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It is clearly HARAM to celebrate those INFIDEL catholics holidays!

For those who celebrate any of those filthy Infidel's holidays, and yes that includes those idiotic mushriqiin shiites holidays of As-Shura or any other holiday which is not in adherence to Sunnis errgg.. Islamic holidays  must be considered as an Apostates, and the stoning of those apostates is a duty of all sunnis erggh.. moslems!

It is clearly evident as the statement of "O hear ye muslimin!, you must not celebrate the catholics holidays!" and also "O hear ye muslimin! you must not celebrate the As-Shura days or any of those mushriqin shiites holidays" appears ZERO times in the Quran!

Salam / Peace

LOL...

I think it is cool and commendable to respect and engage in other rituals in so far as they do not directly encourage evil (e.g. sometimes the extravagance of Christmas is a bit much). For example, fasting during Catholic Lent, Christmas Giving, etc are often really nice rituals that are great independent of their religious status.  Even listening to the sermons of others is great as a sign of unity.  At the end of the day, I feel Islam is a system that is not merely satisfied through saying stuff like "I''m a Muslim."  It could be that the person who calls him/herself Catholic is a far better Muslim than the one who calls him/herself Muslim.

Peace

Salaam
Hirsi is right to critique cultural traditions like female circumcision but her general attack on Muslims and political views are pretty outlandish.  She's just as much of an extremist as the crazies with the beards and all.
See this link below.
http://scienceblogs.com/tfk/2011/01/ayaan_hirsi_ali_should_not_tes.php
Peace

Peace,

My roommate shared this link with me.

http://www.answering-christianity.com/sina_kill_all_muslims.jpg

I don't think that can be used to defame all the members, but still worth noting.

Anyways...
The site has a lot Obama is Muslim Idiots, Iraq Afghanistan War Supporters, and Iran Sanction and Bomb Wishers and I'm not really good with war-mongerers of any type (even online).  Good Luck from me though. Hopefully this helps.

025.063
YUSUFALI: And the servants of (Allah) Most Gracious are those who walk on the earth in humility, and when the ignorant address them, they say, "Peace!";

Peace you gunna eat that

You wrote:
By this reasoning, a slave who is locked away and prevented from the possibility of being free has chosen to be a slave. I guess he could choose suicide. So he has a choice, doesn't he? I think not.

Imraan

Peace,

In the example, the participant is ignorant of the fact that he was no other possibilities; we humans are too.

Peace

Haha sometimes doing this stuff makes my head spin. If we agree that's good. 

Cheers

I agree with you Wootah. That's the point of the example of the room
Peace

Peace

Saying God does not know what we will freely choose is an option to solving the dilemma with the added supplement that knowing what man will freely choose is impossible and against the laws of nature; omnipotence does not necessitate breaking the laws of nature or doing the impossible.  

Wakas's option seems on the right track as well.  The dilemma is built on something called the Principle of Alternate Possibilities.  I must have alternate possibilities in order for my act to be free.  If God knows the future, I can do nothing other than what God knows, thus I am not free.  But I do not think the Principle of Alternate Possibilities is a necessary requirement for free will.  

For example, assume that I am in a room and I must choose between leaving the room or staying in the room.  Let's add the condition that the door is locked.  Thus, I really only have the possibility of staying in the room, no alternate possibilities.  If I choose to stay in the room regardless, have I not acted freely?  I stole this example from John Locke.

Peace

Some more first century Quran inscriptions with the first one being 29 AH in this one.  Its in Cyprus too so imagine how long it took the Arabs to take the Quran inscription there.

Stunningly enough, its the surah that most Muslims read during salat and it's on a grave.

Surah 112
Translation: Say: God the one, God the eternal, He did not beget and was not begotten. And there is none like unto Him

http://www.islamic-awareness.org/History/Islam/Inscriptions/earlyquran.html

agreed. look at the content in quran. if it guides u like it guides me then follow it. if u feel it doesnt then dont. but when u pray and ask God to be guided with a pure heart, be sure u will be guided. u just need to be sure of wat ur heart tells u is the truth. dont let people manipulate you out of wat u believe is true. if i base my knowledge of th eprophet frm hadith, then i wud never think of him as a good man, but fortunately i have an accurate account of his character in the quran.
stick to wat ur instincts are telling you, but pray for guidance, patience and steadfastness. uv made some very good posts onthis forum and u seem like a person trying to honestly search fr the truth. be sure that God will guide u. if u dont feel like depending on any scripture, then dont, just pray to God fr guidance and He will answer u.

peace. i will be praying fr you too.

Good advice for everybody...

Peace Lox,
I've only read your last post and what I've taken out of it is that you have good motivations.  As long as you are truly driven to be Good, I believe you can read whatever damn scripture you please.