Re: The Rushdie Knighthood Affair - Islam isn't as reasonable as you make it sound

Question:
On the face of it, you seem to represent a sane and moderate muslim point of view. I commend you for that. But there are a few problems:

1. Why should "ANYONE", whether a muslim by birth or choice, be punished with death if he quits Islam? Is becoming a muslim like some sort of unfailing method of suicide, which if once resorted to cannot allow you to change your decision?

2. If such killings are unislamic as suggested by you, do you think the killers in such cases are criminals as per Islam? If yes, then please condemn the long list of muslim killers who have killed people speaking against your prophet, quran and islam. Proclaim on your site that the fatwa issued by Khomeini for the head of Rushdie was unislamic and open a forum for debate with those muslims who think that the blasphemers must be killed at all cost.

If no, then please refrain from serving these sweet sounding platitudes which will only fool the already gullible ones who think Islam is a religion of peace.

2. You say that Islam resides in Quran and Sunnah and infer that it is not correctly represented by the millions of muslims who are demanding Rushdie's and UK's heads. You seem to suggest that Quran and Sunnah are just and moral. Why could you not then defend your faith in the debate with Ali Sina? He was accusing Islam of otherwise and you chose to run away taking recourse to lame excuses.

3. Let me quote you. "Ka'b Bin Ashraf and others who were killed during the time of the prophet were not killed by the common Islamic law; as clarified above, they were killed by God through his own law. ". Does it mean God's law does not demand trial and is thus unfair and unjust? If not, then do you mean to say that Islamic law is inferior to God's law? If yes, then what is wrong with muslims wanting to follow God's law instead of Islamic law as interpreted by you?

4. You say, It is anti-Islamic because by so demanding the head of Rushdie, Muslims are creating an impression in the minds of people that Islam was a barbaric religion. That is exactly what Ali Sina accuses Islam to be and you could not refute him.

5. You profess to be a moderate and open minded. Why then the comments of those disagreeing with you are deleted promptly from your site?

Response:
The following are my brief comments on your questions/comments:

1. If you read my article you would find that I am pleading that Islam doesn’t allow a person to be killed even if he becomes an apostate. So I agree with you and I am confident that in Islam there is no punishment for an apostate.

2. Is it not my choice to decide what course action I should follow to communicate my message effectively? I am surprised that on the one hand people like you promote the message of freedom of speech and action and on the other you want to impose your views on how to do things on others. I am guided by the Qur’anic guidance that I should let people know about my religion intelligently. What I have mentioned is loud and clear. I don’t want to make it appear indecent. I often wonder how people like you and Ali Sina are any different from our religious fanatics. I concede that your ideas are different, but your approach towards how to deal with people, given your ideas, is the very same: both parties are emotionally charged, both are totally unprepared to listen patiently to the other views, and both want to impose their views on others.

3. You have the right to form your opinion on how I behaved in my debate with Ali Sina. However, this is my version of the story: I continued to debate with him until such time that I realized that I was communicating with a wall that has only the ability to repel whatever comes its way. I have limited time at my disposal within which to pursue my goals in life. For that reason I have to prioritize my activities. My God tells me to communicate with people so long as doing so is useful. As soon as I realized that Ali Sina was not even considering what I was writing and that his only concern was to continue to appease his fan-club, I decided to withdraw from the debate. You can disagree with my perception about him; however, I am responsible to perform on the basis of my honest understanding of a situation.

4. Well, my perception is that I was able to do so. I have received messages from several readers of our debate. Some thought, as you do, that I failed miserably; others thought that I have shown convincingly that Ali Sina is an unreasonably adamant critic of Islam who has lost his ability to see the other side of the argument.

5. I don’t know what you are saying. Please point out where it has happened. I will try to ask my website managers to look into this matter. Once again, thank you very much for communicating your ideas to me.

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