Did you read that Nidal Hasan was known to frequent a strip bar near Fort Hood in these past months? Excerpt:
Hasan's presence at the club paints a starkly different portrait of the alleged killer from that offered by his imam and family members, who have described him as a devout Muslim, and one who had difficulty finding a wife who would wear a head scarf and would pray five times a day.Starz is a strip club located just down the road from the main gate entrance to the Fort Hood Base. It does not serve alcohol, but customers bring their own beer and liquor and buy ice buckets and mixers at the club.
Hasan sat at a table in the back corner of the club, to the left of the stage on which strippers dance around a pole, employees said.
Jennifer Jenner, who works at Starz using the stage name Paige, said Hasan bought a lap dance from her two nights in a row. She said he paid $50 for a dance lasting three songs in one of the club's private rooms on Oct. 29 and Oct. 30.
"I remembered his face because it was the first lap dance I [gave] to a customer while working here," she said. "When I saw his face [Friday] on TV, I jumped out of bed, I knew it was him."
You may be thinking: how does this square with his being a devout Muslim? Keep in mind that the 9/11 hijackers reportedly did the same thing. A source of mine who does counterterrorism analysis says that we in the West might see this behavior as undermining the case for Hasan's piety, but in fact it doesn't. My source says that within Islamic law, the only believers guaranteed the forgiveness of all their sins and entry into Paradise are shahids -- that is, martyrs. In that sense, an otherwise highly devout Muslim who suddenly starts going to bars or strip clubs could be seen as in the final stages of preparing to martyr himself -- the idea being that he can sin with impunity, because he knows he's about to undertake an act that will cleanse his sin and grant him paradise.
Interesting to consider...
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"I wonder whether the best way to deal with Islam in the West is to refuse to take it seriously - to subject it to ceaseless ridicule and mockery."
I think CS Lewis did that when he created the character of Rabadash the Ridiculous in "The Horse and His Boy."
He also resurrected the figure of the Noble Moor in Emeth in "The Last Battle."
Chuck,
Your comparison of Catholic confession to Muslim martyrdom is foolish. A Catholic cannot go to confession and instantly receive forgiveness unless he has true contrition. To engage in premeditated sin with a plan to simply go to confession afterwards is itself a sin called "presumption".
I'm not sure if Islam allows such premeditation which is why I will not comment on it.
Why do we see pictures of them doing all this army-type training in order to blow themselves up? - I thought the houris were there ready for them - they don't need to be buff.
Indoctrination so that they don't decide not to blow themselves up at the last minute?
Re: A Catholic can go to a strip bar, obtain absolution, do the penance and be guaranteed entry to paradise
False. I'm not Catholic, but if I understand correctly, no one is guaranteed entry into Heaven before the fact. We can tell after someone died if they are in heaven (that's what canonization does) but we don't know before any of us dies if we are going to heaven or hell. That would be the sin of presumption.
I don't trust the habit of proof-texting from Islamic scriptures, largely because I can see how dumb this habit is when it's applied to my own religion. You cannot meaningfully cite a Christian proof-text unless you know the context of the verse, how it has been traditionally interpreted, and how it fits together with the rest of Christian scripture, theology, and teaching. I would think the same would be true of Islam.
Appalachian Prof,
I think C.S. Lewis was drawing at least as much on Canaanite and Phoenician religion (specifically their polytheism and practice of human sacrifice) in his picture of the Calormenes as he was on Islam.
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