As always, I'm getting pelted by conservative friends with ridiculous claims -- the latest round relates to Islam. To confront it, I'm employing a simple strategy: ascertaining what Muslims truly believe by recounting actual conversations with them.
Anyway, below the fold is my latest reply to these goons, a brief summation of the common themes that emanate from my discussions with Muslim friends.
I have several Muslim friends.
They tell me that radicals have misinterpreted Islam by ignoring the context of the Koran's harsher components. Like all religious texts, those passages are a product of their time, and in this case, war was a permanent reality. They say radicals favor that literalist time-trapped depiction over the Koran's transcendent principles. The former tells a story; the latter are a signal to future generations.
They bombard me with Koranic text that speaks of 1) tolerance, 2) love, and 3) full compatibility with democratic, multi-faith society. They say the vast majority of Western Muslims (and many elsewhere) share their views.
They say that Islam comes in two dynamics: the theological and the political. The theological is fairly straightforward, as it relates to daily prayer and personal salvation. The political (societal) is where the disagreement lies: they are adamant that sharia law is not commanded, that it is simply one chosen (literalist) interpretation**.
Above all, they tell me that it's laughable to think there's a simple monolithic position held by all the world's Muslims, which should be obvious as a matter of logic -- especially when we're talking about something squishy like religion.
**the Bible condones slavery in both the old and new testaments. Southern baptists incessantly quoted scripture during the American Civil War in an effort to keep it in place. But smarter people prevailed, because the transcendent principles won out. A similar debate is taking place globally today within Islam. Assuming the radicals are "correct" in their interpretation is tantamount to concluding the slavery-defenders had the Bible right.