Society Religious Discussion and Q&A Thread

[ddadain]

Can human reasoning understand god? Much less the infinite be known by our limited minds?

The site you gave gives similar (heck, almost the same) reasoning used by other religions to claim the existence of a "creator". But the question in hand is WHY Allah is the ONLY god, as your Quran dictates. What discounts all other gods? Your reply is obviously on the presumption that Allah is really the one

No answer to THAT question yet.

Forgive me if I ask another question (and a series of logical sequenced based on the question), you said something very interesting. You mentioned the word trust. Now as I understand the Quran it says that on the day of judgement, your fate would depend on the mood of Allah. Meaning to say, even if you're Muslim, you may not be admitted to paradise, because "Allah was pissed" so to speak ._. How can you trust a person, much less, a god like that? Why should someone become Muslim if it wasn't a sure way to heaven?

 

[TechnoMagus]

thanks for those who tried to answer my question and point me in the right direction. i was hoping for a simple answer like "there is an islamic council and what the most senior and respected clergyman says, goes..." but is seems it's too complicated...

well from the documentaries i've watched and articles read, sunni and shia mainly differed in who is the legitimate successor/authority after mohammed and doctrinal and ceremonial differences came afterwards. i was hoping for a simple answer on the contemporary religious hierarchy but it seems to be too complicated as i've come to realize.

anyways on the subject of religious schisms, sadly there are instances in both islam and christianity itself that one is more tolerant of the other than between different denominations within islam and christianity itself, iraq and northern ireland being prime examples of the latter.

 

[helping]

Belief leaves no room for doubt​

One of the interesting things about the Quran for me is just after the opening chapter it begins with

"This is a book wherein there is no doubt"Surah 2, verse 2

If you believe that Allah is the only god, then state it as so. Tell me why, or show us why YOU believe him.

WHY Allah is the ONLY god, as your Quran dictates

Quran states the God of Muhammad is also the God of Noah, Abraham, Moses and Jesus. But Muhammad is the seal of the prophethood.

So why Allah being the only God? Simplest answer i can give Muslims believe the Quran being the final revelation sent by God.

"God is One. He is the eternal absolute. He begets not was He begotten. There is none co-equal to Him” Surah 112, verse 1-4

And this message (monotheism) is not a new message bought by Muhammad, it’s a message since the time of Abraham.

To put it simply why Allah being the only God? the Quran state it as such and whatever message is in the Quran Muslims believe in it.

Now as I understand the Quran it says that on the day of judgement, your fate would depend on the mood of Allah

Your understanding is wrong, I cant find that statement in the Quran

 

[kiddo7]

Can human reasoning understand god? Much less the infinite be known by our limited minds?

The site you gave gives similar (heck, almost the same) reasoning used by other religions to claim the existence of a "creator". But the question in hand is WHY Allah is the ONLY god, as your Quran dictates. What discounts all other gods? Your reply is obviously on the presumption that Allah is really the one

...

If you are looking for a reply stating facts or reasons backed by logic, then you do not understand one of the basic requirements of most religions: Faith.

 

[ddadain]

kiddo7:

Ooops, I know all about faith, actually.

Read my posts, obviously you haven't.

helping:

Please show me where it states otherwise, that Allah won't just do what he pleases. Isn't your god omnipotent? Where is it [in the Quran] that Allah promises ALL MUSLIMS will be admitted into paradise?

TechnoMagus:

I have to agree with you about your examples of religious hypocrisy. It shows what religion really is for humans. To be used to justify our own desires, and an excuse to kill those we don't want to accept.

 

[kiddo7]

kiddo7:

Ooops, I know all about faith, actually.

Read my posts, obviously you haven't.

Actually I have carefully read every one of your posts in fact, I have read every single post in this discussion and have been reading it since it was started.

1. Knowing about faith and understanding it are two different things.
The way faith works according to my understanding which is based on the Bible (seeing as I am not good so I cannot posses full understanding of faith, like some others claim to)
is that it is belief in things unseen and good hope of things yet to come. In other words, it is a lot like a presupposition in science. Something accepted as true without proof. If we can agree on this definition then your question looses most of its basis. Assuming we can agree on the fact that Islam, like Christianity and Judaism, is a faith based religion then going by the above definition there is no sense in asking for proof of the existence of God, as you yourself have alluded to in your earlier posts.

2. This is a discussion forum, a Q&A for those who seek information. It is not meant as an intellectual battle arena for people to change the beliefs of others or to make converts. Jesus said ask and ye shall receive seek and ye shall find. That is the basic concept behind this thread.
So far the people posting in this thread had no trouble grasping this concept. They came either seeking specific information or attempting to supply what was sought. Somehow you do not seem to fit into either category. You claim you know a lot (from your first post) and you keep asking a number of abstract, partially hypothetical, and philosophically and religiously highly debatable questions. You seem more like you are trying to prove or disprove something or other either to the people here or to yourself. You are in the wrong forum!

3. You claim that anyone who looks at the facts can tell that Islam is not a peaceful religion. I do not wish to comment on that statement. but this much is certain: in this forum ever since you started posting. There have been at least three warnings not to get too aggressive with our posts and to respect each others opinions. In contrast before you came there has been only one or two since the creation of this thread. The Muslims who post here go out of their way to try and give answers that will cause the least possible conflict and to support their claims with quotes form their holy scripture. Whereas you seem to go out of your way to try to generate a response and tell people to look your claims up on Google. If I was an alien that knew absolutely nothing about the religions of this planet. I would be convinced that whatever i is that you believe in, or do not believe in is far less peaceful than Islam.

4.I will state this clearly now lest there be any misunderstanding. I refuse to answer any more of your "questions". They are aimed to provoke, do not seek information, and you will not listen to anything anyone in here has to say anyway(including this post I am writing). You might be entirely right in every point you raise but you present yourself in a way that is inappropriate, shameful, and offensive. I honestly lack the patience to deal with the likes of you and I think the best way to avoid conflict is to make my opinions known then ignore you as until the topic is changed. My God forgive me for my shortcomings.

 

[xi0]

Regardless of whether ddadain has tact or not in what he asks or expresses, this is still a discussion and Q&A thread.

That being said, I'm giving a final warning about this. I understand that this is a controversial subject, but I must say that trying to convince people to not believe in their own respective faith is pointless and waste of time ddadain. If this escalates into an area again where it becomes a problem, this topic will have to be locked temporarily, or it will have to be removed completely.

 

[amar_kun]

thanks for your post kiddo7. and thank also for xio who looking after this forum (and PY as well ), and as a user i would say that both of you did a great job in moderating this thread.

this is the 228th message in this thread, and since its opening in April (5 month ago) there are 5000 views in this thread. the aim is for people to ask about any particular religion and other users will try their best to answer it or link it to some resources in the internet, thus deleting any misconceptions, improving understanding towards each religion, and hopefully creating love between them. (i still remember the first person who ask question was PY, and i hope this thread helps her in any way. )

i would say, for the past 4 month before this fiery arguments started, this thread is very useful for those who sincerely seek query about religion and i would say it is not fair to close this thread just merely because one person.

since the opening this thread, i've made many friends, learn a lot about my religion (since i have to study it to answer ) and learn a lot about other religion (thanks to leen, kiddo7, technomagus) and to be able to find all this in a manga thread are just great.

thanks everybody who read, ask and response in this thread in harmony and peaceful manner.

 

[Optimist]

thanks kiddo7
I also believe that the most important difference between Christian and islam is that
in Christian you have to believe blindly ( i don't know how can they say that in the 21-Century ).
you have to use tour mind to find the truth

In the imagination of most Europeans, Allah refers to the divinity of Muslims, not the god of the Christians and the Jews; they are all surprised to hear, when one takes the trouble to explain things to them, that 'Allah' means 'God', and that even Arab Christians know Him by no other name.

if there were more than one God there would have been confusion in the heavens and in the earth


for your question if all muslims wil go to paradise
well, if you are muslim until the last day of your life, you will go to heaven BUT if you were doing bad things: stealing, lying, cheating,oppressing the weak....don't think you will got similar treat just because you are a muslim ! you have to pay first for what you have done, I think its obvious because God is fair and just

 

[TechnoMagus]

i sure do hope this thread quiets down. please try not to provoke...that goes to everyone. thanks to the muslims who tried to answer questions and to the religious moderates who tried to keep this thread less confrontational.

anyway a special thanks to those who tried to answer my questions. it gave me concepts to work on and research...
thanks to wikipedia, i found this series of topics to help out in similar questions and queries.

Spoiler

Usul al-fiq

Fiqh

• Qur'an and Sunnah
• Taqlid (imitation)
• Ijtihad (interpretation)
• madh'hab (school of law)
• Minhaj (method)
• Qiyas (analogical reasoning)
• Urf (society custom)
• Islamic jurisprudence
• Ijma (consensus)
• Bid‘ah (innovation)
• Madrasah (school/seminary)
• Ijazah (authorisation)
• Istihlal
• Istihsan
• Risalah

Ahkam

• Halaal — legal

• Wajib/Fard — obligatory, duty
• Mustahab — favored
• Mubah — neutral
• Makruh — disliked, abominable
• Haraam — illegal, prohibited

• Baatil — void, incorrect
• Fasiq — corrupt

Scholarly titles

• Marja — ...
• Ulema
• Khalifa
• Mufti
• Qadi
• Faqih
• Muhaddith
• Mullah
• Imam
• Mawlawi
• Sheikh
• Punjabi Shaikh
• Ayatollah
• Mujaddid
• Maulana

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shura

shura was the term i was looking for btw without realizing it... the existence of the similar word sura and sunnah made the distinction harder. >.<

it would help if hopefully there would be more documentaries on discovery channel and the like (where i get my primary info, followed up by research on the net....) to tackle these issues since comparative topics on christianity and the western world abound but there is only a few for the muslim world.

i'm hoping also that there's a shia here so he/she can participate in discussions. but the probability of someone who likes manga and living in iran and iraq makes it quite improbable...

----------------------------------------

anyways, i remembered the question to detect islamophobia...name three muslims you know...guess what's for me?!?

aladdin, ali baba and sinbad!

now why don't we concentrate on what the muslim world has done for the benefit of human civilization? they have safely guarded the classical knowledge by the romans and greeks (together with the greek orthodox byzantines) when the west fell into the dark ages. how about the arabian nights which is a milestone in literature?

like amar who has saladdin as his errr....model (since "idol" would be a very BAD word for it!) another islamic figure to be admired is caliph haroun al-rashid who is potrayed more benevolent and less militaristic by comparison.

 

[amar_kun]

anyways, i remembered the question to detect islamophobia...name three muslims you know...guess what's for me?!?

aladdin, ali baba and sinbad!

mm.. TM, i guess you must watch a lot of cartoon when you're kid, lol

About Haroun Al Rashid

Caliph Haroun ArRashid is one of the Caliph of Abbasid Empire in Baghdad, and during his days (sooo unlikely compared to today) Baghdad is the centre attraction of the word, where scientist, academics, astronomist, chemist, artist, and a whole lot more ppl come to Baghdad. Those was a properity time for Muslim and there are very few wars and the expansion of muslim land also stopped (since they already conquered both east to west).

There is one popular saying from Haroun Ar Rashid, "Oo Cloud. Go anywhere you like, because when you pour your rain, it will grow crop and wealth to my kingdom" (indicating how big his country).

Those days was the time for expansion of knowledge, where muslim academics took book from other ancient cilivillization and translate into arabic, and then the scientist make a lot of discoveries and some of it are still used until today.

However, during the occupation of Monggol army in Baghdad, they used nearly half of the book in the library in Baghdad as a bridge to cross the river in the city, and the river was described "black" due to the amount of ink from those book. Historians say if the book was not destroyed by those Monggol, human will go to Moon a few hundred years earlier than we achieved today.

Nowadays, there is a lot of research being done by historian to unveal again the era which is said "The Dark Ages" by the west because at that same time in Arab region the "Golden Age of Islam" was going on. These historian even say that the "western civillization" must thank for the ancient islam world for what they achieve today.


I found a very interesting documentary made by National Geographic Channel about the time when Islam Rule the Europe. It highlights the advance of science and technology that they have during that time.

When Muslim Ruled Europe (video)

 

[helping]

Firstly thank you all of you for your response especially kiddo's response up there which must have took him a long time to write....and I personally agree with what he said...

It reminds me of what Imam Al-Shafi'i (one of the great scholar of Islam) said

Never do I argue with a man with a desire to hear him say what is wrong, or to expose him and win victory over him. Whenever I face an opponent in debate I silently pray - O Lord, help him so that truth may flow from his heart and on his tongue, and so that if truth is on my side, he may follow me; and if truth be on his side, I may follow him.
Imam Al-Shafi'i

 

[ddadain]

I can understand why you think I'm driving people to unbelief, xi0, but that's not what I mean to do. It really comes down to wanting to know why these people believe in what they say they do. Upon that goal, I ask questions that I think are relevant to the topic of "believing", stuff like dogma, teachings, scripture, text, interpretations, inconsistencies, etc. Nothing I've said is baseless.

If this Q&A Discussion thread is nothing more than:

"Why do the Muslims follow a different calendar?"
"Because they start from a different date!"

or

"Why can we know there's a god"
"Through his creation *insert random website w/ lots of "factual explanations" about the existence of god*!"

Then I think it's better for me not to continue "discussing" here.

Besides, as I love words and meanings, doesn't DISCUSSION mean... discussion? Or did the word change meanings and I am wrong? (for the meaning of the word "discussion" type in "define: discussion" in your Google search bar (without the " ")

I thought "faith" is something personal. If it is, then why can't I ask "personal questions"? Is it so offensive, to the point of rallying people to atheism or to another religion, to ask why they believe? How they think of REAL THINGS in their HOLY BOOKS about their OWN FAITH, and how it seems to contradict what they are saying? We ALWAYS here people reiterate time and again "Islam loves peace" or "What would Jesus do" then we see people blowing themselves up because they think "it's god's will!" or "the clergy raping little boys" or other disdainful things, and I ask if that was really "god's will" or if "Jesus would really do that". Where is salvation to those killed? Where is comfort to the traumatized?

Of course, I can't help but notice how everyone seem to be totally against me Lol. Thank-ing "responses" to my queries and saying "oh, this q&a discussion thread is so harmonious and lovely". You make me YOUR fri*Cough*end

Anyways...



Oh wow!



kiddo7:

In all my posts thus far, I have NOT mentioned the word "faith" (except "crescent faith"... I think) purposefully, because that topic is separate to what I was talking about.

Your understanding (or explanation) of faith is a bit lacking, according to what you quote is your source (the Bible). The Bible says that faith is not merely believing in something unseen or without evidence. In fact, the Bible teaches that you can believe in something and not have faith, but you cannot have faith without believing. You should read more references, especially to the original text (greek version) to have a real understanding of what a verse is talking about, the English translation loses much meaning in terms of degree and such about things. If you think I am offensive, then think of it this way: Jesus offended A LOT of people, Muhammad too. Faith is based on something, or else Demons would also have "faith" in Jesus Christ/Allah/God.

TechnoMagus:

There are a lot of documentaries about Islam/Christianity/Judaism on Discovery/BBC/NatGeo & the internet They don't show them as often, that's all...

Optimist:

So you're saying that Hindus are wrong? That they are confused polytheists? And so is 98+% of all KNOWN religions in HUMAN history? So TACTFUL!

amar_kun:

Of course Muslims have given us such joys as Algebra and Sequences, etc. ;P

xi0:

blah... if you think my posts were "inappropriate" or "tactless"... well... tell me, and I'll edit/remove them... You don't have to close this thread for my "bad bad manners"... ._. And the translator I was talking about agreed to do it... and another translator said he might be willing to do a series if he's shown it and likes it...

 

[xi0]

I'm not in the business of censoring people unless what they say is so offensive and/or pointless/offtopic. All I suggest is to use a little more discretion in how you say what you do. Religion is a sensitive subject, and yes faith is personal, so that's why I was warning you about how you spoke about things.

In a perfect world we could all say whatever we want in a totally unfiltered/unfettered way without having to worry about pissing each other off, but that isn't the case now is it? So it's not going to be that way here either.

 

[ddadain]

you know I wasn't even starting to get rude XD lol

off-topicness~
anyways ;0 What anime is that on your avatar? I've seen it before, but I've forgotten...

 

[xi0]

Come on now you know that you have been rude enough.

BTW: Not an anime. It's a manga called DOGS: Bullets and Carnage. It's based off a sticker that came with an issue of Ultra Jump.

http://www.mangaupdates.com/series.html?id=1380

 

[hunter71485]

... has the flames died down?

no offense to ddadain, he seems to be like me when i was a bit younger -- well, more or less 2 years ago, when i still believe the world is divided between those who will go to heaven and those going to hell....

well, i still believe it, but now i keep my mouth shut on it....

anyways, i got a question :

when a muslim -now will be referred to as you- unknowingly eats pork, and the person who offered it to you knows it is pork, but is ignorant of the laws and teachings that govern muslims, will you have a reason to -well,- be hostile against such person?

my uncle, who is a muslim, even threatened to kill his own son, who is a catholic, named after him... is that reaction dependent on the person involved?

 

[amar_kun]

i hope the flames died down as well, hunter71485

actually, there is no harm for a muslim for accidentally eating a non-halal food. God will forgive us because it was his/her intention to go against God's order (i.e to eat non halal food).

about his furor for such thing, in my opinion, was from his own part. i would highlight that i didnt know ur uncle and ur cousin personally, and maybe before this incident, there was already some crisis between them and this incident is just like igniting oil to cause a big fire. as i said before, it take two to tango. (sorry hunter if i commented too much about ur uncle/cousin case)

as a conclusion, in Islam, between eating pork (for fun) and killing a person (for fun), killing a person would be a greater sin. because the first act will only affect one person health, but the latter act will affect the whole society.

(however nowadays there are a lot of muslims who will get a lot of emotion for not eating pork, but at the same time indulging in other sins, and this also not a teaching of Islam, they just act on their own desire.)
Allah knows best.

 

[xi0]

I used to work with a Muslim man and he explained that the reason they don't eat pork is because the pig is a filthy creature, because he lays in his own filth and consumes his own excrement. Is that how it's indoctrinated that way? Or is there some other explanation. I do know that the true historical reason why Jews don't eat pork isn't because of the pig itself, but because for the longest time pork was prepared incorrectly and consuming it spread trichinosis rapidly throughout communities.

 

[amar_kun]

i found a good article relating to this topic. sorry i dont have much time now so i will post this link for now and i hope all of you will take a look at it

http://www.themodernreligion.com/misc/hh/pork.html

and here is a comic made by a friend of mine regarding a muslim's view on pork

Pork by Wanzu (comic)
http://www.sendspace.com/file/w5c53z (SendSpace)