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2002-09-04 Home Front

ISNA Convention Calls for Self-Reflection, Activism

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Posted by Fred Pruitt 2002-09-04 09:08 am|| || Front Page|| [11130 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 I believe that "Hamza Yusef" was born Mark Hansen, and self-converted to Islam while reading the Koran during convalescence from a car accident. I wish somebody had slipped him a Catechism to read. Seriously, the ISNA convention should have received better coverage.

Posted by Allah the Dog Faced God 2002-09-04 23:29:59|| 2002-09-04 23:29:59|| Front Page Top

#2 refugee issues...what a quaint euphemism, just like the Palestinian "right of return"

Posted by Brian 2002-09-04 12:25:58|| 2002-09-04 12:25:58|| Front Page Top

#3 Its funny how you guys bleat about respect from muslims without dishing any out yourselves. I mean just look at the pathetic name of the imbecile who sent the first post. Your disrespecting God whatever form you follow him in, Allah means the one God , he isnt just muslims god hes the universal god.

Posted by ADAM 2004-09-22 6:08:36 PM|| 2004-09-22 6:08:36 PM|| Front Page Top

#4 Adam,
Allah = Al Ilah, a moon god of old Arabia. It has its origins in Mesopotamian Sin and Cannaanite Baal.

Evidence gathered from both North and South Arabia demonstrate that Moon-god worship was clearly active even in Muhammad's day and was still the dominant cult. According to numerous inscriptions, while the name of the Moon-god was Sin, his title was al-ilah, i.e. "the deity," meaning that he was the chief or high god among the gods. As Coon pointed out, "The god Il or Ilah was originally a phase of the Moon God." The Moon-god was called al-ilah, i.e. the god, which was shortened to Allah in pre-Islamic times. The pagan Arabs even used Allah in the names they gave to their children. For example, both Muhammad's father and uncle had Allah as part of their names.

The fact that they were given such names by their pagan parents proves that Allah was the title for the Moon-god even in Muhammad's day. Prof. Coon goes on to say, "Similarly, under Mohammed's tutelage, the relatively anonymous Ilah, became Al-Ilah, The God, or Allah, the Supreme Being."

This fact answers the questions, "Why is Allah never defined in the Qur'an? Why did Muhammad assume that the pagan Arabs already knew who Allah was?" Muhammad was raised in the religion of the Moon-god Allah. But he went one step further than his fellow pagan Arabs. While they believed that Allah, i.e. the Moon-god, was the greatest of all gods and the supreme deity in a pantheon of deities, Muhammad decided that Allah was not only the greatest god but the only god.

In effect he said, "Look, you already believe that the Moon-god Allah is the greatest of all gods. All I want you to do is to accept that the idea that he is the only god. I am not taking away the Allah you already worship. I am only taking away his wife and his daughters and all the other gods." This is seen from the fact that the first point of the Muslim creed is not, "Allah is great" but "Allah is the greatest," i.e., he is the greatest among the gods. Why would Muhammad say that Allah is the "greatest" except in a polytheistic context? The Arabic word is used to contrast the greater from the lesser. That this is true is seen from the fact that the pagan Arabs never accused Muhammad of preaching a different Allah than the one they already worshipped. This "Allah" was the Moon-god according to the archeological evidence. Muhammad thus attempted to have it both ways. To the pagans, he said that he still believed in the Moon-god Allah. To the Jews and the Christians, he said that Allah was their God too. But both the Jews and the Christians knew better and that is why they rejected his god Allah as a false god.

Al-Kindi, one of the early Christian apologists against Islam, pointed out that Islam and its god Allah did not come from the Bible but from the paganism of the Sabeans. They did not worship the God of the Bible but the Moon-god and his daughters al-Uzza, al-Lat and Manat. Dr. Newman concludes his study of the early Christian-Muslim debates by stating, "Islam proved itself to be...a separate and antagonistic religion which had sprung up from idolatry." Islamic scholar Caesar Farah concluded "There is no reason, therefore, to accept the idea that Allah passed to the Muslims from the Christians and Jews." The Arabs worshipped the Moon-god as a supreme deity. But this was not biblical monotheism. While the Moon-god was greater than all other gods and goddesses, this was still a polytheistic pantheon of deities. Now that we have the actual idols of the Moon-god, it is no longer possible to avoid the fact that Allah was a pagan god in pre-Islamic times. Is it any wonder then that the symbol of Islam is the crescent moon? That a crescent moon sits on top of their mosques and minarets? That a crescent moon is found on the flags of Islamic nations? That the Muslims fast during the month which begins and ends with the appearance of the crescent moon in the sky?

Posted by Memesis 2004-09-22 6:20:30 PM|| 2004-09-22 6:20:30 PM|| Front Page Top

#5 Memesis, You mean it isn't based on Sailor Moon? Shucks!

Wasn't Allah a black rock in some temple (the Kaâaba) in Mecca? I read somewhere that at first the Islamic God did not have a name, then it was 'Ar Rahman' a god foreign to Mecca and then changed to Allah (the Mecca moon god).

Posted by CrazyFool 2004-09-22 6:31:31 PM|| 2004-09-22 6:31:31 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 Ka'aba was worshipped as a Ilah's gift, so a part of the moon-god's cult.

Some segments of Q'uran can be traced to Aramaic apocryphal version of NT that Moe undoubtedly knew, some expressions and etymology poibnt into that direction. So, yes, Moe first incorporated the christian-judaic concept of nameless god, but that wouldn't fly in the polytheistic Arabia well.
Since al-ilah was the predominant deity, Moe simpl adopted it, thus deflecting the resistance against the new idea. Not that he was successfull first. But once he discarded the original core of the judeo-christian codex and replaced it with ideas more appropriate and reflecting the Arab cultural environment, his cult started to take off.

If you analyse Q'uran chronologically, the transformation is clearly discernable. The gradual replacement is also the source of contradictions, which led to different interpretations--the number of sects that existed trough the 1400 years is long.

The typical chronologist sects like Salafis (Wahhabis) maintain that the later suras take precedence over earlier ones. Needless to say that that more later a sura is, the more violence it contains.

That is also becoming the mainstream point of view, as Wahhabi madrassas have been spread far and wide across the globe in the last 50 years and their violent warped version has been imprinted into too many young receptive minds.

Because of that, I believe Islam is not reformable. One day, it would have to be erased completely, else the seeds of it may germinate and sprout again at some point in the future.

How to do it is not certain. It is more probable that a global conflict with everyone involved is in cards. But I don't exclude a possibility of another approach that would involve technology to create what one may call "deux ex machina".

Posted by Memesis 2004-09-22 7:31:08 PM|| 2004-09-22 7:31:08 PM|| Front Page Top

19:31 Memesis
18:31 CrazyFool
18:20 Memesis
18:08 ADAM
22:03 Dan Hartung
20:23 Tony
20:19 Tony
20:02 Allah the Dog Faced God
19:06 Fred
16:54 Jennie Taliaferro
16:45 Wilde
16:42 Fgaines
15:55 R. Simon
12:25 Brian
09:28 Dan Hartung
23:29 Allah the Dog Faced God
22:06 Dan Hartung