Muslim terrorist fatalities reached a peak of 33, 348 in 2014, declining to 13,826 in 2019. From 9/11/2001 – 4/21/2019, there were 146,811 documented deaths from Muslim terrorist acts. That’s an average of over 8000 humans losing there their lives every year because of this misguided mythology. At least three times that number were wounded in those attacks but survived, all the rest of their lives shattered because of those evil acts. Those terrorist attacks have increased again in the twenty first century. Bombs of all types have been employed: car bombs, plane bombs, suitcase bombs, suicide vest bombs, all designed to kill the maximum number of innocent civilians possible. This curse upon human civilization seems to be getting worse, rather than going away.
After 9/11/2001, U. S. Presidents George W. Bush and Barak Obama, Prime Minister Tony Blair of Great Britain took pains to make it clear they were declaring a war against terrorism, not the Muslim religion. They did not want to offend the great majority of Muslim citizens, who are peaceable, law abiding, and compassionate citizens. These statesmen knew that the nation of Islam has a long past history of being a nurturing society. Their prophet, Muhammad, preached to them that they should take care of the lame, the orphan, the widow, the traveler, the needy, the slave, and the followers of Islam followed his teachings passionately. After the beginning of Islam on September 24, 622 CE, there was a flowering of civilization in the Arabian peninsula and surrounding countries, as this robust new religion spread throughout those lands, fostering education, science, learning and investigation. Christianity is to blame for destroying that blooming and advanced civilization, with the massacres of the crusades, beginning in 1096. Muslims, in response, have turned to the violent pole of their religion to fight back. It has been that way ever since: a constant war of violence between Jews, Christians and Muslims.
Muslims have a deep reservoir of instructions from their revered prophet, Muhammad, to do just that: violently act against those who do not share their faith. The Koran is replete, throughout, with instructions from Muhammad to torture or kill all those humans who do not believe in him. Pages 15-18 of Morals, Ethics and Religions, are filled with selected quotes from the Koran which state exactly that, and these are just a small sample of similar additional material throughout the Koran. Muhammad’s most faithful followers, who believe those teachings in the Koran should be strictly followed, and are divinely sent, believe they are purifying Islam by killing those who are infidels, or unbelievers, in their religion. Their prophet has taught them that martyrdom provides heavenly rewards; that Islam should be dominant over all other religions; that jihad, or killing of all unbelievers, restores Islam to its rightful dominant state. Islamic jihadists who massacre and destroy fervently believe that they are doing what is right, following the instructions of their prophet, Muhammad. They believe they are purifying Islam by these horrendous acts; they believe they are purifying the human race by performing these heinous acts; and believe that they will go to Heaven for committing these horrors.
Here are a few examples, taken from the Koran translation by N. J. Dawood:
2:90: God’s curse upon the infidels! Evil is that for which they have bartered away their souls. To deny God’s own revelation… They have incurred God’s most inexorable wrath. Ignominious punishment awaits the unbelievers.
2:191: Slay them wherever you find them. Drive them out of the places from which they drove you…
5:33: Those that make war against God and His apostle and spread disorder in the land shall be slain or crucified or their hands and feet cut off on alternate sides…
9:73: Prophet, make war on the unbelievers and the hypocrites… Hell shall be their home: an evil fate.
47:3: When you meet the unbelievers in the battlefield strike off their heads…
98:5: The unbelievers among the People of the Book [the Bible] and the pagans shall burn forever in the fire of Hell. They are the vilest of all creatures.
We understand that the Muslim world was a peaceful and vibrantly progressive civilization, until that Arab world had to fight against European and Western aggression, oppression and exploitation of their lands. In their anger at these unjust intrusions, they also reached to their religion as justification for their retaliatory destructive acts. This is not, however, some radical interpretation of ambiguous language in the Koran. Killing, torturing and beheading unbelievers is exactly what Muhammad told his followers to do, in very exact and clear language, replete throughout the Koran. We can no longer be mealy-mouthed or politically correct about these fervently believed evil terrorist attacks. The war against terrorism must also be a war against Islam, Christianity and Judaism. Each of our Abrahamic religions has this intolerance of other faiths as an integral part of their belief system. Each of them has participated in that superiority/ license to kill complex, in spades, throughout the centuries. Let’s not mince words anymore; this war against terrorism must also be a war against the evils in our own religions; or else that war against terrorism will fail.
Each of our religions has a compassionate moral pole, most obediently followed in Islam. If we embrace those compassions, and eschew those poles of a mythological violent, vengeful God, we have a chance to survive as a species on planet earth. Without that revision of our religious values, we are doomed. We will torture, kill and destroy our civilizations before we reach the state of an ethical society, where all humans are treated with deep respect, and where each human has an equal opportunity to pursue life, liberty, and happiness.
July 1, 2023