Related Posts

The Difference Between a Moslem and a Klingon

It sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, “what’s the difference between a Moslem/Muhammadan and a Klingon?” It’s not really. While in the popular imagination, I’m sure there is a great deal of similarity between the warlike, aggressive, territorial patriarchal Klingon culture and how Muslims are perceived, there really is more difference. Take for example the great warrior phrase associated with Klingons, “today is a good to die.” If you listen to one of the Sabri Brothers’ Qawwali albums, you’d know that Muslims actually believe “today is a good day to cry.” At least that’s how I’d translate the…

Responding to the unthinkable

An op-ed in today’s Boston Globe led me to the book Responsa to the Holocaust. This book is going on my summer reading list. The level of commitment to God in the face of such horror amazes me. Dealing with crisis as a religious person is difficult enough; as a community I cannot comprehend it.

Gaza Crisis [1/29]

This will most likely be my last major link round-up on the topic. There are individual threads of the cost of the crisis that I may develop, but with the current incursion over, the need for relatively quick, major round-ups has dissipated. One of the things I tried to communicate through my sourcing was that the conflict is not a religious issue. I consciously choose to limit the number of Muslim sources to indicate that there was opposition to Israel’s actions that was not based in a conception of a Cosmic War. I also wanted to highlight the number of…