Archimedes2

Submitted by Zaky (United States), Dec 14, 2006 at 20:42

Why have you never heard this word before?

You are too funny! The link you provided, along with some research i've done on my own, were very helpful to me. Now i understand what you are talking about.

First off the term taqqiya is of shia root and doesnt have any relationship to islam whatsoever. The prophet Muhamad never referred to this term in his life because it was never part of islam.

Even according to Wikipedia this is allowed only under well defined circomstances to prevent evil.. Its not mainstream islam.

From Wikipedia: In Islamic tradition, Taqiyya (التقية - 'fear, guard against')^[1] is the dispensation allowing believers to conceal their faith when under threat, persecution or compulsion. I dont see anything wrong with that.

The way you explained it, it sounded like islam encourages people to cheat and lie when dealing with non-muslims. nothing can be further from the truth. This only exists in your mind and in the minds of the conspiracy theorists. All the muslims i know, including religious scholars, never mentioned this "taqqiya" thing. They all practice the exact opposite of what you are saying. If i thought islam was a bad religion i wouldnt be following it. it wouldnt make sense to any decent person to not seek the truth and be a good person. Nobody is forcing my hand to be a Mulsim. Im an American and i live in a free country.

You guys get your info from anti-islamic websites who devote their entire time fabricating lies.

Religion is interpretation as one poster stated before on this forum.

I read the verses you are referring to. The verse refers to a historical event about Ammar's familty who were tortured to death for not renouncing Islam. Ammar couldnt bear the torture so he told the pagans what they wanted to hear and felt shame afterwards. God sent a reconsiliatory note to Ammar in a way saying "its ok because you coundnt bear the torture as long as your heart is not complacent. This verse doesnt encourage in any way, shape or form muslims to lie. God knew the difficult situation Ammar was facing. the verse relates ONLY to that specific event "ammar story".

Also many other muslims were tortured and killed without renouncing their faith after the verse was revealed. And the prophet Muhamad never discouraged people from doing that.

As for the other verse, about not taking the jews and the christians as friends, relates to a specific event when some muslims were befriending christians and jews and who werent being courteous to other mulsims. The key word here is RATHER.

"Let not take the believers take the for friends rather than believers" revealed in MEKKAH

If what you are saying was true how come Muslims are allowed to mary christains and jews. also there are other verses that states, and i paraphrase " the jews and the christians who do good do are promised paradise". revealed in Makkah.

Also from the same website you provided::

Judaism:

Diana Steigerwald, Religious Studies, California State University:

Maimonides's [or Mosheh ben Maimon] father was a Rabbi and a judge of the rabbinical court and he decided to establish his residence for a time in Fez. He wrote an epistle encouraging the Jews to hold fast to their faith and to practice taqiyya (dissimulating their faith in periods of danger). The taqiyya is commonly practiced by minorities in Islam such as Shiites and Sufis. The father of Maimonides comforted the Jews who were forced to outwardly profess Islam by assuring them that their real faith was the genuine belief concealed within their hearts.

Jewish law allows violation of all laws under duress (ones), save for idolatry, forbidden sexual intercourse, and murder. For the latter, one is expected to give his or her life. There is no actual prohibition against pretending to be an adherent of another religion, unless this would lead to a violation of the aforementioned laws, and Maimonides justified this behavior by the Jews of Yemen in his Iggereth Teiman ("Letter to Yemen"). Under the Spanish Inquisition, following the Reconquista, some Jews in Spain and Portugal publicly professed Catholicism, but more or less remained true to the Jewish faith. They were called Marranos by the Christians.

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