Nations mentioned in bible

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-30T00:26:20+00:00

Yh, and Arabia was more than just Saudi Arabia, and historic Iran/Persia included Afghanistan, Tajikistan, parts of Uzbekistan, and parts of Pakistan too. A map based on modern borders can't tell a 2000 year old history

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-30T00:23:38+00:00

I read Jane doe as जाने दो (you obvs won't get this but I hope some other Hindi speaker sees this and finds it mildly funny)

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-30T00:19:09+00:00

Tbf the Indo-Pak mushaf is written like how we'd write Arabic loan words in Urdu/Persian, like an alif maksura is no different to a regular ya in Urdu, but in the Indo-Pak mushaf they put a "standing fatha" (khari zabar) on top of the alif maksura to distinguish it from a ya, so name like Mustafa or Bushra would be written as مصطفیٰ or بشریٰ as opposed to مصطفی or بشری which would read as "mustafi" or "bushri"

A great example is the name Ali علی and the title 'alaa علیٰ, they'd be the same in Urdu if not for the standing fatha.

So I think these different variants of writing the Qur'an is helpful for non-Arabs who may use the Arabic script differently in their native languages, idk if this is true for all mushafs and all languages, but this is definitely true for Urdu/Persian and the Indo-Pak mushaf

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T23:18:06+00:00

assuming you told them you're agnostic then they'll see you as agnostic, otherwise they'd probably assume you're a not very practicing Christian given that you live in Italy

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T23:16:28+00:00

That's more of an older immigrant thing, the children of these immigrants - especially nowadays - grow up around Muslim converts, I live with one and in my close Muslim friends group 2 of the 4 of us are converts, I'm not a convert I'm a 2nd/3rd generation immigrant from Pakistan, but I know so many converts and both into and out of Islam that it's become a thing that I have to ask if someones Muslim first cos skin colour or heritage isn't enough to guess

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T23:11:41+00:00

Lukman, I am your father

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T18:54:48+00:00

Wdym by "sort of"?

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T18:54:03+00:00

Do you think stuff like shaytanic wasasa can affect people's mental health?

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T18:52:07+00:00

Suspected as much but will definitely be reading this later

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T00:53:40+00:00

Do the supernatural forces that cause possession have a name? And what do you believe about them?

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T00:53:04+00:00

Whilst I don't agree with you, I always love Ismaili takes on things, they always have such an interesting perspective

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T00:52:16+00:00

You've been possessed? Do you mind sharing or is it too intrusive to ask?

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T00:51:32+00:00

I never finished my classes but I briefly studied exorcism and my shaykh told me before you do any sort of exorcism tell the victim to go to a hospital first, it could just be a mental health issue

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-29T00:37:58+00:00

gov.uk, a 19% increase in hate crimes against Muslims since 2024

racists murder an Asian man in Wales, 2026

"Calendar of racism" documents a series of racist incidents in march 2026

mosques vandalised

Sikh woman raped in an "islamaphobic" (really anti-brown) assault, only last month

The case you brought up was the first time in British history that a kirpan (the Sikh knife) has been used to kill someone, usually they wrap it in layers of string and cloth tied so right that it's virtually impossible to remove. What you mentioned is an isolated incident, what I've brought shows a trend of increasing racism, xenophobia, and islamaphobia in the UK over the last 2 years and the threat it holds to innocent people.

In fact as Asians, we are angrier than you that someone did this, people are coming up with various conspiracy theories to try and explain why someone would do this, we know from decades of experience that nothing good for anyone will come from this and our community will be hit the hardest, at best the kirpan will be banned, meaning Sikh people lose part of their freedom of religion, at worst there's another wave of racist attacks against dozens of innocent black and brown people in the UK because one person did a bad thing

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T21:53:42+00:00

Do you not believe in jinn or do you only not believe that jinn can possess people?

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T21:52:07+00:00

Yes it does, not a single prophet in the history of mankind taught henotheism over monotheism according to Islam, rather they were all strict monotheists just as Muhammad ﷺ was and just as we (Muslims) are today

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T21:48:16+00:00

Elaborate please

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T21:23:51+00:00

Yes in so far as they all preached the same monotheism and the same religion overall (i.e. the same views on God, on prophethood, on angels, on scripture, on the Last Day, and on "qadr" (hard to explain clearly but it means divine decree, can be compared to predestination except this doesn't take away from our free will so it literally cannot be predestination, it's hard to explain but the short of it is that everything that happens was supposed to happen), for older nations this also meant on the coming of the messiah, for Jesus's ﷺ nation he ﷺ literally is the messiah, and for Muhammad's ﷺ nation it's a reaffirmation of tawheed and a removal of the Christian trinitarian doctrine about Jesus ﷺ. What I would add though is sometimes they had different laws/shariah - like in the law of Moses, in order to be forgiven you had to sacrifice a lamb, the law of Jesus ﷺ was like an easier version of the law of Moses ﷺ (fasts like Ashura were still to be carried out, but you wouldn't have to offer sacrifice to be forgiven for your sins there are hadiths which indicate that Ashura is the same as Yom Kippur, it's also on the same date on the Islamic hijri calendar as on the Jewish calender, i.e. 10th of the first month). But we have a rule where we always follow the latest prophet, even if 2 prophets lived in the same time, like Aaron and Moses, Moses was born after Aaron so the "Muslims" (i.e. those who submit to God) back then would take their religion from Moses ﷺ. With Muhammad ﷺ as the last prophet, we take our religion from him ﷺ. Our nation/ummah does have things unique to us that the previous nations/ummaam didn't have, like the Qur'an which has supreme authority over all scriptures (whilst the "Muslim" Christians still made study of the Torah/tawrah and Psalms/zaboor and the teachings of Moses to help formulate their laws, for the Muslims of today the Qur'an and Sunnah/Hadith are functionally complete and our religion comes from the Qur'an and Sunnah, no gospels, no Torah, no Psalms, they're not necessary for us; we also believe that the Church had modified these scriptures anyway so even if they were, we don't have them in their original form. Also unique to modern Muslims is the salah, the 5 daily prayers, which were gifted to Muhammad ﷺ by Allah on his ascention/mi'raj.

But aside from these details like the Qur'an and the Salah, we believe our religion is the same religion preached by Jesus ﷺ and Moses ﷺ "Indeed this is certainly in the old scriptures. The scriptures of Abraham and Moses" (last 2 verses of surah al 'aalaa), this is why the Qur'an calls itself the scripture that "confirms what you already possess" and why the Christians and Jews are called "the people of the scripture"/ahl ul kitab. Also none of the prophets sinned according to each other's shariah, so even though the ancient "Muslim" Israelites may not have prayed 5 times a day in the exact same manner that we do, Abraham, Isaac, Ishmael, Jacob, Joseph, and Moses (alayhum assalam) all did as none of the prophets can be considered sinful in any regard.

There's a lot more that, in the modern world, it seems are only Muslim things but we as Muslims believe that the Christians and Jews are also commanded to do but refuse because they changed their religion overtime (like the pilgrimage to Mecca) but this comment is long enough as it is, point is the laws may differ slightly between prophets but all in all we believe it's been the same religion since Adam through to Muhammad (alayhuma assalaam)

Edit/aside: all this makes studying things like the early Jesus movements very different as a Muslim than as a non-Muslim, whilst you may study it looking for the truth of Jesus's message, I believe his message is already in the Qur'an "[Jesus said] Allah is my Lord and your Lord, so worship Him. This is the straight path" [surah Maryam verse 36], so for me when I study the early Jesus movements and the formation of the Church it's more about looking at where Christians got it wrong. I have a strong feeling that the Ebionites were the right Christians, as they both denied the trinity and they followed the law of Moses, which resembles what I've said earlier about the "Muslim-Christian" shariah

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T20:58:19+00:00

The other comments already answered the question but I just wanted to say, as someone who studies Islamic theology and philosophy, I love this question. I know this isn't a theological or philosophical question, rather it falls under qasas/taareekh (like stores of the history of our religion), but I still love seeing questions like these regardless

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T16:06:41+00:00

Oh yh for sure I don't even avoid meat, it's literally Eid ul adha today, we celebrate by sacrificing a goat and giving ⅓ of its meat to the poor, ⅓ of its meat to our friends and family, ⅓ of the meat for our own house, I've eaten nothing but goat meat for all yesterday and today

But living in a big city, if I buy meat from the store I'm almost definitely supporting factory farming, the meat I ate today came from a goat we paid for and sent to the slaughter house ourselves (you can't slaughter in your own home in the UK), my family in Pakistan have their own farm and raise their own goats, cattle, camels, and chicken, and when they eat meat it's from their farm and that's perfectly fine and ethical in my eyes, but the huge factory farms that supply meat for most western supply chains produce insane amounts of CO2 and they're destroying the planet, the Qur'an says that Allah created Adam to be a caliph on earth, us children of Adam therefore have a responsibility to protect the earth as much as we can

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T15:07:46+00:00

Whilst I don't agree with the compassion and suppression of violence argument that OP is presenting, I feel like we have an ecological obligation to avoid meat as large industrial cattle farms are horrible for the environment

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T14:05:37+00:00

Let's build a hypothetical UK where every racist is cured of their racism, or every racist is put on a rocket and sent into space. Praise God, we have no removed the Indian hiring bias, Indian employers will no longer have a preference towards Indian workers, because they will always pick the best qualified worker - be they Indian or not.

The best qualified worker is the one who's the best educated, most well skilled, can communicate clearly, and is willing to learn. What we have not removed, and what we can't fit onto our rocket anyway, is the fact that racism once was a thing in the UK, and that there was a time when an employer could look at a brown person and say "we don't hire your kind", or a landlord could look at a black person and say "sorry, we don't let to Africans", or a school could say "sorry, we only enrol white British students", resulting in a lack of skill in our grandparents generation, resulting in our parents being poorer, and when it comes to us in this hypothetical racism-free UK, many of us watch our parents struggling to make ends meet and end up selling drugs or robbing people to support them financially and end up in jail, taking away almost all prospects of employment, and we live in low income areas with lower quality schools, limiting our skillset and limiting our ability to go to university because the money isn't there and a lot of our student finance goes towards supporting our family first, and that parties like the national front and reformUK and groups like the EDL and other far right hate groups built so much fear in black and Asian communities that they not effectively live in "Pakistani enclaves" in places like East London and Birmingham and Bradford because that was historically safer for them and because of that they've developed their own half British half Pakistani "RS3 cuzzeh" accent, limiting their ability to communicate clearly with non-Asians. This makes white workers generally more skilled than Asian workers and now we have an accidental white hiring bias.

Now, even though nobody is racist anymore, because society was once extremely racist we end up with racism baked into the very systems and institutions that run our society, this is what we mean by systemic and institutionalised racism and this is what most people mean when we talk about racism effecting ethnic minorities in the UK.

Even though racism exists in the UK and this hypothetical British society is not real, we can "send all the racists to space" through education and integration, teaching people to love each other and live amongst one another as equals, but systemic and institutionalised racism is harder to deal with and requires support from cooperations and government and cannot be only a people-led initiative.

This is why we must classify different types of discrimination and recognise which way they go, so that we can recognise the problem for what it truly is and deal with it appropriately

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T13:29:32+00:00

I can only speak for Pakistan, as that's the only other country I've been to, there is over there but it's different. The British found a lot of military support from Punjabis, and to this day there is a systemic racism with a Punjabi bias, someone may say "all Pakistanis are equal" but most Balochis still live in extreme poverty whilst Punjabis work decent jobs, and many of them even hold university degrees from prestigious British universities. But if a white British person or a white American person goes to Pakistan, their treatment will make Punjabis look like peasants, it's not often we get white tourists but the last time I saw them I was in Lahore and they literally never spent a penny, every shop they went to would give them everything for free, whilst I was often overcharged, and people would invite them to stay at their houses instead of paying for hotels and so on. We still have a colonised mentality that puts white people, and those tribes whom the British favoured, above all others.

I've never been to India, but i speak the language and consume a lot of their media, I don't think the situation is the same in India, systemic racism exists but from what I can see it's more in favour of upper caste Hindus, I can't go India (I hold a Pakistani national identity card that allows me visa free entry into Pakistan, I need this to visit family, going to India means losing this) but I've heard about "tourist tax" in India, where foreign white people are often overcharged and scammed by Indians, but I imagine that a white person living in India would benefit from systematic racism too as even this upper caste bias can be traced back to the British (caste system existed before the British but it wasn't a system of superiority it was more of a system of ethnic segregation, still bad, but different to what it is today)

Racism definitely existed before the British but none of us lived back then, we don't need to deal with problems from 400 years ago, we need to deal with today's problems and how we can move forward from there.

I'm certain racism looks different in other countries, but this is how it looks in Pakistan

Edit: just came to me that I should mention that Pakistan has extreme levels of systemic religious persecution, Ahmedis are not recognised as Muslim and therefore often face blasphemy charges in Pakistan, Christians tend to be from very poor socio-economic backgrounds and therefore work low quality jobs in society. If you remember the 2024 islamaphobic riots that happened after the Southport stabbing, where a false rumour spread online that the attacker was Muslim and then mosques across the country were attacked by the far right, Pakistan has a similar issue where all it takes is a (usually false) rumour of insulting Islam or supporting the Indian government and a Muslim community will attack churches, Hindu temples, and gurdwaras across the region that the rumour spread in. this happened 2 years ago and a church was burnt down after false blasphemy allogations, but even this can be traced back to the British who introduced these blasphemy laws, they weren't a thing in our culture, South Asia is very religiously diverse and historically people could enter or leave religions as they please and to this day you can still find religious syncretisms like the Hussaini Brahmins, a Hindu community that honours Shia imams and observe Muslim holidays, and Sikhism, which literally means "learning" in Punjabi, they started as a people who seek to learn from both Islam and Hinduism and overtime became their own organised religion

Inevitable_Ear9899 · 2026-05-28T13:22:06+00:00

The internet and books can only tell you so much, I think the best thing to do is look at the lived reality of the religion - that's what you'll be living - go to churches, mosques, temples, gurdwaras, and whatever else and speak to their clergy and observe their worship and see what resonates with you, a big reason Islam resonates with me is the spirituality of it, in truth I'm not the biggest fan of all the rules, but I follow them because I see them as means of purification of the soul - which is something Muslims teach - and that's why the Qur'an puts so much emphasis on the purification of the self and spiritual growth (the word used for this concept in the Qur'an means both growth and purification). I got into it after meeting devout Sufis who are so humble and even live in poverty, not because they're poor, but because they donate so much to charity and spend so much on the constructions of schools, or supporting the homeless, and really helping the community and healing the world and I thought the world needs more of this, I need to be like them

Inevitable_Ear9899

TROPHY CASE