You have to see the truth in order to reject it. If you read the whole Quran you would realize this important fact.

"Then lo! thy Lord for those who do evil in ignorance and afterward repent and amend--lo! (for them) thy Lord is afterward indeed Forgiving, Merciful." (Quran 16:119)

The passage you quoted is describing people who understand Islam, believe it to be the truth (in their hearts they cannot deny it) and then they reject it. This is the meaning of the Arabic word 'kafir', it comes from 'covering up', and refers to one who covers up the truth.

I don't know what is in your mind. Whether you are rejecting what I say out of ignorance, or out of covering up the truth. Only you (and God if He exists :)) know what your intentions are.



I already explained that. But to humor you, I will explain again. I'm not a Christian or a Jew, because I've read the Bible, and I don't think it is 100% reliable. It contains contradictions, and information that is clearly wrong from a scientific perspective.

I am not a Buddhist, because Buddha said he did not know if there was a God or not, he did not claim to be a messenger of God, and while I like the teachings of Buddhism, it appears that he was just a wise man who taught whatever truth he could gather from his observations. I also did not find anything in his teachings which clearly contradict Islam, with the exception of reincarnation.

Hinduism was just a jumble of many different religions in which many cultures combined their beliefs into many different gods. There are some Hindu scriptures which state that there is one all powerful creator God, and that He cannot be seen. But other Hindus sources teach that there are many gods, and each has it's own sphere of influence. Besides, I went to a Hindu temple once, and it gave me the creeps.

Jainism seemed nice, because of its pacifism. However, not being allowed to eat meat seemed too strange for me. If the creator allowed other animals to eat meat, it would be strange for humans to be forbidden from this practice.

Confucius wrote about running a government, and it's ideal form. He barely ever mentioned God, and I did not recall him mentioning any afterlife.

Anyway, if the Eastern traditions are the correct beliefs, I'll have an infinite number of chances to get it right, and I'd rather find out I was wrong, and have to live as a dog or mouse, than find out Islam was right and end up in Hell.

The many Shamen religions throughout the worlds less advanced civilizations were very compelling. It seems that there must be truth to something if it arises in many parts of the world simultaneously. However, Shamen religions do not concern themselves with God or the Hereafter, but rather with communicating with spirits. Also, some of the practices of the Shamens struck me as a bit strange, like taking mind altering drugs in order to achieve a 'spiritual' state.

Some Native American tribes had a belief in a single Creator God, which they called 'the Great Spirit'. To me, this confirmed that the idea of God was not unique to the Abrahamic faiths. When I looked into this further, I found this creator was mentioned in many of the world's religions. From the Aztecs to the Egyptians, to Hinduism, and others. Even the Greeks mentioned the 'Chaos' from which all things were formed.

The Quran seems to answer to all of these ideas. It is a clear confirmation of the basic doctrine of the Bible i.e. that God created the universe, and sent prophets to teach human beings what to believe, and how to behave. It also answers the Shamens, by stating that there are spirits (jinn) who try to mislead humans from the right path.

It also mentions that messengers were sent to every nation, and this would explain why many of the worlds religions have the creator God at their core. It also explains that humans have a bad tendency to make idols to worship alongside God, or instead of God.

Finally, I realized that the Quran said all this in a way which did not contradict itself, or the reality that I could observe around me. Therefor, I could not deny the possibility that it was actually true. So when it warned that those who reject the truth will be punished in Hell, I took it literally, and became a Muslim.

There are other religions in the world, some of which are even offshoots of Islam. I can talk about these too if you like, but I don't want to take up too much space.

When I learn of a new religion, I do study it, and try to determine if it is better than what I already have. This is the first time I have studied atheism, so I thank you for spending the time to explain it to me



Actually most scientists agree that the question of God lies outside of the ability of science to answer.



Only the Biblical story of creation is clearly contradictory to science.



Don't make comments like this if you've never read any history on the topic. Arabs were divided into small city-states based on tribes and clans. The constantly fought wars with one another, and they worshiped about 360 different idols. There was no 'Arabic Culture' before Islam. They had a common language, and a yearly pilgrimage that was founded by the Prophet Abraham, but that's about all that united them as a nation. They claimed to follow the religion of Abraham, but they had changed it so much that it was unrecognizable.

Islam united the Arabs under one religion and made them the most powerful empire in the world at the time. This sounds like Islam is an aggressive religion, but you have to understand where they lived. The Byzantine empire was not exactly a peaceful neighbor, and the Persian Empire was no better.

I'm not arguing that everything Muslims ever did was good, but you can't fault Islam or the Quran for that.



God is not disproven. You cannot disprove God. God, however could choose to prove himself. He apparently chose to do this through messengers and prophets. You cannot say that they were wrong, because you did not experience what they experienced. You cannot decide what God should and should not do, He's God, you're not.



Again you are thinking about Christian Europe. Under Christianity in Europe, yes, science had to struggle against the church, because the Bible was appearing to be less and less authentic. This never happened in the Muslims world. Science was encouraged and grew under Islamic Civilization. look it up for yourself. Science never made discoveries which clearly contradict the Quran, so there was never any tension between Muslim scientists and the religious scholars.

I know you don't believe me, but I'm explaining it the best way I can. If you want to do a little research of your own into this, and come to a different conclusion, be my guest. I will listen. But I cannot sit here and agree with you, when you are clearly jumping to conclusions about Islam, based only on what you learned about Christianity.



It is obvious that you have never studied any religions. I guess most people haven't, even religious people. I think this is a shame, because religions have a lot of good things to teach us.