Quotes About Islam

Is Islam a tribe or is it a force of globalization? Islam has certainly been studied as a local, tribalistic phenomenon. But Islam is also theoretically a universalist idea, its spread has been facilitated by modern technologies, and it's an identity that people can slip into and out of fairly easily. I don't think Islam has really been understood as a product of globalization. It might be one of these instances where globalism and tribalism ultimately go hand in hand.

I think Islam has been hijacked by the idea that all Muslims are terrorists; that Islam is about hate, about war, about jihad - I think that hijacks the spirituality and beauty that exists within Islam. I believe in allowing Islam to be seen in context and in its entirety and being judged on what it really is, not what you think it is.

Well, the most important thing about Islam is that we have to differentiate between two kinds of Islam. The first one is the institution of Islam... second, the culture of Islam.

Al-Qaeda, ISIS, they can't be Islamic. Islam is the religion of peace. They are bastardizing it. They are frauds. They are calling themselves Islamic and they are calling themselves Muslim, but they're not. Because Islam is as anti-terror as you and I are. Islam is the religion of peace. I'm telling you what our government's position is. The US military position.

To the government, terrorism committed by people who are Muslim is not a reflection on the legitimate interpretation of Islam, even if Islamic supremacist ideology, which endorses jihad violence - Islam, standard, mainstream Islam endorses jihad violence, but our government doesn't want to admit that or deal with it. Here in America, as in Western Europe, this is the key to understand.

Islam's borders are bloody and so are its innards. The fundamental problem for the West is not Islamic fundamentalism. It is Islam, a different civilisation whose people are convinced of the superiority of their culture and are obsessed with the inferiority of their power.

I am a living illustration of Bosnian mixing and converting. My grandparents lived in eastern Herzegovina. Very poor. The Turks came and brought Islam. There were three brothers in the family. One was Orthodox Christian. The other two took Islam to survive.

This paranoid Islam, which blames outsider, 'infidels', for all the ills of Muslim societies, and whose proposed remedy is the closing of those societies to the rival project of modernity, is presently the fastest growing version of Islam in the world.

I think confronted with the modern world or with the rest of the world, I think people are becoming aware that the Western and Islamic civilizations have more in common than apart. It was a German scholar, C. H. Becker, who said a long time ago that the real dividing line is not between Islam and Christendom; it's the dividing line East of Islam, between the Islamic and Christian worlds together on the one hand and the rest of the world on the other. I think there is a lot of truth in that.

Islam says: Whatever good there is exists thanks to the sword and in the shadow of the sword! People cannot be made obedient except with the sword! The sword is the key to Paradise, which can be opened only for the Holy Warriors! There are hundreds of other [Qur'anic] psalms and Hadiths [sayings of the Prophet] urging Muslims to value war and to fight. Does all this mean that Islam is a religion that prevents men from waging war? I spit upon those foolish souls who make such a claim.

The distinction between radical Islam and moderate Muslims is important, as are the differences between Sunnis and Shiites, and between militant and mystical Islam.

This is a war for the soul of Islam. And those countries who are opposed to Islam, they are going to have to get deeply involved in a way that is not the case today. We should be supportive of that effort.

We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with people who have perverted Islam.

All too many Muslims fail to grasp Islam, which teaches one to be lenient towards others and to understand their value systems, knowing that these are tolerated by Islam as a religion.

Islam is the religion of peace. And Islam, genuine, real Muslims are as opposed to Al-Qaeda and ISIS as we are. That is what has been dictated to our law enforcement agents by their superiors. If those were your instructions, and you have a terror attack and you're out there reporting to the media, trying to answer questions, you'd sound like a babbling buffoon, too, because you'd have to come up with ways to violate the very common sense you know is true.

Islam, as a religion, has been established in France for a long time, and the religious question has been resolved in this country. Islam does not threaten France's future in any way.

We twist ourselves into knots convincing people that Islam is peaceful and varied before we realize that, wait a second, you can be a Muslim while also recognizing that Islam doesn't even explain half of your behaviors!

It was not Muslims that had made Islam great; it was Islam that had made the Muslims great.

For Hindus to expect Islam, Christianity or Zoroastrianism to be driven out of India is as idle a dream as it would be for Mussalmans to have only Islam of their imagination rule the world.

All Americans must recognize that the face of terror is not the true faith - face of Islam. Islam is a faith that brings comfort to a billion people around the world. It's a faith that has made brothers and sisters of every race. It's a faith based upon love, not hate.

If we cling to the institution of Islam, then we tend to defend it against whatever we see as a danger to it, so because of this we see now that many people are defending states, defending territories, defending everything institutional in the belief that they defend Islam.

I don't want to change Islam, but if there is to be a European Islam, it must incorporate European values.

My aim is to show that those governments that violate the rights of people by invoking the name of Islam have been misusing Islam.

There is no reason to not trust your process, no reason to get frustrated, no reason to criticize, or judge others, nothing wrong with getting old, or not being able to get pregnant, or being handicapped, or being short or tall or gay, or injured, or divorced or married to an idiot, or with Christianity or Judaism or Islam, or indigenous beliefs, or pollution, crime, war, Bush, etc. When this understanding grows, we realize where we're at now is just as perfect as wherever we could possibly get to.

It is apparent that Christianity and Islam must come, and come immediately, to a closer understanding, and it is equally apparent that their unity if achieved, will be the most effective defensive measure against Communist expansion.

This is a book called Women in the Shade of Islam. It's published by the government of Saudi Arabia. I picked it up in Pakistan, where the Taliban Ladies Auxiliary, and our young wife in California would've picked up an item like this. And it puts out that Salafi-Wahhabi ideology that is ultimately the toxic poison that is crossing all these borders.

Arabic is the language of the Qur'an, but Arab culture is not the culture of Islam.

There are individuals who are working very hard to promote fear and antagonism towards Islam and Muslims in this country. It's fueled, in part, by the first African-American president that we have. Obama's father was a Muslim and people have used this to arouse hostility against him.

Islam doesn't try to destroy cultures; it cleans them up. You can keep your language but get rid of your racist speech. You can keep your style of cooking, but get rid of alcohol. You can keep your cultural dresses, but keep your modesty on the highest level.

The exact objectives of Islam Inc. are obscure. Needless to say everyone involved has a different angle, and they all intend to cross each other up somewhere along the line.

I can now say that the more I learnt about Islam, the more tolerant I became.

Today (1950), the hatred of the Moslem countries against the West is becoming hatred against Christianity itself. Although the statesmen have not yet taken it into account, there is still grave danger that the temporal power of Islam may return and, with it, the menace that it may shake off a West which has ceased to be Christian, and affirm itself as a great anti-Christian world Power.

Islam does give human dignity, certainly. The point I wanted to make is that it is great foolishness to try to impose our notions of democracy. They have their own traditions.

I think what we are seeing is a vicious circle: by covering the controversies and the conflicting realities, it creates a much distorted perception of Islam and Muslims. When a minority is being taken as a majority, it creates a wrong image.

There was a good moment in Islam when people were actually challenging authority at every level. Very different from the world we live in.

There was a time when only specialized Christian missionaries needed to be able to defend the gospel of Jesus Christ against the attacks of Islam. Today every Christian has an opportunity and obligation to present the gospel effectively and in Christian love to the Muslims who have permeated our Western society. When your neighbor, your mechanic, your favorite basketball player, your employer or employee, or even your children's friends could very well be Muslims, the need for proper understanding and an effective Christian witness is abundantly clear.

I think there is a general interest in films that deal with contemporary issues. Constructions of Iran, Islam, the Middle East as well as the U.S. itself are also of interest, it seems.

If we are true small 'l' liberals, it's our job to seek out feminist Muslims, ex-Muslims, liberal Muslims, dissenting voices within Muslim communities, gay Muslims - we should promote those voices and in doing so, we demonstrate Islam is not a monolith, Muslims are not homogenous, and that Muslims are truly internally diverse.

Islam is a religion of justice and dignity, and we are taught to never keep silent when facing injustice, discrimination and double standards.

The singularity of Islam is its universality. As American citizens and as Muslims, you need to show there is something specific, namely our moral singularity. We believe there is one God and this one God is pushing us to reach universal values by liberating ourselves from our ego and by serving humanity. We must be involved in this by all means necessary, in a nonviolent way, through the legal, media, economic and cultural systems. We cannot achieve this if there is no courage, if we are not ready to sacrifice.

The Jihad is not just a way of testing yourself but also means using violence to spread Islam.

Imagine if today, they invented a religion that advocated the killing of gays. We would not tolerate that. However, Islam is a religion that advocates that.

Money and riches don't mean nothing to me. I don't care nothing about being no rich individual. I'm not living for glory or for fame; all this is doomed for destruction. You got it today, tomorrow it's gone. I got bigger things on my mind than that. I got Islam on my mind.

The same failure of liberalism is evident in Western Europe, where the dogma of multiculturalism has left a secular Europe very slow to address the looming problem of religious extremism among its immigrants. The people who speak most sensibly about the threat that Islam poses to Europe are actually fascists. To say that this does not bode well for liberalism is an understatement: It does not bode well for the future of civilization.

Jihad is holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam meaning to purify oneself or one's community.

I have a big problem with Islam.

If Islam was to be saved, it would be saved by the crazy ones.

...according to the teachings of Islam, war is to be waged not against the enemy but against the aggressor. (p. 49)