Rejecting Dr. David Liepert's Apologetic Myth that Aisha's Age is in Question

I have not yet watched the "Innocence of Muslims" clip, and doubt that I ever will. This is because I can think of better ways of spending a spare quarter-hour than staring at rubbish. The film includes references to the Prophet Muhammad's 9-year-old child bride, Aisha. I know this because people in the skeptics community are asking, how factual is this movie really? And some well-intentioned people are replying with claims that "not one thing in the movie is factual", that , "Most scholars for the last 1200 years suggest Aisha was 11-14", and one person even provided a link to an apologetic piece by a Muslim named Dr. David Liepert at the Huffington Post titled, "Rejecting the Myth of Sanctioned Child Marriage in Islam".

Apparently the arguments raised by Liepert and others have given many the false impression that Aisha's age is a long contested issue in Islam, and that it is a valid argument over interpretation that could eventually lead to reforms within mainstream Islam. The problem I have with this, is that it is certainly not an argument over interpretation. The text clearly say one thing and one thing only. For anyone with a little knowledge on the subject and who has actually read the source material, it is disingenuous to claim otherwise. For people like Liepert, simply lying about what sources say may be effective in apologetic pieces, but they are useless if the intentions behind them are to reform the religion.

To explain in a language my readers may understand better; there are valid theological or factual arguments/disagreements, and then there is absurd nonsense that is not worthy of being entertained. For example; there are lots of creationists who claim evolution is not factual because "monkeys still exist, so we haven't evolved from them!!!", and other such ignorant rubbish. Scientists schooled in evolution (in fact, anyone with an ounce of knowledge on the subject) will either laugh or feel pity for those gullible enough to fall for these arguments. The last thing they or anyone will do is claim evolution is in doubt because there are some non-peer reviewed arguments to the contrary posted by obscure loonies on the Internet.... 

Can you see where I'm going with this?

The claim that most scholars for the last 1200 years have suggested Aisha was 11-14 at the time of her marriage to Muhammad is blatantly in error. To the best of my knowledge, the first ever pro-Muhammad and provably faulty objection raised to Aisha's age was by Maulana Muhammad Ali who lived from 1874 to 1951 (see here). He is a nobody as far as mainstream Islam is concerned, since he belonged to the Ahmadiyya whose beliefs drastically differ from them (think of the difference between Judaism to Christianity, or Christianity to Islam, and you're on the right track). The Ahmadiyya and their writings are heavily focused on missionary work (see here for a previous response to a disingenuous Ahmadiyya missionary at the Huffington Post, where I touch upon some of the major differences).

Then there is Habib Ur Rahman Siddiqui Kandhalvi who in his Urdu booklet, "Tehqiq e umar e Siddiqah e Ka'inat" (English trans. 1997), laments that he is "tired of defending this tradition" that is "laughed" at and "ridiculed" by English-educated individuals he meets in Karachi who claim it is against "sagacity and prudence" and "preferred English society to Islam over this", and he readily admits his "aim is to produce an answer to the enemies of Islam who spatter mud at the pious body of the Generous Prophet". Unsurprisingly, a posthumous fatwa was issued against him in November 2004, labeling him a "Munkir-e-Hadith" (hadith rejector) and a "Kafir" (infidel) on the basis of being a rejector of hadith.

More recently, we have Moiz Amjad (who refers to himself as "The Learner"). He readily admits to having lifted these faulty arguments from them, summarizing and presenting them in response to a Muslim asking him how he can respond to Christians who called Muhammad a pedophile (i.e. all of his arguments, like Ali's and Kandhalvi's before him, were apologetic in nature rather than scholarly). It was at this very recent point in history that the arguments originating from the Ahmadiyya in the 1920s and 1930s finally achieved some limited popularity among a few orthodox Muslims on the Internet. Clearly a knee-jerk reaction to the avalanche in criticism of Muhammad's life, as opposed to any real significant shift in beliefs.

Since then, his arguments have been rehashed by countless apologists on the Internet with the same missionary and apologetic focus. Dr. David Liepert's copy of these arguments are clearly aimed at Christians and other "Islamophobes"  (apparently, he cannot envision a fourth reason for disagreeing with his ignorance, e.g. for the reason of Intellectual honesty). The funny thing about these people is that they have evidently not read the source material, or are not knowledgeable on the subjects they discuss with such feigned authority, because, even though Liepert claims his "conclusions [are] little more than simple common sense", they lift these highly convoluted arguments based on assumptions from Moiz Amjad with all of their obvious lies and faults intact. Additionally, since these 'arguments' are so specific, their original source is obvious, but Liepert and others never choose to reveal this to their readers. Instead they play on their target audience's ignorance, choosing to peddle it as their own 'research' (only recently, I dealt with another apologist doing the very same thing. After I replied to him, he deleted his article within 2 hours).

What I'm saying is, there is not a single serious Muslim scholar (someone who is not considered a complete kook by mainstream Muslims or has less knowledge of the sources than a layman like myself) who would repeat these arguments. Shaykh Gibril F. Haddad, who was listed amongst the inaugural "500 most influential Muslims in the world" (p. 94), is a Muslim scholar who is taken very seriously by mainstream Muslims, and deserves my respect simply for taking a stand against Salafi fundamentalism without having to lower himself to the standards held by the likes of Dr. Liepert and others. He responded to Amjad's polemics more than 5 years ago and it has remained unanswered. There has never been a response to "Our Mother A'isha's Age At The Time Of Her Marriage to The Prophet". I've presented it to many apologists and they have never countered any of it, simply because they cant. Shaykh Haddad's response is quite literally the "be all and end all of the argument". Including many facts that are easily verifiable for those who have access to the hadith and sira literature, he annihilates the lies and distortions being spread by apologists.

Fact; Liepert is lying through his teeth when claiming there is only 1 chain of narration for Aisha's age. There are in fact multiple reliable narrations from many different chains of narrators (lifting their classification from sahih to mutawatir, the highest class of narrations). I've read at least 4 different narrations in Sahih Bukhari and 3 in Sahih Muslim that state she was 9. There are many others in Abu Dawud, Ibn Ishaq, Al Tabari's History, etc., that state the same thing. There is none to the contrary.

Fact; even though he claims "it is a matter of incontrovertible historical record", Liepert is lying through his teeth when claiming Aisha took part in the Battle of Badr and Uhud, and thus was fifteen years of age. Sahih hadith state the exact opposite, that she only bid farewell to the combatants of Badr and only carried water skins back and forth to the combatants of Uhud (the age restriction applied only to combatants. It applied neither to non-combatant boys nor to non-combatant girls).

Fact; Liepert is lying through his teeth when claiming Aisha accepted Islam shortly after it was revealed -- 12 years before her marriage. Nowhere does Ibn Hisham's recension of Ibn Ishaq's Sirat Rasul Allah say this. Rather, Ibn Hisham lists Aisha among "those that accepted Islam because of Abu Bakr." Abu Bakr being Aisha's father, the first Rightly-Guided Caliph of Islam.

Liepert shamelessly spews lie after lie and distortion after distortion, but rather than me going through every single one of them, I suggest reading Shaykh Haddad's unanswered reply to Moiz Amjad, and WikiIslam's and MuslimHope's article on the same subject. 

Some of the things that are not covered in those replies include:

Liepert's claim that "the Quran doesn't condone wife-beating either. In pre-Islamic Arabia, men did not need permission to beat their wives. And although the Arabic root Dzaraba does mean "beat" it also means "heal." Dzaraba denotes action for a higher purpose, such as "striking (or minting) a coin," or "striking out on a new path." Note that Liepert's deception is two-fold here. Not only is he playing on his target audiences ignorance of the Arabic language, he is also playing on their ignorance of Arabian History.

His first claim was lifted from another American Muslim apologist named Laleh Bakhtiar. "Dzaraba" and its usage in Qur'an 4:34 linguistically does not leave room for any other meaning than to physically beat someone. His second claim is not original either. Muslim apologists love to exaggerate the so-called "Period of Ignorance" (Jahiliyah), painting all pre-Islamic Arabians as backward, cave-dwelling Neanderthals. This is a view that is contradicted by Islam's own text. In Sahih Bukhari 7:6:715, a Muslim woman complains to Muhammad about her husband beating her until her skin literally turned green. Muhammad refuses to condemn this behavior. Instead choosing to provide his tacit approval of wife-beating by siding with the husband. Ironically, it is the young Aisha who refutes Liepert's claim when she exclaims, "I have not seen any woman suffering as much as the believing women. Look! Her skin is greener than her clothes!" This of course means Muslim women in Arabia were being treated worse than their pagan and Abrahamic Arabian counterparts.

Liepert claims that "the Sunnah confirms that both Aisha's betrothal and consummation occurred with Aisha's enthusiastic agreement. In fact, some even imply she went against the initial wishes of her Dad!". This is a blatant lie. In Islam, a bride's father or father's father may "compel their charge to marry... without her consent." In fact, Muslim scholars are "unanimously agreed that a father may marry off his young daughter without consulting her". This is all based on the unquestionable fact that Aisha did not give her consent to the marriage. 

Liepert also claims that Christians attack Islam for pedophilia, but Muslims never attack Christianity for it. This is, once again, a provable lie. Muslims often attack both Christians and Jews with the accusation that their faiths allow pedophilia. Most Western Christians are either too stupid or too infatuated with Zionism to care less, but I have several pages that destroy their very silly and desperate arguments (for example; see here, here and here). Not only do Muslim apologists erroneously accuse Judaism of permitting pedophilia, they actually go one step further than the Christian "Islamophobes" and accuse the Christian god himself of being a pedophile (how's that for some Muslim "Christophobia"?).  

Liepert amazingly blames "Islamophobes", in addition to blaming Muslims (including imam Bukhari, who is considered to be one of the greatest Muslims to have ever lived), for perpetuating child marriages in the Muslim world. Well, I have news for him. The blame squarely falls on one individual. With an age difference of 45 years, this individual married a child 6 times younger than himself (Aisha was 9 and he was 54). Because of this individual's actions, millions of young girls today are forced into pedophilic child marriages by individuals, and even entire nations, who explicitly use Aisha's relationship with him as justification. Yes, this man is none other than Prophet Muhammad. Someone who more than a billion people believe is the greatest and most moral man to have ever walked this earth.

If anything today is helping to perpetuate the existence of pedophilic child marriages in the Muslim world, it is the lies peddled by these shameless individuals. Change and reform is a result of honest discussion and criticism, the same honest discussion that these people are trying to avoid through inventing false myths, and the same honest criticism that these people are trying to stifle by smearing everyone who raises them as "Islamophobic" bigots.  Change and reform is also the result of human self-reflection, the same self-reflection that these shameless people are trying their damnedest to isolate and immunize the Muslim world from.

I can understand creationists and religious zombies repeating rubbish as facts without doing any fact-checking, but it is not something I expect to see from skeptics. There seems to exist a collective fear that the truth may be too "Islamophobic" for us to acknowledge, so people tend to accept any excuse, any lie, put forward in defense of Islam. If the truth is too Islamophobic, then maybe we should reconsider flinging such a word so frivolously at anyone who criticizes Islam. Maybe it is about time we all got ourselves educated on Islam, on what its texts actually say, and on the views the majority of the world's Muslims still hold today. For this, we certainly do not need to waste precious time on reading fanciful fairy-tales written by apologists or watching trash like "Innocence of Muslims".


Additional notes

1. Since writing this response to Liepert, WikiIslam's article, "Refutation to Muslim Apologetics against Aisha's Age of Consummation", has been updated to include much of my information and commentary on the origins and history of the "Aisha was older" apologetic argument.

2. From my tone in this piece, you've probably guessed I do not hold a positive view of this "Innocence of Muslims" clip. I personally have nothing against satire aimed at religious or political beliefs (e.g. see here and here), but even I have my standards.

3. For examples of people claiming  "monkeys still exist, so we haven't evolved from them!!!" , just Google: http://www.google.com/search?rls=en&q=monkeys+still+exist,+so+we+haven't+evolved+from+them

4. Considering that Liepert is a "National Board member of the Canadian Islamic Chamber of Commerce" and is involved with many other Canadian-based Islamic initiatives, some may think my comparing him to "obscure individuals on the Internet" is unfair. But, in the grander scale of things, an "obscure individual" is in fact a very good description of what he actually is. According to a 2011 Pew Report, only "3% of the world’s Muslims live in more-developed regions, such as Europe, North America, Australia, New Zealand and Japan." Only three percent. If we consider Canada on its own, that figure drops below single digits. Why is this statistic important to us? It is important because these provably false "modernist" claims are almost exclusively entertained by Muslims in these "more-developed" secular regions of the earth. Even within these secular regions, many, if not the majority of Muslims, still hold on to the mainstream Islamic views concerning Aisha's young age. Outside of this measly 3%, we have the other 97%, the 1.5 billion Muslims of the Middle-East, Africa, and Asia. Now, we evidently have these two opposing Muslim groups, but which of the two is more representative of mainstream Islam; the tiny percentage within an already tiny 3% or the 97+%? Make no mistake, the unorthodox views espoused by the likes of Liepert and other apologists are highly controversial, even among their Western co-religionists. For example, take the case of American Muslim apologist Laleh Bakhtiar whom I mentioned earlier. Liepert conveniently borrows her "Dzaraba" argument to deny that wife-beating is approved by the Qur'an. However, not so long ago, this very same argument landed Laleh Bakhtiar in hot water. In fact her claim was so controversial among the "moderate" Muslims of Canada, that the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) refused to sell her translation in their bookstores. So, when all things are considered, we can conclude that, certainly they, i.e. the Muslims that actually matter, overwhelmingly agree on Aisha's age and couldn't care less about what an obscure, white, convert in Canada has to say regarding their beliefs.

5. Text from, "Age of Aisha (ra) at time of marriage",  by Zahid Aziz that discuss Maulana M. Ali: "It appears that Maulana Muhammad Ali was the first Islamic scholar directly to challenge the notion that Aisha was aged six and nine, respectively, at the time of her nikah and consummation of marriage. This he did in, at least, the following writings: his English booklet Prophet of Islam, his larger English book Muhammad, the Prophet, and in the footnotes in his voluminous Urdu translation and commentary of Sahih Bukhari entitled Fadl-ul-Bari, these three writings being published in the 1920s and 1930s. In the booklet Prophet of Islam, which was later incorporated in 1948 as the first chapter of his book Living Thoughts of the Prophet Muhammad..." 

6. On the major differences between mainstream Islam and the Ahmadiyya: the Ahmadiyya have an additional Prophet, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, and some additional religious texts (Mirza Ghulam Ahmad's writings). So they are as different to mainstream Islam as Islam is to Christianity. After all, Islam is simply an additional Prophet (Muhammad) and some additional religious texts (Qur'an and Sunnah). Accordingly, Ahmadis are widely persecuted in Islamic countries because they are viewed as infidels by Muslims. In fact, they are often viewed as more heretical than Christians and Jews. Likewise, according to Ahmadi beliefs, only those who accept Mirza Ghulam Ahmad's prophethood are considered Muslims.

7. All  Habib Ur Rahman Siddiqui Kandhalvi quotations are taken from the Preface of the 2007 English translation of his Urdu booklet, "Tehqiq e umar e Siddiqah e Ka'inat", translated by Nigar Erfaney and published by Al-Rahman Publishing Trust under the title, "Age of Aisha (The Truthful Women, May Allah Send His Blessings)"

8. The fatwa in full, branding  Habib Ur Rahman Siddiqui Kandhalvi's beliefs outside of Islam, thus making him a 'kafir', from "Fatwa's on hadith rejectors?": "QUESTION: A book by the name of 'Mazhabi Dastanain Aur Unn Ki Haqeeqat' comprising of four volumes. This book is authored by Habib ar-Rahman Siddiqui Khandhalvi. Is the afore-mentioned person a Munkir-e-Hadith (Hadith Rejector) or a Pervaizi or does he in reality hold any scholarly status? Please tell me briefly about him. In this book, many views that are contradictory to the Aqeedah of Ahlus Sunnah Wal Jamaah are written, for example denial of Imam Mahdi and denial of Hazrat Ali being the 4th Caliph etc. What is the ruling for such a person and those who agree with his views, follow or propogate them?

ANSWER: Habib ar-Rahman Siddiqui Kandhalvi is a Pervaizi (Munkir-e-Hadith). And Pervaiz and his adherents (Parvezi's) - the Ulema have declared them as Kafirs, on the basis of being rejectors of hadith. Habib ar-Rahman Siddiqui Kandhalvi [deceased] is the son of a renowned scholar of Islam, Ashfaq ar-Rahman Khandhalvi. Ashfaq ar-Rahman Kandhalvi is famous for his book Hujjat-al-Hadith. Both of them are relatives of Sheikh-ul-Hind Muhammad Idrees Khandhalvi (Sheikh-ul-Hadith). We do not know anything about Habib ar-Rahman Kandhalvi's scholarly status [calibre, competence, qualification] and neither are we aware of any details in regards to his Shuhrat [recognition, popularity, reputation] and Allah Ta'ala Knows Best

Answer is correct/approved: Mufti Hameedullah Jhaan, Darul Iftaa Jamia Ashrafia Lahore, Pakistan November 5th 2004".

9. For the apologetic article that really started it all, see: "What was Ayesha's (ra) Age at the Time of Her Marriage?", by Moiz Amjad. And for examples  of Moiz Amjad's arguments being rehashed by countless apologists on the Internet with the same missionary and apologetic focus, see: "Ayesha’s Age: The Myth Of A Proverbial Wedding Exposed," by T.O Shanavas; "What Was The Age of Ummul Mo'mineen Ayesha (May Allah be pleased with her) When She Married To Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him)?," by 'Imam' Chaudhry (word-for-word plagiarism of Amjad's work); and "Of Aisha’s age at marriage," by Nilofar Ahmed.

10. The  only 3 reasons behind disagreeing with apologetic lies and ignorance,  according to Liepert are, "Either you are such a crazy Islamophile that you are willing to go to your grave insisting Muhammad could do whatever he wanted, or you are such a crazy Islamophobe that you want to insist he did, or you are such a weirdly religious sex-crazed pervert that you hope accusing him makes it OK for you to do it too. There is absolutely no other reason to either make or repeat that disgusting claim." This is of course a false dichotomy, meant to smear anyone who speaks honestly about what Islam's sources say as either a bigot or pervert.

11.  All of the ages for Aisha provided by the major hadith collections and the sira literature agree on her age at consummation. However, a Wikipedia article claims Tabari states  Aisha was 10 at consummation. The reference given for the claim is Tabari, Volume 9, Page 131; Tabari, Volume 7, Page 7. I own all 40 volumes of Tabari's History. Opening up both pages, Volume 9, Page 131 says she was aged 9. Nowhere does it claim she was 10. Volume 7, Page 7 says she was 9 three times. Nowhere does it claim she was 10. 

Aisha's Age, "Islamophobic Propaganda" and Tayyab Tanvir's Shattered Faith

This is a quick response to a Facebook note published by Tayyab Tanvir on Saturday, 25 August 2012, titled "Aisha's Age and Islamophobic propaganda"

Slander & Attacking a Strawman

Tayyab Tanvir says:

"Islamophobes always come up with this discussion to degrade Mohammad(PBUH). Ironically enough they always quote an article from WikiIlsam. I have to admit the first time I came across WikiIslam and read the article about Aisha's age, it seemed like everything I believed in shattered. My mind could not accept that my Prophet(PBUH) would force a six year old girl to marry him. So I read few more articles on the website including one about how Quran encourages Muslims to kill non-believers. The author supported his argument with various Quranic verses. The interesting thing I noticed about them was that he intentionally left out important parts of the verses to support his faux argument. This made me realize how the author is manipulating Quranic verses and Hadiths only to spread confusion and degrade Islam."

This is not only an unsupported slandering of critics, but also a strawman argument. He is discussing an article titled "Aisha's Age of Consummation". The article "discusses the DMS (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual) of mental disorders and cites sahih hadiths to prove that Muhammad was a pedophile according to clinical definitions."

It does not argue the age of Aisha since mainstream Muslims (Sunni Islam i.e 80-90% of all Muslims) whole-heartedly accept that Aisha consummated her marriage to Prophet Muhammad when she was nine (the other 10-20%, the Shi'ites, say she may have been 9-10). It is only heretical Muslims, those who are not even considered Muslims by most (e.g. Ahmadis and so-called "reformist"), that argue she was an adult.

Taking Credit for Other's Work

Tayyab Tanvir says:

"Few days ago I was engaged in a debate on a facebook page. Admin of the page stated that Muslims can’t carry out a decent conversation and support it with facts but instead they would accuse “open minded” westerns of racism and send out hate mails and death threats. So I spent hours researching for data and hadiths to answer their claims, only to get banned in the end because somehow my comments were getting more likes than theirs."

He presents 10 different arguments against the young age of Aisha as the result of his "hours researching for data and hadiths". 

His friends are apparently impressed by "his" hard work. For example, Aymen Siddiqui says, "I am out of words for the amount of effort and research you have presented. Brilliant job !!!" And Owais Tahir says "I am amazed at the extensive research you have done , not a lot of people pay attention to matters like this . May Allah bless you".

But they are praising the wrong man. None of the claims presented in that page were thought up by Tayyab Tanvir. They are the work of Moiz Amjad, "The Learner".  Tayyab Tanvir is dishonestly taking the credit for someone else's work.

Tayyab Tanvir's Arguments Refuted 

Tayyab Tanvir's arguments, no, I mean Moiz Amjad arguments have all been refuted in an article titled "Refutation to Muslim Apologetics against Aisha's Age of Consummation".

For Muslims who may not trust critics, you can read "Our Mother A'isha's Age At The Time Of Her Marriage to The Prophet", Shaykh Gibril F Haddad's unanswered reply to Moiz Amjad.

Disingenuous & Cowardly Behavior

He complains about allegedly "being banned", but the fact that Tayyab Tanvir has been attacking a strawman, has been taking the credit for others work and has already been refuted, has been pointed out twice by a user named Issy Jones and once by me. And every single time, our comments have been deleted:

Conclusion

It is a fact that every single sahih hadith narration on Aisha's age when she had sex with Muhammad says she was nine-years-old.

So when Tayyab Tanvir claimed "I have to admit the first time I came across WikiIslam and read the article about Aisha's age, it seemed like everything I believed in shattered" he was either lying about Aisha's age making a difference to his faith, or his faith had been shattered but he's too indoctrinated to care.

Either way, this exposes the false protests made by shameless Muslim apologists who will shout "Islamophobe!!!" at anything they perceive as a threat to their missionary work, even if those "threats" simply repeat what the vast majority of the world's Muslims actually believe.

Resources on Aisha's Age

From Critics:

1. A’isha: Mohammed’s Nine-Year Old Wife
2. Aisha's Age of Consummation
3. Refutation to Muslim Apologetics against Aisha's Age of Consummation
4. Responses to Apologetics: Muhammad and Aisha
5. Qur'an, Hadith and Scholars:Aisha
6. Controversies about the age of Aisha 
7. Aisha the Child Wife of Muhammad
8. Moral Evaluations of the Marriage of the Prophet with Aisha 
9. Muhammad, Aisha, Islam, and Child Brides
10. An Examination of Muhammad's Marriage to a Prepubescent Girl and its Moral Implications
11. Aisha — 9 year-old bride
12. Was Muhammad a Pedophile?
13. Really, really wishing Aisha weren't nine

From Muslims:

1. Our Mother A'isha's Age At The Time Of Her Marriage to The Prophet
2. Child marriage in Islam
3. I would like to marry a woman who is 12 years old, her father and she has also agreed. What is your advise?
4. Ruling on marrying young women
5. Is it acceptable to marry a girl who has not yet started her menses?

Culture or Islam? Muslim Child Forced to Marry at 5 While Living in UK

The Mail Online featured an article recently about a Muslim woman in her 40s who was forced into marriage at the age of 5 in the UK.  She spoke out after revelations that Britain's Forced Marriage Unit had handled the case of another five-year-old girl in 2011.

As I was browsing over the recent comments posted there, one particular comment caught my eye. It was posted by "Amna" from Bristol, and with 112 "likes", it's fair to say that her comment was popular. She states:

For the record, forced marriage isn't a part of Islam, it is the asian culture that dictates it. I'm a non asian muslim and I have never personally met anyone who has had a forced marriage and I'm 100% sure that it's not even allowed in our religion.

How accurate is this statement? Is the "moderate" Muslim Amna correct, thereby it is really a cultural hangover from those "nasty Asians". Or is Amna a lying apologist who is helping to perpetuate the existence of an abhorrent and accepted part of orthodox mainstream Islam by deflecting criticism away from it?

Unfortunately, it's the latter. It may be at some level a cultural thing, but it's existence is justified and perpetuated by Islamic teachings that explicitly condone the practice.

In Islam, a bride's father or father's father may "compel their charge to marry... without her consent." In fact, Muslim scholars are "unanimously agreed that a father may marry off his young daughter without consulting her".Furthermore, "there is no age limit to be intimate with one's wife even if she is a minor (did not attain puberty)". It goes without saying that this is all based on the Qur'an and Muhammad's Sunnah.

"Marriage to a young girl before she reaches puberty is permissible according to sharee’ah, and it was narrated that there was scholarly consensus on this point. The scholars are unanimously agreed that a father may marry off his young daughter without consulting her. The Messenger of Allaah married ‘Aa’ishah bint Abi Bakr when she was young, six or seven years old, when her father married her to him." - Is it acceptable to marry a girl who has not yet startedher menses? - Islam Q&A, Fatwa No. 12708

And:

"According to the Shari'ah, if a girl is a minor (did not attain puberty), she may be given in marriage by her father. When she attains puberty, she has the right to maintain the marriage or discontinue the marriage. There is no age limit to be intimate with one's wife even if she is a minor." - I would like to marry a woman who is 12 years old, her father and she has also agreed. What is your advise? - Islamic Q & A Online with Mufti Ebrahim Desai, Ask-Imam, Question No. 6737

And:

"m3.13 Guardians are of two types, those who may compel their female charges to marry someone, and those who may not. 1. The only guardians who may compel their charge to marry are a virgin bride's father or father's father, compel meaning to marry her to a suitable match (def: m4) without her consent. 2. Those who may not compel her are not entitled to marry her to someone unless she accepts and gives her permission. Whenever the bride is a virgin, the father or father's father may marry her to someone without her permission, though it is recommended to ask her permission if she has reached puberty. A virgin's silence is considered as permission." - Reliance of the Traveller: A Classic Manual of Islamic Sacred Law - Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Misri, Edited and Translated by Nuh Ha Mim Keller

The first fatwa is from Shaykh Muhammed Salih Al-Munajjid, an extremely well-respected Saudi Islamic scholar, lecturer, and author. Where is the South Asian "cultural influence" to his ruling? Additionally, it is not simply "his" ruling. As he makes very clear, Islamic scholars are unanimously agreed on the subject.

This point is further reiterated by the third quote. Within mainstream Sunni Islam (up to 90% of all Muslims follow this form of Islam) there are four mainstream schools of thought which are accepted by one another. The third quote is from a book of Shafi'i Fiqh, Shafi'i being one of those four aforementioned schools.

What was it Amna was saying about  "Asian culture" and Islam?

The Christian God: An "Unholy" Pedophile?

This claim is often presented (for example; here) in addition to the claim that Joseph was a pedophile. It is used as a tu quoque defense of Muhammad's pedophilia.

It has already been shown in a previous post that there is no authoritative Christian text which state Mary's age. Claims about her age are, at best, educated guesses, but guesses none-the-less.  

Additionally, the apocryphal literature (the Christian equivalent of weak or fabricated hadith) used to gather information on Mary's possible age actually reveal she may have been 16 at the time of her marriage, not 12 or 14.

Problems

Even if we were to assume she was 12 or 14 at the time, there still remain several problems with this claim:

• A pedophile by its very definition means someone who is sexually attracted to pre-pubescent children. Teenagers of child-bearing age are not pre-pubescent.
• According to the Christian Bible, Mary became with child by "the power of the Highest", a phrase that does not, or does not necessarily, correspond to Mary being "impregnated."
• Even if we do accept that the Christian god "impregnated" Mary, both Christians and Muslims believe God is omnipotent. Therefore sexual intercourse, something which would have to take place if we were to accept this claim, is not necessary in order to achieve this. For example, artificial insemination needs no sexual intercourse. If humans can impregnate people without sexual intercourse, why can't an omnipotent deity do the same?
• Muslims also believe in the virgin birth. So, if Muslims insist the Christian god must have had sex with Mary in order to have a son, it is tantamount to an admission that, according to Islam, Allah must have also had sex with Mary in order for her to conceive Jesus.

Conclusion

In short; the Christian text do not mention anything of a sexual nature, i.e. there was no giant “holy penis” involved. If there was no penis involved, then there was no sexual contact. Without sexual contact, there is no pedophilia.

Conversely, the Qur'an explicitly tells us Allah (or Gabriel if we refer to the tafsir text) blew into Mary's vagina in order for her to conceive Jesus.

My Prophet, My Führer

Educational and humorous at the same time. This is a Downfall parody video which has "Hitler" playing the role of Muhammad. All references can be found here.

Joseph the Pedophile: A Case of Christian Hypocrisy?

This argument has become very popular with followers of Islam and their non-Muslim apologists. I've seen it posted on many forum discussions and it almost always leads to the critic's silence. When discussing Islam, tu quoque is to be expected. After all, their is no logical way one could defend a faith as flawed as Islam, without resorting to fallacies. It doesn't even surprise me that the accusations against Joseph are patently false, there is no religion out there nearly half as abhorrent as Islam, so it takes a few lies and distortions to even get close. However, what did surprise me is how incompetent many Christians were at defending their own beliefs. American Christians, the group of Christians most active on the net, seem to be collectively suffering from Zion fever, a condition which leaves them able to argue in defense of nothing else but the modern state of Israel.

From WikiIslam:

Mary married 90-year-old Joseph when she was 12-14, so Joseph was a pedophile too

Everyone who makes this claim, cite the same New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia page. What they do not mention is that this page begins by warning readers, "the apocryphal literature is full of details, the non-admittance of these works into the Canon of the Sacred Books casts a strong suspicion upon their contents".

According to Wikipedia, apocrypha is defined as "spurious", "of questionable authenticity", and "Christian texts that are not canonical." Thus they can be considered as the Christian equivalent of da`if (weak) or maudu (fabricated) hadith.

Something that is non-canonical is not binding on a follower and can be ignored. There is no authoritative Christian text which state Mary's age. Claims about her age are, at best, educated guesses, but guesses none-the-less. Bukhari and Muslim, on the other hand, are canonical Islamic writings of the utmost religious authenticity, accepted by approximately 90 percent of the world's Muslims.

Even if we do accept this tu-quoque logical fallacy as a valid argument, there remains several problems. The first being the fact that the New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia page does not say Mary married Joseph when she was aged 12 to 14.

What it actually says, after warning readers once again that the stories are "unreliable", is that Mary was 12 to 14 at the time of the choosing of candidates, and the Annunciation (the announcement by the angel Gabriel to the virgin called Mary, that she would conceive and become the mother of Jesus) took place two years later. This would make Mary 14 to 16 at the time of her marriage, not 12 to 14, or 9, as was the case between Muhammad and Aisha. She would have been a teenager of child-bearing age, not a pre-pubescent pre-teen child.

Another problem is that the theological significance of Joseph and Muhammad to the Christian and Islamic faiths are incomparable. Unlike the Muslim view of Muhammad, Christians do not consider Joseph to be an uswa hasana (excellent model of conduct). Joseph's moral character holds no importance within Christian theology. He could have been insane and it would not matter to a Christian.

Then there is the fact that, according to both the Christian scriptures and the Islamic ones, Mary was a virgin when she conceived and gave birth to Jesus; therefore, her relationship with Joseph could not have been a sexual one until after Jesus' birth, making her possibly 17 years of age at the time the marriage was eventually consummated, if ever.

Indeed, the same New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia page continues the narrative of Joseph's life by stating both Mary and Joseph entered the marriage with the understanding that it was never to be consummated.

Mary's Perpetual virginity, the belief that Mary remained a virgin her entire life, is an essential article of faith for the majority of the worlds Christians (including the Roman Catholic, Anglo-Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox Christians). It is even held by some Muslims.

Finally, the most decisive argument against the claim that Joseph was a pedophile is the fact that the same non-canonical writings which are used to gather information on Joseph and Mary's age, also confirm Mary's status as "ever virgin" (in The History of Joseph the Carpenter, Jesus says on Joseph's death "my mother, virgin undefiled").

Catholic & Eastern Churches believe pedophile Joseph is a Saint, that's the same as an Uswa Hasana in Islam

A saint and an uswa hasana are nothing alike. The entire Islamic faith, almost all of its laws, rituals, and moral principles, are defined by the uswa hasana's actions. A saint has no similar function in Christianity. Their actions do not determine Christian laws, rituals, or moral principles in any way. Joan of Arc and countless others are Catholic saints too, but that means very little to how one practices Christianity.

Muhammad is the central figure of Islam, Joseph is not the central figure of Christianity. Islam wouldn't exist if Muslims decided Muhammad was immoral. On the other hand, for Christians of any stripe, Joseph is a "non entity" as far as its theology is concerned. The closest analogy to Muhammad and an uswa hasana in Christianity is the figure of Jesus, and very few non-Christians would argue that their view of Christians and Christianity would not improve if his followers behaved more like him.

In addition, it is the same Catholic and Eastern Churches which consider Joseph a saint, who also hold to the belief of Mary's perpetual virginity. Since Mary's ever-lasting virginity is an integral part or "pillar" of their faith, and most modern theologians think the Pope could reverse a sainthood without undermining the Church's doctrines, it's not hard to imagine what would have become of Joseph's saint status if he did have intercourse with Mary.

Furthermore, as has already been stated in the previous section, Joseph cannot be labeled as a pedophile by anyones standards because there is no authoritative, or even apocryphal, Christian text that state an adult Joseph had sex with a child Mary. Therefore, even if the status of saint was equivalent to that of an uswa hasana, it would not matter to a Christian or help Muslims in excusing the actions of Muhammad.

Adding to the above text:

• A pedophile by its very definition means someone who is sexually attracted to pre-pubescent children. Teenagers of child-bearing age are not pre-pubescent.
• Even if Joseph was a pedophile, a Christian could not be accused of hypocrisy for criticizing Muhammad's pedophilia. For them to be hypocrites, it is Jesus' actions, not Joseph's, which would have to mirror Muhammad's. This is because all critics, including Christians, criticize the founder of Islam, not the founder's father.

The Qur'an CHALLENGE!

This has got to be one of the most funniest videos  (3 min 9 sec)  I've watched so far this year.  Other than the fact that most of the issues discussed here are from the hadith and sira literature, not the Qur'an, I think what makes this video so funny is that it's accurate in its description of Muhammad's behavior. Enjoy.

Jew Quoque: The Truth about Infidels, Lying, Stealing and Pedophilia in the Talmud

These lies were originally compiled at MissionIslam.com from various antisemitic sources, and are being put to use, without attribution, by many Muslims across the net. Most of the claims are in fact doctrines found within mainstream Islam, thus are being used in an attempt to silence critics.

An excerpt from a post by a Muslim on the FFI forum:

"The Jews are called human beings, but the non-Jews are not humans. They are beasts."

Talmud: Baba mezia, 114b

"The Akum (non-Jew) is like a dog. Yes, the scripture teaches to honour the the dog more than the non-Jew."

Jalkut Rubeni gadol 12b

"Although the non-Jew has the same body structure as the Jew, they compare with the Jew like a monkey to a human."

Schene luchoth haberith, p. 250 b

"It is permitted to take the body and the life of a Gentile."

Sepher ikkarim III c 25

"It is the law to kill anyone who denies the Torah. The Christians belong to the denying ones of the Torah."

Coschen hamischpat 425 Hagah 425. 5

"A heretic Gentile you may kill outright with your own hands."

Talmud, Abodah Zara, 4b

"Every Jew, who spills the blood of the godless (non-Jews), is doing the same as making a sacrifice to God."

Talmud: Bammidber raba c 21 & Jalkut 772

Hitting a Jew is the same as hitting God

Sanhedrin 58b. If a heathen (gentile) hits a Jew, the gentile must be killed.

Jews May Steal from Non-Jews

Baba Mezia 24a . If a Jew finds an object lost by a gentile ("heathen") it does not have to be returned. (Affirmed also in Baba Kamma 113b).

Sanhedrin 76a. God will not spare a Jew who "marries his daughter to an old man or takes a wife for his infant son or returns a lost article to a Cuthean..."

Jews May Rob and Kill Non-Jews

Sanhedrin 57a . When a Jew murders a gentile ("Cuthean"), there will be no death penalty. What a Jew steals from a gentile he may keep.

Baba Kamma 37b. The gentiles are outside the protection of the law and God has "exposed their money to Israel."

Jews May Lie to Non-Jews

Baba Kamma 113a. Jews may use lies ("subterfuges") to circumvent a Gentile.

Non-Jewish Children are Sub-Human

Yebamoth 98a. All gentile children are animals.

Abodah Zarah 36b. Gentile girls are in a state of niddah (filth) from birth.

Abodah Zarah 22a-22b . Gentiles prefer sex with cows.

For the sake of brevity, I did not quote all of the text, but, in addition to the above, there are also claims of pedophilia with girls as young as three. What is most shocking about these allegations is the fact that, in some instances, the truth is the complete opposite.

For example, the text I have bolded above, the claim that "Jews May Steal from Non-Jews". In reality, the Jewish writings actually tell us:

Tosefta Bava Kamma 10:8

It is worse to steal from a gentile than from a Jew because of desecration of [G-d's] name.

For Jewish responses to all of these claims, visit The Real Truth About The Talmud.

Accusations of Bias at WikiIslam: Beheading the Messenger

One of the most common complaints against the use of WikiIslam, and other similar sites, as a source on Islamic beliefs is that it is critical of Islam. The argument used by the more intelligent Defenders of the Faith ™ , rather than the ones who simply cry "hate site!", can be summed up with the following:

WikiIslam, by it's very nature (anti-Islamic), is a biased source.

A more accurate/neutral source that represents what Muslims believe would probably be an Islamic website.

It's easy to argue bias in the first instance, but the only argument in the second instance is humans suffer from universal bias.

I think this response is quite rational and correct, but only up to a certain point. There are many problems with this,  and I shall elaborate on them.


Sites critical of Islam

A site is only as good as the references it provides. If the references are reliable, the perceived bias of the site providing the information is irrelevant. It could be run by the grandmaster of the KKK and all the editors could be his evil minions, and it would not diminish the reliability of the information they provide.

What is being done here in order to defend Islam is "attacking the messenger", a subdivision of the ad hominem logical fallacy.

For example; I could hate the taste of sugary foods and claim "eating sugary foods can contribute to damaging your teeth". The fact that I hate sugary foods (yes, I'm a hate monger!) does not alter the validity of my claim.


Pro-Islamic sites

Regarding Muslim websites and representing what Muslims believe; anyone can open a website and claim to represent anything, so, knowing the type of Muslim site that is being referenced is more important than who is behind it. Are the sites scholarly or apologetic in nature?

Apologetics sites are hardly a reliable source about Muslim thinking. By their very nature, they are there to defend Islam from criticism, they are not there to reflect current Muslim thought on anything. They are just as guilty of bias as the sites critical of Islam are. For a Muslim to disparage sites critical of Islam, and then to present these sites as an alternative source for learning about Muslim beliefs, is extremely hypocritical.

Additionally, with scholarly sites, you have to consider whether or not the particular site that is being referenced is taken seriously by Muslims. Looking "scholarly" is irrelevant if Muslim in general disagree with the site.


Does WikiIslam accurately reflect Muslim Beliefs?

Putting WikiIslam to the test, I came across a forum discussion which included the discussion of Aisha's age at consummation. Some WikiIslam articles were cited by a user, and the response was:

Wiki Islam? Are you kidding me? Its a hate site.

Aisha's age at marriage.

http://www.muslim.org/islam/aisha-age.htm

All of those arguments presented in that article, and more, were first popularized by an apologist named Moiz Amjad. They have all been refuted by WikiIslam. Additionally, Shaykh Haddad, one of the most respected Islamic scholars alive today and someone who I respect immensely, replied to his polemics many years ago. His reply was never addressed by Moiz Amjad.

Isn't it strange that a "hate site" more accurately reflects mainstream Muslim beliefs than the site a  Defender of the Faith ™ provided?

It is the same with the issue concerning 72 virgins. Whilst Muslims will often provide you with articles that claim it's all a Jewish conspiracy, WikiIslam provides you with references from scholarly pro-Islamic sources (here, here & here).