Me Criticize Mr. Zakir Naik

It's not just his views on terror; Zakir Naik's teachings promote disharmony. But a ban won't help.
 

Does Dr Zakir Naik promote terrorism? On Thursday, the

NIA arrested memebr of the Islamic Research Foundation founded by Dr Naik, for having motivated kerela muslims to join Daesh. This allegation has yet to be proved. But Naik's lectures have cropped up in the background of other Daesh followers and terrorists.

In his lectures, Dr Zakir Naik doest not encourage terrorism  But his disapproval of it is never devoid of caveats.

Perhaps the strongest condemnation of terror came in his answer to an Indian who asked whether it was ok for him to resort to terrorist acts on finding all doors closed to him, including those of the courts, after incidents such as Gujarat and the Mumbai riots.

Most of Naik's Lengthy answers was spent expressing empathy for the questioner's feelings. Anyone would feel that way, said Naik, "unless he had worn bangles''. 

Only at the very end, he pointed out: "But you have the Quran, and the Quran prohibits the killing of innocents.''

The relief on the young man's face was palpable.

However, Naik has expressed support for Osama bin Laden as one who "terrorises the biggest terrorist, i.e. America''. This was before 9/11, but, as Naik's own words show, Osama was a terrorist even then. 

In the same answer, Naik compared a terrorist with a policeman who terrorizes a criminal.

Similarly, while declaring that he himself is against suicide bombing, he points out that other Islamic scholars approve of it as a war-time tactic. But some terrorist organisations proclaim that Muslims are always at war with the West, even with India.
 

Naik has always declared that Islam is the only true religion, hence no other religion can be allowed to be propagated in an Islamic country. A Muslim who converts and propagates another religion, even if it is atheism, deserves death. (This answer by Naik in 2010 to a Muslim in the Maldives who admitted to being an atheist, forced the police to whisk the man away for his own protection. He was imprisoned and finally recanted.)

In his celebrated lecture on the similarities between Islam and Hinduism, Naik quotes Hindu scripture only insofar as it matches the Quran in saying that there is just one formless God, and refers to Prophet Mohammed (according to Naik). The rest of Hindu scripture, he declares, is full of illogicalities.

On such views is based his advice to Muslims on living with other faiths.

Naik advises Muslims not to attend Ganpati pujas and eat prasad until their Hindu friends prove that Shiv and Ganesh are gods, which just can't be, he says, given the story of Ganesh's birth. 

I still recall his answer when asked to explain his claim that all subjects in his school - including science - would be taught from an Islamic perspective: "Sister, Islam is a scientific religion; Hinduism is irrational.''

Similarly, he advises Muslims not to wish Christians "Merry X'Mas'' as that would mean accepting that Christ was the "begotten son of God". To think that Allah could beget a child was a sure way to go to Hell.
 

The Taliban's destruction of the Bamyan Buddhas was aimed at "educating Buddhists about their own religion'', says Naik; the Buddha neither claimed to be god nor did he want his idols made.

Naik chides Muslim businessmen for caring more for their business than for Allah, because they do not try to convert their Hindu clients, for fear of losing them. Hence they do not fulfill their Islamic duty of inviting others to Islam.