So the Khan family. We're all good, right?

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you cooterhein;

I was hoping I would find out exactly how the "will of the singular God" asserts itself in the lives of people who are still, you know, alive. You've already told me these laws are optional, that no one should be compelled to follow them by force (although there are some Muslim countries that enforce Shariah law on their whole population, which they equate with Divine Law and with the will of the singular God, although I would disagree with that in principle and even if I didn't, I would vehemently disagree with any such enforcement in practice).

Give unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and give unto God, what belongs to God. You would expect Muslims to live under British rule whilst living in Britain, so why would you object to living under Sharia law if you lived in a Muslim country? If you don't break their laws, then you would be ok.

In the spirit of praying for justice for all people

Eric

 

[kritikvernunft]

You would expect Muslims to live under British rule whilst living in Britain ...

If the British were consistent, the argument could possibly make sense.

Let's investigate: You would expect the British to live under Sharia rule whilst colonizing Muslim countries ... Euh. They didn't. In other words, the following argument would also make sense: The British have no right to expect Muslims to live under British rule whilst living in Britain, because they did not agree to live under Sharia rule whilst colonizing Muslim countries. They could try to enforce such asymmetry. However, that would also imply that they are willing to risk their lives and die for that. I do not believe that. I want to see it first! ;-)

In a country where men are equal to women, in that case, why don't the women do the fighting? Every time that it revolves around armed conflict, there is the issue that you cannot give weapons to, and arm British men, while the women would just wait at home, because that would imply that it is the men who wield the real power. In that sense, forcing the British to fight, would immediately propel the underlying contradiction in British society to the foreground. If I am the one supposed to be doing all the fighting, while you are just going to sit there and watch, in what sense would you be equal to me? But then again, if you are not equal to me, then the guys on the opposite side are actually right about that. Hence, British defense would end up utterly collapsing on its internal contradictions. That means that the country and its ideology are fundamentally indefensible. In other words, as soon as someone credibly calls their bluff, they will be toast.

 

[cooterhein]

Greetings and peace be with you cooterhein;



Give unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and give unto God, what belongs to God. You would expect Muslims to live under British rule whilst living in Britain, so why would you object to living under Sharia law if you lived in a Muslim country? If you don't break their laws, then you would be ok.

In the spirit of praying for justice for all people

Eric

Several reasons.

1) In a Muslim country that has Shariah law that's enforced on everyone (and I know not all of them do), I wouldn't be super welcome there for a number of reasons, not least of which is that as a Christian, it's rather important to me that I evangelize and at least present the opportunity for people to leave whatever religion or non-religion it is that they currently belong to and become a Christian. This is a rather central tenet of Christianity, especially for the particular strand of Christianity to which I belong with is Evangelical. It's no coincidence that evangelism is emphasized to a rather large degree. By way of comparison, Muslims- although they may not feel as welcome as they could be in the West- are perfectly free to invite people to come to mosque, their mosques are free to publicly display whatever it is they want to pertaining to their religion, and in Western countries, you won't be told that you should be satisfied to practice your religion in your home and grit your teeth through a slew of restrictions in public places, all while being told that you are expected to say "thank you" for having the right to have a minority religion that is in effect a bit of a secret.

2) Shariah law is believed by many Muslims to be divine in origin and perfect, and in countries where Shariah law is the only law, that is absolutely believed to be the case by at least two thirds of the population in every example. Such a legal system- especially as it pertains to someone outside the religion, although it is still applied to me- is obviously rather immune to change, to reform, to improvement. Why improve on perfection, and who is this unbeliever to answer back to God and question His will? That's what we're looking at, and that's a huge problem. I happen to be a proponent of natural law, in a certain sense, not in the exact way that Aquinas envisioned it but in a more evolved post-Enlightenment sort of way. You can read up on some of the gory details here. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/natural-law-theories/
In any event, two of the best things about the core concepts of natural law are as follows. For one, for laws to be just they must be equally applied to everyone and this application must be just and fair in all cases and to all concerned. Shariah law completely dismisses that, as it is clearly intended at all stages to favor Muslims and screw over non Muslims. I don't like being screwed. If you come to the West, you probably miss being shown blatantly obvious favoritism at all times, but instead of that you are treated fairly and equally before the law as compared to all other religions and that is decidedly different from getting screwed.
A second core principle of natural law has to do with the very nature of what it is. Natural law is conceived of as an unwritten law that exists independent of any actual laws, something of a hypothetically perfect law, to the extent that a perfect legal code can be accurately surmised. What's great about it though, is that it puts you in a position where existing laws are up for review, and if they are bad then they should change. What that means is the West is constantly looking for things that could be improved in its legal system and tinkers with it in order to make it better. Under Shariah law, however, there is no improving and no tinkering because Shariah is presumed to be perfect already. The thing is though, it's not, especially in terms of the way non Muslims are mistreated. It violates natural law and flagrantly so, at its very core, and by design, it is impervious to the criticism that it so richly deserves. That's what it feels like when I am approaching Islamic law, whereas you get to approach the laws of the West and make some specific suggestions for potential changes, and the West says you may have a good point there, let's examine that and see what we can really do.

Are you beginning to notice that I have some real things to complain about, while you really don't? Maybe that's why I complain, and you don't.

3) I acknowledge that God created laws, I just don't think he ever told Mohammed about them and to whatever extent Islamic law really is God's law (meh), God did not intend for religious law to be enforced on nation states as a matter of common law. Divine Law, as I have repeatedly stated in previous posts, is supposed to be optional in this life and to only be enforced after death, by God, who is the judge. There is not supposed to be compulsion in religion, Muslims at least know that talking point, what you don't seem to understand is that Laws, when they are enforced, are the most basic and common means of compulsion in the history of humanity. Therefore, to whatever extent Any religious law is enforced, and to whatever extent punishments are meted out by religious law enforcement, that is the extent to which there is compulsion in your religion. And there is quite a lot of that in Islam, more so than in any other religion if I may say so. If you think about it, the vast majority of Muslims practice Islam because they were raised in a Muslim family. And then, once they reach adulthood and if they live in a country where Shariah is their law, they are not allowed to leave Islam. They will be punished, and if they speak out against Islam in a public way they will most likely be killed. If you can't see that as a prime example of compulsion then I don't know what it will take. Shariah, when enforced on a society as its law, is basically just compulsory Islam and beyond the life and death business, all manner of other Islamic laws must be followed or violators will be punished in some way. (Not death of course, usually not, but there are punishments for hundreds of different things all pertaining to Islamic law). It is just overwhelming compulsion of a specifically religious variety, and the very thing that so many Muslims look to as the perfect way for Muslims to order their societies is also the perfect example of pure, unadulterated, overwhelming compulsion in their own religion. This should be rather obvious, and I honestly don't know how in the world anyone can read this, think about it for a second, and just not see it. It absolutely boggles my mind.

Shariah is just awful, especially for a non Muslim or for anyone who might even consider leaving Islam (and anyone else that Shariah deems worthy of mistreatment). The West, on the other hand, is not awful for non Westerners and from a legal standpoint, it's as good to Muslims as anyone else. There are some cultural tendencies that are certainly worth complaining about, and the legal system does have its flaws, but we are working on that and unless your favorite Shariah-governed country is working on being secular, Muslims are absolutely not working on improving anything where I am concerned. You have very little to complain about as a Muslim in the West, but I do have all sorts of very good reasons to complain about Shariah law on a very fundamental level.

Thank you for asking, and I certainly don't mind going into detail.

 

[cooterhein]

If the British were consistent, the argument could possibly make sense.

Let's investigate: You would expect the British to live under Sharia rule whilst colonizing Muslim countries ... Euh. They didn't. In other words, the following argument would also make sense: The British have no right to expect Muslims to live under British rule whilst living in Britain, because they did not agree to live under Sharia rule whilst colonizing Muslim countries. They could try to enforce such asymmetry.

That is an excellent point about the British, their colonizing was rather odious wasn't it?

Ah, but the Muslims in India, they had the right idea. Instead of getting along with their neighbors under democratic rule, partition the country into three parts (four if you count Kashmir), give the religious minorities in the newly Islamic countries some time to move out, and then cleanse the rest of those religious minorities as much as possible! That's the way to do it.

In a country where men are equal to women, in that case, why don't the women do the fighting? Every time that it revolves around armed conflict, there is the issue that you cannot give weapons to, and arm British men, while the women would just wait at home, because that would imply that it is the men who wield the real power. In that sense, forcing the British to fight, would immediately propel the underlying contradiction in British society to the foreground. If I am the one supposed to be doing all the fighting, while you are just going to sit there and watch, in what sense would you be equal to me? But then again, if you are not equal to me, then the guys on the opposite side are actually right about that. Hence, British defense would end up utterly collapsing on its internal contradictions. That means that the country and its ideology are fundamentally indefensible. In other words, as soon as someone credibly calls their bluff, they will be toast.

I would like to point out very quickly that I'm from the United States, and I have been paying attention to this exact issue over the course of the last couple of years as people argued about having women in active combat, and eventually it happened. It turned out to be a bit of a non-issue, as far as I've been aware, and the gender-integration seems to be going as well as anyone had hoped. I'm not sure what's going on with the British military, but I wouldn't be surprised if they're working on something similar.

Bringing it back to the OP for the first time in quite awhile- wouldn't it be something if a female Muslim was able to serve in the US military, right? I mean, female military personnel who know Arabic are currently the most-in-demand thing that we need. It also feels good to hear about women killing terrorists, too, because the terrorists believe (some of them believe, anyway) that being killed by a woman causes them to forfeit the martyr's reward that they thought was coming to them. Now, that would be the ultimate indignity for a terrorist, wouldn't it- getting killed by a Muslim American woman serving in the US military. I'm hoping that can be the next step in all of this, and although I'm not up to date on the status of the British military, I know the US military is ready to go and the sooner this can happen, the better.

Actually, now that I've looked it up, as of 2015 the British military determined that in the fall of this year, 2016, British women will begin basic training in order to enter all roles in the military by the end of this year. So good news, that is just starting to happen right now.

Edit- it's a good thing to, they're doing it just in time to avoid your dire predictions pertaining to their implosion and to them being toast. Ah, your wild predictions sure are funny. Now I suppose you'll have to switch to some new predictions, now that they're doing exactly what you said they should. And I assume the British military will still somehow implode and they will still somehow be toast, even though the opposite course of action was supposed to yield that imaginary outcome 15 minutes ago.

 

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you kritikvernunft;

If the British were consistent, the argument could possibly make sense.

Let's investigate: You would expect the British to live under Sharia rule whilst colonizing Muslim countries ... Euh.

You can only colonise a country if you are stronger than them. People in power live under the laws that suit them, they can make their own law, and the victors write the history books. The reasons to colonise are more to do with exploiting trade, wealth and power.

The British have no right to expect Muslims to live under British rule whilst living in Britain, because they did not agree to live under Sharia rule whilst colonizing Muslim countries.

The British hold the power in the UK, so they make the laws, but I do believe Sharia Courts exist in the UK to rule over some civil matters.

In the spirit of praying for justice for all people

Eric

 

[jabeady]

If the British were consistent, the argument could possibly make sense.

Let's investigate: You would expect the British to live under Sharia rule whilst colonizing Muslim countries ... Euh. They didn't. In other words, the following argument would also make sense: The British have no right to expect Muslims to live under British rule whilst living in Britain, because they did not agree to live under Sharia rule whilst colonizing Muslim countries.

Let me get this straight:

You, as a Muslim, speaking on behalf of Islam and Shariah, are saying that two wrongs make a right; that revenge is a tenet of Islam; that the trials sent to Muslims by Allah can be avenged by oppressing others; and so on.

Are you sure you're not a Christian?

 

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you jabeady;

You, as a Muslim, speaking on behalf of Islam and Shariah, are saying that two wrongs make a right; that revenge is a tenet of Islam; that the trials sent to Muslims by Allah can be avenged by oppressing others; and so on.

Are you sure you're not a Christian?

I am sure you already know, but Christians should love and pray for their enemies, we should also forgive.

In the spirit of praying for justice for all people.

Eric

 

[jabeady]

Greetings and peace be with you jabeady;



I am sure you already know, but Christians should love and pray for their enemies, we should also forgive.

In the spirit of praying for justice for all people.

Eric

I used to be a Christian.

But I got better.

 

[Search]

:bism: (In the Name of God, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful)

Thank you for sharing that. I did see the thread about the Chicago student even on IB; however, I didn't participate in it because I obviously want justice for her but also at the same time I don't believe demonizing our police force is in our best interests. I see what happened as an opportunity for CAIR to demand cultural and religion sensitivity training.

That said, I'd like to correct the opinions in the post you've quoted from the other forum. I just want to say that I described myself as a staunch feminist in the past and I've also been an atheist, and I've been an atheist and feminist longer than I've been a Muslim.

In Islam, we as Muslim women don't cover because we believe that we might tempt men but because we believe that it is a simple act of communicating our love and submission to God who created us; men don't factor into our decision. I didn't submit myself to God as a Muslim because I thought men were telling me this; it was my heart, and my conscience telling me this was the right thing to do for myself as a woman. I didn't feel oppressed; I felt liberated. All my life, I had been told how pretty I am; however, I have felt that nobody would ever see me beyond my looks. It felt freeing to be able to see myself as a person who had more to offer people than mere superficiality. I have rushed a sorority in college; I have been to frat parties and I've worn dresses and shorts that perfectly define "showing skin." I have lived that life. I can honestly say Islam brought me the dignity as a human being that I've felt was denied me as a person otherwise. I don't feel like I'm second class; I feel like I'm first class, always.

Islam doesn't see women as chattel to be "owned" in either monogamous or polygamous marriages. Polygamous marriages afford protection to all women in a way that being a girlfriend on the site with whom someone else's husband cheats can't. There are non-Muslim women who fall in love with married men everyday in our own American culture; these women have no rights or protections in an extramarital relationship, and good luck to them for going to court and collecting child support if they get pregnant because these men usually walk away and women are shafted. Also, there will be times when the number of women will outnumber men due to war; what are these women in these types of situations supposed to do? Do they not have sexual needs? If they believe that the only way to share their bodies is in a marital relationship, what are these women supposed to do? Remain single all their lives? Never have children? Are these women not human beings deserving of happiness? I am a woman, and I support the concept of polygamous marriages. Also, we need to remember that Islam doesn't require polygamous marriages of men but it gives men and women the option to enter into polygamous marriage should they desire that for themselves. Let me just say that part of what attracted me to Islam at least partially is that many of the rights that the West didn't come until the last 200 years was given to women more than 1400 years ago in Islam.

Maybe advise this quoted person to come to IB; certainly, I agree with this individual's first part of the quoted post, but I certainly feel that the second part of the quoted post could use revision from interacting and speaking with Muslim women.

Oh, well thank you. [emoji5] I like you, too.

As an illustration, I posted one of the news stories at the beginning of the thread about a female Muslim student in Chicago being roughed up by police, in an atheist forum; the following quote is the entire text from one of that forum's more even-handed replies.

Note that both here and in the other forum I have deleted any personally - identifiable information regarding the poster, and have omitted any identification of both forums. Additionally, in the other forum I quoted only the news article and nothing that originated on IB.

Finally, since the other forum is for atheists, there is at least in theory no religious bias (this guy hates everybody equally).

 

[jabeady]

Maybe advise this quoted person to come to IB; certainly, I agree with this individual's first part of the quoted post, but I certainly feel that the second part of the quoted post could use revision from interacting and speaking with Muslim women.

No, I don't think I'll invite him here. Most atheists on that board are jerks, and most folk here are pretty nice. If you feel like entering the lion's den, however, check in at The Thinking Atheist. Just don't say I didn't warn you.

Just to give you an idea, they'll say something on the order of, you are so oppressed that you don't know you're oppressed.

I never saw atheism as a religion until I started talking with other atheists. That's why I prefer to be called an Unbeliever.

 

[kritikvernunft]

The British hold the power in the UK ...

The National State and especially its police force are absolutely outdated technology that are no longer viable. I already gave an example of why it is trivial to knock out the police force. If you have a relatively small group of people, who hack any of the systems containing the list of names and home addresses of the police force, they can visit them -- and knock them out -- one by one. There is no way that the National State can prevent that from happening, because the functioning itself of the National State requires collecting this information. Even the banks, the city councils, insurance companies, and so many organizations collect data on the profession of their users, members, customers, and patients. Hence, you can always reconstitute this list by extracting information from various other sources. Any system that generally collects that kind of information is trivial to knock out. The National State cannot overcome the fundamental information asymmetry between themselves and any of their determined enemies. Therefore, such system is not viable on the long run. Furthermore, there are many other reasons why the National State cannot possibly survive on the long run. This is just one of them.

 

[kritikvernunft]

You, as a Muslim, speaking on behalf of Islam and Shariah ...

For a starters, my profile says "Religion: other". I do not say that my religion is "other", but the qualification actually suits me fine. That would make me an "Other" speaking on behalf of Islam and Shariah. I already said as an "Other" that Islam and Shariah suits me fine. I never said that anything had to be changed about it. Islam and Shariah are absolutely suitable and useful instruments for "Others" to utilize and apply in order to attain particular goals. Islam and Shariah may also be their own goals, and they often clearly are, but from my "Other" point of view they are first and foremost instruments and tools.

...are saying that two wrongs make a right ...

There is something like the Qisas, An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. It originally appeared in the Codex Hammurabi, was mentioned in the Torah too, and ended up in the Quran as well. Divine Law emphasizes that the morality of hostile behaviour is neutral at the basis, and that its moral status is entirely predicated on the history of hostile behaviour that precedes the particular act of hostility. In other words, there is no out-of-context morality possible about hostile behaviour. Outside of its history, the status of hostility is undetermined.

... that revenge is a tenet of Islam ...

The Qisas does indeed allow the victim to waive his right to retaliation. However, the Qisas does not mandate this. As a matter of fact, nobody can detract the justice-seeking victim from his rights under the Qisas. Symmetry is indeed a central tenet of Divine Law, Fundamentally, Divine Law will overrule symmetry in just a few explicitly mentioned cases: Parents will asymmetrically govern over their children, husbands will asymmetrically govern over their wives, and masters will asymmetrically govern over their slaves. Any asymmetry not mentioned in the scriptures of Divine Law is unlawful.

...Are you sure you're not a Christian?...

As I have mentioned already, the site classifies me as "other" and that suits me perfectly fine. I generally really do not care what other people believe about what I believe. It is of zero importance to me. There are a very limited number of specific circumstances in which your official status matters. It matters when you ask a Muslim family for their daughter in marriage. It also matters when you request a Sharia court not to detract you from the rights and obligations exclusively reserved to Muslims. But then again, in both cases, your own declaration will always overrule third-party declarations. Hence, third-party declarations are of zero importance whatsoever. It is only your declaration that matters.