The death of Prophet Muhammad is a very interesting event. A Jewish lady wanted to test Muhammad’s prophethood by giving him a poisoned meal to see if God would save him. He took the bait and eventually died from the poison.
If the Quran is completely perfect and its best understood by those scholars who dedicated their lives to understand its context then why did many highly reliable scholars understand it as a whale story? If the best Islamic scholars were dead wrong, why ask me to speak to today’s Islamic scholars?
If people that spent their entire lives understanding the Quran and got it wrong, how can we understand it today?
Sam Harris gives a profound talk on finding happiness in the moment. And how humanity can cope with the fact that we all ahev to die. incredible talk.. Please watch
كُلُّ نَفْسٍ ذَائِقَةُ الْمَوْتِ
Every soul will taste death (3:185)
https://youtu.be/zwofsBniYMg?t=111
Here’s a little trick. You can watch videos at a faster speed to save time.
Yesterday I was asked, “How is it that you don’t believe the Quran is from God?”
I said “I see inconsistencies and holes in the stories, in the science, and in other things.”
To which my friend said, “How can you disbelieve in the book of God based on your limited logic?”
I was further asked, “How is it you can disbelieve in Prophet Muhammad who was KNOWN to be truthful?”
My answer? Simple, the Quran fails the checksum. The integrity check failed. A book from God does not have inconsistencies and errors. Even if Prophet Muhammad was the most truthful person, if the book he brought fails the litmus test, we have to admit that it cannot be from God.
As a Muslim, I used to tell this quote to everyone. To non Muslims especially:
أَفَلَا يَتَدَبَّرُونَ الْقُرْآنَ ۚ وَلَوْ كَانَ مِنْ عِندِ غَيْرِ اللَّهِ لَوَجَدُوا فِيهِ اخْتِلَافًا كَثِيرًا
Then do they not reflect upon the Qur’an? If it had been from [any] other than Allah , they would have found within it much contradiction. (4:82)
Because I truly believed it, with all my heart and soul!!
And my other favorite verse, which is usually used to defend how is it that Allah makes rulings that we may not understand.. Things like why it’s okay to hit your wife…
أَلَا يَعْلَمُ مَنْ خَلَقَ وَهُوَ اللَّطِيفُ الْخَبِيرُ
Does He who created not know, while He is the Subtle, the Acquainted? (67:14)
God knows everything. He knows how the universe started. He knows how the universe looked, even 1400 years ago. He knows the inner workings of our body (Embryology anyone?) Unfortunately the Quran over and over repeatedly describes the world according to how someone might think it worked in the 7th century, not how we know it works now.
When my friend says, “The Quran tells us to ponder the creation and contemplate on how it could be that this all came about, ” I will say, Yes. Maybe there is a creator. That doesn’t make Islam true though.
The stories in the Quran suffer similar issues to the science.
To me, I did not leave Islam because I hated God, or because I was angry at the injustice in the world, or because I thought it wasn’t compatible with modern society or fair to women. Nothing like that. In fact I would accept ALL of that if it was from God. I would accept whatever he said, no matter how stupid and ridiculous it looked because God makes the rules, not us.
Now that I have realized it cannot be from God, I cannot in good conscience defend the harmful laws that shariah brings to humanity. Things like apostasy laws. Laws against homosexuality. Laws against freedom of expression and religion. Laws against free speech. Laws unfair to women, that they cannot divorce, or they must receive half a share of a man in most cases.
Check out the new Agnostic Muslims page! I support this movement very much so please check it out.
“How can a person be both Agnostic… AND Muslim?” To many people, it makes no sense. A Muslim is one who believes in Allah, first and foremost. He believes the Quran is the literal word of Allah, and that Muhammad is His Messenger. But an agnostic is someone who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the nature or existence of God, let alone the divine origins of the Quran, or the divine purpose of Muhammad- peace and blessings be upon him and on us all. But here’s what makes no sense to us.
Today, just like yesterday, and countless days before that, thousands of Muslim children were born. Those of us who maintain this website were among those children. Perhaps you are one of them as well.
And the thing that makes no sense is that none of us were born believing in God, or believing that God communicated his most important message to mankind through an angel to an unsuspecting Arab merchant, for it to be transmitted over the centuries for our implementation today. Those are things that we had to be taught. And while all of us were taught those things in one way or another, we also learned other things, and we may have come to different conclusions than the ones we were “supposed” to. Many of us simply don’t believe the supernatural premises of Islam in the literal sense.
We may believe in God; or we may not be sure. We may think there is something after this life, or we may feel uncomfortable speculating that there is.
We may think the Qur’an is a great work of literature, full of ancient wisdom for today; or we may think it’s kind of outdated and even a little violent and divisive.
We may think that Muhammad was a wise leader who spoke his inspired reflections on mankind’s relationship with one another and with God; or we may think he was simply a man of his time who possibly did some things we would not consider particularly ethical or redeeming.
And what makes the least sense of all to us is the notion that it is some kind of act of faith or piety to keep these thoughts private, to never speak of them. That it is somehow blasphemous or insulting to be honest about our ideas concerning our own religious heritage. The truth is that millions of Muslims around the world feel as we do. They have doubts about what they are told by the conservative “guardians of Islam” must be accepted on faith. They are perhaps even cynical toward these spokespeople for our shared faith, who warn so ominously of what should happen to people who share their doubts publicly. But what does that kind of an environment do to a people?
It promotes hypocrisy. It suppresses honesty. It destroys critical thought. It denies people the basic right of sharing their opinions. It prevents them from freely exchanging ideas and learning from one another. We are Agnostic because of our doubts and questions. But we are Muslims because of our faith…
That if we are born into Islam, nobody has the right to take it away from us or tell us what it should mean to us.
That Islam is at its core a tradition of wonder and appreciation for the mystery and majesty of Allah’s creation.
That no merciful God would ever punish or persecute his creations for using their brains, for asking questions, and for not knowing. We reject the rightness of anyone who would deny us the right to ask these questions openly. And we welcome anyone to ask and explore them with us.
Wasalaam. And in the name of Allah, the Most Gracious and Most Merciful, we begin.