Why is it always Muslims?

[Roudy]

The PC-protected religion certainly does have the usual suspects spinning and deflecting for it, doesn't it?

again, Mac, if you want a crusade, no one is stopping you from walking down to the Recruiter's office and signing up.

^^^^^^
Funny how Joe Blow so desperately defends everything and anything Islam.

And at the same time, is always there to take a swipe at Christians and Christianity.
It's typical of American liberals. Instead of being biased towards their own country's dominate culture and religion, they are just the opposite. This is why I truly believe they have never viewed America as the shining beacon on top of the hill.
Instead, they only wish to ridicule America, and only wish to discuss the country's faults.

He could very well be a Muslim posing as a Christian.

 

[Osomir]

I'm just pointing to just one example of Arabs invading a nation and shoving their religion, language, and culture down their throats at the pint of the sword. Islam is Arab imperialism.

Would you find it fair to cite European imperialism as Christian then? I don't find either particularly useful, but since you seem bent on pushing forward with the pissing contest it is easy enough to disprove your assertion that Muslims have historically killed more people than other populations have.

 

[Roudy]

Oh ok. So you admit that Muslims slaughtered millions of people in their conquest of India, it's just a question of how many millions this peaceful religion of Islam slaughtered.

I am familiar with the Arab invasion of Persia yes; though I did ask you for a source to corroborate you 80 million dead figure.

Remind us again, what beef did Muslims have with the Hindus in India, that caused them to invade and start committing genocide on the Indian subcontinent? Same beef Muslims had with Christians in Europe. Mohammad told them to conquer and kill to spread Islam.

The same beef that the Germans had when they invaded south west Africa and engaged in genocide against the Herero and Nama people. The same beef that the Mongols had when they invaded the Middle East. Expansion of empire. No religion required.

So Arabs invaded other lands in the name of Islam, just like Germans and other imperialists. I rest my case.

 

[Osomir]

So Arabs invaded other lands in the name of Islam, just like Germans and other imperialists. I rest my case.

Islam was hardly needed for Arabs to expand their empire. It certainly wasn't a requirement for the Seljuks or the Mongols. You're basing your hatred of Islam on an intellectual fallacy, and a rather narrow vision of history.

 

[Roudy]

I'm just pointing to just one example of Arabs invading a nation and shoving their religion, language, and culture down their throats at the pint of the sword. Islam is Arab imperialism.

Would you find it fair to cite European imperialism as Christian then? I don't find either particularly useful, but since you seem bent on pushing forward with the pissing contest it is easy enough to disprove your assertion that Muslims have historically killed more people than other populations have.

Yes, the Crusades were imperialistic. But were initiated by Muslim invaders. That is what I have been trying to say.

Now what does all of this have to do with the way Muslims react to cartoons or criticism of their religion?

 

[Osomir]

Yes, the Crusades were imperialistic. But were initiated by Muslim invaders. That is what I have been trying to say.

I'm not talking about the Crusades. I'm talking about colonial European conquest and empire building. I don't need Medieval Europe in order to combat your assertion.

 

[Roudy]

Yes, the Crusades were imperialistic. But were initiated by Muslim invaders. That is what I have been trying to say.

I'm not talking about the Crusades. I'm talking about colonial European conquest and empire building. I don't need Medieval Europe in order to combat your assertion.

So? This is all part of past history. Europeans have moved on, and are now open, free, tolerant societies based on democratic Western values. While Muslims are behaving like they are still in the dark ages trying to conquer lands and create imperialistic Islamic Caliphates through Jihad.

 

[Roudy]

So Arabs invaded other lands in the name of Islam, just like Germans and other imperialists. I rest my case.

Islam was hardly needed for Arabs to expand their empire. It certainly wasn't a requirement for the Seljuks or the Mongols. You're basing your hatred of Islam on an intellectual fallacy, and a rather narrow vision of history.

That's why all lands conquered by Muslim invaders had a nice crescent and sword flag of Islam as its emblem? Ha ha ha.

 

[Osomir]

That's why all lands conquered by Muslim invaders had a nice crescent and sword flag of Islam as its emblem? Ha ha ha.

The Crescent moon is historically a Turkish one. Popularized by the above mentioned Seljuks and the Ottoman Empire.

 

[Osomir]

So? This is all part of past history. Europeans have moved on, and are now open, free, tolerant societies based on democratic Western values. While Muslims are behaving like they are still in the dark ages trying to conquer lands and create imperialistic Islamic Caliphates through Jihad.

It's part of recent modern and 20th century history, and rather convenient of you to ignore. There is nothing really unique about the violence we see coming from Islamic populations today outside of the transnational non-state actor nature of them which is an adaptation to a more globalized world setting.

 

[Roudy]

So? This is all part of past history. Europeans have moved on, and are now open, free, tolerant societies based on democratic Western values. While Muslims are behaving like they are still in the dark ages trying to conquer lands and create imperialistic Islamic Caliphates through Jihad.

It's part of recent modern and 20th century history, and rather convenient of you to ignore. There is nothing really unique about the violence we see coming from Islamic populations today outside of the transnational non-state actor nature of them which is an adaptation to a more globalized world setting.

Is that a fancy way of of saying Muslims missed the boat on the 21st century, and are still living in the dark ages, thanks to Islam? So now they lash out like savage barbarians. Got it.

 

[Roudy]

That's why all lands conquered by Muslim invaders had a nice crescent and sword flag of Islam as its emblem? Ha ha ha.

The Crescent moon is historically a Turkish one. Popularized by the above mentioned Seljuks and the Ottoman Empire.

Wrong, the crescent moon is derived from the moon god idol worshippers that existed in the Arabian peninsula. Ramadan was pre Islamic pagan holiday which occurs during a crescent moon.

 

[Osomir]

Is that a fancy way of of saying Muslims missed the boat on the 21st century, and are still living in the dark ages, thanks to Islam? So now they lash out like savage barbarians. Got it.

State building difficulties have hardly been limited to Islamic countries (most of Sub-Saharan Africa for example is Christian, and places like Burma and Thailand have large Buddhist populations). It is also rather intellectually dishonest to ignore the longer period of rather devastating colonization that took place under many European powers that still haunts state and institution building processes today. Feeling high and mighty because we live in the west is an indication of a poor sense of global history.

 

[Osomir]

Wrong, the crescent moon is derived from the moon god idol worshippers that existed in the Arabian peninsula. Ramadan was pre Islamic pagan holiday which occurs during a crescent moon.

Ramadan is a fasting period commemorating the Battle of Badr and it is not pre-Islamic. I think you are thinking of the other holy months for fasting within Islam which are rooted in pre-Islamic Arabian tradition. The crescent moon symbol is not part of that tradition though, and the Quran specifically mentions NOT idolizing the moon, which also rather pokes holes in your theory.

 

[Roudy]

Is that a fancy way of of saying Muslims missed the boat on the 21st century, and are still living in the dark ages, thanks to Islam? So now they lash out like savage barbarians. Got it.

State building difficulties have hardly been limited to Islamic countries (most of Sub-Saharan Africa for example is Christian, and places like Burma and Thailand have large Buddhist populations). It is also rather intellectually dishonest to ignore the longer period of rather devastating colonization that took place under many European powers that still haunts state and institution building processes today. Feeling high and mighty because we live in the west is an indication of a poor sense of global history.

Muslims are not state building, they are trying to build Islamic Caliphates, spreading death and misery throughout the globe. ISIS, Boko Haram, Al Queda, Hezbollah, Irans Ayatollahs, Hamas, Taliban, Islamic Jihad, etc. Etc. They all have more or less the same Islamic supremacist imperialistic mission statement.

 

[Osomir]

Muslims are not state building, they are trying to build Islamic Caliphates, spreading death and misery throughout the globe. ISIS, Boko Haram, Al Queda, Hezbollah, Irans Ayatollahs, Hamas, Taliban, Islamic Jihad, etc. Etc. They all have more or less the same Islamic supremacist imperialistic mission statement.

Once again it's rather convenient for you to leave out the vast majority of the global Islamic population in your above analysis and the fact that most of the victims of the above mentioned groups tend to be Muslim.

 

[DigitalDrifter]

So? This is all part of past history. Europeans have moved on, and are now open, free, tolerant societies based on democratic Western values. While Muslims are behaving like they are still in the dark ages trying to conquer lands and create imperialistic Islamic Caliphates through Jihad.

It's part of recent modern and 20th century history, and rather convenient of you to ignore. There is nothing really unique about the violence we see coming from Islamic populations today outside of the transnational non-state actor nature of them which is an adaptation to a more globalized world setting.

The "uniqueness" lies in the fact that it's (Islamists) the foundation of the organized violence and terror that is occurring around the world today.

 

[Osomir]

The "uniqueness" lies in the fact that it's (Islamists) the foundation of the organized violence and terror that is occurring around the world today.

So is colonialism, and late state failure in the 20th century.

 

[Roudy]

Muslims are not state building, they are trying to build Islamic Caliphates, spreading death and misery throughout the globe. ISIS, Boko Haram, Al Queda, Hezbollah, Irans Ayatollahs, Hamas, Taliban, Islamic Jihad, etc. Etc. They all have more or less the same Islamic supremacist imperialistic mission statement.

Once again it's rather convenient for you to leave out the vast majority of the global Islamic population in your above analysis and the fact that most of the victims of the above mentioned groups tend to be Muslim.

What vast majority are you talking about? Pakistan? Afghanistan? Iran? Iraq, Egypt? Saudi Arabia (the cradle of Islam), Yemen? Algeria? Or should I continue....

Meh, their religion commands that they:

1- Create Islamic Caliphates ruled by true Muslims, by force aka Jihad, if necessary.
2- Said Caliphate must live under Shariah law.
3- Conquer the entire planet, those who do not submit to Islam, Shariah law, or pay the Jizya Tax (Islamic religious apartheid tax, applies only to Jews and Christians however) must be slaughtered.

Those nations that are "victims" as you falsely portray (more like enablers), are simply not following what their religion is saying, and will be considered apostates by the true Muslims like ISIS.

 

[Roudy]

Wrong, the crescent moon is derived from the moon god idol worshippers that existed in the Arabian peninsula. Ramadan was pre Islamic pagan holiday which occurs during a crescent moon.

Ramadan is a fasting period commemorating the Battle of Badr and it is not pre-Islamic. I think you are thinking of the other holy months for fasting within Islam which are rooted in pre-Islamic Arabian tradition. The crescent moon symbol is not part of that tradition though, and the Quran specifically mentions NOT idolizing the moon, which also rather pokes holes in your theory.

The only hole I see is inside your head:

Origin of the Name Allah
The word "Allah" comes from the compound Arabic word, al-ilah. Al is the definite article "the" and ilah is an Arabic word for "god", i.e. the god. We see immediately that (a) this is not a proper name but a generic name rather like the Hebrew El (which as we have seen was used of any deity; and (b) that Allah is not a foreign word (as it would have been if it had been borrowed from the Hebrew Bible) but a purely Arabic one. It would also be wrong to compare "Allah" with the Hebrew or Greek for God (Eland Theos, respectively), because "Allah" is purely an Arabic term used exclusively in reference to an Arabic deity.

The Encyclopedia of Religion says: "'Allah' is a pre-Islamic name . . . corresponding to the Babylonian Bel" (ed. James Hastings, Edinburgh, T. & T. Clark, 1908, I:326).

I know that Muslims will find this hard to believe so I am now going to make many citations and present the archaeological evidence to prove conclusively that is true. Though this data will be painful for many of our readers, it is necessary to face the truth. Facts are facts, and unless you are willing to desert all logic, reason and common sense, and the evidence of your eyes, they must be faced.

"Allah is found . . . in Arabic inscriptions prior to Islam" (Encyclopedia Britannica, I:643)

"The Arabs, before the time of Mohammed, accepted and worshipped, after a fashion, a supreme god called allah" (Encyclopedia of Islam, eds. Houtsma, Arnold, Basset, Hartman; Leiden: E.J.Brill, 1913, I:302)

"Allah was known to the pre-Islamic Arabs; he was one of the Meccan deities" (Encyclopedia of Islam, ed. Gibb, I:406)

"Ilah . . . appears in pre-Islamic poetry . . . By frequency of usage, al-ilah was contracted to allah, frequently attested to in pre-Islamic poetry" (Encyclopedia of Islam, eds. Lewis, Menage, Pellat, Schacht; Leiden: E.J.Brill, 1971, III:1093)

"The name Allah goes back before Muhammed" (Encyclopedia of World Mythology and Legend, "The Facts on File", ed. Anthony Mercatante, New York, 1983, I:41)

The origin of this (Allah) goes back to pre-Muslim times. Allah is not a common name meaning "God" (or a "god"), and the Muslim must use another word or form if he wishes to indicate any other than his own peculiar deity" (Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, ed. James Hastings, Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1908, I:326)

Scholar Henry Preserved Smith of Harvard University stated:

"Allah was already known by name to the Arabs" (The Bible and Islam: or, the Influence of the Old and New Testament on the Religion of Mohammed, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1897, p.102)

Dr. Kenneth Cragg, former editor of the prestigious scholarly journal Muslim World and an outstanding modern Western Islamic scholar, whose works were generally published by Oxford University, comments:

The name Allah is also evident in archaeological and literary remains of pre-Islamic Arabia" (The Call of the Minaret, New York: OUP, 1956, p. 31).

Dr. W. Montgomery Watt, who was Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies at Edinburgh University and Visiting Professor of Islamic Studies at College de France, Georgetown University, and the University of Toronto, has done extensive work on the pre-Islamic concept of Allah. He concludes:

"In recent years I have become increasingly convinced that for an adequate understanding of the career of Muhammad and the origins of Islam great importance must be attached to the existence in Mecca of belief in Allah as a "high god". In a sense this is a form of paganism, but it is so different from paganism as commonly understood that it deserves separate treatment" (Mohammad's Mecca, p.vii. See also his article, "Belief in a High God in pre-Islamic Mecca", Journal of Scientific Semitic Studies, vol.16, 1971, pp.35-40)

Caesar Farah in his book on Islam concludes his discussion of the pre-Islamic meaning of Allah by saying:

"There is no reason, therefore, to accept the idea that Allah passed to the Muslims from the Christians and Jews" (Islam: Beliefs and Observations, New York: Barrons, 1987, p.28)

According to Middle East scholar E.M.Wherry, whose translation of the Koran is still used today, in pre-Islamic times Allah-worship, as well as the worship of Baal, were both astral religions in that they involved the worship of the sun, the moon, and the stars (A Comprehensive Commentary on the Quran, Osnabrück: Otto Zeller Verlag, 1973, p. 36).

"In ancient Arabia, the sun-god was viewed as a female goddess and the moon as the male god. As has been pointed out by many scholars as Alfred Guilluame, the Moon god was called by various names, one of which was Allah (op.cit., Islam,p. 7)

"The name Allah was used as the personal name of the Moon god, in addition to the other titles that could be given to him.

"Allah, the Moon god, was married to the sun goddess. Together they produced three goddesses who were called 'the daughters of Allah'. These three goddesses were called Al-Lat, Al-Uzza, and Manat.

"The daughters of Allah, along with Allah and the sun goddess were viewed as "high" gods. That is, they were viewed as being at the top of the pantheon of Arabian deities" (Robert Morey, The Islamic Invasion, Eugene, Oregon, Harvest House Publishers, 1977, pp.50-51).

The Encyclopedia of World Mythology and Legend records:

"Along with Allah, however, they worshipped a host of lesser gods and "daughters of Allah" (op.cit., I:61).

It is a well known fact archaeologically speaking that the cresent moon was the symbol of worship of the Moon god both in Arabia and throughout the Middle East in pre-Islamic times. Archaeologists have excavated numerous statues and hieroglyphic inscriptions in which a crescent moon was seated on the top of the head of the deity to symbolise the worship of the moon-god. Interestingly, whilst the moon was generally worshipped as a female deity in the Ancient Near East, the Arabs viewed it as a male deity.

In Mesopotamia the Sumerian god Nanna, named Sin by the Akkadians, was worshipped in particular in Ur, where he was the chief god of the city, and also in the city of Harran in Syria, which had close religious links with Ur. The Ugaritic texts have shown that there a moon deity was worshipped under the name yrh. On the monuments the god is represented by the symbol of the crescent moon. At Hazor in Palestine a small Canaanite shrine of the late Bronze Age was discovered which contained a basalt stele depicting two hands lifted as if in prayer to a crescent moon, indicating that the shrine was dedicated to the Moon god.

"The Quraysh tribe into which Mohammad was born was particularly devoted to Allah, the Moon god, and especially to Allah's three daughters who were viewed as intercessors between the people and Allah.

"The worship of the three goddesses, Al-Lat, Al-Uzza, and Manat, played a significant rôle in the worship at the Kabah in Mecca. The first two daughters of Allah had names which were feminine forms of Allah.

"The literal Arabic name of Muhammad's father was Abd-Allah. His uncle's name was Obied-Allah. These names reveal the personal devotion that Muhammad's pagan family had to the worship of Allah, the Moon god" (op.cit., Morey, p.51).

History proves conclusively that before Islam came into existence, the Sabbeans in Arabia worshipped the moon-god Allah who was married to the sun-goddess. We have also seen that it was a matter of common practice to use the name of the moon-god in personal names in Muhammad's tribe. That Allah was a pagan deity in pre-Islamic times is incontestable. And so we must ask ourselves the question: why was Muhammad's God named after a pagan deity in his own tribe?

It is an undeniable fact that an Allah idol was set up at the Kabah along with all the other idols of the time. The pagans prayed towards Mecca and the Kabah because that is where their gods were stationed. It made sense to them to face in the direction of their god and pray since that is where he was. Since the idol of their Moon god, Allah, was at Mecca, they prayed towards Mecca.

As we have seen, and as is acknowledged amongst all scholars of Middle Eastern religious history, the worship of the moon-god extended far beyond Allah-worship in Arabia. The entire fertile crescent was involved in moon-worship. The data falls neatly in place and we are able therefore to understand, in part, the early success Islam had amongst Arab groups that had traditionally worshipped Allak, the moon-god. We can also understand that the use of the crescent moon as the symbol of Islam, and which appears on dozens of flags of Islamic nations in Asia and Africa, and surmounts minerets and mosque roofs, is a throwback to the days when Allah was worshipped as the moon-god in Mecca.

Here is your "allah", feast your eyes: