Daniel J. Pipes

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Reader comment on item: [The Issue of Compulsion in Religion:] Islam is What Its Followers Make of It

Submitted by maurice massaad (Canada), Sep 29, 2004 at 22:32

Moslems ruled Spain for 700 years,yet Spain remained 100% Roman Catholic to this day. Islam conquered the territories of the Byzantine Empire ( Turkey, Syria, Egypt, Palestine,North Africa etc. ) formerly almost 100% Christian countries, now 95% Moslem countries. Somehow COMPULSION works some times ! Sometimes not !

Moslem conquerors imposed the JIZYA tax on the people of the book even in Spain, for protection and freedom of religious worship . It seems those who afforded to pay it kept their original faith, while those wo did not have the money converted to Islam.

In the Quran some verses praise Jews and Christians for their faith, while others vilified them as enemies of Allah and His true and Last messenger. It all depends on the situation the prophet finds himself in. He befriended the Jews of Medina , but could not win their souls, so he waged war on them. Had they accepted conversion to Islam,he would have welcomed them with open arms...

In conclusion, Jews were considered enemies of Islam, for refusing conversion and for attacking Mohammad and his followers,verbally and physically. He accused them of hiding and falsifying their holy books ( no proof ). As to the Christians they were accused of blasphemy i.e: calling Jesus God incarnate ( See Surat Al-Maaeda ) in the Quran.

C'est tout,

Maurice

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Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".

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