The Koran

So I decided to have a closer look at the Koran. Something you can do too. (&) (You can skip the (&) notes for now; they provide more verbose explanations & additional comments you can read later if you want to dig deeper into the subject matter and want to know more about my ideas. Please stay with the main theme of the DIY section: is Islam a threat? & how can one form one's own opinion on the basis of valid and complete information?).  The Koran is composed of chapters, called 'suras' and paragraphs, called 'verses'. One can point to a particular place in the Koran by stating sura and verse e.g. Sura 1 verse 2. Right on the first page the Koran boasts it is a 'perfect book': sura 2 verse 2 .(&) Throughout the Koran three themes are reiterated again and again(&) . It may be possible to identify more and/or other themes but I make these three for reasons that will be explained later. In addition to the main themes there are some references to stories from the Bible, rules of conduct for Muslims and some more things. (&) The Three themes are: (Theme 1) Infidels go to hell and Muslims go to heaven. If you disobey Allah you go to hell. (&) (Theme 2) Allah is omnipotent. He created everything, sees everything, knows everything etc. (&) (Theme 3) Allah is good for Muslims and without mercy to unbelievers. Unbelievers are guilty because they know better, but will not listen. The believers should stay far away from the infidels. (&) Further down this page is a visual representation of the occurrence and frequency of these themes. The Koran is meant to be recited (in Arabic). (&) This prompts the question what will happen when one recites this text or listens to others reciting it (or reads it of course).  We know Muslims make children learn this text by heart in their Koran schools by making them recite the verses. They (the Muslims) themselves tell us so. Also, they hand us the Koran so you are 100% sure you have full and valid information. You don't need journalists to gather and select information, no experts to explain things. You yourself are an expert.(&) Here there is no fog consisting of (historical) context, abrogation, theological interpretation, etc. Six year old children do not take that into account either; they simply don't have the cognitive capabilities to do so as everybody knows. Evaluation is simple. All you have to do is read a couple pages and ask yourself what you think will happen to a six year old child that is made to recite them.  By reading it yourself, you can have a first hand experience which you know is real. Claims which essentially say you don't understand or misinterpret the texts are beside the point. The issue here is not about content and whether you properly understand it or not is unimportant. It is about what you think the effect is likely to be when children are made to recite this.  I suggest you read a couple of pages and see for yourself. I recommend sura 4 verse 93 to sura 4 verse 152; the Koran goes crescendo here. You can read or download it (as ASCII text) here. You can download the entire Koran here.  The visual representation below is not for reading; it's of poor quality and in Dutch. You can use it to look up sura's and verses I colored though.  Have a look and maybe you would like to encourage a friend to do the same thing and have a little discussion about it. You can read my conclusions here.