Islam's war on freedom....
#63
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
The Arabic name for Gabriel is Jibril, Jibrīl, Jibreel, Jabrilæ or Djibril (جبريل , جبرائيل, IPA: [dʒibræːʔiːl], [dʒibrɛ̈ʔiːl], or [dʒibriːl]) Muslims believe Gabriel to have been the angel who revealed the Qur'an to the prophet Muhammad.
#64
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
Double fairy nuff. You're right, it doesn't. You're just some random internet person who I will never know.
I was just trying to have a debate/discussion or whatever to exercise my brain muscles. I thought that was fairly obvious.
As you were people!
I was just trying to have a debate/discussion or whatever to exercise my brain muscles. I thought that was fairly obvious.
As you were people!
#65
BE Forum Addict
Joined: May 2007
Location: Utopia
Posts: 1,644
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
Well ok, I tend to side with the idea proposed by Christoph Luxenberg that the koran is merely a translated form into Arabic of a Syriac Lectionary.
#67
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
I agree that this is a very plausible possibility. People like Mr Luxenberg often have to operate under a pseudonym due to fear of death from angering the extremists. You can imagine that this fact alone discourages true independent linguistical studies on the book.
#70
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
I was responding to the previous poster's assumption that I was trying to make her 'believe'. I wasn't, I was debating.
Re: your response - I guess so, but for the most part (IME), the average lay person (lay-'believer'?!) doesn't go around telling people what to believe/declaring others are wrong/blah blah blah. They are too busy living their lives, although there are some, for sure, who take it upon themselves to spread the word, so to speak.
As for me: if people ask me for information, I give it willingly.
If misconceptions are aired in my presence, I try to clarify.
There's no compulsion in religion; it's impossible to make someone believe something. The nature of belief dictates that it is a personal choice, a completely individual experience.
Re: your response - I guess so, but for the most part (IME), the average lay person (lay-'believer'?!) doesn't go around telling people what to believe/declaring others are wrong/blah blah blah. They are too busy living their lives, although there are some, for sure, who take it upon themselves to spread the word, so to speak.
As for me: if people ask me for information, I give it willingly.
If misconceptions are aired in my presence, I try to clarify.
There's no compulsion in religion; it's impossible to make someone believe something. The nature of belief dictates that it is a personal choice, a completely individual experience.
#71
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
I was responding to the previous poster's assumption that I was trying to make her 'believe'. I wasn't, I was debating.
Re: your response - I guess so, but for the most part (IME), the average lay person (lay-'believer'?!) doesn't go around telling people what to believe/declaring others are wrong/blah blah blah. They are too busy living their lives, although there are some, for sure, who take it upon themselves to spread the word, so to speak.
As for me: if people ask me for information, I give it willingly.
If misconceptions are aired in my presence, I try to clarify.
There's no compulsion in religion; it's impossible to make someone believe something. The nature of belief dictates that it is a personal choice, a completely individual experience.
Re: your response - I guess so, but for the most part (IME), the average lay person (lay-'believer'?!) doesn't go around telling people what to believe/declaring others are wrong/blah blah blah. They are too busy living their lives, although there are some, for sure, who take it upon themselves to spread the word, so to speak.
As for me: if people ask me for information, I give it willingly.
If misconceptions are aired in my presence, I try to clarify.
There's no compulsion in religion; it's impossible to make someone believe something. The nature of belief dictates that it is a personal choice, a completely individual experience.
#72
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
There are contributing factors (background, education, profession etc.) but just as I can't make you believe in the flying spaghetti monster (nor would he want me to try) because belief is personal. Most rational people experience some degree of doubt in their beliefs (or lack of). Overall however, obviously people who thing it's likely there is a deity will tend to worship and those who think there it is likely there is no deity will not.
Which in some ways explains why agnostics are so few? At some point (hopefully at least once daily ) everyone has asked themselves do they believe which is more likely; God or no God. It's not invalid to think there is an equal chance but eventually you'll be walking the dog or reading a book (it was a book on string theory that pushed me off the fence in the end) and realise that you have changed you mind on the God question.
Edit: No disrespect meant to polytheists above .
#73
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
I was responding to the previous poster's assumption that I was trying to make her 'believe'. I wasn't, I was debating.
Re: your response - I guess so, but for the most part (IME), the average lay person (lay-'believer'?!) doesn't go around telling people what to believe/declaring others are wrong/blah blah blah. They are too busy living their lives, although there are some, for sure, who take it upon themselves to spread the word, so to speak.
As for me: if people ask me for information, I give it willingly.
If misconceptions are aired in my presence, I try to clarify.
There's no compulsion in religion; it's impossible to make someone believe something. The nature of belief dictates that it is a personal choice, a completely individual experience.
Re: your response - I guess so, but for the most part (IME), the average lay person (lay-'believer'?!) doesn't go around telling people what to believe/declaring others are wrong/blah blah blah. They are too busy living their lives, although there are some, for sure, who take it upon themselves to spread the word, so to speak.
As for me: if people ask me for information, I give it willingly.
If misconceptions are aired in my presence, I try to clarify.
There's no compulsion in religion; it's impossible to make someone believe something. The nature of belief dictates that it is a personal choice, a completely individual experience.
Same in Jeddah I guess?
#74
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
Certainly no compulsion in religion where I come from, I can be C of E, RC, Jewish, Budhist, Trekkie - anything I like. I can change whenever I like. I have a basic human right to have freedom of thought and religion as I chose. I can question, criticise, analyse and follow what I want to follow...
Same in Jeddah I guess?
Same in Jeddah I guess?
Beardman for instance - my question to him is 'when did you decide to become a Muslim?' - I think the answer lies in the accident of birth, no more complex than a significant number of males born in Manchester support MUFC, while the other 'sect' support Man City. Same in Liverpool or Glasgow - to them it is a religion.
#75
Re: Islam's war on freedom....
If your entire life experience and social structure from earliest memory is seeing all those around you praying 5 times a day, going to church 3 times on a sunday at the call of a muezzin or the chime of a bell then you are simply conditioned... pure and simple. It is just a habit - which we in Europe began to question.
Beardman for instance - my question to him is 'when did you decide to become a Muslim?' - I think the answer lies in the accident of birth, no more complex than a significant number of males born in Manchester support MUFC, while the other 'sect' support Man City. Same in Liverpool or Glasgow - to them it is a religion.
Beardman for instance - my question to him is 'when did you decide to become a Muslim?' - I think the answer lies in the accident of birth, no more complex than a significant number of males born in Manchester support MUFC, while the other 'sect' support Man City. Same in Liverpool or Glasgow - to them it is a religion.
I grew up in London with a Jewish father and a Christian-turned-atheist mother. I was brought up with no real religion or even superstition tbh. I didn't believe in ghosts, magic or UFOs, for example. As a an adult I explored my own spirituality, various religions and questioned the purpose of my existence. I found my answers.
I was conditioned by no one, married well over a year after I 'found the meaning of life' (so to speak ) My dad doesn't even speak to me now. Accident of birth? I think not.
I live three thousand miles away from where I was born, in a place I never even thought I would visit, let alone live. In fact, if I wasn't Muslim, I wouldn't live here. It's nice and all that, but it wouldn't be where I would choose to spend my life.
AFAIK, there are Christians here, and Hindus. Tbh, if you were a super-practising Christian/Hindu/whatever, why would you choose to live in Saudi Arabia. Likewise for me, I can practise Islam in the UK, but I get a fuller experience of my faith here, which is why I moved here. I certainly don't expect England to change for me, change its laws or whatever.