Jarek:
Q08: Ayaan Hirsi Ali has recently said in an interview to German magazine Spiegel, that the only way of reforming Islam is to rid Quran of its absoluteness. If Muslims realize, that their holy scriptures has not been dictated by God, but created by humans, then there is a possibility that the religion may be reformed. After all, Christians also claim that Bible is a “word of God,” yet majority of them do not believe in hell, or that the world has been created in six days. They see these things as symbolic stories, but they still remain true to their faith.  

Sina:
Ms. Ali is right. All the ex-Muslims will tell you the same thing. Islam can’t be reformed. It must be eradicated. I hear many westerners propose promoting Sufism, Ahmadiyya sect or other allegedly less violent versions of Islam to counter the more extremist streaks of Islam like Salafism and Wahhabism. That is sheer arrogance. It is nobody’s business to tell others what religion they should believe, which would certainly be met with sneer. It is one thing to teach your own faith to others and quite something else telling them to follow a religion that you yourself are not willing to follow. 

This also underlies the fact that the westerners have no understanding of Islam. There are no tolerant versions of Islam. Muslims are tolerant when they are in minority. As soon as they come to power they drop the mask of toleration and start oppressing others. Even Muhammad was very tolerant when he was in Mecca and had no more than a handful of followers. Then he used to say: “There is no compulsion in religion” 2:256; “To you be your religion, and to me my religion”; 109:6 and advised his followers to "speak good to men" 2:83; "be patient" with the detractors 20:103 "and part from them courteously" 73:10;  "pardon, with a gracious pardoning"  15:85  and "hold to forgiveness" 7:199. It was only when he came to power that he started butchering innocent people and bragged that he would cast terror in the hearts of those who did not agree with him 3.151, 8.012, 33.026.

Suppose there is a less violent version of Nazism; would you promote it?

No! Islam can’t be reformed. Muhammad was a control freak and he structured his cult in a way that not an iota of his words can be altered. In many parts of the Quran he made categorical statements that none can change the words of Allah (6:34,  6:115, 10:64) Islam is rigid like stone. You can’t bend it but you can smash it.   

We can’t compare Islam to Christianity and Judaism and deduce that since those have reformed, this will too. This is a non sequitur fallacy. It is comparing apples to oranges. The Christians and the Jews do not believe that the Bible is the verbatim words of God. In fact it is clear that the books of the Bible are written by men – allegedly inspired men – but humans nonetheless. God in the Bible is spoken of in third person. This gives the believer a degree of caution. If the writers of the Bible were humans and humans are fallible, the Bible should not be taken literally. It is possible to interpret it, use one’s logic to understand it in the light of science and adapt its teachings to meet the needs of the time. This plasticity has allowed Christianity, Judaism and other religions to evolve. But no plasticity exists in the Quran. This book is believed by Muslims to be the verbatim words of God. How can you change the word of God? Other religions are living. They are changing and evolving. Islam is fossilized. It allows no change. It can’t be reformed.    

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