Muslims must not debate, will not debate, cannot debate. Part 2

Part 1

Muslims will not debate:

Even if not a conscious, dedicated activity, every Muslim does da'wah, in that every Muslim extols the virtues of Islam to non-Muslims, while holding to its rhetorical restrictions. The only truth is allegiance to Islam. When that criterion is met, nothing else they say matters. Consequently, what Muslims say or write is often riddled with inconsistencies, non sequiturs, contradictions and any number of fallacies. They are oblivious to their incoherence, something they do not understand and which, in any case, is not their aim. They lack any concept of argument, the closest to which they manage to get is sophistry, and bad sophistry at that. When they lose control of the discourse, they resort to yelling non-stop. If they succeed in running out the clock without their opponent getting another word in, then they hold the truth, obviously. Muslim ignorance of rhetoric allows the youngest kafir high-school debater without any knowledge of Islam to demolish the most learned sheikh within minutes, purely on grounds of the sheikh's rhetorical incompetence. The non-Muslim school child knows what an argument is; a sheikh does not. But even if a Muslim did know what an argument is and how to debate, he remains hamstrung by the prohibition on scrutinising what is “revealed” and that he is forbidden from going against.

And whoso opposeth the messenger after the guidance (of Allah) hath been manifested unto him, and followeth other than the believer's way, We appoint for him that unto which he himself hath turned, and expose him unto hell - a hapless journey's end! (Qur'an 4:115)

This brings us to the hunting grounds of the da’wah gangs. These Muslims engage in jihad of the tongue to “demolish” all that is not Muslim. Their preferred theatres of operations are large audiences, whether live, such as in auditoria or at London’s now thoroughly-debased Speaker’s Corner, or remote, such as on television, YouTube, social media, etc. Big names like Zakir Naik and Mohammed Hijab prefer extravaganzas. The point of such people’s “debates” is not to win an argument, since they have no argument. The Muslim’s point is to demonstrate his dominance over the kafir by humiliating him for his insolence in presuming to challenge a Muslim. It has to be kept in mind that a Muslim cannot be wrong, ever. “That which the Muslims consider good, Allah considers good,” and “The [Muslim] Community is divinely protected from error.” (Reliance of the Traveller, Book B7.4).

Zakir Naik and Mohammed Hijab are probably the most famous (or infamous, depending on whether you’re Muslim or not) examples of this kind of bombastic, frail-ego showman. They prefer their audiences large and extremely ignorant: if Muslim, then also smug and excitable; if non-Muslim, then docile and naïve. While their non-Muslim audiences may be there to learn something, their Muslim audiences expect to be entertained by a lions-versus-Christians type spectacle. In short, they want blood, for now still, metaphorically speaking.

Zakir Naik, a medical doctor who extols the virtues of drinking camel urine, sends his audiences into ecstasy with a pièce de résistance barrage of Biblical quotations rising to a crescendo. Mohammed Hijab specialises in vulgar obnoxiousness peppered with racist invective under a veneer of pseudo-intellectual jargon, most of which he applies incorrectly and does not understand, relying on bombast to intimidate his opponent into acquiescing and submitting. For good measure, he sometimes spits at his opponent, quite literally. Oh, and this buffoon insists on being acknowledged as “an Oxford graduate”, “a political philosopher,” “a philosopher of religion” and “an academic.” By putting down their debate opponents before an expectant Muslim audience, these sorry specimens not only assert their dominance over their kafir opponents, they assert Muslim dominance over the kufaar and Islamic dominance over kufr. What they do is pleasing to Allah, and therefore will never change.

Less capable, but no less unpalatable for it, are showmen like British broadcaster Mehdi Hasan, who dominate by simply never allowing his opponent to get a word in, only drawing breath once he has overwhelmed his opponent with so many ridiculous assertions that the opponent would not know where to start. The audience's ignorance can be judged by the extent to which they are impressed with Hasan's machine-gun delivery. Hasan always resumes his onslaught before his opponent can decide how to oppose him.

Other Muslim propagandists dominate without seeming to do so, such as Maajid Nawaz and Irshad Manji. They are the most dangerous because their targets want to believe them, and will give them every benefit of every doubt (should they ever get as far as doubting anything they say). Highly intelligent people, such as Dr Sam Harris and Prof. Richard Dawkins, are putty in Nawaz’s hands.

Muslim rhetoric means navigating a checkerboard of permitted and forbidden speech, so as to only ever say what they are permitted to say. For Muslim propagandists such as Maajid Nawaz and Irshad Manji, their rhetoric can approach the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, since their non-Muslim audiences want to be generous towards "moderate Muslims" to show them support against the "extremists". They are especially beloved of the "interfaith dialogue" crowd. Here, on both sides, truth is the slave of expediency. To the credit of the Muslim side, at least they are not deluding themselves. They are there to advance Islam, and if their opponents let them, they simply barrel right over them. So-called "interfaith dialogue" offers easy pickings for the Muslim and is a sad spectacle to behold.

Dealing with Muslims’ idea of truth can be entertaining, frustrating or tedious, but occasionally it can be interesting, such is the case of Sheikh Dr Yasir Qadhi. Four of Dr Qadhi’s five degrees are in what Muslims quaintly refer to as “the Islamic sciences.” Insinuating the word science into things Islamic is part of the endless Muslim quest for religious validation. Camel urine, for example, is a cure for stomach-ache, sperm-eating worms live in the anuses of homosexual males, and diseases with their corresponding cures are found on the opposite wings of houseflies. All of these are specialisations of “prophetic medicine”, while any defiance of the laws of physics or distortion of biology or geology in the Qur’an are “scientific miracles” (a contradiction in terms immediately obvious to any kafir). Some Muslim mind went to waste dreaming that one up.

The bigger picture and the implication for faith are that Muslims who yearn for Islam to be scientific no longer accept that “pleasing Allah” is sufficient for validating their faith. By appending “scientific” to things Islamic, relying on scientific evidence to prove Islamic claims, and resorting to ridiculous attempts at logic, Muslims seek kafir validation of Islam according to kafir criteria. They are, unfortunately and frustratingly for them, forced to play this stupid game of persuasion, as they are not yet in a position to convert the kufaar to Islam by the sword. Muslims elevating their twaddle to the stature of a science, already puts them “on the road to kufr” for “imitating the kufaar,” especially since “Allah’s grace” (faith) will always trump “a mansion of the Moon” (science). But since they also imitate the kufaar in order to deceive them, they get away with it, kindof. This same quest for kafir acknowledgement of Islam as the great religion of Muslims betrays their own nagging suspicion that their religion is not so great, in fact, is downright awful. Engaging the kufaar in debate, real debate on kafir terms, in order to find external validation for Islam, is thus always a lingering temptation.

Nonetheless, Dr Yasir Qadhi is a cut above your Mehdi Hasan, Maajid Nawaz, Irshad Manji, and other prominent Islamic propagandists. Dr Qadhi exemplifies how far it is possible for a Muslim to go in rationalising the claims of seventh- and eighth-century scientifically-ignorant peoples, ossified into a religion and way of life that has persisted as a barbaric relic into a rational, civilised world. Qadhi’s problem is no different to that of any “Islamic reformer”: how to shoehorn the factually untrue into the factually true, the irrational into the rational, the inhuman into the human and the unethical into the ethical, when it is strictly forbidden to excise from Islam the factually untrue, the irrational, the inhuman and the unethical. Dr Qadhi's problem warrants close examination, not least because it throws light on the abysmal standard of reasoning that Muslims can cope with, and that a Muslim would bring to a debate, should he ever be serious about engaging in it. I beg the reader's indulgence of a rather lengthy excursion.

In his April 2014 video, “The Reality of Jinn in the Qur'an and Sunnah,” when Sheikh Dr Yasir Qadhi introduces the djinn, Islam's "unseen beings" that every Muslim must accept as real on pain of apostasy, he presents them not within the cosmos of the Qur’an and the Sunnah, the life of Muhammad, but straightaway offers a catalogue of the infidel world’s supernatural beings, from trolls and demons to fairies, ghosts and spirits. Even Hollywood and The Exorcist are invoked. Dr Qadhi makes two claims here: one, “The reason why each and every civilisation believes in spiritual entities …is because they are real.” It might never have crossed Dr Qadhi’s mind that if you need to “believe in” something, then it obviously is not real, else there would be no need to believe in it. Perhaps he was relying on his audience never picking up on that one, or if they did, that they would never dare challenge a sheikh.

Yasir Qadhi attempts to establish the reality of Islamic supernatural beings not from the Qur’an, which even has an entire chapter titled The Djinn, and is the infallible word of Allah, but from kafir folklore and fairytales. That is quite an admission for a great learned sheikh to make about the world’s final religion. The supernatural beings of “each and every civilisation” that Qadhi relies on, but does not care to identify, of course include those of pre-Islamic Arabia, such as al-Lat, al-’Uzza and al-Manat, the three pagan goddesses praised in the Qur’an’s vehemently-denied Satanic verses. Sheikh Yasir Qadhi both confirms and acknowledges the reality of these goddesses as being of greater veracity than the djinn, since the existence of the djinn is implied by the existence of supernatural beings such as al-Lat, al-’Uzza and al-Manat, along with trolls, goblins, tokoloshes, Santa Claus and the diverse denizens of the SciFi fantasy channel.

But to anyone who is not Muslim, Dr Qadhi’s dishonesty is plain to see. Firstly, none of the infidel supernatural beings he lists are claimed by their cultures to actually exist. Santa Claus, fairies, trolls and ghosts are real only to little children and cranks. By the time healthy little girls lay down their dolls, they are mature enough to realise that such stories are not true, especially if they are married to old men, we are told. Dracula, the bogeyman and demons persist in the world’s cultures because they enrich imagination and speech, and give us safe and enjoyable access to emotions that we no longer experience very often in the relative safety of our modern world, for instance being scared out of our wits. We hold onto our supernatural beings not because they are real, but because we enjoy having them around; but then, of course, there is no fun in Islam.

More seriously, since a Muslim ceases to be a Muslim for denying the existence of djinn and Dr Qadhi predicates their existence on other cultures also having supernatural beings (and not the other way round), those kafir supernatural beings have a greater claim on reality than do the djinn. Dr Yasir Qadhi has no option but to believe in the existence of al-Lat, al-’Uzza and al-Manat since, in his argument, these goddesses are necessary for the existence of the djinn. If these “exalted cranes” do not exist, then neither do the djinn. Fortunately for the learned sheikh, his effective apostasy lies well beyond the red line of questioning that a Muslim must not cross. So Dr Qadhi is probably safe, particularly as those Muslims smart enough to see what he is doing here will probably already have left Islam. But should it come to it, then at least Dr Qadhi now has three beings whose intercession he can seek. Every bit helps, especially with Allah being the best of deceivers.

By lumping Islam’s djinn together with the kufaar’s fantasy beings, Dr Qadhi “proves” that the djinn are real. Note that djinn do not exist because Allah says they exist, or even that every Muslim is required to believe that they exist; they exist because the kufaar have something similar, even if the kufaar themselves know that their something similar does not exist. To a Muslim, Dr Qadhi’s logic is faultless. “From our [Muslim] perspective,” affirms Dr Qadhi:

We look at all of this [SciFi fantasy channel, etc.], we read all of this [kafir fairy tales], and it fits in perfectly with our worldview. …In reality, this [claims of haunting, etc.,] is a sign of our religion being true. …It explains in complete logic and rationality …everything is explained. (Dr Qadhi’s emphasis)

Having just resorted exclusively to infidel sources as evidence for an Islamic claim, completely ignoring the Islamic holy texts, Dr Qadhi immediately backtracks. “We have to take what we can from the Qur’an and the Sunnah. …If Allah says it, we take it as fact,” says Dr Qadhi. If any Muslim happened to have noticed the problem above, it’s all alright now because Dr Qadhi said that we take Allah’s word as fact, never mind that he had just contradicted himself. To the Muslim mind, there is no such thing as a contradiction.

After seeking validation for Islam from kafir folklore and junk TV, implying that the Qur’an and the Sunnah are not quite up to snuff, Dr Qadhi removes all doubt by raising doubt. “We have to take what we can.” This is already kufr, for the Qur’an is “the book about which there is no doubt” (2:2). One moment, “If Allah says it, we take it as fact,” the next moment, “We have to take what we can from the Qur’an,” rejecting those things Allah says and we cannot take as fact. “However,” continues Dr Qadhi, “if there is something we discover upon [sic] ourselves, seems to be a reality, we say this is a theory, this is a possibility, and Allah (swt) knows best,” except, of course, that he has already told his docile congregation that kafir folklore and junk TV are facts, and so the kufaar, rather than Allah, know best.

Without kafir trolls and fairies, let alone “something we discover upon ourselves,” Dr Qadhi cannot prove Allah’s claim of djinn. But there is not supposed to be any need to prove anything Islam claims. The stunting of the Muslim mind during early childhood is supposed to ensure that any sheikh will get away with telling lay Muslims anything at all. They are supposed to hear and obey. So why does the learned sheikh feel compelled to resort to the indignity of proving Islamic claims to Muslims, risking exposing them to something “unwise”? The answer comes down to an entirely new phenomenon that is shaking Islam to the core: a tsunami of apostasy.

There is enough evidence to show that Dr Qadhi himself does not actually believe what he tells his congregation to believe. He tells them what he tells them because “it is wise.” There are, however, sheikhs who do believe all Islamic claims to be true, who do “take it as fact.” They have no need of the cognitive acrobatics that Dr Qadhi perforce must engage in, because they are in sync with their congregations. Dr Qadhi is not going to win back those who have left Islam. His ridiculous djinn evidence is meant to help him hang on to what remains of his increasingly restive and dwindling jama'at.

Dr Qadhi well knows that Islam and Shari'a are indefensible and is careful to avoid debates with kafir experts. Yasir Qadhi came under fire from the da'wah gangs for having destroyed the scam of the perfect preservation of the Qur'an, making it very difficult for them to continue lying to the gullible Western kufaar. The da'wah gangs went for Dr Qadhi's jugular, but that was not the worst of his troubles. Sheikh Dr Yasir Qadhi is an eminent Islamic scholar who stands aloof from the da'wah gangs ("They're idiots! Wallahi, they're idiots!"), and he maintains that aloofness through an academic air. He always calls his talks "lectures", and he does not tire of reminding the "simple Muslims" hearing and obeying him of the difference in their station. But Dr Qadhi's real ire is reserved for those kafir critics of Islam who make it difficult for him to continue lying to lay Muslims about the Qur'an, in particular, Drs David Wood, Jay Smith and Daniel Brubaker. Dr Qadhi disparages Drs Wood and Smith as missionaries, something he cannot say of the third member of "the lot", Dr Daniel Brubaker, an academic critic of early Qur'an manuscripts.

It stung when the people whom Dr Yasir Qadhi fears and secretly admires and imitates, kafir scholars of Islam, zeroed in on the holes-in-the-narrative debacle. He is simply rude about the two Christians, Drs Wood and Smith. Dr Qadhi's response to Dr Brubaker, to whom he is also rude, nonetheless describes Dr Brubaker as "their sheikh", meaning either the "sheikh" of Drs Wood and Smith, or of kafir critics of Islam in general. Either way, understanding Dr Brubaker as the equivalent of a sheikh exposes a profound misunderstanding of knowledge production amongst free people.

Dr Brubaker is not a “guardian, transmitter and interpreter of religious knowledge.” He does not represent God and his messenger on earth. It is not obligatory on anyone to consult him on anything, listen to him or imitate him. He does not withhold knowledge from anyone, and is fiercely opposed to anyone attempting to do so. He expects no one to hear and obey him. He is nothing if not a humble seeker of knowledge, who poses questions, rather than provide answers. And he will most certainly never seek to belittle or humiliate anyone. That's just not how knowledge production works amongst non-Muslims. Dr Qadhi's video response does show that, indeed, when forced to, he is willing to debate the kufaar, but then only from a safe distance.

But as we shall see in Part 3, not every sheikh is that smart.

Part 3/...

Picture credits:

Screenshot from "Shaykh Dr. Yasir Qadhi Remix | Holes in the narratives", DCCI Ministries, YouTube, 24 Nov 2020 https://youtu.be/5Q8W7ZZaE9s

Screenshot from "Holes in the Narrative Ft Sheikh Yasir Qadhi", Suraj Lama, YouTube, 14 Feb 2023 https://youtu.be/5A-2bfUYTSY

Comments:

On 20 April 2024 at 22:45, Jalal Tagreeb wrote:

Excellent Part Anjuli! Well done! I have just finished reading it.

Looking forward to Part-3 and Part-4.

I want to add that Muslims were excited and thrilled by the victory of Ahmed Deedat over the Christian pastor Jimmy Swaggart in their debate – Later on Rev. Anis Shorrosh (an evangelical Christian pastor) defeated Deedat in debate, Swaggart was the wrong person to debate.

Many Muslim apologists are experts in escaping from debates at the right time. For example, in the debate between Mr. Deedat and Rev. Anis Shorrosh in South Africa, Muslims created a rumble and chaos to allow their apologist to escape when Mr. Shorrosh started winning. Another example is when Dr. Naik refused to debate a prominent Christian in India.

For this reason, vanquished Muslim apologists must be paraded on stage. Below is one of the comments about my case when it was first published on Jihad Watch:

Thank you for publishing this interesting case. This case is very hopeful for many people who have pondered the arrogant overconfidence we meet in many Muslim apologists (particularly of the genre of Mohammed Hijab!) They bristle with the thought that they can easily defeat an uninformed kafir in debate, but once they are in the arena with heavyweights like David Wood, Robert Spencer or Christian Prince (men with a solid knowledge of the source texts), the overconfidence melts into a puddle on the floor. They beg to stop their complete defeat. But it does not stop. Nothing they can think of will stop the humiliating deflation of their puffed up pride in Islam, because, as all Islamic apologists discover, Islam cannot be defended by moral, intellectual, logical or factual arguments.

Kind regards,

Jalal.