Free A God Who Hates by Wafa Sultan

aim, which was, indeed, gain and booty. The Koran mentions booty more than once. It does not forbid it: On the contrary, it entitles the Prophet to take a fifth of it and, so that his followers will not be angry at the size of his share, the name of God is appended to that of the Prophet, and the verse was revealed as follows: “And know that out of all the booty that ye may acquire [in war], a fifth share is assigned to Allah, and to the Messenger, and to near relatives, orphans, the needy, and the wayfarer.” (8:41).
    In his commentary on the Koran Al-Qurtubi * explains the phrase “and know that out of all the booty ye may acquire” as follows: You took something from the unbelievers by force. This indicates that booty was seized against the will of its rightful owners. Muslim commentators on the Koran could not agree as to how God could take his share of the booty and to whom his share would be given. They simply gave the Prophet the right to dispose of God’s share.
    Muhammad did not want to leave room for argument with his followers regarding the division of the spoils, and so suggested that these be split five ways, with himself and God receiving one fifth. Had Muhammad suggested that he alone receive a fifth there would have been widespread protest: How could one individual take a fifth of the spoils for himself and leave four fifths for the thousands of others. But when he said “a fifth share is assigned to Allah and to the Messenger,” the problem faded, and the others found it hard to arouse dissent. If Almighty and Exalted God had agreed to share his fifth portion with the Prophet, why should the others, however numerous, not be satisfied with the other four fifths?
    Here, once again, we see the survival instinct playing a decisive role in the teachings and rulings of Islam, which emerged in an environment dominated by the shadow of the unknown, where death from hunger and thirst posed a constant threat to its inhabitants. Another saying attributed to Muhammad in this connection is: “the killer has the right to his spoils,” meaning that when a Muslim kills a non-Muslim, he has the right to despoil him. This
hadith
(Muhammad saying) has caused differences of opinion among Muslims. Some wondered how the killer could be entitled to the spoils when the Koranic verse orders the booty to be divided five ways.
    In an attempt to find a compromise between the differing views, some suggested that if there was little to plunder, what little there was belonged to the killer, while if there was a lot, it was divided into five parts. This emphasizes once again the struggle for survival.
    In America, when you commit a crime, the first thing the investigators look for is the motive behind the killing. If the victim’s wallet and money are found on his body, and if everything in his home is where it should be, the investigators will say, “Basically, theft was not the motive; there would appear to be other motives.” But when they establish his possessions are missing, the investigation takes a different turn, as the motives for the murder are different in this case, and it can be surmised that theft is the most important motive behind the killing.
    While Muslims justify the Prophet’s raids by saying that they were carried out in self-defense, I don’t believe that they can justify the theft and the spoils that were gained as a result of this raiding. If someone attacked you suddenly in the dark and tried to kill you and you managed to kill him instead, you could, in such a case, justify your killing him as self-defense. But if you were to steal his wallet and his money after you had killed him, would you be able to justify that by saying: I stole his wallet in self-defense? If you were speaking the truth when you said that you had killed him in self-defense, would you be speaking the truth when you said you had stolen his wallet in self-defense, after you had killed him, too?
    The raids Muhammad carried out in