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"My
choice of Muhammad to lead the list of the world's most
influential persons may surprise some readers but he was the only man in history
who was supremely successful on both the religious and
secular levels... It is this unparalleled combination of
secular and religious influence which I feel entitles
Muhammad to be considered the most influential single
figure in human history."
Michael Hart
in his Book "The 100-
A Ranking of the Most
Influential Persons in History".
"Islam is
a religion against freedom, justice and democracy and
Muslims are
secretly jealous of us [in the West]. They
also multiply like rats".
Oriana
Fallacy in her Book "The Rage and the Pride"
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Before
I make an attempt to write yet another article on this man,
who claimed to be the Messenger of God in 7th
Century AD and more than a billion people believe in his claim
even to this day after a lapse of 14 Centuries, I will pose a
few very pertinent questions to the readers.
Q:
How does someone most often, deal or treat a person, whom
he/she considers as a rival, a competitor or an adversary?
Q:
(A variant of the above) How would you, in all honesty,
deal with someone whom you consider a threat to your own
agenda, position, social standing or ideology?
90% of the times, most normal human reaction in any of the
above situations is to (in this particular order), try
eliminating the rival, if unable to do so for some reasons,
then discredit all his work or ideology by touting your own
work as superior or better and finally, abuse or slander,
malign him as a person and start a smear campaign against
him/her in order to retain people’s loyalty to yourself or
your ideology.
In
the field of ‘theology’, the reason for such smear campaigns
is usually to ward off people from the rival’s philosophy and
make them averse to listening to anything said by him, to an
extent, make people loathe, the very mention of his/her name.
Now, in
context of the above questions that I posed, let’s compare
attitudes of two such human beings.
“I think
Mohammed was a terrorist…he was a violent man, a man of war.”
(Rev. Jerry
Falwell interview on 60 Minutes, October 6, 2002 )
"Behold! the
angel said: 'God has chosen you and purified you and has
chosen you above the women of all nations. O Mary! God gives
you the good news of a word from Him, whose name shall be
Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, honored in this world and the
hereafter, and one of those brought near to God"
(Quran 3:42).
"And insult not
those, whom they (non-Muslims) worship besides Allah, lest
they insult Allah wrongfully, without knowledge.."
(Quran 6:208)
Rev. Jerry Falwell is a modern day Evangelist, one of those
who consider Islam as the only philosophy that can ever pose
threat to Christianity in the world, now that communism is a
spent force. Falwell is a self proclaimed theologian who made
headlines recently with this statement for otherwise, he was
an unknown entity to most in this world. In the book
Operation World
by Patrick Johnstone, he describes the current Crusade of more
than 100,000 evangelical Christian missionary warriors. The
stated goal of Operation World is to mobilize the
Christian Missionary Forces throughout the world (page 29, all
citations are from the fifth edition), "take the kingdoms of
the world for Jesus" (page 12), and "pull down the spiritual
strongholds that still resist the King of kings and Lord of
lords" (page 24).
The book warns that, "Islam is
the greatest challenge to be faced" (page 39) but boasts that
"the last 15 years has been a time of more Muslims coming to
Christ than ever before in history." (page 26).
On the
contrary, in the times of Mohammed(saw), Christians of Roman
Empire, were a force along with Persians. Though Arabian
Pagans were directly subjugating and humiliating him for
proclaiming pure monotheism, their alliances with both Jews
and Christians posed a major threat to the life and security
of Muslims at their sanctuary in Medina, where all of them had
to migrate under duress.
In the
words of Quran: "Chosen you above the
women of all nations", is an ultimate honor bestowed
upon the mother of Jesus, the Mary (pbuh). Mohammed's own
mother is never even once mentioned. Such words about Mary, as
found in Quran which was revealed to Mohammed, are not to be
found even in the Christian Bible!
What the
likes of Rev. Falwell say today, is human, but what
Mohammed(saw) proclaimed then, was...Divine.
In my opinion, any spiritual personality, worth his name, when
can lay claim to a following of at least a million people at
any given time and the numerical list of his faithful
followers lasts well to this day when at least a 100 years
have elapsed since he died, has already secured his rightful
place in golden pages of History. His name should be upheld in
reverence and respect by present day foolhardy commentators
who have much harder times to even claim respect by their
colleagues or command faithfulness of their spouses.
With
Jesus as the man who came to show the path to 'Lost Sheep of
Israel', Christianity can claim followers to the tune of 2
billion, Islam with Mohammed and his guidance, has 1.3 billion
followers today. Hindus with mainly following Rama and Krishna
amongst others, accounts for 900 million, enlightened Buddha
have 360 million. Guru Nanak can claim adherents to a figure
of 23 million and Moses at the core of Judaism has 14 million
adherents.
Each of
them has these figures of their adherents, after hundreds and
thousands of years after their demise.
(Peace be upon them all).
Lots of imposters came and went. Some claimed divinity and
other claimed be be Godmen. Some called themselves 'Avatars'
while others claimed 'prophet hood'. In our own times we saw
people like Rajneesh who claimed to be a 'bhagwan' (god) and
still see people around like Satya Sai baba. To believe that
their influence will last even 50 yrs beyond their death, is
foolhardy.
So,
we as mere mortals, who probably, also won’t be remembered
50yrs past our deaths, simply lack the status and eminence
required to comment or slander, any of these names for they
have proved their mettle by passing the ‘Test of Time’.
We should not only be ashamed but take a close in the mirror,
the moment we position ourselves on a high pedestal and
slander any ONE of them.
But someone has rightly said: “ Fools Rush where Angels
Fear to Tread!”
Mohammed(saw)
was a man who claimed, to have been appointed by God as HIS
Last Messenger and conveyed HIS message to the whole of
humanity, in the form of a book, The Quran.
Smear
campaigns against him had been underway, since then. The
initial charges that were levied by pagans of Arabia in order
to resist the message of Muhammad ranged from, “Muhammad is
devil possessed, a lunatic and a rebel from his forefather’s
religion”. With the advent of the Christian medieval ages
and Crusades, charges like, 'Muhammad - a plagiarist of the
Bible and an Anti Christ', popped up.
And in
recent decades, those saints in the western world and their
disciples in the East, those self appointed torch bearers of
moralities and self proclaimed upholders of the civilized
world, have started the smear campaign of the variety,
“Mohammed the paedophile and the sensualist.”
Ever
wonder, why such absurdities evaded even his die hard enemies,
who lived through his times up to last century. Critics of
Mohammed have been present in all times and ages but to no one
it occurred before the last century, that this Prophet of
Islam could also be a Paedophile or a sensualist.
Now this
brings me to my last Question:
Q:
On what basis should someone accept or reject a report, a news
clip or different version of the same story coming out of
different sources?
Again, 90% of us, might believe in that version of the news or
a report which suits our pre-conceived biases or prejudices or
sociopolitical alignments. Only 10% of us will believe in the
credibility of the reporter or the writer and if the report is
historical in nature, than maybe we will try to gauge as to,
how far has the narrator of the report, survived the, all
important – ‘Test of Time’.
So, while some of us are surprised and aghast at the complex
questions posed by growing Muslim fundamentalism on one side
and Islam as the fastest growing religion without ‘swords’, on
the other, answers like, ‘Mohammed was a terrorist’, ' a
false prophet', ‘a sensualist’, a paedophile’, ‘a power hungry
Arabian militant’, ‘a Highway robber’, ‘ Plagiarist who copied
from the Bible and works of ancient Greeks’, etc., come as
a solace and appear as Simple to understand with minimum of
efforts. All these subscribes to the version of a Muslim, we
would love to hate. Conversely we can deduce that these
followers of Mohammed(saw),
do not belong to the civilized world, in which we, as Hindus,
Buddhists, Christians or a Jew, have a claim by default.
The remaining 10% of us, might wait to ponder over the
credibility of the narrator.
Ponder over
questions like: Who first called Mohammed(saw),
a power hungry Arabian highway robber who worked towards
worldly financial gains?
Who first
showed his right intellect, when he smeared the prophet’s name
with that of a paedophile?
Who first
called him a Plagiarist, a false prophet?
And when upon research, we find no names associated to these
sentences, we can safely deduce that all those who started
these slanders, were not worth being mentioned even by those
who propagated these slanders further, over ages. Their
probable contribution to the history of the world is nothing
more than demeaning the Prophet of Islam. So nature’s best
test of credibility, ‘the Test of Time’, had failed them
and their names were lost without a trace.
But as we know, neither everyone earns his living in India by
being a Snake charmer nor everyone is hungry in Hungary,
everyone amongst non Muslim Eastern and Western world also
doesn't act in the manner, the 90% humans would do, when posed
by the questions mentioned above. And those who don’t, the
history remembers them by their name and these people are held
in high regards on all Intellectual circles for all times to
come, even though, bigots might detest it. A few such
illustrious names and their thoughts about this Prophet of
Islam are reproduced below, of special mention here is that I
quote only from non Muslim, non political intellectuals, who
for reasons best known to them, despite their reverence for
Islam and it's prophet, didn't become Muslims to the best of
my knowledge nevertheless, when someone from the rival or a
neutral camp, praises your character, extols your virtues and eulogizes
your conduct, it becomes all the more worthy and relevant and
speaks volumes of your genuine excellence.
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"A false man
found a religion? Why, a false man cannot build a brick
house! To the Arab
Nation it was as a birth from darkness into light; Arabia
first became alive by means of it. A poor shepherd people,
roaming unnoticed in its deserts since the creation of the
world: a Hero-Prophet was sent down to them with a word
they could believe: see, the unnoticed becomes
world-notable, the small has grown world-great; within one
century afterwards, Arabia is at Grenada on this hand, at
Delhi on that; -glancing in valor and splendor and the
light of genius, Arabia shines through long ages over a
great section of the world . . . I said, the Great Man was
always as lightning out of Heaven; the rest of men waited
for him like fuel, and then they too would flame."
Thomas
Carlyle (1881)
"If greatness of purpose,
smallness of means, and astonishing results are the three criteria of a human genius, who could dare compare any great man in history with Muhammad? The most famous men created arms, laws, and empires only. They founded, if anything at all, no more than material powers which often crumbled away before their eyes. This man moved not only armies, legislations, empires, peoples, dynasties, but millions of men in one-third of the then inhabited world; and more than that, he moved the altars, the gods, the religions, the ideas, the beliefs and the souls.
On the basis of a Book, every letter which has become law, he created a spiritual nationality which blend together peoples of every tongue and race. He has left the indelible characteristic of this Muslim nationality the hatred of false gods and the passion for the One and Immaterial God.
The idea of the unity of God, proclaimed amidst the exhaustion of the fabulous theologies, was in itself such a miracle that upon it's utterance from his lips it destroyed all the ancient temples of idols and set on fire one-third of the world. Never has a man undertaken a work so far beyond human power with so feeble means, for he (Muhammad) had in the conception as well as in the execution of such a great design, no other instrument than himself and no other aid except a handful of men living in a corner of the desert."
Alphonse de LaMartaine in 'Historie de la Turquie,' Paris, 1854.
"They (Muhammad's critics)
see fire instead of Light, Ugliness instead of Good. They
distort and present every good quality as a Great Vice. It
reflects on their own depravity...The critics are Blind.
They cannot see that the only 'sword' Mohammed wielded was
the sword of Mercy, Passion, Friendship and Forgiveness -
The Sword that conquers enemies and purifies their hearts.
His Sword was sharper than the sword of Steel."
Pandit Gyanandra Dev Sharma,
at a meeting in Gorakhpur (India). 1928
He preferred migration to
fighting his own people, but when oppression went beyond
the pale of tolerance he took up his sword in
self-defense. Those who believe religion can be spread by
force are fools who neither know the ways of religion nor
the ways of the world. They are proud of this belief
because they are a long...long way away from the truth.
A Sikh journalist in 'Nawan
Hindustan':
Delhi, 17 November
1947. |
We will see, the Triumph of Islam in all
spheres of Life. Islam will prevail and that's God Promise and
His promises are True. But How? With the Sword? Not even if
the Muslims had the Laser gun! Could they use it? The Holy
Quran forbids us to use force as the means of converting
others!
Yet the Quran prophesies that Islam would be the most dominant
of all religions. The triumphs of its doctrines have already
started and is gaining hold over the religious ideology and
doctrines of the various schools of thought in the world.
Though not in the name of Islam, but in the name of
reformation and amendments, the doctrines of Islam are being
hurriedly grafted into the various religious orders. Many
things which are exclusively Islamic and which were formerly
unknown, or which were being opposed before with tooth and
nail by the other creeds, are now part of their believes.
The
Brotherhood of man, The abolition of the Caste System and
Untouchability,
The Right of women to inherit, No compulsion in Religion and
Right to freely worship, Prohibition of all intoxicants
and most
important of all...The true concept of the Unity of God.
"The
extinction of race consciousness as between Muslims is one of
the outstanding achievements of Islam, and in the contemporary
world there is a crying need for the propagation of this
Islamic virtue." Civilisation on
Trial. Professor A. J. Toynbee.
Just one
word on the last subject above, Ask any theist, polytheist,
pantheist or Trinitarian: how many Gods he believes in? He
will shudder to say anything other than ONE! This is the
EFFECT of the strict monotheism of Islam.
"THE CREED OF MOHAMED IS FREE FROM THE
SUSPICIONS OF AMBIGUITY AND THE KORAN IS A GLORIOUS TESTIMONY
TO THE UNITY OF GOD". Gibbon
in his 'Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire'.
Essential Reading:
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