First, the most profitless undertaking in the world is to get into a discussion about religion. You never arrive at a conclusion, seldom convince the other person. Only end up producing a lot of heat.
Second, most of us are born into the faiths we profess or hold sacred. I am a Sunni Muslim not because I have read the great Sunni texts and been persuaded of their merit but because I was born into a Sunni household. Yes, one should study different religons but lets be realistic. How many of us would be able to do it? Yes, there are converts but they are few and far between.This being the genesis of my faith how does it qualify me to impose my views on others, much less take up fire and sword to spread them? Think about it !!!
Third, the religion is a matter of faith, woven into the tissues and sinews of the believer, part of his blood, of the very air he breathes. How can you change such a thing by debate or disputation? Isn’t it best then to practice tolerance and let each person stick to the faith he/she professes? Live and let live and get on with the business of the world!!! i wish, extremists especially muslim extremists could understand this…
Haha yeah interesting plagiarism.. Perhaps putting the source in your post wouldve been a good option.
I disagree with these views though. I am a born sunni muslim but i call myself just a muslim. Not sunni or anything. Ive seen enough converts around me, ive seen enough people leave religion too.
You are absolutely right. It’s my mistake and I take full responsibility for it. No excuse whatsoever.
One of my Indian friends sent me an email over this weekend in which he admired the broadmindedness of modern Muslim Scholars. He had simply cut and pasted the paragraphs from different articles authored by numerous Muslim scholars on different topics (religion, social behavior, history etc) without providing the source to the actual links or the names of these scholars at the end of each paragraph. And I can totally understand why didn’t he provide the source or the names of these authors. It was just a friendly/follow up email. I really liked the paragraph related to the religion and found it compatible to my thoughts and therefore decided to paste it on gupshup after adding some more comments to it. However, it is my fault that I did not ask my friend for the actual source before pasting it and I apologize for that. I guess the laziness prevailed and of course there is no excuse for it.
I agree with phoenixdesi (or Ayaz Amir) that the reason most people belong to a faith is because of the household or culture they were born into. It that weren't true we'd have far more conversions than we do. That being the case, it really doesn't make sense that people throughout history have taken up fire and sword to spread their faith. The lack of humility in our convictions doesn't make much sense either. Present 5 unbiased, blank-slate humans with 5 different spiritual options and you'd probabably get 5 different answers.
