Non-people of the book

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- Merry_Squirell
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Non-people of the book
OP - April 02, 2012, 03:19 PM

Muslims always like to point out that Islam recognizes and respects People of the Book. But they conveniently leave out all the others; what about Hindus, Zoroastrians, Shintoists, Buddhists and God forbid atheists and agnostics?

Are Hindus or Buddhists even allowed to live in muslim countries?

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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #1 - April 02, 2012, 03:22 PM

Most muslim countries don't apply sharia, or at least not fully anyway. Anyway, when the Muslims invaded India they declared the Hindu people people of the book for the sake of pragmatism, I think similar rules where applied to Zoroastrians, in fairness, I think the whole 'people of the book' rule was made to hate on the pagan Arabians rather than as an eternal rule.

It doesn't matter now, it doesn't have a major impact on social policies (although heavy discrimination does exist, but not on the pretext of people on the book etc) in most areas where non-Christians/Jews live along with Muslims, like Malaysia, Indonesia for example.

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- billy
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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #2 - April 02, 2012, 03:46 PM

Quote from: Merry_Squirell on April 02, 2012, 03:19 PM
Muslims always like to point out that Islam recognizes and respects People of the Book. But they conveniently leave out all the others; what about Hindus, Zoroastrians, Shintoists, Buddhists and God forbid atheists and agnostics?

Are Hindus or Buddhists even allowed to live in muslim countries?

I have thought of this myself. But even the phrase 'people of the book' is chauvinistic because its imposing on Christians and Jews a definition of themselves that doesn't relate to how they see themselves.

And of course as you point out, the rest of humanity don't even exist as fully realised humans as they are not halal.

Even humanity has to be divided into halal and haraam. Its just basic chauvinism that even gets projected as some kind of generosity.

"we can smell traitors and country haters"

Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #3 - April 02, 2012, 03:53 PM

and the thing is, neither christians OR Jews consider
muslims to be people of the book.

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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #4 - April 02, 2012, 04:04 PM

I think there's a difference between "people of the book" (Jews & Christians) and "dhimmis" (non-muslims under Islamic rule) the latter have less freedom.

Quote from: Jinn and Tonic on April 02, 2012, 03:53 PM
and the thing is, neither christians OR Jews consider
muslims to be people of the book.

Depends on what type of Christian you talk to. A right-winger from Europe or N. America will probably say muslims worship the devil. A Palestinian Christian will probably reply in a totally different way. The brotherhood amongst Arabs regardless of their faith is quite common, I know a Palestinian kid who has Islamist leanings yet refers to Arab Christians as "brothers".

Also the same can be said about muslims, most wouldn't refer to Christians & Jews as "people of the book" today because they're quite different from the Christians & Jews of the 7th century. E.g. Islamically speaking you can eat kosher meat however most muslims won't today because they say Jews aren't as monotheistic as they once were (rejection of OT laws, secularism/democracy etc)
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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #5 - April 02, 2012, 04:10 PM

I thought about that after I posted that, Aphrodite, and you are right.

I have met palestinian xians, too. There are jews in Israel too that
consider muslims their brothers. (mainly the hasaidics)

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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #6 - April 02, 2012, 04:26 PM

Quote from: Aphrodite on April 02, 2012, 04:04 PM
I think there's a difference between "people of the book" (Jews & Christians) and "dhimmis" (non-muslims under Islamic rule) the latter have less freedom.

In other words, People of the book are dhimmis whom are under compulsion to pay jizya.

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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #7 - April 02, 2012, 04:29 PM

In other words, non Muslims are degraded and demonised.

Its long overdue that this attitude was removed.

"we can smell traitors and country haters"

Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #8 - April 02, 2012, 04:36 PM

Quote from: Cato on April 02, 2012, 04:26 PM
In other words, People of the book are dhimmis whom are under compulsion to pay jizya.

Sorry I should have said "polytheists" rather than "non-muslims". The Quran condemns polytheists more than it does Xristians or Jews. So, Buddhists, Hindus and others would have a harder time under Islamic rule than Jews or Christians would. Yup, pay Jizya, leave or face death.
- Merry_Squirell
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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #9 - April 02, 2012, 04:42 PM

Quote from: billy on April 02, 2012, 03:46 PM
I have thought of this myself. But even the phrase 'people of the book' is chauvinistic because its imposing on Christians and Jews a definition of themselves that doesn't relate to how they see themselves.

And of course as you point out, the rest of humanity don't even exist as fully realised humans as they are not halal.

Even humanity has to be divided into halal and haraam. Its just basic chauvinism that even gets projected as some kind of generosity.

Well at least salafis don't even pretend it's generosity. They openly say that paying jizyah is form of punishment.

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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #10 - April 02, 2012, 04:48 PM

The Koran explains everything. Thus it is ridiculous to think that question of hindoos, buddhists and others is not answered in Al-Kitab. In fact as non-people of the book they don't have a religion, since religion comes from Allah swt, they only have human inventions and thus are less than mu'minoon and ppl of the book. Question answered, Islam is perfect.

"That it is indeed the speech of an illustrious messenger" (The Koran 69:40)
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Re: Non-people of the book
Reply #11 - April 02, 2012, 05:34 PM

Quote from: Merry_Squirell on April 02, 2012, 04:42 PM
Well at least salafis don't even pretend it's generosity. They openly say that paying jizyah is form of punishment.

But the Salafis have the virtue of being honest in this regard at least.

"we can smell traitors and country haters"

Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
God is Love.
Love is Blind. Stevie Wonder is blind. Therefore, Stevie Wonder is God.
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