The Ulema is feeling the heat

I saw the following quoted by Frank in the comments at Ezra Levant's. I thought it was a very useful indication of how even a Saudi cleric can't deny the fact that he is enmeshed in a global civil war for hearts and minds, and that he fears a lot of the Muslims are on the side of freedom. Even the most hard-core defenders of a ritualized law and politico-religious practice can't escape a basic fact of reality: to be aware that one's religion is largely ritual is to beg the question of what the original revelation of one's faith was really all about, at its core, and what happened between the initial moment of revelation and its institutionalization in ritual/law. Sure you can proclaim the Koran eternal and uncreated, but is such a belief really going to stand forever a growing awareness of human reality, among those who are aware that Islam is ritualistic?

In other words, a thinking Muslim who values his stake in the faith can't help but think there might be a better way, in our day and age, to re-articulate and express the kernel of truth he so values, the original core of revelation (and not all that he will see as the excresence that came with politics and old tribal codes in Mohammed's day, an excrescence to be shaved away - in the manner of Muslims Against Sharia).

However, the Saudi cleric, Muhammad Al-Munajid, would beg to differ. But doesn't the fact that he has to articulate such a weak argument already show that the emperor is dropping clothes? MEMRI Clip Transcript:

Following are excerpts from an interview with Saudi cleric Muhammad Al-Munajid, which aired on Al-Majd TV on March 30, 2008.

Muhammad Al-Munajid: Some of these heretics say: "Islam is not the private property of anyone." So what do they want? They say: "No sect has a monopoly on Islam." So what do they want? They say: "We want to issue rulings." Someone who is ignorant, who does not know any Arabic, or who has no knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence wants to issue rulings?! They say: "We reinterpret the texts." There is a very dangerous conspiracy against the religion of Islam in newspapers and in what these people say. A journalist, or one of those lowlifes, wants to... These people are a mixture of Western, local, and imported ideologies, but they want to express their views with regard to religious rulings. This is the prerogative of religious scholars, not of ignorant people, the prerogative of knowledgeable people, not of fools or heretics.
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The problem is that they want to open a debate on whether Islam is true or not, and on whether Judaism and Christianity are false or not. In other words, they want to open up everything for debate. Now they want to open up all issues for debate. That's it. It begins with freedom of thought, it continues with freedom of speech, and it ends up with freedom of belief. So where's the conspiracy? They say: Let's have freedom of thought in Islam. Well, what do they want? They say: I think, therefore I want to express my thoughts. I want to express myself, I want to talk and say, for example, that there are loopholes in Islam, or that Christianity is the truth. Then they will talk about freedom of belief, and say that anyone is entitled to believe in whatever he wants... If you want to become an apostate – go ahead. Fancy Buddhism? Leave Islam, and join Buddhism. No problem. That's what freedom of belief is all about. They want freedom of everything. What they want is very dangerous.
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Freedom of thought, within some constraints, is blessed. Islam calls for thinking, for interpretation, and for the use of the mind. But as for freedom of heresy, which allows anyone to criticize whatever he wants in Islam, saying, for example, that he does not like the punishment for apostasy, that he doesn't like the punishment for drinking alcohol, or that he does not like the punishment of stoning adulterers – this is barbarism. They ask: Why should a thief have his hand chopped off? Some of them say that this is "too much." Two-three much on you and your rotten mind. If you abolish this punishment, you will see the rise in thefts. On the other hand, people feel their property is secure because of this punishment.

Covenant, or just Shut Up about my religion!

This is a time when even the Pope in Rome has to decline an invitation to speak at a university because a rabble of scientists can't bear to hear free speech on fundamental questions of human existence from a man who surely knows more about the anthropology that requires us to balance reason and faith, than do the dull-headed materialists whom, I find generally, don't give a moment's thought to why or how every word we speak transcends the merely material existence of grouped sounds or letters. So, I feel it is yet again our duty at this week's Covenant Zone meeting to discuss the secular left's current erosion of free speech in all Western countries. I hope some leftists will some day join us, since there is nothing more important at present, it seems to me, than that the left renew itself and its committment to productive debate and dialogue by covenanting with those whom, at present, the left only writes off as "reactionaries" and "fascists", ignoring entirely what conservatives are really about. No one's freedom can be preserved when rational debate and discussion has collapsed before a pervasive desire to appear the victimized group.

We meet every Thursday in the atrium of the Vancouver Public Library, central branch, in front of Blenz Coffee, wearing blue scarves. Please join us if you can.

In any case, there are a host of items in the blogosphere in regard to free speech fights. Here are a few that have come to my attention. Once again, I feel I must highlight Ezra Levant's fight. If you haven't seen his closing statement to the "Human Rights"/Wrongs Commission of Alberta, please don't miss his call for the Commission to find him guilty, that he may engage real courts in the need to reign in the abuses of our fundamental freedoms in these "Human Rights" Star Chambers.


Will the victim-baiting bureaucrats have the nerve to find Levant guilty, after he has professed his desire to be as offensive as possible to them, to assert a Canadian's right to be offensive in public speech? Will they risk a higher court, public opinion, and hopefully Canadian legislators, reigning them in, or will they admit Levant has a right to be offensive? Ezra has some advice for us on how to get more involved in the fight to protect each other's freedom, the responsibility of every covenanter.

At the least, consider signing this petition against the HRCs.
. The petition was initiated by John Pacheco whose blog is keeping abreast of our free speech fights.

Another good web site for material on the present fight that all Canadians need to engage is Free Mark Steyn!

Rex Murphy showed that he is one of the few journalists in the country who understands that the "Human Rights" Tribunals are not just a threat against those nasty conservatives, but against every and anyone who likes to open his mouth. The relative silence in the Main Stream Media on what is going on in this country's "Human Rights" Tribunals, their unwillingness to discuss the issue pro or con, shows that they have largely conceded any moral authority they once claimed to be free-minded informers of the Canadian public. They are cowards unwilling to fight for a right which while fundamental to everyone, arguably impacts more on their line of work, and the health of their business, than anyone's.

David Warren is one of the few other mainstream journalists who is committed to the fight for our shared freedom. Muslims Against Sharia is also taking a lead in defending Levant. I see their comments throughout the blogosphere.

If we don't all get involved in defending each other's freedom, fighting for the covenant that will make us complete human beings, we will be left with self-righteous busy - bodies to tell us what is and is not permissible speech

Muslims and free humanity against Sharia

I am happy to find a comment from Muslims Against Sharia at one of our November posts.

I'm not sure which member of the group posted that, but it recalled to mind a Front Page interview with Khalim Massoud, president of Muslims Against Sharia:

Most of American mosques are financed and run by Wahhabis. Wahhabi imams are anything but moderate, hence most of religious leaders are radicals. So-called "civil rights" groups, i.e., CAIR, MPAC, ICNA, MAS, etc. that comprise Muslim establishment are nothing more than offshoots of the Muslim Brotherhood and fronts for Hamas and al-Qaeda. They are very well financed and are extremely skilful manipulators of the media. And most of the people in government and media truly believe that those groups are moderate, because they are either too lazy to do research or they choose to ignore terrorist ties.

As a result, when either the government or the media needs an Islamic point of view, Muslim establishment groups are go-to "experts" by default. With the "expert" seat being filled, moderate Muslims are left out.

Another problem with moderate Muslims is they are scared and not organized. They are scared because they cannot speak up in mosques for fear of being kicked out and there are virtually no organizations that represent their views. They are not organized, because, unlike the radical, they do not receive tens of millions of dollars in financial support, therefore they have to work for a living.
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Their strategy is very simple. They constantly claim that they are peaceful and moderate, and Western media is more than happy to repeat that nonsense. They do not praise terrorism in public, but they justify it by playing the Muslim victimhood card. And they are very effective at it.

Many radical organizations have already been exposed by counter-terrorism researchers like Steven Emerson, John Loftus, Rachel Ehrenfeld, Joe Kaufman, Paul Sperry, Zeyno Baran, and many others. The proof that the Muslim establishment is anything but moderate is widely available. However, the government and the media either for political reasons or out of sheer stupidity completely ignore it.

Front Page's Jamie Glazov went on to ask:

I would like to touch on your intriguing point that “the Koran has been corrupted over the centuries, and all we want to do is to revert it as close as possible to the original." Is there any textual support for such a notion? And doesn't this notion run counter to the Islamic doctrine of the perfection of the Qur'an, which insists that the Qur'anic text is the same as it was in the time of Uthman? In light of these considerations, do you think you will gain much support in the Islamic world?

Massoud: We do not have any direct evidence that the Koran has been corrupted over the centuries. However, there is some circumstantial evidence supporting our point. First, if you take two English Korans translated by two different people, the difference could be very substantial. Substantial to the point that the same verses could have completely different meaning. Case in point: a recent arrest of Ghows Zalmay, who, according to the fundamentalists, misinterpreted some verses in the Koran.

Based on these facts, it is reasonable to conclude that when the Koran was copied many times over, the mere mortals who did the copying might have "adjusted" the texts to reflect their personal views, or the views of their superiors.

Second is deductive reasoning. The Koran contains verses that represent mutually exclusive concepts, i.e., human 'life is precious' vs. 'kill the infidels wherever you find them' or 'respect the People of the Book' vs. 'do not take Jews and Christians for friends'.

Allah is infallible and cannot contradict himself, which means that some of those verses are not the literal word of Allah. Also, how can Allah, who is the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate be a source of "kill them [infidels] wherever you find them"?

The only logical explanation is that the Koran we have today was significantly altered.

Glazov was not convinced that Islam could be reformed, pointing out that the violence in the Koran is not incidental to the transcendent meaning of the text, but fundamental to it, a fact confirmed by all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence in their calls for the Muslims to subjugate the infidels to the Ummah. Glazov also notes that Massoud's arguments about contradictions in the Islam seem to be answered by the mainstream's doctrine of abrogation - the later verses of the Koran supersede the earlier, more pacific, ones. Read the rest of the interview, to decide whether Kalim Massoud gives answers that are likely to convince a large number of Muslims who want to live in peace with modernity and its freedoms.

In any case, the comment we received yesterday is full of links to the project of Muslims Against Sharia to provide a reformed version of the Koran, rid of all verses "that promote violence, divisiveness, religious or gender superiority, bigotry, or discrimination". They want readers to check out their reformed version of the Koran and to let them know (koran@reformislam.org) if they are failing in their mandate to rid the Koran of violence. There's a project that could make use of certain bloggers we know.

As anyone who has read the Koran knows, this will not be an easy task. The curses directed towards the unbelievers are ubiquitous in that book, and the more explicit denunciations of the infidels are common.

In any case, Muslims Against Sharia left us with a link,
In Memoriam of Aqsa Parvez.

The recent Canadian media coverage of the Parvez murder is full of all the sins that Massoud discussed at the opening of the Front Page interview; the media seemingly take the words of Islamist front groups that this was "just a horrific incidence of domestic violence" that Muslims condemn, and "nothing to do with religion or Islam", at face value. For example, even when the media reports they are being manipulated, so as to not be able to attend and report on Aqsa's funeral, they still take the blather of CAIR at face value: ""We're not here to talk about religion or culture - it has nothing to do with it - we're just here based on the fact that she lost her life and we just want to work toward stopping this from happening in the future," Ms. Dadabhoy said."

Of course anyone who thinks an honor killing over a daughter's desire to escape from the Islamist dress code has nothing to do with religion is being intentionally disingenuous. The media should just dump the commentators from groups like CAIR, and make people like Khalim Massoud their go-to guys when they need an example of moderate Muslim opinion. And let the CAIR warriors cry to they're wet that people like Massoud are not real Muslims.

As David Warren comments, there are other girls in Canadian society trying to free themselves of Islamic strictures who, like Warren's friend "Harata", know full well "That [Aqsa] could have been me." Anyone with a grain of integrity will want to protect these girls. And that means stopping in their tracks the Saudi-funded apologists for orthodox or "radical" Islam that pervade North American mosques.

Dag wrote a long post on this topic on Saturday at No Dhimmitude.

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