The Life of Brian

[thonglor55]

In this case, it's the life of Muhammed, but I can't help think the prophet would benefit from a Monty Python makeover. Apparently the BBC is to trace the journey of the Islamic prophet Muhammad for a new series which is claimed to be a first for British television. Al Jazeera reporter Rageh Omaar will present the three-part programme for BBC2, following in the prophet's footsteps from Mecca and along the journeys he took during his life. To ensure the programmes are in line with Islamic tradition, they will not depict the face of Muhammad or feature dramatic reconstructions of his life.

I guess that means there'll be nothing about the old guy's pedophile tendencies (he married a nine-year-old girl) and wasn't subject to the restriction that applies to his followers of having only four wives at a time (http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Quran/025-Muhammads-sex-life.htm).

[Khor tose]

In this case, it's the life of Muhammed, but I can't help think the prophet would benefit from a Monty Python makeover. Apparently the BBC is to trace the journey of the Islamic prophet Muhammad for a new series which is claimed to be a first for British television. Al Jazeera reporter Rageh Omaar will present the three-part programme for BBC2, following in the prophet's footsteps from Mecca and along the journeys he took during his life. To ensure the programmes are in line with Islamic tradition, they will not depict the face of Muhammad or feature dramatic reconstructions of his life.

I guess that means there'll be nothing about the old guy's pedophile tendencies (he married a nine-year-old girl) and wasn't subject to the restriction that applies to his followers of having only four wives at a time (http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Quran/025-Muhammads-sex-life.htm).

You sort of edited your facts here. First off, he was happily married to one wive (Khadijah) for 25 years who was 15 years his senior. According to all reports the marriage was happy and she had 6 children by him. When Khadijah died he did start to take other wives and the first was Ayesha who was supposed to be six at the time. He was supposed to have consummated the marriage when the girl was nine. He did take another 11 wives and concubines after Ayesha, mainly for political and humanitarian reasons, but she was always his favorite. However, what you quote is tradition/myth. Recent examination of the facts has determined that Ayesha was in fact between 15-25 when he married her. Several good books on the subject: T.O. Shanavas, "Was Ayesha a six year old bride? The myth exposed."
Allama Sheikh Yasser Al-Habib. "A'isha was not a child when the Prophet married her"

[thonglor55]

However, what you quote is tradition/myth.Which of the four or five standard definitions of myth are you using?:

1a. A traditional, typically ancient story dealing with supernatural beings, ancestors, or heroes that serves as a fundamental type in the worldview of a people, as by explaining aspects of the natural world or delineating the psychology, customs, or ideals of society: the myth of Eros and Psyche; a creation myth.
1b. Such stories considered as a group: the realm of myth.
2. A popular belief or story that has become associated with a person, institution, or occurrence, especially one considered to illustrate a cultural ideal: a star whose fame turned her into a myth; the pioneer myth of suburbia.
3. A fiction or half-truth, especially one that forms part of an ideology.
4. A fictitious story, person, or thing: "German artillery superiority on the Western Front was a myth" (Leon Wolff).I'll accept, in the broadest sense, that it could be #2 but I certainly don't accept that it's #1, #3 or #4.

And I have to comment that, given the chance, I would have done young Rageh Omaar when he was presenting on the Gulf War for the BBC, but seeing him on now Al Jazerah he's become, shall we say, corpulent.

[Marsilius]

According to Ayatollah Khomeini, marrying a girl before she is old enough to begin menstruating is "a divine blessing". His advice to fathers of girl children was "Do your best to ensure that your daughters do not see their first blood in your house.".

Iranian girls of 9 years of age can be married off if their parents approve - and can marry at 13 even if their parents do not approve.

[thonglor55]

Iranian girls of 9 years of age can be married off if their parents approve - and can marry at 13 even if their parents do not approve.Hence "A popular belief or story that has become associated with a person, institution, or occurrence, especially one considered to illustrate a cultural ideal"

[Marsilius]

Perhaps, Khor tose, you could cite full details for the two publications to which you refer so that we can assess their level of scholarship.

I can only hope that they are more effectively argued than this nonsense that attempts to masquerade as a reputable academic treatise: http://www.scribd.com/doc/2404356/Age-of-Aishah

[Khor tose]

According to Ayatollah Khomeini, marrying a girl before she is old enough to begin menstruating is "a divine blessing". His advice to fathers of girl children was "Do your best to ensure that your daughters do not see their first blood in your house.".
Iranian girls of 9 years of age can be married off if their parents approve - and can marry at 13 even if their parents do not approve.

For your perusal. I have not read the book but here are his arguments. http://www.studying-islam.org/articletext.aspx?id=935
Also there is a book in Persian that claims the same thing as Sanavas, and seems to have been published with the blessing of the leadership of Iran.

Ayatollah Qazvini. "Ayesha married the Prophet when she was young?"

There are dozens of Islamic commentaries on this subject with most saying she was not a child. There are dozens of Christian commentaries that say she was nine. I do not understand Thongor's rejections of the other definitions of Myth, specially when he offers no comments or evidence on why.
I can attest to this. From all we know about Ayesha she was smart, intelligent, often gave advice to the Prophet. She displayed none of the characteristics that modern psychology associates with an abused child. Also almost all of the Prophet's marriages where to Widows including his first and longest lasting, and yet Thongor calls him a pedophile. This man likes definitions but ignores the fact that this is not the personality type or normal mode of operation of a pedophile.

So I am now curious Thongor have you posted under the name boy genius, Beach Bunny, etc. I do believe Wombat may have outed you. Beach Bunny is the only other person who would so carelessly call the leader of one of the world's major religions a pedophile.

[thonglor55]

There are dozens of Islamic commentaries on this subject with most saying she was not a child.
They would say that, wouldn't they!

[Brad the Impala]

Back to the title of the thread, rather than repetitions of soapbox positions. The story of the making of The Life Of Brian, and all the controversy around it, is currently being made by the BBC and entitled Holy Flying Circus.

Some favourite quotes from the original movie:

Brian aka Jesus: I'm not the Messiah! Will you please listen? I am not the Messiah, do you understand? Honestly!
Girl: Only the true Messiah denies His divinity.
Brian: What? Well, what sort of chance does that give me? All right! I am the Messiah!
Followers: He is! He is the Messiah!
Brian: Now, fuck off!
[silence]
Arthur: How shall we fuck off, O Lord?


Brian?s mother: He's not the Messiah. He's a very naughty boy!


[Taking the gifts from the Three Wise Men and pushing them out the door]
Brian?s mother: Er, well, um, if you're dropping by again, do pop in. Heh. And thanks a lot for the gold and frankincense, er, but don't worry too much about the myrrh next time. All right? Heh. Thank you. Good-bye.
[Three wise men leave]
Brian?s mother: Well, weren't they nice? Hmm. Out of their bloody minds, but still.

тАЬAt present, the study of Muhammad, the founder of the Muslim community, is obviously caught in a dilemma. On the one hand, it is not possible to write a historical biography of the Prophet without being accused of using the sources uncritically, while on the other hand, when using the sources critically, it is simply not possible to write such a biography.тАЭ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Muhammad

http://blogs.dickinson.edu/arabiclitproject/files/2011/05/ghazali.jpg
Abu H─Бmed Mohammad ibn Mohammad al-Ghaz─Бl─л = Algazel (1058-1111)

Until this day the third brew of Judaism suffers from the fatal influence of al-Ghazali:

тАЬGhazali's influence has been compared to the works of St. Thomas Aquinas in Christian theology, but the two differed greatly in methods and beliefs. Whereas Ghazali rejected non-Islamic philosophers such as Aristotle and saw it fit to discard their teachings on the basis of their "unbelief," Aquinas embraced them and incorporated ancient Greek and Latin thought into his own philosophical writings.тАЭ

тАЬIslam underwent the same debate between faith and reason that occurred in the Christian west. At a time that Christian Europe was mired in dogmatic faith and the learning of the classical era had largely disappeared, there was a flowering of a learning and culture in Islam. Islamic scholars made great advances in mathematics, astronomy, geography, architecture, and other disciplines. To a large extent these advances were based on translations of classical Greek and Roman texts.

Just as Islamic learning was about to move beyond the classics a crisis appeared in the Islamic world. Scholars pursued both rational thought and reference to the sacred texts to defend Islam. The two approaches, however, collided and it became increasingly evident that scholars would have to chose one or the other. This was the same crisis that occurred in the European Renaissance. Islam chose the path of faith. The great Islamic scholar al-Ghazali (1058-1111) was the leading theologian which confirmed this choice.

Al-Ghazali distrusted rationalistic reason and argued against it to support Islam. The result was an anti-intellectual outlook best seen in Sufi mysticism which had a profound impact on spreading the faith. Al-Ghazali's classic work, The Destruction [Incoherence] of the Philosophers (Destructio philosophorum) was perhaps the most significant Islamic text after the Koran. It was followed by Ibn Rushd's Destruction of the Destruction [Destructio destructionum] which questioned some of Al-Ghazali's dogmatism. Sultan Mohammed II settled the argument permanently. He ordered Hodja Zada's (тАУ 1487) to resolve the debate in Al-Ghazali's favor. He did so with The Desctruction of the Destruction of the Destruction.

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The Incoherence also marked a turning point in Islamic philosophy in its vehement rejections of Aristotle and Plato. The book took aim at the Falasifa, a loosely defined group of Islamic philosophers from the 8th through the 11th centuries (most notable among them Avicenna and Al-Farabi) who drew intellectually upon the Ancient Greeks. Ghazali bitterly denounced Aristotle, Socrates and other Greek writers as non-believers and labeled those who employed their methods and ideas as corrupters of the Islamic faith.

In the next century, Averroes [= Ibn Rushd (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Rushd)] drafted a lengthy rebuttal of Ghazali's Incoherence entitled The Incoherence of the Incoherence; however, the epistemological course of Islamic thought had already been set. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ghazali ... ilosophers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ghazali#Incoherence_of_the_Philosophers)
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The result was the destruction of Islamic science. Thus just as the Renaissance was leading Europe into the modern world, Islam decided to perpetually end any real pursuit of modern science. The results continued to this day. Since the time of Al-Ghazali there have been no notable Islamic scientists or important scientific discoveries from the Islamic world.тАЭ http://histclo.com/chron/me/islam/is-fr.html


тАЬThe Arab World has for several reasons; mostly self-inflicted, succumbed to despotism even before the humiliation of foreign domination. Intellectually there was a clampdown upon rational thought. Al-Ghazali all but tore down the culture of rational thinking initiated by Moslem Philosophers from Alkindi to Ibn Rushd. The same reactionary trend was effected in the field of theology and jurisprudence, where the more open minded elucidations of Abu Hanifah were replaced by the more restrictive approaches of Ibn Hanbal.

Such trends were encouraged by a political system, which climbed down from the politically sharing society of early Islam to the monolithic system initiated by Ibn Aby Sufian тАУ the first Ummayad Monarch. This system had more to do with preceding Byzantine and Persian Sassanid political systems, than with anything advocated by Islam. In fact, in the words of Ibn Hijr Al Askalani: Scholars are unanimous that people are obliged to obey anyone who establishes power de facto.

Political stagnation led to economic social, intellectual and cultural stagnation and the prevalence of a socially polarized society. Therefore, the Region was, in the words of Malik Bin Nabi, prepared for Imperial domination. Consequently, it was conquered, and its destiny shaped by foreign occupation. By the end of the First Atlantic War, nearly all Arab Regions fell under European powers.

As independent states, Arab countries have acquired Regimes of Absolute Monarchy and in other cases Liberal Democratic Regimes. The latter fell one by one to military dictatorships. Consequently, the Arab Region became the most democracy deficient Region in the World.тАЭ http://www.clubmadrid.org/img/noticias/ ... _Mahdi.pdf (http://www.clubmadrid.org/img/noticias/2011/04/Talking_Points_Al_Mahdi.pdf)

[Marsilius]

A few years ago, seeking something to read on the beach, I popped into the bookshop at the Jomtien end of Dongtan Beach. I found there a copy of "The politically incorrect guide to Islam (and the crusades)" by Robert Spencer (Regnery Publishing, 2005). As it is very closely based on original quotations - though no doubt selectively chosen ones - from the Koran and the Hadith, it is a good source of material for arguments such as this one, as well as very accessible and a very entertaining read!

Anyone wanting to hear a few home truths about Islam should watch the videos of Pat Condell on You Tube.

[cottmann]

One of the problems with throwing stones at Islam is that it invites retaliation by pointing out the the Judaeo-Christian god also liked young girls - although older that Aisha. The Virgin Mary is said to be have 12-13-14 when she gave birth to Jesus. Jewish custom of the time was that girls became betrothed at 12, so this would have been the age at which she was betrothed to Joseph.

[thonglor55]

One of the problems with throwing stones at Islam is that it invites retaliation by pointing out the the Judaeo-Christian god also liked young girls ...My understanding is that Muhammed is not a god however, but a prophet. Don't Judaism, Christianity and Islam all claim unique title to the truth about the same god? Besides, Islam claims all of the Jewish prophets, including Jesus, as its own. Muslims throw criticisms back at Westerners who criticise Islam but seem incapable of understanding that there are many Westerners these days who have no religion and who would agree with those criticisms, as well as the ones they have already made against Islam.

[cottmann]

What is good enough for a god is surely good enough for one of his prophets.

[thonglor55]

What is good enough for a god is surely good enough for one of his prophets.That's certainly a novel suggestion cottmann; I think you may find the Muslims issuing a fatwa against you if you're suggesting that Muhammed = Allah.

The Virgin Mary is said to be have 12-13-14 when she gave birth to Jesus. Jewish custom of the time was that girls became betrothed at 12, so this would have been the age at which she was betrothed to Joseph.
http://chnm.gmu.edu/cyh/teaching-module ... &source=24 (http://chnm.gmu.edu/cyh/teaching-modules/230?section=primarysources&source=24)

Stephen Robertson (University of Sydney): Age of Consent Laws

тАЬNarrowly concerned with sexual violence, and with girls, originally, since the 19th century the age of consent has occupied a central place in debates over the nature of childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, and been drawn into campaigns against prostitution and child marriage, struggles to achieve gender and sexual equality, and the response to teenage pregnancy. This module traces the shifting ways that the law has been defined, debated and deployed worldwide and from the Middle Ages to the present.

An age of consent statute first appeared in secular law in 1275 in England as part of the rape law. The statute, Westminster 1, made it a misdemeanor to "ravish" a "maiden within age," whether with or without her consent. The phrase "within age" was interpreted by jurist Sir Edward Coke as meaning the age of marriage, which at the time was 12 years of age.

A 1576 law making it a felony to "unlawfully and carnally know and abuse any woman child under the age of 10 years" was generally interpreted as creating more severe punishments when girls were under 10 years old while retaining the lesser punishment for acts with 10- and 11-year-old girls. Jurist Sir Matthew Hale argued that the age of consent applied to 10- and 11-year-old girls, but most of England's North American colonies adopted the younger age. A small group of Italian and German states that introduced an age of consent in the 16th century also employed 12 years.тАЭ

тАЬNear the end of the 18th century, other European nations began to enact age of consent laws. The broad context for that change was the emergence of an Enlightenment concept of childhood focused on development and growth. This notion cast children as more distinct in nature from adults than previously imagined, and as particularly vulnerable to harm in the years around puberty. The French Napoleonic code provided the legal context in 1791 when it established an age of consent of 11 years. The age of consent, which applied to boys as well as girls, was increased to 13 years in 1863.

Like France, many other countries, increased the age of consent to 13 in the 19th century. Nations, such as Portugal, Spain, Denmark and the Swiss cantons, that adopted or mirrored the Napoleonic code likewise initially set the age of consent at 10-12 years and then raised it to between 13 and 16 years in the second half of the 19th century. In 1875, England raised the age to 13 years; an act of sexual intercourse with a girl younger than 13 was a felony. In the U.S., each state determined its own criminal law and age of consent ranged from 10 to 12 years of age. U.S. laws did not change in the wake of England's shift. Nor did Anglo-American law apply to boys.тАЭ

тАЬAt the end of 19th century, moral reformers drew the age of consent into campaigns against prostitution. Revelations of child prostitution were central to those campaigns, a situation that resulted, reformers argued, from men taking advantage of the innocence of girls just over the age of consent. W. T. Stead's series of articles entitled, "The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon," published in the Pall Mall Gazette in 1885, was the most sensational and influential of these expos├йs.

The outcry it provoked pushed British legislators to raise the age of consent to 16 years, and stirred reformers in the U.S, such as the Women's Christian Temperance Union, the British Empire, and Europe to push for similar legislation. By 1920, Anglo-American legislators had responded by increasing the age of consent to 16 years, and even as high as 18 years.

While those ages were well beyond the normal age of menstruation, proponents justified them on scientific grounds that psychological maturity came later than physiological maturity. They also argued that the age of consent should be aligned with other benchmarks of development, such as the age at which girls could enter into contracts and hold property rights, typically 21 years. Opponents remained focused on physiological maturity, however, and argued that girls in their teens were sufficiently developed not to need legal protection. Moreover, they argued, by late adolescence girls possessed sufficient understanding about how to use the law to blackmail unwary men.

Historians have argued that increasing the age of consent also gave the law a more pronounced regulatory dimension. In practice, these laws were often used to control the behavior of the working-class girls. Yet reformers at the time saw no distinction between protection and regulation: in making it a crime for girls to decide to have sexual intercourse outside marriage, the law protected them from themselves and from the immature understanding that led them to behaviors reformers considered immoral.тАЭ

http://chnm.gmu.edu/cyh/teaching-module ... troduction (http://chnm.gmu.edu/cyh/teaching-modules/230?section=introduction)

"The Proceedings of the Old Bailey includes accounts of trials at London's most important court. These were published at the end of each session in an inexpensive form for a popular, rather than a legal, audience. They provide a reliable, although incomplete, account of events and do not record everything that was said. For example, statements by witnesses were frequently summarized or omitted, and little of what lawyers did was recorded."

The Trial of Stephen Arrowsmith (1678): http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/browse.j ... #highlight (http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/browse.jsp?id=t16781211e-2&div=t16781211e-2&terms=Stephen|Arrowsmith#highlight)

тАЬThe publication of "The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon" directed the attention of American reformers to the age of consent in their country and they were not pleased with what they found. The age of consent in the U.S., determined by each state, ranged from seven years, in Delaware, to an average of 10 to 12 years, lower than the age the British had recently deemed too low. Efforts to change those laws met significant opposition from male legislators.тАЭ

William Thomas Stead: The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon: http://www.attackingthedevil.co.uk/pmg/ ... /index.php (http://www.attackingthedevil.co.uk/pmg/tribute/index.php)