Anastasios posted them a few posts back in this thread. They were very helpful in confirming that my own flawed understanding wasn't so different from what the comments stated. If you'll read my post again, you'll notice that I was trying to post passages in context rather than single verses. Before posting, I read the whole Surahs as well as at least some of the supporting Hadith.Mujahid Mohammed said:Where is the tafsir of the ayat. Stop picking out single verses that support what you say according to your limited understanding of Islam.
I am a Believer. I submit my soul and mind only to God, not to a religion and not to people. I am not a believer of Islam, so to you, yes I am a disbeliever/infidel. I do not submit to Muslims (including my own brother in law). So yes, if I were living in Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia or any of the other primarily Islamic countries, I would likely be a martyr by now.Mujahid Mohammed said:Are you a disbeliever. Do you do the things Quraish did to him to people you know. IF YOU DID YOU WOULD BE IN JAIL OR GIVEN CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. e
Why does not having the muslim label make it unimportant that my knowledge and understanding is not the same as yours? Don't you think it's just as important, if not even MORE important that an infidel who is learning about and challenging the PC claims of your religion to have a 'proper' understanding of the religion?Mujahid Mohammed said:If you sincerely want to know the reason I will help you but if not then you will as everyone else make claims unjustly for you do not have the proper knowledge and it is not your fault. You are not muslim so it is not important. And you probably get your information from a partially reliable source.
If I claimed to be a muslim and interpreted the Quran and supporting commentaries the same way I am now, which is very much in line with millions of Muslims worldwide, would that make my claims valid? You and other apologists are trying to refute those claims by saying that Islam is all about peace. Rather than correcting my flawed understanding, you just tell me that my knowledge is inclomplete. This does nothing to change my understanding, other than to confirm that I've hit a nerve.
I am claiming that the peace achieved by killing or forcing submission from those who don't believe in Islam is not just and it's not true peace. Peace under the threat of being blown up or beheaded or jailed or beaten is not peace. You and other apologists are trying to refute those claims by saying that Islam is all about peace.... so we go round and round and round. You pick out invidual verses that say Islam is peace and I refute them by picking out passages that show violence is justified and encouraged. I say neither is the whole picture. You say I'm making silly claims and attacking Islam. How can my understanding ever be complete when the only answers I can get from actual muslims are biased?
The information I'm getting is from reading the Quran (translations of course), hadiths, and now the commentaries as linked for me by Anastasios. If I read a claim on a website (whether pro- or anti-Islam), I go to the source texts (Quran and Hadith) to read the text for myself and come to my own conclusions based on what the text itself says. I have found that simply reading someone else's biased statements never explains the whole picture.
That's what I've been trying to do. Trouble is - everywhere I turn except for the Quran and Hadith themselves is biased. Those who want to tell me what the 'truth' really is either want to whitewash over the negative and only show me the PC parts that promote 'peace' or they only want to tell me how the Quran requires Muslims to fight the non-believers until the whole world is under Islamic rule. I don't think either biased view is the whole truth about Islam, though.Mujahid Mohammed said:I am ready to teach you if you are ready to learn the truth about Islam.
So MM - which 'truth' will you teach me? Is it the same politically correct 'Islam is peace' bias that so many apologists want me to believe. I want to learn what Islam is REALLY teaching and why those Muslims who want to see the entire world under Islamic rule find that so easy to justify by the teachings of the religion. If you want to be honest with me and show me ALL of the true Islam, then I'm willing to let you teach me. If you simply want to show me the PC Islam and gloss over or ignore the parts that justify attacking another nation (under the proper 'rules' of course), then how can I know that what you are teaching me is unbiased?