by calling their opposition "ISLAMIPHOBES", which helps time & time again with those that feel insecure in their arguments, but all in all the use of that term is just a smoke screen, & if for nothing else, should tell you that you are spot on with the subject they object to!
Having written at length on various aspects of Islam, it is always my writings concerning doctrinal deceit that elicit (sometimes irate) responses. As such, the purpose of this article is to revisit the issue of deceit and taqiyya in Islam, and address the many ostensibly plausible rebuttals made by both Muslims and non-Muslims.
The earliest rebuttal I received appeared last year, days after I wrote an essay called “Islam’s doctrines of deception” for the subscription-based Jane’s Islamic Affairs Analyst. Due to the controversy it initiated among the intelligence community and abroad, the editors were quick to publish an apologetic counter-article by one Michael Ryan called “Interpreting Taqiyya.”
For starters, Ryan is not a careful reader: he says I fail to mention ijma (consensus) among the ulema, even though I repeatedly cite and delineate the ulema’s (quite consensual) verdicts supporting taqiyya; he sardonically suggests that, of course all people, not just Muslims, engage in deception during war—a point I stressed; and he evinces shock that I say Islam has no “common sense” and is “legalistic,” when I simply wrote that sharia law is not based on common sense but rather the 7th century words of Muhammad, which may or may not rely on what we would today call “common sense.” (I had in mind anecdotes of Muhammad saying camel urine heals, people should cover their mouths when yawning (lest Satan dive down their throat), men cannot wear gold, only silver, and in order to be in each other’s company, women should “breast-feed” strange men ).
Next, Ryan makes the usual (and ultimately superficial) arguments without any backing: that I “cherry-picked citations from the Quran”; that I focused on a “very narrow use of the term taqiyya”; and that there are “other respected jurists who disagree” with the notion of taqiyya I stressed.
Unfortunately, he overlooks the fact that, right or wrong, none of this denies that there are Koranic references that do permit deception; that, even if there are “broader” definitions for taqiyya, the “narrow” one I delineated is still valid; and that if there are “respected jurists who disagree,” there are still more who agree.
As expected, whereas I listed and quoted several authoritative jurists justifying taqiyya, Ryan makes only flat counter-assertions whose plausibility rests solely in the fact that they comport with the epistemology of the Western, secular reader, who cannot comprehend that a religion would actually mandate temporal conquests and permit deceit in their furtherance.
For instance, he makes comforting assertions such as “It is manifestly not true that Muslims as a whole desire eternal warfare with non-Muslims,” even though I never argue that Muslims desire eternal war but rather that sharia mandates it. Regarding a verse I cited as being relied on by the ulema in support of taqiyya (2:73), he writes, “To this reader, the verse inspires admiration rather than any other emotion.” Odd that an article in a publication geared to the intelligence community and dedicated to analyzing Islam would bother evoking “emotions” in the first place—further revealing that Ryan’s rebuttal relies more on “shared feelings,” not facts.
Moreover, like most of Islam’s apologists who are obsessed with portraying the “true-peaceful-and-tolerant” face of Islam, Ryan overlooks the pivotal fact that it matters very little if the entire Muslim world believes in jihad and deception. What matters is that some Muslims have, do, and always will. If 19 surreptitious jihadists managed to cause horrific deaths and destruction on 9/11, insisting that not all Muslims accept these doctrines is neither relevant nor reassuring..................
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