Aisha

The Koran is unchangeable, being a perfect copy of divine words written on a tablet in Heaven -- in Arabic, no less! -- and transmitted infallibly by an Archangel directly into Mohammed's ear.

Allah had sufficient foresight to write into this tablet all sorts of perks for his last Prophet; while all other Muslim men were only allowed at most 4 wives, Mohammed could have more, because Allah said it was ok.

Mohammed also liked little girls. I mean, really liked them. The authoritative Hadith record that Aisha, his 9-year-old bride, said:

There in the house I saw some Ansari women who said, "Best wishes and Allah's Blessing and a good luck." Then she entrusted me to them and they prepared me (for the marriage). Unexpectedly Allah's Apostle came to me in the forenoon and my mother handed me over to him, and at that time I was a girl of nine years of age. (Bukhari, v5, bk58, n234)

Well, isn't that special? Mohammed was in his mid-50s at the time.

Taking a girl of 9 as a sexual plaything was unusual then even in Arab culture, but it came to Mohammed in a dream from his pagan moongod al-Ilah -- oops, I mean Allah -- so who could argue?

And as a result, ever since, Mohammed's example being by definition virtuous, men having sex with pre-pubescent girls is widespread in much of the Islamic world to this very day, wherever Islamic Sharia law is practiced -- and not just among tribal Africans, but even such places as relatively civilized Iran, currently under Khomeini's implementation of Sharia.

Iran's big "reform" recently was to up the age to 10. The consent of the girl is of course irrelevant.

Now how are we to view this? Through the lens of relativism?

No.

I REFUSE!

This is abuse and exploitation. Pure and simple. What do you call it, if not that? A quaint and charming example of diversity?

No, it's preying on the weakest and most vulnerable. On children. On little girls.

Sanctioned by a "religion".

Embraced by a "culture".

If this is how a society functions, there's no explaining it away as a "tiny fringe of extremists". It's by definition mainstream if it's the law, no?

It may not be polite to say, but this is just another example of how Islamic culture is a sick, ugly, evil thing.

Need we even get into "honor" killings?

Why is it so inconceivable that a belief-system, just because it claims to be a "religion", can't be an evil thing? Do evil acts magically become good after some minimum number of people believe them to be ok?

Enough theory, how about another concrete example, from jihadwatch:

This is the fruit of the example of the Prophet and Qur'an 4:34. From the Arizona Daily Star via Afgha.com, with thanks to Twostellas:

...Once again, her memories take control. Her father's selling her in marriage to a man five times her age to pay the rent; the beatings and sodomy that followed. She was 9 years old....

Pekay is 13 now, one of thousands of girls and women who are trapped in forced marriages, caught between the rural, tribal and Islamic customs that ruled the country for centuries and the promise of a new Afghanistan ruled by laws that apply equally to everyone.

Domestic violence is widespread, but most cases never go to court. The laws are weak, and women stay silent out of fear or shame: Divorce disgraces the family and the tribe. Each year, scores of Afghan women escape bad marriages by setting themselves on fire or other forms of suicide....

...Under Afghanistan's civil law, it's illegal for girls younger than 16 to marry. But the Supreme Court, led by conservative clerics and Islamic law, ruled that she can't get divorced, even from a violent child molester.

Her last hope is that Fazal Hadi Shinwari, the ultra-conservative chief justice of the Supreme Court, will reverse the decision.

"If he doesn't, I'll kill myself," said Pekay, who like many Afghans uses one name. "And I'll leave it up to God to punish the judges in the next world."

Pekay is less than 5 feet tall and slight. Her nose is puffy and crooked from a thrashing. Her left cheekbone is higher than her right, as if a bone is out of place. Her lower lip is split.

She was smaller when she met Malik Muhammad four years ago. At 48, he was old enough to be her grandfather.

"We had no choice," said Omar. "He was a Taliban intelligence agent. He was very powerful. He said if I didn't allow the marriage, he would take us to the Taliban central office and do the wedding there."

On her wedding night, Pekay was confused. Why was the man she called "uncle" taking her to his bedroom? Why was her mother so sad?

"I'll be back soon," she recalled telling her mother.

Smiling, she stepped in. Her new husband shut the door.

"I started to hear screams," recalled her mother, Qudbi. "I thought he was going to kill her."

The next morning, Muhammad refused to let Qudbi see Pekay. He'd chained her hands and legs to his bed, said Pekay. Four days later, he evicted her parents.

Pekay lived as a slave for the next 2 1/2 years. Muhammad locked her in a room, releasing her only to cook, clean and do the washing. He pounded her with sticks and rubber tubing. When he stopped beating her, he started raping her.

"I can't tell you what happened," Pekay said. "It's the type of thing that happens only with animals."

Muhammad, now 52, denies he abused Pekay, but his next-door neighbor, Zalmay Quasimi, remembers her screams....

Fifteen months ago, Pekay's parents finally went to the police. Officers raided Muhammad's house and found Pekay and his first wife, Samar. Dried blood stained the floor and chains dangled from a bedpost, according to court documents. The police took Muhammad into custody.

But Afghanistan's legal system, a mix of civil and sharia, Islamic law, still favors men. Once Muhammad proved he was Samar's and Pekay's husband, he was released. Samar was told to go with him. Because of her age, Pekay was returned to her parents pending a court decision.

The court, filled with progressive young judges, granted her a divorce. Pekay was ecstatic.

Her joy, and her freedom, soon vanished.

Muhammad appealed the decision. The appeals court ruled in his favor, as did the Supreme Court.

Pekay was ordered to return to her husband or go to jail.

Supreme Court Justice Sayeed Omar Munib explained that sharia allows a father to marry off his daughter even if she's under 16. And Pekay hadn't met the standard of evidence - two witnesses who saw the abuse or a confession from her husband.

When asked why he didn't rule according to Afghanistan's civil law, Munib replied: "In Islam and sharia, it's not like that. Women are very smooth operators. If we let her get a divorce, then women will be encouraged to divorce their husbands if they see another man they like. We'll have a lot of divorces in our society."

When asked if he believed that women and men have equal rights, as Afghanistan's constitution states, Munib replied: "It's impossible. We are Muslims, and God has given a place for men and a place for women. We can't change that. Women don't have the same brains like men. They are very forgetful. They can't make big decisions. You should ask your own Western doctors about this. It has been proven that women are not like men."...

Behold the fruits of the lust of Mohammed, the evil pervert, murderer, and child-rapist, echoing down the centuries! Is it not a majestic thing?

That this monster's name is not universally cursed is an unbelievable outrage -- and yet he's revered by 20% of the planet.

We're supposed to believe he came up with something holy? With something worth spending a single second listening to?

That's like saying, with a straight face, that Hitler at least made the trains run on time.

I'm sure Charles Manson has come up with a catchy phrase or two also. You gonna base a philosophy on that?

I'm sure many will consider this "hate speech". All I'm doing is pointing to the historical record, from Islam's own texts. I am happy to also agree that people surely have the right to decide to live their lives according to the instructions of a child-molesting psychopath.

Let's just none of us be surprised by the results.

UPDATE: At least, thank God, and thanks to George W. Bush, Pekay got lucky:

Friends of the family got Pekay an appointment with Chief Justice Shinwari. They were educated women and now had a voice, if a faint one, in the new Afghanistan. It took them weeks, but they finally got a meeting for Pekay.

Shinwari, also a cleric, dispensed justice according to strict sharia. But he looked at Pekay's face and body, and listened to Pekay's witnesses. After considering the evidence, he approved Pekay's divorce.

Muhammad, however, is determined to get Pekay back.

"I'll die before divorcing her," he said. "I can't force her to come back to my house, but I can make sure she won't marry again. One day she'll come back. She has to."

The Old Ways are dying hard. Now is the time to decisively step on its throat.