Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Ya-ta Boy]

I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings, I really do. I hope this information won't disrupt your world view, but it's just too positive to let pass and you'll just have to learn to deal with it. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Turkish cleric offers food for thought

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JG02Ak01.html

Strongly inspired by Sufi thinking, he places Islam at the heart of every person rather than at the heart of the state or government, and is inspired by divine love.

Popular with middle-class Turkish intelligensia, he [Fethullah Gulen] is admired for his peaceful pronouncements on the Islamic religion and has won world-wide support for his message of tolerance, mutual understanding and respect. For example, on the contentious subject of jihad (so often interpreted as the holy war on infidels by Muslims) Gulen's interpretation is typical of his emphasis on the personal rather than the political, the gentle way rather than the militant...

Gulen's schools are the best in Turkey, academically outperforming all other sectors of public and private secondary education...

The Gulen movement has its own universities, business unions, lobbies, student groups, radio and television stations and the Zaman newspaper group. Turkish officials concede that Gulen's followers in Turkey number more than a million and Gulen's backers claim that number is just the tip of the iceberg...

***
It would seem from this that Islam is not the monolithic fundamentalist medieval entity that the Islamophobes so fervently believe in. More, it is startling to me that the Islamophobes' interpretation of the Koran is challenged by an actual living Muslim scholar with a large and influential following in an important country. Oh my.

[Bigfeet]

Turkey's military make sure that the country doesn't get too religious because they want a secular state.

[dirty_scraps83]

[Bigfeet]

[bigverne]

[Ya-ta Boy]

bigverne, haven't you made quite a few posts detailing what Moslems must believe because it is written in the Koran? Or was that another Islamophobe?

[Kimbop]

Wow, one 'kind-of-decent' radical muslem in a sea of genital-mutilating, women-suppressing, gay-killing animals.

[Adventurer]

Sufism is somewhat popular in Turkiye. People are familiar with the spinning Dervishes or as the Turks say Darwish. The Sufis emphasize Tawhid or unity with the divine in a similar vein with Eastern Orthodox and Catholic mystics from the Middle East and Mediterranean and the Hindus of India. The Sufis often use a masbaha or rosary type counter at times to count the names of Allah just as Hindus will repeat mantras connected to their pantheon of gods. Sufis are, in fact, in many cases quite tolerant. Many Sufis when the Islamic empire was at its height were quite prominent unlike now. Many of the were familiar with Neo-Platonic philosophy and the works of Plato or Aflatonis. The Sufis need a resurgence not only in Turkey but in the rest of the Middle East.
Look, there are many stellar Muslims, they aren't all a bunch of religious corsairs, so to speak, off to pillage, kill, maim etc.... Anyway, Christiandom hasn't shown itself to a paradigm of tolerance, warmth, and understanding, but many are acting like that's a given.

[Justin Hale]

I don't understand why this is bad news for Islamophobes. Surely if there is some progressive event within Islam then that is good news for Islamophobes? Bad news for Islamophobes would be something like the following:

* mere allegation against a woman can be enough to defile a family's honor and justify her murder. A common example is a women murdered by her brother for talking to a man.

* The UN Population Fund estimates that the annual worldwide total of killings might be as high as 5,000 women

* police believe that there may 12 honor killings each year in the UK. Many more women disappear.

* London Police are investigating 200 deaths linked to honor killings

* The British government's Forced Marriage Unit receives 5,000 calls a year about the issue of family "honor"

* One in 10 young British Asians believes so-called honour killings can be justified, according to a poll for the BBC's Asian Network

(from the BBC)

Turkey aims to join the EU and laws governing human rights have changed, giving women more protection. Is this bad news for the Islamophobe too?

[postfundie]

[mises]

[manlyboy]

So if I post an article about a wonderful, peace-loving Catholic priest, does that mean I can come over all sarcastic and condescending, and sneeringly imply that anti-religionists are foolish to criticize the Jerry Falwells and Pat Robertsons of the world?

[daskalos]

[bucheon bum]

[On the other hand]