Islamic Thoughts

• ANALYSES
• 1 Behavior code of Muslims toward non-Muslims
• 2 September 11 (2001) attacks on America not compatible with Islam
• 3 Ways To Defuse Religious Tensions
• 4 The Value Of The Ten Commandments
• 5 Bright Spot Of The Us Constitution: Religious Freedom
• 6 Lessons from the prophet's hudaibiah treaty.
• 7 Rulers' roles in promotion of christianity.
• 8 Exploring a model definition of 'religion'
• 9 Where islam stands as a civilized religion?
• 10 Proving god's existence through experimental science.
• 11 Roles of man as necessary & God as sufficient condition.
• 12 Human kindness is a shadow of god's kindness.
• 13 Why islam is the best choice for the Africans?
• 14 In Old Age, All Roads Lead To Death.
• 15 No Creations Are Without Purposes & Uses.
• 16 Prayer Prevents People From Bad Actions.
• 17 When Haram May Be Excusable: Five-Step Conditions.
• 18 Islamization Of Some Un-Islamic Cultures.
• 19 Greater The Faith, Tougher The Test.
• 20 How Science Can Make A Difference For Muslims?
• 21 The Time Gap Reality Between Sin & Punishment.
• 22 Good & Bad Days Alternate In Cyclic Order.
• 23 Let Moon-Sighting Unite & Not Divide The Muslims.
• 24 Faith Crisis Among Some Intellectuals.
• 25 Islamic Policy Toward Animals.
• 26 Improving The Muslim Performance (Aamal) Standard.
• ARGUMENTS
• 27 How Middle Course Better Than Conservative And Liberal Extremes?
• 28 Why God Is The Best One To Be Worshipped?
• 29 Costs And Benefits Of Belief In The Afterlife
• 30 Bible Is Similar To Hadith But Different From Quran
• 31 Defaming Islam: Freedom Of Speech Or Violation Of Rights?
• 32 How Islam Compares With Democracy?
• 33 Who Is Responsible For '0' Small Pox Since 1980?
• 34 Timeliness Is The Leading Condition For Prayer.
• 35 Ten Arguments For Women's Education.
• 36 Why Physical Fitness Matters For The Muslims?
• 37 Homosexuality Vs Adultery: Which Is Worse And How?
• 38 Countering Abortionist Argument
• 39 Which Is Better: Open Or Secret Prayer?
• 40 Small Or Large Recitation: Which Is Better In Prayer?
• 41 Personal Or Social Suffering: Which Is More Painful & Why?
• 42 Cultural Slavery Vs Cultural Diffusion.
• 43 Why Should America Ban Religious Defamation?
• ASSORTMENTS
• 44 Visible Action Of Invisible God: From Author's Diary.
• 45 Optional Good Deeds Are Like Bodyguards For Compulsory Ones.
• 46 The Gravitation Law Of Performance (Not One Of Newton).
• 47 The Theory Of Relativity (Not That Of Einstein).
• 48 In Good Deeds
• 49 "Rob Peter to pay Paul" is not for islam
• 50 Muslims Cannot Be "Penny Wise And Pound Foolish".
• 51 Islam Endorses Salad Bowl & Not Melting Pot Theory.
• 52 100% Homosexuality Means Prospect Of 'O' World Population.
• 53 Sinning In Teens To 40's & Suffering From 50's To Death.
• 54 Revenge May Be Lower But Not Greater Than Harm.
• 55 Why Karl Marx Is Irrelevant Forever?
• 56 Is God The Same One For All Religions?
• 57 How God Controls Economy And Livelihood?
• 58 How Muslim Repression In Myanmar Violates Buddhist Principles?
• MISCELLANEOUS
• 59 Grim Reality of Death: Unfailing Lesson for Everyone
• 60 Religion Vs Reason: Which is More Important?

3. WAYS TO DEFUSE RELIGIOUS TENSIONS

Historically, religion played roles both as a unifying as well as a divisive force. Even though this social institution was supposed to promote peace by establishing the order of God, in reality it had been an occasional source of tension and violence in the society. Religion, however, can achieve goals of peace and stability by means of the following:

(i) Focusing on the Positive Contents: Holy books many contain both positive as well as negative elements. As an example of such positive is the Quranic warning to the Muslims not to "curse" the Non-Muslim gods (6:108). The religious priests should teach their followers more about the positive or conciliatory matters. The followers should also emphasize more on the peaceful rather than divisive elements. Then peace will have better chance to take hold.

(ii) Counting the Past Inter-religious Enmity as Dead: Two religious groups might have a past time of enmities or even violent conflicts. They should consider that past as dead and should not allow that to kill their present.

Compatible with the Quranic ruling suggesting that no one is responsible for sins of others (34:25), the present generation cannot suffer for the mistakes of their past generation. For example, you cannot blame the present day innocent Germans for what Hitler did to other ethnic groups and bearing that in mind you should not mistreat them now.

(iii) Avoid Offensive Propaganda against Other Religions: In a democratic environment, each religious group has the right to promote their own religion by objectively describing its strengths. There should not be any problems as long as each group confine to own religion and tells people what their religion is about. Problems arise when you talk negatively about other religion or in a way offensive to other religious group. Take the simple example of marketing campaign of two competing products, say Pepsi and Coca Cola. Each company will advertise the positive features (if not the negatives) of their own products including ingredients, prices, taste etc. Then it will be up to the customers to decide which product they will buy and at what quantity.

In this way, each religious group will try to sell their religion through positive campaigning about own without transgressing limits. Then it will be up to the people which religion they will follow and the quality of religion will dictate the extent of its following or popularity. In this way, religion can meet the spiritual needs of the society in an orderly fashion.

(iv) Interfaith Dialogue among Moderate Elements: Most religions have both extremist as well as moderate elements. In order to foil any disruptive goals of the extremists, the moderate members should play active roles toward peace. For example, if there is any incident of clashes between the ordinary members of two religions, the moderate people from the both should connect each other, sit down and negotiate peace before the situation goes out of hand. This will be the role of the moderate elements in a crisis situation. During peaceful time also, they can chalk out programs to endure peace and explore a variety of ways to promote mutual interests.