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Religion doesn't make people bigots. People are bigots and they use religion to justify their ideology.

Reza Aslan

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Reza Aslan
Age: 52
Born: 1972
Born: May 3
Trekkie
Writer
Teheran
Raza Aslan
Riza Aslan
Make
People
Bigots
Justify
Ideology
Religion
Use
Doesn

More quotes by Reza Aslan

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Well I wouldn't want to tell Obama specifically what to do, but obviously he's already promised publicly and privately, both before and after he was elected president, that he was going to open up communications with Iran.
Reza Aslan
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Islamophobia has become so mainstream in this country that Americans have been trained to expect violence against Muslims - not excuse it, but expect it. And that's happened because you have an Islamophobia industry in this country devoted to making Americans think there's an enemy within.
Reza Aslan
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Anyone who says that Iran will commit suicide with its nuclear power is a moron and has no business in discussion.
Reza Aslan
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The idea that education will lead to a lessening of bigotry is just factually incorrect.
Reza Aslan
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Even the Quran, which Sufis respect as the direct speech of God, lacks the capacity to shed light upon God’s essence. As one Sufi master has argued, why spend time reading a love letter (by which he means the Quran) in the presence of the Beloved who wrote it?
Reza Aslan
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In times of economic distress, it's only natural for people - and Americans have done this for many years - to look for a scapegoat. Depending on where you live in this country, the scapegoats are either, frankly, Mexicans or Muslims. So, you know, God save you if you happened to be a Mexican Muslim in America right now.
Reza Aslan
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When you forcefully suppress religious nationalism, you radicalize it.
Reza Aslan
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God doesn't make you a bigot. You're just a bigot.
Reza Aslan
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I really believe that to have a full impression of Jesus, both as Christ as a man, you must know about the world that gave shape to him - the world out of which he arose.
Reza Aslan
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I have not ever met Donald Trump, and I plan to go my entire life without ever actually having to breathe the same air that he breathes.
Reza Aslan
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I think if you place Jesus firmly in the historical context... you can make very educated hypotheses and guesses about how he lived.
Reza Aslan
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The language of religion holds the most currency for the masses.
Reza Aslan
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Why? Why not? Why not you? Why not now?
Reza Aslan
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Religion, it must be understood, is not faith. Religion is the story of faith.
Reza Aslan
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If the resistance is going to bring Trump down, it will require Democrats to follow the people, not the other way around. My hope is that the Democrats will realize where their power lies, and will start taking their cues from the people on the ground and not the other way.
Reza Aslan
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In the history of the prophetic biblical canon that starts with Genesis, the Koran is by far the most tolerant of the views of other religions.
Reza Aslan
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Many of the prophets of Jesus's time were thought to just be mad men, just sort of crazy people who were claiming to channel the divine. Perhaps that means we should be a little less judgmental of some of our own crazies talking about God on the corner. They might actually have found a pretty comfortable place in Jesus's time.
Reza Aslan
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A majority of Israelis want to give up the West Bank for peace, and obviously the same thing is desired by the Palestinians. The strong voice of the president of the United States will have a major impact on public opinion, not only in this country, but also in Israel and also in Palestine.
Reza Aslan
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The key to recognizing who Jesus was is to recognize this fundamental truth: He was a Jew.
Reza Aslan
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Im a person of faith, and the language that I use to define my faith, the symbols and metaphors that I rely upon to express my faith, are those provided by Islam because they make the most sense to me.
Reza Aslan