http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Burroughs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manzil

The concept of sorcery or witchcraft exists in Islam. In the Qur’an verse 102 of Chapter Al-Baqara states:

And they followed what the Shaitans chanted of sorcery in the reign of Sulaiman, and Sulaiman was not an unbeliever, but the Shaitans disbelieved, they taught men sorcery and that was sent down to the two angels at Babel, Harut and Marut, yet these two taught no man until they had said, “Surely we are only a trial, therefore do not be a disbeliever.” Even then men learned from these two, magic by which they might cause a separation between a man and his wife; and they cannot hurt with it any one except with Allah’s permission, and they learned what harmed them and did not profit them, and certainly they know that he who bought it should have no share of good in the hereafter and evil was the price for which they sold their souls, had they but known this.

Did Chomsky discuss his dismissal of the victims of the Cambodian genocide because of their inconvenience to his clique?

All of the -isms, particularly the twin monsters of the Right and Left, pick and choose as to whose suffering counts. On the Left the criterion is whether or not Jews or Yanks are immediately involved. If not then whatever happens is A-OK. If it’s a particularly large chain of rape-camps (say Mugabee’s) or a really big genocide (like the Soviet genocide in Afghanistan) then the CIA can be blamed using tortuous chains of logic that make the Saudi inquisitors seem like Mr. Spock.

On the Right anything that might cause commodity prices to rise or interferes with the Very Important Gambling that goes on in the various
financial exchanges is bad. So anyone who diverts any profits to health or education or nationalises anything is evil. Otherwise who cares? If it is thought necessary to explain why such activities are so popular (eg. Cuba, Nicaragua) then take a leaf from the Iranian government and blame it on outside agitators.

I figured I’d save someone the trouble and disemvowell it myself.

To invoke Godwin’s Law, its like moving to, or living in 1940′s Germany and starting up your Jewish Hat and Gypsy Scarf Store, and staring in your own commercial, and then when the Police show up, be honest about what you tell them.

Then act undignified at the response you get…

Or and All-American Pope Hat Emporium in Iran… (I don’t know what is with me and hats today)…
These are not what you would call tolerant people.

As much as I am making fun of this poor individual, it really is sad and silly all at the same time, and with a wife and kids its pretty horrible.

Of course on the other hand, I don’t really believe in “psychic advice and predictions” and think they are all scam and con artists, but be-heading is a bit harsh. Of course I don’t really believe in any religion either and think of most are on about the same level, so there you go.

But labeling the whole of science as a religion is preposterous. Science is about knowing, or at least being confident of the factuality of something to a very high degree of certainty. Religion is about believing in something that more than likely cannot be measured or known by science.

You can’t let this sort of barbarism go unchecked. A nation needs to protect its people. If Lebanon cannot send in a rescue team, then retaliation after-the-fact is all they can do.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=106683049355688

Apparently the last conviction for “witchcraft” in England was in 1944. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Rebecca_Yorke

365. Every one who fraudulently
(a) pretends to exercise or to use any kind of witchcraft, sorcery, enchantment or conjuration,
(b) undertakes, for a consideration, to tell fortunes, or
(c) pretends from his skill in or knowledge of an occult or crafty science to discover where or in what manner anything that is supposed to have been stolen or lost may be found,
is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction.”

Dispelling (or removing) magic in Islam is a form of healing, not an act of sorcery. Using sorcery, as I said before, is wrong both ways in Islam (breaking or casting). And of course you need to believe in something you are removing. And YES “reading the Qu’ran is even recommended as a way to dispel magic”.

Moreover, Saudi Arabia has a king, not a “religious leader”.. it’s like the difference between the pope and the British Queen.

There are a billion living Muslims right now, from nuclear scientists, doctors, to BoingBoing readers, and you somehow managed to find that the Qu’ran is a self-contradictory text by not even knowing Arabic!!!

Please try looking at both sides of the scale, be fair to your self first..

”The existence of this logical inconsistency is a fact” only: FOR THOSE WHO DO NOT UNDERSTANDS THEM.

Personally I would think that eternal torment in Hell for making deals with Satan would be enough of a punishment for witchcraft, but such is life.

Maybe he just underestimated his own fame?

The Qu’ran, like the Bible, CANNOT be self-contradictory. This is because it is – directly – the words of an infallible being. It is simply not possible for it to contradict itself. If, with our fallible human brains, we think we find contradiction between its covers, we are necessarily mistaken. The explanation for the appearance of contradiction must be our own failure to understand it.

This is the nature of faith. Either you believe in a religious text or you don’t. However, you do not – CANNOT – disprove one. This is simply because they are not subject to the rules within which proving and disproving take place. Claiming a religious text is somehow faulty because it fails to play by the rules imposed by ‘science’ or ‘logic’ is a conceit bordering on sophistry.

This goes both ways. You cannot use religion to debunk science. In an opposite but similar fashion, any such attempt will be as vain and fruitless as an attempt to use science to debunk religion. And for pretty much the same reason – it plays by a different set of rules.

Science deals in theory. Religion deals in truth. It is foolish to attempt to use either one as a tool to disprove the other. They pretty much just bounce off of each other.

“This blah blah blah is FOR ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY.”

Dummy.

But you can CLAIM to believe a religious text while cherry-picking which parts to follow and which ones to ignore. I’ve yet to meet a Christian who believes it’s OK to sell your daughter into slavery or a Jew who would kill another person for eating shrimp.

If you have issues with western religions, that’s your business. Please don’t try to validate them by quoting choice tidbits of scripture. The ancient world was full of atrocities that had nothing to do with religion.