Sorry Tashan I missed your post # 455. Here is a brief (I hope) response. I've enjoyed hearing your views, as always. I will leave the final word to you.
Thank you so much for your patience, wisdom, and for being humble enough to hear what other people have to say without resorting to ridiculing their beliefs although you don't believe in them and might also think of them as a myth which societies came up with for generations.
I do not see how this is relevant. According to those passages bad people go to hell. Okay, we both already knew that your religion says that. But we both also know perfectly well that hell is not simply about being righteous or unrighteous, according to Islam polytheists, atheists, etc. go to hell no matter how generous they are, no matter how much they restrain anger, etc. A conviction in your head about the nature of the cosmos is enough to condemn you to hell according to Islam. That is thought crime by definition.
But none of those things have anything to do with the definition of thought crime. There is nothing in the definition that says thought crime must be talked about "through the entire book", must be unjustified, etc.
It depends on how you look at it. How people think of morality, right or wrong is different than the previous generations. In the past it was a crime to deny that earth is flat, it was a crime to be a witch, it was a crime to be black and do something which only the master "white man" should do, etc.
Nowadays, we have a different set of rules and morals but a day would come when a generation would think of our set of morals to be sick and backward.
For example, to me i think it's a thought crime when people condemn me when i speak about things which the West think of as a taboo which shouldn't be touched, but to Westerners, it's something obvious. You see, it's relative according to the set of morals one might hold.
The same can be said about God and the disbelief in him. It might be a thought crime "according to you", but something normal and obvious to God or to those who believe the same thing.
You know what, I would appreciate it if you could provide me with a specific definition of a "thought crime" because i might have understood the concept of a thought crime in a different way than you did.
But then again if God is all-powerful he could just snap his fingers and you would know why you are in hell, so actually carrying out the test is unnecessary unless God wants it to be necessary.
Furthermore, Ghandi or Martin Luther King, or the many disbelievers who are just as (or more) kind and generous as any Muslim person, might still wonder why they deserve to be in hell even after "living their choices".
Not according to God. God said in the Quran that those who knew Islam and knew God in a proper manner then refused to believe in him will definitely know what they have done, because only those who knew Islam and God in a proper way will enter hell of course.
I'm not sure I understand. All I am saying is, consider these two cases:
Case # 1: You are free to believe what you want.
Case # 2: You are free to believe what you want, but if you believe the wrong things, you will be punished.
These two cases are not the same. They are different. You are less free in Case # 2 than in Case # 1. Agreed?
Yeah, i agree with you. That's why i believe that our freedom is a relative freedom, not total freedom.
You are saying the people who are sent to hell "can never change no matter what". But I believe the passages from the Quran in the OP said quite clearly that the disbelievers will realize the "error of their ways" after they die, but they will be shown no mercy anyway. So according to your book it's not true that they will "never change no matter what".
Maybe you didn't read my complete set of arguments supported by verses from the Quran, or it might have been in other posts which you might have missed for not being directed at you.
I have mentioned that the non-believers would never change no matter what although knowing and admitting "in hell" that what they have done in this life was wrong. When i say they will not change, i mean if they got a chance to go back to life, if they have been given another chance.
Think of someone diagnosed of having cancer for being addicted to smoking. He might be frightened, and would admit how wrong it was to smoke heavily, but i think you would agree with me that many of those who *knew* how bad smoking is for their health will keep smoking after finishing their treatment and after being healed from that cancer. That's why God says in the Quran that people would knew their errors but if he allowed them to go back to their normal life, they would disbelieve in him all over and over and over again, because they have already made up their mind, and of course God mentioned other people who would change in this life from disbelief into belief in him. Don't confuse the two.
You can see another example--but very detailed--in post # 459.
http://www.religiousforums.com/foru...9239-question-non-muslims-12.html#post1826290
I hope you will enjoy reading it.
Not just some people--all the millions and millions of people who were disbelievers at the time of their earthly death. That's what you are claiming and it is baseless, clearly many people who died at 30 would have changed their minds and become Muslim, conversely many would have left Islam, if they had lived to 75.
How your life end will determine your state. If someone knew when he/she will die, he would believe in God before dying, just in case .... but it doesn't work that way.
To answer your question, it depends on what you mean by "soul". The psychologist Stephen Pinker gives one brief answer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4A_r6_GGv3U
Remember, I said I had certain feelings about God that you described, and you asked me why I think it's wrong to feel that way. I said it's not wrong to feel any way but "
Muslims would feel indescribable emotions that reaffirm their faith whether or not Islam was actually true, just like Mormons, Catholics, etc."
Then please answer this question, why does a healthy brain dies while there is absolutely nothing wrong with either the brain or any other part of our body, including heart which can be used by another human being when this person die?
Another question, why a healthy normal young guy/girl get an unexplainable *scientifically* sudden heart attack?
I don't think it's strange that some cultures believe in heaven and hell, I simply think it's unlikely these beliefs are actually true because there is no evidence for them.
There have been no evidence at all in the past of things we have discovered recently. So i think it's not wise to claim that just because we didn't discover something until now, so that means it doesn't exist. I think it's an act of ignorance and arrogance to believe so, honestly, and i think you will agree with me on that, just like any sane person would do.
The story of Adam has no basis in biology or history ......
... yet.
Objective inquiry about anything cannot be objective if you are performing rituals several times a day repeating and reaffirming your conclusions to yourself. And again notice something, you are not really talking about "the wisdom behind rituals and repetitions" you are talking about your religion specifically, not the ancient, wise rituals and repetitions of other religions.
Ok, so maybe one has to be immoral in order to be objective enough on knowing whether he is really a moral person or not, and one has to do drugs in order to understand why drugs are bad for health, quite ... interesting.
I know what you gonna say now. You might think that's unfair comparison, because we are talking about *religion* with all the things that word imply, but i would answer you saying that your whole argument against religion have been materialstic so you can't complain now, don't you?
I think you missed my point.
If you re-read what I wrote I think you will see I did not make it sound that way at all, I think you are forming conclusions from what I said that are a lot more severe than the very mild claim I was making.
I just needed this clarification, no need to re-check what you have written because i believe you, thank you.
Peace and blessings,
Faisal
