Do you mean mishtake or shitake mushrooms?

What part? That 300 year window? I'm curious myself but as I said I'm looking for more information but what I tried to explain was the neurological reasons that may have caused Islam to go into the dark ages after a 300 year pursuit of math and science. Most of stars and mathematical expressions have an Arabic origin so what went on and what killed it? I provided a major clues and regardless of the history a damaged hippocampus is causal for superstitious beliefs whatever the history. That goes for rats and probably the hippopotamus too.

Stephen Schwartz
Executive Director, Center for Islamic Pluralism

Essential principles shared by most Muslim Sufis include emphasis on commonalities with other faiths and traditions, which has contributed to improved relations between Muslims and Jews, Christians, Buddhists and other non-Islamic believers. Commentators concerned to denigrate Islam altogether have asserted that Sufis, even if they embody moderation and mutual respect among people of religion, comprise no more than 5 percent of the world's Muslims. Since the importance of Sufism stands, in the minds of many Westerners, on demographic measurement, let us therefore ask: How many Sufis are found in the Muslim world

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Damn,
Talk about giving yourself away dude. Or maybe you don't understand what you type?

Anyways its in black and white in the article I posted the link for.

But for those that didn't click on the article I post the question and answer here.

US News & World Report-
From the article "Paying Attention to the other Islam."

Of the some 1.2 billion Muslims today, approximately how many are Sufi's?

Husain Haqqani, who is now Pakistans Ambassador to the United States, had a conversation with me about this, and he said that we were pretty legitimate in saying that half of the Muslims in the world either are Sufi's or consider themselves to be pretty much under Sufi influence or in some ways follow Sufi precepts.

When you start breaking it down demographically and look at large Muslim societies like India, Indonesia, Egypt, Morocco, French-speaking west Africa, Turkey, and some parts of Central Asia, that figure of about half makes sense.

I've developed the proposition that you have two kinds of Sufism. You have a kind of generally diffuse Sufism in Muslim societies where basically the Islam of the whole society is very saturated with Sufism.
Indonesia is one specific example of this.

Then, overlapping with that, you have societies with the organized teriqat(orders), where Sufism is a social institution.

In countries like Morocco, Kosovo, Turkey, Sufism is really belonging to a movement, going on Tuesday or Saturday night to dhikrs( ceremonies devoted to remembering God); its having a sheik and going to regular lectures, and participating in some of the social-welfare activities.

You guys who think that Islam and all other religions are evil are missing the point. Any human institution can be corrupted by it's leadership or by misdirected intentions of it's followers.
There is nothing that can corrupt a sincere prayer, and prayer is the essence of all religion. You can spout off that you don't believe in prayer and would never think to practice it, and you would be lying. Everyone prays.

When your kid is sick and you sit and yearn for relief for him/her, you are praying.
When you are experiencing the joy of some simple task or pastime, you are praying
When you are in focused attention to listening to someone else’s problem and trying to be a good listener, you are praying.
When your lover cries in your arms and you hurt for her, you are praying.
when you focus your mind on some choice of right or wrong action in your life, you are praying.
When your intention and intellect and emotions and actions are in harmony it is a very powerful prayer.

It's a fundamental function of being a human being with awareness, because awareness is all we are, and awareness is a shared attribute of every human being and everything that is alive.

Sufis and Christian mystics and Spiritual people in general tend to focus their prayers inward, seeking connection. When that is achieved outer labels of religion, nationality, race become meaningless.

chriss

Lying ,and streaching the truth, may be what is at stake here.
sufi is a bonafide branch of islam, a small one, but a branch, as is Baha'i, but they are not the same as Sunni or Shia, though parts of it can be shared, which was the exageration used in your post.
Both are discriminated against by the larger branches, and yes these two are probably the least to worry about in the islamic world.
ut they are such a tiny percentage they hardly represent islam.

@ Iam:

"Yet Islamic theocracies are a threat to modern civilization. You could post the Sermon on the Mount too yet Christianity has murdered more people and destroyed civilization more than any other religion including Islam.

But where did the Islamic pursuit of science go? Why did it stop?"

You are not wrong, but there are those who turn thier faces upward despite the culture surounding themand try to do the right thing regardless of dogma. And they are not unique to thiesm, athiesm, or any other circumstance of birth.

I'm a white guy and MY predecessors commited atrocities on a number of people, starting with the NA and progressing westwards beyond the shores and into the philipenes, another genocide.

I'm not wearing any guilt or blame for that just because I'm white, I know better and try to promote ideas that question those kind of activities.
You can't condemn all white people because of the actions of a few, and you can't logicaly vilify any religion broadside for the same reason.
I'm glad that you speak up for logic and reason, BTW there isn't enough of that.

Spend some time reading his credentials

I said this before to someone else regarding this same video:

"Actually, did you ever stop to consider that it was the Mongols' sack of Baghdad that made it stop being the worldwide center for learning? This sack took place in 1258 CE. It was so bad that people said that the Tigris River was black and red - it was black from the ink of books and red from the blood of the people the Mongols killed. And before this were the crusades.

It's a painful moment in our history, but it was fate and it was as He willed. The Mongols ended up converting to Islaam later on so not all was lost."

OMG I am going to have to spend the day catching up on videos, Thank you all very much.
This PBS series is awesome, if you have an hour to watch. The producers do a great job of bringing the viewer into the desert and setting the stage in context of the times and prevailing culture. Even without the biography, it is a significant immersion into arab history.

Yes, it was in documentary asanb posted. The Mongol catastrophe. The Mongols themselves eventually became Muslim ironically but I'm not yet seeing this as the turning point where Islam falls into the wild fanatical terrorist religion that is is today. I keep saying when we look at fanatical Muslims today we are seeing what Christians were like during the dark ages.

Don't take this the wrong way. I am not defending Islam, maybe that 300 year period at most.....

Actually, the Muslims of today who are fighting are nothing like the Christians back then who fought:

1.) The Crusaders killed mercilessly on a very large scale (repeatedly). Islaam has rules in warfare unlike any other religion to the best of my knowledge.

3.) The Prophet already told us the reason for our demise:

I already know about your hatred of Islaam.

your reasoning has no basements,all what your job is about to be negative forever and bash around to feel and look at you(oh nobody can beat me up)if you come in clean hands,mouth,brain,we would like to teach you a little bit what you dont know,but you are pushing US not to be encouraged to talk to you,thus why we just avoid you or ignore you,any coward can easily call names,insult,do you know why?i wont answer it,i will let you answer,ok?

You're right. Christians back then weren't suicidal bombers.

The crusades killed anything in their path. If the couldn't reach Jerusalem they killed the Jews which probably made Muslims feel a kinship with Christians.

Self fulfilling prophesies are cheap. A lot of religions do that in their disclaimer message.

Its hard to not hate cancer or anything whose sole purpose is to destroy anything around them.

Meanwhile you offered nothing useful to explain why Islam fell after that 300 year period and never recovered to its former glory. Islam is an empty shell and has been for most of its existence. Its not worthy of respect and gives none even for its own followers.

haha, the worst Muslim is better than the best disbeliever in the sight of our Lord. So we would care about your opinion because.......?

Your religion proves that by raping and murdering women for no good reason and act out like violent maniacs throughout the world over cartoons and poorly made videos.

Now here is a video Muslims should actually approve of.

Your religion proves that by raping and murdering women for no good reason and act out like violent maniacs throughout the world over cartoons and poorly made videos.

Now here is a video Muslims should actually approve of.


aw comon man, it's just a bunch of muslims havin fun, doing what they do best,
i get a kick out of the smiles in the faces of the participants, really enjoying doing Gods work.

besides this stuff was obviousaly filmed thousands of years ago, and they don't do it today.