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girlwhowaspluggedout writes:
Hoping to be a pioneer on the Red Planet? First seek permission from your local cleric. Dubai's Khaleej Times reports that the General Authority of Islamic Affairs and Endowment in the UAE has ruled that promoting or being involved in a one-way trip to Mars is prohibited by Islam. The fatwa appears to be a response to Mars One's call for volunteers to make the pioneering trip to the red planet.
According to the General Authority, 'Such a one-way journey poses a real risk to life, and that can never be justified in Islam. There is a possibility that an individual who travels to planet Mars may not be able to remain alive there, and is more vulnerable to death.' Because of the inherent dangers of the trip, those who choose to go there are likely to die for no 'righteous reason,' thus incurring 'punishment similar to that of suicide in the Hereafter.'
The Khaleej Times further states that the General Authority fears that some of the volunteers, among whom are 500 Saudis and other Arabs, may be interested in traveling to Mars to escape punishment or to avoid standing before Allah for judgment. The General Authority decreed that 'this is an absolutely baseless and unacceptable belief because not even an atom falls outside the purview of Allah, the Creator of everything.'"
[ED Note: Likening the one-way-ticket to suicide does make some theological sense, but I am saddened that the Authority does not consider space exploration a "righteous reason" to risk one's life. In times past, many great explorers hailed from Muslim societies, and were part of what made them great.]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by girlwhowaspluggedout on Thursday February 20 2014, @03:42PM
Although many (most?) modern day Islamic "denominations" are intent on becoming a perpetually backwater culture [wikipedia.org], medieval Islam was hardly the same. You can choose to view the religion as nothing more than a joke, but you can also look at its history as a tragedy.
LaminatorX was right in referring to the past achievements of Muslim travelers. But do take the page he linked to, which claims, inter alia, that the Arabs discovered America 500 years before Columbus, with a grain of salt.
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(Score: 5, Interesting) by girlwhowaspluggedout on Thursday February 20 2014, @04:37PM
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(Score: 1) by kumanopuusan on Friday February 21 2014, @01:51AM
It would be a little easier to understand if it wasn't coming from the religion that brings us so many suicide bombers.
(Score: 2) by girlwhowaspluggedout on Friday February 21 2014, @07:32AM
And Christianity is the religion that brings us so many abortion clinic firebombers, yet there are many Christian pro-choicers. Religions, especially global ones, are hardly monolithic.
Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Pentecostalists, and Anabaptists are all nominally Christian, but that doesn't mean they share a systematic theology, or even a single set of beliefs. In like manner, has the UAE's General Authority ever issued fatwas in favor of suicide bombings? Even if they did, it is readily apparent why a fundamentalist would view suicide bombings as a theologically legitimate "righteous reason", whereas a trip to Mars, that may not even succeed, as a religiously unjustified risk.
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