On Sep 16, 9:07 am, Muslim With Mission
gmail.com> wrote:> On Aug 21, 11:40 pm, Aviroce
gmail.com> wrote:
>>> From: Aviroce - view profile
>> Date: Tues, Dec 19 2006 1:48 pm
>> Email: "Aviroce"
gmail.com>>
>> "Others allege the low morality of the religion and the sensual
>> paradise it promises as a sufficient cause for the zeal of its
>> followers: but even were these admitted to the full, no religion has
>> ever gained a lasting hold upon the souls of men by the force of its
>> sensual permissions and fleshy promises... "
>
>> For example, according to the Talmud, fornication with three year
>> olds,
>
>> boys and girls are permitted. Yet Judaism in the present sense never
>> spread. Judaism in Islam's sense, according to the Koran, does not
>> exist.
>
>> Islam spread because it respects individual rights and privileges and
>> opens a direct appeal to the All-Mighty Allah without intermediary
>> and
>> Allah is the only power to prostrate oneself to. Islam has given
>> the
>> human race a sense of dignity unsurpassed. It depends on mutual
>> respect. Transgressors are to be punished. Islam is the religion of
>> good health, cleanliness and social order. The Prophet and Judge
>> Mohammed is the greatest leader mankind has ever lived. Islam is
>> still
>
>> spreading although Muslims are weaker than the West who is inclined
>> to
>> colonize them and exploit them. Islam's social order and laws are
>> inground in every prayer Muslims perform. Mind you that these
>> prayers
>> are by themselves an exercise for a sound body. Islam is not fake.
>> Islam addresses human development and respects it. No wonder even
>> non-Muslims flowered intellectually and were accepted accordingly.
>
>>>From Al-Mutanabbi to Ibn Al-Muqafa'a, Muslims respect their works. The
>
>> first pretended to be a prophet, that is what his name means, and yet
>> wrote the most penetrating and moving and invigorating and patriotic
>> poetry ever written by Arabs. The second like his name says that he
>> is
>
>> hiding behind a mask, wrote the most creative work on animals taking
>> human political and social roles. Even Jews were accepted to become
>> doctors, engineers, professors. Christians had similar plight.
>> Taxes
>> had to be paid by everyone even Muslims.
>
>> ***************************************************************************
>> *******************************
>
>> From: Muslims Are Good Folks - view profile
>> Date: Tues, Dec 19 2006 11:09 am
>> Email: "Muslims Are Good Folks"
yahoo.com>>
>> How Was Islam Spread
>
>> Islam, in the tenth century, was the main religion, or at least, the
>> religion of the majority of nations in an area covering more than
>> half
>> of the civilized world stretching over three continents from the
>> Pyrenees and Siberia in West and North Europe to the farthest end of
>> Asia, up to China and New Guinea in the East; from Morocco in North
>> Africa to the southern tip of Africa, covering two-thirds of the
>> African continent. It is one of the most striking facts of human
>> history that the spread of Islam over such a vast area took place
>> within three centuries. Most striking of all, within half a century
>> after the Hijrah (Prophet Muhammad's Migration from Makkah to
>> Al-Madeenah), Islam had already conquered the whole of North Africa
>> from Egypt to Morocco, all the Middle Eastern lands from Yemen to
>> Caucasia and from Egypt to the lands beyond Transoxiana (portion of
>> Central Asia corresponding approximately with modern-day Uzbekistan
>> and
>
>> southwest Kazakhstan). It was during the reign of the third Caliph
>> 'Uthmaan that the Muslim envoys reached the Chinese Palace, where
>> they
>
>> were welcomed enthusiastically, an important event marking, according
>> to the historians, the beginning of Islam's entry into this country.
>> There are many reasons why nations have been, from past to the
>> present,
>
>> so ready to embrace Islam, what is pointed out by Muhammad Asad, a
>> Jewish convert to Islam, probably being the foremost:
>
>> Islam appears like a perfect work of architecture
>
>> Islam appears to me like a perfect work of architecture. All its
>> parts
>> are harmoniously conceived to complement and support each other,
>> nothing lacking, with the result of an absolute balance and solid
>> composure. Everything in the teaching and postulate of Islam is in
>> its
>> proper place. (Islam at the Crossroads, p.5)
>
>> Islam was spread by force of the sword
>
>> Most of Western writers, especially under the influence of the
>> Church,
>> have never failed to accuse Islam of spreading by force of the sword.
>> The causes of this prejudice lie mainly in the fact that the spread
>> of
>> Islam has often occurred at the expense of Christianity. While Islam
>> has, for centuries, obtained numerous conversions from Christianity
>> without much effort or organized missionary activities, Christianity
>> has almost never been able to achieve conversions from Islam in spite
>> of sophisticated means and well-organized missionary activities, and
>> it
>
>> has always been at a disadvantage in its competition with Islam for
>> fourteen centuries. This has caused its missionaries and most of the
>> orientalists to develop a complex within themselves by depicting
>> Islam
>> and introducing it as a regressive, vulgar religion of savage people.
>> The same attitude has unfortunately maintained toward the Noble
>> Prophet
>
>> of Islam. This is clear in the confessions of some unbiased writers
>> of
>> the West: According to P. Bayle,
>
>> Muslims, according to the principles of their faith, are under an
>> obligation to use force for the purpose of bringing other religions
>> to
>> ruin (probably he means Jihaad which is not for the purpose he
>> suggests); yet, in spite of that, they have been tolerating other
>> religions for some centuries past. The Christians have not been given
>> orders to do anything but preach and instruct, yet, despite this,
>> from
>> time immemorial they have been exterminating by fire and sword all
>> those who are not of their religion [...] We may feel certain that if
>> Western Christians, instead of the Saracens and the Turks, had won
>> the
>> dominion over Asia, there would be today not a trace left of the
>> Greek
>> Church, and that they would never have tolerated Muhammadanism as the
>> 'infidels' have tolerated Christianity there. We (Christians) enjoy
>> the
>
>> fine advantage of being far better versed than others in the art of
>> killing, bombarding and exterminating the Human Race." (Bayle P.,
>> Dictionary, 'the article Mahomed', 1850)
>
>> To what is Islam indebted its unequaled spread?
>
>> Islam is indebted its unequaled spread to its religious content and
>> values, which is confessed by all objective Western intellectuals:
>
>> Many have sought to answer the questions of why the triumph of Islam
>> was so speedy and complete? Why have so many millions embraced the
>> religion of Islam and scarcely a hundred ever recanted? Some have
>> attempted to explain the first overwhelming success of Islam by the
>> argument of the Sword. They forget Carlyle's laconic reply. First get
>> your sword. You must win men's hearts before you can induce them to
>> imperil their lives for you; and the first conquerors of Islam must
>> have been made Muslims before they were made fighters on the Path of
>> God. Others allege the low morality of the religion and the sensual
>> paradise it promises as a sufficient cause for the zeal of its
>> followers: but even were these admitted to the full, no religion has
>> ever gained a lasting hold upon the souls of men by the force of its
>> sensual permissions and fleshy promises...
>
>> In all these explanations the religion itself is left out of the
>> question. Decidedly, Islam itself was the main cause for its triumph.
>> Islam not only was at once accepted (by many peoples and races) by
>> Arabia, Syria, Persia, Egypt, Northern Africa and Spain, at its first
>> outburst; but, with the exception of Spain, it has never lost its
>> vantage ground; it has been spreading ever since it came into being.
>> Admitting the mixed causes that contributed to the rapidity of the
>> first swift spread of Islam, they do not account for the duration of
>> Islam. There must be something in the religion itself to explain its
>> persistence and spread, and to account for its present hold over so
>> large of a proportion of the dwellers on the earth... Islam has
>> stirred
>
>> an enthusiasm that has never been surpassed. Islam has had its
>> martyrs,
>
>> its self-tormentors, its recluses, who have renounced all that life
>> offered and have accepted death with a smile for the sake of the
>> faith
>> that was in them. (Stanley Lane-Poole, Study in a Mosque, pp.86-89)
>
>> A. J. Arberry has also pointed out that the reason for the spread of
>> Islam is Islam itself and its religious values. (Aspects of Islamic
>> Civilization, p.12) He states:
>
>> The rapidity of the spread of Islam, noticeably through extensive
>> provinces which had been long Christian, is a crucial fact of history
>> [...] The sublime rhetoric of the Quran, that inimitable symphony,
>> the
>> very sounds of which move men to tears and ecstasy". (M. Pickhtal,
>> The
>> Meaning of the Glorious Quran, p.vii)
>
>> Arberry continues:
>
>> This, and the urgency of the simple message carried, holds the key to
>> the mystery of one of the greatest cataclysms in the history of
>> religion. When all military, political and economic factors have been
>> exhausted, the religious impulse must still be recognized as the most
>> vital and enduring.
>
>> Brockelman, who is usually very unsympathetic and partial, also
>> recognizes the religious values of Islam as the main factor for the
>> spread of Islam. (History of the Islamic Peoples, p.37) Rosenthal
>> makes
>
>> his point as follows:
>
>> The more important factor for the spread of Islam is religious law of
>> Islam (Sharee'ah which is an inclusive, all-embracing,
>> all-comprehensive way of thinking and living) which was designed to
>> cover all manifestations of life. (Political Thought in Medieval
>> Islam,
>
>> p.21)
>
>> The exemplary life-style of Muslim individuals
>
>> Besides many other reasons which are responsible for the spread of
>> Islam, it is the exemplary life-style and unceasing efforts of
>> individual Muslims to transmit the message of Islam throughout the
>> world which lie at the root of the conquest of the hearts by Islam.
>> Islamic universalism is closely associated with the principle of Amr
>> Bil-Ma'roof (enjoining the good) for Islam is to be spread by Muslims
>> by means of Amr Bil-Ma'roof. This principle seeks to convey the
>> message
>
>> of Islam to all human beings in the world and to establish a model
>> Islamic community on a world-wide basis. The Islamic community is
>> introduced by the Quran as a model community: "Thus, We have made of
>> you a nation justly balanced, that you might be witnesses (models)
>> for
>> the peoples, and the Messenger has been a witness for you." [Quran,
>> 2:143]
>
>> A Muslim or the Muslim community as a whole thus has a goal to
>> achieve:
>
>> This is the spread of Islam, conveying the truth to the remotest
>> corners of the world, the eradication of oppression and tyranny and
>> the
>
>> establishment of justice all over the world. This requires the Muslim
>> to lead an exemplary life, and thus the moral and ethical values of
>> Islam have usually played an important part in the spread of Islam.
>> Here follow the impressions of the influence of Islamic ethics on
>> black
>
>> Africans had by a Western writer of the nineteenth century:
>
>> How does Islam change the nations that have accepted it?
>
>> As to the effects of Islam when first embraced by a Negro tribe, can
>> there, when viewed as a whole, be any reasonable doubt? Polytheism
>> disappears almost instantaneously; sorcery, with its attendant evils,
>> gradually dies away; human sacrifice becomes a thing of the past. The
>> general moral elevation is most marked; the natives begin for the
>> first
>
>> time in their history to dress, and that neatly. Squalid filth is
>> replaced by some approach to personal cleanliness; hospitality
>> becomes
>> a religious duty; drunkenness, instead of the rule, becomes a
>> comparatively rare exception...chastity is looked upon as one of the
>> highest, and becomes, in fact, one of the commoner virtues. It is
>> idleness that henceforward degrades, and industry that elevates,
>> instead of the reverse. Offences are henceforward measured by a
>> written
>
>> code instead of the arbitrary caprice of a chieftain - a step, as
>> everyone will admit, of vast importance in the progress of a tribe.
>> The
>
>> Mosque gives an idea of architecture at all events higher than any
>> the
>> Negro has yet had. A thirst for literature is created and that for
>> works of science and philosophy as well as for commentaries on the
>> Quran. (Quoted from Waitz by B. Smith, Muhammad and Muhammadanism,
>> pp.42-43)
>
>> The tolerance of Islam
>
>> The tolerance of ...
>
>> read more »
>
>
>
> Whatever you think, Whatever you Believe In There is No Harm In
> Searching For The Truth And Studying Islam.
THAT IS RIGHT. IF YOU ARE SEARCHING FOR THE TRUTH, GIVE THE KORAN
SOME STUDY.
