http://www.islamexposed.com/

Moral Evaluations of the Marriage of the Prophet with Ayesha

Ayesha was 9 when Muhammad slept with her. This is a fact
demonstrated by a great number of hadithes. There is no
controversy in that. There has never been until now that some
of the Muslims have come in contact with western values and
are ashamed to admit that their Prophet could commit such an
indecency. They deny the facts and have made it a
controversy. The majority of Muslims still have no problem
with the young age of the Ayesha and they ridicule these
Modern day "moral relativists" who are twisting the truth to
please the morality of the westerners.
http://salam.muslimsonline.com/~islamawe/Polemics/aishah.html

An American lady, with whom I used to correspond about Islam,
was interested in this religion because of her Muslim
boyfriend. She admitted that the thought of Muhammad having
sexual intercourse with a 9-year-old girl appalled her but
she was relieved to know that there are some Muslims who deny
it and this is the subject of a controversy not agreed by all
the Muslims. This is what I wrote in response.

"There are people who deny the holocaust. This happened only
55 years ago and it is very well documented. Yet it has not
stopped some people to deny it. So they start a controversy.
Would you doubt the holocaust because it is a subject of a
controversy? Intelligent people are not affected by
controversies. They look at the facts and are not swayed by
hearsays. Feeble-minded people become confused and do not
know which way to turn. These people switch off and avoid the
issue altogether, because for them, making a decision is not
an easy task. That is why some people start the controversy.

Only a few years ago a Sheikh in Saudi Arabia issued a fatwa
that any one who said the Earth is round is Kafir. Obviously
this did not go very far but he started a controversy. So
what is your opinion about the shape of the Earth? Would you
stay out of it because it is a controversial issue? How about
the evolution? There are many Muslims as well as Christians
who do not agree with the theory of evolution. They believe
in the Biblical and Quranic stories of Adam and Eave and the
creation. This is a big controversy. Are you going to stay
away from it? Is it a none-issue for you? Almost everything
under the Sun is a controversial issue. From death penalty to
hunting, from spending money for space exploration to aiding
the poor countries, everything is a controversy. Even the
very subject of religion is a controversial issue. So you
cannot walk away from responsibility when you are faced with
controversies.

I agree that morality is relative and we should not judge the
ancient people's morality with our modern morality.

Obviously we all cringe when we think of pedophilia and
acknowledge that it is a shameful act of immorality. But
during the time of Muhammad, and even today in some Islamic
countries, marrying a 9-year-old child was not immoral. In
fact Ayesha was given to Muhammad with the consent of her
parents and no one raised an eyebrow. The question is, if
sleeping with a nine year old child was not deemed bad and
therefore was not considered immoral, was it ok? Not
everything that a society accepts as moral is right. Having
sex with a minor may not have been immoral for Arabs 1400
years ago, but it is now, as it was then, unethical.
Moralities are defined by circumstances, but ethics transcend
time and space. They are rooted in logics.Morality can vary
from culture to culture, from time to time and from person to
person. Who is to determine what is moral and what is not?

Having sex with a minor may not have been immoral for Muhammad
and his contemporaries in that uncivilized culture, but it
was ethically wrong. If Muhammad was a messenger of God or an
honorable man, as he made his Allah to proclaim him thus, he
should have known that what he was doing was dishonorable and
unethical.

Although it is true that in the past people married at very
young age. And it is also true that occasionally wealthy old
men married very young girls. We have to realize that these
people acted on their culture. We do not condemn them for
they did not know better. What they did was the norm. But we
do condemn those cultures.

However, we cannot forgive with the same amnesty those who
claimed to be the standard of rectitude amongst mankind. If
average people could not distinguish the right from the
wrong, the messengers of God, if they were from God, should
have known better. If their claim was true, if their
knowledge was divine, if they were inspired, they should not
have followed the tradition of their people but should have
set the example. Muhammad followed the morality of his
people. But that morality was ethically wrong. He claimed to
be the best human and the last messenger of God. According to
him God has said to people all he wanted to say in Quran and
his religion is complete. There is no more guidance to come
and his examples and his teachings are all we need to know
and follow for eternity. Yet what he did and said, under the
light of modern values prove to be very wrong.

Now we realize that we cannot live by his examples any more,
nor can we practice his teachings. Our morality has changed.
We would certainly put a man in jail if he wanted to follow
the Sunnah of the prophet in this day and age and "marry" a
9-year-old child. We would not allow someone to take people
as slaves, trade in slavery or have them as Muhammad did.

If we cannot follow the morality of Muhammad any more, if what
he said and did do not fit in this modern day, why we need
Muhammad? What part of his teachings should we accept and
what part should we discard? Who will determine that? This is
an important question. If we give ourselves the freedom to
pick and choose the teachings that most suit our personality
we should give the same freedom to others?

Suppose you believe that marriage to a minor should be
outlawed, or you do not feel that polygyny is suited any more
for this day and age. Suppose you disagree with slavery, male
or female circumcision, beating of the wives and do not
believe in Jihad any more. You prefer to concentrate on other
parts of Islam that you like, e.g. Salat, Zikat, Haj, etc.
This is your choice. But can you deny other Muslims whose
choices are distinct from yours? How could you stop a Muslim
who wants to follow those teachings of Islam that you
consider outdated? By what authority can you dissuade one who
wants to spread Islam by Jihad, like Muhammad did? How can
you prohibit him not to assault sexually a 9-year-old child
by marrying her? What would you say to a Muslim who wishes to
marry up to four wives and decides to punish them by beating
them if they are disobedient, as the Prophet instructed him
to do? If you use logic in picking the teachings that are
best, you are saying that logic is superior to revelation and
therefore you are subscribing to the freethinker's way of
thinking not Muhammad's.

Many Islamic countries have realized that true Islam is
impractical. Very few of them can practice it faithfully;
they all have modified it to certain extent and have
incorporated secularism into their laws to make life
bearable. Those that do follow Islam are hells on Earth.
Interestingly the civility and the progress of these
countries are proportionate to the level of their
secularization. In the Middle Ages, when religion had plunged
Europe into the dark ages, Islamic countries were progressive
and prosperous. This was possible because of the tolerance of
the rulers of those days, their independence from the Mosque
and their disinterest to implement Islam.

Ar-Razi, one of the greatest minds of Islamic world, attacked
religion in general and Islam in particular with a force
unthinkable in this day. He wrote:

"The prophets-these billy goats with long beards, cannot claim
any intellectual or spiritual superiority. These billy goats
pretend to come with a message from God, all the while
exhausting themselves in spouting their lies, and imposing on
the masses blind obedience to the "words of the master." The
miracles of the prophets are impostures, based on trickery,
or the stories regarding them are lies. The falseness of what
all the prophets say is evident in the fact that they
contradict one another: one affirms what the other denies,
and yet each claims to be the sole depository of the truth;
thus the New Testament contradicts the Torah, the Koran the
New Testament. As for the Koran, it is but an assorted
mixture of "absurd and inconsistent fables," which has
ridiculously been judged inimitable, when, in fact, its
language, style, and its much vaunted "eloquence" are far
from being faultless. Custom, tradition, and intellectual
laziness lead men to follow their religious leaders blindly.
Religions have been the sole cause of the bloody wars that
have ravaged mankind. Religions have also been resolutely
hostile to philosophical speculation and to scientific
research. The so-called holy scriptures are worthless and
have done more harm than good, whereas the "writings of the
ancients like Plato, Aristotle, Euclid, and Hippocrates have
rendered much greater service to humanity."

This kind of criticism of Islam today, would carry the death
sentence. Can any intellectual speak so freely against Islam
calling the prophets "Billy Goats" as Ar-Razi called them
disdainfully in these days and live? Does the fatwa against
Salman Rushdie ring a bell? It is clear that in those days of
the golden age of Islam, Islamic countries enjoyed a freedom
and a level of secularization that has since been
disappeared. And along with that, the glory of Islamic world
also has ebbed. Islam can be used as an index of barbarity
and backwardness. The more a country applies Islam, the more
uncivilized and uncultured it becomes.

I have no doubt that if Islam was eliminated completely, we'll
regain the past glory of those secular days and even surpass
it. There is no reason to believe that the black-eyed hairy
race of Middle East is inferior to the blue-eyed soft-skinned
Europeans. The number of Middle Eastern scientists, academics
and scholars in the West is an indication that given the
opportunity we are no less intelligent than any other race.
The reason that we are backward, uncivilized and barbaric in
our native countries is because Islam has taken away our
dignity, humanity and intelligence. Islam has brainwashed us,
and like a drug has damaged the minds of our people.