Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Ismail Ax

From (the dubiously accurate ) Wikipedia:

In Islam, Ishmael [Ismai] is known as the first-born son of Abraham (Ibrahim in Arabic) from Hagar, and as an appointed prophet of God.
Although Ishmael's name was not mentioned in the Qur'an as the son who was supposed to be sacrificed, nevertheless the sacrifice tale in the Qur'an (As-Saffat [37:112]) clearly states that God gave Abraham the good news of Isaac and who he will be (a prophet, and one of the Righteous) after the sacrifice tale has finished which means that Isaac was not yet born at the time of the sacrifice[2]. In Islamic beliefs, Abraham had prayed to God for a son ('Isma' in Arabic means 'to listen', i.e., answer prayer, and 'ell' is derived from the Hebrew word 'elle', meaning 'God'). God delivered this child to Abraham, and later tested Abraham's faith by asking him to sacrifice his only son at the time. However, just as Abraham was to kill his only son, God halted him, praised him for his loyalty, and commanded him to sacrifice a ram instead. This leads to the Muslim practice of sacrificing domesticated animals such as sheep, goats or cows, on the celebration to mark this event known as Eid ul-Adha.
According to The Oxford Companion To The Bible, "Because Ishmael was circumcised (Gen. 17:25), so are most Muslims. And, analogous to Paul's reversal of the figures of Isaac and Ishmael (Gal. 4:24-26), Muslim tradition makes Ishmael rather than Isaac the son Abraham was commanded to sacrifice."[4]


Not to jump the gun or anything, but I just wondered what the heck "Ismail Ax" could mean. Regardless, I would bet this was more a case of "crazy-nutjob" than Islamic radical.

But, sometimes, those two things are not mutually exclusive.