Talk:Islam/Archive 5

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Fair point - Sharia is in many ways a better place to discuss such issues. - Mustafaa 15:01, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Sharia is separate from Islam? As I understand it, which may be quite flawed, Sharia provides Muslims THE WAY TO LIVE, providing guidance based upon the Qur'an, Hadith, Tasfir (etc.), answering numerous questions of daily life that are not explicitly stated in the Qur'an. Examples might be "How does one pray?" "What are the actions to be performed?" "What are the words to said?"

Islam without Sharia is hard to imagine. The two are deeply interconnected...one being the religion, the other being the way to live/actualize it. One could/should make the same arguements regarding Christianity and Canon Law (be it Catholic (one variety), Lutheran (several varieties) or Anglican (one variety moving to two? based upon recent consecration of an archbishop in the US) all of which have worldwide organizations), Judaism and Rabbinic Liturature.

Your thoughts? Lance6Wins 15:36, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Of course Sharia is deeply relevant to Islam; but it's too large a topic to cover in such detail in what is already too large an article, and it has its own article. - Mustafaa 15:46, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Once, the Talk page was the place where editors discussed the improvement of the article, not a substitute to reading the article. dab 17:09, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

hot-button U.S. political issues ?

How about suicide bombings vs martyrdom operations, Rushie and the Satanic Verses (Iranian Fatwah), Pim Fontyn (sp?), Theo van Gogh: Defenders of Islam vs its detractors? Western liberalism vs Islamic (Sharia based) states. There are many issues. These do not seem to be hot-button U.S. political issues but rather important to quite a number of societies and states around the world...and we havent even bother to talk about India and Indonesia (the most populous predominently muslim) country. Lance6Wins 15:36, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

fair enough, we do have a "Islam in the modern world" section, where such issues would be at home. We may have to fork it into a new Islam in the modern world main article soon, though. There is also Islamism which is wholly devoted to the fanatics. And there is Islam by country for regional issues. dab 17:16, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC) — FFS, there is even Islamist terrorism. Could be added to the See alsos. dab 17:18, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The shared struggle between Christians and Muslims against the predominant Judaism

Is this true? At what time (date, please) since 622 has Judaism been predominant? Seems a strange statement given the Catholicism of Rome, the Eastern Orthdoxy of Byzantium and the Zorastrianism of the Sassanids. Lance6Wins 16:46, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It's "predominant Judaism and polytheistic religions". But the statement is still crap. we cannot cite half the qur'an here, this may end up on Qur'an exegesis or something. dab 17:13, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Agreed. Removed from the article. Where would such an idea come from? Anyone know? Lance6Wins 18:38, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

You guys might be happier deleting text from Jew article. How's the weather in Tel Aviv? --Alberuni 18:47, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Alberuni, calm down. Dab's certainly no Islamophobe, and the deleted text was pretty tangential. - Mustafaa 18:59, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Islamophobe? I read the deleted passage as islamophobe, suggesting inherent antisemitism (ok, antijudaism) in Islam. Maybe I should reconsider. Maybe I didn't get the point of the paragraph. The "How's the weather in Tel Aviv?", however, makes me think, maybe not. dab 19:18, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The sentence under scrutiny is: "The shared struggle between Christians and Muslims against the predominant Judaism and polytheistic religions at the time " It is probably correct that (Judaism+polytheism) was predominant in Muhammad's time. Probably polytheism was dominant, entirely on its own (this would make it a correct but misleading statement, like, e.g. "the Judaism, polytheism and Mormonism predominant at the time". Let us for argument's sake assume that Judaism and polytheistic religions were predominantat the time. Then we still need to show that the quoted passage is evidence of a "shared struggle between Christians and Muslims" against these scourges. IMHO, it is only evidence that Muhammad liked Christians better than Jews. It is no evidence that any Christians in the area were even aware of the man, let alone considered themselves part of a joint struggle with him, as is implied here. dab 19:25, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The statement "The shared struggle between Christians and Muslims against the predominant Judaism and polytheistic religions at the time " may be accurate or factually inaccurate. Do you have a reference to back up the factual accuracy of the statement? I would suspect that Christianity and Zoraster (sp?) were the two dominant religions around 600. If you have information otherwise, I am very interested in reading it. If the only source is the Qur'an, thats fine....then the statement should state such. The Qur'an states that the he shared struggle between Christians and Muslims against the predominant Judaism and polytheistic religions at the time..." Lance6Wins 20:15, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Oh, the prevailing religions part is correct, if badly phrased - polytheism, and to a much lesser extent Judaism, were certainly the prevailing religions of the Hijaz at the time (the prevailing world religions, if my guess about world population is right, were Hinduism and Buddhism), although in Arabia as a whole Christianity also had a significant presence. But it's also true that "it is only evidence that _ liked Christians better than Jews" - or, at least, better than the particular Jews of the Medina area, who opposed Muhammad - and, indeed, while one individual Christian famously supported Muhammad (Waraqah ibn Nawfal), there is no record of any Christian tribes supporting him at that time. - Mustafaa 23:45, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think there were far more Jews than Christians at least in Medina at that time OneGuy

I don't believe there were whole Christian tribes in that time and place. Waraqah bin Nawfal was a convert.—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 02:19, Nov 25, 2004 (UTC)

Not at that place, no, but there were much further north, like the Banu Tanukh. - Mustafaa 02:55, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

can we just rephrase the statement? from "shared struggle" to "premonition of exlusivist tendencies" or something? dab 08:57, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure I see any need for the statement; it's a little tangential to this article. - Mustafaa 17:14, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Agreed. I'll remove it. Lance6Wins 17:28, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Knowledge

Would someone please sort out the Isa page, as it seems to be written from the POV of a Christian missionary. CheeseDreams 19:39, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Another request -- Muslim year

As a non-Muslim, I have only the sketchiest idea of the yearly cycle of Muslim religious celebrations, special events, etc. I know that this differs from sect to sect and place to place; it is also partially covered by notes in Islamic year and articles re the various festivals. But it would be nice to have an article that tied everything together, with descriptions of differences between sects and countries.

I'm particularily interested in the um, housewife's point of view. What must be done at home, in the way of cooking and sewing, etc., to make things happen. Special dishes to be cooked, that sort of thing.

Request probably sparked by looming Thanksgiving dinner. At least I'm going to a potluck. Time to cook Persian rice (with lots of butter) and Punjabi green beans <g> Zora 23:14, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Where I come from, the only events celebrated are Eid al-Adha, Eid al-Fitr, and (kinda) Mawlid an-Nabi - but the whole of Ramadan is an occasion for unusually good food after sunset. It sounds like an interesting article idea, but it's hard to imagine who would have the knowledge to deal with all the regional differences... - Mustafaa 23:49, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I just googled for Islam holiday, read some stuff and then realized -- if the lunar calender is shorter than the solar calender, so that the holiday cycle precesses eleven days a year, that means that the festivals can occur any time of the year. This seems very strange to me, as I'm used to holidays/weather/foods in season all being linked. Not just the Christian calender, but the Buddhist calendar too. (We basically celebrate New Year and Buddha's Birthday, which we do with a birthday cake, being Westerners.) What does it feel like INSIDE that sort of precession?

I suppose someone could outline an article and leave bits to be filled in by Muslims from different regions ... Zora 07:03, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Islam runs on a exclusively lunar calendar, hence the Muslim holydays come about 11 days earlier each year. Christian holydays follow a solar calendar with fixed dates, but for Easter which is always a Sunday, always after the vernal equinox (more on this at Computus). Judaism combines the two approaches running on a lunar calendar that is compensated/corrected for the length of a solar year so that Passover is always after the vernal equinox. The Jewish calendar has two methods of varying the length of the lunar year. One is to introduce an extra month Adar II. The other is to choose which lunar months to lengthen by one solar day and which to shorten by one solar day. (The lunar month is not an even number of solar days...therefore to prevent the new moon from occuring at a time other than the beginning of the lunar month, one must have lunar months of differing number of solar days.) The calculation of the Jewish calendar has been fixed for about 1,644 years now.

If you can read lisp, then the calendar programs included in the emacs distribution have all the information you need to understand these three (and many other) calendars in great detail. The Rambam states that the math is not beyond what a school child could master in 3 or 4 days. Have fun! 69.138.236.221 01:20, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

NPOV

Firstly, I believe obvious Muslims should excuse themselves from editing this page, as they definitely have a POV. Secondly, the article should indicate that Qur'an *prescribes* killing infidels. (Among other things) [unsigned]

(68.107.102.129 deleted my response, here it is restored)

In response to the anonymous user I need to point out that they are a vandal who doesn't understand the concept of NPOV, here are some contribs from this user:

Islamophobia: Islamophobia is the fear of having your head cut off.
Infidel: Islam calls for the killing of infidels, which may be the reason why Muslim countries rarely live in piece their non-Muslim neighbors.
Qur'an: The Qur'an is the training manual for terrorists.

That should be enough evidence, but there is more. Edward 12:53, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Muslims shouldn't be allowed to edit Islam, just like Christians shouldn't be allowed to edit Christianity. Otherwise Wikipedia will turn into one big mosque [unsigned]

unsigned comments should be excused from Talk pages. Also, if you were to suggest that adherents of a particluar religion should not edit articles related to that religion, you would probably have little success on VP. It would be directly opposed to the WP idea that people should have the possibility to insert information on whatever area they are most proficient in. It is more likely that a Muslim has background knowledge on Islam than, say, a Mormon. dab 14:01, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

There are plenty of scholars who study Islam and know more about it than religious fanatics. (I know a thing or two about Islam, having studied it in college, but I'll be the first to admit that I'm not an expert). Anywho, the ratio of non-prejudiced (academic, say) scholars of a religion like Islam to Muslims is too low, and if Muslims are allowed to continue policing Islam-related wikipedia content (which they do with a religious fervor, of course), Wikipedia will never have a NPOV on these issues. IOW it is daft to say that someone with a religious view is allowed to edit the associated article if NPOV is the real, not imaginary, goal. 68.107.102.129

of course there are experts. But WP has to make do with the editors it gets. You are welcome to add your knowledge. Luckily, you don't have to be an expert to npov-police an article. And articles on religions certainly do have to be npov-policed, no doubt about that. Still, even the more radical Muslims are welcome to include their povs, as long as they are not portrayed as fact, but duly flagged as minority opinions. dab 16:34, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

68.107.102.129, what is this NPOV nonsense. You must voice your concerns if you add such a notice. Just the fact that the article has Muslim editors is not a concern. If you think the qur'an is a "killing manual", you do not know "a thing or two about Islam", as you claim, nor do you have a clue about NPOV. dab 18:30, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Possible Overstatement

"or at least the earliest one accepted as correctly-dated by all researchers."

I just have a problem with the word "all" in this case; it doesn't seem any date will be agreed upon by ALL researchers—Trevor Caira 16:03, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

OK! Time for weasel-words. Use "most" <g> One thing that academic writing teaches is the adroit use of qualifiers to barricade statments against an easy attack. Zora 19:47, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Who are these "most" researchers? And how do they explain that Taskent manuscript doesn't have vowel and diacritical marks? These were introduced by Al-Hajjaj bin Yousef (d. 714) in written Qur'ans. He must have introduced them long before his death. Hajjaj became the governor of Kufa around 690s. Why would a Qur'anic manuscript 50 years latter still not have vowel marks? OneGuy 23:27, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

According to Islamic-awareness (a Muslim site):

A few words of caution concerning the dating of the Qur'anic manuscripts need to be mentioned. It is to be remembered that assigning a date to an undated early Qur'anic manuscript is rarely simple especially in the absence of Wakf marking. There is a tendency to assume that those in large scripts and without vowels are of the earliest date. This assumption, true to some extent, is nevertheless misleading in two respects. It ignores that fact that small as well as large masahif of the Qur'an were among the earliest written and that both types continued to be written thereafter. Though the assumption that manuscripts with the vowels must be considered later than those without is true in some cases, it is not always so, for some very early manuscripts of the Qur'an, originally written without vowels, may well have been voweled later. Furthermore, the first vowel system came into use shortly after the first masahif were written. There are also examples of later masahif which were unvoweled even after 3 centuries after hijra!

I can't put my finger on it at the moment, but I also ran across a discussion of Qur'an dating that pointed out that the large Qur'ans used in mosques were particularly difficult to date, as the scripts tended to be both self-consciously elaborate or monumental, and archaic. A Qur'an intended for private reading may have had the vowel markings, and one intended for mosque use would do without them.

Brandon Wheeler, a professor of Islamic studies, regards this [1] Qur'an as the oldest complete and dated Qur'an. It's from 1002 C.E.! Zora

Well, by "complete" Qur'an Wheeler obviously meant a manuscript that is not missing any pages. Taskent is missing a few pages; thus, "incomplete" according to Wheeler. However, that is irrelevant to what I said. Missing a few pages (like all old manuscript do) is not a problem in this case. It's 'almost complete OneGuy 01:53, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Um, it's not COMPLETE unless it's COMPLETE. Almost complete doesn't cut it. Then you start getting arguments about how complete the manuscript must be to be considered complete.

No, Taskent is a complete Qur'an that is missing a few pages. That fact needs to be mentioned OneGuy 03:56, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

One Islamic site says that this [2] is the oldest Qur'an known, late 8th century C.E. However, it is not clear if it's complete.

I can't remember where I got the 750 C.E. figure. Zora

I have seen some people claim that Tashkent manuscript is around 750+. That's where you got it from. The argument they use is that Taskent is in Kufic script and Kufic script only appears on Abbasid coin (thus, 750 date). However, if Kufic script first appeared on Abbasid coins that doesn't mean it didn't exist prior to that. Ummyad were ruling from Damascus till 750 and that's why probably Kufic script didn't appear on coins till Abbasids in Iraq. Doesn't explain why Tashkent manuscript doesn't have vowel or diacritical marks. See the pictures 1 OneGuy 01:53, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

But the Islamic-awareness excerpt I posted says that you can't take the absence of pointing as an indication of age. With which I'd agree.

Still, but there is no valid explanation why Tashkent manuscript doesn't have vowel marks, and it's definitely one of the oldest Qur'an OneGuy 03:56, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I've said it TWICE, and it's quoted from a Muslim site: absence of vowel marks doesn't prove anything. It's not an anomaly. Qur'ans that everyone would accept as 300 years after the Hegira don't have vowel marks. I can't remember if it was on that site, or another, that a sort of explanation was given: there were conservatives who felt that adding anything to the sacred text, even vowel marks, was wrong. Zora 08:46, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I understand that there are scientific tests now that can give dates plus or minus 20 years (IIRC), but that they require too much material for the testing. No one wants to sacrifice a chunk of an old Qur'an to find out how old it is. I do wish that we had some objective dating method -- then we could dispense with all these arguments about calligraphic style, pointing, etc. Zora 03:39, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

D'oh. Islamic sites tend to date the Qur'ans down, academic sites often to date them up. Plus a lot of Islamic sites tend to cruise the academic literature looking for the earliest dates they can find, and cite them, without noting that they usually come from Abbot, who wrote in 1939 and is not the latest word in scholarship.

I think we should probably link to both the Wheeler and the Islamic sites I noted, and give both dates. Because I'm NOT a graduate student in Qur'anic studies at a university with a large library, I'm not at all sure that I'm up with the latest research. I have to piece together info from Google and Questia (an online scholarly library, but with limited holdings), plus the shelf of books I've been able to afford. Zora 01:19, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

unhappy with the "See also" section

why are there only three links, and why the three that are there? Certainly, Jihad should be linked from somwhere in the article text. also, Islamism should be linked from "Islam in the modern world", together with fundamentalism. The "See also" is a bit superfluous, compared with the good "Islam" Template. [[User:Dbachmann|dab (T) ]] 17:10, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

shahādatan

The Kalima is introduced as the shahādatan. Shouldn't that either be shahādah and mention the Kalima? Isn't shahādatan Persian, if that? Arabic would be shahādat'ein for two shahādahs?—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 01:46, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

In Arabic, two shahadas is shahādatān in the nominative, shahādatayn in the oblique. It is technically correct, if somewhat unusual, to call the shahada/kalima the shahadatan, since it involves two statements. - Mustafaa 11:46, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

So what are we documenting? What the Kalima is called? Or what a committee of Arabic scholars would recommend that 1.2 billion people should be saying? Almost every Muslim I have met in Africa, South Asia, Arabia, and North America will never have heard of that way of referring to it. And I am talking about Arabic speakers, too.

My apologies if that sounds testy, and I hate to say this to you, but the logic above sounds very like the argument from the other side in the "discussion" on the definition of "Islamism"—that since it should "technically" mean that, we should use the technical definition in this encyclopedia as the "official" meaning.—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 19:32, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

Hey, relax. I have no objection to it being changed; I'm just pointing out that it's not wrong. Now what to change it to is another question. I suppose technically you can call it the Kalima, but where I come from, it's overwhelmingly more often termed the Shahada. I've only rarely heard the former usage. From what you're saying, I imagine it's the other way around where you come from. - Mustafaa 21:31, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

The Muslims are unique in that their holy book tells them to kill members of other religions

... Last time I'm changing this today. You are not even trying to discuss your reverts. If there is no possibility for consesus, I will have to ask for arbitration.

Might help if you did that, yes. Also, getting an account and/or logging in might help you do that. BTW, you might want to notice that theExclusivistic Thought in Islam sub-section covers part of what you are saying.

If you do want to have a discussion, here's my POV: your statement is rather unqualified. "...tells them to kill" implies/means that the book just says "kill them". You are saying/implying that the book says just kill them in all cases. Most other editors disagree that that is the case. The book does say kill them; but in self-defense. Care to comment?—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 22:28, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

My recent edit

Sorry; the recent edit I alluded to wasn't anon, it was by Tom Paine. However, it's still wrong, and the topic has been thoroughly discussed both here and at Qur'an. - Mustafaa 00:34, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Deleted feminist link

An anonymous editor (new to Wikipedia) added an external link to a site promoting Islamic feminism. I deleted it (despite a certain sympathy) because I felt it was a specialized topic, best discussed in its own article. I don't think there's any such article. If there isn't, I'd suggest that the anonymous editor start one. I'd do it myself if I weren't grotesquely over-extended. Zora 15:19, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Islamic sect

Why is it important to say Islamic sect in the following:

Mainstream Muslims regard Muhammad as the 'Last Messenger' or the 'Seal of the Prophets' based on the canon. However, there have been a number of Islamic sects through the ages whose leaders have claimed to be follower Prophets, or whose devotees have regarded them as Prophets or incarnations of God himself.

It wouldn't be Buddhist sects whose leaders claimed to be follower Prophets to Muhammad, would it? Also, just saying "sects" would keep the writer/editor out of the discussion of whether those specific sects are "Islamic" or not—and, even more perilously, who gets to decide. BTW, traditionally, Muslims would have said "Muslim sects" not "Islamic sects", but I guess most post-modern Muslims have given up fighting that fight.—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 19:52, Dec 13, 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, this is a tricky one. I felt that leaving out Muslim or Islamic in a description of the sects would make the sentence applicable to many thousands of break-away Christian, Buddhist, etc. groups too. Indeed, that's how I first read it. But if I put it in, it makes a judgement about who's Muslim and who's not. You're right there. How about something like:

"However, there have been a number of sects through the ages whose leaders have proclaimed themselves the successors of Muhammad, perfecting and extending Islam, or, whose devotees have made such claims for their leaders." It would take another sentence to add in claims of being incarnations. Zora 02:39, 14 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Yes. Something likethat would work. Though in an article on Mohammed, you did read it wrongly at first. Hmmm. I guess that's the parallax of my being too close to the topic.—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 03:44, Dec 14, 2004 (UTC)

Reasons for reverting

An anonymous editor removed the sentence that Ifaqeer and I had crafted with such pains, re sectarian leaders claiming to be Muhammad's successor. It seemed to me to contain useful info, frex in making sense of Bahai, Ahmadiyya, etc. He/she also made a few other minor edits, of which I retained only one. Others may wish to inspect his/her edits and see if you agree with me. I wish the anon editor would take a username and join the debate on the talk page. I'm guessing that he/she just hasn't learned the rules of the game yet (nor have I, I think). The mechanics of editing are easy compared to learning HOW to collaborate well. Zora 03:34, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)

you are kind to even mention this. I think it is fair to rollback anonymous edits to sections with complicated histories without comment. dab (ᛏ) 08:49, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)

God, Allah, six beliefs

An anon editor replaced God with Allah in the confession of faith, and I reverted it. So far as I know, Allah is just Arabic for God, and the replacement seems to be a sly way of saying that Muslims worship a different god than Jews or Christians. Which I don't believe that Muslims would admit.

OneGuy, I'm also going to question your reversion of the edit that deleted the heading "Six beliefs". After a moment's boggle, I had thought that the edit improved the section's readability. It's not necessary to say "six beliefs" twice, after all. I'm not going to change it back before discussing it with you, however. I don't think the original edit was motivated by anything other than copyediting concerns, which I share. Comment? Zora 22:17, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Zora, hmmm. I see what you mean about the implication. But then the Arabic text reads "La Ilaha Illah Allah"--"None god/worthy-of-worship except Allah". Which draws a distinction between the generic word "god" and the one and only "God", Allah. But maybe I am over thinking it.—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 23:25, Dec 21, 2004 (UTC)

corresponding roughly to the distinction god vs. God. the i in ilaha is an alif al-waṣl so that you have lah "a god" vs. al-lah "the God". Same word, different state (see Arabic grammar)dab (ᛏ) 13:27, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I think it's also a pun on la "no" vs. lah "god". Your illah for illa probably qualifies as blasphemy :p -- the literal translation of the 'creed' would be "not any-god if-not the-God". dab (ᛏ) 13:30, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

List of Islamic and Muslim related topics

The List of Islamic and Muslim related topics was created using a program I wrote that uses google to create a list and wikifies them. Many of the relevant topics might be missing and some irrelevant ones are probably in the list. I cleaned it a bit. Please add more to the list or remove irrelevant ones. Strangely Wikipedia doesn't have an article on women and Islam OneGuy 08:57, 29 Dec 2004 (UTC)

rv 203.101.42.15?

this user is tearing through the article, I suppose with the best intentions, but all edits seem questionable for reasons of style, accuracy and npov. Shall we summarily revert them, or does somebody want to sort them out? (the MU-Islam "etymology" is particularly unenlightening. man. we had this information, less obfuscated. read first, edit later) dab (ᛏ) 13:09, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I suppose this is Yusuf Estes. He is adding his website to lots of Islam related articles, and turns his Talk page (for some reason) into a big vanity article, it appears. (the article itself was made quite 'vain' too, see this edit) dab (ᛏ) 13:15, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Growth of Islam

Higher birth rate of Asian and African countries is the main reason for overall percentage increase of Islam. Clear example of that is this [page. I wrote a program to create these tables and do calculations. Initially I used the file from census.gov that had estimates of population of each country for 2004 (or was it 9-30-2004?). census.gov updated their file to 2005, so I switched to that file. The Muslim percentage increased from 22.646% to 22.792%, a jump of 0.15% in just 4 months? The only change I made was switching from 2004 to 2005 file. See Islam by country OneGuy 04:02, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

And for comparison with Christianity, see User:OneGuy/Christianity by country

OneGuy 21:00, 4 Jan 2005 (UTC)

My recent changes

I removed a link to a website that looked distinctly commercial, and also removed several paragraphs in praise of Bahai which seemed inappropriate in this article. If people want to find out about the Bahai, they can click on the link. Zora 06:15, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Zain Engineer's edits on the Qur'an section

Zain modified the Qur'an section slightly to suggest that there was one invariant oral tradition, exactly reflecting the revelation to Muhammad and Muhammad's words, which was later written down by Uthman. This may be a common belief among non-scholarly Muslims, but all my reading in Qur'anic studies suggests that the opposite is in fact true: there were (slightly) variant oral traditions, which were collected or harmonized by Uthman's recension, and that variations in the reading of the Uthmanic rasm have justified varying traditions of Qur'anic recitation. All of this is discussed in Islamic sources; it's not something being pushed by outsiders.

An analogy might be made to Christians who can believe in the absolute inerrancy of every word of the Bible only because they don't know anything about scholarly Bible studies -- as carried out by Christians.

But this is probably something that should be discussed in the Qur'an article -- which I never have given a good vetting. Zora 09:17, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Disagree there, Zora. While Zain can get passionate, in this case, he was just pointing out that "Muslims believe that Qur'an available today is same as that revealed to Prophet Muhammad without any alteration". And he did not remove the following statement that "Written Qur'an was compiled by the third Caliph, Uthman ibn Affan...". The analogy might be as it may, but the state Zain left that para in is exactly what mainstream Muslims believe. Yes, it's like devout Christians' belief that the writers of the Gospels were divinely inspired. But in my experience in living in Africa, India, Pakistan, and the US, I can tell you without qualification that the analogy is not perfect. the belief in the incorrupted nature of the Qur'an is much, much more widely held than the Christian analogy. (Note here I am not arguing the actual truth or otherwise of the proposition.)

Having said that, I don't think your recent edit has really changed the meaning from where Zain left it. And I think either is an improvement over what was thee before ([3]).—iFaqeer (Talk to me!) 10:12, Jan 5, 2005 (UTC)

Zora please read NPOV policy carefully. If some thing is disagreed you can't put a disputed statement unless you site your source. You can't say it is incorrect until you mention which source rejects it. Similar I can't claim it is true until I mention who claims it is true. As the statement which I changed, source was Muslim believe. It should tell about mainstream Muslim believe.

Now as far as 'true' version among 'non-scholarly' Muslims is concerned I'll like you to know following things.

In arabic there are different levels of 'truth/believe'. One level is when one hears about the truth. Second is when he makes distant observation. Third is one sees it. Fourth and highest level is when one observes it personally. It equivalence can be thought as fire. And following levels

One hears about some fire in some place.
He sees smoke from a distance.
He sees the fire from little distance from his own eyes.
He touches the fire and his hand burns.

Most 'non-scholarly' Muslims have the level of 'believe/Truth' to 4th level. They witness the people remembering qur'an by heart Hafiz in their routine. They see Hafiz reciting entire qur'an in front of them without any dispute. I have personally not observed a single instance when a Hafiz gets in dispute with the person correcting him in ramzan (Who is also an hafiz). There are rare instances when he forgets what comes after it. But Never he disputes. So personally with two Hafiz there. There is not a single dispute. So having possibly million of hafiz non-Scholarly muslims don't even believe that issue exist.

This can be very evident from Islamic history too. No need was felt to have a single written form of qur'an by muslims, until many Hafiz died in a war!.

Your believe will be mostly regarded in this method at level of believe of 1 or 2. As you have only heard of it. Many 'non-scholarly' Muslims have seen its effect personally on regular basis.

Although Quran full text copies from even 9th century are present Muslims don't even feel to present it as a evidence as compare to argument of Hafiz. 9th century source is from BBC which can't be regarded as 'non-scholarly' muslim.

I have seen evidences about even older copies of qur'an from people opposing qur'an un-alteration. It was I believe on yahoo news. It was telling that those 'scholars' have discovered copies with out pronunciations. Meaning that dating before Third cliph and they were arguing that the pronunciations were added after it. But for my interest I was watching that even they didn't talk about 'change'. They were talking about 'additions' which was adding of pronunciation.

And most importantly Third cliph was himself an Hafiz! Along with other cliphs. They remembered Qur'an by heart form the days of the prophet. So although some time was passed but chain was same. The people who make it written observed and confirmed it with the prophet first hand so there was no 'middle man' only difference was that the 'need' of written was never felt. It can also tell about affectivity of Hafiz method from very start.

Once again i'll like to add that all these 'claims' have to be related with who is the 'source'. Is it muslim believe. If it is disagreed, which group disagrees with it? Which group agrees with it?

Putting a blind disputed statement without mentioning who says it is true and who believes it is not true, is not NPOV.

Zain 11:30, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Self contradiction in the statement

Here is a contradiction within the statement.

The Qur'an was first compiled in writing by the third Caliph
and directed that all variant copies be destroyed

So it means that , it was in written form before he compiled! For muslim believe, it was due to 'short vowels'. 'short vowels' are not written in arabic text and this cause no confusion among arab readers, but this causes problem among non-arabic readers. In Third caliph time Islam was spread in various non-Arabic countries. So need of 'short vowels' was felt. It might be seen as muslim believe rather fact. But this too can be put outside the section of 'Muslim believe', so this article can be NPOV.

For reference please see [4]

Zain 12:41, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That's not true. The main reason why Uthman standardized the Qur'an was due to different dialects (ahruf), not due to missing vowels and diactrical marks. Both of these (vowels and diactrical marks) were introduced after Uthman. See

http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/Qiraat/hafs.html

The Qur'an continued to be read according to the seven ahruf until midway through Caliph 'Uthman's rule when some confusion arose in the outlying provinces concerning the Qur'an's recitation. Some Arab tribes had began to boast about the superiority of their ahruf and a rivalry began to develop. At the same time, some new Muslims also began mixing the various forms of recitation out of ignorance. Caliph 'Uthman decided to make official copies of the Qur'an according to the dialect of the Quraysh and send them along with the Qur'anic reciters to the major centres of Islam. This decision was approved by Sahaabah and all unofficial copies of the Qur'an were destroyed. Following the distribution of the official copies, all the other ahruf were dropped and the Qur'an began to be read in only one harf. Thus, the Qur'an which is available through out the world today is written and recited only according to the harf of Quraysh.

And the source cited on that page is Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips, Tafseer Soorah Al-Hujuraat, 1990, Tawheed Publications, Riyadh, p. 28-29. OneGuy 20:24, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Sorry I mistook auraf for 'short vowels' without looking at sources again.

Now can we put it in the statement that first copy with 'aurauf' was made by Uthman? or some thing like this.

Plus there are a lot of other information about the history which are missing or incorrect (according to muslim believes).

Problem is that qur'an was 'first' compiled during several times due to several issues (content was not one of them). like 'ahrauf' , 'short vowels' etc. So we should clear that which 'new compilation' made which 'new change'. Is new change, change of content or new change is change of style, dots etc.

A very good discussion on this issue can be found here http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/Qiraat/hafs.html. This article should at least give muslim concepts of the 'differences'.

The concept of ahrauf is discussed in detailed here http://bismikaallahuma.org/Quran/Q_Studies/ahruf.htm

So what can be put from these in this article? Zain 22:02, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

We have discussed this before. The article is already long. This information should go to the Qur'an article. Utman didn't introduce dots (diacritical marks. i.e. dots on letters like fa, ya, ba etc) or vowel signs (symbols above or below the basic printed letters). From the above article, it's clear that ahruf meant different dialects, even different words, and Utman wanted to standardize that to Qurashi usage OneGuy 22:45, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The term version might be misleading. According to muslim believe there was no content change. So some other word might be used. 'Style of writing' will be too soft. But I don't know whether an explanatory word in english in this context exists.

Zain 22:13, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Many Islamic sites use the word "version". For example ...

http://www.ymofmd.com/books/uaq/ch3s4.htm

The Qur'anic text in printed form now used widely in the Muslim world and developing into a standard version ...

I know since Deedat's polemical video tapes where he claims the word "version" means something totally different, many Muslims don't like the word. Even though I don't think the word itself is misleading, as the quote above shows, even some Muslims use the word. In any case, regarding the Uthman compilation, there were obviously some serious disagreements . Uthman was murdered by people who disagreed with him on this issue. OneGuy 22:59, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

this discussion is stale. and belongs on Talk:Qur'an. A "version" is a text with a difference, even if it is a difference of a single letter. dab (ᛏ) 12:06, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)

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