freediver wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 2:42pm:


Sure, a good place to start would be to google some key words like "massacres in history".

Or if you are looking for the far milder equivalent of judging all men of military age being deemed guilty for the treachery of their leaders, off the top of my head, the Melos massacre by the Athenians during the Peloponnesian War. Though I'm pretty sure those men were not given the courtesy of having the option of re-pledging their loyalty like the Banu Qurayza were.

freediver wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 2:42pm:


Its in the Ibn Ishaq account, and also the Sealed Nectar. You are most welcome to look it up. Some did repent, and were promptly pardoned.

freediver wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 2:42pm:


Thats a pretty universally understood norm in pretty much all cultures FD. Today we distinguish between 'civilian' and 'military' - and rationalise that its far more moral to kill enemy military personnel and spare the civilians. In those days the harsh reality was that if you were a male of military age you were automatically considered military, and therefore far more of a target to the enemy than women and children. Though of course that didn't stop rampaging armies from routinely slaughtering men, women and children alike, indiscriminately - something which, incidentally, Islam put a stop to.

freediver wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 3:58pm:


I don't expect anything - you are free to do whatever you wish.

freediver wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 3:58pm:


You are only betraying your ignorance of history. The fact is until very recent times, a society's men of military age were indistinguishable from the military of that society - for the simple reason that all men of military age were obliged to serve in the military. This is obviously a very foreign notion for our modern society.

freediver wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 3:58pm:


Keep telling yourself that. The notion is a complete joke though.

polite_gandalf wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 2:37pm:


This is the bit that I struggle with Gandalf.

Unfortunately it seems that throughout history, it is the winners of violent engagements who dictate who was or was not acting treacherously.

For my part, slaughtering people is NEVER the right thing to do, it is never justifiable, excusable or acceptable. That is my personal world view. I am also cognizant that as a species we will continue to kill (slaughter) each other for as long as our species exists (well unless we actually do discover enlightenment one day - even then, who knows?), also, we the slaughterers will always try to excuse or justify their actions. Some will accept the justification others will reject it. As we see in the modern world we live in, others will also use their rejection of said justification to justify their own acts of barbarity.

In short, I could not, in good faith, not address that comment.

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The wikipedia articles mentions nothing of these "opportunities to disown" it, and if the first reference to it was in 1979, it is safe to conclude it was made up.

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You said it is a universally undrstood norm. That's a bit different from something that happened in the past.

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The war was long over Gandalf. It never really began. Muhammed laid siege to the Jewish tribe in their own home. They surrendered unconditionally without a fight. They were already in Muhammed's custody. That is about as far from the field of battle as you can get. It was so far that Muhammed had no intention of slaughtering them until an 'angel' told him to.

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This was hardly a violent engagement.

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Like this BS about Muhammed offering to let them go if the "re-pledged" allegiance to his new Islamic state?

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Of course you are not "happy." We can see you squirming, just as you can see me sneering.

Was Muhammed wrong to slaughter all those Jews? If it was wrong, why do you try so many angles to justify it?

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Crap. That was the whole point of it - to make people fear the new ruler and fall into line. It reads like a mob movie on a grander scale. The slaughter of these Jews was the birth of the first Islamic State.

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It compels you to justify and support these attrocities. It causes you and your fellow Muslims to reject fundamental human rights on principle. It forces you to make the "Jew as borg" argument that in any non-Muslim context you would instantly recognise as evil.

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Right, they take the morally superior option of a choice between slavery, forced mass migration, or destitution - so long as Muslims end up with everything - land, goats, women.

Gandalf, you cannot honestly defend this sort of barbarity then act all surprised when modern Muslims do equally horrendous things in the name of Islam.

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What if a similar situation was to arise today? Of course the historical jurists are going to focus on the other options, because they were part of a victorious ruling empire, and the last thing they wanted their enemies to do is fight to the death. That is just common sense. But Muhammed demonstrated for them that when the slaughter of innocents does have a practical purpose, it is justified.

It is a similar hypocrisy with robbery. Before his Islamic State, Muhammed was a thief. But as a ruler of a large state, suddenly thievery looks bad. It is a consistent demonstration of moral flexibility in the pursuit of Islamic rule.

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Erred less? You are starting to sound like a heretic Gandalf.

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Keep tapdancing Gandalf.

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He was not a ruler of a state under pressure. The state did not exist. He was trying to establish absolute rule over the city of Medina so he could continue using it to rob caravans going to and from Mecca, without those pesky Jews interfering. This is the act that sealed the deal for him.

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Does that mean that as a Muslim, if by some freak of circumstance you found yourself in a similar situation, you should follow the same course of action?

Take as much time as you want Gandalf. Think.

Phemanderac wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 4:33pm:


Have you ever read the Bhagavad Gita? Arjuna says as much to Krishna (God).

Krishna replies, giving Arjuna his justification for war. It's probably the most quoted battle cry in history. In a nutshell, the justification is duty. This applies not only to war, of course, but to all actions. Sometimes hard things need to be done - even something as hard as killing members of your own family; something that will cause you regret for the rest of your life.

But when it's the right thing, it has to be done.

That's the justification, but I'm with you. I've always sided with Arjuna's (the pacifist's) view.

Karnal wrote on Jul 4^th, 2015 at 9:58pm:



Still not justifiable, for my part, however, I have always acknowledged that it won't stop us from killing...

It seems to me that we, as an immature species, need to justify our most appalling behaviour for no other reason than to make it easier to live with our flawed selves.

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False dichotomy. I thought only Brian and Gweg sprouted this idiotic nonsense. Have you ever seen someone criticising a violent ideology like Islam use it to avoid holding the individual to account? This is not an insanity defense Phem. A person is still responsible for their actions, and for whatever ideology they adopt to justify those actions to themselves.