgeable people about the Qur`an say that the Wisdom is the Sunnah`` (Al-Risalah, Eng. trans., p. 111).

According to the reliability and memory of the reporters; the final judgment on a hadith depends crucially on this factor: verdicts such as sahih (sound), hasan (good), da`if (weak) and maudu` (fabricated, forged) rest mainly upon the nature of the reporters in the isnad.

1042--Another(unrequited)Love story

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Excerpt from the autobiograpghy of Ibn Hazm.Titled ``The Collar of the Dove``.

``I wish to tell you the following story about myself:In my youth love drew me into a friendly relationship with a slave girl who had grown up in our house was at the time sixteen years old.The beauty of her coutenance,her intelligence,her chastity,her purity,modesty,and her pleasant nature was beyond compare.She would not consent to flirtation,refusing to sully her honor.Her friendliness was exceptional,yet she was always most careful to keep her face hidden by the veil.Faultless and irreproachable,she was always on her guard,and her face always bore serious expression.She was charming whenever she appeared,yet possessed a natural reserve,and was delightful in her movements,making a dignified impression.As she sat,she was full of composure,and herr aloofness was enchanting.No one would have dared hope to win her,nor to covet her,and no one could hope to expect a favourable hearing from her.Thus her appearance drew all hearts to her,while her conduct rejected anyone who sought to approach her.her shyness and reserve in dispensing favors gave her an allure,which no amount of generosity or openness could produce in others.She was of serious disposition,and had no desire for light entertainment,although she played the lute extremely well.

``This girl had won my heart,and I fell passionately and helplessly in love with her.For some two years,I tried with all my energies to gain a hearing from her,and for once to pry from her lips words other than those pass between people in public coversation.HOWEVER,I had no success whtsoever.

``Now I remember the day a social gathering was held in our home........

.......I remember the joy I experienced at the proximity of the girl,and with a hope of lingering a while at her side,I advanced towards the window where she was standing.But sooner did she become of my presence,than she left this window and at a sedate pace moved to anther one.When I then decided to join her at the window where she now stood,again she turned away to another one.Moreover she was aware of my love for her.(You must know that women are most perceptive in detecting the way a person feels about them)......

.......The elder women & the elegant ladies of our circle requested the girl`s mistress to permit her to sing us something.The girl took up her lute and began to tune it with such entrancing shyness and embarrassment as I had never seen before.``

``Upon my life!It was as if the plectron was plucking at my heart,and not the strings.I have never forgotten that day and I shall not forget it until the day I depart this life.I never found another opportunity for seeing and listening to her``

[Political upheaval brings about a drastic change.His father the Vizier to the Caliph moves to another palace and several years pass]

...at someones funeral:``I caught sight of the girl in the circle of of wailing and keening women.Standing there she reawakened in me a long-buried passion,which had since become tranquil,and reminded me of earlier days,of a former love,a time that was over,a vanished epoch,of months long past,of things now ancient,an age that was gone,episodes finished,and days gone by,and of trails effaced``

....``She disappeared from my life for more than six years.When I saw her in Cordoba.I would have hardly recognised her ,had not someone told me who she was.Her attractiveness for the most part been transformed.Her beauty had vanished.the erstwhile comeliness had gone.Faded was the former luster,that had shone like a polished sword and an Indian mirror,and withered was thr bloom that had once drawn and riveted every eye,until,dazzled,the beholder turned away.She had retained only a fraction of her charms,just enough to conjure up a picture of her former whole.She had obviously taken little care of herself,and had suffered from the want of sheltering hand and protection she had been given when we were her masters.She could no longer have been concerned with her honor,when she lowered herself to the inevitable,from which she had always been sheltered and preserved in former times.

``For women are just like sweet-herbs,which lose their perfume,if they are not cared for.They are a stucture that collapses if neglected.....

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Points to Ponder:

1.It is Ghazalis time.

2.She is a slave girl.

3.He is the son of the Vizier to the Caliph of the mightiest empire then.

4.Ibn Hazm author of over 4oo books,including the history of religions & religious sects.

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``Qumree ka tawque hulqua-e beyroon-e darr hai aaj``

.....................Ghalib.

tr:The Collar of the Dove is the chain around my main door these days.

(On the massacre of Delhi & house-prisoning everyone for more than three months by the Britty babboons)

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WASSALAAM

Subject: For All Muslims and brothers who`s still lost!!!

PLEASE MUSLIMS:

SEND THIS TO OTHER MUSLIMS!

ASSALAMU-ALAIKUM WA RAHMATULLAHI WA BARAKATAHU.

Dear Muslims:

This is a letter from Saudi Arabia. It is addressed to all Muslims. It is the words of Sheikh Ahmed, the watchman of the Prophet Muhammed`s Mosque (PBUH). On Friday night after reciting the Holy Quran, he slept and dreamed and saw the Holy Prophet(PBUH). The Prophet said to him, ``Sheikh Ahmed, this Friday about six thousand (6,000) people died, but none went to heaven; The women do not follow what their husbands tell them anymore. The believers who have money do not help the poor people. People do not perform their pilgrimage as was prescribed. The Muslims do not say their prayers regularly, let alone how it is supposed to be.`` Sheikh Ahmed tells the Muslims that this letter comes for you. They are to produce more copies of this letter and give them to other Muslims, so that

it can spread and get to other Muslims in this world. Anyone who produces copies of this and spreads out to other Muslims, will see the REWARD indeed. Such a person will be counted as those suitable for Paradise, INSHALLAH. The Muslim who receives this letter and refuses to disperse it among Other Muslims will not see benediction. I, Sheikh Ahmed, if what I said Is a lie, May Allah not send His Divine Benediction to me. Dear Muslims, you must follow the religion the way the Prophet honoured it, like the divine revelation it is. Ask for forgiveness. Produce twenty (20) copies of this letter, and distribute it to all Muslims. Anyone who does this, so that all Muslims get a copy, will INSHA ALLAH see the opening of the Prophet`s desires and success will follow. He will see the things he had never seen before.

This is not a letter to be kept. It must be dispersed in large quantities. A man called Klavan got this letter, and gave it to his secretary, to produce twenty (20) copies and disperse them. After some days, he saw many doors of opportunities opening up for him. Another, named Abdul-Salam, got it and forgot it in the drawer of His office, and, after a certain time, he lost his job. He later remembered the letter, and went and produced twenty (20) copies, which were distributed, and within five (5) days, he got employed and is in a higher position than what he had before.

Another man, called Balemanthan, received it, and he thought it Was something useless, and treated it without respect or courtesy. He tore the letter and within nine (9) days he died. I am appealing to anyone who comes across this letter to kindly circulate it in a large volume.

Thank You. ASSALAMU-ALAIKUM WA RAHMATULLAHI WA

BARAKATAHU.

Urstruly #109, and Rsaxena #119,

You guys are killing me. (still laughing)

I live for these moments.

Hi All!

I`d like to introduce myself: 17, male, born (and bred) in the US of A, Indian (lapsed) Muslim father, Agnostic Caucasian mother. Brought up in a neutral religious setting, I have for a few years now been searching for my religious roots.

A few weeks ago, a friend told me of chowk and I`ve been hooked ever since, keenly following the threads on Headache and Heartburn and now this. I`ve got to say that the many posts by Solitude, Patrick and others have shaken off the romantic notions of Islam as a peace-loving, tolerant religion, which is something I developed to counter the negative media image that I believed the Western media presents us.

I`m sure this is only a one-sided view, and that for every negative presented by Solitude and company, there are many positives to be found in the religion. Still, the few quotes of Prophet Mohammed, if authentic are quite shocking.

I`m not about to pass judgement on Religion or Islam, but I`d like to say that, from a relatively neutral standpoint, Solitude, Fuzair and Patrick seem to have a stronger case than do their cyber-opponents. It as if the others just don`t see or don`t want to see the sense of their arguments. The attempt to rationalize some archaic laws is quite interesting.. If this is the way folks are brought up to think and examine issues on the subcontinent, it is esy to see why progress has been stunted. (sorry if that sounds condescending but c`mon, other countries started off after you guys with few resources and are now world leaders in many fields)

But to get back to the original purpose of my post, I`d like to say I`d be a lot more convinced if there were more seriously thought out rejoinders to Solitude than the name-calling. And what about Patrick? I think the guy asked some of the most pivotal question some time back on the issues of slavery and ijtahad but no one has responded. Pat, what IS your motivation anyway? Now don`t get me wrong, buddy, I think you`re probably the one making more sense than all the rest here put together, but isn`t it obvious to you you`re sorta being ignored? I think your question to someone, suggesting that you karants (?) need some attention too, tells me that you`re aware of this step-brotherly treatment. By the way, are you referring to Christians when you say `karants`? What`s it mean? Patrick, dude, my sincere advice to you is to dump that crazy place and move to the US or Canada. You`d be lot happier.

Chowk.com`s own decription of itself is ``a place where all are welcome to think read an write``. I can see a lot of writing (and obviously reading too). Folks, let`s have some more thinking now, shall we?

In the immortal words of a certain Mr. King (no, not MLK, but one who earned fame more recently) ``Can`t we all just get along?``

Sincerely,

Adam Hosien