The echo chamber
After reading the criticism websites and checking their claims against a translation of the Qur'an, I realised the book is full of problems, and…
Reason and faith
The scientific miracles genre
The scientific miracles claimed for the Qur'an are post-hoc retrofitting: the discovery comes first and the verse is bent to fit it. Once that…
The fragility argument
You accept praise of your religion but not criticism of it. Shutting down questions shows Islam rests on submission rather than peace, and a…
The challenge
No positive evidence has ever been offered for the Qur'an. Muslims only defend against objections; they never make a case of their own.
Blasphemy and the Rushdie case
A novelist was sentenced to death for a book. Islam cannot tolerate being spoken against.
“I read the criticism websites, then checked the Qur'an for myself, and everything I checked seemed to confirm what they said.”
What you did felt like verification, and the feeling was honest. Look at the sequence, though. The claims went in first, and the reading…
“I was raised on the scientific miracles of the Qur’an. Then I watched that argument get taken apart, and it felt like the floor went with it.”
The argument you watched fail deserved to fail, and Muslim scholars said so before the critics did. Reading each new discovery back into the…
“If this religion is true, why is the Muslim world in the state it is in? The decline feels like evidence.”
The observation is accurate and the inference is not, and it helps to hold those apart. The decline is real. Muslim thinkers have said…
“I studied Islam in school for years. I know it well. That is exactly why I cannot accept it.”
Take the claim seriously, because it is usually made sincerely, and then test it the way any claim should be tested. Years in a…
“Muslims cannot even agree with each other. There are dozens of sects, each saying the others are wrong. How can any of it be true?”
The frustration behind this is usually real and rarely abstract. Someone was told their practice was wrong, or watched two people who both claimed…