No! We are not a Christian Nation
In one of the You Tube videos circulating on the Internet the Republican nominee for President, John McCain described America as a Christian nation explaining emphatically that the leadership must be maintained by those who believe in Christian principles.
We humbly disagree with the former prisoner of war hero. What kind of Christian nation he is referring to, we do not understand. Considering some of the Christian clergy that have endorsed him, does he mean evangelical Christianity that condemns Jews as anti-Christ and described the Catholic church as a den of Satan? Does he believe in revivalist Christianity that describes everyone different from its beliefs as hell bound? Does he believe in white supremacist Christianity that regards white race superior to others or does he believe in Orthodox Christianity that still believes that slavery was one of the God gifted right of the earlier settlers?
We reject his assertion not because we do not believe in Jesus (peace be upon him) as an incarnation of God, we reject his premise because we believe in the founding principals our great nation. We reject his claim because we believe that our nation is composed of people who believe in one God, many gods and no god. We disagree with him because we believe that in the formation of this nation, Catholics, Protestants of various denominations, Unitarians, Hindus, animists, pagans, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and atheists and agnostics played a significant role.
The Republican Presidential aspirant asserted that the founding fathers were devout Christians and hence they used Biblical terms to create a Judeo-Christian society in America.
What are these Judeo--Christian traditions? There is little to suggest that values called Judeo-Christian really exist. Jews deny Jesus as Messiah and still await for their own Redeemer. Christian call Jesus the anointed one. The Mosaic law demands an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. The teachings of Jesus promote the idea of passive resistance by presenting the other cheek. The Jewish people always dreamt of the glory in this world in the form of establishment of a kingdom on the pattern of the rule established by King David and Solomon. The followers of Jesus talk of a kingdom in the heaven. The people who accept the first five books of the Old Testament believe in a God who does not have a son, while those who believe in the New Testament claim that Jesus was the son of god. Some even go to the extent of describing him as god in person.
Apart from theological distance, socially and politically, the two communities have been at each other's throat throughout the past several centuries. America was mainly populated by Europeans who for centuries saw the persecution of Jews in almost every nation. There was no reference of Judeo-Christian traditions in Europe. Jews were subject to all kinds of humiliation and persecution. The writings of earlier settlers are full of hatred of Jews and their religion and traditions. The tragedy of six million Jews killed during the notorious reign of a Christian nationalist, Hitler, is not a myth. It is one of the most shocking realities of our history, a reality that must put every human being to shame for allowing this to happen.
To claim that there is something called Judeo-Christian tradition is an oxymoron. Further, to claim that America was founded on Judeo-Christian traditions is nothing more than an emotional outcry raised for purpose of political expediency.
We need to remember that our nation developed a large part of its infrastructure on the basis of hard work performed by Africans slaves, which included Muslim slaves, who were forcibly converted to various brands of Christianity later. It is only the pluralistic character of America that saved it from plunging into a theocracy run by firebrand religious leadership always ready to send human beings to hell fire.
This plural character was enshrined in the constitution that is not a Christian document. Trust in God and accepting Him as the sustainer of the universe is a monotheistic founding principle that existed even before the arrival of Prophets such as Jesus , Moses or Muhammad (Peace be upon them). It is the Constitution that saved the day for Catholics, Quakers, Mormons or Jews who all can give a detailed account of the hatred and rejection they faced in neighborhoods occupied predominantly by different Christian denominations.
Much of this nations big wonders were performed by people who were not of Christian faith. In the field of science and technology, the contribution of Jewish and Hindu Americans cannot be ignored. In the area of building constructions, the contribution of Muslims has to be acknowledged. In the development of railroad networking, the native and Muslim Africans and Chinese played a significant role.
Thus the claim of McCain that America is a Christian nation does not hold much water. It is true that the majority of inhabitants of America are Christians. But the identity of the nation does not come from its Christian roots. It comes from a pluralism that evolved over the years as a result of interaction among people of different religions and cultures.
To run this country as a Christian nation would be against the spirit of America. It would be against the constitution that guarantees full religious freedom to everyone and ensures that no one religion dominates the state and its institutions.
Perhaps McCain would serve the country better if he takes a sincere look back in to the history of our nation, unless he prefers following the arrogance and ignorance of George Bush.
God Bless America!
Dr. Aslam Abdullah is Editor-in-Chief of the Muslim Observer, director of the Islamic society of Nevada, Las Vegas and acting president of the Muslim Council of America, a Washington-based newly formed groups of Muslim activists
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You asked: "How many times has the King James Version of the Bible beeen rewritten by human hands. Even Christian scholars admit that."
ANSWER: Clearly arabic (assuming that you are a "learned" muslim who can actually read mohmd's quran in arabic) has no word for "translation".
For if arabic does have such a word and if you knew of it, you'd be able to grasp that the KJV is a VERSION of TRANSLATION. Clearly English is not working out for you...
Rewritten by human hands- man you're a hoot! Are you for real?? Re-written- not. Human hands being used- yes. Our God is not a scribe...
I wonder, would you care to prove to us that allah wrote the quran- and that no human hand was involved? You seem so obsessed with "human hands".
As for how many King James versions of translations we have: about three (KJV- very old English; NKJV- slightly modernised old English and RNKJV - in Old English with THE REVEALED NAME of God clearly shown in the text in HEBREW).
As for how many versions of translations of the Bible exist today- well NUMEROUS.
The Bible is the MOST TRANSLATED BOOK in the History of Humankind and remains the No.1 World Bestseller of all time.
Nice Article. I think Roger Smith said it all.
True Weli udDarfuriyya, but if I hadn't specified that it was Arab Muslims I'd be jumped on by the fact that there are Black Muslims. The killings in Darfur may have political motives too but it is evident that racism is present in the matter too. I would have said middle east slavery but the slavery occurred in Sudan, Mauritania, Chad and Egypt etc and still occurs in Sudan and Chad and Mauritania (though illegally in the last) and almost always by the Muslim Arabs. You say: "How about "wage-slavery" of indentured labour or "Hindu" Caste (Varna=colour) system?" Feel free to talk about them but it's not fair for Muslims to not list their own wrongs but to feel free to list everyone else.
You also say "Nobody mentions the elephant in the room i.e. the European White slave trade handled by the middlemen European Jews, because that is a TABOO for the guilt-induced West." TABOO huh? I beg to differ, Go ahead and write whole essay on this "TABOO" and I promise I'll read it.
This brings up interesting points. How many of those millions of slaves brought to US were Muslims? Does that mean muslims practised widespread slavery in Africa on their co-religionsists (i.e., muslims)? Is that Islamic? It is always muslims who castigate US (i.e., christian) practice of slavery. Why not that practised by muslims? Usual double standards!!
[Romesh, I wonder how do you come to the conclusion of Muslims practicing slavery, when slaves themselves were Muslims. From the past comments also, I notice whatever there is for Islam you are just against it. I challenge you to prove Hinduism doesn't treat some other humans as substandard through your cast systems. Islam is the only religion came to rescue the slaves and history teaches that. Islam teaches color or cast does not have any superiority. Can you please spot something like this from Hiduism? Rather it teaches just the opposite, ie, holy cow is holier than low caste humans. Now tell me who s using double standards? Grow up and correct yourself before criticising others!
And remeber this article was about America not being Christian country. I hope you would agree. If the chritians feel high on the work they did, they should also feel ashmed of what they did to the native Indians. Logically, then it will be more of an native Indian nation than a Christian one
]
Overzealous Europeans have always over-documented the Arab trade in enslaved Africans to alleviate their guilt concerning their own trade. "Well the Arabs did it too " became the common tone of contemporary historians. Sadly, many African-American historians who have only these European sources to infer history from have taken these second-hand guilt-massaging accounts as gospel. However, it is a well-known fact that Europeans in their artistic depictions of slave raids have always intentionally portrayed slave raiders as Muslim Africans or Arabs .
For authentic, honest, plural and balance dissertation of Arab Slave Trade, please read... in good faith:
http://www.arabslavetrade.com/
Simple facts:
Slave Trade - existed well before Islam came.
Arabs - the terms Arab and Muslim are not the same thing, thus Arab slave trade does not mean Islam slave trade (don't get mixed up).
Islam - outlawed slavery, though there are outlaws who ignored the laws. Allah will punish these evildoers in His Infinite Court of Justice.
Slavery - Only one form of slavery is allowed in Islam, ie. The enslavement of the creations to the Creator.
The Fluttering US flag in all its stars and stripes glory - represents our true Judeo-Christian values - our history of outright theft of lands belonging to indigenous Indians whom we displaced, tortured and murdered en-masse, the kidnapping, slavery and torture of Africans, and from time to time, illegal invasions, murder, assassinations, slaughter of civilians to secure our "Way of Life".
Proudly we were the first to make use of Weapons of Mass destruction to slaughter millions of civilians and almost wiped out the Japanese race; frequently make use of civilian genocide to stress the importance of our national security & foreign policy; aided South Africa under Botha to keep Apartheid alive and well and continue to support yet another Apartheid state,
Israel, supporting its government & its people are openly and virulently racist with tax dollars stolen from our own civilians;
currently very busy in Iraq and Afghanistan where we are doing what we have done best historically- torture, murder, rape, pillage and gleefully destroy entire cities and towns and eradicate an ancient civilization with our US tax funded cluster bombs, depleted uranium shells, thermobaric bombs, poison gas, napalm bombs,
our millions of land mines..and how dare Saddam use WMDs hey didn't he know they were banned per the Geneva convention which we so proudly uphold? Yes we like it here in Iraq and Afghanistan where we get our jollies by sodomising children,
shooting the elderly or an entire family if it's a particularly boring day or throwing puppies off cliffs....yes we love displaying the flags in our homes our cars after all we are the few
...the proud??..the Mar...??? er! ..well let's put it this way we are proud of something..maybe its our economy...no...oh its our educated masses...?? ..no oh yes it's our strong Judeo-Christian values.
Well spotted Romesh, their religion has no relevance, I believe it about 3% were Muslim. However virtually all the slaves imported from Eastern Europe to the Ottoman Empire were Christian but no one in their right mind places an emphasis on that. Of course a lot of Muslims sugar coat or simply forget to mention the fact that Muslim countries ever had an involvement involving slavery. Just this evening I watched a video in which a Muslim professor insisted that there was no racist slavery prior to Europe in the sixteenth century. There most certainly was! Muslim countries didn't enslave other Arabs but made drastic measures to obtain huge numbers of black (and occasionally Slavic) slaves. Please go on youtube and type in: Muslim Black slavery - Islam slave history of Black Africa. Believe me the facts are not made up and if your not convinced, study the topic in greater detail. It is strongly believed that over 100 million Black Africans were enslaved by Muslims, most of which died before reaching destination. Most of the slaves taken to the Americas were made to do farming and labour, whereas the men taken to the Middle east were castrated and turned into solders and the women were made into sex slaves and many of the children they had were killed at birth. So basically they were reduced, not only to slaves but also into prostitutes and killers. I'd also advise you to look at the video: Arabs TRADED 30 - 40 MILLION AFRICAN SLAVES. It is also known that the mothers of many of the mothers of Ottoman sultans were Slavic sex slaves and concubine. Also, in countries like Sudan, the Muslim Arabs are still enslaving the Black Sudanese. Of course, most Muslim historians are too busy slandering Western countries to talk about this bust all credit to those exceptions's.
You claim: "Actually Jews & Christians DISAGREE on a FUNDAMENTAL point i.e. the nature of God. Jews like Muslims believe in a UNITARIAN god UNLIKE PAULINE Christians who believe in the heresy of TRINITARIAN god."
ANSWER: quite clearly you do not know what the Bible says. Also, I stated quite clearly that Jews and Christians diasgree on the nature of Messiah. Do you not comprehend what this statement means in respect of the nature of God?
1. Christians believe and recite the Shema (which is the foundation of Jewish faith) as found in our Bible: "Hear oh Israel, [the Name] our God, [the Name] is one".
You seem ignorant of this fact.
2. there is no such thing as "Pauline Christianity". If you'd read the Epistles of Peter (one of Jesus' closest disciples) you'd know that he endorses Paul's letters as correct and as Scripture. Paul and Peter agreed- both as Jews (who worshiped [the Name]) and as Christians.
3. You seem to labour from the fiction that "Trinity" is not found in the TANACH. We actually base the doctrine of the Trinitarian God ON THE TANACH. The Oneness of the Trinitarian God is found in the Tanach. So is the divinity of Messiah.
4. You are also ignorant of this fact: according to Torah, anyone claiming to be " prophet" while violating Torah is called a false a prophet and worthy of death.
Jews rejected the founder of islam on this basis, and others, as judged in light of Torah.
5. Jesus was a Jew: through and through.
What was your prophet? A descendant of Ishmael (the one who was not given the Covenant)?
The heirs can only come through Israel (through Isaac) Unitarian- no other way.
The claim to "unitarianism" does not give islam any Judeo roots. Plenty of religions also claim "unitarianism"- but are not Judeo.
Take care.
This brings up interesting points. How many of those millions of slaves brought to US were Muslims? Does that mean muslims practised widespread slavery in Africa on their co-religionsists (i.e., muslims)? Is that Islamic? It is always muslims who castigate US (i.e., christian) practice of slavery. Why not that practised by muslims? Usual double standards!!
Dr Abdullah also writes "Much of this nations big wonders were performed by people who were not of Christian faith. In the field of science and technology, the contribution of Jewish and Hindu Americans cannot be ignored. In the area of building constructions, the contribution of Muslims has to be acknowledged. In the development of railroad networking, the native and Muslim Africans and Chinese played a significant role.".
Yes. But American Jews and American Hindus do not consider their work to be of Hindus or Jews, but only of people who happened to get education and got the opportunity to contribute as scientists, not as Hindus or Jews; they don't advertise their Jewishness or Hinduness.
Regarding the development of railroads, this activity was simply brute force and cheap labour under slave-like conditions; no Chinese or African American could be proud of their slave work; they had to do it to survive. Moreover, this work did not require any brains; only just physical labour under terrible weather (hot and cold).
Dr Abdullah, you should not be proud of people working under those conditions. At least I will not.
The tragedy of six million Jews killed during the notorious reign of a Christian nationalist, Hitler, is not a myth. It is one of the most shocking realities of our history, a reality that must put every human being to shame for allowing this to happen.
UNQUOTE:
Yet America killed close to 10 million Indo Chinese and I've yet to see one memorial raised to those poor people killed by agent orange and napalm and B52 raids at all parts of the day and night. Poor "commies" deserved it!
So do you Dr. Abdullah believe like many do that when Russians were killed in Afghanistan it was Jihad but the same Jihadists are terrorists today?
Who is appeasing whom here?
Note to Romesh, if nothing else I agree Dr. Abdullah's articles make little sense and yes I know the GOD BLESS AMERICA and the nonsense about separation of Church and State while your currency takes GOD's name in vain is typical American hypocrisy.....
One Pakistan rapes a woman and they talk women's rights, hundreds of young women are kept for sexual pleasure in a church compound in Texas and not one politician said one word.
Anyone still watching Teletubbies and SpongeBob in America other than Falwell and Dobson?
1. The founding fathers of USA did not use the koran or other religious text as inspiration. They relied on Biblical influence- go read it up, sir.
2. the claim that there is no such thing as "Judeo-Christian values" is clearly based on ignorance. The Bible (on which Christianity is based) consists of Judeo Scriptures and New Testament Scriptures. Christians read both and base their values on BOTH- meaning Judeo-Christian influence.
3. that Jews and Christians disagree on the identity of Messiah and His nature does not erase the fact that we BOTH recognise the TANACH. Hence, we do not disagree as strangers- but as worshipers of the God we call "the God of Israel".
4. claiming that muslim slaves built America does not change the fact that the nation was built on Judeo-Christian principles. It does not change the character of the founders and their faith.
5. is the writer willing to call those muslim nations that used African slaves "nations of ancestral worshipers"- as the slaves contributed to these muslim nations??
Finally, the reality is that USA is a nation influenced by Judeo-Christian values. Everything good and wholesome in the USA can be traced back to those who adhered to these values.
USA will be all the poorer for rejecting these sound Judeo-Christian values: Biblical principles in action are a wonder to behold:)
I ask not for "god" to bless USA. God is a vague title that means nothing in the company of those claiming religion.
Also vague blessings are pointless- as the people requesting such blessings assume they qualify for them.
Rather, I ask for the KNOWABLE God of Israel to make Himself known to the people of USA, through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Dr. Aslam AbduLLAH;
As a Muslim, I felt that your statement, Paragraph 3, the first sentence, " We...Jesus (peace be upon him) as an incarnation of God, ...,must be revised and corrected. Take good care of our 'Iman/Aqidah'.
Thank You.
What surprises me is that Dr Abdullah says "God bless America". Why did he not say "Allah bless America"? Is he afraid to say so? After all this is an Islamic web site.
"God bless America"!! Is this not just a slogan used by half-witted americans and hypocritic politicians?
You will not find me saying so, even if I were not an athiest, because it is nothing but an emtpy and meaningless slogan.
When he says "God bless America", does that mean God should bring floods, death, and disease to other places?. When did muslims start believing in the concept of nation-state? What happened to the unity of Ummah?
To be honest, Dr abdullah's articles rarely made much sense to me.
So pray tell me Dr. Abdullah will GOD not Bless India or Bangladesh or Germany or Italy?
Are GOD's Blessing exclusively for America as in God Bless America and nobody else?
What exactly is the point you are trying to make here other than to play devil's advocate and cause more hate to be directed towards Muslims?
Wait till Romesh Chander gets to read this!
This nation was founded upon a Judeo-Christian ethic, as is shown in the Declaration of Independence. The founding fathers consisted of a handful of unitarians, one deist, and the rest evangelical Christians. However they established religious freedom in this country because of persecution elsewhere for other faiths.
This country is not predominantly run by Christians, but has a basis in Christian ethics. It is legally wrong to murder, steal, destroy property, or jeopardize man's God given rights to life and liberty. This is all taken from Christian beliefs and ethics.
A note about your comment on slavery. Slavery was started by black African chieftains if you did not realize and slavery was ended by White evangelical Christians.
Please read How Christianity Changed the World for some accurate brief history on the world as it has been changed by the Christian faith. This might contradict your views on how Christianity offered nothing to the benefit of the world.
Also i believe next time an article like this is written, footnotes and supporting evidence should be given instead of personal opinions. Legitimacy is an issue.
Fortuinately, these crazy christians don't bother me; and I am a staunch athiest.