Question:1

Islam is a an old religion. Some of its teachings may not applicable today. But Islam was and still is a great religion with a billion of believers. Islam played an important part in human civilization.

The greatness of a belief is not determined by the number of its adherents but by its coherence and its inherent truths, its usefulness and practicability. There was a time that everybody believed that the Earth was flat. All philosophers and prophets concurred and the common sense confirmed it. Yet it was not true.

Islam did play an important part in human civilization. But was that a positive or a negative role? How many human lives were sacrificed at the altar of Allah? Muhammad exterminated the Jews of Arabia who called that land home for 2000 years. They had alliances with their Arab compatriots and intermarried with them. They were completely Arabianized. There was no religious conflict in Arabia.  Muhammad not only introduced religious intolerance, he undertook the ethnic cleansing of Arabia and instigated a " divinely ordained" hatred between his followers and the Jews that is taking its toll even up to this day. His command to kill the idolaters destroyed more human lives in 1400 years than Hitler succeeded to destroy in 13 years. Only in India the death toll was close to 90 million. Yes Islam had a great impact on the minds of its followers. But we paid and keep paying with our lives for that impact. The suffering and backwardness of Muslims and the present wave of terrorism are the result of that impact.  

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