April 10, 2009, 1:13 pm by dc-agape.

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Surāh 94 – Al-Inshirāh:  The Expansion

Have We not expanded for thee thy breast,

And removed from thee thy burden,

Which weighed down thy back,

And exalted for thee thy mention?

Surely with difficulty is surely ease.

So when thou art free (from anxiety), work hard,And make thy Lord thy exclusive object. 

I will start each post on the Qur’an with a link to M Mohammad Ali’s translation of the Qur’an with his commentaries. 

This surāh begins with the use of the royal “We”.  Since I brought this topic and question up in my last post I will not bring it up again.  The one thing I will point out is that in all the commentaries not a single one seems to explain the use of the royal “We”.  I will have to assume that the understanding of this term is a Tradition of Man that does not need to be explained.

The good part of this surāh is the promise that after suffering a time of peace will occur.  It is simple enough and nothing new to human knowledge.  But this revelation continues with the command to work even harder, during the time of peace, to expand the work of Allah.  This work will, of course, only bring an additional time of suffering.  And then repeat.  I say this because expansion can only occur by reaching into uncomfortable areas.  In the case of expanding new concepts to society this expansion will bring terrible suffering to those who try.  Jesus and the Prophet were ancient examples, Galileo is an example of more recent persecution.  And for some reason the concepts of Darwin are still under persecution by the ignorant.  But any time two different cultures, especially with contrary concepts, meet there will always be suffering for one or the other.

But one of the interesting comments in the commentary by M Ali refers to a verse from the 6^th Surah:

6:125 So whomever Allah intends to guide, He expands his breast for Islam, and whomever He intends to leave in error, He makes his breast strait (and) narrow as though he were ascending upwards.  Thus does Allah lay uncleanness on those who believe not.

It is funny how this commentary claims that the human heart is responsible for Allah intending them to say in error.  But this is obviously a Tradition of Man.  This verse 6:125 and 9:1 clearly indicate that Allah is the one who opens the hearts of men.  So just as in the Jewish and Christian traditions freewill does not exist, except in the minds of humans.  The supreme supernatural being that all three religions worship only gives us the illusion of freewill. 

Posted in Holy Qur'an, Traditions of Men, Freewill, Readings | Print | 1 Comment »

April 10, 2009, 9:02 am by dc-agape.

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Since I do not have to be on campus at any particular time today (I will make it there at some point today), I thought a post on the upcoming Easter celebration would be useful in explaining why Atheist find Christianity to be so unoriginal.  The two major holidays of Christmas and Easter do not originate in Christianity, and neither one was celebrated by the Apostles (try finding an example in the NT).  So the question comes up: where did they originate from and when did they start.

To begin with, both the Jewish Passover and Easter are celebrated at the same time.  To the simple Christian that makes since, Jesus died during the Passover.  But Easter (Pascha) was not a religious celebration until well into the 2^nd century.  By the 8^th century, it was not just connected to the Jewish holiday but pagan celebrations were introduced as recorded by the Venerable Bede.  Such things as the Bunny and Eggs were connected to Easter due to the pagan nature of the spring time resurrection of life.  By the 1600’s the Easter Bunny was spreading throughout Christendom from France and Germany.  In fact, almost all the symbols of Easter are barrowed from pagan celebrations. 

To make things even more interesting, the original Easter celebration was quite different than today’s observation.  Saint Melito’s of Sardis has one of the oldest homilies on Easter discovered.  Of course, not only does this homily celebrate the death of Jesus, but it puts the blame directly on the Jews (read the section IIA-IID).  Anti-Semitism was already strongly entrenched in Christianity by the 2^nd century after Jesus’ death.  It’s a shame that the original tradition of fasting for the entire week prior to Passion Sunday is not part of Easter any more.  And Christians claim their religion does not change!

What about Christmas?  Nearly the same thing happened.  Chanukah is celebrated by Jews near the end of the Roman calendar.  Christmas is on the 25^th of December, even though we know that Jesus was not born in December.  What we do know was celebrated at this time was a pagan holiday of the Winter Solstice.  And what exactly do we know about St Nicholas…nothing but legends.  Not even the Catholic Encyclopedia can give us much information about this man.  So it is more likely that both the celebration of the Winter Solstice and Chanukah that inspired and shaped the Christian’s own holiday of Christmas.

So why do Atheist find both of these religious holidays so ridiculous?  To begin with it is because both of them are remembrance of older holidays that involved the resurrection of ancient pagan gods.  For another reason, both celebrations have been warped by traditions and pagan celebrations into something completely different than what the original Christians intended the events to represent.  If Christians want to believe that their “God” is unchanging, why does their religion evolve?  Each addition of a new Tradition of Men just waters down the original religion and separates the followers from an unchanging “God”.

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• Is Christmas Only for Christians? (thebeautifulheresy.com)
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• Should Atheists Celebrate Christmas? (msatheists.org)

Posted in Traditions of Men, State of Mind | Print | 2 Comments »