A Critique of Manji’s “The
Trouble with Islam”
By Dr. Bashir
Ahmad
Wildwood, MO
Recently, I read a book entitled
“The Trouble with Islam” written by
Irshad Manji, daughter of an abusive father who
was also a wife beater. As a child Manji was left
in a day care center in a church while her parents
went to work. When she grew up she was made to
attend madrassa in a mosque. A bright and inquisitive
child, Manji started asking questions about Islam,
which her tutor could not answer to her satisfaction.
She then started studying translations of the
Holy Qur’an on her own. She is a talented
young lady and not surprisingly has become a TV
celebrity and a writer.
It appears that the abuse she suffered at the
hands of her father has engendered in her nature
a state of rebelliousness. In her book she labels
the Qur’an as a bundle of contradictions.
Her opinion appears to have been based on her
very superficial knowledge of the Qur’an.
I am amazed to note that she flaunts her deviate
sexual orientation so openly and so boldly.
Jordy Cummings of Toronto has this to say about
Ms. Manji: “The fact is that Manji is a
fraudulent opportunist not a feminist or a secularist,
but a confused little bourgeois with an axe to
grind, who had been used by the Israel lobby against
the beliefs she professes to have.”
In her book “The Trouble with Islam,”
Manji has used extremely despicable, derogatory
words about the Holy Qur’an and Islam. Little
does she care that the Qur’an is the most
sacred spiritual spring of over one billion Muslims.
When one analyzes and probes deeply into her anti
Qur’anic and anti Muslim statements, it
becomes absolutely clear that she totally lacks
the understanding of the Qur’an, the Jewish
and Christian scriptures.
An article by Anjim Niaz in the Pakistan Book
dated Nov. 19, 2004, relates that Manji is under
the tutelage of Bernard Lewis, Daniel Pipes (who
hailed Manji as a respected lesbian Muslim feminist
Martin Luther) and Bill O’Reilly of Fox
TV.
In this article I shall try to answer the biased
allegation she has leveled against Muslims that
they have malevolently maltreated the Jews and
Christians. She writes, “Qur’an also
discourages Muslims for taking Jews and Christians
as friends, lest we become ‘one of them’.
It speaks of ‘them’ as an ‘unjust
people’ whom ‘God does not guide’.
There is talk of smiting, slaughtering, and subjecting
non-Muslims to a special tax as a tribute to their
Muslim conquerors.”
Verses from The Holy Qur’an
on this Subject
“O ye who believe, take
not the Jews and the Christians as your helper,
for they are helpers of one another. Who so from
among you takes them as helpers will indeed be
one of them. Verily, Allah guide not the unjust
people”. 5/52
The Muslims were forbidden to make friends with
disbelievers because of the latter’s hostility
towards them. The present verse gives this reason
for that commandment, but does not mean that Muslims
are prevented from having friendly dealings of
any kind with the disbelievers from doing good
to them and treated them kindly.
“O ye who believe, take not as helpers those
who make a jest and sport of your religion from
among those who were given the Book before you
and the other believers. Be mindful of your duty
to Allah, if you are believers. When you call
people to prayers, they take it as jest and sport,
because they are a people who lack understanding.”
5/58-59.
“Say to them: People of the Book, you persecute
us for the only fault that we believe in Allah
and in that which has been sent down to us and
in that which was sent down before it, and you
to that because most of you are disobedient to
Allah. Say to them: Shall I apprise you of those
who recompense from Allah is worse than that of
those whom you despise? They are those whom Allah
has cast aside and on whom His wrath has fallen
and of whom He has made some as apes and swine
who worship the Evil one. These are in the worst
plight and farthest astray from the right path.”
5/60-61
The word “apes” and “swine”
have been used in a figurative sense. Certain
traits are peculiar animals, and these cannot
be fully described unless the animal to which
they are known to belong is expressly named. The
ape is known for its mimicry and the swine is
characterized by filthy and shameless habits.
The expression “who worship the evil one”
shows that the words “apes” and “swine”
have been used here figuratively.
Muhammad Asad - a prominent Jewish scholar who
converted to Islam - has rendered the translation
with a commentary of the Qur’an. The title
of the book is “The message of the Qur’an”.
He writes in the commentary of this verse thus:
“Contrary to many of the commentators who
take in reference to ‘apes and swine’
in a literal sense, the famous Tabri Mujahid explains
it as a metaphorical description (mathal) of the
moral degradation which such sinners undergo:
they become widely unpredictable like apes, and
as abandoned to the pursuit of lusts as swine
(Manar VI, 448). This interpretation has also
been quoted by Tabari in his commentary on 2-65.”
Page 156
Villianously, Ms. Arshad Manji’s through
her total ignorance of the Islamic codes of war
has written that there is “talk of smiting,
slaughtering and subject non-Muslims to a special
tax as a tribute to their Muslim conquerors.”
This statement is absolutely false.
Islamic codes of war are very strict and have
been mentioned in various verses in the Holy Qur’an.
1. Muslims can go to war only against
one who attacks them first.
2. Muslim can fight only those who fight against
them.
3. Even after the enemy has initiated the attack
it is incumbent upon the Muslims to keep the war
within limit and not to extend it.
4. Muslim soldiers are to fight only the enemy’s
regular soldiers and not to fight those on the
enemy’s side.
5. Muslim soldiers are strictly forbidden to harm
or kill non-combatants, men or women, and children
and also not to destroy the crops.
I shall be writing a series of articles, attempting
to erase the blemishes that Arshad Manji has put
on the Holy Qur’an and Islam -- Insha-Allah.
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