Respecting the Faithful vs. Respecting the Faith
by Raymond
Ibrahim
Pajamas Media
June 3, 2009
http://www.meforum.org/2164/respecting-faithful-respecting-faith
During the pope's recent Mideast visit, the media reported
that he has "deep respect for Islam." That exact phrase appeared in the Associated
Press, AFP,
BBC, Jerusalem
Post, Washington
Times, and Al-Jazeera.
Yet he said no such thing; instead, he mentioned his "deep
respect for the Muslim community." There's a world of difference between
respecting a religious group and respecting their religion, and the
pontiff knows this.
As a Christian — indeed, as pope — by evoking his "deep
respect" for Muslims, Benedict probably meant that Muslims, who believe in
one God, pray, fast, and follow a strict set of moral principles, are,
from a religious perspective, worthy of "deep respect."
Even the non-religious uphold this position. In fact, that
is what makes the secular West unique: the right to follow any (or no)
religion is guaranteed, is "respected."
Due to this, however, a subtle conflation has come to
dominate our way of thinking: respect for people's right to believe
any religion has somewhere along the line — and thanks to political
correctness — morphed into respect for the religion itself
(excluding, of course, cheek-turning Christianity, the secular West's
"punching bag"). It was therefore only natural for the (increasingly
sloppy) media to portray Benedict's respect for Muslims as respect
for Islam.
But is this logical? Does respecting a person's right
to believe necessarily lead to respecting what they believe?
Consider: billions of non-Muslims adhere to other religions
or are simply atheistic; by default, this means they do not believe in the
veracity of Islam. A Christian following Christian doctrine, such as the
Trinity, cannot also believe that the Koran, which fiercely
denounces the Trinity, is the word of God, while an atheist believes all
religions and their scriptures are not divinely inspired (i.e., all
euphemisms aside, are built on lies).
At the same time, however, Christians and atheists cannot
"empirically" prove their position; faith is required — even for the
atheist (accounting for the origins of the universe requires "faith"). As
such, it is only logical that non-Muslims should respect Muslims' right to
believe what they will — and, ideally, vice versa.
But short of truly believing Islam's first premise —
that the Koran is the verbatim word of God and Muhammad his messenger —
how can one "respect" Islam itself, considering it is entirely built
around this assumption? In other words, if you yourself believe a
particular system of belief is built atop lies, how can you personally
respect it?
If the Koran was not dictated by an angel to
Muhammad, what is it? If Muhammad was not sent by God, who was he?
As with all who profess to be men of God, Muhammad must have been either
who he said he was (prophet of God) or else the antithesis: a false
prophet, a fraud. The first possibility is not a logical option for active
non-Muslims. Nor are silly "postmodern" mantras — "just because I
do not believe something does not necessarily mean it is not true,
in its own existential way" — very meaningful.
Of course, this position applies to all religions and their
founders. Without believing that the Bible is the inspired word of God,
everything contained therein becomes suspect, including the person (and
nature) of Jesus. As Christians themselves have long maintained, Jesus can
only be viewed as lord, liar, or lunatic — nothing in between. Likewise,
Muhammad was either messenger, mendacious, or moonstruck. Admittedly, most
people are not comfortable thinking out such thoughts to their logical
conclusions; they're happy to end it with an "it's not for me" attitude,
without any further ado.
So why scrutinize Islam and its founder in the first place?
Because unlike all other major religions, Islam is daily associated with
violence, beheadings, misogyny, child marriage, and hostility for infidels
and their ways. Pseudo-respect from non-Muslims shields it from open
analysis.
Moreover, though non-Christians must ultimately conclude
that either Jesus or (as Islam maintains) the Gospel writers were
deceivers or delusional, the fact remains: As with most religions,
Christianity revolves around the spiritual, the metaphysic; true or false,
it does not intrinsically impose itself on politics. Islam, on the other
hand — as embodied in Islamic law — is politics, indeed, dominates
all aspects of human affairs.
As such, Islam's connection to "unpleasant" daily headlines
becomes clear once non-Muslims allow their thoughts to develop logically
and sequentially. Stripped of its hagiographic veneer, the history of
Islam is the history of a warlord and his followers who conquered,
subjugated, and plundered much of the old world, insisting that God told
them to do it. For Muslims, it is only logical to rationalize this
1,400-year jihad as a means to an end — the establishment of Islamic law,
from a Muslim perspective, the embodiment of all good. Non-Muslims do not
have this luxury and must interpret the origins and essence of Islam a bit
more cynically.
But why this philosophical exposition in the first place? To
show that, while there have been countless talking heads, books, debates,
seminars, and hearings dedicated to evaluating whether Islam is
intrinsically at odds with the modern world, good old-fashioned common
sense could have put the matter long to rest:
After all, do you really find it shocking that a
comprehensive way of life, where right and wrong are meticulously based on
the improvised "law" of a seventh-century warlord — who, according to your
own inevitable conclusions, was an opportunistic liar or deluded
megalomaniac — just so happens to be riddled with complications,
especially vis-à-vis the 21st century?
This seemingly simple consideration has profound
implications. Former Al-Azhar Muslim scholar and imam Mark Gabriel
abandoned his faith by simply musing on such
matters:
Did the true God of heaven give him Islam, or did Muhammad
invent it? ... Did Muhammad express the heart of the true, merciful God,
or did he merely express the dark corners of his own faulty human heart?
The implication shook me to the core: If the true God never spoke to
Muhammad, then I am a slave to the manipulative imagination of a desert
tribesman from the seventh century! These were dangerous thoughts, and I
had crossed a dangerous bridge in my mind that all Muslims are taught to
walk away from.
In closing, let us respect everyone's right to believe what
they will; however, let us at least be sincere to our own convictions.
It's one thing to let political correctness stifle free speech; it's quite
another to let it stifle the development of our very own thought
processes, to the point that we fail to connect such clear dots in the
privacy of our own minds.
And while we're at it, let's not distort the well-measured
words of the pope, who most surely knows the distinction between
respecting the Muslim community and respecting Islam.
Originally published at: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/respecting-the-faithful-vs-respecting-the-faith/
Raymond
Ibrahim is the associate director of the Middle East Forum and the
author of The Al Qaeda Reader, translations of religious texts
and propaganda.
Related Topics: Islam Raymond
Ibrahim |
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