July 19, 2005 – islamicate

Terrorists hate Muslims

islamoyankeeJuly 19, 2005

As has been pointed out in several places (1, 2, 3), one of the London bombs went off in a predominately Muslim area. There is a war occurring within the Muslim community; there are those who would throw out 1400 hundred years of intellectual history and development and who would bomb the ummah back to the time before the Prophet (PBUH) verse those who believe Islam is a religion that matures by the grace of God, and struggles with His majesty and revelation every day. I’ve commented before (1, 2, 3) on Muslim-on-Muslim violence. In this instance, I think it’s…

Reading the Qur’an – part 1 – Interpretation

islamoyankeeJuly 19, 2005

The Qur’an (also Quran, Koran) is the Muslim holy book, believed to have been revealed to the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) – through the angel Jibra’il (Gabriel) – over the span of 23 years. The Arabic language of the time was a nascent language of literature, used mostly as a mnemonic guide in its written form; because of the close association of Semitic Languages (including Hebrew, Aramaic, and Syriac) the turn of Arabic into a literary language was not unprecedented. The script did not (and still does not) mark short vowels, punctuation, differentiate amongst different letters, and depending on the scribe,…