July 20, 2024
Is there any hate speech in the Koran and Sunna (comprised of the Sira, Mohammed's biography, and the Hadith, his traditions)? If so, could this hate speech possibly incite violence toward non-Muslims? Should we be worried about this? In order to answer these questions, we must first define just what hate speech is.
As it happens, the term “hate speech” is rather loosely defined, and the legal definition (1) varies from one country to another. To provide a definition we can use for our investigation that will be meaningful for people in every country, we can turn to the UN Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech (2), which defines hate speech as “any kind of communication in speech, writing, or behaviour that attacks or uses pejorative or discriminatory language with reference to a person or a group on the basis of who they are; in other words, based on their religion, ethnicity, nationality, race, colour, descent, gender or other identity factor.”
With a workable definition in hand, we can now analyze the political content of the Koran and determine for ourselves whether or not it is hate speech. Here are some selected verses from the Koran. They are political in nature because they talk about non-Muslims (Kafirs). It is only this portion of the Koranic doctrine that concerns them.
Koran 5:51 O ye who believe! Take not the Jews and the Christians for friends. They are friends one to another. He among you who taketh them for friends is (one) of them. Lo! Allah guideth not wrongdoing folk.
Koran 98:6 Lo! those who disbelieve, among the People of the Scripture and the idolaters, will abide in fire of hell. They are the worst of created beings.
Koran 48:29 Muhammad is the messenger of Allah. And those with him are hard against the disbelievers and merciful among themselves…
Koran 8:12 When thy Lord inspired the angels, (saying): I am with you. So make those who believe stand firm. I will throw fear into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Then smite the necks and smite of them each finger.
Koran 9:30 And the Jews say: Ezra is the son of Allah, and the Christians say: The Messiah is the son of Allah. That is their saying with their mouths. They imitate the saying of those who disbelieved of old. Allah (Himself) fighteth against them. How perverse are they!
Do you see any hateful speech there? Anything divisive? Something that might encourage or condone violence? What about the Sunna? Let’s look at a few hadiths.
Sahih Muslim Book 41, Hadith 6985 Abu Huraira reported Allah's Messenger as saying: The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him; but the tree Gharqad would not say, for it is the tree of the Jews.
Sahih Bukhari Vol. 4, Book 52, Hadith 73 Narrated 'Abdulla bin Abi 'Aufa: Allah's Messenger said, "Know that Paradise is under the shades of swords."
Sahih Bukhari Vol. 1, Book 8, Hadith 387 Narrated Abu Huraira: Allah 's Apostle said, " I have been ordered to fight with the people till they say, 'None has the right to be worshipped but Allah,' and whoever says, 'None has the right to be worshipped but Allah,' his life and property will be saved by me except for Islamic law, and his accounts will be with Allah, (either to punish him or to forgive him.)"
Do you see anything in the example of Mohammed that encourages violence? Hatred? Intolerance? All this material is from 1400 years ago. Is it really a danger to non-Islamic societies today?
The Koran is considered to be the perfect and immutable word of Allah. It is valid for all people everywhere and for all time. It says 89 times (3) that Mohammed is the perfect example for all of mankind to follow. Mohammed engaged in a violent act of jihad every six weeks for the last nine years of his life. He had his followers kill his critics. Through violence, he turned Arabia completely Islamic by the time of his death. All acts of jihad we see today are perpetrated by those who continue to emulate his 1400-year-old example.
Proponents of Political Islam want the ability to have an honest discussion about this part of the doctrine shut down. Why is that? Is this reason for concern?
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📚 Sources:
(1) https://futurefreespeech.org/global-handbook-on-hate-speech-laws/
(2) https://www.un.org/en/hate-speech/understanding-hate-speech/what-is-hate-speech
(3) https://www.cspii.org/learn-political-islam/articles/mohammed/
📖 Doctrinal Sources:
Pickthall, Marmaduke. 1930. The Meaning of The Glorious Koran, An Explanatory Translation, New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
Khan, Muhammad M. 1997, The Translation of the Meanings of Sahih Al-Bukhari: Arabic-English. Riyadh: Darussalam.
Abul Husain Muslim bin al-Hajjaj al-Nisapuri. 2009. Mokhtaser Sahih Muslim. Translated by Abdul Hamid Siddiqui. 1st edition, edited by Mika’il al-Almany. The Vista Publishing House.
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