There is a particular kind of fear that has no name in ordinary vocabulary—the fear not of punishment itself but of being found out. It is distinct from guilt, which is interior and can be managed, rationalized, or suppressed over time. This fear is about the moment when the interior becomes exterior, when what a … Continue reading The Record They Would Burn the World to Hide
How 1979 Geopolitics Pushed Muslim Countries Toward Tyranny
There is a temptation, when examining contemporary predominantly Muslim countries, more rigid expressions—the political repression, the enforced uniformity, the sanctioned violence—to trace these features back through history until they disappear into some unchanging essence of the religion itself. This is a mistake, and not merely an academic one. It misreads the historical record, misattributes responsibility, … Continue reading How 1979 Geopolitics Pushed Muslim Countries Toward Tyranny
How To Dismantle Evil in Society
Jeffrey Epstein ran a trafficking network that serviced some of the most powerful men in the world—politicians, financiers, academics, heads of state. The evidence is not circumstantial. The court documents, the flight logs, the testimony, the photographs are a matter of public record. And yet, years after his death and the arrest of his primary … Continue reading How To Dismantle Evil in Society
Who Are the Baddies? Apostasy, Coercion, and the Mirror the Quran Holds Up to Today’s Islam
There is a famous comedy sketch by Mitchell and Webb in which two Nazi soldiers, mid-battle, pause to notice the skull-and-crossbones insignia on their helmets. One turns to the other and asks the question that has apparently never occurred to them before: "Are we the baddies?" It is a devastatingly simple joke. But it captures … Continue reading Who Are the Baddies? Apostasy, Coercion, and the Mirror the Quran Holds Up to Today’s Islam
Sunni Islam: A Death Cult Designed to Fail
In September 2023, two of the most prominent Sunni Muslim voices on social media, Daniel Haqiqatjou and Jake Brancatella, had a debate on the Patrick Bet-David Podcast against two Christians, Robert Spencer and Brother Rachid, who was a Christian convert from Islam. According to Sunni Islam, the punishment for apostasy is death. Ibn ‘Abbas said: … Continue reading Sunni Islam: A Death Cult Designed to Fail
Sunni Apologists Continue to Perpetuate the Very Deception Their Tradition Claims to Protect Against
The Unchanging Nature of Human Behavior One of the most important insights in historical study is that human nature doesn't change—only the environment does. The ancients were not a different species; they possessed the same cognitive capacity, emotional impulses, biases, temptations, ambitions, and insecurities as people today. Whether we examine Babylonian school tablets, Roman letters, … Continue reading Sunni Apologists Continue to Perpetuate the Very Deception Their Tradition Claims to Protect Against
The Slow Birth of Islam: How Syriac Christians Watched a Religion Take Shape
When the armies of Islam emerged from Arabia in the seventh century, the first Christians they encountered were not the Greek-speaking Byzantines of Constantinople nor the Latin Christians of Rome, but the Syriac-speaking Christian communities of the Middle East. These Christians—centered in Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, and Persia—spoke Syriac, a dialect of Aramaic closely related to … Continue reading The Slow Birth of Islam: How Syriac Christians Watched a Religion Take Shape
Syriac Polemics Against Islam: Muhammad Had No Miracles Aside from Quran
Around the year 781 CE, Patriarch Timothy (727–823 CE) recorded what is now known as the Apology, a transcript of his theological debate with the Abbasid Caliph al-Mahdi (r. 775–785 CE). This text captures a moment in the history of the Christian–Muslim encounter that should unsettle every modern defender of the miracle legends later invented … Continue reading Syriac Polemics Against Islam: Muhammad Had No Miracles Aside from Quran
Notes: Envisioninig Islam: Syriac Christians and Early Muslim World
The following are my notes from the book "Envisioning Islam: Syriac Christians and the Early Muslim World" by Michael Philip Penn. But when Muslims first encountered Christians they did not meet Greek-speaking Christians from Constantinople, nor did they meet Latin-speaking Christians from the western Mediterranean. Rather, they first encountered Christians from northern Mesopotamia who spoke … Continue reading Notes: Envisioninig Islam: Syriac Christians and Early Muslim World
The Earliest Mentions of Muhammad from Syriac Sources
Long before medieval Christian polemicists wrote about “Mahomet,” and centuries before European historians tried to reconstruct early Islam, a different group recorded the rise of Muhammad and his followers in real time: Syriac-speaking Christians of the Near East. These communities lived not in Rome or Constantinople, but in Syria, Mesopotamia, and Persia—the very lands conquered … Continue reading The Earliest Mentions of Muhammad from Syriac Sources
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