Look at this story, posted at Jihad Watch on November 19: "Imam misunderstands Islam, asks, 'What is wrong with Sharia law? If someone steals...why is it wrong to cut off his hand?'"
It says, "Imam Mohamed El Sadi, the Muslim leader in Malta, believes chopping off the hands of thieves is a 'deserving punishment.'" El Sadi said: "What is wrong with Sharia law? If someone steals, he is taking from the country or the poor, so why is it wrong to cut off his hand?" And: "But whoever denies this is not a Muslim."
The story also says: "Fr Renè Camilleri, who was also a guest on the programme, said he was 'shocked' by the Imam's comments. 'I tried to insist violence is unacceptable. The concept is horrific to me. It is equivalent to the death penalty. I know it is what Sharia law dictates but, coming from him, such a moderate and tolerant person, I was shocked.'"
In his comment on the article, Robert Spencer notes that what Mohamed El Sadi said, on the television program Bondiplus, in his endorsement of the cutting off of the hands of thieves, was merely expressing what orthodox Islam, what the Shari'a, holds out as right and proper and to be emulated.
The story, however, has two protagonists. One is Mohamed El Sadi, and the other is the man who thought he knew Mohamed El Sadi, and knew what Mohamed El Sadi believed, as a perfectly orthodox Muslim. The two protagonists are the Muslim Mohamed El Sadi, and the Christian Father Rene Camilleri - and it is the latter who may be of greater significance. For Mohamed El Sadi, as Robert Spencer notes in his prefatory comment, did not say anything that is not orthodox Islam:
If someone in America points out that such punishments are part of Sharia, he is derided as an ignorant "Islamophobe." But the Koran is clear: "As for the thief, both male and female, cut off their hands. It is the reward of their own deeds, an exemplary punishment from Allah. Allah is Mighty, Wise." -- Koran 5:38And it is also clear that this verse is taken literally and seriously by all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence. And so this imam is saying something that is only controversial to those who are ignorant (whether willfully so or not)."
When Mohamed El Sadi said that he saw nothing wrong with the punishment of the cutting off of hands of thieves, he was, let's say it one more time, endorsing the system of criminal punishment, or hudud, that is found in the Shari'a, or Holy Law of Islam. This hudud is now enshrined in the formal law of several Muslim states (most notably, Saudi Arabia), and is, furthermore, the ideal, the model, that still other Muslim states take to be a model worthy of emulation, however imperfect their attempts at the moment. They certainly do not wish to bring attention - especially the attention of those among their own Muslim populations who take Islam most to heart - to the ways in which their laws, at present, may for prudential reasons differ from the Shari'a. And in Muslim states the law of Islam can be enforced not only by the state, but by groups or by Muslim individuals. In Pakistan, Christians fear prosecution on trumped-up charges for blasphemy, but they also fear the punishment that is often meted out to them informally, by Muslims in a fury. And in the lawless or government-less conditions of wartorn Afghanistan and Somalia, the Taliban, and the Shebabe, mete out their own punishments, according to the Shari'a, confirming that the hudud is, for those Muslims who are most deeply and fanatically Muslim, still the law - the law of Islam if not the law of the land.
None of this should have surprised a student of Islam. The only thing remarkable about Mohamed El Sadi's remarks on the television program were that they were made publicly, before an audience of Infidels.
Tariq Ramadan, and those who follow the hissing advice of that smooth man, would never be so impolitic and so candid. He would talk about how, in the here and now, in "the reality of present-day Europe," such punishments "have no place" - and that phrase "have no place" would be received by Infidel auditors as meaning "have no place" because they are morally unacceptable to Tariq Ramadan, when what Tariq Ramadan is actually saying is such punishments "have no place because, at the moment, we Muslims are not yet numerous enough, and for another decade or two we have to be very very careful, and it would be unwise to make demands prematurely, to scare unduly, and perhaps rouse to action, the Infidels among whom we now live, and with whom we must deal, for now, from a position of weakness."
No, there should have been no surprise.
But, as the article makes clear, someone was surprised, someone on the very same television show, someone who had known Mohamed El Sadi and thought he knew him.
And that someone was a Christian Father, Father Rene Camilleri.
Here's how he expressed his surprise:
"I know it is what Sharia law dictates but, coming from him, such a moderate and tolerant person, I was shocked."
So he was "shocked." Oh, he knew what the Shari'a said. He knew that it called for the cutting off of the hands of thieves. But still, you see, in all these years of learning about Islam, and meeting with Muslims, and listening to them, including among them this Muslim cleric whom he apparently knew ("such a moderate and tolerant person"), it never occurred to Camilleri that just perhaps, Muslims - including many or even most of those outwardly, to the undiscerning and ill-prepared, "moderate and tolerant" - might actually be Muslims who took Islam fully to heart. And they not only took it fully to heart, but were quite capable, for a long period, and in great numbers, for disturbing reasons, of practicing Taqiyya, which can be defined as "a doctrine in Islam, having its origin in Shi'a Islam but, on the basis of both Qur'anic textual authority, and the example of Muhammad, is a common practice of both Shi'a and Sunni Muslims, and involves religiously-sanctioned dissimulation about both the Faith of Islam and about the beliefs of particular (threatened) Muslims."
Intrigued by the shock of this priestly Camilleri, the Camilleri who exhibits such naivete about Muslim behavior and beliefs, I did a little research online and found out a bit more about him, his background, his scholarship, his everything.
Here is what turned up:
Rev. Dr Rene' Camilleri read Theology and Philosophy at the University of Malta between 1972 - 1978. In 1979 he furthered his studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome obtaining his Doctorate in Systematic Theology under the tutorship of Profs F. A. Sullivan SJ. In 1988 he took his teaching post in the Department of Fundamental & Dogmatic Theology in the Faculty of Theology at the University of Malta. He teaches Systematic Theology and his main areas of teaching and research are Ecclesiology, Anthropology, Faith and Culture. In 1994 he was Visiting Scholar at Heythrop College, University of London. He had various assignments on the Diocesan level and is a regular contributor in papers and on the Media. He is currently the Archbishop's Delegate for Catechesis.Publications
Towards an Explicit Theology of the sensus fidei, Extract from the Doctoral Dissertation, Malta 1987.
'Faith and its Openness to Culture', Paper read and published as part of the proceedings of a Seminar on "Faith and Culture", University of Malta, October 1996.
'Dostoyevsky. Bread before Virtue', Paper read during a Conference on 'Theology and Literature' organized jointly by the Faculty of Theology and the Department of Maltese of the University of Malta, December 1997.
'Judaism, Islam and Christianity. The Challenge of Inter-Religious Dialogue to the Faculties of Theology in a Euro-Mediterranean Context', Paper read at the COCTI Meeting of the European Faculties of Theology, April 1998.
'Liberation Theology or the Liberation of Theology?', published in: The Communist Manifesto. Karl Marx's Legacy to Humanity, Malta: Malta University Press 2003.
"Creating Identities: Beyond the Hermeneutic of Suspicion", published in: Homosexuality. Challenging the Stigma (Edd. Paul A. Bartolo & Mark G. Borg), Malta: Interprint Ltd 2003.
Now let's see. We have here an Identikit of the thoroughly modern Christian clergyman, the one who doesn't take his own religion too seriously. There's Liberation Theology, represented by a contribution to a book entitled Karl Marx's Legacy to Humanity.
There's the modist theology-and-literature paper on Dostoyevsky that appears, at least from its title - "Bread Before Virtue" - to be another contribution to the Marxist theme, or perhaps one should say Brechto-Marxist theme of "erst kommt das Fressen, dann kommt die Morale" or, as it has been wittily translated, "Grub first, then Ethics."
There's a paper about "identities" - in this case, judging by the title (Homosxuality. Challenging the Stigma) of the book in which the paper appeared, about that old chestnut - "sexual identity" -- being plucked from the fire.
And then there is the most telling of the four publications that Rev. Rene Camilleri lists: his "[p]aper read at the COCTI Meeting of the European Faculties of Theology, April 1998," entitled 'Judaism, Islam and Christianity. The Challenge of Inter-Religious Dialogue to the Faculties of Theology in a Euro-Mediterranean Context.'
Let us be charitable. When Rev. Rene Camilleri wrote, and then "read" at the COCTI Meeting of the European Faculties of Theology, about "Judaism, Islam and Christianity" and "The Challenge of Inter-Religious Dialogue," that was way back - decades, centuries, eons ago - in 1998. The "challenge" now is not to "inter-religious dialogue." We have "inter-religious dialogue" coming out of our ears. No, the "challenge" now was perhaps until now unrecognized by Rev. Rene Camilleri until he had a little salutary shock of recognition, or the hint of a glint of the beginning of an understanding that perhaps, all along, he had not quite understood what Islam's adherents really adhered to, and what they would ideally want if they could get it. And they are working mightily, all over Western Europe, to get it. That is the challenge presented to the world of Infidels, to Dar al-Harb, to above all (right now) the imperiled peoples of Western Europe, of Islam itself.
For Islam itself challenges the way of life, the view of Man, the solicitousness for the individual, the guarantee of individual autonomy and rights, and equality of the sexes, and guarantees of minority rights, that help to define advanced Western democracies, challenges indeed all of the legal and political institutions of every Infidel nation-state, which are flatly contradicted by the letter and spirit of the Shari'a.
What one wonders about Rev. Rene Camilleri and about so many others, including the non-Muslim members of that trio of "faith amigos" described in the Times recently, is why it is so hard for them to look steadily and whole at the totality of Islam. Why is it so hard for them? Why was it apparently impossible for the Rev. Rene Camilleri, a bookish fellow, in the eleven years that have passed since his 1998 paper on "dialogue" among the adherents of Islam, Judaism, and Christianity, and the "challenges" that such "dialogue" pose, to read, to study, to learn what the texts of Islam reveal? Why is it so hard for him to understand how those texts are received, and why they cannot be changed or discarded? Why can't he grasp why it is a mistake to liken the role and reception of those texts to the role and reception of the canonical texts of Christianity and Judaism? And why, in the last eleven years, or at least since 9/11/2001, has Rev. Rene Camilleri not bethought himself, not chosen to consider the figure of Muhammad, who is for Muslims the Perfect Man, al-insan al-kamil, and the ways in which that Perfect Man, worthy of emulation in all times and all places, differs from the figure of Jesus? And why did he not realize that even if the Shari'a is not everywhere congruent with the laws of Muslim states, to the extent that those states take Islam seriously, it does become the law: in the Sudan, in Saudi Arabia, in Iran, in Pakistan. And other states - Egypt, for example - take the Shari'a as the model of what their own legislation should be, even if it is not implemented fully. And the wording of the "Islamic" version of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which differs so significantly from that of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, shows that those who wrote it, and those who signed it, look to the Shari'a as the ultimate law, playing the role, for Muslim states, that the Constitution does in the American framework: the final authority as to what is, and is not, legitimate.
To the extent that the reception of the main texts of Islam (Qur'an, Hadith, Sira) has not been modified by time and custom, by nuance and neglect, by ignorance or by a willful decision to pretend not to know, those texts will inexorably lead Muslims to rediscover Islam. Being raised up in, say, the Western world, their mere consciousness that they are "Muslims" - even outside of Muslim states or societies -- will lead them to rediscover Islam as part of that "identity." Far from rejecting that "identity," they will not only repair to it (sometimes out of an emotional desarroi, prompted by setbacks having nothing to do with Islam or even with politics), but will wrap themselves in it, refashion themselves as devout Muslims who must do everything that Islam commands, simply because - in the end - they are aware that they, because of one or both parents, are "Muslims" and therefore have to accept, and act on, the full program of Islam that some Muslims manage to ignore, or at least to attempt to ignore.
If Rev. Rene Camilleri were, in his willful innocence, a unique case, or if he were one of just a few, then he might not be worth writing about. But if you look around the world, you will see all those who are still insisting that our attitude toward Islam is one of unnecessary, because unfounded, fear. And they do so with self-assured aplomb, though it is clear that those making these statements have not bothered to find out what the many reliable Western scholars of Islam wrote about Islam before the Age of Inhibition set in. That Age set in about 1970. Before that, roughly from 1870 to 1970, was the age of Western scholarship, that of the now-maligned Orientalists, from a dozen or two dozen countries. They studied and wrote before Arab money bought up academic chairs, departments, and whole institutions, and before many non-Muslims academics - self-selected -- became willing apologists for Islam along with their Muslim colleagues, with whom they curry favor either out of belief or out of a desire to smooth a path for their own careers and resistible rises. Nor have they read what the defectors from the Army of Islam - the articulate apostates - have offered, in their own books, as a kind of eyewitness testimony, to what Islam inculcates or, in their brave and unusual cases, somehow failed to do so.
What if that imam in Malta had done what many Muslims, clerics and non-clerics, continue to do? That is, they don't reveal what they actually think, but engage in such a convoluted and confusing way of saying what it is they think, that they know it will be subject to misinterpretation by Infidels who are unable to read between the lines, or recognize what is carefully not being said, or recognize what is being said in a language in a sense Aesopian, that must be unpacked, and its meaning set out, piece by piece, so that Infidels may inspect it, and understand.
We still don't know the rest of the story. We don't know if Rev. Rene Camilleri, now that he has been disabused of his faith and trust, in Mohamed El Sadi, whom he always knew - until just up to the second he suddenly no longer recognized - as "such a moderate and tolerant person," will extend his understanding a bit more. We don't know if he will come to realize that the behavior, and beliefs, of Mohamed El Sadi are not those of Mohamed El Sadi alone, but of many many seemingly "moderate and tolerant" Muslims, especially in Western Europe, where for now they have to be - don't they? - just about as "moderate and tolerant" as they can stand. In other words, how far along in his understanding will this sometime liberation-theologian, this marxisant professor, this student of the phenomenon of "the Other" in all its made-far-too-much-ofalterity, this dialoguist-of-the-deaf, how will this little shock of recognition, this televised epiphany or possible (sensu lato) anagnoris, continue to work itself out in his mind? Will he fight his way all the way to a more thorough understanding of things?
And really, we are not talking about the Rev. Dr. Rene Camilleri alone. We are talking about the men in the Pentagon. We are talking about the men (and, bien entendu, women) in the State Department. We are talking about those who, in our political and media elites all over the Western world, have out of laziness, or willful ignorance, or a deep desire to avoid having to think about things that are unpleasant to consider, and that might require something like the wholesale pulling down of various Idols of the Age, refused to assume their responsibilities to learn, and learn thoroughly, about the doctrine and the practice, over 1350 years, of Islam. Yet they continue to presume, with ever greater expense and mental confusion, to protect and instruct us.
High:
[Why is it so hard for him to understand how those texts are received, and why they cannot be changed or discarded?]
Why is it so hard for you to understand that those texts are not the religion as it was practiced, and that islamic law changed like any other?:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/20753339/Gates-of-Ijtihad
When Mohamed El Sadi said that he saw nothing wrong with the punishment of the cutting off of hands of thieves...
What the good Imam Mohamed was saying is that there's nothing wrong with Islam.
*** 33:12 ***
Nothing wrong with the Holy Prophet Mohammed, either.
*** 48:27 ***
If Islam is above criticism, and it is, then by that logic we must applaud Mohamed and Mohammed, and Sgt Hassan and Major Hasan, these names are close and Moslems are close in a standoffish sorta way, and the Cause is getting ever closer to its interim goal: islands of semi-autonomous Sharia throughout the West.
Hugh,
This is EXACTLY what we need to understand. All over the world, we still haven't yet fully grasped that Islam has long ago declared war on all of the rest of us. We are at war. This is not a war about territory or resources. This is a war about our freedom to think, to worship, to associate, to choose, to travel, to educate, to vote, to speak as citizens. Islam's goal is to destroy all of that and more. I can't agree with you more when you say that we must discredit the ideas of Islam. I want to believe that human beings are FINALLY waking up.... just a little. I just pray that we're not too late.
Wonderin1
Why was Father Renè Camilleri shocked?
1. He's an uneducated idiot,
2. He's confused secular humanism with Christianity, and can't tell the difference between Islam and Christianity.
3. He is educated but he's still an idiot.
You figure it out. I've had enough of Sharia law, honor killings, suicide bombers and fools who think Rifqa Bary should discuss religion with her parents.
I believe it's anagnorisis, not anagnoris.
Also, here is some gobbledegook on ofalterity:
http://books.google.com/books?id=M2StyqHK2I4C&pg=PA133&lpg=PA133&dq=What+is+ofalterity&source=bl&ots=Eo3_x8lIHL&sig=--Pve8OjZ36OidCCZi7TNo7sBuM&hl=en&ei=CYAWS9DtNZG8MJ69-bYG&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CBMQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=What%20is%20ofalterity&f=false
"roughly from 1870 to 1970, was the age of Western scholarship"
i.e., perform taqlid of the ancient Orientalists, and ignore modern scholarship. Only by ignoring modern scholarship can we retain our dogma about Islam. We must resist change in order to retain our ancient belief that Muslims resisted change.
Funny.
Hugh:
"roughly from 1870 to 1970, was the age of Western scholarship"
Count Lean Ostrorog was an Orientalist that wrote this in 1927:
“Considered from the point of view of its logical structure the [Islamic law] system is one of rare perfection, and to this day it commands the admiration of the student…Those Eastern thinkers of the IXth century laid down, on the basis of their theology, the principle of the Rights of Man, in those very terms, comprehending the rights of individual liberty, and of inviolability of person and property; described the supreme power in Islam, or Caliphate, as based on a contract, implying conditions of capacity and performance, and subject to cancellation if the conditions under the contract were not fulfilled; elaborated a Law of War of which the humane, chivalrous prescriptions would have put to the blush certain belligerents in the Great War; expounded a doctrine of toleration of non-Moslem creeds so liberal that our West had to wait a thousand years before seeing equivalent principles adopted.”
Ostrorog, Count Leon, The Angora Reform (London: University of London Press, 1927), p. 30
Is this "acceptable" information?
Dave742 - go sell that stuff to your fellow Muslims. They don't seem to be buying what you are touting.
It is good for a laugh, anything else?
Maybe it's a victim/martyr complex, where they won't be happy until they are bound on the ground, with a Koran-verse-inscribed knife approaching their defenseless throats....
To fully understand the mythology of Islam, there are two things that a Western audience must recognize.
1. The practice of taquiyya, or the sacred lie. The prophet, Mohammed, allows his followers to lie to a man in order to gain his trust and kill him. Things have been going downhill ever since. Lying, deceiving and misleading kuffars is always allowed and doing the same to other believers is permitted if such deception ADVANCES the cause of Islam. Hence the good Father's confusion. Mohamed El Sadi has conned Fr. Camilleri into thinking that he accepts Fr. Camilleri as a peer and as a fellow "man of God". That he, Mohamed El Sadi, is enlightened and Western in outlook. And although the Quran, Hadith and Shariah law call for inhuman punishments, Mohamed El Sadi would never, ever endorse such a thing.
One of the hardest things for a victim of deception to do, is to admit that they have been conned, bamboozled, flim-flammed and lied to. I wish the good Father all the luck in the world.
2. Muslims believe that Heaven contains a copy of the Qur'an. As a result, nothing can ever be changed, explained away or not obeyed as the Qur'an dictates. Oh, muslim 'scholars' have developed the concept of 'abrogation', that is that a later sura 'abrogates' an earlier sura to explain the many contradictions of the Qur'an, but that simply points out to the lack of absolutes in Muslim society. A thing can be both wrong and right at the same time. There is no morality in Islam.
More importantly, despite what any Muslim or Islamic apologist tells you, Islam is no different today from the version practiced by the desert barbarians who remorselessly slaughter their way across three continents. The gates of Ijtihad have long ago closed and any Muslim would attempt to practice Ijtihad would be labeled an apostate and killed.
"anagnorisis, not anagnoris" -- from a posting above
You're darn tootin'. Is my face red.
A fine essay; but midway through there rears its scratching head wondering why?
"What one wonders about Rev. Rene Camilleri and about so many others, including the non-Muslim members of that trio of "faith amigos" described in the Times recently, is why it is so hard for them to look steadily and whole at the totality of Islam. Why is it so hard for them?"
The answer is excruciatingly simple, and may be clarified with four words:
Christians White, Muslims Brown.
Unpacking those four words:
1) Muslims are perceived to be an ethnic people -- or more specifically, a collection of ethnic peoples.
2) "ethnic" of course denotes non-white and/or non-Westerner.
3) This perception is eminently, albeit simplistically, common-sensical, seeing that whenever one looks at Muslims, 98% of the time one is looking at someone who looks "ethnic".
4) There is a worldview that has become dominant and mainstream throughout the West -- the PC MC paradigm
5) According to this PC MC paradigm, only white Westerners are capable of systemic wrongs and even systemic evils: "ethnic" peoples are exempt. Furthermore, according to this paradigm, white Westerners are ever prone toward systemic wrongs, and even systemic evils, against "ethnic" peoples, and one of the slippery slopes that leads white Westerners to slide perilously toward such evils begins with thought and speech -- specifically, with bigotry and prejudice.
6) Any criticism of Islam, and of Muslims, that goes beyond a very delicate, gingerly minimum, thus, begins to be feared to be slipping into bigotry and prejudice -- and from there, we will be slip-sliding down the slippery slope toward rounding up all those "ethnic" peoples, putting them in camps, and inexorably cleansing them, if not trying to exterminate them. So, to prevent another Holocaust -- this time against the New Jews, the new privileged, and endangered, Ethnic People, the Muslims -- we must stop ourselves at the beginning of that slippery slope: at how we think, and what we say.
7) And the power of PC MC is that it is not so much an external imposition of "correct" thought and "correct" speech, as we have seen in totalitarian systems: it is voluntary. Millions of Westerners affected with PC MC impose these inhibitions on their thought and on their speech themselves, voluntarily, willingly, and really feel it to be right (though not at times without some semi-conscious misgivings) -- just as Father Rene Camilleri has all these years.
But reasonably intelligent (not to mention extraordinarily intelligent) people in the still inchoate anti-Islam movement should know all this by now. That's the real wonder: why they don't, and continue to scratch their heads in wonder.
Hesperado
You have hit the nail on the head.
When my son was born I was asked by an African American Christian when I was going to have my son circumcised. I told him that we had no plans to have him circumcised. His response was "but does islam not require you to do that?"
My reply was "we are not moslem, what makes you think we are?"
He saw someone with a brown face of Indian decent & just assumed I was moslem.
He was actually shocked by my deep loathing of islam.
The other good example is our very loathsome, wretched labour government was trying a few years ago to pass a law through Parliament, it was called "The Racial & Religous Hatred Act".
On the day it was dicussed in Parliament there was a large demonstration against it by guess who??
African Christians, from Sudan & Nigeria, I believe there were some Pakistani Christians as well.
Mind you this Christian=White, moslem=brown belief is slowly cracking. Good always comes from evil, the massacres in Mumbhai & the genocides in South Sudan & Darfur are opening peoples eyes.
I am optimistic, we will prevail.
dave724 thinks he has scored some kind of significant point by adducing a Western scholar from 1927 -- that is, from the pre-PC MC era -- who wrote things that were PC MC.
In fact, there were a few proto-PC MC scholars prior to the Age of PC MC. I have analyzed four of them in a series on my blog (and I have since unearthed not a few more where those four came from): One from 1963 (right on the borderline of the historical transition); one from 1942; one from 1917; and one from 1849. Clearly the latter three fall outside the PC MC pale.
When Did PC Begin? Fourth Case Study
The point that dave724's cheap point misses is not that PC MC was non-existent before some magical historical marking date -- but that it was not then sociopolitically dominant and mainstream. Thus, the few scholars we can find from the dusty past who tended to extol Muslims represent a small minority within a society that still had its wits about it. That sociopolitical complexion in the last 50-odd years has been reversed: Now it is the Islamorealist scholars who have become the small minority, for the entire society around them, throughout the West, has changed.
Hesperado:
[In fact, there were a few proto-PC MC scholars prior to the Age of PC MC.]
Ostrorog is responsible for popularizing the "gates of ijtihad" soundbite, and talk endlessly about it in the book I referenced. Was that PC?
El Sadi said: "What is wrong with Sharia law? If someone steals, he is taking from the country or the poor, so why is it wrong to cut off his hand?"
Did anyone notice who was not mentioned here? By omission, does he mean to say that it's OK to steal from the wealthy?
And who might be meant by this unmentioned wealthy class? Westerners in general?
dave,
Ostrorog's praise of Islam as the best thing since Swiss cheese was decidedly PC MC. If he believed in the "gates of ijtihad" trope, he used that to bolster the PC MC view that grudgingly concedes something is wrong in the present with Islamic societies, and seeks to explain that by some historical mechanism that leaves intact the essential goodness and wonder of Islam in the good old days of the "Golden Age" -- a golden age of Islamic goodness corrupted by later, non-Islamic factors; in this case the "closing" of ijtihad.
Hesperado;
Wow! That's some good speculation for someone who has not even read the book! I guess when you're that smart, you don't even have to read books!
You are wrong. Ostrorog was a mainstream Orientalist, peddling mainstream garbage. What I quoted above was the outlying comment. You might get a better idea by actually reading the book, rather than speculating. But I guess spouting off crap off the top of your head without any information goes right along with the Orientalist tradition.
Why is it that Orientalist writing is devoid of any type of support from basic sources? An Orientalist makes sweeping statements, without any support whatsoever from Islamic sources, and it is immediately "the truth". People treat them like Gods, and Gods don't need proof, I guess. Then when a modern scholar comes along and reads through the Islamic text and court records, and sees a different reality, he is merely being "PC". I guess that's why science and conservatism don't get along well.
It is extremely difficult to reconcile what dave742 says with current events.
Perhaps dave742 should try to convince his coreligionists of the progressive and non-violent nature of modern Islam. It would appear that they need to hear it more than we infidels do.
He won't, of course. He knows that it would do no good. Instead, he'll keep trying to convince us, and his fellow Muslims will keep blowing things up and cutting people's heads off.
dave742 complains about lack of "proof". The sad truth is that we non-Muslims don't need to prove that Islam is violent; Muslims prove it every single day by their actions. dave, sorry to have to be the one to break it to you, but their actions speak a whole lot louder than your words.
I think I prefer the faith and courage of, for example, Fr Zakaria Botros and the (recently martyred) Fr Daniel Sysoyev, to the likes of a Fr Rene Camilleri.
dave,
Considering what Ostrorog wrote in the quote you provided, I need read no more of him.
Consider if someone, like Ostrorog, were writing not about Islam, but about German Nazism:
“Considered from the point of view of its logical structure the German Nazi system is one of rare perfection, and to this day it commands the admiration of the student…Those thinkers of the XXth century laid down, on the basis of their theology, the principle of the Rights of Man, in those very terms, comprehending the rights of individual liberty, and of inviolability of person and property; described the supreme power in the Third Reich, or in Der Fuhrer, as based on a contract, implying conditions of capacity and performance, and subject to cancellation if the conditions under the contract were not fulfilled; elaborated a Law of War of which the humane, chivalrous prescriptions would have put to the blush certain belligerents in the Great War; expounded a doctrine of toleration of non-Nazi creeds so liberal that our West had to wait a thousand years before seeing equivalent principles adopted.”
Would anyone in his right mind need read such a writer further? What more could he possibly say in a thousand pages that could possibly undo the monstrosity he has committed to paper in the above quote?
Not only is Islam analogous to German Nazism -- Islam is a thousand times worse.
dave,
Considering what Ostrorog wrote in the quote you provided, I need read no more of him.
Consider if someone, like Ostrorog, were writing not about Islam, but about German Nazism:
“Considered from the point of view of its logical structure the German Nazi system is one of rare perfection, and to this day it commands the admiration of the student…Those thinkers of the XXth century laid down, on the basis of their theology, the principle of the Rights of Man, in those very terms, comprehending the rights of individual liberty, and of inviolability of person and property; described the supreme power in the Third Reich, or in Der Fuhrer, as based on a contract, implying conditions of capacity and performance, and subject to cancellation if the conditions under the contract were not fulfilled; elaborated a Law of War of which the humane, chivalrous prescriptions would have put to the blush certain belligerents in the Great War; expounded a doctrine of toleration of non-Nazi creeds so liberal that our West had to wait a thousand years before seeing equivalent principles adopted.”
Would anyone in his right mind need read such a writer further? What more could he possibly say in a thousand pages that could possibly undo the monstrosity he has committed to paper in the above quote?
Not only is Islam analogous to German Nazism -- Islam is a thousand times worse.
Oddly, one of the nicest guys I know, who is also a mohammedan, expressed the same view over dinner one night, to wit, that cutting the hands off of thieves is perfectly appropriate and unobjectionable.
I was fairly shocked.
We were both fairly deep in our cups at the time and I would like to believe that it was the whiskey talking. But I'm really not sure that I can.
I expressed at the time that the punishment should fit the crime, and that the loss of a hand far outweighs any act of theft I could think of. But all I got was a slightly weird silence in answer, rather than a straight up discussion of the point.
I've occasionally wondered since then what that silence signified. Consideration? Reflection? Shame? Covertness? Not a comfortable line of thought.
I offer the story because it concerns someone who had repeatedly demonstrated himself to me as a decent fellow.
Yet he still appeared to hold this barbaric notion of justice -- and that without apparent mental pain or discomfort.
Mohammedanism makes for strange mentalities.
"Why is it that Orientalist writing is devoid of any type of support from basic sources? An Orientalist makes sweeping statements, without any support whatsoever from Islamic sources, and it is immediately 'the truth'."
Dave, Dave, Dave. Are you REALLY saying this? To complain about a lack of support from "basic sources" is remarkable when coming from an Islamist given that NOTHING in the Koran or from Mohammad is corroborated from any source other than itself. None of what Mohammad claims was "revealed" to him by the angel Gabriel can be supported by anything other than Mohammad's own claims that it was so. I guess if you tell a big enough lie to an unsuspecting group of illiterates long enough and then back it up with the threat of death if one doesn't agree with you, then you can obtain a sort of "pseudo legitimacy" which is all Islam has ever been or ever will be.
While I will never claim that every person who claims to be a Christian is perfect, I do know the difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament and I know that Christ, a devout Jew, never espoused killing anyone. On the other hand, having read the Koran, the hadiths and the sira, I see nothing whatsoever in any of them that are "supported" by anything that Christ said or did, particularly with reference to how we are to conduct ourselves vis-a-vis one another. Simply put, Mohammad himself, based upon YOUR standard for a "basic source", was nothing more than a charlatan and a politician. While he pays lip service to the Old and New Testament, it is quite obvious from reading ALL of these sources, that he never read anything (didn't he say he was "illiterate"?)
Sorry, Dave, but if that's your best shot, it doesn't qualify. Come back when you've read the Bible and can demonstrate that the Koran utilizes it as a basic source for reaching its conclusions. But wait, as a Muslim, you're not allowed to read the Old or New Testaments, are you? No, you're to simply accept what Mohammad has to say without reference to "basic sources", right? I will continue to pray that your eyes and heart will be opened to, as you say, the "truth" that Jesus Christ is God come in the flesh, that he died for your sins, was resurrected and sits at the right hand of the Father and that through His Holy Spirit you may become enlightened to the fact that that same Christ crucified is the Way, the Truth and the Light and there is no other way to the Father except through Him. Peace and Love.
joeblough:
[I expressed at the time that the punishment should fit the crime, and that the loss of a hand far outweighs any act of theft I could think of.]
If instead of jail time, they cut Bernie Madoff's hand off, would that punishment in your opinion be too light or too harsh?
Did you know that when the West colonized Muslim lands, they considered the punishment of cutting off thieves hands too lenient? Instead, they instituted capital punishment for thieves, and used it widely.
Michael Sherrod:
When I speak of basic sources, I am talking about the writings of jurists over the centuries, and of court documents as well. The study of these sources reveals how Islam and the Koran were treated by the jurists, and how Islam was lived. I am not talking about the Koran as a source. I am talking about scholarship, not religion. Once again, I am not a Muslim. I have no need for religion. Allah, Jesus, Muhammad, God, and Shiva can kiss my ass.
dave writes: "I have no need for religion. Allah, Jesus, Muhammad, God, and Shiva can kiss my ass."
While he means it as it is colloquially understood for all the non-Islamic religions, one suspects he reserves a special ass-treatment for Islam.
Hesperado:
Wasn't even funny at the moronic level.
Ladies and gentlemen
our Mohammedan in a mask, dave742 (surah 74 verse 2? surah 7 verse 42?), sweepingly declares - "An Orientalist makes sweeping statements, * without any support whatsoever from Islamic sources*, and it is immediately 'the truth'."
He adds, furthermore, in another posting - "When I speak of basic sources, I am talking about the writings of jurists over the centuries, and of court documents as well. The study of these sources reveals how Islam and the Koran were treated by the jurists, and how Islam was lived".
He conspicuously omits mention of the testimony of 1. non-Muslims whose origins lay outside the Muslim world but who nevertheless knew its languages, read its texts, and resided and travelled in it at ground level for significant lengths of time - e.g. Edward Lane, or Richard Burton, or Samuel Zwemer. I presume 'dave' regards Lane, Burton and Zwemer as ignorant 'Orientalists' all, unfamiliar with Islamic sources?
'Dave742' also, even more conspicuously, omits reference to 2. the testimony of the dhimmis themselves - especially in those cases where they were communicating among themselves, out of the hearing of their Muslim overlords.
Let's hear the opening of Shlomo Dov Goitein's essay - "Evidence on the Muslim Poll Tax *from Non-Muslim Sources* {my emphasis - dda}: A Geniza Study", from 'Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient', VOL 6, 1963, pp. 278-95, which is reproduced in full in Bostom's 'Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism'.
Goitein writes, "There is no subject of Islamic social history on which the present writer had to modify his views so radically while passing from literary to documentary sources, i.e. *from the study of Muslim books to that of the records of the Cairo Geniza* {my emphasis - dda} as the jizya or jaliya, the poll tax to be paid by non-Muslims".
"It was, of course, evident that the tax represented a discrimination, and was intended, according to the Qur'an's own words, to emphasize the inferior status of the nonbelievers. It seemed, however, that from the economic point of view , it did not constitute a heavy imposition, since it was on a sliding scale, approximately of one, two, and four dinars, and adjusted to the financial capacity of the taxpayer.
"*This impression proved to be entirely fallacious* {my emphasis - dda}, for it did not take into consideration the immense extent of poverty and privation experienced by the [non-Muslim] masses, and in particular their way of living from hand to mouth, their persistent lack of cash, which turned the "season of the tax" into one of horror, dread and penury".
It made me laugh.
StephenA55:
[It made me laugh.]
You must be 12.
dumbledoresarmy:
I took a look at your reference that you got from Bostom. I know you are unable to go to a library and do so for yourself. Here is an excerpt from one of the letters (written in 1225) that the authors cites from a poor dhimmi (a schoolmaster)who has to pay jizya:
"This place does not provide me with the poll tax or clothing, and, as to food, the fees suffice only for me alone. For they amount only to five dirhams a week and I need three quarters of a dirham a day at least. Thus my income is not enough even for having a robe laundered... The Nagid promised me a year ago that he would take care of the jaliya. But the year has passed and I have not received anything from him. I am now perplexed and pondering where to turn and where to flee." p. 279-280
The schoolmaster makes 260 dirhams a year, or 21.7 dinars per year. The tax (from the article) is 1.625 dinars a year. His jizya, then, works out to a 7.5% tax on his salary. Oh no!!!! The poor baby!!! Now he doesn't have enough money to get his robe laundered! He might have to do his own laundry!
My tax rate is a lot more than 7.5%. I guess if the Muslims take over, at least my taxes will go down.
The author also talks about "a few cases of exemption from the poll tax occur in Geniza letters related to Egypt." One example was from "a man who had lost his riches and served as a minor community official earning one and a quarter dirhams a day ("which is really not a salary") informs the Nagid Samuel (II40-II59) of his intention to settle definitely in a village near Minyat Zifta belonging to one Nasir ed-Din, whose inhabitants did not pay the jaliya."
So this guy makes 38 dinars a year, and doesn't have to pay any tax!
I really don't see the issue here. My government is persecuting me more than the Muslims did to their subjects.
I read another article on the subject, and it does seem as though the Ayyubids did tax the extremely poor. This other article also looked at the same Geniza letters as Bostom’s article did. (This article concedes that “the Geniza is not a complete archival source from which one can draw absolute conclusions.”).
These articles, however, are looking at an 80 year period, in one location. The poor are traditionally exempt from the jizya, and these articles claim that in one partiular place at one particular time this may not have been the case. This situation was not the norm, but an aberration, but it is not a surprise that this aberration would draw a lot of attention from Jewish scholars. The article I read suggest one explanation for why the Ayyubids taxed the poor:
“...why would the administration and the scholars have adopted such a harsh position towards the dhimmis? Circumstantial evidence suggests a possible motive that might have encouraged the sultan to initiate such an appeal to the religious scholars. At the time of the Ayyubids' rise to power, there was immense poverty in Egypt, Syria and surrounding cities. This no doubt led to a significant loss of tax revenue for the government and jeopardized the regime's political stability. It is conceivable this economic crisis led the pious Ayyubid sultans to appeal to authoritative religious scholars to adopt the more stringent opinion attributed to al-Shafi'i, according to which even poor dhimmis must pay jizya. Such a policy would have increased the state revenue, enabled them to survive the growing social privation, and would not have stigmatized their policy as impious.”
Besides making poor dhimmis pay the jizya, the zakat law that had been the norm in Islamic law was completely ignored by the Ayyubids as well. Muslims, too, had to pay higher taxes than what Islamic law allowed.
So for 80 years the Ayyubids may have made poor pay the jizya, but it was not the norm, and Muslims had to pay taxes not in accordance with Islamic law as well. At a 7.5% rate for the poor, the jizya on the poor was probably not a good thing to do, but also does not cross the line of pure evil, considering that there was immense poverty in the area at the time. When everyone is poor, sometimes even the poor must pay tax. So what.
Above quote from:
Islamic Law, Practice, and Legal Doctrine: Exempting the Poor from the Jizya under the
Ayyubids (1171-1250)
Author(s): Eli Alshech
Source: Islamic Law and Society, Vol. 10, No. 3, The Interaction Between Islamic Law and Non-Muslims: Lakum Dīnukum wa-lī Dīni (2003), pp. 348-375
dave742
Do you realize - do you even begin to realize - just how totally and contemptibly you have exposed yourself, by your sneering dismissal of the validity of Goitein's work, your obvious contempt for me (FYI I *have* read the whole article - Bostom includes *every last word* of it, he does not simply quote a few passages) and by your absolute refusal to believe - in the teeth of what seems to *me* to be, from this and many other sources, a mountain of irrefutable evidence - that anything really bad was ever suffered by dhimmis, anywhere.
I observe, too, that you sneer at the geniza documents themselves, implying that they are less reliable than Islamic documents...why? the simplest explanation is you are a Mohammedan who DOES NOT ACCEPT the testimony of non-Muslims, especially when given against Muslims; this is also why you scorn Goitein's reading and analysis of the documents, and attempt to counter his work, with a piece by a Muslim.
You have consistently refuse to accept the testimony of ANY non-Muslim voice from within or from outside the Muslim world (*unless* they are saying nice things about Muslims); you accept, without question, the testimony of Muslims.
Dimbledoresarmy:
[FYI I *have* read the whole article - Bostom includes *every last word* of it, he does not simply quote a few passages)]
Here is what Bostom quoted:
"There is no subject of Islamic social history on which the present writer had to modify his views so radically while passing from literary to documentary sources, i.e., from the study of Muslim books to that of the records of the Cairo Geniza as the jizya…or the poll tax to be paid by non-Muslims. It was of course, evident that the tax represented a discrimination and was intended, according to the Koran's own words, to emphasize the inferior status of the non-believers. It seemed, however, that from the economic point of view, it did not constitute a heavy imposition, since it was on a sliding scale, approximately one, two, and four dinars, and thus adjusted to the financial capacity of the taxpayer. This impression proved to be entirely fallacious, for it did not take into consideration the immense extent of poverty and privation experienced by the masses, and in particular, their persistent lack of cash, which turned the 'season of the tax' into one of horror, dread, and misery."
http://97.74.65.51/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=14796
(The last word here is "misery", not "penury". I don't know where you got the word "penury" from).
So you think that this quote from Bostom is "every last word" of the article? You must be completely insane. You think that quote above constitutes an entire article? Imbecile. The entire article is 7,000 words. This is not the entire article. Imbecile. The quote I gave above from the article is not quoted by Bostom, but it is certainly in the article. I can't imagine what made you write something so completely idiotic.
[I observe, too, that you sneer at the geniza documents themselves, implying that they are less reliable than Islamic documents...why?]
Because personal letters are not a reliable source of information. It does not matter if the person is a Muslim, Jew or agnostic. A personal letter of a person complaining about taxes is not necessarily reliable. Sometimes people exaggerate when they are complaining, especially about something like taxes. Even you should be able to understand that. That does not mean the information is useless. I accept that the Ayyubids taxed the very poor as a result of the letters. The tax (possibly about 7.5%), however, was not that high. When a poor person buys something in the US, he does have to pay sales tax, you know. Also, just about everyone was poor in the Ayyubid kingdom. Does that mean they should have taxed nobody?
[this is also why you scorn Goitein's reading and analysis of the documents, and attempt to counter his work, with a piece by a Muslim]
I did not counter Goiteins work with anything. The work I quoted was from the same viewpoint as Goiten. Also, the work I quoted was not from a Muslim. Do you really think the name "Eli Alshech" is a Muslim name? Eli is Jewish, you complete imbecile. Eli Alshech is the director of the Jihad and Terrorism Studies Project at MEMRI:
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/03/bin-laden-calls-on-jihadists-to-infiltrate-jordan-to-liberate-al-aqsa.html
You are really unbelievably stupid.
I am not insane nor an imbecile.
I *have* read the entire article, 'Evidence on the Poll Tax from Non-Muslim Sources'.
ALL of it *is* anthologised in 'Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism', where it takes up six close-printed double-columned pages, plus another two pages of footnotes (52 of them). And I assure you I have read all those pages and those footnotes, too.
Thank you for the nit-picking correction re my writing 'penury' rather than 'misery' when I reproduced one particular paragraph from Goitein; however I do not think that that one small error disproves the general point I was making, nor does it demonstrate that I am irretrievably stupid.
Similarly, thank you for the correction re. 'Eli Alshech; however, I still do think that overall, judging from your postings over this entire year, you tend to dismiss non-Muslim sources and analysts unless they are pro-Muslim.
dumbledoresarmy:
I see that the whole article is in his book. Sorry about that. I do not dismiss things that are not pro-Muslim as long as they are based on primary documents and are factual and there has been no deception involved. The article you refer to, even though based on personal letters, has validity, and I accept that very poor people in the Ayubbid period were taxed. The tax, however, was not outrageous, and was forced by the conditions of the time (widespread poverty). We do not exempt the poor from paying sales tax in this country, either. So this is a minor point from one particular place in one particular time. If this article constitutes an important point in showing how evil the Muslims were to non-Muslims, I think it actually shows the opposite. If this was among the worst that was done to non-Muslims, then it really wasn't that bad. As I said, the Ayyubids even taxed Muslims beyond what was allowed by Islamic law. The point is valid, but not very impressive, in my opinion.