'Ismail Ax' written on Gunman's Arm - Any Meaning?

[RamboLiberal]

According to the Chicago Tribune, "Cho also died with the words 'Ismail Ax' in red ink on one of his arms."

Just wondering if any DU'ers know if this has a meaning?

[greenbriar]

1. hannity thinks so

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x681568

[Old and In the Way]

2. I googled it and couldn't find anyrthing relevant.

nt

[KamaAina]

29. Google only has 11 unique hits as of now

all but one from bloggers wondering the same thing we are. The last is just some weirdness where the two words are juxtaposed in a list.

Look for this number to increase exponentially in days to come, like with "linda tripp", for instance.

[Raven]

3. I wrote this in another post...

Ibrahim, who was the father of Ismail, brought an ax to his temple and destroyed all of the false gods. This is from the A-Quran.

[kestrel91316]

4. Poor guy - his delusions probably had him thinking he WAS kiling

all the "false gods" - in his mind, they probably weren't fellow students or even human.........

[pimpbot]

5. Poor guy? HUH!?!?

I seriously hope you're joking.

[EFerrari]

Let's have no empathy for the dead. That would be wrong.

[MedleyMisty]

15. Why dump on people who have more compassion than you?

Hate, anger, and vengeance don't bring people back to life. If you feel that way, that's all right. But there's no need to insult people who feel differently.

[blm]

27. I have a schizophrenic sister who would be very much like this shooter without meds.

And she DOES get worse when she is exposed to fundamentalism. She has been picked up from my nieces' school ranting about the devil taking over the schools.

Schizophrenia is as horrific a mental condition one can have and usually becomes apparent in late teens, early twenties.

[kestrel91316]

30. Not at all, IF he was mentally ill. IF he was, he is guilty of nothing

more than being sick. Society takes the risk of this sort of thing happening when it buries its collective head in the sand about the mentally ill. This may have been entirely avoidable, and is a tragedy for Mr. Cho, too. A wasted life.

If you think mental illness is a character defect or personality problem, you have got some serious learning and growing up to do.

[EFerrari]

8. And/or, he wasn't. The delusions tend to go boths ways.

:(

[kestrel91316]

31. EXCUSE ME???????

WTF is THAT supposed to mean???

People who haven't had to deal PERSONALLY with a family member with severe mental illness really need to STHU here, IMHO. Once again, the haters come out, ready to fling their medieval mindset around.

Yeah!!! Let's burn the mentally ill at the stake!!!!!!

[EFerrari]

35. I don't think I excuse you, no.

I meant, it is part and parcel of delusion that a person can believe that they themselves are not human but have special powerts or attributes. The delusional ideation can apply to oneself as much as it does to other people.

So, no, don't burn anyone at the stake. No, I won't shut up. Yes, I dealt with it for years and no, I don't excuse you.

[RamboLiberal]

7. From a google I was wondering as well

And this in NY Times I found just now.

Decoding ‘Ismail Ax’ | 3:09 PM ET
Whether or not “Ismail Ax” was actually written on the inside of Cho Seung-Hui’s arm, as the Chicago Tribune says in an unconfirmed report, there is some interesting sleuthing going on at BoingBoing. The New York Post boils down the explanation to a few paragraphs:
The reference may be to the Islamic account of the Biblical sacrifice of Abraham, where God commands the patriarch to sacrifice his own son. Abraham begins to comply, but God intervenes at the last moment to save the boy … Abraham uses a knife in most versions of the story, but some accounts have him wielding an ax.
A more obscure reference may be to a passage in the Koran referring to Abraham’s destruction of pagan idols; in some accounts, he uses an ax to do so.

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/

Could it have any relation to mathematics? Check name on this link.

http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/368178.html

11 continued fractions and orthogonal polynomials (context) - Askey, Ismail et al. - 1984
11 A generalization of ultraspherical polynomials (context) - Askey, Ismail - 1983
7 Connection coefficient problems and partitions (context) - Andrews - 1979
7 Diagonalization of certain integral operators (context) - Ismail, Zhang - 1994
5 Diagonalization of certain integral operators II (context) - Ismail, Rahman et al. - 1996
4 Difference hypergeometric functions (context) - Atakishiev, Suslov - 1992
3 Bessel functions on q-quadratic grid (context) - Ismail, Masson et al.

[CJCRANE]

9. I just read this on a blog.

I think it's made up.

http://bangkokker.blogspot.com/

[CJCRANE]

20. Did Abraham/Ibraham actually have an ax?

And if so wouldn't the guy just have written "Abraham's Ax" on his arm instead (if that was what he was alluding to)?

[Error]

26. Its supposed to shout "I DID THIS BECAUSE I'M MUSLIM"!

get it?

here is some more background
http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Contrad/MusTrad/sacrifice.html

[Error]

25. starting to reek of a Psyop

another manchurian sleeper...

[kestrel91316]

32. Oh, BS. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

He was pathetic and wretched and did a terrible thing. He probably did what he did because of organic brain disease.

You're as bad as Eugene McCarthy, seeing Communists on every street corner. Sheesh.

[poiuytsister]

36. I believe you meant to say Joseph McCarthy n/t

[ck4829]

6. Sounds like he is trying to confuse people

Muslims don't usually put ink on themselves, with the exception of henna of course, but I think it's just further evidence that he's trying to confuse law enforcement, the victims, and the families of the deceased.

[mod mom]

10. Another thread mentioned Ismail + Unification Church.

[MethuenProgressive]

11. Screen name? Role playing character name? Email addy?

Video game reference?

[Forrest Greene]

28. Classical Music Fan?

As in pianist Emmanuel Ax?

[CJCRANE]

12. Probably "word salad"...

AFAIK that's where schizophrenic people just jumble words together.

on edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_salad

[kestrel91316]

33. At least SOMEBODY gets it.

[valerief]

13. Anagram it to Simila Ax. Pronounced sounds like Similar Acts.

Just playing here, of course.

[devilgrrl]

14. Yes. It means "I'm a really mentally ill motherfucker"

eom

[Horse with no Name]

16. He was an English major

Could be referring to Moby Dick...who knows?

[jeff30997]

19. I thought the same thing !

Lol! Call me Ishmael.

[MethuenProgressive]

17. Islam Ax I < anagram

ISLAM AX I ?

[WinkyDink]

18. It was supposed to be "Ismail ASKS." Heh.

[FredScuttle]

21. Gunman was a big fan of the little known brother of pianist Emmanuel Ax

[Bicoastal]

22. IT SOUNDS VAGUELY MIDDLE EASTERN = MUSLIM!!!!!

THOSE DIRTY, DIRTY MUSLIMS ARE BEHIND IT, JUST LIKE THE WAY THEY'RE BEHIND EVERYTHING! I KNEW IT ALL ALONG! IT'S A HUGE CONSPIRACY WITH TERRORIST CELLS ALL OVER AMERICAN COLLEGE CAMPUSES! WE SHOULD ROUND THEM ALL UP AND...

Oh, wait. Democratic Underground? Sorry, I guess I got the wrong site. What's the one where you're free to be as hysterically paranoid and racist as you want? Free-Something?

[AndrewJacksonFaction]

23. Could it possibly be this as well?

Source:http://hotair.com/archives/2007/04/17/breaking-abc-news-ids-gunman-as-seung-hui-cho/ Hot Air

You probably already know this, but in James Fennimore Cooper’s story “The Prairie,” the settler Ishmael Bush, who is attempting to escape from civilization, sets out across the prairie with two key tools, a gun and an axe. Each has a symbolic meaning. The axe — which can either kill or provide shelter — stands for both creation and destruction. Given that the VT killer was an English major, might this be the likely meaning of the words on his arm? Just my two cents.

[Scurrilous]

24. Cheat sheet? Answer to a test question?

Perhaps he hadn't bathed since his last English exam.

[sproutster]

34. Found a story from Seattle

An Ismail is a legal immigrant who got a dui or something. He was then deported to the most dangerous area in... bleh let me grab it, Somoli. Where blackhawk down happened.

http://www.seattleweekly.com/2002-03-20/news/from-wedding-bells-to-jail-cells.php

Interesting story in it's own.