GROUNDLESS BASE FOR ISLAMAPHOBIA

Ignorance and fear of Islam are widespread in this
country, and dangerous, because they lead to tragic
mistakes (like Iraq) that are costly and destructive.
"Islam is an evil religion," said Franklin Graham, the
influential evangelist. He was blaming Islam for the
actions of a few terrorists as typical of that religion.
That is like blaming Christianity for the Crusades, or
the Inquisition, or the Hundred Years War in Europe.

Another leading preacher, Pastor John Hagee of a
16,000 member church in San Antonio, in an interview
with Terry Gross on NPR in 2006, said that all Muslims
are programmed to kill and we can never negotiate with
any of them. TG: "If you use the Bible as the basis for
policy, is there any room for compromise? And if you
use the Bible as the basis for policy, should Muslims use
the Koran as the basis for their policy, and then again,
what possible basis is there for compromise at that point?"
Pastor Hagee: "There is really no room for compromise
between radical Islam --" TG: "I'm not talking about
radical Islam. I'm just talking about Islam in
general." Hagee: "Well Islam in general -- those
who live by the Koran have a scriptural mandate to kill
Christians and Jews."

That of course is totally false: there is no such teaching
anywhere in the Koran. Read it for yourself. The Koran
tells us to "live at peace with your neighbor. Do not ini-
tiate hostilities against him. God does not like the aggres-
sor." And "Permission to fight is given only to those who
are oppressed." And "there is no compulsion in religion."

Terrorism violates the fundamental teachings of Islam
just as clearly as the use of torture violates the teachings
of Jesus. Mainstream Islam's leading authorities agree
on this point. In 2005 King Abdullah II of Jordan con-
vened in Amman a conference of 180 of the world's top
Islamic scholars and religious authorities. They repre-
sented all 17 of the different groups, sects, and "schools"
of interpretation in Islam, and together issued a fatwa
summed up by the King: "Muslims from every branch
of Islam can now assert without doubt or hesitation that
a fatwa calling for the killing of innocent civilians -- no
matter what nationality or religion: Muslim or Jew, Arab
or Israeli -- is a basic violation of the most fundamental
principles of Islam."

For a brilliant discussion of the Koran, its origin and
interpretation, and the history and teachings of Islam,
see No god but God, by Reza Aslan. He is an American
Muslim born in Iran and educated in the U. S., and a
professor of religious studies at Univ. of California at
Riverside. His book has been translated into thirteen
languages, and has been recognized by many experts
as the definitive work in English on these matters. He
points out that Muslims are often confused themselves
about what is in the Koran, and what it means, just as
many Christians don't know what the Bible actually says.

In the case of Islam, the hadith (oral sayings and tra-
dition) remembered from speeches and conversations
of Muhammud and written down later, are often mis-
takingly attributed to the Koran. Professor Aslan says
this about that: "The hadith, insofar as they addressed
issues not dealt with in the Quran, would become an
indispensable tool in the formation of Islamic law. How-
ever, in their earlier stages, the hadith were muddled
and totally unregulated, making their authenticaton
almost impossible . . . in less than two centuries after
Muhammed's death, there were already some seven
hundred thousand hadith (emphasis mine) being circu-
lated throughout Muslim lands." He adds that most of
these were fabricated by people who wanted to legiti-
mize their own particular belief or practice. It is easy to
see how almost anything can be advocated or justified
by finding a suitable quote from the "sayings" of the
Prophet.

(To be continued)