Join Gab (@StFerdinandIII) Western Civilisation was and is superior to anything Islam has developed. Islam has not aided in the development of the modern world; in fact civilisation has only been created in spite of Islam. Raising the alarm about the fascism called Submission since 2000.
Allah or Al Lah (The One, The Deity, The Lord); does not mean ‘God’ in the Christian-Judeo sense. Many Westerners wrongly believe that Al Lah is Arabic for ‘God’. Al Lah comes from the Babylonian word for moon-worship or Sin and the real meaning of ‘Al Lah’, a concept which long predated Muhammad’s cult of violence and terror is not ‘God’. Al-Lah really means ‘The Lord Deity’, or ‘Chief Deity’, or ‘First amongst all Deities’, not God as a Christian or Jew would understand that word. There are usually 3 interpretations of what the Al Lah or Hu’Baal means: 1-Storm or Thunder worship, 2-Fertility worship, or 3-Moon and celestial worship. At different epochs in Near Eastern history, and in differing regions, one finds evidence of all three. The commonality between all the strands of Baal worship is human and child sacrifice, animal sacrifice, polygamy and sexual immorality, oppression and war, and a distinct lack of civilised conduct, codes and moral conduct.
The word ‘Sin’ in Western languages is derived from the brutality, licentiousness, pagan worship, and human-sacrificing horrors of the Baal cults of which Muhammadism or Islam is one variant. These fertility-celestial and moon worshipping cults did not esteem the human, the child, monogamy, morality, nor did they understand boundaries and individual rights. There were barbaric paganisms who had no problems with sexual hedonism, profligate living, child-sacrifices, and constant bloody warfare. Sodom and Gomorra were examples of such ‘sin’.
Not consigning the ‘Lord’ or ‘Chief Deity’ of Mecca into historical context just enables Moslems to redefine ‘Al Lah’ to be whatever they propose including ‘God’, and even the ‘same God as that worshipped by Christians’. This lends credence to the propaganda that Islam is a ‘religion’ with only a different emphasis on doctrinal theology separating it from Judaism and Christianity. If viewed through the lens of history and archaeology this claim or belief is absurd.
History and archaeology have confirmed the following:
Near Eastern cults including those in Mecca, worshipped celestial objects, the most important being the Moon or Sun. Much of this comes from the Sumerian-Babylonian empires(s), which dominated the Near East including Arabia, for millennia.
In the Old Testament Canaanites, Hittites, Philistines and most tribes were Moon worshippers, with Baal the Moon God being the venerated deity, usually expressed in the image of a Golden Calf (the story of Moses at Sinai and the tribes of Israel rejecting God for Baal and building the image of a golden calf, whilst engaged in hedonistic sex, drinking and dancing is an example).
The Kabaa shrine itself was a crude structure dedicated to celestial worship. The main idol was Hubaal resplendent archaeology tells us, in red-carnate stone, long pre-dating Muhammad. This Hubaal was called ‘Al Lah’ and Muhammad pronounced him the ‘greatest of all Gods’ or Allahu Akhbar the Moslem war-cry. Evidence gathered from both North and South Arabia demonstrate that Moon-God worship was clearly a central feature in Arabian life even in Muhammad’s day and was still the dominant cult. According to numerous inscriptions, while the name of the Moon-god was Sin, his title was Al Lah, i.e. ‘the deity’, or ‘the Lord’, meaning that he was the chief or high god among the gods.
The evidence that Muhammadism’s antecedents are celestial and moon-cult in nature is overwhelming. Baal cults were the anti-thesis of Judeo-Christian belief. In fact, Hebraic thought rose in direct opposition to the pagan savagery of the Baal cults. Most Atheists and Marxists descry the ‘violence’ of the Old Testament without putting the Bronze Age into perspective. If the Hebrews did not fight the pagan Baal worshipper’s monotheism never would have arisen, the truth of the Bible and of Christ never would have been witnessed and the savagery which help back civilisation in many areas of development would have gleefully rolled on.
It is clear that ‘Al Lah’ has nothing in common with the Christian idea of God, with history, archaeology, and Arabic sources providing overwhelming evidence that Al Lah veneration is moon and celestial worship, directly linked to Babylonian-Sumerian cults. Indeed, the very word ‘Sin’ comes from the depiction of the immorality and atavistic nature of cults such as Baal or its middle-age reincarnation called Muhammadism.
Sura 9 or ‘Repentance’ is the ‘last revelation’ to Muhammad (pace Bukhari), after a failed attack at a Christian Byzantine fort at Tabuk in northern Arabia, in 631 AD, one year before he was murdered by his men who had grown weary of revelations, his gluttony, his special decrees benefitting himself and his hypocrisy in securing for his own needs and wants, that which was denied others, through the invocation of divine approval. Sura 9 is a violent denunciation, anchored in anger and frustration in not overcoming the hated Christians at Tabuk, to Jews, Christians, pagans and insufficiently pious and Jihadic Muslims, that they must ‘repent’ the error of their ways and accept the totality of the Muhammad-Al Lah project and cult. No room for shirking (disbelief), questioning, inquiry, or doubt. Follow, obey, convert or dominate the Unbelievers and receive paradise in this life and the next as your reward. This Sura intimates that though there may be setbacks and even defeat for the followers of Muhammad, a final global victory, is assured and this chapter supersedes all other chapters in the Koran.
Spencer: Given the doctrine of abrogation (see 2:106), this gives it precedence over other doctrinal pronouncements in the Qur’an and codifies its bellicosity as normative for believers for all time.
The Muslim Jihad is thus permanent and universal.
This Sura is translated into English here (Translated by Yusuf Ali, a fanatical Muslim apologist, so there is no ‘mistranslations’ which so bemuse Muslimophiles when discussing problematic texts). The excerpts below are from Robert Spencer’s book with explanations on key verses provided by Spencer in italics. The verses listed are not obviously comprehensive but selected for importance. This link can be used to read the translation of all the verses in this chapter which are not copied out in their entirety.
Verse 1: Break Treaties with the Infidels
Freedom from obligation from Allah and his messenger toward those of the idolaters with whom you made a treaty. According to the Tafsir al-Jalalayn, the treaty between the Muslims and the pagans of Mecca “is canceled by this statement.” Muslims may break treaties with non-Muslims unilaterally; see 8:58.
Verse 2: Infidels will burn
Travel freely in the land for four months, and know that you cannot escape Allah, and that Allah will humiliate the unbelievers. Allah will humiliate the unbelievers “in this world by killing and in the Next by the Fire,” says the Tafsir al-Jalalayn. For how the unbelievers are to be punished in this world, see 9:14.
Verse 3: Infidels will face doom
Give news of a painful doom to those who disbelieve. This refers only to those pagans who have violated the terms of their treaties with the Muslims; the other treaties will be honoured to the end of their term. (However) no treaty with unbelievers is envisaged that does not have a termination date; i.e., no treaty of indefinite peaceful coexistence can be acceptable.
Verse 5: Kill the pagans
Then, when the sacred months have passed, kill the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them, and besiege them, and prepare for them every ambush. But if they repent and establish prayer and give alms, then leave their way free. Indeed, Allah is forgiving, merciful. This is the notorious Verse of the Sword. In a 2003 sermon, Osama bin Laden rejoiced over this verse: “Praise be to Allah who revealed the verse of the Sword to his servant and messenger, in order to establish truth and abolish falsehood.” That is ultimately the goal of jihad warfare: the establishment of Islamic law, which brings about a just society…..Ibn Kathir asserts, on the contrary, that the unbelievers must be killed “on the earth in general, except for the Sacred Area”—that is, the sacred mosque, which is traditionally identified as being in Mecca. This implies an endless conflict…(and)
Thus, even Muslims who do not fulfil Islamic obligations fall into the category of those who must be fought. This is a principle that latter-day Salafist movements apply broadly and use frequently in branding governments that do not rule according to strict Islamic law
Verse 14: Al Lah will help Muslims fight the Infidels
Fight them, and Allah will punish them by your hands, and he will lay them low and give you victory over them, and he will heal the hearts of people who are believers. According to Ibn Juzayy, “Allah will punish them by your hands” means “killing and capture. That is a promise of victory for the Muslims.” The Tafsir al-Jalalayn concurs: “Allah will punish them by killing them at your hands, and disgrace them by capture and defeat.”
Verse 17: Polytheists will end up in the fire
It is not for the idolaters to take care of Allah’s sanctuaries, bearing witness against themselves of disbelief. As for such people, their works are useless and in the fire they will remain. Then Allah declares that the idolaters or polytheists (mushrikeena, from mushrik, polytheist) are not worthy to take care of the sacred mosque. They control it, but as comments Ibn Juzayy, “They do not have either the right or the duty to do so. They inhabit them through forceful occupation and injustice.” They have no right to the mosque because, according to Islamic tradition, Abraham himself built it as a shrine to Allah.
Verse 20: Jihad means fighting
Those who believe, and have left their homes and waged jihad with their wealth and their lives in Allah’s way are of much greater worth in Allah’s sight. These are the ones who are triumphant.
Verse 23: Don’t take Infidels as friends
O you who believe, do not choose your fathers or your brothers for friends if they take pleasure in disbelief rather than faith. Whoever among you takes them for friends, such people are wrongdoers. Says Ibn Kathir: “Allah commands shunning the disbelievers, even if they are one’s parents or children, and prohibits taking them as supporters if they choose disbelief instead of faith.” See also 9:113, 29:8, 31:15, and 60:4.
Verse 29: Fight, subjugate and kill Christians
Fight against those do not believe in Allah or the last day, and do not forbid what Allah and his messenger have forbidden, and do not follow the religion of truth, even if they are among the people of the book, until they pay the jizya with willing submission and feel themselves subdued. Here is the one place where Muslims are explicitly directed to make war against and subjugate Jews and Christians, the “People of the Book,” and A hadith depicts Muhammad saying: “I have been commanded to fight against people so long as they do not declare that there is no god but Allah, and he who professed it was guaranteed the protection of his property and life on my behalf.”
Verse 30: Christians are perverse
…the Christians say, The Messiah is the son of Allah. That is their saying with their mouths. They imitate the statements of those who disbelieved before. May Allah curse them. How perverse they are.
Verse 34: Rabbis and Priests are greedy, corrupt
O you who believe, indeed, many of the rabbis and monks devour the wealth of mankind wantonly and bar people from the way of Allah. They who hoard up gold and silver and do not spend it in the way of Allah, give news to them of a painful doom. Says Ibn Kathir: “This Ayah warns against corrupt scholars and misguided worshippers. Sufyan bin Uyaynah said, ‘Those among our scholars who become corrupt are similar to the Jews, while those among our worshippers who become misguided are like Christians….
Verse 35: The greedy end up in Gehenna
On the day when it will be heated in the fire of Gehenna, and their foreheads and their flanks and their backs will be branded with it, Here is what you hoarded for yourselves. Now taste of what you used to hoard. On Gehenna, see 2:206, as also at 9:49, 9:63, 9:68, 9:73, 9:81, 9:95, and 9:109.
Verse 36: Arabian Astrology and calendar creation was primitive
The pre-Islamic Arabic calendar, like the Islamic calendar, was lunar, consisting of 354 days rather than the 365 days of the solar calendar. To make up this difference, Arabians added leap months—one every three solar years. This verse, which was supposed to have been revealed in the year 629, forbids adding leap months. In connection with this, the contemporary Islamic scholar Johannes Jansen points out that in the eighth/ninth century biography of Muhammad by Ibn Ishaq via Ibn Hisham, “For every event which took place in the life of Muhammad, Ibn Ishaq meticulously recorded in his Sira in which month it took place,” and that this is “one of the main reasons why Western historians classified his book as historiography in the normal sense of that word.”
Verse 39: Jihad is an obligation
If you do not go forth, he will afflict you with a painful doom, and will choose a people other than you instead of you. You cannot harm him at all. Allah is able to do all things. Those who “incline away from jihad,” says the Tafsir al-Jalalayn—will face divine punishment and be replaced by another people.
Verse 41: Jihad is an obligation unless ill or weak (old)
Go forth, light-armed and heavy-armed, and wage jihad with your wealth and your lives in the way of Allah. That is best for you, if you only knew. Ibn Kathir, Ibn Juzayy, and the Tafsir al-Jalalayn all agree that that command was abrogated by 9:91, which exempts the weak or ill from the obligation to fight. This once again demonstrates that the Qur’anic concept of fighting involves warfare against non-Muslims, not a struggle within the soul of the individual believer. This fight is of the highest priority, to the extent that a hadith depicts Muhammad as being asked, “Guide me to such a deed as equals Jihad (in reward),” and answering: “I do not find such a deed.”
Verse 44: Don’t question the obligation of Jihad
Those who believe in Allah and the last day do not ask permission of you that they not wage jihad with their wealth and their lives. Allah is aware of those who keep their duty. True Muslims did not hesitate to wage jihad, even to the point of risking their property and their very lives. The ones who refused to do this weren’t believers.
Verse 52: Conquer the Infidel or die in the attempt
Say, Are you waiting for anything to happen to us except one of two good things, while we await for you that Allah will afflict you with a doom from him or at our hands. Wait, then. Indeed, we are waiting with you. The two best things are martyrdom or victory. The Muslims will either defeat the enemy or be killed by them, in which case they will enter paradise, a win/win situation (see 3:124).
Verse 60: Charity for Muslims alone to make the cult stronger
The alms are only for the poor and the needy, and those who collect them, and those whose hearts are to be reconciled, and to free the captives and the debtors, and for the sake of Allah, and the wayfarer, a duty imposed by Allah. Allah is the knower, the wise one. Allah specifies those to whom the obligatory alms, zakat, can be distributed; it can be spent “for the sake of Allah.” That means, explains the Tafsir al-Jalalayn, it can be spent to “enable those who do not have booty to undertake jihad, even if they are rich.” Ibn Kathir states that zakat for the sake of Allah “is exclusive for the benefit of the fighters in Jihad, who do not receive compensation from the Muslim Treasury.” As-Suyuti adds: “Some say that it is spent on all that is connected to jihad: treaties with the enemy, building fortresses, digging ditches, providing weapons and provision, and paying spies, even if they are Christians.”
Verse 65: Mocking Muhammad is a blasphemy (punished by death)
And if you ask them, they will say, We were only talking and joking. Say, Was it Allah and his signs and his messenger that you mocked? “Mocking the signs of Allah,” says as-Suyuti, “is tantamount to kufr,” that is, unbelief. This is one reason why cartoons of Muhammad are such a hot-button issue among many Muslims today.
Verse 68: Unbelievers go to Hell
Allah promises the hypocrites, both men and women, and the unbelievers, the fire of Gehenna for their dwelling. It will be sufficient for them. Allah curses them, and theirs is lasting torment.
Verse 73: Muslims must wage war
O prophet, wage jihad against the unbelievers and the hypocrites. Be harsh with them. Their ultimate dwelling place is Gehenna, an evil destination. “Wage jihad” is jahidi, strive hard (see 2:218). Attributed to Ibn Abbas is this explanation: “Allah commanded the Prophet to fight the disbelievers with the sword, to strive against the hypocrites with the tongue and annulled lenient treatment of them.”
Verse 86: Wage Jihad
And when a sura is revealed, Believe in Allah and wage jihad along with his messenger, the men of wealth among them still ask permission from you and say, Permit us to be with those who sit.
Verse 88: Your personal Jihad brings rewards
But the messenger and those who believe with him wage jihad with their wealth and their lives. Such people are the ones for whom the good things are. Such people are the ones who are the successful.
Verse 90: If you lie to avoid participating in Jihad, you are not a Muslim
And those among the nomadic Arabs who had an excuse came in order that permission might be granted to them. And those who lied to Allah and his messenger sat at home. A painful doom will fall upon those among them who disbelieve. Ibn Juzayy says that the refusal of the Bedouin Arabs to wage jihad invalidated their claim to be Muslim: “They were the people who did not go on jihad nor ask excuses to stay behind them, so they lied when they claimed to believe.”
Verse 100: Emigrate to spread the cult
And the first to lead the way, of the emigrants (muhajiroun) and the helpers (ansar), and those who followed them in goodness, Allah is well pleased with them and they are well pleased with him, and he has made ready for them gardens under which rivers flow, in which they will remain forever. That is the supreme triumph. In Islamic tradition, the muhajiroun, “emigrants,” are those who left their land to go to another and bring Islam to it. The first muhajiroun were Muhammad and the original Muslims of Mecca when they moved to Medina. The later converts in Medina were known as the ansar, “helpers.” The emigrants have the priority among Muslims, which is an indication of the importance placed upon emigration for the sake of Allah. See 4:100.
Verse 111: Al Lah owns your wealth, so Jihad, including suicide bombing is your duty
Indeed, Allah has bought from the believers their lives and their wealth, because the garden will be theirs, they will fight in the way of Allah and will kill and be killed. It is a promise that is binding on him in the Torah and the Gospel and the Qur’an. Who fulfills his covenant better than Allah? Rejoice then in your bargain that you have made, for that is the supreme triumph. This verse has become in the modern age the rationale for suicide bombing. Ibn Kathir explains: “Allah states that He has compensated His believing servants for their lives and wealth—if they give them up in His cause—with Paradise.” Ibn Juzayy adds significantly that this verse’s “judgment is general to every believer doing jihad in the way of Allah until the Day of Rising.”
Verse 122: Not everyone in the community must fight unless attacked
And the believers should not all go out to fight. Of every troop of them, only a party should go forth, so that they may gain sound knowledge in religion, and that they may warn their people when they return to them, so that they may beware. All the Muslims need not go forth to wage jihad warfare. This is a foundation for the Islamic legal principle that jihad is fard kifaya—that is, a community obligation from which some are freed if others take it up. Jihad becomes fard ayn, or obligatory on every believer, when a Muslim land is attacked.
Verse 123: Contradicting verse 122 all Muslims should fight all Infidels near them
O you who believe, fight those of the unbelievers who are near to you, and let them find harshness in you, and know that Allah is with those who keep their duty. Says Ibn Kathir: “Allah commands the believers to fight the disbelievers, the closest in area to the Islamic state, then the farthest.”
As evidenced by the sample above, Sura 9 has nothing nice to say about non-Muslims. Jews, Christians, pagans, impious Muslims are targeted for Jihad, conversion or death. The obligation for all Muslims to wage Jihad in some manner is restated and emphasised many times. Everyone in the Muslim community has a divine duty to help the cult achieve its main objective which is world-wide domination. This must be an active, not a passive duty. The Sura demands that every Muslim use their person, their goods, their wealth, and any means available including lies, deceit, breaking of treaties, or emigration to non-Muslim lands, to advance the cause of Muhammad’s cult. Sura 9 is the final ‘revelation’ by the Al Lah to Muhammad and is the clearest statement imaginable, on Muslim intolerance toward all Unbelievers and the never-ending, open-ended demand for war, Jihad, and global domination. No wonder Muslimophiles studiously ignore this chapter.
Sura 8 or ‘The Spoils of War’ is a chapter devoted to the Muslim Jihad, which is not a ‘spiritual’ struggle, but simply a campaign of endless war until the earth is subdued for the Al Lah idol of Mecca, and his only true spokesman, the illiterate Bedouin Arab Muhammad. Muslimophiles will studiously avoid this chapter (and most of Chapters 2, 5, and 9), given the obvious declarations of intolerance, timeless war, and depredations against the non-Muslim Infidel. This chapter dates from the second year of the ‘Medinan’ period (fleeing from Mecca) and the ‘second part’ of Muhammad’s career namely that as brigand, war-leader, exterminator. This Sura was ‘revealed’ to Muhammad after the Battle of Badr, a Muslim victory over the Meccan forces and Muhammad’s own tribe the Quraysh, in 624 A.D. If the Quraysh had defeated Muhammad’s small force (maybe some 300 men against 1000 or so of the Quraysh), then the cult of Muhammad would have died in its infancy.
This Sura is translated into English here (Translated by Yusuf Ali, a fanatical Muslim apologist, so there is no ‘mistranslations’ which so bemuse Muslimophiles when discussing problematic texts). The excerpts below are from Robert Spencer’s book with explanations on key verses provided by Spencer in italics. The verses listed are not obviously comprehensive but selected for importance. This link can be used to read the translation of all the verses in this chapter which are not copied out in their entirety.
Verse 1: Muhammad and Al-Lah need the spoils of war as an obligation
They ask you about the spoils of war. Say, The spoils of war belong to Allah and the messenger, so keep your duty to Allah, and settle your differences, and obey Allah and his messenger, if you are believers. Islamic tradition holds that there was great booty for the victors at Badr, so much that it became a bone of contention among the Muslims. According to the story, Muhammad was receiving questions about the disposal of the booty, and Allah responds by telling them that its distribution is up to the messenger.
Verse 5: Jihad is an obligation
Allah refers to various incidents that took place before and during the battle, emphasizing that he commands warfare and protects the believers in it. The true believers were willing to go out of their homes to wage jihad warfare, but some disliked doing so and complained. This echoes 2:216.
Verse 9: Angels help Muslims in battle
When you asked for help from your Lord and he answered you, I will help you with a thousand angels, rank on rank. The thousand angels that joined the Muslims to smite the Quraysh are an indication that Allah fights alongside the righteous, and thus righteousness is a prerequisite for victory.
Verse 12: Al Lah will use terror against the enemies of Muhammadanism
When your Lord inspired the angels, I am with you. So make those who believe stand firm. I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Then strike the necks and strike their fingertips. This verse became one of the chief justifications for the Islamic practice of beheading hostages and war captives. Ibn Kathir explains that the angels are instruments of Allah’s wrath who are to “support the believers, strengthen their (battle) front against their enemies, thus, implementing My command to you. I will cast fear, disgrace and humiliation over those who defied My command and denied My Messenger.”
Verse 13: Al Lah punishes any who don’t follow Muhammad
That is because they opposed Allah and his messenger. Whoever opposes Allah and his messenger; indeed, Allah is severe in punishment.
Verse 14, 15: Unbelievers go to Hell, why Green is the colour of the Muslim flag
So taste that, and that for unbelievers is the torment of the fire. O you who believe, when you meet those who disbelieve in battle, do not turn your backs on them. The Muslims must always advance, never turning their backs on the enemy, unless they do so as a stratagem of war. This is why the colour green is featured on the flags of so many Islamic nations: Islam is and must be ever expanding, always experiencing a springtime, never losing ground or withering and dying.
Verse 16: Jihad is an obligation, don’t turn back from conflict
Whoever turns his back on them on that day, unless he is manoeuvring for battle or intent on joining a company, he indeed has incurred wrath from Allah, and his dwelling place will be Gehenna, an evil destination. On Gehenna, see 2:206, as also for 8:36-7.
Verse 17: It is Al Lah who is really doing the fighting
You did not kill them, but Allah killed them. And you did not throw when you threw, but Allah threw, so that he might test the believers with a fair test from him. Indeed, Allah is the hearer, the knower. Allah tells the messenger that the Muslims were merely passive instruments at Badr. At one point, according to Ibn Hisham, Muhammad threw pebbles toward the Quraysh, exclaiming: “Foul be those faces!” But it was Allah who killed the Quraysh and even Allah who threw the pebbles.
Verse 30: Al Lah’s ‘plan’ includes War against the Unbelievers
And when those who disbelieve plot against you, to wound you fatally, or to kill you or to drive you out, they scheme, but Allah schemes, and Allah is the best of schemers. Here again, the idea is reinforced that the battles of the Muslims are more than just earthly conflicts but elaborations of Allah’s plan. Allah is also depicted as a schemer or plotter at 3:54, 7:99, and 10:21.
Verse 39: Fight all Infidels until Muslims control the world
And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is all for Allah. But if they stop, then indeed, Allah is the seer of what they do. According to numerous Islamic authorities, the statement that Muslims must fight until there is no more persecution (fitna) means that they must fight “so that there is no more Shirk.” For shirk, see 2:193, 4:31, and 6:21. The Tafsir al-Jalalayn explains that the fight must continue until “only He is worshipped.” The popular twentieth-century Saudi Tafsir as-Sadi states: “This is the goal of fighting and jihad against the enemies of the faith; it is to ward off their evil from the faith and to defend the religion of Allah, Who created people to follow this path, so that it will be supreme over all other religions.” This is thus an open-ended declaration of warfare against non-Muslims and assumes that non-Muslim religious observance in itself constitutes “persecution.” The idea that Islam will prevail over all other religions is additionally at 2:193, 9:33, and 61:9.
Verse 41: Spoils of war for Muhammad and the Al Lah
And know that whatever you take as spoils of war, indeed, a fifth of it is for Allah, and for the messenger and for the relatives and orphans and the needy and the traveller, if you believe in Allah and what we revealed to our slave on the day of furqan, the day when the two armies met. And Allah is able to do all things. An Islamic tradition amplifies this with an account of Muhammad’s generosity: After one battle, Muhammad prayed “facing a camel from the war booty,” and then, holding some of the camel’s hair between his fingers, said to his men: “This is also a part of the war booty you earned. Verily, I have no share in it, except my own share, the fifth designated to me. Even that fifth will be given to you.” Muhammad continued by exhorting the Muslims to turn over all the spoils of war to him for just distribution: “Therefore, surrender even the needle and the thread, and whatever is bigger or smaller than that (from the war spoils). Do not cheat with any of it, for stealing from the war booty before its distribution is Fire and a shame on its people in this life and the Hereafter. Perform Jihad against the people in Allah’s cause, whether they are near or far, and do not fear the blame of the blamers, as long as you are in Allah’s cause. Establish Allah’s rules while in your area and while traveling. Perform Jihad in Allah’s cause, for Jihad is a tremendous door….
Verse 50 and 51: Angels strike those who disbelieve
If you could see how the angels receive those who disbelieve, striking faces and their backs and, Taste the punishment of burning. 51 This is for what your own hands have sent before, and Allah is not a tyrant to his slaves,
Verse 55: Unbelievers are the worst of animals
Indeed, the worst of animals in Allah’s sight are the ungrateful who will not believe. This equation of unbelievers with animals is another indication that unbelievers are worthy of no respect or consideration. See also 98:6.
Verse 57 and 58: Unbelievers are treacherous
If you come upon them in the war, deal with them so as to strike fear in those who are behind them, so that perhaps they may remember. 58 And if you fear treachery from any people, then throw it back to them fairly. Indeed, Allah does not love the treacherous. If the Muslims “fear treachery” from unbelievers with whom they have a treaty, they should simply break the treaty. Ibn Kathir says this means that Muslims should tell the unbelievers “that you are severing the treaty. This way, you will be on equal terms, in that, you and they will be aware that a state of war exists between you and that the bilateral peace treaty is null and void.”
Verse 60: Strike terror into non-Muslims
Make ready for them all that you can of force and of warhorses, so that by them you may strike terror in the enemy of Allah and your enemy, and others beside them whom you do not know. Allah knows them. Whatever you spend in the way of Allah, it will be repaid to you in full, and you will not be wronged. This is the Qur’an’s third mention of the imperative to strike terror in the unbelievers. See 3:151 and 8:12.
Verse 65: Believers must fight even if the enemy is more numerous
O prophet, exhort the believers to fight. If there are just twenty of you who are steadfast, they will overcome two hundred, and if there are a hundred of you, they will overcome a thousand of those who disbelieve, because they are a people without intelligence. Allah will give pious Muslims more victories, even if they face odds even more prohibitive than those they had overcome at Badr, although this promise is almost immediately backtracked: originally a hundred would defeat a thousand unbelievers, but this is then reduced to a hundred believers vanquishing two hundred unbelievers (8:66). These became recurring themes of jihad literature throughout the centuries, up to the present day: piety will bring military victory, and the Muslims will conquer even against overwhelming odds.
Verse 67: Slaughter first, take captives and slaves later (in other words earn the right to own slaves)
It is not for any prophet to have captives until he has made slaughter in the land. You desire the lure of this world, and Allah desires the hereafter, and Allah is mighty, wise. According to the Tafsir al-Jalalayn, this verse was revealed “when ransom was accepted for the captives at Badr.” The Muslims had released some of the prisoners at Badr, but this was out of their base desire for material gain: the money they would receive in ransom. The tafsir continues: “You (believers) desire the goods of this world – the money you accepted as ransom – whereas Allah desires the reward of the Next World for you through fighting the unbelievers.” The Muslims should therefore have given up the prospect of gaining worldly goods and simply killed their captives, which would have brought the Muslims the rewards of paradise.
Verse 72: Waging Jihad will grant you a reward
Indeed, those who believed and left their homes and waged jihad with their wealth and their lives for the sake of Allah, and those who took them in and helped them, these people are protecting friends one of another. And those who believed but did not leave their homes, you have no duty to protect them until they leave their homes, but if they seek help from you in the matter of religion, then it is your duty to help, except against a people between whom and you there is a treaty. Allah is the seer of what you do. On “jihad,” see 2:218, as also for 8:74.
These are only some verses advocating war against the ‘worst of animals’ the Unbelieving Kufar or Infidel. Muhammad and his Al Lah want their share of the booty, after all it is the Al Lah and his angels which are guaranteeing victory for Muslims, with a thousand angels purportedly helping the Muslims at the Battle of Badr, allowing the small force of Muhammadans to defeat a larger enemy, and importantly, avail itself of much booty. This would have caused debate within the Muslim ranks as to what to do with the plunder. This chapter reveals the solution and distribution of goods and people, taken in battle. It is clearly stated in this text that Jihad is a mandatory obligation; that Jihad to end ‘Shirk’ or disbelief is a commandment from the Al Lah, and that the terms of warfare are open-ended until all non-Muslims submit or convert. Muslims who do not engage in Jihad, or at least support it, are impious and will be punished. No wonder Muslimophiles avoid this chapter.
7:166. When in their insolence they transgressed (all) prohibitions, We said to them: “Be ye apes, despised and rejected.”
167. Behold! Thy Lord did declare that He would send against them, to the Day of Judgment, those who would afflict them with grievous penalty. Thy Lord is quick in retribution, but He is also Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful.
Sura 7 or ‘The Heights’ is a chapter which rejects Christianity. It repeatedly assures the reader that the Christians are losers, will fill up hell, that Christ is not divine nor associated with Al Lah and that Al Lah will reward Muslims and lead others astray whom he will punish. Jews are described as Sabbath breaking apes and pigs.
This Sura is translated into English here (Translated by Yusuf Ali, a fanatical Muslim apologist, so there is no ‘mistranslations’ which so bemuse Muslimophiles when discussing problematic texts).
Sura excerpts from Robert Spencer’s book are below and explanations on key verses within this Sura provided by Spencer. This link can be used to read the translation of the verses which are not copied out in their entirety. Spencer’s commentary is against that specific verse (italics).
Spencer: “The Heights” is traditionally considered to be another Meccan sura, dating from around the same time as sura 6: Muhammad’s last year in Mecca before the Hijra to Medina. The Tafsir al-Jalalayn states that verses 163 to 170, which deal with the Sabbath-breaking Jews who were transformed into apes, are from Medina.
Verse 3: There are no protectors (as in Christian theology)
Follow what has been sent down to you from your Lord, and follow no protecting friends besides him. Little do you remember. Yet another warning of the dreadful judgment; here “you” is plural, while in 7:2 it was singular. Bell suggests that there may be a textual break between verses 2 and 3, as “appears from the change of address.”
Sura 4: Destruction for the unbelievers
How many a town have we destroyed? As a raid by night, or while they slept at noon, our terror came to them. See 3:137 and 6:6. Such verses about divine judgment do not necessarily refer solely to thunderbolts from heaven: see 9:14. Jihad terrorists consider themselves to be the instruments of Allah’s judgment, destroying cities and punishing unbelievers in accord with the Qur’an.
Sura 16: Adam was a Muslim
He said, Now, because you have led me astray, indeed I will lurk in ambush for them on your right path. Satan, banished, says he will spend his time tempting the Muslims away from the straight path. A hadith details how he would confront “the Son of Adam” and chide him for considering converting to Islam, abandoning his ancestral religion. “However,” the story goes, “the Son of Adam disobeyed Shaytan and embraced Islam.”
…the Son of Adam once again disobeyed Satan and went on jihad. The hadith continues: “Therefore, whoever among them (Children of Adam) does this and dies, it will be a promise from Allah that He admits him into Paradise. If he is killed, it will be a promise from Allah that He admits him into Paradise.”
Verse 18: Non-Muslims will fill up Hell
He said, Go forth from here, degraded, banished. As for those who follow you, surely I will fill Gehenna with all of you.
Sura 41: Repeats verse 18
Theirs will be a bed of Gehenna, and over them coverings. In this way we repay wrongdoers. On Gehenna, see 2:206.
Verse 54: Allah creates everything in 6 days or is it 8 days?
Indeed, your Lord is Allah, who created the heavens and the earth in six days, and then mounted the throne. He covers the night with the day, which is in haste to follow it, and has made the sun and the moon and the stars submissive by his command. All creation and command is indeed his. Blessed be Allah, the Lord of the worlds. Allah here creates the universe in six days, as he does at 10:3, 11:7, 25:59, 32:4, and 50:38. However, at 41:9-12, he does it in eight days.
Verse 81: Homosexuality is punished by death
Indeed, you come with lust to men instead of to women. No, but you are wanton people. Lot’s story bears traces of the Sodom and Gomorrah incident in the Bible, as this verse recalls Genesis 19:5. The punishment for homosexual activity in Islamic law is death, based on a statement attributed to Muhammad: “If you find anyone doing as Lot’s people did, kill the one who does it, and the one to whom it is done.”
Verse 99: Al Lah is a great schemer
Are they then secure from Allah’s scheme? No one thinks of himself as secure from Allah’s scheme except people that perish. Allah is also depicted as a schemer or plotter at 3:54, 8:30, and 10:21.
Verse 124: Transgressors will have their hands and feet cut off and crucified
Surely I will have your hands and feet cut off upon alternate sides. Then I will crucify every one of you. This is the same punishment Allah prescribes for those who wage war against Allah and Muhammad (5:33).
Verse 145: Moses receives the Commandments from Al Lah but none are listed
And we wrote for him upon the tablets the lesson to be drawn from all things and the explanation of all things, then, Hold it fast, and command your people, Take what is better in it. I will show you the abode of transgressors. Moses goes up on Mount Tur (28:46) to converse with Allah and receive laws, which the Qur’an does not enumerate, on stone tablets. The Ten Commandments never appear in the Qur’an and are a notable omission from its multiple retellings of the Exodus.
Verse 156: Al Lah chooses who will disobey and punishes them….
And ordain for us what is good in this world, and in the hereafter. Indeed, we have turned to you. He said, I strike those whom I will with my punishment, and my mercy embraces all things, therefore I will ordain it for those who fear Allah and give alms, and those who believe our signs. “Give alms” is zakat, and “signs” once again is the word used of the verses of the Qur’an, so this passage strongly suggests that Allah shows mercy only to those who are Muslims.
Verse 157: Muhammad is illiterate
Those who follow the messenger, the unlettered prophet, whom they will find described in the Torah and the Gospel with them. He will command for them what is right and forbid them what is wrong.
The fact that Muhammad is not actually described in the Jewish or Christian scriptures has helped give rise to the Islamic claim that the Jews and Christians have corrupted their scriptures to remove references to him; see 61:6. The declaration that the messenger commands what is right and forbids what is wrong is one of the foundations for the belief in the hadiths, despite the fact that they date from two to three centuries after Muhammad is supposed to have lived, and thus have dubious historical value at best. Muslims are told to follow what Muhammad commands, and only in the hadith can those commands be discovered.
Verse 165: Non-Muslims, or impious Muslims face a dreadful punishment
And when they forgot that about which they had been reminded, we rescued those who forbade wrong, and visited those who did wrong with dreadful punishment, because they were transgressors.
Verse 172: All humans are born Muslim
Everyone on earth is born Muslim, as a hadith has Muhammad saying: “No child is born but has the Islamic Faith, but its parents turn it into a Jew or a Christian.” In another hadith, Allah produces all of the multitudes of the children of Adam from his back and asks them, “Am I not your Lord?” All affirm that he is. Therefore, says the Tafsir Anwarul Bayan, “None will be able to claim that he had no knowledge of the fact that Allah is his Lord.”
Verse 177: Al Lah leads the losers astray to be punished
The people who denied our signs are an evil example, and were inclined to wrong themselves. He whom Allah leads, he is indeed led rightly, while he whom Allah leads astray, they indeed are losers.
Verse 179: Al Lah creates humans and Jinns to torture
Allah has created a large number of human beings and jinns solely in order to torture them in hellfire. Those who suffer this fate are entirely bestial. However, Ibn Kathir does not see anything arbitrary about Allah’s judgment here: “We prepared them for it by their performance of the deeds of its people. When Allah intended to create the creation, He knew what their work will be before they existed. He wrote all this in a Book, kept with Him, fifty thousand years before He created the heavens and earth.” The difficulty remains, however, in that he nonetheless created those who were to reject him. On Gehenna, see 2:206.
Verse 181: Muslims will guide the world
And among those whom we created, there is a nation that guides with the truth and establishes justice with it. The believers, on the other hand, shall guide mankind with Allah’s truth and establish justice by means of it. This is a foundation of Islam’s moral critique of the non-Muslim world.
Verse 190: Jesus is not a partner with God
But when he gave them a good child, they ascribed partners to him in regard to what he had given them. He is highly exalted above all that they associate.
Verse 191: There are no partners with Al Lah
Do they attribute as partners to Allah those who created nothing, but are themselves created, And cannot give them help, and cannot help themselves?
Verse 195: Al Lah or Muhammad dares the Christians to use their partners against him
Do they have feet with which they walk, or do they have hands with which they hold, or do they have eyes with which they see, or do they have ears with which they hear? Say, Call upon your partners, and then plot against me, do not spare me.
This chapter conveys a rather clear and unambiguous set of doctrines and paints a rather lurid picture of Al Lah for the reader. Christian and Jews are going to fill up hell and can be tortured in this lifetime and crucified. Impious Muslims who blasphemy will suffer a similar fate. Al Lah is a schemer who leads humans astray to torture them. All humans including the first human Adam, are born Muslim, but for some reason Al Lah through Satan, leads them from the true path of worship to Shirk or unbelief and due to this are to be condemned, punished, and destroyed. This is obviously not the God of the Old or New Testaments. There is no relationship, spiritual awakening, free-will declaration of faith on the part of the human. This Al Lah is impersonal, a trickster, a deity that is uninterested in you as a distinct human and one which does not allow questions or inquiry. Blind obedience and a rejection of free-will is what is demanded.
Sura 6 or ‘Cattle’ refers to the last year in Mecca before Muhammad was driven out of the city to Medina. Cattle is mentioned in the Sura but is not a particularly important theme. This Sura is translated into English here (Translated by Yusuf Ali, a fanatical Muslim apologist, so there is no ‘mistranslations’ which so bemuse Muslimophiles when discussing problematic texts). Excerpts from Robert Spencer’s book are below and explanations on key verses within this Sura provided by Spencer. This link can be used (or the link above) to read the translation of the verses which are not copied out in their entirety. The commentary is against that specific verse (italics).
Sura 6 or ‘Cattle’ does not refer to the brain-dead masses following the Corona diktats and fake data and modelling. That Sura would be named Sheep. According to Islamic tradition, this Sura is from Muhammad’s last year in Mecca, before the Hijra, or Flight, to Medina during the twelfth year of his Jihadic career. According to a tradition attributed to Ibn Abbas, “All of Surat Al-An‘am was revealed in Makkah at night, accompanied by seventy thousand angels, raising their voices in glorification of Allah.” Muhammad was unwelcome in his home city of Mecca. For years he had been a preacher of an uncompromising monotheism in an atmosphere of increasing antagonism with his own tribe, the Quraysh, who were pagans and polytheists. Sura 6 is preoccupied with that antagonism with Al-Lah issuing many imprecations against the unbelievers.
Verse 4: Al Lah leads polytheists astray on purpose and destroys them
Ibn Kathir states: “Allah states that the rebellious, stubborn polytheists will turn away from every Ayah, meaning, sign, miracle and proof that is evidence of Allah’s Uniqueness and the truth of His honorable Messengers. They will not contemplate about these Ayat or care about them. Allah said.” The anomaly of Allah leading the unbelievers astray and then punishing them for their stubborn rejection of his messengers is not explained or even mentioned.
Yet we destroyed them for their sins, and created after them another generation. For their unbelief, Allah destroys the unbelievers. The ruins of their destroyed civilizations bear witness to his power and judgment (see 3:137).
Verse 7: Al Lah will mock the Infidel disbelievers
If we had sent down to you writing upon parchment, so that they could feel it with their hands, those who disbelieve would have said, This is nothing other but mere sorcery…. Allah mocks the unbelievers’ unbelief, saying that if he had sent the messenger a “writing upon parchment,” the unbelievers would nevertheless have dismissed it as “mere sorcery.” In this passage, as in many others, the onus for unbelief is entirely upon the unbelievers, but see 2:7.
Sura 18: Al Lah rules his Muslim slaves (with Muhammad as his intercessor)
He is the omnipotent over his slaves, and he is the wise one, the knower. Say, What carries the most weight in testimony? Say, Allah is the witness between me and you. And this Qur’an has been inspired in me so that with it I may warn you and whomever it may reach. Do you actually bear witness that there are gods besides Allah? Say, I bear no such witness. Say, He is only one God. Indeed, I am innocent of what you associate.
Sura 21: Ascribing partners to Al Lah (Christians) is the worst offence (called Shirk)
Who does greater wrong than he who invents a lie against Allah or denies his signs? Indeed, the wrongdoers will not be successful. “Signs” here again is ayat, the term used for the verses of the Qur’an: they’re signs of the truth of Allah. The Tafsir al-Jalalayn states that the “lie against Allah” involves “ascribing a partner to him.” In Islam, there is no greater evil. One modern-day Muslim writer wrote: Murder, rape, child molesting and genocide. These are all some of the appalling crimes which occur in our world today. Many would think that these are the worst possible offences which could be committed. But there is something which outweighs all of these crimes put together: It is the crime of shirk.
Sura 22: Christians will not be helped by their Trinity
And on the day we gather them together, we will say to those who ascribed partners, Where are those you claimed to be partners?
Sura 54: Christians and Jews will fill up Hell
And when those who believe in our signs come to you, say, Peace be upon you. Your Lord has prescribed mercy for himself, so that whoever among you does evil through ignorance and repents of it afterward and does right, indeed, he is forgiving, merciful. This makes clear that the unbelievers do not do evil through ignorance, for if they had, Allah would have allowed them to repent. Instead, he will fill hell with them (32:13), suggesting once again that those who reject Islam do so while knowing very well that it is true.
Sura 77-78: Al Lah is greater than the Moon God of Mecca (Baal)
And when he saw the moon rising, he exclaimed, This is my Lord. But when it set, he said, Unless my Lord guides me, I surely will become one of the people who are astray. …And when he saw the sun rising, he cried, This is my Lord. This is greater. And when it set, he exclaimed, O my people, indeed, I am free from all that you associate.
Note: What Muhammad or the Koran is saying here is that Baal the moon deity worshipped for millennia by the Arabs, and the Sun his consort or wife, are products of the greater power of Al-Lah, in other words, the polytheistic rituals believed in by pagan Arabs are no longer of importance since they are really manifestations of Al-Lah. The significance of this verse is that Muhammad is effacing all pagan worship, though the ‘Al Lah’ of Mecca was originally Baal the moon deity (who had a wife and daughters, namely Mars and Venus), it is now promoted to the creator of all celestial beings and associated worship, consuming all previous pagan beliefs.
Sura 88-89: Al Lah controls the wills of his Muslim slaves (no free will)
That is the guidance of Allah, with which he guides those whom he wills of his slaves. But if they had set up anything besides him, what they did would have been in vain. …Those are the people to whom we gave the book and command and prophethood. But if these people disbelieve in it, then indeed we will entrust it to a people who will not be unbelievers in it.
Sura 92: Mecca was not an important city in the 7th century
“And this is a blessed book that we have revealed, confirming what was before it, so that you may warn the mother of towns and those around her. Those who believe in the hereafter believe in it, and they are mindful of their prayer.” The “mother of towns” is traditionally identified as Mecca, but the Qur’an never says this. Dan Gibson states of Mecca that “from the life of Muhammad we understand that camel caravans went out from this city, and that Muhammad himself travelled with a caravan to Syria and back. One would expect that a major city, involved with trade across the Middle East, would be well known to the nations around it, especially if it was a merchant city. However, the city of Mecca was not well known. Despite what Islamic literature tells us, there is not a single piece of non-Muslim evidence that points to and corroborates this claim for such prominence during the seventh century. In fact, the earliest substantiated reference to Mecca is in the Continuatio Byzantia Arabica - a source from early in the reign of the Caliph Hisham who ruled between 724 and 743–100 years after the life of Muhammad.
Sura 94: Christians will have no help from their intercessors (angels, saints)
Now you have come to us alone, as we created you at the beginning, and you have left behind all that we bestowed upon you, and we do not see you with your intercessors, whom you claimed were associated with you. Now the bond between you is severed, and what you presumed has failed you. Everyone will stand alone before Allah; no intercession from others will be accepted (2:48, 2:123, 23:101, 39:43, 42:46). However, the Qur’an elsewhere accepts intercession with Allah’s permission (10:3, 20:109, 21:28, 34:23, 53:26).
Sura 100: Angels and Jinns are not Al Lah’s partners
Yet they ascribe the jinn as partners to him, although he created them, and impute, falsely, without knowledge, sons and daughters to him. May he be glorified and highly exalted above what they ascribe.
The jinn are spirit beings that Allah created from “smokeless fire” (55:15). The twentieth-century Islamic scholar Muhammad ibn al-Uthaymeen states a standard Muslim view when he asserts that while human beings cannot see jinn, “undoubtedly the jinn can have a harmful effect on humans, and they could even kill them. They may harm a person by throwing stones at him, or by trying to terrify him, and other things that are proven in the sunnah (prophetic teachings)
Sura 101-102: Al Lah does not have a son, Christ is not divine
The originator of the heavens and the earth. How can he have a son, when he has no wife, when he created all things and is aware of all things?
An attempt at a reductio ad absurdum on the Christian doctrine of the Incarnation: “How can he have a son, when he has no consort?” Ibn Kathir asks: “How can He have a wife from His creation who is suitable for His majesty, when there is none like Him How can He have a child? Then Verily, Allah is Glorified above having a son.” The idea that fatherhood and sonship might not be conceived of in physical terms is not considered. This is Allah, your Lord.
Sura 109: Unbelievers do not understand Al Lah’s ‘signs’
And they swear a solemn oath by Allah that if a sign comes to them, they will believe in it. Say, Signs are with Allah and what will make you realize that if they came to them, they still would not believe? The unbelievers wouldn’t believe even if signs did come to them, a theme returned to at 6:124.
Sura 115: Al Lah’s word can never be changed
The word from your Lord is perfected in truth and justice. There is no one who can change his words. He is the hearer, the knower. No one can change Allah’s word, but at 2:75, the Qur’an states that the Jews did change it, and at 22:52, the possibility is raised that Satan can tamper with it, although Allah abrogates his changes.
Sura 121: Only eat what Al Lah prescribes and which has been blessed in Al Lah’s name
And do not eat what Allah’s name has not been mentioned over, for indeed, it is abomination. Indeed, the satans inspire their minions to argue with you. But if you obey them, you will be indeed idolaters.
The Muslims would be “idolaters” if they obeyed the advice of unbelievers and ate food over which Allah’s name has not been mentioned. According to Ibn Kathir, this means that “when you turn away from Allah’s command and Legislation to the saying of anyone else, preferring other than what Allah has said, then this constitutes Shirk.
Sura 124: Al Lah will punish any who reject his ‘signs’
And when a sign comes to them, they say, We will not believe until we are given what Allah’s messengers are given. Allah knows best with whom to place his message. Humiliation from Allah and heavy punishment will strike the guilty for their scheming. Here again it is asserted, as in 6:109, that the unbelievers wouldn’t believe even if they did receive signs from Allah. The interruption of this theme, and the return to it, may suggest an interpolation. Instead of “his message,” the Warsh Qur’an has “his messages.”
Sura 140: Disbelievers are ‘losers’
They are losers who have foolishly killed their own children without knowledge, and have forbidden what Allah bestowed upon them, inventing a lie against Allah. They indeed have gone astray and are not guided.
Sura 163: Again, the Trinity is invalid and Al Lah has no partners
He has no partner. This I am commanded, and I am first of the Muslims.
(The first of Muslims would reference Muhammad).
So, in summary, what do we read here in this Sura? There are some common themes, reiterated and repeated throughout the chapter.
1-The Christian Trinity and the divinity of Christ is denied.
2-Christians will receive no help from their angels, or worship of Mary, Christ or the saints.
3-Arab polytheism is subsumed by Al Lah who is the actor and creator behind the celestial worship of Arab tribes.
4-Christians and Jews are led astray by Al Lah to be punished and destroyed.
5-Muslims have no free will and are Al Lah’s slaves.
6-Al Lah’s word and commands can never be changed.
7-Muhammad is the first among Muslims.
8-Muslims must follow dietary laws and eat food blessed by Al Lah or offered to Al Lah as an expression of thanks.
These are cult doctrines. Muhammad is separating his cult from pagan, Jewish and Christian practices and beliefs. Dietary proscriptions, the demand to follow only what Al Lah says and what Muhammad instructs, along with denying free will and free inquiry into the Koran or cult practices and rather startling, naming followers of Al Lah as ‘slaves’ is an obvious indication not only of intent, but also of culture. These artefacts are commandments to create a unified, unitary and unthinking devotion to Al Lah and Muhammad. It is hard to understand how anyone can describe this as liberating, enlightening, or civilised.
Ishmael, the son of Abraham and his wife’s slave Hagar is not connected at all to ‘Islam’ or Muhammad. This is one of the more ludicrous lies from the Koran cult attempting to give it legitimacy. Catholics, Protestants, Agnostics have long made this linkage which does not exist. It comes from the Muhammadan cult itself. The Koran and Hadith propose the linkage between Ishmael and Muhammad. No other source does. Why is this? Because none exists. This lie has given rise to the 3 Abrahamic faiths myth. Only 2 are based on Abraham. The cult of Muhammad is based on the Al Lah idol or moon deity and celestial worship found in Mecca which long pre-dates Muhammad. Ishmael has no blood, geographical, or even philosophical connection with Muhammad.
1-Geography
The story is that once Hagar birthed Ishmael she became disobedient and arrogant, knowing her son was the legitimate (based on the laws of that time), successor to Abraham a wealthy nomad and merchant. Conflict ensued and Hagar was banished. According to the Bible Ishmael settled in Paran and married an Egyptian from whom he had twelve sons:
"He lived in the desert and became an archer. While he was living in the Desert of Paran, his mother got a wife for him from Egypt." Genesis 21:13-21
The Bible locates Paran near Israel (Canaan) and Egypt, south of Judah. John L. McKenzie in his Dictionary of the Bible notes:
The desert of Paran was the home of the Ishmaelites (Gn 21:21). It was, the itinerary according to P (cf. PENTATEUCH), reached by the Israelites after the desert of Sinai (Nm 10:12), and they camped in this desert for some time (Nm 10:12; 13:3, 26, mission and return of the scouts). In Dt 1:1 Paran is vaguely defined as a place in the desert. Hadad of Edom passed through the desert of Paran on his journey from Midian to Egypt (1 Kings 11:18). Etc
There are many passages in the Bible locating Paran. The Bible and archaeology place it near Sinai, with some offering Edom or southwest of the Dead Sea as a location. Regardless it is nowhere near Mecca.
2-Bloodlines and Geography
It is clear from the Bible and from Paran’s location that Ishmael never married as the Koran states, a Jurhumite woman. He married an Egyptian not an Arab. We also know where Ishmael's sons settled:
"This is the account of Abraham's son Ishmael, whom Sarah's maidservant, Hagar the Egyptian, bore to Abraham. These are the names of the sons of Ishmael, listed in the order of their birth: Nebaioth the firstborn of Ishmael, Kedar, Adbeel, Mibsam, Mishma, Dumah, Massa, Hadad, Tema, Jetur, Naphish and Kedemah. These were the sons of Ishmael, and these are the names of the twelve tribal rulers according to their settlements and camps. Altogether, Ishmael lived a hundred and thirty-seven years. He breathed his last and died, and he was gathered to his people. His descendants settled in the area from Havilah to Shur, near the border of Egypt, as you go toward Asshur. And they lived in hostility toward all their brothers." Genesis 25:12-18
McKenzie locates Shur around the area of Palestine and Egypt:
Shur (Hbsur), a geographical name which designates the slopes of Palestine and E of Egypt and N of the deserts of the Sinai peninsula. The Hb word suggests sur, "wall", and some geographers have thought that the name alludes to the line of fortresses constructed by the Egyptians to protect the E frontier of Egypt. The region is the scene of the flight of Hagar in the account of J (Gn 16:7). Abraham dwelt for a time in the Negeb between Kadesh and Shur (Gn 20:1). The Israelites traversed the desert of Shur after crossing the Sea of Reeds (Ex 15:22). The area from Havilah to Shur was the home of the Amalekite and other nomad tribes (Gn 25:18; 1 S 15:7; 27:8). (McKenzie, pp. 810-811)
Ishmael’s sons never settled anywhere near Mecca.
3-They migrated
It is claimed that some of the descendants of Ishmael's twelve sons migrated to Arabia. One of Ishmael’s sons Nebaioth, is said to be the father of the Nabateans. The Nabateans flourished in northern Arabia, first establishing their capital in Petra in the 4th century B.C. which was captured by the Romans in 106 B.C. They then moved to Damascus. The Dead Sea Scrolls actually contains Nabatean documents from the later period.
There are two major problems with the above assertion. Even though it may be true that some of Ishmael's descendants settled in Arabia, this does not mean that they necessarily were the fathers of the Arabs. Arab tribes already existed and are described in both the Bible and Egyptian history as existing. Muslim tradition itself affirms that Ishmael was not the father of the Arabs. Ibn Ishaq's biography of Muhammad states:
Ishmael is the son of Ibrahim (Abraham) b. Tarih (Azar) b. Nahur b. Sarugh b. Rau'u b. Falikh b. 'Aybar b. Shalikh b. Arfakhshadh b. Sam (Shem) b. Nuh (Noah). (Ibn Ishaq, The Life of Muhammad, tr. Guillaume, p. 3)
Ishmael was alive circa 1800 B.C. Arab tribes had long existed.
Another specious claim from the Hadith is that Ishmael journeyed to Mecca and married 2 Arab women (Ibn Abbas). In this tradition Abraham was with Ishmael, a journey which never occurred and is not recounted in the Bible or any other texts. In this rendition (2.127) (Sahih Al-Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 55, Number 583) Ishmael is a boy taught by the Arabs in Mecca and grows up to marry 2 Arab women. So the Koranic text itself is confused. Did Ishmael journey to Mecca as a young boy or adult? And if he is the ‘father’ of the Arabs how did the Arabs teach him and how did he marry Arab women?
Neither story is true of course and they make no sense. Consider that since Arabic is not Ishmael's mother tongue, and since Arabic as a language existed before, Ishmael cannot be the ancestor of Arabs. This means that the notion that Ishmael is the progenitor of the Arabs is erroneous. At most, Ishmael can only be called an Arabicized immigrant. The Muslim traditions prove that Ishmael is not the father of all the Arabs.
4-No relation to Muhammad
Given the above, Ishmael has no blood relationship whatsoever to the Quraysh tribe of Mecca or Muhammad. Muslim historians traced Muhammad's line to an 'Adnan, an alleged descendant of Ishmael. The following genealogy is taken from T.P Hughes' Dictionary of Islam, p. 217:
Adnan- Ma'add- Nizar- "Ilyas- Mudrikah- Khuzaimah- Kinanah- An-Nazr- Malik- Fihr- Luwaiy- Ka'b- Murrah- Kilab- Qusaiy- "Abdul Manaf- Hashim- Abdul Muttalib- Abdullah- Muhammad (source)
There are several problems with these genealogies. The first problem is the time span of 2500 years between Abraham and Muhammad. There are not enough linkages in the ‘Adnan story to go from Abraham to Muhammad in that time frame given average human life spans. Only 24 generations exist. The story assumes a life span per generation of over 100 years. This is factually incorrect of course. Abraham did not live in 150 BCE; he lived some 1700 or more years earlier. This is of course what we would expect from the Koran and Hadith. Made up stories with no evidence. In actual fact the genealogy of Muhammad is unknown. As given in Ibn Sa'd, Kitab al-Tabaqat al-Kabir, Volume I, p. 4:
Ma'n Ibn 'Isa al-Ashja'i al-Qazzaz (silk-merchant) informed us; he said: Mu'awiyah Ibn Salih informed us on the authority of Yahya Ibn Jabir who had seen some Companions of the Prophet and said: The people of Banu Fuhayrah came to the Prophet and said to him: You belong to us. He replied: Verily, (the archangel) Gabriel has informed me that I belong to Mudar
To be a descendant of Ishmael (via Mudar) was a claim that started with Muhammad's own words but without historical evidence even in his lifetime. In the end, it comes down to nothing but an unsubstantiated claim from Muhammad and this claim is inconsistent with that given by Ibn Ishaq the earliest biographer of Muhammad in his Sirat Rasulullah who traces his line to Ishmael through Nabit (Nebaioth), not Kedar. Basically the Muhammadans are trying to imitate the genealogy from Adam to Christ and have failed rather spectacularly.
5-The Cube or Kabaa
According to Muslim tradition, Abraham and Ishmael built the Kaaba, the cube-like structure in the Sacred Mosque in Mecca. But outside these traditions there is absolutely no evidence for this claim - whether epigraphic, archaelogical, or documentary. Archaeology reveals a crude cube at the time of Muhammad built from the wreakage of a Roman vessel found in the Red Sea. Probably in the pre-Roman Bronze age era there may have been a shrine built with rocks, a crude structure used for celestial worship. But making up a lie that Abraham journeyed all the way from Haran in what is now northern Iraq to Mecca, to build an altar, in which no other document or proof supports, is simply another example of Muhammad appropriating Jewish and Christian texts for his own purposes.
Historian Snouck Hurgronje has shown that Muhammad invented the story to give his religion an Arabian origin and setting; with this improvisation Muhammad established the independence of his religion, at the same time incorporating into Islam the Kaaba with all its historical and religious associations for the Arabs. (Ibn Warraq, Why I Am Not A Muslim [Prometheus Books, Amherst NY 1995], p. 131)
Finally, Islamicist Alfred Guillaume notes that Ishmael as a name is incorrect in Arabic:
"... there is no historical evidence for the assertion that Abraham or Ishmael was ever in Mecca, and if there had been such a tradition it would have to be explained how all memory of the Old Semitic name Ishmael (which was not in its true Arabian form in Arabian inscriptions and written correctly with an initial consonant Y) came to be lost. The form in the Quran is taken either from Greek or Syriac sources." (Alfred Guillaume, Islam [Penguin Books Inc., Baltimore, 1956], pp. 61-62)
Bottom Line:
The diabolical claim that Ishmael is ‘the father of the Arabs’ is riddled with rotted stench and untruth. It is rather obvious why Muhammad and the Koranic-Hadith scribblers need this narrative. It is an attempt to mimic the genealogical links of Christ back to Abraham and Adam, granting Muhammad credibility. It is done to displace the Bible’s very accurate history and placing of Ishmael in Canaan or near the Dead Sea, neither of which is remotely close to Mecca. It is a feeble and mendacious attempt to link Abraham to Mecca and the Cube shrine. What it does is confuse people and lead to claims by the ignorant that Islam is part of the ‘Abrahamic’ tradition which it clearly is not. Arabs long pre-date Ishmael and Mecca was in the time of the Bronze age into Muhammad’s era, a site where celestial objects, especially the moon, the sun, venus and mars, were worshipped.
Sura 5 or ‘The Table’ translated into English is here (Translated by Yusuf Ali, a fanatical Muslim apologist, so there is no ‘mistranslations’ which so bemuse Muslimophiles when discussing problematic texts).
Sura 5 discusses the imperative of Jihad, how Christ was really a Muslim and that the Christians have perjured and distorted the worship of the Al-Lah deity and joined Christ and the Holy Spirit to the one immanent Godhead. Killing Infidels is certainly expected and supported, but do not kill fellow-Muslims (5-32, taken from ancient Israelite texts about the killing of Abel and the blood of Adam). Muslims are slaves of the Al-Lah, he is not a deity you can get to know or have a relationship with. Jews and Christians are apes and pigs and there should be no philosophical or scientific inquiry unless it is supported in the Qur’an.
Excerpts from Robert Spencer’s book below and explanations on key verses within Sura 5. This link can be used (or the link above) to read the translation of the verses which are not copied out in their entirety. The commentary is against that specific verse (italics).
Verse 5. Muslim men can marry who they wish. Not so Muslim women.
Muslim men are permitted to marry “the virtuous women of the believers and the virtuous women of those who received the book before you.” The Qur’an says nothing about Muslim women being permitted to marry men from the people of the book; this is prohibited in Islamic law as part of the subjugated status of the dhimmis, the “protected people,” in Islam. Traditionally a man takes his wife into his own household but not vice versa. The prohibition of Muslim women marrying non-Muslim men, and the allowance of Muslim men marrying non-Muslim women, means that the Islamic community will always be in a position to grow, while the non-Muslim community declines.
Verse 14. Christian sects are proof of the Quran’s validity.
As far as the Qur’an is concerned, the divisions among Christians demonstrate the falsity of the religion—a proposition for which Jesus stated the obverse: “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). Says Ibn Kathir, “Indeed, the numerous Christian sects have always been enemies and adversaries of each other, accusing each other of heresy and cursing each other… Each sect among them will continue to accuse the other of disbelief and heresy in this life and on the Day when the Witnesses will come forth.”
And Christ is not the Son of God or Al-Lah
And Allah is able to do all things. Those Christians who believe that “Allah is the Messiah, son of Mary” have disbelieved. The Arabic word used here is kafara, it is a form of kufr, unbelief. Islamic spokesmen in the West frequently assert that the Qur’an never refers to Christians as infidels or unbelievers, when in fact this verse is quite clear that those who believe in the divinity of Christ are unbelievers indeed.
Verse 18. Al-Lah is not the ‘Father’ figure of the Bible but a slave-master.
To those Jews and Christians who claim to be God’s children, Allah directs the messenger to retort, “Why then does he punish you for your sins?” The Qur’an’s assumption that a father would not punish his children for their wrongdoing is striking. Whatever the reasoning behind it, it makes clear that in Islam, God is not a father to human beings. To a pious Muslim, a prayer such as the Our Father prayer in Christianity would be utterly alien. A knowledgeable and believing Muslim would consider it presumptuous in the extreme to call Allah his Father; instead, Allah is the master of the universe, and human beings are his slaves. The hallmark of Islamic religious observance is external obedience, not likeness with the divine through an interior transformation.
Verse 32. The killing of Infidels is always acceptable. But don’t kill fellow-Muslims.
This is one of the most oft-quoted verses of the Qur’an, the one that Western non-Muslim leaders refer to frequently in order to establish that Islam is a religion of peace. There is, however, less to it than Western leaders and Islamic apologists claim. It is not a general prohibition of killing: there are big exceptions to the prohibition on killing, for “manslaughter or corruption on the earth.” Also, this prohibition is not a general command but is specifically directed at the children of Israel. After it was given, “many of them committed excesses on earth,” so all this passage is really saying is that Allah gave a command to the children of Israel, and they transgressed against it.
William St. Clair Tisdall noted that the substance of this verse was taken from the Mishnah Sanhedrin: “As regards Cain who killed his brother, the Lord addressing him does not say, ‘The voice of thy brother’s blood crieth out,’ but ‘the voice of his bloods’, meaning not his blood alone, but that of his descendants; and this to show that since Adam was created alone, so he that kills an Israelite is, by the plural here used, counted as if he had killed the world at large; and he who saves a single Israelite is counted as if he had saved the whole world.”
Verse 33. Jews and Christians will be punished by not following the Al-Lah.
This verse continues from 5:32 and makes clear the dire punishments that are prescribed for the corruption and transgressions of the children of Israel, and a warning to the Jews to stop their bad behavior. Seen in its light, the celebrated passage 5:32 is explaining what must be done with Jews who reject the messenger and commit the vague sin of spreading corruption on earth. Contrary to popular belief in the West, the passage is not dictating lofty moral principles.
Verse 38. Jews and Christians are going to Hell.
This lone legal directive amid a lengthy section warning of hellfire and decrying the misdeeds of the Jews and Christians (5:35-86) may be evidence of textual dislocation. In a hadith, Muhammad is depicted as adding a divine curse to the already draconian punishment for theft specified in this verse: “Let there be the curse of Allah upon the thief who steals an egg and his hand is cut off, and steals a rope and his hand is cut off.”
Verse 45. Eye for an eye and legal retribution.
This verse establishes the Islamic principle of qisas, legal retribution (see also 2:178), in which retaliation or punishment is to be in kind. The “eye for an eye” principle is indeed in the Torah (Exodus 21:23-25). In the Qur’an, however, there is no mitigating element comparable to “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18) or, in the New Testament, Jesus’s statement: “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist one who is evil. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Matthew 5:38-9). See also 2:194 and 16:126.
Verse 47. Christian scriptures confirm the Qur’an (they don’t).
This also seems to suggest that at the time the Qur’an was compiled, the believers assumed that the Christian Scriptures did indeed confirm the message of the Qur’an. Because this is not the case, today it is common Islamic teaching that the New Testament as we have it is not the original but has been altered by rebellious Christians to reflect their false doctrines.
Verse 51. Do not take Jews or Christians as friends.
Ibn Kathir explains: “Allah forbids His believing servants from having Jews and Christians as friends, because they are the enemies of Islam and its people, may Allah curse them.”
Verse 60. Jews and Christians are cursed to be apes and pigs.
A reminder that some of those “whom Allah has cursed, him on whom his wrath has fallen,” were transformed into “apes and pigs.” See 2:63. On taghut, see 2:256.
Stanley Jaki, a Catholic priest and physicist, explains that it was the renowned Sufi thinker al-Ghazali who “denounced natural laws, the very objective of science, as a blasphemous constraint upon the free will of Allah.” Al-Ghazali (1058-1111), although himself a philosopher, delivered what turned out to be the coup de grace to Islamic philosophical investigation, at least as a vibrant mainstream force, in his monumental attack on the very idea of Islamic philosophy: The Incoherence of the Philosophers.
Muslim philosophers such as Avicenna and Averroes, according to al-Ghazali, were not intellectual trailblazers worthy of respect and careful consideration. In positing that there could be truth that was outside of or even contradicted what Allah had revealed in the Qur’an, they had shown themselves to be nothing more than heretics who should be put to death and their books burned.
Relatively early in its history, therefore, science was deprived in the Islamic world of the philosophical foundation it needed in order to flourish. It found that philosophical foundation only in Christian Europe, where it was assumed that God was good and had constructed the universe according to consistent and observable laws. Such an idea would have been for pious Muslims tantamount to saying, “Allah’s hand is chained.”
Verse 68. Jews and Christians must convert and renounce their books.
Ibn Kathir explains that this passage tells Jews and Christians they will have “no real religion until you adhere to and implement the Tawrah [Torah] and the Injil [Gospel]. That is, until you believe in all the Books that you have that Allah revealed to the Prophets. These Books command following Muhammad and believing in his prophecy, all the while adhering to his Law.”
Verse 72. Christ is not Divine.
The denial of the divinity of Christ and the labelling of those who believe in it as “unbelievers” is repeated; see 5:17.
Verse 73. The Trinity is again denied.
The denial of the doctrine of the Trinity is repeated; see 4:171. Jesus and his mother are again presented as the other members of the divine trio with Allah, but they were mortal: they both used to eat earthly food (5: 75) “like all other people,” says the Tafsir al-Jalalayn; “Since he was like that, he cannot be a god, because of his constitution and weakness and being subject to urine and faeces.”26 The actual Christian concept of the Incarnation, with Christ being both fully God and fully human, doesn’t enter into consideration.
Verse 88. Slavery is assumed and tolerated.
One who breaks an oath must in expiation feed ten indigents or free a slave; there is, however, no blanket condemnation of slavery anywhere in the Qur’an, or any idea of the equality of dignity of all human beings before God, which led to abolitionism in Christian contexts.
Verse 101. No questions can be asked of the Muhammadan cult.
This passage destroys the possibility of free inquiry in Islam in warning Muslims not to “ask about things which, if they were made known to you, would trouble you.” However, the believers are promised that if they “ask about them while the Qur’an is being revealed, they will be made known to you.” It is odd that a perfect and eternal book would depend for its contents upon the questions of human beings at a particular time, but this anomaly is not explained.
Verse 102. Do not question Muhammad or his texts.
The believers are again warned not to ask questions, as “a people before you asked, and then became disbelievers,” which may explain why international Islamic organizations such as the Organization of Islamic Cooperation are working so assiduously to criminalize and stifle criticism of Islam.
Verse 112. The last supper of Christ was a table from the Al-Lah.
When the disciples said, O Jesus, son of Mary, is your Lord able to send down for us a table spread with food from heaven? He said, Observe your duty to Allah, if you are true believers.
Verse 114. Christ asked Al-Lah for the table to be spread at the Last Supper.
Jesus, son of Mary, said, O Allah, our Lord, send down for us a table spread with food from heaven, so that it may be a feast for us, for the first of us and for the last of us, and a sign from you. Give us sustenance, for you are the best of sustainers.
Verse 114. The Muslim Eid is from the Christian Eucharist.
This has long been seen as a trace of the Christian doctrine of the Eucharist, but Christoph Luxenberg sees it as much more than just a vestige. Jesus asks Allah that this table from heaven be “a feast (‘id) for us, for the first of us and for the last of us, and a sign (ayah) from you.” Notes Luxenberg: “The Arabic word ‘id, borrowed from the Syriac, has been, in conformity with its Arabic meaning, correctly translated by ‘celebration’ [or ‘feast,’ in the liturgical sense].” The scholar of Islam and Jesuit priest Samir Khalil Samir explains that “according to unanimous scholarly opinion [the Arabic word ‘id] is a borrowing from the Syriac ‘ida, which signifies ‘Feast’ or ‘liturgical festival.’”
Verse 115. Al-Lah will punish those who don’t believe he sent the Eucharist.
Allah said, Indeed, I send it down for you. And whoever disbelieves among you afterward, I will surely punish him with a punishment with which I have not punished anyone of the worlds.
Verse 116. Jesus denies he is God.
And when Allah said, O Jesus, son of Mary, did you say to mankind, Take me and my mother as two gods besides Allah? He said, Be glorified. It was not for me to say what I had no right to say. If I said it, then you know it. You know what is in my mind, and I do not know what is in your mind. Indeed, you, only you, are the knower of hidden things. Allah asks Jesus directly if he asked his followers to take himself and his mother as additional gods along with him. Jesus, of course, denies having done so. Those who believe otherwise will be punished. Here we have not only a merely human Jesus but a misapprehension of the Trinity. The Qur’an envisions the Christian Trinity not as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three Persons, one God, but as a trio of deities: Allah, Jesus, and Mary.
Any objective reading of this text will offer some obvious themes:
1-Christ is not divine and was simply a prophet of Baal or Al-Lah (the moon deity, maybe the storm or fertility deity as well of Mecca, maybe the supreme pagan deity of nature as found in many locations in the Near East).
2-The Eucharist and other Christian celebrations were created and permitted by this Al-Lah not the Christian God.
3-Jews and Christians must convert to Muhammadanism or face punishment in this lifetime and the next.
4-Murdering Muslims is strictly prohibited but killing non-Muslims especially to spread Muhammadanism is legal and divinely sanctioned.
5-Muslims have no free will to inquire or question their cult.
6-All Muslims are simply slaves of the Al-Lah.
7-Muslim men can marry whom they wish, but Muslimas must marry a Muslim man and produce Ghazi or warriors of the cult.
8-Bronze age or earlier ‘code’ of an Eye for an Eye is enshrined, and slavery is accepted and tolerated and nowhere in the Qur’an are humans discussed as being equal nor is freedom assumed.
9-It is quite obvious that the Quranic authors took Old and New Testament passages and Christian rituals and misunderstood their meaning and purpose.
It is impossible when reading Sura 5, to make the claim that the cult of Muhammad is a religion of faith, presenting immanent ideals that we find in the Old and New Testaments which sanctify life, the individual and propose salvation through knowing God and Christ. The text portrays Jews and Christians as inferior and Christians as falsely following a Trinity and incorrectly ascribing to Christ Divine status when purportedly Christ denied his own divinity to Al-Lah. Given that Jews and Christians are cursed to be ‘apes and pigs’ it is necessary to either convert them peaceably or war against them until they submit.
St. John of Damascus (675-749 A.D) lived during a high tide of Muhammandan imperialism in the Near East and beyond. His father was a tax collector within the local Muslim government or occupying state and John succeeded him in that role. Around 730 A.D. he left and became a monk. His ‘Sources of Knowledge’ is a foundational text for the Greek Orthodox Church and greatly influenced the development of the Western Latin Church, suffused with neo-Platonism and moral exhortations. He fought to retain the worship of Icons providing logical and theological arguments for their retention, in opposition to official Byzantine policy. St. John was renowned as a writer, speaker and expert of the cult of Muhammad.
St. John’s penned the ‘Fount of Knowledge’ and describes Muhammadanism in part 2 on Heresies in Epitome: How They Began and Whence They Drew Their Origin. The Fount of Knowledge is considered one of the:
“most important single works produced in the Greek patristic period,…offering as it does an extensive and lucid synthesis of the Greek theological science of the whole period. It is the first great Summa of theology to appear in either the East or the West.” (translator’s note in the beginning of the book)
St. John is considered one of the great Fathers of the Church, and his writings hold a place of high honour in the Church. His critique of Islam, or “the heresy of the Ishmaelites,” is especially relevant for our times. To summarise some of his comments on Muhammadanism, we can note that Muhammad mis-understood the Old Testament, did not believe Christ was divine, did not tolerate the Cross as a symbol of divine power, created a book to manage women, engaged in random revelations which have no basis in the prophetic literature, created a long and rather inane story about a camel and its offspring being a divine provider for Arabs, a declaration that Christ is really a Muslim working for the Al-Lah, and the observation that Muslims are engaged in pagan practices such as stone rubbing and kissing. He could have written volumes on the hate and bile within the Koran adjuring Jihad, war and supremacist domination of the Infidel.
St. John’s assessment of Islam from ‘Heresies’, abridge and summarised
There is also the superstition of the Ishmaelites which to this day prevails and keeps people in error, being a forerunner of the Antichrist. They are descended from Ishmael, [who] was born to Abraham of Agar, and for this reason they are called both Agarenes and Ishmaelites. They are also called Saracens, which is derived from Sarras kenoi, or destitute of Sara, because of what Agar (Sara’s slave woman who bore Abraham’s child) said to the angel: ‘Sara hath sent me away destitute.’ (exiled once Isaac the legitimate son was born) [1] These used to be idolaters and worshiped the morning star and Aphrodite, whom in their own language they called Khabár, which means great. [2] And so down to the time of Heraclius they were very great idolaters. From that time to the present a false prophet named Mohammed has appeared in their midst. This man, after having chanced upon the Old and New Testaments and likewise, it seems, having conversed with an Arian monk, [3] devised his own heresy. Then, having insinuated himself into the good graces of the people by a show of seeming piety, he gave out that a certain book had been sent down to him from heaven. He had set down some ridiculous compositions in this book of his and he gave it to them as an object of veneration.
He says that there is one God, creator of all things, who has neither been begotten nor has begotten. [4]
He says that the Christ is the Word of God and His Spirit, but a creature and a servant, and that He was begotten, without seed, of Mary the sister of Moses and Aaron. [5]
For, he says, the Word and God and the Spirit entered into Mary and she brought forth Jesus…But the Christ Himself was not crucified, he says, nor did He die, for God out of His love for Him took Him to Himself into heaven. [6]
And he says this, that when the Christ had ascended into heaven God asked Him: ‘O Jesus, didst thou say: “I am the Son of God and God”?’ And Jesus, he says, answered: ‘Be merciful to me, Lord. Thou knowest that I did not say this and that I did not scorn to be thy servant. But sinful men have written that I made this statement, and they have lied about me and have fallen into error.’ And God answered and said to Him: ‘I know that thou didst not say this word.” [7]
There are many other extraordinary and quite ridiculous things in this book which he boasts was sent down to him from God. But when we ask: ‘And who is there to testify that God gave him the book? And which of the prophets foretold that such a prophet would rise up?’—they are at a loss. And we remark that Moses received the Law on Mount Sinai, with God appearing in the sight of all the people in cloud, and fire, and darkness, and storm. And we say that all the Prophets from Moses on down foretold the coming of Christ and how Christ God (and incarnate Son of God) was to come and to be crucified and die and rise again, and how He was to be the judge of the living and dead. [8]
… On the contrary, he (Muhammad) received it (Koran) while he was asleep.’
They furthermore accuse us of being idolaters, because we venerate the cross, which they abominate. And we answer them: ‘How is it, then, that you rub yourselves against a stone in your Ka’ba [9] and kiss and embrace it?’
Then some of them say that Abraham had relations with Agar upon it, but others say that he tied the camel to it, when he was going to sacrifice Isaac. And we answer them: ‘Since Scripture says that the mountain was wooded and had trees from which Abraham cut wood for the holocaust and laid it upon Isaac, [10] and then he left the asses behind with the two young men, why talk nonsense?
As has been related, this Mohammed wrote many ridiculous books, to each one of which he set a title. For example, there is the book On Woman, [11] in which he plainly makes legal provision for taking four wives and, if it be possible, a thousand concubines—as many as one can maintain, besides the four wives. [12,13]
Then there is the book of The Camel of God. [14] About this camel he says that there was a camel from God and that she drank the whole river and could not pass through two mountains, because there was not room enough. There were people in that place, he says, and they used to drink the water on one day, while the camel would drink it on the next. Moreover, by drinking the water she furnished them with nourishment, because she supplied them with milk instead of water. Then, because these men were evil, they rose up, he says, and killed the camel. However, she had an offspring, a little camel, which, he says, when the mother had been done away with, called upon God and God took it to Himself…..
Again, in the book of The Table, Mohammed says that the Christ asked God for a table and that it was given Him. For God, he says, said to Him: ‘I have given to thee and thine an incorruptible table.’ [15]
And again, in the book of The Heifer, [16] he says some other stupid and ridiculous things, which, because of their great number, I think must be passed over. He made it a law that they be circumcised and the women, too, and he ordered them not to keep the Sabbath and not to be baptized. And, while he ordered them to eat some of the things forbidden by the Law, he ordered them to abstain from others. He furthermore absolutely forbade the drinking of wine.
Notes used by St. John
1. Cf. Gen. 16.8. Sozomen also says that they were descended from Agar, but called themselves descendants of Sara to hide their servile origin (Ecclesiastical History 6.38, PG 67.1412AB).
2. The Arabic kabirun means ‘great,’ whether in size or in dignity. Herodotus mentions the Arabian cult of the ‘Heavenly Aphrodite’ but says that the Arabs called her Alilat (Herodotus 1.131)
3. This may be the Nestorian monk Bahira (George or Sergius) who met the boy Mohammed at Bostra in Syria and claimed to recognize in him the sign of a prophet.
4. Koran, Sura 112.
5. Sura 19; 4.169.
6. Sura 4.156.
7. Sura 5.Il6tf.
8. The manuscripts do not have the adage, but Lequien suggests this one from Plato.
9. The Ka’ba, called ‘The House of God,’ is supposed to have been built by Abraham with the help of Ismael. It occupies the most sacred spot in the Mosque of Mecca. Incorporated in its wall is the stone here referred to, the famous Black Stone, which is obviously a relic of the idolatry of the pre-Islam Arabs.
10. Gen. 22.6.
11. Koran, Sura 4.
12. Cf. Sura 2225ff.
13. Sura 2.223.
14. Not in the Koran.
15. Sura 5.114,115.
16. Sura 2.
Sura 4 translated into English is here (Translated by Yusuf Ali, a fanatical Muslim apologist, so there is no ‘mistranslations’ which so bemuse Muslimophiles when discussing problematic texts).
Sura 4 is called ‘The Women’. Women are important in Muhammad’s cult to produce Ghazi (warriors) and to support the needs of a man. Men can have up to 4 wives and innumerable sex slaves which they have taken by ‘their right hand’. This phrase references slavery. Women are viewed as inferior to men, often equated at ¼ to ½ the value of a Muslim man, can be beaten for not following the commands of the man, or the Qur’an or for ‘lewd behaviour such as talking to a strange man or leaving the house unaccompanied or insufficiently covered. Women are fields to be tithed or used for procreation. There is no expectation that women will be participants in society, education or general affairs. Their subservience to men is clearly delineated in this and many other chapters. But this is not all this chapter presents. Odes to Jihad, supremacism and domination, dominate as well and are listed below at the end.
Excerpts from Robert Spencer’s book below and explanations on key verses within Sura 4. This link can be used (or the link above) to read the translation of the verses which are not copied out in their entirety. The commentary is against that specific verse (italics).
Summation, women are inferior.
Among these laws are two of the most notorious provisions of the Qur’an, the command to beat women from whom one “fears” disobedience (4:34), and the allowance of the sexual enslavement of infidel women (4:24). Like suras 2 and 3, it deals with a variety of subjects and includes the usual castigation of unbelievers, but it is generally more unified than they are and contains almost all of the Qur’an’s key legislation regarding women
John of Damascus on this chapter.
In his remarks about Islam written around 730, John of Damascus may refer to this sura. “This Muhammad,” he writes, “as it has been mentioned, composed many frivolous tales, to each of which he assigned a name, like the text (graphe) of the Woman, in which he clearly prescribes the taking of four wives and one thousand concubines, if it is possible.” This sura does indeed allow a man four wives as well as the use of slave girls, “those your right hand possesses” (4:3), as concubines, although it doesn’t specify they must be a thousand in number, or any particular number. That may simply be John indulging in a bit of polemical hyperbole or using a thousand to indicate a virtually unlimited number of concubines.
Verse 3. Polygamy, every independent woman’s dream it appears.
This verse is the basis for Islamic polygamy and the sexual enslavement of infidel women. Regarding polygamy, the Mishkat al-Masabih depicts Muhammad saying: “When a man has two wives and does not treat them equally he will come on the day of resurrection with a side hanging down.” But equality in such circumstances is in the eye of the beholder. Ibn Kathir says the requirement to “do justice” regarding one’s wives is not a major obstacle to having more than one wife, since treating them justly isn’t the same as treating them equally: “It is not obligatory to treat them equally, rather it is recommended. So if one does so, that is good, and if not, there is no harm on him.”
Verse 15. Women who are lewd are condemned to isolation.
Allah prescribes home imprisonment until death for women found guilty of “lewdness,” most commonly understood in this context as adultery as well as homosexual activity, on the testimony of four witnesses. According to Islamic law, these four witnesses must be male Muslims; women’s testimony is inadmissible in cases of a sexual nature, even in rape cases in which she is the victim.
Death by stoning for both men and women (though men are never stoned in Muhammadanism, just women).
However, the penalty of stoning does not appear in the Qur’an. A hadith attributed to Umar attempts to square its absence by invoking a tradition that Muhammad had prescribed this penalty: “I am afraid,” he said, “that after a long time has passed, people may say, ‘We do not find the Verses of the Rajam (stoning to death) in the Holy Book,’ and consequently they may go astray by leaving an obligation that Allah has revealed.” Umar affirmed: “Lo! I confirm that the penalty of Rajam be inflicted on him who commits illegal sexual intercourse, if he is already married and the crime is proved by witnesses or pregnancy or confession.” And he added that Muhammad “carried out the penalty of Rajam, and so did we after him.”
Verse 34. Beat your wife.
Wife-beating exists in all cultures, but only in Islam does it enjoy divine sanction. Allah tells men to beat their disobedient wives after first warning them and then sending them to sleep in separate beds. This is, of course, an extremely controversial verse, but there is not a great deal of variation in how the primary translators of the Qur’an have rendered the salient word, waidriboohunna.
Verse 46. Jews are cursed by the Al Lah deity or moon idol Baal (sometimes referred to as the storm god in some cultures).
Allah has “cursed them for their unbelief,” that is, the Jews yet again. Says Ibn Kathir: “Allah states that the Jews, may Allah’s continued curse fall on them until the Day of Resurrection, have purchased the wrong path instead of guidance, and ignored what Allah sent down to His Messenger Muhammad. They also ignored the knowledge that they inherited from previous Prophets, about the description of Muhammad,
Verse 47. Jews are cursed as apes and pigs.
The Jews are called to accept Islam or face terrible punishment, including being cursed “as we cursed the Sabbath-breakers,” that is, being transformed into apes and pigs (2:63-65).
Verse 48. Allah will forgive anything except shirk or disbelief in Muhammad and the Al Lah idol (see 2:193, 4:31, and 6:21).
Verse 56. Eternal damnation of Christians and Jews for Shirk.
The exchange of new skins for old so that the damned can be freshly tortured assumes a physical hell where the bodies of the unbelievers are perpetually renewed so that they can be tortured again.
Verse 71. Jihad. Jihad all the time.
Here begins an extended exhortation to the believers to go forth courageously to jihad warfare. Ibn Kathir explains: “Allah commands His faithful servants to take precautions against their enemies, by being prepared with the necessary weapons and supplies, and increasing the number of troops fighting in His cause.”80
Verse 74. The Ghazi or warrior goes to heaven.
This promise that a warrior will be rewarded “whether he is killed or victorious” constitutes a great deal of the reason why Muslim armies have fought with such tenacity throughout history. The warrior of jihad cannot lose: if he gains victory, he can help himself to the possessions (and the women) of those whom he has defeated (see 4:24 and sura 8). If he is killed, he gains paradise.
Verse 76. Jihad by any means possible.
There is no moral gray area in jihad warfare; the believers fight for Allah, while the unbelievers fight for Satan. Osama bin Laden began his October 6, 2002, letter to the American people with two Qur’an quotations, this verse and 22:39.81 On taghut, see 2:256.
Verse 84. Great rewards for Jihadis.
In a hadith, Muhammad is reported as saying there are immense rewards in store for those who wage jihad: “In Jannah [paradise] there are a hundred grades which Allah has prepared for those who fight in His Cause [mujahidin]; and the distance between any two of those grades is like the distance between the heaven and the earth.”
Verse 89. Death for apostasy or cowardice in Jihad.
This verse is a foundation for Islam’s death penalty for apostasy. Al-Wahidi explains that “a group of people initially accompanied the Messenger of Allah, Allah bless him and give him peace, to Uhud but then turned back and returned to Medina. The Muslims were divided in their opinions about them. Some of them were of the opinion that they should be killed while others thought they should be spared, and so this verse was revealed,” which directs that those who join the Muslims and then leave them should be killed.
Verse 95. Jihad is material not spiritual.
This verse provides a clear refutation of those who maintain that the Qur’an’s vision of jihad is primarily spiritual. If one must wage jihad with one’s wealth and one’s life, and those who do so are on a higher level than those who stay home, then clearly what is envisioned is participation in warfare, not a struggle to better oneself.
Verse 100. Conquering through emigration.
Here the Qur’an states the cardinal importance of “emigration for the cause of Allah,” that is, moving to a new land with the intention of bringing Islam to it. See also 4:66 and 4:89.
Verse 104. Unrelenting torment and punishment for Jews and Christians.
The Tafsir Anwarul Bayan explains: “While the disbelievers (kuffar) will be subjected to the unending torment and distress in the abysses of Hell, the Muslims shall be rejoicing in the bliss and comforts of Heaven (Jannah), without the slightest worries and concerns. The disbelievers (kuffar) cannot aspire for these stages as these are promised exclusively to the Muslims. For this reason the Muslims have a much stronger incentive to fight and should do so with greater zest and zeal.”
Verse 124. Paradise is only for Muslims.
Paradise is promised to the true believers, both male and female, but while it is filled with the virginal houris, the women of paradise, for men (see 44:54), it is not described for women.
Verse 137. Kill apostates.
Allah will not forgive those who leave Islam twice. A hadith has Muhammad strengthening this: “If somebody (a Muslim) discards his religion, kill him.”
Verse 159. Jesus will return and Muslimify the globe.
According to a hadith put in Muhammad’s mouth, “The Hour will not be established until the son of Mary (i.e. Jesus) descends amongst you as a just ruler, he will break the cross, kill the pigs, and abolish the Jizya tax.” That is, he will abolish the subservient dhimmi status of the non-Muslims and Islamize the world: “During his time, Allah will destroy all religions except Islam and Allah will destroy Al-Masih Ad-Dajjal (the False Messiah).”
Verse 171. Christ is not divine (but in verse 159 he somehow will return and perform miracles and establish Muhammadanism across the globe…..)
Allah warns Christians to remember that Jesus was a created being and not to say “Three,” that is, not to say God is a Trinity. Ibn Kathir echoes the Qur’an itself (5:116) in saying that the Christians elevated Jesus “and his mother to be gods with Allah”; the actual Christian Trinity of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is not envisioned in the Qur’an. It is “far removed from his transcendent majesty that he should have a son” because having a son would imply that he is insufficient for his tasks and needs a helper, but Allah “is sufficient.”
Verse 175. Muslim men can marry ‘good’ women who are not Muslim, but Muslim women may not do the same (this is part of the demographic Jihad).
Muslim men are permitted to marry “the virtuous women of the believers and the virtuous women of those who received the book before you.” The Qur’an says nothing about Muslim women being permitted to marry men from the people of the book; this is prohibited in Islamic law as part of the subjugated status of the dhimmis, the “protected people,” in Islam. Traditionally a man takes his wife into his own household but not vice versa. The prohibition of Muslim women marrying non-Muslim men, and the allowance of Muslim men marrying non-Muslim women, means that the Islamic community will always be in a position to grow, while the non-Muslim community declines.
There is plenty more which could be listed but the themes are obvious including inter-alia:
This chapter is not religious or about faith. It is a document demanding subservience, the management of women, the use of women to produce Ghazi, the necessity to wage Jihad war, the demonisation of Jews and Christians, and the command to subjugate non-Muslims.
Sura 3 translated into English is here (Translated by Yusuf Ali, a fanatical Muslim apologist, so there is no ‘mistranslations’ which so bemuse Muslimophiles when discussing problematic texts).
Sura 3 is called ‘The Family of Imran (Moses)’. In Koranic lore, Jesus is the nephew of Moses, with Mary his mother being Moses’ sister or daughter of Imran, Moses’ father. Obviously, the scribes of Quran confused Miriam Moses’ sister with Mary, the Madonna. As with Sura 2, Sura 3 continues to expatiate and excoriate Jews and Christians and to demonise non-Muslims. Compulsion of the Infidel, through Jihad and subjugation are assumed to be duties of the pious Muslim.
Excerpts from Robert Spencer’s book below and explanations on key verses within Sura 3. This link can be used (or the link above) to read the translation of the verses which are not copied out in their entirety. The commentary is against that specific verse (italics).
Spencer’s introduction to this chapter.
According to Maududi, sura 3, which is regarded in Islamic tradition as a Medinan sura, is addressed to the people of the book (that is, primarily Jews and Christians) as well as to Muslims, in order to invite them “to the same true religion preached by the Prophets from the earliest times,” and to show them that “the deviant course which they have adopted is inconsistent with the very scriptures which they themselves acknowledge to be of Divine origin. They ought, therefore, to accept the Truth now placed before them by Muhammad.”
….first eighty verses of this sura were revealed, with an eye toward correcting the Christians’ errors about their faith. Ibn Kathir agrees, although he specifies that eighty-three verses were revealed on the occasion of the Christians’ visit to Muhammad, which he says took place in 632.
Verse 13. Muslim victory at Badr and in War over idolators and non-Muslims is due to Muslim piety and Allah’s help.
Allah explains that the Muslims’ victory at Badr was an eschatological sign of his favor upon the Muslims. Al-Wahidi says that the sign was for unbelievers, so that they would embrace Islam, and uses it as the occasion for another story of the perversity and rebelliousness of the Jews. He quotes Ibn Abbas saying: “When Allah defeated the idolaters on the day of Badr, the Jews of Medina said: ‘By Allah, this is the unlettered Prophet who was announced to us by Moses and whose attribute and description we find in our Scriptures and about whom it is also mentioned that his banner will not be defeated’.
…..there is no counterpart in Islam to the Biblical principle that the wicked may prosper because of the fallen nature of the world—in Islam, if the wicked prosper, it is because the Muslims aren’t Islamic enough.
Verse 19. The only religion on earth is that of Islam. Period.
Ibn Kathir sees this as unequivocal: “Allah states that there is no religion accepted with Him from any person, except Islam. Islam includes obeying all of the Messengers until Muhammad who finalized their commission, thus closing all paths to Allah except through Muhammad. Therefore, after Allah sent Muhammad, whoever meets Allah following a path other than Muhammad’s, it will not be accepted of him.” The Jews and Christians also know better than to come before Allah with their false religions.
Verse 28. Muslims cannot be friends with non-Muslims and it is okay to lie to them to get what you want, as long as Islam prospers.
The word awliya, friends, involves more than just casual friendship, and can be rendered as allies, guardians, patrons, protectors, and the like. Ibn Kathir states: “Allah prohibited His believing servants from becoming supporters of the disbelievers, or to take them as comrades with whom they develop friendships, rather than the believers.”
….The development of taqiyya as a theological concept is a product of Shi’ite Islam. It developed during the time of the Sixth Imam, Jafar as-Sadiq, in middle of the eighth century, when the Shi’ites were being persecuted by the Sunni caliph al-Mansur. Taqiyya allowed Shi’ites to pretend to be Sunnis in order to protect themselves from Sunnis who were killing Shi’ites.
Verse 32. Allah only loves Muslims.
Allah’s love is not universal. It extends only to believing Muslims, and disobeying Allah and his messenger makes one a disbeliever.
Verse 35. The Koran confuses who Mary the mother of Jesus actually is.
Mary’s mother is the “wife of Imran,” that is, Amram, the father of Moses and Aaron. At 66:12, Mary is called “daughter of Imran.” This passage, along with 19:28, in which Mary is called “sister of Aaron,” gives the impression that the Qur’an confused Miriam the sister of Moses with Mary the Mother of Jesus, since the names are identical in Arabic: Maryam. The Muslims of the ninth century were apparently confronted about this, as a hadith depicts Muhammad saying: “The (people of the old age) used to give names (to their persons) after the names of Apostles and pious persons who had gone before them.” However, while this may explain why Mary is called “sister of Aaron,” it doesn’t explain why she is clearly depicted in this verse as the daughter of Imran. The authors of the Qur’an clearly thought that Jesus was Moses’s nephew, the son of his sister.
Verse 49. Allah’s performs the miracles of Christ. Christ is not divine.
The miracles Jesus performs are not accomplished by his own power, but “by Allah’s permission.” The Tafsir Anwarul Bayan explains that this clause is repeated in order to emphasize that only by Allah’s permission does Jesus perform miracles—since “after witnessing these miracles, especially the raising of the dead, it is possible that a person may consider Sayyidina Isa to be Allah himself.
Verse 52. Jesus was a Muslim, so were his disciples.
Jesus’s disciples are Muslims, as is Jesus himself. In this understanding, Islam did not originate in the seventh century or the ninth but is the original religion of every prophet. Their followers twisted their teachings to create Judaism, Christianity, and other counterfeits of the prophets’ true teachings.
Verse 67. Abraham was also a Muslim.
Abraham, like the other prophets, was a Muslim, the Tafsir al-Jalalayn explains: “Abraham in truth was neither a Jew nor a Christian, but a man of pure natural belief, a hanif who inclines from all other religions to the Straight Din [religion], a Muslim and affirmer of the Divine Unity. He was no idolater.” On hanif, see 2:135.
Verse 85. Islam is the only religion of truth.
“Commentators,” notes Mahmoud Ayoub, “have generally taken this verse literally.” The idea that Islam is the religion of truth is stated also at 3:19 and 9:29, and that it will prevail over all other religions is additionally at 2:193, 8:39, 9:33, and 61:9. In this verse Islam prevails not just in the hereafter, where the non-Muslims will be losers, but also on earth, where a religion other than Islam will not be accepted, presumably by Allah, although also possibly by the Islamic authorities.
Verse 110. Muslims are clearly the best of any people. Superior. Saved by Sharia.
The Muslims are the “best of people” insofar as they “command what is right and forbid what is wrong”; that is, their preeminence is defined in terms of their establishing proper rules for behavior among all mankind, those which are encoded in Sharia. A hadith quotes Abu Hurairah, one of Muhammad’s companions, explaining that this verse “means, the best of peoples for the people, as you bring them with chains on their necks till they embrace Islam.” See 22:41.
Verse 112. Non Muslims must pay the Jizya slave or second-class citizen tax.
This, says the Tafsir Anwarul Bayan, refers to the non-Muslims’ agreeing “to pay the atonement (Jizya) to the Muslim state, in which case they will be accorded the rights of a Dhimmi.” These rights are not equal to the rights of Muslims: the dhimmis must accept subservience and second-class status (cf. 9:29) in exchange for a guarantee of protection, which remains in place as long as they do not offend the Muslims by criticizing Islam or Muhammad, or violating other provisions of their status.
Verse 118. Permanent war between Muslims and non-Muslims until the world is conquered for Allah.
Ibn Kathir sees this verse in the context of a permanent war between Muslims and non-Muslims: “Allah forbids His believing servants from taking the hypocrites as allies, so that the hypocrites do not have the opportunity to expose the secrets of the believers and their plans against their enemies. The hypocrites try their very best to confuse, oppose and harm the believers any way they can, and by using any wicked, evil means at their disposal. They wish the very worst and difficult conditions for the believers.”
Verse 137. Unbelievers are worthless. All civilisations and artefacts made by Unbelievers are also worthless.
This is one of the foundations of the Islamic idea that pre-Islamic civilizations, and non-Islamic civilizations, are all jahiliyya—the society of unbelievers, which is worthless. In the late twentieth century, some Pakistani Muslims saw in the ruins at the nation’s renowned archaeological site, Mohenjo Daro, a teaching opportunity for Islam. They recommended that this verse be posted there so as to put the ruins themselves in an Islamic context. The Islamic State acted on this assumption, destroying ancient artifacts of pre-Islamic civilizations not just because of the danger of idolatry, but because the ruins themselves reflected Allah’s judgment on the unbelievers.
Verse 144. Muslims must always fight the Unbeliever.
Here is an example of Islam’s fatalism: even if Muhammad himself were killed, the Muslims should fight on, for no one can die except by Allah’s permission. This is one of only four places where the name Muhammad appears in the Qur’an (the others are 33:40, 47:2, and 48:29).
Verse 145. Jihad is an obligation and demands perseverance.
This is a call for perseverance in jihad warfare against non-Muslims, as Ibn Kathir relates in a quotation from Ibn Ishaq: “Many a Prophet was killed, and he had many companions whose resolve did not weaken after their Prophet died, and they did not become feeble in the face of the enemy. What they suffered in Jihad in Allah’s cause and for the sake of their religion did not make them lose heart.”
Verse 156. Allah decides victory and defeat, Muslims must simply fight.
Allah restates the proposition that life and death, as well as victory and defeat, are in his hands alone, and thus no one should fear fighting.
Verse 196. Unbelievers are going to hell – guaranteed.
The believers should not envy the unbelievers even if they prosper, for Allah will send them to hell while the believers enjoy the gardens of paradise (3:198).
Verse 200. All Muslims who follow Allah piously and without deviation, will be granted success.
Allah promises that those who obey him will encounter success, which includes success in this world. This idea has led throughout Islamic history to disasters being ascribed to disobedience, with the prescribed remedy being a reassertion of Islamic strictness.
It is dichotomous text. The Christian and Jew are not accepted. They are demonised, disparaged, and relegated as worthless, impious, almost sub-human followers of evil and waywardness. Only the Muslim is right, honourable, religious and the inheritor of both Earth and Heaven. Jihad and fighting, killing and subjugating non-Muslims is a duty and must never end until the world is conquered for the Al Lah and his spokesman the ’unlettered’ Muhammad. This is a tract of war and conquest, not of religiosity or piety.
Sura 2 translated into English is here (Translated by Yusuf Ali, a fanatical Muslim apologist, so there is no ‘mistranslations’ which so bemuse Muslimophiles when discussing problematic texts).
Sura 2 is called ‘The Cow’, which is referenced once in the chapter and has no real importance in its context or messaging. This is not unusual for Muhammandan texts, logic is hardly a strong suit for Muhammad’s cult. Sura 2 is the longest chapter and one of the most violent against Jews and Christians. It advocates Jihad, supremacism and forced conversion of non-Muslims. There is no gospel odes to love, forgiveness or equality in the eyes of the Al-Lah (who was Baal the moon deity of Mecca). Excerpts from Robert Spencer’s book below and explanations on key verses within Sura 2. This link can be used (or the link above) to read the translation of the verses which are not copied out in their entirety. The commentary is against that specific verse (italics).
Verse 105. Jews and Christians are evil.
The “unbelievers among the people of the book” are the Jews and Christians who do not become Muslims. See 2:62 and 57:27. Here, Allah tells Muslims that unbelievers wish them only ill; Ibn Kathir explains: “Allah described the deep enmity that the disbelieving polytheists and People of the Scripture, whom Allah warned against imitating, have against the believers, so that Muslims should sever all friendship with them.” “Allah chooses for his mercy whom he wills,” see 7:179, 10:99, 32:13.
Verse 106. Abrogation or negating earlier verses with later ones, as Muhammad deems necessary.
The torrent of condemnations of the Jews is interrupted to introduce the Islamic doctrine of abrogation, in which Allah replaces a verse he has previously revealed but abrogated with one that is like it or even better. The doctrine of abrogation is also the foundation of the widespread Islamic understanding that the violent verses of the Qur’an take precedence over the more peaceful verses revealed earlier, since they come later in the lifetime of Muhammad.
Verse 116. Rejection of the Christ and the Christian Trinity.
This is the first of several Qur’anic articulations of Islam’s indignant rejection of the Christian belief in Jesus as the Son of God. The Qur’an repeatedly insists that Allah has neither sons nor daughters (other instances of this can be found at 6:100, 9:30, 10:68, 17:40, 17:111, 18:4, 19:35, 19:88, 21:26, 25:2, 37:149, 39:4, 43:16, 43:81, 52:39, 53:21, 72:3, 112:3). The idea that Allah could have a son is considered to compromise monotheism, and to imply that Allah is not all-powerful and thus capable of performing his celestial tasks by himself, without any helper.
Verse 123. No intercessors between you and the Allah (eg. a Son) except when there is.
Everyone will stand alone before Allah; no intercession from others will be accepted (2:48, 6:94, 23:101, 39:43, 42:46). However, the Qur’an elsewhere accepts intercession with Allah’s permission (10:3, 20:109, 21:28, 34:23, 53:26).
Verse 128. All the prophets including Christ were in fact Muslims.
Abraham and Ishmael are submitters to Allah, that is, Muslims. This underscores the recurring Qur’anic theme that the people we know of today as Jews and Christians are only renegades from the true religion actually taught by Abraham and Moses, as well as Jesus. That true religion was Islam. Much of sura 2 is devoted to addressing the renegade Jews who have rejected the messenger and calling them back to the true faith, the faith of Abraham and Moses as well as the messenger. Thus Islam challenges Judaism and Christianity by claiming that the true and original form of both religions is Islam.
Verse 142. Jerusalem is never mentioned in the Quran.
Allah tells the messenger that only “the foolish among the people” will protest the change in the qibla, the direction for prayer. Islamic tradition holds that the direction for prayer was changed from Jerusalem to Mecca, Jerusalem is never mentioned in the Qur’an, and Mecca only once…and instructs Muslims repeatedly to obey him (3:32, 3:132, 4:13, 4:59, 4:69, 5:92, 8:1, 8:20, 8:46, 9:71, 24:47, 24:51, 24:52, 24:54, 24:56, 33:33, 33:36, 47:33, 49:14, 58:13, 64:12
Verse 178. Infidel lives are worth much less than a Muslim life.
Allah establishes the law of retaliation (qisas) for murder: equal recompense must be given for the life of the victim, which can take the form of blood money (diyah): a payment to compensate for the loss suffered. In Islamic law (Sharia) the amount of compensation varies depending on the religion of the victim: non-Muslim lives simply aren’t worth as much as Muslim lives. Reliance of the Traveller, a Sharia manual that Cairo’s prestigious Al-Azhar University certifies as conforming to the “practice and faith of the orthodox Sunni community,” says that the payment for killing a woman is half of that to be paid for a man and for killing a Jew or Christian one-third that paid for killing a male Muslim.
Verse 193. Muslims must fight the Infidels.
The command to fight “until persecution [fitna] is no more, and religion is for Allah” reveals that there is an aspect to the warfare enjoined by the Qur’an that is not purely defensive. Muslims must continue the war until Allah’s law prevails over the world, which implies a conflict without end until that goal is attained. Ibn Kathir explains that the verse means that Muslims must fight “so that the religion of Allah becomes dominant above all other religions.” Says Bulandshahri: “The worst of sins are Infidelity (Kufr) and Polytheism (shirk) which constitute rebellion against Allah, The Creator. To eradicate these, Muslims are required to wage war until there exists none of it in the world, and the only religion is that of Allah.”99 That’s an open-ended declaration of war against every non-Muslim, in all times and in all places.
Verse 217. War or Jihad can be enacted any time, in any place for any reason.
(reiterates) “persecution is worse than slaughter” … This brief phrase has extraordinarily important implications for Islamic law and practice that are never clearly enunciated in the Qur’an. Islamic tradition holds that this all-important but opaque maxim was revealed to Muhammad during controversies over whether or not fighting was permissible during one of the four sacred months of the Arab calendar, during which fighting was forbidden…But then Allah revealed this passage, explaining that the Quraysh’s opposition to Muhammad was more offensive in his eyes than the Muslims’ violation of the sacred month: the raid was therefore justified, “for persecution is worse than slaughter.”
Verse 218. Jihad means war and fighting.
The phrase here translated as “wage jihad for the sake of Allah” is usually translated in some way akin to “strive in the way of Allah,” as Mohammed Marmaduke Pickthall has it. The key word here is jahadu, which is a verbal form of the noun jihad; thus the translation here is more accurate than most, and more illuminating of how an Islamic jihadi will read and understand the Qur’an. “Jihad for the sake of Allah” in Islamic theology refers to jihad warfare, not to more spiritualized understandings of jihad.
Verse 255. The greatest verse in the Quran (most poetic supposedly).
This is known as the Throne Verse (Ayat al-Kursi). According to the contemporary Islamic scholar Mahmoud Ayoub, this verse is “regarded by Muslims as one of the most excellent verses of the Qur’an. It has therefore played a very important role in Muslim piety.” A tradition depicts Muhammad as saying: “The master of all speech is the Qur’an, the master of the Qur’an is Surat al-Baqarah [sura 2], and the master of al-Baqarah is the Throne Verse.”
Verse 256. Subjection of non-Muslims is a goal of Jihad (no compulsion except to rule the Infidel).
Islamic spokesmen in the West frequently quote this verse to disprove the contention that Islam spread by the sword, or even to claim that Islam is a religion of peace. According to an early Muslim, Mujahid ibn Jabr, this verse was abrogated by 9:29, in which the Muslims are commanded to fight against the people of the book. Others, however, according to Tabari, say that this verse was never abrogated but was revealed precisely in reference to the people of the book: they are not to be forced to accept Islam but may practice their religions freely as long as they pay the jizya (a poll-tax) and “feel themselves subdued,” as per 9:29. Many see the assertion that “there is no compulsion in religion” as contradicting the Islamic imperative to wage jihad against unbelievers. This is because the aim of jihad is not the forced conversion of non-Muslims, but their subjugation within the Islamic social order. Says Asad: “All Islamic jurists (fuqahd’), without any exception, hold that forcible conversion is under all circumstances null and void, and that any attempt at coercing a non-believer to accept the faith of Islam is a grievous sin: a verdict which disposes of the widespread fallacy that Islam places before the unbelievers the alternative of ‘conversion or the sword.’”
The main Koranic themes are all present in Sura 2. A focus on male Muslims and their superiority over females and Infidels. The assertion that Infidel lives are worth much less than a Muslim’s, and that all females, including Muslim females’ lives are of far less value than a Muslim male’s. Muhammad as the last and most important prophet and the necessity to follow what he said and did. The cold monotheism of the Al Lah who decides all, including your will and actions. The injunction that your only role in life is to please the unknowable Al Lah and his only mouthpiece Muhammad. A complete rejection of Christ and the Christian Trinity with endless demands to wage war until all non-Muslim Infidels submit or convert.
Sura 1 translated into English is here and below.
Translated by Yusuf Ali.
Surah 1 – The Opening
With the Name of Allah, the Merciful Benefactor, The Merciful Redeemer
1. In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
2. Praise be to Allah, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the worlds;
3. Most Gracious, Most Merciful;
4. Master of the Day of Judgment.
5. Thee do we worship, and Thine aid we seek.
6. Show us the straight way,
7. The way of those on whom Thou hast bestowed Thy Grace, those whose (portion) is not wrath, and who go not astray.
Sura 1 informs the Shahada or daily morning prayer that Muslims must offer which is simply: “There is no God but God (Allah – i.e. there is none worthy of worship but Allah), and Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah.” The Quran mentions Muhammad only 4 times as the final and only true messenger of the Al Lah or Lord of Mecca (Baal or the moon deity was the chief idol of Mecca and Muhammad’s family its caretakers).
Sura 1 is the shortest of the Quranic chapters. So what is it telling us? From the ‘Critical Quran’, Jews will endure wrath, the Christians are astray.
The path of the believers is knowledge of the truth and abiding by it. In comparison, the Jews abandoned practicing the religion, while the Christians lost the true knowledge. This is why ‘anger’ descended upon the Jews, while being described as ‘led astray’ is more appropriate of the Christians.”
and
Islamic scholars have often identified “those who have earned Allah’s anger” as the Jews, and “those who have gone astray” as the Christians. This is such a commonplace understanding that a translation of Sahih Bukhari, the collection of reports (hadith) of Muhammad’s words and deeds that Muslims consider most reliable, adds identifying glosses into a story in which Muhammad quotes this verse of the Qur’an: “Say Amen when the Imam says not the path of those who earn Your Anger (such as Jews) nor of those who go astray (such as Christians); all the past sins of the person whose saying (of Amin) coincides with that of the angels, will be forgiven.”
In essence Sura 1 and the Shahada are curses on Jews and Christians. The rest of the Quran explicates why this is so, and why Muhammadanism is the only ‘true religion’ and superior to the ‘corrupted texts’ (to quote the Quran) of the wayward and astray Jews and Christians both of whom are condemned to torture, disgrace, death, to be ruled by Muslims as second class citizens if they don’t convert to Muhammadanism and expelled into hellfire when they die if they don’t effect a conversion and grovel to Al Lah in repentance.
The Critical Quran by Robert Spencer.
The problem with the cult of Mecca, centred on the moon deity Baal or Al Lah, is in the cult’s texts. You won’t discover this at ‘university’, nor will an ‘academic’ enlighten you. They are mostly anti-Christian, anti-Orthodox Western civilisation (long since dead) and adamantly for any theology, philosophy or position which will unhinge the modern from the traditional and cultural.
In reality there are many differences between the cult of Muhammad and Christianity. Two obvious cleavages find their loci in the reality that the once Christian-West was based on critical thought and the unitary Golden Rule, Islam is based on a complete and total or totalitarian system which merges church, state, society, private life and even private thoughts and expressions into a ritualised formula of obeisance and exactitude in process and belief. This leads to a dichotomous view of the world, the Muslim versus the Infidel, the pious Muhammandan against the Jew, Christian, Hindu, and Atheist. No ethical expressions are allowed for non-Muslims within this bifurcated worldview.
This book goes through what the Muslim texts and theology actually state. And how this has generated 1400 years of Jihad, imperialism and carnage.
The ‘golden age’ of Muhammadan culture never existed ex-nihilo from the Meccan cult. Any ‘advances’ in Muhammadan conquered territories were the efforts, purview, and inspiration of the conquered. Advanced civilisations were simply taken over and Arabicized. Outside of some plants and fruit, very little was ‘seeded’ by Muslims into these advanced states. Many lost technology, agriculture, irrigation and advanced society (North African, parts of Spain, the Balkans under the Turks etc). There is no proof that ex-nihilo the Arab or Turkish Muslims invented anything. Classical pagan learning was long preserved, used, and vastly improved by Christians and Jews and these groups within the conquered territories, passed on the ancient learning and technologies to the new masters.
Muhammadan ‘science’ based on the Koran and Hadiths is about as relevant as the scientism of Corona, Globaloneywarming, Wind Turbine bird choppers, or abiogenesis and ‘big bangs’ where the magic happens. If it can’t be observed, replicated and proven, it is not science but philosophy and many philosophies are ‘philo-doxers’ or Sophistry and arcana with no relevancy. Muhammadan ‘science’ is one such example.
Cosomology
Quran and Hadith state the following:
There are 7 heavens visible from the Earth, Sura 23:86, 67:3, 71:15
There are 7 earths, 65:12, 41:9, Book 44 Hadith 3298
The earth is flat, 20:53, 71:19 (a carpet spread out)
And that apparently, it sits on a whale (link), to wit:
“Muhammad reported from Ahmad, from ibn Mahbub, from Jamil ibn Salih, from Aban ibn Taghlib, from Abu Abd Allah (upon whom be peace), who said, I asked him about the earth: Upon which does it stand forth? To which he replied: It stands forth upon a whale”
The Hadiths were written to explicate and clarify the rather confused jumble that makes up the Quran or ‘Recital’ in English (recite and obey). Bukhari’s Hadiths are deemed by Muhammadan ‘scholars’ to be the most authentic (dating from some 200 years post Muhammad’s murder by his own men in 632 AD, tired of his ‘prophecies’ and self-enrichment). In Book 44 Hadith 3298 we have the curious explanation of heaven and earth as given in the narrative where Muhammad’s acolytes question him on the structure and interaction of the material with the immaterial. Muhammad relates the distance between the heavens as 500 years.
“Al-Hasan narrated that: …. Then he (Muhammad) said: ‘Do you know what is above you?’
They said: ‘Allah and His Messenger know better.’
He said: ‘Indeed it is a preserved canopy of the firmament whose surge is restrained.’ Then he said: ‘Do you know how much is between you and between it?’
They said: ‘Allah and His Messenger know better.’
He said: ‘Between you and it [is the distance] of five-hundred year.’ Then he said: ‘Do you know what is above that.’
They said: ‘Allah and His Messenger know better.’
He said: ‘Verily, above that are two Heavens, between the two of them there is a distance of five-hundred years’ – until he enumerated seven Heavens – ‘What is between each of the two Heavens is what is between the heavens and the earth.’ Then he said: ‘Do you know what is above that?’
They said: ‘Allah and His Messenger know better.’
He said: ‘Verily, above that is the Throne between it and the heavens is a distance [like] what is between two of the heavens.’ Then he said: ‘Do you know what is under you?’
They said: ‘Allah and His Messenger know better.
’He said: ‘Indeed it is the earth.’ Then he said: ‘Do you know what is under that?’ They said: ‘Allah and His Messenger know better.’
He said: ‘Verily, below it is another earth, between the two of which is a distance of five-hundred years.’ Until he enumerated seven earths: ‘Between every two earths is a distance of five-hundred years.’”
The above is difficult to comprehend in the light of 7th century Arabian history. Jewish and Christian communities had long thrived in Arabia and were envied by pagan Arabs. This is one reason for the success of the Muslim Jihad – plunder and wealth of the civilised Infidel. This passage reveals the very obvious ignorance of the average pagan Arab during the 7th century. Greek, Roman, Persian, Babylonian astrology had yet to penetrate beyond the cult shrines of Mecca, of which the Al Lah or moon idol of Baal, was but one example. There were many advances pre- and post-dating Ptolemy (1rst century AD), which quite obviously never filtered their way into Bedouin life. The cosmology of the Quran states a lot about the relatively callous and undeveloped nature of Arab life in the 7th century.
The Muslim Jihad cult hard at work in Nigeria, slaughtering Christians. But non-existent Climate Change from 0.04% gas by weight plant food, and White privilege are what is really important. Notice the mendacity in all reporting. Boko Harem (books forbidden) is a Muslim terrorist group based within the Muslim Fulani tribe. The Fulani tribe and Boko Harem are usually referred to as ‘Terrorists’, ‘Insurgents’, ‘Radicalised’, ‘Militia’, or ‘Gangs’, as often as possible, without mentioning Muhammad’s cult. 2 stories below, with 150 Christians murdered in total (at least) by Muslim Fulanis. Probably scores more taken as slaves. Churches burnt and villages effaced.
Suspected members of Boko Haram terrorists have killed eight villagers in Kautikari village with another one woman (Names withheld) killed near Kwada village in Chibok Local Government Area of Borno state. Reliable Sources and fleeing residents have said.
Vanguard learnt that the armed insurgents invaded Kautikari village which is about 13km drive from Chibok Council/Headquarters and started shooting sporadically, setting ablaze residential houses, after looting foodstuff and livestock.
Recalled that early this year, Kautikari village which shares border with Sambisa Forest was attacked, living seven people dead, after setting ablaze a local church and residential buildings without confrontation.
“Fulani Militants Kill 142 People In Deadly Attacks Across Central Nigeria,” International Christian Concern
On April 10, armed groups of radicalized Muslim Fulani herdsmen simultaneously attacked an estimated ten villages in Nigeria’s central Plateau state.
One hundred forty-two people were killed in the attacks, with an estimated 3,000 now displaced from their homes due to the violence. Of the nearly 70 people abducted, most were women and girls.
Survivors of the attacks stated that the militants arrived in large numbers riding on motorcycles just as people were preparing their farmlands for the rainy season. In addition to killing and abducting villagers, they burned down at least 100 homes, destroyed farmlands, looted barns, and stole livestock….
The targeted communities were settled by Christians and Muslims, and most of the victims of the attack seemed to be the Christian farmers in those communities.
The Fulani, who are majority Muslim…..
I would like to see the ‘International’, UNO, New World Order response to Christian villagers massacring some 5.000 Muslims a year in the ‘middle belt’ in Nigeria. I doubt very much such attacks would be ascribed to ‘militants’ or ‘terrorists’, they would be depicted as a sortie of Christian Crusades, medieval Christian intolerance and a criminal, deformed, demented rejection of the amity and brotherhood of man.
