How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy.[/quote]
(1) No Islam is not a curse to Muslims. At present one can count the (former) Muslims on fingers who agree with this at practical or theoretical level. Salman Rushdie, Ibn Warraq, Wafa Sultan, Ayan Hirsi Ali, Mariam Namazi and a few more. That is very very tiny. They would not matter and they do not matter except for the fact that they are useful for the west as pathetic weapons against Islam and Muslims.
(2) Sir W attributes fanatic frenzy to Muslims. Have they shown to be more fanatic than Nazi germany? Hardly. More fanatic than the actions of US in last century? No. More fanatic than Britain colonizing the world? No. So there. Pot calling the kettle black?
The family of Sir Winston Churchill urged him to “fight against” the desire to convert to Islam, a newly discovered letter has revealed.
(3) Sir W also talks about fatalistic apathy of Muslims. Sorry Sir they either have fanatic frenzy or they have apathy. Decide for yourself. Two things are contradictory.
For the record Muslims do belief in fate.
Fatalistic they are not. They do believe in action and you are worried because of that.
The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live.
Here Sir W is talking of effects of Islam on Muslims.
We need a perspective here.
If they were as bad economically they why did Britain colonize them?
This was not a charity to Muslims.
They did it for their own benefit.
They expected some gains from colonizing Muslim lands.
So above negative assessment of Muslim society is only partially true.
Indeed European intellectual revolution lead to social, cultural, industrial, economic, scientific and technological revolutions too but what was Europe before that? In that period it was Europe that was sluggish. Islam and Muslims had seen all of above revolutions before Europe.
True Europe in particular and west in general has a slight advantage over the Muslim world today but things are changing rather fast. So Sir W's arguments are not that valid today. By the Grace of God. At least two Muslim countries have that hideous western trophy - the bomb.
A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity.
It looks phony today that Sr W talks of sensualism.
For the uninitiated he is saying that Muslims are womanizers.
At the present moment in history, I suppose, the west is worried that Islam covers woman too much.
So that sensualism is at best anachronous.
Though at present it is controversial but still it can be asserted that Islam purdah has bestowed grace, refinement, sanctity and dignity to women. That is the power of Islamic modesty of women.
Quote:
The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property – either as a child, a wife, or a concubine – must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. [/quote]
The Noble Qur'an explicitly asserts that man and woman are equal.
So there is enormous amount of falsity in above statement of Sir W.
The west has problem with the next part of the statement quoted above that says that man man has slight preferance over woman. Now that is Godly injunction and it does not neutralize the first half completely.
West is unlikely to accept this assertion.
At the moment the west has near complete control over the international discourse and will hold on to the absolute, though farcical, equality of man and woman. It will take some time for them to come around to the side of the truth.
Now we turn again to the Independent news item.
Quote:
The Prime Minister who led Britain to victory in World War Two was apparently so taken with Islam and the culture of the Orient that his family wrote to try and persuade him not to become a Muslim.
In a letter dated August 1907 Churchill’s soon to be sister-in-law wrote to him: “Please don’t become converted to Islam; I have noticed in your disposition a tendency to orientalise, Pasha-like tendencies, I really have.[/quote]
They have been crafty enough to keep this a secret till today.
Quote:
“If you come into contact with Islam your conversion might be effected with greater ease than you might have supposed, call of the blood, don’t you know what I mean, do fight against it.”[/quote]
What was she hinting?
In any case there was a serious possibility of his conversion.
Quote:
The letter, discovered by a history research fellow at Cambridge University, Warren Dockter, was written by Lady Gwendoline Bertie who married Churchill’s brother Jack.
"Churchill never seriously considered converting," Dr Dockter told The Independent. "He was more or less an atheist by this time anyway. He did however have a fascination with Islamic culture which was common among Victorians."
[/quote]
This raises two questions. Why was the letter kept a secret and if he was not serious about conversion then why was she worried?
[quote]Churchill had opportunity to observe Islamic society when he served as an officer of the British Army in Sudan. In a letter written to Lady Lytton in 1907 Churchill wrote that he “wished he were” a Pasha, which was a rank of distinction in the Ottoman Empire.
Rather obvious betrayal of fascination with Muslims,
[quote]He even took to dressing in Arab clothes in private - an enthusiasm he shared with his good friend the poet Wilfrid S. Blunt. But Dr Dockter thinks Churchill's family need never have worried about his interest in Islam.
You see families are like that - they worry about family members.
[quote]"[Lady Gwendoline Bertie] would have been worried because Churchill was leaving for an African tour and she would have known Churchill had been seeing his friend Wilfrid S. Blunt. Who was a renowned Arabist, anti-imperialist and poet. Though he and Churchill were friends and dressed in Arabian dress at times for Blunt's eccentric parties, they rarely agreed.
It is clear that Churchill did not convert so they can relax today also has they have been relaxed till today.
[quote]In 1940, when Churchill was leading Britain’s fight against Nazi Germany, he gave his support to plans to build what became the London Central Mosque in Regent’s Park - putting aside £100,000 for the purpose - in the hope of winning the support of Muslim countries in the war.
He later told the House of Commons that “many of our friends in Muslim countries” had expressed appreciated for this “gift”.
Alright thanks once again Sir W.
[quote]But while he was vocal in his admiration for Islam, Churchill was not uncritical. “The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men,” he wrote in his 1899 account of Sudan, The River War.
