Koran and Genesis
A Comparison of the Joseph Narrative in Genesis and in the Koran

Both Genesis and the Koran give a history of the story of Joseph, who was betrayed by his brothers and taken into slavery. While the story appeared first in the Book of Genesis, the Koran offers a kind of commentary on the Hebrew history. This paper will compare and contrast the two versions of the story of Joseph, analyzing how the two narratives offer different interpretations for two different religious communities.

The story of Joseph is found in chapters 37-50 of the Book of Genesis in the Hebrew history, known in Christianity as the Old Testament. From the perspective of the New Testament, Joseph takes on a symbolic nature. Like Jesus, Joseph is betrayed by his people, is presumed dead (by his father Jacob) but is "resurrected." Like Jesus he becomes a servant and then becomes a kind…...

hy would alcohol benefit the heart? The Mayo Clinic (http://www.mayoclinic.com) explains that a moderate amount of alcohol helps raise the "good" cholesterol in the body. A moderate amount of alcohol also lowers the blood pressure and "inhibits the formation of blood clots." Also, red wine in particular helps the heart (more than any other type of alcoholic drink), according to the research in the Mayo Clinic. This is interesting because at the time that Allah gave these instructions to Muhammad (through angels), red wine was about the only type of fermented beverage other than beer.

Red wine, according to a Danish study from the year 2000 (the "Copenhagen City Heart Study") that is quoted by the Mayo Clinic, contains "Flavonoids." The flavonoids are actually antioxidants and in red wine the antioxidants are at a higher level than those found in oranges, apples, tea and onions. Also red wine has "nonflavonoids" which…...

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Works Cited

Dawood, N.J. (1999). The Koran. New York: Penguin Books.

Daragahi, Borzou, & Hameed, Saif. (2008). Coordinated Baghdad bombs kill 55. The Los

Angeles Times, A3.

Encarta. (2002). September 11 Attacks. MSNBC. Retrieved March 5, 2008, at http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_701509060_2/september_11_attacks.html.

In the Koran, Muhammad is advising some who want to join the war against the pagans to stay by their mothers and go on in taking care of them, assuring them that it is as worthy in God's eyes as fighting for Him in a battle.
y the time Muhammad had his first revelations, Islam came as a tool of God imposing social justice in a world that was divided between tribal wars where women were simple objects in theirs husbands' and fathers' hands. Social justice is also including a fair attitude toward them and it is acting like a book that guarantees their fundamental rights for the first time in the Arabic world, long before they got any rights in the Western world.

It is true that polygamy was allowed by the Koran, but one has to envision it in the frame of a world divided by tribal fights and,…...

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Bibliography

Badawi, Jamal a. "The Status of Women in Islam." Islam for Today. 17 Mar 2007. Retrieved: 6 Aug 2007. Available at http://www.islamfortoday.com/womensrightsbadawi.htm

Maqsood, Ruqaiyyah Waris. "Islam, Culture and Women." Islam for Today. 17 Mar 2007. Retrieved: 6 Aug 2007. Available at http://www.islamfortoday.com/womensrightsbadawi.htm

Quran and Women." 2001, Hashmi Human Resources Development Society. Retrieved: 6 Aug 2007 Available at http://www.hashmitrust.com/htm/women&quran.htm

The Status of Women in Islam." Muslim Students Association. 24 Mar 2004. Retrieved: 6 Aug 2007. Available at  http://www.mtsu.edu/~msa/women2.htm

We learn from Genesis that God was roaming in the garden and had to call out for Adam and Eve while they were hiding behind the trees. However in the Koran, God is instrinctively aware of what Adam and Eve had done and there is no calling out and looking around for them because God knows where they are.
We have always been told that God is aware of what we are going through. He is looking out for us. But how would He look out for us if He doesn't know where we are. Genesis thus sends a wrong message to the people while Koran doesn't make that mistake and shows God as the strong One that He truly is.

After the sin is committed, both Adam and Eve start hiding their naked bodies as they are reproached by God for what they have done. That is what happens in…...

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References

Savasan Yurtsever, The Bible or The Koran,  http://assets.booklocker.com/pdfs/157s.pdf 

The Koran: Selected Suras (Dover Thrift Editions) by Arthur Jeffery (Paperback - Dec 21, 2000)

Ernest Valea. The human condition in world religion.  http://www.comparativereligion.com/man.html 

James Abdul Rahim Gaudet, Rabia Mills. Islam and Christianity

Beowulf and the Koran
In some sense, both Beowulf and the Koran can be understood as adaptations of standard Judeo-Christian scripture to specific culture contexts: each text actually relies upon the previously existing text of the Bible to establish its own bona fides. Yet it is unclear in both cases to what extent this relation bears. In the case of Beowulf, some scholars have argued that the Christian-themed passages in the poem are a later insertion. In the case of the Koran, obviously many of the central tenets of Christianity and Judaism are overturned completely. But in both cases what we are witnessing is an attempt to create a culturally-specific text that can approach the subject of the purpose and meaning of life, while adapting elements of the central western religious tradition and scripture in order to establish the seriousness of the newer text.

In Beowulf, presumably, an older pagan song --…...

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Works Cited

Ali, A. Yusuf (Translator). The Holy Qur'an. Sacred-Texts.com. Web. Accessed 15 April 2014 at:  http://sacred-texts.com/isl//quran/ 

Heaney, Seamus (Translator). Beowulf: A New Verse Translation. New York and London: Norton, 2000. Print.

Quran
The objective of this study is to consider how the language, arrangement and general compositional strategies of the text in the Quran result in a particular understanding of Allah's love of man and man's love of Allah.

For the reader of the Quran who has never encountered the writings love may not be at first obvious to the reader. However, when better understanding the context of the Quran and the meaning that hit holds for believers of the Muslim faith, it is clear that love is interwoven throughout the entirety of the Quran.

Love of God for Humans

According to the work of Ghazali the love of God for human beings in the Quran is God drawing people "nearer to Himself by warding off distractions and sins from [them]…"( Ghazi, 2012, p.12) The word 'mahabbah' is used for 'love' in the statement as follows:

"In its ordinary use, 'love' means the soul's inclination…...

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Bibliography

Ghazi, HRH Prince (2012) Love in the Holy Quran. Revised 6th Ed. Retrieved from: http://main.altafsir.com/LoveInQuranIntroEn.asp#.UwXan_ldUtQ.

Where is the Love in the Quran? (2014) On Islam. Retrieved from: http://www.onislam.net/english/ask-about-islam/ethics-and-values/muslim-character/168414-wheres-the-love-in-the-quran.html

Mahally, F. (nd) A study of the word "love" in the Qur'an. Retrieved from:  http://www.answering-islam.org/Quran/Themes/love.htm

Esposito finds that the premodernist revival movements of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries contributed to the pattern of Islamic politics that developed and left a legacy for the twentieth century. These movements were motivated primarily in response to internal decay rather than external, colonial threat (Esposito 40-41).
At the same time, many areas of the Islamic world experienced the impact of the economic and military challenge of an emerging and modernizing est beginning in the eighteenth century. Declining Muslim fortunes also reversed the relationship of the Islamic world to the est, from that of an expanding offensive movement to a defensive posture. Muslim responses to these changes ranged from rejection to adaptation, from Islamic withdrawal to acculturation and reform. Some responded by secular reform, and by the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Islamic modernist movements had also developed in an attempt to bridge the gap between tradition and modernity…...

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Works Cited

Ahmed, Leila. Women and Gender in Islam: Historical Roots of a Modern Debate. New Haven: Yale University, 1992.

Binder, Leonard.

Islamic Liberalism. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1988.

Eickelman, Dale F. The Middle East: An Anthropological Approach. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1989.

In some ways, the men who practice violence against women and attempt to control them to the degrees that the Taliban has decreed are simply carrying out the violence and the repression that was practiced against them; though it serves no constructive purpose and is indeed highly detrimental both to women and to the country as a whole, the Taliban's action against the women is at least partially a result of the cultural psychological repression that Afghanistan has suffered for thirty years. That, and the fact that a common enemy in women makes the Taliban that much stronger in its operations and control of the government and society as a whole, can be seen as the primary psychological motives for the Taliban's treatment of women.
Women in Islam

According to the Taliban themselves, however, their actions and attitudes towards women simply carry out strict Islamic law, and are necessary for establishing…...

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References

Sengupta, Kim. "Abuse of Afghan women: 'It was my decision to die. I was getting beaten every day'." The Independent, 24 November 2006. Accessed 20 February 2010.  http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/abuse-of-afghan-women-it-was-my-decision-to-die-i-was-getting-beaten-every-day-425580.html .

Skaine, Rosemarie. The Women of Afghanistan Under the Taliban. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2000.

Dhimmis (minorities of other religions) participated as equal citizens in this renaissance and Muslim scholars made more scientific discoveries during this time than in the whole of previously recorded history (Goldschmidt & Davidson, 2007). The break between the hiis (those who considered Ali to be legitimate ruler of the nation) and the unnis (those who revered Muhammad and all four rashidun) occurred during this period. Mystic Islam (best known as ufism), or esoteric groups were born during this period as well as Muslim philosophy.
Today, approximately 80-90% of Moslems are unnis whilst 10-20% are hiites. The key difference between unnis and hiites is that unnis believe that the first four caliphs were rightful successors to Mohamed and that caliphs should be chosen by the whole community. The alafi sect (otherwise notoriously known as Wahabbissm) is an extreme Islamic movement derived from unnism. hiites, on the other hand, believe in the…...

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Sources

Armstrong, K. (2000). Islam: A Short History The Modern Library: UK.

Brown, D. (1999). Rethinking Tradition in Modern Islamic Thought Cambridge: Cambridge Univ,. Press

Goldschmidt, A. & Davidson, L. (2010) A concise history of the Middle East Boulder, CO: Westview Press

Hourani, A. (1991) A History of the Arab People London: Penguin

The poems Catullus wrote to the woman Lesbia are among his best known. How would you characterize their affair?

Catallus describes a conflicted and stormy affair with the women of Lesbia. Sexual tension is evident in his poems, which have a strong erotic content. Therefore, his affairs were passionate and physical.

If the gender roles were reversed and the woman were the narrator, do you think this series of poems would read differently? Explain.

The poems would read differently not because their content would have changed but because they would subvert social norms. As a male, Catallus is allowed, almost expected to write such explicit details about his physical affairs including references to love and hatred. Females would have been more subtle because of the widespread social persecution they might suffer if they admitted to promiscuity or tumultuous romantic interludes especially with married people.

Catullus ends up calling his lady a whore. Would you…...

And just as different divisions of Christianity are more or less fundamentalist in their interpretation of religious texts and traditions, different divisions of Islam are more or less strict. The most fundamentalist version of Islam, one that is primarily associated with Saudi Arabia, is Wahhabism. Muslims who follow this minority version of Sunni believe that they are the only true Muslims and that other branches of Islam are illegitimate (Cleveland, 2004, p.123). In some ways, the division between Wahhabism is like that between Catholics and Protestants during the eformation and Counter-reformation or that between Orthodox and eform Judaism. All major religions have internal divisions, and all major religions -- including also Hinduism and Buddhism -- can be organized along a spectrum from most conservative to most liberal.
Some followers of Wahhabi Islam have been responsible for horrific violence. There is no justification for their actions. It is true that --…...

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References

Cleveland, W.L. (2004). A history of the modern middle east. (3rd ed.) Boulder: Westview Press.

Jenkins, P. (2009, March 8). Dark passages. Retrieved from  http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/03/08/dark_passages/ .

The Koran preaches that "the message of Abraham was the very same as Muhammad's, but it would become corrupted by the Jews" (Kjeilen para. 15). In the Koran, Abraham is a messenger who teaches others about the Islamic God. Kjeilen writes that sources outside the Koran tell many stories about Abraham, one of which includes his circumcision. This is not nearly as significant as it is in the Hebrew texts.
Thus, both religions use the hero of Abraham to evoke their missions. The Biblical Abraham makes a compact with the Jewish God and resigns himself to Judaism. In Islam, however, Abraham is a hero in that he is a prophet, spreading the Islamic message to those who have not heard.

orks Cited

Brians, Paul. "The Story of Abraham, from the Hebrew Bible." ashington State

University. 1998. Department of English. 10 June 2009.

Kjeilen, Tore. "Abraham/Ibrahim." Look Lex Encyclopedia. 2009. 10 June 2009.

...

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Works Cited

Brians, Paul. "The Story of Abraham, from the Hebrew Bible." Washington State

University. 1998. Department of English. 10 June 2009.

Kjeilen, Tore. "Abraham/Ibrahim." Look Lex Encyclopedia. 2009. 10 June 2009.

Abdal-Hakim Murad, in his "Bin Laden's Violence is a Heresy Against Islam," generally makes the point that violence against civilians and innocents is not in accordance with Islamic scholarship or tradition. According to Murad, it was a 19th century Iranian reformer called "the Bab" who "ignored the accumulated discussion of the centuries and wrote a Koranic commentary based on his own direct understanding of scripture." (Murad) Over time, Murad asserts that this led to many Muslim groups ignoring Islamic tradition and making their own pronouncements on what the Koran means. One of these groups were the ahhabi Muslims of Saudi Arabia, who traditionally have been considered "heretics" by mainstream Islamic scholars, but with the influx of oil money in the 1960's, began to export this extreme view of Islam around the world. Because of their seeming ability to decide the meaning of the Koran, Muslims who follow this type…...

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Works Cited

"Al Qaeda in its Own Words." (2008). ed. By Kepel, Gilles and Jean-Pierre Milelli. Cambridge Mass: Harvard UP. Print.

Murad, Abdal-Hakim. "Bin Laden's Violence is a Heresy Against Islam." Islam For Today. Retrieved from www.islamfortoday.com

Qutb, Sayyid. Milestones. Indianapolis: American Trust, 1990. Print.

Any of these conflicts might seem limited when they start, but given the cultural differences involved, at any time they could turn into a broader cultural war involving not a small part of the Middle East but all of it, and that sort of war would be a major threat to world civilization, a Huntington shows in his book.
Khater (2004) offers a look at many documents of Middle Eastern history, documents written by participants and observers of events and trends from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. A survey of these documents helps show how the West has gotten the issues wrong numerous times an how the Islamic countries fail to understand the nature of the West at the same time. Of particular note are the many diplomatic cables and other correspondence addressing the situation in Iran before the revolution and the return of Ayatollah Khomeini in the 1970s,…...

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References

Cleveland, W.L. (1999). A History of the Modern Middle East. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press.

Gelvin, J.L. (2008). The Modern Middle East: A History. New York, (2nd Edition) Oxford University Press.

Gumley, F. & Redhead, B. (1992). The Pillars of Islam. London: BBC Books.

Huntington, S.P. (1993, Summer). The Clash of Civilizations? Foreign Affairs, 22-49.

Islam and Human Rights
a Critique of Contemporary Muslim Approaches

The basic objective of this research is note the errors that are committed by Muslims in their argument of human rights in Islam or in other words to explore possible means of formulation of a more coherent alternative expression of values to point out the errors committed by Muslims in their attempt to argue the case of human rights in Islam in the hope that efforts and resources expended in that direction can be derived to a more agreeable end; which is the exploration of possible means of formulating a more coherent alternative expression of values to the so-called "Islamic human rights."

A considerable amount of literature has been produced on these issues by competent Muslim thinkers and scholars but because they either

purposefully or 2) inadvertently chose to follow almost the same style as explored in the Western tradition in the advancement of…...

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Bibliography

Hassan, Riffat, Ph.D. ( ) Are Human Rights Compatible with Islam? The Issue of the Rights of Women in Muslim Communities, University of Louisville, KY [Online available at: .org/hassan2.htmhttp://www.religiousconsultation

Islam 101 "Human Rights in Islam" 2005 [Online available at: 101. com/rights/index.Htm 'Allamah Abu Al'A'la Mawdudi at Tawid Journal 'Vol.. IV No. 3 Rajah-Ramadan 1407 ajab-Ramadahan 1407 Human Rights in Islam.]http://www.islam