German Scholarship: The Gift that Keeps on Giving

Occasionally, very occasionally, the folks who brought us such heady improvements to higher education as the "research institution," specialization, and "bildung" (Nazism's philosophical wet nurse) get bitten by their own self-made viper.

Consider the case of Muhammad Sven Kalisch, a professor of Islamic Theology at Münster University, who is a Muslim (although that may now depend on who you ask), who has done his research and says he doubts that Muhammed ever existed.  Whoopsie! This is doubly embarrassing for the Germans because Sven was hired to bridge the cultural gap and counter the radical Islamic propaganda emmanating from Germany's mosques.  The mosques that brought us Mohammed Atta, for example.

When Prof. Kalisch took up his theology chair four years ago, he was seen as proof that modern Western scholarship and Islamic ways can mingle -- and counter the influence of radical preachers in Germany. He was put in charge of a new program at Münster, one of Germany's oldest and most respected universities, to train teachers in state schools to teach Muslim pupils about their faith.

Muslim leaders cheered and joined an advisory board at his Center for Religious Studies. Politicians hailed the appointment as a sign of Germany's readiness to absorb some three million Muslims into mainstream society.

Well, this may actually be the best thing to happen to Islamic PR in quite some time.  I mean, if there wasn't a Mohammed, the all the covering up of his personal role in hundreds of beheadings, his slaughter/enslavement/dispossession/exile of the Jews in the Arabian penninsula, and his rather sloppy take on Christianity, can just be dispensed with. 

I see Sven as the perfect amalgam of all that is wrong with Western scholarship with all that is Islamic scholarship: in order to be a real scholar in the West, you have to make a name for yourself in some specialized area of research.  What better place, then, to plant your academic flag than the least populated area of research on earth: the Mohammed Denier School of Islamic Theology. This is in perfect keeping with the Islamic approach, in a mirror image sort of way, which is to deny all facts that are inconvenient and unflattering to the image of the Prophet.

I have to hand it to Sven.  It's a bold stand, but someone should let him know that his choices with respect to "publish or perish" have just been halved.  How about that fatwa-for-tenure swap as a career move?

Comments

[Tom the Redhunter]

I just hope that Muhammad Sven Kalisch isn't behind on his life insurance premiums.

[aelfheld]

Tom, I'm sure his wife is hoping the same.

[Michael]

These German guys lack for originality. When I read Schweitzer's Quest for the Historical Jesus, back in high school, one or maybe two of the guys (German, of course) in his survey of the field had the same conclusion about Jesus.

[TOUFIQ UL ALAM]

This is really funny.....why? Well, so many people tried so many times in the history of human kind to prove that Mohammad didn't exist....but so sad for them.....every time the truth came out....

One has to believe in every single prophet in the history of mankind to become a muslim , the angels, the paradise, the hell, and the life after death.......Now, whatever so many people are trying to prove is something which has been already done....

As muslim we believe Jesus, Moses , Adam, Noah and all others but follow only Mohammad(May peace be Upon him). Because he is the last and the best.....

Whatever the people of this world is telling, the truth is one....and only one answer there is....and that is....

"If you just wait long enough, you will for sure know for yourself!!! You want it or not, death is coming. And death will reveal every answer of your question in the life hereafter when you will not have a second chance....."

In the Quran, if you really want to know what is Islam, you will find that Almighty Allah has given Mohammad(PBUH) lists of questions that people will have against the Prophet and his faith and answers to all those questions.

JUst read quran if you want to save yourselves and come under the shade of real islam. Real islam is peaceful , explore the true islam. ANd the looks could always be deceptive.....

Our days are numbered we want it or not....but the fact is some will just submit to Allah and some will always be questioning as the Boni Israils of Moses until Allah punishes them to death.....

Go to Egypt...Allah said in the Quran that He will keep the real body of Firaun or the Ramses so that everyone in the coming centuries, till day of Judgement, can see and learn how not to go against Allah....Allah drawned Firaun in the river Nile just the moment before he could utter the Kalima-e-Shahadah or the Words of Faith to save himself from death but Allah is the Knower of everything and said that it was too late.....

Allah wants that we believe in HIM before the final time comes and that is the test we have to give here on the face of the earth....

Muslims are not here to wage wars against wars.......A true muslim is always a peace lover.....in this time of confusion I pray and hope that may ALLAH guides us all....

[bbmoe]

OK, I'll bite.

Toufiq: congratulations. You noticed that I was using a sort of sarcasm to highlight the ridiculous. But predictably, you disapprove.

But as you've noted, I'm much less interested in Sven's faith and the orthodoxy thereof, and even Allah's wrath, than his truly crappy scholarship. Let Sven worry about Allah's wrath, that's what I say. But I'm sure his co-religionists will be happy to take a more pro-active approach to impressing Sven with Allah's displeasure.

Does a religion get extra points because its believers have to believe in all the designated prophets? That's something I've heard a million times (slight exaggeration): that Islam is even better than Christianity because (a) they have an extra prophet, who is the real, real, for sure, LAST ONE, and (b) The Quran says more about Mary than the Bible does. And, if that doesn't convince you, I'll give you a really close shave.

[aelfheld]

Yes, Islam is 'peace' - the peace of the grave.

And of course Mohammedans aren't here to wage war - they just like indiscriminate killing, be it wholesale or retail.

Save me from the nonsense.

Islam means, literally and figuratively, submission. There's a reason Mohammedans style themselves 'slaves of Allah' - and not just to absolve themselves of responsibility for their (often atrocious) actions. Mohammedism is a psychotic death-cult that started as a religious gloss on banditry. Living off of the fruit of other's labour for centuries, Mohammedism's only contribution has been repression and stagnation.

The only place 'Allah' - a false god promoted by a false prohpet - can lead anyone is to Hell.

[aelfheld]

So, is the extra prophets thing a permanent feature or just something you get if you call in the next 30 minutes?

[Michael]

Yeah, every account of the life of Mo that I have seen, he sounds like a full-on bipolar. When I did psyche nursing, there were what we called "dayroom diagnoses." You'd look out of the nurses' station, across the dayroom, see the new admission,and, if he or she was bipolar, it was pretty apparent. Davis Koresh, Mo Hammad, to name just two, charismatic following, very high energy level, including a lot of sexual energy, grandiosity, and in Mo's case, hallucinations, that's a pretty classic case. There was a widespread climate change, making Scandinavia colder and the growing season shorter, driving Norsemen out "viking" and Arabian men, because of the drought in Arabia, to raiding caravans. This went on for a century or more, before Mo provided the ideology for it. Of course Mo existed. We laugh at old Sven's bad scholarship. We don't believe that crap, any more than we believe that Jesus did not die on the cross. Another very bad scholar, in this case Mo Hammad, saying it won't make it so. Some fool coming along and killing Sven won't make us any morel likely to believe it, either, just more determined not to submit to such ignorance-driven people. (Otherwise known as idiots.)