If you see this text then you need to update your flash player.

Print this pagePrint this page.

Recent Publications by New English Review Authors
In Praise of Prejudice: The Necessity of Preconceived Ideas
by Theodore Dalrymple
Defending The West:
by Ibn Warraq
Nations, Language and Citizenship:
by Norman Berdichevsky
Romancing Opiates
by Theodore Dalrymple
Which Koran?
by Ibn Warraq
Our Culture, What's Left of It
by Theodore Dalrymple
What The Koran Really Says
by Ibn Warraq
Life at the Bottom
by Theodore Dalrymple
The Origins of the Koran
by Ibn Warraq
Why I Am Not Muslim
by Ibn Warraq
Spanish Vignettes: An Offbeat Look Into Spain's Culture, Society & History
by Norman Berdichevsky
Leaving Islam
Edited by Ibn Warraq
Thursday, 1 May 2008
A Conference On The Early History Of Islam And The Koran

by Ibn Warraq


Report On The Inarah Otzenhauzen Conference On
  “The Early History Of Islam And The Koran”
     March 13-16, 2008

 

The newly founded institute, Inârah Institute for Research of Early Islamic History and the Koran, in cooperation with the Religious Studies Department of the University of Saarlandes, Germany and the Europäische Akademie Otzenhausen, Germany held its first International Conference on the Origins of the Koran and Early Islamic History. Inarah consists of a group of German scholars inspired by the work of Christoph Luxenberg but disturbed by the fact Luxenberg's insights were not discussed by other Islamologists because of their implications for the traditional history of the Koran (now thought to be almost certainly false, and fabricated many years after the foundation of Islam). I think it would be fair to say that the idea for the German conference came naturally after the successful conference at the University of California-Davis in January, 2007 on Scripture and Skepticism organised by the Center for Inquiry, Transnational, and the Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion [CSER], inspired, organised, and coordinated by Dr. Paul Kurtz and Dr. Joseph Hoffmann. Many of the founders of Inarah, the organisers of the German conference, participated in the Davis Conference, and finding the experience exhilarating, decided a similar conference devoted entirely to the Koran and Early Islam would be in order, a conference that would fearlessly examine the origins of the Koran wherever the empirical research might lead, hence the Otzenhausen Conference.  more...

Posted on 7:38 AM by NER
Comments
1 May 2008
Hugh Fitzgerald

How exciting even the driest account would be -- and this is not a dry account -- of the Higher Criticism, getting closer to its refractory and unwilling object of study, Islam. 



11 Jun 2008
Longoverdue

Dear Mr. ibn Warraq, Fantastic job on the conference! And thanks for this fine report. Forensic study of the Koran will reveal the Koran's purpose as a troop conditioner and the late concoction of the caliph/warlords who led them. The Koran is obviously an after-the-fact conflation of various Ebionite, heretical Christian and non-authoritative rabbinical  texts stirred together with generous dollops of paganism and sadistic cruelty (decapitation, mutilation, boiling drinks). These are angry sermons read to the troops to get them in a "fighting mood" before they are sent out to murder innocent families. To a person coming from a "Golden Rule"-based religion, reading the Koran for the first time is a tremendous shock to the mind. The continual hatred it expresses against unbelievers and its constant calls for violence convince one that Islam is what we know today as a mind-control "religious cult", perhaps the most successful one, but only because of Islam's extreme and inherent viciousness. Nothing will change that viciousness, but scholarship can expose its roots and educated, informed ex-Muslims will do the rest by dismantling this great prison called Islam. My expectation is that when the scholarly work is done, the collapse of Islam will be as sudden and irreversible as the collapse of totalitarianism in the Soviet empire or the Romania of Ceasescu.  

Best luck and thanks to all the scholars involved in uncovering the fingerprints on this crime against humanity.



27 Jul 2008
Stephen Silver

I am very interested in the strong evidence of Biblical influence on the writing of the Koran, both from the Hebrew TN"K and the Aramaic Peshitta AN"K, as well as from the Aramaic New Testament Peshitta.

The evidence strongly points to an Assyrian Christian influence on the writing of the Koran.  If you can direct me to more articles in this field of study, Id be very grateful.

Stephen P. Silver

 



Most Recent Posts at The Iconoclast
Search The Iconoclast
Enter text, Go to search:
 
The Iconoclast Posts by Author
The Iconoclast Archives
sun mon tue wed thu fri sat
      1 2
3 4 5 6 7 8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21 22 23
24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31       

RSS Site Feed
RSS Feed