Soren wrote on Jul 20^th, 2015 at 7:54pm:


Soooo.... your logical conclusion is that murderous, barbaric behaviour *IS* an Islamic invention? Must be - otherwise what possible point could you be making?

You haven't a leg to stand on S - both good and bad behaviour existed before Islam, and Islam does not have any sort of monopoly on either. You can't rabbit on all day every day about how Islam motivates people to behave in one way - but somehow doesn't motivate people to behave in the other way. Or if you can you'll have to explain the logic to me.

polite_gandalf wrote on Jul 20^th, 2015 at 2:02pm:


Theoretically, Muhammed erred. But you do not know of any examples of Muhammed erring. Except of course for the time God admonished him for not dipping his wick often enough. Thus, Muhammed did not err - as far as you and other Muslims know. The story or legend of Muhammed that you hear about is one without mistakes. The political implications of Islamic theology is that that must be interpreted as being without error. Thus, you must be cunning in interpreting Muhammed's rape and pillage if you are to make any effort to reconcile Islam with those "wishy washy western liberal morals" you think we are out to get you with.

Soren wrote on Jul 21^st, 2015 at 7:06pm:


I say, old boy, do you really think the New Testament is a good read?

Two gospels (Matthew and Luke) and a few letters in Corinthians.

Is there something I’ve missed?

freediver wrote on Jul 21^st, 2015 at 7:13pm:


I know for a fact Muhammad erred - because he was human. But I can only go by what we know about the man - and on that score we are all at the mercy of the only known sources that wrote about him. Thats you as well as me FD - and everyone else. So do you know of any recorded mistakes he made? I'm assuming you don't consider the Banu Qurayza a mistake, but rather a cold calculated act of brutality that achieved exactly what it intended - right? So what else FD - anything else that you know of?

freediver wrote on Jul 21^st, 2015 at 7:13pm:


Of course. We are all beholden to the legends - know you of any non-romanticised contemprary biographies that we can use to help us better understand this historical figure? Sorry to break it to you FD, but pretty much all we know about the historical Muhammad was written by people who thought rather fondly of him - and yes probably didn't mention any mistakes. Thats history for you.

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I am not having a theological debate with you gandalf. Despite your wild tangent with Karnal, I don't really care whether you think he was divine. What matters is that you do not differ from the rest of the Muslim crowd in interpreting what we know about him - that the written record must be interpreted as the best example for men to follow, because it is an example without error. There is no way around this, even by arguing context. You cannot possibly avoid context, merely differ with the hardline Muslims on how cunning you have to be in interpreting it.

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Easy does it Gandalf. It took us 14 pages to get this far.

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Well thanks for clarifying what you meant by that. I consider his intention to be mistaken, and the cold calculated acts of brutality he engaged in to achieve that end compounded his error. It was such a colossal cock-up that still today we are reaping what he sowed.

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A small number? It is enough to give the "good" Muslims a run for their money, despite being about as bad as it could get in interpreting Islam.

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It is theoretically possible. But it hamstrings those efforts at every turn. Take you for example. I thought we had reached two examples of your efforts to make Islam into something good. But now it is back down to one, and you refuse to talk about it.

Good intentions are not sufficient Gandalf.

So I think this is how it works:

- FD can make any idiotic and baseless assertion about my theological views in order to group me in with all the other muslims, but I'm not allowed to refute those charges and explain how he is wrong about my views - because that would be having a "theological debate" - which FD won't have a bar of.

When FD says "I really don't care" whether or not I think he's divine - what he really means is, he wants to throw around the false accusation that I *DO* think he is divine, and not have that accusation refuted for the baseless nonsense that it is.

polite_gandalf wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2015 at 10:51am:


Exactly. You have no right to respond to FD's accusations. No one has the right to not be offended, after all.

You take this as an opportunity to learn what your views are.

freediver wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2015 at 1:51pm:


right, and I think is along the same lines as when you said...

freediver wrote on Jul 21^st, 2015 at 9:20pm:


And this my friend, is what we call a false dichotomy. The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence: just because Muhammad's sources are biased and (probably) omitted all his mistakes, doesn't mean muslims must accept that he never made mistakes - even if we accept that he was the best example of men to follow.