Believers and Disbelievers

[Rajina]

Since we are leaving the Thorah behind the Buddhist writings are in fact not of the same language.. They choose normally not to gather them into a single text but they often rhyme with great beauty and musical prowess.

First of all the suthras are not in Arabic.. That itself disqualifies it from being similar to Quran.
Since they are in different languages I don't think we can make an honest comparison of the literature style. However I have read that most of the sukthas contain a prose part and a poem part. But if you take any verse from Quran, you cannot classify it either as prose or as poem.

Some sukthas are in the form like the authors are explaining an event that occurred when they were with budha. And some other sukthas are in the form of buddhas speach. In both of these cases its not in the form our creator speaking to us.

They are usually constructed with amazing grace and portray the most information within a single verse as possible. In fact it goes beyond that of the Quran in this instance as in many sutras they leave out meaning which is still understood when read.

I tried reading them in Sanskrit. I understand most of the words in sanskrit, but my knowledge in Sanskrit is very weak. I don't think I can refute your claim that they contain most information in a single verse . To refute that, I will have to study them deeply.

They also change from being lessons to being stories depending on the sutra. But each sutra leaves value for a different lesson.

Yes each suthra leaves a lesson for the reader.. Much like moral stories.. But the style of Qur'an is totally different.

I don't wish to disesteem the Buddhist sutras. They are amazing scriptures. But they are not similar to Qur'an. Both have different styles and different ways. And I believe that Buddha might have been a divinely inspired person.

And what I am telling you is that it isn't impossible for him to have known that. You make it sound amazing that he guessed or figured that bee's made honey rather than collecting it. Its not that crazy.

I am not saying that its amazing that he guessed it. I am saying that there is least chance that he could have guessed it because even people who spent years and years studying and researching about bees couldn't guess it. Even if he guessed it, there is no way by which he could be sure about it. And there is least chance that a person who is trying to write a contradiction free divine scripture would put these kind of information which he/she is not sure about and then mark it as important by saying 'in this there is a sign for people who think' and again showing its importance by naming the chapter as 'honey bee'.

Several problems still. An expander is someone who expands something. The term you used as "making the heavens expadner" doesn't make sense in that "expander" would have to be the doer not the thing being done or affected by.

Please make this clear.. I didn't understand your claim.

So what does it mean when he says "we". Are there more gods or does he simply refer to himself in the plural?

The 'We' here is the royal we. I don't know whether this usage is there in English. But in many other languages when kings refer to themselves, they use plural form like 'we', 'our' etc. God is the king of heavens and the earth and everything in between them. .

The translation in English sounds more like an introduction for oneself. "And yes I am the one who expands it" not "Yes I am expanding it".

Yes.. The translation in English sounds more like an introduction for oneself. "And yes I am the one who expands it".. That's what I am also saying.

Did the Muslims state that the universe was expanding prior to the 1930's?

No.. Prior to 1930 they didn't understand what God would have meant by saying " We are the one who expands it". But now we know that universe expands.

 

[Midnight Rain]

First of all the suthras are not in Arabic.. That itself disqualifies it from being similar to Quran.
Since they are in different languages I don't think we can make an honest comparison of the literature style. However I have read that most of the sukthas contain a prose part and a poem part. But if you take any verse from Quran, you cannot classify it either as prose or as poem.

Some sukthas are in the form like the authors are explaining an event that occurred when they were with budha. And some other sukthas are in the form of buddhas speach. In both of these cases its not in the form our creator speaking to us.

I tried reading them in Sanskrit. I understand most of the words in sanskrit, but my knowledge in Sanskrit is very weak. I don't think I can refute your claim that they contain most information in a single verse . To refute that, I will have to study them deeply.

Yes each suthra leaves a lesson for the reader.. Much like moral stories.. But the style of Qur'an is totally different.

I don't wish to disesteem the Buddhist sutras. They are amazing scriptures. But they are not similar to Qur'an. Both have different styles and different ways. And I believe that Buddha might have been a divinely inspired person.

So it has to be in Arabic? At this point I don't see how you can really take up any other major religion as none of them are written in Arabic. It seems by these criteria they are incomparable for any useful purpose.

I am not saying that its amazing that he guessed it. I am saying that there is least chance that he could have guessed it because even people who spent years and years studying and researching about bees couldn't guess it. Even if he guessed it, there is no way by which he could be sure about it. And there is least chance that a person who is trying to write a contradiction free divine scripture would put these kind of information which he/she is not sure about and then mark it as important by saying 'in this there is a sign for people who think' and again showing its importance by naming the chapter as 'honey bee'.

And the historians disagree. Or at least enough of them that I, as someone who isn't a history major, can feel comfortable accepting. Its a common thing to think even if it wasn't written down.

Please make this clear.. I didn't understand your claim.

I think it is a language thing. In English both your explanation and the modern translation doesn't make sense grammatically to me. I think we can just leave it as a language issue and move on.

The 'We' here is the royal we. I don't know whether this usage is there in English. But in many other languages when kings refer to themselves, they use plural form like 'we', 'our' etc. God is the king of heavens and the earth and everything in between them. .

Yes.. The translation in English sounds more like an introduction for oneself. "And yes I am the one who expands it".. That's what I am also saying.

Thank you. That answers some of my questions I had. However I think at this point we might have to leave it at what it is because since I can't read the original Arabic to judge what it says and it seems that the English translation is simply flawed in reguard to its utilization in this specific debate topic.

No.. Prior to 1930 they didn't understand what God would have meant by saying " We are the one who expands it". But now we know that universe expands.

That is called retrospective and in my eyes the weakest of arguments. Even at the base it means that Allah didn't reveal anything to us. We had to go out and find it and then later someone read the verse after finding out the truth and have attributed it to Allah.

 

[Midnight Rain]

I will give an example to make this clear to you. Suppose we take a research paper on some advanced topic in science and give it to a high school student. If we ask her to read it and explain it, she would interpret it and explain it based on her knowledge. And her interpretations might not come any were near the actual interpretation. Now if we give the same paper to a college student who is studying this topic, she would give a better and more correct explanation. As knowledge increases, their level of understanding the paper increases.

That doesn't sound very god like to me. It doesn't sound very much like divine truth to me.

Qur'an does't use the word embryo. It uses the word 'Alaqah'. See this video:

Yes.. The verse says that the romans were defeated in Adna Al Ardh. Which can be translated both as lowest land and nearest land. Both translations are correct. There is no way by which a person in 7th century could have known that its the lowest land. So those who do not wish to accept the divinity of Qur'an, would believe that its just an amazing coincidence. This is the same case with the word Alaqa also.. Either its mind blowing coincidence or its from a divine source. There are lots of other amazing coincidences/ divine signatures like this in Qur'an.

It depends. Would there have been another word to denote "closest" that would have been far more likely to use rather than the one that also has a double meaning of lowest? If so it would be interesting. If not then no its not really a coincidence at all. Also I apologize I can't seem to get the video to load so I did not watch it.

The words put inside [ ] are not actually there in the verse.. But when we translate the verse to English, we will have to add some words and rephrase it to make it a meaningful sentence in English. This is a problem that we face while translating from some other language to English. You would understand this if you know to speak some other language.

I speak 4 languages and have a fair knowledge of Latin though I don't think anyone really speaks it anymore. However Arabic is not one of those languages. I have been trying to see what the language differences could be and its coming to a head of me realizing its futile at the moment. I know the implied translation but if I can't judge the original verse or analyze it without speaking Arabic. Especially 1500 year old Arabic.

What about the verse which says that the heavens and the earth were a joint entity and Allah separated them. How do you think he could have known that?

Not impressive. The bible gives a similar story. As to many others. It only ever makes any kind of sense if we stretch its extremely vague message with retrospective understanding.

So do you accept that the contradiction free nature of Qur'an is an evidence(weak) for its divinity?
A bunch of small and weak evidences can together form a strong evidence. And I never said that there is any proof for the divinity of Qur'an. If you go back to my post were we started this discussion about Qur'an, I said that I will provide you some facts which would together form an evidence for the divinity of Qur'an. I also said that I am no one to convince you and that you will be convinced only if you have the willingness to accept the truth.

I do not see it as evidence for divinity at all. Small evidences can add up to something yes. I agree. However the small evidences that it does stack up doesn't even clear the first step of a million flights of stairs it would take to prove divinity. And that starts with the given that God is likely to exist at all.

 

[Midnight Rain]

Quran doesn't give any superiority for women over men and it doesn't give any superiority for men over women.

If you are asking about rights of women over men. These are some of them:

- Women in Islam doesn't have any burden of financial responsibilities. It is the duty of men to spend money for her needs, irrespective of how rich she is. If a Woman works, which she is not forced to – all earnings she makes are absolutely her property. She is not obliged to spend from it on the household, unless she wants to do so with her free will.

- Brides in Islam have the right to recieve Mahr(compulsory marital gift) from their grooms. Mahr is considered her property and neither the groom nor the bride's family have any share in or control over it.

"And give the women [upon marriage] their [bridal] gifts graciously. But if they give up willingly to you anything of it, then take it in satisfaction and ease." 4:4

-Lofty position of mothers and daughters

The Prophet (peace be upon him) was once asked," O Messenger of Allah, who among people is most deserving of my good treatment?" He said, "Your mother." The man asked twice more, "Then who?" He repeated the anser twice "Your mother" The fourth time the Prophet responded,"Then your father."

The Prophet Muhammad said, may Allah's peace and blessings be upon him: Your paradise lies under the feet of your mother

In fact, Islam has designated a special reward for raising daughters that is not granted for raising sons.

The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said, Whoever Allah has given two daughters and is kind towards them, they will be a reason for him entering Paradise.


You are asking these kind of questions because u are still inside the myth that men and women are equal. But the reality is that they are not equal both physically and psychologically. Don't you know that women are less capable of defending men during rape attempts?

In Islam rape is a serious crime. In Qur'an, Allah even orders men to lower down their gaze when they see nonmahram women. However Allah knows very well that majority of people will not obey his orders, and that they might harm women, and so Allah asks women to cover themselves and protect themselves from the lustful gaze of men.

I explained this very clearly in my previous post. Please go back and read it again. If you disagree with what I said, please point out where you disagree.

The case you are talking about, applies only to the witnesses during debt transactions.

There is another case in Qur'an, that if a man accuses adultery against a women and if the women says that she has not committed adultery, then the one who accused this against her should be punished unless he brings four witnesses for the adultery. Even if he brings three witnesses and the women says that she haven't committed adultery, her words are given more value. Now would you say that witness of men is considered 1/4th a witness of women.


I think, since you are a nonmuslim lady living in a western country and viewing the Muslim community from outside through the glass of misconceptions that media has provided you, you have loads of misunderstandings about the life of Muslim women.

As a lady, living inside a Muslim community, I experience my rights as a women. I experience the freedom, security and peace of mind that Islam has given me. How can you say that I have misunderstood what I experience?

Take away all your misconceptions and presuppositions and think about this with a clear mind. Biologically men have more muscle power compared to women and women have to face a lot of physical and psychological problems during their periods, pregnancy and feeding period which men do not face. Now if you take the stress faced by women on one side of the balance and stress faced by men on the other side of the balance, the balance would be tilted towards the side of women. Now how do we make the weights equal on both sides and achieve equality? By forcing women to work the same way as men work? To achieve equality, we have to take some stress and difficulties from the side of women and put it on the other side. In Islam this is achieved by taking away all the financial responsibilities and burden from women's side and putting it on men's side.

Where is this 'Muslim world'? I don't think that there is any goverment in the world that can be called as a perfect islamic government. To understand , how an Islamically governed society would treat homosexuals and apostates, you will have to look back to history, to the time of Prophet Muhammad( ص).

I think I can respond to all of this in one bit.

In Islamic culture today and throughout the history of Islam women have been subjugated. What do I mean by that? It means they have had next to no authority in their communities. They have had a vaguely provided household authority which can be overturned by the man. The way that women live in much of the Islamic world, you know what the Islamic world is and I am not talking about specifically Muslim governments, is in fact inferior according to my moral compass.

You have made the claim several times now that women are psychologically unequal. What do you mean by that? As far as pretty much every study has confirmed there is no inequality between men and women mentally. And even if that was not the case the RIGHTS of men and women should be the same. We are all people. Tall men who are big and strong don't get different rules from Allah than the weak men. It is inherently sexist. Its not that I am viewing Islam through a Media glass. I know Muslims. I have met with Muslims. I have Muslim friends. I have apostate friends. I have had it explained numerous times. Each time it leaves me with less and less hope that there is a compatible place for organized religion in our modern world.

 

[ArtieE]

If Truth teller can show beyond a reasonable doubt that the Qu'ran is undoubtedly from god and perfect and that Christianity is wrong and Christ was not the son of god he will have proven the biggest religion and a third of the population of the earth wrong in their beliefs. So Truth teller, from the bottom of an atheists heart, keep up the good work!

 

[Shad]

No.. You have said that it was a hypothesis before islam.. But you haven't shown that.

Yes I have. You even acknowledge it previously

I read them again and again, a lot of times and read about it from other sources too.

Then you read them in bad faith which is typical of the religious when talking about science.

Where in Aristotle's book does he say that bees carry dews by their mouthpieces.

When he talks about them drink, they disgorge their honey in order to drink. Reading comprehension and bad faith as I pointed out above

Aristotle believed that honey was the food of honey bee. But whenever it is near a stream, it drinks only water from the stream. But if they were away from a stream and then comes near a stream then they would disgorge their honey as they drink water from the stream.

It is for the larvae. Food doesn't mean water. You are assume it is the same. However since Aristotle points out they do drink, which you acknowledge, your point is moot.

Did he have the idea that the honey that we collect from the bee hives came from the bellies of bees? If yes, please quote those sentences from his book.

Already showed that in the other source. As I said you read it in bad faith thus is your bias which you can not overcome

The Qur'an doesn't put forward any hypothesis, it just talks about facts. So you will have to say that he guessed which of those hypotheses would be facts and presented them as facts and luckily he got them right. Or you will have to say that by his luck he came to know about only those hypotheses which were correct and he presented them as facts.

Facts such as the Heavens and Earth were once one then separate but forgetting that the Earth is still within the Heavens... Yes facts...... That isn't a fact it is a myth shown to be wrong. So your strawman is nonsense.

There are lots of verses in Qur'an which talks about birds. In some cases, male verb forms are used and in some cases female verb forms are used depending on the context.

It was a generalization which made a mistake. our backpedaling has been noted

" There is not a moving (living) creature on earth, nor a bird that flies with its two wings, but are communities like you. We have neglected nothing in the Book, then unto their Lord they (all) shall be gathered. " Qur'an (6:38)

In the above verse the verb form used is masculine.

Which does nothing to show I was wrong as you go to a different verse....

Another verse which talks about flying birds in which female verb form is used:

"Do they not see the birds above them, spreading out their wings and folding them in? None upholds them except the Most Beneficent (Allâh). Verily, He is the All-Seer of everything."

Which you denied and now are backpedaling. Again noted

Since I am not an expert in Arabic or a scholar, I am not qualified to make my own interpretation about the verse. However, if we interpret that the birds referred to here are female birds, then the verse would mean like 'do they not look at the female birds above them...'. If that is the case then Allah is asking us to particularly study about how female birds glide up in the sky, with their wings spread out and with their wings folded in. If that is the case, then it indicates that there is something special and amazing about the flight of female birds. To understand the actual interpretation we need to do more research and discover more..

Most people are not experts in classical Arabic. Far too many assume that Standard Arabic means you can understand Classical Arabic. The rest of your point is ad hoc rescue, nothing more

 

[Shad]

First of all the suthras are not in Arabic.. That itself disqualifies it from being similar to Quran.
Since they are in different languages I don't think we can make an honest comparison of the literature style. However I have read that most of the sukthas contain a prose part and a poem part. But if you take any verse from Quran, you cannot classify it either as prose or as poem.

Stacking the deck. There was never any requirement about it being in Arabic. You are making it up which is just moving the goal posts fallacy.

Some sukthas are in the form like the authors are explaining an event that occurred when they were with budha. And some other sukthas are in the form of buddhas speach. In both of these cases its not in the form our creator speaking to us.

Irrelevant as the challenge never claims the source must be from God

 

[Rajina]

So it has to be in Arabic? At this point I don't see how you can really take up any other major religion as none of them are written in Arabic. It seems by these criteria they are incomparable for any useful purpose.

You are deviating from the topic. We were discussing about the challenge of Qur'an and not about learning and comparing different religious scriptures. As for my case, its more easy for me to learn Vedas and puranas because I am an Indian and the language that I speak is closely related to Sanskrit. I am learning Arabic to understand and learn Qur'an.

However our topic of discussion was the challenge of Qur'an. The Qur'an challenges those who denies its divinity to produce something similar to Qur'an. You said that Buddhist sutras meats this challenge.I showed you that despite of the fact that its not in Arabic, its style and rendering is totally different from Quran. Since it is not similar to Qur'an, it doesn't meat the challenge. The challenge of Qur'an has never been met and its impossible for human beings to create anything similar to Qur'an.

And the historians disagree. Or at least enough of them that I, as someone who isn't a history major, can feel comfortable accepting. Its a common thing to think even if it wasn't written down.

Historians disagree to what? I quoted from some of the books on history of beekeeping which said that people did not have that idea prior to its scientific discovery.

So you are saying that people would have thought about it, but it was not written down. Its a fallacious argument, but even if we take that into consideration that he might have thought that, how did he become so sure that what he thought was true?

I think it is a language thing. In English both your explanation and the modern translation doesn't make sense grammatically to me. I think we can just leave it as a language issue and move on.

OK.. Leave it.. Come back to it if at some point in your life you start learning Qur'an in Arabic..

Thank you. That answers some of my questions I had.

You are welcome..

That is called retrospective and in my eyes the weakest of arguments. Even at the base it means that Allah didn't reveal anything to us. We had to go out and find it and then later someone read the verse after finding out the truth and have attributed it to Allah.

The argument about scientific facts in Qur'an is not to show that Allah teaches us science in Qur'an. Qur'an is not a science book, and it was not revealed to teach us scientific explanations about the various natural processes. Learning, researching and discovering new things is completely left to us. Quran is a guidance from God and it also gives us a lot of signs from God. It gives a good news for the believers and a warning for the disbelievers. It shows us the right path that we should follow in our life. It also talks about some of the previous prophets and events that occurred in their lives, in which there are lessons for us.Quran also talks about various creations of God and says that there is a sign in them for people who think. Quran encourages us to learn more about nature so that we can see more signs of God.

The argument about scientific facts in Qur'an, is to show that the Qur'an is precisely accurate even when it talks about things which were not known to people of 7th century. If it was a book written by a person in the 7th century, we would have found a lot of errors in it as we discover more and more about nature. But the case about Quran is just the opposite. We are finding more and more things in it which is in accordance with science as we progress more and more.

 

[Rajina]

It depends. Would there have been another word to denote "closest" that would have been far more likely to use rather than the one that also has a double meaning of lowest? If so it would be interesting. If not then no its not really a coincidence at all.

The word commonly used to denote 'closest' or 'nearest' is Aqrab and Quran uses this word lot of time. Wherever the meaning is exclusively nearest or nearer or near Quran uses the word Aqrab or its root form Qareeb or other derivatives of the same word. The word commonly used to denote 'lowest' is Adna', which is also used in Quran a lot times with the same meaning.

Also I apologize I can't seem to get the video to load so I did not watch it.

Its OK.. I just wanted to show you the similarity of leach and embryo.However do you think its a coincidence that the word 'Alaqa' has a meaning leach?

Not impressive. The bible gives a similar story. As to many others. It only ever makes any kind of sense if we stretch its extremely vague message with retrospective understanding.

The verse we are talking about is this:
"Have those who disbelieved not considered that the heavens and the earth were a joined entity, and We separated them and made from water every living thing? Then will they not believe?" 21:30
This is just the word to word translation. And you cannot call it retrospective because the older translations of this verse is the same. I did not give any explanation or stretch the verse to suit my interpretation. How do you think he would have known this?

I do not see it as evidence for divinity at all. Small evidences can add up to something yes. I agree. However the small evidences that it does stack up doesn't even clear the first step of a million flights of stairs it would take to prove divinity. And that starts with the given that God is likely to exist at all.

There is a saying, 'Its easy to wakeup a sleeping person but its hard to wakeup someone who pretends to sleep'.
However let me give one more try because for me its a matter of saving your life.
So you are saying that there are millions of characteristics that a divine scripture should necessarily fulfill and since being free from contradictions and errors is just one among those millions of characteristics, it simply an ignorably week evidence. Since its beyond our scope to discuss about those millions of characteristics, can you point out atleast ten most important ones of them, so that we can check whether Qur'an satisfies them or not.

 

[Rajina]

I think I can respond to all of this in one bit.

In Islamic culture today and throughout the history of Islam women have been subjugated. What do I mean by that? It means they have had next to no authority in their communities. They have had a vaguely provided household authority which can be overturned by the man. The way that women live in much of the Islamic world, you know what the Islamic world is and I am not talking about specifically Muslim governments, is in fact inferior according to my moral compass.

You have made the claim several times now that women are psychologically unequal. What do you mean by that? As far as pretty much every study has confirmed there is no inequality between men and women mentally. And even if that was not the case the RIGHTS of men and women should be the same. We are all people. Tall men who are big and strong don't get different rules from Allah than the weak men. It is inherently sexist. Its not that I am viewing Islam through a Media glass. I know Muslims. I have met with Muslims. I have Muslim friends. I have apostate friends. I have had it explained numerous times. Each time it leaves me with less and less hope that there is a compatible place for organized religion in our modern world.

How much ever you deny or argue, it is a fact that men and women are not psychologically equal. Some of these differences include the way they communicate, the way they solve problems, they way they react , the way they are attracted to opposite sex, and even the way they think. Men in general can take decisions without being emotionally affected that much while women in general take into consideration other factors that are related to emotions that most men overlook.This is not what I say, but this is what the psychologists say. Please do some reading on this.

Islam does not subjugate or opress women . Islam does not restrict the authority of women only to household and islam doesn't teach that household duties are exclusively reserved for women. To see the real subjugation and oppression of women, you just have to open your eyes and look around our modern society were women are commoditized and objectified and the value of a women is measured based on her sex appeal, figure, the harmful cosmetics that she apply and the costly accessories that she hang on herself. Todays modern women are oppressed to such a state that majority of them have become slaves to the capitalist ideas. The role of a women as a mother is given least value in our modern society which is driven by the capitalist ideas and consumerism.

It is not like tall men who are stronger having different rights than short and weak ones. The only difference that you see between male and female might be the difference in heights and strength. But our creator knows very well that male and female are biologically different. There are roles assigned to females by their nature that cannot be undertaken by males. And Allah knows very well that equal justice cannot be achieved through equal rights

And you didn't answer my question, can equality be achieved by forcing women to work the same way as men when women already faces a lot of stress and difficulties that men do not face?

 

[Rajina]

If Truth teller can show beyond a reasonable doubt that the Qu'ran is undoubtedly from god and perfect and that Christianity is wrong and Christ was not the son of god he will have proven the biggest religion and a third of the population of the earth wrong in their beliefs. So Truth teller, from the bottom of an atheists heart, keep up the good work!

A small correction: I am not 'he'.. I am 'she'

Quran doesnt need any truthteller to prove its divinity. Its divinity is self evident. But those who keep their eyes tightly closed will never see it.. Truthtellers like me are just trying to open their eyes.

 

[Rajina]

Stacking the deck. There was never any requirement about it being in Arabic. You are making it up which is just moving the goal posts fallacy.



Irrelevant as the challenge never claims the source must be from God

the only requirement that quran says in its challenge is that it should be similar to quran..being similar means having resemblance in qualities, characteristics, or appearance; but not identical

 

[ArtieE]

A small correction: I am not 'he'.. I am 'she'

Quran doesnt need any truthteller to prove its divinity. Its divinity is self evident. But those who keep their eyes tightly closed will never see it.. Truthtellers like me are just trying to open their eyes.

When you are claiming that the Qu'ran is perfect and your religion is the only correct religion does it bother you to know that you are contributing to scenes like these? http://tinyurl.com/j34ezx3

 

[Rajina]

When you are claiming that the Qu'ran is perfect and your religion is the only correct religion does it bother you to know that you are contributing to scenes like these? http://tinyurl.com/j34ezx3

Contributing to scenes like that?????? In what way?????

 

[ArtieE]

Contributing to scenes like that?????? In what way?????

"A spokesman for the group, Ehsanullah Ehsan, told the Guardian: “We have carried out this attack to target the Christians who were celebrating Easter." You don't think these attacks are partly a result of some Muslims constantly claiming that "my holy book is right and your holy book is wrong"? People who are fanning the flames shouldn't act surprised when there's a sudden flash fire.

 

[Rajina]

"A spokesman for the group, Ehsanullah Ehsan, told the Guardian: “We have carried out this attack to target the Christians who were celebrating Easter." You don't think these attacks are partly a result of some Muslims constantly claiming that "my holy book is right and your holy book is wrong"? People who are fanning the flames shouldn't act surprised when there's a sudden flash fire.

No i dont think so.
Its all part of the international politics.

 

[The Emperor of Mankind]

The first one is not equal treatment - it's identical treatment. E.g. all the kids receive an identical number of boxes, regardless of their respective needs. The tall kid gets a box but he doesn't need one to see over the fence. Kid #2 has his needs met with one box. Kid #3 needs two boxes in order to see over the fence but receives an identical number compared to everyone else. This first picture's definition of "equality" would have disabled access ramps removed because according to the picture that is 'equal' when it's not. The second picture is the real definition of equality & justice because all have an equal chance of seeing over the fence. Equality means having our different needs met in such a way that gives us equal parity with others.

 

[McBell]

Only if the tall guy was forced to give the shortest guy his box.
If not, then it is simply empathy.
Or common courtesy

 

[Shad]

the only requirement that quran says in its challenge is that it should be similar to quran..being similar means having resemblance in qualities, characteristics, or appearance; but not identical

No it says verse like it, that is all. You are extrapolating beyond the challenge by claiming it must be Arabic while it never says that. Beside the challenge itself is based on a fallacy thus God has fallacious reasoning.

 

[Sapiens]

There isn't a knowing God option; some people have an inherent knowledge of God from birth.

I'd say it is quite the opposite, humans are born without any religion, per se, and the religion that they adopt, if any, has to do more with what they are taught than anything else.

Plus then some of us, having had first hand experience of God, can't say knowing someone we've met, is a belief.

That was David Berkowitz (Son of Sam's) problem too.