The Dream of a Worldwide Caliphate

One devout Muslim confided that the dream of every true Muslim is to have a worldwide Caliphate. However, this Muslim dream is a nightmare for all others. It means a degrading subjugation to the laws of Islam and death or imprisonment to those who won’t submit.

Achieving the Caliphate will require violence. Although Muslims would be glad to realize their dream through non-violent means, violence is a regarded as a necessary price, as a recent Al Jazeera poll found – 81% of Muslims polled approved of ISIS. This means that they largely approve of ISIS’ tactics - forced conversions, beheading, kidnappings, and sex slavery.

How is this possible? How is it that people who are pursuing a concept of righteousness could justify such horrors to achieve their worldwide Caliphate?

Before I was a Christian, I was “seeking.” I was given a Hebrew Bible and began with the Book of Joshua. Mesmerized, I read how my people, the Israelites, were defeating everyone by the hand of God. I was elevated, dignified, and thrilled by what I was reading. It felt like I was triumphing, that I was king and that I was finally bestowed with my due glory. However, this glory was short-lived. I finished the Book of Joshua and proceeded to the Book of Judges, expecting that my glory would only be intensified.

It wasn’t! Instead, the Jews rebelled against their God and suffered greatly – death, humiliation, and starvation. I was crushed and fled to the Hebrew Prophets, expecting that they would tell me what I wanted to hear – the greatness of my people. However, they charged them with the very opposite things:

• Isaiah 1:2-4 I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me; The ox knows its owner and the donkey its master's crib; but Israel does not know, My people do not consider.…They have forsaken the LORD; they have spurned the Holy One of Israel and turned their backs on him.

• Jeremiah 1:15-16 For behold, I am calling all the families of the kingdoms of the north," says the LORD; "They shall come and each one set his throne at the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem, against all its walls all around, and against all the cities of Judah. I will utter My judgments against them concerning all their wickedness, because they have forsaken Me, burned incense to other gods, and worshiped the works of their own hands.

• Ezekiel 2:3-5 And He said to me: "Son of man, I am sending you to the children of Israel, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against Me; they and their fathers have transgressed against Me to this very day. For they are impudent and stubborn children. I am sending you to them, and you shall say to them, 'Thus says the Lord GOD.' As for them, whether they hear or whether they refuse--for they are a rebellious house--yet they will know that a prophet has been among them.

Their condemnations of Israel seemed endless but not my patience. I had enough of the Bible. It failed to feed my ego. End of story!

I wish the Muslims had something in their Koran comparable with the Book of Judges or the Hebrew Prophets – something to tame their dream of world conquest and domination. Even more, I wish that they would meditate on the words of Jesus:

• An argument started among them [Jesus’ Disciples] as to which of them might be the greatest. But Jesus, knowing what they were thinking in their heart, took a child and stood him by His side, and said to them, "Whoever receives this child in My name receives Me, and whoever receives Me receives Him who sent Me; for the one who is least among all of you, this is the one who is great." (Luke 9:46-48; NASB)

We all yearn for greatness, but I had a perverted understanding of what true greatness looked like. For me, greatness was a matter of power and conquest. However, for Jesus, it is a matter of humility – being least – and seeking the welfare of others.

Instead, the Koran reads:

• “Make war on them until idolatry is no more and Allah’s religion [Islam] reigns supreme, (Surah 8:37)

• “When the Sacred Months are over, kill those who ascribe partners [like Jesus] to God wheresoever ye find them; seize them, encompass them, and ambush them; then if they repent and observe prayer and pay the alms, let them go their way’.” (Surah 4:5)

• “…kill the disbelievers wherever we find them” (Koran 2:191) and “murder them and treat them harshly” (Koran 9:123), and “Strike off the heads of the disbelievers” (Surah 8:12, cp. 8:60).

These are present obligations. To be a faithful Muslim is to be faithful to the revelation of the Prophet Muhammad. The Apostle Paul reminds us that we too are at war, but not the kind of war generally envisioned:

• Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. (Ephesians 6:11-12; NIV)

While we do resort to armor, our armor is spiritual and mental. Our enemies are primarily spiritual forces who have taken captive the people of the world through deceptive philosophies and religions. The Charleston SC shooter had been taken captive by a philosophy of racism and a white earthly kingdom. Muslims have been taken captive by their own dream of an earthly kingdom. May we provide the light:

• And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Those who oppose him he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will. (2 Timothy 2:24-26)

Who is the Real Muslim?

 Is Bin Ladin the real Muslim or the peaceful Muslim next door? Debater and host of the Aramaic Broadcasting Network, David Wood, provides us with a sobering analysis of the real Islam:

• Islam is unique among world religions in that it explicitly calls for the violent subjugation of unbelievers. Western theorists insist that Islam can be reformed…However Islam does not allow Muslims to question or reinterpret the commands of Allah or Muhammad (Qur’an 33:36). Hence, any attempts to reform the Islamic concept of Jihad will be considered innovation and heresy among Muhammad’s more devout followers. (Christian Research Journal, Vol. 36/Number 01, 47)

However, whenever I mention these harsh realities to my secular friends, they brush off my concerns, claiming that they have many friendly and respectful Muslim friends and that I need to make some myself.

However, Wood insists that if the Muslim is faithful to their religion, then this show of friendship is no more than a ploy according to the Islamic doctrine of Taqiyya, which authorizes the Muslim to deceive the infidel, until they can gain the upper hand:

• Concealing the true intentions of the Islamic community in order to guard against attacks from non-Muslims. This tactic was eventually made explicit in Qur’an 3:28: “Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference to believers. Whoso doeth that hath no connection with Allah unless (it be) that ye but guard yourselves against them, taking (as it were) security” (Pickthall). This verse forbids friendship with unbelievers, unless Muslims are heavily outnumbered and they feel that they are in danger from a stronger adversary. That’s when Muslims are told to pretend to be friendly. Ibn Kathir, history’s most respected Qur’an commentator, quotes Muhammad’s companions to explain 3:28:

• Allah sad next, (unless you indeed fear the danger from them) meaning, except those believers who in some areas or times fear for their safety from the disbelievers. In this case, such believers are allowed to show friendship to the disbelievers outwardly, but never inwardly. For instance, Al-Bukhari recorded that Abu Ad-Darda said, “We smile in the face of some people although our hearts curse them. Al-Bukhari said that Al-Hasan said, “The Tuqyah […Taqiyya] is allowed until the Day of Resurrection.”

Consistent with this, wherever Islam becomes a sizable minority, they are compelled by their faith to seek to impose Shariah law, which reduces all non-Muslims to a secondary and dependent status. It also means the end of free speech and the rights we have long cherished in the West.

Wood demonstrates that Islam has a long and deeply entrenched history of intolerance:

• In Medina, Muhammad began ordering his followers to assassinate critics. Early detractors such as Abu Afak, Asma bint Marwan, and Ka’b bin al-Ashraf were all murdered for writing poems about Muhammad or Islam…Muslims began following Muhammad’s example by killing those who spoke negatively of their prophet: “Narrated Ali ibn Abu Talib: A Jewess used to abuse the Prophet and disparage him. A man strangled her till she died…” Muhammad eventually laid down harsh penalties of death, dismemberment, or imprisonment for the extraordinarily vague crime of “making mischief” in the land: “The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His apostle and strive to make mischief in the land is only this, that they should be murdered or crucified or their hands and their feet should be cut off on opposite sides or they should be imprisoned…” (Qur’an 5:33. Shakir)

What then is the overriding intention of Islam? Wood claims that their purpose is to:

• Subjugate and humiliate Jews and Christians. The justification for carrying out the attacks commanded in Qur’an 9:29...  “And Jews say: Uzair is the son of Allah; and Christians say: The Messiah is the son of Allah; these are the words of their mouths; they imitate the saying of those who disbelieved before; may Allah destroy them; how they are turned away!” (Qur’an 9:30) (45-46)

How do we explain the fact that peace with Islam is always so tentative? The Qur’an gives us all the explanation we need. While the Muslims are the best of peoples (3:110), the “People of the Book [the Bible] … are the worst of creatures” (98:6, Hilali-Khan). Consequently, Muslims perform righteously by fighting against these “worst of creatures”:

• “Fight those who believe not in Allah, nor the Last Day…nor acknowledge the Religion of Truth [Islam]. From among the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizyah with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued. (Qur’an 9:29, Ali)

If this is all true, then concern should lead us to expose these threats. However, the West has not only failed to do this, but has criminalized those who do, charging them with “Islamophobia” and “hate speech!”

What is the true face of Islam? It really doesn’t take much to answer this question. Even if we can’t read the Qur’an, we can travel to Islamic nations, even to the supposedly “secular” Islamic nations where the religious minorities are compelled to live in fear that someone might charge them with “insulting the Prophet.”