Q/A: Why do you think you are different?
July 26, 2008 by greekmuslim
Question:
Hello everybody, I’m a Greek Orthodox Christian, and I wanna ask you, why do you think you’re different? I think we all are the same we are all humans and Greeks, and we’re not supposed to count each other different, I was shocked to see Greek Muslims think they are not Greeks or make their own websites as if they were different, I’ll tell ya, we’re all Greeks, athiests, Jews, Musilms or Christians, the most important thing to believe in Allah only! I speak Arabic very fluently, for Muslims who want help in this language, and I know a lot about Islam, so anyone needs help, I’m here : mesow@hotmail.com.
Answer:
Mesow, welcome to the group and thank you for asking us this important question. Yes, we have some similarities, but we are different.
- human beings (same)
- Greek culture (same)
- beliefs (different)
If you watch our video or browse through our blog posts, you will find undoubtedly that our posts are very different than what another Greek blogger would publish because we share different beliefs and therefore live different lifestyles. Hence, the need for our unique website.
Mesow, let me ask you this, if you believe in Allah (one true God) only, then why are you not a Muslim?
Note: others are free to comment as well.
(MOD EDIT: moved from Find Greek Muslims! section)
From Ramil
Salam!
I think you Mesow do not know about Islam a lot as you sad because if you had known a lot you never would have asked us why we are different. Our belief in Allah differs us from others. Of course it may be new thing for Greece that greek muslims made their own website but for example for my country Russia it is normal, russian muslims have their own websites and places where we can discuss and solve our problems to know more about Islam tell and explain for not-muslims about our religion.
I will give my view on this too.
A person, when embracing Islam, he embraces at the same time, all of it’s values. One very importan value in Islam, is putting aside your nationality, and seeing, every single person, be he black or white or yellow or blue or whatever as equal to yourself. There is a Hadith that mentions the following:
“O people! Your God is one and your forefather (Adam) is one. An Arab is not better than a non-Arab and a non-Arab is not better than an Arab, and a red (i.e. white tinged with red) person is not better than a black person and a black person is not better than a red person, except in piety.”
Narrated in Mosnad Ahmad, #22978.
This means that although we are Greek in nationality, it does not make us feal of higher status towards other nationalities, and the only thing is, we strive for the betterment of our society (e.i. being pious).
Being a muslim is being a human, not a Greek or anything else. (Of course, typically you are still of the nationality where you come from, but it is not more than a color and a language).
Mesow,
We are not all the same, you should know that as Muslims we worship the Almighty in his Divine Unity, declare the messengership of Nabi Mohammed, pray, fast, give charity and go for Hajj.
As an Orthodox Christian you worship a Triune god that consists of Allah, his prophet and a holy ghost. As muslims, we are the only people on earth who only worship Allah without taking any partners, sons or any other created or imagined being in our worship. An atheist denies Allah, a Hindu worships a cow amongst other things while the Jews blaspheme upon the noble character of Jesus and his Virgin mother. The reason why Greek Muslims don’t consider themselves first and foremost Greeks is most likley due to the fact of the way Muslim citizens are treated in Greece, being denied passports, permits to build mosques, lack of educational opportunites and poor infrastructure in Muslim villages. Of course there are exceptions with Muslim Politicians. But the overwhelming things are negative. As Muslims are constantly reminded and blamed for the atrocities commited by some of the Ottomans.
Mesow if you were to come to my house for dinner you would find that we don’t eat cetain foods, I wouldn’t offer you an ouzo or retsina and you definitely will not be sitting next my wife. You would also notice that I would get up and pray at the time of prayer. These are part of the things that make us different despite our common heritage
Mesow,
Greek and a Greek Muslims are different in a lot of aspects. First of all if a Greek becomes a Greek Muslims, his psyche changed. A Greek just think about 12 millions Greeks, but a Greek Muslim thinks about 1500 million people who r his/her brothers and sisters in Deen. He/she is also worry about other 5000 million people, that its now his duty try to save them from hellfire.
An orthodox Greek mostly talk to his orthodox parents in a very harsh way, even he call them “μαλακα”. A Greek Muslim don’t even think about that to talk his/her orthodox parents in even harsh way.
A Greek Muslim do more respect to Jesus then a Greek orthodox. It is his part of Iman and Faith to love Jesus as Prophet of God. Greek Muslim don’t even think to disrespect in any way, even to make a picture of Jesus Peace be upon him.
A Greek don’t bother what he saying about Jesus in anger, mostly when Greek get angry, they say bad words about Jesus Peace Be Upon him. A Greek Muslim don’t even think about that, if he do (God forbid) that, he will lost his Iman, Faith.
Greece is the birthplace of Western Society!
All societies in this world are unique and different. What makes each society different is a number of factors including, language, geography, history and religion. 98% of Greeks belong to the Greek Orthodox Chuch. Our culture dates back thousands of years and is uninterrupted until the present. Most importantly Greek society gave birth to Western Civilization.
The Muslim faith is based in the East, it’s culture is primarily non-European. Since Greece is geographically close to Asia Minor it has been influenced by the East, yet its society is Western coming with concepts like democracy, Orthodox Christianity, the Olympic movement, Western Philosophy, Western literature and so on, all these movements that are foreign to the majority of Musleum societies. Thus a Musleum Greek is a contradiction of terms to what the 98% majority of Greek society is all about.
SonOfSparta
I think that when you are referring to Greek society that you actually mean Modern Greece. Modern Greece expelled all it’s Muslim inhabitants who had been living in Greece for centuries.
Are you forgetting that Greece has had close ties with the Middle-East for thousands of years? The first christians were mostly Jews who came from modern day Palestine and we all know what influence christianity plays in Greece. Orthodoxy is an Eastern religion, not Western. Greece has had close contacts with Arabs since the earliest days of Islam with the first failed Arab siege of Constantinople taking place in 674-678 and the second in 717-718. Cyprus was also ruled jointly by both the Arabs and the Byzantines as a condominium from 688 – 965.
The Arabs also conquered Sicily in 827 which also had a sizeable Greek population, subsquently Arabic became the national language. Although Islam has never been dominant in Greece, muslims have been living and visitng Greece and practicing their religion their for centuries and so I find it ironic that Islam is seen as something strange in Greece (either because it was the religion of the former colonial rulers or because it is the religion of a minority who constantly face discrmination)
Abu Abdullah Azzam, I don’t know where you read your version of history but I myself have an education in the history of Greece and Classical Studies. The Greek civilization gave birth to Western society. We first gave universal thought that man was the measure of all things. In art we expressed the beauty of human form with nude sculptures and paintings. We fought the Persians and won. It was this victory at Marathon and Thermopylae and Salamis that made of free of Eastern domination. We spread Hellenic civilization to the barbarian lands of the East. We created the greatest civilization on earth and many people spoke Greek as the universal language of the Eastern half of the Roman Empire. The Byzantine Empire was based in Constantinople and its laws were Roman (Western) and its language was Greek also Western, in fact when Constantinople fell to the Turks educated Greeks brought their knowledge to cities like Florence, Rome and Venice which in turn gave rise to the Renaissance or rebirth of Western civilization. What did the barbarian Turks give the world? Nothing. They converted Hagia Sophia and the Churches into Mosques because thats what Musluems do, destroy other people’s houses of worship. What Greek in his right mind would follow the religion of the Turks? We fought the Ottamans over and over so as we can be free, So please spare me your skewd view, read some history, read about the hereos of Greece who fought to keep Greece free from foreign Eastern intervention.
Ως πότε παλικάρια να ζούμε στα στενά…. Καλλιώναι μίας ώρας ελεύθερη ζωή παρά σαράντα χρόνια σκλαβιά και φυλακή
Son of Sparta
I do agree that as Greeks we have a rich culture spanning thousands of years.
However, I’m no student of Ancient Greek history like you so could you kindly point where I went wrong? What are the facts that I have distorted?
Didn’t Alexander destroyed an entire city in one night? The Persians were also a highly cultured nation – not barbarians. So were the Ancient Indians, Egyptians, Jews. You remind me of the British who settled in Australia. They claimed that Australia was ‘Terra Nullius’ – meaning a barren land with no law – Oh how wrong they were. The Aborigines of Australia had a rich, sophisticated culture as did the lands that our ancient Greek forefathers conquered.
Who are these barbarians of the East you are talking about? Your views are at the least extremely ethnocentric bordering on racist. My family came to Greece from Turkey with their Pontian language and Christian religion in tact – what slavery are you talking about? Colonisation is different from slavery. I follow the religion of God, not the religion of the Turks as Turkey is a secular state.
Western Civilisatin has has borrowed much from the Arabs and the Indians – us Greeks do not hold a monopoly on that.
Early Greek art from the archaic period is heavily influenced by Persian designs. The Persians did have a high culture but they challenged Athens and other Greek city-states for power in the Aegean. First Darius and the Xerxes attempted to punish Athens for the Ionian Revolts in Sardis where democratic reform was challenging the Persia’s influence and global power. After the victories of Marathon,Thermopylae and Salamis, Greek society transformed. Scholars accept the Greek idea of the individual, political reform, and artistic reform gave birth of Western society. When Alexander came to power, he spread the Hellenic ideas to the East. Yes, he burned down Persepolis in response to Xerxes’ destruction of the first Parthenon in Athens. But, as you know, despite the brutality of the age, Alexander brought the Greek language, artforms and technology to the East. Alexander also incorporated local tradition to each place he travelled. He brought Hellenism to barbaric lands. What does the word barbaric mean? In the ancient Greek context, it means foreign.
When you look at the metopes surrounding the Parthenon on the Acropolis you see images of men fighting centaurs. This is a mythic depiction, but many art historians also view this image as a fight between civilization and barbarism, or if you like the battle between Greece and Persia. This image of beasts fighting men is what the classical Athenians thought of the Persians. Since that time, Eastern and Western societies created varies empires and at their core, their world view is as different as each preceives in other in literature and art. Does this justify violence? No. However we can trace our views and misconceptions of God back to this era. Since even before monothesim took hold in Greece and Persia our view on the world was different and continues to be in the Christian and Islamic present day.
Yes so the Greeks benefited just as much as those they interacted with.
Did they colonise? Yes
Did they enslave people? Yes
So we are guilty of the same thing you criticize the Ottomans for. Why is ok for us to go and destroy cities and then complain when it gets done to us?
Because we did this 2000 years ago not a couple hundred years ago. Also Alexander attacked Persia in revenge for Persia’s attack on Athens. The Greeks built librarys and cities and trade posts in the East, when Alexander died his generals split his empire into 3 parts, The Seleucid Empire ruled Persia and Mesepotamia, The Ptolomey dynasty ruled in Egypt,, Greece was part ruled by the Antigonid dynasty but eventually fell back under the rule of individual city-states. A few generations later the Roman Empire took over the majority of these lands.
The Romans had a saying that went like this, “Rome conquered Greece but Greece conquered Rome.” What does this mean? Rome took over physically, governmentally, and militarilt, but it was the greek religion, greek philosophy, greek sience and greek thought that Rome adopted lock stock n barrel that helped Rome to become so great. So, Rome conquered Greece physically, but in every other manner, Greece’s ways of life overcame Rome.
In terms of, “So we are guilty of the same thing you criticize the Ottomans for. Why is ok for us to go and destroy cities and then complain when it gets done to us?”
There is a huge fundamental difference. The ancient Greeks never converted foreign religious sites into their own places of worship. Persepolis was destroyed because Xerxes the Persian king first burned down the first Parthenon and set fire to Athens. Alexander’s reason to move East was a reaction to the Persians attempting to move into the West. When Alexander went to Persia and Egypt he did not replace their laws with Greek ones, unlike other empires he belived each group of people should keep their laws and religion, this is why the Jews even praised him because he did not touch their temples. Also unlike the Ottomans the Greeks never asked others for a head tax or took away children and create slave armies. The Ottoman Turks came from the far East not because of retaliation but because they knew Byzantium was a rich city and they thought they could over take it. Since then we have the presence of Turkey in Anatolia.
Getting back to the question why we are different, it comes down to our laws, customs, philosophy and religion. The ideas of the ancient Greeks that stayed with us in Roman times into Byzantium times and into the present make us unique just like the cultures of ancient Persia make Iranians unique and all other present day societies. Yet as I hope I have illustrated to you, are past gives us diiferent outlooks on the way we see the world history including the way we see God.
alslam alukum
hello to every body
from the creeke people i want to knoow if there is greeke muslimes are leaving in athens or not and if there is i want to meet them am leaving in athens for 2 years i never seen greeke muslimes here .
this my mail ;basemabdelraof@yahoo.com
i hope contacting from them
best regards
Bassem Hussien
TEL ;6934985424
mail ;basemabdelraof@yahoo.com
i’m a turk who is living in turkey, i consider myself as a grandson of ottomans and i feel like i have no difference than a greek, an arab than an armenian or a jew we’re all same same can’t you understand that people? we’re all on same boat and have some few days on earth.. why to waste them with saying you’re this and you’re that, let’s say we are one and we should saty like that………
Ozgor Soylu, this is exactly the point that SoS has to understand, that accusations and enmity will in no way resolve anything, rather it is unity that will, so we have to get real and discuss what the solutions could be, to resolve issues of both sides as to not give anyone a chance to accuse anyone else again. I hope we can all agree on this.
How come when we say the truth about History, you reply “accusations and enmity” and when you talk about history from your own looking glass we have to accept that ?
why don’t you accept your bad habits and your bad actions and keep quite about Islam’s slaughters and instead you present it as the best civilization of all?
Please, you have to be truthfull and honest, accept the truth that Islam and muslims have aggressive culture and invading mentality and try hard to understand that, so that we all, to have peaceful coexistence and love of each other.
Please, do not say, the sword of peace, when talking about the muslim invasions of foreign lands and the success of the coversions. You whitewash the Truth. That whether you like it or not, Islam and Islamic culture is an aggressive culture. Never ceases to accuse other civilisations and cultures of being decadent and false. Shame! Double language …
Pierra, do you know that when you repeat to a child for several years that he is very dumb, that he will start believing it? (Of course you do.) Is this what you are trying to do with us? Trying to convince us that we are aggressive, or that we should want to be aggressive or should be aggressive? I fear that your approach is…not completely the right way to go
I can admit to you right here and now, that many Muslims throughout history have done atrocities, but you can’t deny that the mentality behind such people and the people out of which came the great scholars, scientists, philosophers, sufis, people with heart, generosity and passion, are complete opposites. And obviously, you have the black sheep, and the white lions, though in our time these white lions have been reduced, and the black sheep have the power, for some centuries now.
Well said Amir, and to add something more, how do you feel about the thousands of people that embrace Islam every year? You know Islam is the fastest growing religion based on numbers. What do you think about the converts? that are bored to live peacfully and civilized and decided to become more “active”, being aggressive and the women more oppressed than used to be?
Can you see the controversy between the stereotypes that Pierra refers to and the facts? When will you look at the facts? Which history you people read? the history that is taught at our high schools? You can double check her accuracy by comparing the Hellenic religion and how it is mentioned at the books. Exactly the same happened with the rest history books as you can realize. So please check more about History, old and new as well as the history of our region. then you will start realizing the whole world picture and avoid sterotypes. Otherwise all britons should wear kilts, all germans drink beer, all french eat cheese, all greeks eat musaka and dance syrtaki all day long. So Pleeeeeaaaaseee!!!
I don’t think Pierra is trying to as Amir Abdullah suggest to ‘convince people in this forum that Muslims are aggressive, or that should want to be aggressive or should be aggressive, All that is mentioned is that Muslim civilization similar to all civilizations on Earth has had to a certain degree and continues to have an aggressive culture and invading mentality. Does this mean all Muslims are aggressive? Of course not, no more than all Christans or other people are aggressive, however history is full of examples of violence conducted by all types of people belonging to a wide selection of religions including Islam.
Now there are some people that will never accept recorded history as truth and deny that their religion or society is capable of conducting violence, however the truth is there for anyone to read who may be interested in uncovering past events. As Greeks we are extremely fortunate to have recorded history as far back as over two and a half thousand years. As someone who has studied the Greek classical period at university and has conducted archaeological surveys in Greece I can tell that still after 20 years of formal and informal studying I am barely understanding our past, yet I know enough to truly appreciate the impact our civilizations has contributed to Western Europe and World history. I cannot alone convince you what makes Greeks different and special, however I stongly suggest you open your minds to beauty of our past, read an introductory book on ancient Greece, visit if you can the ancient sites, go to an ancient play, visit a museum, and imagine if you can the glory that was our civilization. If the written texts of our ancestors and the structures they left behind does not inspire you as a Greek, then nothing ever will.
Getting back to the question at hand, what makes us so different, I believe people are different on many levels, history, culture, religion, politics, yet their at the same time we all share universal principals, justice, hope, compasion, empathy etc.
Cyprus is Greek. Cyprus was always Greek. Turkish Cypriots aren’t even Turkish. They were Greek Catholics forced to convert to Islam or be slaughtered. This is why the terrorist, Mustafa Kemel Atuturk was the hero of Hitler. He successfully slaughtered 4 million Orthodox Christians. He also slaughtered 2 million Kurds. The Turks continue to slaughter Kurds. Even though they are Muslims as they are. So religion was not the reason they committed genocide.
On July 20th, 1974 the barbarian Turkish army invaded our Greek island for no reason. Not one Turk was ever attack, killed, raped or forced to convert to Christianity. They destroyed our churches, stole our houses, and destroyed our dead relatives graves. We, Greeks never did that and mulsim cemetries are taken care of with respect. Why? We are civilized can’t say that about the barbarian turks.
Turkish Cypriots, Greek Catholics forced to convert, can travel, work, live, educate their children and get “free” medical care in the Free part of Cyprus. While, we can see our destroyed churches, relatives tombes and strangers living in our homes. That is how we are different from the barbarian turkish military regime. They want 1/3 of our country for 40,000 enslaved turkish Cypriots. There are only 800,000 people in the whole country. That means 760,000 people have to suffer for whose’s safely? The 40,000 enslaved people?
If Turks are civilized they should leave our island. We don’t want anything from them but to leave and never to return. We want justice. That is how Greeks are different from the barbarian Turk. We are civilized and the turks give uncivilized people a bad name.