WHO WAS MUHAMMED ?
Again, let's start with what it says about Muhammad in the front of my Koran
and build on it.
The posthumous son of 'Abdullah bin 'Abd al-Muttalib, of the tribe of Quraysh, Muhammad was born in Mecca about A.D. 570. His mother Aminah died when he was still a child, and he was brought up by his grandfather and then by his uncle Abu Talib. As a youth he travelled with the trading caravans from Mecca to Syria, and at the age of twenty-five married Khadijah, daughter of Khuwailid, a rich widow fifteen years his senior.
Impressed by Jewish and Christian monotheism, a number of theists, or spiritual fundamentalists, known as hanifs had already rejected idolatry for an ascetic religion of their own. Muhammad appears to have been influenced by them. It was his habit to retire to a cave in the mountains in order to give himself up to solitary prayer and meditation. According to Muslim tradition, one night in Ramadan about the year 610, as he was asleep or in a trance, the Angel Gabriel came to him and said: 'Recite!' He replied: 'What shall I recite?' The order was repeated three times, until the Angel himself said: 'Recite in the name of your Lord who created, created man from clots of blood. Recite! Your Lord is the Most Bountiful One, who by the pen taught man what he did not know.'
When he awoke, these words, we are told, seemed to be 'inscribed upon his heart'. Muhammad, who disclaimed power to perform miracles, firmly believed that he was the messenger of God, sent forth to confirm previous scriptures.
Apparently, following this revelation, Muhammad went to the Meccans and told them he was a great prophet but they just laughed at him, told him he was crazy, and rejected him. Muhammad next went to the Jews and told them he was a prophet greater than Moses. Of course, this was seen by the Jews as being blasphemy because Moses was their greatest prophet who had spent 40 years living with and learning from God in the wilderness. The Jews also rejected Muhammad so he went to the Christians and told them he was a greater prophet than Jesus. Since the Christians believe that Jesus is the living Son of God and God manifest in the flesh, they rejected Muhammad as being satanic because the only other being who dared to elevate himself above God was Satan. It is easy to see why Muhammad was considered as being satanic by the Jews and Christians.
After attempting and failing to elevate himself to the ultimate position of power in the three main indigenous religions of his area, Muhammad only had one other choice and that was to start his own religion using the Meccan moon god and his family's deity, Allah. To do this, Muhammad had to separate Allah and Islam from the rest of Sabianism by creating significant differences between the two religions. He attempted to achieve this by taking different aspects from all three religions and doing away with all the Meccan deities except Allah. Originally, Muhammad kept Allah's wife and three daughters but did away with them later. This is evidenced in that when Allah speaks in the Koran, it is almost always in the first person plural, we and our. There are some verses which are in the singular, I and my, but they seem to have been added in at a later date by some one else. Apparently, Muhammad forget to change the tense of the pronouns when Allah spoke after writing Allah's wife and daughters out of the Koran. I want you to notice this when I quote scriptures where Allah is speaking.
Muhammad also claimed that Allah was the God of the Bible to distance Allah from the Meccans and their idolatry. To support this claim, he made a lot of additional claims such as Moses, Elijah, Noah, and the other prophets being prophets of Allah and creating vague stories about them witnessing for Allah, having discussions with Allah (contradicting the concept that no one can speak with Allah), and Allah destroying the people these prophets witnessed to after they rejected Allah. He also claimed that Allah was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that Jesus was not the son of God and only a prophet (a lesser prophet to Muhammad), and copied (poorly) stories from the Bible. An example of this is the story of King Saul in verse 2:249 of the Koran.
2:249-And when Saul marched out with his army, he said: 'Allah will put you to the proof at a certain river. He that drinks from it shall cease to be my soldier, but he that does not drink form it, or contents himself with a taste of it in the hollow of his hand shall fight by my side. But they all drank from it, except a few of them. And when Saul had crossed the river with those who shared his faith, they said: 'We have no power this day against Goliath and his warriors.' But those of them who believed that they would meet Allah replied: 'Many a small band has, by Allah's grace, vanquished a mighty army. Allah is with those who endure with fortitude.'
Any one who has read the Bible knows that it was not King Saul that used drinking at a river to test his men and shrink his army. It was Gideon and he only did it because God ordered him to do it and not of his own will. Besides the story about shrinking the size of the Israeli army had nothing to do with Goliath. Because of this and many other miss quoted or made up stories about Bible personalities, I believe that, most likely, Muhammad's knowledge of the Bible was based on hearsay and myths. I cannot believe that Muhammad ever read any of it or he would not have gotten so much of it so wrong.
An example of one of the many made up stories about persons in the Bible is between verses 51:31 and 51:44 (the English version Koran doesn't number every verse) where Allah is talking (note the plurality of the pronouns.) "In Moses, too, there was a sign. We sent him forth to Pharaoh with clear authority, but he turned his back, he and his nobles, saying: 'A sorcerer, or a madman.' So We seized him and his warriors, and cast them into the sea. Indeed, he deserved much blame."
This is a pretty standard example of what I refer to as Muhammad using Biblical name dropping to prove that Allah is the God of the Bible. He told a lot of short, vague stories like this with no real detail or substance as you see in all the stories in the bible. In some chapters, Muhammad dropped Biblical names like this and even worse dozens of times. For example one case of Biblical name dropping which was even shorter came just a few verses later when Muhammad wrote, "And the people of Noah before them. They too were impious men." That was the extent and full content of his little "Bible story." Incredibly, this was just enough to make some scholars believe that Muhammad was knowledgeable about the Bible. It is obvious that all he knew was a bunch of names and some second hand stories.
Of course, this only caused the Jews and Christians to believe even more that he was satanic because Muhammad was giving credit for what the God of the Bible had done to Allah and elevating Allah above their God which is considered to be satanic in both Judaism and Christianity.
When Muhammad first started Islam, he was in Mecca and, obvious from his writings in the Koran, ran into a lot of trouble in keeping followers because the Meccans kept telling his followers that Allah was their moon and war god and Allah had three daughters. You can clearly see his written attempts to deal with this in denying that Allah had any daughters or even a consort and writing in one verse that believers or Muslims were not supposed to worship the moon. The irony here is that Muhammad kept the Meccan symbol for Allah as the moon god, the crescent moon.
An example of Muhammad attempting to counter the Meccans telling Muhammad's Muslim followers the truth about Allah having daughters with logic is in verse 53:20 - "Have you thought on Al-Lat and Al-Uzza, and on Manat, the third other? Are you to have the sons, and He (Allah) the daughters? This is indeed an unfair distinction."
Finally, the Meccans grew tired of Muhammad pedaling his new religion and ran Muhammad and his loyal followers out of Mecca. This turned out to benefit Muhammad because, away from the influence of the Meccans, he was able to make Islam grow. Apparently this is when Muhammad started raiding caravans and began developing his army. As his army grew in strength, Muhammad began taking towns until he was finally powerful enough to capture Mecca, seize the temple, and take control of the Sabian religion. He destroyed all the idols except for the black rock of Allah, abolished all the gods except for Allah, and was finally able to rid himself of the contradictions from the Meccans to his religion which had plagued Islam since he had started it. He set the Meccan temple up as the holiest shrine for Islam and began to build the religion while conquering the area.
But Muhammad still had problems with the Jews and Christians showing Muslims Biblical scriptures and converting the Muslims to Judaism and Christianity. So Muhammad wrote that the Jews and Christians had distorted their book, the Bible and that Jesus was not the son of God. He literally created a new, human Jesus. Then he began to wage war on Jews, Christians, and all other non-Muslims with the intent of silencing them the way he had silenced the Meccans. The Muslims are still trying to achieve this goal today.
Muhammad was quite ingenious in the development of Islam. He gave himself absolute power so that, if he wrote it as being a revelation from Allah, it was automatically considered law. The first example of Muhammad giving himself and his lieutenants absolute power comes shortly after verse 4:114 - "He that disobeys the Apostle after guidance has been revealed to him, and follows a path other than that of the faithful, shall be given what he has chosen. We will burn him in the fire of Hell: an evil end."
It should be clear here that what Muhammad is stating is that, if Muhammad or any superior Muslim leader tells another Muslim to do something and they don't do it, that Muslim will burn in Hell. Another example of this absolute power over other Muslims is in Verse 33:36 - "It is not for the true believers - men or women - to order their own affairs if Allah and His apostle decree otherwise. He that disobeys Allah and His apostle strays grievously into error."
According to these scriptures, if any Muslim ruler or cleric tells another Muslim to fly a plane full of people into a building full of people or put on a bomb and blow themselves to bits in the middle of a crowd and the Muslim doesn't do it, that Muslim will burn in Hell. That is a huge amount of power and these two verses will explain a lot about the actions of terrorists.
This would be like a Christian preacher or Jewish Rabbi telling a member of their congregation to do something and, if that member does not do it, they will burn in Hell. This kind of power is very easy to abuse and should scare the hell out of any rational person.
Then Muhammad abused this power to its fullest extent. Right after the verse in 33:36 it says,"You (Muhammad) said to the man (his adopted son) whom Allah and yourself have favored: 'Keep your wife and have fear of Allah.' You sought to hide in your heart what Allah was to reveal. (Muhammad's intention to marry his adopted son's wife.) You were afraid of man, although it would have been more proper to fear Allah. And when Zayd divorced his wife, We gave her to you in marriage, so that it should become legitimate for true believers to wed the wives of their adopted sons if they divorced them. God's will must needs be done. No blame shall be attached to the Prophet for doing what is sanctioned for him by Allah." This sounds too much like Muhammad wrote a law to make something legal because Muhammad wanted to do it. Another example of this is in verse 33:50 - "Prophet, we have made lawful for you the wives to whom you have granted dowries and the slave-girls whom Allah has given you as booty; the daughters of your paternal and maternal uncles and of your paternal and maternal aunts who fled with you; and any believing woman who gives herself to the Prophet and whom the Prophet wishes to take in marriage. This privilege is yours alone, being granted to no other believer. We well know the duties We have imposed on the faithful concerning their wives and slave-girls. We grant you this privilege so that none may blame you. God is ever forgiving and merciful."
In other words, Allah gave a special law making Muhammad above the law so Muhammad could marry his first cousins and anyone else he wanted regardless of the existing law for all other Muslims. Pretty convenient that the prophet can announce that Allah said the prophet can do anything he wants when he wants. This would be the equivalent of Moses making a set of laws for himself and a second set for everyone else. This is another major difference between Allah and the God of the Bible. With the God of the Bible, Moses was not permitted to enter into the promised land with everyone else because he disobeyed God once. With Allah, Muhammad got to do as he pleased by simply writing a new law.
Muhammad had promised one of his wives, Jafsah that he would not have sex with a certain Coptic slave but was later found having sex with the slave by Jafsah. Because of his not keeping his promise to Jafsah and to get out of keeping it, Muhammad wrote the following verses. Verses 66:1-6 - "Prophet, why do you prohibit that which Allah has made lawful for you, in seeking to please your wives? Allah is forgiving and merciful. Allah has given you absolution from such oaths. Allah is your Master. He is the Omniscient One, the Wise One. When the Prophet confided a secret to one of his wives; and when she disclosed it and Allah informed him of this, he made known one part of it and said nothing about the other. And when he had acquainted her with it she said: 'Who told you this?' He replied: 'The Wise One, the All-knowing, told me.' If you two turn to Allah in repentance (for your hearts have sinned) you shall be pardoned; but if you conpsire against him, know that Allah is his protector, and Gabriel, and the righteous among the faithful. The angels too are his helpers. It may well be that, if he divource you, his Lord will give him in your place better wives than yourselves, submissive to Allah, obedient, penitent, devout, and given to fasting; both formerly-wedded and virgins."
This was a really slick way to handle the situation. First, Muhammad made it look like it was wrong for him to have made the oath and, therefore, absolved himself from the oath. Then he transferred the guilt to the two women and hit them with the threat of divorce and replacing the two women with two other women.
I have also found his ideas of what heaven will be like to be telling and interesting. Muhammad regularly speaks of trees and running water with the Muslims lying about on luxurious couches constantly eating, drinking, having sex with virgins, and being waiting on by beautiful young boys. He concentrates on maximizing the fulfillment of the sensual pleasures. I find it difficult to believe that a superior being will just have us spend all of our time lying around, eating, drinking, and having sex (using women as sex toys) while children wait on us. For an example of what Muhammad thought heaven would be like, look at verses between 76:6 and 76:20 - "Allah will deliver them from the evil of that day, and make their faces shine with joy. He will reward them for their steadfastness with Paradise and robes of silk. reclining there upon soft couches, they shall feel neither the scorching heat nor the biting cold. Trees will spread their shade around them, and fruits will hang in clusters over them. They shall be served on silver dishes, and beakers as large as goblets; silver goblets which they themselves shall measure: and cups brim-full with ginger-flavored water from a fount called Salsabil. They shall be attended by boys graced with eternal youth, who to the beholder's eyes will seem like sprinkled pearls. When you gaze upon that scene, you will behold a kingdom blissful and glorious."
As a final control to remove any potential threat, Muhammad regularly wrote laws in the Koran making it a sin to even complain about or question Muhammad in any respect. These laws also show that Muhammad's behavior was causing considerable descention among his followers. An example of this is verse 33:57 - "Those who speak ill of Allah and His apostle shall be cursed by Allah in this life and in the life to come. He has prepared for them a shameful punishment."
[it reveals the Catholic church's involvement in the origins of Islam]
