@Dawood: “The pen is mightier than the sword!” Now that’s a great reply!

I’m not sure what you mean about the missing preposition. I could have been clearer with the second sentence and written as follows: Since the “dagger alif” is confusing to me, I will find a chance to practice using it, إن شاء الله.

Or are you criticizing my “جهاد الكتابة”? If so, would you add من in the middle? Prepositions are always a pain in a foreign language. As I read somewhere, in English, you can cut a tree down and then cut it up.

I wonder if he is libel for slander as his comments are BLATANTLY false/lies.

Just Stopping By: Ah yes, it is the “dagger alif” sitting on the “waw” and in the Qur’anic text the term “salat” is generally written like this. We see it in Qur’an 24:58, for example, compared to 6:162 which uses the “alif”.

@Just Stopping By: Yes, what you said above is true, the ‘Uthmanic Qur’an was a “skeleton” in that it did not have diacritical marks distinguishing the letters due to it being a written aid to the oral transmission. These were added shortly after, when Islam spread to neighbouring non-Arab communities.

The earliest Arabic writing also includes other factors, such as spelling variations for the same words. Even the Qur’an contains these, as far as I remember, leading some to conclude that it was collectively scribed by a number of different hands. These include such common words as: صَلاة and صَلوٰة for the same word meaning “prayer”. So the orthography was not settled, and modern editions still contain this. There is also the issue of the conflation of the dad (ض) and za’ (ظ) in some dialects, which recent research has shown was existent in the pre-Islamic period.

Thank you for your well-wishes regarding Hebrew – I fear it is a long way off yet! But the historical development of the Semitic languages into the Arabic we have today (as the youngest member of the family) is something I have interest in. I am especially interested in the simple fact that Arabic has more letters in its alphabet than Hebrew/Phonecian, so am curious as to whether they were merely vocal differences that later became distinct letters, or developed from something else.

@Dawood: “I think the Hebrew/Arabic difficulty is because of the fact that Arabic has 2 different letters (س/ش ‘sin/shin’) which correspond to the Hebrew ‘shin’.”

Actually, Hebrew has, depending on how one looks at it, either two letters (shin and sin) or one letter that can be “pointed” to clarify that it is a shin. An analogy would be if it were optional to put some diacritical mark over the G in English to denote a hard g (“game”) from a soft g (“generic”). It would still be the same letter, but at some point people might start thinking of it as two separate letters. (In fact, I read somewhere that many of the Arabic letters distinguished by pointing, such as sin and shin, were originally written without those marks and the reader just knew which was which the same way that English speakers know that sum and sugar don’t start with the same sound.)

What is fascinating to me is that to me it does not appear that there is some even split between the pairings but that there is a strong preference for Hebrew words with shin to correspond to Arabic words with sin.

Good luck if you ever want to learn Hebrew. I believe you are a native speaker of Arabic, which would give you a chance to make the leap into having a working ability with the language faster than others. One problem with Hebrew and Arabic compared to a language like English is that it is much harder to begin breaking down full sentences until you know a reasonable amount because of all the prefixes and other word structures. For example, if you took the bismillah and decided to look up the first word under the letter “ba,” you will be in trouble. So you often need to have a reasonable understanding of sentence structure and vocabulary just to sort out the parts you don’t know. Or at least that is my experience.

I feel sorry for Tim Wildmon. Living in a age of hyper communication he does not have the basisc knowledge of the world’s great religions. Islam is a religion of peace, charity and development. The fundamental ethos of Islam is charity. It gives the highest importance on charity. In fact charity is compulsory to acquire rewards of any other virtues. The Qura’n clearly declares that “No virtue of yours will be rewarded unless you perform charity (Infaq) and give in the way of Allah things which you consider valuable to you…….”(Al-Qur’an 3:92 Surah Al-Imran). Charity is the high way to reach paradise as Qura’n says again “Paradise…is for those, who perform Infaq (charity) when they are well to do and also when they are in financial difficulties…” (Al-Qur’an 3:133). The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) not only gave the highest empasis on charity rather he used to love charity so much so that he used to start his day with the special prayer saying that –”O Allah! I seek the ability to do good, avoid evil and to develop love for the poor”. And don’t forget that one of the five pillars of Islam is compulsory charity.

Christianity teaches charity, but not necessarily directly. Christian scriptures are somewhat vague. Islam, on the other hand, openly and quite directly encourages charity. That is an undeniable fact.

Honestly, I am so sick of the racism/fear mongering/stereotypes in this country. I am Arab-American shouldn’t have to live in fear of their appearance/name being scrutinized, anywhere.

Many white people both in this country, and Europe have to truly accept that having a different last name/skin color, or a different cultural/national background does not make any person less human. I think many white people try to accept that….but something is holding them back, as fear, racial stereotyping, hatred, and the usage of despicable words such as n$gg$r, sand ni$ge@ etc. still being a surprising part of the mentality…

@Ravenscroft: The Aramaic zakut is effectively the same as the Hebrew zachut.

For me the most interesting thing about Hebrew and Arabic is that the shin in Hebrew often corresponds to the sin in Arabic in terms you may recognize in Hebrew (and forgive my Arabic transliteration) (shalom — salaam and rosh ha-shanah — ra’as as-sanaa) and many you probably would not unless you studied Hebrew (hamesh (5), sheva (7), and tesha (9), for example). There are some pairings that go the other way, but probably not as many (eser (10).)

Good answer @Ravenscroft, you’re right. While Sadaqa can be interpreted as voluntarily giving more in common with the Christianity interpretation of charity, meaning it teaches and encourages the practice of giving more after the mandatory Zakat. Zakat it’s obligatory charity that commands one to purify whatever wealth h/she amassed or had in possession during the year.

@Ravenscroft: Thanks! It’s interesting that the roots do not have the same meanings but both lead to similar words. Shukran!

This Tim Wildom hack is as usual full of crap. As for the US as a nation/government some truth refuting US “Patriotic” LIES.

http://www.vexen.co.uk/countries/charity.html

“[Americans] are regularly told by politicians and the media, that America is the world’s most generous nation. This is one of the most conventional pieces of ‘knowledgeable ignorance’. According to the OECD, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the US gave between $6 and $15 billion in foreign aid in the period between 1995 and 1999. In absolute terms, Japan gives more than the US, between $9 and $15 billion in the same period. But the absolute figures are less significant than the proportion of gross domestic product (GDP, or national wealth) that a country devotes to foreign aid. On that league table, the US ranks twenty-second of the 22 most developed nations. As former President Jimmy Carter commented: ‘We are the stingiest nation of all’. Denmark is top of the table, giving 1.01% of GDP, while the US manages just 0.1%. The United Nations has long established the target of 0.7% GDP for development assistance, although only four countries actually achieve this: Denmark, 1.01%; Norway, 0.91%; the Netherlands, 0.79%; Sweden, 0.7%. Apart from being the least generous nation, the US is highly selective in who receives its aid. Over 50% of its aid budget is spent on middle-income countries in the Middle East, with Israel being the recipient of the largest single share.”

“Why Do People Hate America?” by Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies (2002)

Some more truth:

http://costofwar.com/en/

http://www.wrmea.com/us_aid_to_israel/index.htm

“Visitors will learn that in precisely the same 1949-1996 time frame, the total of U.S. foreign aid to all of the countries of sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean combined was $62,497,800,000–almost exactly the amount given to tiny Israel.

According to the Population Reference Bureau of Washington, DC, in mid-1995 the sub-Saharan countries had a combined population of 568 million. The $24,415,700,000 in foreign aid they had received by then amounted to $42.99 per sub-Saharan African.

Similarly, with a combined population of 486 million, all of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean together had received $38,254,400,000. This amounted to $79 per person.

The per capita U.S. foreign aid to Israel’s 5.8 million people during the same period was $10,775.48. This meant that for every dollar the U.S. spent on an African, it spent $250.65 on an Israeli, and for every dollar it spent on someone from the Western Hemisphere outside the United States, it spent $214 on an Israeli.” http://radioislam.org/islam/english/jewishp/cost/israel-aid.jpg

More truth: http://www.oxfamamerica.org/publications/the-tied-aid-round-trip/?searchterm=None

http://www.lobbywatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=165

“The USAID website candidly states, ‘The principal beneficiary of America’s foreign assistance programs has always been the United States. Close to 80% of the USAID contracts and grants go directly to American firms. Foreign assistance programs have helped create major markets for agricultural goods, created new markets for American industrial exports and meant hundreds of thousands of jobs for Americans.’” (See USAID and GM food aid)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCj6RvE5Dsc (Talkback with Hugh Hamilton — Phantom aid)

http://uk.oneworld.net/article/view/135857/1/

And then also to continue responding to the fascist imperialist likely white supremacist idiot Tim Wildom, Saudi Arabia gives a far higher percentage of its GDP in aid then the stingy imperialist US (that gives the majority of its “aid” to Zionist “Israeli” colonialism and oppression);

http://topnews.in/saudi-arabia-lead-humanitarian-donor-us-lags-behind-2191671 “Saudi Arabia lead humanitarian donor, US lags behind”

And the United Arab Emirates; http://uk.zawya.com/story/ZAWYA20100913035234/

UAE largest global aid donor in gross income term

“Gulf and other Arab oil producers have provided nearly $272 billion in financial assistance to other developing nations and the UAE has emerged as the largest donor relative to its gross national income (GNI), the World Bank has said.

…
Moreover, Arab aid is generally untied, and is offered without conditions or restrictions. Over time, Arab donors have expanded their reach-beyond Arab and predominantly Muslim countries in terms of recipient countries and beyond infrastructure in terms of sectors.

Their assistance has come to play a major role in total ODA flows to several developing countries,” the report said.

The study noted that at present, the Arab official financial assistance covers a wide range of nations, especially poor countries in sub-Saharan Africa such as Mali, Mauritania, Senegal, Somalia, and Sudan; and in Asia such as Cambodia, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, and Vietnam.”

The imperialist land stealing occupying US regime and their Zionist entity buddies often like to try to falsely smear Arab nations as allegedly “stingy” in donations, which is completely false and the Arab nations are thee most generous nations on the globe when all the massive aid they give is measured against Gross National Incomes which the US again comes out looking VERY stingy giving only a puny 0.1% of its GDP in “aid” (and most of that being again sneaky TIED “aid” designed not to help people in the Third World but to benefit Western mega corporations only; again: http://www.oxfamamerica.org/publications/the-tied-aid-round-trip/?searchterm=None)

And as for Tim Wildmon’s pathetic lying claim that “Gospel for Asia for several years. Why do we care about the outcast people of India?” Umm news flash to imperialist racist scumbags like Wildom you DON’T “care” about any of those people you simply want to push “Jesus” on them and you use their poverty as a means to try to exploit them and use what you see as a weakness to try to better “evangelize” them. And who created that poverty? It was IMPERIALIST Western CHRISTIANS who colonized their lands and stole from these non-Christians to start with!!! As the brave Navajo leader Manuelito (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manuelito) once put it in a famous saying among the Navajo people of America regarding European Christians;
“They came with the Bible in one hand and the gun in the other. First they stole gold. Then they stole the land. Then they stole our souls.”

And as one Atheist speaker once put it, when he was describing himself going down to an Austin, Texas food shelter and helping serve food to the homeless, that unlike him (in this case an atheist) who is doing something good just to help people he saw Christian missionaries trying to use the food as a tool to push “Jesus” on people by first making the hungry homeless lesson to a Christian “sermon” before getting the food and the atheist said that “unlike you (Christians) I’m not holding their food HOSTAGE/RANSOM in the name of Jesus”! I think that was a GREAT line lol.

Also more on supposed “Christian charity” and bs lies of people like this ahole Wildmon.

http://www.vexen.co.uk/religion/charity.html

A very good link on the myth of “charity” and why we need more tax revenue and actual welfare assistance to fair and equal societies. http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-welfarecharity.htm

“Most donations go to churches, but churches are an excellent example of the localized nature of charities. And churches with even national charity campaigns hardly spend a substantial amount of their money on helping the poor. Until recently, the Seventh-day Adventist church had one of the most enviable records of charity collections of any U.S. religious denomination. Yet its department devoted to helping out the poor and needy — the Dorcas Society — received only a tiny fraction of the church’s donations. Instead, the vast majority went to church administration, religious and educational facilities, and a remarkable world-wide missionary effort to convert other nationalities to their faith.”

Right wing Christian churches like those Wildmon is likely a part of have a long history of fraud and ridiculously high overheads as they go to “preach the word” to people their own home country (in this case the US) has often been responsible for impoverishing in the first place via US imperialism, sanctions, and the crimes of American mega corporations. And as South Park so hilarious showed in their old “Starvin Marvin” episode as exploitative “Christian charities” often exhort money from their viewers to “preach the word” via telling starving people in Third World countries “if you some food… you have to read the Bible FIRST!!” Basically again holding any “aid” HOSTAGE in the name of Jesus PBUH!

http://www.city-data.com/forum/atheism-agnosticism/555206-would-you-give-christian-charity.html

Regarding a so-called “Christian charity” an individual writes; “What you describe is what I stay far away from and I don’t think that such activities should be under the tax deductable charity umbrella as proselytizing or pushing damaging practices is not charity.”

And in closing as this website said:

http://www.irusa.org/

http://www.ifrc.org/

http://www.muslimaid.org/

> “If there ever was a contrast in worldviews, it is with Christianity and Islam”

Lol, tell me about it!

> “One of the most striking differences is that Christianity teaches, practices, and encourages charity. Islam does not.”

Yeah, tell me about it buddy! While we may say Christianity “teaches”, “practices” and “encourages”- charity. We can say one of the most striking differences is that Islam made mandatory, obligatory and compulsory -charity,

Huh.

http://www.themeaningofislam.org/five_pillars/zakah/quran_quotes.html

http://www.biharanjuman.org/charity.htm

“Alms are for the poor and the needy; and those employed to administer (the funds); for those whose hearts have been (recently) reconciled (to truth); for those in bondage and in debt; in the cause of Allah; and for the wayfarer: (thus is it) ordained by Allah, and Allah is full of knowledge and wisdom.” – Quran 9:60

“But those most devoted to Allah shall be removed far from it (Hell),-
Those who spend their wealth for increase in self-purification,
And have in their minds no favour from anyone for which a reward is expected in return, But only the desire to seek for the Countenance of their Lord Most High;” – Quran 92:17-20

“And be steadfast in prayer; practise regular charity; and bow down your heads with those who bow down (in worship).” – Qur’an 2:43

“And be steadfast in prayer and regular in charity: And whatever good ye send forth for your souls before you, ye shall find it with Allah: for Allah sees Well all that ye do.” – Qur’an 2:110

“It is not righteousness that ye turn your faces Towards east or West; but it is righteousness- to believe in Allah and the Last Day, and the Angels, and the Book, and the Messengers; to spend of your substance, out of love for Him, for your kin, for orphans, for the needy, for the wayfarer, for those who ask, and for the ransom of slaves; to be steadfast in prayer, and practice regular charity; to fulfil the contracts which ye have made; and to be firm and patient, in pain (or suffering) and adversity, and throughout all periods of panic. Such are the people of truth, the Allah-fearing.” – Qur’an 2:177

“They ask thee what they should spend (In charity). Say: Whatever ye spend that is good, is for parents and kindred and orphans and those in want and for wayfarers. And whatever ye do that is good, -Allah knoweth it well.”

- Qur’an 2:215

“O ye who believe! cancel not your charity by reminders of your generosity or by injury,- like those who spend their substance to be seen of men, but believe neither in Allah nor in the Last Day. They are in parable like a hard, barren rock, on which is a little soil: on it falls heavy rain, which leaves it (Just) a bare stone. They will be able to do nothing with aught they have earned. And Allah guideth not those who reject faith.”

- Qur’an 2:264

“If ye disclose (acts of) charity, even so it is well, but if ye conceal them, and make them reach those (really) in need, that is best for you: It will remove from you some of your (stains of) evil. And Allah is well acquainted with what ye do.” – Qur’an 2:271

“Those who (in charity) spend of their goods by night and by day, in secret and in public, have their reward with their Lord: on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve.” – Qur’an 2:274

“Those who believe, and do deeds of righteousness, and establish regular prayers and regular charity, will have their reward with their Lord: on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve.” – Qur’an 2:277

“If the debtor is in a difficulty, grant him time Till it is easy for him to repay. But if ye remit it by way of charity, that is best for you if ye only knew.” – Qur’an 2:280

“”And He hath made me blessed wheresoever I be, and hath enjoined on me Prayer and Charity as long as I live;” – Qur’an 19:31 (speaking as Jesus Christ)

“Believe in Allah and His apostle, and spend (in charity) out of the (substance) whereof He has made you heirs. For, those of you who believe and spend (in charity),- for them is a great Reward.” – Qur’an 57:7

“Those who establish regular Prayer, and give regular charity, and have (in their hearts) the assurance of the Hereafter.” – Qur’an 31:4