muslim balance
One of our commentators sent me a link to this article this morning by Daniel Pipes which reports how muslim populations are “divided by conspiracy and hate”. I thought that some of the reported results were interesting, and at times shocking, so I thought I would go to the original report of the study. And there are certainly some differences in “spin”, even actual numbers.
Pipes says:
In not one Muslim population polled did most people believe Arabs carried out the September 11, 2001, attacks on the US. The proportions range from a mere 15 per cent in Pakistan holding Arabs responsible to 48per cent among French Muslims. Confirming recent negative trends in Turkey, the number of Turks who point the finger at Arabs has declined from 46 per cent in 2002 to 16per cent today. In other words, in each of these 10 Muslim communities, most view 9/11 as a hoax perpetrated by the US Government, Israel or some other agency. [emphasis mine]
Okay, you might have thought those numbers were actually lifted from the report. I can’t find the raw numbers online, but this is certainly not the way that the researchers elected to describe the results of their surveys (as shocking as they might be):
In one of the survey’s most striking findings, majorities in Indonesia, Turkey, Egypt, and Jordan say that they do not believe groups of Arabs carried out the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The percentage of Turks expressing disbelief that Arabs carried out the 9/11 attacks has increased from 43% in a 2002 Gallup survey to 59% currently. And this attitude is not limited to Muslims in predominantly Muslim countries - 56% of British Muslims say they do not believe Arabs carried out the terror attacks against the U.S., compared with just 17% who do.
The graphs do show that 16% of those surveyed in Turkey believe that Arabs carried out the attacks, but I can find no support for Pipes conclusion (in bold) in the numbers. Significantly, this question was not asked of non-Muslims so we don’t know what the “control” viewpoint is. But some of Pipes’ other analyses are more misleading:
Of all the Muslim populations polled, most displayed support for Osama bin Laden. Asked whether they had confidence in him, Muslims replied positively, ranging from 8 per cent (Turkey) to 72 per cent (Nigeria).
Suicide bombing is also popular. Muslims who call it justified range from 13 per cent (Germany) to 69 per cent (Nigeria). These appalling numbers suggest terrorism by Muslims has deep roots and will remain a danger for years to come.
The report uses different numbers and puts a decidedly different spin on these results:
Confidence in Osama bin Laden also has fallen in most Muslim countries in recent years. This is especially the case in Jordan, where just 24% express at least some confidence in bin Laden now, compared with 60% a year ago. A sizable number of Pakistanis (38%) continue to say they have at least some confidence in the al Qaeda leader to do the right thing regarding world affairs, but significantly fewer do so now than in May 2005 (51%). However, Nigeria’s Muslims represent a conspicuous exception to this trend; 61% of Nigeria’s Muslims say they have at least some confidence in bin Laden, up from 44% in 2003.
The belief that terrorism is justifiable in the defense of Islam, while less extensive than in previous surveys, still has a sizable number of adherents. Among Nigeria’s Muslim population, for instance, nearly half (46%) feel that suicide bombings can be justified often or sometimes in the defense of Islam. Even among Europe’s Muslim minorities, roughly one-in-seven in France, Spain, and Great Britain feel that suicide bombings against civilian targets can at least sometimes be justified to defend Islam against its enemies.
I can’t find an explanation for the different in numbers. Pipes says 72% of Nigerian Muslims support Osama, whereas the report says 61%. Pipes says 69% of Nigerians say suicide bombings are justified, the report summary says 46% believe that bombings can be justified often or sometimes. I suspect that Pipes has added on to these figures another category of respondents - those who say that suicide bombing is justified rarely or only in exceptional circumstances. And he has avoided any mention of the fact that these figures are dropping, despite the fact that he felt it significant to list the increasing support for Bin Laden over time.
There is no denying that surveys such as this include some concerning results. But Pipes’ article has distorted the figures and used them to draw his own conclusions. The reporter of the survey indicated positives as well as negatives signs in the data, and certainly didn’t consider that the three main themes of the results in the alarming way that they have been summarised by Pipes. He says “the Pew survey sends an undeniable message of crisis from one end of the Muslim world to the other”. Which might be true, if he were prepared to acknowledge a little bit of balance in his report instead of turning it into a polemic.
What is frustrating about this is that Pew does substantial research, takes the time to analyse their data carefully and then it is transmitted to the national consciousness by someone who picks out the most alarming results while ignoring those that are reassuring. If we are talking about analysing why Muslim people feel isolated, perhaps this sort of reportage could be part of the reason?
October 31st, 2006 at 7:38 pm
Dan the issue of faith/Islam and the West,is too important to let slip.
Given the statements from the Syd Imam and the stand of Muslim women on the one hand,and the unrelenting attack by the Australia(runnning up to 7-8 pages a day)
why not a thread, start from the other end-instead of beginning with islam and women, frame something in the broader context of women and violence?see the following
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2006/10/30/1162056924231.html
November 1st, 2006 at 6:35 am
janet, greg…*giggles* that’s very funny…
November 1st, 2006 at 10:43 am
did anyone notice that the Islamic women used secular arguments.
The Sheik’s sermon did not raise a ripple until it was put onto the newspapers.
Remember under Islamic law a woman to prove rape needs MALE witnesses. If this does not occur then she would be punished under adultery or something similar.
Another one for all roads lead to Rome brigade.
November 1st, 2006 at 11:18 am
OPF course it didn’t couase a stir - no-one other than those who were in attendance would have known about it!
In some Islamic countries where their law is based upon Islamic principles (just like our law is based uypon Christian principles but could hardly be called Christian law) what you say is true Homer, but that is not the case in most.
Are you saying tyhat the greater majority of Muslims would agree with the Sheiks sermon?
November 1st, 2006 at 11:27 am
Gerg,
The people there undertstand arabic.
They didn’t say boo before the publicity.
Yes!
November 1st, 2006 at 12:21 pm
How many people were present during the original sermon?
How many of the people who were there thenm are now the ones who are outraged by it?
Are you saying that Muslims as a whole agree with what the sheik said? A simple yes or no will suffice
November 1st, 2006 at 1:03 pm
greg,
is that a simple yes back there from me or not?
more than a few thousand I’m told.
November 1st, 2006 at 1:08 pm
1. At the sermon: about 500; more probably heard it on radio as sermons are broadcast
2. How many there now outraged? None
3. Everything shiek said, from Jews and Christians being inferior (not just going to hell), women, and in another sermon jihad is traditional Muslim teaching. So the number who agree with him world wide = no. of traditional Muslims
November 1st, 2006 at 1:29 pm
I’m not certain how you can claim that the entire number of traditional muslims world wide (let alone here in Australia) support and agree with the Sheiks comments.
Also how have you determined that no-one who was there at the original presentation of the sermon was outraged? Did you conduct an exit poll? opr are you arguiing falaciously from silence?
November 1st, 2006 at 1:44 pm
Well one Muslim here reckons most Muslims in Australia would agree with Hilali’s rant.
Hilali has been rabbitting on against Jews, women, Australia was originally Muslim, September 11, kill all Aussies in Iraq and Afghanistan etc for years. But this Lakemba constituency doesn’t seem to mind.
November 1st, 2006 at 2:16 pm
okso you have moved from your original:
to a lesser number of :
My questiopn of your one muslim is still:
I ahve personally met with and spoken to the manager of the Muslim Womens Association, who is most defintiley a traditional Muslim, and she does not agree with the sheiks views.
Your generalisation is not accurate
November 1st, 2006 at 2:16 pm
okso? I meant SO
November 1st, 2006 at 4:40 pm
Tanveer’s assessment is most Muslims in Australia which would be a higher number than the strict traditionalist Muslims in Australia. (Taveer has other articles online as well which are worth a read)
There are surveys, poll questions etc in newspapers. Google away. What you will also have to question when you evaluate each survey is, did people disagree with the shiek (or a similar view expressed by someone else) or how it was said? That’s just the meat issue.
Then there are the other topics covered in the sermon. I notice he did not apologize for laughing about the rapes or suggesting the sentences were too harsh.
We will leave aside that Jews and Christians are not just going to hell (which is mostly full of women in the Muslim view), but are INFERIOR.
We then move to the other choice comments and sermons.
Of more concern is Hilali was a one time member of The Muslim Brotherhood amongst other unsavoury connections. He reckons he quit because they were too radical. This is the MB’s agenda and methodology. If you want to believe any thing that man says in public given how many times he’s been caught out lying, contradicting himself, claiming he was taken out of context yada yada, please be my guest.
November 1st, 2006 at 4:59 pm
The money quote from the second article:
November 1st, 2006 at 5:03 pm
If we have “traditionalist Muslims”, does that mean we have “emergent Muslims”, too?
November 1st, 2006 at 5:17 pm
LOL!
There are some I think like Tanveer who can see the fracture points (eg the Koran standing above history) And remember the move to introduce sharia courts in Canada was opposed by a movement led by Muslim women who’d lived it up close and personal.
But as I noted on my blog, if those fracture points are addressed, what does that do to Allah and would one still be a Muslim? As far as I can see it is a dead end for Islam because it is incoherent - reformation is impossible.
Even the most liberal Muslim countries (eg Malaysia) where on the one hand you can sit down and swig a half a bottle of scotch with a Muslim in KL while his Chinese girlfriend is draped over his shoulder and discuss arguments for the existence of God (as I have) has its own religious police out east and will not offer full equality and freedom of religion to all their people. To my knowledge you still cannot buy a Bible in Bahasa Malay in Malaysia - not forgetting it has just emerged from decades of Dr Ms anti-Semitic anti-West rants. They still can’t let go.
The best Muslims can hope for is a casual if not distant attachment to one’s faith, its history and its theology. Just a set of laws to follow in empty ritual.
There is no God who is Trinity in Islam. No Incarnation, no Redemption, no Ascension.
November 1st, 2006 at 5:19 pm
Oh and Lakemba babes here.
November 1st, 2006 at 8:48 pm
yeesh…
Obviously te religin of Islam allows for no incarnatino, however is it possible do you think (as many quite acceptable scholars ascert) to remain in Islam and yet be a follower of Jesus?
November 2nd, 2006 at 2:22 am
No.
There is a lot of babble around the place by “scholars” who try to say Muslims worship the same God as Christians (and Jews) which is crap. Or that they can be Christian or something. Crap crap crap.
We know our God as Trinity. While Jews don’t accept that Judaism does not preclude it - Paul himself took up the Shema and applied it to the Trinity. And after all the Kingdom of God is the fulfilment of the Jewish hope; Jesus is Israel’s Messiah and the world’s lord…the roots of our faith are in Judaism although now that Christ has come, Jews too must look to Him to be saved.
To a Muslim we are polytheists (see sheiks sermon again) and to believe in the Trinity is to commit shirk - blasphemy. Calling God Father as we do, is blasphemous. The monotheism of Islam is not the monotheism of Christianity.
The Issa of Islam bears no resemblance to the Jesus of the Gospels. He is merely a human, not the Son of God, fully human fully divine, God Incarnate as we know him. All the “prophets” mentioned in the Koran who are also mentioned in the OT - Job, Noah etc are vastly different. Hardly surprising (Mo was illiterate, had some contact with Jews, maybe some Monophysite or Nestorian Christians, in any case the Bible wasn’t translated into Arabic for about another 100 years after his death…and everything was handcopied so not like you could buy one at the corner bookstore; the Koran seems to have some references to the Babylonian Talmud, some apocryphal material on Jesus, probably all based on oral traditions…) There is a concept of sin, but no redemption; at the end of your life your good deeds get weighed against your bad - as long as you are Muslim of course. There is no concept of knowing God or God’s immanence; Allah is unknowable (although Sufi traditions seem to encourage the idea of being close to God…but if you saw the SBS special on Sufi women in Iran the other night, for some that means putting yourself in a trance). There is no concept of grace. It’s law law law all the way. Their idea of inspiration (which they sometimes call revelation) is not revelation as we understand it. And on and on it goes. Islam and Judaism/Christianity are mutually exclusive. The 99 names of Allah might sound a bit like our God, but our God is the living God and bears no resemblence to Allah.
There are some Muslims who have converted to Christianity yet keep up appearances as Muslims to protect themselves (eg Afghanistan, Saudi, Middle East, parts of Pakistan etc). This is because you cannot leave Islam. Traditional punishment for apostasy is death - remember Abdul Rahman? Even in Malaysia a Muslim convert to Christianity has been fighting for five years to be permitted to marry her Christian fiance and she is one of many. A chaplain here told me once that a Muslim girl whispered to her once “I believe in Jesus” - even at a young age and here in Australia she was aware of the consequences. I would never denounce anyone in that position - our calling is to life not death. But this is why I believe very strongly in fighting for freedom of religion - freedom to convert or apostasize - as the most important freedom of all. Not just for Christians living in difficult circumstances, but also for the sake of Muslims and others trapped by their religions.
But can you remain in Islam and be a Christian? Nope. You may have to make room for secrecy. But there is no room for syncretism.
November 2nd, 2006 at 8:51 am
Muslims do not like ( to say it mildly) that God as man could die on a cross for us.
They get very angry about this.
Nor do they believe Jesus died on a cross.
They have no concept of grace. Their works will always outweigh any bad deeds because of the weighting of good works.
Moreover their God can have a bad hair day and simply change the balance on the day of judgement and send you to hell for the hell of it.
November 2nd, 2006 at 10:25 am
I agree that a Muslim can’t be a Christian. Afterall, what is a Christian? Is it not an intellectual assent to a set of beliefs? The intellectual beliefs of a Muslim differ on too many points to those of a Christian.
However, how does intellectual knowledge and intellectual beliefs affect our ultimate salvation and eternity with God? Are the two dependent on each other? Can a Muslim remain a Muslim, and even to some degree give intellectual assent to some beliefs (because that’s all they’ve ever known), but at a heart level follow God given convictions, and then still spend eternity with God? And if so, then from God’s perspective, there is no difference between Muslim and Christian, and one is not superior or inferior to the other. There is only the following of the conviction of one’s heart, as judged by God that determines ultimate destiny…..
November 2nd, 2006 at 11:09 am
except people can ONLY gain entry to God’s kingdom through Jesus.
This means Muslims and all others are denied entry.
November 2nd, 2006 at 11:22 am
Yes, people can ONLY gain entry to God’s Kingdom through Jesus. He is the door. But that door has already been opened, by the work already done through the life, death, resurrection and ascention of Jesus. The question is not whether people recognise the door, it’s whether they walk through it or not. Could the determining factor of whether they actually walk through that door have nothing to do with intellectual knowledge?
November 2nd, 2006 at 11:42 am
Wayne,
I am trying to reconcile how someone can believe Jesus is the only way to salvation yet embrace Islam which says he was a mere prophet and denies both his death on a cross and his resurrection.
November 2nd, 2006 at 11:48 am
Agreed, I struggle to reconcile this too, because Jesus IS the way. What happens if you consciously and deliberately reject this? My next question would be what Jesus are they rejecting? The real one, or an intellectual aparition of Him? Hmmmm….
All I know is that God sees beyond our intellect and sees the heart, and He will do what is right and just….
November 2nd, 2006 at 12:28 pm
the major point is grace.
It is a gift from God. You have NOTHING to do with it. It is all about God.
on the other hand a works based system is all about you. You achieve salvation through your own efforts. Jesus isn’t there at all.
November 3rd, 2006 at 8:21 am
Not sure what you are asking Wayne. Our faith is ultimately based on revelation, a personal encounter with Christ Bit like the man born blind we may not know all the “right answers” at first, but we do come to know “who” as we walk after Him. To consciously reject Him, well that’s not a place I would like to be. And what of those who have never heard of Him - that’s not for me to speculate. But I think we who know Him would say, His judgment will be true.
November 3rd, 2006 at 8:43 am
Homer said:
and Saint said:
I agree with you both…however…(you knew that word was coming)…if Jesus is the door, the only door to God, how is it right to say you ahve to be a Christian? By saying that aren’t you making a religion the door instead of the person Jesus?
The book I reading at the moment The Shaping of Things to Come is written by Alan Hirsch and Mike Frost and they talk about muslims embracing Jesus (and they give examples) and remaining within Islam while rejecting thos parts of Islam that are not consistent with a faith in Jesus.
What are your thoughts on that?
November 3rd, 2006 at 8:45 am
If we believe in an incarnational God, why do youb limit that incarnation to certain religions or sets of belief?
November 3rd, 2006 at 10:17 am
Greg,
any person who accepts Jesus as the door to salvation is a christian.
you are trying to make too much out of a molehill.