"Islam" Means "Submission," Not "Peace" — Explanation of a Subtle Connection

[Debater Slayer]

I have seen more than one post here say that Islam means peace, and, while the connection between the two words isn't nonexistent—for reasons that I will clarify in this post—it is clearly not the case that Islam means such. The word actually means submission; peace is salaam, not Islam.

To explain the fairly subtle connection between the words Islam and salaam, which may be the reason for the conflation between the meanings of the two by some people, I'm going to have to touch on three fundamentals of the Arabic language:

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs

2) Verb roots

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary.

Obviously, since I have to explain mostly in English, I won't be able to get into all of the nuances of these rules, but hopefully I'll be able to explain enough to achieve the purpose of this thread. Furthermore, to avoid lengthening the explanation more than is necessary, I'm going to avoid using diacritics unless they're absolutely necessary for clarity.

---------------------------------------------
​

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs:

In Arabic, there are two types of nouns: derived nouns and "rigid" nouns, which aren't derived from any verbs. There is what is called a "balance of verbs" that determines the noun denoting the action that the verb refers to, and it is based on the word فعل ("[he] did"), in the masculine past tense form.

Note that when you want to derive a noun from an Arabic verb, you generally conjugate the verb in the masculine past tense. (There is only one form for the past tense of verbs in Arabic, unlike in English.) This is the starting point, and it determines what type the verb belongs to out of four possible types:

1) Tholathy, with three letters in its masculine past tense form

2) Robaay, with four letters in its masculine past tense form

3) Khomasy, with five letters in its masculine past tense form

4) Sodasy, with six letters in its masculine past tense form.

With some exceptions, each of these types have certain patterns that they follow when they are used to derive nouns. In the case of the two words Islam and salaam, these are the respective verbs from which they are derived, juxtaposed with their counterparts in the "balance of verbs," i.e., the standard forms they take:

1) Islam:

أسلم
أفعل

2) Salaam:

سلم
فعل

In the case of verbs taking the form أفعل, like أسلم, their corresponding nouns take this form:

إفعال

So أسلم (aslama) makes إسلام (Islam).

أسلم (aslama) means "[he] submitted," hence Islam's meaning, "submission."

In the case of the verb سَلِمَ (salima), meaning "[he] became safe," it makes سلام (salaam), meaning "peace." (Note that I used diacritics in the case of the verb salima because otherwise it is very easy to confuse with other verbs made up of the same three letters.)

So we can see that "peace" and "submission" are two different words in Arabic and are derived from different verbs. But where is the subtle connection that I mentioned in the beginning of the post? This is where I touch on the second thing I mentioned in the beginning:

2) Verb roots:

The vast majority of Arabic verbs can be broken down into three-letter roots. This is first done through the "balance of verbs" by juxtaposing the verb with its counterpart in the standard form:

أسلم
أفعل

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

This gets me to the third and final point of the explanation:

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary:

In the vast majority of cases, to reach the root of an Arabic verb, you need to carry out step (2) as in the above and then omit all letters that are added to the word فعل, on which the balance of Arabic verbs is based, as I said in the beginning of the post. So we get this:

أسلم
أفعل

This is a mazeed verb, meaning that it has one or more letters than are in the base form and that they can be removed while maintaining the meaningfulness of the remaining word. It is a robaay verb, so there is only one letter that we are going to remove to turn it into the three-letter root by only leaving the word فعل:

أسلم
أفعل

After removing the extra letter (colored blue), we end up with this:

سلم
Written in the root form with the letters separated, we get (س ل م).

Now let's do the same with the verb salima:

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

We get this: (س ل م), which is the same root the verb أسلم has.

So, while Islam and salaam are derived from different verbs and have different meanings, the verbs from which they are derived have the same root. This doesn't mean that they are synonyms, however—Islam means submission while salaam means peace, regardless of their verbs' having the same root and regardless of the slight similarity in the way both words sound.

Finally, sorry if this post was too long. I wanted to be as precise as possible without getting into details that would be unnecessary to the purpose of this thread in addition to possibly being too complicated to explain with little or no Arabic writing.

 

[YmirGF]

A very good effort, @Debater Slayer
I get a bit miffed when people try to tell me that Islam means peace. It doesn't; it means submission.

 

[Deathbydefault]

I have seen more than one post here say that Islam means peace, and, while the connection between the two words isn't nonexistent—for reasons that I will clarify in this post—it is clearly not the case that Islam means such. The word actually means submission; peace is salaam, not Islam.

To explain the fairly subtle connection between the words Islam and salaam, which may be the reason for the conflation between the meanings of the two by some people, I'm going to have to touch on three fundamentals of the Arabic language:

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs

2) Verb roots

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary.

Obviously, since I have to explain mostly in English, I won't be able to get into all of the nuances of these rules, but hopefully I'll be able to explain enough to achieve the purpose of this thread. Furthermore, to avoid lengthening the explanation more than is necessary, I'm going to avoid using diacritics unless they're absolutely necessary for clarity.

---------------------------------------------
​

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs:

In Arabic, there are two types of nouns: derived nouns and "rigid" nouns, which aren't derived from any verbs. There is what is called a "balance of verbs" that determines the noun denoting the action that the verb refers to, and it is based on the word فعل ("[he] did"), in the masculine past tense form.

Note that when you want to derive a noun from an Arabic verb, you generally conjugate the verb in the masculine past tense. (There is only one form for the past tense of verbs in Arabic, unlike in English.) This is the starting point, and it determines what type the verb belongs to out of four possible types:

1) Tholathy, with three letters in its masculine past tense form

2) Robaay, with four letters in its masculine past tense form

3) Khomasy, with five letters in its masculine past tense form

4) Sodasy, with six letters in its masculine past tense form.

With some exceptions, each of these types have certain patterns that they follow when they are used to derive nouns. In the case of the two words Islam and salaam, these are the respective verbs from which they are derived, juxtaposed with their counterparts in the "balance of verbs," i.e., the standard forms they take:

1) Islam:

أسلم
أفعل

2) Salaam:

سلم
فعل

In the case of verbs taking the form أفعل, like أسلم, their corresponding nouns take this form:

إفعال

So أسلم (aslama) makes إسلام (Islam).

أسلم (aslama) means "[he] submitted," hence Islam's meaning, "submission."

In the case of the verb سَلِمَ (salima), meaning "[he] became safe," it makes سلام (salaam), meaning "peace." (Note that I used diacritics in the case of the verb salima because otherwise it is very easy to confuse with other verbs made up of the same three letters.)

So we can see that "peace" and "submission" are two different words in Arabic and are derived from different verbs. But where is the subtle connection that I mentioned in the beginning of the post? This is where I touch on the second thing I mentioned in the beginning:

2) Verb roots:

The vast majority of Arabic verbs can be broken down into three-letter roots. This is first done through the "balance of verbs" by juxtaposing the verb with its counterpart in the standard form:

أسلم
أفعل

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

This gets me to the third and final point of the explanation:

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary:

In the vast majority of cases, to reach the root of an Arabic verb, you need to carry out step (2) as in the above and then omit all letters that are added to the word فعل, on which the balance of Arabic verbs is based, as I said in the beginning of the post. So we get this:

أسلم
أفعل

This is a mazeed verb, meaning that it has one or more letters than is in the base form and that they can be removed while maintaining the meaningfulness of the remaining word. It is a robaay verb, so there is only one letter that we are going to remove to turn it into the three-letter root by only leaving the word فعل:

أسلم
أفعل

After removing the extra letter (colored blue), we end up with this:

سلم
Written in the root form with the letters separated, we get (س ل م).

Now let's do the same with the verb salima:

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

We get this: (س ل م), which is the same root the verb أسلم has.

So, while Islam and salaam are derived from different verbs and have different meanings, the verbs from which they are derived have the same root. This doesn't mean that they are synonyms, however—Islam means submission while salaam means peace, regardless of their verbs' having the same root and regardless of the slight similarity in the way both words sound.

Finally, sorry if this post was too long. I wanted to be as precise as possible without getting into details that would be unnecessary to the purpose of this thread in addition to possibly being too complicated to explain with little or no Arabic writing.

Well written!

 

[Sunstone]

DS, you missed a comma in the fourteenth paragraph down, second sentence, between the third and fourth phrases. Just thought you should know.








I'm kidding! Just trying to drive you nuts is all.

 

[Debater Slayer]

A very good effort, @Debater Slayer

Well written!

Thanks!

 

[icehorse]

facts! we should all be big fans of facts!

 

[interminable]

There was not any need to bother.
When Muslims say Islam is peace they wanna say Islam is a religion of peace

That's just because they wanna oppose media in west that introduce Islam as a religion of violation

 

[LuisDantas]

There was not any need to bother.
When Muslims say Islam is peace they wanna say Islam is a religion of peace

That's just because they wanna oppose media in west that introduce Islam as a religion of violation

There is genuine confusion on the matter "here in the West". Many people still believe that Islam, the word, literally means "Peace" in Arabic.

 

[interminable]

There is genuine confusion on the matter "here in the West". Many people still believe that Islam, the word, literally means "Peace" in Arabic.

I think whether Islam is peace or not isn't so important that forces Muslims to translate it from Arabic into English rather as I told they have a purpose of doing it.

To soften people's hearts about Islam

 

[The Emperor of Mankind]

I think whether Islam is peace or not isn't so important that forces Muslims to translate it from Arabic into English rather as I told they have a purpose of doing it.

To soften people's hearts about Islam

Those who follow the 'complete & true religion' shouldn't need to resort to deceitful tactics like misdirection in order to help promote their beliefs.

I have seen more than one post here say that Islam means peace, and, while the connection between the two words isn't nonexistent—for reasons that I will clarify in this post—it is clearly not the case that Islam means such. The word actually means submission; peace is salaam, not Islam.

To explain the fairly subtle connection between the words Islam and salaam, which may be the reason for the conflation between the meanings of the two by some people, I'm going to have to touch on three fundamentals of the Arabic language:

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs

2) Verb roots

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary.

Obviously, since I have to explain mostly in English, I won't be able to get into all of the nuances of these rules, but hopefully I'll be able to explain enough to achieve the purpose of this thread. Furthermore, to avoid lengthening the explanation more than is necessary, I'm going to avoid using diacritics unless they're absolutely necessary for clarity.

---------------------------------------------
​

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs:

In Arabic, there are two types of nouns: derived nouns and "rigid" nouns, which aren't derived from any verbs. There is what is called a "balance of verbs" that determines the noun denoting the action that the verb refers to, and it is based on the word فعل ("[he] did"), in the masculine past tense form.

Note that when you want to derive a noun from an Arabic verb, you generally conjugate the verb in the masculine past tense. (There is only one form for the past tense of verbs in Arabic, unlike in English.) This is the starting point, and it determines what type the verb belongs to out of four possible types:

1) Tholathy, with three letters in its masculine past tense form

2) Robaay, with four letters in its masculine past tense form

3) Khomasy, with five letters in its masculine past tense form

4) Sodasy, with six letters in its masculine past tense form.

With some exceptions, each of these types have certain patterns that they follow when they are used to derive nouns. In the case of the two words Islam and salaam, these are the respective verbs from which they are derived, juxtaposed with their counterparts in the "balance of verbs," i.e., the standard forms they take:

1) Islam:

أسلم
أفعل

2) Salaam:

سلم
فعل

In the case of verbs taking the form أفعل, like أسلم, their corresponding nouns take this form:

إفعال

So أسلم (aslama) makes إسلام (Islam).

أسلم (aslama) means "[he] submitted," hence Islam's meaning, "submission."

In the case of the verb سَلِمَ (salima), meaning "[he] became safe," it makes سلام (salaam), meaning "peace." (Note that I used diacritics in the case of the verb salima because otherwise it is very easy to confuse with other verbs made up of the same three letters.)

So we can see that "peace" and "submission" are two different words in Arabic and are derived from different verbs. But where is the subtle connection that I mentioned in the beginning of the post? This is where I touch on the second thing I mentioned in the beginning:

2) Verb roots:

The vast majority of Arabic verbs can be broken down into three-letter roots. This is first done through the "balance of verbs" by juxtaposing the verb with its counterpart in the standard form:

أسلم
أفعل

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

This gets me to the third and final point of the explanation:

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary:

In the vast majority of cases, to reach the root of an Arabic verb, you need to carry out step (2) as in the above and then omit all letters that are added to the word فعل, on which the balance of Arabic verbs is based, as I said in the beginning of the post. So we get this:

أسلم
أفعل

This is a mazeed verb, meaning that it has one or more letters than are in the base form and that they can be removed while maintaining the meaningfulness of the remaining word. It is a robaay verb, so there is only one letter that we are going to remove to turn it into the three-letter root by only leaving the word فعل:

أسلم
أفعل

After removing the extra letter (colored blue), we end up with this:

سلم
Written in the root form with the letters separated, we get (س ل م).

Now let's do the same with the verb salima:

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

We get this: (س ل م), which is the same root the verb أسلم has.

So, while Islam and salaam are derived from different verbs and have different meanings, the verbs from which they are derived have the same root. This doesn't mean that they are synonyms, however—Islam means submission while salaam means peace, regardless of their verbs' having the same root and regardless of the slight similarity in the way both words sound.

Finally, sorry if this post was too long. I wanted to be as precise as possible without getting into details that would be unnecessary to the purpose of this thread in addition to possibly being too complicated to explain with little or no Arabic writing.

This is really helpful; thank you for taking the time to produce a post as detailed and informative as this.

I'm still waiting for you to be called an Islamophobe or someone who distributes 'anti-Islam propaganda' though.

 

[LuisDantas]

I think whether Islam is peace or not isn't so important that forces Muslims to translate it from Arabic into English rather as I told they have a purpose of doing it.

To soften people's hearts about Islam

I am not sure that is even a good thing at all.

My forum experience leads me to believe that most Muslims greatly over-estimate (or misrepresent on purpose?) the extent of ill will against Islaam, particularly in the media. Most media actually go out of their way to avoid stepping into the toes of Muslim sensitivity - and that probably ought to stop outright very soon.

If Islaam is to ever be well accepted, it will have to happen by virtue of its merits, not its slogans.

 

[YmirGF]

I think whether Islam is peace or not isn't so important that forces Muslims to translate it from Arabic into English rather as I told they have a purpose of doing it.

To soften people's hearts about Islam

So..... deception is good?

What I mean here is, just so you understand, if Muslims lie about something so elementary to those who are unfamiliar with Islam where does the lying stop? How much of the truth do you leave out so as not to alarm people learning about Islam?

Besides this, if one feels a need to sugar-coat something or whitewash something, that doesn't exactly bode for the conversation that follows.

 

[Rival]

Okay guys, so you all understood that? Okay good.

 

[interminable]

Those who follow the 'complete & true religion' shouldn't need to resort to deceitful tactics like misdirection in order to help promote their beliefs.




This is really helpful; thank you for taking the time to produce a post as detailed and informative as this.

I'm still waiting for you to be called an Islamophobe or someone who distributes 'anti-Islam propaganda' though.

If western media were honest and telling lie wasn't piece of cake for them there wasn't any need to do so. I wonder why u call it deceitful

 

[Fool]

I have seen more than one post here say that Islam means peace, and, while the connection between the two words isn't nonexistent—for reasons that I will clarify in this post—it is clearly not the case that Islam means such. The word actually means submission; peace is salaam, not Islam.

To explain the fairly subtle connection between the words Islam and salaam, which may be the reason for the conflation between the meanings of the two by some people, I'm going to have to touch on three fundamentals of the Arabic language:

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs

2) Verb roots

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary.

Obviously, since I have to explain mostly in English, I won't be able to get into all of the nuances of these rules, but hopefully I'll be able to explain enough to achieve the purpose of this thread. Furthermore, to avoid lengthening the explanation more than is necessary, I'm going to avoid using diacritics unless they're absolutely necessary for clarity.

---------------------------------------------
​

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs:

In Arabic, there are two types of nouns: derived nouns and "rigid" nouns, which aren't derived from any verbs. There is what is called a "balance of verbs" that determines the noun denoting the action that the verb refers to, and it is based on the word فعل ("[he] did"), in the masculine past tense form.

Note that when you want to derive a noun from an Arabic verb, you generally conjugate the verb in the masculine past tense. (There is only one form for the past tense of verbs in Arabic, unlike in English.) This is the starting point, and it determines what type the verb belongs to out of four possible types:

1) Tholathy, with three letters in its masculine past tense form

2) Robaay, with four letters in its masculine past tense form

3) Khomasy, with five letters in its masculine past tense form

4) Sodasy, with six letters in its masculine past tense form.

With some exceptions, each of these types have certain patterns that they follow when they are used to derive nouns. In the case of the two words Islam and salaam, these are the respective verbs from which they are derived, juxtaposed with their counterparts in the "balance of verbs," i.e., the standard forms they take:

1) Islam:

أسلم
أفعل

2) Salaam:

سلم
فعل

In the case of verbs taking the form أفعل, like أسلم, their corresponding nouns take this form:

إفعال

So أسلم (aslama) makes إسلام (Islam).

أسلم (aslama) means "[he] submitted," hence Islam's meaning, "submission."

In the case of the verb سَلِمَ (salima), meaning "[he] became safe," it makes سلام (salaam), meaning "peace." (Note that I used diacritics in the case of the verb salima because otherwise it is very easy to confuse with other verbs made up of the same three letters.)

So we can see that "peace" and "submission" are two different words in Arabic and are derived from different verbs. But where is the subtle connection that I mentioned in the beginning of the post? This is where I touch on the second thing I mentioned in the beginning:

2) Verb roots:

The vast majority of Arabic verbs can be broken down into three-letter roots. This is first done through the "balance of verbs" by juxtaposing the verb with its counterpart in the standard form:

أسلم
أفعل

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

This gets me to the third and final point of the explanation:

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary:

In the vast majority of cases, to reach the root of an Arabic verb, you need to carry out step (2) as in the above and then omit all letters that are added to the word فعل, on which the balance of Arabic verbs is based, as I said in the beginning of the post. So we get this:

أسلم
أفعل

This is a mazeed verb, meaning that it has one or more letters than are in the base form and that they can be removed while maintaining the meaningfulness of the remaining word. It is a robaay verb, so there is only one letter that we are going to remove to turn it into the three-letter root by only leaving the word فعل:

أسلم
أفعل

After removing the extra letter (colored blue), we end up with this:

سلم
Written in the root form with the letters separated, we get (س ل م).

Now let's do the same with the verb salima:

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

We get this: (س ل م), which is the same root the verb أسلم has.

So, while Islam and salaam are derived from different verbs and have different meanings, the verbs from which they are derived have the same root. This doesn't mean that they are synonyms, however—Islam means submission while salaam means peace, regardless of their verbs' having the same root and regardless of the slight similarity in the way both words sound.

Finally, sorry if this post was too long. I wanted to be as precise as possible without getting into details that would be unnecessary to the purpose of this thread in addition to possibly being too complicated to explain with little or no Arabic writing.

submission to love, to allah, is peace. it isn't war

 

[interminable]

I am not sure that is even a good thing at all.

My forum experience leads me to believe that most Muslims greatly over-estimate (or misrepresent on purpose?) the extent of ill will against Islaam, particularly in the media. Most media actually go out of their way to avoid stepping into the toes of Muslim sensitivity - and that probably ought to stop outright very soon.

If Islaam is to ever be well accepted, it will have to happen by virtue of its merits, not its slogans.

The more media introduce Islam as bad religion the more Muslims will do that.
Do u know the meaning of Muslims'greeting?
سلام
Is one of the name of Allah

Which means a Muslim that say سلام to u he wanna say u r my friend and I'm completely harmless and that hi and hello don't have this meaning.

Persian and Arabic are full of removed words in a sentence.
As I told Islam is peace they wanna say Islam is a religion of peace. It's very nonsense that Muslims try to translate Islam literally for others. They have a purpose.

 

[interminable]

I am not sure that is even a good thing at all.

My forum experience leads me to believe that most Muslims greatly over-estimate (or misrepresent on purpose?) the extent of ill will against Islaam, particularly in the media. Most media actually go out of their way to avoid stepping into the toes of Muslim sensitivity - and that probably ought to stop outright very soon.

If Islaam is to ever be well accepted, it will have to happen by virtue of its merits, not its slogans.

The more media introduce Islam as bad religion the more Muslims will do that.
Do u know the meaning of Muslims'greeting?
سلام
Is one of the name of Allah

Which means a Muslim that say سلام to u he wanna say u r my friend and I'm completely harmless and that hi and hello don't have this meaning.

Persian and Arabic are full of removed words in a sentence.
As I told Islam is peace they wanna say Islam is a religion of peace. It's very nonsense that Muslims try to translate Islam literally for others. They have a purpose.

 

[interminable]

So..... deception is good?

What I mean here is, just so you understand, if Muslims lie about something so elementary to those who are unfamiliar with Islam where does the lying stop? How much of the truth do you leave out so as not to alarm people learning about Islam?

Besides this, if one feels a need to sugar-coat something or whitewash something, that doesn't exactly bode for the conversation that follows.

Deception????
U say it's a deception??
How strange!!!!

U expect Muslims to translate Islam literally for u?????

Instead talk about western media that one of their duties is to defame Islam and Muslims

 

[paarsurrey]

I am not sure that is even a good thing at all.
My forum experience leads me to believe that most Muslims greatly over-estimate (or misrepresent on purpose?) the extent of ill will against Islaam, particularly in the media. Most media actually go out of their way to avoid stepping into the toes of Muslim sensitivity - and that probably ought to stop outright very soon.
If Islaam is to ever be well accepted, it will have to happen by virtue of its merits, not its slogans.

"If Islaam is to ever be well accepted, it will have to happen by virtue of its merits, not its slogans."

I agree with one on the point colored by me in magenta.
Regards

 

[oldbadger]

I have seen more than one post here say that Islam means peace, and, while the connection between the two words isn't nonexistent—for reasons that I will clarify in this post—it is clearly not the case that Islam means such. The word actually means submission; peace is salaam, not Islam.

To explain the fairly subtle connection between the words Islam and salaam, which may be the reason for the conflation between the meanings of the two by some people, I'm going to have to touch on three fundamentals of the Arabic language:

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs

2) Verb roots

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary.

Obviously, since I have to explain mostly in English, I won't be able to get into all of the nuances of these rules, but hopefully I'll be able to explain enough to achieve the purpose of this thread. Furthermore, to avoid lengthening the explanation more than is necessary, I'm going to avoid using diacritics unless they're absolutely necessary for clarity.

---------------------------------------------
​

1) Derivation of nouns from verbs:

In Arabic, there are two types of nouns: derived nouns and "rigid" nouns, which aren't derived from any verbs. There is what is called a "balance of verbs" that determines the noun denoting the action that the verb refers to, and it is based on the word فعل ("[he] did"), in the masculine past tense form.

Note that when you want to derive a noun from an Arabic verb, you generally conjugate the verb in the masculine past tense. (There is only one form for the past tense of verbs in Arabic, unlike in English.) This is the starting point, and it determines what type the verb belongs to out of four possible types:

1) Tholathy, with three letters in its masculine past tense form

2) Robaay, with four letters in its masculine past tense form

3) Khomasy, with five letters in its masculine past tense form

4) Sodasy, with six letters in its masculine past tense form.

With some exceptions, each of these types have certain patterns that they follow when they are used to derive nouns. In the case of the two words Islam and salaam, these are the respective verbs from which they are derived, juxtaposed with their counterparts in the "balance of verbs," i.e., the standard forms they take:

1) Islam:

أسلم
أفعل

2) Salaam:

سلم
فعل

In the case of verbs taking the form أفعل, like أسلم, their corresponding nouns take this form:

إفعال

So أسلم (aslama) makes إسلام (Islam).

أسلم (aslama) means "[he] submitted," hence Islam's meaning, "submission."

In the case of the verb سَلِمَ (salima), meaning "[he] became safe," it makes سلام (salaam), meaning "peace." (Note that I used diacritics in the case of the verb salima because otherwise it is very easy to confuse with other verbs made up of the same three letters.)

So we can see that "peace" and "submission" are two different words in Arabic and are derived from different verbs. But where is the subtle connection that I mentioned in the beginning of the post? This is where I touch on the second thing I mentioned in the beginning:

2) Verb roots:

The vast majority of Arabic verbs can be broken down into three-letter roots. This is first done through the "balance of verbs" by juxtaposing the verb with its counterpart in the standard form:

أسلم
أفعل

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

This gets me to the third and final point of the explanation:

3) The omission of additions to verb roots to reach the verb root's basic form, which is used to search for it in an Arabic dictionary:

In the vast majority of cases, to reach the root of an Arabic verb, you need to carry out step (2) as in the above and then omit all letters that are added to the word فعل, on which the balance of Arabic verbs is based, as I said in the beginning of the post. So we get this:

أسلم
أفعل

This is a mazeed verb, meaning that it has one or more letters than are in the base form and that they can be removed while maintaining the meaningfulness of the remaining word. It is a robaay verb, so there is only one letter that we are going to remove to turn it into the three-letter root by only leaving the word فعل:

أسلم
أفعل

After removing the extra letter (colored blue), we end up with this:

سلم
Written in the root form with the letters separated, we get (س ل م).

Now let's do the same with the verb salima:

سَلِمَ
فَعِلَ

We get this: (س ل م), which is the same root the verb أسلم has.

So, while Islam and salaam are derived from different verbs and have different meanings, the verbs from which they are derived have the same root. This doesn't mean that they are synonyms, however—Islam means submission while salaam means peace, regardless of their verbs' having the same root and regardless of the slight similarity in the way both words sound.

Finally, sorry if this post was too long. I wanted to be as precise as possible without getting into details that would be unnecessary to the purpose of this thread in addition to possibly being too complicated to explain with little or no Arabic writing.

So.......... what?
OK, I think I got it within the simplicity of :
Salaam = Peace
Islam = Submission

The most fundamental fact for any person is that they, (whether liking it or not) will submit, either to their God or Nature. They can take their pick. There are no exceptions.

Try asking a Christian, or an Atheist, or a Buddhist what the name of their 'way' means and you will get a score of varying answers from each one; then you could pick holes in 'em all.

What Islam doesn't need, just now, is a lesson in semantics given that billions of peaceful Muslims are being subjected to the fact that International criminals are murdering thousands in their name.

And so if any Muslim chooses to describe their way as anything connected to Peace then I will acknowledge them.

Were you just getting on the 'bandwagon' here?