A better way to deal with Atheists?

I’ve always find religious people to be deeply insecure about their belief. History has shown plenty of examples of wars, wage by none other but religious folks, against those they perceive as ideologically hostile. So, it’s not a surprise reading this latest news from Saudi Arabia about certain religious factions who wish to redefine atheism as a severe crime/criminal activity punishable with an extremely harsh sentence. Here’s the exact wording used in the legal definition

Royal Decree 44, which criminalizes ”participating in hostilities outside the kingdom.” The penalty for such activity is three to 20 years in prison.

Article 1: “Calling for atheist thought in any form, or calling into question the fundamentals of the Islamic religion on which this country is based.

I’m not sure what has prompted this new rule. Maybe an increase in the number of folks who claim they are now atheist?

Being a Muslim, I can safely say that Islam in general doesn’t really have an issue with people leaving religions. Muslims eagerly accept and welcome folks from other religions (such as Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism) converting to Islam. Islam promotes dawa or calling people from other religions to Islam. Islam’s holy book encourages thinking and research and acceptance to the freedom of speech and thought and the ability to question anything that disagrees with rationality. Islam also forbids force-conversion; Someone who is not a Muslim cannot be forced to convert to Islam by Muslim unless he/she willingly wish to do so. Now that you know how progressive the teaching of Islam can be, let me also tell you how anti-progressive Islamic teaching can be.

If you are blessed to be born from Muslim parents/household then you are basically stuck with the Islamic faith for the rest of your life. You are not allowed to ever change your religion or express doubts about Islam even unintentionally. You are completely forbidden to leave Islam to convert to other religions and you are also forbidden to leave Islam to become a complete disbeliever of God (atheist). If someone witnessed you leaving Islam, expressing doubts or questioning important tenets of Islam then you can be brought in front of a judge who can force you to repent and recant whatever you say. If you disagree with the judge or wish to stand by your opinion, then you will be considered an apostate. The punishment for apostasy according to Islam is death. Yes, you heard me right. It’s a death sentence. But don’t worry, the judge/court system will give you a few days or months for you to contemplate on your sin and change your mind eventually. But if you still stubbornly insist on standing by your words, and refuse to back down, then the court is under no obligation to deal with you with mercy.

Based on my study about Islam and Muslim, most Muslim doesn’t really question or disagree with the punishment for apostasy. Most have gladly accepted that the punishment is severe only because when you are guilty of the most heinous crime, against the God HIMSELF, then death can only be the most fitting punishment for this sin. I’ve seen some studies (I think one of it was from the Pew research), when questions are posed about apostasy, the majority of the populations from Muslim countries understand the crime, the punishment and the wisdom behind the Islamic way of dealing with this issue.

I know that this topic deserves a deeper analysis than what I’m providing but I’ve no time or energy to delve deeply into it.

I’ve had numerous discussions with seemingly knowledgeable people about apostasy. Most of the explanations (background, history and reasoning) about apostasy are very unsatisfactory and speculative.

The biggest assumption Islam makes about apostates is that they are perceive as enemy of Islam and Muslim, which is completely false in my opinion because of the following reasons:

Religion cannot be forced on anyone because it requires sincerity. You either believe in something or you don’t.

Forcing anyone to accept the religion you are born into is foolish because you don’t decide your religion at the moment of your birth so how can you be forced to accept it for life long.

Islam doesn’t view people of other faiths who are extremely misguided as the enemy of state.

Islam also tolerates people leaving other religions to convert to Islam. So why have a different standard for atheist (or apostate)?


You know what they say ‘If your religion can’t stand the scrutiny then perhaps something is wrong with your version of the truth’. I somewhat agree with this saying because whenever any thoughts or ideas that are perceive to be attacking the legitimacy of the religion, you are expected to blindly follow the religion without questioning.

Now, back to the original news article. Seems to me, some clever folks have also found a convenient way to attach other rules to the so-called legal frameworks to prevent any kind of dissenting opinions; socially, politically or religiously.

Reference

http://www.salon.com/2014/04/03/new_laws_in_saudi_arabia_declare_that_atheists_are_terrorists/

Easter is the Most Ridiculous Christian Celebration

Today is Easter Sunday. Easter is the day when the Christian God was resurrected after being dead for 3 days. And the purpose? So, he can save the humanity for all time.

The idea of a God being born in a human male form is already absurd enough without the added stupidity of having that God dying on the cross only to be resurrected three days later! The fact that a billion Christians in the world subscribing to this belief easily only goes to show that there's absolute nothing that the religious people would not believe when absurd ideas are presented in a theological context.

Moving on, I was a little bit overjoyed reading this news article two weeks ago: If Jesus Never Called Himself God, How Did He Become One?

I'm quoting essential part of the article, but you should read it entirely

When Bart Ehrman was a young Evangelical Christian, he wanted to know how God became a man, but now, as an agnostic and historian of early Christianity, he wants to know how a man became God.

During his lifetime, Jesus himself didn't call himself God and didn't consider himself God, and ... none of his disciples had any inkling at all that he was God. ..

I think it's completely implausible that Matthew, Mark and Luke would not mention that Jesus called himself God if that's what he was declaring about himself. That would be a rather important point to make. This is not an unusual view amongst scholars; it's simply the view that the Gospel of John is providing a theological understanding of Jesus that is not what was historically accurate.

Right at the same time that Christians were calling Jesus "God" is exactly when Romans started calling their emperors "God." So these Christians were not doing this in a vacuum; they were actually doing it in a context. I don't think this could be an accident that this is a point at which the emperors are being called "God." So by calling Jesus "God," in fact, it was a competition between your God, the emperor, and our God, Jesus.

Christians had a dilemma as soon as they declared that Christ was God. If Christ is God and God the Father is God, doesn't that make two gods? And when you throw the Holy Spirit into the mix, doesn't that make three gods? So aren't Christians polytheists? Christians wanted to insist, no, they're monotheists. Well, if they're monotheists, how can all three be God?


I was struck in doing my research by the fact that the New Testament never indicates that people came to believe in the resurrection because of the empty tomb. This was a striking find because it's just commonly said that that's what led to the resurrection belief.

But if you think about it for a second, it makes sense that the empty tomb wouldn't make anybody believe. If you put somebody in a tomb and three days later you go back and the body's not in the tomb, your first thought isn't, "Oh, he's been exalted to heaven and made the son of God." Your first thought is, "Somebody stole the body." Or, "Somebody moved the body." Or, "Hey, I'm at the wrong tomb." You don't think he's been exalted to heaven. In the New Testament it's striking that in the Gospels the empty tomb leads to confusion but it doesn't lead to belief. What leads to belief is that some of the followers of Jesus have visions of him afterward.

If Jesus had not been declared God by his followers, his followers would've remained a sect within Judaism - a small Jewish sect, and if that was the case it would not have attracted a large number of gentiles. If they hadn't attracted a large number of gentiles, there wouldn't have been this steady rate of conversion over the first three centuries to Christianity; it would've been a small Jewish sect.

Reference

http://www.npr.org/2014/04/07/300246095/if-jesus-never-called-himself-god-how-did-he-become-one

Religious Fundamentalism is a Mental Disorder

I'm reading this news

Kathleen Taylor, a neurologist at Oxford University, said that recent developments suggest that we will soon be able to treat religious fundamentalism and other forms of ideological beliefs potentially harmful to society as a form of mental illness. She said that radicalizing ideologies may soon be viewed not as being of personal choice or free will but as a category of mental disorder.

Even before reading this article, I've always considered such people, who are radicalized and deeply influenced by the harmful aspect of religions, as very unstable and highly detached from reality. Religion promotes blind faith most of time. Once you voluntary/involuntary give up on thinking because of your affiliation to that religion/group/sect, then you are probably no different than someone with an impaired mental conditions.

Also, she is pushing for classifying extremists as people with mental illness rather than criminals. I disagree since people with mental illness can be annoying sometimes but they are not violent.