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Murder is better than divorce?

So thinketh the Dumass. Considering one of the Ten Commandment is “Thou shalt not kill,” I would have thought murder would be a bigger sin. Perhaps it’s what happens when you de-sacralize the word of God and simply make it a monument that has no religious meaning. BTW, did you know that Muslim women have the right to divorce? I did. Most Muslim women don’t. It’s a shame. I wonder if homicide rates in the Muslim world would go up if women knew their rights?

Sufism in Fez

Very cool photo exhibit on the Beeb. Technorati Tags: Morocco, Sufism

Reading the Qur’an – part 3 – Translations and Secondary Sources [updated][2x]

[I’ve jumped a head to part 3 since several commentors have asked about translations and secondary material.] I’ve done one post already on the vagaries of Qur’anic Arabic. Learning Arabic does not really help in learning to read the Qur’an in the sense of its interpretive history, but it does help you appreciate the large semantic range of each word in the Qur’an. (A really good secondary source for this discussion, although somewhat technical, is The Qur’an’s Self-Image.) As a result, when I look up passages, I don’t rely on just one translation, but rather several. I also use languages…