Wednesday, January 7, 2015

Misconceptions of Islam: An Intensive Overview

On September 11, 2001 I was a freshman in high school and was sitting in my English class watching the towers fall on that fateful day, and I remember asking my principal if we were under attack, he said he did not know. Several days later I made a comment of bigotry towards Arabs and Muslims and was immediately corrected and discipline by said principal. 2 years later, I watched a countdown on the television for a war in Iraq. A year later (roughly) I watched a man get his head cut off by a radical Muslim. I graduated high school in 2005 and joined the US Army as an airborne infantryman. By the time I left the army I had deployed to Baqubah, Iraq (same city and sector coincidentally) twice for a total of 26 months. Since I have been a civilian (October 2010) I have accrued a much different mindset than what had been inserted into my young and fickle brain. I had been desensitized and essentially brainwashed to view Iraqis as animals rather than living and breathing human beings. My investigation into Islam has still been biased a bit against the religion, along with every other religion, and I now go into it with a much more open mind than ever before.
           



The intent of this paper is to not only address preconceived notions and misconceptions, but delve into the text of the Quran and discuss how, when, and why the text has been taken out of context.
“America's 2.5 million Muslims make up less than 1% of the U.S. population, according to the Pew Research Center. Many Muslim students face discrimination and some cases have warranted investigation by the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights. Muslim groups have reported widespread bias as well” (Shah, 2011). With America being land of the free and the founding being centered on flight of religious persecution, the world needs an extensive review of not only Islam, but all religious beliefs. Though ignorance may be bliss, willful ignorance is just a shame. The first step to combating a problem is to recognize there is one.
First and foremost, the biggest shock to most people is how closely related Islam is to Christianity and Judaism. Some may know they were essentially the same, but after reading sections of the Quran, especially sections of Joseph, Moses, Mary, and Jesus it was beyond shocking. The biggest surprise to Christians have to be that Muslims acknowledge that Jesus existed and walked the earth, but few never know they acknowledge the virgin birth, that he was a prophet of God, or that he even performed miracles. Miracles such as: speaking while in the cradle (Quran 3:46), healing the blind and the leper (3:49), or raised the dead (3:49)!
“He will speak unto mankind in his cradle and in his manhood, and he is of the righteous. (46) She said: My Lord! How can I have a child when no mortal hath touched me? He said: So (it will be). Allah createth what He will. If He decreeth a thing, He saith unto it only: Be! and it is. (47) And He will teach him the Scripture and wisdom, and the Torah and the Gospel, (48) And will make him a messenger unto the Children of Israel, (saying): Lo! I come unto you with a sign from your Lord. Lo! I fashion for you out of clay the likeness of a bird, and I breathe into it and it is a bird, by Allah's leave. I heal him who was born blind, and the leper, and I raise the dead, by Allah's leave. And I announce unto you what ye eat and what ye store up in your houses. Lo! herein verily is a portent for you, if ye are to be believers” (Quran Explorer , 2006)
Within the previous 3 verses from the Quran the virgin birth of Jesus, acknowledgement of Judaism and the future Christian texts, and the miracles performed by Jesus. It is unclear at what point the religions turned into a rivalry and escalated to a point where one religion’s followers essentially HATE each other, (probably since the religion’s birth) which is ironic because no modern religion (that I know of) teaches to hate fellow man. Especially when considering the simple fact that both religions share the same God and ancestry of the human race through Abraham. If these beliefs, books, and prophets were indeed put into human’s consciousness then the way religions have evolved (primarily in the Western world) is just further evidence that mankind has flubbed up more things than they have gotten right. Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and all other mainstream religious fundamentals seem to hover around a main theme; love.
            The most important thing to discuss and put forth is, though Islam may be misunderstood by the majority of the Western world, the religion itself is used as a scapegoat for treacherous acts across the globe. In the words of Swiss journalist and author, Roger Du Pasquier:
“The West, whether Christian or dechristianised, has never really known Islam. Ever since they watched it appear on the world stage, Christians never ceased to insult and slander it in order to find justification for waging war on it. It has been subjected to grotesque distortions the traces of which still endure in the European mind. Even today there are many Westerners for whom Islam can be reduced to three ideas: fanaticism, fatalism and polygamy. Of course, there does exist a more cultivated public whose ideas about Islam are less deformed; there are still precious few who know that the word islam signifies nothing other than ‘submission to God’. One symptom of this ignorance is the fact that in the imagination of most Europeans, Allah refers to the divinity of the Muslims, not the God of the Christians and Jews; they are all surprised to hear, when one takes the trouble to explain things to them, that ‘Allah’ means ‘God’, and that even Arab Christians know him by no other name” (Collection of Muslims and Christians, 2011).
The mainstream media is very quick to the punch of identifying horrible acts as radical Muslims, and unfortunately this has led to the overall assumption that all Muslims are terrorists. And a study in 2001 is only evidence to back the notion that Western media is notorious for this.
American newspapers depicted Muslims more negatively after September 11, 2001, and significantly changed in their representation of Muslims a year before September 11 and a year after the terrorist attack. “The study drew a random sample of ten Sunday issues of each newspaper (e.g., five issues prior to September 11 and five issues after the tragic event) and analyzed the editorial content of each selected issue” (Melina Trevino, 2010). The analysis revealed that all three newspapers represented Muslims more negatively after September 11; however they did not change their portrayal of Islam. Each newspaper had selected more unfavorable terms than favorable and neutral terms combined for both periods. The dominant negative terms labelled Muslims as terrorists, extremists, fundamentalists, radicals, and fanatics.
Globalization seems to be making a difference in the political culture of Islam and what Americans are familiar with when it comes to Islam in the Western tradition. Professor Sulayman Nyang from Howard University commented on this in an interview with Neil Conan.
“I think one of the root causes of present political malice and predicament is the nature of political culture in the Muslim world and the manner in which globalization is making some of these contradictions come to the fore. Muslims living in the West… would be very much distraught by the fact that the manner in which they understand Islam and the manner in which they would like to practice Islam in a democratic society is radically different from the state of affairs in the Muslim world” (Professor AZIZAH AL-HIBRI, 2001).
This is interesting because it implies that Muslims in America practice Islam in a different way. One can only assume the many reasons it is this way is due to not only misunderstanding of the religion, but also the misinterpretations radical Muslims have taken. However, a large majority of Muslims do not agree with the tactics used by radicals and view their actions with disgust.
“…the terrorist elements… were trying to destroy not only the normalcy in American society by terrorizing all of us, but more significantly they tried to drive a wedge between American Muslims and Arab-Americans and the rest of the society. And I think that's more sinister and more destructive because what happens then is you have an alien group that is not committed to the democratic process, and they have grievances against systems that are authoritarian and tyrannical in their part of the world, if they are actually from that part of the world, trying to interfere with the lives of Americans and, therefore, trying to get some kind of sympathy from people who may--in my view, very misguided. And I think that is the clearest danger, creating a climate of terror and at the same time undermining, conceptually, the pluralistic lifestyle of Americans” (Professor AZIZAH AL-HIBRI, 2001).
            To admit that the radicals are winning their objective to alienate a people is a bitter drink many do not want to swallow; however, it is necessary to look at if the human species plans to evolve into something better than it is already. Without digressing too much, America has a bullying problem (argument is worldwide, but discussing an in school issue here) and with an alienated group of people, in this case Muslims, children raised to view them not only differently but also as a lesser people will cause a much more polar culture climate and be a heavy obstacle to overcome (i.e. sexism and racism in America).
Without speaking for countries outside of the United States, (and while speaking for several Americans) many people seem to have the notion that radical Muslims want to cut off your head, and moderate Muslims want a radical Muslim to cut off your head. Radical Muslims that have been interviewed share the belief that they are fighting because of Western oppression and killings of Muslims across the globe. Israeli tactics in Gaza seems to be overlooked by many, as the angle and twist of the story is these are “bad people.” (I also think it is important to notate here that when I was attending basic training we were not told to call them terrorists, but rather bad guys). Majority of Americans get their news from televised media stations, without going into more than what is necessary and without digressing too much, it is important to understand that 6 companies own about 96% of the Western media: Vivendi Universal, AOL Time Warner, Walt Disney Co., News Corporation, Viacom, and Bertelsmann AG. This information is only for the reader to comprehend how narrow his or her consumption of media really is. Time and time again satirical informative news show host, Jon Stewart, has segmented news clips of anchors across the nation reading their teleprompters with near strict scripting. Again, the main point of this paragraph is to attempt to broaden the mind of the reader, which only goes to show that environment one is raised in is a huge factor of thoughts, beliefs, and even actions. However, at this point huge corporations strictly will not allow a media company to grow and compromise the order they have put in place. With this structured media outlet being strained, this is where common misconceptions are birthed.
            A common idea by most Westerners of a Muslim man is a dark olive skinned turbaned man, with a long beard, and a rolled up rug that he sporadically throws down and stops everything to mumble something in Arabic. In all actuality, Arabs only make up about 15% of the Muslim population, with East Asia coming in first at 69% and Africa at 27%. Though the majority of Arabs are Muslim (75%), the rest are mainly Christians and Jews (Collection of Muslims and Christians, 2011). With 1.6 Billion Muslims in the world, Arabs only make a small percentage. Many countries declare Islam as the state religion, but only Iran has developed their government as a theocracy, in which the Supreme Leader is viewed as the highest religious and political leader over its complex structure. It is also important to keep in mind that Iranians do not like to be called Arab, as they are Persian. This is a quick way to offend an Iranian. It is improbable to comprehend with so many countries sharing the same religion, why there is so much cross boundary and sectarian violence. Especially when the Quran itself says, “God does not forbid you, with regards to those who fight you not for religion nor drive you away out of your homes, from dealing kindly and justly with them, for god loves those who are just” (Quran Explorer , 2006).
            This brings us to the next very common misconception of Islam, religious intolerance.  As stated earlier in the paper, the God of Islam is the same God as the one within Judaism and Christianity; one God, one maker of the world, one merciful God, and one owner of judgment. Many people would go to think that Muslims hate Jews and Christians and vice versa. Without speaking for any party out right, this only tends to happen within the radical views of the religions. Unfortunately, radicals exist, not only within Islam, but also Christianity, Judaism, and other organizations outside of religions, and these radical views tend to be frowned upon by the majority of the population. The Quran says;
“And fight in the Way of Allâh[] those who fight you, but transgress not the limits. Truly, Allâh likes not the transgressors. [This Verse is the first one that was revealed in connection with Jihâd, but it was supplemented by another (V.9:36)]. (190) And kill them wherever you find them, and turn them out from where they have turned you out... And fight not with them at Al-Masjid-Al-Harâm (the sanctuary at Makkah),[] unless they (first) fight you there. But if they attack you, then kill them. Such is the recompense of the disbelievers. (191) But if they cease, then Allâh is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful. (192) And fight them until there is no more Fitnah (disbelief and worshipping of others along with Allâh) and (all and every kind of) worship is for Allâh (Alone). But if they cease, let there be no transgression except against Az-Zâlimûn (the polytheists, and wrong-doers.)” (QuranExplorer).
This passage is used by many people across the globe when discussing Islam and its misconceptions. Many people who are hatefully against Islam and view it as the radicalized religion that is portrayed on Western media news stations (such as Fox News), point to the phrase, “kill them wherever you find them.” However, what follows after that short phrase is directions from God to Muhammad on how and where to fight those that were persecuting Muslims after they fled to Medina. It is also important to notate that the enemies of Islam at this point were not Christians, but rather polytheists, as God recognizes Christians and Jews as people of the book. However, most, if not all radical Muslims certainly turn to this passage to justify their actions as well. Another passage from the Quran suggests peace over war. “If they incline to peace, make peace with them, and put your trust in God” (Longman 352). Religious tolerance is directly implied as well, in Sura 109.
“Say: O ye that reject Faith! (1) I worship not that which ye worship, (2) Nor will ye worship that which I worship. (3) And I will not worship that which ye have been wont to worship, (4) Nor will ye worship that which I worship. (5) To you be your Way, and to me mine. (6)”(Quranexplorer).
Passages of peace among men are found more than once in the Quran and usually followed by a statement saying that God is all-knowing and merciful.
            This is a perfect time to segway to the next common misconception and quite possibly the most twisted and contorted concept within Islam, jihad. Islamic jihad is a concept that comes from the Quran and unfortunately has been twisted many radical Muslims across the world to commit violent acts of terror against innocent people in every corner of the world. These non-Islamic acts have quite possibly been the biggest form of distorting the image of Islam, combine this with Western media and the image is misrepresented even more. In order to gain a clear and concise understanding of what jihad is and means, one must rely on the legitimate scripture and look beyond one line of passage. There are a few questions many non-Muslims have when referring to jihad. What is the Quranic definition? What is “the cause of God?” Do Islamic suicide bombers go to heaven as they are lead to believe?
First, there is a literal definition of jihad, “striving to achieve a goal”, and then there is the Quranic definition, ““striving with one’s self and one’s money in the cause of God.” The definition from the Quran is represented in a few different passages, for reference, “jahadu” is the verb form of jihad (Collection of Muslims and Christians, 2011).
“The true believers are those who believe in God and His messenger, then attain the status of having no doubt whatsoever, and strive (jahadu) with their money and their lives in the cause of God. These are the truthful ones.” 49:15
“Those who believe, and emigrate, and strive (jahadu) in the cause of God with their money and their lives, are far greater in rank in the sight of God. These are the winners.” 9:20
“As for the messenger and those who believed with him, they eagerly strive (jahadu) with their money and their lives. These have deserved all the good things; they are the winners” (Quran Explorer , 2006).
As one can see, the violence of jihad implied by Western media and the ignorance of those unclear about Islam, these scriptures do not implicate the call for violence, especially toward innocent people. Next, the investigation into the phrase “cause of God” must be explored. The strive, or struggle, to uphold God’s commandments and prohibitions is quite simply “the cause of God.” Therefore, a jihad in the cause of God is a struggle to live the 5 pillars of Islam and the struggle to uphold God’s way and law. (An interesting correlation could be made from the struggle and wrestling with God’s law and prohibitions to Gilgamesh wrestling Enkidu. Though this paper is not the correct time to do so, further investigation could lead to interesting conclusions.) Since the concept of jihad has been distorted so negatively, it is important to implement positive reconciliation for the word, using passages from the Quran for evidence. The true “cause of God” does not allow unlawful killing, violence, or illegal acts. In the Quran and Hebrew bible, god does not advocate sin. In fact, "God never advocates sin. Are you saying about God what you do not know?" (7:28).
"...... You shall not kill - God has made life sacred - except in the course of justice. These are His commandments to you, that you may understand." 6:151
"You shall not kill any person - for God has made life sacred - except in the course of justice. ....." 17:33
The ban to kill any innocent soul has always been the law of God, not only in the Quran but also in all previous scripture.
"......, we decreed for the Children of Israel that anyone who murders any person who had not committed murder or horrendous crimes, it shall be as if he murdered all the people.” 5:32
With Quranic evidence the killing of innocent people is referred to as a gross sin and the Quran blatantly calls for Muslims to not persecute those who have a different religion. The Quran commands complete freedom, respect, and joint co-existence must be implemented with those of other religions. The Quran also commands Muslims to treat non-Muslims with kindness and hospitality:
"God does not enjoin you from befriending those who do not fight you because of religion, and do not evict you from your homes. You may befriend them and be equitable towards them. God loves the equitable" (Quran Explorer , 2006).
(I was fortunate enough to witness this type of hospitality in both of my deployments. Every house we entered we were given chai and bread, even though we were implementing a military police state in their own country. This was a big culture shock.)
Islamic hospitality and kindness is unparalleled in Western culture. Whether it be to strangers, or especially family, the majority of Muslims embrace those God has created, everyone. The attacks across the globe in the name of Islam, jihad, and God, are a direct violation of the Quran and the commandments of God, as the Muslims view God.
            By avoiding common mistakes committed by humans across the globe of stereotyping a group of people by the few bad apples in the world, the cohesion and love that God speaks of in the Quran and old scriptures this world might become a better place. However, environment plays a huge role, but unfortunately ignorance has been playing a larger roll. Fear of something different than what one is used to seem to take the reins in most people’s lives. Though this paper touched on only a few preconceived notions and misconceptions of Muslims, the points that were touched on were the most relevant to current events and to the audience that may read into this beyond the classroom. In theory, though man has written both the Bible, texts within Judaism, and the Quran, the inspiration was directly from one monotheistic God, the same God. Therefore, it is beyond a shadow of a doubt there will be similarities within all texts.  

Author’s discourse: After investigating and exploring the texts within the Quran it helped me learn a great deal more not only about one Islam, but also Christianity. I was raised by a father who was a Baptist preacher, believe me he would absolutely refuse to read this paper, and I would refuse to have any sort of debate with him about the parallels between Islam and Christianity. Before the start of this paper I had a much different view of the words Islam, Muslim, and jihad. At first I was reluctant to delve into this topic, but I am certainly glad I did, and I am certainly glad Arabic and Islamic literature is being instructed on, as I am sure it will only help to close any type of misunderstood cultural gaps.


           






Works Cited

Collection of Muslims and Christians. (2011). Retrieved 11 13, 2014, from Answering Islam: http://www.answering-islam.org/
Melina Trevino, A. K. (2010). Islam through editorial lenses: How American elite newspapers portrayed Muslims before and after September 11, 2001. Journal of Arab and Muslim Media Research, 3-17.
Professor AZIZAH AL-HIBRI, P. S. (2001, September 26). Analysis: American Muslims discuss common misconceptions about Islam. (N. Conan, Interviewer)
Quran Explorer . (2006, September 22). Retrieved 11 11, 2014, from Quran Explorer: http://www.quranexplorer.com/Quran/Default.aspx

Shah, N. (2011). Combating Anti-Muslim Bias. Education Digest: Essential Readings Condensed for Quick Review, 32-35.

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