Sincerity of Arwa is beyond doubt but ...

Submitted by Prashant (United States), Jan 19, 2012 at 10:04

Dear Dr Pipes:

The sincerity of the reader Arwa from Saudi Arabia when she responded to the article about marrying Muslim men is beyond doubt. Arwa said that she knows Islam well, Islam is good and perfect, and the muslim men who mistreat women know nothing about Islam.

I think the "Islam is perfect" idea is the act of denial that good Muslim people use to reconcile the bad that goes in the name of Islam around the world. The arguments like "Islam is good and terrorists and other people who do bad things in the name of Islam are not true Muslims" can be used to justify almost anything. All religious texts say some good things and some bad. So do the Islamic texts. If every muslim follows just the most liberal interpretation of what is good in Quran, there will no problem. But the previous argument attempts to protects Islam as perfect and, instead, puts the blame for bad actions on the Muslims who do the bad things. In reality, Muslims who do bad things --be it terrorists or the men who exploit women-- take their inspiration from many questionable things in the Islamic religious texts (such as don't make friends with Jews and Christians)

Even if we grant that Islam is perfect and it is just some muslims who become untrue and imperfect, it entails that Islam and the Islamic societies have failed miserably in keeping the followers of Islam good.

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