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What I like about Islam ...

Started by Baruch, November 25, 2016, 12:35:29 PM

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Baruch

Being a Jewish mystic, I appreciate other spiritual traditions, particularly Semitic or Persian ones ... so I have been impressed by Rumi, who was born in Persia ... so I thought I would share a quote by Rumi that greatly impressed me ...

Only Breath - Jelaluddin Rumi
(translated by Coleman Barks)
Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu
Buddhist, Sufi, or Zen. Not any religion
or cultural system. I am not from the East
or the West, not out of the ocean or up
from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not
composed of elements at all. I do not exist,
am not an entity in this world or the next,
did not descend from Adam and Eve or any
origin story. My place is placeless, a trace
of the traceless. Neither body or soul.
I belong to the beloved, have seen the two
worlds as one and that one call to and know,
first, last, outer, inner, only that
breath breathing human being.

Ibn Arabi is another Medieval Muslim spiritualist who is open to Persian influence, but who was born in Spain:

Garden Among the Flames - Ibn 'Arabi
(translated by Michael Sells)
Wonder,
A garden among the flames!
My heart can take on
Any form:
A meadow for gazelles,
A cloister for monks,
For the idols, sacred ground,
Ka'ba for the circling pilgrim,
the tables for the Torah,
the scrolls of the Qur'an.
My creed is love;
Wherever its caravan turns along the way,
That is my belief,
My faith.
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
Táadoo ánít’iní.
What are you doing?
Are you taking any medications?
Don't do that.

Hijiri Byakuren

I like Islam in video games because it gives me interesting shit to do. Particularly in Europa Universalis IV, where your goal as the Ottomans is to become a Super Islamo-Roman Caliphate.
Speak when you have something to say, not when you have to say something.

Sargon The Grape - My Youtube Channel

Munch

#2
I try to look for things that I could like about islam, but nothing really comes up. As a theocracy, is pretty disgusting in what it gets people to swear to, from how it treats women, to how it sees homosexuals, to the ideals it forces into childrens heads. Even the food of islam is grotesque, just google 'food of islam' and see what I mean, what it does to animals.

I suppose the only thing I could find likable of islam is its architecture




But then, is it islam I'm looking at, or middle eastern culture, and so separating the two? This is why when I look to those regions, I try to look at if its possible to enjoy middle eastern culture that isn't influenced by islam.



'Political correctness is fascism pretending to be manners' - George Carlin

Atheon

The restrictions on what they can eat, plus the geographical locations of were Islam is concentrated, has led to the development of some fantastically tasty dishes. You're always in for a treat if you go to an Islamic restaurant.
"Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful." - Seneca

Shiranu

Quote from: Atheon on November 25, 2016, 10:03:38 PM
The restrictions on what they can eat, plus the geographical locations of were Islam is concentrated, has led to the development of some fantastically tasty dishes. You're always in for a treat if you go to an Islamic restaurant.

This x100. Middle Eastern food is unfairly delicious.

Also about Rumi; while he was Muslim, the Sufi and the dervishes are honestly closer to "pagans" than Muslims. Very interesting sect, but alot of bad shit in them too. Rumi's works are amazing though, have his writings somewhere...
"A little science distances you from God, but a lot of science brings you nearer to Him." - Louis Pasteur

Baruch

Quote from: Shiranu on November 25, 2016, 10:27:57 PM
This x100. Middle Eastern food is unfairly delicious.

Also about Rumi; while he was Muslim, the Sufi and the dervishes are honestly closer to "pagans" than Muslims. Very interesting sect, but alot of bad shit in them too. Rumi's works are amazing though, have his writings somewhere...

When Islam arose among the Arabs, they were barely civilized.  The Persians were civilized for a 1000 years already.  When Persians converted from Zoroastrianism and Christianity, they brought a higher civilized view into Islam.  The Arabs have never forgiven them.  Mysticism is not only ancient, it isn't sectarian itself.
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
Táadoo ánít’iní.
What are you doing?
Are you taking any medications?
Don't do that.

PickelledEggs

Quote from: Shiranu on November 25, 2016, 10:27:57 PM
This x100. Middle Eastern food is unfairly delicious.
Shut the fuck up, you're making me hungry.

You're right though...

Shiranu

Quote from: PickelledEggs on November 25, 2016, 11:46:23 PM
Shut the fuck up, you're making me hungry.

You're right though...

*Silently eats left over shawarma wrap with homemade hummus and tzatziki*
"A little science distances you from God, but a lot of science brings you nearer to Him." - Louis Pasteur

PickelledEggs

Quote from: Shiranu on November 26, 2016, 12:51:29 AM
*Silently eats left over shawarma wrap with homemade hummus and tzatziki*

Isn't shawarma indian?

Shiranu

"A little science distances you from God, but a lot of science brings you nearer to Him." - Louis Pasteur

popsthebuilder

Based on the Qur'an alone, Islam( submitting to the will of GOD) is a wholly merciful peaceful, rightly guided faith. Unfortunately, like most organized religions; it's practitioners as a majority, do not follow the teachings. They are plagued by a literal interpretation in many cases it seems.

peace

Baruch

#11
Quote from: popsthebuilder on November 26, 2016, 09:44:25 AM
Based on the Qur'an alone, Islam( submitting to the will of GOD) is a wholly merciful peaceful, rightly guided faith. Unfortunately, like most organized religions; it's practitioners as a majority, do not follow the teachings. They are plagued by a literal interpretation in many cases it seems.

peace

Their initial opponents, the Byzantines and Sassanids ... were weakened by constant warfare and plague.  Except for that, it is doubtful that the Arabs would have been successful outside of Arabia.  They naturally attributed their military success to their own virtue ... just as Nato attributed its victory over the Warsaw Pact to their own virtue ... then it was corruption from within that took down the Warsaw Pact ... and excessive military expenditure to defend against Nato, and their misadventure in Afghanistan.

It is impossible to know if Muhammad said any of the things attributed to him, or if his hagiography is realistic ... since it was the product of the second generation after his death.  I take him to be a Sufi who was forced to become a community/war leader, because of oppression by his opponents.  By the time Islam was spectacularly successful in war ... the Muslims needed a foundation legend to justify it.  Nothing was settled politically, until well into the Umayyad Caliphate, after the opponents of the Umayyads had been disposed of.  The Umayyads originally were deadly opponents of Muhammad, so they had no reason to show integrity to his legend.  The Birmingham manuscript is disputed ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_Quran_manuscript

But it is very early, since it has no vowel marks, which were invented for the Quran no later than 689 CE.  The material of the pages, could be older than the writing on it.  Tradition has it that Uthman, the third Caliph, had one version of the Quran produced, and all other version destroyed, but it is known that a few private compilations survived at least as late as 656 CE (end of first Muslim civil war, immediately after the death of Uthman), as well as the Hadith material (compiled in 8th and 9th century).  The Umayyads didn't have full control of their territory until as late as 692 CE (end of second Muslim civil war).  There was early pointed (vowel marks) on the Dome of the Rock which was built in 692 CE, and a later Umayyad Caliph did a general reform of official Arabic as late as 705 CE.  There is of course religious reasons to "early date" manuscripts in various religions.  The Samarkand Quran (nearly complete) was believed to be Uthman's personal copy, but has been shown to be no earlier than 765 CE.  The first sira literature (biography) came even later, based on the Quran and the Hadith (after 760 CE ... and sira were considered too "popular" by the Umayyad court).  I think the evidence supports the idea that the Quran as we now have it, is pretty well what existed in 700 CE ... before that there are disputes and fragments ... and like the NT, no way to tell what Paul or Muhammad actually said, or their contemporaries wrote down (Paul had a secretary write his stuff, Muhammad had one or more of them, according to tradition).  Sufism starts around that same time (no later than 728 CE) in reaction to the worldliness of the Umayyads.
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
Táadoo ánít’iní.
What are you doing?
Are you taking any medications?
Don't do that.

doorknob

I've never had Arabian food or Islamic food. I'm a bit jealous.

Baruch

Quote from: doorknob on November 26, 2016, 02:32:34 PM
I've never had Arabian food or Islamic food. I'm a bit jealous.

I have had Lebanese and Egyptian and Moroccan.
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
Táadoo ánít’iní.
What are you doing?
Are you taking any medications?
Don't do that.

Mike Cl

Quote from: popsthebuilder on November 26, 2016, 09:44:25 AM
Based on the Qur'an alone, Islam( submitting to the will of GOD) is a wholly merciful peaceful, rightly guided faith. Unfortunately, like most organized religions; it's practitioners as a majority, do not follow the teachings. They are plagued by a literal interpretation in many cases it seems.

peace
I see Pops, you read the quran and the bible with one eye open and one eye closed.  And you use a huge amount of blindness (to get through the shit in both) and fantasy.  Both preach peace?  :))))))  yeah, right!
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?<br />Then he is not omnipotent,<br />Is he able but not willing?<br />Then whence cometh evil?<br />Is he neither able or willing?<br />Then why call him god?