I’ve seen lists like this bounce around every so often, and an influencer with 342,000 followers just posted this on Facebook, so I figured it’s as good a time as any to disprove this nonsense. While this is an “easy target” as it were, sometimes something within you just tells you that this is the fight to pick today. Poking through falsehoods also has a certain fun quality to it, I won’t deny.

[Only after writing the post did I look up the source of this image, though obviously they took the quotes from somewhere else. This is from some guy or guys named “Uncle Sam’s Misguided Children,” clearly a great authority on Islam and the Qur’an, who seem to have gotten kicked off most social media platforms, but whose YouTube channel showcases such insightful videos on “HOW TO QUICK ASSEMBLE YOUR AR15 PATTON RIFLE” and the like. But I’ve seen lists like this before, so hopefully this will be a useful reference regardless.]

This can also serve as a reference for anyone who is told that the Qur’an is full of calls to kill Jews or something. Needless to say, whoever wrote up this collection (which is similar to others I’ve seen) scraped the bottom of the barrel for them. So you can tell people that if this is the worst these guys could find…

I’m going to start with the simplest and most accessible approach possible– showing you translations of the original passage, and sometimes the passages immediately before or after, and that’s it. In other words, it’s what you can see for yourself if you google or look things up, without a trace of knowledge of Islam or Arabic or anything. As you’ll see, almost all the above claims collapse at even this most preliminary of glances.

All quotes below are from this Qur’an reader, and specifically the translation of Abdullah Yusuf Ali, one of the most common English translations of the Qur’an. I will be trying to stick to as close a translation of the Arabic text itself, such that hopefully the translation choice shouldn’t matter, but where the translation inserts something important I’ll note it.

• Qur’an 2:191 starts with the words “Kill them wherever you come across them.” The word “unbelievers” is a fabrication. And who are “them” here? Well, take the full quote including 2:190 and 2:192 (emphases mine):
  • “190. Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you, but do not transgress limits; for Allah loveth not transgressors.
  • 191. And slay them wherever ye catch them, and turn them out from where they have Turned you out; for tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter; but fight them not at the Sacred Mosque, unless they (first) fight you there; but if they fight you, slay them. Such is the reward of those who suppress faith. 
  • 192. But if they cease, Allah is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful.”
    
    
• Qur’an 3:28 and 3:85 are filler. Sure, any religion other than Islam is not acceptable. You have a problem with religions saying that other religions are not acceptable? An alternative translation (which you can see at the same link) has “allies” instead of “friends,” but even if it were the latter– exhorting people not to be friends with people of other religions is hardly a terrifying passage. 3:28 reads “believers” and “unbelievers.” 3:85 is saying that those from religions other than Islam won’t make it into the hereafter.
  
  
• What they do with Qur’an 5:33 here is a work of art. “If they criticize Islam”? Did you forget the part about…
  • “The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land.”
  • To be clear: I’m no fan of the war ethics in the Qur’an, if read at surface level. Or those in the Bible, if read at surface level (see below). But this is as bald-faced a fabrication as it gets.
    
    
• Qur’an 8:12: The words “taken out of context” are used far too often these days, but…
  • “Remember thy Lord inspired the angels (with the message): “I am with you: give firmness to the Believers: I will instill terror into the hearts of the Unbelievers: smite ye above their necks and smite all their finger-tips off them.””
  • If you translate “I will instill terror into the hearts of the Unbeliever” to “terrorize those who believe in scriptures other than the Qur’an,” and turn a command to the angels to a command to people, well, you might as well just copy-paste some lines from Osama Bin-Laden, slap a “13:5” on and be done with it. And if you look a couple passages before and a couple after, you’ll see that the context is one of battle again.
    
    
• Qur’an 8:60: I really have to emphasize, this isn’t a matter of differing translations or interpretations. Here is the passage:
  • “Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into (the hearts of) the enemies.”
  • Translating “The enemies” to “the infidels” and “prepare steeds of war to strike terror into your enemies’ hearts” to “terrorize them”… that’s just making stuff up.
  • And what is the very next passage?
  • 8:61: “But if the enemy incline towards peace, do thou (also) incline towards peace, and trust in Allah: for He is One that heareth and knoweth (all things).”
    
    
• Qur’an 8:65: I’m going to again call “The unbelievers are stupid” as filler, if every religion called other religions stupid and that’s it I think we’d be in a better world. But in this case, it’s…well…
  • “O Prophet! rouse the Believers to the fight. If there are twenty amongst you, patient and persevering, they will vanquish two hundred: if a hundred, they will vanquish a thousand of the Unbelievers: for these are a people without understanding.”
  • Do note that this is coming right after the previous passage– it’s obvious that the “Unbelievers” here are those facing Muhammad’s armies in battle. And again: “if the enemy incline towards peace, do thou (also) incline towards peace” is 4 lines earlier.
    
    
• Qur’an 9:5: See below for more, but it is worth pointing out what immediately follows this quoted passage:
  • “5. But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the Pagans wherever ye find them, an seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war); but if they repent, and establish regular prayers and practice regular charity, then open the way for them: for Allah is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful. 
  • 6. If one amongst the Pagans ask thee for asylum, grant it to him, so that he may hear the word of Allah; and then escort him to where he can be secure. That is because they are men without knowledge.”
    
    
• Qur’an 9:30: Here you might guess that the key will be the word “perverts.” After all, the shock value of including this line is that “pervert” in modern contexts more or less invariably means “sexual pervert.” But “perverse” can just mean, per the Merriam-Webster definition, “turned away from what is right or good,” which is if anything a pretty mild and sensible thing to say about someone from a different religion. So you can give a pretty good guess what the issue is without even looking. But would you be correct? No! Because this one is just straight-out fabricated, bearing no relation to the actual text:
  • “The Jews call ‘Uzair a son of Allah, and the Christians call Christ the son of Allah. That is a saying from their mouth; (in this) they but imitate what the unbelievers of old used to say. Allah’s curse be on them: how they are deluded away from the Truth!“
  • Now: there’s a really eyebrow-raising assertion here, which is the reference to Jews claiming that the biblical character Ezra (“‘Uzair” in the Qur’an) is the son of God. There is a fascinating debate about what is going on here, because claiming that Ezra is the son of God is not a common belief among Jews, to say the least. But…hopefully you can tell that any translation as “perverts” is pure, unadulterated imagination.
    
    
• Qur’an 9:123. The original passage is:
  • “O ye who believe! fight the unbelievers who gird you about, and let them find firmness in you: and know that Allah is with those who fear Him.”
  • This is just about the only passage quoted that does not obviously mistranslate, except that “neighborhood” here clearly means “close to you” (or, in the translation I used, “who gird you about”) rather than a neighborhood in the modern urban sense. But see below on the general exhortations to fight unbelievers.
    
    
• Qur’an 22:19: Again, you should be able to sense by now what the real passage says. Is it Muslims who are exhorted to punish unbelievers with these hellish instruments? Or…
  • “These two antagonists dispute with each other about their Lord: But those who deny (their Lord),- for them will be cut out a garment of Fire: over their heads will be poured out boiling water.”
  • I’m not a fan of hell. I like my religion hell-less. To hell with hell, I might even say. But this is a description of hell, and if you have a problem with that, take it up with Dante.
    
    
• Qur’an 47:4: As far as I can tell “Do not hanker for peace” is pulled out of thin air. Not a trace in the original, no clue where it’s coming from. Now, here’s the quote in the translation I’ve been using, but do note it includes interpolations not in the text itself:
  • “Therefore, when ye meet the Unbelievers (in fight), smite at their necks; At length, when ye have thoroughly subdued them, bind a bond firmly (on them): thereafter (is the time for) either generosity or ransom: Until the war lays down its burdens. Thus (are ye commanded): but if it had been Allah’s Will, He could certainly have exacted retribution from them (Himself); but (He lets you fight) in order to test you, some with others. But those who are slain in the Way of Allah,- He will never let their deeds be lost.”
  • The words “(in fight)” is an interpretation, not in the original text.

Now, if we’re being entirely above-board, two passages here– and only two, 9:123 and 47:4– have anything like a call to violence that is not explicitly linked to those waging war against Muslims or where it is immediately clarified that those who ask for asylum or don’t attack should be spared. In the case of 47:4, the interpretation that this is a matter of battle is accepted enough that the two translations I read insert the words “in fight” or “in battle” into the sentence; it’s also reasonably clear from context, given that this is immediately followed by an exhortation to either ransom or let free prisoners of war. A passage reading essentially “in battle, aim for the neck” is rather different from “behead the nearest unbeliever.”

So from that list, what we’re left with is how you understand 9:123’s “fight the unbelievers near you.” As you’ve seen, very often when the Qur’an talks about “fighting the Unbelievers,” it is referring to actual wars and battles that happened in Muhammad’s time. The Qur’an rarely discusses the details of these battles, so it is “left to the reader” to fill in the blanks. Moreover, as I discussed in another post, the Qur’an is anything but straightforward: it doesn’t tell a continuous story nor give a coherent list of commandments, but rather weaves different stories, exhortations and laws in ways that are absolutely inscrutable when taken on their own (much moreso than the Bible). A passage can refer to a battle that Muhammad fought without once naming which battle it was or saying anything else about it. All this is to say that the meaning of a single passage reading “fight the unbelievers near you” is not at all straightforward, and reams and reams of texts will try to explain what context the passage is trying to refer to.

And if we’re being entirely above-board, we’d also obviously include the many passages in the Qur’an that are frequently held up as exhortations to tolerance or peace, in addition to those above. I’ll just bring up three of the most famous:

• Qur’an 2:256, immediately following a passage known as “the climax of the Qur’an”:
  • Let there be no compulsion in religion: Truth stands out clear from Error: whoever rejects evil and believes in Allah hath grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold, that never breaks. And Allah heareth and knoweth all things.
    
• Qur’an 109, “The Disbelievers,” (Al-Kafirun, which is frequently used in the sense of “infidels”) in its entirety:
  • 1.Say: O ye that reject Faith! 
  • 2.I worship not that which ye worship, 
  • 3.Nor will ye worship that which I worship. 
  • 4.And I will not worship that which ye have been wont to worship, 
  • 5.Nor will ye worship that which I worship. 
  • 6.To you be your Way, and to me mine.
  • Note: the word “Way” at the end is the Arabic word for “religion,” so one common translation of the passage is “To you your religion, and to me mine.”
    
• And my personal favorite, Qur’an 29:46, and here I’m using the other translation in the link, Saheeh international, just because I find it clearer:
  • And do not argue with the People of the Scripture except in a way that is best, except for those who commit injustice among them, and say, “We believe in that which has been revealed to us and revealed to you. And our God and your God is one; and we are Muslims [in submission] to Him.”
  • “People of the Scripture” here are the people of the book, i.e. Jews and Christians.
  • And to add an explanation from one of the attached interpretations, Ma’arif al-Qur’an, because this is the way I was taught the verse (by my very Jewish teacher): “It means that if one has to get involved in a discussion or debate with the people of the book, he should present his arguments in an affable manner. For instance, it is prudent to answer an impudent remark with politeness, the rage with mildness, and uncivilized tumult with dignified speech.”

So am I saying the Qur’an is in fact a text that promotes tolerance, or that Islam is a “religion of peace”?

No.

Because that’s not how religions work.

Orthodox Jews, of all people, know this. The Bible is full of passages that, if taken at face value, are horrific– well beyond anything in the Qur’an. Just to give one example, Deuteronomy 13:7-10 commands that you should stone to death even family members who try to convince you to worship other gods. Meanwhile, the Bible’s war ethics– again, if taken at face value– are awful as well. Deuteronomy 13:13-16 tells us to put to death the residents of any city that has turned to other gods. And of course there is the classic scene in The West Wing, where the president– portrayed as a devout Catholic throughout the show– makes a similar point:

Such passages in the Bible are absolutely legion. So is Judaism a violent religion?

No, because you cannot understand a religion by merely reading its “holy text,” and a religion is not a single monolith that is either “of peace” or “of war.”

In Judaism, there is a massive corpus dedicated to interpreting and expanding on the Bible, to the extent that it is considered an “oral Bible” in its own right. And that oral tradition has been debated and evolved over millennia, and different groups have interpreted the same texts in completely different ways. The libraries of Islamic texts, oral traditions and legal texts and everything in between, are no less expansive. Like the hadith forbidding the killing of women and children, for example.

Not always for the best, to be clear; there are hadiths where Jews are not portrayed in the most sympathetic ways. And interpretations of the Qur’an aren’t all in a more tolerant direction. The opening passage of the Qur’an ends with an exhortation to follow “the straight path; The path of those upon whom You have bestowed favor, not of those who have earned [Your] anger or of those who are astray.” This seems innocent enough, but the most common interpretation of “those who are astray” are the Christians and “those who have earned Your anger” are the Jews. Some Islamic exegesis argues that more tolerant passages were superseded by more militant ones.

If you want a good and accessible portrayal of what the back and forth between those interpreting a verse in a more violent direction versus a more benign one looks like, check out the Wikipedia page on the “Sword verse,” i.e. verse 9:5 above.

But none of this will tell you much of anything about how people who adhere to these religions actually behave in the real world. Think for a moment of all the incalculable violence done throughout history in the name of Christianity, and then ask how much of that fits a simple reading of the New Testament (or the Old one for that matter). Christian behavior– toward other faiths, toward other Christian denominations, toward Jews, toward war ethics– changed radically over time, even though the “holy texts” did not. Conversely, consider how different Muslims in different countries and societies today are on those same issues (and see my post If Saudi Arabia Is the Solution, Islam Is Not the Problem for more on this), whereas all hold by the same basic Qur’anic text.

As I like to say, a constant cannot explain a variable, so the constant text of the Qur’an cannot explain the massive variation through time and space that is Muslim attitudes toward violence and other religions. So if you asked me whether on balance the Qur’an’s passages lean more toward atrocities or more toward peace, I’d say probably it leans more toward peace (see above). But that’s fundamentally the wrong question if you want to ask a question about how the world itself works.