Part one

Franklin Graham recently made a statement that "Islam was a violent and evil religion." He was promptly ostracized by the media for being so blunt and "out of touch with reality." Many critics arose to defend this religion as peaceful and god fearing. Was Franklin Graham right or wrong?  Unfortunately he was completely correct in his assessment of Islam.

   Even so we cannot be to hard on his critics for being unaware of the tenants of Islam because many Muslims are also ignorant of the most violent teachings of their religion. Many are not even aware that the Hadith ( a companion book to the Koran) and some commentaries interprets Koran statements in two different places to kill non Muslims as instructions to specifically "Kill Christians and Jews where ever you find them."

    The truth is that in countries other than the U.S. and Europe most Muslims are illiterate and cannot read the Koran for themselves but those who can and who do study their religion often become either disenchanted or a radical militant who wants to kill for his religion. Case in point John Walker, an impressionable young convert who wound up in Afghanistan fighting for "Allah".

    The most common mistake that most people make when considering the Islamic position is that Allah is just another name for the same God that Christians and Jews worship; not so. When Mohammed constructed his religion he decided that there were already to many gods and that one god should be supreme. So he chose a local Arabian moon god named Allah and declared him to be the one and only god. That is why their symbol is a crescent moon. Regrettably many Muslims also think that we worship the same god. A false god then became the god of a worldwide religion, a religion of conquest, violence and deception, all which are traits of the kingdom of darkness.

   We have erred for so long in accepting this former idol-god as valid and even mistaking him to be the same god as our God, that we fear making a stand against it and declaring it false. We must however look at the bible itself. God said His name was I AM(or He who is) for which Jehovah is an acronym or transliteration. There are many other Names for God that state one of His many attributes such as Jehovah Jireh- Lord of Provision and Jehovah Shalom Lord of Peace or Elohim Creator of the universe. But nowhere does he say His name is anything remotely resembling Allah.

         Our God does not operate under assumed names or aliases. Neither does He demand killing of innocent people or beating our wives in His name. He is Jehovah, God and creator of the universe, Jesus Christ His son and redeemer and God the Holy Spirit. He goes by no other assumed name and Mohammed was definitely not His prophet. In fact there are no prophets or Apostles in Islam. Mohammed simply borrowed this title from Christianity and Judaism in the early years hoping to draw many Jews and Christians into Islam.

 It was during this time that he said "You will find that the people of the book (Jews and Christians) are closer to us than others." But this changed when he saw that he would be opposed and not revered by them. It is one of the many contradictions in the Koran and one verse that some will point to as proof of its "peaceable nature".

     Admittedly there are a few good things in the Koran, much of it borrowed and plagiarized from Christianity and Judism, but much of what was "received" by Mohammed was simply conventional seventh century Arabic philosophy, such as beating your wife for certain offenses. Some even came to him during epileptic type seizures. He himself questioned whether some of what he received might be from Satan. These verses have often been referred to as the satanic verses and it is quite conceivable that they were indeed from Satan. History records that many who knew Mohammed thought he was possessed by evil spirits. He possibly was and now so many are deceived by these same spirits. As we study Islam let's keep in mind that while the Koran and its companion book of interpretation promotes violence and evil many of its adherants do not . Let's all pray that God delivers them from the terrible hold and deception of Islam.

                      In part two we will look more in depth at the origion of Islam and its history of conversion by conquest and some of it teaching and reasoning for terrorism.

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