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Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: E. T. who wrote (68907)	3/20/2003 7:46:23 AM
From: zonder	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 70976

I have not been to a Quran school, although I did read Quran (along with the Old & New Testaments). Muslims do not appreciate any change in the Quran, for they believe it has come down page by page from God, within Mohammed's lifetime, and has never been added to or subtracted from ever since. It is believed to be straight from God's "mouth", so it is "perfect" and cannot be changed. This is of course a far different view of one's holy book than, say, Christians', who know that their book was assembled from stories of others, a long time after the death of Christ. However, interpretation is not forbidden. It is true that younger children are not encouraged to comment on the Quran as they study it, but in higher education interpretation is employed to a degree where it approaches philosophy. My humble opinion of a lifelong agnostic, for what it is worth, is that especially the Old Testament needs interpretation much more than the Quran - Former tells of certain stories that are far more difficult to appreciate without an interpretation, while the latter is far simpler, full of mundane, everyday events. For example, a religious guy named Elisha prays to God and complains of children making fun of his bald head. God then sends two she-bears to tear thirtysomething little kids into bloody bits. Because they made fun of a guy's bald head. It is not easy to understand or appreciate for a person of 21st Century without a little bit of interpretation :-) If I recall correctly, Quran is far more straight-forward, and specific about what it preaches. "Don't have sex with your wives when they are having their period" and all that. Interpretations of the Quran depend on where you go. In more liberal countries, scholars go on TV, debating for hours what God meant in a certain paragraph in the Quran. In others, like Iran of Ayatollah Khomeini, you write a book that vaguely refers to the Quran in a conversation between two characters, and you are sentenced to death. One interpretation of the Quran I find especially incorrect and distasteful is the sentence that says "Tell your women to hide their jewels.", referring to when women were being attacked by thiefs for their jewellery in those days and another line I cannot recall now that referred to married women dressing a bit more modestly to avoid being taken for prostitutes and harrassed on the streets. Collectively, these two led to women being buried indoors for a life time, hidden behind burkas and the like in the rare events they were let out. "Dress modestly" was interpreted as "loose black blanket or burka" and "jewels" were interpreted as "all the beauty of a woman - her hair, eyes, nose, etc". It is a sad sad shame... Do you know if in Muslim religious schools new meanings or hidden meanings are actively pursued as I know they are in Hebrew religious study? As I said, Quran is not that cryptic. However, there are scholars devoting their lives to meanings in the Quran, but I have never been so interested as to read what they have "found". If I ever had to study a religious book, I would probably be studying the Torah as a number set. Now THAT would be interesting :-) (Yes, I have seen "Pi")