“Take not from among them a friend or a helper.”

Paraphrasing an incisive comment about the Arabs by the noted historian of ancient Rome, J.B. Bury, I have said that “Muslims are undesirable either as friends or foes.”

We should not feel in the slightest degree uncomfortable or guilty about thinking and saying this. After all, the most sacred texts of Islam tell Muslims that they must not be friends with us. Thus Koran 4:89 says:

They desire that you should disbelieve as they have disbelieved, so that you might be (all) alike; therefore take not from among them friends until they fly (their homes) in Allah’s way; but if they turn back, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them, and take not from among them a friend or a helper.

In other words, Muslims can only be friends with a non-Muslim if he becomes a Muslim; and if he changes his mind and ceases to be Muslim, he must be killed. Even if a Muslim is not presently acting on this mandate, and is an extended truce of sorts with non-Muslims, the dehumanization of the non-believer remains embedded in his religion as a sacred calling. On what grounds, then, can any sane, self-respecting non-Muslim imagine that he could have a genuine friendship with a Muslim?

Posted by Lawrence Auster at April 05, 2006 12:46 AM | Send