The jihadis thrive on a lack of definition

John Murray

Sorry, Fraser, I stopped reading at "Aled Jones". I thought real journalists were supposed to be nursing hangovers and drinking bloody mary's on Sunday morning?

Baron

Fraser, before you come to electing the twin of the Pope, tell us, if you will, how do you engineer the fusing of the Sunni and Shia schools of the teachings of Allah?

Bill Murray

Aled Jones? Radio Two? How many times can you listen to 'walking in the air' in one morning? Why don't you just put on "Now That's What I Call Choirboys?"

whatawaste

Fraser

The lack of a hierarchial system or a formalised religion within Islam enables the crackpots and sometimes the village idiots (literally) to lay claim as an imam. Once they grab the crown they can spout whatever nonsense they like.

The only country that has some semblance of an organised "church" is Iran. Greg Mortensen of "Three Cups of Tea" fame sought out a senior cleric in the holy city of Qom to write a letter giving Greg the right to travel in North West pakistan and Afghanistan with impunity. This letter was respected by locals and Taliban, though Greg was very wary when the Saudi Wahhabis were about (they are the trainers of the Taliban). A little matter of Persians and Arabs hating each others guts over the last few millenia.

Tiberius

You're quite right in your conclusion, Fraser. Indeed lack of good leadership in any kind of organization will lead to a chaotic outcome.

Adherents to Melanie's or Mark Steyn's views will recognize that the same lack of coherent leadership in the West (or at least Western Europe) is a major factor in its inadequate response to the threat it faces from Islam demographically and culturally, and Islamism politically and militarily.

Two of the three outcomes are contained here. Either the West finds a coherent response, or Islam changes its structure (or more correctly develops one, as Fraser says).

The third outcome: well it won't include song titles like "glad to be gay".

Edward McLaughlin

"we’re all children of Abraham. It’s all fine."

See you at Mass next Sunday then Sarfraz.

Barry Bilge

"I am – to put it mildly – no expert in Islam but have long thought that if there were the equivalent of excommunication, and a global hierarchy to enforce it, then mainstream Muslims would be better-empowered to root out the extremist strains in their own ranks."

I find it amusing the notion that you 'empower' anyone by getting them to kowtow to a centralised bureaucracy.

Barry Bilge

Though to be a little more charitable:

What you are suggesting would be a Union of Moderate Muslims. Safety in numbers and influence garnered by being a mob. Yes, politicians would love that. A corporate Muslim identity. Ideal for lobbying Government and for Government to currying favour with.

Hexhamgeezer

Jihadis are inspired by imams and clerics. These imams and clerics do so by direct reference to the Koran and the Hadith. How can they then be 'excommunicated' by any central authority that may be created? They would rightly say such actions are a denial of the so-called directly revealed word of God or the sayings and deeds of Mohammed.

Manzoor's words are evasive fluff. Of course the marrying isn't the problem. Its what Islam says the infidel must do once married that is the problem.

JohnBUK

Given the underlying issue is one of humans gaining and holding on to power don't look for change in that direction unless the people of the Middle East decide to debunk this rubbish and take personal and collective responsibility for their own lives.
Frankly anyone who needs to get "permission" from a religious leader of any sort is a goal down at the start.
Education of the masses is the key which of course is why it's useful for some to declare the Koran or whatever doesn't allow it.
Democracy doesn't come cheap.

john

Yes.There is no hierarchy in ISLAM. The faith is bottom up. In Islam everbody can be an imam. Its true this can cause and does cause problems.But it is also the dynamic that drives it.And is very little understood outside Islam. In Islamic history nobody remembers the dynastic khalifs.But the early scholars due to their knowledge and piety are still remembered and influential. This gives rise to a great diversity of opinion fatwa) in the faith. For example the role of a wife: According Imam abu hanifa: a wife has to be payed for cooking,cleaning, and taking care of a man's (her) children. This includes being payed as a wet nurse for her own children. A man only has conjugal rights to his wife and no other right.

Naomi Muse

I agree with your principal point, Fraser but the CofE has members who are very good at sending people to coventry if they don't agree with them and creating factions. Whilst Christianity is clear on tolerance, that does not apply to many within it.

My sister even curled her lip that someone had purchased me a copy of the Q'ran from Saudi Arabia and closes her mind to reading other books. She will also only listen to liturgical music, so Aled Jones would be lost on her.

Ben WELLS

Your atheist work-experience child may be correct in stating that there is no mention of the veil in the Qu'ran: hardly surprising, since that is a top-level document, dealing with major questions of faith & doctrine.

The more mundane matters of applying the Qu'ran are addressed in aHadith, the sayings of the prophet. There are many of these, some are accepted by Sunni but not by Shi'ite, and vice versa; moreover there is a hierarchy within Hadith, depending upon how closely they are associated with the Prophet himself, or his immediate followers - but there is very little consensus on what this hierarchy is!

Throughout history, this lack of central definition has served Islam well, allowing it to adapt to local conditions; a combination of modern communications and our current political landscape have allowed a relatively small but very vocal and sometimes violent element to dominate our thinking about Islam, and increasingly to affect other Muslims' views of their own religion.

Hexhamgeezer

So, its a lack of heirachy that results in flying planes into buildings, blowing up tubes and buses, sawing off peoples heads on camera, blowing up your fellow believers at their holiest shrines, murdering innocent women because they've been raped, throwing acid in girls' faces who have transgressed a dress code, using mosques as arms dumps, strangling artistic expression of any description, refusing to enter infidels' homes or eating food prepared by them, cultivating drugs for the use of infidels, refusing to allow your children to visit synagogues or participate fully in the national curriculum, refusing to translate the most inoffensive of books or even rejecting the 'multicultural' society allegedly so beloved of many Speccy employees.

Aye - Sarfraz and Fraser - you are part of the problem, most definately not part of the solution.

Tarka the Rotter

"I agree with your principal point, Fraser but the CofE has members who are very good at sending people to coventry if they don't agree with them and creating factions. Whilst Christianity is clear on tolerance, that does not apply to many within it".

mmmmm let's see now, being sent to Coventry versus jihadi bloodbath...gosh, it's a tricky choice when you think about it

What I did in my holidays

and why stop at the simple act of unifying Islam? I suggest that next week the Conservatives, Labour, Lib Dems, BNP and Greens come together to form one party to generate sensible policies for the people of Britain. (UKIP obviously being beyond the pale for paid up members of the political classes).

Week 1 Day 1 stuff and reads like a 5th form essay. Still, good to see that unused parts of the Editor's brain are stirring. You never know, some time before the next election we may even see some genuine opinions about Europe and immigration.

Mike Stallard

Please don't confuse Christianity with Islam just because they are both religions.
Islam is totally different in that it has never had a Pope, a Reformation, an age of Enlightenment or an Industrial Revolution.
Instead of reasoning the universe out, Islamic Scholars turned to reasoning the Revelation out.
Islam looks backwards to 622 when the angel delivered the Message.

michael

Islam is about 400 years younger than Christianity.
400 years ago-ish Christianity went through its worst years of extremism, the Inquisition.

Is Islam going through the same sort of mid life crisis.

Fergus Pickering

Can I point out, Fraser, that the Presbyterian Church is just the same and suffers from the same faults as Islam. You, as a Scot, will know this The most close-minded Christians in Britain are Presbyterians. I remember them banning a performance of Aristophanes (Aristophanes!) in Edinburgh when I was young.

David Bouvier

I am not quite sure that I see Muslim terrorists as some kind of Islamo-Lutheran non-conformists.

Scary Biscuits

It is a common mistake by Conservatives to believe in decentralisation and freedom, except where they disagree with the outcome. Mrs T's blind-spot was engineering in universities; throwing money at them had the unintended consequence of lowering the standard of engineering graduates, making it even more difficult to recruit engineers.

Fraser's is apparently religion. It is highly unlikely that the Roman Catholic church has been more effective due to its unified structure. It may have helped at the outset, when all Roman Citizens immediately converted by decree. It was a lot less help when the Muslims invaded Europe from 632 AD onwards, where resistance was left to local war lords and the eventual fight back, including the Reconquista and the Crusades, were primarily private ventures with only token involvement from the Vatican.

The Protestant Church is founded specifically on rejecting the notion of centralised control. The Church of England (despite Rowan Williams's recent attempts to create his own papacy) embodies the idea of a universal church where each member has a direct relationship with God and a personal responsibility to Him. It was this very British idea which was the keystone in our development and growth as a rich and liberal society that became the envy of both Catholic and Islamic states.

Baron

Scary Biscuits @ 1.00:

a rather fresh dissection of the boil, I must say, except perhaps that if Christianity didn’t go through the reforming phase, or rather phases since even in my mother country a chap called Jan Hus had a go in the mid 14th century, would a part of the movement morphed in the 16th century into the Protestant Church stressing more individualistic affinity with Him? And another thing: doesn’t David Bouvier @ 10.40 have a point?

Scary Biscuits

Baron, you are right, if Christanity hadn't been reformed from its low point, it would still be as bad as the Islamists but the point is it was. However, you could argue that protestant disagreement was merely returning the church to its original form, as preached by Jesus, where the priests were dis-intermediated and people were allowed a personal relationship with God. This wouldn't have been attractive to the Roman priests, as it threatened their privileges, so compromising on this issue and adopting many other Roman customs was the price the early Christains paid for the end of persecution.

Although it is loath to admit it, the modern Catholic church has quietly conceeded almost all the points made by the Protestants and today the difference between the denominations is little more than emphasis. This supports the argument that freedom of conscience is the true form of Christianity, supported by all braches today.

David Bouvier does indeed have a point. Muslim terrorists are not non-conformists, like the Lutherans or any other mostly northern European variations that sought freedom of conscience. They are far more like the Inquisition in that that are the exact opposite, ultra-conformists, extremely intolerant of personal opinion and advocating brutal and cruel behaviour in support of what they see as the greater good (honour killings, torture, stoning for adultury or throwing acid in the face of women who don't wear a veil etc, all of which have been often reported). It remains to be seen whether the pre-eminence of this strand represents a low point in Islamic history, as it once was for Catholics, or whether it is the default state for that religion.

sarat kumar

You let sarfaraz get away .Only a muslim man is allowed to marry a female from "people of the book".That means christians and jews.NOT hindus ,buddhists , taoists,etc.
On the other hand a muslim woman CANNOT marry anyone other than a muslim male.
These journalists spouting wisdom without real knowledge irritate me.

John.

What about those who are not "children of Abraham"? It borders on the unbelievable that people in this present century still allow themselves to be controlled and ruled by this absurd rubbish. Obviously years of childhood indoctrination lead to this intolerance and discrimination. It can be stopped in schools by law even if there is no sign whatsoever of that being done here. It has been the case in France for over a century of course. The insuperable obstacle is that parents will continue to inculcate this poisonous mumbo-jumbo into children's heads whatever the government does in schools. The Chinese had State nurseries for infants and young children. Short of that what could possibly be done?

John Montague

I take it you've been to the USA at some point, Fraser? My father's house has many mansions indeed.