Atheist’s Guide to Understanding the Quran and Talking to Muslims

(When Recovering from Religion announced a blog space, I thought about how I might contribute. I have worked for 20+ years as a Mulsim-language translator and spent long portions of my life living among Muslims. I think that this is the best I can contribute- some background notes for those hoping to help Muslim seekers who call or chat with us. A word of caution, however- this is written to also speak to atheists who debate/confront Muslims. So, some of it will touch on deconversion. Also, I ask the question, “Should we bother trying to convert Muslims who act just like us, but happen to have Muslim beliefs in the background?”)

I. Disclaimer. Having already written most of what follows, I feel compelled return to the beginning and insert some paragraphs here. What I had written made me sound like a cheerleader for regular, normal Muslims. I’m an atheist and I’m deeply troubled that I might be writing anything that would be construed as defending a religion. I am not writing this to defend Islam, but to help atheists understand the mentality of ‘normal’ Muslims. By normal, I mean both representing the average level of adherence (to religion) in their societies, but, also, representing the views and behavior that would be seen as average (normal) in most societies, worldwide, in 2020. There are many, many disgusting aspects of Muslim societies- forced marriage, wearing the veil, preventing women from working, female genital mutilation, flogging, limiting expression, honor killings- or even the idea of chastity.

Among Muslim societies, some ills are regional. Honor killings are vile, horrendous acts. But, if we plotted them out on a map, we would see that most of them are regional- Yazidis and Hindus, as well as Muslims, all in western-south and south Asia, defend some stupid sense of familial honor by slaughtering family members who violate it. This is completely indefensible. Is this Muslim or regional? Either way, it is subhuman. But when multiple religious groups in the same area conduct the same horrible act (‘honor’ killing), perhaps more than the religion is at play. The same can be said of female genital mutilation, which is largely a northeastern African practice, though a group in south Asia also practices this. I once had a soft spot in my heart for the Yazidis in Iraq, who practice a religion that refuses to allow people to convert to their religion. I was disgusted when they stoned to death a Yazidi girl for having a Muslim boyfriend. I can’t recall any other stoning deaths in Iraq (pre-ISIS). Honor killings aren’t necessarily Muslim. We need to fight them, but we should probably engage with Muslim allies before we do- so we can present a unified front against the practice.

I think we should look at Islam with the same lens that we view 17th to mid 19th century Christianity. Some Christian countries legalized slavery and defended it on religious grounds. Other countries, with the same bible, never considered slavery to be moral. The religious text provided cover for the transgression, but the religion didn’t require it. Today, we have Muslim societies that are completely, or even partially (women lose either way) patriarchal, but we also have millions of Muslim women living in societies where they enjoy the same rights as men, at least on paper. There is a vast trove of justification for patriarchy in the Quran, but we need to ask what is driving a particular society to seek that justification to oppress women. Are they oppressing because it is demanded by the religion, or using the religion as cover for their oppression? [We definitely need to ask why anyone would associate themselves with any religion or system of belief where someone could ask such a question. You can’t substitute the word ‘atheism’ for ‘religion’ in that last sentence, as no one is oppressing women in the name of atheism.] Some Muslims don’t use religion to oppress women. Islam, when viewed by our current values, denigrates women. So does Christianity and Judaism. If our goal is to have a maximally free society, we should focus on adherents who actually take up the banner of oppression offered by these religions, rather than focus on religious documents that justify oppression. All Muslims have the same Quran. If some oppress and some don’t, then the Quran itself isn’t the driving force behind the oppression. I drove by a United Methodist church today with the biggest rainbow flags I’ve ever seen and giant “Everyone is welcome here” signs. I don’t think there would be any point in engaging them with some bible verse about killing LGBTQ+ people. They have found a way around those verses and I salute them. We need to have the same attitude when relating to the Muslims in our lives, except that we need to recognize that they won’t directly confront problematic verses in the Quran the way a Christian might. That’s OK. If most Muslims are every bit as decent, ethical and normal as other modern citizens of the world, why should we care if they have some dusty book on a shelf that justifies abhorrent practices? They ignore it as much as we do. I’ll come back to this in the passage on ‘bad Muslims’ below.

I enjoy looking sideways at a culture, noticing the less typical indications of its health. I have two observations of Muslim culture from these sideways glances. The best indication I ever had of the oppression of Muslim women occurred when I went to a conference of Muslim university students in the US. I was 25 years-old at the time and was 5/10 in terms of my personal appearance, nothing but ordinary, no woman was going to pay any attention to me just for my looks. But I was white and, as this was in Ohio, presumably American. In other words, every Muslim woman there assumed that I was an American man who had converted to Islam. I was utterly besieged, the entire time, by college-age Muslim women giving me their phone numbers and asking me to call them. I interpreted this, and all my Arab friends (male) confirmed, as women desperate to meet a western Muslim who had a western appreciation of women. They saw me as a ticket out of arranged marriages or marriages to conservative idiots who wouldn’t show them respect. They were Muslim, but they wanted the kind of relationship that non-Muslim westerners (usually) have with their spouses. It was embarrassing, not for me, but for them. They were the ones wearing the veils of that religion, yet eager to marry someone who wasn’t raised in their culture. That seems to be the best possible argument against women remaining Muslim. So, whatever good things I say about Muslims below, and I have many good things to say, that experience was poignant and unshakable. I met dozens of women that weekend who wanted to remain Muslim, but with protection from their Muslim tradition. Nothing can shake that testament of the fear Muslim women have of living in their own culture. This really points to a central weakness of Islam. I didn’t mention it above, but many Muslim societies, keep their women out of the workforce, which, obviously, weakens those societies. They can’t compete with countries where many/most women work and contribute beyond their own families. On a purely economical level, this is a recipe for decline. This also weakens Islam by fanning resentment among the women who are prevented from having an impact beyond their immediate families. My central take away from this conference was that Muslim women want to be Muslim in a non-Muslim context- at best. And good for them for all instantly realizing it when they saw me, because I saw the wheels turning in their eyes before they approached me.

Having lived in ultra-liberal Muslim societies, it often takes a while to see the way religion effects women. I spent a lot of time in Iraqi Kurdistan. The region has a huge mix of religions, even including religions that still haven’t made it to Wikipedia, but has a Muslim majority. I’ve never met more and more vocal atheists than in this region. I knew a woman in one of the most liberal cities there, who worked in a leadership position and never hesitated to assert power at work. I always laugh when remembering how she shut down a peer by saying, “That’s how it’s going to be and you are fine with that.” She was strong, independent, unmarried well past the usual age for marriage and only nominally Muslim. She was perfectly happy to meet me in her office, but, in years of interacting, she never once would go out to eat with me, because her father was a believer and she didn’t want news to get back to him about her eating in a restaurant with a man. She was oppressed, despite her high level of independence, power and success. She didn’t deserve to have that weight on her back.

But here’s another, tangential, experience of Islam. I lived for several years in India, which has the second-largest Muslim population in the world, but not a Muslim majority. I sought out Muslim neighborhoods when exploring cities because they had the best Afghani bread and they had restaurants with meat on the menu. (Sorry- I eat meat and food is my principle lens for examining our world.) The surest indicator that I had stumbled into a Muslim neighborhood was the presence of beggars. Literally, this was my guide- I would drive until seeing beggars, then stop. Because Muslims are beggars? No, because the Hindu beggars knew that the Muslims would actually give them money (see the translation from the Quran below), unlike the Hindus, who blamed the poverty of Hindu beggars on their conduct in past lives. If I wasn’t near a hospital or a foreign embassy (where beggars also stacked up), the presence of beggars usually indicated that I was in a Muslim neighborhood, and probably not far from some delicious kebab. That made a huge impression on me- the density of beggars in Muslim neighborhoods was so heavy. Poor people paid precious money to travel to these neighborhoods to beg, knowing that the Muslims wouldn’t turn them away and would give them alms. Almost all of the beggars were Hindus. Think about how screwed up that is- going to a space belonging to a different religion because the other religion will be more generous than yours, yet still adhering to your original, sick religion, which wouldn’t help you. Crazy. (My children had portraits of Ambedkar (an author of the Indian constitution) in their rooms when they were little- he was from the untouchable caste and urged low-caste Hindus to leave Hinduism. He had the right idea- if a religion doesn’t care about you, dump it. He will always remain a hero for me.)

Some forms of Islam are a terror for many people in the world, especially the women, and even for the women who embrace it. But, most Muslims in the world are far less influenced by religion than right-wing evangelical, American Christians are influenced by religion. Please reread that last sentence and trust me that it is true. American evangelicals spend far more time focusing on religion than most of the Muslims in the world. Most Muslims claim the religion of their parents, yet ignore most of the bad parts of the religion and try to lead normal, modern lives. Most Muslims are closer to atheists than evangelicals.

II. Background.

I went to high school in a Muslim country, where I learned the language (Egyptian- it’s almost Arabic). You can learn Thai and never discuss Buddhism. You can learn Japanese and never discuss Shintoism, but you can’t learn Arabic without discussing Islam- so I learned Islam, too. I loved forming close relationships with Muslims. I hated the fatalistic aspects of Islam, which breed political apathy and personal irresponsibility. Even the language refuses to blame. Cultures that speak Arabic are often fatalistic and it’s baked into the language. In Europe, when taking roll call at school, we all say some form of the words ‘here’ or ‘present’. In Arabic, students use the word ‘found’. So, when a student is absent, they say that she ‘isn’t found’, as if the teacher and other students aren’t looking hard enough for her. They don’t fault her for not bothering to show up. When someone drops a glass and it breaks on the ground, they never say “I dropped it”, but “It fell from my hand”, as if the glass were an active agent. Fervent Muslims believe that if something already happened, god wanted it to happen. I once ended up under a bus, with my bike wrapped around its tire, because the Muslim driver failed to signal his turn and I collided as he turned in front of me. After numerous attempts to drive away (with me underneath), he finally got out, looked underneath, saw that I was alive and pronounced some religious mantra that this was the will of Allah. A split-second later, for the first time in my life, (I am not an angry or violent person) I found myself choking someone (the driver) on the side of a bus. I was chill until he acted like the accident was the will of Allah, rather than his failure to signal. Islamic fatalism is problematic- as was my reaction to it (at 15 years of age).

But I had a much more pleasant and meaningful encounter of that same phrase (Insha’allah- see Biden/Trump debate 1) with my family friend Ibrahim Helmy. Ibrahim was a Muslim family man and a Renaissance man. He was a biologist, working for the US Navy in Egypt. But he was also an amateur Egyptologist, who had discovered tombs that became permanent exhibits in the tourist circuit. He was an avid SCUBA diver and had discovered underwater archaeological sites. He was vibrant, polyglot, loving spouse and father, smart and active. One day, on a mission collecting animal specimens for the US Navy in the Sinai Peninsula, he put his jeep in reverse and backed over a WW II landmine. Instantly, he lost one leg below the knee, one leg above the knee, an eye, an arm, fingers on the other hand. Somehow, his American co-worker (Navy Commander Morel- not sure of the rank), was able to stop all the bleeding in his wounds. No rescue crews would come into the minefield, so Morel had to carry Ibrahim to the nearest road, walking through the minefield, for which he was decorated with a medal for bravery. (And damn the first responders who didn’t understand what they signed up for.) I saw Ibrahim in an Egyptian military hospital about a week later. No A/C, so flies were all over him and his wounds, coming through the open windows. I walked into the room and was immediately struck by how little of him was left. The sheet draped over him touched the mattress where his legs and arm should have been. This is a hard thing to see. I had worked in a charity clinic, cleaning infected wounds, two days a week for the year prior, so I had a strong stomach for gore, but I was still shocked at his appearance. Clumsily, the only thing I could think to say was “Izzayuk?” (“How are you?”, in Egyptian). His immediate response was “Insha’allah” (It’s God’s will). That still, 32 years later, strikes me. He lost everything- his ability to provide for his family, his ability to walk, his hobbies, his ability to climb the stairs to his apartment, but he never complained. To him- this was god’s will, so that’s what he’d live with. As an atheist, I don’t want to see misfortune as the will of a god. But, I would love to see everyone face unalterable circumstances with that kind of quick acceptance. Ibrahim skipped the stages of grief and went directly to acceptance. No doubt, that enabled him to better focus on his family and his recovery. In fact, conducting research for this article, I see that he quickly re-engaged fighting for Egypt’s endangered species. Only death could keep him down. But the thing that hit me the hardest was his sincerity. When Biden used the term Insh’allah in the debate with Trump, many Muslims commented on the sarcastic nature of his usage- which perfectly corresponded to the way most Muslims use the term. Allow me to take a second to restate that- in much of the Muslim world, the phrase ‘If Allah wills it”, is considered sarcastic. It’s a joke,-a weak, premature defense of your anticipated failure to fulfill an obligation. In much of the Muslim world, when someone asks if you will do something and you say ‘Tomorrow, if it’s god’s will’, the implication is that you have zero intention of doing it tomorrow. Muslims praised Biden for using the culturally significant, sarcastic, rather than literal, sense of this phrase. This sarcastic use of the term, if not initiated in Egypt, was very thoroughly established by the time I lived there. But Ibrahim, didn’t have any hint of sarcasm. He just seemed to mean, ‘This is what I’ve been dealt and I’ll have to deal with it.’ Over thirty years later, it was one of the most intense conversations I’ve ever had.

Joe Biden used the same phrase, ‘Insha’allah’, during the first 2020 Presidential debate, when confronted with a promise from Trump, in the sense that the bus driver used it- ‘whatever’, ‘it won’t happen’, ‘who cares’, etc. This is how many Arabs/Muslims actually use the phrase (with implicit atheism- ‘I’ll say it all depends on god’s will, so I don’t have to act.’) Ibrahim did not use it in this sense. He really felt that whatever happened to him was ordained by god and he would get through it. He’d probably never SCUBA dive again. He wouldn’t be able to walk the desert until he saw sand dropping away under his foot, which is how he discovered a famous tomb in Saqqara. He couldn’t trap animals in the desert or even type a scientific paper. He damn sure could never climb the stairs to his 10th floor apartment. Still, he, at that time, seemed more peaceful than I am during any random week of my life.

Ibrahim had a huge affect on me. I idolized him before the mine explosion (I was into Egyptology), but after talking to him in the hospital, I really respected his total peace with his circumstances. I was internally freaking out, seeing him there with half his body, but he wasn’t. I have neglected some other details of his life- he doted over his wife, he loved his young little boy, so proud that he had a bicycle. He was an awesome person. SO, ATHEISTS, LET US PAUSE HERE. What ugly part of the Quran would you throw in the face of this man during a discussion? What horrific terrorist act would you try to link him with, using guilt by association? When should we ask Ibrahim to defend some Quran verse he ignores that grants him permission to beat his wife or kill an unbeliever? SERIOUSLY. PAUSE. HOW DOES ANY OF THAT RELATE TO THIS MAN?

Ibrahim, though definitely more impressive than most, was just a religious believer who happened to be Muslim. Except that he was far more curious, studied and adventurous, he wasn’t unlike most Christian father/husbands. His religion, Islam, has some baggage, like every other religion. That’s true. I’m guessing that Ibrahim would have said so if I had asked him. (Sorry, but when you’re a teenager talking to a guy who discovered pharonic tombs and underwater cities, you don’t waste time talking about religion.) The question for anyone who wants to influence Muslim people is- how much do we want to heap in the laps of similar believers when we can just coexist? Are we better considering ‘normal’ Muslims as allies and working toward a common goal than tarring them with the worst aspects of their scripture?

I’ve spent a significant part of my life in Muslim countries. I have had the chance to meet and befriend so many Muslims. I also worked conducting interrogations of Taliban, Al-Qaeda and ISIS predecessor ‘Muslims’, so I don’t have any delusions about the evils that have been committed in the name of Islam.

The wrong way to approach Muslims-

The persuasive methods of American atheists have been corrupted by Christians. Atheists love to surprise Christians by pointing out things that Christians never knew were part of the Bible. Especially slavery, which I really think is the rock that American Christianity will eventually die on. I’m not at all denying that this is an effective means of getting thousands of Christians to rethink their beliefs, but here is the Atheist Experience method-

1- Do you think your book is the literal word of god?

2- OK, then you think your god agrees with this verse? (then quote something appalling.)

3- Christian either creates some completely awkward defense or confesses ignorance.

(I listen to Atheist Experience with my children each week and love to listen to my nine year-old poke holes in bad arguments. It’s an awesome show, but not a good model for moving forward with compatible Muslims toward a more progressive future.)

This is not a good model for dealing with Muslims. The evangelical insistence that the bible is the literal word of god has led atheists to learn all the bible verses that are abhorrent. Nothing wrong with this. My kids have had a children’s version of the bible, since birth, that contained all the worst parts, with graphic illustrations, including children being ripped apart by bears on the cover. We should ask Christians- if you think this is god’s word, then why did he say this? This is effective with some Christians, who either, never knew the bible said that bullshit, or now have to tie their brain in knots trying to defend it. I’ve heard debates and discussions where the atheist quotes the bible more, and more accurately, than the Christian. The atheists take a sentence from the bible, which is supposedly literally true, and prove a contradiction in some propositional argument. I don’t know whether this tactic really works to change hearts and minds in America or western societies, but this won’t work on Muslims. Muslims, all of them, already know every horrible verse in the Quran, even if they can’t read it. They have lived in societies that quote all the bad stuff. You will never confront a Muslim with a bad verse from the Quran that she has not already heard. We can’t play ‘Gotcha’ with Muslims. They know the horrible stuff in there and, to the extent that they are living normal, modern lives, they are actively turning away from those verses- even at the risk of being branded an infidel, which carries the death penalty in some countries. I’ve seen atheists and others quote selected verses from the Quran and demand that some Muslim defend or own up to some horrible practice like wife beating. This is never a good approach when talking to Muslims. Atheists should have a word for the Muslims who ignore the bad parts of the Quran- ALLY.

III. Bad Muslims. Personally, I consider bad Muslims to be a major problem in Muslim societies. These Muslims that understand the literal words of their religion, but ignore them, usually refer to themselves as ‘bad Muslims’. In other words- they don’t pray, they drink, smoke, screw around, maybe eat pork, but never consciously consider that their conduct is an acceptable version of ‘being Muslim’, despite the fact of millions of others just like them. Statistically speaking, they represent a huge proportion of ‘Muslims’. They deserve the same recognized status as secular/reformed Jewish people. They should be able to say, “Yeah, but we’re a different type of Muslim and we look like this.” However, they refuse to offer themselves as a contrasting narrative to Quranic Islam and accept the fact that they are inferior Muslims. Personally, I think they are the key to reforming Islam, though I’ve never met any ‘bad Muslim’ who cared about reforming Islam, because they were always more interested in living life. That is the central paradox in reforming Islam. Bad Muslims have enough space to live their lives ignoring Islam, so they don’t feel any need to confront it. These Muslims are just normal, modern people, who happen to be Muslim. They break the rules of the religion constantly and they are, in my experience, the majority of the population in most Muslim countries. They don’t all break all the rules, but there isn’t a plurality that follows all the rules. With the exception of eating pork, which seems to be the last rule they are willing to break, they ignore the edicts of Islam- they drink alcohol, they don’t pray, they sleep around (less often), they skip the fast in Ramadan. I’ve never driven to the base of a mountain, with steep, crumbling, dangerous roads, and seen hawkers selling ice buckets full of chilled bottles of Jack Daniels to drivers, except in a Muslim country. (You almost want to take one and drink when you realize that the other drivers on these dangerous roads are already drunk.) When traveling on the borders of Iran, GPS and maps are completely inaccurate. But, you know the border is close when there is a giant liquor store, which is often, literally, the only building for miles around. If a Muslim is about to enter one of the most strict Muslim countries in the world, he wants to visit a fully-stocked liquor store before entering. A tech-savvy, modern Muslim in Iraq invited a colleague and me to his house to celebrate the end of Ramadan. I wanted to arrive with a gift. Usually, in the Muslim Middle East, Johnnie Walker Blue Label is the standard (if expensive) gift (nothing less, ever, is acceptable). I brought a bottle. We knocked on his door the night of the holy Muslim religious feast and I asked him to step outside so I wouldn’t offend his family if the gift was inappropriate. For a second, I thought I had totally screwed up. He looked at the bottle and said, “You shouldn’t have done that.” For a split second, I wondered if he wasn’t the delightful bad Muslim I thought he was, but then he said, “We have so much of it inside already.” Indeed they did. Their Ramadan feast had a 50-cent sound track and booze flowing. The were normal Muslims.

That was great, except that this guy neglected what some claim are his religious duties. I’m not saying that it was bad that he violated them, but that he never even thought of them. When pressed, he would just reply that he was a ‘bad Muslim’. We won’t get rid of radical Islam until the, statistical majority of ‘bad’ Muslims, like my friend, start saying, “No, I’m Islam. Muslims don’t follow all these rules, but we are the real Muslims.” Instead, they violate the rules, but never try to say that Islam should belong to the normal Muslims who don’t follow the rules.

Most of my current neighbors are Jewish. Literally, the Black Lives Matter signs in my neighborhood are in Hebrew. (I don’t read Hebrew. I assume that the Hebrew words written next to the English words mean the same thing.) All the other signs are either Biden signs or welcome signs in every conceivable language saying that they are happy to have immigrant neighbors. On Saturdays, my Jewish neighbors all walk past my house to the temple. I have to remember to buy bagels before 2PM on Friday, because the shops close til Sunday. They are devout, sincere, practicing Jewish people. But they don’t stone people for collecting a stick on Saturday or stone witches. They have found a way to embrace their faith, while dropping some of the more destructive parts of it. They own the most popular version of Judaism. They don’t let ultra-orthodox Jews tell them that they aren’t really Jewish. They found something that works for them, embrace it, thrive with it and live great lives. (Damn, I’m now praising two religions.)

Bad Muslims need to start reclaiming Islam like my Jewish neighbors. My wife has a sweatshirt that says, “This is what an American Atheist looks like.” I wish the bad Muslims would all get shirts saying, “This is what an actual Muslim looks like.” I hate the fact that the ‘bad Muslims’ cede the dialogue on their own religion to the fundamentalists. They don’t ever say “Who cares what someone wrote in a book 1400 years ago, modern Muslims aren’t like that.” I need to give props to the Free Muslim Coalition against Terrorism, which has led the way toward this kind of reform. If I remember correctly, they called Mohammed a ‘cave man’, had a woman lead prayers for men and, incredibly, criticized some pundit’s plan to nuke a Muslim stronghold- not because it would be inherently evil (which it surely would have been), but only because it would have been ineffective in achieving his aims. They might go too far, but they are an example of normal Muslims trying to claim their religion.

IV. Considerations when engaging Muslims.

First, of course, before any engagement with a Muslim, think positively and imagine what a productive conversation with a Muslim would look like- building common ground, establishing rapport, demonstrating empathy, enjoying common experiences and reveling in life. Unless a Muslim comes to you expressing doubts, you should think really hard before initiating any deconversion discussion, especially if you haven’t built a solid, human relationship. Think about it- if you know this person, but haven’t gotten close on a human level, then why are you talking religion? Priorities, please!! In that case, you need to focus on forming a friendship, not atheist proselytizing. During that time together (while attempting deconversion), you’re not building your relationship with that human being. In the Muslim world, human relationships are very important. They are the glue of society; they are the bank balance Muslims consider more valuable than their actual money. Don’t talk to a Muslim unless you’re willing to start a relationship. Luckily for us atheists, most Christians haven’t gotten this message. If you are more concerned with deconversion than building a human relationship, you have more in common with fundamentalist Christian preachers than you know. Also, (see below), you’re treading into a minefield of taboos that are much more stark than any in western societies. I have Muslim friends that I’ve known and loved for decades. Our families are close, in some cases we’ve risked our lives together in war zones, had dozens of dinners together. They all know I’m a hardcore atheist, but it rarely comes up in conversation. These people are friends, not religious opponents. I don’t ever actively try to deconvert anyone, but especially not these Muslims. From a moral, ethical, political point of view, I think most Muslims in the word are either closely aligned with my values or working toward them as ideals. I’ll remove Pakistan from that equation, and perhaps Somalia, and some countries where the populace embraces some version of strict Islam that never existed there historically, but I can’t think of many countries where majorities are backsliding away from modernity. Check out the incredibly high number of free downloads of Richard Dawkin’s books in Saudi Arabia!! I wish that percentage of Americans were reading them.

V. Islamic Sources. Sunni Islam relies on three sources of ‘scripture’ and Shi’a Islam relies on three plus. The Quran, as revealed to the prophet Mohammed is one source. These are the 114 chapters revealed to Mohammed by the angel. As Mohammed was considered to be perfect, his followers set down his words (Hadith) and deeds (Sunnah) to paper soon after his death. These words and deeds fill in the gaps of the Quran. They are everything he said or did that wasn’t part of the 114 chapters. I’m not sure if the Quran mentions how to treat cats, but there is a Sunnah that a cat fell asleep on Mohammed’s robe so he cut his robe to avoid waking the cat when he got up. As a result, I’ve had flea-bag feral cats in Egypt jumping in restaurant windows onto my shoulder because Muslims think they shouldn’t keep them away. Many of the rules that Muslims follow come from the non-Quranic sources. I remember reading a book written by a journalist who traveled with the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation. The Muj nearly killed him because he pissed standing up. The Sunnah recount Mohammed squatting to piss, so they took offense at his standing posture. Muslims today will not talk while relieving themselves (in a bathroom) because there is a Sunnah where someone recounted, basically, “I saw Mohammed relieving himself, I said ‘Hey’ and he didn’t respond.” Takeaway- if Mohammed wouldn’t talk while pissing, you shouldn’t talk while pissing.

Both the Sunni and the Shi’ite have fatwas, or religious decrees, that influence them. For the Sunnis, these seem more like specific, event-driven proclamations about proper Muslim conduct, as pronounced by a religious leader. The Sunnis do not have a formal hierarchy of leadership, so only the people who have elected to follow a certain leader subscribe to the fatwas. Often, the fatwas are disgusting, but sometimes they actually align with western values, such as fatwas encouraging participation in vaccination campaigns or fighting terrorist groups. Since there is no formal prerequisite for Sunnis to issue fatwas, we see both pro-modern fatwas, like vaccine compliance, as well as crazy fatwas, such as a construction contractor’s son (Bin Laden) issuing decrees. For the Shi’ite, religious scholars study in a sort of Shi’a peer-review atmosphere until they reach the rank of Ayatollah, when they can then produce fatwas that are often considered as valid as the other sources of scripture. Shi’ites see these fatwa as filling in the gaps where the Quran, Hadith and Sunnah didn’t fully explain the rules. From an atheist perspective, these things are absolutely pure delight. My favorite, though not at all the craziest, are Ayatollah Khomeini’s fatwas in Tozi Al-Masayel. Muslim prayers require that a Muslim perform a fixed number of repetitions of kneeling, prostrating (banging forehead on the ground) and kneeling again. Khomeini has an entire chapter called ‘doubts’, enumerating every possible doubt one could have about the number of repetitions one has performed- ‘If you are certain that you have banged your head on the ground twice, but have doubts about whether you banged your head on the ground the third time, then …..”. He goes through every permutation and it’s a joyride. My favorite chapter is ‘Istemna’, or masturbation. So, during Ramadan, you can’t spill your seed during daylight. Khomeini answers the tough questions that aren’t necessarily covered in that rule. For instance, what if you start fooling around before the fast, but haven’t reached climax by the time the fast starts and want to stop before the sperm comes out and violates your fast? Khomeini, mercifully, says that it is not necessary to try to prevent the sperm from coming out. No doubt a blow to the rubber band industry in Iran, but merciful, nonetheless. Please think about this. Khomeini was the Head of State for a government with a huge military. And he wrote masturbation rules. WTF? #notheocracy.

The Quran- The Quran is a collection of 114 chapters (surah), of quite varied length, communicated by Mohammed to his followers during his lifetime, one at a time. The shortest surah has four lines. The longest is dozens of pages. I’m not going to get into whether the Quran, as written, is actually what Mohammed said, but it was put to paper, with fewer variations, much closer to the time of the events, than the bible ever was. As religious books go, we can fairly assume that it’s what Mohammed said, for the most part.

Sequential Revelation in the Quran- This is an awesome feature of the Quran, from an atheist’s point of view, and is seen as, equally and oppositely, beautiful by Muslims. Each chapter (surah) of the Quran has a title with a parenthetical reference to where it was revealed, so we can place them all in almost chronological order, as reliable history tells us where Mohammed was at various times. When Mohammed was initially in Meccah and began proclaiming the Quran, the Surah were short, sweet, generally admonishing people to trust in Allah and turn away/seek protection from spiritual dangers. If you start reading the Quran at the end (the back of the book, highest page numbers), you can actually watch the chapters get less spiritual and more political (except for the first chapter, which comes from the time when the ending chapters were written.) I’ll quote one here, my translation. Of note, I know some Arabic and have training in Quranic Arabic. You may notice that my translation is pretty flat, simple and boring. This is an unbiased translation. I’m only translating the actual words, not some imagined, spiritual meaning. This really takes the wind out of the sails of Muslims. The second line below is only six letters in the Arabic. The (I swear) is implied. Literally, the second line only says “by the dawn”(also three syllables in Arabic). I have seen English translations that say “I swear by the glorious light of the dawn as it breaks”. That’s BS. The language of the Quran is fluffed up in English translations. I once counted dozens of different translations (in the same English Quran) of the two-letter Arabic word here translated ‘lord’. English translations of the Quran, written by Muslims, are terrible. It’s not that they beautify the bad parts, but they try to make every verse beautiful by inserting so many words that aren’t in the Arabic original. I don’t speak Greek or Hebrew, but I wonder how much of this nonsense occurs in biblical translations.

Surah of the Dawn

In the name of Allah, the compassionate, the merciful

(I swear) by the dawn

(I swear) by the night as it settles

your lord has not forsaken you nor been displeased

the afterlife will be better than the present (good Arabic pun in here, sort of)

and know that your lord will give you what will satisfy you

(A) did he not find you an orphan and gave you shelter

(B) did he not find you lost and guided you

( C) did he not find you in need and gave you riches

(A) so, don’t be harsh to the orphan

(B) don’t turn away the beggar

( C) and of the lord’s bounty- Speak!

This is pretty vanilla stuff, a message to appreciate the good things and be nice. I don’t believe it’s from a god, but it’s not really ISIS fodder either, fortunately. Mohammed was an orphan, so this is personal to him. This the stereotypical happy, hippy prophet kind of revelation. From a literary perspective, it definitely restates themes, as many Christian parables do. In fact, its structure matches some of Jesus’ parables (Look at the last six lines and the correspondence between lines A, B &C. This was a pattern in many of the gospel parables.) We know when it was written, though- when Mohammed was chilling alone, powerless, in a cave and speaking to his hometown.

As the Mohammed acquired followers and political power, the revelations get more administrative, apologetic and legal. The chapters get really long, less poetic and sweet. Because we know the order and approximate dates of the revelation, we can see all the absurdity clearly. At first, Muslims were to pray 3 times a day, facing Jerusalem. Then, the Jews approached Mohammed and said (essentially) “Yeah, you sound like you’re trying to be Jewish, why not just be Jewish?” After that and some attacks on Jewish tribes in retaliation for a paranoid dream Mohammed claimed and a prank pulling a Muslim woman’s skirt down, the Quran changed the number of times and direction of daily prayers (and the Muslims killed or enslaved thousands of Jewish people.) The shahadah, the statement one must make to become a Muslim, also has an interesting context. Because Mohammed was plundering well, non-Muslims were trying to fight with him. Some of his sincere followers got upset about this- why are we fighting beside pagans? The solution- a revelation that, as long as someone recites “There is no god but Allah and Mohammed is the messenger of Allah”, they are a Muslim (even if they’re just here for the loot). Unlike most religions which require at least a few minutes of dedication to convert, Islam requires only that you say (preferably in Arabic) ‘There is no god but Allah and Mohammed is the messenger of Allah.’ If you say it, you are a Muslim. I hope you aren’t reading this aloud, as you will already be Muslim twice over. As a westerner who has traveled the Muslim world, it is not rare to get accosted by gangs of young, Muslim kids who try to trick you into saying this, as if they can trick you into becoming Muslim. When ordered to fight during Ramadan, without eating or even drinking water during daylight, his sincere followers protested- they couldn’t fight a battle without food and water. Then came the convenient revelation that fighters are exempt from fasting. Knowing the order of the chapters, and the historical context, makes the convenience of these revelations embarrassingly clear. I can’t imagine how frustrating Mohammed found it to have devout followers who quoted his own religion against him, but I’m happy he had to deal with that.

If you confront a Muslim about any of this, they will say that Allah was revealing what was needed at that moment, so, of course, those were the times when the Quran revealed these things. It’s not a discussion worth having. We, atheists, can appreciate the fact that the Quran can be tied to local, temporal events, but we won’t ever sway a believer by bringing this up. I’ve tried. We accept the same facts (unlike today’s US political climate), but come to opposite conclusions. You can’t ‘Gotcha’ a Muslim with this stuff.

The Language and Style of the Quran-

If you want to understand Muslims, especially Arab Muslims, this is very important. Arabic is very different from Indo-European and other language families. English is more closely related to Sanskrit, Persian and even an ancient Chinese language (Tocharian), than it is to Arabic. Arabic has 3 or 4 letter verbal roots, from which an astonishing array of other words can be created (hundreds). If I know the root meaning ‘write’, I can generate words for writer, writing, the place you write, the thing you write, causing something to be written, desk, office, notebook, etc. There is an almost ontological component to this, as, for any verb, all these different words exist in the grammar, a priori, even if they aren’t actually used or don’t make sense for the particular verb. They exist, in theory, even if no one ever uses them. It’s hard to articulate this, but there is almost an ontological implication of existence, in that the language already has, based on the grammatical rules for constructing words, words for things/actions that no one may have ever felt the need to say. The words are waiting there like Platonic ideals. An important religious aspect of this grammatical feature is that some sentences in the Quran repeat multiple words with the same root, which really creates a resonance and emphasis in the sentence, which can get hypnotic. A sentence that says, “The author wrote the book at the desk”, in Arabic, will repeat the root for writing four times. This is hypnotic. [The worst example of this is Surah Al-Kafarun- Chapter of the Unbelievers, which has numerous sentences using the verb for ‘worship/believe’, over and over, in slightly different forms. One sentence repeats, word for word, but all but the last sentence are similar. The whole chapter is ‘Oh you unbelievers, I don’t believe what your believe, you don’t believe what I believe, what you believe I don’t believe’, etc. It sounds like a toddler wrote it, but Muslims find this powerful.] There is almost a sense for Arabic speakers that the words make it true. (Atheists who want to engage in Street Epistemology, please think about this- the words themselves are the reason they believe.) In the Surah translated above, Mohammed made a pun when he said that the ‘afterlife will be better’. The transliteration of the verse is “Walla khayratun khayr lakka min al-awulah”. He’s putting two nearly identical words “khayratun” (afterlife) and “khayr” (better) [same apparent roots] next to each other. How could the afterlife not be better? It’s almost literally the same word! This feature of Arabic and the Quran really resonates with native Arabic speakers.

I know one person who converted to Islam solely because he felt Arabic was such a perfect language that any god who spoke Arabic was the true god. I understand his respect for Arabic grammar. My wife studied Arabic and her teachers told her that it had no grammar. In fact, it has the most productive, and useful grammar in the world. It is beautiful, complicated and incredibly able to generate new words. I’ve studied languages with objectively stupid grammar (Pushto!!), but Arab is the only grammar I’ve ever encountered that I would actually recommend.

So, Arabs find the literary style of the Quran miraculously beautiful. FULL STOP ATHEISTS- listen to me, some Muslims really think that the very style of the Quran is so beautiful that it proves that it was written by god. FULL STOP- REREAD THE LAST SENTENCE and accept the fact that Muslims think this as the truth. You cannot go against a Muslim without acknowledging this. They literally believe it is so perfect that a human could not have written it. Literally- by which I mean literally, they really believe that only a god could have written such beautiful sentences. It is really hard for any westerner to understand that Muslims actually mean this when they say it. I’ve seen debates with atheists where the Muslims say this and it goes unchallenged. This is absolutely not the first Timothy ‘inspired by god’ argument in the bible. Before they get to the actual meaning of the words, Arab Muslims find the very style, flow, syllables, etc. so perfect that this book must be divine. It’s like they hear a song so beautiful that the words must be true, whatever they are. If they really believe this, then we won’t sway them by saying some verse is abhorrent or contradicts another. If someone approached a Christian and said that they had come to believe in Jesus just because they read the bible, the Christian might accept that, but would probably have a lot of questions to ensure that the convert properly understood the few verses that the Christian considered important. I’ve never heard a Christian say, “Just read this book and you’ll know everything is true.” Usually, they talk about trusting scripture and seeing results in your life or praying that god reveal himself. Having done so (faked a conversion to Islam, claiming I was convinced just from reading the Quran- I was bored in college), I can assure you that Muslims easily believe you when you say say, ‘I’m a Muslim because I read the Quran and it must be true.’ They almost accept it as necessary- if you read it, you must know that it’s true. Indeed, when I faked a conversion to Islam, no one ever once questioned me. When I made my shahadah declaration before the mosque, the imam (and good for him for thinking of this) did ask me to recite an additional sentence in the shahadah. I suspect that this might actually have been sacrilegious for Muslims- he made me say, out loud and in Arabic, ‘Jesus is a prophet of Allah’, in order to prove that I understood that Jesus wasn’t god. For Muslims, the Quran proves itself, not in the stupid way that the bible has a verse saying that it’s inspired, but by being so perfect that it couldn’t possibly be wrong.

Some Arabs and Most Non-Arabs Can’t Read the Quran in Arabic.

I know most evangelicals haven’t read the whole bible, but imagine if they couldn’t read it at all. Our approach to the Muslim community must be different because of the facts described below.

I remember seeing an eight-year old, blind kid in Egypt who had memorized the Quran. It’s not unheard of for people to do this. The Muslim world even has a special title for people who have memorized it- Hafez. Modern Egyptian Arabic is nothing like the Arabic of the Quran. It’s not even like any Arabic. This kid must have spent years just listening to and regurgitating recitations. There is no way he had time to memorize it and learn all the grammar, meanings, historical context, theology, etc. of the entire book. He literally, just memorized the sounds, somehow. But, if it’s the word of god, reciting it is good, even if it means nothing to the reciter. This is an actual Muslim belief- merely reciting is virtuous. Muslims have a concept of “niyat”, or intention, that has to accompany good or proper actions in order for them to be valid (you don’t get points for fasting during Ramadan if you merely forgot to eat- a Khomeini fatwa), but there is no equivalent concept of understanding for Quranic recitation (i.e., that you need to understand what you are reciting). While Arabs on the Saudi Peninsula, can most easily understand the 1,400 year-old Arabic of the Quran, other Muslims need to learn the Arabic, then learn the meaning and context of the verses. Most Arab Muslims never achieve total comprehension of the whole book. Most of them memorize a few short chapters to use in prayers and read some of the more important (as determined by imams) sections.

Non-Arabs learn even less of the meaning of the Quran. Islam has historically resisted translations and even claimed that the Quran is impossible to translate. (It’s not impossible to translate- it just sounds a lot more boring when you put it in another language. If you look at the cover of most English translations, you’ll see verbiage like ‘A translation of the meaning of the Quran’- they translate the meaning,not the words.) As a translator- I suspect that this came about when the Muslims first translated for the Persians (who had a long tradition of complex and flowery poetry). The Persians were probably unimpressed because the language was nowhere near as beautiful as Persian poetry and it was then decided that only the original Arabic counted. Mohammed occasionally made statements consistent with an inferiority complex towards the Persians. Non-Arabs can definitely recite some chapters and the prayers and most Muslims understand what those mean, but only people with extensive, Arabic education would be able to read and understand the entire book. In my travels, I’m always shocked at how many muezzin, leading the call to prayer blasted from mosques around the world, mispronounce even the few lines of the call to prayer. Seriously, these imams are Muslim leaders and they can’t even learn to pronounce 5–10 phrases in Arabic. It’s so tempting, even as an atheist, to grab the microphone from them and take over, just so it sounds intelligible. There is no way these people read and understand the whole book. The Muslim world is not fluent in Arabic.

Differences in ‘Scripture-based’ Understanding of Religion among Evangelical Americans and Average Muslims

So, if most Muslims, without extensive study, can’t fully read their holy book, in the original language, we’re talking about a group that practices a religion while, to some degree, cut off from the written source. This is so different from evangelicals who can justify every belief with a reference to (their English translation of some selection of the various, contradictory original manuscripts of) the bible (not that they read the whole thing). So, if Muslims aren’t constructing their belief system with every belief/taboo/requirement consciously tied to a specific quotable verse, what do they base their religion on? The teachings of their parents and community. The religion is sketched out by those respected people in their lives and they learn enough history, rules, traditions, practices, etc. to function as ‘good’ practicing Muslims, if they so choose. But, unlike evangelicals, most Muslims aren’t consciously linking every action, prohibition or belief back to some literal reading of a Quranic verse. The American evangelical literalist model isn’t very relevant here. And, by implication, waving a particular verse in their face is speaking past their experience of the religion. You’re not having a dialogue at that point. You’re both functioning in different paradigms and nothing will come of it.

Allow me to contrast American Catholics, evangelicals and Muslims.

Catholics- They read the bible, but don’t interpret everything literally, so they can ignore a lot of problematic areas.

Evangelicals- Don’t read everything, but believe that every word is literally the word of god. If they can find it in the book, they’ll concoct some way to defend it.

Muslims- Don’t or can’t read everything, but believe it is literally the word of god, yet don’t feel too bad ignoring it.

Let’s Take Muslims Where They Are, Not Where The Quran Says They Should Be

My best Muslim friend worked for years as a sommelier in New York City, recommending expensive wines in restaurants (and I will never stop being jealous over this). He drinks. He smokes. He doesn’t pray five times a day. His wife never wears a veil. He enlisted in the US Army after 9–11 and deployed overseas many, many times. He has chosen not to follow every tenant of Islam in his daily life. Good for him. He’s more fun because of it. If I were to press him on the literal interpretation of the Quran (and I did once), he would say, for instance “Yes, if nothing else works out, under Islam, you can beat your wife.” If this guy were to ever beat his wife (whom he adores and would never harm), his wife would destroy him. It would be epic. But he would never think of beating his wife, because he’s just a normal, modern-day human being- he loves his wife. So, I can point to some horrendous verse in the Quran and, out of some religious hesitancy to criticize the Quran, he won’t question the verse. But why should I care about a verse that he ignores? If a Muslim ignores it, why should I bring it up? It’s like asking modern Catholics why they don’t kill witches. They ignore some verses. Asking evangelicals is more valid, because they make the literal truth of every (translated into English) word a cornerstone of their faith. Just because my Muslim friend’s religion offers him permission to be an asshole, why should I bring that up when he is a loving, gentle husband? (Again, the difference here is that the Christian might not know that the bible charges believers with killing witches, whereas the normal Muslim husband knows that the Quran says he can beat his wife, but just ignores that. Muslims disregard from a standpoint of full disclosure- Christians believe all, without full awareness, usually.)

There is an extremely important and critical difference here between Muslims and American Christians. The Christians insist that every word in the bible is the literal word of god. Most of them haven’t read the nasty bits, so atheists engage them on issues like the support of slavery, forcing them to either denounce the bible or condone chattel slavery. Having listened to a few podcasts from Austin, Christians seem more than willing to swallow that bait. We can’t do this with Muslims. They know all the skeletons in the closet. They just ignore them, while drinking Johnny Walker. We rub Christian noses in their bible, because they insist that it is perfect. Muslims, however, are just trying to go about their lives with whatever elements of scripture they still accept. Asking them about the stuff they ignore shows an extreme lack of gratitude for the fact that they ignore it. When questioned about the bad parts of the Quran, they really feel, “Do you want me to act this way? Why are you telling me that if I want to follow my religion, I should beat my wife?”. Literally, when you ask a normal Muslim, who ignores the worst of the Quran, to defend the worst of the Quran, they feel like you are judging them for not being as awful as the Quran allows. We can’t condemn them for ignoring the parts that we would like them to ignore. From the Muslim point of view, it feels like we are urging them to be more radical. Why would we ever want to do that?

In some cases, we need to acknowledge, as much as it conflicts with everything that every modern, western atheist believes, that the recommendations of the Quran were, sometime 1,400 years ago, progressive. Yeah, the Quran says you can beat your wife. But it definitely says that you can’t beat her until several days after she has pissed you off. We, atheists, need to acknowledge some of that context. ABSOLUTELY, there is no situation in which hitting family members is justified. Yet, the Quran did put a pretty extensive stopwatch on this stuff. I’m sorry to all of us, but this is a good thing. If every wifebeater in the US, suddenly decided to follow the Quranic prescriptions, there would be way less wife beating. They literally have to talk to their wives, then sleep apart from them, etc., before they can strike. If every American asshole who beats his wife followed this, we would have less beating. Islam definitely doesn’t allow this just because you are pissed off tonight. I’ve seen enough episodes of COPS to to know that many American Christians don’t practice this restraint. In the 7th century, this was progressive. No one should get points for adhering to it now, but it did break with tradition in favor of women. If Muslims understand anything about the worst verses of the Quran, they understand this cultural context. If you bring up a verse like wife beating, they will know all the steps a believer needs to go through before he can beat. Again, we can’t ‘Gotcha’ Muslims like we can the Christians.

The Quran is full of insidious stuff, but, with the exception of radical Muslim groups, these passages don’t enjoy widespread support. Most Muslims are living normal lives, fighting the same daily struggles that everyone else is. This is more true of Muslims outside of the Muslim world, where some of the more odious aspects of Islam- veils, oppression of women, etc. are less universal. But most Muslims that anyone reading this are likely to encounter are just normal people.

When we bring a bible verse to an evangelical (such as the endorsement of chattel slavery in the bible), we do so based on their insistence that they take every word of the book literally. With a Muslim, we face an entirely different issue- people who believe much more strongly than any Christian that not a word of the Quran can be contested, but who much more routinely ignore the Quran. This is a hard thing for those of us raised in a Christian culture to understand. HARD FOOT STOMP FOR THE ATHEISTS HERE- Most Muslims believe, even more strongly than evangelicals that the Quran is the word of god, yet, they are far more likely to ignore it. The more we try to quote the Quran at them, the more they will defend it. But, why should we try to force them to defend bullshit that they ignore in their lives from their own religion. Yeah, Muslims won’t contradict the Quran. But they sure as fuck will ignore it- all day long. Let’s meet them there- on a picnic table of neglect, rather than rubbing their noses in something that doesn’t inform their lives. Seriously- they don’t defend the worst bits in their daily lives- they are normal people. Let’s stop bringing up examples that don’t apply to the Muslims we actually know (and hopefully) love.

Let’s take wife beating as an example. I’ll say, at the outset, that there is probably some small, statistically significant percentage of wife beating among Muslims that can’t be explained away except that the Quran states that it’s OK. That sucks and is completely unacceptable in 2020. That is worse for those wives than anything I’ve experienced as an adult. I feel for them. Yet, let’s consider a few things. First point- If you are reading this, and you don’t live in a totally back-water Muslim country, you aren’t going to meet this fringe percentage. The vast majority of Muslim husbands don’t beat their wives and don’t care what the Quran has to say about beating wives. They handle marital problems just like the rest of the world. I recently had a Muslim friend tell me that his wife had given him a divorce ultimatum. He was frantically working to please his wife. He never considered beating his wife. He never once ever considered even trying to change her mind about the divorce- he just worked to change the circumstances that made her want the divorce. He was trying to fight every major force that might have created the conditions that she was concerned about. (She had just moved her family to a new location and didn’t want to disrupt the family with another work-related move so soon after just moving, after making many such moves in the past.) Beating her never crossed his mind. He was desperately calling in every favor he could to appease his wife. He was just a good husband and father. Beating his wife had nothing to do with this. Incidentally, he never questioned her right to divorce him if he couldn’t find a solution. He is a normal Muslim dude, a loving father and an awesome husband.

So, do Muslims beat wives? Hell yeah. Do Christians? Hell yeah. Do non-religious men in the west beat their wives? Definitely. Is this a product of religion or a product of other psychological/sociological factors? My guess is that wife beaters are driven more by their own faults than their religion.

BAD ISLAM (not bad Muslims)

ISIS created the best testing ground for Islam. In the Atlantic article about ISIS, the author quoted an American Salafi convert who agreed that everything ISIS did followed his warped interpretation of Islam. But this guy didn’t join ISIS. Why not? Because he, although deluded, wasn’t a fucking psychopath. ISIS was a clarion call to psychopaths around the world. Tons of Europeans ran to Syria to join ISIS. For the women who joined, they wanted the instant emancipation and ability to escape arranged marriages (still a thing for Muslim girls, even in the west). Among the guys, the Tunisians were probably sincere radical Muslims (and they were most of the guys). But the Europeans who joined?! I’m guessing that most of them were sick psychopaths who joined ISIS because they could kill with impunity, have sex slaves, do lots of methamphetamine and rule over women. ISIS was a global psychopath magnet. Religion was an afterthought for so many members. Any atheist who wants to dangle ISIS in front of a Muslim needs to be ready to defend Stalin’s atheist purges. We should never force our contacts (who are, hopefully, our friends) into defending shit that they don’t agree with. If your Muslim buddy also hates ISIS, then you can’t use that against her. I have personally spoken with Al-Qaeda members who weren’t even religious Muslims, including one who blew $250,000 of AQ money on hookers and drugs (I so hope that I can have a drink with him some day.). Radical, terrorist Islam is not a Muslim phenomenon. It’s political or nihilistic. We need to acknowledge that the unpopularity of this stuff among the Muslim world suggests that something other than Islam is at play here. We should never bring up radical, violent Islam when speaking to a real, actual, normal Muslim- unless we’re ready to defend a Stalinist firing squad.

Coming Out

I had a girlfriend in high school, in Egypt, whose parents were Southern Baptist missionaries in Egypt, a predominately Muslim country. Why would the Egyptians allow baptist missionaries in a Muslim country? Simple. In Egypt, changing religions was illegal. So, a Coptic (Egyptian) Christian could become a baptist christian, weakening the Coptic minority, but it was illegal for any Muslim to convert or for anyone to try to convert a Muslim. Leaving Islam is a capital offense in many countries. People are literally killed every year because they renounced Islam. We cannot take this lightly. Criticizing Islam, Mohammed or god is illegal in many countries. Even in much of western Europe, criticizing a religious group is illegal. I had to buy one of Oriana Fallaci’s books under the table in France, because they were banned for criticizing Islam. Literally, in France, bookstores would not put her books on the shelves and would only, illegally, sell to people who specifically asked for them.

No Muslim can come out against Islam without great personal risk. Honor killings routinely happen in much of the world, where a family will kill one of their own so they don’t have to face community backlash for harboring a cultural/religious rebel. In fact, the story of the prodigal son in the bible contains, for Middle Easterners, a description of a father trying to stop such an honor killing. When Middle Easterners hear the story, they understand the father ‘falling on the neck of’ the son to be the father protecting him from the wrath of the village he returned to. I heard an NPR story today where a story-teller mentioned her atheism in the context of discussing the meaning of death with her kids. She said that this was the first time she ‘came out’ as an atheist. In other words, she came out as an atheist so she could accurately tell a story that wasn’t at all centered on her atheism. I’m happy to live in a society where so many of us can decide to declare our non-belief without fear of repercussions. Many in the US still face severe repercussions for declaring their atheism. Few are killed for it. Even in the US, however, a Muslim might suffer severe consequences here or might see their family suffer severe consequences overseas if they publicly declare their atheism. We need to protect anyone brave enough to denounce Islam.