The Disaster That is Radical Islam

Islam is difficult to understand. To some extent it is what you want it to be. Like Christianity it's history has been both violent and peaceful. Today's Islam is both. The religion has been taken over by a radical and fundamentalist minority of it's members.  Non-Muslims must consider it 100% aggressively militant for their protection. The written book of Islam is the Koran (Qu'ran). The book contains rules, laws, propheses, and like the Holy Bible, several contradictions of the religion. Followers of Islam often refer to the KORAN as: A GUIDE TO A WAY OF LIFE. 

Many Muslims (perhaps most) consider that following the Koran is not enough. To complete the religion they must also follow SHARIA LAW, a collection of punishments to be given to those who do not follow the Koran properly.  

The Koran and Sharia Law are both subject to interpretive disagreements that are the main cause for confusion within Islam, as well as the division of Islamic belief.  There are two major divisions of Islamic thought:

     1.  Radical,  Fundamentalist and Aggressive.

          Intent on obeying only Sharia law.  

          Desire to erase all Jews and all other infidels.

                                  

   2.   Moderate, Peaceful, Non-Aggressive.   

         Obey public laws and do not obey Sharia Law.

         They are tolerant and respectful of  infidels.  

At the turn of the century (1900) Arabic speaking people were of vastly different social and economic stages. They were characterized by their intolerance, firm belief, and  unsympathetic views. Life in the desert regions was hard. There were no gradients. Just black and white. 

The desert Arabs were considered dogmatic. The majority lived a difficult life in poverty. They did not understand the philosophical growth of the civilization around them, nor did they understand societies introspective curiousity. The desert Arabs were at ease only in extremes. They never compromised. They followed the logic of traditional incompatible opinions to absurd ends. 

Years ago an "Arab" was from a country called Arabia and there was a language called "Arabic" that  became the foundation of the ancient and current languages of Syria and Palestine, Mesopotania and Arabia. These middle eastern areas were inhabited by diverse Arab populations, all speaking languages that related to the "Arabic" family. Together they all often referred to as "Semitic" people - but 
actually this was not correct.

The Arabic, Assyrian, Babylonian, Phoenician, Hebrew, Aramic and Syriac languages are definitely related. There  are clear indications of common influence between them, and are found in the customs and traditions of present day Arabic speaking peoples.  All of these traces to the past support the concept of all Semitic people being cousins. In most cases, far removed perhaps, but cousins. 

For a number of reasons the development of all Arabic speaking people in the Middle East has made little progress: 

• They remain a narrow minded people with vivid, but not creative, imaginations. 
• There is so little Arab art that it's almost correct to say they have none.
• Nor do they have any great industries. 
• Nor have they invented any system of philosophy.
• Nor do they believe in any complex mythologies. 
• Their convictions are by instinct and their activities by intuition. 

In the world today the most important product of Arabic speaking people is the three revealed religions. Two were exported to both Semetic and non-Semetic areas. 

1. Christianity was translated into Greek, Latin, and Teutonic tongues, and had conquered Europe and America. 
2. Islam,in it's various transformations, was accepted in Africa and parts of Asia. 

Judaism, while a similar creed, was not as accepted, and there were many other religions that also could not be exported. The Arabs kept those failures to themselves. They were considered "assertions" rather than "arguments".  Successful exports required a remarkably similar "prophet" to set them forth. Consider the prophets of Christianity, Islam and Judaism:

• Their lives were after a pattern. 
• Their birth set them in crowded places. 
• A passionate yearning drove them into the desert. 
• They lived there in meditation and physical abandonment. 
• Then they returned with their imagined message. 
• Which they preached to their associates.

The founders (Prophets) of the three great religions fulfilled this cycle. The common root they taught is the idea of "world worthiness. It is also interesting to note that each concerns a profound reaction away from "physical matter". This led the prophets to preach bareness, renunciation, and poverty. The Beduin of the desert embraced with all his soul this nakedness. He lost material ties, comforts, and superfluities in order to be free. He saw no virtue in poverty itself, and he enjoyed the little vices and luxuries (coffee/fresh water/women). His life had air and winds, sun and light, open spaces and great emptiness. Unconsciously, he came closer to God.