In the theological dogmas of Islam there are plenty of unanswered questions to which most apologists play same old game of sidetracking and putting lame excuse to the ‘out of context’, or ‘faulty Quranic translations’. Among them, I like to discuss one question about which I have been asking/searching the truth for long time, but till today nobody could give me satisfactory answer. This is the question of ‘killing/slaying’ human being by another human being by the order of Almighty God! Several years back when I read Holy Quran from beginning to end, I was totally dismayed when I found Allah telling/advocating to ‘kill’ another human being by numerous Ayats. I could not conceive this idea of insisting by Allah to kill somebody. How come? Question which bothered me most is why an omnipotent/almighty God will ask for killing human being? Who knows, may be this advice by Allah to ‘kill Kaffirs’ is working as the main fuel/ingredients behind the very spirit of Islamic Jihadhelping create more and more Osama Bin laden and other potential terrorists?
My father used to read Quran twice a day (after Fazr and before Magreb) with so much devotion until his death. One day I asked him if he (my father) understand what he was reciting with such a melody and devotions. My father’s answer was negative. My father did not understand a single word of what he was reciting daily. Now I can count how many thousands of times he uttered the word ‘killing’, of course, with sweet melody. We can even count how many trillion trillion times this word of ‘killing’ is being uttered by devout Muslims throughout the whole world.
Let me cite an example to illustrate this better: Say I am the owner of a flock of 100 Cattle. These hundred Cattle are mine, I am the sole owner, and by virtue/authority of my ownership, I have every right to do, what ever I want to do with these 100 Cattle. Now, if in the course of time, I find that some Cattle have become very destructive and wicked up to a degree that these Cattle are out of control. Then, I have two choices in front of me to handle these wicked Cattle: (a) tell other good and docile Cattle to kill those wicked and unruly Cattle by their sharp horns, or (b) because of my authority, I sell them or killed (Zabai kare khaeyya felba) those cattle and invite friends to a feast. Quite obviously, I will choose (b), and never will advocate poor Cattle to kill those wicked Cattle, right? But here in the God business of correcting wicked people, I really do not find any logic why Omnipotent God should ask human (who are less than Cattle to God) to kill other wicked humans. This problem of disobedient by some humans is so little problem for an Omnipotent/almighty Allah that, it should take only a wishful thinking for Him to correct all Kaffirs. Does any reader see any logic to it? So far, I could not get any logical/convincing answer from any apologists to this very dynamic question.
I cannot believe that, God can really ask human being to kill/slay another human being! The center of my question is not the word ‘killing, ’ but WHO actually is asking for ‘Killing.? This ‘WHO’ is nobody but OMNIPOTENT/ALMIGHTY GOD. Is Allah telling/advocating to ‘kill’ another human being by numerous Qur’anic Ayats? I could not conceive this idea that Allah is insisting his creation to kill somebody who is also his creation. Question that bothered me the most is why an Omnipotent/Almighty and Merciful God will ask for killing human being. Why then He is called a Merciful? Omnipotent God is not like human being of flesh and blood that He will take revenge through others. Even the mother of a serial killer will not ask others to kill her son, rather she will ask for forgiveness. Is Almighty God crueler or weaker than the mother of a serial killer?
Of course, if these killing orders (i.e., Ayats like: 9:5, 2.191, 5.33.or 2.193) have had come from Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) himself then, I would not ask this question. Because, Prophet Muhammad was also a human being of flesh and blood, and in need, he also can ask for necessary killings. Apologist’s example/comparisons with history of mankind --killing by American Civil War, battle of Kurukhetra or Hitler, Yahya Khan, Tikka Khan, Winston Churchill, etc., would fit here very well. Because, these are simply earthly (parthive) happenings and humans are not omnipotent/almighty by any standard. Human cannot achieve something simply by wishful thinking like an Omnipotent God. But God of course can achieve something simply by His wish. As we are told in Quran that, ‘Of course if Allah (swt) wills He can create anything just by saying ‘Qun’ (Be) and it exists. Likewise Allah (swt) can destroy at will.’ If we are to believe the text of preceding quotation by Maoulanas then we cannot find any validity of asking by God to kill anybody. God Himself can kill them by His killer Angel AZRAEL. Or, Omnipotent God simply can correct every anomaly by His wishes, period. He should not need anybody’s help.
Another new question has generated by the Qur’anic Ayat quoted by most Apologists. That is, ‘Let there be no compulsion in religion’ (Quran-2: 256). This Ayat is used repeatedly by all apologists like a broken record to claim Islam’s tolerance to others, although, there are hundreds of Qur’anic Ayats and Sahih hadiths (which apologists hardly disclose) which prove otherwise. My humble questions here to all apologists are: What is the punishment of an apostate as per Islamic Sharia? Isn’t the punishment of an apostate is death by stoning? Why in Saudi Arabia all other religious activities except Islam are completely prohibited? Why very recently Saudi Government has closed Shiite Mosque in Saudi Arabia? Why then early propagators of Islam had to fight so many bloody battles both defensively and offensively?
What is the difference between the code of King Hammurabi of Mesopotamia (2900 B.C): Killing for revenge, i. e., ‘life for life, hand for hand, eye for eye, ears for ears, tooth for tooth and wounds equal for equal’, and the Allah’s Guidance of Qur’anic Ayat: 5:45, i.e. ‘life for life, hand for hand, eye for eye, ear for ear, tooth for tooth and wounds equal for equal.’ Do we see any similarities between the judgment of King Hammurabi (a human), and Omnipotent Allah? Here in this decree of judgement, who probably copied from whom?
Most important and mysterious questions for us to ponder are: Why Muhammad (pbuh), the prophet of God, needed to insist/ask people to fight/kill fellow people violently? And why did he lure Islamic believers that they will get Jannat el-Ferdous if they kill kaffirs? Why on the other hand, another Prophet of the same God Jesus Christ said, ‘He who live by the sword will die by the sword’ or ‘If you get slapped on your right cheek then give your left cheek for the another slap.’ Why Jesus asked people to conquer the hearts of enemies by their love? Why did Mahatma Gandhi asked people not to attack/kill the enemies but to tolerate all tortures? Was Gandhi or Jesus a better person than the omnipotent who goes by the name Rahman-ur-Rahim (Kind and forgiving)?
As a child, we were told by the clerics back home that Almighty Allah has 100 names. The two names show up side-by-side in the book Niam-ul-Qur’an (By Moulvi Mohammad Shamsul Huda) page 20. One of the names is Ya-Gaffaru (Oh, forgiver!). The other name mentioned next to it is Ya-Kah-haru (Oh, big punisher). The Mullahs of the world should know better that the Almighty couldn’t be both all at the same time. Whether we like it or not, Jesus seems to have opted for the forgiving part of Allah, whereas, our Payare-Nabi Mustafa Karim (pbuh) had shown his proclivity to mete out punishment and thus opting for the title Kah-haru. No wonder so many bystanders Arab had to be murdered in the broad daylight because they had their nagging doubts about the divinity of Muhammad (pbuh).
The bottom line in this ongoing
debate is the following: It would be quite unjust for the CREATOR to approve
killing of his creations by his own creation. If He thinks that some creations
are becoming unruly, and are deviating from the Seerut-al-Mustaquim, then,
why can’t He come down from his Arash to this lowly place call Arda (Earth)
and do the killing Himself? He most certainly has ever-ready Azrael under
His arm. But could it be that poor Azrael is too tired doing his job from
the time immemorial! In that case, Allah is very wise to tell us that we
men should kill another fellow human being because in His infinite wisdom
He thought we are the right persons for this job. What a cruel joke this
Almighty is playing on us!