well becoming Muslims would be a solution for us, but it's not possible if you don't believe in God. I only want to make a decision that others could also make. So for now I can't be a Muslim, or I need arguments or an example for other people that have found a solution for this problem. Because there's millions of Muslims in Islamic countries, and very few agnosts/atheists. So their solution may be good enough for Western people. But I have a hard head in it, maybe the culture itself needs to adapt to non-believers. And accept non-believers, in the Islamic life. I mean, the Chinese are doing well right, and they're mostly atheists, so there's other explanations for how everything's working.
Personally for example I believe that there's two problems that cause the degraded Western society, two main problems, Christianity and not being circumcised. Christianity puts the world on its head, it tells the men to be like women, to be sweet and soft, and walk away in a confrontation. Also to be lazy, and to follow. Because Paulus said you need only believe, works are not necessary. I have reasons to doubt the intentions of this man Paulus, who so much seems to have changed the message of the prophet Jezus. Too bad that we may never know a satisfactory amount of the truth.
Not being circumcised has a similar effect, it keeps men down, it keeps them from developing into men, and they have a dirtier mind. So there's 2 forces working against the unfortunate Western people, and the two combined makes it complicated, and keeps Christians and Muslims apart! They don't really mix, and people don't understand the reasons, and the Christian guys can't bridge the gap. This is mostly because noone knows about the circumcision.
So this is the problem of a non-believer, he can find out that his own Christian system has shortcomings, and that Islam has many solutions. Still Islam also has shortcomings, for example it may hold back science, and there seems to exist some prejudice against non-Muslims, mostly Jews. I'll have to read the Quran to know more about it though.
So if you know solutions for this problem, please let me know. Should the Middle East accept atheists into its culture (remember that more than half the world population is atheist, think of the Chinese), should atheists find a way to believe in God, should Western people have an alternative to Islam that would still improve atheists' lives and be a system with many similarities to Islam, or is there another solution. A solution to solve the Western social problems, and to bring the Western and Middle Eastern people together?
I'm not sure if more than half of the world population is atheist, where did you get your statistics from? I'm not intending to criticize you or ridicule you, I'm just curious. Logically speaking half of the world at the very least should be believers.
1/4 of the world population is Muslims, and then if you take Christians, Sikh, bahai, and Jews (all of them being monotheistic faiths), IMO, that's at the very least half of the world's population.
Take into consideration I'm not even considering the people who "believe in many goods, higher beings, spirits, etc... Ex: Hindus, Buddist, etc...
"Still Islam also has shortcomings, for example it may hold back science, and there seems to exist some prejudice against non-Muslims, mostly Jews"
The Quran repeatedly emphasis the need to seek knowledge, and repeatedly encourages the audience to question, investigate, and examine the natural world in order to witness the glory and majesty of Allah SWT.
If you look at Islamic history, you will see Islam has a rich history of priceless contribution to many modern scientific fields astronomy, medicine, mathematics, etc...
So to answer your question, No Islam does not hold back science, sadly in recent times Its followers may have been holding back science. That is very unfortunate.
"and there seems to exist some prejudice against non-Muslims, mostly Jews"
I can't speak for all Muslims, but I personally have no problem with a believing Jew as long as he is not harming me, my family, or the society I live in.
What I do have problem with is a Zionist Jew. There is a clear distinction between the two, you can be a Zionist Jew without actually being religious or anything.
I believe majority of the Muslim hold similar opinion of the Jews.
Keep in mind, that Jews and Muslims were getting along fine throughout their respective history until 1948. Many Jews served under Ottoman Turks, Islamic rulers in Spain, etc. It's not like the Musilms ever prevented the Jews from entering their temples, or persecuted their religion or drive them out of Palestine. If we willed we could have certainly done so. The jews were a small population and lived in Islamic countries. We even sheltered the Jews and let them live in our lands when the Christian Inquisition in Spain drove Muslims and Jews out of Spain.
How do the Jews repay us? By stealing lands from the Palestinians and driving nearly 800000, Muslims out of Palestine. And continuing to oppress, persecute, and kill our Muslims brothers and sisters in Palestine.
Muslims do have a legitimate reason to be angry.
Under what standard of justice is the establishment of Israel is fair to the Palestinian? I can't think of any. Like I said, Muslims have many legitimate reasons to be angry, and if you ask me, these Zionist Jews and the people who helped them in their cause are nothing but "Scum of the earth".
That being said, I do have Jewish friends, but they are not zioinist nor are they harming my Muslim brothers and sisters, so I have no problem with them.
Shoaib
p.s. Your openness toward Islam is very admirable. Even though you said your an atheist, nonetheless you do not seem like an arrogant person, so feel free to ask us anything about Islam
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