although with returns ever diminishing, maybe I’m getting a subtle hint that it is getting to be time to pack it in, rather than to press on ahead to the second half of the Qur’an.

Dear Mr. Spencer,

I for one read every entry in your Quran blog, sometimes a few weeks late, but always with great interest. Please continue your excellent work.

Martin

Mr. Spencer if you are still having doubts, please realize you have the most loyal, if not largest, following on Hotair.com.

…although with returns ever diminishing, maybe I’m getting a subtle hint that it is getting to be time to pack it in,…

What are you basing these ‘diminshing returns’ on? Do you count number of comments or are you relying on a site meter to see how many are actually reading?

As for comments, I read every week, along with all three translations you link to, although I usually don’t get to it until Tuesday or Wednesday. I don’t have as many questions as I did early on – now that I have read a fair bit of the Quran, I sort of understand the game a little better and usually understand what is going on with the help of your commentary.

I find the above statement offensive. You should not generalize in such a way. Do you think I (or any of the other bloggers) are too stupid or too uneducated to understand what Mr. Spencer is doing here?

Not only that, but in her zeal for us to not generalize Muslims, she has generalized the readers of this blog. Kind of ironic, huh?

I will add my two cents and repeat what’s already been asked – Judaism and Christianity did commit violence in the name of religion. Problem was it was centuries (or mellinia, in the case of Judaism) ago. Islam is commiting violence in the name of religion now. You can say what you want about it being “a minority of extremists” but the fact still remains that a global-scale jihad is being waged by Muslims now. Not 700 years ago, not thousands of years before Christ, but now. Why the moral equivelance?

The other problem is that Islam teaches and encourages violence in their holiest of books. Jesus never would have said to kill the infidels and make them feel humiliated. If you’re the Christian that you claim to be Amy, you should know the basic difference between Christianity and Islam. Jesus taught to bring people to Him through demonstration – live a Christian life and people will want to follow your example. Mohammed taught to bring people to Islam through the sword – conquer their lands and force them to submit and be humiliated or convert. We have to look no further than the lives of these two men to see the glaringly obvious difference – Jesus died for our sins, sacrificing himself in order that countless others can be saved. Mohammed spent his life marauding and conquering. He was a warlord who used relition as a tool to whip his followers into a frenzy.

If what I’ve said above somehow offends you then read it in Mohammed’s own words – specifically Sura 9 and (I believe) Sura 22.

You can’t have moral equivelance when things aren’t equal. Islam’s violent tendancies come directly from the words of their most revered figure. Christianity had a violent past, but Christians weren’t instructed by Christ to violently conquer their enemies (or have you forgotten a little thing called the “Roman persecution”? You know… lions and all).

I find this entire series completely counterproductive. We’re Christians and every night we have a Bible study with our children. Currently we’re studying the Old Testament.. Genesis, Exodus. Here are some goodies to consider:

Amy Proctor on May 11, 2008 at 7:38 PM

First, my husband and I have watched some of your speeches on C-Span and agree with most of your comments. We respect your expertise.

What is wrong with your Blogging the Quran series? Nothing in and of itself. I see nothing to disagree with in content but my concern comes when looking at the audience it is presented to.

Amy Proctor on May 12, 2008 at 3:02 PM

So which is it Amy, a completely counterproductive waste of time or accurate analysis?

It appears that you and your husband know little to nothing about “Dr.” Spencer and his work, but then again, your little rant here is really directed at Michelle Malkin, isn’t it?

This “war on terror” that you and the hubby so desperately want to win is hampered by your inability to properly identify the enemy. Terrorism is a tactic. not an enemy.

In your zeal for fairness and religious moral equivalence, which was painfully apparent by your attempt to portray Christianity and Judaism as equally violent in textual presentation, you fail to acknowledge the basic reality that Jews and Christians are not waging global warfare against other faiths like many followers of Islam are.

That is, unless of course you feel that the primary perpetrators engaging in terrorist acts worldwide these days, Muslims of Arab descent, is simply a grand-scale coincidence?

If you had actually read Spencer’s Q-blog you would know that he relies mainly on Islamic sources, so as to avoid being labeled as a purveyor of conjecture. Knowing that, shouldn’t you be on Muslim blogs correcting those misunderstanders of their own religion, explaining to them that they do not really mean what they say, day in and day out?

I just don’t want to be completely oblivious to the possibility, as evidenced by the sparse commentage, that there just isn’t much interest.

I can’t speak for others, but I read this every Sunday (or when it appears at Jihad Watch). If I don’t comment, it’s for one of two reasons: 1) Nothing I’ve read particularly stimulates a comment, often because it would be an observation I’ve made before (or others have); or 2) Something in what I read so bugs me that I can only think of something snarky to write about Islam or Muhammad, and I’d rather not drag the conversation down. :)

However, I’ve found it edifying reading and I’ve recommended it to friends, just as I have with your biography of Muhammad and “Religion of Peace” (which I’m reading now). I hope you’ll continue this project and someday turn it into a book.

I see nothing to disagree with in content but my concern comes when looking at the audience it is presented to
Amy Proctor on May 12, 2008 at 3:02 PM

Amy-

I find the above statement offensive. You should not generalize in such a way. Do you think I (or any of the other bloggers) are too stupid or too uneducated to understand what Mr. Spencer is doing here?
I find that when people cannot discuss or debate on the issues, they resort to name calling or assume that the intended audience is dumb. Please reevaluate.
YOU HAVE JUST INSULTED ALL OF US WHO READ THIS WEEKLY.

I have an education, I can understand. What audience should Mr. Spencer direct it to? I await your reply.

With all respect, I request that you answer the questions I asked you in my replies to your earlier post before I assay another lengthy reply to another lengthy post. The questions were not rhetorical ones: I would honestly like to know your answers to them.

Thanks and kind regards
RS

First, my husband and I have watched some of your speeches on C-Span and agree with most of your comments. We respect your expertise.

Secondly, my husband is an active duty soldier (a Master Sergeant –E-8 in the U.S. Army) and is a subject matter expert in the field of Religious Leader Engagement in the war on terror. He has been to Iraq twice; once for a year with the 82nd ABN and once recently to draft policy for the Army on dealing with Muslim leaders in Iraq. This was at the request of MNF-I. He also authored A Leaders Guide to Shiaism which is used internally by the military.

I preface my comments with this to let you know of our concern and aim regarding Islam. It is not to bless its theology but to win the war on terror.

What is wrong with your Blogging the Quran series? Nothing in and of itself. I see nothing to disagree with in content but my concern comes when looking at the audience it is presented to. Michelle Malkin often has inflammatory entries on her blog that act as a thumb in the eye of the Muslim community both stateside and abroad. So in the context that you are cementing misconceptions among her readers, not necessarily by error of your own but by the stubbornness of her readers, I find the series unproductive. That is a rebuke to conservatives who refuse to understand the difference between apostates and real, devout Muslims.

A scholar could do a series on Blogging the Torah with equally disturbing content that would yield positive commentary from Hot Air readers because we understand Judaism in friendly terms. However, the anti-Islamic bias by many conservatives based on terrorists rather than Muslims is hurting the war effort and frankly prolonging the war in Iraq. That is my concern.

Christianity has some highly unusual theology as well that we just accept because it is our culture. Eating the flesh and drinking the blood of a divine man doesn’t make anyone bat an eye, nor does the return of a savior from heaven who was killed and risen from the dead. The return of the Messiah is a theme not exclusive to Christianity, but Islam and Judaism as well, yet only Islam is labeled as a freakish religion for nutty ideas. I think not.

So my concern is that this series cements misconceptions.

This is an example of what we address in the Army:
http://www.StrategicStudiesInstitute.army.mil/

PRECISION IN THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR:
INCITING MUSLIMS THROUGH THE WAR OF IDEAS
By Sherifa Zuhur
April 2008

SUMMARY
This monograph questions the messages conveyed to Muslims about their religion and extremism in the war of ideas. Why do American strategic messages on this issue play so badly in the region? Why, despite broad Muslim disapproval of extremism as shown in surveys and official utterances by key Muslim leaders,
has support for bin Ladin actually increased in Jordan and in Pakistan since some polling suggests bin Ladin’s approval in Jordan suffered a great deal after the hotel
bombings?

A reason that the United States is winning so few “hearts and minds” in the broader Islamic world is confusion and imprecision in American strategic messages. The grand strategy of defining, isolating, and destroying Islamism or radical Islamism may not be possible if America does not proceed more carefully, and listen to what its allies think, know, and feel about their faith.

This monograph will not revisit the origins of Islamist violence. It is instead concerned with conceptual failure that wrongly constructs the War on Terror and discourages Muslims from supporting it. They are unable to identify with the proposed transformative countermeasures because they discern some of their core beliefs and institutions as targets in this endeavor.

ISLAM AS THE ENEMY?
An excellent preface to American strategic communications on the GWOT are frequent statements that “Muslims are not our enemy.” These have featured
in many of President George W. Bush’s addresses9 or in media coverage of Islamist violence or militance. Unfortunately, the very next statement often denies key
faith concepts of our “enemies,” as in “we [the United States] honor the traditions of Islam. . . . Our enemy does not. Our enemy doesn’t follow the great traditions of Islam.”10 The President is attempting to describe the radicals as bad Muslims, or “evil,” but many Muslims see the “enemies” literally as “extremists” or coreligionists
who do honor the traditions of Islam, but unfortunately to an extreme.

Initial disclaimers that Islam is the enemy may precede references to the Caliphate, an idealized historical form of rule for all Muslims, as in President Bush’s comments that:
6
They (the terrorists) hope to establish a violent political
utopia across the Middle East, which they call a
“Caliphate”—where all would be ruled according to
their hateful ideology. Osama bin Laden has called the
9/11 attacks—in his words—“a great step towards the
unity of Muslims and establishing the Righteous . . . [Caliphate].”
This Caliphate would be a totalitarian Islamic
empire encompassing all current and former Muslim
lands, stretching from Europe to North Africa, the Middle
East, and Southeast Asia.11

This statement correctly quotes bin Laden, but primarily informs Americans that the “Caliphate” is an evil goal of extremists, and does not mention the historical role of the Caliphate in Muslim history, weltanshauung, or imaginaire. If President Bush wants
to reassure Muslims that they are not the enemy and they are not totalitarians, it would be better to attack the alleged totalitarianism of bin Ladin’s promised
state, rather than imply that its form (as Caliphate) would necessarily be totalitarian.

Our media analysis of actual attacks may begin by excusing ordinary Muslims, but immediately describe radicals as those “who are loyal to the ummah,”12 the name for the Muslim community. Muslims then understand that the initial disclaimer that Islam “is a great world religion, and Muslims are U.S. allies in the GWOT”—is just rhetoric. They cannot help reacting this way when they hear condemnations of “bad” Muslims
who are totalitarians, or Islamofascists who believe in the Caliphate, the ummah, or the principles of jihad or tawhid (the concept of oneness, or strict monotheism).

When it comes to Iran, and the Iraqi Shi`a, we hear statements about fanatic millenarianism, defined as belief in the Twelfth Imam, the Imam Mahdi (the messianic figure who will appear before the Day of Judgment), which impart wrongly sinister, or uncompromising ideas to the population. Belief in the Day of Judgment and the Mahdi are core concepts to all Muslims, although only certain Muslims are attracted to the current that prepares for the return of the Twelfth Imam, as in frequent references made by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran.

When my husband and I see some of the entries about Islam on Michelle Malkin’s site we cringe. I am not suggesting all Muslims are benevolent but I would suggest along that line that Christianity also has its struggles against apostasy. It doesn’t look as violent as a suicide bomber and can look quite attractive in the name of tolerance, love and acceptance, all the while the commandments of Christ are sacrificed on the altar of relativism. That sends as many people to hell as any IED, in my opinion.

While I rarely post, I can’t express how interesting and important the work you are doing is. It is my Monday morning must read. While some posters here may say “crap”, you leave that up to the reader to decide. You simply present what IS and leave the rest for us to digest. I applaud you for that.

As far as the comments go (or lack of questions), others have noted that Sunday mornings are not exactly prime net surfing times.

It’s really maddening and sad that about 1 BILLION people believe this crap.

SouthernGent on May 11, 2008 at 3:57 PM

Given the preponderance of evidence I am forced to surmise that it is largely in their nature to believe it.

Holmes on May 11, 2008 at 4:05 PM

Of course, I am all for reading the book — if I weren’t, I wouldn’t be leading this exercise, although with returns ever diminishing, maybe I’m getting a subtle hint that it is getting to be time to pack it in, rather than to press on ahead to the second half of the Qur’an. Still, whatever happens with this, I would caution you and everyone against conceptualizing the contents of the book in a way abstracted from the culture and civilization to which it has given birth. This book doesn’t stand alone any more than any book does.

Robert Spencer on May 11, 2008 at 4:18 PM

The first four paragraphs of this thread would be a great teaser for your book, except it might terrify people who already believe their world is being threatened by a militaristic cult. To Westerners it is mind bending to understand how people submit themselves to this level of control. There is your problem Robert. If you simply (hah it is not simple) reveal all that is islam, it will scare people from reading your book.

Your book is terrifically important but must be promoted carefully.

Westerers must come to terms now with the enveloping culture of islam so we can understand how it blocks rational communication, and so we can defend outselves from being absorbed into the unrelenting dominance without giving up our love for liberty and our desire to repect others.

The old rules do not work with a culture that is divorced from our context

The most important part of your book will be the preamble. You must set a context for us so that we will read the details of this alter culture for self defense.

The second most important part of your book would be any suggestions you might have for how to bridge this world without a nuclear holocaust.

Pope Benedict sent out requests to islamic leaders for a dialogue about the concept that there are universally held beliefs in certain human rights that transcend all religions including freedom to practice a chosen faith. Multiple times he was given the reply that they were willing to discuss the concept that there is but one god. I believe Benedict expected this answer but intentionally set up the dialogue to show the world exactly the problem we face

Why do people stay in islam when it seems so controlling? Because a faith that micromanages how you wash your hands becomes your world in the same way putting food in a refrigerator to keep it from spoing becomes a part of our world. We learn to tie our shoelaces, put on a warm coat etc etc. Their list of etceteras in islam begin before a baby can speak and become part of the survival mechanism.

A Christian who converted to islam said she was so consumed by meeting the physical requirements there was no time to think about the reasonableness of the requirements.

And then who defines ‘reasonable’?

You can do it Robert. We need someone to put it together. This is survival

Robert, please continue this work, here (or elsewhere). Despite this site’s name, some of us are shy.

Thank you for your work so far!

and another thing…
Amy asked, “Are we prepared to condemn Judaism?” My answer, “Yes, of course. And I am prepared to condemn Christianity, and Islam and any other religion that walks through the room.” It is up to the religion to convince ME that it should be treated respectfully, and not MY job to put on a Stepford wife smile whenever anyone talks about religion.

I am not registered to comment at Hot Air, but I really wanted to respond to Amy’s comments.

I myself have read the Bible. You know what happens? I come across something that is opaque and I find myself asking, “Well, what is that all about?” For example, “Why is the sacrifice of Abel accepted but not Cain’s?” “Lot’s daughter’s did what with him?” “Why is Jacob’s treachery rewarded?” and those are just off the top of my head recalling questions from Genesis.

So what do I do with these questions? I don’t just give a dumb, happy grin and say, “Well it’s in the Bible so it must be okey-dokely!” Instead I try to find out how Jews and Christians throughout the ages have considered these passages. What do the Fathers of the Church say, what do Biblical scholars say, what do Jewish rabbis say?

I could go on at length about interpreting each of the points you raised, but that would deprive you of the useful exercise of researching something. On the other hand, I am not sure you would. It seems to me from your criticism of David’s behavior that you must have flung the Bible from your hand in mid-verse. Otherwise you might have noticed the second part of 2 Sam 11:27, “But the LORD was displeased with what David had done.” Hello??? That’s a clue in the text itself about how to view the behavior, and it is fundamentally dishonest of you to present this as a problem of Biblical morality. You are simply taking refuge in willful ignorance of both the Bible and the Koran.

Robert is in fact providing context about each and every part of the Koran. He is systematically, week-by-week going through the Koran and showing how Muslim commenters view the passage.

Comments at Hot Air are closed, but Jihad Watch is open, and anyone with an alternative commentary is entirely welcome to post it.

Most people are too lazy to wonder why adulterers are not stoned to death in Jewish or Christian societies, and why they are in Muslim societies. They buy into a watered down historical determinism that says, “Ah yes! Islam is such a young religion, and we used to stone adulterers back in the day, and I am sure Muslims will grow out of it.” I suppose that if you turn your head and pretend you don’t see what is going on in Muslim societies and even Muslim communities in the west that you think that you will have nobody’s blood on your hands. Countless women can be put in prison or murdered for the crime of being raped, and you can ignore it, and feel ever-so-good about yourself for being tolerant and respectful of other religions.

Perhaps Robert could post this at Hot Air where Amy commented. If so, thanks.

Or, I could just say “Heaven’s Gate”, “Order of the Solar Temple”, or the “People’s Temple”. My view is that we don’t see any of these sweeping the globe because that belief space is already occupied by world religions. Things were a bit more open back in 7th Century Arabia.

P.S. There’s also the lottery effect. It may be that Mohammed was very unlikely to have succeeded, but if Arabia were ripe for the emergence of a comprehensive pan-tribal religion, Mohammed could simply be the lucky winner from a number of “prophets” who were starting things, the losers having been erased from history by the winner.

1) It gives divine sanction to the darkest part of our natures. Islam is gaining traction in our prison systems precisely because it says that theft, rape, and murder are moral acts.

2) It hides its true nature until your corruption is complete and it’s too late to switch horses. Look at the transformation of Cat Stevens into Yusuf Islam. He looked for solace from the violence and tumult of the 1970s and ends up converting to Islam, the most violent and tumultuous religion in the world? How can that be? It is incredible how anybody could believe as Cat Stevens did and not be utterly repulsed by Islam.

3) It is a Complete System. Islam purports to answer all questions and regiments life to the minutest detail. The believer need not spend a minute looking for answers or figuring out how to live their own life (and indeed is encouraged not to). That is very comforting to many people.

Robert Spencer on May 12, 2008 at 5:48 AM

Has anyone ever brought up the idea of having state “chapters” of JW?

Robert Spencer on May 11, 2008 at 5:22 PM

If there’s enough interest in what you are doing to have someone start an online petition against you, then I think that should indicate that what you are doing is extremely important and worthwhile. I would like to see some trackbacks here, however. Considering your own effort to link heavily in articles at JW/DW, you’d think more bloggers would return the favor. Still, Robert, don’t give up. You are an integral part of the community of scholars who have forced the beginning of a very overdue internal dialogue in the Islamic world. Even though it is frustrating that it is taking so long to try to educate your own country, remember that a few years ago, very few knew your name. Now you are an international figure. We are gaining ground, Robert. Believe it!

I read and learn from every post, I just don’t question or comment much.

Thanks Robert!