By now the whole world has heard about the blasphemous teddy bear. Because some Mohammadan schoolchildren wanted to name their mascot after Muhammad, the schoolmarm is facing punishment for defaming “the Prophet.”
Mohammedans suffer from a chronic PR problem. A few years ago, the cause celèbre was a beauty pageant. When a participant suggested that Muhammad would approve, since he had an eye for women, murder and mayhem ensued. And this is despite the fact that, according to Islamic history, Muhammad was, indeed, a womanizer.
What’s ironic about all this is that Mohammedans accuse Christians of idolatry because we worship Jesus. Of course, we have a good reason to worship Jesus—he is God Incarnate.
But, in the meantime, Mohammedans idolize Muhammad. Indeed, they resent being called Mohammedans, but that’s exactly how they act.
The reason for this is that Allah is so remote that they can’t relate to him. Technically, Allah is a personal agent. But because he’s so inscrutable and unapproachable, he’s indistinguishable from fate or a force of nature. Allah is like a natural disaster: indifferent, deadly, and unpredictable. Where will he strike next?
So, as a practical matter, Allah fades into an ultimately impersonal absolute. And no one can relate to an impersonal absolute. So, by default, Mohammedans identify with Muhammad. He becomes their personal absolute.
Indeed, Muhammad is a surrogate Christ. They deny the Incarnation, and yet they act as if Muhammad is Allah Incarnate. His person is sacrosanct. His every deed is worthy of emulation. In a sense, Mohammedans are crypto-Christians without the benefit of saving faith.
Even apart from the Incarnation, Yahweh is far more approachable than Allah. The Incarnation doesn’t make an otherwise unapproachable God approachable. Yahweh is predictable. He’s a covenant-keeping God. A God who makes promises, and keeps his promises. A God who foreordains and then foretells his own actions. This is before we even arrive at the manger.
Spot on brother. The demonstrations calling for this teacher's execution are deplorable. Hard to defend Islam as the religion of peace, isn't it? The Islamic reaction to this nonsense even offends pagan sensibilities. Truly disgraceful...
ReplyDeleteNext people are going to get upset if a crusifix is placed in a jar of urine.
ReplyDeleteNikki Pate said:
ReplyDelete"Next people are going to get upset if a crusifix is placed in a jar of urine."
Silly comparison:
i) Jesus and Muhammad are not equivalent. In principle, Jesus is not to Christians what Muhammad is to Muslims. According to Islam, Muhammad was just a human prophet.
ii) There was no intention of defaming Muhammad by naming a teddy bear after him, in contrast to the protest "art" you refer to.
iii) There's an obvious difference between verbally denouncing a piece of protest "art" and pronouncing a fatwah on the "artist."
Your comparison merely illustrates your moral blindness and intellectual incompetence.
One might also justifiably say there's a difference between a teddy bear and a jar of urine.
ReplyDeleteIt's funny to me about this on several points. First, the Western media is always telling us that Islam is a religion of peace but this demonstrates otherwise. The liberal National Organization for Women (NOW) will not even take a stand on this issue but yet they attack President Bush every time they can.
ReplyDeleteSecondly, Islam claims that Muhammad is nothing more than a man albeit the "greatest prophet" but they claim to worship only Allah and not Muhammad. Then why the uproar? The British teacher didn't name the teddy bear Allah but Muslims want her dead anyway.
I believe this once again shows the dangerous teachings of Islam. As a Christian I recongise the false teachings of Muhammad and the need to evangelise Muslims could not be greater.
I have already mentioned on another blog that I will refrain from voting for any candidate who calls Islam "a great religion," or who says something to the effect of "Islamic fundamentalists have hijacked a peaceful religion." It is impossible for anybody who touts this kind of claim, which is patently false, to lead this country forward.
ReplyDeleteThese kinds of comments should make the American people irate. Yet we take it all in because of organizations like CAIR.
(Of course, I still may vote, if, say, every candidate on the right makes a comment to this effect. But that's only because some candidates who lobby for the Muslim vote are better than others who lobby for the Muslim vote.)
Apparently you never had a jar of urine when you were a kid. Who are you to judge?
ReplyDeleteNikki Pate said:
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Apparently you never had a jar of urine when you were a kid. Who are you to judge?
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I've never shot anyone in the head. I suppose I'll shoot Nikki. Who are you to judge?
Peter, you've got to get a little more serious. A jar of urine has never killed anyone. Only people kill people.
ReplyDeletePeter, also, I mentioned the crucifix in urine, not Christ. There's a difference.
ReplyDeleteLittle Nikki said:
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Peter, you've got to get a little more serious.
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I'll get serious when you actually present an argument. Until then, I'll practice speed-loading.
Nikki said:
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A jar of urine has never killed anyone.
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How do you know?
Nikki said:
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Only people kill people.
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Tell that to Pompeii, to name just one example.
Nikki said:
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Peter, also, I mentioned the crucifix in urine, not Christ. There's a difference.
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And I mentioned a gun not a knife. There's a difference.
Peter, are you smoking crack. What if I name my pig Christ? As it is, you're planning to kill me, and you object to the behaviour of others? Don't inhale.
ReplyDeleteLil' Nikki said:
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Peter, are you smoking crack.
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Nope. But at least I don't end questions with periods.
Nikki said:
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What if I name my pig Christ?
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What if I planted a field of blue donuts and played Dixie on air guitar while jumping on a trampoline screaming "Oh I wish I were an Oscar Myer weiner"?
Nikki spake:
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As it is, you're planning to kill me, and you object to the behaviour of others?
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Oh would that the youth of our nation actually picked up books and read from time to time. Perchance they'd learn a thing or two about satire and then they wouldn't look so stupid.
On the other hand, thanks for driving our standardized test scores below that of Canada. They need to feel superior about something. ;-)
Back to the main issue... ISTM that the Muslim attitude to Muhammad blends, seamlessly in practice, two dogmas that in principle should be utterly opposed:
ReplyDelete(a) That Muhammad was God's last prophet, and therefore to insult Muhammad personally is to blaspheme Allah. (Some, though not all, Muslims seem to believe that Muhammad was personally sinless, although I have read that the man himself said he prayed forty times a day for forgiveness of his own sins.)
(b) That Muhammad was mere mortal, not God incarnate (as Christians regard Jesus), which means that depictions of Muhammad are depicted on (the Islamic equivalent of) First/ Second Commandment grounds. Muslims may grudgingly allow pictures of humans in some contexts (drivers licences, Shi'ite placards of various Ayatollae, etc) but depicting Muhammad himself is a no-no because that might lead them into the same error as the Christians fell into, of idolising mere prophets.
Exhibit A: When the film "The Message" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074896/ (bankrolled by some devout but westernised Muslims) was made, in 1975-76, the producers agreed that they could not have an actor depicting Muhammad, as that would be blasphemous. Nor, apparently, could any actor depict any of the Companions of the Prophet, these being roughly analogous to the Apostles in Christianity. Eventually, by default, the leading role fell to Hamza, one of Muhammad's followers, played by Anthony Quinn http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammad%2C_Messenger_of_God_%28film%29.
The two dogmas, above, in practice reinforce each other: showing too much respect for Muhammad would be idolatry, while showing too little respect to Muhammad would be blasphemy.
Questions for Nikki Pate:
[a] Do you get upset when white comedians wear blackface?
[b] If yes to [a], do you try to behead them for doing so?