Muhammad (PBUH) is dead

Ron Webb wrote: If you agree that ghazu is not morally acceptable, then why was Muhammad engaged in it?

The Prophet didn�t. He only used similar ways as a tactic to enforce Blockade.

Ron Webb wrote: ahmadjoyia wrote: There is no reason to suppose that the caravans were owned by the same people who kicked the Muslims out. Who else can you attribute it if not to the Quresh (one of the tribes of Mecca)? I suppose I should have said "persons" rather than "people", i.e. there is no reason to suppose that the caravans were owned by the same persons who kicked the Muslims out.

Oh I see!! But why you just stopped at using plural in persons. You could have rather inquired Why not against the only single person who kicked Muslims out of Mecca?. Thus, your argumentation reflects your limitation to visualize the tribal societies of that time.

Ron Webb wrote: If you were (wrongly, in your opinion) kicked out of my country of Canada, do you think that you would be justified in stopping me on the highway and robbing me? Would that be fair?

This example is confirmation of my assessment of your limitation. Remember that the tribal societies work in unison where an individual�s action is owned by the whole tribe same as the decision of the tribe (good or bad) is binding on every individual (to reap benefits / losses).

Ron Webb wrote: ahmadjoyia wrote: �Blockade�, because it was a tactic by the Muslims to make their enemy make mistakes in their arrogance of power. I think Karen Armstrong made the purpose clear. They needed the money -- they had no other way to earn a living.

This could be partly true where the blockade ensured strategic advantage but also helped the individuals to survive in such an adverse environment. So, if she thinks that there was no other way to earn a living, then I guess it was all the more legitimate to go for this as their prime motive. What do you think how else the exiled people would survive?

Ron Webb wrote: ahmadjoyia wrote: Though I really don�t know your source, but even then, how amicably you think the expulsion of the Muslims was from their homes, if you don�t call brutal killings as violance? Again, maybe "amicably" was a poor choice of words. What I meant was that some sort of impartial "justice" (even if we wouldn't necessarily agree with the principles on which this justice was based) would be applied to internal disputes, while pretty much anything goes with those who are not members of your own tribe. But this is just a general impression from what I have read. I don't know it for a fact and don't have any specific source.

Now that you have read Karen saying � they had no other way to earn a living , I think that should suffice for any reasonable mind to see their actions as fully justified.

Ron Webb wrote: ahmadjoyia wrote: No, sorry, I didn�t suggest anything. All I am saying is �if these non-Muslims�..�. However, the onus is on to them to show how their sources are better if all they have is quotations based upon the �gossips� of the times. On the contrary, you can reject a report based upon many things, however, the methodology applied to ascertain some aspect of its reliability can�t be rejected as merely an opinion but only through sound argument to show some weakness in this methodology. In the absence of such critic, IMHO, it is this attribute which goes in favor of the Muslim Scholars. How do you decide on the reliability of a source? For Muslims, the main criterion seems to be whether the source is a good Muslim. Muslim scholarship is therefore almost by definition biased in favour of Muslims.

I don�t think there was any other choice in all Muslim society, thus it became a necessity and not as a choice.

Ron Webb wrote: IMHO a random "gossip" from the time would be a more reliable source. At least there is no a priori reason to believe he might be distorting the facts.

Thanks for sharing your HO, however kindly consider this that for any report to be reliable, there are two conditions. While your view only takes one condition to be sufficient, the Muslim Scholars, in addition, also look for solid �chain of narration� and not just �random gossip�.

Ron Webb wrote: ahmadjoyia wrote: We just can�t go on own whims to include or exclude what is there in Quran. Once the punishment for Zina is clearly prescribed in Quran, any other evidence out of Quran, can�t be accepted in any way. That is the basics of Isalm 101, which I keep reminding to my brothers. We're not talking about the punishment for a victimless crime of zina. We are talking about an additional punishment for the much more serious crime (against the aggrieved spouse) of adultery. As I said, murder is a form of assault; but just because we have a prescribed penalty for assault, that doesn't mean we can't have an additional penalty for murder.

While the punishment for all forms of zina (fornication / adultery) is explicitly defined without distinguishing them, however, you are correct, many other forms of related crime can be enacted. But then, these would not be called as �Hadd� (an offense described in Quran) but would be called �Tazeer� (penal) offense.

Ron Webb wrote: ahmadjoyia wrote: The biggest problem with Ahadith literature is that generally they are just a �snap shot� of an event without much details of the context as well as they have not been made synchronous with Quranic revelations. Thus, although these Ahadith related to apostasy or adultery are numerous, it is not possible to answer, if these happenings were before or after the revelations of relevant verses in Quran. Therefore, in the presence of clear evidence from Quran, the basic principal dictates no other conflicting evidence is admissible. Are you saying that it was okay to kill people for apostasy and adultery before the relevant Quran verses were revealed, but not after? Or do you think that Muhammad was wrong to enforce these punishments?

While discussing the issue of �apostasy and adultery� the whole purpose was to show how the Islamic principle 101 must be applied without going into proving/disproving the authenticity of related Ahadith literature.

Ahmad: Thanks for sharing your HO, however kindly consider this that for any report to be reliable, there are two conditions. While your view only takes one condition to be sufficient, the Muslim Scholars, in addition, also look for solid �chain of narration� and not just �random gossip�.

Well, why don't they apply this rule to the Quran ?
The only "witness" was your prophet, who always had his "revelations" when it suited him the most.
Not really what I call a solid "chain of narration".


Airmano

Edited by airmano - 23 January 2016 at 8:31am

AhmadJoyia wrote: No that is not a correct line of argument. Kindly name a ghazu against any other tribe except those in alliance with the Meccans to prove your point.

Do you know of any other tribes who operated caravans as lucrative as the Quraysh?

Maybe a better question would be, would Muhammad have known of them? Remember, Muhammad was a Quraysh merchant. He would have known just about everything there was to know about their caravans: when and where they travelled, what goods they carried, how they were protected, how they would respond if attacked, etc. Even if there were equally appealing targets, why would he take a chance on robbing any others?

This is not what I meant. From your own example, if there is an embargo against Canada, then it is expected that all its citizens including companies etc, would not be allowed to make trades just like Iranian companies/banks are not allowed to do the same, up until few days ago. The only thing is, that you so sagaciously miss out; who is so powerful to do it against the Canadians, if it is not done on moral grounds? Thus it was Muslims� moral high ground that enabled them to tease the superpower of that time and it was this �temerity of the Muslims� that amazed the other Arab tribes.

Muhammad was engaged in what would now be called "asymmetric warfare". It has nothing to do with "moral high ground". Quite the opposite, in fact: it is especially effective because it is a level of moral depravity which civilized societies find abhorrent. Terrorism is a good example of this.

I don�t think Moral high ground achieved by the Muslims could have existed against the �innocent people (person)� that you assume they were. Can you provide any evidence to support your assumption?

Can you support your assumption that Muhammad achieved a "moral high ground"? As for "innocent people", I think the principle of most civilized nations is the assumption of "innocent until proven guilty". Perhaps some of the Quraysh caravans were owned or driven by the same people who mistreated Muhammad, but I doubt that all of them were, and I doubt that Muhammad bothered to check.

�Reliability� through honesty and truthfulness of the narrators! Do you think, this is not important or less important than the gossips?

I think that the honesty and truthfulness of an ideologue or a biased witness is more doubtful than a person chosen at random, "gossip" or not.

I don�t know what�s your stats are, but yes, it can�t be ruled out as this notion was prevalent among some Muslim countries.

Was prevalent? It still is.

AhmadJoyia wrote: While discussing the issue of �apostasy and adultery� the whole purpose was to show how the Islamic principle 101 must be applied without going into proving/disproving the authenticity of related Ahadith literature. In that case I'm disappointed, because the reason I started this topic was to discuss the authenticity and reliability of the hadith. My point from the beginning is that Muhammad (PBUH) is dead, therefore whatever commands he gave to his contemporaries should have died with him. The hadith collections we have are so haphazard, and the dubious that I don't see how anyone can take them seriously as scripture. Allah (allegedly) made such a point of preserving the Quran from corruption. If He had wanted us to be guided by the hadith as well, then why wouldn't He have taken the same care in preserving the hadith? Oh, I am surprised! I thought I already answered all of this in my very first post on this topic, but it was only through your �litmus test� that we got so long in this topic to reach this point. Are you awake?

I was hoping that this discussion of the hadith related to apostasy would lead us back to the authenticity and reliability of hadith in general. That's why I was disappointed when (above, bold) you apparently wanted to steer clear of the subject. Perhaps I misunderstood.

As I said in my first response to you, however, you seem to have a very different view of the hadith from most Muslims, at least most of the ones I have previous discussed apostasy with here. I was hoping that others would join the discussion, but none have. (See also my first reply in Anti-science madness.)

Do you have any thoughts on why that is? Do you think your views are representative of Muslims in general? If not, why do you think that no other Muslims care to join this discussion and offer their perspective on the authenticity and reliability of hadith?

AhmadJoyia wrote: So your answer to my question is clearly seen as No . However, your counter question is also curious; but how would you define .. as lucrative as the Quraysh? Any quantification index? Anything not �opinionated�?

By "as lucrative", I mean any caravan likely to be carrying cargo as valuable as the Quraysh, who were a very wealthy tribe. My point is that the Quraysh were the obvious targets. Why rob poor travellers when you can rob rich travellers?

Knowledge about Meccan Caravans is expected of the �Migrants� but how is it possible �not to attack� other non-Meccan caravans about whom no information is expectedly known to them?

I'm not sure what you mean by your question. It's very easy not to attack a caravan. I do it all the time.

No, the question is how is it possible to attack them, if you don't know where or when they are travelling, or how they might be guarded, or whether they are even carrying anything worth the effort?

How quickly you change your spectacles to analyses the centuries old situation with those of modern day by drawing flimsy analogies, is nothing but called as �totally out of context�.

My analysis does not depend on context. You were suggesting that Muhammad's tactics were successful because he occupied the "moral high ground". I am suggesting that if anything the tactics of asymmetric warfare are successful precisely because they are widely regarded as abhorrent, not moral. A numerically and militarily weaker force of insurgents cannot expect to win by "playing by the rules"; but by breaking the accepted rules of conventional warfare, they can gain an advantage against their opponents who are unwilling to resort to such tactics.

However, from your perspective being a part of Superpower, you may call your actions as justified as what governed the expulsion of �Mormons� internally, or to the Japanese in WW2, internationally.

This is a tu quoque fallacy. Indeed, Canadians were also guilty of mistreatment of the Japanese in WW2 (though I don't know if we expelled any Mormons), but that doesn't justify either episode or make them morally right. Besides, they weren't my actions, though they may have been my parents' or my grandparents'.

I don�t think Moral high ground achieved by the Muslims could have existed against the �innocent people (person)� that you assume they were. Can you provide any evidence to support your assumption? Can you support your assumption that Muhammad achieved a "moral high ground"? So, again you seem to dodge the question by asking counter but unrelated question. So essentially, it is reasonable to take your answer as No.

My answer is that I question the premise implied by the question. I don't think that the Muslims had the moral high ground at all.

However for your question, the evidence comes from your own sources which are unable to provide any ghazu which was against any non Meccan allied tribes. Karan supports this concept when she writes that all other tribes were astonished on the temerity of the Muslims; taking head on against the superpower of the time.

You might want to double-check the definition of temerity. It's not necessarily a compliment.

Do you think an Iranian company trading against the embargo as �Innocent�?

As I keep trying to tell you, there was no embargo. What right did Muhammad have to impose an embargo anyway? He was just robbing them, plain and simple. The fact that he preferred to rob the caravans that he was most familiar with should be no surprise. The fact that he was probably robbing the same people he used to trade with, the same people who had trusted him with information about their caravan routes etc., should help you to understand the usual connotation of "temerity".

On the contrary, do you think the Millions of Japanese Civilians killed of your Nuke attack weren�t innocent?

Again, a tu quoque fallacy. The question of whether the use of nuclear bombs was justified is a difficult one, which will probably be debated forever. But even if bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was entirely wrong and unjustified, that wouldn't change a thing regarding the raids on the Quraysh caravans.

Your presumptuous opinion, IMHO, goes against your own logic of �innocent until proven guilty�. Hence, not very convincing.

"Innocent until proven guilty" is a principle of criminal law, requiring proof of guilty before a penalty is imposed. It doesn't mean that I have to naively believe anything I am told unless I can prove otherwise.

My views are representative of all �Thinking Muslims� who are Muslims not just by birth but by conviction through their own comparative studies and analysis. I can�t claim, at all, that it is of a Majority opinion. Regarding others not doing as what you propose, how can I tell other than to say that a logical argument doesn't need the support of the 'Majority' but the 'reason with reasonable evidence' only.

That's true, but it seems to me that if a Muslim is presenting aminority opinion that the majority of other Muslims think is wrong, they seem reluctant to enter the debate to offer a logical argument in favour of the majority. But I have to admit that you are an exception to that, as you are in many other ways.