Talk:Christian view of Muhammad

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This article was nominated for deletion on 03:09, 11 January 2007. The result of the discussion was keep.

• Please note that there are some conditions on the keep, please re-name this article, and fix the POV issues raised. Cheers! —— Eagle 101 ^{(Need help?)} 21:23, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] AFD discussion

What is the use of having a biased version of a section that already - in a much improved version - is in the Muhammad article? -- Karl Meier 10:30, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Go for article for deletion WP:AfD, if you would like to redirect it or remove it. Encyclopedia Britannica has an article on this, so it is an encyclopedic topic. --Aminz 10:35, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with this being a redirect, and I don't see any reason to delete it outright. If you can change this into something something that use well sourced material in an unbiased and neutral way and at the same time something that is more than a POV fork of a section in the Muhammad article, then there is no problem. -- Karl Meier 11:01, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

If you would like to redirect it or delete it, please use WP:AfD.--Aminz 11:03, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

If you would like to keep it as something more than a redirect, then change it into something that is according to NPOV and which is something more than a POV fork of a section in the Muhammad article. -- Karl Meier 11:10, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

You can explain your reasons in WP:AfD --Aminz 11:15, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I have what I believe is a better suggestion. Can you explain your reasons, why you wanted to copy the most biased version of a section in the Muhammad article into a new article, when several individual editors had expressed concerns about it being against Wikipedia's rules regarding neutrality? -- Karl Meier 11:22, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

If you can reason why it is biased, then you can add a POV tag. But I don't think it is. Encyclopedia Britannica has an article on the same topic. --Aminz 11:24, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Talk:Muhammad#Muhammad_and_the_West. The subject might very well be notable, but copying the most biased version of a section in the Muhammad article is not an acceptable way to start an article. -- Karl Meier 11:28, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Any attempt to Afd this article may well be marred by votestacking, as was Talk:Antisemitism#Existence_of_Dispute. Nevertheless Afd is probably the most appropriate way to proceed. Beit Or 11:49, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

That is one problem, another is that several editors will then have to waste quite a lot of time dealing with this nonsense. Perhaps, another solution could be to simply replace the vast majority of the content that is currently here, and which as mentioned is a copy of the most biased version of that section in the Muhammad article, with a lot of the more neutral content that we now have in that section in the Muhammad article. -- Karl Meier 11:56, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

This article is just started. This is going to be the main article for the small section in Muhammad's article. --Aminz 12:13, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

There is not much worth keeping here. Possibly nothing. I'll fix the neutrality issues tomorrow. -- Karl Meier 12:16, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Biased section on "Modern Times"

I made the decision to move the "Modern Times" section to the articles talk page, as it is entirely POV and unbalanced. -- Karl Meier 11:27, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Modern Times

Watt states that since then the Western view of Muhammad has been much changed, particularly during the last two centuries. ^[1] In Watt's view some of the world's urgent political problems might be easier to solve if Christians and Muslims had a deeper respect for each other's religion, something which is so difficult for West to do due to its "deep-seated prejudice" against Muhammad. ^[2] While it is never possible to achieve pure objectivity in the case of Muhammad, since any judgment about him is bound to writer's culture and system of values, yet a measure of objectivity is attainable. ^[3]

[edit] Definition of West

This article needs to define at the outset what it means by the term West and back that definition up with references. Specific quotes defining the term would be especially helpful, perhaps as footnotes. It shouldn't be taken for granted that the reader will know what is meant by West. And, for neutrality's sake, the definition used for West ought to be one used by Muslim and non-Muslim scholars alike. Nick Graves 21:14, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Title change

Leaving aside the issues of defining The West and neutrality concerns, let us consider a name change for this article, as it appears that many people commenting during the recent AFD discussion were dissatisfied with the name. Let me just point out two things that I believe will be fairly uncontroversial.

First, the word "Image" is ambiguous and potentially confusing, since the word is typically used to mean "visual depiction," rather than "opinion about." We're not talking about pictures of Muhammad, but opinions about him. (Note that one of the commentators on the AFD thought the article should be merged with Depictions of Muhammad, a suggestion that shows confusion about what this article is supposed to be about).

Second, the initial word of the title should not be singular, but plural. There are many opinions about Muhammad in the West, not just one.

Views about Muhammad in the West or Western views of Muhammad are two names that are good possibilities, I think. I like the latter option. It's punchier and more to the point.

However the article currently talks only about Christian views of Muhammad. As long as that is the case, the article really belongs at Christian views of Muhammad. The article doesn't even mention the secular tradition in the West, a tradition that is different from (and sometimes antagonistic toward) the Christian tradition. Nick Graves 06:26, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Someone edited out all the references and reference data at the bottom of the page; I really hope someone can put it all back! Unicorn144 04:43, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Some kind of typo... fixed. - Merzbow 05:49, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Late Middle Ages to Current Times

I have moved the following sections from the article to this Talk page because they are of insufficient quality, clarity or independence to be included in any encyclopedia. - Fayenatic london (talk) 22:17, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Late Middle Ages to Chaucer

For those open-minded christians who have investigated the true status of Muhammed and the rise of Islam some notable information about this period can be found in Idries Shah's book's "The Sufis" and "The Way of the Sufi". Further studies of the Holy Grail corpus of writings show that because Jesus was killed by the "stewards of the vineyard" to keep it for themselves it was God who took away the kingdom from the Jews who occupied the position of Abraham and gave it to the desert tribes who, (once Muhammed cleansed the Courtyard of the Kaa'ba), were given the status of Israel's 12 "tribes"; in fact the reason Muhammed ascended the 7 heavens^[4] over Jerusalem from Mount Moriah or the Temple Mount is because that is where Abraham originally offered Issac as a living sacrifice. The meaning for this ascension (see: "Night of Power" ref, Qu'ran^{[citation needed]}) would seem to be the fact that as Jesus was killed as the Bridegroom or the mythical "Issac" it was Muhammed who then was given this position as the reborn "Ishmael" as God restoring the position of the elder son of Abraham in His punishment upon Jerusalem by replacing it with Mecca as the "new" House of God. The 7-10 Crusades can then be seen as the futile resistance of a "Canaan" to the "New Israel" or "Bani-Israel" now given the Holy Land. For those who began to wonder during the Crusades why Christinanity could not prevail over Islam it was the gradual "Illumination" of enlightened mystics like St. Francis that the world was witnessing God's Judgment upon Israel by God apparently having now given that "name" to Muhammed and the accompanying status of the 12 tribes to the desert tribes who he now no longer had face Jerusalem during the daily prayers: now they faced Mecca. This was further proof of God's wrath in that Jerusalem was now "tributary" who had once been the center of worship and yearly pilgrimmages for the tribes lest they "have no rain".

[edit] Chaucer to Columbus

The rapid expansion of Islam was seen as the result of the rise of Mecca due to Muhammed's removal of the 360 idols from the Courtyard and enforcing a strict and iconoclastic form of worship that recognized only one God: alone. How this had happened was actually seen in the Gospel where Jesus himself had told the scribes ("lawyers") and Pharisees ("businessmen") that God would take the kingdom away from them and "give it to a Nation bringing forth the fruits of it." This "Nation" was obviously Islam, as the Dome of the Rock built on the Temple Mount over Mt. Moriah substantially showed. It is for this reason that the Templars built their church in London in the round shape of the "Dome of the Rock" because they as members of a persecuted inner elect knew of the historic "shift" in God's Providence. They also knew in Christianity's tradition of celibacy in relation to Islam's archaic institution of polygamy Christianity actually represented the position of the priestly tribe of Levi to the "12 princes of Ishmael"^[5] who now occupied the position of the 12 sons of Jacob or Israel, who had lost their position as God's Elect due to their rulers sacrificing of the "heir" to the throne of David. That the Qu'ran seemed to fulfill the prophecy of Malachi (Israel's "last prophet" in the 430 years before Jesus arrived) as being the "Curse of God" threatened upon "Jacob" or Israel if they failed the providence of God's Messiah and his Messenger Elijah the Qu'ran conversely seemed to be the "Blessing of God" upon Muhammed as the new "Israel". Ishmael now supplanted Issac as the apparent revenge of Esau upon Jacob for stealing the birthright from him and Issac's blessing Issac with his mother's help; Issac being blind. This was not lost on the Jews themselves who now had the sad fulfillment of the prophets called down on them of the "sword" of Jehovh being drawn out after them as they were dispersed to the 4 quarters of the earth: this "sword" was "anti-Semitism"; not seen since the days of the animosity of "Egypt" (Hamitic race descended from "Ham") to its Israelities (Semitic race descended from "Shem") going back to the 430 years of captivity before the Exodus.

[edit] Columbus to Current

With the current division of the "House of God" between Sunni and Sh'ia the old saying that "a House divided against itself cannot stand" the stage is now set for the final test of the "3 Faiths" which are rerepresentations the "3 Sons of Noah": Ham, Japeth and Shem; as is written in Isaiah,^{[citation needed]} "Egypt my people; Assyria the Work of my hands; and Israel mine inheritence". These three monotheistic "Faiths" of the "Inner Courtyard" face their unification or "final test" with Iraq and Iran in the prophetical position of "Gog and Magog". The fact that Russia is now over half Muslim in population is further evidence of the global shift in this final conflict: the false "Jihad" of World War III as a Holy War in our "Last Days" can be seen in the ominous advent by default if you will of the "Antichrist" in the person of "Osama bin Laden"; the "Man of Lawlessness" or "global terrorist" who decided to "judge" the West as if he were God; spiritually "sitting" on the Saudi Arabian throne in the Meccan "House of God" as St. Paul wrote long ago^{[citation needed]}. As the Unificationists known as the Sufis it is now the gradually surfacing Sufic point of view that all three monotheistic religions have an intimate relation to the 7 trumpets of Revelation in that each trumpet seems to strike only one-third of the things each one mentions; bringing some observers of scripture to conclude that the trumpets strike Islam at some points; Christianity at some points and Judaism at others. This Sufic point of view is that the Revelation of St. John the Divine applies to all 3 monotheistic religions; as also the three out of the four "sheepfolds" Jesus mentioned when describing himself as "the Way; the Truth and the Life"; (ie; the mystic "Way" of Taoism; the philosophic "Life" of Socrates; the psychological "Path" of Buddha and the psychic "Truth" of Quetzacoatl). The mythic "Resurrection" of Elijah was supposed to have been initiated by John the Baptist by admitting he was Elijah: which he denied; thus stopping the Resurrection from beginning; it was for this reason that Jesus did not baptize John even when John pointedly asked him to. Obviously the "Resurrection" was to have started with Elijah himself as the prophet Malachi wrote when he said that the "Great and Terrible Day of Jehovah"^{[citation needed]} would not come until after Elijah "returned".