Category: Political philosophy

  • Meek pharisee in a machiavellian world

    I am a meek pharisee in a machiavellian world. They killed me for being a stupid pharisee. They killed me for being a tough love pharisee. They killed me for being an ugly pharisee. I am a meek pharisee in a machiavellian world.

  • An Afpak saint died

    Maata rahib at tawhid wa zahidu khurasan wa hibrus sufiyyah. 

  • Islam, Christianity and narcissistic victim syndrome

    I am an orthodox Muslim with some narcissistic family members. I am raised a Sunni and I like Shia attitude towards narcissistic anti-religious or pseudo-religious dictators. Now I am a semi-Sunni semi-Shia Zaydi. Shias cites Quran 4:148 as the Scriptural basis for being outspoken when you suffer abuse. Religion neither teaches blind anarchism nor blind obedience. Rather a optimal middle path of moderate respectful rebellion on that spectrum. Reza Aslan has shown rebellious elements in early Christianity which are different from modern socialism.

    https://narc-attack.blogspot.com/2008/02/religion-and-victimhood.html

  • Quran 14:4 and multiculturalism

    What is the biblical perspective on multiculturalism?

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    Chris Lee, Neo-Evangelical Protestant Christian, ecclesiology, apologist, M.Div. GCTS
    I don’t think the Bible outright addresses the issue of multiculturalism, but H. Richard Niebuhr did write a book, “Christ and Culture.” There are five paradigms:

    1. Christ against culture — there are times where specific elements of culture or a culture itself is antithetical to Christianity. For instance, until the Edict of Toleration by Constantine, Christianity and the Roman Empire were at odds in many ways.

    This also occurs when Christianity is a minority within a larger culture that isn’t even nominally Christian. So to be Christian is to be very different — and a Christian cannot accept these things in culture that are against his or her beliefs. And some of the downsides of this belief is often “circling the wagons” and an “us vs. them mentality.”

    2. Christ of Culture — there are times when cultures are aligned with Christianity. When Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire and in certain red states of the USA, being Christian was consonant with the general culture.

    Unfortunately this also leads to nominalization among some other problems. If Christianity is the official religion, then people just put “Christian” in front of their titles (e.g., “I’m a Christian plumber” or “I’m a Christian fisherman”) — but were people really Christians or were they just going along with culture?

    3. Christ above culture — there are those who believe our faith has nothing to do with culture and is above culture so to speak — or that is impossible to separate human culture from the grace of God. So culture is neither good nor bad.

    This tends to be the paradigm within the Catholic Church. The upside is that this view tends to balance both Christians being involved with culture and yet God as outside of culture, sustaining it. The main downside is that cultural elements can become syncretized within Christianity (e.g., you can worship your family idols as well as worship God).

    4. Christ and Culture in Paradox — while there is cooperation within culture and Christianity, there exists also conflict between culture and Christianity.

    Niebuhr himself though that this position is static and that the Christian loses the voice to say anything meaningful in/to culture — since this view would just accept culture as is.

    5. Christian transforming Culture — an extension of the fourth view, but deliberately, Christians have sought to change elements that are unChristian or antithetical to their beliefs.

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  • Post righteous kingdom and trinity/antinomianism of Ishmaelites

    The bloodshed in Syria is in the name of hatred of first post righteous king named Ameer Mu’awiyah and the bloodshed in Yemen is in the name of love of this post righteous king making it the political trinity of Ishmaelites. Or like Paul who is loved by Gentiles and hated by pronomian Semites. Both appear to disagree with the idea of genetic primacy of righteous Semites and Ishmaelitic Prophetic descendants. This line of thinking makes it plausible that Jewish Einstein had a tendency towards Shia Islam. I am a semi-Shia pro-Zaydi Sunni like Nasai and Shawkani.

    Alperovich Anatoly I would love if you explain about shia
    
    Ishmael Abraham They are like zionist rabbis of Ishmaelites. Zionist rabbis want to bring Jewish Moshiach into power while they want to bring Ishmaelite Mahdi into power. But both will be disappointed when Messiah and Mahdi ends up opposing them.
     Both need apolitical Scriptural spirituality to recognize the true Mahdi and Messiah.
  • Shia non-neutrality between wise revolt and narcissistic anarchism

    In Islamic history, a non-neutral person is called a Shia. But a non-neutral person can become a narcissistic anarchist if he lacks empathy and respect while changing the status quo. Some Sunnis can become narcissistic Uthmani Shia.

  • Failure of Ishmaelite outreach and tragedy of blasphemy

    There are important outreach efforts in our sub-continent. Tabligh movement has global outreach but they are not qualified for interfaith dialogue. Dr Zakir is qualified and a bit confrontational but does not have an organized missionary movement. Mufti Taqi has written some reasonable material about Christianity but laymen in Tabligh movement are out of touch with it . Dr Qadri has tried to visit churches but he is criticized for condoning Christian errors, If we integrate these visions in qualification, compassion and outreach we can minimize these tragic events of blasphemy .

    But still we should not ignore the legal element of our religion. In western law, in case of preponderant evidence makes you guilty. For example, the evidence against Dr Afia was not of totally certain nature but still she was sentenced. The idea of complete certainty of evidence is actually Islamic. So, in case of iota of doubt, life imprisonment is more just than execution.

    مغرب میں اسلام کا پیغام عام کرنے کی کافی اہم کاوشیں بر صغير میں ہو رہی ہی۔ تبلیغی جماعت کے روابط عالمی سطح پر موجود ہیں لیکن وہ بین المذاہب مکالمے کے اہل نہیں۔ ڈاکٹر ذاکر اہل شخصیت ہیں لیکن ان میں تھوڑا پہلو محاذ آرائی کا بھی ہے اور ن کی کوئی منظم مشنری تحریک نہیں ہے۔ مفتی تقی عثمانی صاحب نے عیسائیت کے حوالے سے چند معقول کتب تحریر کی ہیں لیکن تبلیغ سے وابستہ ایک عام فرد ان سے لاعلم ہے۔ ڈاکٹر طاہر القادری نے گرجا گھروں میں جانا شروع کیا لیکن ان پر عیسائی اغلاط کو تسلیم کرنے کی وجہ سے تنقید کی جاتی ہے۔ اگر اہلیت ، ہمدردی اور اسلام کا پیغام کرنے کی کوشش جیسی تین باتیں جمع ہو جائیں تو ہم توہین رسالت جیسے سانحات ہونے کے امکانات کو کم سے کم کر سکتے ہیں۔ لیکن اس کے باوجود ہم اسلام کے قانونی پہلو کو نظر انداز نہیں کر سکتے۔ مغربی قانون میں ، غالب ثبوت آپ کو مجرم بنا دیتا ہے۔ مثال کے طور پر ڈاکٹر عافیہ صدیقی کے خلاف ثبوت کی نوعیت یقینی طور پر ثابت شدہ نہیں تھی لیکن انہیں سزا سنا دی گئی۔ ثبوت کا کلی طور پر یقینی ہونا اسلام کا دیا گیا تصور ہے۔ لہذا ، شبے کا شائبہ ہونے کی صورت میں سزائے موت کے بجائے عمر قید دینا زیادہ قرین انصاف ہوگا۔

    The Mission of the Ummah and Asiya Bibi

  • How liberal Muslims use state power to destroy traditional forms of religion?

    Liberal Muslims would be arguing against state power in countries like Saudia and Iran, and like they demanded resignation from Morsi. But in secular and semi-secular countries they argue for more state control to destroy traditional forms of religion , which is inconsistent. State has never been as powerful as today since 14 centuries. 

    حکومتی کنٹرول اور لبرل تضاد

    لبرل مسلمان ، ایران اور سعودی عرب کی طرح کے ممالک میں حکومتی کنٹرول کے خلاف بات کرتے ہیں جب کہ سیکولر یا نیم سیکولر ممالک کے لیے وہ حکومتی کنٹرول کے حق میں دلیل دیتے ہیں.

  • Political theology of apolitical psychological resistance to spiritual democratic resistance

    Houthis follow Zaydi political theology of armed resistance by Prophetic descendants against Muslim oppressors. But the loophole in the current movement is that they do not have a unifying moderate leader. Iran is based on a political theology of apolitical psychological resistance to Muslim oppressors but a Prophetic descendant Syed Khomeini brought Twelvers closer to Zaydi political theology. A Pakistani Prophetic descendant Syed Mawdudi taught a political theology of democratic resistance against Muslim oppressors, but lack of charismatic leaders of spiritual democratic resistance after Banna and Mawdudi makes young zealots succumb to seduction of armed resistance.

  • Between anarchist narcissism and pacifist self annihilation

    The cure to anarchist narcissism and pacifist self-annihilation is following a just and moderate leader. The challenge is to recognize that unsung hero or even heroes. Quran teaches the state of guidance requires increasing the level of sacrifice and struggle.

    Nick Elam “Moderate” in this day and age means continuing the status quo, and that is unacceptable.
    Ishmael Abraham One can have a moderate ideology but a tempered radical strategy like Karbala.

     

    Nick Elam I would argue that my views are only really radical in America where the Overton window is tightly controlled. When imperialist exploitation is the norm, I guess anything outside of that is by definition radical.
    Ishmael Abraham Fb seems to have started to enforce that window.
    If liberals overcome their spiritual anarchism, they can find allies among compassionate ant-imperial conservatives.