Why would a Muslim write a book about Jesus?

[G_j]

my issue with this has nothing to do with religion, it's the ugliness of the slant that the (once again) FOX interviewer applies to
the interview. I just stumbled across it on You Tube, as its seems to have received some attention. I don't watch FOX. It's disgusting, fortunately, the guy does an excellent job of responding to her. It's like the days of the John Birch Society or something.

[BainsBane]

1. Why as an American would you write a book about the French Revolution?

or Weimar Germany?

Leave it to Fox to be thoroughly idiotic.

[UglyGreed]

2. The interviewer

did not read the book and was just referring to talking points given to her. What a farce.

[Blue_In_AK]

3. Muslims like Jesus.

They believe that he was a great prophet. At least that's what the Muslim in my family told me.

[G_j]

5. The point he tries to get across

is he writes as an academic scholar of world religions, not as a Muslim. But the interviewer doesn't seem to want to accept that.

[Igel]

12. And yet he keeps returning to it.

Over and over and over.

He should have turned down the interview. Or found some other way of saying what he had to say.

[CTyankee]

23. all he was doing is try to get the interviewer back on track. Nothing wrong with him but with HER!

He is a scholar. He has credentials and has written a book that is evidently heavily footnoted. The interviewer was a fool.

Why does HE have to turn down an interview? He wrote a scholarly book. She's just a media idiot on Fox...

[burnodo]

25. I think he was trying to communicate what ludicrous arguments

She was trying to make

Granted, a large portion of the audience wouldn't be sophisticated enough to understand what he was doing.

[truebluegreen]

26. Why turn it down?

One person looked really bad in that interview and it wasn't him.

[Aristus]

15. Not just a great prophet. The second-greatest prophet of Islam after Mohammed

himself.

I've heard anti-Muslim types (usually self-proclaimed Christians) sneer: "Muslims hate Jesus!" If you think that stinks, it's because they're talking out of their asses...

[HardTimes99]

31. 75 years ago, you would have found them proudly declaiming that "Jews

hate Jesus". So maybe there's been a tiny bit of progress in rolling back the darkness of religious bigotry and ignorance, although I'm not holding my breath.

[etherealtruth]

4. Reza Aslan is a scholar ... also happened to convert to Christianity for a while

He also wrote a phenomenal book on Islam: No God, but God

I don't expect a Fox nitwit to even understand what someone of Aslan's intellect has to say.

[Igel]

13. There are other interviews with him.

He didn't just happen to revert. He seriously came to doubt what he'd been taught and to doubt the basis of Xianity. Largely because of the teachings on Jesus.

And that was one of the motivations for his book, although I'm unaware of his saying it was a major one. Jakobson said that you shouldn't let your personal history determine your research programme. He sort of did a bit, and that opened him up to criticism.

Others who've written books on Jesus have had the same deconversion experience and they stay nominal Xians, become agnostic, or go full-tilt atheist.

Muslim writing about Jesus is one thing. Outsiders do that all the time. Convert from Xianity writing about Jesus is a reprobate writing about Jesus.

The question I'd want to ask--and maybe she did in the interview, I don't have the patience to listen to them--is why having abandoned Islam once did he go back to it, esp. if he makes the point that he rejects much of what Islam teachers about Issa.

[etherealtruth]

20. Very true

Though my reply was very glib, I was aware.

I think (if I recall correctly) his conversion to Christianity (notably fundamentalist Christianity) was more an attempt to fit in socially with his new country. His childhood in the US coincided with the rise of the Ayatollahs in Iran and the taking of US hostages (probably not a great time to be an Iranian Muslim in the US).

My understanding was that his defection from Christianity had to do with the mass misinterpretation by Christian fundamentalist as to what the bible writings are and the impossibility of the literal interpretations made by these Christians.

He is a very good writer and a super interesting guy. I have not read his new endeavor but am very glad I have read his earlier work

[elehhhhna]

35. I'm reading it now - great book! ANd he was a nonpracticing Muslim from a

not-devout family.

[AllINeedIsCoffee]

6. He reduced to her a stuttering nincompoop.

[Captain Stern]

11. He didn't reduce her to that at all.

That's what she was long before the interview even started.

[AllINeedIsCoffee]

17. LOL.

[sgtbenobo]

28. From FOX's own site this is "interviewers" Bio

Lauren Green serves as a religion correspondent for FOX News Channel's (FNC). Prior to this, Green served as a news anchor for "FOX & Friends," where she provided daily news updates for the irreverent morning program.

Prior to joining FNC in 1996, Green served as a weekend news anchor and correspondent at WBBM-TV (CBS) in Chicago. From 1988 to 1993, she was a general assignment reporter at KSTP-TV (ABC) in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Outside of her career at FNC, Green is well known as a concert pianist with a degree in piano performance from The University of Minnesota. She has interviewed some of the most prominent people in the classical music world including Placido Domingo, Pierre Boulez, Joshua Bell and has covered such events as the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition and opening night of The Metropolitan Opera. Green has given several solo recitals and performed in small ensembles. In 2004, she released her debut CD, "Classic Beauty."

A graduate of Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism, Green was named Miss Minnesota in 1984 and was the third runner-up in the 1985 Miss America contest.

When I was in the TV biz about a 1000 years ago such an individual would be referred to as a "Meat Puppet."


Carry on

[HardTimes99]

32. Former piano performance major here (dropped out after 2 years). Don't know about the

U. of Minnesota, but piano performance can be a grueling degree, as students regularly practice their instruments for 8 or more hours each day and have to perform at least 1-2 full-length solo recitals to graduate (and maybe even required ensemble work, e.g., concertos or chamber music).

Now back to regular programming.

[CurtEastPoint]

7. I just ran across that myself. He was on Maher Friday and is a sharp tack.

[John2]

8. Did Christians

write any books about the Muslim prophet? That was a very stupid question. Jesus is a historical figure of one of the Greatest religions in the World. What is the problem with people on the right?

[Bluenorthwest]

9. Many aspects of the Jesus story we consider 'Biblical' are recounted in the Holy Koran as well

or in many cases only in Koran. Jesus big deal to Muslims, very big deal. Mary as well. Big.

[kestrel91316]

14. Anybody can write about anything they damned well please.

But seriously, are you unaware of the significance of Jesus in Islam??????????????????????

Get a clue.

[burnodo]

16. you're missing the sarcasm tag, right?

I hope?

[kestrel91316]

21. NO I AM NOT. Jesus is highly significant to Muslims. You need to do a little homework.

And only religious fascists try to tell people who they can and cannot write about when it comes to religion.

If you don't like what a guy with a funny sounding name has to say about Jesus, you are free to ignore him.

[burnodo]

24. So you didn't watch the video then

Which was the basis for g_j's comments

[Deep13]

18. Wow, hate mongering on Fox. Who would have thought!

I have to assume a Muslim who write about Jesus out of personal or professional interest, to advance some new perspective, or just to sell books.

[penultimate]

19. I groaned and face palmed whenever she opened her mouth.

WTF? I couldn't even finish watching it after the second time she asked the stupid question. This despite the fact he clearly answered and explained why he has an interest in the topic.

[Skittles]

27. very painful indeed

[zappaman]

22. Why would a man write a book about a woman?

Why would a person living in Los Angeles write a book about Chicago?

The mind reels...

[Poll_Blind]

29. People should watch this, if ONLY for the perfect example of how..

...a person can do (whatever), be called onto a "news" show of some sort, and simply be attacked, almost without any exploration of what they actually did.

PB

[AgingAmerican]

30. There is a chapter in the Koran about Jesus

He is part of their religion.

[exboyfil]

33. She uses William Lane Craig

Last edited Mon Jul 29, 2013, 01:59 AM - Edit history (1)

as a source to impeach Aslan. Craig is the one that thinks it was ok for the Israelites to slaughter entire peoples including babies.

She may be the dimmest bulb in the Fox Christmas tree.

She is a graduate of Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. I wonder how they feel about their graduate and her journalism ability.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

34. Owww!!! The stupid, it burnnsss! Foxnews really classes up the TV,eh?

This is right up there with Chris Farley interviewing Paul McCartney for "so pathetic it's comedy".