Islam Watch

I see this article on a main page:

Bismi Allah (In the Name of Allah) : Part 1a of 11 by Abul Kasem

Why is it posted? It seems to contain the worst kind of literalism and to hold that the Quran is to be taken literally in every word.

Really, the idea that Allah or God destroyed Sodom by raining down literal clay tiles with Allah's seal on them is laughable. Obviously the rocks were from a volcanic eruption so the "seal" must have been the hot steam and smoke rising from them when they hit.

Religious books are fine when they are taken as symbolic language about the creation of human consciousness but to take them literally as objective history is the delusion of humankind.  The destruction of Sodom can be taken literally as the destruction of a city by a volcano, or it may be taken metaphorically as a story about the destruction of our city of delusions by the power of the unconscious. But don't confuse the two. 

The Quran, the Torah, and the Bible all came from the one collective unconscious mind of humans. Usually we only contact the unconscious directly when we dream during sleep. A human who directly contacts the unconscious during waking consciousnesss is a prophet or a lunatic. The difference being whether one can contain and communicate the contact by useful means in socially beneficial ways. Prophets can communicate what they experienced in the language of symbology, but unfortunately, most prophets don't understand what they are experiencing is a symbol of the unconscious and so they literalize and objectify their own unconscious symbols as "God given" or "Allah given" objective TRUTHS. This is the seed of fascism in all religions that if cultivated can turn a perennial or universal truth of the collective unconscious into a totalitarian dogma.

With a bow,

Heavenly Donkey

 

 

Heavenly Donkey,

I think you are taking Abul Kasem's article too literally. In that article, Kasem is entertaining us and educating us at the same time by showing us the ludicrous, absurd ideas in the Islamic texts. Islam-Watch publishes articles on all kinds of problems within Islam, such as human rights violations, imperialism, intolerance, as well as logical inconsistencies and scientific absurdities. I see no reason why the article would not be posted. You seem to be implying that any approach other than your apparently Jungian or New Age interpretation is somehow incorrect and should not be published. Before you get too carried away in applying your New Age views to Islam, you should find out what Mohammad and his men were really up to. Read Abul Kasem's article on Mohammad's terrorism/plunder/gang loyalty scheme here and about Sex in Islam here.

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-Arch

If the article was meant to be ironic or satirical then I missed the indicators and cues for that. Perhaps I would have heard them in the tone of voice if it was spoken.  As I read the article it sounded like the writer was presenting his own views, not exposing the problems with other people's views. 

I feel that I know what "Mohammad and his men" were really up to on the socio-political level, but I also believe that Mohammad was genuinely in the grip of an prophetical and archetypal possession which he himself later distorted to accomplish his socio-political goals.

Heavenly Donkey,

Regarding later distortion, my initial assessment of the Meccan verses suggests that Mohammad had premeditated his (later) actions that would be carried out against the Meccan people. There are frequent warnings of violent punishment in the real world, not just warnings of hell-fire in the hereafter.

Lots of mystics or mystically-minded people have some interesting ideas. But I would not put Mohammad in the same category as those thinkers. His messages are too crude, and his major moral failures cannot be overlooked. His anger and hate show up from the beginning, even in the Meccan verses before he has obtained military power.

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-Arch