Journal of April 7, 2005

Thursday, April 7, 2005 7:20 PM Further reflections on Islam.

Abraham as murderer? The key, it seems clear now, is Abraham and the sacrifice of his son. I need to determine if Ishmael’s birth was miraculous. If not, we will nail Abraham as a murderer and indicate in that way that the faith does not exclude immoral acts* and that it can be expected that such acts can be ordered from time to time (as evidenced by the Abraham Ishmael saga from the Islamic perspective) and they are, of course, to be sincerely complied with and leaving it up to Allah to decide if it should be aborted (in the case of Abraham) or whether it be permitted to reach its culmination. Allah knows best.

[* I offer an escape from this moral defamation of Islam below by means of a possible, alternative understanding which would put the Islamic Abraham on a moral par with the Jewish Abraham. However in both cases, Jewish and Islamic, there remains the possibility of a call for immoral acts.]

Ishmael is just as staunch a Muslim as is Abraham (in this telling). Once he realizes that Abraham has been told to kill him, he immediately, as a good Muslim, accepts that and submits to that, just as his father Abraham has done, and volunteers to be killed by Abraham. Thus the two great icons of the life of Abraham are a murderer and a suicide,* and serve to indicate that a Muslim does immediately what is communicated without the least moral restraint on that communication. There is evidence in the Muslim tales that Allah occasionally calls for immoral acts and the staunch Muslim, in the likeness of Abraham, immediately seeks to comply with that guidance. Thus we should not be surprised to find suicide bombers among the Muslims. It is not as though we were saying that the moon were made of cheese. It is impossible to tell in advance what a communication will be and the Muslim is simply be so oriented that he will immediately comply with whatever communication it may be. Let there be merely clarity, and the sky is the limit.

[* It is worth noting that Abraham had no inkling that the order would be countermanded.** But more germane to our present theme, since Abraham was intent upon carrying out his act, which is the sense of this example for the Muslims, this means that in a spiritual sense this man is as evil as they get, for he is even willing to do infinite evil, if he sincerely thought he were so commanded and the opportunity were available. Such a person can never be the friend of anyone, much less a friend of God.]

[** Indeed it is even surprising that he did not rebuke the angel calling upon him to stop. Since he did not, we understand then also that Allah can change his mind or at least that Allah can say one thing now and a different thing later, and so we are not to be in the least surprised at what may develop in any sincere compliance with the perceived guidance. We may end up completing the actual crime, or we may be stopped; but the heart is directed toward the sincere completion of the actual crime.]

Now according to the Jewish story, involving Isaac, it is possible to salvage Abraham morally (and not even to call Ishmael’s into question) by having him touched by the experience of the miracle of Isaac through Sarah and of the promise that this miracle child would have children in turn. Now at the time of the sacrifice Isaac had not yet had any children. Therefore Abraham could easily have reasoned so: I know that God who gave me my Isaac will keep his promises, and although I don’t know for sure that this voice that tells me to kill Isaac is his voice, nevertheless I will comply because this much is clear to me: no matter what I do my Isaac will not be harmed. Whether this be the voice of God or of a devilish angel I cannot tell; but one thing I know: my son will not be harmed.

Here Abraham is akin to the magician’s assistant who takes part in a trick that looks dangerous to some participant, but who knows that it is just a trick, although he may not know how the magician does the trick. Thus he acts conscientiously and totally without sin.

Today we would consider a man thinking in this way as a lunatic and in need of psychiatric care.

Ensuing Icons. Now what are the icons that we have from Islam and from Christianity? In Islam we have the ultimate example of the Muslim in Abraham, an example par excellence. Ishmael joins with him as a Muslim in the most intense meaning of the word, of immediate submission to the clear indications of Allah. No holds barred and no questions asked, for Allah always knows best. Death to me (à la Ishmael) or death to an innocent person (à la Abraham), it does not matter. “Allah, lead us; we will follow (from Goehring’s call: Hitler, führe uns; wir folgen!” )

The Christians accept the Jewish tale and find that Abraham was wrong to have believed that God would call for a wrongful act and is excused by virtue of his experience in the miracle of Isaac. But then the Christian still needs a positive icon and finds it in Jesus. Twice in chapter 5 John reports that Jesus broke the law, i.e., the accepted word of God, by doing good on the Sabbath. This speaks then clearly that no scripture or church edict may be understood by any Christian as calling for commission of an immoral act, e.g., the slaying of an innocent boy.

In a word: in the Muslim’s story, so far are we from a icon of moral character of the religion that we actually have rather an icon of immoral character in Abraham (and also in Ishmael). In the Christian we not only have no sin in Abraham (due to his miraculous experience)* but also a certification that no immoral act can ever be thought to have been a command of God, no matter the circumstances. This certification is given by the person acts of the Lord of the Christian.

[* And the Jews could also appeal to this same reasoning with regard to Abraham. But they may also, like the Muslims, lack a positive icon of the clarity of that of the Christians.]

8:02 PM Now even if we find out that Ishmael had some miraculous aspects which would lead Abraham to believe that no harm could possibly come to the boy, then the most we are left with is like the Abraham of the Jews, i.e., an Abraham who did not commit any sin, not even in his heart (as the Christians are wont to say). But we will find (as I have been informed by a sincere and knowledgeable Muslim) no positive icon, where Mohammed may have defied some guidance in the spirit of Jesus vis-à-vis the prohibition against doing anything on the Sabbath besides merely saving a life.* In fact the very notion of doing as Jesus is reported to have done by John would have seemed thoroughly absurd to the Muslim, to the man who has submitted.

[* According to Jewish custom the patient should have been told to return to Jesus at sundown (when the Sabbath would be over) and that he would then be healed. Jesus refused to wait and thus knowingly broke the Sabbath law by his healing. An extremely vivid icon.]

As a final note it may be worthwhile to remember that it was Kant who first of all posed the question concerning Abraham and who demanded moral clarity concerning him.

Extortionism. 8:47 PM Now we are ready to turn to the “extortionist” claim of Kant. Here we are told that while giving to the poor as a command of a religion would ordinarily be considered as a moral act, this is not the case with the Muslim, and I will now seek to expose Kant’s mind as to this conclusion.

We will consider two required acts, the bowing according to the clock and the compass and the giving of a tithe like amount to the poor. Now these acts are sincere only when undertaken in the awareness of Allah and for the sake of that awareness.

Now there are two elements here which need to be exposed. In the first place since the entire rationale for submitting to Allah’s guidance is to get the reward that it leads to. And so in this regard it is inherently immoral, for it assumes as part and parcel of the intention that even if the command is immoral, nevertheless it will be complied with. And so whether an immoral command is ever recognized or not, still the attitude is toward compliance and that denotes an evil spirit, e.g., willing to use another human man as a sheer means, e.g., Abraham in his willingness to sacrifice.

The other element has to do with the identity in moral worth given these two commands, for both are moral by virtue of the fact that in accordance with Muslim thinking they both lead to personal happiness in a paradise of some sort. And so we are beginning already to lose moral purpose and import. Here is the presumption: I would not bow down or give according to this formula, and the only reason I am doing them now is because I have been ordered by God, much as though I were told to burn a certain piece of money. This is the whole point of the sincerity element, that the act is being undertaken in the awareness of Allah’s ever watchful eye and for the sole reason that he has called for it. Therefore a man might say that it could be conceivable in a far fetched sort of way that someone might just keep on bowing down and giving even though he knew that it was meaningless in terms of purpose just because he might happen to like that. But that is a rarity, and so in both cases we are doing what we do for the sake of a reward, and indeed in the form of a deal which you cannot turn down, namely: do this and maybe go to hell; don’t do these and go to hell. Period. It is in the latter sense of the two moral elements that I think Kant is referring to in this claim of extortionist. They are for him much like the mafia threats to small store keepers and such. Pay or your window will be broken. That is a promise.

[Concerning mafia: To make it sweeter the mafia often promises to keep other window breakers at bay, so that the shop keeper is not in constant threat and might go out of business, thus hurting mafia business.

[Take only as much as you can get away with. It’s that simple. Use your head, always make sure you got someone looking out for you. Don’t worry about fairy tales of heaven and hell, play your cards right and you get more than the rest and you get to enjoy it in your own little mansion in heaven, where you are not bothered by pieces of shit that act like they are equal to you.]

And so the Muslim is forced to give to charity, and so then of course all moral value is removed (leaving rank legalism) and there is no choice, and that is what is an extortion.

The Muslim is immoral in the first place because he is willing to kill anyone, including himself, if he ever happened to think that were the guidance of Allah. But even more than that, he does this for personal gain, where the life and meaning and opinion of Ishmael could not have made the least difference, and where Abraham is going after the biggy, i.e., total submission, utter submission to whatever it is that these voices tell me to do. A man is reported to have told his unbelieving brother, “if the Prophet told me to kill you, I would not hesitate for a second. Not a second.”

In a word, a Muslim is a sinful (self above morality) man who is willing to do absolutely anything whatsoever that some voice tells him, in his utter sincerity, and knows of cases where people have been called upon to do immoral acts and who did not hesitate to undertake them in all sincerity, and that is the attitude that he must bring with him when he acknowledges Allah’s uniqueness and Mohammed’s authority.

A Muslim will do an immoral act if that is sincerely understood as guidance, and so there is no a priori bar to that understanding of guidance in general. That is the final point to be stated. The Islamic religion is not a moral religion at all. It simply is not. It’s icon far rather points to an radical evil in having no moral bars, but, at the same time, by definitions, to consider themselves as moral, and thus blind to any moral problem.

The Christian in contrast has the clear picture of Jesus knowingly and willingly breaking the Sabbath law in order to comply with the moral law in its immediacy, i.e., to not let a wrong (an illness of an innocent person) continue for even a split second. Do good now!

And so I think I have justified Kant’s moral condemnation of Islam as well as indicating, at least in outline, Kant’s moral approbation of the Christian religion.

And that was all that was required.

Mohammed versus Joseph Smith. 9:21 PM With regard to application, I would think in these lines if I were writing my essay now.

I would announce to the Muslim the prophethood of Joseph Smith. Not as though we were interested in promoting Mormonism, for we certainly are not, but are pleased to introduce to the Muslim mind the idea of a better prophet than Mohammed, i.e., one who did everything Mohammed did, but then more.

Mohammed, because he was illiterate, had to take it on the word of a vision of an angel that there was a book which was in the presence of God, and that the angel is reading from this book (but which is not in sight in the vision) and is having Mohammed recite back to him to make perfectly sure it was correct, and then have Mohammed recite this to the scribes who recited it back to him and then which he shows to the angel to read once a year and so in this way insures that the book with the Muslim is reading is exactly the same, word for word, as the book in the presence of God and so which has never changed. The order of the chapters may be different, but chapters are identical between the book of God and the book of the Arabian.

But Smith does a better job than Mohammed for since he can read and write he is able to read the book just as well as the angel, for he has the actual book itself in his possession (in the form of the golden plates) and has been able to copy it before it was taken back to heaven, and after it was actually seen by other people (unlike Mohammed who never “chose” to produce an angel). So he is given the special glasses and he can read the book, and so therefore there is absolutely no mistake, no dependence upon an angel (who might even be evil!), nor upon the memory and honesty of men, but are traced out visually from the original, almost as though they were gravestone rubbings (and that would be an additional improvement on the Mormons).

All of this now can be dispensed with if you can think of the law of the book being revealed directly to every human being in a way in which there were no doubt. And this is the solution of Kant and Paul. The soul responds to the moral law and recognizes divinity due to the righteousness of the man. The soul contains the recognition of the moral law. The law is then written into the heart of the Christian with an increasing joy at doing good. What we see we ought to do we find ourselves coming to want to do, i.e., in taking joy in giving rather than in receiving.

The gentile Christian is empowered to do all things without restriction that he can do in conscience with regard to the love of neighbor and of considering all people as neighbor.

The secularist will have no show of religion, but individually he can worship with the gentile Christians for nothing more can be demanded of anyone than a sincere intention to love neighbor as self which is also spoken of as loving as Christ loved.

It would be another question to think in terms of loving fellow Christians as Christ did, for that would mean more than self.