Understanding Islam
From a Arabic Christian Professor in the Middle EastName withdrawn for security reasons
Islam does not mean peace, It means submission. The word for peace in Arabic is "salam" not "islam." Islam refers to slave submission to Allah and man's duty is to submit whatever the result of this submission. The Quran lacks the biblical concept of a son's relationship to God as Father.
The word Allah is Arabic for God. The Bible used this word, even before Islam, to refer to God and the Arabic NT speaks of Christ as Son of Allah.
Though Christians and Muslims speak of the same God or Allah, God's nature and attributes are entirely different between the two religions. The God portrayed in the Bible is very different from the God in the Quran.
Not all Arabs are Moslems. The word Arabs refers to Arabic speaking people, while the word Moslems refers to those who follow Islam. There are 19 Arabic speaking countries with 300 million people. While 95% of Arabs within them are Moslems, only 20% of Arabs in the USA are Moslems.
The state religion of most Moslem countries is Islam. Moslems think of the West as Christian and the present conflict as Islam versus Christianity.
A Moslem is not allowed to leave Islam at the risk of his life. At birth, a person is either Moslem or non-Moslem and his religion is entered on official documents. A person can easily become a Moslem, but not the reverse. There are no known visible churches of Moslem converts to Christianity. Converts do exist in small numbers meeting secretly.
There are many decent Moslems who are against terrorism. Some, embrace Christian values and those of the US constitution.
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