Boreal

Children and The Koran

The End of Empathy

Little Boys Learning To Hate Little Girls

and Little Girls To Hate Themselves

Narrated abu Said al-Khudri:

The Prophet said, "Isn’t the witness of a woman equal half that of a man?"

The women said, "Yes."

He said: "This is because of the deficiency of the woman’s mind."

Bukhari 48.286

Little boys don’t believe that they are more special than little girls and little girls that they are inadequate until they are made to feel that way by adults. If they are born into a traditional Muslim family, their parents will justify playing favourites and their unequal treatment by having the children read a book in which a god does just that, while promising to welcome into his Paradise those who accept that this is the way it was always meant to be and live their lives accordingly.

A child’s concept of an invisible omnipotent being is not fully formed at the age you hope to implant an idea that will impact their behaviour for the rest of their lives. This means they may not be receptive to what they are compelled to read, or mouth word for word along with you. Little girls in particular may have difficulty accepting that their little brother is better than they are on the say-so of a ghost who wrote a book.

That is why children’s books, like the one we talked about in Getting Kids To Feel Nothing, introduce the concept of a god in conjunction with something or someone children can relate to: a person. This, of course, is not a problem for Christian parents and educators with their earlier variation of the same god having taken on all the attributes of a man. It was, however, a problem for the earliest clerics who had to find a way to get into a child’s mind when it is most receptive to being decisively influenced.

Around Muhammad, stories like those you find in My Book of Islam were woven to bring out a child’s natural empathy for someone they would come to see as a hero, someone they could trust. That trust, for little girls, will be tested when, to back up Allah’s negative assessment of their sex, they are told that their hard-done-by hero—who delivered God’s exact words regarding their deficiencies as human beings—more than agreed with what he communicated from on High.

Allah, in His Koran, reminds us that;

1. Girls are inferior by at least one degree.

2:228 Divorced women should keep away from men for three menstrual periods. And it is not lawful for them to conceal that which Allah has created in their wombs, if they truly believe in Allah and the Last Day. Their husbands have the right in the meantime to take them back, should they seek reconciliation; and women have rights equal to what is incumbent upon them according to what is just, although men are one degree above them (what is meant here is that the men have a superior authority). Allah is Mighty, Wise.

2. Girls have trouble remembering things.

2:282 … And call to witness two witnesses of your men; if not two men, then one man and two women from such witnesses you approve of, so that if one of them (the two women) fails to remember, the other will remind her...

3. Girls have no more rights when it comes to sex than an inflatable doll (2:223) that boys may penetrate at their discretion, except when the doll is menstruating (2:222) because that makes the doll dirty.

2:223 Your women are a tillage for you. So get to your tillage whenever you like. Do good for yourselves, fear Allah and know that you shall meet Him. And give good news to the believers.

2:222 And they ask you about menstruation, say: “It is an impurity.” So keep away from women during their menstruation and do not approach them (do not have sexual relations with them) until they are clean. Once they get clean get to them as Allah commanded you. Allah loves the repentant and loves those who purify themselves.

4. When little boys grow up, because of their superiority and the wealth they will accumulate because of their sex (which they can use to purchase girls to marry), are in charge and can beat up girls for whatever reason, even for what they might be thinking.

4:34 Men are in charge of women, because Allah has made some of them excel the others, and because they spend some of their wealth. Hence righteous women are obedient, guarding the unseen which Allah has guarded. And those of them that you fear might rebel, admonish them and abandon them in their beds and beat them. Should they obey you, do not seek a way of harming them; for Allah is Sublime and Great!

5. That a wife can be shared among men like so much chattel after a husband has “satisfied his desire for her.” During her public prayers she will loudly repeat verses like the following about how Allah made what the Arabs considered taboo legal so that his spokesperson could have sex with his daughter-in-law, whom he walked in on when she was half-naked and just had to have her.

33:37 And [remember] when you said to him whom Allah favoured and you favoured: (this is addressed to Zayd regarding his wife Zaynab) “Hold on to your wife and fear Allah”, while you concealed within yourself what Allah would reveal and feared other men, whereas Allah had a better right to be feared by you. Then, when Zayd had satisfied his desire for her, We gave her to you [Muhammad] in marriage; so that the believers should not be at fault, regarding the wives of their adopted sons, once they have satisfied their desire for them. For Allah’s Command must be accomplished.

How do you explain to pre-pubescent little girls the concept of menstruation and what Allah means when he warns little boys to “not approach” them when it is happening?

What about denying them intimacy, the understood meaning of “abandon them in their beds,” and encouraging boys to beat them because of what they might be thinking, e.g., illegal sex, Allah and Muhammad’s pathological obsession? It must be equally, if not more, difficult to get the message across to little boys without giving them a premature and precarious understanding of the ins and outs (pun intended) of sexual relations.

You could decide to take advantage of the fact that they will also be exposed to God’s befuddling description as to where babies come from and the gestation process and combine it all into a comprehensive, if precipitated, explanation of procreation and marriage.

Allah has a dubious and definitely skewed understanding of conception. For example, God knows there is a connection between a female’s menstrual cycle and babies, as demonstrated in His admonition to divorced women to “keep away from men for three menstrual periods,” revealed truth 2:228. However, in His explanation of conception, the man’s sperm is all that is necessary, with the woman serving only as a receptacle for his life-giving seed.

16:4 He created man from a sperm-drop and, behold, he is a professed disputant.

35:11 Allah created you from dust, then from a sperm, then made you into couples. No female bears or gives birth, save with His knowledge, and no man advances in years or his life-span is diminished, except as ordained in the Book. That indeed is an easy matter for Allah.

36:77 Does not man see that We created him from a sperm; and behold he is a manifest trouble-maker?

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56:57 We have created you, if only you would believe! 56:58 Have you seen the semen you emit?

56:59 Do you create it, or are We the Creators?

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80:18 Of what did He create him?

80:19 Of a sperm, He created him and determined him.

Allah may have been aware of the connection between a female’s menstrual cycle and the eventual birth of a child but perhaps not the role a woman’s eggs plays in reproduction. This would explain His focus on the sperm as all that is needed, and His labeling of the discharge of a woman’s unfertilized eggs as an impurity. This would also explain His getting the gestation period wrong.

Of all the things God got wrong about conception and the growth of the embryo (recommended reading: Getting to Know Allah, Boreal Books, Allah and the Beginnings of Life), the gestation period is a whopper.

2:233 Mothers shall suckle their children for two whole years; [that is] for those who wish to complete the suckling. Those to whom the children are born (the fathers) shall maintain and clothe them kindly. No soul is charged beyond its capacity. No mother should suffer on account of her child and he to whom a child is born should not suffer on account of his child. The same [duties (the maintenance and clothing of divorced women)] devolve upon the [father’s] heir (if the heir is a child and has a guardian the latter would be charged with those duties). But they commit no offence if by mutual agreement and following consultation they choose to wean the child. You also commit no offence if you engage wet-nurses, provided that you give them what you promised to give kindly. Fear Allah and know that Allah has knowledge of what you do.

If the weaning period is included in the suckling period (24 months) then Allah, in the following verse where He decrees that the gestation and weaning period combined total thirty months, has underestimated the gestation period of the human fetus by three months (30 - 24 = 6 months gestation time).

46:15 We have commanded man to be kind to his parents; his mother bore him painfully and delivered him painfully, his gestation and weaning totalling thirty months. When he is fully grown and turns forty, he will say: “Lord, inspire me to be thankful for the favour, with which You have favoured me and favoured my parents; and to do a righteous deed, well-pleasing to You. Grant me righteousness in my progeny; I have truly repented to You and one of those who submit.

You are never sure exactly what your child will retain from Allah’s speckled bits of misleading information as to where babies come from.

Why would parents want an asexual god who has never married or had children, and is proud of it, to teach their kids about sex and procreation and the rules governing what He refers to as a female’s “private parts”? You would think parents would be the first—mothers in particular, who are responsible for getting a child to the Khatmi-Qur’an—to want to avoid exposing their children to persuasive, obvious misconceptions and a misogynous philosophy.

In reality, it is probably too much to expect a believing mother, who has been conditioned like her mother and her mother before her, not to drown her children in Allah’s Wisdom. She has been cowed and lowered to the status of the animals to which Muhammad compared her.

Narrated Aisha:

"The things which annul the prayers were mentioned before me. They said, Prayer is annulled by a dog, a donkey and a woman (if they pass in front of the praying people)…"

Bukhari 9.490

Aisha said [to Muhammad]: "You have made us equal to the dogs and the asses."

Sahih Muslim

Women are mere animals who will burn in Hell for eternity for not being grateful enough for all the good things those with exclusive, unrestricted access to their “private parts” have generously provided for them out of the goodness of their hearts.

Narrated Uqba:

The Prophet said: "The stipulations most entitled to be abided by are those with which you are given the right to enjoy the (women's) private parts (i.e. the stipulations of the marriage contract)."

Bukhari 62.81

Narrated Ibn Abbas:

The Prophet said: "I was shown the Hell-fire and that the majority of its dwellers were women who were ungrateful."

It was asked, "Do they disbelieve in Allah?" (or are they ungrateful to Allah?)

He replied, "They are ungrateful to their husbands and are ungrateful for the favors and the good (charitable deeds) done to them.

Bukhari 2.28

Why would women put up with the beatings, the confinement, and the degradation yet attack those who say, “This is not normal”? Is it really that females are what God and His spokesperson said they are: mentally deficient?

Unlike the Creator of Everything and His spokesman, don’t be too quick to judge. Remember that believing women are initiated to God’s opinion of their sex during the first reading of the Koran as children—the start of a thorough indoctrination that will result in women literally hating themselves—making them inclined to adjectively yield to the men Allah has made their wardens for life.

Men, from boyhood, also can’t help but be influenced by God’s disparaging assessment of females, which may explain what can best be described as a contempt tinged with desire for the women in their lives.

From that first reading and for the rest of their lives, five times a day (for Sunni Muslims), women and girls will get down on their hands and knees at the back of any room in which they find themselves to worship a god who said those bad things about them, where they must loudly proclaim their shortcomings to all as part of their devotion.

As mentioned earlier, prayers mainly consist of repeating word-for-word revealed truths from the Koran. They may not fully understand what it means to be sexually assaulted, but during their prayers they are bound to reaffirm that their rape is a husband’s God-given right, as in revealed truth 2:223, “Your women are a tillage for you…” They are also bound to reaffirm that it is the right of a believer to rape a wife in front of her unbelieving husband.

4:24 Or married women except those your right hands possess (captives of war or slave-girls). This is Allah’s decree for you. Beyond these it is lawful for you to seek, by means of your wealth, any women, to marry and not to debauch. Those of them you have enjoyed, you should give them their dowry as a matter of obligation; but you are not liable to reproach for whatever you mutually agree upon, apart from the obligatory payment (the dowry). Allah is indeed All-Knowing, Wise.

According to a saying of Muhammad, this revelation was sent to reduce the resistance of some believers to raping their female captives in front of their husbands.

The Apostle of Allah (may peace be upon him) sent a military expedition to Awtas on the occasion of the battle of Hunain. They met their enemy and fought with them. They defeated them and took them captives.

Some of the Companions of the Apostle of Allah (may peace be upon him) were reluctant to have intercourse with the female captives in the presence of their husbands who were unbelievers. So Allah, the Exalted, sent down the Qur’anic verse: (4:24) "And all married women (are forbidden) unto you save those (captives) whom your right hands possess."

Abu Dawud 2.2150

How psychologically damaging for a woman’s self-respect to have to publicly acknowledge that, when all is said and done, she is, in essence, nothing more than a sexual object created by a god to reward males for they loyalty, whether as wives or as captives.

What may be a bizarre consequence of women’s instilled self-loading is the rise of the female suicide bomber. It is a relatively new phenomena with women perhaps trying to prove they are worthy of more consideration by doing what get Allah’s attention and respect.

They may get the Almighty to notice them, even praise their self-sacrifice, but the reward for the barbarity they will commit on His behalf will be nowhere near what male suicide bombers get. According to a Hamas website, the best a female martyr can expect if she died a spinster is to be “married to one of the people of Paradise.”

[Question] I wanted to ask: what is the reward of a female martyr who performs a martyrdom operation; does she marry 72 of the houris?

[Answer] … The female martyr gains the same rewards as does the male, with the exception of this one aspect [the houris], so that the female martyr will be with the same husband with whom she dies. “And those who have believed and their progeny, followed them in belief. We shall join their progeny to them. We shall not deprive them of any of their work; every man shall be bound by what he has earned” 52:21. The one who is martyred and has no husband will be married to one of the people of Paradise.

David Cook, Understanding Jihad, p.146

An Evil Affliction

Narrated Abdullah bin Umar:

llah's Apostle said, "Evil omen is in the women, the house and the horse.'

Bukhari 62.30

Narrated Usama bin Zaid:

The Prophet said, "After me I have not left any affliction more harmful to men than women."

Bukhari 62.33

Muhammad’s reference to women as evil may have something to do with the story of Joseph, son of Jacob. That story, more than any other telling-tales from the Bible that made their way into the Koran—with the usual confusing modifications—may be responsible for much of the disdain that believing men have for women, if not outright hate.

When you hear or read about women and girls in countries governed by Islamic law being jailed after reporting sexual assault, blame Allah’s account of the story of Joseph.

Children can easily identify with the central character, which is one reason I suspect the authors of My Book on Islam included it in their catechism. Again—unfortunately, like much of what you find in the Koran—you cannot divorce the text from the message, whether it be one of hate, cruelty, intolerance or, in this instance, judgement of women as sexual predators and liars.

The Vision

Joseph, the eleventh of Jacob's twelve sons and first son of Rachel, not only gets an entire surah named after him, but the surah is also almost exclusively about him. Allah, in the Koran, unlike his earlier appearance in the Bible, can’t be bothered with the names of the supporting cast. Nowhere is this more evident than in the story of Joseph where his brothers are just “the brothers” or “the brother”; no Benjamin, no Simeon, no Judah, no Reuben…

Joseph’s surah begins with Allah praising His Arabic version of the Koran.

THE PROPHET JOSEPH

12 Yûsuf

In the Name of Allah,

the Compassionate, the Merciful

12:1 Alif – Lam – Ra.

These are the verses of the clear Book.

12:2 We have revealed it as an Arabic Qur’an, that perchance you may understand.

12:3 We narrate to you (Muhammad) the fairest narratives in revealing to you this Qur’an, although you were, prior to it, one of the headless.

With those formalities out of the way, Joseph makes his entrance.

12:4 When Joseph said to his father: “O my father, I saw [in my dream] eleven planets and the sun and the moon, I saw them prostrating themselves before me.”

He fathers warns him not to tell his brothers about his dream, that he will be one of God’s chosen.

12:5 He said: “My son, do not relate your dream to your brothers, lest they plot evil against you. Surely, the Devil is the sworn enemy of man.”

12:6 And thus your Lord will chose you and teach you the interpretation of dreams and will perfect His Grace upon you and upon the family of Jacob, as He has perfected it formerly upon your two fathers*, Abraham and Isaac. Surely your Lord is All-Knowing, Wise.

12:7 There are indeed in Joseph and his brothers signs for the inquiring.

* In three of seven translations consulted, “two fathers” becomes “forefathers”.

Sold Into Slavery

As in the Bible, it is the affection that their father bestows on Joseph and Joseph’s dreams that causes his brothers to plot against him. In the next verse, Allah mentions another brother—possibly Benjamin, the youngest of the brothers.

12:8 When they said: “Joseph and his brother are dearer to our father than the rest of us, although we are a large group. Our father is truly in manifest error.”

What to do?

12:9 “Kill Joseph or cast him away in some land that your father’s love may be wholly yours, and you may become after him a righteous people.”

12:10 One of them said: “Do not kill Joseph, but rather throw him in the bottom of the pit, so that some traveller may pick him up, if you must do anything.”

But first they have to convince their father to let Joseph come out and play.

12:11 They said: “Our father, why do you not trust us with Joseph? We certainly wish him well.

12:12 “Send him forth with us tomorrow that he may frolic and play, and we will surely take care of him.”

Jacob is worried that if he lets Joseph out of his sight he will be eaten by wolves.

12:13 He said: “It grieves me to let you take him away; and I fear that the wolf may devour him while you are not watching him.”

12:14 They said: “If the wolf should devour him while we are a large group, we should then be the real losers.”

It’s in the pit with Joseph. While the brothers were plotting, Allah was keeping Joseph apprised of what they intended to do.

12:15 But when they took him away and decided to cast him in the bottom of the pit, We revealed to him: “You should tell them about their intention while they are unaware.”

12:16 And they came to their father in the evening weeping.

In the Bible, Joseph is 17 years old when the brothers decide to get rid of him, which means that his ten half-brothers (he and his younger brother, Benjamin, were the only sons of Rachel, Jacob’s second wife, the first being Leah) were older; some had to be much older, but in the Koran they all behave like children and their explanation for Joseph’s disappearance is a child’s explanation.

12:17 They said: “Our father, we went away racing and left Joseph by our baggage; and so the wolf devoured him. You will not believe us even if we truthful.”

12:18 And they stained his shirt with false blood. He said: “Rather, your souls tempted you to do something. So come gentle patience! To Allah I turn for help against what you say.”

In the Bible, Midianite traders find Joseph in the pit and sell him to Ishmaelites on their way to Egypt. In the Koran, it is an unidentified group of travelers who send down buckets to get water from the “pit,” which appears to have been a functioning well, and discover Joseph, whom they sell to an Egyptian.

12:19 And some travellers came, and they sent their water-drawer, who let down his bucket. He said: “Good news! Here is a boy.” And they hid him as merchandise, Allah being fully aware of what they were doing.

12:20 And they sold him for a cheap price, a number of dirhams, since they were not interested in him.

Joseph and the Governor's Wife

Joseph’s story will provide an opportunity for Allah to offer an opinion on rape and why women who complain of being raped are usually lying, and how you can tell, using the example of the wife of the Egyptian who bought Joseph. She will attempt to seduce the reluctant Joseph after being told by her husband to make his stay an honourable one.

12:21 And the Egyptian who bought him said to his wife: “Make his stay honourable; perhaps he will profit us or we may take him for a son.” Thus We established Joseph in the land and taught him the interpretation of dreams. Allah has control over His Affairs though most people do not know.

12:22 When he was fully grown, We gave him judgement and knowledge, and thus We reward the beneficent.

12:23 And the woman, in whose house he was, sought to seduce him. She closed the doors firmly and said: “Come.” He said: “Allah forbid. It is my Lord who gave me a good abode. Surely, the wrongdoers do not prosper.”

12:24 Certainly she made for him and he would have made for her if it were not for a sign from his Lord. And that was to divert him from evil and indecency. He was indeed one of Our sincere servants.

A woman can also be expected to lie about sexual assault, for example falsely accusing a man of attempted rape when in reality she was the aggressor.

12:25 They raced to the door, and she ripped his shirt from behind. When they met her husband at the door, she said: “What is the penalty of one who intended evil for your wife except imprisonment or severe punishment?”

Exceptionally, Allah, when relating this encounter, concedes that men can, on rare occasions, be the aggressors and how you can tell.

12:26 He (Joseph) said: “She sought to seduce me.” And a member of her household bore witness: “If his shirt was torn from the front, then she is telling the truth and he is a liar.

12:27 “But if his shirt is torn from behind, then she lies and he is one of the truthful.”

While admitting that men can, on occasion, be forceful in the pursuit of intimacy, Allah makes another generalization about women…that they are skilled in the art of deception. Notice the plural form of woman, “you women,“ in verse 12:28.

12:28 When he (the husband) saw that his shirt was torn from behind, he said: “This is part of your guile, you women. Your guile is indeed very great.

Her husband asked Joseph to overlook his wife’s attempt at getting him to share an intimate moment and told his wife to ask forgiveness for her sins.

12:29 “Joseph, overlook this matter; and you woman, ask forgiveness for your sin. You are indeed one of the sinners.”

In the Bible, the husband is a fellow by the name of Potiphar, “an officer of Pharaoh and the captain of the guard”; in the Koran, he is "the governor."

12:30 And some women in the city said: “The wife of the governor has been seeking to seduce her slave; he has infatuated her with his love. We see her in manifest error.

The husband’s wife, rather than ask Allah’s forgiveness for having sinned, invites Joseph to dine and perhaps exchange more than the usual pleasantries (it all depends on your interpretation of “Come out unto them” in the following verse) with some of the women who have been spreading rumours about her attempt to seduce him.

12:31 When she heard about their wiles, she sent after them and prepared for each of them a dining couch. Then she gave each of them a knife and said to him (Joseph): “Come out unto them.” But when they saw him, they admired him and cut their hands and said: “Allah forbid! This is no mortal, he is but a noble angel.”

The women are completely mesmerized by Joseph’s presence and cut themselves. Whatever the governor’s wife had in mind, her wily guests want none of it after seeing Joseph, and neither does he, judging by her reaction.

12:32 She said: “This is the one you reproached me for. I have in fact sought to seduce him, but he held back. If he will not do what I command him, he will surely be imprisoned and will be one of the humbled.”

Joseph in Jail

In the Bible, Joseph is thrown in jail because the husband of the wife who tried to seduce him believed her lies about Joseph coming on to her. In the Koran, as can be expected, Joseph is not thrown in jail because of a woman’s accusation that he tried to have sex with her against her will; that would be unthinkable. It is Joseph who insists that Allah make it so to get away from his owner’s wife and her friends who may—by his expression “their guile”—also have wanted him, a prospect that he is finding more and more difficult to resist.

12:33 He said: “My Lord, prison is dearer to me than that which they call me to. If you do not rid me of their guile, I will be inclined towards them and will be one of the ignorant.”

Allah grants Joseph his wish, with a little help from the governor, and his entourage.

12:34 Thereupon his Lord answered his prayer and so rid him of their guile. He is indeed the Hearer, the Knower.

12:35 Then it occurred to them after they had seen the signs (of Joseph’s innocence) to imprison him for some time.

Joseph, Son of Jacob – My Book on Islam

The last two pages of Prophet Yusuf: Part 1 from My Book on Islam. There is no Joseph demanding to be thrown in jail. What the children are expected to remember is that a woman lied about wanting to seduce a man and an innocent man paid the price. That is what women do. Got that?