Linked with the presentation of Statement by IBN WARRAQ on the World Trade Center Atrocity, and linked with the presentation of Institute for the Secularisation of Islamic Society, and the article When Ibn Warraq met Edward Said.
Linked also with My comment to a new fatwa, and with Democracy or Islamocracy, and with WAFA SULTAN.
Ibn Warraq says: « How can we expect immigrants to integrate into western society when they are at the same time being taught that the west is decadent, a den of iniquity, the source of all evil, racist, imperialist and to be despised? »
Ibn Warraq – another Muslim with a Fatwa – book see here on Amazon.com.
News on Ibn Warraq on April 2006:
See on FrontPage Magazine on April 18, 2006: An even more stringent critique is provided by the pseudonymous Ibn Warraq in ‘Why I Am Not a Muslim’, which was published in 1995, but has gained renewed attention since 9/11.[15] Raised as Muslim in a Muslim country, but now a secular humanist who admires John Stuart Mill and Friedrich Hayek, Warraq wrote this book (its title inspired, of course, by Bertrand Russells ‘Why I Am Not a Christian’) in response to the 1989 Salman Rushdie fatwa. « It is rare in one’s life, » Warraq writes, « that one has an opportunity to show on what side of an important life and death issue one stands -the Rushdie issue and the rise of Islam are two such issues and this book is my stand. » He does not pull punches: « The horrendous behavior toward women, non-Muslims, heretics, and slaves manifested in Islamic civilization was a direct consequence of the principles laid down in the Koran and developed by the Islamic jurists. Islamic law is a totalitarian theoretical construct, intended to control every aspect of an individual’s life from birth to death. » He admits that the theory has not always been put into practice -that Islamic culture, in other words, has often been less severe than the Koran prescribes -but adds that sometimes, as in the case of female circumcision, it has been more severe. « What Esposito and all Western apologists of Islam are incapable of understanding, » Warraq insists, « is that Islam is a threat, and it is a threat to thousands of Muslims. »
Writing about the Muhammad cartoons controversy, author Ibn Warraq quoted what the great British philosopher John Stuart Mill wrote in ‘On Liberty’, “Strange it is, that men should admit the validity of the arguments for free discussion, but object to their being ‘pushed to an extreme’; not seeing that unless the reasons are good for an extreme case, they are not good for any case.”
He says also: “The west is the source of the liberating ideas of individual liberty, political democracy, the rule of law, human rights and cultural freedom. It is the west that has raised the status of women, fought against slavery, defended freedom of enquiry, expression and conscience,” Ibn Warraq stated. “How can we expect immigrants to integrate into western society when they are at the same time being taught that the west is decadent, a den of iniquity, the source of all evil, racist, imperialist and to be despised? Why should they, in the words of the African-American writer James Baldwin, want to integrate into a sinking ship?”. See more on Moderate Voices speaking out, on April 18, 2006;
Ibn Warraq, author notably of ‘Why I am Not a Muslim’; Leaving Islam: ‘Apostates Speak Out’; and ‘The Origins of the Koran’, is at present Research Fellow at a New York Institute conducting philological and historical research into the ‘Origins of Islam and its Holy Book’ … He is a bestselling author and scholar who has written books on Islam … He is an outspoken critic of Islam who has written extensively on what he views as the oppressive nature of Islam and religion in general. The name Ibn Warraq (Arabic ابن وراق, most literally « son of a papermaker ») is a pseudonym that has traditionally been adopted by dissident authors throughout the history of Islam. (Read more on wikipedia).
Among the few personal details known about his life is that he was born in 1946 in Rajkot, India, to Indian-Muslim parents who soon emigrated to Pakistan, and that he studied at the University of Edinburgh under the Orientalist scholar Montgomery Watt. Ibn Warraq has written several books, some of which are more scholarly and gather together critical research on such topics as the origins of the Qur’an and the life of Muhammad. Ibn Warraq promotes secular humanist values among Muslims … In March 2006 a letter he co-signed entitled MANIFESTO: Together facing the new totalitarianism with eleven other individuals (most notably Salman Rushdie) was published in response to violent and deadly protests in the Islamic world surrounding the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy.
(Red the rest on blogspot.com).
Democracy in a Cartoon, By Ibn Warraq – Best-selling author and Muslim dissident Ibn Warraq argues that freedom of expression is our western heritage and we must defend it against attacks from totalitarian societies. If the west does not stand in solidarity with the Danish, he argues, then the Islamization of Europe will have begun in earnest. The great British philosopher John Stuart Mill wrote in On Liberty, « Strange it is, that men should admit the validity of the arguments for free discussion, but object to their being ‘pushed to an extreme’; not seeing that unless the reasons are good for an extreme case, they are not good for any case. » (Read this long article on the english SPIEGEL online).
He says also: « Why do all these people the immigrants) try to emigrate to our (western) countries and not to Saudi Arabia? We’d do better if we teach them the history of the centuries of struggle that brought about the freedoms they enjoy today; the history of the individuals and groups that fought for those freedoms and who are nowadays disregarded, degraded and forgotten. We’d do good if we make emphasis on the freedoms that a great part of the world envies, admires and tries to emulate with. When the Chinese students died for democracy at the Tiananmen Square in 1989, they were not carrying the images of Confucius or Buddha, but a copy of the Statue of Liberty.
The freedom of expression is our Western heritage and we must defend it or it will succumb to totalitarian attacks. This freedom is also essential for the Islamic world. By defending our values we give an important lesson to the Islamic world, we allow them to compare their old and sacred traditions with our values ». (Read the rest on this page).
Together with other Muslims he is again exposed to a new fatwa (see on this site).
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