Rev. Franklin Graham: President Obama 'born a Muslim'

[IndianaGreen]

Rev. Franklin Graham: President Obama 'born a Muslim'

The Rev. Franklin Graham on Friday said that President Barack Obama was “born a Muslim” because the religion’s “seed” is passed from the father.

Graham made the remark during an interview with CNN’s John King set to air Friday night after being asked about a new Pew poll showing that 31 percent of Republicans believe the president — a Christian — is Muslim.

Asked by King if he, too, believes the president is a Muslim, Graham said that Obama’s “problem is he was born a Muslim.”

“The seed is passed through the father,” Graham said. “He was born a Muslim. His father was a Muslim; the seed of Muslim is passed through the father like the seed of Judaism is passed through the mother. He was born a Muslim; his father gave him an Islamic name.”

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0810/41292.html#ixzz0xABJNc8X

This is so wrong on so many levels that I don't know where to start. I will only say that my Jewish mother made me a Jew by birth, but I was not beholden to remaining a Jew or being Orthodox like she was. A Jewish father would not have made me a Jew had my mother been non-Jewish.

I don't know of any other religion that says that a parent's religion makes a child a member of that religion, certainly not Islam or Christianity. The only exception being the Catholic Church that counts children born to Catholics as being Catholics, even if they don't practice that faith later in life.

There is a whiff of racism in Rev. Graham's comments.

[TheCowsCameHome]

1. Who is Franklin Graham? I really don't know,

and it's not that I care.

[Seedersandleechers]

2. I think his father Billy

was much more tolerant - but I could be wrong. After all Billy raised him.

[IndianaGreen]

10. Billy Graham was quite a rightwing firebrand back in the 1950s

He was Joe McCarthy with a clerical collar!

[RamboLiberal]

12. Not when he was behind closed doors with Tricky Dicky Nixon

Except then it was the evil Jews!

A 1973 conversation between President Nixon and evangelist Billy Graham about Jews, laden with critical references including a Biblical verse on the "synagogue of Satan," has put the aging, frail Graham back in unwelcome headlines.
The conversation is part of newly-released secretly recorded tapes from the Nixon presidency, from the U.S. National Archives in College Park, Md., and the Richard Nixon Presidential Library in Yorba Linda, Calif. A sampling of more than 150 hours of tape recordings and 30,000 pages of documents from two months in 1973 were made public Tuesday (download at Nixon.archives.gov/National Archives), culled from 4,000 hours of taped meetings and phone calls in a two-year period.

An earlier release of tapes in 2002 shocked fans of Graham, who is heard agreeing with Nixon as the president rails against liberal Jews' political activism and media clout. Graham tells Nixon how Jews befriend him but adds, "They don't know how I really feel about what they're doing to this country."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2009-06-24-graham-tapes_N.htm

[AngryAmish]

29. so do I

[Mz Pip]

3. Religion is a choice

not something that resides in one's DNA. And yes, his father named him, or rather his parents did. That's sort of how it works. You don't get to name yourself unless you want to change your name after you turn 18. It has nothing to do with DNA. A Muslim name, whatever that means, does not make you a Muslim.

[IndianaGreen]

13. Graham is making religion a racial thing, like the Nazis did

We have seen where this path leads to.

[maxsolomon]

15. I thought you were Jewish if you mom was

maybe Muslims have something similar?

or is Judaism a religion and an ethnicity?

from wiki:
According to halakha, the oldest normative definition used by Jews for self-identification, a person is matrilineally a Jew by birth, or becomes one through conversion to Judaism. Adherence to this definition has been challenged since the emergence of the Karaite sect, emergence of modern groups in Judaism since the 19th century, and the creation of Israel in 1948.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_is_a_Jew%3F

[Mz Pip]

16. Interesting

Good read. Learn something new everyday.

Since I'm not Jewish by birth or any other way I probably shouldn't comment and leave it to the experts, but from the way I read that it seems more like ethnicity rather than religion. Ethnicity is something that is passed on; religion is something that one chooses to practice. But that's just my opinion; I could be wrong.

Do Muslims have something similar? I don't know. I do know a couple of people who grew up in the Muslim faith but do not practice it any longer. I know one of them does not consider himself Muslim anymore, but I don't know if that is a common belief.

FOr what it's worth I come from a long line of practicing Catholics and do not consider myself Catholic or any other religion for that matter.

[maxsolomon]

20. same boat.

i call myself a post-catholic!

[mzmolly]

26. Isn't Graham supposed to be a Christian? If so, why is he defering to a Muslim doctrine?

In doing so, he's going against the very religion he claims to represent.

[Bluerthanblue]

4. Franklin Graham's father was a Democrat when

his seed created him. (Rev.Billy Graham) So I guess by his reasoning that makes him a Democrat by birth?

:shrug:

this is so silly- and sad, that the media thinks this is something that needs or is worthy of being broadcast.

:shrug: :shrug: shrug:

[no_hypocrisy]

5. A whiff? I'd say outright stench.

And from a so-called man of God to boot.

Shame

[rsmith6621]

6. What Was The Last Cause This EFFFN Pastor

.....fought for those in this country who are less fortunate...... Graham is nothing but a mouth spout-n conservative tool...What Graham forgets is that we all are born into sin if he want to maintain the spiritual line...Who EFFFN appointed him Judge.

The church is more interested in this discussion than helping the poor...

....EFFFN HYPOCRITE

[Jennicut]

7. So now you are born into a religion? Silly me, I had no idea.

What idiotic stupidity is this ignorant BS?

[JBoy]

9. I'm relieved. Having been born to two Christian parents

I won't have to do any of that "accepting Jesus as my personal savior" stuff, attend church or anything. I can live the life of a hedonistic atheist without fear.

When my day of reckoning comes, I just flash my pass and it's into heaven baby!

[opihimoimoi]

8. People born of GOP parents prone to be GOP because of parental SEED?

am i getting this wrong??

[Dulcinea]

11. I always heard that children are the religion of their mothers.

At least that's what Judaism teaches: "A Jew is any person whose mother was a Jew or any person who has gone through the formal process of conversion to Judaism."

http://www.jewfaq.org/whoisjew.htm

I don't think President Obama's mother was a Muslim.

[Vinca]

14. Apparently the idiot seed has passed through the Graham family.

[Mz Pip]

17. That for sure is genetic.

He seems to be particularly gifted in that respect.

[Jefferson23]

18. Hopefully Franklin's seeds dry up before he can pass on more bigotry to the next generation. n/t

[flpoljunkie]

19. Our president can do without such disingenuous and thinly veiled support.

No surprise coming from the likes of Franklin Graham.

[fogonthelake]

21. That comment is beyond the Silly Season of stupid comments.

[TheKentuckian]

22. Franklin, you can only become a Christian by choice. What your parents did or didn't do cannot

replace or nullify your personal relationship with Christ.

LIAR!!!

Did Jesus question "the seed" of the man who helped him carry his cross, or the Roman Centurion that came to him, or when he said to spread his word throughout the world?????

Did he dismisses his disciples? Was he himself not called Rabbi?

Christians do more harm to Christ than a Hell full of devils.

[lynne]

23. I've seen this elsewhere so its not just from Graham. Supposed it has to do with Muslim law -

- but I'm not muslim so I have no idea. It was in a NY Times article from 2008, link below, FWIW -

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/12/opinion/12luttwak.html

[mzmolly]

25. But Christianity is supposed to be the "truth and the way" is it not?

It's also supposed to be available to all who seek it, so how do these loons rectify their blatant, anti-biblical contradiction?

[mzmolly]

24. So the rev is going against the message of the Bible and Christianity?

http://www.sbc.net/knowjesus/theplan.asp

"If you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved." Romans 10:9-10

Here's what these people are saying over and over again.

1. "Muslims" attacked us on 911.
2. "Muslims" are terrorists.
3. Terrorists should be killed.
4. Obama is a Muslim, therefor he's a terrorist who should be dealt with accordingly.

These people are trolling for assassins, as Frank Schaeffer points out over and over again. And, we need to do something about it.

[Perky]

27. Idiocy. Being Jewish is a nationality, Being Moslem is not.

Being Jewish is also a religion, but conflating the two is just stunnigly ignorant.

[Alcibiades]

28. He also says Obama is a Christian

Count on politico to bury the lede: "He has renounced Islam, and he has accepted Jesus,"

Evangelicals love religious conversion. Why so much doubt in this particular instance? Has not Franklin Graham himself called on Muslims to convert to Christianity? And why is that the whatever "Muslim rules" about religious status Franklin claims to assert knowledge of supersede Christian ones? Doesn't the sacred blood of Christ the Redeemer wash away all stain?

Apparently not.

Also, why the insistence that Obama must be a Muslim because his father, who was an atheist, gave him a Muslim name? Is every kid named Joshua, Abraham, or David Jewish? Would he because he had some sort of desire to be like his father in some way? Here, again, they show no understanding: if you have an absentee father who is thousands of miles away with a new family while you're struggling, why would you want to be like him? Anyone who has read the President's book on his father can read the not-so-subtle subtext of seething resentment. Of course, that would entail reading, something Graham probably doesn't often do.

[polichick]

30. The difference between Billy and Franklin is a good example of...

...what's happened in this country with the rise of Christian extremists.

[Hansel]

31. There's a religion seed. Who knew?

Does the Christian ones have little crosses or fishes on them?

Why does anyone listen to these idiots? Oh wait, never mind.

[saltpoint]

32. Man, this is well past the outfield and deep into the

parking lot, in the very last row, next to the dumpsters.

Am I letting my already long-standing revulsion at Franklin Graham inform this position?

You bet.

[shimmergal]

33. And there's more than a whiff

of sexism in all that talk about "seeds."

[Igel]

34. Check out Malaysia.

If the husband of your mother is Muslim, you are born Muslim. If you do something else in practice, that may be your business; but you're still Muslim, that's what your ID card says. Therefore, you're subject to the shar'iah courts.

You don't get to decide if you want to convert. The court allows you to or not. Your religion is a question of official status, not practice. Changing religions is very, very difficult.

Same holds true in Pakistan, Iran, Egypt, Syria, Libya, and other "Muslim" countries.

In this, it's rather like ethnicity is in the West. You can be born Latino, develop a Korean fetish and adopt Korean ethnic trappings, learn Korean and eat no chalupas but lots of kimchee. You remain Latino.

So Graham isn't entirely wrong. There's a reasonably sized group of Muslims who agree with him. Racist or not: Obama's father was born Muslim, therefore he was Muslim; he had a son, who obligatorily was Muslim, whatever he may say, and unless he's officially changed his religion with shari'ah-court approval he remains a Muslim. Moreover, his children are necessarily Muslim, as well. Absurd? Sure. But that's the result of a medieval code meant for one sort of society being applied where it fits very, very poorly.

On the other hand, Graham is far from being right. There's a reasonably-sized group of Muslims who believe that you are what you say. The shari'ah court has no jurisdiction over permitting conversions--whatever numerous governments might say. You start eating pork and going to a Baptist church, you're Xian. In the west, the very idea of some court being in charge of deciding if you can convert is an absurdity.

Well, unless you're Israel, then a court has to determine if your conversion, no matter what your actual behavior is, was valid. Again, mixing of religion and ethnicity.

The Ottomans really were a scourge, weren't they?

[mitchum]

35. And the grifter seed must also pass through the father

[Radical Activist]

36. Does that mean Franklin was born a sanctimonious asshole?

It would stand to reason.