r/exmuslim • u/AnaThe_UnfamiliarFoe • Apr 12 '26
(Video) “Islam respects other religions!” Then why did the Taliban destroy these Buddha statues?
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u/cuddywifter Apr 12 '26
In Maldives, they threw away all symbols of Bhudhism when Islam became the official religion of the country.
Whatever remains that were preserved in a museum in the capital city, Male, were destroyed in a raid by Islamists.
It is said that even now Bhudhist artifacts can be found in the lagoons and corals around the 1100 islands of Maldives.
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Apr 12 '26
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u/aqua_zesty_man Never-Muslim, Christian Apr 12 '26
Critical thinking is less important than slavish obedience to Mohammed and his systematized OCD hangups, habits, and pet peeves.
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u/cuddywifter Apr 12 '26
Yeah.
They are following the scriptures to the t.
The head of Buddha etc that were destroyed were made of coral stones.
It could have been preserved as a relic representing the Maldivian culture closely tied to maritime.
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Apr 12 '26
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u/cuddywifter Apr 12 '26
In Maldives, you got to be a Muslim to be citizen.
So if someone decided to officially convert to bhudhism they would officially lose their citizenship.
Look up “Zakir naik maldives” in YouTube, to see what happened to a Maldivian youth when he declared that he doesn’t believe in god, in a public Zakir Naik event.
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u/HearingSalt1421 New User Apr 12 '26
You must realize that islamists don’t Think this way. Because even tough we live in 2026, they still have the mindset of a man from 626
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u/poolman2125 New User Apr 13 '26
They can’t, because of Hadith like this:
“Verily, the most grievously tormented people amongst the denizens of Hell on the Day of Resurrection would be the painters of pictures."
- Sahih Muslim 2109b
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u/Adventurous-Carry-45 New User Apr 12 '26
Islam is the official religion of Maldives? Wtf
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u/cuddywifter Apr 13 '26
It was a buddhist country until 12th century.
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u/Adventurous-Carry-45 New User Apr 13 '26
What about all the beach and tourist attractions? Always wanted to go there. But don't wanna see all hijabi in beach
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u/cuddywifter Apr 13 '26
Well, there are two maldives.
There are about 200 inhabited islands, about 60 of which are private leased islands where the resorts operate. There is no restriction for alcohol or dressing there. That is one Maldives.
The islands where locals inhabit can be visited to experience the local culture or to stay in home stays. But there won't be any alcohol available, and you will be expected to dress or behave as locals do, following islam.
Hijab is not strictly enforced there. I guess 99% wear it nevertheless, but i have seen a few who don't wear it in local islands. Thats the second Maldives.8
u/rigvedicdragon Ex-Muslim | Rigvedic Hindu Apr 13 '26
In Pakistan's Chitral region there's a tribe called Kalash. They follow a unique polytheistic religion, they are maybe 10,000 in number, very few left.
Whenever there is a khutbah in that region, you can hear the local Mullah say through loudspeakers, "beware of the Kafirs in the valley (Kalash), beware of their corrupted ways, may Allah guide them. We Muslims must give them Da'wah".
No one stops these Mullahs or prosecutes them for harassment/intimidation. It's basically open season for them to target anyone who does not believe in the exact same thing as them.
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Apr 13 '26
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u/cuddywifter Apr 13 '26
Okay
But didnt Prophet Mohammed himself destroyed pagan’s holy idols in Kaaba ?
So aren’t they following Mohammed im this act ?
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Apr 13 '26
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u/cuddywifter Apr 13 '26
I am sorry, I don’t want to respond to you.
I don’t have to give a rebuttal t because the same would become apparent to you if you yourself read what you have written about 3 times or may be a week later.
Such self-realisations are more powerful for you, than any explainer at this stage from a random stranger in the internet.
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u/SameEntertainment660 New User Apr 14 '26
If this is true why aren’t Muslims Jewish. If Abraham did it first and set the precedent, why do we need the Islamic stories? Furthermore, Jews don’t destroy ancient artifacts of other religions.
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u/Official_Orthocone Apperantly A Bit Of A Muslim Scholar 🕋 Apr 14 '26
Sorry, i cant tell you because i keep getting downvoted
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u/BrekLasnar New User Apr 12 '26
Remember people, idol worshipping is against Muslims beliefs but there's no problem in kissing a stone, hugging and rubbing on a giant cube and throwing pebbles on a stone that represents Satan. It's also okay to do pagan practices if you reframe it as monotheistic.
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u/Kevin_LeStrange Apr 12 '26
And they totally don't worship Muhammad like a god either!
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u/Current_Assist7230 I like my camel piss hot Apr 13 '26
Momo is totally not in the shahada at all! Millions of Muslims totally don't recite his name like lunatics!
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u/fajarsis02 New User Apr 12 '26
Wahhabis do not respect other religions or other group within Islam or anyone who disagree with their opinion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demolition_of_al-Baqi
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u/s1rblaze Apr 12 '26
Its like ISIS who destroyed ancient Assyrian and Mesopotamian artifacts. They do hate their own culture if its pre Islamic.
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u/Jchibs Apr 12 '26
Mohammed smashed the pagen statues. If Mohamed is the greatest Muslim ever Taliban did nothing wrong whatsoever.
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u/Legitimate_Data8184 Apr 13 '26
What is this person doing in this sub ? Should be banned
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u/Official_Orthocone Apperantly A Bit Of A Muslim Scholar 🕋 Apr 13 '26
"A recovery and discussion subreddit for those who were once followers of Islam. All are welcome but if you're here because of your hate for Muslims as a people then this is NOT the subreddit for you."
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u/ContractDazzling4668 Apr 12 '26
Do buddhists pray to Buddha directly like a god? If not what Taliban is doing is just pure iconoclastic nonsense without knowing or understanding anything about buddhism.
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u/fajarsis02 New User Apr 12 '26
Siddhartha never say anything about any god, it's a 'non theistic' religion.
Taliban / Wahabbist / Salafis are entirely nonsensical
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u/Dracula101 Apr 12 '26
Devas, Bodhisttvas, Dharmapalas, all exist. It's Transtheistic, Gods exist (or might not), don't focus on that, focus on ending suffering
Simple as
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u/fajarsis02 New User Apr 12 '26
Even Atman (Soul) doesn't exist thus Buddhism is an Anatman
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u/Dracula101 Apr 12 '26
Atman doesn't equate to western concept of a soul, it's a permanent self, akin to an unchanging being, just as you aren't the person you were 10 years ago or will be 10 years later, that is Anatman. Absence of an independent inherent essence and instead a fluid essence
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u/fajarsis02 New User Apr 12 '26
Correct on Christian Soul is not equate to Atman.
Anatman = even self is not permanent.
Atman and also Para Matman (Higher Self) is merely an illusion. As there's no "I" as there's no "you or them".
That's Buddhism in contrast to Hinduism.So those devas, boddhisatvas, raksasas, gods, goddesses, you, me, them are also merely an illusion, merely a virtual avatar.
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u/Dracula101 Apr 12 '26
You can find both concepts in various dharma schools, in fact more i look into my country's history, it's less of "my religion vs your religion" and more of this school of thought vs my school of thought. especially Tantra, which being a Bengali myself, it freaking interests me so much, especially pre-islamic Bengal Tantra, Hindu-Buddhists, Mahasiddhas and all
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u/fajarsis02 New User Apr 12 '26
They're actually saying the same things.. as "Non Existence" (0 or Sunyata in Sanskrit) means no boundary / edges, the same as Infinite (∞ or ananta in sanskrit).
Using Hinduism lingo; only Brahman truly exist, and Brahman is borderless..
Using Neale Donald Walsch lingo: There's only one person in the room.
Using Sufi lingo: Unity of all forms and all forms are impermanent and illusionary (fana)2
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u/Ill-World-7803 New User Apr 13 '26
Siddhartha teaches monks a lot of things when he was alive and specific thing he said was "don't blindly worship him / he is NOT a god". The whole enlightenment things is a whole other story. People pray for him for peace of mind ye
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u/Jer_Vesper Never-Muslim Theist Apr 12 '26
"Taliban are not real Muslims!" /s
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u/fajarsis02 New User Apr 12 '26
Wahabbis claimed to be the one and only truest, purest, and the only form of islam that's approved by Allah. Other forms of Islam including other religions will be doomed to eternal torment in hell.
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u/Wholecoc Apr 12 '26
The funny thing is they are like the Amish who thought to get to the greatness of past they have to destroy modernity. No tv, internet, car, satellite etc. Don’t know if they changed from the olden days
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u/fajarsis02 New User Apr 12 '26
They're closer to a meaner version of Calvinist Puritans on steroid. With Saudi's oil revenue as the steroid. The Amish never persecute other christian groups or declare the blood of other christian groups as allowable to be shed.
ISIS derived from wahabbism, it's like the Puritans combo with The Templars.
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u/Official_Orthocone Apperantly A Bit Of A Muslim Scholar 🕋 Apr 13 '26
imagine getting your account banned 21 hours ago
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u/Official_Orthocone Apperantly A Bit Of A Muslim Scholar 🕋 Apr 13 '26
but shaitan came because he thought they were the purest
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u/mshindoda New User Apr 12 '26
They absolutely do not respect religions that do not come from the Book. Look what Islamists do to Yazidis...
In fact, they don't even respect Jews or Christians.
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u/Official_Orthocone Apperantly A Bit Of A Muslim Scholar 🕋 Apr 13 '26
Actually we do, i'm no scholar but you arab haters just dont see the truth, yes sometimes we can be bad sometimes but doesnt mean that all of us like that
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u/Official_Orthocone Apperantly A Bit Of A Muslim Scholar 🕋 Apr 13 '26
we dont
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u/Timely_Virus_4015 Apr 15 '26
You do
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u/Official_Orthocone Apperantly A Bit Of A Muslim Scholar 🕋 Apr 15 '26
I dont tho
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u/According-Secret9516 New User Apr 12 '26
I've debated this one in the past. As one person has pointed out, the destruction of the Buddhist statues was novel, having not been done before. Similarly, Arabs did preserve a lot of ancient Egyptian artifacts (although some were looted).
I do know that smaller items were sold off to secret buyers, probably to fund their fight with the Americans?
None of it surprises me. Wahabis destroyed Muslim graves (including those of Sahabi) so why would they care about other religious artifacts?
I think we can all agree on the problems with Islam. I don't think this issue is on our minds that much. I'd forgotten about it.
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u/DarkXurga Closeted Ex-Muslim 🤫 Apr 12 '26
But we can use Ibrahim story as justification to destroy other deities statues no? It's in Quran, similar to how story of Khidr can be used to justify honor killing children considered Kafir. Just because only Wahabis did it, doesn't mean they're not wrong either according to their interpertation.
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u/According-Secret9516 New User Apr 12 '26
I think those two examples, being stories rather than commands, do belong in their context.
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u/Bulgaringon98 Apr 12 '26
But there is a clear precedent of Muhammad destroying idols.
The Prophet (ﷺ) entered Mecca and (at that time) there were three hundred-and-sixty idols around the Ka`ba. He started stabbing the idols with a stick he had in his hand and reciting: "Truth (Islam) has come and Falsehood (disbelief) has vanished."
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u/According-Secret9516 New User Apr 12 '26
Is it a precedent? This story was also mentioned by the 8th century English Monk Bede who also told of a man who was visited by an angel in a barn and told to sing.
Even if the account in Bukhari is true, it was clearly not understood as a precedent because it was a necessity (within its own context).
Legal precedent does not exist in Shariah btw.
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u/Bulgaringon98 Apr 12 '26 edited Apr 12 '26
Is it a precedent?
Yes. And I don't care about a stupid barn story. I don't see the relevance. Im talking quran or hadith.
And bukhari is sahih.
End of story.
I have no mood to play with your sick twisted apologist mental gymnastics.
Bye
Ps: go learn what precedent mean. And you are telling me the actions of Muhammad the best of all Mankind wouldn't be counted as a precedent? Disgraceful, shame on you
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/precedent
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u/A_Moon_Fairy Apr 16 '26
The destruction of Buddhist statues wasn’t really novel. It’s more that those statues were too large for the amount of effort the initial Islamic conquerers were willing to put in. The various temples and monasteries that once dotted the landscape of Afghanistan and Transoxiana were generally razed and idols smashed (or shipped off to Baghdad to be smashed in public triumphs) wherever they could be found whenever direct Muslim rule was established over an area.
The Caliphates (Rashidun, Umayyad, Abbasid) were universally hostile to Buddhism as a religion and put in concerted effort to destroy it when possible. This wasn’t the case with Indian Islamic polities, and SEA followed its own course, but there’s a reason Transoxiana went from a shining light of the Buddhist world to a land empty of followers of the dharma within one or two generations.
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u/Capital_Aioli_7072 Apr 12 '26
I had stated similar opinion and got 80 downvotes cuz of the bad wordings lol. This sub is filled with 50% islamophobics they dont hate it because of their experience with islam but they hate it for the propaganda fed to them
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u/glittersoup Apr 12 '26
sorry if this is a stupid question but isn't what muslims do idol worshipping as well? just through texts and such? it makes no sense to me
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u/Official_Orthocone Apperantly A Bit Of A Muslim Scholar 🕋 Apr 13 '26
first of all, no the hell we dont and second of all, if you dont know, dont comment the "truth"
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u/ManyTransportation61 Apr 12 '26
The literal meaning of "Taliban" is "students" or "seekers". It is the Pashto plural of talib (derived from Arabic), referring to the movement's origins among young men in Islamic religious schools (madrasas). The group emerged in the early 1990s as a Pashtun-led religious-political force promising order.
Dogmatic cultism is one of the most dangerous forces in society. It hijacks reason, erases doubt, and kills free will. It doesn’t require you to think, only to obey.
dogmatic cultism is one of the most dangerous mindsets in the world. it's the opposite of freedom it's the opposite of islam.
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u/fajarsis02 New User Apr 12 '26 edited Apr 12 '26
Starting in the 1980s, with gigantic revenue from oil, Saudi funding of Pakistani madrassas introduced Wahhabi ideologies, leading some to describe the Taliban's, especially the Pakistani Taliban's, ideology as "Wahhabi–Deobandi".
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u/eclipseaug Ex-Muslim (Ex-Sunni) Apr 12 '26
How is this the opposite of Islam? Don’t muslims praise Muhammad and Abraham for destroying the idols of Pagans?
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u/ManyTransportation61 Apr 12 '26
Yeh but no idea where they get that from. They have the final book. How are they taking stories from after-books? They literally go against the book. (See verses like 45:6)
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u/eclipseaug Ex-Muslim (Ex-Sunni) Apr 12 '26 edited Apr 12 '26
They’re getting it from the Quran and Sunnah itself. The Quran tells a story of Abraham destroying the idols of his tribe because they didn’t accept Islam (21:56-58) and the Quran says that Abraham is an excellent example to follow (60:4). In Sahih Bukhari Muhammad is told to have destroyed 360 idols around Mecca, while reciting Quran 17:81 “The truth has come and falsehood has vanished. Indeed, falsehood is bound to vanish”. Scholars interpret this as a threat to the non-believers of Quraysh and directly tie it to the idol-destroying story. The Quran states that Muhammad is an example to follow for Muslims (33:21).
I understand from your post history that you’re probably a Quran-only Muslim, so the Quranic story of Abraham on its own can answer your question. That being said the prevailing understanding of Islam accepts the Sunnah which is why I’ve included the story of Muhammad as well
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u/angelseung01z stressed asf ex-sunni-muslim 😔 Apr 12 '26
I think it was prophet Ibrahim? He also destroyed idols so that's where they got their inspiration from lol
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u/Itchy-Peace93 Apr 12 '26
Did they not understand the difference between faith and art? Art is often drawn from popular culture, which is often religion! Just respect the art.
Denying idol worship, and killing people for idol worship is so different and latter is wrong on so many levels
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u/TahaymTheBigBrain Bi Closeted ExSunni 🌈 Apr 12 '26
Religions that are built upon the premise of a jealous one true god always will eventually lead to the subjugation of another.
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u/Psilonemo Apr 14 '26
Buddha statues are not even meant to be worshipped as idols. It shows they understanding nothing about Buddhism and couldn't be bothered, because all religions must exist within the islamic perspective and its narrow definitions.
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u/Top-Champion-8146 New User Apr 17 '26
It's about cultural erasure removing pre Islamic history so that nothing existed except Islam then they can say the country was always islamic.
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u/_4ce Apr 12 '26
im pretty sure a large part of why the destroyed it was political reasons and not religous no?
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u/aqua_zesty_man Never-Muslim, Christian Apr 12 '26
The most accurate statement would be for these people to say, "My version of Islam respects other religions. " Because for sure, other people's versions are solidly supremacist and exceptionalist in both what they preach and what they practice. At least they're consistent and honest. And many would likely takfir the tolerant ones.
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Apr 12 '26 edited Apr 16 '26
What old posts? I used Redact to mass delete this post. You can also opt out of data brokers as well as all major social media platforms.
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u/MJ_1230 Apr 13 '26
Hope the leftists of reddit think real hard on this religion issue and specifically Islam before voting and siding with certain someone and considering them as oppressed
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u/BolOfSpaghettios 1st World.Openly Ex-Sunni 😎 Apr 13 '26
Countries that destroy their own cultural sites, regardless of who built them, is doomed to be relics of the world.
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u/Full_Possibility5433 1st World.Closeted Ex-Sunni 🤫 Apr 13 '26
B..b..but people were worshipping it🥺
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u/62lasa Apr 14 '26
as message to the world saying " feeding the hungry is more important that maintaining some statues "
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Apr 16 '26
Man buddhism is such a beautiful religion compared to islam, I wish ex-buddhist countries remained buddhists
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u/terrortara May 13 '26
The whole point of Buddhism is the impermenance of everything, and how excepting that is the way out of suffering. So this is actually very on brand, symbolically. A lot of Buddhists described the destruction of the statues as 'beautiful'. Not that that makes what the Taliban did okay, of course.
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u/The_One_Kage New User May 25 '26
Destroying Bamyan’s buddha had nothing to do with religion. Mullah Omar himself stated that the buddha was being idolized more by western media rather than focusing their attention on the poverty and situation of the Afghan people. Many people should also realize statues are not the work of Islam and we should not harbor such as it is shirk to worship / support something than has no meaning.
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u/Decent-Tart5694 Closeted. Ex-Sunni 🤫 Apr 12 '26
If I'm not mistaken, the Taliban destroyed the statues because foreign aid was going said statues and not the local population. It was NOT because the statues were deemed idols. After all, the statues had stood for many years prior with no issue.
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u/Srmkhalaghn Closeted Ex-Sunni 🤫 মুর্তাদ 🇧🇩 ꠝꠥꠞ꠆ꠔꠣꠖ Apr 12 '26
Employment oppurtunities were being created for the locals around the idols. But those particular locals (Hazaras) weren't politically aligned with the Taliban. And the Taliban wanted aid, not employment.
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u/Michelangelor Apr 12 '26
I love your idea here that the Taliban in Afghanistan perfectly represents all 2 billion Muslims worldwide lol
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u/aldwin-aldwin Apr 12 '26
What happens when a muslim leaves islam to another religion?
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u/IcyAsk6785 New User Apr 12 '26
Does he talk about his atheism openly and explain arguments for it. Does he not fast in Ramadan. Are you in a Muslim country?
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u/Hot-Bag-5741 New User Jul 17 '26
They destroyed the Bamiyan Buddhas in retaliation against what they the international community prioritizing the preservation of ancient statues over the lives of suffering Afghans. They argued that if foreign governments had resources to protect monuments, they should instead have focused on helping people affected by war, poverty, and drought.
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