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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]

Actually Allah said if a concubine asks for her freedom, the owner should negotiate it. So it would seem odd that Allah would ask for owners to grant concubines freedom but simultaneously permit owners to have forcible sex with them. A God compassionate enough to encourage her freedom is not going to also be callous enough to permit an owner to treat a concubine as a chair or table.[/quote]

There is no scriptural support for the concubine having an option to say, no Abdullah, I don't think I want to be your concubine, thanks very much.

[b]But the absence of scriptural support does not negate that possibility. We know from the passages that do exist in the Quran that fair and just treatment was ordered by owners toward their concubines. We can infer from those passages that such treatment should be extended to all aspects of the relationship.
[/b]
"Granting freedom" is not the same as "do X for X years, then we'll see."
[b]The granting of freedom is the end result of negotiation.
[/b]
Being allotted to men by their leader does sound very much like being treated like furniture.[/quote]
They  were slaves and, like I said before, you can not possibly understand how Islam dealt with concubinage without first accepting how different life was at the time. It was likely inconceivable for people to imagine life without slavery and concubinage. As I stated before also, concubinage pre-dated Islam. It was mentioned in the Bible. [/quote]

And as several of us mentioned, you failed to prove your point about concubinage and slavery in the New Testament. [b]Not a single one of your 3 New Testament quotes proved your point and, in fact, 2 of your 3 New Testament quotes actually disproved your point and are used by Christians to support monogamy.[/b] The irony!

More important, we're talking about God/Allah here, and s/he could have done anything, including banning slavery and concubinage - that's the whole point.[/quote]

[b]It was provided. You chose to gloss over it though. So here's another writeup from another Christian writer:

"Concubines are married to a True Christian man. Concubine is a woman living in a lawful marriage arrangement with a man, but whose status is regarded as being less than a wife. A concubine is especially recommended by the Bible if the wife is unable to have children (e.g. Sarah suggested that her husband Abraham take Hagar as a concubine i.e. Genesis 16:1-3).
We True Christians have a simpler, quicker marriage for adding concubines to a man. The concubine is expected to be equally chaste, submissive, and loyal to the man as any true wife! However, concubines are not actual wives, so they can be released from service, or traded to another concubine with another True Christian man (not just anyone!) if so desired.
A woman who wants a True Christian husband but is not a virgin has the option to become a concubine. Of course, health check and STD tests are required.
The concubine was a wife of secondary rank. There are various laws recorded providing for their protection (Ex. 21:7; Deut. 21:10-14), and setting limits to the relation they sustained to the household to which they belonged (Gen. 21:14; 25:6). They had no authority in the family, nor could they share in the household government.
There are no passages in the Bible that condemn concubines. God was displeased with Solomon's approximately 1,000 wives and concubines. But it was not because of the polygynous arrangement. God was concerned that many of the women were foreigners, and worshiped foreign Gods. They eventually lead Solomon to stray from worshipping Yahweh. (1 King 11:1-6).
There is no indication that Jesus indicated disapproval of any other forms of marriage. He never criticized polygnyous marriages, levirate marriages, or any of the other marriage types mentioned in the bible.
John the Baptist criticized Herod's polygynous marriage to Herodias. (Matthew 14:3). But the criticism was based on the inappropriate choice of Heodias, since she was the wife of his brother Philip. John did not criticize the fact that it was a polygynous marriage.
Some interpret Jesus' comments on divorce in (Mark 10:2 & Matthew 19:3) as proof that Jesus supported only the usual "one man, one woman" type of marriage. But his response "So they are no longer two but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate" was in answer to a specific question from the Pharisees: whether "a man" was allowed to divorce "his wife." (Matthew 19:3). Jesus' response, which denied a man the right of a man to divorce his wife, does shows that at least Jesus acknowledged the nuclear, one-man-one-woman marriage. But it does not exclude support for the other types of family structure, listed above. Polygyny was less common during the 1st century CE than it was in earlier times, but it was still practiced. For example, Herod the Great had nine wives."
[/b]

[b]If you are a Christian, then you accept the Old Testament too. Here's a Bible lesson that explains the truth about how and why the Bible did permit slavery, polygamy, and concubines. 
http://www.biblestudylessons.net/faqs/polygamy1.htm[/b][/quote]

I'm a Christian and I reject this as nonsense, as do most of the Christians that I know. We know that Christianity is an evolving religion that can't be practiced as it was practiced hundreds of years ago -- or even 100 years ago. I have no problem with that. Where do Muslims reject the parts of their religion that make them appear brutal and backward? I only know what I see in the media. I'd like to hear the good parts of this religion.[/quote]

The vast majority of Muslims DO NOT HAVE CONCUBINES, EVEN IN WAR TIME. Thus, Muslims are like Christians in this regard. However, our Islamophobe poster said what people actually believe or do is irrelevant. She wanted to see proof in the scriptures that concubinage was prohibited. I'm showing here that it was neither explicitly prohibited in the Biblical or the Quranic scriptures. However, in the Quran it was indeed eradicated in stages by systematically raising the status of the concubine and / or her children and imposing restrictions on her and her children's treatment and care. Society has evolved, however.

The good parts of Islam are many. I believe I've shown in this thread that Islam was the first religion to systematically eradicate concubinage. It's a start. I will continue to post more information about Islam in other threads.[/quote]

I guess what most of us are responding to is what we see on the news, happening today -- which is women and girls being kidnapped and "married" or kept as sex slaves. I get that that is probably extremists but what about the normal members of society who arrange for child brides and kill women who "shame" their families? Seems accepted by society.[/quote]

It is a complete abomination for families to engage in honor killings. However, they exist in tribal areas or areas deeply influenced by culture. Many of the girls or young women that were killed had engaged in fornication or adultery but even the Quran does not prescribe death (by stoning or any other method) for fornication or adultery.

As for arranging child brides, however - engagement is permitted at a very early age. Girls may be engaged to a boy from another family through their parents but the actual marriage does not and should not take place until the girl is much older. I have Hindu friends who were engaged via families at the age of 4 but they did not marry until they were 22 years. Often times this happens between families that are close, or families that want to unite their children to form a closer bond with one another. However, when they are older, they may not be forced into marriage against their will. Islam requires the consent of both parties.[/quote]

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