I’m gonna start this post with a disclaimer. I am not an expert of Islam, but even more importantly I’m not professing against the Islam. I’m explicitly a fan of Islamic architecture and calligraphy. I feel some sympathy with the one of the most humane sects, the Sufism. I keep everyone’s religion and faith in deep respect, and I have many Muslim friends, they are all very good persons, which alone made me reconsider twice publishing this post. However there are some issues about the Islam which I can’t ignore. Let’s see what I’m talking about.
What is meant by peace? How can we define this very intangible phrase at all? I can understand that the peace means different for a Muslim than for westerners (Christians, Jews, seculars, atheists, agnostics, ect.) The peace might mean for the Muslims that every tribe, nation, individual on the planet bows before one true God. At least before God, who Muslims believe to be true. But let’s be honest this is an utopian interpretation of peace, because this is completely unachievable in practice. As many people as there are, there are so many interpretations of God even within the Islam. That is, peace is actually unthinkable as long as there is no single image of God. This means in practice a constant warfare and sectarian conflicts among the different tribes and cults. Once the Prophet passed away the civil war broke up immediately between Sunnis and Shias.
In contrast, for us Westerners, peace means something completely different. The freedom of every man can extend as long as he does not endanger the freedom of another man. Of course, this also applies to women. This is not a liberal reform program, but a fundamental moral law, and as such is the foundation of human civilization. You leave me alone and I don’t hurt you. That’s basically it. Where this prevails, there is civilization, where doesn’t, there is not. As simple as that. Of course this also means I have no right to determine what you should believe and how, because I’m only a human without possessing the objective truth. This interpretation of peace is not utopian but rather crucial.
Of course in the ancient Arabia with constant struggle for resources the survive of tribe was up to integrity of tribe. Which meant the integrity of belief system as well. That is, the individual wasn’t allowed to determine what he believes because that would have led to the disintegration of the tribe. Its roots go back to pre-Islamic times. The moral issues could emerge only in more complex society where the people could afford ethics. It is no coincidence that civilization appeared first in micro-communities representing villages and towns. The pagan tribes and even states who had own gods held accountable the faithless members for adversity. But with rise of Judeo-Christianity the state was no longer given cosmic and transcendent significance, it abandoned the image of God. The morality was associated with God. And this is why I consider worship of state a neo-paganism. This is why the ideologies and state theories generate moral relativism. Because the morality must be well protected from any mood of a particular period of history. This is the monotheism for. Yet it is not the case with the Islam. And here’s another issue. How can anyone determine his or her own belief especially with lack of enough self-knowledge?
No one is a master of his or her own belief system. We have as humans no capacity to decide what we want to believe in, rather we have a capacity to explore what we believe in. If it’s possible in full depth. So no one can be able to pick a side directly of being either atheist or agnostic, or theist agnostic or atheist agnostic whatever. It’s just a game of words. It’s not up to you. You have to accept that something is out of your control. Many things, including the ninety percent of your own mind.
The human mind is the most complex thing in the universe, at best case, only a few percent of it is consciously controlled. We will never be able to know the full objective reality even about ourselves. Much Everything in our subconscious is decided even before we would awaken to the real causes of our actions. Many people do not have much self-knowledge. Many people have low level of consciousness. There is a long way to go to gain self-knowledge, and requires openness. Those who consider themselves believers have often doubted the strength of their own faith, even according to their own confession. Many who consider themselves atheists began to believe in God at some point in their lives without being able to give a rational explanation. Many people like an idea but still feel the need to force it on their subconscious self, simply because we don’t just have a conscious self. So many people strive to believe in something desperately but eventually they fail to believe anything, just because they urge what cannot be, gaining self-knowledge. Trust me, it’s much more complicated than anyone would believe.
What is happening in Islamic countries to those who are converting to Christianity or are decalizing themselves as atheists, agnostics? They are given three days to reconvert or cancel declaration, otherwise they’ll declare fatwah on them, in other words they will be executed. That one no longer does enjoy the protection of community. Anyone in the community can kill that person legally. The Islam is the only religion where no way out of. But how can Islam know what is good for the individual, and the conscience of individual which feels the individual only? So many Muslim prays God without listening his teachings. They overuse the ‘God is the greatest’ cliche, while they dispute this statement with judging instead of God. The God is not smart enough to let him judge over his own creations? Killing in behalf of God is the biggest ever blasphemy.
Do not take revenge, dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath. For it is written, “Vengeance belongs to me. I will pay them back, declares the Lord.”
Romans 12:14,17
Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.
Leviticus 19:18
Never take revenge, my friends, but instead let God’s anger do it. For the scripture says, “I will take revenge, I will pay back, says the Lord.
Luke 6:27-29
The Bible is almost about nothing else just warning the creation to not judge over God’s creations. Because who is judge is either the God or person who acts as God. The tares should be allowed to grow with the wheat until the harvest, and the Lord is a harvester, who judges after death and does not entrust any creation with judging in this world.
Another problem is that the Islam leaves no time for the true conversion and spiritual development of man but leaves room for hypocrisy. Since even a life is little to turning to God. What are three days enough for? What is this arrogance whatsoever? What if someone only turns to God on his deathbed and realizes that he was wrong in his entire life? How much time does the ‘religion of peace’ leave for this?
Urging time leads superficial belief, or hypocracy, or simply lie. The Islam does not leave time for individual to turn to God, and in many cases even the life is not enough time. Only the Christianity is built on that man who denied Jesus three times, because the Christianity accepts how unperfect, errant and corruptible the human being is. The story of St. Peter has symbolic significance, because he was as far from perfection as humanly possible. Islam, on the other hand, is a religion that is also a political ideology. And the ideology does not tolerate any sort of imperfection, and individual who can’t be comformized. Islam as the Marxism is called to regulate every moment of an individual’s life, from the cradle to the grave which the Christianity does never need. It is absurd from the outset that the community, or any other human being, may have something to do with an individual’s relationship with the creator, or with his or her own spirituality. Since the individual is the image of God without capacity to be God, not the community in whole, claiming divine rights to judge over individual. If any religion strives to alienate anyone from this special individualistic spiritual connection with conscience, I’m sorry but I have to say that is no longer a religion but a totalitarian ideology.
Islam, however, claims to be not only a religion but also the only religion. Islam considers itself the end of other Semitic religions such as Judaism and Christianity, a kind of improved version of these. I’m sorry, but I don’t see how that could be possible. How can a religion stand over anything that doesn’t consider the unconditional love as a supreme rule, especially over that religion where this is the only one fundamental commandment? The unconditional love which is attainable via compassion and empathy via our conscience, which is the voice of God, and what the Islam ignores completely, or fails to recognize the significance of it. Because there is only one true God? Yes this statement was very revolutionary in the world of paganism, but Christianity has long since gone beyond dwelling on this alone. Love your neighbour as yourself. If only this one commandment would be followed by everyone, that would make all laws and legislation needless. But laws that override this one divine commandment cannot come from God. The religion which approves these laws cannot be a religion of peace. This must have only one final result, the moral relativism, which can be everything but not devine. As the Christian fathers at the third and fourth centuries noted, the neighborly love can’t be improved only can be spoiled by humans. How can the Islam overbid this?
Islam, like the Ten Commandments, forbids idol worship, but these idols may also be abstract things, such as man-made laws relativizing morality. Those rules and laws are satanic, because they idolize ego and vanity. The human approach is always satanic, because only the divine approach can be really divine. Self-denial is needed for not suffering more than absolutely necessary. But the Islam is not based on self-denial but on pride, which is again does not come from some divine inspiration. The pride is the nature of ideologies, which is human approach, thus imperfect and satanic. Do not get me wrong, I don’t state that the Islam would be spoiled by default, but it’s definitely not the religion of peace for the reasons I mentioned above, and as such it can’t be the improved version of Christianity and Judaism. Rather it’s a religion of warriors in struggle for unattainable peace.
The Prophet must have known the Christian doctrines that arrived at ancient Arabia on routes of the merchant, but since he denied the doctrine of Trinity, his doctrines could be based only on heretics Christian sects and cults as Arianism and Gnosticism. And since the Islamic religion was most prevalent in the areas previously ruled by these heretical Christian sects, which is not coincidence by the way, they considered the Islam at most as an improved version of these. But they weren’t a religions of Christlike love.
Islam is based on a fundamental principle, which is: There is no God but Allah, Muhammad is the messenger of Allah. This is the first Kalima. It’s interesting because I’ve heard from so many Muslims that the Christianity has three gods (by this was meant the Trinity). But this assumption is utterly wrong, because the Christianity is not polytheism. There’s no three gods in Christianity, only one with three manifestations. Let’s make a try. If you ask any Muslim about where is God, you’ll be told, he is everywhere. This is exactly the essence of Trinity. The Holy Spirit ties the creation and Creator together. In other words the Holy Spirit is the manifestation of God in human. I do not live anymore, Christ lives in me. This is the essence of Christlike self-denial. If the human being would be capable to live without sin, would be a part of God, as Jesus was. According to Christianity Jesus wasn’t a son of God in terms of human procreation, but because he was living without sin. He was living not by human (satanic) but divine purposes. The human is a perfect image of God with no sin, and who is able to live without sin, can be godlike only. But there’s no such a man, except Jesus. This is the essence of the Christianity. Where is the inclination of polytheism in this? Everyone is a sinner, but it also means everyone is redeemable. And if you are a sinner as everyone, you have no right to judge over others. This is a fundamental difference between the Christianity and Islam.
And finally, let me tell you a personal story. The priest of the Christian community in Johnstown (Lahore, Pakistan) was telling me why he believed that Christianity was the most persecuted religion in the world, in the East as well as in the West, for only religion can be the most persecuted, which is closest to God. It is up to the reader to decide whether to agree with this or not, but for me it made sense in terms of following an individual conscience, that makes us better. Nevertheless during telling me this I saw the fear in his eyes. Not without reason. The Christian community of Lahore is one of the most threatened Christian minorities. They are suffering deadly attacks on regular basis, and the Pakistani authorities shamefully tolerate or even advocate these attacks. Being a Christian in Muslim countries would put the belief of even ancient Christian martyrs to the test. Why? Because ‘the religion of peace’ can live in peace only when everyone bows before its own interpretation of God, and in this there’s no room for disagreement or doubt. Of course not every Muslim pours acid into the face of his wife. Not every Muslim rapes his nine years old wife to death at wedding night. Not every Muslim cuts a throat of his Christian neighbour. There are so many amazing and extremely hospitable people among the Muslims, including my friends. You can experience the warm hospitality of locals in Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, which you’ll never experience in any western country. But if the Islam claims to be a religion of peace, getting rid of troublemakers would be essential. And by that I don’t mean ‘unbelievers’.
I regret if this post offends any of you in religion because it’s not a purpose of this essay. Please correct me if I’m wrong at a comment section below. Anyways thanks for reading me!