Monday, May 4, 2015

Duke University Islamic Studies Professor Omid Safi Blames Critics of Jihad for Muslim Violence

The Islamic Studies Center of Duke University has a message for critics of jihad: When terrorists decide to murder you for what you say, it's your fault.

Omid Safi, Director of Duke's Islamic Studies Center, was quick to condemn Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller for a jihadist attack on a Muhammad cartoon contest:


The fact that Safi's comments don't cause outrage at Duke University is quite disturbing. If someone were to murder, say, Richard Dawkins for his criticisms of Christianity, it would never cross my mind to say, "Two groups are responsible for the murder of Richard Dawkins: the people who murdered him, and Dawkins and his associates for mocking Christianity." There is simply no connection, logical or theological, between (a) making fun of Christianity, and (b) being murdered. Hence, if a murderer were to attempt to make a connection, the rest of the world would be puzzled.

But Omid Safi is the latest proof that there is a clear connection between (a) making fun of Islam, and (b) being murdered. The connection doesn't just exist in the mind of the murderer; it exists in the minds of hundreds of millions of Muslims around the world, including many moderate Muslims.

Omid Safi
Oddly enough, Safi's attempts to blame Spencer and Geller for jihadist violence only underscore the need to address Muhammad's teachings. Safi portrays himself as a "progressive Muslim." But if even highly educated, "progressive" Muslim scholars believe that critics of jihad and sharia are asking to be killed, doesn't this tell us something about Islam?

Following Safi's reasoning, we shouldn't be surprised to read future tweets declaring:
  • Yes, we can blame ISIS for beheading journalists. But we also need to blame the journalists for upsetting ISIS.
  • Yes, we can blame Boko Haram for kidnapping and raping Christian girls, but let's not forget to blame the girls themselves. If they had been devout Muslimahs, they wouldn't have been raped. So it was their decision.
  • Yes, we can blame Al Qaeda for the 9-11 attacks. But the victims of those attacks paid taxes to the U.S. government, and the U.S. government has killed many Muslims. Hence, those who died on 9-11 got what they deserved.
  • Yes, we can blame the Taliban for murdering girls who want to go to school. But since the girls decided to go to school, it's their fault as well.
It's sad to see that the next generation of Islamic Studies scholars are being taught that cartoonists who are murdered for drawing pictures of Muhammad must be blamed for their own deaths. But it's exactly what we should expect when we realize that Muhammad ordered his followers to murder people who made fun of him. There is a connection between criticizing Islam and being murdered because the prophet of Islam demanded it.

14 comments:

Sisgp said...

The Media in the UK is trying to blame Pamella Geller for having a "History of Hate". Fortunately from reading the comments the public is having none of it. For my part one of the national dailies (one of the most right wing does to boot) has banned all my comments on any muslim stories because I mention that we should read the Quran and Hadith's. Those words are banned as hate speech. Its a disgrace and unsurprising that Muslims are operating without limit.

Unknown said...

Omid Safi and Osama Abdallahhave no difference.

Osama be like: "It was all staged by Zionists. Pamela and Robert hired two zionist men to fight their own policemen.i was all staged, blame the zionists they are making islam look bad!"

Omid be like: "Calm down everyone. Both sides are to blame. Pamela and Robert should have limited their freedom of speech so that the brutal attack wouldnt happen. Both the shooters and the critics of islam are to blame"

Both Omid and Osama would work well to make a grand lie to defend every evil committed in their religion's name.

Even if one says it zionists and the other says its both the muslim attackers and the victims (pamela, robert) to blame, its no denial that Islam doesnt support freedom of speech.

Unknown said...

I agree with everything Sisgp has said. No we are not having it I have already had "discussions" with 1 of our electoral candidates and a canvasser for one of the other candidates. The first called me a racist bigot but I think I have changed her mind due to a couple of articles I forwarded to her, the 1990 Cairo Declaration of Islamic Human Rights and the Muslim Manifesto for the UK released in the houses of parliament in early March. The other was a priest, not sure if CofE or Catholic, but I don't think I have managed to change his mind although hopefully he will go and look up the information. There are still too many people who believe the lie about Islam the Religion of Peace.

Cole said...

What the Duke professor is relaying is something of the conditioned mindset Muslims live under in the Islamic world. Where they accept coercive threats and attacks on individuals with a different view to the one held by the Islamic society in which they live.

For example, if a Muslim politician suggest some sort of moderation or reform of sharia based laws - which would make the country a more tolerant place - it is very common for these state leaders to be openly threatened by senior religious clerics in those countries. And what this means is that they back away from measures which would result in real progress for these nations.

Muslims live in a state of fear!!

Since its first incursion into many of these countries - the Islamic world's mindset is conditioned to accept the killing and attacks of those who offend Islam.

Come forward to the free world - and here we say so long as we do not threaten someone's life - free expression is a protected right.

Now we have satirical cartoons that are offensive and books that are offensive. What next? And who decides? A Saudi cleric? Or perhaps an Iranian Ayatollah?

If we follow the professor's logic - and Salman Rushdie was successfully assassinated for his satirical work The Satanic Verses - then it would have been his own fault.

More dangerously the professor seems to be arguing for equal criminality...

Example, in Saudi Arabia when a woman is raped - she is often blamed and jailed for the crime of being raped.

... however when it comes to criminalizing free expression - the obstacle in the professor's way would be the US Constitution. Clauses that were put in place - because the western world experienced religious tyranny with the Inquisition.

The Duke professor's argument seeks justification to take us back to the Dark Ages.

sheik Yer'Mami said...

Omid is a primitive taqiyya gigolo, just like Sharpton is a race huckster. I didn't realise he was an Ahmadiyya. As far as I know its only them who use that slogan "hatred for all and love for none" or some such. The head honcho of the sekt threatened Geert Wilders with "destruction".

Spencer put him through the shredder a few times, but he keeps trying.

Anonymous said...

When the price of immigration is that heavily armed guards must attend every venue where something displeasing to the new immigrants might be said, then the price of immigration has become too high.

When the price of immigration is that you must alter your culture and your behavior to appease the religious and social bigotry of new immigrants, then the price of immigration has become too high.

When the price of immigration is that a significant number of new immigrants must be placed under full-time surveillance to track potentially terrorist activity, then the price of immigration has become too high.

Unknown said...

The moment I learned of this shooting, I knew this would happen.

And it's not just Muslims blaming the victims. It's liberals as well. If professing Christians murdered anyone for similar reasons, those same liberals would be screeching for all our heads!

Mo

TPaul said...

Omid Safi is a shameless Ahmediyya, because no other Muslim from mainstream Islam would ever use the slogan of a heretical Islamic group. " Love for all, hatred for none" . This motto of the Ahmediyya community has absolutely no basis in any Islamic doctrine... It is a fictious taquiyya ploy in order to make Islam look more like Christianity.

The irony of it is that these same Muslims consider the Ahmediyyas as kafirs and slaughter them in some Islamic countries, yet we have this shameless Omid Safi using double talk to condemn freedom of speech.

Islam is truly the cruelest joke Satan is playing with humanity

Joseph said...

can't wait to see Osama's twist on this -

Obviously, this islamic scholar knows absolutely NOTHING about Islam!!! He must be an undercover Jew!! This is Zionism at its finest!! They will do anything to make islam look bad!!!

In any event - Its clear that Islam is a cancer - We desperately need a conservative in office in 2016. We can't keep letting muslims kill who ever they want to.

Mike said...

I am quite concerned about Philadelphia this September, as the Pope (who is a fraud)will be in town for the meeting of families, he will be addressing the catholic world and will also be addressing congress for the first time in world history. this event will draw many (hundreds of thousands)of mislead people along with the mislead muslims, who recognize idolatry when they see it . i think I will take my family far away from Philly during these events.

Unknown said...

Muslims says “Free speech does not mean free ticket to criticize Muslims prophet Muhammad. Same way we Christians and all non-Muslims of the world say “Muslims of 21st century did not get free ticket to kill Christians, Buddhists, Hindu, Sheiks, and ethics etc., based on Muhammad’s order in Quran to kill non-Muslims.

If Muhammad and his Allah want they can kill Non-Muslims by their own miraculous power, if they have it. Constitution of America did not give Muslims to work for Muhammad and his Allah to kill other. What kind of justice is that when Quran can order Muslims to kill non-Muslims but non-Muslims could not criticize Muhammad? Quran must be banned to avoid 3rd WW and bring justice for all.

Emmanuel said...

@Cole

"because the western world experienced religious tyranny with the Inquisition."

Ummm... you DO realize that the inquisition (assuming you mean Spanish inquisition), was about keeping the Muslims down during the reconquista of the Iberian peninsula, right? You also do realize the kind of crap the Arabs and Berbers did while they dominated Spain, right? Forgive the Spanish for screwing them over a fraction of a percent like they did to them.

D. Collaric said...

o25.0 THE CALIPHATE
(n: This *section has been added here by the translator* because the *caliphate is both Obligatory in itself and the necessary* precondition for hundreds of rulings (books k through o) established by Allah Most High to govern and guide Islamic community life. What follows has been edited from al-Ahkam al-sultaniyya wa al-wilayat ad-diniyya by Imam Abul Hasan Mawardi, together with three principal commentaries on Imam Nawawi's Minhaj al-talibin, extracts from which are indicated by parentheses and the initial of the commentator. Ibn Hajar Haytami (H:) Muhammad Shirbini Khatib (K:), or 'Abd al-Hamid Sharwani (S:).)

*end quote*


Christians not only should blow Islam out of the water by using the theological errors, but ALSO start focusing on the goal of Islam, the KINGDOM of allah a WARPED perversion of the "kingdom of God" the Jews were hoping their Messiah shall bring. Muhammad was not just a "false prophet" but a FALSE MESSIAH, because taking the Jewish expectations, their Messiah was to CHANGE their whole society, their complete way of life, including the lives of the Non-Jews, and Gentiles would flock to Jerusalem, 10 people would grab the robe of ONE Jew asking him to "bring us to Jerusalem, because the Lord is reining there".

Jews in Yathrib/medina still had this hope, and why should one blame them? After all GOD PROMISED, them that Jerusalem would be capital of the kingdom of God.


THE OBJECTIVES OF JIHAD


o9.8 The caliph (o25) makes war upon Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians (N: provided he has first invited them to enter Islam in faith and practice, and if they will not, then invited them to enter the social order of Islam by paying the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya, def: o11.4)-which is the significance of their paying it, not the money itself-while remaining in their ancestral religions) (O: and the war continues)until they become Muslim or else pay the non-Muslim poll tax (O: in accordance with the word of Allah Most High,


"Fight those who do not believe in Allah and the Last Day and who forbid not what Allah and His messenger have forbidden-who do not practice the religion of truth, being of those who have been given the Book-until they pay the poll tax out of hand and are humbled" (Koran 9.29), [end of quote]

ISLAMIC STATE full in accord.

duresport said...

As a Christian, an alumnus of Duke University and a friend of Omid Safi, I have this to say ..

Scratch that -- let's back up and just look at the sheer logic of this post:

1. Omid posts something urging us all to get rid of hate.

2. "He said ALL! Let's focus on the two hateful people he mentioned who aren't Muslim! He's clearly just trying to do what we say Mohammad commanded, even if lifelong Muslims who have spent their lives researching all religions say differently! Yes! Because it fits our easy stereotypes and fills us with the satisfaction of being superior to others!"

As a philosophy major, that makes my head hurt.

I'm guessing, though, that a psychologist would have much more to say about it.

This post says nothing about Omid, who is one of the finest men of God I've ever met. Fundamentalist Christians who knew him at Duke knew they had a friend.

God is love. Love for all. May we all one day know God's peace and love our neighbors rather than twisting their words to make them enemies.