Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About The “Religion” Of Islam

[PearlHowardman]

Muhammad and his band of immigrants arrived in Medina in 622 completely dependent on the hospitality of the three Jewish tribes that lived there alongside the Arabs. In less than two years, two of the tribes that had welcomed him, the Banu Qaynuqa and the Banu Nadir would be evicted, losing their land and their wealth to the Muslims as soon as their guests gained the power to conquer and confiscate. Muhammad accomplished this by deftly exploiting his opponents divisions.

 

Muhammad chose the order of the doomed tribes carefully. He knew that the other two tribes would not come to the assistance of the first, for example, since they had been aligned against one another in a recent war. He also knew that the third would not assist the second - due to a dispute over "blood money."

 

The last tribe to remain was the Banu Qurayza. Like the others, the Qurayza were a peaceful community of farmers and tradesmen who eventually surrendered to Muhammad without a fight. Although the prophet of Islam had been wise enough not to order the wholesale slaughter of the first two tribes following their defeat (which certainly would have stiffened the resistance of the Qurayza), there was no practical reason for Muhammad to repress his genocidal urges once the last tribe had surrendered their wealth and power.

 

Over 800 surrendered men and boys (and at least one woman) from the Qurayza tribe were beheaded by Muhammad in a bloodbath that is of acute embarrassment to today’s Muslim apologists. It is an episode that is not only completely at odds with the idea that Islam is a religion, but also the claim that it is the heir to Christianity, since even that religion’s most dedicated critics could hardly imagine Jesus and his disciples doing such a thing.

 

It is only in modern times, as Islam finds itself having to compete with morally mature religions in open debate, that the story of the massacre has become controversial. Some Muslims deny the episode, largely on the basis of mere inconvenience. Others are unaware of it altogether. But, not only is the incident well documented in the Hadith and Sira (biography of Muhammad), there is even a brief reference to it in the Qur’an (verse

).

 

Since Islam makes no apologies, particularly for anything that Muhammad personally did, contemporary Muslims generally try to convince themselves that the victims of Qurayza deserved their fate. They must have turned on the Muslims in battle and inflicted many deaths, forcing Muhammad to yield to the wishes of his people and respond in kind.

 

Unfortunately, the accounts of what happened, as related to the early Muslim historians by eyewitnesses, do not support this myth. In fact, it was the Qurayza who were caught in an impossible situation at the time between the Muslims and their Meccan adversaries.

 

Shortly after arriving in Medina in 622, Muhammad began raiding the merchant caravans traveling to and from neighboring Mecca. He would steal their property and kill anyone who defended it (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 424-425). The Jews of Qurayza had nothing to do with this. Much like the Meccans, the Jews were also traders and they appreciated the value of security in doing business. They neither encouraged Muhammad’s raids nor shared in his ill-gotten gain.

 

After a few years of this, the Meccans eventually realized that they would have to try and capture Medina, since it was being used as a base of operations by Muhammad and his murderous pirates. In 627, they sent an army to the outskirts of the city and appeared poised to take it in what has been called the Battle of the Trench (the Muslims dug a trench around the exposed northern and western parts of the city to stop the Meccan military advance).

 

The Qurayza, who lived to the east of Medina, were thus caught in a bad situation. Not responsible for Muhammad’s war, they were nonetheless drawn into it, particularly when they were approached by a Meccan leader and asked not to assist Muhammad in his defense against the siege (to that point, the Qurayza had contributed digging tools to the Muslims, but not fighters).

 

The chief of the Qurayza did not wish to even entertain the Meccan envoy, but he was tricked into allowing him into his home (Ishaq/Hisham 674). Once there, the Meccan began making his case that the battle was going against Muhammad and that his fall was imminent. The anguish of the Qurayza chief over the trying circumstances of the position that he felt forced into is noted even by Muslim historians:

 

When Ka'b heard of Huyayy's coming he shut the door of his fort in his face, and when he asked permission to enter he refused to see him, saying that he was a man of ill omen... Then Huyayy accused him of [being inhospitable]... This so enraged Ka'b that he threw open his door. [Huyayy] said to him, "Good heavens, Ka'b, I have brought you immortal fame and a great army... They have made a firm agreement and promised me that they will not depart until we have made an end of Muhammad and his men. "Ka'b said, "By God, you have brought me immortal shame and an empty cloud while it thunders and lightenings with nothing in it. Woe to you Huyayy, leave me as I am." (Ishaq/Hisham 674)

 

After much “wheedling” by the Meccans, however, the Qurayza leader finally gave in and agreed to remain neutral in the conflict. He would neither contribute troops to the city’s defense nor to its impending capture at the hands of an army with superior numbers. The Muslims would be left on their own to deal with the conflict they had started with the Meccans.

 

The first twenty days of the conflict passed "without fighting" (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 676) other than a few exchanges of arrows across the trench. A half-hearted effort on that day to breach the defenses proved fatal to the Meccan, thus convincing their leader that they could not win unless the Qurayza joined the battle from the other side. However, the Qurayza refused, ironically enough, thus prompting the Meccans to immediately abandon the siege.

 

With the battle over, however, Muhammad surprised his army by turning them against the Qurayza fortress, claiming that the neutrality of the leader was a breach of the original constitution of Medina which the prophet of Islam had personally drawn up for the tribes five years earlier. The original language of this 'treaty' is not known, however, and later guesses as to what it might have said seem suspiciously tailored.

 

It is unlikely, for example, that the tribes of Medina would have given Muslims the right to slaughter them for merely speaking out against him, yet several prominent Jewish leaders and poets had been assassinated on Muhammad’s order prior to the Qurayza affair. At least one innocent merchant was slain by his Muslim business partner following Muhammad’s order in 624 for his men to “kill any Jew who falls into your power” (al-Tabari

). Muhammad had also attacked the two other Jewish tribes – parties to the same agreement – looting their property and then evicting them from their land.

 

There is little doubt that the troubles Muhammad brought on Medina, through his mistreatment of the Jews and his relentless pursuit of hostilities against the Meccans, were a part of the sales pitch made by the Meccans to the Qurayza leader to win his neutrality - along with the implicit threat of slaughter if the city were taken by the Meccans. From Kab's perspective, it would only be a matter of time before Muhammad found an excuse to attack and plunder his tribe as well.

 

Contrary to popular misconceptions, however, the Qurayza had not attacked the Muslims. In fact, had they attacked, then it surely would have been the end of Muhammad and his band of pirates since the southern end of the city was completely exposed to the Qurayza. In a terrible irony, it was the decision not to engage in violence that later sealed the fate of the Jews, who were only the first in a very long line of victims to horribly overestimate the value that Islam places on the lives of unbelievers.

 

According to Muhammad, it was the angel Gabriel (seen only by himself, of course) who ordered the siege on the Qurayza. After twenty-five days of blockade, the Jews gave in and surrendered to the prophet of Islam. As Ibn Ishaq/Hisham puts it, they “submitted themselves to the Apostle’s judgment” (Ishaq/Hisham 688).

 

Another misconception is that Muhammad did not render the death sentence against the Qurayza and was therefore not responsible for it. There is a partial truth in this, in that Muhammad clearly attempted to offload responsibility on another party. However, from the narrative, it is obvious that Muhammad clearly approved of the subsequent massacre - a fact further verified both by his choice of "arbitrator" and his subsequent reaction.

 

First, the prophet of Islam tricked the Qurayza by getting them to agree to put their fate in the hands of "one of their own." In fact, this was a Jewish convert to Islam, a Muslim who had fought in the Battle of the Trench. Unbeknownst to the Qurayza, Sa’d bin Muadh had also been one of the few Muslims fatally injured in the battle (Ishaq/Hisham 689), which one can reasonably assume to have influenced his judgment. According to the Hadith, he was quite eager to continue slaying "unbelievers" even as he lay dying in his tent (Bukhari

8).

 

Secondly, when Sa’d did render his decree that the men of Qurayza should be killed and their women and children pressed into slavery, Muhammad did not express the slightest bit of disapproval. In fact, the prophet of Islam confirmed this barbaric sentence to be Allah’s judgment as well (Bukhari

8).

 

Consider the contrast between the historical Muhammad and the man of “peace and forgiveness” that today’s Muslims often assure us that he was. In light of the fact that the Qurayza had not killed anyone, wouldn’t a true man of peace have simply sought dialogue with them to try and determine their grievance, find common ground and then resolve the matter with dignity to both parties?

 

Instead, Muhammad had the men bound with rope. He dug trenches and then began beheading the captives in batches. In a scene that must have resembled footage of Hitler’s death squads, small groups of helpless Jews, who had done no harm to anyone, were brought out and forced to kneel, staring down at the bodies of others before their own heads were lopped off and their bodies were pushed down into the ditch.

 

There is some evidence that Muhammad personally engaged in the slaughter. Not only does the earliest narrative bluntly say that the apostle “sent for them” and “made an end of them,” but there is also support for this in the Qur’an. Verse

says of the Qurayza, “some you slew, some you took captive.” The Arabic "you: is in the plural, but the Qur’an is supposed to be Allah’s conversation with Muhammad, so it makes no sense that he would not be included.

 

In any event, there is no denying that Muhammad found pleasure in the slaughter, particularly after acquiring a pretty young Jewish girl (freshly "widowed" and thus available to him for sexual servitude) (Ishaq/Hisham 693).

 

Boys as young as 13 or 14 were executed as well, provided that they had reached puberty. The Muslims ordered the boys to drop their clothes. Those with pubic hair then had their throats cut (Abu Dawud 4390). There was no point in trying to determine whether or not they were actual combatants because there were none. There had been no combat!

 

Muhammad parceled out the widows and surviving children as slaves to his men for sexual servitude and labor. The wealth accumulated by the Qurayza was also divided. Since the tribe had been a peaceful farming and trading community, there were not enough weapons and horses taken to suit Muhammad’s tastes, so he obtained more of these by trading off some of the Qurayza women in a distant slave market (Ishaq 693).

 

Yet, there has never been, nor will there ever be in the future, an apology from those who follow Muhammad, since the massacre of infidels was the example personally set by their prophet at Qurayza.

 

http://www.thereligi...-mu-qurayza.htm

[Jim in Anchorage]

Interesting. Expect many references to the crusades and the inquisition to follow. In the name of fairness.

[DC Tom]

Interesting. Expect many references to the crusades and the inquisition to follow. In the name of fairness.

 

If he's going to go all the way back to 622 for "proof" that Islam is evil, the Crusades and Inquisition are an entirely appropriate response.

[Security]

All the old stuff is completely stupid to use as reference. I care about human rights of today, and the biggest evil of today, and that is radical Islam. Closely followed by Putin with no shirt on.

[OCinBuffalo]

Didn't Jews also reject the idea that Jesus was a true prophet of God? Its nice that they could put aside that minor technicality and find some common ground.

This thread sucks, but I can't let this one go by. This is wrong. I work with Orthodox Jews and have known many for 10+ years now.

 

They seem to feel a need to tell me stuff, and I listen. From what I've heard: they believe that Jesus was an Orthodox Rabbi, and a model one at that. They believe that he may very well have been visited by God/angels. However they believe his disciples committed a massive fraud: they bastardized his teachings and his life for their own personal gain. And, they threw the Jews under the bus in doing so, by blaming them for Christ's death, when it was obvious the Romans were going to kill him anyway.

 

The Jews say: The Romans just wanted to attach false propriety to a summary execution, and the apostles needed a vehicle to convert people. What better than "Christ Killer"? So, the apostles went along with the Roman propaganda, because it also has the side benefit of absolving Romans from wrongdoing(agan, conversion-friendly). Thus, the Jews get the short end of the stick....and in the longest of runs? The Pope lives in Rome.

 

I could of course poke many a hole in this logic, and many here can too, such as why would somebody do all this when it only ends with signing up to be executed, like most of the apostles were...but...I don't because "the client is always right, at lunch, talking about things that have no bearing on my project".

Edited January 23, 2014 by OCinBuffalo

[4merper4mer]

 

"the client is always right, at lunch, talking about things that have no bearing on my project".

 

Unless he order the Gehachte Leibe, in which case.....gross.

[Jauronimo]

This thread sucks, but I can't let this one go by. This is wrong. I work with Orthodox Jews and have known many for 10+ years now.

 

They seem to feel a need to tell me stuff, and I listen. From what I've heard: they believe that Jesus was an Orthodox Rabbi, and a model one at that. They believe that he may very well have been visited by God/angels. However they believe his disciples committed a massive fraud: they bastardized his teachings and his life for their own personal gain. And, they threw the Jews under the bus in doing so, by blaming them for Christ's death, when it was obvious the Romans were going to kill him anyway.

 

The Jews say: The Romans just wanted to attach false propriety to a summary execution, and the apostles needed a vehicle to convert people. What better than "Christ Killer"? So, the apostles went along with the Roman propaganda, because it also has the side benefit of absolving Romans from wrongdoing(agan, conversion-friendly). Thus, the Jews get the short end of the stick....and in the longest of runs? The Pope lives in Rome.

 

I could of course poke many a hole in this logic, and many here can too, such as why would somebody do all this when it only ends with signing up to be executed, like most of the apostles were...but...I don't because "the client is always right, at lunch, talking about things that have no bearing on my project".

Jews think Jesus is a real mench, but they don't think hes the son of God. You start by telling me I'm wrong and then go on to validate my point in more detail. You almost did so without talking about yourself and your work. All in all, one of your better posts.

[DC Tom]

You almost did so without talking about yourself and your work.

 

Almost.

 

There's narcissists out there that would read an OC post and say "Dude, you have serious !@#$ing issues."

[OCinBuffalo]

Almost.

 

There's narcissists out there that would read an OC post and say "Dude, you have serious !@#$ing issues."

It's hilarious that you don't see.....nope...not gonna tell you.

 

But, by all means, continue. Far be it from me to do anything to prevent you from stepping in it over and over.

 

Jews think Jesus is a real mench, but they don't think hes the son of God. You start by telling me I'm wrong and then go on to validate my point in more detail. You almost did so without talking about yourself and your work. All in all, one of your better posts.

Since when do the words "son of God" = the words "true prophet of God"?

 

Now way dingleberry.

 

Notice how you changed what you "said", so now...you're not "wrong"?

 

Come now, you're dealing with me here. Perhaps you need to be reminded what I do, and why what I do can only be done by people who are infinitely smarter than you are?

 

Edited January 23, 2014 by OCinBuffalo

[Jauronimo]

It's hilarious that you don't see.....nope...not gonna tell you.

 

But, by all means, continue. Far be it from me to do anything to prevent you from stepping in it over and over.

 

 

Since when do the words "son of God" = the words "true prophet of God"?

 

Now way dingleberry.

 

Notice how you changed what you "said", so now...you're not "wrong"?

 

Come now, you're dealing with me here. Perhaps you need to be reminded what I do, and why what I do can only be done by people who are infinitely smarter than you are?

 

Since when do they have to mean the same thing for both of my statements to be true? Are you implying consensus amongst the chosen people in regards to their views on Jesus?

[Justice]

While we're on this subject I need to ask a question. Why is Jesus (pbuh) considered God's son and not Adam?

[Azalin]

While we're on this subject I need to ask a question. Why is Jesus (pbuh) considered God's son and not Adam?

I'm only guessing here, but I'd say that God creates his direct progeny via virgins, where mere mortals were formed from clay, and a rib.

[TakeYouToTasker]

While we're on this subject I need to ask a question. Why is Jesus (pbuh) considered God's son and not Adam?

Much of the Bible is written in parable, as was customary in Jewish culture of the time. Adam, litterally speaking, did not exist.

[Justice]

 

Much of the Bible is written in parable, as was customary in Jewish culture of the time. Adam, litterally speaking, did not exist.

 

So Adam, per se, didn't exist. How was man initially created according to Christianity or Judaism? Were they created in bunches all at once or did God only make one man and one woman at first?

[TakeYouToTasker]

 

 

So Adam, per se, didn't exist. How was man initially created according to Christianity or Judaism? Were they created in bunches all at once or did God only make one man and one woman at first?

God fostered evolution, as if we "came from the clay". "Adam and Eve" are used to create a visual representation that man can easily visualize and embrace.

[Koko78]

While we're on this subject I need to ask a question. Why is Jesus (pbuh) considered God's son and not Adam?

 

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/23/justice/kansas-sperm-donation/index.html?hpt=hp_c2

 

Because God didn't use a qualified physician with Jesus.

[3rdnlng]

http://www.cnn.com/2....html?hpt=hp_c2

 

Because God didn't use a qualified physician with Jesus.

 

Now that's just FUBAR.

[OCinBuffalo]

Since when do they have to mean the same thing for both of my statements to be true? Are you implying consensus amongst the chosen people in regards to their views on Jesus?

Since you said one, and then changed it to the other?

 

Look, I don't care. All I did was tell you what I've heard, it's not to bust on you.

 

Regarding consensus? Here's my hypothesis, based on the behavior I've observed: If you put a "regular" Jew in a room with an Orthodox one, and asked both what they thought about this? The regular Jew would defer to the Orthodox guy, and he would tell you what I've said, probably around 9/10 times.

 

Largely because: the regular guy now hates you for putting him in this room, and asking that or any other question like it. I imagine regular guy might even start heading for the doors/windows 8/10 times, because he doesn't want this experiment to turn into a 5 hour, guilt-ridden diatribe on the various ways he sucks at being Jewish. The 2/10 times? That's the poor bastards who don't know yet.

God fostered evolution, as if we "came from the clay". "Adam and Eve" are used to create a visual representation that man can easily visualize and embrace.

One thing I know to be true:

The people who quote the Bible literally, and not largely as parable, as a way to enforce their Christian view upon others

are eqally as dopey as

The people who quote the Bible literally, and not largely as parable, as a way to enforce their atheist view upon others

 

It's just common sense: how would you explain evolution or DNA seeding to a caveman, or a guy who just figured out animal husbandry 2 days ago? Christ, we can't get the relatively basic concepts of "cost" or "falsification of a theory" through to some of the supposedly evolved here.

 

You wouldn't. Instead, you'd use a metaphor. God is all-knowing. Therefore it's fairly easy for us to assume an all-knowing entity...

 

...would know his audience.

Edited January 24, 2014 by OCinBuffalo

[4merper4mer]

 

It's just common sense: how would you explain evolution or DNA seeding to a caveman, or a guy who just figured out animal husbandry 2 days ago?

 

Why would you drag The Big Cat and his Golden retriever into this already crazy thread?

[DC Tom]

Now that's just FUBAR.

 

Easy way to win that case: sue for custody of the child.