evolution said:
answer: It is a common complaint among some non-Muslims that Islam would not have millions of adherents all over the world, if it had not been spread by the use of force. The following points will make it clear, that far from being spread by the sword, it was the inherent force of truth, reason and logic that was responsible for the rapid spread of Islam.
Islam was indeed spread by the sword from day one hell according to hadith your prophet participated in 19 military expeditions.
Military Expeditions led by the Prophet (pbuh) (Al-Maghaazi)
Volume 5, Book 59, Number 747:
Narrated Abu Ishaq:
I asked Zaid bin Al-Arqam, "In how many Ghazawat did you take part in the company of Allah's Apostle?" He replied, "Seventeen." I further asked, "How many Ghazawat did the Prophet fight?" He replied, "Nineteen."
Can we really expect a religion of peace to be started by a man of war?
1. Islam means peace.
Islam comes from the root word ‘salaam’, which means peace. It also means submitting one’s will to Allah (swt). Thus Islam is a religion of peace, which is acquired by submitting one’s will to the will of the Supreme Creator, Allah (swt).
Yeah and my name means king of the franks guess that means I am even though I have a job and pay taxes like everybody else
2. Sometimes force has to be used to maintain peace.
Each and every human being in this world is not in favour of maintaining peace and harmony. There are many, who would disrupt it for their own vested interests. Sometimes force has to be used to maintain peace. It is precisely for this reason that we have the police who use force against criminals and anti-social elements to maintain peace in the country. Islam promotes peace. At the same time, Islam exhorts it followers to fight where there is oppression. The fight against oppression may, at times, require the use of force. In Islam force can only be used to promote peace and justice.
Nonsense the arabs burst out of the arabian peninsula bent on conquest in the name of thier new religion and gee what do you know allah even included instructions for dividing up war booty
632 - 634 Abu Bakr, one of the Prophet's first converts and his father-in-law, established the caliphate (khilaafa, or, "succession"), initiating the first dynasty of caliphs (sing. khalifa, plural, khulafaa ). These first four caliphs became known as al-rashidoon ("the rightly-guided ones"), and, they ruled from their capital in Medina. All four were, like the Prophet himself, members of the leading clan of Mecca, the Quraysh, and, thus, were close relatives of the Prophet. The period of the Muslim conquest dates from this time. Abu Bakr sent Muslim armies into Syria and Iraq.
636 Battle of Yarmuk: The Byzantine army was defeated by the Muslims. Muslim sovereignty over Palestine begins.
637 Battle of Qadisiyya: The Sasanian army was defeated by the Muslims. After the Muslim victories over the Byzantine and Sasanian armies, Palestine, Syria, Iraq, Egypt, and Persia fell under Muslim control.
639-641 Egypt was conquered by the Muslim general Amr, who built a new capital, Misr al-Fustat, ("city of the tent"): the future Cairo.
Also in 639, Arab invaders led by Abu Musa al-Ashari conquered Khuzestan (southwest province in modern Iran -- see also).
669 - 718 The Umayyads, under the banner of jihad, mounted a series of sieges against Christian Byzantine Constantinople all of which failed. Since the Muslim understanding of jihad demanded that successful conquest, as ordained by God, must be inevitable, the cognitive dissonance these defeats engendered was difficult to explain and endure especially as they came at the hands of Christians. A technological factor in the Byzantines' success resisting these attacks was their use of "Greek fire": crude oil or tar from natural wells along the Black Sea which, on board Byzantine warships, was used with devastating results in flamethrowers directed against enemy vessels. (See Roger Crowley, 1453: The Holy War for Constantinople and the Clash of Islam and the West (New York: Hyperion, 2005), 11-15)
698 The Muslim conquest of North Africa was completed.
710 A Berber named Tariq ibn Malik led a Muslim raiding party across the narrow eight mile straits from North Africa into Spain, or, al-Andalus, as the Muslims called it (the word is etymologically linked to "Vandals" -- Philip Hitti, History of the Arabs, Tenth Edition (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1970), 498). Several months later, he was followed by Tariq ibn Ziyad who landed at Gibraltar (Arabic: Jebel Tariq, "Tariq's Mountain") with an invasionary force of 7,000. By 718, the Muslims had subjugated the Iberian peninsula despite resistance from the Visigoth Christians under King Roderick
732 In October, Charles Martel ("the Hammer") halted Muslim expansion northward into Europe at the "battle" of Poitiers-Tours on the banks of the Loire. In actuality, this was a great non-event. After days of posturing at one another, the parties fought a single, light skirmish after which the Muslims retreated south under cover of night.
Do I really need to go on in the west all the way to the second siege of Vienna in the 17th century?
3. Opinion of historian De Lacy O’Leary.
The best reply to the misconception that Islam was spread by the sword is given by the noted historian De Lacy O’Leary in the book "Islam at the cross road" (Page 8):
"History makes it clear however, that the legend of fanatical Muslims sweeping through the world and forcing Islam at the point of the sword upon conquered races is one of the most fantastically absurd myth that historians have ever repeated."
O'Leary is a joke see above
4. Muslims ruled Spain for 800 years.
Muslims ruled Spain for about 800 years. The Muslims in Spain never used the sword to force the people to convert. Later the Christian Crusaders came to Spain and wiped out the Muslims. There was not a single Muslim in Spain who could openly give the adhan, that is the call for prayers.
Oh so the invaders were finally thrown out and we are supposed to feel sorry for them? If the spanish really wanted islam they had 800 years in which to convert wholesale but they never did did they.
5. 14 million Arabs are Coptic Christians.
Muslims were the lords of Arabia for 1400 years. For a few years the British ruled, and for a few years the French ruled. Overall, the Muslims ruled Arabia for 1400 years. Yet today, there are 14 million Arabs who are Coptic Christians i.e. Christians since generations. If the Muslims had used the sword there would not have been a single Arab who would have remained a Christian.
Yes everything is just
rosy for them too isn't it? Why should muslims have put the religious minorities to the sword they are second class citizens anyway?
6. More than 80% non-Muslims in India.
The Muslims ruled India for about a thousand years. If they wanted, they had the power of converting each and every non-Muslim of India to Islam. Today more than 80% of the population of India are non-Muslims. All these non-Muslim Indians are bearing witness today that Islam was not spread by the sword.
In other parts of Asia and Europe, the conquered nations quickly opted for conversion to Islam rather than death. But in India, because of the staunch resistance of the 4000 year old Hindu faith, the Muslim conquests were for the Hindus a pure struggle between life and death. Entire cities were burnt down and their populations massacred. Each successive campaign brought hundreds of thousands of victims and similar numbers were deported as slaves. Every new invader made often literally his hill of Hindu skulls. Thus the conquest of Afghanistan in the year 1000, was followed by the annihilation of the entire Hindu population there; indeed, the region is still called Hindu Kush, 'Hindu slaughter'.
The Bahmani sultans in central India, made it a rule to kill 100.000 Hindus a year.
In 1399, Teimur killed 100.000 Hindus IN A SINGLE DAY, and many more on other occasions. Koenraad Elst quotes Professor K.S. Lal's "Growth of Muslim population in India",
who writes that according to his calculations, the Hindu population decreased by 8O MILLION between the year 1000 and 1525. INDEED PROBABLY THE BIGGEST HOLOCAUST IN THE WHOLE WORLD HISTORY. (Negat.34)
7. Indonesia and Malaysia.
Indonesia is a country that has the maximum number of Muslims in the world. The majority of people in Malaysia are Muslims. May one ask, "Which Muslim army went to Indonesia and Malaysia?"
Here at last you have in Malaysia a valid example, congratulations
8. East Coast of Africa.
Similarly, Islam has spread rapidly on the East Coast of Africa. One may again ask, if Islam was spread by the sword, "Which Muslim army went to the East Coast of Africa?"
Christianity flourished in the Nubian kingdoms mostly among the royalty and the monks; it is unknown whether the general populace fully embraced the religion. Under pressure from their northern Muslim neighbors, the Nubian Christian kingdoms fall one by one to Islam---the last in 1504. This is significant as for centuries to come the greatest threat to Ethiopia shall be their Muslim neighbors to the north
Here learn
9. Thomas Carlyle.
The famous historian, Thomas Carlyle, in his book "Heroes and Hero worship", refers to this misconception about the spread of Islam: "The sword indeed, but where will you get your sword? Every new opinion, at its starting is precisely in a minority of one. In one man’s head alone. There it dwells as yet. One man alone of the whole world believes it, there is one man against all men. That he takes a sword and try to propagate with that, will do little for him. You must get your sword! On the whole, a thing will propagate itself as it can."
Again bullocks just read
10. No compulsion in religion.
With which sword was Islam spread? Even if Muslims had it they could not use it to spread Islam because the Qur’an says in the following verse:
"Let there be no compulsion in religion:
Truth stands out clear from error"
[Al-Qur’an 2:256]
Tell that to the man in afghanistan who recently was under death sentence. Tell that to Mustafakofi
If this is the case then why is there a death sentence on apostates to this very day?
Here from Malaysia in the year 2006!
The scholar had said in his book Kifayatul-Akhyar that a person who had left the Muslim faith should be asked to repent three times and if he did not, he should be killed, his body cannot be bathed according to Muslim rites, prayers cannot be performed for him and he cannot be buried in a Muslim cemetery
source
11. Sword of the Intellect.
It is the sword of intellect. The sword that conquers the hearts and minds of people. The Qur’an says in Surah Nahl, chapter 16 verse 125:
"Invite (all) to the way of thy Lord
with wisdom and beautiful preaching;
and argue with them in ways that are
best and most gracious."
[Al-Qur’an 16:125]
What sword of the intellect? where are the groundbreaking scientific, literary, or artistic works from themuslim world?? More books are translated into spanish in spain alone than are translated into arabic in the entire arab world! In fact the middle east and north africa have the Lowest average literacy rates of any region on earth.
see
12. Increase in the world religions from 1934 to 1984.
An article in Reader’s Digest ‘Almanac’, year book 1986, gave the statistics of the increase of percentage of the major religions of the world in half a century from 1934 to 1984. This article also appeared in ‘The Plain Truth’ magazine. At the top was Islam, which increased by 235%, and Christianity had increased only by 47%. May one ask, which war took place in this century which converted millions of people to Islam?
High birthrates, which go hand in hand with poverty and illiteracy (see above) is this a good thing?
Poverty is both a cause and an effect of high birth rates. Lowered intellectual capacity leads to economic difficulties and an inability to manage the environment sustainably, increasing poverty and fueling high birth rates.
Female illiteracy is linked to high birth rates. Illiteracy is likely to be greater in communities suffering less-than-optimal intellectual capacity, precipitating high birth rates and more poverty.
High birth rates mean that populations grow beyond the capacity of the environment to feed them, and poor nutrition results. Poor nutrition contributes to poor learning, which, through illiteracy, may precipitate high birth rates and poverty
here
13. Islam is the fastest growing religion in America and Europe.
Today the fastest growing religion in America is Islam. The fastest growing religion in Europe in Islam. Which sword is forcing people in the West to accept Islam in such large numbers?
The sword is called IMMIGRATION
and high birthrates, conversion rates amongst native europeans and americans is negligible.
