From: seetam@hub.eng.wayne.edu (Seetamraju Uday Bhaskar Sarma)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.indian
Subject: Forced Conversion in Islam !?
Date: 4 Jan 1993 18:40:04 -0600
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

> From: mohammed@cs.uh.edu (Zulfikhar Ali Mohammed)  (INDIA-DiGEST)...
>      Mr.Girish has taken one Quranic verse  "There is no Compulsion in Religion"
> to prove that the Quran teaches exactly the oppposite.  How he does this is by
> quoting verses in the Quran which warn the disbeleivers of the impending hell-
> fire and then saying  that Allah decides who is to be a Muslim and who is not.
> Then he claims that we Muslims can force our religion on anybody saying that it
> is Allah's (God's) will that we are forcing it.  This is highly illogical if not

leaving his point or argument style aside, how about countering my and a few
other's personal opinion, that the general islamic belief is that muhammed's
word do imply that kafis, are a danger to islam, and hence should be destroyed.

And if U dont believe the current libral attitudes in the world arent destroying
islam, look at turkey.  I happened to know two students from turkey, who were
naam-ke-waaste muslims.  One of them graduated a sem ago, though...
They smilingly acknowledge that they are not islamic at heart by the ``true''
definition of islam (I shall leave that in quotes for some room for U to maneuver).
Do U think turkey is considered an islamic nation.  At least it was. once.  Now all
its muslims are considered pagans.  Did U hear about the revivalism that made
headlines a few years agon (in turkey)...

> ludicrous, and it does not portray the spirit of Islam.

>......... What it teaches is that although
> the power and the strength to do anything comes from God, Man still has the free
> will to decide for himself what is right and what is wrong.  He has the right to
> choose his path and God will help him to walk on any path he chooses.  It means
> that if you choose the wrong path, God will not stop you from walking on it - No
> He will give the strength to walk on the wrong path too.  If you close your eyes

Never heard such an interpretation of islam before...   pretty progressive
attitudes....  But, I would like to hear this from the ``horse's mouth'' (i.e., saudi arabia
, iran, and even the afganistani mullahs).  Clearly, by Ur argument below, the
billion people foloowing them cannot be stupid or irrational.

>      Two more things: One is that Mr. Girish gives two non-Muslim scholars' in-
> terpretaions, which no Muslim will give any heed to.  If he had given similar
> interpretations from Muslim scholars (say Ibn Kathir and Qurtubi among the ear-
> lier ones or Yousuf Ali, Daryabadi or Maudoodi among the comtemporaries) whom
> the Muslim masses follow, then his theory may have carried more weight.

Again, the external features of the argument are being given more importance.
What about the substance?  A lot of famous muslim scholars of yore, have been the source
of moral authorization to spread islam throught the mid-west, and uptill Sindh.
Or are U claiming the islamic spread was a happenstance during overzealous caliphates?

>      Finally, no philosophy can be as irrational as has been suggested and yet
> win over a billion adherants all over the world by doing just four-hundredths of
> the missionary work that is being done by Christains.

We are not talking about the logical structure of islam.  What is unlogical or
stupid, in a musalmaan's conclusion non-muslims are a threat to islam?? Dont U hear about
the opinions of people from the arab and mid-west worlds?  And do U know
they do not consider muslims from the subcontinent as true muslims, as they 
are supposed to have deviated form the path of allah and muhammed?

> Yours in Islam,
> Z. Ali Mohammed

Just wondering how would people interpret me if I signed off in ``Yours in Hinduism''?
This comment shouldnt rub off on U, ali mohammed, as I commenting about the
general atmosphere of such discussions, and the audience...

Seetamraju Udaya Bhaskar Sarma
(email : seetam @ ece7 . eng . wayne . edu)

Newsgroups: soc.culture.indian