PART THREE VOLUME IV: SOUNDING ISLAM.

THE SET QUR.HAD.SIR. and SHAR.FIQ.MAD.

The closing of the gates of Ijtihad, Insidad bab al Ijtihad in Arabic, ordered by the Caliph al Qadir in 1019 (Risala al Qadiriya) is certainly difficult to date in practice, but it coincides at least with the rise of the four schools of law in Sunnism and with the concomitant extinction of the last fires of Mutazilism, i.e., a period from the 11th to the 13th century, and has been an UNPRECEDENTED CIVILIZATIONAL DECLINE FOR MANKIND, a twilight of old age before the time when imagination is reduced, creative faculties diminished and thought ankylosed (Mohamed Charfi, Islam and Freedom. Paris 1999).

(Most of our translations of the traditional Quranic verses are taken from the Skeptic’s annotated Quran website).

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PART THREE VOLUME IV: SOUNDING ISLAM.

THE SET QUR.HAD.SIR. and SHAR.FIQ.MAD.

(Most of our translations of the traditional Quranic verses are taken from the Skeptic’s annotated Quran website).

ODE FOR THE HIGH-KNOWERS.

Half of Mankind’s woe comes from the fact that, several thousand years ago, somewhere in the Middle East, peoples through their language conceived spirituality OR MYSTICISM….

-Not as a quest for meaning, hope or liberation with the concepts that go with it (distinction opposition or difference between matter and spirit, ethics, personal discipline, philanthropy, life after life, meditation, quest for the grail, practices...).

-But as a gigantic and protean law (DIN) that should govern the daily life of men with all that it implies.

Obligations or prohibitions that everyone must respect day and night.

Violations or contraventions of this multitude of prohibitions when they are not followed literally.

Judgments when one or more of these laws are violated.

Convictions for the guilty.

Dismissals or acquittals for the innocent. CALLED RIGHTEOUS PERSONS.

THIS CONFUSION BETWEEN THE NUMINOUS AND THE RELIGIOUS, THEN BETWEEN THE SACREDNESS AND THE SECULAR , MAKES OUR LIFE A MISERY FOR 4000 YEARS VIA ISRAEL AND ESPECIALLY THE NEW ISRAEL THAT CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM WANT TO BE.

The principle of our Ollotouta was given us, long time ago already, by our master to all in the domain; the great Gaelic bard, founder of the modern Free-thought, who is usually evoked under the anglicized name of John Toland. There cannot be, by definition, things contrary to Reason in Holy Scriptures really emanating from the divine one.

If there are, then it is, either error, or lies!

Either there is no mystery, or then it is in any way a divine revelation!

There is no happy medium...We do not admit other orthodoxy that only the one of Truth because, wherever it can be in the world, must also stand, we are completely convinced of it, God's Church, and not that one of such or such a human faction … We are consequently for showing no mercy to the error on any pretext that can be, each time we will have the possibility or occasion to expound it in its true colors.

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1696. Christianity not mysterious.

1702. Vindicius Liberus. Response of John Toland to the detractors of his "Christianity not mysterious."

1704. Letters to Serena containing the origin of idolatry and reasons of heathenism, the history of the soul's immortality doctrine among the heathens, etc. (Version Baron d’Holbach, a German philosopher).

1705. The true Socinianism * as an example of fair debate on matters of theology *.To which is prefixed Indifference in disputes, recommended by a pantheist to an orthodox friend.

1709. Adeisdaemon or the man without superstition. Jewish origins.

1712. Letter against popery, and particularly against admitting the authority of the Fathers or Councils in religious controversies, by Sophia Charlotte of Prussia.

1714. Defense of the Jews, victims of the anti-Semite prejudices, and a plea for their naturalization.

1718. The destiny of Rome, of the popes, and the famous prophecy of St Malachy, archbishop of Armagh, in the thirteenth century.

Nazarenus or the Jewish, gentile, and Mahometan Christianity (version Baron d’Holbach), containing:

I. The history of the ancient gospel of Barnabas, and the modern apocryphal gospel of the Mahometans, attributed to the same apostle.

II. The original plan of Christianity occasionally explained in the history of the Nazarenes, solving at the same time various controversies about this divine (but so highly perverted) institution.

III. The relation of an Irish manuscript of the four gospels as likewise a summary of the ancient Irish Christianity and what the realty of the keldees (an order half-lay, half-religious) was, against the last two bishops of Worcester.

1720. Pantheisticon, sive formula celebrandae sodalitatis socraticae.

Tetradymus.

I. Hodegus. The pillar of cloud and fire that guided the Israelites in the wilderness was not miraculous but, as faithfully related in Exodus, a practice equally known by other nations, and in those countries, not only useful, but even necessary.

Il. Clidophorus.

III. Hypatia or the history of the most beautiful, most virtuous, and most accomplished lady, who was stoned to death by the clergy of Alexandria, to gratify the pride, the emulation and even the cruelty, of Archbishop Cyril, commonly, but very undeservedly, styled Saint Cyril.

1726. Critical history of the Celtic religion, containing an account of the druids, or the priests and

judges, of the vates, or the diviners and physicians, and finally of the bards, or the poets; of the ancient Britons, Irish or Scots. In plus with the story of Abaris the Hyperborean, priest of the sun.

A specimen of the Armorican language (Breton, Irish, Latin, dictionary).

1726. An account of Jordano Bruno's book, about the infinity of the universe and the innumerable worlds, translated from the Italian editing.

1751. The Pantheisticon or the form of celebrating the Socratic-society. London S. Paterson. Translation of the book published in 1720.

"Druidism" is an independent review (independent of any religious or political association) and which has only one purpose: theoretical or fundamental research about what is neo-paganism. The double question, to which this review of theoretical studies tries to answer, could be summarized as follows:

"What could be or what should be a current neo-druidism, modern and contemporary?”

"Druidism" is a neo-pagan review, strictly neo-pagan, and heir to all genuine (that is to say non-Christian) movements which have succeeded one another for 2000 years, the indirect heir, but the heir, nevertheless!

Regarding our reference tradition or our intellectual connection, let us underline that if the "poets" of Domnall mac Muirchertach Ua Néill still had imbas forosnai, teimn laegda and dichetal do chennaib, in their repertory (cf. the conclusion of the tale of the plunder of the castle of Maelmilscothach, of Urard Mac Coise, a poet who died in the 11th century), they may have been Christians for several generations. It is true that these practices (imbas forosnai, teimn ...) were formally forbidden by the Church, but who knows, there may have been accommodations similar to those of astrologers or alchemists in the Middle Ages.

Anyway our "Druidism" is also a will; the will to get closer, at the maximum, to ancient druidism, such as it was (scientifically speaking). The will also to modernize this druidism, a total return to ancient druidism being excluded (it would be anyway impossible).

Examples of modernization of this pagan druidism.

— Giving up to lay associations of the cultural side (medicine, poetry, mathematics, etc.). Principle of separation of Church and State.

— Specialization on the contrary, in Celtic, or pagan in general, spirituality history of religion, philosophy and metapsychics (known today as parapsychology).

— Use in some cases of the current vocabulary (Church, religion, baptism, and so on).

A golden mean, of course, is to be found between a total return to ancient druidism (fundamentalism) and a too revolutionary radical modernization (no longer sagum).

The Celtic PAA (pantheistic agnostic atheist) having agreed to be the defense lawyer of ancient Celtic paganism and to sign jointly this small library *, of which he is only the collector, druid Hesunertus (Peter DeLaCrau), does not consider himself as the author of this collective work. But as the spokesperson for the team which composed it. For other sources of this essay on druidism, see the thanks in the bibliography.

* Socinians, since that's how they were named later, wished more than all to restore the true Christianity that teaches the Bible. They considered that the Reformation had made disappear only a part of corruption and formalism, present in the Churches, while leaving intact the bad substance: non-biblical teachings (that is very questionable in fact).

** This little camminus is nevertheless important for young people ... from 7 to 77 years old! Mantalon siron esi.

1) Do ratath tra do Mael Milscothach iartain cech ni dobrethaigsid suide sin etir ecnaide 7 fileda 7 brithemna la taeb ogaisic a crech 7 is amlaidsin ro ordaigset do tabairt a cach ollamain ina einech 7 ina sa[ru]gad acht cotissad de imus forosnad [di]chetal do chollaib cend 7 tenm laida .i. comenclainn fri rig Temrach do acht co ti de intreide sin FINIT.

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60 CHAPTERS ON OR MORE EXACTLY AGAINST FALSE ISLAM

AND AGAINST THIS IDEOLOGY (here we are not talking about the true Islam that is Sufism or Mu’tazilism, of course).

Like the useful idiots * who occupy our media space (opinion journalists pseudo-intellectuals , artists, sportsmen, bishops ...) are intellectually incapable of understanding that a religion can develop autonomously according to some of its qualities or to certain of its intrinsic flaws (its simplicity, its power of conviction, its adequacy to the expectations of time, its internal organization, its practice, etc.); they refuse to study the history of it, so we will tackle it in this book,

It goes without saying dear Muslim reader that we will not criticize here the true Islam that is yours; but the false Islam which is an ideology, one more, whose definition is below by Gustave Le Bon.

"Under certain given circumstances, and only under those circumstances, an agglomeration of men presents new characteristics very different from those of the individuals composing it. The sentiments and ideas of all the persons in the gathering take one and the same direction, and their conscious personality vanishes. A collective mind is formed, doubtless transitory, but presenting very clearly defined characteristics. It forms a single being, and is subjected to the law of the mental unity of crowds…..

The disappearance of conscious personality and the turning of feelings and thoughts in a definite direction, which are the primary characteristics of a crowd about to become organized, do not always involve the simultaneous presence of a number of individuals on one spot. Thousands of isolated individuals may acquire at certain moments, and under the influence of certain violent emotions--such, for example, as a great national event--the characteristics of a psychological crowd……

The sect represents the first step in the process of organization of homogeneous crowds. A sect includes individuals differing greatly as to their education, their professions, and the class of society to which they belong, and with their common beliefs as the connecting link. Examples in point are religious and political sects……By the mere fact that he forms part of an organized crowd, a man descends several rungs in the ladder of civilization. Isolated, he may be a cultivated individual; in a crowd, he is a barbarian--that is, a creature acting by instinct. He possesses the spontaneity, the violence, the ferocity, and also the enthusiasm and heroism of primitive beings, whom he further tends to resemble by the facility with which he allows himself to be impressed by words and images--which would be entirely without action on each of the isolated individuals composing the crowd--and to be induced to commit acts contrary to his most obvious interests and his best-known habits. An individual in a crowd is a grain of sand amid other grains of sand, which the wind stirs up at will. It is for these reasons that juries are seen to deliver verdicts of which each individual juror would disapprove that parliamentary assemblies adopt laws and measures of which each of their members would disapprove in his own person. Taken separately, the men of the Convention were enlightened citizens of peaceful habits. United in a crowd, they did not hesitate to give their adhesion to the most savage proposals, to guillotine individuals most clearly innocent, and, contrary to their interests, to renounce their inviolability and to decimate themselves.It is not only by his acts that the individual in a crowd differs essentially from himself. Even before he has entirely lost his independence, his ideas and feelings have undergone a transformation, and the transformation is so profound as to change the miser into a spendthrift, the skeptic into a believer, the honest man into a criminal, and the coward into a hero…... " (Gustave Le Bon The crowd a study of popular mind).

What will therefore be denounced here below is false Islam, whose four pillars are....

-The abrogating verses in the Quran.

- The millions of hadiths (sunnah) many of which are inadmissible.

-The life of Muhammad or its imitation (isma).

-Finally, the remarks of some scholars on the first three points (Sharia) namely Malik ibn Anas (died in 795), Abou Hanifa (died in 767), Shafi'i (died in 820). And some others just as badly inspired as Ibn Hanbal.

This having been said, the huge and catastrophic misunderstanding for our intellectuals is that the word religion does not mean the same thing for everyone.

For the ancestors of present-day Jews and Muslims, religion was the law.

For the Hebrews it was a tribal law, for Muslims a universal law. For pagans of Indo-European spirit and especially the Celts, religion was social events and festivals (the law was distinct, a reason why Christianity, unlike Islam, did not directly involved in establishing laws to govern society).

-For today's Jews religion has become ethnocultural, apart from the law, and for some of them a question of nationality. Ditto for Syriac, Coptic, Maronite, Christians.

-For Buddhists, Shintoists and Hindus, religion is a philosophy. Also, when an Indian speaks of Hindu religion it does not mean the same thing in the mind of a Pakistani as in that of an Indian, and this is probably not the same thing for an Iranian ( Persian).

There is therefore no real dialogue in this field since we are not talking about the same thing but about successions of monologues.

With the emergence of the Nation-State idea things have become even more complicated.

When an Arab today speaks of "Jews," he refers mostly to a question of beliefs. For an Arab today, just as for the Europeans of the Middle Ages (religious and non-racial anti-Semitism), a converted Jew is no longer a Jew.

But for a Jew, a Jew is someone whose mother was Jewish (traditional rabbinic definition). Moreover, all of this is more or less confused with the idea of the nation-state and is now equivalent to a nationality.

-In Serbia in Croatia or Lebanon, the notion of religion means something in peacetime and something else in war.

For Orthodox and Catholic Christians, religion has become above all an esthetics, ceremonies and rites.

Being a deeply believing Muslim has therefore important and immediate social and political consequences since it is also and above all a way of life.

Conversely, the less man is a believer, the less this has a repercussion or impact on his everyday social life.

REPEAT IT ONCE.

As far as we are concerned, we will speak here only of false Islam, that is to say one based on the four pillars mentioned above because we do not want to waste time with the trees that hide the forest.

The purpose of the 60 chapters that follow is therefore not Islam 1), about which we humbly confess to ignore what it is in reality (no doubt a subjectivity that is perfectly incommunicable like many others 2) but the religious ideology that determines a certain number of collective social or individual behavior in today's world, either positively or negatively (towards brothers in religion, against false brothers, or non-Muslims, etc.) and which claims to be in line with a cluster of words 3) supposed to contain only excerpts from an eternal heavenly book written directly in Arabic language (what in this case relates it more with the notion of a chosen people, therefore of a myth compensating a complex of inferiority, or a total lack of self-confidence, than that of Old Testament) downloaded by an "internet" operator belatedly called Gabriel (when it was a question of bringing the whole closer to Jewish and Christian traditions in order to be more acceptable, more traditional); a cluster of words called here "Quran" or recitation of a lectionary in Syriac language, extracted from a heavenly table of the Law eternal and consubstantial with God (theory of the uncreated Quran).

" And when you see those who meddle with Our revelations, withdraw from them until they meddle with another topic. And if the devil cause thee to forget, do not sit, after the remembrance, with the congregation of wrongdoers” (verse 68 chapter 6).

And…

" He has already revealed unto you in the Scripture that, when you hear the revelations of God rejected and derided (you) do not sit with them (who disbelieve and mock) until they engage in some other conversation. Lo! in that case (if you stayed) you would be like unto them. Lo! God will gather hypocrites and disbelievers, all together, into hell” (verse 140 chapter 4: women).

One of my Albertivillarian penfriends points out to me that there is the same kind of rejection of all dialogue in the New Testament, more precisely in the Second Epistle of John, first chapter verses 10 and 11.

"Whoever goes beyond and does not abide in the doctrine of Christ does not possess God; he who abides in this doctrine possesses the Father and the Son. If any man come unto you, and do

not bring this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither say unto him, Hail: for he that says unto him, Hail, partakes of his evil works."

.Duly noted. We nevertheless emphasize, dear reader...

Firstly, that this does not apply to all critics (agnostic atheists or members of another religion) but to members of the same religion who disagree on certain points (heretics gnostic persons).

Secondly, that the true believer is not asked to move away if such individuals come to discuss BUT NOT TO RECEIVE THEM AT HOME (let's skip the greetings which are only anecdotal).

All this is mentioned once and in a relatively minor part of the New Testament. While the Muslim prohibition appears in the Quran and twice.

Chapter 6 verse 68.

Chapter 4 verse 140.

May the pious Muslim nevertheless wish to forgive in advance what will follow and which unfortunately falls under God's prohibition of any questioning any discussion or any dialogue. Because we will indeed many times in the following pages discuss the verses of the Quran; their meaning, their relevance, their adequacy, their philosophical or scientific ethical value. How to do otherwise?

And especially its abrogating verses (nasikh) including the famous verses of the sword, of the fight, and of the lesser jihad. Namely verses 5 of chapter 9, 29 of chapter 9, 4 of chapter 47.

- Without forgetting the hundreds of thousands of anecdotes (hadiths) concerning the life and the work of the theoretical founder of this religious current 4) which was distinguished from the Arab paganism as well as from Judaism and from the various Christianities of the time, in this part of the Arabian peninsula in the 7th century. The hadiths are remarks ascribed to Muhammad, or sometimes to contemporary observers, who provide information on his doctrine, his life, and concern subjects of a very great variety. They number in the hundreds of thousands and are usually distinguished according to their level of reliability.

In other words, and we will return to the essentially "law" aspect of such spirituality, if indeed we can speak of spirituality in this case, it is "the unchangeable law of God" explained commented and detailed by Muhammad, the son of Amina, from a small and forgotten obscure clan of the powerful tribe of the Quraysh in Mecca.

The word hadith includes even the absence of reaction of Muhammad or of the main figures of the community after him.

The best-known collections of hadiths are those of Bukhari that of the Sahih Muslim and that of Abu Dawud. "Discoveries" or "forgery" of these hadiths f course have been instrumentalized or encouraged, or even remote-controlled, by the various powers in place. In addition to the collection of Bukhari, they have in common with the Sunnis, the Shiites (20%) have their own collections of hadiths.

There are in these millions of anecdotes things unlikely. And here again is asked the question of their authenticity. An expert from Tehran once esteemed hardly more than 30 or 40 (out of millions) the number of genuine hadiths.

But all these hadiths nevertheless play a big role in the Shariah. For example, as regards the stoning.

A determining factor in the current blockage of Islam lies therefore in the sacralization or idolatry in the 21st century still, of these hadiths, which are as many witnesses of a primitive thought. Some opt for the contextualization, others for the metaphorical interpretation or even more radically, for the falsity of some hadiths ... Yet lighten one’s burden does not remove it.

-No forgetting either the blind and servile imitation of the life of the founder of this new mass religion (see the Muslim dogma of Isma).

- And to finish the remarks of some bookworms on the first three points; in other words, the rules of life in society (sharia) that have been deduced from the foregoing by a certain number of (essentially originally non-Arab as regards grammar) thinkers, quite obliged to explain all these oddities to the new converts; and which are called "Schools"; the main ones being, as we have seen, the four Sunni schools (Hanafi Maliki Shafi’i Hanbali) and the four Shiite schools (Ismailism, Jafarism, Zaydi, Twelver) plus some other very minority (the equivalent of our modern catholicity, orthodoxy, evangelism, or others, in this first mass religion which it is agreed to group under the generic term of Christianity).

For here too great tendencies have distinguished themselves from each other, and especially those that are known as Sunnism and Shiism (Shiism itself subdivided into many subcurrents)

etc ...

The recent developments in the world of jihadist terrorism and the conversion to Islam of an elected representative (Maxence Buttey 5) of the National Front, the French political party that needs no introduction, have inspired me the following reflections about of the personality of those converts of the last hour.

It should be noted that a certain Islam (Salafism for example), being more or less a Sunni fundamentalism or integrism (80% of Islam), attracts many unbalanced persons of all kinds. But just as converting to Christianity in the second century of our era was not a proof of intelligence - intelligence was then the god of philosophers - to convert to Islam today is not a proof of intelligence 6).

It is not with a policy of the style jumping out of the frying pan into the fire by multiplying imams in the prison or mosques or prayers in the street; that we will challenge of Islamist terrorism. What is needed instead is the tireless teaching of the values of respect for and tolerance towards the kafir of the big kufr (for example the Yazidis in Iraq) and the Mushrikun of the big shirk (some Christians or some believers who do not belong to the category of the people of a single book) as well as all that can, wrongly, be considered taught: secularism apostasy freedom of conscience of opinion and speech, and more generally besides the Human rights rather than the rights of God; what includes the freedom to say or write what can be considered blasphemy by some or mere criticism of certain religious ideologies or behaviors by others.

Criticism even radically, going so far as to say that God does not exist and that Muhammad was never his prophet, must be perfectly and peacefully possible, because it is a legitimate part of the human rights in question.

Finally, let us point out for Mr. Buttey that faith having nothing to do with reason 6) this false Islam 1) object of the present study has nothing to do with intelligence, with the exception of its Mu’tazilite variant, but the latter has come to be almost unanimously considered a heresy; and as a result has unfortunately disappeared today after having known its moment of glory. What a pity ! What's missing in all of this is the Holy Spirit.

The vast majority of Muslims no longer agree with these teachings from another age, despite the brainwashing in this sense that they have generally suffered from childhood, by memorizing the Quran and its commentaries, and they cultivate a friendly traditional and family Islam. But there are some who practice them or are exhorted to do so. It is therefore wrong to say that Islam is spirituality without consequences or political implications. The experience of the totalitarianisms of the 20th century and particularly of Bolshevism shows that the moderates, despite their number, do not resist the injunctions or the taking of the ideological power by a Blanquist and determined minority group. The latter have already won the battle of ideas in the media and in some legal circles, by succeeding in giving the word Islamophobia a meaning radically opposite to its original meaning and to turn against most of our modern concepts like those of religious freedom or secularism.

Once again, of course, it goes without saying dear Muslim reader that will not criticize here the true Islam that is yours; but the false Islam which is an ideology, one more, whose definition by Gustave Le Bon was indicated herein above.

TO CONCLUDE.

Peter DeLaCrau has discovered nothing spectacular about the origins of Islam.

The existence at the time of millions of Arab Christians in Jordan in Syria or Iraq, made it possible to understand or to appreciate unequivocally the various verses of the Quran.

This book by Peter DeLaCrau does not contain any new fact. Everything has been known for a long time, except for some details.

As for various reasons that we will detail below, the intellectuals of this country act as if nothing had happened; Peter DeLaCrau took the opportunity to publish them in order to inform the widest audience.

The reasons why, with rare lucid and courageous exceptions which will, of course, happily now….multiply; the vast majority of those who know (check the box: bishops journalists politicians abbots authors of books priests sportsmen artists .....) and who have only one fault, their poverty (because they give everything to the homeless) but to whom the will to resist with courage as in 1940, is not lacking, are the following ones.....

Here is a long list of flaws ranging from ignorance to hubris through the most complete intrinsic confusionism that the heirs to Peter DeLaCrau (John Wolf Alex and Millicent) preferred to

suppress because they are really discouraging.

1) The true Islam is yours, of course, dear reader, Sufism (or Mu’tazilism, Shiism etc.), and false Islam is therefore based by contrast on the following pillars...

-The Quran and its abrogating verses (nasikh) including the famous verse of the sword, fight, and lesser jihad. Namely as we mentioned above, the verses 5 of Chapter 9, 29 of Chapter 9, 4 of Chapter 47.

-Hundreds of thousands of hadiths even if only a few dozen of them are perhaps genuine.

-The imitation of the life (sira) of Muhammad.

-The reflections of some authors about what is above (sharia).

Only these 4 points, taken together and not separately, constitute the equivalent of the Bible for the Judeo-Christians.

2) And which, moreover, as a pure manifestation of human egoism, does not interest me.

3) What matters is not the letter but the spirit!

4) The man to whom all these texts have been attributed, the man whom the Marwanides have put forward in order to claim to be in line with his authority: Muhammad.

5) Elected in 2014 in Noisy-le-Grand, in the French department of Seine-Saint-Denis.

6) What a very small thing that intelligence! Intelligence is in itself without any finality. Intelligence is an instrument at the service of our feelings. With the exception of the love of science and curiosity, its impulses come from elsewhere "(Gaston Bouthoul, Treatise of sociology, Volume 2).

* The expression "Useful Idiot" appeared for the first time in 1948 and was not attributed to Lenin until several decades later. It was then used in a New York Times article about Italian politics. It applies to persons who serve, in fact, involuntarily, designs which get away from them and which contradict their deep aspirations.

TO CITE BLAPHEMY IS NOT TO BLASPHEME (Persian proverb).

What is certain, on the other hand, is that Muslim values have aroused from the beginning very abrupt judgments (see the reactions of the fellow countrymen of Muhammad). Some did not fail to fall into caricature. Here are a few. Therefore all need to be put in context.

“It is a misfortune to human nature, when religion is given by a conqueror. The Mahometan religion, which speaks only by the sword, acts still upon men with that destructive spirit with which it was founded” (Montesquieu 1689-1755).

“This book is a long conference of God, the angels, and Mahomet, which that false prophet very grossly invented; sometimes he introduces God, who speaks to him, and teaches him his law, then an angel, among the prophets, and frequently makes God speak in the plural. … You will wonder that such absurdities have infected the best part of the world, and will avouch, that the knowledge of what is contained in this book, will render that law contemptible” (John Adams 1735-1826).

“In the spirit of enthusiasm or vanity, the prophet [Muhammad] rests the truth of his mission on the merit of his book; audaciously challenges both men and angels to imitate the beauties of a single page; and presumes to assert that God alone could dictate this incomparable performance. This argument is most powerfully addressed to a devout Arabian, whose mind is attuned to faith and rapture; whose ear is delighted by the music of sounds and whose ignorance is incapable of comparing the productions of human genius... If the composition of the Koran exceeds the faculties of a man to what superior intelligence should we ascribe the Iliad of Homer, or the Philippics of Demosthenes? […..] Instead of a perpetual and perfect measure of the divine will, the fragments of the Koran were produced at the discretion of Mahomet; each revelation is suited to the emergencies of his policy or passion and all contradiction is removed by the saving maxim that any text of Scripture is abrogated or modified by any subsequent passage “ (Edward Gibbon 1737-1794).

“…In the seventh century of the Christian era, a wandering Arab of the lineage of Hagar, the Egyptian, combining the powers of transcendent genius, with the preternatural energy of a fanatic, and the fraudulent spirit of an impostor, proclaimed himself as a messenger from Heaven, and spread desolation and delusion over an extensive portion of the earth. Adopting from the sublime conception of the Mosaic law, the doctrine of one omnipotent God; he connected indissolubly with it, the audacious falsehood, that he was himself his prophet and apostle. Adopting from the new Revelation of Jesus, the faith and hope of immortal life, and of future retribution, he humbled it to the dust by adapting all the rewards and sanctions of his religion to the gratification of the sexual passion. He poisoned the sources of human felicity at the fountain, by degrading the condition of the female sex, and the allowance of polygamy; and he declared undistinguishing and exterminating war, as a part of his religion, against all the rest of mankind. THE ESSENCE OF HIS DOCTRINE WAS VIOLENCE AND LUST: TO EXALT THE BRUTAL OVER THE SPIRITUAL PART OF HUMAN NATURE [Adam's capital letters]….While the merciless and dissolute dogmas of the false prophet shall furnish motives to human action, there can never be peace upon earth, and good will towards men……

The precept of the Koran is, perpetual war against all who deny that Mahomet is the prophet of God. The vanquished may purchase their lives, by the payment of tribute; the victorious may be appeased by a false and delusive promise of peace; and the faithful follower of the prophet may submit to the imperious necessities of defeat: but the command to propagate the Moslem creed by the sword is always obligatory, when it can be made effective. The commands of the prophet may be performed alike, by fraud, or by force. Of Mahometan good faith, we have had memorable examples ourselves. When our gallant Decatur had chastised the pirate of Algiers, till he was ready to renounce his claim of tribute from the United States, he signed a treaty to that effect: but the treaty was drawn up in the Arabic language, as well as in our own; and our negotiators, unacquainted with the language of the Koran, signed the copies of the treaty, in both languages, not imagining that there was any difference between them. Within a year the Dey demands, under penalty of the renewal of the war, an indemnity in money for the frigate taken by

Decatur; our Consul demands the foundation of this pretension; and the Arabic copy of the treaty, signed by himself is produced, with an article stipulating the indemnity, foisted into it, in direct opposition to the treaty as it had been concluded. Chauncey’s arrival, with a squadron before Algiers, silenced the fraudulent claim of the Dey, and he signed a new treaty in which it was abandoned; but he disdained to conceal his intentions; my power, said he, has been wrested from my hands; draw you the treaty at your pleasure, and I will sign it; but beware of the moment, when I shall recover my power, for with that moment, your treaty shall be waste paper. He avowed what they always practiced, and would without scruple have practiced himself. Such is the spirit, which governs the hearts of men, to whom treachery and violence are taught as principles of religion” (John Quincy Adams 1767 – 1848).

“We took the liberty to make some inquiries concerning the ground of their pretensions to make war upon nations who had done them no injury, and observed that we considered all mankind as our friends who had done us no wrong, nor had given us any provocation.

The Ambassador [of Tripoli] answered us that it was founded on the Laws of their Prophet, that it was written in their Koran, that all nations who should not have acknowledged their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as prisoners, and that every Musselman who should be slain in battle was sure to go to Paradise “(Letter from the Commissioners, John Adams & Thomas Jefferson, to John Jay, 28 March 1786).

“Consider the Koran, for example; this wretched book was sufficient to start a world religion, to satisfy the metaphysical need of countless millions for twelve hundred years, to become the basis of their morality and of a remarkable contempt for death, and also to inspire them to bloody wars and the most extensive conquests. In this book we find the saddest and poorest form of theism (….) I have not been able to discover in it one single idea of value” (Arthur Schopenhauer 1788-1860).

“I studied the Quran a great deal. I came away from that study with the conviction that by and large there have been few religions in the world as deadly to men as that of Muhammad. As far as I can see, it is the principal cause of the decadence so visible today in the Muslim world and (……) I regard it as a form of decadence rather than a form of progress”(Alexis de Tocqueville 1805-1859).

“The sword of Mahomet, and the Coran, are the most fatal enemies of Civilization, Liberty, and Truth, which the world has yet known.Some dream of an Islam in the future, rationalized and regenerate. All this has been tried already, and has miserably failed. The Koran has so encrusted the religion in a hard unyielding casement of ordinances and social laws, that if the shell be broken the life is gone. A rationalistic Islam would be Islam no longer. The contrast between our own faith and Islam is most remarkable. There are in our Scriptures living germs of truth, which accord with civil and religious liberty, and will expand with advancing civilization. In Islam it is just the reverse. The Koran has no such teaching as with us has abolished polygamy, slavery, and arbitrary divorce, and has elevated the woman to her proper place. As a Reformer, Mahomet did advance his people to a certain point, but as a Prophet he left them fixed immovably at that point for all time to come. The tree is of artificial planting. Instead of containing within itself the germ of growth and adaptation to the various requirements of time and clime and circumstance, expanding with the genial sunshine and rain from heaven, it remains the same forced and stunted thing as when first planted some twelve centuries ago” (William Muir 1819-1905).

“From the literary point of view, the Koran has little merit. Declamation, repetition, puerility, a lack of logic and coherence strike the unprepared reader at every turn. It is humiliating to the human intellect to think that this mediocre literature has been the subject of innumerable commentaries, and that millions of men are still wasting time absorbing it” (Salomon Reinach 1858-1932).

“How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property – either as a child, a wife, or a concubine – must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the faith: all know how to die but

the influence of the religion paralyzes the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome.” (Winston S. Churchill, The River War).

“...The Mahommedan religion increases, instead of lessening, the fury of intolerance. It was originally propagated by the sword, and ever since, its votaries have been subject, above the people of all other creeds, to this form of madness. In a moment the fruits of patient toil, the prospects of material prosperity, the fear of death itself, are flung aside. The more emotional Pathans are powerless to resist. All rational considerations are forgotten. Seizing their weapons, they become Ghazis—as dangerous and as sensible as mad dogs: fit only to be treated as such. While the more generous spirits among the tribesmen become convulsed in an ecstasy of religious bloodthirstiness, poorer and more material souls derive additional impulses from the influence of others, the hopes of plunder and the joy of fighting. Thus whole nations are roused to arms. Thus the Turks repel their enemies, the Arabs of the Soudan break the British squares, and the rising on the Indian frontier spreads far and wide. In each case civilization is confronted with militant Mahommedanism. The forces of progress clash with those of reaction. The religion of blood and war is face to face with that of peace.” (Winston S. Churchill, The Story of the Malakand Field Force).

“Islam, this absurd theology of an immoral Bedouin, is a rotting corpse which poisons our lives.” ( Mustafa Kemal Ataturk 1881-1938).

“ Christianity and Buddhism are primarily personal religions, with mystical doctrines and a love of contemplation. Mohammedanism and Bolshevism are practical, social, unspiritual, concerned to win the empire of the world”( Bertrand Russell 1872-1970).

“In a major encyclopedia [which shall remain nameless] one reads phrases such as "Islam expanded in the eighth or ninth centuries ..."; "This or that country passed into Muslim hands..." But care is taken not to say how Islam expanded, how countries "passed into [Muslim] hands." Indeed, it would seem as if events happened by themselves, through a miraculous or amicable operation... Regarding this expansion, little is said about jihad. And yet it all happened through war!

...the jihad is an institution and not an event, that is to say it is a part of the normal functioning of the Muslim world... The conquered populations change status (they become dhimmis), and the shari'a tends to be put into effect integrally, overthrowing the former law of the country. The conquered territories do not simply change owners (Jacques Ellul 1912-1994).

“Most Muslims are not profound Koranic analysts. For a vast number of believing Muslim men, Islam stands, in a jumbled, half-examined way, not only for the fear of God -- the fear more than the love, one suspects -- but also for a cluster of customs, opinions and prejudices that include their dietary practices; the sequestration or near-sequestration of "their" women; the sermons delivered by their mullahs of choice; a loathing of modern society in general, riddled as it is with music, godlessness and sex; and a more particularized loathing (and fear) of the prospect that their own immediate surroundings could be taken over by the liberal Western-style way of life “ (Salman Rushdie 1947 -?)

Such a judgment can only be designed as the shock summary of a much more researched detailed qualified analysis.

These authors as well as others who generally know nothing about Islam broadcast unacceptable revolutionary points of view unacceptable as they are in their raw state. It is therefore important to keep a cool head and to analyze them point by point to have a fair and personal appreciation of this religion.

Decryption therefore slight differences that we will develop now for a long time in this first part of our fight against religious alienation. Against all religious alienations. Having nothing to do with spirituality.

So let's tackle now, not the history of Islam from a diachronic point of view, nor Islam as a system from a historical and global synchronic point of view including its most extreme heresies, but some of its present or past prominent points, which are problematic to non-Muslims as we see in the eyes of many Muslims themselves 1) such as the Bengali (now Canadian) Hossain Salahuddin, Pakistani Ibn Warraq, etc.

To the value judgment a little too sweeping of Dr. Gerard Zwang we will oppose below the a little more elaborate but potentially more explosive (it's some dynamite) deconstruction performed by Peter DeLaCrau.

Everyone will then be free to judge whether such summaries betray more the truth than they serve it.

1) Hossain Salahuddin, is a poet and essayist born in 1984, in a Muslim family in Bangladesh. His family was quite orthodox and made him learn the Quran even before being enrolled in school. He had a private tutor at home, a mullah who taught him to recite the Quran in Arabic; when he was 12 years old, he was able to recite it by heart without understanding a word of the text. He had to read translations of the Quran and hadiths in his mother tongue. First, he thought it was only some translation problems before realizing that it was not. Declared " Apostate" or "Nastik-and Murtad" in 2002. Intellectual coherence, intellectual honesty, logic, command indeed to no longer recognize oneself as Christian (or Muslim) when one no longer believes in the fundamental points of the religious system in question, but only to some of its secondary elements, or when one is only affectively attached to some of its family traditions, customs, or practices, such as the famous Jews of Yom Kippur, he Christians on Christmas Day.

FIRST RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE ASSASSINATIONS OF MEDINAN OPPONENTS.

Chapter 5 verse 32.

"For this crime [of Cain] we decreed for the children of Israel that whosoever kills a human being, for other than manslaughter or [spreading] corrption [fasad] on the earth, [it shall] be as if he had killed all mankind...

Tafsir by Peter DeLaCrau.

a) Oops, God had forgotten to specify this at the outset.

b) Fasad fi al ardi covers, in Arabic, a very wide semantic field that can go as far as anarchy...

c) What can be deduced from this verse: God is not Jain.

d) Christians want to be the new Israel (and even the Verus Israel) but Muslims? Are they sons of Ishmael or sons of Israel?

e) Other exceptions to this early absolute Jain pacifism.

Ibn Ishaq's biography of Muhammad recounts many episodes in which sentimentality was not appropriate when it came to fighting fasad. These first biographies of Muhammad, that of Ibn Ishaq or Ibn Hisham, did not feel at all embarrassed to report the episodes in which Muhammad had made blood shed . In them political assassination is considered as a military campaign.

These killings at the request of Muhammad are neither specific to Jews nor specific to poets. The murders are in the mores of the time and legal provisions govern them, for example in the series of pacts pompously called "Constitution of Medina."

“The Quraysh immigrants will continue to pay blood money, according to their present custom. [...] A believer will not kill another believer, for the sake of an unbeliever [...] If any unbeliever kills a believer, without good cause, he shall be killed in return, unless the next of kin are satisfied (with blood price)”. This does not concern the murder of an infidel, nor the murder of a believer with a valid reason, and for the murder of a believer without valid reason, it is possible to offer compensation to the nearest relative.

CONTEXT.

The fight fought in Badr, poor by the size of the troops in presence, will have a huge impact in the Islamic culture, since it constitutes the first Muslim victory over the infidels, miraculous since unexpected, due to the intervention of God, and of his angels. Many verses of the Quran refer to the episode. The victory of Badr was only a successful raid but it had a great impact among the Arabs of Yathrib / Medina, and even among the Jews, even throughout the Hejaz. The multiplication of political assassinations that ensued cannot be due to chance alone. Because in Yathrib / Medina, it is indeed in this way with which Muhammad will now gradually establish his (counter) power. (He could not do otherwise because he was then still an immigrant in Yathrib and not his legitimate leader.) It is obvious that this terrorism was a deliberate strategy to conquer power. The "political" assassination will be part of the means used by Muhammad to emerge or to be powerful enough so that one no longer thinks to take revenge on him or his followers. To frighten, so much frighten that no one will dare to attempt anything against him, so will be the strategy of Muhammad to take power in Yathrib / Medina. The terrorist attacks in question were obviously perpetrated only because that was his pleasure. " And it does not become a believing man or a believing woman, when God and His messenger have decided an affair (for them), that they should (after that) claim any say in their affair; and whosoever is rebellious to God and His messenger, he verily goes astray in error manifest " (Chapter 33 verse 36). The political assassinations ordered by Muhammad, recorded by Ibn Ishaq, were numerous, and occupy an important part of his second volume. These assassinations are classified by the chroniclers in the category "expeditions of the Prophet (maghazi)". These first terrorist attacks, at the request of Muhammad, were perpetrated by some of his relatives on leaders or intellectuals not convinced by his message, including Jews, of course, because the break with them had begun.

At the beginning of 624, when Muhammad became aware of the failure of his attempt towards the Jews, the tone changes, and the methods too. Contacts are broken, threats and insults appear, including in the Quran. The time of conviction has passed, that of pressure begins: obvious calls for murder then arise in Muhammad's speeches.

Five personalities of Yathrib / Medina were assassinated by the minions of Muhammad with his

blessing, his explicit approval, even at his request. Muhammad does not like poetry or criticism. This will lead him to practice in Yathrib/Medina a very effective policy of eliminating opponents. The technique will be that of the commando, the small group attacking by surprise and nightly. The victims will be important characters. Beyond the simple elimination, the desired effect will be to inspire the fear, it is clearly mentioned in the sources.

These are the intellectuals named Abu Afak, the poetess Asma Bint Marwan, both pagans and non-Jews each other, Kab ibn al-Ashraf, then Ibn Sunayna and finally Sallam Abu Rafi.

The first of the list was probably the poet Abu Afak, a hundred-year-old Jew, who had dared to compose a satirical poem about Muhammad (Kitab al-Tabaqat al-Kabir, volume 2, by Ibn Saad, page 32). Muhammad ordered his assassination, but in a convoluted way, like a mafia godfather launching a contract on someone: " Who will deal with this rascal for me ? And someone actually took charge of this attack: a man named Salim ibn Umayr. Abu Afak was killed during his sleep because of four wretched lines of verse.

The assassination of Asma Bint Marwan. The episode is concealed in all works devoted to the origins of Islam for the West, ad usum delphini, but sources abound in detail about the murder of this personality. This is an exception to the rule of Muhammad prohibiting the killing of women.

Some Muslim writers argue today that these hadiths are fake (eternal problem with hadith) but the Muslim chroniclers, both past and present, do not question the historicity of these murders and have no problems citing them as genuine events in Muhammad’s life. For instance, Ibn Hisham, one of the oldest editors of Ibn Ishaq's Sira, is known to have omitted material he deemed negative or inauthentic from Ibn Ishaq's work, but retained the stories of Abu Afak and Asma bint Marwan being murdered.

After Abu Afak was murdered, Asma wrote a poem blaming Islam and its followers of killing their opponents.When Muhammad heard what she had said he said, "Who will rid me therefore one day of Marwan's daughter?" Umayr b. Adiy al-Khatmi who was with him heard him, and that very night he went to her house and killed her. In the morning he came to the apostle and told him what he had done and he said, "You have helped God and His apostle, Umayr!" When he asked if he would have to bear any evil consequences the apostle said, "Two goats won't butt their heads about her," so Umayr went back to his people.

The effects of the assassination of Asma (Ibn Hicham, Biography of the Messenger of God, 996).

Now there was a great commotion among B. Khatma that day about the affair of bint Marwan. She had five sons, and when Umayr went to them from the apostle he said, "I have killed bint Marwan, O sons of Khatma. Withstand me if you can; don't keep me waiting." That was the first day Islam became powerful among B. Khatma.

The day after bint Marwan was killed the men of B. Khatma became Muslims because they saw the power of Islam; before that those who were Muslims concealed the fact. The first of them to accept Islam was Umayr b. Adiy who was called the "Reader," and Abdullah b. Aws and Khuzayma b. Thabit. The day after Bint Marwan was killed the men of B. Khatma became Muslims because they saw the power of Islam.

Waqidi. Al-Maghazi, History and campaigns, page 173.

“Abdullah ibn al-Haarith told me, from his father, that ‘Asma bint Marwaan, from Banu Umayyah ibn Zayd, was married to Yazeed ibn Zayd ibn Hisn al-Khatmi. She used to revile the Prophet, criticize Islam and incite people against the Prophet. When news of what she said and her incitement of the people reached Umayr ibn Adiyy ibn Kharashah ibn Umayyah al-Khatmi, he said: O God, I make a vow to You that I shall kill her if You grant a safe return to Madinah to the Messenger of God – as the Messenger of God was in Badr at that time. When the Messenger of God came back from Badr, Umayr ibn ‘Adiyy came to her in the middle of the night and entered upon her in her house when she had a group of her children sleeping around her, including an infant who was still being breastfed. He reached out to touch her and found the infant whom she was breastfeeding. He pushed the child aside [what gentleness] then he plunged his sword into her chest until it came out of her back. Then he went out and prayed Fajr with the Prophet in Madinah. When the Prophet finished praying, he looked at Umayr and said: Did you kill the daughter of Marwaan? He said: Yes, may my father be sacrificed for you, O Messenger of God.

Umayr was afraid that the Prophet would not approve of his killing her, so he said: Is there any sin on me for that, O Messenger of God? He said: “The validity of what you have done is something that no one could dispute.” And this is the first time I heard this phrase from the Prophet. Umayr said: The Prophet turned to those who were around him and said: “If you want to

see a man who supported really God and His Messenger, then look at Ubayr ibn Adiyy.”

Let recognize that these hadiths are, of course, disputed, but what is less so are those concerning the assassination of Kab ibn al-Ashraf. We must not underestimate the role of the Jewish tribes in the Medina at the time, who were not mere clients of the Arab tribes. The other political assassination of the most famous period is indeed undoubtedly that of Kaab Ibn Ashraf, because it legitimizes the principle of dissimulation in the interest of Islam called taqiyya. According to Tabari indeed, Muhammad allowed recourse to the lie to eliminate this opponent. Poetry has always been one of the most formidable weapons of the human mind. Ashraf was a man from the Tayy tribe, his mother was a Banu Nadir. He was therefore half Jewish. He was undoubtedly the most rebellious of all poets. When he heard of the victory of the Muslims at Badr, he began to doubt it; but when the news was confirmed, he went to Mecca in order to recite an ode in the memory of the unfortunate men slain by the Muslims. He also disapproved of the execution of some of the prisoners after the battle and addressed erotic or gallant poems to the wives of some of the disciples of Muhammad. For Kaab's true crime may was perhaps to have accompanied some of his satires with verses teasing the women in question (including those of Muhammad?) The non-Muslims of Yathrib / Medina were regaled with his poems spread throughout the city. A quirk proper to men that is not always very fine and that we may describe as almost natural for them to the extent that use is second nature; but about which there never was reason to go crazy about it, at least not deserving of death.

Muhammad, however, ordered his assassination, but again in a convoluted way,asking: " Who is willing to get rid of Ka’b bin Al-Ashraf who has hurt God and His Apostle?" The desire expressed by Muhammad was understood as an order by several Muslims, including the poet's own foster- brother.

In his History of the Prophets and Kings Tabari specifies.

"Ka'b b. Al Ashraf was a man of the tribe of Tayyi, one of the Banu Nabha, and his mother was from the Jewish clan of Banu al Nadir......then he composed love poetry on some of the women of the Muslims, causing them offense. According to.....the prophet said then: who therefore will rid me one day of Ibn al-Ashraf?”

Ibn Ishaq recounts the assassination of Ka'b ibn al-Ashraf in more detail on 7 pages (pages 364-369). It is justified by Ibn Ishaq who quotes for this the verses of Hassan ben Thabit.

"They sought victory for the religion of their prophet, counting their lives and wealth as nothing" (page 369).

This episode, largely developed by Ibn Ishaq, will be summarized here, as the details are unsustainable sadism. Here again the political nature of his assassination is not in doubt since this half-Jewish poet is presented to us as an active opponent of Muhammad even of Islam.

The killing of Ka’b ben Ashraf (page 364).

“When he heard [ Ka’b ben Al Ashraf] the news said : is this true , did Muhammad actually kill them whom these two men mention ? These are the nobles of the Arabs and kingly men, by God, if Muhammad has slain the people it were better to be dead than alive. When the enemy, of God [of course] became certain that the news was true, he left the town and went to Mecca......here he began to inveigh against the apostle and to recite verses in which he bewailed the Quraysh who were thrown into the pit after having been slain at Badr. He said...[Several poems are quoted in full]. Then he composed amatory verses of an insulting nature about the Muslim women.

The apostle said therefore “who will rid me one day of Ibnu’l Ashraf “? Muhammad b. Maslama said: “I will deal with him for you, etc.”

According to Ibn Ishaq's account, a small group of men do the work, pulling Ka'b out of his house at night, then piercing him with their swords, Muhammad b. Maslama finishing him with a dagger. The latter states: " our attack upon God’s enemy cast terror among the Jews, and there was then no Jew in Medina who did not fear for his life.”

Immediately after this mention of the concern of the Jews, in the following paragraph, entitled "The Case of Muhayyisa and Huwayyisa, Ibn Ishaq continues in this way: The Apostle said: " Kill any Jew that falls into your power »

And He then recounts while he was at it the murder of a Jewish trader called Ibn Sunayna, by Muhayyisa b. Mas'ud. His older brother, Huwaysa b. Mas'ud, who was not yet a Muslim will exclaim: “By God, a religion which can bring you to do this is marvelous” and he will become Muslim.

In some countries today when a man or a politico-religious party is behind such facts (for example Mr. Yahya Maryam - Le Pen in Gaul) he is immediately charged and judged , by the street by the intellectuals (journalists) by the religious men and finally by the courts.

Editor's note. French friends coming out of a weekly visit to the rector of the Paris mosque told me that it was not the same thing, and that I had misunderstood. Duly noted!

The assassination of Sallam ibn Abu al Huqayq known as Abu Rafi (May 626). A poet member of a powerful Jewish family of Kaybar (it has in it fort Qamus).

The theme of Abu Rafi's assassination became popular because it concerned a question of importance: can one kill an infidel at night, contrary to customary habits?

The assassination of Abu Rafi is recounted in several texts, which have in common a great dramatic sense.

- Ibn Hisham, Conduct of the Messenger of God 714-6. Tabari, History of the Prophets and Kings III 186. Waqidi, Book of history and campaigns 25. Ibn Sa'd, Tabaqat II 112-3.

- Bukhari, book of military expeditions, chapter 16, hadith number 404.

- Bukhari, book of military expeditions, chapter 16, hadith number 4039:

-Bukhari, Book of Jihad and expeditions, chapter 155, hadith number 302.

- Bukhari, Book of Jihad and expeditions, chapter 155, hadith number 3023.

As usual the very existence of this embarrassing event, its historical reality, is radically questioned by the pious Muslims under the pretext of detail contradictions between the different versions.

SECOND RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

In 622, after the second great meeting of Aqaba which sealed this departure in an oath of allegiance, Muhammad, with a group of faithful, left Mecca, where he finds himself marginalized. He settles in Yathrib, which is not yet called Medina ("The City"), where he imposes himself as a leader, with the ambition to develop political power (some pacts) and religious (make conversions) .

Capital difference between Mecca and Yathrib, in Yathrib / Medina there were powerful and prosperous Jewish tribes hence an incontestable Judaization from the references of Muhammad in direct contact with Jews for the first time.

Yathrib was composed mainly of five Arab tribes, two non-Jewish tribes (Banu Aws and Banu Khazraj) and three Jewish (Banu Qaynuqa, Banu Nadir and Banu Qurayza).

The Banu Aws and Banu Khazraj tribes belong to the southern Arab or "Yemeni" tribes who arrived in Yathrib around 300 .

Semantic specifications.

-The Quraysh are the Arabs of Mecca ... .. remained in Mecca.

-The Migrants, or Muhajirun, are the companions of Mahomet who followed him from Mecca to Yathrib.

-The Ansars (the Auxiliaries) are the companions of Mohammed from Yathrib.

The three main Jewish tribes around Yathrib, which appear almost everywhere in Islamic sources - Banu Qaynuqa, Banu Nadir and Banu Qurayza - are attested in sources independent of the Islamic tradition and in the Jewish poetic tradition. Banu means “sons of.” All these tribes are made up of clans. These sources are inscriptions, but especially in the Kitab al-Aghani (book of songs), well-documented references to poets and context, introducing pre-Islamic poems. Jewish poets are presented, with introductory notes. In it there is mention of Banu Qaynuqa, Banu Nadir and Banu Qurayza, as well as Banu Hadal, who lived with the Banu Qurayza before 300. These Jewish tribes dominate in the region of Yathrib until the arrival of Banu Khazraj and Banu Aws around 300.

Their domination, according to the Kitab al-aghani, is then disputed by the latter, who impose themselves progressively after the year 400.

The settlement of these Jewish communities dates back, according to a plausible hypothesis, to the brutal expulsion of the Jews by the Romans, on the occasion of the First Judeo-Roman War and of the Revolt of Bar Kokhba. The oasis of Khaybar, 150 km north of Medina, was according to Abdurrahman Badawi populated by Jewish tribes and Judaized or Judaizing Arabs. It seems, according to this author, that the Jews settled there after the destruction of Jerusalem in the year 70, the emigration continuing in the subsequent centuries, with the persecutions from the Romans then from Byzantine Christians.

The Banu Qaynuqa and their members are the "clients" (allies) of Banu Khazraj. Banu Nadir and Banu Qurayza as well as their members are the "clients" (allies) of Banu Aws.

Montgomery Watt specifies: "The dividing line between Arabs of this earlier stratum and Jews is confused. The Arabs were weaker than the Jews –thirteen Arab strongholds (atam) to fifty-nine Jewish ones is one figure- and were in relations of jiwar or hilf to them, that is, were protected by them, either as “neighbors” or as confederates. They probably intermarried,and marriage was presumably uxorilocal. They may have adopted the Jewish religion. Not surprisingly, then, certain Arab clans are sometimes reckoned as Jewish clans; thus As-Samhudi's list of

Jewish clans includes B. Marthad, B. Mu'awiyah, B. Jadhma,B. Naghisah, B. Za'ura', and B. Tha'labah, although the first of these is properly a part of the Arab tribe of Bali, the second a part of Sulaym, the third and fourth Arabs of the Yemen, and the last

two Arabs of Ghassan. The authentic Jewish tribes or clans are commonly said to be three, Qurayzah, An-Nadir, and Qaynuqa. This is a simplification, however. As-Samhudi has a list of about a dozen clans in addition to those already mentioned as being clearly of Arab extraction. The most important was B. Hadl, closely associated with Qurayzah…”

He continues: “By about the time of the Hijrah all the lesser Jewish clans or groups in as-Samhudi's list had lost their identity, or at least had ceased to be of political

importance. They are not mentioned in the primary sources for the career of Muhammad. When

the Constitution of Medina deals with them, they are simply 'the Jews of an-Najjar,' 'the Jews of al-Harith,' and so on. The nearest to being an exception is Hadl ; it had become very closely connected with Qurayzah, but we find three members of it becoming Muslims and escaping the fate of Qurayzah. From these facts it seems likely that the clan system had largely broken down, and that the groups which became attached to the various clans of the Ansar were not small clans or sub-clans but groups containing people of varying origin.”

Ghatafan are from the north (see Banu Qays article). In conflicts, they serve as auxiliaries to Jewish tribes. Their role is presented by Ibn Ishaq in Yathrib (battle of the trench) and in Khaybar [(Battle of Khaybar).

While arriving at Yathrib / Medina Muhammad wanted therefore straightaway to be very close to the local Jewish tribes from which he immediately copied certain characteristics (prayer turned to Jerusalem, forbidden food, Biblical figures like Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, etc.) while keeping some distance not to create the impression of rallying them completely by converting to Judaism.

At first, as a mediator, he assembles the members of several tribes (Ansar) and, by pacts ill fittingly known as "Constitution of Medina," he submits to his authority several tribes, including three Jewish tribes (There are very few Christians in Yathrib)

Treaty of Confederation (Umma).

There is a fairly general agreement among historians to consider the two preceding covenants as authentic and to date them from 622. Allusions to these first two text pacts are found in the Quran and in the Sira. R.B. Serjeant thinks that these two pacts correspond to the al-Sunnat al-Jdmi'ah of Sira. Muminun means "believers."

There are two main versions of this document, that contained in Ibn Ishaq (sira page 231) and that reported by Abu Ubayd (kitab al amwal). Both agree on the main lines. R.B. Serjeant distinguishes 8 different pacts and supplements by some other documents. But it is not up to us barbarian druids of the West to decide between all these specialists.

The repetition of the final clause is

-either a forgery inserted after the ousting of Banu Quraïza

-or the sign of a certain mistrust.

Muhammad lost his illusions of 622 and has understood that the Jewish tribes would not be converted, that his initial hope was only an illusion and that he was, there, heavily mistaken (see the change of the qibla, now directed to Mecca). The Jewish tribes, too, understood that Muhammad had lost his illusions and did not intend to see, beside his power over the submitted (Muslims) thrive a non-submitted (non-Muslim) power. Muhammad cannot allow himself to see what remains of the Jewish tribes allies with the Quraysh, hence the need to sign a new pact, with provisions that are, for the most part, identical to those that already existed at the time of the treaty establishing the Umma.

NB. The text uses to describe Muhammad - this is the first time - the expression Apostleof God, what proves that he has gained power and authority.

Even if, at the level of words, the text of RB Serjeant is the same as that which appears in Ibn Ishaq, it can be drawn from it diametrically opposite conclusions about the relations between Muslim tribes and Jewish tribes, Umma protecting the Jews, instituted in a constitution, in one case, against ousting of two Jewish tribes from Yathrib, with the massacre of the men of the last tribe and the sale as slaves of their wives and children, then proclamation of Medina "sacred enclave" (haram) two years later, in the other case.

What is agreed to call Constitution of Medina shows in any case that Muhammad then thought to form with these local monotheists a coherent bloc, a single front opposed to the Quraysh and generally Arabic paganism. He seems to have learned a little more at this time from the morals peculiar to the people of Israel and to have decided to approach it. He ordered his followers to turn towards Jerusalem. Muhammad was also struck by the great fast that the Jews observed on the tenth of the month of tishri, the yom kippuri, or day of the atonement. He decided that his faithful would be associated with it. According to Jewish usage, a time of prayer was also fixed in the middle of the day. Nevertheless it does not seem that Muhammad ever thought of following all the meticulous food regulations observed by the Jews, but he rallied to a reduced version of these prohibitions: do not eat pork, nor blood, nor animals dead through natural death, suffocated or sacrificed to idols.

According to Ibn Ishaq Muhammad since the first pledge of Aqaba in 621 indeed Muhammad had

been particularly interested in Judaism, first religion of the book, of which had spoken to him some inhabitants of Yathrib / Medina.

" God had prepared the way for Islam in that they lived side by side with the Jews who were people of the Scriptures and revelation, while they themselves were polytheists and idolaters.”

Hoping to rally them to him, Muhammad thus partially adopts the customs proper to the Jewish tribes (forbidden food and fasting period) but this opening quickly turns to failure. Mahomet hoped for a quick and massive rallying of the Jews in question, but his illusions vanished quickly enough.

Ibn Ishaq “About this time the rabbis showed hostility to the apostle in envy, hatred, and malice, because God had chosen His apostle from the Arabs [….].Ibn Ishaq adds: “It was the rabbis who used to annoy the apostle with questions and introduce confusion, so as to confound the truth with falsity.”

The first significant break was Muhammad's decision to change the direction of prayer, which will no longer be done turned to Jerusalem, but turned to Mecca.

"It is said that the Qibla (the direction of prayer was changed (directed towards the Kaaba in Mecca) in Sha’ban at the beginning of the eighteen month after the Apostle’s arrival in Medina ."

THIIRD RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE EXPULSION OF BANU QUAYNUQA (APRIL 624).

This first group of Jews is the weakest of the three, and the closest to Yathrib / Medina: simple craftsmen, but the problem with them was that they were rich, controlling the trade, and manufacturing weapons. The Banu Qaynuqa were especially famous for being a tribe of goldsmiths. They held the main market of the city of Yathrib / Medina, which was also known as the "Banu Qaynuqa Marketplace." They had some fortresses north of the agglomeration.

Ibn Ishaq is quite short on what he calls "The Affair of the Banu Qaynuqa," in fact, the expulsion of the first of the three Jewish tribes.

According to the anecdote of Ibn Hisham (it is not from Ibn Ishaq, it is between brackets and explicitly preceded by the mention, "Ibn Hisham said:", the case begins when a Muslim woman visited a jeweler's shop in the Qaynuqa marketplace…The goldsmith, a Jew, pinned her clothing such that, upon getting up, she was stripped naked. A Muslim man coming upon the resulting commotion killed the Jewish shopkeeper in retaliation. A mob of Jews from the Qaynuqa tribe then pounced on the Muslim man and killed him. This escalated to a chain of revenge killings, and enmity grew between Muslims and the Banu Qaynuqa.

Ibn Ishaq said: "Asim b. 'Umar b. Qatada said that the Banu Qaynuqa were the first of the Jews to break their agreement with the Apostle and to go to war between the battle of Badr and the battle of Uhud and the Apostle besieged them until they surrender unconditionally. "

After the surrendering of the Banu Qaynuqa, it seems that the primary intention of Muhammad was to execute men. But 'Abd Allâh b. 'Ubayy b. Salul, chief of the Banu Khazraj, whose Banu Qaynuqa were the clients (the allies), intervened vigorously with Muhammad saying : “By God, I will not let you go until you treat my mawali (clients allies) well. Four hundred men without armor and three hundred with coats of mail, who defended me from the Arab and non-Arab alike, and you would mow them in a single morning? By God, I do not feel safe and am afraid of what the future may have in store."" Going up to threaten Muhammad, he finally gets satisfaction and Muhammad said, "They are yours."

Ibn Ishaq does not say what happens to these vanquished.

In "Campaign against the Banu Qaynuqa," Tabari specifies ....

"The messenger gave orders to expel them, and God gave their property as booty to his messenger and the Muslims.The Banu Qaynuqa did not have land, as they were goldsmiths. The messenger of God took many weapons belonging to them and the tools of their trade. The person who took charge of their expulsion from Medina along with their children was Ubada b. Al Samit.He accompanied them as far as Dhubab saying....”

Tabari adds that their forts were around Medina, and that they surrendered after a fortnight's siege. The reason for the attack, according to Tabari, was that the Banu Qaynuqa mocked the defeat of the Quraysh in Badr, claiming that if the latter had asked for their help, they would as for them have defeated Muhammad. According to him " they were fettered and the Prophet wanted to kill them “ but Abd Allah b. Ubbay b. Salul chief of the Banu Khazraj with whom the Banu Qaynuqa had concluded a treaty of alliance spoke to him on their behalf and got their grace from Muhammad.

According to Tabari, the Banu Qaynuqa then went to Syria but it is generally admitted that they actually went to Khaybar (150 km north of Medina), where there was also a large Jewish settlement.

Point of view of pious Muslims.

It is obvious that the Jews began to think that the prophet, peace and blessings of God be upon him, would be a mere leader; who would simply make a political agreement with them, and only deal with the earthly interests of his community. When the Prophet, peace and blessings of God be upon him, and the Muslims, won a decisive victory against the Quraysh in Badr, they were disappointed. In fact, they expected the Quraysh kill many Muslims. That is why, even before the news of the victory reached Medina, they had already spread the rumor that the prophet, peace and blessing of God be upon him, had perished in the fighting; that the Muslims had been beaten, and that the army of Amr ibn Hisham (known as Abu Jahl) was marching on the city. But when the battle turned bad for them, they exploded with anger. For example, Kaab Ibn Al-Ashraf exclaimed: "By God, if Muhammad has really slain all these noble Arabs, it were better to be dead than alive." Then he went to Mecca and incited his inhabitants to revenge by writing and reciting provocative elegies, in honor of the Quraysh leaders who fell in Badr. After returning to Medina, he composed amatory verses insulting for Muslim women. The prophet, peace and blessing of God be upon him, was sickened by so much malice. So

much so that he sent Muhammad Ibn Maslamah Al-Ansari to kill him.

After Badr's victory, the Banou Qainuqa were therefore so annoyed that they began to harass Muslims going to their shops, especially women. Things got so bad that a Muslim woman found herself completely naked in front of everyone, having been stripped of her clothes.

"Some time later, a Muslim woman went to a jeweler, the men wanted to unveil her, but she refused, so the jeweler secretly lifted the end of his dress on his back and tied it. She stood up, uncovering her private parts and screamed. A Muslim hurled himself on the Jewish jeweler and killed him ... "

This episode shows us that the veil imposed on women by Islam must cover not only their bodies, but also their faces. Otherwise, the Jews would not have been tempted to unveil her. They wanted to mock her very apparent religious feelings, and, of course, to defy the Muslims, for they did not hesitate to openly threaten the prophet by saying, "Here is an opportunity for you to measure up against us."

Editor's note. We are still somewhat surprised by the wording of this remark, because according to the website in question itself, it is the "private " parts of the lady sitting by trying jewelry on that were suddenly discovered. And it is this joke, unquestionably of bad taste (but that did not deserve death anyway, just a pair of slaps) of the Jewish jeweler (or of one of his relatives) who sparked things off ; and not the unveiling of her face that did not take place. End of the editor’s note.

This incident caused by the Qaynuqa Jews shows the hatred that they secretly vowed well to Muslims. If they had respected the pact with the believers, the latter would never have uttered a single word against them, nor touched their homes. But their bad intentions turned against them.

The prophet, peace and blessings of God be upon him, went to the place, gathered them, and asked them for some restraint. But the Jews replied, "O Muhammad, do you really think that your people has our moral fiber? Do not trust your own followers, they do not know anything about the art of war. Tackle us, and you will see who is stronger. "

When the Prophet (saw) gathered the Banu Qaynuqa, he reminded them of the fact that his coming was announced in their own books [Editor’s note. What is, of course, inaccurate !]

The Jews knew very well that a prophet (saw) was to come to a palm-tree country like Yathrib, but after realizing that God had chosen a prophet from the Arab people, they refused to recognize him.

The Muslims who had allied themselves with the Qaynuqa clan therefore canceled their commitment. God forbids believers to have non-believers as friends. Previous verses that can go in the opposite sense are abrogated by these: "O you who believe! Take not the Jews and the Christians for friends. They are friends one to another. He among you who takes them for friends is (one) of them. Lo! God guides not wrongdoing folk"(chapter 5 verse 51).

The true Muslim always feels anger towards unbelievers, anger provoked by their disobedience to God. But this feeling only reflects the immense pity he feels towards the unbeliever, just as one might consider the wrath of a father acting in the interest of his son; for it does not please the Muslim to know that a non-believer will go to hell. A true Muslim must wish for everybody all what he wishes for himself. This does not forbid, however, being sometimes indulgent to non-believers if justice requires it, or to respect the agreements concluded with them.

As a result, the prophet - peace and blessings be upon him - invades their neighborhood at the end of Shawal Month (or according to some of Dhul Qidah) year 2 of the Hegira. The siege lasted a fortnight, then they were defeated and their fighters taken prisoner. But Abdullah Ibn Ubbay came to support them and insisted that they be forgiven. Abdallah Ben Ubbai Ben Salul had converted to Islam through mere hypocrisy. Before the arrival of the Muslims, this hypocrite was to be proclaimed king of Yathrib / Medina. He had therefore welcomed the Hegira of Muslims with hatred and we will see in other stories that he did not miss any opportunity to harm Muslims. This was the reason why the envoy of God (saw) accepted the exile of the Banu Qaynuqa. The prophet granted him this motion and decided that they would be exiled out of Yathrib / Medina, but that they would leave behind their goods, their armor, their tools, and all their shops. Believers, however, continued to watch the hypocrites in their eyes by carefully observing their behavior, because it is a certain and constant duty of every Muslim "(on Muslim Hisba, see below).

FOURTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE DEPORTATION OF THE BANU AL NADIR (AUGUST 625).

The Jewish tribe of Banu Nadir was more powerful than the previous one. Our sources suggest the thesis of a Jewish conspiracy to justify the attack; but in reality, after their defeat of Uhud, the Muslim troops were simply in search of easy success, and Muhammad anxious to get rid of a possible center of resistance, by making an example, moreover.

Muhammad evicted from Yathrib/Medina, the second Jewish tribe, that of the Banu Nadir or sons of the star, less than a year after evicting the first. These reprisals illustrate the deep-rooted egotism of verse 29 chapter 48 in the Quran. “Muhammad is the messenger of God. And those with him are hard against the disbelievers and merciful among themselves.”

In 625, one of the Muslims Amr b. Umayya al Damri murders two men in their sleep who were from a tribe, the Banu Amir, that had "an agreement of friendship" with him (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham the deportation of the B al Nadir page 650). It was therefore decided that blood money would be paid to satisfy the families.

Rather than take care of this debt himself in the name of Muslims, Muhammad went to the Jewish tribe of the Banu Nadir, because there was a mutual alliance between the Banou al Nadir and the Banou Amir, in order to request their contribution, even though the tribe of the Banu al Nadir had nothing to do with the murder (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 652).

Once he showed up with his men, Muhammad made his demands and then waited outside their house for the money. Later, he claimed that God spoke to him during this time and told him that the Jews were going to assassinate him by dropping a rock from the roof of the house onto his head: “As the apostle was with a number of his companions… news came to him from heaven about what these people intended” (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 652).

Muhammad got up and went back to Medina but returned with a whole army and laid siege to the entire community.

« The Jews took refuge in their forts and the Apostle ordered that the palm trees should be cut down and burnEDS…….they asked the apostle of God to deport them and to spare their lives on condition that they could retain all their property which they could carry on camels, except their armor, and he agreed….only two of the B. al Nadir became Muslims [….] in order to retain their property” ( (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 653).

Another revelation from God allowed the prophet of Islam to seize for himself all the goods left behind (Bukhari 52: 153).

Point of view of pious Muslims.

God warned his messenger of the plot of the Jews. This is one of the many miracles with which God honored him before and after the revelation and which serve to strengthen our belief in the mission of the Prophet (saw). Did not the Lord keep his promise when he said in the Quran, “God will protect thee from mankind" (chapter 5 verse 67).

Chapter 59. The theme of this chapter 59 is the judgment on the battle against the Banu Nadir.

Five main points will be dealt with.

The first four verses contain a warning and an exhortation to carefully ponder the fate of the Banu Nadir. An important tribe, as large in number as the Muslims, whose members had more wealth and property, who were well equipped militarily and who were able to support the siege led by the Muslims for several days. Some biographers did not hesitate to say that the messenger (saw), by intuition, had guessed the plot. The Quran says that this happened, not because of a mysterious power possessed by the Muslims, but because the Jews had wanted to resist or fight God and his Messenger, peace and blessings of God be upon him. Those who dare to resist the power of God always end in the same way.

Scholars allow the killing of the fruit trees of the enemy and their destruction if it can cause him to surrender. The doctors of the Law also deduce that the spoils that Muslims take on the enemy, without any fighting, must be used to what the Imam considers to be in the interest of the Muslims; and should not be divided among the fighters as the mere booty made after the battle. In verses 6-10 it is stated that land and property that fall under the control of Muslims as a result of war must be used. As this was the first time Muslims took control of a foreign territory, the

corresponding divine law was revealed to them. The spoils that Muslims take on their enemies without fighting must not be shared between the warriors or the soldiers of the jihad, but assigned to the uses judged the most appropriate.

The attitude adopted by the munafiqun or non-Muslims on the occasion of this battle against the Banu Nadir is mentioned in verses 11-17, and the causes of it are underlined.

The last part of this chapter 59 (verses 18-24) is a warning to all who have joined the Muslim community but have deviated from true faith. They are shown what true belief is, what the difference between piety or perversity is, what the place and importance of the Quran are, and what are the attributes of God.

The Jewish tribe of the Banu Nadir continued to break the pact of Medina; so much so that, during the month of Rabiul Awual, of year 4 of the Hegira, they even plotted against the life of the Holy Prophet himself (Peace and Blessing of God be upon him). They had agreed in principle to help compensate the families of their allies who had been killed by mistake by a Muslim; yet they plotted for one of them to go up on the wall against which the prophet was leaning, and drop a stone on him to kill him. But before they put their plan into action, God warns his prophet, peace and blessing of God be upon him. He got up at once and returned to his home. It was no longer a question of making concessions to the Banu Nadir. On the contrary, the prophet gave them an ultimatum announcing that their trick had been brought to his attention, and that consequently they must leave Medina within ten days; if one of them was found in their neighborhood after that time, he could be killed. Abdullah Ibn Ubbai, the leader of the hypocrites in Medina, nevertheless encouraged them to defy this order and to refuse to leave. He promised to support them with 2,000 of his men, and assured them that the Banu Ghatafan of Najd would support them too. Convinced by these promises, the Banu Nadir made it known that they would not leave, whatever the noble prophet did (peace and blessings of God be upon him). That is why he besieged them a few days later (6 days according to some accounts, 15 according to others) as soon as the deadline had expired. But since none of their supporters had the courage to come to their rescue, they eventually surrendered on the condition that they were allowed, in groups of three, to load a camel with what they could carry, and to depart (leaving the rest of their properties). The members of this perfidious tribe dispersed in Khaybar, Wadi al Qoura and in Syria.

There are nevertheless a couple of problems with Muhammad’s justification for evicting an entire tribe of people.

In the first place, it is strange that he demanded that another tribe pay for what one his own member had done – and that he went personally to collect the money. Given what God knew, one wonders well why he didn’t just spare His "messenger" with this trip.

As for Muhammad’s assertion that his god spoke in his ear, thus enabling him to confiscate the wealth of an entire community for his personal gain… well, let’s just say that it is curious at best.

Revelations of convenience were quite common in Muhammad’s life, providing him with wealth from Muslims and non-Muslims alike, along with eleven wives and unlimited sex with female slaves.

But the biggest problem is that Muhammad justified his attack on the Banu Nadir by saying that they had planned to assassinate him. By this standard, the Jews would have been all the same acting entirely within their rights, given that the prophet of Islam had ordered several assassinations against some members of their own community by that time!

A Banu Nadir Jew named Ka’b al-Ashraf was actually murdered on Muhammad’s order just a few months before the entire tribe was attacked. The excuse was that he had lamented the killing of Meccan friends at the Battle of Badr and responded by composing sexual poems about the Muslim women:

“Then he composed amatory verses of an insulting nature about the Muslim women. The apostle said then…”Who will rid me of al-Ashraf?” Another Muslim said, “I will deal with him for you O apostle of God. I will kill him.” He said, “Do so if you can.” (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 550)

Muhammad gave the man in question permission to take any measures necessary to murder the poet, including lying. The assassin gathered a group of fanatical Muslims and tricked al-Ashraf to come out of his house, alone and unarmed, by pretending to be interested in obtaining a loan.

The murder took place in the dark and was a messy affair. Al-Ashraf began screaming as he was being stabbed:

“The enemy of God had made such a noise that every fort around us was showing a light. I thrust [the dagger] into the lower part of his body, then I bore down upon it until I reached his genitals,

and the enemy of God fell to the ground” (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 552)

These two events demonstrate that the Muslims of Medina operated under a different standard than what they held to those around them. Muslims were allowed to kill when they felt insulted or in danger, but others were not allowed to even defend themselves.

Given the rise of his power within his first two years spent in Medina Muhammad was quickly in a position to deny others the same empathy and tolerance that he demanded for himself. And he used his very newfound power to order assassinations and evictions, thus putting opponents in fear. He also behaved with extreme hypocrisy towards those who spoke out against him, regardless of what sort of threat they actually posed.

For today’s pious Muslims, who are firmly convinced that Muhammad was an unselfish man of perfect character (isma), the fate of the Banu Nadir is but a minor incident. It does not bother them that an entire tribe of Jews was evicted on the basis of a hypothetical plot following the very real assassination of one of their leaders.

FIFTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE TRAGIC DEATH OF BANU QURAYZA.

After the battle of Badr fought and won in 624 by the Muslims, a long conflict began with the Jewish tribes of Yathrib / Medina, marked by the brutal expulsion of the first two. But then there was after a parody of judgment, massacre of all men and enslavement of women and children, of the third. The emergence of this type of organized violence will also shock Arabs.

R. B. Serjeant writes that it is clear that the Banu Qurayza tribe, at the time of the Battle of Al-Khandak (trench or ditch) in March 627, is the only surviving Jewish tribe in Yathrib. He specifies that the Banu Qurayza are the hulafa and the mawli of the naqib Sa'd b. Mu'adh.

During the battle it seems that at one point the Medinan Jewish tribe of the Banu Qurayza accepted a kind of separate armistice with the Quraysh and Ghatafan besiegers.

Back in town Muhammad decided to end with this third and last Jewish tribe, and unleashed against it more than a pogrom, a real genocide. The case is very well known, by wordy sources, but the current talks on the beginnings of Islam generally strive to minimize or obscure the episode, which is very rarely mentioned, at least as for the Western audience, one wonders why. The ancient authors were already pushing in the same direction, because they were themselves embarrassed by the behavior of Muhammad in this case. The fear of betrayal seems to motivate this last assault against the Jews of Yathrib / Medina. We feel the will to definitively eliminate the Jewish presence in the oasis.

Ibn Ishaq gives a very precise and very detailed account of the preparations for the battle and of the betrayal (according to this account) of the Jews who forget the convention that binds them to Muhammad.Twenty pages of Ibn Ishaq's book are in fact devoted to the Banu Qurayza.

According to him, the Banu Qurayza plan well to fight alongside the Quraysh and Ghatafan attacking the city, but finally give up.

The alleged treachery on Banu Qurayza’s part is very hard to accept for a rational mind. To be really treacherous, Banu Qurayza must have joined the confederate army who had come to attack the Muslims. If that were the case (had Banu Qurayza joined the Meccan army), it would have ended in the total eradication of Muslims. But Abu Sufyan's (the Meccan chief’s) own words before retreating, testifies Banu Qurayza did not ally with the Meccans in their war against the Muslims. Ibn Ishaq: Then Abu Sufyan said: “Quraysh, we are not in a permanent camp; the horses and camels are dying; the Banu Qurayza have broken their word to us and we have heard disquieting reports of them. You can see the violence of the wind which leaves us neither cooking pots, nor fire, nor tents to count on. Be off….” (Ibn Ishaq page 683)

Besides, if Muhammad nor his followers accused the Banu Qurayza of being treasonous they will not be categorically accused, however, of having taken up arms against the Muslims but simply of having called for the victory of the coalition.

According to the story, it is the angel Gabriel, assuring him of his active support in the battle, who would have asked Muhammad to march against the Banu Qurayza:

" According to what al-Zuhri told me, at the time of the noon prayers Gabriel appeared to the apostle of God wearing an embroidered turban and riding on a mule with a saddle covered with a piece of brocade. He asked him if he had abandoned fighting, and that the angels themselves had not yet laid aside their arms and that he had just come from pursuing the enemy. 'God commands you, Muhammad, to go to B. Qurayza. I am about to go to them to shake their stronghold.'

The prophet ordered it to be announced that none should perform the afternoon prayer until after he reached B. Qurayza (705). The apostle sent `Ali forward with his banner and the men hastened to it. ... (Sirat, p. 461.)

"When the apostle approached their forts he said: "You brothers of monkeys, has God disgraced you and brought his vengeance upon you?" Banu Qurayza replied: "O Abul Qasim (other Muhammad’s name), you are not a barbarous person" (Ibn Ishaq: 684).

Montgomery Watt gives March 31, 627 as the date of the beginning of the siege, and a fortnight for its length.

Still according to the account of Ibn Ishak, Ka`b b. Asad would have said to them: 'O Jews, you can see what has happened to you; I offer you three alternatives. Take which you please.' We will follow this man and accept him as true, for by God it has become plain to you that he is a prophet who has been sent by God and that it is he that you find mentioned in your scripture, and then your lives, your property, your women and children will be saved. They said, 'We will never abandon the laws of the

Torah and never change it for another.' He said, 'Then if you won't accept this suggestion let us kill our wives and children and send men with their swords drawn to Muhammad and his companions leaving no encumbrances behind us, until God decides between us and Muhammad. If we perish, we perish, and we shall not leave children behind us to cause us anxiety. If we conquer we can acquire other wives and children.' They said, 'Should we kill these poor creatures? What would be the good of life when they were dead?' He said, 'Then if you will not accept this suggestion tonight is the eve of the sabbath and it may well be that Muhammad and his companions will feel secure from us then, so come down from our fortress, perhaps we can take Muhammad and his companions by surprise.' They said: 'Are we to profane our sabbath and do on the sabbath what those before us of whom you well know did and were turned into apes?' He answered, 'Not a single man among you from the day of your birth has ever passed a night resolved to do what he knows ought to be done” (Sirat, pp. 461-462).

Then the banu Qurayza sent to the apostle saying, 'Send us Abu Lubaba b. Abdu'l-Mundhir, brother of B. Amr b. Auf (for they were allies of the Aws), that we may consult him.' So the apostle of God sent him to them, and when they saw him they got up to meet him. The women and children went up to him weeping in his face, and he felt sorry for them. They said, 'Oh Abu Lubaba, do you think that we should submit to Muhammad's judgment ?' He said, 'Yes,' and pointed with his hand to his throat, signifying slaughter. …Then he left them and did not go to the apostle but bound himself to one of the pillars in the mosque saying, 'I will not leave this place until God forgives me for what I have done.”

After the 25-day siege, the situation of the Banu Qurayza was now hopeless and the next morning they officially surrendered. They submitted to the apostle's judgment and the Aws leaped up and said, 'O Apostle of God, they are our allies, not allies of Khazraj, and you know how you recently treated the allies of our brethren.' Now the apostle had indeed besieged the B. Qaynuqa` who were allies of the Khazraj and when they submitted to his judgment `Abdullah b. Ubayy b. Salul had asked him for them and he gave them to him; so when the Aws spoke thus the apostle said: 'Will you be satisfied, O Aws, if one of your own members pronounces judgment on them ?' When they agreed he said that Sa`d b. Mu`adh would be the man (Sirat, p. 463).

The judgment of the captives will give rise to a particular procedure, which has not often been understood: Muhammad assigns them therefore as judge their former head under customary tribal law, but meanwhile become Muslim, who in addition is dying: Sa’d b.Mu’adh.

He condemns them to death, but it is Muhammad who enforces the sentence.

The case can be understood in two ways. Subterfuge of the tradition, which is reluctant to give Muhammad a direct role in this genocide. Ability of Muhammad that makes a dying person responsible for that and therefore avoids the risk of revenge, always possible in tribal milieu. The sentence will be executed either by Muhammad himself or by relatives (Ali). The bodies are piled up in common graves dug under the market, against all the usual rules (it is an additional humiliation inflicted on the victims). Women and children are divided between Muslims, and Muhammad himself will appropriate one of the most attractive widows. The booty consists mostly of weapons.

The massacre gave rise to some clear verses in the Quran, chapter 38 verses 25-27.

Muhammad Hamidullah's claim that the judgment was made in the name of Deuteronomy is a personal consideration of the author, categorically contradicted in the accounts of Ibn Ishaq and Tabari, and which has not received the slightest echo among historians.

The judgment is delivered in the name of the Muslims: see above "the Apostle and the Muslims" and "get up to greet your leader ."

Sa'd, who was seriously wounded during the battle of the ditch (he will die soon after), after reflection, comes to make the verdict solemnly: Ibn Ishak " When Sa’d reached the Apostle and the Muslims the Apostle told them to get up to greet their leader. The Migrants of Quraysh thought that the Apostle meant the Ansar, while the latter thought that he meant everyone, so they got up all ….Sa’d asked: ‘Do you accept the judgment I pronounce on them? They said yes...the Apostle answered yes.

Sa’d said: then I give judgment that the men should be killed, the property divided, and the women and children taken as captives.”

History of Al Tabari volume 8 The Victory of Islam. “The messenger of God attacked them a few days before the end of Dhu al Qa’dah. He asserted that the messenger of God commanded that furrows should be dug in the ground for the Banu Qurayza.

Then he sat down, and Ali and Al Zubayr began cutting off their heads in his presence. He asserts that the woman whom the prophet killed that day was named Bunanah etc.etc.”

Ibn Ishak.“The Apostle of God confined them in Medina in the quarter of d.al Harith a woman of B. al-Najjar. Then the Apostle of God went out to the market of Medina (which is still its market today) and dug trenches in it. Then he sent for them and struck off their heads in those trenches as they were brought out to him in batches…….There were 600 or 700 in all, though some put the figure as high

800 or 900. As they were being taken out in batches to the Apostle of God, they asked Ka’b what he thought would be done with them. He replied: will you never understand? Don4t you hear that the summoner never stops and those who are taken away do not return?”

The fate of women and children is thus clarified ...

“Then the Apostle of God divided the property, wives and children of B. Qurayza among the Muslims, and he made known on that day the shares of horses and men and took out the fifth…..then the Apostle sent Sa’d b. Zayd al Ansari brother of b. Abdu’l-Ashhal with some of the captive women of B. Qurayza to Najd and he sold them for horses and weapons.”

According to Ibn Ishaq, the Quran echoes this massacre in 33, 26-27: “ He brought those of the People of the Scripture who supported them down from their strongholds, and cast panic into their hearts. Some you slew, and you made captive some. He caused you to inherit their land and their houses and their wealth, and land you have not trodden. God is ever able to do all things.”

In a note, Abdurrahman Badawi states that “some you slew” refers to the massacre of men and “you made captive some” to the women and children.

According to Montgomery Watt after the elimination of the Banu Qurayza, there was no longer any large group of Jews in Medina, but there were nevertheless some isolated Jews included in Arab families; neither Ibn Ishaq, nor Tabari nevertheless, nor any Modern historian cited in the article mentions any manifestation of their existence in Medina after 627, much less an event where one would have noted their political strength.

Mohammed now has free rein to exercise his political power - which extends, at that time, over Medina and its surroundings, Khaybar being, 150 km north, out of its range. Historians locate at this date the beginning of an established state power worthy of the name, even if it is only a "booty state."

The point of view of pious Muslims.

By arguing that the Banu Qurayza were not killed but "expelled," Barakat Ahmad (Muhammad And The Jews Re-Examination) radically disagrees with Ibn Ishaq and Tabari. Barakat Ahmad maintains that there remained "Jewish tribes" in Medina after that. 1 The Jews of Banu Awf, 2 The Jews of Banu al-Najjar, 3 The Jews of Banu Sa'idah, 4 The Jews of Banu Jusham, 5 The Jews of al-Aws, 6 The Jews of Banu Tha'labah, 7 The Banu al-Schutaybah, 8 The Jews of Banu Zurayq, 9 The Jews of Banu Harithah, 10 The Banu Qaynuqa. He disagrees radically with Tabari, according to which the Banu Qaynuqa went to Syria after the attack of 627, and with modern historians, according to which it is to Khaybar that they left. Therefore this is no longer a question of a reasonable doubt about the details, as expressed by Ibn Khaldun and modern historians but of apologetics more than history.

The maneuver did not save the Jews from the consequences of their betrayal. They thought Ali's contingent was just a bullying. They realized the scope of the threat only when they saw the Islamic army arrive under the command of the holy prophet himself (peace and blessings of God be upon him). A siege of two or three weeks was enough for the surrender of the Jews. They agreed to surrender on the conditions of Saad Ibn Mu’adh, the chief of the Aws. They had made him judge of their case, because in pre-Islamic times, the Aws and Quraysa were allies. But Saad knew very well what the two tribes who had already been allowed to leave the city had done. As soon as the gates of Yathrib / Medina behind them, they were eager to gather the men of the surrounding clans against the Muslims. He also knew the treachery that the Quraïza had shown at the time of the attack on the city: a separate armistice with the people of Mecca, which had endangered all the Medinans. In view of these elements, Saad Ibn Mu’adh decided that all the men of Banu Qurayza would be put to death, and that their property but also their wives and children would be distributed to Muslims. His judgment was applied literally. By entering the citadel, the Muslims found there a whole war equipment prepared by these traitors: 1500 swords, 300 chainmail, 2000 spears and 1500 shields. This war material was to be used to take Medina backwards after crossing the ditch by the polytheists.

SIXTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE CAPTURE OF KHAYBAR (SPRING 628).

Montgomery Watt gives as date May-June 628.

The capture of Khaybar is particularly highlighted by our documents: it is the example, or the very prototype, of the punishment of defeated enemies by Islam. This rich oasis located north of Yathrib / Medina, populated by Jews, will be conquered by Muhammad, who methodically captures all their fortresses.

Ibn Ishaq's long text on the capture of Khaybar is rich in various anecdotes, but he it is silent on the reason that led Muhammad to attack the last Jewish bastion in the Hejaz.

The cause of this surprise attack is indeed clear enough: Muslim troops are disappointed by the truce of Hodebiya, which frustrates them with the joy of conquering Mecca. Mahomet, a good war chief, anxious to maintain the morale of his troops, launched them to the assault of another locality, renowned for its opulence; the treaty of Hudaybiyyah of 628 having guaranteed him that he would not be attacked from the rear by Meccans, who themselves respect the truce.

The Jews, under severe pressure, will agree to surrender, according to precise terms that then will be used as the legal basis for the domination over infidels.

Muhammad went therefore and besieged the Jewish tribe who had settled 170 km north of Medina in the oasis of Khaybar, the Banu Nadir. Tabari does not say what the casus belli was.

After having deprived them from help by isolating the Ghatafan, Muhammad quickly captures most of the forts, of which he takes all the wealth, then does a siege of ten nights around the last two forts. The inhabitants, according to the story, ask the Messenger of God that the blood is spared and argue that they are the best able to exploit the property. Muhammad grants them this favor on the basis of half of the real estate, but nevertheless with a reservation which makes it an agreement revocable at any moment, which will justify their subsequent expulsion. “The Apostle agreed to this arrangement on the condition that, “if we will expel you, we will expel you.”

A paragraph is devoted to highlighting the role of Ali ibn Abi T̩ālib (whom Muhammad has made his standard-bearer). Ibn Ishaq also expands on how Muhammad seizes Saffyah bint Huyayy b. Akhtab, wife of Kinanah b. al-Rabi 'b. Abi al-Huqayq, who was seventeen years old, and who became in a first time his sexual slave. He also tells how Muhammad makes torture Kinanah, in order to seize the treasure of the Jews.

“Kinana b. Al-Rabi, who had the custody of the treasure of B. Al-Nadir, was brought to the Apostle of God who asked him about it. He denied that he knew where it was. A Jew was brought to the Apostle of God and said that he had seen Kinana going round a certain ruin every morning .................when he asked him about the rest of the treasure he refused to produce it, so the Apostle of God gave orders to al-Zubayr b. Al-Awwam: “torture him until you extract what he has” so he kindled a fire with flint and steel (a lighter) on his chest until he was nearly dead. Then the Apostle of God delivered him to Muhammad b. Maslama and he struck off his head.”

The capture of Khaybar by the Muslims was indeed marked by various atrocities, including the murder of Kinana ben al-Rabi, his chief, an important figure in Khaybar. It was in his house that the Banu Nadir treasure was supposed to be.

The capture of Khaybar delivered into the hands of Muslims a large number of prisoners (the men were executed - 600 dead - women and children enslaved).

The Jewish community living in Fadak, north of Khaybar, terrorized, then surrenders by itself and without a fight.

History of al Tabari volume 8 the victory of Islam: “After the Messenger of God had finished with Khaybar, God cast fear into the hearts of the people of Fadak when they received news of what God had brought upon the people of Khaybar, so they sent to the messenger of God to make peace with him for a half share of Fadak ....Thus Fadak became the property of the messenger of God privately, because no horses or camels had been spurred against it” ”.

During the following days, the beautiful Zenobia, daughter of AI Harith, sister of Marhab, wife of Sellem ibn Mishkam, tried to take revenge on the one she considered as responsible for the death of her brother and of her co-religionists. Concealing her true feelings towards him, she feigned a deep attachment for Muhammad, thus gaining his confidence, and one day sent him a

roasted sheep she had poisoned. She had inquired beforehand to know what was the piece of this animal that he preferred the most, and as it had been said that it was the shoulder, she had put a lot of poison on this part of the animal. As soon as Muhammad had bitten the leg offered to him, he felt that the meat had probably been poisoned, and spat out what he had in his mouth.

From there, the versions given by the different hadiths ... diverge.

A hadith gives the following version: the Muslims wanted to kill Zenobia on the spot, but Muhammad ordered that she be released. Bishir Ibn Al Barra ibn Maarur, who had also eaten poisonous meat of this kind, having died a few hours later; Muhammad made her executed, and left with the wife of the unfortunate Kinana, Saffyah daughter of Huyayy ben Akhtab.

He did not have the patience to wait for his return to Medina to consummate their union. One of the Companions, Abu Ayub al Ansari, nevertheless stood armed outside their tent for the fear that Safiya, whose father and brother were killed in the battle after all, may try to harm him (Ibn Saad 8/126).

One can easily imagine indeed the state of mind that was that of this unhappy Jewish Deirdre *.

According to Ibn Ishaq, the last followers of Judaism were expelled from the Hejaz under the caliphate of Umar ibn al-Khattab (634-644).

Tabari. After the death of the prophet, Abu Bakr after the prophet confirmed the properties in their hands on the same terms of sharecropping **.When Abu Bakr died, Umar confirmed the sharecropping arrangement in the beginning of his term as commander, then, however, Umar was informed that the Messenger of God had said during his final illness: two religions cannot coexist in the Arabian peninsula. Umar investigated the matter until trustworthy evidence reached him, then he sent an envoy among the Jews saying, “God has given permission for you to be expelled....”

Abdurrahman Badawi is in any case categorical : "Muslim historians are unanimous in stating that the Jews were definitively expelled from the Hejaz during the caliphate of Umar.”

* Muslim sources would want us to really believe that a woman whose husband, father and brother were killed, within a couple of days gladly and voluntarily chose to marry and have sex with the very man who caused the deaths of her family members!

** A more preferable economic model for a growing Islamic empire that had become dependent on seizing justified by its religion.

SEVENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE THESIS OF MAXIME RODINSON (1915-2004). ORIENTALIST SPECIALIZED IN ISLAM.

Let it present itself,it is more cautious, based on extracts from his essay published in 1968.

CHAPTER II.

« The old Beduin tribes were no sooner settled than men emerged to make a business of organizing caravans and dealing in the transport of valuable goods. They formed themselves into companies to finance caravans. The profits were large, amounting to as much as fifty or one hundred per cent. The towns which became the centers of their operations grew and prospered, foremost among them Mecca, halfway between South Arabia and Byzantine Palestine. The same conditions brought economic expansion to the whole of western Arabia. The town of Ta 'if, south of Mecca, a hillside resort for the Meccans, did a roaring trade in its fruit, vegetables and wines. Throughout the Wadi I-Qura ( ' the wadi of the towns' - this was the name of an almost continuous line of oases in the northern Hejaz) and south as far as Medina, Jewish settlements created a flourishing agricultural life. 35 A mercantile economy was growing up in the chinks of the nomadic world. As well as barter, money transactions using dinars (gold deniers) and dirhams (silver drachmae) were becoming commonplace. The Beduin borrowed from the rich merchants of the towns, got into debt and were sold into slavery or at any rate reduced to a dependent status. The disintegration of tribal society had begun. Large and prosperous markets grew up, like the one at Ukaz, attracting foreigners as well as Arabs from every tribe. The tribal limits had been overstepped.

Inevitably, along with this economic and social transformation, there came intellectual and moral changes. Shrewd men were seen to prosper. The traditional virtues of the sons of the desert were no longer the sure road to success. Greed, and an eye to the main chance, were much more useful. The rich became proud and overbearing, glorying in their success as a personal thing - no longer a matter for the whole tribe. The ties of blood grew weaker, giving way to others based on common interest. At this point a new set of values began to transcend the old tribal humanism. The poor, the young and the honest were suffering from upstart arrogance. There was a vague feeling that the old tribal principles, which might have been invoked to prevent it, were somehow out of date. People began to turn to the universalist religions, religions of the individual which were concerned not with the ethnic group but with the individual salvation of each human being in his incomparable oneness. Judaism and Christianity were known, as we have seen, often in somewhat odd forms but these were foreign faiths associated with the powers that were fighting for control of the Arab peninsula. They had all the prestige of foreignness - there was their undeniable superiority to the tribal religion and their links with mighty civilizations - but adopting them meant taking sides politically, something distinctly mortifying to Arab pride. Some hunted obscurely for something fresh, inspired by the foreign ideas to cast doubt on the powers of the countless tribal idols and to fear only God, who was so close to the supreme God of the Christians and the Jews. At the same time, the Saracen lands were suffering from a sense of political inferiority. As mercenaries and auxiliaries, the Arabs were the mainstay of the great empires, who purchased their support, feared their revolts and played off the tribes against one another. Why not use their importance to their own advantage ? To do that, a powerful state would be needed to unite all Arabia. It would then be in a position to safeguard its newly acquired wealth and commerce and to direct the avidity of the poorer Beduin outwards, instead of allowing it to prey on Arabia's own commercial interests. This was what the South Arabian kingdoms, with their colonizing attitude to the nomads and, for all their distant kinship, their lack of contact with the Beduin, had ultimately failed to achieve. An Arab state, framed according to Arab ideals, tailored to the new conditions and yet still sufficiently close to the Beduin life that it had to incorporate, and able to take its' place on an equal footing with the great empires - this was the great need of the times. …

……………….. ………….

A fitting slogan for Muslim ideology at this period might have been: An Arab religion for the Arabs. We have seen how the community had finally traced its descent from Abraham Ibrahim, the

supposed ancestor of the Arabs. Now God was revealing his demands and his truths in the Arabic tongue through Muhammad. We have seen that from now on they turned in prayer not to a foreign sanctuary but towards the Ka'ba, an Arab shrine if ever there was one.

CHAPTER VII.

He had created an embryonic Arab state inspired by an Arab religion. That this creation fulfilled Arabia's deepest needs is clear, since it survived the terrible crisis which followed his death.

Notice by Peter DeLaCrau. We agree on one point with this great historian. The very fact that the more or less great Christian prophet of central Arabia was known in Mecca and Yathrib/Medina before Muhammad began to makke a breakthrough.

Al Baghawi, Tafsir surah 25 verse 60.

(And when it is said unto them) to the people of Mecca: (Adore the Beneficent) submit to the Beneficent through the profession of God's divine Oneness! (they say: And what is the Beneficent) we do not know anyone with this name except Musaylimah the liar?

The Meccans then sent a delegation to the Jews of Yathrib to find out more about him and according to the book entitled Thimar al-qulūb by Abd al Malik b. Muḥammad al-Tha'ālībī, " When the Prophet came to Medina, he found the people mentioning Musaylima,quoting his sayings and referring to the opinions of Banu Hanifa about him » (page 146 No. 207).

And that it took no less than three Muslim armies to defeat his followers.

The very fact that the first people interested in Muhammad's message, apart from his direct preaching in Mecca, were the inhabitants of the oasis city of Yathrib/Medina (the Ansars) ...

PROVE INDEED THAT THE IDEA WAS IS IN THE AIR.

The triple question is...

WHY SO MUCH VIOLENCE?

Was it impossible to do like Buddha or the early Christians and spread the philosophy of Tawhid and all the good things that go with it by other means than by force?

Even more radically: WAS MUHAMMAD INDISPENSABLE?

To the spreading of this message of peace, love and forgiveness IN SHORT OF ELEVATION OF THE HUMAN SOUL AND STATUS ??? as stated in the Declaration (fatwa) of All India Anti-Terrorism Conference, Deoband 31 mai 2o08.

“Islam is the religion of mercy for all humanity. It is the fountainhead of eternal peace, tranquillity, security. Islam has given so much importance to human beings that it regards the killing of a single person the killing of entire humanity, without differentiation based on creed and caste. Its teaching of peace encompasses all humanity. Islam has taught its followers to treat all mankind with equality, mercy, tolerance, justice. Islam sternly condemns all kinds of oppression, violence and terrorism. It has regarded oppression, rioting and murdering among severest sins and crimes.”

If not a contrario?? History will say..

It already says to us that Arab polytheism was in decline and that many of the recipients of the Quran were already more or less familiar with the major biblical or Judeo-Christian themes.

* It's verse 32 of chapter 5. See our study on the subject above and the questions this ayah arouses..

EIGHTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE TRIUMPHAL MARCH ON MECCA (630).

The March on Mecca is a tactical masterpiece. Malevolent historians make the connection with the March on Rome of Mussolini in 1922.

ACT I: The break of the truce.

Muhammad takes advantage of a latent civil war in Mecca to interfere, and break the truce. When it is necessary, he knows how to revive the relationship of tribal solidarity, which are used as a pretext. It remains noticeable that those he comes to protect are not yet Muslim but no matter!

In the treaty that Muhammad concluded with Quraysh at Hudaybiyya in 628, it was stipulated that they would not make war against him, that they would not help his enemies, that they would excite no one against him, that they would not help his enemies, whether in arms or men, and that they would not make and would not help to make, war against his allies.

But there were, on the territory of Mecca, two tribes allied to Muhammad, one called the Banu Khuzaa, the other the Banu Bakr ibn Kinana. The Banu Khuzaa were former allies of the Banu Hashim, while the Banu Bakr were allied with the Banu Omayya, Banu Makhzum and other Quraysh clans. At the conclusion of the treaty of Hudaybiyya, the Banu Khuzaa had declared themselves allies of Muhammad, who had accepted them and who had assured them that they would be in Mecca under his protection, even though they were not of his religion. The Banu Bakr, on the other hand, had renounced his alliance and protection. After these stipulations, they separated, and Muhammad had returned to Medina.

The pact of al Hudaybiya had therefore specified the position of the Khuzaa in the Medinan party and of the Bakr in the Meccan party. Now there was between them old vengeances to take, and the circumstances invited for reviving the memory of them.

A member of the Khuzaa clan having heard that a member of the Kinana had sung a satirical song mocking Muhammad, he attacked him and smashed his skull.

It will be noted in passing that the god of Muhammad was not attacked and that only the person of Muhammad, that is to say his vices and brutalities, was attacked. It is not therefore a blasphemy in the modern sense of the term. In their mind the god of Muhammad remains respectable. What is less so is the personality of his prophet who acts as King of the Hejaz.

The incident nevertheless provoked the confrontation of both parties. The Banu Bakr, reinforced by the Kinana, pursued to the limits of the Meccan Haram some Banu Khuzaa, whose chief went and sought help from Muhammad. Abu Sufyan went to Medina and asked that the pact be renewed, and the truce period extended. But Muhammad refused. Abu Sufyan stood up and exclaimed: I have received my powers from the people.

Muhammad would have answered: O Abu Sufyan! What are you saying?

The unsuccessful return of Abu Sufyan.

ACT II: Preparation of the intervention.

The number of troops alone (more than 10,000 men) is enough to make it clear: never such a troop had been assembled in Arabia and set in motion for a specific purpose.

Descriptions emphasize the mass, power and determination of the troops: the tactic is that of the deterrence, in order to dissuade the enemy from any reaction, and of the terror, in order to further discourage it.

They are composite, made randomly, Bedouins and settled, enemy tribes, and especially the two components of Medina, the Muhajirun or migrants from Mecca and the Ansar or local Muslims.

The first want to return home, the second attack a city rival since always.

Among the fighters few have real religious motives, despite Muhammad's oratorical efforts.

Al Abbas warned leaves Mecca with his family and joins the army of Muhammad in al Juhfa. We would like to be better informed about the details of the life of this great ancestor of the Abbassids, so clever at reconciling his material and moral interests. He now proclaims his conversion to the religion preached by his nephew. The tradition nevertheless shows him still worried about the dangers that risk the Quraysh and quick to play a role of mediator between them and his nephew.

The forced and grudgingly, conversion, of Abu Sufyan, the sworn enemy of Muhammad, has given rise to several versions; each author wanted to give this piece of choice a personal tone,

even funny. The fact that Abu Sufyan is the origin of the first Muslim dynasty is certainly not for anything in it: we see together the eponyms of the Umayyad and Abbasid dynasties in this episode.

But can we really speak of conversion in the case of Abu Sufyan? This may seem like an anachronism. In the head of Abu Sufyan it was to be especially the submission to a new political power. It is besides likely that the profession of faith expression (shahada) was not yet fixed at that time.

As a good trader he was not a swordsman, but rather of negotiations.

This (conversion) scene is finally an opportunity to introduce the character of Abbas until then well spared by events.

Converted very late, he is especially important because he will be the eponym of the future Abbasid dynasty. It's during his empire only that most of the Islamic tradition is formed. The fact that it is he, the eponym of the Abbasids, who assists the ancestor of the Umayyads, is remarkable, and surely made by a whole thick layer of historians accomplices of the Abbasids.

With little regard for verisimilitude, the Muslim tradition shows us al Abbas, pulling Abu Sufyan into a gorge where he will attend the parade of the army, of which, apparently, he knows nothing. At each group of Bedouins that comes, Abu Sufyan asks, "Who are these? Who are these? Until the squadron of the Emigrants, frightening, wearing their helmets, invulnerable in their coats of mail, "the green squadron," or rather blue squadron, according to the color of their arms. We cannot help thinking of the famous Slemain Mide parade of the Irish legends (Tain Bo Cuailnge).

The Meccans must be petrified in order to make any resistance impossible and the Muslim tradition considers rightly that the city was taken by force (Arabic anwatan).

Abu Sufyan returns therefore hastily to Mecca, and in front of the Kaaba harangues the Quraysh, depicts to them the irresistible attack that is being prepared and the guarantees they are given if they surrender. His wife Hind (mother of the future caliph Mu’awiya I) catches him by the mustache while shouting: "Kill that fat-filled goatskin, this scumbag, this big piece of meat! What poor guardian he is for a city. "" Do not be misled by this woman, Abu Sufyan retorts, you face the irreversible one! " And everybody scatters to take shelter.

The submission of Abu Sufyan and Abbas, the two Meccan leaders, has only been a prelude. They come to negotiate, to empty from the inside, the resistance capacity of the Meccans, and to save the city, to offer it the defeat in order to avoid it the disaster.

ACT III: The forgotten fights.

The March on Mecca proceeded therefore "almost" without fighting, without obvious violence, especially compared with the rest of the operations led by Muhammad. There was, however, at least an organized attempt to resist, contrary to what all Muslim popularizers say, solicitous of presenting to the audience an immaculate image of the ultimate Conquest. Original sources are less prudish.

But it is true that global violence was replaced by a skillful policy of terror.

Contrary to what is diffused by most of the modern works of popularization, the conquest of Mecca will not have been a peaceful moment, that of a communion which would be only the prelude to a universal conversion, around a leader, impeccable in the strict sense of the term (isma). There was real fighting (cf. Maurice Gaudefroy-Demombynes pages 172-173°.

To this was added the proscriptions, that is to say, the lists of people or personalities to be killed as soon as the entering the city, a blacklist before the word is invented.

ACT IV: the Tulaqa.

For the conquest of Mecca was at first the invasion by revanchist emigrants (we have known that also in 1815), and some Medinans, from another city independent on Mecca. Subsequently, of course, the stories will make a religious or even theological reading of these events, but that is hardly an illusion.

The entry to Mecca is an opportunity to describe beautiful ceremonies of allegiance from the population, and among them, that of the great Meccan figures.

The converts of 630, those of the conquest, will be part of a subordinate category of Muslim population: the sincerity of their Muslim faith will always be suspected. This episode shows that Mecca has been taken effectively by force (arabic anwatan). The Meccans should have been taken prisoner but Muhammad granted them freedom, so the annalists call from now on the Meccans Tulaqa, "the released," the "freedmen."

ACT V: The Speech to the Inhabitants

The "prophetic discourse" genre is difficult to implement for Muslim chroniclers and historians: they hardly dare put in the mouth of Muhammad something other than what is in the Quran itself, under pain of blasphemy. They circumvent therefore the difficulty by minimizing its addresses to the population, which itself has ample time to answer. The situation is therefore paradoxical when it concerns a person considered as a prophet, but who in the end hardly expresses himself.

In order to understand what was then played, it is worth recalling here an episode that took place well after

the violent recapture of the city of Mecca, by the famous and bloody Al Hajjaj, Umayyad governor of Iraq, in 692, who attacked even the Kaaba by means of catapults.

ACT VI: The scene of the oath or baya.

The men swore to obey God and his Messenger with all their strength. The women pledged not to associate anything to God, to commit neither theft nor adultery, not to kill their young children. Muhammad seated on the rock of Safa, touches the hand of the men, but as beneath the sacred tree of al Hudaybiya, it is to Umar, Seating beneath Muhammad that the women take their oath; or they dip their hand into a jar full of water, where Muhammad had before plunged his. Hind's submission is the most interesting. His second sense, warlike, coercive and political, is constantly underestimated. The Abbasid traditionists, it is interesting to note it, in this circumstance ascribe to the terrible Hind, wife of Abu Sufyan, a very noble attitude. She comes to take the oath, veiled, disguised; but when Muhammad recognizes her and demands from her a commitment not to kill his children, she replies, "We raised them when they were young, and you killed them in Badr when they became men! "

Hind, Abu Sufyan's wife, who until then has been a fierce opponent of Muhammad, of course, submits, but the freedom of speech she is losing, along with her sisters, does not prevent a strong, ironic and witty tone on her part , facing the rigorous exposition of the new obligations. She noted, for example, that men were not entitled to such questions during their submission. She will be the last woman to speak freely publicly in Mecca forever and ever.

This woman is an endearing personality, lost in the midst of a multitude of murderers, brutes and morons, all hairy face, a true heroine whose Islamic literature could not erase the existence.

It is to be emphasized besides how abnormal her survival was, so much she had differentiated herself by a behavior abominable in the eyes of Muslims (act of cannibalism during the Battle of Ouhoud). Yet she continues to provoke the new masters.

What to say?

Either the crimes she committed were not, or she was spared at the cost of a long bargaining. Other women were not so lucky.

Hind's forgiveness would be explained in another way: it is Abu Sufyan's wife ...

But what is also gripping in this text is the allusion to the relations between Hind and Omar.

It is therefore exceptional in all points of view, and Tabari, we feel it, takes pleasure to tell it, whereas at other times, he struggles to write, and is a sorry reading.

alors qu’à d’autres moment, il peine à écrire, et fait peine à lire.

ACT VII: the sacking of the sanctuary.

The Muslim tradition thus explains this serious intervention of the Prophet: "Fighting in it (the haram) was not made lawful to anyone before me!, nor will it be made lawful to anyone after me, and it was not made lawful for me except for a short period of time “ (Sahih Bukhari volume 5 book 59 number 603).

Soon after entering Mecca, the Prophet went to the Ka‘ba, took its key from Uthman B. Talha, and entered it. Ibn Ishaq records: “There he found a dove made of wood. He broke it in his hands and threw it away.” Next he turned to the statues which were housed in and around the temple. They were 360 in number. Muhammad was standing by them with a stick in his hand, saying: “The truth has come and falsehood has passed away. Verily, falsehood is bound to pass away” (Quran 17.82).

Then he pointed at them with his stick and they collapsed on their backs one after the other….then he ordered that all the statues which were round the Ka‘ba should be collected and burned with fire and broken up.

In some variants of these hadiths we read that Iblis had fixed the bases of all these statues with lead, but that nevertheless when Muhammad touched them with the lance or stick he had in his hands, and uttered the words: ‘Truth had come, and falsehood has departed,’ the statues then fell on their faces at the mere touch of the staff… The Islamic tradition has thus turned into a miracle

what was actually a show of brute physical force.

As we have already had the opportunity to say, the beginning of Muhammad's apostolate does not, however, contain any attack on idols; it is a time when the new prophet can hope for a compromise solution with the aristocracy of the Quraysh.

In practice, idols, rough stones and altars are mixed, both in appearance and in their ritual functions.

The absolute rejection of these practices will consecrate the break. Muhammad takes over an old biblical theme, a little easy, moreover, and idolatry will thus become in his mouth an absolute evil.

But in reality for the highest minds like the high king of Ireland Cormac the idol is not the god himself but a mirror of the divinity, a symbol.

"Ar baí cretim in óenDé oc Cormac . ar ro ráidseom na aidérad clocha ná crunnu acht no adérad intí dosroni & ropo chomsid ar cul na uli dúla" (Senchas na relec inso).

"Cormac believed in one god. He said that he did not worship stones or trees, but only the one who made them and who is the protector of all the elements" (History of burial places).

However, the distinction was too subtle for some.

Hubal, the principal idol in the Ka‘ba. “was pulled down and used as a doorstep .This practice set up a precedent which was followed literally. Many Hindu idols ended at the doorsteps of the principal mosques not only in Muslim capitals within India such as Ghazni, Kabul, Lahore…..but also in far off places like Baghdad, Mecca and Medina.

Statues were not the only “abominations” which Muhammad had to take care of in the Ka‘ba. Ibn Ishaq and other biographers report that the “Quraysh had also put icons in the Ka‘ba including two of Jesus son of Mary and Mary… Muhammad ordered that the pictures would be erased except those of Jesus and Mary.” According to a tradition, as Umar began to wash out the pictures with the water of the well known as Zamzam, Muhammad placed his hand on the pictures of Jesus and Mary and said: “Wash out all except what is below my hands.” We may doubt the anecdote (some Christian icons in the Ka’ba during the Jahiliyya) but There is no reason to doubt that the walls of the Ka‘ba carried paintings. Pagans have always been as solicitous of presenting their pantheon and mythology through color as through carving.

This gruesome example of iconoclasm set up by Muhammad himself (these pagan works of art could simply have been removed and stored elsewhere) will be followed centuries later by the Taliban or the minions of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

In Syria, in September 2015, the jihadists of the Islamic State, for example, successively destroyed the Baalshamin temple, that of Baal, then seven funerary towers, three of which were particularly well preserved, as well as the Triumphal Arch and some columns which had nothing to do with any worship.

Editor's note. As far as the Taliban are concerned, it is the Bamiyan's Buddha that their stupid imitation of Muhammad in all respects attacked in March 2001.

These three statues had been carved in high relief so that they stood out from the bottom of a niche in the sandstone cliff. The fine details modeled on the rock by a mixture of straw and plaster made them representatives of the Gandhara style. The statues were originally colored, the largest in carmine and the others in multiple colors.

At the beginning of the 20th century, following the sending of Saudi Mutawas to Afghanistan in order to help the Taliban government in training their police of suppression of vice and promotion of virtue, the Taliban government decided to demolish the Bamiyan Buddhas with explosives and artillery fire.

After the destruction, Mullah Omar declared that he was proud of all the Taliban who had participated in the destruction of this impious horror synonymous with a religion for degenerates.

Of course, in this case, and unlike the religious works of art exhibited in the Kaaba, it was impossible to simply remove them from the place, which is why an official Japanese delegation accompanied by a Sri Lankan Buddhist group had then proposed to cover the statues. In vain, the Taliban refused.

In early 2015, Muslim fundamentalists proposed the construction of a mosque on the premises, financed by Saudi funds. The construction of a Medersa is also under study.

ACT VIII: The elimination of poets and singers and of some other intellectuals.

An amnesty was proclaimed, but there were exceptions. Muhammad ordered six people to be killed, no matter where they were found, even in the Kaaba. They were Safwan ibn Omayya, Abdullah ibn Katal, Meqyas ibn Sobaba, Ikrima Ibn Amr Ibn Hisham (Ikrima Ibn Abu Jahl) al-

Huwayrith ibn Nuqaydh, Abdullah ibn Sad Abu Sarh (Ali Dasthi) in his book entitled “23 years”).

Muhammad therefore proceeds to a superficial and targeted purge but amply sufficient. The powerful and the wiseass escape: it is well necessary to build a new future with the lifeblood. But the scapegoats will pay the price. The suspension of the immunity allowed Muhammad to make some noble gestures but it allowed him also to get rid of some particularly hated individuals: lists of names circulated.

For once, the texts are honest enough to recount the cases of those who managed to escape the lot that was promised to them, by the flight or by mistake on the part of the murderers. Each time, we are told little personal adventures, with what is necessary of dramatic to show that their lives hanged by a thread.

The black list contained for example the name of Abdallah ibn Sad bin Abi Sarh, converted, then an apostate. Uthman ibn Affan being his foster brother, he accompanies him to Muhammad , who, embarrassed, renounces his vengeance, but who immediately reproaches his entourage for not having killed him. The survivor will occupy high offices in the state under Umar and Uthman. Ikrima Ibn Amr Ibn Hisham (Ikrima ibn Abu Jahl) and Safwan ibn Umayya manage to flee and their wives will get their pardon. Muhammad dogs particularly the authors of dreadful verses cast against him. Although Abdallah ibn Khatal is accused of a stupid murder and of apostasy, they are his lines of verse in reality that condemn him. Of the two singers who recited them, one can escape, but the other is murdered. The poets Abdallah ibn az Zabara and Hubayra ibn Abu Wahb through flight escape the fate that awaits them.His first fury passed, Muhammad will accept the protection that Umm Hani, sister of Ali, granted to the two fugitives. Ibn Az Zabara, after a brief retreat in Najran, returns and becomes a convert. Kab ibn Zubayr, encouraged by his brother, comes and recites to Muhammad the qasida (ode) he composed in his honor, the Banat Suad, and becomes a convert.

ACT IX: the hajj of 631.

Muhammad seems to have left a deadline for Arabs who wanted to go to the Ka'ba, probably not to provoke a revolt among the Bedouins, and a financial loss too strong for the Meccans: rituals practiced in the same place for two different religions (Arab paganism and Islam) could therefore coexist a few months of the year 631. The annalists who, usually, gladly report the minor incidents that occur during the Hajj are very sober in detail on that of 631.It is yet obvious that the intimate mixture of Muslim and pagan non-Muslim pilgrims in the performance of the traditional ceremonies of the Jahiliyya , adapted to the worship of God, could not fail to produce some clashes that it would have been instructive to know. The hajj of 631 was therefore a transitional pilgrimage and, it seems, of reciprocal tolerance, even if the recitation of Sura 9 was a violent attack against the pagan Arabs.

One can now wonder from a theological point of view who was then the god worshiped in this place? The same god worshiped by two different populations, or two gods, by one or two communities? Strange space between but there is no question of tolerance because this concession will not last. Everything will be done to make old customs disappear as quickly as possible.

ACT X: the prohibition of hajj to non-Muslims: sura 9.

Muhammad, again well helped by a timely revelation, that of chapter 9, will send Abu Bakr to forbid definitively to non-Muslims the access to the temple but will not go personally.

Was the situation on calming, or could one fear a revolt?

On a technical level, the agreement between the two parties, the temporary compromise, took the form of a pact. But then it will be a question of the rupture of the aforementioned pact, by the infidels, of course.

Here again, the tone is very brutal: the incitement to murder reappears, out of a warlike context. This is the sign that Muhammad now has full option to impose himself, and far from wanting to soften it, he wants to further increase his power of constraints. The violence of the verses of this chapter 9, which is there to terrorize, accompanies this confiscation by Islam of the ancient customs. The rites remain the same, but are integrated in another schema. The tone is extremely brutal, which leaves flabbergasted, that of the triumphant Islam which, when it triumphs, knows no longer what empathy is.

This prohibition of the hajj to the disbelievers will also prepare the coming of Muhammad to the pilgrimage of 632.

The content of the chapter is as usual incoherent, and prevents any real analysis, because there

is an encouragement to respect the pact, and immediately after, an incitement of an extreme violence to attack non-believers by all means.

To conclude we will not resist the pleasure of quoting the beautiful speech of the great Scottish patriot Calgacus reported by Tacitus in his life of Agricola.

" Whenever I consider the origin of this war and the necessities of our position, I have a sure confidence that this day, and this union of yours, will be the beginning of freedom to the whole of Britain. To all of us slavery is a thing unknown; there are no lands beyond us, and even the sea is not safe, menaced as we are by a Roman fleet. And thus in war and battle, in which the brave find glory, even the coward will find safety. Former contests, in which, with varying fortune, the Romans were resisted, still left in us a last hope of succor, inasmuch as being the most renowned nation of Britain, dwelling in the very heart of the country, and out of sight of the shores of the conquered, we could keep even our eyes unpolluted by the

contagion of slavery. To us who dwell on the uttermost confines of the earth and of freedom, this remote sanctuary of Britain's glory has up to this time been a defense. Now, however, the furthest limits of Britain are thrown open, and the unknown always passes for the marvelous. But there are no tribes beyond us, nothing indeed but waves and rocks, and the yet more terrible Romans, from whose oppression escape is vainly sought by obedience and submission. Robbers of the world, having by their universal plunder exhausted the land, they rifle the deep. If the enemy be rich, they are rapacious; if he be poor, they lust for dominion; neither the east nor the west has been able to satisfy them. Alone among men they covet with equal eagerness poverty and riches. To robbery, slaughter, plunder, they give the lying name of empire; they make a solitude and call it peace "(Tacitus, Agricola's life, 30).

FOR THE (minded) FORMER CELTS FOUGHT NOBODY FOR QUESTIONS OF TRUE OR FALSE RELIGION OR OF WORSHIP TO BE PAID TO SUCH OR SUCH GOD BUT GENERALLY FOR QUESTIONS OF FREEDOM. See also the words of Critognatus and Boudicca (in England).

NINTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE QURAN.

As we have seen, the Quran ("al quran" in Arabic) is supposed to be only the transcription of an eternal divine fundamental law designated by the Arabic word "Umm al kitab". A kind of Tablet or Table of the Law, written by God himself. Muhammad was therefore only a simple intermediary, a kind of "receiver" who would have simply retransmitted the revelations of this Umm al kitab, made by the (arch) angel during his epileptic fits

Muhammad insists that he is not the author of the Quran, that he is only repeating what this spirit dictated to him, directly in Arabic, and at the command of God. It is therefore on the basis of this principle that the Mohammedans have established their religion. What we must constantly have in mind when speaking with believing and practicing Muslims; it is because all the verses of the Quran are supposed to have been directly dictated by the spirit who visited Muhammad, additionally in the mother tongue of God, that is to say, Arabic.

The Islamic tradition represents to us Muhammad dictating these chapters, according to their revelation, to relatives who keep them faithfully in memory; or scribes who write on "pieces of leather, shards of pottery, palm leaf veins and camel shoulder blades."

At the time of Muhammad, writing had barely made its appearance. It is important to bear in mind that the symbolization or distinction of vowels by diacritic points located above or below consonants appeared only well after Muhammad.

Some discrepancies come from the fact that the Quran was first noted in a written language (Nabatean writing); who was ignorant of the signs of the short vowels, the diacritical marks, where the letters n, t, b, y, q, f, could not be distinguished from each other; it was rather in reality a kind of stenography used as tickler for men already familiar with the contents of these notes. This mainly consonantal writing is called "mushaf."

The questions to which any critic of the Quran nevertheless hopes to find an answer are the following ones.....

1. When was the Quran written, and by whom?

2. What are the sources of the Quran? From where come the stories, legends, and principles that abound in the Quran?

3. How did the Quran come to us? (The problem of the compilation and transmission of the Quran.)

4. What is the Quran? (Since there has never been a "textus receptus ne varietur": the question of authenticity.)

Non-Muslim scholars working on the Quran today are torn in two between several hypotheses. The text would have evolved over time.

A clue tending towards showing that the Quran was written in successive layers is due to the existence of contradictory information within it.

Example, the Pharaoh in the pursuit of the Hebrews. He is saved in some verses 1), drowned in others 2). The change in the facts alleged shows that these strata were accumulated over a period of time long enough so that coherence could no longer be kept; presumably because of the death of the first writers or of the loss of their memory before the intervention of the following writers.

J. Wansbrough has shown that, far from being fixed in the seventh century, the definitive text of the Quran was still not completed in the ninth century. Islam is only partially of Arab origin and it is only through a confrontation with other cultural universes that it has gradually developed. See the innumerable allusions made by the Quran itself to the Judeo-Christian religious worlds. The challenge of producing the same or higher writing (or a portion of it), expressed five times in the Quran, can only be explained by a polemic with the Jewish or Christian community.

Very influenced by rabbinic accounts, the early Muslim community took Moses as an example. The new community cared about establishing the titles of Muhammad as a prophet like Moses; this implied, of course, in this case that there was to be a scripture testifying to his prophetic

nature.

Another progressive development was the emergence of the idea of the Arab origins of Islam. To this end, the idea of the Arabic sacred language was developed. The Quran was said to have come down from God in an unsurpassable Arabic.

Let us remind of it once again , for true Muslims the text of the Quran is not a personal work composed by Muhammad; it is only the repetition of divine words, kept (or engraved) on a kind of sacred table (or clay tablet), coming from a well-guarded tablet ("lawh al-mahfuz"), uncreated because co-eternal with God Himself, a little like the Christ of the Trinitarian Christians, and reported by the spirit or power that appeared to Muhammad.

Consequently Muslims regard the Quran as eternal and perfect, in the image of God, and therefore without history.

Who can believe it? ? ? Even within Islam, there were also movements to be raised against such an absurdity (phew, honor is safe!): The mu’tazili, who once tried to reconcile faith and philosophy, faith and reason.

What is certain indeed is that the Quran has also experienced a textual evolution and that its current version is not that which was thought until recently, that it was that of Muhammad. The linguistic evolution that took place between the 7th century Arabic and the classical literary Arabic in which today's Quran was fixed, suggests that the Quran probably underwent modifications after the time of Uthman.

Any study that is a bit serious comes up against four problems having serious consequences

Different dialects (lughat) coexisted in the Arabian peninsula during the time of Muhammad: there were differences between the Arabic of the Hejaz region and that of the Nadjd, and so on. Within these regions, there were also differences between the subdialects of the tribes (for example between that of the Quraysh and that of the Hawazin ...). Exactly as there were several dialects of the "Gallo-romance" in the France of yesteryear: oïl language (spoken in the North), oc language (spoken in the South) the Saboyan or Arpitan (spoken in the Center- East and Switzerland), etc. Not forgetting the Catalan (and the languages of the Po plain as well as the Portuguese and the Galician my Parisian pen-friend adds).

The language of the Quran contains anyway words of non-Arabic origin.

A very good example is the case of sura 108, which is very short but almost every fourth word is a hapax. So we can make it say whatever we want.

Theodor Noldeke has even hypothesized that the beginning of this Sura is now lost.

What is more problematic, however, is the exact meaning of the word kawtar.

Even an exegete like Abul Mansur Maturidi loses his Latin. Sorry, his Arabic.

While the traditional translation of Al-Kawthar is "abundance," "wealth," this term which is a hapax is considered to be of Syrian-Aramaic origin by Christoph Luxenberg who translates it as "perseverance." Studying the other ambiguous words of this sura, he recognizes in them a reminiscence of the First Epistle of St. Peter (5:8-9) of the Syriac Peshitta or Bible: "We have given you [the virtue] of perseverance; pray therefore your Lord and persist [in prayer]; your adversary [Satan] is [then] the vanquished."

The first problem is nevertheless that Muhammad did not speak the literary Arabic of today, but a dialect, certainly very close since it contributed to the formation of the literary Arabic, but different, the dialect of Hejaz, his region of origin.

Was the Quran really revealed in seven ahruf (dialects or reading modes) ? Anas mentioned that when Uthman told them to copy out the Quran, he added: "When you and Zayd differ, then write in the dialect of Quraysh. It was revealed in their dialect" (al-Bukhari). Ibn at-Tayyib [al-Baqillani]: "These words are not a definitive proof that it is all in the dialect of Quraysh since there are words and letters which differ from the dialect of Quraysh. This indicates that the Quran was revealed in all the language of the Arabs, and no one can say that it was just Quraysh or one part of the Arabs rather than others. Ibn Abdu'l-Barr thinks that this meant that most of it was revealed in the dialect of Quraysh because other than the dialect of Quraysh exists in sound readings with the use of the hamzas and the like letters or diacritical marks (some tribes indeed used writing more than others). On the other hand, Quraysh did not use the hamza. Some specialists think that these seven dialects in the Quran are the seven dialects of all the Arabs, both Yamani (South) and Nizar (Norh-West)), because Muhammad was not ignorant of any of them….these seven dialects are in different parts of the Quran. Some of it is in the dialect of Quraysh, some in that of Hudhayl, some in that of the Hawazin, and some in Yamani.

In short, a kind of Arabic Esperanto before it is invented!

The second problem is that the writing of the time of Muhammad differed from that which transcribed the literary Arabic of today, a change of writing having occurred just after his death.

The third problem is that it is more than obvious that Muhammad himself voluntarily and in his lifetime has proceeded to rework of his own text (by addition deletion or displacement ... of verses).

Fourth problem lastly! It is not less obvious that after the death of Muhammad there were also many changes in his text.

Everyone knows the lucidity we have shown about his personality, but we are convinced that he would never have accepted in his lifetime that stories like those described in chapter 94 are told about him. When he was six years old, he was "visited" by two angels who would have opened his chest to purify his heart before putting it back! It is to be a hadith! Inserted a posteriori in the Quran!

As to what chapter 17 relates (Muhammad could have made the two-way trip Mecca-Jerusalem in one night; it is obvious that it could not be affirmed in all seriousness that only after the death of the prophet and his first companions. Unless, of course, to admit that this trip was made only in dreams.

1).Chapter 10, verses 90 to 92.

2) Chapter 20, verse 78. Chapter 28, verse 40. Chapter 79, verse 25.

TENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEMS WITH TRANSLATION.

The word Islam comes from the fourth verb form of the stem SLM / ASLAMA "to submit" and means "submission" (implicitly to God). Muslim is the active participle of it: "he who submits" (still implicitly to God). Concretely it goes without saying that this submission to the divine will was immediately confused with the submission to the law of Moses (or Muhammad, in this case).

Let us remember therefore that among speakers of Semitic languages religion has never been an individual spirituality of the type "lock up yourself in your room and pray or meditate" but a way of life, in a community: DIN.

The religion of Moses is the Law of Moses just as Islam is the law of Allah.

And this religious law like any law (din), governs important and multiple sectors of the everyday life.

The word nasara is usually translated as "Christians" when we speak of the Quran. However, we can doubt the relevance of this term because we know today that there was a Jewish sect called the Nazarenes and that Yeoshua Bar Yossef of Jerusalem himself (Jesus) was one of the most listened to members. See our essay on or more exactly against, Christianity.

The word mushrikun is usually translated as "polytheist pagans." However, we can doubt the relevance of the term when we know that this reproach is also frequently sent to the Trinitarian Christians. John of Damascus, who attended the court of the Caliph, explicitly testified that this word Mushrikun designated well (Trinitarian) Christians. "They call us associators, because, they say, we introduce an associate with God, by declaring Christ to the Son of God and God"; and according to his testimony, this word does not mean idolaters.

Shirk is the only sin that, if not followed by an earthly repentance, cannot be forgiven by God. The competition is always difficult to admit and we are with all this story of jealous God opposite the true philosophical and thoughtful monotheism as it is very well expressed by the dialogue having had between the god Krishna / Vishnu and the prince Arjuna according to the Bhagavad Gita.

"Even those who are devotees of other gods and who worship them with faith actually worship only me. O son of Kunti, but they do so in a wrong way because I am the only enjoyer and master of all sacrifices. If one offers me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I accept it. I envy no one, nor am I partial to anyone. I am equal to all. But whoever renders service unto me in devotion is a friend, is in me, and I am also a friend to him" (Bhagavad Gita, dialogue between the god Krishna / Vishnu and Prince Arjuna).

To return to our subject, the word shirk is therefore generally conveyed by the terms "idolatry," "polytheism" or "religious association" and those who are guilty of such "sin" (angel jinn, etc.) are called Mushrikun.

The word mushrikun was first used - together with kuffar, meaning "disbelievers" - in the Muslim tradition to refer to the pagan Arabs in the Hejaz at the beginning of Islam. This expression is frequently used in the Quran to designate the opponents of Muslims, who are accused of practicing shirk which is considered a sin. But it is also frequently used to refer to Trinitarian Christians

Quran chapters 29, verses 61-63; 31 verse 25, 39 verse 38. "And if you were to ask them: Who created the heavens and the earth ? they would say: God!”

The question is: who are these non-Muslims who recognize God as the creator of this World? Quran chapter 6, verses 23. "They will say: By God, our Lord, we never were idolaters.

The question is "who are these non-Muslims whom the author accuses of being polytheists and who refuse to be so ?

1) Such an anti-Trinitarian controversy is very present in the Quran; see also 6:41and 136; 10:12 and 22; 16: 38 and 54; 23: 86-89; 31: 32; 43: 87.

ELEVENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE DOGMA ACCORDING TO WHICH THE QURAN IS UNCREATED (GHAYR MAKHLUQ).

Here we enter a very particular field, that of the aporias of the big monolatries that are Christianity or Islam. The very knowers of ancient druidiaction have rarely gone so far.

Except when they have examined the question of the being and of nothingness (for example, by assuming that the being could only have emerged one day from nothingness, or has always existed but then by constantly changing its form; such is indeed the fundamental druidic alternative).

It turns out that Christians and Muslims have lost their time in trying to find what is consubstantial with God or not, so we will deal with it in this chapter.

Judaism and Christianity have a fundamentally different and much more open relation to their texts (and let us not speak even of the ancient druids who favored the spirit to the letter) ... The confusion spread by the faulty expression "religion of the book" (and some others of the kind Sons of Abraham, the same design of God, etc.) has the most serious consequence because it results in “lumping together” these three religions, what can only benefit the last born, while yet a gap separates their different designs of God. The Bible is not a book, but rather a vast library; the Gospels are pleas of lawyers gathering or exploiting a certain number of testimonies on the life of a named Jesus known as the Nazarene.

For Christians: the Word that is to say the word of God is a (divine) person: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (Gospel according to John 1.1).

True Christians by definition recognize the Nazarene high rabbi Jesus as the Word of God who came among men to save them. For them Jesus is the Word of God made man.

The question of the attribution of the Quran to God is today brushed aside by any rational person for whom every text is necessarily a human product, everything grows from earth, and nothing comes down from heaven . But for the Muslim, the attribution of the Quran to God is an essential part of his faith, to deny it exposes him to death.

The Quran is eternal and uncreated, a little like Christ in the prologue of John's Gospel. It always existed and forever. It is written in the present tense, its commandments are imperative and apply as well today as in the future. This is the Sunni tradition expressed by Ibn Khaldun. It suggests that there is an original whose material Quran is a partial transcription. The material Quran is only the physical representation, a kind of replica, of an upper Quran, hidden from the eyes of the non-religious man, a glorious Quran on a guarded tablet (Quran, 85, 21-22) a kept hidden book (Quran 56, 78) that the Quran describes as an Umm al kittab or "Mother of the Book" ("mother" must be taken in the sense "that contains" "matrix") (Quran 3, 7).

To note. For Christoph Luxenberg, this heavenly book, which is so often mentioned in the Quran (the "mother of the book" 3: 7, 13 : 39), is no other than a Syriac lectionary or the Bible itself. Luxenberg thus understands chapter 3, 7: "He is who has sent down to you the book, in it are clearly expressed verses, these are the essence [lit.”mother”] of the Book; other [verses] are ambiguous.”

It could be very well that what is referred to here is the canonical scripture, and what resembles the apocryphal texts (because some of the pronouncements of the Quran about the Nazarene high rabbi Jesus, are obviously repeats different Gnostic or Judeo-christian texts about him).

Dictated by the archangel Gabriel to Muhammad, who recites it and demands that we do no more than do this: recite it (Quran means "recitation"), the Quran is for Islam the direct, literal, to take literally word by word. At least as understood by the Sunni tradition, which is by far the majority in the Muslim world (85%).

Shiism, because it developed on a soil of civilization infinitely richer and older, offers a more elaborate vision, with a tradition of more sophisticated interpretation, but ultimately refers to the same interpretative framework.

EXPLANATION PROVIDED BY THE MUSLIM THEOLOGIANS.

An act that takes place at a given moment in time can absolutely proceed from a being that is eternal and, simultaneously, as such, not to be created.

A word of God, on the one hand, is uncreated (ghayr makhluq) since it comes from God as an expression of His Attribute; however, on the other hand, it was pronounced by God at a given moment. It is uncreated, but it was pronounced by God, not in the pre-eternity but at a given moment (ghayr makhluq wa hadith).

Bukhari in the Tarjama No. 37 of his Sahih, for example, showed that God spoke in the past, and in

No. 36 that there are words that God will say on the day of the last judgment (and that He therefore has not yet said).

The word that constitutes the Quran is only a part of the totality of God's words (Shar'h ul-Aqida at-tahâwiyya, , Sahīh ul-Bukhârî, kitâb ut-tawhîd, tarjama no. 35); it is, however, what God wanted to say to men - what He wanted to bring down on them - as a text recited as "His word" ("yuta'abbadu bi tilâwatih") and as a source for their conduct on earth ("hudan li-n-nas").

God, when He wanted to, uttered different parts of this Word that is the Quran, the angel Gabriel listened to them, heard them, then repeated them to the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) (Shar'h ul- ' aqdda at-tahâwiyya, p. 195, Shar'h ul-qqīda al-wâssitiyya, p 105).

In short, for the Muslims of today: the Word, that is to say the Word of God, is a book existing from time immemorial: the Quran. It is the uncreated Word of God; only the ink and the separate letters, with which it was written, are created.

But the question was not asked at the beginning of Islam, it is only in contact with Greek philosophy outside Arabia that some early Muslims began to raise questions.

Mu’tazilism, or mo’tazilism, is a school of Muslim theological thought that emerged in the 8th century. Appeared at the same time as Sunnism and Shiism, but independent of them. Mu’tazilite theology developed on logic and rationalism, inspired by Greek philosophy and reason (logos), that it sought therefore to combine with Islamic doctrines to the point that the first mu’tazili could be considered as occupying a middle position between Orthodox Muslims and non-Muslims.From the time of Harun al-Rashid (766-809), theologians therefore tried to elucidate the relationship that existed between this celestial Quran kept on the Table near the throne of God and the one that was revealed (in principle) to Muhammad. Mu'tazili and Hanbali debated this issue until to get out of breath ... and sometimes to lose their life.

For the mu’tazili God cannot be designed by the human mind (tawhid). They say, for example, that the verses of the Quran describing God as sitting on a throne are allegorical. The Mu’tazili therefore affirm that the Quran cannot be eternal, but that it was also created by God, if not the oneness (tawhid) of this one would be impossible. They took their design to the extreme and called their opponents anthropomorphists. This was also the case of many Christians of the time besides.

Contrary to the history of the Christian religion, the first school of Muslim theology is indeed a school with a rationalizing tendency. This school also took rationalism to support the thesis of the creation of the Quran by God in order not to be in contradiction with the dogma of the Oneness of God (Tawhid).

The Mu’tazili indeed had been interested from the beginning in the attacks on Islam by non-Muslims; they even became quickly obsessed by the debate of ideas with other theologies and currents of thought within Islam itself.

How can one affirm the oneness of God if something external to himself is co-eternal? The Christians had already had to struggle with this problem, which is a real challenge to human reason with their idea of Trinity (God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, the same God but who can have with men three different types of relationships).

The problem was just as serious for Islam since its most radical feature justifies it in its eyes as a true religion against all others, namely its strict monotheism and its absolute respect for the absolute oneness of God (tawhid), is logically rigorously contradictory with the notion of uncreated Quuran ...

"Come down" directly from heaven, the Quran is intangible and all the earthly copies of this book reproduce a model book, eternal and uncreated, stored in the "tablet guarded" beside the throne of God ... But how to explain in these conditions the presence of this entity with God ... if you are a supporter of an absolute monotheism.

Jahm Ibn Safwan, who died in 746, and the jahmi accused the literalist traditionists of being some anthropomorphists. Jahm Ibn Safwan denied any resemblance between God and man in order to preserve his absolute transcendence.

The"Murji" theological school arose from the need, on the one hand, to absorb the various and new cultures on which Islam had developed after the Muslim conquests and, on the other hand, from the opposition to the Kharijite school especially on matters relating to sins or truth.

N.B. The Murjites clashed with the Sunni traditionalists by declaring that no Muslim, no Christian, no Jew, or even a member of another religion would enter Hell, how dark his sins are, if he believed in God sincerely . The Murjites are therefore SINCE considered as "Ahlul Bidah" (some innovators) by the Sunnism, which is not really a compliment but rather a quasi synonymous of heretics.

At the beginning of the 9th century Greek philosophy was introduced into Persian and Arab intellectual circles. The Peripatetic School even began to have representatives among them. Those who sought by a philosophical demonstration to comfort and demonstrate the validity of their religious faith and to do so used a methodology based on the Greek dialectic were called mutakallamin ("those who use kalam doubly").

Al-Ma'mun, son of Harun ar-Rashid, came to power in 813, when he was twenty-seven years old, after having defeated the legitimate heir, his brother, with the help of the Persians. It must be said that the Persians are everywhere, and that the caliph himself is the son of a Persian slave; they govern and administer in Baghdad and in the provinces; they also dominate the intelligentsia. The new caliph, who has received a very good education – from Persian masters - opens to the scientists the library that his father had established in the capital for his private use, the House of Wisdom (Bait Al-Hikma); it makes it a place of debate; he gathers in it many Persian (Pahlavi) Byzantine (Syriac and Greek) manuscripts which he makes translated.

In 827, Mu’tazilism became the official religion in the court of the Abbasid Caliphate, after having been officially embraced by Caliph Al-Ma'mun to whom we also owe the recognition of the Sabians of Harran as (later) Thabit ibn Qurra.

As we have seen, the mu’tazilites also vigorously refused the dogma of the uncreated Quran (GHAYR MAKHLUQ), in which they saw, rightly, a questioning of the oneness and transcendence of God and a deviation towards the associationism already reproached to Christians. Indeed, let us remember that Muhammad had clearly rejected by calling it associationism the Christian doctrine of the Trinity because it "associated" other persons with the single and transcendent person of God.

For the Mu’tazilites, one of the first divergent currents of traditional Islam, the notion of uncreated Quran came back in reality to idolatry in the strict sense of the word, that is to say, to put on the same level as God a being an entity or an existing one, not created by him and distinct from him.

Mu’tazilism will remain the official doctrine of the Muslim empire under the two successors of Al Ma'mun, Al-Mu'tasim and Al-Wathiq. The inquisition (Mihna) even forced non-supporters to openly renounce the idea that the Quran is eternal and to profess that it was created. The prison, the whip, the torture, even the death sentence, strike the recalcitrant subjects.

Although its rationalism was very appealing in the educated classes of the time, mu’tazilism did not spread much among the people, probably because of its elitist nature. After its adoption by the rulers (the caliphs) and because of the ensuing persecution, its unpopularity even developed in the common people of Baghdad.

NB. One day Imam Ahmad Ibn Hanbal was asked his opinion about who claims that the Quran was created. He replied, "He is a kafir!" He was asked: "Why do you say he is a " Kafir "? He replied, "Because of these verses from God: Thus have We revealed it, a decisive utterance in Arabic; and if you should follow their desires after that which hath come unto thee of knowledge, then truly would you have from God no protecting friend nor defender "(chapter 13, verse 37). Since the Quran therefore is a part of the knowledge of God, the one who considers it to be created thus becomes a kafir” Ibn Hanbal, after having trouble with this Muslim inquisition, declared the Quran uncreated from the first to the last page.

This rationalizing and more or less philosophical approach, taken over in different forms by other Muslim currents, sometimes with reluctance, therefore will decline significantly from the thirteenth century among Sunnis. The fury of the Orthodox indeed will be such that the debate will no longer be possible. The Orthodox attack all philosophers without distinction and make the books burned. The most famous of these rationalists in the West, the Cordovan Averroes (Ibn Rushd, 1126-1198) was condemned to exile, and his books burned, his work had therefore no influence on Islam.

After Averroes we therefore see an audience loss of the philosophy in favor of the mysticism, the Orthodox considering that the divine revelation does not have to be subjected to human criticism. Let us note in passing that there is concomitance between this defeat of the mu’tazili and the closing of the gates of ijtihad.

THE END OF MU'TAZILISM AND THE DOGMA OF THE UNCREATED QURAN IN LANDS OF ISLAM, LED TO THE CLOSING OF THE GATES OF IJTIHAD AND THEREFORE TO AN UNPRECEDENTED REGRESSION OF CIVILIZATION FOR MANKIND.

In the end the thesis of the uncreated Quran (ghayr makhluq) triumphed after the representatives of the opposing doctrines had been eliminated. The Quran is the very word of God and since God has always existed, so the Quran too is eternal. The Quran was not created by Muhammad or his successors, he was only revealed by them to men.

This Word of God is so precious and so sacred that not a comma, not a single point (and there are many of them in Arabic calligraphy) can be changed. The Quran is FIXED FOREVER as on the form as for the content, and no human, council of sages, theologian or doctor, council or congregation of believers, is authorized to change it in such a minute manner. Its origin is not human. Its criticism is a criticism of God. The only study of the text comes down to memorize it and put it into practice.

The dogma of the uncreated Quran is therefore currently an article of faith in Orthodox Islam but we have seen above that it has not always been so. An atheistic or deistic school of thought has long existed among Muslims, but it has remained very minority because of the ban of which it was a

victim,later. The writings of this current are therefore mostly lost and are known only by the excerpts quoted by their opponents to refute them (same phenomenon in early Christianity with philosophers such as Celsus Porphyry or the works of the Emperor Julian).

For example, we have the case of the famous Ibn al-Rawandi (827-911), a skeptic of Persian (Iranian) origin, critic of the religion in general, Ibn Al-Rawandi was a friend and pupil of Abu Isa al-Warraq, a Manichean "Zindiq" .They were reportedly both driven out of the Mu’tazili school. Then he became a member of Shi'ism, before ending freethinker. Being a heretic whose original writings were lost, several interpretations of his thought exist. Some regard him as a Shiite heretic, a mu’tazilite who has become insane, an Aristotelian or a radical atheist. None of his books have survived him, the only traces of them are found in the critical books that reply to him or in the writings of his admirers.His most famous work is the "Kitab al-Zummurrud" or Blinding Emerald.

Abu Ala Al-Ma'ari (famous poet of the Abbasid time: 973 to 1057).

“People come from far corners of the land

To throw pebbles (at the Satan) and to kiss the black stone.

How strange are the things they say!

Is all mankind becoming blind to truth?

O fools, awake! The rites you sacred hold

Are but a cheat contrived by men of old

Who lusted after wealth and gained their lust

And died in baseness—and their law is dust “.

Without forgetting Jalal al-Din Rumi (famous Sufi poet much later it is true: 1207-1273).

“I search for the way, but not the way to the Ka'ba and the temple

For I see in the former a troop of idolaters

And in the latter a band of self-worshipers.”

And in the second a band of worshipers of oneself.

Let us also mention the doctor philosopher Muhammad Ibn-Zakariyya Al-Razi (Latin: Rhazes, d. 935). He asked: "

“On what ground do you deem it necessary that God should single out certain individuals [by giving them prophecy], that he should set them up above other people, that he should appoint them to be the people's guides, and make people dependent upon them?

You claim that the evidentiary miracle is present and available, namely, the Quran itself. You say: "Whoever denies it, let him produce a similar one." Indeed, we shall produce a thousand similar, from the works of rhetoricians, eloquent speakers and valiant poets, which are more appropriately phrased and state the issues more succinctly. They convey the meaning better and their rhymed prose is in better meter. ... By God what you say astonishes us! You are talking about a work which recounts ancient myths, and which at the same time is full of contradictions and does not contain any useful information or explanation. Then you say: Produce something like it"?!

TWELFTH RANDOM DRILLING IN IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE CONTRADICTIONS THEREFORE WHICH PROVE THAT THE QURAN CANNOT BE UNCREATED (GHAYR MAKHLUQ).

Sahih Bukhari Volume 6, Book 60, Number 10.

Umar said, "I agreed with God in three things," or , "My Lord agreed with me in three things.” I said, 'O God’s Apostle! Would that you took the station of Abraham as a place of prayer.' I also said, 'O God’sApostle! Good and bad persons visit you! Would that you ordered the mothers of the believers to cover themselves with veils.' So the Divine Verses of Al-Hijab (i.e., veiling of the women) were revealed.

Sahih Bukhari 6:60: 313.

Ibn Umar reported Umar as saying: My lord concorded with (my judgments) on three occasions. In case of the Station of Ibrahim, in case of the observance of the veil and in case of the prisoners of Badr.

No revelation was sent down on this subject until Umar spied on Muhammad's own wives. Why did Umar do this? How did he know (or at least suspect) it would be “successful”? Why does God about toilet privacy so much that he revealed a verse pertaining to all Muslim women that will ever live?

How can the Quran be the text that was in existence since before the world began, if God is taking suggestions for its content from Muhammad's contemporaries? If Muhammad is just a messenger, relating God's word, why did Umar ask Muhammad for the hijab (veil) revelation? Why did he not just pray to God and ask directly?

A common apologetic for this is that God was waiting for Umar to do this so that the situational revelation could come down. However this is not mentioned anywhere; thus there is no evidence for it. Moreover, Umar confirms that he came up with the idea first and then God "agreed with him."

The only margin of interpretation given by a sacred text considered to have come directly from Heaven may result only from its possible obscurities, contradictions, or ambiguities, either intrinsically or according to the language in which it was then expressed. However, ambiguities, contradictions and obscurities are not lacking with regard to the Quran, the sacred text admits it itself.

Chapter 3 verse 7: "He it is Who has revealed unto thee the Scripture wherein are clear revelations - they are the substance of the Book - and others which are allegorical. But those in whose hearts is doubt pursue, indeed, that which is allegorical seeking …..seeking to explain it. None knows its explanation save God.”

Chapter 4 verse 82: "Will they not then ponder on the Quran ? If it had been from other than God they would have found therein much incongruity.”Indeed, the whole problem is there!

A) The verses that cannot come from God.

Several passages cannot be attributed to God and are obviously told by Muhammad or by the angel Gabriel even by others.

This is the case, for example, of the Fatiha or first chapter of the Quran which proclaims, "In the name of God, the Beneficent, the Merciful. Praise be to God, Lord of the Worlds, etc., etc."

Don't have to be a rocket scientist to understand that these words are addressed to God and are in no way a revelation that God gave to Muhammad. It is a prayer that Muhammad addresses to his God, to ask him for help and assistance.

The pious Muslims remark that it would suffice to add the injunction "say" at the beginning of this chapter so that there is no more contradiction. And in fact, the verb "to say" in the imperative is repeated 350 times in the Quran, but it can also simply mean that this verb thus conjugated was inserted by late compilers in order to circumvent the difficulty that we have just mentioned.

For Ibn Masud, companion of the prophet and undeniable Quranic authority, the Fatiha and the last two chapters (113 and 114) were not part of the Quran because they contain the words: "I seek refuge in the Lord."

Editor's note. There is, however, a good chance that these are chapters that are among the most authentically Mohammedan (the beginning of preaching in Mecca) precisely because they are short and still pagan minded.

This is even more obvious in chapter 6 verse 104 where it is said, "I am not a keeper over you." The subject who speaks and who explains that he is not a keeper for men ... can only be Muhammad.

In this same chapter, in verse 114, “Shall I seek other than God for judge," it is still Muhammad who

speaks again and not God.

Chapter 75 verses 1 and 2, chapter 90 verse 1. God cannot swear otherwise than by himself or on himself.

And besides, why would God speak of him in the third person? It is simply Muhammad speaking of God.

Chapter 19 verse 64 and chapter 37 verses 164-166, they are the angels or some angels who speak and not God.

B) Verses revealed to Umar.

There are at least three verses in the Quran that were not first received by Muhammad but by the future Caliph Umar according to the asbab al nuzul or "circumstances of the revelation."

This is the verse on the place where Abraham stood as an oratory (chapter 2 verse 125), the verse on the veil or hijab (chapter 33 verse 59) and the verse on domestic problems found by Muhammad with his wives (chapter 66 verse 5). Is not Jesus the Nazarene whoever wants indeed!

The hadith of Umar. A hadith of the Sahih by Al Bukhari according to Anas Ibn Malik (volume 6 Book 60 number 10). "

“Umar said, "I agreed with God in three things," or said, "My Lord agreed with me in three things.

-I said, 'O God’s Apostle! Would that you took the station of Abraham as a place of prayer.'

-I also said, 'O God’s Apostle! Good and bad persons visit you! Would that you ordered the mothers of the believers to cover themselves with veils.' So the Divine Verses of Al-Hijab (i.e., veiling of the women) were revealed.

-I came to know that the Prophet had blamed some of his wives so I entered upon them and said, 'You should either stop (troubling the Prophet ) or else God will give His Apostle better wives than you.'

When I came to one of his wives, she said to me, 'O 'Umar! Does God's Apostle haven't what he could advise his wives with, that you try to advise them?' " Thereupon God revealed:--

"It may be, if he repudiated you (all) his Lord will give him instead of you, wives better than you Muslims (who submit to God, etc.)." (Quran 66.5)

C) Some verses state that the Quran was written in a clear Arabic language.

Holy Quran.

Chapter 11 verse 1: "ALIF, LAM, RA. This is a Scripture the revelations whereof are perfected and then expounded. (It cometh) from One Wise, Informed,

Chapter 6 verse 114: "this Scripture, fully explained ? ".

Chapter 41 verse 3: "A Scripture whereof the verses are expounded, a Lecture in Arabic for people who have knowledge."

But despite this repeated affirmation that God speaks Arabic and very clearly, the Muslim tradition nevertheless admits that the Quran was revealed according to seven different "al-ahruf" or "reading variants" corresponding, according to the majority of the doctors of the Muslim faith to the seven dialects of the seven major Arab tribes that prevailed in Mecca at the time of Revelation.

This is a new miracle of the Quran, God's adaptation of the Quranic message to each Arab tribe in their own language! Different words were used to mean the same sense so that each Arab tribe would easily understand it (whereas any amateur linguist knows that there are no exactly synonymous and interchangeable terms in which case the language would make one of the terms disappear, becoming then unnecessary. In reality, there is therefore always a difference, however minimal, between synonyms, whether it is related to the signified itself, to the connotations conveyed (meliorative pejorative, laudatory, etc.) the language register or the context of use of the words. Strictly speaking, it is therefore some parasynonyms.

D) The traces of manipulation.

As we have seen, according to the Shiites, the revealed text would have been compiled in its original chronological form and in its entirety by Ali only. Members of a very closed circle of the Shiite elite even claim to know the contents of this compilation. But they do not have the right to reveal it to public (even within the Shiites): it is only when the one they consider their twelfth infallible imam (the Mahdi, hidden in a cave for twelve centuries) will return among the men that he will unveil again publicly the true and genuine compilation of the Quran.

By analyzing the poetic style, it is possible to detect additional sentences that have been added to the Quran because they break the rhythm and the versification of the suras (e.g., 20:15, 78: 1-5, 78: 32-34; 74: 31 and 50: 24 to 32).

A break in rhythm also affects visibly verse 51 of chapter 5: " O you who believe! Take not the Jews and the Nasaras (Nazarenes or Christians) for friends. They are friends one to another.”

It can be seen that the mention "and the Nasaras" is in the way because it breaks the original phrasing, so it is a late addition, probably inserted to discredit the Christians. In fact, we can even notice that the passages containing the word "Nasara" are almost all some interpolations, for example

in the chapters 2 : 111, 2 :113, 2:120, 2 :135, 2 :140 and 5 :18.

Lastly, a gloss has been added to chapter 104 to translate FALSELY the hapax legomenon hutama that no one knows in reality what it means. End of the world ? Explosion? Final conflagration?

E) The abrogated verses (mansukh), the abrogating verses (nasikh).

As we have already had the opportunity to say it, Mu’tazilisme is a school which, from a reflection about the question of the omnipotence of God and the freedom of man, the oneness of God and his attributes (partly in reaction to Mazdaean dualism and Christian dogmas) developed in fifty years a doctrine that can be described as rationalizing. Mu'tazili don’t believe that God was able to give men a book with the attribute of eternity like Him. An uncreated Quran would contradict the dogma of divine oneness (tawhid). But since the Quran is created that it is a fact of history which can be explained by circumstances and men, it can be corrected, updated. Moreover, God cannot have recommended to men behaviors that are not in compliance with reason: some passages of the Holy Book that preach evil as reason makes it possible to define it cannot therefore be words of God. It is therefore with the Mu’tazili that will begin therefore a first sorting between the verses, of which some of them are abrogated.

The contradictions that exist within the Quran are therefore today explained by Islamic casuistry as being a simple matter of abrogated verses (Mansukh) and abrogating verses (Nasikh): the most recent verses relating to a given subject repeal the verses the oldest on the same subject (what is a priori logical, except that we would still expect from God a little more ability to anticipate). There are several levels of abrogation depending on whether the abrogation relates to the reading of the text or only to its prescription while the text remains inscribed in the Quran. The abrogation principle is based on two verses (Quran chapter 2 verse 106 and chapter 16 verse 101). To make people understand the principle of God's abrogation of his own verses, religious men in the lands of Islam often use the analogy with the doctor who makes his treatment evolve according to the state of the patient (Revelation could not be given at once wholly to Men).

Our comment. We understand what the pious Muslims are saying in this regard. God cannot do everything and he is obliged to take into account some limits and particularly the human limits that he has fixed to his own creature. Among us Taranis or Jupiter, Lug, Jehovah or Buddha, are not omnipotent, they are subject to the set of universal cosmic laws that is called Fate, Dharma, secondary causes or providence. So far no problem, we understand very well!

But what we have more difficulty to understand is how an almighty God, a tawhid, who agreed to enter into the spirit of the game at the beginning and for a few decades, of the gradual revelation of the Quran to be understood from men, suddenly stopped doing this because of the death of a man in 632 and now refuses to change anything in his text, to abrogate anything, to adapt anything, to the modern world, for example.

And why besides he created our world if it was to destroy it after (hutama = end of the world). To have the pleasure of Judging and sending to hell some of us ??? Because he needed to be worshiped (oh the need for love, forever!)

F) The pathetic personal polemics having constantly peppered the life of Muhammad according to the Quran itself. How could an uncreated, eternal, consubstantial with God, text, could be lowered to this level of baseness or be so involved in such details, bordering on the sordid (stories of debauchery, etc.). See the literary genre of the circumstances of the revelation (asbab al nuzul). God is almighty but even so! How can one think that the being of beings whatever the name given to him (the Tawhid God or God) can be lowered to the point of directly dealing with the domestic problems of Muhammad ??

This, indeed, is the meaning of one of the remarks of Muhammad's favorite wife, Aisha, as related by the hadith 48 volume 7 Book 62 of the Sahih Bukhari.

“When the verse: "(O Muhammad) You may postpone (the turn of) any of them (your wives) that you please,' (Quran 33: 51) was revealed, " 'Aisha said, 'O God’s Apostle! I do not see, but, that your Lord hurries in pleasing you.' "

De minimis non curat praetor. God does not deal directly with secondary or subordinate things. The Fate the secondary causations or the divine providence it serves for that. How can you get such a low idea of the being of beings or Tawhid, of God or Allah ???

This is really a very schizoid design of the Tawhid or God as being beings that to lower him to take sides in all these pathetic stories (see for example chapter 111 of the Quran).

G) The vocabulary which is not of "pure" Arab origin in the Quran.

The uncreated Quran has always existed since it is consubstantial with God. But the Quran was written in a rather precisely dated language, which certainly did not exist 100 000 years ago and which will not be spoken any more surely in another 100,000 thousand years. The Quran uses in principle the known and practiced Arabic of MUHAMMAD TIME. It was necessary, by definition, that

Muhammad be understood by his listeners, the Arabs in Mecca or Medina. We say "by definition" because we will see that this statement of principle is not without raising many problems to which we will return.

Let us note for the moment that words of non-Arab origin are included in it, as well as the Arabization of certain terms, designating particularly import products unknown by the Arab world: "qintar" (chapter 3 verse 14), of Latin origin (centenarius); "Suradiq" (chapter 75 verse 51), of Ethiopian Amharic origin; "sundus" (chapter 18 verse 31), of Persian origin; etc.

NB. On this subject, let us point out to Muslim or non-Muslim specialists but who are Arabic speakers, of the Quran, that the Barbarian and the Roman are not languages (the language of the Romans was the language of the Latium, that is to say Latin) and that the probability of a penetration of "Romanian" words in the Arabic of that time is, of course, more than non-existent. Hebrew, Indian, Persian, Ethiopian, Coptic, Greek and Syrian or others by cons, all right!

For a long time, Orthodoxy muzzled the many Muslim philologists who recognized that the Quran was full with words of non-Arab origin.

Luckily, philologists like Suyuti invented subterfuges that allowed them to circumvent the opposition of the Orthodox. Ibn Atiya explained that there were words foreign in origin but that " Arabs used them and Arabized them and that from this aspect they had become Arabic.”

Yes, but what relationship with the word of God from immemorial time? What is the relationship with Arabic spoken a thousand years before Muhammad? And did Arabic exist three thousand years before Muhammad? Is it in Arabic that God spoke to Eve and Adam in the Garden of Eden? The objection is childish because the idea thus refuted proves to be childish. In any case, the Muslim faith in this field, as in many others, has nothing to do but nothing to do with reason. These are two different worlds. The pious and believing Muslim is schizoid.

But let us return to our sheep.

Where Al Suyuti lists 107 words foreign in origin, Arthur Jeffery finds of them about 275, mainly borrowed from Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac, Amharic, Persian and Greek. The word "Quran" itself would come from Syriac qeryana (which means lectionary) and obviously Muhammad had it from a Christian source.

You believed to read to listen, to translate the Quran. In reality, you repeat only the interpretations of the commentators who from the end of the ninth century, especially from Tabari (died in 923) have sought simply to overcome the web of obscurities which forms the " Clear book.” Their interpretations continue to guide those of the contemporaries.

But these grammarians and commentators are not Arabs of the Hejaz, they are Persians living in Baghdad. They have no idea of the society and of the legal system of Arabia before Islam. And they know no other Semitic language than Arabic. These grammarians reasoned from classical Arabic whose Quran was supposed to be the inimitable masterpiece. So they were trying to explain things that are, in fact, not some bad Arabic, but some good Syriac.

For Christoph Luxenberg the Arabic of the Quran is certainly not the official Arabic, as it will be established by the grammarians of the following centuries. It is an intermediate language, the result of a mixture between Arabic and Syriac, which for centuries has been the culture language in the Syrian-Iraqi space ....

The original or early Quran was only an anthology of passages from pre-existing and adapted in vernacular language, holy books, an anthology for liturgical reading, in other words, what is called a lectionary.

This is, moreover, what the beginning of chapter 12, which tells the story of Joseph (Genesis, 37-50), affirms, if we translate it as Luxenberg does: "These are the signs of the elucidated Scripture. We have sent them down as an Arabic lectionary (Quran) so that you may understand.”

Or again 41: 3: "A scripture that we have translated as an Arabic lectionary (Quran).

As well as 75: 17-18: "It is incumbent upon you us to compile it (the Quran/Lectionary) (by means of excerpts from the Scriptures) and to recite it (instructively)”.

And finally 28: 49. " Then bring a scripture from the presence of God that gives clearer guidance than these two (that) I may follow it” (of course. It can be only the Old and New Testament ... since the paper Quran did not exist yet).

If the Quran means, strictly speaking, a lectionary, one is allowed to admit that the early Quran meant nothing more than being a liturgical book with selected texts from Scripture (Old and New Testaments), and by no means a new Scripture itself, an independent scripture. Hence the many allusions to Scripture, without the knowledge of it the Quran might seem to be for its reader a book sealed with seven seals.”

After the death of Muhammad, a first version was gathered under the reign of Abu-Bakr (died in 634), on the suggestion of Caliph Umar (died in 644). This first collection would have been deposited at

Abu-Bakr, and after his death in the house of his daughter Hafsah, widow of Muhammad. But divergent private collections also began to go around. As a result, there have been many Qurans whose content and organization of the verses differed sometimes completely (the Quran of Ali would have been a chronological Quran). To put an end to it, the Caliph Uthman (died in 656) decided to establish his own edition. He ordered to burn any other private collection of the Quran, not without reluctance from their owners (but Umar and Abu Bakr had already made remove many versions before). It is important here to remember that the reign of the caliph Uthman was only a long crisis, and that he was particularly criticized for his version of the Quran before being finally assassinated by a Muslim. Uthman was therefore the first "commander of the believers" to have been assassinated by ... believers! Yet it is his version of the Quran that is today considered the eternal word of God. A little bit as if in Christianity it was Judas who had had the responsibility to write the Gospels.

In the early centuries of Islam, many books were written, which noted differences between the existing Quran; and even if Othman only released one version (his own) it took years for Muslim scholars to recognize the book and propagate it in the Islamic world.

While modern Muslims may be bound by boundless religious conformism, early Muslim scholars were much more flexible, and admitted that entire parts of the Quran were lost, perverted, that there were many thousands of variants that made it impossible to speak of a single uncreated Quran. They also knew that the Quran compiled by the private secretaries of the Prophet was different from Uthman's.

Whatever it be, it is certain that the present Muslim dogma is that the Quran of Uthman is the only authentic text, and that it is in compliance with the revelation received by Muhammad. Anyone who doubts it anyway is considered an apostate and therefore liable to capital punishment.

This dogma is based on a divine promise: Lo! We, even We, reveal the Reminder, and lo! We verily are its Guardian (chapter 15 verse 9). Let us point out once again , however, that while Sunni and Shiite Muslims today have roughly the same text of the Quran, with minimal differences, Shia still blames Uthman for removing or modifying the passages in which Ali is mentioned (died in 661), his political rival.

A rigorous historical study exploiting all available documents in order to better determine the steps of the writing of the Quran, the language actually used during its creation, the successive writings, changes and adaptations that this text has obviously undergone over the hundred years which were previous its definitive fixation is therefore indispensable, but the Muslims of today do not care in any way and besides resist all the scientific attempts on the subject, most often external, and for good reason : it would be to question the central dogma of their belief, that of the uncreation (GHAYR MAKHLUQ) of the Quran.

THIRTEENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE QURAN ACCORDING TO OTHER CURRENT AUTHORS.

Exogenous elements are present from the beginning in the Quran, which are neither from the Arab cultural background nor due to the literary or poetic talent of Muhammad.

Assuming that there was indeed an early Quran made of a collection of chosen texts from the Old and New Testaments including in the broadest sense that is to say with the apocryphal texts), this apocryphal Quran had to be very early, even during the lifetime of Muhammad, increased with various texts, the true visions of the Muhammad of the Meccan beginnings, the false visions of the Medinan Muhammad, the writings coming from the Judeo-Christian circles, without taking into account the incredible repeating chopping in which the publishers of the subsequent Quran, Abu Bakr, Uthman, engaged by cutting out the texts in any way as in order to make them illegible, incomprehensible, and therefore better to mask their own incorporation of new texts.

Objectively speaking, the Quran is therefore a series of sheets of paper containing many narratives circulating throughout the Orient, integrated into the most official dogmas or into apocryphal works of popular piety. Muhammad or his companions heard, reproduced, distorted, disguised, adapted, many existing traditions. Muhammad has heard them in a foreign language, in fragments, in a superficial way, without always fully understanding the deep meaning of the doctrines in question, and often from heterodox Christian religious (Nestorians Gnostics ). This is why it leads to a curious result that sometimes falls within the mishmash, sometimes the puzzle, with many collages, cuttings, changes, the whole linked by an "inspiration" which gives prominence to invective rude remarks and curses, everywhere present, to the omnipresent vendetta, revenge, hatred and jealousy.

The resulting text is nevertheless considered by Islam as a definitive absolute one, Muhammad being "the seal of the prophets", and as such he closes the complete cycle of the announcements of God to men. The Muslim religion therefore considers itself the ultimate and definitive religion of the human race in its totality.

The Quran is therefore the word of God revealed to his last prophet, by the angel Gabriel, we said. And it's the guidance towards a perfect life. God said indeed, " This [the Quran] is clear indication for mankind, and a guidance and a mercy for a folk whose faith is sure” (Quran chapter 45 verse 20).

Muhammad also stated in a hadith narrated by Ibn Hibban that whoever takes as a guide the Quran, God will lead him to Heaven, and that whoever (leaves it) behind him, then God will push him into the fire of hell .

This has many practical effects and several dramatic consequences.

God said: " Only those believe in Our revelations who, when they are reminded of them, fall down prostrate and hymn the praise of their Lord”(Quran chapter 32 verse 15).

Muslims must establish and keep a particularly close relationship with the Quran. They are called for reading it, understanding its meaning, memorizing it, and living in conformity with its teachings.

The Muslim must respect the Quran and glorify it because it is the sacred word of God. He must protect his verses from anything that might harm them. If he owns, for example, a Quran or a Quranic book, then he must put it in an honorary place and not use it in a manner that would run against the respect due to it. He must not put another book on it or any other object. The Quran or Quranic collection must always be in the upper position because it contains the word of God.

Respect is equally due to any newspaper or sheet of paper containing a verse from the Quran or one of God's names. Anyone who uses these sheets in a way that would harm them, who does not protect the verses of the Quran or the names of God, or the names of his messengers and prophets, would be guilty of a serious sin.

For this reason, it is illegal to use the pages of newspapers or magazines containing verses from the Quran or the names of God, to pack objects and foods or to arrange them for eating on them. Because these papers are then thrown in the trash and thus become subject to degradation.

If a Muslim wants to get rid of a sheet containing a verse from the Quran, then he must burn it and then bury its ashes to make sure that it will not be subject to degradation. This is a legal obligation and anyone who takes it lightly will be guilty of a serious sin.

The Qur'an therefore occupies a fundamental place in the life of every Muslim believer. In mosques, it is not recited but chanted. Indeed, by reciting the Quran, the imam thinks he recites a word from God: he is no longer a man using his own voice but an instrument of the divine word.

TAFSIR (BY PETER DELACRAU).

We agree on one point with Islam: yes God spoke to men.

The Divine one has always spoken to men since they existed, because that is perhaps what distinguishes best Man from animals. The Neanderthal man already buried his dead for example. But can we really believe that God spoke Arabic with Neanderthals ??? Spoke Arabic with Adam and Eve ??? That the

uncreated or heavenly Quran is written in this language and not in another ???

So yes the Divine one hasalways spoken to men since they existed, for perhaps 100,000 years if not more, all over the planet and not only on the Sinai in Palestine or Arabia, and in all languages BECAUSE IN FACT THE DIVINE ONE DOES NOT NEED A HUMAN LANGUAGE TO MAKE FEEL HIS PRESENCE AND SENSE HIS WILL. Since some specialists in quranic pure Arabic speak of borrowing from the Roman language (sic) or from the barbarian language (again sic); let us be assured that the Divine one also spoke in Sumerian to the Sumerians in Hebrew to the Hebrews ... and even in Celtic to the Celts. This idea was explicitly part of druidic dogmas in this field.

Diodorus of Sicily. Historical Library. Book V, chapter XXXI.

" It is a custom of theirs that no one should perform a sacrifice without a "philosopher"; for thank-offerings should be rendered to the gods, they say, by the hands of men who are experienced in the nature of the divine, and who speak, as it were, the language of the gods [they are homophonon in greek language], and it is also through the mediation of such men, they think, that blessings likewise should be sought”.

The custom among them is that no one can make a sacrifice without one of these 'philosophers', for thanksgiving must be offered to the gods, they say, through these men, who have the experience of divine nature, and which speak, so to speak, the language of the gods [they are homophonon in Greek]; it is also through these men, they believe, that one must also seek divine blessings. "

But if the Divine one speaks to mankind since its appearance on earth, why in this case would have it definitively stopped to do so in 632 in Medina, because of the death of a single man? Was this man alone (Muhammad) as good as past present and future Mankind?

The Christian theologians at least were wise to design the notion of Holy Spirit and / or Paraclete after the disappearance of their god-man.

Our conviction to us is that the Divine one has spoken to mankind and that he is still speaking to it!

And to do this he uses all possible and imaginable languages because in fact the Divine does not need to enunciate words to make himself (partially *) understood.

We also fully agree with the Christian allegory of the Pentecost miracle.

“Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!” (Acts 2-8, 9,10,11).

Pentecost is a Christian holiday attested since the fourth century; it took place at the end of a period of fifty days after Easter. It commemorates a collective mystical experience of the apostles of the Nazarene high rabbi Jesus reported by the Acts of the Apostles and celebrates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon them: tongues of fire arise on each of them, thus symbolizing the coming of the Spirit in an episode of inspired communication that allows the disciples to express themselves in languages other than Galilean, without it is very clear whether it is polyglotism or glossolalia cases.

N.B. Glossolalia is the ability to speak or pray aloud in a foreign language totally unknown by the speaker. Glossolalia phenomena have been reported in shamanism and spiritualism.

For Christians, this glossolalia corresponds to "speaking in tongues", a phenomenon described in the Acts of the Apostles, as we have just seen. It is sometimes the "tongue of angels" (true glossolalia) what the ancient druids as we have also seen considered to be the tongue of gods(they called themselves homophonon of them - this is the word used by Diodorus.

In order to return to the uncreated Quran theory. My God but how can one believe that ??? The eye has its blind spot called Mariotte's spot. We are forced to admit that some of our fellow humans have a brain also unfortunately endowed with an intellectual equivalent of the blind spot of Mariotte. Arrived at certain places of the road (in curves or slopes) their brain shifts to neutral, it works no longer. Their faith has nothing to do with reason.

We will therefore apply in this brief essay the method of analysis used until now in our study of Irish legends and developed in our many counter-lays (no jealous people!)

There remains, of course, the hypothesis that the Quran is a demonic or devilish word, since some verses explicitly recognize that Satan can deceive even the greatest prophets: "Never sent We a messenger or a prophet before thee but when He recited (the message) Satan proposed (opposition) in respect of that which he recited thereof" (chapter 22 verse 52).

As far as we are concerned, however, we also reject this hypothesis because the Quran is indeed a human word and even in its claim to be only a divine word it is precisely human, too human, terribly human. And we therefore respect Islam and Muslims only to the extent that they respect us, this is called reciprocity, it is one of the basic principles of all life in society. On a negative level it gives the law of retaliation theorized by the Hebrews in the Bible, it gives the need to sanction every bad action in the former Druidism. As St Patrick himself recognizes it in the Senchus Mor, there is strengthening social cohesion (in the case of pagan societies in any case) when a bad action does not remain unpunished (Intud i ngeindtleacht gnim olc madindechur).

On a more positive level that gives that gives eh well the greatest respect precisely: I do not do unto others what I would not want them to do unto me (golden rule). So, little question now, you who believe in God (in the design of God that is designated by the name of Allah), do you respect me who is neither Jew nor Christian nor Muslim nor Parsi but whose ideas oscillate according to the subjects or my mood between pantheism (all is god) agnosticism (I am not sure of the cultic path that must be followed) even atheism?

CONCLUSION.

The Qur'an is not only a series of excerpts from the word of God transmitted by direct reading of a pre-existent tablet of the heavenly law, done by the angel Gabriel, it is "Makhluq" and this for 4 main reasons .

-The first is that God, at least a god like that of Abraham of Isaac and of Muhammad, does not exist and that the only god whose existence may be discussed is that of the philosophers (the Greek high knowers).

-The second is that there can be no tablets of law written from immemorial time, containing (in Arabic) all that there is to br know by and for mankind.

-The third is that the angel Gabriel is only a human invention belatedly linked to these visions. Islam is not originally a monotheistic religion of the Abrahamic type but a henotheism focused on a divine figure called God by the inhabitants of Mecca and artificially but gradually inserted in the common core of the various monotheisms spread in the region at the time (Judaïsm Judeo-Christianism, Christian Gnosticism, and finally perhaps Christianity period), this bringing together having been initiated by Muhammad himself and his entourage after they have discovered the Jews in Medina or by their successors.

-The fourth is that the Quran thus created is only a series of words written down on some paper and resulting essentially:

First, from the visions of a man in a state of trance, born in Mecca in the second half of the 6th century.

Secondly, from quotation borrowed consciously by him or his immediate successors from other regional religious traditions (Jewish, Judeo-Christian, Gnostic, even Christian).

Thirdly from various manipulations of these flashes of inspiration or of these quotations:

-By removal.

-By additions and interpolations.

-By dismemberments of certain long chapters of the initial compilation and displacements elsewhere of their constituent elements.

The unsurpassable nature of the final result called Quran is therefore only a matter of taste (to each his own) resulting essentially from a conditioned reflex instilled from childhood to the young Muslim, and just like beauty, it is purely subjective.

So let us pray that the laws of this country will continue for a long time to leave us free

-Not to be convinced by all this.

- Not to agree with these dogmas.

-To express this opinion and to make it shared.

* When we say "partially" we do not mean that the Divine one is incapable of being understood but that the human understanding is necessarily limited. Human beings only comprehend with difficulty what belongs to the realm of the divine one.

FOURTEENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

The version that is now considered the official Quran is that of Uthman (644-656), a despotic caliph who destroyed all previous sources (but Umar and Abu Bakr had already removed many versions before).

The most widespread version of the Koran today is therefore that of Cairo, prepared under the patronage of the king of Egypt, Fu'ad 1st, in 1923. It has 114 chapters (called suras). Each chapter is presented with a title, some with two (chapters 9, 17, 35, 47,68), even more.

The title comes either from one of the first words in the chapter (53: the Star, 55: the Beneficent), either from a characteristic narrative (14: Abraham, 19: Mary), or from an episode considered characteristic (16: the Bee, 29: the Spider).

These titles are not part of the original text (same thing with the Bible) and do not appear in the earliest known Quranic manuscripts; they were added by the scribes to distinguish the chapters.

Some, however, trace these titles back to Muhammad who would have fixed them.

The chapters are classified almost in the decreasing order of their length, with the exception of the first the fatihah . Some argue that this order was established by agreement of the Muslims (ittifaqi). It is reported in this regard that Ali (died in 661) had a Quran in chronological order, now lost.

Others believe that the current order of the Quran was settled on by Muhammad himself on God's decree (Tawqifi).

The Muslim tradition maintains that during Muhammad's lifetime, his companions wrote down the revealed passages as they could. During the last month of Ramadan preceding the death of Muhammad, the angel Gabriel would have

reviewed with Muhammad the whole of the Quran and indicated the final order of the verses and chapters.

At the head of 29 chapters are letters called fawatih al-suwar or al-huruf al-muqatta'ah: ALM (chapters 2, 3, 29, 30, 31, 32), ALMR (chapter 13), ALMS (chapter 7) ), ALR (Chapters 10, 11, 12, 14, 15), HM (Chapters 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46), KHI'S (Chapter 19), N (Chapter 68), Q (Chapter 50) ), S (Chapter 38), TH (Chapter 20), TS (Chapter 27), TSM (Chapter 26, 28), YS (chapter 36).

It is doubtful that these letters could be dated during the lifetime of Muhammad since nobody has thought to ask him their meaning. As a result, we may think that these are later additions, probably serving as point of reference for the classification of Quranic passages, the letters of the alphabet then having numerical values, as in Syriac, Hebrew and Latin. .

In fact, five chapters of the Qur'an have kept as such a group of letters: the chapters 20 (TaHa), 36 (YaSin), 38 (Sad), 50 (Qaf) and 68 (Nun, also called Al-Qalam).

FIFTEENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE DOGMA OF THE INIMITABILITY OR INSUPERABILITY

OF THE QURAN (I’JAZ AL QURANI).

The dogma of the inimitability of the Quran is obviously to be compared to the dogma of the impeccability of the prophets and above all of Muhammad the good model (isma).

This inimitability (i’jaz) of the Quran is an article of the Muslim faith which was established by the grammarian al-Rummani (died in 996), but the Iranian-Arab author Ibn al-Muqaffa (720-757) had already been involved in polemics concerning this Quranic inimitability. He was indeed attributed a Muaradat al Qurani clearing Manicheism).

Quranic foundation.

Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 23: "If you are in doubt about what we have brought down on our servant, come with a similar sura ."

Holy Quran chapter 5 verse 3: "Today I have made your religion perfect, I have completed my grace on you, I accept Islam as your religion."

Holy Quran chapter 6 verse 114: "Shall I seek a judge other than God? It is he who has sent down the Book which is clearly set out for you."

Holy Quran chapter 10, verse 38: "Produce a sura like this ."

Holy Quran, Chapter 11, verse 13: "Produce then a dozen suras like this one ."

Holy Quran, Chapter 17, verse 88: "Even if men and jinns were to join together to bring the likeness of this Quran, they cannot bring its likeness, even if they help each other ."

The inimitability or impassable nature of the Quran (i’jaz) is therefore the dogma that the Quran, as a

divine revelation, cannot be imitated, either in the beauty of its language or in the ideas it contains.

As far as the beauty of ideas is concerned, this dogma is somewhat paradoxical since Muhammad spent his time repeating that he was only recalling a message already sent by God before him. The Quran, as its name indicates, was not originally equated to a Revelation, but presented itself as a "reminder" of it (11,120; 21,10 and 50; 29,51; 36,69), a meditation of already known texts: "Thus, We tell you certain accounts of times gone by and it is indeed a reminder from Us that We bring you" (20,99). How then can you continue to equate the Quran with Revelation?

It is customary among today's Muslims to repeat that from the point of view of style the Quran is inimitable, unsurpassable (i'jaz al Qurani). This statement is anything but objective. Beauty is subjective and just as faith has nothing to do with reason.

This dogma was constructed relatively late and was the subject of numerous divergences before becoming established.

It was also put forward by some Arabic speakers to prohibit the translation of the Quran. Some currents of Islam still claim that the Quran can only exist in Arabic and that it cannot and should not be translated. This insistence on the Arabic language can obviously give rise to all sorts of racist, nationalist or xenophobic excesses, at least in the eyes of non-Arabic-speaking populations.

Ibrahim ibn Sayyar al-Nazzam (died in 846), a Mutazilite rationalist theologian, also advanced the theory of the sarfa. It consisted in saying that God had deliberately intervened to prevent the Arabs from producing a text similar to the Quran. Without this divine intervention, Muslim Arabs would have easily won the challenge. This divine intervention was in itself a miracle (mu'jiza). As far as the text is concerned, there is nothing special about it. However, its superiority is due to the information it contains about the unknown events of the past or those to come.

The theologian Fakhr al-Din al-Razi (1150-1210), as for him, also affirmed that the linguistic miracle of the Quran was not in the stylistic quality of the text, but in its meanings.

The Quran is therefore not inimitable as an Arabic text; its superiority lies in its content rather than in its style. This brings us back to what has already been mentioned above, namely that the Quran initially was NOT A REVELATION BUT A REMINDER.

This theory of the sarfa still considers the Quran as a miracle (mu'jiza), a work beyond human capacity. It falls into the same category as the miracles performed by the ancient prophets such as the change of a staff into a serpent by Moses or the healing of diseases and the return of the dead to life, practiced by Jesus. On the recognition of this Quranic miracle, of course, depends to a large extent the credibility of Muhammad and the authenticity of the Quran.

But the idea that the content of the Quran, what it says that had remained unknown until then or that

concerns the future, would be the only matter of the "challenge" (al-tahaddi) arouses theological difficulties, even from a Mutazilite point of view. To the extent that the divine knowledge is absolute, whatever the limits of human knowledge, it is impossible for God - whose justice is absolute - to challenge man beyond human capacities. Divine justice (al-'adl), the second principle of the Tawhid in Mutazilite rationalist theology, allows only a challenge that would fall in the order of human capacities....

Despite the refutation of al-Nazzâm's theory by both opponents and supporters of the Mu'tazila, it remained implicitly taken into account. Judge Abu Bakr al-Baqillani (died in 1013), an Ashariite theologian like Abd al-Qahir, devoted a book to explaining what distinguishes the Quran from all other texts, including earlier sacred texts. For him, the uniqueness of the Quran lies precisely in the fact that it is neither prose nor poetry; it is a literary genre in itself. No human literary criteria can be used to evaluate it. Al-Baqillani even goes so far as to belittle the famous seven great pre-Islamic odes (Mu'allaqat) which he considers inferior to the Quran.

The fact that Muhammad was semiliterate (ummi) serves as further evidence that it is the very nature of the speaker -God- that makes any comparison between the Quran and another text impossible.

According to him, the Quranic miracle (al-i’jaz) can indeed be proven by three elements.

-The first is that it contains information about the invisible (al-ghayb), which is beyond the power of human beings who have no means of attaining this knowledge.

-The second is that it is well known that Muhammad was illiterate (Ummi), that he could not write and could hardly read. Similarly, it is usually admitted that he had no knowledge of the books of earlier peoples, their memory, their history, the biographies of their heroes. Yet, he gave summaries of what happened in history, spoke of past periods, and gave the accounts of Adam's creation. He also mentioned the story of Noah, the story of Abraham and all the other prophets mentioned in the Quran. Muhammad according to al-Baqillani, had no way of knowing any of these, except that he was taught (sic) ……His conclusion is that he acquired this knowledge only through Revelation.

-The third element is that the Quran is wonderfully arranged and composed, and it is so high in its literary elegance that it is beyond what any creature can compose. At least this is al-Baqillani's conclusion.

Two of his ideas are interesting for this paper. Firstly, his idea that the Quran represents a unique literary genre; this is an idea that will be taken over by Taha Hussein (1889-1973). Secondly, his definition of the ghayb (the invisible).

Let us begin, however, by debunking a legend that has a hard life, that of the illiterate or semiliterate prophet.

Semiliterate Muhammad, perhaps, but certainly not illiterate! He must have at least known how to read and write his name, or even count.

According to Al-Baladuri (Futuh al-Buldan) there were already in Mecca in the time of Muhammad many men and women who could read and write an alphabet from Hira in Iraq. Baladuri quotes Abu Sufyan and his two sons Yazid and Muawiya some women and eleven Medinans. But there were to be more.

Anyway, that's not the problem. It is that ummi does not mean illiterate but MEMBER OF A PEOPLE OF UMMIYUN THAT IS TO SAY OF A PEOPLE WHO HAS NO SCRIPTURES LIKE THE JEWS AND CHRISTIANS (THE FAMOUS PEOPLE OF THE BOOK). It is therefore ultimately only a synonym for goyim nations or pagans.

What is certain, however, is that there was no lack of Arab intellectuals to challenge this inimitable or unsurpassable character of the Quran from the outset, starting with one of Muhammad's lifelong rivals, the great prophet of Central Arabia.

Musaylima ibn Thimâma ibn Bani Hanifa of the Yamama besides mocked in his own Quran the incredible chapter on the elephant (Sura 105), if we believe various authors.

"The elephant, what is an elephant, who can tell you what an elephant is?

It has a poor tail and a long trunk,

It is an insignificant part of your God's creation."

N.B. What we have been able to save from the fragments of his Quran shows us that in addition to prose, of course, he also used a great deal, just like the Quran of the beginning (from the Mecca period), the saj-type verses of the kahins (soothsayers) or of the shu'ara (poets: singular sha'ir).

Same thing in Mecca itself, during the lifetime of Muhammad, who will remember it a few years later.

One of the opponents who had the most tragic end (his daughter will be one of the unfortunate collateral victims of the battle of Badr in 624) but of the same temperament as Musaylima, i.e., not convinced by the verses recited by Muhammad in a state of trance, was a man named Uqba.

The best known example remains, however, Al Nadr Ibn al-Harith. He was a wealthy merchant who traded with al Hira and Persia from where he brought books as well as she singers. Al Nadr Ibn al-

Harith used to tell the Meccan people stories of the Great Rustem, Isfandiyar, and the king of Persia, boasting that the verses of the Quran brought back by Muhammad were no better than his own.

Pages 162-163 of The life of Muhammad a translation of Ishaq’s Sirat Rasul Allah by A. Guillaume. “Al-Nadr b. al-Harith b. `Alqama b. Kalada b. `Abdu Manaf whenever the apostle sat in an assembly and invited people to God, and recited the Quran, and warned the Quraysh of what had happened to former peoples, followed him when he got up and spoke to them about Rustum the Hero and Isfandiyar or the kings of Persia, saying, "By God, Muhammad cannot tell a better story than I and his talk is only of old fables which he has copied (sura 25,6) as I have."

Several of the verses in the Holy Quran are particularly relevant to him.

Chapter 6 verse 25: " Of them are some who listen unto thee, but We have placed upon their hearts veils lest they should understand, and in their ears a deafness. If they saw every token, they would not believe therein; to the point that, when they come unto thee to argue with you, the disbelievers say: This is nothing else than fables of the men of old.”

Chapter 8 verse 31: " When Our revelations are recited unto them they say: We have heard. If we wish we can speak the like of this. Lo! this is nothing but fables of the men of old.”

Chapter 17 verse 85: " They are asking you concerning the Spirit. Say: The Spirit is by command of my Lord,”

Chapter 45 verse 9: Chapter 45 verse 9: “When he knows nothing of Our revelations he makes it a jest.”

Chapter 83 verse 13: " Who, when you read unto him Our revelations, says: (Mere) fables of the men of old.”

N.B. Circumstances of this revelation (asbab al nouzoul).

Sirat, pp. 136-137." “When Al-Nadr said that to them, they sent him and Uqba b. Abu Mu`ayt to the Jewish rabbis in Medina and said to them, 'Ask them about Muhammad; describe him to them and tell them what he says, for they are the first people of the scriptures and have knowledge which we do not possess about the prophets.' They carried out their instructions, and said to the rabbis, 'You are the people of the Taurat, and we have come to you so that you can tell us how to deal with this tribesman of ours.' The rabbis said, 'Ask him about three things of which we will instruct you; if he gives you the right answer then he is an authentic prophet, but if he does not, then the man is a rogue, so form your own opinion about him.

-Ask him what happened to the young men who disappeared in ancient days, for they have a marvelous story.

-Ask him about the mighty traveler who reached the confines of both East and West.

-Ask him what the spirit is.

If he can give you the answer, then follow him, for he is a prophet. If he cannot, then he is a forger and treat him as you will.' The two men therefore returned to Quraysh at Mecca and told them that they had a decisive way of dealing with Muhammad, and they told them about the three questions.

They came to the apostle and called upon him to answer these questions. He said to them, 'I will give you your answer tomorrow,' but he did not say, 'if God will.' So they went away; and the apostle, so they say, waited for fifteen days without a revelation from God on the matter, nor did Gabriel come to him, so that the people of Mecca began to spread evil reports, saying, 'Muhammad promised us an answer on the morrow, and today is the fifteenth day we have remained without an answer.' This delay caused the apostle great sorrow, until Gabriel brought him the Chapter of the Cave, in which he reproaches him for his sadness, and told him the answers of their questions, the youths, the mighty traveler, and the spirit.

According to our Muslim friends, this is a first proof of the authenticity of Muhammad’s prophecy. Indeed, if he was not an Envoy of God, he would have provided answers to the questions the very next day without delay. But the fact that he was only able to answer them a fortnight later, while waiting for God's permission, shows that they were revelations coming only from God and that Muhammad was not a false prophet.

Editor's note: 15 days is also more than enough time to research the Christian legend of the seven sleepers of Ephesus or the novel of Alexander the Great (Dhu Al-Qarnayn).

When Muhammad was asked about this kind of lapse of memory, he replied: "I do not forget, but I am made to forget, in order to establish a jurisprudence! "In other words, God made him subject to memory lapses so that people would know what to do or what to say in this case (Editor's note: see our study on isma).

Al Nader and Uqba having had the bad idea a few months later of getting caught in the battle of Badr March 624 (an attack on a Meccan caravan by Muhammad with the support of thousands of invisible angels), they were taken prisoners and executed on Muhammad's orders a few days later on their way back to Medina.

On a significantly different level but relating to the beauty of the ideas or the contents, let us not forget that there were at that time millions of ARAB, ARABIC SPEAKING Christians AND THEREFORE PERFECTLY ABLE TO APPRECIATE THE QURAN AT ITS RIGHT VALUE.

Mansur ibn Sarjun known as St. John Damascene (676-749) was one of them. He therefore understood Arabic perfectly since he was bilingual and also spoke of the Quran in his treatise against heresies.

"“There are many other extraordinary and quite ridiculous things in this book which he boasts was sent down to him from God. But when we ask: ‘And who is there to testify that God gave him the book? And which of the prophets foretold that such a prophet would rise up?’—they are at a loss. And we remark that Moses received the Law on Mount Sinai, with God appearing in the sight of all the people in cloud, and fire, and darkness, and storm. And we say that all the Prophets from Moses on down foretold the coming of Christ and how Christ God (and incarnate Son of God) was to come and to be crucified and die and rise again, and how He was to be the judge of the living and dead. Then, when we say: ‘How is it that this prophet of yours did not come in the same way, with others bearing witness to him? And how is it that God did not in your presence present this man with the book to which you refer, even as He gave the Law to Moses, with the people looking on and the mountain smoking, so that you, too, might have certainty?’—they answer that God does as He pleases. ‘This,’ we say, ‘We know, but we are asking how the book came down to your prophet.’ Then they reply that the book came down to him while he was asleep. Then we jokingly say to them that, as long as he received the book in his sleep and did not actually sense the operation, then the popular adage applies to him (which runs: You’re spinning me dreams).

As has been related, this Mohammed wrote he says that there was a camel from God and that she drank the whole river and could not pass through two mountains, because there was not room enough. There were people in that place, he says, and they used to drink the water on one day, while many ridiculous books, to each one of which he set a title….Then there is the book of God’s Camel. About this camel the camel would drink it on the next. Moreover, by drinking the water she furnished them with nourishment, because she supplied them with milk instead of water. Then, because these men were evil, they rose up, he says, and killed the camel (Holy Quran 11: 64; 54 : 27-28. The story remains only in the state of disjointed fragments in our text).

Let us repeat it, Peter DeLaCrau did not discover anything spectacular about the origins of Islam. The existence at the time of millions of Arab Christians in Jordan, Syria and Iraq, made it possible from the outset to understand and appreciate (or not) unequivocally the various verses of the Quran. See also, for example, the Risalat al-Kindi or apology by Al-Kindi, an Arabic religious treatise, transmitted in Christian circles,

Abd al-Masih ibn Ishaq al-Kindi is one of the two authors of what is commonly known as the apology of Al Kindi, a set of two letters, one from a Muslim and the other from a Christian, each one apologizing for his religion and inviting the other to join him. Both would have lived under the reign of Caliph Al-Ma'mun, in the 9th century (from 813 to 834 to be precise). This Abd al-Masih ibn Ishaq al-Kindi is obviously Christian (Nestorian?) given his name. This text was translated into Latin in 1142.

Abd al-Masih ibn Ishaq al-Kindi therefore wrote in it that the Quran is by no means proof of the prophetic mission of Muhammad, for several reasons.

First of all, it is not a unique book. There are more eloquent ones.

According to this Christian Al Kindi the composition and writing of the Quran are far from perfect. It is rhyming, broken prose.

Moreover, the Quran lacks specifications in terms and in narrative.

"The result of all this is patent to you who have read the Scriptures, and seen how in thy book histories are all jumbled together and Intermingled; an evidence that many different hands have been at work therein, and caused discrepancies, adding to the text, or cutting out there from whatever they liked or disliked.” The Quran therefore is not a wonderful miracle according to him and it is only for illiterate people, strangers or barbarians.

It is not inimitable. Others produced similar works (still according to Al Kindi) but did not have the support that Muhammad had.

And finally, the mastery of the Arabic language was not a gift of the Quraysh (the tribe of Muhammad), the Kindi were also powerful men great speakers and eloquent poets.

With regard to the Quran itself, Al Kindi's answer begins like this.

" We come now to what you regard as your stronghold, to wit, the book which is in your hands. Your argument is that the narratives therein of the prophets and the Messiah prove that it was revealed by God, because your Master was unlearned, and could have no knowledge of the same excepting by way of inspiration. You say that ‘neither Man nor Genius could produce the like thereof’; and, 'If you be in doubt as to that which We have revealed unto our servant, then bring a Sura the like thereof, and

call your witnesses other than the Lord, if you be true men.’ And, yet again, ‘If We had sent down this Coran unto a mountain, you would see it humbling itself, and cleaving asunder, from fear of the Lord, etc.’ This in your view is the main evidence of your Master's claim, ranking with the miracle of the Red Sea, the Staying of the Sun in the sky, the Raising of the Dead, and other wonderful works by the Prophets of old or the Messiah. By my life! This argument indeed has deceived many. But it is a weak and hollow subterfuge. The answer is near at hand, and not far off, as I will show you. The disclosure may be bitter, but it will be wholesome in the end.”

Al Kindi goes on by adding that " All that I have said (about the Quran) is drawn from your own authorities and no argument have I advanced but what is based on evidence accepted by yourselves. And in proof thereof, we have the Quran itself, which is a confused heap with neither system nor order. The sense, moreover, does not consist with itself; but throughout one passage is contradicted by another. Now, what could betray greater ignorance than to bring forward such a book as the evidence of Apostleship, and to put it on a par with the miracles of Moses and Jesus! Surely no one with a grain of sense would dream of it; much less should we who are versed in history and philosophy, be moved by such deceptive reasoning… And the result of all this is patent to you who hast read the Scriptures, and see how in your book histories are all jumbled together and intermingled; an evidence that many different hands have been at work therein, and caused discrepancies, adding to the text, or cutting out there from whatever they liked or disliked…..Then followed the business of Hajjâj ibn Yûsuf, who gathered together every single copy he could lay hold of, and caused to be omitted from the text a great many passages.

....... Six copies of the text thus revised were distributed to Egypt, Syria, Medina, Mecca, Kufa, and Bassora. After that he called in and destroyed all the preceding copies, even as Uthman had done before him in his days.”

Closer to us there was also al-Abu l-Tayyib Ahmad ibn al-Husayn dit al-Mutanabbi (born in 915, died in 965). He is considered to be the greatest Arab poet of all times, the one who best mastered the Arabic language and its effects.

He was born in present-day Iraq, in the city of Kufa. His father was a water carrier but later became a professional panegyrist. He was brought up in a Shiite Bedouin environment, which gave him a solid religious education.

In 924, after a Qarmatian attack in Kufa, he went to live in the desert with them. At the age of seventeen he declared himself a prophet too, claimed to be able to make a Quran similar to that of Muhammad, and then fomented a Qarmatian rebellion against Latakia in Syria. The attempt failed and he was imprisoned in Homs. It was then that he was given the nickname al-Mutanabbi, which means "he who calls himself a prophet." He was not released until 935 after demonstrating an apparently sincere repentance. In 948 he entered the service of the Hamdanid emir, Ali Saif al-Dawla and fell in love with his sister Khawla. Mutanabbi left his court after a violent argument with the grammarian Khalawaih, who had not hesitated to slap him in front of the Amir himself. In 957 he joined another princely court, that of the Ikhshidites, and wrote poems for Abu al-Misk Kafur. He was then appointed governor of Sidon, but because of his satirical poems against the prince was forced to leave the region in 961. He then left for Shiraz in Iran, where he worked for the Buyid prince, Adud al-Dawla. He died accidentally at the age of 41, after being attacked by brigands in the Iraqi desert.

More recently, Pastor Anis Shorrosh, a Christian author of Palestinian origin living in the United States, has published

a work in Quranic style called Al-Furqan al-haq (The True). Furqan is one of the names in the Quran. According to him, the work in question was written in seven days (the Quran was revealed in about twenty years!) by an anonymous Arab poet of Bedouin origin who claimed to receive divine inspiration in the same way as Muhammad. As can be imagined, this book provoked a strong reaction from Muslims, who called on governments, institutions and private individuals to ban its distribution and to bring legal action against those who would contribute to its publication and dissemination.

If Muslims repeat the Quranic Challenge over and over again that it is impossible to imitate it, this does not mean that they allow such imitation. Anyone who proposes a book that competes with the Quran is subject to the worst criticism and risks his or her life.

Style of the Quran.

For the Muslim, the Quran is perfect in style. No one can surpass it. This perfection is culturally felt by Muslims, as with any text that has been cradled since childhood. To question this belief is blasphemy punishable by death.

But the beauty of the Quranic style has been challenged by those who, for one reason or another, escaped this collective spell. For example, Theodor Noldeke, a great specialist in Semitic civilizations and a good connoisseur of Arabic, wrote a major article on what he thought were the stylistic flaws in the Quran that made it difficult to read.

a) Lack of punctuation.

The Quran is divided into 114 chapters. Within the chapters, the text has been divided late into verses, the numbering being put at the end of the verse, and not at the beginning as in other sacred texts. The length of the verses varies largely. A verse may consist of one or two words (55,1; 101,1 and 103,1) or several sentences (2,101; 196 and 282; the latter is the longest verse in the Quran).

The verses related to the beginning of Muhammad's religious activity, which today are placed at the end of the Quran, are lapidary, short, and have clausulas of identical rhythm.

Then, the tendency was to stretch the rhyming unity. The criterion for the division into verses is mainly based on assonance and rhyme, but there is no unanimity on this division and on the number of verses.

Thus, the Cairo and Tunis editions have 6236 verses, whereas a tradition that goes back to Ibn-Abbas

(died around 686) counts 6616. of them.

In the Arabic edition of Gustav Flugel (1834), some verses of the Cairo edition are cut out or reunited.

Apart from the division into verses, the Arabic version of the Quran, even the modern Arabic version, does not include punctuation (period, comma, etc.), which makes it difficult to read, especially when the sentence is divided into two or more verses (9,1-2; 53,13-16), or on the contrary when a verse consists of several sentences. One of the reasons for not adding punctuation is uncertainty about the end of the sentence. A verse may have a different meaning depending on the location of the period.

b) Interpolation.

The lack of punctuation is accentuated by the fact that the Quran has many interpolations. Thus, within the same chapter or even within the same verse, there are passages that are out of context. The Quranic text thus gives the impression of a piece of work that has been disjointed and mended.

With the exception of the shortest chapters, most of them lack unity because they are compilations of various texts taken up by Muhammad or his successors. The same sura can thus bring together verses from various periods and themes.

A good example of interpolation is verse 2:102, which is particularly long compared to the previous and following verses.

c) Lack of systematization.

The Quran does not present the fields treated in a systematic manner. This makes a problem for the jurist. If he seeks to know the position of the Quran on a given subject, he has to refer to various scattered, sometimes contradictory verses, mixed with passages that are often not directly related.

This contradiction of verses has been resolved by Muslim jurists through the theory of abrogation: a later norm abrogates an earlier norm (what is logical, by the way). This, however, requires a dating of these verses, which is an uneasy and controversial task, especially since some verses repeal others that are found in later chapters.

d) Repetition.

The same story or standard is reported in several chapters, either in abbreviated or detailed form. For example, the story of Lot and the destruction of Sodom, inspired by the Bible (Gn 18:16-33 and 19:1-29), is repeated in about ten chapters of the Quran. We find this phenomenon in the account of the prophet Moses or of the Arab prophet Shu'aïb. This shows that the Quranic text has been the subject of successive superimposed redactions.

Sometimes a verse is repeated literally in two passages, the repetition being unrelated to the context of one of the two. For example, verse 28:62 is repeated in verse 28:74, but the latter is out of context. In chapter 55, which has 78 verses, the same sentence occurs 31 times; and in chapter 77, which has 55 verses, the same sentence occurs 11 times.

So we are in general agreement with Al Nader and Al Kindi. The Quran is indeed unique but in the bad sense of the word! It is an anti-book, an insult or an offense towards human intelligence or reason, even worse, a crime against the spirit, an absolute intellectual horror, a challenge or an insult to the most elementary common sense, an unprecedented brainwashing! It is a snuffer for all critical thinking, and therefore for all freedoms, the foundation of the most accomplished of totalitarian systems.

The Quran is a book that contains many invective apostrophes of threatening commandments...but who is talking?

God? Sometimes it can't be him. See chapter 75 verses 1 and 2, chapter 90 verse 1. God cannot swear other than by himself or on himself.

God talking about Him in the third person?

The archangel Gabriel?

Angels? Chapter 19 verse 64 and chapter 37 verses 164-166, it is the angels or some angels who speak and not God.

Muhammad?

The hypocrites say... who are these hypocrites?

Associators say...who are the associators (Trinitarian Christians or polytheists?)

The Jews...which Jews are they, those of Yathrib/Medina contemporaries of Muhammad ? Of those of past centuries or even millennia (the Hebrews)?

In addition to being inimitable or unsurpassable, the Quran claims to be complete, maintains that nothing is missing from its corpus.

Chapter 6 verse 38: "We have neglected nothing in the book."

Chapter 16 verse 89: "We have sent down the book upon you to make all things clear”.

There is unanimity among Muslims that the Quran is binding on all (hujjatun 'ala al-jami'), and that it is the first source of Muslim law. This stems from the fact that it comes from God. And the proof that it is of divine origin is its inimitability (doctrine of I'jaz). And if it is accepted that it does come from God - because of its inimitability - then everyone is obliged to follow it.

However, some Muslim practices are not included, or at least without any of the details necessary for their exercise. For example. The five pillars of Islam, the profession of faith known as "Shaada," prayer, almsgiving, fasting and pilgrimage, do not really appear as such in the Quran.

There is no God but God and Muhammad is his prophet. This profession of faith must be pronounced by every Orthodox Muslim to confirm his religion or in the case of conversion to Islam. But this Shaada does not exist as such as a single block in the Quran, it is only composed of two themes frequently hammered in it.

1) The theme of divine oneness. Which is perhaps of Judeo-Christian or henotheistic origin if we consider the name of Allah. Ibn ul-Qayim: " The Arab idolaters recognized the divine oneness with regard to the management of events ("tawhid ar-rububiya") and the idea that God is the sole creator of this world; they said that if they worshiped entities distinct from his being, it was to bring them closer to Him ." "They never went so far as to say that there were two creators of the world, one of good and one of evil, like the Zoroastrians ."

2) The affirmation that Muhammad is a prophet. This second point being rejected by those who stick only to the text of the Quran, the name of Muhammad appears only 5 times in the sacred text, four times in the form Muhammad (what is relatively little to justify its inclusion in a profession of faith) and once in the form Ahmad.

Chapter 3 verse 144,

Chapter 33 verse 40.

Chapter 47 verse 2.

Chapter 48 verse 29.

Chapter 61 verse 6 (Ahmad).

The problem is that each time it can be a simple adjective meaning something like "the praised one" and not a real proper noun.

Prayer (salah). The Quran gives no details on how to pray. This has led to many differences of opinion on this subject. Most Sunnis cross their hands on their stomachs when they stand up to pray, but the Sunnis of the Malekite School the Shiites and the Ibadites pray with their arms along their bodies.

The way in which minor ritual ablutions (wudhu) are performed also varies.

Orthodox Muslims do not refer to the Quran but to hadiths to determine the number of cycles or raakats (inclination of the bust and prostration) on the occasion of collective prayers or certain other prayers such as for example the rogation prayer to get rain (Salat-ul-Istisqa: and in this case one must put one's coat on one's head upside down...).

The Quran does not explicitly specify the number of times a day one should pray. Sunni Muslims believe that one should pray five times a day while Shiites say only three times. In the morning (fajr) in the afternoon (dhurh) and in the evening (maghreb). There are also differences over the exact time of the beginning of the evening prayer (after the sun has disappeared behind the horizon or after the last light has gone) and its duration. The Quran also determines the duration of the prayer according to the position of the sun and its light, but it does not provide for the case of polar or circumpolar regions (such as Scandinavia, for example) where the length of the day may vary significantly according to the season.

Compulsory almsgiving or zakat is repeatedly recommended in the Quran. Orthodox Muslims, however, believe that 2.5% per year (of its wealth) is sufficient. No such precision exists in the Quran.

The practice of fasting is urged by the Quran but without as many details or clarifications as the tradition of hadiths (sunna) gives. In Orthodox Islam, for example, a menstruating woman may not fast even though there is no such prohibition in the Quran.

The Quran hardly details the great pilgrimage to Mecca. Current practices such as the (symbolic?) stoning to death of Satan at the western entrance to Mina, the kissing of the cornerstone of the Kaaba, are probably remnants of pagan rites. The Quran says nothing about them. The Ismaili believe that this great pilgrimage is not obligatory.

TAFSIR (Note) BY PETER DELACRAU.

Anima naturaliter pagana. Repetere = ars docendi.

We can't totally exclude, of course,

a) That Abraham really existed.

b) That he passed through Mecca at some point in his life.

c) That the kaaba was built there by him.

d) That the purest philosophical and thoughtful monotheism was spread by him from there.

e) That there has been a subsequent fall in the religious level such that all kinds of paganism can be considered to have succeeded this original Hanifism.

The simplest and most consistent with Occam's razor's principle is still to suppose that the original religion of mankind is more akin to paganism (animism polytheism henotheism, etc.) than to monotheism renamed if one can say "hanifism."

This worthy of the worst of self-suggestion methods relentless to want at all costs to be recognized as a legitimate and direct heir to the Jewish religion and to Abraham; whereas it is obvious that only certain details of the Islamic veneer are such, and that the background is pagan (the notion of man-god in Christianity, the role of the kaaba in Islam, etc.). IS PATHETIC. It is at the same time the timeless manifestation of an incredible racism towards other religions coupled with an equally incredible inferiority complex. Not to mention a crass ignorance of the historical science and the discoveries of archaeology (the beginning of the Bible up to the episode of the Tower of Babel is borrowed from Sumerian myths, Abraham is a legend, Moses did not exist, neither did slavery in Egypt, etc.).

But we have already said that.

In addition to these five pillars of Islam, there are other practices of Islam not mentioned in the (current) Quran.

The recourse to hadiths.

Stoning of adulterers.

Circumcision or excision.

Prohibition of women with menstrual periods from praying or entering a mosque.

Classification of dogs as unclean animals.

The function of imams among Shiites.

Clothing or sumptuary standards (except for the highly controversial case of the hijab or Islamic veil).

A debated issue: to whom should unclaimed inheritances belong since the distribution formula indicated by the Quran only applies to a very specific case: that of direct line inheritances between parents and children.

Orthodox Muslims, however, see no contradiction between proclaiming that the Quran is complete or unsurpassable, in short, perfect in a word, and the fact that they need to resort to other documents or texts in order to practice their religion. This is the traditional Muslim faith, which has nothing to do with reason and is merely a Pavlovian conditioned reflex.

N.B. There are also some Islamic currents or sensitivities that interpret the Quran in an allegorical way and are therefore in no way hindered by the lack of concrete specifications or details in taking it as a guide (the Ismailis for example).

This notion of perfection or completeness of the Quran (i’jaz) is, moreover, conceived differently according to the authors.

Finally, let us remind, in conclusion, of the fact that the present Quran is, of course, not that of Mohammed; it was compiled after his death according to the wishes of various characters. As a result, there have been several Qurans whose content and organization of the verses were totally different.

Nevertheless, commentators are wrong to make fun of the dogma of i'jaz. The Quran is indeed a rather unique book would it be for a few of its main features.

It is not written in chronological order.

Nor is it conceived in any thematic order.

The Quran is presented today with its "suras" arranged in order of length, from the longest to the smallest, therefore in complete disorder with respect to the chronology of its "revelation," and in particular by mixing verses dictated in Medina, verses dictated in Mecca, "repealing" nassikh verses and repealed mansukh verses, etc. The Quran is presented in a very different way from the chronology of its "revelation." The only thing which is important for this disastrous presentation of such an important book is to facilitate its "recitation" which, under these conditions, is more akin to brainwashing than to a thorough reading, at least.

Even the fundamental distinction in Islamic lands between Meccan and Medinan verses (the latter repealing the former) is not respected; it is to be deduced from the text after long and learned calculations.

It is, of course, burlesque or childish, not serious at all, unworthy of a good debate, to assume that the Quran is impassable or unsurpassable, both in substance and form.

As for the form, simply because there is no accounting for taste and languages evolve over centuries and millennia. Just as Breton is not the language spoken by God in the Garden of Eden , contrary to what some Celtomaniacs such as La Tour d'Auvergne have claimed, the Arabic of the Quran is not the mother tongue of mankind, it was not spoken 20,000 years ago and it will not be spoken in 20,000 years' time; and just as the Basque language contains many non-Basque terms of origin, the Quran contains many words borrowed from the various major languages of the region at the time (Syriac Persian Ethiopian Greek Hindi, etc.) but especially not from the Roman or the barbarian which are languages.... never having existed! The original Romans spoke the language of Latium, i.e., the Latin, the "Roumis" or Byzantine Christians spoke...Greek, and the barbarians (hello the barbarians!) spoke various languages such as Celtic, Germanic and so on.

SIXTEENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE DOGMA OF ISMA.

To translate the Muslim dogma of isma by the notion of infallibility (a little like that of the pope in terms of dogma, and yet, ex cathedra) is not judicious, it would be better to express this concept by the notion of impeccability. By definition in Islam the prophets cannot sin, they are free from sin, their conduct cannot be criticized, on the contrary it is to be imitated (cf. the concept of good model). The dogma of the impeccability of the Prophet is, of course, to be brought closer that of inimitability of the Quran.

If the tendency to clear Muḥammad by exempting him from any error is obvious from the first biographical writings of Islam, it is important to note that the Quran and the Ḥadiṯhs do not explicitly mention the iṣma of the prophets as a preservation of error or sin.

There are even Quranic verses known of admonition verses in which clearly God reproaches Muhammad for a fault or inappropriate behavior.

Let's move on to the so-called satanic verses case (Muhammad to somehow calm the relations with the inhabitants of Mecca would have made a major doctrinal concession, agreeing to consider as valid intermediaries that man is allowed to pray the goddesses al-Lat al -Uzza and Manat, before being disavowed by God himself: chapter 53 verses 19-23 and chapter 22 verse 52: “Never sent We a messenger or a prophet before thee but when He recited (the message) Satan proposed (opposition) in respect of that which he recited thereof. But God abolishes that which Satan proposed.

There are other verses in the Quran in which Muhammad himself is always so visibly disavowed by God.

Chapter 80 verses 1-10.

"He frowned and turned away because the blind man came unto him….He scowled and turned away because the blind man came to him ... . As for him who thinks himself independent, unto him you pay regard. Yet it is not your concern if he does not grow (in grace) etc.”

Chapter 8 verse 67.

"IIt is not for any prophet to have captives until he hath made slaughter in the land.”

N.B. Apparently Muhammad wanted to keep the vanquished of the battle of Badr alive for exchange for ransom, a common practice even in the West during the Middle Ages. But the merciful and forgiving god of love apparently disagreed.

Chapter 33 verse 37.

" And when you said unto him on whom God has conferred favor and you have conferred favor: Keep your wife to yourself, and fear God. And you did hide in your mind that which God was to bring to light, and you did fear mankind whereas God has a better right that you should fear Him. So when Zeyd had performed that necessary formality (of divorce) from her, We gave her unto you in marriage, so that (henceforth) there may be no sin for believers in respect of wives of their adopted sons, when the latter have performed the necessary formality (of release) from them. The commandment of God must be fulfilled.”

Explanation of pious Muslims. God wished to abrogate the prohibition concerning this type of marriage, but, fearing the invectives of the hypocrites, the prophet recanted, whereas it would have been more judicious to divulge his intention and to endure the hearsay.

The Islamic dogma of Isma imposes to recognize that in these circumstances Muhammad behaved like the greatest and the most elegant or the noblest of heroes that the earth has ever seen. A true Christ.

We could also mention, of course, the chapter 111 unworthy of a merciful and forgiving god of love and of a great prophet. This is the expression of a very personal rancor towards his uncle and even his aunt who had done nothing to him.

So there have been Muslim thinkers totally refuting this notion of isma and others limiting it in the realm of the faith of the message or of the revelation.

For example, the Muslim theologian Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn At Tayyib Al Baqillani (950-1013) is frequently referred to by later theologians as the very archetype of the negation of the impeccability of the prophets. Starting from Ibn Ḥazm (died 1064).

We know from the work of his companion Abu Ja'far al Sumnani, the qadi of Mosul, that he claimed that any sin, tiny or enormous, is possible from the prophets except the lie in the revelation. He admitted that they commit great sins by adding that if the prophet forbids something and then he allows himself to do so, that does not mean that there was abrogation , because he may do so while disobeying God, but it is not to his companions to reprimand him.

N.B. This notion probably entered Islam by Shia thought, under the influence of beliefs from the ancient East, assigning to men invested by a divine authority, to guide their community, with many supernatural attributes.

The Mu'tazili adopted the doctrine of the moral impeccability of the prophets as a rational argument in their demonstration of the validity of Muhammad’s prophethood (dala'il al-nubuwwa). Subsequently, the doctrine was naturally absorbed by the Sunni creed with the formation of the treatises of maturidite and asharite kalam. It appears in the professions of faith under the form of affirmations and in the traditional questions (sam'iyyat) of kalam treatises where it has become unavoidable.

The various schools differed as to the extent and nature of the isma. According to the Mu'tazilites and the Shia it fell within the same rational argument which justifies the sending of prophets to mankind, namely, the benevolence obligatory for God (luṭf waqib) towards his creatures.

Asharites themselves, most often invoked the ex auditu tradition (al-sam) and more specifically, the consensus of scholars (ijma), to talk about this notion.

Firstly, they seem to have restricted the usefulness of iṣma to safeguarding the integrity of the revelation, aiming only at the infallibility of the prophet in the transmission of the divine message. But insisting on the period following the revelation, the impeccability of the prophet understood as an absolute inerrancy nevertheless was to gain ground.

Especially in Ibn Sa'd, Ibn Hisham and al-Ṭabari. The hadith talking about Muhammad purified by angels while he

was a child illustrates this phenomenon: They came unto me two men clothed in white, with a golden basin full of snow, then they held me and splitting open my breast they brought forth my heart. This likewise they split open and took from it a black clot, which they cast away, then they washed my heart and my breast with snow” (Ibn Hisham, Sira , p. 176).

In later Asharites, the doctrine ends up encompassing the two senses of total impeccability and infallibility of all prophets, from their investiture.

Isma is therefore the force that prevents man from committing sin and falling into error.

The Arabic word iṣma is a declination of the stem s-m. Al-iṣma = al-man (prohibition).

In the religious literature of Islam, the substantive isma refers therefore to several senses that converge on the idea of "protection" or "preservation" from error or sin. The word isma thus encompasses the idea of infallibility, understood as the ability to be immune from error, whether produced in consciousness or not; what includes the estimation error (tark al-awlā) or the error in the effort of interpretation (al-ijtihad), the slip of the tongue (al-zalal) and inadvertence (al-sahw). The notion also covers the sense of impeccability, that is, the preservation of the intentional fault that includes the minor ones and the major sins (al-kaba'ir).

Muslim jurists base this isma of Muhammad and other prophets on different Quranic verses:

“Your comrade errs not, nor is deceived; nor does he speak of (his own) desire. It is nothing save an inspiration that is inspired” (53: 2-4).

“And We bestowed upon him Isaac and Jacob; each of them We guided; and Noah did We guide aforetime; and of his seed (We guided) David and Solomon and Job and Joseph and Moses and Aaron [….]And Zachariah and John and Jesus and Elias [….] Each one (of them) did We prefer above (Our) creatures.With some of their forefathers and their offspring and their brethren; and We chose them and guided them unto a straight path” (6: 84-87).

This infallibility attributed to Muhammad has even been extended to his companions.

Ibn-Qayyim Al-Jawziyyah (died 1351) claims that if they were wrong there would be no one who would say true. It is not allowed therefore to attack them or to question the veracity of their words.

Specialists distinguish three categories of the Sunnah from the companions of Muhammad with regard to its obligatory character.

- The positions of the companions about whom their agreement was unquestionable, even if this agreement was only tacit. This is the case of the verse on the stoning that Umar (d 644) invoked as part of the Quran without having been integrated in it. To follow the companions in this case is a compelling duty (wajib) for every Muslim.

- The positions of the companions about which it is known with certainty that they disagreed. Such positions commit only those who issue them.

- The positions of the companions about which it is not known whether the agreement was established or not between them. Here, opinions are divided.

The point of view of the French historian AnneMarie Delcambre on the subject.

The Muhammad of early Islam, in the seventh century, had difficulty in being obeyed, in being respected and had never succeeded in winning the esteem of the important people of his tribe. In the Quran, the person of Muhammad is in no way portrayed as a model to follow.

The fellow countrymen of Muhammad took him for a sorcerer (sahir: 51:52), a soothsayer (kahin: 52:29, 69:42), a man possessed by a jinn (majnun: 51:52; 52: 29-30; 37 : 36), even a poet in contact with the supernatural (sha'ir: 21: 5; 37:36; 69:41).

But in the eighth century, under the Abbasid caliphs, we see the construction of a mythical figure who has no longer something Arab and who claims to be a perfect Muslim prophet, the exact image of Abraham with a few traits of Jesus in addition. The simple Arab spokesperson became, in the writings of the Persian converts of the eighth century, the Good Model that every Muslim must imitate, a blessed intermediary, between God and his word.

The importance of the imitation of the prophet in Muslim life is explained by the importance of standards in Islam. This law as a mirror reflects the example of the Prophet. The latter in Muslim life has become the embodiment of the word of God in its prescriptive and practical aspect. This places the Sunna at the level of the Quran. Popular belief places Muhammad at the top of the scale of the miracle-worker saints. The Muslims - truly "Mohammedans" by their practice - venerating to that extent Muhammad give in fact a rival to God and break up by the very fact, with the strict monotheism they still believe, with a great naivety, to practice .

At the time of the Crusades, the whole of Europe saw this isma as an idolatrous adoration of the very person of Muhammad.

This worship, which developed among Muslims for the person of Muhammad, spread to his familiar objects. Tradition enumerates and describes the vessels which he used for his ablutions. We often speak of his staff, of his usual dress, of a coarse fabric and as felt-like. The grave of Muhammad , finally, in the mosque of Medina, is the goal of a pilgrimage and the object of a true worship.

To understand the behavior of pious Muslims, we must know that in all fields they intend to copy the conduct of their prophet. Behind the way of treating women, behind the horror of celibacy, behind the beard for men, behind the reluctance to let a dog into the house (poor beast), in short behind any attitude of the Muslim, there is the care about imitating Muhammad. In the current Muslim belief, each of the thoughts of Muhammad and each of his acts were ordained and inspired by God. The importance of this imitation of Muhammad in Muslim life is due to the fact that Islam is both normative and ritualistic.

Faith is perceived above all as obedience and submission to the prescriptions of God or the Prophet and it requires the fulfillment of a set of words and gestures that involve the body. The practical application and actions are essential. Faith is not designed without the acts and these must be in compliance with the norm, which is a true "orthopraxia." But the respect and the application of norms presuppose the knowledge of legal-moral classifications: what is allowed - lawful -, recommended, tolerated, hated or on the contrary forbidden. Hence the fundamental role of Muslim law or fiqh.

But the sunnah which recounts the behavior of the Prophet is not, contrary to the Quran, contemporary or almost contemporary with Muhammad. It was written like the fiqh tracts in the time of the Abbasid caliphs, more than a century and a half after the death of Muhammad, by often Persian converts. It proposes, through hadiths, short stories supposed to date back to the time of Muhammad, to report the supposed exemplary life of the latter. Quranic verses revealed late in Medina recommend to believers the imitation of Muhammad "If you love God, follow me; God will love you and forgive you your sins” (chapter 3, verse 31), "Verily in the messenger of God you have a good example "(Sura 33, verse 21), and about the spoils: "Whatsoever the messenger gives you, take it. And whatsoever he forbids, abstain (from it)"(chapter 59, verse 7).

But the Muslim doctrine of the Abbasid era distorted the meaning of these verses by attributing to Muhammad particular qualities of perfection, an incapacity to commit evil and even some magical powers. A kind of hyperdulia or idolatry concerning the person of Muhammad resulted, conveyed in the written down oral histories that are hadiths.

But why this eagerness to follow the norm? This is because the non-respect of the norm makes the Muslim a "deviant, a lost man" on the road to perdition. To understand the believer's eagerness to follow the example of Muhammad, it is necessary to bear in mind the weight that have rituals in Muslim life. You do not pray anytime and in any way. There are times of prayer. You have to do ablutions. The fast of Ramadan is not practiced as you want and when you want. You do not eat anything. You must comply with dietary prohibitions: no pork, no wine, no meat not ritually bled. From the cradle to the grave, the Muslim is surrounded by a network of prescriptions that he cannot avoid.

The way of salvation, therefore, is to cling to the handed rope represented by the prophetic model, the best example, a living commentary on Revelation.

The question that worries the Muslim, for each use, is indeed: "Is it consistent with Islamic law”? The jurists that are the muftis then confront the usage with the norm written in the fiqh treatises and deliver fatwas or legal consultations.

The mufti has the official charge, at the mosques, to interpret the fiqh treatises. But its function is also to reassure believers. Questioning Ibn Taymiyya, a thirteenth-century Hanbali jurist, about the rites of purification, a group of worshipers ended his question with the formula: "Deliver us the solution to calm our anxiety.” Indeed the pious Muslim is perpetually anxious. His constant concern is: "Am I really a Muslim who is in compliance with the ideal image? One can easily imagine the exorbitant power of the mufti who says the law and who can calm or, on the contrary, upset the believer. As for the faithful, they do not hesitate to ask the most diverse questions. Is it lawful to sell television sets? Is it lawful to consume meat imported from Europe? Is it lawful to drink soda? Ibn Taymiyya had even one day to answer the question: "Is it lawful to shave his hair? According to some traditions, Muhammad indeed had long hair, reaching even his shoulders. Ibn Taymiyya also stated in his legal consultation that "cutting one's hair for no reason is blameworthy."

The police of the attitudes, in worship and social life, play a role that the non-Muslim is far from suspecting. The latter ignores the crucial importance of ritualism for the Muslim. To refuse to comply with the norm is to become abnormal, nonconformist. In order to be in the norm you must imitate, copy, repeat. Any innovation (bida) is blameworthy. The Shafi legal school, which represents a compromise between tradition and use of reasoning, warns against the danger of a servile imitation or taqlid. The most progressive tendency is represented by the Hanafite school which advocates the use of individual reason. But the Hanbali school, fundamentally religious as the Maliki school, gives the Sunna a vital role, hence the word "Sunni" that will be applied to Muslims.

So, the Muslim, today as yesterday, in order to answer and match the norm, regulates his conduct on the behavior of Muhammad, from the hadiths, these fragmented accounts which together constitute the Sunnah. He consults treatises of traditions, easily accessible, such as "the garden of the righteous" by Nawawi, a doctor in law of the thirteenth century. It is a compilation of traditions, arranged in thematic order. This is how he knows that Muhammad dressed preferably in white, that he left on Thursday early, that he managed to fast on Monday and Thursday, that he forbade the woman to shave her head; he reads the prohibition of owning a dog except to keep the flock, the prohibition to pass in front of someone who prays, to eat with the left hand, because it is with it that man washes his private parts, one enters the toilet with the left foot ... while the right hand is reserved for noble things. He knows through tradition the obligation for men to wax his pubis and armpits, to trim his mustache at the maximum and to let the beard grow, to cut one’s nails. In short, there are thus chapters and chapters on what to do, how to do it, how to behave in society and towards God, because all behavior obeys a rule and every rule is a rule of behavior.

The Muslim through the imitation of Muhammad continues to live at the time of Medina, between 622 and 632, Medina where Muhammad and his community of wives did not distinguish the private from the public, the politics of the religious.

"The Muslim God is the only monotheistic God whose sacred place, the mosque, opens on the bedroom, the only one to have chosen a prophet who does not keep quiet about his concerns as a man, but on the contrary thinks aloud about sexuality and desire. The Western jurist is surprised to see in the fiqh treatises so many lines devoted to washing the sexual parts for great ablutions. He thinks he is browsing a medical journal! But no, it's the search for the lawful. Anne Marie Delcambre.

To imitate the life of Muhammad in all respects is not to imitate the life of a holy man in the Christian or Buddhist way, but to imitate the life of an Arab warrior or conqueror of the seventh century; of course dead in his bed but at the head of a state already become powerful (the city of Yathrib / Medina) and not crucified like a vulgar thug as in the case of the man Jesus.

In short, Islam has been a gigantic return to a faith turning all the more the back to the reason that faith and reason are two very distinct things, and today still to convert to Islam, is not a proof of intelligence but an act of faith. But as in all the mass religions of today, the hope of a happy marriage of faith and reason is only a sweet oxymoron at least a wishful vow: see the emblematic case of their belief in angels (and jinn in addition in Islam).

SEVENTEENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

FIRST CONTACTS WITH THE CHRISTIAN WORLD

(and more, see the Sabians of Harran).

Eastern Christians did not immediately understand with what they were dealing with Islam.

Two reasons have led them to consider it a mere heresy (one more) of Christianity.

The first reason is that the nascent Islam was referring a lot to the Old Testament and especially to Jesus.

The second reason is that the worship devoted to the person of Muhammad (isma) was then far from bordering on idolatry as today and that in the early days of Islam the figure of Muhammad did not surpass that of Christ.

They tended to refer to Muslims by ethnic terms such as Arab, Saracens, Ishmaelites or Hagarenes rather than religious terms.

Nevertheless, we have numerous texts written by "eastern" Christian authors between 750 and 1350, which indicate their position facing Islam. A large number of Christians regarded Muslims as members of a Christian heretical sect; others, so numerous, interpreted Islam and its earthly power as a precursor of the end of time. It is only exceptionally that a new religion was perceived in it.

In contrast, Muslim Arabs saw Christianity as an outdated religion. Between 850 and 1350, countless controversies followed one another. Political events such as the Crusades, the arrival and conversion of the Mongols, the Reconquista of Sicily and Spain, tensed the debate. Since the fourteenth century and the work of Ibn Taymiyyah, controversial arguments have hardly changed.

Contrary also to what Christian intellectuals believe today, the Eastern Christians of the time soon had a wide knowledge of the content of the Muslim message by drawing their information directly or indirectly from the very sources of the teaching of Islam (Quran, Sira, hadith). These contemporary theologians of the first centuries of Islam showed energy, combativeness, even condescension, whereas today, those who are contemporaries of the last centuries of the Islamism are unable to defend their faith, their doctrine or even their point of view. Christian polemicists, whether Arabs, Greeks, or Latins, have sought to refute Muslim doctrines and practices. Let us cite among others…..

A) The controversy between the Jacobite Patriarch of Syria John I and Emir Said ibn Amir

B) The testimony of Jacob of Edessa.

C) The account of the debate that took place between a monk from the Nestorian monastery of Beth-Hale and a Muslim notable.

As well as that of John of Damascus although they are not from the 7th century but from the following century.

These are testimonies of the period OR NEARLY, contrary to Muslim traditions.

They are testimonies free from the caliphal constraint, which is not the case with Muslim traditions.

It should also be noted that these Eastern Christians were then in direct contact with a victorious, majority or dominant Muslim world, and were even integrated into it as dhimmis, thus aware of the divisions that were tearing Islam apart (a situation similar to that of Christianity, moreover), and that they used this as an argument to demonstrate its falsity.

A) 640 Approximately. Letter from Mar John, Patriarch about the interview he had with the Emir of the Agarenes (Mahgroye).

1. Because we know that you are anxious and fearful on our account due to the matter for which we have been called in this region, with our holy father the Patriarch, we inform your Grace that on the ninth of this month of May, the day of the Holy Sunday, we went to the famous general, the emir, and this holy father of all was questioned by him to know if it is one and the same gospel without any difference, which is held by all those who are Christians and who bear this name throughout the world.

-The blessed father replied it was one and the same among Greeks, Romans, Syrians, Egyptians, Cushites, Hindus, Armenians, Persians and all people and all languages.

2.He asked him another question:

"If the Gospel is one, why are there differences in the faith ?"

John replied:

"In the same way that the Law is one and the same and is accepted by Christians and Hagarites, by Jews and Samaritans, each person having a different faith, it is the same with the Gospel: each faction understands and interprets it differently, and not as we do…

9. We are sending your Goodness these few words on a number of topics discussed at this time that you might pray for us with zeal and care and beg the Lord, in his mercy, to visit his Church and his people and that Christ might provide a happy outcome, as he pleases, and help his Church and comfort his people.

Even the Chalcedonians, as we said earlier, prayed for our blessed Patriarch because he had spoken for all Christians and had shown no partiality. They sent to him constantly and asked him to be good enough to speak for them all and not to plot against them, for they knew their weakness and the grave danger and peril that threatened if the Lord in his mercy did not visit his Church.

10. Pray for the illustrious Emir that God may give him wisdom and enlighten him about what pleases the Lord and is in his own interest. The blessed father of the Christian community and the holy fathers with him, Mar Thomas, Severus, Sergius, Aitilaha and John, and their whole saintly company, the heads and the faithful assembled here with us, and especially our cherished and wise director, St. Andrew, we who are humble in the Lord ask for your health and holy prayers.

EDITOR'S NOTE. John Sedra was the Syrian Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch from 630 until his death in 648. The Emir who appears as his interlocutor is said to be one of the "Mhaggraye," i.e., the Agarenes, but the terms "Islam" and "Muslim" are not used. His name in Syriac is Bar Saʿd.

The Emir questions the Patriarch on several subjects, such as the textual integrity of the Bible, disagreements between Christians on points of doctrine, etc.

The meeting may never have taken place, but the document is very representative of the spirit of the time.

B) 690 approximately. Questions addressed by the priest Addai to James, Bishop of Edessa, who gave them an answer. Some were addressed by other people to the above-mentioned priest who proposed the rest with great zeal.

Therefore we place his questions before the answer that concerns them.

25. A. - What is to be done with a sacred tablet on which the Arabs have eaten flesh and left it stained with fat?

J. - The table on which the pagans have eaten is no longer an altar; it shall be well washed and cleaned and then used for the ordinary uses of the sanctuary or sacristy. If it is small and of little use, it should be broken and hidden in the ground.

57. A. - If the Amir commands a man, the bursar of a monastery, to eat with him from the dish, will he or will he not eat?

J. - I do not advise him to do so, but necessity obliges him to do so.

58. A. - Is it necessary for a priest to instruct the children of the Mohammedans who have the power to punish him if he does not instruct?

J. - Apart from the fact that necessity obliges him to do so, I add that this does not harm either the teacher or the faith, even if the chiefs do not have the power to punish him; it often happens that similar things are of great benefit.

81 . - James also says, "The Armenian people at the beginning of the world lived without law and produced neither a doctor, nor a monk, nor a man who had sufficient knowledge, so that foreign teachers dominated them and distanced them from the true faith; some of these teachers were Jews and the others Phantasiasts. So they adhere to the Jews in that they offer (as a sacrifice) the lamb, and unleavened bread and pure wine, they also bless the salt and adhere to the Jews in other things worse than these. They adhere to the Chalcedonians because they make the sign of the cross with two (fingers); to the Nestorians because they pass their whole hand from right to left (in the sign of the cross?); to the Arabs because they genuflect three times southward when they make a sacrifice (celebrate the Mass?); to the pagans, because, without exception, when someone dies, they offer the holy sacrifice on him, and it is in this especially that they irritate God, because it is in no way permitted to the Christian to offer the holy sacrifice on a dead man on the day of his death, for this custom is pagan and Jewish and is in truth foreign to the Church of God.

88 (p. 22). - We do not rebaptize the Christian who has become a Mohammedan or a pagan and who then converts, but the bishop will pronounce upon him the prayer of the penitents and impose upon him a time of penance, and when he has fulfilled it, he will receive communion again.

C) 720 approximately. Account of the debate which took place between a certain Muslim and a monk from the Nestorian monastery of Beth-Hale.

1. In so far as, Father Jacob - beloved brother of my soul - it seemed good to you to ask us, in the small measure of our means, to provide you with an account of our debate, concerning the apostolic faith, which took place because of a son of Ishmael, and since it seemed to me that it would be beneficial, if I could say this again for your brothers, and because I know it will be useful to you, so I will put it in writing in the form of questions and answers, as appropriate. Praise be to Him who gives strength to the weak and helps those who call on Him by His Name! Now, since it is right for a wise builder to place a solid stone to begin the foundation of what he is building, we, weak as we are, begin and complete our story with our Lord Jesus Christ (the chief cornerstone), through Your prayers and the prayers of all the saints. 2. Behold, O Master. This Muslim was one of the public figures standing in the presence of Emir Maslama, who, because of illness, came to us and stayed with us for ten days. He used with us in freedom, being well informed both about our Scriptures and about their Quran. And when he had observed our prayer, which takes place seven times a day with its rites, as Blessed David said, "Seven times a day I praised you for your precepts, O Righteous One," he called me to him. And since he was a man who had long been in the service of the Emir, and because of his high status, he first addressed us through a translator, criticizing us with regard to our faith. And he said: Day and night, you are extremely diligent in prayer and never cease, so that you surpass us in prayer, fasting, and your petitions to God. But it seems to me that your religion makes it impossible for your prayer to be accepted by God.

59. The Muslim says: I testify that were it not for the fear of the government and of the shame before men, many would become Christian. But you are blessed of God to have given me satisfaction by your conversation with me.The monk said: To him from whom all things come, and in whom all things are, and by whom all things are, to Him be the praise of spiritual and bodily beings and of myself, wretched one, who proclaimed it. Glory be to his name, and on us his mercy and grace, for ever and ever. Amen.

These are testimonies of the time OR ALMOST, contrary to the Muslim traditions.

These are testimonies free from the caliphal compulsion, which are not the case of the Muslim traditions.

It should also be noted that these Eastern Christians were then in direct contact with a victorious, majority or dominant Muslim world, even included into it as dhimmis, so aware of the divisions that were tearing apart Islam (a situation similar to that of Christendom, moreover), and that they took advantage of it to demonstrate its falsity.

The themes of the Byzantine literature of controversies concern the points of the teaching of Islam which seem to oppose the Christian doctrine. Thus the legitimacy of Muhammad's prophetic mission and therefore the very truth of Islam is refuted. The Quran is analyzed to emphasize its errors and weaknesses and especially the fact that it is considered a divine revelation and the word of the eternal God. Islamic prophetology is also rejected, while the elements opposing the divinity of Jesus and the mystery of the Holy Trinity are refuted. More generally, the themes of these controversies attempt to cover the whole of the teaching of Islam on God, the universe, man, prophecies and revelation, morality and eschatology. It is probable that some of the most virulent attacks launched by these writings are due, beyond the danger represented by Islam, to the particular sensitivity manifested by society and even more by the Byzantine State facing the problem of heresies, a legacy of the great Christological quarrels and of the battles led against the different heresies that threatened the foundations of Christianity and the unity of the Byzantine Empire.

Their analysis was, moreover, not so absurd since the main prominent points (weak in their view) that they quickly spotted in the life and work of Muhammad are still those that are controversial or are dealt with today by atheistic or independent historians like us.

Muhammad was Arab and not Jew.

He was an orphan.

He began by being married to a widow much older than him.

The true authors of the Quran (he had one or more human inspirers whose identity has been the subject of many assumptions).

The origins of his revelations are not clear (the devil, epileptic fits ...)

The Qissat al gahraniq (the case of the satanic verses).

The absence of well-confirmed true miracles.

Polygamy.

His marriage with Aisha when she 6 years old.

His scandalous marriage with Zenob.

Violence political assassinations and looting.

On the theologically level.

Misinterpretation of some verses of the Old and New Testaments to make them announce the coming of Muhammad. Example the mention of the coming of the Paraclete in John 15 : 23. For present-day Christianity it was the Holy Spirit. Why not ?

Versions of the Old Testament deviating from the Bible or contradicting it.

A description of Heaven let us say a little too Celtic-druidic

Lastly , let's note haphazardly.

Prohibition of consumption of pork, alcohol. Fasting, ritual ablutions, pilgrimage, Black Stone of the Kaaba (pagan idol and remnants of Arab paganism), orientation of prayer (qibla). Jihad and iconoclasm.

During the first two centuries of Islam, the debates have a lively and innovative character; then they lose their freshness and begin to repeat themselves.

Conversely, in the centuries following the death of Muhammad, especially in the great era of Muslim civilization, between 750 and 1350, a large anti-Christian Muslim polemic literature also developed. It takes up the points aroused in the Quran and develops them.

Among the most brilliant polemicists, we can quote Ibn Hazm (994-1064) and Ibn Taymiyyah (1263-1328).

Falsification of the initial scriptures by Christians.

Jesus is a simple servant of God and a simple prophet.

Negation of the Trinity.

Status of the Virgin Mary.

Negation of the crucifixion.

Some hadiths will evoke Christians, and their meaning, when it can be established, is of great importance for the doctrine. It is certain that many of the stories relating to these subjects were written during the great confrontations with the Byzantine Empire, and therefore have only a very loose connection with Muhammad himself, hence their very hostile tone.

Dawud, Hadiths Book 41, hadith 5186.

I went out with my father to Syria. The people passed by the cloisters in which there were Christians and began to salute them. My father said: Do not give them salutation first, for AbuHurayrah reported the Apostle of God as saying: “Do not salute them first, and when you meet them on the road, force them to go to the narrowest part of it.”

Editor’s note. The Christian or Muslim, polemical and apologetic literature, although in principle intended for believers of the other camp, was read mainly if not exclusively by the co-religionists of the author.

In the sixteenth century, the debate between Christianity and Islam entered a new phase, which went far beyond the religious domain, not only in Spain. When the Turks overran Hungary and Austria, Europe would react ideologically by multiplying lampoons hostile towards an Islam often considered, irrespective of Christian denominations, like the Antichrist. It is interesting to see that between the partisans of the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation, the Christian adversary was willingly equated with this terrible enemy who were the Turks and their Islam.

In medieval times, the quality of religious debate suffered from the hubris of Muslims, which they derived from their dominant position; in the nineteenth century, the imbalance turned in favor of Christians who, a little prematurely, were even tempted to predict the disappearance of Islam.

POLITICALLY INCORRECT CONCLUSION.

As we have had already the opportunity to say, the beginning of Muhammad's apostolate does not contain any attack against idols; it is a moment when the new prophet can hope for a compromise solution with the aristocracy of the Quraysh .

In practice, idols, rough stones and altars are mixed, both in appearance and in their ritual functions.

The absolute rejection of these practices will consecrate the break. Muhammad takes up an old biblical theme, a little easy, moreover, and idolatry will thus become an absolute evil in his mouth.

But in reality for the highest spirits like the high king of Ireland Cormac the idol is not the god himself

but a mirror of the divinity, a symbol.

"Ar baí cretim in óenDé oc Cormac . ar ro ráidseom na aidérad clocha ná crunnu acht no adérad intí dosroni & ropo chomsid ar cul na uli dúla" (Senchas na relec inso).

"Cormac believed in one god. He said that he did not worship stones or trees, but only the one who made them and who is the protector of all the elements" (History of burial places).

The distinction was, however, too subtle for some individuals.

When everything was flattened, converted, Mecca emptied of its statues, when nothing remained of the ancient civilizations, but Islam; what were its "contributions" to Humanity?

First of all, the systematic recourse to religious expansion by arms, a phenomenon that was previously insignificant IN THE CASE OF JUDAISM (a given epoch and a very limited sector of the globe: Palestine), or unknown to the founding, basics, canonical SACRED TEXTS OFf OTHER GREAT RELIGIONS, AS BUDDHISM, JAINISM, ETC...

For in matters of lesser jihad one could not validly compare the hadiths or commentaries of the Quran with THE FOUR GOSPELS themselves, whatever we may think of their historicity. Gospels and hadiths are not at all on the same ontological level. The gospels are to be put on the same level as the Quran, not on the same level as the hadiths or the commentaries of the Quran. And let us not even mention the popes or crusaders who acted, certainly in a similarly deplorable manner, BUT CONTRARY TO THE DICTATES OF THEIR FOUNDING TEXT, NOT BY FOLLOWING THEM LITERALLY. The best illustration of this is the famous expression "kill them all God will know his own" ascribed to Arnaud Amaury. Who perhaps never pronounced it but which sums up rather well the state of mind of these atrocious wars waged against pseudo-infidels or heretics (the report of the legate of the time speaks of 20,000 dead, the crusaders massacred civilians including in churches).

You have to be stupid or intellectually dishonest like a journalist or a former French Prime Minister to act as if all this real terrorism was advocated by the Four Gospels. War cries or slogans like "kill them all God will know his own" (Inquisition crusades, some popes like Urban II, Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, etc.) may be shouted by some BUT ARE NOT IN CONFORMITY WITH THE SPIRIT OR THE LETTER OF THE GOSPELS.

Let us specify finally to be complete in this respect.

First of all, it was not the Arabs who put an end to the free access to Jerusalem in 1071 but the Seljuk Turks who were not true Muslims.

Secondly, that the Council of Clermont in 1096 did not promise the crusaders who died in battle direct access to heaven as in the case of certain verses of the Quran dealing with the lesser jihad (3,157; 3,169; 4,74; 9,89...) but dispensation from the penances to be done in order to be forgiven. A nuance of size!

To return to the lesser jihad, what Muslim jurists have done with it was (with the possible exception of the defensive lesser jihad in the strict sense) a real crime against the spirit.

The civilizations that have been confronted with the Muslim religion in its phase of military expansion have all experienced terrible declines, especially the Hindus under the blow of the atrocities of which they were victims during the Muslim occupation, especially on the part of Tamerlan. Reflection made and although they did not belong to the category of People of the Book they were subjected to the characteristic payment of the dhimmitude, the jiziya).

These regions which were formerly flagships of civilization (one thinks of Egypt, Babylon, the Sumerians, Phoenicia, the lands of the Levant which were the jewels of the Roman Empire, one also naturally thinks of Persia); resisted Islamization for a time, before dying out and becoming these places where the spirit no longer blows but the sharia at the expense of men. Always accompanied by those detestable jinns that are the lack of critical spirit, ignorance of other cultures, and obscurantism. With rare exceptions such as Akbar (1556-1605) but his Din-Ilahi is considered heretical by true Muslims. And also the Sufis !

In view of the abominable memory left by the Ottoman Empire (which succeeded the Arab caliphates) in the Balkans, which even Arab memories detest; one can regret the disappearance of the Sassanid Empire and to a lesser extent of Constantinople, then the most beautiful city in the world, where Hellenism and myriads of scholars (the same ones who contributed to the Renaissance) took refuge.

Here below, besides, repetere = ars docendi how the great scholar Thabit Ibn Qurra (836-901) saw

the situation in retrospect.

"Although many have been subjugated to error by means of torture, our fathers, by the hand of God, have endured and spoken valiantly…. We are the heirs and the transmitters to our heirs of heathenism, which is honored gloriously in this world. Lucky is he who bears the burden with a sure hope for the sake of heathenism. Who has made the world be inhabited and filled it with cities except the good men and kings of heathenism? Who has constructed harbors and canals? Who has made manifest the occult sciences? On whom has dawned the divinity which gives divinations and teaches the knowledge of future events except the wise men of the heathen? It is they who have pointed out all these things, and have made to arise the medicine of souls, and have made to shine forth their redemption and it is they also who have made to arise the medicine for bodies. They have filled the world with the correctness of modes of life and with the wisdom which is the beginning of excellence. Without these of heathenism, the world would be an empty and needy place, and it would have been enveloped in sheer want and misery.”

EIGHTEENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

The Arab-Muslim culture was essentially a culture of assimilation; which borrowed many things from non-Arab cultures (such as Persian, Mesopotamian or Greek cultures, for example).

THE HOUSES OF WISDOM (bayt al-ḥikma),

The oldest of these houses of culture arose from the transformation of the personal library of the Abbasid Caliph Harun ar-Rashid of Baghdad in 832, during the reign of Al-Mamun. Astronomers, mathematicians, thinkers, scholars, translators, frequent it, and among them, al-Khwarizmi, Al Jahiz, al Kindi, Al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf ibn Matar and Thābit ibn Qurra.

Translations are carried out there, particularly under the aegis of the Persian Salm, who was the first director of the Bayt al-Hikma. The Nestorian Christian Hunayn ibn Ishâk al Ibadi was commissioned by Al-Mamun to check the corrections of the other translators, but there is no evidence to support the claim that he directed the first translation workshop of this institution. Nevertheless, with the help of his son Ishâq and his nephew Hubaysh and other lesser-known specialists such as Stephen ibn Bâsil, Musâ ibn Khalid and Yahyâ ibn Hârûn, he translated some 100 works from Greek into Syriac and then from Syriac into Arabic.

It should be noted, however, that this translation work had begun a century earlier.

The Brahmasphutasiddhanta (a fundamental mathematical treatise) seems to have been translated as early as 722 in Baghdad. Similarly, in 771, a translated version of the ancient Indian astronomy treatise, Surya Siddhanta, is said to have been translated, which brings us back to the process of acculturation that took place in this part of the world in the aftermath of the military conquest.

These first translations inaugurated a movement of translation of some of the Greek, Pehlevi, Syriac, Hebrew, Sanskrit, etc. texts of medicine, logic, mathematics, astronomy, music philosophy, including those of Aristotle, Plato, Pythagoras, Sushruta, Hippocrates, Euclid, Charaka, Ptolemy, Claudius Galen, Plotinus, Âryabhata and Brahmagupta to the Arab-Muslim world. The translations were accompanied by reflections and commentaries that gave rise to a new form of literature.

The house continued to develop under the caliphs Al-Mutasim and Al-Wathiq, but declined during the reign of Al-Mutawakkil. It then became the seat of the Mihna, the Muslim inquisition intended to impose (unsuccessfully) the Mutazilite thesis of the created Quran. Mutawakkil having finally lost interest in these theological quarrels, the house became a simple library. Under the name of Hizanat al-Ma'mun, it remained open at least until the 10th century, perhaps even until the destruction of the libraries of Baghdad in 1258.

This model of an institution was emulated in Muslim countries, as houses of wisdom were reported in many other places later on.

Some refer to these places as forms of universities, in the tradition of the famous library of Alexandria in the Hellenistic period. But the surest historical links, particularly for the oldest of them (Baghdad), are those with the ancient Gundishapur academy (Djund-i Shapur) of the Sassanids (and, through it, the schools of Athens), and with the school of Dayr (or Deir Qunna), a school of Nestorian scribes of Syriac culture located 90 km south-east of Baghdad.

Some racist cliches to deconstruct therefore.

- Poetry (diffusion of paper invented by the Chinese, public libraries, legacy of the Greek metrics, Sufi poems).

- Carpets (Persian legacy).

- Painting (miniatures of Persian inspiration).

- The tales of the Arabian Nights (heritage of Persia).

- Public baths (hammam, Greek and Roman legacy).

- Architecture (Greek, Roman, Byzantine legacy + typical Muslim aspect).

- Philosophy (Falsafa: Greek legacy: Plato, Aristotle + mystical Muslim aspect).

- Medicine (very accurate diagnosis, taking into account the entire patient, hygiene, surgery).

- Astronomy (resumption and improvement of Ptolemy's work: catalog of celestial bodies, determination of latitudes).

- Mathematics (discovery of Indian numbers).

Although commonly called "Arabic numerals," the Indians already knew and used a decimal system similar to the one we know today. And zero was already used by Indian mathematical thought.

The accepted idea that the Arab-Muslims have "invented" the figures called by their name is therefore a racist cliche to deconstruct absolutely. Figures 1 to 9 were invented in India in the third century before our era by Brahmagupta, an Indian mathematician; he created the Devanagari numerals. They appear in inscriptions of Nana Ghat. The positional numeration with a zero (a single point at the origin) was developed during the fifth century. In it the word "sunya" (the void), which represents zero. It is to date the oldest document referring to this number. It was only much later, following conquests in Asia, that Muslim mathematicians discovered this system. Similarly, the concept of zero, as a neutral element of the addition. Its existence is mentioned in Syria in the middle of the seventh century by Bishop Severus Sebokt. They are borrowed by the Muslim civilization from the ninth century and described in a book by the Persian mathematician Al-Khawarizmi 1) then gradually transmitted to the medieval West where they took several centuries to impose themselves. These figures have gradually been imposed around the world because they make possible an easy notation in the decimal system used in the West and make easier simple operations on large numbers and complex operations.

Conclusion: Muslims would do well to remember what they owe not to God, directly, but to other peoples. But it is true that if they admitted this reality (everything doesn’t come from God) , they would stop being Muslims!

We therefore totally reject the idea of a golden age of Islam. Islam destroyed the brilliant Sassanid civilization in Persia (destroyed Zoroastrianism), for example by burning the library of Ctesiphon, also Arabized or Islamized the Berbers in the Maghreb. Armenia will be a martyr country: Christians burned , churches destroyed, until the genocide committed by the Turks (1.5 million dead).

With a few exceptions like Al Ma’mun, caliph from 813 to 833, 2) but who was not an orthodox Muslim, it is true (he was a mu’tazili heretic or atheist) the Abbasid era is absolutely not a model. It is an era of absolute despotism AND terror, where political assassinations succeeded one another, where religious conflicts between Muslim sects were threatening to break out at any moment, where social problems accumulated (the costly negligence of the Caliphate Court of Baghdad, in parallel with the misery of the peasants and especially of the "dhimmis" crushed with taxes, or of the rebelled Zanj slaves)

On the artistic level, Islam totally restrained the creative forces of its empire (especially in Persia where epicurean poets like Omar Khayyam could not express themselves as they intended). Its iconoclasm before the word is invented has prevented the development of plastic and pictorial arts, except in Persia whose miniatures and Shiism have resisted.

So that meant Muslim civilization, unlike Africa, West and Asia, ignores the pictorial art. In the scientific and philosophical fields, Muslims have been put in contact with the cultural richnesses of the civilizations of Greece, Persia and India. They borrowed a lot, they played the role of transmitters, but the "added value," so to speak, is very weak; especially in view of the civilizational drama of the closing of the gates of Ijtihad which was played out in the 11th century in the land of Islam (Insidad bab al Ijtihad). Whereas in the West the added value snowballed from the 13th century onwards and resumed with the Late Middle Ages (14th century) after a break due to the Black Death and the Hundred Years' War.

It is especially the Greek thinkers (Plato and Aristotle for philosophy, Euclid, Pythagoras, Thales, Archimedes for mathematics, Ptolemy for astronomy) that Muslim scientists have copied or translated, never really managing to exceed their models. Yet when the West left the nest at the Renaissance, it was to the rediscovery of Greek richness that it owed that he had to (hence the word renaissance: Rebirth). And if there were contributions in the Muslim world, the majority of them came from non-Muslims, from dhimmis for example, from ancient civilizations, and who continued somehow their intellectual traditions. Ninety percent of the great "Muslim" doctors were in fact Syriac-speaking Christian Assyrians 3); astronomers came from southern Iraq and were descendants of the Babylonians. Or, of the Sabians IN HARRAN. The famous “Arab” mathematician Thabit Ibn Qurra bin Marwan al-Sabi al-Harrani (Harran 836 - Baghdad 901) was Sabian as his name (al Sabi indicates it, and one of the most famous Arab astronomers, Al Battani, also (converted to Islam).

1) Born in Khiva Uzbekistan around 780 died in Baghdad around 850.

2) But Al Ma'mun was also unfortunately the instigator of the first known inquisition, the Mihna. This caliph made the same mistake as Lenin a thousand years later in Russia: he believed that he could impose by force the progress of the Enlightenment.

3) The development of the prophetic medicine (tibb e nabawi) having definitively killed any serious

development of secular medicine in the minds of pious Muslims, the medicine of the prophet or Tibb e nabawi being nothing but obscurantism.

NINETEENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

REVELATION OR SYNCRETISM?

Regarding the notion of revelation, Christianity and Islam diverge.

The point of view of pious Christians.

Contrary to what Muslims claim, Christianity is not a religion of the Book. For true Christians the word of God is not reduced to a book that God would have given to Jesus so that he reminds of its content. The Word of God is the Word of God EMBODIED IN JESUS. Hence the famous evasive reply of the Nazarene high rabbi Jesus to his detractors wanting to trap him: " “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them” (Matthew 5: 17-20). Then, squarely, the notion of New Testament

The writing of the Gospels is later to the message delivered by Jesus because each Gospel is the rereading that has been made, under the action of the Holy Spirit, by a community that has lived on this message. The Word of God contained in the Gospels as in the whole of the Bible is transmitted by inspired writers speaking with their own style and culture. God reveals himself in both Testaments through these authors who express the divine message with all their personality and their human capacities. But this message is delivered by human instruments marked by a culture, history, temperament and preoccupations of their time (Editor's note: this is the current position on this subject, but it was not always so, see the life and work of John Toland to be convinced).

The point of view of the pious Muslims.

In Islam, the concept of inspired author exists in no manner in this way. God reveals directly to the prophet Muhammad the words, the sentences, the commas, which he has to transmit to men. Muhammad is a purely passive instrument and his personality does not influence the sacred text that is uncreated. It would be a change of the Word of God that is to reach men in all its absolute purity and all its rigor. Moreover, God has transmitted only some of his decrees inscribed on the "well-guarded table." They were given by God in due time throughout human history. N.B. On the criminal level, a Muslim who denies the prophecy of one of the prophets named by the Quran becomes an apostate; he is punishable by death.

It is important to point out that the Quran was revealed in stages, according to the events and conditions that prevailed at the time of the Prophet Muhammad (sallallahu alayhi wa sallam), and that in order to facilitate for the first Muslims the transition between their habits and their pre-Islamic practices and the noble path brought by the Quran. The purpose of this gradual revelation was therefore to form the character of the new Muslims, in order to prepare them to accept the divine precepts that were revealed in successive ways. Thus throughout the period of Revelation, with changing living conditions, mentality and context, some revealed commandments were abrogated by commands more in touch with the new situation of the Muslims ."

Our comment or our tafsir to us People of Twelve Books (and not of one).

We understand what the pious Muslims are saying in this regard. God cannot do everything and he has to take human limits into account. Taranis or Jupiter, Lug, Jehovah or Buddha, are not omnipotent, they are subject to the set of universal cosmic laws that we call Fate , Dharma, secondary causes or providence. So far no problem, we understand very well! But what we have more difficult to understand is how an almighty God, a tawhid, who agreed to get into the small game at the beginning and for a few decades, of the gradual revelation of the Quran to be understood by men, suddenly stopped doing so because of the death of a man in 632 and now refuses to change anything in his text, to abrogate anything to adapt anything to the modern world.

And why did he create our world if it was to destroy it after (end of time). To have the pleasure of Judging and sending to hell some of us ??? Because he needed to be worshiped (oh the need for

love!)

Holy Quran chapter 2 verses 136.

"We believe in God and that which is revealed unto us and that which was revealed unto Abraham, and Ishmael, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the tribes, and that which Moses and Jesus received, and that which the prophets received from their Lord. We make no distinction between any of them, and unto Him we have surrendered.”

We agree on one point with Islam: yes God spoke to men.

The Divine one has always spoken to men since they existed, because that is perhaps what distinguishes best man from animals. The Neanderthal man already buried his dead, for example.

But can we really believe that God spoke Arabic with Neanderthals ??? Spoke Arabic with Adam and Eve ??? That the uncreated Quran is written in this language and not in another ???

So yes the Divine one always spoke to men since they existed, for perhaps 100,000 years if not more, all over the planet and not only on Sinai in Palestine or Arabia, and in all languages BECAUSE IN FACT HE DOES NOT NEED A HUMAN LANGUAGE TO MAKE HIS PRESENCE FELT AND TO MAKE SENSE HIS WILL. Since some specialists in Quranic pure Arabic speak of borrowing from the Roman (sic) language or from the barbarian (re-sic) language; Let us be certain that the Divine one also spoke in Sumerian to the Sumerians in Hebrew to the Hebrews ... and even in Celtic to the Celts. This idea was even explicitly part of druid dogmas in this field.

Diodorus of Sicily. Historical Library. Book V, chapter XXXI.

" It is a custom of theirs that no one should perform a sacrifice without a "philosopher"; for thank offerings should be rendered to the gods, they say, by the hands of men who are experienced in the nature of the divine, and who speak, as it were, the language of the gods [they are homophonon in Greek language], and it is also through the mediation of such men, they think, that blessing likewise should be sought.”

But if the Divine one speaks to men since their birth, why in that case would it be definitively stopped to do so in Medina in 632, because of the death of a man, because of the death of a single man? Was this man (Muhammad) worth past and present and future mankind alone?

Our conviction is that the Divine one has spoken to mankind and that he is still speaking to them! BECAUSE IT IS NECESSARY TO BE DAMNED HUBRISTIC TO BE PRESUMPTUOUS ENOUGH TO CUT THE WORD TO THE BEING OF BEINGS, TO THE TAWHID AND SO TO HAVE SOMEWHERE THE LAST WORD OVER HIM.

THE MUSLIM SYNCRETISM.

The Quran relates many stories and facts (real or imagined) that are found in the Old and New Testaments, the apocryphal writings of Jews and Christians, and the rabbinic literature.

Other sources of inspiration for Muhammad (or of God, of course, if you believe in the dogma of the uncreated Quran).

At the time of Muhammad , there were Christians and Jews in Arabia. In the north, in what today Iraq Jordan Palestine, Syria, is. In the south in what Yemen is today, and even in the central part called Yamama.

See the tribal confederation of Banu Hanifa, which was directed in 630 by a charismatic religious leader (apparitions to him also of the Archangel Gabriel) called Mussaylima ibn Thimama ibn Bani Hanifa. He even had an army of 40,000 men and it is besides near him that the half-Pagan and half-Christian prophetess Sajah as well as his disciples of the Banu Tamim tribe will take refuge finally, after having suffered a whole series of defeats.

There were even some of them in Mecca. The cousin of Muhammad’s first wife, Khadija, was probably a Nestorian monk or bishop (Waraka ibn Nawfal) and there were Manicheans in the very tribe of Muhammad, the Quraysh.

Hishām Ibn Al-Kalbī (d. circa 820) included, in the Kitab mathalib al-Arab, Manicheism (zandaqa) among the religions of the Arabs of the pre-Islamic period (Jahiliya). Muhammad Ibn Habib (d. 860) mentions in his Kitab al-Muhabbar that the divine justice sent the punishment of a violent death on the 8 Manichean heretics (zanadiqa) of the Quraysh tribe: "They learned the zandaqa from the Christians of Hira ." In turn, Ibn Qutayba (died 889) affirms in his Al-Ma'arif that" the zandaqa was among the Quraysh, who took it from Hira ," and Al-Maqdisi (around 966) confirms, in the Al-Bad 'wa-l-ta'rīch, that "zandaqa and ta'til (denial of divine attributes and names) were among the Quraysh."

These Christians were not always Christians in the sense we understand it today because they were often Judeo-Christians very early separated from the rest of Christianity or Nestorian Christians, even heretics, or Gnostics (thinking for example that the high rabbi Jesus the Nazarene was not really dead on the cross, that he was only a man, etc.

According to Muslim sources, the kaaba in Mecca also housed pagan idols, images of Abraham, Mary and the infant Jesus.

Let us also remind for this purpose of the thesis of the researcher and linguist Christoph Luxenberg: the sources of the Quran are Syriac lectionaries intended to evangelize Arabia and the expression "seal of the prophets" would only mean "witness of the prophets." The Quran therefore did not claim to replace the Bible, but to provide an intelligible version of it to the Arabs of the time. It did not present itself as an immediate revelation. In this way, the doctrine of the later Islamic dogmatic theology according to which Muhammad would be the seal of the prophets would lose all reason for being.

Christian Snouck Hurgronje is the first to have studied in their chronological order the Quranic verses that speak of Abraham. He concludes that it was on the occasion of his controversies with the Jews in Yathrib / Medina that Muhammad theorized that this Patriarch of the Old Testament was only a primordial holder of pure monotheism (hanif) and therefore in a meaning the first of the Muslims (according to his design or his terminology).

It was therefore only after the Hegira and exile in Medina that the Mohammedan preaching affirmed that Abraham and Ishmael were the (genetic or spiritual?) ancestors of the Arabs, built the Kaaba and initiated the pilgrimage ceremonies. It is only then that Abraham - still according to Snouck Hurgronje - becomes the most important precursor of Muhammad. The Mohammedan message was thus able to claim, as pure monotheism already preached by Abraham, precedence over Judaism and Christianity.

NB. It is quite obvious that the divergence of opinion between Muslims and non-Muslims about the Quranic histories in general - and the figure of Abraham in particular - can never be solved: the first ones consider that Abraham really lived in Mecca where he built the Kaaba with Ishmael and spread the pure monotheistic faith. Non-Muslims, and atheist historians, see this simply as a religious legend, a myth. At this stage of the dialogue, there can be no reconciliation of the two points of view.

But for Muslims, the similarity between the Bible and the Quran is not due to the fact that Muhammad has taken over various elements from Jews and (Gnostic Nestorian, etc.). Christians but to the fact that the Bible and the Quran have as author the same God.

Muslim authors therefore do not make comparative studies to find the origin of the common passages. For them, the Quran is the only one to be from a divine source, and Muhammad is only an instrument of transmission at the disposal of God, without any external influence.

Holy Quran chapter 2 verses 136.

" We believe in God and that which is revealed unto us and that which was revealed unto Abraham, and Ishmael, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the tribes, and that which Moses and Jesus received, and that which the prophets received from their Lord. We make no distinction between any of them, and unto Him we have surrendered.”

The differences between Bible Gospel and Quran can only be explained by the fact that Jews or Christians have manipulated or changed the text that was initially revealed to them.

Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 146.

“Those unto whom We gave the Scripture recognize this revelation as they recognize their sons. But lo! a party of them knowingly conceal the truth.”

Holy Quran chapter 5 verses 12 to 15.

" God made a covenant of old with the Children of Israel…. but because of their breaking their covenant, We have cursed them and made hard their hearts. They change words from their context and forget a part of that whereof they were admonished. Thou wilt not cease to discover treachery from all … and with those who say: "Lo! we are Christians," ….but they forgot a part of that whereof they were admonished…. O People of the Scripture! Now has Our messenger come unto you, expounding unto you much of that which you used to hide in the Scripture….”

THE TRADITIONAL MUSLIM DOCTRINE.

Holy Quran chapter 5 verse 3.

" This day have I perfected your religion for you and completed My favor unto you, and have chosen for you as religion al-Islam.”

Holy Quran chapter 33 verse 40.

" Muhammad is not the father of any man among you, but he is the messenger of God and the Seal of the Prophets.”

The covenant between God and men was first entrusted to the Hebrews but was later removed from them because of their disobedience and of the killing of the prophets. God later gave them a chance to redeem themselves by sending them Jesus, whom they also betrayed, and because of this, since it was not fitting for His Perfection to leave Mankind in failure, He sent them the prophet Muhammad.

Muhammad had on his back the Seal of Prophecy, a distinctive mole shaped mark surrounded by hair

announced in the scriptures and that he had between the shoulders since the earliest childhood.

The seal is the whole, closing a cycle, it is the cycle itself, sealing the covenant, it is this covenant, confirming the prophecies, it encompasses them all, guaranteeing the truth, it is itself the truth, preserving the secret, it is this secret. In the Quran (33, 40), seal of the prophets designates a very specific reality, namely the last of the prophets in the sense that he brings the last version of the divine message to men, the only true version and, because of this, the only true way of salvation. The Manichean origin of this precise meaning of the phrase “seal of the prophets” has been put forward by many scholars. Mani (put to death in 276 at Jundishapur), proclaiming that he was not only the apostle of Christ, but especially the seal of the prophets, wanted to affirm that his revelation was both the last and the most perfect one. He thus proposed to bring a definitive light at the same time on Christianity, Zoroastrianism and Buddhism, but also on many Gnoses, particularly on movements based on the knowledge of the Apocryphal texts of the Old and New Testaments. He declared that the perfect essence of the teachings of all these religions or religious branches was in the revelation entrusted to him, which was intended to gather them all according to their true meaning. The same meanings have been preserved in Islamto the expression seal of the prophets, namely, that the text revealed to Muhammad sums up and rectifies at the same time the contents of all previous revelations, no divine envoy being to be sent after him.

Let us point out nevertheless that according to Christoph Luxenberg the Arabic word translated seal (Khataman) actually means only "witness." So in this case Muhammad would not be the greatest of the prophets, the one who ends the lineage, but only a witness of the prophets who came before him.

But this is not the question dealt with in this paragraph and we will content ourselves with expounding there the traditional Muslim doctrine (orthodox Sunni ).

The seal is what comes to close, but also what comes to authenticate, confirm. As a result, the Prophet Muhammad confirms the previous prophecies and the Quran mentions the many prophets sent over the ages.

When a document is sealed, it is complete and nothing can be added. The Quran also specifies, as we have seen, that the religion brought by Muhammad is perfect.

Holy Quran chapter 5 verse 3.

" This day have I perfected your religion for you and completed My favor unto you, and have chosen for you as religion al-Islam.”

The presence of the seal reveals the entirety of the message and the fidelity of its transmitter. It is a guarantee against counterfeiting and changes. The seal of the prophets, through its function, guarantees Islam against counterfeiting and it is indispensable to refer to his Sunna and his example to understand the true religion.

The seal also seals the covenant. The covenant between God and the Prophets, concluded in the Covenant of the Prophets and the covenant between God and men, concluded in the meta-history. By this seal, the covenant is renewed and completed successfully. Man can once again carry out his mandate of divine lieutenancy.

The seal also contains the secret that it makes possible to preserve. This secret is that of the faith that the Prophet Muhammad protects, as the protector of the believers ...

MUHAMMAD SEAL OF PROPHECY (Khatam an Nabiyyin) ?

Muslims believe that the Quran comes from God, but the contemporaries of Muhammad reproached him for plagiarism, against what he defends constantly in the Quran besides.

Holy Quran chapter 16 verse 103.

We know well that they say: Only a man teaches him. The speech of him at whom they falsely hint is outlandish, and this is clear Arabic speech.

Holy Quran chapter 25 verses 4-6.

Those who disbelieve say: “This is nothing but a lie that he hath invented, and other folk have helped him with it,” …….they say: “Fables of the men of old which he hath had written down so that they are dictated to him morn and evening.”

Circumstances of this revelation (asbab al nuzul) according to some authors:

"" Whenever the apostle sat in an assembly and invited people to God, and recited the Quran, and warned the Quraysh of what had happened to former peoples, Al-Nadr spoke to them about Rustum the Hero and Isfandiyar and the kings of Persia, saying: By God, Muhammad cannot tell a better story than I and his talk is only of old fables which he has copied [Sura 25.6] as I have" (Sirat pages 162-163).

Holy Quran chapter 25 verse 60.

When it is said unto them: Adore the Beneficent (Ar Rahman) ! they say: “And what is the Beneficent ?”....And it increases aversion in them.

Circumstances of this revelation (asbab al nuzul) according to Al Baghawi: [the Meccans replied to Muhammad] the only Rahman we know is the Rahman of Yamama, that is, Musaylimah.

But since Muhammad is the Seal of the Prophets, this has considerable implications.

His mission….

Is completed, and completes all previous prophecies while assuming their inheritance.

Is universal, and is addressed to all men.

Is timeless and remains valid at all times until the day of the last judgment.

Must be preserved from all change since no other prophet can come after him to restore true religion.

The ways in religion are divided into 2 categories: some have an origin in the Islamic legislation and others have no origin. Innovation or bida falls under the invented category (2nd category) -which resembles the legal Islamic way: it is similar to the legal way in the external aspect when in fact it is not part of it but is opposed to it in many points of view, such as constraining oneself to particular worship of which no such specification is found in the Legislation (al-Shari'a) .2).

The innovation does not respect the dictates of God and of his prophet Muhammad and distracts believers from the religious practice as it is fixed in the Islamic tradition. The revelation being finished with the death of Muhammad, no addition to religion is tolerated. To say that there is a good innovation in religion is to contradict these words.

Several quotations from the Quran are mentioned in order to condemn innovations.

Holy Quran chapter 3, verse 31.

" If you love God, follow me.”

Holy Quran chapter 6 verse 153.

" This is My straight path, so follow it. Follow not other ways, lest you be parted from His way.”

Holy Quran chapter 7 verse 3.

" Follow that which is sent down unto you from your Lord, and follow no protecting friends beside Him.”

The hadiths are even more explicit: Muhammad used to conclude his sermons by: " Every innovation (in religion) is misguidance and all misguidance is in the Hellfire.”

That said, the best speech is in the book of God and the best direction is that of Muhammad. The worst things are innovations, and any innovation is an aberration "(Reported by Muslim under No. 867).

" ‘Whoever innovates [any deed] which doesn’t concur with what Islam demands is rejected” (reported by al Bukhari, Hadith 2697 and by Muslim, Hadith 4467)

More philosophically speaking, how to understand the Muslim theological notion THAT MUHAMMAD IS THE SEAL OF PROPHETS, THE LAST PROPHET? That is to say that, since Muhammad died GOD CANNOT TALK TO MEN? THAT SINCE MAHOMET IS DEAD THE DIVINE ONE CAN NO LONGER TALK TO MEN?

Repetition being the most powerful of the figures of speech.............

1) Nevertheless, there are at least three verses in the Quran that were not first received by Muhammad but by the future Caliph Umar according to the asbab al nuzul or "circumstances of revelation."

This is the verse on Abraham's station as an oratory (chapter 2 verse 125), the verse on the veil or hijab (chapter 33 verse 59) and the verse on the domestic problems of Muhammad with his wives (chapter 66, verses 5). Is not the Nazarene Jesus whoever wants indeed!

The hadith of Umar.

A hadith of the Sahih of Al Bukhari according to Anas Ibn Malik (volume 6 Book 60 number 10).

"My Lord agreed with me in three things. When I said, 'O God’s Apostle! Would that you took the station of Abraham as a place of prayer.' And it was revealed "Take the station of Abraham (maqam Ibrahim) as a place of prayer."

Likewise for the verse of the "veil" (hijab), when I say: O Messenger of God, why do not you order your wives to isolate themselves behind a curtain because they speak to them as well the perverts as the virtuous, and the verse of the "veil" was revealed.

And when the wives of the Prophet were all jealous, and then I said to them, it is possible that his Lord, if he were to repudiate you, would bring him better brides than you. He was then revealed this verse (Quran 66 :5).

2) Celebrating the festival of Mawlid (Mulud, Mulad etc...) that is to say the birth of Muhammad a little like the Christmas of the Christians or the winter solstice of the pagans is considered by some theologians often Salafi, but also Hanafi like Muhammad Taqi Usmani as a condemnable heresy, because unknown at the time of Muhammad and his companions, and warn against a change of Islam as it was revealed.

3) This change by Jews and Christians of their books has also resulted in the voluntary removal of the name of Muhammad from their books, thus denying his mission. In spite of this last reproach, the Muslims of all times tried to exploit the slightest clue of the sacred books Jewish and Christian to prove that these last ones had foreseen the coming of Muhammad. The harvest was poor...

- A vague mention in the Torah (Deuteronomy 18.18-20: I will raise up for them a prophet like you [Moses] from among their fellow Israelites, and I will put my words in his mouth. He will tell them everything I command him. I myself will call to account anyone who does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name.”

-The Paraclete of the canonical Gospel known as John’s gospel

-An apocryphal gospel that is itself in this instance obviously an antedated forgery, the gospel of Barnabas.

TWENTIETH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

ODDITIES IN THE QURAN.

The Quran is therefore the sacred book of Islam. It would group the words that God would have revealed to the prophet and messenger of Islam Muhammad through the Archangel Gabriel. This revelation would extend over a period of twenty-three years. The Quran is sometimes called simply Al-kitab (the book) or Adh-dhikr (the reminder). It constitutes one of the two parts of the revelation to Muhammad, the other part being formed of the hadiths known as prophetic.

Let us begin, however, by saying that the current Quran doesn’t come from God s neither from Muhammad; it was compiled after his death according to the wishes of various characters. As a result, there were many Qurans whose content and organization of the verses were totally different. The one who is considered THE official Quran is that of Othman (644-656), a despotic caliph who destroyed all previous sources (but Umar and Abu Bakr had already done the same by removing many previous versions).

This Quran of Uthman, is divided into chapters called suras, numbering 114 and beginning with the first, called Al Fatiha (sometimes translated as "the preliminary on" or "the prologue" or still "the opening "). These suras are themselves composed of verses called ayat (plural of the Arabic ayah, "proof," "sign"). The verses are the traditional number of 6 2361.

Order of texts.

The Islamic tradition says that the arrangement of the verses and a part of the order of the chapters was fixed by Muhammad personally on order of the Archangel Gabriel. What is certain is that it is neither a chronological order nor a thematic order. The Quran is a kind of anti-book, a real challenge to common sense!

Specialists traditionally separate his text into two parts that stand out by differences in style and tackled themes.

The chapters of Mecca, previous to Hegira, they are generally shorter chapters of religious and liturgical orientation; and the chapters of Medina, later to Hegira, longer and of more clearly political, societal, legislative, orientation.

The Meccan period previous to Hegira is nevertheless to be considered as the beginning of the “prophethood” or of the visions of Muhammad.

Meccan chapters.

The chapters of the first period, Meccan, mainly affirm the idea of absolute monolatry and define what God is for the Muslim. Among others, there is the idea of the resurrection of the dead in the day of the last judgment, the unity of God, and so on.

Medinan chapters.

The Medinan chapters are some "orders." They lay the basic foundations of a new society, in which respect and obedience are due to Muhammad and his family, where praise goes to those who fight and die in the lesser jihad (struggle) on the way to God, and where men fight against the oppression of the enemies of Islam. Nearly 500 verses group the civil, criminal, military regulations and will be used as a basis for Islamic law. Other Medinan chapters also define the duties and beliefs of the Muslim.

Professor Regis Blacheres as everyone distinguishes in the Quran of Othman two large periods, the first taking place in Mecca and the second in Yathrib / Medina.

He cannot make any distinction in the Medinan group (we will return to it) but, on the other hand,

finds 6 groups of Meccan chapters or verses s (here below the summary of the analysis of professor Regis Blacheres, his indulgence in less).

First Meccan period.

The verses, generally short, often form single-rhymed and rich units. The sentence is frequently elliptical, always ardent, oratorical, cut off by oaths, by imperious questions. Often return some formulas, some cliches, whose monotony acts obsessively on the listener.

A) First group (8 chapters). Suras 96, 74, 106, 93, 94, 103, 91, 107.

Essential theme, a call for purification, charity, perseverance.

B) Second group (23 chapters). Suras 86, 95, 99, 101, 100, 92, 82, 87, 80, 81, 84, 79, 88, 52, 56, 69, 77, 78, 75, 55, 97, 53, 102.

What is prevailing in these chapters are the eschatological developments. From the divine oneness, essential dogma in Islam, it is not yet question. On the contrary, what is constantly returns, as an obsession shown by the minutia of detail as much as by the power of evocation, is the reminder of the end of time and of the Last Judgment. God will assign to each, according to his works, the delights of Heaven or the tortures of Hell. The new preaching, as it appears in the chapters of this group, does not yet tackle directly paganism.

C) Third group (11 chapters). Suras 70, 73, 76, 83, 111, 108, 104, 90, 105, 89, 85.

Same themes as the previous chapters but a new element slips into it. Some quick remarks are indeed more or less direct and vehement retorts to opponents. The stage of conciliation with paganism is outdated. Another theme is added to these retorts: the reminder of the earthly punishment that struck, in the past, those who remained deaf to the voice of the prophets. The argument is weighty: it evokes both the omnipotence of God, his concern to support his Envoys and also the threat that weighs on what the impious people have most dear, their goods here on earth.

D) Fourth group (5 chapters). Suras 112, 109, 1, 113, 114.

These five chapters stand out very clearly of all others by their content. These are very short texts, in the form of creeds or prayers warding off. Three of them seem old. Two others on the contrary seem later.

Second Meccan Period

E) First group (21 chapters). Suras 51, 54, 68, 37, 71, 44, 50, 20, 26, 15, 19, 38, 36, 43, 72, 67, 23, 21, 25, 27, 18.

The style of these chapters differs very much from that of earlier revelations. The passionate, panting tone has calmed down. The verses are gradually stretching without, however, as a rule, ceasing to be felt as rhythmic units. The rhyme becomes more monotonous, is reduced to a few groups dominated by the finals in, un.

The oaths, certain cliches frequent in the texts of the previous period, have disappeared. Others replace them, such as the expression: " Those who believe and do good works." God is usually referred to as the "Benefactor" in the very body of the chapters. Finally, the double noun for God, such as "He who forgives, the Merciful", "the Omniscient, the Wise" appear more and more often at the end of the verses. It is possible to see there the development of a religious thought which feels the need to state some of the attributes of God or to attribute it to the habit of the community recitation that these repetitions of themes with rich sonority favor.

The form taken by the revelations provides a glimpse of the atmosphere: the increasingly hostile opposition is no longer confined to skepticism and mockery. It attacks, discusses, provokes, casts sarcasm. Between paganism and nascent Islam, contrasts are increasing. As a result, some Quranic themes take a back seat. The dogma of the divine oneness affirmed in certain texts of the end of the period becomes the essential theme of preaching. At the same time the remarks against the gods multiply. On the other hand. Descriptions of the Last Judgment, rewards and punishments in the Hereafter are shorter, less picturesque and often stereotypically evoked. The dominant theme is now what might be called the argument of the prophet preaching in the wilderness. In the chapters of this second period, on the contrary, this theme is amplified, it deals with more energetic threats, more capable of arousing fear among the skeptics. God has punished the Ad the Thamud and the people of Noah or even Pharaoh, with their impiety, and destroyed them. In these chapters the reminder of aborted prophecies brings a juxtaposition of narratives identical in appearance and style. Another important characteristic is the role of Muhammad himself. From now on, this one is presented as a signaler charged to announce to the Polytheists the imminence of the Hour of the punishment. As such, he continues the lineage

of the earlier prophets but he is not a superman: he cannot in any way compel the unbelievers. He only enlightens them and reminds them of the lamentable fate of the wicked in the past.

The chapters of this period are composite sets. A number of them takes the form of homilies in three parts. The first, more or less long, expounds points of doctrine or contains a threat, an appeal to the impious people. The second part, often very developed as in chapter 26, illustrates with examples borrowed from the past the fate reserved, in the Hereafter and Here on earth to the unbelievers. All ends with a conclusion that often resumes the initial presentation.

F) Second group (22 chapters). Suras 32, 41, 45, 17, 16, 30, 11, 14, 12, 40, 28, 39, 29, 31, 42, 10, 34, 35, 7, 46, 6, 13.

The style of these 22 chapters is not easy to define. On the whole, the verses tend to stretch and become arrhythmic. Yet the meeting of verses of twenty syllables is not rare and remains of a very sensitive effect. Compared to the language of the revelations of the second period, that of these texts is less elliptical, less charged with penumbra and implicit .

The vocabulary presents some interesting facts. The divine name "Benefactor" is no longer used. It is now replaced by the word GOD as in the previous period, double epithets are the rule in it, but some more common than others, such as for example "The one who forgives, the Merciful". Quranic Revelation is designated by various new names such as al-Furqan (Aramaic or Syriac Redemption) al-Balag (Communication). Many cliches become essential as "a hopeless doubt, wandering far astray, those who go astray." This repetition obviously shows the oratorical turn of certain developments. Above all they ensure the verse become arrhythmic a more sensitive to the ear "ending.”

The rhyme indeed, in these chapters, completes losing all diversity. By the use of double epithets or cliches in the kind of those we have just enumerated, the end of the verses succeeds in recovering a sonority, a brilliance all the more expected by the ear that the verse is more stretched .

These twenty-two chapters extend those of the second period and form the transition with the revelations received in Medina, after 622. They contain besides many important additions dating back this last period.

We find in them almost always the form of tripartite homilies taken by many of the chapters of the second period.

The Quranic language bears the imprint of some enlargement of the preaching. In the chapters of the end of this period, there is an opening that says a lot. "O People, O Mankind. Preaching is no longer addressed only to the skeptics in Mecca, but to the multitude of those whom it has not yet reached. This argument, however, requires a conclusion that is a reminder of the religious duty, an act of submission to the "Lord of the Worlds" (Rab al alimin, odd plural) one and all-powerful. Hence the formation of tripartite chapters whose public recitation favors the conversion of the impious or skeptic people.

In the texts forming the chapters of this period are taken over the themes of the previous period, on the divine oneness, beneficence, omnipotence, and omniscience. The descriptions of Hell and Heaven, even more so than before, are becoming rarer and, when they are met, are reduced to more and more summary characteristics.

The narrative parts dealing with earlier prophets, on the contrary, retain the full extent they already have in the previous period. However, they do not take care of new details except for Abraham, who is sometimes presented as the founder of Hanifism. This characteristic, however, results only from the inclusion in the texts of brief Medinan revelations. Also note the appearance of some new "prophets" like Joseph and Shuayb apostle of Midian.

Very often, however, return lastly little developed but important propositions: for example, the novelty represented by the revelation of a Scripture, no longer given in Hebrew but in Arabic - the role of a simple signaler attributed to Muhammad - the fickleness of Man who is quick to turn towards God, in misfortune and no less quick to return to his false gods when all is well. In these texts, as in the previous ones, the divine determinism asserts itself without ambiguity. God guides whom He wants and misleads whom He wants. In various forms, this idea returns frequently. In the same way, from time to time, is expressed the notion, fundamental in Islam, that the faith takes precedence over the works.

G) Medinan period (24 chapters). Suras 2, 98, 64, 62, 8, 47, 3, 61, 57, 4, 65, 59, 33, 63, 24, 58, 22, 48, 66, 60, 110, 49, 9.5.

No grouping by style. Duly noted. The twenty-four chapters of this group are of very variable

length. If we exclude the shorter ones, we find that they are all formed of revelations often very brief, simply juxtaposed or connected more or less closely. In these sets are sometimes met, here and there, revelations which are clearly previous to Emigration in Medina. The oratorical passages abound as well as admonitions to the believers, the condemnations against the "Hypocrites" or Israel that are here have a strength and a momentum yielding in no way to what the revelations of the third Meccan period show. Moreover, under the pressure of new circumstances and probably to provide the believers with multiple prayers to recite together, there are here and there, in the chapters of Medina, hymns of a lyricism and a harmony of style equaling what we found elsewhere in the Quran.

Very strange besides is the appearance of these texts. The Quranic sentence already so brief, generally, still accentuates its elliptical turn and its conciseness. Unusual cliches, formulas, arise. Repetitions abound, because above all it is a question of limiting, of defining, the cases, of clarifying an earlier disposition. The absolutely arrhythmic verses have usually four or five lines, but sometimes they can stretch further. Would not these texts evoke what the contemporaries of Muhammad met in their "customs"? It is very plausible yet impossible to prove. Whatever it be the Quran offers us here the most archaic specimens of the legal language, among the Arabs.

In detail, the style of the Medinan chapters shows certain characteristic that proceed from the new conditions in which Muhammad finds himself . The imperative: Say! already frequent from the last period in Mecca, becomes more and more common. He often appears on the occasion of an inner dialogue of which God dictates the answer. Often too, it is the believers personally who ask for the solution of a problem or the definition of a worship detail. Muhammad is then interrogated as a kind of Mufti to whom the Lord communicates his light.

In the chapters of this period the expression used by the Quran to those to whom the speech is addressed is not without meaning. The expression: Mankind ! yield to others more or less qualified: O you who believed! O People of the Scripture. One moment, the Meccan Polytheists are even named not associators, but those who do not know. This periphrasis supposes, of course, the expectation of their conversion. Similarly, as long as Muhammad keeps hoping to attract the Medinan Jews to the syncretism he calls hanifism, the Quran calls them sons of Israel. In the revelations which, on the contrary, take into account the vanity of this hope, they are designated by the expression: Those who practice Judaism.

A small number of locutions or phrases emerge, ousting most of those that are frequent in the chapters of the previous period. Such are the stereotypes: Those in whose heart is an evil, or still : Obey God and His Apostle.

In the strict field of the vocabulary, the revelations before us show the adaptation to the Medinan milieu. Some new double epithets used as nouns of God are to be signaled in the Medinan chapters. But, generally, they are unusual.

The effect produced by these double epithets is the same as in the last Meccan chapters. They close the verse on a wide, sonorous, sometimes indispensable ending when the verse is arrhythmic.

In Medina, it is not only the events of interest for the community as a whole that have had to attract the attention of Immigrants and Helpers. All the facts of daily life, the words and deeds of the prophet who is their leader, guide and model, are also charged with interest and meaning.

The allusions contained in the Medinan chapters and the exegetical data are on two levels differing to the point of being opposed .

The first are purely edifying; they only evoke the facts to relate them to a transcendental cause, which is God, the dispenser of victory to whom deserve it by his faith, his courage, his constancy and his submission to the charismatic leader. Here, therefore, no interest for the fact in itself and even less for the detail that depicts. The remark is a reminder, an admonition, a threat for those who have a mind. The second ones, on the contrary, are apologetic, inspired by curiosity, the phobia of gaps and obscurities, by the desire to order the facts in a continuous sequence and an impeccable chronology, by the taste for the picturesque amplification which touches the imagination and the heart. From then on, a conclusion is necessary, the same or almost as for the Meccan revelations.

Despite the resources offered by exegesis, we must give up a strict chronological grouping of texts and content ourselves with a ranking that simply takes into account some markers such as the success in Badr (624), the failure of Uhud (625), the battle of the trench (627), the Pilgrimage of 629, the capture of Mecca in 630 and the Tabuk expedition.

In their present state, the Medinan chapters of some extent reveal easily the element which provoked the crystallization of originally distinct revelations. Sometimes this element is reduced to one or some terms belonging to the same stem. But most often, the texts are focused around a central question: marriage, repudiation, contracts, Holy War, provisions aroused by an event such as the failure of Uhud.

If one wishes at all costs to isolate what distinguishes the Medinan chapters from the last Meccan chapters, one notes that the difference concerns only the very numerous developments of a juridical or practical order inspired by the new circumstances. Everything, in this community, is settled by the will of God, therefore by the revelations that receives and retransmits the charismatic leader who directs this community. To a large extent, the chapters of Medina form thus our essential source for the history of this important period for the future of Islam. We will find there the echo of the struggles led by Muhammad against the Israelite clans in Medina, against the party of the hypocrites (so named because of the distrust that inspires their faith), against the Polytheists of Mecca, finally against the Bedouin tribes rallied to triumphing Islam less by conviction than by interest.

In parallel with these conflicts between the enemies of the interior and of the exterior, the charismatic leader must solve a host of problems, important or secondary, often delicate and always urgent, affecting the internal organization of the Community and the status of its members. In the Medinan chapters, we will meet consequently some texts of a very high scope for the elaboration of the future Islamic law. Some, for example, relate to the relationship of the new religion to other monolatrous religions.

Others from the organic elements of civil or criminal law in matters of marriage, repudiation, transactions, suppression, etc.

In our Vulgate, these revelations received under the pressure of circumstances are not arranged in such a way that it is possible to reconstruct the chronological sequence of events. Likewise, texts of a legal or cultural nature are the germ of a code but do not form a Code. Innumerable developments are mingled there that takeover, by amplifying or clarifying them, the usual themes of the chapters of the last period in Mecca: reaffirmation of the divine oneness and condemnation of Polytheism, formulation of the moral duties of the believer, preaching in the desert, earlier prophets, evocation of the Last Judgment and retribution according to the works. To these themes are added a number of others inspired by the new circumstances. This is for example the one about the intervention of God in the critical hours crossed by the faithful. Other themes are changed: Abraham, a prophet similar to the other prophets, in the Meccan chapters, ends up in appearing as the founder of Hanifism whose religious center was Mecca. If Muhammad remains a Herald and a Signaler he also appears and especially as the leader of the community. Obey God and his Apostle is the usual expression which synthesizes this.............

TWENTY FIRST RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE SEVEN DIFFERENT VERSIONS OF THE QURAN.

According to the Sunni hadiths, the Dhikr (remembrance) of the Quran at the time of Muhammad consisted of seven ahruf (variants).

“ I heard Hisham bin Hakim bin Hizam reciting the sura al-Furqan (the sura 25) in a way different from that of mine. God’s Apostle had taught it to me in a different way. I was about to quarrel with him (during the prayer) but I waited till he finished, then I tied his garment round his neck and seized him by it and brought him to God’s Apostle and said, “I have heard him reciting Surat-al-Furqan in a way different from the way you taught it to me.”

The Prophet ordered me to release him and asked Hisham to recite it. When he recited it, God’s Apostle said, "It was revealed in this way." He then asked me to recite it. When I recited it, he said, "It was revealed in this way. The Quran has been revealed in seven different ahruf (versions), so recite it in the way that is easier for you."(Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume 3, Book 041, Number 601).

The differences were not simply about dialects since both Umar and Hisham belonged to the same Quraysh tribe and therefore spoke the same dialect.

Ubayy b. Ka'b reported: I was in the mosque when a man entered and prayed and recited (the Quran) in a style to which I objected. Then another man entered (the mosque) and recited in a style different from that of his companion. When we had finished the prayer, we all went to God’s Messenger………The Messenger of God asked them to recite and so they recited, and the Apostle of God expressed approval of their affairs (their modes of recitation). ……….The Holy Prophet said to me: Ubayy, a message was sent to me to recite the Quran in one dialect, and I replied: Make (things) easy for my people. It was conveyed to me for the second time that it should be recited in two dialects. I again replied to him: Make affairs easy for my people. It was again conveyed to me for the third time to recite in seven dialects” (Sahih Muslim, Book 004, Number 1787).

Moreover the discoveries made seem to show that the diacritical signs of the time of Muhammad were already used except for the vowels because their absence never prevented the reading: at the most it is there a cause of ambiguities on a few rare occasions (for example when the context does not clearly indicate whether the verb is in an active or passive form).

The Arabic inscription dating back 644 and discovered in Saudi Arabia is a very good example of that.

But why under these conditions did the first Qurans (Uthman's) were first published without diacritic points?

Answer envisaged by some: because Uthman had only reminders or ticklers used a little like stenography and not texts intended to be published. It is usually assumed that a continuous oral tradition would clear up the doubts that may arise from this shorthand".

Luxenberg shows that it is not so: the existence of a tradition of this kind would make incomprehensible many accounts in which Muhammad declares himself unable to explain certain verses, or gives his approval to several different readings.

The context of the formation of the Quran is therefore that of a written culture: we are not here in a universe of oral traditions, but in a universe of composing scribes.

Clarifications made by others. The first Muslims were confronted not with problems of

memorization but with texts which, in one way or another, were not familiar to them, they were notes belonging to Judeo-Nazarenes (like Waraqa cousin of the first wife of Muhammad) and dating back to his time, even before him. Did these words come from "God," through writing then so extraordinarily careless, or from groups other than their own tribal circles? In any case, if "God" spoke on this occasion, it would be necessary to suggest him to express himself in the future in a better Arabic and especially with less obscurity, the text is peppered with it and that is an understatement. Textual obscurities, fortunately, that some researchers have begun to clear up thanks to a better diacriticism: Christoph Luxenberg undertook to do so, relying on expression existing in Aramaic, and more recently Munther Younes. The results are encouraging.

Early Muslim scholars were much more flexible than today's Muslims and had realized that entire parts of the Quran had been lost, perverted, and that there were many thousands of variants making it impossible to talk about one Quran.

And they knew that the Quran compiled by the private secretaries of the Prophet was different from that of Uthman.

In the early centuries of Islam, many books were THEREFORE written, which noticed differences between the existing Quran; and although Osman only released one version, it took years for Muslim scholars to recognize his book and propagate it in the Islamic world.

Certain variant of recitation (of the Quran) existed and, indeed, persisted and increased as the Companions who had memorized the text died, and because the inchoate (basic) Arabic script of the time, lacking vowel signs and even necessary diacritical signs to distinguish between certain consonants, was inadequate. ... In the eighth and ninth centuries, it was therefore decided to have recourse to "readings" (qira'at) kept from ten different authoritative "readings" (qurra'); in order, moreover, to guarantee accuracy of transmission, two "transmitters" (rawi, pl. ruwah) were accorded to each. There resulted from this seven basic texts (al-qira'at as-sab', "the seven readings"), each having two transmitted versions (riwayatan) with only minor variations in phrasing, but all containing meticulous vowel points and other necessary diacritical marks. ... The authoritative "readers" are:

The Ten authoritative Readers and their Transmitters are...

Nafi (from Medina; d. 785)

Transmitters:Warsh,Qalun.

Ibn Kathir (from Mecca; d.737).

Transmitters: al-Bazzi. Qunbul.

Abu Amr al-Ala (from Damascus; d.770).

Transmitters: Al-Duri. al-Suri.

Ibn Amir (from Basra; d.736).

Transmitters: Hisham. Ibn Dhakwan.

Hamzah (from Kufa d.772).

Transmitters: Khalaf. Khallad.

Al-Qisa'i (from Kufa; d.804).

Transmitters: al-Duri. Abu'l-Harith.

Abu Bakr Asim (from Kufa; d.778).

Transmitters: Hafs. Ibn Ayyash.

Abu Ja`far (from Medina; d.747).

Trannsmitters: Ibn Wardan. Ibn Jamaz.

Ya`qub al-Hashimi ( d.820).

Transmitters: Ruways. Rawh.

Khalaf al-Bazzar (from Baghdad; d.843)

Transmitters: Ishaq. Idris al-Haddad.

There are even more Readers than those who are mentioned above but these are considered the most authoritative.

- The "book of the difference of the books" (the Qurans of Medina, Kufa and Basra) written by Kassaei.

-Ali’s Quran was organized according to the dates of the revelations.

-The Quran of Abd God Ibn Masud. the number and order of the chapters differed considerably from those of the Quran of Othman, because in the Quran of Ibn Masud there were only a hundred and ten chapters.

The names of many of these chapters were longer than those of Uthman's Quran.

There were also some additional suras which were not found elsewhere.

-The Quran of Abi Ibn Ka'b. Here again the order of the chapters was different. The chapter entitled Jonah was not included. There were not 116 chapters and many did not appear at all in Othman's Quran.

-The Quran of Zayd Ibn Thabit etc.etc.

Of all these former versions of the Quran that have disappeared or have been destroyed, only two manuscripts have survived to this day: the Samarkand Codex (dated 654) kept at the Topkapi Palace Museum in Istanbul and the London Codex (dated 772) preserved at British Museum. Each contains about 750 divergences from the current Quran (one notes that it is often the current Quran that seems to have added words or sentences to the original text).

In fact, we do not really know when the Quranic text has taken its final form.

The Muslim tradition tells the beautiful story of a text written on makeshift media – the camel shoulder blades have made many scholars dream. Discrepancies between readings, or even the risk of their violent disappearance during wars of conquest, would have necessitated a fixation through writing down. A commission convened by Caliph Uthman would then have established a definitive text sent to the main camps of the new conquerors, the others then being burned.

Western scholars depart from this tradition in two opposite directions.

For John Wansbrough, the Quran would not have reached its canonical form until two centuries after the death of Muhammad. Conversely, according to John Burton, he was collected during his lifetime.

Why not stick to tradition, as we have just sketched it? Because it summarizes only a part of the testimonies that contradict each other.

The data are surprisingly contradictory as to the identity of the people who collected the texts, of the people in the house of whom they were on deposit, as well as about the nature of the latter, collection or separate sheets.

It seems that the distinction between the Quran as Book of God on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the words attributed to Muhammad (hadith) was set up only gradually. The Quran and some hadiths are like two crystallization of the same magma. The Book of God was originally considered only as a selection of the words of Muhammad.

The Quran is a set of hadith selected for public recitation, and which is intended to represent the book of God. The constitution of a Quran seems to have made up for a large part of this selective composition. This was one of the tasks assumed by the scholars of Islam throughout the 1st century of the Hegira.

It is this initial indecision that explains, for example, that we find in the Quran dictates contained in the hadith, but in such a form that they are comprehensible only in a context subsequent to the life of Muhammad. Thus, the belated declarations of the latter, which have been grouped together in what is called the Farewell Sermon (Ghadir Khumm 632), recommend observing a rigorous truce during the sacred months; these provisions are reduced in the Quran itself because the new context of wars of conquest would have made absurd the respect of this truce.

As a result, the question of the author of the Quran is not closed. For official Islam, this author is God and he alone, in no case Muhammad, who only passively received a supernatural dictation. Non-Muslims are accustomed to speak of Muhammad as the real author, possibly inspired, of the Quranic texts. Ancient traditions, however, contain something to suggest a collective work, not only of collection, but in the writing of certain passages. In this writing, a great role seems to have been played by the future Caliph Umar, who would have been the true author of at least three suras.”Ibn Umar reported Umar as saying: My lord concorded with my judgments on three occasions. In case of the Station of Ibrahim, in case of the observance of veil and in case of the prisoners of Badr ( Sahih Muslim Book 31 Hadith 5903)

TWENTY SECOND RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

EVIDENCE THAT THE QURAN IS ONLY A COLLECTION OF MISCELLANEOUS WRITINGS

(notes, stories and songs, prayers, fragments of customary law, apocryphal gospels, etc.).

The letter codes of the Quran.

There are 29 chapters coded by letters but 30 codes in all. 28 chapters start with a single code and a sura starts with two codes, therefore in total 30 codes.

Five of these chapters have kept as such a group of letters: chapters 20 (TaHa), 36 (YaSin), 38 (Sad), 50 (Qaf) and 68 (Nun, also called Al-Qalam).

The most likely explanation is that they are the remains of an old classification of these leaves in the lifetime of Muhammad or in the time of their preservation in the house of relatives of his entourage, the letters then having a numerical value or having a figure value. A little like in Latin for that matter (see Roman numerals).

The number of letters beginning 29 chapters of the Quran varies from chapter to chapter, from one letter for some chapters to five for others.

On the other hand, these letters are written attached to each other as if they formed words, but do not have any known meaning in Arabic.

Chapter 2, entitled "THE COW," for example, begins with three attached letters, as if they were a word: ALM. But "ALM" is not a word of the Arabic language. The letters of these codes are spelled one after the other in reading, and not read linked as in a word. Thus, to read the beginning of chapter 2, you must pronounce "Alif Lam Mim," and not "ALM."

Transposed to the case of our language we are a bit like if we had, for example, a code composed of the two following letters: "WY." These letters, written in this way, have no known meaning. We should read this group of letters "WY" and not "double U - Y."

28 chapters begin with a single group of letters and a chapter begins with two of these groups of letters.

The exception, the chapter beginning with two codes, is Chapter 42, "THE CONSULTATION." It starts as follows.

Ha Mim

A’in Sin Qaf

Thus God etc.etc.

These are two codes, not one. Indeed, the Mim (M) appearing at the end of the first code, is spelled as at the end of a word. If it were a single code, the five letters beginning this chapter would be written in a linked manner, as for all other codes. In addition, the two groups of letters "Ha Mim" (HM) and "A’in Sin Qaf" (ASQ) are spread over two different verses, namely verse 1 and verse 2 of the chapter in question.

Finally, this chapter 42 is located in a series of chapters beginning with the code "Ha Mim" (HM), from chapter 40 to chapter 46. Thus the letters "A’in Sin Qaf" (ASQ) stand out even more of the first two, "Ha Mim" (HM).

It is doubtful that these letters could be dated from the lifetime of Muhammad since nobody has thought to ask him their meaning. As a result, we may think that these are later additions, probably serving as markers for the classification of Quranic passages, the letters of the alphabet then having numerical values, as in Syriac, Hebrew and Latin.

The mystery surrounding these codes of letters remains intact for fourteen centuries, and in the eyes of pious Muslims no one has been able to give the slightest beginning of explanation. Muhammad himself did not give clear details about them, contenting himself with having them transcribed conscientiously.

As can be seen, written in one way and read from another, these letter codes nonetheless meet strict rules. It is also this rigorous aspect which, very early, made think that the letters thus beginning some suras of the Quran were the support of an organized message, even of a hidden secret language.

For the rational minds, it is therefore a kind of numbering, these letters having as often value of digits.

For some Muslims it is a secret code conveying information that remains to be deciphered but perhaps linked to the end of time, to Messianism, in any case to a day when everything will be clarified.

Attributes of God for some, "language of the Day of Judgment and Heaven" for others, there has never been any doubt for Muslims in any case, since the revelation of the Quran, that these letters were as a coding and concealed a message.

TWENTY THIRD RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

QURAN AND HADITHS.

Between Quranic verses and hadiths (anecdotes concerning Muhammad) or vice versa, the border is sometimes porous.

The millions of hadiths that followed are in their vast majority forgeries made over the later centuries, and thus form a real Spanish inn as it is said in French, where everyone can find everything and its opposite by application (or not) of the famous principle of the abrogation (of some verses).

Since the descendants of Muhammad were all eliminated, a new dynasty was set up, that of the Umayyads, who also came from Mecca, but who, however, vigorously opposed Muhammad to begin with. A little as if in Christianity Judas had become the first pope. In order to establish its legitimacy, this new dynasty will lay the foundations of a true worship (isma) centered around the person of Muhammad. The control of the collections of hadiths (from their elaboration to their distribution through their writing) will be the key of the process.

During the period known as sufyanid (660-683), the expression Rassul God (Messenger of God), to designate Muhammad, did not exist, and the idea of a Message dispensed through him was absent. At the very least, the caliphs of the so-called marwanid period (684-750) did not feel subordinated to Muhammad, their authority as princes of the believers emanated directly from God.

The expression is then attested under the caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan (685-705), and it seems to be explained only in the context of a separation from the Byzantine Empire.

Faced with the Emperor Justinian II, the Arab power opportunely emphasized a prophet peculiar to Arabs, a prophet somehow unbiblical, not shared by Christians and Arab Muslims.

The seizure of power by the Abbassids in 750 changed the basis of caliphaL authority. Apparently, nothing changed fundamentally in the "imperial ideology" of the caliphs, as it had been built by the Umayyads. The legislative and ordering function always and so legitimately came down to the caliph in the name of his intimate knowledge of the true divine purpose. But another source of power began to emerge: the tradition concretized by hundreds of thousands of anecdotes (hadiths) relating the words as well as the deeds and actions of Muhammad, even his silences or his non-reactions. And therefore the specialists in hadiths or traditionalists (the muhadithin).

It should be noted that almost all of these collections were compiled at least 150 years after the death of Muhammad, in order to preserve and catalog the deeds or words of the latter. It is remarkable that the al Sahifah al Sahihah by Hammam ibn Munabbih is among the works written by the companions of Muhammad, before 678, under the dictation of Abu Horayra by a disciple of the companion. Many of the works written by the companions of Muhammad have been lost in later works, but some are included in the corpus of the latter in their entirety.

It is indeed in the 720s that appear the first occurrences of these elements of tradition in use among the believers. From then on, the intrusion of this "new tradition" became massive and the stories began to be frozen, until taking the form that one knew then, and until today.

As for the propagation of these stories, it was soon under the mode of the "spiritual genealogy" (silsila). Such hadith held its validity from the solidity of the chain of its transmitters (isnad) until it was fixed as the unit of the tradition corpus. But we must take for granted that the links common to the chains of transmission of hadiths were the true inventors of these normative narratives.

This quest for traditions or hadiths was combined with an investigation about the of the reporters, the companions of Muhammad being regarded as first-order guarantors of this living memory of the behavior of the prophet. The collectors of traditions, often converts, composed collections of hadiths,

where they carefully noted the path by which the prophetic words had reached them, the "chain of supports" or isnad. These traditionalists, unfortunately, often sought in the example of the prophet the confirmation of their own opinions; thus collections were formed, more or less favorable to the Umayyad caliphs or on the contrary to the Abbasid caliphs. Some hadiths were even purely and simply invented. Early on, Muslim society came up against the proliferation of apocryphal stories and a particular discipline, the criticism of hadiths, came into being, dealing with the conditions of transmission and never with the content. Western criticism has always shown extreme skepticism about the effective attachment to Mohammed of most hadiths; some, like Henry Lammens, have even considered the hadiths as one of the greatest historical deceits whose literary annals have kept the trace.

Before discussing further the content of the Hadith literature, it should be noted that only works of Sunni Islam have been translated and that even these translations are partial. The Quran is a canonical script par excellence and is common to all branches of Islam. But the Sunni Hadiths are not the same as those of the Shiites. Western scholars have studied most of the world's religions, but the hadiths are especially published in English.

Translations are mainly due to ulama of Pakistan and Bangladesh. It seems that these ulama have hesitated to make this literature easily accessible to the infidels. In any case, their enthusiasm to make the Quran accessible to each other has no equivalent in terms of popularizing the Hadith literature. This is perfectly understandable when one sees that the language used in this literature sometimes borders on rudeness and obscenity. One can thus think that the ulama did not want to spread this aspect of their religion before a priori neutral or hostile infidels. The researcher must therefore be wary of those works that have been cut up or have been the subject of thematic grouping and above all he must very well know Arabic in order to detect translations ad usum delphini or euphemisms.

Leone Caetani and Henry Lammens have shown that the entire Hadith literature, of which the biography of Muhammad forms a part, must be treated with caution and reserve,and each individual Hadith weighed and tested before it can be accepted as authentic. More recently, the researches of Joseph Schacht and Robert Brunschvig have shown that many traditions of apparently historical content in fact serve a legal or doctrinal purpose, and are therefore historically suspect.

To fully understand a hadith, it is important to have some knowledge of it's narrator. The Hadiths, of course, only report the deeds of Muhammad, but they do so through his Companions, in Arabic Sahabah. The first question that arises is who can be called "companion of Muhammad" because the companions of Muhammad are counted by the thousands, and it is therefore impossible to name them all.

The most famous of them is a woman, Muhammad's favorite childlike wife, Aisha. The others are men such as Abu Hurairah, Jabir, Anas bin Malik, Abu Sa’id, Abu Musa, the second Caliph Omar and many others...

Many of these quotations are suspect (a tenth-century critic pointed out the weakness of at least two hundred of the traditions incorporated in the collections of Muslim and Bukhari, which, however, are considered more serious) their credit is therefore proportional to the prestige accorded to those who reported them. This chain of witnesses is called isnad.

Specialists in the science of hadith (historical criticism) have implemented several types of classifications. Among the best known the classification according to reliability, the classification according to the reference to a particular authority, the classification according to the extent of the geographic area where it is found.

Classification according to reliability:

It is a classification by the degree of admissibility. Some authors, like al-Bukhari, have classified the hadiths as "authentic" or "acceptable," others being simply rejected. The authentic hadiths are reported with the chains of the witnesses.

Genuine (Sahih).

Good (Hasan).

Weak (Dha'if). These hadiths have a fragile chain of transmission and are often apocryphal.

Accepted (Maqbul).

Rejected (Mardud).

Invented, forged or made (Mawdu). These hadiths are false, their texts going against the norms established for the words of the prophet, or the chain of transmission includes at least one liar.

Classification according to reference.

Sacred (Qudsî). These hadiths are considered to relate the divine word through the prophet himself.

Elevated (Marfu). These hadiths are the narratives beginning for example with "I heard the prophet say, etc."

Stopped (Mawquf). These hadiths are the narratives of the companions who begin, for example, with

"We were ordained to...".

Severed (Maqtou '). These hadiths emanate from the direct successors of the companions.

TWENTY FOURTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE SUNNA OF THE COMPANIONS OF MUHAMMAD.

The Sunna is the second source of Islamic law after the Quran.

The Quran mentions the term Sunna 16 times to designate the conduct of God or that of men. The translations of the Quran use the word "rule" or "custom." Muslim jurists use the term Sunna to refer to all the implicit or explicit statements, facts, and approval attributed to Muhammad, or even to his companions. Sometimes this term is replaced by that of hadith, but this usually indicates an oral narrative.

Apart from some "sacred" hadiths, considered as the words of God addressed directly to Muhammad and reported by him, the hadiths are the words and actions attributed to the prophet and not a divine word. The term hadith therefore refers to an oral communication of the Prophet of Islam and Muhammad by extension a collection that includes all traditions relating to the acts and words of Muhammad and of his companions, considered as principles of personal and collective governance for Muslims, generally referred to as the "tradition of the Prophet."

With the precepts of the Quran, the hadiths form therefore the sunna hence the name of Sunni Islam for the orthodox current (85% of Muslims). The hadiths have been reported in various collections (true or otherwise, see the classification above) by faithful Muslims, but always at least two centuries after the death of Muhammad.

Some authors have identified more than 700 000 hadiths but in his become classic study on the fabrication of Hadith, (Muhammedanische Studien or Muslim studies vol. 2) Goldziher has shown that a large number of these traditional stories, accepted even in the most rigorously critical Muslim collections, were complete fake, dating from the end of the 8th and 9th centuries and, as a result, that the chains of transmission (isnads) which supported them, were totally fictitious.

Unlike the Quran, these collections have not been subject to state approval.

The Sunna has been united in many private collections, of unequal lengths.

The three oldest collections we have today are....

- The Musnad of Imam Zayd (died in 740), founder of the Zaydi school. It includes 550 narratives classified according to the following subjects: purification, prayer, funerals, legal alms, fasting, pilgrimage, sales, societies (legal relations involving two or more persons), testimony, marriage, divorce, criminal law, war and inheritance rules.

- The Muwatta attributed to Imam Malik (died in 795), founder of the Maliki school, of which three versions are published, of unequal length. Like the previous one, this collection also follows a predominantly legal classification.

- The Musnad of Ahmad Ibn-Hanbal (died 855), founder of the Hanbalitschool. It includes 28,199 narratives. In this collection, the narratives are classified not by the subject, but by the (closest to Muhammad) companions whose number is 700 male companions and 76 female companions.

Six other collections have become particularly important among Sunni Muslims.

- The collection of Al-Bukhari (died in 870), called Sahih al-Imam Al-Bukhari or Al-Jami al sahih.

Regarded as the most important work after the Quran, it contains 9082 hadiths, including the duplicates. It should be noted that al-Bukhari was Persian, and therefore that his hadiths are widely accepted by the Shia community, mostly Persian in Islam.

- The collection of Muslim (died in 874), called Sahih al-Imam Muslim, or Al-Jami 'al-sahih.

It includes 7563 hadiths.

- The collection of Abu-Dawud (died in 888), called Sunan Abu-Dawud. It includes 5274 hadiths.

- The collection of Al-Tirmidhi (died in 892), called Sunan Al-Tirmidhi. It includes 3956 hadiths.

- The collection of Al-Nasa'i (died in 915), called Sunan Al-Nasa'i. It includes 5761 hadiths.

- The collection of Ibn-Majah (died in 886), called Sunan Ibn-Majah. It includes 4341 hadiths.

Another very popular collection is the Mishkat-ul-Masabih (a niche for lamps), which, in addition to hadiths common with the "genuine" collections, also contains some others held in high esteem among Muslims without really being considered as canonical.

The Shiites have their own collections and their own collectors of hadiths, later, and mainly collecting the words of the imams of the line of Muhammad by Ali and Fatima.

- Abu-Ja'far Al-Kulayni (died 939): Al-Kafi fi 'ilm al-din.

- Abu-Hanifah Al-Kummi (died in 991): Kitab man la yahduruh al-faqih.

- Abu-Ja'far Al-Tusi (died 1067): Tahdhib al-ahkam.

- Muhammad Al-'Amili (deceased in 1692): Wasa'il al-shi'ah.

- Muhammad Baqir Al-Majlisi (died 1698): Bihar al-anwar.

However, in Shiite ideology, the place of hadith is largely secondary compared with the Quran, the only revelation considered of divine origin in Islam and therefore self-sufficient.

The Ibadi (dissent of the kharijites) recognize many Sunni hadiths. However, the main collection accepted by them is the collection of al-Jami'i al-Sahih, containing 1005 hadiths.

The Shiites reject the hadiths of the companions of Muhammad because they take into consideration only the Sunna of the People of the House (Ahl al-bayt) of Muhammad as a source of law. They base their obligation to follow the hadiths of the people of the house of Muhammad on two passages of the Quran.

Chapter 4 verse 59.

"Holy Quran chapter 4 verse 59.

" O you who believe! Obey God, and obey the messenger and those of you who are in authority; and if you have a dispute concerning any matter, refer it to God and the messenger if you are believers in God and the Last Day. That is better and more seemly in the end.”

Chapter 33 verse 33.

" God's wish is but to remove uncleanness far from you, O Folk of the Household, and cleanse you with a thorough cleansing.”

These different collections fuel the opposition between Shiites and Sunnis in particular.

In addition to these collections which collect the hadith, it is necessary to point out the different biographies of Muhammad which constitute an important source of information to better understand.

- Ibn-Ishaq (died 768): Al-Sirah al-nabawiyyah, only a part of which has reached us.

- Ibn-Hisham (died 834): Al-Sirah al-nabawiyyah. This work is based on that of Ibn-Ishaq.

- Al-Waqidi (died in 822): Al-Maghazi.

- Al-Tabari (died 923): Khulasat Siyar sayyid al-bashar.

TWENTY FIFTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE THEOCRACY.

God is merciful and forgiving [Holy Quran. Chapter 1 verse 1] No compulsion in matters of religion [Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 256].

The term theocracy is formed on the Greek words Theos God and kratos power. "Theocracy" means "government of God."

In its primary meaning, the term theocracy refers only to the idea that God governs and was invented by the Jewish writer Flavius Josephus to justify the disinterest of believers in politics.

Since the nineteenth century, however, the term "theocracy" is most often used to designate political regimes based on religious principles or governed by religious people. In this case, some writers prefer to speak of "hierocracy," a term proposed by Max Weber and which specifically refers to the government of religious people. However, the most widespread use is to speak of theocracy as soon as there is confusion between politics and religion.

Theocracy in the sense of a government of God may be envisaged when it is a question of God and of his activity in the world, whether he reveals his laws or acts directly in directing the life of men and the course of events by his Providence. As such, the theocracy is particularly concerned with Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

To think theocracy as a confusion of the political and of the religious one makes sense only if we consider beforehand what makes it possible to distinguish them. However, the distinction between politics and religion, or, in other words, between temporal and spiritual powers, is not universal at the outset. It does not arise in the same way in Judaism, Christianity or Islam. In other religions, such as Buddhism or Hinduism, it may be the very idea of religion as a reality separate from the political thing that has never been considered before globalization began.

Holy Quran chapter 4 verse 59.

" O you who believe! Obey God, and obey the messenger and those of you who are in authority; and if you have a dispute concerning any matter, refer it to Go and the messenger if you are (in truth) believers in God and the Last Day. That is better and more seemly in the end ."

N.B. Those who are in authority are the connoisseurs in matters of religion, and not necessarily the state or political authority.

Holy Quran chapter 5 verse 3: " This day have I perfected your religion for you and completed My favor unto you, and have chosen for you as religion al-Islam.”

There is unanimity among Muslims to say that the Quran imposes itself to everybody (hujjatun ala al-jami), and that it constitutes the first source of Islamic law. This stems from the fact that it comes from God. And the proof that it is of divine origin is its inimitability (I'jaz doctrine). But if we admit that it comes from God – because of its inimitability - everyone is therefore obliged to follow t.

We must never forget that the Muslim religion denies the man the right to legislate. The only legislator that matters for the Muslim religion is God. The role of man (of the human reasoning that underlies the ijtihad for example) is not to create norms, but to deduce from the Quran and the Sunnah (tradition hadiths, etc.) new norms respectful of these two sources.

We are here at the antipodes of what the famous French philosopher (professor of philosophy

more exactly) French of the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century that was Jean Jaures could write on the secularism.

"What must be safeguarded above all else, that which is the inestimable good that can be achieved by man despite prejudice, adversity, and conflict, is the notion that there is no sacred truth; that is to say, nothing is beyond the reach of human investigation. There is nothing greater in this world than the sovereign freedom of thought; it is this notion that no power – inside or outside - any power or dogma, must limit the perpetual effort and the perpetual search from human reason; the notion that Mankind in the universe is a great investigation committee of which no governmental intervention, no - heavenly or earthly – plot should never restrain or distort the operations; this notion that all truth that does not come from us is a lie; that regardless of our attachments, our critical sense must remain acute and all our assertions and thoughts must be impregnated by a rebellious spirit; it is to say that if God’s ideal were rendered visible, if God himself stood before the masses in physical form, the first obligation of man would be to refuse obedience to him who he considers his equal, not as a master to whom he must submit himself. Thus are the meaning and the greatness and the beauty of secular teachings in their essence and quite strange are those who come to ask Reason to abdicate, on the pretext that it has not, and will never have, the total truth; quite strange those who, under the pretext that our approach is uncertain and stumbling, want to paralyze us, throw us into the night, through despair of not having a full and complete brightness”

N.B. Jean Jaures's speech on the idea of God (February 12, 1895, applause). At least, if I understood well his very refined French.

Our purpose here will be to deal with the Muslim theocracy (and not its sympathetic heresies such as Sufism or mu’tazilism) because the Islam of the fundamentalists is undoubtedly the most successful of all totalitarianism. It's the perfect vicious circle. Perfect circular reasoning (uncreated Quran i'jaz isma hisba mihna duty of lesser jihad blasphemy death sentence for apostates ). And it concerns all aspects of life even intimate according to the hadiths on how to dress to wash to brush your teeth ... .even to relieve oneself.

Hadith 5397 book 26 of the Muslim Sahih.

" A'isha reported that the wives of God’s Messenger (Peace be upon him) used to go out in the cover of the night when they went to open fields (in the outskirts of Medina) for easing themselves. Umar b Khattab used to say: God’s Messenger, ask your ladies to observe the veil, but God’s Messenger (Peace be upon him) did not do that. So there went out Sauda, daughter of Zama, the wife of God’s Messenger (Peace be upon him), during one of the nights when it was dark for that. She was a tall statured lady. 'Umar called her saying: Sauda, we recognize you. (He did this with the hope that the verses pertaining to veil would be revealed.) 'A'isha said: God, the Exalted and Glorious, then revealed the verses pertaining to veil.”

Who said that God should not be unable to ... deal with subordinate things ???

Unlike the Nazarene Jesus who died crucified after the failure of his coup attempt against Rome, and whose spiritual heirs spent three centuries in opposition, Muhammad died as chief of state (the State of Medina), head of a state that has begun a rapid expansion. This obviously changes everything because we do not find traces in lands of Islam of the famous Christian maxim: we must give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s. On the contrary, it is very significant that the Year One of Islam begins with the Hegira when Muhammad becomes a political leader. This shows clearly that Islam is indeed a political-religious doctrine whose mission, assigned by the Quran, is the political and social organization of the male or female Muslims.

The idea is widely accepted, among the ancient historiographers and modern historians, that the institution of the caliphate was at first political, or rather that the religious authority of the caliph emerges, and in a confrontational way, only in a second time. The religious power of the leader of the community of "true believers" belonged to the Prophet Muhammad and was sealed with him (Manichaean idea) ; it lasted only in memory, in the memory of the companions of Muhammad, who remembered and passed on what he had said, prescribed, practiced (the hadiths). Since the first caliphs - the four "well-guided" caliphs (Abu Bakr, `Umar,` Uthman, `Ali) - were in fact companions, they could to a certain extent make coincide in them the political power of the head of the community and the religious power of one who knew what the Prophet had meant. But the contestation of the fourth caliph, Ali (cousin and son-in-law of Muhammad, oldest of his companions, first of the converts) and the advent of the Umayyads (660-750) broke the caliphal

chain of companions. It was after this first great dispute (fitna) that other men became specialists in the prophetic word: the "traditionnists" (collectors of the hadiths of the Mahometan tradition), the legal scholars, the theologians.

It is important, however, to point out here that the primitive caliphate power was, not conjecturally but in essence, religious and political at the same time.

Contrary to the claims of the scholars (`ulama) of the Abbasid era, it is the title Khalifat Allâh (representative of God) who first prevailed to designate the caliph, and this is only then came the title Khalifat Rasul Allah (representative of the Messenger of God). The expression Khalifat Allah is attested for all the Umayyads, as well as for the "well-guided" caliphs, and by multiple sources (the poets, the collectors of hadiths themselves, the first Arab historians), as well as by the archeological documentation. On the other hand, when the term Khalifa alone was used, it was obviously elliptical of this same Khalifat Allah expression.

Admittedly, there is the famous reluctance attributed to Abu Bakr al-Siddîq, the first of the caliphs: when the men of his entourage called him "Representative of God (Khalifat Allah )" he demanded not to be called so, but rather "Successor of the Prophet," adding that this title fully satisfied him.

Abu Bakr's remarks nonetheless have all the characteristics of an apocryphal tradition: isolated, it is reported by a single source, which is not earlier than the beginning of the eighth century (a century after the Caliphate of Abu Bakr, 632 -634).

A letter from the Caliph Walid ibn Yazid ibn Abd al-Malik (743-744), a letter reported by the historiographer al-Tabari for the year 125 of the Hegira, and regarded as authentic, has for its object the reiteration of the agreement that regulates his replacement. The document, certainly written by a secretary, and based on a standard administrative model, nevertheless reflects a precise image of the caliphate's legislative function. God inspired his caliphs; the caliph is, by vocation, in the good; the caliph is the instrument of God, each one must obey him: such are the precepts that the letter hammers home, in a repetitive, bombastic style, marked by the bureaucratic sufficiency of the decree. Effective link between God and the caliph; legitimate authority of the caliph; obligatory recognition of this authority. So the caliph could decide, give law, independently. He could say good and evil, signify the prohibition, and judge in the name of God, whose power he represented here below. And it is because such a representation of the caliphal authority is considered that the precise object of the letter, the agreement which governs the designation of the successor of Walid ibn Yazid, becomes very important. Essentially, Walid Ibn Yazid said: God has sent the Commander of the believers and he has no more concern than this convention, since he knows what a prominent role such a convention has in the affairs of Muslims; the Commander of the believers knows that such an agreement is part of the fulfillment of Islam.

Such a principle of governance emerges from that of the "sacred king" such as it may have existed in the ancient Near East.

Two pillars therefore support in total the power of the caliph: his authority emanates directly from God, if the Muslims recognize it, they will respect the divine order; its succession is the moment when the perpetuation of the divine order is fulfilled, if it proceeds according to his wishes, the historical fulfillment of Islam will take place. The law of the Muslims, of divine inspiration, was and was only the caliphal law. The caliph, commander of his community, defined and elaborated the law which made the divine plan. The court poets of the Umayyads, such as al-Farazdaq, the official poet of Walid ibn Yazid, spoke of the caliph as the being who made the existence of the community possible, as the link between God and men (Habl God, word for word: God’s rope). The link is what makes the religious one: an emblem it is impossible to do more significant of the mediating function of the political power.

The enormous political error of the mu’tazili (as criminal as the death camps for national-socialism), namely the establishment of a dictatorship intended to impose by force a certain rationalism and to fight against superstitions or obscurantism in religious matter (it might have been better to multiply schools in the ordinary meaning of the term, or to give oneself personally the example of the good instead of ordering it), had the opposite result of the one they sought. The opposition of the opponents of a law giving caliphate was very effective. Scholars, theologians, and historiographers, who for the most part were in the rows of this opposition, soon denied any active religious authority to the caliphs, depriving them even of the legitimacy of the title of Imam.

TWENTY SIXTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE SHARIA AND THE 70 SINS OR PROHIBITIONS IN THE LAND OF ISLAM (DAR AL ISLAM).

The problem of sins in Islamic lands is that ... .THEY ARE ALSO LEGAL PROHIBITIONS AND PUNISHED AS SUCH.

It is not useless to proceed here with a brief overview of the ritual dictates or prohibitions present in the Quranic text. It is also a way to see, in a negative way, what the gestures of the previous religious system were, and to realize thus the brutality of the Cultural Revolution that was Islam. It should be noted that very many rituals have nevertheless been preserved, when they could have been integrated, without much damage, into the Mohammedan doctrine.

The verses devoted to this subject date mainly from the arrival at Yathrib / Medina. They mainly concern the rituals practiced by the breeders, and finally, rather secondary acts.

Sunan Abi Dawud Book 27 Hadith 3791.

The people of pre-Islamic times used to eat some things and leave others alone, considering them unclean. Then God sent His Prophet and sent down His Book, marking some things lawful and others unlawful; so what He made lawful is lawful, what he made unlawful is unlawful, and what he said nothing about is allowable.

Muhammad, Quran 5: 2.

O you who believe! Profane not God’s monuments nor the Sacred Month nor the offerings nor the garlands, nor those repairing to the Sacred House, seeking the grace and pleasure of their Lord.

Muhammad, Quran 22: 27-28.

They will come from every deep ravine that they may witness things that are of benefit to them, and mention the name of God on appointed days over the beast of cattle that He has bestowed upon them. Then eat thereof and feed therewith the poor unfortunate.

Bukhari, Vol. 7 Book 67 Hadith 415.

Narrated Aisha: a group of people said to the Prophet, "Some people bring us meat and we do not know whether they have mentioned God’s Name or not on slaughtering the animal." He said, "Mention God’s Name on it and eat." Those people had embraced Islam recently adds Aisha.

Islam distinguishes, according to the level of impurity, two main types of procedures: the minor ablutions (wudhu) and the great ablutions (ghusl). Ritualism is pushed very far, as often in primitive systems.

The strength of detail.

Sunan Abu Dawud Book 1 Hadith No. 175.

The Prophet saw a person offering prayer, and on the back of his foot a small part equal to the space of a dirham remained unwashed; the water did not reach it. The Prophet commanded him to repeat the ablution and prayer.

Bukhari, vol. 7 Book 69 Hadith 534.

God’s Apostle said [?] When you urinate, do not touch your penis with your right hand. And when you cleanse yourself after defecation, do not use your right hand.

Bukhari, Vol. 1, Book 4, Hadith 137.

100

God's Messenger said, "The prayer of a person who does Hadath is not accepted till he performs the ablution." A person from Hadaramwt asked Abu Huraira, "What is 'Hadath'?" Abu Huraira replied, " 'Hadath' means the passing of wind."

Editor’s note. The very content of the prayers is not mentioned. What gives us all the same in the end.

The minor ablution: wudhu.

1. Invocation.

2. Three washes of the hands and wrists.

3. Three rinses of the mouth and nostrils.

4. Three washes of the face.

5. Three washes of the right hand and forearm.

6. Three washes of the left hand and forearm.

7. Wash of the head.

8. Wash of the auricle.

9. Three washes of the foot as well as the right ankle.

10. Three washes of the left foot and ankle.

Let 24 operations for small ablution.

The great ablution: ghusl.

1. Invocation.

2. Wash of the genitals.

3. Wash of the anus.

4. Wash of belly and inguinal fold.

5. Three washes of the hands.

6. Gargling.

7. Three rinses of the mouth.

8. Three aspirations then exhalation of water in the nostrils.

9. Three washes of the face.

10. Wash of the entire head and neck.

11. Three washes of the right ear.

12. Three washes of the left ear.

13. Wash of the entire body on its right side avoiding genitals.

14. Wash the left side avoiding genitals.

15. Wash of armpits, navel, inner thigh and knee pits.

16. Wash of the back.

17. Wash the chest.

Quran 3 :195: "Our Lord! Therefore forgive us our sins, and remit from us our evil deeds, and make us die the death of the righteous.”

Quran 46 : 30: "They said: O our people! Lo! we have heard a scripture which has been revealed after Moses, confirming that which was before it, guiding unto the truth and a right road.

Muslim sharia is precisely this path of the righteous and this right road, the "great road," the path traced by the ancestors before paganism (sic) that every Muslim must rally. Sharia is the clear path which must be followed, it is the path that the faithful must follow. As a technical term, writes Joseph Schacht, in the Encyclopedia of Islam, it is the set of God's commandments.

Originally, the knowledge of Sharia was drawn directly from the sacred book of Islam and from the traditions (hadiths) of Muhammad.

Concretely it is the meeting of the dictates of the Quran and hadiths, as well as the jurisprudence of the Sunna, Qiyas and Ijma. It is a corpus of ancient texts (9th century) on which every Muslim jurist is based.

More precisely, it is the external, exoteric, religious law, which is addressed to everybody, and which is made to be followed by everybody.

Justice or Muslim law (the two expressions amount to the same thing for our purpose) has two sacral sources: the sacred book or the Quran, and the Sunna or traditions (hadiths) relating to Muhammad.

Among the 70 sins stigmatized by Islam (a mostly symbolic figure) let us quote pell-mell.

MAJOR SINS.

-Polytheism or paganism: the most serious (unforgivable).

-The murder of a Muslim.

101

-The black magic.

-Neglect one’s prayers.

-Do not pay mandatory alms (zakat).

-The breaking of the fast of Ramadan Month, without valid excuse (illness, travel ...)

-Do not perform the great pilgrimage to Mecca while you are physically able to do it

RELIGIOUS CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS LAW BEING CONFUSED IN THE LANDS OF ISLAM UNDER THE CONCEPT OF “DIN” THE SHARIA DEALS A LITTLE (AND EVEN VERY MUCH) WITH ALL THAT FOLLOWS.

RELIGIOUS LIFE.

To tell lies about God and Muhammad, to conceal the divine revelation, or manipulation of revealed texts by people of the book, to deny that it is God who decides our destiny, figurative representations, idols, sculptures, sacrifices offered to another than God, doubts about the omnipotence of God over the hearts of men, fleeing the battlefield in case of jihad, deserting group prayer to pray alone, especially on Friday, the insult, especially towards the companions of the prophet, the insult and slander towards Muslims, hypocrisy, especially simulation of faith, saying curses, believing in the diviners, astrologers, female fortune-tellers ... ...

SOCIAL LIFE.

Suicide, adultery, consumption of alcoholic beverages, drug addiction in general (hashish included) gambling, slander of married women, disobedience of the wife, if the husband is righteous, escape for a slave, if the master is righteous, the denial of his father through full adoption or adoption of another name, arrogance, both in the wearing of rich clothes and in the gait, the wearing, by men of silk clothing and gold jewelry, homosexuality, the imitation of women by men, and vice versa, a fortiori transsexualism,

ECONOMIC LIFE.

Usury, robbing orphans, a government not following the rules of Islam, etc.

A. The secular sources of Muslim justice.

About one third of the Quranic laws existed before Islam, including the pilgrimage to Mecca.

Sharia has its roots in pre-Islamic Arab society, long before the birth of Muhammad. This society and its tribal laws were conditioned by both secular and magical features. The tribal laws of the Arabs were magical to the extent that their research and demonstration processes were dominated by the methods falling under divination, invocation, or oath. Its secular aspect was materialized in the fact that these same laws mainly concerned payment and compensation disputes. From these archaic laws, sharia has preserved the essential characteristics governing personal status, family and inheritance. They came to us almost unchanged, as they were applied in the small towns of the Arabian Peninsula, and among the Bedouin clans.

B. Sacred sources of Muslim justice.

1 The Quran.

a) The verses used by the doctors of Islam in their elaboration of the divine law are about 500. The strictly legal verses do not exceed 200. There is therefore, from this point of view, huge gaps. Only the chapter "successions" contains some details.

b) The Quran is not a code because, even with respect to regulated matters, no elaborate legal theory can be found in it. The legal regulation of the Quran is casuistic. The texts were revealed to settle particular cases, to solve specific problems that had arisen.

It should be emphasized that there are contradictory verses in the Quran revealed at different times. The Islamic scholars tried to reconcile them, but often without success, so they had to distinguish between the abrogating verses and the abrogated verses (Nasikh wa Mansukh). The problem is that almost all the verses showing tolerance are part of the Meccan verses therefore abrogated. Abrogated by those who were later revealed in Yathrib / Medina, and which are much less conciliatory.

2 The Sunna.

The second religious or sacral source of Islamic law is formed by the Sunna, that is to say, by the words and judgments ascribed to Muhammad. During his lifetime, the prophet was indeed often consulted personally on the meaning and exact scope of certain passages of the Quran, as well as on the solution of difficulties to which it did not seem that the text of the sacred book was directly applicable. The prophet, answering the questions that were asked to him, explained, commented, supplemented the revelation, and therefore Muslim considers the answers thus provided by him, as a new source of Law.

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The same observations as for the Quran are essential: casuistic nature of justice and insufficient number of hadiths in the field of law, which cannot suffice to form a complete theory or code. In Mecca, his fellow citizens regarded him only as a simple diviner, and this explains why he hastened to give up the principle of arbitration as practiced by the polytheistic Arabs. However, when he was called upon to settle a conflict within his own community, Muhammad continued to act as an arbiter. The Quran besides recommends appointing a mediator from the families of the husband and wife in the event of a spousal dispute. It is a typical survival of pre-Islamic law.

Became a "Prophetic Lawgiver," Muhammad in Yathrib / Medina exercised his power as an absolute ruler. The legal framework being almost non-existent, he exercised this power by referring to God and his revelations. For the "lukewarm persons," his authority was finally considered to be of a political nature.

The thirty years of the reign of the caliphs known as "Medinan" will be presented, later, as the "Golden Age" of Islam. And that's the idealized image that prevails, even today. Now, what we know about the genuine (and verifiable) history of early Islam shows that this was far from being the case.

Indeed, during this period, the commandments of the Quran were not even applied unrestrictedly. The study of the development of legal doctrines from Islam shows that one attributed only a very superficial interest to these commandments.

The main question facing the first Muslims was mainly whether the orders of the first two caliphs (Abu Bakr and Omar) were to be equated with binding precedents (sunna) or not. It was aroused when the third caliph came to power in the year 644, the very contested Uthman.

The "sunna," considered in this context, had at the beginning much more political than legal connotations.

The non-elementary conclusions that the Arabs drew from the Mohammedan message came at much later times. It is even noted that, in several specific cases, the doctrine of early sharia was in total contradiction with the explicit terms of the Quran (at least that of Uthman).

-Verse 6 of Chapter 5 states, "O you who believe! When you rise up for prayer, wash your faces, and your hands up to the elbows, and lightly rub your heads and (wash) your feet up to the ankles"; but the sharia of that time imposed only the washing of the feet.

-Verse 282 of Chapter 2 endorses the practice of writing down contracts that are not immediately enforced. This habit, usual among traders in Arab towns, therefore passed into the Quran; but the Islamic law emptied this command of its binding power, by denying the validity of the written documents, by giving primacy to the declarations of the witnesses; which, however, are only secondary characters, or accessories, if we interpret the verse in question correctly.

Muhammad had insisted on the notion of "brotherhood” between Muslims, but had not lingered on the notion of equality. As for the notion of "freedom," it was non-existent in the mind of the founder of Islam. He had, on the other hand, tried to fight the hubris of the Arabs and their mind of caste (to better control them). We know, however, that social discrimination and hubris never really disappeared in the lands of Islam. From the outset, non-Arab converts - regardless of their previous social status - were all considered second-class citizens. They were called "mawali" or "muladi"(in Spain). All the schools of law were also obliged to recognize the existence of "levels" in the social scale. These degrees did not prohibit the marriage between two persons of different ranks, but they permitted, if necessary, to demand the dissolution of it by the qadi. The Quran had accepted cohabitation as it existed in pre-Islamic Arab society, but in the main verse that approaches this issue (Chapter 4, verse 3), cohabitation appears only as a cheaper alternative to polygamy. It is far from the practice of unlimited cohabitation which was in force, in addition to polygamy, as soon as Muhammad disappeared. It is true that he had not been a perfect example in this area!

The former system of arbitration was kept under the first caliphs (caliphs of Medina), just like pre-Islamic customary laws.

In their office as sovereigns and supreme lawgivers, these first caliphs essentially played the role of legislators. During the first century of the Hegira, the legislative and administrative offices of the Islamic government are closely merged. However, the purpose of this legislation was not to change the customary law beyond what was said in the Quran. It had first to organize the territories newly conquered by the Muslim armies, and ensure the viability of an Islamic state that was growing day by day.

The first caliphs, these "fellow travelers of the prophet," modeled their behavior on that of

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Muhammad. They suppressed very severely, often bloodily, the manifestations of disloyalty. They went as far as to make whip the authors of satirical poems against rival tribes, form theoretically authorized of literary expression, on the pretext that these writings threatened the internal security of the State.

Although not taken under the Quran, many decisions issued by the caliphs got an official recognition, and were incorporated into Islamic law. The use of stoning as a punishment for adultery is one of those decisions. Most Arab theorists of Islamic law claim that this is a "command of the prophet." They refer to a verse of the Quran evoked by some hadiths and which speaks, indeed, of stoning, but which was not kept by the Muslim canon (Uthman’s version). The hadiths in question are ...

- Either the proof that Muhammad himself abrogated and removed this verse during his lifetime.

- Or the trace of one of the first attempts to establish, a posteriori, the "divine" (thus legal) validity of a caliph's order.

It was in this somewhat surrealistic context that the notion of "sunna of the prophet" appeared; not yet identified with a set of rules, but serving as a link between the "sunna of Abu Bakr and Omar," the "sunna of Uthman" and what could remain of the Quranic message.

As a result, from this distant era, Islamic or Quranic law was established on the basis of a general principle (sunna) that was not specifically Islamic, and on a text (Uthman’s Quran more than dubious.This is not the least paradox of Islam!

"Islamic law" in the strict sense of the term, only appeared in the eighth century, more than one hundred years after the death of Muhammad. The early Muslims had little interest in the "technical" aspects of law and justice. This explains the survival, in Islamic law, of legal practices inherited from the conquered peoples (like the Persians for example). We may thus mention the way of treating the "tolerated" religions (Judaism and Christianity) which was modeled on the legal rules of the Byzantine Empire. The same is true for the modes of taxation or the institution of the emphyteutic lease. The principle of preservation of pre-Islamic legal practices was even sometimes officially admitted, especially by the historian al-Baladuri (died in the year 892). As a general rule, however, fictitious Islamic precedents were completely fabricated as a justification.

The "traditions" (sunna or hadiths) reporting "actions" and "sayings" of Muhammad, of which we know they are more than doubtful, became "references in law" from the end of the eighth century.

It is in this idea of "a precedent,” of "a sunna" that the Muslim world has, if we can say, developed. What was customary was decreed, "right and true." What the ancestors had done deserved to be imitated. This will be the germ of conservatism and "backward-looking attitude” that affects the Arab-Muslim world of today. A world that refuses to evolve, but locks itself in its shell as soon as it feels threatened by "progress." On the mental level, pious Muslims are real living fossils.

In a single verse only, the ancient Arab term for arbitration appears side by side with, and is in fact superseded by, a new Islamic one for a judicial decision:”But no, by your Lord, they will not (really) believe until they make you an arbitrator of what is in dispute between them and find within themselves no dislike of that which you decide, and submit with (full) submission (Sura 4.65). Here the first verb refers to the arbitrating aspect of Muhammad’s activity, and the second ‘to decide’ from which the Arabic term qadi is derived, emphasizes the authoritative character of this decision.

This is the first sign of the emergence of a new concept of justice. The Islamic judge is the perfect continuity of the "guiding judge" of pre-Islamic society.

The jurisdiction of the qadis extended only to Muslims. Non-Muslim populations kept the right to be judged by their traditional institutions, including rabbinical or ecclesiastical courts, which were known to have largely doubled the official organization of the Byzantine Empire. Muslims even adopted certain functions unknown by Arab society, such as that of the market inspector (or "agoranomos"), which they renamed "amil al-suq" or "sahib al-suq." Later, under the first Abbasids, this office of inspector of the suq will give birth to the"muhtasib." Similarly, the Muslims of the time borrowed the function of "court clerk" from the Sasanian administration.

The groups of qadis, ceaselessly increasing in number over the years, were gradually changed (in the 8th century) into what we could call "Law Schools"; a term that implies nevertheless no form of precise organization, nor even the existence of a set of laws (as we imagine them). The qadis continued to be private persons. It can be said, however, that the division of Muslims into two "classes" - the elite and the man in the street - dates from the emergence of the first schools

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of Islamic law. From the beginning, the interpretation of the Quranic commandments was "multifaceted." This is one of the reasons for the appearance of many sects and sub-sects within Islam (which should be considered globally as a religious sect, a heresy of Christianity).

The fiqh, the Muslim law, built by private jurists, allows considering human behavior according to categories that range from what is permitted to what is forbidden through what is recommended, reproved, hateful. This is how repudiation - in fact a unilateral divorce - is the most hateful lawful! Taking into account the multitude of ethnic groups, jurists are divided into four more or less rigorist schools, which derive their originality and their name from the founder.

Malikism, with the Medinan jurist Malik Ibn Anas, takes into account the customs of Arabia; Hanafism, created by the Persian Abu Hanifa, is based on Mesopotamian law and is the least religious of the Schools, the most legal, the one preferred by non-Arabs; Shafi’ism, due to the Palestinian jurist Shafi, adopts a middle ground between the two previous rites; finally, Hanbalism is the religious law of an Islam that has become a legalistic and ritualistic religion, with a kind of meta law the sharia, whose jurisprudence or fiqh is elaborated in the legal schools. Taking into account Greek logic and reasoning, it is related to the Quran and Sunna.

It is significant that the real foundation of the doctrine of each School is not the consensus of all Muslims, but only that of the "Muslims doctors in the Law." The specific role of the "ulama" class in Muslim society was established at that time.

The need to find a justification for what had previously been based on the opinion of the majority led to the rejection of the legal school tradition from the first decades of the eighth century of our era. At the very moment when the "Doctors" of Kufa in Iraq attributed their doctrine to a certain al-Nakha’i, another doctrine of the time was adorned with the aura of the glorious era of the beginnings of Islam (still in Kufa); by being attributed to Ibn Mas’ud, a fellow traveler of Muhammad who had settled in this Iraqi city. The movement grew and most of the "companions of the prophet" became similarly the eponyms of the schools in Medina and Mecca. Iraq will outbid in its quest for solid theoretical foundations of the doctrine of the ancient schools, when the expression "sunna of the prophet" will pass - at the beginning of the eighth century - from the political and theological background to the legal background, by being identified with the "sunna" itself. The Syrians in turn took this name to make it the axiom according to which the practice of Muslims results directly from that of the "prophet." This last transformation of the sunna did not yet imply the existence of "hadiths" (information allegedly related to "tradition"). But it was not long before these "traditions" appeared, and those who put them into circulation were called "traditionists."

Under the last Umayyads, the Law Schools were representative of the Islamic opposition towards popular and administrative practices. The opposition group that developed within the "traditionists" clan only accentuated this trend. As long as a "companion of the prophet" had represented the supreme authority for the doctrine of a school on a particular point, it had been enough for a divergent doctrine to put itself under the aegis of another companion of equal or higher authority. Thus, in Kufa, all kinds of minority opinions were attributed to Caliph Ali (who made Kufa his capital).

Among the uses that the first Abbasid caliphs (and probably the last Umayyads) borrowed from the ancient administration of the Sassanid kings, we can mention the institution called "investigation of grievances." Its mission was to study the denials of justice, the illegal acts of the qadis, the difficulties arising in the execution of a judgment, or the injustices committed by officials. Ignored by the Arabs, this Sasanian-style "appellate court" was renamed "al-nazar" and competed with the qadis. The very existence of these "courts of grievances" - which were introduced to compensate for the deficiency of the jurisdiction of the qadis -; indicates that the legislative system of early Islam was already in full decline at the end of the eighth century (less than two hundred years after the death of Muhammad). Since the Abbasid caliphs, a double judicial administration - one religious, the other secular - is found in almost all highly Islamized countries. Competition still exists between these two levels of competence (or incompetency!) and this competition is the source of many conflicts.

For Europe the case of the island of Mayotte is a perfect example of the problems aroused by this rivalry. Yet in this case, there should be no problems. This island, although mostly populated by Muslims, is part of the French (and therefore European) territory and only falls under the "Western" (French / European) law. It is not permissible in this background that "religious judges" oppose legal jurisdictions.

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The following caliphs - as well as secular rulers - established new rules in turn. But although these are true "legislations," they continued to speak of "administration" in order to circumvent religious prohibitions. In this way, they keep the fiction that their "regulations" were only used to strengthen or enforce the "sacred law." This ambiguity, skillfully supported by artifices of language, extended to all the Islamic administration.

Islamic law, however, was never uniformly implemented in the Muslim world. We can be convinced of that by reading the memorandum that the Secretary of State Ibn al-Muqaffa presented to the Abbasid Caliph al-Mansur, shortly before being cruelly put to death (in the year 756). Intelligent and very observant al-Muqaffa, a converted Persian, did not hesitate to highlight certain aspects of Islamic legislation as it was in his time. Aspects that the sources known as "conventional" do not make possible to observe.

Ibn al-Muqaffa recorded particularly the significant differences that could be seen in the implementation of Justice in several big cities. He noted the same inconsistencies from a district to another and from one law school to another. Consequently, he advised the caliph to revise the various doctrines, to codify them and then to put into practice his own decisions in order to get a minimum of standardization. This would result in a "code" that would have been imposed on the qadis. This code could be revised or adapted by successive caliphs. It was a coherent legislative project that was in line with our modern idea of law. It remained "Islamic" in its foundation, although incorporating in it many non-Muslim elements. To understand this acceptance of concepts and legal methods foreign to the Quranic doctrine, which extend to the modes of reasoning and the fundamental ideas of Islamic law, we must consider the role played by cultivated converts. Because during the first two centuries of Hegira, these converts belonged mainly to the higher social classes. They were the only ones to whom the entry into Islamic society, even as second-class citizens, made possible to get considerable benefits. They were also and especially those who had benefited from the liberal education, pervaded with Hellenistic rhetoric, which was usual in the Middle East before the Arab-Muslim conquest.

These learned converts entered Islam with the designs and ideas that were familiar to them, and gradually incorporated them into the new religion. Thus elements of Roman and Byzantine law, elements of the canon law of the Eastern Churches, elements of Talmudic and Rabbinical law, as well as elements of Sassanid law, gradually pervaded the nascent Islamic code. This "infiltration" took place during the incubation period of the first century of Hegira, and was materialized in the Islamic doctrines that were developed between the eighth and fourteenth centuries of our era.

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TWENTY SEVENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

DE MINIMIS NON CURAT PRAETOR.

Sahih Bukhari Volume 6, Book 60, Number 10.

Sahih Bukhari 6:60: 313.

What is more appropriate to say is that in the lands of Islam (Dar al Islam) good and evil have nothing to do with any kind of golden rule like "do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you.

Is good in the lands of Islam what the Quran dictates or authorizes is good what Muhammad did or said (isma).

Is evil in the lands of Islam what the Quran forbids or curses is evil what Mohammed condemned or disapproved.

It is beside significant that the words used most often in this religious ideology are the words halal or haram and not the universal terms of good or evil.

The created (human) Quran being a true intellectual catastrophe (no plan no context mixing genres times poetry and non-philosophy, etc.) moreover limited in number of words, it was still possible to arrange a few spaces of liberty, the most well known being that of the famous and primordial distinction between abrogated verses of the time when Muhammad was in opposition at Mecca his native city and verses become abrogating when Muhammad exercised power in the City State of Medina.

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On the other hand, considering the phenomenal quantity of hadiths or anecdotes collected about Muhammad, either directly or indirectly, here impossible to escape it.

The misfortune of the Muslims is that Muhammad lived much longer than the Nazarene high rabbi Jesus and that he ended as head of state (while the coup of the followers of Jesus, itself, was crushed by the Romans) .

Given the mentality of the time (equating of every religion not to spirituality but to a law, Din, as in the case of the Law of Moses, social conformity within a society quite limited in number and in space, the oases) Muhammad was therefore asked about everything and anything.

It is likely that many of these questions unworthy of a philosopher or of a mystic and pertaining to simple hygiene or gastronomy, etc. .... were asked after the fact, and after the personal death of Muhammad. It was possible then to ask the same kind of stupid questions to the family members or relatives.

As everyone else Muhammad had opinions on everything, and he does not seem to have resisted the temptation to give his opinion to who asked him.

It would have been preferable that Muhammad acts as the great hero of the initiatory novel called the four Gospels and, faced with the many trick questions of the Pharisees, escapes by some evasive replies or expresses above all with parables like the parable of the adulterous woman, the return of the prodigal son, he laborers of the eleventh hour, the unjust steward or the good Samaritan.

It would have been better that Muhammad does as the great hero of the initiatory novel called the four Gospels and breaks with his family.

It would have been better that Muhammad is like the great hero of the initiatory novel called The Four Gospels and doesn’t start a family.

It would have been better that Muhammad remains in the opposition and doesn’t end up at the head of a huge empire.

This was not the case, alas, for two billion of our human fellow men and d women. Because the first victims of all this are the Muslims themselves of course). The misfortune is therefore that in Muslim religious ideology good is not the application of the golden rule (do not do unto others what you would not want to be done unto you) but the application of the rule: "IF MUHAMMAD HAS DONE IT THEN THAT IS GOOD" IF IT IS THE QURAN THAT SAYS IT (NAMELY STILL IF IT IS MUHAMMAD WHO SAYS IT IS GOOD!)

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TWENTY EIGHTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

There is unanimity among Muslims that the Quran is binding on all (hujjatun 'ala al-jami'), and that it is the primary source of Muslim law. This stems from the fact that it comes from God.

FUNDAMENTALISM * AND ARCHAISM IN LANDS OF ISLAM.

After the death of Muhammad, a number of his companions took care of the fiqh, dispensing fatwas to Muslims or acting as judges. Their decisions have been reported in Muhammad's Sunnah collections or in separate collections.

Both terms fiqh and sharia are unfortunately often confused and used for each other.

-The sharia is the virtual , ideal, theoretical, abstract, norm.

-The fiqh is the applied jurisprudence, drawn from sharia law by the reasoning of great jurists in Baghdad, between the 8th and 9th centuries, through four schools of law: the Hanifi school, the Maliki school, the Shafii school, the Hanbali school. But this jurisprudential construction of the fiqh is based on five sources: the Quran** , the sunna, the ijma or consensus of scholars, the qiyas or reasoning by analogy, and the ra'y or personal opinion of the judge.

Two of them are fundamental and accepted by all, partisans or not of the reason: the Quran ** and then the sunna, or tradition.

Shari'a is therefore the attempt made by some of these later authors, asking themselves many questions, to systematize a number of the principles selected by them to settle everything of the daily life of men and women, including in the least detail.

Islam (which means submission ...... to God) is at the same time not only a religion and a way of life (al-islam Din wa dunya) but also a religion and a state: al-islam din wa dawla,

Islam does not allow for a separation of the political and religious similar to that based on the distinction between temporal and spiritual in paganism or in Christianity.

Holy Quran chapter 3 verse 104: " And there may spring from you a nation who invite to goodness, and enjoin right conduct and forbid indecency.”

Consecha do chursachad i n-gnimaib antechtai is found in the barbarian druids of Far West. Reproves and blames bad deeds. Note that our hero is not a god but a semi-god benefiting from any particular isma unlike Muhammad, that this expression is still less constraining than the famous " You are the best community that has been raised up for mankind. You enjoin right conduct and forbid indecency” (chapter 3 verse 110 of the Holy Quran) and also that it applies only to civil life (so can be summed up as "condemns what is obviously unlawful ). The only problem is that ancient druids equated justice and truth. Was just what was true or conversely was true what was just. To reprove what is bad is already much and even perhaps enough, but to order the good ... then this opens the door to all totalitarianisms. Quran chapter 3 verse 19: Lo! religion with God is the Surrender to His Will and Guidance.”

The principle "what is not forbidden is a contrario allowed" is more compatible with our idea of human freedom. To order the good !!! Brrr !!! This opens the door to all dictatorships by definition especially when you think you know that, unlike the Bible, the Quran does not constitute a human narrative of the divine message (as attested by the scholars and sages of the Synagogue or the Church ) but is the "original text" of divine revelation **. At the very time of the divine revelation, these words were memorized and recorded (by the companions of the prophet) in a single collection using a very

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rigorous method of cross-referencing sources (sic, end of the quote).

The problem of theocracy in Islam can therefore be studied starting from the sharia, whether or not it is in force, and in the case it is, from the conditions under which it applies.

The original idea of sharia is that each community is assigned a program, project or some commands. In this sense, the original Sharia was the exact correspondent of the various professional deontologies forming druidic ethics (the deontology of the warriors, the deontology of the producers and the craftsmen, etc.) what the Church calls the "duties of one’s state" .

Subsequently, without ever ceasing to debate, has developed the idea that the sharia should regulate all the gestures from the most harmless to the most serious (whereas in druidism was applied before it existed the Latin maxim "De minimis not curat druis ").

The Shari'a will thus fix the ritual obligations (prayers, pilgrimage, mandatory alms, etc.), taxes, expiations, lesser jihad or punishments. Shari'a also defines different communities to which it sets rights and duties according to their condition of man, woman, Muslim, "people of the book" or other.

Upgrading Sharia law can only come (in the spirit of the Muslim legal system) from the discovery of a principle already contained as a germ in the Quran.

In certain situations, the ijtihad must be performed by everyone, but when the Muslims are in a community, it is up to the scholars (mujtahid) to do so while the common believers must "follow" the afore mentioned scholars.

The question remains whether we now consider that the gates of ijtihad are closed or whether it is still possible to practice this ijtihad.

In theological Arabic, in fact, the term bid`ah (innovation, new idea, heresy) designates something invented on the basis of no previous, existing, model, therefore groundless, and unprecedented. Therefore a heresy.

Several quotes from the Quran are cited to condemn innovations in religion. Here is one: Holy Quran chapter 5 verse 3. “This day have I perfected your religion for you and completed My favor unto you, and have chosen for you as religion al-Islam.”

In the context of Sunni Islam, the ways in religion are divided into two categories: some have their origin in Islamic legislation and others have no origin in Islamic law.

Innovation falls within this second category, that of invention, which resembles the Islamic legal path (it is similar to the legal path in its external aspect) when in fact it is not part of it but there are several points of view, such as the fact of constraining oneself to religious practices of which no advice is found in the Legislation (al-Shari'a). Innovation or bid'ah is that which does not respect the prescriptions of God and his prophet Muhammad and distracts believers from the religious practice as it has been fixed by tradition. The revelation having ended with the death of Muhammad, no later addition to religion is tolerated. To say that there can be good innovations in religion is to contradict these words.

The hadiths are even more explicit: Muhammad used to conclude his sermons by:

"The best of the speech is embodied in the Book of God, and the best of the guidance is the guidance given by Muhammad. The most evil affairs are their innovations and every innovation is error "(Reported by Muslim under No. 867a).

" He who innovates things in our affairs for which there is no valid reason commits sin and these are to be rejected”(Reported by Muslim under No. 1718 a).

ON THE FORM OF GOVERNMENT.

The first "government" in the history of Islam was perhaps the one that coincided with the Medinan period of Muhammad. It is difficult to know if he founded a real state, but in any case he presided over the destiny of the young Ummah, or nascent Muslim community. The function of guiding the latter is therefore, in these early days of Islam, assumed by the one who has the status of a prophet, and has received the Quranic revelation. At his death, the question will be asked what role this revelation should play in the government of the city, and who are the men who will make the link between this revelation and the management of politics. This question crosses all the political history of Islam and arouses the problem of the link between religion and politics in the lands of Islam.

The believers then respond by establishing a caliphate: the first leaders of the community take the title of Khalifat Allah. Historically, this caliphate is realized in very different ways: in the institution of the first four caliphs, known as "well guided", and in the dynasties that follow and then are fragmented over time into other forms of government (multiple caliphate , sultanates, emirates ...), as the Muslim empire expands geographically. But the notion of caliphate decays correlatively to this enlargement. We must therefore note the discontinuity of this "caliphal experience." This is not the only type of government lived by Muslims and it disappears definitively in 1924.

Returning to the concept of caliphate amounts to describing some of the main features of the executive power in the community. The idea of a legislative power remains for a very long time

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indefinite, theoretically coming down only to the Quranic revelation and the Sunnah or Mahometan Tradition.

Caliphate power, on the contrary, has been defined and studied by Muslim authors, and has given rise to different conceptions. The most common, which has become the state's political management, is the classic Sunni theory of the caliphate.

In this version of the myth of origins, the prophetic period, immediately followed by that of the first four caliphs, defines a golden age. The further we move away, the more we witness the decline of socio-political Islam. This representation has become common among many intellectuals or Islamist ideologues of all kinds. For them, the Islam of Medina represents the perfect, ideal Moslem city, where Muslim universalism replaces blood ties and tribal formations. Some insist on the exact adequacy to the standards of the revelation of this Medinan period but others reinterpret the Medinan period by giving it democratic accents. Through the notion of shura (consultation) for example, they attempt to assert the cooperative and consultative nature of the original Islam. These two interpretations are not exclusive of each other and give rise to representations of the government which are not without ambiguities.

In this regard, let us note that the problem raised by the so-called Constitution of Medina, in fact, a series of several pacts (8 according to R.B. Sarjeant), is far from being settled.

If the use of the concept of caliphate is done at the death of the prophet, and his first succession by Abu Bakr in 632, the question of the link between the caliphate and Islam will really begin to arise for the Muslim community only in the year 657. The battle of Siffin opposes the partisans of Ali, son-in-law and cousin of Muhammad, to the partisans of Muawiya, Ali's competitor and self-proclaimed caliph for a year.

A) Those who decide to remain foreign to this battle, the dissenters known as kharijites, from kharaja, "to go out" in Arabic, leave the party of Ali and refuse to accept the globally favorable to Muawiya arbitration ***. For them, only a godly and just caliph deserves obedience. They thus affirm the elective principle of the caliphate, without any other restriction than religious. Thus, the Kharijite party will continually rebel against the men in power, basing the principle of political opposition in Islam.

B) The faithful of Ali, who will become the Shiites, then make the caliphate a divine right that belongs only to the descendants of the prophet by Fatima, the people of the house (ahl al-bayt).

C) On the other hand, Muawiya's men will found Sunni orthodoxy and establish the foundations of the so-called traditional idea of power in Islam. The caliph, legitimately elected or appointed, provided he is of the tribe of the prophet and not necessarily of his family, has the right to the obedience of the Muslims as long as he does not order anything that is openly contrary to Islam. But after the appointment of the caliph, the intimate beliefs and practices of the caliph, even impious, cannot legitimize the rebellion of the community against him and / or his withdrawal from the power.

This thesis produces roughly the matrix of a Sunni theory of the caliphate, which is based on the absolute necessity of having an executive and coercive power. It is better to have an unjust leader than to make the community suffer the ordeal of a fitna, or civil war, according to Abu Hamid al-Ghazali, in the eleventh century.

Under the Abassid dynasty, to cite only an example, a functional separation between religion and politics will be established around the 10th century, even if, at that time, the temporal power becomes almost absolute, and governs "in the name of God ." By the emergence of a class of men of God, who are in a partnership relationship with the State, religious tasks, especially that of producing fatwas, come down to an establishment that is not to be confused with that of the executive power, but which remains subject to it. The caliph himself gradually becomes khalifat God, rather than the successor of the only prophet and his person gains spiritual authority. But because the management of the imperial state, geographically extended, becomes more and more complex, he gradually delegates the temporal tasks to the vizier, placed under his theoretical control. The religion expresses itself and is fulfilled then in a relation of intersections with the power. Hence the role of Mu'tazilism at the time.

But with the end of the Muslim Inquisition known as Mihna and the triumph of Sunnism in Baghdad, the leader of the community will be no longer a "spiritual" authority. He will only make the link between spiritual and temporal authority. He will be able therefore to be defined as a temporal leader - who has nothing "divine" in himself - charged by the community to enforce temporal and spiritual laws. He no longer has the power to define the dogma, which remains above him, for it is generally not his competence to say the lawful and the unlawful with regard to the religious field. The specialists of the Moslem law, the fuqaha and the ulema take care of this function, by their practice of ijtihad first, of fundamentalism then. In this ideal representation, the sovereign does not have either legislative or judicial power. He simply enforces existing civil and religious laws. But he appoints qadis and muftis to say the law.

The government of the city is thus organized around a division of tasks, the legislative power being

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represented directly by the revealed texts as well as the Sunna, the judiciary one by the ijtihad or exegesis of the doctors of the law, and the executive one by the caliph himself. These three functions are separated in institutional terms, but all refer to the divine norm.

In short, Islam is not its heresies or minorities like the Sufis. Islam is not either the Quran (an antibook), Islam is:.. the Quran + the hadith + the life of Muhammad (with isma) + the tradition concerning them (sunna = 85% of Muslims) + the reflection of the doctors in Muslim law (sharia and fiqh). These are the five real pillars of Islam.

For Islam, the separation of politics and religion is not even conceivable. It would be even shocking, because it would then seem an abandonment of the human to the power of evil, or a relegation of God out of what belongs to him by right. From the beginning, Islam asserts itself as "religion and regime" (din wa-dawla) and this unity of politics and religion is still defended today in some fundamentalist currents.

Shariah is a set of laws that do not all have the same status. We can distinguish the rights of God (huquq God) and the rights of men (huquq aladamiyyin).

The existence of these "rights of God" and the fact that their application come down to the government makes it possible to speak of theocracy if sharia is in force in a country.

The implementation of the rights of God is the responsibility of governments, they form what is called the civil law in the West, while the application of the human right is at the discretion of each.

The underlying idea is that a violation of God's rights will immediately harm the entire community while the fact that an individual does not claim his rights concerns only him.

Defenders of Islam must therefore repeat TIRELESSLY AND EXPLICITLY that even in a predominantly Muslim country they admit equal rights between men and women or between Muslims and non-Muslims. A non-Muslim must be allowed to reach the highest office even in Muslim land (secularism).

N.B. "After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new totalitarian global threat: Islamism. We call for resistance to religious totalitarianism and for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values for all….We plead for the universality of freedom of speech, so that a critical spirit may be exercised on all continents, against all abuses and all dogmas. We appeal to democrats and free spirits of all countries that our century should be one of Enlightenment, not of obscurantism.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali,Chahla Chafiq, Caroline Fourest, Bernard-Henri Levy, Irshad Manji, Mehdi Mozaffari, Maryam Namazie, Taslima Nasreen, Salman Rushdie, Antoine Sfeir, Philippe Val, Ibn Warraq......

Let us pray in order the laws of this country will continue for a long time to leave us free....

-Not to be convinced by all this.

- Not to agree with this dogma.

-To express this opinion and to make it shared.

* Fundamentalism is the rejection of any innovation in religion.

** Our Quran to us. "As soon as you will see people explaining to you that Islam is only freedom peace love and tolerance, or scientific progress, etc. then ... get away from them because you may be outraged" ( Surah 6 verse 68. From our Quran to Us).

Secularism is, facing of a politico-religious ideology that has given itself the goal of submitting the world to its Law; in itself and by definition, inoperative.

The advances of such a politico-religious ideology can only be countered by substituting, at least momentarily, for the practice of secularism a fight of ideas in all directions, from the child-care center, but also in the media, in the courts, and, of course, within the cults in question (supervision of preaching, automatic sanction for the non-respect of civil laws, etc.).

The return to secularism will only be possible after the success of this first phase, and therefore only in a second phase.

In the meantime, and in this regard, a moratorium should be adopted.

*** But the case is not clear.

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TWENTY NINTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

FREE MEN OR SLAVES.

Judaism practiced slavery but it was a little particular: for the Hebrews it was a temporary slavery limited to 7 years. After 7 years the Jewish slave was to be freed.

On the other hand, the foreign slave was not placed on an equal footing with the Jewish slave (with the temporary status and which was not the property of the master):

" Both thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall you buy bondmen and bondmaids. Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall you buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession " (Lev 25: 44-45).

Moreover, it is perfectly correct that the Nazarene high rabbi Jesus never asked for the explicit abolition of slavery, that he never required his followers to have no slaves, but unlike Muhammad himself at least never personally possessed slaves, because the fact that Muhammad personally had slaves, sexual or not, changes everything for a pious Muslim. Muhammad indeed captured slaves, sold slaves, bought slaves, received slaves as gifts (e.g., the Coptic named Mary, offered to Muhammad by the governor of Alexandria in Egypt) and used slaves for labor. The Sira or life of Muhammad is very clear on the subject. Slavery is obvious in the Quran. It focuses on women captured during the lesser jihad, turned into sex slaves, what is, of course, a powerful incentive to recruit fighters.

It should also be pointed out that Arab-Muslim slavery on the eastern shores of Africa began well before that practiced by Christian Europeans (West Coast of Africa, Portuguese 1510) and lasted much longer: 1300 years against 300.It was also necessary that it was the Christian Europeans who put an end to it because just as there is no equivalent of the parable of the good Samaritan in land of Islam, in the land of Islam, there has never been an abolitionist movement either. There has never been the equivalent of a Bartolome de Las Cases or of a William Wilberforce.

In addition, African slaves were often castrated by their Muslim masters, what explains why there are so few blacks or descendants of Africans in the Middle East. For comparison there are several ten million of them in America.

How many millions and millions of poor blacks (or whites) have been enslaved by Muslims; and driven in long and sinister caravans to the desert penal colonies which were waiting for them (mines of salt, copper, and castration into the bargain the eunuchs)? Nobody knows !

What is certain is that this incredible black slave trade began long before that which was undertaken by the Westerners, who were apparently in good hands (in the seventh century with regard to the Zanj, that is, seven hundred years before) and it ended well after (1980 for Mauritania). Yet was necessary the progress of ideas in the nineteenth century so that Europeans gradually come to put an end to these ancestral practices. No without clashes elsewhere, from the religious.

May the pious Muslim wish to forgive in advance what will follow and which unfortunately falls under God's prohibition of any challenge of any discussion or any dialogue. For we will many

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times indeed in the following pages discuss the verses of the Quran: their meaning, their relevance, their adequacy, their philosophical or scientific ethical value. How to do otherwise?

"He has already revealed unto you in the Scripture that, when you hear the revelations of God rejected and derided, (you) do not sit with them (who disbelieve and mock) until they engage in some other conversation. Lo! in that case (if you stayed) you would be like unto them. Lo! God will gather hypocrites and disbelievers, all together, into hell” (verse 140 chapter 4: women).

"When you see those who meddle with Our revelations, withdraw from them until they meddle with another topic. And if the devil cause thee to forget, do not sit, after the remembrance, with the congregation of wrongdoers "(verse 68, chapter 6: the cattle).

And…

"Lo! the devils do inspire their minions to dispute with you. But if you obey them, you will be in truth idolaters "(verse 121 chapter 6).

The verses confirming the practice of slavery now.

Semantic precision before starting. The Arabic expression Malak-ul-Yamin or possession of the right hand actually means slaves or women who have become property of a Muslim as a result of war or purchase.

Verse 3, chapter 4. "Marry of the women, who seem good to you, two or three or four and if you fear that you cannot do justice (to so many) then one (only) or (the captives) that your right hands possess.”

Verses 24-25 chapter 4. " And all married women (are forbidden unto you) save those (captives) whom your right hands possess…. And whosoever is not able to afford to marry free, believing women, let them marry from the believing maids whom your right hands possess…. When they are honorably married, they commit lewdness they shall incur the half of the punishment (prescribed) for free women (in that case)”.

Verse 36 chapter 4. "Show kindness unto parents… the wayfarer and (the slaves) whom your right hands possess.”

Verses 1 to 6, chapter 23. " 23:1 Successful indeed are the believers....whom guard their modesty save from their wives or the (slaves) that their right hands possess, for then they are not blameworthy.”

Verse 52, chapter 33. " It is not allowed you to take (other) women henceforth, nor that you should change them for other wives even though their beauty pleased you, save those whom your right hand possesses.”

Verse 29 chapter 70 " Those who preserve their chastity (sic) save with their wives and those whom their right hands possess, for thus they are not blameworthy.”

In short, a non-Muslim may very well be the slave of a Muslim but a Muslim cannot belong as a slave to one of his co-religionists UNLESS THE CONVERSION HAS TAKEN PLACE AFTER ENSLAVMENT. THUS THERE MAY BE MUSLIMS SLAVES OF OTHER MUSLIMS.

There are Muslims who are hypocritical enough (taqiya) or unaware of the sunnah to claim that there is no hierarchy in Islam but the founding texts (Quran hadith Sira) are categorical. Either they did not open them to the right pages.

“You can have sexual intercourse with two slave girls at a time without ghusl (bath) but can’t do like this with free women…” (Malik’s Muwatta 2.23.90).

“Yahya related to me from Malik from Ibn Shihab……that Umar ibn al-Khattab was asked about a woman and her daughter who were in the possession of the right hand, and whether one could have intercourse with one of them after the other Umar said, "I dislike both being permitted together." He then forbade that” (Malik’s Muwatta:Book 28, Number 28.14.33).

“Yahya related to me……that a man asked Uthman ibn Affan whether one could have intercourse with two sisters who one owned. Uthman said, "A verset makes them halal, and another verse makes them haram. As for me, I wouldn't like to do it." The man left him and met one of the companions of the Messenger of God, may God bless him and grant him peace, and asked him again about it, and he said, "Had I any authority and I found someone who had done it, I would punish him as an example" (Malik’s Muwatta:Book 28, Number 28.14.34).

N.B. The free Muslim is superior to the Muslim slave (herself superior to the non-Muslim slave, e.g., Mary the Coptic, one of the slaves of Muhammad), superior to Christian women, superior to Jewish women, and so on.

Mary the Coptic. We know the name of one of the sex slaves of Muhammad. When the delegate from Muhammad met the head of the Egyptian Copts (Muaqaqis) and invited him to convert to

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Islam, he politely refused to do so, but knowing the appetite of Muhammad in this field well, he offered Muhammad two beautiful slaves who were sisters. Muhammad took Mary, the most beautiful one for himself and gave her sister Sirin to his poet friend, Hassan ibn Thabit. Mary gave birth to Ibrahim, Muhammad's last child who died in infancy.

THE REVOLT OF SLAVES IN IRAQ FROM THE 7th TO THE 9th CENTURY.

The Zanj, as well as many other black slaves from the East African coast (where they were captured, bought, or got from the submissive states, as tribute); were imported in large numbers into the heart of the Muslim empire from an indeterminate date. Their living conditions were to have been extremely harsh, since within three centuries they revolted three times.

A first uprising occurred in 689-690, under the government of Khalid ibn Abdallah, successor of Musaab ibn al-Zubair. It was apparently of minor importance, they were, it seems, small bands engaging in looting, which were dispersed without great difficulty by the government army. The prisoners were beheaded and their corpses hanged on the gallows.

The second insurrection took place five years later, in 694. It seems to have been more important, and especially better prepared. The Zanj this time had a leader, a certain Rabah (or Riyah?) Nicknamed "Shir Zanji" ("Zanj's Lion"), and the authorities were forced to go twice to crush them. The character of this revolt appears to have been complex, but the information available to us is rather poor. The information we have on this movement does not make us able to detect its true character; some think that it did not explode spontaneously, and that the Zanj had been worked on by some propaganda.

But it is, of course, especially the third Zanj revolt which is the best known, for this new slave revolt shook very strongly and for fifteen years (between 869 and 883) Lower Iraq and Khuzistan; causing countless material damage and dozens (some sources speak of hundreds) of thousands of dead. It was the work of a formidable and apparently unscrupulous character, Ali ibn Muhammad, nicknamed "Sahib al-Zandj" ("the master of Zanj"). "Revolutionary-type," of obscure descent, but having been able to approach the "higher spheres" of his time; a talented poet, educated, versed in the occult sciences, having been a follower of various doctrines and having attempted several uprisings (notably in Bahrain and Basra), he succeeded in fomenting the greatest slave insurrection in the history of the Muslim world.

Four reasons explain the success of his action and the length of this revolt.

a) The extreme misery of these "herds" of slaves. The rebels, according to Tabari [our main source of information] were employed as diggers, having the task of farming Lower Mesopotamia, removing the silt, to pile it into mounds, so as to make cultivable the nitrite lands of Chatt El -Arab; grouped by work sites of 500 to 5,000 workers, parked there, without home or hope, with, for all food, a few handfuls of flour, semolina and dates.

b) The theater: favorable to guerrilla warfare.

c) The precarious situation of the power in Baghdad (the country at that time was shaken by anarchy in its central part, and by serious problems in the remote provinces).

d) The personal qualities (organizational, warlike and political) of Ali ibn Muhammad.

There are two periods in this insurrection.

- The first (869 - 879) is the period of expansion and success for the insurgents, the central power not being able, for internal and external reasons, to fight them effectively.

The rebels organize themselves, get arms, and fortify themselves in camps set up in inaccessible places, from where they launch expeditions. After a large number of ambushes and battles which turn to their advantage (because the freed slaves constantly increase the "army" of the insurgents); they temporarily take over the main cities in lower Iraq and Khuzistan (al-Ubullah, Abadan, Basra, Wasit, Jubba, Ahwaz, etc.).

The Abbasid troops reoccupy without difficulty those cities that the Zanj have taken, looted and then left. But they are unable to quell the revolt, or inflict a decisive defeat on an enemy present everywhere and nowhere. As the power of Baghdad had other more pressing issues to resolve, the Zanj issue took a back seat. Meanwhile, the "Zanj Master," firmly established in the region of the canals where his "capital" is located, mints his own currency, organizes his "State"; and attempts, more or less successfully, to link up with other contemporary movements (such as those of the Qarmatians of Hamdan Qarmat and of the Saffarids of Yakub ibn al-Layth).

- The second period (879 - 883) is only a slow agony before the final crash. At that time, the Zanj became the main concern of the Caliph in Baghdad, who acted methodically, cleaning everything in his way, leaving the Zanj to lock themselves in the canals area; where they suffered a siege

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according to the laws of war, led by "the regent of the Empire," al-Muwaffak, and his son, Abu I-Abbas (the future caliph, al-Mutadid). Finally, Ali ibn Muhammad was killed, his closest companions and officers taken prisoner, then transferred to Baghdad, where they will be beheaded two years later; but some members of his family will survive him for some time.

One could conclude by saying that the Zanj revolt was a political (power struggle) and social revolt (improvement of the living conditions of a particular class of the population), but several points of importance concerning this extraordinary event are worthy of long developments. The personality of the leader of the revolt, his so-called genealogies, his creed and his "ideology," the political and social organization of the new "State," his relations with the different classes of the population and with other contemporary movements.

It is necessary, however, to insist on one essential fact: if this very particular movement holds a place absolutely apart, among the very numerous insurrections that took place in the history of the Muslim Middle Ages ; it is because it put an end to the only attempt in the Muslim world to change family slavery into colonial slavery.

Our conclusion will therefore be the following one in this field: anyone, whether a journalist or a politician (anyway it is the same) who says that Islam prohibits slavery ... .LIES.

The caliphs (successors of Muhammad) had harems housing hundreds or even thousands of girls or young women coming from all countries, from India to Europe. In one year (1619-1620), 200,000 Hindus were deported and sold on the Iranian slave markets. Three million Hungarians were enslaved by the Turks in 150 years (from 1619 to about 1650).

As original Christianity indeed (the religion of love has always had its limits), Islam only prohibits the ill-treatment inflicted on slaves. Verse 36, chapter 4. "Show kindness unto parents… the wayfarer and (the slaves)".

Being clear here that forced sex is not considered mistreatment or castration of boys either apparently.

* Remember, however, that the Civil War was not launched to end the slave but ... .to end the secession of the southern states precisely. Slavery (cf. the compromised of 1850 and the fugitive slave act) also remained lawful in the northern states until 18 December 1865.

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THIRTIETH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

OPEN LETTER TO OUR SISTERS OF WICCA (some verses from our Quran to us).

The chapter entitled "mankind” has 6 verses. This is the last chapter of the Quran the 114. This is probably a magic formula concerning human beings in general and which dates back to the Meccan period. Its magical character of magic protection against spells is undoubted considering the one that is previous, the number 113.

We looked vain inly the Quran for a chapter "men" equivalent in length and subject to this devoted to women, the number 4, a Medinan surah with 176 verses (for example to explain to she believers how to treat their husbands). Such a chapter does not exist.

There is therefore a Quranic chapter entitled Women (where Muslim men are explained how to treat their wives) but since there is no Quranic chapter specifically for men, let us try modestly (we are not God) to fill this obvious gap in the Quran.

The human being who is really dependent on his hormones in a couple is the man. Aggressiveness in man depends on the same hormones as those of manliness (testosterone) it is only a question of degree, of doses.

Do not ask the impossible for your men. They cannot be both everything and its opposite. Forgive him therefore his trespasses and use only sparingly your power of seduction. Always know how far you can go too far.

Martial arts should not be reserved for men. Instead, give yourself over martial arts or self-defense and combat sports. Being very strong in the wrestling or the handling of the staff, even in fencing, can only do you the greatest good not only on the bodily level (exercise, sport) but also on the psychic level. This can only give you more confidence in yourself and it can, of course, provide you with ways to defend yourself against anybody.

Domestic violence. Some domestic quarrels here and there are alright, it’s up to you to see, but never agree to be regularly beaten (every day, every week, every month ???).

In case of unusual, rather exceptional violence, use self-defense techniques against your man.

If this violence becomes very frequent, then divorce without hesitation. A true pagan woman cannot blossom in such a conjugal climate. Leave that to Muslim women.

On the other hand, do not ruin your men in the event of divorce, do not demand an unjustified compensatory allowance as if you were unable to support yourself financially. Claim compensatory allowance only if the wrongs are exclusively on his side, or at least mainly on his side, if you have only peccadilloes to feel bad about and, moreover, that it is he who asks for the divorce).

Do not blackmail him by using children as a means of pressure. Give him the largest possible alternating custody. Alternating custody must be the rule, exclusive custody the exception.

N.B. If in a couple it is the woman who earns more than her husband, or who is richer, she must pay him a compensatory allowance. A compensatory allowance calculated in the same way as if it were the opposite.

It is necessary to find a modus vivendi: supplementary is the key word.

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Never let religion intervene between you and your man. Never let a second person or a third party (God, priest) intervene between you and him. Your sexual relations are only your business (as soon as, of course, where there is consent).

If you need one or more lovers so that you blossom, there must be a tacit agreement from him on this subject. I know it's difficult, but a number of modern couples manage very well to live so. What must be avoided at all costs are lies or dissimulation.

By cons in this case no lie about the father of potential children. It is very important for a man to have the certainty that he is the father.

It is certain that the ancient druidic religion made more room for men than for women. To recognize it without hiding it does not mean that we want to return to this stage of the relationship between men and women. We are for the most complete parity between men and women in this field, and if we do not claim the word druidess to avoid such anachronism, the word priestess is among us its exact equivalent. (Celtic) druids and priestesses have exactly the same rights and duties in our association. This does not preclude that there are also strictly male (or female of course )colleges in accordance with our oldest traditions,on some sacred islands.

Never forget that the man is a woman who cannot bear children.

Never abuse that power you have in comparison to him.

Conversely, no woman should find herself alone and helpless to raise the children. Living allowance in the case of exclusive custody granted to the mother must depend on the financial means of the ex-husband, but society as a whole also has the duty to meddle in the good sense of the term.

The expectant mother must benefit from safer and more comfortable working conditions. She will be allowed to benefit from a lightened work position, or even be exempted from work, and in no case dismissed for this reason. Medical expenses related to pregnancy must be reimbursed. It is in the best interests of society that women never be penalized by pregnancy. Life is the first of the values to be handed over.

The status of the father.

Women should never give fewer rights to fathers than to themselves regarding the education of children. All decisions concerning them will have to be made by agreement.

Paternity leave must be the rule and must not be an empty word. At work, the father of young children must also benefit from arranged schedules allowing him to take care of them properly.

Name of the child. In order to avoid repeating the stupidity of the current legislation in this field, it is advisable to make possible without problems and without complications the adoption when he is become an adult of an individual and non-hereditary name. This right should nevertheless be supervised limited or weighted to avoid any abuse or regrettable mistake.

As for you my sisters, stop taking the name of your husband as if it were your owner and that no one will designate you with a civic title, different according to your matrimonial status, depending on whether you are married or not (no more miss for unmarried women, madam for everyone).

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THIRTY FIRST RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE PLACE OF WOMEN IN PRE-ISLAMIC ARABIA (JAHILIYA).

The non-existence of any critical spirit since the closing of the gates of ijtihad in the 11th century (insidad Bab al Ijtihad) was one of the greatest disasters of humanity.

The infanticide of girls.

The infanticide of girls is mentioned in several Quranic verses that prohibit this practice.

Islamic sources therefore all claim, based on these verses that the Arab pagans practiced female infanticide. They buried them alive.

Consequently, for many Muslims, this prohibition shows how Islam has honored women, whereas before, girls were killed at birth.

As it often happens that our authors, carried away by their hagiographic enthusiasm, do not specify whether this concerned the whole Earth, or only a part of it, we can a priori think that Muhammad put an end to this practice on a world scale from the outset.

Pushed into the corner, our authors end up conceding that only Arabia was concerned by their remarks.

LET US THEREFORE IDENTIFY THE PROBLEM A LITTLE MORE CLEARLY.

The question is whether female infanticide was a "common" practice in Arabia.

MATIRA'S INSCRIPTION.

Around the 2nd century before our era the small town of Matira, 45 km north-east of Sana’a, promulgated a decree (MAFRAY-Qutra , 1stone discovered in 1978), the translation of which is given below.

"Let it be forbidden for the city of Matirat to bring any lawsuit (?), without the order and permission of the Banu Sukhaym, and let it be forbidden to give (in marriage?) a daughter of the city of Matirat, in any place and city other than the city of Matira, and let it be forbidden to kill her daughter to 'the whole tribe of dhû-Matira.'

The prohibition is expressed by the formula 'l-s'n in the first line, where 'l is the Arabic "do not ..." and s'n is sunna ("custom, tradition"). L-s'n therefore means: "It is contrary to customary law."

The last of the prohibitions concerns the killing of girls, probably at birth.

This is how Christian ROBIN comments. This decree does not seem to be dictated by moral considerations but by the necessities of the time. It should be noted that it does not mention any divinity: it has its authority from the tribal assembly alone, no doubt in agreement with the great lords of the tribal confederation, the Banu Sukhaym.

Questions now.

How is it that many of the poems of the Jahilliya began with the praise of a beloved woman, and descriptions of her generous beauty, gentle companionship, and presence?

Below is an example.

THE POEM OF IMRU AL QAYS (circa 501-550).

STAY!-Let us weep at the remembrance of our beloved, at the sight of the station where her tent was raised, by the edge of yon bending sands between Dahul and Haumel,

2. "Tudam and Mikra; a station, the marks of which are not wholly effaced, though the south wind and the north have woven the twisted sand."

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3. Thus I spoke, when my companions stopped their coursers by my side, and said: "Perish not through despair: only be patient."

4. "A profusion of tears," answered I, "is my sole relief but what avails it to shed them over the remains of a deserted mansion?"

5. "Your condition," they replied, "is not more painful than when you left Howaira, before your present passion, and her neighbor Rebaba, on the hills of Masel."

6. "Yes," I rejoined, "when those two damsels departed, musk was diffused from their robes, as the eastern gale sheds the scent of clove-gillyflowers:

7. "Then gushed the tears from my eyes and flowed down my neck, till my sword belt was drenched in the stream."

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8. "Yet have you spent many days in sweet converse with the fair: but none so sweet as the day which you spent by the pool of Daratjuljul."

9. On that day I killed my camel, to give the virgins a feast; and, oh! how strange was it that they should carry his trappings and furniture!

10. The damsels continued till evening helping one another to the roasted flesh, and to the delicate fat, like the fringe of white silk finely woven.

11. On that happy day I entered the palanquin, the palanquin of Onaiza, who said: "Woe to you! you will compel me to travel on foot."

12. She added (while the palanquin was bent aside with our weight), "O Amriolkais, descend, or my beast also be fall!"

13. I answered: "Proceed, and loosen his rein; nor withhold from me the fruits of thy love….

Two theses clash therefore.

The traditional Muslim thesis presents the place of women in pre-Islamic Arabia or Jahiliya as particularly unenviable. Muhammad would have significantly improved her status.

Two remarks are necessary. We speak here of Arabia only. What about the role of women in other societies, among the Celtic or Germanic peoples for example? God should have indicated through the mouth of his prophet that the status he preached should not be imposed on societies where women had a more enviable lot. Annoying memory lapse. Is it too late to fix it ????

Second remark: Arabia of before Muhammad , the Jahiliya, was already largely Christian or in the process of Christianization. This was the case of northern (present-day Iraq Syria Jordan) and southern Arabia (Yemen). Many testimonies also show us that this penetration had also begun in central Arabia. The cousin of Muhammad's first wife, Waraqa ibn Nawfal, was undoubtedly a Nestorian monk or bishop, and Khadija herself must have been more or less Christian since she will consult him according to the Muslim tradition. Other testimonies show us less Christian tribes in central Arabia (see the episode of Musaylimah and Sajah in the time of Muhammad, during the so-called Ridda wars. Musaylima also referred to the Archangel Gabriel, but he called God Ar Rahman -the merciful- instead of Allah.

According to Father Guy Monnot's book about the Muslim Thinkers (pages 290-292), a whole series of Muslim writers of the 9th-10th centuries also mention the presence of Manicheism in the tribe of the Quraysh, the dominant tribe of Mecca in the seventh century, which included the family of Muhammad.

As already mentioned above, but repetere ars docendi, Hischam ibn Al-Kalbi (d. circa 820) included, in the Kitab mathalib al-Arab, Manicheism (zandaqa) among the religions of the Arabs of the pre-Islamic period. Muhammad Ibn Habib (d. 860) mentions in his Kitab al-Muhabbar that the divine justice sent the punishment of a violent death on the 8 Manichean heretics (zanadiqa) of the Quraysh tribe: "They learned zandaqa from Christians in Hira. In turn, Ibn Qutaïba (died in 889) affirms in his al-Ma'arif that "the zandaqa was among the Quraysh, who kept it from Hira," and Al-Maqdisi (around 966) confirms, in al-Bad 'wa-l-ta'rish, that' zandaqa and ta'til (negation of attributes and divine names) existed among the Kurikites'.

But Christianity, although having in practice always reserved a subordinate role for women, has never theorized it so much. Especially considering its prohibition of polygamy and repudiation.

The traditional Muslim thesis presenting us the place of women in pre-Islamic Arabia as particularly unenviable and therefore very much improved by Muhammad, would it be only an additional example of taqiya?

Other historians like Arnold Joseph Toynbee (nineteenth century) consider that this vision of a pre-Islamic misogynist Arabia would be only one aspect of a black legend surrounding the "Jahiliya." The fact that Muhammad's first wife, Khadija bint Khuwaylid, and the mother of the future Caliph Muawiya I himself, Hind bint Utbah, were traders free to hire men, would prove it. In a general way, Islam, by systematizing it, would have leveled out the formerly diverse feminine status among the Arab tribes. Women, for example, also enjoyed much greater freedom among the Sabeans of South Arabia.

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Our point of view. We take into account that the human species is composed of two supplementary genders, women first and then men, who in exchange for the fact that they are free from "the labor pains" are cons more often victims of their testosterone (shorter average life, etc..).

We do not deny these biological differences (we cannot expect from a woman the same muscular capacity as that of a man) biological differences that obviously have repercussions on individual or collective psychologies. With rare exceptions (true hermaphroditism or intersex, 1 to 2% of births) it would be stupid to deny it.

What we say, on the other hand, is that women and men must have the same civil and political rights but if we imagine very well that a woman can be admiral, we personally see her less crawling in the mud with a knife between her teeth to attack enemy commandos. Yes, Peter deLaCrau is an old idiot!

THIRTY SECOND RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

QURAN AND WOMEN (a few examples in order to begin).

Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 221. "Wed not [pagan or Christian] female associators till they believe; for lo! a believing bondwoman is better than a female associator though she pleases you; and do not give your daughters in marriage to [pagan or Christian] associators till they believe, for lo! a believing slave is better than an associator though he pleases you. These invite unto the Fire….”

Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 223. "Your women are a tilth for you (to cultivate) so go to your tilth as you will.”

Holy Quran chapter 24 verse 2: "The adulterer and the adulteress, scourge you each one of them (with) a hundred stripes. And let not pity for the twain withhold you from obedience to God, if you believe in God and the Last Day. And let a party of believers witness their punishment ."

THE STATUS OF WOMEN IN ISLAM.

The Quran, of course, gives a real legal status to women (and men, do they have one?) but this status keeps them in an obvious inferiority regarding men (they acquire a right to inherit less than half to that of men, their testimony before the courts is half the value of that of a man, etc., etc., etc.). This long list of differences in law regarding man is actually longer than equalities - in fact as well as in writing.

Holy Quran chapter 4, verse 34. "Men are in charge of women, because God hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the support of women). So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which God hath guarded. As for those from whom you fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them……God is Great!”

Testimony: a woman is worth half a man.

Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 282. "O you who believe! When you contract a debt for a fixed term, record it in writing. Let a scribe record it in writing between you (in terms of) equity. No scribe should refuse to write as God hath taught him, so let him write, and let him who incurs the debt dictate, and let him observe his duty to God his Lord, and diminish nothing thereof. But if he who owes the debt is of low understanding, or weak, or unable himself to dictate, then let the guardian of his interests dictate in (terms of) equity. And call two witnesses from among your men, two witnesses. And if two men be not at hand, then a man and two women, of such as you approve as witnesses, so that if one errs (through forgetfulness) the other will remember….”

Inheritance: a daughter is worth half a son.

Chapter 4 verse 11. "God charges you concerning (the provision for) your children: to the male the equivalent of the portion of two females.”

Quarrel in the household. If it is the man who is at fault, only one solution is proposed: reconciliation.

Chapter 4, verse 128. "If a woman fears ill treatment from her husband, or desertion, it is no sin for them twain if they make terms of peace between themselves. Peace is better. But greed hath been made present in the minds (of men). If you do good and keep from evil, lo! God is ever Informed of what you do.”

If the woman is disobedient, on the other hand, among the proposed solutions there is light violence.

Chapter 4 verse 34. " As for those from whom you fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them……God is Great!”

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Temporary marriage (zawaj al-mut'ah) among Shia . It is based on this verse of the Quran: " Those of whom you seek content , give unto them their portions as a duty” (4, 24).

By virtue of this passage and the practices of imams, the Shiites therefore recognize this marriage, which is still provided for by the Iranian Civil Code.

Article 1075 - Marriage is called temporary when it is for a limited period of time.

Article 1076 - The duration of the temporary marriage must be definitely determined.

Some Shia religious authorities allow therefore their co-religionists who are in the West for studies or for a mission to marry monotheistic or monolatrous non-Muslim women as part of this type of temporary marriage with the end of the aforementioned marriage clearly planned in advance (otherwise we are then in the context of classical Muslim marriage).

Temporary marriage is therefore intended to prevent extramarital sex that is prohibited by Muslim law.

This problem has raised a great debate in the Muslim community in the United States as a result of a fatwa in favor of this type of marriage.

Inequality in the dissolution of marriage (repudiation).

" Repudiation must be pronounced twice and then (a woman) must be retained in honor or released in kindness. And it is not lawful for you that you take from women anything of that which you have given them; except (in the case) when both fear that they may not be able to keep within the limits (imposed by) God. And if you fear that they may not be able to keep the limits of God, in that case it is no sin for either of them if the woman ransom herself”(Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 229).

By virtue of this verse, the man can therefore repudiate his wife, by a unilateral decision on his part, without giving any reason and without going before the judge.

He may also ask the judge to dissolve his marriage, particularly in order to free himself from his incumbent obligations in the case when he has recourse to repudiation.

The wife can repudiate her husband only if she has included such a possibility in the marriage contract or if the husband has granted it.

To be allowed to free herself from her husband, she must either go to the judge or negotiate with her husband for payment and / or renunciation to alimony. This possibility, called khul, is provided by the aforementioned Chapter 2 verse 229 which speaks of repurchase (iftadat).

In what concerns mixed marriage, traditional Muslim law can be summarized as follows.

A Muslim can marry any woman, regardless of her religion, provided that she is neither a polytheist nor a member of an unrecognized community or an apostate. The Shiites, however, also forbid the marriage of a Muslim with a non-Muslim, even if she is from the "People of the Book," that is, Jewish or Christian.

On the other hand, every non-Muslim who marries a Muslim acts contrary to the law, so his marriage is considered null, and he loses the political "protection" of the state (dhimmah).

In case of conversion to Islam.

If the man becomes a Muslim, he can keep his non-Muslim wife, provided that she is neither a polytheist nor a member of an unrecognized community or an apostate.

If it is the wife who becomes Muslim, her non-Muslim husband can only continue to live with her if he converts in turn to Islam.

A Muslim couple or of which a spouse is Muslim cannot choose the religion of its children, who must be Muslim.

Note about the Islamic veil (or hijab).

Let us first note that the veil concerns only free women; slaves are not allowed to veil themselves.

Then it is necessary to point out that the problem of the veil (Hijab) and the verses that we find on this subject ... .. relate to the words of Umar and concern the wives of Muhammad first. Umar, who was the father of one of Muhammad's wives, would have suggested that his wives should be veiled.

But later, when the problem of Aisha's relationship with a young Medinan man named Safwan arose in 626 (affair of the necklace or ifk), the veil was generalized to all Muslims (chapter 33 verse 59).

What is certain in any case is that there is only one verse in the Quran prescribing the wearing of the veil and it is this one. Holy Quran chapter 33 verse 59: "O Prophet! Tell thy wives and thy daughters and the women of the believers to.” (The Arabic expression is not very clear and can simply mean wear strict clothes and in no way suggestive) ….. So that they may be recognized and not annoyed.”

I Right to a key function and political rights.

Muslims who oppose granting a woman a key function and political rights invoke the following Islamic norms.

1) a woman does not have the right to command man.

2) The work of a woman is at home. The exercise of public power is not compatible with this duty.

3) The authority of a woman leads to failure according to the word of Muhammad having learned that the Persians had entrusted power to a woman: "Never will succeed such a nation as lets their affairs

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carried out by a woman" (Bukhari, Maghazi, 82, Fitan, 18; Tirmidhi, Fitan, 75; Nasai, Qudat, 8; Ahmad b. Hanbal, V, 43, 51, 38, 47).

4) Women have a brain and religion deficiency according to a hadit

h ascribed to Muhammad.

Hadith 293 of Sahih Muslim.

" Narrated Abu Said Al-Khudri: Once God’s Messenger went out to the Musalla (to offer the prayer) o 'Id-al-Adha or Al-Fitr. Then he passed by the women and said, "O women! Give alms, as I have seen that the majority of the dwellers of Hell-fire were you (women)." They asked, "Why is it so, O God’s Messenger?" He replied, "You curse frequently and are ungrateful to your husbands. I have not seen anyone more deficient in intelligence and religion than you. A cautious sensible man could be led astray by some of you." The women asked, "O God’s Messenger! What is deficient in our intelligence and religion?" He said, "Is not the evidence of two women equal to the witness of one man?" They replied in the affirmative. He said, "This is the deficiency in her intelligence. Isn't it true that a woman can neither pray nor fast during her menses?" The women replied in the affirmative. He said, "This is the deficiency in her religion."

5) In many situations, the woman is subject to a lesser treatment than the man's treatment: she cannot conduct the five prayers, repudiate, travel alone, or marry without her guardian's consent. If this is the case for minor cases, all the more so, the woman must be banned from gaining power in important cases.

Granting of political rights.

a) Favorable opinion based on religion.

1) The Quranic verses invoked by traditional jurists opposed to these rights for women are often truncated and have nothing to do with politics.

2) The narratives of Muhammad cannot be invoked to deprive the woman of her political rights. The story about the deficiency of their brains and their religion of women concerns only their ability to testify.

3) As far as practice is concerned, history shows that the prophet and the caliphs asked women for advice. Caliph Omar (who died in 644) had even entrusted the market police (hisbah) to a woman.

Aisha, the wife of Muhammad, also led an army of three thousand men to avenge the blood of the Caliph Uthman (died in 656): the famous battle of the camel.

II Excluded functions for women.

Traditionalist writers have excluded women from authority offices. They cannot be elected heads of state, ministers, judges or heads of the army. While many Muslim countries have resolved the right of women to vote and be elected, these countries remain reluctant to do the offices mentioned below.

a) Head of State.

Muslim jurists were unanimous in excluding women from the office of head of state.

In an official fatwa released on January 27, 2007, by many Arab newspapers, the Grand Mufti of Egypt, Ali Jum'ah, says that Muslim law does not allow women to become heads of state because one of her office is to direct prayer, which the woman cannot do.

She is allowed, on the other hand, to hold other public offices, elect and be elected to parliament if she can reconcile her office of a wife and mother and her parliamentary office, and if she can respect the rules of Islamic decency (wearing the veil, clothes with no low-cut neckline , and not to be alone with a man).

b) Minister.

Traditional Islamic law distinguishes between a minister exercising sovereign powers and a minister of execution who can only execute orders. Al-Mawardi (deceased in 1058) excludes the woman from both categories.

Saqr writes that the woman cannot occupy this office because she can neither keep the secrets nor report the accounts accurately; she does not have the necessary presence of mind to avoid the traps of those who want to extract secrets from her. This weakness to keep secrets is even found in the women of Muhammad (66: 3). He concludes that it is not wise to entrust a woman with such a delicate office.

Others admit that a woman may serve as executing minister.

c) Direction of army.

Aysha the preferred wife of Muhammad, led an army of three thousand men against Ali (died in 661) to avenge the death of Caliph Othman (died in 656). This, however, was blamed on her: she was not allowed to leave the house according to the Quran. Muslim jurists say that women cannot become army chiefs.

She is even dispensed from serving in it.

The Egyptian Fatwa Commission, however, condemns the recruitment of women into the army as

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soldiers, while allowing them to serve as nurses.

d) Judge.

The majority of traditional jurists were against granting judicial power to women. They invoke...

-The account of Muhammad: " Never will succeed such a nation as lets their affairs carried out by a woman. Never does a nation that entrust its business to a woman will be successful."

- The prohibition on women to mingle with men with their faces uncovered.

- The following hadith attributed to Muhammad: " Judges are of three types, one of whom will go to Paradise and two to Hell. The one who will go to Paradise is a man who knows what is right and gives judgment accordingly; but a man who knows what is right and acts tyrannically in his judgment will go to Hell; and a man who gives judgment for people when he is ignorant will go to Hell " (Sunan Abu-Dawud, Book 24, Number 3566).

The hadith mentions only men; women are therefore excluded from this office.

In an official fatwa released on January 27, 2007, the Grand Mufti of Egypt, Ali Jum'ah says that the woman cannot hold the office of judge, because of the verse: " Men are in charge of women….” (4:34).

III. Work.

No verse in the Quran and no hadith from Muhammad expressly prohibit the woman from working. But traditionalIST Muslim jurists say that woman's obligations prevent or limit her right to work. Their point of view can be summarized as follows:

1) Women do not have the right to leave their homes, and their husbands must keep them there. The Quran says, " Stay in your houses" (33:33); " Expel them not from their houses nor let them go forth " (65:1).

2) The natural place of woman is in the home where she has to take care of her husband. Having his wife at home is a husband's right over the woman because she is the steward of his business and the guardian of his house. It's in

the counterpart of this work of the wife that the husband takes care of the expenses of the house.

3) The woman can work only when necessary, provided she does not compete with men. Man must strive to replace her in the work to safeguard her honor. They invoke here verses 23 and 24 of chapter 28 of the Quran.

4) The work of women must be done in accordance with the standards of Islam concerning clothing and separation of the sexes.

5) The woman can work only with the consent of her male guardian (her father, her husband, etc.).

6) The woman must not do a job where she commands the man. Having learned that the Persians had entrusted power to a woman, Muhammad said: "Never will succeed such a nation as lets their affairs carried out by a woman" .

Let's leave the last word to the study of Ghassan Ascha published by Editions L'Harmattan.

“Islamic thought remains bogged down in its historical contempt for women, today as in the time of the Hegira ... The gap in which Islam is wallowing is that these unjust precepts stated 1400 years ago are still in force and now justified by Muslim dignitaries against the human rights of freedom and equality "! The study of Ghassan Ascha is certainly an extraordinary reference, a remarkable work by his courage. Its very rich documentation places the Muslim authors in the face of the misogyny, absurdities and contradictions which alone have made their notoriety among the boorish and ignorant mass. Islam is only submission to the Quran and its permanency requires the oppression of women.

The only problem of this kind of manifesto (because it is more a manifesto than a study) is that the quotations that can support its point of view, and therefore certainly at the same time TO QUALIFY IT A LITTLE are missing.

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THIRTY THIRD RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

MUHAMMAD AND WOMEN (the question of pedophilia).

Holy Quran, chapter 65, verse 1.

"When you (men) put away women, put them away for their (legal) period and reckon the period, and keep your duty to God , your Lord”.

So far, no problem ... But now let's look at what verse 4 says.

"And for such of your women as despair of menstruation, if you doubt, their period (of waiting) shall be three months, along with those who have it not. And for those with child, their period shall be till they bring forth their burden. And whosoever keeps his duty to God, He makes his course easy for him.”

How is it: " along with those who have it not "?

Does this mean that it is possible in the Muslim religion for a girl to be married or repudiated BEFORE EVEN HER FIRST MENSTRUATION !!

What does the example of Muhammad himself tell us in this area?

Let's look at the following Hadith (is it necessary to remember that this is a fifty-three-year-old man who marries a nine-year-old girl?)

Sahih Muslim 8: 330.

" A'isha reported: God’s Messenger married me when I was six years old, and I was admitted to his house at the age of nine. She further said: We went to Medina and I had an attack of fever for a month, and my hair had come down to the earlobes. Umm Ruman (my mother) came to me and I was at that time on a swing along with my playmates. She called me loudly and I went to her and I did not know what she had wanted of me. She took hold of my hand and took me to the door, and I was saying: Ha, ha (as if I was gasping), until the agitation of my heart was over. She took me to a house, where had gathered the women of the Ansar. They all blessed me and wished me good luck and said: May you have share in good. She (my mother) entrusted me to them. They washed my head and embellished me. God’s Messenger came there in the morning, and I was entrusted to him.”

Tabari: " Aysha was therefore betrothed at seven years of age and began to cohabit with Prophet at the age of nine years.”

Holy Quran. Chapter 33. (The invention by Muhammad) of a divine law forbidding the adoption in order to marry the wife of his adopted son.

Verse 4.

" God has not made those whom you claim (to be your sons) your sons. This is but a saying of your mouths. But God says the truth and He shows the way.”

Verse 5.

" Proclaim their real parentage. That will be more equitable in the sight of God. And if you know not their fathers, then (they are) your brethren in the faith and your clients. And there is no sin for you in the mistakes that you make unintentionally, but what your hearts purpose (that will be a sin for you). God is ever Forgiving, Merciful.

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Verse 37.

" When you say unto him on whom God hath conferred favor and you have conferred favor: Keep your wife to yourself, and fear God. And you did hide in your mind that which God was to bring to light, and you did fear mankind whereas God has a better right that you should fear Him. So when Zeyd had performed that necessary formality (of divorce) from her, We gave her unto you in marriage, so that (henceforth) there may be no sin for believers in respect of wives of their adopted sons, when the latter have performed the necessary formality (of release) from them. The commandment of God must be fulfilled.

Verse 40.

" Muhammad is not the father of any man among you, but he is the messenger of God and the Seal of the Prophets and God is ever Aware of all things.”

Verse 52.

" It is not allowed you to take (other) women henceforth, nor that you should change them for other wives even though their beauty pleased you, save those whom your right hand possesses (your slaves). And God is ever Watcher over all things.

Circumstances of this revelation (asbab al nuzul).

Muhammad went one day to visit his adopted son Zayd, but he was not at home. Zaynab, Zayd's wife, was there, without a veil, and Muhammad said to her: "May God congratulate this creature."

When Zaynab told that to her husband, he understood that his wife had pleased Muhammad and sent her to his father's house.

But in the Arab society of that time there was no right to marry the wife of his son, even adopted, even after a divorce.

To achieve his goal, Muhammad invented divine revelations condemning adoption. And so, since Zayd was not his biological son, he had the right to marry his wife after their “divorce.”

Our comment. The adopted children are certainly not biological children and vice versa but was it really necessary to have it confirmed by God personally? Our opinion also is that the being of beings or tawhid should not deal directly with subordinate things. Fate poetic justice secondary causations or divine providence are there for that. De minimis non curat praetor. God does not deal with details.

Holy Quran chapter 33 verse 50.

" O Prophet! Lo! We have made lawful unto thee thy wives unto whom thou hast paid their dowries, and those whom your right hand possesses of those whom God has given you as spoils of war, and the daughters of your uncle on the father's side and the daughters of your aunts on the father's side, and the daughters of your uncle on the mother's side and the daughters of your aunts on the mother's side who emigrated with you, and a believing woman if she gives herself unto the Prophet and the Prophet desire to ask her in marriage, a privilege for you only, not for the (rest of) believers.”

Circumstances of this revelation (asbab al nuzul).

One day a woman proposed herself to Muhammad and he married her. Aisha thought that this attitude was unworthy and let him know. Immediately after, Muhammad received from heaven the verse:”.... this is a privilege for you only, not for the (rest of) believers” to silence her criticism.

Aysha's response: " "I feel that your Lord hastens in fulfilling your wishes and desires " (Sahih Bukhari, book 60, Hadith 311).

The Quran includes only the aforementioned verse. For details, you have to consult the works relating to the causes of the revelation and the collections of hadiths of the Sunnah.

Holy Quran. Chapter 66. Verses 1-5.

Casual sexual encounters with a negress (a Coptic Christian Ethiopian slave: Mary).

“ O Prophet! Why ban you that which God has made lawful for you, seeking to please your wives ?.....God has made lawful for you (Muslims) absolution from your oath......When the Prophet confided a fact unto one of his wives and when she afterward divulged it and God apprised him thereof, he made known (to her) part thereof and passed over part. And when he told it her, she said: Who has told you ? He said: The Knower, the Aware has told me. If you twain turn unto God repentant (you have cause to do so) for your hearts desired (the ban) and if you aid one another against him (Muhammad) then lo! God, even He, is his Protecting Friend, and Gabriel and the righteous among the believers and, furthermore, the angels are his helpers. It may happen that his Lord, if he divorces you, will give him in your stead wives better than you, submissive (to God), believing, pious, penitent, devout, inclined to fasting, widows and

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maids.”

Circumstances of this revelation (asbab al nuzul).

According to the famous exegete of the Quran Ibn Katir, Muhammad was then in the room of his wife Hafsa, daughter of Umar, when the latter went out to visit his parents. Muhammad brought Mary soon to Hafsa's room and slept with her. When Hafsa returned home and heard the news, she made him a violent domestic quarrel or a fit of jealousy by reproaching him for having slept, in her room, and during her night, with a black slave, and who smelled bad ... Muhammad would have apologized and begged Hafsa not to talk to the other wives. On the other hand, he forbade himself Mary and offered her to Abu Bakr.

But Hafsa told everything to the other legitimate wives who revolted against Muhammad. Hence the verses we have just seen.

Our Muslim friends explain to us that it was quite necessary for God to intervene to help his unfortunate prophet victim of the fury of these shrews ?????????????????????? ???????????????????????

Our position. We strongly condemn the racist remarks unworthy of the women of Muhammad, but our view also is that the being of beings or tawhid should not deal directly with the subordinate things. Fate poetic justice secondary causations or divine providence are there for that. De minimis non curat praetor. God does not deal with details.

N.B. The hero of the spiritual initiatory novel called "four gospels" at least never fell into such ridicule. He thought it best to devote all his human energy, including bodily energy, to his mission. What has avoided him the ridicule of this kind of situation.

Holy Quran chapter 4 verse 128.

"If a woman fears ill treatment from her husband, or desertion, it is no sin for them twain if they make terms of peace between themselves. Peace is better.”

Circumstances of this revelation (asbab al nuzul).

Muhammad would have liked to separate from one of his first wives, Sawda, because she had become too old. Sawda therefore agreed to give up her nights (her bed’s turn) to the very young Aisha but on condition that she remains one of Muhammad's official wives. Muhammad was delighted by this deal.

Now let's look at some of Muhammad's (hadiths) words about women.

Hadith 36 : 6601 of the Sahih Muslim.

“Among the inmates of Paradise the women would form a minority.”

Hadith19 of Zad al-Talibin “Provisions for the Seekers” : “Women are the snares of Satan” (Razin).

Hadith 1080 of the Sunan by Al-Tirmidhi, classed as sahih by al-Albani, No. 927. “It was narrated that Talq ibn ‘Ali said: “The Messenger of God (peace and blessings of God be upon him) said: ‘When a man calls his wife to him, then let her respond, even if she is at the oven (baking bread).’”

Holy Quran. Chapter 24. Verses 1 to 26.

(Aisha’s alleged adultery, the favorite wife of Muhammad.) Aisha was indeed accused of adultery when she was 13 years old. The scandal, al ifk, calmed only with "divine" revelations exonerating the wife of the holy man).

" Here is a chapter which We have revealed and enjoined, and wherein We have revealed plain tokens, that haply you may take heed.

The adulterer and the adulteress, scourge you each one of them with a hundred stripes. And let not pity for the twain withhold you from obedience to God if you believe in God and the Last Day. And let a party of believers witness their punishment.

…..

And those who accuse honorable women but do not bring four witnesses, scourge them with eighty stripes and never afterwards accept their testimony. They indeed are evildoers save those who afterward repent and make amends. For such lo! God is Forgiving, Merciful.

As for those who accuse their wives but have no witnesses except themselves; let the testimony of one of them be four testimonies, swearing by God that he is of those who speak the truth; And yet a fifth, invoking God’s curse on him if he is of those who lie.

It shall avert the punishment from her if she bears witness before God four times that the thing he said is indeed false. And a fifth time that the wrath of God be upon her if he speaks truth. And had it not been for the grace of God and His mercy……! God is Clement, Wise. Lo! they who spread

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the slander are a gang among you. Deem it not a bad thing for you; nay, it is good for you. Unto every man of them will be paid that which he has earned of the sin; and as for him among them who had the greater share therein, his will be an awful doom.

Why did not the believers, men and women, when you heard it, think good of their own folk, and say: It is a manifest untruth ?

Why did they not produce four witnesses ? Since they do not produce witnesses, they verily are liars in the sight of God.

Had it not been for the grace of God and His mercy unto you in the world and the Hereafter an awful doom had overtaken you for that whereof you murmured when you welcomed it with your tongues, and uttered with your mouths that whereof you had no knowledge, you counted it a trifle. In the sight of God it is very great.

Wherefore, when you heard it, said you not: It is not for us to speak of this. Glory be to You (O God )! This is awful calumny.

…….

Lo! as for those who traduce virtuous, believing women (who are) careless, cursed are they in the world and the Hereafter. Theirs will be an awful doom.

Circumstances of this revelation (asbab al nuzul).

The Facts.

Muhammad used to take one of his women with him whenever he launched a "Ghazwa" or raid. He launched several of them a year besides. In 627 Muhammad took Aisha with him to accompany him during his campaign against the Jewish tribe of Banu Al Mustalak. The campaign was a success, most of the men of the tribe were slaughtered and their wives as well as their children enslaved. Among the captives was Juwayreya, the beautiful and splendid wife of the chief of the tribe. Islamic historical sources emphasize the class and splendor of Juwyreya and claim that she was one of the most beautiful women in Arabia. Not only was she attractive, but she was also an eloquent woman who had received the education of a princess. Aisha openly admitted that she hated Juwayreya at first sight because of this distinction. Aisha could not have been more accurate; Juwayreya was immediately promoted by Muhammad from the slave status to that of a wife.

According to Aisha, while the army was stopping on the way back to Medina, she felt the need to move away from the camp to release oneself. She would not have returned to the bivouac immediately because she had been looking for a collar that had come away while she was controlling her waste elimination. When Aisha finally returned to the camp, she found that the army had already left the site, so she waited on the spot in the hope that as soon as Muhammad would note her disappearance he would return to save her. It turned out that Muhammad did not even notice his absence until he arrived in Medina.

On the other hand, Aisha was quickly spotted by Safwan Ibn Al Muattal, who joined her and offered her to ride on her camel. Safwan was one of the Muhajirun, or companions of Muhammad who had come from Mecca with him, and he traveled alone in the footsteps of the army. Safwan and Aisha returned together to Medina, where Muhammad and his companions were waiting.

According to Ibn Hisham, this is the version given by Aicha. This implies that she spent more time in these "desert toilets" than it was necessary for the whole army to dismantle and clear the camp and disappear completely from the horizon. It also implies that she neither heard nor perceived the commotion of an army of seven hundred men, with women, horses, camels, captives, and slaves. The story also implies that the disappearance of Aisha was noticed by nobody including Muhammad probably too busy with Juwayreya.

The sight of Aisha and Safwan returning to Medina made a splash considering the situation and the dominant culture. This event triggered a storm of gossip though the couple claimed that their relationship was in all honor.

Ibn Abi Salul, the leader of the Al Khazraj tribe, was one of the rare Arabs in Medina who opposed Muhammad and regretted his presence in the city. Incredulous, he saw Aisha return to the city with a foreigner and openly expressed his doubts: the couple could not have spent so much time together without engaging in sexual activities. The ugly thoughts of Ibn Abi Salul were besides in tune with the own teachings of Muhammad who had declared in an authentic hadith that " No man is alone with a woman (who is not a member of the family) but the satan is the third one present.” Ibn Abi Salul said aloud what many people whispered .

This scandal could not have come at a worse time because the relations between the Muhajirun

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(Muhammad and his Meccan companions) and the Ansars (inhabitants of Yathrib) were going through a difficult time. According to Ibn Hisham, after the end of the campaign against the Al Mustalak, a conflict broke out between a Muslim from Yathrib and one of the henchmen of Omar (one of the Muhajirun therefore). The argument between the two men had quickly spread to a large number of Muslims on both sides. Ibn Abi Salul became indignant when he learned about the confrontation and threatened to reconsider the presence of the Muhajirun in his city.

Naturally, the people of Medina expected Aisha's case to be promptly settled because they believed that Muhammad had direct contact with God. An urgent revelation was needed, but there was nothing such.

This absence of revelations was interpreted as a sign of Aisha's guilt and fueled suspicions about her faithfulness. Even high-ranking Muslims like Ali, the future third caliph, and Hassan IbnThabit, the poet of Muhammad, took an active part in spreading gossip in Medina.

Muhammad himself must have had suspicions because for nearly a month he neglected Aisha who, ill, had gone back to his parents' home. The silence of Muhammad and his poor management of the situation did not help, he seemed confused and indecisive in the face of this more than sensitive question.

After nearly a month of humiliation, the divine silence was broken and Gabriel came down with the news that Aisha was innocent and that it was those who thought otherwise who were guilty:

Chapter 24: 11. “Lo! they who spread the slander are a gang among you. Deem it not a bad thing for you; nay, it is good for you. Unto every man of them will be paid that which he hath earned of the sin; and as for him among them who had the greater share therein, his will be an awful doom.”

The verse condemned those who interpreted divine silence as a sign of Aisha's guilt and described them as liars and sinners. God targeted Ibn Abi Salul, but he could not say it openly for fear of displeasing the Khazraj!

In revealing this verse, Muhammad contradicted his own teachings involuntarily. "No man is alone with a woman (who is not a member of the family) but the satan is the third one present.”

People who doubted the innocence of Aisha therefore applied Muhammad's own teachings. They expected a verse to come down right away to make her innocent, but the aforementioned verse not coming they had interpreted this to her detriment. How could they have known that God would wait a month to reveal the verse?

The Muslims are extremely cautious about this and in this case apply with the greatest force the principle of the presumption of innocence but why a month indeed?

Muhammad was used to difficult times, he was an experienced politician who mastered the art of getting out of the most difficult situations through the revelation of an appropriate divine verse. However, in this case, he seems to have remained totally helpless in the face of these rumors. The nightmare of Muhammad must have been that Aicha could show signs of pregnancy quickly enough because not only that would accuse her, herself, but that would discredit him if these signs occurred after the "revelation" of the necessary divine verse. A pregnant Aisha would mean an unfaithful wife since Muhammad had not slept with her since his marriage with Juwayreya and the imposture of his divine revelations. In addition, no one has failed to see that Aisha had not become pregnant with Muhammad, even after several years of marriage, so a pregnancy at this delicate moment would have been more than dubious.

The fidelity of Aicha, a point obviously of the highest interest for Muhammad, was an issue that he could have managed if it had remained a private affair but the situation had become too complex because the whole city knew about it.

To the great relief of Muhammad, Aisha finally had her period and his fear of pregnancy disappeared along with the prospect that Muhammad's favorite wife would be officially discredited. Muhammad was finally relieved of this heavy burden and the long-awaited verse was immediately revealed.

Was Aisha unfaithful to Muhammad?

It is no secret that Muhammad preferred Aisha to all his other wives, including Juwayreya, his new pearl. When Muhammad decided to repudiate Sawda because she was getting too old, Sawda begged him to keep her and offered to give up her share of Muhammad's nights to Aisha. The maneuver worked very well and so Mohammed kept Sawda but without having to sleep with her.

Aicha was intelligent, sure of herself and very attentive to anything that could threaten her

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position. She did not hesitate, for example, to set up a plot to provoke the repudiation of a new beauty that Muhammad was about to add to his harem. Deceived by Aicha's treacherous advice, the new bride whispered something like, "I'm sheltering from you near God" during the foreplay of her wedding night. Result, Muhammad, vexed, immediately repudiated the naive one while Aisha came out from that white as snow.

On another occasion, Aisha pointed out that the Quran still approved the wishes of Muhammad: " I feel that your Lord hastens in fulfilling your wishes and desires " (Sahih Bukhari, book 60, Hadith 311). Apart from Aisha, no one could allow oneself to make such remarks without fear of reprisal.

We will never certainly know what really happened between Aisha and Safwan. Some researchers suggest that Safwan was following the caravan in the hope of picking up valuables lost by the army.

From a psychological point of view, the question that arises is this: Is it possible for the wife of the most perfect of men to consider having an affair? The answer is yes, Aisha had many reasons to consider an affair.

Aisha was a spoiled teenager well aware of Muhammad's obsession for her. She loved her privileges as Muhammad's favorite wife and jealously watched her pre-eminence. After the campaign against the Al Mustalak, Aisha had to rage to see Muhammad leave her to the benefit of the beautiful and distinguished Juwayreya. Aicha was certainly the kind of woman who fights back.

It is also natural to suppose that Aisha, like all the other wives of Muhammad, was sexually frustrated; they were too numerous for one man. The assertion of the pious Muslims that the sexual power of Muhammad equaled that of forty men is, of course, a meaningless boast for non-Muslims. As for Aisha, she was a girl who barely opened her eyes to life when she found herself married to a man older than her father and she had no experience, she did not know what a normal sexual relationship resembled .

Muhammad asked his followers to learn half of their religion from Aisha. Indeed, Aisha reported more hadiths than all the other wives. Most of these hadiths reported by Aisha describe the intimate relationship between a man and his wife, the kinds of things on which we would now stick the label "for adults only." Anticipating any criticism relating to his rather embarrassing assessment, pious Muslims teach that shyness is not appropriate in this field!

One of these hadiths reported by Aisha describes Muhammad's "etiquette" for caressing a woman during menstruation and pays tribute to his ability to control his ejaculation. At the end of the hadith 577 of the Sahih Muslim, Aisha adds " and who among you can have control over his desires as the Messenger of God, may peace be upon him, had over his desires.”

What did she know of that?

The episode (al-fik) caused much talk in the community of early Muslims (including the future fourth caliph, Ali, son-in-law and cousin of Muhammad, what will explain the rest) until God intervenes directly but after only one month to testify to the innocence of Aisha and thus allow Muhammad to resume his life together with her.

Our comment. We believe personally and for various reasons in the innocence of Aisha but our opinion also is that the being of beings or tawhid should not deal directly with such subordinate things. Fate poetic justice secondary causations or divine providence are there for that. De minimis non curat praetor. God does not deal with details.

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THIRTY-FOURTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE SCANDAL OF THE WOMEN STATUS.

The very example of Khadija, Muhammad's first wife, proves that, contrary to the assertions of the useful idiots of Islam, and without even being on a world scale, to limit oneself only to this region of Arabia precisely (The Hjjaz) because there were already millions of Christian Arabs in Jordan and Iraq (a cousin of Khadija, Waraka Ibn Nawfal, was even perhaps a Nestorian bishop), the male / female relationships did not systematically play against women.

That the woman was inferior to man is nevertheless an idea that certainly also formed a part of the imagination of the first Christians.

The misfortune for the Muslim women is that unlike the New Testament it was written down in black and white in the Quran.

Because the Quran, and not an abusive interpretation of the Quran, as many French intellectuals or journalists believe or pretend to believe, considers that woman is inferior to man, that she must be virtuous, a good wife, always consenting with her husband, in a word, submissive.

Chapter 4: 34: "Men are in charge of women, because God hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property for the support of women. So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which God hath guarded. As for those from whom you fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them. Then if they obey you, do not seek a way against them. Lo! God is ever High, Exalted, Great "(Editor’s note. What does God do in there?)

Chapter 2: 228: " Women have rights similar (yes) to those of men over them in kindness (oh), and men are a degree above them. God is Mighty, Wise!” (Editor’s note. Again what does God do in this?)

Including, and in a much less symbolic way, inheritance or testimony (let us not even talk about politics).

May the pious Muslim forgive in advance what will follow and which, alas, falls under the ban of God's prohibition against any discussion or interfaith dialogue.

" He has already revealed unto you in the Scripture that, when you hear the revelations of God rejected and derided, you do not sit with them until they engage in some other conversation. Lo! in that case (if you stayed) you would be like unto them. Lo! God will gather hypocrites and disbelievers, all together, into hell "(verse 140, chapter 4).

" When you see those who meddle with Our revelations, withdraw from them until they meddle with another topic. And if the devil causes you to forget, do not sit, after the remembrance, with the congregation of wrongdoers "(verse 68, chapter 6)"

And.....

" Lo! the devils do inspire their minions to dispute with you. But if you obey them, you will be in

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truth idolaters” (verse 121, chapter 6).

Because indeed, in the pages that follow, we will continue to discuss the verses of the Quran: their meaning, their relevance, their appropriateness, their ethical, philosophical or scientific value. How can we do otherwise?

The primacy of man comes from his first appearance (4: 1): " O mankind! Be careful of your duty to your Lord Who created you from a single soul and from it created its mate ."

Let us note therefore first that the Quran speaks primarily to men, because when the text also speaks to female believers this is specified.

Let us also note that if there is an entire chapter of the Quran devoted to women, that is to say, explaining to Muslim men how to treat their women (chapter 4, entitled An-Nisa); there is no symmetrical or reciprocal chapter, that is to say, explaining to the Muslim women how to treat their men. We will allow ourselves to fill this gap at the end of the chapter.

Muslim commentators rely on certain verses of the Quran to show that cunning, deceit, and cheating are intrinsic to female nature.

Chapter 12:23: “She, in whose house he was, asked of him [Joseph] an evil act. She bolted the doors and said: Come! He said: I seek refuge in God! Lo! he is my lord, who hath treated me honorably. Lo! wrongdoers never prosper.”

Chapter 12: 28-29: " So when he [the husband] saw his shirt torn from behind, he said: Lo! this is of the guile of you women. Lo! the guile of you is very great. O Joseph! Turn away from this, and you (O woman), ask forgiveness for your sin!”

In the Quran the female sex is systematically combined with the paganism or the demon. Chapter 4, 117: " They invoke in His stead only females; they pray to none else than Satan.”

Chapter 53:27: " Lo! it is those who disbelieve in the Hereafter who name the angels with the names of females."

The ideal woman according to the Quran is closer to the submissive slave than to a person who is able to decide one’s life (7: 189). " He it is Who did create you from a single soul, and therefrom did make his mate that he might take rest in her. And when he covered her she bore a light burden, and she passed (unnoticed) with it.”

The harmfulness of the Sumerian myth of Adam and Eve can never be repeated enough.

Islam asserts that women must be treated "with justice and respect," but it is a vain wish by definition, since it is also said in the Quran (4:34) that "Men are in charge of women, because God has made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property for the support of women.”

This unequal treatment is found even in some verses dealing with adultery.

Punishment of adultery.

Verse 2 chapter 24. 100 lashes for both men and women.

But....

Verse 15 chapter 4. Life imprisonment for women.

Verse 16 chapter 4. If one of the two culprits is a a man and that they repent: forgiveness.

Let us note in this connection that it is perfectly true that there is no longer in the present Quran verses that order stoning.

But this is the punishment required by some hadiths, which are perhaps former verses of the Quran removed from the Uthmanian corpus.

This is the verse of stoning as it is reported by Umar: "The old man and the old lady if they committed adultery then stone them.”

Sahih Muslim. Book 017, Number 4194.

Abdullah b.Abbas reported that 'Umar b. Khattab sat on the pulpit of God's Messenger and said: God sent Muhammad with truth and He sent down the Book upon him, and the verse of stoning was included in what was sent down to him. We recited it, retained it in our memory and well understood it. God’s Messenger warded the punishment of stoning to death (to the married adulterer and adulteress) and, after him, we also awarded the punishment of stoning, I am afraid that with the lapse of time, the people may forget it and may say: We do not find the punishment of stoning in the Book of God, and thus go astray by abandoning this duty prescribed by God. But stoning is a duty laid down in God's Book for married men and women who commit adultery when proof is established, or it there is pregnancy.”

Sahih Bukhari.Volume 8, Book 82, Number 816.Narrated Ibn Abbas.

Umar said, "I am afraid that after a long time has passed, people may say, "We do not find the

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Verses of the rajam (stoning to death) in the Holy Book," and consequently they may go astray by leaving an obligation that God has revealed.

Lo! I confirm that the penalty of rajam be inflicted on him who commits illegal sexual intercourse, if he is already married and the crime is proved by witnesses or pregnancy or confession." Sufyan added, "I have memorized this narration in this way." 'Umar added, "Surely God's Apostle carried out the penalty of rajam, and so did we after him."

Imam ibn Hajar Al Asqalani says in his commentary on Sahih Bukhari.

Umar said: "When this verse came down I approached the Prophet so I asked him: Should I write it down?' It is as if he hated that." Then Umar said: "Can’t you see that if the old man if he commits adultery he does not get the whip, and that if the young man if he commits adultery he gets stoned?"

The scholars of Islam are unanimous that the recitation of this verse has been abrogated but its ruling still remains in effect. The only reason why Umar got emotional and wanted to put the verse in the Quran was because he was afraid that one day people would think that its ruling had been abrogated. However, the companions did not allow him to because they all knew that its recitation had been abrogated (Ibn Hajar Al Asqalani, Fathul Bari, Kitab: Al Hudood, Bab: Al I'tiraaf bil Zina, Commentary on Hadith No. 6327).

The Nazir high rabbi Jesus therefore showed too much laxity or a guilty indulgence in this field according to the parable of the woman taken in adultery after St. John 8, 3 to 11.

The scribes and Pharisees brought to Him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst, they said to Him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses, in the law, commanded us that such should be stoned. But what do You say?” This they said, testing Him, that they might have something of which to accuse Him. But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with His finger, as though He did not hear. So when they continued asking Him, He raised Himself up and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first.”

And again He stooped down and wrote on the ground.

Then those who heard it, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, “Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?”

She said, “No one, Lord.”

And Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.”

*It is therefore a traditional case in Muslim theology that has nothing to do with taqiyya when the recitation of a verse has been abrogated but not its execution.

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THIRTY FIFTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

Falsafa, truth and progress.

We will apply here in this brief essay the method of analysis used until now in our study of Irish legends and developed in our many counter-lays (no jealous!)

"God himself fights against them (the Christians) how yufakuna are they! (Surah 9 verse 30.) And that, if it's not God who said that, it's at least Muhammad.

Regarding the Arabic word "yufakuna" which essentializes or characterizes therefore Jews and Christians according to Surah 9 verse 30 in the Quran and which is often conveyed in translations as something like "Jews and Christians .... understand nothing .”

They are...

-Beguiled.

-Perverted.

-Perverse.

-Deluded.

-Turned away.

It is a derivative of the word afaka, at least according to the volume 1 of the book by Muhammad Mohar Ali entitled "Word for word translation of the Quran.”

But the word yufakuna does not imply a simple ignorance, it rather suggests a misguided intelligence, or that one prevents from functioning normally.

And the "one" in question is to be taken in the strongest sense: it can be God as well as the devil.

Being an atheist, however, we will reject this hypothesis and we will opt for a more natural impediment.

"Jews and Christians ...... are naturally unable to see, to know, to understand! "

As verse 171 of Chapter 2 says, "They are like cattle that hear the sounds and cries of the animals only in confusion and are deaf, dumb and blind and are unable to understand their meaning.”

Philosophically speaking, "Jews and Christians’ faith…has nothing to do with Reason! ”

More bluntly "Jews and Christians……are morons.”

In short in summary "Jews and Christians ... are persons with Down’s syndrome.” Or alienated.

There is unanimity among Muslims that the Quran is binding on all (hujjatun 'ala al-jami'), and that it is the primary source of Muslim law. This stems from the fact that it comes from God.

When the new Arab-Muslim empire spread from the 7th century over all the populations in the Middle East, among these cultivated people - including religious men - had an intellectual background that integrated a part of Greek thought. Those who converted to Islam kept this background, while Christian monasteries preserved translations already made in Syriac. Also,

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from the first intellectual productions of the eighth century, are there elements from this legacy. But the framework of reflection is religious. Christians have long assimilated the logical concepts they use for their apologetics. Muslims, for their part, face the charges of irrationality brought against the Quran; consequently, not only do they strive to take up this logical apparatus in their polemics, but they extend their loans to a wide variety of fields (psychology, ethics, physics, etc.) to account for controversial passages in the Quran. In all cases the material of Greek origin remains subordinate to the religious framework of thought.

Things change with the appearance of a discipline that privileges this material in itself. It develops at the same time - and no doubt in interaction with - as a thorough process of translation into Arabic of scientific and philosophical Greek texts. Philosophy is in fact designed as the crowning achievement of the sciences, and the one to whom the appearance of this new discipline is attributed, the Arab Muslim Abu Yusuf al-Kindi (circa 801-866) is essentially a scientist. Now, the Arab world has its own tradition only in the literary field and, for the scientific field, depends entirely on Hellenistic antiquity. The change of perspective is conscious, as evidenced by the adoption, alongside the traditional word Hikma (wisdom), of the noun falsafa, Arabization of the Greek Philosophia. In the same way, the actor, the philosophos, becomes the faylasuf, a term which, itself, is submitted to a deeper Arabization by the imposition of an internal plural: falasifa. There is no break with the religious perspective from the point of view of the set of problems, but there is an upheaval in the methodology in that the relationship of subordination between the framework and the material is reversed. Falsafa can be defined as the branch of Arab thought that refers primarily to the Hellenic intellectual heritage.

JAHILIYYYA.

In so far as humanism presupposes faith in mankind, the very appearance of falsafa is therefore a humanist position, since it favors a human development and, moreover, carried out by pagans. It is well this last aspect which is most reproached to the discipline by the upholders of the religious perspective.

AL-KINDI.

Al-Kindi expresses himself clearly on this point: as Aristotle had expressed the idea that it was necessary to be grateful to our predecessors for the fact that they have made the search for the truth progress, he paraphrases that lengthily in the following way :

"The truth requires that we do not reproach anyone who is even one of the causes of even small and meagre benefits to us, how then shall we treat those who are (responsible for) many causes, of large, real and serious benefits to us?

Though deficient in some of the truth, they have been our kindred and associates in that they benefited us by the fruits of their thought, which have become our approaches and instruments; leading to much knowledge the real nature of which they failed to acquire. (We should be grateful) /particularly since it has been clear to us and to the distinguished philosophers before us who are not our co-linguists, that no man by the power of his own pursuits can attain the truth, i.e., that which the truth deserves, nor will the (philosophers as a) whole comprehend it. Rather, each of them either will not attain any truth or will attain something small in relation to what the truth deserves. When, though, the little each of those acquiring truth has achieved is collected from them, something of great worth is assembled from this.

It is proper that our gratitude be great to those who have contributed even a little of the truth, let alone to those who

have contributed much truth, since they have shared with us the fruits of their thought and facilitated for us the real, hidden inquiries, in that they benefited us by those premises which facilitated our approaches to the truth. If they had not lived, these hidden principles with which we have been educated towards the hidden conclusions of our inquiries would not have been assembled for us [……] Aristotle, the most distinguished of the Greeks in philosophy, said: "It is proper for us to thank the fathers of those who have contributed any truth, since they were the cause of their sons' existence; let alone their being a cause for their sons' and our attaining the truth." How beautiful is that which he said in this

matter!

We ought not to be ashamed of appreciating the truth and of acquiring it from wherever it comes, even if it comes from

peoples distant from us and nations different from us. For the seeker of truth, nothing is more primary than the truth; there is no minimizing of truth, nor belittling its spokesmen or proponents.

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(The status of) no one is diminished by the truth; rather does the truth ennoble all.

It is well for us—being zealous for the perfection of our species, since the truth is to be found in this—to adhere in

this book of ours to our practice in all our compositions of presenting the ancients complete statement on this subject by the most direct and facile means, entering thereby upon an understanding of this approach; and completing, following the custom of the language and contemporary usage” (On first philosophy, Rasa’il al-Kindi al-Falsafiyya).

Al-Kindî is, of course, well aware of what differentiates the Greek world of the Jahiliyya from his: chronological difference (they lived quite before him), linguistic difference (Greek, on the one hand, Arabic on the other) and religious difference (The Greeks were not Muslims). On the other hand, on the philosophical level, which is where the lot of "truth" is decided , it is the human community that wins. The difference is there only quantitative: the Greeks knew less truth than the Muslims possess. And especially, this quantitative difference does not stem from the fact that the Greeks were not Muslims, as the enemies of al-Kindi would have us believe by calling them "infidels"; it is only due to the chronological sequence.

Al-Kindi therefore imagines the development of human thought as a continuous progress, a growth without break or detour: each author takes over the results got by his predecessors of the Jahiliyya , and uses them as a starting point for a new stage in the human walk towards the truth. And this truth is that of the Greeks as well as that of the Muslims: the content of the Quranic revelation is in no way opposed to the conclusions of philosophy. The Quran and Aristotle aim at the same and single truth and deal with the same issues.

Although al-Kindi had little influence on the further development of falsafa, the text quoted above can be considered as the manifesto of the movement. But it is a manifesto that will experience vicissitudes in the difficulty of reconciling the acknowledgement of debts due to pagans and the certainty of the superiority in all of Islam.

AL-RAZI.

The extreme attitude is chosen by an Iranian thinker, Abu Bakr al-Razi (around 863 - 925 or 935), who holds a place quite apart in the world of falsafa. He is especially a physician, and he is the most eminent representative in Islam of clinical medicine, that is to say the one who is "at the bedside" (Greek kline = bed) of the patient. He is moved, in fact, by an intense compassion towards all pain, compassion which he extends to the animals.

His attachment to the Greek heritage is total and he rejects the official religion of the Islamic Empire. Protected against retaliation by his quality of a great doctor, he contests with the largest serenity any form of prophethood in the name of equality between men. His controversy with an Ismaili propagandist is characteristic in this respect. Both start from the same assertion that the world is dominated by a wise steward, but they imagine this wisdom in two opposite ways. The Shiite believes to rely on common sense starting from the daily observation. He views this wisdom obvious in the hierarchical distribution of Mankind; he also asserts that inequality is natural, which calls for mutual support, and that, consequently, the weakest must submit to the one who benefits from a higher inspiration. Our physician philosopher speaks on the contrary in terms of the prerequisites of consciousness and summons his opponent to say what allows him to adventure that. For him, the wisdom implies that all are likely to participate directly, by personal inspiration, because otherwise we find ourselves in a situation generating conflict, each favoring his leader. He therefore proclaims the equality of all in the capacity to learn and reflect. If there are differences between men, it is only because of the fact that they engage in it with varying intensities and also that they specialize differently. When his opponent tells him that he takes himself well for a superior being, he answers that he is such only in the subject he has studied and that he readily admits his inferiority in certain manual trades, for example, trades in which those who have practiced there often show a remarkable intelligence, an intelligence that could have been involved in theoretical knowledge if circumstances had led to it.

Al-Razi is thus led to complete the idea of progression that emerged in the al-Kindi manifesto. There is no truth, on the one hand, and mistake on the other, as the supporters of an absolutist design of religious revelation believe; on the other hand, there is an incessant search for an ever-greater, but nevertheless remaining approximate, discovery of the truth our modern quest for the holy grail. If he writes a book entitled Doubts about Galen, it is - he says - to obey Galen himself who in many passages of his books, recommends distinguishing and classify what the ancients have neither distinguished nor ranked. All truth that we reach is only partial and calls for

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adjustments and extensions. Similarly, in philosophy, differences between thinkers are only the mark of their eagerness to research. Philosophy cannot be therefore a school affair, and even less a sect affair. It is this progress that is liberating and ensures immortality.

Around the end of his life, he wrote a short treatise on The Philosophical Life. He shows in it a positive vision of the world, taking as a model the character of a Socrates father, a good citizen, even a good guest.

“When some people who are scholarly, discerning, and accomplished observed us mixing with people and pursuing our livelihood they found fault with us and disparaged us. They claimed that we had diverged from the path of the true philosophers, notably the path of our leader [imam] Socrates.”

However, unlike the Greeks, Razi does not seek salvation in ethics. Man does not reach happiness here below, but gets ready, according to the conditions that are his, to reach him in the hereafter. Most important is not to put in it any impediment, that it is by an excess in more (it rejects the asceticism, maker of useless pains) or in less.

Al-Razi's approach remained totally isolated in the world of Islam.

It is necessary here to return to the criticism of falasifa by Ghazali in his Tahafut. Three fundamental points emerge which, for the Persian, make it possible to equate the philosophers with the disbelievers - one has seen that it was this problem of legitimacy, in a Muslim world, which arose for the falasifa in a primordial way. These are the theories - stated particular by al-Farabi and by Ibn Sina - of the eternity of the world, of the denial of the knowledge by God of individual cases, and of the negation of the resurrection of bodies. For Ghazali, the world was created at a precise moment, and matter is not eternal, God knows the individuals and the bodies will be resurrected. These points of controversy fall within the theological field, but allow Ghazali to affirm the incompatibility of the falsafa inherited from the Greeks and of the Moslem faith, thus questioning the whole philosophical enterprise of the falasifa....................

Traditionally, the word defamation refers to the damage brought to an individual's reputation. Defamation of a group is a problematic concept, since it can check freedom of speech and provide customs or practices with protection that they do not deserve. The defamation of religions transcends even the defamation of a group since it can go as far as forbidding the defamation of religious ideas and doctrines.

The defamation of religions could be defined as similar to blasphemy, but not directly against the deity, against religion, especially against the reputation of religion, and in this case of Islam. This is a clear break in comparison with the historical interpretation of the concept of defamation, which can have serious legal repercussions.

The anti-racist concept of "defamation of religions" is indeed one of the main contemporary instruments to question the principle of religious freedom.

The result of this concept is to confer some legitimacy on repressive laws directed against religious minorities such as the laws against proselytism and blasphemy. In addition, it aims to replace the notion of incitement to hatred or violence, with the major difference that in the logic of "defamation of religions" the appreciation of the reality of defamation is reserved to the offended person. As for the character of incitement to hatred, as evidenced by the violent reactions provoked by various cases, this violence is very real, but it is not directed against the victims of blasphemy or defamation but against their perpetrators.

The concept of defamation of religions belongs to a political culture linking the "law of God" and the "law of men," and thus reintroduces religion in its social and collective dimension to the detriment of human rights.

According to the modern design of freedom of religion, only individuals, taken in isolation, possess religious rights that can be exercised collectively, but within the limits fixed by national legislation. Since only individuals have a conscience, they alone deserve that the exercise of their conscience be protected against compulsions.

However, the notion of "defamation of religions" aims particularly to globally defend Islam as a religion against its "defamation," notably by justifying new restrictions on freedom of speech.

The notion of "Islamophobia" aims to collectively defend the Muslim community as a whole by "victimizing" part of the population in order to "blame" the other, while prohibiting the use of any form of rational justification. The notion of "Islamophobia" thus prohibits all comprehension and rational criticism of Islam.

In many countries, the concepts of "defamation of religions" and "Islamophobia" are equated with

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incitement to hatred and violence and with manifestations of racism.

The legitimate fight against racism (which is legitimate because there are no more non-racists than we are) serves as a massive deterrent by arguing that any negative description or criticism of Islam and of its followers should be proscribed as "hate speech." Islam's immunity outweighs the freedom of speech and press - especially when these words may lead to negative or violent reactions.

Fortunately, on 16 November 2009, the Council of the European Union adopted a resolution on the freedom of religion or belief in which it states unequivocally that "defamation of religions is not a concept falling the human rights." In this regard, the "Council expressed its deep concern that countries that have legislation on the defamation of religions often use it to undermine religious minorities and limit the freedom of speech, as well as freedom of religion or belief ."

It is shocking in this respect to see how much French intellectuals (journalists 80% of politicians football writers artists lawyers etc.) are putting energy to promote Islam in this country.

Pluralism, tolerance and open-mindedness, without which there is no democratic society, mean that the right to freedom of speech does not necessarily imply that an individual must be safe from the expression of religious views for the simple reason that they are different from his own.

On the other hand, it is because the countries of Muslim culture have not accepted the distinction between temporal and spiritual orders that the attack on religion is considered as an attack on the State, thus giving a civil sanction to a religious qualification. Arbitrariness is further aggravated by the legal inferiority of non-Muslims, particularly with regard to testimony.

The threshold of restrictions on freedom of speech therefore must be high. These restrictions should not be intended to prevent the expression of critical opinions, controversial opinions or politically incorrect statements ... nor should they be intended to protect the belief systems of internal or external critics. The expression of an opinion can only be prohibited if it constitutes a direct incitement to immediately commit an act of violence against a particular individual or group.

In France, however, we have the feeling of a desperate fight from the aforementioned intellectuals (journalists 80% of politicians football players writers artists lawyers etc ...) in this field (to promote Islam) while France is no longer since a long time the eldest daughter of the Church but a country where Islam has become the dominant religion. The French intellectuals show in this field consistency and stunning heroism. This almost desperate relentlessness in the promotion of Islam is really impressive, and gives the feeling that any criticism of the Muslim religious ideology (its dogmas, etc. ) moves them personally. They are ready for anything (censorship caricature untruth, etc.) to silence these critics. None of them has gone so far as to commit suicide or deliberately endanger one’s own life, but this will happen one day, French intellectuals being visibly ready to die for Islam (for various psychological reasons which remain still to be determined: ignorance of what Islam really is, superiority complex towards the ordinary citizen, contrariness, desire to appear as a hero bravely fighting against totalitarianism, sense of guilt towards immigrants aroused by one’s social status or income?)

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THIRTY SIXTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

ISLAM AND TOLERANCE.

The pioneers of political violence in Islam (Al Qaeda, Daesh) , there are the Kharijites who all justify, with more or less nuances, the drawing of the sword against an imam considered unfair. The fiercest in this respect, and the quickest to shed blood, were the Azraqites, who excommunicated all who did not rally to their principles, and exterminated their opponents, including women and children. To achieve their goals, the Kharijites were forced to resort to secret action, as did the various branches of Shiism; justifying it legally by a whole series of principles, for which they even forged a specific vocabulary: solidarity, dissimulation (taqqiya), clandestinity, disavowal, etc. To anathematize the opponents and to legitimize the bloodshed or justify the political-religious violence was not the doing of the only Kharijites or Shiites. The Sunnis did the same thing. Let us point out, as an example, that Imam AI-Awza'i (died in 774) vassal of the Umayyads, decreed that one could assassinate Ghaylan of Damascus because he preached predestination. Hisham Ibn Abd al-Malik (724-743) had him put to death under Sharia and to please God! As for the Imam of Medina, Malik Ibn Anas (died in 796), let us be content with quoting the hadith here below which is in section 36 (Judgment) of his famous Muwatta.

"If someone changes his din (religion), strike his neck!" refers to those who leave Islam for another religion than it - as the heretics and their like, about whom it is known they are killed without being called to repentance because their repentance is not recognized. They were hiding their heathenism and publishing their Islam, so I do not think that one calls such people to repentance, and one does not accept their word. As for the one who goes out of Islam to something else and divulges it, one calls him to repentance. If he does not turn in repentance, he is killed.

The Aghlabid Ibrahim I (875 - 902) did not violate therefore the Maliki rite, which became dominant in his time, by killing the Ibadites in the Jabal Nafusa in Libya 1). After having enjoined them to convert, he took part in their execution by tying them himself with his hands. This theological totalitarianism tempts all the theorists of revolutionary violence, whatever the times, and of those who justify purges at any time and place. Here are some examples of political violence and of its justification in the name of religion, still in accordance with the famous verse 110 of chapter 3. You form the best community, you order what is good and you forbid what is wrong.

The Azraqites, Imam Al Awza'i, Imam Malik, Ibn Yassin or Ibn Tumart, and people of their kind, were all in good faith applying this verse of the Quran literally! Who can doubt the sincerity and piety of a Malik? This is where the problem lies, at the level of beliefs that can be turned into a call for violence; when man loses the sense of his limits. We do not doubt for a moment the sincerity of Sayyid Qutb towards what he believed to be the truth. But this kind of sincerity, in a

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society that accepts neither dialogue nor pluralism, nor the right to be different 1), founded on the recognition of the limits inherent in human nature; creates tensions that quickly surpass the framework of the rational confrontation able to enlighten the path of truth; to turn into intellectual terrorism, or even just bodily. We get there at a totalitarianism that kills both mind and body.

The historian can never analyze news, it is the work of the social sciences. But his analysis is useful to these subjects.

Everyone uses Islam for his own ends, such is the reality of political Islam, which suffers from the tendency to torment or even suppress, or from the demons of totalitarianism, what in turn generates clandestinity as well as terrorism. All this in fact has deep roots in our history, is reflected in our imagination, and hangs in our individual or collective awareness. The historian can help us to a large extent to get rid of these hidden sediments within ourselves; and which prevent us from basing our societies on dialogue or mutual respect, so that good is truly the good.

Muslims have greatly suffered in the past from the use of Islam for political purposes; they have submitted to the ones opposed to others, have used religion as a springboard for power, riding on it like a mount that they spurred with anathemas, and took all kinds of perilous paths. Are we going to stay forever in this situation? Or will we finally learn from history and break with what has led to mutual exclusion or call for murder, in the name of revolution and deterrence? Is it conceivable to read again today in "The Muslim weekly," a large-circulation newspaper published in London, under the pen of a doctor by the name of Al Adwe; "It is necessary to apply the legal punishments for apostasy in order to close the door to the satans", that is to say to atheists according to his criteria; and "the discourse on the freedom of religion is determined by what the Ulema themselves think." This is where the danger is, which endangers the most sacred freedoms. These Ulamas are indeed those who, even today, consider that the apostate must be killed. Long live, in this case, the courts of the Inquisition and the gallows in Salem! Where are the most basic human rights? Do not those who are threatened in their lives have the right to try, by whatever means the urgency of the situation dictates, to prevent their executioners from gaining power? Who could blame them for trying to save their skin before the threat acts, before they feel the rope of the gallows tighten around their neck?

And when tactics dictate to some conciliatory remarks, is it not a caution to put on the account of concealment and temporary withdrawal while waiting for better days; following the advice of those who, at the beginning of our history, theorized about violence and clandestinity [taqiyya]?

As long as there is no revolution in our mentality resulting in a radical change in our thinking, we can only have doubts and continue to wonder.

The duty to command the good (verse 110 of chapter 3: you form the best community, you order what is good and you forbid what is evil) applies differently depending on the circumstances. Every generation and every era has its criteria, and the balance is not easy to find. Life in society requires fair concessions and permanent adjustments. The rule in all circumstances is to seek peaceful coexistence on the basis of mutual respect, so that the resources hidden in man, in every man, can flourish. All forming the family of God 1) Editor’s note. Including atheists].

Nowadays, Muslim exercises this duty to command the good prescribed by the Quran by means of his voter's card. Among the programs offered to him, he chooses the one that seems to him the best and the closest to his convictions. Nothing, however, prevents him from doing good, or from advocating for the right by the pen, the language, or the good example, and bearing witness in the manner that pleases him, while respecting others. Freedom remains the property of all, without distinction, and all liberty stops where the one of others begins. This means that in pluralistic societies, based on freedom as well as the legitimate right to be different 1); the Muslim must at most, if the common good or necessity requires it, be content to condemn in his heart, what offends his convictions, when they are in contradiction with those of others. " God tasks not a soul beyond its scope. For it (is only) that which it has earned, and against it (only) that which it has deserved. Our Lord! Condemn us not if we forget, or miss the mark! Our Lord! Lay not on us such a burden as you did lay on those before us! Our Lord! Impose not on us that which we do not have the strength to bear! Pardon us, absolve us and have mercy on us!” (2: 286) *.

Mohamed Talbi, Professor emeritus of Arabic, specialist in medieval Muslim history, former dean of the University of Tunis. Advocacy for a modern Islam.

* Editor’s note. These verses are very similar to the " lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil " of the corresponding Christian prayer. What a pity they are followed by a very clear call for war : " give us victory over the disbelieving folk.

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1).These courageous Berbers took advantage of the collapse of the central government after the assassination of Colonel Gaddafi in 2011, under the French-British bombing, to make revive their language and culture (Amazigh). Very good, long live human biodiversity! Long live the natio-ethnism! No to forced Arabization!

THIRTY SEVENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

God is great enough to defend himself alone.

A word (or an act) is not blasphemous in the absolute. Its blasphemous nature and the seriousness of this blasphemy can only be assessed in relation to what a religion defends.

A conscious blasphemy betrays, in the eyes of religious institutions, a will of deliberate aggression against God.

As such, a theocratic state may be led to fight against blasphemy, while a secular state may sanction it, but regardless of any religious consideration, in order to preserve social peace (if necessary).

A religion always leads to delimit a sacred domain exclusive from the secular domain. The protection of this sacred domain is characterized by a system of prohibitions. In relation to these prohibitions, the society, when it is a theocratic society, can intervene to "protect God" or to "protect the practitioners." In states with official religion, when the religious fact is at the founding center of society, the law protects religion, and in this context blasphemy can be a crime because it attacks the very foundation of social order.

The god of love, all of clemency and mercy, drags through the mud and dooms to hell all kinds of human beings and calls for the fight, sometimes to the death, many individuals (kafir kufar, for example) from here on earth, but it is true that God has forgotten in his great wisdom (see the notion of uncreated Quran) to give a precise definition of what the defamation of his worship or blasphemy is.

Offering insult (sabb ) to God, Muḥammad, or to any part of the divine revelation is a crime in Islamic religious law, fully comparable to blasphemy. In the Christian tradition, blasphemy properly denotes mockery or lese majeste of God. There is no exact equivalent to blasphemy in the Islamic tradition, although the Quranic phrase "word of infidelity" (kalimat al-kufr ) comes fairly close. From the viewpoint of Islamic law, blasphemy may be defined as any verbal expression that gives grounds for suspicion of apostasy (riddah ). In theological terms, blasphemy often overlaps with infidelity (kufr ), which is the deliberate rejection of God and revelation; in this sense, expressing religious opinions at variance with standard Islamic views could be looked upon as blasphemous. Blasphemy can also be seen as the equivalent of heresy (zandaqah ), a pre-Islamic Persian term used in reference to the revolutionary teachings of Mani and Mazdak; in this sense, it can mean any public expression of teachings deemed dangerous to the state. Thus, in describing the Islamic concept of blasphemy, it is necessary to include not only insulting language directed at God, Muhammad , and the revelation, but also theological positions and even mystical aphorisms that have come under suspicion. Mircea Eliade in his encyclopedia of religion thus defines the concept of blasphemy in Islam: the expression of denigration (istikhfaf),

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contempt (iḥanah ), or scorn (ḥaqarah ) for God, the Prophets, the Quran, the angels, or the traditional religious sciences based on the revelation.

One of the dogmas of Islam is that Adam was a Muslim, Abraham too, and Jesus too, the word Muslim also having the meaning of "submitted to God." The Muslim religion is therefore in the human nature, every man is born Muslim * and only different circumstances make that he is found Jewish Hindu Buddhist Christian Parsi Pagan ... or agnostic even atheist.

In Islam, blasphemy is therefore confused with infidelity, defined as the deliberate rejection of God and his revelation. In this sense, the expression of religious ideas that are not in conformity with the usual Islamic aims is blasphemy. It can also be defined as the equivalent of heresy and, in this meaning it is understood as the public expression of teachings dangerous for society.

In 1982, Pakistani general and dictator Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq introduced into the penal code the section 295B punishing "the defiling etc. of the Holy Quran" with a life sentence. In 1986, section 295C was added. It is worded as follows: "Whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable to fine."

N.B. It is true that in Articles 298 and 295-A the other religions also receive legal protection, but only by way of a prohibition of wounding and outrages against religious feeling. This protection is therefore without any comparison with that enjoyed by Islam, and it is taqiyya to suggest the opposite, to do as if it were the opposite.

In France the annexation of Alsace and of the Moselle in 1918 reintroduced the notion of blasphemy into French law, via the incorporation of Article 166 of the German penal code. In Alsace and in Moselle, there is no separation between Church and State. Articles 166 and 167 of the local penal code punish blasphemy and the impediment to the exercise of worship of up to 3 years' imprisonment.

In addition, the French law on the separation of churches and the state does not apply in French Guyana. Guyana (then colony) was excluded from the scope of this law because of opposition from some local politicians. It is not under the regime of the Concordat, but under that of the royal ordinance of Charles X of August 27, 1828, which organizes the political institutions of Guyana. This ordinance only recognizes Catholic worship.

In fact, the law against blasphemy is therefore a repressive weapon given to the state religion and Islamist groups against non-Muslims. The imprecision of its constituent elements makes this incrimination completely arbitrary. This offense, as provided for in Pakistan's penal law, does not require any intentional element, nor does it require any evidence other than a simple testimony, the accused person is immediately detained with the social consequences that this entails for his family. This provision against every offense towards Islam turns out to be nothing more or less than an instrument of oppression.

In Muslim countries, the blasphemy laws that protect Islam from defamation is used to protect the dominant religion, but also serve to condemn to silence the adepts of religious minorities. The ECLJ has collected a sample of recent incidents of accusations of "defamation of religions" in various countries. These facts relate to various civil and criminal offenses, including incidents of blasphemy, defamation, apostasy, defamatory writings, slander and hate speech, but they share the same denominator: For all these persons, the charges were based on their words or opinions. There were no incidents involving defamation of any person or incitement to hatred or violence against an individual or group. We will cite only one example from Pakistan, where Jagdeesh Kumar, a 22-year-old Hindu, was beaten to death by fellow workers in a factory for allegedly committing a crime of blasphemy, punishable by death penalty in the country in question. The three workers behind this deadly attack were arrested and charged not with murder but for "failing to report a case of blasphemy.” In Islamabad, a human rights activist said: "There is not a single case of killing a person for blasphemy where the murderer has had to be accountable for his crime. In fact, such murderers are treated as heroes in police stations. Police officers who openly honor such murderers have never been tried for their unlawful and reprehensible actions. "

The blasphemy defined by theologians can be of three kinds.

It is a simple disrespect when it is entirely made of scorn or indignation towards God.

It is an imprecation when it comes to expressing a curse towards the Supreme Being such as "let us rid ourselves of God."

It is a heresy when the insult contains a statement against faith, such as "God is cruel and

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unjust," or "God is the most wonderful creation of Man."

May be, for example, considered blasphemies.

-Deny a divine attribute, even the existence of the god in question.

-To appropriate an attribute or a consecrated object.

-Enter some places.

-Injury or ruin a representation of the god.

-Inversely to represent him in the form of an image of a statue or an icon when the religion in the context of which it is done, forbids it and a fortiori in the form of a caricature.

-Ly, perjure oneself.

Special case of Islam. The following facts were considered blasphemies.

-Tell evil of God.

- Impute moral faults to Muhammad.

- Disrespect a prophet mentioned in the Quran or a member of the family of Muhammad.

- To claim to be a prophet or a messenger of God.

-Speculate on what Muhammad would have done if he were still alive (Nigeria).

-Represent Muhammad or any other prophet or make a film featuring Muhammad.

- Write the name of Muhammad in the toilet.

- Call a teddy bear Muhammad (Sudan).

- Invoke the name of God while committing a prohibited act.

- Speak against leaders or guides of Islam.

-Impute mistakes to Islam.

- Say that Islam is an Arab religion, that praying five times a day is not necessary, and that the Quran contains lies.

- Believe in the transmigration of souls or reincarnation or do not believe in life after death (Indonesia).

- Impute a fault to a belief or practice adopted by the Muslim community.

- To mock the prophets or the angels or to impute a fault to them.

- Express an atheistic or secular point of view or propagate such points of view.

-Use the same terms as Muslims without being Muslim oneself (Malaysia).

-Pray for the Muslims change (Indonesia).

-Do not respect the rules of Ramadan.

-Recite a Muslim prayer in a language other than Arabic (Indonesia).

-Consume alcohol.

-Play games of chance.

-Be alone with people of the other sex who are not biological parents.

-Mock Muslim customs (Bangladesh).

-Publish an unofficial translation of the Quran (Afghanistan).

-Practice yoga (Malaysia).

-Watch a movie or listen to music (Somalia).

- Makeup on television (Iran).

-Criticize Muslim religious schools.

-Wear Jewish or Zoroastrian clothing.

-Support that prohibited acts are not prohibited.

-Tell forbidden things.

-Participate in non-Muslim religious holidays.

-Touch a Quran when you are not Muslim (Nigeria).

- Damage a Quran or any other important book for Islam (a collection of Hadiths) for example (Pakistan).

- Spit against the wall of a mosque (Pakistan).

Phew! Who spoke of idolatry ???

The variability in the importance of blasphemy in law is largely due to the social context. Whatever the religion concerned, the use of this notion (to justify any action) is possible only if the religious feeling that has been hurt is sufficiently strong. In some societies, many even, it is possible to outrage Ahura Mazda Zoroaster Lug Jupiter Taranis Aton, the Solar Disc, Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva or Krishna, etc. without risk of being prosecuted. They are gods that the legislator and the judge do not care about because they do not have enough or have no longer enough faithful.

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In the case where there are faithful enough to weigh in the life of the society, for example when this feeling is majority, and in the societies characterized by a strong degree of authoritarianism and religious extremism, authorities that decree that there is blasphemy make the accusation and may thus justify in the eyes of the believers the executions or the persecutions which ensue. In these cases, the problem of the "protection of communities" is reversed, and becomes that of the protection of persecuted minorities.

In the case where there are faithful enough to weigh in the life of the society, when the State does not rely on religion or on a non-divine law, blasphemy may be considered as a prejudice for the faithful as citizens protected by the law that allows them to have their own beliefs. Blasphemy can engage the civil responsibility of the one who utters it, who can be condemned if it he contravenes the right of free belief.

NON-MUSLIM PROSELYTISM AND BLASPHEMY.

Non-Muslim proselytism is therefore, of course, combined with apostasy in lands of Islam (it is an incitement to apostasy) and risks the same penalties.

Some examples.

On March 11, 859, Eulogius archbishop of Toledo, was whipped and beheaded in Cordoba for having housed Leocritia, young Muslim became Christian. She herself will be beheaded a few days later.

In 1220, five Franciscans sent by Saint Francis of Assisi come to preach Christianity in Morocco. Sultan Abu Yakub tortures them for a whole night (they are rolled on crushed glass), and cuts off their heads on the next morning. September 30, 1227, new expedition of seven Franciscans who land in Morocco, in Ceuta. They begin to preach, are immediately arrested and spend a week in prison. Having refused to convert to Islam, they are all beheaded.

In 1240, the Irish or Scottish Serapion, left to release for ransom Christian slaves in Algiers, takes the initiative to preach there. He is condemned to death by the bey of Algiers, who recommends making him suffer much. So the executioner imagined, among various tortures, to cut him only half of the neck.

* While everyone knows that the soul is naturally pagan, that is to say, open variable floating changing plural. In short characterized by what is called "moods" precisely.

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THIRTY EIGHTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE RIGHT TO CHANGE ONE’S RELIGION OR APOSTASY*.

Cyrus the Great established the Achaemenid Empire ca. 550 before the common era, and initiated a general policy of permitting religious freedom throughout the empire, documenting this on cylinders.

Article 18 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights." Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in a community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.”

Religious freedom implies the right to believe or not to believe, the right to teach one's religion to another to make them change their religion, and the right to practice or not to practice a religion: freedom of worship. This must be possible without any legal consequences in terms of family law, inheritance law or public law: access to work and public service, right of residence in a country, etc.

QURAN.

God the Beneficent, the Merciful [Holy Quran. Chapter 1 verse 1] There is no compulsion in religion [Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 256].

So far no problem everything is fine but things go bad after!

Holy Quran chapter 5 verse 3: " This day have I perfected your religion for you and completed My favor unto you, and have chosen for you as religion al-Islam."

While Muslims encourage followers of other religions to convert to Islam, penal and civil measures are taken against those who give up.

Holy Quran chapter 9 verse 74.

“They did say the word of disbelief, and did disbelieve after their Surrender (to God)…God will afflict them with a painful doom in the world and the Hereafter…..and they have no protecting friend nor helper in the earth.

With the exception of this verse, which does not specify what pain it should be (except that it is to be painful) the Quran does not provide for specific punishment against the apostate although by using either the word kufr (disbelief) or the term riddah (apostasy with secession).

The hadiths dating back to Muhammad, on the other hand, are more explicit.

Two hadiths are considered by some Muslim theologians to be in the sense of applying the death penalty * in case of apostasy: "He who changes his religion, kill him." This hadith attributed to Ibn Abbas is reported by Bukhari (vol. 9, book 84, number 57) and is not taken over by Muslim in his Sahih.

N.B. Ibn Abbas was only 13 years old when Muhammad died, but that does not prove that he was

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wrong or lied.

Ibn Masud's Hadith: " The blood of a Muslim man who testifies that there is no god but God and that I am the Messenger of God should not be lawfully shed but only for one of three reasons: married fornicator, soul for soul, and one who deserts his religion separating himself from the community” (Sunan Abu Dawud 4352).

Traditional doctors in law (madhhab) consider that a male apostate must be executed (by beheading with a saber among our friends in Saudi Arabia) but leave him a three-day reflection period whereas for the apostate woman, according to some hanafi Ulama, the sentence is life imprisonment, but a release is possible if she decides to return to Islam.

Apostasy also has civil consequences: the prohibition or dissolution of marriage, the abduction of children and the deprivation of the right to inherit except for the benefit of any Muslim heirs. This is for example the treatment that is frequently reserved for Baha'is when they are not considered heretics.

In Iran since 1979, the 350,000 Baha'is are considered "unprotected infidels ** (...) non-persons, [who] have neither rights nor protection," says the International Federation of Human Rights (IFHR) in its 2003 report. Their religion being later to Islam, it is not considered as a religion by the regime.

They do not have the right to receive a pension, to inscribe a name on the grave of their deceased, to inherit, to meet in order to practice their religion, their sacred places and their cemeteries are destroyed. The property of many Baha'is is confiscated. There is pressure on employers to dismiss Bahá'í employees.

In Egypt, the 2000 Baha'is got the right from the District Court n Alexandria to inscribe their confession on their identity card, but this right was removed from them by the Egyptian Supreme Administrative Court in December 2006. The Baha'is are obliged either to choose between the three officially recognized religions (Christianity, Islam and Judaism) or to give up their identity card, which deprives them of most of the rights of the Egyptian citizen ............ ..

Article 11 of the Federal Constitution of Malaysia guarantees everyone the right to choose one's religion, but Article 3 states that Islam is the official religion and that no other religion should be preached to Muslims. Most states have passed the Control and Restriction Act, which provides for a fine or a one-year prison sentence for those who induce a Muslim to change his religion. Criticism of Islam is considered by law to be an act of sedition (law inherited from the colonial period). It is therefore very difficult for Muslims (mainly Malays, considered to be Muslims by birth) to give up their religion because they must for that have their choice endorsed by a Muslim religious court, the only relevant jurisdiction in this field since 1988. But the request is almost always refused, and a sentence can be imposed ranging up to the prison or confinement in a "rehabilitation" camp until the renunciation to their project of officialization (of their apostasy).

* The traditional view is that a Muslim who denies his religion under duress is not an apostate. Quran chapter 16 verse 106: "Whosoever disbelieves in God after his belief - save him who is forced thereto and whose heart is still content with the Faith - but whosoever finds ease in disbelief: On them is wrath from God . Theirs will be an awful doom. " The problem is that this well understandable in this background, verse, is also used in a broader sense to ground taqiyya, including in an offensive sense (an initiative and not an individual self-defense reaction).

** Not benefiting from the dhimmitude reserved for the people of the Book (Jews Christians Mandeans Sabians, Zoroastrians).

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THIRTY NINTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

HYPOCRITES OR HERETICS IN ISLAMIC LANDS.

Holy Quran chapter 5 verse 3: "This day have I perfected your religion for you and completed My favor unto you, and have chosen for you as religion al-Islam.”

As we have had already the opportunity to say but repetere ars docendi; the lowest “Orthodox” Muslims in the scale of values are the moderates qualified as hypocrites. In Arabic theological munafiqun (singular munafiq).

The term originally designated the inhabitants of Yathrib / Medina who had welcomed and given asylum to Muhammad and the few dozens of Muslims who had followed him in his exile far from their hometown of Mecca. But who were then gradually surprised disappointed or annoyed by the conduct of these first Muslims who behaved as if they were lording it over everyone. Then, who had accepted only with forced and compelled lips, the accession to the power of Muhammad in this city. Their emblematic leader was a man named Abdullah bin Ubayy, an important figure who thought to become one day the prince of the city.

There must have been among them pagan polytheists but also perhaps Judeo-Christians. Taking part in offensive military operations, especially because of the booty. In theological Arabic, the term munafiqun today designates those who have of Muslims only the name, who are not true Muslims, who do not comply with all the rules of the Muslim theocracy (verse 8, chapter 63). Power belongs to God to his messenger and to the believers).

There are so many allusions to the "hypocrites" or "munafiqun" in the Quran, that one can draw up a true police sketch portrait of this adversary everywhere present. These Medinans called hypocrites or "munafiqun" are excessively vilified in the Quran and the Muslim tradition; which includes under this name faithful believed to be too weak and not aggressive enough (especially at the time of the fighting), simple opportunists or supposed ones, followers without energy who do not want to break with the infidels, traitors; or sincere people who displease the leader, or even simply do not support the autocracy. A chapter besides has their name, the chapter, the chapter called "munafiqun" justly. It is a chapter often recited on Friday and one of the five most popular chapters. It is also particularly violent, since an incitement to murder is made in it, without ambiguity. Verse 4 of chapter 63: "They are the enemy, so beware of them. God confound them! How they are perverted!”

The Quran promises the most severe punishment to those who would support only a part of these divine laws and not the others, what by definition in passing excludes therefore any so-called moderate Islam.

Chapter 2 verse 85: " Believe you in part of the Scripture and disbelieve you in part thereof ?”

Chapter 66 verse 9. " O Prophet! Strive against the disbelievers and the hypocrites, and be stern with them. Hell will be their home.”

The Quran thus clearly equates the moderate elements of the population with hypocrites who are to be

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mistrusted even fought resolutely.

Verse 91 of chapter 4. " You will find others (the hypocrites) who desire that they should have security from you, and security from their own folk..... If they do not keep aloof from you nor offer you peace nor hold their hands, then take them and kill them wherever you find them. Against such We have given you clear warrant’.

Verse 141 chapter 4. " Those who wait upon occasion in regard to you and, if a victory cometh unto you from God, say: Are we not with you ? and if the disbelievers meet with a success say: Had we not the mastery of you, and did we not protect you from the believers ?”

Chapter 33.

Verse 60: " If the hypocrites, and those in whose hearts is a disease, and the alarmists in the city do not cease, We verily shall urge thee on against them, then they will be your neighbors in it but a little while.

Verse 61: " Accursed, they will be seized wherever found and slain with a (fierce) slaughter ."

Chapter 63 verses 1 to 8. 63:1 When the hypocrites come unto thee (O Muhammad), they say: We bear witness that thou art indeed God’s messenger.... that is because they believed, then disbelieved, therefore their hearts are sealed so that they do not understand.”

The favored target of the future Muslim inquisition will be formed rather by the "false" Moslems suspected of zandaqa.

Zandaqa. This Persian term vaguely referred to everything seriously repugnant to religious orthodoxy: Free-thinkers atheists impious unbelievers libertines hypocrites perfidious and ...

In this case, it will ultimately be summarized in the notion of "heresy."

But let us not forget that before getting this simple meaning and in a different and more complex background, that of the development of a Muslim orthodoxy and orthopraxy, the term zandaqa (whose adept is called "Zindiq," plural: "zanadiq" or "zanadiqa") was used to designate a set of personalities whose doctrines or behaviors were judged sufficiently prejudicial to motivate, sometimes, their bodily elimination.

The zandaqa did not cover a very homogeneous reality and those who were recognized as zanadiq were so for various reasons, of course, all falling within the religious field, but the religious field in the broadest sense. The doctrinal deviations (in relation to the manner in which the "divine oneness," the Tawhid, was understood heard by the theologians of the time), ethical legal (compared to the revealed law, the sharia, as interpreted by legislators) and politicians (in relation to the foundations of the legitimacy of the newly established Abbasid Caliphate) were as many attributes of the zandaqa so that it was thinkers, poets, libertines and political opponents who were persecuted by the inquisition instituted by the caliph al-Mahdi (775-785) and perpetuated until the end of the century. In short, the zindiq was "the enemy within," the one who, follower of an unapproved religion (Manicheism, the Daysanism of Bardaisan , etc.) or "false" Muslim, lived in "the abode of Islam (Dar al Islam) while defending doctrines (dualism, negation of prophethood, etc.) or spiritual attitudes (skepticism, materialism, etc.) or while adopting behaviors (wine drinking, pedophilia, etc.) deemed to undermine Islam in its very foundations. The non-Muslim zanadiqs ("the zindiqs of the non-Muslim religious background") were mostly Manicheans, Bardaisan * followers (Dayṣaniyya, Daysanites or Disanites) and Marcionites * who were considered to form "one Christianizing family" and not to be followers of Mazdeism.

Different political and religious sensibilities therefore very early divided Islam. The first attack against a mosque was made by Muslims and at the request of Muhammad himself. This is recounted in chapter 9 verse 107 of the Quran: " Those who chose a place of worship out of opposition and disbelief, and in order to cause dissension among the believers, and as an outpost ..... Never stand there, etc.”

There is, however, a lack of sufficient information on this case of the mosque of dissension (Masjid al-Dirar) to understand what really happened: a church built in Medina by a Christian monk named Abu Amir al-Rahib? The place of worship of a more or less Nestorian Christian movement rival of Islam in the kind of that of Musaylima in the Yamama later in 632, who called God Ar Rhaman instead of Allah?) Settling of scores between religion of love for ever and religion of clemency and mercy?

It is not known exactly what the religion of Abu Amir al-Rahib was at the time of the events.

Below is what ibn Hisham says about it (Conduct of the Messenger of God 411-3).

With him was a man of the Aws to whom the Aws obeyed, Abu Amir. He was an ascetic, at the time of the Jahiliyya, and he wore coarse woolen garments, and he was called the monk. These two men were cursed in spite of their high position, and they were hurt (....) Abu Amir stubbornly refused to believe and abandoned his people when they submitted to Islam and the Apostle of God , and he set out for Mecca with ten disciples (...) But before leaving for Mecca, Abu Amir came to have the Apostle of God to ask him what religion he had to bring.

-The Hanifiya, the religion of Abraham.

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"That's what I am" said Abu Amir.

-You do not.

- But if I do! You, Muhammad, have brought into the hanifiya things that were not there.

"I did not: I brought it pure and white."

"Make God that the liar dies solitary, vagabond and fugitive!”

And this is what happened to the enemy of God.

Another Muslim tradition saw him finish his days as a monk at the court of the Byzantine Christian emperor Heraclius.

We will pass over the chapter of the so-called Ridda wars, which seem to have been mainly conquest wars or some rebellions against the tax payment, rather than true heresies or apostasy.

This aspect is obvious in the case of the confederation of Banu Hanifa which, under the leadership of Musaylima, groups more ancient monotheistic tribes honoring a God whom they call Al-Rahman, the Merciful. This name of Aramaic etymology has led many scholars to believe that these we pre-Nicene Monophysite Christian groups.

And we will come directly to the battle of Siffin in 657.

It will oppose the followers of Ali, son-in-law and cousin of Muhammad, ephemeral fourth caliph, to the followers of Muawiya (son of Abu Sufyan, the sworn enemy of Muhammad), Ali's rival.

Both sides decide to stop hostilities and resort to arbitration. Some supporters of Ali who are against arbitration, considering that Ali was chosen by God to be caliph and that he should not disobey him, separate from him and will be called Kharijites.

Those who remain loyal to Caliph Ali (often Persians elsewhere, what explains some of their peculiarities) will become Shiites.

On the other hand, Muawiya's men will be at the origin of Sunni orthodoxy.....

The first mutakallimins (philosophers) of the kalam were recruited by Hunayn ibn Ishaq for the House of Wisdom under the Abbasid Caliphs in Baghdad. They collected, translated and synthesized everything the genius of other cultures (Greek, Indian, Iranian) could produce, before undertaking commentaries on these works and laying the foundations of Muslim philosophy in the ninth and tenth centuries. It will influence several schools of thought later (madhhabs).

Although inspired by the rationalistic reasoning method of ancient philosophy (falsafa), kalam differs on several points, especially the nature of God and the soul.

Aristotle seeks to demonstrate the Oneness of God, but he considers that he cannot be the creator of the universe. The knowledge of God is then only an extension of the knowledge of the universe and therefore it does not need to be the result of a revelation or prophecy. It may be the result of reason and knowledge alone. But this is contrary to the teachings of the Quran, which insists much on the idea of revelation of God to men.

The Peripatetic philosophers of ancient Greece believed that the soul was only an aptitude and a natural capacity, which could passively reach perfection. This ability could, through virtue and knowledge, be qualified for a union with the intellect and only then be united to God. To admit this theory it is necessary to deny the immortality of the soul. This point naturally shocks the Mutakallimins or philosophers of Kalam.

For these reasons of opposition to falsafa, the mutakallimins have had, first and foremost, to establish a philosophical system which demonstrated the creation of matter and adopted for this purpose, the theory of atoms enunciated by Democritus of Abdera. Atoms have been created by God and are created whenever He desires. The bodies are born or die by the aggregation or separation of these atoms. However this theory does not solve the philosophical objections to the creation of the Universe: If we suppose that God begins "His Work" at a date defined by "His Will" and for a "precise goal," we must admit that he (God) was imperfect before his achievement or before reaching "His Goal."

The creation of the world being admitted it was simple to show the necessity of the Creator, the one God, Omnipotent and omniscient.

The cosmological argument of "kalam" was revalorized from the late 1970s by the philosopher William Lane Craig. The new wording proposed by Craig can be summarized as follows:

Everything that begins to exist has a cause.

The universe began to exist.

So the universe has a cause.

Editor's Note: This theory, of course, has nothing to object to the claim that the universe has always existed, especially if we add, "in one form or another."

The theology of kalam forms a theological corpus attempting to answer the following questions:

-Is man free of acting, or is everything willed by God?

- The Quran speaks of a Word of God. Is this Word created or uncreated? Is it God?

- Does God have attributes: Word, Wisdom, Mercy?

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- Is the text of the Quran explicit in all cases or does it also uses allegorIes, or metaphors?

-How to overcome the contradictions between many Qur’anic verses?The twelfth century experiences the apotheosis of pure philosophy and the decline of kalam, later. This supreme exaltation of philosophy must be attributed largely to the Persian Al-Ghazali and the Jew Judah Halevi. By issuing criticisms, they have produced a reaction favorable to philosophy by questioning concepts and making their theories more logical and clearer. Ibn Bajjah and Averroes have produced some of the most beautiful works of Islamic thought. Averroes closes the debate with his work of a great boldness. The fury of the Orthodox is indeed such that the debate is no longer possible. The Orthodox attack all philosophers without distinction and burn their books. The debate will continue, but in the West. The madhhabs therefore still consider today, with great circumspection, all that comes from kalam, without completely rejecting it. These various schools therefore distinguish...

"Blameworthy”kalam, kalam known as " kalam of the people of passions ," kalam called dangerous innovation (bidah).

The kalam in conformity with the Quran and the Sunnah, clarifying the fundamental truths when a controversy appears.

This last kalam is commendable.

On the basis of the themes defined above, this speculative theology will be divided into several schools...

- Hashwiyya: the school hashwiyya, or "materialist,” argues that we must take literally the anthropomorphic verses of the Quran. God therefore has bodily capacities, He who "sits on a throne" and "descends" from it. This literalist tendency was prevailing at the beginning of Islam.

- Zahiri: the Zahirite school, founded in the ninth century by Dawud, and mainly represented by Ibn Hazm (died in 1064), also insists on the literal meaning of the Quranic verses, although he refuses the anthropomorphic interpretation of the previous school. It is therefore necessary to affirm the simplicity of the Quran, to support the “apparent” meaning (Zahir) of its verses, without, however, making a concession to the Christian doctrine of the embodiment. Ibn Hazm therefore will explicitly attack the Christian dogma thinking to defend the Quran ( Kitab al-Fisal, 11th century).

- Jabarite: this school gathers the partisans of the divine compulsion. It received support and endorsement from the Umayyad caliphate power.

- Maturidite: school founded by al-Maturidi (944) and having sought a compromise between reason and Law, accepting theological speculation without denying the obligation to believe.

- Asharite. In response to mu’tazilism, an Islamic madhab that opposed the view of the orthodox Islam of the time, Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari, initially a mutazili himself, developed the method called "Ilm -al-Kalam ," based on the Greek dialectic. This school, founded by Al-Ash'ari (956), prevailed over the previous one, by establishing the primacy of the Law over the Reason. It imposes a relentless view of divine voluntarism, reducing to nothing the importance of human freedom. Conclusion closed on itself of all the great theological questions that fermented in Islam, Ash'arism is the most restrictive answer that could be given concerning faith : "It is necessary to believe because it is written!" Cf. Latin credo quia absurdum.

-Qadarite: an inverse school founded in the seventh century by Ma'bad al-Juhani, who was perhaps a disciple of an Iraqi Christian, while Ghaylan, another representative of Qadarism, was a former Christian converted to Islam. The Qadarite school (which "limits the Qadar"), therefore, opposes, in the name of the justice of God, that human acts are predetermined. Here again, we find a Christian problematic of the sense of freedom, involving disobedience, merit and divine judgment of men. The members of this school were pursued and executed under the Umayyad Caliphs, whose authority was based on the very fact that what is, is wanted by God.

However, even with regard to the Ash'arite doctrine, the Kalam remains suspect in the eyes of uncompromising Muslims, and especially for the Hanbali, defenders of strict legalism.

-Mu’tazilism. It is within the background of this formation of the majority Muslim theology, which was to crystallize gradually in the form of Sunnism, that mu'tazilism or mo’tazilism will arise. At the end of the Umayyad caliphate (around 750), a pupil, Wasil ibn Ata, was dismissed from the Al-Hassan al-Basri school. He created his own school in Basra and systematized the most radical views of earlier movements, particularly that of the Qadari. This new school was called mu’tazilite. Subsequently, the supporters of mu’tazilism called themselves Ahl al-adl wa al-tawhid: “people of justice and of strict monotheism” (according to the theology they adopted). Wasil ibn Ata died in 749. Other great names in the mu’tazilism Amr ben Ubayd (762), Abu-l-Hudhayl (840), an-Nazzam (845).

The same period also sees the development of various heterodoxies within Islam, which also suffered a number of atheistic attacks, such as those of the apostate Ibn al-Rawandi 911).

According to the Muslim tradition, the caliph Umar had created under his reign a police of manners primarily with a trade vocation, the Hisba, of which he would have entrusted the responsibility to a

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woman besides. This institution in reality dates back to earlier, perhaps to the Byzantine agoranomos.

Anyway Caliph Al-Mansur (754-775) changed this Hisba to enlarge it and at the beginning of the reign of the caliph Al-Mahdi (775-785) appeared the first muhtasib whose mission was to track apostates and other heretics.

Many jurists preferred sinners and infidels to heretics because the latter presented, according to them, a "more pernicious danger, because more subtle and diffuse, than that of clear impiety." This was particularly the case of Shafi'i, the father of Shafi'i school, for whom it was necessary to fight the" apostates "/ rebels before doing lesser jihad to the infidels in the of Dar al-Harb. The principle is taken from a word attributed to Muhammad in which the latter enjoins Ali to lead against the dissidents a fight similar to that led [against the disbelievers] in compliance with the preaching. This precept suited Muslim leaders, whose political realism often led them to ally with the disbelievers to fight against their Muslim opponents.

The third Abbasid caliph thus had a fairly rigorous religious policy: he pursued the dualists. The Zoroastrian converts could be accused of dualism, especially among the Persians, but also the Sufis. Al-Mahdi declared that the caliph was not only a ruler, but that it was his duty to define religious orthodoxy in order to keep the cohesion of the community of believers (umma).

Strangely nevertheless, the caliph's opponents were declared as heretics (zindiqs), as it is proved by contrast with the impunity granted by the caliph Harun ar-Rashid (786-809) to a notorious heretic like Abu al-Atahiya while he was evicting the powerful Barmecide family with the help of this accusation.

The Mu'tazili took to the extreme the Qadarite theses on free will, thus entering into an open rebellion against the power of the caliphs. They did not hesitate to read Greek philosophers and develop arguments based on reason and logic to "discuss" with theologians of other religions. They also condemned any recourse to the attributes of God in order to define or express divine actions, thus making Islam adopt a definitive and extremely limiting orientation concerning the definition of the Oneness of God. But, for their last great thesis, that of the creation of the Quran (once again, in order to deny the attribute of the Word in God), the Mu'tazili were not followed by the subsequent evolution of the theological thought in Islam, since today orthodoxy preaches an uncreated Quran, Word of God.

In 827, Mu’tazilism became the official belief in the court of the Abbasid Caliphate, after having been officially embraced by Caliph Al-Ma'mun. He will remain the official doctrine under his 2 successors.

A persecution (the Mihna) will even be organized between 833 and 848 against the collectors of hadiths who did not agree with mu’tazilism. The Mihna forces non-adherents to openly renounce the doctrine that the Quran is eternal and to accept that it was created. The zeal of the mu’tazili will go so far as to refuse to make release the Muslim prisoners fallen into the hands of the Byzantines if they professed the uncreated character of the Quran.

A clear resistance of opinion against these persecutions is reported by the chroniclers. In fact, the Mihna is perhaps partly the cause of the final failure of mu’tazilism.

However oppositions were heard at the end of the ninth century by the Asharite madhhab founded by Abu-l-Hasan Al-Ashariy, former mu’tazili himself, then by the Maturidite school. The Caliph al-Mutawakkil gave up Mutazilism in 847 and came back to the traditional doctrine, which was to give rise to Sunnism.

Mutazilism was forbidden , its books burned, and its doctrine is no longer known except through the texts of the theologians who attacked it. Mu’tazilism will regain some luster nevertheless under the protectorate of the Buyid Shia emirs, in the tenth and eleventh centuries, where it will be taught again. Then it will be rejected again at the arrival of the Seljuk Turks. But from the middle of the eleventh century the Sunni Orthodox theology will prevail definitively and mu’tazilism will disappear definitively this time between the eleventh and the thirteenth century.

* Marcion and Bardaysan were Gnostic Christian theologians rejected by the NASCENT orthodoxy.

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FORTIETH RANDOM DRILLING IN TNE MUSLIM CORPUS .

PRISON OR DEATH: THE PUNISHMENT OF HERESY IN THE LAND OF ISLAM (Dar al Islam).

The study of some cases of Muslim personalities accused of zandaqa shows, firstly, that they were often members of the entourage of princes, and, secondly, that this was in many cases the unacknowledged but the most immediate cause of their persecution or of their execution.

Theological controversies again indicate how the name "zandaqa" covered multiple realities. All, however, had in common the ruin of one or other aspect of the then orthodox doctrine of tawhid, of divine oneness. The strictly sensory epistemology (to which the name of "sumaniyya" is attached in Islam) adopted by some zandiq opposed the supposed intelligibility of the existence of a single God, the demonstration of contradictions in the Quran challenged the idea of divine wisdom and goodness; the adventitious nature of the world and its creation ex nihilo were disputed; Muhammad, at last, was at best regarded as a skillful political strategist, nothing coming to prove the reality of his quality of "Messenger of God." This skepticism, which doubted more than it denied, disagreed fundamentally at odds with the confident and, so to speak, Quranic, optimism of Muslim theologians, and these, in their controversies with the zandaqa, somehow determined the tolerable limits of religious criticism in Islam. These limits, categorical (so far as they concern spiritual attitudes) as material (in so far as they affect doctrines), will not fade; later, but that's another story, they will have frankly negative effects on the vitality of critical thinking in Islam.

The zandaqa was further accused of corrupting Islam "from within" by falsifying or inventing sayings, hadith-s, attributed to the Prophet Muhammad. Here appears the idea that Islam should be protected against a group of "natural" enemies, in this case the zanadiq, whose secret purpose is to harm it. It became thus impossible to clearly define these enemies since they were deemed to approach "from the rear" within the community and work secretly to its ruin. That a satanic plot in the strict sense of the term threatens Islam and believers is another idea that will fizzle out: it is today more alive than ever.

In spite of the scarcity of information on their architecture, it is necessary to finally think that the prisons constituted a striking element of the urban landscape. They were often built along main roads, as in Samarra, where the "great prison" ran along the main street. The only architectural element recurrently mentioned, the high walls surrounding them - particularly imposing in the case of the Mutbaq - were to impress the masses. They were not only intended to prevent escapes; they marked the coercive power of the state in the heart of the city - which is why they were often one of the first targets of the rabble during urban riots. Such a symbolic role was particularly obvious during the execution of the great Sufi mystic Mansur al-Hallaj in 922: while the rest of his body was cremated, his head, hands and feet were exhibited on the ramparts of

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the new Prison.In 924, some of his followers were arrested in turn and Nazuk, the head of the police in Baghdad, made them suffer a similar fate : their bodies were crucified on the eastern bank and their heads exhibited on the walls of one of the prisons. Like the palaces and mosques - to which the first ones were often associated - the high walls of the prisons pointed out on a daily basis that the safety of the people also depended on their submission to the social and political order.

The case of Ibn al-Muqaffa is most characteristic of the criminal aberrations of this Muslim inquisition because of two things: either Ibn al-Muqaffa was well and truly a sincere Muslim - what is not impossible - or Ibn al-Muqaffa did not really present the traits of an irreproachable Muslim in the eyes of his contemporaries. But he was especially not a heretic.

As for Ibn Abi l-Awja, another great zindiq for the Muslim tradition (a cryptomanichean?) The most prominent trait of his personality was perhaps his "independence of mind" but there are also reasons to think that he was Dahrite, i.e. "atheistic materialist."

There is indeed another group of personalities recognized as zindiqs: the libertines especially represented by poets (Bashshâr b Burd, Abu Nuwâs ...). As expected, it was mainly the "heteropraxis" of the libertines, their disobedience displayed and assumed to the revealed Law and their polymorphous hedonism that caused scandal. These "outlaw" behaviors were considered as the practical expression of their "disbelief" (kufr) and it was for this reason that they were ranked among the zanadiq: atheists denying the future life, they were quickly taxed with cryptomanichaeans.

N.B. Other examples of well-known zindiq: Abu Al-Ala Al-Ma'ari (973-1057), Ibn Arabi (1165-1240). Incredible but true, this great metaphysical philosopher is indeed considered to be heretical by the official orthodoxy of Islam.

On the other hand, the traditional comparison between the anti-Arab intellectual and literary movement called shu'ubism and the zandaqa does not seem to resist the analysis. One can nevertheless add to this list the case more than ever topical of Bahais. Bahaism is the religion of the followers of Baha Allah, inspired from Babism, Persian doctrine of the eighteenth century. Its followers are 7 million worldwide. It is a syncretism of different rites, every 19 days are read passages from the Bible, the Gospels and the Quran. Every year, believers fast from March 2nd to 21st. From Persia, Bahaism is now very present in India, Africa and the United States. Its New Delhi temple is famous for its gigantic lotus-shaped architecture. They are not considered Muslims and therefore are sometimes even considered apostates.

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FORTY FIRST RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE VICE SQUAD (HISBA).

Holy Quran chapter 3 verse 104: “And there may spring from you a nation who invite to goodness, and enjoin right conduct and forbid indecency.”

Holy Quran chapter 5 verse 3: " This day have I perfected your religion for you and completed My favor unto you, and have chosen for you as religion al-Islam.”

The Arabic but non-Quranic word hisba (literally asking for accounts) refers, on the one hand, to the obligation of every Muslim "to enjoin right conduct and forbid indecency " (amrbi-l-ma'rufwa-nahi 'an al-munkar, Quran 3,104 and passim) and, on the other, the office of muhtasib, inspector of markets and guardian of public order. The good is formed by the realization or the defense of the rights of God (huquq God); and the guardian of these rights (muhtasib) expects reward only from God in the afterlife.

Originally, hisba was responsible for verifying the compliance of the proceedings of economic and trade affairs, of weights and measures, as well as of the legality of contracts, with reference to sharia law. Its foundation in the ninth century, under the governance of Caliph Omar, is based on a verse that gives a list of good behavior (by defining some major prohibitions)": And do not approach the wealth of the orphan save with that which is better, till he reaches maturity. Give full measure and full weight, in justice. We task not any soul beyond its scope. And if you give your word, do justice thereunto, even though it be (against) a kinsman; and fulfill the covenant of God. This He commands you that haply you may remember.” (Holy Quran chapter 6 verse 152.) Her first manager was perhaps a woman, Shifa. Hisba or Hisbah (calculation, verification) is therefore a means of seeking full conformity with the divine laws.

The specialists deal at length with the question of whether the Greek agoranomos or the Latin aedilis are at the origin of this office. If Stern (1970, p. 26) and Foster (1977) do not see any link between the ancient and Islamic institutions, Floor (1980, p.122 et seq.), and before him Sperber (1969 and 1970), have clearly shown the continuous development of the office and its name from Antiquity to Islamic times.

According to Schacht (1957, p. 207), it was at the Abbasid time that this office was "Islamized" and it was legitimized by resorting to the aforementioned Quranic verse. Tradition also refers to this office in several hadiths.

At the beginning of the reign of the caliph Al-Mahdi (775-785) appeared the first muhtasib, or price controller; charged with hisba, whose mission was also to preserve public morality, faith and to protect the Muslims against charlatans and crooks. The first texts on Hisba were written during the eleventh century by Mawardi (died in 1058) and Ghazali (died in 1111). This branch of Arabic

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literature is concerned with the practical aspects of the muhtasib charge, offering long taxonomies of goods and their qualities, professions, and everything related to them.

This is the main charge of the muhtasib, also called sahib al-souk (market lord): the control of weights and measures, prices and quality. He also regulates aspects of medical and pharmaceutical practices.

The powers of the Hisba then expanded to include all aspects of the social life of Muslims. It has for example been used to track down apostates and those considered heretics. According to his personality and circumstances, the muhtasib also monitored the performance of prayer, the correct use of mosques, public morality and order in the streets, squares and baths, as well as the execution of the rules concerning the dhimmis, Jews and Christians. Monitoring the cleanliness and maintenance of streets and sidewalks was also his responsibility.

It is often difficult to distinguish hisba from neighboring offices, such as those of qadi or that of head of the police (shurta). The muhtasib indeed had the right to judge and punish in all cases that did not require that a piece of evidence is given or when the offense was flagrant. His authority did not exceed the limits of the city. He was invested by the governor or qadi and this investiture was the subject of a public proclamation. Theoretically, in addition to his moral qualities and his legal knowledge (the muhtasib was often at the same time a lawyer, faqih), he was also usually required to have professional experience (as a merchant, for example).

This institution also became a kind of militia serving the interests of the caliph. For example, the opponents of the caliph were declared apostates as evidenced by the impunity granted by the caliph Harun ar-Rachid (786-809) to Abu al-Atahiya while he evicted the powerful Barmecide family with the help of this charge. We can therefore consider that in these cases, the hisba has proved to be an instrument of political suppression under cover of a crime against God or against the society.

Islamic law grants every citizen the right to appeal to the courts to denounce an act that is in his eyes contrary to public interest.

In Egypt with Hassan El-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, hisba is changed into a vice squad, it gets equipped with a militia and promotes denunciation. The act of denunciation can be made by any informer, setting himself up as a sheikh (scholar). It investigates the private life of people, controls practices and canonical observances. Under the influence of Ahmed Rifaat, it begins to punish women who do not dress according to the Islamic criteria in force. This slide of the Hisba knew a certain notoriety, by reaching some intellectuals.

Several cases of religious censorship were initiated by people who believed themselves to be attacked in their faith by a work or ... by the private life of its author, convinced of "apostasy."

Prior to 1955, Egyptian jurisprudence had established the following principles regarding Hisba.

Hisba is the accomplishment of what is important for God. It is one of the obligations that are fulfilled if only one person performs it (fard kifaya). It comes from a legitimate authority by principle (wilaya shar'iyya asliyya).

The application for hisba does not require permission (idhn) or authorization (tafwid) from the legal guardian (wali al-ami).

The application for hisba belongs to the rights of God (huquq Allah).

Before the court, an application for hisba can be studied only after submission of a request.

The application for hisba is obligatory for all offenses against the rights of God.

It is the concept of "rights of God" (huquq Allah) which forms the central concept of this application. These rights ground the legitimacy of Hisba.

By "rights of God" is meant the rights of which the benefit comes down to all men and not only to certain persons. However, it is necessary to distinguish in the "rights of God" those which concern mainly men and those which concern mainly God. With regard to the infringement of the rights falling within the first category, an application for hisba is impossible, the victim (maqdhuf) - for example in a case of false testimony for adultery (qadhf) - suffering here a particular damage. As for the infringement of the rights falling under the second category - for example, the Quranic punishments (hudud), such as the punishment of adultery – an application for Hisba is possible here and even recommended.

In other words, contrary to the concept of "rights of the human being (huquq al-ibad)", which concerns the requests of individuals acting in isolation and in a private capacity against other individuals, God's rights include requests made in the name of the state and of the religion against private legal persons. Human rights are guided by the idea of transversality between

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equal individuals. The rights of God are, on the contrary, absolute and indivisible. They represent public interests (masalih amma).

When the Taliban established power over most of Afghanistan (1994 / 95-2001), they established a department, soon promoted to the rank of ministry similar the Saudi Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice;

some muhtasib were responsible for enforcing sunnah dictates in the areas they controlled.

In Nigeria, in the federal states that promulgated Islamic law, there are Hisbah committees. These Hisbah violently and badly apply Sharia, dragging more the poor down into misery. A UN report notes violent attacks, sometimes towards non-Muslims, in most complete illegality and in violation of human rights. This violence involves an arming of non-Muslim communities in order to resist them. Moreover, the existence of these hisbah gives an exaggeratedly retrograde image of Nigeria. This application, the compulsions it imposes (such as the non-cohabitation in transport that prevents women from using motorcycle taxis driven by men) and the fears it arouses, also push health and education workers and Christian humanitarians to leave. Especially since all the Quran is not applied: the obligatory alms due by the rich is not paid for example.

Hisbas are particularly active in the city of Kano. They are partly responsible for the interfaith violence that bloodies this country.

CONCLUSION.

The Hisba should not be confused with the Muslim inquisition that has raged for a few years (828 - 848) at the instigation of the mu’tazili.

The ḥisba has two meanings: the broadest one of "ordering what is good when it is obviously neglected and prohibiting evil when it is done openly." Every Muslim must forbid evil and enjoin the good, but in an organized state it is not possible to give up this mission to private initiatives: that is why it will be entrusted to a special magistrate, the muḥtasib.

In its narrowest sense, the ḥisba consists in the surveillance of trade: control of markets and transactions, fraud control, verification of weights and measures, supervision of corporations. It has often been considered that the economic role of muḥtasib, being an aspect of his general office of censorship of morals, has gradually taken precedence over his other attributions, since, more and more, over the centuries, it has formed the most of his task; or, in other words, that the evolution of the office has been from its general definition to the more restricted function of market control. However, although the genesis of the ḥisba is obscure, we know that the word hisba, as well as muhtasib, did not exist in the beginning of Islam. The name appears in the East around the reign of Al Mamun and spreads later in Maghreb and Spain. On the other hand, the office already existed, but its holder was called ṣaḥib es suq. This name suggests that the essential if not exclusive attributions of the ṣaḥib es suq related to the control of the markets and that it could well be an older office preserved and then Islamized by entrusting to its holder the Quranic mission of dictating the good and prohibiting evil and giving him the title muḥtasib.

In practice, it seems that the narrow aspect of the function has, in most cases, taken precedence over the general aspect of censorship of morals, and that the most of the activities of the muhtasib have been devoted to the control of transactions. However, the general aspect remains of primary importance since it is the one that confers on the institution its religious character.

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FORTY SECOND RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE HISBA AGAIN.

As we have seen previously, Hisba is an Arabic term with two meanings, a broader one and a narrower one.

In the broadest sense, it means the duty of every good Muslim to order good and forbid evil. This principle is stated in Quranic verses 3,104 and 3,110 and as everyone knows OR SHOULD KNOW, the Quran is binding on all (hujjatun 'ala al-jami'), and is the primary source of Muslim law. This stems from the fact that it comes from God.

Nevertheless, the origins of Hisba remain rather nebulous.

The term ḥisba, as well as that of muḥtasib did not exist at the beginning in Islam.

While there is little doubt that pre-Islamic judicial administrations existed in major cities such as Mecca or Yathrib to settle disputes, either through the intervention of an arbitrator (hakim) or by using a diviner (kāhin), to speak of "muhtasib", and of hisba during the lifetime of Muhammad is an anachronism. It is better to speak of souk keepers (amil al suk) or souk masters (sahib al suk), whose functions were then considered purely secular, with no religious obligation. It is likely that their primary responsibilities were the control of weights and measures, given the numerous hadith and Quranic verses on this subject, including a sura on fraudsters, which suggests that the problem was endemic at the time.

The name appears in the East around the reign of Al Mamūn (9th century) and later spread to the Maghreb and Spain. However, the function already existed, but its holder was called ṣāḥib es sūq.

Historically speaking, the origin of the hisba therefore goes back rather to the beginning of the Abbasid period, i.e., around the end of the eighth century, and consists first and foremost of an Islamization of the existing Byzantine institutions. The institution of the Byzantine Empire regulating markets and other commercial exchanges, including the verification of weights and measures, as well as the control of religious affairs, was then called agoranomos (from the Greek "public" and "rule"), and its members were called logists. The Jews translated these terms into bal-a-suk and hasban: the latter is perhaps the probable origin of the Arabic word hisba.

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The Hisba was therefore originally concerned mainly with economic and commercial matters, and only later did it focuse on religious or moral questions. The hisba managed mosques and was responsible for good religious morals, including those of the dhimmis, whether Christian or Jewish, who were required to bear distinctive marks.

The immense and ultra dangerous difference between Islam and other religions, and which changes everything, is that Islam affects many more aspects of private or personal life (food hygiene adoptions marriages inheritance jobs finance, etc.) than other religions (except for ultra-orthodox Judaism of the haredim which is very similar to it because of the arrival of Muhammad in Yathrib in 622 ).

It is in a way the most accomplished of the totalitarian systems.

In terms of the number of victims, however, points of comparison should perhaps be sought rather with the Gestapo [we are not speaking here of the Shoah which, from the Shoah by bullets of the Einsatzgruppen to the gas chambers, caused between 5 million (Raoul Hilberg) and 6 million (symbolic figure) dead, and, moreover, died in atrocious conditions]: the unfortunate ones did indeed experience hell on earth] because contrary to popular belief, the Gestapo was not an omnipresent and omnipotent police force (Chris. McNab, The SS: 1923-1945, Amber Books Ltd. 209 (page 163).

The popular picture (sic) of the Gestapo with its spies everywhere terrorizing German society has been rejected by many historians as a myth invented after the war as a cover for German society's widespread complicity at that time.

Detlev Peukert, Robert Gellately, Reinhard Mann, Inge Marssolek, René Otto, Klaus-Michael Mallamann and Paul Gerhard, which by focusing on what the local offices were doing has shown the Gestapo's almost total dependence on denunciations from ordinary Germans, and very much discredited the older "Big Brother" picture.

Of the 84 cases in Würzburg of Rassenschande ("race defilement"—sexual relations with non-Aryans), 45 (54%) were started in response to denunciations by ordinary people, two (2%) by information provided by other branches of the government, 20 (24%) via information gained during interrogations of people relating to other matters, four (5%) from information from (Nazi) NSDAP organizations, two (2%) during "political evaluations" and 11 (13%) have no source listed while none were started by Gestapo's own "observations."

Eric Johnson (Nazi Terror: The Gestapo, Jews, and Ordinary Germans. New York:199) remarks, "The Nazi terror was selective terror," with its focus upon political opponents, ideological dissenters (clergy and religious organizations), career criminals, the Sinti and Roma population, handicapped persons, homosexuals and above all, upon the Jews.

This is also supported by historian Richard Evans who states that, "Violence and intimidation rarely touched the lives of most ordinary Germans. Denunciation was the exception, not the rule.

But the involvement of ordinary Germans in denunciations also needs to be put into perspective so as not to exonerate the Gestapo. As Evans makes clear, "...it was not the ordinary German people who engaged in surveillance, it was the Gestapo; nothing happened until the Gestapo received a denunciation, and it was the Gestapo's active pursuit of deviance and dissent that was the only thing that gave denunciations meaning."

The Gestapo's effectiveness remained in the ability to "project" omnipotence...they co-opted the assistance of the German population by using denunciations to their advantage; proving in the end a powerful, ruthless and effective organ of terror under the Nazi regime that was seemingly everywhere.

Lastly, the Gestapo's effectiveness, while aided by denunciations and the watchful eye of ordinary Germans, was more the result of the co-ordination and co-operation amid the various police organs within Germany, the assistance of the SS, and the support provided by the various Nazi Party organizations; all of them together forming an organized persecution network, of the enemies, or alleged enemies, of the regime.

Compare this with the number of victims of the Medieval Inquisition executed by the secular power, which at the time knew what it had to do in case of condemnation by the Church. According to the figures of the sentences of Bernard Gui, the inquisitor in Toulouse for 15 years, from 1308 to 1323, out of 633 sentences, only 40 people were handed over to the secular arm, therefore to be burned at the stake (the Inquisition, which theoretically could not execute the death penalty, sends the sentenced man to secular justice). From the end of the 13th century, the burning at the stake was more and more exceptional; it was also a sign of the failure of the

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Church, unable to bring back lost souls.

As far as the number of victims is concerned, the comparison between Hisba and the Inquisition is difficult for two reasons.

The first reason is that there were four different Inquisitions.

-The medieval Inquisition introduced before the ecclesiastical courts by Pope Gregory IX in 1231.

-The Spanish Inquisition, which was under the Spanish crown, founded in 1478 and suppressed in 1834, and the Portuguese Inquisition, which also operated in the colonies of these countries;

-The Roman Inquisition (Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition), founded in 1542, replaced by the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office in 1908.

The second reason is that in the collective imagination the Inquisition caused millions of dead, what is not the case of the Hisba.

We have also been reproached for comparing the Hisba, or Islamic morality police, to the GPU and the Soviet gulags.

It is important in this respect to distinguish between two different things, the number of victims and the reasons for their imprisonment or death.

According to Alexander Zinoviev, many people were sent to the Gulag for what could be described as anecdotal, absurd and uninteresting facts (having put a jacket on a bust of Lenin because there was no coat hanger in the room, or having wrapped fish in a newspaper representing Stalin), or even without a reasoned accusation, simply because the local branches of the Cheka-GPU-NKVD had an "arrest plan" to keep.

Number of victims from 1917 to 1991, 18 million zek (detainees), 3 million dead.

20 December 1917 creation of the Cheka, which in 1922 became the GPU (GPU not Gestapo).

Raymond Duguet in 1927 diffused the first testimonies outside Russia in his work devoted to the Solovki Islands. The work was paid in food: 800 g of bread and 80 g of meat for the strongest elements; 400 g of bread and 40 g of meat for the disabled. Execution by a bullet in the neck.

The mortality rate in the Kolyma from 1937 to 1938 10% of the zeks.

Important differences with the Hisba on the other hand.

The Hisba does not aim like the gulag to have a free workforce in number, almost reduced to the state of slaves.

The Hisba does not aim to keep opponents away, but to punish behavior deemed deviant or heretical (a common point with the Inquisition).

Thus there were no huge camps for those condemned to long or heavy, often fatal, sentences (forced labor).

Prison is only a temporary stay before the sentences are executed.

The sentences applied are those of sharia law.

In Syria and Iraq under Daesh, for example, lashes for wearing colored shoes, or execution by crucifixion for drug use. N.B. In Nigeria the hisbas were particularly active in the city of Kano. They are partly responsible for the inter-religious violence that caused 10,000 deads between 1999 and 2004.

The contemporary consensus in the Muslim community is that hisba, as a principle, is a collective duty (farḍ al-kifāya), which is carried out by delegation to competent authorities.

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FORTY THIRD RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

There was actually a double Inquisition (Hisba from 629 ? until today, Mihna from 833 to 847 or more ?)

The Hisba was a police force of morals intended to order good or forbid evil according to Islam, i.e., to punish any violation of Muslim morals, essentially in the field of trade at the beginning, then morals later; the Mihna was a period of this institution which had its powers extended to the fight with certain heresies.

MUSLIM INQUISITION OR MIHNA.

The seizure of power by the Abbassids in 750 changed the basis of caliphate authority. Apparently, nothing changed fundamentally in the "imperial ideology" of the caliphs, as it had been built by the Umayyads. The legislative and ordering office came down still and just as legitimately to the caliph in the name of his intimate knowledge of the true divine purpose. But another source of power began to emerge: the tradition concretized by hundreds of thousands of anecdotes (hadiths) relating the words as well as the deeds and actions of Muhammad, even his silences or his non-reactions. And therefore the specialists in hadiths.

It is from the year 720 that we date the first occurrences of elements of the prophetic tradition used by believers. From then on, the intrusion of this "new tradition" became massive and the authoritative stories began to freeze, until taking the form that we knew then, and until today.

As for the propagation of these stories, it was done soon in mode of the "chain of transmission" (silsila). Such hadith owed its validity to the solidity of the chain of its transmitters until the moment of its fixation as a unit in the corpus of tradition. But we must take for granted that the links common to many chains of transmission of hadiths were the true inventors of these prescribing narratives. *

Faced with the establishment of what would soon be a group with a definite social status, that of the ulama, with the shaping of a language that became common to them, and after an Umayyad century marked by the affirmation of the Caliphate authority, the Abbassids began by showing the tranquility of those to whom the blood - they were kin as Muhammad - granted legitimacy, somehow, natural. Legitimacy of the kindred that seemed to take precedence over the office legitimacy (of Caliph, Commander of the believers, initiator of the divine order among the believers). But that was perhaps only an appearance.

In fact, the Abbasid caliphs, the governors and emirs, willingly surrounded themselves with legal

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scholars and theologians, but the relationship of complicity they had with them did not mean, far from it, that there was renunciation to the pre-eminence of the caliphate. This is because the natural legitimacy (of the blood) could very well accommodate itself to the legitimacy of the people of knowledge, and vice versa: their relationship was indirect, the nature of some did not necessarily face of others. It faced it only if, ostensibly, the discourse of the legitimacy of nature fueled the claim of the office prerogatives.

This happened with the Mihna, the first true great Inquisition of the "modern" world.

The main actors were the caliph al-Ma'mun (who ruled from 813 to 833) and the hadith collector Ahmad ibn Hanbal (780-855) but the conflict had deeper roots.

Al-Mahdi (746-785).

Muhammad al-Mahdi bin Abd God al-Mansur or Al-Mahdi, the third Abbasid caliph, was born in 746. He succeeded his father Al-Mansur as caliph in 775. He died on August 4, 785.

He was proclaimed caliph while his father al-Mansur was still on his deathbed (775). But his chosen successor should have been his uncle Isa. This uncle had been ousted by al-Mansur for the benefit of Al-Mahdi. Al-Mahdi began by proposing large sums of money so that he renounced his right of succession. After various maneuvers Al-Mahdi got what he desired: Isa renounced his right of succession.

Al-Mahdi continued the establishment of the Abbasid administration by creating new ministries (diwan): that of war, justice and finance. The judges (qadi) were paid and some laws against the non-Arabs were abolished.

The caliph Al-Mansur (754-775) had changed the Hisba or surveillance of the markets to widen it and at the beginning of the reign of Caliph Al-Mahdi (775-785) appeared the first muhtasib whose mission was to track down the apostates and other heretics.

But his caliphate was also that of the development of Muslim civilization in Baghdad through an opening towards ancient wisdom and the beginning of the golden age of traditional Islamic civilization. Al-Mahdi was indeed behind the great undertaking of translation of the Greek classics into Arabic via Syriac.

It was besides for the translation of Aristotle's Topics that al-Mahdi got closer Timothy, the Catholicos of the Nestorian Church.

The Barmecides who had supplied viziers since the reign of Abu al-Abbas As-Saffah, ruled these new ministries. Al-Mahdi built roads, established a postal system and waged war against the Byzantines. The use of paper, instead of parchment and or papyrus, became widespread. Whole streets of Baghdad were engaged in the paper and book trade.

As we have seen previously, Al-Mahdi kept a rather rigorous religious policy, he pursued the dualists. The Zoroastrian converts could be accused of dualism, especially among the Persians, but also the Sufis. Al-Mahdi declared that the caliph was not only a sovereign, but that it was his duty to define religious orthodoxy in order to maintain the cohesion of the community of believers (Ummah). What will have serious consequences under the reign of Al-Ma'mun.

Al-Ma'mun (786-833). Become caliph in 813.

It is to learn to distinguish a right word from a human nonsense that the caliph Al-Ma'mun will give a decisive impulse to the house of wisdom. It had been founded by his father Harun ar-Rashid, but as a library then for the exclusive use of the prince. Under Al-Ma'mun, this library will be opened to the learned elite.

The reign of Al-Ma'mun was a great success on the cultural level. He was particularly interested in the work of scholars, especially those who knew Greek. He had assembled in Baghdad scholars of all beliefs, whom he treated magnificently and with the most complete tolerance. He brought manuscripts from Byzantium. He set as a condition of peace with the Byzantine Empire the delivery of a copy of Claudius Ptolemy’s Almagest.

Passionate about astronomy buff, he created in 829, in the highest district of Baghdad, near the Shamasiya Gate, the first permanent observatory in the world, the Observatory of Baghdad, making its astronomers, who had translated the Treatise of Astronomy by the Greek Hipparchus, as well as his catalog of stars, able to methodically monitor the planetary motion. He conducted two astronomical experiments intended to determine the distance of a degree of earth’s latitude. Y gratitude for these works, a lunar crater bears his name: Almanon.

From his stay in Central Asia, he had brought the three sons of Musa ben Shakir, a former brigand, now an astronomer and companion of the future caliph. On the death of their father, he gave the three brothers of whom he was become the guardian, Muhammad, Ahmad and Hasan, a solid training in applied sciences and gave them a considerable fortune to found in 832 and head in Baghdad the House of wisdom: Bayt al-Ḥikma.

The great mathematician Abu Ja`far Muhammad bin Musa al-Khawarizmi spent most of his life in

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Baghdad, under the patronage of Caliph Al-Ma'mun. He translated into Arabic, with his colleagues, the Greek Byzantine manuscripts gathered in the library founded by the caliph in the House of Wisdom, and studied from them geometry, algebra and astronomy .

A famous story tells how al-Ma’mun once saw Aristotle in a dream. Several versions of the story exist.

Al-Ma’mun to Aristotle: What is good?

Aristotle: That which is in the mind.

Al-Ma’mun: What more is good?

Aristotle: That which is in the law.

Al-Ma’mun: What more?

Aristotle: The will of the people.

Al-Ma’mun: And what more?

Aristotle: There is no more.

The reason for the religious activism of Caliph al-Ma'mun was often questioned. The simplest is to think that he personally was quite rationalistic himself. The man was learned, versed in the questions of the foundation of law; his confidant was the mu'tazilite Ahmad ibn Abi Du'ad, and it is known that Mu'tazilism, in its effort of theological conceptualization, of the doctrinal construction of absolute monotheism, affirmed the created character of the Quran. Was Al-Ma'mun under mu'tazilite influence? Did he have a more personal view of what truth was about belief? The second of his motives may have been, of course, to increase his grip on the clergy as well as on religious affairs (as did as for him the Roman emperor Constantine with Christianity a few centuries earlier).

What is certain is that in 828 al-Ma'mun established an inquisitorial court charged with the control of religious orthodoxy: the Mihna. This inquisition was essentially directed against the fuqaha (theologians) and the muhaddithun (collectors of hadiths).

At the beginning of the year 833, al-Ma'mun was at Raqqa on the Euphrates, in Syria. He decided to write to Ishaq ibn Ibrahim, his representative in Baghdad, and to question the city's qadis on the question of the creation, or not, of the Quran.

In substance the letter said this: the religion of God must, in law, be accomplished in every respect, and true belief must triumph; particularly, the belief that the Quran is created, because it is said in the Text itself, "Lo! We have appointed it a Lecture, in Arabic that haply you may understand” (43:3); the common people (al-amma ) deceive the believers when they claim that the Quran is pre-eternal (qadim awwal), or uncreated, these common people believe to make the connection with sunnah and thus call themselves the men of the true religion, of the truth of the law, whereas they are only unbelievers, speaking the "language of the devil" ...

Another letter from al-Ma'mun arrived ordering him to send seven eminent traditionist. What was done. The traditionalists, having accepted to profess the creation of the Quran, were allowed to return home.

Similar letters were sent to Egypt, to Syria.

In Baghdad, where new traditionalists and legal scholars were questioned - sometimes roughly, hence the name given to the event, mihna, “ordeal” - there was some resistance: two men, Ahmad ibn Hanbal and Muhammad ibn Nuh, professed the uncreation of the Quran.

Chained, they were sent to Tarsus, where was now al-Ma'mun, returning from a war campaign against Byzantium. But the news of the death of the caliph came: they were sent back to Baghdad. Muhammad ibn Nuh died on the way; when he was arrived in Baghdad, Ahmad ibn Hanbal was thrown into prison.

Ahmad ibn Hanbal represented what could be called the accomplished function of traditionism. A rigorous traditionism, a literalism of all times, flawless, which claimed to be totalizing, exhausting, in a way, the totality of what was its object: the knowledge of the foundations of the order given to this world.

The Caliph al-Ma'mun was the natural opposite of Ibn Hanbal. Let us return for a moment to the first letter he wrote to Ishaq ibn Ibrahim. The way to make progress his ideas about the nature of the Quran is significant. We have seen that he was violently attacking traditionists, those who, calling themselves the transmitters of the sunnah, proclaimed to be the models of the true believers and claimed the prerogatives of the capacity to distinguish between the true and the false, between the right and the wrong. But the way he introduced his virulent attacks is significant of the authority he thought he had to precisely recognize the truth from the false, the right from the wrong ..... The rest of the letter is introduced by a definitive formula: "The commander of the believers knows that ...". With haughtiness, al-Ma'mun affirmed, ultimately, the reason for the caliphate regarding the salvation of true believers.

The punishments imposed by the Mihna became more and more difficult to bear for the ulama, who united to oppose them.

Al-Ma'mun's brother, al Mu`tasim (833-842), succeeded him.

The new caliph, who was yet ready to put an end to this inquisition, was convinced by the Mu'tazilite

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qadi, Ahmad ibn Abi Du'ad, who argued how dangerous it would be for the State's authority to appear abdicate an officially stated position.

Ibn Hanbal was summoned to appear before the caliph. He was severely scourged, and was allowed to return to his home after an imprisonment that lasted a total of two and a half years.

Had he finally yielded and declared that the Quran was created, as many historians have believed?

Had he, on the contrary, been released under pressure from the Baghdad crowd who supported him? The real reason does not matter here.

What is certain is that during the rest of the reign of al Mou'tacim, Ibn Hanbal led a secluded life, while continuing to dispense lessons in accordance with the hadith tradition.

The Mihna lasted still, but more and more softly. Al-Wathiq (842-847), son of al-Mu`tasim, had other concerns, such as the secession movement of Ahmad ibn al-Aghlab in Ifriqiyya (now Tunisia). And al-Mutawakkil, brother of al-Wathiq, put an end to the Mihna as soon as he came to power in 848.

Shortly after, the last imprisoned lettered men were released, the "martyrs" cleared. The doctrine of the uncreation of the Quran was definitively established in the empire. The religious power of the caliphs thus came out of this crisis weakened and that in favor of that of the ulema. The tradition of the hadiths came to power and emerged as a dominant ideology.

Scholars, theologians, and historiographers, who were mostly in the ranks of the opposition, even soon denied any active religious authority to the caliphs, even depriving them of the legitimacy of the title of Imam.

The important thing for us is to note that it is thanks to this crisis that the great legal schools of Islam (madhhab) have really asserted themselves, and that Ibn Hanbal distinguished himself particularly during this period for his opposition to mu’tazilism. Mu'tazilism was therefore identified not with the rationalism he taught, but with the terror it practiced once in power. And Ibn Hanbal who personified the resistance to this terror became the symbol of orthodoxy.

* The collections of hadiths have almost all been compiled at least 150 years after the death of Muhammad, in order to safeguard and catalog the acts of this one. Many of the works written by the companions of Muhammad have been lost in later works, some of which appear in the corpus of these in their entirety. The al-Muwatta of Imam Malik (715-795) and the al-Musnad of Ahmed ben Hanbal (780-855) are among the oldest works that have survived in full.

** "Just as death camps and genocides are an eternal stain that will forever defile the socialist national ideal, the Mihna is an eternal stain on the honor of mu’tazilism that makes it impossible to subscribe to it despite all the positive qualities developed otherwise by this rationalist or free thinker current "(Peter DeLaCrau).

The Mutbaq was the main prison in Baghdad for more than a century. The caliphs al-Rashid and al-Ma'mun sent in it political prisoners like the preacher Muhammad b. al-Layt or still Alid rebels.

Mentioned as early as 762-63 by al-Tabari, the very year of the founding of Baghdad, it was established inside the "Round City" of al-Mansur. Le Strange locates it at the end of the southern district, between the gates of Basra and Kufa. According to al-Ya`qubi, this prison stood in a street to which it gave its name (sikkat al-Mutbaq, "Mutbaq Street").

The Mutbaq does not appear as a mere dungeon, but as a jail housing, behind its high walls, a series of wells where the prisoners were descended at the end of a rope. They lived in absolute darkness and lost all sense of time.

This prison may have, over the years, received various kinds of criminals. But at least initially, it seemed intended for political prisoners involved in conspiracies or revolts.

Incarceration was thus substituted for a death sentence, when the guilt was not established with certainty or if an execution would have been politically wrong. In fact, the convict was buried alive under extreme conditions of survival. The main description comes from al-Tabari.

Other accounts confirm this: according to al-Isfahani, some Alides incarcerated in the Mutbaq under al-Mansur could not distinguish day and night nor know the hours of prayer. Their only temporal landmark was provided by one of them - Ali b. al-Hasan b. al-Hasan, died in prison in 763 - who recited the Quran on a loop. This prison was therefore literally a dungeon, where the caliph was getting rid of those he wanted nevermore hear of. Its name was symbolic: derived from the stem b.q., implying the idea of "covering, closing," the Mutbaq resembled a "lid" closed forever on the detainee. A kind of London Tower , it was used to impress the masses and fueled the fear of power: when in 850-51 al-Mutawakkil had the tomb of Husayn razed in Karbala and forbade go there, a subordinate of the Head of the Police shouted around: "Anyone who will be found near his grave will be sent to the Mutbaq! The announcement was enough for the Shiites to flee and not return anytime soon. But if the dungeons of the Mutbaq were good at grabbing people’s attention , less severe forms of imprisonment seemed to be practiced in parallel: in 825-26, a mutiny broke out there, during which prisoners barricaded the main gate of the prison: visibly these did not rot at the bottom of a pit.

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The "zindiq prison" (habs al-zanadiqa) that al-Tabari mentions under al-Amin, reserved for people accused of crypto-Manichaeism like Abu Nuwas, was perhaps not a full prison, but a specific wing inside the Mutbaq.

FORTY FOURTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

FROM THE BORROW TO THE CONTROVERSY:

THE DIFFICULT DIALOGUE WITH OTHER RELIGIONS.

There still, let us point out once again, we will not speak here of the true Islam, which is yours, namely the Sufism of whirling dervishes, or the mutazilism, which are only love calm and voluptuousness, but of the false Islam which is based on the non-abrogated verses of the Quran and on the undreamed life of a certain Muhammad son of Amina (sira and hadith).

True Islam does not approve of Taliban actions, true Islam has nothing to do with lesser jihadists.But in the false Islam of all these false prophets, interfaith dialogue ranges from the refusal to discuss precisely, to pure and simple violence.

Islam is the most perfect totalitarian system since it deals with everything including the least details of our lives, and forbids discussing its principles or to leave it (death penalty or serious punishments for apostates).

Islam is perhaps the most sophisticated of totalitarian systems since its god (its idea of God) prohibits any critical (and peaceful) confrontation with other religious or non-religious systems.

Chapter 4verse 140: He has already revealed unto you in the Scripture that, when you hear the revelations of God rejected and derided (you) do not sit with them (who disbelieve and mock) until they engage in some other conversation. Lo! in that case (if you stayed) you would be like unto them. Lo! God will gather hypocrites and disbelievers, all together, into hell.”

And

Chapter 6 verse 68: " And when you see those who meddle with Our revelations, withdraw from them until they meddle with another topic. And if the devil cause thee to forget, do not sit, after the remembrance, with the congregation of wrongdoers.”

Verse 28, chapter 3. " Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference to believers. Whosoever does that has no connection with God unless (it be) that you but guard yourselves against them, taking (as it were) security.”

Verse 51 chapter 5. "O you who believe! Take not the Jews and the Christians for friends. They

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are friends one to another.”

Verse 35 chapter 47. " So do not falter and cry out for peace when you (will be) the uppermost, and God is with you, and He will not grudge (the reward of) your actions.”

That is why it is so important to allow debate and criticism of false Islam throughout the world. The intellectual debate, honest and without irenical concessions (from the useful idiots that Jean-Pierre Peroncel-Hugoz called in his time, 1983, Turks by profession) is essential to the disarmament of religions and therefore to the establishment of peace in the world.

As we have seen, the early visions of the young Muhammad (40 years old) were rooted in the Meccan pagan cultural fertile ground of his time.

Quran 53: 1-18.

“By the Star when it sets, your comrade errs not, nor is deceived; Nor does he speak of (his own) desire. It is nothing save an inspiration that is inspired, which one of mighty powers has taught him, One vigorous and he grew clear to view when he was on the uppermost horizon. Then he drew nigh and came down till he was (distant) two bows' length or even nearer, and He revealed unto His slave that which He revealed. The heart did not lie (in seeing) what it saw. Will you then dispute with him concerning what he sees ?

And verily He saw him yet another time by the lote tree of the utmost boundary, nigh unto which is the Garden of Abode. When that which shrouds did enshroud the lote tree,

The eye did not turn aside nor yet was overbold.

Verily he saw one of the greater revelations of his Lord.

Have you thought upon Al-Lat and Al-'Uzza

And Manat, the third, the other ?

Quran 81, 15-23.

“ Oh, but I call to witness the planets [...] your comrade is not mad.

Surely he beheld Him on the clear horizon and he is not avid of the Unseen. Nor is this the utterance of a devil worthy to be stoned. Whither then go you ? This is nothing else than a reminder unto creation, unto whomsoever of you will to walk straight. And you will not, unless (it be) that God will, the Lord of Creation.”

Under the influence of his wife Khadija who was more or less Christian (she had a cousin Waraka Ibn Nawfal who was unquestionably Christian, maybe Nestorian, at least a Hanif) Muhammad and his entourage borrowed little by little but more massively from Judeo-Christian literature then circulating in Arabia or on its borders (Iraq Syria Jordan).

A hadith from Aisha gives these details.

“ Khadija then accompanied him to her cousin Waraqa bin Naufal bin Asad bin Abdul Uzza, who, during the pre-Islamic period became a Christian (Nazara) and used to write the writing with Hebrew letters. He would write from the Gospel in Hebrew as much as God wished him to write. He was an old man and had lost his eyesight. Khadija said to Waraqa, "Listen to the story of your nephew, O my cousin!" Waraqa asked, "O my nephew! What have you seen?" God's Apostle described whatever he had seen. Waraqa said, "This was the same one who keeps the secrets whom God had sent to Moses (angel Gabriel). I wish I were young and could live up to the time when your people would turn you out." God's Apostle asked, "Will they drive me out?" Waraqa replied in the affirmative and said, "Anyone (man) who came with something similar to what you have brought was treated with hostility and if I should remain alive till the day when you will be turned out then I would support you strongly." But after a few days, Waraqa died and the Divine Inspiration was also paused for a while.”

The gospel in question, since the word is in the singular, can only be that of the Judeo-Christians. This is confirmed by the previous sentence: Waraqa had become a Nazara.

Muslim, compiler of one of the six main collections, very famous, but less than that of Al Bukhari, quotes the same hadith, with, however, a significant difference: " he used to write books in Arabic and, therefore, wrote Injil (Gospel) in Arabic as God willed that he should write” (book 1 hadith 301).

If the same Gospel is in one case in Hebrew, in the other in Arabic, one can deduce that Waraqa translated into Arabic the Gospel in Hebrew of the Judeo-Christians.

One of the unexpected consequences of the dogma of the uncreation of the Quran lies in the "post-Biblical" Islamic legitimacy it gives to the Bible. Indeed, over the course of its text, the Quran takes over sometimes, but with very strong changes, a few selected episodes of the Bible. The untouchable sacredness of the Quran makes these biblical contributions THE NEW BIBLE

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that Muslims cannot and are forbidden to compare with the Bible itself.

The only sure and authorized Bible source becomes ... the Quran and nothing but the Quran. Every literate Muslim thinks oneself to be a specialist in the Bible and willingly agrees to dialogue with a Christian about the Bible, on the sole condition that it is spoken of on the basis of the Quranic revelations.

The Bible as known to Christians is swept away in three sentences by the pious Muslims "these texts are unreliable ... Quran alone tells THE truth about the Bible.”

To summarize, it is not permissible for a Muslim scholar to consider the Bible of Jews or Christians, or even to study it.

The "good" text that is authentic is a subset of the Quran and the Bible can only be studied through what Muhammad has revealed of it to Mankind. This is this text that is authentic.

Traditional view of the churches.

One of the peculiarities of the Quran is that it appropriates and Islamizes a whole series of biblical characters: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Noah, David, Solomon, Job, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Zechariah, John the Baptist, Jesus, Elijah,Ishmael, Elisha, Jonah, and Lot are mentioned there (see, for example, Sura 6, verses 83-86), but as Muslims. Sura 3, 67, for its part, says explicitly: " Abraham was not a Jew, nor yet a Christian but he was an upright man who had surrendered (to God) = Muslim.” The text plays on the double meaning of the word muslim, which means "subjected " and also "Muslim." This peculiarity of the Arabic language allows the Quran to Islamize all the great figures of the Bible and to effect a real reversal of the traditional chronology of religions. The Quran "welcomes" Jesus, Moses and the Hebrew prophets in a special way: it welcomes them, after having made them Muslims.

Islam "swallows" or encompasses all that is previous to it and changes a posteriori a whole series of biblical characters into Muslims. For a familiar of the Bible, the biblical figures quoted in the Quran seem both identifiable and distorted. Abraham is not Ibrahim, nor Moses, Musa. When Muhammad linked the name of Allah to the myths of Judaism and Christianity, it was a way for Islam to claim them as its own. In light of the events that followed, the claim that Islam is the original religion and all previous prophets already Muslims can be seen as an attempt to appropriate the sacredness or authority of other religions. The effect is to deprive real Christianity and Judaism of their authenticity.

Another characteristic trait of the Quran is that while repeating many biblical stories (which it sometimes changes or simplifies),it claims that Jews and Christians falsified their texts. As they refused to recognize the prophethood of Muhammad, they are accused of being unfaithful to what God had given them and of having falsified the "message" that God had already made "descend" for them. This accusation of falsification against the "people of the book" is repeated many times in the Quran (chapters 2: 59; 2: 75; 2: 79; 3: 70-71; 4: 46; 5: 13; 5: 41). The falsification (tahrif) of the Scriptures is considered by Islam to be an extremely serious form of "corruption" or "forfeiture" (fasad), which can be punished by the death penalty. The Quran therefore regards the two present Testaments, the Old and the New one, as false and falsified; it claims to restore the authentic texts, the texts as they existed before their falsification by Jews and Christians.

Another Jesus.

Our Christian friends are sometimes impressed by Jesus's place in the Quran. But it is not the one to whom they gave their faith. The Jesus of the Quran repeats what the previous prophets, Adam, Abraham, Lot, etc., had announced. Indeed, all prophets have the same knowledge and proclaim the same message, that is Islam. All are Muslim. Jesus is sent to preach the oneness of God. He repeats that he is not an "associator." "Do not say three." He is not the son of God, but a mere creature.

The Jesus of the Quran does not have much to do with that of the Christians. His message was pure Islam, submission to God (Sura 3: 84); he received his revelation of Islam in the form of a book, the Injil or "Gospel" (Sura 5: 46); his mother, Maryam, was the sister of Aaron and Moses (sura 19:28); he announced the coming of Muhammad (Sura 61: 6); he has not been killed or crucified, and those who claim otherwise are lying (Sura 4:157); On the day of the resurrection, Issa-Jesus himself will testify against the Jews and Christians who believe in his death (Sura 4: 159).

As it is inconceivable for Islam that an envoy of God be defeated, Jesus did not die on the cross. A double has been substituted for him. This Christology, from the Catholic Orthodox or Reformist Christian point of view, presents mixed marks of Nestorianism and Docetism. The Jesus of the

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Quran is a Muslim who calls his own followers to reject their idolatry and accuses Christians of manipulating the scriptures.

It is therefore wrong to say that the Issa (Jesus) of the Quran is one with the Jesus of the Gospels. This Jesus, reduced in the Quran to a purely human prophet, can only shock a true (Trinitarian that is to say Catholic Orthodox or Reformist) Christian, since this status is in complete disharmony with what his faith teaches him.

In the Quran, Jesus is the only prophet who is presented as not agreeing with the doctrines of his community. Sura 5, in verse 116, is a real slap for Christians, whose beliefs are rejected without even being expressed correctly: When God said: O Jesus, son of Mary! Did you say unto mankind: Take me and my mother for two gods beside God ? he said: Be glorified! It was not mine to utter that to which I had no right.”

In other words, the Jesus-Isa of the Quran rejects his followers, the Christians, by accusing them of having distorted the Scriptures. He intends to separate from the perverted beliefs of his supporters! In fact, what is a shame is that in the Quran, Jesus accuses his followers - the Christians - of giving him words that he would never have uttered. One must be dreaming! The Quran refuses a crucified Christ, as it refuses a resurrected Christ: for it Jesus is only a prophet, neither more nor less honored than the others. The Jesus of the Gospels is the founding principle on which Christianity has developed. By Islamizing him and making him a Muslim prophet who allegedly preached the Quran, Islam destroys Christianity and appropriates its history. He does the same regarding Judaism.

False accusation.

In the Quran, Christians are called "associators." For Islam indeed, Christianity is not a true monolatry because of the Trinity, which would consist in "associating" God, Jesus and ... Mary. Needless to say, that Christianity never envisaged the Trinity in this way, and this is a silly distortion of one of its major dogmas. Whatever it be, the "associators" are guilty of an unforgivable, the only one that is unpardonable. Sura 4: 116: " Lo! God does not pardon that partners should be ascribed unto Him. He pardons all save that to whom He will.” Christians are mushrikuns, that is, individuals guilty of shirk ("associationism").

To the accusation of falsification of the Scriptures (tahrif), the Quran adds therefore that, even more serious in the eyes of Islam, of "the association with God of one or more other entities" (shirk). The doctrine of the Trinity is disbelief, polytheism, and a painful lot awaits those who believe in it (Sura 5: 73). The "associators" are (with the Jews) " The most vehement of mankind in hostility to those who believe " (Sura 5: 82). This corruption does not concern what men have done with the Scriptures given by God, but what they say about God himself. In the order of corruption, the tahrif is high, but with the shirk, we have to do with the inexpiable one: this fault is the most serious that can be imagined according to the Quran.

The true Bible is not known from the Quran. It only mentions the Torah (the first 5 books of the Bible) and the Gospel (in the singular). For Muslims, Truth being the Quran revealed by God, differences can only be attributed to the changes brought by Jews and Christians to these texts of the Torah and of the Gospel. The Quran is rid, because of its divine origin, of all the errors that Jews and Christians could introduce.

All the Books announcing the single God to men have the same content. Thus, the Torah given to Moses and the book of the Gospel given to Jesus contain the same message that was later delivered by God to Muhammad in the Quran. The uncreated and eternal Word of God cannot change. It is substantially the same revelation that is repeated. If earlier scriptures differ from the Quran, they are considered to have been changed by those who received or transmitted them.

In the Quran, some biblical characters (Adam, Abraham, Moses, ... Jesus) are considered authentic prophets previous to Islam. They are described according to the image of Muhammad and live in an environment of pagans practicing polytheistic cults as in Mecca or resemble the Jews of Medina who rejected the "Quranic Revelation." It is the presentation of a static world where history takes on a repetitive character.

Commentators of the Quran presented the Torah as the oldest text of monotheism. Its divine origin is authentic, but it has been corrupted by the introduction of Egyptian and Phoenician pagan legends which, however, have not changed the essence of its message which is faith in the single God in conformity with the Quranic revelation. Unfortunately, say these commentators, human contributions foreign to the initial divine Revelation have changed it: a too human face given to God who creates man in his image and gives him control over the earth and living

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beings, systematic bias in favor of the Hebrews even when they behave as ungrateful and capricious children, destroying by God of their enemies, the role of leader of the army that they make played by God sheltered under a tent erected in the middle of the camp and the role steward who is concerned about their provisioning in the desert (Manna).

As for the Gospels, in the usual way, Muslims think that the "prophet" Muhammad is announced in the Gospel, citing the word "Paraclete" IN the Gospel of John which would designate him. According to the Muslims, the original gospel (Injil) revealed by God would be an announcement of the Quranic message intended for the whole of mankind arrived at the age of spiritual maturity.

Doctors of the Muslim faith maintain (editor's note: rightly besides) that the Gospels were written around the end of the first century by scribes of different times and backgrounds who had not been direct witnesses of the life of Jesus. These scribes were supporters of the theses of Trinity, divinity of Jesus, Incarnation and original sin.

Some of them reproach the Apostle Paul for being the main falsifier of the Gospel as it was given to Jesus and the faith in the One God as received by Abraham.

Other Muslim commentators believe that the recognition of the four gospels by the various churches would be late and later than the Council of Nicaea (4th century) and the Council of Chalcedon (5th century) where was defined the official doctrine of the Church concerning the divine nature of Christ.

The most astonishing proclamation of this "new" religion is undoubtedly that which appears in the middle of the Dome of the Rock improperly called Mosque of Umar, in Jerusalem, on the octagonal arcade, but inside the dome, and reading from left to right (the other is uninteresting).

This inscription dated 692-4 is the first major one that is clearly and apparently Muslim. This is the first document from this new movement. The text seems very anti-Christian, in the sense that we usually understand it. It rebels against the Trinity, criticizes the idea that Christ has a divine nature, etc.

There may be only one precise allusion to Muhammad (we say well may be) and only one mention of the word Islam (but there too may be, we will return to it).

On the other hand, Jesus is mentioned 3 times and Mary twice (the expression Jesus son of Mary is indeed repeated twice).

And not to be denigrated. Only his divinity is denied, but his status as a prophet, word of God, his birth through the working of the Holy Spirit, as well as his resurrection from the dead, are recognized there.

The other notable inscription is on the same octagonal arcade but on the outer side and reads from the right to the left. Muhammad (well maybe as we have said before) is mentioned 5 times (as a prophet) and there this time no more allusion to Jesus.

The said inscription ends, however, by the mention of the prince who built the monument, namely Abd al Malik (later replaced by the name of Al-Mamoun).

The reason for our reservations now.

The name of Muhammad. The problem is that in Arabic it is initially a common noun (Muhammadun), meaning something like "the one who is expected, desired, coveted."

N.B. The Arabic word muhammadun appears

In verse 144 of chapter 3.

In verse 40 of chapter 33.

In verse 2 of chapter 47.

And finally in verse 29 of chapter 48.

In verse 144 of Chapter 3, for example, it is associated with a kind of oracle mediator between God and his people. In verse 40 of chapter 33, may very well have the general meaning of "prophet or messiah." Verse 2 of chapter 47, and verse 29 of chapter 48 same thing.

A kind of Messiah, therefore. But this noun (Muhammad) actually appears so little (4 times?) In the Quran, much less than that of Jesus, that some have been even as far as to think that his true original designation was probably Amin (since his mother was called Amina). And historically speaking it is indeed attested that the founder of this religion was often described as such: Amin (which means "the faithful” in Arabic).

Islam is a technical term that means nothing but submission. Implied to God.

In short we simply have the irresistible impression that it is a text written by Christians but not recognizing the divinity of Jesus. Recognizing that he was a great prophet, that he was the expected Messiah, but not God himself. And God knows that Christians of this obedience there

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were at the time in this region of the world.

Let's move on to another document still about Islam but very different. This is therefore a very different approach.

In the name of God, the Merciful the Compassionate. There is no god but God. He has no associate. Unto Him belong sovereignty and praise. He quickens and He gives death and He has Power over all things. Muhammadun is the Servant of God and His Apostle. God and His angels shower blessings on the Prophet. O you who believe! Ask blessings on him and salvation on him, peace be on him, and may God have mercy. O People of the Book! Do not exaggerate in your religion, nor utter anything concerning God save the truth. The Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, was only an apostle of God, His Word which He conveyed unto Mary, a spirit from Him. So believe in God and His apostles, and do not say 'Three' - Cease! (it is) better for you! - God is only One God. Far be it removed from His transcendence that He should have a son. His is all that is in the heavens and all that is in the earth. And God is sufficient as Defender. The Messiah will never scorn to be a servant unto God, nor will the nearest angels. Whosoever scorns His service and is molded with hubris, all such will He assemble unto Him. Oh God, bless your Messenger and Your servant Jesus son of Mary. Peace be on him the day he was born, and the day he dies, and the day he shall be raised alive! Such was Jesus, son of Mary this is a statement of the truth concerning which they doubt. It befits not God that He should take unto Himself a son. Glory be to Him! When He wants a thing, He says unto it only: Be! and it is. God is my Lord and therefore your Lord. So serve Him. That is the right path. God (Himself) is witness that there is no God save Him. And the angels and the men of learning (too are witness). Maintaining His creation in justice, there is no God save Him, the Almighty, the All-knowing. True religion in the eyes of God is submission. Those who (formerly) received the Book differed only after that revelation came unto them, through breaches among themselves (of that submission). Whoso disbelieveth the revelations of God, God is swift at reckoning!

Muhammad’s personal drama is that he was not accepted as a prophet either by the pagan community in Mecca who knew only poets more or less possessed or inspired by a jinn or by the Jews of Medina or by the Judeo-Christians despite his efforts. The dialogue turned quickly to the dialogue of the deaf.

Hence the fact, capital for the history of East and West, that the notion of dialogue between religions is obviously unknown to Islamic theology. This would be to recognize that there may be in other religions, including pagan ones, a part of truth. DIFFERENT.

Or these truths already appear in the Quran, or they do not appear in the Quran, what is by definition impossible in Muslim theology.

Muhammad insisted throughout his life that the Quran he recited was only a reminder of an eternal and uncreated truth, consubstantial with God, a little like the word or Logos of Christians, the uncreated Quran. And that this eternal truth had an answer for everything. That everything was planned. That every question had its answer in the Quran. So how can one want to change an eternal and immutable truth without contradicting oneself?

Verse 85, chapter 3. " And who seeks as religion other than the Surrender (to God) it will not be accepted from him,

verse 110 chapter 3. “You are the best community that has been raised up for mankind.”

Verse 3 chapter 5. " This day have I perfected your religion for you.”

Verse 33 chapter 9 . " He it is Who has sent His messenger with the guidance and the Religion of Truth, that He may cause it to prevail over all religion.”

Verse 55, chapter 24. " God has promised such of you as believe and do good work that He will surely make them succeed (the present rulers) in the earth.”

Verse 9, chapter 61. "He it is Who has sent His messenger with the guidance and the religion of truth, that He may make it conqueror of all religion.”

" He hath already revealed unto you in the Scripture that, when you hear the revelations of God rejected and derided (you) do not sit with them (who disbelieve and mock) until they engage in some other conversation. Lo! in that case (if you stayed) you would be like unto them. Lo! Good will gather hypocrites and disbelievers, all together, into hell "(verse 140, chapter 4).

" When you see those who meddle with Our revelations, withdraw from them until they meddle with another topic. And if the devil cause thee to forget, do not sit, after the remembrance, with the congregation of wrongdoers "(verse 68, chapter 6).

And…

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“ Lo! the devils do inspire their minions to dispute with you. But if you obey them, you will be in truth idolaters"(verse 121 chapter 6).

Because Muhammad very quickly became a head of State and therefore that Islam quickly came to power in some parts of the world, Muslim theology has divided the Earth into three distinct geographical areas.

The main discrimination by the Muslim religion is the division of Mankind between Muslims and non-Muslims, what is sure is that ensues from that therefore a geographical break of the world between land of Islam (Dar al Islam ) and land to conquer: Dar al Harb. Verse 28, chapter 3. " Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference to believers. Whosoever does that has no connection with God unless (it be) that you but guard yourselves against them, taking (as it were) security.”

Verse 51 chapter 5. “O you who believe! Take not the Jews and the Christians for friends. They are friends one to another.”

They are therefore two irreducible, incompatible, universes, the one being destined to disappear before the other. There are verses of the Quran stipulating it plainly spelled.

Verse 41 chapter 13. " See they not how we aim to the land, reducing it of its outlying parts ?”

Verse 44 of chapter 21 same thing.

Let's be honest and recognize that there is a third type of land called Lands with which a peace treaty was signed (Dar al Ahd) or Land of Truce: Dar al Sulh. The problem is that there is no very precise definition of these notions or central authority to enforce them since the Ummah or community of believers ignore such institutions, the caliphate having been abolished in 1924.

Are generally considered as a Land of peace or truce (Dar al-Ahd or Dar al Sulh) countries that grant to Muslims the rights that are denied to non-Muslims in lands of Islam (Dar al Islam). That is to say the right to freely practice their religion and to proselytize, in exchange for the renunciation by them to any violence. By free practice of religion one must understand, of course, the application of sharia and Islamic courts to do this within the Muslim community.

N.B. In any case doctors of Islam consider that these are transitional phases before complete conversion of the non-Muslim population of the concerned country.

And others, relying on the example of the truce concluded by Muhammad with the inhabitants of his hometown (Mecca) consider that no truce can last more than ten years.

The relations between Islam and other religions can only be confrontational, at best in a state of temporary truce (the very example of the truce signed by Muhammad with his Meccan fellow countrymen showing that no truce could last more than ten years). The ultimate goal is that the whole Mankind , that the whole Earth, be Muslim one day. Verse 28 chapter 3: "Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference to believers. Whosover does that has no connection with God unless (it be) that you but guard yourselves against them, taking (as it were) security.....Unto God is the journeying.

Believers do not take unbelieving friends for believers. Whoever does this would have nothing to expect from God. Unless these people are a danger to you ... the final return will be to God. "

Editor’s note. The Arabic word translated "friends" is awliyaa which means at the same time protector, guardian, help.

Verses 39-40 of chapter 8 are also very clear in this regard. "Fight them until “Fitna” is no more and religion is all for God."

Fitna is an Arabic term that is difficult to translate, let us say, "trouble, opposition, dispute." What follows clearly explains the meaning of it, of course.

In order to understand the concept of lesser jihad it is necessary to return on two of its elements, the ghazi and the shahid.

The ghazi is the one who kills infidels. The shahid is the one who dies in battle (against the infidels) by professing the shahadah, that is to say that there is no God but Allah and that Muhammad is his prophet.

That lesser jihad is the greatest duty of a Muslim is described in the Hadiths without any scope for doubt or ambiguity. According to Imam Muslim indeed , "It has been narrated on the authority of Abu Hurairah that the Messenger of God said: One who died but did not fight in the way of God nor did express any desire (or determination) for lesser Jihad died the death of a hypocrite." (Sahih Muslim, No. 4696).

There are even hadiths explicitly describing how a mujahid (fighter) can be considered ghazi or dead as shahid.

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"What kind of heroic death in lesser jihad is the best ? Said God’s Messenger: When a faith fighter sends (an infidel's) blood streaming, he should (before falling dead) cut off the hollows of the knee of the horse carrying the said infidel" (Mishkat, No. 4530).

FORTY FIFTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

SEMANTIC REMINDERS.NASARA = CHRISTIAN?

The word nasara is usually translated as "Christians" when we speak of the Quran. However, we may doubt the relevance of this term because we know today that there were still Judeo-Christians of this orientation in Transjordan in the time of Muhammad.

In the Quran, the word "nasara" appears ten times after the term yahud (Jews); in this place, it can logically mean only "Christians" - what responds to Islamic theology which presents both under the same introductory paragraph (that of Jews and Christians who have respectively received a revelation but who would have distorted it).

However, in the other occurrences of this word (without proximity to that of yahud), its meaning appears other - and obviously not that of "Christians." Moreover, many translators then convey the word by Nazarenes. The same term would have therefore two meanings?

Because these are well two different meanings: Christians have never called themselves Nazarenes - except during the first ten years (they are non-apostolic Christians and very opposed to the tradition of the apostles who have appropriated this name).

Is this divergence of meaning the explanation of the contradiction that appears in the chapter 5 between a verse in which the nasara appear as allies’ friends of the true believers (the Muslims) and another verse where they are enemies of these same true believers? This explanation had long escaped the researchers until Father Antoine Moussali found the key of it.

For many, it is still a discovery of which little is spoken, probably because it ruins a dogma: that of the intangibility of the Quranic text. However, in its history, this one has suffered manipulations, one of which, precisely in chapter 5, is detectable by ear.

A categorical contradiction indeed exists between the v.82 and the v.51 of the chapter 5 about nasara.

"O you who believe! Take not the Jews and the Nasara for friends (waly, allied). They are “friends” one to another" (5:51).

While we read further.

"You will find the nearest of them in “friendship,” to those who believe (to be) those who say: Lo! We are Nasara "(5:82).

The contradiction is so strong that in this last verse, "nasara" is conveyed by "Nazarenes" by many

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translators, while they translate it by "Christians" in verse 51.

The problem must be in verse 5:51, which is particularly absurd: how can one claim that Jews and Christians are friends or allies "from one another"?

In fact, if the word "nasara" means "Christians," it is simply because it is placed after that of yahud (Jews) and is paralleled with it. But is this situation, what creates an absurdity in the rest of the verse, original?

A technical difficulty must draw our attention. The psalmody of the passage reveals a rupture of rhythm and an imbalance which disappear if we omit "and the nasara" (wa n-nasara). The balanced text is then the following:

"O you who believe! Take not the Jews for friends: they are friends one to another "(5:51).

The verse becomes clear again, sensible and coherent. And the contradiction with verse 82 disappears. That makes therefore three convergent reasons that it's an addition. From the point of view of exegetical science, this conclusion leaves no room for doubt.

Now, such an addition involving the word nasara is not unique.

Of the 14 occurrences of the word (including one in the singular, nasrani, 3:67), 4 are original and 10 have been added. In each of these 10 cases, this word appears after that of Yahud (or yahudiy in the singular in 3:67); these are additions every time.

Examples: and / or [the] nasara (perceptible to hearing): chapters 2: 111 (or n.); 2,113 (with the continuation: and the n . say: the Jews follow nothing (true); 2: 120 (and the n.); 2: 135 (or n.); 2:140 (or n.); 5:18 (and the n.).

In verse 2: 135, the introduction of "or nasara" after "be Jewish" appears especially absurd; it leads to the reading that the "sons of Abraham," recommend being, "Jews or Christians"! Without the addition, the verse becomes again sensible:

"They (the sons of Abraham, cf. 2: 133) said: Be Jews (hud, that is," of Jewish ethnic group "), you will be on the right track. Say: No, [follow] the religion (millah) of Abraham, as hanif-s "(2: 135).

The Quranic polemic is subtle: what saves is not being Jewish but believing like Abraham.

This verse 2: 135 is to be put in relation with another which is close to it, 3:67 which must also be rid of its addition ("and not a nasrani"), which then gives us: "Abraham was not a Jew but on the contrary he was a submitted hanif (muslim)" (3:67).

These two verses 2: 135 and 3:67 mean that Abraham was not a Jew since he himself is the father of the Jews, and that these, while boasting what they are, have not been faithful to the religion of this father submitted to God (muslim). Such an idea is present in the Gospels (for example in Matthew 3: 9, and Luke 3: 8); but here is added a dose of irony because Abraham is given as a model of the hanif.

We must understand the background of these anti-Judaic polemics we find throughout the Quran, a background that is obviously previous to the Quranic text. In the Talmud-s, the word hanef designates a heretic and equates to min. In presenting Abraham as a "submitted heretic" these two Quranic verses turn against Rabbinic Judaism the condemnation of those whom it regards as heretics - and particular those that the patristic tradition knows under the name of Nazarenes precisely - if we are heretics, say these, then Abraham was so before us: the unfaithful heretics, it's you!

One cannot understand the controversies of the Quran without knowing their Hebrew underpinnings and their Jewish-Aramaic background so present in the thought of the true promoters inventors of Islam. The Quranic text, duly analyzed , reveals many secrets - and not only some stories of interpolations or other undergone manipulations.

It reveals in particular the fact that, if it speaks of the Christians, it is not originally under the name of nasara (that the Christians have never worn).

And if it seems to designate them today under this name (that the Muslims use instead of masihyun which means really "Christians" in Arabic and that Arab Christians use since the time of the apostles), it is for a pressing reason: to make disappear the memory of true nasara-nazarenes while going as far as reassigning their name to others.

MUSHRIKUN- ASSOCIATORS.

As we have already had the opportunity to say previously, but repetere ars docendi, the word shirk is generally conveyed by the terms "idolatry," "polytheism" or "religious association" and those who are guilty of such "sin" (angels jinns etc.) are called mushrikun.

The word mushrikun is usually translated as "people who practice shirk," that is, who, like us, subordinate to the supreme being other entities that are frequently associated with him.

However, we may doubt the relevance of the word when we know that this reproach is also frequently addressed to the Trinitarian Christians. John of Damascus, who attended the court of the Caliph, explicitly testified that this word Mushrikun designated well (Trinitarian) Christians. "They call us associators, because, they say, we introduce an associate with God, saying that Christ is the Son of God and that he is God"; and according to his testimony, this word means in no way idolaters.

The shirk is the only sin that, if not followed by earthly repentance, cannot be forgiven by God. The competition is always difficult to admit and we are well with all this story of jealous God opposite the true philosophical and reflected monotheism as it is very well expressed by the Bhagavad Gita.

"Even those who are devotees of other gods and who worship them with faith actually worship only me, O son of Kunti, but they do so in a wrong way because I am the only enjoyer and master of all sacrifices. If

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one offers me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I accept it. I envy no one, nor am I partial to anyone. I am equal to all. But whoever renders service unto me in devotion is a friend, is in me, and I am also a friend to him" (Bhagavad Gita, dialogue between the god Krishna / Vishnu and Prince Arjuna).

The term mushrikun was first used - together with kuffar, meaning "disbelievers" - in the Muslim tradition to refer to the pagan Arabs of the Hejaz at the beginning of Islam. This expression is frequently used in the Quran in order to designate the opponents of Muslims, who are accused of practicing shirk which is considered a sin. But it is also frequently used to designate Trinitarian Christians.

Quran chapters 29, verses 61-63; 31 verse 25, 39 verse 38.

" If you should ask them: Who created the heavens and the earth ? they will say: God! "

The question is: who are these non-Muslims who recognize God as the creator of this world?

Quran chapter 6, verse 23.

" They will say: By God, our Lord, we never were idolaters ! "

The question is : who are these non-Muslims whom the author accuses of being polytheists and who defend themselves to be so?

N.B. Such an anti-Trinitarian controversy is very present in the Quran; see also 6:41and 136; 10:12 and 22; 16: 38 and 54; 23: 86-89; 31: 32; 43: 87.

FORTY SIXTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE ESSENTIALIZATION OF NON-MUSLIMS. IN THE QURAN.

Chapter 3, 118:

"O you who believe! Take not for intimates others than your own folk, who would spare no pains to ruin you; they love to hamper you. Hatred is revealed by (the utterance of) their mouths, but that which their breasts hide is greater.”

Chapter 4, 89:

"They long that you should disbelieve even as they disbelieve that yOU may be upon a level (with them). So choose not friends from them till they forsake their homes in the way of God; if they turn back (to enmity) then take them and kill them wherever you find them, and choose no friend nor helper from among them."

Chapter 4, 144:

"O you who believe! Choose not disbelievers for (your) friends in place of believers."

Chapter 4,160:

"Because of the wrongdoing of the Jews We forbade them good things which were (before) made lawful unto them,...... And of their taking usury when they were forbidden it, and of their devouring people's wealth by false pretenses, We have prepared for those of them who disbelieve a painful doom. "

Editor's note: Muslims also have food bans, so what about them?

Chapter 5, 57:

"O You who believe! Choose not for guardians such of those who received the Scripture before you.”

Chapter 5, 64:

"The Jews say: God's hand is fettered....they are accursed for saying so.”

Chapter 8 verse 55:

"Lo! the worst of beasts in God’s sight are the ungrateful who will not believe...”.

Chapter 9 verse 30:

“God (Himself) fighteth against them. How perverse are they!”

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Editor’s note. And that, if it's not God who said it, it's at least Mohammed.

Chapter 48 verse 29:

"Muhammad is the messenger of God. And those with him are hard against the disbelievers and merciful among themselves”.

Chapter 63 verse 4:

"They are the enemy, so beware of them. God confound them! How they are perverted!”

THE ESSENTIALIZATION OF NON-MUSLIMS IN THE HADITHS.

A hadith states: "Unbelief is a community," in other words, "infidels from the same nation," thus expressing that the distinctions between different types of non-Muslims are insignificant in relation to what separates Muslim and non-Muslim (same distinction between Jews and goyim) in the eyes of true Muslims.

The jurists distinguish two categories of non-Muslims, kafir and ahl al-kitab (people of the book).

In the Muslim tradition, the World is divided into two parts: Dar al-Islam, the "House of Peace" and Dar al-Harb, the "House of War." Dar al-Islam and its associated terms do not appear in the fundamental texts of Islam that are the Quran or the Hadiths: these are deductions of jurists.

In the land of Islam, human beings are classified according to their sex, but also according to their religious affiliation.

There are four main groups.

Muslims: they are full citizens. You can be Muslim by birth or by conversion.

The followers of monotheistic or monolatrous religions, paradoxically called People of the Book because if there is indeed a religion deserving this qualifier it is rather Islam which is the religion of the Book by excellence. These are the Jews (and Samaritans), the Christians (more or less), the Mandaean Sabaeans (now almost extinct) and the Zoroastrians (the Parsis, only a few tens of thousands).

Followers of polytheistic or unrecognized religions, such as the Baha'is.

Apostates: they are Muslims who give up Islam to join one of the two groups mentioned above or who adopt positions considered by the Muslim authorities to be contrary to Islam.

This last category is the most disadvantaged.

In mixed marriage, traditional Muslim law can be summarized as follows.

A Muslim can marry any woman, regardless of her religion, provided she is neither a polytheist nor a member of an unrecognized or apostate community. The Shiites, however, also forbid the marriage of a Muslim with a non-Muslim, even she is from the "People of the Book," that is, Jewish or Christian.

On the other hand, every non-Muslim who marries a Muslim woman acts unlike the law, so his marriage is considered null and void, and he loses the political "protection" of the state (dhimmah).

- The marriage of polytheists and unrecognized groups is prohibited.

In case of conversion to Islam.

If the man becomes a Muslim, he can keep his non-Muslim wife, provided that he is neither a polytheist nor a member of an unrecognized or apostate community.

If it is the woman who becomes Muslim, her non-Muslim husband can only continue to live with her if he converts in turn to Islam.

- In case of abandonment of Islam: the apostate is not allowed to marry, and if he apostatizes after the marriage, it is dissolved.

Muslim law prohibits succession between Muslims and non-Muslims in both directions. The apostate who leaves Islam cannot inherit from anyone and only his Muslim heirs can inherit it. Which means that in the case of conversion to Islam as in the case of the abandonment of Islam, only Muslim heirs can benefit from his succession while non-Muslim heirs are deprived of it.

N.B. A Muslim couple or whose spouse is Muslim cannot choose the religion of their children, who must be Muslim.

The compulsory nature of lesser jihad explains the dichotomous vision of the world viewed by Islam, which pits the kingdom of Islam against the kingdom of war. The first, Dar al-Islam, is the "kingdom of submission," the world in which sharia prevails; the second, Dar al-Harb (the kingdom of war), is the non-Islamic world. The struggle continues until the kingdom of Islam submits the non-Islamic world - and it is a situation that still persists today. Ibn Khaldun (died 1406), a famous Muslim historian and philosopher, clearly expresses this division in his prolegomena (Muqadimmah).

"In the Muslim community, the holy war is a religious duty, because of the universalism of the (Muslim) mission and (the obligation to) convert everybody to Islam either by persuasion or by force. The other religious groups did not have a universal mission (false at least regarding Christianity) and the holy war was not a religious duty to them, save only for purposes of defense. It has thus come about that the person in charge of religious affairs.....are under obligation to gain power over other nations, as is the case with Islam.”

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Dar al-Harb (Arabic / domain of war) is the word that, in the rest of Islamic history, is used to describe non-Islamic societies. Dar al-Harb traditionally refers to lands managed by non-Muslim governments. The inhabitants of Dar al-Harb are called harbi. In Islamic theology and its legal interpretations, the purpose of Islam is to reign also in these territories.

Holy Quran chapter 9 verse 29. “Fight against such of those who have been given the Scripture as do not believe in God nor the Last Day, and forbid not that which God hath forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth, until they pay the tribute readily, being brought low. "

It is therefore important for Islam to define the possible conduct of Muslims towards these regions or in these regions as long as the inhabitants of Dar al-Harb refuse to recognize the sovereignty of Islam.

Dar al-Ahd (Arabic "land of truce," we also meet the term Dar al-Suhl as equivalent). According to ancient books about shari'a, a territory governed by the laws of Islam can postpone the due date of a war with a non-Islamized neighboring territory for a period of ten years. This idea is based on the Hudaybiyya agreement passed with the city of Mecca by Muhammad in 628. This period of ten years is said to be renewable several times. This period is then called muwadda'a (smooth relations). These words were mainly used to describe the relationship that the Ottoman Empire had with its tributary Christian provinces. This notion of a country of truce was then supported by two arguments generally accepted by the traditional Muslim theology: the Muslims are too weak to gain a victory, the infidels pay with a tribute the cessation of hostilities. But the latter were then obliged not to stop the progress of Islam in their country.

Currently, the word refers to non-Muslim governments that have armistice or peace agreements with Muslim governments. The current status of the non-Muslim country in question may change from that of recognized equality to that of tributary state.

Dar al-Islam (literally House of Submission - to God- and / or Peace) is a word used to refer to lands under Muslim rule (s).

Some authors think that calling a country or place Dar al-Islam or Dar al-Harb depends only on the religious security carried out or not of the believer in legal terms. That means that if a Muslim can practice Islam freely, he can be considered living in a country belonging to the Dar al-Islam, even if he lives in a non-Muslim country. Muslim theologians say that the five daily calls to prayer must be made for an area to be considered Dar al-Islam. From this point of view The United States or the United Kingdom can be considered as belonging to Dar al Islam.

KAFIRITUDE.

Kafiritude (duty of kafirs or kuffar , i.e., pagans or atheists).

We may read in chapter 18 verse 29: " Then whosoever will, let him believe, and whosoever will, let him believe like a kafir.” The verse goes on describing at length the gigantic fire that God has prepared for those who make the wrong choice (especially the choice to believe as a kafir), while verses 30 and 31 describe the delightful heavenly rewards that await those who make the right choice. The fatalistic likeness of these assertions does ground indeed a certain tolerance towards "those who do not believe," certainly, but a tolerance devoid of all respect since God has already condemned them. Ultimately, these verses express rather some scorn, in the name of God.

So let's be clear. It appears from the texts of the Quran from the hadiths and from the hypothetical biography of Muhammad that, at the beginning of Islam, certain populations clearly had the right to stay alive while continuing to celebrate their worship, albeit restrictively and in a way as second-class citizens (paying a specific tax, etc..). They were the Jews (except at the beginning or more exactly during the Medinan period) Christians, Mandaean Sabeans, some experts even add the Mazdeans.

Others had no choice but between conversion (to Islam of course) or death.

DHIMMITUDE.

Traditionally, in the lands of Islam (dar al islam) the Jewish or Christian * non-Muslim has the status of Dhimmi.

As we have seen, jurists distinguish between two categories of non-Muslims, kafir and ahl al-kitab (People of the Book). The latter can "benefit" from the status of dhimmi. A dhimmi (an Arabic word usually translated as "ally" or "protected") is, according to Muslim law, a non-Muslim who has entered into a treaty of surrender (dhimma) with Muslims determining his rights and duties.

From the 630s, Arab cavalrymen began to conquer vast territories, from Iraq to Maghreb. These were inhabited by Christian, Hindu, Jewish, Animists and Mazdean populations. In the early days after their conquest, as Muslims formed only a small part of the population, they had to make sure of the collaboration or, at least, of the passivity of the dominated peoples. Umar, Caliph from 634 to 644, was the first to make decisions on this matter. They were probably made one by one. These limited decisions gradually gathered together ended up in what is called the pact of Umar, an indefinitely renewed contract, the dhimma, provided that the beneficiaries, the dhimmi, respect the domination of Islam. It is therefore an unequal social pact.

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The concept of dhimma that applies to Jews and Christians stipulates a submissive behavior towards Muslims. The dhimmi must respect a whole series of prohibitions: do not carry a weapon, do not ride a horse, do not build new places of worship, do not raise their voice during ceremonies or do not look like Muslims in their clothing. Nevertheless dhimmi keep their internal rights and can still use their courts. The right of residence of the Jews was not limited in principle but it remains that the stay in the holy cities was forbidden to them. Some Jews end up disappearing from the Arab peninsula, with the exception of Yemen.

An additional step is taken when the Arab conquerors take root in their conquests and when the contact with the dhimmi becomes permanent. They are then forbidden to build houses higher than those of Muslims, to take Arabic names and titles, to study the Quran and to sell wine to true believers. Nor can they be members of the public service, what does not prevent them from keeping or conquering, particularly in Egypt and Spain, an important place in the higher administration and more particularly in finance.

FORTY SEVENTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

STUDY OF A CONCRETE CASE: TO BE A “PROTEGÉ” OF MUSLIMS

IN THE ISLAM OF CORDOBA. By Clemence Helou Matar.

Those who do not convert to Islam thus receive, as we have just seen, the status of dhimmi * in exchange for a special tax (jizya and kharaj **) guaranteeing them the protection of their lives, property and conditional freedom of worship.

Ddhimma is the Arabic word for the legal regime to which dhimmis are subject and the expression "Ahl adh-dhimma" refers to the community of dhimmis.

The word dhimmi applies essentially to the "people of the book" (Ahl al-kitab), who, in the field of Islamic governance, by means of the payment of a per-person tax (jizya), a property tax ( kharaj), a certain legal incapacity and the respect of certain rules enacted in a "pact" concluded with the authorities, are granted a restricted freedom of worship, an exemption from certain obligations that Muslims are required to do (as the compulsory alms called zakat or serving in the army) as well as the guarantee of security for their person and their property. In exchange, certain compulsions are imposed, such as the prohibition to build new places of worship or the prohibition of proselytism.

In exchange for the payment of an individual tax (jizya) acting as surety, Jewish subjects, Samaritans, Christians (including Nestorians), and Mandaean Sabeans [but also, in the East, Zoroastrians and in India, the Hindus of a Muslim state] can exercise their religion under the terms of a "pact" with the authorities, like the pact of Umar first of the kind established IT is supposed in the seventh century by the Caliph Omar for Christians in Syria. It would seem in fact that this document is a compilation of progressively elaborated provisions some of which could be traced back to Umar ben Abd al-Aziz (717-720). All of these theoretical rules will be implemented in a more or less strict or brutal way according to the periods and places.

Notes. The rights of the dhimmi are rights granted, that is to say that they can be canceled unilaterally by the Muslim authorities. These rights to life and security are convertible into cash, he must pay a Quranic capitation, the jizya. The essayist Bat Ye'or, who invented the neologism "dhimmitude" sees in the purchase of these rights an inseparable obligatory condition of humiliation, of inferiority and of

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extreme vulnerability.

It is forbidden for the dhimmi to proselytize. Some Muslim laws are also imposed such as the prohibition of blasphemy against Islamic faith, the consumption of alcohol, the consumption of pork. Some obligations were intended for the dhimmis so that these non-Muslims are easily distinguished in public from Muslims, Muslim rulers have often forbidden the dhimmis to wear certain types of clothes, and forced them to wear recognizable clothes, usually brightly colored. Historians cite the Pact of Umar II in which the dhimmis and especially the Christians are supposed to accept an obligation to "always dress in the same way regardless of where they are, and ... to put the zunar (wide belt) around their waist.” Al-Nawawi imposes on the dhimmis the wearing of a yellow coat and of a belt, as well as a metal ring inside the public baths.

The dress laws concerning the dhimmis have frequently varied to obey the caprices of the sovereigns. Although the origin of such laws is generally attributed to Umar I, historical reflection suggests that it was the Abbasid caliphs who inaugurated this practice. In 850, the caliph Jafar al-Mutawakkil imposes on Christians and Jews to wear a made out of fabric belt (zunnah) and a kind of shawl or scarf called taylasin (Christians were already obliged to wear the belt).

He also requires that they carry a little bell in the public baths. In the eleventh century, the Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr God requires that Christians carry a wooden cross half a meter long around their neck and that Jews carry a wooden lamb. At the end of the 12th century, the Almohad caliph Abu Yusuf Yaqub al-Mansur forced the Maghreb Jews to wear dark blue clothes with long sleeves and a saddle-shaped hat. His grandson Abu Muhammad al-Adil, after many claims from the Jews, loosens the restraints and accepts the yellow clothes and turbans. In the sixteenth century, Jews in the Maghreb are only allowed to wear sandals made of rush and turbans or black hats with a small piece of red cloth.

The sultans of the Ottoman Empire will continue to regulate the clothes of their non-Muslim subjects. In 1577, Murad III published a firman forbidding Jews and Christians to wear clothes, turbans and sandals. In 1580, he changed his mind and restricted the previous ban on turbans but forced dhimmis to wear black shoes. Jews had to wear red hats and Christians black ones. Noting in 1730 that some Muslims used to wear hats identical to those of Jews, Mahmud I ordered that the offenders be hanged. Mustafa III personally helps to enforce his clothing decrees. In 1758, he traveled incognito to Istanbul and ordered the beheading of a Jew and an Armenian dressed with forbidden clothes. The last Ottoman decree ordering different clothes for the dhimmis was promulgated in 1837 by Mahmud II. The wearing of discriminatory clothing was not used in the predominantly Christian Ottoman provinces, such as Greece and the Balkans.

In 822, at the beginning of the reign of Abd ar-Rahman, the Emir of Cordoba, annual revenues from the dhimmi population amounted to six hundred thousand dinars and thirty years later they reached five and a half million dinars.

When a popular resistance appeared or threatened to appear, the Muslim power organized at will and in good conscience - since obeying divine orders - massacres, transfers and deportations, of populations. Any attempt at rebellion was therefore snuffed as soon as the social fabric was torn apart.

Religious authorities, bishops, priests or rabbis, absorbed by their parochial problems and their doctrinal and theological disputes, did not encourage their flock to revolt. They levied the jiziya for the Muslim power and tried to keep the peace especially that the Muslim authorities made them responsible for any problem and punished them accordingly.

Any attempt by the dhimmi to escape his "humiliations" in another way than by conversion to Islam, or any manifestation of critical mind or independence, entailed the loss of "protection" and in fact the obligation for the Muslim to fight him and kill him on pain of angering God.

Due to the disarmament of the population, any attempt at revolt was doomed to failure and ended with ruthless killings and slave taking.

In 805, to put an end to unrest in Cordoba, the government executed 72 people and had their bodies nailed on crosses along the path following the Guadalquivir. Around 807, in Toledo to put an end to the opposition of the Muladi, public figures, of the city, the emir invited them all to a reception and had them executed.

The humiliation of the dhimmis has taken the most diverse forms. Bells, shofars, banners, cross, any visible or audible sign of their faith was forbidden for them and they had an obligation of discretion in the practice of their worship or the burial of their dead. Their inferiority was also manifested by, among other things, distinctive clothing and the prohibition of having houses higher than those of Muslims.

The horse riding (horse = noble animal) was also forbidden to the "protected" who had to yield the passage when they met a Muslim on foot or to dismount if they were on donkeys back.

In the eighteenth century, King Frederick V of Denmark (1723-1766) sent an expedition led by the Dane Carsten Niebuhr to study Arabia. C. Niebuhr said that in 1761, during the stay of his team in

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Cairo, a French doctor was mutilated there for not having dismounted quickly enough from his donkey crossing a Muslim lord. The mere passing of (unclean) non-Muslims near mosques, some houses, or certain neighborhoods, was considered a desecration.

The dhimma relies on chapter 9 verse 29 of the Quran.

" Fight against such of those who have been given the Scripture as do not believe in God nor the Last Day, and forbid not that which God has forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth, until they pay the tribute readily, being brought low” (being brought down).

When he came to pay his taxes, the dhimmi had to stand at the lowest point, to appear hanging one's head, to be treated with disdain. It was necessary to make him feel that it was to do him a grace that to accept this jizya from him, and the humiliation could be completed by slaps or blows with a stick.

The ulema Muhammad al-Majlissi (died in 1699) advised keeping the dhimmis in fear and doubt by not allowing them to know the amount of the jiziya, so that, on the day of payment, they present themselves with all their money and count until they are told to stop.

In Spain in the twelfth century, the obligations of a Muslim inspector of public order consisted inter alia, in looking after the perfect segregation of the sexes, the assiduousness in the mosque and especially that the Jews wear a sign that identify them. The inspector was also to make sure that the Muslims do not wish peace (salam) to Jews and Christians who, being the devil's party, should be hated and isolated.

The precarious situation of non-Muslims, even when their services enabled them to reach a relatively high job, is illustrated by the massacres in Spain of nearly five thousand Jews following the loss of favor and of the murder in 1066 of Joseph son of Samuel ibn Naghrela known in Hebrew as Samuel ha-Naguid (993 - 1056).

In Muslim-dominated countries, natives who became Muslims and who returned to their original faith were still executed. Thus, the daughter of Ibn Hafsun, a descendant of the last count of the autonomous principality of Rhonda in Spain, who had returned to Christianity and entered a convent in Cordoba, was extracted from it, condemned for apostasy and slaughtered in 937.

In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, fundamentalists Almoravids (al murabitun, that is to say, those who guard the borders of Muslim territories), then the Almohades (al muahiddun or those who work in the service of the divine oneness), coming from North Africa to support the Muslim power in Spain, forced many Jews and Christians to convert.

The Muslim inquisitors responsible for controlling the sincerity of the new converts removed the children from their families and entrusted them to Muslims. To escape them, the great Jewish scholar Maimonides feigned a conversion to Islam, and then fled to Egypt. In 1148, the Jews were expelled from Spain by the Muslims in conditions that will be found again during the evictions organized by the Spanish royal power in 1492.

The dhimmi had no legal weight against a Muslim against whom in a court his word was inadmissible in case of conflict.

The charge of blasphemy against Islam was (is still) in Islam the simplest way to have someone condemned to death. Under the guise of a noble defense of the sacredness, it is also the sneakiest means of muzzling and destroying freedom and truth. European travelers reported in the eighteenth century that in Muslim countries, their word had no value, they had been forced to pay significant sums to traders who accused them of insulting Islam.

The humiliation of non-Muslims and the multiplication of aggression against them at every moment of daily life was facilitated by the distinctive clothing they had to wear, allowing them to be recognized at first sight.

The distinctive garments of the dhimmis were also used to control them financially. They could be stopped in the streets and still had to be able to show the proof that they had paid for their jiziya. In Yemen, Jews were forced to wear special clothing until they left for Israel in 1948.

The exploitation of the dhimmis was a constant concern of the Muslim authorities over centuries. We find it in 1576 in the correspondence of Sultan Mehmed III asking the governor of the city of Safed to send Jewish families to Cyprus to enrich him. The response of the governor who wished to keep his Jewish families, because the treasure of Damascus would suffer great losses if they left, is eloquent.

In Spain under Muslim domination, to compensate for the loss of income resulting from the conversion of natives, the Muslim authorities decided to continue to make the Kharaj paid by the converts by distinguishing early Muslims and their descendants from the more recent converts, the "mwalladuns."

The segregation and hatred maintained between Muslims, non-Muslims and new Muslims, Arabs and non-Arabs, in the Spanish population, have often led to spontaneous eruptions of violence. In 891, when the Arab corps from Yemen which constituted the garrison of Seville rose, the raging soldiers massacred both the dhimmis and the mwalladun converts whose sincerity was doubted by old Muslims. An Arab poet of the ninth century celebrated these massacres by being pleased with the

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killing of new Muslims, slaves and sons of slaves.

Conclusion by Clemence Helou Matar. History proves therefore that it is vital to refuse to play the game of Islamists who are trying to impose segregation between Muslims and non-Muslims everywhere and to question the traditions and culture of their host country.

* Status extended for various reasons and in various circumstances to the Sabaeans (of Harran), the Nestorians (Christians), the Samaritans (Jews) but also in the East to the Zoroastrians. In India, the Hindus of a Muslim state could also practice their religion, but mostly for fiscal reasons apparently (this made money for the state).

** The kharaj was about lands and not individuals.

FORTY EIGHTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

ISLAM OF CORDOBA AND ANDALUSIAN POTLUCK DINNER.

A number of French (or German) intellectuals in television channel ARTE are trying for some decades to make us believe that the Islam of Cordoba is the very model of an ideal society to which every sensible man must aspire.

As we do not understand very well (for lack of intelligence, no doubt) how the Islam of Cordoba would be preferable to the abbey of Theleme by Rabelais, to the Utopia by Thomas More, to the Republic by Plato, even to the other world by druidic legends (Hyperborea, Tir na nOg, Mag Mell etc ...) and even still to Human Rights.

Let's look again at this golden age of Islam (something has perhaps escaped us).

And let's start by noting that no place in it is planned.

-For believers of other religions than that of the Book.

-For agnostics.

-For atheists.

"To speak, as some occasional historians did and still do, of a civilization and of a society of the three cultures, Muslim, Jewish and Christian; is a sign of ignorance or deceit, both together generally "(J. Heers in" Slave traders in the Land of Islam ").

The concept of CONVIVENCIA is used by some European intellectuals (see recently in France the report of the German television channel ARTEtv entitled in English in the text "Islam is love." In order to designate the relations between Christians Jewish and Muslim in medieval Spain, i.e., from 711 to 1492 (the year of the "discovery" of America by Christopher Columbus) symbolized by the city of Cordoba in some authors, such as Roger Garaudy, who wrote a whole book on the subject in 1987, and the aforementioned television channel makes this Muslim Cordoba a flag of science and tolerance, a haven of mutually enriching peaceful coexistence, the homeland of a moderate and tolerant Islam, an open society where Christians, Jews and Muslims would have lived in harmony.

Let us remind, however, that the Spanish term has no especially positive connotations and is in no

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way specific to interfaith relations. The original convivencia is neither positive nor happy in itself; it implies and also includes resistance, rejection....

According to the almost unanimous chorus of historians, whether they are for or against, convivencia, as a term and a concept, is said to have been invented by the Spanish philologist Americo Castro, in his fundamental work published in 1948, España en su Historia, Cristianos, Moros y Judíos .

However, Castro's central idea, despite what the subtitle of his work suggests, is not so much to speak of Christians, Jews and Muslims as to write a "biography of Spain."

ANDALUSIAN INN (Rise of a Myth).

There is the myth, and there are historical facts. Although a true multicultural intellectual ferment took place in Toledo and Cordoba, the Muslim occupation of Spain was nevertheless perpetually peppered with abuses and discrimination due to the status of dhimmi of the vanquished, with looting and persecution.

In 817 a revolt of converted by force in Cordoba provoked the expulsion of the inhabitants.

In 850, the priest Perfectus (Perfect) was beheaded on the square for blasphemy.

Perfect or Perfectus was born in Cordoba, while the region was still under the control of Moors and Umayyad Caliphate. A monk and ordained a priest, he officiated in the Basilica of Saint Acisclus. In 850 Perfectus was challenged by two Muslims to say who was the greatest prophet, of Jesus and Muhammad.

At first he preferred not to answer, so as not to provoke them, but they insisted that he give them an answer, promising to protect him from retaliation. He told them in Arabic that Muhammad seemed to him to be a false prophet and an immoral man for having seduced the wife of his adopted son (Zenob, wife of Zayd, see Quran 33:37). The Muslims respected their promise and let him go, but a few days later, some of them changed their minds and made him arrested.

They asked friends to seize him (so as not to be perjurers) and had him judged. Perfectt was convicted of blasphemy by the Islamic court and was executed. The legend adds that his last words were to bless Christ and condemn Muhammad as well as his Quran.

But the punishment imposed on the holy man does not have the consequences hoped for by Muslims, on the contrary: the number of martyrs increases. No less than forty-eight public figures in Cordoba, all Christians, offer themselves in sacrifice. From then on, begins a real wave of death sentences that are difficult to quantify.

Between June 3 and 25, 851, Muslims execute a layman and eleven monks. On November 25, two sisters, Nunila and Alodia, were put to death. Three days later, the virgin Flora (daughter of a Muslim and a Christian woman) and the nun Maria.

Let us try to understand in order to prevent this kind of situation from occurring again in the country of human rights because it is well on the way, given the intellectual and moral mediocrity of the journalistic class.

THE LIBRARY OF IBERIAN RESOURCES ONLINE.Christian Martyrs in Muslim Spain.Kenneth Baxter Wolf. The Martyrs of Cordoba. “ Who were the martyrs who contributed so much to the anxiety of the emirs? What prompted their suicidal outbursts against Islam? The limitations of the sources make these questions difficult to answer. The only martyr who left any written record was Eulogius and, as we shall see, there is every reason to believe that he was not representative of the group as a whole. For the most part, what we know about the other martyrs is what Eulogius chose to report about them. Though it can be risky to rely on a martyrology which, true to its genre, inflates its protagonists to heroic proportions, we can trust Eulogius at least to identify the martyrs and to inform us of the circumstances surrounding their deaths” which has nothing to do with that of "the martyrs" of Muslim type (shahid, the translation by "martyr" besides misleads , voluntarily -taqiyya? -or not, the speakers of European languages) but rather looks like a.suicidal madness 1).

Paul Alvar condemns the "lukewarmness" of most Spanish Christians and the recourse to dissimulation because the Christian taqiyya or Latin simulatio is justified only if it is a question of the multorum salus, not simply of one’s personal safety), he exalts the ardor or the zeal of the prophet Elijah and of the martyrs.

Like Alvar of Cordoba, who composed the Indiculus luminosus in 854, the Vita Eulogii shortly after the martyrdom of his friend in 859 and several epistles, Eulogius adocates the voluntary martyrs against their Christian detractors in his Liber apologeticus sanctorum martyrum, written in 857 : he emphasizes the need to protect, to safeguard, including by martyrdom and polemic against Muhammad, the identity of the Christian minority in Spain compared to the Muslim domination, which favored the Arab acculturation of the Spanish Christians and also the conversion of many of them to Islam.

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The official Mozarab clergy, which sought to establish cordial relations with the rulers by adopting in particular the Arabic language to guarantee the continuity of the Christian community, does not approve this attitude which radicalized the struggle between Christians and Muslims provoking a strong reaction from the latter.

This is a situation partially comparable to the tensions that divided Christians during the time of the former “persecutions” : we can point out the issue of the lapsi, these Christians who had sacrificed to the gods of Empire to avoid death.

Same situation besides in the communist states after the last world war: groups willing to accept a kind of accommodation with power and the dominant culture opposed radical and intransigent groups who refused any compromise and who were accused by their adversaries of adopting a "suicidal" attitude.

In some cases, moreover, these are individuals from "mixed" families who have chosen Christianity and who, according to Islamic law, could be accused of "apostasy" like Flora, daughter of a Christian woman and a Muslim , so legally Muslim, accused by her brother and martyred in 851, or Mary, daughter of a Christian father and a converted Muslim, or Adulphus, Alodia , Aurea, Aurelius, Leocritia, Liliosa, Nathalia / Sabigotho, etc.

While the martyred missionaries evangelizing the Frisian, Norman, Slav, Pagans, are generally monks or clerics, in Cordoba there are many martyrs among laity and women. There are also some examples of double conversion: Felix, of Christian origin, had professed the Muslim faith before recanting; Witesindus, from a Christian family, first converted to Islam, then returns to Christianity.

We can also think that these men and women were convinced that the end of the world was near and that they did so because they were waiting for the apocalypse.

Whatever it be this epidemic of martyrs provoked a deep unease both in Cordoba and among the Christians under Muslim domination.

Emir Abd Ar Rahman II summons a council in 852. He wants to force the bishops to condemn the voluntary search for martyrdom. He cannot get it. The council advises against martyrdom, but refuses to express a clear and accurate condemnation of it. Martyrdoms will therefore multiply. The unrest also continues in Toledo. Christians in this city even lead offensives against the Guadalquivir Valley. In retaliation, the Moors intensify suppression, persecutions and forced conversions.

In 900 will be taken a radical measure: the prohibition for the Christians in Cordoba to build new churches.

"The Almoravids managed to restore to their benefit the unity of Al-Andalus which under their domination underwent deep changes. The very relative "tolerance" enjoyed by Mozarab Christians and Jews in the Umayyad era quickly disappeared. The Jews of Lucena thus had to pay a large sum of money to escape the conversion, and many Christian churches were destroyed (Philip Conrad, Spain under Almoravid and Almohad rule).

In 976, after the Almoravid invasion, de facto “caliph” Almanzor (Al Mansur) established at the foot of the Sierra Nevada a real official Inquisition, and undertook to expunge all the libraries of the caliphate; including that of Al-Hakam II, consisting mainly of works collected by the Visigoths, which will be burned in a gigantic book burning.

In 1010 begins the massacre of hundreds of Jews around Cordoba, which will last three years.

The year 1066 will be marked by the massacre of thousands of Jews in Granada.

In 1102, the Christian population of Valencia had to flee to northern Spain recently recaptured to escape persecution.

In 1125 the expedition led to Granada by Alfonso of Aragon, combined with an uprising of the local Mozarabs (Arabic-speaking Christians), generates, during the retreat of the Battler, the departure of ten thousand of them to the north; most of the Christians who remained on the spot were deported to North Africa in order to be settled near Meknes and Sale, where the ban on practicing their religion led to the rapid disappearance of these communities (Philip Conrad, Spain under Almoravid and Almohad rule).

In 1146, there was another exodus, that of the Christians of Seville, fleeing the invasion of Spain by the Almohads, Islamized but radical Berbers, provoking expulsion of the Jews or forced conversions.

These Almohads in 1184, impose distinctive signs to Christians and Jews, and in 1270 took place the widespread segregation of Jews in Andalusia.

In this whole set of laws organizing the dhimmitude, the worst is perhaps the ritual imposed by the conclusion of verse 29 of chapter 9 of the Quran 2) for the payment of the capitation (jizya), as described in an Arabic manuscript kept in El Escorial Library; for the dhimmi who live not in an

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autonomous zone or city, but in the Dar al-Islam, as a member of an unfaithful community in an urban neighborhood, in a suburb or in the countryside. This payment takes place on a fixed day, once a month, publicly. The Muslims who attend this session have the right to upset or mistreat the infidel who comes to "submit" by paying his personal tax. They do indeed cry out to this "ungodly one": "Oh, Enemy of God, pay the capitation! !" It's kind of a show. Everyone who has to pay this tax is obliged to appear personally, and cannot send someone in his place. He must therefore enter the room where the Muslim collector, who normally is sitting in the eastern way, on a mat or carpet; he must stand before him; then give him his money. This ceremony is applied in a fairly cheerful manner, or even not without a certain condescending fellowship. It is none the less humiliating 2).

Churches and chapels have to be constantly be open, day and night; Muslim travelers who wish to stay there must be accommodated or fed for three days. Inside a church, bells and small bells should be sounded only very gently, "making as little noise as possible," and it is forbidden to much "raise your voice" while praying, especially if a Muslim is in the building. No cross should be placed outside of a building. When priests go to the home of a dying or sick person, they must not visibly carry crosses or gospels if they pass through streets or paths that Muslims can take. In funeral processions that can never be full of pomp, prayers have not to bo said aloud, and lighted candles are prohibited in the streets where Muslims live. Under no circumstances and under any pretext, Christian processions may pass through Muslim streets or souks, with statues, palms, tapers or candles. In no case, a "polytheist" should attempt to propagate his religious mistakes to Muslims. Moreover, a Mohammedan who becomes a Christian is immediately sentenced to death, even if it is a former Christian who had only provisionally converted to Islam. Any Christian, man or woman, who denies God's divinity by claiming that Jesus is also God, by saying of Muhammad that he is not a prophet, by denigrating the Quran, or by “blaspheming,” is also liable to the death penalty. A whole series of varied dictates governs in this way the relationship between infidels and believers. The most serious is that they sometimes cause hatred and violence against the "protected" (dhimmis). It happens here and there that a Muslim crowd, in which the new converts are distinguished by their arrogance, insult and disorder celebrations of Christian worship, especially funerals; at the passage of these funeral processions, sometimes arise impassioned cries powered by hatred: "God! Do not be merciful to these infidels!” The most excited throw stones and filth at the mortuary stretcher and the priests. When they move without being grouped, they are sometimes taken to task by the rabble, especially by the children, who amuse themselves by throwing stones at them, singing some burlesque verses making a mockery of the cross (Charles Emmanuel Dufourcq: everyday life in medieval Europe under Arab rule).

Apart from that, yes, we can find periods of relative calm that make possible a peaceful coexistence on condition of submitting to the Pax Islamica ...

Go further gentlemen of Arte! . It is true that there was once a "golden age" of Islam, as there was a "golden age" of pre-Columbian civilizations in North America. Islamists delight in this "cultural richness of Islam" forgetting to say that the Arab-Muslim culture was essentially a culture of capitalization which borrowed many things from non-Arab cultures (such as Persian, Mesopotamian or Greek even Indian or Chinese, cultures , for example).

An essential step in the construction of the myth of the convivencia was the controversy that pitted Americo Castro against another giant of Spanish historiography, Claudio Sanchez Albornoz.

The two authors clashed virulently over the definition of Spanish identity. Castro, going against the mainstream of historiography, argued that Spain was born in the Middle Ages from the coexistence and fusion of Christian, Jewish and Muslim elements. Sanchez Albornoz developed his own theory in radical opposition to Castro's, dedicating his 1957 work Espana, a historico enigma to contradict him. For the former minister in exile, Spanish identity was built through the Roman and then Visigothic presence on Iberian land. In this sense, the Middle Ages were not the time of the birth of Spain, but of its consolidation through the ordeal of the Reconquista. Christians, Jews and Muslims never merged, on the contrary.

Yet there were many things in common that united the two intellectuals beyond their disagreements. For each of them, the coexistence of Christians, Jews and Muslims is nothing but a froth of what was at stake in their eyes, much wider and deeper. And for both of them, the answer lies in the presence of Muslims, and Jews to a lesser extent.

Sanchez Albornoz, clearly revolted by Castro's theories, and anxious to defend the "Spanish soul" as best he could, claimed to sum up his opponent's remarks by lending him the idea that "the simple neighborhood convivencia between Spanish Christians and Spanish Muslims produced a symbiosis," a criticism which he reiterates several times in his work, hammering that "peaceful convivencia was impossible," while often taking care to put the end in italics or quotation marks. So it was Sanchez Albornoz who, carried by his wrath, attributed this irenic concept to Castro and gave it a centrality that

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he did not initially have. In this sense, the polemic between the two authors was indeed the founding moment of the myth of the convivencia.

Following the confrontation between the two Spanish historians, the term convivencia gradually imposed itself in historiographical production, and was initially used by non-Spanish researchers, with at least two fundamental consequences. Firstly, the debate on Hispanicity never had much impact outside Spain, and so the term (or, more broadly, the idea) of convivencia became part of issues that were originally foreign to it. Moreover, the latter, although it is commonly used in Spanish to designate the simple fact of "living together," has no strict equivalent in many languages and therefore requires the use of a neologism or a circumlocution. Many English-speaking historians therefore decided to adopt it as it is in their own language, a strategy that is both convenient and highly conducive to its transformation into a concept subject to all kinds of more or less conscious and assertive ideological uses.

It seems that the term was most rapidly established as a concept in the United States.

In a society marked by questions about minorities, "multiculturalism" and the "racial question," the work of historians follows the questions of their time while at the same time nourishing them. From then on, the medieval Hispanic convivencia was able to acquire the value of a model to be followed, favoring simplifications and shortcuts.

Similar uses of the term can be found in Europe and particularly in France, where the multicultural issue is also sensitive.

While the term convivencia in Spanish initially referred only to "living together," which is not in itself harmonious, its many uses over more than half a century have gradually turned it into a real concept, through numerous polemics among historians, but also more widely because of a large number of sometimes totally contradictory ideological appropriations. The spread of the concept outside the strictly academic spheres even led to the convivencia becoming a period (albeit vaguely situated in time and space) in the same way as the Renaissance or the Reformation.

THE CONVIVENCIA AND THE ISLAM OF CORDOBA PUT TO THE TEST. (ANTITHESIS.)

RECONQUISTA.

Surprising things are currently being written about the phenomenon of the Spanish Reconquista.

Example.

Dear Sir of Arte you lament the "genocide" committed against Muslims. You fail, of course, to remind us how the Arab Muslims behaved in their conquest of Tamazgha and Spain.

RECONQUISTA, for the record, simply means, take back what has been taken from... by force.

As for the conversion of Amazighs, it was made by force at the tip of the sword, but certainly not by a spontaneous adhesion.

Today many people do not really support Islam, but declare themselves Muslims for fear of the punishment promised to apostates (death). If the courts of the Inquisition no longer exist, those of Arab-Muslim fanatics still spread terror.

To recapture is not to change things, but to restore them. I hope the Berbers will meditate on this word.

LONG LIVE TO THE RECONQUISTA, LONG LIVE THE FREE TAMAZGHA. Idir, October 7, 2008.

The Battle of Covadonga is told by texts of the end of the ninth century, written by Mozarab having taken refuge in the north of the Iberian Peninsula: the Mozarabic chronicles precisely. According to these texts, noble Visigoths elect as captain a named Pelagius (Pelayo, born in 681, elected in 718, died in 737), son of Favila; a former dignitary of the court of King Egica (687-700), who fixes his capital in Cangas de Onís, and takes the lead of an uprising against Muslims.

This battle having taken place at a remote time, it is difficult to make the share of truth, forgery or embellishment, in the different versions. Let us say that a Muslim punitive raid let itself be dragged into unfavorable ground (a mountainous area), and that it then suffered very heavy losses by pursuing the fugitive Christian rebels without much success.

Date: Summer 722.

Location: Picos de Europa, Cantabrian Mountains.

Issue: Asturian victory.

Belligerents: Kingdom of Asturias against Umayyad Caliphate.

Commanders: Pelagius the conqueror for Christians, Munuza and Al Qama for Muslims.

Forces involved: 300 men for Christians, 800 men for Muslims.

Losses: 289 dead on the Christian side, 600 dead on the Muslim side.

It is therefore important with regard to the phenomenon of the Reconquista in Spain, to see the

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differences.

Deep causes of the European Reconquista.

a) The fragmentation into different communities (Muslims, Jews, Christians) of Spanish society, due to the implementation of Shari'a laws by Islam (which prevented total interbreeding).

b)The crimes against humanity of vizier Al Manzor.

From 977, date of his first warlike feat, to his death, Al Manzor will lead more than fifty victorious military expeditions in the name of God (Jihad). Victorious of the king of Leon, Ramiro III, in 978, he revived the holy war (980). In his kingdom of Andalusia, Al Manzor mistreats and persecutes the descendants of Romans or Visigoths who have not yet converted to Islam (they are called "Mozarabs": those who look like Arabs, but without being really). This religious intolerance will have fatal consequences for the caliphate of Cordoba: displaced Mozarab refugees bring the technical knowledge of the caliphate, and will trigger the technological catch-up of the Christian West. The old states of the Spanish March will be changed into powers that can compete in every respect with the caliphate. Taking advantage of the disorders which prevail in Andalusia at the time, they will lead the recapture. "Christian" states benefit from the support of the population in the recaptured territories (the establishment of the compulsory Catholic religion will not take place until the 16th century).

The difference between the European situation and the situation in North Africa, therefore, is the number of Muslims living in the territories at stake: a few tens of thousands in one case, millions in the other. And also the fact that this recapture was supported by the civilian population in general. What is not the case today (it's even the opposite!) Some friendly advice too: go further than the Christianity of Tertullian or Augustine, and do not hesitate in your case, like the Sabians of Harran, to go straight back to your previous pagan roots. Finally, good luck anyway, and hold on, because there is only hope that gives life.

N.B. On the ousting Mudejars and Moriscos, occurring after the end of the Reconquista, see previous pages.

However, we must not overestimate the role of religion in the early days of this recapture. The very example of the legendary El Cid Campeador is the evidence, even if Hollywood Spain and France (Oh Corneille, Corneille) have written a lot of nonsense about him.

Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar (c. 1043 – 1099) was a Castilian nobleman and military leader. The Moors called him El Cid, and the Christians, El Campeador, champion. He was born in Vivar, near Burgos. After his death, he became the hero of the most significant medieval Spanish epic poem, El Cantar de Mio Cid.

Born a member of the minor nobility, El Cid was brought up at the court of King Ferdinand the Great and served Ferdinand's son, Sancho II of Leon and Castile. He rose to become the commander and royal standard-bearer (armiger regis) of Castile upon Sancho's ascension in 1065. Rodrigo went on to lead the Castilian military campaigns against Sancho's brothers, Alfonso VI of Leon and García II of Galicia, as well as in the Muslim kingdoms of Al-Andalus. When conspirators murdered Sancho in 1072, Rodrigo found himself in a difficult situation. Since Sancho was childless, the throne passed to his brother Alfonso. Rodrigo lost his ranking in the new court which treated him at arm's length and suspiciously. Finally, in 1081, he was ordered into exile.

El Cid found work fighting for the Muslim rulers of Zaragoza, whom he defended from their traditional enemies, Aragon and Barcelona. While in exile, he regained his reputation as a strategist and formidable military leader. He repeatedly turned out victorious in battle against the Muslim rulers of Lerida and their Christian allies, as well as against a large Christian army under King Sancho Ramírez of Aragon. In 1086, an expeditionary army of North African Almoravids inflicted a severe defeat to Castile, compelling Alfonso to overcome the resentment he harbored against El Cid. The terms for the return to the Christian service were to be attractive therefore since Rodrigo soon found himself fighting for his former Lord. Over the next several years, however, El Cid set his sights on the kingdom city of Valencia, operating more or less independently of Alfonso while politically supporting the Banu Hud and other Muslim dynasties opposed to the Almoravids. He gradually increased his control over Valencia; and the Islamic ruler, al-Qadir, became his vassal in 1092. When the Almoravids instigated an uprising that resulted in the death of al-Qadir, El Cid responded by laying siege to the city. Valencia finally fell in 1094, and El Cid established an independent principality for him.

El Cid's final years were spent fighting the Almoravid Berbers. He inflicted upon them their first major defeat in 1094, on the plains of the Huerta, outside Valencia, and continued resisting them until his death. After El Cid's death in 1099, his wife, Jimena, succeeded him as ruler of Valencia, but she was forced to surrender the principality to the Almoravids in 1102.

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Christian and Muslim kings fraternally united to continually fight against other Christian and Muslim kings, in other words, the war of all against all in the service of the highest bidder, it is perhaps that finally the philosophical and democratic ideal of the French-German journalists of d'Arte, but it's not ours. We prefer Enlightenment and Human Rights.

And since we are dealing with the Reconquista, let us remember that the Crusades were not intended to convert the infidels (at which jihad aims) but to restore free access to Jerusalem.

After the Byzantine reconquest carried out in the East under the impetus of the Macedonian emperors, but brutally stopped by the irruption of the Seljuk Turks; the crusades carried out in the Holy Land by the Latins are part of the general context of the awakening of a West which, for three centuries, has been confronted by Muslim pressure; takes the initiative to restore to Christendom the lands it has lost. At a time when entire regions are still only superficially acquired to the Mohammedan religion and where in the land of Islam remain significant Christian minorities.

Among the little-known episodes of these crusades, it is necessary to mention the expedition led by Renaud de Chatillon, because it was close that he managed to make his banner flutter on Mecca, probably around 1190. Hollywood ( Kingdom of Heaven, released in 2005 at Montreal, a movie full of historical mistakes and especially of anachronisms, Ridley Scott placing his own ideas in the mouths of some characters who would have been very surprised to hear himself talk like this); recently painted an unflattering portrait of Renaud de Châtillon. The expedition of which Renaud de Chatillon was the prime contractor and which, for some, was doomed to fail, almost succeeded, despite its limited means. If the Franks could have been better informed about their geographical position, they would not have lingered along the coast and would not have been surprised by the Egyptian fleet. Once in Mecca, they could have withstood a long siege and impose heavy losses on Muslims, not to mention the shame they would have inflicted upon them. Think so! The Kaaba in the shadow of the cross. If Renaud's men had entered Mecca, the course of history could have been changed. The anger and revolt that would have been the consequence of that could have led to a turnaround among Muslims. But we cannot remake history with some "if."

CONVIVENCIA AND ISLAM OF CORDOBA THE SYNTHESIS...

Most researchers are calling for a "demystification" of Al Andalus, in particular the abandonment of the concept of convivencia, given the difficulty of granting content to this concept with its vague contours. As Manuela Marín and Joseph Perez sum up, "The myth of the 'Spain of the three cultures,' widely used as an element of propaganda, is so far removed from historical reality that it can only generate new elements of confusion" .

We can therefore only warn free minds against these manipulations or distortions of History and we can only join (swimming) the islets of resistance that ring the bell in the face of this danger.

Some authors present the historical period from the conquest of Hispania by the Umayyads in 711 to the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492 after the end of the Reconquista as a "stabilized pluralism" in which exchanges and dialogues would have enriched groups of different obedience, having essentially peaceful relationships, and it is this conjunction that would have favored the cultural development of the peninsula. This is partly true because this cohabitation has led to new cultural forms at all levels of society and has had a profound effect on the history of Spain in the important periods in which it has persisted. The Arabic language is a major vector of transmission and enrichment of knowledge for the West" thanks to the translations into Latin and Romance languages that will be at the origin of the medieval renaissance of the 12th century and which will culminate in the scientific deployment of the Renaissance with a capital "R."

But on this historical substratum, contemporary myths developed, with a political scope, which were highly criticized for their lack of objectivity and rigor. In Spain itself, the concept of Convivencia has continually been questioned (David Nirenberg in his essay entitled "Violence and minorities in the Middle Ages" even paints the portrait of a medieval Aragon where neither a persecuting mentality nor peaceful coexistence exists) or has been the object of political distortion, both in its version limited to Al Andalus and in its version extended to all medieval Spain.

More recent studies underline the strong variability of regimes and situations over time, a great dynamism of populations and regular mass conversions. Societies are organized by the juxtaposition of religious communities that are often rival, autonomous and inegalitarian. Frictions, tensions and suspicions are numerous, exacerbated by conversions and by the fear of religious hybridization and

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interbreeding.

The Convivencia between Christians, Jews and Muslims is rather an "uncomfortable necessity" which goes hand in hand with the absence of declared juridical principles, an absence whose consequences are always harmful.

One of the reasons why historians have abandoned the concept of Convivencia is its closeness to contemporary notions among the public of the twenty-first century, generating confusion and incomprehension because the very notion of "integration" is foreign to medieval thought. Indeed, it is seen as a risk of weakening the faith of each individual, of syncretism or even schism. The Convivencia serves to delimit social categories and not to make them evolve. Communities live side by side and fight firmly - and sometimes violently - any attempt at integration: marriage between members of different faiths is impossible and sexual relations are punishable by death.

The historicity of a cultural golden age is now generally regarded as a myth dependent on extrapolations or unreliable documentation. If Al Andalus was, at its peak under Abd al Rahman III, an opulent, peaceful civilization on its borders, for Michel del Castillo, on the other hand, this convivencia remains a myth as false as its opposite, that of Islamic fanaticism.

David Nirenberg (Communities of violence Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages. Princeton 1996) believes, however, that violence was a central and systemic aspect of majority-minority coexistence in medieval Spain and that coexistence was partly based on such violence.

Serafín Fanjul denounces the "myth of Al-Andalus" and in particular the mystification of Islamic thought developed in the 19th century by literary Romanticism, which tends to represent a facet of Spanish history in an erroneous way. This mystification of Moorish society is merely a revival of the Eurocentric discourse, that of the "Good savage" and that of the "lost Paradise." This author demystifies the idealization of the Islamic past, that is, of the superior, refined and cultured Arabs succumbing to the barbaric, ignorant and clumsy Christians. He shows that this idealized image of a multicultural Spain, a land of tolerance and coexistence between three cultures and three monotheistic religions is, to a very large extent, historically false.

For Eduardo Manzano Moreno, the convivencia as a historical concept affirming multi-faith tolerance at the height of Muslim rule during the Umayyad Caliphate (929-1031) is not obvious. The few historical elements that have come down from this period mainly describe Caliphs who were very attentive to religious orthodoxy, harassing followers of the philosopher Ibn Masarra, preventing any Shiite infiltration, and Almanzor having astronomy books and controversial books from his library destroyed. As for relations with Jews and Christians, too few documents have reached us to make generalizations. Although Al-Andalus is one of the best known medieval Islamic societies, both in writing and in archaeology, we know almost nothing about the Jewish population, its organization, its social dynamics. We have information on only a handful of people, mainly on Hasday ibn Ishaq ibn Shaprut, which does not make us able to say whether it was an exceptional or common case in the Caliphate. Information about Christians is not much more extensive. They indicate that Recemundo, Bishop of Elvira, was at the service of the Caliph as ambassador and intermediary with Juan de Gorze, and, as far as the rest of the inhabitants are concerned, they only allow us to deduce that this period was calmer than the previous one, which was marked by waves of martyrs. Finally, the mention of these two figures is not related to their religion, but to their presence at court.

He concludes his article by explaining that the concepts of tolerance and convivencia are inoperative as historical tools: "they imply political concepts used by different agents, in different circumstances, with very different [political] objects. If medieval Iberian society is of a multi-faith nature, it is impossible to understand it from a static point of view. There is a wide spectrum of situations, contacts and interactions, depending on places and times. Even more difficult, in the context of contemporary debates, the "platitudes" associated with convivencia imply a difficult semantic shift from the religious to the cultural, studying Islam, Christianity and Judaism, which are especially religions, from an intercultural perspective. Furthermore, he believes that Cordoba has been at the origin of the confluence of cultures with very different traditions, a situation that has provoked friction with those who did not respect the prohibitions of other religions, such as the insolent verses of the poet Al Ramadi (died in 1012) "I kissed my beloved in front of a priest and drank glasses of the wine he had sanctified," but that this diversity has facilitated the reception and translation of scientific works from various sources.

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For Bruno Soravia, it was mainly American academics who idealized the Convivencia and made it a period of tolerance and fluid transmission of knowledge and arts between the Arab and European worlds. This idealization stems from a counter-recovery of nationalist literature in an interpretation that pits Al Andalus against the petty nationalism of the northern Christian kingdoms as a symbol of beneficial globalization. He attributes this approach to a political and social misunderstanding of Al Andalus and its characters, the primary cause of which is the general ignorance of texts - recent or ancient - written in languages other than English, especially the abundant literature in Spanish, Arabic and French.

In his introduction to his article "Al Andalus in the mirror of multiculturalism" he complains even about the difficulty of simply considering Al Andalus as part of the history of the classical Islamic world and that it is become common to interpret it in a singular noncritical way, with the eyes of the present.

Perhaps more Marxist than his socialist critics,Eduardo Moreno Manzano attributes the cultural and artistic richness of Al Andalus less to a hypothetical "convivencia" than to an increase in economic production, pointing out that the Caliphate was then by far the most powerful political system in Europe since the fall of the Roman Empire. At its height under Almanzor, Al Andalus had indeed a centralized administration, a powerful army and navy; and its state and population were relatively wealthy thanks to the development of agriculture, irrigation, industry and trade. Manzano Moreno points to the immense treasure accumulated by the Umayyads through their tax system as proof of this.

CONCLUSION.

There are different approaches to explain the interactions between religions during those centuries, but the most widespread one since the 21st century is to study medieval Spain considering that the interactions between religions were polymorphic, varying according to places and situations, and that cooperation or conflict are different aspects of the same reality that must be studied jointly.

For Christina Mazzoli-Guintard, there was neither conviviencia nor armed cohabitation, but very different realities according to the social groups considered, under the constant pressure of a power seeking coexistence through avoidance.

For Francisco Marquez Villanueva there was convivencia only because coexistence between Christians, Moors and Jews was always a necessity imposed by the facts, without ever managing to be framed by real, declared juridical principles. The management of these principles proved to be impossible within the parameters of medieval thought; they could only be expressed with the period of the Enlightenment and the Revolution.

1) On this subject (Polycarp of Smyrna, Perpetua of Carthage, Blandina of Lyons, etc.) see our previous notebooks on, or more exactly against, Christianity.

1) Holy Quran, chapter 9 verse 29: "Fight against such of those who have been given the Scripture as believe not in God nor the Last Day, and forbid not that which God hath forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth, until they pay the tribute readily, being brought low (saghiruna)”.

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FORTY NINTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

LA IKRATA FI D-DINI: NO COMPULSION IN RELIGION.

We have often quoted in our various studies the precept which is stated as "La ikrata fi d-dini": "No compulsion as regards religion" (Holy Quran Chapter 2 verse 56) because it reflected well it seems what to think in this field (at least from our point of view of consistent neo-pagan) and because the four words forming the beginning of this verse, are always quoted as soon as it is a question of "tolerance" in relation with Islam and the Quran.

The usual translation of it is indeed that we began to indicate: "No compulsion as regards religion." But the exact translation is: "No compulsion in religion."

But what religion? Religion in general? Is this quarter of verse an invitation to respect for those who profess other religious beliefs? Is this interpretation really always explicitly taught in Islamic universities, so influential today? Can this be based on tradition, or relied on the highlighting of a textual meaning?

Other verses about religious tolerance should also be examined, what all the more feasible is as they are not very numerous among the 6226 that are in the Quran.

The sentence in four words "No (la) compulsion (ikrah) in (fi) religion (ad-din)" does not have an immediately obvious meaning. If the text had intended to designate the universal religious fact understood in the West way ("no compulsion in [as regards] religion"), the word din is not the most adequate with regard to the Quranic vocabulary itself. In the Quran, the term millah means just religion doctrine in general, and ibadah refers to religion as a divine service of worship: they would be very suiting.

Al Tabari underscores that the Arabic word used for “religion” in the verse is al-din. The Arabic definite article al attached to the word din signifies that it is a reference to Islam alone.

Finally, according to others, this verse was abrogated because it was revealed before the fight against the associators was imposed [according to the principle that later verses abrogate verses "descended"

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previously].

The most relevant is to consider that this verse has been revealed about certain categories of believers: the people of the two books, the Mazdeans (Majus) and all those who profess a religion different from Islam but of whom the capitation can be accepted. The Muslim tradition reports that Muhammad compelled indeed certain categories of people to embrace Islam, that he did not accept any other profession of faith from them, and that he condemned them to death if they refused; this was the case of the pagan Arabs and other similar.

There is no necessity of coercing or forcing to enter the Muslim religion somebody of whom it is permitted to accept capitation to the extent that he settles that capitation and agrees with the status [of inferiority] conferred on him by Islam.

Clearly, it is not appropriate to compel Jews and Christians to become Muslims, but to submit them, the Islamic political domination being to be particularly exercised by a special tax that they will have to pay and which will be worth them to be " tolerated.” In a way, this tax, paid by the individual, confers the right to live in Muslim society, or more exactly the right to live simply. So it is well a question of tolerance by comparison with an evil: Jews and Christians are evils, but they become tolerable if they yield money and are second-class citizens - the dhimmis.

Moreover, God does not oblige to enslave non-Muslims: " God forbids you not those who warred not against you on account of religion and drove you not out from your homes that you should show them kindness and deal justly with them" (Holy Quran chapter 60 verse 8) .

Permission is therefore given to be good and fair. If you are not, that's good too. Thus, whatever the nuances, it seems difficult to look at the four words La ikrata fi d-dini other than in the manner of Tabari: "No compulsion in MUSLIM religion."

This formula is nevertheless one-way: we must let to a non-Muslim the freedom to embrace Islam, but nothing is said about the opposite approach where a Muslim would choose to renounce his religion.That said, some recent fatwa-s issued in the Arab Emirates have enacted that one who renounces Islam does not have only fifteen days to return to it (before being killed), but all his life, which is an elegant way of circumventing the principle and sending God's vengeance to a better world. But does such a subtlety have a chance to be received by the multitude of simple people and in an exacerbated tensions background?

A small digression is needed here concerning the words of this verse. It is not obvious that the word din meant religion in the original leaflet that became one day the chapter 2 (because the Quran is a compilation of various writings whose visions or sayings of Muhammad are only a part). What exactly was the primitive meaning of the word din?

In the first chapter , the meaning of religion clearly does not suit: God is said to be "Malik yaumi d-dini," what doesn’t mean "Master of the Day of Religion" but "Master of the Day of Judgment" as Tabari himself indicates.

The Semitic root din is related to what is due (in Arabic, we have precisely this meaning in the word based on this root, dayn, debt) or to the fact of giving back what is due, that is to say justice (the predominant connotation in the 38 occurrences of the Biblical Hebrew, what gives especially the meaning of judgment and of judge). What is due in all fairness to God is, of course, worship; in this way, we have been able to shift belatedly from the meaning of worship to that of religion (this last term not covering only worship).

As for the word ikrah, its meaning is inseparable from that of the root krh, that is to say, to divide in two or, in the figurative sense, to divide internally, to disturb. We find this meaning in the Arabic karata, to afflict (t and h have an original equivalence). The verb kariha, to hate, seems to be thus an artificial duplicate from which derives our causative form ikrah, the fact of making hate, from which is extracted by shifting the idea of compulsion. But the original meaning of ikrah would be rather to cause an inner trouble.

The famous verse 256 of chapter 2 then takes on a completely different meaning ,much more coherent: "[For the believer, there is to be] no cause of trouble in worship, because the right path is distinct from error, etc. . "

Moreover, it appears that the primary meaning of the stem krh remains underlying in the various Quranic occurrences, whatever their verbal form. For example, in verse 216 of the same chapter 2, the word kurh means rather disorder or source of hesitation than compulsions or annoyance : " Warfare (qitalu) is ordained for you, though it is hateful (kurhun) unto you.”

"No problem in the worship to pay to God. The good path is indeed distinguished from error ... God is the Patron saint of those who believe: He makes them go from darkness into light. But those who act in kafir have for their patrons the taghuts: these make them go from light into darkness ."

True believers who worship God are on the right path of light, while others are wandering: they are doomed to demons and darkness. The text is clear.

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Among the other verses sometimes quoted to prove this tolerance, it happens that is quoted the beautiful verse of chapter 9, the number 6 which reminds of the duty of hospitality, even regarding an associator (that is to say a pagan or some Christians).

" And if anyone of the idolaters seeks your protection, then protect him so that he may hear the Word of God ...because they are a folk who do not know."

This verse is positive. Or rather it would be so if there was not the previous verse which states: " slay (qtulu) the idolaters wherever you find them....[but if they] pay the mandatory poor due, then leave their way free."

It is also necessary to mention the verse 32 of chapter 5, usually shortened: " Whosoever kills a human being it shall be as if he had killed all mankind.”

This verse is very interesting. But it must be read in its entirety: " For that cause [the crime of Cain] We decreed for the Children of Israel that whosoever kills a human being for other than manslaughter [that is to say by virtue of the law of retaliation] or corruption in the earth [for it is lawful to eliminate those who oppose God] it shall be as if he had killed all mankind.”

What changes everything is the mention or the reservation, “for other than manslaughter or corruption in the earth.”

These words take away the absolute nature of the prohibition of murder; they even suggest that it is lawful or necessary to kill to defend God's order on earth. Of course, one may wonder if they were not added later (they come badly in the text). But as this is the present text which is authoritative, this verse can only receive the following meaning: Murder is an evil unless it is to avenge oneself (especially in the case of homicide) or to avenge the honor of God on earth (that is, the honor ... of Islam). Murder is therefore lawful in this case.

Let us conclude without get-out: no passage in the Quran allows us to found anything other than an Islamic tolerance, refusing all respect to non-Muslims. What is understandable: respect for persons always implies a certain equality before God. This is unthinkable and expressly denied (for example, in chapter 6 verse 165). God Himself is said to place his followers above others and teach them to despise non-Muslims, who at best have only a temporary right to exist before going to Hell.

This is the message of the Quran as it appears today. It is not possible to say anything else except to deceive those who do not know it (taqiyya).

FIFTIETH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

COMPARISON BETWEEN JESUS AND MUHAMMAD.

Let us overlook over the stories of polygamy of imposed divorce of privilege with regard to the number of wives (more than the four allowed to any good Muslim) and other casual sexual encounters of Muhammad having aroused the fury of the legitimate wives (see about it our chapter on Muhammad and his wives).

God is love (clemency and mercy) but still! How can we think that the being of beings whatever the name given to him ( Tawhid God or Allah) can be lowered to the point of directly dealing with the casual sexual encounters or domestic problems of Muhammad ??

De minimis non curat praetor. God does not deal directly with secondary or subordinate things. Fate secondary causations or divine providence are used for that.

How can you make yourselves of the being of beings or of the Tawhid, of God or Allah, such a low idea ???

N.B. How do we know all this? Because God in the Quran constantly intervenes to defend His “prophet.”

I f the Nazarene Jesus had been so well defended he would never have finished crucified for an attempt at Zealot rebellion against the Roman authorities (it is true that for the Quran which is here echoing various Gnostic or Judeo-Christian heretical doctrines, he was not really crucified).

So we will come directly to the episodes a little less pithy of his life, those when there aw bloodshed, to see if it is indeed cases of self-defense or really works of justice consistent with the principle that is dear to us "Intud i ngeindtleacht gnim olc mad indechur" and which was reported to saint Patrick in the Senchus Mor: "there is strengthening of social cohesion (in the case of pagan societies anyway) when an evil deed does not remain unpunished."

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The main difference between Yehoshua bar Yosef of Jerusalem and Muhammad son of Amina of Mecca, is that the first, Jesus, has, at the beginning and to begin, even if it ended badly for him (aborted coup attempt) ) worked only as a reformer, moreover, in a background already largely worked by such calls and of which a part was already prepared for hearing him ( Essenes, Nazarenes, the movement of John the Baptist ... ..)

While the second, Muhammad, has from the outset hit hard the almost totality of his natural audience. Whether to begin as a hallucinated visionary with a disturbed mind or possessed by the spirits (jinn) or by subsequently spreading actively and aggressively, the Christian themes most foreign to the mentality of his contemporaries as those of the last judgment and of the end of Time.

In short, Jesus is a reformer who ended alone and abandoned by all but it was not the case initially. At first his movement was only one of the many currents that agitated his people. He himself conceded that he did not want to abolish the law of Moses but to fulfill it.

While Muhammad very quickly preached, worse than in the desert, in a totally completely and 100% hostile background, a message foreign to the spirit of his own, before ending up imposing his ideas by force.

This is well felt from one end to the other of the Quran. Muhammad speaking of him in the third person, the atmosphere is constantly in it to permanent self-justification.

FIFTY FIRST RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

GIVEN THEIR IMPORTANCE, LET US GIVE AGAIN HERE IN FULL ALSO THE BEST KNOWN OF THE QURANIC VERSES EXTOLLING THE LESSER JIHAD.

Reminder. Here again, dear reader, we shall not speak of the greater jihad which is the struggle to be waged against oneself, as in Sufism, but of the lesser jihad.

-The verse of the sword.

The verse 5 of chapter 9 revealed in Yathrib / Medina in 631 (in Medina, therefore abrogating all those of Mecca going in opposite direction) is known as “verse of the sword."

And as one of the characteristics of the Quran is its non-contextualization (it is uncreated), it is not known if the commandment it contains has a universal and timeless value, i.e., whether it is still valid today, or if it should be considered as having targeted only the pagans of the time in Arabia and more precisely in Mecca.

This verse, the verse of the sword, expresses itself as it follows…..

Chapter 9 verse 5: " Slay the polytheists (mushrikun) wherever you find them….if they repent and establish worship and pay the Zakat, then leave their way free. Lo! God is Forgiving, Merciful!” (establish worship and pay the Zakat, in other words, if they convert).The meaning of this expression was clearly explained later by the later hadiths.

Ad-Dahhak bin Muzahim: "This verse has abrogated every peace agreement between the Prophet and the idolaters, whatever they may be, every treaty and every provision in this sense ."

Al Awfi adds that Ibn Abbas commented it in this way : "No idolater can benefit from a peace treaty or a safe conduct since the sura 9 was revealed."

-The verse of the fight.

Verse 29 of chapter 9 is called the verse of the fight.

What does this verse 29 of chapter 9 say?

"Fight against those who believe not in God nor the Last Day, and such of those who have been given the Scripture but who do not forbid that which God hath forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth, until they pay the tribute readily, being brought low (saghiruna). "

This verse revealed in 631 also abrogates all previous provisions allowing a gentler attitude towards polytheists, Jews, Christians, Sabaeans / Mandeans and Zoroastrians. Indeed, this verse makes no distinction between the

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idolaters and the monolaters.

-The verse of the lesser jihad.

Verse 4 of chapter 47 is called "the verse of the lesser”: it abrogates all previous verses advocating peace.

Indeed what does this "lesser jihad verse" say?

" When you meet in battle those who disbelieve, then it is smiting of the necks until, when you have routed them, then making fast of bonds; and afterward either grace or ransom till the war lay down its burdens. That (is the ordinance). And if God willed He could have punished them (without you) but (thus it is ordained) that He may try some of you by means of others. And those who are slain in the way of God, He does not render their actions vain.”

Let us point out in this connection, since it is a question by contrast of Christianity, and to conclude the debate, that, contrary to a legend skillfully and hypocritically maintained by Christians, the Nazarene high rabbi never condemned any use of violence, he only limited it to the symbolic field, in order to emphasize a disagreement or disapproval. There is therefore only a difference of degree between the Christian design and the Muslim design of the lesser jihad.

St. Luke 22:47. While he was still speaking a crowd came up, and the man who was called Judas, one of the Twelve, was leading them. He approached Jesus to kiss him, but Jesus asked him, “Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?” When Jesus’ followers saw what was going to happen, they said, “Lord, should we strike with our swords?” And one of them struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his right ear.But Jesus answered, “No more of this!” And he touched the man’s ear and healed him.

Tafsir.

1) John’s Gospel gives us the identity of the companion of Jesus having drawn his sword to defend him, it was St. Peter.

2) The Nazarene high rabbi Jesus therefore accepted the use of violence in self-defense but at a symbolic level and as in certain categories of duel with a stop to first blood.

3) As for the famous phrase " “All who draw the sword will die by the sword,” mentioned by St. Matthew; it is not a curse or a condemnation but a simple statement of common sense. Of the kind "All who drives too fast and drunk one day will die in a car accident."

FIFTY SECOND THRANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE LESSER JIHAD FROM THE VIEWPOINT OF MUSLIM RELIGION (at least according to Ibn Khaldun).

"The word jihad has several meanings that have come together over the course of history, and its translation is a matter of controversy. Its meaning in the Quran also offers difficulties since the interpretation of the ulemas of the classical period, for whom jihad means offensive holy war, is opposed to that of the reformists and western intellectuals (journalists women politicians sportsmen actors bishops...) for whom jihad means defensive war or just war. The meaning of jihad as a holy offensive war dominated the legal tradition and the qualification of jihad eventually extended even to various suppressions against heretics, rebels or brigands, albeit at a late stage among the Sunnis. To this warlike meaning is opposed a spiritual sense, according to the well-known hadith evoking the lesser and greater jihad. This spiritual meaning was explained especially by Al-Muhasibi and the Ikhwân as-safâ'. Alfred Morabia (1931-1986) pointed out that the distinction between the meanings of the jihad tended to fade in the Muslim mind: the true mystic, anxious to fight the passions within him, always ends, because of the duty to command good and forbid evil, by fighting evil outside him, in his surroundings. This guardianship of one's neighbor, this hisba*, towards Muslims, naturally leads to war, either against rebels, brigands and heretics, or against infidels. The murâbit, ascetic, preacher and warrior thus incarnates well the totality of the meanings of the word jihad (Morabia, the jihad in medieval Islam chap. IX).

The innumerable army of the pseudo-philosophers of Islam justifies the recourse to holy war by the fact that Islam would be the only religion to have a universal vocation.

In fact, their favorite reference to religion, ibn Khaldun, seems to know only three of them IN THE QUOTED PASSAGE.

Prolegomena or Mouqaddimah chapter 3,31.

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"For the Muslim community, the holy war is a religious duty, because of the universalism of the (Muslim) mission and (the obligation to) convert everybody to Islam either by persuasion or by force. Therefore, caliphate and royal authority are united in (Islam), so that the person in charge can devote the available strength to both of them 408 at the same time.

The other religious groups did not have a universal mission, and the holy war was not a religious duty to them, save only for purposes of defense. It has thus come about that the person in charge of religious affairs in (other religious groups) is not concerned with …They are merely required to establish their religion among their own (people).

Let us omit the case of Judaism.

As far as Christianity is concerned, this error is undoubtedly due, as usual, to ignorance, BECAUSE CHRISTIANITY HAS WELL GIVEN TO IT AS A MISSION TO CONVERT ALL MANKIND.

The proof below.

Gospel according to Matthew 28:19: "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.3

Gospel according to Mark 16:15. « He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved."

In fact, the mistake of Ibn Khaldun and the pseudo-intellectuals who follow him is to confuse the end with the means.

As far as the end is concerned, Christianity has the vocation to convert the whole world to its conception of religion.

As for the means, however, ITS FOUNDING TEXT EFFECTIVELY EXCLUDES WAR.

AND THAT IS THE DIFFERENCE WITH ISLAM that ibn Khaldun claims without shame but clearly: he makes it a religious obligation of Muslims.

THE MINOR JIHAD.FROM THE POINT OF VIEW NOT OF THE MUSLIM RELIGION BUT OF MUSLIM LAW.

HISTORICALLY DATED OR OBSOLETE VERSES.

(concerns the region of Mecca before 629)

2, 190: "Fight in the way of God those who fight against you, don't be transgressors (mu'tadîn) (aggressors?), God doesn't love transgressors."

2:191: "Kill them wherever you meet them; drive them out of the places where they drove you out. Sedition (fitna) (persecution?) is worse than murder."

2,192: "Fight them not at the Sacred Mosque, unless they fight you there. If they fight you, kill them: that is the reward of the unbelievers."

2, 193: "Fight them until there is no more sedition and the worship of God is restored. If they stop, cease to fight, except against those who are unjust."

8, 39: "Fight them until there is no more sedition, until all worship is given to God. If they stop fighting, let them know that God sees perfectly what they're doing."

8, 67: "It is not for a Prophet to make captives until he has completely defeated the unbelievers on earth. You want the goods of this world, God wants the future life for you. God is mighty and just."

9:5: "After the holy months have passed, kill polytheists wherever you find them. Capture them, lay siege to them, ambush them. But if they repent and pray, if they give alms, let them go free. God is the forgiving, the merciful."

9:6: "If a polytheist seeks refuge with you, receive him to hear the word of God. Then bring him to his safe place, for they are people who do not know."

9, 7: "How can there be a pact, admitted by God and his Prophet, with polytheists, other than those with whom you have already made a pact at the Sacred Mosque? As long as they are sincere with you, be sincere with them. God loves those who fear him."

22, 40: "And to those who have been unjustly driven from their homes for saying only, 'Our Lord is God!'" If God had not rejected some men by others, hermitages would have been demolished, as well as synagogues, oratories or mosques where the name of God is often invoked. Yes, God will save those who assist Him. Truly, God is strong and mighty.

"On the other hand there is unanimity among Muslims that the Quran is binding on all (hujjatun 'ala al-jami'), and is the primary source of Muslim law. This is because it comes from God.

DEFENSIVE VERSES STILL IN FORCE.

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22, 39: "All permission (to defend oneself) is given to those who have been attacked (fought) because they have been unjustly oppressed - God is powerful to help them-".

22, 41: "(Permission to defend oneself is given) to those who, if we grant them power over the earth, perform prayer, give alms, command what is right and forbid what is wrong. The end of all things belongs to God."

"OFFENSIVE" VERSES STILL IN EFFECT.

N.B. For the majority of Muslim schools the TRINITARIST Christians are polytheistic.

1, 194: "Be hostile to anyone who is hostile to you, inasmuch as he is hostile to you..."

4, 89: "...Take no protector among them (the hypocrites) until they emigrate in the way of God. If they turn away, seize them, kill them wherever you find them. Take no protector or defender among them,

4, 90: "except those who are allies of a people with whom you have made a covenant, or those who come to you with a heavy heart to fight against you or to fight against their own people... If they stand aside, if they don't fight against you, if they offer you peace, then God gives you no reason to fight against them"...

4, 91: "You will find other people who desire peace with you and peace with your own people. Whenever they are driven to revolt, they fall back into it en masse. If they retreat away from you, if they do not offer you peace, if they do not lay down their arms, seize them, kill them wherever you find them. We give you power over them!"

9, 29: "Fight those who do not believe in God and the Last Day; those who do not declare unlawful what God and the Prophet declared unlawful; those among the people of the Book who do not practice the true religion. Fight them until they pay the tribute directly, and they will be humiliated."

9, 36: "Fight polytheists totally, as they fight you totally..."(what would repeal 9, 29 as far as polytheists are concerned).

9, 123: "Fight those of the unbelievers who are near you. May they find you hard."

25, 52: "Therefore do not submit to the unbelievers. Fight against them with strength, with this (= with the Quran).

22, 78: "Fight for God, for he has a right to the fight that the believers wage for him."

In the classical treatises of Muslim law, the minor jihad is indeed a war waged with weapons against concrete unbelievers, not a spiritual struggle. The lesser jihad is, moreover, an obligatory duty which is therefore necessarily good and holy. Hence the translation of "holy war" that is often used. It indisposes reformists and western intellectuals (journalists women politicians sportsmen actors bishops...) who see it as an unjust reduction of the meaning of the word jihad. But there is always a discrepancy between the meaning of words in law and their meaning elsewhere.

First of all, it can be noted that fiqh always distinguishes wars against Muslims from others.

Wars against Muslims arise out of the struggle against rebellion (baghî) or against banditry (muhâraba) and the treatises give each of the two situations developments in criminal law (chapter of the hudûd).

But against unbelievers? Are there wars against them that cannot be qualified as minor jihad? Is any warlike activity automatically a lesser jihad as soon as the enemies of Muslims are non-Muslims? What defines a minor jihad? Is it the religion of the enemy, or something else, the internal dispositions of the Muslim, the niyya, the intention?

These problems have to do with the very definition of the lesser jihad and its aims...

I. THE PURPOSE OF THE JIHAD AT THE TIME OF CONQUESTS.

As understood by Muhammad (A) and his contemporaries and successors (B), i.e., the meaning historically attested by practice or other evidence.

A. The Quran and the Prophet

In Mecca Muhammad forbade violence. The Quran warned him to be patient and to give time to the unbelievers (73:10-11 and 25:56). He should not coerce them (10:99-100, for example). The battle he had to wage was especially preaching (25, 52; 16, 125).

In Medina, on the other hand, he authorized it in the name of self-defense, even of religious freedom. In fact, the reference text (22, 39-41) implies that, without authorization to defend oneself, the divine religions would be condemned to disappear. The idea of reciprocity is also quite implicit. Later on, this defense was even conceived in a broader way.

Has Muhammad therefore passed from defensive jihad to offensive jihad? One could say that the question depends on two other questions, whether one accepts the doctrine of the abrogated

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(mansukh) and the repealing (nasikh) , and if so, on the chronological classification of the different texts. But this way of making the problem emerges from this search for the "true meaning" which we have discarded. For the historian, the question is simpler and several conclusions are proposed:

- For the Quran, true prophets are especially some fighters (3, 146) and victory is the sign of divine favor (8, 10 = 3, 126; 3, 148). There is coherence between this way of thinking and that existing in the pagan world, all of which are united in the ancient "only thinkable": the fate of cults and gods is first decided in war.

- The problem is clearly defensive in a certain number of Quranic verses, the oldest (Sura 22 and 2). Even if one does not rely on the Sîra of the Prophet, written late, they have a background of historical truth, but one must admit that the practice of Muhammad seems to have conceived this defensiveness in a broad way, since it includes the elimination of the Jews in Yathrib/Medina and various political opponents.

- The various problems are much more offensive in Sura 9, the latest. It will be seen that according to the classical view, verse 9, 29 expresses the theory of the offensive jihad and abrogates all the others, from where its name " sword verse." But it is certain, even if one rejects the details given by Tradition that the practice of Muhammad becomes offensive since he extends his undertakings to all the Arabs of the peninsula, what leads him to confront the Byzantines.

Alfred Morabia writes (The Minor Jihad in Medieval Islam Paris 1993): "The Quran does not offer a frank answer to what we would be entitled to consider to be the essential questions: when, on what basis, according to what modalities, under what objectives, and especially in what countries can or must Muslims take the initiative in fighting" ?. Thus for the purpose of minor jihad, it is said that it is the conversion (8, 39; 9, 5) or submission (9, 29) of unbelievers, but it can also be only the request for the cessation of fighting on the behalf of the infidel (2, 192, 193; 4, 91, 94; 8, 39, 61).

B. The Companions of Muhammad and their Successors

The thoughts of the Prophet's contemporaries and successors are recorded in principle in the hadith. Unfortunately, there are more fakes than true ones, and all compilers of traditions have had much difficulty in order to compose plausible collections. Even nowadays it is difficult to propose any dating at all. The oldest collection, that of Imâm Mâlik (died around 795), Al-Muwatta', is already very late, dating at best from the end of the/ 8th century.

There is nothing explicit in this text about the aims of the jihad. However, the formula "jihâd fî sabîli Llâh" is frequently used, and, once the order, " Struggle in the cause of God..." is given (vol. 1, p 298) the atmosphere of the whole is very pious. Martyrdom seems to be the almost unique motive of the fighters. Fraud for the sake of loot is condemned several times: jihad is therefore a matter of piety, not a good business. A hadith opposes jihad and contempt for the goods of this world (some dates!) It is immediately followed by a saying of one of the Companions who distinguishes between good and bad expeditions, but despite the context, it is difficult to see in it the condemnation of offensive wars or wars of profit.

It is hard to imagine that a defensive tradition could have coexisted with the conquests without leaving more obvious traces.

In the Sîra of Ibn Hichâm, the doctrine of offensive minor jihad is clearly established. The vision of the conquests that is reported (at the moment when the Prophet strikes the rock by digging the trench before the battle of the same name), shows that the Sîra is posterior to the conquests and that it seeks to justify them, as well as most of the provisions of classical Muslim law (Morabia, pp 147-157). The hadith are late (Morabia pp. 157-175), or at least contemporary with the formation of Muslim law, and all of them "come to accentuate the bellicose character that the Preaching had taken on in the last years of the Mohammedan apostolate and to exalt the conquering role of the Arabs..." (Morabia p 159). They too, like the Quran, insist on the disinterestedness of the combatant.

But if the texts are difficult to relate to the seventh century, the practice of this period is well known, it is the Arab conquest. The interpretation of the Prophet's contemporaries is clearly offensive. They had no "moods" and set out to conquer Persia and the Mediterranean basin. As far as we know, no tradition or echo contests the legitimacy of these undertakings in the name of a defensive jihad or a betrayal of the thought of Muhammad. Started by the Râchidûn caliphs, the phase of conquests continued under the Umayyads. It is likely that not all of the combatants had only religious intentions and that, for some, the lure of gain has to play a significant role.

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II. THE AIM OF THE MINOR JIHAD IN THE CLASSICAL ERA (8th-18th)

From the Abbasids, the borders of the Muslim Empire stabilize. This phase of Islamic history should be called the phase of positional warfare. It is not strictly speaking a defensive phase, since wars are continuous and the initiative of conflicts constantly changes sides.

It is at the beginning of this phase that the doctrine of the offensive minor jihad is formed (in the eighth century), whereas the historical phase corresponding to it has passed (Morabia, p 184). This gap between practice and theory seems to be the rule. In the ninth century, the doctrines of spiritual jihad, the jihad of ribat, summer expeditions and the privateering, which corresponded more closely to the war of position, became explicit. But these new doctrines are combined with the previous one, that of the offensive minor jihad.

Yet there are many texts with a certain dating. Let us first explore the chapters devoted to the lesser jihad (A), before seeking other insights on the conversion of the infidel (B), and on non-canonical wars (C).

A. Purpose of lesser jihad according to the Treatises

In the Mudawwana of Sahnun (died in 854) the theme of the necessity of the da'w (call to conversion/surrender) appears (vol 3, p 2). According to Abd ar-Rahmân Bn al-Qâsim, Mâlik would have: "I did not see that the associators were fought without being invited to Islam." To Sahnun's question if it is the same whether Muslims attack or are attacked, al-Qâsim replied, "I did not ask Mâlik, but for me the two situations are identical." The reason for this call is to let the enemies know "what they are being invited to do (Islam), their state of hatred and enmity towards religion (Islam) and its followers, their long opposition to (Muslim) armies and their struggle (against them) ...". That's almost a defensive sketch of justification. The appeal "removes doubt and justifies the lesser jihad," the text specifies farther. A very clear statement can be found on p 31: "You fight people only so that they leave disbelief to enter Islam." According to Sahnûn, the goal of the lesser jihad is therefore the conversion of the non-believers. Most Maliki texts will adopt this position.

Ibn Ruchd the Younger (Averroes) (d. 1189) devoted a special paragraph to the question "Why they are fought" (Bidâya, book of Jihad, 1st section, § 7). He noted the unanimity of the doctors on the goal pursued with regard to the people of the Book: the conversion or payment of the jizya. The Quran (9, 29) does not allow for differences on this subject. Divergences exist as to polytheists, but they do not concern the nature of the goal of the minor jihad, they concern the question of whether they can be admitted to the status of dhimmî. Ibn Ruchd points out that Malik was of the opinion that they could: for him disbelief, even if it was polytheistic, was not a reason for death [citation needed].

In the Bidâya, the purpose of the lesser jihad is also evoked in connection with the promises of gratification (nafal) (2nd section, § 3, question 3). Mâlik is presented as hating this practice in the name of the goal of the minor jihad: "You aim in the attack only at the face of God Most High and the exaltation of his Word. If the imam promises gratification before the war, it is to be feared that blood will be shed for a right of someone other than God." This text confirms the reticence of Malekite jurists towards operations aiming only at profit and gives a definition of the minor jihad very close to that which will become that of the school.

It is Ibn 'Arafa (d.. 1400) who established this definition, in his Hudûd: "The minor jihad is the struggle of a Muslim against an infidel who is not the object of a pact, to promote the word of God (li-'i'lâ'i kalimati-Llâh)...". The commentary of Ar-Rasâ' (d. 1489) emphasizes that fighting a Muslim is not a minor jihad, and, says the shaykh (Ibn 'Arafa), it is the same for (the fight against) the dhimmi who breaks his contract; what is said of this contract is generalized to other contracts, such as the aman (spared life in case of surrender).

N.B. 1/ Imâm Mâlik would therefore have been a supporter of defensive warfare, but his followers, particularly Sahnûn and Ibn Far'ûn, adopted the Shafi’i point of view of permanent offensive warfare.

2/ This change of doctrine was made under the influence of shafiism, but even more so under the pressure of events, the expeditions to Sicily, the maritime privateering (qarsana), the fight against Fatimid Shiism...

3/ This change affected not only the aim of the lesser jihad, but also hardened its various aspects: the declaration of war became optional, Zoroastrians were excluded from the benefit of the status of dhimmî, legal permissions for destruction during operations were extended, the murder of women during operations was allowed, the penalties against the booty defrauder were lightened,

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which would have led to an implicit permission of the privateering aiming at the booty alone which became minor jihad just like the repression of heterodox.

4/ Thus the humanism of Malik was perverted.

B. The fate of the prisoners clearly indicates that the aim of the minor jihad is the conversion of polytheists (forced conversion, under penalty of death) and the submission of others to the status of dhimmî. This status also reveals the true purpose of the lesser jihad. Late treatises specify that it must be humiliating. Ad-Dirdîr writes, in Khalîl's commentary, that one does not accept jizya from the hands of a proxy, but everyone must come in person, for his humiliation, perhaps this will cause his entry into Islam." (vol. 2, p 202). And in fact the masses converted, for various reasons, often of convenience and interest: let us remember the mass conversions under Umar II, for not paying the Kharaj and the Caliph's refusal to exempt the new converts from taxation, both of them competing in love for the goods of this world. But Muslim law had achieved its goal.

Will it be said that the aim of the little jihad is not conversion but only the extension of the Islamic state? It is only to postpone the problem. Without going into the question of the Caliphate, we will agree that since Ibn Khaldun and Ibn Taymîya, the only thing unanimously demanded of the sovereign is that he applies the sharia. We must add that with regard to Muslims who would be tempted to leave Islam, Islamic law provides for a special hadd, which is the death of the murtadd (apostate). There can be no question of protected communities growing at the expense of Islam, even less so the number of free thinkers (zanâdiq) or polytheists. In the classical conception, religious freedom is strictly speaking a tolerance, and a provisional tolerance.

C. Peace, as such, is not developed, only truce. "War is the permanent and normal state of Muslims" wrote Du Caurroy in 1851 (quoted by Louis Mercier **, p 40). One does not find anything concerning the aims of the lesser jihad in the texts on the truce, they only underline the permanent character of the minor jihad. The war does not truly cease until the capitulation of the opposing forces.

CONCLUSION.

In Muslim law we have three situations. Wars made against Muslims are without hesitation qualified as rebellion or brigandage and they are punished. Wars waged against non-Muslims who have entered into a pact are condemned and qualified as treason (khiyâna), but not punished. However, an unlawful act committed against those who are not the subject of such pacts is not punished whether it is murder, theft, or an interest loan. Unbelievers without pacts do not have immunity ('isma). These acts must give rise to a request for forgiveness from God (Louis Mercier **, p 69), but the law does not provide for any punishment. It follows then that acts of war against harbiyîn are tolerated. The legal status of such operations is not in fact tackled in the treatises.

Practice, as is well known, has not been hindered by the duty to ask God for forgiveness, whether for the privateering or for the slave raids, even in the case of a pact. It was the prince who decided on the sanctions to be imposed on those who disobeyed his orders.

* Islam has in fact known a DOUBLE INQUISITION (Hisba from 629 ? to today, Mihna from 833 to 847 or more ?) The Hisba was a morality police force intended to order good or forbid evil according to Islam, i.e., to punish any violation of Muslim morality, essentially in terms of trade at the beginning, then morality later on. The Mihna was an extension of the latter's competence intended to combat certain heresies.

** The ornament of the souls and the motto of the inhabitants of el Andalus, an Islamic holy war treatise.

With an introduction by the translator Louis Mercier. Paris 1939. This is a text with a mystical tendency aimed at convincing the Andalusian Muslims of the opportunity to take up the profession of arms again. Its author Abū l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Fazārī al-Andalusī, a Grenadine scholar and writer of the second half of the fourteenth century reproves greed, and quotes a ẖadîth (that cannot be found elsewhere) where the Prophet, criticizing a man greedy for seizing a donkey as booty,would have said, "He fought in the way of the donkey!"

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FIFTY THIRD RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

THE ETHICAL CONTROL OF THE VIOLENCE IN THE QURAN AND THE HADITHS.

Many verses of the Quran assure us that the God of Love (merciful and forgiving) will not forget to inflict in the other world all the sufferings, disgraces and possible humiliations to the souls of a certain number of dead human beings (in short, hell).

We will not deal with this subject (of the idea of hell in Islam) but of what the merciful and forgiving God orders to his faithful to concretely do on this earth regarding a certain number of other human beings, in their lifetime, so to speak.

Chapter 2 verse 216: " Warfare is ordained for you, though it is hateful unto you; but it may happen that you hate a thing which is good for you, and it may happen that you love a thing which is bad for you.”

Chapter 4 verse 74: " Let those fight in the way of God who sell the life of this world for the other. Whosoever fights in the way of God, be he slain or be he victorious, on him We shall bestow a vast reward. "

Chapter 5 verse 33: " The only reward of those who make war upon God and His messenger and strive after corruption in the land will be that they will be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet on alternate sides cut off, or will be expelled out of the land. Such will be their degradation in the world, and in the Hereafter theirs will be an awful doom;

Chapter 8 verse 17: " You slew them not, but God slew them. And you threw not when you did throw, but God threw, that He might test the believers by a fair test from Him. Lo! God is Hearer, Knower.”

Chapter 8 verse 39: " And fight them until religious clashes (civil war, civil disorder) are no more, and religion is all for God. But if they cease, then lo! God is Seer of what they do.

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Chapter 8 verse 67: " It is not for any prophet to have captives until he hath made slaughter in the land. You desire the lure of this world and God desires (for you) the Hereafter, and God is Mighty, Wise.”

Chapter 9 verse 5: " Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them (captive), and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush. But if they repent and establish worship and pay the tithe then leave their way free. Lo! God is Forgiving, Merciful.

Chapter 9 verse 29: " Fight against such of those who have been given the Scripture as do not believe in God nor the Last Day, and forbid not that which God has forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth (?) until they pay the tribute readily, being brought low.”

9 verse 111: "Lo! God hath bought from the believers their lives and their wealth because the Garden will be theirs: they shall fight in the way of God and shall slay and be slain. It is a promise which is binding on Him in the Torah and the Gospel and the Quran. Who fulfills His covenant better than God ?”

Chapter 9 verse 123: " O you who believe! Fight those of the disbelievers who are near to you, and let them find harshness in you, and know that God is with those who keep their duty (unto Him).

Chapter 47 verse 4: " Now when you meet in battle those who disbelieve, then it is smiting of the necks until, when you have routed them, then making fast of bonds. "

Chapter 47 verse 35: " So do not falter and cry out for peace when you (will be) the uppermost, and God is with you, and He will not grudge (the reward of) your actions. "

The chronicle of Tabari (838-923) brings together many 'hadiths' concerning Muhammad. Some of them show that the pious Muslims were in no way shocked by his warlike behavior or even traced back to him the doctrine of the martyrdom of warriors who died in battle.

Here is for example what Tabari reports about the Battle of Badr (624).

"The Messenger of God went out to his men and urged them to battle. He promised every man that he could keep all the booty he took and the said: By him in whose hands Muhammad’s soul rests, if any man fights them today and is killed, fighting steadfastly, and with resignation, going forward and not turning back, then God will cause him to enter Paradise.”

Umayr b. Al Humam, the brother of the Banu Salimah, who was holding some dates in his hand and eating them, said: “

Excellent! All that stands between me and entering Paradise is being killed by these people!” Then he threw down the dates, took his sword, and fought the enemy until he was killed, reciting the following lines.”

These "divine" words will be constantly repeated over the centuries by commentators and theologians of Islam. Examples:

Sahih Muslim (20,4678).

It has been reported on the authority of Jabir that a man said: Messenger of God, where shall I be if I am killed? He replied: In Paradise. The man threw away the dates he had in his hand and fought until he was killed (i.e., he did not wait until he could finish the dates).

What do the hadiths say on the subject of lesser jihad? The most important piece of information it contains is that Muhammad , in course of his ten years’ stay at Medina, had engaged in as many as 82 lesser jihads of which 26 he commanded in person. These 26 jihads are called ghazwahs indicating that he became a ghazi by slaying kafirs and coming out victorious. The hadith also tell us that most of these ghazwahs were in the nature of raids or swooping down upon the enemy without previous notice. The hadiths also gives details regarding the vast wealth and the great number of men, women and children he captured in these ghazwahs. Before we give some idea of this ghanimah (plunder), it is important to realize to what extent the Quranic Revelations regarding lesser jihad are confirmed by the hadiths.

The traditional Muslim theory is that these lesser jhads were only defensive: it was for Muslims to defend themselves or defend theirs, who were persecuted, beaten and put to death (reference).

In order to finally see more clearly and determine whether it is taqiya or not, Marie-Therese Urvoy in 2007 made a detailed analysis of the use of the word jihad in the Quran.

She notes that there are 41 occurrences of the stem of this word in the Quran, six of which correspond to particular meanings ("solemn oath," five times, and "find the necessary" once).

Under 16 occurrences, the word from this stem appears in a vague and imprecise meaning of fighting for God, with a single, explicitly nonviolent reference.

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In verses (29: 8, 31:15) term from this stem points out "the negative idea of putting pressure on children wishing to become strictly monotheistic."

Marie-Therese Urvoy states that there are six occurrences (9:41 and 88, 49: 15, 61:11......) meaning the idea of" fighting with one's property and personnaly, clearly," and points out that some Quranic passages employ other terms not using the same root that incite to fight, like (9:41) Go forth, light-armed and heavy-armed ," (9: 86)" exemption" or "opposition to noncombatants" ("al-qa'idun = those who sit still") in (4:95). And finally she ends by quoting a last Quranic formulation in this analysis remits " Strive against the disbelievers and the hypocrites! Be harsh with them " appears twice (9:73, 66:99).

Marie-Therese Urvoy concludes therefore that we cannot oppose the jihad to the qital (fight). That there is, in the 18 occurrences in which the meaning remains vague, the possibility of inserting the theory of the major jihad against oneself, we can admit it. But it is illegitimate to say that the Quranic jihad is only spiritual.

On the other hand, it can be said that in the text of the Meccan period, the use of the word jihad and its derivations, seems to designate rather a spiritual war, namely to respect the instructions to resist the surrounding impiety. The supreme motto is then to hold firm. What remains compatible with the threats against the infidels, which will be realized in the Medinan period ... Moreover, to call the fight lesser jihad does not mean its elimination, and the Islamic history knew many Sufis doing their military service in the hermitages fortresses called ribat.

In his book entitled Muqaddimah, the Islamic philosopher, theologian and Muslim jurist of the 14th century, Ibn Khaldun divides Jihad in four categories:

I) Jihad of the heart: the struggle against the inner self.

II) Jihad of the tongue.

III) Jihad of the hand.

IV) Jihad of the sword.

The best known of the senses of jihad is jihad by the sword known as "lesser jihad." It is with it that we will deal today in this in a way geo-theological drill.

Dar al-Islam (literally House of Submission - to God- and / or Peace) is a word used to refer to lands under Muslim rule (s).

Dar al-Harb (Arabic domain of war) is the word that, in the later Islamic history, is used to designate non-Islamic societies.

The founders of the Muslim law schools had different opinions about the relations between the two domains.

Al-Shafi'i (767-820) theorized the doctrine that jihad is to be a permanent war against non-believers and not only when they come into conflict with Islam. This is based on a verse from the Holy Quran: " slay the idolaters wherever you find them " (chapter 9 verse 5).

When the situation in the Muslim world changed from the tenth century onward, some ulemas claimed that the shari'a did not oblige anyone to personally fulfill the duty of lesser jihad unless the domain of Islam was threatened by foreign forces. Ibn Rushd/Averroes, for example, as a Qadi, writes in his Bidayat-il Mujtahid, that some considered the jihad by the sword as not an obligation and others as an eternal obligation (Fard ayn ) for all Muslims, but that the majority argues that armed jihad is not an obligation for all Muslims individually, only an army raised by the commander of the believers is obliged to take part in this type of war.

It should be noted lastly that for many Shiite branches, the offensive lesser jihad is forbidden until the advent of the Mahdi.

Minor jihad and armed struggle.

It is the only one established by the fiqh (Muslim law) which defines it as a collective effort and duty. The holy war was not included in the religious obligations of Islam except for the Kharijites who elevated jihad to the rank of sixth pillar of Islam.

The minor jihad can be led against the infidels (kuffar) or against factions of Muslims considered as opponents and rebels.

Lesser Jihad against non-Muslims can be of two types, defensive or offensive.

1) Defensive lesser jihad.

Consists of expelling the polytheistic or equated pagans (atheists some Christians for example *) from a land of Islam and it is a Fard 'ayn, a compulsory duty on all! It is the most important obligations.

The circumstances necessary for armed lesser jihad to become an obligation for every Muslim

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(Fard ayn and not fard kifaya ) are nevertheless the following ones:

When non-Muslims enter or invade a Muslim land.

When the front lines start to get closer.

When the imam calls a person or a people for battle.

When non-Muslims capture and imprison a group of Muslims.

Concerning the first condition, the pious predecessors, those who succeeded them, the scholars of the four schools of fiqh (Maliki, Hanafi, Shafi'i and Hanbali), the reporters of Hadith (Muhaddithine) and the commentators of the Quran (Moufassirine) are unanimous to say (Ijma ) that at all Islamic times, minor jihad could become fard' ayn on all Muslims around the world against polytheistic or equated pagans (atheists some Christians *) who enter Muslim land.

So (during an invasion), the children of the country will have to participate without the permission of their parents, the wives without the permission of their husbands and the students (Taleb) without the permission of their teachers. And, if the Muslims of the country cannot expel these Polytheists or equated pagans because of the lack of forces, or for any other reason, then the Fard ayn (the obligation) is handed over the neighboring Muslims until becoming if necessary and gradually a fard ayn for all the Muslims of the Earth.

Sheikh Ibn Taymiyya said about this subject : " About the defensive jihad, which is repelling an aggressor, is the most tasking type of lesser jihad. As agreed upon by everyone, it is obligatory to protect the religion and what is sacred. The first obligation after Faith is the repulsion of the aggressor who assaults the religion and the worldly affairs. There are no conditional requirements such as supplies or transport, rather he is fought with all immediate capability.”

Hanafi School.Ibn Aabidin said: "Lesser jihad becomes compulsory (Fard Ayn) if the enemy attacks one of the borders of the Muslims, and it becomes Fard Ayn upon those close by. For those who are far away, it is Fard Kifaya)”.

MaliIki School.

The Maliki Ibrahim Ad-Dussuqi (1246-1288) wrote in his comments (volume 2 page 174): “ Lesser jihad becomes Fard Ayn (compulsory) upon a surprise attack by the enemy.” Dussuqi adds: "Wherever this happens, lesser jihad immediately becomes Fard Ayn (compulsory) upon everybody, even women, slaves and children, and they march out even if their guardians, husbands and creditors forbid them to.”

Shafi’i school.

It is said in Nihayatu-l-Mahtaj by Ramli: “If they approach one of our lands and the distance between them and us becomes less than the distance permitting the shortening of prayers (travel prayer 55 km), then the people of that territory must defend it and it becomes obligatory (Fard Ayn) even upon the people for whom there is usually no lesser jihad; the poor, the children, the slaves, the debtor and the women.”

Hanbali School.

In El Mughni, Ibn El Qadamah wrote: "Lesser jihad becomes compulsory (Fard Ayn) in three situations:

1) If the two sides meet in battle and they approach each other.

2) If the Kuffar, in other words, the polytheists or equated pagans (Atheists or some Christians *) enter a Muslim land, lesser jihad becomes Fard Ayn (compulsory) upon its people.

3) If the Imam calls people to march forwards, it is obligatory upon them to march forwards.

Tafsir Ibn Kathir. “In this verse (2:216) , God made it obligatory for the Muslims to fight in minor jihad against the evil of the enemy who transgress against Islam. Az-Zuhri said, "Lesser jihad is required from every person, whether he actually joins the fighting or remains behind. Whoever remains behind is required to give support if support is warranted; to provide aid if aid is needed and to march forth, if he is commanded to do so. If he is not needed, then he remains behind. It is reported in the Sahih:

Whoever dies but neither fought (in God’s cause), nor sincerely considered fighting, will die a death of Jahiliyyah (pre-Islamic era of ignorance)).

On the day of Al-Fath (conquest of Mecca), the Prophet said: There is no Hegira (migration from Mecca to Al-Medina) after the victory, but only jihad and good intention. If you were required to march forth, then march forth.

God's statement: (...though you dislike it) means, `Fighting is difficult and heavy on your hearts.' Indeed, fighting is as the verse describes it, as it includes being killed, wounded, striving against the enemies and enduring the hardship of travel. God then said: (. ..and it may be that you dislike

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a thing which is good for you) meaning, fighting is followed by victory, dominance over the enemy, taking over their lands, money and offspring. God continues: (...and that you like a thing which is bad for you).

This verse is general in meaning. Hence, one might covet something, yet in reality it is not good or beneficial for him, such as refraining from joining the jihad, for it might lead to the enemy taking over the land and the government. Then, God said: (God knows, but you do not know). meaning, He has better knowledge than you of how things will turn out to be in the end, and of what benefits you in this earthly life and the Hereafter. Hence, obey Him and adhere to His commands, so that you may acquire the true guidance.

Tafsir Ibn Kathir. “Sufyan Ath-Thawri narrated from his father ..........This verse (9:41) (March forth, whether you are light or heavy armed).... commented (on this verse), "Whether you are old or young, God did not leave an excuse for anyone. ....A man came forward, and he was fat, complained, and asked for permission to stay behind Jihad], but the Prophet refused. Then this verse.

2) Offensive jihad (when the non-Muslim is attacked on his own territory).

It is interesting to note that expansionist jihad is seen as an altruistic enterprise. This view has an ancient pedigree: Soon after the death of Muhammad (634), as the lesser jihad fighters burst out of the Arabian peninsula, a soon-to-be conquered Persian commander asked the invading Muslims what they wanted. They memorably replied as follows:

“God has sent us and brought us here so that we may free those who desire from servitude to earthly rulers and make them servants of God, that we may change their poverty into wealth and free them from the tyranny and chaos of [false] religions and bring them to the justice of Islam. He has sent us to bring his religion to all his creatures and call them to Islam. Whoever accepts it from us will be safe, and we shall leave him alone; but whoever refuses, we shall fight until we fulfill the promise of God” (Hugh Kennedy. The great Arab conquests. Page 112).

Fourteen hundred years later— in March 2009—Saudi legal expert Basem Alem publicly echoed this view: “As a member of the true religion, I have a greater right to invade [others] in order to impose a certain way of life [according to Shari'a], which history has proved to be the best and most just of all civilizations. This is the true meaning of offensive lesser jihad. When we wage jihad, it is not in order to convert people to Islam, but in order to liberate them from the dark slavery in which they live.”

Opinion of some Muslims on the subject (not all of them fortunately).

In this type of jihad, non-Muslims do not meet to invade Islamic lands. The fight then becomes a Fard Kifaya calling for sending an army at least once a year to "terrorize" the enemies of God. To raise and then to make go out armed units in Dar al-Harb (non-Muslim territory) from time to time every year is a duty of Faithful . It is the responsibility of the Muslim population to contribute; if no army is raised and sent to fight for it, every Muslim is then in a state of sin.

Some authors mention that this type of jihad is essential for the keeping of the payment of the jizya and fiqh or Muslim jurisprudence specialists are also of the opinion that it is obligatory to do it with all the available capacities, until that there remain only Muslims or people who submit to Islam.

Treaties and truces.As lesser jihad is an obligation as long as Islam will remain, or as long as there has not been in fact the unification of the whole world under the yoke of Islam, peace with the "infidels" can be therefore only, at least theoretically, a succession of temporary truces.

The perpetual nature of lesser jihad is underlined by the fact that, on the basis of the Hudaybiya Treaty (628) signed for 10 years between Muhammad and his Quraysh opponents in Mecca, most jurists have agreed that ten years represents the length duration maximum during which Muslims can live in peace with the infidels; once the treaty has expired, the situation needs to be re-examined. According to the example of Muhammad, who broke the treaty after two years (on the pretext of an infringement from the Quraysh), the only function of the truce is to give the weakened Muslims the time necessary to regroup before resuming the offensive: "By nature, treaties must be of temporary length, because in Muslim legal theory, normal relations between Muslim and non-Muslim territories (Dar al Harb) are not peaceful, but contentious." As a result, "fuqaha [jurists] agree that unlimited truces are illegitimate if Muslims have the necessary forces to resume the offensive against them [non-Muslims]".

Even if Sharia orders Muslims to respect the treaties, they have a way to escape this compulsion, a way that opens the door to abuses: if Muslims believe - even without serious evidence - that

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their opponents are on the verge of breaking the treaty, they can initiate action by revoking it first. Moreover, some Islamic law schools, such as the Hanafi, claim that Muslim leaders have the right to repeal treaties simply because it seems advantageous to Islam to do so. See the following canonical hadiths: "If you take an oath to do something and later on you find that something else is better, then you should expiate your oath and do what is better" (Sahih Bukhari Volume 9, Book 89, Number 260: Narrated 'Abdur-Rahman bin Samura). And what is better, what is more altruistic, than to make God’s word supreme by starting a lesser jihad anew whenever possible?

* Trinitarian Christians, that is, roughly Catholics Reformists orthodox and others.

FIFTY FOURTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

ETHICAL JUSTIFICATION OF THE FORCE.

Christianity is silent on the issue and this is one of its biggest weaknesses because it opens the door open to all abuses (torture, genocide, and so on ...). And it goes without saying that in this field the various Geneva Conventions or the Red Cross cannot be equated with Catholic or Christian canon law: even atheists can subscribe to it.

The absolute non-violence of Jainism can only encourage injustice, let us not forget that Gandhi was not the sole architect of the Indian independence. The activism of men like Subhas Chandra Bose, of the style “England's Difficulty, Ireland's Opportunity,” also played a big part in the English decision to withdraw from Indies.

The immense moral superiority of Islam in relation to Christianity is, therefore, to have gotten into an attempt of ethical control, in conformity with its legal genius, of the use of force and violence in the relations between states.

Between the ethics a little too Don Quixotic of the Fir Fer or rights of fighters in Druidism and the nothing at all of Christianity in this field, Islam occupies a golden mean evidently perfectible but it is a first notable attempt of taming of the violence.

"Law without force is nothing, force without law is a crime," and absolute Christianity in this domain leads only to a dead end.

To return to the subject that worries us, let us note first that the very meaning of the word jihad offers difficulties because of glosses and later interpretations. The choice of concepts and the meaning attributed to them raise a problem in that they have already been interpreted and that the use made of them can be conditioned by the authors' profound attitude towards the question of the lesser jihad and, more broadly, in relation to Islam. Ethnocentric ideas and prejudices, a

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priori and a posteriori, that freeze the Muslim religion in a fixed and single concept, are an obstacle. In this regard, and knowing that there is a single Islamic from the orthodox theological point of view, we insist on distinguishing between...

1) Popular and traditional Islam - or rather popular and traditional islams, different from one culture and from one region to another, and even from one individual to another, and particularly according to the concerned European Western media or intellectual circles (the TV channel Arte for example).

2) Fundamentalist and spiritualist Islam.

3) Radical Islam, or Islamism, which, sharing the moral puritanism of fundamentalism, theorizes Islam and seeks through activism to effect a politically radical change in the society.

An attentive reader cannot fail to notice the contradictory verses of the Quran, especially the way in which the verses of peace and tolerance are almost side by side with verses of violence and intolerance. The ulama were embarrassed at the outset to decide from which verses to codify the universal order: the one that affirms that coercion could not exist in the religious field (2: 256), or the one that orders the believers to fight all the non-Muslims until their conversion, or at least their submission to Islam (8:39, 9: 5, 9 : 29)?

To resolve this dilemma, commentators have developed the doctrine of abrogation, which roughly states, when there is contradiction, that the verses revealed to Muhammad lastly take precedence over those expressed at the beginning of his life. Thus, in order to determine which verse abrogates what other, a theological science devoted to the chronology of the verses of the Quran was created (it is called an-Nasikh wa'l Mansukh – what abrogates and what is abrogated).

Whereas nothing like this exists in the Quran of the Christians, which has been subdivided by the lawyers of Christianity who have followed one or two generations afterwards (the time to sort, the time that everything sorts itself out) into parts autonomous and independent of each other: childhood and hidden life, public life, preaching, passion and resurrection, etc.

The preaching part is itself subdivided into autonomous chapters independent of each other.

Why, then, is there such a difference between the Quran of the Christians and the Quran of the Muslims?

In the case of the Quran of Christians the explanation is simple.

Christianity became an official religion only very late and its lawyers could convince the court of the history of the peoples only by the force of their word and of their speech, of their very structured advocacy, of the kind paradoxes of Zeno, beginning with the Jewish world and then expanding to the Judaizing or God-fearing pagan circles, even step by step to the pagans period like Montanus.

But it was different in the case of Islam. Muhammad did not die crucified by the Romans in atrocious sufferings for wanting to take power (it was at least the accusation used against Jesus) but crucified in his bed, poisoned by Jews it is said. AFTER HAVING TAKEN POWER IN ALL THE WESTERN HALF OF ARABIAN PENINSULA.

But why should there be contradiction precisely? The classic answer is that in the early years of Islam, Muhammad and his community being outnumbered by the infidels with whom they were competing and who lived with them in Mecca, a message of peaceful coexistence was required. However, after the exile of the Muslims in Medina in 622, and the development of their warlike force, the verses inciting them to the offensive were progressively "revealed" to them, that is to say, in principle sent by God, as the power of the Muslims increased.

In the legal texts, these verses are classified into different categories: passivity facing aggression; permission to respond to aggressors; command inciting to fight the aggressors; command inciting to fight all non-Muslims whether they were initially aggressors or not . The development of Muslim power is the only variable provided to explain these gradual changes in policy.

Other scholars reinforce this view, pointing out that over a period of 22 years the Quran was gradually revealed and initially favored verses that did not require action and remained spiritual in nature before moving on to prescriptions and injunctions calling for the spread of faith through lesser jihad and conquest, so as not to put off the first Muslim converts from the duties that are those of Islam and to prevent them from being discouraged by the obligations which will appear only in the later verses.

This lesser jihad or siyar is studied in almost all the tracts of Muslim law. It has also been frequently discussed in books on the caliphate or on general political problems, such as those of

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Abu Yusuf, al-Mawardi, Ibn Taymiya or Ibn Khaldun. The discipline has also been the subject of special tracts, such as those of Chaybani and Sarakhsi.

The repertoire of traditional texts on lesser jihad is very broad and often redundant. The tracts on the subject exist in the form of commentaries and discussions and, even if they have not been gathered in a specific corpus, they together constitute the doctrine.

The doctrine of the lesser jihad was fixed much earlier than the Muslim law of nations of which it is a part, that is to say in the second half of the thirteenth century, and its formulation was worked out in parallel with the great movement of Islam expansion, especially with the wars against the Byzantine and Sassanid empires. The traditional theologian jurists have made the numerous campaigns led by Muhammad against Mecca and other regions in Arabia, then against the Byzantines, a precedent in the name of which the warlike raids (maghazi) will be legitimized by religion. For theologians, the "holy wars" become intrinsic to history and are henceforth part of the worship that must be paid to God (Morabia, p. 200). "Classical authors, for different reasons, detached Quranic rules from their historical justification and context and transplanted them in all other cases."

In the traditional tracts of Muslim law, the lesser jihad is therefore a war made with weapons against the concrete unbelievers, not a spiritual struggle. The expression jihad al-asghar is not used to the best of our knowledge in these texts, the word jihad period is used.

To the interpretation of the fuqaha of the traditional time a, for whom lesser jihad means offensive holy war, is opposed that of the Reformists for whom lesser jihad means defensive holy war or just war and many hadiths place the jihad very high in the hierarchical order of religious duties, before pilgrimage or prayer. Hence the translation of "holy war" that is used frequently in order to speak of it.

The earliest collection of hadiths, that of Imam Malik, the Al-Muwatta contains nothing explicit about the goals of the lesser jihad. There is, however, the expression "jihad fi sabili Allah" which is frequent, and once the order, "Loot in the name of God ..." (vol. 1, p. 298). The atmosphere of the whole is very pious. The martyrdom seems to be the almost unique motive of the combatants. The most pious Muslims, the most willing to fight, are valued. The fraud in the spoils is condemned several times: the lesser jihad is therefore a matter of piety, not the opportunity to make good business. A hadith opposes jihad and contempt for the goods of this world (a few dates!) It is immediately followed by the saying of one of the Companions who distinguishes good and bad expeditions, but in spite of the context, it is difficult to see in it the condemnation of offensive wars or profit wars.

In the Sira of Ibn Hisham, the doctrine of the jihad al-talab wa'l-ibtida or lesser offensive jihad is clearly established. The vision of the conquests which is reported (at the moment when the Prophet strikes the rock by digging the trench before the battle of the same name), shows that the Sira is later than the conquests and seeks to justify them, as most of the provisions of classical Muslim law besides.

Independently of all the facts, it is worth noting for the intelligence of the phenomenon that lesser jihadist expansionism is considered an altruistic act, for the supreme good of mankind lies in its agreement with the law of God.

Aim of the Islamic state in the lesser jihad. It is necessary to distinguish the collective goals, those assumed by the Islamic State, from the individual goals.

While the lesser defensive jihad is an individual obligation (jard 'ayn), which requires the mobilization of all the faithful without exception, the lesser offensive jihad is a collective obligation (jard kifaya) that falls to the community as a whole. This means concretely that if there is a sufficient number of warriors, the other people able to participate in the fighting are exempted from them. There is a large majority on this issue.

The fighter must have a right intention, that of fighting the unbeliever and not that of plundering or getting glory. This obligation is religious and the Muslim dead are martyrs certain of ascending to heaven.

This fighter must fulfill a number of conditions. He must be male, Muslim, pubescent, sane, free (non-slave), defect free (non-disabled, non-sick), lastly able to support his expenses of maintenance in the campaign (Quran 9: 91). This last condition is omitted among the Hanafi who insist on another: the combatant must not leave debts due for payment without the permission of his creditor, what the other rites do not consider as obligatory but only recommended. Young people must have the permission of their parents, but there are differences of opinions when the

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parents are not Muslims. Non-combatants must assist the warriors, especially by their money (Quran 4: 95, 9: 41).

Fuqaha are unanimous in saying that the obligation of the lesser jihad may become individual in the event of a surprise attack by the enemy and impose itself even on the wife without the authorization of the husband, on the slave without the authorization of his master and on the child without the authorization of his father. The faithful who refuses to join this lesser jihad is punished by the absence of homage paid to his remains once he is dead, what an exceptional after-death in the Muslim Law is.

FIFTY FIFTH RANDOM DRILLING IN THE MUSLIM CORPUS.

LACK OF CRITICAL MIND OR...?

You only have to browse the internet a little to see how websites run by pious Muslims...often lack CRITICAL MIND...OR DO NOT TAKE THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE, HISTORY, OR OTHERS,INTO ACCOUNT.

The closing of the gates of Ijtihad, Insidad bab al Ijtihad in Arabic, ordered by the Caliph al Qadir in 1019 (Rissala al Qadiriya) FORMED AN UNPRECEDENTED CIVILIZATIONAL DECLINE FOR HUMANITY, a twilight of old age before the time when imagination is reduced, creative faculties diminished and thought ankylosed (Mohamed Charfi, Islam and Liberty. Paris 1999).

What often characterizes a religion indeed, Biblism was a very good example of it before the 17th century, it is the begging the question that is to say, the sophism which consists in supposing proved what is in question or in defining an object by the word which needs to be defined.

For example…."Why does opium makes people sleep? Because it has a sleep-inducing property.

Or still…

"Abortion causes the unjustified death of a human being and this is a murder. Murder is illegal. So, abortion is illegal.”

The conclusion is simply a rewriting of some of the premises. In more difficult cases, the premises are the consequence of the conclusion.

“Poisonous snakes are useful because without them one could not make the serum immunizing against their venom.”

Begging the question should not be confused with the circular argument: the circular reasoning is a begging the question ut the opposite is not (always) true.

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A circular argument is reasoning in which a proposition A uses for its justification a proposition B at the same time that the justification of proposition B requires the validity of proposition A.

Example:” Our bureaucracy is a crucial element in our functioning (proposition A), because it generates many documents, which I remind you, are extremely precious (proposition B) since useful to the correct functioning of our so vital glorious bureaucracy !”

The circular reasoning is comic because, obvious in short sentences, this type of argument becomes much more difficult to detect when the loop is longer and has more than two elements. Because the "return" is less obvious in the eyes, whereas on the contrary, all the construction of the argumentation seems (and is) locally and at every moment, relevant and logical.

We have a perfect illustration of this type of circular reasoning with the notion of uncreated Quran .

Idolatry (definition in dictionary): worship of a physical object as a god, immoderate attachment or devotion to something. From Medieval Latin idolatria, alteration of Late Latin idololatria, from Greek eidololatreia, from eidolon idol + -latreia –latry. First known use: 13th century.

MUSLIM CASUISTRY OR TAQIYYA NOW.

Unlike the original Christian tradition for example (see the case of the lapsi martyrs or confessors of the faith during the “great” persecution *), Muslims who were forced to choose between denying (true) Islam or being persecuted (e.g., by Sunnis) received from the Quran itself the right to lie and to feign apostasy.

In its best-known form, taqiyya is a practice that consists in concealing one's membership in a religious group and practicing one's religion in secret with the specific purpose of escaping persecution.

Concealment can be passive (by hiding), or go to the active stage (going so far as to feign the religious habits and customs of the adversaries) because the Quran expressly states that those who have been forced to apostasy will be forgiven.

By taking advantage of these divine verses and decrees, taqiyya has thus become a historically adopted behavior in suppressed Shiite or Kharijite Muslim minorities, who have largely used it in the face of the attacks by the Muslim (most often Sunni) majority. It is not then a question of denying Islam but of hiding one’s own convictions to its oppressors (whether they are Muslims members of other Muslim denominations or "infidels").

Taqiyya is not, as is often believed, a phenomenon limited to Shiism. Of course, as a minority group scattered among their Sunni enemies, Shiites have historically had more reason to hide. Conversely, Sunni Islam quickly dominated vast empires that extended from Spain to China. As a result, his followers were not accountable to anyone, they did not have to apologize for anything, and they did not have to hide from the unbelieving infidels (among the few exceptions are Spain and Portugal during the Reconquista, when the Sunnis actually concealed their religious identity).

One of the few books devoted to the subject, At-Taqiyya fi'l-Islam (Taqiyya in Islam), shows very clearly that taqiyya is not limited to the concealment of Shiites threatened with persecution. Written by Sami Mukaram, a former professor of Islamic Studies at the American University of Beirut and author of some twenty-five books on Islam, this book clearly highlights the ubiquity and broad applicability taqiyya .

“Taqiyya is of fundamental importance in Islam. Practically every Islamic sect agrees to it and practices it … We can go so far as to say that the practice of taqiyya is mainstream in Islam, and that those few sects not practicing it diverge from the mainstream … Taqiyya is very prevalent in Islamic politics, especially in the modern era” (page 7).

THE QuRANIC FOUNDING PRINCIPLES.

Some verses of the Quran are frequently cited to justify taqiyya.

Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 195. " Be not cast by your own hands to ruin3.

Holy Quran chapter 3, verse 28: "Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference to believers. Whosoever does that has no connection with God unless (it be) that you but guard yourselves against them.”

Holy Quran chapter 4 verse 29: “And do not kill one another. Lo! God is ever Merciful unto you.”

And finally...

Holy Quran chapter 16, verse 106. " Whosoever disbelieves in God after his belief - save him who is forced thereto and whose heart is still content with the Faith - but whosoever finds ease in disbelief: On them is wrath from God . Theirs will be an awful doom.

Let us pass over the case of the two verses, which condemn suicide in the broadest sense of the

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term. The second one even disapproves of any suicidal attitude. Let us admit that every human being has the right to lie in order to save his life, it is not very glorious, but it is very human and as my old master Pierre Lance once said: "Children don’t blame to your fathers not to have been heroes, HEROES HAVE NO CHILD! Primum survivere, therefore, as the ancients said, and at the level of the individual it is up to each person to see in all honesty. Who can blame, for example, the deportees in the Nazi death camps who have agreed to bury or burn the bodies of their murdered brothers .....in order to survive? In any case not me!

There remains the moral problem raised by chapter 3 verse 28 and chapter 16 verse 106.

Let us come quickly to the simplest case, a little in the tradition of the first (the prohibition of suicide or suicidal attitudes), chapter 16 verse 106. " Whosoever disbelieves in God after his belief - save him who is forced thereto and whose heart is still content with the Faith - but whosoever finds ease in disbelief: On them is wrath from God . Theirs will be an awful doom.”

This defensive attitude can very well be understood at the beginning. It was also most often practiced by the Shiites in the face of Sunni political and religious authorities.

The moral question is: Should we extend this attitude even when our life is not at stake, even when our property is not at stake ??? That is to say no longer in a defensive mode but in an offensive mode ???

Muhammad ibn Jarir at Tabari (died 923), author of a traditional commentary on the Quran which is authoritative, explains as follows verse 28 of chapter 3 of the Quran: " Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference to believers. Whosoever does that has no connection with God unless (it be) that you but guard yourselves against them.”

If you [Muslims] are under their [non-Muslims’] authority, fearing for yourselves, behave loyally to them with your tongue while harboring inner animosity for them … [know that] God has forbidden believers from being friendly or on intimate terms with the infidels rather than other believers—except when infidels are above them [in authority]. Should that be the case, let them act friendly towards them while preserving their religion.

About this same verse Quran 3:28, Ibn Kathir (d. 1373), another standard authority on the Quran, writes, “Whoever at any time or place fears … evil [from non-Muslims] may protect himself through outward show.”

As proof of this, he quotes Muhammad’s close companion Abu Darda, who said, “Let us grin in the face of some people while our hearts curse them.”

Other prominent scholars, such as Abu Abdullah al-Qurtubi (1214-1273) and Muhyi al-Din ibn al-Arabi (1165-1240), have extended taqiyya to cover deeds. In other words, Muslims can behave like infidels and worse—for example, by bowing down and worshiping idols and crosses, offering false testimony, and even exposing the weaknesses of their fellow Muslims to the infidel enemy—anything short of actually killing a Muslim. "The taqiyya, even practiced out of all restraint, does not lead to a state of infidelity - even if it leads to a sin deserving of hellfire” (Mukaram, At-Taqiyya fi ‘l-Islam, pp. 30-7). (Mukaram, At-Taqiyya fi ‘l-Islam, pp. 30-7.) In other words, it is not the most unforgivable of sins, it is a serious sin, certainly, but it remains nevertheless forgivable because God is love clemency and mercy.

The concepts of "houses" or "divisions" of the world in Islam, such as Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb, do not appear in the Quran.

In the Muslim tradition, however, the world is initially divided into only two parts: Dar al-Islam or the "land of submission to God" and Dar al-Harb, the "land of war."

"Dar al-Islam" initially refers to countries where Shariah law applies and then, by extension, to countries with a Muslim majority and/or governed by Muslims, and which should, according to Islamist movements and parties, be governed according to Shariah law.

As for "Dar al-Harb," it is the rest : the countries where Islam has yet to be brought in, the word "Harb" meaning "war" in various senses of the word, military war of conquest, but also "war" through the tongue with other cults and beliefs, i.e., proselytizing and missionary effort.

These terms do not appear in the Quran or the Hadiths, but appear (in connection with the conquests of the Umayyads, Abbasids and Ottomans) among the theologians who define "Dar al-Islam" as the set of countries where you can publicly perform the five daily calls to prayer, live according to the dictates of Islam and build mosques. Traditionally, in these territories, the non-Muslim has the status of dhimmi ("protected," but some "protected" who must deserve this protection by paying a tax: the jezia ).

As the relations of Muslim states with the rest of the world became more complex, other

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designations appeared which led to a division of the world into three. Dar al-Islam, Dar al-Kufr (or Harb) and Dar al-'Ahd (or Suhl)

Dar al-Kufr , "land of infidels" or "land of unbelief") is a term used to designate territories where Sharia law was once applied, but no longer applies, as in the case of the Iberian Peninsula after the reconquest, or the State of Israel.

Dar al-Kufr" is therefore a territory that was (or should be) part of "Dar al-Islam" but has joined "Dar al-Harb."

Some jurists and theologians have advocated the defensive minor jihad that allows one to fight the infidels only if they attack first. But most have adopted the offensive lesser jihad, which advocates war as soon as circumstances are favorable. An intermediate position consists in authorizing jihad with the aim of recovering lost Muslim territories (Jerusalem, Andalusia, Kashmir, Palestine...), following the principle that all gains are irreversible at the borders as well as at the heart of Islam: it is not allowed that a Muslim convert to another religion nor that a Muslim land returns to mistrust, even if Muslims become a minority. Which brings us back to the question of jihad.

Let us concede from the outset that for mystical minds the term has above all a spiritual meaning, but the fact remains that this is not the case for certain suras of the Quran, too numerous for our taste, and that we must, as Alfred Morabia has clearly shown, take the changing dynamics of this concept in the collective Muslim mentality into account.

For Raymond Ibrahim (Coptic Christian specialist of Islam) taqiyya is used mainly in two cases. The best known is the situation when it is a question of masking one's religious identity when one fears a persecution. This is the historical use of taqiyya in Shiite communities everywhere and whenever their Sunni rivals were more numerous and therefore threatened them. Conversely, Sunni Muslims, far from suffering persecution, and whenever they have had the opportunity, have unleashed jihad against the kingdom of disbelief (Dar al Harb) and that's where they deployed taqiyya - not as a hiding maneuver but as an active deceit. In fact, deceit, which finds its basis in the doctrine of Islam, is often described as equal to - or superior to - other universal military virtues such as courage, bravery, or sense of sacrifice.

According to one Arabic legal manual devoted to jihad as defined by the four schools of Sunni Islamic law, “The ulema agree that deceit during warfare is legitimate … deceit is a form of art in war.” Moreover, according to Mukaram, , this deceit is classified as taqiyya: “Taqiyya in order to dupe the enemy is permissible.” Several scholars believe that deceits are an integral part of the management of war: Ibn al-Arabi declares that “in the hadith [words and actions of Muhammad] the practice of deceit in a war is well described. Moreover, it is presented as more necessary than courage. Ibn al-Munir (died 1333) wrote: "War is a deceit, that is, the most complete and perfect war it is possible to wage in the holy war is a war of deceit and not of confrontation, because it is intrinsically dangerous and it is possible to get victory by cheating without suffering damage oneself. ".This Muslim notion that war is anyway a gigantic deceit in itself goes back to the Battle of the Trench (year 627), which pitted Muhammad and his followers against several non-Muslim tribes known as Al-Ahzab : the Confederates. One of the members of these Confederates, Na‘im ibn Mas‘ud, went to the Muslim camp and converted to Islam. When Muhammad discovered that the Ahzab or Confederates were unaware of his conversion, he told Mas‘ud to return and try to get the Ahzab forces to abandon the siege. It was then that Muhammad memorably would have declared, “For war is deceit.” Mas‘ud returned therefore to the Ahzab without their knowing that he had switched sides and intentionally began to give his former kin and allies bad advice. He also went to great lengths to instigate quarrels between the various tribes until, thoroughly distrusting each other, they disbanded, lifting de facto the siege imposed on Muslims thus saving Islam still in the germ from a defeat that would have been fatal for it.

That Islam legitimates lies during the war is obviously not surprising.

Sun Tzu and Machiavelli justified the lie to the war. To deceive the enemy during a war falls within common sense.

It is necessary to be daft as a brush or to have a sense of honor a little too exacerbated like the great Irish king Cunocavaros / Conchobar to jump into the lion’s den and to trumpet including for his worst enemies the place where you will set up your camp. So, of course, sure enough the case (the battle of Ros na Rig) would have turned disaster if a superhero (the hesus Cuchulainn) had not come to reverse the situation.

The problem with Islam is that the war against the infidels is a war that must last, according to the

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very terms of the Holy Quran chapter 8 verse 39: " And fight them until religious clashes (civil war, civil disorder) are no more, and religion is all for God. But if they cease, then lo! God is Seer of what they do ."

Holy Quran chapter 9 verse 29: " Fight against such of those who have been given the Scripture as do not believe in God nor the Last Day, and forbid not that which God hath forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth (?), until they pay the tribute [of dhimmis] readily, being brought low.”

N.B. The four Sunni schools of case law indeed agree that "jihad is when Muslims make war against infidels, after they have called them for embracing Islam or at least pay the tribute [jizya] and to live under the protectorate, and that they refused ."

Peace with non-Muslim nations is therefore only a temporary situation; only random can justify it temporarily ."

The following anecdote, which appears in all the former lives of Muhammad, illustrates in a still more convincing way the legitimacy of the lie to infidels. The poet, Ka'b ibn Ashraf, offended Muhammad, prompting the latter to exclaim, "Who will kill this man who has hurt God and his prophet?" A young Muslim named Muhammad ibn Maslama volunteered on condition that in order to get close enough to Ka'b to assassinate him, he be allowed to lie to the poet. Muhammad agreed. Ibn Maslama traveled to Ka'b and began to denigrate Islam and Muhammad. He carried on in this way till his disaffection became so convincing that Ka'b took him into his confidence. Soon thereafter, Ibn Maslama appeared with another Muslim and, while Ka'b's guard was down, and killed him (Ibn Ishaq, The Life of Muhammad ,Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1997, pp. 367-8).

The (moral) problem of the abrogation practice of abrogation (verses abrogating verses abrogated).

Of course, other writings contain contradictions, but the Quran is the only book whose commentators have built a doctrine to explain the very visible differences even contradictions that appear from one injunction to another. No attentive reader can fail to notice the many contradictory verses of the Quran, and more specifically the way in which peaceful and tolerant verses appear almost alongside violent and intolerant verses. The ulemas were initially thrown when it came to determining the verses to be codified : the one who asserts that there is no compulsion in religion (2: 256), or those which command believers to fight all non-Muslims until they are converted, or at least subjected to Islam (8:39, 9: 5, 9:29)? To get out of this embarrassment, commentators have developed the doctrine of abrogation, which essentially states that in case of disagreement, the verses revealed later in Muhammad's career take precedence over earlier verses. In order to know what verses abrogated what others, it appeared a religious science devoted to the chronology of the Quranic verses (it is called an-Nasikh wa'l Mansukh, the abrogating and the abrogated one).

But why are there contradictions?

The explanation of the pious Muslims is that, over a period of twenty-two years, the Quran was revealed in fragments, passing from passive and spiritual verses to prescriptions and injunctions of law to spread the faith through jihad and conquest, and this simply to make possible the acclimatization of the first Muslim converts to the obligations of Islam and to avoid discouraging them from the beginning by the spectacular compulsions that were to be revealed in later verses (that would have been out of context when the war was not conceivable in the facts).

Other writers consider that in the early years of Islam, Muhammad and his community being far less numerous than their infidel opponents while living next to them in Mecca, a message of peace and coexistence was on today's agenda. But when the Muslims emigrated to Medina in 622 and acquired military strength, the verses urging them to take the offensive were gradually "revealed" - in principle, sent by God - always in agreement with the (growing) capacities of Islam. In the legal texts, these verses are classified in 4 levels: passivity with regard to the aggression, authorization to riposte against the aggressors, orders to fight the aggressors, orders to fight all the non-Muslims, that they commit aggression or not. The growing strength of Muslims is the only parameter that explains this gradual change in policy.

Some Muslim scholars like Ibn Salama (who died in 1020) agree that verse 9: 5 of the Quran, known as the verse of the sword (ayat as-sayf), repealed some 124 more peaceful verses from Mecca, as well as "all the verses of the Quran that order or imply less than a total offensive against unbelievers."

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Other authors, finally, consider that there are no abrogating verses nor abrogated verses, that all the verses keep their own value, and that the only problem is to know when to implement them.

The moral difficulty of this interpretation is that there are no clear and convincing criteria (such as those of just war in the West, for example) to determine when (for example) a war is fair.Or should we consider then that the following is a good example ???????????

"When Muslims are weak and in a minority position, they should preach and behave according to the ethos of the Meccan verses (peace and tolerance); when strong, however, they should go on the offensive on the basis of what is commanded in the Medinan verses (war and conquest).

The vicissitudes of Islamic history are a testimony to this dichotomy, best captured by the popular Muslim notion, based on a hadith that, if possible, jihad should be performed by the hand (force), if not, then by the tongue (through preaching); and, if that is not possible, then with the heart or one's intentions.

SOME EXAMPLES OF MODERN TAQIYYA.

Dictionary definitions in order to begin.The euphemism, from the Greek: "Euphemismos," from the Greek "phemi" ("I speak") and "eu" ("good, fortunately"), is a figure of speech which consists of easing or softening an unpleasant idea by having recourse to a litotes or a paraphrase mainly. One also speaks of "euphemism of propriety" when there is a disguise of unpleasant ideas. The euphemism is primarily aimed at an easing effect of reality; it has the hyperbole as antonyms.

Learning exegesis is also part of the standard training of imams and "the most famous exegeses are translated into many languages, including French, and are successful in selling," notes Sami Aldeeb.

But let us now come to the case of Tariq Ramadan, of whom we do not know whether it falls within the exegesis intended to evade the issue or within the euphemism of the same water.

The verse: "No compulsion in religion ..." Quran 2/256 radiates in an eminently demanding space and we would be wrong to do without the training conditions it presupposes ."

We do not think to betray his thinking by translating, in perhaps more accessible terms, that this verse applies only to properly trained Muslims living in an entirely Muslim space.

LA IKRATA FI AD DINI.

In Islamic lands "No compulsion in religion" really? Let us check ...

Sami Aldeeb considered the question ... and its answers.

This specialist in Islamic law offers us an analysis of text through dozens of exegetes in a book entitled: "No compulsion in religion: interpretation of Quranic verse 2: 256 over centuries."

Here is first this verse in its entirety, translated by the author: "No compulsion in religion! The right direction was distinguished from straying. Whoever disbelieves in idols, and believes in God, holds the most secure and unbreakable handle. God is listener, knower.”

Yes, all right, it's not a schoolyard talk. But our friend Aldeeb who moves without problems in the arcanes of the Arabic language is there to guide us.

According to him this principle of non-compulsion represents progress in comparison with the Christianity of the seventh century (see the role of Heraclius, duly noted), but a relapse if we consider the Arab society polytheist which accepted all religions.

Whatever the case may be in an Islamic state, this maxim in no way manifests itself as the freedom of practicing the religion of one's choice.

This text, Aldeeb tells us, is one of the countless examples of incomprehensible and controversial verses. It also contradicts the hadith (acts and words of Muhammad): "He who changes his religion, kill him!" dictate inscribed in sharia law and still confirmed in 1996 in a unified Arab penal code, adopted unanimously by the Council of the Arab Ministers of Justice, published on the website of the Arab League.

To return to our verse, many exegetes have heated their neurons so that the light emerges. Sami Aldeeb quotes some 80 of them, in Arabic with summary and commentary.

The specialists immerse themselves into the hadiths to detect what are called the causes of the revelation: asbab al nuzul. It will be for us in this case to examine under what circumstances this verse of "tolerance" was revealed (through a long chain of transmitters, isnad), then to draw from it the conclusions.

Six hadiths are taken into account. In one there are children suckled by Jewish women, in another two sons converted to Christianity by two Syrian traders, in a third the slave of Umar Wassak, and so on.

All illustrate an example of compulsion - or not - to conversion.

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The main conclusions of the legal scholars can be summarized as follows:

1) "No compulsion in religion" means for any exegete the right to leave Islam or not to practice his obligations (fast, prayer, alms, etc.) The Muslim born are forbidden to change their religion. Apostasy is forbidden.

2) The overwhelming majority of exegetes believe that the general meaning of the verse (that is, absolute freedom) has been abrogated by the verses that order the fight against other religions. Let us remind that the abrogation rule has been imagined in order to eliminate the contradictions in the Quran.

3) Verse 2: 256 remains valid only in the sense of non-imposition of the conversion to "people of the book" (mainly Christians and Jews). They must choose between converting to Islam or keeping their religion but while paying the special tax called jizya, what is well a compulsion besides. If they refuse one of these two options, they are put to death, the alternative is simple.

4) Polytheists or pagans and perhaps atheists or agnostics have the choice only between conversion or death. “They must be eliminated from the face of the earth,” as one of the modern exegetes writes, says Aldeeb. This explains why Muslims do not seem moved by the massacre of more than 80 million Hindus between 1000 and 1525 **, they were polytheists.

And these great jurists of Islam of the seventh century do not forget anything in their quest for the Truth. They stipulate, for example, that a polytheist who converts to a religion of the book (Judaism or Christianity) will still be treated as a polytheist. What means he must either convert to Islam or die. As for the children of Jewish and Christian prisoners, they will be forcibly converted to Islam.

5) And finally, icing on the cake, Al Tabari points out that there is a definite article before the word religion (AL DIN, the exact expression being La ikrata fi ad-dini ) and that the definite Arabic article attached to the word din means that it is only a reference to Islam. If the text had wanted to refer to the universal religious fact understood in the Western way ("No compulsion in [the field of] religion"), the word din was not the most appropriate in view of the Quranic vocabulary itself. In the Quran, the term millah precisely means religion-doctrine in general, and the term ibadah refers to religion as a divine service of worship: they would have been more appropriate.

The interpretations mentioned do not prevent the modern exegetes from equating the principle of "no compulsion in religion" with that of religious freedom guaranteed by human rights. Now, it can be seen, it is totally contrary to him. Not a single Muslim country exempts from compulsions the followers of other religions or atheists, either from a civil or a criminal point of view. None of these countries accepts the principle of religious freedom as expressed , for example, by Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights ***. None of these countries admit that a Muslim may leave one’s religion freely. Whoever does it is forbidden to marry, separated from his wife and children, deprived of inheritance, and can be killed with impunity by a member of his family in case the state does not punish him with death.

In the end, the use of this verse by imams and other Muslim devotees is just one of the many cons designed to make us swallow the Quranic holy tolerance ... Knowing that no one will check.

So let's conclude with a dictionary definition.The truth is the quality of what is true. It is the conformity of the idea with its object, the conformity of what is said or thought with what is real.

*We will return to the question of the martyrs of the first Christianity, the number of which has been greatly exaggerated. Not to mention that in many cases these fundamentalists intolerant and aggressive towards other worships asked well for it ( public nuisance, refusal to take an oath of loyalty to the state, suicidal attitude, etc.)

** Estimate of Professor Kishori Saran Lal in his book "Growth of Muslim Population in Medieval India".

*** The Swiss constitution of our friend Sami Aldeeb, like the international conventions, does not distinguish between "people of the books" and followers of other beliefs. No coercion or discrimination based on religion is allowed, including in matrimonial or inheritance matters. Everyone can choose his religion from the age of reason. The freedom to join or leave it is complete. This is a true example of "no compulsion in religion".

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CONCLUSION.

It is OK, God is merciful and forgiving [Holy Quran. Chapter 1 verse 1] No compulsion in religion [Holy Quran chapter 2 verse 256].

But Islam is not its heresies or minorities like the Sufis. Islam is not either the Quran (an antibook), Islam is the Quran + the hadiths + the life of Muhammad (isma) + the thinking of the doctors in Islamic law (sharia) + the fiqh. These are the five real pillars of Islam.

But perhaps we have not understood the deep spirituality of this religion of love (of clemency and mercy).

As we have not been really clarified by all these soundings into the depths of Islam (since we still do not understand anything) so perhaps the best is to begin at the beginning that is to say to look a little on its history.

The most important part of the discussions possible from the Quran finally amounts, for Muslims, to the delicate question of the adaptation to modern times of rules expressed at a very different time and in a very particular context: that of the city dwellers and Bedouins of the Arabian desert around the 7th century.

It is not of “how many angels can dance on the head of a pin “ that we dispute here, there is no metaphysical background or philosophical issue behind the quarrels and discussions that fuel the intellectual field in the Islamic world, but practical questions, the transposition of the way of life displayed by Muhammad or demanded by the Quran becoming more and more inconvenient in the modern world. Moreover, even this extremely limited margin of interpretation or adaptation was considered exhausted for the most part as early as the 9th century with the end of the Mu’tazili current. To understand this phenomenon, it is important to look at the history of the development of the Islamic

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religion. During the first three centuries of Islam, the learned Muslims practiced Ijtihad, "the effort of interpretation of the sacred texts," using human reason, which gave rise to intense intellectual creativity. But in the twelfth century, under the pressure of conservative nations (Arabia, Iran, Mesopotamia, Syria, Egypt), the gates of Ijtihad were closed.

This fundamentalist wave reached the shores of North Africa and Andalusia. The Islamic civilization never recovered from this "cultural suicide," this curfew imposed on the critical mind, despite the influence of the Mogol empire in India, of the Safavid dynasty in Iran and of the power of the Ottoman Empire. To the confrontation with other cultures (Indian mathematics, Greek philosophy and Persian astronomy), Jewish or Christian or even Indo-European religions (Zoroastrianism) succeeded a literal reading of the Quran, a rigorous interpretation of religion closed to all other knowledge.

Muslims wonder how we can be wicked enough to attack the Quran. I will tell them (text copied from what Robert G. Ingersoll said about the Holy Bible in 1894).

This book stayed and stopped the onward movement of the human race. This book poisoned the fountains of learning and misdirected the energies of man. This book is the enemy of freedom, the support of slavery. This book sowed the seeds of hatred in families and nations, fed the flames of war, and impoverished the world. This book is the breastwork of kings and tyrants—the enslaver of women and children. This book has made colleges and universities the teachers of error and the haters of science. This book has filled the world with hateful, cruel, ignorant and warring sects. This book taught men to kill their fellows for soul’s sake. This book invented the Inquisition (Hisbah/Mihna ), built the dungeons in which the good or most unhappy languished, forged the chains that rusted in their flesh, erected the scaffolds whereon they died.

For examples the zandaqua ibn al-Muqaffa (died in 760), Bashar Ibn Burd (died in 785), Abu Nuwas (died 810), Al Mutanabbi (died in 965), Abul-ala al-Ma’arri (died in 1057), Al Suhrawardi (1154-1191).

This book drove reason from the minds of millions and filled the asylums with the insane. This book filled the African trails or the sails of the slave trader in the Indian Ocean and made merchandise of human flesh. This book lighted the fires that burned heretics like Mansur Al-Hallaj in 922. This book filled the bodies of men and women with devils or jinns. This book polluted the souls of men with the infamous dogma of Hell and eternal pain.

Holy Quran chapter VI verse 68. " When you see those who meddle with Our revelations, withdraw from them until they meddle with another topic. And if the devil causes you to forget, sit not, after the remembrance, with the congregation of wrongdoers.”

This book made credulity the greatest of virtues, and investigation the greatest of crimes. This book placed the ignorant and unclean jihadist above the philosopher and philanthropist. We attack therefore this book because it is the enemy of human liberty—the greatest obstruction across the highway of human progress.

Let us ask to the journalists and intellectuals of our country one question: How can you be wicked enough to defend this book?

The first impression that emerges from these drills in the land of Islam (Dar al Islam) is that "So long as Islam endures, the reconciliation of its adherents, even with Jews and Christians, and still more with the rest of mankind (pagans atheists agnostics) must continue to be an insoluble problem." (James Lorimer).

The ontological problem of Islam is precisely that its radical design of the "God" is a total stalemate (formal, logical, theological, existential, etc.) and that it is, as absolute separation, inhuman as much as "un-divine," literally. Even the Quran is verily "impossible thing" in such a perspective. "God," in this framework, is a word that designates no longer anything that relates so small it is to what it means everywhere else, including for other "monotheistic" traditions. Since the disaster of the closure of the gates of Ijtihad in the 11th century Islam removes all relation to the most living life, wants to impose a "revelation" stuck, definitely and down to the last comma, within the human future. It is of a radical simplicity, not to say of a frightening simplistic view, that is to say it is dangerous, especially with the ignorant ones, and without doubt still more with the half-cultivated ones.

In these conditions we understand that R.P. Henry Boulad could write that "Islamism is Islam in all its logic, in all its rigor. Islamism is present in Islam as the chick in the egg, as the fruit in the flower, as the tree in the seed.” In short, Islam is for Islamism what mobilization is for war.

GOD (CONCEIVED AS ALLAH) IS THE GREATEST COMMON DIVISOR OF MANKIND.

War, razzia, conquest, submission, control of the whole world and of the totality of all human life are consubstantial with Islam, because omnipresent in the Quran and in the life of Muhammad (Sira) which clarifies it to a degree, unfortunately that we do not meet in any other "religion," to such an extent that we must also wonder about this term, which is probably not the best suited to correctly name the entire phenomenon Islam. In Arabic, there are the words millah and ibadah, which mean just

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that, but the term most often used term is "Din," which means rather Law.

This book does not make fun of Islam: what is happening in the world around Islam is too serious to laugh at and the only incitentive to murder that you will find here are those contained in some verses of the Quran.

AND NOW THESE SOME TRUTHS ABOUT THE BIBLE OF ISLAM HAVE BEEN HAMMERED HOME, WHAT TO DO (AS LENIN COULD HAVE SAID)?

The Islam that must legitimately be called to mind by the modern man is not a race but a politico-religious ideology in the sense in which Gustave LE BON understood it (in his study of crowd psychology).

The question of orthodoxy does not only arise in the Christian world of the Middle Ages. It is also expressed in the Muslim world through the notion of ijtihad, a word with complex content but which means roughly research, effort of reflection.

Islam has had a flourishing period that has experienced a significant development of critical mind, fueled in particular by the distribution of Arabic translations of Greek authors. This period was stopped around the 11th-12th centuries, known as the "closing of the gates of ijtihad." This process happens precisely when it can be said that the "gates of ijtihad" open in the Christian West through the introduction of Aristotelian thought, by the means of Muslim thinkers such as Averroes.

The Muslim culture was then of an incredible wealth in all fields: mathematics, natural sciences, medicine, arts. It had assimilated the cultural contribution of the ancient Greek world but also that of India even China. When the Crusaders arrived in the Holy Land, they appeared - rightly - in the eyes of the Arabs, as crude and ignorant barbarians.

The result of this closing of the gates of Ijtihad is that you can no longer today be at the same time a true Muslim and a reformer it is a contradiction in terms, an oxymoron. Let us not forget that the Quran promises the most severe punishments to those who will follow only a part of these divine laws and not others, what by definition excludes all so-called moderate Islam.

Chapter 2 verse 85: " Believe you in part of the Scripture and disbelieve you in part thereof ? And what the reward is of those who do so save ignominy in the life of the world, and on the Day of Resurrection they will be consigned to the most grievous doom.”

Muhammad insisted throughout his life on the fact that the Quran he recited was only a reminder of an eternal and uncreated truth, consubstantial with God, a bit like the word or Logos of Christians, the uncreated Quran. And that eternal truth had an answer for everything. That everything was planned. That any question had its answer in the Quran. So how can one want to change an eternal and immutable truth without contradicting oneself?

These reformers will continue to tell you that Islam is a religion of peace and that true Islam does not approve of Taliban actions, that true Islam has nothing to do with jihadists and so on.

This denial is pathetic because there is no need to go very far to see if Islam has anything to do with the barbaric acts of the Islamic State or of the caliphate that has been established on the banks of the Euphrates or Tigris in the second decade of the twentieth century. It is enough to read the Quran, the hadiths, or consult the Shari'a: basic Islamic texts are available everywhere.

That is why it is so important to allow the debate and criticism of Islam around the world. The honest and unconditional intellectual debate without foolishly irenical concessions is indispensable to the disarmament of this religion, of all religions, and therefore to the establishment of peace in the world.

Yet even the most open-minded Muslim authors seem incapable of coming out of a dualist perspective when, between faith and reason, religion and politics, one must necessarily define the other: you will be "fundamentalist" if you think that it is the faith that dominates reason, the religion that determines politics, and you will be "partisan of a moderate Islam" in the opposite case: all agree on the way in which man fulfills the will of God, this one being interpreted by "scholars" drawing from four or five schools of jurisprudence. Insofar as it is ultimately God who defines the law, the "fundamentalist" option and the "moderate" option are basically only different degrees of the same approach. The defeat of the camp of reason prevented Islam from developing its own antibodies against this ideological infection. Yet, Muslim intellectuals are ready to take over the Mu’tazilite torch. But they are usually in exile, and the problem is that their ideas are more discussed in the West than in lands of Islam.

To cite a blasphemy is not blaspheme, said Bernard LEWIS but let us overlook Gerard Zwang's remarks, which are really too without abrupt: "Overtaking the vilest aspirations, flattering the most archaic impulses, encouraging intellectual laziness, intolerance, hypocrisy, violence, preaching a pathological virility, justifying the worst anti-feminist ignominy, Islam is neither a wisdom nor a civilization (way of life), it is a plague ."

Those of James Lorimer are at the same time more moderate in the form and more radical in their content. They expound the problem well. " So long as Islam endures, the reconciliation of its

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adherents, even with Jews and Christians, and still more with the rest of mankind must continue to be an insoluble problem."

However there are 4 categories of Muslims with whom we can hope to build a peaceful coexistence.

A) Non-practicing Muslims.

They are very numerous in the West. They renounced what in the Quran collides head-on with non-Muslims. They have become members of our societies or aspire to do it, work and live among others without much problem. They view Islam as a cultural background, a sense of belonging, a bit like Western non-believers who have "secularized" values and customs of Christian even pre-Christian origin like Christmas tree. Or like the Yom Kipppur Jews. These Muslims little or not practicing also exist in the Muslim countries in more or less large number according to the places.

It should be noted, however, that some peaceful-looking Muslims lie and practice taqiyya or kirman to better infiltrate the Western world for jihadist purposes. And other Muslims, today peaceful, can have their mind changed tomorrow by radical elements.

B) Muslims whose practice is selective.

Just as many Christians ignore the Old Testament and have a limited New Testament-inspired practice, many Muslims ignore violent verses and sincerely believe that Islam is only tolerance and generosity. They were raised like that and were not contradicted by those of their imams who spread this vision.

C) Reformer Muslims.

Many Muslims want Islam to give up its domineering and violent political ideology to become a religion more compatible with the rest of the world and taking into account modernity, what implies a change in the interpretation of the texts. They believe that the text of the Quran is to be understood in the background of the customs of the time, and that we must go back to the deep intention, regardless of this background. They bypass thus the argument of traditionalists who rely on the letter of a text "dictated by God" ("uncreated"), since it proclaims the fidelity to this text. It should be noted that this approach also exists among Christians. There are many recommendations in the Bible, supposedly dictated by God (Leviticus, etc.), that Christians have given up.

There has been some reinterpretation in the past. After a long period of freeze, it seems that this update of the understanding of the texts is again the object of work in various groups of lettered and religious. For example, a group of 25 Egyptian scholars, including some scholars or the El-Azhar University, recently published a document advocating a profound reform of many concepts that are incompatible with our values.

D) The opponents.

There are also people in the Muslim world who are totally opposed to Islam and bluntly denounce its totalitarian nature, its barbaric practices and its inability to evolve. They are often brave women, some of whom have become famous like Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Wafa Sultan, Taslima Nasreen, Irshad Manji, Veena Malik and many others. These opponents speak, write and show by their example that it is possible to escape the weight of Islam. They encourage the West to resistance. Do not let them go. The lot reserved for women explains that they are numerous to take risks.

What is certain, however, is that Islam is defined as submission to God and his prophet, or more exactly to a certain idea of God and his prophets; has already constituted in its time an unprecedented in the history of human civilization intellectual relapse; and moreover, it is still more than ever a snuffer or a stifle of human thought. Any society that lives according to these rules (the Qur'n, the hadiths, the life of Muhammad or his imitation, and the remarks of some scholars with a full head on the first three points (in other words Sharia), forms a totalitarian society from which it is difficult to be free: to choose Islam, to defend Islam, to be indifferent, is to take a one-way ticket for a society where human rights are nothing in the face of the rights of a certain idea of God (of an almighty god and not of the god of philosophers).

To choose to live according to Islam is therefore to take a without return ticket for a totalitarian society from which it will be very difficult to free oneself or to go out, given the deep intellectual and moral mediocrity, for many decades, of Western elites (female and male politicians, or other dominant opinion makers such as journalists, artists, writers, bishops, and other intellectuals of this type).

Islam being not a race because races do not exist but a politico-religious ideology as defined by Gustave Le Bon, our conclusion cannot by definition be racist and aims only to denounce this ideology. It is intended to believers and unbelievers of all colors. She does not support any spirituality or party in particular. It is not against God but against a certain idea of God. It rejects fundamentalism and not the moderate believers who are its first victims. In short, this conclusion is not obsessed with racial questions, it is not racialist. The color of the skin does not care. Yellow, red, striped or with polka dots, the only thing that matters for it is the color of the ideas, or of the lack of ideas, what then brings back to the raw and intrinsic personalities of one or the other ( hubristic? Shameles? Liars? Thieves?

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etc.)

On the other hand, this book is Islamophobic in the etymological sense of the term. Fascistophobia or Nazi phobia was a healthy and legitimate reaction in the 1930s and this book emanates well from someone WHO IS AFRAID, WHO FEARS FOR HIM AND FOR 7 BILLION HUMAN FELLOWS, NOT BECAUSE OF SUFISM OR MU’TAZILISM BUT BECAUSE OF STRICT APPLICATION OF THE SUNNI SHARIA. WHO DREADS FOR HIM AND THE 7 BILLION INHABITANTS OF THIS PLANET A STRICT APPLICATION OF THE SHARIA.

So the author of this essay does not understand the European intellectuals for whom the fear of the rise to power of nazislamism or fascism becomes a reaction to constantly denounce ridicule or condem.

Integral Islam, as a religious ideology and way of life in common and not as an individual Sufism-like spirituality, is the most perfect and the most dangerous of totalitarianisms, for 9 reasons which are the 9 pillars of Islam.

-The first is that integral Muslim religious ideology is not just a simple inner spirituality but a code governing everything, including the everyday life of individuals.

-The second is that within a non-secular or non-pagan society governed by integral Islam, there is no room for kufar, that is, human beings who are neither Muslims nor "people of one book" (i.e., neither Jews nor non-Trinitarian Christians -99% of Christians- neither Mandaean Sabaeans nor Zoroastrian nor equated); they have no rights or status and are therefore outlawed. Only Imam Malik would make them dhimmis, it seems, but this opinion, if it exists, is too tafarrud ("isolated").

-The third is that the broad lines of Islam thus designed also apply to non-Muslims belonging to the community known as "people of the book." They have a place and a status in the integral Muslim society; but as second-class citizens. It is the dhimmitude theorized by the Pact ascribed to Umar, second of the caliphs having succeeded Muhammad.

-The fourth reason is that Islam requires the devout Muslim not to discuss dialogue or question this religious ideology of which the holy book must be learned by heart and without critical thinking (brainwashing) since only made of extracts from a tablet of the eternal heavenly law written in Arabic and consubstantial with God (uncreated Quran theory). As for the divergences or contradictions with the previous traditions, the doctors of this totalitarian "religious" law have found an explanation that cannot be made more peremptory: these divergences stem from the fact that the supporters of other previous revealed religions previous to Islam have falsified the revelations they have received ... No discussion is therefore possible, and everything can be reduced to the eternal Manichean struggle of the truth against the false, of Satan against God.

God said, " And when you see those who meddle with Our revelations, withdraw from them until they meddle with another topic. And if the devil cause you to forget, do not sit, after the remembrance, with the congregation of wrongdoers " (Sura 6 verse 68).

-The fifth reason is that it is forbidden under pain of death to cease being a Muslim (apostasy).

-The sixth reason is that heresy is also punished with death. As Bernard Lewis has shown, in the land of Islam the very notion of bidah or innovation has become suspect or even blasphemous.

-The seventh reason is that the reference book of this religious ideology is supposed to contain the right answers to all the possible questions that man can ask oneself, moreover, written in unsurpassable Arabic. In short, the Quran has an answer to everything! Why therefore in these conditions to go and see elsewhere.

-The eighth reason is that this book also instills a feeling of superiority bordering on hubris to its followers by repeating to them black and white that they form a chosen by God superior spiritual race, the only worthy of attention, and having all rights.

Verse 85, chapter 3. " And who seeks as religion other than the Surrender (to God) it will not be accepted from him."

Verse 110 chapter 3. " You are the best community that has been raised up for mankind. You enjoin right conduct and forbid indecency.”

Verse 181 chapter 7. " And of those whom We created there is a nation who guide with the Truth and establish justice therewith."

Verse 9, chapter 61. " He it is Who has sent His messenger with the guidance and the religion of truth, that He may make it conqueror of all religion.”

But the Mecca of the time of the Jahiliyya was an open society that exchanged and traded with the great civilizations of the time that were the Eastern Roman Empire and the Sassanid Empire (influence of Persian culture, presence of Christians and Judaizing tribes, exhibitions in the Kaaba of works of art similar to the famous Buddhas of Bamyan or the temples in Palmyra).

The ninth reason is that any questioning of the obligatory reference book or its original author,

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Muhammad, is punishable by death for blasphemy. There is indeed unanimity among Muslims that the Quran is binding on all (hujjatun 'ala al-jami'), and that it is the primary source of Muslim law. This stems from the fact that it comes from God.

The final result of this total blocking of critical mind since the closure of the gates of Ijtihad: what characterizes Islam as social ideology and this from the Quran is a fivefold hierarchization of the Society even of the world (Dar al Harb dar al Islam dar al kufr…).

Islam is a colonialist and imperial Arab ideology engaged in a cosmic struggle to conquer the planet. “Jihadists divide the whole world into two spheres - Islamic world and un-Islamic world. It is the ultimate battle between those who value freedom, peace and humanity and those who do not” (Hossain Salahuddin, Bangladesh 1984 -?)

Let us content ourselves to note that in our modern democratic societies, the law with some minor exceptions (death penalty immigration belonging to such or such a union of states) is supposed to more or less match the will of the majorities of the population.

But Islam is a law and doing nothing is like letting billions of human beings live under the fossilized control of a law that has nothing to do with reason as it is designed since the Enlightenment century .

And to convert to Islam would be to return to an Act based on a Faith having nothing to do with reason as it is designed since the Age of Enlightenment.

Considering their great intellectual and moral mediocrity, for many decades; Western elites (female and male politicians, or other dominant opinion makers such as journalists, artists, writers, bishops, and other intellectuals of this type); in this respect attack the symptoms, not the causes.

Western society, which devoted so much energy to fighting the extreme right wing at the end of the 20th century, like the Coptic Egyptians in the seventh century, therefore has seen nothing.

The West and the East (Protestants against Catholics or Sunnis against Shiites) have been devastated for too long by hatreds that claim to be in line with such or such religion so that we can support a policy (in the broad sense of the word) that can only inevitably reduce our peoples at this stage.

But the only durable solution in this field is not the military or police fight against terrorism but the fight against ideas. It is therefore now, against the budding or potential religious wars, to lead the most implacable war of ideas. The twenty-first century opens with a merciless struggle. On one side [...] On the other, a pious, zealous, brutal, intolerant, violent, imperious and conquering Muslim world, that of Daesh, Al Quaeda.

It is not with a Gribouille policy consisting of multiplying imams in the prisons or mosques or even street prayers; that the challenge of Islamist terrorism will be effectively met. Matthew 6: 5-6. " “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen."

Man is the measure of all things Protagoras said..... What should rather be is teaching relentlessly the values of respect and tolerance towards the kafir of the big kufr (e.g., Yazidis in Iraq) the mushrikun of the big shirk (some Christians or some believers not falling under the category of the people of one book) as well as anything that can wrongly be considered as taught (the laity the apostasy the freedom of conscience of opinion and speech, and more generally human rights rather than the rights of God, which includes the freedom to say or write what may be considered blasphemies by some or as a simple criticism of certain ideologies or religious behavior, by others).

Criticize even radically, even while going so far as to say that God does not exist and that Muhammad therefore was never his prophet, must be perfectly and peacefully possible within this framework, because it is a legitimate part of the questioned human rights.

What is needed for this is just to take into account the carnal cover of the individuals whose behavior is criticized or condemned (whether it is a blue-eyed tall blond or a small brown-eyed black or a polka-dotted E.T. ) but only the religious ideology that moves them.

And about the famous hero of the Countess of Ségur: Gribouille. "Defenders of Islam must repeat TIRELESSLY AND EXPLICITLY that even in a Muslim-majority country, they admit equal rights between men and women or between Muslims and non-Muslims. A non-Muslim must be able to accede to the highest office even in Muslim land (secularism).

At least let us begin by applying with rigor and justice our laws, equal for all. Let us prevail everywhere

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the order and secularism indispensable to the rule of law. Let us respect the fundamental rights that are the right to life, freedom (including of opinion and speech) to property and security. This should already solve many problems. And if new laws are needed to deal with the terrible provisions of the triptych "Quran hadith sharia" nothing prevents us from voting them. It is nonsensical for nations to continue to tolerate on their own soil practices that are in categorical contradiction with their laws and that cause the misfortune of billions of human beings or ruin the lives of others.

It is therefore self-evident dear reader or journalist that we have not criticized here the true Islam that is yours; but the false Islam whose 4 pillars or Bible are mentioned here below.

- The Quran and its abrogating verses (nasikh) including the famous verse of the sword: verse 29 of chapter 9.

-The hadiths (the sunnah).

-The life of Muhammad (sira) and its imitation.

-Finally, the remarks of some penpushers on the first three points (sharia)

That said, the true Islam is, of course, still yours (sufism, mut’azilism, etc.). Only false Islam has been questioned in this booklet; and this false Islam is therefore by contrast based on the four pillars mentioned, remember it for all practical purposes, here below.

-The Quran and its abrogating verses (nasikh) including the famous verse of the sword: verse 29 of chapter 9.

-Hundreds of thousands of hadiths even if only a few dozen of them can be genuine.

-The imitation of the life (sira) of Muhammad.

-The reflections of some authors on what is above (sharia).

LAW AND DEBATES.

Official Gazette, February 12, 1895.

"In the form of society which was previous to ours, there was at least harmony between the ideas and the facts, between the things and the words: there was a social hierarchical order as there was a matching religious hierarchical order; there were a social resignation and a religious resignation; there was a scale of creation, at the top of which were the higher powers and God, as there was a scale of the society, at the top of which were the noble one, the priest and the king; and there was neither fraud nor ambiguity: the serf knew that he was in front of God equal to the noble one; but he also knew that, from the order of the same God, as long as he would be on earth, he would be a serf. There was no social hypocrisy.

What, on the contrary, characterizes the present society, with the result it is unable forever to be taught itself and to be expressed itself in a moral rule, it is that there is everywhere in it an essential contradiction between the facts and the words. Today, there is not a single one great word which has its true meaning, full and honest: brotherhood - and the fight is everywhere ; equality - and all the disproportions go increasing; freedom - and the weak are given over to all the power games; property, i.e., close and personal relation of the man and of the thing, of the man and of a portion of nature changed by him, used by him - and here is that property becomes more and more a monstrous fiction which gives the natural forces over to some men, some natural forces of which they do not even know the law, and human forces of which they do not

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even know the name! Yes, everywhere the emptiness, the hypocrisy of the words. More than one century ago, Diderot had a presentiment of these nearest falseness, when he said in one of his revolutionary thoughts: “To have slaves is nothing; but what is intolerable, it is to have slaves while calling them citizens!” .....

"“What must be safeguarded above all else, that which is the inestimable good that can be achieved by man despite prejudice, adversity, and conflict, is the notion that there is no sacred truth; that is to say, nothing is beyond the reach of human investigation. There is nothing greater in this world than the sovereign freedom of thought; it is this notion that no power – inside or outside - any power or dogma, must limit the perpetual effort and the perpetual search from human reason; the notion that Mankind in the universe is a great investigation committee of which no governmental intervention, no - heavenly or earthly – plot should never restrain or distort the operations; this notion that all truth that does not come from us is a lie; that regardless of our attachments, our critical sense must remain acute and all our assertions and thoughts must be impregnated by a rebellious spirit; it is to say that if God’s ideal were rendered visible, if God himself stood before the masses in physical form, the first obligation of man would be to refuse obedience to him who he considers his equal, not as a master to whom he must submit himself. Thus are the meaning and the greatness and the beauty of secular teachings in their essence and quite strange are those who come to ask Reason to abdicate, on the pretext that it has not, and will never have, the total truth; quite strange those who, under the pretext that our approach is uncertain and stumbling, want to paralyze us, throw us into the night, through despair of not having a full and complete brightness. " (Applause Jean Jaures).

But secularism is, facing of a politico-religious ideology that has given itself the goal of submitting the world to its Law; in itself and by definition, inoperative.

The return to secularism will only be possible after the success of this first phase, and therefore only in a second phase. In the meantime, and in this regard, a moratorium should be adopted.

KHARIJITE VICTIMOLOGY.

The purpose of secondary victimology is to identify the perpetrator(s) in order to put them out of harm's way as quickly as possible, treat or punish them, and do what is necessary to guarantee that it does not happen again.

In criminal matters, the details are of only one interest, to draw a portrait of the criminal in order to put him out of action as quickly as possible and the technical arsenal used by the forensic police aims to answer three main questions:

What happened at the crime scene? Why did these events occur? What type of people may have committed such acts?

Benjamin Mendelsohn (1900-1998) in an article published in 1937 in the Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, classified victims into 6 categories, of which only the first was unanimously agreed upon as innocent, defined as being truly innocent or having been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and 5 other categories, encompassing most victims, those who would have contributed to their own victimization. This notion has been highly controversial and has led to the static state of victimology today.

So why would we want to collect personal data on the victim if not to try to increase the victim's responsibility and reduce the perpetrator's guilt in the act?

However, it should not be forgotten that, unlike primary victimology, secondary victimology, in conjunction with the deductive profiling method, only makes sense and is useful in the perspective of quickly putting the aggressor out of harm's way and treating him or her in order to prevent any recurrence of the offense.

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To this end, the typology of victims (who are the first victims? The unbelievers the Christians the Muslims themselves) is certainly important; but this empathy for the first victims should not make the specialists in profiling criminal religious ideologies forget that what matters in the end: IT IS TO IDENTIFY AND PUT WHERE HE CANNOT HURT ANYONE...the guilty party!

To appeal to emotion by speaking only of the victims (Muslim Christian or simply atheists?) and never of the guilty for fear of stigmatizing or conflating, triggering misplaced or with mistaken targets manhunts; is certainly a laudable concern but this sophism CAN...

-only make it impossible to arrest the guilty party or at least delay it considerably and thus give him time to make still more victims. Now the victims should only be the avenging or accusing finger pointing in the direction of the guilty party.

Below is for the record what the truly monotheistic position should be, free from any anger of any resentment of any inferiority complex of any jealousy of any need for revenge, in short philosophical and thoughtful .

"“Those who are devotees of other gods and who worship them with faith actually worship only me, O son of Kunti, but they do so in a wrong way because I am the only enjoyer and master of all sacrifices. If one offers me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I accept it. I envy no one, nor am I partial to anyone. I am equal to all. But whoever renders service unto me in devotion is a friend is in me, and I am also a friend to him” (Bhagavad Gita 9: 23-29, dialogue between the god Krishna/Vishnu and prince Arjuna).

Peter DeLaCrau has not discovered anything new or unheard about the origins of this evil. God, or more exactly a certain idea of God, has always been the greatest of the common divisors of Mankind.

More precisely, certain verses of the Quran followed literally, not to say blindly, at least without interpretation, taking us far from the initial or traditional meaning; the whole systematized, explained and justified by the new kharijites, certain theorists of the lesser Jihad or certain takfirists (salafism of action) .

The extreme danger of all these political Islams is that, like their Kharijite ancestor, they can have an attractive aspect, a revolutionary ideal well in tune with the ideas that work our societies (contestation of the established bourgeois powers, refusal of compromises, anti-racism, etc.) that can attract the youth. For Kharijism indeed all men are equal and the leader of the community must be the best, "even if he is a black slave." If this is not the case he must be eliminated, like Ali in 661.

Peter DeLaCrau's book therefore contains no new facts.

Everything has been known for a long time, except for some details.

The existence at that time of millions of Arab Christians in what was to become Jordan, Syria or Iraq (it was even the Christians of Hira who developed the Arabic script), made it possible to understand and appreciate unequivocally from that time the various verses of the Quran.

The reasons why, with rare clear-headed and courageous exceptions, which are obviously fortunately now going to multiply; the immense majority of those who know (tick the box: bishops journalists politicians abbots authors of books sportsmen priests artists etc.) and who have only one flaw, their poverty or destitution (because they give everything to homeless persons) but to whom the will to resist with courage as in 1940, does not lack, has said nothing, or says the opposite, are the following....

Now the immense and ultra dangerous difference between original Islam or Salafism and other religions, and which changes everything, is that Salafist Islam touches many more aspects of private or personal life (food hygiene adoptions marriages inheritance jobs money etc.) than other religions (with the exception of the ultra-orthodox Judaism of the HAREDIM which resembles it very much because of the arrival at Yathrib/Medina of Muhammad in 622 ).

Salafist Islam is in a way the most accomplished of the totalitarian systems.

As far as the very pious and very religious Muslims are concerned (we are not talking here about the "bad" Muslims, that is to say those who eat and drink a little bit of everything, who do not their five prayers every day, etc., etc. in short the equivalent of the Jews of Yom Kippur or Christians who go to church only to get married, have their offspring baptized or bury their dead) IT IS NECESSARY TO DISTINGUISH THE QUIETISTS FROM TAKFIRISTS OR JIHADISTS.

Both are branches of SALAFISM, i.e., the most rigorous movement of Sunni Islam.

This religious family stemming from Sunnism (the main branch of Islam) advocates a rigorous practice of religion, close to its first followers (the term salaf designates, in Arabic, the "ancestors," in this case the first companions of Muhammad).

Obedience to Islamic law (Sharia), refusal of gender mixing and the wearing of the niqab (full veil) or abaya (black cloak covering the body) for women are some of the characteristics common to quietist Salafism and takfirism.

BUT QUIETISTS are pacifists and do not seek to change the law, even if they do not recognize its

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legitimacy.

The problem is that Salafism can be an airlock to takfirism. An airlock, because Salafist ultra-Orthodoxy offers an ideal ideological breeding ground for radicalization of its followers, and it is often in Salafist circles that takfiri recruiters operate. Some imams are also likely to engage in double dealing especially since the practice of taqiya (cunning, concealment) is part of the takfiri arsenal.

TAKFIRISTS (so called because of their propensity to throw the anathema, takfir, against other Muslims), on the other hand, are clearly distinguished from the quietists by their messianic ideology (that of the advent of a new caliphate and an apocalypse born of a new war between crusaders and Muslims on their holy land) and therefore their call to arms.

It is an Islam that is at once fundamentalist, non-legalistic and violent. The takfiris claim to be an ultra-orthodox Islam whose laws take precedence over those of secular countries. Only Sharia law prevails, or at least an oriented interpretation of the rules laid down in the Quran.

An ultra-violent ideology, takfirism does not distinguish between soldiers and civilians: only two worlds exist, Dar al-Islam (the Islamic land, the Caliphate) and Dar al-Harb (the land at war or to be conquered). The takfiri readily describes himself as a 'lion' (the metaphor dates back at least to the late 1990s) and the communication of takfirist organizations, such as al-Qaeda or the Islamic state, is based on the dissemination of bloody executions, the estheticization of war and the intimidation of enemies. The historical concept of Dar al-Sulh (the land of the truce, of cohabitation) is set aside from takfiri thought, which, on the other hand, considers any land where people once prayed turned towards Mecca as a land of mistrust (dar al kufr) to be reconquered on the principle that what has been acquired by Islam remains acquired by Islam (Islamic irredentism). The truce it enjoyed can therefore only be temporary, the ultimate goal remaining that this country will one day turns again, this time definitively, into Dar al Islam.

Takfirism does not only target Christians and Jews. It also attacks Shiites and Sufis, who are perceived as deviant Muslims. The takfiri ideology also allows for taking up arms against other Sunni Muslims if they refuse the hijra (emigration to Islamic lands) or do not submit to a certain interpretation of the sharia.

Takfirism idealizes the sacrificial death of one who has melted among the enemy. Called inghimasi ("the infiltrator"), he wears a belt of explosives and fights to the point of (self-)death, "as a martyr" (shahid) .

The "spiritual" father of takfirism is Sayd Qutb (1906-1966). This militant of the Muslim Brotherhood * is the one who theorized during a stay in prison the obligation of armed minor jihad against the established powers, whether Christian or Muslim, marking a schism within Salafism.

It is to him that we owe the idea that "the passage to radical violence can be a religious obligation to fight against the political authority when the latter has lost its Muslim roots,"

His ideology was built up in layers from a rereading of several radical historical Muslim theologians, including Ibn Tamiyya (1263-1328), a radical Syrian Hanbalite theologian, who in the particular historical context of the Crusades theorized the call for holy war against non-Muslims. Through his violent and simplistic preaching, he had achieved real success among the popular masses.

We therefore only denounce and call to fight here these Takfirists (kharijites practicing taqyia and kirman); but as for the quietists we call to dialogue, directly or indirectly but firmly through the contents of our teaching of the religious fact THE OBJECTIVITY AND SCIENTIFIC CHARACTER OF WHICH MUST BE UNCOMPROMISING. When I was a child in the 1950s, our country teacher asked us to correct the sentence "Joan of Arc heard voices" with the sentence "Joan of Arc thought she heard voices."

With those who practice taqiya (which is also known to Sunnism) like the Muslim Brotherhood, we call for the utmost caution and the greatest mistrust or lucidity in the debates.

And the same with the Shiite Muslims mutatis mutandis, for as far as the Shiites are concerned, since they have a clergy, a compromise of the same type as that imposed on the Jews by Napoleon in 1806 could be found.

Reactions advised to our readers depending on the case.

Bad Muslims (Muslims who are not very religious). No problem!

Salafists. Direct or indirect dialogues (via teaching) based on objectivity, science and history!

Neo-Kharijites and Takfiri. No pasaran!

Muslim Brotherhood. Distrust of Sioux and lucidity in debates. Yet we are far from seeing the abyssal intellectual and moral mediocrity of journalists or of today's media-political class. Rather than learning how to fight against common sense or the revolt of the peoples against the Empire, schools of journalism would do better to learn how to fight and flush out the taqiya or the kirman.

* The Society of the Muslim Brotherhood, shortened to Muslim Brotherhood, is a Sunni Islamic transnational organization founded in 1928 by Hassan el-Banna in Ismailia, northeastern Egypt.

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Composed of a military apparatus and an open organization, its official objective is the Islamic revival and the non-violent struggle against the "Western secular hold" and the "blind imitation of the European model" in the land of Islam.

The doctrinal corpus of the Muslim Brotherhood was formed mainly with the writings of Sayd Qutb (1906-1966), considered one of the most important thinkers of radical Islamism.

The writings of Sayd Qutb continue to have a strong influence on the Muslim Brotherhood - an influence that has been growing since the new geopolitical situation and the Islamic radicalization of the early 21st century. Qutb is regarded as one of the ideological inspirers of al-Qaeda: he is described as "the father of Muslim extremism," "the father of fighting Salafism."

You have been warned !

APPENDIX No. 1.

DEFINITION OF A RELIGIOUS IDEOLOGY ACCORDING TO GUSTAVE LE BON.

“Under certain given circumstances, and only under those circumstances, an agglomeration of men presents new characteristics very different from those of the individuals composing it. The sentiments and ideas of all the persons in the gathering take one and the same direction, and their conscious personality vanishes. A collective mind is formed, doubtless transitory, but presenting very clearly defined characteristics. The gathering has thus become what, in the absence of a better expression, I will call an organized crowd, or, if the term is considered preferable, a psychological crowd. It forms a single being, and is subjected to the law of the mental unity of crowds.

Moreover, by the mere fact that he forms part of an organized crowd, a man descends several rungs in the ladder of civilization. Isolated, he may be a cultivated individual; in a crowd, he is a barbarian--that is, a creature acting by instinct. He possesses the spontaneity, the violence, the ferocity, and also the enthusiasm and heroism of primitive beings, whom he further tends to resemble by the facility with which he allows himself to be impressed by words and images--which would be entirely without action on each of the isolated individuals composing the crowd--and to be induced to commit acts contrary to his most obvious

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interests and his best-known habits. An individual in a crowd is a grain of sand amid other grains of sand, which the wind stirs up at will.

It is for these reasons that juries are seen to deliver verdicts of which each individual juror would disapprove that parliamentary assemblies adopt laws and measures of which each of their members would disapprove in his own person. Taken separately, the men of the Convention were enlightened citizens of peaceful habits. United in a crowd, they did not hesitate to give their adhesion to the most savage proposals, to guillotine individuals most clearly innocent, and, contrary to their interests, to renounce their inviolability and to decimate themselves.

It is not only by his acts that the individual in a crowd differs essentially from himself. Even before he has entirely lost his independence, his ideas and feelings have undergone a transformation, and the transformation is so profound as to change the miser into a spendthrift, the skeptic into a believer, the honest man into a criminal, and the coward into a hero…(Gustave Le Bon.The crowd, a study of the popular mind).

Anti-racism being too important to be left to the self-proclaimed anti-racists alone (as far as I am concerned I am only non-racist) the untruths about the above-mentioned things should be nipped in the bud as soon as they come out of the private sphere, especially as soon as they are relayed by religious or political leaders like Maxence Buttey); in order to preserve social peace and radically avoid new wars of religion.

In the meantime, any democracy that wants to be effective should at least symbolically prohibit any even indirect apology of Nazislamism , such like that which can be inferred from the remarks of a Tariq Ramadan and his taqiyya ... or at least it should be automatically published with the right to reply that it deserves legitimately, which would avoid the book burnings for whish Laurent Joffrin wishes in such cases. Because if we understand well the reception of the French-speaking novel by Houellebecq entitled "Soumission" (published in 2015 ); to be against patriarchy, polygamy, the wearing of the burqa, the confinement of women at home, and the conversion to Islam ... it is according to Laurent Joffrin this director of a big French reference newspaper of reference: "a fight of extreme right."

This stupidity is made dangerous only by the overdeveloped ego of all those ladies and gentlemen placed at the information hubs of our societies (the media, for example). If they were only sea fishermen or cowboys, they would be less dangerous.

N.B. This is not an unqualified endorsement of the life and work of the most famous French writer living abroad. He was wrong when he said in 2001 that "the stupidest religion, it is still Islam" not to sufficiently explain this conclusion by supporting it with detailed argumentation, what we have done in this pamphlet.

APPENDIX N ° 2.

JACQUES ELLUL AND ISLAM.

I would say "yes," easily, to Buddhism, Brahmanism, animism ..., but Islam is something else. Islam is the only religion in the world that claims to violently impose its faith on the world.

I know that I will be answered immediately: "Christianity too!"

And there are the Crusades, the conquistadors, the Saxons of Charlemagne, and so on. Well, there is a radical difference.

When Christians acted by violence and converted by force, they went against the whole Bible, and especially the Gospels. They did the opposite of the commandments of Jesus, whereas when the Muslims through war conquer some peoples that they constrain to Islam on pain of death, they obey the order of Muhammad.

Jihad is the first obligation of the Muslim believer. And the whole world must enter, by all means, the Islamic community.

I know it will be objected: "But it is only the 'fundamentalists' who want this war."

Unfortunately, during the complex history of Islam, it is always the "fundamentalists," that is to say the faithful to the letter of the Quran, who have prevailed over the moderate Muslim currents, over the mystics, etc.

Seriously declaring that the support of "certain Muslims" to Islamic fundamentalism is the result of

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an identity crisis is a disastrous interpretation.

Is Islamic fundamentalism in Iran, Syria, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, now in Algeria a reaction to an identity crisis?

No, Islamic fundamentalism is only the awakening of Muslim religious consciousness among men who are Muslim but have become more or less "lukewarm."

The fierce and orthodox awakening of Islam is a worldwide phenomenon. We must live in the moon to believe that we can "integrate" peaceful and non-conquering Muslims. It is necessary for that to forget what the remanence of the religious feeling (what I cannot develop here) is. We must forget the obligatory reference to the Quran. It is necessary for that to forget that for a Muslim, the state can never be secular and the society secularized: this is unthinkable for Islam.

Jacques Ellul.

Article published in the weekly Reforme on July 15, 1989. Jacques Ellul has been recognized by various American academic circles as one of the most important contemporary thinkers. During his lifetime, he has published more than 600 articles and 48 books, translated into a dozen languages.

APPENDIX N ° 3.

Pieces of evidence that Christians falsified their official gospels.

As Bernard Lewis wrote in 1972 in his essay about race and color in Islam, "To cite aa blasphemy is not blaspheme." We will gather below for comparison purposes the main falsifications of the Book done by the first Christians in their gospels in order to keep their fellow countrymen away from true religion. It's edifying! How is it possible to make such a mistake by believing to do the right things. These falsifications of divine revelation are visible and coarse, they are blindingly obvious.

Falsification No. 1. John 8: 3 to 11.

The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?”They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”

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No one, sir,” she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

Editor's note. The falsification of the initial divine revelation is obvious. God who is righteous cannot stand idly by facing this example of fornication. Everyone knows that the woman must be either whipped or stoned according to some other doctors of the Law.

Falsification No. 2. Luke, 6:27.

But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.

If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.”

Falsification No. 3. Luke, 10: 29-37.

Who is my neighbor? In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’

“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”

Editor’s note. Here too, the falsification of the initial Book is obvious. The Samaritans were pagans. How could a heathen do this to a believer?

Falsification No. 4. Luke 22: 47.

While he was still speaking a crowd came up, and the man who was called Judas, one of the Twelve, was leading them. He approached Jesus to kiss him, but Jesus asked him, “Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?” When Jesus’ followers saw what was going to happen, they said, “Lord, should we strike with our swords?” And one of them struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his right ear. But Jesus answered, “No more of this!” And he touched the man’s ear and healed him.

Falsification No. 5. Luke 23:33.

When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals—one on his right, the other on his left. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”

Falsification No. 6. Luke 15, 11 to 32.

There was a man who had two sons. The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them. “Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.“When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’ So he got up and went to his father.

“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’

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But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’

Editor’s note. Here again the falsification is obvious because these verses have no sense!

Falsification No. 7. Luke 20 : 20-26.

Keeping a close watch on him, they sent spies, who pretended to be sincere. They hoped to catch Jesus in something he said, so that they might hand him over to the power and authority of the governor. So the spies questioned him: “Teacher, we know that you speak and teach what is right, and that you do not show partiality but teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. Is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?”

He saw through their duplicity and said to them, “Show me a denarius. Whose image and inscription are on it?”

“Caesar’s,” they replied. He said to them, “Then give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”

Falsification No. 8. Matthew 20, 1 to 16.

" “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.

“About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went.

“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. About five in the afternoon, he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’ “‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered. “He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’

“When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’

“The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’

“But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’

N.B. The supreme falsification. How can God command to be unjust? The workers of the eleventh hour have worked less, so they must be paid less. It's elementary. If only one passage of the Gospels was needed to prove that Christians falsified divine revelation, this would be sufficient.

Falsification No. 9. Matthew 6: 5-6.

“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen.”

The last straw of the last straw! How could God accept to be worshiped or prayed as if we one were ashamed of him?

Falsification No. 10. Matthew 6: 16.

“When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show others they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen.”

Another obvious falsification that denies the holiness of Ramadan.

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APPENDIX N° 4.

AND FINALLY LAST BUT NOT THE LEAST, THE GOSPEL OF BARNABAS.

This text must not be confused with the Epistle of Barnabas, which differs completely from it, or with the Acts of Barnabas.

Let us say immediately, what proves that the manipulation of texts or the pious fraud is not a preserve of Christianity; the gospel of Barnabas is a pitiful fake emanating from Muslim, or remained secretly Muslim (SPANISH?), circles.

This is obvious, hence the rather coarse nature of this fake, on which John Toland was wrong not to insist enough in his Nazarenus, misled by the fact that he had in his hand only the Italian translation“J’en viens presentement a l’évangile des Turcs, qui vraisemblablement est le meme livre.....traduit en italien par quelque renegato” (in Italian language in the text).

The only thing worthy of being discussed therefore is the initial core that some scholars can trace back to Judeo-Christian circles of Syria-Palestine in the 6th century.

Prologue.

Translated from the Italian manuscript of15th century (the Spanish text has a hundred chapters less).

Barnabas, apostle of Jesus the Nazarene, called Christ, to all them that dwell upon the earth desires peace and consolation. Dearly beloved the great and wonderful God hath during these past days visited us by his prophet Jesus Christ in great mercy of teaching and miracles, by

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reason whereof many, being deceived of Satan, under presence of piety, are preaching most impious doctrine, calling Jesus son of God, repudiating the circumcision ordained of God for ever, and permitting every unclean meat: among whom also Paul hath been deceived, whereof I speak not without grief; for which cause I am writing that truth which I have seen and heard, in the intercourse that I have had with Jesus, in order that you may be saved, and not be deceived of Satan and perish in the judgment of God. Therefore beware of everyone that preaches unto you new doctrine contrary to that which I write, that you may be saved eternally.

The great God be with you and guard you from Satan and from every evil. Amen.

39. Then said John: 'Well hast thou spoken, O master, but we lack know how man sinned through pride.'

Jesus answered: 'When God had expelled Satan, and the angel Gabriel had purified that mass of earth whereon Satan spat, God created everything that lives, both of the animals that fly and of them that walk and swim, and he adorned the world with all that it hath. One day Satan approached unto the gates of paradise, and, seeing the horses eating grass, he announced to them that if that mass of earth should receive a soul there would be for them grievous labor; and that therefore it would be to their advantage to trample that piece of earth in such wise that it should be no more good for anything. The horses aroused themselves and impetuously set themselves to run over that piece of earth which lay among lilies and roses. Whereupon God gave spirit to that unclean portion of earth upon which lay the spittle of Satan, which Gabriel had taken up from the mass; and raised up the dog, who, barking, filled the horses with fear, and they fled. Then God gave his soul to man, while all the holy angels sang: "Blessed be thy holy name, O God our Lord."

'Adam, having sprung up upon his feet, saw in the air a writing that shone like the sun, which said: "There is only one God, and Mohammed is the messenger of God." Whereupon Adam opened his mouth and said: "I thank thee, O Lord my God, that you have deigned to create me; but tell me, I pray you, what means the message of these words: "Mohammed is the messenger of God." Have there been other men before me?"

Then said God: ''Be thou welcome, O my servant Adam, I tell thee that thou art the first man whom I have created. And he whom thou hast seen [mentioned] is thy son, who shall come into the world many years hence, and shall be my messenger, for whom I have created all things; who shall give light to the world when he shall come; whose soul was set in a celestial splendor sixty thousand years before I made anything."

'Adam besought God, saying: "Lord, grant me this writing upon the nails of the fingers of my hands." Then God gave to the first man upon his thumbs that writing; upon the thumbnail of the right hand, it was said: "There is only one God, and upon the thumbnail of the left it was said: "Mohammed is the messenger of God." Then with fatherly affection the first man kissed those words, and rubbed his eyes, and said: "Blessed be that day when thou shalt come to the world."

'Seeing the man alone, God said: "It is not well that he should remain alone." Wherefore he made him sleep, and took a rib from near his heart, filling the place with flesh. Of that rib made he Eve, and gave her to Adam for his wife. He set the twain of them as lords of Paradise, to whom he said: "Behold I give unto you every fruit to eat, except the apples and the corn," whereof he said: "Beware that in no wise you eat of these fruits, for you shall become unclean, insomuch that I shall not suffer you to remain here, but shall drive you forth, and you shall suffer great miseries.

221….So there went all, saving twenty-five of the seventy-two disciples, who for fear had fled to Damascus. And as they all stood in prayer, at midday came Jesus with a great multitude of angels who were praising God: and the splendor of his face made them sore afraid, and they fell with their faces to the ground. But Jesus lifted them up, comforting them, and saying: 'Be not afraid, I am your master.'

And he reproved many who believed him to have died and risen again, saying: 'Do you then hold me and God for liars? For God hath granted to me to live almost unto the end of the world, even as I said unto you. Verily I say unto you, I died not, but Judas the traitor. Beware, for Satan will make every effort to deceive you, but be you my witnesses in all Israel, and throughout the world, of all things that you have heard and seen.'

And having thus spoken, he prayed God for the salvation of the faithful, and the conversion of sinners. And, his prayer ended, he embraced his mother, saying: 'Peace be unto thee, my mother, rest thou in God who created thee and me.' And having thus spoken, he turned to his disciples, saying: 'May God's grace and mercy be with you.'

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Then before their eyes the four angels carried him up into heaven.

222. After Jesus had departed, the disciples scattered through the different parts of Israel and of the world, and the truth, hated of Satan, was persecuted, as it always is, by falsehood. For certain evil men, pretending to be disciples, preached that Jesus died and did not rise again. Others preached that he really died, but rose again. Others preached, and yet preach, that Jesus is the Son of God, among whom is Paul deceived. But we, as much as I have written, that preach we to those who fear God, that they may be saved in the last day of God's Judgment. Amen.

* Coarse because this text in its present state fits closely exactly what many pious Muslims think of the person of Jesus Christ: it is only a prophet, he has not been crucified and the text even goes so far as to mention Muhammad in spite of the centuries of anachronism that it supposes.

APPENDIX N ° 5.

EULOGY OF UNBELIEF OR CONCLUSION ON THE THREE MASS RELIGIONS.

1) If Jews, Christians or Muslims, have the right, and no one thinks of contesting it, to say all the good they think of their respective religions and particularly to claim that they were instituted by God; unbelievers must have the right to say ill, all the ill that they think about them, and especially to affirm that these religions are on the contrary a real insult to the human intellect.

2)The beliefs that the former have the right to present as immutable and divine truths, the latter must have the right to look at them as a web of anachronistic stupidities and to say it bluntly.

3)They could not be asked to keep quiet or, at least, to use the understatement, only if the believers themselves did the same.

4) Now, if it is true that Christians of today tend to be less and less dogmatic, to such an extent that unbelievers are more and more often obliged to remind them of what they are supposed to believe; it is not the same thing for Muslims.

5) And this is perhaps what makes that unlike the Christian religion, now too little self-assured to be still oppressive, the Muslim religion remains deeply alienating for free minds.

6) And this is also why Islamophobia remains fully justified, though it might not please our President!

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7) Believers readily say that they feel personally insulted when their beliefs are criticized, and especially when they are ridiculed.

8) So, and we have seen more recently with the case of the caricature of Muhammad, many of them, especially Muslims, would want to impose on us "the universal respect of religions" with some exceptions (heathenism, idolatry, animism, pantheism, etc.) and beginning with theirs, of course, and by ending with others. In short, the whole world should respect (to conform to?) their religion, not to say to follow it, or even why not, to convert to it.

9) Of course, it is natural believers are not very happy and that they feel more or less hurt in their self-esteem, when they are told, as Baron d'Holbach did, that they believe in ridiculous stupidities.

10) And, of course, the unbeliever who tells them this does not intend to pay homage to their intellect.

11) But faced with the absurdity of some religious beliefs, the first reaction of the unbeliever is necessarily to wonder about the intellectual quotient of the believers.

12) But he does not think that all believers are necessarily stupid, nor besides that all unbelievers are necessarily intelligent.

13) The unbeliever knows that beyond mere intellectual laziness and social conformity that push them not to question the "truths" instilled in their childhood; believers are generally driven by motives that can be understood, including the desire to have answers to questions that which unbeliever too would like to be able to answer.

14) The desire to find in another world the beings that we loved or to taste the joys that we would have appreciated tasting in this one.

15)This is why unbelievers have always been able to distinguish between the person of believers, whom they respect (who would be their mother or their wives), and their beliefs, whom they can only judge very severely. They admit that believers often have great human qualities and even great intellectual qualities, despite the absurdity of their beliefs.

16) And they are all the more worthy by doing so that believers are often reluctant to reciprocate, and to make a similar distinction between the unbelievers and their philosophical opinions.

17) On the contrary, the three monotheistic mass religions have almost always questioned the very person of the unbelievers; for example, by pretending that their unbelief was essentially explained, intellectually, by foolishness, or at least by laziness and triviality but also, on the moral level, by an immoderate hubris, which made them reject all authority. As well as by a deep depravity or the desire to indulge without restraint in all their basic instincts and all their passions.

18) In the eyes of the vast majority of devotees, unbelievers have always been both "fools" and "wicked," "morons" and "deviants."

19) The Bible and even more the Quran are full of insults towards unbelievers.

20)The psalmist call atheists fool. "The fool has said in his heart, there is no God! (Psalms 14 and 53, verse 1.) He calls out to the "impious" in these terms: " Understand, you senseless among the people; and fools, when will you be wise? (Psalm 94, verse 8.)

21) Muhammad repeats until he can no more repeat that only those who are "men of understanding," only those who "think," are able to recognize and understand the "signs" that God has sent to his prophet ( 38 :29. 39 : 12, 41: 3, 45 : 5). Those who refuse to do so are "foolish" (2: 13), "hubristic" (38: 2, 74: 23) and "wrongdoers" (2: 92) the worst of created beings (98: 6).

22) As for Christian authors, whether religious or secular, they have unleashed such disdainful expressions and insults on unbelievers that it would be impossible to list them all. Anyone who starts to work on this task would very quickly have enough to make a big book ...

Our friend Rene Pommier is a specialist in French literature of the seventeenth century, and unfortunately his conclusion is that the French philosophers of that time have had appalling reactions in this field. Here are three excerpts, unflattering for the self-esteem of the French, which do not shine with their spirit in this case.

If Pascal, who has libertine friends, is a little more understanding towards them; he thinks

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still, like Bossuet, that they are superficial, frivolous, minds who do not want to bother to seriously inquire or really think. "They believe therefore, that they have made great efforts to learn, when they have spent some hours reading a book of the Scriptures, and that they have questioned some clergyman about the truths of Faith. After that, they boast of having searched unsuccessfully in books and among men. "

Pascal is convinced that they have to oppose to religion only simplistic and ridiculous arguments. "Make them explain their feelings and the reasons they have for doubting religion: they will tell you things so weak and so low that they will convince you of the opposite."

La Bruyere, too, thinks that unbelievers are ignorant and incapable of any real reflection: "The ignorance which is their characteristic makes them incapable of the clearest principles and of the most thorough reasoning." And he is, moreover, convinced that atheists are all immoral and perverted beings. "I would like to see a sober, moderate, chaste, fair man, to say that there is no God: he would speak at least without being self-interested but such a man does not exist!

To conclude and crown this very brief sample of the contemptuous, insulting, even hateful words that believers have held during so many centuries against unbelievers; I cannot do better perhaps than to quote those lines of Paul Claudel imploring God in these terms: "Do not dissipate me with the Voltaire, the Renan, the Michelet, the Hugo, and all the other infamous people ! Their soul is with dead dogs, their books are become manure. They are dead, and their name, even after their death, is a poison and a corruption. "

In the "How to read" appended to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, we can read this: "Atheism professed denial of God and agnosticism refusal to pronounce on this subject even if they are explained by different motivations, nevertheless betray a real deficiency in the exercise of human intelligence” and during the general audience Wednesday 14 April 1999 titled "Christian response to modern atheism" delivered in the Vatican; John Paul II did not fear to repeat, to describe the atheists, the very term used by the Psalmist: " The psalmist calls foolish anyone who says in his heart: "There is no God" (Ps 14:1).

I confess I do not know in what terms religious Jews today speak of unbelievers. But I did not hear that they had given up the unpleasant habit of starting their day by thanking God for not having created them non-Jews. It is true that some Jews, a little more liberal, prefer to resort to a positive formulation by thanking God, not to have created them non-Jews, but to have made them Jews. This, however, does not change anything, as it always means that Jews are chosen people compared with non-Jews, and therefore start their day by displaying their contempt for other believers, all the more so for unbelievers, considered as subhumans. For more details on the Birkat ha Minim see our notebook on Judaism.

But it is, of course, among Muslims today that we encounter the most scorn, even hatred for unbelievers. And how could it be otherwise since this contempt and hatred are expressed in an obsessive way throughout the Quran? I have traveled often to Muslim countries, and I have heard several times local guides who, to show their broadmindedness and to attract the sympathy of the tourists, declared that they sympathized willingly with non-Muslims Christians or Jews.But immediately added that it was quite different with those who had no religion: they did not want to know them, they did not want to have any relationship with them, they refused to look at them as human beings.

All in all, it is the unbeliever much more than the believer who would be justified in complaining of being the object of contempt and hatred of those who do not think like him. And it is not surprising that this is so. For if, as I have said, the unbeliever can understand quite easily the reasons of the believer, or at least some of them, which are undoubtedly the most important; it is not the same for the believer who, on the contrary, generally has great difficulty in admitting the true reasons of the unbeliever, and is easily inclined to lend him others. But the true reasons of the unbeliever are none other than improbability, extravagance, absurdity, as well as the obvious fallacy of religious beliefs. For the believer, only begin to understand the reasons of the unbeliever, so it is already beginning to doubt. In order to truly and fully understand them, it would be necessary to completely stop believing. Believers begin to respect unbelievers only when they begin to no longer believe truly , only

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when they start to feel deep inside themselves that unbelievers might be right.

The unbeliever can, on the contrary, very easily understand the reasons of the believer, without feeling in the least inclined to join him. He can very well understand that you may wish to have answers to questions that we cannot but ask yourselves; without being the least tempted to join those proposed by religions or sects. For, strong as may be his desire to have answers, he cannot consider as such obvious absurdities. To Pascal who does not fear to tell us that "without this incomprehensible mystery [the original sin] we are incomprehensible to ourselves"; Ernest Havet responds very rightly: "An incomprehensible fact is still a fact, but an incomprehensible explanation is no longer an explanation."

23) The unbeliever is too aware of the absolute impossibility of finding the key of the enigma so that he can only consider adopting any solution that can be offered to him; even though it would not be so obviously devoid of any foundation as those to which believers cling.

24) When Jehovah's or Allah’s witnesses or members of another sect come ringing at my door to explain to me that they have the truth, and to offer to share it with me; I answer them that, if one day someone had really found it, the news would have spread like wildfire, it would have circumnavigated the world and they would not be going door-to-door to announce a truth they know no more than those to whom they speak.

25) The unbelievers would not ask better somebody comes and gives them real answers to their questions.

26) And this is why when believers tell them that they know the solution, when they have to offer them only a grotesque assortment of poppycock, only a jumble of fables and nonsense as incredible as anachronistic; they, too, may feel offended, as would be a beggar to whom a false coin of one cent would be given, or a hungry man to whom cheese in plaster and bread in wood would be offered.

27) They too, may be deeply annoyed by beliefs and practices which, beyond those who indulge or devote themselves in them, tend to ridicule the whole of our species.

28) Yet, if believers cannot do without believing that there is an answer and that they know it; if they are obliged, to swallow the tall tales that their respective religions make them swallow, to engage in all sorts of contortions and gesticulations; unbelievers, whatever may be their disappointment and nerviness, have no intention of doing anything to try to oppose it.

29) Let believers bleat! Let them yelp! Let them groan each one more so than the other! Let them prance about! Let them wiggle! Let them go into a trance! Let them kneel! Let them prostrate themselves by lifting their backs in the air! Let them indulge in all the funny faces, all the affectations, all the buffooneries they will want! No unbeliever thinks of preventing them! Let them flog themselves mortify themselves or lie down on nails in the intimacy of their room or garden away from prying eyes! No unbeliever thinks of preventing them!

30) The unbelievers only contest them the right….

31)To oblige others to do the same.

32) To embark their children in the same pain by manipulating them, alienating their future right to choose, by closing them in advance such or such door. We have no rights with respect to our children, only duties. We do not have children, we are belonging to our children.

33) And nothing could excuse or even less justify the believers; when they claim to contest the right of unbelievers to express themselves with complete freedom, but one thing, at least, should prevent them, not only from doing so, but even from contemplating it one moment; the awareness of all the abuses, all the violations of human rights, all the crimes, all the massacres, that have been committed for so many centuries in the name of their god; and who, in the case of Islam are still committed every day here and there.

34) The sole thought of all the heretics and unbelievers whom the Church burned after having cut off their tongues, to prevent them from speaking a last time; should absolutely forbid her, not to answer, or at least to try to do it, to certain criticisms or jokes of unbelievers, what the latter admit very willingly; but to claim they had no right to do them.

35) If some men, if many men, if the majority of men, need to believe tall stories like a divine choice a resurrection or the isma of a prophet and the uncreation of sacred book, to bear our human status, eh well let them believe them! If they need to proclaim their faith, eh well, let

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them proclaim it, provided, of course, that they respect the freedom of others. If they need, not only to think that unbelievers are fools, but to say it, eh well let them say it! If calling unbelievers all the names under the sun can relieve them, eh well let them do it!

36) But let them not intend to demand that unbelievers respect their beliefs, let them do not try to force them to bowdlerize themselves and to restrain, so little it is, their freedom of opinion and speech! Gentlemen believers, a little decency please!

37) Believers respect believers' beliefs to the precise extent that believers respect their unbelief. It is the very pagan principle of reciprocity. You cannot decently ask them more. Reciprocity principle.

As we have already pointed out above, Rene Pommier, who taught French literature in the seventeenth century, is the author of many works, many of which show an exhilarating disrespect for religious superstitions.

As we have had the opportunity to say, we agree only at 98% with such an analysis of the phenomenon Belief. As for the intelligence of the believers, we are even more radical than him and we prefer to stick to the following comparison or image.

Every human being would he be the most intelligent of men, has in his head a zone of non-intelligence from which reason and reflection are excluded. A Bermuda triangle or Devil’s triangle where common sense or normal critical mind disappears, as well as culture. A bit like a fault, of a very small width, certainly, sometimes, BUT ALWAYS OF VERY LARGE DEPTH. This zone of non-intelligence in the brain, analogous to lawless areas of certain districts or certain regions of certain countries, where the laws of logic no longer prevail; can concern, according to individuals, areas as diverse as sexuality, money, hubris, but also religion.

Yes, but Rene Guenon it will be objected to me. Eh well, too bad for the followers of the Perenial Tradition, my opinion to me is that to convert to Islam has never been a proof of intelligence; except, of course, in the case of the Tulaqua like Abu Sufyan before the capture of Mecca in 630. Abu Sufiane, here is at least a Muslim who can hardly be blamed for having idolized a mere mortal like Muhammad. For Islam is the last of the idolatries, and the object of this idolatrous worship, which is a real insult to the Higher Being, is called Muhammad.

There are intelligent people, and very intelligent even, whom religion can make stupid, even very stupid. To believe that the human being (it is to be a manufacturing defect) needs such a safety valve not to explode (otherwise he would commit suicide ??) To believe that it is impossible for a human being to be 100% intelligent, 100% rational. He needs an outlet. Moments of madness! A blind spot like the retina of our eye (it is where the optic nerve and blood vessels leave the eye).

You have any doubt as to the existence of this point? So, try this visual test and you will understand.

+ O

Close your left eye and fix the cross well, and only the cross, come closer about 30 cm, you will see no longer the little lunula. If you still see it, get a little closer or farther away, there will be a specific place where you will see no longer the lunula anymore.

In the same way: Close your right eye and fix the lunula and only the lunula, come closer to about 30 cm, you will see no longer the cross. If you still see it, get a little closer or farther away, there will be a specific place where you will see no longer the cross.

Eh well in terms of intelligence, it is the same thing, every human being has his blind spot, his Mariotte blind spot, and it varies according to individuals: sexuality, money, atheism? But for some people you can tell by the fact that it can be religion!

To show a rational mind is first to confront religion with its numerous and truly extravagant contradictions. Epicurus and Spinoza have denounced the ridiculous and contrary ideas of divine perfection, which religions support.

The impious, already retorted Epicurus when he was attacked on this subject, is not the one who is thought to be so, but he who makes of gods of so foolish and contrary to their divinity, ideas. The anthropocentric and anthropomorphic double prejudice. Men imagine that gods, like them, act according to a purpose, and that their main purpose is Man. Excessive hubris, need to fight against the terrors of life or the fear of death? All that is incompatible with the

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omnipotence or goodness of God, and with the union of the two, is ascribed to the limits of our intelligence: the ways of divinity are mysterious.

But the stones thrown by the Jewish fundamentalists of Jerusalem, the Naturei Karta, on the Jewish motorists of Saturday, are neither symbolic nor in rubber.

John Toland, the intellectual who, oddly enough (this celtomania is really stupid) revived Druidism in the eighteenth century, wrote a book, about, or more accurately against (stuffed with explosive ideas) Christianity, he wanted not mysterious but all that he has recorded in his essay can and must also apply to Islam, mutatis mutandis. Toland explains, in particular, that if we admit that we are by nature incapable of reasoning well; then we are not more prone to damnation, not following the commandments of God; that those to whom the Gospel (or the Quran) was never announced are, by not believing in Christ (or Muhammad). May we condemn the one who does not believe in what they have said if he cannot understand them? And how can those who do not believe in Jesus or Muhammad follow them? It had been a much better answer that God would thus abridge our speculations, to gain us the more time for the practice of what we understand. Either the Apostles could not write more intelligibly of the reputed Mysteries, or they would not. If they would not, then it is no longer our fault if we neither understand nor believe them. And if they could not write more clearly themselves, they were so much the less to expect credit from others.

Some Christians or Islamist say nevertheless that God has a right to require the assent of his creatures to what they cannot comprehend. But I demand to what end God should require us to believe what we cannot understand. Except Faith signifies an intelligible persuasion, we cannot give others a reason of our hope.This famous and admirable doctrine is the undoubted source of all the absurdities that ever were seriously vented among Jews Christians or Muslims. Without the pretense of it, we should never hear of the transubstantiation, and other ridiculous fables of the Church of Rome nor should we be ever bantered with the Lutheran impanation, or the ubiquity it has produced, as one monster ordinarily begets another. And though the Socinians disown this practice, I am mistaken if either they or the Arians can make their notions of “a dignified and creature-God capable of Divine Worship,” appear more reasonable than the eccentricities of other sects touching the Nazarene.

It is time for Christians today to admit the relationship that can exist between their own language on the divinity and that of certain myths of paganism; that they renounce to present revelation and mythology, logos 1) and mythos 1), like a fight between the error and the truth; for Pelagius was completely right: the story of original sin is only a Sumerian-Babylonian myth 2). This idea, the idea of sin, nevertheless continues to prevail in the mentalities of a large part of the world, in spite of de-Christianization or de-Judaization which did not make it possible to eradicate it. As for Islam, let's not even talk about it!

The death of Jesus on the cross, despite all the respect that we also owe to this victim of Roman imperialism, the ordeal in question being really atrocious (see the fate of the rebellious slaves who followed Crixus and Spartacus); had no more effect for the salvation of Mankind than the death of a fly tortured with a pin. Christianity indeed develops more energy to teach the virtue of pain than to fight to improve the world and release the disadvantaged persons from their pains.

As Nietzsche rightly pointed out, Christianity is the gravestone that influences man heavily and prevents him from resurrecting. Nailed to the cross, Jesus continues to lead to physical or intellectual death, those who continue to worship him, for 2000 years.

I believe because I want to believe, that is, because I'm in the mood for believing, is the ultimate of this way of seeing things. This is at least in summary John Toland's thesis on this subject (Christianity not mysterious). Christianity remains a threat for Reason and Free Thought (the free expression of opinions). For fear of appearing less learned than one might think, the doctors of the Moslem, Jewish, or Christian belief, gloss ad infinitum over the secret designs of the Almighty. Most often it is only the result of impressions or preconceived ideas, which they rarely dare to correct by freer or more mature thoughts. Wanting to be specialists in the Law at all costs without understanding anything about their own speeches or statements, they are lecturing us. And why would they deprive themselves of it besides,

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because, from the moment we admit this principle, we do not see very well what we could refuse from what is said to us in the name of the Lord? ?

Under the pretext of fidelity to the Word of God, the worst follies or blasphemies can be deduced from the letter of Scripture. For example, that God is prone to passions, that He is responsible for sin, that Christ is a rock, that He is guilty of all our sins, even defiled by them; that we are sheep and not men, that Muhammad himself is a saint or an angel, etc.

All these religions are in fact based on ignorance, on generalized ignorance or ignorance of many things, and are therefore only superstitions of sects which have succeeded 3).

Christians, Jews, and Muslims talk a lot about fighting what they call sects, but they themselves are members of them in reality. It is repeated to us that Islam is tolerant. Does this mean that other monolatries are not so? That Christianity is essentially love, that Judaism is destined to be universal. All of this is new and, to say the least, debatable. It cannot be said that, until now, monolatrous (monolatrous, not henothistic) religions, have had a past of tolerance. Fortunately, there are more and more Christians, Jews, and Muslims, tolerant; they come there because of the spirit of the times, we must rejoice of that, as for the promotion of human rights, but until now, tolerance was not a truly religious virtue. A certain attitude, the philosophy that it generates, dogmatic and exclusive, generally leads to terrifying practices. The faithful of our various Abrahamic religions willingly remind it: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are not mere doctrines; but a total and constraining design of human existence, in its double relation with other men and with the universe. If conditions make it possible, they will hurry to restore the lost unity, with violence if necessary, and clear conscience in any case. Fundamentalism is only the exacerbation, the exposition to the light of day, of a latent claim, consubstantial to all monolatry.

The first anticlerical activist was perhaps the Irishman called Mongan (in the seventh century). See how he mocks Bishop Tibraide in the Gaelic narrative heading "Compert Mongain Ocus Serc Duibe-Lacha do Mongan." This Monganian state of mind has fortunately been kept throughout centuries in our latitudes. As John Toland pointed out when speaking of the Scriptures, is it well the Word of God in all this besides? ? ?

Our response to us will be more categorical than that of our illustrious predecessor, the great Gaelic druid Sean Eoghain Ui Thuathallain, known as John Toland in English, since it also applies to Quran.

It is rather inspired by the radicalism of a Mongan, and it is negative.

Throughout History , Man has seen his beliefs evolve or adapt. He went from animism to a more "intellectual" form of religious thought, before some people come to understand that nothing, strictly nothing, can establish the existence of any god. This was the beginning of "rational thinking."

Faced with this underway Mankind, and claiming to tower it through its full height, there is the caste of priests. A favored caste which, like all favored castes, has struggled - or still struggles - to preserve its power, or what remains of it. Formerly omnipotent, the caste of Christian priests (priests, monks, clergymen, popes) had to yield a lot of ground. But in other parts of the world, under the influence of other cultures, priests have sometimes kept significant spiritual and temporal power.

The specific case of Islam is of a more complex nature, given that there is no real clergy among Sunni Muslims (the most numerous). We must therefore consider here as "priests" all individuals who set themselves up as religious sermonizers, commentators of the Quran, or preachers. This concerns both the "teachers" of Quranic schools and the imams or mullahs. Here, the "caste of priests" is diffuse, without precise outlines and without particular dress. Nevertheless, it exists all the same for all that, and it is it which pulls the strings, from Arabia to the depths of Asia and Africa, to the heart of Western nations.

Their expertise? To recite by heart stories that more or less reproduce those of the Bible. These texts of the Bible were themselves already a compilation of different traditions; those of Sumer, those of "Yahweh" then YHWH / Adonai, archaic and jealous God, that of the Canaanite "El," who is found in Isra-el (meaning the one who fought against God) and, finally, that of Elohim (all the gods !) Some claim that this is proof of the authenticity of this book!

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Fortunately, archeology now gives us a more precise idea of how things really happened beyond the fantastic narratives reworked by successive powers.

The Bible is a collection of myths that are poorly or sometimes more skillfully mixed with some stories inspired by historical facts, but it is in no way factual or true. No more the Torah than its Christian version the Bible, with the additions of the New Testament, or than their Muslim version which in addition despite its contrary claims contains many extra biblical but not more divine, elements (see notebooks on this subject).

The religion of the Jewish people, of Christians, and even Islam (through its frenzied even artificial Biblism) is built on lies. To assert this, unfortunately, is today subject to a narrow-minded or literalist interpretation of the laws known as "anti-racist," because Christians, Muslims, and especially Orthodox Jews (Haredim), have always fought against historical reality. But the latter ends in imposing itself slowly under the impetus of archeologists whether in Jerusalem or Mecca. Slowly but surely.

For a normally educated human being of today (yes, it is true that a little education is necessary for that) gifted by the nature of a little critical mind (just the dose which is necessary) free of his thoughts or feeling good inside (a minimum of intelligence) such a God does not exist. It is obvious. It is the Man who created such a God (and first the gods), but not the opposite.

And it is lucky for this "God" besides. For if this "God" existed, if it came to manifest, we bring him immediately and right now in an international court for crimes against humanity!

The antagonisms between men are natural. With Civilization many of these antagonisms diminish or disappear, to make ideally room for solidarity. But the most irreducible antagonisms are of religious origin, because they are based on elements that cannot be discussed, some sacred elements over which reason has no control.

The biggest murderer in the history of mankind, the "Hitler" who killed hundreds of millions of human beings, is a "virtual assassin." He never existed! But millions of men, women, and children will still die because of him, even for him, in the years and decades to come. And that it is not some virtual. It's the sad reality. God has reveled in the sufferings of Job.

God does not exist, but the Devil himself really exists, and he has a name: Homo sapiens! When one thinks that "sapiens" means "wise" in Latin!

Man is a wolf to man. It is a predator who will stop at nothing to give himself the best part of the feast, woe to the vanquished of life, and that, it is not a prophet inspired by God who said it, since it is a man named Brennus but it contains much more truth than all the religions in f the world.

Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, claimed to be inspired by God to be better obeyed. They were only impostors whose power is only based on the marriage of credulity, ignorance, and lies. As for the interesting ideas in their works, they were drawn from the Sumerians, Plato, mythology and paganism. (Editor's Note: This last statement is nevertheless to be qualified seriously: the addition of Greek philosophy did not have only happy results on Christianity, the Sumerians were not angels, etc.)

The life of Muhammad took place quite differently than that of the Jesus of the Gospels. The earthly existence of the Jesus of the Gospels has been a failure, that of the Muhammad of the Hadiths a success. It was at the beginning of his career that Mohammed experienced disappointments. Muhammad, on the other hand, founded a state in Yathrib / Medina, and afterwards waged a war of submission against Mecca, then of conquest of Arabia. His influence has been felt throughout Muslim history. Imitating his behavior remains for every pious Muslim the goal to be reached, and this, in extremely varied fields: say such prayer at such a time, begin with the middle of one’s plate or with the edge while eating, not to use the right hand for such action, to free a slave, to go to the toilet, etc.

The influence of the personality of the founder of Islam was such that the following generations, after a period of latency corresponding to the coming to power of those who had really known him, hastened to collect all his acts meticulously; his least words - even his silences - have been the subject of interpretations; to systematically record them in collections whose dogmatic and legal weight equals that of the Quran. The corpora of prophetic traditions regarded as the most genuine are the voluminous collections of al-Bukhari and Muslim (ninth century). Tradition (Sunna) and Quran thus form the two "sources" of the Muslim religion.

It would be easy to get out of this impasse if the Quran was considered by Muslims as a merely human work, due to a Muhammad more or less inspired by God. If one could admit in the land of Islam that Muhammad simply behaved in man of the seventh century, and that his actions met the

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requirements of his time, which is not ours. For the most rigorous Muslim can also, a priori, recognize that the new times require a change of the teaching of the man Muhammad.

But here it is, the problem is that what is in the Quran is not supposed to be from Muhammad. It's supposed to come from God, through Archangel Gabriel. And a divine legislation is in principle immutable. However, the interpretation of the Law is largely based on the Sunnah, that is, precisely on the words and life of Muhammad, which thus enter the Law, and receive from it a part of its immutable value of eternity. We find ourselves facing a blockage similar to that of the Bible, even worse.

The world of Islam is a world of certainty from which doubt is excluded, where the mystery is wanted by God: the thought thus remains safe from the great shocks of History. The gaze of Muslims on the world is one-eyed: Islam does not see its own abuses, but clearly perceives those of the West or of the "barbarians." Paralysis of survival: to preserve one's cultural identity, to avoid a deadly confrontation with reality.

Freud was interested in the psychological effects of monolatry on the individual. The concept of creation ascribes to a mythical being (God) an energy from which he dispossesses himself. The less creative a being is, the more he feels the need to rely on a superior force (which is only his own strength, but denied by renunciation). The task of emotional consolation, carried out by monolatry, prolongs the childhood of the individual, and prevents him from developing his maturity, in other words, "infantilizes him." Monolatry uses the image of an all-powerful and protective Father. Just as the child projects on his father the omnipotence of his narcissistic desire (in terms of psychoanalysis, narcissism is the affective fixation on himself) that he imagines thus satisfied; the monolatrous believer seeks to calm the anguish born from the frustration of his desires.

The monolatrous consolation builds an imaginary world, which satisfies the human desire in an illusory way. At the same time, it removes from reality all its weight and all its value.

Freud's analysis of monotheism goes even further. For Freud, in fact, monolatry functions as a collective neurosis. As John Toland has pointed out, the object of belief must be comprehensible to all if man must believe in it, on pain of being damned (he who will have believed will not be damned); but can someone be condemned for not having done something impossible?

The obligation to believe in something implies the possibility of understanding it. Contradiction and mystery are just two emphatic ways of saying, "something which does not exist." Contradiction does not make sense because it is expressed in words that cancel each other, see the case of the abrogated or abrogating verses of the Quran (nasikh wa mansukh) , and the mystery too; but because it is expressed itself with words that make no sense at all.

Believers who are victims of this mental illness have made of their Higher Being a Father in the image of human desire, a desire always frustrated on this Earth by an unavoidable reality. In the case of the Quran, the aforementioned title of father is attributed to his prophet, but indirectly (since his wives are called “mothers of believers” even when they are 10 years old as Aisha).

Monolaters have identified the Higher Being with the image of their satisfied desires: monotheism according to Freud is therefore a mixture of regressive narcissism and keeping in infantilism.

Any revealed religion that does not really apply the principle "no compulsion in religion" (Quran Chapter 2, verse 256, chapter 22, verse 78) is akin to an axiomatic system, it cannot tolerate that its foundation be contested. The biblical texts that form Jewish, Catholic, Anglican, Orthodox, Reformed, canons, even the Quran, are not identical, but for their followers, they hold alone the truth which was conferred on them, through the prophets, by the divine power.

We must believe that the Scriptures are divine because the religious men have decided so, and the religious men have authority to decide so because they rely on the Scriptures.

It is doubtful whether such power can really be found in the passages alleged for this purpose, but the religious men themselves (those who are concerned by this in any case) affirm it.

Is not this vicious circle the most extraordinary argument ever invented to make the weak-minded vertiginous or dizzy? It goes without saying that what John Toland writes of the Church also applies to the Synagogue or the Mosque. John Toland, this reformer of the high-knowers of his time (who really needed it) and who is behind the Modern Free Thought, also wrote a book on, or rather against, Muhammad, quite judicious. The so-called revealed truths are always dangerous because they are imposed truths, which exclude any questioning. They are ferments of fanaticism or intolerance.

These sacred scriptures break down when they are confronted with the progress of the history that discloses them.

None of these sects, after having cursed all the others, does not go to the end of the questioning of the teachings with which they are pervaded, yet, like it, to the very depths of themselves. And with a few details, even though they refrain from it, they finally take over the main part of the previous ones.

The Sumerian texts are of a "biblical" simplicity: Man was created for the service of the gods (Christians and Muslims say, to worship God).

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Without being literally a robot, since he has been given a soul and reason, he will nevertheless have to work for the gods all his life, to cultivate the ground, to prune the trees, to domesticate the animals.

And if the gods have given him the means to grow and multiply, it is by no means so that he indulges in the forbidden joys of bodily pleasure; but to increase the number of men, in other words, of workers and thus increase the productivity of human slaves! Perfect or imperfect, men and women now have to perform tasks for which their creator designed them. Thanks to man, the gods can therefore consider the future with serenity. Humans work on earth for them : they will no longer have, in the empyrean, to rest from their creating task and to monitor the smooth running of the physical universe.

[Editor’s note. At least they had considered things like that, but alas, three times alas for them! they occurred quite differently. For far from being grateful, the humans showed a total ingratitude and claimed to keep for themselves the result of their labor. So the gods had to eliminate them and then recreate another mankind, different, more submissive, in other words, more pious].

As our teacher John Toland (in his Christianity not mysterious) has very clearly seen when the defenders of these various and basic religious ideas are asked to explain the words they use (which commonly means nothing ); and why they should to admit that they may be wrong; then they become nervous as a merchant a little expensive who is asked to review his accounts. It is always necessary to learn to think! In other words, Faith, but also Reason! One of the imprescriptible human rights is that his intelligence of beings and things is the object of a pedagogy designed to refine it, not of maneuvers intended to hinder its use. Humanity being both History and Reason, the progress of freedom depends on the progress of knowledge and of the assimilation of the past. If we do not learn to believe (catechisms are not explanations, but affirmations, to make them learn from childhood is a practice that amounts in fact, to ensuring the primacy of the blindest belief over reason, as well as to break any critical judgment in this field); such an attitude is a crime against humanity. Dogma is a crime against humanity. It is always necessary to learn to think!

The high-knowers of antiquity thought they spoke the same language as the gods (they thought they were homophonon, Diodorus of Sicily book V chapter XXXI) but what exactly means the notion of chosen people? Why would God, if he exists, would have chosen one people or a single man and a single period of time, very limited (compared to the 100,000 years of the current Homo sapiens) to speak to Mankind? The current mankind is at least 100,000 years old, but the revelation would have manifested only from - 1800 to +632 passing by +70 or + 135, in a precise zone of our planet? (No luck for Buddha!)

Schopenhauer has shown that the moral, social, and intellectual concepts of Hebrews are to be rejected. A god like this Jehovah, who, willingly, for such is his pleasure, and gladly, produces this world of misery and lamentation, and which in addition congratulates oneself on it, that is too much!

“Judaism, originally the one and only purely monotheistic religion that teaches an actual God creator of heaven and earth, has with perfect consistency no doctrine of immortality of soul. Thus it has no reward or punishment after death, but only temporal punishments and rewards whereby it is distinguished from all other religions (though not to its advantage). The two religions that sprang from Judaism really became inconsistent, because they took up the notion of immortality of soul that had become known to them from other and better doctrines, and yet retained the God creator.* The religion of the Jews as presented and taught in Genesis and all the historical books up to the end of Chronicles is the crudest of all religions because it is the only one that has absolutely no doctrine of immortality of soul, not even a trace thereof. When he dies, each king, each hero or prophet, is buried with his fathers and with this everything is finished. There is no trace of any life after death; indeed every idea of this kind seems to be purposely dismissed, etc.”(Schopenhauer, in his book titled in German-Greek language in a way, "Parerga und paralipomena").

Duhring too has shown this dangerous side of the Semitic design of the divinity and of morality, far less positive and happy for Man (last straw!) than the ancient design of barbarous peoples. ("Death is the middle of a long life if you know well what you sing. Happy the peoples beneath the Great Bear Thanks to their error; because they do not know this supreme fear which frightens all others” Lucan, in his Latin book De Bello Civili I, 454-462).

How a man, endowed by the nature of a brain and of faculties of reasoning, may accept such nonsense? Why does God so desperately need to be known? If God despairs to that extent of being known, why not reveal Himself to everybody, in the same way he reveals himself to prophets or

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oracles? Why does he play hide-and-seek to then punish those who do not see him?

Why are the words of the Bible [and of the Quran] so opposed to science, logic, and common sense? We are not goats. We are humans with a brain, and it's up to us to use it. If God wants no longer there are unbelievers on Earth, why he does not change into believers with one wave of his magic wand] the multitude of unbelievers; that is to say atheists or followers of another belief or of no one? Why does not he appear himself personally to everyone?

The French Jaures can insist [in Parliament on February 11, 1895] everyone would then believe in him and definitely. Why does he leave this heavy task of converting the minds to his prophets or to his faithful retainers [Moses, Joshua, David, Torquemada, Muhammad]?

1) Greek terms meaning respectively: logos, logic, rationality, and mythos, myth, mythology.

2) The creation of the world was first imagined in terms of procreation and not of more or less ex nihilo making. The Mother Goddesses formed the central figure, before being demoted (in patriarchal civilizations) to the position of infernal and evil deities. Marduk, Baal, El or the Elohim, will always start by fighting water (identified by Hebrews to a monster - Leviathan, Rahab -); and the female creator whom they supplant is a goddess of fertility, that is to say, a goddess of water.

The chaos in the Hebrew myth of Genesis is called Tohu wa-Bohu. The Bohu (or Behemoth) was a terrestrial monster and the Tohu (Tehom) a sea monster whose name is close to that of the Babylonian Mother Goddess Tiamat. Although the goddess Astarte (Asherah) is still more or less revered by the Hebrews before the ultra-racism of the worship of YHWH hits her with a curse, the woman among them always symbolizes disorder.

3) The Christian religion is very far from having always been a model of naïve optimism. But overall, it is weakened and became less virulent. Christianity, however, did not renounce its Mission, that is to say, to convert, or to unify, under its leadership, the inhabited universe, while waiting for better. Various Reformist or Pentecostal churches are still very active in this area, either in America or Africa.

APPENDIX Nr 6

The properly understood tawhid does not imply an exclusive, intolerant monolatry of the second, third, fourth or thousandth commandment type, but a benevolent and philosophical spirituality similar to that expressed in the famous dialogue between the god Krishna/Vishnu and Prince Arjuna.

" Those who are devotees of other gods and who worship them with faith actually worship only me, O son of Kunti, but they do so in a wrong way because I am the only enjoyer and master of all sacrifices. If one offers me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I accept it. I envy no one, nor am I partial to anyone. I am equal to all. But whoever renders service unto me in devotion is a friend, is in me, and I am also a friend to him” (Bhagavad Gita 9: 23-29, dialogue between the god Krishna/Vishnu and prince Arjuna).

So I respect Muslims in the exact same way that they respect me, a panentheist in the morning, a pantheist at noon, an atheist in the evening and an agnosticist before bed. And I have made myself an advocate for impossible cases, because everyone has the right to a defense lawyer.

If a Sufi wants to respect me, then I'll respect him, too. If a Taliban doesn't want to respect the miscreant that I am, then I won't respect that Taliban; it's called the principle of reciprocity and it's as old as the hills, the retaliation law is just one particular (and particularly negative) application of it.

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All this, of course, is colored by the fact that I was born by chance into a particular national community and not into another. If I'd been Japanese, for example, some of my cultural references would have been quite different; if I'd been Japanese, I'd have composed haikus to the glory of the samurai. But as it is, I'm not Japanese and I respect Muslims only insofar as they respect me (Peter DeLaCrau).

AFTERWORD IN THE WAY OF JOHN TOLAND.

Pseudo-druids with fabulous initiatory derivation (the famous and indescribable or hilarious perennial tradition) having multiplied since some time; it appeared us necessary to put at the disposal of each and everyone, these few notes, hastily written, one evening of November, in order to give our readers the desire to know more about true druidism.

This work claims to be honest but in no way neutral. It was given itself for an aim to defend or clear the cluto (fame) of this admirable ancient religion.

Nothing replaces personal meditation, including about obscure or incomprehensible lays strewing these books, and which have been inserted intentionally, in order to force you to reflect, to find your own way. These books are not dogmas to be followed blindly and literally. As you know, we must beware as it was the plague, of the letter. The letter kills, only spirit vivifies.

Nothing replaces either personal experience, and it’s by following the way that we find the way. Therefore rely only on your own strength in this Search for the Grail. What matters is the attitude to be adopted in life and not the details of the dogma. Druidism is less important than druidiaction (John-P. MARTIN).

These few leaves scribbled in a hurry are nevertheless in no way THE BOOKS TO READ ON THIS MATTER, they are only a faint gleam of them.

The only druidic library worthy of the name is not in fact composed of only 12 (or 27) books, but of several hundred books.

The few booklets forming this mini-library are not themselves an increase of knowledge on the subject,

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and are only some handbooks intended for the schoolchildren of druidism.

These simplified summaries intended for the elementary courses of druidism will be replaced by courses of a somewhat higher level, for those who really want to study it in a more relevant way.

This small library is consequently a first attempt to adapt (intended for young adults) the various reflections about the druidic knowledge and truth, to which the last results of the new secularism, positive and open-minded, worldwide, being established, have led.

Unlike Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, which swarm, concerning the higher Being, with childish anthropomorphism taken literally (fundamentalism known as integrism in the Catholic world); our druidism too, on the other hand, will use only very little of them, and will stick in this field, to the absolute minimum.

But in order to talk about God or the Devil we shall be quite also obliged to use a basic language, and therefore a more or less important amount of this anthropomorphism. Or then it would be necessary to completely give up discussing it.

This first shelf of our future library consecrated to the subject, aims to show precisely the harmonious authenticity of the neo-druidic will and knowledge. To show at which point its current major theses have deep roots because the reflection about Mythologies, it’s our Bible to us. The adaptations of this brief talk required by the differences of culture, age, spiritual maturity, social status, etc. will be to do with the concerned druids (veledae and others?)

Note, however. Important! What these few notes, hastily thrown on paper during a too short life, are not (higgledy-piggledy).

A divine revelation. A (still also divine) law. A (non-religious or secular) law. A (scientific) law. A dogma. An order.

What I search most to share is a state of mind, nothing more. As our old master had very well said one day : "OUR CIVILIZATION HAS NO CHOICE: IT WILL BE CELTISM OR IT WILL BE DEATH” (Peter Lance).

What these few notes, hastily thrown on paper during a too short life, are.

Some dream. An adventure. A journey. An escape. A revolt cry against the moral and physical ugliness of this society. An attempt to reach the universal by starting from the individual. A challenge. An obstacle fecund to overcome . An incentive to think. A guide for action. A map. A plan. A compass. A pole star or morning star up there in the mountain. A fire overnight in a glade?

What the man who had collected the core of this library, Peter DeLaCrau, is not.

- A god.

- A half god.

- A quarter of God.

- A saint.

- A philosopher (recognized, official, and authorized or licensed, as those who talk a lot in television. Except, of course, by taking the word in its original meaning, which is that of amateur searching wisdom and knowledge.

What he is: a man, and nothing of what is human therefore is unknown to him. Peter DeLaCrau has no superhuman or exceptional power. Nothing of what he said wrote or did could have timeless value. At the best he hopes that his extreme clearness about our society and its dominant ideology (see its official philosophers, its journalists, its mass media and the politically correct of its right-thinking people, at least about what is considered to be the main thing); as well his non-conformism, and his outspokenness, combined with a solid contrariness (which also earned to him for that matter a lot of troubles or affronts); can be useful.

The present small library for beginners “contains the dose of humanity required by the current state of civilization” (Henry Lizeray). However it’s only a gathering of materials waiting for the ad hoc architect or mason.

A whole series of booklets increasing our knowledge of these basic elements will be published soon. This different presentation of the druidic knowledge will preserve nevertheless the unity as well as the harmony which can exist between these various statements of the same philosophical and well-considered paganism : spirituality worthy of our day, spirituality for our days.

Case of translations into foreign languages (Spanish, German, Italian, Polish, etc.)

The misspellings, the grammatical mistakes, the inadequacies of style, as well as in the writing of the proper nouns perhaps and, of course, the Gallicisms due to forty years of life in France, may be corrected. Any other improvement of the text may also be brought if necessary (by adding, deleting, or changing, details); Peter DeLaCrau having always regretted not being able to reach perfection in this field.

But on condition that neither alteration nor betrayal, in a way or another, is brought to the thought of the author of this reasoned compilation. Every illustration without a caption can be changed. New

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illustrations can be brought.

But illustrations having a caption must be only improved (by the substitution of a good photograph to a bad sketch, for example?)

It goes without saying that the coordinator of this rapid and summary reasoned compilation , Peter DeLaCrau, does not maintain to have invented (or discovered) himself, all what is previous; that he does not claim in any way that it is the result of his personal researches (on the ground or in libraries).

What s previous is indeed essentially resulting from the excellent works or websites referenced in bibliography and whose direct consultation is strongly recommended.

We will never insist enough on our will not be the men of one book (the Book), but from at least twelve, like Ireland’s Fenians, for obvious reasons of open-mindedness, truth being our only religion.

Once again, let us repeat; the coordinator of the writing down of these few notes hastily thrown on paper, by no means claims to have spent his life in the dust of libraries; or in the field, in the mud of the rescue archaeology excavations; in order to unearth unpublished pieces of evidence about the past of Ireland (or of Wales or of East Indies or of China).

THEREFORE PETER DELACRAU DOES NOT WANT TO BE CONSIDERED, IN ANY WAY, AS THE AUTHOR OF THE FOREGOING TEXTS.

HE TRIES BY NO MEANS TO ASCRIBE HIMSELF THE CREDIT OF THEM. He is only the editor or the compiler of them. They are, for the most part, documents broadcast on the web, with a few exceptions.

ON THE OTHER HAND, HE DEMANDS ALL THEIR FAULTS AND ALL THEIR INSUFFICIENCIES.

Peter DeLaCrau claims only one thing, the mistakes, errors, or various imperfections, of this book. He alone is to be blamed in this case. But he trusts his contemporaries (human nature being what it is) for vigorously pointing out to him.

Note found by the heirs to Peter DeLaCrau and inserted by them into this place.

By respect for Mankind , in order to save time, and not to make it waste time, I will make easier the work of those who make absolutely a point of being on the right side of the fence while fighting (heroically of course) in order to save the world of my claws (my ideas or my inclinations, my tendencies).

To these courageous and implacable detractors, of whom the profundity of reflection worthy of that of a marquis of Vauvenargues equals only the extent of the general knowledge, worthy of Pico della Mirandola I say…

Now take a sheet of paper, a word processing if you prefer, put by order of importance 20 characteristics which seem to you most serious, most odious, most hateful, in the history of Mankind, since the prehistoric men and Nebuchadnezzar, according to you….AND CONSIDER THAT I AM THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE OF YOU BECAUSE I HAVE THEM ALL!

Scapegoats are always needed! A heretic in the Middle Ages, a witch in Salem in the 17th century, a racist in the 20th century, an alien lizard in the 21st century, I am the man you will like to hate in order to feel a better person (a smart and nice person).

I am, as you will and in the order of importance you want: an atheist, a satanist, a stupid person, with Down’s syndrome, brutish, homosexual, deviant, homophobic, communist, Nazi, sexist, a philatelist, a pathological liar, robber, smug, psychopath, a falsely modest monster of hubris, and what do I still know, it is up to you to see according to the current fashion.

Here, I cannot better do (in helping you to save the world).

[Unlike my despisers who are all good persons, the salt of the earth, i.e., young or modern and dynamic, courageous, positive, kind, intelligent, educated, or at least who know; showing much hindsight in their thoroughgoing meditation on the trends of History; and on the moral or ethical level: generous, altruistic, but poor of course (it is their only vice) because giving all to others; moreover deeply respectful of the will of God and of the Constitution …

As for me I am a stiff old reactionary, sheepish, disconnected from his time, paranoid, schizophrenic, incoherent, capricious, never satisfied, a villain, stupid, having never studied or at least being unaware of everything about the subject in question; accustomed to rash judgments based on prejudices without any reflection; selfish and wealthy; a fiend of the Devil, inherently Nazi-Bolshevist or Stalinist-Hitlerian. Hitlerian Trotskyist they said when I was young. In short a psychopathic murderer as soon as the breakfast… what enables me therefore to think what I want, my critics also besides, and to try to make everybody know it even no-one in particular].

Signed: the coordinator of the works, Peter DeLaCrau known as Hesunertus, a researcher in druidism.

A man to whom nothing human was foreign. An unemployed worker, post office worker, divorcee, homeless person, vagrant, taxpayer, citizen, and a cuckolded elector... In short one of the 9 billion human beings having been in transit aboard this spaceship therefore. Born on planet Earth, January 13, 1952.

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CONTENT.

60 chapters on Islam Page 004.

To cite blasphemy is not to blaspheme Page 009.

First drilling: political assassinations Page 013

Second drilling Page 017

Third drilling: the expulsion of Banu Qaynuqa (624) Page 020

Fourth drilling: the deportation of Banu al Nadir (625) Page 022

Fifth drillingg: the massacre of Banu Qurayza (627) Page 025

Sixth drilling: the capture of Khaybar (628) Page 028

Seventh drilling Page 030

Eighth drilling: the triumphal march on Mecca (630) Page 032

Ninth drilling: the development of the Quran Page 038

Tenth drilling: translation problems Page 041

Eleventh drilling: the dogma of the uncreated Quran Page 042

Twelfth drilling: the contradictions Page 046

Thirteenth drilling: the Quran according to other authors Page 051

Fourteenth drilling Page 054

Fifteenth drilling: the dogma of the inimitability of the Quran (i'jaz) Page 055

Sixteenth drilling: the dogma of isma Page 064

Seventeenth drilling: the first real contacts with the Christian world Page 068

Eighteenth drilling: the House of Wisdom (Bayt al-Hikma) Page 074

Nineteenth drilling: revelation or syncretism? Page 076

Twentieth drilling: the oddities in the Quran Page 082

Twenty-first drilling: the 7 different versions of the Quran Page 087

Twenty second drilling: evidence that the Quran is not...Page 090

Twenty third drilling: Quran and hadiths Page 092

Twenty-fourth drilling: the Sunna Page 094

Twenty-fifth drilling: the theocracy Page 096

Twenty-six drilling: the 70 sins targeted by Sharia law Page 099

Twenty-seventh drilling: De minimis non curat praetor Page 106

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Twenty-eighth drilling: fundamentalism and archaism Page 108

Twenty-ninth drilling: slavery Page 112

Thirtieth drilling Page 116

Thirty-first drilling Page 118

Thirty second drilling: the Quran and the women Page 120

Thirty third drilling: Muhammad and the women Page 124

Thirty-fourth drilling: the scandal of the women status Page 130

Thirty-fifth drilling Page 133

Thirty-sixth drilling: Islam and tolerance Page 138

Thirty-seventh drilling Page 140

Thirty-eighth drilling: the right to change religion Page 144

Thirty-ninth drilling Page 146

Fortieth drilling: the fate of heretics Page 151

Forty first drilling: the vice squad (Hisba) Page 153

Forty-second drilling: Hisba again Page 156

Forty-third drilling: the Muslim Inquisition: the Mihna Page 159

Forty-fourth drilling: dialogue with other religions Page 163

Forty-fifth drilling: semantics Page 170

Forty-sixth drilling Page 172

Forty-seventh drilling: Islam of Cordoba a case study Page 175

Forty-eighth drilling: Islam of Cordoba and Andalusian potluck dinner Page 178

Forty-ninth drilling: LA IKRATA FI D-DINI Page 187

Fiftieth drilling: comparison Jesus Muhammad Page 189

Fifty first drilling: Quranic verses extolling the lesser jihad Page 190

Fiftieth second: the minor jihad Page 191

Fifty-third drilling: ethics and violence Page 197

Fifty-fourth drilling: ethic and force Page 202

Fifty-fifth drilling: Critical spirit are you here? Page 205

Conclusion Page 212

Law and debates Page 218

Kharijite victimology Page 219

Appendix 1: Gustave Le Bon Page 222

Appendix 2: Jacques Ellul Page 223

Appendix 3: Evidence that Christians have falsified their official Gospels Page 224

Appendix 4: John Toland and the Gospel of Barnaby Page 227

Appendix 5: Eulogy of unbelief Page 229

Appendix 6 Page 239

Afterword in the way of John Toland Page 240

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BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

1 Quotations from the ancient authors speaking about Celts or druids.

2. Various preliminary general information about Celts.

3. History of the pact with gods volume 1.

4. Druidism Bible: history of the pact with gods volume 2.

5. History of the peace with gods volume 3.

6. History of the peace with gods volume 4.

7. History of the peace with gods volume 5.

8. From Fenians to Culdees or “The Great Science which enlightens” volume 1.

9. Irish apocryphal texts.

10. From Fenians to Culdees or “The Great Science which enlightens” volume 2.

11. From Fenians to Culdees or “The Great Science which enlightens” volume 3.

12. The hundred paths of paganism. Science and philosophy volume 1 (druidic mythology).

13. The hundred paths of paganism. Science and philosophy volume 2 (druidic mythology).

14. The hundred ways of paganism. Science and philosophy volume 3 (druidic mythology).

15. The Greater Camminus: elements of druidic theology: volume 1.

16. The Greater Camminus: elements of druidic theology: volume 2.

17. The druidic pleroma: angels jinns or demons volume 1.

18. The druidic pleroma angels jinns or demons volume 2

19. Mystagogy or sacred theater of ancients Celts.

20. Celtic poems.

21. The genius of the Celtic paganism volume 1.

22. The Roland’s complex .

23. At the base of the lantern of the dead.

24. The secrets of the old druid of the Menapian forest.

25. The genius of Celtic paganism volume 2 (liberty reciprocity simplicity).

26. Rhetoric : the treason of intellectuals.

27. Small dictionary of druidic theology volume 1.

28. From the ancient philosophers to the Irish druid.

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29. Judaism Christianity and Islam: first part.

30. Judaism Christianity and Islam : second part volume 1.

31. Judaism Christianity and Islam : second part volume 2.

32. Judaism Christianity and Islam : second part volume 3.

33. Third part volume 1: what is Islam? Short historical review of the set QUR.HAD.SIR. and SHAR.FIQ.MAD.

34. Third part volume 2: What is Islam? First approaches to the set QUR.HAD.SIR. and SHAR.FIQ.MAD.

35. Third part volume 3: What is Islam? The true 5 pillars of the set QUR.HAD.SIR. and SHAR.FIQ.MAD.

36. Third part volume 4: What is Islam? Sounding the set QUR.HAD.SIR. and SHAR.FIQ.MAD.

37. Couiro anmenion or small dictionary of druidic theology volume 2.

Peter DeLaCrau. Born on January 13rd, 1952, in St. Louis (Missouri) from a family of woodsmen or Canadian trappers who had left Prairie du Rocher (or Fort de Chartres in Illinois) in 1765. Peter DeLaCrau is thus born the same year as the Howard Hawks film entitled “the Big Sky”. Consequently father of French origin, mother of Irish origin: half Irish half French. Married to Mary-Helen ROBERTS on March 12th, 1988, in Paris-Aubervilliers (French department of Seine-Saint-Denis). Hence 3 children. John Wolf born May 11th, 1989. Alex born April 10th, 1990. Millicent born August 31st, 1993. Deceased on September 28th, 2012, in La Rochelle (France).

Peter DELACRAU is not a philosopher by profession, except taking this term in its original meaning of amateur searching wisdom and knowledge. And he is neither a god neither a demigod nor the messenger of any god or demigod (and of course not a messiah).

But he has become in a few years one of the most lucid and of the most critical observers of the French neo-druidic or neo-pagan world.

He was also some time assistant-treasurer of a rather traditionalist French druidic group of which he could get archives and texts or publications.

But his constant criticism both domestic and foreign French policy, and his political positions (on the end of his life he had become an admirer of Howard Zinn Paul Krugman Bernie Sanders and Michael Moore); had earned him moreover some vexations on behalf of the French authorities which did everything, including in his professional or private life, in the last years of his life, to silence him.

Peter DeLaCrau has apparently completely missed the return to the home country of his distant ancestors.

It is true unfortunately that France today is no longer the France of Louis XIV or of Lafayette or even of Napoleon (which has really been a great nation in those days).

Peter DeLaCrau having spent most of his life (the last one) in France, of which he became one of the best specialists,

even one of the rare thoroughgoing observers of the contemporary French society quite simply; his three children, John-Wolf, Alex and Millicent (of Cuers: French Riviera) pray his readers to excuse the countless misspellings or grammatical errors that pepper his writings. At the end of his life, Peter DeLaCrau mixed a little both languages (English but also French).