Jesus versus Mohammed, what westerners should know.
The world’s two largest religions are both based on teachings and knowledge revealed by God to their main figures. Understanding these teachings of both Jesus and Mohammed is necessary knowledge for Christians and modern western society. It is important because as far as role models go, there are significant disparities between the teachings of Jesus and that of Mohammed. Why this is important I will explain to you in this article.
Both Christianity and Islam revolve around the central figures described in the scriptures and lore of both religions. In fact, there would be no Christianity without Christ and no Islam without Mohammed. The central figures are fundamentally pivotal to the doctrine.
Jesus had intimate knowledge of the will of God as he was, at once, the son of god, and god himself incarnate on earth. Mohammed was told of the laws of Allah by the angel Gabriël.
The Quran actually acknowledges Jesus (Isa) as a prophet along with all the other biblical prophets, but it considers Jesus a prophet of Allah that lost his way and corrupted the faith. And this is where the few similarities end between Jesus and Mohammed.
In acknowledging that both religions are so heavily based on the teachings and conduct of its main figures, it stands to reason that one would strive to emulate them as much as possible. And this is where it gets awkward.
Jesus speaks mainly of love, forgiveness, personal responsibility, and to make use of your free will to steer clear of sin and vice and live a life of virtue. Counterintuïtively, Mohammed’s main issue is with those outside the religion (kaffir, unbelievers) instead of with Muslims and speaks mostly of war, hate, death, and eternal damnation.
The views and behaviors of the two religious figureheads become most pertinent when people start to cherrypick from the scriptures that suites them best. Since most people are moderates and do not carry the religious dogma to its extremes, they tend to pick the parts that are peaceful or moderate and neglect the adversarial, exclusionary, and the hateful.
Religious cherrypicking is universal among all religions, there is however a significant distinction to be made here. The bible consists of the old and the new testament. The old testament is all about a vengeful and murderous god. A piece of literary history filled with hate, murder, jealousy, and genocide. And the god of the new testament is the same as that of the old. Jesus is the son of this same god, in fact, he is god. This schizoid problem Christianity is still to solve. However, Jesus as a man and as a role model was quite exemplary. Taking the teachings of Jesus Christ and try to live by them is generally a good idea and doing so does not deteriorate the cohesion of the doctrine. There is nothing in the bible that says you cannot focus on Jesus alone. One is, after all, a Christian when one follows the teachings of Christ and not necessarily that of the entire bible.
One cannot be a Muslim, however, if one denies or neglects anything Mohammed said. The key to this lies in the shahada. It is the prayer that every Muslim has recited to become a Muslim. The words of the Shahada are “Ash-hadu anla elaha illa-Allah wa ash-hadu anna Mhammadur rasul-Allah”, which translates to:
“I testify that there is no other god but Allah, and I testify that Muhammad is Allah’s messenger’’.
Where Christians can lift the figure of Christ out of the bible and pick from his teachings what they need without severe consequences to the figure of Christ or the biblical context, every single Muslim has to, at least, acknowledge that Mohammed is the one prophet of Allah and that the figure of Mohammed is pivotal to the doctrine of Islam.
Muhammad is claimed to be the last of the prophets and the Quran was recited to him by the archangel Gabriel. The Quran has existed forever in the heavens with Allah and is the PERFECT and IMMUTABLE word of god. Even the most moderate of moderate Muslims have to acknowledge this, otherwise, they simply are not Muslim. And because the word of Allah is eternal and immutable, none of the teachings of Mohammed can be neglected or foregone.
In other words, the message and the character of Mohammed have to be honored and followed completely in order to be a true Muslim. The Quran is clear on this matter;
‘And verily, you (Mohammed) are of an exalted character’. (Quran 68:4)
‘(Mohammed is an) Excellent pattern of conduct for mankind’ (Quran 33:21)
In fact, Mohammed considered false Muslims the worst of creatures. Worse still than Jews, which he said were apes and pigs. Mohammed himself declared that the first thing he would do upon the arrival of Allah on judgment day was to kill first the hypocrites (munafiqun).
Surah At-Tauba: Ayat 68:
‘’And they will be in hellfire which will be everlasting. On them will be lanath and disgrace of Allah. They will be burning forever in hellfire and they will have a forever punishment’’.
Surah An-Nisa: Ayat 145:
‘’On them will be a very severe punishment. And they’ll be in the lowest part of jahannum. The punishment on them will be much severe than that of kafir. And they will have no helper helping them over there’’.
Because the Quran declares itself to be the perfect and immutable word of god inevitably means that to deny or neglect some of its teachings means one is trying to perfect the already absolutely perfect. This is a mortal sin in Islam. No mere mortal can improve on the perfect word of god. This is also why an Islamic reformation is completely impossible. You cannot reform a doctrine that declares its holy documents to be perfect, eternal, and immutable.
The fact that none of the teachings of Mohammed and the Quran can be altered is rather unfortunate because, in terms of Mohammeds’ capacity as a role model, his behavior and morals were highly problematic;
“I will cast terror into the hearts of those who
disbelieve. Therefore strike off their heads
and strike off every fingertip of them.” (Quran 8:12)“Fight everyone in the way of Allah and
kill those who disbelieve in Allah.
Muhammad” (Ibn Ishaq 992)“The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His messenger (Mohammed) and strive to make mischief in the land is only this, that they should be murdered or crucified or their hands and their feet should be cut off on opposite sides or they should be imprisoned; this shall be as a disgrace for them in this world, and in the hereafter, they shall have a grievous chastisement” Quran (5:33)
Where Jesus’ teachings can be summarized as “love thy neighbor as thy self”, the teachings of Mohammed are not easily summed up, since they are many and often contradictive. Moreover, the teachings of a spiritual role model should be about moral and virtuous guidance. Unfortunately, Mohammed offers none that we can reasonably conceive of as moral in our age.
He condoned and partook in sex with children, slave trade and ownership, political murder, mass murder, violent conquest, necrophilia, sex slavery, lying and deceit, infanticide, betrayal, religious hypocrisy, and much more unsavory acts. Yet good Muslims are expected to emulate this loathsome character as much as they can.
Most pertinent to the matter is the fact that Mohammed preached two sets of morals. In relation to each other, Muslims were held to higher moral standards than when dealing with unbelievers. It is forbidden for a Muslim to murder a fellow Muslim. For murdering an unbeliever there was no severe punishment if any. A Muslim was expected to be truthful towards his fellows, yet an unbeliever can be deceived and betrayed without consequence. A Muslim is mandated to perpetually complain about his rights not being respected, yet Muslims universally deny the rights of others when they are in power.
So, taking into account that only a minority of Muslims take the teachings of Mohammed to heart in their exact prescriptive intent, we are still left with an enormous body of so-called moderates, all of whom acknowledge that this man of severe moral questionability is the central figure in their religion. And since no real moral guidance can be found in the teachings of Mohammed, we are left with over a billion people who are inculcated with a religious dogma that does not stimulate them to be the best humans they can be. The purpose of Islam is solely to force its adherents to be the best Muslims they can be, and being a good Muslim has precious little to do with being and acting moral.
When speaking of Islam as a religion of peace we can be concise; it is. When the whole world has ultimately fallen under the violent dominion of Islam there will be peace. Or at least that is what Islam claims. In reality, Islam is hopelessly divided into four different schools. The different sects within Islam have been killing each other for as long as Mohammed has been dead. On one thing they unanimously agree, however, and that is that the world must submit to the will of Allah.
After fourteen hundred years and killing more than a hundred million people in the name of Allah( ‘the most forgiving’), Islam is not showing any signs of growing weaker in its religiosity.
Christianity, and the entire western world for that matter, are in serious denial about the violent and expansive nature of Islam. We feel that we need to be tolerant of all peoples and religions. After all, Jesus taught us to love our enemy and pray for those that persecute us.
Muslims fight, in word and deed, from a place of zealous religious fanaticism, to which we no longer have an equivalent unifying force to counter them with. Where Christianity used to be a formidable unifying force, after the decline in religiosity the will to fight and protect their way of life diminished. As far as the (mostly liberal) nonreligious go; they are too concerned about letting everyone be as they are and primarily just want to feel good and not exclude anyone. Working towards an inclusive society might be a noble pursuit, if Islam gains ground and power, it will impose an exclusive society in the extreme.
The west is gravely mistaken and childishly naïve about the nature of Mohammed and Islam and if we are not going to be honest about this intrinsically anti-semitic, homophobic, misogynistic, hatemongering doctrine, the west will pay a heavy price.
Islam is truly diametrically opposed to western values and it has no place in the western world. A religious system that mandates its religious laws should supersede the laws of the land the Muslims live in is utterly unacceptable. The killing of homosexuals, repression of women, stifling of scientific pursuit and progress-devouring backwardness cannot be tolerated if the west wants to remain free.