Osama Abdallah is always good for yet another surprise and a chuckle. Let's have a look at a recent publication that introduced a new concept, new to me anyway. On the page, "What's new on Answering Christianity?", he announced:

07/20/2006- ...

Also yesterday, I forgot to add my new article that I wrote several days ago on The hateful Christians of FOX News barking false lies (not fair and balanced lies) on the Muslim soccer legend Zaiduldeen Zidan (Zinedine Zidane)!   (Source)

And here is how it looks when we go to this article:

The hateful christians of FOX News are barking false lies (not fair and balanced lies) on the Muslim soccer legend Zaiduldeen Zidan!

Even more, he actually considers this article to be such an important piece, that he added it to his list of especially advertized files found at the top of the "What's New" page, before the actual updates log starts.

I do not really care about the discussion in that article, i.e. what a certain soccer player did or didn't do, and what may have been his reasons. It is completely irrelevant for the discussion of Christianity and Islam. What caught my attention is that Osama apparently thinks that there is something called "fair and balanced lies". How can lies be fair? How can lies be balanced? How can lies be a good thing at all?

For weeks I was simply grinning and shaking my head in disbelief about this formulation. However, while thinking further^[1] about my earlier rebuttal to Osama's number one article, titled "GOD's Stupidity is smarter than all of us?!", I suddenly realized that this formulation may actually make sense in Abdallah's own frame of mind.

Abdallah is clearly outraged at what he calls "false lies" and contrasts those with something else that he calls "fair and balanced lies". False lies are evil and need to be attacked and exposed. On the other hand, fair and balanced lies are — by implication — acceptable or justified or necessary or even morally good in some sense.

We are all against evil lies. There is agreement, and thus no need to discuss those. However, at this point, one question naturally raises its head:

What exactly could Abdallah have had in mind when talking about "fair and balanced lies"?

Could that, perhaps, refer to the articles he is publishing on his own website?

Let's try to explain why this conclusion is not as far-fetched as it may seem.

In the Qur'an we find the following statements:

Verily, the hypocrites seek to deceive Allah, but it is He Who deceives them. And when they stand up for As-Salat (the prayer), they stand with laziness and to be seen of men, and they do not remember Allah but little. S. 4:142 Hilali-Khan

And (the unbelievers) schemed and planned, and Allah schemed also, and the best of schemers is Allah. S. 3:54

Remember how the unbelievers schemed against thee, to keep thee in bonds, or to slay thee, or get thee out (of thy home). They scheme and plot, but the best of schemers is Allah. S. 8:30

So they schemed a scheme: and We schemed a scheme, while they perceived not. S. 27:50

Like O. Abdallah, the author of the Qur'an is apparently convinced that there are two kinds of lies, or deceptions, or schemes. There are deceptions that are bad, i.e. the schemes and deceptions of the unbelievers. But then there are the deceptions of Allah, which are clearly viewed as something acceptable in the message of the Qur'an, something even to be proud of.

Muhammad follows in the "footsteps" of his god and condones the use of lies and deceit, e.g. for the purpose of murdering his opponents. As this is not the topic of this article, I don't want to get into details of this here. It has all been discussed in other articles (e.g., 1, 2, 3). And Muhammad is the Muslim role model, the divinely ordained standard and ideal that the believers are called to imitate (Sura 33:21, 68:4).

One of the greatest theologians of Islam, Imam al-Ghazali, is quoted on this issue in a sharia manual:

Imam Abu Hammid Ghazali says: "Speaking is a means to achieve objectives. If a praiseworthy aim is attainable through both telling the truth and lying, it is unlawful to accomplish through lying because there is no need for it. When it is possible to achieve such an aim by lying but not by telling the truth, it is permissible to lie if attaining the goal is permissible." (Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Misri, The Reliance of the Traveller, translated by Nuh Ha Mim Keller, amana publications, 1997, section r8.2, page 745)

Basically, "Islamic deceptions" are justified when used as a means for a good purpose, e.g. the defense and propagation of Islam.

A friend of mine recently made this remark: "Muslim logic is ‘the logic of favorablism’. This means whatever is favorable to believe and say about Muhammad is to be honored and defended and believed and stated at all costs. These things become the truth, regardless of what you and I would consider to be objective truth."

Given this insight and background information, even the parenthetical phrase in Abdallah's title, as ridiculous as it looks at first sight, suddenly makes sense ... and explains a substantial portion of his website.

Sometimes, one is accidentally more honest than intended, and says what one means — without having meant to say it.

In fact, Quennel Gale collected a substantial number of these "fair and balanced lies" that Osama Abdallah is propagating all over his site, and has put them together into a List of Osama Abdallah's fabricated lies & deliberate alteration of quotes.

Further advances in "Project Self-Destruction"

Osama Abdallah responded to the above and his claim is, basically, that he did not mean what he said, at least he did not mean it to be taken literally. He claims that his expression was one of sarcasm:

... I, therefore, sarcastically said that they propagated "not fair and balanced lies". Jochen Katz tried to twist my comments and lied to his reader by bringing Islamic theology into this silly game of his. ...

I am utterly flabbergasted. Abdallah now claims that his words should not be taken literally since they were clearly meant to be sarcastic. Wow! Wow!! Wow!!!

Why is that so amazing? For the purpose of mocking the Bible, Abdallah insists that the words of the Apostle Paul have to be taken literally. He will absolutely not allow the use of sarcasm by the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 1. But if we take his own words literally instead of being sarcastic, he then calls doing so dumb, foolish, silly, and irrelevant, twisting his comments and even "lying to the readers".

Anyway, having given this response, Abdallah is now judged by his own words. His article on "God's stupidity" is dumb, foolish, silly, and irrelevant. He is twisting the words of Paul in order to make them say something Paul never said; and because Abdallah is doing this deliberately, he is lying to his readers.

Despite the fact that I explicitly stated that there is a connection between these two articles, both in the text and in a footnote, Abdallah apparently failed to see the relevance of those remarks.^[2]

If the reader has not yet done so, he should now read that article. Against the background of Abdallah's protest here, it is all the more hilarious and exposes him as an utter hypocrite.

Actually, I have no problem believing that Osama Abdallah meant this expression in a sarcastic way, but as already established in that other article (and he just now gave more evidence for this), Abdallah is a fool and I am simply following the biblical instruction to answer a fool according to his folly (Proverbs 26:5) in order to expose his foolishness to him.

Nevertheless, although he did not mean it the way in which I decided to interpret his expression in this article, that does still not invalidate my reference to these Islamically justified lies. Most of the points I made above are serious issues.

Abdallah then continues by giving the following explanation about the circumstances in which it is allowed for Muslims to use lies:

Islam's permission to not tell the complete Truth (i.e., lie):

Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, allowed lying in the following cases:

1-  Lying to the enemy during war (war is deciet).

2-  Not telling the complete Truth if you're trying to reconcile between two people when asked what one said about another during hostile times.  In other words, you don't have to narrate the foul words that one said; just narrate the main point.

3-  When one is under a threat.

Here is my question to Abdallah:

Could you do us, and all of your readers, a favor and go through this List of Osama Abdallah's fabricated lies & deliberate alteration of quotes, and let us please know for each entry whether this particular instance is a permissible lie because (a) you are at war with Christianity, (b) you are trying to reconcile between two people, or (c) you are under a threat (please be specific about what kind of threat you are imagining)?

I think your audience would appreciate this greatly.

However, there is an additional problem. The above definition allows to lie to your enemies during war times. But whatever you publish is not read only by your enemies. All the lies you are publishing are read probably by more Muslims than Christians. Thus, you are lying and deceiving and misinforming mostly Muslims. What is your justification for that?

Apart from that list of older lies, I want this question answered in particular for your current hot topic on "God's stupidity". Now that you have said that interpreting a statement of sarcasm or irony literally constitutes twisting the meaning and lying to the readers, you have indirectly admitted that you have been propagating an enormous lie in your top article. Let your readers therefore know whether you lied to them because they are your enemy and you are at war with them (and are thus justified to use all kinds of lies in this war), or because you tried to reconcile between two people (whom? in what issue?), or because you were personally threatened (what threat?).

Although Abdallah rejects and mocks the Bible all day long, he now tries to justify at least his last category of permissible lies by referring to the story of Abraham in the Bible.

Abraham lied in the gospel of porn:

I want to ask this loser about what's his say about Abraham lying to Pharoah to save his own life:

"Abraham lied and told the Pharaoh that Sarah was his sister because he feared that Pharaoh would kill him in order to marry his wife. The Pharaoh does indeed desire Sarah for his wife, but becomes enraged that Abraham lied to him about his relation to her (Genesis 13:18)."  (Source)

If this loser is going to now say that Abraham was wrong, then he must thoroughly explain to us from his gospel of porn, the book of women's vaginas and breasts literally taste like "wine", why he was wrong so that we can then see if he is justified in attacking Islam or not.

Abraham was under a threat/danger and had no choice but to lie.  It's in his gospel of porn and it wasn't condemned by GOD Almighty.  So I wonder how this childish and totally waste of time missionary will respond to this now.

Leaving aside Abdallah's vulgar language and insults, let me say this: The lies of Abraham are nowhere endorsed in the Bible. Since Abdallah reads everything we publish, he knows very well that we have explained this issue already in many articles. A report is not necessarily an endorsement, a description is not automatically a prescription (e.g., 1, 2). Abraham sinned in this incident. However, since Abdallah is never going to accept anything we say about the Bible anyway, I will show it to him from the sayings of Muhammad.

Narrated Abu Huraira:
... on the Day of Resurrection. ... Allah will gather all the human being of early generations as well as late generation on one plain so that the announcer will be able to make them all-hear his voice and the watcher will be able to see all of them. The sun will come so close to the people that they will suffer such distress and trouble as they will not be able to bear or stand. Then the people will say, 'Don't you see to what state you have reached? Won't you look for someone who can intercede for you with your Lord?' Some people will say to some others, 'Go to Adam.' So they will go to Adam and say to him. 'You are the father of mankind; Allah created you with His Own Hand, and breathed into you of His Spirit (meaning the spirit which he created for you); and ordered the angels to prostrate before you; so (please) intercede for us with your Lord. Don't you see in what state we are? Don't you see what condition we have reached?' Adam will say, 'Today my Lord has become angry as He has never become before, nor will ever become thereafter. He forbade me (to eat of the fruit of) the tree, but I disobeyed Him. Myself! Myself! Myself! (has more need for intercession). Go to someone else; go to Noah.' So they will go to Noah and say (to him), 'O Noah! You are the first (of Allah's Messengers) to the people of the earth, and Allah has named you a thankful slave; please intercede for us with your Lord. Don't you see in what state we are?' He will say.' Today my Lord has become angry as He has never become nor will ever become thereafter. I had (in the world) the right to make one definitely accepted invocation, and I made it against my nation. Myself! Myself! Myself! Go to someone else; go to Abraham.' They will go to Abraham and say, 'O Abraham! You are Allah's Apostle and His Khalil from among the people of the earth; so please intercede for us with your Lord. Don't you see in what state we are?' He will say to them, 'My Lord has today become angry as He has never become before, nor will ever become thereafter. I had told three lies (Abu Haiyan (the sub-narrator) mentioned them in the Hadith) Myself! Myself! Myself! Go to someone else; go to Moses.' ... (Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume 6, Book 60, Number 236)

This is a very long hadith, basically stating that (most of) the earlier prophets are unfit to intercede because of sins they have committed, and they themselves need intercession. Muhammad's delusional punch-line is that he himself is the only one qualified to intercede. This hadith is discussed in more detail in these articles (1, 2). For the purpose of this paper, however, I am only interested in one specific point.

What are those lies of Abraham referred to in the above hadith?

Narrated Abu Huraira:
Abraham did not tell a lie except on three occasions. Twice for the Sake of Allah when he said, "I am sick," and he said, "(I have not done this but) the big idol has done it." The (third was) that while Abraham and Sarah (his wife) were going (on a journey) they passed by (the territory of) a tyrant. Someone said to the tyrant, "This man (i.e. Abraham) is accompanied by a very charming lady." So, he sent for Abraham and asked him about Sarah saying, "Who is this lady?" Abraham said, "She is my sister." Abraham went to Sarah and said, "O Sarah! There are no believers on the surface of the earth except you and I. This man asked me about you and I have told him that you are my sister, so don't contradict my statement." ... (Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 55, Number 578)

As the reader can see, yet again, it is self-refuting and self-destructive for Abdallah to even bring up the lies of Abraham. Despite the fact that Abdallah tries to justify these lies as being in one of his categories of lawful or "permissible lies" — or rather, he tries to justify these Islamic categories by pointing out that Abraham did the same —, Muhammad refutes him by stating clearly that these lies will prevent Abraham from being an intercessor on Judgment Day. These lies were definitely not as harmless as Abdallah wants to make us believe. They are viewed as being sinful, even in Islam. The Bible and the hadith agree against foolish Abdallah's deceptive use of this incident.

Though on a different aspect, Abdallah had attacked the story of Abraham and Sarah before. Just like this time, his attack backfired. It seems that he never learns, and repeats his follies over and over again.

Abdallah concludes with these words:

Jochen Katz has, once again, proven to be a total loser and a complete waste of time!  His articles and points are mostly absurd and self-refuting, and his attitude is all wrong.  Therefore, it is time for him to grow up and wise up so that he doesn't suffer further embarrassments.  I am really anxious to see his response to my Biblical verses above regarding GOD Almighty causing others to be deceived through sending them evil spirits, and Abraham lying to Pharaoh about his relationship to Sarah.  I am anxious to see how this polytheist trinitarian pagan will try to answer away this double-standard of his.

Abdallah's appeal to Abraham was dealt with already. The issue of "deceiving evil spirits" is answered in this article.

Actually, I found Abdallah's concluding words quite funny. I will leave it to the readers to decide whether they really apply more to me or to him. Let me repeat the relevant parts with some words underlined:

... has, once again, proven to be a total loser and a complete waste of time! His articles and points are mostly absurd and self-refuting, and his attitude is all wrong. Therefore, it is time for him to grow up and wise up so that he doesn't suffer further embarrassments. ... I am anxious to see how this idolatrous pagan will try to answer away this double-standard of his. (Underline emphasis mine)

Endnotes:

Rebuttals to Answering-Christianity
Answering Islam Home Page