THE HANDSTAND

SEPTEMBER 2002


  "And the mind - may God preserve you - is more
  prone to deep sleep than the eye. Neediest of
  sharpening than a sword. Poorest to treatment.
  Fastest to change.  Its illness, the deadliest.
  Its doctors, the rarest.  And its cure, the
  hardest. Whoever got a hold of it, before the
  spread of disease, found his sake. Whoever
  tried to wrestle it after the spread would not
  find his sake. The greatest purpose of knowledge
  is the abundance of inspiring thoughts. Then,
  the ways to go about one's needs are met."
    -- Al-Jahiz

the Christian Religions did not allow their congregations to read the New Testament for hundreds of Years.

The Quran describes Jesus as a Word to show that his true identity was in his message and not his flesh. Afterall Jesus's flesh never saved anybody and the fact that we have Christians today is because of the greatness of his message. Jesus being born without the agency of a human father means that the message produced from his mind was not birthed through worldly religious leadership. God taught him. As such he was an immaculate conception raised from ignorance by Godly influences. The Quran says that Jesus was a word from God and the likeness of Jesus is as the likness of Adam. If we deprogram ourselves from thinking only in physical terms we will get more profound messages from scripture.
"The Jews believe in retaliation and Muslims believe in earthly justice while Christians believe in forgiveness and divine justice as being the only fair justice."
According to Islam there are two heavens and two hells. Heaven and hell on this earth and also after death. As such there is punishment and rewards both in this life and in the next. The Mercy of Allah - as such forgiveness is important in Islam. I know many other religions besides Christianity teach forgiveness and God's Divine love. Forgiveness, Love, Justice, Mercy, Wisdom, and more are all attributes of the same God that all true religious people believe in. 
May God grant us with understanding, patience and strength to stand strongly united against our common foe. That foe is both ignorance and the evil of men.
Nashid Abdul-Khaaliq

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Denis Diderot (Fr. philosopher, 1713-84): sadly reflecting on the fate of the Tahitians after the discovery of their island by European explorers, in Supplément au Voyage de Bougainville [1772]


Pleurez, malheureux Otaïtiens [Tahitiens]! pleurez; mais que ce soit de l'arrivée, et non du départ de ces hommes ambitieux et méchants: un jour, vous les connaîtrez mieux.  Un jour, ils reviendront, le morceau de bois [le crucifix] que vous voyez attaché à la ceinture de celui-ci, dans une main, et le fer qui pend au côté de celui-là, dans l'autre, vous enchaîner, vous égorger, ou vous assujettir à leur extravagances et à leurs vices; un jour vous servirez sous eux, aussi corrompus, aussi vils, aussi malheureux qu'eux.
From Raja Mattar