Are you a Swede?
The first thing you should do is to listen to azan , the Islamic call to prayer.
You may want to get the translation of azan. Here it is:
Allahu Akbar.Allahu Akbar.Allahu Akbar.Allahu Akbar(Allah is Great).
Ashhadu an la ilaha illa Allah.Ashhadu an la ilaha illa Allah (I bear witness that there is no god except Allah.)
Ashadu anna Muhammadan Rasool Allah.Ashadu anna Muhammadan Rasool Allah (I bear witness that Muhammad is the messenger of Allah).
Hayya ‘ala-s-Salah.Hayya ‘ala-s-Salah (Hurry to the prayer).
Hayya ‘ala-l-Falah. Hayya ‘ala-l-Falah (Hurry to success).
Allahu Akbar.Allahu Akbar (Alllah is great).
La ilaha illa Allah (There is no god except Allah).
*
As-salatu Khayrun Minan-nawm.As-salatu Khayrun Minan-nawm (Prayer is better than sleep).
Then you should read the news.
A mosque in suburban Stockholm could become the first in Sweden to sound prayer calls from its minaret after getting permission from police.
A Turkish Islamic association in the suburb of Fittja wants to use loudspeakers to sound the Islamic call to prayer at midday on Fridays.
Stockholm police on Thursday approved the group’s application, but said it must inform residents living within a 1-kilometer (0.6-mile) radius of the mosque before it starts to use the loudspeakers. The decision can be appealed by local residents.
Though there are mosques in all major cities in Sweden, the one in Fittja, where many residents are immigrants from Muslim countries, was the first to request permission for prayer calls.
Then you should think how you would feel to listen to azan at every midday on Fridays! You should know that if you allow to do it on Fridays, they will continue asking you to allow it on other days. And you have to allow it on other days because you have allowed it on Fridays. Then they will continue asking you to allow it for 5 times a day. And you have to allow it 5 times a day because you have allowed it once a day. Then you should sit down and think how you would feel to wake up early in the morning everyday when you badly need some sleep. Then you should think about listening this prayer call 5 times a day. Then you should learn that more mosques will be built in your town. More azan you will hear every day. You should know that other towns in your country will get more and more mosques too. And Your neighbor countries are also having the same noise of Islam. And one day you will find that you have no voice. No one can hear your voice, not even you, because the noise of Islam is louder than your voice.
It is alarming!
Why do Muslims need to listen to azan to get ready for prayers? The world is not a desert, it is not a barbaric, illiterate, uncivilized world. It is a modern world. It is 21st century, not 500 or 600 something AD. It is not like nobody knows what time it is. Muslims have watches, mobile phones, alarm clocks; they go to their meetings and demonstrations in time. They go to work in time. They do not need any loud call to work that says, ‘It is time for your work. Hurry to work. Work is better than sleep’.
Muslims! You will not spare Europe! But keep in mind your neighbors do not need to hear about your personal belief 5 times a day. Do they? It costs nothing to be a bit rational. Why don’t you try?
To any Christian, or to any member of virtually any non-Islamic religion, the azan Islamic call to prayer is blasphemous. By asserting that Muhammad is a (or the) messenger of God, they are denying the validity of all other faiths.
In a country with free speech, that would be no problem.
But in any country that follows Islamic patterns of behavior (i.e., limitations on criticism of religions), or perhaps even in any country that values “community cohesion” over free speech, this refusal of Islam to respect the views of believers of other religions would be blasphemous and offensive.
Rational Muslims should either tolerate all comments regarding religion, or else they should refrain from making them publicly themselves, including refraining from any public call to prayer.
The other response often seen, unfortunately, is the hypocrisy of claiming that somehow it is OK for Muslims to insult other religions, but not OK for the reverse. This is called “begging the question,” when one starts by assuming what has yet to be debated. In general, such a position would be given no respect by the Islamic authorities of any Islamic country, so it should also be given no respect elsewhere.
So Sweden should not permit any Islamic public call to prayer, unless all Muslims who are in or who ever enter Sweden all agree not to object to criticism of their religion.
Fairness requires either that they don’t pray publicly, or else that they don’t object to public criticism of their religion. If they are fair and civilized, then they can’t have it both ways.
The loud Azan at ten minutes before six while it is still dark here in Malaysia is the one that deives me crazy. How they got a recording of Satan singing in the shower I’ll never know. I Malaysia any criticism of the Azan or complaining about it is a criminal offense. It is much worse than church bells. Try it for a year and you’ll be praying for church bells. Of course church bells are prohibited in Muslim Malaysia.
I don’t see how this is any worse than church bells. I’ve been to places where the azan is piped out, it’s no more disturbing than any other moderately loud noise at night, and far less disturbing than many other sounds. Really, unless you object to the mere presence of people being openly religious, I don’t see how this is a problem.
Church bells are annoying. Worse than azan. If you hear the melody coming from a far away mosque, it is fine. I personally like the melody of azan, but not the nonsense words. Once I lived in a house surrounded by 10 mosques. It was a nightmare when all those mosques played their azan in the loudspeakers at the same time.
During azan, when mullahs shout simultaneously using multiple loud speakers, it sounds like a herd of mad bulls howling to forcefully shove their supremacy down the throats of others. It is far from melodious, it is unpleasant to hear, annoying and outright disrespectful. I wonder if Muslims will ever be able to identify what elements of their practices cause others to dislike Islam and Muslims. Though not all Muslims are bad, because of mad bulls like these numbskull mullahs brain-dead from prolonged suffering from pathetic Islamic supremacy, other Muslims get looked down upon.
Taslima, are you Muslim?
If you have ears you would realize that this sound from Muslim mosque is far different from church bells. Where bells has nice ring, but Azan has sound of high-pitched male. I am a Sri Lankan and once I wanted to move to Colombo and unfortunately the house I rented was near a mosque. First night I was awaken by a mysterious frightful sound. and after a week only I realized this is from Muslim mosque near by. Whole point of me rent out a house was to save time that is wasted for daily commuting.This sound was so unbearable , that I decided to leave the house. Now I am travelling daily to Colombo waste around 3-4 hours. But it is better than being near a mosque.
@taslimanasreen :
O mankind! Be careful of your duty to your Lord Who created you from a single soul and from it created its mate and from them twain hath spread abroad a multitude of men and women. Be careful of your duty toward Allah in whom ye claim (your rights) of one another, and toward the wombs (That bare you). Lo! Allah hath been a Watcher over you.
Mr Khan, I regret to inform you that there is no concrete evidence for your god or indeed any god, so your advice to Taslima is therefore entirely pointless if well meaning!
I would suggest you go back to your teachers and sue them for malpractice.
a good one.
“Amongst the Malagasy the vehicle for carrying away evils is called a faditra. “The faditra is anything selected by the sikidy [divining board] for the purpose of taking away any hurtful evils or diseases that might prove injurious to an individual’s happiness, peace, or prosperity. The faditra may be either ashes, cut money, a sheep, a pumpkin, or anything else the sikidy may choose to direct. After the particular article is appointed, the priest counts upon it all the evils that may prove injurious to the person for whom it is made, and which he then charges the faditra to take away for ever. If the faditra be ashes, it is blown, to be carried away by the wind. If it be cut money, it is thrown to the bottom of deep water, or where it can never be found. If it be a sheep, it is carried away to a distance on the shoulders of a man, who runs with all his might, mumbling as he goes, as if in the greatest rage against the faditra, for the evils it is bearing away. If it be a pumpkin, it is carried on the shoulders to a little distance, and there dashed upon the ground with every appearance of fury and indignation.” A Malagasy was informed by a diviner that he was doomed to a bloody death, but that possibly he might avert his fate by performing a certain rite. Carrying a small vessel full of blood upon his head, he was to mount upon the back of a bullock; while thus mounted, he was to spill the blood upon the bullock’s head, and then send the animal away into the wilderness, whence it might never return.”
– “The Golden Bough”
Fuck you bastards, You muslims are all filthy psycho’s and you ever have destroyed peace and I pray that you would be ruined and damned one day. I live near a mosque and my life has become hell because of you filthy damned Muslims.Once I was a muslim but now I left the religion because of disturbance I faced in the form of fucking Azaan. Damn you Muslims !!!
Taslima, you are aware that you have just used the slippery slope argument, don’t you? And that that’s generally considered a fallacy? You’d make a nice pair with Geert Wilders, he’s arguing identically.
Did I say something wrong, Kilian? You are foolish to say I will make a nice pair with Geert Wilders. I do not like him and his extreme right wing stuff anyway. Mr Wilders will never say what I have said (comment 2.1) : Church bells are annoying. Worse than azan.
First of all, Wilders is not “extreme right wing”. He is vehemently anti-islam, and one of his tactics is using the same type of slippery slope argument as you did: “allow one, allow many, muslim domination OMG!!!11!!!”. You are absolutely right about church bells: Wilders is completely blind to Christian extremism, and is always talking about “Judeo-Christian values”, as if they are any good…
Did you say something wrong? Yes, the first wrong thing you said is “And you have to allow it on other days because you have allowed it on Fridays.” It goes downslope from there.
Perhaps she knows something you don’t.
Hi Taslima,
Could you tell us:
why you do not like Wilders.
why do you classify him as extreme right.
please.
Dear Taslima,
//Mr Wilders will never say what I have said (comment 2.1)//
Why do you expect Wilders say such a thing? While you can say you love the melody of azan, why cannot Wilders love chimes of church bells?
//Church bells are annoying. Worse than azan.//
Have you considered the fact that the church bells do not chime in the early mornings and certainly not 5 times a day 365 days?
A couple of thoughts…that I’m happy to shift my position on in light of reasoned argument.
First, I would object to any religion or organization using loud speakers to repeatedly anounce their opening hours or worldviews within residential or workplace earshot. I see it not as an issue of free speech, but an issue of harrassment of a captured audience, that being any resident/worker in the area that is forced to listen to this. The thing about sound, is that unlike reading material, it can’t be avoided.
Second, if I was a neighbour of the mosque, would the local council allow me to broadcast my views by loudspeaker about evidence and reason and the dangers of religious nonsense every Friday as well? Would the mosque owners or other Muslims object? If so, on what basis? Somehow I think they would, thus highlighting the problem of allowing any group permission to repeatedly proselytize by speaker.
I live in Sweden by the way, and I certainly don’t see this as a welcome precedent…very curious to see how many residents object, and if that rapidly puts an end to it.
“…an issue of harassment of a captured audience…”
“… would the local council allow me to broadcast my views by loudspeaker about evidence and reason and the dangers of religious nonsense every Friday as well?”
Those two statements pretty much hit the nail on the head.
I don’t think it is mater of how does Azan or Church bell sounds like! Both are annoying anyways. The thing is, in a Muslim country people are familiar with Azan, I remembered I used to live in a crowded place in Dhaka where 10 to 15 mosques were surrounding my house and the funniest part was all the mosques start the Azan at the same time and the sound was so loud that you could not even understand what they are saying. How annoying only non-Muslims can correctly explain. I think Taslima’s point was how Swede will tolerate this Azan so easily. The birth place of Islam Saudi Arabia does not allow any other religion than Islam to practice in their land. So how these Islamists expect colonizing Islam to Kafir country? Not justice! However, the heart of white people are so easily convincible that they fall into Muslims, though one day they will surely suffer for this. Masjid, Azan followed by Shariah law. Few years ago Muslim wanted Sharia law in Canada. Thanks government did not permit that, thanks goes to Christian! if not we ( infidel ) would not be where we are today!
“think Taslima’s point was how Swede will tolerate this Azan so easily. The birth place of Islam Saudi Arabia does not allow any other religion than Islam” – The fact that restrictive regimes do not allow something, does not mean we should not allow something that is linked (even indirectly, as in this case), to that regime. The fact that they do not have freedom of speech and religion does not mean that Sweden should do away with it.
I believe there are many Muslims who emigrated to Sweden out of necessity – because they could not well live or even survive in the country they came from. They have given up their homes and much of their culture and needed to adapt to the new culture they are now a part of.
It is nice if through all of this turmoil and change in ones life, it is possible to save some tradition from the culture you were born with. The muezzin’s call to prayer is such a tradition.
“Muslims! You will not spare Europe!” — Please tell me you’re being ironic. 🙁
Isn’t there an app for that instead?
And would “La ilaha” mean what I think it means?
Technicaly, Hindu immigrants in the area might demand the right to publish a challenge to the words of Azan on official billboards and the like. After all, hindus have 2000+ gods, so they will feel offended to the claim.
And if you trust the many-worlds hypothesis of quantum physics, you might claim “there are infinitely many iterations of Allah, one for each universe”.
I was working in Lexington Ma, and there is a christian church that has a loudspeaker playing an entire song in bell chimes, sometimes for 4-5 minutes. It was absolutely absurd and I could hear it through the woods hundreds of yards away. Most of the time church bells are little more than large scale grandfather clock chimes, tolling on the hours, entire songs or tirades about how their god is awesome is overboard.
mendel:
The call to prayer is more than a quaint tradition, it is an imposition onto the adopted culture. I despise any religion that forces me to “bear with a smile” any of it’s inanities. If they want to hear the call to prayer they can put it on their iPods.
“The call to prayer is more than a quaint tradition, it is an imposition onto the adopted culture” – Since the call to prayer is aimed at the believers only, I disagree that it is an explicit imposition. You may see it as an implicit one, as all have to bare it, even the non-believers. This is, however, freedom of speech, religion and expression, unless other laws are broken, e.g. those concerning loud noises and the prohibition thereof.
“I despise any religion ” – So do I, but I concider the freedom of speech as one of the most, if not the most, important value of humanity.
Nonsense. The call to prayer is not aimed at believers only. It’s being blasted through a loudspeaker in a public area. At that point freedom to not listen to it has been violated.
The fact that it is publically broadcast does not mean it is aimed at everyone. And there is no such thing as “freedom not to listen”.
I’ve often noticed that there is no freedom not to listen. Both when walking past “musicians” playing on the streets, and on buses where there usually were around three private conversations and four different pieces of “music” at the same time.
Nonsense. There are noise laws in every country I’ve been to.
I’m a viking. I want to listen to Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” by the played by the Trans Siberian orchestra every Friday at noon. It’s my religion.
Freedom of speech includes freedom not to listen. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,814892,00.html
Taslima:
Do you have any evidence for this?
According to this article: http://www.svt.se/nyheter/regionalt/abc/moske-kan-fa-infora-boneutrop-i-fittja the nearest residential area is 700-1000 meters from the mosque. The article also states that there are three alternatives for the frequency of the prayers: Every friday, the first friday of each month and twice a year. This article:http://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/article16581477.ab says that the loudspeakers won’t be directed towards the residential area, and that the permit has been given for one year, after which they have to reapply.
I started chasing around this idea of a freedom not to listen, and I found a strong case for why we should have such freedom, and why such freedom is entirely compatible with freedom of speech.
http://open.salon.com/blog/kent_pitman/2009/05/21/the_freedom_to_hear#
In short, your right to express your views does not imply a right to force others to listen to you. In a free society I should have a right to hear someone engaged in holocaust denial for instance. But if I wish not to listen to such views, as most would not, then I should be able to opt out. The end result is a society where both listener and speaker have freedom with respect to the exchange of ideas.
The problem I have with any group broadcasting their views is that it takes the position that they have a right to force you to listen to their worldviews or demands, and if you live or work sufficiently proximate to their speakers, there’s nothing you can do about it short of soundproofing your walls or winning a court case. In such circumstances, the workers or residents cannot “move on” as it were in the case of a street preacher in a public square, or not read the article in the case of text they find objectionable, or say no thanks to the door knocking Mormon, or evict they sexist house guest. They are compelled to listen by their circumstance. That is simply a perversion of the idea of freedom of speech.
I don’t think it should have to come to that; and it wouldn’t if we respected both people’s freedom of speech and freedom to listen from the outset.
As a side note in relation to this particular case, the people involved have indicated that their request for a single day a week call to prayer, is in fact, just a starting point.
Hence supporting Taslima’s comment – “Then they will continue asking you to allow it for 5 times a day.”.
http://www.thelocal.se/43482/20120927/#.UXOKgGz8J2s
the topic is sound,
if you live in an area and you are able to hear wherever in busy town or jungle you will hear many sound some are manual and some are natural.
if you don’t like crowdy I think you may not like to live in sound and man poluted city.
if you don’t like lonely as same you would not live in jungle reason there quiet.
suppose someone doesn’t like a person, for this reason it keeps him busy always to find out his/her faults though he/she is good at all to others
the point is here
the noise of islam and also you said in a comment that church bells sound is worse then azan
i don’t know may be you are not clear about any religion or you have no ideas IN FULL
I am not big status people yet I think “HUMAN CAN NOT BE FULLFILLED EXCEPT RELIGION”
it leads human whole life to right way
T. NASREEN
sincerely
your younger brothers from bd
taslima when you will say why need sun we have electricity???????
I am listening it every day every early morning, every afternoon, every evening
Do u know how frustrated am i?
About the Noise of Islam and it has prayer as azan from mosque conflict. First thing , Azan is a call prayer that prophet Muhammad ask to Moslem in every prayer time for 5 times a day to shout unfortunately now moslem use a speaker and make it 10 times louder event there are many mosque about 200 metres to each other so the sounds became polluted. Second things about why so many mosques around and they became outnumber for not many people will come to enter the mosques. It has because the hadits as a source about prophet Muhammad said that people who built the mosque will have a paradise land to enter. This source will increase the number of mosques it doesn’t meaning to belong where people will go pray as it said indeed. Now sound azan became air polluted. Surround me now we have 5 new mosques and 1 of them has no tower to put speaker. They put the speaker so low on the second floor. The sound hit my neighbour room where they sleep. Can you imagine where you have sleep in your room and azan just next to your wall. There are regular and rules about this new methode of azan as a call prayer. It is a homework for moslem to reduce the air polluted. Prophet Mohammed has said to loud your sound to azan as a call prayer, he did’ not meaning to say to you to use a super Mega Phone as a call prayer to every mosques for closer distance in every 200 metres or 100 metres. A thought from an Indonesian Moslem