Czech Scientist explains conversion from Atheism to Islam

[Menydh]

In the video I don't see any clear explanation why he converts to Islam. I'm not sure what is this mashala that he speaks as a scientific fact that was only discovered in the XXth century, and which is contained in the Quram,. But from what he explains, I gather that it is some kind of acceptance of predestination of some kind, as in a divinely preconceived order in things:

"... mashala I'm a muslim ... how did you react? did you want to be muslim? and I said I had no choice ..."

"... when I was boy I was a baby, I didn't know I'm different from my mother... one day I suddenly discover [looks towards his genitals] mashala I'm a boy!"

Mind you, if it is predestinationism that convinced him, he might as well have joined the Hebrews, the Puritans, the Dutch Reformed, the Huguenots, or any other similars.

+ YouTube Video

[Marcus Marulus]

Mashala is shortened form od ma shaa llahu ("that what wants God"). It is an exclamation that Muslims make quite often.

[Menydh]

Originally Posted by Mynydd

I gather that it is some kind of acceptance of predestination of some kind, as in a divinely preconceived order in things:

On a quick second thought, it does indeed look like an idea of predestinationism in the order in the Universe, to which everything and everyone would be submitted by God's own design: "I am a Muslim ... I had no choice".

Just found it that he refers to masha'allah, which translates to God's Will. It is Islam's own idea of Jewish and Protestant (not all) predestination, and it links to submission.

I find predestinationism terrible and perverted. It is opposed to the teachings of the Catholic Church, by which God makes man free to choose between right and wrong, good and evil. It is ultimately man who chooses his own destiny. If everything has been planned by God in advance, as predestination religions assert, it doesn't matter if it is good or evil because it is God's own will that leads man to act.

[Errigal]

He doesn't sound Czech to me, he sounds possibly Dutch.

[Ikutiera]

Qur\'an and Science

[Carnyx]

Like any religious people, Muslims really must have the most opacous explanations to give... You know what is scary? The impact this can have on a population. Seeing a scientist falling for Islam. Then many have to think he is correct in his sayings since even a scientific mind has come to this conclusion. At any rate, how is mashala a scientific fact?

[Menydh]

There is another possible reading of this. One which I believe that it is more interesting to us.

Admitting that science doesn't have the answers beyond its own limits, which are our own limits, and admitting that a spiritual belief on the other hand can help answer those questions, why would someone from a country in Christendom turn to a foreign spiritual belief instead of one which is home-grown?

This has, in my opinion, little to do with Islam itself. Already before Islam became an issue of concern you had people who were confronted to the questions that cannot be answered through science, and who looked to the east in search of these answers, converting to religions such as Buddhism or Hinduism.

What was striking here is that such people often did not bother with looking closer to them, and they ignored the rich tradition of Christian mystics.

[Marcus Marulus]

Originally Posted by Mynydd

There is another possible reading of this. One which I believe that it is more interesting to us.

Admitting that science doesn't have the answers beyond its own limits, which are our own limits, and admitting that a spiritual belief on the other hand can help answer those questions, why would someone from a country in Christendom turn to a foreign spiritual belief instead of one which is home-grown?

This has, in my opinion, little to do with Islam itself. Already before Islam became an issue of concern you had people who were confronted to the questions that cannot be answered through science, and who looked to the east in search of these answers, converting to religions such as Buddhism or Hinduism.

What was striking here is that such people often did not bother with looking closer to them, and they ignored the rich tradition of Christian mystics.

One of the possible explanations can be that this man is coming from the otherwise wonderful country of Bohemia (in Czech it's Česko, but here, speaking in English, I prefer the old designation to the ugly sounding "Czech Republic"), which has been impregnated with the intensive anti-Catholic (mostly of Freemasonic inspiration) propaganda for the last 200 years. Catholicism has been understood as the religion of the oppressors, the Habsburgs, who had ruled the country with an iron fist since the defeat of the Czech nobility - the considerable part of which had converted to Protestantsim - at the Bilá Horá (White Mountain) in 1619, until 1918. So the Czechs tried other religions, from Eastern Orthodoxy to Protestantism, as well as secular creeds like Panslavism, Atheistic rationalism (Freemasonic), Communism...

I say, this is only one of possible explanations, because things like that happen in other countries as well, which were not exposed to such an amount of anti-Catholic feeling like Bohemia.

An alternative explanation for the phenonema like this is that Christianity is not being presented in a proper way by the Church and its representatives. We can speak here of a massive betrayal of much of the priesthood on their own respective peoples.

Christianity is being presented either as: 1) a pure custom bereft of any real substantial meaning, like you know, it's our heritage and tradition, you go twice a year to the Church etc (in this case you don't have even to believe in God, the only important thing is that your relatives and acquaintances see you occasionally attending a mass); or as 2) some kind of soppy emotionalism, which can appeal only to some women (not even all women); or as 3) dry and lifeless moralizing (while morals and ethics are extremely important, they also have to be intertwined with faith, otherwise moral degenerates into moralizing, which are two different things).

Due to all the above mentioned versions of how is Christianity being presented nowadays, many people turn away from it and go for some eastern "spiritualities" (or even American "Evangelical" cults), which they perceive as being more absolute and not so watered down.

[Errigal]

Originally Posted by Mynydd

There is another possible reading of this. One which I believe that it is more interesting to us.

Admitting that science doesn't have the answers beyond its own limits, which are our own limits, and admitting that a spiritual belief on the other hand can help answer those questions, why would someone from a country in Christendom turn to a foreign spiritual belief instead of one which is home-grown?

This has, in my opinion, little to do with Islam itself. Already before Islam became an issue of concern you had people who were confronted to the questions that cannot be answered through science, and who looked to the east in search of these answers, converting to religions such as Buddhism or Hinduism.

What was striking here is that such people often did not bother with looking closer to them, and they ignored the rich tradition of Christian mystics.

And also a Christian and Classical tradition that should attract anyone who wants to exercise their mind. I see little need to embrace Eastern philosophy when there is so much which can be revived from our own civilization.

Trivium (education) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Marcus Marulus]

Originally Posted by Errigal

And also a Christian and Classical tradition that should attract anyone who wants to exercise their mind. I see little need to embrace Eastern philosophy when there is so much which can be revived from our own civilization.

Trivium (education) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

...and there are also many worty mystics like Saint John of the Cross and Saint Theresa of Avila.

[Breydel]

Originally Posted by Mynydd

There is another possible reading of this. One which I believe that it is more interesting to us.

Admitting that science doesn't have the answers beyond its own limits, which are our own limits, and admitting that a spiritual belief on the other hand can help answer those questions, why would someone from a country in Christendom turn to a foreign spiritual belief instead of one which is home-grown?

answers on what questions?

[Menydh]

Originally Posted by Waarnemer

answers on what questions?

Questions, for example, on the inner-self or about your existance beyond the mere physical matters.

[Breydel]

Originally Posted by Mynydd

Questions, for example, on the inner-self or about your existance beyond the mere physical matters.

the intangible, the nothing and the vague that is

and what is the answer you think to those questions?

[Menydh]

Originally Posted by Waarnemer

the intangible, the nothing and the vague that is

Of course you are entitled to believe that your very existance is nothing and that there is nothing to search beyond your physical being.

I imagine that you will be able to explain emotions as a combined reaction of the nervous system, muscles and the brain. However, you can't explain why seeing a child crying provokes one reaction in you while it doesn't provoke the same reaction in others. Life is not an egalitarian universe.

and what is the answer you think to those questions?

I can't search for answers to your inner questions. It is you who should search for the answers, assuming that you have a soul that enables you to pose the questions and search for the answers.

The question if certain individuals had a soul or not was already formulated a few hundred years ago, and I'm not sure that it was correctly answered.