A matter of opinion only

Submitted by gttm (United States), Oct 24, 2013 at 14:42

Dear Abhi,

You wrote a thoughtful and wise response. However the same introspection you exhibit should allow you to consider the following. You are grafting your own expectation and ideals onto the persona of Muhammad. Those two need not necessarily be the same. You believe in a kinder gentler, world, and, say, a set of values and spiritual ideals. let us term them X. To assume that those are universal, have universal merit, and necessarily would have been espoused by him or indeed should be espused by anyone, is to say that the world should submit to system X. Perhaps Muhammad was inclined to soe system Y, or Y & Z, & W, simultaneously.

Your assumptions, of love, peace, harmony, etc. in the way YOU have chosen to visualize them, being the bedrock of all religions, or any religion, is not logically true. Have you studied the Kalachakra Tantra, a Vajrayana Buddhist Tantra, generated in response to the carefully-planned destruction of the Vikramshila Vihara by the invading Islamic forces? It is wrong to suppose that these forces were ever ignorant or unschooled. Quite the contrary, because like any other successful conqueror, e.g. Genghis Khan's Subotai, they were led by exceptionally abel generals who would not move without highly accurate intelligence concerning every possible aspect of the land that lay before them; this included all aspects of the culture, religion etc., anything at all that would or might impinge on military success. Indeed, Cortez, with a mere handful of men defeated the Atec empire simply because he carefully studied the social and political weaknesses therein after landing, and indeed, fed his men from the royal largesse of corn cakes every day thrown down from the walls to indigents. The British, too, carefully familiarized themselves with minute issues of the various courts and intrigues between Muslim nobility and Hindu subjects, to gain unsurpassed advantages in Bengal and in other places. SO, NO ONE is ever blind or stupid, and none ever work without extreme premeditation.

When we consider the events of Muhammad's life, e.g. the DETAILS surrounding the BANI QURAYZ, for which you should contact the PIPES organization and educate yourself THOROUGHLY, you will lose much of your asinine Indian attitude of hastening to compromise with anyone, believing that is the right path, and ascribing the noblest intentions to them. You are completely mistaken about the Ramayana and Mahabharata and demonstrate your illiteracy, since you are unable to parse the nuanced ways in which these texts are composed. They are describing two TOTAL WARS, dharmayuddhas, Jihad, in times past, and why these happened, seen throught the eyes of various participants. They are NOT laying down prescriptions for the world saying things like this: Direct messages from the Prophet of God, if refused are punishable by death. Have you thought about this, or know this? You are a fool, an ignoranus, who thinks he knows all when he knows naught, and an infinitely dangerous one for imposing your moral equivalence between systems and pretending a sagacity when you are most dangerous interlocutor.

In the case of the Bani Qurayz, a Jewish tribe, among other things they were accused of, including a labyrinthine argument of breach of contract, was that they were unmoved by a DIRECT VERBAL APPEAL or FIAT from the ONLY TRUE messenger of "God". This became the necessary and sufficient condition for theoir death sentence, and this clause has been upheld in later times: wajib-ul-qatl if you refuse to obey the direct command of the nabi to convert, or to do something else he has seen fit.

It is not a question of a "few verses in the Quran" but of the fundamental or the canonical ones. Go to Quran 8:55-57. Here "Allah", which for a Hindu, should NEVER be accorded the equivalence of God, for reasons you can come and ask me, since you are not informed about Shastra. Here the angel Gabriel is allegedly quoting this Allah and in turn Muhammad is allegedly repeating correctly those words. Go, read and understand the meaning. The passages are saying that only Muhammad is the true messenger, all previous messages are corrupted, and this is the final message which if not believed is going to land people into serious trouble because this Allah is angry and is going to judge everyone with severity.

Now, if you claim to be Hindu, you have a choice. You can either take these words to be true, and believe in Allah, Muhammad and Qayamat OR you can accept this,t he words of the SrimadBhagAvad [and I am not a Vaishnav, but a Vaidika and kaula, so a neutral arbiter here] : 1) kecit ca amsha cA kalA kRShNastu bhagavAna svayam; 2) speaking about the teachers of the avadhUta, "avatArAh hi asamkhayoyAH. Meaning 1) Some are amsha, part, some are kalA, partial aspect , but KrShNa is God Incarnate. Muhammad has claimed that the great avataras like Trailanga Swami, Sri Shankara, Sri Chaitanya, Ma Anandamayi, and hundreds of others of the past, present, and future are imperfect, flawed, and untrue. So you must be joining voices with this guy and also calling them false, imperfect and full of bullshit, and those who revere them destined to be condemned by this Allah!

So PLEASE clearly make your CHOICES NOW AND STICK BY THEM! Because, tens of millions of bhaktas have died for their beliefs and faith in those same avataras, and for simply believing in them, and for saying NO to the nonsense propagated by Muhammad. Died in the most awfully sadistic ways you can imagine if you can bring yourself to read the accounts peened by their killers, themsleves, that have included generations of "sufi' saints, including your babas of Ajmer, Delhi, etc. all the Chishtiyeh! This is not fanning hatred or animosity but merely stating fact. Choose what you believe and stand by your beliefs because IDEAS HAVE CONSEQUENCES.

Sadly, you have been born a Hindu but have chosen to absorb only folly. If everything is equivalent to everything else, as you suppose , you will harvest the fruit of consuming from all places, from the sewer, as well as the sublime prasad. Pigs do that all the time; they eat feces and the finest, holiest food with non-discrimination and equal relish, as do you. Prakrti will assume that you have fullfilled the potential of becoming a nice, sweet-natured pig, and should occupy the mind and body of one in the future. Whether or not this Universe functions on a law of ause and effect, is something Muslims and you will have to find out by experiencing death which none can avoid. No need of writing exhortatory letters, because death will arrive soon, and no amount of hidayat will suffice in the face of our personal misdeeds and failings.

If you want to comment on the Mahakavyas and dharmashastras, please make sure you have at least a glimmer of understanding of what you speak. That is, something more than the TV or Chandamama Comic version of these astonishing works. You will find a world which there are grays, where there are extensive implied criticisms and layers of meanings. Try reading the passage where Gandhari and Dhritarashtra speak to each other before they decide to enter the forest fire that is approaching the area where they are living in voluntary exile. This is the first real conversation this husband and wife is having in their lives. You will be shocked at the the line by line conversation preserved in the ancient text, at how brutal and unsparing it is from a personal point of view, how painful from a purely himan point, and perhaps the roots of the Mahabharata war and of human tragedy become more clear when you hear a couple vent their long-held anger and grudges at each other. It is like sitting in a marriage therapist'a room today. You did nto ever expect such a thing to be in the Mahabharata, did you? Unless you read and fully understand the exquisite nuances in this passage, which ends in tragedy, reconciliation and triumph, you will not have grasped the Mahabharata at all.

If you have not studied or understood anything rigorously, why do you allow yourself the authority to make pompous statements, ...? When I look at you, I see your face, I see something. Just as when you make a cursory study of the Ramayana or the Mahabharata, you see something. But just from looking at your silly or not so intelligent mien, I conclude I know everything about you, then that would be doing you a great deal of disservice, would I not? I am taking your interview, but I do not go any farther, but think, this boy seems not to have that bright spark, but seems full of himself. I won't hire him. Will you not feel cheated? That is waht you are doing with your cursory, supremely ignorant assessment of the great dharmashastras. It reveals more about your character, than what you say reveals about them! They have invigorated Bharatavarsha for millenia and will continue to do so long after your new-fangled faiths have bitten the dust. So many "faiths" set themselves up in vigorous opposition! Do you see them now?!!!!!!!

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".