“Freedom of expression is the central nerve in a functioning democracy. Without it, democracy will die.”
The translated article below from Berlingske was originally published at Vlad Tepes. Many thanks to Liberty DK for the translation:
We have to ask the question: Was Mohammed doing the right thing?
Tina Magaard knows Islam to the core, both personally and academically. She believes that the Danish experts on Islam have failed to disclose what is really written in Islam’s holy scriptures, and to what degree extremists draw their ammunition from them.
Tina Magaard has been away for a long time. Away from both the debates about Islam that she had helped shape in the middle of the 2000s, and also from her home in central Jutland.
She is, after working at some of Europe’s finest universities on top of a career in the capital, happy to be back in the heart of Jutland, specifically at Aarhus University’s campus in Herning, located a mere stone’s throw from the city’s landmarks: Ingvar Cronhammer’s iconic “Elia” sculpture.
But in terms of a return to the debate on Islamism, Tina Magaard is a bit more skeptical. Back when she was employed by Iranian-born Mehdi Mozaffari, a Professor Emeritus Dr.sc.pol at Aarhus University from 2005 to 2008, she learned how costly it can be to deal with Islamism and integration.
Not least in the wake of the cartoon crisis, when she was one of the few Danish academics who spoke up against the general consensus that reigned among Danish Islam-researchers who almost unanimously claimed that acts of terror had nothing or very little to do with Islam’s central tenets and scriptures.
However, after the terrorist attacks in Copenhagen and Paris, Tina Magaard has nevertheless decided to briefly return to the debate about Islam in Denmark.
A cultural encounter
Tina Magaard’s first meeting with Arab culture took place in the late 1980s, when she worked at a restaurant owned by a Jordanian man in Kolding. A place that many of the city’s middle eastern immigrants frequented.
“I spent more time there than I spent in high school. There were several of us who would hang out there, even when we were not at work. “
However, the relationships between the sexes were very clearly defined.
“The first thing my boss said to me when I was hired was, ‘Never trust an Arab man.’ He stressed that I should come to him if any Arab men at the restaurant tried to approach me. He would then make it very clear to the potential “candidate” that things should be done in an orderly manner. I was treated with respect in that environment, almost as if I had been his daughter”, she says.
Under the Jordanian café owner’s Arab paternalism and safe wings, it was easier to navigate in that environment than even among the culturally radical teachers at the school who represented something new and unknown. Because Tina Magaard was not raised in an atheist, academic or culturally radical family where one subscribes to the newspaper Politiken and maintains a becomingly urban and ironic distance from God. Quite the contrary.
From the age of 11 she lived with her evangelical grandmother, and she has read the Bible from cover to cover. And although she has long since put religion behind her, the experience stayed with her.
“The impact of growing up in that environment has actually been to my advantage when I have had to navigate in Muslim communities in Europe and the Middle East,” she explains.
“It has made it easy for me to understand what it means to let religion be a guideline for this life, and the security it can provide, but also how it changes your behavior when you are fearful of going to hell.”
After high school, Tina Magaard set out on a journey to meet the world. First Brussels and later to Paris, where she took her Ph.D. In France she gained a whole new perspective on culture and Islam as she moved in cosmopolitan circles amongst anarchists and leftists, learned Oriental and Indian dance and questioned all dogmas with curiosity.
Her friends also asked questions, and several of them came from North Africa and Iran. She became very aware of how difficult it was for them to express themselves freely, as radicalized members of immigrant communities constantly tried to put a stop to their exploits with direct references to the Koran and Islam’s tenets. Even something as innocuous as traditional Indian dance was hated and condemned by Islamists.
“That some in the Islamist environments consider it legitimate to use violence to punish those who they believe violate Islam is not something that is created by European racism, nor did it arise out of thin air with the cartoon crisis. It is a trend which has for many years curtailed the rights of artists and critically thinking individuals in Muslim countries and Muslim communities in Europe. The only new development is that now the violence is also directed toward non-Muslims,” says Tina Magaard.
The weak but strong
The civil war which played out in the early 1990s between the government and Islamists in Algeria was crucial for Tina Magaard’s understanding of the cultural war that takes place in Muslim communities around the world. It was an extremely bloody conflict in which extremist groups, several of which today have links to al-Qaeda, massacred hundreds of thousands of civilians:
“I have met many liberal-minded exiled Algerians who were opponents of the Islamists. They asked a lot about what was going on in Scandinavia, and they claimed that the fundamentalists actively sought to go to Denmark and Sweden, where they could obtain refugee status or marry and get citizenship, thereby having access to state welfare benefits. This made it possible for them to collect money that they then sent on to the Islamist movements in their countries of origin. So the welfare state funds were used to finance terrorism and the fight against secular-minded Muslims and other religious minorities. Furthermore, these were used for social programs that served to lure more people into their ideology. The liberals Algerians were extremely indignant that Scandinavians let this happen,” she says.
“Although it is inherently difficult to verify these types of claims, it made me aware of how persons who in Denmark were unambiguously perceived as victims, could themselves be oppressors and even use the welfare state as a means to oppress others,” she says, emphasizing that victims of Islamists are always first and foremost other Muslims.
During the 1990s Tina Magaard also taught intercultural communication at a Finnish business school. Among other sources, she used people who stressed that Islam in its essence is a peaceful and tolerant religion that had simply been misunderstood or hijacked by extremists.
But this put her in a dilemma, because even though she wanted to believe that this was so, she herself had had many experiences throughout her life that suggested otherwise. Both Islamists and those they persecuted were distinctly in agreement about one thing: the justifications for restricting freedom of expression, artistically, literarily and politically, were taken directly and often verbatim from Islam’s holy scriptures.
Deliberate concealment
She then decided to examine the sources. She studied Arabic and read both the Qur’an and the hadith. Here she recognized many of the repressive tendencies she had experienced in her environment.
“What is striking is not only that one can find violent passages in Islamic texts; these can be found in many holy scriptures. What is striking about these texts is how much these passages are filled with and how much they are centered on an us-and-them logic where infidels and apostates are characterized as dirty, rotten, criminal, hypocritical and dangerous. It was also striking the degree to which these texts demanded the reader to fight the infidels, both with the word and the sword. In many passages Mohammed plays a central role as the one who encourages the use of violence, whether it is by stoning, beheadings, acts of war or execution of critics and poets. “
Tina Magaard finds it particularly objectionable that many Islamic scholars, in her opinion, knowingly fail to disclose this fact and use their position of power to create specific standards for what people are allowed to say. Often, they put the blame on Danish racism rather than candidly disclose that the justification for using violence and threats as extremists is actually to be found in the holy scriptures.
“The core of the problem is a lack of acceptance of the liberal freedoms we have in the EU, as well as the justification of violence to promote an Islamic agenda that primarily affects other Muslims. If a researcher fails to disclose it, you actually end up taking sides in an internal Muslim cultural war, while concealing important knowledge from the public. To blur the religious injunctions and rules found in the Koran and the hadith is dishonest. And no, they do not explain everything, but they are an important part of the reality that it is the task of the academics both to understand and to communicate, and therefore you have to engage them.”
The demands will continue
Asked whether, after Krudttønden and Charlie Hebdo, it is desirable for the sake of future harmony and coexistence to refrain from drawing Mohammed, Tina Magaard’s answers unequivocally:
“The only thing we earn by saying that we must not draw Mohammed is that there will be more religiously motivated restrictions on our freedoms. Rather, we must take the bull by the horns and question whether Muhammad did the right thing when he, for example, ordered his critics murdered. That is the discussion we need to take up with European Muslims.”
According to Tina Magaard, the most thought-provoking issue is that it is difficult to find an Imam who dares or even wants to criticize those aspects of Islam that stand in marked contrast to liberal freedoms, although there are many Muslims who do not personally share the ideology found in the tenets of Islam.
“Instead you get a diffuse chitchat such as: “That is not appropriate to discuss in Denmark now” or “that is a misunderstanding.” You will also hear no criticism of the concrete passages, such as those the terrorists use to justify their actions, “she says.
“In a study I conducted for the Ministry of Integration, I visited a variety of Muslim communities. Only the Ahmadiyya Imam clearly read the violent passages metaphorically, for example by saying that when it says that a thief must have his or her hand chopped of, it is a metaphor to say that one should prevent one’s hand from stealing more.”
But she also mentions that the Ahmadiyyas are regarded by virtually all other Muslims as apostates, partly because they read the Koran metaphorically.
“It shows how difficult it is to get started on the reform of Islam, which is necessary for Muslims to live in peace with each other and us. But we have to push to promote this reform in order to safeguard the freedoms that our society is based on and which have ensured our prosperity. Freedom of expression is the mother of all other freedoms. It’s not just about having the right to shout and scream at each other. It’s about being able to criticize any religious dogmas without being exposed to violence or threats of violence. Freedom of expression is the central nerve in a functioning democracy. Without it, democracy will die.”
I’m glad she pointed out “Only the Ahmadiyya Imam clearly read the violent passages metaphorically” and mentioned how they were persecuted as apostates, but I wish she had mentioned the following which are extremely I portant:
1) only around 1% of the Muslim population is Ahmadiyya. If you ask the other 99% of Muslims they’ll say that it’s 0% because their defintion of Muslim doesn’t include Ahmadiyya.
2) Ahmadiyya are explicitly forbidden from entering Mecca as they are institutionally and legally declared non-Muslims in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and likely just about every majority Muslim country.
The other problem is that when talking to non-Muslims about Islam, Ahmadiyya spokespeople falsely give the impression that all Muslims believe the same thing they do. This is unhelpful to their cause, and unhelpful to anyone else opposing violent jihad.
Aren’t Ahmadiyas muslim in the same way mormons are Christians or the same way Christians are Jews? They have newer prophets and books, right? I’d consider them something else as well, though I don’t know what.
regards
Yes, they are sort of like Muslim Mormons or something because their founder declared himself the Madhi.
I’d still consider Mormons to be a sect of Christianity though. Obviously this is not universally agreed upon.
This is hyperbole:
Matthew 5:30 “And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.”
Both Jesus and Paul used a lot of figures of speech: mainly hyperbole and metaphor. Hyperbolic speech is still common in Mediterranean culture.
However, Koran 5:38 is not a figure of speech: it is written as a direct command (albeit softened by 5:39):
5:38 “Cut off the hands of thieves, whether they are male or female, as punishment for what they have done.”
So many verses in the Koran are taken from figures of speech in the bible and re-written as literal. Hand amputation is probably yet another one.
Very good point. In fact the Ahmadiyya would probably agree with you that this is a sort of literalist corruption of metaphor.
Problem is that they won’t denounce the belief in this sort of corruption, and they give people the false impression that most Muslims in the world believe in the metaphorical reading of these things.
The problem with an assertion that the “Off with their heads!” type verses of the Quran are metaphor or hyperbole is that whenever Mohamed himself had the opportunity he most un-metaphorically actually DID lop off the heads of his opponents.
As an example, after obtaining the surrender of the Bani Qurayza by promising them they would be allowed to leave with their personal property, Mohamed himself oversaw the beheading of some 600 – 800 men and boys before the women and girls were sold into slavery.
Comment….
One off observation….only.- No more articles.
The State Of The Disunited Kingdom.
By the Late Bishop Guy Leven-Torres.
6th April 2015
When are the British going to say “ Enough”? Frankly I am stunned matters have been allowed to
come so far. By the hour our ancient laws and freedoms have been trammelled by the so called ‘Political Class’. This in itself is a thorough misunderstanding of who we the People of these Isles really are. It is “We The People” who are the State. Even the “Peelian Rules” of British policing make this clear- to with “The Police are the Public and the Public are the Police…..” yet everyday we see these ancient rules abused but actually well established at Common Law and Custom in Anglo-Saxon England and even from its source, as I have been wont to explain time after time the Roman respublica or “Commonwealth” represented by the famous “Senatus, Populusque Romanus”- the People of Rome, to which under the Lex Hortensia even the Senate was subject.
No magistrate had power greater than the people gave him by vote or for more than 10 Months- the ancient Roman year. Furthermore, every magistrate had a colleague or college of fellows who could impose their veto if the man exceeded his authority. It is from these hallowed and time honoured customs that stem the very principles of English Common and Statute Law. God help any man who exceeded the law. The very act an affront to the Majesty of the Roman People- Treason in fact or “Maiestas” from which again stem our concepts of the same.
Furthermore we are subjects, not just “citizens” of the Monarch on our throne in whom we reside our power and national authority that is “maius imperium” and above any other in the land. Even this is nothing new, since there is a strong Saxon tradition of elected Kings dating back to the tribes who allowed Kings and Queens rule as long as we the people deemed fit. Every one of us is under absolute obligation to report or refuse to obey any other authority, especially that imposed by a foreign power or official. These are not just quaint “has beens” for antiquaries like myself but absolutely the Law of England. Simply in our failure to act we too are guilty of Treason and assisting a foreign occupying power to destroy us. Even Parliament is subject to them as is the old Roman Senate in its system.
Today we have a plethora of officials – often in local public employ or in private “Security” daily breaking our laws and levying fines and censure of people who are legally and in fact their Lords- namely us the Public. Then again we have A State Church of England that seems to go out of its way to do down English Christianity that is the State religion, in a way that no other land can claim. Christianity is by law the primary faith of England- above Atheism, Judaism, Hinduism but especially Islam that the gangsters in power seem intent on “reverting” us to. Why do we stand by and do nothing, when it is our clear responsibility to act to prevent this daily abuse?
1400 white girls abused by Moslem gangs have been ignored. Daily British Asian and African girls are made to suffer the disgusting practice of female genital mutilation and these too are ignored by our revolting “political class”. Are Asian Britons not entitled to the same respect accorded by the majority of us to our own offspring?
It is a heinous crime in England to abuse all underage Britons of whatever colour and creed, for all are equal under the law, so why is it only a few freaks on their way to commit murder and high treason in the name of their fake godlet made a fuss over by people, especially in the Media? All Britons are entitled and must expect and require protection from the state.
This situation must end and we are the only ones that can do it…..
This public failure to do our duty is why I “died” and will remain so until people act as they should.
Ms Magaard doesn’t come close to addressing the scope of the problem. Mohammedanism may well be the most perfectly and hermetically sealed poli-theological systems ever designed. To even raise the question of whether Mohammed made a mistake one must first demolish the very foundation of Mohammedanism, i.e. the Koran is the actual, literal, and indisputable word of God. Not Mohammed reciting, repeating, or recounting what he was told or heard but God using Mohammed’s speech physiology to project his thoughts and instructions into to world of men. This is understood and accepted by all Mohammedans and, as in the case of the Ahmadiyyas, to even consider it to be anything else is blasphemy. The understanding that the Bible is made up of second-hand accounts, narratives, and obvious oral traditions for possibly dozens of generations before being commited to writing makes it a completely different type of text. To treat the two as the same type of theological vehical is a mistake that is almost universal but a mistake nonetheless.
The Koran states explicitly that Mohammed is the perfect man; therefore to even question whether he was ever in error is a direct attack on the validity of the Koran. He is also explicitly designated as the last prophet – EVER. The Mahdi is not a prophet but a winnower or avenger. This seals the circle and makes it perfect. To cut it at any point is to shatter all of the constituent parts. How can this be done? Who could possibly possess the authority to do it? From whence would their authority derive?
Figure this out and you may be able to “reform” Mohammedanism. Till then your just barking in the dark
Agreed. The initial command to Mohammed, as recorded by his followers, was “Recite.”
Not “Write.”
Not “Tell.”
“Recite” is perfectly described by your words, “God using Mohammed’s speech physiology to project his thoughts and instructions into to world of men.”
From a previous comment:
Family dysfunction goes ‘way back.
Indeed it does. And that family information is lost to the descendants of immigrants. They are cut off from their roots in terms of consciousness but the old information persists in their DNA and continues to be acted upon, for better or worse.
—————————-
“Recite” because he was illiterate and envied the neighboring Jews whose literacy was widespread and matter of fact. What would have been the outcome if, instead of laughing at him for the mythology he stole, they had responded compassionately and taught him to read?? Not that those who made fun of him were responsible for what was to come – i.e., their mass decapitations- but they were nonetheless instrumental in the development of his envy.
A Turkish neurologist made a good case for the likelihood of Mohammed having an occipital lobe lesion. Thus his aural “visitations” where he heard his instructions rather than seeing Gabriel in the cave. Due to the lesion there were also likely bouts with urinary incontinence from which grew his obsession with cleanliness before prayer.
I’m annoyed with myself for eventually putting the book in my Goodwill donations; it had some valuable deductions. But I allowed my annoyance with the doctor’s abrupt insertions of Christian proselytizing in the midst of medical explanations. Two separate books would have been fine, but mixing the two subjects together ruined his theses.
Science in general makes an ignorant mishmash of religious dogma; religion does the same to the hypotheses which form the basis of scientific inquiry. Still, I regret not keeping the book. Fatally flawed as a whole, it had some useful parts.
Tina Magaard is getting warm… Close but no cigar. Her liberal background from her student youth is still deforming her worldview. She’s certainly better than most mainstream analysts of the problem of Islam; but that doesn’t mean we should not notice how far she still is from seeing what the rest of us few in the Counter-Jihad can see as plain as the nose on our face.
Thus, for example, she says things like:
“Rather, we must take the bull by the horns and question whether Muhammad did the right thing when he, for example, ordered his critics murdered. That is the discussion we need to take up with European Muslims.”
This only makes sense if you think Muslims are 1) capable of reforming Islam and 2) are not lying to us in order to advance their stealth jihad against us.
And:
“It shows how difficult it is to get started on the reform of Islam, which is necessary for Muslims to live in peace with each other and us. But we have to push to promote this reform in order to safeguard the freedoms that our society is based on and which have ensured our prosperity.”
Again, this only makes sense if you believe there is a viable critical mass of Muslims actually amenable to this. In 2015, after the mountain of data we have (actually, a churning volcano of the evil lava of Islamic data) and the ocean of dots we should be able to connect (if, as Hugh Fitzgerald wryly remarked, we have the “mental pencil” capable of connecting them), such starry-eyed hope for reform among Muslims so that they will help us solve the hoary & hairy problem their Islam is causing us and the rest of the bloody world is — or should be — simple unacceptable for the Counter-Jihad. If the Anti-Islam Movement were actually coherent, it would thank Tina Magaard and pat her on the head for having inched along on the LCPOI (the Learning Curve of the Problem of Islam), but would then hand her paper back to her and tell her to correct its grievous neo-Wilsonian premises and conclusions.
H- Thanks for the Hugh Fitzgerald quote. I’ll have to remember that. A metaphor with wonderful allusions. Definitely, his own “mental pencil” is the Full Scribe model. I’ll bet it can write under water or under duress.
This was spoken by Moses, Mahomet’s favorite Old Testament character, “Hear O Israel, The LORD (Adonai) God (Ya) is One! You shall love the LORD(Adonai) God (Ya) with ALL your hear, soul, mind and strength. You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Deut.6:5 BTW, according to Jesus Christ your neighbor was anyone AND everyone.
Now, let’s see whether the Dar al Sa’laam can live up to that standard of behavior. I dare them to even try. (Sound of gauntlet landing on the floor)
Without the Paraclete (Mohammed in Arabic) having an abiding residence in us as the Spirit of God Who maintains our fellowship with Him through Christ Jesus, loving anything is impossible for God alone is Love and God alone is Good.
“By their fruits you shall know them” spoken by the Word of God who was accorded the authority of God AS a Son. Get it straight already, AS a Son!
Profuse apologies, the Lord woke me up this morning with a Harrumph! The reason is as follows, “No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.”
Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
Allah doesn’t have a son because Allah is not Ya. Allah is only a counterfeit, put forth by the Deceiver and enemy of all that is good.
Please accept my apologies for my mis-characterizaton
I’ve always thought it strange that Arabs would/could respect – much less venerate – a man who had no children.
Abraham is venerated precisely because his descendants were many…and even modern, efficient methods of genocide could not destroy them entire. Such a deed will never be fully accomplished despite the rigorous efforts made by so many haters. As long as Earth circles the sun there will be descendants of Abraham traversing our planet.
Of course, there will be Irish, too.
The difference being that the Irish took the command to go out and multiply more seriously. In their sober moments, they continue to obey that dictum.
Meanwhile, Arabs take it a step further, pushing copulation with their domesticated animals as a necessary part of life.
And inspiring Wells’ “The Island of Dr Moreau”?
Repeat after me, “Two legs good, four legs bad…”
I believe the statement that Mohammed “had no children” is provably incorrect.
When we see mullahs and imams, and other self-appointed spokesMEN for Islam, some wear white turbans and some wear black.
This is a crucial difference, and there’s a long-standing reason for it.
Black turbans signify men who are descended from Mohammed. They cannot have “descended” from him unless M himself had children. Indeed, the Shiite/Sunni sundering in Islam relates (originally) to the murder of Ali, M’s son-in-law. Can’t have a son-in-law without a daughter, so…M had *at least* one daughter, and probably many. But, apparently, no sons.
Re. descendants of Abraham: Ishmael, Hagar’s son by Abraham, was also promised by God to be the founder of “a great nation” (Gen. 21:18). Thus the Arabs, as well as the Jews, are all children of Abraham. Sadly, like the two different mothers (Hagar and Sarah), they cannot seem to live together in harmony. The descendants of the older son want to exterminate the descendants of the younger.
Family dysfunction goes ‘way back.
Magaard writes:
“It shows how difficult it is to get started on the reform of Islam, which is necessary for Muslims to live in peace with each other and us. But we have to push to promote this reform in order to safeguard the freedoms that our society is based on and which have ensured our prosperity. ”
This is a dangerous recommendation to the Danish government, for it gives control of the muslim problem to the muslims themselves, as if there are no measures the Danish government itself can take to reduce this threat to freedom that don’t depend in any way on muslim cooperation (such as stopping immigration, welfare and free medical care, infiltrating the moskkks, and deporting any and all muslims who preach sharia or jihad). Quite apart from the question of whether islam can be reformed (it cannot), muslims will make an outward show of reforming islam to fool the Danish government, who will be willing fools b/c they want to believe that reform is possible and that muslims want the same things the Infidel wants. All the while, however, the muslims will be spreading their tentacles throughout Danish society.
Late Guy,
I’m reading your post and sense the following, which I used as an Easter meditation, will help to shore up your position.
Peace be with you.
Prudentius’s ‘Contra Symmachum’, a refutation of Symmachus’ plea for the retaining of the altar of Victory in the Senate house at Rome; 405AD
Over all countries within the bounds of the western ocean
Over all lighted by Aurora’s rosy dawning
Raging Belona, had confounded all things human
And had armed savage hands to inflict wounds, one upon another.
To bridle this madness
God taught the nations everywhere to bow their heads under the same laws.
All whom Rhine and Danube water
Or gold bearing Tagus or great Ebro
All that and Tiber flows through
And Ganges nourishes
Or the seven mouths of the warm Nile sustains
All these did God teach to become Romans.
A shared law made them peers,
Intertwined them under a single name,
Brought the vanquished into bonds of brotherhood,
In regions most diverse
Life proceeds as if fellow citizens of the same breed
Dwelt within the walls of a single ancestral city
As if all were at peace under their grandfathers’ roof.
Areas geographically remote,
Shores divided by the sea
Now merge in allegiance to a single jurisdiction.
Now their trade and their handicrafts bring them to a single thronged market.
Now dwellers in disparate regions unite in solemn wedlock
And a single progeny in the mingled blood of diverse races.
Such was the enormous success and achievements of Roman power.
It was for Christ, who was even then on His way,
That the path was prepared.
The general amenity of our peace had long since paved it
under the direction of Rome.
What room could there have been for God in a world that was savage,
In human hearts at discord with one another,
Each proffering its own claims and asserting its own rights.
Such was the situation of old,
And when the passions of the human heart are disordered,
And the parts of the soul dissevered by confused partisanship.
Neither limpid wisdom can find access,
Nor God enter in.
But if high intelligence gains rightful sovereignty,
And bridles the impulses of the pugnacious temper and the rebellious flesh
And it constrains all passions under a single rational,
The poise of life is made stable
And firm conviction draws God into the heart,
And yields authority to a single Lord.
Now the Earth is in Concord.
Infuse it, Almighty, with Thy Presence.
Now Christ, a world receives Thee,
In which Peace and Rome hold together in a bond of union.