Usually the MSM falls all over itself to present Islam as nothing less than the religion of peace, so imagine my surprise this AM when the Los Angeles Times had this story on page one:

Separation of Mosque, State Wanes in Indonesia

Yusman Roy, a former boxer and a convert to Islam, is serving two years in prison because he believes that Muslims should pray in a language they can understand.

Roy, who led bilingual prayer sessions at his small East Java boarding school, is seen as a heretic by conservative Muslims here. They believe true prayer can be conducted only in Arabic.

Roy’s desire to pray in Indonesian has sparked such an outrage that he was convicted last year in criminal court of “spreading hatred.” Animosity toward Roy ran so high that police posted guards to keep an angry mob from torching his house and school.

Ah yes good readers, it looks like conservative Muslims consider not only Islam as the only legitimate religion in the world, but are ethno-centric about it as well — “They believe true prayer can be conducted only in Arabic.” This does not look good in regards to any possibility of “moderate Muslims”, whatever or wherever those might be, reforming Islam anytime soon.

But hey, ol’ Roy has company!

Sumardi Tappaya, 60, a high school religious teacher on the island of Sulawesi, was locked up in January after a relative told police he had heard Sumardi whistling while he prayed. The whistling was declared deviant by the local ulemas, and Sumardi is now in jail awaiting trial on charges of religious blasphemy. He faces five years in prison.

Maybe he should have been whistlin’ Dixie!

Ardhi Husain, 50, who ran an Islamic center in East Java that treated drug addiction and cancer with traditional medicine and prayer, was sentenced in September to five years in prison for writing a book that the ulemas said contained 70 “errors,” such as claiming that Muhammad was not the last prophet and that non-Muslims could go to heaven. Five editors of the book also received five-year terms. An employee who sold a copy to a neighbor received three years.

And then there’s this one, too:

Lia Aminuddin, 58, who claims to be the Virgin Mary and leads the quasi-Islamic God’s Kingdom of Eden cult, was arrested in December on blasphemy charges after thousands of angry protesters surrounded her headquarters in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital. The ulemas and demonstrators accused her of insulting Islam by claiming that she was married to the archangel Gabriel and that God spoke to her through him. (In Islam, Gabriel, or Jibril, is revered as the archangel who communicated God’s word to Muhammad.)

Too bad, sounds like Lia just needs to go on some meds. So, what do these conservative Muslims say about folks like those above?

“These kinds of people are the ones who cause all the trouble, and the people wouldn’t bother to riot if there was no one who deviated,” Amin said. “These kinds of people should not exist.”

Hmmmm, “should not exist.” Wonder what their solution to that dilemma happens to be? Anyway — here’s what happed to ol’ Roy.

In August, the judge acquitted Roy of the charge that his teachings deviated from Islam, but found him guilty of inciting hatred by challenging the views of local clerics.
(…)
Roy’s sentence is only six months shorter than the term given radical cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, the purported spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiah. The Southeast Asian affiliate of Al Qaeda is believed to have killed at least 225 people in suicide bombings in Bali and Jakarta.

That last graph tells us all we really need to know about the religion of peace! (db)

Technorati Tags: Indonesia, Yusman Roy, Islam, religion of peace

This entry was posted on Monday, March 20th, 2006 at 12:22 pm and is filed under Islam, Radical Islam. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.  |   Print This Post  |   Email This Post

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