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> I thought so too, but then I looked it up. Surah al-Mai-dah verse 5 states that "lawful in marriage are chaste women form among the believers and chaste wome

> I thought so too, but then I looked it up. Surah al-Mai-dah verse 5 states that "lawful in marriage are chaste women form among the believers and chaste women from among those who were given the Scripture before you..." This, giving Muslim men permission to wed Jewish and Christian women, has been interpreted by Islamic jurists as implying by omission that Muslim women may not wed Jewish or Christian men. It was believed that such husbands would impart their religion to their children, and may pressure their wives to convert away from Islam. You "looked it up" but you didn't understand a single word. For those interested in the nuances of old religious texts written in dialects that have long since been changed beyond all recognition: a good starting point is http://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp?chapter=5&verse=5 http://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp?chapter=5&verse=5 - Note: there is no more consensus in the Muslim population on what this scripture means than there is consensus between the Catholic and Orthodox Church on the liturgy. The only difference is that the latter two have been under centuries of global public pressure to reconciliate. > Since Islam has no central governing authority, adherents largely rely upon the religious scholarship of their own imam, or upon those known to them to have a thorough understanding of Islamic religious interpretations. Some such scholars declared interfaith marriage by a Muslim woman to be equivalent to apostasy. The consensus opinion, however is that interfaith marriages are never acceptable outside of Muslim-establishment countries, as without the support of a Muslim community, both parents are required to reinforce the faith in their children. The punishment for apostasy in the Islamic world ranges from death to no punishment at all. Under Shafi'i, Maliki, and Hanbali schools, female apostates are executed, whereas Hanafi and Shi'a will imprison her indefinitely, until such time as she reverts to Islamic orthodoxy. As a result, I must agree that it is possible that a woman in an interfaith marriage may be executed for it, with no other reason necessary, under recognized interpretations of Sharia law. This is, of course, independent of those who may murder women in interfaith marriages under color of religion, outside of the purview of recognized Islamic judges of Sharia law. I believe such "honor killing" murders are in fact based upon the underlying tribal culture and not upon its majority religion. As such, if you're not from Pakistan, Sudan, or Saudi Arabia, no one will recommend that a Muslim woman be murdered for marrying a non-Muslim. However, it is likely that everyone she knows will constantly be telling her to get a divorce or will be shunning her until she does. Replace [Islam] with [American Evangelical Christianity], [Imam] with [Pastor], [Islamic] with [Christian], [interfaith] with [inter-racial], [Muslim] with [white], [Shafi'i, Maliki, and Hanbali] with [KKK], [Hanafi and Shi'a] with [their husbands], [Sharia] with [Jim Crow], and [Pakistan, Sudan, or Saudi Arabia] with [Alabama, Mississippi, or Texas] and you have a pretty accurate (although grammatically intolerable) history of 20th century America. I too love uninformed word salad.

logfromblammo 10y ago
I believe you are distracting from the issue rather than addressing it directly. What Christians have done in America under the presumed aegis of their faith is orthogonal to what Muslims have done under Islam. It is equally unacceptable from a pure ethical standpoint for adherents of any religion to use their shared beliefs to justify murder. It is also very common for the apologists for every religion (including Agile software development) to claim that its failures are due to misunderstanding or misinterpretation of the tenets. And it is interesting that you mention Texas. When I was researching the issue, some of the most frequent search results were multiple news reports and editorials on Yaser Said and Ali Irsan. The former is one of the FBI's most wanted fugitives, and the latter will soon go to trial. The UN estimates 5000 honor killings every year, worldwide. About 25 of them occur within the US. The perpetrator tends to employ a religious argument to justify their actions, and are typically (90%) fathers who claim that their daughters had grown "too westernized"--while living in the United States, no less. You can claim that they are spurious arguments all you like; the ones making them still believe that they are valid. My post tried to explain why that belief might exist. And yes, non-Muslim Americans commit domestic violence at a deplorable rate, too, but they are extremely unlikely to be motivated by concern that a Muslim might be abandoning or undermining Islam. Amish, Scientologist, Fundamentalist LDS, Jehovah's Witnesses--they all punish defection or apostasy in some way. The fact that others do it does not make it more morally acceptable for any of them to do it, and it is still very rare for the prescribed punishment to be execution. I also said that the distribution of honor killings is more easily explained by tribal culture rather than religion. It has little to do with religion, and everything to do with the psychology of murderers. In any case, the root of this thread lies in group dynamics--specifically homogenization and xenophobia. Dividing yourself from "the other", whether it be by surrounding yourself in your own bubble or echo chamber, or by excluding them from your society, only increases the likelihood of violence between your tribe and the xeno's. Ignorance leads to fear. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. When Americans support a presidential ban on Muslim immigration, they are already ignorant and afraid of the xeno, and possibly also angry. As a grandparent post mentioned, this ignorance and fear would be lessened by interfaith marriages. But the vast majority of potential interfaith marriages are forbidden in Islam, according to an overwhelming consensus by Islamic religious scholars. A Muslim man may marry a Muslim, Christian, or Jewish woman, while within an Islamic country. It is deplorable for a Muslim woman to marry a non-Muslim man. It is deplorable for any Muslim to marry a Christian or Jew outside of an Islamic country. It is forbidden for a Muslim to marry one who is not either Muslim or "of the book". That is indisputably what Muslims believe, and that belief limits one of the many ways in which people of different religious faiths acquire understanding of and compassion for "the other". One simply can't acquire familiarity via a "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" scenario.

logfromblammo 10y ago

I believe you are distracting from the issue rather than addressing it directly. What Christians have done in America under the presumed aegis of their faith is orthogonal to what Muslims have done under Islam. It is equally unacceptable from a pure ethical standpoint for adherents of any religion to use their shared beliefs to justify murder. It is also very common for the apologists for every religion (including Agile software development) to claim that its failures are due to misunderstanding or misinterpretation of the tenets. And it is interesting that you mention Texas. When I was researching the issue, some of the most frequent search results were multiple news reports and editorials on Yaser Said and Ali Irsan. The former is one of the FBI's most wanted fugitives, and the latter will soon go to trial. The UN estimates 5000 honor killings every year, worldwide. About 25 of them occur within the US. The perpetrator tends to employ a religious argument to justify their actions, and are typically (90%) fathers who claim that their daughters had grown "too westernized"--while living in the United States, no less. You can claim that they are spurious arguments all you like; the ones making them still believe that they are valid. My post tried to explain why that belief might exist. And yes, non-Muslim Americans commit domestic violence at a deplorable rate, too, but they are extremely unlikely to be motivated by concern that a Muslim might be abandoning or undermining Islam. Amish, Scientologist, Fundamentalist LDS, Jehovah's Witnesses--they all punish defection or apostasy in some way. The fact that others do it does not make it more morally acceptable for any of them to do it, and it is still very rare for the prescribed punishment to be execution. I also said that the distribution of honor killings is more easily explained by tribal culture rather than religion. It has little to do with religion, and everything to do with the psychology of murderers. In any case, the root of this thread lies in group dynamics--specifically homogenization and xenophobia. Dividing yourself from "the other", whether it be by surrounding yourself in your own bubble or echo chamber, or by excluding them from your society, only increases the likelihood of violence between your tribe and the xeno's. Ignorance leads to fear. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. When Americans support a presidential ban on Muslim immigration, they are already ignorant and afraid of the xeno, and possibly also angry. As a grandparent post mentioned, this ignorance and fear would be lessened by interfaith marriages. But the vast majority of potential interfaith marriages are forbidden in Islam, according to an overwhelming consensus by Islamic religious scholars. A Muslim man may marry a Muslim, Christian, or Jewish woman, while within an Islamic country. It is deplorable for a Muslim woman to marry a non-Muslim man. It is deplorable for any Muslim to marry a Christian or Jew outside of an Islamic country. It is forbidden for a Muslim to marry one who is not either Muslim or "of the book". That is indisputably what Muslims believe, and that belief limits one of the many ways in which people of different religious faiths acquire understanding of and compassion for "the other". One simply can't acquire familiarity via a "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" scenario.