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Islam: The second largest
world religion...and growing.






Quotations:

"The messenger of Allah said: "Islam is to testify that there is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah, to perform the prayers, to pay the zakat, to fast in Ramadan, and to make the pilgrimage to the House if you are able to do so." He said: " You have spoken rightly", Jebreel (Gabriel) from Number 2 of "Al-Nawawi's Forty Hadiths." 1
"If anyone harms (others), God will harm him, and if anyone shows hostility to others, God will show hostility to him." Sunan of Abu-Dawood, Hadith 1625.
"Those who believe (in the Qur'an), and those who follow the Jewish (scriptures), and the Christians...and (all) who believe in God and the last day and work righteousness, shall have their reward with their Lord; on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve."  The Qur'an, 2:62
"Jim Jones, David Koresh and Meir Kahane do not typify Christianity and Judaism in the eyes of the civilized West, but those same eyes are prone to see Osama bin Laden and Mullah Muhammad Omar as typifying Islam," Richard Bulliet 2


About Islam:

Estimates of the total number of Muslims range from 0.7 to 1.8 billion worldwide and 1.1 to 7 million in the U.S.  3 We accept the best estimate as 1.57 billion, concluded by the Pew Forums. About 23% of all people on Earth follow Islam. The religion is currently in a period of rapid growth.

Christianity is currently the largest religion in the world. It is followed by about 33% of all people -- a percentage that has remained stable for decades. If current trends continue, Islam will become the most popular world religion sometime in the mid-21st century.



Topics included in this section:

1994 to now: The rise in Islamophobia: hate speech & violence against Muslims

Information about Islam:

"The Truth About Islam": A description in about 600 words

Introduction to Islam:
Part 1: Its origin, Muhammad, texts, beliefs,  etc.
Part 2: Its practices, schools, holy days, etc.

Comparing the beliefs of Islam and Christianity 

Comparing their growth rates

How many Muslims are there in the U.S. and in the rest of the world?


Geographical distribution of Sunni and Shiite Islam




Contemporary Muslim information sources
Muslim information websites
Muslim books; free ebooks: translations of the Qur'an; bookstores, publishers
Web sites featuring clothing, cards, etc

Quotations:
Quotations from the Qur'an
About the Hadith: sayings and deeds of Muhammad
Examples of Hadiths
Comparison of Qur'an verses with the Hebrew Scriptures' Ten Commandments

Beliefs and Practices:
Apostasy  (Irtidad) -- abandoning Islam
The environment and global warming
The Hajj -- pilgrimage to Mecca
The significance of Eid-Ul-Adha
Holy days of Islam -- seasonal days of observance and celebration
Homosexuality
Reasons why same-sex marriage is bad, as given on Aljazeera's website
The concept of Jihad
Sharia law
Punishment for non-marital sex
Sharia law in Ontario, Canada
Sharia law in the UK
When is killing innocent humans permitted? Terrorist attacks and the principle of tattarrus
Paradise: life after death
The fast during Ramadan
Determining the dates of Ramadan
Status of women:
Female genital mutilation among Animists, Christians, and Muslims
The role of women in predominately Muslim countries
Corporal punishment of women

Tolerance items:
2011-JAN: Status of religious freedom worldwide, with emphasis on predominately Muslim countries.
Accommodation for and by Muslims in North America
Should Americans fear Islam? -- An ABC This Week panel discussion/debate/free for all
Islamic prayers in public schools
Senate/House resolutions promoting religious tolerance towards Muslims.
Why do "they" hate the West?
"Terror has no faith" An essay by Ibraham Hooper of CAIR

Peace:
A prayer for peace and unity
Appeal for peace by Muslim scholars, sent to Christian leaders

Conflicts:
Is Islam a religion of violence or peace?
2002: The Washington-area sniper
A book about Islam on the University of Northern California reading list
Al Qaeda's beheading of Paul Johnson in Saudi Arabia
An excerpt about Iran from a book by Reza Aslan titled "No god but God"
Some Muslim statements condemning terrorist acts -- statements that the media rarely covers
Radical Muslim group(s) in U.S. Prisons
2006 conference in Iran of Nazi Holocaust deniers

Religious topics:
Can a person be both a Christian and a Muslim?
"Fundamentalism" within Christianity and Islam
Names given to the "Holy Land"
Religious terms used to refer to Islam and Muslims
In addition to the above, we have short passages on:

Virgin birth of Jesus (pbuh)
Jesus' (pbuh) sinlessness


Amazon.com provides these books on Islam:

If you see a generic Amazon.com ad here, click on your browser's refresh button to get a book list.




Important resources on the Internet:

GuidedWays has a number of translations of the Qur'an available for free:
For an English translation, go to http://www.guidedways.com/. Click on the "Quran" button underneath the graphic; select "translation;" select "English" (or any of eight other languages), and select from one of up to four translations. You can select any of the chapters and display the translation.

A Qur'an reader for Java-enabled mobile phones is available at: http://www.guidedways.com/

For a Qur'an reciter in many languages, see: http://www.guidedways.com/

Frederic A. Moritz has written a web guide for journalists and others titled: "Islam under a human rights spotlight," at: http://www.worldlymind.org/

Abid Qureshi has written an essay: "Islam’s View on War and Terrorism: A Survey of the Qur’an and Prophetic Traditions." It is available on his blog at: http://abidnyc.wordpress.com


References used:

The following information sources were used to prepare and update the above essay. The hyperlinks are not necessarily still active today.

Yahya bin Sharaf Ul-Deen An-Nawawi , "Al-Nawawi's Forty Hadiths." This is a compilation of 43 sayings of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). See: http://www.dartmouth.edu/
Richard Bulliet, "The case for Islamo-Christian civilization," Columbia University Press, (2004). Read reviews or order this book safely from Amazon.com online book store
The estimate of 1.1 million Muslim in the U.S. was derived from the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) of 2001. It was based on a telephone survey. See: http://www.gc.cuny.edu/The seven million estimate was obtained from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) website. It was based on the number of immigrants from Islamic countries. See: http://www.cair-net.org/


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Copyright © 1995 to 2010 by Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance
Last update: 2010-OCT-17
Author: B. A. Robinson


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