Hello there.
I am an 18-year-old girl.
Sorry for the lengthy post.
I would like to share my journey from Sunni Islam, Quranist Islam to being a fully apostate.
I was born to Sunni parents. When I was a toddler, I used to wonder who created us. I used to think that we were created in factories. Hahaha. I never thought of God or gods at that time. When I almost turned 5, I lived with my grandma. She thaught me how to perform Salah and at that time I started to learn about God, Islam and stuff. I never learned anything bad about Islam at that time, only good. I didn't even know that Muhammad had so many wives.
When I was 12 to 13, after a few dosages of indoctrination, I often believed that the Jews and US often wanted to misguide Muslims, made people hate Islam and fabricated things about Islam etc. I used to hate Jews a lot and whenever I read or heard criticism about Islam, I often felt like there were telling lies and inspired by Satan. I was anti-Semitic.
When I was 15, my dad told me the
truth about Adolf Hitler. He told that the US and Jews made up lies about him and made me believe that he was a "hero" because he killed Jews and left a few so that the world would know who the Jews were. Of course at that time I believed what my dad said and agreed with him. I started to love Nazi, Hitler and Osama. My dad also said that Osama was actually trying to fight back against US and 9/11 was just an inside job to slander Muslims. At the same age I also doubted which was the correct sect. I learned about Shia from bigoted Sunnis and searched about Shia on the internet. I also learned that I belonged to Sunni group and in Sunnism there are 4 school of thoughts— Hanbali, Maliki, Shafi and Hanafi. I belonged to Shafi sect and when I learned about Imam al Shafi, I hated him even though I was still a Shafi Sunni.
When I turned 16, I wrote on a paper that my wish was to kill all Jews. Sorry Jews I am not like this anymore!!!! But months later I changed my mind about it after talking to other "Moderate" Muslims since the Moderate Muslims also hate Hitler, Osama, al Qaeda, Taliban etc.
But even though I had extreme views at this time, I also often felt that Islam really oppressed me— the hijab particularly. I used to be taught that women who do not cover their awrat will be burnt in hell (this BS is very common to hear) and when one hair shown to one non-mahram, the punishment in hell is 70,000 years (most of you have never heard this BS, I know)
I went on Yahoo Answers and debated the anti-Muslims. I called them Islamophobes and Mr-Know-It-All. In one of my answers, I stupidly wrote "NOWHERE IN THE QURAN DOES IT SAY TO BEAT WIVES". Then there was a YA user sending me a private message telling me about Sura al-Nissa' verse 34 (he asked me to read it), showing me links of pro-Islamic websites that support wife-beating, and asking me to read 3 different hadiths (I forgot the volumes, chapters and numbers of the hadiths). He was actually really polite. As a Sunni Muslim at that time, of course I became so aggressive against him and believed that he was just telling lies and trying to misguide me. I arrogantly thought that I could prove that he was telling lies so I downloaded Quran and hadiths collections apps on my phone. I.... was.... speechless.... and trembled when I read Quran 4:34 and the 3 hadiths he mentioned. He was damned right. He shattered my beliefs. In my mind it was like "what the heck is this?". A day later I replied back to him, I acted much dumber. I DEFENDED 4:34 and tried to prove that the 2 of the hadiths were
taken out of context. The 2 hadiths were about prayer annulled by women, dogs and donkeys and about a woman that has a mark on her arm that was "greener than her cloth". I could not find the remaining one hadith. I also learned that Muhammad married Aisha at the age of 6 and had sex with her when she was 9 by reading hadiths online and hadiths apps. I also tried to defend it by trying to convince myself that child-marriage was the norm during Mo's lifetime. Before that, at school I only learned that Aisha was married to Mo when she was 9, after she had reached puberty and I thought it was fine.
I used to feel fed up of hijab and tried to find justification for not wearing hijab.
Then I found Quranism. After learning and feeling convinced by Quranism, I felt liberated.
My arguments to support Quranism were:
- Hadiths were collected 2 centuries after Muhammad's death through hearsay and verbal transmissions.
- Hadiths contradict Quran.
- Hadiths are self-contradictory.
- Verses saying "obey God and obey messenger" cannot mean / is invalid to follow hadiths because the word Messenger is mentioned instead of Muhammad so "where are hadiths of Jesus, Moses, Abraham etc?" and hadiths are hearsay and have nothing to do with Muhammad.
- There are verses that say Quran is fully detailed so extra-Quranic sources should be rejected.
After becoming a Quranist, I wasn't worried at all about going to hell for not wearing hijab because most Quranists do not believe that Quran obliges women to cover their heads or hair. I debated Sunnis a lot. I was so active on free-minds.org/forum . My username is diamantinehoneybunch on Free-Minds forum.
But I have to admit that I still did not read the Quran much after becoming a Quranist even though my knowledge on Quran and even hadiths after becoming Quranist was much more than when I was a Sunni.
But I often didn't perform Salah because I was confused which interpretation of Quranic Salah was the true one.
A few months after becoming a Quranist, I started to question the Quran itself. I started to doubt God especially its intervention in human lives and I often read Deist websites and forum conversations. But I came back to Quran because, well, you know, no one can change his or her belief overnight.
I have to admit that these things in the Quran bother me a lot and lead to my apostasy.
- Disbelievers are burned in hell ETERNALLY. How can a merciful God burn people eternally for finite sins? Disbelieving in God is to be punished in hell? Even if the person tries too hard to believe in God but still does not make sense to him or her? So rapists, mass murderers, torturers are much better than disbelievers?
- God increases faith in believers and decreases faith in disbelievers.
- People who believe, disbelieve, believe again and disbelieve will be made increase in disbelief.
- A prophet told pagans to kill themselves if they don't stop worshiping idols. But some Quranist apologists say it actually means to kill their egos, not themselves.
- Ma malakat ayman or right hands possess as Yusuf Ali's Quran translation says. I have heard various opinions and interpretations by Quranists but there are still no convincing answers.
- Witnesses: 1 male witness is equivalent to 2 female witnesses.
- Polygamy.
-4:34 . I am actually aware of the Quranist interpretation of this verse. When I was a Quranist I also believed that the verse did not mean to beat wives. My argument was that verse 4:35, the verse after 4:34, was about reconciliation between seperated husbands and wives and since even without " ´an" after idrib or idrab there were still a lot of meanings of ض ر ب , therefore the idribuhunna in 4:34 was best to be translated into leave/separate from them.
- If Quran was truly a Book from God then why does God not protect it? 1 Quran, multiple interpretations.
- Verse that says Mo can marry whomever he likes.
- Inheritance
- 24:30-31. Men are only required to keep covered their privates but women must cover everything except "that which is ordinary to appear". It is vague. It also shows that women must cover muuuuuuuuch more than men. It is still understandable and acceptable if women must cover their bosoms. But it is more than private parts and bosoms!!!!
- Establish "God's law".
- Why should people do aerobics called Salat to communicate with God?
- Fasting. If Quranic Ramadan is the same as traditional Ramadan, if Ramadan falls during summer, the Northern Hemisphere will fast much more than Southern Hemisphere and the Equator which is not fair.
Okay enough.
Now I a convinced that even Quranism is not right and I am an apostate and infidel. I am also not interested in religion anymore. Here I am, a humanist.
Dear my friendly Quranists who read this, especially if you are from Free-Minds forum, I am sorry. I cannot pretend to believe in Quran anymore. I must be myself. I cannot keep lying to myself and force myself to believe the Quran.
Also many Quranists believe in the same Muhammad as Muhammad in general Islam. Then where did you get the history of Muhammad if not the historical books such as al Tabari etc? In Sirah books, there are still terrible stories about Mo.
Sorry for long story.
Have a nice day
Topic: Ex Quranist