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By Dr Austin Orette

“If you cannot question or interrogate it, then it is a lie “Of all the religions in the World, Islam is the only one that you cannot interrogate. Those who do are violently killed by adherents of Islam, who proclaim they are fighting for Allah. My question to the preachers of Islam has always been: If Allah is great, all powerful and all merciful, why does he need weak humans to fight for him or defend him? 

All over the world, Islam is fighting one war or the other in the name of Allah. The major reason is that they want to impose their teaching on people who just want to be left alone. They tell us Islam is a religion of peace. All we see around us is contrary to this claim. Any attempt to interrogate and question the teachings of Islam is met with fatuas and murderous rage and violence.

When Muhammad started as a preacher in Mecca, he didn't have followers. He moved to Medina and started interacting with Christian and Jewish scholars who contributed to some of his knowledge. When he could not convince them of the veracity of his claim about his Allah, he left and went to raise an army to conquer them. This is why the beginning of the Quran is similar to the Torah and the Holy bible. 

In his last 4 years in Medina, he had some vision that he was not sure if they came from God. Those visions were apocalyptic. The gentleness of the first part of the Quran was gone and has been transmogrified into a monstrous recreation of human existence. It was in these last four years he captured the Jews and Christians and forced them to his ways of teaching. Many were slaughtered. Those who did not convert were taxed and called Dhimis. The Dhimis are taxed but cannot testify in any disputes and Muslims are allowed to cheat them in any transaction. They are not protected unless they pay Jizia (An Islamic tax for unbelievers), which is another tax or protection. This system had to be repeated every time a new territory was captured and subjugated. The booty from the wars was given to his warriors and followers. This is how Islam was spread across the world with a Sword until the Islamic empire fell with the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1924. A lot of people were set free.

Mohammad himself said he cannot tell whether his later visions were from god. The attempt by Salmon Rushdie to question the satanic verses led to a Fatua on him and was almost killed in a gruesome attack by a fanatical Muslim. He lost an eye during that attack. He was a Muslim who grew up in a Muslim family.

As it stands today, anyone who questions the ways and whys of Islam is marked for death. Millions of Muslims who don't want to be Muslims anymore cannot come out and say it. Their own family will execute them.

I grew up in a Christian household. My childhood was very idyllic. As a child going to church on Sundays was a treat because we also used the Sundays to visit relatives and eat some nice and tasty food. On my way to church on one Sunday day, I saw this group of women wearing white wrappers and dancing. The dance and music fascinated me and I forgot Church. At the end of the dancing and incantations they served some nice meal. I enjoyed the meal and lost my sense of time as I enjoyed the food. No church for me that Sunday. One of the best goat pepper soup I ever tasted. My childhood Friend who missed me at church saw me. He reported to my mother that I was eating unclean food because those people were pagans. I was chastised. After that incident, I devised a way to hide my visit to that idol worshipper’s shrine. Somehow I got the time table for the meals. It was a new world for me. I will stealthily go there and eat one of the best meals. I will go to Church and smuggle myself out without my friends noticing. Gradually they all joined me and our demand for the pepper soup could no longer be satisfied. Our parents found out and it was all over. No more goat pepper soup on Sundays. We had a stern warning that that food is forbidden food. I was confused .I asked if that was the same food eaten by Adam and Eve? There was no answer. I became very skeptical. How can the good people who were so kind to me be regarded as bad? No one attacked the traditional worshippers. As a child I was confused and very curious. I missed the pepper soup, but most of all I missed the love those people showed me at the shrine. I started hanging around if I could run errands for them. I could not eat their food any more but I wanted to serve them in some capacity to show my gratitude for their love and care. I was precocious. Not once did they put pressure on me to adopt their religion. It was the Christians who were putting pressure on them to convert to Christianity. Coincidentally I started asking more questions about the Bible .Why would the Bible say these good people who gave me so much love will end in a lake of fire because they did not believe in Jesus? The cruelty and unfairness of such a scenario tormented me. My curiosity became feverish and exponential. I will ask the Sunday school teacher questions like: God created Adam and Eve. They had two children named Cain and Abel. Cain killed Abel. Who did Cain marry since Adam and Eve and Cain are the only ones alive? The answers given did not satisfy my curiosity.

Studying the bible in secondary school as I grew older created more questions. Throughout this period of inquiry, no Christian person in my surrounding gave me any reason to feel that my life was in danger. These inquiries led me to the conclusion that whoever God is, will reveal itself to me. I was told to believe but I wanted to know. In my heart I know a just and kind God would give me the answers I am seeking. I was searching for meaning when a verse in the Bible flashed through my mind. The verse says: Those who worship God must do so in truth and Spirit. I went back to the Bible and read Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, and I came to the absolute conclusion that all I need to be close to God is Love. All the religions talk are just rituals to mystify the masses. I came to the understanding that all we need to do in this world is love our neighbor and God is an essence that is in every one of us.

Dr Austin Orette writes from Houston Texas

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