Criticism of an ideology should not be confused with criticism against people who belong to a community. The best example today is Islam. When you criticize Islam, the Quran or Prophet Muhammad, many people are quick to misinterpret or misrepresent that as hate speech against Muslims. Let me make it very clear that I'm not attacking Muslims in any way when I attack Islam for some of its evils. A frequently encountered argument is: "The real Islam is not what ISIS/Al Qaeda practice. Why do you generalize Islam based on the actions of a few extremists? Their Islam is not our Islam." A few important points to observe here:
1. When I criticize Islam, I'm not criticizing "their Islam" or "your Islam". I'm criticizing the Islamic example that is held in the Quran and the Hadiths. I'm pointing out certain clear evils in the Islamic doctrine (If you think there are no evils, we can talk about it).
2. I know that many Muslims I've met in life are clearly among the most peaceful and nicest people I've ever met. It is true that many people who identify themselves with a religion follow only the good parts of the religion they subscribe to and ignore the evil side. And this is how it should be.
3. However as long as Islam considers the Quran holy and Muhammad as the role model, there will be certain people who follow anything and everything held in Islam. Ultimately, every follower is inspired by the Islamic doctrine and gives their own interpretation to it.
4. Islam is probably the strongest religion today in the sense that its followers are the ones who regard religion in highest esteem overall. This is probably why Muslims (not everyone, but overall) get offended more than others on criticism of religion.
5. The problem with Islam goes well beyond ISIS or Al-Qaeda. Below the extremists who take up arms, comes extremist supporters who don't actually take up arms. Below extremist supporters, comes religious fundamentalists who don't support armed struggle yet support dangerous ideas such as legally executing people for leaving Islam (citing examples of how Muhammad did that in the Hadiths/certain moral examples from Quran). And this is not an insignificant number by any means - look at the support for the Sharia in Saudi, Iran, Egypt, Pakistan, Afghanistan etc. Dangerous ideas such as armed violence don't suddenly crop out of nowhere. They have their roots in Islamic fundamentalism.
6. The common tendency among religious moderates is to pretend that the evil verses/teachings in Islam don't even exist. This solves NOTHING, because Islamic fundamentalists know otherwise - only that they agree with these teachings considering God as a better moral judge.
7. Hence, pointing out moral errors don't work with many of these fundamentalists. What can actually help to deal with these people is to show the scientific/factual errors that clearly exist in Quran/Hadiths so it cannot be the word of God.
8. Another common folly is to assume that holy books don't play a significant role in influencing people's minds compared to social or economic factors (a common argument to disassociate Islam from ISIS). This argument fails because Islam is often considered larger-than-life, especially when it comes to people of middle east. If you are a weakly religious person or an atheist/agnostic in India, it is easy to be ignorant or oblivious of how highly certain sections of people consider religion.
9. Nobody really gets sentimental when harsh statements like "Israel is actually helping ISIS" or "USA doesn't actually want ISIS destroyed" are made, but even on moderate criticism of religion people seem to get offended. Religion should be given the same level of criticism as anything else. Why should Religion be immune to criticism?
10. The first step to solving any problem is to recognize that the problem exists. The less we recognize the existence of a problem, the farther we are away from solving the problem.
2. I know that many Muslims I've met in life are clearly among the most peaceful and nicest people I've ever met. It is true that many people who identify themselves with a religion follow only the good parts of the religion they subscribe to and ignore the evil side. And this is how it should be.
3. However as long as Islam considers the Quran holy and Muhammad as the role model, there will be certain people who follow anything and everything held in Islam. Ultimately, every follower is inspired by the Islamic doctrine and gives their own interpretation to it.
4. Islam is probably the strongest religion today in the sense that its followers are the ones who regard religion in highest esteem overall. This is probably why Muslims (not everyone, but overall) get offended more than others on criticism of religion.
5. The problem with Islam goes well beyond ISIS or Al-Qaeda. Below the extremists who take up arms, comes extremist supporters who don't actually take up arms. Below extremist supporters, comes religious fundamentalists who don't support armed struggle yet support dangerous ideas such as legally executing people for leaving Islam (citing examples of how Muhammad did that in the Hadiths/certain moral examples from Quran). And this is not an insignificant number by any means - look at the support for the Sharia in Saudi, Iran, Egypt, Pakistan, Afghanistan etc. Dangerous ideas such as armed violence don't suddenly crop out of nowhere. They have their roots in Islamic fundamentalism.
6. The common tendency among religious moderates is to pretend that the evil verses/teachings in Islam don't even exist. This solves NOTHING, because Islamic fundamentalists know otherwise - only that they agree with these teachings considering God as a better moral judge.
7. Hence, pointing out moral errors don't work with many of these fundamentalists. What can actually help to deal with these people is to show the scientific/factual errors that clearly exist in Quran/Hadiths so it cannot be the word of God.
8. Another common folly is to assume that holy books don't play a significant role in influencing people's minds compared to social or economic factors (a common argument to disassociate Islam from ISIS). This argument fails because Islam is often considered larger-than-life, especially when it comes to people of middle east. If you are a weakly religious person or an atheist/agnostic in India, it is easy to be ignorant or oblivious of how highly certain sections of people consider religion.
9. Nobody really gets sentimental when harsh statements like "Israel is actually helping ISIS" or "USA doesn't actually want ISIS destroyed" are made, but even on moderate criticism of religion people seem to get offended. Religion should be given the same level of criticism as anything else. Why should Religion be immune to criticism?
10. The first step to solving any problem is to recognize that the problem exists. The less we recognize the existence of a problem, the farther we are away from solving the problem.
(1)Are you judging God?
ReplyDeleteLook at the people all over the world who became a Judge, are they stupid? Don't they require some minimum academic standard to execute their positions? Can it be anybody become Judge? If you have horrible case in court that you accused for something, can you allow any illiterate or primary school dropout became your Judge? In any case/competitions/circumstances etc, the Judge will always have certain minimum criteria/standard of knowledge or experienced to be recognised as the right candidates. And is always 'above'(more experienced++) from the contestant(for entertainment industries), or an expert on the issues he/she is handling. Not vice-versa. Are you wiser than God? But God have created the Universe and what within that if you were to name it each single creation, it'll take volumes of 100/1000 books and month even years to complete! But you till this moment can't create even a piece of hair? You even use the creation of God to think (your brain) yet you want to judge God?! You are lucky God is not human, if God is human, your head might be smashed before you say/type it! There's the difference between a knowledgeable person and ignorant. You might notice in the village, in olden days, when your tv set have problem, you call someone, because everybody call him. When he came, straight away he meddle on the tv set. Turn here and there, cannot, again turn here and there. Cannot, knock the tv here and there. Still cannot, climb to the aerial, bend here and there, cannot knock the aerial. Still the tv set not ok, in fact became worst! Finally, one of the family that owned the tv fill sympathy to him, shake hand(with cash)and tell him its ok, the tv cannot be repaired, the 'technician' left feeling embarrassed and guilty. Actually the so called 'technician' have no knowledge whatsoever with regards to tv let alone solving it correctly. Previously, he solve someone tv set only by chance/luck. He doesn't know what he's doing is wrong, he thaught it was right. A day later someone introduce to the tv set owner a qualified technician. He came, ask few questions, look thoroughly all angles, ask few questions,
think(starring at tv)simple touch +-few seconds, done! The tv set ok, function back to normal! The qualified technicians are so careful on his approach, ask questions to know the situation better, he understand it, solve the problem, all parties happy! The fake 'technician' are so bold in his approach. But his boldness are from his own ignorance. Finally he make matters worst and upset everybody. This is a metaphor of yourself - the difference between a knowledgeable person(qualified technician) and the 'fake' technician of a village guy(example of yourself).
(2)You might don't believe the existence of God, as mentioned in your article your journey to atheism.
If there's a building with 1000 floors, each floors 1000 units, each unit 1000 rooms, each rooms 1000 letter box and I told you, your key I put inside 1 of the letter box. Not even completed searching first floor due to fatigue for few days, you said the key was not there! If you haven't open each letter box on every rooms, every units, every floors, can you say the key is not there? Likewise, you must find God in every corner of the world. Completed, inside the earth. Completed, on every planets. Completed, on every stars. Complete searching God on the entire universe and every inch corner of it internally and externally, then you could proclaim the non-existence of God, otherwise your statement is fraud, invalid, just like you haven't open all the letter box, you proclaim the key was not there! If you want prove of the existence of God(by seing), you must prove the non-existence of God by searching all throughout the earth, planets, stars and entire universe.
(3)Rohit Balakrishnan, science have proof seeing is not believing anymore, this phrase are void/outdated. On the contrary, you will believed even you don't see it! If someone show on phone to you, your mother(I'm sorry)on phonography or killing your brother, can you believe it? Of course not! You know with all the photoshop, software technologies, these all can be created! But if you believed your wife at home(informed you earlier she's at home), nobody can convinced you otherwise even you don't see her really at home. Someone told you to go back home to see whether she's really at home, you don't feel the need, because you strongly believed she's really at home.Therefore the 'eyes' of knowledge is more clearer /sharper/accurate then the eyes itself! If you don't believe the existence of something which exist, you must find it thoroughly to proof that thing really not exist. But if you believed, you don't have to find it physically. Eyes can be mislead, not Knowledge.
ReplyDelete(4) the difference between others talking about our belief and vice-versa is : Other beliefs especially liberalism and atheism does not holds responsibility and accountability, so why criticize? On the contrary, our beliefs comes with responsibility and accountability, that it's our duty towards God to bring 'wrong' to 'right'.(5)Lastly, let settle this RIGHT NOW, to know who is right between us? : In the middle of the night(no single one hear), you say SINCERELY(with humble and low voice(you only hear),(1)If you REALLY sincere to find the TRUTH say, "Oh God who creates the universe, show me your way".(2)If you don't believe in God, say "Oh God, if you exist, take my life now! YOU WILL SURELY FIND THE TRUTH!!!
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