Psychology of Mohammad By: Dr. Massoud Ansari 1 Preface This book should be read almost as though it were a work of fiction. It deals with a religion and events in the life of a man who pretended to be a prophet, elements of both subjects being far from truth and reality. In other words, the contents of this book explain realities about unrealities. Mohammed through his book, the Koran, both tried very hard to make realities out of unrealities. He fabricated a preposterous metaphysical faith that, by its appeal to the baser instincts of pagan Bedouins, began on the Arabian Peninsula and then, by bloody conquest, spread throughout the Mid-East, northern Africa and even into Spain. If anyone should ask why more than one billion of the world’s population follows this absurd creed and accepts Mohammed as a prophet, I would refer them inter alia to the works of two distin- guished scientists; Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene1 and Susan Blackmore, The Meme Machine.2 It is not the intention of the author to delve into the definition of religion because it would be impossible to find one that would be acceptable worldwide. I am writing this book to analyze and expose the psychology of the creator (Mohammed) of the religion called Islam; the despicably crafty methods he used to achieve his ambitions; the spirit and principles of Islam; and the drastic and destructive impact of that religion on Muslims’ minds in particular and the world in general. Religion should transcend human ethics, generate a sense of spiri- tuality, and establish principles to guide human behavior along paths of peaceful, caring coexistence with one’s fellow man. But no phe- nomenon in human history has caused as much bloodshed and fratri- cide as religion. One of many examples: at the beginning of the sixth century a Jewish king, Dhu Nowas, after having defeated the Chris- tians of Najran and having conquered their land, dug an enormous trench which he filled faggots and burned twenty thousand Christians alive. During the Crusades, Christians and Muslims butchered each other for 300 years; each side called it a Holy War. Crusaders commit- ted themselves with solemn vows and in the thirteenth-century were granted full Indulgence, i. e. remissions of all punishment for sins committed in their quests and an assurance of direct entry into heaven. The battle cry of Christians, Pope Urban II urged, should be Deus volt 2 [God wills it]. In a like manner, Muslim theocrats called fighting against Christians, Holy War (Jihad) against infidels and promised Muslim fighters a paradise with houris (virgin girls) among other delights in return for their deaths in battle. The Thirty Years War (1618-48) eventually involved almost all of the European powers and they were all convinced that they were fighting for a Holy Cause. The actual cause of these wars was the attempt of the Habsburg controlled Holy Roman Empire to impose Catholicism on Protestant principalities such as Sweden and the Netherlands. The war affected the lives of the 500 million or so people who were then living on the earth, and that of their descendents.3 Historians have written that in Brandenburg, Mecklenburg, Pomerania, the Palatinate, Wurttemberg, and parts of Bavaria, civilian population losses may have been 50 percent or more. Art, science, trade, and industry declined.4 Whole cities, villages, farms, and much property were destroyed. It took almost 200 years for the German territories to recover from the effects of the war. For 1400 years Jews and Muslims have been killing each other, the Muslims believing that they are following a sacred edict. Many of the tragic conflicts in the world today are rooted in long-standing religious differences and animosities. Even within a certain religions such as Islam, intramural differences have caused Sunnis and Shi’as to massacre each other for hundreds of years and Irish Catholics and Protestants have been at each other’s throats for over a century. Homo sapiens, is a Latin term meaning a wise or knowlegable man. But in actuality many times we simply ignore our innate wisdom, believe in superstitions and easily become the victim of impostors. Where religious ideas are concerned, we often become narrow-minded and ethnocentric because we naturally tend to identify religion with our heritage or with those conventional forms of religious behavior that we observe in our own communities. We simply believe the religious faith that our parents have chosen for us is the best and even thinking about the authenticity of that faith is profane. The new-born mind is a blank slate upon which all the environmental and cultural elements that are prevalent in our milieu, including our religious beliefs, are copied. The ubiquitous characteristic of religion is “sacred power.” What is the nature of this “sacred entity” that we unconsciously inherit from our forefathers? If all the multitude differences of worship are elimi- 3 nated, then the only remainder will be the common denominator of an unseen power, sanctity. If we remove sanctity from religion, then what remains will be superstition. In other words, sanctity plus superstition makes religion; religion minus sanctity makes superstition or myth. Therefore, sanctity is an attribute peculiar to religion. Sanctity is a man-made invisible power that man must live in contact with it or be condemned to chaotic experience where there is no foundation for reality.5 In the Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912), Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) writes, “The division of the world into two domains, which include everything that is sacred in one and everything that is profane in the other, is the characteristic feature of religious thought.” For Durkheim, sanctity is not an intrinsic status. Sacred is an appellation conferred by human beings on other persons, places, or things. This has been expressed as the vague and undefined Mana of the Melanesians; the Kami of primitive Shintoism; the fetish of the Africans; spirits possessing some human characteristics, that pervade natural places and animate natural forces; the Sutras and impersonal principle of Buddhism; Tao Te Ching and the Analects of Confucius, the Vedas and Upanishads of Hinduism, the gods and goddesses of the Greek and Roman Pantheons, the essence of Judeo-Christian faiths, the preposterous content of the Muslim’s Koran echoing the power- hungry, lascivious thoughts of Mohammed who presented himself as a prophet of God. It is this invisible sacred power which generates obedience and reverence, awe, and fear in the mind of whomever becomes the follower of a particular religion. The difference between a sacred power and that which is almost powerless is, according to the Dutch scholar Gerardus Van der Leeuw, what distinguishes the sacred from the profane. When elaborating on sacred power, der Leeuw points out that a unique characteristic of sacred power is the fact that it evokes an ambivalent response. He believes that sacred power awakens a profound feeling of awe which manifests itself both as fear and as being attracted. There is no religion whatever without terror, but equally none without love.6 The author of this book rejects Van der Leeuw’s characterization of religion insofar as its application to Islam. Throughout passages of the Koran, one can rarely find a verse indicating Allah’s “love” of his followers. Rather, the bloodthirsty Allah of Islam, among other threatening verses, clearly states: “Many of the jinns and human beings I have made for 4 Hell,” (Koran, VII: 179); “I have only created jinn and human beings that they may worship me” (Koran, LI: 56) and “I shall assuredly fill hell with all of you” (Koran, VII: 17, XXXII: 13). A truly ‘sacred power’ condemns evil and cruelty and embraces good and truth. In other words, in all religions sacred power, God, and truth are virtually synonymous. Plato said goodness, knowledge and truth are interrelated and since the goal of knowledge and truth is goodness, therefore, the goal of knowledge is also goodness. Gandhi believed that the truth is higher than God.7 Every religion teaches that rejecting the faith means turning away from truth. The sacred power turns evil and cruelty into good and truth. Plato, in Euthyphro also proposes the same idea, that what makes an action right is simply the fact that it is commanded by God. But, Socrates asks him’ “Is some- thing right because God commands it or does he command it because it is right?” Euthyphro replies that, of course, God commands it because it is right and it is against the nature of God to command cruelty. Most theologians would tend to agree with this norm. However, some writers including Soren Kierkegaard do not agree. As an ex- ample, Kierkegaard believes that the God’s command to Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac (Genesis 22) is not just. In the Koran, Allah orders Muslims to kill the cursed people mercilessly (Koran, XXXIII: 61). The interesting point in this verse is that Allah not only com- mands Muslims to kill the cursed people, but they have to do it mercilessly and because it is the command of God it should be taken to be the “truth.” Women may not resist sexual abuse and the Koran commands that the men who abuse them get off free.8 Believing in such cruelty makes a person good Muslim; rejecting it arouses the wrath of Allah and condemnation to Hell. To be religious and have faith is to believe without asking questions such as an explanation of Mohammed’s trip to seven heavens on an animal similar to a donkey. This fantasy cannot be tested because God is invisible and invisibility is the sacred characteristic of Him.