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Watt caravan quote

Itaqallah whats the whole passage can you quote it? It looks about Arabian raids in general. Is it saying that Muslim raids saw it as a sport and were careful not to kill anyone? Or thats what raids were like before? Doesnt it contradict to say it was a sport but then they did it to get property back?Opiner 22:20, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

you cannot delete sourced material just because it conflicts with your own understanding. doing so may be perceived as vandalism. we AGF of whichever editor initially inserted it, assuming that they quoted him faithfully and in context. if you believe he has been misquoted, it is for you to explain how. ITAQALLAH 22:29, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Opiner, you need to educate yourself rather than removing well-sourced materials. If you don't want to do scholarly research, then you shouldn't be editing wikipedia. --Aminz 22:32, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I just asked question and got two non-answers. Not saying quote is wrong but it looks off-topic because its not awbout Muslim raids just Arabian raids usually.Opiner 22:42, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Opiner, you know how to check with the sources. Try books.google.com --Aminz 22:45, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Google books. Good idea. I checked pages 105 and 106, Watt does NOT say Muhammad raids were sports or careful not to kill anyone! Only generally Arabian raids he was talking about! DOES say that Muhammad raids 'deliberately challenging and provoking the Meccans' so maybe that should go in instead?Opiner 23:04, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for checking with source and coming into the terms of scholarship. Please note that Watt is trying to address how Muhammad could have turned into raiding caravans bound for Mecca. He is giving context to the nature of these raids in general. The only reading of the text that I can see approves what is written in the article. Muhammad raids 'deliberately challenging and provoking the Meccans' is not related to the perception of the raids in the tradition. Infact the Battle of Badr happened in response to the raids. --Aminz 23:44, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Hahaha I find your discovery comical, Opiner. I would venture a guess that there exists much more blatant misrepresentation of sources in this article. —Aiden 01:35, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Which blatant misrepresentation of sources? I don't know who added Watt quote, but I checked it myself. It isn't a misrepresentation of sources. --Aminz 01:58, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

i think Aiden may be noting that there are other cases where misrepresentation, if that's what someone is looking for, may be far more apparent than it is here. it can be read both ways :) ITAQALLAH 02:22, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

this is what Watt says: "The first thing to be said in explanation of Muhammad's behaviour is that the raid or razzia was a normal feature of Arab desert life. It was a kind of sport rather than war.", he then goes on to describe how raiding was perceived in comparison to actual war. within the context of the previous paragraph where he discusses (and probably questions) the act of raiding by Muhammad and the Muslims (which is where the above quote re: challenging/provoking Meccans is derived), as well as the passage directly afterwards which i have just quoted, it is clear that Watt is trying to justify Muhammad's actions by noting Arabian customs. looking at the current passage in the article, i would agree with Aminz in saying that the source has been represented fairly and entirely within its correct context. ITAQALLAH 02:18, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Comment on "Persian illustration showing Muhammad preaching"

An anonymous editor left the following comment below the afore-mentioned picture (which has been added and removed a few times recently and is clearly the subject of some debate): "This image here, is worthless,, it should be seen just as an imaginaton." I have no opinion on this issue at this time but I didn't want this anonymous editor's comment to be deleted and ignored just because he or she left it in the wrong place. --ElKevbo 12:47, 28 September 2006 (UTC) DocEss 19:59, 28 September 2006 (UTC)==Why is "Persian illustration showing Muhammad preaching" here?== What purpose does the image have? At present we have three images of Muhammad. The one where he is placing the Al Hajar Aswad into the Kabaa is right beside the text discussing it, the one where is ascending to heaven is right beside where the text of the same nature. The image of Muhammad preaching serves absolutely no purpose. Why is it here? --Irishpunktom\ 14:20, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

It is their to "freedom of expression" and to tell how artist think about Muhammad. These are the two only reasons given by them so far. --- ابراهيم 14:28, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

1. Since when do we need a bundle of reasons to include photos into articles? What next, written permits and official approvals? And BTW, I stated explicitly and in length why I consider these photos a valuable addition, you just never stooped to reacting to (let alone challenging) my points.
2. What do you mean with "their" freedom of expression? Since you're living in Western countries, too, it is also your freedom. Do you disapprove of it? Do you think it should be abridged? In that case, you'd be in the wrong circus here. --The Hungry Hun 09:01, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

hm, I think our first question should be, is it really Muhammad preaching? The image page description claims as much, but I haven't found any reference for the claim. The source given is a deep link directly to the jpeg file. We'd need at least a link to a description on expositions.bnf.fr. dab (ᛏ) 14:52, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

It is, I had to do the research myself. Originally it said it was an Arab painting, which it was not, and it was sourced with the notoriously innaccurate "Zombie Time" site. The image is clearly Persian, even an amateur such as myself was able to spot that, though the details behind who the people in attendance are interests me. Is that Fatima to the fore? Irrespective, it does not warrant inclusion here. --Irishpunktom\ 15:06, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

The Description given is "Le Prophète Mahomet - Al-Bîrûnî, al-âthâr al-bâqiya (Vestiges des siècles passé). BNF, Manuscrits (Arabe 1489 fol. 5v)"--Irishpunktom\ 15:23, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

The people at "Zombie time" or whatever seemed to be amoung the group that think Persians are arabs simply because they practice islam. Zazaban 15:27, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Persians are not Arabs. Neither are Indonesians. Niether are many AFricans. Lots of people practice Islam who are not Arab; why people fail to graps that I'll never know. In any event, what we need is more pictures and images that are verifiable as proper representations of Mohammud. DocEss 16:27, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Some people are under the impression that arab is just another word for Muslims. most people are unaware that africans and indoneasians are Muslims because they are not Arabs. Zazaban 16:40, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Uhh...ya. We were able to grasp that from the tenure of the discussion; thanks for re-iterating it. Anyway, what we need is more pictures and images that are verifiable as proper representations of Mohammud. I found http://www.zombietime.com/mohammed_image_archive to be a veritable goldmine of pictures and images. Which ones whould we include? DocEss 16:44, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

we just finished saying that Zombie Time was notoriously innaccurate... Zazaban 16:46, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I can read; your saying it does not make it so. What, precisely, is inaccurate? Every single image? They can't all be inaccurate - there are hundreds! Which ones are accurate? Point out the accurate ones, please.DocEss 16:49, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not saying the pictures are inaccurate. What we have been saying is that it has inaccurate descriptions. anything that says Persans are Arabs are automatically inaccurate. Zazaban 19:56, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Which descriptions are inaccurate? For which images? Why throw the baby out with the bathwater? The images are fine - let's use some.DocEss 20:00, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Umm... where in the site does it say that Persians are Arabs? The description is "Islamic images of Muhammad". Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 04:28, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I have the strong impression that the determination to fill the article with images of Muhammad has less to do with conveying information (that's in a breakout article, on Depictions of Muhammad) or creating a visually pleasant article (calligraphy can do that) than it does with a desire to piss off Muslims. "Nyah nyah nyah you can't censor me!" Seems to me that there's a WP principle about not creating ruckuses to make a point. WP:Point. I think we did fine with one picture, the Persian miniature of Muhammad on the buraq. Is there a WP article on the Idomeno controversy yet? Why don't some of you folks turn your attention to that? Zora 05:25, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Very well said. I do not think they will listen although. --- ابراهيم 07:04, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, it would be easier to turn to other topics if people stopped obstructing the existing ones, right? Again: It works the other way round - you don't have to explain or argue for additions to an article if they give an added value. But you must have very good reasons to delete such content.

Accusing others of pretexting is laughable in this context: Scroll up a little bit, I took the freedom of collecting the various reasons that have been given to advocate deleting the pictures. It is pathetic - it all boils down to a refusal due to personal beliefs. But instead of saying so, argument after argument is raised against these images. This is really, really paltry. --The Hungry Hun 09:01, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

guys, regarding zombietime and what not, it is very simple, if you upload a manuscript image, it is your responsibility to give encyclopedic identification of the image. It doesn't matter if you found the image on zombietime or myspace, you'll just have to do your own research and identify the image. The French "manuscrit Arabe" in this case translates to "Arabic manuscript", the MS is in Arabic, but made in Persia. Nobody claims it is an "Arab manuscript", made by Arabs, but the Persians happened to know and write Arabic, too. I agree that we should have fewer Persian images and more calligraphy here. Therefore, dear aniconists, instead of complaining of the images we have, do upload us some nice images of notable "Muhammad" calligraphy, and I will certainly suppport giving those precedence over Shia portraits (although at least a single Persian image should remain here for balance). dab (ᛏ) 09:13, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Dab, if you can find a moment, please comment as to your assessment of The Sealed Nectar (text is linked) as a reliable source, equivalent in this respect to the works of Bernard Lewis and Montgomery Watt.Proabivouac 10:49, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, the image does not add value to the section in which it is placed, which is "rejection". We know little about the image itself, other than it is suppposed to be representing Muhammad speaking to some unknown persons who are presumably significant, given their depiction. --BostonMA 11:04, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

BostonMA, try reading whole paragraphs instead of headlines and image descriptions only: Right before the word rejection we find Around 613, Muhammad began to spread his message amongst the people. Most of those who heard his message ignored it. A few mocked him. Others believed and joined him., and right after it there is As the ranks of Muhammad's followers swelled, he became a threat to the local tribes and the rulers of the city.

The image blends in to the text just perfectly. If anything, it's the headline that is a little bumpy. --The Hungry Hun 11:57, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

• What is the image showing? Is this Muhammad in Makkah, or Madinah, or back in Makkah? Who are those in the Image, they are obviously significant, they have Halos. Is that Hafsa, Fatima or Khadija towards the top - Its important to know, it gives us a period in time. Whats clear though is that it's irrelevent to the section on rejecton. --Irishpunktom\ 14:59, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I could create your picture showing The_Hungry_Hun thinking something and even I do not know you or meet you. Then I insist to put in the article written on you. It will be well fit in many places in the article but it will not add any thing historically or informational to that artilce written on you. This picture is nothing more than that. It could be placed in articles like Depictions of Muhammad but not here. Even the artist who made that picture is not that well-know and famous that we give this pictures such a great respect. --- ابراهيم 12:24, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

if you were a 15th c. Persian and had drawn a picture of a Hungry Hun, we would be sure to include it in our Huns article! dab (ᛏ) 12:38, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I cannot born again in the past but I can create your picture right now. Then I can place it on this page (with the hope to save it in wikipedia cache). May be after few centuries my freaking drawing become valuabe for some people. --- ابراهيم 12:43, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

who knows. make sure to upload it then (in a few centuries), not now. dab (ᛏ) 13:02, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand the question. This is apparently a piece of Salafi pious literature. What does this have to do with historians/orientalists like Lewis or Watt? dab (ᛏ) 11:14, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Dab, your talk page is edit-protected so I had to ask you here. Several editors are trying to use this as a reliable source in articles such as Muhammad as a diplomat and, so I've heard, Battle of Mut'ah. There may be more infected articles, as they've gotten it into their head that this source is okay. I am arguing over at Muhammad as a diplomat, but I'm all alone against a like-minded clique, and am being treated brusquely to say the least. Please drop me a line on my user talk if you agree that Sealed Nectar should not be a source for historical fact on WP.Proabivouac 19:41, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

what Proabivouac is constantly ignoring however (deliberately or otherwise), is that the publication would be, at the very least, notable for providing the muslim opinion in order to ensure NPOV in that all significant opinions are covered. RS does not circumvent NPOV, even though some editors believe that the book as a standalone resource is legitimate. we have been discussing this for a significant period of time, and in many instances Proabivouac does not respond to the clarifications given. what Proabivouac in fact has resorted to is requesting editors to comment upon the content of the book in order to support his expunging of it, instead of requesting editors to analyse the pedigree of the book- the former being something editors are not in a position to do whereas the latter is something that editors are required to do. ITAQALLAH 20:26, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

The pedigreee of this book: peer-review by Islamic scholars, endorsement by the Islamic University of Medina, an award from the Muslim World League. Itaqallah made his position clear when he wrote, "you should understand, that secular academia is not the only academia, and nowhere does WP request that we make use of only secular sources." They are not using it to "ensure NPOV," but this and similar publications are being used to add dubious facts to articles. One example, Heraclius knew Muhammad was the prophet, but for political reasons didn't convert, regarding which Itaqallah wrote, " if you find the passage to be false, then tell us what Heraclius did do and source it so we can include that opinion in the article." If you don't think the Miraj actually occurred, find a source that says what Muhammad was doing that night...Proabivouac 20:55, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

"peer-review by Islamic scholars, endorsement by the Islamic University of Medina, an award from the Muslim World League.", yes, as well as being declared notable in a number of other secular publications, as noted on the relevant talk page. and yes, wikipedia does not conform to your view of western or euro-centrism. it is being used to ensure NPOV, to include the muslim account of an event where secular sources omit or reject it. it seems however, that your real issue is with the secular sources as the article is heavily based upon them, and you have shown a tendancy to constantly misrepresent the whole issue by criticising the sealed nectar to discredit the majority of the article where secular sources are used (almost exclusively). in fact, the sealed nectar is perhaps the only muslim source used in the article to any significance, yet even then you cannot seem to tolerate its inclusion though it is a notable secondary source, and arguably reliable. your false analogy re:Heraclius is also open for all to see. would you like to discuss this issue where it is relevant (i..e Talk:Muhammad as a diplomat) instead of smudging the matter by going here-and-there telling editors to judge a book by its content alone? ITAQALLAH 21:23, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

"telling editors to judge a book by its content alone?" You know the old saying, never judge a book by its content!Proabivouac 21:30, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

WP editors are not in a position to dismiss a notable work just because they oppose the POV of the author. ITAQALLAH 21:43, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

What a lot of noise! Look, I think we need more (nay, many!) pictures of Mohummad. We are visual creatures. We are creatures who identify with one another by faces, expressions, countenance. We are creatures who wish to either identify with a face --- or even recoil from it. We are creatures who like (nay, need!) to put a face to a name. It is ridiculous to us in the West to have calligraphy or symbols represent a person - how did that work for the artist formaerly known as Prince? We need pictuers! I need to imagine his face when I read about Muhommed. DocEss 16:13, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

"a religion he called Islam"

this is actually worse than "the founder of Islam", and it doesn't do justice to the fact that islam was an Arab word before the time of Muhammad either. It sounds as if Muhammad had just made up the term. "the founder of the religion of Islam" circumnavigates this problem: it is a problem of islam meaning both "piety" in general and "the religious community initiated by the 7th c. publication of the Quran" (regardless of whether the Quran is 'eternal', it was still made known in the 7th c.). Once again, call it Islam, or Ummah, or whatever, but get rid of the clumsy and wrong "a religion he called Islam". dab (ᛏ) 12:36, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

also, I presume (I don't remember seeing it made plain) that the objection to the "M was the founder of Islam" claim on the part of pious Muslims is because they consider God the founder of Islam and M as merely God's instrument. How about "Muhammad was instrumental in the founding/establishment of the religion of Islam" then? This may work, because instrumental may be both taken literally ("M was God's instrument") and in its common sense of "essential". And it doesn't sound moronic. dab (ᛏ) 13:00, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

The "founder" thing is equally problematic -- even if (especially if) it's preceded by "history" or any similar qualifier. (Subtext: "In the realm of objective fact, Muhammad's supposed status as the final prophet of God is absurd, because he was in actuality founding something entirely new. Muslims have a special realm of belief that rejects historical fact, however, and they do not regard him as the founder of the faith.") It's needlessly provocative fighting talk. I'm not crazy about "he called," don't think I wrote it (or did I?), but it's better than "founder" or any variation thereupon, IMHO. BYT 13:06, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

um, I do not see any such subtext at all. Do we have any sort of WP:RS to establish that "Muslims object to the term 'founder'" or is this just an onwiki phenomenon? As you can tell from my "instrumental" suggestion, I have no interest in introducing any such subtext at all. I mean, hell, even ultra traditionalist Christians and Jews would agree that Abraham founded "Abrahamic religion" (who else), without of course admitting that Abraham made up God or something. Something started in the 7th century, even Muslims acknowledge that (or there wouldn't be such a fuss about the figure of Muhammad in the first place) -- if it wasn't Islam, what was it? Ummah? Dar al Islam? World domination? dab (ᛏ) 13:15, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

just a note: the EoI article on Muhammad states that Muslims do not regard him to be a founder as such. ITAQALLAH 15:16, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Links establishing the Muslim aversion to calling Muhammad "founder" of Islam:

http://www.isna.net/index.php?id=35&backPID=1&tt_news=713 (Islamic Society of North America -- search on "founder")

http://www.karamah.org/news_supreme_court.htm (Muslim Women Lawyers for Human Rights -- search on "founder")

From which article I quote, concerning the description of the image of the Prophet that appears on the Supreme Court building: "KARAMAH explained to the administrators that for Muslims, the Prophet is not the "founder" of Islam. As an Abrahamic religion, Islam is considered by Muslims as a later revelation of the same message revealed to Moses and Jesus. Supreme Court administrators showed great sensitivity and understanding of the matter. It was readily agreed that the caption would be revised to describe Prophet Muhammad as the "Prophet" of Islam." End of quote. Note, please, that those who object to the same approach here are thus staking out a position to the right of Clarence Thomas.

Pardon my harshness - this last conclusion is one of the sillier things I've read on Misplaced Pages since the ideas of some proponents of the Hollow Earth theory.

1. How did Thomas Clarence interfere in this whole thingy? Did he write the challenged vistor brochures?
2. In what way are an office building's administration's views related to those of the officers working there - if the Supreme Court swings back to the left, do they sack all the janitors?
3. How is the question of how to call Muhammad intertwined with the question whether someone's on the political left or right? If anything, a god-fearing right-winger will be far more prone to an over-sensibility towards what it means to intimidate people's religious beliefs than a secular nihilist leftie.

Declaring everyone who considers "founder" the appropriate term a loony right-wing gun nut does not help this discourse and is far, far off-course.

--The Hungry Hun 18:37, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

http://www.aaiil.info/simplyIslam/intro.htm (search on "founder")

BYT 13:32, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

note that I have no problem with saying "Muhammad was the prophet of Islam" either. Founder or prophet refers to the exact same function here, and either states the same obvious, prosaic fact. What do you think about my "was instrumental" suggestion, though? Ands what about "M was the founder/instigator/whatever of Dar al-Islam"? dab (ᛏ) 14:00, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

your sources state "Islam was the religion of Buddha / Moses etc.". This is precisely the semantic confusion I have discussed about five times on this page now: they take the Arabic meaning of islam, i.e. "piety". In Arabic, "Moses was pious" may be an arguable statement. In English, "Moses was a Muslim", "Jesus was a Muslim" or "Buddha was a Muslim"(!) is simply nonsense. dab (ᛏ) 14:02, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

No, they DO mean that "Moses was a Muslim", NOT in the "Moses had piety" sense. --Striver 14:50, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

The definition used for Islam is submission to god, and if you equate that to piety, then ok if you are pious you are a muslim. Technically, the term Momin is used to designate piety, muslim for those who have submitted for god. It has not been always strictly interpreted as post Muhammad requiring acknowledgement of Muhammad, or Post Jesus acknowledgement of Jesus etc. etc. People of Book are a grey area, generally Muslim is applied to differentiate them from Mushrik, or polytheists. Agreed today the definition become primarly charged with differentiating the various branches of the Abrahamic faith, seeing as it has swept the globe. Remember this was not always the case, most of the world were "pagans" back then and the identity of the term was defined vis-a-vis this reality, and most muslims still see that as their defining charecteristic not Muhammad, that is only a second layer of differentiation.

Personally I see no dichtomy between prophet of Islam and founder, but some editors have insisted that prophet is POV and founder is somehow neutral and factually accurate must be used. I may not agree that there is a POV but two camps have formed, and the compromise must be found between two equally verifibale statements. Muhammad was the last prophet of Islam; and; Muhammad was the founder of Islam. Unfortunately, this also obliges us to "explain" how each position is a construed as a POV.--Tigeroo 15:12, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, yes ... if (and only if) we use either term in the intro. But we don't have to, and notice that the present version of the article does not::

Muhammad ... was an Arab religious and political leader who preached a religion known as Islam.

My sense is that either "founder" or "prophet" will probably continue to destabilize the article. Many Christians and Jews (the US Supreme Court notwithstanding) will dispute the term "prophet," and request a softener such as "claimed" -- which will be instantly disputed by Muslims. And, as I have shown above, the term "founder" is similarly rejected by Muslims. What we have now is informative, accurate, and likely to stick around for a while. Ideologues and vandals won't care for it much, of course, but that's not exactly a news flash. They would prefer a picture of him with horns.BYT 16:32, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

yes (sigh) I am using "pious" as a shorthand for "submits to the will of God". In English, it makes sense to say "Moses submitted to the will of God", but unlike in Arabic that is not synonymous to saying, in English, "Moses was a Muslim". Why is that so difficult to understand? "Islam" doesn't have the same meaning as an English loanword as it does in Arabic. In English, "Islam" means "the religion preached by Muhammad in the 7th century", and to talk, in English, about "Muslims" for times preceding the 7th c. would be an anachronism. The reason is that in English, "Islam/Muslim" are proper names (hence the capitalised spelling), not mere adjectives. I'm sorry, but that's simply the lexical meaning, no theological pov intended. dab (ᛏ) 16:11, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

i was thinking just use "preached the religion of Islam"? ITAQALLAH 15:14, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I had added this intro last time I edited this page, but it didn't last more than 2 hours I guess. Anyway, here it is. I think its fairly neutral, in that it doesn't treat "M established Islam" as a fact, that most Muslims will object to and disagree with, while at the same time acknowledging that having "established Islam" is what he is "primarily known for" anyway:

Muḥammad (محمد; also Mohammed, and other variants), 570-632 AD, is an influential historical figure, known primarily for having established the Islamic religion. He is, within Islam, the pre-eminent prophet and messenger to whom the Qur'an, which Muslims believe to be the 'word of God', was divinely revealed.

--Bluerain (talk) 09:23, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Alas, that "established the Islamic religion" piece has precisely the same problems as "founder." I'm not calling anyone a loony, by the way, just pointing out how a major US institution has handled precisely the same question. That's a fair point for discussion, I think. BYT 11:47, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Tomb of Imam Bukhari

Irishpunktom, you state that the image of a preaching Muhammad "serves absolutely no purpose" in the Muhammad article. Yet you apparently think it's important to have an image of the tomb of a guy who authored a Hadith collection on Muhammed. Is this some kind of weird inside joke? Or why is the image of an article's topic less relevant in that article than the image of the tomb of a guy who once wrote on the article's topic? Befuddled, The Hungry Hun 14:25, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Considering their are no images of anything better concerning Imam Bukhari, I thought this should be added. It relates directly to the section it is in, but, if you can think of a better image, perhaps a book, or whatever, add it, I won't be offended. --Irishpunktom\ 14:35, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I got no specific feelings towards this picture - I just wonder what makes a certain image (ir)relevant in your opinion. --The Hungry Hun 18:54, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

• The section was about the sources we have for Muhammads life. The Most authorative source for the Sunnah in Sunni Islam is Sahih Bukhari by Imam Bukhari. Thus, an image concerning Imam Bukhari is relevent. As I've said previously, the one I added is because of the absence of others, if you have a better image for the sources of the Sira, please add it! --Irishpunktom\ 22:01, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I think the important thing is agreeing that Misplaced Pages:Images applies to this article the same as to any other: we want a well-balanced collection of pertinent images: no image clutter, but also no extremely pedantic approach that doesn't allow anything except an authentic mugshot. Treat Muhammad exactly the same as Charlemagne, Theodoric or any other notable early medieval figure. Once we agree on this, there can be good faith discussion of whether the tomb image is relevant: it should be replaced if there is a sufficient number of more relevant images. At present, there is no image clutter, and this means it is perfectly alright to keep also more tangential ones to keep the article illustrated. dab (ᛏ) 14:40, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what policy is here, but I'd like to see an image on every single page whose Title is that of a person. Page on Pres Bush? put a photo. Page on Pope Benedict? Put a photo. Page on Charlemagne? Put a painting. Page on Constantine? Put a painting. Page on St. Peter? Put a statue. Page on Moses? Put a skecth. Whatever kind of image is readily available and most verifiable should be used. The museums (and the internet) are full of pictures of Mehummud! I wrote this above: We are visual creatures. We are creatures who identify with one another by faces, expressions, countenance. We are creatures who wish to either identify with a face --- or even recoil from it. We are creatures who like (nay, need!) to put a face to a name. It is ridiculous to us in the West to have calligraphy or symbols represent a person - how did that work for the artist formerly known as Prince? We need pictuers! I need to imagine his face when I read about Muhommed (or anyone, for that matter).DocEss 16:28, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

um, I beg to differ, it is not "ridiculous to us in the west", and we don't put random sketches even on Moses. The image has to represent a notable artistic tradition. Shia Persia is such a tradition. If there were no Persian/Shia images, we would not just put up with South Park's Muhammad instead. dab (ᛏ) 16:38, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Unlike all person you have stated above Muhammad had many less images made centuries after his death and Museum are NOT full with his pictures. Can you give stats about your above claim? Why you have to put imaginary picture that has no relationship with Muhammad at all, for your imagination (what good that imagination will be)? The best way to imagine someone is like we imagine God. Think about his qualities and characteristic. Like Most sweet, forgiving etc. --- ابراهيم 16:49, 29 September 2006 (UTC)--- ابراهيم 16:49, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I suggest your responses are not logical and were not thought out to conclusion. Your response is simply radommly chosen words designed to counter whatever has been written by anyone. Think about it. It IS ridiculous to us in the West to put a symbol to represent a person. Persian/Shia/pee-a/wee-a --- whatever you're on about there I have no idea. There exists a treasure-trove of images of all kinds of people, mohammed included. We all know they aren't photographs. We know they are only artists' renditions. We know they are mere interpretations. We know they are only facsimiles. But we know they're good enough to satisfy the human mind's need to visualize the face. We don't have a clue what Moses looked like - but there are thousands of images that we have assembled over the millenia that allow us at least an adequate amount of 'face-to-name'satisfaction. Pictures of Nehummud are perfectly legitimate - and from what I've seen, they all kinda look alike, close enough at least for me to put that face to a name. We even have multitudes of representations of God himself in all kinds of literature, murals, paintings,etc. And Mohammed ain't God!DocEss 16:53, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

in case you are replying to me (indent?) - your level of debate is exactly what bogs Misplaced Pages down. "us in the west"? "Persian/Shia/pee-a/wee-a"? "Nehummud"? indeed. either try to follow the debate and contribute something useful, or feel free to remain silent. dab (ᛏ) 17:03, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to include a whole host of images now. OK? DocEss 17:17, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Please do not do that. There are already 3 picture of Muhammad. --- ابراهيم 17:33, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand - why should I not do that?DocEss 17:34, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

nice one. very productive editing. you, sir, are a dunce. dab (ᛏ) 18:31, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Explain, please. Alos, why are you calling me names? Are you not cognizant of the fact that doing so may hurt my witlle feewings?DocEss 18:32, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

You do not care about feeling of many Muslims (and keep insisting on adding pictures) and even say my responce "a random selection of words". Then why you are sensitive about other people remarks. You should not have double standards. --- ابراهيم 21:19, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

"We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart." (H.L. Mencken)

Do you understand what this means? Respecting your rules re images means that I don't demand you to draw some (though your offer concerning me was rather flattering). It does absolutely, positively not mean that others are bound by these rules. Think about it. Accept it. Move on.

--The Hungry Hun 21:55, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

This is an encylcopedia. Your feelings are as irrelevant as mine.DocEss 21:23, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

What about this: Portrait of Mohammed from Michel Baudier's Histoire générale de la religion des turcs (Paris, 1625). We can include this one, right? Hey, Hungry Hun - what thinkest thou?DocEss 21:59, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Uh - dunno. An intro depiction (as in most bios) would be a nice starter, but a non-westernized image would be preferable for a non-western guy, I guess.

This image names Muhammad as a prophet, not a founder, though, what might be a plus for some...

--The Hungry Hun 22:21, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

• An image from 1000 years later? The image is not a definitve portrait for the man, and doesn't even fit his description per the Sira. no. --Irishpunktom\ 22:27, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Your reasoning is specious. Should we delete all the images of Moses, Abraham, David, Jesus Christ, Peter, Paul, Constantine, Charlemagne and on and on from the pantheon of knowledge just because they were painted or created thousands of years later? That is senseless and you well know it. Now - which images do you believe are true representations of Mehammud?DocEss 22:38, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Now - which images do you believe are true representations of Mehammud? None. Because Muhammad disallowed sketching him and except some Muslims biographies not much really old exist about Muhammad. The earlier Muhammad biographies do not have any images so nothing realistic could be found.

Should we delete all the images of Moses, Abraham, David, Jesus ... Certainly, why not. I am for it. --- ابراهيم 22:42, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Your choice to believe we should delete all those other images is but a convenient one for you because it allows you to achieve your objective of having no images of Mahammud. That makes your position a disengenuous one; moreover, it invalidates your credibility. We are going to have images of all of those humans listed in this discussion.DocEss 22:47, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

You asked him a question, he answered it. Get over yourself. There is a tradition in Judaism of paint prophets, likewise in Christianity, indeed, in most traditons, painting of Human leaders is followed. Not so Muhammad. At present this article has three images of Muhammad, all persian, all Shia. The Majority of Islamic Art is created not Persian, nor Shia, but Sunni. It tends to be Calliographic, and Arabesque. There are centuries of development of the art forms, wheter the colourfull nature of the turks, the repition of the Arabs, or the golden mosaics of the West-Africans, etc. ignoring this so as to see an image of a Human, and ignoring the islamic traditions so as, what seems, to have a go at Muslims is wrong in every way. Why can't you devote your energies finding these calliographic images that are Creative Commons allowed or Fair use to use here? --Irishpunktom\ 23:15, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

{Discerning what you wrote is certainly a challenge.} But here is a suggestion: let us have all kinds of images, and you can help us write intelligent commentary on the validity of each. Shia, Persian, Sunni, West African, Turk --- whatever! Cool. Put em all in and educate the readers about each style. I know I'd be intensely intereted and impressed. Now THAT would be a excellent use of your energies and a good application of your obviously deep knowledge of Arabic art. And just a reminder --- this is an encyclopedia, and we do not shy away from things that might offend the odd person. See here, for example: medicine - this would be ofensive in another context. See?DocEss 23:23, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Is there any reason why you chose to hide the link to Scrotum, using the name "medicine" instead? Looking to provoke is not a good way of creating an encyclopedia. As for Arabic Art, I do not have an "obviously deep knowledge", and never claimed I did, so your sarcasm is unwarranted. I have a basic knowledge of the art, being as it is, a significant part of Muslim History. This is straying from the subject here. The fact remains that the vast quantities of art concerning Muhammad are Sunni Muslim in origin and are not reflected here. There are three Persian - Shia images, which creates a POV problem, why is their art given more weight than the majorities? We also have an utterly irrelevent image sitting in the rejection section, an image with around ten people, though noone seems to know who any of them are, except one. This image needs to be fixed, and better images need to be introduced --Irishpunktom\ 23:56, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

<indent reset> I choose to hide the name so as not to offend anyone! Man - I can't win! I wasn't sarcastcic at all - you have a deeper knaloedge than I do. hey, man - let's get this done for the benifit of all the readers. DocEss 23:59, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

That would be more believeable if (1. It made sense or (2. You didn't choose to hide it with the word "Medicine". --Irishpunktom\ 00:02, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure why this image is in this article, For what reason was it included? I'll remove it, and please understand why...

--so after I removed the image I see that change has been reverted!!! What's going on here, why should we not put the tomb of his cousin Ali too if we're putting a person who's only relevance to him is that he wrote his sayings, and it's not a picture of him it's a picture of his TOMB!! 217.17.224.28 12:35, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Negative traits of Mohammed suppressed

Muslim censors are refusing to allow quotes from the Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim, and other relevant holy Sunni texts which from the modern standpoint cast Mohammed in a negative light. They refuse to even permit us to inform readers that Mohammed was poisoned after plundering a Jewish settlement and lived in pain for three more years until he died from it. If you guys won't let people know what your own holy books say then there is something wrong with your minds (unsigned comments from User:24.7.89.173 )

It is in history books that he was Poisoned by Jew(s). I am not denying it. But the real question is that if that if his death after more than 3 years was indeed from that poison? Why you are so sure? What kind of poison was that? What is your prove ? I have not read in anywhere that he was sick for 3 years, from where did you get this information? --- ابراهيم 02:12, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

My "prove," oh he who speaks english so well that he can't understand a quote in english from his own holy book, can be found in Bukhari's Hadith 5.713.

I have gone to and tried to find the Hadith but not sucessful. They are given in this fashion volume#:book#:Hadith#. Now tell me who to find your hadith that will prove it in above format? I really want to know it. --- ابراهيم 09:44, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

No academics accept the poisoning theory. Zora 02:56, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

If that is your criterion for inclusion in the article then you should censor about a third of it. Go on, do it. Also I'm kind of scared that you're adding my IP to my comments. Adherents of the ``religion of peace" Islam sometimes murder when someone asks questions, following Mohammad who had many of his early opponents murdered in their sleep, i.e. Abu Afak, Asma bint Marwan, Kab al-Ashraf, Kinana, and others. By the way, where do you get this "One day after coming home from a cemetery..." line anyway, if not the exact same book I'm quoting, Bukhari's Hadith?

Adding the author to unsigned comments is a standard procedure at Misplaced Pages; simply create an account to prevent being associated with your IP.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of hotheads around here - sometimes editors too easily take changes for vandalism and are a little trigger-happy on the revert button re new, un-annonunced changes.

Plus, this whole topic is a battlefield, WWI-style. Every addition you make will be challenged until you can undeniably reference your claims. Hence, the following approach might be helpful:

1. First, create a new section on the talk page.
2. Add a prototype of the changed text you propose.
3. Back your claims with citations from primary sources and other (preferably scholarly) references.
4. Go through the discussion; believe it or not, but besides a lot of hooey you'll get helpful hints on both details and broader points.
5. Refine your changes.
6. Go through 4 and 5 until you feel it's ripe. (this is not about pleasing, let alone convincing every opponent but about steeling your arguments).
7. Publish the stuff.

It's far easier to defend statements if they are well-grounded and sourced. It also helps other editors evaluate your contributions and will often cause them to be supportive.

--The Hungry Hun 07:31, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

PS: Ad hominem attacks, e.g. at someone's language skills, are not considered helpful here...

"No academics accept the poisoning theory."

Hungry Hun has a point. Most often, it's asserted that Western academia is inherently biased for excluding the Islamic POV, based on Islamic traditions. Here were have the opposite. The real governing force is contemporary sensibilities. Where Islamic tradition makes Muhammad look good by contemporary standards - as with Muhammad being called "the honest one" - we must include it as being potentially correct and at least notable. Where it makes him look bad by contemporary standards - as with Aisha's age, and much less directly the poisoning incident - it's suppressed as un-academic. This does not constitute a principled approach to Islamic tradition, but instead, by the inconsistent plea for reliable sources, and under the excuse of NPOV, reserves a veto for what certain editors to Misplaced Pages who happen to be on this page think today. The determination of which traditions to promote and which to suppress, if unaccompanied by principle, is the macro-equivalent of original research.Proabivouac 09:58, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Zora is non-Muslim and has written most of the Muhammad article. If she says "No academics accept the poisoning theory." then there should be some reason behind it. We should try to assume-good-faith towards each other. I am open to any possiblity if given good enough prove which I am not able to get so far. --- ابراهيم 10:03, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

You have not answered the question of: if we ignore the Sahih Bukhari, where do we get source material for Mohammad's life. Also your logic of "Zora says she's not a Muslim so what she says must be true" seems like something you would be killed in Pakistan for saying. Anyway it seems like the only people who know the complete picture on Mohammad and Islam are people like Osama bin Laden and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Please do not be rude and keep saying those things. Why so much hate? I promise you that you give me good evidence I will change my views. As I said above already I have gone from and tried to find the Hadith but not sucessful. They are given in this fashion volume#:book#:Hadith#, chapter 5 had no 713 hadith. Now tell me how to find your hadith that will prove it, "in above mentioned format" (give me 3 numbers)? I really want to know it. The only convincing evidence you have given me so far is Aisha Hadith as all other are prediction to died by him and tell nothing about cause of death. So tell me the source of Aisha hadith if it is in Sahahi Bakahri or in any other athentic books of Hadith then I will be standing with you and support to change the article. --- ابراهيم 21:04, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

I will tell you where to find it on the website you mentioned:

http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/fundamentals/hadithsunnah/bukhari/059.sbt.html#005.059.713 If you continue to have difficulty understanding it I can translate it into Urdu for you.

I have changed that section. Please do not add hate and dramatic sentences there (like even after Muhammad prayer he died or he remained sick for 3 years) without references. If you have more information with reference like above then we can mention it there. I have used "could be" because that what hadith tell. --- ابراهيم 23:30, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

It is difficult not to feel rage. If every Muslim chose ANY OTHER religion to convert to (Buddhism, Christianity, Jainism, Hinduism, Judaism, Taoism, Sikhism, Bahai...) we would have world peace; do you realize that? What makes Islam different? Read the Hadith and you will know.

The problem with relying on hadith for Muhammad's biography is that the hadith stories are snippets of information that were not written down for hundreds of years. When they WERE written down, it was for polemic purposes. Scholars supporting particular legal theories or religious beliefs wanted to prove that they were right, and the way to prove that was to cite Muhammad, or Muhammad's life, in support. There was enormous incentive to invent stories, or perhaps not to be too critical of dubious stories, in support of one's position.

Academics tend to be wary of working with hadith and rely more heavily on the histories, such as those by Ibn Ishaq and Tabari. Neither Ibn Ishaq nor Tabari mention the poisoning theory in their descriptions of the death of Muhammad. However, in Tabari, volume 8 of the SUNY translation, the narrative of the conquest of Khaybar is followed by the poisoning story and a claim that Muhammad said at the time of his death that his death was due to the one bite of poisoned sheep he had taken and then spit out years ago. (p. 124) The story is grotesquely implausible; if the tiny quantity of poison he absorbed from a spat-out mouthful didn't make him sick then, it is unlikely to have bided its time and then killed him years later. Why invent such a story? The answer is right there in Tabari: "The Muslims believed that in addition to the honor of prophethood that God had granted him the Messenger of God died a martyr." If you exalt people who die in battle and denigrate people who die in their beds, what about Muhammad dying in his bed? Well, you invent a story that makes Muhammad a martyr.

Tabari is writing approximately 150 years after Ibn Ishaq. 150 years in which legends about Muhammad continued to evolve. That's why academics don't accept the late, unsubstantiated, and scientifically implausible poisoning theory. Zora 21:54, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Zora I believe in correctness of those hadith books. I also believe that it is possible that his sickness "could" had been delayed because Allah wanted him to finished few important task. Allah could do anything and his powers are beyond our imaginations. I have changed the section based on the information available to me. My intention for this change was good. --- ابراهيم 23:33, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

I find it laughable that you believed it before you had even heard of it. Anyway I'm sure that there could be some biological reason why he wouldn't die for 3 years. Maybe his system was weakened by the poison for three years, and then he got some bug and that pushed him over the top.

Is it not entirely possible that Muhammad was poisoned, and that this was at the time falsely blamed on an earlier incident involving the Jews of Khaybar? The desire to consider him martyred is only one of several plausible hypotheses; to blood libel Jews is another. Regardless, it should be presented as a significant tradition, one which at the very least offers insight into the psychology of its sources, and suggests the circumstances surrounding Muhammad's death to have been mysterious enough to allow for creative interpretations.

Why should it carry any less weight than similarly dubious claims rooted solely in Islamic tradition? Isra and Miraj are covered and even illustrated; these are much more certain not to have occurred, and are historically less important than the cause of Muhammad's death. Are there academics who find this story scientifically plausible?

See Ibn Hisham. Al-Sira al-Nabawiyya (The Life of The Prophet). English translation in Stillman (1979), pp. 148–149.Proabivouac 22:28, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Your rationality is a breath of fresh air. If you read the relevant passages you will see that they are not casting Jews in a bad light, really. According to the Hadith, Muhammad and his followers sacked the Jewish city and enslaved many of the inhabitants, so the fact that one of the Jews tried to poison Mohammad in retaliation is understandable. In fact the woman is quoted as saying that she poisoned him to find out if he was really from God or not: if he new about the poison beforehand then he was from God, and if not then they would be rid of him. It's kind of a strange passage.

-- About Mohammed's death, did he not die of a battle wound?

Also, why is it that this passage has no information about the years he spent terrorizing people along the Silk Roads or his frustration at the world after his exile? Does it not seem more than plausible that his frustration and initial rejection could have led to his invention of the Koran? After all, with that book in his hands he would be revered, instead of scorned, and he could exact revenge on those he thought had wronged him.

Oh, and the Koran seems to be one of the most historically inaccurate texts ever written, constantly white-washing details from centuries past (denying the Hebraic nature of Abraham, counting his descendants in favor of Mohammed , and denying the death and resurrection of Christ, to name a few instances)! And yet it is so widely accepted ... If it weren't for the end of the sword, a favorite tool of conversion for the people of Islam, I am forced to wonder what basis such a faith would have ... (MrLigit was responsible for this)

Please do not upload any image of Muhammad

Please do not upload any image of Muhamamd, that may be any drawing or any imaginary image. Because Muslims dislike this and in relagion Islam to Portrait any image of Muhamamd (PBUH) is prohibited. So please avoid it.

Thank you.

<believe above unsigned comment was user:Mmsarfraz>

Well, with all due deference to your belief system, we are an encyclopedia and as such do not have to cowtow to any particular religous belief or cult procedures. It may be prohibited for You to do images, but it is not prohibited for Me to do images. Look, there are ample images and pictures of many things that people find distasteful in an everyday sense but agree are required iamagery in an encyclopedia. For example, there are pictures of vulvas, breasts, scortums, penises, colons, abscesed teeth, ingrown hairs, s&m tools, vivisected rabbits and any number of other revolting and disgusting things that turn the stomach and challenge the senses. But they are, to be sure, necessary. We don't put them on T-shirts but we do put them in encyclopedias. Pictures of Mowhammed are equally neceassary and we will include them. Sorry man, you will just have to suspend your abhorance and get over it. Or even simpler, don't look at it if ya don't like it. Maybe a sort of Viewer Discretion warning at the top of the page would help?DocEss 16:39, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Content disclaimer, which is on the bottom of every content page (though not editing pages) covers that very nicely. Verifiable facts and useful images in this encyclopedia may offend or shock viewers with certain belief systems, tastes, and phobias. I really think this needs to be more prominently featured encyclopedia-wide. As for the request by the original commenter, images and renderings of Muhammad that illustrate an important event in his life or provide visual context for the reader are appropriate images and should remain within the encyclopedia. I respect your desire to have Muhammad honored, but will disagree. Captainktainer * Talk 16:50, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Dear Muslim Wikipedians, you ought to take note of the fact that Misplaced Pages is a non-Islamic encyclopedia. That you happen to dislike portraits of Muhammad has absolutely no bearing on what is allowed here. You simply have no right to demand that no painted portraits of Muhammad be shown here! (Anyway, the claim that any portraits of the Prophet have always been universally forbidden in Islamic history is a lie. There are many such depictions made by Muslims.) — Editorius 14:58, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Dear Editorius, you said Dear Muslim Wikipedians, you ought to take note of the fact that Misplaced Pages is a non-Islamic encyclopedia. That you happen to dislike portraits of Muhammad has absolutely no bearing on what is allowed here. You simply have no right to demand that no painted portraits of Muhammad be shown here!

If its Non Muslim encyclopedia and can not respect the relagion and there prophet then Muslims should not come here. Its not matter of rights it was my humble request and you please increase your knowledge regarding religions, Muslims and Islam and its history then you will in some good position to say some thing about it. And one thing, because this artical is abouot prophet Muhammad(PBUH) to whome Muslims of all world love most so please keep in this mind that it should not hurt there beliefs.

Thanks for your comments, concerns and interest.

--Mahmood Sarfraz 18:57, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

"Historical Founder"

Adding "historical" to "founder" would only make sense if there could be an unhistorical founder of something. But I fail to see what "unhistorical founder" might mean. — Editorius 15:05, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

• No, it means from a historical perspective. From the perspective of the religion M "sparked", Allah was the founder, not M. Allah/God is outside history - he is not a historical personage. So I suppose Allah could qualify as the "non-historical" founder (from the M POV) --JimWae 00:02, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

According to Islam (and the other Abrahamic religions in fact), God influences history, revealing himself first to Israel, whom he guided for a while, then by communicating through the various prophets, ending with Muhammad. The idea that God is outside of history is more of a Hindu belief. unsigned comment by user:24.7.89.173

• God is not a historical personage. The discipline of history has nothing to say about a person called God. If historians write about God as if he is a person (rather than within the history of religion), they are not writing within the discipline known as history, but rather are writing religion. --JimWae 07:01, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

You are using the word history in an unusually restrictive way. Native speakers of English do not think of "the discipline of history" when saying "history".

A.D. vs C.E.

The Misplaced Pages manual of style states that dates within an article may be given either as AD or CE, provided one system is used consistently within that article. Given the subject of this article, I think it would be preferable to avoid using terms which have definite Christian overtones, when neutral terms are available. --BostonMA 21:12, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

This is the date system we use. Why don't you put the Muslim date on every page then? Get over it - in the West, there are Chritsian overtones to everyhting (thank goodness, too!) The Gregorian Calendar is the one we use. Calling it C.E. instead of A.D. does not change that particluar fact, now does it? All it does is expose the silliness of political correctness.DocEss 21:18, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Please read the appropriate section in the manual of style. When you say this is the system "we use", whom do you mean by "we". I don't use A.D. Further, there is nothing than mandates using A.D. in Misplaced Pages. --BostonMA 21:20, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

CE has just as much a Christian overtone as AD, it counts the years from the birth of Christ (albeit slightly mistakenly). Using AH is not an alternative, since no English reader is familiar with the Islamic calendar. See also Misplaced Pages talk:Eras for the current round of this endless debate. Or let's focus on the article's actual content instead. dab (ᛏ) 21:21, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

I read it. You do use A.D. --- you just don't seem to know that you use it! This is 2006. What does that mean - it means 2006 A.D.! Always has, always will. And don't send me to the A.D. page, I've read that too. DocEss 21:22, 2 October 2006 (UTC) PS Common sense mandates we use A.D. What should we use: Star Trek dates? Klingon? Muslim? Chinese: Jewish? Goodness, use you head.DocEss 21:24, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

I will thank you to be civil. No, I do not use A.D., I use C.E. Clearly, the change made to the article was not a change in the year, but in the description of the year. Which description shall we use, one that refers to "the lord" i.e. domini, or one that is used by common consent, even though it happens to have originally be based (erroneously) on belief that Jesus was born in year 1. Common sense does not mandate the use of A.D. over B.C., rather common courtesy suggests avoiding using terms that imply that Jesus is "the lord", even if that is what you may believe. --BostonMA 21:30, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

this is futile, ok? Misplaced Pages:Eras says, don't unilaterally change the date style of an article that uses one or the other. In this case, it was DocEss who unilaterally changed CE to AD, and although I am more on the AD side of the debate, I will of course help revert him in order to keep the "Era armistice". DocEss, you should urgently show that you also mean to make useful contributions in terms of content, it is getting more and more difficult to assume good faith on your part. We don't need people who hang out looking for idle confrontation: we prefer trying to write an encyclopedia instead. dab (ᛏ) 21:36, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Ok Ok. Yawn. It's all been hashed and re-hashed all over Wiki world. It is 2006 A.D., your PC blindness notwithstanding. {A.D. vs B.C.? I think you meant to try to distinguish A.D. from C.E, did you not?}DocEss 21:37, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

the fact that the "AD" Era is in use worldwide today is a direct consequence of colonialism, which is not an era "the West" should be particularly proud of. Still, it's a random convention, never mind the 'D', just the Era "the West" happens to have picked historically. You don't need to believe in Christ, let alone the Holy Trinity and what not, before you are allowed to use it. You can also use the Julian epoch without being an Ancient Roman imperialist, and you may use the Unix epoch without being a Linux geek. alright? dab (ᛏ) 21:43, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, Doc, you're wrong. On Misplaced Pages, by ruling of the ArbCom, you are not to change styles without good reason. Now, I personally believe that BCE/CE is politically correct nonsense and should be removed from all human discourse. However, the community consenus says "Don't muck around with these things!" So stop replacing C.E., which our Muslim contributors and others seem to like better here, and everyone just move on to something more important. Captainktainer * Talk 22:05, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

All right all right. I got the damned message! Stop picking on me or I might have a tantrum and go burn an athiest in effigy!DocEss 22:07, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

The fact that you think that's funny shows how little understanding you have.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.7.89.173 (talk • contribs)

The fact you don't think that's funny shows that you have no sense of humour. Lighten up.DocEss 16:26, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

what's an athiest? someone who is very, very athy? dab (ᛏ) 07:36, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Someone who worship the Ungod Athe = LA = 31. first word of Shahada.Opiner 07:47, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Seeing that Mohammed is a Muslim Profeit, shouldn't the wishes of Muslims be a concern. Which would they perfer to use? Which do they use? Any data on that?Mantion 05:40, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Just a small remark:

The word 'founder' floats between two sentences: Muhammad (Arabic: محمد‎ ​; also Mohammed, and other variants) 570-632 C.E., was an Arab religious and political leader who preached the religion of Islam. founder He united

There should at least be something that makes sence instead of just a word. Maybe it's an idea to add the and to the end of the first sentence: The word 'founder' floats between two sentences: Muhammad (Arabic: محمد‎ ​; also Mohammed, and other variants) 570-632 C.E., was an Arab religious and political leader who preached the religion of Islam. He united ................... -- unsigned by 145.52.160.68

• Looks like somebody has been blindly reverting instead of participating in discussions--JimWae 17:49, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

• Possible. At the same time, though, I've been participating in discussions. Lots of other people have been participating in discussions. Based on those discussions, there is simply no consensus for including the word "founder." BYT 22:34, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

But saying he 'preached the religion of Islam' makes it sound like existed before AS Im sure you know. People didnt like my words 'a religion he called Islam' but that at least doesnt make it sound preexisting without saying he started it. Second paragraph makes clear what he was saying. Im sick of this though. Only evidence for preexist is, Qur'an says so. All real world evidence says Muhammad started it himself. If Qur'an says, dinosaurs around with humans do we go to Dinosaur and fight there over the introduction?.Opiner 23:52, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

You know what, though? I could live with "a religion he called Islam" -- totally accurate, neutral, no theological claims implicit or otherwise... what do you say we go back to that? BYT 20:48, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Place of picture

Do not touch the disputed picture. It an imagary picture and will stay at its place. or be deleted from the article.) by Ibrahimfaisal

What does that mean? Now you have the powers to both determine which pictures are to stay and where they should be placed? Please play nicely, you sound a little bit aggressive. A picture that shows Muhammad in general is much better suited for the overview section. What reforming actions or qualities of Muhammad's do you see inside the picture? --The Hungry Hun 18:48, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Do NOT move the picture up without any discussion. It suits no where. It is just an artistic picture with no historical value whatsoever. We do not know anything about it.

1. I didn't move it without discussion. You moved the picture without discussion (after Irishpunktom moved it without discussion and without your objection). Yes, it would be nice if you stopped that.
2. Yes, it is an artistic rendition; photography didn't exist until severeal centuries later. It is no valid argument against these pictures. We already covered that in all length.
3. What sense does the picture make in the reformer section? What reforms does it represent? It shows Muhammad in a general pose - maybe preaching - and thus fits much better in the general overview.

--The Hungry Hun 19:39, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

In my mind, it works better in the general overview section. An artistic depiction that is fairly faithful to the descriptions given within Muslim texts does definitely belong - human beings are visual creatures. We have sufficient context to know that it is a depiction of Muhammad, and preaching is certainly an activity Muhammad engaged in frequently, but we don't know enough to know that it's specifically related to Muhammad as a reformer. Oh, yeah, and it was a little odd how it just kept creeping further down the article over the past few weeks. Captainktainer * Talk 21:40, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Its customary for any encyclopedia known to me (WP, Britannica, Larousse, Brockhaus) to illustrate the subject if possible. If so, the illustration is right on the entries top. Again, WP is a secular project - that Mohammed's depiction keeps creeping down before it gets deleted over and over again is shameful censorship. --tickle me 01:42, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

My addition to the intro

My addition to the intro: "By 750, his successors had conquered Persia, the Levant, North Africa, Sicily and Iberia and introduced Islam to the newly acquired territories, lowered taxes, provided greater local autonomy and greater religious freedom for Jews and indigenous Christians, and brought peace to peoples demoralized and disaffected by the casualties and heavy taxation resulted from the years of Byzantine-Persian warfare. "

Proabivouac removed my edits to the article on the following basis:

"You are perfectly aware that we could source all kinds of well-sourced negative things about him in the intro. NPOV governs not just presentation but also placement of information; tacking hagiography onto a perfectly neutral introduction is POV".."shall we also mention that he beheaded hundreds of people and enslaved many more? also a fact, but equally inappropriate for the intro"

First, the intro is talking about "He united the tribes of the Arabian Peninsula under a state governed by Islamic law with its capital in Medina. By 750, his successors had conquered Persia, the Levant, North Africa, Sicily and Iberia and introduced Islam to the newly acquired territories." All I added was in the context of this sentence. If you would like to add anything related to this, feel free to do it.

Secondly, please go ahead and add "all kinds of well-sourced negative things about him". I will then come and bring other well-sourced material in his defense. This is how we should work on this article, not by censoring information. --Aminz 08:23, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

• Does all that apply equally to every area mentioned? Were Sicily & Iberia involved in Byzantine-Persian wars? --JimWae 08:30, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Esposito is generally talking about the time when the boundary of the Muslim empire was extended to Morocco and Spain in west and across central Asia to India in the east. But some of the comments may be only fit for Iraq, Syria or Persia. --Aminz 08:37, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Of course, Esposito also talks about the misconception that Muslims wanted to spread their faith through forced conversion by sword. But I didn't get into that detail. I can if you would like. --Aminz 08:40, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Farhansher wrote in his edit summary, "he actually beheaded only one ( who came to kill him at Ohad ) & enslaved none . Thats a fact)." That's a shameless lie. See Banu Qurayza. I'm also having trouble understanding how Aminz interprets death and enslavement as greater freedom for Jews. Maybe Islam helped some other Jews in some other time and place (such as Andalusia), but those seventh-century Arabian Jews who knew Muhammad didn't fare well.Proabivouac 08:46, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, there was enmity between the seventh-century Arabian Jews and Muhammad, because Muhammad was expecting them to do not ally with his enemy after they allied to him and were given religious and cultural autonomy. But if you look at the early expansion of Islam, you'll see Jews welcoming and aiding Muslim armies. --Aminz 08:58, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

The word HE is interpreted as himself . Moses/David led to the killing of many, we dont say HE killed them . Bush led to the killings of Hundreds of thousands of people , again we dont say HE killed all of them . F.a.y. 08:51, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Farhansher: ridiculous. We were talking about prisoners Muhammad had beheaded in cold blood, not people killed in battle. The point is that the introduction is neither the place to indict Muhammad nor to sing his praises. To do either is tendentious and invites edit warring.Proabivouac 08:58, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

"To do either is tendentious and invites edit warring." --> I am abiding by the golden rule. --Aminz 09:03, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Too much scepticism

There is too much scepticism running around all over the article . We are told in every section that what muslims believe is not authentic, there way of collection knowledge is not so good e.t.c . Plz take a look Jesus or Moses article for comparasion . People writing theose articles arnt ashamed to state that their articleis based on bible , & they even consider gospels authentic. This should not be the only article that should bear the burden of "sceptic revisionism" or funny beheading disputes. F.a.y. 08:48, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Then go fix them; it'd be appreciated.Proabivouac 09:01, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Funny beheading dispute? Do you really think there's anything funny about beheading childen? Do you know what Muhammad did after his unprovoked attack on Khaiber? 24.7.89.173 22:16, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Schimmel Mahomet & Mahound

Please provide name of book & page number in which Schimmel says Mahomet is Scottish for Mahound. Even better, also write out the sentences where that assertion is made --JimWae 09:39, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

It is found at the introduction (page 2) of Schimmel's Islam:An Introduction. It says "The medieval European image of Islam and its prophet, Muhammad, is a throughly distorted one. The distortion reached such absurdities as to consider Muhammad, usually called Mahomet (hence the Scottish Mahound for devil), to be a kind of "supreme god" and to speak of the adoration of his golden statutes. The image of the goldne Mahomsbilder, golden effigies of Muhammad, continued to be used in early nineteenth-century German romantic poetry."

Also, on page 164 (index) you can find the following... Mahound, Scottish: "evil spirit", derived from Mahomet. -- Szvest 11:34, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

The ref says:

Mahomet cf. Annemarie Schimmel who states that Mahomet is the Scottish "Mahound" meaning "devil", a thoroughly distorted view of Muhammad in medieval west, Schimmel states. See the next footnote for further information about the word "Mahound" cf. Schimmel, Islam: An Introduction, 1992.

Where does the Schimmel text say that "Mahomet IS the Scottish Mahound". It says "hence"... but the relationship is more just similarity of sound - it is not a translation - Mahomet is not a Scottish word - it is how they spelled Mohammed --JimWae 16:35, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Scottish were calling Mahomet instead of Mahound. To them, Mahomet meant the evil spirit. --Aminz 20:06, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

That's not what your source states but quite the opposite: According to your quote, it wasn't that Scottish were calling Mahomet instead of Mahound and Mahomet meant the evil spirit but

1. Scots called Mohammed by the variant of Mahomet, what is not a different name, but merely a different spelling / pronounciation.
2. Scots believed him to be a kind of god to Muslims.
3. Scots used the word Mahound for devil, a word that might have derived from Mahomet.

The quote does not state that Scots considered Muhammad / Mahomet a devil.

--The Hungry Hun 21:03, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree w/ both Jim and Amin. The thing is that Mahound comes from Mahomet (to mean the devil). Mahomet comes from Muhammad (to mean the prophet of Islam). So we can say that Scots got two different meanings for each one of the terms though they are related but not totally inter-related. -- Szvest 20:53, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

The Hungry Hun's better explained what i tried to say. -- Szvest 21:31, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

If you click on the pronunciation linked in the article, it is easy to see that Mahomet comes pretty close to being a phonetic spelling. D & T are often pronounced the same in English - especially at the end of a word (or syllable). Spelling was not standardized before dictionaries came along in the early 1800s. Mahound could be a mockery of either spelling - because there was no "correct" way to spell it then, AND mockery is more commonly a "play" in speech sounds than writing anyway - it was a mockery based on similar sounds at the beginning of the word. I doubt Mahound meant "devil", or anything at all, in any language, at first - it was the "hound" that was used to mock. --JimWae 23:52, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Mohammad's Wives

I was going through the article and I noticed that the names of the wives of Mohammad were missing so I thought I would add them. Problem is I dont know how to . I made some changes earlier but they got deleted so how do I make them permanent–Sonianaveed 06:10, 6 October 2006 (UTC)Sonia

You don't. Misplaced Pages content is constantly added to, revisted, edited, and deleted. It's the fundamental characteristic of the Wiki. Captainktainer * Talk 06:23, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

You have to understand that this article is a vehicle for Dawah, not truth. In any way emphasizing his polygamy is in opposition to this. 24.7.89.173 09:10, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

you have to understand that your constant talk-page trolling and proselytization-via-polemic, as an anon and now as a registered user, that a number of editors are growing weary of, is entirely unacceptable. ideally, you should cease this and refrain from using wikipedia as your personal soapbox in the future. if you have anything constructive to contribute to the encyclopaedia, then please do. ITAQALLAH 17:57, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

To what faith am I trying to convert people with my "proselytizing?" All I'm doing is keeping these articles balanced. If you have a logical argument why anything I've added to any article should be removed, I will consider it, and if you're right, I'll remove it myself. If fact if you can convince me to convert to Islam, I'll do that too. But I don't think you can do any of that. Arrow740 20:30, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

that is precisely the point: how can you keep articles "balanced" when much of your contributions are talk-page regurgitations of polemic? an extremely brief look at your contribution history as both anon and "arrow740" shows that over two thirds of your contribs have been on talk pages, the vast majority being you-know-what (not one edit under your current account has been outside of talkspace). not to mention that much of your mainspace contribs under anon were reverted. of course, there would be no need to expound upon any of this had you not been repeatedly ignoring reminders to cease trolling. that you introduce red herrings like your last comment utterly exemplifies how you are misunderstanding what this project actually is. ITAQALLAH 21:20, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Do you know what proselytizing means? You accused me of it, then I asked you how I was doing it, and you ignored me. Please do not insult me unless you have reasons for doing so. Yes I have been posting to the talk pages a lot. What harm is there in that? If people like you, Ibrahimfaisal, dab, and others address statements to me, should I ignore you? The fact that many of my contributions have been reverted is evidence of nothing more than Ibrahimfaisal's refusal to allow anything even mildly critical of Islam on wikipedia. In one case he refused to let me include the majority Muslim belief that Muhammad died as a result of poisoning (until I found the exact statement from Bukhari's hadith from the website that Ibrahimfaisal usually consults). Who acted wrongly there, him or me? Now answer me this: Do you honestly think this article is fair and balanced? Arrow740 23:35, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

do you enjoy shifting the focus of the discussion through red-herrings? the issue here is what is being perceived as trolling, like the first comment you made in this section. you feel that it is an "insult" to be described with the word "proselytizing", though you are conveniently ignoring the dozens of times you have been accusing other editors of such in far more explicit terms, like in this very section. as for how accurate that word would be, you may want to bring that up on my talk page where we can discuss it at length. is this article (and by that i assume you mean Muhammad) "fair and balanced"? no, but certainly not for the reasons you believe it not to be. my qualm with you is simple: stop trolling, use talk pages how they are supposed to be used. if you want to advocate neutral articles, please do it without resorting to polemic as you have done frequently in the past. ITAQALLAH 00:08, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

as for some of your contributions being reverted, well i did take the time to look at some and in all honesty removing a number of them would be justified on the grounds they generally fall through either WP:NPOV or WP:OR, or even both, though the former has been more frequent. i think a lot of editors would be much more motivated to work with you cordially if you would observe some simple talk page guidelines. ITAQALLAH 00:21, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

If you find any flaw in my argument you may dismiss it as polemic. Otherwise please respond to it in a reasonable way. I have given evidence for my claims of proselytizing, you haven't even identified which religion I'm supposed to be promoting (I'm interested to see what you eventually come up with). Arrow740 00:17, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

your own arguments generally carry no merit here: as it would count as WP:OR. we deal in what is verifiable and attributable to reliable or at least notable sources. if you want to formulate your own arguments you may be interested in . ITAQALLAH 00:27, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

You consistently ignore my responses to you and have yet to substatiate your claim that I am proselytizing. In fact my arguments with which you have such problems have all been posted to talk pages and were either proposing additions to articles, thus appropriate, or responding to others statements regarding the article or otherwise, which is again appropriate.

You only seem interested in telling me to shut up. I would take you more seriously if you had ever tried to censor someone who agreed with you; if you cared about NPOV, your would have. In any case, give me a list of my postings to talk pages which were inappropriate, and cite wikipedia rules to prove your point. You can post to my talk page if you want. Again, I don't think you'll be able to prove anything of the things you're saying about me, and if you continue to be unable to back up anything you say, I'm going to have to ask you to stop harassing me. Arrow740 20:04, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

discussion continued here. ITAQALLAH 21:50, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Please calm down guys. Just reading your comments here (i have no idea which edits are being disputed upon) but this is what the policy mandates:

• Articles should contain only material that has been published by reputable sources.
• Editors adding new material to an article should cite a reputable source, or it may be challenged or removed by any editor.
• The obligation to provide a reputable source lies with the editors wishing to include the material, not on those seeking to remove it. -- Szvest 23:59, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

excuse me. All I wanted to do was add the names of Mohammad's wives and this led to a long heated argument. The only reason I am on the talk page is because I have just recently joined wikipedia and am not very familiar with how it works. your accusation of constant talk-page trolling and proselytization-via-polemic, as an anon and now as a registered user could not possible refer to me and I dont think it does because some one else has already replied to it. But then why am I seeing it under my contribution. This is very confusing.

Marriage to a child

Did Muhammad not marry a child of 6 years old, and consumated the union when she was 9? 86.7.208.240 16:09, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

how about you read the article? hint, find the section "family life", or click on Aisha directly. Hell, we even have Aisha's age at marriage, which has more on the question than you ever wanted to know. Only if you are asking in earnest of course, maybe you would prefer to just a few more "pedophile" headers to this page to stir things up a bit? dab (ᛏ) 16:28, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Presentation on the life of Muhammad

Please comment if this should be posted as an external link. http://www.geocities.com/moreonislam/prophetmuhammadandyou.pps — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tahniyat (talk • contribs) 23:55, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac , Stop "misrepresenting" the sources

This is a warning. Proabivouac, don't do misrepresent the sources.--Aminz 06:34, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Tell us where did you find this information: " Non-Muslims were offered the choice between conversion to Islam, payment of a special tax upon non-Muslims, or to be attacked until Islamic rule was accepted. Some areas which were previously under the Persia or Byzantium rule enjoyed reduced taxes, greater local autonomy and greater religious freedom for Jews as well as unorthodox Christians."

--Aminz 06:38, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Could you please quote for us what the text exactly says. --Aminz 06:40, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

"Christians and Jews were offered ..." not only the source doesn't mention this, but it is also wrong. The status of Dhimmi was also given to Zoroastrians and (later Hindus and Buddhists which is not related to the early Islam). Tell us where in source did you find this? --Aminz 06:49, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Regarding Taxation, doesn't the source says that for many, Muslim's rule was just the changing of master. You are writing as if taxation wasn't required under other rules? --Aminz 06:52, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

From page 37 as referenced:

"Thus non-Muslims were offered three choices: (1) conversion to Islam and full membership in the community; (2) retention of one’s faith and payment of a poll tax; or (3), if they refused Islam or "protected" status, warfare until Islamic rule was accepted."

Also,

"...under Muslim rule, idolatry and paganism would be eliminated, and all people of the book could live in a society guided and protected by Muslim power."

If you'd like to add Zoroastrians to "Christians and Jews," that's fine.Proabivouac 06:57, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

You are using "The Islamic Threat: Myth Or Reality?" book but I am using "Islam the Straight Path" (extended edition). Let me check your source. --Aminz 07:06, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

It's also in Straight Path, p.35. Esposito routinely plagiarizes himself.Proabivouac 07:36, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, none of Esposito's books contain the phrase "Thus non-Muslims were offered three choices: (1) conversion to Islam and full membership in the community; (2) retention of one’s faith and payment of a poll tax; or (3), if they refused Islam or "protected" status, warfare until Islamic rule was accepted". In fact, you've taken this from the "Is Organized Religion A Sham" written by Ed Sepernik p. 352 which I am not sure if is a reliable source (it seems to be polemics though) . Now, I am not happy with you man. I am asking again, do you again confirm that Esposito on page 37 says: "Thus non-Muslims were offered three choices: (1) conversion to Islam and full membership in the community; (2) retention of one’s faith and payment of a poll tax; or (3), if they refused Islam or "protected" status, warfare until Islamic rule was accepted."? --Aminz 07:13, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

You are wrong. I am looking right at Esposito, page 37, and have quoted it word for word. Check Google Books "The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality?" if you don't have it handy. I know nothing of the Sepernik book, and would never consider introducing material from such a source. If it appears there, I assume he is quoting Esposito.Proabivouac 07:20, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Searching for "Thus non-Muslims were offered three choices: (1) conversion to Islam and full membership in the community; (2) retention of one’s faith and payment of a poll tax; or (3), if they refused Islam or "protected" status, warfare until Islamic rule was accepted" in google, I only found "Is Organized Religion A Sham" p. 352. But it seems that it also appears in page 37 of Esposito. Balant copyright violation by Ed Sepernik. I am sorry, I couldn't think of such a copyright violation.

Here is what Esposito writes in p.34 of the "Islam the Straight Path":

"Religious communities were free to practice their faith-to worship and be governed by their religious leaders and laws in such areas as marriage, divorce, and inheritance. In exchange, they were required to pay tribute, a poll tax (jizya) that entitled them to Muslim protection from outside aggression and exempted them from military service. There were therefore called the "protected ones" (dhimmi). In effect, this often meant lower taxes, greater local autonomy, rule by fellow Semites with close linguistic and cultural ties than the Hellenized, Greco-Roman elites of Byzantium, and greater religious freedom for Jews and indigenous Christians."

I have also read the Esposito's quote in his other book. I still have problems with it. You have written :"Christians and Jews were offered the choice between conversion to Islam, payment of a special tax upon non-Muslims, or to be attacked until Islamic rule was accepted, while the practice of other religions was banned altogether." --Aminz 07:39, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

"under Muslim rule, idolatry and paganism would be eliminated, and all people of the book could live"Proabivouac 07:58, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

But on page 36, it says that the populations were either Jews, Christians or Zoroastrians. So, saying "while the practice of other religions was banned altogether." is irrelevant. --Aminz 08:06, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Then what was this "idolatry and paganism" that was "eliminated"?Proabivouac 08:18, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

"Islam the Striaght Path" doesn't mention it. "The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality?" says that "The Islamic ideal was to fashion a world in which, under Muslim rule, idolatry and paganism would be eliminated". The very early Muslim conquerers didn't find pagans in the conquered lands. Later Muslim conquerers gave the Dhimmi status even to Hindus. --Aminz 08:39, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

"The very early Muslim conquerers didn't find pagans in the conquered lands. Later Muslim conquerers gave the Dhimmi status even to Hindus."

That's not in the source, either. All that is in the source is that idolatry and paganism are eliminated. But we all know that these were banned, so why the fight? Wikilaw, for sure. Actually, it seems an excuse to change the order of the sentences in the paragraph. None of this should even be here. It's unfortunate that you felt the need to introduce this source to begin with, for that forces others to waste their time - ultimately our time - balancing it. I propose instead that this entire passage be deleted as off-topic. That would solve our problem while keeping this article on track.

Meanwhile, can Truthspreader and anon join the discussion? It's depressing to see such shameless edit warring.Proabivouac 08:53, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

P. 36 says: "The indigenous peoples in the conquered ares belonged to one of the three major "scriptural" communities" p. 37 says: "The Islamic ideal was to fashion a world in which, under Muslim rule, idolatry and paganism would be eliminated" (the first part of which you didn't quote). My presentation of the source is quite fair. Yours was not (saying only Zoroastirans had to convert). --Aminz 08:57, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

And as to the order, actually honesty is a good thing to have. The text mentions those points at the very end of the section (one of them doesn't even mention). --Aminz 08:59, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

I reiterate that this entire discussion is off-topic for this article. It's really unfortunate that you introduced it. Propose to eliminate the entire discussion, or move it to a more relevant article.Proabivouac 09:13, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Of course it is relevant. Do you want people to get the impression that Muslims were spreading their faith by sword? --Aminz 10:03, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

The current introduction merely states that Muhammad's successors conquered a vast territory and also introduced Islam to the newly-acquired territories. Is that untrue? Your addition does not challenge it, it merely states some ways in which this benefited inhabitants of some of the conquered territories. "Introduced" is pretty neutral wording when we could as easily write "ruthlessly imposed Islamic law upon" or "invited them to embrace the truth of Islam."Proabivouac 10:14, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, I am not adding any untrue sentences. But there is such misconceptions in the minds of many readers that Muslims were spreading their faith by sword. Pope is a good example of such people. Aside from these, Taxes and Religous freedom was one of the most important concerns of the inhabitants. Even today taxes are of concern. Back then, it was more important. I am fine with summarizing the whole text in a sentence saying that 1. they lower taxes and 2. provided greater local autonomy and religous freedom. I think it is a fair summary of what the source says. --Aminz 10:26, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

JFK also lowered taxes and supported religious freedom, but without forcing people to convert to Islam, pay a special tax or be attacked. Greater religious freedom? Note that Esposito specifies local unorthodox Christians (at this time, Catholics and Greek Orthodox are the same), that is, a small minority. Most inhabitants were orthodox and lost religious freedom even under Esposito's formulation.

What is really more on-topic here? Was Muhammad a seventh-century supply-sider, or a religious leader? Of course here we're not even talking about Muhammad but his successors, so that much more off-topic.Proabivouac 10:39, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Borelli, John. Christian-Muslim Relations in the United States: Reflections for the Future After Two Decades of Experience. The Muslim World. 94 (3), 321-333, July 2004. says on p.330 when second Caliph Umar conquered different lands, The Nestorian Patriarch in Persia, Yeshuyab III wrote: “They have not attacked the Christian religion, but rather they have commended our faith, honored our priests . . . and conferred benefits on churches and monasteries.” TruthSpreader 10:48, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, I am not interested in discussing the historical benefits of Islam to humanity, not as a religion, but as a system of social laws. People today may easily live without religion but that back then, it was religion which was regulating people's actions. Esposito explicitly says "greater religious freedom". So, you are doing original research inspired by your POV. It is clear that Esposito is writing about the early conquests and also it is clear that the points I mentioned are a fair summary of what he states. So, adding that in just a sentence or two isn't inappropriate. Proabivouac, I have encountered with some people who are filled with hate for Muhammad and Islam and that's enough for me. Any unbiased reader would notice Esposito's stress on the point that Muslims were builders rather than destroyers. But this is so difficult for you to see. --Aminz 11:06, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Certainly that is Esposito's stress, but that is also why you choose to rely heavily on him, is it not? He is, however, occasionally obliged to nod towards neutrality, and if we're to use him, there's nothing wrong with reflecting these nods in our text. That he chooses not to dwell on the fact of the forcefully imposed supremacy of Islam, but only mentions it in passing, reflects his own POV as surely as would the opposite. We're obliged to be more neutral than Esposito where we can be, not to duplicate his tone where he's not. In this vein, observe that his "local Christians" upon whom was imposed a "foreign orthodoxy" did not refer to all or even the majority of Christians, though it may have in some areas (for example, Nestorians.)

"I have encountered with some people who are filled with hate for Muhammad and Islam and that's enough for me." Fortunately, they don't seem to have had much of an influence on this article beyond trolling on this talk page. To maintain NPOV, we also must be wary of those filled with love for Muhammad and Islam, for love is as non-neutral as hate. Do you disagree?

In this instance, the very inclusion of this information is off-topic and POV. You say you wish to "discuss the historical benefits of Islam to humanity, not as a religion, but as a system of social laws." More neutral would be to discuss its impact; more on-topic would be to discuss Muhammad's impact. For example, to observe where Muhammad's teachings served as the basis for the policies of his successors is be on-topic as long as the former remains the central subject, and neutral so long as we discuss it without the aim of suggesting to readers that they ought to like or dislike Muhammad. Your additions, as they stand, fail those tests.Proabivouac 20:15, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, do you have any other sources commenting on Muslim early conquests? I have read about Dhimmi in general but Esposito was my only source on the early conquests. The regulations mentioned in Pack of Omar is considered to be later forgery partly copied from Christian and Zoraostrian sources, so that doesn't help. That's why I choose to rely on that source. I still think that all I wrote was a fair summary of what Esposito said in "Islam the Striaght Path". None of your additions wasn't there. --Aminz 04:49, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

As mentioned above (I understand it's easy to miss threaded responses), the three choices found on page 37 of Islamic Threat are also found on page 35 of Straight Path.Proabivouac 05:15, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I found it. I had read pages 33-34 and stoped reading after he went explaining the misconcetion about jihad. I am fine with having a summary of p.35 as well. --Aminz 05:23, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Small Change

I deleted the variant" mohamet" at the start of the article as it is not really a correct transliteration of the arabic pronounication of the name, and honestly, in the many religious books about muhammad or mohammed i have never come across THIS (mohamet) type of spelling. Ofcourse its fine to mention there ARE other variants of the spelling of the name, but wouldnt it be correct just to mention the most widley used, and most widley regarded correct names ( which is i think muhammad and mohammed)? what do the other wikipedians think ? thanks for your comments.

--Aadamh 15:10, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

• It was a widely-used spelling in writings a couple of centuries ago - also "Mahomet" appears several times in this article - neither are noted in text or footnote now --JimWae 17:18, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
• On Google, there are 138,00 hits for Mohamet - along with a suggestion (did you mean Mahomet?). There are almost 2.5 million hits for Mahomet (excluding -Illinois). Because Mahomet is so different in spelling (though little different in sound), many people might not be aware it is just a variant spelling--JimWae 20:46, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
• 1911 Britannica article is under name Mahomet http://encyclopedia.jrank.org/LUP_MAL/MAHOMET_strictly_MUHAMMAD_commo.html --JimWae 20:48, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Esposito references

There are many references to Esposito - many give only a year and no title. Some give different years for the same book. They all need attention.--JimWae 17:34, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

The trouble is that these books have undergone several reprints, some in the same year. Standard practice would be to use the original year and page number where possible, and to use titles until it's sorted out. If a pubication is to be cited only by year in references, its title must appear in the bibliography.Proabivouac 20:19, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Women's rights

The Women's rights section exemplifies everything that is wrong with what several editors are trying to do with this article.

• This article is about Muhammad, not Islam or Islamic law. Islam and Islamic law are only on-topic when we connect it to Muhammad taught, said or did.
• It is unencyclopedic to ask, "Was this good or bad by contemporary standards?" and then providing a section for each view. If there is a disputed point of fact, then present the views side-by-side, not in different sections. If the dispute is only one of value judgement, then it doesn't need to be here at all.
• It is of course not neutral to create a "positive view" section while leaving the "negative view" as a stub. That one might say, "well, you're free to provide a negative view" evades the fundamental point: editors shouldn't be attempting to provide either a positive or a negative view in their edits, and it should occur to you that perhaps other editors don't wish to be placed in the position of prosecuting the subject of the article simply to "balance things out."

It is bad enough that some editors are incapable or unwilling to provide a balanced approach without institutionalizing it by dividing labor and article space in this way. The current section constitutes a shameless admission of advocacy on the part of its creators.Proabivouac 01:05, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, you are very ungrateful. I, myself added the views of Leila Ahmed to the article. I found this source hardly in a journal. Sigh! I found it last night and now you are welcoming me with this warm comment. All I added was my most sincere efforts in reflecting what academic scholars think. --Aminz 04:42, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

It's nothing to do with being grateful or ungrateful. You are adding well-sourced material to Misplaced Pages, which is commendable. Your selection of this material is often POV, which is not particularly commendable, but that's also true of many other productive editors. Your placement and arrangement of this material is at times inappropriate. If the material is about women under Islamic law as interpreted and applied by later generations, then Muhammad is simply not the place for an extended discussion, much less a POV one.Proabivouac 05:21, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

It is related to Muhammad being a reformer, so it is relevant. Academic scholars are trying to recover what Muhammad really taught, so it is relevant. --Aminz 05:27, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, please do NOT tone down or neutralize the sayings of academic scholars. Instead, find the view of another scholar and let them talk for themselves. Thank you--Aminz 05:29, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

No, that is not the way we must do it. One of our jobs is to distinguish findings of fact from individual POV, cite the first to reliable sources, and attribute the second to noteworthy ones. If John Esposito writes, "Muhammad was a great guy," we don't write, "Muhammad was a great guy" and cite it to Esposito. Of course the most faithful way to represent scholar's opinions is to quote dump, but we're not supposed to do that, either. Rather, we're to paraphrase their points in a neutral tone and manner.Proabivouac 05:36, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, you've messed up my hardwork. Esposito says: "Muhammad's phenomenal success" and then says that western scholars have marvelled at it. It is not his own POV then. (Lewis also says that modern historians can not agree that "so great and significant a movement was started by a self-seeking impostor." You also removed "and presents views of different scholars, however he asserts one thing is certain: "that something happened that transformed his whole consciousness and filled him with a spiritual strength that decided the whole course of his life. He felt himself compelled to proclaim the revelations that were communicated to him in a mysterious way." Welch states that it is difficult to determine that to what extent Muhammad was influenced by various monotheistic ideas and movements existed in Arabia at that time and presents views of different scholars, however he asserts that one thing is certain: "that something happened that transformed his whole consciousness and filled him with a spiritual strength that decided the whole course of his life. He felt himself compelled to proclaim the revelations that were communicated to him in a mysterious way."" It IS a fair presentation of the source. He says that there is no controversy that something happened to Muhammad. So, that should be all the scholars think. Bye --Aminz 05:50, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

You also removed " being found by his followers as a righteous, trustworthy, pious, compassionate and honest man." Why? Because you don't like it. How is it that even when you attribute something to Esposito, still it should be censored???? --Aminz 05:53, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

It's not censored. "and the ability to win and maintain the trust of his followers" is a fair and neutral thumbnail paraphrase of Esposito's text and meaning. This isn't the place for quote dumps; capturing the main point and moving on is both acceptable and desirable.

Similarly, "that something happened that transformed his whole consciousness and filled him with a spiritual strength that decided the whole course of his life. He felt himself compelled to proclaim the revelations that were communicated to him in a mysterious way." is fairly paraphrased as " should be regarded as genuine." The inclusion of Welch is its entirety doesn't add any information ("something happened"?), and is palpably POV..Proabivouac 06:23, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

1. Really? "and the ability to win and maintain the trust of his followers" is the same as " being found by his followers as a righteous, trustworthy, pious, compassionate and honest man."?????? If it is the same to you (which I am sure it is not, but you don't want to accept), then I'll write my version.

2. You haven't responded to the "phenomenal" comment.

3. "that something happened that transformed his whole consciousness and filled him with a spiritual strength that decided the whole course of his life. He felt himself compelled to proclaim the revelations that were communicated to him in a mysterious way." says much more. Talks about a force that was pushing Muhammad. It well matches with Muhammad's initial revelations and starting a movement when there was no prospect of success. Again, I will post the other version. --Aminz 06:33, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

You've not added one substantial fact about Muhammad besides what I've paraphrased.Proabivouac 06:55, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, you pretend to be neutral and wise but that you are NOT. You look down upon others and talk from the position of a neutral person but infact, your real self-definition of neutrality is something that doesn't conflict with your thoughts much. Esposito uses "phenomenal" to describe Muhammad's success and says that western scholars has marvelled at it. Lewis says "great and significant" movement. Encyclopedia of Islam's article on Muhammad has the same prose. Your intention from the very beginning was to criticize other people's work, why? because that's easy and makes you feel good. You don't want to refer to the sources and be productive, why? because you have to spend two hours to add a well-researched paragraph and even then, there is always the possibility of unknowledgable editors who appear and remove your edits, because they don't like it (even if it is a footnote for example on Mahound). Proabivouac, don't think that you are the one who determines what should be there in the article. --Aminz 17:14, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I can't imagine that anyone would disagree that his success was "phenomenal", that his movement was "great and significant", or that scholars have "marvelled" at it. That doesn't mean all this languge needs to be in the article. No, dealing with this is not easy, and it doesn't make me feel good. In fact it's incredibly frustrating that one has to go through all this trouble to make such obvious improvements the article. Editting is also a lot of work. Remember this is a wiki. We're supposed to be collaborating. I have carefully considered your material, and taken care not to eliminate or alter its sense. You've shown no sign that you've considered what I've tried to do and why, but merely assume it's an excuse for a POV war. You appear to be so stuck on these glowing turns of phrase that you can't step back from it a bit and see how unencyclopedic these passages are in their current form. The inclusion of the material is not the issue, and thank you for finding it, but your work needs editting with a mind to brevity and topicality, and avoiding quote-dumping of lofty rhetoric regardless of its source. Are you quite certain that every word you've written is perfect, and every one of my edits to them wrong?Proabivouac 19:22, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

The language you think is unencyclopedic is the language that "Encyclopedia of Islam", Esposito and sometimes Lewis is using. If they are exciting things about Muhammad and these scholars express their excitements using such words, there is no reason to hide them. Like it or not, that excitement is part of the literature. You even don't let Esposito's description of "being found as righteous, trustworthy, pious, compassionate and honest" to stay there. Instead you are removing morality values of the sentence by replacing it with "win and maintain the trust of his followers", something which even hitler and all leaders did. You know well what you are doing. You think if a sentence would even suggest that Muhammad was a good man, it will be un-neutral. But the definition of neutrality in wikipedia is NPOV = ALL POV. I.E. The neutrality is acheived by inclusion of all views and not changing scholar's words from their true position. I respect the personality of Muhammad so much, and am willing to spend time searching in sources that are friendly to him and add what professors of Islamic studies have to say about him. But once I chose a section in a source, I try to represent it fairly. I often try to merge a couple of sentences into one sentence, so it is not quote dumping per say, and I don't think it is a copyright violation. Proabivouac, your edits, most of them, are in the direction of what you view "neutralizing" the sentences. I view it as a systematic distortion of the sources through chaging the language they are using (and sometimes putting words into their mouth. Welch, I don't think, believes that Muhammad was recieving revelations, but that he was a great and respectable man) --Aminz 21:57, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

You're right, I know exactly what I'm doing. Where "excitement" is part of the literature, we're supposed to ferret it out and state things soberly, not reflect it in Misplaced Pages. Reliable sources are reliable for findings in their fields, not for extraneous and subjective reactions to the subject, which you aptly call "morality values." This is especially a problem in books written for popular audiences, where a neutral presentation of fact is by itself unmarketable and where standards of scholarship are not uniformly applied.

"You think if a sentence would even suggest that Muhammad was a good man, it will be un-neutral."

It is perfectly acceptable to present material that suggest value judgements indirectly through the sober presentation of facts (or of disagreement on points of fact where these exist). We don't need to say, "he accomplished great and important things" when merely recounting history shows this to be true. There is a WP guideline which states something to this effect, which may be rephrased as, "don't tell it, show it." Consider what evidence there is for his honesty, piety, kindness and whatever other fine qualities you believe he had. Then include these points in the article in a historical and non-polemic manner - that is, don't create a section, "evidence that Muhammad was so-and-so", but just tell what happened in chronological order.Proabivouac 00:51, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

The proof that you didn't look at my edits very closely before reverting is that you restored your duplication of the Welch material. Had you actually examined what I'd done with a cool head, you would have retained that fix, at least. If I've actually distorted points of substance, that is a legitimate point. I wonder if you are willing to concede that I have some legitimate points as well.Proabivouac 00:51, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

There is no policy avioding us to censor the consensus of academic scholars. We can add the evidences, but I don't have to follow your guildline on how things should be. Of course, I am not going to read your wholesale removal of sourced material lest there is something good there. See, most of 19th century scholars such as Lammens, Muir, Arthur Jeffery, Margoliouth had a very dark view of Muhammad in the Medinian period at least. It is only recently that the view of a good portion of the academic scholars has changed. Anyways, I am going to be less active in wikipedia. Don't change my edits siginificantly please. --Aminz 01:44, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Aminz, you're not engaging my points at all. You write, "Of course, I am not going to read your wholesale removal of sourced material lest there is something good there." And you're proud of this? How are you able to pass judgement on edits you don't read? It's absolutely untrue to say that I've removed sourced material, any more than you "censored" your sources when you chose only portions of them to include to begin with. It is our job to evaluate the sources, determine what is worthy of being included (you've not been neutral about this at all) and decide how best to characterize the important points, and to review one anothers' work in these regards. I am taking issue with the way you've done this and that is entirely legitimate.Proabivouac 03:02, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I did read several pieces of your edits and found them improper. They were all done along the same lines. And please don't compare me with yourself. If I am not interested in something, I don't write about it, but you, instead, distort (well, you call it "neutralizing" the source) the source. I wasn't interested in writing how Welch thinks the religous ideas of Muhammad was evolved, but even then added this to the "historical view of Muhammad" section. Of course, I am not going to spend my time working on it. So, please don't compare me with yourself.--Aminz 03:31, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Obviously, you didn't read them closely enough to see that I'd removed duplicated material…which can't be very closely at all, now, can it? Perhaps you saw the duplication removed, and called it vandalism? It was, after all, "removal of sourced material." As for reliable sources, your credibility has not benefited from your hearty recommendation to keep one of the most outrageous piles of unsourced nonsense ever to appear on Misplaced Pages. It seems your standards are very lenient to non-existent when an article promotes a point of view to which you're sympathetic.Proabivouac 04:44, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I have found the following sourced material from some 19th century scholars. Would you be happy to add both these material side by side with the material already was there in the article?

Margoliouth, asserts that the first written biography of Muhammad, 'Ibn Ishaq' is exceed­ingly unfavorable to Muhammad. Marogoliouth exaplins that this biography depicts Muhammad as the tyrant of Medina, and his career to have been that of a "robber chief, whose political economy consists in securing and dividing plunder, the distribution of the latter being at times carried out on principles which fail to satisfy his fol­lowers's ideas of justice." cf Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, volume 8, p. 878.

As to the AfD, you've missed the point there. This nomination was done only 16 hours after the first one decided to give time to the editors to turn the article into a sourced article. You failed to see this, didn't you? I changed my vote. --Aminz 08:47, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Sura 4:34

Why is there no mention of sura 4:34 here? It states that men are in charge of women, men are made by God to excel women, good women are obedient, and if men fear rebellion from their women, they can scourge them. Shouldn't these facts be mentioned here? If no one responds soon I will quote the entire sura here. Arrow740 07:50, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

And why would this be in this article about Muhammad instead of a more general article about the religion he brought to prominence or a more specific article about women's rights in Muslim society? It just seems to be out of place here. --ElKevbo 21:51, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

ElKevbo, there is a currently a fairly lengthy Muhammad#Women's rights section. It is, as you say, utterly out of place in this article (as well as entirely POV.) Would you agree with me that this should be moved elsewhere?Proabivouac 00:54, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I am going to put Yusuf Ali's translation of sura 4:34 into the article, and will defend it once you guys try to take it out. So if you want to stop me this is the time to dissuade me. Arrow740 21:36, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

that is known as disruption of wikipedia (in this case, to prove a WP:POINT), as is reporting an article again for afd less than a day after consensus was reached to "keep" in the previous nom. ITAQALLAH 22:00, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

So discussing something beforehand is disruptive? I think this sura is relevant to "Muhammad and Women's Rights." And this is not the place to discuss the other article, though in my defense, the article I nominated for deletion is very different from the one that was kept previously. I'm working on a well-documented piece to put in the "negative views" section; it may take me a while. It's sad that it has to be done this way, but you guys have put so much work into the "positive views" section and it's so dense that I don't want to have to rewrite the whole thing. Arrow740 23:14, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I fail to see how adding genuine content relative to a section, regardless of its views, can be labelled "disruptive". This is an encyclopedia is it not? —Aiden 06:57, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Your censorship

Who are you guys trying to block by refusing anonymous and new user editions, and how can you justify it? Arrow740 06:29, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Aminz' readdition of the s-protect template is only cosmetic; it is of no real effect.Proabivouac 06:31, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Arrow740, why don't you edit using your regular account. --Aminz 06:34, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

The talk page is not the place for such a request. It is inappropriate here, and you should post to my own talk page. You should ask itaq for a lesson on where you should post what; he makes a little more sense than you do. In any case this is the only account I use. What are you referring to? Arrow740 06:39, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

There was a lot of vandalism from anonymous editors, so I s-protected the page. That's all. --Aminz 06:41, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

So answer my question; what other account? Arrow740 06:42, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

You need to stop harassing people, Aminz. Don't you think it's childish to constantly accuse people of using sockpuppets? Arrow740 08:18, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Anonymous "mahound" comment

why u are adding this wrong variant "mahound" again n again. its a blasphemy against our prophet.can not be tolerated.respect other religions.Please dont add this word "mahound" again. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.147.179.191 (talk • contribs) 04:11, October 8, 2006 (UTC)

We are just saying that certian people say it. we are not calling him that or anything. please remember this is not an islamic encyclopedia. Zazaban 21:30, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Blashemy? Hmmm....blashpemy only applies when refering to God; I'm quite sure mohowmud was not devine.DocEss 21:33, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but there seems to be a personality cult around muhammed with some muslims. Zazaban 00:29, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes , He was not devine. I thing i want to say is Jesus(pbuh) is our prophet but if someone add his name variant that was used by romans to vilify him , you and i will erase it because it would be not common. In name variant dont add those term which were used to vilify him but another thing is that no one say dis word to him or said by few people. Suppose If i make an article about you i will write ur name i wont write name that was used by ur mate to vilify you.. thats why that name "Mahound" makes no sense at all. And it hurts feelings of muslim.. i know its not religious encylopedia but in religion topic u cant write anything else but religion. and if we cant write abt religion we should remove all religious things in wikipedia topic of hindusim , christianity or judaism. It would be better of you respect other veiws and feelings—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 202.147.179.191 (talk • contribs) .

anon, please remember to sign your comments (type ~~~~ after your comments). if you wish to involve yourself further in the editorial process you may wish to consider registration. ITAQALLAH 15:07, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Semi-protection requested

I've requested this page be semi-protected as several anonymous editors insist on making large changes to the article with no discussion in Talk or useful edit summaries. --ElKevbo 11:25, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

"Historical View"

If we write "from a historical perspective", it remains unclear whether this historical perspective is theological or non-theological, because in the theological view of history Muhammad isn't even the historical founder of Islam. So we need to write that Muhammad is the founder of Islam from the secular (=non-theological) perspective, and that from the non-secular (=theological) perspective he is not. The word "historical" simply doesn't differentiate between the theological and the non-theological view of history. — Editorius 14:45, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Does this undercutting two-step happen in any other article connected to a world religion? "From a 'secular' perspective, St. Paul must be considered the founder of Christianity, inasmuch as Christ himself chose not to elucidate yadda yadda yadda..." "From a 'non-secular' perspective, of course, the followers of Judaism claim it has no human founder ..."

No. You don't see this quibbling Why not? Well, one reason, people would laugh you off the page. Another reason, it's blatant anti- proselytizing. A responsible encyclopedia rejects such an approach to the world's faith systems. Go start a blog or something. BYT 01:02, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

BrandonYusufToropov, it is rather you who proselytize by propagating the patently absurd notion that Islam was practiced prior to Muhammad. The two-stepping is indeed undesirable; Editorius is merely attempting to compromise by incuding your absurd view alongside the obvious one.Proabivouac 01:07, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

A Jew would qualify as a practicising Muslim before Jesus and A christian as a practicsing Muslim before Muhammad. Your view is socialogically centered. What are you referring to is not the concept of Islam as a religion of beleifs but one of social pratices and behaviour akin to that of a particular modern community. You need to qualify your view accordingly, and this problem of misconception is why as a responsible encylopedic article there probably needs to be an explanation. Qualify both views, maybe in a seperate section if clutter of intro needs to avoided and a neutral acceptable sentence in the intro indicating a conflict inserted instead so that interested parties can get the details in the relevant section. He was the founder of society with certrain characteristics but as a monotheistic religious tradition he did merely restated pre-existing concepts.--Tigeroo 11:26, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

• From a Christian (non-secular) perspective M is not the founder? From a Jewish (non-secular) perspective, M is not the founder? From a non-Islamic perspective, M is the founder, while from an Islamic perspective he did not start a new religion, but restored ... From a non-denominational perspective, M is the founder... --JimWae 05:21, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
• The historical perspective does not have "within it" a theological perspective, and it does not include God/Allah as a historical person. From a historical perspective, the founder of Islam is not God. Historical perspective also works --JimWae 05:31, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Right you are. The game here is to treat Muslim and non-Muslim as equal opposites, as if there were a single non-Muslim viewpoint that resulted from an analogous and opposite practice of arbitrary indoctrination, as if non-Muslims were taught that the Qur'an is false, that images of prophets are okay, that Muhammad founded Islam, etc., then attended Colleges of Non-Islamic Science from which to develop these theories. Not so. Where completely independent people with diverse backgrounds and overall views independantly assume the same perspective on a given issue, while only those followers of a specific ideology take a contradictory perspective, these do not carry equal weight. It is the Muslim view that is ideology-specific and cognitively marked.

The answer is to state that Muhammad founded Islam, then to say that Muslims believe he restored the religion of Adam etc., and to neither highlight nor worry about the contradiction, which probably isn't all that salient to anyone who is reading rather than obsessing over the article.

"Xorqu is considered by Xorquists to have been born on planet Xorq aeons ago, and sent to Earth to complete the teachings of the Ancient ones. From a non-Xorquist secular historical perspective, he was born in Akron, Ohio in 1953…"

Sigh.Proabivouac 05:48, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

The only way to end the edit warring is to observe WP:NPOV and present both views - that according to most of the world and from a historical perspective, he was the (historical) founder, but that according to Muslims he did not found a new religion, but restored... --JimWae 06:09, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but we should not have to characterize the obvious view as a special kind of view, "non-Muslim," "secular," "historical" or otherwise; it is citable to reliable sources (e.g. EB) as fact and should be stated as such. The Islamic view is the special one, based only upon partisan unreliable sources, but due to its notability must be included following the general/non-partisan view.Proabivouac 06:27, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Jim hit the nail on the head. It is a violation of WP:NPOV to omit the historical viewpoint. Show both views, that is the neutral way. —Aiden 07:01, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Of course. But the questions still arise: in which order should they be presented, and how, if at all, should the "non-Muslim" view be qualified? Jim also hit the nail on the head when he observed that not just the in the historical view, but in the Christian and Jewish theological views, Muhammad is the founder. "Most everyone except Muslims" is exactly accurate, but unduly prejudicial.Proabivouac 07:11, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Let's stick to reality, please -- I am not saying, and have never said, that the article must incorporate the position that Muslims are right when they say Islam was practiced before M, and non-Muslims who hold the contrary belief are wrong. Again, and please read carefuly: Observant Jews believe Moses received the Ten Commandments from God; atheists and Wiccans might dispute that. Yet we don't bolt a "beware, from a historical/secular/non-hallucinatory perspective, this bit about the Commandments is nonsense" label onto the Judaism article. Nor should we. BYT 09:22, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Of course such a caveat would be completely out of place in any article. We should restrict ourselves to statements of fact: facts attributed to reliable academic sources, whese these do not disagree, and facts about the opinions of notable sources. To observe and comment upon contradictions we editors perceive between these is a sort of original research.Proabivouac 09:55, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

No violation of NPOV is observed of the same in articles about Paul, Jesus, Abraham or Moses all personages who are considered founders of religion from one historical view point or the other. A compromise has been found there and it serves as a good example to emulate here.--Tigeroo 11:26, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

BYT, you write: "Does this undercutting two-step happen in any other article connected to a world religion?"

What do you think induced me to use the differentiating phrases "from a secular p." & "from a theological p."?

Answer: The behaviour of Muslims like you, who have been incessantly ranting and raving against the simplest formulation "M. is the founder of the religion of Islam"—full stop!

I could live very well with this formulation, but obviously you can't, you hypocrite!

Anyway, we certainly do not have to make an explicit decision here as to whether the Islamic view of history is the right one or not. All we have to do is state the two conflicting perspectives.

And, JimWae, for this purpose "historical" simply isn't sufficient, while "secular" will do.

It's the following semantic aspect of "secular" that is most relevant here:

<Not specifically relating to religion or to a religious body>

(http://www.bartleby.com/61/90/S0209000.html)

This aspect is not included in "historical" alone.

Editorius 14:09, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

First of all, I agree with your assertion that "secular" is the better word to use in this context.

Second, and more importantly, I completely object to the tone and content of your post. I understand that this is a heated discussion but accusations of hyprocisy and raving are completely inappropriate and unhelpful. Please cease your personal attacks on other Misplaced Pages editors. --ElKevbo 15:41, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, of course, the incredible amount of bullshitting the reader is confronted with here is certainly much more helpful than my marginal personal criticism of some, which I do consider justified. I've tried my best to be as helpful, objective, and fair as possible for a very long time. But unfortunately, some Muslim blokes such as BYT, who are grimly determined to boycott or even sabotage any formulation that is "not Islamic enough", give a damn about other people trying to be helpful. It is this fact that makes me alter my tone sometimes.—Editorius 16:36, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Making personal attacks against other editors is against WP policy and degrades the dialogue necessary to improve articles. Please stop doing it. BYT 13:09, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

??

The first sentence of this article reads: "Muhammad (Arabic محمد muḥammad; also Mohammed, Mohamet, and other variants ), 570-632 C.E., was an Arab religious reformer and political leader who preached the monotheistic religion of Islam which he established." Could we maybe add after "established", " as we know it today" so it reads at the end of the first sentence "... who preached the monotheistic religion of Islam which he established, as we know it today". I say this because as many of you will probably know many muslims believe that Islam is not a new religion but a reestablishment of the true monotheistic faith, starting from the prophet Aadam. So to clarify that when we mean Muhammad founded Islam, we do not mean Islam just as a religion, but as a political, social as well as religious entity. So just to save confusion and controversy among fellow wikipedians, readers and researchers etc., could we add these small five words? ("as we know it today")?? If everyone kindly agrees, could someone do this, as whenever i enter the "edit this page" tab i see something that is different to the article that is written. Thank you very much. --Aadamh 18:46, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like a workable idea to me. What do others think? (BTW, that text dump you encounter when you try to edit the paragraph has, by a remarkable coincidence, the effect of making a controversial paragraph hard to edit for all but veteran editors of this page. The passage you want is in there, buried among footnote references that belong elsewhere in the article. You'll find it after making forty or fify tries.) BYT 13:56, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Dawah trash

What a trashy article, from a project that is increasingly going down the drain... The following crap, copy-pasted from the "article" says it all:

"According to some scholars, vague hints of Muhammad's upcoming prophecy are foretold in the Christian Bible. In the following links, scholar ahmed deedat debates this thesis with the famous Christian preacher Jimmy Swaggart, with the end result having Jimmy Swaggart agree to ahmed deedat's thesis(movie links: and ). Except in the very rare bible, the gospel of St. Barnabas, where Muhammad's fore coming is mentioned in more detail and clarity. In addition, another bible, found in Egypt, also foretells the fore coming of prophet muhammad. The bible's name is the Didache(meaning the teachings of the twelve Apostles). Article in Arabic" --Cyp.

If only there were some way you could pitch in and help us make the article better... --ElKevbo 19:51, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Yeah. But there ain't. Of course I could registrer an account and delete the junk, but unfortunately there will be new trash added tomorrow. It's just sad that the great idea to create a free online Encyclopedia doesn't really work and degenerate into nonsens like that. Hopefully some new project will be created, where editors can contribute responsible work within their area of expertise.

Ok, it seems other people have seen the load of shit, i'm going to do some clean up in the last section.Toira 21:22, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Too late, someone did it before me! lolToira 21:24, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

NPOV

The last section section says that the Gospel of Barnabas mentions the "fore coming" of mohamed while we know that this gospel is a ridiculous fraud written in the middle ages. It also uses an arabic website to speak about a bible "discovered in Egypt", none of this is found in the arabic website! it just says that an arabic translation of the Didache was done lately, and that the editor holds the belief that the Didache speaks about a successor of Jesus, nothing more.Toira 21:19, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Crap; someone added that earlier, and I and some others removed the nonsense; looked like it slipped by. I'm going to remove that part. If anyone has a problem, I suggest they can take it up here, and we can come up with some conciliatory language. -Patstuart 04:33, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Observation

We need to somehow draw more unbiased people to work on these articles. Misplaced Pages is as it stands a platform for trumpeting false and incomplete information about Islam and Muhammad. Arrow740 06:59, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm unbiased. In a concise maner, please tell use what exactly is false and misleading abou the Article. DocEss 15:52, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm working on a more attainable goal right now than cleaning up this article. I will suggest one area for you to consider. According to the hadith, Muhammad was a mass murderer. He slaughtered entire tribes and executed captured children (I'll beat the apologists to the punch by saying that according to the Muslim doctrine of Itmaam-i-hujjat, this was acceptable because he was a Messenger of God). You could inform yourself about this then quote reputable sources in the article regarding this, for a start. Arrow740 09:30, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

"Misplaced Pages is as it stands a platform for trumpeting false and incomplete information about Islam and Muhammad." - and it seems, you'd only be contributing to that perception. ITAQALLAH 14:22, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

What I said is not false so you must be implying that it is incomplete. Well, sure. But in my mind (and probably in the minds of most people) the actions he took are not acceptable under any circumstances whatsoever. Arrow740 06:57, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Sources of Mohammad's life

I don't know who said that Abu Is-haq could not have coexisted with any eyewitness of Mohammad. He was born 85 years after Hijra and it is very possible that he could have met some of Mohammad's companions. Therefore the personal POV that says "and would not have been able to speak to any eyewitnesses but does reference other biographies of which no texts have survived" must be removed.

Let us not make wikipedia a place for our personal conclusions and leave the reader do it. 70.25.83.46 08:53, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Prophet Muhammad in other religions/religious traditions

I think we should keep this section Un-Biased and don't mislead the reader, Prophet Mohammad's Coming is Proven on the Both Torah and Bible Scriptures with many resources. and i think we should leave the final judgment to the reader after his own research.ColdFire 05:23, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

It was terribly written (even for this article), was completely POV, & omitted relevant counterpoints. --JimWae 05:31, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

With all due respect, that is a Muslim point of view. If you want to put it under the "other religions" part, be ready for other editors to make sure that it's clear that the other religions don't actually be believe this. It will probably contain several strong caveats with a lot of potentially damning quotes like "These other religions disregard these claims" and even "the large majority of modern scholars find these proof texts to be nothing more than a forgery." -Patstuart 05:34, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, I might point out, to claim that it's "proven" that Mohammed is in the Scriptures is not at all agreed upon. I believe it's even more proven that the Old Testament claims that Jesus is God. It was be similarly silly for me to put a comment under the Jesus article claiming that the Quran had several hidden texts saying that Jesus is actually God - it would be POV, and not fair to the reader. -Patstuart 05:36, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I know it's a one of the Major conflicts between Islam and *modern* christianity, But I assure you it's more than just a Point of View, Believe me it's Not because i'm Muslim, But i try to leave every lead of information as is. it may confuse the reader a bit specially if he is not well educated on the regarding subject. When i Mentioned the word "proven" i meant it was based on the resources i have already so far as i will show you some proofs here from the new Testament itself not even the old one:

First of all, The Arabic word "Muhammad" is an expression which means "The honorable one" or "The glorified one" or "The admirable". Prophet Muhammad was the first in the Middle East to be named "Muhammad". Below, you will see how Jesus in today's Gospel of John had called this human Prophet which he predicted his comming "The honorable one". Jesus peace be upon him in the Greek Bible used the Greek word "Periklytos" which means the admirable or glorified one. He called that predicted human prophet "Periklytos". This word corresponds exactly to the Arabic word "Muhammad" which also means the "admired one" or "glorified one." In other words, "Periklytos" is "Muhammad" in Greek.

In the Bible we can find the following four passages wherein Jesus (peace be upon him) predicts a great event:

John 14:16 "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever"

John 15:26 "But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me"

John 14:26 "But the Comforter, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you."

John 16:7-14 "Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you. And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: Of sin, because they believe not on me; Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more; Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come. He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew unto you."

In these four verses, the word "comforter" is translated from the word "Paraclete" ("Ho Parakletos" in Greek). Parakletos in Greek is interpreted as "an advocate", one who pleads the cause of another, one who councils or advises another from deep concern for the other's welfare (Beacon Bible commentary volume VII, p.168). In these verses we are told that once Jesus (peace be upon him) departs, a Paraclete will come. He will glorify Jesus (peace be upon him), and he will guide mankind into all truth. This "Paraclete" is identified in John 14:26 as the Holy Ghost.

It must be pointed out that the original Greek manuscripts speak of a "Holy pneuma." The word pneuma {pnyoo'-mah} is the Greek root word for "spirit." There is no separate word for "Ghost" in the Greek manuscripts, of which there are claimed to be over 24,000 today. The translators of the King James Version of the Bible translate this word as "Ghost" to convey their own personal understanding of the text. However, a more accurate translation is "Holy Spirit." More faithful and recent translations of the Bible, such as the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), do indeed now translate it as "Holy Spirit." This is significant, and will be expounded upon shortly.

All Bibles in existence today are compiled from "ancient manuscripts," the most ancient of which being those of the fourth century C.E. Any scholar of the Bible will tell us that no two ancient manuscripts are exactly identical. All Bibles in our possession today are the result of extensive cutting and pasting from these various manuscripts with no single one being the definitive reference.

What the translators of the Bible have done when presented with such discrepancies is to do their best to choose the correct version. In other words, since they can not know which "ancient manuscript" is the correct one, they must do a little detective work on the text in order to decide which "version" of a given verse to accept. John 14:26 is just such an example of such selection techniques.

John 14:26 is the only verse of the Bible which associates the Parakletos with the Holy Spirit. But if we were to go back to the "ancient manuscripts" themselves, we would find that they are not all in agreement that the "Parakletos" is the Holy Spirit. For instance, in the famous the Codex Syriacus, written around the fifth century C.E., and discovered in 1812 on Mount Sinai by Mrs.Agnes S. Lewis (and Mrs. Bensley), the text of 14:26 reads; "Paraclete, the Spirit"; and not "Paraclete, the Holy Spirit.".

A "Spirit" in the New Testament is a human Prophet. Therefore, Jesus had predicted the comming of a human Prophet (spirit) after him and not the Holy Spirit. Jesus would not have used the word "he" for the Holy Spirit. He would have used "it" instead in John 14:26 above. Read 1 John 4:1-3 below:

"Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world," (1 John 4:1-3)

(also see 1 John 4:6), or an inspired human, for example read 1 Corinthians 2:10, 2 Thessalonians 2:2.

There is more, But That's enough for now, Waiting for your kind reply :), Regards ColdFire 06:11, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

The "comforter" those verses speak of is the Holy Spirit, as the verses clearly say, not Muhammad or any other man. The Holy Spirit also came at Pentecost, some 500 years before Muhammad. —Aiden 06:56, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

John 14:16 "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you *another* Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever"

Why Jesus Peace be upon him uses a word like "another" if he meant the Holy Spirit, it can be only One Holy Spirit, Right? ColdFire 07:09, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

not if the HS is "generated" many times and does not "exist" in-between (assuming the translation and copying are accurate) --JimWae 07:20, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

In Islam we call the Holy Ghost/Spirit as "Angel Gebreel" which is resposible for transfering and revealing the Message from Almighty God Allah to all his Prophets and Messengers like Noah, Abraham, David, Solomon, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Jesus and Mohammad and many others peace be upon them all. The Holy spirit as an angel is generated (Visit) many times and doesn't exist in between doesn't necessarily need Jesus to point at it on his words as a different entity, Allah created it from Pure light and it travel throw the seven skies to carry the revelation so it's logically better use "visit" than using "give you another" in "and he shall give you another Comforter". Holy Spirit is definitely different from "The Comforter" Jesus meant here. With Much Respect, There had been many cases of deliberate modification of the Biblical text by members of the Christian clergy themselves, as well as deliberate large scale projects to "correct" the Bible, and the writings of "the early fathers," (such as the deliberate insertion of the verse of 1 John 5:7 which is now universally discarded) It is, therefore, possible that either:

1) The word "Holy" could have been dropped by a careless copyist., or

2) Someone could have inserted the word "Holy" to convey his personal understanding of the text.

Which was it? In order to arrive at the answer we must follow the same path of detective work the Biblical scholars themselves do. We must study the characteristics of the "Paraclete" and compare them to both the "Holy Spirit" and to a "Spirit." Muslims believe that Muhammad (peace be upon him) was the one intended and not the Holy Ghost. In the Christian's own "Gospel of Barnabas" Muhammad is mentioned by name here. The Trinitarian church, however, has done its utmost to obliterate all existing copies of "The Gospel of Barnabas," and to hide it from the masses or to label it a forgery. For this reason, it becomes necessary to show that even the Gospels adopted by Paul's church also originally spoke of Muhammad (peace be upon him). ColdFire 15:22, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Please read Gospel of Barnabas - it is not a Xn "bible" nor is it accepted (by more than a few) as a scripture. It is POV to just omit claims that it is likely a nearly complete forgery. --JimWae 16:21, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I have read that article already, But even before that over a year ago i got a copy of the Gospel of Barnabas translated into arabic language and it mention that Jesus peace be upon him Said Clearly the coming of another prophet with the name "Ahmad" (which is another name of Prophet Mohammad), and With Much Respect, Gospel of Barnabas are Not Forgery and it's the Only Un-Edited Bible Exist until date..it was even leaked out of the Vatican Library itself, without going into much detailed explanations. Instead, many parts of the other Gospels Nowadays have been Forged among translation and other means. Besides, I have mentioned (but not finished even) a simple example evidence from the Gospel of John indicate signs of the coming of another Human Prophet and i got no real and verified logical or written evidence prove the opposite from any editor here. I Have many other logical proofs away from Barnabas Bible But from the *Many* Gospels avialable today, But no need to take the time and type everything here if it's going no further regarding the article. You Please read carefully on this website http://www.answering-christianity.com/ . anyway i'm not going to add the removed text back under that section, I know all this is not going to convince anyone here, I just wanted to defend what is right. Regards ColdFire 19:21, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Accurate Text was Removed!!! Either declare biases or Delete Whole Article.

I was disturbed to find actual and fairly common information deemed “point of view” by some religious individuals, when I can easily site excellent sources for this information. I will now resubmit with the sources added. This is a web-site encyclopedia for facts, ladies and gentlemen, not opinionated or watered down revisionism.

There has been debate about this entire half-truth pro-Islamic article for sometime … and it is high time this debate ends now. Either this article warns all readers that it is biased and downplays anything negative attributed to Muhammad … or it be completely removed from Wikipaedia, to prevent this disinformation (or propaganda) from being perpetuated further.

Nonprof. Frinkus 04:43, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Note: Frinkus is referring to this removal. -Patstuart 04:52, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Frinkus, for quotes like "When the Jewish clan surrendered to Muhammad, the men were all summarily executed and the women and children were sold into slavery." you will definitely need to provide a reliable citation. I will admin that I do not know the Quran well enough; it may actually be in the Quran. You may also wish to use softer language; even if it's true, some Muslims will object to the term, and you will have to settle for nice language if you want to put it in at all (e.g., slaughtered -> killed).

Using soft words for a possible crime against humanity? Is "Holocaust", "genocide", or "ethnic cleansing" soft words for what occurred before, during and immediately after WWII in Europe? Should I worry about offending potential Neo-Nazis? Actions during the “terror” phase of the French Revolution to WWI, Bolshevik Revolution, WWII to the creation of Maoist China were particularly brutal … can we get a recommended thesaurus that would contain translations that are considered acceptable words? That would be quite helpful.

And this quote: "- Despite the facts that Muhammad at times advocated conversion by force, and pre-genocidal (see Banu Qurayza) consequences that were later used as a template by Islamic armies that forged one of the world's great empires, Muhammad did introduce revolutionary ideas to the Arabic people." - it sounds more like weazel words. It sounds like you're trying to get in the information that he was violent. If you think he was violent, maybe it should be stated somewhere else, and in a more direct fashion. -Patstuart 04:56, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

It isn't in the Qur'an, but is in Ibn Ishaq's biography and in the Hadith. I agree with you, Patstuart, that "slaughtered" is pointlessly POV. Most informative and least judgemental is "beheaded." Frinkus os correct to observe that stating that the Qurayza were "defeated" represents censorship - censorship because a look through the article history shows that a more specific description of these events was once present. It is difficult to understand the mentality which holds at once that a man was sinless and beyond reproach and that his reputation relies on us to cover up the details of his life. If it's included, we can sadly expect at least one paragraph of complex and tenuous justifications to follow the bare statement of fact. I couldn't agree with you more when you say it's not appropriate to state or insinuate that Muhammad was violent, anymore than we should state that he was peaceful, honest or dishonest, pious or impious, etc. The encylopedic way to build a picture of a subject's character is through the neutral presentation of details.Proabivouac 05:54, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I do concur with this comment by “Proabivouac”, and I am sorry if my words sounded judgmental in any way. One of the reasons I was putting some life into some quotes … and by my mistake in going about it all wrong ... was the whole article left readers with an wholly inaccurate view of Muhammad, has he is considered by everybody. That needs to include all schools of thought. Why does the “Views on Muhammad” section not contain much of any non-Muslim critcal views on Muhammad? There is a lot out there (just ask the current Pope). In the “Historical impact” section, it states that the Muslim empire was a successor of the Roman empire (via the Byzantine empire) … when it is definitely not a continuation of that empire at all … but a wholesale hostile take over. What about the large loss of life that was caused by Islamic expansion (such as in northern areas of India)? In “Muhammad the reformer”, I see nothing but apologist views Bernard Lewis of the impacts of Muhammad's teachings … nothing about how they even relate today (though admittedly this might not belong here). I see information written quite positively, but negative views must be censored. I do not see such positive reviews of Adolph Hitler as a reformer (which he was, and a monster no doubt). If there is any holding back or censorship involved … we must apply it equally to all sides … or have nothing at all.

I am going to write a section on "Muhammad and the Jews of Medina" fairly from scholarly sources soon so that there wouldn't be any objection remained. Other changes were either out of place, or un-neutral and all unsourced. --Aminz 05:09, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

It is difficult to understand the mentality which holds at once that a man was sinless and beyond reproach and that his reputation relies on us to cover up the details of his life. Well said. So let's include the information, but make sure we do it, um, encyclopedifiably. -Patstuart 05:58, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, but I'm afraid that, "If it's included, we can sadly expect at least one paragraph of complex and tenuous justifications to follow the bare statement of fact," proved more prophetic.

Aminz, why is it that you seem ever incapable of stating something simply without including extensive arguments about what mitigating circumstances readers you'd like readers to consider?Proabivouac 06:37, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

How about the Jews of Khaiber? Arrow740 07:02, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Other academic POV's

1. Why Proabivouac are you removing the following from the article:

"On the fate of Banu Qurayza, another academic point of view is that Ibn Ishaq, the first biographer of Muhammad, supposedly gathered many details of the incident from descendents of the Qurayza Jews themselves. These Jews allegedly embellished or manufactured details of the incident by borrowing from histories of Jewish persecutions during Roman times. Watt, a scholar of Islamic studies, however thinks that this argument "is not entirely convincing." The majority of academic scholars think that Banu Qurayza had negotiated with the enemy or that Muslims "discovered, or perhaps became suspected" that the Jews were conspiring with the enemy.

--Aminz 06:35, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

2. Why are you removing the summary of what Esposito says? "John Esposito, professor of Islamic studies at Georgetown University writes that Muhammad's use of warfare in general was alien neither to Arab custom nor to that of the Hebrew prophets, as both believed that God had sanctioned battle with the enemies of the Lord. " from the article? It is a fact, isn't it? We can let it speak for itself. --Aminz 06:36, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Allegations that Ibn Ishaq was hoodwinked by Jews are marginal. Why are we linking to "Jews for Allah?" The language as I've editted doesn't decide whether the accusations against the Jews were legitimate or not. Much of your material was good, but there's no need to include all these arguments here; a better place is in the articles which are specifically about these events.

Esposito's quote is emblematic of your modus operandi, to "add context" to and only to events with which you are personally uncomfortable, and feel the need to plead on the subject's behalf by appealing to extraneous information. The subject isn't on trial here.

I should also thank you for making a worthy and needed contribution to the article.Proabivouac 06:50, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

John Esposito's comments is directly related to Muhammad. It definitely belongs in this article, whether it supports someone's ideology or not. TruthSpreader 07:02, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

No, it's not directly related to Muhammad. It might be paraphrased as, "Pagans and Jews did it, too." It changes the subject from a straightforward narrative to a comparative judgment designed to downplay events which aren't played up to begin with. Likewise, there is, and must not be, a "critics contend that these events show that…"Proabivouac 07:23, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Proabivouac, thanks for copyediting my edit. Here are my thoughts:

1. It is an academic POV and a notable one, mentioned by Watt in encyclopedia of Islam. The article is available at the "Jews for Allah" website but that website didn't publish the article. Feel free to remove the link if you like. Omitting this POV makes the section POV according to the policy.

2. First of all, it is not only what Esposito thinks. Secondly, that quote is useful because it tells the reader that the Jewish tribes, being Arab tribes, were not shocked by appropriateness of such judgment for treasury. They might have been amazed by the danger of the blood-feuds incurred due to the high number of people who were killed, but it wasn't unexpected to their standards and unexpected. In a nutshell, they were beforehand aware of the risk and possible punishments for treasury. Also, the mind-set of Muhammad and Hebrew prophets are explained which is informative at least. Now, if we don't provide the context, people will naturally look at it from the perspective of the culture in which they are raised. --Aminz 07:04, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

That’s the reader’s prerogative; it’s not our job to argue with them, only to make sure we’re not trying to influence their decision.

We might also observe that, at the time of Muhammad, the events recounted in the Tanakh were further in the past than Muhammad is from us today; they don’t after all say much about the Jews of Muhammad’s time or provide any relevant context in which to view these events.Proabivouac 07:23, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Comment to what Aminz just said there … the Jews in this tribe were probably never a part of any state here … so they could not have ever committed treason (and would not obtain the consequence). So, because state sanction murder was the norm … Muhammad seems much less prophet like and more like every other dictator of the time (he just started the ball rolling onto something big). Hasn’t anyone done any research to that effect?

Proabivouac, I don't wish to give a headache to both of us on point number 2. I personally prefer to discuss it sometime in the future. But point number one is quite relevant to the article. I don't see any reason why it shouldn't be there in the article. There are academics who think that Banu Qurayza wasn't beheaded and their view should be presented. --Aminz 07:30, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I removed "Muhammad then moved decisively to crush the Jews who remained in Medina, viewing them as a continued political threat to the consolidation of Muslim dominance and rule in Arabia" since the neighboring sentences were omitted from the article and only this was left.--Aminz 09:43, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I am for keeping in all information (as long as each side is as prominent and equal in size). I am certain there is plenty of critical information on Muhammad that just is not here (such as quotes of historical figures criticizing Muhammad in the past, which could go in the summary and legacy sections). One issue about specific information on Muhammad, as most extensive material written about this subject is by Arabic or through Arabic sources. With most Arabs being Muslim, and it being a religion, the bias is there and should be noted to lay people who would read this article. I found the same issue with talking about the Bible with most scholars being Christian. In the case of modern people, such as Sadam Hussein, there is plenty of work written by people who are of all different faiths (and non-faith) ... so getting balance would be easier I believe.

It seems Muhammad was quite decent (and many ideas probably were good too) originally (prior to Medina and possibly criticism), and fell into the “absolute power corrupts absolutely” situation and became yet another despot of a new variety. Why does the article seem much more warmer than reality?

Must everything be pure quotes from other sources, to avoid POV … I do not believe so?

If someone kills someone else in absence of reasonable rule of law … it is murder. For example, just because the norm with Hitler involved killing people in accordance to his own rule of law, did not except him from the fact those were acts of murder. In times with absence of democracy, reasonable rule of law was virtually non-existent (save for those following natural law … which largely does not relate to most religions at all). Now … if someone orders the killing of an entire group of people, such as a tribe or clan, … is it not a crime against humanity, or genocide? Look at current United Nations definitions for genocide, and killing of entire peoples or gender of a people, and suppressing the rest, is genocide. Again, Hitler and his bunch certainly committed a lot of that (and due to modern times … large populations facilitated potential record numbers of victims). However, Muhammad could possibly be considered guilty of such crimes against humanity. In fact, after the conquest of Arabia and his death … a massive empire was expanded in a relatively short amount of time historically … largely through brutal means with many justifications produced from his literature. Just look at possible Muslim work against humanity when they conquered areas in northern India (especially if you were Buddhist or Hindu). It took Christianity 400 years before it was embraced by a power (and for crimes in the name of that religion to be put into high gear). Sure, the Crusades were bad (in terms of humanity) thanks to both sides … but it was most likely a response to the brutal tactics that could be attributed Turkish migration and Muslim activity. By the way, in case people wonder, I am not Christian, Jewish or Islamic (nor am I a pagan). I am just a continuous researcher and scientist.

I was told that when I am putting in information, it must be only to the letter … but that is near impossible to write a cohesive article that way (something which would be just pure quotes and nothing more). Any wording on my part and it was considered bias or point of view. And then, what happens when information from two different sources contradict each other? Should they not be both prominently and equally displayed as opposing possible facts? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Frinkus (talk • contribs)

Do you really want a comparsion between Akbars treatment of the hindu majority and the Treatment of the Native, lets say Americans by the Catholic Church in south America, or "Indians" by the Protestant settlers, or the native Australians by the anglican conqurers, or the treatment of the Dalits.. I could really go on at legnth here. The fact is, religious cleansing took place to a massive degree everywhere most survivng religions, and most non-surviving ones too, took hold. The same cannot be said for Islam. Where Islam once ruled, in your example of India, the majority are, as they were prior to Muslim rule, Hindu. Where the Incan religion once dominated in South America, the religion of the conqurer, Catholicism, is omnipresent because of that religious cleansing. One of Muhammads first actions as leader of the Theocratic state was to give word to the Christians that their places of worship were safe, when the Catholic Church took Al Quds, its first action was to kill Jews, and then Muslims, and then loot. Compare Muhammads actions over a millenia ago with those of Radovan Karadžić in the 1990s. --Irishpunktom\ 12:04, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Akbar, that is way too late in time. I refer to the initial "Muslim conquest of the Indian subcontinent took place during the ascendancy of the Rajput Kingdoms in North India, during the 7th to the 12th centuries", and the noted and debated conversion by the sword. Reading up on entire histories is important ... not just taking snippets. That seems to what occurs in these articles at times ... people present the most positive example related to Islam, and the most critical related to Christians (largely because being critical is what we in the Western society does best, and can freely do so ... something that does not seemed to be shared in the Islamic world). I wonder what happened to the Buddhists there? I speak of an area that encompasses many different countries today. Even early critics of Muhammad in Medina once Muhammad as attained military power? I guess the Turks were all walks in the park too. Recent Balkans, compared to Armenian genocide? Remember, there were no Turks in Turkey 2000 years ago. Even upon the initial fall of Mecca, was destroying all the idols was a sign of religious tolerance? Looting from the beginning has also been shown here. Genocide in the Americas is definitely something not to be proud of in the Americas ... most modern religions seemed to be just as bad as each other. I can go on if need be.

Muhammad Pic

(discussion copied from User talk:Briangotts with permission. The Muhammad Pic in question is the image in edits such as these --BostonMA 14:22, 16 October 2006 (UTC))

Hi Briangotts, are you up for a discussion about the disputed Muhammad Pic? --BostonMA 13:19, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

I generally concur with the Hun. I'll see how the discussion develops but like he says, there has been absolutely no concrete objection raised, based on WP policies, why the image should be removed, other than a general iconoclasm based on a particular interpretation of a religion not shared by the majority of WP users. I believe removal would be outrageous- the image is souced and is a historical relic (made by, it should be noted, Muslims). Since those objecting to the image maintain that Islam objects to images of all of its prophets, are we to now remove images from Jesus, Abraham, etc.? Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 13:25, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Several points

• "there has been absolutely no concrete objection raised, based on WP policies..." WP:Profanity states in part:

"Words and images that might be considered offensive, profane, or obscene by other Misplaced Pages readers should be used if and only if their omission would cause the article to be less informative, relevant, or accurate, and no equally suitable alternatives are available. Including information about offensive material is part of Misplaced Pages's encyclopedic mission; being offensive is not."

I believe that I am following this guideline. I believe that the image is a) considered offensive by a large number of people, b) is not informative in the context of this article -- we have absolutely no clue regarding the event which this image is depicting. I would very much like to know whether you believe you are applying this guideline, or whether you believe the guideline is inappropriate. If it is inappropriate, how would you amend it?

• "Since those objecting to the image maintain that Islam..." This is an inappropriate ad hominem argument and is furthermore incorrect. Please discuss Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines rather than the alleged views of editors.
• "are we to now remove images from Jesus, Abraham, etc.?" Are all images of Jesus and Abraham uninformative in their respective articles? (added later --BostonMA 14:13, 13 October 2006 (UTC))

Looking forward to hearing from you again. Sincerely, --BostonMA 13:39, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

From your latest message, I am not sure our views are at all reconcilable. In my opinion the image is neither offensive nor obscene; it was created by people who revered and honored Muhammad. The only reason it is "offensive" is because there are some people who object to all images of Muhammad, and by extension images of religious figures in general. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 13:42, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi, what I wrote was that the image is considered offensive by a large number of people. I consider this a question of fact. Do you disagree that large numbers of people find the image offensive? It is entirely possible to reconcile the belief that "a large number of people find the image offensive", with a personal valuation that does not find the image offensive.

I would still like to know how you would answer the questions I have asked originally. Thanks. --BostonMA 13:49, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

(unindenting)I see no contradiction between including the image and the policy you cite. My interpretation is that image must be both subjectively and objectively offensive and this falls far short of that standard. You also seem to maintain that while these images should not be included in the Muhammad article, they might be appropriate for a separate article on images of Muhammad. I encourage you to establish such an article and see if the attempts at censorship are any less frequent there. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 14:33, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi, I don't see WP:Profanity as being based upon the subjective values of the editor, but that is my reading. Yes, I do believe that images of Muhammad are appropriate in other articles. For example, articles on Persian art, or Depictions of Muhammad. If fact, the image in question is found in the latter article. You write "I encourage you to establish such an article and see if the attempts at censorship are any less frequent there." As a matter of fact, you can see that that article is extraorinarily stable -- 50 edits since June 1. There is an occasional blanking vandalism, and although I haven't read the talk pages, there may be someone who argues there that the article shouldn't exist, or shouldn't have images in it. But even if the article were vandalized on a regular basis, and even if people who did not support Misplaced Pages's encyclopedic goal argued for deletion of the article, it would not mean that attempts at censorship there means that application of the WP:Profanity guideline is inappropriate here. --BostonMA 14:49, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

• what is the image of? Who are the people in it? Why are they gathered round? Why are some wearing persian-like Shia caps? Who is the woman? When was this set? We know so very little about this image, it does seem important, but its done on a large minbar, which would appear to make it late-ish, but that would rule out Abu Talib from being present, but maybe that was artistic license. Is there a copy of the image in context, that is atop of the text that accompanies it, as that would explain what we are seeing. --Irishpunktom\ 15:06, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

That's ludicrous. Your standards would eliminate virtually every image on Misplaced Pages. You are clearly searching for excuses to remove an image you find personally offensive. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 15:18, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

The fact is, we don't know what the image in question is about. However, we do know what is going on in a depiction of Jesus being crucified, or Abraham preparing to sacrifice his son, or any number of other images. Applying a standard that says that if we can't say anything sensible about what an image depicts, then that image is not informative seem reasonable, and it clearly would not apply to many, hopefully the vast majority, of images on Misplaced Pages. But note, the majority of images do not need to meet even this minimal requirement, because they are not considered offensive by significant populations. --BostonMA 15:29, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

You are not representing the situation accurately. The image is sourced and the source describes what is depicted. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 15:39, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

The source, unless I am missing something, says the image is a depiction of Muhammad. Being made several centuries after Muhammad's death, and without any attestation that the image is a reasonable likeness, the image does not inform us of anything in particular about Muhammad's appearance. Given that we don't know anything else about the image, the information content of the picture, related to Muhammad is essentially nothing. The image is informative about Persian art. It is informative about the variation in attitudes about depictions of Muhammad in Islam. But I don't see how it is informative about Muhammad. If I am mistaken, could you please write a paragraph describing things I might learn about Muhammad from the image. --BostonMA 15:59, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

The image illustrates the veneration in which Muhammad was held by Muslims of al-Biruni's time, and how they viewed him. Misplaced Pages biographies contain numerous images made by people long after the death of the person depicted. See Jesus, Gautama Buddha, Leif Ericson, Genghis Khan. You are setting up false criteria for judging whether the article should be kept, criteria that were never intended to be part of Misplaced Pages policy but are rather your own (in my opinion, very tenuous) interpretation of what that policy means. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 16:04, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

• Yes, the image illustrates the veneration in which Muhammad was held by Muslims after Muhammad's death. The image might therefore appropriate in an artcle on Islam (assuming no better images available). The Muhammad article is about Muhammad, and only tangentially about Islam as it evolved after Muhammad's death.
• Misplaced Pages does include images of figures such as Buddha, Leif Erikson and Ghangis Khan which are not historically accurate. These images usually add aesthetic value to an otherwise barren textual landscape. But we should be clear they are not informative. They are acceptable for the purpose of providing aestheic value, in part because they do not violate any other policy or guideline. To my knowledge, no good-faith complaints have been made that these images are offensive.
• You say you disagree with my interpretation of WP:Profanity. Do you disagree with the part that says: "Including information about offensive material is part of Misplaced Pages's encyclopedic mission; being offensive is not"? I would really like an answer. Do you disagree with the part that says "Words and images that might be considered offensive, profane, or obscene by other Misplaced Pages readers should be used if and only if their omission would cause the article to be less informative, relevant, or accurate, and no equally suitable alternatives are available."? If you disagree, could you explain how you would amend this guideline?
• There is obviously a conflict between writing an encyclopedia and not offending people. An encyclopedia, if it is really "encyclopedic" will cover material which will unfortunately offend some people. It would be nice to avoid being unnecessarily offensive, while still covering offensive material in an encyclopedic way. But how do we decide what is "unnecessarily" offensive? To me, that is the purpose of the section: "Words and images that might be considered offensive, profane, or obscene by other Misplaced Pages readers should be used if and only if their omission would cause the article to be less informative, relevant, or accurate, and no equally suitable alternatives are available." If an image is not informative in a given context, and it further is considered offensive by many people, then, in my opinion, it is probably unnecessary to have that image in that context. --BostonMA 17:04, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

You and I are in fundamental disagreement about the nature of "offensiveness". You appear to believe that because a group of people, based on subjective criteria, regard an image as offensive, it should not be included. I believe that it is a consistent principle of both law and common sense that offensiveness must be measured objectively and subjectively. The fact that a particular group is offended by the inclusion of an image that, as you admit, adds aesthetic (and as I maintain, informative) depth to the article does not warrant its deletion. There is no objection to the image on the grounds that it depicts Muhammad in an offensive manner (and, I do not believe that such an offensive image could be excluded from an appropriate article, such as Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy or Piss Christ, for that matter), only that it is offensive because it is an image of Muhammad. This is an encyclopedia and is governed by the general principles and obligations adhering thereto. It is not governed by sharia and arguments based on sharia cannot exclude images or material from being included if they are otherwise well-sourced. That's really all I have to say on the matter, and I refer you to the additional arguments made by User:The Hungry Hun, with which I concur. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 19:46, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Several points

• You have mis-characterized (or misunderstood) my position as:

"You appear to believe that because a group of people, based on subjective criteria, regard an image as offensive, it should not be included."

That is not my position. My position is that, in accordance with Misplaced Pages guidelines, if a group of people regard an image as offensive and if that image is not informative in the context of a given article, then the image should not be used in that article, but it may be used appropriately elsewhere.

• You state that you maintain that the image is informative. I agree that the image is informative. A picture of a butt-plug may be informative to someone who does not know what one looks like. (I still don't). However, while removing a picture of a butt-plug from the butt-plug article may make that article less informative, removal of a similar butt-plug image from Michaelangelo would not make that article less informative about Michaelangelo, even if it could be established that Michaelangelo used a butt-plug. So, as I have asked before, please write a paragraph detailing the information appropriate to the Muhammed article which the image in question provides. I really do not understand what is, or could be, that information.
• In reference to the following paragraph:

"Words and images that might be considered offensive, profane, or obscene by other Misplaced Pages readers should be used if and only if their omission would cause the article to be less informative, relevant, or accurate, and no equally suitable alternatives are available. Including information about offensive material is part of Misplaced Pages's encyclopedic mission; being offensive is not."

I have asked you a number of questions. Unfortunately, I don't feel you have responded to them. To make the discussion fruitful, I think we really need to engage with each others concerns. If I have not engaged your concerns, please let me know, and I will try to do better. However, I would very much like to know with regard to this paragraph:

• Do you agree with the first sentence?
• Do you agree with the second sentence?
• If you disagree with either, how would you amend this guideline?

• I think the references to Sharia are out of place. It is not Misplaced Pages's mission to offend, although we must do so incidentally in the course of writing an encyclopedia. In my opinion, if there are guidelines that say that doing X causes offence which is unnecessary from the point of view of writing the encyclopedia, then it should not matter which group is offended, but rather all groups should be treated equally, whether they are Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus, women, Blacks, gays or whoever. That is my opinion, I would like to know yours.

I look forward to your response. --BostonMA 23:12, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

You have said nothing new here. I have responded to your questions to the best of my ability - you simply choose not to accept my answers, which is your right. However you continue to attempt to impose an artificial standard of "offensiveness" on this project which it was never the intention of its founders to follow. I accept in its entirety the paragraph you quoted. But as I said offensiveness must be measured both objectively and subjectively. A Jew might find the visual depiction of the Tetragrammaton to violate the tenants of his faith, but it would be unreasonable to expect Misplaced Pages, which is not bound by the laws of any religion, to adhere to religious law (or one subgroup's interpretation of the laws of a religion it shares with other subgroups, some of whom actually created the image in question). For this very reason the image of "Piss Christ", which is FAR more offensive than the Muhammad image you object to, is not censored from WP. I don't know how I can explain this any more clearly to you. I am trying to assume good faith but you do not seem inclined to accept my view or acknowledge that I have even made any points. Therefore I don't know that continued discussion will be fruitful. I will not agree with your imposition of an entirely subjective standard of offensiveness which would only lead to more images being censored in the future. Cheers, Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 02:15, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry that communication seems to have broken down. Please remain cool. I appreciate that you believe that you have answered my questions, and that you believe that I have failed to address your issues or acknowledge your points. However, from my perspective, I did not, until this last comment, an answer to my question about the paragraph from the guideline that I had quoted. I am very thankful that you have stated that you accept in entirety the paragraph I quoted. That clarifies things for me a bit. Also, from my perspective, you have not told me what information you think the image supplies that related to Muhammad that is appropriate to the subject of that article. Perhaps you feel you have answered that, but I have not been able to "hear" that answer. From my perspective, I have also acknowledged many of your points. If you feel that we are unable to communicate, would you be amenable to having a mediator assist in our communication? Sincerely, --BostonMA 02:35, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi, it has been a while since I have heard from you, and I see that you are active on Misplaced Pages. I will assume that you may still be considering my suggestion that we obtain the help of a mediator. If you are not amenable to discussing with me with the help of a mediator, please let me know. Also, if that is the case, would you object to my copying this discussion over to the talk:Muhammad page, so that it would be visible by more editors? Thanks. --BostonMA 14:07, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

You may copy this discussion to whichever talk page or pages you wish. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 14:08, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Response to some points made by User:Briangotts.

• The guideline has, what I consider to be clear language. The clause about offensive materials reads:

"Words and images that might be considered offensive, profane, or obscene by other Misplaced Pages readers..."

It seems that you do not believe that this should be interpretted literally, but should be interpretted according to some principles of "objective and subjective" offensiveness. Could you elaborate what you mean by "objective and subjective"?

• I am trying to understand your position, and I do not intend this as a personal attack. At some points, you argue that the image in question is informative. However, at other times it appears to me that your position is that the offensiveness that might be perceived by Muslims wheter based upon their religion, or merely custom, ought never to be used in applying the Profanity guideline, whether the image is informative or not. Could you clarify whether or not you think the profanity policy should ever apply to the offensiveness perceived by some Muslims regarding images of Muhammed?
• If you think that the guideline never applies to offensiveness perceived by some Muslims regarding images of Muhammad, could you explain how this might relate to offensiveness perceived by other groups, such as Christians or Jewish people?
• If you think that the guideline does apply to offensiveness perceived by some Muslims with regard to images of Muhammad, but doesn't apply in this particular case, could you give an example of a case where it would apply? --BostonMA 14:43, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I do not know how to make the case more clear to you. You appear to wish to censor every bit of discussion or information on Misplaced Pages that might offend anyone. I am at a loss to find a Misplaced Pages policy that permits you to strike portions of comments (whether or not they are inappropriate or offensive) as you have done below to another editor. "Objective and subjective" offensiveness is a standard used in many different areas, such as employment law. In order for an image to be worthy of removal it must (a) offend an individual or group of people based on that group's belifes AND (b) be offensive to the community as a whole (in this case, the community of Misplaced Pages users. I concede that certain subgroups of Muslims might find the depiction of Muhammad offensive (not, however, the Muslims who created the image in question.) Nonetheless, there is nothing inherently offensive about this image to the majority of Wikipedians, who do not share the iconoclastic beliefs you fear offending. It depicts Muhammad neither engaging in any unseemly activity, nor portrays him in a negative light (the creators of the image, on the contrary, held him in the highest reverence). If, for example, an image was posted of Muhammad immersed in a jar of urine (as with "Piss Christ), an argument could be made that the offensiveness of the image, to the community as a whole, outweighed its informative value to the article in question (it would not, however, do so in the case of an article about the "work of art" (just as the image of the execerable "Piss Christ", offensive as it might be to the community, cannot be banned as uninformative from the article about that work. Re:the informative nature of the image, it is self-evident. The image was created by Muslims, in accordance with a classical Islamic understanding of the life of Muhammad, to illustrate a period of his life. You appear to believe it cannot be informative unless it was made contemporaneously; that standard, of course, would condemn virtually every painting used on this or any other encyclopedia to illustrate a historical event and therefore cannot possibly be a valid standard by which to judge. I find it difficult to assume that you are making this argument in good faith. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 18:05, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

If you raise no new points in your response to the above, I have nothing further to say on the matter. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 18:06, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

You all talk way too much, I think. Look,with all due deference to this belief system, we are an encyclopedia and as such do not have to kowtow to any particular religous belief or cult procedures. It may be prohibited for You Muslums to do images, but it is not prohibited for Me to do images. (striking out inappropriate comment --BostonMA 17:46, 16 October 2006 (UTC)) Anyway, there are ample images and pictures of many things that people find distasteful in an everyday sense but agree are required iamagery in an encyclopedia. For example, there are pictures of vulvas, breasts, scortums, penises, colons, abscesed teeth, ingrown hairs, s&m tools, vivisected rabbits and any number of other revolting and disgusting things that turn the stomach and challenge the senses. But they are, to be sure, necessary. We don't put them on T-shirts but we do put them in encyclopedias. Pictures of Mowhammed are equally neceassary and we will include them. I am under the impressions that Islammis (struck inappropriate epithet --BostonMA 17:46, 16 October 2006 (UTC)) are against presenting images of Mouhummud because they want to avoid idolatry: I can re-assure you that I, for one, have no intention whatsoever of idoloizing the likes of him, so you can sleep at night. In short: sorry man, you will just have to suspend your abhorance and get over it. Or even simpler, don't look at it if ya don't like it. (striking inappropriate comment --BostonMA 17:46, 16 October 2006 (UTC)) Maybe a sort of Viewer Discretion warning at the top of the page would help quell the juvenile squimishness? DocEss 16:41, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Thats' the spirit! - censor things that scrape you over-sensitive nerves. Goodness.DocEss 17:55, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I have censored nothing. (struck comment that defies logic -- DocEss 18:24, 16 October 2006 (UTC)) The comments were inappropriate, and I struck them. They are, however, obviously still readable. Please refrain from making personal attacks per WP:NPA --BostonMA 18:05, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

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